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aewrie · 3 months

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notes on grimm and luuca

cw past sexual abuse, d/s dynamics involving consensual nonconsent, etc

grimm uses 'lover' as a blanket term for people he's had sex with, it doesn't hold much meaning beyond that. while luuca certainly falls under that, it's not the most important part to him. (currently unsure if i want them to use dominant and submissive specifically, i get finicky about terms in settings that are not based on present-day reality, but either those or some equivalent of would be the go-to. need to think of titles they might use. though grimm gets finicky on that front; doesn't want to be called master or anything similar. 'master' is for non-kink uses only.)

the cnc started out as roleplay contained within a scene. and over time they experimented with that sort of thing, just occasionally at first, but consistently enough that eventually grimm thought to ask if they would make it a more 'official' arrangement. something more permanent.

a bit of background on luuca: before the troupe, luuca was living in exile from the moth tribe. they were doing generally fine, until their assault. their abusers were another moth (cirrus) they considered a friend, not someone particularly close, but close enough, especially after what they'd been through together, and his partner (unnamed). the encounter started out consensual, but little things came up that bothered luuca, which were dismissed when they tried to voice their discomfort, and then everything escalated from there. (this is also when they got their wings torn at the edges and their other antenna broken. it was all around a shitty time.)

on a surface level their kinks are a 'revisiting/processing traumatic event in a safe, controlled way' situation, and there's some of that in there too, but more so it's about the shame and anxiety brought by them having initiated the interaction that ended with their assault. they could not enjoy sex for the longest time without feeling guilty about wanting anything at all. rape fantasies, and later cnc, were the loophole around that (can't be guilty if you didn't want/agree to it), though it also came with it's own complicated emotions and, initially, added distress. it was not a logical thought process that led to their fantasies, but their subconscious making a cocktail with the ingredients given. it took time to accept and longer to fully process. they had dreams: sometimes nightmares more distinctly reminiscent of their abuse, sometimes more vague, with someone unknown taking them; involuntary physical reactions were a hurdle to start with, but once they realized that was not all, that they were waking not from anxiety but arousal that went beyond simple physical responses, is when it got messier.

the first time playing with grimm was the first mostly guilt- and anxiety-free sexual experience since their assault. and if he hadn't happened to discover their fantasies, they were at the time content to take all of it to their grave and remain celibate, just to avoid the distress of being perceived as wanting. which would have come as a surprise to most who knew them, since they weren't shy around the topic of sex in a more broad, general sense. they can hide a fair bit of anxiety behind relaxed confidence, and early on, grimm wasn't as good at picking out the nuances of emotions he can sense from the troupe.

it took a long time of playing with grimm before luuca warmed up to anything else or anyone else. but when they did, they figured they like doing intimacy this way, just in general. and even if other things were on the table now, this affected the dynamics with grimm rather by making it more intense, as this was around when they reconfigured their relationship and dynamic.

and, expanding on the first time, it was. a success in some ways, not so much in others. grimm dealt with a drop immediately following the scene and then a continued low in the days after, which meant that, among others things, he kept some distance to luuca. luuca on their part almost had a drop, after getting back to reality from their high and not having been immediately able to spot grimm - but they noticed where he was before their anxiety got the better of them. had grimm been able to pay attention to how luuca was feeling before he could calm down, he would have felt very differently about the whole ordeal.

some days after that scene luuca decided to go talk to grimm because they noticed he wasn't doing so great. they didn't actually have sex. there was an attempt, but luuca got nervous to the point grimm called it off. after that there was cuddling and just being close, and that's the part that grimm cared about. that luuca willingly came to him, offering something devoid of all the power games. and, he was more comfortable getting in 'control', to decide that they would just be there and hold each other, in a more relaxed setting like that. which helped luuca calm down in turn.

it was a learning process for both of them, figuring out how to make things work beyond the one semi-fumbled go they lucked out with. they went pretty hard for first time and started with actual small steps after that, after having had a chance to reflect on how things worked out and how they could have gone both better and worse.

while luuca did say 'anything', when they worked out their long-term agreement, really it meant 'anything within grimm's limits', and that's the mutual understanding on that too. there's things luuca doesn't care for or that are soft limits that grimm is into, like biting, or scents, but the right amount of pushing those limits is something that adds to the experience for them. and sometimes it's a bargaining chip. i'll let you do x if you're willing to try y is something grimm heard more than once or twice, earlier on. soft limit ≠ hard limit.

and grimm's limits are what restrict their play the most. between the two of them luuca is more eager to go further, to the point that they sometimes worry about pushing grimm. it's not always easy to tell when he's nervous about something because he doesn't want to do it period, and when he's nervous because he does want it, he's just worried it would be too much. and here's a part of why they operate with a system of luuca suggesting things and grimm deciding if and when those things happen.

(he does have his own ideas too, but luuca can be prolific on that front.)

to luuca, kink is sexual first and foremost. to grimm these are two separate things that can also be enjoyed together, and particularly later on he does not hesitate to edge and even tease luuca without ever getting sexual at all when the mood strikes.

luuca will not beg, but might express their frustration with some colourful language, among other things. they are above being petty or making themself a nuisance when they know they are being toyed with.

often enough, the consent play is the only intense part of these two having sex. on surface level it might even appear gentle with playful teasing and resisting, but there is still the power exchange. and depending on luuca's headspace, gentle might be more intense emotionally than more overt play. gentle, and trying new things that push limits, are two situations where grimm is particularly careful.

a lot of the more intense stuff they get to is something that luuca initially brought up, grimm shot down without consideration, and then much later once he's really thought about it, they give it a go. or, grimm gives it a go and luuca is there for the ride.

even when there's someone else involved, for the occasional threesome or moresome, be it vanilla(ish) sex or a scene, luuca does not decide anything, though things get toned down a in many ways. the troupe is aware of the nature of the relationship, even if not all the details of it. more than a few would be surprised to learn just how rough (in multiple senses) grimm is with luuca at times.

(they are also aware that luuca can get away with certain things because what's grimm gonna do, threaten them with a good time?? which is why in the event anyone's hesitant to bring up an issue with grimm directly, they often go to luuca.)

(this is also why grimm has to get creative if he ever wants to 'punish' them.)

(and for real grimm would be more likely to stress himself into an anxiety attack about doing something luuca would genuinely, not at all in the fun way be distressed over, than actually do it.)

once they got properly established with their more permanent arrangement, the cnc aspect became more prominent, and also changed. it was not just about roleplay anymore, but a dynamic of their relationship in general. luuca has essentially consented to their consent not being considered. grimm decides what they do and when, and luuca's input is not pertinent. and, power exchange is part of their daily life to an extent. it's always there in the background. luuca's devotion to grimm and helping with whatever he needs assistance with is just that, but also acts of service as part of their submission.

there's a lot of little things luuca handles in his stead; grimm decides something should be done and luuca sees to it that it gets done. if he needs assistance with something, luuca handles it or sees that someone suitable does. and on a more personal level, luuca remembers things from grimm's past lives he doesn't. they tell him some of these things each reincarnation, and bring up some as needed. much of this they have discussed at some point, but at times it's luuca's judgement call.

there is also the element of things luuca chooses to tell others; things grimm doesn't like keeping a secret but also doesn't fancy talking about publicly or semi-publicly. this one is particularly heavy on the responsibilities department when grimm forgets something and doesn't want to be reminded without a good reason. at times luuca does worry, but it's a task given by grimm to handle these things, so handle it they do.

they do have a safeword/signal - typically takes the form of three consecutive taps or such, but could be just about anything, so long as it's repeated that three times and is recognizable as something deliberate - but it's not something luuca really uses, at least not to indicate that they want to stop.

to them, the whole point is that they don't get to have a say. it puts their anxieties around sex at rest. and even after they reach a point that they can relax, they like it; the anticipation of waiting and/or not knowing what might come, and the satisfaction of being claimed. grimm can act extra possessive during a scene and the emotional effect on luuca is on par with best aftercare; their abusers did essentially just abandon them after they were done, and even though luuca only vaguely remembers the fact, its effects are something they carry with them longer than anything else from that day, aside the physical scars.

they used to have an actual word, and technically that is still valid for use, but they switched to a more versatile signal after learning the hard way that grimm struggles with words when he gets anxious enough.

when luuca safewords, it's typically a case of there being an issue grimm was not aware of, something that he would not want to ignore if he had noticed it. maybe they've gotten sick and only just realized it a little before grimm showed up. maybe there's an injury/risk of injury that needs to be attended to right then and there that he didn't notice. and, often they'll just try to explain the situation without the use of the signal, if possible. it's more a backup in case they have trouble getting grimm's attention, or they're gagged and can't talk, or something along those lines.

grimm, on his part, is more likely to safeword precisely because things got too emotionally intense. he's not the best at actually doing so, though. there's been a few times when luuca's noticed he's not really in it, and called things off just to give him a chance to reel back and ground himself.

just about every time luuca has safeworded, it's been because they knew grimm would have wanted to stop, or be made aware of something before deciding whether to continue, and if yes, how to continue.

and related to that, if luuca is actively resisting, they're fine. what grimm knows to look out for is them freezing or fawning (latter not to be confused for when they're exhausted and more cooperative for that reason. they will get grumpy about it).

the safeword signal has spread to some others, primarily through luuca as grimm doesn't play particularly hard with most others, and generally there's less chance of causing confusion as to whether a 'no' or such is part of the play or not. luuca on their part, once they get comfortable enough with others, tends to lean as far into the cnc as a given partner is comfortable going.

(the signal is also something that comes handy when either discreetly needs to alert the other of something serious in the company of strangers. a carefully placed repeated word or gesture in the middle of a friendly interaction isn't likely to raise suspicions.)

aftercare is interesting in that grimm, when he's domming, really just wants to be gentle and caring when he hits that point. luuca is generally more pragmatic, once they got more experienced and started working out the kinks (heh) of how all this works for them. for the most part, it's about the immediate physical needs. and it works out well, much of the time. making sure luuca is physically fine and attending to any problems gives grimm an 'excuse' to fuss over them and be gentle, even if more in the physical sense. the emotional gentleness tends to be reserved for scenarios outside of sex.

and like mentioned, luuca gets anxious about being abandoned, but it's less that they (emotionally) want to be cared for and more that they want to be wanted, be it sexually or in general. grimm just being there and acknowledging them does the trick generally, though he tends to do more than that even when there's nothing else that needs taking care of.

luuca generally prefers grimm stays 'in character' as much as possible with checking in and aftercare. particularly early on, at times grimm being too nice messed with them in a bad way. this was at the time one the bigger obstacles in figuring out something that works for them both, because while grimm enjoys the power and control, he also worries and does not want to push it if he is at all uncertain.

some things with aftercare that extends outside kinky scenarios: whenever grimm is responsible for an injury on luuca, no matter how mild, they let him address it. this goes for things like accidents or the child getting bitey. whatever it is, grimm checks luuca over and treats wounds as needed. they're his, and that means they're his to care for.

and, in a way that goes both ways. luuca is grimm's safe space to fall apart and be messy and emotional. this is in part just because they've been around for so long, but also largely because they've seen all the worst parts of him and still stick by without anything so much as resembling fear or contempt.

in case of grimm having a personal crisis or the like, luuca tends to be the primary line of communication between grimm and the rest of the troupe. there are others who will step up to handle grimm's duties, but anything else that is pressing luuca can relay so that grimm can take his time sorting himself out.

in case of interpersonal conflicts involving grimm that do not appear to be getting anywhere good, fetching luuca to diffuse the situation or to press for a resolution is a common occurrence. while many may be able to pinpoint the issue and offer solutions, luuca has less hesitation with regards to forcing grimm's hand if he does not seem to be getting anywhere near resolving an issue.

dreamsex/somnophilia deserves its own little section. for reasons.

initially luuca would have liked to jump right into grimm fucking with their dreams/nightmares, but he flat out refused. he had his hesitations because of teh inherent power imbalance, and his lack of confidence with manipulating dreams in a controlled way. and a good while later, when they were at the testing waters with various aspects phase, luuca brought up him having sex with their actual physical self while they're asleep. this grimm also initially refused. and after he got assaulted, luuca figured that best not bring that particular kink up again, just to play it safe. grimm had enough of a rough time reconciling with their role as a dom again after that.

to their surprise, grimm might have taken his time considering the dreamsex (as in, both of them are asleep, nothing is going on physically beside involuntary responses, but their minds are fast at work), but it did eventually happen. because he had ideas that carried more of a risk of serious injury, and by then he had grown more confident with his ability to control and manipulate dreams, and there he had a way to test things without risking real, lasting damage. and later, it was something done for its own sake. a little treat for special occasions.

the somno also happened later. after even further careful consideration. grimm didn't like the idea of luuca being unable to communicate at all, even if for them this was, for a good while, the #1 kink to hopefully try at some point. and when that did happen, it was a perfect example of how luuca should be careful what they wish for, because grimm can be creative about implementation and absolutely will scheme when he gets in the mood. they technically got what they wanted and were salty about it for days, much to grimm's delight.

closer to canon events luuca is old and is starting to feel it (au lore is troupe bugs age very very slowly but they do age) and their libido has gradually declined over time, though it's not completely gone. the biggest hurdle is that they need to be a more careful because they can't handle physically demanding things the same way they used to; they do grumble about grimm handling them like they're delicate, though. they may be a bit achy and have less stamina but they're not made of glass, they'll have you know.

fortunately, even when doing something in waking would be a potentially bad idea, grimm can still drop a visit to luuca in their dreams. even if the reason might have shifted from 'this would be a bad idea in general' to 'this would be a bad idea because of age related health concerns'.

tl;dr they have nasty disrespectful sex and also trust each other with their lives. ty for coming to my ted talk

#presenting: i can do a wall of text explaining their kink dynamics #luuca #a fire sets alight #hk #cirrus #for him being mentioned

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titch-the-eskibro-bandit · 9 months

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Hi, I know it's been a while since I've posted. I think something so important is accountability. When you have a public social platform whether you have 4 followers 400 or thousands it's so important to look at behavior both past and present and say yes I did or said this previously I do not support this now. I'm sorry if I said or did anything that was ignorant or just hurtful. Truth is I regret a bunch of things I posted. Of all things arguably my most problematic era was being a Degrassi blog of all things.

There was a time I dismissed Tristan being biphobic very early on when he said a line. He was biphobic. And thank fuck there were so many fans who called out that shit as harmful. Because it was and it still is. Even now it's still such a prevalent thing in the community especially with gay men towards bisexual men. Or lesbians with bisexual women. For someone who is queer herself I shouldn't of defended it the first time I heard it. I shouldn't of defended it period. I go both ways I wouldn't ever want someone to say that to me or anyone on the spectrum of sexuality because there's nothing to change or apologize for. Thank you to every single fan who said it was. Thank you for calling me out at that time even when I was too ignorant to see it for what it was. I am sorry. As an adult. Fuck that shit. Fuck the me that said those things.

Degrassi of all shows normalized a lot of things that shouldn't of been normalized. Katie raping Drew. Zoe doing child pornography to take back power after her assault. Biphobia. Ableism etc. We shouldn't herald a show for having representation as perfect because even shows with spectrums of representations aren't perfect. Or even shows/movies with little representation can fall under the umbrella of problematic normalization. Gossip Girl normalized rape culture with Chuck Bass where he attempted to SA two of the main females in the first episode and later the show demonized one of the girls for having 'sex' with him when she had hit a low point and Chuck took advantage of her. He was romanticized as a romantic lead and good endgame when he was an abusive predator who deserved jail not marriage and a child. Sex in the City Carrie was biphobic and it was normalized. The vampire era normalized so much pedophilia. It's okay to still enjoy the shows, media or movies you consume despite the problematic tendencies if you recognize and call out said problematic tendencies.

Whilst it's easily to look back and be like well oh it was normalized so my reactions at that period are fine. I think it's so important to look inward to yourself and reflect on if you have said or done something harmful to the community you have. I was harmful. It doesn't matter what I was going through. It doesn't even really matter if it was normalized I contributed to a bad stigma which hurt and potentially invalidated people. That's not okay.

Whilst queer representation hasn't 100% improved over the years seeing shows like Kitty x0x0 or schitts creek and many others depict bisexuality, pansexuality and the spectrum in general with so much respect and love makes me want to cry with happiness. I'm so thankful that kids and teens growing up get that. It's important ESPECIALLY if you are depicting a same sex relationship to see gay characters love and respect their spectrumed partners. I want better for the community I'm a part of. I want the representation that's deserved. The world is shitty and scary enough having that small ember of hope is needed.

#my one non regret to the degrassi fandom is my friends I made #they are genuinely good people who I love very much

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ashtrayfloors · 1 year

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Halloween was magical. P. and I both dressed as vampires, he in a Lost Boys style, me inspired by Dave Vanian’s look in the “Nasty” episode of The Young Ones. We took the kids out trick-or-treating for the first time since 2019—I mean, C. was too young then to even remember trick-or-treating. But I was just happy to be out, wandering the neighborhood on Halloween; it reminded me of Halloweens when I was a kid—the bonfire and chimney-smoke, crunching through the leaves, kids shrieking in delighted fear, the early dark. And two of the houses we stopped at had crock pots full of warm, boozy apple cider for the grownups, and it was wonderful.

Then November, the Day of the Dead—which I had already been celebrating for days beforehand. A Santa Muerte candle burning, offerings on my altar, thinking of all my dear departed. Missing Jack, missing Erik. Missing Sean and Frank and Travis and Matt and Molly and and and. Having conversations with my Grandpa—my mom’s dad, who died before I was born.

There were some other strange occurrences at the end of October and into November. A few objects launched themselves off of surfaces when no one was nearby, and when they weren’t anywhere precarious enough to just fall for no reason. There may be a rational explanation, but it happened enough times in the span of a few days when I felt the presence of the dead all around for me to think it was related.

I was feeling stressed and anxious later in the day of November 1, and C. was in a cranky mood, but then I remembered that both he and I do better when we get out of the house. And it was such a gorgeous day that day, weather-wise—part of a few-day stretch of warm weather before the autumn cold settled in. So in the late afternoon, we walked down to the neighborhood park, and it was perfect. I got to sit on a bench and write while C. did “parkour” and played tag with a couple of other kids. We were both a lot happier afterwards.

Last Thursday I cut my hair into a partially-shaved, semi-undercut style. I needed the change.

