how much of what we know about ‘addiction’ has been made up to fit the idea that it is a ‘disease’? What complex functions of human nature are we ignoring to force a person’s behavioral compulsions into a model that has no backing of actual studies because agenda took the helm? I wish more people would read Chaz Bufe’s “AA: Cult or Cure?” and Joe Miller’s “The United States of AA” to get an idea of where a lot of it came from. If I were granted the wish of one Behind the Bastards episode/series it would be not on Bill Wilson but Mrs. Marty Mann (aka the lesbian who took her name and honorific from a marriage of convenience so she could hide behind it/not hurt the “reputation” of AA by being known as a lesbian, while being the most lesbian a lesbian can be, e.g., owning a housing in Cherry Grove on Fire Island). She was a PR wizard who managed to strongarm the AMA into adopting the hypothesis that ‘alcoholism’ could be a disease—once she was able to get even the barest acknowledgement that it could be likened to a disease, the PR cogs were set in motion, and people have been swallowing this idea wholesale ever since. I don’t expect anyone who goes to a 12 step group in a state of utter desperation to know these things or do scads of research before they begin; when a person feels overwhelmed by their problem and needs help, that’s the last thing they’re going to do. But the structure is such that research and free thought are discouraged (or summarily dismissed as “stinking thinking”)—often from an ‘experienced’ sponsor to the newcomer in a power dynamic that could best be described as a ‘cult of two’—and someone can find themselves convinced of something that has no basis in reality, more scared of themselves than they ever were under the influence of whatever they were medicating with, whether it’s alcohol, drugs, food, gambling, shopping, or sex.
If you struggle with substances (a behavioral compulsion with threads of chemical dependence), then you owe it to yourself to read widely. You are not broken or diseased—you are a human being, being human. The severity of your struggles don’t put you in a class above or below all others with their own behavioral issues, and you don’t need to close yourself off from the world at large to find community that understands you. Guidance and fellowship are awesome but you also don’t need to take a single person or group’s word for it when you have the capability to seek and parse other information. I’m not even asking you to take my word for it—I’ve only listed two authors and books but I’ve read more than just those, including Dr. Lance Dodes and Dr. Gabor Mate. I have plenty more on my to read pile. I got into the research after feeling completely overwhelmed by the stifling nature of Al-Anon, which I likened—then kindly—to “emotional kindergarten.” I think there are lots of people in 12 step groups that feel that there’s something more to life than endless meetings and a perpetual recovery with no exit into ordinary life, but are actively discouraged from looking outside of “the rooms” for help. You’re allowed to look beyond the first measure of help. It is not the only way. (I dare say it’s not the way at all, but again, that’s my opinion based on my own research.) if people are trotting out the notion that your only alternatives are “jails, institutions, or death,” but also say “you’re free to leave at any time,” you will get stuck somewhere in the middle, and you deserve more than to be merely held in place for the rest of your life, afraid that thinking for yourself will lead to a downward spiral.
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What do you hope to see in the second season of Hazbin Hotel?
-the repercussions of all of Hell now knowing that angels can be killed. How would the hell denizens and the angels react to it? Would exterminations still be a thing?
-finding out how exactly Pentious got to be an angel
-just more Emily god pls i love her so much
-I heard about the fact that Angel has a sister in heaven who was actually cameod in ep6, so I'd like to see their storyline explored too
-more of the mentor/mentee relationship between Rosie/Charlie and Carmila/Vaggie. I just love that they're role models for different things, with Rosie teaching Charlie that she can lead demons even tho she also has a bright disposition while Carmilla teaches Vaggie how to fight for her loved ones without leaving herself vulnerable.
-Chaggie proposal? Maybe something Vaggie works up to do the whole season and she pops the question at the finale. It would be great if she asks Lucifer advice too, especially if this triggers him to reminisce about his own failed marriage
-just any Lucifer/Vaggie interaction is what I need tbh
-also really want Vaggie to interact with Clara and Odette(Carmilla's daughters)
-I wanna see Alastor do something truly evil. And I dont mean eating some nameless fodders or stories about him torturing overlords. I want the show to actually show how evil he is by killing a named character. I thought it was gonna be Husk at first because narratively speaking he's in the best position to be killed off, but apparently he and Angel are a slowburn so maybe not.
