dishonored really has the sexiest aesthetic ever. there’s assassins. there’s witches. there’s whales. there’s steampunk tech and shit. a beating heart that tells you peoples darkest secrets. a spooky-looking twink that won’t let you sleep. swarms of rats. it’s just undeniably sexy.
Some things about this post since getting quite a few notes:
1. If you see this post, highly recommend taking it as an opportunity to set a timer for 15 minutes and switch over to ACTIVITY YOU ENJOY. if after those 15 minutes, you want to go back to scrolling, that's okay!
2. Huge shout out to this popping up in my notifs often, bc I do go back to activity.
3. I think there are times where scrolling is fine. Right now, for example, I'm being connected to a machine for two hours to donate plasma and platelets. Yes this is a brag but it is also a time where scrolling is one of the few things I can do. (Though I will probably also read or watch something on phone lol)
Hey, so this may be a weird place to put this, but if your college or school uses Canvas, it was likely affected by the recent data breach. As of right now, the most likely personal information swept up in this hack is names and email addresses. Login and financial information were not included in the breach (as far as we know).
Right now, as a student you should beware of phishing attempts. Do not click on links seeking your login or financial information. Do not respond to emails about financial aid until verifying the email is legitimate first. Call your school or go speak to an admin in person if you have to. Report any suspicious emails to your school's IT department.
Want to add that mirrored sites are a very likely avenue of attack here. If you receive a legitimate-seeming e-mail telling you that you have to log in to a given account and take some action, navigate to the website for that account through your browser and do NOT click the link. It's fairly easy to create a perfect simulacrum of a website and only redirect you to the legitimate website after obtaining your login credentials in order to avoid arousing suspicion
Be especially wary of e-mails claiming to be from Canvas, as it's the one site the hackers can guarantee you use and are expecting communication from
Let’s Talk About Reese’s Storyline: Ableism, Horror Tropes, and Chapter 4
Or, how Reese’s storyline relies on an ableist horror trope that frames real world disability symptoms as suspicious and monstrous, and the narrative fails to meaningfully subvert that trope.
I want to begin with a brief disclaimer, that this is my perspective as a chronically ill person. It’s not an attack on the writers, nor is it a judgment of disabled players who connect with Reese’s storyline. I’m focusing specifically on portrayals of physical disability, and I’m also not interested in framing physical disability as allegory for mental health conditions.
I am a chronically ill person who notably, has strechy skin, chronic pain, gastrointestinal issues, and a rare disease that affects roughly 1 in 100,000 people annually. My perspective is shaped by that lived experience. With that context and disclaimer established, here is my take:
Ableism and Horror Tropes
Ableism and horror, like many bigotries, have a long history. Horror as a genre often relies on fear of the body, and historically, disabled bodies have been framed as unsettling, deceptive, or morally corrupted. Disability becomes shorthand for villainy, or worse, a false mask of a villain or a monster.
The trope Reese's storyline is established in is rooted is a long running ableist trope. The act of having a disabled character turn out to secretly be a monster is a horror trope that is inherently routed in ableism, a villainization of disabled people and our experiences. This needs to be understood from the get go, as it is the biggest elephant in the room with this storyline, that its foundations are shakey to begin with.
That trope can be subverted. Horror can absolutely interrogate bodily fear in interesting ways. But subversion requires intentionality. It requires the narrative to actually challenge the idea that disabled people are inherently 'others', are dangerous, are not human.
The moment Reese was introduced in the game, I was already bracing myself. Not because of anything the game wanted me to suspect, but because I already know this pattern. Horror so often refuses to let chronically ill characters simply exist. There’s almost always a reveal, a corruption, a 'this isn’t what it looks like.' And in this case, that expectation was proven right. Disabled bodies are always a sight of dismisal or harm.
