#4. lack of his own bodily autonomy | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

payphoneangel · 1 year

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HEHEHE 4 & 5 for Sam, 9 & 10 for Dean, and 14, 15, & 18 for Cas >:3c

Send me a character + a number and I’ll tell you my headcanons for them

DOHOHOHOH OKAY HELL YEAH

Sam (given the nature of these two i'm gonna b a little horny abt it lol) 4) Best places to kiss on their body: uhhhh first and foremost his cute lil pointy nose!! give that bad boy a hearty ~chu~ But if the kisser wants to really feel how they're affecting him I would say go along the jawline. He carries a lot of tension in his jaw and it would be fun to feel how that tension lessens/intensifies by being smooched. (Spicy version) I think starting at the hip and kissing down the V of his abdomen would be fun for all parties involved. 5) Guilty pleasures: Now this one is very fun bc has his whole obsession with purity and being 'clean' so there's a lot of things he doesn't allow himself to do. I def think one of his guilty pleasures is that he likes Chick fil a. He knows they're a super shitty homophobic corporation and he KNOWS he shouldn't support them AND a lot of the food on the menu is 'unhealthy' and something he can't eat bc of [insert w/e diet he's on this week] but he loves it. OH, how he loves it. It's his comfort food. He likes their special sauce and even when he tries to make it himself it never quite tastes right so he will occasionally buy food from there and then feel awful about it for like 3 days afterward. (Spicy version (warning for mentions of SA)) Ok so I think Sam has a lot of weird hangups about sex. Particularly, he feels weird about subbing. I do think he enjoys it, but where the guilt comes in is that he doesn't feel like he should enjoy it because of the ways in which his bodily autonomy has been jeopardized. It feels very strange to him to derive pleasure from a situation that resembles a context in which the circumstances were very dire for him. I think it's scary for him to give up that sense of control, but even scarier that he actually enjoys it. Since Sam has been known to diminish and trivialize his own trauma, I think subbing might make him slip into a spiral about if he 'actually was assaulted' bc if he enjoys it here how bad were the times when he was forced to submit to someone? I think he has a lot of trouble acknowledging himself as a victim, and I think enjoying subbing would make him think himself a """bad victim""" if he doesn't actively work to get out of that mindset. Because of that, I don't think he subs often, and only with someone he really really trusts, but I think he does really enjoy it and can even derive some catharsis from it.

Dean 9) Humiliating memories: ooooooooh ok now this one is a little tough bc Dean is constantly tormented by The Shame so it's hard to pick out a specific instance where he was definitely humiliated buuuuuut in my personal headcanon one of the most impactful times is his first solo hunt. More specifically, the situation leading up to Dean's first hunt. I mention it here, but essentially, John catches on to Dean having feelings for another boy, which scares the hell out of Dean. After disappearing for a few days (leaving Dean alone and sick to his stomach with anxiety for John's total lack of a reaction) he comes back to the motel, picks Dean up, and tells him to go do a salt and burn of two dead gay nuns. He does, but also internalizes the message John is sending: this is what happens to people like you. John picks him up afterward and never directly says what he's referring to, but tells Dean, "you need to be careful and not be selfish. Your stupid decisions could get you or even Sammy hurt." That, of course, makes Dean feel so astoundingly horrible, he can barely respond. It's why I am in the camp of 'Dean is painfully aware of his attraction to men, but rarely acts on it/never vocalizes it.' bc ^this memory, coupled with the homophobia of the 90's/00's makes Dean very wary of how he carries himself and the kind of """negative attention""" he wants to could attract, and how that could endanger himself/other people around him. 10) Fears/phobias: ok this could couple nicely with the thing i just talked about above but instead I'm going to go in an entirely different direction: DEAN IS (or should be) SCARED OF DOGS. It's honestly pretty wild to me that this really isn't touched on in canon. One of his most significant/narratively impactful deaths is when he was mauled by Hellhounds, and consequently dragged to Hell for 40 years. Canon like, farts in this direction sorta in s6 but it's really not talked about. Homeboy got sliced and diced by dogs!!! He should have some residual stuff about that!! Also I think it would be a point of contention between himself and Sam, Known Dog Lover. It's also why i'm team 'fuck that dog' from the finale. Although, it could be cathartic for him to have an esa/therapy animal be a dog, to rebuild trust.

Castiel 14) Ingrained habits/forces of habit: this one is SO fun for him bc there's so many possibilities with him being an angel. I think this manifests a lot as physical ticks/quirks from being an angel in a human vessel. I think a 'force of habit' of his is literally breathing. He really only needs to breathe in order to talk, but I think in early seasons he catches himself doing it all the time, as a leftover instinct from his human vessel. Later, he catches himself mirroring Dean's, Sam's and other people's breathing as he starts growing closer to humanity, before eventually just adopting breathing all the time. I think it also takes him a long time when he's human to get used to moving at a human speed. If he realizes he needs to go somewhere, his first thought is to fly, and he often has this moment of "why am I not there yet?" before realizing he needs to physically move his human body 🙄🙄🙄 I also think it would be really fun if, especially after first obtaining a vessel, he often speaks quietly because he is used to overwhelming humans with his True Voice. 15) What it takes to make them cry: 🤔🤔🤔 I think Cas is like, a medium-frequency crier (order of most to least likely to cry imo is Dean, Cas, Sam). I think he IS a happy crier and that's what most often causes him to cry; being overwhelmed by positive emotions (i.e. love for his family). I don't think he's normally an angry crier but I do think that when Jack died he should have 1) gone completely silent and stone faced 2) leveled like an entire forest in grief-induced rage and 3) broken down in full on heaving sobs in the middle of all the destruction. 18)Things they’ll never admit: OUGH THIS ONE IS SO JUICY FOR HIM. SO SO JUICY. This one stumped me a bit at first because Cas is a very honest person who normally speaks his mind. He's also pretty self aware. BUT the thing that Cas will never admit is that he kind of revels in being The Universe's Greatest Fool. Like, he's the Angel that Fell in Every Way Imaginable!! He betrayed all his kin and fucked up The Father's Great Narrative, all because he fell in love with a stupid human!! A Bug, Even!!! A BUG WHO DOESN'T LOVE HIM BACK (he does, but, well, see above). And he does it, over and over and over again. He always chooses humanity; he always chooses Dean. The thing is, there's a part of him that feels really comfortable in that idea of ceaseless devotion without acknowledgement; without reciprocity. Of course, it's familiar, but on top of that, I think there's a part of him that still houses guilt for going against his programming. We know he was lobotomized countless times; certainly there's residual feelings about straying from his designed path? And I think it's easier, in a way, to wallow in this self-pity, then to actually attempt to vocalize his wants and ask for what he needs. So, essentially, he fell and he feels like he needs to be punished, and the best possible punishment is for his one true desire to be something he can never obtain, because he doesn't deserve to have what he wants. Anything else feels foreign.

#vinny answers #that was fun #shit got heavy but like. this is a drama tv show so #also to anybody reading this please lmk if you want me to tag certain triggers

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young-dumb-and-vaccinated · 3 years

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Cult Girl: Doctorate (Hannibal x Female!Reader) pt. 4

Will

Cult girl attends her grandmother's funeral and is approached with a highly unorthodox last will and testament.

@wisesandwichshark

Trigger warnings: emotional manipulation and abuse, verbal abuse, death, slight emetophobia, body-shaming, ED mention, pregnancy and family planning

There was no use recounting anything from the leading up to the funeral. You spent that first night wine-drunk, munching on foie gras, watching Arrested Development and diagnosing each character to the best of your psychological abilities. You remembered cry-laughing at the same jokes you had memorized, and reminiscing on all the insane shit your own personal Lucille Bluth pulled on you. That was the highlight of the week. It was all downhill from there.

Firstly, you were sick. That Sunday, you wrote it off as a hangover. Then, the hangover returned with a vengeance, just to add salt to the already open wound of having to pretend to mourn your abusive grandmother. At least the physical pain would give your acting an air of sincerity, you thought.

Hannibal dressed in a solid black tux: it was almost uncanny to see him outside of any of his normal checkered suits. You selected a plain black dress and a strand of pearls.

The funeral was to be held at the same country club Anna’s wedding was held. Your grandmother was like a pharaoh, insisting that the empire she built know that even in death, she reigned supreme. The country club was her pyramid.

Anna asked if you wanted to say a few words. As much as you wanted to get up and tell all her country club friends about the time she reported you as an abducted child at age twenty-two when you refused to leave your boyfriend and move back in with her, you knew that it wasn’t in good taste. You racked your brain for any story that could be considered remotely funeral-appropriate, but none came to mind.

You spent the entire funeral trying not to roll your eyes too obviously at the stories of abuse her country club friends somehow remembered fondly. Your soul just left your body throughout the entire process and you were unsure if it would ever return.

All things considered, it could have gone much worse. Then, it did.

The beginning of the end was when your grandmother’s estate lawyer pulled you and Anna aside to conduct the reading of the will. He showed you to a side room, then excused himself before closing the door behind him.

“Hello, [F/N].” Liam greeted, trying to cut through the awkward silence that came with first seeing each other after four straight years. “I’m very sorry about your gran. She was a great woman.”

You gave him a smile that didn’t quite reach your eyes. “Thanks, Lee. I appreciate it.”

“No she doesn’t.” Anna muttered. “And it’s Liam.”

“I don’t mind ‘Lee’.” Liam contested. “My mum called me Lee. I actually quite like it.”

Anna was in one of her ‘I’m so upset, please ask me why’ moods. She sat on one of the heavy armchairs with her legs crossed and eyes to the wall. You weren’t going to bite.

Liam wasn’t so cautious. “Princess, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” She pouted, not even dignifying her husband with a look. “I just think it’s interesting that I put the funeral together all by myself and someone couldn’t even be bothered to speak.”

You shot Liam a look that said ‘way to go, jackass’.

“Yeah,” You said, sitting down in an adjacent armchair. “That must suck.”

Anna glared at you. “You really have nothing to say? Really?”

You tensed up. “Let’s see, which charming anecdote would you have me tell? How about that time when she made you wear a fat suit for an hour after you complained about how the low-carb ice cream tasted like chemicals?”

Liam looked in shock at his wife. “Did she really?”

“Once.” Anna confessed, holding up one finger.

You turned to Liam, as if you were sharing some hot gossip. “That was all it took to give her an eating disorder when she was thirteen.”

Hannibal was just a fly on the wall. Anna noticed his lack of reaction.

“And I bet Hannibal knows all about this, huh?” Anna said, throwing her hand in his direction. “Because he just needs to hear all of our private family business, right?”

You stood up from your seat. “First of all, I take offense at the implication that my fiancée isn’t family.”

An evil smile spread on Anna’s face. “But he wasn’t always your fiancé, was he, [F/N]?”

“Holy shit, you cracked the code.” You said, flatly. “There was a point in time when Hannibal and I weren’t an item. Real shocker, that one.”

“You know what I mean.” She sneered, then approached Hannibal. “Dr. Lecter, is it true that before you and [F/N] became romantically involved, you were her therapist?”

Liam looked scandalized. Hannibal was just as put-together as always.

“That is true.” He said, feeling no shame whatsoever.

Anna turned back to you. “Now don’t you think that’s just a smidge unethical? For a therapist to date their much younger patient?”

You narrowed your eyes. You carried yourself with the lightness of a woman who finally had the moral high ground. “So you want to talk about what’s ethical, huh? I suppose that means you’ve told Liam about pineapple.”

All the blood drained from her face. You crossed your arms and held your head up a little higher.

“That’s what I thought.” You grinned.

