#reactive abuse in politics
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Reactive Abuse
pathologizing someone’s reaction to abuse is called reactive abuse… calling someone “crazy” or being labelled as having anger issues when the reality is that you're having appropriate expected normal reactions that make sense given the circumstance ... or getting misdiagnosed or being labelled w an externalizing style of BPD (petulant/impulsive) as a response to abuse (ie. narcissistic abuse) is one of many ways reactive abuse can manifest
Clinical discernment is so important in these cases, is it your environment thats creates these "symptoms" or is it pathology??
If a person is taken out of an environment (a toxic one), which ppl who are often diagnosed with BPD are from and currently still in, would they still be exhibiting these symptoms if placed in a healthier environment...
its for these reasons thats transformative social justice is so important too.. the personal is always political. The stance that one's environment creates disability (in this case mental health pathology) can not only be applied to encourage critical thinking towards bpd diagnosis but to other mental health disabilities too like depression but to also advocate for necessary changes in broader society within policies n our government (broader safety nets)
we also see this a lot with right-wing ppl calling ppl on the "left" unhinged for having justified appropriate reactions when those more vulnerable to them r being abused, disrespected, and having their rights and protections taken away
#reactive abuse#petulant bpd#impulsive bpd#narcissistic abuse#bpd rage#critical thinking#biopsychosocial model#hollistic approach#trauma survivors#trauma#trauma informed#reactive abuse in politics#personal is political#transformative social justice#major depressive disorder#anti oppression#anti capitalism
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Unlearn the dumb idea that inflicted pain justifies your reaction to it. It doesn't. Ladies elite women make it because we have a level of stoicism that borders on sociopathic apathy, exhibit A: we don't react to triggers we mimosa, sleep, see if it's worth it then logically make decisions. The idea that when someone does you dirty you have the right to react based on emotions so you're angry mad throwing names & hands sending texts talking sheet & other loser girl things is dumb dumb. You're not justified to react. 'They did me wrong' . So? Sit down, watch Netflix, wait for the emotions to pass then use the head God so generously gave you + that pretty face bonus.
When you react to people doing you wrong you give them the permission to bypass their actions & focus on your reaction so if your bf cheats on you & you start screaming sending 1b texts making titktoks he can bypass his cheating & focus on you're immature you're abusive why did you hit me you're mentally unstable you throw things around bla bla & will never face what he did. When we say be non reactive we aren't asking you to be a stone we are asking you to be smart. Do you want to get manipulated? Abused? Sit down get a manicure & go for brunch. Run to your room scream cry anhiliate your pillow but when they're watching its Elsa Lite, froooozen ice queen don't let them in don't let them see, ever.
One tactic m3n use in divorce court is to get the lady so triggered she loses her cool then it's look at her could you live with that? I'm taking my child this is an abusive woman & men don't leave relationships they just trigger you into irrational behavior and use that as an excuse & crying is worse what did we say about public vulnerability? Go cry to your bestie and God in your house out here tears are a sign to bully you. When you're not reactive you throw THEM out of balance and you hold the cards, once you go 'right to my opinion I'm the victim' we'll find you a grave bc that's called social suicideeee.
Two friends. Real life story here, ladies. Ah high-school back in the good old days.
We call them Allie and Sara. High school circles were tight so you're friends with someone you're also friends with their bfs, right? Alice & Sara both got cheated on (by m3n looking like area 9 failed experiment Shrek cosplayers but that's not thepoint). The bfs know that they were discovered. Allie, Allie is that girl. Drama girl. Find him in cafeteria & make a scene girl. How could you cheat on me you suck your pp is short anyway bla bla watch me devalue myself. Allie feels good in the moment, her bf leaves and tell his friends of course i cheated that girl is crazy. Would you date someone like her? So immature. Women are so ovarical I can't handle it. Evening the story is- she was abusive. She hit him & threw words in public imagine in private? He's been protecting her in silence, you know women can be abusive too.
Sara, Sara my love. Sara sits next to her Shrek Lite boy and says hey so that girl you kissed, Jane was it? She's pretty. You have taste. End of story. After lunch her Human experiment failure boy says let's talk she says sure abd listens with 'mhm' and nods. She meant nothing babe she seduced me I'm an adolescent what can I do bla bla. She nods says okay and goes to class. Days goes as usual. Evening we get dinner , Weekend we do research for our papers & talk college. Is she talking to him? Yes. Painfully polite, painfully. No emojis no nothing just shallow dry polite texts. Let's talk about this babe- is left on blue ticks. Monday morning her factory reject lookalike is losing his mind, she's being painfully polite, in a shallow way, so he resorts to triggering. It's because you're like this you are like a man and I'm straight I need a woman bla bla. She says OK then turns to the next person & did you hear about the trip to the beach? Of course I'm going. Boy realizes that's not working & resorts to Allie behavior- throw a tantrum in public make yourself the victim why won't you give me the pleasure of being the one to push you to your edge? Sara says babe pull yourself together you're embarrassing your family. Do you need your anxiety meds? My therapist is good she can treat hysteria are you okay? No this isn't like you, this is hysteria babe do you need psychological help? No this isn't normal , hey do you guys think it's normal to do this? I'm calling your mom babe we are getting you a mental check hold up-
Heres a little secret. In private? In our dorms? Sara was BAWLING her eyes out. Chocolates & Styrofoam cups. We are talking 3am on the bathroom floor. In public?
Guess who won.
Unlearn the idea that you're entitled to reacting to others actions to you, you're not. Learn to hold your tongue and tears and smile and Elsa don't let then in don't let them see then call mom and spend the rest of the week in her arms crying. The amount of women I've seen triggered out of their jobs, marriages, houses, parenting &c when they were 10000% the victim from lack of emotional intelligence is unforgivable.
Dont, be dumb. Don't let yourself think you have the freedom of expression, you don't. Not in the way you want to. Go write a poem but remember everything you say can and will, in fact, be used against you.
Non reaction is the highest level of power in existence. Mind over body. Logic over emotion.
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Ok I've rambled about this before but I want to do it once more.
You may need to sit down for this one but the Wicked Stepmother Trope is a reflection of very real life situations. There were and still are, "wicked" stepmothers. This is not just a stereotype. Irregardless of the societal reasons behind this (patriarchal structure of society), we cannot deny the fact that women, deprived of any real political power in the outside world, often abuse the little power they had inside their own household, at the detriment of other, weaker family members. Women are people, not holograms. Women historically had power however limited, and they too abused that power when they could, and they could do that against children because children are weaker. This is a centuries old societal problem that still exists today, especially in more traditional cultures. It is not mere construction. If you are not familiar with this issue, you have lived a very privileged life and I am happy for you.
However, let's suppose for a moment that the Wicked Stepmother Trope is indeed problematic and has a misogynistic nuance. I believe this is often the case and I will explain why.
If you want to deconstruct the Wicked Stepmother Trope, you have to be sure that there is a proper Wicked Stepmother Trope to begin with in the source material. You also have to make sure that the Wicked Stepmother Trope isn't already deconstructed in the source material. Which is EXACTLY the case in Fire and Blood.
So let's take a typical example of the Wicked Stepmother Trope : Cinderella. Let's compare Cinderella with Fire and Blood for a second.
