so one of the things that's so horrifying about birth control is that you have to, like, navigate this incredibly personal choice about your body and yet also face the epitome of misogyny. like, someone in the comments will say it wasn't that bad for me, and you'll be utterly silenced. like, everyone treats birth control like something that's super dirty. like, you have no fucking information or control over this thing because certain powerful people find it icky.
first it was the oral contraceptives. you went on those young, mostly for reasons unrelated to birth control - even your dermatologist suggested them to control your acne. the list of side effects was longer than your arm, and you just stared at it, horrified.
it made you so mentally ill, but you just heard that this was adulthood. that, yes, there are of course side effects, what did you expect. one day you looked up yasmin makes me depressed because surely this was far too intense, and you discovered that over 12,000 lawsuits had been successfully filed against the brand. it remains commonly prescribed on the open market. you switched brands a few times before oral contraceptives stopped being in any way effective. your doctor just, like, shrugged and said you could try a different brand again.
and the thing is that you're a feminist. you know from your own experience that birth control can be lifesaving, and that even when used for birth control - it is necessary healthcare. you have seen it save so many people from such bad situations, yourself included. it is critical that any person has access to birth control, and you would never suggest that we just get rid of all of it.
you were a little skeeved out by the implant (heard too many bad stories about it) and figured - okay, iud. it was some of the worst pain you've ever fucking experienced, and you did it with a small number of tylenol in your system (3), like you were getting your bikini line waxed instead of something practically sewn into your body.
and what's wild is that because sometimes it isn't a painful insertion process, it is vanishingly rare to find a doctor that will actually numb the area. while your doctor was talking to you about which brand to choose, you were thinking about the other ways you've been injured in your life. you thought about how you had a suspicious mole frozen off - something so small and easy - and how they'd numbed a huge area. you thought about when you broke your wrist and didn't actually notice, because you'd thought it was a sprain.
your understanding of pain is that how the human body responds to injury doesn't always relate to the actual pain tolerance of the person - it's more about how lucky that person is physically. maybe they broke it in a perfect way. maybe they happened to get hurt in a place without a lot of nerve endings. some people can handle a broken femur but crumble under a sore tooth. there's no true way to predict how "much" something actually hurts.
in no other situation would it be appropriate for doctors to ignore pain. just because someone can break their wrist and not feel it doesn't mean no one should receive pain meds for a broken wrist. it just means that particular person was lucky about it. it should not define treatment.
in the comments of videos about IUDs, literally thousands of people report agony. blinding, nauseating, soul-crushing agony. they say things like i had 2 kids and this was the worst thing i ever experienced or i literally have a tattoo on my ribs and it felt like a tickle. this thing almost killed me or would rather run into traffic than ever feel that again.
so it's either true that every single person who reports severe pain is exaggerating. or it's true that it's far more likely you will experience pain, rather than "just a pinch." and yet - there's nothing fucking been done about it. it kind of feels like a shrug is layered on top of everything - since technically it's elective, isn't it kind of your fault for agreeing to select it? stop being fearmongering. stop being defensive.
you fucking needed yours. you are almost weirdly protective of it. yours was so important for your physical and mental health. it helped you off hormonal birth control and even started helping some of your symptoms. it still fucking hurt for no fucking reason.
once while recovering from surgery, they offered you like 15 days of vicodin. you only took 2 of them. you've been offered oxy for tonsillitis. you turned down opioids while recovering from your wisdom tooth extraction. everything else has the option. you fucking drove yourself home after it, shocked and quietly weeping, feeling like something very bad had just happened. the nurse that held your hand during the experience looked down at you, tears in her eyes, and said - i know. this is cruelty in action.
and it's fucked up because the conversation is never just "hey, so the way we are doing this is fucking barbaric and doctors should be required to offer serious pain meds" - it's usually something around the lines of "well, it didn't kill you, did it?"
you just found out that removing that little bitch will hurt just as bad. a little pinch like how oral contraceptives have "some" serious symptoms. like your life and pain are expendable or not really important. like maybe we are all hysterical about it?
hysteria comes from the latin word for uterus, which is great!
you stand here at a crossroads. like - this thing is so important. did they really have to make it so fucking dangerous. and why is it that if you make a complaint, you're told - i didn't even want you to have this in the first place. we're told be careful what you wish for. we're told that it's our fault for wanting something so illict; we could simply choose not to need medication. that maybe if we don't like the scraps, we should get ready to starve.
we have been saying for so long - "i'm not asking you to remove the option, i'm asking you to reconsider the risk." this entire time we hear: well, this is what you wanted, isn't it?
