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#that it would cause you to become disillusioned towards this media
nabulsi · 5 months
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i keep seeing ppl talking about how theyre ugly sobbing over that shitty pirate show. do you not have shame to care more about a racist antiblack TV show glorifying slave owners, written by a zionist racist supporter of genocide. that you have more tears to shed for that blight on the human race than you do for the millions of palestinians going through horrors unimaginable. where's your ugly sobbing for them?
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rhube · 11 months
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This reminded me of something I hadn't thought on for a while: muckers.
In 1969, John Brunner wrote a wonderful, challenging, prescient, complicated science fiction novel on overpopulation, called Stand on Zanzibar.
50 years on, it's not flawless, but a lot of what I've wrestled with because I thought they might be flaws, I now see were simply misreadings. For example, I thought SoZ was a warning about overpopulation, but I now see it is rather a critique of the response of historically colonial societies to dense populations.
It's also predicts a detrimental rise of the American Christian Right (although he focuses on Catholicism, rather than Puritanism), critiques globally monopolistic companies, the military-industrial complex, white middle-class complacency, exploitation of AI, media that presents itself AS you to shape YOUR views... it's got a lot going on.
But one thing SoZ got both right and wrong is muckers.
In Stand on Zanzibar, Brunner predicts that in dense population areas, there will be an increase of people flipping out and going on murder-sprees, because in the overpopulated world, crammed into ever tinier spaces, with complete loss of privacy and sense of self, mental health plummets. When this happens, the people who flip out are called 'muckers'.
All this tracks reasonably well to reported psychology of many US mass murderers.*
But.
Firstly, Brunner predicted a global phenomenon, and frequent mass murders is by quite a long way a distinctly US problem. A distinctly white, male, US problem.
Secondly, he imagined people just, like, flipping out in crowds and going on axe murder sprees. He didn't foresee the guns.
This is an American writer growing up with American gun culture. But you gotta know that the 2023 gun culture of the US was not how it was in 1969. Heck, I don't think it was like that when I was out there in 1990.
It changed after Columbine. When every other high-income country had their watershed moment with a school shooting, they introduced laws to prevent it happening again. But in the US, the NRA felt threatened. And their response was to ramp up the industry before it could be ramped down by politicians.
And this is why gun deaths don't really have anything to do with population density. They have to do with politics and the power of the NRA.
Because people don't become muckers, the way Brunner thought, in response to a world that is increasingly isolating, increasingly crowded, where our identities are stripped by work and invasions of privacy, where people in their 30s and 40s do still have roommates to afford rent in cities. All the things Brunner thought would make us lose our minds are in fact causing rising mental health issues. It's just that a) mental health issues don't actually usually make you violent, the person you're most likely to hurt is yourself; b) it's white men who have been taught to feel a right to the compliance of others who are most likely to take turn their frustrations into violent action towards others; and c) in most places, disillusioned, angry, mentally unstable people don't have access to guns.
Access to a gun is what causes someone who becomes violent in public to turn from harming one or two people before being subdued into a murder spree.
Because it does still happen elsewhere. Very occasionally. I can recall a couple of high-profile knife- or axe-weilding cases in the UK since 2010 (when the book is set). And in those cases, despite the shock of it all, the person only ended up killing one or two people.
It's having a gun that makes it extremely easy to kill a lot of people.
And also, these people aren't ordinary people who 'just snap'. Mass shooters plan their incidents and often turn up with a whole arsenal. An arsenal that proper gun laws could have prevented them from having.
People are, on the whole, less unstable than Brunner imagined. And those of us that are made depressed and anxious by the modern world usually go home and feel miserable, or hurt ourselves, rather than anyone else.
But he also, crucially, didn't imagine we would have such easy access to guns. And that has made all the difference.
*Set aside for now the issue of whether overpopulation is really a problem - Brunner suggests at the end of the book that it isn't really, the problem is colonialist values... although it took me a while to get that because the trope by which that comes out is a little problematic. IIRC the people of Beninia had evolved pheromones that just made everyone more chill, and we could use that somehow to solve everything (?), whiiiich is a bit Magical Black people. It was 1969. It's still the most thorough attempt to provide a truly global perspective on a book about a global issue that I can think of, and the very structure of the book says 'Look, guys, it's complicated.' Which makes me think I need to read it again, because did it really come out so hard against colonialism and then end with that? IDK.
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scoups4lyfe · 2 years
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Journal Entries (4)
Below are entries from my journal, both my real life and online one.
Note: I do (again) --to my felllow writers out there --think that if anyone ever writes a bipolar character, then these entries would be a good look into the kind of mindset someone with bipolar might have <33.
I don't have much else to say :D. so--
[Journal Entries]
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“February 23rd 2022 — Wednesday 6:51 PM
Everyday…it seems that no matter how hard I try or dream or wish….I’m not able to accomplish anything. The days stress me out.
Bubbling anxiety fills my gut like locusts.
Gnawing….gnawing….gnawing….gnawing away. I pray (continuously) for the ability to be productive. My lack smothers me and I become just a shadow of the dreamer I was before. What is the color of all this overwhelming emotion? My sights are empty, I’m the only one whose stuck in this abandoned place.
“My time in the bottle 2022” indeed. I am overwhelmed.
My ocean — all these emotions crashing like waves inside me — threatens to drown me. God is my life vest and he holds my head above water. Everyday he says: “Just breathe, all in due time” and I want to believe this so badly, 100% wholeheartedly, yet each day that I fail to move I cling desperately on the very edge of despair. ‘God do you not hear me?’
“I do.” He answers.
“Then what shall I do?”
“Wait.” — I hope the Holy Spirit can renew me, for my hopes suffocate.”
[End of entry]
[Friday, April 16th, 2022 — 12:24 AM]
“I feel like a lake slowly withering up. Is it so bad to crave love and attention? Recognition? Is having too much ambition a sin? These dreams are big, and so, so, very heavy. It feels like my back is breaking under its weight. Do you cry at my failures? Are they expected? More often than not I feel built to fail. I wish my psychiatric appointment was sooner. I really want to be able to function like a normal person. What an idea, to be able to do exactly what you set out to do, as you’ve dreamed it. Sometimes I think these dreams are poisoning me. Making me disillusioned, insane. Especially because the difference between dream and reality is enough to drown in.
I don’t want to drown.
Help me. Help me. All I can do is cry out for your help. Please don’t let me drown.”
[End of entry]
NOTE: The rest of the entries I'll be uploaded are from my online journal. I moved journaling to online entries because I didn't have the energy / motivation to write by hand.
[Ssat. May 14th 2022]
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Monochrome Diamonds.
Today’s title is directly related to the TXT’s “Good boy Gone Bad” MV that I just finished watching like 0.1 seconds ago.
ANYWAYS. Excited cause a new episode of KinnPorsche drops today. I need to live blog for Revice~. I just did a lot of self-care AND cleaned the house so I feel pretty great. Very solid. [End Quote]
… [Sunday, May 15th 2022]
The Sht-storm of Editing
(6:15 PM)
I went to bed at 5:50 AM last night and woke up today at just before 3PM. (12:32 AM — So I guess May 16th, tech) Hmmm. I can’t say that I’ve been all that productive today ngl. Tumblr — that btch — said I ‘hit my media post limit’ because of the amount of sh*t I had in my drafts. Which meant I couldn’t even EDIT my damn drafts LOL!!! Now that it's midnight tho I can edit them but damn that was frustrating, yo. (LMAO)
I also have no idea what I’m doing right now. I….haven’t really accomplished anything today and yeah that’s frustrating, but mostly I’m tired. I’m wondering if this is from Ritalin? Because I *DO* notice a difference when I take Ritalin compared to Adderall. Not 100% sure what it is yet — but I’m gonna go ahead and say it's positive.
My sabbath (sat) was soooooo good. Makes me wish that the weekend was longer. And work isn’t even that hard or bad? Is this just a defeatist mindset?
….
[Monday, May 16th 2022]
The Morning Discussion. A Thousand Dreams. And Small Step
Today feels like a good day to get sht done. Ahhh I’m so ready to finally work towards my goals. I’m really looking forward to writing. And also improving my art skills <33. (6:18 PM) Just got on a call with [Friend]. I need to make sure I get stuff done today :oo. Got some Culver's chocolate ice cream.
[Tuesday, May 17th 2022]
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The Loser’s guide to Sleep Deprivation
(2:49 PM)
I did not sleep at all last night….. I spent all night reading webtoons and now I feel like sht. Having to work through this both sucks and hurts lmao 😭.
[Insert George and Dream Axolotl video] …
[Thursday, May 19th 2022]
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[Sister’s] 20th Birthday
(9:54 PM)
I really clowned myself on accident by not snacking in between 5pm-7pm because my sugar dropped and I got the worst brain fog fking EVER bro. I hate brain fog. Not being able to formulate sentences. Losing your train of thought every 3 seconds. Ughhhh. And even rn I still feel out of it. Though now I’m thinking that’s from the caffeine in the tea rather than anything else :PPP.
(10:26 PM)
I am……out of it, unmotivated, frustrated, and soured like a grape. I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want, I want. I want, I want, I wan-
And yet none of it I do. THere’s always a reason. Always an excuse.
Always something that stops me from moving forward. Is it doubt? Reason? Rationality? It's especially frustrating rn :(((. Man, I can just see someone asking: “Bro there is so much time in a day. How do you even accomplish not a single thing in an entire day?” And dammit! Dammit! WHy! WHy!!!!!Why do essays take me 4 hours to write??? Why does 500 words take me 4 hours??? Why does drawing deplete the clock to zero??? WHY???
How. How. How. How. How. HOw. HOw. How. How. How. How. How. HOw. HOw. Is it the internet???? Should I fast from electronics???? Only write, draw, and learn sh*t offline???? Is THAT the answer?? (Bro I’m gonna go insane. Full on insanity plea. Ahhhghhhh I want to CRY yo.) I can never do anything and the clock tick tick tiCKS away. Like I’m marching to my death. To nothing for nothing to nothing for nothing.
…..
*sighs.* Sometimes I wonder why I exist.
There is something I want to do with EVERY SINGLE PART OF MY BEING — but then what? I’m not able to? I can’t? I’m just going to continue failing? God….I know, I kNOW, I can’t do sht on my own. I’ve well learned THAT lesson. You’ve told me to just show up. To check my priorities. To prioritize you and other ppl in order to get sht done.
And for what??? I’m here-
I’ve showed up!!! [God] — why have you forsaken me? Why does something pop in the way? Why am I unable? Why am I unable even as I desperately cry for help???? Why does my mind fail and break right when I need it most??? Is it my family? What-? Should I go into self-isolation? Block all the world out if it isn’t related to whatever “work” I need to get done???????????????????????
….
[Friday, May 20th, 2022]
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My Complaints Just Shan’t End
Okay….so I got to keep my sugar up and make sure I'm getting good nutrition so I don’t die or something serious like that happens. But it's either my family or my body just making that such a hard thing to accomplish.
They barbequed at [Older Sister’s] and damn. I just….man I just CAN’T go over to [My Sister’s House] more than once a week. That’s too much stress. And I didn’t want to spend my whole night there lmao ://
Bro this sucks.
As I said….really just makes me feel hopeless. All I wanna do is shrivel up and cry even tho I’m not sad, just frustrated, anxious, and hopeless. (LOL!!!) Yesterday night ended well though — I practiced Thai, and I’ve been doing more Thai practice >:)))) — and since I stayed home I have been learning the Thai alphabet and practicing my Thai handwriting. Damn I’m still so frustrated though. This is such sht man. This is such sht
Sunday. May 22nd, 2022.
The Day That Wasn’t.
[Tuesday, May 24th, 2022]
Table of Contents
(7:17 PM)
At the bookstore/cafe [Name of Bookstore / Cafe], working on….idk fiction probably. I have done no writing yet LOL!!!! So here I gooooo.
10:00 PM)
:).
[Wednesday, May 25th, 2022]
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Re. Vice. And the Sleep Deprived Day
(10:11 am)
I haven’t slept yet.
Revice. Revice. Revice. Revice. Revice. Revice. Revice.
✨✨Revice~✨✨
…..Gosssh I love Revice and I love liveblogging. I don’t know where I went wrong (along the way) but yaish. (Time always got to be my #1 enemy).
…I should probably get some sleep. I’ve really just been goofing around — watched Kang Daniel’s new music video, I want to re-watch TXT’s GBGB Performance. I have the Chinese drama ‘Be Reborn’ up because I want to watch it but I don't want to watch it so I’ve been trying to re-watch my favorite scenes from episode 5 (lol).
[Yesterday in recap]
…Wrote maybe 100 words? I was NOT flowing at all. That and the brain fog was for real. Which….is very frustrating?? Why is it that whenever I start to get serious about getting work done and being productive something creeps up and smacks me in the face, completely preventing me from getting anything, ANYTHING done.
????? WHY??? (아버지. ???)
왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜. 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜.왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜.왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜.왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜.왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜 왜.
[Friday. May 27th, 2022]
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Everything was going great….Until it wasn't.
(11:30 PM)
Okay, so. The entire first half of the day was great…but what the fck am I doing right now??? It's like sudden insanity hit me out of nowhere and now I just??? Like my stomach is lightning in a bottle.
And I’m tired. SO tired. But not sleepy.
This sucks. I hate this. Thanks tho God <333. I’ll try and idk??? Outlast this nonsense I guess? Naw, but I don’t even know how to describe this feeling??? I just feel…everything. It’s indecipherable and mixed together and it feels like my insides are on fire.
.................
NOTE: So this is the end of part 4. I talk about God a lot in these entries LOL. Whenever I'm going through something extremely difficult I pray (I mean, I do normally too but that's not the point). This is why I was fascinated with the religious themes in DPR Ian's MVS. When you're in an episode or transitioning into one it can feel like you've been abandoned, and so I perfectly understood what Ian was putting down (LOL).
Right. I'll be posting the next powerpoint part soon.
[Prev] [Next]
PPT Essay: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6]
PPT Essay Extras: (1), (2), (3)
Visuals of a Depressive Episode: (1), (2)
Journal Entries: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
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theminecraftbox · 2 years
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If you were in charge of writing a conclusion to c!Dream's story/character arc, how would you personally go about it? Would you give him a healing/redemption arc? Would you have him get worse before letting him go out in a blaze of glory? Would you kill him off and have his death be the catalyst for genuine introspection and change on the server?
/dsmp /rp
Mmm. I would write him getting everything he ever wanted, and it all turning to ash in his mouth.