There is no Wicked Stepmother resembling Cinderella's stepmother in Fire and Blood, for the simple reason that there is no Cinderella héroïne. What is a Cinderella héroïne : a passive, innocent, purely reactive girl, that patiently suffers and awaits for her Prince (a man) that will save her from her evil Stepmother (a woman). All these elements need to exist in order to talk about a proper Wicked Stepmother Trope. This trope gets this misogynistic nuance only when it is paralleled with the poor innocent fairytale heroine. It's the antithesis of the willful and driven woman that is punished in the end (stepmother) Vs the passive perfect feminine figure that is rewarded in the end (stepdaughter), that gives the Wicked Stepmother Trope the misogynistic nuance it has. And this is very important.
Now back to Fire and Blood.
Well, Rhaenyra isn't a Cinderella character at all. She is willful, she's radical, she claims her birthright, she makes mistakes, she dares, she goes against the status quo. She fits the stepdaughter role, and she too has a dashing Prince that tries to save her. Except that he doesn't. He dies, and so does she, horribly. She is not rewarded by patriarchy for her youth, beauty and submissiveness (very important factor if we wanna talk about misogyny in fairytales). Quite the contrary, SHE is punished by patriarchy.
Alicent fits the stepmother role, except that she doesn't fit the misogynistic Wicked Stepmother Trope because her punishment does not constitute an exemplary punishment for NOT being a Cinderella type of female. It's this juxtaposition to Cinderella that makes the trope misogynistic to begin with.
If anything, the Wicked Stepmother Trope is ALREADY deconstructed in the source material. By not respecting that, the writers achieved of course the contrary result : a deeply misogynistic narrative. Rhaenyra is basically a whore. The entire Dance stems from the fact that Rhaenyra had extramarital sex and that's it. That's literally it. The main antagonist was reduced to a rape victim, and had no ambition whatsoever. Since Rhaenyra wasn't a rape victim and had sexual freedom, morally she comes across as more ambiguous than the pure one dimensional victim that show!Alicent is. Rhaenyra had a choice, Alicent doesn't. So the whole BS that both women are equally victims of patriarchy comes at the expense of the actual female protagonist, the willful, daring, non-conforming female character trying to preserve her agency : Rhaenyra. It also comes at the expense of creating characters that feel real and consistent and are not just the product of a power-point on misogyny in uni.
Book!Alicent does not fit a stereotypical misogynistic Wicked Stepmother Trope, a trope whose main goal is to reward submissiveness and punish willfulness. It's already deconstructed in the source material. The author did all the work, all they had to do is copy it. They didn't, which is why we have takes like "oh if Rhaenyra didn't want to be burned alive she shouldn't have had a paramour in Court".
#wicked stepmother trope#alicent hightower#rhaenyra targaryen#fire and blood#hotd#cinderella#aspa rambles
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Musk reactivated the accounts of Brazilian far-right politicians Carla Zambelli, Gustavo Gayer, and Nikolas Ferreira. Ferreira, a Bolsonaro supporter, openly questioned the security of Brazil’s electronic voting machines, even though he won his local legislative race.
“All of these names have been problematic for years on social media,” says Flora Rebello Arduini, campaign director at the nonprofit advocacy organization Ekō. “They've been pushing for the far-right and election misinformation for ages.”
When Musk purchased Twitter in 2022, later renaming it X, many activists in Brazil worried that he would abuse the platform to push his own agenda, Arduini says. “He has unprecedented broadcasting abilities. He is bullying a supreme court justice of a democratic country, and he is showing he will use all the resources he has available to push for whatever favors his personal opinions or his professional ambitions.”
Under Musk, X has become a haven for the far right and disinformation. After taking over, Musk offered amnesty to users who had been banned from the platform, including right-wing influencer Andrew Tate, who, along with his brother, was indicted in Romania on several charges including with rape and human trafficking in June 2023 (he has denied the allegations). Last month, one of Tate's representatives told the BBC that "they categorically reject all charges."
A 2023 study found that hate speech has increased on the platform under Musk’s leadership. The situation in Brazil is just the latest instance of Musk aligning himself with and platforming dangerous, far-right movements around the world, experts tell WIRED. "It's not about Twitter or Brazil. It's about a strategy from the global far right to overcome democracies and democratic institutions around the world," says Nina Santos, a digital democracy researcher at the Brazilian National Institute of Science & Technology who researches the Brazilian far right. “An opinion from an American billionaire should not count more than a democratic institution.”
This also comes as Brazil has continued working to understand and investigate the lead-up to January 8, 2023, when election-denying insurrectionists who refused to accept right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro’s defeat stormed Brazil’s legislature. The TSE, the country’s election court, is a special judicial body that investigates electoral crimes and is part of the mechanism for overseeing the country’s electoral processes overall. The court has been investigating the dissemination of fake news and disinformation that cast doubt on the country’s elections in the months and years leading up to the storming of the legislature on January 8, 2023. Both Arduini and Santos believe that the accounts Musk is refusing to remove are likely connected to the court’s inquiry.
“A life-and-death struggle recently took place in Brazil for the democratic rule of law and against a coup d'état, which is under investigation by this court in compliance with due legal process,” Luís Roberto Barroso, the president of the federal supreme court, said in a statement about Musk’s comments. “Nonconformity against the prevalence of democracy continues to manifest itself in the criminal exploitation of social networks.”
Santos also worries that Musk is setting a precedent that the far right will be protected and promoted on his platform, regardless of local laws or public opinion. “They are trying to use Brazil as a laboratory on how to interfere in local politics and local businesses,” she says. “They are making the case that their decision is more important than the national decision from a state democratic institution.”
Though Musk has claimed to be a free-speech advocate, and X’s public statement on the takedowns asserts that Brazilians are entitled to free speech, the platform’s application of these principles has been uneven at best. In February, on order of the Indian government, X blocked the accounts Hindutva Watch and the India Hate Lab in India, two US-based nonprofits that track incidents of religiously motivated violence perpetrated by supporters of the country’s right-wing government. A 2023 study from the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard found that X complied with more government takedown requests under Musk’s leadership than it had previously.
In March, X blocked the accounts of several prominent researchers and journalists after they identified a well-known neo-Nazi cartoonist, later changing its own terms of service to justify the decision.
—Elon Musk Is Platforming Far-Right Activists in Brazil
#politics#brazil#elon musk#disinformation#twitter#nikolas ferreira#misinformation#libertarians#fascists#fascism#elon musk is an enemy of democracy#democracy#eugenics musk#apartheid clyde#crypro grifters#techno grifters#crypto bros#election interference#electioneering
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“Are you okay?”
Inspired by @octopus-reactivated’s tags!
Words: 695
Warnings/tags: implied abuse, captivity, domestic whump, controlling behavior, mute whumpee
Whumpee was hard at work this morning, adding new flowers to the front garden of Whumper’s home. They always referred to it as Whumpee’s home, too—but Whumpee knew the truth. None of it was theirs.
But they pushed the thought from their mind, instead focusing on gently patting down the soil around the new assortment of red flowers. They immediately glanced over their shoulder at the sound of an approaching car—Whumper couldn’t be home early, they were never home early—
Whumpee deflated with relief. It was the next door neighbor, whom Whumpee had spotted a few times whenever Whumper had them doing work outside. They worked odd hours, and it wasn’t unusual for Whumpee to see them returning in the mornings in scrubs.
