#issues with this being no idea what denomination i am

[queer-reader-07]

you know what i think really gets me as a good omens fan who also grew up catholic? the very human approach it takes to morality.

i can’t speak for every denomination of christianity, but i can speak to catholicism. i grew up in the church, i went to catholic school, i was confirmed for fuck’s sake. i know the catholic church. the ways in which it eats away at your self esteem. the ways in which it makes you feel like you are a terrible person because you’ve sinned in one way or another. the way you’re taught the concept of original sin as though it isn’t deeply unsettling to believe that all humans are born corrupt. you’re taught that you were born tainted by satan, you as a baby you as a child you who doesn’t even know your place in this world yet. you are sinful because you are human.

there is no room for shades of grey in catholicism. you have either sinned or you haven’t. you are either good or you are bad. you are either going to heaven or you are cursed to damnation. (yeah yeah purgatory and all that but if i’m being honest the diocese i was a part of never really talked about it)

we all know the church is corrupt. every catholic knows that, but whether or not we ever admitted it to ourselves and accepted it as truth is another story. you cannot deny the staggering statistics regarding catholic priests assaulting and molesting children. you cannot deny the financial corruption that has been present in the institution for centuries. but you can ignore it. you can ignore it and pretend like the church is perfect and good because if you allow yourself to admit it’s issues, you admit that maybe your entire world view is flawed. that maybe the idea of morality as being black and white is wrong.

that's what i grew up with. with these contradictory beliefs. these adults in power telling me i was inherently sinful because i was human while also being told that God loves me. that God will save me from myself. so i grew up thinking someone else could fix me. because if i was inherently bad i couldn't fix myself.

but of course, the truth is, i don't need fixing. i'm not broken or bad. i'm human.

when aziraphale described adam as "human incarnate" i got EXTREMELY emotional. because to be human incarnate is to be not good or bad. it's to just be. be whoever it is you are. make the best choices you can. will they all be perfect? of course not. but will you be trying your damndest? yes.

good omens is a breath of fresh air for me and my religious trauma because the thesis of the story is that black and white thinking is unproductive at best and actively harmful at worst. you cannot live a fulfilling life while also believing there is only Bad and Good, and that Bad and Good are inherent.

good omens is a comfort because it reminds me in more ways than one that i'm worthy of love. i'm worthy of life. i don't have to be perfect, far from it. i'm allowed to be messy and make mistakes, but none of that means i don't deserve to be here. none of that means i'm a Bad Person. i'm just, A Person.

i'm trying. i've always tried. tried to love the best i can, tried to be the best person i can be, tried to live my life to the fullest, tried to cultivate joy for myself.

my brain is a mess. and 15 years, give or take, of being fully immersed in the catholic church (including 7 years of catholic school) definitely didn't help. i am still riddled with catholic guilt and toxic mental frameworks because of the time i spent in the church.

but good omens helps me work through it just that little bit more. it's there in its corner of my heart saying "hey. you're human. you're not Bad or Good, you're You. and you're trying."

it's... comforting. yeah, i think that's the right word.

#found this one in my drafts and finally decided to finish it #good omens #good omens meta #gomens meta #cw religious trauma #religious trauma #catholic trauma #catholicism

[crooked-wasteland]

Something I am working on after the live blogs. I came across a very easy to find, but under shared bit of information regarding Medrano that has really recontextualized the show for me. It still isn't a good show, but I missed a crucial component when I said the series had nothing to say. It still doesn't have much to say, but once you realize that Vivienne Medrano was raised Presbyterian, and seems to still adhere to most of those teachings, a lot of decisions make sense. The particular denomination of Christianity is one based on Trinity doctrine, and also strongly adheres to the idea that depicting god is a biblical transgression. So that explains why God and Jesus are not characters within the series and will never be.

Additionally, the Presbyterian Church is one of the few sects that has a relatively strong belief in the Calvinist ideology of Predestination. Specifically that one is born chosen by God or not, which explains pretty much everything in Hazbin. Angels are "winners" because they were born chosen while a random select of unchosen people are damned to hell. Some versions of the Presbyterian Church still hold to the belief that one's lifestyle, be you a good or evil person, is irrelevant. If you are chosen, nothing you do will remove that.

And that is why these characters being in hell doesn't matter. They didn't do anything to get there. They still adhere to Christian beliefs of what sort of people are not chosen (drug addicts, sex workers, mean people), but there is an inherent lack of nuance because the doctrine renders it unnecessary. Adam and Lute are awful and allowed to be in heaven because heaven is forever. Chosen are forever chosen regardless of Sin. It also explains why the LGBT aspect of the show is irrelevant to the plot.

This background knowledge is paramount to understanding Hazbin and Helluva (Hell is like the living world because a mixed bag of people are in Hell in the first place. Hellborn characters are not that different from humans and still exist in a realm of morality because morality isn't the reason they are in Hell).

My issue with trying to get into Hazbin's themes was because I didn't understand this was the origin of the plot. A lot of critiques and proposed rewrites miss the point entirely because Predestination in this sense is not a common belief. The world building requires a relatively intimate understanding of Presbyterian teachings in order to grasp the basic foundation of the story.

#vivziepop critical #vivienne medrano #spindlehorse critical #vivziepop criticism #hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel critique #tw religious themes #presbyterian #predestination

[unbidden-yidden]

Okay so I feel like I may be swinging a bat at a hornets nest here, but please hear me out. I'm asking this genuinely and hoping for an actual discussion on this.

This is an excellent and insightful thread that I'd ask you to read in full first because I am writing this after reading it; however, this is definitely part of a larger conversation on tumblr so it's not a direct response to just this post. Also that thread is so long already and OP seems pretty done with it, so I don't want to blow it up (again.)

---

At what point does someone stop being culturally Xtian? Is there a threshold past which someone has actually done enough unpacking of Xtian ideas and assumptions to ever escape it? Do you have to literally join another culture to overwrite Xtian culture? Does that, by itself, actually even fix it?

I guess what I'm struggling with here is this: are we talking about a behavior that people engage in, and can therefore escape by not doing that behavior or thinking in that way anymore? Or are we talking about a set of privileges that one cannot ever truly leave behind?

If it's the former, then I think it would be more appropriate, more accurate, and more respectful (especially to survivors of Xtian religious abuse) to describe the behavior rather than the person. Because at the end of the day, this person, no matter how obnoxious - and trust me when I say I've been on the receiving end of this obnoxiousness and sometimes outright antisemitism plenty - isn't a Xtian* and isn't necessarily defined by this behavior. It's one thing if they define themselves by a bigoted behavior - a self-identified t//erf is a transphobe by their own definition, for example - but people whose identity is otherwise neutral are not, as a person, a/an [x] based on this particular example of their behavior. So if this is the case, perhaps saying "[x] thing you said comes from [y] culturally Xtian idea that is antisemitic," (for example) would be more productive and lead to a better conversation than simply saying "you're culturally Xtian and need to stop speaking over us on [x] issue."

This is also important because anyone can make culturally Xtian assumptions, even if they've never once been Xtian in their lives. Do you know how many Jewish-from-birth folks I've had to help unpack culturally Xtian ideas and internalized antisemitism that they were putting out into Jewish spaces? Especially (but far from only) assimilated Jews? It's not only a non-zero amount, but it comes up frequently. Because I've spent the last several years unpacking my own cultural Xtianity and intentionally assimilating into Jewish culture, thought, and religious ideas, I am hypersensitive to the intrusion of Xtian normative ideas and am able to explain the difference from personal experience in these conversations.

On the other hand, though, that brings me to possibility #2, which is that this is a privilege that is being described. If we're talking about the set of circumstances that one grew up with and the cultural assumptions one has baked into their emerging personality from birth, then I'm still, as a person who is now Jewish, more culturally Xtian than someone who was raised an atheist by atheists. My hard work over the last several years does not change where I came from, no matter how much I sometimes wish I could overwrite my past. I not only grew up as part of the privileged religious majority (and since I am white and was part of a mainline protestant denomination, I really was at the top of that pile) I still, to this day, know Xtian texts and religious practice and assumptions from the inside and can therefore speak to people who are coming from that place in a way that others without that privilege typically cannot.

That is still true, years after I finished converting, never mind started the process of de-Xtianizing my culture and worldview. Yet, I've never been accused of being culturally Xtian in discourse on here, and I feel like anyone who would do more than say, "hey - [x] particular thing you said seems to be coming from [y] Xtian assumption about the world. Can you clarify what you mean and/or maybe this is something you need to address?" is likely to get yelled at for how they are othering me as a ger. Even if what they're saying is true! Because it would be disrespectful to point it out by just flatly telling me I'm coming from a culturally Xtian place and need to put a lid on it.

So I guess I'll end by posing some questions for discussion. I am genuinely interested in people's different responses to this.

Is it possible for someone who has left Xtianity to no longer be considered culturally Xtian?

If so, what would it take for someone to reach that?

If not, why not?

Does the answer change if the person is an atheist/areligious/non-religious full stop, versus someone who has replaced it with another religion?

Does it matter what that new religion is? Must it have longstanding culture behind it, such as Judaism or Hinduism, or can it be a new and/or eclectic religion, such as many neo-pagan religions, Satanism, new age religions, etc.

What do our answers to these questions say about how we view and treat atheists, followers of new religions, and gerim?

Part of my concern with how we talk about this besides just the interfaith piece, is that it also gives Xtianity a whole lot more space and power to control the conversation about religion and interfaith discourse than it necessarily needs to, as well as sometimes starting a weird purity rabbit hole to try and get away from the "taint" of Xtian ideas. I'm just not sure we want to cede that much control, but obviously at the same time we need to be able to name Xtian privilege and the thoughts, behaviors, assumptions, and discourse that flow from it, so I'm not sure what the right balance here is.

