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#maybe it’s because I’m autistic and like sorting things like a little sorting freak
nazumichi · 2 years
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always feel like a bit of a hypocrite for hating incorrect quotes but loving alignment chart memes. like. that’s their cousin.
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activated-pen · 1 year
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hi i’m gonna post rambles about a book series nobody knows maybe. i came across it while reading an anthology called fell beasts and fair. idk if anyone will read this and i don’t care but i need to get out something in my brain. i have a degree in fiction writing or something idk
i don’t think anything’s really inspired me to sit down and think about stuff like this in a while but i read a book of queer essays before the anthology (queer reflections on horror) and i guess ive been in “alternate analysis” mode
but anyways when it comes to fae there’s always something to be said about neurodivergancy 
i think, as a nonbinary autistic person, there’s something distinctly fascinating about the city between series and pet. i'd initially gone "omg this must be some it/its nonbinary child" (the anthology short story is narrated by a leprechaun who doesn’t know pet’s gender and constantly thinks of “it” though there’s actually a typo that calls pet “she” in narration once that i noticed because i was laser focused)  bc there was only one use of pronouns and it seemed to be corrected back to it/its. like, i thought pet was an it/its human that happened to be correctly gendered bc the leprechaun didn’t apply a gender to her
and then i still didn't quite get it until a good way into the first book that pet was probably a she/her because athelas called her she mistakenly. as far as i recall, pet never calls herself a girl. 
even tho ive only read one short story and the first book so far (gonna read more once i’m paid for freelance stuff,) i’ve felt like there’s a strong lack of an Image of pet. like yeah she’s narrating but also she carries the story and her weight based on her personality, voice, and narration, it feels a lot like you’re looking into the world through this narrator. she doesn’t really seem to react much to being called it besides mild annoyance at the confusion rhe first time, mostly it's annoying that they keep trying to pretend they don't like her
but like (within the context of the first book n stuff) pet is talked about so little and has existed by her/itself for so long, unnoticed and hidden, that it feels like she/it truly lacks a personhood and has for a Long Time. like it’s already noted that nobody knew she existed. she may well not exist, but of course she does, she’s got such a hyperactive and involved personality and is brave and kind.
and only the people who seem to recognize that about her actually seem to talk to her as a Person. even though she’s ostensibly dehumanized by fae that are detached from the concept of humanity, they also award her more humanity and recognize her individuality and personality more than anyone has in SO long, bc she’s been hiding and not really interacting with people outside of work. 
there’s some trans metaphor i can see in there, that’s all i’m saying, but also something about adhd + autism and masking
i feel like she/it isn’t too bothered by going by pet because she hasn’t really gone by a name besides “you” for so long and just no longer has interest in pretty much anything human of that sort. she also takes quickly (and in a somewhat silly way) to this “role” because she’s not really been given a role in so long. i don’t think pet knows how to be a person or human, and doesn’t CARE to understand a right or wrong way of doing anything, she just is and only begins to exist around the freak squad. (i keep thinking of her as it/they)
i feel like i could write a whole thing about the comparisons between neurodivergant (ESPECIALLY autistic) people and fae, and the idea of autistic people forcing themselves to mask and pretend. and then also how trans people often have to hide who we are and only be ourselves in private, or how sometimes there’s a uniquely isolating experience about being trans and nonbinary and feeling disconnected from other people, even other trans people sometimes, because it’s hard to be Seen when you’re nonbinary
anyways pet is autistic and nonbinary (she/it/they/maybe just doesn’t care) and i’d hazard a guess at bi and/or ace if i wanna keep pushing the disconnect from others angle. 
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🔥 for any topic we both like or anything you want to write about! 💙💋
Everyone else look away from this post I want to be alone with topshelf2112-blog. Now then. [kisses your hand] My opinion is that you are so right. about everything in the world. Lightning round of some thoughts for you:
I know canon mentioned Charles has/had a dog and I do totally believe he's grown up with multiple hunting/guard dogs as well as horses and probably other creatures too on the big family estates, and I’m sure he’s always enjoyed hanging out with said creatures and avoiding all human interaction, because as we all know, he IS autistic. However when it comes down to it he is absolutely a cat person. Because what is the ultimate autism animal, after all? That’s right!
Not to say that he’d ever get a cat, or any pet I think, of his own volition. He’d be one of those infamous grumpy old men (Charles became a grumpy old man, spiritually, at about age 17) where his spouse/sister gets a cat and he’s like “ableghbleghblegh I don’t want a cat it’s gonna make a mess and you won’t take care of it because you are Irresponsible bleghebglhdghdhl” and then he is ALWAYS cuddling that cat. fucking ride or die BFFs with the cat. But of course it’s always strictly “my spouse/sister’s cat”. Of COURSE.
When you said Charles’ little brother’s name was David I was like ok. scream. and you were so right. In any other circumstance I’d be like ok no way that’s too much but this is MASH where the cast and writers LOVE doing shit like that because they’re all little FREAKS. Like they literally did this exact thing in canon with Sad Piano David from Morale Victory. (Also this HC makes Morale Victory even more fucked up, so obviously a huge win.) So this is canon to me now, sorry to all other Dead Little Brother Name Candidates but you can’t beat this one.
Also every other Dead Little Brother Name Candidate (TM) I’ve seen is a nickname of some sort and I totally get what people are going for but in my humble opinion. This is simply NOT a nickname household.
On a related note I don’t seriously subscribe to the notion but if someone told me Charles’ mother’s name was also Honoria I’d just be like of course it fucking is. I hate this fucking family.
I LOVE your idea that Maxwell’s birth father was the physically abusive one he mentions and that his current one is a step-father, and I think that’s supported by how in The Interview he mentions that he and his sister(s?) call the man by a nickname, “Butch”, as opposed to just “dad”. (And I love how you write that said step-father and some other family members are not as accepting of his dresses as other relatives like his mom and uncles, because I feel like that’s so often how it is, you know? Some of your family are great about it but some are not and then you become this Object Of Tension and it’s just exhausting. Soooo many Thoughts about Maxwell's family......)
Every time you have Charles and Kellye interact in a fic or mention that they’re friends an angel gets its wings. Maybe if enough of us do this we will be able to physically manifest more scenes of them together somehow. Also I’m just gonna say it. Society if Hawkeye finally went to ask Kellye on a date in Hey Look Me Over and the guy she’s already with were CHARLES of all people. He would take 10d10 psychic damage. absolute crit. destroyed.
Charles and Honoria are [REDACTED] survivors. I know it’s all played over the top for laughs but the stuff he says in Bottle Fatigue and Heal Thyself is [REDACTED] [REDACTED] [REDACTED]
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So this is a personal one for me to ask and if you're not comfortable with it don't mind it; how would the tmnt boys (seperate) react when the reader confesses that they're autistic after the boys got curious when she had some peculiar, behavior or stims. The reader would be stressed, because she has a crush on the tmnt boy in question and she didn't want them to find her weird or just stop interacting with her. When she's met with confusion instead, because the boys never heard of it, cue this weird conversation where reader tells them to the best of her ability what it is and the boys just keep asking questions. Also some general headcannons with it maybe?
Okay so I'm actually really happy that you asked me this because I feel like ASD isn't portrayed a lot in any type of media. My ADD and ASD have a lot of overlap so I hope I can capture what you're asking of me!
Now let's get into it!
TMNT Headcanons
The boys reacting to an autistic reader
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Leonardo
he wasn't really sure what was happening the first time you reacted
one minute you were standing next to him doing dishes and the next you were attempting to claw your skin off like an angry cat
Leo tried not to look annoyed as he watched you rub your hands against your shirt until your flesh started to turn red
you looked like you were crying but he knew you weren't
but your face was starting to turn purple and your cheeks were puffy from the effort of holding your breath
"Y/N? You need to breathe."
You shot a glare at him, scathing eyes meeting his now very concerned expression
your own softened and you clutched your arms to your chest, heaving oxygen into your lungs until your face became a normal shade again
"Are you okay?"
The words were stuck in your throat and you weren't sure if you should nod or shake your head
so you gave him a half-hearted shrug
he frowned back at you but turned to finish the dishes on his own
when he questioned you about it later he couldn't help but be curious
"Well actually it's uh- it's kinda a sensory type of thing? There are certain textures that I can't stand touching do I avoid them but if I come into contact by accident my brain just kinda explodes and I shut down."
"How exactly does that work though?"
"I don't really understand it much but like- you know that feeling you get when you think there's a bug on you and there's not but it really really feels like it?"
He nodded
"Yeah, it feels like that. And anytime I touch something that triggers that reaction it takes FOREVER to get the feeling off my skin. That's why I usually wear gloves when I do dishes. Guess I just forgot to grab 'em today."
He was sympathetic
and god, you were so embarrassed
lucky for you, Leo's not an asshole
"Well thank you for explaining it to me, you really freaked me out earlier. I'll talk to April and see if we can keep a pair or two at the lair just in case you forget again."
Consider your heart melted
you couldn't even find the words to thank him and holy shit was your face red
"Hey y/n?"
"Yeah Leo?"
"Why didn't you ever tell me- us that you were autistic?"
Did you rip the band aid off now or make something up? Which would ,technically speaking, be less catastrophic in the long run?
"I uh- I really like you and I really didn't want you or the other's to look at me differently..."
wow, you liked him? miss ma'am you have saved this boy a world of anxiety and damn does he thank you for it
"Thanks for telling me... and y/n? I really like you to."
Awh fuck yeah, best possible execution of band aid-ripping-off ever
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Donatello
Donnie wished he could act surprised when you finally told him
he really wanted to, it would've made you feel better for sure
but he sucked at lying and he didn't want to make you feel like he thought you were an idiot
because that was so far from the truth
after going through extensive research on Mikey's behalf when he suspected he had ADHD Donnie had stumbled across many different websites that discussed the symptoms and overlaps between both disorders
to make a long story short, Donnie knew that you had ASD and he was waiting for you to tell him
it would probably come off as rude if he brought it up in conversation right?
he didn't want to risk it
but that didn't stop him from keeping an eye on you and your behaviors
he was a man of science, of course he was going to analyze you
not in a weird way or anything, just as a curious sort of precaution
but the longer you were involved in the turtle's lives the more noticeable your stims and meltdowns got, Donnie did his best to cover for you without making you suspicious of him
eventually he'd come up with something that he hoped would come across as a friendly gesture and wouldn't set you off or scare you away
it was game night at the lair and you, as always, were perched on the arm of the sofa, a large grin plastered on your face
inside your head was exploding but you were masking it pretty well if you do say so yourself
but Donnie was, well... donnie was donnie
so when he noticed you starting to rock a little more visibly he removed his attention from commentating the game and grabbed a pair of headphones from the side table
you were beyond confused when he passed them to you but your face revealed everything
"They're noise cancelling, try them on."
holy shit it was like putting your head underwater, everything was muffled
not in the way normal headphones did, you quite literally couldn't hear anything at all, just a calm amount of nothing
you nearly started crying when you realized that Donnie had figured you out on his own
but you'd never been more relieved about anything in your life
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Raphael
he wouldn't admit that he was mesmerized by your presence
you practically radiated calm
his complete opposite
it was his favorite thing about you, because despite your quiet disposition and calming aura you weren't afraid to call him out or rebut any of his insults
this was not something you expected him to appreciate nor was it something you thought would make you catch feelings
but damn if you didn't
he'd been sitting in on yours and Donnie's little experiment for an hour or so now, watching you both exchange quiet whispers and inside jokes that you always seemed to lag on
then you slipped up
not bad, nothing detrimental to the project, just the same mistake that you'd already made ten times over
you might as well have exploded
"Y'N, you just have to move thi-"
"I KNOW DONATELLO. I FUCKING KNOW AND I JUST CAN'T DO THIS BULLSHIT!"
you set everything down gently enough to avoid breaking it before turning and storming out of the lab, waving your hands like they were on fire
Raph and Donnie exchanged a look that sent the larger red turtle following after you
when you calmed yourself down enough to talk you kept your gaze locked on the wall, explaining that you couldn't make eye contact when you were upset
he might not be the smartest brother, but Raph's no dummy, he put those pieces together pretty quickly after you told him that one small detail
he wasn't upset that you didn't tell him and you'd personally never been more relieved
your heart nearly splattered into the stratosphere when you finally gace him your own explanation
"yeah, I like ya too."
you grinned so wide you were sure your face would split open and your entire body rocked side to side with excitement
he thought that was pretty adorable too
And he did stick around to offer a bit of support when you apologized to Donnie for screaming at him
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Michaelangelo
to be frank it probably shouldn't have taken so long for Mikey to realize that you were autistic
the similarities between your own personality and his ADHD were so in sight it was near painful
it was his turn to make dinner that night and you'd made sure that you came over early to help him set up, you knew how side-tracked he'd get and you were the poster child for solid routine
what more perfect matchup existed?
trick question, there isn't one
you were on one side of the counter cutting vegetables and he was on the other throwing said vegetables into the mixing pot
the music was at an ungodly level of loud so your only means of communication were screaming over it
"MIKEY."
"WHA?"
"YOU GOT THE-"
"YEAH."
"AND THE-"
"UH HUH."
"COOL, HAVE YOU SEEN THE-"
"TONGS? NO, THE SKEWERS. YEAH, THEY'RE IN THE OTHER DRAWER."
"THANKS."
the two of you went about your previous tasks, thinking nothing of the conversation that had just taken place
at least until you'd begun washing your knife and cutting board
that's when Casey walked in, looking both perturbed and annoyed at the same time
"Alright, which one of you knows telepathy?"
Mikey exchanged a glance with you and you returned it with a raised eyebrow
"The hell you mean brah?"
he looked at the both of you like you were the ones that had grown four extra heads before speaking again
"You literally just had a conversation with like five words and somehow just knew what the other meant? What's up with that?"
you glanced at Mikey again
"Holy shit, did we?"
"I mean, not really. You used your hands."
now all three of you were confused but it quickly became two when Casey shook his head in defeat and left the room
"You know I think he's right."
he blinked first and your staring contest ended
"But you used your hands-"
"I got autism Mikey, one does not simply not use their hands as forms of speech."
"You're-"
"Yep."
was the silence laughing at you? could it do that? it was kinda rude
"Huh, that actually makes sense, that's not mean is it?"
you shook your head no
"You're just me but fast."
Mikey agreed with that, pestered you with a few more questions, and went back about working, as did you, you saw no reason to address it further
but your cheeks burned red
"Yo- Y/N that actually explains why everyone else thinks we're a thing."
you didn't know if you could choke on air or not but you did it anyways
"Are we?"
he gave you his signature grin
"If we are then Raph owes April a hundred bucks."
you returned his smile
"Oh this oughta be good."
I'd like to preface this by apologizing for my near three week absence. Life got crazy and my writer's block hopped on a train, went through a school zone, killed seven pedestrians, and committed tax fraud before tumbling off a cliff never to be seen again.
But on the bright side- I got my SAT scores back and started some scholarship applications. Super happy with that. School's out in a few weeks so I'll be able to write more (hopefully).