The biggest thing I crave for Dream in terms of a fulfilling character arc is to see the successful completion of his Plan. I want the steps and the ideas, however he’s laid everything out in his head, to reach its conclusion. And then—then I want to see what happens when he “wins.”
Because he can’t win, right? What he wants is fundamentally unattainable. But for as long as that is a future prospect, something to work towards, Dream will be utterly unable to unwind himself from it. He will never stop striving towards it. Even months of torture was a setback rather than anything that’s actually deterred him from his path, so he has to see it through.
Any sort of healing or change or whatever you want to call it that happens before his Plan is completed, or happens under the requisite assumption that his Plan has either been derailed or set aside, must by necessity sidestep Dream’s most core motivations and coping mechanisms. Before Dream can change, he must win and therefore lose: that’s going to be the only way he will realize the degree to which he’s totally fucked, and totally fucked up.
After that, I’m open to nearly anything. I confess a blaze of glory/quick death would be dissatisfying, because I prefer the idea of Dream forced to sit in the rubble of his plans and have the loss work its way into his mind. I would write him lost and broken and completely disillusioned with himself, forced to realize that everything he did was for nothing, all his suffering, all the suffering he caused.
I dislike the term redemption arc even though I understand in what context it’s usually meant: that’s because I think that phrase puts too much onus on forgiveness or reconciliation or amends. That, plus there’s a presupposition that people are “redeemable” or “not”, or that they have phases that are “pre-” or “post-redemption”—which I think is a bad paradigm in most forms of media but which is an especially terrible fit for the narrative structure (ie the lack thereof) of dsmp. Healing does not need to look one particular way. Dream could become a healthier and better person without ever, eg, apologizing to Tommy or even explicitly regretting exile. Same with Quackity re Dream.
I will add that for a character I like well enough, that I find enough depth in, I find I’m usually open to nearly any sort of ending as long as I’m given sufficient space to contextualize and interpret. For example: I was dead sure I’d hate whatever the end of SPN had to say about Sam Winchester, and then 15.20 was phenomenal—and at least half of that was in how much room it gave the characters to breathe, and in how long the denouement was.
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i was reminded today of the quote john gave to playboy shortly before he died about how he didn't believe in cancer because he was on a macrobiotic diet and people on a macro diet didn't get cancer, and sometimes i think that if john had lived (and i still wish he did), he would have ended up one of those crackpot right wing conspiracy theorists.
he was so contrarian, so angry all the time even after his "calm househusband period," the things he said about liking parts of reagan and billy graham.. he just has the personality of someone who in 2021 would have looped over into right wing mania, and i can never tell if would have been worse to see him do THAT than lose him altogether.
So um… This is a Controversial™ ask. But I've actually wondered about this before, so here are my thoughts:
First of all: It's [sort of] True But You Shouldn't Say It. Ironically, reading about John's struggles and how his mental health and life impacted his perception of "truth" and the type of people he tended to put his trust in has made me somewhat more sympathetic towards the hardcore conspiracy theorists we see today.
Second of all: I don't really know much about Billy Graham and I'm also not the most educated person on the US political landscape of the late 70s, however, my understanding is he was "pro-Reagan" simply because he was disillusioned by Carter and didn't want him to get re-elected. Also, from my understanding, most of the atrocious shit Reagan did wasn't like part of his campaign. (He did promise to build up the military strength which is something I'd've thought John would hate but I think the Cold War is also just…… A genuinely weird period in history and it's not like Carter was planning to make peace with USSR or something). I have a very hard time believing John wouldn't've been appalled by the War on Drugs or the way the AIDS-crisis was handled.
Third of all: That being said, I do think during his house husband years he had been so isolated from the world, that he barely had an understanding anymore for "how the world works". Like, he didn't believe in evolution?? But I don't think he'd ever really been explained/read up on what evolutionary theory really means, because his comment about it was something along the lines of "And I don't believe we're descended from monkeys", which is like a classic misunderstanding of the concept. He was, however, clearly planning on stepping back into the public by late 1980, so there's a chance he would've started "coming back down to earth" pretty quickly afterwards. I also look at people like Brian Wilson and feel pretty hopeful that he still had a chance to improve his mental state, that he wasn't a lost cause.
Fourth of all: Though obviously I see the parallels, I'd be slightly careful comparing QAnon anti-maskers to whatever John was in 1980, specifically because John didn't live through the major events that led to QAnon existing the way it does today. (Namely, the entirety of Reagan's presidency, things like 9/11, the proliferation of cable news + social media, the financial crisis at the end of the 00s, the rise of anti-vaccine sentiment, Trump and his alternative facts etc etc.) He just really didn't live in the same world we do, so I don't think it's entirely fair to say well because in 1978 he thought macrobiotic diets prevented cancer, he'd be an anti-vaxxer in 2021, y'know? He might've been, but also bear in mind, he'd be 81. Even though there are obvious exceptions (*cough* Clapton), generally at a certain age you stop caring about this sort of stuff. Maybe John would've never stopped (although personally, his Reagan comments to me come off far more like the opinions of a middle-aged dude tending towards somewhat indifferent centrism rather than crackpot rightwing). We have no way to know.
Whether it would have been worse? Well, murder is never good, but I can't imagine myself personally becoming interested in his life if he was like that today. But my interest in him doesn't really make a difference in how "good" the state of the world is. From a purely utilitarian "trolley-problem" perspective, anti-maskers and QAnon have literal blood on their hands. Someone like John would potentially have a huge platform nowadays so in that sense… Hm!
Would be interested if anyone else has thoughts on this by the way!
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A very rambly post on Harry Potter and jk r*wling written by an enby who hates r*wling
I gotta say I’m surprised by just how thoroughly jk r*wling has killed her own fandom. And I’m not saying she doesn’t deserve it, fuck her for her views, but the change I’ve seen is astounding. 
My dash used to be full of HP content. That’s absolutely plummeted. Dedicated HP blogs I followed became innactive or switched their focus. Half the HP content I’m seeing now is criticisms of the bigotry in the books or discussions on r*wling’s bigotry itself. Similarly, a lot of the HP content I’m seeing on Youtube is critical of r*wling when before I was seeing fan theories or reviews.  Almost every post I’ve seen related to r*wling has been tagged as “tw jk rowling” and/or censored her name completely. 
I’ve seen author scandals before, like when people criticised Orson Scott Card for virulent homophobia, and while admittedly I’ve never been in the Ender’s Game fandom I never saw people embarassed over liking his books. I’ve seen backlash against media before, like rightful criticisms over how ATLA handles race, but no one’s embarrassed to be a fan of it and people are still discussing which nation they’d belong, whereas people are finding alternatives to Hogwarts houses now. I’m a member of the Ranger’s Apprentice fandom and follow a great number of blogs about it, and while every single blog criticises the awkward heteronormativity of the series and the awful way it handles race, we’re still unabashedly fans of it. None of that comes close to the change in attitude towards Harry Potter.  
I can’t actually think of a time when such a huge, omnipresent, global fandom came crashing down so thoroughly. And I definitely can’t think of when one person’s bigotry caused such a massive change of opinion. Once again, I’m not criticising any of this. I’m absolutely disgusted by r*wling’s transphobia, and though I’m not a direct target of it (she hasn’t said anything about enbies as far as I know), I feel like it’s only a matter of time before she expands her horizons into criticising the rest of the trans/enby community as well. 
And this has all been in the past month or two. It’s such a rapid change, and everyone has become so thoroughly disillusioned with her and HP that it’s almost a full reversal of opinion. 
I’m so happy we’re having these conversations, though. I’m so glad there’s consequences for an awful author. But part of me is fascinated with precisely why this is the person, and the fandom, that we’ve all turned against. Is it because so many of us had such strong feelings towards Harry Potter for decades, and still have those feelings? Is it because the fandom is so huge, crossing generations and continents? Is it because the HP fandom spans books, movies, plays, video games, and theme parks to become one of the largest franchises of all time? Is it because, up until this, you couldn’t take six steps without encountering HP merch, or scroll anywhere on the internet without seeing HP content? 
This fills me with hope, though. It feels like we’re moving in the right direction. We’re not excusing her awful views, we’re taking them down. I hate that she holds these views, I would rather she wasn’t a transphobe, but I’m glad the community has so thoroughly recognised her as terrible. 
This is very rambly please ignore it 
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terfslying · 5 years
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Extremist Traits & TERFs
 The traits are taken from (here), which is a list of extremist traits by Laird Wilcox. Most examples are from interactions with people on this blog, because I’ve got to limit myself to something.
Character Assassination
“Extremists often attack the character of an opponent rather than deal with the facts or issues raised. They will question motives, qualifications, past associations, alleged values, personality, looks, mental health, and so on as a diversion from the issues under consideration”
TERF Examples: Character attacks on Susie Green, of Mermaids UK, to attempt to imply that her motive for Mermaids UK is to force her own child to transition. & Claiming Mermaids UK was a significant part of forcing a young UK child to be trans, when in fact he was being abused by his mother and Mermaids UK only ever were contacted by phone by the mother, and were not otherwise involved in any way.
Name-Calling and Labelling
“Extremists are quick to resort to epithets (racist, subversive, pervert, hate monger, nut, crackpot, […] and so on) to label and condemn opponents in order to divert attention from their arguments and to discourage others from hearing them out. These epithets don’t have to be proved to be effective; the mere fact they have been said is often enough”
TERF Examples: "pedophile apologist”, “infertile, fat white loser”, “rapist” (all directed at me!)
Irresponsible Sweeping Generalisations
“Extremists tend to make sweeping claims or judgements on little or no evidence, and they have a tendency to confuse similarity with sameness […] they assume that because two (or more) things, events, or persons are alike in some respects, they must be alike in most respects.”
TERF Examples: “trans women are just men”; use of crimes by cis men to attempt to demonstrate trans criminality
Inadequate Proof For Assertions
“Extremists tend to be very fuzzy about what constitutes proofs, and they also tend to get caught up in logical fallacies […] they tend to project wished-for conclusions and to exaggerate the significance of information that confirms their beliefs while derogating or ignoring information that contradicts them.”
TERF Examples: “This research is reliable because I agree with it, and I don’t care that the authors have deliberately published politically motivated anti-gay propaganda studies before”
Advocacy of Double Standards
“Extremists generally tend to judge themselves or their interest groups in terms of their intentions, which they tend to view very generously, and others by their acts, which they tend to view very critically. They would like you accept their assertions on faith, but they demand proof of yours. They tend to engage in special pleading on behalf of themselves or their interests, usually because of some alleged special status, past circumstances, or present disadvantage.”
TERF Example: Refusal to criticise WoLF + Julia Beck’s association with the Heritage Foundation due to presumed good intentions
Tendency to View Their Opponents and Critics As Essentially Evil
“To the extremist, opponents hold opposing positions because they are bad people […] not merely because they simply disagree, see the matter differently, have competing interests, or are perhaps even mistaken.”
TERF Example: I deserve to “rot in hell” because I don’t agree with TERFs
Manichaean Worldview
“Extremists have a tendency to see the world in terms of absolutes of good and evil, for them or against them, with no middle ground or intermediate positions. All issues are ultimately moral issues of right and wrong, with the ‘right’ position coinciding with their interests.”
TERF Example: Willingness to use and spread sources from the alt-right with no regard for the source, since if it coincides with their interest, it’s ‘right’
Advocacy Of Censorship or Repression of Their Opponents or Critics
“They may include a very active campaign to keep opponents from media access [… or] actually lobby for legislation against speaking, writing, teaching, or instructive ‘subversive’ or forbidden information or opinions.”
TERF Example: Pressure to isolate young trans teens from media access
Tend to Identify Themselves In Terms Of Who Their Enemies Are
“[E]xtremists may become emotionally bound to their opponents, who are often competing extremists themselves. Because they tend to view their enemies as evil and powerful, they tend, perhaps subconsciously, to emulate them, adopting to same tactics to a certain degree.”
TERF Example: "TRA’s”, “libfems”, “transcult”; emulating anti-feminist tactics by joining groups like Hands Across The Aisle to directly partner with anti-abortion, anti-feminist conservatives and divide-and-conquer
Tendency towards argument by intimidation
“Extremists tend to frame their arguments in such a way as to intimidate others into accepting their premises and conclusions. […] They use a lot of moralising, pontificating, and tend to be very judgemental. This shrill, harsh rhetorical style allows them to keep their opponents and critics on the defensive, cuts off troublesome lines of argument, and allows them to define the perimeters of debate.”
TERF Example: Using the words “trans women” and “literal pedophiles and rapists” interchangeably in arguments
Use of Slogans, Buzzwords, and Thought-Stopping Cliches
“For many extremists, shortcuts in thinking and in reasoning matters out seem to be necessary in order to avoid or evade awareness of troublesome facts and compelling counter-arguments. Extremists generally behave in ways that reinforce their prejudices and alter their own consciousness in a manner that bolsters their false confidence and sense of self-righteousness.”
TERF Examples: “Peak trans”, “autogynephiles”, the bathroom & prison rapist tropes, to discredit trans women; “handmaids” and “libfems” to discredit cis women who disagree with them
Assumption of Moral or Other Superiority over Others
“Most obvious would be claims of general racial or ethnic superiority […] Less obvious are claims of ennoblement because of alleged victimhood,”
TERF Examples: Expanding real victimisation of women to include historically inaccurate concepts, such as ‘witch hunts were methods of controlling women’s knowledge’ to increase superiority; complete disownment of any moral responsibility for violence perpetrated or encouraged by TERFs
Doomsday Thinking
“Extremists often predict dire or catastrophic consequences from a situation or from failure to follow a specific course, and they tend to exhibit a kind of ‘crisis-mindedness’. It can be a Communist takeover, a Nazi revival, nuclear war, earthquakes (… etc. …) Whatever it is, it’s just around the corner unless we follow their program and listen to the special insight and wisdom, to which only the truly enlightened have access.”
TERF Example: Fair Play For Women’s unrealistic theory that if Gender Recognition Certificates were easier to get, women’s prisons would be flooded with trans sex offenders instantly.
Belief that it’s okay to do bad things in service of a good cause
“Extremists may deliberately lie, distort, misquote, slander, defame, or libel their opponents or critics, engage in censorship or repression, or undertake violence in “special cases”.”
TERF Example: Wetmeadow ‘distorting’ my post on the cotton ceiling to imply that I was saying same-sex attraction is a mental illness, to discredit me.
