#but coming from the perspective of an ally and not as someone with those disorders

[cluster-b-culture-is]

Cluster b culture is being scared of getting into new relationships because people get upset when you tell them your diagnosis. How are we supposed to know if they're safe to tell unless we bring it up?

.

#cluster b culture is #cluster b #npd #aspd #bpd #hpd #Mod Reef #anonymous #quite honestly if i'm thinking of relationshipping someone (rare but it happens on occasion although it's never worked out save for with-- #--Saltwater) #we tell them before doing it and preferably before we're Too close to them #and we usually just start with a vent (real or fake) about someone we saw equating NPD or ASPD or what have you with being evil #but coming from the perspective of an ally and not as someone with those disorders #that way we can more easily gauge their reaction beforehand

[yonemurishiroku]

Wondering the whole thing about loyalty being Percy's fatal flaw might actually be on a much more personal level rather than an encompassing "children of Poseidon"-trait.

This is to say that Percy's problem with unhealthy 'loyalty' could be a consequence of his upbringing. You see. The whole point is that Percy can be wary, yet once he deems someone an ally/ not-enemy, it's dangerously difficult for him to see them in a negative light. It's this sort of bipolar disorder but the categories are "Friend or Foe", each of which comes with a package of completely separate treatment. He put Luke in the Friend lot and he nearly died for that. He distrusted Nico but he didn't see him as an enemy and fell for the kid's trick still.

Revert back to his childhood. IIRC Percy had two parent figures growing up, i.e. Sally and Gabe. And here's a thing. They are basically two ends of the spectrum of Parenting. Gabe was an abusive, negligent, alcoholic, problematic stepfather whereas Sally was like a saint or something, who had sacrificed for him so much. So Percy had only experienced two types of attitude in his perspective-shaping phase: extremely loving and downright scornful.

This could thus limit his relationship categories, and later create a hole in his view of others' attitudes, I believe. His relationship table basically has only two columns, Friendly vs Not friendly. Percy puts people in those lots based on how they treat him, how they express themselves to him, how he sees them. But people are way more than just one facet. People can be many things at once, and so are the relationships. Percy's system is lacking, so he suffers from being twirled around in complicated, multilayer dynamics.

Imagine Percy, who only has two sets of acquaintances in his life, one of which gives him misery whilst the other fights for him, is thrown into a mess of two-faced lies and concealed intentions. He doesn't have the specialized code of reaction for that. There's no special section in his handbook dedicated to "People you need to beware of" or "These guys seem friendly, but better be safe than sorry". Once Percy has decided to put you in his mind as not an enemy - he would actively refuse to treat you as an enemy because that's not the way he does it.

And because Percy has so few 'Friends', you know, that he intrinsically, automatically puts you in the Friends column as long as he finds no hostility from you. Yeah, he has Sally, Grover, and Annabeth, but he also has Gabe and Nancy (?) and IIRC the bullies. He has always felt like he didn't fit in (no thanks to you, demigod-bonus ADHD and dyslexia). Percy has had to put too many in the unfavorable section that he, subconsciously or not, favors amicable acquaintanceships - that's why Luke got to him so effortlessly, just by treating him decently.

It's quite similar to the other category too. The best example I can come up with now is Bob/ Iapetus. Bob first made his entrance as Percy's enemy aka Iapetus, and later became harmless to him after getting his memories erased. You'd think Percy would rearrange the columns, but the fact is that Percy technically didn't even remember Bob, or Iapetus for that matter, after leaving him in Nico's care. If my theory is of any credit, I suppose Bob didn't make it into Percy's 'Friends' category, i.e. Percy hadn't considered him a friend. Bob landed in as a Foe and he stayed there in Percy's head - at least up until the Tartarus debacle.

So, like I said: a bipolar relationship classifying system.

#percy jackson #pjo #hoo #toa #yone rambling #percy jackson and the olympians #heroes of olympus #trials of apollo #over analyzing #sally jackson #gabe ugliano #luke castellan

[allylikethecat]

the 'discussions of piss (in a non sexy way)' LMAO. but how did it end up being actually kind of endearing tho lol

fictional taylor constantly thinking about how tiny he is (as a theme, not just the new chapter) :( i dont even know who that makes me sadder for honestly

and fictional matty being so protective even though he was forced into the whole thing is very sweet. but oh no karlie knows...i totally didnt pick up on that in the previous chapter. im on the edge of my seat 😬

side note, whenever matty mentions george it makes me want to read taylor to meet him so bad. excited for that, if you have it planned. excited anyway if not lol. tbh im not a swiftie in the slightest, but youve made me like your fake taylor so much haha

hope that was coherent lmao. ill try to organize my thoughts better and leave an actual comment later <3

OH MY GOSH! The happy dance-squealing sound combo I made when I saw this ask was absolutely insane. Buckle up because I am very excited, very caffeinated and going to write you a small novel in response!

I had way too much fun writing the whole piss segment, I too get extremely pee shy when there are people around and can hear it so I obviously had to inflict that on poor Fictional!Matty as well. In interviews from that era, Matty was also extremely passionate about Frozen, and Let It Go just seemed way too fitting 😂

Matty in 2014/2015 was tiny, at the time I don't think I even realized how tiny he was. But especially looking at pictures and videos of him now compared to then? Whoa. The man looked like a strong breeze would knock him over. Taylor during that time period, and Fictional!Taylor in my fic (who is a more dramatized version) was struggling with disordered eating and body images issues. Therefore, in my fic, she's hyper aware of those around her, and Fictional!Matty is skinny, boney, and as far as fictional!Taylor knows, basically living off of cigarettes, red wine, and Starbucks brownies, so obviously she is captivated by it. She had no idea that he's spiraling deeper and deeper into addiction. I think I had said it before, (and if I haven't I've at least told the Bestie) this isn't going to be a story where they make each other better. It's going to be one where they make each other worse.

IRL Matty during that era was a very outspoken Taylor Swift fan (before the whole putting his foot in his mouth thing about it being emasculating to date her) so my Fictional!Matty is obviously protective. He's still very much an up and coming artist at this point, and she's Taylor Fucking Swift in her 1989 era! He also has a little bit of a hero complex, we haven't seen it as much yet, since this fic is primarily from Taylor's perspective, but Fictional!Matty is an absolute disastrous mess and he is salivating at the chance to be the one to have it together, instead of having to constantly have someone else clean up his mess making him protective... And in terms of Fictional!Karlie, I hate to say it, but she is a model, and even if Heroin Chic wasn't necessarily all the rage in 2014 - it was still prevalent and influential enough that unlike my Fictional!Taylor, she knows what she's looking for and can clearly see the signs in Matty.

Taylor and George will be meeting in an upcoming chapter! It might not go the way that you're thinking or hoping though 👀

I'm glad that you're enjoying this fic even though you're not a Swiftie! I'm so happy to hear that you're enjoying my fictional version of Taylor, I was really nervous about getting her right because she is so famous, but I've had a lot of fun creating her into her own stand alone character!

Thank you so much for your wonderful long message, and I hope you read and enjoy all of this overenthusiastic, extremely long answer I've written in response! I look forward to reading your AO3 comment!

Thank you for reading and reaching out and all of that wonderful fun stuff!

❤️Ally

#allylikethecat #ask ally #anon ask #fanfiction #matty healy rpf #the 1975 rpf #fanfic #matty healy fanfiction #You Know Where the City Is #Matty x Taylor #matty x taylor fake dating au #matty x taylor fake dating fic #im so sorry this is so long #i get really excited and have absolutely no chill

[blessedarethebinarybreakers]

My therapist who is a Catholic Deacon and works on a team representing my city’s Catholic diocese specifically invited me to share my experiences and concerns with the Catholic church’s treatment of LGBTQ individuals as part of the on-going 2021-2023 “Synod on Synodality” ,

but I’m worried that I will mess up. This blog is one of the best resources for LGBTQ people of faith so I was wondering, should I participate if I’m nervous (it does mean a lot to me, I’m just nervous) what could be good things to say? I know I should speak from the heart but I worry I wouldn’t have anything worthwhile to say.

Thank you for any advice

Hey there, thanks for reaching out! That sounds like it could be a very cool opportunity. If you feel relatively comfortable with public speaking, and are out to everyone in your life who could possibly find out about this event, then I say go for it!

When I'm nervous about participating in something, I like to make sure I have all the information possible about it in advance. That way when the day comes, I don't have to worry as much about unexpected "environmental" factors — just about doing my part as best I can. If you don't already have this info, could you ask your therapist for more info about stuff like when and how long you'd be scheduled to talk, how many LGBTQ Catholics are likely to be there (speaking or even just in the audience), etc.?

On the topic of LGBTQ Catholics, this event could provide you with the opportunity to meet more of them, which would be really neat!

One big thing I'd recommend you ascertain from your therapist is what the "tone" of this event will be. Are those present genuinely hoping to learn to do better for LGBTQ Catholics? I assume yes, but in the off chance it's framed as some sort of "debate" thing, I just want make sure you're prepared.

___

Let go of the fear of messing up, as best you can — and let go of the thought that you might not have anything meaningful to say!

Hopefully you won't be the only LGBTQ person / ally there sharing their perspective, so you don't need to worry about Making Every Point.

It's not your job to singlehandedly speak for the Whole Community; not your job to sway the whole church, synod, or diocese. You don't need to worry about, like, making the perfect argument "proving" LGBTQ Catholics are valid or something. You're there simply to share one little piece of your truth, your perspective, nothing more and nothing less. Your story matters; your experience is meaningful. The courage and love it takes to speak — especially to a group that includes people who don't fully affirm your existence as a child of God — is vital and powerful as is, no matter what you choose to say. There's no way to "mess up."

___

Speaking from the heart is great, but I think you're smart to want to plan a little! Even just getting a list down of a few themes or points you want to include can help you feel more prepared.

I think if I were going to talk at an event like this, I'd probably accept that chances are, the Catholic Church isn't going to completely reverse course on its current theology around LGBTQ persons — so instead of advocating heavily for, idk, gay marriage, I'd mainly emphasize the already-existing theology that the church claims to hold but is largely failing to live into.

Namely, while the Catholic Catechism sticks to insisting that "homosexuality" is "disordered" (siiigh), but it also preaches compassion for gay persons: "They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided."

With a call to compassion as my theme, I'd share a story or two of times when I / someone I cared about / LGBTQ Catholics as a whole have been made to feel less-than-accepted and respected, treated not with compassion but with apathy or cruelty.

Some other ideas I might bring in:

LGBTQ persons are made in the image of God, too, and have gifts that the Body of Christ needs in order to be whole

LGBTQ Catholics belong to the community as much as any other Catholics, and should not be made to feel second-class or like their belonging is conditional

The sheer number of LGBTQ persons (and their allies) who leave Catholicism because of the pain they've endured speaks to the failure to show compassion for them

But overall, I'd keep it short and simple — one heartfelt story will stick with people more than convoluted rhetoric.

___

Best of luck to you if you decide to go, anon! May the Spirit of God who blesses you and calls you Good fill you with the courage and wisdom you need. <3

If any other LGBTQ Catholics have ideas for anon, please share!

#queer and catholic #suggestion request #synod on synodality

[higheverlost]

ellis’ mental state is a complicated one. he’s a multifaceted man that carries a lot of demons on his back... literally. In this post I’m going to study his mental state before the blight, during the blight & the years following. If you’re uncomfortable with talking about mental illness a) this probably isn’t the post for you and b) this probably isn’t the blog for you. I love to explore the minds of characters & how trauma affects them. not all of this is based off of trauma, but does explore how it aggravates any of his conditions. to start off, i’m going to touch on some of the mental illnesses ellis lives with & when they come into play.

bpd. ellis has always lived with borderline personality disorder since he was very young. from the very beginning of his life he has always had trouble regulating emotions & relationships in his life, often having extreme reactions to things that happen in his life. these extreme highs & lows are often triggered by his perception of what’s happening, though it is often warped by his inability to regulate the reality of situations. 

though he felt freely before the blight, after the fall of highever he lives in a dissociative haze most days, swallowing whatever extremities come to life in his mind. they often cause thoughts of self-ridicule & paranoia as to how he’s perceived by his allies & friends, driving him to embrace the general disconnect he feels with the world for some kind of relief. He often wields his ability to disconnect with the world in order to look at things from an outside perspective, finding it easier to sort through his thoughts if he’s not actively swimming in them. this being said, his disconnect does not help him perceive himself in any positive way. he’s very hard on himself & has a distorted perception of his own self image 

this is something that worsen’s during the events of the fifth blight. though his ability to disassociate likely saves him from spiraling on many, many occasions it also drives him to make rash & cruel decisions that don’t pay much mind to right or wrong. his dissociative states often lead to feelings of boredom or emptiness & on occasion, thoughts of ending his own life. depending on where he’s at in life, he has made attempts on his life that have thus far been ineffective. 

many of his decisions haunt him, feeding into his distorted sense of self. over the years he does learn how to regulate his emotions better with the helps of friends & surviving family, though he has a habit of tearing those close relationships apart from the inside out. this often happens because he perceives some kind of ill-will that just isn’t there & puts his defenses up.

distorted sense of self-worth & being 

self-destructive behavior, often having to do with his relationships 

extreme perceptions of how he or the ones he cares about are treated. 

