#in HER house while blaming the VICTIMS and downplaying their abuse WHAT right does this fuckswizzle have to say SHIT about sex pests

[timeisacephalopod]

I've seen, repeatedly, that every accusation is a confession from the political right and honestly nothing rings more true to that than the claim that university is liberal indoctrination and this is a problem for right wingers for reasons I can't identify when they have the Joshua Generation.

At least libs only indoctrinate adults who are paying thousands of dollars for it instead of literally breeding a billion kids they all homeschool and abuse the fuck out of with the hopes they'll all become Clarence Thomas and fuck America 18 different ways to Sunday. What an odd thing to even bitch about if they're ok with literally doing what they falsely accuse universities of except to literal children from birth to, if they had their way, death while also flailing around about "false accusations" like they aren't throwing them out as fast as they're having kids they force their other kids to raise while treating that abuse like a Funny Little Organization System. Kids are such blessings you know, that's why they don't even bother raising half of them and force their daughters to do all that work for them.

I'm actually surprised I don't see more people who left this lifestyle as adults who were raised into it speaking up about this stuff. There's more of it now, half these things were mentioned in the Shiney Happy People doc and I found out about the Joshua Generation from a podcast called Kitchen Table Cult that is hosted by 2 people who left similar beliefs to the Duggars but I'm honestly surprised it's not like. A huge thing in news everywhere but that's probably because this type of shit isn't even a blip on the map of all the fucked up things the political right does so often it's exhausting to keep up with let alone hold anyone accountable for. Too busy bitching that trans people shit and do so in public bathrooms sometimes. Priorities, you know. Think of the children, but not the ones being bred and abused to further their parents political ends.

#winters ramblings #like BRUH if you want to talk about school and indoctrination clean your OWN mess up before pointing fingers #at least unis are 'blanket training' babies into obedience if you look this up its HORRIFIC child abuse be warned #nor are they irresponsibily having 80 000 children they dont even fucking raise THEMSELVES #while criticising OTHER PEOPLE for habing a bunch of kids!!! like ???!?! #yall motherfuckers will turn women into breeding horses until they DIE or can no longer reproduce and you whine about #PEOPLE OF COLOR who only have like FOUR kids compared to your TWENTY??? okay bud #like yes that last one was a direct duggar callout but they arent alone in these contradictory beliefs that make NO sense #like michelle bitching about trans women taking a piss like shell get raped by her as if she wasnt housing a FUCKINF CHILD MOLESTER #in HER house while blaming the VICTIMS and downplaying their abuse WHAT right does this fuckswizzle have to say SHIT about sex pests #if michelle gave a shit about that she wouldnt be a part of the HORRIFICALLY abusive IBLP so shut your irresponsible child abusing ASS #michelle. and stop calling your kids blessing when you didnt even RAISE most of them your fucking DAUGHTERS did that FOR you #why even HAVE all these kids if THATS what you do to them? shelter them from ANY outside opinion abuse them #force them into your pokitics withthe hopes theyll TAKE OVER THE COUNTRY YOU LIVE IN LMFAO #dont complain about indoctrination when you have MASSIVE swaths of your politicsl party okaying shit like the duggars #or ACTIVELY participating in turning children into politicsl weapons instead of appreciating them as individuals #you know. since theyre allegedly blessings and all that not just convenient and easily controlled political pawns

[bloodraven55]

Gaslighting as a Form of Abuse in RWBY

With another comic focussing on an abuse victim having just been released today in the form of Weiss’ issue of the DC comic series, I want to tackle another analysis post in the hopes of bringing some more understanding surrounding emotional abuse to this fandom because in some parts it seems to be sorely needed.

There are a couple of points I’d like to address in this post, the first being the identity of the person speaking to Weiss during the sections set post-V3 in the comic. Most people assume it to be Jacques, but some also think it might be Willow. I can understand both arguments, and I’m not totally decided myself yet on which I think it is.

On the one hand, the type of abuse seems more subtle and manipulative compared to Jacques’ usual direct and aggressive approach, and we’re never actually shown who’s talking, which could suggest Weiss’ mother. But on the other hand the only thing we know about Willow is that she drinks to excess and fights with Jacques a lot so there isn’t really any basis to assume she would be manipulative towards Weiss, and the tone of the dialogue does fit Jacques’ sleazy and condescendingly pleasant demeanour that he assumes when he’s pretending to be nice to Weiss like in V4, so it would also make a lot of sense for it to be him.

For the purposes of this article I’m simply going to refer to them as Weiss’ parent to avoid any confusion and prevent me having to change it later if we get more information or I form a concrete stance on who it is. Their identity doesn’t impact the content of the post at all so it seemed the most logical solution.

With that covered, let’s move on to the main thing I want to talk about, which is the parallels between the way that Weiss’ parent gaslights her in the comic and the way that Adam gaslights Blake multiple times throughout the show but primarily in his Character Short.

“You are not the first Schnee in history to suffer disappointment, and this behaviour is really rather excessive…”

“Blake, I'm sorry. I told you it was an accident.”

This first part is representative of the main principle of gaslighting, which is to undermine the other person’s judgement and make them doubt their own ability to think rationally so that they’ll act the way you want them to.

Weiss’ parent diminishes her suffering by claiming it’s no worse than what other people have been through before—an interesting reference to the quote in the White Trailer which directly contradicts it by stating that “everyone is entitled to their own sorrow, for the heart has no metrics or forms of measure”—to invalidate Weiss’ pain.

Adam downplays the importance of innocents being killed on his missions by framing them as mere “accidents” to make Blake seem paranoid and foolish for being concerned by them and prefaces it with an insincere apology so that she’ll immediately feel bad because she thinks she’s hurt his feelings.

These both show the abuser using the way they talk to make it seem like the victim is totally detached from reality and as though their point of view on the situation must be false, leaving the abuser’s way of seeing things as the only correct option.

“Weiss, I just… don’t understand why you’re behaving this way. You act as though you’ve been kidnapped or imprisoned, and that is simply not what happened.”

“I don't know. I'm out there fighting for us, and when you fight, people get hurt.”

This is a continuation of the first part, further cementing the supposed “irrational” nature of the victim’s behaviour and showcasing the abuser moulding the scenario so that they’re never the one in the wrong.