Anyways, I hope I got this one down okay. I may have hyper analyzed the request so I might be a little off. But I really enjoyed doing this one and I hope you like it!
-Mars 🌠
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So I looked through a detransition blog just out of curiosity, since it was one you reblogged, but now I’m super... freaked out? I have a top surgery consultation in April but now I have this weird fear that I’m faking it or that I’ll regret it afterwards. I’ve identified as somewhere along non-binary and trans (he/they!) for over a year, and I’ve known I’m not a girl for even longer, but now I’m just so afraid that maybe I don’t know myself at all. Do you have any advice on what this is?
Lee says:
Discussing your feelings with a therapist can sometimes help you untangle the anxiety from everything else. It’s reasonable to have some apprehension about a major surgery that can have a big impact on your life because it is a big change- and like any other surgery, it also has medical risk and can result in complications. 
And reading about other people’s feelings about their surgeries can be helpful! I do recommend reading things from people who were happy with the outcome and reading things from people who weren't to get a better perspective on the range of experiences that can exist. Only reading the negative or the positive doesn’t provide a balanced view!
But even if you read other people’s stories, and talk to them about why they feel the way they do about their choices and bodies, nobody else can tell you what you should do for yourself. Even a therapist can’t know for sure if you will regret surgery (or anything else that you choose to do) because nobody can see into the future, see into your heart, and see into mind simultaneously to and determine for certain what it is that you need. 
As soon as I came out as non-binary when I was 15, I started saving money for top surgery. I was someone who ran towards top surgery at full tilt and I didn’t give myself any space for doubt about whether it was the right choice for me because I felt it was the only choice I had-- forwards or nothing. I was pretty severely depressed at the time and had a brief hospitalization the month before I turned 18, and I was sort of pinning all my hopes on top surgery reducing my dysphoria and booting out my depression. So I scheduled my consultation as soon as I turned 18 and was legally an adult and could do so without parental permission. I immediately scheduled my surgery for the soonest available date, and had inverted-T incision top surgery about 3 months after I turned 18.
Now I’m 21 years old, and I’m 3 years and 5 months post-op from my top surgery. 
In retrospect, top surgery was 110% the right choice for me. If I could do it all over again, I’d do it in a heartbeat. Top surgery really did reduce my dysphoria by a significant amount, and that made it easier for me to cope with my depression and other mental health issues. I was proudly parading around the house shirtless as soon as I was able to stop using post-op compression, before my incisions had even healed into scars.
I don’t have any dysphoria about my chest anymore, especially now that I’ve gotten tattoos to cover my scars. I finally feel like I look like how I always knew I was meant to look.
I don’t post pictures of my chest anymore because I have distinguishing tattoos but I’ve posted a few before/after pictures when I was 3 years post-op and I think things have only gotten better now.
I was lucky to not have any complications; I don’t have any nerve pain, and hypertrophic or keloid scarring, and I didn’t need any revisions. But there are some things that are non-ideal compared to if I had just been born with a typical cis-guy flat chest. My nips are a little wonky in color and shape, and I plan on getting medical tattoos at some point to even the edges out. I also have slightly muted sensation in my chest now, so everything is like slightly number than it was before.
When I was pre-op, I did enjoy having nipple sensation that was pleasurable; even though I had inverted t-incision top surgery which preserved the nipple stalk, I still only have tactile, temperature, and pain sensations in my chest. If you put an ice cube on my nipple and my eyes were closed, I’d know it was cold. If you poked me while I was looking away, I’d still feel it. And if you squeezed me, it would hurt. But somehow it doesn’t feel good anymore like it used to. 
I don’t know how much of that loss in erotic sensation is a mental thing and how much is a physical change caused by scar tissue build up around the nerve. But regardless, it is a real loss. 
For me, that loss is well worth it. While I might have been physically capable of experiencing erotic nipple/chest sensation before, I rarely actually did have that experience because it made me too dysphoric and I didn’t like to take my shirt off during sex. Now I feel more fully present and comfortable in my own body and it makes me more engaged so I can focus on my partner and on the other feelings I’m having and how I look isn’t something that is detracting from the experience. 
In general, top surgery has made my life better in a million ways. I love running shirtless with my college cross country team, I like going swimming at the beach with no shirt, and I like the way I look now when I see myself in a mirror after stepping out of the shower. 
When I get dressed in the morning, my day starts off on a neutral note because it’s just me putting on clothes. Sometimes I pause to think about how I can just put on a shirt and feel good about it and move on. Before, I used to be upset every morning because the first thing I’d be reminded of when I woke up was that my chest was there and I didn’t want it to be. I’m Autistic, and binding was Not comfortable for me sensory-wise, so not having to bind was also nice.
I would choose to get top surgery again, but that doesn’t mean that it’s the right choice for each and every person. I am sure it was the right choice for me, and I have no regrets at all, I never want to have breasts again. But someone else might think that not having erotic nipple sensation is a dealbreaker, or they might not be comfortable with scars if they tend to heal with more visible raised scars that are harder to cover with a tattoo like I did mine.
So I can tell you that top surgery has made my life better and I’m glad I got it and I don’t think that there would have been any way for me to be as happy as I am now if I had not gotten it. Top surgery is life saving and life-changing for some people, and I am one of those people. I might be more inclined to tell people that if you think you need surgery you should get it because my surgery went so well and because I’m still identifying as genderqueer, transmasculine, and non-binary, just like I was when I was 15, so my identity is pretty static there.
Some other post-op people may tell you that they regret their surgery, that they wish they hadn’t done it, and they would make a different decision if they could go back in time. They might want to help warn other people to not make the same mistake that they did.  Detransitioned folks often (but not always) have a different perspective than folks who persisted in being transgender and that’s okay- it isn’t a better perspective or a worse one, just a different one. But both trans and reidentified people can feel this way, even though it’s usually more common for de-trans folks to regret surgical procedures that it is for trans folks.
I semi-rushed into surgery for both emotional and logistical reasons but I knew it was right for me. But that isn’t the best choice for everyone and if you aren’t 100% sure that it is what you want and need then there’s nothing wrong with having the consultation with the surgeon to learn more and then thinking things over before you schedule a surgery date (or don’t), you don’t need to immediately schedule a surgery date after the consult. Think of it as an interview and as an information gathering session.
Neither of us can tell you what you should do because neither of us are “right” or “wrong” about top surgery. It’s just a different experience and a different perspective. We all have biases based on our own way of seeing things, and that can inform our advice.
If you know what the risks are, and you’ve given it careful thought and can provide an informed consent, then whether you should get surgery is your decision. I won’t tell you “go get it!” or “don’t go get it!” and I don’t think that any blogger should be telling anons what medical procedures to get or not get. 
Worrying that you’re faking it, that you don’t know who you are, and worrying about regret is something that can be pretty scary and frustrating, but you don’t need to figure it out on your own, and it’s okay to take a little longer to come to a decision and talk it over with a therapist if you think it’s necessary to help you cope with that anxiety.
But yeah, I believe that ultimately you have to trust your gut feelings on what you know to be right for you.
Top surgery 101 links
Finding a therapist
Side note: While we do our best to avoid reblogs from obvious TERFs/truscum/transphobes/racists/sexists/ableists/etc to avoid exposing people to triggering content by boosting the blog’s visibility, and we do appreciate getting heads up asks about reblogs from a problematic OP, if we reblog a post from someone we do not necessarily endorse all of the content in every post they’ve made, and we don’t necessarily agree with all of the blogger’s opinions either. We reblog a specific post if we think seeing that post might be helpful for some of our followers.
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lorablackmane · 3 years
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Kid & Tuna Sandwich: A Purr-fect Combo
Hello fellow KC fans I’m here to ramble ‘bout how amazingly written Kid and Tuna’s relationship is written as someone who was like him when it came to my kitty. (This essay became longer than I expected so I put it under the read more)
First, Tuna loves him so much and it ain't just because Kid gives him sandwiches like most people would think, especially after seeing the flashback/nightmare scene. He loves Kid, and this is fully proven at the end of the 3rd episode when Kid places a sandwich between them and tuna ignores it completely to snuggle up under his head and purr. Tuna attacks the government, aliens, anything that could harm kid despite him having nothing but his teeth and claws - no superstrength, no invincibility, nothin. It’s his love for the kid that keeps him fighting to the point he’s willing to hijack a truck to save him when he thinks he’s going to die. To him, Kid is a sunbeam in a dreary house - a source of warmth and happiness that’d make any kitty lucky to have around.
And that platonic love and trust is fully reciprocated by Kid. Everyone else had to prove themselves to get or keep their ring (Jo convinced him he’d need a partner against a threat, Rosa destroyed Chuck’s plan, Papa G used his to rescue himself and the others).
Tuna though? He has Kid's full trust. He can't even tell them what's going to happen and the ring would be far better suited for a human member but Kid let's tuna keep it because he truly trusts Tuna, maybe even more than he trusts Papa G!  
And it makes sense! Like I get it, because just like Kid I've had my own old man since I was younger even younger than when Kid found Tuna - I was younger than Rosa actually. When I was Kid’s age my own old man had my full trust - I would have totally trusted him with cosmic power just because I know I can trust him! It’s not logically logical, but it is emotionally logical - especially considering Kid’s hobbies. Even if you aren’t a comic book fan you might know the story of Dexter/Dex-Starr, the Red Latern who is a cat. And Dex-Starr isn’t the only animal superhero! Ace the Bathound debuted in Batman #92 which came out in June of 1955, and before him Rex the Wonder Dog and Krypto - all of these are animals but also superheroes. And if I remember correctly not all of these fuzzy friends can talk, so to Kid the fact a cat can be a hero is perfectly sound. And even better, it’s his bestest friend whose been by his side since he was little - ready to listen to him read comic books and stuff (AN: I just wanted to add that during Tuna’s short if you look closely Tuna’s only pretending to sleep while Kid’s with him. During most of it his brow is turned downward and resting on his muzzle, but when he’s with Kid it’s slightly above the muzzle. He’s listening to Kid’s reading and I bet Kid knows it too since he’s been with him so long).
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The two of them know each other almost perfectly. When they go to save him after Tuna can talk and the kid freaks out excitedly, to the point he can only repeat the same thing, Tuna understands what he wants to say and tells him he loves the kid too before moving his head towards Kid - who meets him exactly at the same time before hugging him. That's not a motion you can do so perfectly if it's not something you do often, so they do the kitty affection thing of butting heads often enough it's ingrained in how they react to 1 another. Kid always has a tuna sandwich with him ready for his kitty (AN: which reminds me of another autistically coded, well written kid character - Lilo. It’s interesting how both of these kids, who lost their parents in car crashes, ended up doing a regularly done ritual involving sandwiches), knows how Tuna wants to be petted, and when he rescues them he immediately knows how and why he came despite not having actually seen his power. Tuna allows Kid to play with him (ex. Episode 1, after Kid descends into babbling at him he grabs Tuna’s face and Tuna doesn’t growl or anything, just waits for him to let go), is the 1st to realize Kid’s upset at being called comic relief (during the big win when everyone is making fun of Kid, his eyes are surprised and open and only turns after he hears the door chime), and listens to him read comics to the point where certain ideas are part of his dreams.  Tuna says he'd been dreaming of a device that'd let him communicate for years. That sort of tech is so common in comics, so kid hasn't been just talking to the air, Tuna has been listening to him when he gets excited and reads his comics to him.
In conclusion, their dynamic is one of the best written kid and animal friend dynamics I’ve ever watched since I was a little creature, and I hope season 2 has more moments that expand on their relationship.
Thank you for reading! Here’s an obligatory old pic of my own old man btw, back when he looked a lot like Tuna.
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spectrumed · 3 years
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2. voice
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As a child I could not pronounce the letter R. I once complained to my mother for being so careless as to give me a name that had two R’s in it. Fredrik. Or as I pronounced it back then, “Fledlik.” Cute, right? I was a cute child, all blonde and with big blue eyes. At one point, I got surrounded by a group of older girls who forced me to pronounce my name, even though I really couldn’t. They laughed and laughed, teasing me for my inability to pronounce even my own name correctly. If I ever had a reason to develop a fetish for femdom, I think this would have been it.
Like it or not, in speech, there is no room for individual quirks. No, we’ve all got to learn how to speak properly. Historically, that has led to some pretty heinous attitudes towards regional accents, any tongue that was the standard was seen by default as being less or developed and intelligent. Regional accents were seen as practically unhygienic, the worry being that if people just got to speak as they wished, they might end up potentially thinking dangerous thoughts. While I understand the importance of being understood, it’s clear that the stigma that exists around speech difficulties stems from a place of prejudice. If a person has a lisp, do you really struggle to understand them? And while stammering can be quite debilitating, it should be blatantly obvious that shaming people who stammer, suggesting that they are bereft of intelligence, is not the way to help them. Humans are social animals, and language may be the one thing that distinguishes us as a species, it is natural that proper elocution should be treasured. But some people do struggle with their speech, and that should not cost them any respect or kindness.
As a child, I didn’t speak nearly enough. As an adult I am speaking too much. That’s the problem with you, Fredrik, you’ve never understood that there is a middle ground between two extremes. There is a way you can speak that is neither too quiet, nor too loud. It is how normal people speak. Why can’t you be normal, Fredrik? Are you going to spend this whole blog post talking about how difficult it is for you to simply learn to be like everyone else? Self-pitying yourself, much? Back in my day people pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, if they had something they struggled with, they learned to sort it all out, and they didn’t start complaining about society being all mean to them. You’re just spending too much time inside your own head, go take a swim, take up a hobby that requires you to step outdoors, it will serve you well. Don’t be a freak, Fredrik. Be normal, for once.
On a side note, “pulling yourself up by your bootstraps” is meant to be understood as an impossible feat. You can’t possibly pull yourself up by your bootstraps, it’s ludicrous to even suggest that such a thing may be feasible. While, yes, there are many things you can do to help yourself, ultimately, you can’t profoundly escape from a sorry situation you’ve found yourself in without some outside help. There is no shame in requiring help. To guilt someone into thinking that if they can’t do it alone, they are weak, is frankly sociopathic. Humans need each other, we take care of each other, we are there for each other. Self-sufficiency is great, but let’s not take it to levels of absurdity by suggesting that needing help from others is anything but normal. No-one succeeds in life without others there to prop them up. Instead of telling someone to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, you might as well tell them to go and swallow the sun, which is clearly another impossible task.
Most people will never in their lives experience what it is like to go through a neuropsychological evaluation. Turns out that it is not always such a pleasant experience. Though, considering the popularity of pseudo-scientific nonsense like the Myers-Briggs test, I am sure some folks would lie and pretend to love it. Certainly, there is a charm to being there and talking about yourself for several hours near-uninterrupted, but the exhaustion that you will feel at the end of it cannot be understated. Naturally, it does vary between who does it, and why they’re doing it. But if the stated goal is to find out whether you’ve had a neurodevelopmental disorder since you were but a young babe, then of course, there are going to be some pretty long conversations happening about those early days. Lots of stuff you may not have considered or thought about in a very long time will suddenly become very relevant to your current situation. And at the end of it all, you get some papers detailing your fashionable new diagnosis. Your entire life, all written down. Can make you feel rather wistful. And there’s really quite a surprising amount of typos included in the text, and barely any jokes.