Emphasis on Emotional Response (and less on logical analysis and reasoning)
“Extremist have an unspoken reverence for propaganda, which they may call ‘education’ or ‘consciousness-raising’. Symbolism plays an exaggerated role in their thinking and they tend to think imprecisely and metamorphically.”
TERF Example: ‘consciousness-raising’ has a long history in extreme radfem spaces; in recent online spaces it’s more often called ‘peak trans’.
Hypersensitivity and Vigilance
“Extremists perceive hostile innuendo in even casual comments; imagine rejection and antagonism concealed in honest disagreement and dissent; […] Although few extremists are clinically paranoid, many of them adopt a paranoid style with its attendant hostility and distrust.”
TERF Example: Exposinglesphob’s entire blog
Problems Tolerating Ambiguity and Uncertainty
“[T]he ideologies and belief systems to which extremists tend to attach themselves often represent grasping for certainty in an uncertain world, or an attempt to achieve absolute security in an environment that is naturally unpredictable […] Extremists exhibit a kind of risk-aversiveness that compels them to engage in controlling and manipulative behaviour, both on a personal level and in a political context.”
TERF Example: “What do you mean, someone’s gender or sex might be ambiguous?? Woman is a biological term for adult human females, it’s simple”
Inclination towards “GroupThink”
“‘Groupthink’ involves a tendency to conform to group norms and to preserve solidarity and concurrence at the expense of distorting members’ observations of facts, conflicting evidence, and disquieting observations [… Extremists may] only talk with one another, read material that reflects their own views, and can be almost phobic about the ‘propaganda’ of the ‘other side’. The result is a deterioration in reality-testing, rationality, and moral judgement.”
TERF Example: Any source I give is bad, even if they’re genuinely trying to say that wikipedia is ‘good research’.
Tendency to Personalise Hostility
“Extremists often wish for the personal bad fortune of their ‘enemies’ and celebrate when it occurs.”
TERF Example: The fact that pretty much every person who isn’t a TERF and who discourses has been told to kill themselves.
Extremists often feel that the system is no good unless they win
“If public opinion turns against them, it was because of ‘brainwashing’. If their followers become disillusioned, it’s because of ‘sabotage’.”
TERF Example: Ex-terfs like myself either are just too dumb to understand radical feminism, or we never even existed in the first place.
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Taking the Year Off Was the Best Decision I Made for Myself
Caution: Long and cathartic post ahead
I always knew what the next step should be. The person I was at 20 years old, fresh out of college,was self-assured with a good sense of self. Fast forward to 5 years later, just before officially finishing med school, and I was a mess.
I was disillusioned with the healthcare system and the job, I didn’t know what to do with myself even after passing the boards, I was tired of ticking off the premade checklist without having no real direction, I was exhausted and hardly knew who I was at that point, I was angry that a situation happened where I felt like my choices were taken from me but was angrier at myself that it happened because I sucked at communicating. I was heartbroken that it led to losing someone I said I cared about because my emotional response had been to close off.
I hated that I didn’t know how to deal with anything and there was so much confusion, sadness, anger and fear of the future (plus the pressure of the board exams). I hated parts of myself too. 
My hospital groupmates always talked about how med school catapults you into a stronger and more mature person, as you are always faced into situations that you wouldn’t really have a choice but to step up. We lived and survived that way and I wasn’t even sure how I didn’t notice the amount of damage I had been accumulating along the way. At the end of med school, I wanted to be done with it. I wanted to close that book because there was so much pain associated with it and I didn’t know how to keep afloat. I felt nothing while waiting for board exam results and I felt nothing when I passed the boards. My colleagues were applying to residency. I just knew I couldn’t go through with it so soon. 
For months, I lived like an island (TS ref here cause I had to). I limited social media and closed a few accounts. I only talked to my best friend everyday. I met up only with her on a regular basis. Sometimes, it becomes a small group if our groupmates were available. It had been an extremely comfortable bubble because I really needed to feel safe. 
I allowed myself to feel what I had to feel for a period of time. Then I decided to break the cycle by making a routine.I got a job. I spent time with my family and realized I missed them so much. Spent both Christmas and New Year at home for the first time in 2 years. I was able to go to different places because of my job. I talked and joked around with my patients, watched local telenovela with my workmates, went drinking with them and asked what their stories were. I educated myself on things I didn’t know. I did things I loved and enjoyed. 
I started checking up on some old friends bit by bit. We talked about work and cases.I told them about critical cases and about the deaths I couldn’t do anything about. They also told me about difficult situations and calls they made.
I realized I still loved my job. Even when in reality, the title came with more responsibility than prestige. I looked into applying to UK and taking the PLAB exams, made a timeline and plan for it too but promised myself that if I didn’t reach the timeline goals, I’d apply for residency here. 
At some point, Iike the fog clearing (lol), I was finally able to look back on my med school memories in a good way. I made a med school photobook. I loved the process because it made me realize how some of my best memories were in med school. I reopened my instagram acct and saw a feature that allowed me to compile my stories from internship. It was so difficult and painful and complicated towards the ending that I may have forgotten how uncomplicated and joyful the little moments were. The in-betweens: coffee and breakfast with my groupmates before going to posts, from duty drinking sessions, study days in the library, exam weeks that ended with good food and a movie, birthday dinners, game nights, walking around in BGC and finding new places to eat, college events, playing mystery games for the first time, all the procrastinating and should-be-studying-but-not-studying, finishing my papers the morning it was due,deciding where to get lunch with friends, movie nights, all the conversations and good times. 
and so at this point, I am happy. I committed every day to being a better person and not to hate aspects of myself that made me feel vulnerable. I realized that being emotional and feeling isn’t abnormal. I just needed to learn how to make better choices and express them in the proper way. I accepted that I’ll never be the type of person to burn bridges and I’ll always be the type to go the extra mile for the people I love and care about. I have decided that a life lived like that would have fewer regrets. I learned that you could love and care for people from a distance and be able to wish them well with all your heart even if you couldn’t be with them because what’s really important is that they’re happy. I am learning bit by bit to be more honest with how I communicate because there’s really just no other way and life is too short. I make an active effort to check on the people I love because I need to know they’re okay and I don’t want to take anything for granted. I listen to my patients and feel for them and try to learn from them. I love learning and so I try to learn as much as I can, medical or non-medical. 
Sometimes, we do need to stop and make a detour. It has now made me thankful for everything I have been through and everything I have now. It also has made me more hopeful to live. I don’t feel as stuck anymore. 
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ofcloudsandstars · 5 years
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Happy Sunday! Here's the forecast for this week! 
June 9th - 15th
It’s going to be an intense week that will force us to examine ourselves, our past actions and form new ways to break through obstacles that will grant us a new sense of freedom for the full moon that’s to come next week in Sagittarius!
June 09
Moon transits Virgo The mood of today will make us gravitate towards practical activities. In an urge to set things right we might find ourselves re-organizing and rethinking plans. Emotional satisfaction will come from solving problems, making order out of confusion and helping others. Health matters might come into focus. We might fixate on ironing out troubling matters so that we can feel more confident moving ahead. This moon favors the following activities: Mental pursuits, work activities, services and routines.
Sun (Gemini) square Neptune (Pisces) This is a great time to be a recluse and not do work at all (imagine if that were possible for all of us haha). Enjoy this Sunday by engaging in art and fueling your escapist desires into writing, drawing, running away into the woods and not returning etc. This transit might may you feel inclined to escape through substance abuse or media binging but to avoid any consequences the future might bring, try to release that energy through healthier outlets. This will not be a day that you'd be inclined to get work done. You will feel more stressed out by completing tasks than usual and worse other people  might cause some additional obstacles. It might be normal to feel insecure, guilty and apologetic which some worst people might take advantage of so it's best to avoid any important decision making on this day. Especially with Neptune's transit you might tend to see the best in people and this can lead to a chance of becoming disillusioned or if dealing with a particularly manipulative person they can easily deceive you. Over idealization and gullibility can lead to slander or loss. It's important to stand your ground on this day.
Magical Activites: Meditation, vision boards, divination
June 10
Sun (Gemini) opposite Jupiter RX (Sagittarius) This transit brings opportunities for success, good fortune and happiness. A lot may fall into place without too much effort making you feel like you have a lucky streak. Be careful to take it all for granted because this transit can also result in overindulgence which can lead to loss. Especially with Jupiter in retrograde forcing us to expand within this transit may make us examine our own behavior and motives giving the opportunity for personal and spiritual growth. Use this energy wisely to focus on completing tasks that need to be ironed out (with the energetic influence of the moon transiting virgo). The remainder of this week might bring challenges and obstacles but this transit can be a helpful boost in laying the right things into place. 
First Quarter
Moon conjunct Eros in Virgo The mood will be a longing for erotic intimacy that can bring emotional fulfillment. This conjunct can bring emotive passion and plans to conjure an appropriate hook up in your life. This can also bring light to hidden longing desires or bring about intense passionate feelings which can heighten insecurities or feelings of possessiveness. Eros in virgo is a position where we can express our passions or sexual nature through a giving side. We may have the desire to give ourselves to someone and find a reward through our services satisfying them.
Magic Activities: Road opening, attraction magic, sex magic
June 11
Moon Transits Libra Creating order is the focus, not necessarily through tidying or organizing as was the case with the moon's previous journey through Virgo but rather through pleasing interactions with others and our environment. We tend to solve problems through diplomacy and we are more able to put aside our own emotions in order to achieve the peace we crave. The tendency now is to avoid direct confrontations and decisions will not come easily. Seeing both sides to any situation will be the reason for hesitation. With previous transits making it easy to side with others despite their intentions being harmonious towards you, use this mood to find a diplomatic ground with them to establish peace instead of giving into their wishes which might not be best for you. Remember to set boundaries. This moon favors the following activites: relationship and partnership issues, activities involving teamwork and cooperation and activities related to beauty.
Magic Activities: Energetic Sheilding, Warding, Sound healing/balancing
June 12
Moon grows into a Waxing Gibbous, energy begins to heighten
Magical Activites: charging magical tools
June 13
Moon transits Scorpio The mood of this moon will bring intensity. As the energy of the moon heightens into its full moon position, Scorpio will exaggerate the climax. Whether its passion, elation, sorrow or desire, emotions are felt on a deeply personal level. We are motivated by the desire to get to the bottom of things and we instinctively read between the lines. This moon will urge us to uncover our own power. Its a great time to rid ourselves of old fears and limiting habits. It can be an intimate and passionate time. Avoid manipulative tactics and unnecessary suspicions. This moon favors the following activities: intimacy issues, psychological examinations, research and shedding away old things.
Magical Activities: Shadow work, divination, sex magic (orgasmic release/manifestation)
June 14
Mars (Cancer) trine Neptune (Pisces) This transit stimulates your sensuality and creativity. It also will make it an ideal time for passionate romances as attractions might feel strongly magnetic with a sultry charm. Sexual encounters would be compassionate, tender and spiritual in nature. If you are seeking love you are more likely to attract a less aggressive more spiritually inclined partner. You will be more in touch with the subtle vibrational energies that influence our lives and this energy can motivate you to express your creativity through the physical arts such as dance, music or sculpture. You will also have the energy to draw on strong spiritual courage and fighting spirit to defend yourself and loved ones. You can win battles now but more through acts of kindness than being on the offense. This transit will also bring out the desire and good karma for someone wanting to become actively involved in charitable organizations since your desire to help others will be based on strong moral and ethical convictions.
Mars (Cancer) opposite Saturn (Capricorn) This transit might bring frustration disappointment and anger. The frustration might be due to others standing in your way whereas disappointment will come from unfulfilled desires. With the previous transit mentioned this frustration can be focused on the lack of justice towards your needs or the needs of loved ones or human/animal/environmental rights. Even if you lack obstacles this could bring out the situation that you are your own worst enemy. Since this is a slow energy transit this can make your energy feel low and powerless. Don't feel upset if you feel unsuccessful, this transit will force you to face your battles with long term endurance. "This is a marathon not a sprint". Endurance is rewarded here. Any aggressive confrontations can be very painful and bring out bitterness in you. If someone is an obstacle towards you they might lash out today. You might find it hard to express your own anger but you need to find a healthy outlet so that it won’t build up within you. 
Magical Activities: Attraction Magic (for more spiritual minded friends, a sensual lover), creating charms especially with the intention for defense/protection. Journaling to relieve stress, protection for yourself or loved ones. 
June 15
Moon transits Sagittarius The mood here is optimism and joy. We are motivated by a need to seek the truth and are ready to pursue a new vision. We are not interested in details at the moment yet the bigger pictures. New experiences and adventures will satisfy a deep emotional need. Spontaneity is the key! New adventures, travel, higher education and sharing knowledge or publishing a product will be favored with this transit.
Magical Activities: dream oracling, nature walks, journaling for expressing spiritual insight and self examination
I wish you all the best week!
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moistwithgender · 5 years
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Monthly Media Roundup (June-July 2019)
Well, I neglected doing a post last month, and now another has passed. I haven’t done too much, about three games each month and not anything else media-wise, so let’s get it all done right now!
Little Nightmares (PC/Steam): 
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These types of spooky “cinematic platformers”, like LIMBO and INSIDE, never really scare me or fill me with dread. Part of this may be that due to the trappings of cinematic platformers. Checkpoints are very fair, and nothing is too difficult because priority is on delivering the story. Little side challenges exist, like trying to light all the candles or break all the porcelain dolls in the short 3-hour run of the game, but these are also pretty reasonable, even if you’re in a chase sequence. I’m reminded of a youtuber I briefly followed who talked about how horror games aren’t scary anymore, and somewhat unintentionally delivered the point that as you become accustomed to the limits of a medium, and therefore are less likely to be surprised by it, you’re also much less likely to be scared by it. It’s a somewhat unfortunate and inevitable trade-off to becoming more invested in a hobby. When I was a kid, all games held infinite possibility, and so an NPC in Harvest Moon telling me that wild dogs came out at night led me to think that night time held the possibility of ENEMIES in a game without combat. What the NPC meant was that you should build fences. As an adult who has spent my life playing games, I can tell you that a game is almost never going to put you in a situation without the means to deal with it. If there’s going to be combat, you’re going to know how combat works before an ambush. If there’s an escape sequence, you’re going to be in an area that facilitates your escape (often a narrow space that leads you in a direction while also making it as harrowing as possible). Games are theme park rides, and while learning that can make seemingly difficult games more manageable and enjoyable, it also gradually disillusions you. Thankfully, there are always new things to learn if you keep an open mind.