Reese’s storyline enters directly into that tradition. A character with visible, real world disability symptoms is eventually revealed to be something monstrous. While the choices are technically 'grey,' the framing leans heavily toward distrust. The narrative positions him as threatening and unstable — and the story continues to treat violence toward him as narratively justified.
That’s where the issues really begin. The problem isn’t just that he’s a monster. It’s that the symptoms we’re supposed to find "suspicious" are real-world symptoms being demonized.
Disability Symptoms and Experiences Are Not Suspicious
Reese's symptoms in the game are very much real-world disability symptoms. This is an extremely important distinction to make: Nothing about Reese's experience is inherently suspicious.
Image Descriptions: A screenshot of the game showing Reese's stretchy skin
Here is a link to google images for 'eds stretchy skin' to show this as a real world symptom [I was originally intending to show a direct image comparison here, but tumblr marked any portrayals of the skin as mature so i cannot due that. the irony here is not lost of me 🙃]
The stretchy skin. The difficulty keeping food down. The fatigue and itchiness. The deep frustration of not having a clear diagnosis. Being isolated and medically controlled by a caregiver.
None of this is a "hint" at a monster, nor a hint about poison; these are common, daily experiences for chronically ill people. In fact, if the storyline hadn't introduced supernatural elements, Reese’s situation would read as a heart-wrenching and accurate portrayal of chronic illness and caregiver abuse [And it still can for many, i'm sure!]. The isolation, the total dependency, and the sense of being "managed" rather than supported are real patterns of harm.
That's what gets to me about the writing. Because those are real symptoms. Real dynamics. Real patterns of abuse. And the narrative rewards you for having suspicions about the disability.
The player is repeatedly nudged toward doubt rather than concern. Dialogue options position the symptoms and experience as suspicious from the get go. And when the reveal happens, his disability is retroactively reframed as concealment. The symptoms become “evidence” that something was wrong all along.
Its not just that a disabled person turned out to be a monster, the problem is that real-world disability symptoms are treated as proof of deceit. The narrative does little to acknowledge that these are real-world symptoms experienced by many disabled people. This could be something easily corrected with aknowedlegment or a hint of awarness.
And the fact that no characters respond to your ableist dialogue options with anything but implied or explicit agreement is... concerning. If you play with the booksmart trait, its worse, as the narrative offers a specific, harmful label: Factitious Disorder.
The Misuse of 'Factitious Disorder'
One of the most jarring moments comes if you’re playing with the Book Smart trait. The game gives you a dialogue option, multiple times around the subject
Image Description: Text option with the book smart trait, "Have you ever heard of factitious disorder?"
Which, if you're not familiar with the term, is a huge can of worms. It's not just a throwaway line here. It’s framed as an intelligent deduction, an educated response to Reese’s situation. Not an expression on caregiver abuse directly, but jumping from real world disability symptoms to a misframing of a mental health condition.
For anyone unfamiliar factitious disorder is a real mental health condition involving the falsification or induction of illness. You may be more familiar with its original title 'Munchausen' , or 'Munchausen by proxy'. It is a very serious mental health condition, and it is mostly certain not just 'poisoning yourself or others to make them seem sick'. It is a heavily villainized disorder.
It is also frequently weaponized against chronically ill people who struggle to get diagnoses. Spend any amount of time in chronic illness communities and you will find story after story of patients being dismissed as exaggerating, fabricating, or inducing their own symptoms. The label becomes a shortcut for disbelief, and for medical profesionals to dismiss chronically ill patients.
So when the game introduces “factitious disorder” as a plausible explanation for a character displaying very real, very common chronic illness symptoms, it doesn’t land... well. For me. It comes across to me as perpetuating real world medical gaslighting and dismisial.
This isn't even a case of facititious disorder imposed on another. Even within the story’s own logic, this does not cleanly align with factitious disorder imposed on another. Simply poisoning someone does not automatically constitute that diagnosis. The term feels imprecise at best, and harmful at worst.