“Look, could we just pretend to be a normal, functioning family for ten minutes?” Anna pleaded, as if there were anyone other than herself to blame for provoking an argument.

“That’s on you two.” Liam, rightfully, pointed out. He gestured to himself and then to Hannibal. “Neither of us have said anything.”

The estate lawyer must have gotten his juris doctorate alongside a master's in impeccable fucking timing, because that was when he decided to make his entrance.

"I'm sorry for the wait, everyone." He announced. "And I'm sorry for having to pull you aside in your hour of mourning. Usually the last will and testament is handled through email to the beneficiaries, but your grandmother was quite adamant it be approached this way."

"That definitely sounds like her." You said, exchanging glances with Hannibal. You'd talked about this for what felt like hours the week prior. She was going to pull some last-minute bullshit to humiliate you from beyond the grave. Give all the inheritance to Anna and leave a snide comment about you in a legal document. You knew it was coming. All you could hope was for it to be quick.

The lawyer pulled an envelope from his briefcase. "She specifically asked for her two living grandchildren and their significant others to be present."

"Did she say it like that?" Anna raised an eyebrow. "Or was it more like, 'Anna and her husband, and [F/N] and her therapist'?"

"Mrs. Young," Hannibal said, taking your hand. "Until you tell your husband about pineapple, you aren't allowed to judge us."

Anna glared at you. "What the hell? He knows, too?!"

"Yeah." You answered. "I tell him everything."

"Okay, who or what is pineapple?" Liam interjected. "And why do I get the feeling I'm the only one not in the know, here?"

"That's cause you are." You confirmed. "And you have your lovely wife to thank for that."

"Everyone!" The lawyer called out. Clearly, he'd seen his share of dysfunctional families. "Please, let me just read the will and you can continue arguing afterwards."

"Y'know what? Fair enough." You said, crossing your legs. "Let's rip off this band-aid, shall we?"

The lawyer opened the envelope and produced a single page. He cleared his throat.

"I, Beatrice [L/N], being of sound mind and body, do hereby bequeath all my worldly possessions-" He began reading the long first sentence. "Including but not limited to, a collective sum of $45 million, the family home and my shares of the country club, to the first of my granddaughters to give birth."

You expected nothing. You expected something. But you never could have expected this.

"Can you please read that last part again?" You asked, unsure if what you heard was the result of a stroke.

"The entire inheritance goes to the first one of you to have a baby." The lawyer clarified, trying to make it sound like a reasonable arrangement.

"That makes sense." Anna said, nodding.

You looked at her, dumbfounded. "How in the fuck on fire does that make sense to you?"

"Well, the money would be going to a good cause." She rationalized. "To raise the baby, right?"

You shook your head. "No, this is insane. Grandma has always had this weird obsession with bloodlines, and now she's trying to incentivize us to carry it out."

"What happens if neither of us can, y'know?" Anna asked.

The lawyer pushed his glasses up his nose. "If neither granddaughter is willing to produce a child, the entire inheritance will go to the Eagle Forum, so my ungrateful grandchildren can learn about family values."

"She hated the Eagle Forum!" Anna objected. "She wouldn't dare."

"She absolutely would." You pressed your fingers into your forehead. "That's upper-class white moderates for you. And she doesn't have to be around to see when they name a fucking wing after her."

"The Beatrice [L/N] center for denying women bodily autonomy." Hannibal said. "It's quite fitting."

"[F/N], we can't let that happen." Anna pleaded. "We can't let Eagle Forum get a penny of that money."

"Why the hell not?" You said. Though on principle, you agreed, you knew this was just another one of your grandmother's power grabs. At the end of the day, she chose to leave her money to the Eagle Forum. And it would be her name on that check, not yours.

"Oh my god, you actually hate babies more than you hate conservatives." Anna stood with her mouth agape.

"Don't put words in my mouth." You snapped. "I don't hate babies. I hate grandma for trying to threaten me into having one. I hate grandma for pinning us against each other and making sure it stays that way."

"What do you have against giving me a little niece or nephew, huh?" Anna folded her arms.

"I'm fucking done." You said, throwing up your hands. "This will be the last you ever see of me."

Of course, that's what you said the last time.

#hannibal lecter #hannibal x you #hannibal x reader #hannibal nbc #more cult girl #cult girl #cult girl 2 #tw pregnancy #tw emotional abuse #tw death #tw conservatives

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astoryinred · 3 years

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"Trese" and the truth in the fiction

In short: why the actual monsters in Trese don't have horns, wings, or summoning rituals

Finally the Netflix anime adaptation of the Filipino graphic novel/comics series "Trese" has dropped. It is available in several languages such as English, Filipino, Japanese, Spanish...just to name a few. It is not a perfect work, both in technical terms as well as an adaptation of the source material, but it is worth a watch. Go watch it. Please.

That being said, there is so much to unpack about the series, and I do not mean in terms of the voice-acting and the ethnicities of the persons involved, or just how crunched together the writing is. I will leave that to the critics. What I am writing here is a view as to the real life truths woven into the horror/supernatural threads of the "Trese" episodes, and why these are important. It's because for a lot of people encountering "Trese" at this point, the actual every day monsters of the tale (or at least of the first 4 episodes) are even more distant than the aswangs, tikbalangs, nunos and other supernatural beings that populate the anime.

This will go into spoilers below the cut

Episode 1: The series opens with a train stopping right near the "Guadalupe Station", and some of its passengers being attacked by aswang as they walk along the railroad tracks. During the course of investigating this and another case (that of a ghost murdered on Balete Drive), Alexandra Trese learns that other spirits using this train line have recently perished in a fire or have also been murdered by aswang in league with a politician.

The squatter/informal settler community mentioned in this episode is based on a real one. That area has gone up in flames from accidental and not so accidental fires over the past few decades. Some of the settlers have moved on, but a good many have stubbornly stuck around despite the land being eyed by a large property developer. That area is a symptom of the inequality that plagues that particular part of the metropolis, since it is only less than a mile away from some of the country's swankiest gated subdivisions. While the powers that be are (probably) not involved in selling anyone for meat, they still have a long way to go to address the woes of that community when it is not election season.

As for the other murder in the episode? There have been several cases of women associated with or married to prominent politicians who have died in mysterious circumstances, with some of these deaths ruled as suicide. In many cases, the truth has been hushed up, or simply swept under the rug.

Episode 2: While Alexandra is pursuing the trail of a tikbalang running wild in the city, she also is called to investigate a mysterious series of electrocutions in a gated village. Along the way she discovers that this is a form of human sacrifice to the bagyons manning the electricity providers of the city.

As reprehensible as the bagyons are, what is truly sickening is the seeming indifference of the people in Livewell Village. It's mentioned more in the comics (but also given a line or two of exposition here by the Nuno) that the people regularly offer an outsider, usually a skilled worker in charge of maintenance, to ensure that the bagyon will bless them. In real life there is the callousness that some people exhibit towards essential workers such as yes, repairmen and electricians who have to endure heights and storms just to ensure the "comfort" of consumers. Although the Philippines isn't a country crawling with litiginous folk and "Karens", there are enough of this sort to make essential workers' lives miserable on a daily basis.

Episode 3: This is a difficult one, both in the comics and the anime. One of Trese's cases leads her to cross paths with an actress named Nova, who is later revealed to have had her child left to die (hence making her a target for a specific type of monster). Nova's story is admittedly not easy to deal with and may be considered incredulous, but there are two important contexts to remember when watching it.

The first is that abortion is still illegal throughout the Philippines. It cannot be legally offered by any clinic or medical practitioner. There are clandestine alternatives available, but at a steep price.

That being said, most Filipinos regardless of where they stand on the abortion issue will still consider the abandonment or murder of an infant to be beyond the pale. Yet this does happen. Every month one can expect to read a story or two of babies being tossed in the trash or left in bathrooms---and those are just the stories that make it to the press. There have been exposes about mothers who have sold off their infants to "adopters" willing to pay thousands of pesos or dollars for an under the table transfer of custody. These happen because of desperation, poverty, and lack of resources to support mothers. Maternity leave is only up to 120 days here in most cases, and there are few resources to support mothers with PPD, mothers abandoned by their partners, or those with just too many mouths to feed. Questions of "bodily autonomy" are not first and foremost in the mind of many women who do the worst to their newborns; the question is food on the table for the next day or the day after. Survival is key. Not independence or empowerment.

With these in mind, it is not surprising that Nova is considered one of the most disturbing and reprehensible characters in this episode. From what we see, her choice of abandoning her child stems from vanity and pursuit of a glamorous career. We can see that this is not because she would be out on the streets if she had a child to care for, or because she was escaping something. It's just portrayed as pure selfishness.

It is interesting that Nova is introduced here almost as a juxtaposition to another mother, Ramona. Ramona, the mother of Crispin and Basilio, is an armed insurgent who engages in a ritual to avenge herself on the military men who forced her to murder her own comrades. It is also implied earlier in the season that it was not just murder involved, but that Ramona had also been a "prize" given to the soldiers who captured her. And yes in this context, it can also mean rape. The Armed Forces of the Philippines does not have a shining record when it comes to its treatment of women dissidents and prisoners. This backstory does not justify what Ramona does for the remainder of her screentime, but it does show why she has absolutely no sympathy or mercy to give to anyone outside of her two children. She is part of a cycle of killing that makes any peaceful resolution of the insurgency in the Philippines so difficult to achieve. Both sides behave abominably, and civillians do get caught in the crossfire (or explosions).

Episode 4: Much of this episode revolves around the events in and surrounding a certain police station located near a large public cemetery. We see that the police chief Captain Guerrero has his hands full with cases and keeping his subordinates in line. The cops in the precinct range from the innocent apparent newcomer Tapia to the more stereotypical "asshole" cops Reyes and company. Later it is discovered that the bodies apparently "stolen" from the graves are resurrected zombies who are being directed to attack the station for a specific reason...and it has to do with how the police run their often bloody operations.

The real life neighborhoods surrounding the cemetery have seen their share of violence and "extra judicial killings". In some houses there are still candles and placards calling for justice for family members killed in raids or accused of having been drug suspects (almost a death sentence in the Philippines 2016 onwards). Eyewitnesses and CCTV footage show members of the police force taking part in these raids and clandestine operations. The worst part? The neighborhoods surrounding that particular cemetery haven't even seen the worst of it. Other disadvantaged communities in the north of the metropolis have seen even more deaths of this sort...with some of the deaths being those of children. Google the name of Kian delos Santos as a test case. Kian's case was one of the few to have extended media coverage, and even then the resolution has been rather wanting.

It is tempting to go into the "all cops are bastards" line of thought with this episode, but I do like how Captain Guerrero is forced to interact with someone who he is trying to save in the station, since as it turns out this person has recently lost a family member to this form of senseless murder. Captain Guerrero and the audience are led to remember that these victims have names. They had families. They had lives. They are more than body counts and statistics. That scene is one of the most humanizing of the series, and shows that while not all cops are bastards, there is enough rot in the institution to make it a problem.

Episodes 5-6: I would go more into Episodes 5 and 6, but those deserve a whole new treatment into the nature of truth, compromise, and even gaslighting (even I am not sure how much of a certain character's narrative is true, and how much is just meant to confuse Alexandra with regard to what she knows of her father). The context she does face before those harrowing revelations is a very real one though: things going wrong in a penitentiary.

The penal system of the Philippines is alarmingly punitive and full of inequities. Privileged inmates like politicians do receive special treatment (including media coverage and becoming leaders of factions) while less privileged inmates languish and must struggle to survive the brutal social hiearchy in some institutions. And yes it has happened that inmates have been sent out to do "jobs" of murder and arson in the outside world, often being snuck in and out. A movie that tackles this aspect better is "OTJ (On the Job)" directed by Erik Matti. That one will keep you up at night.