Weiss’ parent feigns confusion and disbelief at the fact that Weiss is upset at being dragged away from her school and friends against her will, insisting that she isn’t being forced to stay and outright denying the validity of Weiss’ perception of what happened.

Adam dismisses Blake’s concerns at the deaths he’s caused by shifting the blame away from himself, falsely presenting the loss of life as an inevitability of fighting, and placing himself as the victim who’s having his heroism questioned.

In both cases the abuser warps reality to make themself seem as though they’re in the right so that the victim will stop trusting their own perception of events and come to believe that their abuser is right.

“It is natural to be unhappy to leave Beacon Academy, but friends come and go, and go more often as they get older… but family is forever.” / “And if you did have to leave those radicals, those ‘friends’ behind, well… all the better.”

“What, do you want me to just abandon our cause? Like your parents?”

This part ties into another major aspect of emotional abuse which is isolating the victim from their support network of friends and/or family so that they have nowhere else to go and no one else to rely on. However, it is also another example of gaslighting as it involves making those close to the victim appear like the bad guys in order to push the victim away from the people who might try to help them and further into the abuser’s control.

Weiss’ parent describes Weiss’ friends as “radicals” and mocks her bond with them, saying that it was good for Weiss to leave them and reminding her that she’s alone now without them, even spinning it to sound like they never cared about Weiss at all in the first place and as though her family—a.k.a. them—are the only people she can trust.

Adam deliberately brings up Blake’s parents, which he knows is a vulnerable topic for her, to remind her that they’re “traitors” and brand her a traitor too by association, reinforcing the idea that he is the only one she has left.

I suspect that this is the aspect of gaslighting that most people have the least trouble identifying since it basically amounts to guilt-tripping and even the majority of people without much knowledge of emotional abuse are aware of how that works.

“Weiss, sweetheart, please, don’t sulk!” / “Weiss, I love you, but you are really quite overreacting to the whole thing.”

“I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought them up. I just get scared when it feels like you don't believe in me anymore.”

This part I think is what blinds a lot of people to the fact that emotional abuse and manipulation is happening. And that’s because the abuser offers what might appear to be a sincere expression of affection or a genuine apology, when in reality it’s simply a way of convincing the victim that everything that they’re going through is for their own good and that their abuser has their best interests at heart.

Weiss’ parent calls her “sweetheart” and tells Weiss they love her, while in the same breath solidifying the idea that her behaviour is unwarranted and undermining her grievances.

Adam apologises for mentioning Blake’s parents after the damage is already done, while in the same breath making Blake feel guilty for being worried that he’s killing people and making it her job to reassure him instead of the other way around. He deliberately blows what she says out of proportion so that he can pretend to feel hurt in order to illicit sympathy from her.

The veneer of niceness that the abuser uses to hide the way they double down on their manipulation is what makes this facet of abuse hard to spot and can lead other people as well as the victim into thinking that the abuser is right because they seem to be being honest, when in reality it’s all part of how they manage to deceive their victim as well as sometimes serving the added purpose of further isolating the victim from their support network as the people close to them will often side with the abuser here.

“At a certain point, you have to take responsibility for your role in all of this. If you choose to continue in this way, Weiss, then we will have no choice but to keep you here. And you’ll have only yourself to answer to.”

“Why did you have to come into my life and ruin everything?!” / “… but not before you’ve suffered for your betrayal, my love.” / “I wouldn’t have to be doing this if you’d just behave.”

And this final part is a clear example of the end goal of emotional abuse, which is to make the victim think that everything bad that happens is their fault. This is achieved by distorting their perception of reality via gaslighting, as we’ve already covered, so that they trust their abuser’s judgement before their own and will believe it when they’re told that they’re the one to blame for the harm that the abuser causes.

Weiss’ parent makes it Weiss’ fault that she’s not okay with being confined within her own house in a relentlessly unpleasant environment and puts the blame for it on Weiss while claiming to have “no choice” but to inflict pain on her.

Adam places responsibility for the results of his own actions—a.k.a. Blake leaving him, his losing power in the White Fang, etc.—on Blake instead of himself and insists that if she doesn’t “behave” then he has no option but to punish her.

When people in this fandom blame Weiss and Blake to any extent whatsoever for the actions of their abusers, they’re doing the same thing as Weiss’ parent and Adam do here. It’s victim blaming pure and simple, and y’all who are still saying that Weiss deserved to be “disciplined” by Jacques and denying Adam’s abuse of Blake need to just stop.

If you’re interested in reading some of my sources, then here’s a list:

How to Recognize Gaslighting and Get Help

11 Warning Signs of Gaslighting

What is gaslighting? And how do you know if it's happening to you?

You’re Not Going Crazy: 15 Signs You’re a Victim of Gaslighting

#rwby #weiss schnee #blake belladonna #adam taurus #rwby analysis #my analysis #rwby meta #my meta #tw abuse #abuse tw #tw gaslighting #gaslighting tw

[thejustknowing]

"I never said that"

The Truth You can't See.

This is my story and you are the first to see it.

"I Never Said that”

The Truth You can’t see Yet

He keeps telling you you’re being irrational and need to get help. He yells “Why are you trying to start a fight with me?” and slams the door. Your daughter is barely 2, and you find a hint of comfort knowing that she probably won’t remember this. He tells you he's moving out and taking your little girl because he needs so badly to start a manipulative argument. He says you take everything the wrong way. He calls you a victim and tells you it's all your fault. He makes false references about your own childhood to try to break you apart. He thinks he can still convince you of things about yourself that aren’t true, he wants to so bad. You can tell he truly misses those days. When he could gaslight you and play confusing mind games disguised as a conversation you 'think' you are having with your husband; about something real.