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D (3DS): 
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2019 has been about thoroughly enjoying the games that I considered overrated in my young adulthood. I joked on twitter that 70% of my personality was disliking Final Fantasy VII and Ocarina of Time, and honestly, it might as well have been. I earned a lot of undeserved respect in college through arrogantly spouting hot takes about “objectively good art”, and a lot of people reasonably assumed this must mean I know exactly what I’m talking about. The way I process art and media is much looser and more personal than it used to be, partially due to burning out and becoming too exhausted to deal with other arrogant people. I think a lot about how tiring I had to be for other people to talk to. Watching Tim Rogers bleed his personal trauma into his video series on the subtleties of FF7’s japanese script was the most instrumental in turning me back toward the game. When Square Enix revealed gameplay footage of the remake at E3 this year, I was hooting and hollering with the longtime fans.
But, this is about Zelda, not Final Fantasy. I had already played through OoT, as hurriedly as possible, just to say I had done it. It was the better part of a decade ago, at the urging of a then-girlfriend who had nostalgia for it. Frustrations with the Water Temple in the original version are valid despite it being largely well designed, due to some minor shortsighted-ness that blows up into nagging issues, but I think I had put myself in the headspace to dislike it from the get-go. Similarly, I didn’t want to do any collecting in the game as a whole. I had convinced myself that there was no joy to be found in collecting in games (a take bereft of nuance). When the point of Zelda games is to inspire the player to explore every nook and cranny in search of rewards, going in as a player and stubbornly trying to avoid any of that ensures that you’ll miss the point of the whole experience. I’m not sure what it was that made me want to go back. It might be that I wanted to prove my younger, cockier self wrong, and pave over my old evaluations with more nuance. 
It certainly worked out that way, as several previous opinions changed entirely. Ruto used to be annoying to me, but was now one of my favorite characters. Doing all the little minigames felt rewarding in itself, and in turn I was unexpectedly rewarded with important items (they really did bet everything on the entire world they’d made). The Water Temple, now tweaked for a bit more convenience in the 3DS version, was extremely interesting. The side quest to acquire the Biggoron Sword was easily doable, whereas I had grown up assuming it impossible. And the story which had never appealed to me (because I wouldn’t let it) now felt relatable in a way I hadn’t expected. Link intends to do good, but through unfortunate circumstances and honest mistakes becomes unable to take part in the world, and it spirals downward for years as he remains trapped in a room, aging but inactive. Something about that mirrors my own experiences with depression. Sure, Link, can travel back to his younger self at any time, but there’s still a powerlessness in the inability to affect the seven year gap. You can flash back, but you can’t change what you’ve lost.
Banjo-Kazooie (N64): 
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You know, as a kid I probably would have just accepted that Grunty was evil, but as an adult it’s hard not to see her as a product of her environment. Obsessed with asking her cauldron who the objectively prettiest in the world is, she seeks out and kidnaps the younger girl given the title in an attempt to steal her youth. Every character in the game describes Grunty as ugly, rather than evil, and even her own sister shows up in every area to tell you how gross she is and how terrible her lifestyle is. I ended up sympathizing with her more than anyone else. I’ve only played half an hour of Banjo-Tooie, but it was a relief in multiple ways to see her pivot to straight up murder after rising from the dead.
Despite playing Donkey Kong Country multiple times growing up, I’d never really grown to love Rare’s in-house aesthetic of big-eyed cartoony animals. It might be hypocritical, but Smash Ultimate’s reveals for both King K. Rool and Banjo (and) Kazooie made me see the charm in these characters. Something about how Smash canonizes characters as essential pieces of game history always causes me to drop any negative pretense and adopt them as favorites. It’s a little intellectually hypocritical, but I can’t help liking what I like. After the trailer for B-K in Smash, I immediately started up the original game in Retroarch. Thankfully the core I used was advanced enough to play the game without issues (the same cannot be said for Tooie), as other alternatives were expensive or hard to get a hold of. While the slightly-mean humor and talking animate objects took a bit of getting used to, I get it now. I get the children’s show aesthetic they were aiming for, and I appreciate the feel of the physics and control of the interspecies friendship of the protagonists working in tandem with each other, even if the game is at times quite difficult.
Dragon Quest I, II, & III (SNES): 
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Yes, I did play through three JRPGs in a row! And yes, you might notice that the hero of Dragon Quest XI (and VIII, and IV, and III) was also announced for Smash Ultimate. They recently released, as of this writing! A lot of what I’ve been playing has been influenced by outside forces, whether it be Nintendo news or friends, but I’m not bothered at all when otherwise I might not have the energy to play anything. The games I’ve been playing are also ones I’ve intended to play for a while, so the excuses have been convenient for me. Though, actually, this decision had less to do with the Smash announcement and more to do with the upcoming re-release of DQXI, which seems to be related to the original three games, known as The Erdrick Trilogy. I had heard that you can play XI on its own, but that there is an extra layer of appreciation to be had if you’ve played the original trilogy. Me being me, I naturally queued them up. I chose the older fan translations of the SNES remakes, and though I did finish them, I can tell you that they have their fair share of bugs (DQII even has a game breaking glitch I had to finagle through using save states across multiple versions, phew). Besides that, those old translations lack the modern localizations of the games, so if they namedrop something in XI, there’s a chance it’ll go over my head. Oops! If you want to play these games, the best versions are currently on mobile phones.
Around a decade ago I was in early college, with no friends except for those still in high school or at another university. I was very lonely and nervous. I started playing Dragon Quest V purely by chance, and it served as the perfect salve for that loneliness, with its lonely child protagonist traveling around the world accumulating found family. It’s one of the more poignant and cathartic JRPGs I’ve ever played, and for the next decade I would actually be bothered that the rest of the games didn’t live up to the catharsis of DQV.
In revisiting the roots of the series, and playing it through to see how it develops from title to title, it finally clicked with me, and continues to click with me, as I keep learning more about the series. Rather than comparing every entry to DQV, I should have been comparing them in order. This might sound obvious, but it really did make a world of difference to see that V’s narrative is placed on top of the foundation the previous games set, rather than a singular case of lightning in a bottle. And the games have always featured loneliness, but in differing contexts, and to different degrees. The hero of DQI is almost entirely alone through the full game. In DQII, the princess comes from lonely circumstances, and one of the princes comes down with a sickness that leaves him temporarily unable to help his friends. In DQIII you can make as many team members as you want, but you grow up with an absent father, and your own good deeds receive bittersweet resolution. They are all games built on simple settings and followed through with empathy. The series is at times disarmingly heavy, which is part of what makes the games as memorable as they are. You’re never quite as prepared for Dragon Quest as you think you are.
As of this writing I’m currently half-way through a replay of Dragon Quest IV, and I’m enjoying it a lot more. I’m looking forward to replaying V. I have no idea what VI will be like. I’ve heard it’s a lower point in the series, but that’s what I heard about II as well, and I ended up loving it, so who knows. Dragon Quest is good.
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Well, I managed to catch up. I didn’t get into the finer details of the DQ playthroughs, but DQIII is honestly so good I don’t want to spoil it for anyone (you should play these games). Maybe in August I’ll actually get back to watching and reading things. Maybe I’ll try to keep these things to a single paragraph per item, to make it more manageable to read. Let me know what you think, if you think.
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onisionhurtspeople · 6 years
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The Spiral of Narcissistic Abuse: Onision Edition
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I originally wrote this post in April 2017, but in the year and a half since it’s been published, there have been literally dozens of new victims targeted by Greg (Onision) and his wife Lainey (Laineybot) that I felt were severe enough to warrant inclusion; and so here I am to re-write this post to include this new information. 
1. “Love Bombing”: Display of excessive attention and professions of deep love. “Soul mate.”
Love bombing is the practice of overwhelming a person in a new relationship with signs of adoration and attraction in the form of gifts, compliments, meaningful gestures, discussions revolving around long-term future plans (marriage, children, vacations, etc), and professions of true love. The difference between love bombing and genuine love is that real love is earned over time through intimacy, trust, and consistency, whereas love bombing creates artificial feelings of intimacy that have not yet been earned. 
Greg routinely engages in love-bombing when it comes to either a) trying to lure in new victims, or b) making attempts to reel in previous victims (such as exes), or current victims who are becoming disillusioned with him and beginning to pull away. In 2015, after Greg had convinced his wife Lainey to “explore her bisexuality” by getting a girlfriend, she had settled on an 18-year-old YouTube personality and makeup guru named Billie, and flew her down to their house for a visit. What Greg neglected to tell Lainey was that he had ulterior motives for pushing her to get a girlfriend, and this was because he wanted to convince Lainey and whoever her girlfriend was to enter a three-way, polyamorous triad with him. While Billie was there, in an attempt to draw her in, Greg showered her with gifts, compliments, and an excessive amount of attention and admiration; according to him, he paid her $1800 a month to manage his social media accounts, spent thousands of dollars buying her gifts of makeup and clothing, and his videos were full of glowing compliments towards Billie. 
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He tweeted this at Billie after she managed to “fix” a broken camera lens by throwing it on the ground. He screams at his own children just for losing at Mario Kart, could you imagine Onision having this reaction to anybody else treating his expensive equipment that way?
Every time he and Lainey broke up with Billie (usually because she refused to go along with their bizarrely strict and controlling expectations for her behavioral conduct, such as having to ask their permission before smoking weed - and yes, you read that correctly; the problem was not that she was smoking weed because it was illegal (as Greg and Lainey had originally claimed), the problem was that she didn’t ask their permission before doing it), Greg would begin to reel Lainey back in by trying to love bomb her again. This comment was made just two days after he’d cheated on Lainey with Billie, while she was pregnant with their second child:
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…and every time they get back together, he begins love bombing Billie again, and ignoring Lainey. He is careful not to do this overtly on Twitter or Instagram like he does with Lainey, but during this time, he expends much more effort into communicating with Billie over Twitter and in videos than he does with Lainey. He is also very clearly more physically affectionate towards Billie in videos where the three of them appear together than he is with his own wife.
(And maybe this is just my unprofessional opinion, but the manner in which he compliments Lainey rings much more hollow and inauthentic to me than the compliments he used to give to Billie. It comes off as very rote and robotic, not genuine or sincere.) 
2.  Over-protection and isolation in the name of love. “We only need each other.”
One of the most common tactics that abusers use to control their victims is by isolating them from friends and family. They do this so that it’s harder for them to escape or see the truth of what’s happening to them. This behavior is manifested in ways such as convincing the victim to stay at home and not have a job, by controlling all of the money that flows through the household (including the victim’s money, if they DO have a job), and by slowly convincing the victim to stop talking to their friends and family members, because the narcissist “doesn’t think they’re good for [them]”. Without a sense of perspective or anybody from whom to gain a third-party point of view, it’s extremely difficult for the victim to objectively analyze the severity of the situation. 
Throughout the history of his relationships, Greg follows this pattern with all of his partners to the tee. He makes repeated attempts to convince Billie to stop flying home to spend time with her friends and family members, who she is extremely close with.
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Unbelievably, he attempts to manipulate her by bragging about how he’d already managed to successfully convince Lainey to not visit her own family more than once a year. In a livestream, Lainey once admitted that earlier this month (October 2018) was the first time she’s attended a family funeral in over five years, because Greg wouldn’t give her permission to go to any of the other ones. He also frequently attacks Lainey’s family on social media, as well as diminishing them in Lainey’s eyes by making his disapproval of them quite clear:
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This is what he said about Lainey’s sister:
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He especially does this to Lainey’s father, who saw through Greg from the very beginning, and desperately tried to stop his 17-year-old daughter from marrying him:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8sAjnkASwOo
He also did this with Skye while they were still married, restricting her from seeing anybody but members of his own family, and members of her family that he approved of (which was basically just her younger sister, a 15-year-old girl who Greg admitted to fantasizing about having sex with, including (more than once) accidentally moaning her name while being intimate with Skye). A quote from his website at the time:
January 24th, 2007
Alright, so it has been a few days since Skye and I hung out with another couple… judging from the fact that these people were the only ones we knew that had a lifestyle that wasn’t drugged out, beered out (also known as drugged out), smoked out, ethically lacking, rude etc. and we can’t even enjoy ourselves around them as much as we do each other… I just really don’t see myself and Skye spending time with anyone in the future other than family…
It seems that everyone who isn’t blood related has something extremely wrong with them… it may not be apparent at first, like a used car, but when you get on the road with them, and get to know them, the clanks and pings begin to show, maybe not after the first few miles, but definitely after the second or third ride.
(Source)
This isolation of Skye got so bad that eventually, two of their friends actually tried to convince her to leave Greg:
January 27th, 2007
I was going to post something extremely long about how upset I am with two people I know, within my personal life - who are continuously trying to break my wife and I apart psychically and vocally… but I’m not going to as I believe it can only cause a greater level of drama, which is exactly what they feed on.
In fact, they probably know I’m talking about them right now, and are dialing my number just to tell me/others how wrong I am for my wife, and somehow by saying I love her every hour of the day, feeding her full of yummy food, trying to make her happy emotionally/other ways, putting a roof over her head, that in result of that I’m a bad husband.
(Source)
A former classmate of Greg, who had gone to high school with both he and Skye, also gave an interview with someguy827, in which he detailed his observations of Greg slowly but surely isolating Skye from all of her friends and family members:
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You can read the interview here. (Source)
And read the comment that he made on lolcow here. (Source)
3. Power gained by social isolation and artificially inflated self-esteem. “I feel like a better person with I am with them.”
Greg has claimed this about every single one of his exes. I can’t track down photographic examples of him claiming this about all of them never mind, I managed to find examples of him saying this to at least three different women. Here’s an example of when he said it to ex-girlfriend Adrienne:
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Keep in mind that they had been dating for a grand total of two weeks when he made the claim to her that she had helped him grow into a better person in the short amount of time they’d been together. 
He made the same claim about a high school girlfriend, Tanya, whom - again - he had known for only a couple of weeks; and they were not even officially dating when he said this to her:
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Here is another example of him saying this about his first wife, Skye - again, only weeks into their relationship. The journal entry this screenshot was lifted from is much longer and I was having trouble pasting it into the body of this text in a way that was readable, so here’s a very short, cropped version of what he said. You can find the source for this quote here. (Source)
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At the end of his relationship with Adrienne - while they were in the process of breaking up - he called her repeatedly while she was at work, leaving her over a dozen voicemails in less than a day. During this time, Adrienne managed to get in touch with Shiloh, another of Greg’s exes, to compare notes about the similarities in their relationship. When Shiloh listened to the voicemails that Greg had sent to Adrienne, she posted this comment on Facebook:
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He had been telling the two women, only hours apart from each other, about how special and meaningful they were to him. The saddest thing about this is that at the same time, he was also calling Skye; and this exchange between himself, Shiloh, and Adrienne occurred only days before he started talking to Lainey. 
