archive

[kpfun]

[mediadiversified]

Statement from the organisers of the #PredatoryPeacekeepers petition and campaign:

We started the #PredatoryPeacekeepers petition and campaign on April 6th. Since then hundreds of people have used the hashtag, it even trended on twitter on one day, thousands have signed the petition, We’ve forced the UN deputy commissioner to respond to our demands on prime time TV (and then on twitter) coverage has been in the UK, France, Australia, Russia and elsewhere. Those are not insignificant achievements and, we want to thank everyone who has signed the petition, shared with with friends and family and tweeted using the hashtag #PredatoryPeacekeepers 

We would like to take this opportunity to share a few reasons why we should all continue to do the above as we approach the United Nations Internatioal Day for Peacekeepers.  And, why it is critical that we continue to put pressure on the UN.

An expression that has been coming up a lot during the course of this campaign is ‘depraved indifference’. It cuts across gender, ethnicity & class. It is hard to avoid coming to the conclusion that this seemingly ‘depraved indifference’ is fed by the ethnicity and socio economic status of the victims in CAR. Being poor, African and living in the 'third world’ is too often a recipe for creating apathy in relation to your plight.

Peacekeepers were sent to protect vulnerable people, they have not only failed that, they targeted them for some of worst crimes know to humankind, the violation of their bodies. Let’s remind ourselves that the majority of the victims we are campaigning for are children as young as seven, it has been alleged. 

The timing of the #PredatoryPeacekeeepers campaign is relevant not only because United Nations Internatioal Day for Peacekeepers  is on May 29th but because Ban Ki-Moon is leaving his role as of head of the UN this year. (interviews are taking place now to replace him ).

A former UN head of mission stated yesterday in this New York Times article I Love the U.N., but It Is Failing. He said:

“The thing that has upset me most is what the United Nations has done in the Central African Republic.When we took over peacekeeping responsibilities from the African Union there in 2014, we had the choice of which troops to accept. Without appropriate debate, and for cynical political reasons, a decision was made to include soldiers from the Democratic Republic of Congo and from the Republic of Congo, despite reports of serious human rights violations by these soldiers. Since then, troops from these countries have engaged in a persistent pattern of rape and abuse of the people — often young girls — the United Nations was sent there to protect.”

Ban Ki Moon taking firm transparent action could be his final act. This would show ethical leadership and help restore trust in the UN. Without this, his legacy will be one of complicity in allowing  #PredatoryPeacekeepers to keep abusing with impunity.

It is regrettable that we have had to plead a case for people to sign the petition or to make some noise about the issues and though we gain more and more support and awareness each day beyond our immediate networks, much more work is still needed.

We want to keep the pressure on the UN to act upon the 12 recommendations from the December 2015 report issued by a CAR Panel. Short of having articles in the MSM daily & getting more TV coverage we need actual big numbers, a critical mass of people demanding action leading up to May 29th. For further information or to get involved with some of the offline actions email [email protected]

‘You would never tolerate these injustices if the majority of the children raped were little blonde girls with blue eyes. That such vile abuses of power continue to happen, often perpetrated by powerful western men who consider themselves guardians of civilisation, testifies to the ways in which even “peacekeeping” can display the same dehumanising disregard which drove colonial endeavour.’ - The UN must smash the culture of impunity that lets peacekeepers get away with child abuse

Sign the petition here

We hope in due time to get tangible support from the feminist/women groups we have contacted since the campaign began on April 8th

Mumsnet

Women for Refugee Women

The Women’s Equality Party

Labour Women

Caitlin Moran

Hadley Freeman

And others

And coverage on all media platforms. Any pressure put on the UN is good.

 Signed

Samantha Asumadu and Guilaine Kinouani

Please share and reblog, all are welcome to publish the statement on other platforms

[psychepng]

agents of none of this really happened: an agents of shield recap

3x19: failed experiments, or the one where lincoln literally dies

Keep reading

[gregorygerwitz]

Hey, okay, I’m going to make a request that I probably shouldn’t have to make, but here we are.

TAG YOUR POSTS.

I know, weird concept, right?

But one post (that blacklist would have caught if it was tagged) just took my mood from soaring high to near tears in seconds. I don’t care what you want to put on your blog, but if it’s a post that’s very clearly against something that someone might like, TAG IT.

It takes a few seconds to tag “anti ___” or “___ wank” or whatever, and blacklist will catch it so shit like this doesn’t happen.