It's something wrong in your relationship that you actually want to fix, so you tirelessly try and try because you want things to be OK again. Over time though, this constant cycle sucks all of your energy and everything that is good out of you, but you don't know that yet. You feel broken hopeless and destroyed and you don’t understand why, but you eventually start to realize that something is very wrong. You must have missed something somewhere, this no longer even resembles an argument you would have in healthy relationship, probably not even in most unhealthy ones. It's irrational, it's confusing, it skips around from one thing to another, its fact twisting, it's blaming, it's accusing, it's getting another person's pain and problems thrown at you and piled up until you can’t breathe at all. At it's the worst, it's doubting your own perception of anything because of someone telling you that you're crazy over and over and over. He is starting to convince you that you remember things wrong, and saying that you make stuff up in your head. It's someone denying what they have said so many times that you can't be 100% sure of anything. Your trust in yourself is dwindling. You start to ask yourself "Who is this person in the mirror? It's being told that 'you' said what 'they' are denying having said, even though they said it to your face two minutes ago. It's being locked out of your house in the middle of January with shorts and a tank top on. It's being told you are a horrible person and nobody likes you. It's being told you can’t be trusted to do anything right and then getting guilt tripped because they have to do everything and you do nothing. It's having your baby used against you, it's being threatened to have your baby taken to a hotel by someone who is drunk because, "What you deserve is to be in a dark house with the power out, alone." It's being told that the cops are coming and it's because YOU are the actually the abuser and you are scaring them. It's real FEAR. It's slamming doors, sighs, silent treatments, and dirty looks. Its lies aimed to control how other people view you. It's an argument about money, laundry, what time the kids should be in bed, work, who left the lights on, a dropped dish, spilled milk, the way you said something, a choice you made. It's everything you do is wrong, and it's not Real. It's dealing with it, and on some level knowing, and saying nothing because you know it will make things worse. It's walking on eggshells every single day. It's downplaying your successes, it's really jealousy and deep resentment of your accomplishments, but you don't know that yet. You just aren't good enough, and that even what you thought was good about yourself isn't. Your strengths, talents and most admirable traits were the first thing he targeted, but you don't know that yet. The constant and unending ridicule and forever reminders of even the insignificant mistakes. You are careful never to make a real error in judgment or a bad decision because he will never stop reminding you. He will say "The truth hurts, doesn't it" He will exploit and expose any weakness or vulnerability you show him, he does not have the capacity to genuinely love, he has no regard for the feelings of other's. He is a victim when presented with any information suggesting he is at fault. He is a victim to control you and suck out your compassion even after he breaks you down for hours. He has a huge RED Flag, it's one of many you don't realize you missed yet. He is 100% incapable of admitting he did or said anything wrong. He cannot take responsibility, he only knows how to blame, twist and project. He is not capable of a genuine apology because 'You' are the problem and he is the victim. His personality makes him capable of one of the worst and most dangerous forms of abuse. You don't know it yet but you never did anything wrong, you were never the problem. You didn't deserve this.

It's slow and intentional and you can't understand it yet. You think this person loves you and would never try to hurt you. You are so wrong though, and if you don't figure it out soon you might never recover. How will you be a mom to this beautiful baby if you don't figure out what has changed in you? How do you get up for work and do your job that "the old you" used to excel and thrive at? How will you and be able to function much longer if you can't find your confidence and strength, 'your edge'. You don't know how to survive without the one thing about you you've always counted on when everything else was gone. But it's no use, it's not inside you anymore. It's gone. You ask yourself how could this happen? How could you have let this happen and not see it coming so you could stop it? You start researching and searching for something, anything to fix this. You'll one day be an expert on this type of personality disorder and the pattern of behavior that goes with it, but not yet. You've always been able to fix anything, but you can't fix this. You hit bottom, and you do the only thing left to do when you are truly helpless. You beg and pray to God and angels to help you. You can't get through this on your own, you beg for help and look up at the sky while tears roll down your face, and you cling to hope.

To your complete surprise the help does come, and it comes quickly, within days. The help sent to you is unfamiliar and strange, it's almost spiritual. It's an untraveled path of self-realization of how you ended up where you are. But this is no quick fix. You don't understand for a long time that there is no quick fix for this, and why. Help is sent in all different forms you couldn't see before, you start a sort of awakening. You start to see signs, coincidences, information, people appear in your life that seem to have been strategically placed there at just the right time. It’s truly amazing. But the dark realizations keep coming. As you put all the pieces together and start to truly understand what happened, you really hit the bottom. You'll see later that this is the only way to come back to life, but not yet. This is the lowest and darkest place there is. You could easily stay in that place forever. Getting yourself back to where you were, and who you used to be seems more and more impossible the more you come to terms with the reality of it all. There is nothing of what was. You can't even muster up the courage to ask for help because you are so ashamed of yourself and you are constantly blaming yourself for being so blind and so naive.

The worst is over now, but you don't know it yet. You are still just trying to survive. One thing you come to realize at rock bottom is that you have two choices, and that one of them is giving up and believe me it will be the obvious choice. It seems like the only way out, but it means giving up on your chance to be the Mommy your baby was meant to have, before all this. It means giving up on the "YOU" that you remember being your whole life. I know for an absolute fact that God, the Universe (undoubtabley both) showed me the ONE tiny glimmer of "the old me" that was left, and for good reason. They knew that giving up is something 'She' would NEVER choose. She would FIGHT and SEARCH and never stop until she found a way, just like she always had; with or without her edge.

So that's what I did, with no idea if it was even possible at all or if it would ever work. I spent two long and painful years of exploring, awakening and trusting in a plan I couldn’t even see yet. Then one day I started feel like me again; the NEW me. I’ll never forget the way I felt, it was like I had completely let go of control over anything and just let myself be guided by a higher power. It felt like freedom, it felt like light, it felt like love, for myself. The old ‘me’ was gone, and there was a period of mourning ‘her’ but eventually I came to accept it, and let her go. I hid this journey from every other person on the planet even those closest to me. I faked a smile, worked as hard as I could and hid the ugly, shameful truth. Out of the darkest place I began to emerge a new better version of myself, one I didn't know was inside of me. It turned out this whole experience was the start of a new phase of my soul's journey. I had a new purpose, and I understood the "Old Me" wasn't meant to travel with "Me" this far. So I left her behind and kept going. I understood the laws of attraction and the power to manifest strength where there is none. I now have faith, I realized my gifts, and amazingly I came back!