Sometimes, they wondered what the neighbor’s job actually was. Maybe Whumper knew.
They had been so lost in their observations, Whumpee had accidentally begun staring. Caretaker raised a hand as they walked to their door, smiling in an inviting way.
“Hi, Whumpee! Haven’t seen you in a while!”
Whumpee nearly jumped at the realization they were being addressed directly. But they smiled back and nodded, shrugging and turning their attention back to the flowers.
Caretaker frowned slightly. Whumpee had always reacted like that, when Whumper wasn’t with them. They always seemed to be trying to seem busy, suddenly concerned with fiddling with the pillows on the deck or adjusting the flowers. They had always seemed nervous, in Caretaker’s opinion. Were they making them nervous?
They walked over, peering down at the new bunch of flowers. “Hey, those look really nice. They’ll do great in this weather, I think. You chose a good one.”
Whumpee nodded, only briefly glancing up.
“You’re pretty good at this, I think. Hey—if you want, I have a little garden out back, maybe you could give me some advice.”
Whumpee shook their head. Firmly, quickly. Caretaker seemed surprised even as they rushed back into the house.
Again, so nervous.
Whumper sat down on the couch, scrolling through their phone as Whumpee hung up their bag and keys for them.
“I saw Caretaker come over to you, on the cameras.”
Whumpee only nodded. They busied themself with fixing the curtains.
“Sit down, Whumpee.” Whumper smirked when Whumpee obeyed.
“I heard them invite you to their home.”
Another nod.
“You said no, that’s very good. I wouldn’t be able to watch you at someone else’s house. And you know how much that’d upset me. If they ask again, I’m going to have to talk to them.”
It was another week before Whumpee saw Caretaker again. Now, Whumper was dozing off on the deck chair while Whumpee wiped down the railing. Caretaker approached again, their usual friendly smile across their face. But, this time, they whispered.
“Hey, Whumpee. Are they asleep?”
Whumpee nodded, feeling their stomach churn. They were excited Caretaker had come over to talk to them, and that feeling was unnerving.
“I just wanted to check in with you…I feel like I never see you leave the house.”
Whumpee swallowed. Oh, god.
“Whumpee, can you look at me?” Their warm and quiet voice hadn’t faltered, but Caretaker sounded more serious now. Whumpee obeyed.
“Is everything okay? Are you okay?”
Whumpee’s stomach flipped. This could be their chance, their escape from—
Whumper slapped a hand on their shoulder, seemingly sharply awake now. “Of course they’re okay, neighbor! You’ve been working late nights again?”
“Yes, I have, but…” Caretaker’s jaw shifted.
“I wasn’t asking you. I was asking Whumpee.”
“Wel, they can’t talk, so—“
“That doesn’t mean they can’t answer.”
Whumper looked confused for a brief second before their expression snapped back into a polite smile. “Well, they’ll tell you the same thing. We’re doing great. Why don’t you come up here and have a beer with us?”
Caretaker waved a hand, maintaining their own polite expression even as their chest tightened with concern. They hadn’t broken eye contact with Whumpee, who looked absolutely petrified. “I…have some stuff to do in the house, but thank you. It was good to see you, Whumpee.”
Caretaker watched from their own window Whumper dragged Whumpee back inside by the arm. Whumpee undoubtedly needed help.
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Complex trauma and Angband Series: Hygiene
Angband World Building and Aftermath of Captivity Masterlist
Torture, especially in the deliberate and political sense is designed to eradicate the victim’s sense of self by, among other things, stripping away one’s basic physical needs (food, water, hygiene, rest,) and one’s basic emotional needs (safety, comfort, belonging, privacy, hope, and identity). It also seeks to damage the relationship that the victim has with these needs.
I have a specific post about privacy that will overlap with some of this
content warnings: general Angband warnings of Captivity and abuse, trauma after torture, etc
Hygiene in Angband is very minimal. The slaves who work in the mines and forges are afforded very little supplies for washing, perhaps a few cloths and run off water if any can be saved and hoarded. Again this is a combination of items sorted through prisoners who have been there for a long time and know what can be saved without punishment as well as supplies given by the overseers.
Prisoners who work in the fortress itself are sometimes allowed a bit more water to clean themselves, depending on where they work, how visible they are, and what role they primarily fulfill. Prisoners who are more clean are often the favorites of various higher-ups who have a vested interest in their appearance or who use access to supplies as coercive ‘rewards’ and thus cleanliness rather than the opposite becomes stigmatized in many ways. This will have more detail on my post about the elves of the upper levels.
Sauron’s personal servants of course have a high standard of hygiene as do the elven healers.
Among the small population of human slaves, diseases of poor water, food, and crowded conditions are common There are certain afflictions even the elves are not entirely immune to. There are healers among them but they too have little supplies and must improvise (and yes I have many ideas for how mushrooms, evil herbs, algae, and other Angband possible ingredients could be implemented)
Access to a proper toilet is also next to nonexistent in much of the fortress. Some of the cells have a bucket but it’s not a priority among the elven prisoners. The slaves in the mines often have nothing while they work and in the forges it’s only marginally better (if only because urine is potentially reactive to some of the substances there). This is consistently demoralizing and humiliating and the level of control over one’s bodily functions is frequently utilized for punishments and even games.
Only in the medical wings and among the personal prisoners of some higher ups is consistent access to a proper toilet the norm.
The effects of all of this are profound and long lasting. Inability to bathe not only is an exertion of control felt acutely by the prisoners, it also often relates to an inability to feel like oneself.
Following captivity, many struggle to integrate bathing and grooming into their routine. Some continue to associate beauty and cleanliness with its associations in Angband.
Just like with other activities it takes great will to make even seemingly simple decisions such as going to bathe. Many survivors of Angband experience a constant dread that they are out of place or will be caught out of place.
Not to mention other aspects of complex trauma such as depression and self image issues as well as physical symptoms like chronic pain can impact ability to care for oneself in this way.
My own headcanons regarding my case studies, Maedhros and Húrin (feel free to request more about this or other prisoners)
-In Angband, I do still enjoy the headcanon Maedhros is bathed primarily when he was presented for some public occasion in the beginning(even before the cliffs he is a trophy…) and it’s harrowing and mortifying and invasive and as much a form of abuse as anything else. Angband is talented at making even and especially the most simple things into a horrible ordeal. This isn’t a common occurrence but it was enough to have an effect on his view of himself
-After Angband baths are very vulnerable especially and he has to relearn his right to privacy and this relates with self image issues. His view of himself is fragmented and he does not recognize his reflection.
-It takes awhile before the image of someone clean and put together in clothes he chose begins to feel like his own.
-The severe physical consequences of his time on Thangorodrim make this harder in the beginning too
-Húrin cares very little for his appearance after his release though at times suffers sensory flashbacks that lead him to try to wash away phantom touches, sometimes to the point of opening old scars.
#the silmarillion#maedhros#Húrin#the children of húrin#musing and meta#in the iron hell#post Angband
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dont feel obligated to answer this at all; I'm sort of just musing but also really appreciate your thoughtfulness on here and wondered if you have any thoughts.
with "terminally online" often being used as a dismissal, would it serve us better to reframe complaints about the reactivity/bad faith (which at least in my spaces are what I notice get classified as terminally online) as conversations about how to improve online discourse? instead of dismissing it?