[deactivated-blog]

CHLOE FANS!

We need YOU to help us get ‘We Love You Chloe’ (no hashtag, with spaces, just as you see it) trending Wednesday April 27 @ 4 pm EDT (1 pm PDT).

Why?

Because Chloe is an amazing person, talent, and the cutest cupcake alive. Also, because with some of the hate she’s been receiving lately we want to show her how much people love and support her. We know her fanbase is not as large or vocal as some of the other cast members and with the upcoming story-lines sure to increase the hate sent her way we want to make sure Chloe knows she has a loyal fanbase.

To participate here is all you need to do:

have an unlocked twitter account

tweet using the phrase ‘We Love You Chloe’

quote retweets and use the phrase to help it trend

schedule tweets if you cannot do it live

use a timezone converter to make sure you’re participating with everyone else

be awesome and shower Chloe with as much love as you can before your account hits limit

That’s it!

Please help spread the word so we can show Chloe that Brett & Clark’s fans may be amazing but so are hers. For any questions feel free to contact @snarkysweetness (twitter) or @skyezwards (twitter). Happy trending!

[pumpkinspicestarship]

Why am I STILL this upset about Agents of Shield?!

Honestly, I have watched THREE different, superiorly written, shows since the mid-season finale of AOS,(1st season of The Flash, 2nd and 3rd season of Arrow, and 1st season of Daredevil) and for whatever reason I keep coming back to my utter hatred intense disappointment with this show. Honestly.

1. This is not the first time a show has disappointed me.

2. Ward is not NEARLY the first character I’ve loved to die a horrific death. (I have a long history of loving characters that get killed off. It should probably concern me more than it does.)

3. In fact, as soon as I saw the end of season two, I already was preparing myself for Ward’s death, which is why I stopped watching the show. I hadn’t seen an episode of AOS since the season two finale when I saw the mid-season finale for season 3.

But it’s been months and I am STILL mad about it. BUT WHY? 

The only thing I can come up with is because the show had potential but became an absolute failure, and the mid-season finale was the last freakin’ straw.

I started watching AOS for Coulson. He was one of my favorite characters from the Marvel Phase 1 Universe, which is saying A LOT when you consider all the Avengers are these amazing people,

 and Coulson was still, like, my third favorite character.

So the idea that he didn’t have to stay dead was appealing to me, and I watched the show.

I liked it at first! In fact I liked all of the characters, except May, in season one. I’ve always hated May. I’ve seen damaged stoicism done WAAAAY better.

You want an example of a well done stoic character with a sense of humor and a damaged past look at Agent Kimball Cho from ‘The Mentalist’. He’s stone faced, scary, and hilarious. (And also kinda hot.)

Or Ice Bear from ‘We Bare Bears’. 

Seriously. A child’s cartoon did funny, slightly unnerving stoicism better than AOS. Think about that…

Anyway, I mostly liked season one!

 Aaand had all my dreams crushed for all of the characters, not just Ward, with season two. Everyone became weird, un-likeable, douchey, self-righteous versions of themselves (Coulson becoming the absolute golden standard for Self-Righteous Toolbag), and the show lost it’s sense of fun. By the midpoint of that season, I hated most of the characters, except Ward and Fitz.

I figured they were going to shove Fitz at Simmons until we all wanted to barf, but never actually get with her because that would ruin the bad writing dramatic tension. So I gave up hope with him.

 But Ward. Dear, dear Ward. The had set his character up with such an interesting backstory and motivation that I was hopeful they would do something creative with his character. Because they couldn’t possibly screw up the character THEY set up, right? It’s not like it was an accident, right? No one ACCIDENTALLY writes a complex antihero.

That’s like accidentally drawing this

While copying this picture

No one accidentally draws a pretty Japanese lady while studying Samuel L Jackson’s crazy eyes. They’re too dissimilar.

Much the same, you can’t completely accidentally write a complex character with an emotional backstory and ambiguous motives while preparing for a completely flat generic Hydra-crazed fanatic.

So, that’s why even though the stupid season two finale almost physically hurt to watch, and a part of me expected Ward’s demise in the future based on that, I still held out hope because there HAD to be a purpose, seeing as he’s the only interesting person left. RIGHT?