This is a story with a happy ending but there are remnants of it all that I carry with me. So much of 4 years of my life is still gone, my daughter is now five. There are huge parts of these years l still can't remember. I’ve found pictures of my daughter’s birthday parties and I don’t recognize the cake or the decorations or the event. When I try to remember, memories of the abuse like him taunting me because I asked for help while putting up streamers are what come back. I remember stepping down off a kitchen chair and just kneeling on the floor with my head in my hands crying on my daughter’s birthday, and hating myself for it. I remember sitting in my car crying on multiple Christmas Eve’s because he knew it was my favorite holiday and loved to make it miserable. I will continue to write In hopes of bringing back the precious memories of my little baby girl, memories still covered and buried by the painful ones that I unknowingly blocked. I am a survivor of a long encounter with a monster I could have never seen coming. They don't teach you about these kind of monsters growing up, even though ARE the REAL ones. They don't live under your bed, or in your dark scary attic at night. They don't wear scary masks, or have horns and sharp teeth. They look like whatever you want them to, they are the greatest of imposters. They look like love, infatuation and friendship. Sometimes they look like your parent. They are all the same, they have the same cruel games and tricks up their sleeve to break you. And trust me, if you think you are unbreakable or immune to this, think again. I was one of strongest, most confident, and intelligent woman I knew on my 30th birthday. I was successful, healthy and happy with where I was at in my life. I felt the best I ever had, my mom surprised me and flew out from NY to help me pick out my wedding dress that day. This nightmare started before I turned 32. I hope to someday be able to educate as many people as I can about narcissistic and emotional abuse. Woman and men both need to be able to recognize the hundreds of subtle little tactics that these people use to slowly destroy you. There ARE so many red flags and you can protect yourself, but only with knowledge and awareness of what this type of abuse is and how it happens. If this sounds anything like your life, know you are not alone and know that THIS IS YOUR SIGN. If this sounds like something you have never experienced, you were meant to see this so you never have to.

#narcisistic #emotional abuse #mental abuse #toxic people #toxic #abuse #gaslighting #manipulation #projecting #healing #awakening

[its-a-queer-thing]

ICYMI Pt 15--3x07

I frequently read people discussing Mickey and Mandy's relationship, and talking about Milkovich loyalty. While at the core, they are tight-knit siblings, the fact is Mandy does look down on Mickey a lot. She makes fun of him with Ian, which is realistic for siblings, but she makes fun of things that really shouldn't be made fun of...

Look at that shit-eating grin on her face! She looks amused that her father not only abused her brother but even seems smug about the degree of abuse! Now, while I’m outraged about this, I do also have to defend her by reminding myself that in this abusive as fuck household, everything is topsy turvy when it comes to violence. Her reaction is the equivalent of a sibling being smug about their sibling getting a spanking and it’s very disturbing. Discipline in this house I am certain is very extreme, so her desensitization to violence isn’t shocking. What does shock me even further is when she asks

Uhh... You definitely need a reason to pistol-whip someone. Specifically your brother! I know he can be a shit, I know he gets on your nerves, that's siblings... I'm just personally amazed that she would be so dismissive about this degree of violence. 

I guess what she finds amusing is that this has knocked Mickey down a few pegs (we all know he’s got a swagger befitting of a high-running thug and while that cockiness may intimidate some people, I’m sure it annoys her more than anything.) 

Of course this is coming from the same person who downplayed her own incestual rape, trying to convince the Gallaghers that it wasn't a big deal, when in fact it most certainly is. So what she could have thought this was, or if maybe this has happened before (maybe or maybe not with Mickey in particular), we don't know. But clearly, Mandy is desensitized to this level of violence, and is accustomed to justifying and or dismissing things in her life that are really messed up to give herself a sense of security and normalcy that she doesn't actually have. 

It’s unclear if this is the first time Mickey has experienced this level of abuse from Terry (rape aside). Mandy’s response to this seems so commonplace and casual it almost seems as though this type of thing happens frequently, or at least happened consistently enough throughout her childhood that she is now thoroughly desensitized to it. Also Mickey’s fear of Terry which has been so evident throughout the entire series  up to this point gives the impression that Terry has been physically violent with Mickey before, probably multiple times, but I can’t decide if this is the first pistol-whipping in the Milkovich family. Once again, Mandy’s casual response is super disturbing because it hints that maybe this has happened before...

Ian is tracking Mickey down due to a genuine concern for Mickey’s well being. I find this a very sweet display of Ian’s gentle nature and shows how much he does care for Mickey. He recognizes that what Mickey endured was hard and traumatizing.

What Ian doesn’t necessarily understand is exactly what about the attack was traumatizing. Granted, the whole event was traumatizing, but I think Mickey is mostly desensitized to Terry’s usual abuse. What Mickey was unaccustomed to, and so unprepared for, was the sexual assault--which, I don’t even think he or Ian would classify as a “rape” in their minds because many people don’t even believe men can be raped and there isn’t a lot of talk about male rape to open up understanding about it.

Not only do I argue that Mickey was certainly raped due to the scene we witnessed before and the reasons I listed out in my last ICYMI, but I also believe it because of Mickey’s demonstration of rape trauma syndrome symptoms.

People suffering from rape trauma syndrome, and rape specific PTSD, are more likely to physically and emotionally withdraw from their lives, act out in violent or otherwise harmful ways, and do certain things to assert a sense of control. It appears that Mickey is working through his aggression and probably his need for control in his life by shooting his gun. Whereas before he had a seemingly accurate aim, here we see his aim is quite off (or at least it seems to be from where I’m sitting). This is important just to show how out of focus he is right now and how much this experience has truly rocked him.

This moment is really sad for me because he almost looks happy to see Ian, until he remembers what happened. I can see it clearly, like he looked up and his instinctual reaction was to get excited and then what happened flashed behind his eyes and he wasn’t happy anymore. Suddenly, he REALLY didn’t want to talk to Ian anymore.

But it’s not that he won’t want to talk to him forever, and I think Mickey knew that. That’s why he didn’t fight back or tell him to go away. Mickey’s silence, to me, was his way of asking for space without telling him to go away or talking about what happened or promising any sort of future conversation.

I see some people being upset at Ian for trying to push Mickey into talking to him. Something I would like to point out is while Ian has been traumatized to a degree, because he was violently assaulted and forced to witness something very deeply upsetting, in his family he has learned to turn misfortunes into jokes, to dismiss what doesn't work out. It's not necessarily a healthy coping mechanism, but there are some people in my life personally I can say would have reacted similarly. I don't support this coping mechanism, it's deeply insensitive to people who don't have the same coping mechanism and probably unhealthy in general. So I had a similar reaction to Ian making a joke of Mickey's trauma as many people did, I assume, and was very disappointed in the way that he tried to make light of it.

 I think he expected Mickey to be able to bounce back again because as a society we see men as sexual beings that are rearing to go for any sexual attention they can get, and the truth is men are just as capable of being traumatized by sexual assault and rape as women. Also Mickey as a character is a bounce-back kid. He doesn’t dwell long before he, like Ian, gets up and dusts himself off. But this is one experience that Ian can’t sympathize with so he’s expecting Mickey to bounce back from something he doesn’t understand.

