#Murderbot is touch repulsed | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

ober-affen-geil · 2 years

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Ok so having just started the Murderbot Diaries series by Martha Wells I was going through the Murderbot tag here and noticed 2 things. 1) people yelling about respecting Murderbot's canonical and consistent touch-repulsion but not really supplying any alternatives and 2) at least two pieces of art of what seemed to be people attempting to either respect (charitably) or get around (uncharitably) Murderbot's touch repulsion by having it "link" or "hold" pinkies with someone for comfort.

As someone who is....not exactly touch averse or repulsed but certainly touch neutral (it's not something I flinch from but it's also not something I seek out or really enjoy) I thought I could provide helpful insight for both points: namely, "here is how someone who doesn't enjoy touch would prefer it to be substituted because humans are pretty touchy feely and getting your brain around someone genuinely not enjoying that is tough" and also "this is why touching just pinkies is not the loophole you think it is".

Keeping in mind this is more meant to be for fic reference, but if it helps with insight for real life that's great too. For clarity, this is based on my experience which is mostly for sensory reasons and is not in any way trauma related; others may have different experiences.

I will start with the pinkie and why that's........super not great actually, because it will help get into the headspace which will help with "what to actually do instead".

The thing is, linking pinkies as a substitute for holding hands, which seems to be how it's being used here, does not "get around" touch aversion because it's not enough contact to "set it off". It actually does the opposite (for me). Now I have to be hyper aware of how much my pinkie is curled, how high am I holding my hand, how far away from my body is my arm, does it feel like I'm pulling on *their* arm or hand or pinkie, is my hand sweaty, do I have an itch, I can feel my joints creaking as I struggle not to move too much lest I dislodge them...etc. If the point was to offer me a point of contact that was small enough for me to be able to not notice it too much? It failed. Badly. I'd rather have a full body hug.

Linking pinkies doesn't work as a loophole because it fundamentally misunderstands the main source of the touch aversion: concentrated hyper awareness of the body. The smaller the touch the more tightly concentrated the awareness is, and the worse it will be. It's also a non-standard kind of touch which means there is NOTHING to go off of in terms of what is wanted from you, aka its a very difficult touch to "perform" (yes I'm talking about masking). Edit: Also! Your fingertips and finger pads are *designed* for sensory input! And are a part of your body that is nearly almost always uncovered! Which means a) practically GUARANTEED skin to skin contact which is Worse and b) congrats, you picked one of the few areas on the body that is Designed To Tell A Person They Are Touching Something.

What a touch averse person would prefer, if you wanted to offer comfort or convey affection, is to first and foremost *not to ask them to perform for YOUR comfort/frame of reference to begin with*.

Words of affirmation, a simple hand gesture (such as placing your hand over your heart), literally just asking them if they want to talk, sitting in silence with them (engaging in parallel play), or perhaps offering a blanket/comfy clothes/food are all much better ways to actually offer a touch averse person comfort or intimacy while also still respecting their boundary.

Actual "loopholes" in (my) touch aversion include incidental contact that doesn't last and is ignored/meaningless to all parties (such as brushing past someone or being in a crowded space), the "mom" override (when I know someone really needs physical comfort in that moment which, tbc, is doing fuck all for me and is entirely about the other person), and functional necessity (such as medical attention or grabbing someone to help them up or keep them steady). (In case anyone was keeping track, Murderbot has shown all of these "exceptions" to my knowledge.)

I just. Hope this helps with understanding the mindset instead of just being beaten over the head with "respect touch aversion or you are ableist" because i do understand its hard to wrap your head around. But we deal with it so frankly, you can deal with it too for a change.

#Murderbot #the murderbot diaries #Touch aversion #Touch repulsed

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comfortunit · 10 months

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people using fandom ‘artistic license’ as an excuse to depict a sex-repulsed, romance-repulse, platonic-averse traumatized character—the few who even exist, mind you—in romantic sexual situations to their heart’s content, ignoring how trauma has canonically impacted this character, and how trauma impacts actual people, not to mention the number of times murderbot itself has explicitly said something in the category of “i am repulsed by sex and repulsed by romance and i hate it when people ignore me and don’t listen to me” brings to mind the sentiments like “oh honey, everyone is traumatized!” i get from idiots all the time

#even if everyone has trauma i don’t see everyone’s trauma being treated as the traumatized person’s trauma #i see other people fail to grasp *how* traumatized someone is - and in what way;#as in ‘i was sexually traumatized and now i am touch averse and sex-repulsed and romance-repulsed’#as in ‘i am all of these things and i don’t want to ‘‘get better’’ and i don’t want to be touched i want to be left alone’#how hard is it for people to be taken at their word when it comes to this #misunderstandings after this level of transparency speak to an intentional misunderstanding #you don’t want to get it because you refuse to get it.#if murderbot itself knew you shipped it with gurathin. sexually. and romantically. it would be afraid of you.#it would be angry and it would be afraid of you.

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starblaster · 1 year

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some murderbot fans/readers think they can say whatever they want about murderbot as long as they use the right pronouns for it. as if the romance and sex repulsion, touch aversion, and its other characterizing mannerisms mean nothing, apparently. it's just transparently obvious that people like this don't appreciate or respect how murderbot is written.

#and it's honestly quite shameful #i would hate to know what you think of real life people who are touch averse and romance repulsed and sex repulsed #do you force your affections on them? do you make them uncomfortable and violate their boundaries despite knowing them?#there are real people who share a lot of those preferences with murderbot #how could people like that trust you?#when it's clear you'd rather erase those attributes in favor of things you're personally comfortable with #murderbot tag #the murderbot diaries #suit.txt

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walks-the-ages · 2 years

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Imagine reading the Murderbot Diaries, featuring a main character who is l the endangered three way species of "canonically aromantic" "canonically asexual" and "canonically touch-repulsed",

Imagine reading a book series that has a main character that's canonically ace, aro, and touch repulsed, and then going out of your way to explicitly romantically and sexually ship this character with literally everyone under the sun,

because you're literally so goddamn fucking obsessed with shipping that you can't let aro ace and touch-repulsed and autistic and nonbinary people have this single tiny scrap of representation without literally having a solid chunk of the fandom literally shipping the aro ace touch repulsed sex repulsed main character with its literal owner/adoptive mother?