I do think there is a real difference in tone and approach in online conversations than in offline, and that online conversations can often lean towards taking others in bad faith because there are less consequences to doing so than in person. or seek to gain clout in a way that isnt as possible in casual offline conversations.
But I also recognize the importance of online spaces for disabled folks or just for people who maybe don't have the time to be engaged in physical spaces that discuss things like politics and activism. and its worth making our online spaces better for everyone.
I guess I just wonder what might be a way to approach the real problems present in online discourse spaces besides the dismissal that comes with insisting a take is just "terminally online" and leaving it at that.
Earlier (after you sent this ask) I reblogged another ask I had answered a while back regarding the phrase "terminally online" that might get into some of this!
Yeah, I definitely don't believe that there aren't any differences between online and physical spaces, or that we shouldn't talk about said differences--both the ones that may be inherent to at-a-distance communication, and the ones that may have more to do with how we think about online communication or how social media and other forms of at-a-distance communication are practically organised. But I will note that in-person groups are not immune to any of the criticisms that such a conversation might involve--people destroy popular movements by clout-chasing (i.e. viewing the accrual of power and influence as their primary goal--whether formal or informal influence depends on the structure of the organisation in question) or through interpersonal abuse, escalation of interpersonal conflict, ostracisation of people they think they can get away with ostracising (because they're trans women or Black or just weird or something and so people are more likely to view them as the aggressors of whatever situation).
So if what one wants to posit is that "online spaces" (which ones?) are more prone to bad-faith readings, immediate ostracisation or hostility, clout-chasing, &c. than "in-person spaces" (which ones?), I guess my questions are 1. how would you prove that? Is it a falsifiable statement / what are the conditions that we would have to meet to be able to claim that the statement had been proven in a way that wasn't just anecdotal? How do you divide "online" and "irl" spaces up in order to be able to compare them (what's the status of "online spaces" that arise out of in-person groups, e.g. workplace slack channels, club groupchats? Are large social media platforms considered to be in the same experimental group as these things, and if not, why not)? and 2. (more importantly) what's the use of making this statement? What does it allow us to say that we wouldn't be able to get at otherwise?
I'm not sure what the answer to 1. is, but the more I think about 2. I think the answer is that this type of statement isn't particularly useful. It's enough to say that online spaces are prone to misreadings or hostile readings in ways that may in part arise from the fact that they are at-a-distance, and in part from how they are practically organised (by which I mean, the possible behaviours on whatever social media site we're talking about). And now suddenly we're getting somewhere, because describing exactly what it is about this space that could lead to hostility is probably going to be useful in trying to counteract it. Off the top of my head:
The ability to reblog or retweet can push a take far outside of its intended context. Do I know anything about the other political viewpoints of the OP that would help me to contextualise what they're saying here? Does it seem like this post was written in response to a particular argument or event that isn't as immediate for me? What kinds of argument does it seem like the OP is seeing a lot of / what kinds of experience does it seem like they often have? Could this make their frame of reference different from mine?
I may be assuming that someone knows the etiquette on a given platform well enough to intuit that a reblog/quote retweet is considered more or less hostile than a reply/comment, whether screenshotting is considered a polite avoidance of conflict or a rude talking-behind-someone's-back, &c. &c. Should I be making that assumption?
I may be assuming that any given person is writing in their native language, and is otherwise pretty much aware of how their tone will come off to someone else reading their writing or to me in particular. But is that a fair assumption? How does the English-dominated nature of social media constrain the rules of engagement?
I tend to believe that someone who's come back with a false idea of my post's main argument is not even trying to understand what I'm saying. But is it fair to assume that everyone has a high degree of literacy?
A lot of different kinds of statement or argument (self-consciously political, solely personal, &c.) can co-exist on one website or on one person's blog without necessarily broadcasting their intended audience or scope (like, a political post or a personal post could "look" the same). What are the actual, immediate, material stakes of the conversation someone is trying to have? Am I wrongly assuming that someone else is attributing actual stakes to something that they intended as musing? How much does it matter if this person and I disagree about this? Does this disagreement prevent us from agreeing about other things?
If I do fundamentally disagree with someone about something I think is important, what action (of the range of actions the platform makes possible) should I take about it? What does it seem like the developers probably intended (e.g. unfollowing, blacklisting a post, blocking, reporting), and what informal or user-driven models do I have for what to do (the "call-out post" comes to mind)? What is the ideal end goal of each of these actions (to stop engaging with this person? to get my followers to stop engaging with them?), and what is the actual result of each of these actions likely to be? Which is to ask--am I writing a post about x user because I actually want them to be ostracised or whatever (by whom?), or because I believe it's just "what one does" when you encounter substantial disagreement? What has given me that model?
and so on and so on.
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Saw a post saying basically not to abuse medical professionals and like.
Medical professionals have extreme power over their patients. They literally hold people's lives in their hands. Is what you're calling "abuse" actually abuse, or is it self-defense against your abuse of a vulnerable marginalized person?
Well, this is the profession that exists primarily to gatekeep medical care and knowledge (at least under our current legal and political systems, given that if you have the knowledge but lack the paperwork you can face criminal charges for practicing medicine), which has a culture of hero-god worship built up around it and treats any criticism of extreme violations of patient autonomy and medical abuse as heretical and hysterical anti-science ravings.
This is them saying "don't expect us to help you do the most basic aspect of our jobs if you 'mistreat' us, we're not martyrs".
You signed up to deal with people in extreme pain, who are dying, who are in survival mode and like drowning people may accidentally hurt others no matter how badly they wouldn't normally want to, and you claim that if they "really can't help it" that's one thing, but these are the same people claiming that people are either too quiet or too dramatic to be in pain, that let people die because they don't take very serious symptoms seriously until it's too late because they think their judgment is infallible and patients don't know shit about their own bodies, and so on.
Doctors are just fucking medical cops. All I can see when a doctor says this shit (or a nurse or most other medical workers, though I'll admit that there are exceptions) is people accusing my (impoverished disabled neurodivergent queer) ass of abusing my abusive (middle class not queer abled neurotypical) mother. All I can think of is how an abused child or a battered spouse is called abusive the one time they hit back, or even say something mean, or even fucking disobey whoever is considered the "authority" in a given situation.
While this is vague-ing a post, it isn't really at anyone in particular. I'm making my own post about this on my own blog because I have medical trauma* as a result of deeply ingrained systemic abuse, primarily perpetrated by medical professionals.
*If you think trauma makes people LESS reliable narrators on the oppression that caused it, you've bought into sanist psychiatric bullshit and need to check yourself/ves. You might also consider that if the vast vast majority of a marginalized group of people share similar stories of the same type of trauma, the problem isn't actually the fucking "insanity of trauma" and that the problem is actually that fucking bad.