I’m not blaming Ian for this unfair expectation because I'd also like to point out that ian's understanding of sexual assault is fuzzy. We see this in season 6 when he's talking about his drug-induced nights at the club, and reveals that sometimes he was unaware of what was being done to him. Instead of getting scared or becoming a victim, he decided to ignore it. I'm not saying that admirably, I think it's terribly unhealthy for Ian to ignore this, but at the same time if he would rather put it behind him and not address it that is his business. My point about Ian's future history with sexual violence, is to show that he really doesn’t understand sexual violence against men and if he doesn’t understand it then he certainly doesn’t know. Also, we don't know how long before season 6 his history with sexual abuse started. We don't know how Ian and Kash got together. While I don't see Kash as an aggressive type, the truth is we have no idea how this started, I'm going to stop there because thinking about that is scaring me, but for all we know Ian was manipulated or seduced and we don’t even know it.

So my point being because Ian has such a casual attitude towards his own experiences with being sexually violated, I believe that he expected Mickey to have a similar mentality, which obviously he does not, and be able to bounce back. 

Further, I think Ian did want things to go back to normal, wanted to believe that this experience would not end them because he does seem to already recognize that he loves Mickey. I think he wanted their normal back so bad that he got frustrated when it didn’t happen, almost like he had already decided in his mind that everything would be the same. I think he also doesn't want Mickey to associate Ian with his trauma and is afraid that Mickey will do that. And that is not to the fault of either Ian or Mickey, it's how the human brain works and getting angry at Mickey was not going to help anything. 

Ian tries reasoning with Mickey, tries being sensitive to his trauma but it doesn’t get him anywhere.

I understand Ian's desperation for things to just bounce back to the way things were. So to the Ian haters I understand why you don't like this moment, because we want to be sensitive to Mickey's trauma, but at the same time due to Ian's experiences with sexual assault and his general mentality of refusing to dwell, as is the Gallagher way, I think explains why he was able to be so casual when talking to Mickey after this and wanting him to acknowledge him.

Mickey is the one guy Ian has really felt for and I argue really relied on emotionally. I’m sure he and Kash and Ned talked about things Ian went through but they are so much older than him, I can’t imagine it being a conversation Ian feels very understood in. Then there’s Mickey who he can vent to and talk to about his family and Mickey will understand because they have similar experiences and they are around the same age so they see the world more similarly. My point being, I feel Ian was afraid of losing his best friend, not just a lover. I think he was afraid that everything they worked for would be lost and in this moment when Mickey refused to look at him, that fear was very, very real.

I have also seen some (but not many) people express irritation at Mickey for ignoring Ian here, but I would really like to point out something that should be obvious. 

Mickey has just endured a huge trauma, he has been violated in so many ways that we don't understand unless we've gone through it. And what I appreciate about this arc, this three episode long arc where Mickey is explicitly demonstrating his RTS symptoms, is that we get to see that men do respond to rape similarly to women, to show that male rape is a real thing, it is traumatising, and it's serious. We need to talk about it because men are not unfeeling beings who are grateful for any kind of sexual attention (which I think our society tries to make both men and women out to be depending on the circumstance.) So right now we're talking about men being looked at as being ready for sex at any time and being happy about sex at any time, and so being incapable of sexual trauma (specifically from a woman), and realizing that this is not the case. It's not only because Mickey is gay, it's because someone touched him and manipulated his body against his will, period. I'm going to stop before I go too much into detail because I didn't put a trigger warning up but what I want to leave you with is a plea to recognize that Mickey is definitely a victim of rape. He has withdrawn himself physically because he's at this abandoned building, and emotionally because he refuses to talk to the one person in his life that he used to be able to talk to; he's lashing out in a controlled yet violent way to release some of what he's feeling-- and he's probably feeling a lot of things; anger, resentment, hurt, confusion, fear, helplessness... We will see later that he turns to alcohol for comfort, we see later that he is sensitive to touch, and that he is more likely to lash out violently in ways that he didn't before-- but as I said I'll get to that in next couple of episodes. 

Ian finally realizes that Mickey isn’t up for talking and leaves. I can only imagine how hurtful this situation must be for both of them so while I understand where Ian haters and Mickey haters are coming from in this, and upcoming, episodes, I just want to remind everyone that this is a REALLY hard situation to put yourself into if you haven’t been through something similar. I personally admire Mickey for finding his space, claiming an isolated space where he can work through his shit in peace, and trying to leave Ian out of it, because we all know what a Mickey backed in a corner looks like, and he knows that’s ugly. I think he is actively trying to avoid any further damage to a relationship he probably still wants, but is now looking less worth it due to what happened. 

And I admire Ian for looking for Mickey to check on him himself since Mandy was of no help. She doesn’t recognize the deep degree of Mickey’s trauma, and Mickey probably puts up a front when he’s home which is another reason he holes himself up here rather than curling up in his room, so his siblings don’t ask and he doesn’t have to tell (or lie). Ian can sometimes be a bit of a dreamer and his poor hopes were shot down in this moment and my heart really goes out to him for it.

That is all I have for 3x07, lovies! Let me know if you agree or disagree with my analysis! And get the full story here!

#icymi #shameless icymi #gallavich icymi #gallavich #shameless #shameless us #ian gallagher #mickey milkovich #lip gallagher #mandy milkovich #terry milkovich #shameless 3x07 #3x666 recovery

[sage-nebula]

What do you think of the direction the Pokemon anime is taking on Lusamine? They are trying to make her more sympathetic and she don't seen to be abusive. I feel conflicted because will they are whitewashing the only female villain, they are also going into to the USUM route without the unfortunate implications.

Well, first, before anything—I mean no offense, but I just feel that you should know for future usage that “making a villain out to be a good person” is not the correct use of the term “whitewashing.” 