Really?

You could literally pick any of the canon relationships to write about, you could literally pick any other goddamn million fandom in existence for you to write shippy shit about, and you choose to ship goddamn fucking Murderbot?

You choose to ship the canonically aro and ace and touch repulsed and sex repulsed character?

Out of the literally unlimited number of characters that exist in the entire world, and you just have to pick the canon ace and aro character? You pick the character that's sex repulsed and romance repulsed to ship?

You literally can't let real life aro and ace and sex repulsed and touch averse and autistic and nonbinary characters have this single shred of representation without turning it into your own personal fantasy of sex and romance magically "fixing" ace and aro characters into being "normal"?

Taking this canon ace and aro and touch repulsed character, who represents so many real people, and instead erasing everything that they are so you can write smut and shippy romance bullshit about "haha funny robot""?

#Murderbot #the murderbot diaries #SecUnit #ART #Perihelion #Mensah #dr mensah #asexuality #aromantism #aroace #touch repulsion #aphobia #fandoms erasing aspec characters for the sake of shipping

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imitationgame77 · 6 days

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Murderbot's repulsion to physical contact

We all know Murderbot hates to be touched.

Her expression had turned all melty and sentimental. "No hugging," I warned her. It was in our contract.

[Network Effect]

But it did not express the repulsion so strongly earlier.

When I came out Ratthi was still there. He grabbed my arm and tugged me past a couple of human techs and [...]

"Again, I have a court order," Pin-Lee said, grabbed my other arm, and they walked me out.

[All Systems Red]

Maybe, at this point, Murderbot was not used to not pretending to ack like a normal SecUnit, so, quick suppression of reaction happened automatically. And also, maybe in this situation when things happened so rapidly that Murderbot was too overwhelmed to comment on something which had lower priority in terms of its threat assessment.

Murderbot can spontaneously grab, scoop up, carry humans in situations that require action. In order to save them. But I thought it was noteworthy that Murderbot was voluntarily holding a hand of a human in Artificial Condition.

When Tapan woke, I was sitting on the MedSystem's platform holding her hand.

[Artificial Condition]

Tapan was being cared for by ART's MedSystem, and it was not necessary for Murderbot to hold her hand while she was just gaining consciousness.

I thought about possible explanations: (1) Murderbot had only very recently started living without the armour, thus, its no-contact boundary was less strict; (2) Murderbot felt responsible for her injuries, and seeing how young and vulnerable Tapan was, it felt holding hand was necessary like when it extended emotional support to Volescu; (3) Tapan was its first voluntary-contract client, and having been given appreciation, gratitude, apologies, and requests that it had not been used to, it also wanted to reciprocate with kindness; (4) In medias that Murderbot had watched, all the good people came out of coma or whatever state with somebody holding their hands; (5) ART told it it should do it.

Anything else?

#the murderbot diaries #murderbot #tmbd #murderbot with physical contact #all systems red #artificial condition

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murderbotwritingprompts · 3 months

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Yes, yes, you love Murderbot. You think Murderbot is so funny and relatable. You'd die for Murderbot. We know.

But do you actually use Murderbot's it/its pronouns? Do you actually respect the fact that it's an everything-repulsed aroace and is solitaremit touch-averse, and the fact that it represents real people who are these things?

Or do you just "love" the "relatable" version of Murderbot that exists in your head, where you've cut out and replaced everything that makes it who it is as a character with things you can personally relate to, even though the whole theme of the series is that you need to respect people even when you can't relate to them?

Do you think "representation matters" only when you're the one being represented?

Do you think it magically becomes okay to erase canon Queer identities and disabilities as long as you're not the one being represented?

Do you actually love the character of Murderbot, who is explicitly everything-repulsed aroace, nonbinary and uses it/its pronouns exclusively, and is soltaremit touch-averse?

Or do you just love the OC you've slapped its name onto that exists in your head?

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penig · 11 months

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So, in the category of Silly and Impossible Sim Challenges, I wonder what mods, cheats, and mechanics you'd have to use to make Murderbot in Sims 2?

Murderbot is a construct of a type called a SecUnit made of cloned human tissue, extremely complex hardware, and software that integrates with both and makes the hardware look simple. Its primary function is to protect, so it has energy weapons in its arms, superstrength, superspeed, a certain amount of self-healing, and can handle multiple sensory and data inputs, utilizing scout drones and a kind of universal internet/virtual reality environment called "the feed." It can, quite literally, fight a running battle with multiple opponents, hack multiple systems, track what's going on in other locations that it has camera access to, communicate and make coherent plans with other intelligent entities over the feed or through direct verbal communication, and worry about what's going on in places outside of its sensory reach, all at the same time. A lot of its time, however, has been spent monitoring a peaceful environment for threats and hacking systems while consuming media.

It can pass as a human augmented with cyborg technology, and has altered its height and its hair production to make this easier. It also runs subroutines to mimic random human movement when it wants to pass. When it doesn't want to pass, it becomes noticeably uncanny valley.

Corporations abuse their SecUnits functions quite a bit, and install governor modules in their constructs that punish them by directly acting on neural tissue, in case they protect the "wrong thing" (like, workers instead of equipment) but after a certain horrific incident, Murderbot hacked its governor module so that it could do whatever it wanted to. It then kept doing its job, lying low and watching media, because it didn't know what else it wanted to do; only what it didn't want to do. This backstory has left Murderbot full of rage and anxiety. It is touch averse and doesn't like being looked at directly or making eye contact with people. Sometimes it has an Emotion and it wants privacy for that.

It is AAA - agender, asexual, and aromantic. It literally has no sex organs, and being used to spy on clients 24/7 has left it not only indifferent to but deeply repulsed by sex - it fast-forwards through sex scenes in media. It doesn't even like the word "relationship," yet its favorite show is a long-running soap opera, and it tracks the personal relationships of its clients closely (ostensibly for security reasons; if a married couple who treat each other and it well retreat to a room it can't monitor they're more likely to be having sex than plotting against it, while two people who hate each other may break out into violence and require intervention to prevent them from damaging each other and/or company property).