Apparently,  AOS writers are only good writers on accident, and when they realize their mistake, they work hard to fix it:

Oh, Movie!Coulson is a pleasant, optimistic, unflappable Secret Agent Man with good insights into humanity and behaviour? I mean, he gave Loki what was tantamount to a pep-talk after the guy stabbed him through the back. (no joke, look at that scene) Well, we can’t have that. That takes work to maintain. Let’s turn him into The Bionic Murder-Douche. Yeah, that sounds awesome.

 FitzSimmons, the geeky adorable Science!Twins? Hmm, well, we could write a natural maturing relationship into something more….Or, we could write one as disinterested in the other, but kind of goes along with the relationship because she has no other options at the moment. And the other one is just a lil’ lost puppy. ‘Cus everyone likes puppies and forced relationships! Yay!

Sky, the sweet peace-loving pop-culture referencing hackivist? Well, that’s stupid, no one wants to see THAT on their screen. That’s not a strong female character. Strong female characters don’t need empathy and nonviolent approaches to life when they can kill brainwashed people, taunt mentally unstable suicidal prisoners, and shoot former love interests in the back four times after they help her out of danger. Strong female characters just need guns and opportunities.

May, the taciturn ridged self-righteous Second in Command? Nah, she’s good. Moving on!

Ward, the deeply troubled wanna-be hero with the extremely tarnished heart of gold? Well it seems as though we’ve written ourselves into a bind, guys. We meant to write a one dimensional crazy Hydra cultist. What we’ve actually written-and I don’t know how this happened, I swear!- is a three-dimensional, smart, highly skilled antihero, who doesn’t care about Hydra and is trying to do good, but is so deeply screwed up he doesn’t know what ‘good’ actually is. But he sure is trying his best! Look at him go! Ha! Oops!  We can fix this though. We’ll just give him a totally out of character speech halfway through season 3, kill him in an unrealistic fight, and literally make him a sausage-casing for our Death Alien. If anyone asks, we’ll retcon he’s always been evil and hope they don’t watch season 2. Boom. Problem solved, drinks all around.

That totally probably happened in the writers room for this show.

Ok, for real, this should be my LAST post for Agents of Shield (I hope), I just needed to get that out. I PROMISE I HAVE OTHER INTERESTS.

[misslocus]

Dear AOS writers/showrunners

Look, I accepted the retread of the somewhat stuffy man with quirky attributes, who belongs to a secret organization adopting the sassy young girl full of potential; (Giles/Buffy >>> Coulson/Skye)

I even accepted that her best friend was a geeky, rule obsessed girl who blurted out embarrassing things (Willow/Buffy >>> Jemma/Skye)

I wasn’t even perturbed that Lance Hunter was just a carbon copy of Spike, or season 1 and season 2a’s Grant Ward was just a more fucked up version of Faith LeHane, or that Jemma got Angel’s hell dimension story….

Because I get it, every story in the world has already been done. Plus, BtVS was an amazing show, and AtS was pretty awesome too! Who wouldn’t want to try and capture that magic?

But SERIOUSLY….

Now you’ve killed a character, replacing that character with a demon-Esque alien who has Acolytes that have been preparing for this very thing since…. Forever?

You Illyria’d Grant Ward?

That is pretty specific plagiarism, man. I would even forgive it, if it wasn’t already set up as such a poor copy.

The compelling aspect of the Fred/Illyria story was how gut wrenching it was to have a beloved character be dead, (forever dead-not in heaven, or a different dimension) While her loved ones are forced to see her face being worn by her killer.

there is a better chance that my dog will start reciting The Gettysburg Address in perfect French, than you penning a better version of that tragic, interesting, character driven story. There is a better chance Of Donald Trump, moving to Mexico and converting to Islam. Hell, there is a better chance of Obama becoming the spokesperson for the NRA, Neil Degrasse becoming a creationist, and the West Borough Baptist church changing their slogan to: “God loves us all, especially George Takei, that huggable pop culture icon.”

You are out of your depth. You couldn’t even flesh out a story that was already layered for you, like Skye’s being torn between Shield and her biological family. You went out of your way to make it as shallow as humanly possible, in fact.

I beg of you to stick with what you excel at, which is having pretty people sass each other, continue their cartoonish good versus evil stories and have cute/quirky scenes with some witty dialogue.

Really, it’s okay to be a shallow show. Glee did it and had quite a bit of popularity! Just accept that you have limitations, and play to your strengths.

[andarthas-web]

Cool story bro, still murder?