lashes out because of imagined abandonment

inappropriate displays of anger

idealizations & attempts of suicide.

schizophrenia. ellis does not struggle with schizophrenia until after the events of the circle tower. walking in the fade as a non-mage scrambled his brains, often leaving him with delusions about what is & isn’t real. this is only fed by his extreme perceptions of what is & what isn’t. this also feeds into any perceptions he might have about how people feel about him, often fearing the worst. this is something he doesn’t acknowledge until after the events of the blight. though it affects him & how he functions throughout his quest to unite everyone under one cause, he very adamantly denies that anything is wrong for quite a long time rather than meet the condition face to face. 

schizophrenia directly affects his daily life as he often feels that there is someone right behind him, whispering something he can’t quite hear. he can see things dancing in the shadows, often thinking that they are demons just on the other side of the fade. he will often feel a knife in his back that is not there, only to turn around to find no opponent. regardless of this, he often believes that his delusions are still real... so he continues on with the weight of believing there is a demon at his back, waiting for him to falter. this is also directly effected by his bpd as his extreme perceptions of his relationships are often fed into by any delusions he has about people. he has difficulty communicating any long-term goals or ideas & often feels a complete sense of disconnect with them, more concerned with his perceived reality. 

by the events of inquisition, the condition progresses quite a bit. he’s still able to function but is known to be a very strange & haunted man. he often has difficulty communicating with his peers & making decisive decisions to help the inquisition, despite being an advisor. He has a lot of ideas & theories of what will & wont work, but has difficulty settling on any long-term goals that don’t directly affect him. This state of mind is only fed by the song of the calling & worsens with age.

as time passes & he hears stories about himself as the hero of ferelden, this altars his perception of past events & makes it extremely difficult for him to sort through them to remember what actually happened. the more he hears about himself, the less he feels he is himself & has had several psychotic breaks because of this. I’d like to think after the events of witch hunt he has one of these, as he chooses not to go with morrigan & spirals into a state that is completely disconnected with reality. the only thing that matters to him at that point is finding her & their son, though his perception of how to do that is terribly warped. 

he struggles with hallucinations & delusions, even moreso as time passes.

has difficulty taking in / processing new information & applying it in effective ways 

he is often paranoid when it comes to his relationships & the desires of those around him 

inability to make decisive plans regarding the future 

small events often have huge meaning in his perception of the world. ex: someone says something in passing & he’ll think about it for days after, wondering what they really meant 

the inability to keep the events of his life straight in his mind. 

there is a lot more i have to say on this subject specifically, but i’ll make a separate post detailing his experiences with schizophrenia / psychosis. 

ptsd. this is a given for many people who lived during the blight. he is often haunted by flashbacks & delusion of things that have already happened in his life, often feeding into any fear he may have of what is to come. though he is able to function with his other illnesses, ptsd causes them to come to an ugly head as he already has warped perceptions of what has happened & what is actively happening in his life. 

the first event to trigger his ptsd was, of course, the attack on highever castle. rendon howe’s betrayal is the event that triggered his involvement in the blight & of course the loss of his parents. he often has invasive thoughts of the sights & sounds of that night... though it was hardly the most brutal thing that ellis saw during the blight, it was the first & clearest thing he can remember. when he closes his eyes he often see’s his father holding in his own intestine’s & the look in his mother’s eye when she told him to run for his life. throughout the blight he fixates on these events & they drive him to prioritize revenge over defeating the blight. the other big events that play in his mind endlessly are nearly dying at ostagar, fighting the undead at redcliffe, tearing through abaominations in the circle tower, carving his way through the deeproads, literally everything that happened in the temple of sacred ashes, ect. I’ll likely make another post regarding the effects the blight had on his ptsd another day as i could talk endlessly about it. However, one of the extreme events was taking the circle tower back from the abominations. it’s perhaps one of the most haunting things he faces during the events of the blight & for the rest of his life he struggles with intense flashbacks of the creatures he faced there. He often imagines the scent of old blood, sulfur & rotting flesh even in the finest castles. 

of course, the battle with the archdemon is also a huge trigger of his. he doesn’t celebrate when he delivers the final blow, instead standing at the head of the beast & staring it in it’s lifeless eyes. This is something that causes him to become numb to the state of the world for several years following, which plays into him not following morrigan through the eluvian during the events of witch hunt. he doesn’t feel like it’s over, he still feels there’s work to be done & even if there isnt how can he let whats been done be undone? he feels like he’s still in the midst of the blight for half a decade following it’s end. he’s haunted with thoughts of the archdemon’s lifeless body, but he still feels like he can hear it singing to him.

he violently avoids anyone who wants to tell his tale or anyone who wants to hear about it. he doesn’t want to talk about it because he feels it’s still actively happening. he’s still on the run, hiding from loghain & darkspawn & bandits & anything in between. 

a feeling that the blight isn’t over lingers with him for five years after it’s end 

he often pushes people away that remind him of the event 

his usual disconnect is only aggravated by his ptsd 

he is unable to stop replaying traumatic events in his mind 

terrible nightmares, not only driven by the darkspawn 

more difficulty maintaining close relationships because of his inability to stay in the present 

he is easily scared of small events & often jumpy 

ocd. ellis has a strong idea of what should be & what shouldn’t. if that perception is not met it can often feed into his mood swings, causing him to have a negative drop until he can rectify this. this condition doesn’t really show up until after the events of the blight, triggered by his ptsd.

during the blight, ellis is stinky almost the whole time. there is little time to bathe or wash his clothes or practice any self care. after the archdemon is slayed it becomes an obsession of his to remain clean, often scrubbing his skin raw to be clean of dirt & blood & violence. This thought process doesn’t nescessarily apply to his surroundings as he has difficulty keeping everything in his life in order... but he, himself, must always remain clean or it’ll feed into invasive thoughts or obsessions from elsewhere. he has difficulty sorting through unwanted thoughts & expectations. it often gets in the way of daily life & thought processes. his ocd comes into play as it also drives him to have very invasive thoughts about harming himself or others in extreme displays of violence. 

invasive & violent thoughts having to do with the people around him 

obsessing with keeping himself clean of dirt, blood & anything else

making sure doors & windows are locked before he is able to relax to any degree 

shame surrounding his ocd

#ooc. #hc. #meta. #mental illness tw #suicidal thought tw #self harm tw #my brain is so wrinkly tonight #i cut some bits out ??? #bcs it was getting really long #but expect separate posts having to do with each of these in the future #there are also more factors but these are the biggest ones #i also didnt proofread this at all but i feel alive

[shattered-catalyst]

Intro to OCD for the RPC part 1/?

This is a balmy 6 page document on the VERY BASICS of OCD by a person who has had OCD for over 15 years and knows their shit.

If you want to write a character who has OCD this series is going to be a good starting point. If you dont know much about OCD I encourage you to read it so you can be an ally to those of us who have the disorder.

OCD is made into a cultural joke and when there isnt the ‘Obsessive Cat disorder’ bullshit its an angst off with other people and their non-ocd intrusive thoughts. Its different. Do your research and be an ally.

This will cover the very very basics. The next post will look into subtypes of OCD and how those are experienced.

 Whomst can write it? 

Literally anyone as long as you 

● Do so respectfully and not make a mockery of the disorder and the harm it causes in peoples lives 

● Dont make OCD the characters single thing or boil them down to it entirely ● Do respect the experiences and opinions of muns who have the disorder if they have concerns about your portrayal.

● Dont milk it for angst - unless you have OCD in which case release some of your angst.

● Dont try and say you know what intrusive thoughts are because they have *insert any other neuro a-typical thing here* 

● Dont police how Muns who have OCD choose to portray it. Its our experience not yours. I like to write out my characters OCD as I experience OCD so my experiences are different from other muns. OCD is very diverse in its effects but always ask if you arent sure.

. What isnt OCD? 

● Cleanliness or organization- OCD is NEVER an adjective. 

● Planning/ Hypervigilance/Organized/Methodical 

● Turning light switches on and off, unplugging things (find out more on later time)

 ● “I have to organize my pencils otherwise it bothers me” “ I have to make sure my mattress is straight” “ my nails have to be the same length” are all typical responses from people WHO DO NOT have OCD. 

● Making sure objects are lined up neatly 

● Having things go in a particular order like the letters CDO as the joke goes

● Really loving Cats, Corgis, or Christmas; if you own any of these items i urge you to reflect and also send me 10$ (jk but do reflect)

The Barest minimum 

Google OCD this will be an advanced version of OCD. This will be long but if you want to be aware of others or want to write the character you will read it. 

OCD is made of Obsessions. Triggers. Anxiety, Compulsions/Rituals.

1. Obsessions are the thoughts 

2. Triggers are the object/person/image/situation/smell ETC 

3. The Anxiety occurs is at uncomfortable levels to the point of panic or anxiety attacks

 4. Compulsions or Rituals are performed 

*There is a variant of OCD called Pure O. In this individuals have the obsessions triggers and anxiety but there is NO compulsion or ritual. This is still valid OCD. 

Obsessions are the precursors to the flawed unwanted and harmful intrusive thoughts: 

Im going to use you so you really understand this because its important.If you misunderstand this you are basically encouraging a mental health condition and dont get a sticker for reading this far. 

First check out this link as it has ALL the subtypes and examples. 

Obsessions can be hidden by the intrusive thought and teasing them out can be difficult to do if you have the disorder because well its a disorder okay thats why. It boils down to ‘i could harm someone’ ‘i could cause harm’ ‘ i may have accidentally harmed ___’ ‘ i may accidentally harm’ etc 

This is the flawed powerful belief that predate the Intrusive Thought. 

Intrusive thoughts appear in every brain on earth. They are not special or unusual however intrusive thoughts with OCD get stuck in the brain- meaning they stay there no matter what you do. So yes , they are different from intrusive thoughts in other conditions. 

The thing about OCD is that it latches on to what you hold dear; it may be you are a caring person and love children and animals- your OCD would give you intrusive violent or sexual thoughts or images. These are horrible to experience. They are not welcome nor appreciated and there is no benefit or positive side to having them. 

If say social justice is something you hold dear your ocd may take the form of intrusive thoughts of slurs, jokes, visuals etc. These are horrible to experience and lead to high levels of anxiety and are not positive nor beneficial to have in any way shape or form. 

Maybe you would not harm someone or you value others; your OCD may present as graphic intrusive images or thoughts around poisoning, stabbing,accidental..ly murdering (yeah you read that right), hitting, insulting etc someone else 

I must emphasize this because it is critical that people understand POCD: for the sake of those of us who have OCD read this until its burned into your brain. 

This is the fucked up awful Obsessive thought that you are/were/ or could be sexually attracted to children. This is NOT pedophilia. People kill themselves over this because they are afraid that these intrusive thoughts are true. People isolate themselves and dont have families out of fear of harming a child. People take work in different fields or avoid areas with children out of the absolute terror their obsessive thoughts could be true. This is NOT pedophilia. There is NO attraction present.

Most people who experience POCD intrusive thoughts would rather punch a sharknado than even THINK of hurting a kid in any way shape or form. That is why the OCD does its thing it is like having an abusive brain. 

Again for clarity's sake 

If you value social justice -> the intrusive thoughts violate social justice stuff 

If you value animals -> intrusive thoughts come up with harming animals 

If you care about the protection and safety of children -> POCD 

Triggers would be the situation, scenario, object, person,creature, context etc that is related to the Obsession. It can be literally anything. 

What follows is a hell of a lot of anxiety that can range anywhere from discomfort to full on panic attacks. 

Everyone has different intrusive thoughts and everyone experiences different amounts of distress upon being triggered. 

● As a side bar. Do not ever try and expose someone to their triggers or write about a character being exposed to their triggers as a way to help ‘cure them’ or ‘expose them’ to ANYTHING. What you are doing is literally taking someone with a mental illness and shoving them into a breakdown and thats a piece of shit move. Exposure therapy does exist and is done by professionals TRAINED in ERP. My parents did this a lot and I am positive I am not alone in that experience. 

Compulsions or Rituals: Now you may be saying ‘hey i know what those are’ yeah dude me too and I have had ocd for over 15 years and trained in mental health for 7 and guess what. They teach ya wrong. 

Compulsions or ‘rituals’ are any behavior done to alleviate the anxiety from the intrusive thought and trigger object. 

This can be as passive as ‘i am leaving the room’ ‘ i am checking my body sensations’ ‘ i am trying SO HARD TO HEAR MY HEARTBEAT’ .

 It can also be repeating the same thing over and over. To illustrate this I once mentally chanted the same song lyric line on a 3 hour plane ride because otherwise we were all going to die. I took one for the whole team.

It can be somatic things like counting your heart beats, focusing on your breathing, swallowing, staring and not blinking for so many seconds. 

It can be readjusting clothing until the seams fit. It can be checking god yes checking IK its a common trope but it IS a compulsion that has ruined my life and can be as passive as checking my reality or texting for proof my cat is still alive. It can also be checking yourself for assurance you wouldnt do the intrusive thought or that the intrusive thought isnt going to happen.

Compulsions are mentally painful and sometimes physically painful; 

● Washing your hands with scalding water for 5+ minutes can lead to horribly dry and cracking skin to down right BURNS.