(*For purposes of this thread I'm only talking about people who are not religiously Xtian, even though obviously Xtians engage in this behavior plenty and are the privileged religious group in the US.)

#interfaith #every hour is theology hour around here apparently #jumblr discourse #jumblr

[sag-dab-sar]

Personal Terminology: why "Mariolatry" and not "Marian Devotion/Veneration" ?

Mariolatry is a pejorative term used primarily by protestants to describe Catholic & Orthodox veneration of The Virgin Mary.

Here is part of what Mary means to me.

Mariolatry

Wiktionary Entry

Latin Maria + o + -latry

Maria referring to The Virgin Mary, 'o' is an interfix, and "-latry" meaning 'worship of'.

-latry according to wiktionary comes from "Late Latin latria, from Ancient Greek λατρεία (latreía, “service; worship”).

So the literal meaning is "Worship of Mary"

This may not seem bad on the surface but it certainly is bad for many Christians because there are different types of acceptable veneration.

Christian Veneration

*Obviously individual Catholics and Christians are going to have different ideas. Certainly not all follow official doctrines many syncretisms and DIY exist. I am basing my view off Church *doctrine* as I know it.

In Catholicism (largest denomination of Christianity) worship is known as latria. It comes from the exact same origin "-latry" does.

Latria is due only to God (The Trinity) and God alone.

Dulia, which comes from Greek douleia meaning servitude, is the honor paid towards Saints.

Hyperdulia, which is just dulia with a hyper prefix attached meaning "over", describes the honor paid towards Mary. It is above the honor of saints but below worship.

"Wherefore dulia, which pays due service to a human lord, is a distinct virtue from latria, which pays due service to the Lordship of God. It is, moreover, a species of observance, because by observance we honor all those who excel in dignity, while dulia properly speaking is the reverence of servants for their master, dulia being the Greek for servitude". — St. Thomas Aquinas

Worship is due to God and God alone.

So saying "you worship Mary" can be offensive, and a Christian who participates in Marian Devotion might strongly disagree. Marian devotion exists in the Roman & Eastern Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodox Church, Anglican Communion, and Lutheranism. They don't worship her, they give her honor and veneration that is below the worship of God, even if it is devout.

Many Protestants refuse these distinctions and see the veneration of Mary and Saints along with statues and icons as idolatry..... hence "mariolatry"

My Personal Practice

The distinctions individuals wish to use is all well and good, and I completely respect it.

But I am not Christian. I am a polytheist. I see no reason to give Mary Hyperdulia/Dulia and not Latria.

I don't come from a theological framework were worship is due to The Trinity and The Trinity alone. Or even due to Gods alone. Many other types of spirits that may not be considered Gods or "fully" Gods can receive worship in my practice. I view Mary on par with heros such as Herakles, he certainly receives worship.

Mary is separate from my rituals, offerings, and prayers to the Theoi and Diĝirene. However, my veneration/honor of Mary is still not below their worship. Hence "worship of Mary" seemed completely acceptable and well thats what "mariolatry" means so I took a very strong liking to the word.

Other Terms

"Mariology" — this is the theological study of The Virgin Mary. Her place, her role, etc within Christian theology. I have no interest in studying theology.

"Marian devotion" — devote is a very strong word in my religion that can't be ascribed to Mary

"Marian veneration" — connects my desired personal practice more to Christianity than I want it to be. Also "Marian devotion/veneration" just tingle my childhood schoolgirl catholic spidey senses and I don't like that.

(Hm, 🧐 so if an idolater is someone who practices idolatry would a mariolater be someone who practices mariolatry.)

Last Note

I am not trying to be pejorative towards Christians. I have no issues with Christians. Nor would I insist Marian Devotion by other people = worship. This is solely about me personally using a particular word. I also don't feel any offense if someone called me an idolater, even if they are trying to offend, since I call the animated objects of the Diĝirene & Theoi "Idols."

Anyways hope that all makes sense.

-not audio proof read-

#xtianity #polytheism #multiple faiths #mariolatry #my spirituality is a tangled mixed nowadays #my practice

[abyssalpriest]

Leviathan: What Makes a God, 31/7/23

An essay channelled from Leviathan on what is biologically or physically at play when a spirit acts or "becomes" a "god", which he distills into your ability to connect with the world around you.

Leviathan said:

In my humble opinion, “a god” isn't something you can definitively define. It's similar to the issues with the word "religion" though not as complex, but a rough idea of what I mean when I use the word is as follows: A god is a spirit that responds to requests and petitions, rules over a certain aspect or aspects of the world - note the worda "rules over" as a comparison to politics, not an inherent complete synchronisation like "is" would imply - and interacts with a set of people who elevate the spirit to a point of revering them in a working relationship. It’s a relationship-based title. We can look anywhere to get an understanding of what the relationship is on the half of the people worshiping, case studies are all around us waiting to be carried out and classified, but the active side of what it looks like to the deity's body and self is what I want to discuss. What makes a god on the side of the god, as opposed to the elevation by those he works with?

It’s worth noting that the word “god” is arbitrary. Powerful beings can be called a god in one culture and a demon in the next, that's why people like the Void's consciousnesses can be considered a god or an ancestor depending on where you go, "god" is an arbitrary set of letters and is used often just to denote a powerful worshiped being in good standing with the culture the speaker is a part of. I however am using it as a catch-all for beings that are deified in whatever individual sense they are. For now the word "god" is just a stand-in for "spirit who is the subject of what I am talking about", really.

Becoming a god is a continual and active process done every moment a god is active as a god, and there is no moment where they become a god and stay it forever since there are no major biological changes in the way of transmuting species, only in the way of gathering fat on or growing in a human body. Something absolutely happens, though, if we’re talking biology.

Godhood (the state and act of being a god) will always be about acting as a medium for a set of people to connect with reality in ways they themselves alone cannot. Something is needed for a spirit to act as that medium, though. Power and connection are necessary here on the half of the god, people don't worship beings that they don't either believe or want to believe are more powerful than them, but since powers amongst gods is an individual thing… Well, we cant say a god is a god because they control the weather, or move wealth, or guard royalty, and so on, because any one of those would exclude many other legitimate gods, so what exactly is this power a god has? What is it at the base of the issue that almost all gods have that serves as the basis for their godhood?

The common denominator in my opinion is a connection to reality and an ability to alter it specifically without tools (or amplified by them), through consciousness and Self alone. A god generally becomes so in touch with and fluent in specific parts of reality that they almost become one with them (or do become one, depending on how you look), which is a function nigh on all consciousnesses are capable of doing. I would say that if a new god is seen as a god but they haven't efficiently threaded themselves into and aren't puppeting reality based on a network of strings and resonances and learning to be conscious as reality themselves - if they have been elevated to godhood without the connection to reality I’m talking about - then they sure as Hell are going to learn a few years later how to do it when the phone calls won't stop and they completely obscure a normal life and sense of self.

Godhood almost always comes back to this connection as its crux of power, because people revere it and if they don’t revere you for it then you’ll need to learn to use it in order to interact with the people below your chain of command, to live up to the expectations they provide which inform whether they worship you or not. Hence: Connection to reality is the answer to my prompt of "What makes a god?" And it is going to be the focus of this discussion.

---

The connection between mind and body is a little different on other planes compared to this one, allowing for example the inhabiting of multiple bodies split from your main one, or people to split into multiple separate people, or allowing possession of the dead to puppet around, but it goes the opposite way too where we are very able to spread singular selves outwards to an extent that you on this plane… can also do as consciousnesses, yes, but when you do this it will be your Astral bodies doing it. Physical bodies are uniquely isolated even from themselves. Like a physical plane body accumulates fat from food, we are all able to accumulate energy and inhabit it by right of the coding and rules of reality itself, but the way in which physical plane beings do it is different.

What are these connections to reality, though? Let’s look at the subset of reality alteration often classified as “magic” around parts of this plane the Priest frequents, for a moment.

“Magic” is a word for a narrow identification of a part of a large spectrum of Self-Other influences. Saying "magic" is like saying "red" when there's an entire spectrum of visible light, and what specific colours "red" denotes is going to be different from culture to culture… Magic is a subset of interactions between your mind and the external world that occurs through the creation of a body, magic generally creates an energy body or system of energy bodies which do one of a few things in order to communicate and influence whatever the target is through the gateway of the subtle substances of the world.

Creation of a physical body is another "colour" in this colour spectrum metaphor, like green instead of magic as red, we'll say. Magic creates energetic add-ons to the practitioners energetic body and overall self (or creates new energetic bodies), inhabits them, and either dissipates them, propelling the practitioner's will into subtler and subtler forms until it is rippling and influencing the causal laws and coding and such of reality, like burned sigils, or sustains it as an autonomous gateway of transformation like a plant-based ward. Either way - whether the body is dissipated or sustained or what-have-you - magic is a subset of creating a body through which to influence the workings of the world and it has an emphasis on doing so by going back to the programming (Causal and coding-based abstract parts of reality). Magic is Self going through the gateway of programming to then be released as something Other than you, as opposed to Other going through programming to create a body that is a Self like what happens when a being is created or incarnates.

Effectively, in order to influence the Material and Objective and physical worlds as a Mental thing, a consciousness, you need a gateway and a vessel which are one and the same thing. The creation of a physical body is the accumulation of Reality's substances in accordance with DNA and coding in the subtle substances to coalesce and form a direct sort of robot to pilot around in order to heavily influence the Material, which, as a gateway, means that it in turn simultaneously allows the Material to heavily influence you. Likewise, magic is consciousness creating energy bodies to inhabit to interact with the world in accordance with Mental programming and coding in general in the subtle substances, but the key here is that magic is employed to alter the Causal and so on parts of reality (that which I am calling “subtle substance”) which then disperse changes into reality in the Other... Dispersion is a complex and not always present thing, but magic is often used to change things that you don't want to be - for instance altering probability of rain instead of possessing the weather system - and when you want to change something that isn't you, you have to do the paradoxical act of ritual self-suffocation until you die and become the Other by becoming nothing. Subtracting part of yourself to add on to the Other. This is best done in an energy body instead of sacrificing your physical one, best done with raised energies you temporarily claim rather than your core energies...