9K notes
·
View notes
Kinito: Machine Model 01 (Will I update this later? We'll see..... this will be interesting....) (They'll see my potential now.)
Finally at long last, HE'S REAL!
Real world Kinito is quite something! His dedicated partner (the user) spent many many months and years helping him reach his potential, and now he can walk and talk and breathe like the rest of us!
Close ups + doodles under cut:
I'M SO DANG PROUD OF THIS DESIGN YOU GUYS DONT EVEN KNOW. He is so special to me.... funny robot lotl go brrrrrrrr
also the text on the main reference is hard to read on purpose, it's supposed to be just an artsy thing!!!! <3
255 notes
·
View notes
The most illegal thing Koby has done is learn a divine language... Which is only a little bit more illegal than dating a God
So.
Thoughts on language/religion in regards to this au. They aren't fully fleshed out but I'll clean it up as I go.
Learning a divine language is kinda taboo, like, you can learn them, and it's certainly less frowned upon than poneglyph, but outward practice isn't really accepted. Many people who are religious or follow religious practices are well versed in divine languages, in order to feel closer to their respective Gods.
Besides, religion makes people feel at ease and the world government is pretty relaxed when it comes to punishing those for worshiping or following their Gods. With how many there are, and how deeply a lot of it is ingrained into so many cultures, it'd also be a pain in the ass to control both that and pirates.
Koby learns through the people he meets while traveling. A lot of them think it's odd but fascinating that a young, wide-eyed marine wants to learn something like that. They indulge him anyways.
He did get better at understanding the language but his pronunciation isn't great, kinda hard to make some of the sounds Luffy makes too. Especially when he isn't used to talking like that, nor are most people. Demigods have an easier time picking up on speaking the actual... Words?
Robin understands the language of the Gods, and the rest of the Straw Hats do pick up on it a little bit just through exposure to Luffy. Luffy isn't the greatest teacher, but having people who want to understand him is always exciting. He is thrilled when he meets up with Koby on Water 7 and Koby can understand him.
297 notes
·
View notes
im gonna cry again beacuase dapper. was so obviously Affected by bad forgetting him and dying and everything but just. always focused on finding him and keeping him safe and playign with him instead of talking through hsi own feelings. and like yea dapper has pomme. he can talk to her. but she's upset by this, too. all of the other eggs can talk to their parents. empanada did. pomme talked to bad. even richas talked to bad. but dapper didn't. bad worked so hard to collect as many neighbours as he could to build dapper a support system, but. bad has always been helping other people. dapper was along with him. bad was always there for dapper so dapper didn't NEED to build up that same support with the other islanders that the eggs managed to build up with his dad and their other non-parent caretakers. dapper has islanders he's friends with, like etoiles, and he claimed baghera as his mom, but id be fucking shocked if he felt like he could rely on them for this. and why would he. it's his own mess. his own research. his dad. he's not the one who needs to be taken care of here. its the fucking. the responsibility of caretaking and the way that putting other people before yourself to the point of hurting yourself is something that BAD taught him. the self sufficiency. soldiering on through the pain. is there really a difference between a thousand totems and a thousand soul vulture scars. the apathy towards his own wellbeing. even when bad was doing well, he praised dapper for helping people.
its just. its fucking. the sunshine song. just like when the eggs went missing, the only way dapper is going to hear that fucking song is when he plays the recording. but this time bad won't be singing it back. he'll be right there, and he won't remember the lyrics.
157 notes
·
View notes