● If you do the same movement you can mess up joints and ligaments. So if you pray constantly you may have knee issues from standing and kneeling.

● If your compulsion has you doing movement against an object ie say gripping and regripping something you get callouses. 

● If you compulsively exercise you may get trapped doing something above a healthy amount or say going from not working out to running a five minute mile and wiping out on a treadmill because your brain demanded it. Totally didnt do that... 

● If your compulsions make you rub against any object you can get friction burns and scars. 

To put this in perspective 15 years of compulsions have left my hands and finger joints a complete mess, damaged my arm tendons, friction scars on my arms that only now faded, and scars on my legs from doing too much of an activity. 

Its not lmao I gotta fix these pencils its real agony and real torture. 

In short compulsions and rituals are not fun they are absolutely not logical, and we know they are not logical but we are forced to do them. Thats why its a disorder. 

OCD disrupts relationships with social components such as ; 

Obsessively checking in with partner/friend if things are ‘okay’ (this feels horrible to do too fyi like you KNOW things are fine but you cant NOT because the anxiety is SO BAD), 

Relationship OCD is a WHOLE category itself! this ties into sexuality OCD where your obsessive thoughts prey on your sexuality (regardless of your orientation), your relationship, cheating or being disloyal etc.

OCD causes significant withdrawal from others, fears of being a monster, intense guilt over intrusive thoughts, disgust with yourself over the intrusive thoughts sometimes leading to self punishment. 

OCD leads to strange behavior which more often than not leads to bullying and ostracization. To exemplify this I have an intrusive thought that I have stolen something when I am inside stores, my check-check-check-check-check-recheck! of my pockets gets me store security called so often its criminal.

OCD limits activities that may expose them to triggers or influenced by intrusive thoughts ie: not being able to take the train to work or only getting off at bus stops with even numbers.

OCD impacts where they spend time, who they associate with, what jobs they take or even if they have a family or not

OCD leads to overwhelming feelings of guilt, shame, and fear over having intrusive thoughts or images that they experience which causes them to socially isolate or have difficulty in social situations. 

OCD leads to Hyperfixation: like a lot of other things but thankfully it is just hyperfixation and not different from other diagnoses. 

OCD leads to rigidity or structured routines: I have listened to the same CD in my car for 5 years now. Every single day. 5 Years.And Im not okay with that. 

OCD impacts standards we hold ourselves to and others: its like regular perfectionism but like add on 5 extra layers of anxiety! 

OCD according to NIMH statistics 

1.2% Occurrence among US adults 

2.3% Lifetime Prevalence among US adults 

34.8% Of Adults who have OCD suffer moderate impairment to daily functioning 50.6% of Adults who have OCD suffer serious impairment to daily functioning

OCD has strong co-morbidity with the following:

Tourettes Syndrome- is a genetic friend of OCD and if you have tourettes or OCD your chances of having someone else in the family is high

ADHD

Autism 

GAD

Eating Disorders

Depression - this is a big one along with low self esteem because of the intrusive thoughts

Writers like to make jokes about characters “being OCD” well now they have clinical OCD and you should consider fleshing out your character with this information just as you would any other disorder.

Batman (DC)

Riddler (?)(DC)

Domino (Marvel)

 Cyclops (Marvel)

#this took a lot of emotional energy and i am now terrified

[nerdygaymormon]

A Letter to Elder Hamilton

Elder Hamilton,

Greetings!

I’m the stake executive secretary in the Brandon Florida Stake. We met this past Sunday when you & Elder Carter interviewed me as part of the process of finding the next stake president.

When he was leaving, Elder Carter said to me, “You really impressed us. We talked about you quite a bit.”

My response to him was, “Thank you for telling me that. You guys were tough on me.”

He looked surprised, and commented, “We ministered to you.”

I’ve been thinking about how differently we viewed the same interaction. I decided to write a letter to share my perspective and a bit more about my journey.

From my perspective, it felt like I experienced 2 different interviews done back-to-back. The first half was rough. You were asking very probing questions, one after another. I realize we were in a time constraint and weren’t having a proper conversation. I can see how the same questions could be intended as trying to get to know me and my background better. I’m not trying to say you did anything wrong, but I think our perceptions of the interaction were different.

You are someone in a position of authority. Upon learning I’m gay, you asked if I always adhere to the Law of Chastity, was I ever inactive, do I have a recommend, and am I worthy. I thought perhaps you were trying to determine if I should be released.

When I spoke briefly about why the temple can be a hard place for me, there was a shift in your body language, your face became softer, you replied that you could understand that. It’s that moment that I felt like you saw me as a person and felt my humanity.

The second half of the interview had a different tone. You asked how I felt about my calling, how do I help other LGBT members, what I’ve learned from my stake president. For me, those were questions that sounded like you wanted to know me rather than focusing on am I following the rules.

 At the end you thanked me for sharing that I struggle and do my best and carry on, that you can tell I’m impacting people, thanked me for being visible, said you wish we were meeting in person so you could give me a hug, that’s when it felt like ministering because I could feel your love and that you cared.  

As I think about it, I’m certain this difference in perception is because the interview was such where you asked questions but didn’t respond to the answers I gave. That didn’t give me any context for why you were choosing to ask the next question and the next one.

I am very honest with my stake president, he can ask me anything and I’ll help him understand, and I’ll also share what I struggle with. Part of what makes that work is I know he loves me and trusts me and cares for me and will help me. I hope the same is true of you and Elder Carter, but we didn’t have a chance to build that rapport. You asked questions, I answered. 

I’m glad the things I said were heard, that you felt something for me. At the end, I felt love come from you and that was important for me. And I do thank you for those very kind sentiments, I wrote them down, they are meaningful to me. 

I want to share with you, an important moment in my journey. In 2015 gay marriage was made legal across the USA. In November, the Church implemented a new policy about gay couples and their children. That hurt. It felt like the Church was so wary of people like me that even innocent children associated with us were poison and had to be cut off. I let God know how hurt & upset I was about this.

I heard a voice say that if I want to leave the Church, that’s fine, but if I’m willing to stay, there is a special work for me to do.  

 If I stayed, I would: * Help young gay Mormons accept themselves * speak to leaders and help them understand better * speak to youth of my stake about being gay * share my story as a gay Mormon

I knew staying came with a cost, but if I could be part of these things then I would pay that price.

I didn’t understand then how these things would happen, but I felt strongly this is what the Lord wanted me to do and I showed faith by staying.

Almost immediately my calling changed, the stake president said the Spirit was insistent that I have this new calling so that my unique viewpoint could be heard.

In time I came to see that by doing the work of my new calling, stake executive secretary, it opened up the ability to do the work that I’d agreed to do with the Lord.

Looking back at my notes from 2015, it’s amazing how specific the things were that the Lord said would happen and how all of them have occurred on a scale much larger than I imagined. I haven’t been trying to force these things to happen, instead I’m where the Lord wants me and His work follows.

For example, I don’t go out of my way to meet and talk with Seventy and Apostles. When they come to my stake, they find me here doing my calling. I don’t always bring up that I’m gay, it’s not always relevant to what’s being discussed, but when I’m prompted to share, the reactions are interesting. 

Sometimes I can sense their unease and it takes time to break that down and have them see me for me. Other times there’s an immediate outpouring of love and caring. Sometimes I get invited to visit them when I next go to Utah and then we have more in-depth conversations and I’ve even developed friendships with a few of them.

While many wonderful things have happened over the past 5 years, it’s been a difficult road. I had a mental health crisis. I was suicidal and needed professional help. I stayed in therapy for a year working on a number of things such as low self-esteem, internalized homophobia, social anxiety disorder, and these all had root in my experience as a closeted gay man in the Church.

I have my struggles, and have my strengths. I try to do good. I’ve had hard times, I’ve been blessed. I spent a lot of time in the closet and it feels much better to be out and honestly answering questions, even if they feel probing or reflexive.

I get asked many inappropriate questions. I hear little comments made about me. I know some people have pulled the stake president aside to ask if he knew his secretary was gay. It’s easy to question the motivation of people asking questions, especially if they haven’t indicated they’re a friend or ally.

I want to believe you were genuinely curious and this is why you asked the questions you did. I hope you understand why I didn’t recognize that until half-way through the process.

I did feel genuine warmth and love from you at the end of our interview. I’m glad that Elder Carter said something to help me understand that my answers to the questions were heard and appreciated. I wanted to be understood but thought I was being judged, that is until you responded to my answer about why the temple can be a hard place for me.

I’ll pray for you in your ministry, and hope you’ll pray for me.

Your friend,

David

#Kevin S. Hamilton #tumblrstake #queerstake

[johannas-motivational-insults]

Adora might be autistic too

Alright, most people in the SPOP fandom agree that Entrapta is autistic, as her coding is extremely obvious. However, some of us also believe that our beloved protagonist Adora is on the spectrum as well. She comes off as quite the aspie, and while Asperger’s is no longer a diagnosis in the DSM-V (but is in other manuals), it falls under the blanket diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and its diagnostic criteria is still useful in analyzing people for signs of the disorder. In analyzing Adora’s character I will refer somewhat to both disorders, with the understanding that Asperger’s is a specific manifestation of ASD.

I would like to preface this by saying this is a headcanon and people are free to disagree with me. Some of these characteristics I’m going to bring up could also manifest because of her very sheltered upbringing in a cult-like atmosphere or mental illnesses such as anxiety and complex PTSD (both of which she arguably has). I am autistic myself, so obviously I am inclined to interpret these symptoms this way, but to each their own. It’s also worth noting that Adora has a lot of symptoms that cross over with AD(H)D, a cousin disorder to ASD, and it’s totally possible she has both.

In any case, there is now enough evidence hinting at Adora’s neurodivergence (especially now that the Rebel Princess Guide has been released) that I feel the need to explain this theory in detail instead of just occasionally mentioning it. So here goes...

She’s naive/easily manipulated

This one doesn’t really need explaining, we’ve all seen it. Adora assumes people are telling the truth because why would anyone lie to her? That is such a relatable spectrum feel. She was handily brainwashed by Shadow Weaver in the Horde, while some of the others didn’t seem to swallow the propaganda so easily. This is of course partly because of the special attention and affection Adora got from Shadow Weaver, but she had to be vulnerable to manipulation in the first place for it to work.

Later, she trusts Huntara easily in the Crimson Waste despite Bow and Glimmer’s warnings about her questionable character. Adora happily follows her into a trap even once Bow and Glimmer tell her they're going the wrong way, reasoning it’s probably a shortcut rather than reevaluating her misplaced trust. This can be partly explained by how she‘s gay af for Huntara, but still.

(Interestingly, the episode cuts straight from this moment to the obviously autistic Entrapta going against her own friend's advice and refusing to give up on the portal machine despite the obvious warning sign of Hordak’s violent dismissal. Parallels, much?)

Her difficulty understanding other points of view

A lot of Adora’s conflict with Catra is predicated on misunderstandings, and she has a hard time understanding the effects her actions have on other people, Catra in particular. For instance, she misunderstands Catra talking about ruling the Horde together as being purely about power, while Catra’s actual goals are safety and Adora’s companionship. That miscommunication is not just Adora’s fault, but it illustrates that she has difficulty understanding other people’s needs and motives without being explicitly told.

This isn’t just a problem with Catra, either. In general Adora has a difficult time understanding other’s motives and feelings. For instance, she doesn’t understand Glimmer’s insecurity over Bow’s friendship with Perfuma at Princess Prom, and she can’t fathom why Entrapta would choose to work for an evil faction, going so far as to assume she must have been brainwashed into it. This is because, just like with Catra, she doesn’t understand that some people’s priorities are not the same as hers.

Autistic kids tend to reach developmental milestones at different times than neurotypicals, sometimes being way ahead and other times falling behind. One such marker that is usually slower to develop and often stays impaired is theory of mind, our ability to a) understand that other people have different perspectives and b) understand those perspectives. Adora’s difficulties being able to put herself in someone else’s shoes definitely lines up with this symptom.

She’s clumsy

For someone so athletic, Adora sure lacks coordination. This is a commonly cited symptom of people with Asperger’s, though it shows up in people with other forms of ASD too. In general, autistic people often have difficulty with fine and/or gross motor skills, and this can lead to being accident and injury prone. According to Catra in 3x05, Adora bumps her head a lot. That may have just been a callback to 1x01, but either way clumsiness has been part of her characterization since the beginning, one of her many loveable, adorkable qualities.

Her lack of social and self awareness

Adora can be painfully oblivious to her own inappropriate behavior. There’s several examples of this throughout the series, one of the more costly ones coming at Princess Prom. Shocked by Frosta’s youth, Adora fails to register how maybe this (in front of Frosta, with all eyes on her) is not the time to remark on it. She immediately realizes this was the wrong thing to say (or at least not something she should shout), but that small delay causes both her and Glimmer a lot of embarrassment.

Part of the issue here is that she loses control of her volume, which in itself is a common problem for those of us on the spectrum. This isn’t the only time we see her have this problem, either, and it’s amplified (tee hee) when she’s drunk/infected.

More generally, one of the funniest examples of Adora’s poor social awareness comes when she barges into Huntara’s flirtation with the bartender in the Crimson Waste. She’s so focused on her task of recruiting Huntara that it doesn’t even occur to her that this is an intimate moment and intruding would be rude.