Still, as part of my official diagnosis, there is a reference to my speech at being at times “stilted.” Though, the diagnosis does take very good care to mention that I appear intelligent and thoughtful, exhibiting a wide vocabulary and a good sense of the right words to use at the right moment. It’s flattering, for the most part. Yet, it does irk me that I could be perceived as being stilted. I know that at this point, I am being petty, because who cares if I sometimes come across as maybe a little robotic. I’ve got Asperger’s. Of course I am a robot. The closest role model we folks with Asperger’s ever had for the longest time was Star Trek: The Next Generation’s android named Data. God forbid anyone like me ever turned out to be the protagonist of a series, we’re all doomed to play the part of the robot, the alien, or the socially awkward geek. I should just be delighted that I am high-functioning. I know how much worse some have it. I should be grateful and pleased that I come across as mostly normal, mostly neurotypical. But… I really just don’t want anyone to think my speech is stilted. I don’t want to be Data. I want to be Riker.
It is never enough, you’ll never be good enough. If you fake it, they’ll see through it. If you struggle and if you work honestly to appear more normal, they won’t recognise it. As soon as they get an inkling you may be an imposter, looking like them, but having a neurologically deviant brain, they’ll single you out. For you, normalcy is an illusion. To attempt to be normal is to remake yourself only to receive nothing. Sure, you can be disingenuous, pretend you're not yourself, but it’ll never fool them. In the end, you’ll only lose yourself. Maybe I should just own the fact that my speech sometimes comes across as being stilted. Maybe I should own it. Be proud of who I am. But… sometimes I just don’t want to be me.
I want to be ignored. Sometimes, not always. But that goes for everyone. But most of all, I’d like to be able to go unseen whenever I’m not trying to impress anyone. When I’m just off to buy some milk. When I’m sitting on the bus. When I’m walking through the park. I know it is partly paranoia, but I can’t help but feel like I stick out. It’s always been like that with my friends growing up. The metaphor I used with my therapist is that I felt like a thumb. That they, my friends, were the fingers and I was the thumb. Sure, we’re similar. In many ways we’re the same. You could even say that I was crucial to making the social dynamics work. Who doesn’t like the thumb? What would you do without your thumb? But still, I was different. Some people would do anything to be different like that, to feel special. Some folks feel all invisible and forgotten in the crowd, and I’d lie if I told them that I didn’t envy them sometimes. The ability to go all invisible? That seems swell! There’s this question people like to ask as a sort of personality test. If you could choose a superpower, would you rather be able to fly, or would you rather be able to go invisible? The answer is obvious, as far as I’m concerned. Of course I’d love to be able to go invisible. To be able to exist without anyone seeing me. Without anyone judging me. Without ever having to worry if someone is going to treat me as different. For a moment to feel what it is like not to be some big, dumb, stupid, thumb.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not too anguished. Nowadays, I feel like I am in a relatively good place. But I would be lying if I told you that I still don’t get frustrated at the plethora of difficulties I face just trying to blend in. Even with family members, people who are supposed to know you the best, even then I have to go out of my way to behave a certain way, to exist a certain way, because fundamentally, they just don’t seem to get you. Not in that way. They have an image of you that you need to try and match. It doesn’t matter how many times I tell them that sometimes you need to be more direct in your communication to truly reach me, I don’t pick up on the many smaller little social cues they may throw my way, it’s still just me being silly and looking for excuses for why I didn’t understand them the first time around. And I am deathly afraid of hurting anyone’s feelings. A very prevalent misconception about autistic individuals is that we don’t care if we’re being rude. That if we are rude, our rudeness can simply be overlooked because, y’know, we’re autistic. While this sort of thing is commonly represented in media that is supposed to depict autistic characters, in real life, things don't quite work like this. Believe it or not, readers, being autistic is not a free pass to act like a dick. Autistic individuals still very much have to modulate our behaviour if we wish to fit in and be accepted. No-one will ever excuse you for being autistic. To be autistic is living with extra hurdles in your way, thinking that it’s anything but a social handicap is romanticising a diagnosis you clearly know very little about.
When I was a kid, I didn’t speak much. As far as I was concerned, I merely spoke whenever I needed to speak. It took until adulthood for me to learn that my parents and teachers were actually concerned about that. I was made to see a specialist, under the guise of learning elocution, but I’ve later come to realise that those meetings were about more than just learning to pronounce the letter R. Like, what does testing my memory have to do with diction? Yes, her job was partly to help my speech develop more in line with the other kids, but she was also there to evaluate whether or not I was intellectually disabled. I have come to learn that I had teachers at the time that were adamant about me going to a different school, more equipped to handle kids like me, but my mother vehemently defended my right to stay in the school I was in. After all, I did have friends, and to anyone who really knew me, they knew that I was a bright child. Sure, I wasn’t as communicative as the other children, but I clearly had no issues processing information, and it’s not like I was disruptive in some other way. But that was also part of the problem. The teachers that thought that I may need specialist schooling were concerned about the fact that I was too placid and too agreeable. They wanted me to express frustration at my lacking pronunciation, to see me get mad at others for not fully understanding me. That amazes me, if anything. The fact that I was a happy kid they took as some indication that I wasn’t quite right.
My mother delights in a memory of me as a kid once slamming my fist on the table and declaring that “now, I am speaking!” May I remind you that I was a cute kid. Sure, it is the sort of behaviour that parents of the old times would have spanked their kids for. Kids in the past were supposed to be quiet. To be seen, but not heard. I wonder if there’d be any kind of hubbub about my early development if I lived back then. I’d probably be seen as the ideal child, all pretty and docile and never too loud. Still, it was a moment my mother cherished, because for once, I really proved that I did have the capacity to speak. Though, I still couldn’t pronounce my R’s. But it was time for Fledlik to speak.
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doberbutts · 3 years
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Hi! Wondering if I can take you up on the offer in that dysautonomia post.
I’ve been feeling randomly more tired than it feels like I should, but I think it’s not general deconditioning? Showers can wipe me out for a few hours and a shower chair is helpful - but I can walk for miles and afaict even a 5 mile hike drained my mental energy before obvious physical exhaustion (noticeably worse executive function and sensory/emotional tolerance but only normal muscle fatigue). Medically, been trying to sort out high hgb/hct that isn’t going down that much with T dose, and also night sweats at least a few times a week, and also I can be lying down to nap with my heart rate over 100 and it only comes down slowly. Can’t freaking tell what’s ptsd triggers, what’s other stress/anxiety, what’s maybe autistic burnout/sensory management taking much more energy than I expect, what’s needing to eat more consistently, what might be sleep issues, what’s effects of hormone levels, or what might be something else. I’m waiting for a sleep study to try to rule out sleep issues. I would really appreciate any pointers if any of this sounds like it might point a particular direction or if other tests might be useful.
Sadly that could be a lot of things, and I definitely think a sleep study is a good way to start. Making sure to manage your food and water intake, fixing your sleep schedule, taking care to be kind to yourself during episodes, those are a good place to start. No, I'm not saying that that will completely fix your problems, but any doctor that knows about POTS that does end up diagnosing you [if you have it] will tell you to do these things anyway. This is why I have been slowly attempting to unfuck my life.
If all of these things don't seem to be helping and the sleep study reveals nothing, the next thing I'd do is buy a cheap blood pressure monitor and see if you can have an actual record of your heart rate and blood pressure before, during, and after these episodes if possible. Something that records the output, or take a photo of the readings so you can show them to your doctor. Personally being a child of diabetics I also recommend buying a cheap glucose test kit to see if your sugar levels are doing anything funky during these times as well. Try to keep a journal of time of day, what you were doing just prior, and the readings you're acquiring to see if someone can point out a pattern.
A really easy way to see if there's a cause for pushing for specific testing is to go from seated to standing at your usual pace. If you are an otherwise healthy person and your heart rate jumps more than 30 bpm there is a pretty good indication that something interesting is happening inside of you that shouldn't be. If you also notice a big spike or drop in your blood pressure when initially standing or after standing still for a long period, that's another clue.
If you unfuck these areas of your life AND are getting concerning readings with little to no improvement on symptoms, it's time to look deeper. Most cardiologists will do a 24hr holtor, an EKG, a tilt table test, and/or a stress test, though the tilt table test is the one that really tends to seal the deal. However with some of your symptoms, I would honestly not be surprised to hear your doctors wanting the sleep study and probably an EEG to rule out things like sleep disorders or epilepsy as there can be some overlap.
It does take the average patient 8 years for a diagnosis- it took me less the first time around because of my family history, but the second time around took more like a year and a half due to comorbidities and I literally almost died. A friend of mine got really jerked around by her doctors for close to 6 months before someone was willing to run a tilt table test and almost instantly diagnosed her the second she fainted during the test. Another friend was told she was being a ridiculous germaphobe while her doctor ordered the test despite having a known dx of something commonly associated with POTS and again she was still diagnosed almost instantly during her tilt table. A third friend keeps getting 'hmm maybe' 'no' 'totally healthyl 'yes?' 'okay well that's weird' when he asks for a tilt table and they refused to give it to him despite picking up arrhythmias during his holtor and EKG- it's been a year and he's still arguing with the doctors to get a tilt table. Unfortunately many doctors simply aren't trained in autonomic disorders or in autoimmune disorders, and POTS is both. It can be very difficult to find someone willing to listen to you.
If you do all of these things and land on 🤷‍♂️, a lot of times it's things like fibro or MS, and the knowledge gained from these tests will help find a diagnosis of whatever-it-is affecting you.
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tabby-shieldmaiden · 2 years
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Hm, I think I have some thoughts from this post about sex and autism and the internet which I would want to expand on, now that I’ve had a little more time to think about and stew on some things.
Firstly, maybe I should unpack what I mean by ‘spaces’. Because depending on which sort of space I’m talking about, different things are going to be appropriate. Like, are we talking about a collection of online resources about living life as an autistic where autistics and cousins can pick and choose which ones to read? Then yeah, there may be articles about sex because some autistics have sex or want to have sex. And the appropriate response for people who do not wish to have sex would be to ignore those articles. Are we talking about social spaces? Discord servers and the like, where autistics and cousins can meet up and talk? Then yeah, it would be wise to have different servers for different kinds of people, and people can discern for themselves which one they would prefer to join.
Secondly, I think while my history of facing sex negativity (alongside odd flavours of sex positivity) is a thing that I’m sure other people have experienced, I don’t necessarily blame other autistics (and cousins) for the things they said. A number of them were asexual young people (meaning teenagers and young adults) and well, yeah, it makes sense why they would feel uncomfortable with sexualisation and objectification and such. But some of them were allosexual, and well... also young people. Also trans people of a number of different genders. And also cis girls. In other words, young people who were part of groups which tended to have complicated somewhat uncomfortable relationships with sex and objectification and sexualisation at a young age for a number of reasons. It’s completely understandable why such people would be uncomfortable hanging around spaces where nsfw topics get discussed frankly.
And I think a very common solution is to section off spaces for adults and spaces for minors. No minors allowed in this 18+ discord server, for example. And based on the current limitations of social media, this is probably one of the better ways of handling the issue. But well, where does that leave young autistics who are the opposite? Who are very sexual? And why did I think about this group of young people second when that was - and in some ways, still is - me?
More under the cut because it gets personal.
Because I was kind of oversexed as a teenager. Maybe a part of that was because of sexual OCD, maybe it is just who I am as a person. Either way, I did think about sex a lot. I did read and even wrote (and later deleted) porn. I could be crass and vulgar in my sense of humour. And I did have some kinky interest which in some ways were linked to autism. (Like uh... I apologise to anyone who thought that my whole ‘badass fighter woman’ thing was just a girl power thing... it’s not just that.*) It did make it hard for me to fully fit in among a lot of autistics and cousins my age, I must confess.** Especially once I turned eighteen.
Last year, I kept having this... continuous streak of panic running through the back of my mind. Like now that I was an adult, it felt like a lot of the plausible deniability about my morality at being sexual was gone. Now I could be a real creep. I could be predatory. I was a freak before, but my freakishness is enhanced and made worst by my newly acquired status as an adult. I was that eighteen year old putting ‘minors dni’ in her bio. And a lot of it was because all those years of marinating on a site with weird purity politics with anxiety was getting to me. I knew a lot of it was irrational and that sex and sexuality didn’t work that way, and I still had anxiety over it. It was bad. Really bad.
And the thing is... I don’t know how to manage other cases like me. I was lucky that I eventually found a few people and social groups that I’m okay around.
But like, I’m not everyone in my situation.
I think with the way the internet is set up, a lot of people aren’t really equipped to help kids like me find community spaces. Which is unfortunate. The internet is often one of the first or only spaces young autistics and cousins can really congregate and form friendships, and being able to access a lot of mental health and autism stuff via the internet did help me out in some ways. And I don’t know what to do. I can’t blame anyone; if a minor is uncomfortable discussing sexual topics they have a right to avoid that. But at the same time, people like me are kind of left out to dry.
*I have a side tangent at how dommey women get treated in the current internet culture and how that has led to some personal insecurities of mine. But like, one topic at a time, this post is rambley enough as it is.
**If we have previously interacted as friends and you see this: don’t worry, I really don’t blame you and this is in large part a ‘me and my mental illnesses’ thing.
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vexy-hexy · 3 years
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Hey so it might have a (as far as I'm aware) neurotypical actor playing an autistic character but I just finished 'Come Play' and... I loved it so much
Despite being verbal, I related to Oliver's character so much that by the end I was crying
The monster, Larry, was so cool, both in looks, the way he communicated, and his backstory (I guess)
It was so good, it did both horror and (in my actually autistic opinion) autism as well. There was no blood and gore but it was still scary (again, in my opinion) and whenever one of the parents (mostly the mom) complained about Oliver's autism, she was told she was in the wrong
I've actually been looking forward to this movie since I saw the trailer so I'm happy I finally did
Honestly, I would give this movie a 11/11 (because I hate even numbers for some reason)
It was good because, instead of what Sia did (which I'm assuming she just browsed Autism Speaks' website of bullshit and hate for 3 minutes and just lied about researching for 3 years because no way she researched for 3 years and came out with that fucking mockery), they seemed to do actual research and on the Insider he's quoted saying
"... it's not a movie about him [being autistic]. That's just one of the many facets of who he is and what the movie is [about]."
(I did change him saying "having autism" to "being autistic" because statements like 'person with autism' make me uncomfortable)
It's also mentioned that both the director and Oliver's actor actually shadowed autistic kids to get more of an in depth experience instead of just getting all of their info from some autism mommy blog who mostly just whines about how unfair it was for her child to be autistic. They apparently even got insight and reviewed but an autistic man who was nonverbal
Probably my favorite quote from the director was from the Insider as well. He said
""When you've met one kid on the spectrum, you've sort of only met one kid on the spectrum. Everyone's so different," ... "So it was about finding...the specificities of the character that we were going to use for Oliver."