It derives operating energy from a rechargeable battery pack of remarkable productivity and longevity. It could mimic eating or drinking, but what it consumed would just sit in a lung till it could be expelled and that's gross. Most human bodily functions repel it more or less, though it isn't disgusted by seeing people eat. It doesn't sleep but occasionally goes offline during recharge cycles, mostly to avoid conversations it doesn't want to have.

The obvious thing is to make it a servo, which should deal with some of the motive-based things; but the first thing you'd need would be a servo default that looked like a humaniform sim, onto which you could add layerable CC accessories. Its bare feet are a particular problem as they are never explicitly described, but the text makes it clear that they're not remotely like human feet. However, as I understand it (I have never played a servo), servos are on the same gender binary as humaniform sims, so we'd need a lot of androgynous CC, too. Its preferred clothing styles are hoodies and loose pants with lots of pockets (for carrying drones and tools and evidence and stuff; it also has secret compartments in its torso, which we fortunately don't have to worry about because of the inventory mechanic), and it wears boots with most outfits. Oh, yeah, and it can detach extremities and still operate them like drones, which I don't think we can simulate but so far in the series it's only done this once. Another difficulty with servos is that Murderbot's core identity is SecUnit and it resents being asked to do mundane chores outside of its function, while Servos were designed and coded with the notion of a housekeeping bot in mind.

Using an editing tool to set its gender preference at -100/-100 should be sufficient for the asexual/aromantic part. Zero social points is obvious; but nice points are a problem. Murderbot is capable of extreme violence even when its rage isn't activated (its rage is usually activated) but it's never unprovoked violence. It would never walk up to a stranger and flick their nose or otherwise pick a fight. It would recoil from flirts or solicitations to dance or play, but if you did get it to play catch with you, it wouldn't throw the ball at your head - it'd be more likely to aim precisely at your hand so that it's almost impossible for you not to catch it. In a lot of ways it's high nice, but the nice gestures are entirely inappropriate to it.

Active and playful points are another puzzle. Murderbot can stand still for hours, perfectly happy, watching hour after hour of media and scanning for threats, but it can also sustain heavy mental and physical activity for similar stretches of time. It takes life very seriously but has a snarky sense of humor and an endless capacity for media consumption.

Honestly all the personality points are like that. It's scrupulously tidy but isn't down for cleaning up after anybody - that's one of the things drones and cleaning bots are for. It's cripplingly shy but you only have to look vulnerable and it will adopt you as a client and protect you with its life and then some, even if you're not very nice to it. (We only see it happen once, but it has no reason to lie when it says that multiple clients have shot it.)

Aspiration is hard. It likes winning fights and Popularity is the least sexy aspiration, but the idea of it actively wanting to make friends with people or throw parties is absurd. Fortune sims are very sexy and though Murderbot likes getting paid so it can get its own gear and doesn't have to pirate shows it's not much into money otherwise. Pleasure and Romance are right out. Family would be...technically doable but so, so weird in so, so many ways. And Knowledge...well, it's very smart indeed, and highly knowledgeable in its areas of interest, but it's also prone to using words it knows are wrong but can't be bothered to correct, and it complains about the low quality of learning modules provided by the company it was owned by until the end of the first book, but never provides itself with better ones.

It would have to have max body points and stuck smart milk syndrome, but otherwise start play pretty ignorant.

Probably you couldn't really do it satisfactorily at all, but I'm willing to hear suggestions from simmers who have read The Murderbot Diaries, or have played nonhuman sims before and know where the CC is.

#Sims 2 #murderbot #silliness

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readythefanons · 1 year

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1, 14, & 15!

ah! ♥ I will answer re: my silly MurderBot WIP

1: the dumbest possible version of the next sentence needed:

And then the soft marshmallow and the sunshine one hugged, and the grouchy one was grouchy about not being included while still repulsed by physical touch.

That's it, that's the penultimate beat of this entire thing!!!!

15: what about this WIP is driving you nuts?

Honestly I would really like to be done writing this one! It feels like having a tab open for several months... in my brain

14: what do you like about this WIP?

This is the dumbest, silliest, most unnecessary fic in the entire world. The audience for this fic is me and one other person, maximum, and given my current antipathy for it, it's probably less than 2 right now!

And yet,* here it is, still taking up space in my brain.

This started with some sort of joke along the lines of "I'm going to invent a crackship. I'm going to artificially create a blorbo." And then I picked a) a character with like 3 speaking lines in the whole fic and b) a character with 0 speaking lines that may or may not be canonically sentient. And I went "IT'S TIME"

And... you know??? It was super fun to write! And my friend liked it! And I would just love to slip those last few jokes into it and tie it up with a bow.

And I will.

(someday!)

#and yet #one of my favorite phrases #my world turns on 'and yet'#it is my personal feeling that the more niche and unlikely to draw attention a fic is #the more fervently enthusiastic the author needs to be #completely unhinged with love and whacked out on glee #shake the pompoms with aggressive love #shake them with living aggression #ask game

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aspec-tmbd · 1 year

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Title: Pleasure Contract Author: rainbowmagnet Rating: Explicit Tags: #No Archive Warnings Apply #Asshole Research Transport/Murderbot #Murderbot #Robot Brain Sex #Compromise #Asexual Character #Sex Repulsion #touch-averse character #Self-Doubt #Size Difference #Comparing yourself to others #Aftercare #mention of robot STIs #Sexual Shame #Trust Words: 2,795 Chapters: 1/1

Murderbot "blackmails" ART into having a media marathon with it in turn for giving ART some intimate pleasure. Murderbot ends up thinking about how their data exchange differs from regular human sex.

#the murderbot diaries #aspec tmbd #fanworks #murderbot shipping

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uovoc · 3 years

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Murderbot privacy

“SecUnit is a very private person, it doesn’t like to talk about its feelings” made me do a double take because I was like, SecUnit, who’s listening to you right now? Since when has it cared about privacy? Because while MB is a secretive fucker, it sure doesn’t extend that courtesy to others. And what I could figure out so far to explain this apparent hypocrisy is some more-or-less coherent stuff.