The ending of Episode 6 is rather ambiguous, and it remains to be seen what Alexandra really experienced during her trials prior to becoming a detective, and what her father really did to her and her sibling. We'll have to wait for another season to get to the bottom of that. But if the anime will continue to draw from the comics themselves for stories/case files, we can count on seeing more societal demons and baddies alongside the supernatural ones. And those are the villains that Alexandra Trese cannot just readily beat; it will take a heck lot more than a babaylan na mandirigma to handle those!

#trese #tw:infanticide #tw:gore #tw:abortion #tw:horror #tw: suicide #tw: implied rape

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curiosity-killed · 4 years

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wei wuxian’s body

bc @veliseraptor reminded me

wwx + bodily autonomy, a potentially incoherent jumping-off from this post

this is v hastily written bc i’m literally leaning across an open WIP on my art laptop to write it but it’ll languish in the annals of Things I Meant to Write But Forgot About alongside that other wwx thots™ post i drafted and then abandoned

this also may be less based in canon than HCs but i will contemplate that when/if objections are raised in the notes bc again im trying to do this quickly so i can draw sad sad wangxian

edit: just forewarning this is a very limited read atm without much consideration for other cultural and environmental influences that might impact this so apologies for those limitations. this is, again, a very hasty pile of Thots™

a brief thesis: wwx has never felt that his body is his own

summary of evidence: lack of bodily security as a child on the streets -> perceived debts to yunmeng jiang -> burial mounds -> death -> resurrection

1) childhood

basically, as a kid on the streets, wwx couldn’t take for granted the security and wholeness of his body at any given point; his constant foraging for scraps of food, fighting dogs, etc., p much demolishes the sanctity of his body and makes his physical security extremely conditional

2) debts to yunmeng jiang

thanks to the jiang clan, he is provided with physical security and is able to grow up nurtured and safe. however even here, it is made clear that this is not a condition-less state. he’s reminded he’s the son of a servant elevated above the position he “should” have, he’s disciplined via harsh(ish — depends on your reading of canon/personal headcanons a bit here) physical means, etc.

this is obv most exemplified by the golden core transfer (“that is what I owed Jiang clan” isn’t, i don’t think, at all insincere) but it’s also apparent in things like accepting a physical beating from Zidian, a high-powered spiritual weapon, and resigning himself to having his sword hand cut off if it means the Wen will leave Lotus Pier alone, etc. also madam yu/jiang fengmian ordering him to protect jiang cheng and jiang yanli (i’d pull the direct quotes but again! speed.)

2a) xuanwu cave

here we have, obviously, his diving in to take the branding iron for mianmian but i also think an argument could be made for his staying behind in the cave as being partially due to this. like is it partially just how the pieces fall? sure. but i also think that all things being equal, he would still shove jiang cheng out of the cave and stay behind bc jiang cheng’s life is worth more than his in his view

3) burial mounds

aight this one takes more of a dive into headcanon territory since i insist on slightly-left-of-human!wwx BUT in an effort to keep it canon: esp in novel canon, wwx essentially sacrifices his body again through demonic cultivation given the deterioration of his mind/body/heart thru using resentful energy/stygian tiger seal

3a) empathy

this one is a bit more of a fudge, but basically: empathy requires the user to give over their body/control of the situation to see the other person/spirit’s memories and is indicated to be fairly high risk. who’s noted for being good @ empathy and constantly willing to do it? same guy who’s never believed he has a right to his own body in the first place

4) death

a. novel-verse, he sacrifices himself to destroy the seal in an effort to prevent it getting in the wrong hands/stop the y’know disaster happening

b. CQL-verse, he kills himself to...well, depending on your reading, either make up for the death(s) he’s caused, accept defeat, remove a living pain from the lives of the people he caused, just end it already bc it’s not worth it

but in any case, there’s a level of sacrificing his body/physical life there

5) resurrection

again this varies a lil between CQL and the others and is at its most extreme when he’s resurrected into mo xuanyu’s body, seeing as that is literally not his body and thus carries a bunch of weird consent things

but in either case, he was dragged back to life (apparently at least somewhat against his will — “I wish I were still dead” or smth along those lines in ep 1) and given a body that isn’t his original (i’m still hung up on the fucking mole. what the FUCK) body and isn’t something he asked for and immediately set on a quest that he, again, is pushed into and during which he’ll repeatedly put his body on the line as a sacrifice

conclusion

sorry if this is super incoherent and doesn’t make sense to anyone but me! this is basically a semi-fleshed out but still p skeletal speed reading of my thoughts on the whole thing and, again, done quickly bc i have art to get to

but basically i think the bottom line for me is that wwx’s self sacrificial tendencies come from a confluence of arrogance, sense of obligation/duty, lack of self-worth, and ingrained lack of ownership of his body and i think a major part of any arc post-canon (regardless of which body he’s got) somewhat requires him learning his body as his own and as deserving of protection/preservation

i still don’t know if any of this makes sense LMAO

#mdzs meta #untamed meta #wei wuxian #wei ying #here are speed thoughts with curio #feel free to disagree obv this is just my reading of it

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lizzybizzyzzz · 3 years

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before tfatws caatws I had always thought of bucky as touch adverse/ sensitive and was even planning on adding it into the fics I was planning when the series began, but it’s incredibly interesting that he is the exact opposite. it’s almost like he indulges touch, he gives and receive it so freely for a man that was stripped of his bodily autonomy.

I rewatched catfa for a character study and bucky doesn’t actually touch steve too many times in the movie but his introductory scene is one of them.

steve & bucky also hug twice after this, but beside that they don’t really touch each other which is why I believed bucky wasn’t really a touchy person.

I am very glad to have been proven wrong. bucky doesn’t interact with too many other characters (that we saw) besides steve, sam, the wakandans, and the main characters of tfatws.

sam and bucky touch a lot throughout their show. in every episode that they are in together there is some significant moment where they are touching that can be used as analysis.

sam on the other hand interacted with more characters (sarah & his nephews, natasha, rhodey, steve, bucky, main tfatws characters) but does not initiate his own touch with them. this could be due to just lack of his screen time in previous movies but he, steve and natasha had the time and it wasn’t taken. which means it is not a significant enough part of his character to add like it is to bucky’s. sam and steve shake hands probably twice but that’s all the physically contact sam has, and one he didn’t even initiate.

the only time he does is to bucky, at tony stark’s funeral.

touch is their love language together. while bucky’s is act of service + touch I believe that sam’s is words of affirmation + quality time (I could go deeper into this if people want headcanon style).

here are what I think the most important touching scenes per episode are and what gives this away most:

ep 2:

ep. 3:

ep. 4:

ep. 5:

ep. 6:

honorable mention:

#I just think they’re neat #tfatws #sambucky #sam wilson #winterfalcon #bucky barnes #character analysis

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antiloreolympus · 3 years

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5 Anti LO Asks

1. RS doesn't understand the meaning of I'm misunderstood and you're the only one who sees true me trope. Just like the definition, it means their bad public image is false. The bad rumors surrounding them are false. Hades being actual slave owner. Persephone being actual murderer. Both did it with their free will and were not forced. Those are not being misunderstood. They're actually bad guys. Both should get punished. He being king and her having uncontrollable dark side don't excuse the crimes.

2. LO kinda shames Hera too? If we are to believe the Hera/Persephone parallels, then Rachel is basically shaming Hera for the sin of not marrying Hades and marrying Zeus instead. Like it clearly sympathizes with Hera, but at the same time because of how she frames HxP, it's almost as if she's like "See what you're missing, Hera? If only you picked him instead of Zeus! Then you wouldn't suffer like this!" while Persephone instead gets everything she could want bc of Hades. It rubs me the wrong way.

3. wouldnt it be a show of his sweet inner character if it turned out hades adopted kids (maybe a shade(s)? surely there are a lot of kids who died young in those times) and he was more sympathetic as a working single father who is just trying his best, because lo hades wanting kids now seems purely out of him wanting another trophy/reinforcing what is "expected" of a heterosexual man to have and not remotely parental at all. tbh he seems rather annoyed by kids? it could be handled so much better.

4. (Fp spoilers) am I over thinking this, but did the recent chapter feel like Persephone questions was some plan of sorts to overthrow hades? Like I swear if she eats the pomegranate or something behind hades back and overthrow hades, that would be a evil twist I wish would happen, but will never because Rachel need the uwu love couple to be a thing sadly.

5. (1 of 4?) Sorry this is so long- I wanted to get in everything that had to be said about this topic. It may be easier to splice these all together rather than post all of them individually. Also your choice to post or not as the content is a more sensitive side of an already sensitive topic of sexual abuse. I’m re-reading LO after some therapy and work on sexual trauma healing.

(2 of 4?) It’s something I used to enjoy when I was in a bad spot sexually and very very much believe the story is trauma reenactment. After four years working with a specialist in sexual trauma, I can identify some traits of a sexual abuse history in others. I would be extremely surprised if the author doesn’t 1have a sexual assault history. She fetishizes age differences, a lack of bodily autonomy, being a sexual object for someone, and is drawn to unhealthy (frankly kinda creepy) men.

(3 of 6?) I see an internal struggle between wanting someone safe but also being attracted to someone with inappropriate lust with a weird power dynamic. I’ve struggled with the same kind of trauma reenactment and know from experience. Which is why I was drawn to the story while I was more sexually unwell. I think this also explains the stories in the Twilight and 50 shades series and why they’re so popular among a society filled with sexual victims.

(4 of 6?) I’m not saying this to hate of victims of sexual assault by any means. Trauma reenactment is harsh reality and a horrible, upsetting, and crazy making effect from sexual assault. It’s one of the hardest pieces for victims to accept sometimes as the idea is so disgusting that things mimicking the attack could be sexualized in our brains and, for myself at least, the concept didn’t get tackled until a couple years in as I became strong enough to face my personal experiences of it.

(5 of 6?) I hope to not upset anyone if they’re realizing their own experiences with this but I think this is a major piece that has to be talked about with LO and other damaging romance stories like it. I feel for the author and sincerely hope that she gets the healing she needs. I wonder what that would look like if she ever does and chooses to speak out about the story she made and why.

(6 of 6) For now though, the story being so public and getting a netflix adaptation soon is frightening as it’s a dangerous portrayal of relationships and sexuality to show impressionable minds.

#anti lo #anti lore olympus #lo critical #lore olympus critical

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rosemaidenvixen · 3 years

Text

In the Fullness of Time

Chapter 4: Years Past

Ao3

Content warning: Classist language, Violation of bodily autonomy without knowledge or consent

Merlin swore as the carriage went over yet another bump.

“A thousand pardons Lord Merlin sir!” Galahad called from outside “Road’s a bit rough out this ways,”

Rough, that was a gentle way to put it. Was this an actual road or were they driving over a legion of troll remains? This was no way for a Master Wizard to travel, but where he was going his preferred forms of magical transportation would not be...well received “How much longer Galahad?”

Without warning the carriage jerked to a stop, Merlin letting out a whole string of curses as he was nearly thrown from his seat.

“We’ve arrived! Mind your boots, ground’s a touch muddy,”

“...Thank you for the warning,” Merlin grumbled, getting to his feet and opening the carriage door.

If anything Galahad had understated the conditions. The road, if one applied the term quite loosely, was nothing more than a coarse dirt track that went from the larger, more maintained road to their destination. Thoroughly churned by countless wagons and boots until it was a quagmire of mud and rubish, reaching ankle deep in places.