Which... I almost cried just reading that. So many people seem to think we're all the same and don't see us as individuals who are different... so when I read that quote I felt so happy.
His wife also works with autistic kids which probably also helped in developing the film
I loved Oliver's character though. It was so nice to see an autistic character who was shown to be nice and well meaning instead of the stone-cold, no emotions ones that are usually depicted. I also liked how they explained stimming, it was so simple and yet it was good, especially since it was being explained to children at the time. Special interests, while not mentioned, are extremely obvious in this movie with Oliver's being Spongebob, something the director explained was not random, saying that both Spongebob and Oliver are well-meaning and I thought that was nice, especially as someone who obsesses over characters I relate to, more so than most neurotypicals. I also liked that they didn't make Oliver, I don't know, "slow". I feel like a lot of people assume nonverbal people can never be smart but Oliver is in a class with kids his age so I liked that. I also liked how he couldn't just talk perfectly all of a sudden by the end, you still see him struggle with words with his speech therapist.
One of THE best things about this movie in my eyes though... it's mostly the mom and the other neurotypical people around Oliver who are learning, not JUST Oliver, which is huge in my mind. I feel a lot of people only put the pressure on the autistic person to learn to be able to cope and act neurotypical so they are less of an inconvenience to the rest of the world (at least, that's what ABA made me think) and there's little to no expectation for neurotypicals to try and learn how to HELP us and stop looking at us, laughing at us like we're some walking freak show when we stim or have a meltdown or ANYTHING. Instead it was the neurotypicals learning how to help, which again, almost made me cry.
All that being said, as much as I loved this movie and Azhy's performance as Oliver, I do sincerely wish they had used a kid on the spectrum or maybe try and show some sort of diversity. I don't know, maybe it's just me but I'm kind of tired of only seeing white, cis boys as the only representation in mainstream media, but at least with this they made him nonverbal which I haven't really seen.
I really do recommend this movie though because I came out feeling seen and heard instead of mocked and looked down on, and for the other neurodivergent people out there, if you watch this movie, I hope you walk away feeling as happy as I did.
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softer-ua · 3 years
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in regards to what you pointed out a few posts ago, ngl one of my least favorite fandom things is when they make Kaminari the Har Har Stupid Joking ADHD Bi Playboy Who Is Never Serious Trope. like, he's very smart, 'worst in ___ area of a UA course' is very impressive and I don't remember if it even said that or just that he was studying with some other students, worried about his grades overall, calls himself stupid with implied insecurities about it, and didn't think he was very smart compared to the other people in the course. quirk overuse makes him loopy, incoherent, and think everything's funny. and yeah, he's a bit of a flirt and made a few perverted comments and actions that he clearly didn't think through that well. I'm pretty sure he's not ever stated to be bi in the manga because it was written by a coward, so I think people should think more about why they're associating and pairing together the idea of "hot flirty playboy who if legally able would sleep with everyone he meets" with emphasis or joke in the captions of whatever the content is on him being bi. I don't think this is inherently bad, even put together, but the execution feels kind of :/ and shallow. and I mainly just wish they'd pause to consider if there's any reason (subconscious or intentional) why one of those makes them think about the other, and at the very least lean back to see if they're blatantly making those traits centric around each other and tweak how they're showing them a little. Part of this is also because it's basically his fanon sexuality, but then they stick together "oh he's bi and everyone thinks that" and "he's made flirty or perverted comments and actions in canon at some point" and then mentally exaggerate and have this Canon Image of him as *waves hand at above* and I don't think that's happening consciously in most cases but. again. Cookiecutter Bi Party Playboy Who's Made a Date Offer to Everyone In The Building. not a flirty Person or a Playboy who is bi and flirts with more than one genders
I myself headcanon him as adhd and while the exact sexuality depends on my mood I think of/have him as bi in a lot of my content, but it's the same thing with why non adhd people see how he acts and label "adhd!" Especially about comprehension speed and derpy acting and intelligence and attention span jokes/tropes. Again, not bad in and of itself, but the specific parts of his behavior that make them think he's adhd, or that they start making jokes about or Ha Ha ADHD'ing, or that they think is why we project ADHD on him, (which they aren't necessarily wrong about, but like right in a really disrespectful look at how funny this is oh look squirrel way that's only funny when adhd people are doing it and it isn't all mocking like that) when they see other people calling him adhd, are the wrong ones, I think, and it shows in their characterization of him.
I'm not saying that any of those traits are bad in a character, but as a queer adhd girl with very high annual test scores and Gifted Kid Intelligence but extremely poor grades, focus, and brain damage (admittedly nothing like his, it was a longterm passive thing that mainly just made me have a Lot of Really Bad headaches, and closest thing it did to me was make me sluggish and emotional on bad days and also techincally have the potential kill my language bit if left untreated or the surgery messed up, which it didn't, and it won't be a problem again. but even after explaining that it wasn't cancer or any sort of tumor, and after seeing it do very little at all to affect my behavior outside of irritability and performance, because y'know, constant migraines, gone after the surgery but this was before that, Certain People I Was Vaguely Kind Of Acquaintances With started to treat my like I was a fragile glass thing going to to drop dead and revive myself speaking like a comic relief cartoon crazy person at any moment which was. patronizing.) I've since had surgery for, the way the fandom combines them into stereotypes and portrays them really just rubs me the wrong way- "Flirty Bi(tm) Playboy" "Har Har ADHD Can't Focus Or Get Things After They're Explained To Him, He's Still Confused And An Idiot" "Stupid Person With Brain Damage Who Can't Take Care Of Or Think For Themself And Acts Stupid And Funny For People To Laugh At" which tbh is super ableist even and especially when people irl do fit that description, and also reminds me of the Autistic Person Freaking Out And Being Dramatic sense of humor. And I know it's not helped by canon, because it done for comic relief and to limit his powers, but explored more I think it as a limitation could have been used way more interestingly than canon did and also call me biased but that quirk induced brain frying sounds at least as concerning as Izuku's quirk's backlash.
And it's a shame!! Because he's so much more interesting than that! Instead, the fandom gives me the Cookicutter Funny Bi ADHD Flirt Who's An Idiot and I am sad about it.
tbh it reminds me of what happened to percy jackson, esp with the ADHD Idiot Trope thing. which sucks because apparently it originated in the author making up stories around characters like his adhd and dyslexic kid inspired by Greek myths to tell him after running out of actual myths because it was his special interest and he wanted more. and then the series got kind of all over the place and the fandom processed that the adhd and dyslexic main character who does dumb things sometimes but is very combat smart and great at strategizing and leading gets bad grades and has trouble focusing and has, y'know, adhd, and made him the ADHD Idiot and erased his Gifted Kid girl friend's traits and ADHD and dyslexia into No Nonsense Calls Him an Idiot And Thinks He's Stupid And Has To Tell Him What To Do And Manage His Life For Him and honestly that just kind of sucks and it reminds me of what happened to fandom Kaminari. and now that I think of it people have jirou like that around him a lot too.
im fine with you answering this publicly if you want or have something to add but probably tag as ableism and maybe a biphobia mention content warning for people who don't have the energy to deal with thinking about those kinds of negative things rn because I kind of Went Off About It
I love this! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and experiences 💚(and double thank you for tag suggestions)💚
I couldn’t agree more that a lot of fandom has messed up Kami’s character, which is why I’ve kinda been posting more about him cause he’s just stuck in my head.
I think a lot of fandoms have trouble with characters like this, people have a hard time with duality in characters and fast/fun posts are easier to make if you flatten a character down.
The did it to Kami, they did it to Percy, they did it to Ron Weasley, they do it to Thor, the list goes on. If being the Smart One ™️ isn’t your thing and you can be goofy than you get pigeonholed into the idiot trope.
I feel for Kami a lot(probably because I have adhd/brain damage too)
It sucks when you’re smart but it’s not the traditional, measurable kind of smart(even if by national comparison Kami technically is).
I got terrible grades growing up, and I pretty much got the absolute lowest gpa you can get and still graduate. But absolutely no one would have known if I didn’t tell them, because I’m not dumb.
(It’s okay if you are “dumb”, I love me a head empty just vibes friend. You’re 100% valid, stil worthy of joining discussions, and should be listened to and taken seriously. This just isn’t about that tho)
I joke sometimes that I’m clever and witty but not smart, because that’s exactly what it feels like.
I have lots of thoughts and ideas that I think I articulate pretty well, I am excellent at finding the humor in things and expressing it in a way that’s funny to others too, and there is almost zero problems I can’t find a work around. And the people in my life love it, and they love to use it.
But eventually everyone in my life finds out that I’m not smart. They see the way I have to pause to Google how to calculate a tip, that I don’t know the name of all 50 states or even where to find them on a map, or I legitimately just can not spell (if you ever see a post where it looks like I used a weird word choice it’s probably because I tried 4 times and autocorrect+Google couldn’t help me and voice to text wasn’t an option)
No one ever questions my intelligence until they find out about my adhd and/or catch me struggling with it. After the mask comes off it’s like they can’t even hear me anymore, nothing I say could be true or matter because I’m now just the goofy accident prone spacy girl. My family literally calls me Spacy
And ya know what sometimes I just let people think that because it’s easier, it’s easier than explaining that I’m dyslexic and that I didn’t have a single geography/history clas until 10th grade and shocker the capital of Iowa doesn’t come up much by then. And it’s easier for me to laugh off losing my keys again than dwell on the fact that sometimes it feels like I’m losing my marbles.
And I wouldn’t be at all surprised if after this post I get a lot more “fact checkers” and push back on anything else I post.(not talking about people who want to genuinely engage,y’all are always welcome, I’m talking those people who don’t wanna look it up themselves but no longer trust me to know what I’m talking about)
Kami is a sweet brilliant boy. He’s in a nationally high ranking school, he loves the weather channel, he’s careful about his quirk that could easily hurt his friends in combat, he has a very high emotional intelligence level, he wears dorky shirts with electricity puns on them, and he pays attention to his friends and remembers a lot of little things about them.
He wants to be a hero and he takes that seriously, and the series has tried time and time again to tell y’all that smiling and laughter are an important part of that. Kami excels at this part! So what if his history grades don’t rival the top of the class, the top 5 students would struggle hard to do what Kami does.
Iida can’t relax, Momos rather shy, Todo struggles with social cues, Midoriya is canonically not funny, and jfc where to even begin with Katsuki. I’m certain they’ll all grow up to be excellent heros in their own right, but none of them are going to bring the level of joy and camaraderie that Denki can. You can’t test that into someone.
Kami also just notices people differently and has any easy way of joining in with them, he doesn’t struggle approaching Katsuki or Shinso. Sure he doesn’t hit the the nail on the head the same way Deku does but he’s the only one who has the guts and skills to try. Also he’s not that kinda friend, he’s not looking to a save these guys but pal around with them
I think Kami 100% realizes what a special case and tough nut to crack Bakugo is, I don’t think he’s just careless or too dumb realize his life’s at stake or whatever.
I think he’s purposely testing Bakugos boundaries all while trying to not be a threat to Katsukis actual ego and calling Bakugo out when he needs it in a way that not to serious. Kami knows how to be just goofy enough that he’s approachable. He’s also keyed in that the way to Bakugo is through Deku, meanwhile everyone else is stuck believing the opposite.
Kami also realized how important music is to Jiro and saw an opportunity to let her display her skills and combin the two worlds she lives, and he wasn’t afraid to get some back lash from her for it.
Like Deku Kami isn’t afraid to be uncomfortable. You really can’t teach that level of social ease, you can teach the posture and feed people a couple of lines but it’ll never hit the same. Funny approachable people have spent a lifetime learning the craft, usually out of necessity.
It’s actually what gives me the biggest adhd vibes from him, because adhd is (speculated to be) a dopamine deficiency disorder. People with adhd are constantly trying to raise their dopamine levels, and that means looking for praise and reward and nothing makes the human brain light up faster than postative human connections.
Adhd children struggle a lot with connecting with peers and often find making people laugh a fast way into people’s circles and makes it more likely people will overlook being interrupted or spaced out on.
Also adhd people are pretty much forced by their own brain structures to be genuine in all they do, low dopamine levels make it very hard to do things you don’t enjoy because there no promise of dopamine from the activity and you don’t have enough to spare, plus impulsiveness makes it really hard to not show when you do or don’t enjoy something.
I agree that Kami is also painted as overly perverted at times, he’s a little flirty but in a fun casual way but it’s not the foundation of his personality and it’s really mellowed out over the course of the series.
And while I subscribe to the bi hc from his interactions with Jiro and Shinso, we should all be very mindful that we don’t lump these characteristics together. The are separate facets of his personality that are not dependent on each other in anyway.
Kami deserves all the respect and love, I can’t wait to see our electric king again 🖤⚡️🖤
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dappercritter · 4 years
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Random She-Ra Season 5 Thoughts: THE FINAL RAMBLING
Yep. I finally got all my crazy absurd thoughts about this gay adventure-romance-drama cartoon summarized into one incoherent yet fun to read computer document/article! ...four months after the show itself ended. Oh well, no one’s perfect. Anyways, there are a whole lot more insane observations than ever before, so I had to put it below a link so this thing didn’t back up my blog or any of yours. Hope you enjoy reading through these as much I enjoyed spouting them for no discernible reason other than I felt like it!
-I feel that since is the last season, I ought to talk about an important part of the show that I’ve been putting off: the animation. It’s… okay. It’s definitely smoother than what the original 80’s show and it’s brother series (heheh) looked like, but at the same time it still seems to suffer from similar limitations which causes some distracting moments of stiffness. But other than that, it’s pretty good. It’s no Titmouse or Studio Mir but it looks good and it gets the job done.
         -After all, let’s not forget: “Imperfection is beautiful!”
-Even when things are at their lowest, Adora is a jock with a heart of gold.
-Horde Prime and the Galactic Horde’s aesthetic feels like a mixture of Catholicism, Scientology, Heaven’s Gate, and modern Microsoft, and honestly, that just makes him creepier.
-Speaking of Horde Prime, he didn’t waste any time with destroying Bright Moon. …apparently.
-Furthermore, on the topic of his giant holographic messages, WAS THAT A FREAKING MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE MOVIE REFERENCE?!
-Boy, Glimmer and Catra sure got along quickly! It’s almost like they magically understand each other because they both assumed leadership roles and screwed up big time! …I guess.
         -Either that or this season is going to be a speedrun.
-Wow, the Rebellion sure got used to having a once-thought-dead king as well as a known enemy general/abuser running around their camp awful fast, didn’t they?
-Mara’s got a spaceship, a cyber girlfriend, a magic grandma, a dragon, a tragic backstory, AND a force ghost?! Dang, even in death, the girl’s got it all. No wonder everyone likes her!