4. Creation of a feeling of dependency; induction of fear of the loss of relationship.
One of the ways that Greg likes to induce feelings of psychological dependence on him is through a tactic called “manipulation break-ups”. The phenomenon is explained here by dwayners13:
One of the most common tactics used by manipulative & emotionally abusive individuals is the ‘manipulation breakup’. This is simply when a person repeatedly breaks up with their partner, not because they truly want to end their relationship, but rather to gain power & control over their partner & the relationship in general. There are a variety of issues & events that can cause a manipulation breakup (far too many to list here), but it can range from their partner doing something they don’t like/approve of to the emotionally abusive person being confronted on their abusive/manipulative behavior (by their partner &/or their partner’s family/friends). [...]  Instead of taking the time to discuss or even arguing about the issue in an attempt to resolve it, the person will just break up with them, knowing that their partner doesn’t want to break up. They will then refuse to speak with them about the issue (& the relationship in general), essentially shunning or ignoring their attempts. This can include ignoring phone calls, text messages, VMs etc.., If the couple live together, they will simply refuse to speak with their partner (aka the silent treatment). Their intention is to make it seem like the relationship is over, so that the person will practically beg & plead with their partner & be willing to agree to anything in order to get back together.
(Source)
Greg and Lainey both admitted to him doing this multiple times throughout their relationship; and still, to this day, they admit that he attempts to break up with her every single time they argue, even though they’re married and have been for over seven years. It is extremely abnormal for a 34-year-old father of two who has been married for seven years to threaten to “break up” with his wife every time they get into an argument. These attempts at manipulation on Greg’s part terrify Lainey so much that she readily complies with whatever he wants in order to convince him not to leave her. This pattern could not be more apparent than how this manipulation tactic played out in their relationship with Billie. 
During the time when Greg and Lainey were in a polyamorous relationship with Billie, Lainey expressed repeated discomfort about Greg and Billie spending so much time together while she was excluded by having to spend so much time cooking, cleaning, looking after their their son (she was pregnant with their daughter at the time), and managing their household (which we now know, thanks to Maya, that Greg does not help out with at all, meaning that Lainey spent the vast majority of her day doing these things while Greg and Billie were in another room playing games, making videos, and hanging out). She felt that Billie was only there for Greg, and was not comfortable with them being sexually intimate together, even when it was all three of them together. After a while of this - despite Lainey’s continued discomfort, disapproval, and lack of consent (which is vital for any healthy, functioning polyamorous triad) - Greg told Lainey that there would be more more boundaries, no more jealousy, and that he and Billie were going to do whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted; and that if Lainey didn’t like it, then he was going to divorce her. 
Naturally, terrified of losing her husband, her family, her home, her source of income, and the only lifestyle that she’d ever known - with a three-year-old in tow, and pregnant with their second child - Lainey felt forced to remain in the three-way relationship that she didn’t even want to begin with. 
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A quote from his video, “Onision’s Break Up Story”:
“I told my wife that there would be no more rules in the relationship. That there would be no more boundaries, no more jealousy, and that I would do what I want.”
(Source)
After this quote, Greg goes on to explain that he reassured his wife that he had no intention of leaving her; however, how could Lainey believe this, when just a few months before he had attempted to leave her for Billie, which only didn’t end up happening because Billie told him that she didn’t feel right about it? When he had threatened to leave her so many times before over much smaller and less significant things? He goes on to say this:
“Regardless, it is important to note that Billie did tell me that she thought Lainey might be upset if she and I slept together, but every time she indicated she was worried, I would remind her of the conversation I had with Lainey where I repeatedly told her there would be no more boundaries, we would all have balanced relationships, and that there would be no jealousy.” 
This is an ultimatum. The reason why Lainey went to Billie to ask her not to sleep with Greg is because she already knew that he would shut her down if she tried. Ask yourself this question: for what reason would a woman feel more comfortable asking other women not to sleep with her husband, instead of just going straight to the source and simply asking her husband not to sleep with other women instead? The answer is that it’s because she already knew that he would say no and try to divorce her if she kept bringing it up. It is not unreasonable for Lainey to believe Greg capable of doing this, considering that he has admitted in the past to leaving one woman for another (when he left Skye for Shiloh in 2011):
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Greg doesn’t just do this to Lainey, however; he has done this, to my knowledge, with every other woman he’s ever dated. The following is a screenshot of a portion of the letter written by Adrienne - the 26-year-old that Greg dated for three weeks just before he met Lainey - describing how Greg attempted to manipulate her through making her fear the loss of the relationship:
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Later on in the same letter:
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The entirety of the letter written by Adrienne can be read here. If you’re interested in understanding how Greg’s mind works, I highly recommend reading it - it is extremely insightful, analytical, and well-written. 
5. Restrictive control of resources and activities enforced by induction of guilt, or fear of anger.
It’s no secret that Greg attempts to restrict the activities that his girlfriends are allowed to participate in. This ranges from the aforementioned control over how often they’re allowed to visit their families, to whether or not they’re allowed to have a job (a tactic reported by several of his exes and by Greg himself), to how often they’re allowed to go out with their friends, and even to what they are and are not allowed to eat.
In the following screenshot, a blog post by Shiloh months after they’d broken up, she details how he not only manipulated her into cutting off contact with her friends and family back home, but also convinced her to put her music career on hold so that they could be together all the time:
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(You can read the full post here.)
He also talked Skye into quitting her job once he began making enough money off YouTube, with the reasoning that couples should be spending at least 50% of their time together. (I’m having trouble finding the screenshot for this, but it’s out there somewhere - I’ve seen it before.) Here is a similar screenshot, however:
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He would also become extremely angry with Adrienne when she wanted to go out with her friends…
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...and tried to manipulate her into quitting her job, moving in with him, and depending entirely on him as her source of income, all within three weeks of meeting her. 
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6. Gaslighting causes victim to doubt what they see or hear. Inability to trust own thoughts and reasoning.
When Lainey first broke up with Greg and was considering divorce after he cheated on her with Billie, she admitted that she had never even wanted a girlfriend to begin with, and that it had been Greg who was pressuring her into it…
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…but later, when Lainey recounted her side of the story in a response video to the one that Billie released, she adamantly maintained that it was she who had wanted to experiment with her bisexuality - evidence that Greg had been gaslighting her into believing that he was not at fault, yet again, and that it was Lainey who had desired to keep bringing back Billie over and over again. The tweet posted in first part of this screenshot was taken only six months after the tweet in the second part:
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In addition - despite having told Lainey that it was his decision to sleep with Billie, and despite having literally admitted in a video that he published on YouTube to Billie having repeatedly brought up her discomfort with going behind Lainey’s back in order to be intimate with Greg - he still managed to convince Lainey to doubt her own perceptions enough to the point where she now, to this day - over two years later - still considers Billie to be the homewrecker, and that it was Billie who cheated on her with Greg, not Greg who cheated on her with Billie. That is how manipulative he is. 
During one of the periods in time when Greg and Lainey had broken up with Billie yet again, Lainey began talking to a new girl named Hailey (known online as Luxymoo). At first, Hailey believed that her relationship with Lainey would be exclusive; but after Greg informed her that the relationship would actually be an open polyamorous one, she realized that she was uncomfortable with the arrangement and decided to pull out. Despite the fact that she had every right to choose not to go through with it, Greg then attempted to gaslight her and invalidate her feelings:
After that I started doing research on what it meant to be in a three way relationship, I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t for me. Which killed me, because all I wanted to do was be with Lainey. I wanted to try for them, but at the end of the day, I had to consider my personal feelings on the matter. I knew I couldn’t be what they wanted, because I wanted Lainey.
I told Lainey as soon as I came to that conclusion. I wanted to be honest. I didn’t want to drag it out. Lainey didn’t respond to me.. but Greg did. He said that if he were in my position, he would do whatever it takes to be with Lainey. He said that I didn’t really care about Lainey, that all I was looking for was friendship. He said that he thought my mind was broken. He said he thought I may be sexually dormant. He then would say that he thinks i’m a good person and that i’m the safer alternative. He called me a good distraction.
He wanted me to still come up. But that was a fleeting thought. He said friendship would be hard, and that I was doing everything I could to avoid a relationship with Lainey. Then he pitched the idea of me being with Lainey exclusively, while he’s with Lainey exclusively. Like we wouldn’t be doing sexual things together. I still declined because 1. he had spent so much time invalidating MY feelings on the matter, attacking my personality, pressuring me, etc. and 2. I also knew that that wasn’t what they wanted, and I told him that we would still hit that road block of me wanting exclusiveness. He had said in a previous conversation that it was like him and Lainey were on an island and I had a boat, but I wouldn’t throw them a life line because I wasn’t the right boat.
(The full conversation and screenshot can be seen here.)
He also tried to use this tactic on Maya - a girl who dated Lainey very briefly in late 2017 - in an attempt to preemptively gaslight her and discredit her, should she choose to come forward with her story about what he did to her:
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Which he did, in fact, try to do later on, by attempting to accuse Maya of being a “homewrecker” for “wiggling while she was sitting on his lap” (despite not mentioning that he was the one who had placed her there, which she did not consent to, and only went along with because she felt so uncomfortable). The posts detailing her full account can be found here and here. 
7. Increased emotional and psychological dependence of victim on abuser.
Greg has already succeeded in doing this with Lainey and many other girlfriends in the past, and has attempted to do this to several more. When married to Skye, Greg insisted that she not have a job outside of the home because he believes that a couple should spend most of their time together (despite later claiming that spouses who do not have a job outside the home, or at least have children, are useless). After meeting Shiloh, despite the fact that she was a celebrity in Canada at the time they met, he forced her to quit her singing career and move in with him to work for and with him full-time; to this day, over seven years later, her singing career still has not recovered. Upon breaking up with Shiloh, he dated a woman named Adrienne, who he attempted to manipulate into moving in with him within three weeks of the start of their relationship - and she almost did. And likewise, when he began dating Lainey, within a month of meeting her, he had proposed to her, rented a house in the state where she lived so that she could finish high school, and then married and impregnated her within the year, so that he could groom her and keep tabs on her until she was old enough to marry. 
Lainey does not have a job, and is completely financially and psychologically dependent upon Greg for not just survival, but her very sense of identity and self-worth as a person. In fact, she is so dependent on Greg as a source of ego regulation that I wrote an entire post breaking down and analyzing my impression of Lainey’s personality matrix because I was so baffled by the extent of her psychological dependency on him. You can read it here, if you’re curious (and have a lot of spare time). 
8. Punishment through anger, verbal abuse, forced isolation, character assassination, etc.
When angry with ex-girlfriend Shiloh, he pushed her into a door frame, causing her to miscarry (although some people do not believe that she was pregnant, since she and Greg had once faked a pregnancy and stillbirth):
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He also forced her to shave her head bald, calling her a “whore”, “his property”, and “a good bitch”:
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When Billie lied to him about smoking weed, he attempted to punish her by forcing her to dye her eyebrows green, shave off her hair (the third time he has attempted to, or succeeded in, manipulating a girlfriend to shave her hair off), get an ugly tan, be chained to his basement wall for a week wearing a sign saying “I’m sorry for lying Lainey” around her neck, and tattoo “I’m a liar” in the small of her back:
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When he breaks up with exes, he also slanders and demeans their character on social media. He even does this with friends, other YouTubers, and sometimes just with people - usually women - that he doesn’t like. Including myself, by the way:
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Proud moment. :’)
He made a video criticizing his ex (Adrienne) for the number of sexual partners she’s had, as well as implying that her vaginal hygiene was poor, and even made a series of videos in which he went and got himself tested for various STDs in order to imply that she was so promiscuous that she could have given him one (a video which later got deleted off YouTube when he realized how many downvotes it was getting); however, you can see her reference the video in her letter here:
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When he and Skye divorced, he slandered her by calling her a thief and a liar, and continued to milk sympathy from his fans by implying that he was unfairly being forced to pay alimony, even though he agreed to the amount in the settlement, and she was rightly owed that money for her part in producing his early Onision videos.
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When he broke up with Billie, he said and did several things to demean her character, including calling her a drug addict, imply that she’s “less than” for being a high school dropout who lives with her parents still, and also revealed to his entire fan base that she has an eating disorder, accused her family of being drugs addicts, and that she had been sexually assaulted and had an abortion, a secret which she had previously revealed to only a handful of close friends and family:
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After Blaire White called him out for his actions, he made a video calling her so many different vile names, with such vitriolic hatred in his voice, that I actually have trouble watching it all the way through. You can really see his narcissistic rage coming out in this video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEVHT6No5Xc
He has exhibited this cycle over and over again with YouTuber Cyr, who he has been friends with off and on for years:
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Most recently - meaning since I first wrote this post (about a year and a half ago) - he has continued in this pattern of slandering ex-girlfriends and ex-friends a further three or four times at least; and so this is the part of this sub-heading that will provide new information that was not included in my old post.
After Jaclyn Glenn began dating Richie of SocialRepose, Greg flew off the handle, making a series of insulting comments about Jaclyn’s physical appearance on Twitter and YouTube, including remarking that tall women are gross, and that had she been dating him, he never would have allowed her to get breast implants, because they’re disgusting (and she’s disgusting for having them):
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Since she has broken up with Richie, Greg has now reverted to his attempts at love-bombing Jaclyn (and her friend Jessie Paege) on Twitter, hoping to reignite their friendship (and the possibility of bringing her into a new trinity with Lainey, or at least hoping that she’ll be able to give a boost to his YouTube career). 
A few months ago, a close friend of both Greg and Lainey - model, actress, and member of the BDSM community Madison DeCambra - made a video with Greg about the DDlg (Daddy Dom/little girl) kink, which was received very poorly by the DDlg community. Feeling responsible for having hurt and contributed to the misrepresentation of the community that she loves so much, Madison posted a video on YouTube apologizing for any pain that her involvement in Greg’s video may have caused. Greg reacted to this by terminating their six-year-long friendship, as well as - predictably - going on a tirade of character assassinations against her on Twitter, including bringing her two-year-old daughter into it despite having previously accused anyone willing to bring a person’s children up during an argument of being trash. 