In the Rebel Princess Guide Adora also says she wishes Queen Angella would let her make some adjustments to the uniforms of the Bright Moon guards, which implies she tried to make these suggestions already. Maybe she figured She-Ra could suggest anything, but as both a newcomer and a royal subject that’s a bit of a faux pas. Chances are, that went right over Adora’s head.

She can’t read a room to save her life (literally)

This is another, more specific aspect of social awareness. Adora has difficulty picking up on the implicit rules (social norms) when she enters unfamiliar situations, and has a tendency to step on toes because of it. She also doesn’t understand when her friends try to nonverbally communicate what she’s doing wrong, and nonverbal communication deficits and problems with social awareness and insight are two major symptoms of ASD. One specifically listed example is “difficulties adjusting behavior to suit social contexts”, including:

Lack of response to contextual cues (e.g. social cues from others indicating a change in behavior is implicitly requested)

Unaware of social conventions/appropriate social behavior; asks socially inappropriate questions or makes socially inappropriate statements

Here’s a couple specific example of times where Adora misses or misunderstands nonverbal cues to change her behavior:

At her first Rebellion meeting she doesn’t realize that maybe she shouldn’t sit in the special-looking chair, and doesn’t clue in that that’s why everyone is freaking out.

In the Crimson Waste, Glimmer responds to the growling bar patrons surrounding them by suggesting that maybe these aren’t the kind of people they should be asking for help, but Adora persists. She jumps up on the bar and makes a speech trying to get directions (which is socially inappropriate for the context as well as dangerous), somehow missing all the scowls from the patrons as well as Bow and Glimmer’s wild gesturing.

Panic over unfamiliar social situations

Adora’s anxiety about going to Princess Prom could be attributed to many things, not just a spectrum disorder. Her obvious anxiety, for one, though to be fair there’s a high comorbidity between the two disorders. In any case, it seems the unfamiliarity of the situation is a sticking point for Adora in particular, while Bow and Glimmer are nothing but excited for their first ball.

Adora’s anxiety seems to stem mostly from being overwhelmed by the prospect of entering a new social situation with a whole bunch of unfamiliar rules to remember. She’s still learning behavioral norms outside of the Horde, and this is a huge jump up in terms of difficulty for her fledgling social skills.

To cope with her stress she goes overboard trying to prepare by making a conspiracy board of sorts, flash cards, and an obstacle course. And at the ball itself, it seems like she’s even rehearsed how to behave.

This probably isn’t only relatable to autistics, but it’s very relatable to us. Creating and rehearsing behavioral scripts is a common strategy to avoid embarrassing ourselves in public. Unfortunately, as we saw above, this works for about five seconds before Adora botches the whole thing by commenting on Frosta’s age.

Extreme stress over details

In general, Adora is a very anxious, perfectionistic person who hyperfixates on details, a very autistic trait. As mentioned above, this is wonderfully illustrated by her overpreparation for Princess Prom. She’s broken down the overwhelming list of rules in the invite into categories to make it more manageable, gone into detail categorizing people’s relationships to each other, and learned trivia about the guests in order to feel more prepared. Yet, somehow she missed the important fact that the hostess is only eleven years old.

Unfortunately this hangup doen’t only affect her, but also her friends and allies. The overarching theme in “Roll With It” is how debilitating Adora’s anxiety and perfectionism can be. Her eye for detail and ability to see flaws in plans is actually very valuable, but she gets so hung up on every possible thing that could go wrong that she can’t accept imperfect solutions with calculated risks.

Her propensity to be overwhelmed by too much information (like with the Princess Prom invite) shows up here too. Adora grows more and more frustrated and overwhelmed as more princesses join the planning session, adding more variables to deal with and more people to manage. She begins lashing out and shooting down every possible solution that doesn’t satisfy her need for perfection immediately. Her behavior looks like it may be headed for a meltdown until it culminates in an epic rant revealing all her anxiety and how it ties into her insecurities about her own imperfection.

Thankfully her friends are able to reassure her that she has support and doesn’t have to be perfect, but it’s an ongoing battle, one we already saw her struggle with in “Flowers for She-Ra” and “The Battle of Bright Moon”. It’s a strong tenet of Adora’s personality that is proving difficult to shake.

What she misses about the Horde

The recently published Rebel Princess Guide contains a list by Adora of things she misses about the Horde, and this list screams neurodivergent. I’ll go through it point by point, since there’s a lot to unpack here.

THINGS I MISS ABOUT THE HORDE

1. I miss the rigid schedule. It never changed, and I always knew what to expect.

Ritualistic behavior and an insistence on sameness are often seen in individuals with ASD. In fact, it’s a major symptom. Many of us have diifficulty adjusting to changing schedules, changes in diet, or even minor changes in our environment (such as placement of objects, boy do I have stories there). We need warning when things are going to change, and even if we know it’s coming it’s still a struggle to adjust.

2. I miss the constant sound of machines and whirring. In Bright Moon, there’s always music playing, or people laughing, and birds singing. It’s nice but it makes it hard to focus!

Autistic brains process sensory information differently from neurotypicals, that’s basically our disorder at its core. Over or under reactions to sensory input are common and in fact considered a major symptom, and this entry of Adora’s specifically refers to difficulties with sensory filtering. We have a hard time filtering out information that’s irrelevant to our current task, which makes us easily distractable.

3. Believe it or not, I miss my hard cot in the barracks. My bed in the castle is way too soft!

This ties into both the insistence on sameness and sensory issues.

4. Catra… sometimes.

This isn’t autistic, it’s just gay.

Speaking of which...

She’s gay

Adora's relationship with Catra has always been queer-coded, but any doubts about her sexuality were dispelled in season 3 by the way she fawns over Huntara like a baby gay over her gym teacher. Her obvious queerness might seem unrelated to the topic of autism, but those of us within the community can attest there’s probably just as many queer people among us as there are cishets. It’s so notable that there has been quite a bit of scientific research confirming people with ASD are more likely to be LGBT and gender atypical and exploring the cause of this link.

(This needs no proving at this point, but enjoy these gifs anyway...)

In conclusion

Overall, there’s a lot of hints and circumstantial evidence suggesting Adora could have ASD. Was this the creators’ intent? Hard to say. Adora is the protagonist and one of the most developed characters, so she’s definitely not a cardboard cutout or checklist for ASD symptoms (compare that to Entrapta, a secondary character whose behaviors can often easily be attributed to autism). It’s totally possible the creators just characterized her as naive and awkward and obsessive without realizing the implications of that cluster of traits together.

Regardless of authorial intent, it’s perfectly valid to look at Adora and see representation of the ASD community. The groundwork is there. And if someone else looks and doesn’t see it, or sees something else causing this behavior, that is also fair. No one is forcing anyone to accept this headcanon (or at least they shouldn’t be), but in return please don’t disparage it. Even if she is not autistic Adora is definitely autistic-coded, and we could use some more heros with the disorder, given how we’re mostly relegated to being villains and anti-heroes (not that there’s anything wrong with us filling those roles sometimes, but a little variety would be nice).

Adora is often referred to as a dumbass, but she’s actually quite intelligent, just sometimes slow to understand how she should act and how people feel. Still, she tries her hardest, just as she does with everything else. Adora is heroic and compassionate, even if she sometimes struggles to understand others. When autistic-coded characters are so commonly portrayed as cold and unforgiving, Adora is a sorely needed exception.

#spop #she-ra #she ra #meta #autistic adora #adora #autism #asd #asperger's #actuallyautistic

[bloody-wonder]

I kinda have a take and just wanna clarify its not @ u. (This is Part 1) So lots of ppl rlly like Aaron and that's fine ofc I cant tell anyone who to like and who not to but ppl that do tend to try and say that hes not actually homophobic in canon which is simply not true. Or they try to justify it somehow. Aarons homophobia honestly ruined any chance I had of liking him (same with seth) and ppl sometimes say that if u dont like Aaron for that then u cant like Neil or Wymack cuz they're ableist

(Part 2) and have they used ableist language? Yes. But is there actual evidence to suggest they hold prejudices against disabled/neurodivergent ppl? I dont think so. Neil only uses this language once and its clearly to rile Kevin up, theres so much evidence that he admires Kevin and I dont see Neil looking down on him for his disability at all. Wymack-he uses ableist slurs more but he still signs neurodivergent players and I cant say I genuinely believe he thinks any less of them for it.

that’s an interesting ask!

first of all, ofc no one can tell you which character to like and which to dislike. everyone chooses their faves for personal reasons and no one owes anybody explanation for why they like or dislike them. however if you want to explain why you dislike aaron as opposed to neil you’ll have to come up with different arguments bcs so far it looks like you have double standards. 

it’s true that aaron is homophobic. you say there’s no justifying it or explaining it away and i agree but aren’t you at the same time trying to justify neil’s and wymack’s use of ableist language, to discard it as unimportant and not worthy of calling out or being a reason for disliking someone?

has aaron used homophobic slurs? yes once, if you count “flamer”. how many times have neil and wymack and other characters called andrew crazy, psycho or retarded? i don’t know exactly but more than once. now you say that it doesn’t count bcs they don’t seem to hold any prejudice against disabled people. well by that logic any straight ally can use the f-word freely bcs it’s just a word after all. but it’s not just a word, it’s a slur and if you call somebody like that it won’t be a good look no matter how many lgbt people you know and how many fictional gays you ship. and the only difference between homophobic and ableist slurs is that the former ones at this point are taboo in a civilized conversation bcs we’ve learned to interpret them as signs of bigotry whereas the latter ones still aren’t even registered as slurs by most people.

when neil called kevin a cripple - what does it matter if he generally has no prejudice against disabled people? he specifically used an ableist slur with an intention to hurt. let’s imagine that kevin’s gay - would neil use an f-word in the very same situation to hurt him? probably not. but it speaks not so much of neil’s character as about how normalized ableist slurs are. for if neil has ever used an f-word it would be much harder for him to become a fan favorite, however words like “cripple” and “psychotic” directed at a disabled person and a person who probably struggles with mental disorders we just let slide. did he want to hurt them? he did. does he generally have any prejudice against disabled people? well idk the only ones he interacted with in canon are kevin and andrew and he totally used slurs against them with ill intention.

does aaron really have prejudice against gay people? it seems he does but if we continue this thought experiment then the only gays he interacted with in canon would be nicky, andrew and neil. when he called neil a flamer - this is the very same situation as neil vs kevin. aaron wanted to hurt and used the slur he thought would accomplish it. aaron never called nicky anything like that and all the rudes comments he made against him that are usually interpreted as homophobic are partly call outs for being inappropriate and partly expressions of discomfort at his relative graphically describing his sexual desires. 

if neil calling kevin and andrew, who he at that point perceived as dangerous, ableist slurs isn’t a sufficient indication of his prejudice than why is aaron calling neil, who he perceived as dangerous, a homophobic slur a sufficient indication of his?

i believe that disliking aaron has more to do with how the story is told from neil’s perspective - not only bcs they hate each other but also bcs aaron gets very little screen time. all that he is and does behind the scenes is surmised by the reader and so he either becomes a homophobic jerk who uses slurs in his head frequently (just like neil uses ableist language) or he becomes an angry misunderstood boy who’s constantly made uncomfortable by his cousin. there’s room for interpretation and only you decide which way it goes.

all aftg characters have done problematic things which range from making fun of each other’s grief and trauma to harassment to armed assault. if we put homophobia and ableism into this perspective the would be roughly on the same level of “badness“ in my opinion. the differences between them would lie not in which character holds more prejudice or uses more slurs objectively but in what type of bigotry you subjectively think is more unforgivable and likely to ruin a character for you. you will never like aaron bcs he’s homophobic, those other people will dislike neil bcs of ableist language and i will forever be angry at nicky and his rapey comments and actions. we all have double standards and we don’t like these characters for their “goodness“ and lack of problematic character traits bcs they all have some. we like them bcs something in their personalities speaks to us and in that we either acknowledge their flaws or ignore them. 

i personally think acknowledging is a better way.

tl;dr you certainly aren’t obliged to like aaron just bcs you like neil but explaining neil’s ableism away isn’t an efficient way to rationalize it. maybe there’s no way to rationalize it at all so you just say yes i dislike aaron bcs he’s homophobic and i just can’t ignore or forgive that and at the same time i like neil although he’s ableist without ignoring or justifying it. basically just acknowledge that your fave’s problematic and move on🤷

#aaron minyard #neil josten #kevin day #the foxhole court #all for the game #aftg mine #aftg ask #and life will become so much easier i promise #i dispensed with seth and wymack #there's much less stuff to talk about in their cases #and also idc for seth #he's more of a plot device than a character anyway #i've been writing this for like two hours #idk if it makes any sense #basically all the foxes are problematic but we still love them #and homophobia isn't inherently a more unforgivable thing #than any of the other bad things the foxes did #i'll stop rambling right about now

[blakelywintersfield]

I’m gonna rant for a moment, because I think there’s something that needs to be said on this subject.

One thing that tumblr (and other social media sites) and gotten better at is replacing self-deprecation and hopeless cynicism with self-care and self-help guides. And I’m really happy to see that; the last thing people with disabilities or neurodivergency need is to feel worse about the conditions they have, and finding ways to make their lives easier and better is fantastic. But in this, I think a lot of people have forgotten one very critical thing: Your disabilities and neurodivergency will never be “fixed” or “cured”. No therapy, medication, self-help, self-care, and adaptation in the world will ever fix your disability or neurodivergency. It will never go away.