Merlin let out a sigh, resigned himself to the inevitable filth, and stepped down, grimacing as his boots sank into the muck. The small company of knights around him dismounted with a clatter of metal and leather. Galahad himself hopped off the front of the carriage and jogged up to face Merlin “What are your orders sir?”

“That won’t be necessary,” Merlin said while gracefully stepping around the knight “You and your men may stand down, I shall deal with this myself,”

Moving with surprising speed, Galahad ran forward and once again blocked his path “With all due respect, I cannot do that, the king’s orders are that all unregistered magic users be investigated by a company of trained knights, no exceptions,”

Merlin barely suppressed a grumble, it was rather impressive how Arthur managed to be both brilliant and a fool “Very well then, set up a perimeter around this…” he glanced warily at the buildings ahead of them “village...don’t want any surprises coming in or getting out,”

“Right on then,” Galahad turned towards the knights “You heard the man, spread out and surround the village! No surprises in or out,”

The knights all rushed to obey, Galahad joining them, as Merlin walked up the road straight into the thicket of buildings. He could have easily handled this by himself, no need for busybodies gumming up the works. But Arthur insisted on the knights’ presence to...what was it? Reassure the masses…

Merlin spared a glance at the people of the hamlet as he passed through.

Men and women in clothes just as patchy and ragged as the buildings around them lined either side of his path. As soon as they noticed his presence they parted like all of the sea, ducking inside buildings and hurrying down alley ways. Some peeked at him out of cracked windows and doors while speaking to each other in hushed whispers. A precious few stood their ground, glaring openly at Merlin as he passed by, nearly drawing a laugh out of the Wizard.

Ignorant rabble the lot of them.

Fools who spent their lives with noses buried so deep in the dirt they couldn’t be bothered to look up at the stars.

There had been a time in his youth that he longed to teach people like these. To use his powers to help those that lacked the tools to help themselves. To bring enlightenment to those that clung stubbornly to the dark.

Had he ever really been that young?

Merlin shook his head to dispel the daydreams.

More likely than not this so-called sorcerer was someone that happened to swear right as a pitcher of milk was falling to the floor. Soon enough Merlin could clear this all up and be on his way. As it was all he wanted was to get back to Camelot and have his boots cleaned to a polish.

A space opened up in front of him as he reached the heart of the village, Merlin paused and glanced around. Most decent sized settlements surrounding Camelot had a central building of sorts, usually used for storage and official gatherings. Even smaller communities had squares that served much of the same purpose.

This town, if it was large enough to truly be considered that, had neither of those things. The only sort of central feature present was a modest stone well, which a large crowd was gathered around.

“--which is why we need to burn him!” a woman’s voice screeched “We cannot tolerate this evil blight in our midst!”

“And anger the demons who made him? Are you mad!? No, we have to sink him in the bog, give him back to his own,”

“I’m not touching him! You know what Fae do to those who mess with them and theirs, best to wait for the king’s men to come, let them deal with--”

“We’re wasting time! Just give me a barrel and a cartful of peat and I’ll do the job myself!”

Merlin cleared his throat softly, just loud enough to make the gathered crowd turn in his direction. Upon sighting him nearly every one of them gasped and staggered back in alarm. Only three held their ground, two men and a woman, the one who so fiercely advocated for burning if he remembered right.

He allowed his face to mold into the placating smile he so often used when discussing magic with those who hadn’t the slightest idea how it worked “Good morrow to you folk, I am Merlin Ambrosius, here on behalf of the king. Now I understand you’ve been having trouble with a sorcerer?”

One of the men, the one in charge if his slightly cleaner coat and trousers were anything to go by, stepped forward and stammered out a response “Y-- yes, we have him locked up for now, but there’s no telling what kind of curses he’s brewing,”

Even with all of Merlin’s considerable patience, he was barely able to keep from rolling his eyes. These simpletons wouldn’t know a curse if he conjured one up right in front of them.

Well time to go clear this up and let the village goat herd or whoever it was out of wherever they’d penned him up “I promise you have nothing to fear, a squadron of the king’s best knights are here with me and they will allow no harm to befall you. Now take me to this sorcerer of yours and I will deal with him myself,”

The crowd visibly relaxed at his words; or more precisely, upon learning of the knights’ presence, the village headman slowly nodding at him “Follow me then,”

Merlin allowed himself to be lead to the far side of the village, with the rest of the group trailing behind. No doubt curious about his powers as much as they feared and despised them. The headman stopped at the edge of the buildings, pointing into the trees beyond “He’s in there,”

A cave barred with a wooden door was built into a hill a short distance away from the village proper. A space no doubt ordinarily used for storage now converted to a makeshift prison cell.

The headman twisted his cap in his hands “So...how long will it take you to--”

“That will be enough,” Merlin waved him off “I’ll take care of everything from here on out,”

The headman swallowed hard but still stepped aside to let Merlin pass, striding towards the cave. None of the villagers followed him, of course not that he expected any of them to.

Reaching the cave door, he opened it a crack and poked his head in. It was too dark to see the contents of the cave, the light of the open door doing little to penetrate the gloom.

“Hello?” Merlin called into the dark cave “Anyone in here?”

No reply from within the cave was forthcoming. Merlin remained standing in the doorframe in silence for a few moments.

His patience was rewarded when a soft sniffle broke through the silence.

Merlin blinked in surprise. Well that was...unexpected.

He opened the door all the way, banishing some, but not all of the shadows. Allowing for his eyes to adjust just enough to see a small figure huddled in the far corner of the cave.

A child, dark haired, a boy by the looks of it, sat curled up on the floor of the cave. And by the look of how dirty and disheveled he was, he had been in here for some time. Clear tracks ran down his cheeks from where tears had cut through the dust. The child wasn’t crying at the moment, though whether that was due to exhaustion or dehydration remained to be seen.

Merlin strode over, slowly as not to startle him, and got down on one knee a few feet in front of the boy “Hello there,”

The child said nothing but followed him with his eyes, clearly trying to gauge how much of a threat the Wizard was.

Merlin gave his best, non-threatening, smile “Let’s lighten things up a bit, shall we?” he held out his palm, and with the barest breath of effort a green witchlight flared to life there before floating up to the cave ceiling, filling the small space with emerald light.

A parlor trick by his standards, but it served as a good example to those not versed in the subtleties of Wizardry.

The child lifted his head to stare at the witchlight as it ascended to the roof of the cave, mouth open and eyes large with wonder.

“Now tell me young one…”

Aware he was being addressed, the child tore his gaze away from the ceiling to stare back at the Wizard, wariness coming off of him in palatable waves.

“Can you do anything like that?”

Merlin expected the child to shake his head, or at the most mumble a soft no. So it came as no small shock when the child raised his own tiny palm and stared at it with furrowed intensity.

His astonishment was even greater when cerulean sparks flared to life in the boy’s hand.

They flickered for a few seconds before going out, the boy letting out a small puff of exhaustion as they did.

This was no charlatan or victim of coincidence, this boy had actual power. And for someone of his age to even attempt to mimic a spell after only seeing it performed in front of him once…

This boy had potential.

And Merlin would be damned if he let such potential waste away in a dank cave.

Merlin got down on both knees “What is your name young one?”

“Hi-- Hisirdoux,”

“Well then Hisirdoux, what do you say we go outside and discuss things further?”

“I...I can’t…”

“Of course you can, others may not like what you can do but if I say you can leave no one will stop you,”

“But…” Hisirdoux raised one of his arms ever so slightly, a soft clink of metal accompanying the action.

A sound no louder than a cricket’s chirp, deafening to Merlin’s ears.

“Boy, show me your hands,”

Hisirdoux complied, stretching both arms out in front of him, allowing Merlin to see crude iron shackles wrapped around his wrists, sloppily fastened to heavy chains bolted into the cave wall.

Merlin had been millenia old even before Camelot was founded. He’d watched empires rise and crumble. And he’d seen every manner of cruelty that humans could inflict on each other. By now there was no atrocity that was capable of shocking him.

This however, gave him pause.

“Hold still Hisirdoux, let me get those off you,”

Merlin moved closer, raising a hand over Hisirdoux’s wrists, gently probing into the shackles with his magic.

Elemental iron was the antithesis to magic and could impede it in any form, from raw ore to rusty nails, but it’s true power of binding lay in its shaping. Molding the earth and bending it your will, ingenuity triumphing over the unknown. And a clever and experienced Wizard such as himself could see through the patterns of iron’s construction and unravel it.

It was not difficult, these shackles were especially crude. Hastily hammered together from materials never intended to bind. Probably why Hisirdoux was still able to manifest some power. So it only took a minute, then a flick of his fingers and the shackles fell to the ground.

However the damage had been done.

Hisirdoux whimpered, gently poking at one of the angry red burn marks with a wince.

Merlin laid both hands over the boy’s wrists.

“Sana et integro,”

Bands of green light bloomed to life and wrapped around the burn marks, slowly fading as they sank into the skin, taking some of the bright redness with it. It wouldn’t heal Hisirdoux completely, but it should end his pain for now.

However he would carry the scars with him for the rest of his life.

Had his neighbors known how badly the iron would injure him, a young child fresh into his magic, or had they merely been concerned with sealing his power away at any cost?

The real question was if any of them bloody cared.

“Better?”

Hisirdoux nodded with a sniffle.

“Good,” Merlin reached over and gently cupped his chin, the boy flinching at the contact, tilting his head up to look him in the eye “Hisirdoux, what I can do and what you can do is called magic, the ability to channel the arcane energies of the universe to bend them to your will,”

Hisirdoux said nothing, merely stared up at him with wide, but not frightened, eyes.

“You are capable of so much more than you know, and if you become my apprentice, I can teach you how to wield your powers to their fullest potential,”

“B...but I don’t want to be an apprentice, I want to stay here with mother and father,”

Merlin held back a sigh of disappointment. Hisirdoux might not have realized it yet, but he had no home here, not anymore. No matter, that truth would make itself known soon enough, the only thing to do was get it over with as quickly as possible. no reason for Merlin to prolong the inevitable.

“Very well then,” Merlin stood and extended his hand “I will take you to them,”

Even though he was far from being moved by such things, sentimentality being something he’d abandoned centuries ago, seeing the flash of hope on Hisirdoux’s face and knowing how unfounded it was hardly felt pleasant.

Hisirdoux reached up, tiny fingers grasping his own, and pulled himself to his feet. Following along as Merlin stepped out of the cave, wincing as they stepped into the bright sunlight.

How many days has his parents sat back and allowed him to be locked away in the dark?

Merlin wasn’t overly fond of the sensation of the tiny, grubby fingers grasping his own, but it was the best way to keep Hisirdoux from running off. If their talk of burning earlier hadn’t convinced him, seeing Hisirdoux’s condition in the cave cinched it.

The boy was not safe here.

And sure enough, as they approached the village, Hisirdoux brightened, and started to pull away “Mother! Father!”

Merlin kept his grip on Hisirdoux’s hand firm, not letting go as they stepped up to the gathered villagers, despite the boy’s attempts to pull away. Steeling his expression when he saw the mother and father Hisirdoux was looking at.

Hopefully Hisirdoux never had to learn that his mother wanted to burn him alive.

The tell-tale clatter of plate armor came up from beside him, and Merlin turned to see Galahad rapidly approaching.

“How goes it finding the unregistered sorcerer, any luck?”

Merlin paused and greeted the knight with a nod, ignoring Hisirdoux’s attempts to break free and run to his parents “As a matter of fact I have, he right here,”

“Where? All I see is some waifish…..” Galahad trailed off, eyes going wide from behind his bushy brows.

Good to see Merlin wasn’t the only one appalled at how these villagers had treated their ‘sorcerer’.