Abuse arises out of hierarchical power imbalances. Patients may be able to hurt medical professionals - especially physically. And I'm not saying there are never entitled people seeking medical care that treat people in general like shit. Some patients may even be able to do lasting harm. But in the vast majority of cases, patients are categorically incapable of abusing medical professionals. If you think otherwise, especially as a medical professional, it's most likely because you're unwilling to examine your own power, privilege, role in upholding deeply harmful ableist systems, the harm you've already done, your own limitations, biases, flaws, fallibility, and bigotry, and the way your own ego gets in the way of acknowledging your complicity in structural ableism.
And you know what? You've been taught at every turn to reinforce and reify those things. It's still your responsibility to deconstruct those and stop hurting vulnerable people, though.
So anyway, don't worry, you're not abusing medical professionals. Even you acting in self defense being called "abuse" is just classic victim blaming. It's the exact same thing that happens to all victims of abuse - while I have complicated feelings about this mnemonic, it is basically DARVO, and sometimes it's also the bullshit concept of "reactive abuse" being weaponized against victims, if they have the bare minimum decency of recognizing the abuses of medical professionals as such.
Don't abuse patients. Don't abuse disabled people. Get over yourself and recognize that you did sign up for a job that is sometimes dangerous, that sick, injured, and dying people don't owe you worshipful gratitude for often failing to do the bare minimum of your damned jobs, and that any actual abuse you face is not from fucking patients, but from your bosses/jobs. Organize, form unions, and actually use them to get better working conditions instead of just to cover your asses while you play Malpractice: The Game, but as a patient who has only been made sicker and had my quality of life ripped from me by 99 percent of you, stop fucking crying "abuse".
You're half a step from calling it "reverse ableism".
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I don't follow you but I would just like to thank you for your thorough research about this queen bullshit. I hate how people tend to have selective memory about the terrible history of certain important figures and it just boils my blood. So thank you for all your hard work. :)
You're welcome. The way I see it is like this. Vladimir Putin has not set foot in Ukraine, or fired a weapon, or personally killed any Ukrainians in the current war, but everybody (except for tankies, but they don't count) has no problem understanding that he is ultimately responsible for what is happening there. He gave the order, it is happening under his government and with his say-so, and in pursuit of policies which the entire Russian state apparatus has long supported. No, QE2 is not functionally equivalent to an autocratic dictator with essentially absolute power over the degraded political systems in his country, for any number of reasons. But she was likewise the head of state and ultimate authority of the British government and the many terrible actions it took both at home and abroad between 1952-2022 (the period of her reign). Any idea that she doesn't know or bears no responsibility for her enthusiastic, unwavering, and lifelong support of the institutions that facilitated and carried them out, often with her direct advice and counsel (see: weekly meeting with the PM, privileged access to state papers) is just... wrong.
As others and myself have pointed out, the monarch actually does have considerable power in the UK system, even without getting into the shadowy process of Queen’s Consent and backroom wrangling to get the Palace exempted from diversity laws (because what are they going to do, say no to her?) She opens Parliament, she gives the speech laying out the government's agenda (even if it is written for her), she has to give "consent" to all draft laws, and so forth. Besides, her figurative and symbolic role also confers a great deal of assumed social and cultural authority on her, which is why she was often held up as an impartial "beacon" somehow above the muck-slinging of regular party politics. To act as if the literal Queen of England, head of that entire system, when even the minority party in parliament has to style themselves "Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition" to demonstrate that they're opposing the other party, but not her personally, is totally exempt from that, is, to say the least, strange.
This is obviously, again, rooted in white supremacism, the Anglo-American cultural background, and the fact that the British (and the British Empire) are still largely portrayed as "cool," "aspirational," or "universal" (why does everyone in every period piece have modern British accents, regardless of the time or place, and why do we accept that was how the past sounded?) In other words, it's the "good" empire, rather than the "bad" empire (as the rhetoric was during the Cold War in re the USSR). This ignores the fact not just of the British monarchy itself and the actual things that QE2 did in support of that paradigm, but the fact that an empire is by its nature an inherently harmful, exploitative, and assimilationist political structure. Besides, you would think that the least she could do would be to proactively address the bad stuff of the past and try to fix it, right? Nope. All the "modernization of the monarchy" came under extreme duress and only in moments of reactive crisis, and even after all the shit that England did to Ireland over the centuries (including the height of the Troubles during QE2's reign) she could only, on one occasion, offer something that was described as "the closest thing" Ireland had ever gotten to a formal apology, without being an apology. Even the goddamn Pope has apologized for the historical injustices/sexual abuse scandals of the institutional Catholic Church. If those guys are doing better than you in the historical-atonement department, there's something REALLY wrong.
Likewise, there is no doubt that overall, QE2 will have an absolutely glowing, lavish, and uncritical epitaph, and people who call that legacy into question will be stigmatized. Which is the last thing Britain needs right now, with a new hard-right government, a massive cost-of-living crisis (splashing out on a state funeral while people cannot both eat and heat their homes? Huh), and all the economic and social crunch that will be put on its most vulnerable citizens as a result. QE2 was sitting on massive amounts of automatically granted taxpayer money, and yet she steadfastly resisted any attempt to let the public have any notion at all of how she spent it (along with, as noted, sealing Philip's will and that of other senior royals). That alone was a massive moral failing of the country she supposedly "dedicated her life to serving," and it is neither bad nor disrespectful to point that out and seriously question all the saintly hagiography we are expected to uncritically embrace.
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What kind of illnesses do you treat aegon for if you’re his doctor ? Is he ok?
thank you for the ask! let me preface this by saying: this is going to be my half baked headcanon and totally not serious. also i’m drawing from both the book and the show, randomly. and english is my second language. basically it’s gonna be a mess. i just hope it’s an enjoyable mess. if you don’t agree with me? great. treat this as an opinion of an internet nobody and move on!
alright, i think we all agree that Aegon is not okay. an okay person do not jack off towards the sun probably, whilst standing on the windowsill completely naked. someone could catch him in the action. he could be easily fall to his death. i am not an arbiter of okay-ness, but i don’t think an okay person would do that for shits and giggles.
then what could be wrong with Aegon? here’s some possible diagnoses in my opinion as a very unqualified doctor.
1. Depressive Disorders
(Major Depressive Disorder, Persistent Depressive Disorder (Dysthymia))
in the book Aegon is described as follows:
The groom(Aegon II) was fifteen years of age; a lazy and somewhat sulky boy, Septon Eustace tells us, but possessed of more than healthy appetites, a glutton at table, given to swilling ale and strongwine and pinching and fondling any serving girl who strayed within his reach.
this is the septon’s account. i would assume he’s got this impression of Aegon mostly from observing him in the formal settings, where the prince would be at least somewhat conscientious. Alicent or Otto would have asked him to behave, and if the show!Aegon’s tearful claims mean anything, that could be him trying to do what he was asked for.
if so, in his privacy, where he could put his guard down, he could’ve had been worse than what he’s appeared to be, because he doesn’t have to pretend when he’s alone. and if he has to put extra effort every time he goes outside of his chambers, he would want to avoid going out at all eventually. it’s a waste of energy, especially so if you’re already depressed and low in energy. all of this is just a conjecture of mine, but i do think that it’s fair to say he has depression.