Summary:

MB conflates personal, private, and secret because these categories could not exist separately under the regime of surveillance and objectification inflicted upon it in the CR. This meant that the development of MB’s sense of personal identity was limited to its internal self. As a result, MB has a good instinctive grasp of the right to privacy regarding one’s emotions and internal state. However, its lack of bodily autonomy and background as a cog in the CR surveillance state have led it to regard physical privacy as a personal privilege rather than a right.

2200 words below the cut. I think about Murderbot a normal amount

Terminology

For clarity, the terms personal, private, secret, and privacy will be defined basically by their Merriam-Webster definitions. Personal will be used to mean relating to an individual’s character, conduct, motives, or private affairs. Secret is defined as kept from knowledge or view; hidden. Private will be used to mean 1) intended for or restricted to the use of particular person, group, or class. Privacy will be defined as the quality or state of being apart from company or observation; freedom from unauthorized intrusion. These are not comprehensive definitions, but for clarity’s sake they’re the ones I will use here.

The connotations that they carry in this analysis are:

Things that are secret are actively concealed. If something is secret, people are not aware of its existence. Secrets carry the implication of potential harm if divulged.

Privacy and things that are private are generally kept as such by social norms rather than active enforcement. The existence of things that are private may be known, but the details are limited to a restricted (trusted) audience. For instance, to quote Beatrice-Otter, “the contents of my underwear drawer are private, but not secret.” If you’re at someone’s house, you could technically go look in someone’s underwear drawer – it’s not like they can stop you – but out of the mutually agreed-upon respect for privacy and definition of what qualifies as private, you don’t. Things kept private tend to be done so for personal-emotional reasons rather than practical reasons.

These are limited definitions and not mutually exclusive. For instance, privacy can be enforced by gates and barriers like secrets are. These definitions aren’t meant to be comprehensive, but just to establish the meanings and connotations that I’m working with.

Privacy in the CR versus Preservation

Murderbot’s approach to privacy reflects the attitudes of the Corporation Rim. Preservation regards privacy more like a personal right and establishes it through primarily through societal norms, while the Corporation Rim treats privacy more like a personal privilege which individuals are responsible for securing and maintaining. In Preservation, freedom from observation is the default, and surveillance is the exception. To MBs annoyance, unless a space is singled out for security reasons (cargo spaces and high-traffic zones on the station), it’s generally left unsurveilled (residential areas, pedestrian corridors, most of the planet that we see in NE). Preservation also has cultural expectations of certain types of spaces being private. MB doesn’t share these expectations, as it notes in NE when it admits that its eavesdropping habit is “a little incriminating with the whole listening to private conversations in secured spaces and personal dwellings thing.” The specificity of “secured spaces and personal dwellings” makes this sound like something someone else said to MB that it’s now repeating, especially since it doesn’t agree that what others consider private conversations or private spaces are inherently off-limits to observation.

Unlike Preservation, MB sees privacy as a privilege rather than an inherent right, because it’s more used to the attitude of the CR surveillance state. In the labor installations that MB was deployed on, everything people did was observed by SecSystem at all times. If you wanted privacy, you had to pay for it, as MB notes in ES when it’s complaining about the lack of cameras in the fancy hotel that it books when it arrives. Even then, you might not get what you pay for, and MB take steps to secure PresAux’s own camera network that they later set up. In the CR, privacy is closer in meeting to secrecy, something that must be actively enforced and secured against intrusion. Corporate entities in the CR are motivated to erode personal privacy for profit in the form of datamining and workforce control. Privacy is thus a personal responsibility, since the surrounding environment is one that seeks to undermine it. This is the attitude towards privacy that MB is working with, and part of why it feels entitled to constant surveillance of its humans. In contrast, privacy in Preservation is a right maintained by the collective expectations and policies of the larger community. Station Security doesn’t exactly approve of MB setting up its own surveillance network, but nor does it do regular drone removal sweeps. MB expects privacy to be actively secured, and sees Preservation’s easily breached systems as the equivalent of leaving your valuables out on the lawn. If you don’t want to be surveilled, don’t go around being surveillable.

Surveillance exemptions

Instances where MB appears to respect the notion of privacy are sex/bodily functions, proprietary data, and feelings talks. However, out of these 3 categories, feelings are the topic where MB’s motivations align most closely with the human understanding of privacy. MB’s aversion to sex is more of an ick factor thing, since it repeatedly states that it finds human bodily functions to be disgusting. (I think touch aversion is also part of the sex-repulsed thing, but touch aversion aligns more with ick factor and also with lack of bodily autonomy, discussed below.)

Proprietary data is another topic on which MB appears to be on the same page as humans regarding “private” as being restricted to a particular group: it doesn’t tell the Mensah parents about Amena’s creepy date, and it removes the audio when it shows Indah the video of Mensah complaining about another councilmember. In both of these cases, there’s the potential for harm if the information is divulged: Amena would get scolded and possibly grounded by her parents, and Mensah’s relationships with the Council and Senior Indah would be damaged by her lack of professionalism. In a business context, proprietary data is information kept within a company because it would give your competitors an advantage, or because your competitors could use it to put you at a disadvantage – pretty much the same results, in the game of capitalism. Although both of these examples deal with personal-emotional information, the concept of proprietary data is closer to secrecy in its potential for harm and complete concealment of the information’s existence.

The third type of situation where MB appears to be on the same page as humans regarding privacy is people talking about their feelings. After Arada gets back from the Barish-Estranza negotiations, MB pointedly does not watch her and Overse make up because of the high likelihood that “they were having sex and/or a relationship discussion (either of which I would prefer to stab myself in the face than see).” Sex falls under the ick factor, but there’s a number of reasons the fandom collective braincell has pointed out for MB not wanting to watch people talk about their feelings:

MB exercising the privilege of not having to care about human feelings, as a formerly enslaved person subjected to human whims.