And speaking of a crowd was starting to form around them, drawn by Merlin’s appearance and Hisirdoux’s shouts.

Merlin straightened to his full height and squared his shoulders.

Time to reset the wound as quickly as possible.

“False alarm everyone,” he gestured towards the squirming Hisirdoux with one hand while looking around at the gathered villagers “This boy does have magic, but he is of no threat to you, you can all go back to your ordinary lives,”

Hisirdoux strained as he continued to try and escape Merlin’s grip and run to his parents “Mother! Mother! I can come home now!”

The mother in question stepped up close and glowered down at him, expression hard enough that it caused Hisirdoux’s brightness to dim “That’s not my boy, not any longer, that child is tainted by darkness, he has no place in my house or in this village,”

No one else around them spoke up, either in agreement or objection, although based on the looks on their faces they hardly disagreed.

Hisirdoux froze, expression beginning to crumple “But moth--”

“Don’t you dare!” the woman shrieked, the sheer venom dripping from her voice enough to cause Hisirdoux, some of the villagers around her, and even Galahad to recoil “Don’t you dare address me as your mother! You’re a curse, a demon, you dare to call yourself our child, deceiving us and hiding your true nature so you can bring ruin to us all--”

“Beloved enough,” the man next to her put an arm around her waist and gently pulled her back “I know this is a trying time for you, but you must not lose yourself in such wrathful displays,”

He put both hands on her shoulders and looked her in the eye “Our child may be tainted by Fae magics, but all is not lost, soon the evil will be gone. And there will be more children between us,”

She sighed, slumping in his grip “You are right, soon our village will be godly once more, and we will have more children to replace the one we lost,”

Hisirdoux had gone completely still, staring up at his parents with an utterly horrified, heartbroken expression.

His father turned back towards Merlin “My wife speaks true, that’s no son of mine, either you take care of him or we’ll do it ourselves,”

An unfortunate but not unexpected response “Very well then,” he gave a gentle tug on the fingers still clasped in his “Hisirdoux?”

The boy looked up at him, eyes brimming.

“My offer still stands, do you wish to become my apprentice?”

He gave a terse nod, tiny faced pinched in the effort to hold back tears.

“Then let us go and--”

“Hang on,” Hisirdoux’s father cut in “You can’t just carry my son off,”

Merlin raised an eyebrow “I thought you said he was no son of yours?”

The man flushed but held his ground “I sired him, raised him, and fed him. Can’t just let anyone go carrying him off with nothing to show for it,”

The sheer audacity of this man stopped Merlin in his tracks “How are you to demand such a thing when you’ve made it quite clear you’re not interested in taking him back?”

A triumphant glint entered the man’s eyes “You seem fairly interested in him, wouldn’t want to leave him and have something happen now would you?”

Merlin’s expression darkened, disgust he’d thought himself long past feeling slowly trickling into his chest. He’d seen poor reactions to people discovering their child was touched by magic many times before, this was far from the first time Merlin had witnessed parents proclaim their child dead while they stood living before their eyes. But never in all his centuries had he witnessed any cling so greedily to the corpse “You presume much if you think you can command me to--”

“It’s not as though you can just carry him off,” the the man said, unnervingly calm “The king wouldn’t be happy to hear of his Master Wizard carrying off children from their parents. So you can either pay my price or I’ll find someone who will,”

Around him the other villagers, his wife included, were murmuring in agreement. Mentions of prices or even other options should Merlin prove unwilling to pay floating up in hushed bits of conversation.

Hisirdoux glanced back and forth between the two men. As young as he was he couldn’t possibly understand the intricacies of the situation surrounding him. But he clearly understood something, some base instinct informing him of the peril he was in, that he stood at the crossroads of danger and safety. His tiny fingers gripping Merlin’s hand with all the feeble strength he could muster.

The disgust filling him deepened into a rage the likes of which he hadn’t felt in decades. Merlin had to make an effort not to shatter Hisirdoux’s fingers in his grip. From off to the side he could see Galahad watching the entire exchange with his jaw hanging open.

These people, who owned little more than the clothes on their backs, had been blessed with a child with immense magical potential, who possessed the power to potentially build their hamlet up to a kingdom in its own right, and this was how they treated him? They didn’t even afford him the dignity that they would a rat or a wolf, to them Hisirdoux was merely property. Blighted property that they had no desire to keep, but every right to sell to the highest bidder.

These fools had done what in a single afternoon what beings far greater than them had spent years trying and failing to accomplish.

They had made Merlin angry.

He let out a sigh and hung his head “Very well, name your price,”

The man grinned victoriously “Eighty pounds and not a pence less,”

“Fine,” Merlin said coldly.

The man blinked, clearly expecting some haggling involved.

“Galahad,”

The knight jerked towards him, startled out of his stupefied state.

“Write up a contract stating that these two,” he inclined his head towards the couple in front of him “Are to receive eighty pounds in exchange for signing over their son to be a ward of the crown,”

Galahad nodded slowly, pulling open his bag of parchment and official seals “I’ll get right on that,” he glanced down at Hisirdoux, tears now openly rolling down his small face “How about you two go ahead and wait in the carriage, I won’t be but a minute,”

Merlin nodded, turning and tugging Hisirdoux after him as he headed away from the village and back towards the awaiting carriage.

He waited until Galahad and the crowd of villagers were far out of earshot before starting the chant. Hisirdoux could no doubt hear him, but he would neither remember the words or understand their significance.

Merlin preferred not to use blood magic, both due to the impracticality and the immense risk, but today he would make an exception.

Hisirdoux’s parents, with a complete lack of understanding of magic and how it functions, had declared their child tainted and cut him out of their hearts and community. Deciding to either sell him to offset their so-called loss or kill him and be done with it.

Well if that was the way they treated their firstborn child, Merlin would ensure that there would be no more children after Hisirdoux, for either of them.

From now until their dying days Hisirdoux’s parents would never again bear children, neither with each other nor any other partner.

The words felt cold and slimy falling from his lips, the magic they invoked soft and subtle. Slowly creeping into the bodies of Hisirdoux’s mother and father, altering them just enough to accomplish his goal.

Of course the blood magic curse would only affect those two, the rest of the village, the ones who had been complicit at best and gleeful participants at worst, would not share its effects.

But they would see Hisirdoux’s parents, see what the curse did to them without ever knowing the cause for certain. And they would wonder, and they would be afraid.

He completed his curse just as the carriage and the rest of the knights came into view, falling silent as he stepped up to them, from far behind he could feel the last traces of magic settle into place and the curse take hold.

Merlin helped Hisirdoux climb the steps into the carriage, from behind him he heard Galahad come up and call to the rest of the knights.

“Alright we’re burning daylight, let’s get a move on!”

A quick glance to the west revealed just how right Galahad was, the sun was now far lower in the sky and they needed to hurry if they wanted to make it to safety before the darkness came and brought trolls with it. Moving swiftly, he stepped into the carriage and shut the door behind him, lifting Hisirdoux up onto the seat and sitting himself beside him just as the carriage pulled to a start.

Hisirdoux remained silent the whole while, had been ever since he’d heard what his parents truly thought of him, eyes locked on the small window, watching the village that had been his home slowly fade into the distance.

“Hisirdoux,” Merlin spoke softly “I know you must be dealing with quite a lot right now, but you need to understand that there is nothing inherently wrong with your abilities. They are a tool like a sword or a hammer that can be used for good or for ill. They are not evil or corrupt they simply are,”

The boy refused to look directly at him, eyes bright and lip trembling.

“How your village reacted to your abilities isn’t a reflection of your faults, but of theirs,”

Hisirdoux didn’t react aside from a sniffle, small shoulders starting to shake.

Years from now Hisirdoux would look back on this day as nothing more than a faded scar, a memory of a wound long since healed. But the future was far away, and today the wound was still fresh and raw. Merlin had said and done all he could for now; some wounds could only be healed with time.

Settling back in his seat, Merlin turned to glance out his own window, prepared to spend the rest of the trip in silence.

Without warning something abruptly pressed into his side.

Startled, Merlin glanced sharply down, only to see Hisirdoux clinging to his torso, openly sobbing against him.

The sight was so baffling that Merlin didn’t know how to react.

What on earth did this boy think he was doing? Merlin was a Master Wizard, not some nursemaid Hisirdoux could cling to whenever he wished. Merlin’s duty as his master was to instruct him in the ways of magic and that was it, he’d hire a nanny for everything else. If Hisirdoux was going to be his apprentice the boy needed to bloody well learn the difference between the two straight away.

He raised a hand to push Hisirdoux away, but paused just before it could touch him. Keeping it poised in the air for a few seconds, Hisirdoux’s weak sobs echoing in the small carriage, before dropping it with a sigh. Lowing his hand to softly pat Hisirdoux’s back instead.

Perhaps some indulgence was in order, the boy had just been cast out of his home and family. Granted it didn’t look like either of those had been worth very much, but still they were all that he had ever known.

This couldn’t be a regular occurrence, as soon as they got to Camelot Merlin would arrange for a proper nanny to handle caring for Hisirdoux. As master and apprentice, Merlin was responsible for Hisirdoux’s education and nothing else. But just for today, he would make an exception.

As their journey went on, the carriage rocking along as it carried them down the rugged road, Hisirdoux’s sobs gradually softened into sniffles, Merlin rubbing his back all the while, eventually he quieted altogether, though still remaining curled up against Merlin’s side.

“Hisirdoux?” Merlin said quietly.

No response.

He glanced down, glimpsing shut eyes and a slack face, a soft snore escaping him.

For a moment Merlin just stared incredulously.

The child had fallen asleep on him, of all the impertinent-- good lord what if he started drooling on him?

Merlin briefly considered trying to move him, before settling back in resignation. If he tried to move the boy chances are he would wake up, and after being locked away for days with hardly any food or water and his wrists wrapped in iron...Hisirdoux needed a good rest.

And while Merlin wasn’t smitten with the idea of being drooled on, at least while he was sleeping Hisirdoux would be quiet and out of the way.

Tilting forward as much as he could without disturbing the sleeping child, Merlin peeked out his window, and again out the opposite one. Seeing no knights riding near enough to see inside, he swiftly snapped his fingers. A blanket on the opposite seat becoming sheathed in green light, leaping over and tucking itself securely around Hisirdoux’s sleeping form, the light around it vanishing just as quickly as it appeared

Satisfied that the deed had gone unwitnessed, Merlin leaned back and gave Hisirdoux one more soft pat on the back as the carriage continued on down the road.

#tales of arcadia #in the fullness of time #rmvwrites #toawizards #merlin #hisirdoux casperan #classist language #violation of bodily autonomy #douxie's parents #galahad

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phynali · 3 years

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Dean’s Body as a Punching Bag

Ever since I made this post about Sam and (his lack of) bodily autonomy (as well as the follow-up post that carries the theme through the other 10 seasons), I’ve been trying to determine what the corollary for Dean is. Re-watching 5x01 made it jump out at me in a huge way:

The bodies of the people that Dean loves are consistently used in a way that hurts/harms Dean and metes out violence against him. And it is specifically his loved ones’ bodies themselves, not shapeshifters or lookalikes or Leviathan either. It is the people he loves’ hands and fists and weapons.

(I need a snappier way to word that, but bear with me).

Where Sam’s bodily autonomy violations occur before he’s born, and are seen as early as the pilot with Azazel in his room and with the Woman in White, Dean’s analogous theme doesn’t sneak in until the mid-season finale with Asylum.

In this episode, Sam gets infected with a sort of ghost-possession/ghost-sickness (another example of a violation of his bodily autonomy) and his internal anger becomes external, focused on Dean. Sam attacks Dean violently, and Dean goes so far as to hand over a (thankfully unloaded) gun and in this altered state, Sam actually tries to shoot him.