I see this extremely harmful thought process in a lot of people who are fighting to make their lives better or easier -- in particular those with disabilities, both physical, emotional, and mental, but I’ve also seen it with people with neurodivergency, in particular people with ADHD and OCD. I won’t comment on those with autism very much because (1) I am not autistic and don’t want to speak on something I don’t experience, and (2) there has, thankfully, been a lot of progression on self-advocacy and self-acceptance for autistic folks. Obviously that doesn’t mean they don’t face ableism (they do, and a lot of it is aggressive and abusive af), but I’m mainly leaning on the first reason for this. As an allistic person I don’t want to speak over people with autism, especially since this is going to come from my own perspective.

Your disabilities are never going to go away. They will forever be with you. They won’t just become unnoticeable or disappear one day. Even with the perfect medication, therapy, and coping skills, you will always have that disability. If you have schizophrenia, you will always risk having a day where you fall into psychosis. If you have depression, there will always be a possibility you’ll fall into a depressive bout. If you have anxiety, there will be days that everything will be too overwhelming. If you have bipolar, you still have times of emotional instability. If you have arthritis, there will still be days you’ll feel tired and fatigued. If you have ADHD, there will still be times you won’t be able to focus on the world around you. No disorder will go symptom free if you have it forever. The frequency and severity may be controlled, but it will never be gone.

This is extremely important to understand and accept. It’s not a pessimistic view. It’s a realistic one. And it’s okay! That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive to get help, because even with the points where the medicine and therapy doesn’t work 100%, it still makes life easier and better. I could be bedridden and unable to feel my limbs thanks to RA, but my medication helps (not very much at this point as the fatigue is extreme and I’ve been losing feeling in my hands again, but that’s beside the point). I could be at the point I was 10 years ago and actively wishing not to wake up the next morning, but my antidepressants help. I might not be happy and awake all day, but I’m still in a better place than I was 10 years ago, or 5 years, or even 6 months ago. Medications and therapy are fucking amazing and help a lot. But they will not “cure” any of this.

It’s called chronic or life-long for a reason. And both people with these conditions and people without need to understand this, to be a better ally to those with disabilities and neurodivergency. If your friend with a physical disability has a period where they can’t move as easily, or have more pain, or are more fatigued, it’s not that they “aren’t trying” -- some times a disorder breaks through the treatment. The same goes for someone with an emotional disorder; if they seem more down than usual, it’s not that they aren’t trying to be better, sometimes those symptoms still come through. And your reaction to these breakthrough symptoms matter.

The best thing you can do for someone having breakthrough symptoms is to be supportive. Talk to them. Ask them if they’ve noticed their symptoms breaking through, and if they have, give them the opportunity to talk about their struggles. Sometimes just talking about it can really help. Offer suggestions to help if they ask for it. Be there for them. No one is purposely trying to make their lives harder; no one wants their life to be harder.

The worst thing you can do is tell them they’re not trying hard enough. It doesn’t matter how well you know someone, you never know what they’re going through down to the last detail. Especially since these conditions can be exhausting, you don’t know every single detail because they don’t always remember every single detail. The neurotypical “tough love” treatment does nothing and doesn’t actually show someone you love them; it shows them that you think their condition is a burden to you. It’s selfish, self-serving, and more abusive than not. It is not your place to determine if someone has been trying their hardest or not, regardless of your status in their life.

Both abled and disabled people need to accept that the mass majority of disability is lifelong and will never fully go away. Disabled folks will always have their disabilities present. There will never be a day a disabled person wakes up and never has to deal with their disability again. This needs to be normalized and accepted. It’s okay to have bad days, weeks, months, even years. It’s okay to struggle. It’s okay if your medications stop working for a bit. If you’re trying, that’s enough. And everyone needs to understand and actively defend this. Chronic and lifelong disabilities will stay there for life (DUH) and disabled people deserve to be treated kindly regardless of how their illness is in the moment.

#long post #mental illness #disability #chronic illness #mental health

[natrashafierce]

The author of that terrible Your Fave is Problematic Tumblr has grown up and written a great piece for The New York Times expressing regret about picking people apart and talking about how (surprise, surprise) it was really just that she was young and poorly adjusted and had gone through some stuff.

I hope more people can be honest with themselves that most of us are susceptible to weird, spurious extremist stuff online if we’re in a bad enough mood, and you can always just, like, stop and change course and be someone who tries to spread forgiveness and humility instead of accruing points for tiresome, punitive, identity-obsessed nitpicking. I completely forgive the author of the blog and applaud her for this extra step that will surely expose her to the same sort of poorly adjusted person she used to be.

I also hope more people come to understand that they shouldn’t signal boost people articulating extremist things, because all it does it create a contagion of poor mental health and social behaviors that are counterproductive to achieving anything positive. It’s normal for people to get angry, and everyone has every right to rant in their own online space, and you don’t have to invalidate anyone’s moment of anger. But you can comfort them without reblogging or retweeting them. You don’t have to enable their descent into binary thinking by rewarding them with a ton of attention and influence.

It may be “tone policing” to try to tell any one individual how to express themselves, but it is not “tone policing” to suggest that society should not take our cues and policy ideas from people who are hysterical. Almost no one is good at formulating solutions to social problems, and angry people least of all. Every marginalized group has at least SOME people who are capable of remaining fair, nuanced, and rational despite what they’ve gone through, and those are the people to signal boost if you take societal problems seriously. They tend to have a much more complete perspective on an issue than someone who has barely read or experienced anything outside themselves except for the dozens of aggro internet posts that end up in their bubble.

Chronically angry people see everything through the lens of their anger and their ego, do not seek perspectives or explanations that would defuse them, and their ideas for solutions will tend to be unfair and dehumanzing. Now the internet pays people for that, and people psychologically stagnate because their newfound career depends on it and their reputation seems locked in by the long memory of the internet. Grounded people have learned to control their egos, seek genuine understanding of those who disagree with them, and are capable of finding uplifting solutions, but those people are getting drowned out and harassed offline nowadays.

It used to be that people would have their big moments of anger and, lacking any audience except for a few people they knew, had to learn to introspect, calm themselves down, and approach problems effectively. They would often get gently challenged by the people around them and pulled back into a healthy mindset. They would confront interpersonal problems privately instead of trying to tear people down publicly, and extremism only arose in bad social circles or with especially recalcitrant people. But now that everyone gets their basest impulses rewarded by strangers as poorly adjusted as they are, there is little incentive for introspection or growth. This got worse for a lot of us during the Trump years, I think, because the shock of his incivility made it seem like civility had been a losing tactic. I know I felt like that for a few years until I realized how easily I could be manipulated into believing the worst about someone if it played to my biases. Unfettered mass venting just contributed to a bad cycle.

One of the worst things is how the crazed brigades accrue well-intentioned allies who enforce their insane, unpopular ideas and, together, tank public support for what were once important political objectives. SO MANY people were into the Your Fave is Problematic blog and would troll tags for the celebrities mentioned just to harass and intimidate people who were fans, and they were all indoctrinated into a disordered, shallow worldview were they derived their worth from tearing people down instead of cultivating their own talents. Your Fave is Problematic was by no means the first or only vector for leftist identitarian brain worms, but it was an influential one. There’s a whole lot of obnoxious Tumblr stuff that leaks out into the larger world now.

Back then I thought people would grow out of it, but either a ton of them didn’t, or else those who did just got replaced by new people. I thought right-wingers were catastrophizing and exaggerating when they fixated on it because a lot of the time they were, and too many of them couldn’t criticize it without being dehumanizing themselves. But sure enough, it got worse. I realize now that regardless of ideology, extremism always gets worse if there are incentives for it to grow, and the internet supplies those incentives in spades. This stuff didn’t stay on Tumblr; it didn’t stay on some stray college campuses. They said it wouldn’t, and they were right.

And now it has infected more mainstream, influential spheres of life with infantilizing and dehumanizing ideas that train people to perceive everyone as an aggressor or a pinata they can beat up for clout. It’s increasingly ruined more innocent lives, all while people who are ideologically captured keep insisting it’s no big deal because that’s the line in their social circle. The goalposts move every week to provide more targets, and even left-leaning media has quit thoroughly investigating a lot of things in its rush to cash in on whatever social media controvery has been ginned up by unwell people. The corrections, when they come out, are almost never widely circulated.

It’s been surreal and disheartening to watch. People I used to consider reasonable and compassionate just gradually morphed into aggrieved, insecure pod people who can’t handle the slightest challenges of evidence against their worldview. They can’t accept that their insecurities and peeves are frivolous distractions that actually do materially harm efforts to fix serious problems, whether by beclowning entire political parties or candidates, or diverting resources to organizations that aren’t changing anything significant or are making things worse. They all even say the same tired phrases. It’s such a shitshow, but public opinion polling on this stuff has remained mostly sane. A lot of people are snapping out of it like the author of YFIP, so I can only hope that more people feel comfortable to finally push back against it.

[srandhawa21ahsgov]

Political Party Action

1. Criminal Law Reform and the positions/opinions of each Party:

Republican - On the Republican side, Criminal Law Reform is given, but only to a certain people depending on their crime. They look at the bigger picture and state that “every human life matters”. Republicans expect that “the essential role of federal law enforcement personnel in protecting federal property and combating interstate crime should not be compromised by diversion to matters properly handled by states and local authorities”. Also, they see both sides of the story. They mourn for citizens that are treated unfairly due to inequality and they also mourn for officers that have sacrificed their lives to protect out country. Through a Republicans perspective, reform occurs for non-violent offenders only. For example, non-violent people that have committed crimes have options including “community sentencing, accountability courts, drug courts, veterans treatment courts, and guidance by faith based institutions with the proven track records of rehabilitation, our platform emphasized restorative justice to make the victim whole and put the offender on the right path”. Republicans encourage states to capture people and hold them in mandatory prison for people that assault or cause serious injury to law enforcement. They also encourage that people who are locked up have the right to educational resources. Juvenile justice is put first ahead of adult justice in order to break the cycle of crime within a teen. The Republicans have a theory that “tyranny and injustice thrive when America is weakened. The oppressed have no greater ally than a confident and determined United States, backed by the strongest military on the planet”. I would agree with the Republicans Criminal Reform views because I think it is important to keep our country safe from violent offenders that intentionally harm our country but if the offender is non-violent then there are other ways that we can fix a person to make better decisions and get them on a good path to success. Prison time is not going to be beneficial for someone that is hooked on drugs. Proper care and treatment for that individual will help them become sober and create a life that they may have never had the opportunity to have. The Republicans do not mention anything about the wrongdoing that some law enforcement people have done. If we don’t change the fact that police officers have little or no consequence when it comes to murdering another citizens, then this is only going to cause more diversion and inequality within our nation. This is where the Republicans start to go wrong. Although, I do think that they do not pay enough attention to how serious inequality is and how certain people (people of different color, or race) are treated differently to white people. 

Democrat - Democrats believe that our criminal law justice system is “failing” and it needs to be changed from top to bottom. Their beliefs give people more opportunity, but especially for the convicted. They emphasize on the fact that we don't offer the incarcerated a chance to turn their lives around. Instead, this country as of right now wants prisons to be overcrowded and continue to rely on inhumane methods of punishment. Where is the change and reform? With the recognization of police brutality, Democrats think that it is “unacceptable that more than 1,000 people, a quarter of them Black, have been killed by police every year since 2015”. Those numbers will continue to rise unless we seek action and change. On the juvenile justice scale, Democrat's believe that every school should have sufficient funding and resources to employ guidance counselors, social workers, nurses, or school psychologists to help guarantee age-appropriate and racially equitable student disciplinary practices, rather than turning to police and locking them up in juvenile detention facilities. They will encourage federal government to stop incarcerating kids, and create community based alternatives “to prison and detention centers for youth and invest in after-school programs, community centers, and summer jobs to provide opportunities for young people at risk”. They support the ban of chokeholds and carotid holds and permitting deadly force only when necessary to prevent an imminent threat to life. Democrat's believe that we need to change our criminal law reform system from top to bottom meaning, increasing the use of drug courts, harm reduction and interventions, provide treatment diversion programs for those struggling with substance use disorder, eliminate use of cash bail, abolish death penalty, provide rehab, and ensure access to transitional housing for returning citizens (mental health and substance treatment). Democrats also acknowledge the change that needs to happen to all Law enforcement agencies. Changes will include “no-knock warrants”, improve “training and education for judges, corrections officers, prosecutors, public defenders, and police officers to ensure transgender and gender non-conforming people receive fair and equitable treatment in the criminal justice system”, increase diversity among the ranks of police departments, end the use of “private prisons and private detention centers, and will take steps to eliminate profiteering from diversion programs, commercial bail, electronic monitoring, prison commissaries, and reentry and treatment programs”. Personally, I 100% agree with the the Democratic Party. We as a country have NOT had an equal justice system for a long time. The Democrats want to submit a lot of change within our country and I think that everything they plan on doing will be very beneficial. Teaching police officers when to use extreme force and when not to use extreme force is very important. Creating a system where we provide treatment instead of locking people up will be more beneficial to creating a unified nation again. Even on the juvenile justice scale I think that the Democrats are going to do an excellent job. A teens brain isn’t even fully developed for many years because of the frontal lobe with makes teenagers prone to irrational decision making which is why they need support to head on the right path. 