These were the texts he sent to Madison, which he then posted publicly on Twitter in order to discard and defame her:
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(Source)
Here is a screenshot of Madison arguing with TomatoBisquette (another former friend of Greg’s whom he has discarded, in his case for being friendly towards MrRepzion, a YouTuber who Greg hates for having called him out in the past), who had tried to make light of how upset she was when Greg posted on Twitter telling her that he was disgusted by her and never considered her a friend:
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He also used the opportunity to take another pot-shot at Beck - a former fan of Greg and Lainey before she, too, was ousted from their lives - for defending Madi:
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However, the worst part of this interaction is that he chose to bring Madison’s two-year-old daughter into the argument, just because he was angry with her mother. Here was Madison’s (understandably angry and hurt) response:
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A recent addition to the roster of the Avaroe’s stable of ex-friends, Maya - a 19-year-old bartender who briefly dated Lainey, and who visited them for about a week over the Christmas holidays in 2017 - described Greg’s behavior towards her as being bizarrely, uncomfortably interested in probing her about her past. She felt that he was pressing her for information to use against her in the future, and described the odd, inappropriate expression of pleasure that would come across his face while he was listening to a person describe some misfortune that had befallen them:
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It would take me ages to compile a list of all of the exes, friends, YouTubers, and other randoms that he’s demeaned on social media or in his videos, so instead I’m just going to provide a (probably incomplete, and still-growing) list of people whose characters he has assassinated on Twitter or YouTube:
Exes: Skye, Shiloh, Adrienne, Billie 
Friends: Cyr, Andy Biersack (and his father), TomatoBisquette, Maya, Madison DeCambra, Beck, Jaclyn Glenn
YouTubers: Social Repose, Blaire White, Eugenia Cooney, Dan Howell, Keemstar, LeafyIsHere
Other: Ayallah (best friend of Billie, ex-girlfriend of Social Repose), Lainey’s family (father and sister), his own father, Luxymoo (Hailey)
9. Scouting new supply.
Before he had even divorced Skye, he moved on to Shiloh. When Shiloh left him and went back to Canada, he met Adrienne. When he broke up with Adrienne and she refused to take him back, he was texting Shiloh and Skye within 24 hours. When Skye, Shiloh, and Adrienne all refused to take him back, he then moved on to Lainey, who he had met and proposed marriage to within just a few short weeks of meeting. When he got bored of the ultimate power that he exerted over Lainey, he used her as queerbait to pull in Billie. When he and Lainey broke up with Billie - still bored with Lainey - he began auditioning new girls for a spot in his harem (Hailey/Luxymoo, Eryn, Maya, Sam, Beck). Here is a timeline of Greg’s known romantic relationships over the past fifteen years:
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If Greg’s high school classmate is to be believed, however, then there are many, many women that Greg has been with that did not make this list.
And finally, here’s a funny, tongue-in-cheek chart chronicling the pattern of what happens when Greg and Lainey bring a new girl into the house: 
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Lainey doesn’t know it yet, but this entire cycle is going to begin repeating itself sooner or later. It’s just a matter of time. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were lowkey auditioning girls as I write this.
10. Acting as though nothing happened.
Need I say more?
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March 7, 2019
As my readers may’ve seen or sensed from the recent comments and content on this blog, I have become disillusioned with the CRE writing project and may decide not to continue writing about my experience as a Crohn’s patient trying to survive outside the Western medical system that was not helping me and was only making me worse.  As far as I can tell, this project has not inspired any additional writing or critical thinking on this subject, my posts have not been widely shared or inspired much interesting feedback, and this work has not opened up any additional opportunities for me in the way of writing or activism.  Of course, those were not the reasons I started this blog in the first place but they are to be considered when looking into the future of this project and whether it is in my or anyone’s best interest that it continue.
My original intent in starting this project nearly one year ago was to document my experiences as a seriously ill woman for whom conventional medical treatments were not working including the social, financial and health-related fallout of this system that seems designed to control and punish sick people while we carry the blame and shame for Western medicine’s failures and even its lies.  At times my health and financial situation have been so precarious that I actually believed (and still do believe) that I am going to die here, alone and in the middle nowhere, and I wanted the truth about what happened to me to be known or at least knowable by those who would wonder what the hell could’ve possibly happened that led to that sad and lonely end.
Through this project I have documented how, as strong and intelligent as I was, and regardless of how much I prioritized and activated toward my own health and wellbeing, one woman is simply no match for this hideous system of Western capitalism and patriarchy and how and why that is.  I documented every step of this horrible journey including Western medicine’s early failures to treat my pain and symptoms, how prohibition and regulation of medical cannabis drove my search for relief 1000 miles away from my partner, my family and my profession, and how corporate propaganda serving both Western medical and cannabis interests misled me (and others) to believe that I could cure myself of an incurable, progressive disease.
Ultimately, all of this has led me to where I am now: still sick and extremely vulnerable, having spent my entire life’s accumulations in pursuit of effective treatment and where my friends and family now believe that my life is falling apart because of my obstinate noncompliance with Big Medicine and “reefer madness” and not because Crohn’s disease is a dangerous, debilitating, incurable and progressive disease that predictably and consistently robs people of their money, their independence, their dignity and their very lives regardless of how and even whether they attempt to treat it.  Over the past 6 years treating first with Western medicine and then with medical cannabis and reflecting on my experiences, and after a year spent writing about it, I now believe that Crohn’s disease is a terminal illness where I have to medicate constantly in order to eat.
This collection of articles comprising the CRE blog documents the reality of all of this and stands in opposition to the propaganda about Western medicine and medical cannabis generally and of Crohn’s disease specifically where seriously ill people are given false hope and ultimately blamed when our incurable illness predictably is not cured and where our progressive pain, symptoms and disability predictably get worse, and not better, over time.  And I, as an individual woman, have been unable to change these fundamental truths about my illness and about my existence as a female-bodied person under capitalism and patriarchy.  Thanks to feminist gaslighting though, I foolishly believed otherwise and that somehow I would be able to wrest back control over my health and my life against all the odds and against all evidence. This has been a rude awakening for me and has left me broken and terrified with little to no hope for my future.
So that is where I am now and I do not know where I will go from here.  I had hoped this whole time that somehow, maybe through the care and concern of others (and maybe not) I would manage to get myself into a sustainable living situation.  For me, that means that I will continue to manage my pain and retain my dignity indefinitely as a seriously ill person who is not likely to get better.  The reality is that there is probably no way I will be able to do that, and that reality has caused me endless terror and grief.  However, what even is “sustainable” under the current system and how many of us live sustainably whether we are sick or well?  How many women are safe and secure financially and materially under any circumstance?
Despite my best efforts, I wasn’t ever able to reliably control my outcomes when I was (relatively) well so there is even less chance I will be able to do that now that I am seriously chronically ill. Just because I stubbornly believed otherwise, and had to believe otherwise to retain my alleged “sanity” doesn’t mean it was ever true and it very obviously was never true was it?  For now, I am starting to recognize and process the apparent fact that everything I am experiencing, including progressive pain and symptoms; aggregating side effects from medications; abuse and neglect by Western and alternative medical systems; rejection by and unconcern of family and friends; hopeless poverty, social isolation and crippling despair; suicidal ideation and/or attempts and completed suicide; even early and current Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) symptoms — all of it — is part of the Crohn’s experience.  And as a sick person and especially as a sick female there will be little or nothing I can do to mitigate this experience for myself or for anyone.
Any support including donations I can muster now are probably not going to get me into a sustainable situation since that really does not exist.  Donations including from my Patrons will simply buy me time until the inevitable arrives, or until I get the miracle I have atheist-prayed for since I’ve been so seriously ill.  So thank you, Patrons, for buying me some time, which I am spending with my beautiful cats in a gorgeous geographical area, treating my pain and symptoms with medical cannabis, and (for now) thinking and writing about what this all means.  I do think this has been a worthwhile project and I have been pleased with the content if not the outcome which seems to have been, basically, for naught.  We really appreciate your support.
Please feel free to contact me through my Patreon page or consider becoming a Patron if you have used or enjoyed my work.  Thank you for reading.
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megers67 · 5 years
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Saisei Academy Verse: Saitou Hibiki
I’m re-making this post since it’s not showing up in the tags. I suspect it’s because I linked my fic which is bullshit, but I want others interested in this little OC grouping to find it so I de-linked it. If you want to find it, I’ve linked my AO3 to my blog or you can just ask me!
I'm finding it increasing difficult to refer to this as an AU version of Hibiki since, while I came up with it second, it's the only verse I've actually written about so far. But now that @miracide has created the wonderful school, Saisei Academy, I've decided that this version of Hibiki would end up there. My story, Ascent, is an origin story for her. So uh... I guess this will inevitably contain spoilers. Take that as you will.
For that reason and for length, I will put her bio under the Keep Reading. Also, I based the formatting after one of the bios she made for one of her own OCs, though I added my own sections.
Hibiki Saitou
Age: 16
Status: 2nd Year Student, General Studies
Basic personality: Deeply cares for others and tends to put them ahead of herself to a fault, quiet, usually only speaks when she has something to say, good listener but bad at communicating her own needs, tends to mother people, over-prepared, anxious and paranoid, only truly comfortable when doing something she knows she’s good at (her preferred school subjects, first aid, cooking) so she is most likely to speak up during these times (providing answers in the school subjects, assertive during first aid, opening up while cooking) though it’s not a guarantee
Basic appearance: On the shorter side of average, thin (due to recent months), long dusty-pink hair that she usually keeps up in a tight bun, dark eyes, covered in scars including prominent one at the corner of her mouth and a crooked nose from when an injury there failed to heal properly, she hides her scars as much as she can (basic foundation on her face, tights/stockings, and sleeves when she’s allowed to, even when it’s hot) because she doesn’t want people to ask her about them
Likes: English language media (especially music), cooking, biology, first aid
Dislikes: Being touched, passive aggression, things being put on higher shelves out of her reach
Favorite food: Hot chocolate
Best school subjects: Biology, English (nearly fluent since her father was)
Worst school subjects: PE, arts
Random fact: She tends to sing while she does chores when she thinks nobody is around (her skill is only average). She gets super embarrassed by it if someone catches her doing it. But because she keeps forgetting that she lives with other people, this happens relatively often.
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Quirk: Injury exchange
- With skin-to-skin contact, she can exchange any active physical damage between herself and the person she is touching.
- Injuries transfer between analogous body parts so a broken left arm causes a break in the same place in the same way on the other person’s left arm. If one gets an injury in a place that is otherwise uninjured, the state of non-injury is given in the exchange. So if Person A has a broken left arm and Hibiki is uninjured there, she takes the broken arm while it is healed in Person A.
- By default, it switches all injuries across the entire body, but with concentration, she can focus it to a specific area. This means she can theoretically heal others while stockpiling a dangerous amount of injuries onto herself.
- The quirk activates automatically and she has to specifically cancel it, so she is dangerous to touch while unconscious (since generally injuries are what cause one to become unconscious).
- Her most common use of her quirk is where she can sense any and all injuries of the other person, but deactivates her quirk before the exchange is made. This allows her to accurately access someone injured without advanced scanning equipment or putting herself in harm's way.
- Still-present causes of injuries are not affected, only the active damage to the body. A stabbing would need to have the knife removed first. Otherwise it will completely heal around the knife in the victim and leave a disconnected knife-shaped flesh in her own wound in the exchange as that could not be exchanged. Similarly, damage from an illness or a poison can be exchanged, but the original victim would simply acquire that damage again. The only advantage of proceeding with the exchange despite this is it gives the chance to “restart the clock” once that may buy time.
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Background:
Unlike many students at Saisei Academy, she came into the program with excellent quirk control. She mainly attends the school for psychological support and reform due to her criminal activity. Since she has an otherwise clean record and her crimes were nonviolent in nature, she avoided jail time. This, plus her good academic record and other extenuating circumstances, saw her admission to Saisei Academy. However, as she IS a criminal, she is liable to have more restrictions than the average student (I just don’t know what restrictions Miracide would have for this kind of situation).
Her home life has not been great. Hibiki's mother died shortly after her quirk manifested because a villain attack left the toddler gravely injured. When her mother naturally came to her aid, the injuries transferred to her and help didn't come until it was too late. Hibiki's father, in his grief, always blamed her for her mother's death, often taking his frustration out on her and using Hibiki's quirk to indirectly aid in his hero work.
He was a local pro-hero named Noci whose quirk allowed him to store any pain he's sustained in the past 24 hours and give it to someone else. This allowed him to incapacitate villains without causing actual damage to them. The potential for his quirk to be used for torture made him a controversial hero so he never became incredibly popular outside of his home town. For his hero work, he would often allow himself to become injured so he could store the pain, but later force Hibiki to take on the actual injuries herself so that he wasn't incapable of actual fighting. She'd attempted to go to the authorities about this, but his connections with local law enforcement prevented the case from being pursued seriously. This long-term abuse and the refusal of its acknowledgment made Hibiki incredibly skeptical and disillusioned towards the hero system and law enforcement as a whole.
Hibiki was left to her own devices for much of the day, but was not allowed to interact much with her peers outside of school. She took on many of the domestic responsibilities of her house at a young age as a result. She disliked most of them, but became very efficient in doing them, a skill she carries to this day. Hibiki does like cooking, however.
Her only true friend in school was Tanaka Rin. Rin was one of the only students who didn't treat Hibiki any differently despite her scars and frankly was the only reason Hibiki has any real social skills at all. The two girls became even closer when an accident permanently blinded Rin and Hibiki helped her devise a way for Rin to use her temperature quirk as a form of thermal imaging.
The two however were separated when Rin chose to pursue a career as a pro-hero and succeeded in getting into the hero program at the famed UA. Hibiki applied to a more normal high school on the area in order to be near her and in the process ran away from home. However, she became too embarrassed to let Rin see her as she was since she had nothing to her name after becoming a runaway. This put her in a very dark place.
A fateful encounter with a young criminal who nearly died since he didn't want to be arrested had he gone to a hospital led her to create The Bunker. The Bunker was an off-the-grid medical facility housed in an abandoned bunker that had been built when quirks first began to emerge, but had long since been forgotten. The 6-bed facility allowed her to help those who, like her, had been ignored but still needed help. With the help of a disgraced nurse who had been fired from the local hospital for taking pain killers while on the job, she ran the facility for 6 months before a raid brought it to its end.
While the raid meant Hibiki now had a criminal record (though the charges were less than you'd expect due to the care she took to remain as close to technically legal as possible), it also finally exposed her father's abuse to the world. He went on the run before he could be arrested and remains at large. As she now doesn’t technically have parents or legal guardians, she is a ward of the state until further notice.