2. Trauma-and Stressor-Related Disorders
(Reactive Attachment Disorder)
Reactive attachment disorder is a rare but serious condition in which an infant or young child doesn't establish healthy attachments with parents or caregivers. Reactive attachment disorder may develop if the child's basic needs for comfort, affection and nurturing aren't met and loving, caring, stable attachments with others are not established. (Mayo Clinic)
it seems this is very likely Aegon’s case. Alicent was a young, unprepared, lonely, and quite frightened mother. i would imagine Alicent would’ve had hard time forming attachment with baby Aegon. he was an embodiment of her suffering. also, he’s not wholly hers. he belongs to the realm more than her. even though Viserys never named him the heir, he was at least a spare and have certain values and standards to achieve for that.
so Alicent must felt like she couldn’t let Aegon to be just her son. she had to make sure he’s perceived to be worthy of the Iron Throne. which Aegon was arguably not that. he was reluctant to marry Helaena, he had little understanding of his family’s political positions and what kind of danger they were facing. in the show he appeared as a weird ass boy who has no shame, less dutiful than his younger brother, and many other worse things.
for that Otto would kick him around, Alicent would forcefully grab his face and slap him. it must’ve happened often enough. i could imagine if Otto and Alicent would comfortably abuse him in public, they wouldn’t be deterred in any other situation. whenever he missteps, he would’ve been punished.
Alicent wasn’t just Aegon’s mother, she was his handler, more like. i would not say there wasn’t any comfort, affection or nurturing. at least i think there couldn’t have enough to nullify the abuse. not enough to form loving, caring, stable attachments between them. he’s unsure if Alicent loves him at all. he asked her directly right before his execution coronation, and even then Alicent never said she loved him explicitly. whatever complicated meaning of love “you imbecile” implies, Aegon most likely felt just rejected, again.
okay this is getting too long. but the next two i would show you rather than tell you.
3. Dissociative Disorders
Depersonalization/Derealization Disorder
4. Alcohol use disorder
again, he’s said to be;
given to swilling ale and strongwine
is this too long? of course. am i reaching? oh absolutely. is this logically sound? ahaha don’t push it.
personally i feel bad for him. Aegon was born into becoming a disappointment, beaten and berated for it, always falls short despite his efforts. he never wanted any of it, but when the war broke in earnest, he accepted his fate and did what he was supposed to do. for that he’s burnt, broken, and lost everything. his story has so many fascinating arcs.
if anyone read all of this atrocity, know that i love you and please be nice to me. have a great day/night!
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I do respect and commend people who are not paraphiliacs but try to be openly supportive because it's the type of decision that can come with a lot of harassment involved, and for a lot of people I know the mindset that 'you can't control a paraphilia but you can control the harm they cause' is like, the 101 of this sort of activism.
But we ought to move on to 102 at some point, right? This isn't even simply about paraphilias but about the larger discussion on sexual abuse: 'the harm they cause' is a reductive and inaccurate view that continues to perpetuate the idea that sexual abuse is caused by sexual desire.
That there is a wrong type of 'horniness' that makes people violate the autonomy of others, and therefore people who are oriented towards being 'turned on' by the wrong things are always implicitly more at risk than the people with 'normal' orientations: that we speak of paraphiliacs in terms of 'control' and 'avoidance', as if they were reactive dogs that need to be muzzled.
This view simply does not hold up when we compare it to other sexualities (and I think this is sort of another fundamental issue involved: people think that paraphilias are somehow morally 'distinct' from sexualities and thus speak of them in different terms and standards).
A man who sexually abuses a woman didn't abuse her because of his heterosexuality. A man who sexually abuses another man didn't abuse him because of his homosexuality. What you are attracted to is neither prerequisite for nor predictive of abuse, because abuse rests on factors like power dynamics, dehumanisation and the ability to get away with it first and foremost.
It is very surprising to me still that people who seem to recognise that abuse isn't about 'the victim was so hot that I couldn't resist' and that there are larger interpersonal and systemic factors at play still often speak of paraphiliacs in these terms (something to be controlled, something that causes 'urges', something that, even it doesn't 'make' you abusive puts you at risk of it). To me, it tends to reveal two things:
The first is, like I mentioned above, these people think there is a fundamental difference between 'sexuality' and 'paraphilia' in terms that are underlined by respectability politics. And I say this as somebody who doesn't actually consider being a paraphiliac as quite 'the same' as being queer/etc. (there are other sociopolitical differences that make me think this), but when you see the people who make these distinctions explain themselves:
'Liking the same gender is normal, liking [x] is not'
'Homosexuality isn't a mental illness though, I have nothing against the mentally ill but a paraphilia is a mental illness'
'Being queer doesn't give me urges to hurt people unlike a paraphilia'
'You don't need to "recover" from being gay, that's conversion therapy and it's also impossible! However I support paraphiles who are seeking help for their attraction!'
... the message becomes quite clear: people believe that there are identity markers that are inherently indicative of morality. That a paraphilia has to be distinguished from a sexual orientation because a sexual orientation is never a reason why a bad person is bad, but a paraphilia could be.
And the second, which I find more fundamental, is that these people don't talk to paraphiliacs. They 'want' to be activists so they will 'support paraphiliacs seeking recovery, don't bully them, don't threaten them!' but they will put paraphiliacs on their DNI as their personal boundary, 'for my own comfort.'
Look, I'm not here to tell people to interact or not interact with whoever, frankly it's none of my business. But I do think you need to consider what exactly you're trying to do when you say you want to advocate for a group you refuse to even talk to. Do you think you sound different from those people who say 'I don't care if you're gay, just don't be doing that in front of me'? If you won't talk to paraphiliacs, your idea of how paraphiliacs live come from stereotypes, call-out posts, and hyperpathologised psychiatric description, even if you think you're reading those posts in a Non-Judgemental Critical Thinking Immune-to-Propaganda Way.
Like I said, I do have some appreciation for people who take that 'first step' of at the very least recognising the harm in perpetuating the normalisation of threatening/harassing/etc. paraphiliacs, but there is often this kindness-as-concession undertone to it all when you see it spoken about in these controlled, pathologised ways. It feels very much like you don't think you're actually talking about real people, but you're talking about abstract concepts in a thought experiment where you side with the model that furthers your self-image of your ideological bent.
#d#paraphilia#this is also not even going into how people often have gut reactions to the literal word PARAPHILIA#like they'll be all 'kink at pride! furries are queer! fetishes are based!'#what do you think kinks and fetishes ARE?#a paraphilia isn't 'when the attraction is evil'#a PARAPHILIA is an umbrella term that INCLUDES KINKS AND FETISHES!#and if you're basing your beliefs this strongly on the reputation of the -arrangement of letters- I question how much you've 'educated' +#+ yourself despite those claims#'oh but if you Google paraphilia you see it means--' this is my point!#Instead of asking people who live like this what it means to them you're looking to shrinks from the 50s who want them to fuck off and die!#This is the shallow restrictive thing akin to 'well Google says transgender is when you have gender dysphoria'#Paraphiliacs have a life outside of pathology!
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Also I think because LXC can't actually fix JGY's situation, people don't always realize how often he does help JGY? But we do actually see it a lot! Even aside from repeatedly saving his life from NMJ trying to kill him on the spot, there's:
- the teacups scene
- bringing news of the possibilities at Langya (and offering to talk to NMJ if needed)
- intervening politely when Jin Zixun is yelling abuse at him at the Phone is Mountain Hunt
- helping expand the grounds at the Phoenix Mountain Hunt, and even recruiting LWJ to help them out
- giving him the cloth after Zixun throws wine at him
- even teaching him the Song of Clarity!