Libertarian - This party believes in constitutional rights meaning they support the constitution. They favor “the repeal of all laws creating “crimes” without victims, such as gambling, the use of drugs for medicinal or recreational purposes, and consensual transactions involving sexual services”. They support that restitution needs to be paid back to the victim that lost x amount fo money or property. The only thing that this party talks about is their view on crime and certain consequences that need to be done to the offender. I did not find anything about my topic which is criminal law reform. They did not talk about what needs to be changed about our criminal justice system. They did not talk about the fact that people are being locked up for the wrong reason. They did not talk about the fact that people with substance abuse should have the right to rehab or some facility to get support. THEY DID NOT MENTION REFORM. I think they didn't mention criminal law reform because it is too controversial and they don’t want to have people that disagree with them. Personally, I think it is a winning tactic to persuade people to vote for them because they didn’t form their own personal views about criminal justice, and criminal law reform. Also, I don't think it is a big enough party for them to go into depth about these topics. 

Green - The Green Party has many requests to reform the criminal justice system. There view is that prisons are being overcrowded, and the fact that our law enforcement places to much emphasis on “drug-related and petty, non-violent crimes, and not enough on prosecution of corporate, white collar, and environmental crime”. They understand that forty percent of those 2.3 million locked down come from America's black one-eighth. The Green Party suggests that in order to reform our criminal justice system we need to abolish death penalty, repeal three strikes laws, establish and fund program to strengthen self-help and community action through neighborhood centers that provide legal aid, alternative dispute-resolution practices, mediated restitution, community team policing, access to local assault care shelters, restrict police use of weapons and restraining techniques such as pepper spray, stun belts, tasers and choke holds, establish freedom on bail as a right of all defendants charged with non-violent crimes. Incorporate mental health and social services in bail agreements, protect victims' rights, ensure the opportunity for victims to make victim-impact statements. Consider forms of restitution to victims, eliminate the gun show loophole that permits sale of weapons without background checks, extend background checks to all private sales of firearms. The Green Party only considers prison time as a “last resort”. Not only do they talk about reform, they also talk about what needs to be done within prisons and jails to make the prisoners more productive during prison life. For example, they want to provide access to education, provide addiction and psychological treatment, and even consider job training while attending a prison. Personally, I agree with this party's position. I think that their opinions to reform the justice system is productive and can create a lot more change within our society. They recognize inequality within our justice system and they want to recognize ALL PEOPLE not just CERTAIN PEOPLE. 

Peace and Freedom - The Peace and Freedom Party believe that “Working class people are the primary victims both of street crime and of police reaction to it. The bosses use laws against victimless activities, "legal" and illegal expansion of police powers, military and paramilitary occupation of poor and minority communities, and diversion of resources to police and jails, to keep workers intimidated and dependent. This party’s idea of reforming our justice system is to abolish death penalty, repeal the three strikes law, stop trials and imprisonment of juveniles as adults, provide rehabilitation, decriminalize victimless activities including drug use and consensual sex. Legalize marijuana, stop unwarranted searches and seizures and restore constitutional rights, prosecute crimes of the wealthy and powerful against workers and the environment, abolish all torture in prisons and uphold prisoner rights. Personally, I agree with the Green Party. I think they lack to understand and publicize the problem of inequality but their forms of reform are great! They want to see less imprisonment and more rehabilitation and change. 

2. I identify with the democrats the most because they seem to recognize most inequality problems and they provide the most reform. I don't think that locking an individual with a drug addiction is smart and rational. I think that for non-violent offenders we need to seek change and reform to build a better nation and give people the benefit of the doubt. Yes I would vote for this presidential candidate. 

3. Yes my civic action was a topic during the debate. Biden did not give a specific plan about what he will do with racial inequality, and injustice. He only tells the American people what he wants to see happen not what he is going to physically do. He politically slanders Trump multiple times, and gives little fact about the issue. He has not done anything to make this issue better. He thinks that a psychiatrist would help a cop calm down to not make irrational decisions like kill someone but a cop's job is to already know these things. You should not be a cop if you are scared of getting hurt. But resulting to violence is not rational. Also, he sees the violent protests and thinks they are peaceful even when people are burning down things, and stealing things from stores. THIS IS NOT PEACEFUL!!! On the other hand, Trump slanders Biden by saying “you call African Americans superpredators”, who knows if this was true or not. Trump did not conduct a plan for decreasing racial justicement, or a treatment for treating inequality but he does make a good point by saying that he has law enforcement on his side and Biden has none. Biden couldn't even admit to have one 1 enforcement support coming to watch him. The difference between Biden and Trump in this situation is that Trump see’s reality and Biden sees fantasy. I don't think that Trump liked the violent protesters where people were going around destroying cities, this does nothing besides cause more violence. These were the things talked about in the presidential debate regarding justice, and reform. Personally, I did not agree with either of the candidates but after me reading the plan for what the Democrats plan to do about criminal law reform I 100% agree with their positions. I don’t think that the debate was constructive in any way shape or form which makes me think that both candidates messages did not support their party platform. Most of the debate was full of arguing, and slandering each candidate rather that respecting both sides. I think Biden did a better job at stating his facts. I think he was very effective at staging his facts based on his arguments, and specific policy plans.

[slytherflynn]

The Return of Slytherflynn | Witch Weekly No. 1

Salutations, witches and wizards! Slytherflynn here. I haven’t posted on this account in a long time. My reason? Actually, there are a few. I’ll get to those soon. Today I’m going to give you an introduction to me, discuss why my exodus happened, and what this blog will consist of moving forward. Let’s jump right in!

Who Is Slytherflynn? Who else? My name’s Eden, but my last name is Flynn, hence the username. I am a Slytherin primary, Hufflepuff secondary. My patronus is a dolphin, so that’s pretty cool. I’m mixed, but live the life of a white girl because I look white and don’t care to argue with people about my DNA. I enjoy elevating underrepresented voices, and will go to any length to protect the unprotected. I’d consider myself to be a humanitarian. I know people despise labels, but I believe choosing labels wisely can give others a great insight into who you are as a person, so here are some labels I identify with: Bisexual, Androgynous, BLM Ally, Liberal, Socialist, University Student, Abuse Survivor, ADHD, Excoriation Disorder, OCD, Depression, PTSD, [an] Attachment Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder, Tacoman, Creator. There are plenty more I could throw out there, but those in particular are important to me. Make of them what you will, but know that I am not ashamed of any of those. I am going to open a nonprofit center supporting POC Youth and connected communities in art and education, but I also want to do everything. Now that you know about me...

Who Are You? Yes, you, reading this paper! What do we have in common? Different? What makes you special, and what makes you the same? What communities are you tied to? Tell me in the replies!

My Magical Journey I grew up in a dreadfully muggle world. My mother, also a muggle, delighted in Harry Potter, as did my brothers. I was resolutely a Harry Potter hater, and thought they were too fangirly, but when Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince came out and I saw Louis Cordice portray Blaise Zabini, everything changed. I may or may not have gone off the deep end and started fangirling over him - what? He’s attractive, okay? But I did end up reeling myself in, as having unrealistic fictional crush is one thing, but thirsting for an unattainable person who probably is married with a kid by now is another, and I didn’t want to get to a point where I was fetishizing someone rather than admiring them for their skills and unique perspective on the world. He did notice my thirsting though, and thought it was funny! So no harm, no foul as far as I’m concerned. Absolute win! Anyways, after becoming a fan of him, Tumblr let me know that there was more content about Blaise Zabini in the books than the movies, so what did I do? Commit to reading all seven, because my ADHD said so and would rather do that than homework. Eventually, I started up this side blog so my main blog wouldn’t be so flooded with hp content. I have written quite a few fics, all appropriate, all probably trash because most of them were written in my junior year of high school, all available for you to read. I ought to make a masterlist for my work, now that I think about it. Anyways, you can find that content and other fun stuff under the tag #slytherflynn so check that out for some light, probably shitty reading!

Why I Left At some point, I decided not to post as much, and went from 100 to 0, real quick. I have a bunch of unfinished writing in my drafts, and I’m not really sure how to start up everything again, but I know I want to, because writing and creating is such a passion of mine, and so is Harry Potter. Part of the reason I left was because I’m a perfectionist and felt this need to make every post perfect, my feed perfectly curated, everything perfectly on time, and I ended up holding myself to a standard that I just can’t meet - no human could, not even Hermione Granger, as evidenced in Prisoner of Azkaban. It took a long time to come back to this blog because I burnt myself out, truth be told. That perfectionism carries over into every aspect of my life - I did mention I want to do everything, after all - and I ended up piling so much up that I couldn’t get all of it done. I felt guilty every time I thought about this blog, because I had so many faithful followers that I essentially abandoned without warning, and I know feeling abandoned isn’t a good feeling. That, and I still couldn’t shake the shame surrounding the fact that I wasn’t posting content every week despite my want to. I even considered deleting this blog! Sorry to anyone who was waiting for me to post hp content on my main account ( @id-rather-be-an-outsider ), I got too anxious to do that, even.

Seeing the Future I’m not skilled at Divination, but I can confirm that I will be making an official return to this blog - complete with Witch Weekly articles whenever I have updates to give! I have at least one short fic finished that I’d like to create a moodboard for and post on here sometime soon. This time around, I’m only going to be posting when I really want to so I’m not putting any pressure on myself, and I’m going to open up asks for you guys to request writing for pairings (note that I do not write smut), as well as giving you guys the opportunity to submit stories - my goal for submissions is to elevate PoC and other voices the masses don’t usually hear, and I encourage those who do submit to always self-promote in their author’s note! You can find the guidelines for post submissions on my submission section :)

Goodbyes Since we are reaching the end of this article, I’m going to be officially saying goodbye to: negativity, destructively high and unrealistic expectations, anxiety, writer’s block, artist’s block, fear of under 10 notes (notes shouldn’t matter, but yakno, there’s still gonna be that part of me that knows bad writing probably won’t be getting 10 notes so it’s still... scary), fear of unfair criticisms, defensiveness... and hello to: creativity, letting our hair down, wearing our glasses, posts on the witching hour, going to bed early instead of staying up late to force out a piece, perfectly imperfect writing, pretty moodboards, and making mistakes! Hope to see you all soon with a post, and Happy Pride! My city’s official Pride month is July so I get to celebrate Pride twice, lucky me!

be loving <3 - slytherflynn

#slytherflynn #witch weekly #hp #Harry Potter #slytherin #hufflepuff #hp fanfic #hp moodboard #Blaise Zabini #angelina johnson #Ginny Weasley #fred weasley #Hermione Granger #hogwarts #lee jordan #cho chang #Pansy Parkinson #theodore nott #padma patil #pavarti patil #lavender brown #Neville Longbottom #katie bell #ravenclaw #Gryffindor #hp rare pair #fleur delacour #beauxbatons #hp aesthetic #hp longfic

[vernonfielding]

Life Writes Its Own Stories

EPILOGUE (AO3)

AN: There is discussion of symptoms of post-traumatic stress in this epilogue. It's nothing too dramatic, I don't think, but I wanted to note it for anyone who is sensitive to the topic. Please take care of yourselves, readers.

Jake was right – the ceremony was no New York Public Library gala. The room was decorated with wilted streamers and a few drooping mylar balloons, and it had a stale high-school cafeteria aroma. All of the appetizers plus the sparkling cider – which was definitely not Champagne – were an unappealing room temperature. The metal folding chairs were stiff and unforgiving, and Amy’s butt was falling asleep.

But as she sat in the front row among the cops and politicians who made up the bulk of the audience, as she watched Jake stand square-shouldered in his dress blues – as the commissioner thanked him for his bravery and hung the Medal of Honor over his chest – Amy blinked back tears and thought: This is exactly right.

An elbow nudged her gently, and Amy looked down to find a tissue pushed discreetly into her hand. She glanced to her right and caught Melanie’s eye.

“I won’t tell if you won’t,” Melanie whispered, quickly brushing a stray tear from the corner of her own eye.

Amy looked back at the stage, where Rosa was now getting her medal, and she saw the barely-there smirk on Jake’s face as he caught her eye.

“I think they’re onto us anyway,” she muttered to Melanie, and they both laughed under their breath and dabbed at their eyes.

+++

The weeks after they’d been kidnapped had been rough.

It started a day or two after she’d gone back to work. At first Amy noticed that she startled easily. Car alarms, the bang of a door slamming shut, the thud of a stack of newspapers dropped on a newsroom desk – any loud, sudden noise made her heart race and her breath catch in her chest. She thought it was lack of sleep or stress about work, then Charles came up behind her one day at the copy machine and she was so surprised – so scared – that she elbowed him in the gut and very nearly stomped on his hand when he fell to his knees. Terry took her aside after that and gently suggested she take some time off. Later he slid a business card into her hand and said it was his own therapist, and Amy should make an appointment.