Friday I had a Facebook Messenger conversation with a friend of mine. At first we were talking about trans stuff, about how we feel like we’ve had experiences and feelings that are pretty tied to our AGABs, but then other experiences and feelings which are more often tied to the gender ‘opposite’ our AGABs. Then we were both venting about stuff we’ve been dealing with IRL. One of the things I vented about was finding out that a guy I know in the Kenosha punk scene is some level of serial sexual harasser or abuser. He’s not someone I know well, but it also just keeps happening, every year or two, finding out that some guy I knew from punk or activist circles is a rapist or abuser. And I was talking about how it’s kinda retraumatizing, giving me flashbacks to when I outed the Kenosha punk scene dude who raped me many years ago, and a bunch of other dudes in the scene either denied it or dismissed it. But I also said that most of the people I’ve seen calling this current guy out are in fact other men; and I said how heartening that is, and how maybe the tide has at least started to turn in the past 15-20 years. She was sympathetic at first but then started going on this rant about how awful cis men are and like... I wasn’t going to “not all men” her, but it made me deeply uncomfortable. Because like, I’d just mentioned how it was largely cis men standing up against this particular dude. And yeah, I’ve been raped and abused by cis men, but I’ve also been raped and abused by women. And some of my biggest supporters and comrades have also been cis men. And my partner is a cis man, and my kiddos are AMAB—they may or may not grow up to be cis men, but right now they’re boys, and whatever they grow up to be, to just write them off as “well of course they’ll be awful if they’re cis men?” No. Also, she’s a trans woman, so you’d think she’d realize that “all (cis) men are bad” is kind of a direct pipeline to the TERF viewpoint of “anyone AMAB is bad.” You know?

The first day I cut my hair I was feeling really good about it, felt like a hot queer punk again, but then I started feeling weird and kinda bad about it. I’m premenstrual, which can cause weird bad feelings about any manner of things, and I started worrying that maybe I actually look ugly with the new hairstyle, and also maybe like I’m too old to be doing shit like that to my hair anymore. I never ascribe to the “too old” thing for other people, and logically I know it’s bullshit, but as a woman, AFAB person, or someone perceived to be a woman, it’s hard not to internalize those kinds of cultural messages.

But then on Saturday morning, waiting to get vaccinated at Walgreen’s, I saw this person come in—they were probably in their late 50s or early 60s, their hair was all gray/white, and they had a full undercut, plus a bunch of piercings in their ears, and combat boots. And they looked so fucking fabulous that it made me go: If someone with a full head of gray hair who is like 15 to 20 years older than I am can rock a punky style, then I definitely can. (Also, they were super hot and my queerdar definitely pinged, and I’ve been having some sexy fantasies about them since the encounter.)

I got double-vaxxed that day; flu shot + updated CoViD booster. I get so mad at anti-vaxxers in general and at anti-CoViD-vaxxers specifically who are like “we don’t know what the side effects of the vaccines really are.” Because I do know what the side effects of vaccines are for me. I’m not allergic, but I get extreme reactions to both flu and CoViD vaccines (and others). I feel half-sick for twenty-four hours or more, I get pain and swelling near the injection site, and I get painful, swollen lymph nodes on the parts of my body near the injection site, which last anywhere from three days to a week. But I still get fucking vaccinated, because I’d rather have all that then get seriously ill or die, or potentially be a carrier and cause other people to get seriously ill or die. (It’s that whole “I do not know how to make you understand that you should care about other people” thing.)

What else? Well, I’m premenstrual, and still have the swollen, painful lymph nodes, and I’m stressed about money as always and desperately trying to find ways to hustle for side gigs and side-side gigs. But other than that, things aren’t so bad. I’ve been spending my time cutting, collating, stapling, and packing up zine orders while drinking hella coffee and listening to punk and post punk. I’ve been playing accordion; I’m glad I forced myself to do a tribute for Songs Jack Taught Us, because it got me to start playing accordion again. And I have been writing so much—I’m working on a bunch of poems, as well as a novella/memoir hybrid for NaNoWriMo, and the words are just flowing. In fact, I wish all I had to do these days was write, and I get frustrated that there are so many interruptions and other things I have to do, but I’m counting my blessings. I’d rather have this problem than the opposite one—the one where I have all the time in the world to write, but nothing will come out.

#ashtrayfloors #dear livejournal #halloween #magic #day of the dead #ghosts #small good things #haircuts #rape cw #all men are evil except my boyfriend #said the sound of the spectacle #hot queers #vaccines #life #trans stuff

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agentcable · 1 month

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Law & Order Season 21 Ep. 1 "The Right Thing"

Kevin Bernard and Frank Cosgrove, who have recently become partners, are investigating the murder of a well-known entertainer. A disagreement over whether to discard a confession causes a division in the District Attorney's office.

If you want to watch the series for yourself, stop reading! This post contains spoilers to the storyline.

During a morning talk show, a Black entertainer who was recently released from prison claimed his innocence regarding a rape accusation and vowed to spend his life correcting the injustice. However, he was soon found dead with five bullets in his body. Cosgrove expressed disgust towards the man, but Bernard reminded him that every victim deserves respect.

Bernard and Cosgrove speak with King's wife, who did not turn on the security cameras. She explained that she is from North Carolina and is not used to locking her front door.

Later, at the station, Dixon reacts negatively when Bernard mentions that this is the first time he can remember anyone caring that a Black man was shot. She requests that he and Cosgrove concentrate on the case.

Bernard and Cosgrove speak to a man who was fired by King. He claims that everyone, including a gangbanger, threatened King. The detectives leave and almost get into an altercation with a Black kid. Bernard intervenes and pulls Cosgrove away. Cosgrove acknowledges that Bernard is straightforward and speaks his mind. They both agree that cameras are useful in holding cops accountable.

Bernard's acquaintance agrees to an interview and reveals that while in jail, King was targeted for assault by other inmates. To prevent this, the gang offered to protect him for a monthly fee of 100k. However, after his release, King stopped paying and was physically assaulted by Shabaz, who was then chased off by a bodyguard. At the time of King's death, he was in a bar tlaking to his bodyguard in an attempt to resolve the issue. King offered him 50k, but he refused. The bodyguard appears to be shocked and disappointed by King's death.

The police confirmed that Shabaz's alibi checks out. Dixon reviewed security footage of an argument between King and a woman. The woman was identified as Jamie Roos, a prosecutor known to Dixon.

Jamie informs the police that she was the prosecutor for the initial case. She believed it was only one victim, but later more women came forward. Following a civil lawsuit, she attempted to charge him for the other women's rapes, but his confession was dismissed because what he said in civil court was supposed to be protected from prosecution. Cosgrove insinuates that she may have been involved in King's death, and she promptly asks the police to leave her office.

Dixon is displeased upon hearing this. Cosgrove shows no remorse for his words, but Dixon affirms that Ross is trustworthy and not involved. The police investigation leads them to suspect King's wife, who left the restaurant she was using as an alibi an hour before the murder. Security footage shows her two blocks from the brownstone 20 minutes before the killing occurred.

However, when questioned again, Mrs. King admits that she did not want to go home and face her husband, so she went to a local bar and had some drinks. Additionally, she saw someone wearing a green hoodie hanging around.

The story may seem unbelievable, but it is true. The police begin their search for the woman wearing a green hoodie. They discover a discarded cigarette butt at the crime scene and use it to identify her as Nicole Bell, formerly known as Nicole Atkins, who was the first woman raped by King.

The police obtain a search warrant for Nicole's residence and locate the green hoodie in her washing machine. Although there is no gunshot residue on the hoodie, it is still considered evidence. Addtionally, two officers find the gun in a dumpster.

During questioning, Nicole was assured that she was not under arrest and that the police were there to help. Unfortunately, she confessed to shooting King because she couldn't stand the fact that he had no remorse and was free to rape again. After disposing of the gun, she went home and took a shower before going to bed. Nicole was shocked when she was arrested following her confession.

During the arraignment, the Assistant District Attorneys (ADAs) had to navigate through a crowd of protesters who believed that Nicole should not be arrested for killing her rapist. Nolan requested a low bail amount, but the judge deemed it a murder case and set bail at one million dollars, which caused an uproar among the protesters in the gallery.

Nolan and Maroun discuss the arraignment. The defense is requesting the confession be thrown out, claiming coercion. Nolan questions the validity of the claim, but Maroun disagrees. She witnessed the interrogation and believed Cosgrove skillfully presented falsehoods as truth. Nolan then proceeds to meet with McCoy. According to McCoy, police officers are permitted to deceive suspects. It is important not to undermine their authority. Nolan contends that this is not merely a falsehood. Cosgrove essentially guaranteed immunity. During cross-examination, the defense will dismantle his testimony and portray the police as the antagonists. McCoy asserts that law enforcement is facing criticism and calls to defund, but they are meant to work alongside district attorneys. Nolan believes he can win the case without the confession, so McCoy allows him to discard it.

During the cross-examination of Cosgrove, the defense attorney argues that there is no evidence to prove that their client is the murderer. However, Cosgrove testifies that Nicole confessed to him. The defense objects, and the judge calls the attorneys into chambers. The defense attorney is requesting a mistrial due to the confession being mentioned. Nolan admits that Cosgrove made a mistake, but takes responsibility for not reminding him not to mention the confession. However, Nolan argues that the testimony was not prejudicial. The judge agrees with Nolan and denies the request for a mistrial.

Nolan confronts Cosgrove. Cosgrove tells him to go to hell. Nolan cares more about his ideals than getting murderers off the street. Cosgrove says he had the right to lie to suspects.

Maroun visits Nolan and shares news. Nicole claims self-defense, and Mrs. King supports her.

During the trial, Mrs. King testified that she witnessed Henry pursuing Nicole on the night of the murder and that Nicole shot him in self-defense. However, Nolan challenged her testimony by pointing out that Mrs. King was at a bar during the time of the incident. Despite this, Mrs. King maintained that the bar manager was mistaken and that she had left earlier than she believed. She refused to alter her statement. Nolan accused her of lying to absolve herself of the guilt of supporting her husband when he was accused of raping 40 women. Mrs. King vehemently denied the accusation, insisting that she was telling the truth. Nolan is instructed by the judge to stop badgering the witness.

Nicole testifies next, recounting being raped twice by Henry. She brought a gun to their last meeting as a precaution, as he had claimed he wanted to apologize but then poured her a glass of wine, causing her to fear he had spiked it. She was frightened and attempted to flee, but he pursued her. She shot him to allow the women he had victimized to move on.

Maroun informs Nolan that Nicole met with Jamie Ross on the day of the murder. Nolan locates Ross at a nearby restaurant but she refuses to provide any information. He subpoenas her, but she pleads the fifth amendment on the stand when questioned about seeing Nicole or having knowledge of Nicole's intentions to kill King.

Nolan is upset that the jury seems to be buying this preposterous self-defense argument. Maroun tells him that the jury wants to acquit, as they are sympathetic to Nicole's plight. McCoy agrees and tells Nolan he should not have thrown out the confession. Nolan realizes that being the hero is only okay if he wins. McCoy leaves, and Nolan tells Maroun that McCoy is right. The jury sees him as yet another man victimizing Nicole. Nolan asks Maroun to do the closing.

Maround delivers a powerful closing. She sympathizes with Nicole as a woman. It was legal for Nicole to fantasize about shooting her rapist, but not to actually do it. If she acted with intent, she must be convicted.

Nicole is found guilty, enraging protesters who demand her release. Maroun tells Nolan that she doesn't feel good about this verdict and hopes he will ask for the lightest possible sentence.

#USA #TV Serie #Crime #Drama #2022 #Law and Order

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analtbeast · 9 months

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For reference this is what I'm talking about: X

Wow Birdsong continues to get worse and worse huh? I got the feeling that Talk was an aggressive asshole from the original callout so I'm not surprised that they wouldn't give a shit about racism. (Being "ignorant" and not experiencing much racism yourself doesn't mean it's ok to ignore racism ffs. Especially antisemitism like wtf???)

But Birdsong continues to lie out of their ass. Oh you were feeling disgusted with yourself for drawing rape and incest and other illegal art? GOOD. But I don't think that's true. You literally were joking about an adult uncle raping his minor nephew days before getting rid of Toffee. I don't know what's worse, you "pretending" to be into it while being too much of a coward to stand up for what's right, or you being into it and now lying to everyone now about being better. At least Toffee has the decency to be open about their illegal ships.

Toffee may be a proshipper but even I feel bad for them here. Imagine being lied to about your friend being open and honest to you just to find out that they were lying this whole time because "boo hoo i was scared you might commit suicide". Excuse me??? I've had friends who were off and on again suicidal but I'd never just hide shit from them because of it, much less blame them for me hiding shit?? That's on you Birdsong for being a slimy, pathological liar.

And it's nice to have solid proof of this group being antisemitic. Like they were obviously stalkers. Deplatform proshippers all you want but going after a minor and every single friend they have? That's fucked. If you go around attacking the same person for years you have a problem. Birdsong should have known that. But now we even have screens from Talk themselves that these people were bigots. And Birdsong knew about this?? And it took TWO times of them being bigots to leave the nazis? Wtf is wrong with you?

Keep Birdsong away from minors, keep them away from any POC especially Jewish people and keep them away from autistic people too considering the shit their sister said and how they see autism as an "excuse" rather than something they dismissed and demonized someone for.

Birdsong lured a vulnerable, mentally unstable person in with kindness and then stabbed them in the back by working with their abusers. They used someone almost 10 years younger than them for their weird fetishes and as free labor and then tossed them aside. And then falsely accused them of horrible things and called them out on them for things they both drew, pretending to be a good person and a victim. Anyone who is their friend is at risk of being another victim. Anyone who gets close to them is likely to be lied to and cast aside for their own goals or for their partner. Honestly I even think Talk should get away from them since they clearly lied about their art and about Toffee. Talk seems genuinely remorseful now that they know the truth, and the fact that they don't care that Birdsong hid the full story from them is alarming. The weird attachment these two have where they excuse each other's horrible actions but also are okay with hiding so many things from each other is disturbing.

Of course, they were never going to come clean about this if their victim didn't speak up. Sure they're all "I'm so sorry I'm just the worst" now that they've been caught. You ruined someone's life and you didn't care until it affected you? How horrible can you get? And even after being so so sorry, they didn't say anything on their blog about it. Only remorseful enough to talk in private so you can silence your victim while never having to take a blow to your reputation? You snake. They were too nice to you and yet they feel bad for being "blunt". They were just telling the truth and you couldn't take the heat. How does it feel to be accused of awful things Birdsong? Except they have proof and your own admission to support them, you had nothing but lies to support you.

I'm disgusted that they still get over 100 notes on their comic pages. That's over a 100 people that are supporting a liar, freak, and a bigot apologist. How many people support them financially? How many close friends do they have? How can anyone look at their blatant lies and betrayal and think "hmmm I want to continue supporting this person"? I really hope that people just don't know. Because this is just another thing making me lose faith in people among many MANY other things.

#warriors #warrior cats #rape mention #proship mention #incest mention #tw abuse #i don't know how to tag things #birdsong warriors #talkingtalltales #swifthawk's chance #redtail's choice #wc #yeah i'm putting this in main tags #people need to know #may birdsong lose all support and fuck off #and talk not be dragged down with them since they seem to not have known just how wrong they were #get out of there buddy you can do better #even if you have serious anger issues ngl

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innuendostudios · 3 years

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youtube

I was invited to give a talk on GamerGate over Zoom in early 2021. I've long been frustrated that there isn't a good timeline of GG and its origins on YouTube. When people ask "what the hell was GG anyway?" they often get referred to my or Dan Olson's videos on the subject, but both of them were made while GG was ongoing, and presumed a degree of familiarity on the part of the audience. There was just too much to say about what was already happening to spend time getting the audience up to speed, and it was safe to assume our audiences had enough context to follow along. But time moves fast on the internet, and many people who now care about such things weren't there while it was happening, and are lacking the necessary context to follow the better videos. For a long time, I've only been able to direct them to RationalWiki's timeline, which is excellent but so exhaustively comprehensive that it's likely to scare off first-timers.

I realize an hourlong lecture isn't necessarily helping matters, but the first 20-or-so minutes of this video are my attempt at streamlining the timeline such that people can be up to speed on the most important stuff fairly quickly. The rest is talking about what it all meant, how it prefigured the Alt-Right, and using it to better understand digital radicalization.

This video was made with the help of Magdalen Rose, who edited the slides to the audio while I was laid up with a back injury. Go sub to her channel! And please back me on Patreon.

Transcript below the cut.

FUCKING VIDEO GAMES? FUCKING VIDEO GAMES. THEY MADE DOZENS OF PEOPLE MISERABLE FOR YEARS OVER VIDEO GAMES! NOT EVEN FUCKING VIDEO GAMES, FUCKING ARTICLES ABOUT FUCKING VIDEO GAMES. THIS IS WHAT PASSES FOR LEGITIMATE GRIEVANCE. ARE YOU KIDDING ME WITH THIS SHIT??

Hi! My name is Ian Danskin. I’m a video essayist and media artist. I run the YouTube channel Innuendo Studios, please like share and subscribe.

I’m here to talk to you about GamerGate, and I needed to get all that out of the way. I’m going to talk about what GamerGate was and how it prefigured The Alt-Right, and there are gonna be moments where you’re nodding along with me, going, “yeah, yeah I get it,” and then the sun’s gonna break through a crack in the wall and you’ll suddenly remember that all this is happening because some folks - mostly ladies - said some stuff - provably true stuff, I might add - about video games and a bunch of guys didn’t like it, and you’re gonna want to rip your hair out. By the end of this, you will have a better understanding of what happened, but it will never not be bullshit.

Also, oh my god, content warning. Racism, sexism, antisemitism, homophobia, transphobia, rape threats, threats of violence, domestic abuse - I’m not going to depict or describe at length any of the worst stuff, but it’s all in the mix. So if at any point you need to switch me off or mute me, you have my blessing.

Brace yourselves.

Some quick prehistory:

In 2012, feminist media critic Anita Sarkeesian ran a Kickstarter campaign for a YouTube series on sexist tropes in video games. And, partway through the campaign, 4chan found it and said “let’s ruin her life.” And a lot of the male general gaming public joined in. And by “ruin her life” I’m not talking 150 angry tweets including dozens of rape and death threats per week, though that was a thing. I’m talking bomb threats. I’m talking canceled speaking engagements because someone threatened to shoot up a school. I’m talking FBI investigation. The harassers faced no meaningful repercussions.

And in 2013, Zoe Quinn released Depression Quest, a free text game about living with depression. They received harassment off and on for the next year, most pointedly from an incel forum called Wizardchan that doxxed their phone number and made harassing phone calls telling them to kill themself. The harassers faced no meaningful repercussions.

(Also, quick note: Zoe Quinn is nonbinary and has come out since the events in question. When I call Zoe’s harassment misogynist, understand I am not calling Zoe a woman, but they were attacked by people who hate women because that’s how they were perceived. Had they been out at the time things probably would’ve gone down similarly, but on top of misogyny I’d be talking about nonbinary erasure and transphobia.)

Okay. Our story begins in August 2014. The August that never ended.