-(*me looking at the TV rating at the start of episode*) “Why is language in there? Is there surprise cuss words or something in this season?” (*sees Horde Prime seize control of a clone for the first time*) “HOLY FREAKING SH—oh that’s why.”
-Applause to the crew for making the “dinner with Prime” scene for making a meal between a sparkly princess, a catgirl, and alien cult leader feel even more uncomfortable than it had a right to.
-(*me throughout the season whenever a clone was onscreen*) Is that Hordak? Is that him? Is that him? Is that him right there? Oh it is—oh no wait. … Is that h—
-Extra applause for having Glimmer learn from her grey-area wetwipe phase and refusing to sell out her friends again whilst telling the imperialist cult leader where to stick it.
-I would pay a sizeable portion of my life savings to hear what a Scorpia and Swift Wind duet would sound like.
         -In fact, I’d double it if it was just Scorpia singing.
         -Ah what the heck. I would triple it for an entire She-Ra musical!
-As happy as I am to see to see Entrapta interacting with the other princesses again, I have to say that their big reunion left me with some mixed feelings. Here’s a quick rundown:
         -Entrapta, a grown autistic woman, being led around on a leash by non-neurodivergent teenagers—again: that’s bad.
         -The Princesses confronting Entrapta about joining the Horde: that’s good!
         -The Princesses blaming all their problems with the Horde bots on Entrapta’s actions and her hyper fixations alone: that’s bad.
         -Entrapta explaining herself, admitting that she regrets her mistakes, and getting the Princesses to understand that she thinks and communicates differently, but in spite of that, she really does want help find Glimmer: that’s good!
         -Entrapta never gets to call out the Princesses for how poorly they treated her: that’s bad.
         -Entrapta saves the day and goes to space: that’s good!
         -Scorpia and Entrapta still haven’t interacted even though the former is with the Rebellion in the first place because she went to look for her because she is her best friend: …can I go home now?
-How nice! Michah finally got to shapeshift!
         -And he’s rocking that She-Ra outfit to boot!
-So is Darla a back up of Light Hope or do they just run on the same operating system and have the same voice?
-I could watch an entire season of Adora, Bow, and Entrapta going on space adventure in a rundown ship with their custom-made spacesuits, tbh.
-Is anyone else weirded out that Catra’s younger self looked at her in her flashback(?).
         -Actually what WAS happening there, anyhow?
-(*watching Bow’s spacewalk to save Glimmer*) “Is that a Gravity reference?” asked the man who never saw Gravity.
-Speaking of spacewalks, how did Glimmer survive those precious few seconds in space? Does the teleporter teleport a breathable atmosphere too?
         -Also, Catra, WHY did you think it would be a good idea to teleport Glimmer into space? I know you had a plan and the ship was right there but… Ah, never mind.
-Not that I’m complaining but Glimmer’s apology to the rest of the friend squad for her HORRIBLE plan last season went… surprisingly quickly.
-You know as cool as The Star Siblings are, being a quirky band of space-travelling siblings with cool powers and some trans rep to boot, I only have one small problem with them: weren’t there already Star Sisters on Etheria back in season 1?
         -That doesn’t sound right, but I don’t know enough about Masters of the Universe characters to dispute it.
-Entrapta confirmed pan, objectum, AND horny on main. Dang girl, you’re gonna have fun whether you got Hordak back or not…
-“The Velvet Glove” is both a menacing and stupid name for a decadent overlord’s mothership.
         -Wait, it’s from the 80’s canon? Oh. That kind of explains it, actually.
-Goshdangit, I wanted Catra to face punishment for her crimes, but I didn’t think that would involve going to evil alien conversion therapy!
         -Nor did I want her to die! For a second. Actually, since it obviously wasn’t going to last I was… weirdly okay with that part???
-Horde Prime seems awfully okay with Catradora. I mean he’s still super creepy and manipulative about it, but also oddly progressive for an evil brainwashing cult leader.
-(*Adora transforms into a She-Ra through seer will*) First of all, called it. Second of all, WOAH MAMA now that’s a glow up!
-Wrong Hordak did not have to be a thing, and yet, I’m glad that he is.
-Hordak remembers the LUVD crystal and Entrapta… Hordak remembers Entrap—! It’s happening! Oh my gosh, it’s happening! Everybody stay calm!
-Wow, Entrapta didn’t have to be so forgiving of Catra for everything she’s done to her but she did. Only I’m not sure if that was Entrapta taking the high road or the low road.
         -Or which road the crew took for that matter.
-I remember when I thought those “Chipped AUs” floating around here on tumblr were just something the fans came up with and that chipping people was not an actual despicable thing Prime does in canon. I miss those days.
-I know it’s not the same as before or the original design, but True She-Ra’s designs and powers? I think they slappin’.
-Hooray, Adora and Catra are finally making up! And it only took four and half seasons worth of communication failures, toxic villainous behaviour, and physical violence for Catra to snap out of it!
         -…We can go back to Entrapdak now, right?
-Poor Elberon. First they unknowingly adopt a double agent then get invaded by the Horde and now they’re getting brainwashed and chipped by the Galactic Horde. They might be a cute village, but they got some pretty lousy security.
-You know it’s cute that Micah is doing his best to be friends with Frosta and get back in touch with his dad-side, but look I can’t be the only one worried about how the local King is a less proactive leader than the princesses or the known war criminal/abuser, right?
-“The Perils of Peekablue” or as I like to call it, “You Thought ‘Boys Night Out’ Caught You Emotionally Off-guard? Hah! Watch This.”
-You know I didn’t think Scorpfuma would be a thing aside that one moment of flirting near the end of season 4, but they really pushed for it to be a thing! This is… actually pretty great! Perfuma’s not perfect, and I would have appreciated giving them a little more time to bond and form some real chemistry, but at least she reciprocates Scorpia’s sweetness instead of rebuffing it in increasingly aggressive fashion.
-I’m not sure what’s more concerning: that Mermista set a boat on fire, that it’s worded like she had a fling as part of some experimental phase, or that Sea Hawk is turned on by this.
-Peekablue might not be real, (I think?) but he is one dapper dude! Female-to-male redesigns could learn a thing or two from him.
-It involved them getting stung and seizuring, but that was a heck of a way to reintroduce Double Trouble! I swear I got watching them cycle through their transformations in some sort of physical reaction.
         -Or maybe that was just me worrying about their wellbeing…
-Okay, I get the Chips are huge, and actually rather clever threat, but how do these characters get chipped in the first place? I get there are chipped people who spread the chips throught the population but where do they get those from???
         -Do one of those Horde Prime drones just sneak behind someone, slap a chip on their nape then hand them a whole bagfull and say, “Beep boop beep, Horde Prime’s Light, blah blah blah. Alright have fun, kiddo”?
         -Or is it some sort of Alien: Covenant deal where they’re just floating around and Lord help you if one sticks to you?
-HOLY CRAP THEY ACTUALLY GOT SCORPIA TO SING! AND SHE WAS GREAT!
         -Oh shoot. Guess I owe the crew twice my life savings now…
-Entrapdak might be what got me into this show, but it’s Double Trouble that kept me around, so you can imagine how happy I was to see them make their grand reappearance!
-Conversly, you can imagine my disappointment when they just disappeared until the finale.
         -And on that note: HOW DID YOU GUYS LOSE DOUBLE TROUBLE?!
                  -You forgot to cherish them, didn’t you?
-So, Scorpia sacrifices herself just after finding a new girlfriend and gaining some newfound confidence, Mermista and Sea Hawk are split up,and Double Trouble didn’t join the main cast. Why can’t you just have fun like a normal cartoon, show?
-Gosh, I love me some shifting title cards!
-Is it just me or did they sneak in some more Annihilation references on Krytis?
         (-Said the guy who was too chicken to watch the movie and just read about it and watched a few clips online.)
-(*audibly sighs*) FINE. I guess I like Catradora now. Are you happy now, SPOP Crew? ARE YOU?!
-Hooray, Catra’s got a emotional support animal! And they’re a shapeshifting magic alien cat. Those are the best kind!
-Is it weird that I knew that weird glowing stuff on Krytis was just magic all along, or was it just not hidden very well. Anyways, I like Krytis. I like that we got to see a truly alien world with its own form of magic.
-Plus, we got a logical advancement of the magic versus science subtheme with magic being Horde Prime’s weakness! Neato!
-Getting back on the “which is worse?” wagon for a second, I don’t know what feels less right: that Wrong Hordak’s big revelation and his resolution to free himself and his brothers and friends from Horde Prime’s control is played humorously, or that Real Hordak should be the one having this moment.
-That bit with Castaspella and Shadow Weaver where she tells Casta about Etheria being a living thing with inherent magical property, or whatever, while we got a peaceful shot of some boar creatures sleeping was actually kind of nice. It would have been nicer though if it wasn’t part of a power hungry abuser’s obvious scheme. If only there was a kindly old witch lady character who was in touch with nature and knew just what to say when someone was feeling downOH WAIT.
-Furthermore… Why did Shadow Weaver and Castaspella need to have romantic tension?
-Seriously though, where’s our Madame Razz quota this season? Where’s my supportive magic grandma timelord at, yo?
-Yup, they speedran this season.
-I’m actually really disappointed we didn’t see more of an intergalactic new rebellion rising up to fight Horde Prime’s forces across the universe. Especially if it meant we got to see more Star Sibling action!
-Again, I adore Wrong Hordak but I keep wondering what was keeping the crew from just bringing in Original Flavour Hordak. (You know, aside from teasing us Entrapdak fans and trying to distract us with a loveable new character in the meantime.) I mean he could have done the whole infiltrating the clone squads and tricking them bit, too.
         -Heck, he could have done the wink, too!
-I’d gleefully point out Loo-Kee’s cameo this season but apparently, they already made some several seasons ago. That’s what I get for not rewatching the 80’s show and training my eyes first.
-(*sees Erelandians*) Are those freaking Toads and Toadettes?
-So, what’s keeping them from just hitting Spinerella’s chip again? Besides emotional baggage and gale force winds, I mean.
-Perfuma coming out of a cave scared out of her wits, demanding to know who’s there, clinging to her friends as soon as they come back, and balling her eyes out is a big, BIG mood.
-Frosta absolutely decking Catra in the face was nestled somewhere between cathartic and excessive.
         -Netossa spraying her with a bottle of water on the other hand…
-Oh, so Greyskull was the name of a Rebel Squad! I think. Meh, the important thing is we got an explanation and it still sounds cool.
-Leave it to a couple of dads to make a secret message out of a dad joke.
-You know I made fun of Light Hope for being creepy, but I swear that avatar from the Spire is even creepier. I don’t know if it’s her face—those dang blank eyes, man—or just that it she’s less animated than the real thing, but it just felt… off.
-Aww, Noelle made Netossa’s princess weakness illustrations! So cute!
-Forget episodes that deserves Emmys, Keston John deserves one for voicing Hordak, Horde Prime, all the clones, and several minor villains and giving each and every single one a distinct voice! Where my king’s respect, eh?
-Yes, Catra you had a small disagreement with Hordak. …Over sending his girlfriend and your “friend” to DIE IN A LITERAL LIVING HELL.
         -Sorry, I just had to get that out of my system.
-Why does Perfuma get pressured to get angry and go wild when Entrapta’s the one who’s had it the worst out of all them? Why can’t my gamer girl go berserk, dammit!?
-Okay, but really, how do these fricking chips work??? Are they parasite devices who store Horde Prime’s Baptizing Dew then slowly pump it into their host’s bodies? Do they have their own nervous systems? Are they technorganic? Also, how and why do we need to make these chips are bigger threat then they need to be?
-Horde Prime showing up on Hordak’s throne in grand Killing Joke style and casually throwing shades at his brother’s overblown attempts to impress him is pretty awesome, but it feels strangely underdeveloped. Hordak’s not there to have his hard work insulted and we never got to see Adora have any similar encounter with Hordak here before, so unless you look at it from the perspective of someone who has been here before in the Horde story like Catra it lacks the dramatic weight it should have had.
-Scorpia resisting the chip to save her new friends was pretty great, though.
-I swear, when they got to the scene where Adora and the others figured out that Shadow Weaver was grooming her so she could use her to get to the Heart of Etheria, I was mouthing “You B***H” through the whole thing.
-They really brought back Etherian deep magic just so they had something to make Micah threatening. …okay.
-Okay, the rest of “Failsafe” messed me up, so here’s a rundown on all the other messy thoughts I had while the show ripped my heart and ground it to dog food:
         -Entrapta and Hordak reuniting: Yay!
         -Swift Wind yanking her away before she can get through to him: Boo.
         -Catra encouraging Adora to try and take care of herself for a change: Yay!
         -Adora hurts Catra and she runs away: Boo.
         -Adora finally calling out Shadow Weaver on what an utterly horrible person she is: Yay!
         -Adora resolves to risk sacrificing herself to save the world: Bo—okay, seriously, was all this suffering really necessary, show?
-I know I mentioned in my previous She-Ra random thoughts that I supported Glimmadora, but I am okay with Catradora and Glimbow ending up canon. The only problem I have is how rushed they feel—moreso with Glimbow. With Catradora, the crew had an entire season to make it work again and they took it. Glimbow it feels like they were down to the last few episodes and went, “Oh right, we were gonna do something with these two!” then did their darndest to fit in some chemistry in between all the other stuff going down.
-As ominous as it was, the music where Horde Prime starts hacking Etheria honestly SLAPS.
-Okay, I know everyone is magic or something, but I am legit surprised getting electrocuted in water didn’t kill the heroes right then and there.
-Sea Hawk tries to flirt with his girl even as she’s trying to kill him. Truly, he is a man of taste.
-What do you know, Shadow Weaver can only do good when she’s (canonically!) punch drunk.
-You know a whole lot of this could have been avoided if Holo-Mara was Adora’s mentor instead of Light Hope.
-When I think about it, it was actually really clever to make Horde Prime the final villain for Adora to face: a domineering decadent man who’s been in power forever against a humble emotionally vulnerable compassionate young woman.
         -Not to mention the divide between cult-like oppression and progressive freedom. Or something.
-Holy crap, did the First Ones get a great freaking a Great Old One for a guard dog?!
-So, you guys seriously didn’t bring Angella back to reunite with her family OR mention her all season after the impact her death had on everyone all last season until Glimmer needs a power-up at the last possible minute and then you never bring her up again. That is absolutely a dick move in bird culture.
-Entrapta’s hacker sticker gives me life. Gamer girl gremlin princess forever!
-On the one hand, I’m disappointed that Adora and Catra don’t get to have an awesome couple battle against the security monster and win. On the other hand, Shadow Weaver is finally dead. YAY!
         -With apologies to the writers and especially Lorraine Toussaint. She did splendidly bringing this character to life and even if I hated Shadow Weaver, I adored the effort she put into making her one of the most emotionally complex villains I’ve ever seen.