Secondhand embarrassment because MB would never talk about its feelings.

Related to the above, MB reflexively recoiling out of empathy because if it was in their position, it wouldn’t want someone listening in on its feelings.

Actually, now that I think of it, MB doesn’t go into great detail on why it doesn’t like watching humans talk about their feelings, unlike how it explicitly expresses its disgust for anything involving human fluids. Which is why I’ve got the suspicion that when it comes to feelings, MB does have a strong instinctive understanding of what it means for something to be private and, as a result, gets uncomfortable observing a moment that is not meant for others to see. MB has an easier time understanding how privacy applies to feelings rather than acts because unlike its body, its feelings are strongly tied to its concept of what is personal.

MB’s internal and external self

To paraphrase this one MDZS meta, MB’s body is not its own. MB’s sense of what is personal to it, or its sense of unique identity, applies more its internal self than its external self because of its former nonperson status in the CR. This informs what MB considers to be inherently private. While in the CR, its appearance and configuration were decided by the company. To be fair, humans don’t get to choose our original bodies either, but our bodies and the modifications we make to them tell a story of our personal background. The history inscribed in MB’s body, down to the logos etched on its structure, is that of a mass-produced piece of corporate equipment. MB does not have a particular attachment to its external appearance (“standard human”) because its appearance reflects the company’s choices rather than its own. (This changes after it gains the freedom to choose its own clothes and gets tabletop surgery from ART, discussed at the end.) Although MB’s configuration is what makes it a SecUnit, and being a SecUnit is an essential part of its identity, it’s not an identity that’s unique to MB.

For most of its life, MB’s actions have also been extensions of the company. Its actions have either been dictated by its clients and governor module, or it has had to pretend to be controlled by those things, which means making decisions which could conceivably have been issued with the governor module’s approval. MB is also used to selling its body, since it’s expected to literally sacrifice pieces of itself to keep its clients safe (an expectation it continues to hold). MB has been ship-of-Theseus’d to hell and back. The lack of both bodily autonomy and bodily safety due to its nonperson status in the CR means that MB considered its body to be neither private (restricted to the use of only one person) nor entirely personal (pertaining to its unique character).

As a consequence, MB doesn’t consider its external self to have the right to privacy. Although it doesn’t like being looked at, it’s reaction is to hide rather than ask people to stop. (This is also because MB isn’t used to exercising its personal preferences regarding other people’s actions, but that’s a different angle.) It doesn’t like it when Mensah walks into the security ready room, or when its humans and ART’s crew are watching it come out of involuntary shutdown on the deck, but it doesn’t tell them to stop. In general, MB doesn’t like being looked at because if it’s falling apart, it’s in a vulnerable state, and if it’s not falling apart, then being paid attention to used to carry the threat of abuse/incoming orders/being clocked as a rogue. These reasons are more about safety than privacy.

However, MB specifically doesn’t like people looking at its face are because its face shows its emotions, and its emotions are a reflection of its internal state and, by extension, its internal self. MB considers its thoughts and emotions to have the right to privacy because they are the aspects of itself that it has been able to control, and thus has been able to make personal. When Gurathin reveals its name, it grates out, “That was private.” On one level, Murderbot’s name is an honest expression of what it thinks it is and all the associated self-loathing and guilt. MB does NOT want humans to know its name because then they know how it feels about a topic truly important to it. On another level, its name reveals its self-deprecating humor, something a ruthless killing machine is not supposed to have.

Everything that MB considers personal, it has also needed to keep secret, because in the CR, it’s not supposed to be a person the first place. Conversely, the only reason it’s been able to have personal opinions and emotions is because it has been able to keep these things secret. Anything MB would have wanted to be private – restricted to a trusted audience – would have also needed to be secret because of the pervasive surveillance present in the CR, the nonperson status of constructs, and the fact that it had no trusted audience with which it could share private information.

Conclusions

MB conflates the categories of personal, private, and secret because these concepts could not exist separately under the regime of surveillance and objectification inflicted upon it in the CR. Anything in one category had to be able to fit into the others, which limited the development of MB’s sense of personal identity to its internal self. Although MB has good instinctive grasp of the right to privacy regarding one’s internal state, MB’s lack of bodily autonomy and its background as a cog in the CR surveillance state have led it to regard physical privacy as a personal privilege rather than a right.

Now that MB’s in a safer place (kidnappings by giant asshole research transports aside), it’s beginning to separate out those concepts a bit and allow things to be personal and private but not secret (its desire to be with ART, its affection towards Mensah). It’s also starting to allow things that are neither secret nor private to be personal (expressing preferences in its hairstyle, clothing, and aversion to physical touch), which can also be considered MB reclaiming its external self/body.

#murderbot

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rjalker · 1 year

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do I really need to start adding "if you get touch starved do not fucking argue with me" on my posts about not erasing Murderbot's touch aversion when it explicitly does not get touch starved and literally reiterates and strengthens its boundaries after being forced to bend them in the last book?

Yes. There are multiple kinds of touch aversion.

And yours is not the one being represented here. If it were, I would not have a single fucking problem with what people are writing.

Charley Pollard likes holding hands and hugging, but hates sex and kissing. I do not get mad when people write about her holding hands or hugging someone. I do get mad when they write her kissing or worse, having sex with someone.

Murderbot does not enjoy touching. It does not seek out touch. From anyone. Not even people it likes and trusts.

If Murderbot sought out touch and enjoyed being touched and got touch starved, I'd have literally zero problem with people writing about that. But that is the exact opposite of the case, and the fact that that's all everyone fucking writes about is in fact literally bigotry. It's ableism. It's athiktomisia.

How are you all reading a book series with the theme of "respect people even if they're different from you" and immediately leaping to erase everything that makes Murderbot who it is so you can instead make it as much like you as you think you can get away with?

It'd be one thing if you were adding on additional traits that do not conflict with or erase its current character traits, like making it physically disabled, giving it other neurodivergencies, ect.

But no. All you people do is go, "oh? it's ace? Well not anymore!" "Oh, it's aro? Well not anymore!" "Oh, it doesn't want a relationship? Well not anymore!" "Oh, it has no desire for touch? Well not anymore!"