She dismissed his concerns at first, but then she called in sick two days in a row when it was too cold to walk and the thought of getting on the subway, surrounded by the noisy chaos of too many strangers packed into a too-small space, sent her into a panic. So she called the therapist, and after one nerve-racking visit she was diagnosed with acute stress disorder.

Though Amy knew it wasn’t logical she felt instantly, deeply ashamed. She told herself that she couldn’t be traumatized, that she’d come through it all fine, no injuries, barely even a bruise. So she’d been scared for a few hours – they’d been held in a penthouse suite the whole time, lounging on a king-sized bed with silk sheets and embroidered throw pillows.

But she couldn’t stop feeling scared, and sometimes she couldn’t stop crying, and sometimes she felt so angry that her blood pulsed in her temples and her neck. The worst was when she was overwhelmed or overstimulated and seemed to float out of her own body, like the real world was slipping away while she stood by, cotton-headed and paralyzed. Her therapist called it dissociation. She said it was normal. It made Amy feel like she was losing her mind.

Jake figured out pretty quickly what was going on, and he told her it was understandable that she had post traumatic stress, that he’d been there too, in the past. He was gentle with her and he validated every one of her roller coaster emotions and he didn’t judge her or patronize her. And when she threw him out of her apartment one night because she fucking needed to be alone, she texted him an hour later and he was at her door instantly, because he’d stayed in the hallway the whole time, waiting for her to come back to him.

After that they talked about trust some more, because it always seemed to come back to trust between them. Amy realized she needed to trust that she could lean on Jake, that he wasn’t going to break and neither was she if she let him take care of her sometimes. And Jake realized he needed to trust Amy when she said it was time to handle things on her own. Amy knew she’d gotten the easier deal, because she couldn’t imagine watching Jake hurt and letting him go.

But it had been eight weeks since the Vulture. Amy could take the subway to work again. She didn’t jump out of her skin every time a taxi honked or Gina suddenly swore at someone on the phone. She still sometimes cried in the shower for no obvious reason, but she hadn’t yelled at Jake since that one night.

And Jake – he was so good. They were great.

+++

Jake and Rosa were swarmed by reporters as they walked off the stage after the ceremony. Normally this kind of commendation wouldn’t get any media attention, but the Vulture story was still huge, and now every local publication was present. Amy spotted Hitchcock in the fray – he was pretty much the only person on the Bulletin staff without any ties to Jake, at this point – and also Adrian Pimento, their new photographer. Pimento was a talented shooter but had a tendency to go rogue on his assignments. Amy avoided working with him.

Amy and Melanie watched with amusement as their significant others braved the throngs, and Amy couldn’t help the flush of pride at how Jake handled himself. She’d drilled him over the weekend on how to handle the press, and the practice seemed to be paying off. She could read the signs of stress in the fine lines between his eyebrows and around his mouth, but to a casual observer he would look courteous and professional. Rosa, on the other hand, was standing just behind his shoulder and scowling. Amy couldn’t hear what either of them was saying, but every now and then she saw Rosa frown even more deeply and respond with a “no comment” Amy could read from across the room.

When they finally broke free, they bee-lined for Amy and Melanie and both couples exchanged the briefest of cheek-kisses before everyone seemed to deflate with relief and the simple joy of being on their own in the crowd.

“I still can’t believe we got the same medal when only one of us was kidnapped and stabbed,” Jake said to Rosa, who smirked at him.

“Not my fault you got your ass captured,” Rosa said, and turned to Amy. “No offense.”

“None taken,” Amy said. “But if anyone should be annoyed, it’s the woman who helped take down the Vulture and got kidnapped and nearly died and isn’t getting any medal at all.”

Everyone laughed and Jake gave her a quick one-armed hug. Melanie said, “I thought there were rumors that the mayor was going to give you some kind of civilian commendation?”

“Yeah, but probably not after that piece on the mayor’s slush fund she wrote last week,” Rosa said.

“Plus, she’d never take a commendation from the mayor,” Jake added. When everyone glanced at him he shrugged and said, “Conflict of interest. Right, babe?”

Amy just beamed at him and said, “You do know me.”

+++

Amy had met Jake’s mom the weekend after the kidnapping, when she had a well-timed lull between breakdowns and Karen came by Jake’s apartment with a bag of frozen meals to get him through the couple of weeks his arm would be in the sling. Jake had met Amy’s dad and the rest of her brothers over Christmas. They both made great first impressions – Amy because Karen was kind and sweet-natured and basically impossible to scare off, and Jake because her family had decided he had saved Amy’s life, despite Jake insisting that it was mostly the other way around.

She’d been exhausted after the holidays, burned out on anxiety and too much family, and they spent New Year’s Eve in her bed, watching old TV blooper reels and favorite SNL sketches on their phones until they both drifted off, well before midnight. And Amy thought if it was true that how one spent the last hours of the old year would be echoed in the new year, she was all right with that.

They mostly stayed holed up in her apartment or Jake’s after that, though they met Rosa and Melanie for drinks more than once. Those two were an odd but charming couple, a sweet-and-sour combination that clearly brought out the best in both of them. Melanie was warm and easy to just be with, even when Amy felt socially exhausted. And Amy found in Rosa a surprising ally as she worked through her issues, because Rosa was an attentive listener and also brutally no-nonsense. Sometimes Amy needed to spiral a little bit, but sometimes she needed someone to shut her down, or to help her put things in perspective.

“I’m just tired of having a panic attack every time the Uber Eats guy buzzes my apartment,” Amy said morosely one night at Shaw’s, when it was just the two of them at a table while Jake and Melanie dueled over darts.

“Yeah, it’s ridiculous,” Rosa said.

Amy froze. She was getting used to Rosa’s bluntness, but there was blunt and then there was insensitive. “I mean, I wouldn’t say I’m ridiculous-”

“Not you,” Rosa said. “Our brains are wired to turn trauma into chronic stress sometimes. It’s dumb. I hate it.”

Amy stared at her, mouth agape, because it wasn’t every day a revelation was dropped in her lap. “Yeah,” she said. “It is dumb.”

+++

Jake slipped Amy’s glass of (flat) sparkling cider from her hand and set it on the tray of a passing waiter. Then he turned and offered her his arm.

“Time to mingle?” he said.

And it was a small gesture, but it made Amy’s heart rush to loop her hand over his bicep and let him escort her toward the crowd. Rosa rolled her eyes as he led her away, but Melanie gave them a playful wave and mouthed “good luck.”

“So now I’m just arm candy?” Amy said to him.

“Always. Wait- never,” Jake said. “Is that a trick question?” She could hear the smirk in his voice.

They hadn’t actually discussed that this would be their first big outing as a couple. Somehow, despite all the press around the Vulture and countless interviews with Amy (and a few with Jake) and multiple in-depth stories about the night they’d been kidnapped, the fact that they were dating had not been made public. Amy wasn’t sure why anyone who wasn’t family or friend would care at this point. Still, given their history, she’d expected Jake to be nervous about coming out.

But his only reservations in the days leading up to the ceremony had been for her sake – making sure that she was going to be okay with all of the people and the socializing. They’d walked into the venue hand-in-hand, Jake in his crisp uniform and Amy in a wintery-green day dress. She’d felt a flutter of nerves in her belly, but only for a moment, and he’d pressed her fingers as if he sensed she needed the reassurance. They’d met up with Rosa and Melanie inside, and Jake had found Amy a seat and he’d stayed by her side until the ceremony began, and she wasn’t sure if his attentiveness was out of concern or affection or both, but she appreciated it all the same.

Now, as they moved through the celebratory mob, Jake was enthusiastic with his introductions. Amy met men and women he’d been in the academy with, and former partners and mentors from before his time under the Vulture. Everyone seemed to have a story about Jake to share – some prank he’d pulled, an amazing solve he’d made, how if anyone was going to take down a captain they would have put their money on Peralta. There were also an alarming number of stories about horrible bouts of food poisoning, and Jake apparently had a bizarre tendency to accidentally pants people. She thought that was some kind of running joke until she caught Jake blushing furiously after the third story.

After a while they found themselves surrounded by a few high-ranking officers, stumbling over each other to congratulate Jake and make some comment about how they’d always had doubts about Pembroke, which was as hilarious as it was insulting because men like the Vulture didn’t climb the NYPD ladder without support from the top. Jake introduced her to his new captain too, a man who insisted she call him CJ, and who seemed pleasant enough; both Jake and Rosa had said the jury was still out.

Amy was glancing around the cluster of brass, thinking how odd it was to be standing with so many gray-haired white men who looked the same, when she noticed a faint buzzing in her ears and a tingling in her fingertips – signs of an impending dissociation. She fought it for a moment, impulsively chastising herself for becoming overwhelmed in such a non-threatening place, but then she reminded herself that it wasn’t her fault and she wasn’t alone. She was still holding onto Jake, and she squeezed his arm slightly. He glanced at her and must have recognized something on her face, because he interrupted his captain, and with barely an “excuse us, sir” he led Amy away.

He took her to a quiet corner of the room, where they could watch the clutches of people talking and laughing, wait staff slipping in between to pick up used glasses and plates. A DJ set up near the stage was playing something Amy couldn’t quite make out. Jake slipped behind her and tucked his arms around her waist, holding her to him. She felt him kiss the top of her head, felt his thumbs rub over her knuckles, felt his chest solid and reassuring against her back. She leaned into him and breathed through the anxiety. Keeping herself in the moment. Letting him ground her.

When she felt like herself again, she closed her hands over his briefly, and turned in his arms to face him. He gave her a careful smile, and she nodded back at him that she was okay – because she was, truly.

She let her eyes fall to the star-shaped medal on his chest, and she reached for it, holding it in the palm of her hand. It was heavier than she’d expected, and cool to the touch. She ran a thumb over the points of the star.

“You realize,” she said, now tracing the engraving with the tip of a finger, “I’m going to need you to wear this all night.”

She looked up at him with a coy smile, expecting a flirty smirk in return, or a whispered suggestion of what else the night would bring. Instead, the smile he gave her was soft, even wistful, and the warmth in his eyes made her stomach do a slow flip.

“You realize that I’m in love with you,” he said.

Amy felt her cheeks flush, felt the warm rush of tears in her eyes, and she nodded, because yes, she did know. She’d felt the same for a while now, and maybe it had been petty of her but she’d needed him to say it first. She thought maybe they’d both needed that.

“I know,” she said, when she thought she could trust her voice. She brought her hands up around his neck, felt his hands at her back, pulling her a little closer. “I love you too.”

The kiss was just a brush of their lips, but also a promise.

+++

Rosa and Melanie came up not long after, Rosa complaining that she was straight-up insulted that there was no open bar. “Can we leave for your mom’s now?” she said.

Jake pulled out his phone and glanced at the time, and he noted that they would be a little early to the after-party that Karen was hosting but she wouldn’t mind.

“Thank god, I’m starving,” Melanie said, ditching a plate filled with half-eaten appetizers on a side table as the four of them headed toward an exit near the stage.

“We might want to stop somewhere for a snack first – Charles arranged the catering,” Rosa said.

“Smart,” Melanie said.

They disappeared into the lobby, Amy and Jake right behind, but Jake paused when someone called out his name. Amy turned, and it took her a moment to recognize the man jogging toward them, an anxious smile on his face – he ran a new Brooklyn newsletter-slash-gossip blog. She’d seen him at a few recent press events. She thought his name was Teddy.

“Can I get a photo?” maybe-Teddy said, addressing both of them.

Amy opened her mouth to say no, but Jake was faster, and he said, “Sure” and slid an arm around her waist, pulling her to his side. Teddy grinned and lifted his phone, and just before he snapped the picture Jake turned and planted a kiss on the corner of Amy’s mouth. It was sweet and it was chaste but it was also a kiss, and Amy blinked in surprise as Jake pulled away with a sheepish smile.

The photo ran on the top of Teddy’s blog that night. Two days after that, Amy found a printed-out copy of it on Jake’s refrigerator, under a Donatello magnet. The image was slightly out of focus, and the quality of the black-and-white print was not good, but it was impossible not to see the warmth and the love between them. Jake’s eyes were closed, his lips curved into the hint of a smile against her mouth, and Amy looked like she was a breath away from laughing, utterly charmed by her impulsive boyfriend.

“It’s not the first time we made news together,” Jake told her, when Amy asked why he’d put the photo on display. “But it’s the best.”

Amy told him that was the cheesiest thing he’d ever said and she was never going to let him forget it, and he said, “Promise?” And she kissed him.

The photo ended up on Amy’s refrigerator when Jake moved in with her six months later. She laminated it.

And that, officially, is the end. <3

#b99 fic #peraltiago #jake and amy au #newspaper au #life writes its own stories

[3w-writer-with-wings]

Response to “Yusaku is BORING” video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQOfKpSPlzI&t=

To start off, well plain and simple - it's hard to compare previous Yu-Gi-Oh! series with one that is currently ongoing. One thing that you kept repeating (besides the word "boring") was that we don't know much about Yusaku. Well newsflash - at the point of your video being posted there were roughly 56 episodes out which is not even the half of the series yet - Kaiba's full backstory wasn't revealed until episode 100 (therefore you wouldn't know his entire backstory at that point) so if you put it in perspective of other series you should compare them up to the point where VRAINS is right now - which you didn't so VRAINS got a lot of disadvantages when being compared to the rest of the series and therefore you didn't judge Yusaku as equally as the rest of the protagonists. But let's say I ignore this fact and I fully focus on your character analysis of Yusaku:

1) He is bland - It might be just me, but I don't really see him as bland - in fact, I see him as one of the most interesting characters so far. In the very first episode, he already states clearly who he is, using his three things speech - he thinks a lot so it's understandable that he, therefore, doesn't talk as much unless he talks with those who understand him. And even though Naoki wasn't one of those people, he still listened to him even when he could freely ignore him. The reason why he may appear bland is that he kind of has to look bland - he lives a double life, he has trouble socializing (which Kusanagi and Ai point out a lot) and he doesn't want to involve more people in this so if he appears boring and bland he doesn't need to interact with that many people and attract unwanted attention. So to keep in in one sentence - he is using the fact that he appears bland to his advantage. 