-Words cannot, will not, and will never describe the pure joy that I experienced when I first saw Hordak’s big scene: standing up to and disowning his tyrant brother, saving Entrapta, declaring his love to her (albeit in a nicely lowkey fashion), and then throwing Horde Prime to his apparent doom Disney style with Entrapta cheering him with sheer glee. GOSH, it was everything I could have hoped for from this season!
         -Now if only they kept the deleted scene where they got a moment to themselves before Prime body-jacked him again like the creepy sonuvabich he is.
-Horde Prime just wouldn’t be a religious villain if he didn’t tell everyone to burn.
         -Bonus points for actually trying to burn the frigging planet.
-Aside from the idea of Adora switching to wearing a She-Ra themed dress everywhere in the future, the future vision was really quite sweet, and seeing Prime step in to ruin it made it all the more impactful.
-Can I just say that it’s absolutely wonderful that the show, for all it’s flaws, said  “**** senseless heroic sacrifices”?
-BREAKING: Lesbian cat finally makes up with her jock ex, has a canon kiss so pure it saves the world!
         -In other news, Catradora fans are still spoiled rotten.
-Wow, look at all those character comebacks they skipped through! Look, there’s the chefs from Dryl, Double Trouble, Huntara, the Horde Trio, Imp, Madame Razz—are you kidding me?!
-Grumbling aside, I actually find the idea of the Horde Trio and Imp getting involved in a G-rated science-fantasy version of the first Hangover movie quite amusing.
-Oh dang, they pulled a Castle in the Sky with the Velvet Glove!
-As nice as it was to see Aodra save Hordak from Horde Prime and destroy the latter through exorcism via sheer compassion, I’m rather disappointed we never got to see She-Ra go full Metal Gear Solid Rising: Revengence on any creepy old cult leaders.
         -Yeah, it would have gone against the “love conquers all” set up, but love takes on many forms, does it not? So, why can it not manifest as cleaving your mortal enemies with extreme prejudice to save your loved ones?
-Furthermore, in addition to Holo-Mara being a better mentor, Hordak raising Adora instead Shadow Weaver could have prevented a lot of similar problems. Maybe. Possibly.
         -Eh whatever, he has a lifetime’s worth of fanfiction to make up for it.
-ENTRAPDAK IS CANON, ALL IS RIGHT WITH THE WORLD.
-And so is Catradora and Glimbow! That’s nice, too.
-Aww, how sweet of them to skip through Catra and Scorpia, and Glimmer and Micah’s big reunions! It’s not like we’ve been waiting forever for this stuff or anything. HahahahAHAHAHDHAHAHFHAFHKSADJHFKAJHDfine.
-And so it all ends with everyone either friends, in love, or both, as heroes decide to make up for it all with a grandiose sequel promising more exciting space adventures we probably won’t see! HOORAY!
-All snarky ranting aside, I actually really enjoyed the finale. It was exciting, heartwarming, and above all it ended on happy, hopeful note without leaving too many frustrating questions unanswered. (*glares with utmost contempt at Voltron and Star vs. The Forces of Evil*)
-You know, this wasn’t bad for a final season, but I think this might have worked better as two seasons. Not in Netflix’s cheap “split a regular 13-episode season in two 6-7 episode long seasons” strategy, but I mean two full seasons with their own storylines leading up to the grand finale:
         -First, one that starts out with Horde Prime’s arrival the downfall of Etheria, focuses on the space adventures, ends with their return to Etheria and gives the characters time to recuperate from season 4.
         -Then, we have one final season that focuses on the Best Friend Squad’s Return to Etheria, Horde Prime’s plan, gives everyone more time to properly reconcile before ¾ of the entire cast gets chipped, sets up a new Rebellion made up of Princess Alliance and former Etherian Horde members, maybe even set up a proper Hordak redemption arc or something, and then our big happy ending.
-On a mostly unrelated note, I also feel that the whole show could have turned out even better if it had been either a dedicated science-fantasy war drama with some levity (like the good Star Wars shows or Avatar: The Last Airbender) or a lighthearted yet empowering slice-of-life action-adventure romcom (i.e. basically a well-made remake of the original show in the style of Adventure Time and Parks and Rec or something).
-My final random thought for this whole thing: we really could have used a triumphant end credits song or something. Aside from obviously recommending Fabulous Secret Powers, I would have also recommended the original 4 Non Blondes “What’s Going On,” a reprise of “Warriors,” Gorillaz’s “We Got the Power,” or (my favourite) Talking Head’s “(Nothing But) Flowers” since the ending scenes remind me of it.
Thanks again to the crew for giving me something to live for and/or complain about!
Now, let’s hope the He-Man reboots do as well...
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rpbetter · 3 years
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Urgh. Okay, full disclosure, I haven't been on tumblr much over the last week or so, because I was one of the people that Raven initially called out after the COAR mess, and it was in the interest of my own mental health to fuck off for a while so I didn't stress myself out into oblivion. So I'm scrolling through most of this stuff for the first time, and talking to other people who were targeted. And pardon my French here, but I'm fucking disgusted at the lengths Raven has gone to assert themselves as a victim, how many people they've affected, and the waving around of something as serious as suicide for brownie points.
I have sympathy for people who overinterpret things in a strictly emotional and mental sense (actual reactions aside) because they lack the maturity. There's always a reason for that, and it's not their fault. And I have sympathy for people if they legitimately feel suicidal. That, too, isn't their fault. If I hadn't been blocked, I would've reported Raven in case their claims were true as well, because yeah, I don't mess around with that stuff either. But what's unacceptable is how Raven acted on those sentiments and behaved towards others, even after people tried to provide perspective. How Raven claimed to be done with the drama, but continued inciting it; how they claimed to be suicidal and had left tumblr, but wrote what amounts to a "fuck you" in their header and were still putzing around on their blog, and were apparently still editing their posts until as late as today; how they claimed to have deleted but only changed the url; how they weaponized all of this stuff and used it as a tool for guilt-tripping. Like, come on. It's okay if you're down in the dumps, but it's not okay to treat innocent people like garbage, and carpet bomb half the RPC. To me, it really feels like there was an intent to weaponize all of their hurt, offense, anger, and suicidal ideations, despite the possibility it did come from somewhere genuine, and that's so harmful to anyone who is actually struggling with depression.
Every time someone weaponizes mental illness in this way, it just makes people more and more apathetic the next time someone is genuinely just hurting, and saying they feel like they're at the end of their rope. And it makes people suspicious of whether those words are being used maliciously, or legitimately. That suspicion and that association is now there, unconscious or not. And every time this kind of stuff happens, the association gets stronger. What happens if Raven does this again? Some people will still report, but some people might just scoff and walk away - people who might've actually acted before. So in a way, that kind of behaviour impacts Raven as much as it impacts other people.
And you know what? They're not the only one dealing with serious shit. I've been suffering from MDD for the last fifteen years, and I've been in the process of changing medications and having little success for months. I've been going through hell offline. I have a shit list of people I want to yell at because they're dragging their feet on really important things I need to function; I'm constantly running a deficit on spoons. Until a week or so ago, roleplay was one of the only ways I could unwind. So for Raven to bully me by sticking that stupid post in my tags, because they needed to make a scene on COAR, which I was obviously going to comment on (like many other people), then to "like" an unsubstantiated callout about me and other innocent people related to that mess, it's only worsened my own mental health. It sounds melodramatic, but really. Someone else mentioned this too, but the fear of being in another callout, and the fear of that first callout somehow exploding, was in the back of my mind all week, despite being away from tumblr. So that was a little anxiety-inducing, much as I tried not to think about it.
And I'm debating whether to return now, or take more time off, and I have no idea what to do. Because that callout post is still in my blog's tag. I'm freaking out because I was planning on approaching some people to roleplay, which is something I rarely ever do, but now I'm concerned that I'll contact someone, they'll look at my tag to get an idea of my writing/partners/who I am, and see the callout post, and immediately dismiss me because even seeing the word "callout" on its own will send up red flags, by unconscious association with more impactful drama. And as long as that callout is up, these fears are going to be there.
That's just not fair.
And Raven's "apology" is completely unacceptable. Like you and others said, it doesn't reach anyone who needs to hear it, because they've all been blocked. I would fucking love an apology if it came from a place of honesty, but am I going to receive one? Probably not. And even for the followers who can still see that apology, it doesn't address anything. It isn't directed to anyone in particular. It doesn't mention the specific behaviours that were wrong on their part. And miss me with the "my intentions were good" part. No, they weren't; going around blocks and sticking shit in peoples' tags is vindictive and entirely intentional in all the worst ways, and shame on them for pretending otherwise, and by leading with such a poor example for many roleplayers, some of whom are in their teens. One of the people who tried to message Raven (they, too, were called out on Raven's blog) was speaking to a nineteen-year old who was completely clueless about the extent of the manipulation Raven was pulling. They thought all of it was normal and acceptable behaviour. That genuinely terrifies me. And while I imagine if Raven was genuinely apologetic, they would've gone to the callout blog and ask them to delete the callout post (attempt it, at the very least), somehow, I don't think that would've happened given all of their prior actions. God forbid something else is going on there.
Phew. Yeah, I'm angry. Maybe I'm just biased and tired. But honestly, I have a right to be. Raven's apology is a handwave, and they know it. It's a slap in the face to me, to you, and to everyone else who was involved in this clusterfuck. They're not the center of the universe. They affected real people, with real problems of their own. Anyways, I am so sorry for this, argh. Really had to get this out, and I didn't want to dump it on discord or somewhere else; I sure as heck didn't want to go to COAR with it. But hey, maybe people here will feel less alone if I added my own account to the mix. The more, the merrier? In a sense, anyways. Sometimes if you feel like you've been singled out, it's nice to know you're not actually the only person it's happened to.
Sorry for saving your reply for last, Anon. It's such an important one, I wanted to be properly thoughtful!
I think that it is going to make some people feel less alone, and there is always some relief in sharing one's trials. That might be especially true when one has been unable to share them anywhere else. It's not like you can address this on your own blog right now, COAR is definitely not a safe place to do so, it's a very isolating feeling that is made worse for having done nothing.
Coming back and being required to wade through this shit was really damn disgusting to me as well, but at least in my case, I had neither been obliged to distance myself for the sake of mental health nor was I treated to the sickening display of drumming up ideas of victimization from someone who victimized me. What I experienced was just incredulity and disgust, I cannot imagine how incensing this must be for you, I am so very sorry. If it makes me angry having a degree of removal and watching in it real time? What you're experiencing...there really isn't a single word to adequately encapsulate that, I'm sure.
You've still expressed so many of the things I've thought and felt. I found all that initial behavior uncalled for, shameful, yet another display of what's actually wrong in the RPC, but it was increasingly upsetting to me the more I looked into it because it did feel a little (a lot) too reminiscent of the sort of bullying experienced in person. It's really something else to be viciously picked at by someone who keeps upping the game until such point as it begins to cause them trouble, then get to be painted the wrongdoer and punished in some way for it because they're presenting as a sympathetic victim. A more sympathetic victim than you, that's really what I mean, I'm just going to say it.
And that was already in swing by the time I got from the launch point to the smoking crater of then current events. I got to Raven's again after bouncing back and forth between their interactions with others, largely from COAR, yes, and the shit on the callout blog...to see...everyone else being blamed in increasingly drastic ways.
Because on tumblr, unlike reality, if you throw out enough times ahead of time that you have disorders people can get behind, you're more sympathetic, not less. So long as one has set that foundation and has others to broadcast it once convenient, any horrible action one undertakes is given a pass. Anyone disagreeing, anyone not tolerating the abuse, is in the wrong now. In the worst possible way, of course.
This whole thing began with incredibly unnecessary bullshit and every, I mean fucking every, further action taken was a new level of fucked up, but the trivializing of and damage done to the perception of mental health and differences is quite possibly the worst. Are those things that need any more of that? It's already such a problem! I already see suspicion and fatigue with this, every time it's given validation, it grows.
Even if I wasn't mentally ill, with one of the disorders that gets vilified even on tumblr, even if I were not autistic, even if I never knew a single person who suffered worse than I do from the the complications they won by way of being born, hadn't anyone I loved that took their lives, this would be extremely upsetting to me. Using the idea that "whatever I do, it's got to be acceptable because I am X" while not caring that anyone else is X, Y, and/or Z. Weaponizing it for bullying and sympathy simultaneously. Way too much. Incredibly gross and harmful, legitimately fucking problematic.
I want people to be taken seriously when they choose to speak of the boundaries their mental health requires, I want muns to be able to say that they are having a difficult time without it coming off (even to the rest of us with mental health conditions) as a ploy for attention/guilting for whatever action they desire be taken by partners, and I want people to take threats of oncoming, serious harm seriously. How are they to do this, when it is continually used as tool or weaponized against others? At very best, it becomes another thing to ignore and scroll by on the dash.
As we've all had the misfortune to experience or witness so recently, once it is weaponized, it's a problem of priority. I've said in damn near every message I've gotten that Raven isn't the only person involved here who has serious shit going on, but like the absurdity with trying to spin an accident as transphobia, or having the audacity to attempt speaking from a place of peace in a way that might benefit everyone, Raven included, resulting in a callout about being against ND people...it doesn't matter. Doesn't matter that any of us are neurodivergent, have serious chronic mental health complications, or are not cisgender. Raven was swinging that around like a flaming sword to drive off bigots real and imagined before we ever got their attention.
Attention they fucking asked for.
Reblogging that post from COAR was just like posting those rules. The intention was to get attention, and it was asked for with extreme hostility. I have no idea how that is coming off to anyone as simply them defending themselves. It was a great moment to either not out themselves as the person in the confession at all, not engage with it, quietly remove the post, or to reblog it and take responsibility in a meaningful way at that point. Can you imagine what a difference that would have made then? If Raven had chosen instead to reblog it and apologize for doing what they had. Just that. No shitty, snide little comments about how they're sorry, but still absolutely correct and here are five reasons why everything they've misconstrued won't be tolerated. Just an acknowledgment of wrongdoing, an apology for doing so, and awareness gained moving forward.
Their decision to interact with that post in the way they did wasn't just more of the same nonsense, it was actively upping the game. I don't really care if it was intentional bait or just continuing to let malicious impulse run free, it was used as bait. Everyone who interacted with that post was effectively consigning themselves to harassment, and if they happened to interact on literally any other topic that group held a passionately opposing opinion on, they were attacked for it. Curiously, it became necessary for them to be harassed by way of the callout blog, but that is getting a little close to off-topic, so, I'll leave it at that.
So, while I initially really wanted to have the appeal to Raven work because their expressions of regret that I was greatly on the fence about being genuine, I'd say those flags were accurate. I cannot believe that someone who took every opportunity to do the wrong thing is genuinely sorry. Sorry for themselves, absolutely, sorry for anything they did, not so much. This constant narrative I got of "they SAID they were sorry" and "they apologized again and again and took the posts down," including from Raven, is incredible. On that last one, they, yet again, couldn't actually address me.
Appropriate response: messaging me or reblogging that post (you know, the rules snippet I found right the hell there still, despite the claim of it being deleted and the final catalyst of me needing to say something after I saw that, nope, surely was not) with the acknowledgment of a single thing I said.