“Whitewashing” is a very specific term which relates to portraying a character of non-white ethnicity as white in adaptations of the original work. So for instance, the characters Katara and Sokka were whitewashed in the live action film adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender, because although they have dark skin in the original cartoon, they were played by white actors. The character Yagami Light was whitewashed in the recent Netflix film adaptation of the series Death Note, because although he is originally a Japanese character, he was portrayed by a white actor and his name was changed to Light Turner, and so on and so forth. “Whitewashing” applies specifically to the depiction of race (and sometimes culture) within media adaptations, and doesn’t at all refer to the heroics or villainous traits present within the characters. Again, I don’t mean to call you out on this or attack you or anything even remotely close to that, but I just thought you should know for the future, since there are some reactionary people on this website who might get a little more volatile about it, even though it’s just an honest mistake on your part.

As for the actual content of your question: It’s complicated.

First, before anything else, it needs to be said that Lusamine is still abusive in USUM. Gladion’s line about how he was “an ornament to [his] mother” is still in tact, as is all of the verbal abuse she hurls at Lillie and Gladion right there on screen when you confront her at Aether Paradise. I actually transcribed this while playing through that scene last night, so I can share that now:

LUSAMINE: “A gifted young trainer like [player] … and they bother with someone like you? How disappointing. […] My … you do say such imcomprehensible things. Calling me mother? I don’t have any children! Certainly not any wretched children who would run off and reject my love! So tell me how you’ll save that pokémon. What can you do, Lillie? You failed to convince me to listen to you. You don’t even have the strength of a trainer. The only thing that you’ve ever done on your own is steal someone else’s research material! It’s so terribly unattractive. But know that my fathomless love will save even someone like you … when I protect this entire world from darkness!”

The very first thing the player witnesses Lusamine saying to Lillie, her daughter, is that it’s disappointing that the player has “bothered” with someone like Lillie. The fact that Lusamine takes the time to point out that the player is gifted hammers in the point that she feels that Lillie is not. By saying that the player is a gifted trainer bothering with Lillie, Lusamine is—in essence—saying that Lillie is not worth their time. She is not good enough for the player. She is worthless. Given that this is the first thing we witness Lusamine saying to Lillie—and that this is the first time they’ve even spoken in person in some time—we can see right off the bat that she’s an abusive mother.

But she doesn’t stop there. When Lillie tries to defend herself by saying that she doesn’t need Lusamine’s approval, and that she will save Nebby, Lusamine says that she says “incomprehensible things”. This ostensibly applies to everything Lillie just said, but Lusamine decides to drive the nail in further by disowning her (and Gladion, though not by name), saying that she doesn’t have any children, and that the children she does have by blood are wretched children who rejected her. Even if you wanted to argue that Lusamine is just lashing out in anger and rejecting those who she perceives rejected her first, the truth of the matter is that Lusamine is the adult. She is their mother. She is supposed to love and support them, and do the right thing, which she has not done. She treats them, as Gladion tells us, like objects and possessions, and when they don’t behave the way she wants them to, she throws them out and blames them for how poorly she treats them. This is emotional abuse.

And again, she doesn’t stop there! She continues to berate and belittle Lillie right in front of the player character, to the point where Lillie ends up bowing her head in shame and hurt. She blames Lillie for her own refusal to listen to or acknowledge Lillie’s concerns, saying that it’s Lillie’s responsibility to convince her rather than her own responsibility to listen. She insults Lillie for not being a trainer, and calls her a thief (while at the same time reducing Nebby to an object, calling him “research material”). She then goes on to call her unattractive, and to say that she’s going to save someone like [Lillie], once again pointing out that she sees Lillie as the lowest of the low without directly saying that. All of this is verbal and emotional abuse. All of it. It’s extremely realistically written, something I can say from personal life experiences with my own biological mother, and it is high-key abusive.

And then, shortly after that, we get:

HAU: “:Daughter? Son? Wait … you all are a family?!”

LUSAMINE: “Perhaps once we were … sweet Hau. But those wretches beside you left me.”

She straight up once again says that Gladion and Lillie are no longer ones she considers family, and calls them wretches on top of it. (Note that, despite the fact that Lusamine says this to Hau, Hau still calls her “a good person” later. Have I mentioned how much my opinion of Hau has plummeted by this point?) Despite the fact that her intention now is to save the world, and despite the fact that she has moments where she does things like call Gladion “a sweet boy” for seemingly worrying for her, it’s more than evident that Lusamine is every bit as abusive toward her children in USUM as she was in SM. If anything, Lusamine changing her tune only when her children seem to care about her is even more indicative that she’s an abuser. Abusers will act nice and sweet toward their victims when their victims “behave”; it’s when they start to “step out of line” that abusers bring down the hammers of pain, and that’s exactly what Lusamine is doing here. Oh sure, she’ll act like a sweet, caring mother if her children are doing what she wants them to do, but the second they try to think or act for themselves she declares them wretched traitors that she wants nothing to do with. Considering the last conversation I had with my own biological mother ended with her calling me a traitor because I got out of her house (and me saying I didn’t have to listen to that, and her saying I did, and me saying I didn’t before I hung up the phone), yeah, that’s all very familiar to me, and it is absolutely abusive.

So make no mistake: Lusamine is still an abusive mother, and is still the most realistically written abusive parent that we’ve had in Pokémon to date (far more so than Ghetsis, whose dialogue makes him sound more cartoonish than anything). Even though the anime is clearly looking to adapt USUM, that shouldn’t affect the fact that Lusamine is an abusive parent to Gladion and Lillie, because she is. The only real difference is that here it doesn’t seem as if her abuse is being blamed on Nihilego toxins; instead, it’s just being handwaved and treated as though it isn’t abuse at all (along with Lillie’s experiences pre-canon being erased, since we no longer have the, “… you left me alone with Mother. She became so bad after you left!” line that she delivers to Gladion on Poni Island in the original games). And honestly, that’s kind of even worse, since now the fandom’s awful behavior of ignoring / downplaying Lusamine’s abuse and excusing her because she’s a woman is being validated by Game Freak themselves. Disgusting.

With all of that said, I would argue that Lusamine’s behavior still carries shades of emotional abuse in the anime as well. It’s clear from the few interactions that she has with Lillie that she doesn’t actually respect Lillie’s autonomy or agency very much at all. She ignores Lillie’s personal space, and handwaves the fact that Lillie is upset being hugged and cuddled by her. She also completely disrespected Lillie’s wishes regarding her old clefairy, treating Lillie as though she was an ignorant child and evolving the clefairy despite the fact that she knew Lillie wanted to raise the clefairy as a clefairy, rather than as a clefable. Whether Lusamine was right in that it was illogical to raise a pokémon in a pre-evolved form simply because it was cuter that way or not is irrelevant. The point is that she railroaded over Lillie’s wishes and boundaries, and she seems to have a habit of doing so. That said, you’re right: That is far less overt than the emotional abuse she hurls at Lillie and Gladion in the games, so it does seem as though they’re treating her as though she’s just an oblivious, overbearing mother rather than an actively abusive one in the anime.