What's next? You're all gonna start insisting it totally loves making eye contact and loves showing off its face?

#sigh #actuallysolitaremit #actually solitaremit #actuallytouchaverse #actually touch averse #actuallytouchrepulsed #actually touch repulsed #Murderbot is solitaremit #Murderbot is touch averse #Murderbot is touch repulsed #solitaremity #touch aversion #touch repulsion #canonically solitaremit characters #cannonically touch averse characters #cannonically touch repulsed characters #Murderbot #The Murderbot Diaries #SecUnit

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publisher021 · 5 years

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Breathless

Prompts 1, 19, 20

Shaky hands, Asphyxiation, Trembling

He's always been into the whole 'leaving your mark on someone (or a lover, although, he doesn't exactly have a lover anymore, does he? He and Pepper were sort of fizzling out and were taking a bit of an unofficial break) after a good night spent in bed' thing. He likes the idea of someone knowing that he's touched them, worshipped them and their bodies. He likes the idea of someone returning the favor even more.

He's most certainly dreamt of Steve doing it to him. Who can blame him? The captain's body is built like it was sculpted out of expensive marble, after all. He's a modern-day Anubis. A god amongst men. He's dreamt of Steve touching him all over, hands roaming and caressing with feather-light touches. He's dreamt of Steve kissing him, gently, chastely and then kissing him until his lips felt bruised. He's dreamt of Steve whispering nothing but praises in his ear, dreamt of Steve kissing along his neck, scraping his teeth against the tendons and sucking bruises into his skin.

He knows the thoughts are less than pure, not appropriate, especially now with what's going on.

Which is why he tries to steer clear of the good captain, muttering apologies and excuses whenever he can. God knows the apologies were needed, with him fucking up everything the team has worked so hard for left, right and center.

It's only when he wakes up in the middle of the night, the sky outside his window clear of any toxic gases in the atmosphere and filled with hundreds of thousands of bright stars that he realizes that he's not in the tower. He's at Clint's farmhouse, alone in a bed that he is supposed to be sharing with Steve.

He thinks he understands why Steve doesn't want to get into bed, doesn't want to see him. The sight of him must repulse Steve to no end, the anger at what he's done behind both him and the team's backs coursing through his veins.

Not for the first time, he wishes Clint had an extra bedroom so that he can sleep alone. Which, now that he thinks about it, if it wasn't for Laura (when did Clint even get married, let alone have time to have kids and work for SHIELD?) Clint would have definitely thrown him out of his house. It wasn't difficult to see how much Clint hated him at the moment. He wasn't exactly hiding it.

He lies in bed for a while, unable to sleep except let his mind wander. It was actually peaceful here, he realizes. He likes the idea of seclusion, a place away from all the manic chaos that is New York. Sure, the tower is amazing, it has his lab filled with the latest cutting edge technology, after all, but out here, in the middle of nowhere surrounded by the stars and the sound of crickets at night, it's surprisingly beautiful.

In the end, even he can't keep on thinking. He decides to get out of the house. A walk sounds nice.

So he climbs out of bed, shivering as his bare feet touch the frigid floor. He throws on another shirt, this one long-sleeved and shoves on the first pair of shoes he sees.

He fumbles for a light switch, trying to fix his messy hair slightly. What he sees in the mirror has him sucking in a shaky breath, eyes drawn to the dark blue finger marks around his neck. When he prods it with his finger it draws a hiss from his mouth. It hurts and has him thinking about how Thor's hands wrapped around his neck. The raw power that barely managed to stay contained. He remembers the feeling of fear as Thor lifted him by his neck, remembers struggling to draw in a breath and then the panic that followed. He remembers trying to take in a breath of air and then how his airways seemed to close as Thor squeezed harder, making his anger known.

He moved to touch his neck again, his hands trembling. Before his hand can come into contact with his neck, he changes his mind, letting his hand fall to his sides.

He turns off the light switch and ignores the mirror after that.

He doesn't like this mark that's left on his skin.

He grabs his gauntlet watch, just in case, he tells himself. He snickers silently to himself, albeit a little bitterly. He knows that there won't be any threats outside unless you count the teammates that are less than thrilled with his existence at the moment.

He makes his way down the stairs, hand holding on to the side rail. He's careful not to make any noise so as not to wake anyone up. He doesn't want to give everyone even more of a reason to hate him.

He laughs somewhat hysterically at the thought, eyes avoiding his shaking hands.

His team hates him and nothing that he says or does will fix it. Not when he created a murderbot hellbent on creating its own version of 'world peace'.

The lights downstairs are off, but he can make out faint sounds coming from the kitchen, almost as if the person skulking around the house doesn't want to wake anyone up.

He can't help it, his curiosity is piqued.

He treads lightly, trying to avoid the floorboards that he knows makes the most noise but it's easier said than done, especially in the dark.

When he reaches the kitchen, he can make out the faint silhouette of someone sitting at the kitchen table.

Who sits in the dark?

He walks closer until he can make out the light switch, and, without thinking, flicks it on.

Both he and the other person blink at the sudden light, and oh, the person sitting in the dark was no one else but Steve.

Why was Steve just sitting alone in the kitchen, in the dark?

Apparently, he wasn't the only one surprised to see Steve awake, Steve seemed just as surprised to see him.

"Uh, what are you doing awake?" Steve asked him, face flushing slightly. He watched as Steve lifted his hand to his neck in nervousness. It was a habit of Steve's that he managed to notice, and once he noticed it, he could never stop seeing it. He could always tell when Steve was nervous or uncomfortable.

He tried for a smile, but he knew that he wasn't succeeding.

"Couldn't sleep. Decided a walk might be good. You?" He was surprised at the hoarseness of his own voice and winced slightly.

Steve flushed even more. Well, he could understand why. It might come across as strange to someone else that he was just sitting in the dark.

"Wasn't tired. The serum makes it so I have to sleep less than the average person. So here I am," Steve said, waving a hand around.

He nodded slowly, tilting his head to one side.

