So, The Formula Of Plot Is... Succeeding After Trying At A Thing??

What's the point, indeed!

i’ve heard a lot of people say “don’t reach out to your friends first and see how many people will remain in your life. those are your true friends” and i get it. it sucks and it’s tiring constantly being the one to message first, to initiate hang outs but don’t take this so literally. some friendships require initiation. i have lost touch with so many people who genuinely cared about me and wanted me in their life because i stopped reaching out. it’s a hard pill to swallow but honestly some people just suck at it and it doesn’t mean they don’t love and value you. i’ve reconnected with some people over the past few months and it’s crazy how genuinely happy they are to see me and how engaged they are in the conversation. i just think sometimes we’re too harsh on each other & too quick to emphasize other peoples flaws and remove them from our lives but then we’ll all be alone and what’s the point of life then!!!!

I get so fucking angry when people try to rationalize why parents abuse children and it’s always “oh parents have been thru it too” “oh they had a hard life” “oh they were abused too” “oh they never knew love so how could they give it” and what they’re basically saying is: Well, the child is suffering but it’s not anybody’s fault. It was inevitable. And you know what that means? There’s nobody to blame, there’s no way to stop it, parents who have had difficulties in life will always abuse their kids and children will just have to suck it up because that’s life.

Well then, what about me? And others like me? We’ve been brutalized by our parents severely, we haven’t known anything except neglect and pain and hatred, and would never do it to another living soul on earth, much less a child. What are we then? An exception? Are we so much fucking smarter and intelligent and insightful than all the parents on the world that we figured this out? Are we special cases? Are we miracles? How come our parents couldn’t have figured out what we have, that hurting a child is an act of evil and that we cannot claim to be a good person after we do that? How come something so fucking simple and obvious has eluded all of their eyes over and over again but we know it? How come if everyone abused has no choice but to become a monster themselves, we’re not monsters still? If we could suffer abuse and remain human, why couldn’t they do it to?

We’re the proof that abuse does not produce abusers. Abuse is a choice, every single time a parent abuses a child they’re making a choice to do it. And the easier this choice is to make and get away with, the more abusers we will have. This world is run by abusers and makes it easy for abusers to make that choice, even relives them out of the guilt for choosing that and provides them with many “worse” examples and excuses and rationalizations so they would still feel good about themselves! This world is fighting to continue child abuse, to continue worshipping abusers. This needs to stop, all excuses need to die. All abusers need to be held responsible for their own actions, every single one. No sad backstories, no tragic histories, no debate about how much harder it would be to not abuse a child than to abuse them. If we could make a choice to not abuse others, so can they. Their last excuse is burned to the ground by our existence.

Truth 💓

The longer I live, the more deeply I learn that love — whether we call it friendship or family or romance — is the work of mirroring and magnifying each other’s light. Gentle work. Steadfast work. Life-saving work in those moments when life and shame and sorrow occlude our own light from our view, but there is still a clear-eyed loving person to beam it back. In our best moments, we are that person for another.

-James Baldwin

I'm still thinking about Hobie letting Gwen crash with him regularly. Considering how big and busy the Spider Society building is, I would assume they have bedrooms or at least a couch she could have crashed on after she first got there. I think Hobie let her stay with him in part to make her less dependent on Miguel and Jessica. Considering how fast he prepared to help Miles out, I find it hard to believe he wasn't trying to convince Gwen something was wrong too. Though I wonder if she still would have visited Miles without Hobie guaranteeing that she would still have shelter and not be ratted out.

Neglect is abuse. It has the same effect on you. Being last on the priority list of people “have other things to worry about” is not how you grow up into an emotionally healthy person. You will accept being ignored and neglected because it’s whats expected of you. You will be grateful for crumbs of attention and seek for no more, no matter what. You will grow up dealing with every problem alone and learning to not reach out, not ask for help, not take away a second of someone’s precious time for your problems that surely couldn’t matter.

You learn to be quiet and invisible and to not show signs of pain. You learn to blame yourself for not speaking out, for suffering alone, as if you’re doing it on purpose. You learn to cope with being insignificant, because when you’re neglected, that’s a given. Surely, if you were of any importance, someone would care enough to notice, to talk to you, to see if anything’s wrong. To see if you’re drowning in depression and dissociating from the amount of pain you’re in. Surely, what you’re going thru would matter to someone.  

People who don’t care to give you attention are not people who love you and care for you. They don’t raise you, they don’t even learn who you are. And it’s only a matter of time before you fall into resignation and learn that being ignored and sent to the gates of hell to deal with demons all by yourself, is how your life will be. And the more dangerous part – if someone gives you predatory attention, if someone finds something they can use within you, something they can tear away for their own purposes – it will feel welcome, it will make you feel like finally, you’re good for something. Finally, someone is looking at you. You’ll welcome people who use and hurt you, because even that is better than to be completely and utterly abandoned and ignored by the world. Neglect will make you welcome abusers in your life, not only without caution, but with gratitude that even for a moment, you’re not feeling neglected anymore.

Hey. Large chest people that want it to be smaller and flatter. I have a tip for you.

I am a trans man. I have an h cup chest. That is not a typo, not a brag, and not an invitation to sexually harass me. This means I have about 4 pounds of breast. This means that binders do not work for me. There’s not enough structure in the compression to keep that much weight in place.

I wore a sports bra under my binder, for a time- it kept things in place, and the binder flattened. This isn’t really safe and I recommend against it. It also never actually got me looking masc- I tended to look like I had between a c or b cup. TransTape I discarded too- it’s just not sturdy enough.

Enter Enell. Specifically, the Enell Sport High Impact Bra.

I want you to look at the construction of that sports bra. It clasps in the front. This flattens the chest. And since it’s a sports bra designed for busty people, it LOCKS everything in place. When I wear my Enell sports bra, I do not bounce. It also gets me looking like I have an a cup at worst- and at best, when I layer, I actually look masc.