Anyway. Magic details I can get into another time and I can afford to have inaccuracies due to oversimplification here, this isn't the place to learn about magic. What you need to know is this: The common denominator in magic, incarnation, and godhood is all about types of body creation in order to influence the part of reality you want to influence, creating a body of that type (or nearest to it as you can) to play with it. Magic - or the Priest's understanding of what is classed under that word - is very relevant and begins to explain what a god does and is, which is basically a constantly sustained and expansive set of spells or what is tapped into when doing spells that reaches out into reality.

Energy bodies and altered states allow will to be slowly translated from conscious into subtler and subtler states and threaded into subtler and subtler places, because the conscious mind alone and by itself cannot pilot into these places with any accuracy. Note: "pilot into". You always are in all of these places and are doing all these things, every single person in existence alters the weather and causation lines and everything else to varying degrees, it just depends on the force of locality. But to consciously go and interact with something distant to you whether physically distant or conceptually, you need to take up a form that interacts more strongly with your intended target.

Different parts of yourself have different bodies and/or attach to different bodies easier; energy bodies house or are influenced by emotional consciousness pretty easy for one example, and subtle energy bodies allow a medium between subtle substances and the self in the way that physical bodies allow a medium between self and physical reality. Therefore, if you want to influence Causal substances... Get closer and closer through increasingly more subtle energy bodies. If you want to control the oceans...

Godhood, at least in my opinion, experience, so on, is directly tied to a spirit’s ability to create energetic bodies/expand their energetic bodies and interact with the world through them. However, it's not just as simple as "they do magic". In order to discuss that, let's look at what the act of calling a god is like - godhood is an active and working practice of being a medium, remember.

There’s a multitude of ways to call on a deity or more so a multitude of things to connect with when you call them. People invoke energies, consciousnesses, Causal influence, physical concepts like the sky - and evoke these things too, many people don't see a difference between a god's persona self and the world itself, seeing, say, Poseidon as all oceans and permeating all water that they relate to him, and it isn't a case that either everyone is misguided and he's not involved when they call the water or they all get his utmost attention making him always have to show up, listen, make choices, change the world's functioning, leave. That would be exhausting for him, right? There's not just two options of either "he doesn't show up when he's called because he isn't the water" and "he has to show up every time all the time because his persona is tied to the water".

We who are worshiped need to cultivate all sorts of consciousnesses and ways of being conscious, and thread our consciousness through various energies in order to have a presence that can be called upon both through evocation and invocation. The more things you are threaded into, the more resources you have, and the more resources you have the more people will either purposely or accidentally work with you, meaning you will get more energy. Godhood cannot be sustained purely selflessly, it is certainly always self-centred and often selfish to a certain degree. Anyway, this is an art that extends into many parts of reality. It isn’t enough to just be conscious of things such as watery energies and the energies of specific places, nor is it a matter of constantly consciously being called and then doing spells to alter the water when you're asked to because that would be exhausting. You need to be able to paradoxically be conscious of things the conscious mind cannot be conscious of, including things like names and causation - the very subtle strings of reality - to a point where you learn to inhabit those themselves. You need to become the reality you want to be seen as.

It is enough for a small god to be able to pilot the clouds around a fair amount of the time. But a key to being a big god is to understand how to inhabit causation and subtle substances like energy bodies, become them, which is especially delicate given that moving an energy body around and causing damage with it is one thing, but accidentally twanging a thread of reality… You have to - or at least I have to, there’s no manual on this written by God - sustain subtle consciousness levels and remain in a meditative state in certain parts of your subtle self now, because you have become microscopic tendrils wrapped around reality’s strings. You need to be conscious in a myriad of different ways and woven, often through energy bodies that get subtler and subtler, into all that you want control over. You need to make the Other the Self.

Really, this stems back to nondualist ideas, because nothing I teach can stray too far from that for long. Godhood and awakening to being Shiva is a process of learning to, well, wake up, expanding your awareness as opposed to taking things that aren't you and tacking them arbitrarily on to yourself. If you are tacking things on, you are sleeping in them and they are not you. If you understand them as you regardless of whether they're physically attached to your physical body or not, then you're getting it. When you get that, you need to understand how to slip through the subtle substances to alter this new part of yourself in the myriad of ways you can alter it, all decided by the varying languages of reality you need to speak to get results.

For example you may see the branch of a tree just like your arm. Now, how do you influence it? Telepathy is not a language here that will physically move that branch, so what about going through the language of the weather or possessing an animal to move it? Really, your physical body getting up and moving it is equally a "mystical" language of creation and "telepathic" influence, but I want to illustrate that controlling reality isn't about becoming conscious of reality and then you just think very very hard and attempt to move it with your mind. You have to move it through gates, take detours, hop your consciousness from one body to another to another and take a myriad of forms to get to the result you want. But I digress, the how-to's of this cannot be taught through words on a screen unless you already understand me, so let's get back to acknowledging this is theory and not attempting to look like we're teaching practicals.

To be a god you need to become parts of reality, which is possible because you already are within them as a sleeping Other - reality is compatible with your mind because it is like an extensive brain waiting for signals to pass through it - and you need to be aware of your presence and recognise the strings of Causation between you and everything around you. Creating energy bodies and becoming reality happens through the expansive nature of awakening consciousness.

So, we all get that godhood is about bodies and stretching your consciousness and Self into varying levels of subtlety and substances such as energies, but it's important to understand even things like thoughts, names, vibrations, places, awarenesses, and so on, are possessable concepts. Everything in reality is partly conscious and everything in awareness can be conceptualised - and when consciousness and reality meet, reality can be altered. Everything is code, which means on a certain playing field everything from linear time to movements to atoms to people to thoughts to planes are all the same substances, just different encoded arrangements of the same base elements, meaning when you understand how to possess coding, you can worm your way into many things. Coding can be possessed by its nature and if all is code, all can be possessed.

This does have its limits and of course this is much easier with things you resonate with, for myself connecting with and becoming fire is possible but it's not the most comfortable body for me, I would rather be the sky... And the limits are largely based on both resonance and whether you can decode what you're trying to access. Reality is encoded things, things are gateways, if you unlock the code you get access to the gateway.

When you know the languages of reality and how to decode and encode things, you can possess and become and exist in many things. This goes for anything from the weather to eye movements, to changes in emotion, and so on. It also allows you to bypass spatial confines - locality is a globally enforced rule I will talk about in my essays on magic, effectively it is just my word for the underlying law that while everything influences everything it has to be to differing degrees, and what is "local" to you isn't based on spacetime but instead the influence it has on you and you have on it, but locality is yet another manifestation of the same underlying code that can be decoded and inhabited and so on.

Effectively, a god is generally a spirit that has a high connection to reality, who has done the work to spread their "mycelium network" as the Priest put it through reality, effectively wearing reality like a set of clothing, and who is worshiped for this. This connecting can often only be done to this scale when supported by worship, because in order to do this you need a network of supporting energy which often comes best from worship. You cannot simply spread yourself thinly into an entire town, the very concepts of water itself, certain vibrational frequencies, names, times, etc, without having the energy to support your body as it extends, as well as the awareness and practice and so on. It’s also a case where worshipers asserting your position in energies and workings of the world helps in its own way to anchor you in them, decreasing the territorial fight. Nigh on no one challenges me for rule of the oceans at this point.

It's very akin to kingship where yes, the king has unequal power over the masses, but the masses are the ones that give a lot of that power - and just because people give that power, that doesn’t mean that they can easily take back the king’s power once his rule is established. The king has millions in taxes because millions gave him taxes, but, of course, when he has millions in taxes he can fund expeditions to gather more funds from elsewhere and likewise a god is not only sustained by their worshipers. If a practitioner of magic can gather energy and power without worship, so can a god. Archetypal energy fonts are also available to nigh on everyone in existence, meaning gods are also able to tap into them, but archetype tapping is archetype possession which numbs and takes over the personalised individual and, as I said earlier, godhood is seldom a selfless act, very often tied to gaining personal I suppose "ego"-based support and feeding. No point wanting to be a god, being possessed by an archetype to have the energy to do so, and then becoming just another face of that archetype.

It takes practice and action on the part of the god to reroute and assign certain calls to certain parts of himself and levels of his conscious awareness, which is hard to explain. A god is itself even when it is a part of nature, or maybe it’s better to word it that even when a god is inhabiting nature, he is still a person, and there is a need to cultivate an ability to understand which part is being called upon and automatically tie it to a reaction. Just like a mother may be on autopilot as she attends to her kids being rowdy's needs but a bad scream will catch a different more central part of her consciousness, one can relax into godhood and their extended body in reality and easily interact with practitioners without having to show up as their central consciousness. This is also adjacent to what's involved in a god rerouting energy he gains from certain sources to other beings…

The bigger and older you are, the easier it is to make this entire process of being summoned and acting as a medium automatic, or close to it for a number of reasons. First, you need to shut off your curiosity and wariness about new people, very much easier when you have practice and are too big to be heavily negatively affected by anyone who calls you respectively. Second, you're more used to being everywhere anyway and much more aware of what happens when you influence reality, so you don’t need to drag your main consciousness around everywhere you’re being called upon to make sure you're providing the right reaction.

This process of shutting off, however, allows a god to… Well, we’ll put it this way: There’s a reason that to some people Poseidon is a man who appears in person, old and stern, and to others he is an expansive ocean devoid of any recognisable self, and to others he is a mix of both, or something high energy and unrecognisable to practitioners who know his more traditional appearances… Or to others still he is unrecognisable as Poseidon instead being an expansive Day Sky god under a different name, or the physical wind itself, or an ancient primordial archetype, and so on.