Extra appropriate response: ^ plus going to everyone who could still be located that they harmed with a genuine, individual, private apology.
Inappropriate response that was had: new post, shitty, childish tone like they at once wanted to argue with me and didn't want to drop the act, restating of this apology that had already been deleted and meant exactly shit while it existed, restating of how they deleted this post and couldn't control reblogs, ignoring that I literally reblogged the original copy from their blog.
Apology neither believed nor accepted. Just as it wouldn't be if my nephew came to my house, broke a bunch of my things, said he was sorry while throwing the pieces at my pet, then threw himself on the floor screaming that he said he was sorry when I told him to go have a time out.
(Yes, I absolutely did just make a comparison to a child, y'all can shit yourselves again. It's not my problem if you want to misconstrue "this person's actions are not befitting of an adult" as "Vespertine said autistic people are children!" Fucking miss me with that. I'm an autistic adult who pays my bills, apologizes, doesn't treat people like shit while trying to excuse it by being ND. You're offensive with that shit, and contributing to the negative perception people have of those on the spectrum. Be a good ally today! Don't valid that! Free ninety-nine offer!)
Again, sorry for yourself does not equal being sorry for what you've done. The former can contribute to the development of the latter, but as I said in a response yesterday, there has been no display of that beginning to transpire. I genuinely hope that will eventually be the case because that would be the best outcome, the only "best" outcome at this point. Even if it was two years from now, if it did happen, I certainly would not be kind to people refusing them any such growth in peace, and I hope that, by some distant chance, I get to prove that.
But...stating "my intentions were good" over any part of this is not remotely promising. When? Where? At what point? Oh, right, when you took it upon yourself to label a random mun you took issue with. That's when your intentions were good. Then, when you vehemently needed to defend that point by callouts and individual attacks under the guise of it definitely not being about your pride, no! It was the defense of everyone else! Defending the community by carpet-bombing it, yes. This is not a "the path to Hell is paved with good intentions" situation.
I am so disturbed about the nineteen-year-old mun, my god. I'm telling y'all, my anger and disgust almost reach what I think is a pinnacle, then there's something new like this.
I don't even subscribe to tumblr's ideology that anyone under twenty-five is an actual infant who needs be kept in a protective bubble and forgiven for all bad behavior with infinite kindness, nineteen-year-olds deserve the agency of the adultier adults they are becoming, but it is a transitional age. Especially today. Most socialization and formative ideas take place online, and by the time younger RPers are entering the adult sphere of RP here, they've already got some really unhealthy ideas. About themselves, about others. There is such a demand for rabidly performative action that gets internalized, it shouldn't be being heartily fed by people in the community they might look up to.
At that age, someone like Raven is going to be a person looked up to. They espouse all the right ideas, and it's an age in which aggressive interaction over those things is seen as amusing and correct, no matter how wrong the actions taken are or the basis upon which they are founded. When these people foster an environment of cruelty for questioning, of course, that is not going to be the natural response. The response is now going to be the requirement of being told otherwise with adequate proof.
I have suspected that many of the hateful anons I've gotten were from Raven's even younger followers who feel like it's normal, acceptable, and that everything they're being told by Raven's sales team over at the callout blog is absolutely true. Of course, they're now morally obligated to come harass me for the things they were told I did! I think it's likely that several of the anons people got were from actual minors, which is so many levels of scary and irresponsible. Really great example all around, yes!
Because whether it is one's intention or not, that is potentially exposing minors, or muns who are still close enough to be more negatively impacted, to who even knows what. As well as violating the rules of blogs who do not interact with minors for good reason, setting those blogs up for yet another callout for treating someone they didn't know was a minor the way they did or having "freak shit" on their blog. Setting up the other party to be treated with full hostility as an adult would be. Very cool, very responsible.
There is just so much here that is unacceptable, I don't think people who were not directly impacted or have never had a callout against them understand the results, and that is one more unacceptable thing you've been good enough to talk about.
Even while taking a break from the RPC, it affects you negatively. Wondering what you're coming back to, your blog is no longer a safe feeling space, and there's nothing you can do to "cultivate your blog" to change that. They've taken away the ability to simply block and avoid others, the thing that keeps all of us comfortable here as well as allowing that to be all of us no matter how disagreeable we might be to each other. Callouts negate adult behavior. Callouts mean that one doesn't know where more potential for harassment might be coming from, or how long we might have to be worried about that.
It would be a major concern for me as well about what putting myself out there to new writing partners might bring. What the success of that might be. It's incredibly unfair that they've made finding new people precarious and more unpleasant than it can be anyway. That puts all of the future of your RP here in question, and if you're like me, just dropping a muse, picking up another, and moving to a new URL isn't going to be a good choice for you. It isn't that simple if you dedicate time to a muse for a long period of time, when that's the case, that's the RP you want to do and have laid the groundwork for.
I don't know if it will help at all, but it has seemed to me, over the past several days, that there are fewer people in the RPC who are inclined to believe or support callouts than there once was. I was hoping that was the case, since there is always so much interaction on my posts against callout culture, but until this crap went down, I had no idea just how many people are not positive toward it. It has seemed to be that the people who are inclined to listen to callouts are just louder.
I've also noticed that those people have the same set of red flags, so maybe sharing that will help you or others?
They don't have simple, basic, reasonable Do Not Interacts. It isn't simply asking that minors don't interact because the mun is over eighteen, that muns writing a triggering topic not interact, or that sort of thing. No, it's URL dropping of specific muns, outright links to callouts or "receipts," and an accusatory tone about any topics or types of muns who shouldn't interact. Such as "nasty ass proshippers" or "pedo apologists shipping incest."
Their rules are reflective this as well. A statement cannot be made that they do not write, let's say, toxic ships and left at that. There will be some morality wank present about normalizing or romanticizing toxic/abusive relationships.
There are less assured flags, but literally, anything that stands out as an interest in RPC or fandom-based activism as opposed to an interest in writing, their muses, or even their friendships with a variety of muns. I don't mean a rounded-out interest in things, I really do mean a glaring predominance of buzzword-laden reblogs and PSA's while they've not written a reply, headcanon, or answered a meme in months.
I'm not saying any of that because I feel like you, or anyone else's, judgment is terrible or that you're oblivious to warning signs! It's just that when we've experienced bad situations, it can compromise our ability to see clearly. It becomes easy to see a potential threat everywhere, and maybe that seems contrary, but it's then easy to fail to see real threats from those we're blowing up. We question whether we're being just as judgmental as the people who wronged us, putting words in other muns' mouths and thoughts in place of their own as was done to us. While we still are afraid to be wrong in giving someone an in to ruining our time again.
So, please, don't feel like I'm questioning your intelligence or speaking from a place of ultimate knowledge, never making mistakes in such a choice! I just really hate that you, and many others, are going through this, and anything at all that I can think of that might help you move forward from this utter bullshit you've been through, I've got to try to grab it.
Because, Anon, like all those sharing their experiences these last few days, you sound like the kind of mun we need in the RPC.
You're someone willing to share with others for the benefit of others. You're being honest about your feelings of anger and even the hopeless sensation of whether it's even worth it to try to return, having your progress on and offline stomped on, while still maintaining a sort of fairness and calm that I know is not easy. Because that's the mature thing to do, it's the right thing, and unfortunately, those are usually the harder things to do as well.
You did the right thing in expressing your opinion and doing what people like Raven's group love to be on about, can only do through bullying: not tolerating it. I'd hate for the RPC to lose someone like you!
Just as your message matters to more people out there than myself, I have no doubt that your choice to not quietly allow this behavior mattered to more muns than you'll ever know. I'm sure that none of them would have wanted this result for you, but so many muns have experienced such toxic, bullying behavior over the years in which not a soul spoke up.
Many of you proved something very important with challenging Raven and the callouts blog, that unlike them, it isn't necessary for good people to even know each other to do the right thing. They have to dogpile and engage in cliquish behavior, what they do isn't coming from a place of inner ethics and strength, but what you all did? It's the opposite.
So, not only do I thank you again for sharing and providing the important support of simply not being alone to others, I thank you for being the example to the RPC that people dealing in callouts and generalized shaming cannot be, no matter their platform.
I hope that, whether you choose to remain, leave, or take a very long break, everything you've been dealing with starts to look up. I know it's easy to say things made hollow for their repetition and flippant use, like telling you not to let them win, or that their bullshit just isn't that important. So, I'm not going to say them.
It doesn't work that way when you're dealing with mental health concerns! You can logically know that this is just petty bullshit not worth being run out of something important to you, but that doesn't stop the worry, frustration, or depression. You can have all the determination in the world to hang in there, even the spite to back it up, but neither is a match for the things you cannot control coming from your brain. That is the cruelty of mental illness on the very best of days.
You have all of my respect, support, and genuine sympathy that this happened to you. No one should be allowed to continually and unapologetically go out of their way to throw a wrench into someone's hard-won progress. You did nothing to deserve this, and the people out there worth interacting with are going to be the same ones who will have no question of that.
Lastly, I also hope that some of the anons sharing their experiences have helped you feel less alone, or like you're not just irrationally upset. Please know that you're seen and supported as well! And that you are always welcome to talk more, vent, share successes here.
Thank you, Anon.
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surveillance-0011 · 3 years
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Another Autistic Headcanon
Aka the headcanon one of my previous posts was about. This one will be longer and more in depth because I have a bit more to say this time around. Possible TW/CW for talk of/implications of ableism, as well as human experimentation and violence. Also mentions of meltdowns and sh/harmful stims at one point.
Anyways... Hangedman from House of the Dead is autistic.
Rationale
Firstly, I think it makes sense. Bats have good ears as is, and choosing someone with a sensitivity to sound could make sure this is not lost in the creation of a being that is both man and bat. By using an autistic person with aural hypersensitivity for this creation, Curien practically has the perfect sentry, scout, hunter-of-humans... you get the gist of it.
The Sega Saturn manual states that there were human text subjects. Certainly, in the creation of numerous lab grown “zombies”, at least one of said human subjects could be neurodivergent.
Anyways, onto things that are actually in the game(s). He does laugh a lot in both of the games he’s in. In the first game I’m pretty sure he shouts “Die!” (which I cannot help but mention is a sound clip from Virtua cop and not pitched to match his typical voice) every two seconds, and he talks through the battle in Scarlet Dawn and at one point in the battle he sort of mimics the sounds the guns make. Basically what I’m getting at here is that it could be vocal stimming (I think some of these could be considered echolalia specifically).
Also, in Scarlet Dawn, he doesn’t seem too upset about being, oh, I don’t know, literally set on fire. Hell, he’s still talking throughout the battle. Maybe he has some resistance to fire, but the lack of any pain or reaction reads like hyposensitivity and/or a major underreaction due to fixation on something else - in this case, attempting to murder our heroes.
Even his outfit (talking abt the first game) Could be seen as something meant to regulate or apply certain sensory input. Long fingerless gloves and leg warmers, the top that only covers half his chest, the only two reasons I can think of for that is strange aesthetic reasons and sensory reasons. The skin-tight-ness is probably for aerodynamic reasons but there’s the added bonus of pressure.
Headcanons
Very fidgety. Lots of vocal stims as well. Pretty much constantly moving and/or talking/making noise. A lot of the time he just talks to himself and repeats certain phrases.
If he ever gets really quiet, something is definitely wrong.
Hangedman also taps on things, wrings his hands when he’s nervous, etc etc etc,,  he actively seeks out tactile stimulation and pretty much has to be doing something or he’ll get restless. 
While sensitive to sound and also somewhat sensitive to sight, he’s definitely a bit of a thrill seeker, which is why he does not mind going up against the AMS agents. 
Used to have more harmful stims (hitting self, biting/scratching..) but he’s learnt to avoid them. Sometimes he still does those things during meltdowns tho, it’s hard to redirect sometimes. 
Sometimes he would ask Curien to put on music, whenever he had the time. He likes alternate rock, punk, that sort of stuff, it just has a lot of energy to it.
Usually can avoid sensory overload but he is definitely pretty sensitive to sound. Too much noise, especially if it’s sudden, can cause him to freak out. He also doesn’t like bright lights or the buzz of fluorescent lights.
Rather detached from his emotions and the real world. Hangedman is impulsive, he doesn’t always think about the consequences of his actions before he acts. He does not relate to others well, besides the bats he lives with and Curien. 
Though he doesn’t have much meltdowns, when he does they’re awful. He can get kind of aggressive and it’s hard for him to calm down.
Special interests are bats and vampires. Rambles about these two things to Chariot a lot, considering that they seem perfectly fine with just standing there and listening.
Becomes very fixated on certain things, usually focuses on certain tasks and routines and can forget about other things that are going on. On one hand, good for getting stuff done. On the other, he can be distracted for a while by certain things and sometimes will not realize if things are going bad.
(these next two are specifically related to Scarlet Dawn) The sudden change of his entire physical appearance threw him off for a little while, but he got used to it surprisingly quickly since he’s usually not very good with change. 
Two new stims with this new form are running his hands over the hair/fur on his arms and fidgeting with his earrings (by the way, didn’t make this post yet but I am 95% sure Hangedman has earrings in Scarlet Dawn). Thornheart doesn’t understand too much about autism but he’s fine with Hangedman doing whatever he has to do to stay content.
Though he does not know much about autism, he’s always known that he was not the same as others, both because he’s a hybrid of two different species and because of what he does know about it. He basically knows he has it, and that it affects certain skills, but that’s about it. Curien didn’t get to talk about it with him much.
Sometimes he does get frustrated from how different he is from others, even the other creatures, but for the most part he is satisfied and confident in himself. The fact that he’s even alive is amazing, considering how incompatible bat and human DNA could possibly be, so he really doesn’t see why he should get caught up on all these things he can’t help. All in all, he’s happy with his life and with himself.
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Hi Colour! This is going to be a long one, so buckle up!
Oh wow, that's so precious! You've definitely earned the "real life Dani" nickname haha I wish I could find something meaningful like that to do with my life. I'm actually autistic and have ADHD so hearing you do this kind of work makes me really happy! Keep up the good work Ms. Clayton! 😁 Haha
You sound like a lot of fun to hang out with at pubs! Haha I'm glad you identify with that bit of info on your star placements. I had a lot of fun doing it too!
The thing about Hozier is that some of his lyrics are incredibly sapphic to me for some reason, I'm still trying to figure it out. NFWMB is one of the songs that feels like that to me. Don't know if you've heard it before but give it a try if you haven't. If you close your eyes it sounds like you're in an epic romantic story and there are swords, pretty gowns, and rooms lit by torches. Haha
The beginning of this song was inspired by a poem written by W.B Yeats called "The Second Coming" in 1920, and it talks about an apocalypse of sorts, alluding to all of the horrors men inflicted upon the world which ends up awakening this beast that goes to Jesus's place of birth in the Bible (Bethlehem) to be born. The last lines being:
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?"