Depression Quest, after a prolonged period on Greenlight, finally releases on Steam as a free download with the option to pay what you want. In the days that follow, Zoe’s ex-boyfriend, Eron Gjoni, writes a nearly 10,000-word blog called The Zoe Post, in which he claims Quinn had been a shitty and unfaithful partner. (For reference, 10,000 words is long enough that the Hugos would consider it a novelette.) This is posted to forums on Penny Arcade and Something Awful, both of which immediately take it down, finding it, at best, a lot of toxic hearsay and, at worse, an invitation to harassment. So Gjoni workshops the post, adds a bunch of edgelord humor (and I am using the word “humor” very generously), and reposts it to three different subforums on 4chan.

We’re not going to litigate whether Zoe Quinn was a good partner. I don’t know or care. I don’t think anyone on this call is trying to date them so I’m not sure that’s our business. What is known is that the relationship lasted five months, and, after it ended, Gjoni began stalking Quinn. Gjoni has, in fact, laid out how he stalked Quinn in meticulous detail to interviewers and why he feels it was justified. It’s also been corroborated by a friend that Quinn briefly considered taking him back at a games conference in San Francisco, but he became violent during sex and Quinn left the apartment in the middle of the night with visible bruises.

Off of the abusive ex-boyfriend’s post, 4chan decides it’s going to make Zoe Quinn one of their next targets, and starts a private IRC channel to plan the campaign. The channel is called #BurgersAndFries, a reference to Gjoni claiming Quinn had cheated on him with five guys. A couple sentences in The Zoe Post - which Gjoni would later claim were a typo - imply that one of the five guys was games journalist Nathan Grayson and that Quinn had slept with him in exchange for a good review of Depression Quest. Given the anger that they’d seen drummed up against women in games with the previous Anita Sarkeesian hate mob, #BurgersAndFries decides to focus on this breach of “ethics in games journalism” as a cover story, many of them howling with laughter at the thought that male gamers would probably buy it. This way, destroying Quinn’s life and career and turning their community against them would appear an unfortunate byproduct of a legitimate consumer revolt; criticism of the harassment could even be framed as a distraction from the bigger issue. Gjoni himself is in the IRC channel telling them that this was the best hand to play.

The stated aim of many on #BurgersAndFries was to convince Quinn to commit suicide.

Two regulars in the IRC, YouTubers MundaneMatt and Internet Aristocrat, make videos about The Zoe Post. Incidentally, both these men had already made a lot of money off videos about Anita Sarkeesian. Matt’s is swiftly taken down with a DMCA claim, and he says that Quinn filed the claim themself. (For the record, in those days, YouTube didn’t tell you who filed DMCA claims against you.) Members of the IRC also reach out to YouTuber TotalBiscuit, who had been critical of Sarkeesian and dismissive of her harassment, and he tweets the story to his 350,000 followers, saying a game developer trading sex for a good review might not prove true, but was certainly plausible.

This is where GamerGate begins to get public traction.

Zoe Quinn is very swiftly doxxed, with their phone number, home address, nudes, and names and numbers of their family collected. Gjoni himself leaks their birth name. The Zoe Post, and the movement against Quinn - now dubbed “The Quinnspiracy” - make it to The Escapist and Reddit, which mods will have little luck removing. The Quinnspiracy declares war on any site that does take their threads down, most vehemently NeoGAF. People who defend Zoe against the harassment start getting doxxed themselves - Fez developer Phil Fish is doxxed so thoroughly, hackers get access to the root folder of his website.

In what I’m going to call This Should Have Been The End, Part 1, Stephen Totilo, Editor-in-Chief at Kotaku where Nathan Grayson worked, in response to pressure not just from The Quinnspiracy but an increasing number of angry gamers buying The Quinnspiracy’s narrative, publishes a story. In it he verifies that Quinn and Grayson did date for several months, and that not only is there no review of Depression Quest anywhere on Kotaku, not by Grayson nor anyone else, but that Grayson did not write a single word about Quinn the entire time they were dating.

In response, The Quinnspiracy declares war on Kotaku. r/KotakuinAction is formed, which will become the primary site of organization outside of chanboards. The fact that their entire “movement” is based on a review that does not exist changes next to nothing.

Some people start to see The Quinnspiracy as potentially profitable. The Fine Young Capitalists get involved, a group ostensibly working to get women into video games but who have a Byzantine plan to do so wherein they crowdfund the budget and the woman who wins a competition gets to storyboard a game, but another company will make and she will get 8% of the profits, the rest going to a charity chosen by the top donor. 4chan becomes the top donor. They like TFYC because the head of the company has a vendetta against Zoe Quinn, who had previously called them out for their transphobic submission policy, and he falsely accused Quinn of having once doxxed him. 4chan feels backing an ostensibly feminist effort will be good PR, but can’t resist selecting a colon cancer charity because, they say, feminism is cancer and they want to be the cure to butthurt. They also get to design a character for the game, and so they create Vivian James, who will become the GamerGate mascot.

Manosphere YouTubers Jordan Owen and Davis Aurini launch a Patreon campaign for their antifeminist documentary The Sarkeesian Effect and come to The Quinnspiracy looking for $15,000 a month for an indefinite period to make it, which they get.

In what will prove genuinely awful timing, Anita Sarkeesian releases the second episode of Tropes vs. Women in Video Games, and, despite not being a games journalist and having nothing to do with Quinn or Grayson, she is immediately roped into the narrative about how feminists are ruining games culture and becomes the second major target of harassment. Both she and Quinn soon have to leave their houses after having receiving dozens and dozens of death threats that include their home addresses.

After being courted by members of the IRC channel, Firefly star Adam Baldwin tweets a link to one of the Quinnspiracy videos and coins the hashtag #GamerGate. This is swiftly adopted by all involved.

In response to all this, Leigh Alexander writes a piece for Gamasutra arguing that the identity that these men are flocking to the “ethics in games journalism” narrative to defend no longer matters as a marketing demographic. Gaming and games culture is so large and so varied, and the “core gamer” audience of 18-34 white bros growing smaller and septic, that there was no reason, neither morally nor financially, to treat them as the primary audience anymore. Love of gaming is eternal, but, she declared, “gamers,” as an identity, “are over.” Eight more articles contextualizing GamerGate alongside misogyny and the gatekeeping of games culture come out across several websites in the following days. GamerGate frames these as a clear sign of [deep sigh] collusion to oppress gamers, proving that ethics in games journalism is, indeed, broken, and Leigh Alexander becomes the third major target of harassment. These become known as the “gamers are dead” articles - a phrase not one of them uses - and they make “get Leigh Alexander fired from Gamasutra” one of their primary goals.

Something I need you to understand is that it has, at this point, been two weeks.

Highlights from the next little bit: Alex Macris, a higher up at The Escapist’s parent company, expresses support for GamerGate; he will go on to write the first positive coverage at a major publication and cement The Escapist as GamerGate-friendly. Mike Cernovich, aka “Based Lawyer,” gets GamerGate’s attention by mocking Anita Sarkeesian; he will go on to hire a private investigator to stalk Zoe Quinn. GamerGate launches Operation Disrespectful Nod, an email campaign pressuring companies to pull advertising from websites that have criticized them. They leverage their POC members, getting them, any time someone points out the rampant racism and antisemitism among GamerGaters, to say “I am a person of color and I am #NotYourShield”; most of these “POC members” are fake accounts left over from a previous, racist disinformation campaign. Milo Yiannapoulos gets involved, writing positive coverage of GG despite having mocked gamers for precisely this behavior in the past, and gets so much traffic it pulls Breitbart News out of obscurity and makes it a significant player in modern conservative news media.

[Hey! Ian from the future here. This talk mostly addresses how GamerGate prefigured the Alt-Right strategically and philosophically, but if you want a more explicit, material connection: Breitbart News took its newfound notoriety to become, as its Executive Chair phrased it in 2016, "a platform for the Alt-Right." That Executive Chair was Steve Bannon, who threw the website's weight behind The Future President Who Shall Not Be Named, and, upon getting his attention, would then go on to become his campaign strategist and work in his Administration. So, if you're wondering how one of the central figures of the Alt-Right ended up in the White House, the answer is literally "GamerGate." Back to you, Ian from the past!]

In what I’m calling This Should Have Been The End, Part 2, Zoe Quinn announces that they have been lurking the #BurgersAndFries IRC channel since the beginning and releases dozens of screenshots showing harassment being planned and the selection of “ethics in games journalism” as a cover. #BurgersAndFries has a meltdown, everyone turns on each other, and the channel is abandoned. And they then start another IRC and things proceed.

It goes on like this. I’m not gonna cover everything. This is just the first month. It should be clear by now that this thing is kind of unkillable. And I worry I haven’t made it obvious that this is not just a chanboard and an IRC. Thousands of regular, every day gamers were buying the story and joining in. They were angry, and no amount of evidence that their anger was unfounded was going to change that. You could not mention or even allude to GamerGate and not get flooded with dozens, even hundreds of furious replies. These replies always included the hashtag so everyone monitoring it could join in, so all attempts at real conversation devolved into a hundred forking threads where some people expected you to talk to them while others hurled insults and slurs. And always the possibility that, if any one of them didn’t like what you said, you’d be the next target.

To combat this, some progressives offered up the hashtag #GameEthics to the people getting swept up in GamerGate, saying, “look, we get that you’re angry, and if you want to talk about ethics in games journalism, we can totally do that, but using your hashtag is literally putting us in danger; they calling the police on people saying there’s a hostage situation at their home addresses so they get sent armed SWAT teams, and if you’ll just use this other hashtag we can have the conversation you say you want to have in safety.” And I will ever stop being salty about what happened.

They refused. They wouldn’t cede any ground to what they saw as their opposition. It was so important to have the conversation on their terms that not only did they refuse to use #GameEthics, they spammed it with furry porn so no one could use it.

A few major events on the timeline before we move on: Christina Hoff Sommers, the Republican Party’s resident “feminist,” comes out criticizing Anita Sarkeesian and becomes a major GG figurehead, earning the title Based Mom. Zoe Quinn gets a restraining order against Eron Gjoni, which he repeatedly violates, to no consequence; GG will later crowdfund his legal fees. There’s this listserv called GameJournoPros where game journalists would talk about their jobs, and many are discussing their concerns over GamerGate, so Milo Yiannopoulos leaks it and this is framed as further “proof of collusion.” 4chan finally starts enforcing its “no dox” rules and shuts GamerGate threads down, so they migrate to 8chan, a site famous for hosting like a lot of child porn. Indie game developer Brianna Wu makes a passing joke about GamerGate on Twitter and they decide, seemingly on a whim, to make her one of the biggest targets in the entire movement; she soon has to leave her home as well. GamerGate gets endorsements from WikiLeaks, Infowars, white nationalist sites Stormfront and The Daily Stormer, and professional rapist RooshV. And hundreds of people get doxxed; an 8chan subforum called Baphomet is created primarily to host dox of GamerGate’s critics.

But by November, GamerGate popularity was cresting, as more and more mainstream media covered it negatively. Their last, big spike in popularity came when Anita Sarkeesian went on The Colbert Report and Stephen made fun of the movement. Their numbers never recovered after that.

Which is not to say GamerGate ended. It slowed down. The period of confusion where the mainstream world couldn’t tell whether it was a legitimate movement or not passed. But, again, most harassers faced no meaningful repercussions. Gamers who bought the lie about “ethics in games journalism” stayed mad that no one had ever taken them seriously, and harassers continued to grief their targets for years. The full timeline of GamerGate is an constant cycle of lies, harassment, operations, grift, and doxxing. Dead-enders are to this day still using the hashtag. And remember how Anita had nothing to do with ethics in games journalism or Zoe Quinn, and they just roped her in because they’d enjoyed harassing her before so why not? Every one of GamerGate’s targets knows that they may get dragged into some future harassment campaign just because. It’s already happened to several of them. They’re marked.

(sigh) Let’s take a breath.

Now that we know what GamerGate was, let’s talk about why it worked.

In the thick of GamerGate, I started compiling a list of tactics I saw them using. I wanted to make a video essay that was one part discussion of antifeminist backlash, and one part list of techniques these people use so we can better recognize and anticipate their behavior. That first part became six parts and the second part went on a back burner. It would eventually become my series, The Alt-Right Playbook. GamerGate is illustrative because most of what would become The Alt-Right Playbook was in use.

Two foundational principles of The Alt-Right Playbook are Control the Conversation and Never Play Defense. Make sure people are talking about what you want them to talk about, and take an aggressive posture so you look dominant even when you’re not making sense. For instance: once Zoe leaked the IRC chatlogs, a reasonable person could tell the average gater, “the originators of GamerGate were planning harassment from the very beginning.” But the gater would say, “you’re cherry-picking; not everyone was a harasser.”

Now, this is a bad argument - that’s not how you use “cherry-picking” - and it’s being framed as an accusation - you’re not just wrong, you’re dishonest - which makes you wanna defend yourself. But, if you do - if you tell them why that argument is crap - you’ve let the conversation move from “did the IRC plan harassment?” - a question of fact - to “are the harassers representative of the movement?” - a question of ethics. Like, yes, they are, but only within a certain moral framework. An ethics question has no provable answer, especially if people are willing to make a lot of terrible arguments. It is their goal to move any question with a definitive answer to a question of philosophy, to turn an argument they can’t win into an argument nobody can win.

The trick is to treat the question you asked like it’s already been answered and bait you into addressing the next question. By arguing about whether you’re cherry-picking, you’re accepting the premise that whether you’re cherry-picking is even relevant. Any time this happens, it’s good to pause and ask, “what did we just skip over?” Because that will tell you a lot.

What you skipped over is their admission that, yes, the IRC did plan harassment, but that’s only on them if most of the movement was in on it. Which is a load of crap - the rest of the IRC saw it happening, let it happen, it’s not like anybody warned Zoe, and shit, I’m having the cherry-picking argument! They got me! You see how tempting it is? But presumably the reason you brought the harassment up is because you want them to do something about it. At the very least, leave the movement, but ideally try and stop it. They don’t, strictly speaking, need to feel personally responsible to do that. And you might be thinking, well, maybe if I can get them take responsibility then they’ll do something, but you’d be falling for a different technique I call I Hate Mondays.

This is where people will acknowledge a terrible thing is happening, maybe even agree it’s bad, but they don’t believe anything can be done about it. They also don’t believe you believe anything can be done about it. Mondays suck, but they come around every week. This is never stated outright, but it’s why you’re arguing past each other. To them, the only reason to talk about the bad thing is to assign blame. Whose turn is it to get shit on for the unsolvable problem? Their argument about cherry-picking amounts to “1-2-3 not it.” And they are furious with you for trying to make them responsible for harassment they didn’t participate in.

The unspoken argument is that harassment is part of being on the internet. Every public figure deals with it. This ignores any concept of scale - why does one person get harassed more than another? - but you can’t argue with someone who views it as a binary: harassment either happens or it doesn’t, and, if it does, it’s a fact of life, and, if it happens to everyone, it’s not gendered. And this is not a strongly-held belief they’ve come to after years of soul-searching - this is what they’ve just decided they believe. They want to participate in GamerGate despite knowing its purpose, and this is what would need to be true for that to be ok.

Or maybe they’re just fucking with you! Maybe you can’t tell. Maybe they can’t tell, either. I call this one The Card Says Moops, where people say whatever they feel will score points in an argument and are so irony-poisoned they have no idea whether they actually believe it. A very useful trick if the thing you appear to believe is unconscionable. You can’t take what people like that say at face value; you can only intuit their beliefs from their actions. They say they believe this one minute and that another, but their behavior is always in accordance with that, not this.

In the negative space, their belief is, “The harassment of these women is okay. My anger about video games is more important. I may not be harassing them myself, but they do kind of deserve it.” They will never say this out loud in a serious conversation, though many will say it in an anonymous or irreverent space where they can later deny they meant it. But, whatever they say they believe, this is the worldview they are operating under.

Obscuring this means flipping through a lot of contradictory arguments. The harassment is being faked, or it’s not being faked but it’s being exaggerated, or it’s not being exaggerated but the target is provoking it to get attention, which means GamerGate harassers simultaneously don’t exist, exist in small numbers, and exist in such large numbers someone can build a career out of relying on them! It can be kind of fun to take all these arguments made in isolation and try to string together an actual position. Like, GamerGate would argue that Nathan Grayson having previously mentioned Zoe Quinn in an article about a canceled reality show counts as positive coverage, and since Grayson reached out to Quinn for comment it’s reasonable to assume they started dating before the article was published (which is earlier than they claim), and positive coverage did lead to greater popularity for Depression Quest. But if you untangle that, it’s like… okay, you’re saying Zoe Quinn slept with a journalist in exchange for four nonconsecutive sentences that said no more than “Zoe Quinn exists and made a game,” and the price of those four sentences was to date the journalist for months, all to get rich off a game that didn’t cost any money. That’s your movement?

And some, if cornered, would say, “yes, we believe women are just that shitty, that one would fuck a guy for months if it made them the tiniest bit more famous.” But they won’t lead with that. Because they know it won’t convince the normies, even the ones who want to be convinced. So they use a process I call The Ship of Theseus to, piece by piece, turn that sentence into “slept with a journalist in exchange for a good review” and argue that each part of the sentence is technically accurate. It’s trying to lie without lying. And, provided all the pieces of this sentence are discussed separately, and only in the context of how they justify this sentence, you can trick yourself into believing this sentence is mostly true.

So, like, why? This is clearly motivated reasoning; what’s the motivation? What was this going to accomplish?

The answer is nothing. Nothing, by design. GamerGate’s “official” channels - the subreddit and the handful of forums that didn’t shut them down - were rigidly opposed to any action more organized than an email campaign. They had a tiny handful of tangible demands - they wanted gaming websites to post public ethics policies and had a list of people they wanted fired - but their larger aim was the sea change in how games journalism operated, which nothing they were asking for could possibly give them. The kind of anger that convinces you this is a true statement is not going to be addressed by a few paragraphs about ethics and Leigh Alexander getting a new job. They wanted gaming sites to stop catering to women and “SJWs” - who were a sizable and growing source of traffic - and to get out of the pockets of companies that advertised on their websites - which was their primary source of income. So all Kotaku had to do to make them happy was solve capitalism!

Meanwhile, the unofficial channels, like 8chan and Baphomet, were planning op after op to get private information, spread lies with fake accounts, get disinformation trending, make people quit jobs, cancel gigs, and flee their homes. Concrete goals with clear results. All you had to do to feel productive was go rogue. In my video,

How to Radicalize a Normie, I describe how the Alt-Right encourages lone wolf behavior by whipping people up into a rage and then refusing to give them anything to do, while surrounding them with examples of people taking matters into their own hands. The same mechanism is in play here: the public-facing channels don’t condone harassment but also refuse to fight it, the private channels commit it under cover of anonymity, and there is a free flow of traffic between them for when the official channels’ impotence becomes unbearable.