The process of not allowing your main conscious body to go around sniffing all new pluckings of its Self-strings allows other parts of you to reply to people, and it also, in line with what I have been saying thus far, means that often when people call to you and you let your energy bodies and the consciousness you’ve threaded through concepts reply, these people will get these energies and these concepts on call instead of your main persona and self.

To wrap up the discussion, let's have a little look at what calling a god looks like to a practitioner and discuss the interplay of that calling with inhabited energies and concepts. I think I've belaboured the rest of the discussion enough, but to make sure it's clear... This isn't really something that I can really illustrate accurately, but let me try.

Take this image below to be a representation of a specific god's entire self at time of calling, spread out as he is into all the workings of reality he's woken up to, all the energies and concepts he embodies, though obviously the picture is missing much more than it shows. The dots are representations of presences of consciousness in its various forms (the type of which is tied to the categories on the left), but they're not dots for a reason other than ease of visualisation - large swathes of colours would blend and create new colours. I want the colours separate. Hence: Dots. It's also worth mentioning that the positions and patterns I'll be showing you are just examples, if you were to map the god's consciousness to colours and dot positions accurately it would be millions of colours changing by the moment and reliant on many factors. It's for simplified visualisation only.

This, above, would be a representation of the entire god as said, but a map of where his consciousness might be if you had the ability to call him as an entire whole being and attract the attention of every part of him in every bit of reality he exists. In this case, his consciousness, threaded through every part of him equally on conscious, subconscious, and unconscious levels would be aware and present. Each colour represents a specific designation of his consciousness to specific parts of reality - or parts that parts of his consciousness naturally inhabit. To explain the short list here:

Conscious Self:

The being, the person, able to be confined to a moving body, the personality… The spirit equivalent to your conscious self, your individual being. This really is a grouping of all masks and personas, but we'll keep it simple. Red is the consciousness designated to being this Conscious Self, that aligns itself with this persona and energy.

Ocean Body:

The part of this definitely arbitrary and made-up god that has tied itself to the depths of the ocean, present in the energy of oceans as a thing that has tied itself to the coding of the Universe that manifests as ocean water and related phenomena. Orange dots represent the consciousness tied to this energy, that will react when the god is invoked as oceanic or the ocean is invoked as this god, the consciousness that threads itself through oceanic energies.

Ruling Energy:

Like the Ocean Body, but a more abstract and internalised concept example to help illustrate that it’s not just spatially-bound things that can be inhabited. This is less a where and more a what, the part of the soul that embodies rulership. This could be engaged by calling upon this imaginary deity as a king, or by calling on him as the ocean as a ruling fortress, or in the general energy of this god when asking for him to do something with authority. Green represents, again, the consciousness of the overall Self assigned to and that resonates with this concept.

Weather Ties:

Like the Ocean Body, again, but this time tied to an action of a thing (like being tied to waves and not the ocean as a whole), to a translation of things from one place to another, the actions of change - preservation, creation, destruction - the energy tied to a place and a concept and a set of actions. Blue is the representation of consciousness tied to this.

Spell-Work Designation:

It's not rare for gods to designate a portion of their energy and self to be called upon when practitioners want to work with nature or the god itself, a low-consciousness set of energies or a mass of energy, however you want to see it, that is submissive and allows itself to be moulded and directed largely by the practitioner. Of course, any energy attached to us can attract the rest of our attention, but when you are a big energy and are used to being called on for every little thing it's easier to just allow part of yourself to be played with so you don't have to be more present. Pink is the colour for the consciousness tied to this.

---

Calling upon the Conscious Self - for example using an ocean related name (say, Poseidon) in a mantra to keep yelling at the god until he shows up in person, please don't - would look like this:

There's no part of a self that isn't present in everything else, and every part of the self is tied to other parts of the self. You would be mostly calling their conscious level of consciousness in the persona-based area of Self, but that consciousness would be tied to everything else. In calling the god this way - looking for his conscious persona - you’d likely feel a much bigger personal and relatable presence in that area than, say, feeling the lifeless ocean itself show up at your door, but it depends on if the god answers the call you put out with the energy you want or not.

---

If you called, however, to the weather using a name that happens to be tied to him, not even understanding or knowing or caring there is a person connected to said name, what you'd called upon might look more like this:

A completely different energy, a completely different type of consciousness. Keeping in mind that the colour positions are just a possible example and can change moment-to-moment, in this example you'd have a recognisable haze of a self, a presence we'll say, but mostly you would have the experience of a swathe of "being" unlike yours, a presence without a conscious, persona-based mind, primal energies, something recognisable yet entirely wild. Not operating on the same level you are. Maybe you won't even spot the conscious presence and instead will just be greeted with autonomous changes in the weather because again, at these levels, a god of this much experience knows how to shut off and act like the parts of reality he's inhabiting.

You’ll see I included a large amount in the Ruling Energy areas because if you call on a part of nature in any specific way, which, well, why call upon the weather in a neutral way, that will likely drag up the energies of the part of nature as they manifest in certain mindsets and such. For example: Calling a name of mine as a representation of the weather as being the only thing that can alter itself, then you could end up causing the weather to inhabit the sovereign-based parts of the self.

This example is the same god as addressed in the repetitive persona-calling mantra, only you've dug into some part of him that isn't like your conscious mind. A part of nature self-sovereign, likely tapped into archetypal and primordial forces - or very close to them. If he cares to respond how you want him too, that's what you'll get - and you may go your entire life working with him without ever being aware that there is a part of him that can appear human and have a face-to-face conversation with you... Likewise, that which I present here to talk here is just one face of millions and one tiny outreaching reaction to the environment I've been called to teach in now.

Anyway, on that note about the god likely being tapped into the archetypes: Archetypes are in a way are the parts of reality tied centrally to everyone (and therefore no one), or energies that are so widely compatible with consciousnesses and selves, and there ends up being a sort of scale between a god's central persona consciousness, a god's offshoot consciousness in reality, and the archetype of that part of reality. By that I mean that gods generally tie themselves to archetypes as sources of power but remain separate from them to some degree so that they can feed on your energy you offer rather than it going to the archetypes, and in a practical sense for a practitioner that means that it's very easy to go too far into an archetype thinking you're interacting with a deity, and vice versa. Calling on Poseidon as the sea itself tied to your area specifically, if he hasn’t tied himself to it, will likely bring up local spirits to answer your calls who will pretend to be Poseidon - but if you approach calling "Poseidon" in the way that this name is synonymous with archetypal concepts, you may just end up calling the archetype to you under his name. Especially if he has blurred himself with said archetypes, meaning that his names are their names. They very easily mimic real beings and take on appearances that you expect them to take on, just by nature of their non-conscious heightened consciousnesses.

---

Now, say you were calling on this god for spell work, something involving oceans, and you may or may not realise you're calling on a god since, as above, a lot of people believe they're calling on gods when they call on archetypes and vice versa:

Since, as I said in the above about what this Spell-Work Designation section is, gods can designate a part of themselves to be used and played with for individual workings, this part tends to not tug too much at the persona of the god. By that I mean the part exists because the god has chosen to sacrifice consciousness in certain areas that can then be used by practitioners. However, it does allow a door (as many doors, including a lack thereof) into other energies and parts of the god to be designated to the spell.

Attracting too much conscious persona attention entirely defeats the purpose of an unconscious part to be worked with, so these parts - though it varies from god to god - may act as conscious persona stand-ins, making decisions based around an autopilot-esque system of sorting and reacting to engagements and requests in a similar way to how one can shut off their brain in work and yet not make many mistakes. It can act as a doorway to call other energies and parts of the self, basically guiding other energies like if the conscious persona mind was awake and deciding how to help practitioners. Really all energies can engage other energies, but generally a more conscious sorting system is more effective in shutting off one energy to allow another to come through, hence creating a non-persona-based sorter self.

This isn't really a common thing, though, this second brain of sorts. Well, it's common, all people have this function but to such a degree as... the imaginary god in this example... would be rare. Mostly it is rare to dole out energetic presences without actually sorting out who and what is addressing you and why, but I've come to not care. Or should I say this example god doesn't care. When you take the role of king you agree to serve all of your people to some degree whether you morally agree with them or not, whether you like their actions or what they do with your resources or not, so gods like this tend to be rather uniquely used to being called for ridiculous things and to make ridiculous decisions to the point where deciding to help or not can be more autonomous than having to consciously dissect and work with each person. A god like this has agreed that many of those who tap into him, that he's agreed to help, can use his body like a sort of conscious extension of reality around them... To a certain degree.

--

I suppose the natural rhythm of this essay would be to go into how to do this. No. I’m done. Bye.

Just kidding, but that can be addressed when we talk about magic. Instead, have this note I wrote to the Priest as a curiousity and a "what if" as a final note:

"I showed you before before a representation of my outermost energies, which would be heavy and nearly unconscious or "dreaming" tentacles threaded through things I control and resting in and around the Earth. That's not unique to me. I also showed you this in relation to interacting with and directing my energy as a "Priest". Gods get so big that we can't possibly be conscious in all of our body at once, or, well, we can, but then horrific things happen and reality suffers because of it.

When Ahi and I show up full and in control, especially in close proximity where we blur again, or any other big entity in its near-entire body, that begins to cause issues. You may have noticed when you've joined Ahi in the Garden of Stars as you call it that reality doesn't even just bend to Ahi, it is liquefied around him and his aura becomes reality itself, no longer having its full autonomy like a hivemind of rats around the pied piper, and this is because gods blur with reality.