"Uh, Clint told me that the kids are excited because we're here. They have a set bedtime but because we're here they don't want to sleep. He said to leave the lights off if we need to go anywhere. That way they won't know that we're, uh, still awake." Steve's explanation made sense, in a way.

"Okay," he said.

The silence between them stretches and he can feel himself grow more uncomfortable. Now might be a good time as any to get up and go for that walk of his, if only his body would obey his orders.

He stands up to leave and glances at the time on his watch. Huh, it's just pushing eleven. Which, for him, is early. He usually only gets to bed in the early hours of the morning after spending a night in the lab.

"Wait!"

Steve grabs his arm and then seems to think better of it because he let's go, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck and turning red.

He's waiting for Steve to say something.

He doesn't have to wait long.

"Uh, stay. Please. I'll make you a cup of hot chocolate. Or, uh, coffee. If you want," Steve offers somewhat awkwardly.

For once he's stumped. He half wants to stay with Steve and drink a cup of hot chocolate and he half wants to go for a walk. But then he remembers the cold bed that he has to go back to. The dark, empty room. It reminds him of that god awful vision that he got.

He's the man who killed the Avengers.

Why should the team associate themselves with him?

When he doesn't answer, Steve's face does this thing where he looks momentarily disappointed, as if Tony refusing to stay for hot chocolate saddens him.

He already feels bad and seeing Steve's face do that thing where it looks like he kicked his puppy makes him feel even more guilty.

So he agrees to stay for hot chocolate. Not that it was even a question; of course he can't say no. It's Steve.

He sits down and watches how a slow grin starts at the corner of Steve's mouth and stretches until it brightens his whole face. Then Steve is standing and moving around the kitchen with all the grace of someone who's lived here his entire life.

It's quiet in the kitchen while Steve gathers all the ingredients. He watches Steve until he notices how Steve seems to move the same few things around on the worn kitchen counter, his movements a tell-tale sign of something that seems to be eating at him.

When Steve turns to give him a tiny, practiced smile, he bites the bullet and decides to just ask what's wrong already. He hates it when people can't come out and say what they're thinking.

"What are you thinking about? It's got you doing that frowny face thing that I hate," he says bluntly.

Steve stops mucking about with their hot chocolate and sighs, turning to face him. He leans against the counter and rubs a hand down his face before pinching the bridge of his nose.

It's only now that he's watching Steve closely that he can see how tired and old Steve seems to look. Steve's not supposed to look that way. He's supposed to have a ready smile on his face and crack dry jokes until you want to either bang your head against a wall or laugh 'till the tears run down your face.

It makes him feel infinitely guilty.

He put that look there. It's his fault that Steve looks the way he does. He put the team and the rest of the world in danger.

"Why didn't you - why couldn't you trust me enough to tell me about Ultron? Why go behind our backs and put everyone in danger for the sake of something that you didn't even know worked properly?" Steve asks. His voice sounds slightly hoarse.

Okay. So the conversation was going to go this way.

He was so not ready for this.

"Because you wouldn't understand, " he says in reply and hates how weak it sounds. He hates how that is the only answer he can give Steve. He deserves better than that.

He can see the rising frustration on Steve's face, he can hear it, even more, when Steve asks him to elaborate.

"Understand what, Tony? I know I might not be from this time but that doesn't mean I won't try to understand everything that goes on. Even I know that Ultron was a bad idea! You had to have gathered that."

He can feel his hackles rise in anger and frustration, and, in the end, it could only boil down to this: if Steve would only try to see it from his point of view, then surely he'll be able to see that he wasn't trying to create a murderbot. He was only trying to prevent something like aliens pouring from the sky occurring again.

It was a valid fear. Not that he was afraid or anything, just, you know, worried for everyone else's safety. His plan was of sound logic, however, Ultron turning against the team and the whole world at large was not.

"Give me a break, Steve!" he hisses.

He throws his hands up in frustration and can immediately tell when Steve realizes something is wrong and that his hands were shaking and he's begun to tremble. Whether in anger or frustration, or something else, he doesn't know.

He puts his hands down and refuses to look at Steve.

"I tried to stop something like the Battle of Manhattan from happening again. Because, in case you haven't noticed it, Cap, aliens pouring from the sky with the intent to kill everyone isn't exactly our forte. We have to have something to stop a threat before it decides to strike. I was trying to do just that because no one else was stepping up to the plate, " he says bitterly.

He's angry at the team for not trusting him but he's angrier at himself for putting the team in danger.

He sees the way Steve seems to slump at his words, fatigue overcoming his normally perfect posture.

When Steve looks at him, his blue eyes are filled with regret and his entire face seems to be bathed in guilt.

"I get that, Tony, and I'm sorry for making you think that you can't trust me. But please, next time, if there is a next time, tell me about whatever plans you have and we'll work through it together. If not for the sake of our team then for the sake of the world. Because every time somebody tries to stop a war from happening, bad things happen. Lives are lost and I honestly don't think I would be able to cope if it was one of you," he admits quietly.

Steve doesn't sound accusatory, just tired, and defeated?

For Steve to admit that big of a thing such as not being able to cope if one of the team members died was unusual. He was a very private man and kept all of his feelings close to his chest.

It leaves him more than a little at a loss for words, if he's being honest.

"Together, right? Fine, Cap. I solemnly swear to come to you first if I have any intention of creating any plans or thinking any thoughts of creating an entity with mass murder on its mind."

"It's not a joke, Tony. Can't you take things seriously for once in your life?" Steve asks.

"I am being serious! I promise I will tell you about these types of things. I learned my lesson and now I have to be the one to see that I fucked up with a capital 'F' and not only am I the cause of multiple people losing their lives, people who are innocent, by the way, but also come to terms with the fact that so many people had to vacate their homes because there's a murderbot on the loose," he replies, breath running out at the end of his rant.

His hands are shaking again and his body is trembling all over.

He remembers the feeling of Thor's hands around his neck, squeezing until all the precious oxygen had left his body. He remembers struggling for air that might not come.