Ouch. The person Dean loves and most wants to protect had his body violated and used against Dean. This theme is going to carry us through the next, eh, 10 or so seasons, with some tail-end examples even after that.

In Season 1 we have Asylum mid-season, and we have the finale in which John is possessed by Azazel and hurts Dean most grievously, almost kills him. In Season 2, Sam is possessed by Meg and shoots Dean (in the arm). In Season 3, we had a writers’ strike and a season cut short so I can’t think of any examples there (but lots of other shit to unpack for another day).

The in Season 4, we have Sex and Violence, which is super interesting. While Dean is the one targeted by the siren and therefore the one whose body is used against his brother to hurt him, the actual violence doesn’t start until Sam is also infected. Sam’s body is violated by being held at knifepoint by his brother and his mouth forced open to accept the siren’s venom, but then it’s a fist-fight, a showdown. Both brothers’ bodies being used to hurt the other, but getting to that point required Sam’s body to similarly be ready to be used against Dean.

Season 5 is literally bookended by instances of this happening. First, true to the idea that Dean sees Bobby as family, Bobby becomes possessed by a demon and he violently attacks Dean. And then Swan Song, most famous example by a huge margin, Sam is possessed by Lucifer and is fist-fighting Dean, destroying his face and killing him with his fists, and it is his overwhelming love for Dean that allows him to overcome this possession and save the world.

The theme is carried forward for a few more seasons, pretty much until that narrative turning point in Season 10 that I mentioned in my post about Sam. In Season 6, soulless!Sam allows Dean to be hurt by a monster, harming him by proxy. In season 7, Sam is hallucinating and almost shoots Dean. In season 8, Cass is programmed by Naomi to kill Dean, and in the episode Goodbye Stranger beats him to a pulp before overcoming this programming. In season 9, when Gadreel reveals himself and takes over Sam’s body and kills Kevin, he also attacks Dean.

Skipping Season 10 for a hot sec (more on that below), Lucifer also later possesses Cass in Season 11 and harms both Sam and Dean. In Season 12, we get brainwashed Mary attacking her sons (and overcoming possession thanks to Dean). And possibly examples from S13-15 that I’m missing (Garth being affected by Michael? Cass being affected by Rowena’s spell? Both Sam and Dean were affected by the Witch from Wizard of Oz, right? I honestly can’t recall the late seasons near so well). But regardless we see the theme play out in the final 5 seasons, just less and a bit different than it had prior.

Now, let’s unpack the S10 shift a bit, and why it changes things for this theme of Dean’s.

In S9, Dean takes on the Mark of Cain under the weight of guilt and self-loathing from having violated Sam’s bodily autonomy by tricking him into being possessed by an angel (and forcibly having him possessed by a demon to then fix that angelic possession). In this instance, Dean is willfully taking on something that alters his own body, and the narrative between he and Sam is flipped. Now Dean is the one with something ‘evil’ marring his body and impacting it outside his control, and now Sam is the one who is ignoring Dean’s protests and autonomy in order to save him from this thing, consequences be damned.

That 2.5 season role-reversal arc was huge for how it changed Sam’s storyline for the final 5 seasons, and similarly huge for how it impacts Dean’s.

Dean is now the one whose body is being used as a weapon against those he loves most, and he is the one suffering that loss of autonomy and control over himself. He is sick with bloodlust, is turned into a demon, is drawn to the First Blade, and is not in full control of himself. When the Darkness is unleashed and Dean suffers the emotional consequences of feeling tied to and drawn to this monster (woman? celestial being? godlike person?) against his will.

The Mark/Darkness narrative shows us that Dean’s body might belong to him, but it too can be corrupted against his will. Dean learns that he won’t always be able to choose, learns what it means not to have control over his own body. That while he puts his family as his duty above all else, while he would sacrifice literally everything (his body, his soul, the entire universe) for his little brother, the opposite might also be true, even if Dean doesn’t want it to be.

(And I said elsewhere that I fundamentally believe this narrative role-reversal was a consequence of him overstepping his ownership over Sam by tricking him into taking Gadreel. Their positions are swapped because they have to be, because narratively it becomes necessary for Dean to know what this loss of autonomy feels like, and for Sam to override his brother’s choices, or else they may never find a sense of equilibrium again).

By the time this Mark/Darkness narrative wraps up, Dean is fundamentally, irrevocably changed. Where in Season 5 it was completely unthinkable that he would agree to be a vessel for Michael, it is in the finale of Season 13, just two seasons after the Darkness storyline wraps up, that we see him take Michael into himself as a snap, in-the-moment decision. What was previously unthinkable is now canon.

Because Dean is now different. Because his core of protecting Sam is the same, but his theme of how others' bodies are used against him has now upended itself, and he now has had his body used against others.

In my post about Sam, I said that in the end for the final seasons, the narrative has shifted from Dean owning Sam’s body to Sam also owning his own, and them acknowledging that they are in this together as a result of Season 10. I believe that happens with Dean as well, owing to this reversal. Sam has now taken some ownership over Dean’s body by getting rid of the Mark, and Dean has relinquished some of his tight-fisted control over himself.

So Sam is sharing ownership over his body with Dean (in the vein of “I can’t pretend you won’t do whatever you can to keep me alive, even if I don’t want it, but we’re in this together” and “if we die we do that together too”), and Dean is also sharing ownership over his body with Sam (in the vein of “I’m no longer convinced you’re going to abandon me, so the things that I will do to keep you by my side will be met equal between us” and “when it comes to keeping you safe, it’s my autonomy I will give up first, not yours”).

But what does this particular form of bodily-violence-from-family say about Dean from a thematic standpoint?

In my post about Sam, I talked about how the themes of possession (ghost and demon) and demon blood are inherently about bodily autonomy and free will.

For Dean, thinking through this theme of his loved ones being used to hurt him, I’m torn trying to find the way to word it, but I feel that it has to do with his themes of self-effacement as love, as protection and duty. It’s about being willing to suffer anything (even to the point of death) to protect his family, the ones he loves most. Family is the end-all-be-all to Dean, and protecting his family (most especially his little brother) is the core and heart of his character. It is a duty and a responsibility and a calling and a purpose.

To remix a quote from the film Legend, Dean’s devotion to his brother (and to a lesser extent, to everyone else he calls family) is how he measures himself. There’s no single word for it, as it’s a mix of protection as love, as an instinct, but also as a fundamental duty, an identity. His internal compass.

So Dean’s narrative invokes free will in a very different way than Sam’s. Dean always had and has free will. He had the will to sell his soul, the will to refuse Michael. He has autonomy over his body and he has choice, so much so that he makes choices over and over for Sam. Instead, Dean’s struggles with autonomy of self as related to his constant effacement (to the point of complete ego-destruction and physical loss of self) for the people he loves. He will die, sell his soul, let himself be beat to a pulp, and anything more that the situation calls for, so long as it means protecting or not harming his loved ones.

The original Swan Song end is a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions, in the style of Greek tragedy. Sam’s struggle for autonomy, and the moment he claims that autonomy for himself, he falls into the Pit for eternity. Dean’s original intended Swan Song ending is analogous: a struggle to exist as more than his duty to his family, and right after he accepts that Sam is allowed to choose Lucifer and death for himself while Dean may continue on living, he then chooses to fall into the Pit after his brother so they could be together (in Hell, in the Cage) eternally.

Both of them have these absolute tragic flaws and in the first Kripke-era arc, tragic sacrificial ends. Sam’s relating to will and autonomy, Dean’s relating to love, family and protection/duty. Both of them belonging to themselves and to each other.

A few extra things about this theme worth noting:

1. the people who love Dean are always in an altered state when they harm him, whether it be possession, brain-washing, siren venom, soulless, etc etc, which I think goes to show in some ways how this love as a given to people who will never deliberately harm him.

2. in a huge proportion of these instances, Dean is saved by the person who loves him reclaiming themselves over and above their altered state. John overcomes Azazel’s possession (arguably, I would say, deliberately from Azazel, but let’s not quibble). Bobby stabs himself in the stomach to save Dean. Cass overcomes Naomi’s brainwashing. Sam overcomes the literal Devil possessing him. Mary overcomes some brainwashing (I think?). Etc. So Dean's love as sacrifice is rewarded?

3. Sam’s body is the most frequently used to harm Dean.

#supernatural #supernatural meta #spn #spn meta #dean winchester #dean winchester meta #oof #i made myself sad #i gotta stop thinking too much about these damn brothers #long post #long post for ts #violence tw #abuse tw #family violence tw #in a weird way #ask to tag #apologies for typos this got away from me

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sarcasmandships · 3 years

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why derek hale deserves better:

derek hale’s character had so much potential to bring attention to male survivors of sexual violence, particularly when perpetrated by an older, attractive female and break away from the ‘oh but she’s hot, you’re so lucky’ (looking at u ryan murphy) trope that is disgustingly common in media but jeff davis is a weak ass bitch and just introduces a character with endless trauma but refuses to recognise or develop it??

he also has endless trauma from his family being hate crime’d to death and his surviving sister being murdered and having her body mutilated but apparently derek is unaffected with this and the only time we see him express a feeling about it is when the plot needs tension between the werewolves and the hunters??

throughout teen wolf we see examples of bodily autonomy and consent being taken away, most notably with stiles and the nogitsune and lydia being controlled by peter - but the same attention never seems to be given to derek who was taken of advantage to by kate (twice!!) so that she could burn his entire family alive and then use him to control her were-jaguar impulses - a series of events which leads to him (temporarily) losing his powers and making him feel overwhelmingly helpless and vulnerable as he becomes more human/loses a key part of his identity

tw: rape mention

not that the weird kate/derek dynamic needs to be pointed out but he was an emotionally vulnerable teenager and she was a grown woman who committed statutory rape (im not sure of derek’s age to say whether it was legally statutory rape but in my brain she took advantage of someone much younger and more naive than her and im going to consider this statutory rape from my own moral standpoint) against him whilst actively hunting people like him

even when derek is an adult the dynamic between them is toxic like when she shoots him with a wolfsbane bullet and that weird scene when she has him locked up and licks his abs? their dynamic always has derek in a vulnerable position regardless of his age, and show kate to have the upper hand, and their scenes (the scene when kate reveals werewolves to allison comes to mind again) always seem to have a degree of sexual coding like was it necessary for derek to be shirtless in that scene? no - and it was probably intended to be from more of a ‘let’s show of tyler hoechlin’s abs’ perspective but (to me personally and likely for others) it doesn’t come across that way it just shows derek again in a vulnerable position, at the hands of a woman who has taken advantage of him in the past and he is being unecessarily sexualised

not sexually motivated but he was also manipulated by his uncle (who at this time he seemed to trust) into a series of events which ended in him having to kill the girl he loves (which in turn leads to being used and manipulated by another woman years later) and the only residual impact this seems to have on him is ‘ooo he has blue eyes’, this undoubtedly puts derek in an emotionally vulnerable position which may have aided in kate being able to manipulate him but we still never see any real impact of this on derek in canon

i know he his portrayed as a private and reserved character but there was so much wasted potential here and the lack of attention given to the trauma in derek’s past really minimises the horror of it and makes it easier for the casual viewer to dismiss the impact that trauma like that would have on a person if they were not a fictional character - he doesn’t even seem to get any attention from the other characters in the show who are made aware of derek’s past including kate, paige, and the fire but it’s like ‘derek will be derek’ rather than ‘wtf this guy needs help and support’, although i would’ve liked a developed plot where derek confronts and overcomes all the shit he’s been put thorough I’d have accepted a crumb of derek getting the emotional support he needs