Are there really “good victims”, who beautifully cope with their own trauma, save for the occasional bad dream or anxiety attack, and use their own suffering as a fuel that motivates them to help others, and as such deserve praise and compassion, and “bad victims” who are left broken, unstable and who lash out and hurt others and who deserve to be taken down and taken out and nothing else?

In how far does a villain’s tragic backstory explain their actions and in how far does that lead to other people carrying at least part of the responsibilty for making it a tragic backstory?

Should we really demand that every victim of abuse should pull themselves out of the quagmire they’ve been pushed into by others by their own boot-straps?

When people end up damaged and hurt and broken, how appropriate and realistic is it to expect that this brokenness and that hurt will never leak out and affect their interactions with others negatively?

Well, what about veterans with PTSD?

They have a higher probability of ending up as drunks or drug addicts or committing acts of domestic violence.

What about juveniles that were abused and which come from broken homes?

They have higher probabilities of becoming criminals than other juveniles, with stable homes.

Is the solution to these problems really to point a finger at vets with PTSD and kids from broken homes and tell them “Well, it’s all your own damn fault and you really should have coped better with your trauma!” and  “So what if you didn’t receive any support whatsoever, emotionally or otherwise! You still should have been able to overcome all that by yourself!”?

And should we really equal broken people who end up doing bad things with asshats who do bad things out of greed and entitlement?

Or is there a difference after all?

Yes, if you hurt others, a tragic past is no reason to be exempt from accountability.

However it IS an extenuating factor.

And being compassionate and holding people accountable / preventing them from harming others are NOT things that are mutually exclusive, though some people seem to think so.

[halfagony-halfhope]

happy one year anniversary, darcy and lizzie!

[reckonedrightly]

Bad literature is our only hope.

[fuzzycricket]

Absolutely here for bad literature and coquettery

[moon-boob-deactivated20191204]

Someone make a “the signs as left girl/right girl” out of this

[greenwithenby-deactivated201609]

video game morality systems

[gamegrrl]

right girl: taurus, cancer, virgo, libra, sagittarius, pisces

left girl: aries, gemini, leo, scorpio, capricorn, aquarius

[mcdyke-deactivated20171112]

being a female means needing to see 10 different doctors to get a proper diagnosis because they always think you’re exaggerating and/or lying

[leftiesneedrights]

define proper diagnosis. I mean, does that just mean the diagnosis you want?

[mcdyke-deactivated20171112]

no :) it means going to 10 different doctors who disbelieved your symptoms until the 11th found cysts on your ovaries :) which may mean infertility :) sit on a cactus :)

[cobra-23-deactivated20151224]

I call bullshit

[40yodater]

Of course you do. Like the first 10 doctors. 😒

[cobra-23-deactivated20151224]

I call bullshit on the story. If you think you have an issue you should see a specialist not just your PCP.

[40yodater]

Like the 4 “specialists” I saw for the crippling numbness in my face and legs I had for over a year while they told me it was “stress”? When it was finally found that I had scars on my brain and spine? Those “specialists” we’re male neurologist who wouldn’t give me an MRI because “women stress too much”. Go fuck yourself.

[beesplosion]

MY SPINE WAS BROKEN FOR 2 YEARS BECAUSE MY DOCTORS TOLD ME I JUST HAD BAD CRAMPS AND REFUSED TO TAKE XRAYS. FUCK YOU AND YOUR ENTIRE LIFE. WHEN WILL BOYS REALIZE THEIR EXPERIENCES ARENT STANDARD???? I ALSO LOVE THIS IDEA THAT YOU CAN JUST GO TO A SPECIALIST WHENEVER YOU WANT LOL IF OUR PCP DOESNT BELIEVE US WHEN WE TELL THEM OUR SYMPTOMS THEY ARENT GONNA REFER US TO A SPECIALIST YOU FUCKING MOLDY WALNUT

[proudly-pro-choice]

My parents began noticing something large in my throat, saw a specialist….Guess what? Told me to lose some weight..even though I wasn’t overweight. I would have my period for weeks at a time. Was told that it was teenage hormones and stress.