- i want a Nifty song!! I wanna hear Kimiko sing more so bad!!!! Also really wanna know if there's more to her or if she's really just meant to be the comic relief. Either way im happy with it tho!
- an actual Chaggie duet. The More than Anything reprise is great, even if it was short. But i need an actual duet that's a song of it's own
- I wanna see Charlie win a fight. I know it's not her thing, but i wanna see my baby finally let the devil in her loose.
- Valentino's death ❤️
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since you write for demon slayer i was wondering if you could write about the reader being tengen’s tsuguko and their mentor/mentee relationship (personally i think he’d be tough on them but care deep down. maybe touching on the entertainment district arc? thank you <3
being the sound hashira's tsuguko.
summary. what is it like being tengen uzui's student?
trigger & content warnings. mild depictions of injury, limb loss, voluntarily consuming poison, etc.
tropes, pairings, fic length, & other notes. found family-ish, fluff, slight angst towards the end. tengen uzui (and his wives) & reader. 0.7k words. they/them pronouns for reader.
author's thoughts. i took this request and RAN with it, i love mentor/mentee requests for any fandom but especially for demon slayer.... the age was unspecified in this req, so i personally imaged tsuguko!reader being around tanjiro's age, however i left it pretty ambiguous so anyone can imagine it however they want. i also decided not to touch too deeply on the entertainment district arc, since this is only a headcanon post, but i'm totally cool with writing an actual fic about it! just shoot me another request if that's something you'd like to see <3
tengen is definitely a very tough mentor, and he doesn't get the opportunity to train many tsugukos because of this. he's hard on his students. he's a demanding mentor, though at the very least, he lays out his expectations clearly. he knows exactly what he wants he students to know.
the lower ranked demon slayers have favored hashira, ones they would prefer to train under if they were ever given the chance to. tengen is not really one of those favored potential mentors. preferred mentors would be people like kyojuro or mitsuri. that isn't to say any other hashira would be any less tough on their tsugukos than tengen is, but the sound hashira supposes those two come off as kinder than he does.
of course, it should be made very clear that he's hard on his students not because he gets some kind of sadistic pleasure out of watching them struggle, but because he wants them to survive.
his training is just downright difficult. it's all in the spirit of survival, though.
a tsuguko of his would have a lot of things expected of them.
his student is expected to build poison resistance by microdosing themselves day after day.
his student is expected to have a certain amount of stamina.
they're expected to be stealthy.
they're expected to be able to make split-second decisions.
simply put, it's... a lot.
generally, anyone who trains under him quits shortly after beginning, so they don't really get to know him. they don't get to understand why he does what he does. they miss the opportunity to really understand him. the one exception would be his current tsuguko, [name].
he cares very deeply for the one tsuguko that did stick around!
tbh, he's pretty open about that fact, especially when he's alone with them and his wives! he's not secretive about caring for them.
he expects them to prioritize their own life. it is something that other demon slayers might not agree with, something that others find "selfish" and "cruel."
tengen does not see it that way.
he's seen that self-sacrificial, "give everything up for the mission" ideology tear people apart. he's seen it tear his blood family apart. he'd be damned if he let it tear his chosen family apart.
"because you are very dear to me," he'd say, placing a firm hand on their head and ruffling their hair fondly, "i expect you to value your life above all others. the mission is not worth your life. you protect yourself, you protect others, and you get the hell out of there if you can't handle it. you come back to me, to us. you got that?"
i personally think he'd treat his tsuguko like his kid if they're sixteen or under. yeah, he's only in his early 20s. so what? that's his kid. if they're above that age, he treats them like a precious younger sibling. if they happen to be older than him? he does not care. that's still his younger sibling.
regardless of their age, his tsuguko is a part of his little family.
no demon will ever lay their hands on his family and get away with it. he will not allow it.
if they get injured on a mission and they're recovering at the butterfly estate, my man is at their bedside in an instant. he probably yells at them because how dare they worry him?? where did they get the audacity??? tengen eventually gets over it and admits that he's glad they're alright. his wives also come to visit them when they have the time!!