So the song starts with:
"When I first saw you
The end was soon
To Bethlehem it slouched
And then, it must've caught a good look at you"
And oh boy do I think of Dani when I hear that. Especially bc of that scene where Viola accepts Dani's invitation to live inside her. And nobody knows why she accepts it (but I do!).
And yeah at first glance you might not think much of Dani. in the beginning she's just a tiny frail small-town girl with a lot of anxiety, running away from her past traumas. But she proves us wrong again and again and again. She moves to a country she's never been before entirely by herself, sees an opportunity, and doesn't let go of it even when it looks like it went wrong. Then is very loving and tender with these children who have gone through so much and are still going through so much. Tries to fight (with a fire poker!!) the threatening man that keeps harassing her, the children, and her friends. THEN manages to soften the angry, grumpy lesbian who's given up on people after A LOT of trauma (too much in my opinion) and doesn't give up on her when she rejects her either. Freaking exorcises her ex and makes him stop haunting her so she can be with the love of her life. And then finally as if all of that didn't make her the bravest hero in this story, she literally stops an apocalypse from happening and saves everyone from this beast by sacrificing herself without even thinking twice. Saves everyone that came before her and then the ones who'll come after for the rest of eternity. I mean the P-O-W-E-R this girl has. 💪 so hell yeah the lady in the lake wanted to take her.
When Hozier says:
"Ain't it a gentle sound, the rollin' in the graves?
Ain't it like thunder under earth, the sound it makes?
Ain't it exciting you, the rumble where you lay?
Ain't you my baby? ain't you my baby?"
I can only think of Dani at the bottom of the lake laying on top of all the bones of the people Viola killed and how she's at peace living forever in a dark place like that. That's kinda hardcore y'know?
After the first verses, Hozier goes on to talk abt his lover, someone so utterly terrifying even the beast of the end of the world can't stand to look at them. But this song is also about being proud to be this person's lover bc nothing can fuck with them, not bc you are there to protect them and wouldn't let anyone harm them, but bc they're more than capable of protecting themselves and you too. So in my head, this song is Jamie's declaration of love to Dani.
And then I think of Jamie's devotion to Dani when she said "If you can't feel anything, then I'll feel everything for the both of us." shown in this verse:
"If I was born as a blackthorn tree
I'd wanna be felled by you
Held by you
Fuel the pyre of your enemies"
And the fact that she took what she could get just to be with Dani. She knew she'd have to suffer for/bc of her at some point, but chose to be with her anyway. I have no doubts in my mind she'd want to be anything for her as long as they could be together in any way, shape, or form. In all the lives they happened to meet one another too.
Wouldn't it be cool to see them in an AU where Dani is like a medieval princess who's supposed to marry Edmund to form an alliance between kingdoms or something and Jamie is an assassin who is hired to kill the princess so she has to pretend to be Dani's personal guard or wtever but they fall in love and run away together and Jamie teaches her how to fight so Dani becomes this warrior but turns out Dani is naturally good at it and then she becomes a legend? Hahaha I can see her riding a horse in the winter with paint on her face and her blonde hair falling over this fur-lined cloak, fierce look on her face, and Jamie riding next to her (always). Then they come across Viola who's a witch and puts a curse on Dani and then Dani and Jamie have to travel to all sorts of places and fight all sorts of people and go on this whole adventure to rid Dani of this curse. Maybe Dani has to go back to her kingdom bc her father dies and there are other people trying to take her kingdom so there's a lot of angst and suffering but then they win at the end after a lot of sweat and tears and they live happily ever after! 😎Hahaha
Anyway, I hope you're having a great week so far and hope you had fun with your niece today! (I know if I was her and you had us make fudge and paint I'd worship you haha) I'm sorry for the very (very) long ask, but I've been obsessing over this idea for months and I just had to share it with someone! ✌️✨
(And you can call me Libby or wtever since I'm not anon anymore 🤗)
Awwh thank you so much for saying I have earned my 'real life Dani' title is means a lot to me that you guys see that in me!! I am sure you do so many meaningful things in life without even realising it!! I honestly just want to make a difference and I love helping people so going into a career like this just seemed so natural to me and I really do love what I do!! Thank you so much I really hope I can keep up the good work!! I hope I'm a lot of fun- I know I have helped win a few pub quizzes and there's been a few times I've won games of trivial pursuit as well so that really did make so much sense to me and learning about all the placements of my chart was so much fun and was so interesting so thank you very much!! I have heard some of Hozier's lyrics are quite sapphic and I always mean to look into more of his songs and then just never do but I will definitely look in to NFWMB because the lyrics you have sent me here are incredible and definitely give of Dani x Jamie vibes I definitely agree with you in everything you have said about why Viola accepted Dani's invitation- Dani and Viola are similar in some ways and this was something I was explaining to my niece when she watched it with me. I explained to her that both Viola and Dani are strong willed, and stubborn, and would do anything to fiercely protect the people they care about. We saw that time and time again with Dani, how within days of knowing Miles and Flora she was out with a fire poker trying to protect them from a strange man that she kept seeing around the manor. And how Viola would've done anything to protect her daughter. One major difference between them though is that Viola seemed to have a slight selfish streak where as Dani is entirely selfless, she was selfless for the longest time in even agreeing to marry Eddie so she wouldn't hurt him, she was selfless in protecting Miles and Flora, and even more selfless in saving Flora's life and freeing all the trapped spirits of Bly Manor and then she is selfless in the fact that she won't drag anyone down and won't hurt anyone else at Bly ever again. The one thing she did for herself was being with Jamie- and she was able to make Jamie open up and trust people in way she probably hadn't for the longest time. Dani is a truly strong person as was Viola and I can see why she would accept Dani's invitation. I will have to listen to this song to see it from a Jamie perspective which I will definitely do tomorrow but from the lyrics you have sent me I can definitely see it being a love declaration to Dani from Jamie. Jamie knew in the end she would suffer because she knew she wouldn't be able to keep Dani forever, and knew that one day she would have to leave her- but she knew loving Dani for as long as she was allowed to would be worth that pain in the end and Jamie is a truly strong person as well for knowing this and staying by Dani's side anyway when that must have been such a hard thing for Jamie to ever have to accept. Jamie would've been anything for Dani and would've one anything for her as Dani would've for Jamie and that's why I love them so much. They loved each other so purely and without conditions and so wholeheartedly and it really was such a lovely thing to watch play out in front of us (even if it did hurt us all at the end). I think it would be so cool to see an AU like that I think medieval stuff is always so fun and so interesting and a good enemies to lovers start never fails either because there's so much tension there between them. And Jamie being undercover as someone to get close to Dani and them slowly falling in love with each other would just be a great thing to see!! And I am all for warrior Dani and Jamie (women with weapons is a little bit of a weakness of mine)!! This whole AU just sounds incredible I love a good curse in fantasy stories and the curse slowly taking over and you thinking they're going to run out of time but everything works out in the end!! Dani going back to her kingdom because of her sick Dad dying would be great for angst because it would look
like she would have to marry someone to create an alliance and that she would have to take over a kingdom (perhaps something she never wanted to do in the first place)!! I think this could be a very angsty one shot and could be so interesting and fun and the happy ending would definitely make all the angst worth it in the end!! I am having a good week so far thank you and I had so much fun with my niece today, making fudge went great and she was happy that I was able to show her how to do it because she'd never made it before so now that's something she knows how to do (I think she thinks I'm way cooler than I actually am haha thank you for saying you'd worship me though if you were my niece haha 😂) but tomorrow she is teaching me how to do something because I taught her how to make fudge today... she's gonna teach me how to draw in an anime style- which is something she is really into and even though I'm not she loves drawing so I've asked if she can teach me since I taught her something today!! There's no need to apologise I loved this long angst and I loved this idea I think it's really great and interesting and that song just seems amazing and I am definitely gonna listen to it tomorrow when I get chance!! Thank you for sharing this idea with me I loved it!! ☺️ Haha oki doki then as long as that's alright with you Libby is what I'll call you!! Like I said you can seriously call me anything!! ☺️
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simptasia · 3 years
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Fo the ship ask meme - Charladay + 2, 4, 23, 27, 36, 38, 39
thank you!! :D
How’s their team work? Do they share well?
oh excellent teamwork, very good, dan takes instructions very well [snort]
and yeah sure why not
First impression of each other? Was it love at first sight?
well, no, not ~love~ at first sight but they defo both looked at each other for a prolonged amount of time. both finding themselves curious, strangely fascinated. one of charlotte’s thoughts was that he looks... sad and little lost
and dan’s thoughts were, less words, more !!!, oh and some “is,,, is she looking at me?” [looks around to check] “???”
How do they hug? Kiss? Tease? Flirt? Comfort?
hug: tight, sometimes they hug in manner like they think they won’t get another hug. also dan is more Hands than man, really
kiss: soft soft pet pet WHOA PASSION HELLO CHARLOTTE. dan holds char’s face with his hands when he kisses and it’s soft sweet kisses and char will often be the one to make ‘em deeper. pull dan real close to her, maybe pin him to something. depends on the mood~ like, not always, char isn’t always ravenous jhajhsa she does do gentle and romantic too,, im just. talking o///o
tease: char’s teasing is more the cheeky playful “yeah i have the power to suddenly turn you on and im gonna use it” variety. hand on the thigh. whispers in the ear. footsie. asking him to join her in the shower in a sultry voice. hm, maybe im not so great at teasing because this is outright seduction ahudsajh
as for dan, mayhaps he takes his time savouring char’s body. maybe a frustrated whine from char inspires him to draw out the touches and caresses even longer until she’s panting and Strongly Insisting he stop teasing her :)))
don’t underestimate dan, he’ll surprise ya
flirt: i imagine char is quite flirtatious given the right context and motivation. having a boyfriend who blushes so easily and prettily is pretty good motivation. she’s makes it clear what she wants, she’s a pretty proactive person. meanwhile dan is less likely to flirt, he’s more of a “i worship at the temple of you” kinda guy. full of adoring looks and of course he’s tendency towards petting
comfort: oh hey you brought this up in a recent thing u reblogged; dan is a “hey hey whoa” kinda person. gentle words, hand on the shoulder. saying things are gonna be okay. and char, she leans towards words of affirmation. support and encouragement, like hey, you can do this, i believe in you. dan and char have repeatedly comforted each other in canon so that helps
Do they have kids? Grow old together? Split up?
yes, yes, fuck no
4 kids to be exact. penny, ada, marie and isaac. bunch of creative and intellectual geniuses, the lot of ‘em (”will you two keep your hands off each other already? you keep making nerds” miles says after marie shows him her book of haikus at the age of fucking five)
grow old, well they COULD move on at any time but it’s MY indulgent OTP fantasy and i’m driving the bus, damn it. and on that note, they’d never split up, they were already torn apart by death, they are never letting go of each other. heck, when dan and char first hugged after they remember, dan held her for a reaaally long time and started crying. no, they’d never split up
What’s their greatest strength as a couple? Their weakness?
i think they compliment each other very well. they’re very different in temperament but not so different that it’s annoying. they also have so much respect for each other. and they can listen to each other talk for hoooours
weakness... well maybe if you two were open about ur feelings sooner, you could have gotten a little kissy, eh? sigh their weakness is bad timing. like on their own they have their own issues, but together their relationship would be strong... feels good, feels organic
What are they like in the bedroom? Any kinks/fetishes/turn-ons? Anything they won’t do?
in a word? fantastic. in two words? noise complaints. char is LOUD
but yeah what they’re like, well im gonna have to use that word i love so much, passionate. they’re real passionate. love making, fucking, what have you. char,,, well, char isn’t what you’d call subtle, and dan is overwhelmed and reverent, touching her and looking at her with a downright sense of awe. oh and naturally char is way more prone to using her words than dan, even if once things get really going it’s less structured sentences and more horny babbling
[nature docu narrator voice] the daniel faraday is a submissive creature and spends 90% of his sexual experiences underneath his lover
needless to say, char is the more dominant lover. girl’s gotta have strong thighs because she is gonna be on top a loooot. this is Ideal for both of ‘em
i could go on but basically These Nerds Fuck Each Other Like Champions
now kinks, etc:
char = she’s dominant in bed overall but she’s into it more than just that; being a dom is nice hobby she has. she’s got a chest at the end of the bed for her toys and other sexy tools. she loves control, and well, dan will do Anything she says (to the point where she had to stop and have a serious talk with him letting him know, hey i don’t wanna actually make you do anything you don’t wanna do, if you don’t like something, you have to tell me). and yeah basically a lot of kinks assoicated with that sort of behaviour. causing pain, being worshipped, edging, overstim, pegging, tying her lover up, etc and so forth. also dirty talk, lots and lots of dirty talk
dan = i started off having dan really like char’s hair and thats evolved into a fetish over time. he’s not Weird about it, but he Really likes it. being told what to do, specifically charlotte telling him what to do. and if i haven’t make it clear already that he’s worshipful of her, well,,,, can a person be a fetish? cuz at this point dan has a Charlotte Fetish dajkdsakjds. he’s not really a kinky person but char makes him feel lotsa confusing new things. oh and i’ve given him this thing i call pressure kink, basically sexual enjoyment of having physical pressure on you. like somebody laying their full weight on you. or a hug that would be way too tight by socially acceptable standards. or the classic, being tied up
besides their own turn ons, they’re also willing to experiment. char is kinky and dan is relatively vanilla but will try new things. he’s learnt so much from her (and miles), like most of the stuff they’re into, he hadn’t even heard of before
what won’t they do:
okay out of the way, eliminate that Really Gross Thing. you know. if you don’t, well i’m not writing it while dan and char are in my head, so moving on
as much as char is into it, dan draws a hard line at being in pain. when he saw how much char and miles like to do that sort of stuff with each other, he started to feel worried because he really doesn’t wanna be hurt. but char is like, ya know, a good person so she respects that and won’t hurt her sweet boy
also for the love of fuck, don’t pull on daniel’s hair. i know that can filed under Don’t Hurt Him but i’m putting special emphasis on it because he’s autistic and he will cry and in a bad way. it’s a guaranteed way to make his dick peace out
as for char, besides what i mentioned up top, there isn’t much char won’t do or at least isn’t willing to try out at least once. oh and while she will hurt, she’s not gonna like... mutilate. ugh
also one time char was on her period and they got intimate, and dan, being inclined to use his mouth down there, Licked A Drop. not out of his own desire to do so, he just thought it was the right thing to do. and char was equals ways stunned, horrified and disgusted. (and miles straight up had a freak out, calling dan a sick fuck, etc. dan was like ???) so yeah, thats a no go for her. period sex? yes. but keep your damn mouth away from there, thats icky
Who initiated the relationship? Who kissed who first?  When did they realize they were in love?
i think char’s the one who’s gonna ask dan out first. and kiss him first (limbo char is making up for lost fucking time, my dude)
oh sometime on the boat, for sure. i think dan was in love with char after knowing her a week. char i’d give her 1 or 2 more weeks on top of that. they both decided to keep it to themselves out of a mix of insecurity and guilt
thank you for your time!
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