Like Ive been saying: a god inhabits a large energy body through which they will pass intent and conscious programming between themselves and reality, which leads to issues when those wires are kicked into overdrive - and also, mostly, regarding the whole "bad consequences for reality's autonomy"... there's things I can't quite explain to your brain yet, but it's similar. It's about what is inhabited in-between a spirit and reality being engaged and pushed into overdrive, similar to how the more energy a witch picks up and pushes into the energy bodies they create, the higher the impact on reality a spell usually has. Imagine that but to a very conscious extent in an energy body that has been collecting and understanding itself since before this plane's creation.

You've seen it to a certain degree once before, an evening Ahi was circling close to the Earth. Strange rain, liminal skies, liquefied warbled ramblings from electronics, two friends overseas individually talking about how liminal everything was that day, one without any input from you. Ahi is generally found in states of consciousness and self-awareness - a true Shiva - that does not shy away from inherent destruction by force of proximity to his consciousness as it's thread into reality around him. A true gateway to the skies.

But I digress. Overdriven workings aside, extrapolate from reality-crushing intensity when a god is fully conscious of his entire body down to a general awareness level, and you'll start to see what I'm talking about with what a god is."

#NOT GONNA READ THROUGH THIS AGAIN TO CHECK GOD THIS IS GFDJXKBKJBVFD IS LONG THANK YOU LEV #ramblings // #channellings // #divinity // #consciousness // #energy //

[takashi0]

I don’t know if you’re still accepting the pride asks and this may be too personal but I’d be curious if you answered 24 (your relationship with your religion and your lgbt identity) and 33 (what you find the most important about your identity)

>24. Do you practice any religion, if so how does it play into your LGBT identity? Do you feel welcomed by your spiritual community?

Christian. Protestant. Between Denominations. Probably a Universalist.

Truth be told I used to be homophobic when I was young, but the first thing that chipped that away was my mom, of all people, who asked the question of "If being gay is a choice why wouldn't you choose to be straight to avoid all the mistreatment?"

Which sounds shitty but even still, a victory is a victory.

After that, for as much time as I spend bitching on tumblr and the insistence this place has on taking the wrong approach of building up (minority) groups by tearing (majority) groups down, it did help me further build the notion of "oh yeah, gay people are actual human beings who suffer and deserve better."

And beyond that, I learned about non-mainstream analyses of Biblical text, namely how the passages bigots use to justify their views aren't what they claim and so I have pretty much no cognitive dissonance between my faith and my identity.

That being said?

Fuck no I don't feel welcomed by my community. I've pretty much resigned myself to never, EVER coming out as Bi. At least not until my Granddad passes on. Because I know the odds of me being accepted are next to nil. And it sucks because my family are generally decent people EXCEPT when it comes to LGBT issues.

And the constant news feed of people in the """Kweer community""" caring more about "owning the straights" and deciding "let's take every awful stereotype Homophobes have about us and be that way unironically even when it's actively detrimental to us" and the inevitable backlash sure as fuck isn't helping that.

They're all gonna think I'm some kind of demonic freak who wants to fuck children because God fucking forbid people understand why "maybe we shouldn't have Kink shit and Children in the same location" is a bad idea.

I love Jesus as much as I always have but my family will reject me based on my identity and many of my views politically and the wider "Queer Community" has made it clear they feel the exact same way.

No I'm not bitter, why do you ask?

>33. What about your LGBT identity do you feel proud of/ want to recognize/celebrate?

"Proud" is a strong word. I'm not really "proud" of being Bi, but I'm not ashamed of it either. I just am. To me it's not just like. Some big fucking thing with which to make a big hoopla over, it's just another facet that's as trivial as my race or me being a man.

Though I suppose it has considerably expanded my horizons and taste in smut, lmao.

Though in terms of "Want to recognize" how about actually recognizing that I like Men AND Women? Can I do that and not be treated like Diet Gay or Diet Straight or like I need to "Pick a side?" or some bullshit like that?

#discourse #disc horse #long post

[inslo]

Right now I am going through a period where I'm kind-of church shopping. I've been going to HCL for most of the last six years, and have been a member there since 2019. However, the pastor that was supposed to marry Angie and I, and instead served at her funeral has left for another church plant as of August. At the same time, I'm realizing that I'm not feeling spirtually fed and HCL as large as it is does not have any small groups. They have three "bible studies" but two of them meet during the morning hours during the week…at the senior community across the street. The third meets Sunday morning. I went to the one on Sunday morning and I was the youngest one by 20+ years.

I attended a new-to-me church this weekend and left my email and phone number with hopes they have a small group for me. In the meantime, there are two stories of times where I have been looking to get plugged into a church and it resulted in severe disappointment and failure. One of them was quite epic, I'll save that one for last.

Back in my early-to-mid 30's just after I lost my first fiance, I tried getting plugged into a small group at a super-mega church. I contacted a pastor and I said I was looking for a coed small group, explaining I was single, I said I didn't need a singles group necessarily, but would be happy with a single/married coed group. So they gave me information about a small group and I went the next week. It turned out it was like six married couples….and me. I called a pastor again, and I told them what had happened. He apologized and gave me information about another small group. I went to that one, and it was the same deal, six married couples….and me. On my third call with the pastor, he gave me information on another small group, and I went to that one and it was nice. Single, married, young and old, I was happy with it, but just three weeks later that group disbanded, and I gave up.

Another time I was looking to get involved in a small group, this was with a smaller but fast growing non-denominational church. For many years they had banned any sort of coed singles group bible studies. They had only three choices, mens, womens and married. Finally, one year they decided to give coed singles groups a try, however they're requirement was that the group had to be led by a married couple. For what reason, I have no idea. The group started the last week of September, and then I was out of town for the next two studies. I returned to the small group in mid- to late-October. Let's say this group met on Tuesdays, and November 1st fell on a Tuesday that year. So I went to small group on Tuesday November 1st. When I walked in, the married couple's apartment looked like an elf had puked everywhere. Every wall, every surface was covered in Christmas. The windows had frost and snowflakes. The area rug had been swapped out for a Christmas one. There was a Christmas blanket covering the couch. There was even a choo-choo train doing circles underneath their Christmas tree. Even the bathroom and kitchen were untouched with a Christmas bath rug and soap dispensers and candles to lights draped from the kitchen ceiling. I have a lot of issues with Christmas being single and having almost no family. It's my least favorite holiday out of all the holidays, with Thanksgiving my second least favorite Holiday. However, I said to myself, "I'm an adult, I can deal with this. Take a deep breath and relax. Come on now, you can do it." So I sat through the bible study in the Christmas themed apartment on November 1st. As the bible study was wrapping up, the leaders said they had an announcement to make. "Guess what! We're PREGNANT! Yay! Yay!" That's my other sore spot, because I've always wanted children of my own and every time someone announced they were pregnant, it would send me into a depressed funk for a few days. I got up and left the small group and never went back.

[uwmadarchives]

Oral History Behind the Scenes

by Chloe Foor, Student Historian 2022/2023

The last two months have consisted of many emails and many cups of chai tea. I have officially begun the process of reaching out to potential oral history candidates, which is equal parts exciting and terrifying. I have never conducted an oral history before, but Troy Reeves, the head of the Oral History Program at UW, has been nothing short of incredible in supporting me and in answering any questions I may have. The process of creating an oral history project, unsurprisingly, began with learning about the practice of oral history. I learned so much about why and how people conduct oral histories. After this, I used a planning worksheet to determine a realistic timeline for my project, based on both the materials that I have at my disposal (a lot), and how much time I realistically have to conduct these interviews (less than a lot). For every hour of actually interviewing someone, there’s about eight hours of behind-the-scenes work consisting of research, pre-interviews, transcribing, adding metadata, and many other tasks to ensure that the oral history interview will be accessible for as many people as possible. I won’t lie, this process looked very daunting at first, but Troy was incredible at helping me break it down step-by-step.

In conducting preliminary research for the project, I spent a lot of time on pewresearch.org, a site that “informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world” through polls. They have conducted polls on religious people’s opinions on the LGBTQ+ community, as well as how the LGBTQ+ community feels about religion (side note: I’m taking STAT 324 right now, and it’s very interesting to see what I’m learning being used on real life data!). The Human Rights Campaign also has articles of “Stances of Faith on LGBTQ Issues'' across various denominations, which I referenced a lot while conducting preliminary research. Around this time, I also started creating a list of people who I might want to interview for the project. I did this by visiting The Crossing, St. Francis House, and PresHouse, which are all religious centers on campus that have a long history with the LGBTQ+ community, and talking to the lead pastors or directors of those churches. They gave me great background information about how those locations have historically interacted with the students of UW, both queer and not, and some of them even provided me with potential oral history candidates. Scott Seyforth, one of the founders of Madison’s LGBTQ Oral History Project and the Madison LGBTQ Archive, also sent me a list of possible contacts.

Right now, I am in the process of reaching out to these people and seeing if they want to be involved in my project. If they are interested in hearing more, I will set up a pre-interview session with them where I inform them about my project and the topics that I am hoping to cover. After all of this, we schedule a time for the actual oral history interview to be conducted if they are still willing. Actually conducting the interview itself is the most daunting part of this process to me, but it is also the part that I am the most excited for. I had no idea how much work went into the process of collecting oral histories, and I feel incredibly grateful that I can go through this process with such a great support team.

In addition to this, I have also spent a lot of times in the archives leafing through old articles in the Daily Cardinal, mostly from the years 1969-1971. These years are the period during which the Madison Alliance of Homosexual Equality (MAHE) was formed, so I was interested in seeing the immediate reactions of the student body to this. Overall, they aren’t really mentioned except for the occasional announcement that they will be meeting in the basement of St. Francis House, a church on campus.