now, as for the entertainment district...
i think that mission would be very mentally taxing (and of course physically taxing, but let's focus more on the stress and panic for now).
seeing tengen lose his arm like that, thinking he was dead... god, it would terrify them. they have grown to see him as strong and infallible, so to see him so weak and broken would be genuinely horrifying.
they'd cry tbh
good luck to gyutaro, though. bro is at the mercy of their rage. having learned from tengen, i wholeheartedly believe that his tsuguko would be able to hold their own against the demon for at least a little bit. long enough for tengen to recover, long enough for everything to go according to plan.
but, of course... tengen does retire in the end.
well.
the whole point of having a tsuguko is to have someone reliable to succeed their respective mentor, right?
tengen loves his tsuguko.
he knows they're capable enough.
he wouldn't want anyone else taking his place <3
please consider reblogging, it helps me out quite a lot!
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reasons to stay delulu jjk 236 spoilers sorry if this is messy i have classes in a bit
why would gojo say bye to all the dead people if he's dead?
nanami said 'move north, if you are looking for a new side of yourself and move south if you want to stay as you are'. stay with the dead, or move on to the living?
on a even more serious note, gojo is not gege's favourite character, it's a pretty well known by now. however i do not think that means that he wouldn't wrap up gojo's character in some way that wasn't satisfying to his character. i can see gojo losing the fight, maybe even losing his technique from sukuna. i think it would be a pretty good way to call back the whole "are you satoru gojo because you are the strongest, or are you the strongest because you are satoru gojo?" if gojo lost he would have to address the flaws in his plans for the future of jujutsu, the mistake of shibuya. the reason why everyone's freaking out about gojo's death so much, other than... well. is that it doesn't really sink in. a flashback/afterlife scene before an offscreen death? really?
gojo's students got no goodbyes, only dead people.
megumi and tsumiki didn't get mentioned at all in his "last moments". and while the "megumi and tsumiki are his children" concepts are one of my favourites to see in fanfics and art, the manga definitely leans more towards mentor/mentee/caretaker. nevertheless, no matter how you interpret their relationship, there still is some form of care between them that should have required some form of goodbye! he's literally fighting megumi's body!
the overall rushing of the buildup to gojo vs sukuna didn't allow any of the characters to have any closure or move their characters forward. what was gojo's reaction to all the deaths that happened? nanami, president yaga? yuuji's grief for causing the death of so many? nobara out of commission? maki's murder of the zenins?
was gojo the one to kill the higher ups? if so that meant that he went back on his idea of replacing the upper echelons with his own people, meaning there was still development to be had.
the "you should have gone for the head" quote from the hidden inventory arc.
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Steve Week 2023 Day 4: Old Friends/New Friends
I think about Steve and Lilith's weird coworker/mentor-mentee relationship a lot. Lilith has probably worked with hundreds of scouts in her years with the coven before Steve showed up (he's mid-20s, she's late-40s at least) but there's something about this scraggly young lad who's always aggressively optimistic and never knows when to stop talking (and always carries the best snacks on away missions) that makes her rather fond of him. He talks about his baby brother a lot, and maybe it makes her think of Eda. He's a hard-working and reliable scout, just like they all should be, but he's also refreshingly honest and observant, and he notices things other people don't. She's long since abandoned any attempts to keep their work dynamic formal, despite the difference in rank, and she enjoys their little on-duty chats far more than she'd ever admit.
In turn I think Steve looked up to and idolised Lilith for many years and initially jumped at the chance to work with the head of the coven. Over the years he's realised she's nothing like he expected, but he still holds her in very high regard and greatly values her advice and approval. He's learned a lot from her over the years, both in terms of magical ability and how to survive in the EC without drawing the wrong kind of attention. Lilith abandoning the coven at the end of Season 1 was probably the first major lightbulb moment Steve had about something being very wrong and maybe trying to get out himself, but it takes a few extra pushes for him to work up the courage to go. I think after the Collectorpocalypse they become even firmer friends, possibly even working together on rebuilding the museum, and eventually he asks her to officiate his wedding
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