When Steve pulls him into an embrace, he sags into it, welcoming the warmth that's offered even for just a moment. After all, he never knows if Steve will finally come to his senses and pull away. He is the man who killed the Avengers. He doesn't deserve comfort.

He thinks of the unfinished draft stating that all superhumans be responsible for their actions sitting in his inbox, marked unread. Maybe when all of this is over he'll read it. He agrees with it, if only to prevent things like this from ever happening again. Who is he kidding, he already knows that he'll sign the SHRA and redraft it so that it's better suited to the needs of superheroes like the Avengers.

#whumptober2019 #whump #whump trope #stony endgame #steve rogers #tony stark #tony stark needs a hug #tony stark centric #angst #open ending #day one #mine #original work

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rjalker · 1 year

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[ID: Three screenshots from the show The Good Place, showing Chidi and Eleanor talking.

Chidi has four pride flags around his head:

Aroace, with stripes of orange, yellow, white, blue, and navy blue.

Touch averse, with stripes of orange, red, black, red, orange, with a black and red milkweed flower in the center.

Solitaremit, with stripes of light grey, gold, orange, red, black, and red-purple.

Nonpartnering, with stripes of sky blue, cyan, dark grey, purple-pink, and dark purple. In the center is a white, rounded, five pointed star.

Chidi speaks first, gesturing for emphasis: "What you are doing is harmful. You are hurting oppressed people with your behavior. You are hurting people who face erasure and oppression from all sides of our society no matter where they go, in a place whose whole entire purpose is to be welcoming and safe for them.".

Eleanor, smiling, responds, "Actually, no, it doesn't hurt anyone at all. I know, because I don't face this oppression, and it doesn't hurt me, that means it doesn't hurt anyone at all. My behavior isn't hurting anyone.".

The word "don't" in "I don't face this oppression" is underlined for emphasis.

Chidi responds, eyes wide, in all caps, "I literally just explained to you that your behavior is hurting people".

End ID.]

People are like "What do you mean I'm a bigot, all I did was tell oppressed people they aren't actually facing bigotry!!!"

Archived link of the bullshit in question.

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rjalker · 2 years

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Some important additions to this post because people in this fandom fucking suck.

[ID: Six pictures of Murderbot from the cover of All Systems Red, in front of different pride flags. Murderbot is shown from the chest upward, wearing grey armour, with a helmet that hides its face behind a dark visor like a spacesuit. Each has the word "Oh," in the top left corner, and "Fuck you" at the bottom, with text in the right upper corner completing the sentence. The first has Murderbot in front of the it/its pride flag and reads, "Oh, you insist on misgendering me 'to be respectful'? Fuck you.".

The second has the touch-repulsed flag, with stripes of orange, red, black, red, and orange, and says, "Oh, you erase the fact that I'm touch-repulsed? Fuck you.".

The third is a combination of the sex-repulsed and romance-repulsed flags, with a very dark grey center, a vertical purple stripe on the left, a vertical green stripe on the right, and inside each stripe a dark grey circle with a white minus symbol inside it. Each stripe is separated from the grey by a white line. It reads, "Oh, you erase my repulsion towards sex, romance, and any other form of relationship? Fuck you.".

The fourth is the aroace flag, with stripes of orange, yellow, white, light blue, and navy blue, and reads, "Oh, you erase the fact that I feel neither romantic nor sexual attraction? Fuck you.".

The fifth is the "you are looking away" flag, with stripes of dark purple, black, grey, and desaturated green, and reads, "Oh, you ship me with other characters? Fuck you.".

End ID.]

Free fucking memes for everyone to use as reactions when they come across assholes erasing Murderbot's identity for the sake of fucking shipping.

If you haven't seen anyone doing these things, I hope for your sake it stays that way.

Here's a blank one so you can make your own as long as you aren't doing any of this fucking shit.

[ID: The same style of image as above, now with a plan pink background. End ID.]

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rjalker · 1 year

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Zygz, if in book 7 or 8 or 9 or 10 or what the fuck ever, if Murderbot starts warming up to the idea of being touched and starts seeking out and enjoying touch, I will not have a problem with any of you people writing about it doing so.

But until Murderbot expresses any desire for touch, any hint of touch starvation, any inking that it wants to seek out touch, then yes, I do in fact expect you people to respect the fact that it does not desire touch and does not seek out touch and does not get touch starved.

Murderbot being willing to touch people when the only other option is letting them die horribly does not mean it's secretly enjoys being touched.

Murderbot being willing to hold Mensah's hand so they both don't fucking die and thinking it's not as horrible as it has been imagining it would be does not mean it secretly enjoys being touched. Espesially because the very next story, Home range blahfuckityblah then goes on to explicitly reiterate that it does not enjoy touch even though it will tolerate it to save peopel's lives.

Murderbot being willing to let Mensah hug it so she isn't further traumatized is not the same fucking thing as Murderbot enjoying being touched and enjoying hugs. It literally later makes sure to put "no hugging" in its fucking contracts and tells humans in distress that if they need a hug, it will go find someone else for them to hug.

Because it is no longer going to tolerate being hugged. This is after it let Mensah hug it so she wouldn't have a mental breakdown in the middle of being rescued.

Being willing to touch people so they don't literally die does not equal secretly enjoying touch and being touch starved.

Apply this logic to ltierally any other intimate thing and I hope to hell you'd quickly figure out your argument is horrific.

If I perform CPR on someone who's just drowned to try to save their life, do you think that means I consent to them kissing me any time they want later? Do you think that means I'm secretly attracted to them and want to kiss them?

If you actually care about consent and apply consent to more than just sex and kissing, you'll hopefully figure out very quickly why insisting that someone who is willing to touch people to save their lives must surely be secretly attracted to their touch and secretly wants to touch them, is just straight up horrific logic? I'd fucking hope you'd all figure this out.

If Murderbot one day in a future book Learns To Enjoy Touching And Gets Over Its Problems And Learns To Love Itself Enough To Admit It Enjoys Being Touched™, then I will have no problem with you people writing about it doing so.

But until then, you do in fact need to internalize the main theme of this series, and respect people even when they're different from you.

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