Admittedly, they’re not cheap. That one’s 66$. But I’ve tried even custom binders, and they don’t work as well as Enell. I was actually contemplating a custom built corset before I found Enell. Enell is also much, much safer than layering compression, since it is being used as intended (sort of). As a bonus, you can actually exercise in it- it’s a sports bra!

I will note that they use their own sizing system, so you will have to measure yourself.

Happy binding!

The gangly man himself, Jonathan Crane

Batman Annual #19 || Scanned at 300dpi

Amen, amen, amen.

For victims of abuse, it’s almost essential to gain ability to stop empathising with our abusers, not only because it’s keeping us trapped in their manipulations, but because we deserve to know that we don’t have to prioritize the feelings of a person who is actively doing harm to us.

Empathy for victims of abuse is almost mandatory, to the point where we’re punished for every moment we’re not displaying extreme and unconditional empathy for the abusers. We can get called out and berated for simply going about our business and not thinking of what the abuser might want of us in the particular second. We get shamed for ‘not knowing better’ and 'failing our role’ if we take a minute to consider our own needs.

When they’re doing their usual play – hurting us, then quickly acting hurt and playing the victim, bringing out their past trauma, crying about how hard they have/had it, how our feelings hurt them, even in the case we don’t fall for it, and refuse to apologize and accept that our feelings are just collateral damage in their personal crusade, we will get attacked immediately for being an emotionless and selfish person. Fail to react empathetic to the abuser’s guilt trip will get us called out for being horrible, for not caring, for being the most vicious demon, the worst person, the most unworthy and ungrateful human being in the world. That kind of thing sticks. We don’t just get over that. It becomes etched in our brains that displaying empathy, even to someone who is walking all over us, is our biggest priority, that showing empathy is the last thing that might protect us against an even bigger outburst, that might help us deserve to not be attacked for our lack of morality. We don’t get to be mad. We don’t get to stand up for ourselves. We have to put up a display of empathy or endure personal attacks that will make us feel like we don’t deserve to live.

To finally be able to cut the empathy and stand up against the abuser, is an act that fights years, maybe decades of brainwashing and conditioning. To not care if the abuser has it bad anymore, means we faced and fought years of trauma, lies, personal attacks, self doubt, self hatred, pain and injustice. Abusers want to take away our ability not to care, not to empathize and not to prioritize them, and seizing that back means seizing ourselves back, existing in a place where our empathy is not mandatory anymore, where we’re not pure compassionate receptacles of trauma anymore. Where empathy isn’t forced and squeezed out of us under the threat of pain. Where our value and personality isn’t dictated by whether we endlessly forgive and accept people who will only continue hurting us and bringing trauma into our life.

It is not a mark of a healthy and normal human being to offer our entire compassion and understanding to a creature who is destroying us in return. If someone proves to be a danger to us, it’s normal to disregard everything except the knowledge that this is a threat, and nothing else to us. To keep away because our well being shouldn’t be put under a fear of a constant threat. We are normal for following our sense of self-preservation and turning away from whatever is damaging us, regardless of how sad or upset this being becomes. We are not to be a collateral damage to someone’s misery or manipulation. Our empathy doesn’t have to be an opening to accept harm. We can save our empathy for those who also feel for us. We’re not bad people if we close up under a threat of abuse, and want to retreat to safety. We’re not evil, cruel or selfish for extending our hearts only to those who also keep ours safe.

I want all nonblack people to watch this video, especially white people.

This is the best video IMO that displays the depth of what it feels like to be Black in the midst of white supremacy.

This is the rage that burns in so many Black people and eats at us when it is not sufficiently soothed by our self restraint and years of learning to cope with and sit with us. This is the pain that shortens Black people’s very lives, that we smother each day. This is the justified yet unjustly ignored anger we have learned to hold and to aim and to deal with without breaking (too much).

This is the fire that those of you who are just showing up on the scene are learning to sit beside.

When you ask us ‘how we’re doing’, understand that this is the real core of it, every single day, and we have had to learn to laugh, to sing, to dance, to work, to grieve, to heal around heavy, heavy pain. I don’t get the feeling that y’all are expecting nor could you handle if we answered you like this. But I do feel like you should already know how we’re doing: we’re Black.

So y’all, sit with this video for a hot minute.

Kimberly Jones, you are a warrior. I feel every moment of this, every diaphragm flex, every tenuously tempered shout. And I hope that you are taking a break, and experiencing a moment of peace, because you deserve it.

Hello all! I have learned that a website called Live Heroes has multiple versions of my Princess Mononoke illustration available for purchase. The kicker is that I had no knowledge that the image was being sold and I do not give them my consent to have it on their website. The image was uploaded by a user going by Coffeecatsandcigaretts.  Please help me get this image off of this site!!! This is completely disrespectful/illegal! You can help me by following the link provided below and completely then bomb the comments section with aggression. Here is the link: DESTROY THE EVIL And it would also help if you Reblogged this post!! I’m glad people like my art, but this isn’t flattering to me. It just makes me feel cheap. Unfortunately, I am I one of thousands of victims of this situation. If you see someone’s art being sold and you think it’s being done without their consent please notify the artist!  In addition, if you do want to purchase this image, and love Princess Mononoke as much as I do, then you can purchase a print of it on my printshop: Princess Mononoke Print For Purchase I’ll look into selling other versions of this image since it seems to be so popular! Thanks so much for you support!! In the meantime I have emailed the website, and hopefully will have this issue resolved. It looks like the user made a pretty big profit off of my image. Hope it can be given to it’s rightful owner.  Thanks! :) www.daniel-shaffer.com danielh.shaffer@gmail.com