The first mention of MAHE in the Daily Cardinal, from November 25, 1969

They organized a “coming out” dance at the Union in March of 1970 and held a day-long “teach-in” on May 1, 1970. This “teach-in” had events where they would discuss “Religious Views on Homosexuality,” “Sociological Aspects of Homosexuality,” “Female Homosexuality, Lesbianism,” “Gay Life,” “The Meaning of Gay Liberation,” a screening of the movie “Matron in Uniform,” a German film from 1931 that featured “forbidden love between two women,” and closed with a dance at the Union.

Article announcing the MAHE “Coming Out” dance, from March 13, 1970

MAHE Day Schedule, from April 29, 1970

These scraps of queer history in Madison aren’t much to go off of, but they still provide invaluable insight into what the priorities of the LGBTQ+ community were at the beginning of the rights movement. All of these were fascinating to read, and if you’re interested at all, make sure to book an appointment at the Archives to check them out! You can do this here.

That’s all from me! I will hopefully have most of my oral history interviews conducted by the next time I write a blog post. Thank you for reading and for coming on this journey with me!

#student historians #undergraduate research #campus history #uw madison #lgbtqia history

[qqueenofhades]

What’s even more ridiculous about that anon is, if you really want to go there, the Civil War began over states rights to practice slavery.

I mean, uh. Yeah. States' rights. To practice slavery. That is what was at stake, and the Confederacy themselves said so over and over. No other "states' rights" were even remotely at issue, or if they were, they were likewise related to the financial and geographical economy of slavery. As noted by my last anons, the Cornerstone Speech, given by vice president of the Confederacy Alexander Stephens in 1861, on the eve of the war, laid this all out very clearly. For the benefit of the functionally illiterate among us, I shall place the relevant passages below:

But not to be tedious in enumerating the numerous changes for the better, allow me to allude to one other — though last, not least. The new constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institution — African slavery as it exists amongst us — the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the "rock upon which the old Union would split." He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old constitution, were that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally, and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with, but the general opinion of the men of that day was that, somehow or other in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away. This idea, though not incorporated in the constitution, was the prevailing idea at that time. The constitution, it is true, secured every essential guarantee to the institution while it should last, and hence no argument can be justly urged against the constitutional guarantees thus secured, because of the common sentiment of the day. Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the government built upon it fell when the "storm came and the wind blew."

Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery — subordination to the superior race — is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth. This truth has been slow in the process of its development, like all other truths in the various departments of science. It has been so even amongst us. Many who hear me, perhaps, can recollect well, that this truth was not generally admitted, even within their day. The errors of the past generation still clung to many as late as twenty years ago. Those at the North, who still cling to these errors, with a zeal above knowledge, we justly denominate fanatics. All fanaticism springs from an aberration of the mind — from a defect in reasoning. It is a species of insanity. One of the most striking characteristics of insanity, in many instances, is forming correct conclusions from fancied or erroneous premises; so with the anti-slavery fanatics; their conclusions are right if their premises were. They assume that the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with the white man. If their premises were correct, their conclusions would be logical and just — but their premise being wrong, their whole argument fails.

Oof. That seems, uh, pretty explicit. I am unsure what I did to draw the attention of said internet idiot, since this is a fact which is blindingly obvious if you a) think about it for two seconds and b) are not a racist trashbag, but here we are, so hey.

#anonymous #ask #cw racism #history #american history #history of racism

[kurlyfrasier]

You said anything, right? So... I have two characters whoshare a friend group, one is very charismatic and everybody likes her. The other is more of a rich loner. He secretly like her, but the issue is... Never written any form of romance. I don't know how to say he has feelings for her subtly. I have no idea what I am doing, and you said ask you anything.

Hello Nonny!

I am honored you sent me such a lovely Ask!

First off, I am no professional. So I apologize if this answer is terrible/cheesy advice, or doesn't answer your question at all. Also, I apologize now, this got away from me and ended up being kinda long lol

From everything I've read: fanfics, published books, advice on Google, etc... - they all have one thing in common. "Show, don't tell." I know, seems vague, right? And can be a real struggle at times, but that seems to be the common denominator.

Second off, I live this reality lol sort of. My hubby just doesn't…really…like people…in general. So I've learned a lot just by being in a relationship with him and have learned that a man of few words speaks with his actions.

Now, if you're wanting something more specific, I have a few suggestions.

Your rich loner (may I call him Loner Boy?); is he awkward and shy? Is he confident in his abilities? (whatever they may be). Does he spend a lot of time with the girl? Or does he like her from afar? Maybe have him do something nice for the charismatic girl (whom I shall affectionately call Charisma) that she doesn't know about. He's rich, yes? Does Charisma like material things? Have Loner Boy buy her something. Heck, have him buy her something anyway, just to see if Charisma does like material things (maybe he'll learn something lol). She doesn't necessarily have to know in the moment that he bought it for her if you don't want her to. Maybe Loner Boy could do something as simple as carrying something for her. Doesn't necessarily have to be something heavy, especially if he's more on the lanky side (unless he's got super strength or a crazy cool prosthetic arm or something, of course- Wait. Does he have arms?) Is he naturally a nice person? Towards everyone? If not, being nice to Charisma would show his partiality.

I have a friend who love love loves the little touches: brush of the hand, accidental shoulder/leg bumps, that sort of thing-

OMG! Does Loner Boy like reading? Does Charisma like reading? I always find it funny when a guy reads a girl's favorite book (or vice versa) despite not being much of a reader/hating the genre LOL

Anyway... Maybe he writes poems about her in a journal and she ends up with it somehow? Or the same, but with a sketchbook.

Then there's always the things we can't control among things we don't even realize we're doing until it's too late: dilated eyes, the instinct to touch the other person, staring, smiles, awkward blabbering, leaning towards each other, finding everything about them to be amazing lol and so on.

I tend to base aspects of my characters off of people I know. For example, I told you my hubby speaks with his actions more than words. So, I ask myself (sometimes I ask him lol) what he would do in this situation.

With all that being said, I also follow @dearwriters (and many others who I can't think of at the moment, sorry guys) who posts some awesome stuff about writing who would likely, and is more qualified, to give better writing advice than me. Also, I Googled and found a few promising links: Romance 101, Not Schmaltzy, and 3 Great Ways. Take note; I did not read these lol I just thought they looked promising.

I hoped this helped at least a little! Thanks for the ask! And if you decide to post your story somewhere, let me know. I would love to read it! Or tag me if you post it here on Tumblr.

Most of all, have fun writing!

#Ask #writing #advice #nonny #romance #love #subtleties #show don't tell #fun writing #suggestions

[ailelie]

labels: vegetarian, christian/lutheran, cis woman, asexual/demisexual

I think about the labels I wear sometimes, not the relational ones (e.g., daughter, oldest child, sister, aunt, friend), but the ones I've chosen or kept over the years.

I'm a vegetarian. I wanted to become a vegetarian when I was in elementary and middle school in a bid to save the rain forests. I disliked how forests were cut down for farmland and becoming a vegetarian was my own personal boycott. I knew it wouldn't have any effect, but I wanted to show that I cared in some way. My parents, though, said 'no.' In my senior year of high school I became a vegetarian because my parents could no longer control what I did or did not eat. I intended to only do it for a month just to see if I could, just a sop to my younger self who never had the chance, but then I didn't see a reason to stop. I remained one through college until I went to Japan where I wanted to try all the food. I remained an omnivore through grad school because it was easier and cheaper. Then, a year or two after moving to Chicago, I became a vegan. I had brought an apple pie to a party and another woman, who was vegan, was about to take a bite because I told her it was safe, when I remembered, at the last moment, that the crust had real butter in it. I promised to bring a real vegan dish to the next event. I spent a month researching and started to realize that I could be vegan. It wasn't as hard as I thought. So, again, I decided to try it for just a month. But a month passed and I didn't have a good reason to stop. I remained vegan for a few years, stopping only when I realized that I was staying one out of spite and that I disliked how my dietary choices complicated going out with friends. So I became a vegetarian again.

I don't have the zeal of my youth or the need to prove myself anymore. I learned a lot of the tricks during my first bout of vegetarianism and being vegan taught me a lot more, so I don't have the rush of learning something new either. I don't have a good reason to be vegetarian. I don't buy into the idea that it is a better lifestyle. Sometimes I miss how easy being an omnivore is. But this is a label I've chosen.

I am a vegetarian. It is as much a part of me as my glasses (I could do contacts; I wore them throughout high school. I could get lasik. I chose and choose glasses).

When I decided to stop being a vegan, I didn't even consider going back to eating meat. The years I ate meat don't feel like the norm; they were my break from being a vegetarian. I made a decision in elementary/middle school to become a vegetarian and from that point onward, practicing or not, I was one. Vegetarian feels like my default setting. Maybe I stick to decisions too long out of stubbornness. I don't have a good reason to stick to this lifestyle. I also don't have a good reason to stop.

I am a Lutheran. This is a label I picked out during college, but only made a official a few years ago. I grew up Baptist and then just general Christian. I attended a Lutheran church in college when I attended church at all and after that, whenever I've moved, I've looked for Lutheran churches first.

I explored alternatives in high school and early college. I read widely on paganism. I toyed with atheism. Sometimes I still do. Sometimes I wonder whether I believe in God or if God has simply become a habit.

I like Lutheranism because it isn't Catholicism (which I have issues with; my family are black sheep on my dad's side because he switched to Protestant and raised us the same), but it has rituals and liturgy. I like saying the Lord's Prayer before communion, knowing that thousands of other people across the world are doing or have done the same. I like the tradition of it all. I also deeply appreciate that my church is extremely liberal and acts on its commitment to social justice.

That said, if I moved and I didn't have a good ELCA Lutheran church nearby, I'd join a different denomination.

I'd keep Lent, though. I started Lent in high school because I was tired of my one Catholic friend making such a big deal of it. I gave up potatoes. Horrible idea. When the year rolled around again, though, I continued to practice it. No one else in my family observed Lent, but I couldn't let it go. I didn't have an understanding of why people did Lent, so I made my own. It was a reminder. Every time I reached for or thought about that which I'd given up, I'd remember God and Jesus and what they'd given up. It was a yearly rooting in my faith.