As for how I feel about it? Well … I would think that would be obvious.

I’m livid at the way Lusamine has been handled in all forms. I was so, so excited to finally have a female Big Bad, and I had so many high expectations for her. Game Freak and TPCi have successfully ruined and destroyed every last one of them. In USUM, which the anime is clearly taking its cues from, she’s not even a villain anymore; she’s an antihero at best, because although she clearly abuses her children and is willing to sacrifice Nebby, her decision to sacrifice Nebby is not one borne out of selfishness, but rather is one borne out of perceived necessity. If Necrozma comes over to this dimension, he’ll steal the light, and presumably everyone and everything there will die. Lusamine is taking the tack that sacrificing one life is worth it if it means saving billions. That’s logic that can’t be easily argued with. It’s an ethical dilemma, and ethical dilemmas often don’t have hard line right or wrong answers. (Often, but not always. There are some “ethical dilemmas” which aren’t ethical dilemmas at all and do have hard line right or wrong answers.) They’ve completely stripped her of her villain status, presumably because in their minds women just can’t be villains. (And by “their” I mean “Game Freak’s”, because remember, the anime staff did have Hunter J back in DP.) It’s upsetting and infuriating both on the basis that I really wanted a competent, dangerous female Big Bad for once, and also because she’s still a blatantly abusive mother in the games, and that’s just treated as if it doesn’t matter. I guess, in the eyes of Game Freak (and a large part of the fandom) abuse just doesn’t count or isn’t that bad if it comes from one’s mother. What a great fucking message to send. [/s]

Anyway, I’m not happy about it, but there’s also nothing I can do to change it. So long as Alan is left out of the Team Rainbow Rocket arc coming up (or at the very least, if he’s involved, he doesn’t have his character assassinated), I don’t have it in me to get very worked up about it, emotionally.

#white-gehenna

[citizentruth-blog]