What I hope I’m illustrating is how these techniques play off of each other, how they create a closed ecosystem that rational thought cannot enter. There’s a phrase we use on the internet that got thrown around a lot at the time:

you can’t logic someone out of a position they didn’t logic themselves into.

Now, there are a few other big topics I think are relevant here, so I want to go through them one by one.

MEMEIFICATION

So a lot of interactions with GamerGate would involve a very insular knowledge base.

Like, you’d say something benign but progressive on Twitter.

A gater would show up in your mentions and say something aggressive and false.

You’d correct them. But then they’d come back and hit you with -

ah shit, sorry, this is a Loss meme.

If I were in front of a classroom I’d ask, show of hands, how many of you got that? I had to ask Twitter recently, does Gen Z know about Loss?!

If you don’t know what Loss is I’m not sure I can explain it to you. It’s this old, bad webcomic that was parodied so, so, so many times

that it was reduced to its barest essentials, to the point where any four panels with shapes in this arrangement is a Loss meme. For those of you in the know, you will recognize this anywhere, but have you ever tried to explain to someone who wasn’t in the know why this is really fuckin’ funny?

So, now… by the same process that this is a comics joke,

this is a rape joke.

I’m not gonna show the original image, but, once upon a time, someone made an animated GIF of the character Piccolo from Dragon Ball Z graphically raping Vegeta. 4chan loved it so much that it got posted daily, became known as the “daily dose,” until mods started deleting every incident of it. So they uploaded slightly edited version of it. Then they started uploading other images that had been edited with Piccolo’s color scheme. It got so abstracted that eventually any collection of purple and green pixels would be recognized as Piccolo Dick.

Apropos of nothing, GamerGate is a movement that insists it is not sexist in nature and it does not condone threats of rape against the women they don’t like. And this is their logo. This is their mascot.

If you’re familiar with the Daily Dose, the idea that GamerGate would never support Eron Gjoni if they believed he was a sexual abuser is so blatantly insincere it’s insulting… but imagine trying to explain to someone who’s not on 4chan how this sweater is a rape joke. Imagine having to explain it to a journalist. Imagine having to explain it to the judge enforcing your abuser’s restraining order.

Reactionaries use meme culture not just because they’re terminally online but also because it makes their behavior seem either benign or just confusing to outsiders. They find it hilarious that they can be really explicit and still fly under the radar. The Alt-Right did this with Pepe the Frog, the OK sign, even the milk glass emoji for a hot minute. The more inexplicable the meme, the better. You get the point where Stephen Miller is flashing Nazi signs from the White House and the Presidential re-eletion campaign is releasing 88 ads of exactly 14 words and there’s still a debate about whether the administration is racist. Because journalists aren’t going to get their heads around that. You tell them “1488 is a Nazi number,” it’s gonna seem a lot more plausible that you’re making shit up.

MOVE FAST AND BREAK THINGS

Online movements like GamerGate move at a speed and mutation rate too high for the mainstream world to keep up. And not just that they don’t understand the memes - they don’t understand the infrastructure.

In an attempt to cover GamerGate evenhandedly, George Wiedman of Super Bunnyhop interviewed a lawyer who specializes in journalistic ethics. He meant well; I really wish he hadn’t. You can see him trying to fit something like GamerGate into terms this silver-haired man who works in copyright law can understand. At one point he asks if it’s okay to fund the creative project of a potential journalistic source, to which the guy understandably says “no.”

What he’s alluding to here is the harassment of Jenn Frank. A few weeks into GamerGate, Jenn Frank writes a piece in The Guardian about sexism in tech that mentions Anita Sarkeesian and Zoe Quinn. In another case of “here’s a strongly-held belief I just decided I have,” GamerGate says this is a breach of journalistic ethics because Frank backs Quinn on Patreon. They harass her so intensely she not only has to quit her job at The Guardian, for several months she quits journalism entirely.

Off the bat, calling a public figure central to a major event in the field a “journalistic source” is flatly wrong-headed. Quinn was not interviewed or even contacted for the article, they were in no way a “source”; they were a subject. But I want to talk about this phrase, “fund a creative project.” Patreon is functionally a subscription; it’s a way of buying things. It’s technically accurate that Frank is funding Quinn’s creative project, but only in the sense that you are funding Bob Dylan’s creative project if you listen to his music. And saying Frank therefore can’t write about Quinn is like saying a music journalist can’t cover a Bob Dylan concert if they’ve ever bought his albums.

And we could talk about the ways that Patreon, as compared with other funding models, can create a greater sense of intimacy, and we also could comment that, well, that’s how an increasing number of people consume media now, so that perspective should be present in journalism. But maybe it means we should cover that perspective differently? I don’t know. It’s an interesting subject. But none of that’s going on in this conversation because this guy doesn’t know what Patreon is. It was only a year old at this point. Patreon’s been a primary source of my income for 5 years and my parents still don’t know what it is. (I think they think I’m a freelancer?) This guy hears “funding a creative project” and he’s thinking an investor, someone who makes a profit off the source’s success.

The language of straight society hasn’t caught up with what’s happening, and that works in GamerGate’s favor.

In the years since GamerGate we have dozens of stories of people trying to explain Twitter harassment to a legal system that’s never heard of Twitter. People trying to explain death threats to cops whose only relationship to the internet is checking email, confusedly asking, “Why don’t you just not go online?” Like, yeah, release your text game about depression at GameStop for the PS3 and get it reviewed in the Boston Globe, problem solved.

You see this in the slowness of mainstream journalists to condemn the harassment - hell, even games journalists at first. Because what if it is a legitimate movement? What if the harassers are just a fringe element? What if there was misconduct? The people in a position to stop GamerGate don’t have to be convinced of their legitimacy, they just have to hesitate. They just have to be unsure. Remember how much happened in just the first two weeks, how it took only a month to become unkillable.

It’s the same hesitance that makes mainstream media, online platforms, and law enforcement underestimate The Alt-Right. They’re terrified of condemning a group as white nationalist terrorists because they’re confused, and what if they’re wrong? Or, in most cases, not even afraid they’re wrong, but afraid of the PR disaster if too much of the world thinks they’re wrong.

ACCOUNTABILITY AND CONTROL

A thing I’ve talked about in The Alt-Right Playbook is how these decentralized, ostensibly leaderless movements insulate themselves from responsibility. Harassment is never the movement’s fault because they never told anyone to harass and you can’t prove the harassers are legitimate members of the movement. The Alt-Right does this too - one of their catchphrases is “I disavow.” Since there are no formalized rules for membership, they can redraw boundaries on the fly; they can take credit for any successes and deny responsibility for any wrongdoing. Public membership is granted or revoked based on a person’s moment-to-moment utility.

It’s almost like… they’re cherry-picking.

The flipside of this is a lack of control. Since they never officially tell anyone to do anything but write emails, they have no means of stopping anyone from behaving counterproductively. The harassment of Jenn Frank was the first time GamerGate’s originators thought, “maybe we should ease off just to avoid bad publicity,” and they found they couldn’t. GamerGate had gotten too big, and too many people were clearly there for precisely this reason.

They also couldn’t control the infighting. When your goal is to harass women and you have all these contradictory justifications for why, you end up with a lot of competing beliefs. And, you know what? Angry white men who like harassing people don’t form healthy relationships! Several prominent members of GamerGate - including Internet Aristocrat - got driven out by factionalism; they were doxxed by their own people! Jordan Owen and Davis Aurini parted ways hating each other, with Aurini releasing chatlogs of him gaslighting Owen about accepting an endorsement from Roosh, and they released two competing edits of The Sarkeesian Effect.

I say this because it’s useful to know that these are alliances of convenience. If you know where the sore spots are, you can apply pressure to them.

LEADERS WITHOUT LEADERSHIP

One way movements like GamerGate deflect responsibility is by declaring, “We are a leaderless movement! We have no means to stop harassment.”

Which… any anarchist will tell you collective action is entirely possible without leaders. But they’ll also tell you, absent a system of distributing power equitably, you’re gonna have leaders, just not ones you elected.

A few months into GamerGate, Randi Lee Harper created the ggautoblocker. Here’s what it did: it took five prominent GamerGate figures - Adam Baldwin, Mike Cernovich, Christina Hoff Sommers, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Nick Monroe, formerly known as [sigh] PressFartToContinue - and generated a block list of everyone who followed at least two of them on Twitter. Now, this became something of an arms race; once GamerGate found out about it they made secondary accounts that followed different people, and more and more prominent figures appeared and had to get added to the list. But, when it first launched, the list generated from just these five people comprised an estimated 90-95% of GamerGate.

Hate to break it to you, guys, but if 90+ percent of your movement is following at least two of the same five people, those are your leaders. The attention economy has produced them. Power pools when left on its own.

This is another case where you have to ignore what people claim and look at what they do. The Alt-Right loves to say “we disavow Richard Spencer” and “Andrew Anglin doesn’t speak for us.”

But no matter what they say, pay attention to whom they’re taking cues from.

AD CAMPAIGN

George Lakoff has observed that one way the Left fails in opposition to the Right is that most liberal politicians and campaigners have degrees in things like law and political science, where conservative campaigners more often have degrees in advertising and communications. Liberals and leftists may have a better product to sell, but conservatives know how to sell products.

GamerGate less resembles a boots-on-the-ground political movement than an ad campaign. First they decide what their messaging strategy is going to be. Then the media arm starts publicizing it. They seek out celebrity endorsements. They get their own hashtag and mascot. They donate to charity and literally call it “public relations.” You can even see the move from The Quinnspiracy to GamerGate as a rebranding effort - when one name got too closely associated with harassment, they started insisting GamerGate was an entirely separate movement from The Quinnspiracy. I learned that trick from Stringer Bell’s economics class.

Now, we could stand to learn a thing or two from this. But I also wouldn’t want us to adopt this strategy whole hog; you should view moves like these as red flags. If you’re hesitating to condemn a movement because what if it’s legitimate, take a look at whether they’re selling ideology like it’s Pepsi.

PERCEPTION IS EVERYTHING

One reason to insist you’re a consumer revolt rather than a harassment campaign is most people who want to harass need someone to give them permission, and need someone to tell them it’s normal.

Bob Altemeyer has this survey he uses to study authoritarianism. He divides respondents into people with low, average, and high authoritarian sentiments, and then tells them what the survey has measured and asks, “what score do you think is best to have: low, average, or high?”

People with low authoritarian sentiments say it’s best to be low. People with average authoritarian sentiments also say it’s best to be low. But people with high authoritarian sentiments? They say it’s best to be average. Altemeyer finds, across all his research, that reactionaries want to aggress, but only if it is socially acceptable. They want to know they are the in-group and be told who the out-group is. They don’t particularly care who the out-group is, Altemeyer finds they’ll aggress against any group an authority figure points to, even, if they don’t notice it, a group that contains them. They just have to believe the in-group is the norm.

This is why they have to believe games journalism is corrupt because of a handful of feminist media critics with outsized influence. Legitimate failures of journalism cannot be systemic problems rooted in how digital media is funded and consumed; there cannot be a legitimate market for social justice-y media. It has to be manipulation by the few. Because, if these things are common, then, even if you don’t like them, they’re normal. They’re part of the in-group. Reactionary politics is rebellion against things they dislike getting normalized, because they know, if they are normalized, they will have to accept them. Because the thing they care about most is being normal.

This is why the echo chamber, this is why Fox News, this is why the Far Right insists they are the “silent majority.” This is why they artificially inflate their numbers. This is why they insist facts are “biased.” They have to maintain the image that what are, in material terms, fringe beliefs are, in fact, held by the majority. This is why getting mocked by Stephen Colbert was such a blow to GamerGate. It makes it harder to believe the world at large agrees with them.

This is why, if you’re trying to change the world for the better, it’s pointless to ask their permission. Because, if you change the world around them, they will adapt even faster than you will.

THE ARGUMENT ISN’T SUPPOSED TO END

Casey Explosion has this really great Twitter thread comparing the Alt-Right to Scary Terry from Rick and Morty. His catchphrase is “you can run but you can’t hide, bitch.” And Rick and Morty finally escape him by hiding. And Morty’s all, “but he said we can’t hide,” and Rick is like, “why are we taking his word on this? if we could hide, he certainly wouldn’t tell us.”

The reason to argue with a GamerGater is on the implied agreement that, if you can convince them they’re part of a hate mob, they will leave. But look at the incentives here: they want to be in GamerGate, and you want them not to be. But they’re already in GamerGate. They’re not waiting on the outcome of this argument to participate. They’ve already got what they want; they don’t need to convince you GamerGate isn’t a hate mob.

This is why all their logic and rationalizations are shit, because they don’t need to be good. They’re not trying to win an argument. They’re trying to keep the argument going.

This has been a precept of conservative political strategy for decades. “You haven’t convinced us climate change is real and man-made, you need to do more studies.” They’re not pausing the use of fossil fuels until the results come in. “You haven’t convinced us there are no WMDs in Iraq, you need to collect more evidence.” They’re not suspending the war until you get back to them. “You haven’t convinced us that Reaganomic tax policy causes recessions, let’s just do it for another forty years and see what happens.” And when the proof comes in, they send us out for more, and we keep going.

The biggest indicator you can’t win a debate with a reactionary is they keep telling you you can. The biggest indicator protest and deplatforming works is they keep telling you in plays into their hands. The biggest indicator that you shouldn’t compromise with Republicans is they keep saying doing otherwise is stooping to their level. They’re not going to walk into the room and say, “Hi, my one weakness is reasoned argument, let’s pick a time and place to hash this out.”

And we fall for it because we’re trying to be decent people. Because we want to believe the truth always wins. We want to bargain in good faith, and they are weaponizing our good faith against us. Always dangling the carrot that the reason they’re like this is no one’s given them the right argument not to be. It’s all just a misunderstanding, and, really, it’s on us for not trying hard enough.

But they have no motivation to agree with us. Most of the people asking for debates have staked their careers on disagreeing with us. Conceding any point to the Left could cost them their livelihood.

WHY GAMES?

Let’s close with the big question: why games? And, honestly, the short answer is:

why not games?

Games culture has always presented itself as a hobby for young, white, middle class boys. It’s always been bigger and more diverse than that, but that’s how it was marketed, and that’s who most felt they belonged. As gaming grows bigger, there is suddenly room for those marginal voices that have always been there to make themselves heard. And, as gaming becomes more mainstream, it’s having its first brushes with serious critical analysis.

This makes the people who have long felt gaming was theirs and theirs alone anxious and a little angry. They’ve invested a lot of their identity in it and they don’t want it to change.

And what the Far Right sees in a sizable collection of aggrieved young men is an untapped market. This is why sites like Stormfront and Breitbart flocked to them. These are not liberals they have to convert, these people are, up til now, not politically engaged. The Right can be their first entry to politics.

The world was changing. Nerd properties were exploding into popular culture in tandem with media representation diversifying. And we were living with the first Black President. Any time an out-group looks like it might join the in-group, there is a self-protective backlash from the existing in-group. This had been brewing for a while, and, honestly, if it hadn’t boiled over in games, it would have boiled over somewhere else.

And, in the years since GamerGate, it has. The Far Right has tapped the comics, Star Wars, and sci-fi fandoms; they tried to get in with the furry community but failed spectacularly. They’re all over YouTube and, frankly, the atheist community was already in their pocket. Basically, if you’re in community with a bunch of young white guys who think they own the place, you might wanna have some talks with them sooner than later.

Anyway, if you want to know more about any of this stuff, RationalWiki’s timeline on GamerGate is pretty thorough. You can also watch my or Dan Olson’s videos on the subject. I’ll be putting the audio of this talk on YouTube and will put as many resources as I can in the show notes. The channel, again, is Innuendo Studios.

Sorry this was such a bummer.

Thank you for your time.

#video essay #alt-right playbook #Youtube

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sillyrabbit81 · 3 years

Text

The Pull

Summary: Alternative Universe. Vampire Henry. Henry, Crown Prince of the Vampires is avoiding his responsibilities because of his mother's fate. When Henry finds his mate, the circumstances are eerily similar to his mother's. Rather than risking his mate's life, Henry chooses to run, but can he run from his fate?

Pairing: Henry x OFC

Word Count: approx 3.5k

Warnings: blood drinking, depictions of violence, slavery, implied torture, starvation, rape, multiple deaths

Authors Note: Thanks to @henryobsessed for beta reading and support!

Masterlist

Part 23 Part 25

Part 24

Rowena

My heart thumped in my chest as Anglica and I walked the quiet halls of the castle. Flanked by Min, Willow and Eliza, I gave my best impression of an empty-headed noblewoman with her chaperone as I giggled my way down to the dungeons.

I babbled like a horny teenager, drunk and in love with a new partner and said the lewdest comments I could, while still maintaining the dignity of a lady. As we rounded the corner to the dungeon doors, I was giggling saying that it will take my mate years to train him to find the little man in the boat. It took everything I had not to blush as I continued my bawdy talk. The chatter had the desired effect on the guards though, who looked red-faced and uncomfortable as they stopped us from entering the dungeons.

"Why are you stopping us, gentlemales?" I pouted pushing my breasts forward as I spoke. Most of Alfred's guards were unmated, Alfred usually got rid of them believing that once they mated their minds were no longer on the job. But by the hungry way these males were looking at me and Angelica, I think Alfred had it backwards.

"You don't want to go down here, ma'am," one of the guards said. "Nothing down here but the dungeons."

I gasped, putting a hand to my chest and opening my eyes wide in faux excitement. "Do you hear that! They have dungeons!" I grabbed Angelica's hands like a child would and excitedly jumped up and down squealing, making sure my breasts would bounce as I did.

Angelica tilted her head imitating a patronizing older woman. "Alright, your Highness." The guards shifted nervously as Angelica addressed me by my honorific title. She addressed the guards, "Princess Rowena, would like a tour of the dungeons."

"Oh, can I?" I clasped one of the guards hands in mine and pleaded, "I've never seen dungeons before, and Henny Baby promised me I could go anywhere I like." I heard Angelica stifle a nervous laugh. I bit my lip to stop my own giggle, where did Henny Baby come from? The guard froze at my touch, but his eyes flicked between my breasts, my hands and my fluttering eyelids.

Min spoke up behind us, "Come on, Yuri. Let her in, it stinks so bad down here she won't want to stay long."

"There are prisoners in some cells." The guard said with a strained voice. Although he was addressing Min, he kept his eyes on me.

"You could show us around, if you like," I said as seductively as I could manage, I took a step closer to the guard, leading with my hips. "You will protect me, won't you?" I cringed inside. I would never have been able to act this way as a human, but Vampires were so innately sensual, all I had to do was tap into my Lust and think of Henry and I felt like an old Hollywood bombshell.