jennifer (who we know to be a master manipulator) is the second woman who uses sex to manipulate derek as she tries to use him to help her take down the alpha pack and in the process of her plan she nearly kills derek’s sister and derek gives up his alpha powers to save her, once again leaving him less powerful than he was before and leaving him vulnerable

isaac makes a comment about how derek was ‘rolling around the sheets with the real killer’ as though derek was supposed to know that jennifer was the darach when no one else had figured it out/even suspected her - jennifer kills stiles’ friend and nearly kills lydia, but she doesn’t have as much impact on any other main character as she does on derek - we don’t know too much about the nature of their relationship but derek does go to her after he is injured episode 3x05/3x06(?) and he does have some feelings for her and wants to protect her - at the very least they have an emotional connection and jennifer uses sex and intimacy to manipulate derek like a pawn in her overall plan

continuing with the themes of bodily autonomy and consent derek’s body is repeated used against his will - like in season 2 when scott forces derek to bite gerard (although this was part of a larger plan this doesn’t take away from the fact that derek’s autonomy was stripped away again) and in season 3 when derek’s claws are used to kill boyd- not only painful for him because he is taking the life of a friend and a member of his own pack but also because of derek’s ‘im a predator but i don’t have to be a killer’ line which shows us that CHOICE is important to him and he wants to have control over the actions and path he takes (which is probably fair to say for most people but is specifially an important part of derek’s character)

overall, derek is repeatedly manipulated by people he is supposed to trust and care for - he has a whole lot of trauma for his teen years which could have been so well addressed in the show and brought awareness to male sexual violence (already unrepresented) and teen wolf could’ve really stood out against other teen dramas but jeff davis and the writers weren’t willing to go in that direction (but they still gave us the train wreck of season 4??) and instead derek’s character is left as this stoic, eye candy guy with so much wasted potential

rant over x

(soz for any spelling mistakes/bad grammar but it’s half one in the morning here n i had a lot of thoughts to get out before i went to sleep)

#Derek Hale deserved better #this was LONG so shoutout to u if u read all of my rant x #teen wolf #Jeff Davis #stiles Stilinski #Derek Hale #kate argent #lydia martin #scott mcall #derek hale deserves nice things #sarcasmandships #tw: rape mention

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ablackwomansurvivingrape · 2 years

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Consent Belongs in Marriage Too. Your marriage license does not…

This is something that should be automatic knowledge but there are still people, namely very religious people, who believe a woman waives her bodily autonomy the moment she signs that marriage certificate, I shit you not.

This is a sentiment held by the Christian majority in my country, The Bahamas, and other countries around the world and has only been changed in the 20th Century in the United States.

Rape within a marriage is still rape, men, you do not own your spouses’ bodies, I don��t care what your religion says. Here’s why.

The History and Prevalence of Marital Rape

Wikipedia states that Marital rape or spousal rape is the act of sexual intercourse with one’s spouse without the spouse’s consent. The lack of consent is an essential element and need not involve physical violence. Marital rape is considered a form of domestic violence and sexual abuse.

Although, historically, sexual intercourse within marriage was regarded as a right of spouses, engaging in the act without the spouse’s consent is now widely classified as rape by many societies around the world, repudiated by international conventions, and increasingly criminalized. — Source

In 2006, Approximately 10–14% of married women are raped by their husbands in the United States. Exactly one-third of women reported having ‘unwanted sex’ with their partner. To reiterate, historically, most rape statutes read that rape was forced sexual intercourse with a woman, not your wife, thus granting husbands a license to rape. — Source

In fact, as late as 1992 marital rape was still legal in the United States and only became illegal in 50 states in 1993.

In 20 states, the District of Columbia, and on federal lands, there are no exemptions from rape prosecution granted to husbands. However, in 30 states, there are still partial exemptions given to husbands from rape prosecution.

In most of these 30 states, a husband is exempt when he does not have to use force because his wife is most vulnerable (e.g., she is mentally or physically impaired, unconscious, asleep, etc.) and is unable to consent. Women who are raped by their husbands are likely to be raped many times — often 20 or more times.

They experience not only vaginal rape but also oral and anal rape. Researchers generally categorize marital rape into three types; force-only rape, battering rape and sadistic. — Source

Fast forward 13 years later, October 2019, Refinery29 published an article during National Domestic Violence Awareness month on marital rape. The updated statistics show 17 states still have existing loopholes for marital rape including Alabama, Alaska, Connecticut, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Washington, and Wyoming.

The law exempts prosecution of spouses who rape their wives while they are incapacitated, drugged or otherwise mentally impaired or unconscious. Other facts stated in the article about marital rape show that 1 in 10 women still experience rape at the hands of their spouse. Marital rape remains 4 times more prevalent than stranger rape women are more likely to be sexually assaulted by someone they know.

#martial rape #rape #consent #force-only rape #battering rape #sadistic rape #multiple assaults #marital rape loopholes

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jaggedcliffs · 3 years

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Slowly continuing my CQL re-watch. Have some thoughts about the Cloud Recesses Arc, episodes 1-6 (episode 7 and the wrap-up gets it’s own post because I had too many thoughts about that one episode):

Episode 3 be like: the Jiang Clan’s no good very bad day :p

Episode 3 also really establishes the Jin clan in general - and in Jin Zixuan in particular - as a rude, upper class dickwads. I mean, Jin Zixuan moves past that, thankfully, but it’s not a good look to start with.

I love the Jiang disciples throwing shade in the background about things like: the Jins are rude upperclass dickwads; Lan Wangji is a rude, inflexible dick; and Jin Zixuan is rude when he publicly disses the engagement (as represented by their gasping and throwing glares in JZX’s direction).

brb distracted by how pretty Wei Wuxian’s hair is here

gosh he’s pretty even while being mean to Lan Wangji

But seriously, Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian really are such dicks to each other to start out with (even if WWX is kind of trying to make friends at some points). Part of it is that they are boys in their late teens, and not in fact grown men in their mid-twenties. Part of it is just personality clash. Part of it is that they are too comfortable with performing occasional violations of bodily autonomy (LWJ mildly multiple times with the Lan muting spell, WWX once majorly when he makes LWJ drink alcohol). Part of it is that both deal with having crushes in wildly opposite ways, where teenage Wei Wuxian decides to bother LWJ constantly and step all over his boundaries, while teenage Lan Wangji - in is inability to deal with his feelings - becomes his rudest, most confrontational, unreasonable self.

It’s interesting that even though Wei Wuxian is introduced in Episodes 1-2 as the future ~dark lord~, and Lan Wangji as the ~heroic shining good~, it’s Lan Wangji who needs that “jerk with a heart of gold” moment when it’s revealed that he let the Jiang cultivators into Cloud Recesses after all. Which I guess is a bit a part of how these characters aren’t who you think they are: the “dark lord” has a moral core that the rest of society lacks, the “shining hero” needs to re-evaluate his relationship with society and the rules that he thought they abided by in order to realize how corrupt they were all along

I like the little head-shake that Lan Xichen gives Lan Wangji when the Wens are there - it’s similar to the sort of gestures Jiang Cheng and Wen Qing give Wei Wuxian, and that Wen Qing also gives Wen Ning. It shows that even this early on in the series, despite Wei Wuxian’s and Lan Wangji’s opposing personalities, they (along with Wen Ning) really are on the same wavelength for certain ideals - those ideals being “let’s fight bullies in authority.” Though Wen Qing does eventually join the “let’s fight bullies” side, for better or for worse.

In Lan Qiren’s speeches in Episode 4, it’s very ironic that Wei Wuxian actually fulfills most of the rules that he lays down (and I say “most,” because Wei Wuxian definitely does break the “don’t brag about your skills” rule)

I love Wei Wuxian’s methods of confronting Wen Qing on her “don’t be suspicious don’t be suspicious don’t be suspicious” missions:

Step 1) observe from a distance.

Step 2) approach and pretend to be guileless and like you aren’t suspicious.

Step 3) act goofy and non-threatening while probing for information.

Step 4) gently alert to her that you are suspicious, but in a non-threatening and humorous manner.

Step 5) continue to gently probe while also making light of it, and also deciding that you think her little brother is really neat and you want to be his friend (completely unrelated to aforementioned probing).

Step 6) decide her little brother is your new best friend and create a magical item for him while reassuring her that though you’re pretty sure you were sent to Cloud Recesses for nefarious purposes, you don’t care and just want her little brother safe - endearing yourself to her just that little bit more even as she tries to see you as an enemy for her own protection.

Things I love about the Waterborn Abyss mini-arc:

Wei Wuxian’s approach to convincing Lan Xichen to bring himself, Jiang Cheng, Wen Qing, and Wen Ning to come along on the mission: making note of everyone’s strengths, allowing for their weakness, and minimizing the possible danger they might face.

Showing off Wei Wuxian’s smarts

Showing off the beginnings of how well Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian work together as a team (continued in the Yin Metal Roadtrip, the Xuanwu Cave, and the battle scenes of Sunshot Campaign). One suggests an idea and the other finishes off the idea, building off each other create a whole idea of what they’re dealing with and a solution to the problem.

Lan Wangji be like “I will maybe admit that Wei Wuxian is a little bit right, but only to my brother, and never where Wei Wuxian can hear it”

When Lan Wangji walks into the scene where the Gusu trio sneaks in alcohol, Jiang Cheng is pretending to throttle Wei Wuxian for telling Nie Huaisang about his standards for women. This is both foreshadowing and good practice for Jiang Cheng to know exactly how to wrap his hands around his brother’s throat when he chokes Wei Wuxian for real

I’m guessing if when Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng eventually reconcile post-canon, playful throttling is off the table as forms of brotherly affection

Sometimes it makes me so sad that while we know so many cool things about the Lans’ unique cultivation, and some cool things about about the Nie, we don’t know anything about the Jiangs (nor the Jins, but they aren’t as central to the story). Like, we even know that the Wens either like 1) fire or 2) medicine, but we know nothing about the Jiangs?!?! I want to know what their specialties are :(

#jagged watches the untamed #the untamed #wei wuxian #lan wangji #wen qing #jiang cheng #lan xichen #wen ning #jin zixuan #one reason I know I will never really be able to enjoy the novel is because violations of bodily autonomy is a squick for me #when it comes to relationships where both sides love each other least #(ie. it's not as squicky here when they're barely even friends let alone husbands)#(though still somewhat squicky)#though this also doesn't extend to sacrifice plays like wq paralyzing wwx so they can go off to die #because then it's just tragic #anyway for some reason all my neat bullet-point formatting isn't showing up??#it's only showing up on my blog page not on my dashboard :(

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cruelfeline · 4 years

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The Hordak Bleatings Masterpost

The new and improved Masterpost! All of my ridiculous bleating in one place! Now with categories to allow you, dear friends and neighbors, to better marvel at the utter nonsense I get up to in my spare time. It shall be updated every so often/when I remember.

some of these categories may overlap or perhaps not be perfect; I tried; there was... a lot

Enjoy!