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The main goals for Hibiki's reform are to:
- Regain trust in authority. While she doesn't necessarily act out, she does a worrying amount of hopeless/mindless compliance.
- Learn it is okay to put her own health first. She went through much of her life thinking it's her place in life to sacrifice herself for the betterment of others and that prioritizing herself was selfish.
- Figure out what she wants to do with her life. Due to the above, Hibiki has resigned herself to believing she will die young and as such has difficulty thinking in the long-term. She's never thought much about her future because she never thought she had one.
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aion-rsa · 3 years
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Marvel’s Road to the Thunderbolts in the MCU
https://ift.tt/eA8V8J
The first phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe had a simple mission: build up to the creation of the Avengers. The next two phases went further by setting the stage for Thanos and his quest for the Infinity Stones, culminating in one of the biggest movies of all time in Avengers: Endgame. While MCU Phase 4 is a mix of Disney+ TV shows and theatrical movie releases, there hasn’t been an established narrative goal just yet. So what are they building towards?
One belief is that we’re getting an MCU incarnation of the Thunderbolts or its sister team, the Dark Avengers.
The Thunderbolts first showed up in 1997, created by Kurt Busiek. In the aftermath of the Onslaught event, the Fantastic Four and Avengers were seemingly vaporized. Not only were these two major teams gone, but they were the superheroes people trusted the most. What remained was the likes of Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Hulk. Not exactly media sweethearts.
To fill this heroic void, Baron Zemo came up with a scheme where he took members of the Masters of Evil, dressed them up with fake superhero identities, and had them gain the public’s trust in hopes that it would lead to world domination. Despite being a ruse, certain members of the Thunderbolts came to realize they wanted to truly be heroes and opposed Zemo. Hawkeye eventually took over the team and they became a group of outlaw heroes fighting for redemption. A reformed Zemo soon took the reins again, once again trying to take over the world…but this time for the good of all humanity.
The Thunderbolts then became a government-run team and acted as Marvel’s counterpart to DC’s Suicide Squad. New leader Norman Osborn politicked his way into running the Avengers, where he copied Zemo’s old idea of dressing up villains as heroes. And so, the Dark Avengers were born, featuring such members as Bullseye pretending to be Hawkeye and Venom pretending to be Spider-Man. Unlike the Thunderbolts, the Dark Avengers were an example of failed redemption on all fronts and the team crumbled. Once Osborn was ousted, Luke Cage took over and the group became far less corrupt.
The Thunderbolts team has been reborn again and again. It’s been seen as a force of good, a force of evil pretending to be good, and a force of evil taking down worse threats. And now it looks to be coming to the MCU.
Let’s look at who will be and who could be major players to this plot down the line:
Valentina Allegra de Fontaine
In the comics, Contessa Valentina Allegra de Fontaine was a triple agent who constantly either worked for SHIELD or against it while being an on-again/off-again love interest of Nick Fury. So she’s perfect for whatever they’re doing with her as she plays up a more curious version of Fury’s iconic visit to Tony Stark’s mansion from the Iron Man post-credits.
We don’t know who Valentina works for and how high up the ladder she is, but she does appear to be setting up something. Whatever her Thunderbolts-like team is called, we’re left wondering why they will exist and how many movies and TV shows will we have to sit through before we finally get an answer.
US Agent
John Walker’s role in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was one of the more interesting parts of the show, even if they didn’t quite land the ending. The US government’s attempt at a new Captain America meant well, but he was only the right person for the job on paper. Too haunted by his military exploits, too frustrated by not getting the respect he wanted, and feeling inadequate due to not being a super soldier, Walker injected himself with a black market serum that gave him the physical boost he needed. It also helped drive him over the edge when Walker’s best friend and partner Battlestar died during a mission and he got a bit too violent while in public.
Disgraced and discharged from his position, Walker was visited by Valentina, who gave him a new lease on life as US Agent. Valentina’s people realize that someone with Walker’s abilities shouldn’t be discarded so easily. Take away the idea that he’s tarnishing a legacy and someone like him could be very, very useful.
In the comics, a wheelchair-bound Walker acted as a warden at the Raft, Marvel’s supervillain prison and, for a time, the headquarters for the Thunderbolts. He did lead the team very, very briefly when it was retitled Dark Avengers, but the series was cancelled immediately after and it was quietly forgotten about. Still, the adventure did allow him to regrow his missing limbs!
For the MCU, this does suggest that this team won’t be a publicly-celebrated unit. You can use US Agent to kick ass all you want, but I doubt Valentina wants a media spotlight on him in any way.
Yelena Belova
As shown in the post-credits for Black Widow, Yelena Belova has been working for Valentina for at least a little while. She’s a paid assassin and she’s going to be going after Hawkeye in the near future on his upcoming Disney+ series. Much like US Agent, she’s a darker replacement of an Avenger who has been taken off the board. Maybe not as easily manipulated as Walker will likely be, though.
The Yelena version of Black Widow was a member of the Thunderbolts in the comics…sort of. It eventually turned out that it was really Natasha disguising herself as Yelena for the sake of doing undercover work against Norman Osborn. Well, I think we can agree that they won’t be doing that twist any time soon.
The Abomination
“We have a Hulk.”
If they’re building a roster full of Avengers knockoffs, it seems rather suspicious that Emil Blonsky is suddenly becoming relevant again. Not only is he supposed to be coming back for the She-Hulk show, but he has a cameo in the Shang-Chi trailer where he’s taking on Wong in an underground cage fight.
Abomination is someone that the government wanted on the Avengers from the very beginning, even in spite of the damage he caused in Harlem. He’s no longer in prison and the events of She-Hulk could end up working in his favor legally. The cage fighting may suggest that he’s a bit aimless, but for a soldier who loves nothing more than to fight, Valentina’s team might be the perfect place for him.
In terms of the comics, Abomination never had anything to do with the Thunderbolts. Though now that I think about it, the Thunderbolts series did a one point focus on super-powered individuals taking part in underground fight clubs. Hm…
Various Thunderbolts Leaders
As mentioned, there have been a lot of different variations of the Thunderbolts and the team has had a handful of different leaders to push the focus in different directions. Four of those leaders happen to have recent roles in the MCU: Baron Zemo, Hawkeye, the Winter Soldier, and General Ross. It’s also very possible that the team is named after the latter considering his nickname is “Thunderbolt Ross.”
Luke Cage and Wilson Fisk are also notable Thunderbolts leaders, but the wonky relationship with the Netflix shows makes them unlikely to get involved.
Hawkeye and Bucky could easily take over the operation and add a little purity to the situation. But if Baron Zemo gets involved? Man, that could be unpredictable and interesting.
Ghost
With Norman Osborn in charge of things, Ghost was thrown into the Thunderbolts and became a major recurring member. Considering he was blatantly written as being Marvel’s Rorschach, it wasn’t he biggest deal when the MCU gender-swapped him and gave him a different personality. The version from Ant-Man and the Wasp is still pretty nihilistic when it comes to authority.
Ghost has been a huge question mark since the mid-credits scene of Ant-Man and the Wasp. The heroes were trying to mine the quantum materials that would normalize Ghost and heal her, only for Thanos’ snap to kick in. We don’t even know if Ghost went away due to the snap, but it’s possible that she was abandoned by those who said they’d help her and that could push her in a very dangerous position.
Considering her past as a SHIELD weapon, she’d make for an interesting member of the group.
Taskmaster
Taskmaster is a lot like Ghost. Not just in that she’s a gender-swapped version of the comic original with a different personality, history, and mission but in the same character arc of going from villain to someone with a new lease on life and opportunity to be more. Taskmaster was last seen being rescued by an army of liberated Black Widows. With her own future to decide, she’s basically in the same boat as Yelena, so it’s fully believable that she too might be working for Valentina.
Also, Taskmaster only just recently joined the Thunderbolts in the comics. That could be an intentional attempt at synergy. Marvel’s been pulling that kind of thing for years.
White Vision
WandaVision ended with the confusing fate of Vision’s reanimated body. SWORD was able to awaken Vision, now without his memories, personality, or color scheme. White Vision fought a magical construct of his original self (AKA “WandaVision”) and allowed his memories to be reinstated. After that, he peaced out and flew off to parts unknown.
Scarlet Witch is meant to be a major player in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, but I’m not expecting White Vision to be a part of that. It would make sense for White Vision to pop up as part of a group of grim doppelgangers. Even if he’s just a dark doppelganger of himself. I imagine the guy needs something constructive to do while keeping a low profile.
Speaking of Doctor Strange…
Karl Mordo
Remember when Mordo became so disillusioned with the Ancient One that he crippled a man for the sake of making a point about how much sorcerers suck? Then he was all, “Haha, I’m going to get rid of all magic users!” Yeah, that was about 10 years ago according to the MCU’s chronology. Good hustle, guy.
The whole Multiverse of Madness thing makes me wonder how much of a role Mordo will have to play in it. And that’s fine because you know what? I bet Valentina would love to have someone like Mordo on her roster. Not only would she have a Dr. Strange counterpart, but getting rid of all magic on Earth seems like the kind of thing a shadowy operative might get behind.
The Vulture
The Spider-Man/Sony deal mucks this up, especially if they’re pushing for some kind of Sinister Six situation, but since Spider-Man: Homecoming, I’ve always thought Vulture would be a perfect member of the MCU Thunderbolts.
See, the thing about Vulture is that the Michael Keaton version is absolutely nothing like the Mr. Burns lookalike comic version outside of fighting Spider-Man and having the ability to fly. In fact, MCU Vulture has a lot more in common with Abner Jenkins. Jenkins started off as blue collar working man who later used his engineering genius to become a Spider-Man supervillain as the Beetle.
As a founding Thunderbolts member, Jenkins became MACH-I (renaming himself after many armor updates) and was one of the first to realize that maybe he was better off being a good guy. He even led the team for a little bit. Considering how sympathetic and likeable MCU Vulture has been, some kind of Thunderbolts/Dark Avengers situation could help redeem him down the line.
Those Yet to be Introduced
Just like MACH, there are certain key members of the comics Thunderbolts who have yet to show up in the MCU. Perhaps we’ll see them soon enough. For instance, there is speculation that Moonstone will probably be a villain in the Captain Marvel sequel The Marvels. Not only does she have similar powers as the heroine, but she also posed as her in Dark Avengers.
The Fixer/Techno is another big one as the team’s resident tech guy and loyal Zemo henchman. Atlas, who has size-changing powers, is easily someone who can show up in the next Ant-Man movie. Jolt is…actually, we really don’t need Jolt.
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The biggest name to not show up is Songbird. Formerly the villain Screaming Mimi, Melissa Gold is practically the heart and soul of the Thunderbolts. She’s the one who came out of it better than anyone to the point that she was even an Avenger for a little while. If you want to put together a cynical Avengers knockoff and have someone turn it into something optimistic, Songbird is the one you need to throw in.
The post Marvel’s Road to the Thunderbolts in the MCU appeared first on Den of Geek.
from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/3z9IfTW
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wasabi-duck · 7 years
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romeo - namjoon
idk how to label this because romeo and juliet is obviously Straight so like im just calling it romeo namjoon so i hope you enjoy!! again, it’s gender neutral so!!
hey people i submitted all my college apps so i think i can maybe try harder with this blog
okay so for this au!! you and namjoon are fated to be together
the kim family is really really prominent in society today
not so much political or social, but economically-speaking they’re one of the top players across the board
his family controls the shipping market, whether it be post, or air, or sea
they control it all
almost everything goes through the kim family shipping industry if it isn’t public post
and that’s just the domestic market, they also do a whole ton of international business too, and have a presence all across the globe- from china, to the usa, to germany
growing up, namjoon knew that he was going to inherit the business
his entire life his family prepped him for the business, whether it be training in how to be polite and diplomatic, to going to the most prestigious schools in the country to make sure that he was over and beyond when it came to areas like economics and maths
namjoon’s entire existence revolved around being the heir for the powerful kim business, and it was almost like he wasn’t allowed to exist
he was there for the money, the power, the glory
never for himself
he always lived in the shadow of his parents, or the business
as he got older, things got worse
because more expectations were pushed on him, and suddenly the 97 in differential equations wasn’t good enough, he needed 100
and days where he used to sit in his room, messing around with a music program on his computer… he now needs to force himself to meet anyone and everyone who might have some relation to his future in the business world, half of them who are over the age of like… seventy-two
and as he got older, things also got worse because of well…
you
well, not exactly you, but your family
your family runs the most well-known media outlet in the country
and that’s just a nice way to put it
you guys are basically the paparazzi, and although there are other, smaller groups around, none of them compare to your family
seeing as how the kims are the most influential people in the shipping business, and some of the most powerful people in the business playing field, so your basically always trailing them wherever they go
it’s never a role that you wanted to be a part of
you always wanted to be a normal kid, with a normal life
but you remember one of your first gifts being a camera, and not like a cute lil baby camera, but a nice, expensive one
and you were like anyway i was like five but…
so your entire life you’ve been told that the most important goal is to find the truth, no matter what the cost
but your family definitely stretched that a bit, and you can’t help but think they invade to many private lives just to get a story, just to find anything that will make the public go absolutely wild
because of this, you’ve run into namjoon more than a few times
never personally, and never to chit-chat, but simply because you were on the scene, your camera held in your shaking hands as you tried to snap pictures of him getting out of the airport
you kind of… think he’s cute…
but it’s not like you could ever approach him
you know his family hates your family’s guts…
and your family isn’t necessarily a fan of the kims either
your family just sticks with them for the money, there’s no idolization there, actually quite the opposite, they dislike the kims for their disillusion towards the general public
when you sit down and think about it, more of the stories your family has published have been scandalous
which you know is because the public likes that…
but also because your family wants to see them pay for their general disregard and mistreatment of the public
because the kims are notorious for having prices much too high for the average person to pay continually, and since they have a monopoly on the industry, there is no competition and no incentive to work better
and so to say that there’s some animosity between your families… would be right
but you’re drawn to namjoon
he seems different from his family
where they all appear stiff and cold, his smile could light up an entire room
you’ve never seen him speak rudely to any of the paparazzi, or the public
he handles himself so professionally, and when you have had the privilege to sit in on press conference or public business meetings… he always is polite and courteous, and always listens to what everyone else has to say
and you kinda have a lil crush on him
but you’re just the shy kid behind the camera…
so like, he’d never notice you anyway
but then…
an invitation to a party shows up on your doorstep one day
your crazy mother realizes that ah yes, a party for the most socially elite means that you can get so much dirt on people there, so she’s like haha… you gotta go
and you’re like can i not i would rather sit inside and marry leo off to selena because they are my otp,,,
and your mom is like anyway you better figure out what you’re wearing
you wanna know how the hell you got invited in the first place, but you guess because your family is socially prominent you were somehow invited too…
okay so party time
it’s at some nightclub??