Both guards couldn't keep their eyes off me, both looking me up and down, not bothering to hide their own Lust. The one whose hand I held, Yuri, Min had called him, even licked his lips as his fangs descended.

That's when Min struck at the second guard and planted a small sharp silver knife in his neck. Before Yuri could react, he too was bleeding out from a silver knife in his throat.

"I didn't think you would kill them," I said to Min, shocked but impressed by her sudden, ruthless violence.

"They were not going to let you in. This was the only way. They are unmated, no one will miss them," she said with a dismissive shrug. She was formidable. I asked Angelica and Eliza to stand guard and alert us if anyone approaches.

Min, Willow and I entered the dungeons expecting more guards, but there weren't any as far as we could see. The first room appeared to be a storage area with whips, swords, silver chains, rough blankets, cleaning supplies and a small round table that looked to be 500 years old, But there was also a modern bathroom, and a small kitchenette with modern stainless steel appliances, the sight of which would have made me laugh at how ridiculous it looked if we hadn't been on such a serious mission.

We continued down the hallway and found cells on both our right and left with human women inside. Emaciated, dirty and bloody, the women cowered as we entered, covering their faces and hiding under filthy blankets.

"Lilith!" I cursed. Alfred was worse than we had imagined. I had never in my life seen anything like it. I started shaking uncontrollably, trying to process what I was seeing.

One woman reared her head and dared to looked at me. She opened her mouth to speak but saw my eyes, and hid again. Fury flowed through me, and I advanced on the door. The rotten smell of their unwashed bodies and uncollected waste was so putrid I stopped breathing for as long as I could so I wouldn't vomit.

"Go back and get the keys, please," I sent to Min.

Min held up a large set of ancient keys. "One step ahead of you, Highness," she said with a grim smile.

"A good thing too," I grimaced. "Can you open the doors?"

Nodding, Min started opening the heavy iron door while I used my speed to run back and get clean blankets for the women and freshwater bottles from the fridge. "Angelica, I need you. Eliza can stay at the door and let us know if anyone comes." I sent.

Angelica held her nose as she entered the horrific corridor. She stopped dead in her tracks when she saw the five human women aged in their late teens and early twenties covered in blood and filth.

I wrapped a blanket around the timid, yet brave woman who had lifted her head. Her clothing was so tattered she needed a blanket around her to maintain her dignity. "Shh, now. We have come to free you," I said, as gently and as reassuringly as I could.

"Get away from me you freak!" She shrieked.

While I admired her fight, I was frustrated by her words. I lifted her chin and said forcefully, willing her to understand, "Listen, I'm going to get you out of here. I'm not interested in your blood."

Her jaw slackened and her face lost all of its tension. For a moment I was scared I had frightened her so badly that she was about to faint from fear. "Are you ok?" I asked.

"Yes," she said as if dazed.

Angelica was behind me and said, "Well done Rowena, you just coerced your first human."

"What?"

"Coerced. Mind-controlled."

Stunned I stared at the poor girl. "I don't even know how I did it."

"Try again." Angelica encouraged.

I concentrated hard and said in the same forceful manner and applied the same will to her mind, "Drink." She grabbed the water bottle I held out for her and started guzzling it down. "Sip it slowly," I amended my orders. She did and I sighed in relief.

I looked at the other women, huddled in the corners of their cells. I didn't have time to do this for all of them. Having seen the disgusting way Alfred had stored these humans as if they were canned food, I had no doubt Henry's mother must be here too.

"Angelica, see to the other women. Willow, you too," I said. "Min you're with me." Min followed me wordlessly and we descended further into hell.

We walked cautiously down a darkened hallway, lit every few metres by a naked globe over an opened cell. These were more like the rooms I had seen in Alfred's images, but they were all empty. We reached the end of the hallway and there we found the only closed door. This had to be it.

I was scared to open the door. The state of the human girls was so atrocious, and they were so sickly and starved, I couldn't imagine what state Hannah would be in. Those girls were young, they could only have been captured for a few years at most. Hannah had been held for nearly one hundred and eighty years. I shuddered. One hundred and eighty years of torture, one hundred and eighty years of being raped, and feeding the man who was supposed to be your lover.

Damn Lilith. Damn her for what she allowed this woman to go through. Damn Alfred. He has destroyed so many lives. He will pay for what he did to those girls. For what he did to Henry.

With hands trembling, from both fear and anger, I found the key right key and opened the door. It was as bad as I imagined, worse even.

A large table hard table stood in the centre of the room, and I recognised it as where Alfred would tie Hannah while he violated her. But at first glance, it appeared the room was bare other than some crumpled up blankets in the corner and some silver chains. I saw no sign of Hannah.

Looking at Min I said, "This is the room, but she's not here." Min, pursed her lips as she indicated with her chin the blankets. I saw what she meant as the blankets started to move.

Two red and amber eyes peeked up out of the blankets. I gasped as I realised the tiny bundle of cloth was actually Hannah. She raised a head that looked far too big for her sickly thin body.

"Hannah?" I asked cautiously, softly so as not to scare her.

She nodded. She licked her peeling and dehydrated lips. She was staring at the bottle of water in my hand. I thought she would ask for the water, but instead, she asked, "Who are you?"

"I'm Rowena." I took a small step towards her, holding the water out in front of me. "Would you like some?"

She nodded and I continued my slow advance while opening the bottle. "Water?" She asked as her grubby hand with thin spindly fingers reached for it.

"Yes," I said. "But drink slowly, if you go too fast you'll throw it up."

She took my advice taking several small gulps. She looked at my face. "Your eyes. Like mine."

I nodded, "Yes, Like Henry's."

Her head snapped to attention. "My Henry," she croaked, then fell into an unhealthy coughing fit. I wanted to comfort her but I held back, unsure if she would welcome any touch, even a friendly one.

"Yes, your son," I paused, thinking maybe she'd like to see him. "May I show you?" I asked.

"Please," she begged, grabbing my hand.

I sent her some of my most treasured memories. The night I saw Henry at Lawrence's party. Henry kneeling before me at Alex's house. Henry's smiling face looking down at me while I hugged him as he cooked his first meal. Henry reading to me and giving me the cheeky smirk he makes when he was feeling amorous.

The sob that left her was heartbreaking. "He's not like his father," she sent.

"Not at all, Hannah," I promised.

"Is he here?" she asked.

I explained the situation briefly. She seemed to take the news well and nodded. "Take me there," she said.

"Where?" I asked.

"To the Court." I blinked in surprise. I wanted to tell her no, but I could tell by the determined set of her jaw and the hardness in her eyes that she wouldn't be persuaded. I tried a different approach.

"Would you like to clean up first, eat something? Maybe someone could offer you a feed?" I suggested. She looked like she couldn't stand on her own, let alone confront Alfred.

"I think it will be more impactful if they see me like this, don't you think?"

"Yeah, but..." I couldn't come up with any good reason to stop her except her own health.

Hannah said trying to sit up a bit more. "What better evidence is there of his tyranny than me? I will confront Alfred in front of everyone. They will all know him for what he has done to me."

Hannah tried to stand, but I was right and her weak legs could barely hold her. "Let me help you," I offered. She nodded and I wrapped her body in a clean blanket and put my arm around her waist and lead her slowly out of the dungeons.

Min and I made our way back to the hall. As we got closer, I sent word to Felix, "We have her. She is coming to the court."

Felix met us outside the hall. He gasped when he saw Hannah and scolded me, "She needs rest, food and a bath. Not to come into here like this."

Hannah spoke for herself and said, "Do you think that after nearly 200 years of captivity I haven't thought about exactly what I would do if I ever got free?"

Felix looked at both of us, he didn't know what to do. "I can't in good conscious let you in, you look ready to fall to the ground."

"Which is why she has me," I said.

"And me," Min said.

"And me," someone said behind us. We all turned to look and were shocked by the females who filled the hall, all the human women had followed us and despite being traumatised they too looked ready for vengeance.

"And me," another of the freed girls said, and the refrain was taken up by all of them.

I turned back to Felix, smirking. "Do you think you will let us in now?"

Felix shook his head, amazed. "To think, all the legal research, all the arguments, everything we planned will be made unnecessary. Alfred will be brought down by that which he hates most."

Felix opened the door and Alfred saw us immediately. I grinned as he went white and he sat up straight in his throne. "What is this?" He asked. His voice was nowhere near as confident as it had been earlier that day.

"I think you know, my Inamorata," Hannah's rough voice cut through the silence of the hall. We all walked towards the dais, towards Alfred, slowly closing in on him, making sure he knew he wasn't going to be able to bully us anymore.

"Why are there humans in my court?" Alfred said, ignoring Hannah. "Get these urchins out."

"These humans were used as blood slaves," I said loudly, ensuring my voice carried through the hall. "They were used exclusively by Alfred, despite the Law against it."

The thin man who appeared to be Alfred's advisor said loudly, "You will address the King as His Majesty in court, Princess Rowena."

"I will not," I said firmly. "Alfred's power comes from his covenant with Lilith. He has locked his mate up, used her as a slave and fed from the blood of others. Does this not contravene all of Lilith's commandments on how to follow the Covenant?"

Lawrence entered my head. "Keep going Row, they're listening," Lawrence urged, and he sent me the exact wording of the Law.

"The law states that: Neither low nor high, youthful or aged, mated or unmated; shall make use of slaves for blood; no vampire, fae, or wolf, elf or gnome or other creature of magic may be bound as slaves. Children of man may be used for feed but not as slaves. They may be hunted or coerced and they will be dead or set free once they have been fed from." I recited Lawrence's words. Murmurs of agreement filled the hall, even Alfred's guards started to look uneasy.

"Further," I continued. "When it comes to mates the law expressly states: One may not force another to his bed, nor force the blood from their vein. Alfred has done both."

As I spoke, I searched the room for Henry. When I found him, his eyes were glued to his mother, and I doubted he had heard a word I said. His face was twisted in opposing emotions, he looked angry, hurt, but also curious and stunned at seeing his mother for the first time. I wanted to run to him, hold him. But we had a duty. "Henry," I called to him, his eyes met mine. "Now is the time. Take it."

Lawrence touched his shoulder and he jolted, as if snapped back into reality. Henry said, "On these heinous crimes, Lilith's law is clear: all must be held to account, from high to low, youthful or aged, mated or unmated, Monarch or no, they will be executed if found guilty of these crimes." Henry took a step towards his father, "Alfred, I hereby order your arrest for breaking the Covenant of Lilith..."

Alfred was burning with fury but still sat as if he hadn't just been accused of engaging in slavery, rape, forced feeding and wasn't in the process of being disposed of his position. "What makes you think I would go along with this son? Just because you bring random humans and a female who claims to be my mate to court." Hannah growled at the suggestion she was lying, but Alfred ignored it and continued to speak, "You don't have the authority or ability to arrest me. In fact, all you have done is given me grounds for charging you, your mate and your whole cohort with treason." Alfred signalled his guards.

A few guards shuffled their feet, but most stayed put. The horrific nature of the charges gave them pause. This surprised me. Had Alfred really acted alone and not allowed his guards in the dungeons? I filed the thought away, to be investigated at a later date.

In contrast, Henry's guards ascended the dais. For the first time, Alfred looked nervous. "Call off your guards' son," Alfred warned. "Call them off and perhaps we can negotiate..."

"We will negotiate nothing," Qiang called from the hall. "You have lost all authority here tonight. You are no longer our King." The rest of the crowd shouted in support.

Alfred stood, raging, shaking with anger, and I could see in his eyes the moment his Lust took full control of him. Faster than the guards could move, he launched an attack.

Alfred didn't attack Henry, Hannah or even Qiang.

Alfred attacked me.

Before I had a hope of fighting him off, his fangs were in my throat, I felt like he was ripping my neck apart. I screamed in pain, realising very quickly that I was dying.

Alfred was killing me.

I fought him as hard as I could, scratching, kicking biting. But he was too strong. My defence grew weaker and I knew I wouldn't last much longer.

I thought of Henry. What would he do without me? He had waited so long for me and I would be taken from him so soon. It wasn't fair. What would it do to him? What kind of ruler would he be now? Would this be the moment he snaps and becomes as cold and heartless as his father?

And then I saw Charlie's smiling face. I remembered hearing his cry and the way he felt when he was laid on my chest in the seconds after his birth. I remember my life had changed in that one moment, I would never be the same person I was seconds before I touched him. I had never loved anything like I had loved Charlie. And now I would be leaving him too.

I let myself say goodbye to them, they needed to know, I had to tell them. My thoughts carry into every mind I could find, "They need to know I love them."

Just as quickly as he attacked, Alfred let me go. He dropped to the ground and without him holding me up, I wasn't far behind. As I fell, I thought I saw Min and Hannah holding small silver knives in their hands, both were covered in blood.

I sank to my knees, but they couldn't hold me up. The wound Alfred had made was too big to heal fast enough to stop my blood loss. Henry was by my side, holding me, shoving his open wrist into my mouth.

"Rowena, drink," he urged.

I tried to latch on but I was too weak, Henry forced his wrist into my mouth, and his blood to flow into my mouth. I tried to swallow but I was too weak, exhausted. I closed my eyes, I wanted to sleep.

"Don't give up, Fawn." Henry started shaking me and my eyes opened again. "Don't you give up and leave me and Charlie."

I tried again to swallow and surprisingly I felt a tiny trickle of his blood slide down my throat. I tried again and got a little more.

"That's it my Little Fawn. You're doing so well," Henry whispered to me, encouraging me until finally, I could feed no more. I closed my eyes, but this time Henry didn't stop me. "You're ok now, Fawn. You can rest."

Part 25

Tag List:

@henryobsessed @omgkatinka @legendarywizarddetective @posiemax @nostalgicb-txh @moonlacebeam @anitababi @agniavateira @blakerogue @shadesofarrogance @mansaaay @stxlemate @wheretheriversrunintothesea @amberangel112

#henry cavill #henry cavill fanfiction #henry cavill vampire #vampire #vampire!henry #vampire x human #fanfic #alternative universe #alexander skarsgard

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theunderdogwrites · 3 years

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In Defense of Marilyn Manson

Just kidding.

This is another one of those ‘if you live under a rock, you might not know what is going on’ pieces. But because this story appears to be unfolding daily, I’d think you’ve heard a murmur here or there even if you haven’t really paid too much attention to it because for many, I think this may fall into the “that guy has been a messed-up weirdo for years so I’m not surprised” category.

Please note that in NO WAY I am making fun of this situation, but I learned a long time ago that I require a certain amount of humor to be able to digest much of what this world presents to me.

As always, let me give you the Coles Notes version with the hopes you will go and do your own reading as well.

On February 1 actress Evan Rachel Wood posted this on her Instagram:

"The name of my abuser is Brian Warner, also known to the world as Marilyn Manson. He started grooming me when I was a teenager and horrifically abused me for years. I was brainwashed and manipulated into submission. I am done living in fear of retaliation, slander or blackmail. I am here to expose this dangerous man and call out the many industries that have enabled him, before he ruins any more lives. I stand with the many victims who will no longer be silent."

Quick history lesson – They started dating in 2007 when she was 18 and he was 34 and were engaged for a brief time in 2010.

This was Manson’s response to what she wrote:

"Obviously, my art and my life have long been magnets for controversy, but these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality. My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners. Regardless of how - and why - others are now choosing to misrepresent the past, that is the truth."

Since the original statement on February 1 a number of women have come forward with stories of their own ranging from physical and emotional abuse to human trafficking. And everyday something new is revealed. Evan Rachel Woods is feverishly posting on her Insta-Story and is slowly burying Manson in an ocean of consequences. She isn’t “fired up” or “a woman scorned”, she is a victim rising above the shame she has felt and the fear of what others will say about her to tell her story and encourage others to do the same. She is the voice that started the ball rolling. The ball that is about to crush Marilyn Manson.

Whenever I write stuff that is currently being heavily featured in the media, I always dive into articles so I can get as much information as possible. But more importantly, I plunge my sensitive little soul into the murky depths known as “the comments section”. I do this because unlike those polished, finished pieces the comments section will give you a better idea of what your fellow human beings think and feel about the topic at hand. And it is never polished or even polite. And often not for the faint at heart. In case you didn’t already know – people can be quite terrible.

The comments section is the modern-day gladiator pit. Only most (not all) of the participants are not ripped, athletic warriors but rather drooling basement dwellers with one hand down their pants (not gender specific by the way) and the other hand maltreating the letters on their keyboard.

Side note: Look, I am not the grammar police as I often just push past all the warnings from the Gestapo editing program in Microsoft Word. BUT I know the value of proper spelling, well placed punctuation and valid attempts to appear smarter than a domesticated turkey by making sure sentences are well-thought out and complete. Raising your argument doesn’t mean USING ALL CAPS AND ABUSING THESE THINGS -> !!!

I just deleted three paragraphs going over the recent “reckoning” that has taken place in the past few years with regards to sexual and physical abuse accusations against (mostly) men in positions of some kind of power. I eliminated all that writing because I started to tumble off topic. I’m not writing about all the dicks now getting their comeuppance, but rather the reactions to it being Marilyn Manson’s turn in the chamber.

Victim shaming is sadly a real thing.

The easiest way I can explain this to you – if a person gets pickpocketed and then blamed because they should’ve known better than to carry their wallet in their back pocket.

Evan Rachel Woods and others have come out to accuse Manson of some pretty appalling acts of abuse and what I’ve found to be the biggest reaction is, “How did they not know he was a bad guy? His music is so graphic and they thought it was all an act? Why did they stay so long?”. As innocent as those questions might seem, and I say that because our brains don’t always serve us or others well, it is a form of discrediting those women. Let’s be honest here… it’s hard to look at Marilyn Manson and his art form and not say, “What the fuck, this guy has bad idea written all over him!”. I feel that is a perfectly reasonable response, but that is where it should end. I think it is fair to pause and attempt to understand the choices of others, but it’s heartless to minimize their experience by placing blame on them for a situation we couldn’t possibly understand if it has never happened to us.

And like I’ve quoted before: People only understand from their level of perception. But that doesn’t stop them from laying on the judgement and damaging already fragile individuals with their inability to show compassion for a fellow human being. Reading through comment sections isn’t just maddening, it’s disappointing and sad but also a real look into how awful many people feel about themselves… to the point where they seem to derive some pleasure or satisfaction from condemning a rape victim for wearing a short skirt and getting drunk.

So… we have to touch on this to be balanced: innocent until proven guilty. Only these days it’s an automatic trial by media with the public acting as judge, jury and executioner. This is where “cancel culture” steps in and within days can destroy an entire career / life. I am not a fan of cancel culture. It does not give people a chance to learn from their mistakes or make amends as it immediately harms their very existence. Often times even before any proof has surfaced. I don’t think I need to tell you how dangerous this is… the fact that just an accusation could ruin your life.