2) He has no friends - I'll be involving some things from season two here, but even in the first season it is kinda clear why Yusaku has no friends, not counting allies. Due to Lost Incident Yusaku developed PTSD and most likely his social anxiety as well. If you live with such disorders from an early age, it is very difficult to develop your social skills - if you rewatch the flashback scene, you'll see Yusaku in some sort of a daycare trying hard to smile, but he can't. He told Akira himself that yes, he had taken treatments, he did everything to leave the past behind and he tried to live a normal life - but he couldn't, PTSD and Lost Incident didn't let him so revenge was the last resort. And in a way, the revenge on Knights of Hanoi helped him out the most - he gained allies and friends. Yusei had friends who went through the same thing as him so he managed to develop his social skills while Yusaku couldn't which may suggest that Yusaku doesn't really understand the difference between an acquaintance and a friend. Yusaku only considered "three things person" a friend - Revolver - because he knew that he was in the same situation as him so he trusted him and swore to save him one day. Same went for Takeru - the moment he revealed that he is a victim as well, Yusaku agreed to trust him and when Kusanagi referred to Takeru as his friend, Yusaku didn't deny it and was even fine with Takeru calling him by his first name (in Japan this is a big deal, since first names are reserved only for close friends and family). Yusaku eventually warmed up even to Ai, so to answer your question - yes Yusaku changes in the means of that and is also smiling more and has more heart to heart conversations with others (just a few episodes ago he had a really good conversation with Takeru, Ai and Flame - talking about their future, how they got to this point and generally just how he feels about the whole situation - I really recommend checking it out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j60tQvhbfvY ). One other reason why Yusaku might not have so many friends is that he is careful and hardly trusts anyone – especially due to how he was kidnapped. In one of the flashbacks, it is revealed that Yusaku used to be a very cheerful kid who loved playing card games and wasn’t hesitant to talk with a total stranger about the game. The only problem was that stranger was an eight-year-old Revolver who later lured him to his house so Dr. Kogami could have a subject for his experiments. It is completely understandable that Yusaku became scared and untrusting of strangers. This is also shown in another flashback (there are two episodes dedicated entirely to how Kusanagi and Yusaku met) that showed Yusaku approaching Kusanagi very carefully both in VRAINS and in real world. Yusaku even uses a very quiet and stuttering tone when he talks with Kusanagi outside VRAINS, suggesting it was really difficult for him to trust someone.

3) He doesn’t care about anyone, he has no goal and has no noble cause to duel – Actually, in the duel between Yusaku and Spectre, it is revealed that’s his greatest weakness – when Spectre uses Akira as a hostage in his duel. Akira luckily quickly realizes that and practically removes himself out of the duel in order to help him. True the whole revenge thing on Knights of Hanoi started purely so he could move on, but that’s not the only reason. During the duel with Akira Yusaku stated clearly that he had wanted answers – he wanted to know what the point of his suffering was, he wanted to understand what happened to him and he wanted to punish the people who did that to him. Yusaku was right to react the way he did when he shouted: “YOU KNOW NOTHING!” – after all Akira made it sound really easy when he said he can take care of his problems for him, but what he didn’t know at the time was just how corrupted SOL actually was and that it isn’t safe to trust anyone – what Yusaku knew well. Yusaku doesn’t want to involve anyone in this dangerous mission which is in a way a noble cause already – he wanted to take care of this by himself without getting others in the danger. In one episode Takeru saves Yusaku from a trap and Yusaku is extremely reluctant to take him to another mission because of that. His current team consists of people who were involved with Lost Incident and what they are doing right now is trying to stop the consequences of the Lost Incident – no one sent them to do it, they did it by their own free will even though they know it’s dangerous and that they are getting more enemies by it. Also when Yusaku stated his three reasons of why he needs the information about Lost Incident – one of them is so he could save the person who gave him courage and that person is Revolver. Even though Revolver was the one who kidnapped him and caused him even more suffering in a form of Knights of Hanoi, Yusaku forgave him. He never blamed him for the Lost Incident and what’s more, he saw him as the seventh victim and never stopped reaching out for him. Yusaku believes there’s good in Revolver and so far he hasn’t stopped believing in him, even when no one else did and seemingly Revolver is slowly changing because of Yusaku.

4) He is overpowered – He hasn’t lost a duel so that makes him a Mary Sue – not quite well. Again this originates from his backstory. Lost Incident forced him to learn how to win at all costs and in case it wasn’t clear enough – Yusaku lost numerous times during those six months and was punished by starvation and electroshocks. He also suffers from night terrors that kept showing him “YOU LOSE”. Akira stated that losing a duel for him is like losing his life – so every time he is in a duel it’s like he is in a life or death situation. When Revolver dangerously lowers his Life Points in both duels, Yusaku finds himself on the ground both times just like a warrior that is very close to dying and that’s not the only time he is shown in a vulnerable state. During the duel with Faust he is sent flying through numerous walls, he loses an arm during the speed duel with Revolver, he is shown to be exhausted every time he comes from VRAINS (he even falls asleep right away one time) and he temporarily loses it when he watches Ghost Girl being erased. He is a tragic and vulnerable hero that was forced to grow up way too fast. Winning is something he learned the hard way so it is a lot more like surviving for him. He may appear like a superhero, but really he is just a human. In the last few episodes there were also a lot of hints that Yusaku may lose soon and even if he doesn’t – the duels are getting rougher which also makes him use other summoning methods – Ritual, Fusion, Synchro and most recently XYZ.

5) He is not relatable and we don’t know everything about him – Not every main character is meant to be relatable and while Yusaku is relatable to some, that’s not his purpose in the story. VRAINS has taken a different turn from other series, using a major storyline and a unique protagonist that carries it forward. Lost Incident IS his story and what deeply motivates him to duel is finding answers to his fast. The reason why we don’t know everything about him from the start is so we can even as watchers experience his desire to know more and because of that, we continue watching him unveil more of his backstory. A lot of anime series use this technique – most notably Attack On Titan – we are not presented with all the answers from the start so we have something to look forward to and VRAINS is using that a lot – we continue to get more details and more information, especially in the second season, there are a lot of surprising plot twists connected to Yusaku and more are being hinted for the future episodes. Yusaku also happens to be one of those characters that have been hurt and is slowly recovering – each protagonist in the series had a point like this (Atem lost Yugi, Judai gave in Supreme King’s power, Yusei nearly died, Yuma lost Astral and Yuya gave in Zarc’s power) – Yusaku just happens to have this point from the start so every time he smiles, every time he is honest with his emotions and every time he slightly opens up to someone – that’s when we can all relate to him. Each of us has probably gone through some difficult situation in life and we all know those things take long to heal – Yusaku is healing slowly, but every time we see a little sign of recovery we are glad he is on the way to let go of his past.

He might not be as appealing as all the protagonists so far, but this does not in any way made him boring. He is a very complex character that doesn’t want to stand out, but due to his past he is forced to. It is difficult to relate to him, but that’s not the point – his story is and so far VRAINS has proven to be one of the most realistic and plot-driven yugioh series. The themes are rather dark but nicely explored and it is quite terrifying to realize it could happen in real life – like AIs with free will, Virtual Reality games going wrong and being forced to grow up fast.

So yeah, VRAINS actually started delivering exactly what you wanted right around the point where you stopped and is still going strong. Maybe finish the series first and then rant about it next time you do such video.

#vrains #yusaku fujiki #yugio series #yugioh analysis #yugioh vrains #I was going to post this as a comment but it ended up too long

[busybrain7]

Needed to share this. He hit it out of the park!

Why I do not celebrate gay pride...

If you ask my detractors, they would tell you that the reason I do not celebrate gay pride is that I’m a bigot. A hater. A homophobe. A transphobe.

And I understand their perspective.

After all, no matter how Christian I claim to be, if I tell a gay couple I do not believe they are truly married in God’s sight, that feels like hatred to them.

If I tell a woman who identifies as a man that I still believe she is a woman, that feels like hatred to her.

From their perspective, I can understand how unchristian my position seems, how bigoted, how biased, how primitive.

After all, they would be quick to point out, there are gay parents who are more devoted to their kids than some straight parents.

There are transgender men and women who are kind, gentle, caring souls.

There are people all across the LGBT spectrum who help the poor, who care for the oppressed, who love the loveless, who are outstanding bosses or employees or friends or neighbors.

Why shouldn’t all of us celebrate gay (or, LGBT) pride?

For me, there are three major reasons, and none of them have anything to do with hatred or fear.

First, I do not accept the categories of LGBT as fixed and definite categories, worthy of special recognition.

Put another way, why should there be a special month to celebrate people based on their sexual desires and romantic attractions? Or based on their gender identity perceptions?

The very fact that we’ve gone from G (as in gay) to LG, to LGB, to LGBT, to LGBTQ, to LGBTQI to LGBTQIP (and beyond) indicates that these are hardly fixed categories.

Or, to zero in on the letter B, why should I celebrate someone who is attracted to both males and females? Why should I put them in a special category (like Hispanic or Asian or Black)?

If the person happens to be a courageous firefighter, I’ll celebrate them for that. If the person happens to be a cancer survivor with an amazing story, I’ll celebrate them for that.

They are fellow human beings, and if they deserve honor or commendation, I’ll gladly give that to them. But I won’t celebrate their bisexuality. Why should I?

And that leads to my second point.

If I’m convinced that homosexual practice is contrary to God’s design, why should I celebrate it? That would make me a hypocrite essentially. 

If I personally know people whose same-sex attractions were the result of childhood sexual abuse and rape, why should I celebrate those attractions?

If I’m convinced that, ideally, a child should have a mommy and a daddy (rather than two mommies or two daddies), why should I celebrate a family setting that willfully deprives that child of either their mother or father?

Do we celebrate single parent pride? No, we say to those single parents, “It must be hard to raise your child on your own, but we’re standing with you to help.”

There’s quite a difference.

And why should I celebrate transgender identity? What is there to celebrate?

Why should I celebrate putting a child on hormone blockers? Why should I celebrate a 17-year-old girl having her breasts removed? Why should I celebrate a lifelong regimen of hormones? Why should I celebrate something that causes so many people so much pain, even after “transitioning?” 

God doesn't make mistakes. 

If you asked me to stand with those who identify as transgender and offer them support and compassion and hope, I would say, “Count me in.”

If you asked me to stand against their harassment and mistreatment, again I would say, “Count me in.”

But if you ask me to celebrate their transgender identity (and all the challenges that come with it), I would have to politely decline.

Third, and finally, I do not celebrate LGBT pride because there is an agenda attached to it.

In other words, this is not just a matter of me appreciating LGBT people as people, or recognizing their accomplishments for the sake of their accomplishments.

Instead, to celebrate LGBT pride is to recognize and embrace a larger cultural agenda.

As I explained in 2011, “the legitimizing of homosexuality as a perfectly normal alternative to heterosexuality also requires that all opposition to homosexual behavior must be delegitimized. At the very least, the gay agenda requires these three platforms (and let recognized gay leaders renounce this if it is not so).

“Whereas homosexuality was once considered a pathological disorder, from here on those who do not affirm homosexuality will be deemed homophobic, perhaps themselves suffering from a pathological disorder.

“Whereas gay sexual behavior was once considered morally wrong, from here on public condemnation – or even public criticism – of that behavior will be considered morally wrong.

“Whereas identifying as transgender was once considered abnormal by society, causing one to be marginalized, from here on those who do not accept transgenderism will be considered abnormal and will be marginalized.”

And remember, I wrote this in 2011. (In fact, I wrote this several years earlier, but these comments were not published until 2011.)

Again, from the LGBT viewpoint, LGBT pride is all about coming out of the closet. It’s about saying, “We’re just as good and as gifted and as normal as anyone else, and rather than being ashamed of our LGBT identity, we are proud of it. The days of being mistreated are over. That’s what LGBT pride is all about!”

Again, I understand these sentiments, and if it was a matter of caring for people as people, I’d march side by side with them.

But it’s not just that. It’s about creating new categories and foisting them on the society. It’s about celebrating something that should not be celebrated. It’s about a larger agenda.

For those reasons, I do not celebrate gay pride, even though it makes me a hateful bigot in the eyes of many LGBT people and their allies.

That saddens me, but that doesn’t change my convictions.

June remains just another month on my calendar. It is not marked off for LGBT pride.

I refuse to celebrate,  defend, and/or glorify sin, and it's really that simple. 

https://www.christianpost.com/voice/why-i-do-not-celebrate-gay-pride.html