Don't Trust Your Lying Eyes, Say the Liars

What's the matter, Nick? Don't feel like wearing your MAGA hat now? What about that smirk? Stop it before I throw up. (Image Credit: Savannah Guthrie/Twitter) A while back, I attended a Saturday morning meeting for a group of Democratic Party supporters in northern New Jersey. Former FOX News personality and Democratic strategist Julie Roginsky was the special guest. She talked about, among other things, having conversations with people who hold different political views, and at one point, fielded questions from those in attendance. Anna Wong, a tireless activist and someone I know from her work with Indivisible NJ-5, stepped up to the mic, and with a sense of due frustration, asked how we're supposed to reach across the aisle when we can't even agree on a set of facts, let alone whether facts matter. Anna's question and how she delivered it prompted laughter from the audience—myself included—but she was very earnest in her query. Thinking back to this scene, as I frequently do, I too wonder how having a dialog with people of opposing ideologies is possible when both can't agree to the same qualitative or quantitative data—right down to what we see. The episode which jumps to mind, especially as a tone-setter for the Trump administration, is the whole business about whose inauguration crowd was bigger: Donald Trump's or Barack Obama's. It seems like eons ago when Sean Spicer—remember him?—was trying to persuade us to believe that the president's detractors were manipulating camera angles of aerial views to diminish Trump and his achievements. Meanwhile, in the real world, objective visual analysis showed Obama's numbers clearly bested Trump's. Like, it wasn't even close. If Washington, D.C. transit numbers are any indication, Obama walloped Trump in attendance, managing 513,000 trips on the Metro by 11 A.M. in 2009 to his successor's 193,000 by the same time. The numbers, at least in this case, don't lie. And yet, Trump et al. held to their erroneous claim. As Groucho Marx would say or is thus attributed, who are you going to believe: me or your lying eyes? Like some errant, erratic philosopher, President Trump seemed to be arguing against the very existence of verifiable truth. To borrow a phrase from Kellyanne Conway, there were no lies—only "alternative facts." Seeing is believing? No, no—believing is believing. If you're not on the side of the president, you're not on the side of America. How are we supposed to make the country great again if you don't buy in? We're in 2019 now, but the same tactics are being used by conservative commentators and, in turn, centrist media outlets to make us question what we see and know. Back in November, there was an uproar from the right after CNN reporter Jim Acosta was alleged to have manhandled a female aide who tried (unsuccessfully) to grab his microphone during a Trump press conference. Abuser, they cried! Assault, they railed! Of course, there was a proportionate uproar from the other direction when the Trump administration moved to revoke Acosta's credentials (and deservedly so), but with various critics calling for his ouster at CNN, one might've been concerned the network would give in to the calls for Acosta's head. What was truly disturbing about the whole episode was not Acosta's conduct—the CNN correspondent may have been a bit defensive about giving up the mic but he did excuse himself as the young woman grasped for it—but rather the attempts to discredit him. Instrumental in the effort to get Acosta canned was a video shared on social media by InfoWars editor-at-large Paul Joseph Watson and later passed along by Sarah Sanders that showed the interaction between Acosta and the aide. The clip appeared to show Acosta arresting the woman's arm with a "karate chop" of sorts. Casually omitted from proliferation of this video segment, however, was the knowledge that the action had been slowed or sped up at points to make Acosta's movement seem harsher than it actually was. The audio of Acosta excusing himself also was removed. The footage from the press conference was, in a word, doctored. By the time the clarifications could be assigned a day later, the right was already off and running with its narrative. To this day, conservative trolls maintain that Acosta should've been fired for his "attack" on the aide. In doing so, they have chosen a very convenient point at which to come to the defense of a young woman when members of the Republican Party are generally so intent on circumscribing women's power and freedom. But I digress. These cases are a little bit different in their presentation. With the aerial shots that proved Obama's crowds were bigger beyond the shadow of a doubt, there was little Donald Trump and his cronies could do outside of arguing for the relativity of truth in the abstract. Re Jim Acosta vs. the female White House aide, there was intentional manipulation at work(Watson denies it, but it's not like he and InfoWars have built a strong sense of credibility), though there were other versions of the clip from more trustworthy sources available. Either way, you were made to doubt what you saw or thought you saw. The eyes, they play tricks. And as we know, tricks are for kids. You're not a kid, are you? It is within this context that we can view the much-talked-about interaction between Covington Catholic High School (KY) students in Washington for a March for Life and Nathan Phillips, a Native American and veteran present for the Indigenous Peoples March. The iconic moment, if you will, happened when Nick Sandmann, one of the students and one of a number of them wearing a MAGA hat, stood face to face with Phillips while the latter beat a drum and sang. As Phillips has said in interviews, he was attempting to intercede between the students and members of the Black Hebrew Israelites, who shouted epithets at the high schoolers and preached about how they were "cursed Edomites." In the initial reaction to video from the interaction, most people regarded the Covington Catholic H.S. students fairly negatively. They were akin to a mob, standing in menacing opposition to Phillips, who was but one man. And that smirk. The enduring image of Sandmann staring motionless and speechless with a smirk on his face conveyed notions of racism and white privilege. Here were a bunch of white kids ganging up on an older person of color, a veteran and Native American no less. What better symbol of Trump's effect and how discriminatory values are inculcated in future generations? Not soon after, though, the narrative began to change. Additional videos were released that showed additional footage, including the students being egged on by the Black Hebrew Israelites. All of a sudden, these boys were the victim or were regarded with less contempt than before given the circumstances. Actually, now that I look closer, Phillips accosted them, not the other way around! We owe them an apology! We're so sorry, Covington Catholic High! Our mea culpas and retractions can't come fast enough! Thankfully, not everyone is buying the "both sides" arguments and self-flagellation many among the media, their associated outlets, and Hollywood's elite have begun to make. Laura Wagner, reporter at Deadspin, for one, advises us not to doubt what we saw with our own eyes. Recounting the predictable shift from immediate condemnation of the boys' conduct to downplaying if not outright denying any wrongdoing, Wagner addresses the notion that the kerfuffle on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial is nothing more than a Rorschach test for what you personally believe: One lesson of the past two days is that you will see what you want to see here, if you are determined to do so; that does not mean that there is anything to be seen but what is there. I see a frothing mass of MAGA youth—who, since we’re taking in all angles here, go to a school where students fairly recently wore blackface to a basketball game—frenzied and yelling and out of control. I see four black men who seem to belong to the Black Israelites—a threat to women in their orbit, but not to random white people they’re heckling—yelling insults at the students. Then I see Phillips, as he has stated from the beginning that he did, walk up to the teens, in what seems to be an attempt to diffuse the situation. I see them laughing and dancing, red MAGA hats bobbing up and down in glee. I see them yell in Phillips’ face, and I see that he doesn’t falter. I see the smugness of a group secure in its relative power over someone more vulnerable than they are. Nothing about the video showing the offensive language of Black Israelites changes how upsetting it was to see the Covington students, and Sandmann in particular, stare at Phillips with such contempt. I don’t see how you could watch this and think otherwise unless you’re willing to gaslight yourself, and others, in the service of granting undeserved sympathy to the privileged. And yet, that's exactly what happened. Various individuals backtracked, excused themselves, blamed their "reptile brains." They ignored their initial emotional responses and, without much else informing their decision-making, reversed their position. I apologize. I regret. I shouldn't have. I'm sorry. As far as Wagner is concerned, the reason for this is simple: it makes them seem more reasonable and trustworthy. They're not among the followers of the news who react impassionedly to it, betraying their better judgment for the sake of an outrage fix. Even if that means, as Wagner puts it, "siding with some shithead MAGA teens and saying that 2 + 2 = 5 in the face of every bit of evidence there is to be had." Whatever the reason, the final outcome still stands. These people failed to believe what they had seen with their own eyes. One criticism from people tracking this story is that these kids are being demonized by some, but what would you have them do instead? Unfortunately for promoters of this line of thinking, the answers are pretty easy. Walk away. Find a chaperone. Certainly, don't make mocking tomahawk chants. For those suggesting "boys will be boys" or pointing to the folly of youth, that shouldn't be an excuse. If Gillette can make an advertisement about toxic masculinity (which you may hate for being too preachy, but that's another story), these Catholic school kids can behave in a respectful manner. Blame the parents if you want, but let's have some responsibility assigned. Otherwise, some might point to the remarks made by Nick Sandmann and agree with his side of the story. But come the eff on. Why would this kid and his family need to hire a PR firm if, as the saying goes, the truth shall set you free? And that smirk. I know I'm harping on it, but it's pretty hard to get past. Sandmann says he was trying to diffuse the situation, but he could've taken any of the prescribed actions to do that rather than standing within feet of Nathan Phillips and smiling like an entitled little asshole. That Savannah Guthrie would encourage his defense of his "right" to stand on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and listen to Phillips as part of a softball interview is downright nauseating. The last objection to deliberation on this altercation may be perhaps the most valid: "Who cares?" That is, why are we spending so much time on whether some high schooler was smirking at an older Native American man when there's a crisis in Yemen, lead is still being found in drinking water, and other catastrophes abound? Relatively speaking, the events of this past weekend are a blip on the proverbial radar. Their symbolic value, meanwhile, carries more weight. It's about media portrayal of members of different ethnicities. It's about how pressure by conservative commentators and right-wing trolls—including threats of violence and release of personal information—can influence individuals and media outlets to spin the national conversation toward white victimhood. And it's about how people irrespective of gender or political ideology can be made to doubt what they see. It has nothing to do with "intelligence" either. When group dynamics are at work, the pressure to conform is a powerful force. We're all susceptible. Returning to the anecdote from the start of this piece, if it's hard to agree on what is factual or whether that matters, it's that much more difficult to have a meaningful conversation when something is right before our eyes and we can't come to a consensus on what we see. That's the most disturbing implication of the Covington Catholic/Nathan Phillips standoff and why people like Laura Wagner invoke 1984's dystopia. When you're made to question your own judgment, you're liable to believe anything. Should Nick Sandmann or anyone else involved herein be sent death threats? Of course not. But should he and his peers be absolved of all culpability? I submit no, and neither should the antagonists of the Black Hebrew Israelites. If you saw what I saw, you're not wrong—lying eyes and all. Read the full article

#BlackHebrewIsraelites #CovingtonCatholicHighSchool #NathanPhillips #NickSandmann #SavannahGuthrie