Let me make this clear: if someone comes forward and claims they’ve been sexually assaulted/abused, they need to be taken seriously and not dismissed based upon the circumstances, their gender identity, the color of their skin, their economic position or profession or the person they’re accusing. In turn, the individual being accused should be given time to address the claims before the public begins demolishing their life.

A reoccurring comment in almost all these cases where someone comes forward and alleges abuse YEARS after it happened, is – “Why did they wait so long to come forward?”.

Is this a fair question? Sure. And I feel it is asked because our brain needs to find a way to understand the information we are being given. Because while we’d all like to think that if in the same situation we’d be unfuckable with and anyone who dared to bring damage to our doorstep would immediately suffer the consequences, we actually cannot predict our reaction. There are too many unknown variables to be able to confidently say we’d instantly speak up and seek retribution.

The fear of not being believed. The fear of being blamed. The fear of rejection. The fear of retaliation from the person being accused. The fear of being forever defined by your experience. The fear.

It does not matter the why, what matters is the chance they’ve taken by speaking up at all. Those who come forward should be embraced, not ridiculed. Not abandoned. Not criticized.

“Don’t ask why victims wait so long to speak up. Ask what systems were in place to keep them quiet”. Anonymous

I own a few Marilyn Manson CD’s. And I’ve even attended one of his concerts. Would I say I am a fan? Probably a number of years ago I was but truthfully, I’ve not paid attention to any of his music in recent years because I feel it devolved while my taste evolved. That’s not a slam against him or anyone who fancies his work, it’s more a statement on how I’ve matured and now seek out music that feels authentic to me.

The one concert I attended was opened by Courtney Love. I know, what a duo to pay money to see. Near the end of Manson’s set he made a disparaging remark about Love and trashed her music. At the time he was wearing some pretty hefty platform shoes so it made it all the more hilarious when from out of nowhere she charged like a rhino and tackled him to the stage; throwing punches at his head all the way down. When he finally was able to get up, he announced the show was over. There would be no encore and then him and his bandmates trashed the stage in a temper tantrum worthy of a toddler Napoleon. Still makes me laugh to this day.

Shoutout to Evan Rachel Wood and her most recent movie ‘Kajillionaire’. Watched it on demand about a month ago and it’s a brilliant comedy that will also pull at your heart. I highly recommend you give it a chance.

Check out the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiMPCevu8Wk

#evan rachel wood #victim shaming #marilyn manson #comments section #kajillionaire

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aros001 · 3 years

Text

Read through light novel vol. 11. Random thoughts.

Okay, right off the bat, this

is my favorite art in the books yet just because of how annoyed Naofumi looks.

It's always been a thing but I've been seeing it more in these last couple of books, especially in contrast to Sadeena and Alta, but I really like that Naofumi likes that Raphtalia will push back against him when she doesn't like something, be it his attitude, his action, or his ideas. He doesn't want a yes-man or someone who'll worship and never question him. Child Raphtalia was kind of his sidekick but adult Raphtalia is definitely his partner. They trust each other completely and they never have to worry about holding back their honest thoughts. This is especially important if there is to ever be a romantic relationship between the two of them. Romance is not supposed to be just the guy and his prize. Naofumi and Raphtalia I can see working as a couple because they genuinely see each other as equals.

So, as has been revealed so far, Trash's family, save for himself and his younger blind sister, were murdered by the hakuko. He hated Siltvelt because it's where the hakuko came from and his own kingdom for taking no action against them for those murders. Then later his sister was attacked by a hakuko and presumably murdered and possibly raped but the body was never found, thus pushing him to overthrow the king of Siltvelt because he was a hakuko.

And he hates the Devil of the Shield because...! ...A previous Shield Hero helped to found Siltvelt? I get that Siltvelt is a demi-human supremacist country and that it worships the Shield Hero but I feel like there's a little bit of a disconnect in Trash's hatred. I suppose his hatred for Naofumi didn't blow up until he thought he tried to force himself on Malty and before that he just treated him dismissively, but I can't help but feel like I'm missing something here. Also, didn't the previous Shield Hero die in Siltvelt a month into him being summoned? I get that hatred and the desire for revenge are not always very rational, especially when religion is thrown into the mix, but I feel like it's odd he's placed so much of it on Naofumi and the Shield Hero as a whole.

So Fohl and Alta are possibly the nephew and niece of Trash through his sister and the grandchildren of the hakuko king of Siltvelt whom he killed. Obviously I'm hoping Trash's sister wasn't raped to conceive them and that it was just a forbidden love like was one of Naofumi's theories, but I guess I'll find that out in a later book.

Also, poor Naofumi and poor Raphtalia. Either Alta wants to be with Naofumi (romantically or...) or she's on her way to becoming the new pope of the Church of the Shield Hero. She was reminding me a little bit of Neia from Overlord and her devotion to Ainz in the latter regard.

“Apparently there’s a new bandit chief that’s risen to power lately, and we’ll be wasting our time unless we capture him.” ... “That’s the thing. I don’t know all the details, but apparently the boss is really distrustful and rarely makes appearances. But he’s also supposed to be strong enough to pick off even the toughest of adventurers one by one without a problem.”

This is going exactly where I think it's going, isn't it?

[Five minutes later]

Yep.

Reading this book and I realized my main issue with Ren, beyond the issues he shares with the other two heroes, was how unbelievably condescending he'd been to Eclair, someone who knew her way with a sword WAY better than he did, just to protect his own ego after he would have lost if he hadn't cheated in their duel. That left a really bad taste in my mouth but it's still not as bad as what I dislike about Motoyasu and especially Itsuki. He hasn't yet specifically apologized for that but he is showing her a lot more respect and being clearly remorseful over his actions. Even him blaming his loss against the Spirit Tortoise on his party's weakness and not his own I could swallow fine because there was the implication that he was unable to deal with the guilt of it being his fault that they were all dead, which, while bad, is a very human thing to feel. As long as he takes his training seriously from this point on and doesn't regress back, I can look forward to his progress and his interactions with Naofumi.

I actually was slightly spoiled before I started reading the light novels that the other heroes were going to unlock their own curse series as well. It was minor because I didn't hear any specifics beyond that but the person I was reading I remember being really unhappy about it. Personally, I'm fine with it. The Holy Weapons are meant to be equal to each other so it makes sense they'd have similar unlockable abilities (relative to what each weapon is, of course). The reason Naofumi is so much stronger is supposed to be because he actually bothered to learn how to use his weapon and because he took how he was told to power it up seriously. If he had an ability the others had no equivalent of it would basically be cheating. Part of the criticism too was that Naofumi had been through so much worse than the others to unlock his curse series, but everyone has different levels of stress they can take and it definitely helps that, thus far, each curse series embodies a different sin and thus has different effects. Motoyasu is clearly being effected differently by his Spear of (I'm assuming) Lust than Naofumi is by the Shield of Wrath or Ren by the Sword of Greed.

Speaking of which, I'm not the only one who felt a big red flag over Motoyasu's Temptation ability, right? I'm not saying he would abuse such a thing but powers that force attraction on people always makes me feel very uncomfortable. Just the fact that it worked on Naofumi whom is both straight and can't stand Motoyasu shows it can work on pretty much anyone who doesn't have specific resistances. It's a scary thing, your romantic and sexual preferences being altered by an outside force. Like a date rape drug weaponized.

The whole controversy over RoTSH's first episode holds less and less weight the further into the series I go. Naofumi vs. Motoyasu I'd argue has several great examples of feminism vs. sexism throughout the story. Naofumi was horribly betrayed by Malty but he doesn't hate women or use what she did as an excuse to. He's simply distrustful of anyone who can potentially betray him and is put off by the idea of any romantic or sexual relationships. Motoyasu gets betrayed by Malty (and his two other party members) and now sees all women as pigs, save for Filo, whom he's now obsessed with. The stupid criticism of RoTSH was that the series had Malty representing all women; that all women lie about being sexually assaulted and that all women are horrible bitches. That is the mentality Motoyasu now has, judging all women by the actions of one.

“Mr. Ren . . . I’m sure you’ve felt just terrible this whole time after losing your companions. It’s okay to cry now. Don’t worry. Even if the whole world insists you’re a criminal, I still believe in you, Mr. Ren. I believe you were fighting for the sake of the world.”

I love how, even after everything else she's done, the thing that makes me hate Bitch almost as much, if not more, as when she made the false rape accusation was her plagiarizing the words Raphtalia had said to finally reach Naofumi's heart and earn his trust. It just felt like such a violation, sullying that moment so much that you just want Bitch to die almost as much as Naofumi does.

Though I suppose it's Witch now, huh? Doesn't have quite the same punch as Bitch but I don't want to call her the Witch Bitch because that's my nickname for Satella in Re:Zero and that's more a term of endearment ironically enough. I don't want to sully her by putting her in any kind of association with Malty.

Original Reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/shieldbro/comments/fh9syh/read_through_light_novel_vol_11_random_thoughts/

#rising of the shield hero #random thoughts #reddit repost

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forestwater87 · 4 years

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OK. So idk if something is wrong with me, I'm naive or just missing something but I really really don't understand how these girls are Victims? I'm not saying they aren't, I just don't understand. As far as I can tell they all consented, and were never pressured or coerced into doing anything. I'm not trying to troll or be contrary or judgmental I'm just struggling to understand. Sorry, you seem to be quite well thought about this whole mess. I hope this ask is okay and doesn't cause any offence, it genuinely is not my intention.

I understand why you feel that way. I wasn’t comfortable calling them victims early in this whole situation (which has only been about a week long, Jesus), and it wasn’t really until I started to put all of them together that patterns began to emerge and I could really understand the scope of what Ryan did. I’ll lay out my thoughts here, referring to the individuals by their first initial following the example set by r/RyanHaywood, and hopefully we’ll be able to piece together why so many of us are willing to call these women victims.

(To be clear: I’m not trying to call anyone a victim who does not consent to that term. I don’t believe any of these fans have come forward expressing that they don’t want to be considered victims, but if that’s the case then I have no interest in forcing that label on anyone. I’m using it as a descriptive term, not a prescriptive one, if that makes sense.)

First off, we’ll start with the easiest stuff to agree with:

1. At least one of them was a victim of statutory rape, and potentially just plain rape. I’m not sure what the laws on removing a condom during sex without consent are, but M’s story makes it clear that he did not do due diligence in making sure she was of legal age -- the same can be argued for T, though her lying to him about her age makes that a tougher putt for some people; I’m pretty sure legally speaking he’s still in the hole -- so he just straight-up had sex with a minor. Technically with two minors.

So that one’s pretty easy. However, there have been something like 9 people have come forward and only 2 of them were minors. Certainly not a winning record -- to be abundantly clear, the number of minors you should be having sex with is 0; if it’s possible to have sex with negative numbers of minors, that should be the baseline for everyone -- but one of them lied about her age and the other one seemed really enthusiastic, and what about those other women? They were adults and they consented, so they shouldn’t be considered victims, right?

Well, that’s where it gets a bit trickier. I’ll put this all under a cut for length, but while the following isn’t illegal, it’s definitely immoral, and part of what led to me being more comfortable calling these women victims:

2. They were victims due to his celebrity status. Your mileage is definitely going to vary on this one, but the fact that Ryan is a popular internet personality means that his fans are more likely to be starstruck, intimidated, flattered, or otherwise willing to do things to make him happy that they otherwise wouldn’t do. T, M, and L have all said that they were influenced by their admiration of him as a fan to do things they wish they hadn’t, and there are definitely ways that influencers or celebrities can ethically date fans (Caiti Ward was a huge RT fan before she and Jack married, and by all appearances they’re the most wholesome couple in the entire world), but encouraging them to send you naked pictures in exchange for positive validation from someone you idolize definitely seems like a bad use of celebrity status. L indicates that Ryan claims he didn’t realize the impact his status had on fans, but considering he was seemingly exclusively choosing sex partners from within the fanbase -- as opposed to, say, Tinder or something -- he must’ve on some level gathered that fans were easier to convince to do what he wanted.

3. They were victims of dishonest behavior. All of the women who’ve spoken up so far have said that they believed they were the only one Ryan was having an extramarital sexual relationship with, which indicates at best that he was extremely vague on establishing the parameters of their relationship and arguably suggests he was misleading them. This put them at risk for STDs (especially considering his apparent comfort with unprotected sex) as well as just general emotional harm. He lied about them as well, indicating to anyone who found out -- from his mods in 2017 to his statement a few days ago -- that any relationship was an isolated mistake.

It’s also unclear how honest he was about his marriage; all of the women who discussed this aspect have said that he told them a similar story, and at least M was led to believe that she was actually helping his marriage by satisfying his sexual needs so he wouldn’t have to leave his wife. It’s naïve and perhaps delusional to an outsider, but that and a lot of other stuff seems to be explained by . . .

4. They were victims of emotional manipulation. What’s really telling about lining all of these accounts up is the pattern that emerges: Ryan began with friendly conversation, often dispensing advice on personal and mental health issues (virtually all of the women who’ve come forward have expressed that they have some sort of mental illness), before testing the waters with a sexual comment that could be read as a joke or escalated further depending on the response of the fan, then alternating between showering them with compliments and attention and ignoring them for days or weeks on end. In at least one account he appears to have lied about a fan behind her back, which intentionally or not resulted in her losing most of her friends and being bullied on his own server, which he dismissed (again, behind her back) while treating her sympathetically to her face. That particular sexual relationship didn’t begin until after all of the above, and it’s not much of a stretch to note that he found a fan, isolated her, and then escalated the relationship into a sexual one.

And again, it comes down to spotting a pattern. Even if you don’t feel like a particular woman here is a victim, it’s important to take a look at all of their commonalities:

They were huge fans of Ryan, and followed him on at least one form of social media. Words like “idolized” and “loved” are used a lot in these testimonies.

They struggled with mental illness or personal issues (including bullying, depression, insecurity, marriage problems, etc.) that Ryan was informed about and seemingly supportive of.

They were younger than him by at least 8-9 years.

Their conversations gradually become more and more sexual. Sometimes this was initiated by Ryan, sometimes by the fan; if the sexual comments were rebuffed, they were immediately dismissed as jokes.

Nudes were sent and received, and they all stress how desired and valued Ryan made them feel.

If they were told about his marriage, it was a story that made him look highly sympathetic, and made cheating seem like less of a big deal or even the lesser of two evils.

He would push for in-person meetups, even offering to pay for the flight and hotel (using money he received from stream donations, which he claimed were being sent to his children's’ college funds).

He appears to have been uneven with his attention; multiple fans mentioned that he would “get bored” of them and not reply for days or even weeks at a time, and M mentions that he’d continue to “check in” even after their sexual relationship had ended. (Putting these together creates an image of a constantly-rotating list of potential partners that he’d cycle through, but admittedly this is just speculation.) One of the fans -- not sure which, but I linked them all so go hunting if you feel like it -- mentioned that he seemed bored or dismissive of non-sex talk after their relationship got sexual, essentially rescinding the very thing that made them want to talk to him in the first place.

So here we have a pattern of Ryan seeking out fans, especially those who were young and had personal issues making them vulnerable, drew them in with charm and friendly advice, then escalated the conversations to a graphic sexual nature, attempted to hook up with them, and made them feel special and unique (when that clearly was not the case). There are justifications for all of these on their own -- he’s not obligated to tell every sexual partner about all the others, some of the fans were the ones who took it further, etc. -- but when you put them all together, it’s pretty damning. This isn’t the behavior of someone who made a few mistakes with equally-consenting adults, but someone who had his strategy down to a science.

To finally sum this up, anon: you don’t have to feel like any of these individual women were victims (well, except M; I don’t think there’s any other way to read that horrible story), but taken together I hope you can see Ryan’s predatory behavior. At the very least, I hope we can agree that they were all victims of lies and emotional manipulation.

Maybe it was unintentional . . . but with such consistent accounts, I find it hard to believe.

#ryan haywood #rooster teeth #roosterteeth #achievement hunter #ask forest #god this was a lot and i feel like i didn't say anything useful #but you know #tldr fuck ryan #i don't have a consistent tw tag because i don't talk about it enough #but uhh let's try #tw rape #cw rape #rape #there if you've blacklisted any of those i think you should be good #Anonymous

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rishabh-ghosh · 3 years

Text

The Apparition

News report. 15.5.2020.

According to the latest reports, the cyclone, 'Amphan' just entered West Bengal and is supposed to crash in Kolkata by 7pm tonight. The estimated speed of the cyclone is estimated of about 80 km per hour. If it doesn’t slows, then it will cause huge damage in the city. Citizens of the city are requested not to get out of there house during the storm and to stay away from electrical devices. We will now have a look on the damages caused by the cyclone in Odisha.

I switched off the T.V . Every channel was broadcasting the same news. About the cyclone. I left the drawing room and went to the kitchen. I took out a bottle of Scotch from the fridge. As it was an off day so I decided to relax. My plan was to drink as much I could and sleep till evening. But before, I have to make some arrangements in my flat so that my rooms don’t get overflowed from rain water like the last time. Oh those fuckers from those I bought this flat scammed me good. The flat is is full of flaws. The walls are damp, the sink was badly damaged and there were numerous electrical leaks. Although I have a shelter above my head. I am looking for a job currently. But I doubt an alcoholic and drug addict like me will get any job. I wish I had never left army . But the scenario couldn’t let me work there. After lunch, I drank 5 pegs of Scotch, as a result I was feeling very warm inside but as I am an alcoholic, I didn’t felt intoxicated that much. So I injected myself with morphine to get a good sleep. I just wanted to sleep till tomorrow. Now I can feel sleepy. Darkness was surrounding me and I was feeling the air around me heavier and…………

2 years ago. – Rajasthan, Indian Army Base. 1000 hours. 15.5.2018

“ Major Sanjay Ghosh, I just checked your achievements , it’s mind blowing. You joined Indian army via CDS in 2015. You were part of various Counter Insurgent operations. Then you voluntarily opted for Para regiment, and you didn’t flinched. Even your training officer told me that you are very tough physically and mentally.” I nodded my head and saluted him. He was Colonel Vipin Sinha. My Commanding officer. I replied, “ Sir, from my very first day in IMA, I wanted to be a para commando. And that’s why I trained myself to be as tough as possible.” He smiled and told me, “ Son, force needs brutal and intelligent officers like you only. You guys are tough as nail and are unbreakable. Just remember, never ever let your emotions work in battlefield. Dismiss.” I saluted him and went to the shooting range. I was just inspecting the skills of new recruits. Suddenly, a lieutenant came and told me , “ Sir, we need to go to the BSF camp, it is under attack.” I took 6 men whom I trusted most and gathered our weaponry and went to the camp. According to intel, there were 10 armed men. They were armed with machine guns. The BSF soldiers were pinned down. I asked a Captain named Laxman to be overwatch. He would coordinate us for enemies and provide sniper cover. It was less than 16 minutes we entered the place and almost all of them were killed. I killed 3 with my Insas rifle that day. When we were moving to the jeep, overwatch said via radio, “ Watch Tango 6oclock.” Which meant, that a target was behind us. I took out my pistol and turned around and killed that bastard. Bur the gun in his hand got misfired and the bullet hit Lieutenant Rajveer in the head.