This term could have been avoided all together if they had to point out poisoning as a topic. Instead, its just again another point to bad portrayals of illness.
Caregiver Abuse
Dr Kelly is an abusive caregiver. The narrative tries to justify her situation with the background and Reese being a monster, but that is still what is being portrayed here.
Reese is extremely isolated and controlled by his mother. Even without the poison - and in fact ignoring the poison here -
Caregiver abuse doesn’t always look like overt violence. It often looks like control. Like limiting access to outside perspectives. Like deciding what information is shared and what isn’t. Like positioning the disabled person as unreliable or unstable. That they have to be harmed and locked away 'for the greater good'.
Now, obviouslly we're supposed to be left feeling grey choices here and what is and isn't acceptable. But..... the game is basically asking you to decide if abuse is okay if someone is a monster.
The reveal reframes earlier control as reasonable, at least to some peoples interepretations of it. When the disabled character turns out to be dangerous, the narrative validates the idea that restriction, surveillance, and distrust were necessary all along.
It stops being “is this caregiver overstepping?” and becomes “maybe he needed to be controlled.”
That shift reinforces the same underlying trope: that the disabled body is not just vulnerable, it is potentially dangerous.
Obviouslly theyre aiming for moral ambiguity here, but that doesn't change the pontential underlying message.
Why Portrayals Matter
Why does any of this matter, you may ask, as you get to the end here. Horror is allowed to cover dark topics, and not all portrayals of disability need to be sanatized. Sure, yea of course. I think there are still inherent values to the character and the narrative.
This video game didnt invent ableistic tropes, even if it is continuing them.
I don’t think this storyline will suddenly make someone ableist. But when suspicion of disabled bodies is already normalized, reinforcing that suspicion as narratively correct is not neutral.
This is a game made only by two people, and there are a lot of spots where that shows. This storyline would have greatly benefited from a sensitivty reader, by a long shot. Simple things that, while the trope still inherently has backage, could have lessened the blow. Not misuing the terms for factitious disorder, focusing on immediate suspicion just of dr kelly and not of the disability, exploring any feelings of reese being connected/disconnected from the disability community, having people in the game push back at ableist dialogue options, or even just... aknowledging real world symptoms could have made a world of difference.
its not an inherently harmful portrayal, but it does reaffirm some harmful issues. I think a re-write of the booksmart portions of chapter 4 especially is a much needed contribution. As it stands, Chapter 4 doesn’t feel subversive to me. It feels like a missed opportunity.
Critique doesn’t negate appreciation, I still enjoy the game. But when media tackles disability, especially in today's ableist landscape, it carries weight. And that deserves care
flpc event: group cookie baking with the below factors:
one ingredient allowed only. No premixes.
No prior communication, everyone is bringing ingredients and adding them blind. After adding them they're allowed to take a peek at how the mix is going but no tipping off the newcomers please and thank you
being anti ai is making me feel like in going insane. "you asked for thoughts about your characters backstory and i put it into chat gpt for ideas". studies have proven its making people dumber. "i asked ai to generate this meal plan". its causing water shortages where its data centers are built. "ill generate some pictures for the dnd campaign". its spreading misinformation. "meta, generate an image of this guy doing something stupid". its trained off stolen images, writing, video, audio. "i was talking with my snapchat ai-" theres no way to verify what its doing with the information it collects. "youtube is impletmenting ai based age verification". my work has an entire graphics media department and has still put ai generated motivational posters up everywhere. ai playlists. ai facial verification. google ai microsoft ai meta ai snapchat ai. everyone treats it as a novelty. every treats it as a mandatory part of life. am i the only one who sees it? am i paranoid? am i going insane? jesus fucking christ. if i have to hear one more "well at least-" "but it does-" "but you can-" im about to lose it. i shouldnt have to jump through hoops to avoid the evil machine. have you no principles? no goddamn spine? am i the weird one here?
yousharknotpass
romaincrisis
2087
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