And honestly I'm probably forgetting some other things too. And like—again setting aside the defending his life from NMJ part, most of these are fairly subtle or small? But that's just the kind of help LXC can give! He can't fix JGY's situation; it's just not in his power. But that doesn't mean there's never any help he can give. And I think it's worth noting that the help is graciously given and graciously accepted; even when LXC urges him to go change his clothes after Zixun throws wine on him, and JGY has to point out that he can't, he's not offended or reactive or anything of the sort; he simply says that he can't leave, even as he accepts the handkerchief without any problems and uses it to clean his robes.
#jin guangyao#lan xichen#xiyao#and I mean don't get me wrong obviously the debt is massively in JGY's favour!#he's helped LXC more than LXC has helped him by a very significant amount#(and I'm still never over the way we ONLY LEARN THIS AFTER HE'S BEEN STABBED IN THE NOVEL)#but that doesn't mean that LXC never helps JGY!#he absolutely does#it's just often not very splashy and it doesn't magically fix everything#so I think it's often undernoticed
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Brazil’s new President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has so far shown little concern about defying consensus in the West on foreign policy -- even when it comes to dealing with authoritarian governments.
In recent weeks, Lula’s Brazil sent a delegation to Venezuela, refused to sign a UN resolution condemning Nicaragua’s human rights abuses, allowed Iranian warships to dock in Rio de Janeiro and flatly refused to send weapons to Ukraine, at war with Russia.
These decisions have raised eyebrows in the U.S. and Europe, but experts said Lula is reactivating Brazil’s decades-old principle of non-alignment to carve out a policy that best safeguards its interests in an increasingly multi-polar world.
Brazil’s foreign policy is based on its 1988 constitution, which establishes non-intervention, self-determination, international cooperation and the peaceful settlement of conflicts as guiding principles.
That involves “talking to all states at all times without making moral judgements, while respecting certain red lines,” said Feliciano Guimarães, a political scientist at the think tank Brazilian Center for International Relations. Lula’s red lines are not yet clear, he added.
16 Mar 23
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A Brazilian court has announced that it will be opening an investigation into X owner Elon Musk for obstruction of justice, after Musk reactivated far-right accounts that the Brazilian government had flagged for removal. The announcement came after Musk called for Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who heads the country’s Superior Electoral Court (TSE), to “resign or be impeached,” and a statement from X alleged that the orders to remove the accounts violate the Brazilian constitution.
While the court has not released the list of accounts it requested for blocking or investigation, the São Paolo–based newspaper Estadão reported that it includes the fugitive far-right influencer Allan dos Santos, a supporter of president Jair Bolsonaro. (Dos Santos fled the country in 2020 to avoid investigation for disseminating disinformation.) The list also includes right-wing YouTuber Bruno Aiub, known as Monark, who has over 1 million followers on X and has argued that Brazil should recognize the Nazi party, and Brazilian billionaire and Bolsonaro-supporter Luciano Hang.
Separately, after taking over the company, Musk reactivated the accounts of Brazilian far-right politicians Carla Zambelli, Gustavo Gayer, and Nikolas Ferreira. Ferreira, a Bolsonaro supporter, openly questioned the security of Brazil’s electronic voting machines, even though he won his local legislative race.
“All of these names have been problematic for years on social media,” says Flora Rebello Arduini, campaign director at the nonprofit advocacy organization Ekō. “They've been pushing for the far-right and election misinformation for ages.”
When Musk purchased Twitter in 2022, later renaming it X, many activists in Brazil worried that he would abuse the platform to push his own agenda, Arduini says. “He has unprecedented broadcasting abilities. He is bullying a supreme court justice of a democratic country, and he is showing he will use all the resources he has available to push for whatever favors his personal opinions or his professional ambitions.”
Under Musk, X has become a haven for the far right and disinformation. After taking over, Musk offered amnesty to users who had been banned from the platform, including right-wing influencer and convicted human trafficker Andrew Tate. A 2023 study found that hate speech has increased on the platform under Musk’s leadership. The situation in Brazil is just the latest instance of Musk aligning himself with and platforming dangerous, far-right movements around the world, experts tell WIRED. "It's not about Twitter or Brazil. It's about a strategy from the global far right to overcome democracies and democratic institutions around the world," says Nina Santos, a digital democracy researcher at the Brazilian National Institute of Science & Technology who researches the Brazilian far right. “An opinion from an American billionaire should not count more than a democratic institution.”
This also comes as Brazil has continued working to understand and investigate the lead-up to January 8, 2023, when election-denying insurrectionists who refused to accept right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro’s defeat stormed Brazil’s legislature. The TSE, the country’s election court, is a special judicial body that investigates electoral crimes and is part of the mechanism for overseeing the country’s electoral processes overall. The court has been investigating the dissemination of fake news and disinformation that cast doubt on the country’s elections in the months and years leading up to the storming of the legislature on January 8, 2023. Both Arduini and Santos believe that the accounts Musk is refusing to remove are likely connected to the court’s inquiry.
“A life-and-death struggle recently took place in Brazil for the democratic rule of law and against a coup d'état, which is under investigation by this court in compliance with due legal process,” Luís Roberto Barroso, the president of the federal supreme court, said in a statement about Musk’s comments. “Nonconformity against the prevalence of democracy continues to manifest itself in the criminal exploitation of social networks.”
Santos also worries that Musk is setting a precedent that the far right will be protected and promoted on his platform, regardless of local laws or public opinion. “They are trying to use Brazil as a laboratory on how to interfere in local politics and local businesses,” she says. “They are making the case that their decision is more important than the national decision from a state democratic institution.”
Though Musk has claimed to be a free-speech advocate, and X’s public statement on the takedowns asserts that Brazilians are entitled to free speech, the platform’s application of these principles has been uneven at best. In February, on order of the Indian government, X blocked the accounts Hindutva Watch and the India Hate Lab in India, two US-based nonprofits that track incidents of religiously motivated violence perpetrated by supporters of the country’s right-wing government. A 2023 study from the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard found that X complied with more government takedown requests under Musk’s leadership than it had previously. In March, X blocked the accounts of several prominent researchers and journalists after they identified a well-known neo-Nazi cartoonist, later changing its own terms of service to justify the decision.
X did not respond to a request for comment about why the company made a public statement condemning the Brazilian court’s takedown orders but not those issued by other governments.
“We have a background that is different from the US. It’s more similar to the European concept of freedom of expression,” says João Brant, digital policy secretary for Brazil’s Secretariat of Social Communication. “You can discuss the elections, of course. The problem was, affirming categorically that there has been fraud and that the electoral court has not acted upon. It’s perfectly OK to discuss judicial orders, but it’s also important to comply with them.”
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I get that people don’t like the “Wicked Stepmother” trope, and if you ever read feminist analysis of fairytales, they’ll often talk about how the Wicked Stepmother trope is about demonizing older, more openly/blatantly ambitious and active women, in contrast to the younger, more innocent, chaste, and often (not always) more passive/reactive ingenue heroine.