Present day 6pm

That nightmare again! It spoiled my sleep. What? It’s only 6 pm. I better confront Salim. He gave a low quality drug. I tried to switch on the lights but I failed because there was no electricity at that moment. The storm was brewing up. I didn’t wanted to remain awake during the storm. Because storm brings that gruesome memory back. The reason I had to leave army and have to live rest of my life as a broken man is because of storm only.

2 years ago . Indian Army Base.Rajasthan 20.6.2018

Rajveer's death saddened the whole battalion. He was like a younger brother to me. He was very close to me and Shruti, my better half. I didn’t told Shruti about all these because she shouldn’t get any stress as it can be harmful for her and our baby.

Our C/O, Colonel Sinha instructed me that we got intel about many insurgents hiding in a village in Kuldhara. He added, “ The place is allegedly haunted as a result there are no inhabitants. The operation should be a clean job. No target should be alive. And one more thing, this time kill each target at once.” I understood what he meant. I started gathering best men for this night operation. An elderly Naik named Pawan Tripathi asked me, “ Sir , with due respect I am requesting you to not enter the place. I am local and that’s why I am warning, anyone who goes inside the village at night never comes out alone.” I along with nearly whole battalion laughed at him. I told him, “ If you are not interested in taking part in the operation, I won’t force you. But don’t worry about us.”

Around 7 o clock, with a team of 15 men, I entered the village. Our mission was to check every corner of the village and get back to our base by 10 o clock. I didn’t phoned Shruti because of this crucial mission.

Nearly after 2 hours of moving through the whole village, we finally found those bloody terrorists. They were about 20. All of them were all in a single room and were about to rape a local woman of about 27. The woman was asking for freedom. When they were about to do the heinous act, I ordered to shoot. All of us shot the bloody insurgents but sadly, the woman was also killed in crossfire. I threw a hand grenade inside the house and ran away from it with my sub ordinates. I instructed, “ It’s sad and a war crime as well. But it was done by mistake and moreover we were trying to save her only. But we didn’t had any intel regarding her. None of us will say a bit about the girl in the base.” While we were leaving the place in the jeep, suddenly storm brewed. It was not the weather for a storm a while ago. The driver in our vehicle lost his control and suddenly I saw a pair of red eyes in front of me and then I lost my conscious.

I woke up in the Indian Military Hospital, New Delhi. My C/O was sitting beside my bed and was smiling. I tried to sit but my Medical Officer , Major Vikram asked me to lay. Sir asked me, “ It’s been 10 days you were unconscious. All of your partners died. You were lucky that you got thrown out of the vehicle during the accident, because the car caught fire afterwards. Sad death for a band of brave warriors. But there is another bad news.” I asked , “ Yes sir?” He replied, “ Seasonal thunderstorm took place in Kolkata the same evening you faced your accident. Maybe your wife was near a conducting pole in your house. She and her unborn child died due to lightening strike.” I was shocked by the news and was about to say something , but stopped after I noticed a familiar figure behind C/O. It was the same woman but she wasn’t pretty as she was that night. Blood was coming out from her left eye, there were burning marks all over her body . I collapsed.

After a few days, I left army because of that apparition. I thought that it was my PTSD and guilt for unable to save the life and dignity of a woman being a soldier. After leaving army, I tried to commit suicide many a times but failed. As if someone was trying to stop me from committing suicide. Then I got involved into drugs and alcohol.

Present day

Every stormy night, they come and visit me. They don’t have particular face. Sometimes they look like poor old men, sometimes as voluptuous ladies , sometimes as animals like dogs, cats, rats and bats. They torture me and drains life from me. I wish I had listened to that Naik that day. Then I would have not been so broken and dying every stormy night. This night I tried toby pass by sleeping but I couldn’t. I can hear footsteps in my house. It was coming from near the bathroom. I screamed fear fully, “ Who is this? Leave me alone.” In response a familiar voice replied, “ Dear, won’t you see me again?” It was Shruti, my wife. I ran towards the bathroom and saw the thing which could break even the most bravest men. Shruti was there but she was not like before. Her eyes were swinging out of her eye sockets , her cheek bones were emerging out from her burnt face, blood was all over inside her mouth and there was a lump of red mass on her hand from which, a sound of a crying baby was coming. I tried to ran away from the house and suddenly I saw a bright light and a strange shakiness and pain inside me.

Next day, 7 pm , Lal Bazaar, Kolkata police , Detective department

“ Sir, the guy was definitely sick and became insane because of these drugs.” Sub Inspector Suryasis Mukherjee told this to Investigating officer ACP Abhay Roy. ACP replied, “ Are you sure? The man was a Para SF, those who don’t breakdown easily.” The Sub Inspector replied, “ But sir, these things like ' Swinging eyes, mutilated face, dead wife back to life, red mass crying like baby, are these logical? I am telling you what happened, the guy lost his wife during his time in Army, he might have lost his sense from then and started taking drugs. His love for his wife, the things he have seen during his Army days etc along with his drug addiction made him insane and he could see ghostly things. We found that there were leaks in the main lines. Floors of his room were flooded with water. Maybe he hallucinated all these and while running due to his fear, the main line was connected with the floor and the electricity came back then only. As a result, he died.” Abhay smiled and replied, “ What a coincidence, but there’s one thing which doesn’t makes sense.” Suryasis replied, “ What is it sir?” Abhay replied, “ The forensic reports came a while ago. I was reading it while you were there in the crime scene. Maybe because it is the case of a soldier, they did it faster. Sanjay’s fingerprint matches with that of the prints found on the pen found near the page where he wrote this whole senseless horror story. But that’s not the case. The case is , according to forensic tests, Sanjay died yesterday around 7 pm yesterday because of electrocution only. But the write up was written 11 hours ago, which means around 1 AM today. According to the investigation, he lived all alone in his house. My question is , if he was alone in his house then who had written all these , 6 hours after his death?

#my writing #horror #war crimes #military #psychological horror

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imaginebeatles · 4 years

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Hello, I'm a homo-romantic ace whose been having a lot of weird conversations lately about who belongs in the LGBT umbrella. I think anyone who is ace has the space if they want it because it is a little understood sexual orientation that experiences a lot of corrective reactions. But lately people have been arguing to me that only aces with non-hetero rom orientations and/or folk who are non cisgender have access to the space. I was wondering the following things:

2/2 what’s your take on asexuality belonging to the LGBT term, the LGBT community and the LGBT complex (cuz I think it’s gotten more complex as a functioning being)? Does asexuality belong in a tertiary space like BDSM which crosses over with queer (and shares similarities) but is not fully within it? Thanks for sharing about your thesis, every time it pops up on my dash I feel very excited. It’s been awhile since I engaged in queer theory and I am loving your work! No pressure to answer tho!

Okay, so…. this is a very contentious topic, but I have a lot of thoughts on this, especially since I’ve started doing research for my thesis. I’ve read some articles on asexuality and the queer community so… here we go. I’ve put it under the cut, so people can easily scroll past it if they’re not interested.

(I would also like to first say that I will be use the word “queer” here. I know some people are uncomfortable with that because its past use as a slur, however, because it is an actual academic term that is used by everyone writing about these issues, and especially within queer theory, I will be using that word too. I use the word to talk about all non-normative identities/practices related to gender and sexuality, which includes the LGBTQ+ community, but is more extensive than that, including any letters not part of that acronym. Queer is also a (political and academic) practice, not just an identity. This already possibly shows where my answer to your question is going…)

Firstly, I want to say that I understand why some people within the LGBTQ+ community might be uncomfortable about letting asexual people into that community. There is a difficult relationship between asexuality and queer identities. Some people in the field of asexuality studies have begun to write on this (I’ll list them down one or two down below). Within queer politics, historically but also now, there is a heavy focus on sex. Because queer people have struggled against oppression based on their sexual habits, not having sex is generally viewed as conservative or as a form of assimilation. For wlw this is further true because for a long time healthy sexual behaviour (aka having sex at all) was seen as impossible between two women, because both women would be sexually passive. Not having sex is not radical. This is why hetero-romantic aces are often dismissed as being “straight anyway”. Non-normative sexual practices (like cruising) are an important part of the queer community (academic work within queer studies in especially the 1990s and 2000s shows this too, wherein theoretical and political potential is mined from non-normative sex acts, including bare-backing because of its relation to the HIV crisis in the 80s).

It therefore makes sense that queer people (especially gay men and women, but also others) are uncomfortable with asexuality’s focus on not having sex, and as such asexuality is often seen as being “sex negative” instead of “sex positive” and thus bad. At least, politically.

I, however, and other academics, do think asexuality is queer, if you define queer as being non-normative in relation to hetero-normativity). Asexuality is seen as non-normative in our current hyper-sexual society and sex is seen as a vital part of heterosexuality too (you have to reproduce and women are meant to be sexually available to men at all times). Asexual people are discriminated against because they refuse sex, which society sees as natural. While the struggles of asexual people are different from those of gay people, bi and trans people (and other identities) also have their own struggles against which they fight. This does not diminish their struggles.

Acephobia is based on ableist ideas: if you don’t want sex, there must be something wrong with you either mentally or physically, because sex is naturally and everyone should want it and have it (often). Asexuality is often dismissed and not seen as “real”. There must be something that inhibits you from having sex, whether that is physiological, hormonal, or having to do with trauma, or maybe just because you are not “hot enough to get a boyfriend”, which reminds me of how for a long time lesbians were seen as being men-hating ugly women (and feminists). This view leads to asexuality being pathologized (as homosexuality used to be). There have been numerous ways in which low sexual desire or a lack of sexual fantasies has been sees as a disorder in the psychoanalytic tradition. Attempts to “fix” asexual people are made through things like therapy or hormone treatment (or stuff like viagra or other such things), but also through corrective rape, either in a medical contexts under the idea that sexuality needs to be “awakened” within the patient, or in the private sphere at the end of a partner or friend. Research has also shown that people see asexual people as less human, more machine-like. They admit feeling uncomfortable with asexual people, and that they may discriminate against them, such as refusing them rent.

Asexual people have their own political issues to work through, just as any other identity within the LGBTQ+ community. However, each of these issues and more are related to the fight against hetero-normativity. Another example is that asexual people, especially those who are also aromantic, can help critique the way society privileges heterosexual romantic couplehood, especially married heterosexual couples. Asexual and aromantic people often privilege non-romantic and non-sexual relationship, such as friendships or family, allowing us to re-evaluate these other relationships and open up new forms of queer relating, which will also be appealing to other queer people, who often form their own social group or families and whose relationship and friendships are often in some way “queer”.

On top of that, it is important to realise that there is a lot of overlap between asexual people and other queer identities. However, queer asexual people constantly remark on how they do not feel safe or represented by the queer or LGBTQ+ community, even those who “welcome” queer aces, but not hetero-romantic aces. The queer and LGBTQ+ community are heavily sexualized spaced, which makes aces feel unwelcome, but also leaves many non-asexual queer people to complain about the lack of safe spaces for queer people that aren’t about clubbing, such as the lack of queer cafes or library. The queer community (and LGBTQ+ community) is itself deeply entrenched in compulsory sexuality, just like hetero-normative society, making aces feel like they don’t belong to either community.

If an asexual person if gay, or bi, or non-binary, or trans, or queer, or whatever, it is the LGBTQ+ and queer communities that should provide them a safe space and fight for them. Their asexuality informs their experience as homo-romantic or trans or anything else, and cannot be separated from that part of their identity. These are not separate issues. If we want to protect trans kids or gay kids or any other member of the queer/LGBTQ+ community, these communities need to be inclusive of asexuality and provide spaces where these kids are safe and can talk freely about their experiences and the challenges they face. These will undoubtedly also be informed by their asexual identity.

We are stronger politically when we fight together. We fight the same cause. Asexual people do not ask other LGBTQ+ or queer people to not be sexual. They only ask that they are included and that their own issues are being taken seriously.

On top of that, asexuality intersects with a lot of other queer issues. For trans folks, for example, the focus on sex in society and romantic relationships may leave them uncomfortable because of their body dysphoria and may thus run into similar issues as sex-repulsed aces. Stone butch women may find common ground with asexuality too, because of the focus on penetrative sex in society. The hypersexualisation of gay men may find that they experience similar issues as asexual people who feel they are being (hyper)sexualised despite not being sexual. There is a lot of overlap, and these issues need to be addressed. We can help each other and offer new perspectives that will help us fight for the same rights.

On top of that, on a more abstract level, can also be valuable for queer politics in the way that it undermines our current understanding of sexual identity. The way we now think about sexuality was constructed by straight people with the aim of pathologizing and thus actively discriminate against and eliminate perverted sexuality. This started with homosexuality with Freud, and quickly began to expand. If you want to know more about this, Foucault’s History of Sexuality is a good place to start. This allowed for sexual object choice to be used to group specific people together and make them into a specific type or “species”, as Foucault calls it. Our conception of sexuality, then, was constructed to uphold heterosexuality as the norm, making heterosexuality (that is the opposite sex as the sexual object choice) out to be the natural and normal and healthy form of sexuality.

Asexuality undermines this construction. Asexuality not only shows that there are different forms of attraction, which do not need to be connected to each other in a one-on-one relation, but also shows that sexual attraction is not the only or even the most important basis for attraction. Asexuality is not explainable in our current system and forces people to consider their sexual preferences. What do I like in sex? What kind of sex? What kind of sensuality? And with whom? If I like having sex with men, but only being sensual with women, what does that mean? Asexuality asks us what we prefer, putting the focus on preference rather than something biological or innate that makes us feel desire towards one gender and not the other.

This is not to say that asexuality makes sexual identity into an arbitrary choice. Rather, it shows that you cannot divide people into identity categories based on sexual object choice shows that attempting to do so is just as silly as doing so based on if you like tea or coffee. Or ketchup or mustard. On top of that, it allows for sexuality to be seen as fluid, not that it changes, but that it is not fixed. Maybe you like ketchup for a long time, and then no anymore. Or maybe you are briefly in the mood only for this specific type of mustard but not the others. Focusing on preference allows us to undermine the whole construct on which hetero-normativity is predicated. Making identities such as heterosexual or homosexual or bisexual or pansexual almost meaningless or nonsensical. If we want to do away with hetero-normativity completely, this is a crucial step to take. It allows us to focus on sexuality as a social construct, rather than something that must be biologically explained.

TL;DR: I understand why some LGBTQ+ people are uncomfortable with the idea of bringing asexual into the community. However, I think ultimately we are fightening the same cause despite our own specific issues that we face. We have a similar stake in queer politics and queer academia. Asexuality can offer the queer or LGBTQ+ community a lot, and being inclusive to asexuality is crucial if we want to protect queer kids. As such there is a lot that both communities can offer each other.

This goes for both queer aces and hetero-romantic aces. Hetero-romantic aces also benefit and often have a stake in dismantling hetero-normativity because they are asexual. Hetero-romantic aces also face discrimination under hetero-normativity. Because of this, asexuality at large ought to be included. Excluding hetero-romantic aces from the queer community or LGBTQ+ community shows a misunderstanding of asexuality and its political issues and seems not so much inclusive of asexual issues, but rather inclusive of those issues that relate ONLY to the other part of their identity. For queer aces, however, these two are not separate issues. If you want to be inclusive to queer aces, you have to be inclusive towards asexuality in general.

Asexuality, then, should be fully within the queer community, not be treated as a separate but overlapping thing like BDSM. Asexuality, when taken seriously, will affect all spaces of the queer community for the better, while still allowing for sex-positive politics.

Reading suggestions:

Michel Foucault, History of Sexuality.

Megan Milks, “Stunted Growth: Asexual Politics and the Rhetoric of Sexual Liberation.” In Asexualities: Feminist and Queer Perspectives, edited by Karli June Cerankowski and Megan Milks.

Erica Chu, “Radical Identity Politics: Asexuality and Contemporary Articulations of Identity.” In Asexualities: Feminist and Queer Perspectives, edited by Karli June Cerankowski and Megan Milks.

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longformautie · 4 years

Text

Addressing sexism of autistic men

CW: gender-based violence, including murder and rape

I. Introduction

This post has been coming for a long time. And I mean a LONG time. My thoughts on this topic have been evolving constantly. They will probably evolve even after I post this. I am still learning and welcome feedback.

I was prompted to write this post during the pre-coronavirus Before Times, when I saw that the popular Facebook page Humans Of New York had profiled an autistic man who had become a pickup artist. For context, pickup artists are a group of straight men who will cynically do whatever it takes to get them laid, which of course means blatantly ignoring the needs of the women they interact with, and who share strategies with one another. The autistic man in the photo post talked about how before he was a pickup artist he was hopeless with women, and now he was getting girls - getting laid, even. He said he knew it was manipulative, but that it was only fair - after all, it’s not like anyone had ever sympathized with him for his social difficulties. I was curious about what people had to say in the comments section; turns out, I wasn’t satisfied by any of the takes I found.

The takes I didn’t like can be broken down into two categories. Category number one were formulations like “poor him, he just wants to be accepted.” I’m not even a little bit sympathetic to this take and will only be spending a moment on it. Suffice it to say, it’s hard to take these people at their word that they care about the autism struggle when they don’t show up in droves to the banners of the neurodiversity movement with this level of enthusiasm. Rather, we are part of a culture that likes to sympathize with toxic men. If the man wasn’t autistic, they’d find some other excuse, but since he is, in defending him they can also activate the ableist notion that autistic people are incapable of respecting boundaries. I choose the word “incapable” because if your position is that autistic people sometimes don’t know better than to violate a boundary, the logical conclusion is simply that someone should teach them. To sincerely and enthusiastically take up this kind of “poor autistic guy doesn’t know any better” rhetoric, you have to presume complete incompetence of autistic people and that we’ll never learn, so that when a straight autistic man does a violating thing to a woman, they can shrug their shoulders and say, “well, I guess nothing can be done about this.” This attitude is sexism and ableism couched in a delusion of sympathy.

Category number two of takes, I like lots better but still am not quite satisfied with, and can be roughly summarized: “This isn’t caused by autism, it’s caused by being an asshole.” While I agree that being an asshole is the main ingredient in this cocktail, I don’t think the autism should be dismissed as an irrelevant detail. I think there is a sexism problem specific to autistic men that needs to be separately talked about and addressed. I intend to do so in this post, without assigning blame either to the autism or to the women being abused.

I want to note in advance that this post will be cishet-centric, not because I think straight experiences are universal, partly because the behavior of cishet men is what’s at task here, but mostly because I have no idea how these issues affect LGBTQIA communities. If anyone is able and willing offer insight or resources on that topic, I’d love to hear from you.