your girl is underage as heck so idk what they’re about
anyway i imagine some great dance music would be playing, with the bass super boosted, like idk… everytime we touch by cascada
and the lights are all dark but they have strobe lights going i think that’s what they’re called at least
and it’s, like i said, super dark, so it’s not like you can see anyone, and you maybe forgot your camera
and like there are so many people!! no matter where you go, there are at least twenty people accidentally bumping into you and it’s all a little overwhelming, so you grab a drink (grape juice) and head over to the back corner of the club where it’s less noisy, and there are less people around to bother you,,,
finally, some peace and quiet…
you close your eyes and take a deep breath
your parents would flip if you came home early, and there’s no use being outside, alone, in the dark, when everything is closed…
so you stay put, instead rummaging around your bag to see if you can find your earbuds and phone so you can just chill by yourself
you grab onto what you assume is your earbuds, but before you can pull them out, someone bumps into you, with enough impact that you topple forward
the person, apparently startled just as much as you, loses their balances, and falls on the ground right beside you
you look up
and everything slows down
it’s the part of everytime we touch where she’s like your arms are my castle btw
you blink, your eyes unable to focus in the dim light, and when your vision finally clears, you recognize the person to be none other than kim namjoon…
you startle, quickly pulling away from him, your face red in embarrassment
namjoon frowns, clearly confused, but then a look of recognition spreads across his face and he smiles a little shyly
“i think i know you.”
you nod slowly, not taking your gaze off of him
“i think i know you too…”
he stands up, then offers you a hand, which you take gratefully
he coughs awkwardly and you put your hand on the back of your neck
“um… i’m namjoon.”
and you introduce yourself too, and you almost feel the need to apologize because you’re sure that you and your family have caused him so much trouble
but you don’t know what to say, but you stay silent, unsure of what you should do next
namjoon doesn’t say anything at first, but then he sees something on the floor, and bends over to pick it up
it’s your earbuds
he hands them over with a small smile “i had the same idea.”
“parties aren’t really my thing…” you laugh softly
“mine either.” he pauses, shoving his hands in his pockets before adding, “so if you want to… maybe head outside?”
your brows furrow
“god that probably sounded creepy, i meant, like get out of here, i know a cool little diner that’s open twenty-four hours, the coffee sucks, but the dessert is pretty great.”
you laugh and nod sheepishly “yah, that sounds nice.”
so you and namjoon dip out of the party, and head down to the cafe where you talk the entire night away
you exchange numbers too hehe
anyway, as the weeks progress, you two talk more and more, and things get a little flirtier and flirtier
and you’ve become glued to your phone, and your cousin, yoongi, is like, “anyway who’s the hot babe and do they have a brother”
and youre like “yoongi,,, plz,,, it is not like that, namjoon is just a- ooPS”
cause you had namjoon under a code name like “B)” or something awful like that and you thought that you had this all under wraps but now you just basically admitted everything to yoongi isn’t that just the greatest
“kim namjoon? like the guy our family is so intent on stalking and tarnishing his name and everything? the kim namjoon who wears beanie when it is obviously bucket hat season?? that kim namjoon?”
“um…”
“he totally has a hot cousin.”
you blink “so wait, you’re not… telling on me?”
yoongi shrugs “i don’t see why i should.”
and you smile and hug him and yoongi just laughs and ruffles your hair
yoongi is the one who covers for you when you sneak out to see namjoon
and boy howdy do you see namjoon a lot
like yoongi always drives you to meet up with him, whether it be the diner, or the park, or the city!!
and he always makes awful excuses when your family asks where you are
and namjoon’s cousin, jungkook, does the same thing for him, and the two of them often meet up and laugh about it over bitter coffee
you and namjoon are so in love though, and it’s a passionate affair, not for the cheating aspect, god no, but because everything must be done in secret
every time you press your lips to his, you’re afraid that suddenly your mother will walk around the corner and rip you away from his arms
and when you two are out and about, walking down the streets, your hold his hand so tightly, so fearful that you could be torn away from him at any second
every time you call him it’s late at night, because you’re scared that your father might accidentally stop and listen in when you’re least expecting it, and your entire world will crumble to pieces
namjoon is the same way though, extra careful, extra cautious, and he always says it, says he hates how you two have to hide your relationship just because your guys’ parents hate each other
but it’s something he’s willing to hide if it means seeing you every day, being with you every day
except that you two aren’t as careful as you should hope to be, because one day you leave your phone unlocked and it just so happens that your mother was cleaning up your room a little bit, and she picked up the phone and read the messages and realized that these gentle “i love yous” were all sent to none other than kim namjoon
and she hurries down the steps, your phone in her hand, cursing and shouting and asking you what in the hell you’re thinking
and your eyes widen in horror as you realize your mistake and you rush over to try and grab the phone from her hands, but in a fit of rage, she throws the phone down and it’s probably an awful iphone or something so the entire thing shatters in a million pieces
this of course is your breaking point, and you start to sob, begging your mother to change her mind, trying to tell her that there’s nothing wrong about this, but she doesn’t listen, instead storms off to go talk to your father
you kneel down and hold the broken phone in your hands, continuing to cry harder
yoongi, startled by the commotion, comes racing in, and when he sees you, sees the scene, everything clicks
he holds you in his arms and promising things will be okay but you know they will not
after that, your parents ban you from leaving the house
you are confined to your room, and if you want to leave your room, you have to stay within the house, even being limited to indoors, as in, like can’t even see the garden
at first, namjoon thinks you’re ignoring him or something and his heart breaks because it’s not like you to ignore him, ever
but yoongi texts jungkook who tells namjoon the situation, and from that moment on, he is planning a way to get you back
one night, it’s been like a week since the incident, you are sitting on your bed, watching psych
when you hear a faint knock
you think it must be a squirrel or something like that outside?
so you ignore it
but the noise continues
so you head over to your window, and step out into the balcony, and standing there, with a large bag slung over his shoulders, is namjoon
he waves, and you cup your hands over your mouth
“are you coming?”
“like hell i’m gonna trust you to catch me!”
you laugh, and the tears have already started to prick the corners of your eyes
he smiles softly “i love you”
“I love you too namjoon…”
and im saying the balcony isn’t super high so you’re like fxxk it and you jump and he catches you and you’re both safe and sound
and when you are safely on your feet, you lean up and kiss him and he wraps his arms around your waist and pulls you close
and it feels like you kiss him for an eternity, and you want to kiss him for an eternity, but he says there’s no time, and that you two need to hurry before someone realizes something is up
he says that his friend hoseok is offering up his place for you two to stay
and with that, you two vanish into the night
obviously both sets of parents find out, and it doesn’t take them long to realize where you two are hiding
but namjoon is like nah not coming home until you recognize our love,,,
and so both parents are like our children and their happiness are most important so they are willing to make amends
you and namjoon come back home but he was digging the cute apartment vibe so he asks if you two can move out together if he still decides to manage the business in the near future
and your parents are all !! about it at first but they agree because you two are most important
and you and namjoon are happily in love and you have a cute apartment where you two snuggle and kiss all the time mwah mwah
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yeonchi · 6 years
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2017 In Review
It’s been a very eventful and turbulent year, with quite a few things, both good and bad, happening all over the network.
Over on the Waifu Network, I’ve restarted Waifu Pros and Cons with the intention of hopefully posting at least one entry per month. The posts on the Waifu Network are pretty much linked to my anime posting on Facebook, so I needn’t make original posts for every page, which makes my life very easier.
We’ve introduced Ritsu’s brother and Azusa’s boyfriend, Satoshi Tainaka, as a new poster on the Waifu Network this year. This was a tie-in to the series A Month of Summer Azusas and its mini-series The Missing Pics on the Ecchi Waifu Network, which (despite delays) went off without a hitch. Anime Tiddie Check was also intended to be a series that estimated the breast sizes of the Waifu Network girls and compared various artists’ (official and fanart) interpretations and portrayals of them. However, it was made a one-off instalment for the K-On girls because there was a lack of viable nude group fanart for the other series we’ve featured.
I’d like to take a moment to pay tribute to three people who inspired me to begin the Koei Warriors Rant Series, namely Matthew Barth, Nathan Kennedy and Mansour Abdulla. Matthew became an admin on the Fans of Anime page for a little bit, but he was a staunch proponent of English voices in Koei Warriors games. Nathan was fighting with depression for a long time (as far as I knew), so I was particularly concerned for him. He deactivated his account in September this year and I haven’t heard from him since. Mansour became disillusioned with Koei Tecmo omitting English voices from their games and gave up on them a while back, even when I transitioned to discussing Japanese game localisation in the West. An honourable mention also goes to Scooter McDowell for helping me out with compiling the EX and Musou attack list for the characters in Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires, which was a big help for me at the time (it’s been a few years, so you should be able to find that information on wikis already).
The #NoDubNoBuy page will be changing its name to English Dubbed Game News from January 18, 2018 and we will no longer be reposting negative comments in the name-and-shame album as it has now been deleted. I will not confirm or deny the fact that recent events have influenced this decision, but regardless of this, I stand by what I said about the comments and the people who wrote them. More information can be found in this post.
The Undub page has strangely gone dead recently as their last update (at the time of writing) was posted on September 9. In the months before this, they have been promoting a website known as Own Your Game, which provides information on games that have physical releases, whether Western or Japanese. They have even gone to great lengths to show the text and voice languages that the game has, which fits with their standard of games being released with dual audio and as many text languages as possible. (UPDATE: 3 January 2018 - Apparantly, the Undub page is not dead. Thanks for clearing that up.)
Over the past three years, you may have seen me comment about English dubs on some posts on the Koei Tecmo Facebook page. I’ve decided to drop that because I feel that my time and efforts are wasted trying to convince a bunch of sheep to support dual audio when Koei Tecmo doesn’t make any effort towards dubbing their games. I’ll admit that I’ve lost interest in Dynasty Warriors and other Koei Warriors games recently because of this and other commitments. I’ve expanded to talking about English dub in general over the past few years, but right now, I just feel like posting news about games that have been dubbed or not. If that helps the English dub fanbase, then I’m happy with it.
I had plans to revive the Sea Princesses cartoon in order to complete the Sea Princesses Wiki, but I’ve decided to put that on hiatus because I’ve heard nothing regarding reruns or fansubs over the past year. I was going to post details about my proposed fansub project, but I’ve decided to put that on hold as well because I’ve been very busy (and not because no one would be interested in it, in case people are pointing that out). The vandalism of pages on the wiki is also continuing, but I’ve decided that it would be a waste of time to continue undoing random changes made by stupid people who have no idea about the cartoon (and rightly so).
Obviously, we’ve had a few conflicts with some people over the years and out of all of them, I think we’ve only had one or two that have escalated. Despite everything that has happened, I think that the main reason as to why the Network has continued to survive to this day is because we stood tall and maintained the high ground in the face of adversity. People have tried to discredit us over the years, but they failed because of various factors - they may have made points that were missing the point, they may not fully understand the topic in question, or they were just being petty (because I already proved that they were morally worse than me). I’m actually tempted to generalise all my naysayers in a negative light, but in the end, all I can count on is the satisfaction of being on the moral high ground. If you want to win an argument with me, your best bet is to just have a polite and civilised discussion, otherwise, it’ll just end up in a conflict with stupid people fighting stupid with stupid.
I’ve stopped actively looking for people to admin my Facebook pages as I’ve found that there hasn’t been a lot of interest in it over the past few years. It’s really sad when you’ve already hired admins to post on your pages and they don’t do anything, which makes you think that they probably shouldn’t have applied to be an admin in the first place. Personally, I think the way I’m running my pages is going good so far, even if the growth is a bit slow because I don’t use dishonest methods to promote my pages.
Speaking of pages, the rumour about non-business pages being deleted is still going on. Even though the timing of the rumour coincides with recent events that caused me to be postblocked three times in a month, I still think that it is bullshit. I won’t elaborate any further on this, but I hope that the people responsible for the reports thinks about the irreversible damage they have caused just for being petty on social media.
Rumours have been spread about me being an “attention-seeking dork with no friends” in relation to the #NoDubNoBuy page and the Dub Logistics series, or me using my niche status on the internet to promote hate and harassment in relation to the political posts on Hong Kong news that a page related to the Network has posted. Firstly, I like to keep my personal life separate from my online life, so what right have you to make judgements about me based on my opinions? Secondly, I’m not the type of person who wants to be perceived that way (in fact, who does?). I like to see myself as an insightful person who likes to speak their mind about things. Obviously, I’ve kept myself informed regarding current affairs in Hong Kong and Mainland China and like other people, I have negative opinions regarding the current situation over there, particularly when it comes to governance and law enforcement (criminal activities). Granted, some offensive language may have been used, but chances are that other people have the same thoughts I have, even if they would have worded it differently.
(UPDATE: 3 January 2018 - Looking back, I’m not even sure what effect the other party was trying to achieve with the events of the feud. Him ‘flexing’ over my posts being reported was definitely a ruse to attract my attention, but it didn’t work well because I didn’t hear about it until three weeks after the first post was reported. As I mentioned, some of his actions did nothing to redeem himself, yet it didn’t seem to mean much to other people since they didn’t pay much attention to it. Personally, I still think that he is either trolling or being paranoid about his reputation. He can say that I’ve been wrong about him and I can say that he’s been wrong about me, but I think that both of us should be grateful in at least one aspect, including the fact that the feud hasn’t escalated to drama the likes of YouTube, 4chan, Reddit, or even Encyclopedia Dramatica, where other people could start taking sides and blowing things way out of proportion. I’d like to reiterate that all views and opinions of the feud have been left to each party’s own interpretation - this is just my side of it. Both of us have moved on from all this, so hopefully in time, it’ll all become a forgotten afterimage.)
Given that I’ve kept the Hong Kong page separate from the rest of the Network, the thing I’m trying to say here is “don’t believe the rumours”. I can only say this because I have a niche fanbase; if I was famous like Keemstar, Leafy or RiceGum, that statement wouldn’t stick with everyone. This is my way of telling you all to focus on the positives and not the negatives.
So, despite what others may say about my fanbase, I’d like to thank my fans for their continued support. You don’t need to be flattered or anything because I know who you are. I wish you all the best for 2018.
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