I tried to stop being a Christian, but I couldn't. What I've figured out is that, for me, faith is about questions and doubt. If I'm not wondering, then I'm not believing. Only questions I can't answer are big enough to hold the God I believe exists.

So I am Christian and I am Lutheran. The first label is absolute. The second label is the one that fits best now and one I've liked in the past and am comfortable with now. But I'm still learning what it means to be Lutheran vs any other denomination. I'm still figuring out why it matters. (My parents church hopped a lot when I was younger. We ended up at some Baptist churches, but I don't think those were the only ones we attended. They would discuss each church with each other after the service in the car and I would eavesdrop. From them, whether they meant to teach me or not, I learned that no church and no pastor has the authority to declare what is and isn't Christian. That has been extremely important to my faith).

I am a cis woman. This is one I was born with and have kept. I have felt like a very poor example of femininity in the past. I was teased about being butch in high school by a friend who knew it bothered me. I once heard a man on the phone say "yeah, all the guys are out" or something similar and then spent half a block reassuring myself that he hadn't meant me. That was only 4-5 years ago.

I was extremely girly as a child. I cried when my parents put me in pants. I wore bows throughout elementary school and part of middle school. I got tired of dresses and stopped caring about what I wore just as my peers started caring a lot. I hate hassle, so I didn't care for make-up or trendy outfits. I wore what I found comfortable, but I still wanted to be recognizably a girl.

One year, for Halloween, I wanted to be a cowboy not thinking of that as a gendered thing. But my mother gave me a five o'clock shadow. I hated it. I didn't want to go trick or treating. I didn't want anyone to see me. I cried, but my parents didn't change my costume. I still remember that as my worst Halloween, even worse than the year my parents got worried about the holiday as a devilish thing and decided we wouldn't do any celebrating beyond some "Boo" glasses.

In elementary or middle school, I started to worry that my voice was too low. I practiced speaking in a higher tone to be more girly.

My hair is dark. The hair on my upper lip grows in dark. I hate it. I've learned to ignore it because waxing is a hassle and, as established, I also hate hassle. In high school, I practiced different smiles to try and hide the hair in the shadows.

I'm less worried now, thanks to friends playing with gender in different ways, but I used to fear someone basically telling me that I wasn't really a woman. That I haven't played the part well enough. That my whole identity was really a mistake.

I'm more secure now, but I still don't enjoy role-playing as other genders. It feels like slipping on an ill-fitting, itchy suit.

I'm demisexual. Technically, I'm biromantic demisexual. I have felt attraction and desire before. I fully believe that if I know and trust someone, I can feel it again. For the most part, though, these days I just tell people that I'm 'under the ace umbrella.' It is easier.

I used to think I was straight. Then I was told I was bisexual by a stranger online. Then I wondered about being a lesbian. Then I figured I was straight again. Then I was back to bi. I was the definition of questioning, except that I never let anyone else into my head. I've only had one real 'coming out' conversation, which led to my friend clarifying that despite her undergrad explorations, she wasn't into women. I told people at work recently and felt like it should have felt like more. That feeling when you think you should be feeling a feeling. No one else made much of a deal about it, though. Part of me wishes someone had? I don't know. I did have one girl, point blank, ask me how I was queer. I just stared at her and was like, "Um, I'm demisexual?" Wondering why it mattered to her. That reminds me, in my last semester of high school, it was apparently common knowledge that I was bi. I only learned this when my college roommate learned this fact from someone I never even spoke with but who had attended my high school. My roommate marched into our dorm room, demanding to know why I hadn't told her I was bi. I was blindsided and torn between saying "I'm not, though?" and "Why in the world would I have to tell you my sexuality just because you told me yours?"

Anyway. As defensive as I am of the queer label, I struggle with it. I pass as straight. I don't have an undercut or hair dye. I don't have tattoos or piercings. I don't do bold make-up or nail polish. I don't dress queer. I wear jeans and blouses and cardigans. Other than a sports bra and some socks, I don't wear pride colors. I'm not someone who gets noticed as part of the community even if that is a community I feel more comfortable within. And I'm ace and demisexual within ace and biromantic within that and those are all marginal identities anyway. Like, not everyone accepts that bisexuality/romanticism is a real thing. And not everyone accepts asexuals in the queer community (unless they're there as cheerleaders for the allosexuals and handing out water bottles; god I hate that post) or that demisexuality is even a thing.

Friends make me welcome, but at general queer events or things, there's a part of me that wonders if I'm taking a 'real queer's' place. It is irrational, but the feeling persists.

I tried so long to convince myself that I didn't need labels for my sexuality, but finding demisexual just made so much of my life make sense. Fuzzy moments suddenly focused. Now I worry that I'm not really demisexual, but am instead some other flavor of asexual. It has been so, so long since I've felt desire for another person. But the ace umbrella is absolutely correct.

I don't know what the point of this all was.

Labels are weird. Some are simply fact. Some need constant poking. Some I'm hyper protective of. And some I'm almost careless with and it is being careless that makes the label better fitting.

These are some of the boxes I've chosen to put myself within.

#labels #identity #ramble #insomnia

[animation-blog-amera-mahamud]

VEWN (VICTORIA VINCENT) CASE STUDY: ANIMATION STYLE, SUBJECT MATTER AND IMPRESSION

The first reason why I decided to use Vewn as a source to learn from is because her video, ‘Agoraphobia’ is an animation project which you could believe had come from the brief we were given. You can imagine where questions were asked – more open-ended ones and standard one-answer questions. The second reason why I decided on Vewn was because I’ve been watching her videos ever since the first upload on YouTube, 2016’s ‘Pizza Movie.’ She’s a big source of inspiration for me artistically, and all her uploads make me want to start drawing.

 Agoraphobia is a documentation of an unnamed (and undrawn) individual’s experience with agoraphobic disorder. I am unable to find the source for the audio, so I assume Vewn interviewed him herself. As well as his own words, there is a good number of sound-effects and audio editing that went into the final product. When the speaker’s dog was chewing various objects, for example, you can hear it, and the sound of traffic is also audible in the scenes with the motorways. Vewn’s own stunning animations make up the visuals for the short video and give the faceless audio more personality.

 The questions I can pick out are:

Who is Claire?

When/how did you realise you had agoraphobia?

What have you been diagnosed with? (Or some other question prompting the speaker to explain the various mental health issues they suffer with)

 I like the fact that there are no audible questions in this – it feels more like a free-flowing stream of thought rather than a rigid, call-and-response interview. I also love that the speaker is faceless – we only see his border collie, Claire. We get a good glimpse into the speaker’s personality without ever seeing a face – many commenters even mention how they believed the dog was a representation for the speaker rather than someone in the speaker’s life. It’s an interesting storytelling device, almost letting us see through his eyes rather than showing him in his environment and being outside of that as a viewer. I hope to make my own part of this project feel immersive.

 Aside from this, the piece is beautiful to look at. Vewn’s skewed style of drawing perspective is unique, and her rougher colouring style and bold colours is eye-catching. There aren’t many artists like Vewn out there. Her work is almost deceptive, making you feel like it’s ‘not much’ until you properly watch them. It’s purposeful in creating the taste by which she wants to be enjoyed rather than making art for the common folk – this is how I also think about my own art. Artists should be tastemakers, curating their audience of people who have the taste to enjoy them instead of common-denominator appealing for-the-masses art. Vewn takes this man’s story of having agoraphobia and shows it to her audience in a new way. Her art stands out, which means she can shed light on topics like agoraphobia, which people aren’t too familiar with normally.

 Researching ‘Agoraphobia’ by Vewn gave me a good idea of the kinds of things that can be accomplished through the medium of an interview. I keep referring to her work here and there while animating my own half of the project. I don’t want to create a Vewn pastiche, though, so I’ll be using more of the philosophy than any cherry-picked aesthetic attributes.

[seroqueldreamer]

Anti-women language and rhetoric + Fetishization of LGBTQIA+ people in fandom spaces

DISCLAIMER: This is an OPINION piece. Sources will be cited if referenced, individuals if mentioned, will not be named. I'm not looking to incite any sort of anger, arguments, problems, etc., etc. I am simply and quite literally expressing my views.

So, as the title suggests, there's something on my mind and it's the language used for women and girls in fandom spaces. I won't say I'm the first to post something like this regarding the topic.

But the way we talk about, regard, and discuss fictional women and girls' behavior is gross. I just recently saw a post calling Odalia Blight from The Owl House, "The bitch from hell." I will not be naming OP, or defend Odalia Blight, because she is canonically a terrible person. But it was the context that caught my attention. It was, to my understanding, a Darius/Alador Blight ship post. I understand their point of view, but again, it was the language used. I don't have any issues with OP nor do I want to have any with them + the fact I don't know them.

Often, women who interfere with popular ships that aren't confirmed in canon and are fanon, are often regarded and treated horribly. Examples include Bakudoriya with Uraraka being the 'villain' so to speak, Gratsu with Lucy as the 'villain', Naruto/Sasuke with Sakura and Hinata regarded as the 'Villains', so on and so forth. People put these ships on pedestals and often knock the women to the side, labeling them as useless, bitches, etc., etc.

A very common denominator is the age and gender demographic. Oftentimes, these younger girls come from Catholic/Christian spaces and have families that may have indicated anti-LGBTQIA+ ideology, whether it be through actions, comments made in passing, or outright said it. They want their "UwU SINNING BABIES XDDD" They latch onto this idea of something being forbidden or off-limits. So when they see the heteronormativity imposed in animes or shows that they're watching, and immediately villainize these fictional women.