I. Autistic men

Having experienced it firsthand, I can say for sure that autistic loneliness is a vicious cycle. By loneliness, I mean a lack of any social connection, not just a lack of romantic or sexual partners. Autism makes social interaction more difficult, which makes it harder to find friends, but, crucially, not having friends also makes social interaction more difficult. More people to interact with means more practice with social interaction; it also means more assistance from comparatively clued-in people who care about us. This vicious cycle can also manifest with respect to a subset of people. For example, an autistic child who only socially interacts with adults may have trouble forming connections with peers. For the purpose of this discussion, I want to focus on the problems this presents for autistic boys who want to interact with girls in their age group.

The scarcity of cross-gender social interaction during childhood need not be framed as a uniquely autistic experience. Societal forces sort us by gender from an incredibly early age, so the vast majority of our social connections in childhood are with people of the same gender. Furthermore, especially during and after adolescence, boys and men are discouraged from being emotionally close with one another. Thus, the norms of masculinity isolate us almost totally from peers of all genders. Our social connections with men must be superficial; our social connections with women must be non-platonic. For those of us who crave the emotional intimacy that our same-gender friendships lack, a romantic relationship is the only socially acceptable opportunity to forming a deep, loving bond with someone close to our own age.

Enter autism (again). Dating, when we hit adolescence, is wholly new to us, and we have been given no opportunity to adjust ourselves to its social norms. Autism makes this a particular challenge, as do gender roles in dating. Since men are supposed to initiate and women are supposed to merely give subtle hints (if not be straight-out “hard to get”), straight autistic men face both the pressure of leaping into an arena that intimidates us, and the bewilderment of not knowing whether it’s working. If I had a crush on you in high school, I probably kept it a secret; if you had a crush on me, I probably didn’t notice.

Worth noting here that none of the things I’ve listed are evidence against autistic men’s actual attractiveness or appeal to women. We are facing access barriers that accumulate over the course of our lives until we finally figure out how to start ripping them down, and when we do, we quite often do get to have romantic and sexual relationships. But the prevailing narrative about autism and other disabilities is that they’re unsexy, and a lot of autistic men buy into that. I myself thought I was one of those autistic men who’d never date or have sex until experience taught me otherwise.

Knowing all this, we can see why a lot of autistic men might feel both that they need a relationship to be happy, and that they cannot possibly have one. This makes us prime targets for recruitment, because the sense of personal injury at being deprived of sexual experiences for reasons beyond one’s control is as indispensable an ingredient in the various movements of the “manosphere” as the sexism itself. It’s not that autistic men are any more or any less sexist than regular men, but that the sexists among us already feel exactly the way these communities require them to feel: deeply aggrieved, and deeply desperate. Pickup artistry both validates this sense of personal injury, and sells itself as the solution: a set of simple, logical rules that, when followed, will grant success. But it misses the uncomfortable truth that while everyone deserves to receive love, no particular person is obliged to give it. This is a deeply frustrating contradiction with no easy solution, but the solution certainly is not to cynically manipulate women into doing the thing you want.

III. Allistic women

I never was a pickup artist, but that doesn’t mean I never harbored a grievance against women for my loneliness. After all, I thought, wouldn’t my perpetual singleness end if women were more direct and assertive? As such, I worry that other people who read this may end up pinning the responsibility for autistic loneliness onto individual women too. The previous section hints at why that’s wrong, but I also want to take the time to explain why it’s deeply unfair.

My autism and masculinity were first brought into conjunction (or was it conflict?) in my mind in my freshman year of college. One of my new Facebook friends shared a Tumblr blog called “Straight White Boys Texting” which was a collection of screenshots of unwanted straight white boy texts, running the gamut from simple inability to take a hint to bona fide “what color is your thong” garbage. I felt pretty attacked, partly because I wasn’t yet used to seeing myself as part of a “straight white boys” collective that people didn’t like, and partly because what I saw was a bunch of guys missing social cues and taking things literally, just as a younger me would have done. I felt like I needed to say something - and boy, was that a bad decision. I said something about how the women in the screenshots needed to be more direct, and got instant (and deserved) backlash both for focusing on the least important problem in the interactions and for placing responsibility for a male behavior problem squarely back onto women.

At the time, I didn’t have a coherent framework for understanding sexism. Since then, I’ve learned that giving a direct no can occasionally get women killed, and most often at least gets them yelled at and insulted. Giving a yes also comes with its own risks - the risk of rape, in (unfortunately-not-actually-so-)extreme cases where that inch of “yes” results in guys taking a mile, but also the more pervasive risk of being socially stigmatized as slutty or promiscuous. It’s often the most women can get away with to be subtle (rather than completely silent) about all of their wants and needs, so that a discerning man who actually cares will know what those wants and needs are and respect them.

This puts those of us who have trouble with reading subtle signals in a difficult position if we inadvertently cross a boundary, but that’s not a problem women can reasonably be expected to solve. If a man crosses a woman’s boundaries because he simply doesn’t respect them, he wants to make it look like it’s an accident so that he will be forgiven. “But Aaron,” you might say, “didn’t you just say that the right thing to do in those situations is to teach people the right behavior, not ignore it?” Yes, that’s true. But that assumes the continuation of a conversation that a woman might feel safer just skipping; if a man is making her feel uncomfortable, she’s probably not inclined to continue to converse with him in order to establish whether his intentions were good or bad. When we impose the burden of freeing males from loneliness onto women, we are asking them to continue to interact with frightening men at their own peril.

Ironically enough, some of these frightening men are the autistic pickup artists from part 1. This means that pickup artists, far from “solving” the problems with dating they feel aggrieved by, are actually making it more difficult for everyone except themselves by giving women one more reason to be scared and cynical, and men who slip up one more type of monster to be mistaken for.

IV. Autistic women

At first glance, it seems like there’s a choice to be made here, between supporting autistic men who want to be valued as potential romantic and sexual partners and supporting allistic women who just want to be safe. But what I’m realizing more and more is that when there seems to be a conflict between the needs of two marginalized groups, the right choice is generally to avoid picking a side and instead find ways to support both groups. This works well, not only because both groups get what they want, but because if a side must be chosen, the people at the intersection of the two groups will lose both ways.

Autistic women bear the brunt of every part of this mess, as described in detail by Kassiane Asasumasu on her blog, Radical Neurodivergence Speaking (see the links later in this paragraph). Because autistic men fear ableism from neurotypical women, we tend to believe that autistic women are the only partners who will accept us for who we are. As a result, autistic women report being swarmed at autism meetup groups by men looking for a girlfriend, and those men who struggle with independent living are more than willing to escape that by leaning on the patriarchal expectation that the woman does all the chores, even when she is an autistic woman who struggles with the exact same tasks. This means autistic women actually interact with sexist autistic men the most, and not only are they subject to the same toxic shit that allistic women have to deal with, but they’re also expected to “understand” these men and thus endlessly tolerate their (supposedly inevitable) shitty behavior.

V. Solutions

Fortunately, the choice between female safety and autistic desirability is not a choice we have to make, but the solutions are not as simple as members of one or the other group simply choosing to behave differently. Rather, they require the collective participation of all kinds of people.

Addressing autistic male sexism necessarily means addressing sexism. It means respecting when women say no, rather than making it an unpleasant experience they might fear to repeat. It means teaching consent in special education classrooms, so that no one can claim in good faith that an autistic boy who crosses a boundary simply doesn’t know better. It means teaching girls, as they grow into women, that they are under no obligation to tolerate sexist behavior out of sympathy for the sexist man.

But addressing sexism also means supporting boys and men as they escape the confines of conventional masculinity. It means enabling and encouraging them to have close friends of all genders. It means reminding them that they don’t need a woman, any more than a woman needs a man.

In addition to addressing sexism, we need to address the ableism that prevents autistic people from accessing not just dating but emotional closeness of all kinds. We need to stimulate autistic people’s peer relationships at all stages of life. We cannot do this if special ed teachers continue to view us as broken allistic people rather than whole autistic people, nor can we do it if they view us as incomplete adults rather than entire children. If an autistic boy is unable to learn about condoms because it offends the sensibilities of the teacher, or if he is unable to learn how to talk like a teenager because his parents would like him to learn to speak like an adult, then that autistic boy is being deprived both of autonomy and of the opportunity to learn.

Furthermore, we need to teach allistic children how to interact with their autistic peers. Autistic people need no additional incentive to learn how to interact with the societal majority who control their access to jobs, housing, healthcare, education, political representation, and much more. Allistic people can, however, choose not to bother learning how to support and include us and face almost no social consequences beyond not getting to see my cool maps. Rather than alleviating this unequal distribution of incentives, adults generally exacerbate it by focusing only on the social development of autistic children with respect to interactions with allistic people, but not on the social development of allistic children towards being able to interact with autistic people. This is because the prevailing view regarding autism is still that our modes of moving through the world are incorrect and defective, whereas allistic modes of social interaction are viewed as normal and valid even when they exclude others.

The problem of autistic male sexism is hairy and complicated, but if we take the above steps, we can solve it without further stigmatizing autism, and without victim-blaming women. We don’t have to leave anyone behind in this conversation. Rather, by fighting both for autism acceptance and consent culture, we can produce a more just world where everyone gets the love and respect that they deserve.

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halstudandruz · 5 years

Text

Unexpected

*Not my gif*

Pairing: Jay Halstead x Reader

Requested: Yes

Prompt: Jay and Reader go undercover as a married couple, little did they know this would push them even closer to wanting that reality.

Warnings: Almost rape, swearing

“Okay, you ready?” Jay asked getting ready to pull into the club. I nodded my head preparing myself.

“Safety word is ‘fired’ you understand?” Voight said in my ear. Jay and I both confirmed. Jay looked at me nodding before getting out and walking over to open my door. He helped me out grabbing my hand as we began to walk into the club. Upon walking in I was overwhelmed with the smell of sweat and drugs. There were numerous people crowded on the dance floor right up next to each other. Jay clutched his hand around mine tighter pulling me over to the bar where he helped me up on a stool. Intelligence was investigating a notorious drug dealer. Who supposedly owned the club we were in. Jay and I were sent undercover as a married couple to hopefully set up a deal with him, he knew we were coming thanks to Antonio’s CI who knew him well and was now trying to help us catch him. The bartender came over asking us if we wanted anything to drink. I ordered two rum and cokes for us. I pretended not to notice the bartender looking me up and down, but Jay didn’t hesitate to send him a hard glare while stepping closer and putting his hand on my thigh making the bartender scurry away to prepare our drinks. Jay’s simple action caused butterflies to rise in my stomach as well as heat to form between my thighs. I had been having these kind of feelings for a while. Pretty much ever since Jay and I became partners causing us to spend more time together obviously. I was formally partners with Antonio but once he left for the short period of time he did Voight rearranged us and didn’t bother to do so again when Antonio came back. It seemed now whenever Jay touched me in the slightest way my heart began to race faster which was extremely confusing and not mention embarrassing when I felt my face heat up. Luckily it seemed like he never noticed. I just chalked it up to the fact that Jay was a good looking guy and I spent most of my days relying on him in literally life or death situations. All of a sudden I felt Jay talking in my ear pulling me out of my thoughts and making me jump he pulled back giving me a confused looked as I just shook my head apologizing. He leaned back in repeating himself while rubbing up and down my thigh teasingly.

“I need you to look over by the bathrooms and tell me if that looks like Hernedez to you.” He whispered as I pretended to giggle keeping up the act. I began to kiss up his neck as I shifted my eyes over towards the bathroom.

“I can’t tell it’s too dark in the corner.” I whispered nipping at his ear slightly causing him to groan that he tried to cover up with a cough. I pretended not to notice even though I will admit I suddenly didn’t want to be undercover anymore, and I could’ve swore I heard a chuckle in my ear. However I quickly regained my composure knowing we had a job to do. “Go to the bathroom and see.” I told him.

“No, I’m not leaving you.” He dismissed quickly like I was crazy.

“Jay it’s 20 feet away if anything happens I’ll be watching to back you up.” I explained.

“I’m not worried about me I’m worried about you.” He whispered harshly.

“Your call Jay, but stop fighting you might draw attention.” Voight said in our ears. He looked at me as I gave him a reassuring nod before he gave in. He brought my hand to his lips before heading over to the bathroom. I was too busy trying to keep an eye on him that I never even heard someone slide right in next to me.

“What’s a pretty girl like you doing here setting alone.” I jumped in my seat turning to see Hernandez leaning against the counter beside me.

“Actually I’m not-wait are you Hernandez?” I asked pretending to realize just now.

“Why yes I am and who might you be?” He asked giving me a creepy smirk that made my skin crawl.

“I’m Victoria. Anthony set us up a meeting remember?” I smiled at him sweetly.

“Ah yes.. did you husband, what was it? Ray? Bail on you?” He asked sliding closer to me.

“Ryan,” I smiled sweetly. “And no he’s here he actually just went to use the restroom.” I continued.

“Well why don’t we go get started?” He asked.

“Yeah of course, let me just go get Ryan-“ I began to say carefully sliding off my seat before he grabbed my wrist turning me back towards him.

“No, I’ll have someone bring him up we can just go get started.” He whispered in my ear making goosebumps rise on my skin. He slid his hand down to the low of my back, a little too low might I add, leading me up the stairs. As much as I waned to protest I knew I couldn’t push it too far and was just relying on Jay to meet us up there like Hernandez said. Upon walking up stairs he led me down a hall into a room that was filled with couches, a TV, and a desk on one side. As I walked up the stairs I realized my ear piece was breaking up and I could not longer hear those on the other side. Hernandez kicked out the few men that were seated in the room telling one of them to get my husband and bring him up however he ended the sentence with a smirk and a wink to the man. I was suddenly regretting telling Jay to go check near the bathrooms, but I had to trust that he was looking for me.

“Well let’s talk business.” I smiled wide leaning up against his desk.

“How about we just get to know each other real quick first.. you always want to know the people you do business with right?” He asked stepping closer to me running his hand lightly down my shoulder the whole way to my hip where he roughly gripped.

“Yeah I guess we can talk first, what do you want to know?” I asked hiding my uncomfortableness and emphasizing talk.

“Top or bottom? Cause I am perfectly fine with doing either.” He whispered in my ear running his tongue down my neck nipping at the skin on my collarbone. He picked me up easily setting me on the desk positioning himself in between my legs making it easy for him since I had a tight short dress on. I tried to close them but he just harshly ripped them back open stepping closer into me. “What’s the matter Tori? You shy? Don’t worry I can make you feel so good.” He said running his hand very slowly up my heat pressing hard. That was it for me I was offfically too scared.

“What are you doing? Can’t you get fired for this?” I laughed nervously making sure to say the word “fired” a little louder than the rest hoping they could hear me.

“Fired? Honey I don’t get fired I own the place. Which means I can do whatever I want.” He laughed loudly grabbing my hips yanking me closer to the edge of the desk. He grabbed my hand forcing it on his crotch that was disgusting full by now while he began to pull my panties down my thighs throwing them to the side. I tried to wiggle out of his touch which made him harshly grab my hip tighter no doubt leaving a bruise as I whined slightly. I knew I had a small knife in the cup of my bra but I wasn’t sure how to get to it without him grabbing my hands first.

“Oh suck it up this will be over quickly.” He smiled trying to pull my dress up above my thighs. Just then the door came busting open. Kevin rushed in tackling the guy away from me. I watched as they threw handcuffs on him not even slightly hesitating. It was then that the sobs came busting out. Jay rushed over to me pulling off his jacket covering my lap up with it knowing if I moved a certain way I would be on full display. He pulled me into a hug not saying anything. Once they dragged Hernandez out Voight came to check on my asking if I was okay. I nodded my head as he ushered me down to the ambulance to be checked out anyway. After being check and given the clear I sat in the back of the ambulance watching the scene around me. Jay very cautiously came over setting beside me. I still had his jacket around me. I was freezing now and I was coming down from the adrenaline.

“I’m.. so sorry [Y/N].. I cant even began to explain to you.” He said continuing to look down in his lap.

“Jay look at me. There nothing for you to be sorry about, I told you I’d be okay I told you to leave me. It’s completely on me and is nobody else’s fault.” I explained reaching over to brush his hand.

“I still shouldn’t have listened, and this is not your fault. It’s all that fucking disgusting bastard’s fault.” He said harshly anger clearly running through him.

“Yeah but I put myself in that situation.” I shrugged playing with my hands.

“No. Stop it right there. Absolutely not [Y/L/N]. You shouldn’t have to worry at all about being in a situation like that. It is not your fault and never will be.” He said looking straight into my eyes making me breakdown a little.

“He was.. he was.. so close Jay.” I whispered out tears beginning to roll down my face again. Making him swoop me up in his arms.

“Shhhh. I know. It’s okay. I’m right here.” He repeated over and over into my hair as I clutched to his chest. Once I calmed down I looked up at him.

“I’m sorry...” I croaked out a little embarrassed now.

“Don’t be sorry.” He smiled tucking a stand of hair behind my ear and wiping the tears from my face. “I promise I will never let anyone hurt you like that again. That son of a bitch is so luckily Antonio was the one hauling him out.” He said softly but ended with anger in his voice. I looked him and still seen pain and concern over his face.

“Jay, please don’t blame yourself for this.” I begged knowing what he was thinking. He sighed heavily.

“I won’t if you won’t.” He said putting his hand against my cheek. I nodded continuing to look him not moving my eyes from his. I closed my eyes once I felt Jay’s lips hit mine. I kissed back passionately before I remembered where we were pulling back quickly. I blushed once I looked over to see everyone watching.

“It’s about damn time you two.” Kevin yelled from a couple feet away. As everyone stood around agreeing. I looked over at Jay to find him chuckling.

“Well it seems like everyone knew about us, but us.” He continued to laugh.

“Sounds accurate.” I laughed leaning my head on his shoulder as Voight walked up to us.

“Don’t worry I already have the HR forms printed out for you guys. They’re on my desk you can take them tomorrow. In the meantime go home and rest up. If you need anything let me know.” Voight said looking at me slightly concerned as I nodded. He continued on walking past us towards his car.

“I’m so beyond confused right now.” Jay admitted helping me down onto the ground. I giggled in response.

“I have to get out of this dress. I’m fairly certain I’m going to cut it up and throw it away. Also you’re not getting this jacket back anytime tonight I’m fucking freezing.” I admitted shivering.

“Looks better on you anyway.” Jay smiled wrapping his arm around me leading me to the car. I rolled my eyes at his cheesy comment but secretly loved it. I guess good things really do come unexpected.

#chicago pd imagine #chicago pd x reader #halstead x reader #jay halstead #jay halstead imagine #jay halstead x reader #jayhalsteadxreader #chicago pd

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