Biological/Medical Musings

A Fairly Comprehensive List of Hordak’s Clinical Signs

I Wrote Too Much About Hordak’s Arms

And Then Someone Asked About His Elbows So Voila

Someone Else Asked About His Eyes

Yes; I Did Measure Hordak’s Ears via Fuzzy Math; You’re Welcome

A Brief Word About Dentition

Some Sad Thoughts About Clone Lifespan

I Like to Headcanon that Clones Have Naturally Different Eye Colors

Counting Hordak’s Ports

Thinking About Terrible Ways Prime Could Institute Biological Control

Doing Very Fuzzy Math And Wondering Just How Young Hordak Could Be

Spending Way Too Much Time Figuring Out Whether Hordak is Left or Right Handed

Why Tiny Food is Probably Ideal for Hordak (a joke ask I essentially took Seriously)

Discussing Hordak’s Temper

Considering Whether Hordak Needs Oxygen

Discussing Whether Prime and his Clones are Genetically Identical

Hordak in Relation to Other Characters

Entrapdak

Hordak Can Get Close to Entrapta Because He Needn’t Fear Her

Discussing Entrapdak Age Discourse

Bit More Regarding Hordak’s Maturity vs. Entrapta’s

Hordak Didn’t Manipulate Entrapta… But Catra Did

Assessing that Unfortunate Moment When Hordak Snapped at Entrapta

Further Assessing Hordak Snapping at Entrapta by Noting When He Doesn’t

On Hordak’s Wardrobe Change

Entrapta Shushing Hordak is One of My Favorite Interactions

The Entrapdak Scene Was Also One of Self-Love

I Really Like How Entrapta Talks to Hordak About Failure

Hordak Tells an Actual Lie and Succeeds

Entrapta’s and Hordak’s Social Differences Help Them Connect to One Another

I Would Have Appreciated A Scene Where Entrapta Learns About What Happened To Hordak

Hordak Takes Strength From Realizing That Entrapta Came For Him

Hordak and Entrapta Just Like One Another, and I Enjoy That

There is a Huge Difference in How The Alliance and Hordak React to Entrapta Being on Beast Island, and it’s Jarring

This is Mostly About Catradora But Kind of in the Sense of Why Entrapdak is Better, so Here it Goes

Entrapta Didn’t Teach Hordak How to Love; She Taught Him How to Be Loved

The Soup Scene is a Condensed View of Why Entrapdak Works in Light of the Rest of Hordak’s Arc

Hordak and Entrapta Search for One Another Alone, and it Makes Me Sad

I Love How Hordak Scooches Over for Entrapta to Join Him on his Throne

Catra

The How-Catra-Manipulated-Hordak Masterpost

Watching Catra and Hordak Switch Roles in Season Three is Fascinating

Hordak and Catra’s Low Points Indicate Their Core Problems

Did Hordak Abuse Catra? Did She Abuse Him? The World May Never Know

Comparing Hordak and Catra in Terms of Consequences and Agency

Hordak and Catra’s Apparent Ages Likely Affect How People Judge Them

Why Doesn’t Hordak Subdue Catra?

Losing and Regaining the Will to Fight is Another Hordak/Catra Parallel

Sometimes I Wish The Show Would Focus Less on Catra and More on Hordak

Why Catra Besting Hordak Isn’t As Satisfying As Catra Besting Shadow Weaver

Hordak Exhibits Some Level of Trust in Catra Even in Season 2... and She Betrays It

The Difference in How Hordak and Catra Handle Relationships followed by Why They Are Like This

Some Brief Words on the Differences Between How Hordak and Catra End Up Driven to Destruction in Season Four

Musing About What I Actually Would Accept as “Hordak Abusing Catra”

I Think It’s Kind of Funny that Some Expect Catra to be Suspicious of Hordak Post-Canon

Two Scenes That Look Distressing Side-by-Side

Discussing How Catra and Hordak Start Off as Parallels but Later Deviate Due to Character Differences

Adora

How Adora and Hordak End Season Four Differently

Hordak and Adora Parallels

I Wonder if Adora Recognizes Some of Herself in Hordak

Other

This is Actually About Shadow Weaver, but Compared to Hordak, So…

Hordak Doesn’t Seem to have a “Rule the World!” Moment (compared to Shadow Weaver)

On Hordak’s Weird Interactions with DT

Watching DT Circle Hordak is Interesting

Let’s Compare the Circling Scenes, Shall We?

What Wrong Hordak’s Arc Teaches Us About Clones and Hordak

Wondering if Hordak Actually has Control Over the Etherian Horde (could he have stopped the war?)

Prime

There Is A Huge Difference In The Standards Prime And Hordak Hold Others Two Versus Themselves

Hordak and Horde Prime Handle Their Own Vulnerabilities Quite Differently

The Difference Between How Prime and Hordak Use Anger

The Moment Prime Touched Hordak’s Face is the Moment I Truly Knew That Something About Hordak’s Backstory was Very Wrong

Clone/Origin/Prime-Related Sadness

The Clone Thing

More Distressed Bleating about The Clone Thing

Hordak’s DMV Photo Disturbs Me

Hordak Isn’t Actually an Idiot About Disease Transmission

On Hordak’s Bodily Autonomy, or Lack Thereof

How Much of Hordak is “Hordak?”

I’m 99% Certain That Hordak Sucks at Lying Because he Literally Couldn’t

You’d Think Hordak would Think Things Through, But…

Hordak isn’t Really Proud of “Hordak” (with a bonus Adora mention)

Hordak Provides Excellent Fridge Horror

Hordak’s Behavioral Pathology Isn’t Actually Pathology

So! That Purification Ritual was Really Something

Despite Erasure, Hordak Remains Himself

The Clones Are Essentially Trapped By Prime And It Upsets Me

I Get Annoyed That The Clones Aren’t Discussed More By Our Heroes

Again, I Wish The Show Acknowledged The Clones A Bit More, Wrongie Edition

Wouldn’t It Be Swell If Prime Really Did Manage The Clones Like Livestock?

It’s More Emotionally Poignant That The Clones Are Individuals Rather Than Drones

Prime’s Doctrine Ensures Hordak Blames Himself, and it’s an Awful Control Measure

Hordak Probably Isn’t Dumb for Using Uninsulated Cables; Rather, Clone Sadness is in Play

Why I Can’t See Hordak and the Other Clones As Colonizers (unlike Prime) (also a whole convo thread)

Thinking About Clones and Self-Care

Each Clone Will Have to Realize That They Were Victimized

Wondering if Horde Clones Might Feel Anxious Sleeping Alone

Why Prime Might Encourage Some Autonomy in His Clones (spoilers: for cruelty)

Completely Arbitrary Classification of Clones Post-Prime!

Prime is an Actual God to the Clones and it is Terrifying

Canon Plausibility of Blanket Burritoing Horde Clones!

I Appreciate That, Despite Their Devotion, the Clones are Portrayed as Legitimately Suffering due to Prime

Catra and Adora have Happy Memories; do the Clones?; does Hordak?

Morality/Punishment/Redemption Related

Morality is (sadly) not a Universal Thing

Don’t Talk to me About the Reset as “Proper Punishment”

Why Hordak Doesn’t Just Become a Good Citizen

I Think About Hordak’s Choices a Lot

Hordak as an Abuse Mimic Rather Than Pure Evil

Looking at the Horde Child Soldier Thing From a Certain POV

Emotional Support is a Necessary Part of Healing

Hordak Was Forgiven Without Redemption, And I’m OK With That

Hordak’s Arc Speaks Directly to People who were “Raised Wrong”

I Wonder if Hordak Would See anti-Princess Propaganda as Propaganda

Semi-Intelligent Plot/Story Observations

Hordak’s Portrayal is a Function of Character Lens

Hordak Gets Very Legit Development in Season Four

She-Ra Isn’t a War Drama and Here’s Why

Hordak Suffers From a Distressing Lack of Agency

Hordak is a Weirdly Unenthusiastic Lord

The Season 4 Finale Reframes Hordak’s Vulnerability

Untangling Hordak’s Backstory in Light of What We Now Know

Why Hordak Getting Possessed is Narratively Good

Hordak’s Rebellion and Subsequent Possession Essentially Summarize His Story

There Are Big Differences Between Hordak and Prime’s Etherian Wars

It Is Pretty Unlikely That Hordak Would Have Pulled The Portal Lever

It Occurred To Me That Hordak May Initially Ignore FO’s Tech Because It’s Just Really Old

An Assessment Of The Villain Intro Cards, Focusing On Hordak

I Think It’s Silly To Blame Hordak For Everything - Especially When Considering Prime

Literally Just a Thread Explaining Why Hordak is Sympathetic

Some Words On Exactly How Terrible DT’s Reveal Was For Hordak

The Escalation of Hordak’s Situation is Really Something

An Anon Asks a Normal Question and I go on a Tangent About Hordak Compensating for his Inability to Innovate via Entrapta and Catra

There are Monumental Differences Between the Galactic and Etherian Hordes in Terms of Brainwashing and Agency

Thinking About Why Chipped Etherians May Not be That Sympathetic To Clones After All

Random Bit of Logicking About Why Hordak Calls the Princesses a Rebellion

Figuring Out Why I Find Hordak So Much More Sympathetic Than The Princesses

Brief Musing on How Hordak Might Face Antagonism From Both Sides Post-Canon

Hordak’s Story Touches on the Concept of the Imperfection of Authority

Someone Asked Me if I Found Hordak’s S5 Arc Satisfying

Discussing Whether Or Not Hordak Planned on Leading Anything After Conquering Etheria

Taking Apart an Abysmal Twitter Take Because It’s Fun

Talking About Prime’s Clone Troops v. Robot Troops

Talking About Hordak’s Emotional Age

Hordak’s S3 Backtory Being Part-Delusion Helps Emphasize the Inequality in Attachment Between the Clones and Prime

A Few Not-So-Nice Acts Hordak Commits That I Find Justifiable

Random Headcanons of All Sorts

Stupidly Cute, Pointless Headcanon #3825 (ears covered)

Stupid Pointlessly Cute Headcanon #4853 (yawning, with appropriate artwork)

Stupid Pointlessly Cute Headcanon #2938 (snoring)

Stupid Pointlessly Cute Headcanon #1423 (REM sleep)

Stupidly Cute, Pointless Headcanon #7845 (blushing)

Random Hordak-Related Thought #2935 (forearms)

I Like to Think That Hordak Does Cute Things in his Sleep

I Like to Think That Hordak’s Eyes Dim While He Sleeps

Literally Me Just Having Emotions

Thinking About the Stress of Maintaining His Image in the Horde

Why Hordak’s Trauma is Particularly Disturbing To Me (compared to Catra/Adora)

Catra Overcomes her Fear of her Abuser; Hordak Does Not

All of my Emotions over the S4 Finale

Hordak’s Goddamned Smirk Lied to Me

I Have Feelings about Hordak’s Enforced Self-Care

I Need Hordak to Know that He is Loved

Hordak Goes Pew Pew and It’s Cute

Watching Hordak Lift Things Makes Me Smile

Hordak’s Unreasonable Expectations Make Me Sad

Please Just Let Hordak Rest

A Sassy Post About People Complaining the Hordak and Catra are Forgiven

All My Words About That Hordak/Adora Scene

Hordak Taps the Asphyxiation Lever With Two Fingers And It Makes Me Happy

I Wonder If Individuality Felt Blasphemous To Hordak

Please Don’t Stab Clones In Their Ports, Thank You

Hordak Clasps His Hands And It Makes Me Anxious

Hordak Shaming Catra Mimics the Purification Room And It’s Disturbing

Watching Hordak Give Up Is Heartbreaking

I Worry About Hordak Handling Anxiety

People Being Considerate of Hordak Makes My Heart Smile

I Wonder If Magic Was Frightening to Hordak at First

Thinking About Hordak Progressing in Terms of Self-Care

Prime Never Calls Hordak by Name, not Even Once

Just Being Sad While Realizing the Sort of Life Hordak had to Look Forward To

Strange Fic-Like Things No One Should Read

Please Consider: A Concept Masterpost

Hordak Practices Eyerolling

Imp Hacks Up The Worst Color of Hairball

#hordak #masterpost #entrapdak #this post fills me with an exquisite mix of pride and abject horror

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