But at the end of the day, that's exactly what happened with HOTD. The whore and her bastards vs the dutiful, obedient, self-sacrificing, and sexually pure queen. (even though Rhaenyra has been stripped off of her strong personality, anger, ruthlessness and ambition and turned into a pacifist who do not want “it.”)
That's accurate nonnie. That's exactly what happened. Alicent was indeed presented as a wicked stepmother in the book, the difference is, Rhaenyra wasn't presented as the chaste/passive/reactive héroïne. This is not a Cinderella story. Rhaenyra is not a fairytale princess crying in her castle and waiting for her beautiful prince to come and save her from her evil stepmother : she was a woman who basically broke a lot of patriarcal laws, went against the system, fought for her rights and got punished for it, she was eaten alive. And in all the horrible shit that happened to her, her stepmother played an instrumental role.
Yesss, the HotD writers tried to subvert the "Wicked Stepmother" trope but the problem is that this subversion would only work in the context of the fairytale but doesn't work here, because here, Rhaenyra is not being rewarded for her chastity, innocence and passivity, like the heroines of fairytales who are normally abused by Wicked Stepmothers. The Subversion of the Wicked Stepmother trope is not needed to give the story a human female character with agency : the story already has one, and it's Rhaenyra. That's why whatever HotD writers tried to do, it ultimately came at the great cost of the actual protagonist, who is now being painted a whore, by her stepmother and her fanbase.
That is why it is so dangerous to try and rewrite stories on the basis of your personal political ideology. It doesn't fucking work. Write your own fucking story, respectfully.
#hotd#house of the dragon#anonymous#rhaenyra targaryen#anti alicent hightower#fire and blood#wicked stepmother trope#feminism#misogyny
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fanfic request !!! (SPECIFICALLY WITH MY PERSONAL SELF INSERT/OC). Based on info given in dms, Headcanons for Alastor and attempting to get the human he made a deal with and brought to Hell to be less, well, anxious about his current situation being in Hell. Can be a bit on the yandere or even possessive side if you like ^^
One-Shots and Headcanons Masterlist
Reactive mutism: a reaction to trauma and/or abuse
OC belongs to @kirbybooo
Kirby always had a strange fascination with the occult, so when he started hearing constant radio noises around, he figured that some kind of entity might be trying to communicate with him
He knew that a lot of the self-proclaimed ghost hunters and ghost busters often used radios to communicate with the creatures from the beyond, so first thing in the morning he decided to order a very old school looking radio from an antique shop
When it arrived, plugging it in Kirby messed with the dials so that it would be on the same wavelength as the signals
“Oh dearie, what might this be?”
Alastor, whom was currently in the world of the living hunting wondered as he felt an unfamiliar radio signal
Paying it no mind, he continued with his pursuit of his latest victim
Soon, he started receiving message from whoever was responsible, though they were very strange to say the least
There were numerous voices cut together forming sentences, a clever way for Kirby to reach out without having to use his voice as he was unable to talk due to severe traumas in his life which ended up restricting his ability to speak quite a bit, but more about that later
Sniffing out the source of the signal, the deer demon decided to observe Kirby for a bit
It was a long, long time since someone reached out to him and talked to him WILLINGLY and without fear, even the Hazbin Hotel residents could not deny they felt uneasy around someone of his caliber
It was more than obvious Kirby’s life was a mess, it reminded Alastor of Angel Dust’s situation with Valentino, and he was more than ready to exploit that
Sending the little human a message offering his services, he expectantly awaited his reaction and soon enough, received a confirmatory response
Appearing in his modest apartment, Kirby stared at his “saviour”
He looked nothing like he would imagine a demon to look like, especially with his cute little antlers and fluffy ears and tail
A deal was formed soon after
In exchange for Kirby’s soul, the deer demon had to get Kirby out of his abusive situation using any means necessary
Looks like human meat was back on the menu for today
Teleporting back to Hell, Alastor strode towards the Hazbin Hotel looking forward to showing everyone his new human pet
If by taking his soul Alastor meant right after Kirby got a taste of his newfound freedom, he might have thought twice about making this deal or, more like made it specifically known that his soul would only be for taking after his death (which would have to not be caused by Alastor)
But a deal was a deal, there was no going back now
At least the people at this strange hotel seemed nice enough, though they first assumed Kirby’s unwillingness to talk to them to be rude at first, but thanks to a good old pen and paper they were able to understand his situation and to communicate just fine
Angel Dust felt instantly protective of Kirby as he could relate to him the most, knowing just how loathsome such a lifestyle is and what it does to a person’s psyche
Charlie welcomed him with a warm smile and open arms while Vaggie was glaring daggers at Alastor, standing between you two and pointing her trusty spear at his throat, cursing at him in Spanish about the repercussions and dangers of bringing a human to Hell
Niffty was quick to introduce herself as the “maid” of the hotel with a polite handshake and evident excitement in her eye
Husk stayed at the bar, observing the situation while downing a bottle of cheap booze
He seemed to be the most laid-back guy around here, so Kirby naturally gravitated towards him for a drink while the cat demon offered to indulge him in some stories of his life as a human in order to avoid awkward silence
The little human was a handful for sure, sulking over his unfair deal with Alastor, sneaking out in order to discover the ins and outs of Hell, partying and drinking way too much (in Alastor’s opinion) with Angel Dust and Husk, arguing with Vaggie over your intentions with the hotel and running around like a pair of goofs with Niffty
Maybe, just maybe it was more than Alastor bargained for
Perhaps he will just get a collar with a leash to get his new human pet to not run around like a fool, getting constantly either lost or in trouble
Days turned into weeks and weeks into months and slowly but surely, Alastor picked up on the fact Kirby was slowly starting to express himself not with a paper and a pen, but with his own voice
It started with small hmm’s and ohhh’s, gradually turning into single words as responses until it fully bloomed into short sentences
His voice was but a gentle whisper, yet it was tremendous progress from his previous muteness
But Alastor soon found out he wanted to be the only one who would be blessed to hear Kirby’s voice and just hearing him address anyone else made his blood boil, smile wavering
Yet he knew kidnapping was not an option as he noted Kirby only graced those he trusted with his words and doing such a thing would break the already delicate trust the two had
So there are only 3 possible options
First one, Alastor gets over his pettiness and accepts the fact he’s not the only important figure in Kirby’s life (VERY unlikely)
Second one, Alastor kidnaps his little pet, breaking his trust and reverting to being mute (he’ll resort to this only as a last option)
Third one, manipulation (the most probable option)
And oh boy is Alastor good at manipulating others
He’ll expertly manipulate him like a puppet without him even realizing it to the point where in his mind, there will only be Alastor
And since Alastor is the only one he needs, there is no necessity for the others now, no?
“Oh dearie, don’t you think I should be the only one deserving of that delectable voice of yours?”
#hazbin hotel#alastor#angel dust#hazbin hotel alastor#hazbin hotel angel dust#headcanon#alastor headcanons#alastor x reader#hazbin alastor#fanfiction#oneshot#reader insert#hazbin niffty#husk#charlie magne#hazbin charlie#vaggie#niffty#fat nuggets#helluva boss#alastor the radio demon#fanfic#hazbin hotel charlie#alastor headcanon#hazbin angel dust#hazbin demon#reader#valentino#mute#muteness
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