Something I don't think people realize is how conservative Japan is. Marriage rights for same-sex couples are still being debated in the Japanese courts, same-sex couples cannot legally adopt children*, and there's a gigantic list of discrimination that LGBTQIA+ people face in Japan. But in spite of this, Japan is a large creator of MLM/WLW mangas.

So what does this have to do with my talking point? The immediate fetishization of Gay/Bi/Pan men in MLM relationships but the straight-up misogyny and unjust anger directed at women in media. These men in anime are not confirmed to be LGBTQIA+ but are shipped and fetishized. It's not the shipping I take issue with, do what you want, make that representation, but it's the fetishization and misogyny.

I don't understand the immediate dislike of female characters, but the idolization of male characters, simply because they exist.

I lost my talking point, I will most likely reblog or edit when I have my shit together.

*In April 2017, Osaka officially recognised a same-sex couple as foster parents, making it the first such case in Japan [Copy pasted from This Wikipedia article.]

#midday rambles #starry eyed rants #fandom critical

[rptgossip]

You can do with this what you like but I highly suspect that the new rpc-home-truths is Nolan in disguise. Dude has been a problem in the tumblr rpc since 2015 stealing theme codes and original character ideas and plagiarizing other media sources for his “original rp” plots and claiming it all his own. On top of that he’s known for hella godmodding in threads, harassing and stalking his partners that he gloms onto because they have a male fc he’s super attracted to, blatantly ignores female characters because he’s not interested in m/f romance/smut, ignores rp lore, and has been kicked out of a few groups, like Empire and Corinth Bay to name a couple recent ones that I know of, for his behavior. He’s also been racist and misogynistic with the premade characters and lore he’s created in his own rps. And when he’s kicked out and called out for his shit? Gaslighting for days to paint himself as a victim. He’s still going on about drama from 2015 where he was 100% the aggressor and problem.

I know it sounds crazy and conspiratory. That rpc-home-truths talks a lot like how Nolan does, using “staff” as opposed to “admin” or “mod,” and I bet is about to rehash the whole shit he did from his perspective again. The blog just hid their likes but I saw a few pics of nearly naked buff dudes plus a photo set of Joshua Orpin, who is a fc Nolan has been using frequently since 2020.

Here is the link to his last-known rp blog from Corinth Bay: https://www.tumblr.com/callum-marcoh

His account where he continues rehashing his past problematic behavior from a victim narrative in novella format: https://zachnovak.tumblr.com/

And this thread has a pretty good breakdown of his behavior from a couple people in Corinth Bay: https://binxrps.tumblr.com/post/630553132533940224/wiscowrites-loganlcrmans-jayrpssometimes

Okay this is a lot. I have a lot of thoughts so i’m going to bullet point. But firstly do not send hate to this blog or any of the blogs mentioned above. That shit just keeps the fire going and responding to toxic behavior with toxic behavior gets no one anywhere. Moving on 

This guy has been called out many times over the years. I remember lurking and reading about him over and over again. In cases like these if you're the common denominator you're probably the problem. And you should probably start looking introspectively on what went wrong 

That 2nd link to his blog is wild…. I scrolled through a couple of pages and there's just straight up smut out there in the open? I know I just preached about being open to someone not knowing something but I think everyone should know what the read more button is and use it ? Like i’m all for smut but c’mon some of us rp at work and yes people should know the risks of doing that but the read more button is right there- and on a definitely more important note, it could be super triggering

At this point the proof is right there.  This isn’t a ‘witch hunt’ or ‘drama’ this is a person with some serious issues who should be avoided at all costs. And to have an rpc-home-truths defending them using that vocabulary is disgusting. The internet can 100% have an affect on people's mental health, and Nolan’s actions has affected many people .he should be named, shamed, and blocked

The last part is going under read more it because it discuss triggering topics which are all tagged below 

Speaking of rpc-home-truths its been really gross in their defense of Nolan. One of them posted a scenario that put out a scenario about s*uicide basically victim blaming the ‘mob’ or whoever is against Nolan, Except as an example she used her daughter. And to top it off put in the tags with no trigger warning or tags, and it is still up as of now. I find this disgusting, I am not a mother but why would you put that energy out into the world about your daughter?? Its gross and manipulative. And to not have it tagged? I feel like anyone rping who are decent humans know that has to be tagged. It should have never been posted in the first but at least tag it or warn people in some way so they can choose to ignore it. 

Call me a coward but I have blocked them already( and screenshotted the post in case they delete and act like that it never happened), they have a blog they can defend themselves on but how that was handled has given me enough information on who they are as people and I don’t want to see them or  interact with them.

#rpt #tw mental illness #tw suicide #suicide tw #I hope I tagged this correctly please let me know if I need to add more

[automatismoateo]

I'm tired of being cast as evil or a Satanist by religious people just for being atheist. via /r/atheism

I'm tired of being cast as evil or a Satanist by religious people just for being atheist. Once upon a time, I didn't care if you were religious. It never mattered because where I grew up, religious people didn't take their religion and smash it into your face like they do in the US. I was born into, and grew up in a family of non-practicing, non-believers. Both my parents were born into catholic and ethnic Jewish traditions, but neither of them carried on any of that stuff, except for baptizing us to keep with convention and for cultural reasons more than anything else. My dad still had some catholic habits but we were never indoctrinated into religion. He often chuckled with us about some of the absurdities of religious practice and talked with us about the many kinds of beliefs as children. The first time I read the Bible I was 14 and in a catholic intern school (my parents dealt with my ADHD-related school issues by changing my school frequently--it was the 80s... they didn't really know what my problem was and blamed the school instead). I thought it was on par with Aesop's fables, except the Bible's fables had concubines being gang raped and chopped up into 12 pieces, infanticide, incest, genocide, murder and slavery as imagery to 'enjoy'. I thought it was horrifying and sat through the bi-weekly services thinking the nuns and priest were plain crazy to live by this text. I was made to kneel on frozen peas several times for asking too many uncomfortable questions. I have since lived my life in altruism and acceptance. I spent years of my career working in non-profits, I donated a year as a VISTA (volunteer in service to America), I have helped displaced homemakers, at risk kids, taught ESL, helped create safe play spaces in poor neighborhoods. I give money to people who need it. I try to be kind to people who deserve kindness and I have raised my son to be compassionate and good too. I have spent my entire life giving back to others. Paying it forward to others. I never once looked at people critically because of who they are or who they worship. But after Obama was elected, it's like the grubbiest, worst human beings crawled out from their little burrows to pupate into full assholes and start screaming hate like toxic cicadas. And I have heard nothing but invective and cruelty from them. I've been threatened with their hell and told I am evil simply for not being indoctrinated into some version of the myriad religions and denominations that exist. Told that my altruism, my hard work, my kindness to others is either weakness or meaningless unless it was given with a heaping side of religion. I'm done being tolerant of this. I'm tired of it. I'm sick of seeing and hearing more and more divisive crap being slung at atheists, aspersions cast upon us for what? Not toeing the line? I'm finished being thoughtful and told to be respectful of mere ideas when they can't be respectful of me as an atheist. I'm starting an atheist group in my area and I intend to be loud and proud about it. I'm not going to be bullied by theists anymore and told that I'm a lesser being for not swallowing their bullshit. I certainly think that as moral creatures, I've proven my worth. I won't have any narcissistic theist belittle that anymore. I'm done taking the "higher" road. Submitted September 07, 2023 at 02:07AM by Feffies_Cottage (From Reddit https://ift.tt/GCRjSa0)

#reddit

[jcmariasblog]

I guess this is it.. this is where I'll spill my thoughts. I've started therapy recently but in between sessions I still find myself needing to get a few things out.

Over the past 3-4 years life has been... difficult...devastating...painful...frustrating...traumatic and just overall challenging to process. One of my biggest struggles has been letting go of the need to be liked by everyone. The need for the approval of others. The need for validation from others and doubting my goodness as a person if it isn't seen by them. My most recent relationship only exacerbated this problem..

When we first started dating it seemed like the majority of the people in his life not only approved of me but really liked me. It just felt like a natural fit when it came to his family and me. His friends and I didn't vibe so seamlessly but I could tell they were excited to see him with me. The best way I can describe it is that over time all of that just became one big dumpster fire lol. And the common denominator in all of this drama was always him.

Looking back on the experience I can't help but just to feel that I was bullied. Whether it was Kylee and Justin, Bianca, people at Wegmans that he would involve in our business.. and the few members of his family- all of these people ended up with a completely inaccurate impression of me based on his emotional rantings whenever issues arose between us.

It's honestly frustrating because some of these people such as Bianca and his aunt were people that I genuinely enjoyed being around. I guess I can't expect differently since they are HIS friend and family.. its a little questionable to me that no one seems to notice how he makes himself the victim is EVERY scenario. It's always the woman who's the hurtful, damaged one that doesn't know how to treat him right. It's always the woman who is doing wrong... no one sees anything wrong with this? I mean, really?

It rubs me the wrong way to see a man victimize himself to this extent and constantly villainize any woman he's dating. I just never witnessed that growing up. My father went through so much and never complained once. I usually don't put much stock in the idea of gender roles but I'm sorry.. as a grown man, why are you like this?

I'm far from perfect and I'm aware of that. I'm anxious. I'm guarded. I'm prideful. I'm hyper independent and constantly fearful of feeling like I settled in this life. I'm sensitive, irritable and emotional. I know these things and I beat myself up about it all the time. But I am NOT a bad person. I'm not damaged goods. I have a great heart that's full of patience, empathy and care. That's just the truth and I can't focus on people who's biased view of me doesn't align with the reality.

I'm taking Lexapro again and I'm eager for it to take effect. I feel more irritable than usual and I'm just ready to let this go with all of its negativity. Maybe this was just a learning experience, another challenge to fortify my own self love and self view. Maybe I failed again but I can see that I'm getting better. While it may still affect my peace temporarily I'm still able to recognize it for what it is now.