Two fucking years later I attempted suicide they ran a battery of tests as required and bam! They find out that I have untreated Hashimoto’s. The “thing” was a goiter. Possible symptoms of an untreated thyroid disease is the goiter, unexplained weight gain, and depression. All they had to do was test my blood, but they said young people don’t have thyroid problems. 😒

-Allie

[tikkunolamorgtfo]

Ten years ago, my mother—who is a pretty tough cookie—started feeling both ridiculously wired, anxious, and incredibly emotional. Every doctor she saw told her she was going through early menopause, even though she was still menstruating. Her health declined to point where she was barely sleeping, losing weight, and crying constantly, which was a huge red flag because my mother never cries. Finally, she went to see another doctor 2.5 hours away who referred her to an endocrinologist. And what did the endocrinologist say? He diagnosed her with one of the most advanced cases of Grave’s Disease he had even seen, and said if she had gone just a few more months without being treated, she could have FUCKING DIED. 

Also, it turned out that her thyroid levels had been moving out of the normal range in a progressive pattern for years, but nobody bothered to look at her past test results until after the diagnosis. They would just do a test, see that it was “in the normal range” and leave it at that. She could have caught it before she even had symptoms, instead of basically being accused of having hysteria. 

[celestial-cat-prince-deactivate]

i had a brain aneurysm/hemorrhage ten years ago, doctors still tell me im faking my disability BECAUSE YOU CAN TOTALLY FAKE LIMITED MOVEMENT OF THE LEFT SIDE

[symphonicsadness]

My sister had intercranial hypertension which was causing headaches, dizzy spells and loss of vision, and you know what the hospital told her? She was being a hysterical girl and making it up. A few weeks later she spent roughly a month in hospital and had several lumbar punctures to relieve her RECORD HIGH spinal pressure that was causing so much strain on her brain and optic nerves she was being sent blind.

[fail-sage]

Everytime I see this post (and it’s been a good 5/6 times), it has different stories and experiences of women who have been horribly mistreated by doctors and it just blows my mind that this is so big. It’s absolutely disgusting how terribly women are treated in the medical world and something needs to be done about that.

[kirawords]

my friend lea had back pain, then pain in her legs and feet, and then numbness. despite seeing 7 different doctors over 2 years, by the time they found the cancer it was inoperable. chemo and radiation didn’t work. the cancer spread. she died and left behind a 5 year old daughter.

[kaijuno]

A few years ago I would go through spells where I literally could not stand on my own and I couldn’t get out of bed. I would be freezing and too weak to eat. I would keep having heart palpitations as well. I got up the money to go to a clinic and they told me it was just stress and to basically just work on chilling out. I saved up money for a few weeks to do this and I pretty much get a “chill out” from them. As time went on it got worse, most noticeably the heart palpitations were happening almost constantly. I went again to a different clinic and was told it was normal and that it was probably stress. They did no tests, and they told me it would “just go away”. Two weeks later I ended up collapsing going down some stairs, and at the hospital it was discovered that I had such severe anemia that my heart could barely keep up with trying to get enough oxygen to my body. I had developed left ventricular hypertrophy (my heart muscle is too big) and because of them ignoring me and dismissing me I’m at a much higher risk of heart attacks and stroke now.

[spacebabenumber-25]

I went to the doctor with severe intermittent pain in my upper right stomach area that was so bad I had to miss school. Despite the fact that my period has been on a regular 3 month cycle for years, and I still had two months left until my period, my doctor told me it was period related cramps and or indigestion. 2 months later I’m in the hospital getting my gallbladder removed. It was so obstructed that there was gangrene developing my my system.

[words-writ-in-starlight]

So…everyone who’s given me shit for that one post (about medicine and equal treatment and shit) can just read this because I’m sick of defending my case.

[hypergoomba-deactivated20171103]

i know this post is already long but here’s a pretty good article about how gender bias in medicine is quite literally killing women. it focuses a lot on heart attacks but it applies to all areas of medicine

[remake-me-marie]

Thirteen years ago (I was 13yo at the time, actually) I started getting agonizing pelvic pain during and around the time of my period.

Let me be clear: AGONIZING. PAIN. I would lay in my bed and cry. If I was in school I’d sit at my desk with my head down and cry. I was in so much pain and no one would help me because of my gender wand where the pain was coming from. 

My mom and the school nurse blamed menstrual and premenstrual cramps. I was literally told “Every woman since Eve has had these. You’ll be fine.”

At 18 I started going to the ER. It was all I could do because I had no insurance. They’d give me morphine and send my ass home. ER’s don’t do diagnostics unless it’s an “emergency” and it’s not an emergency unless they think you’re dying. They tell you to see a PCP.

This went on for months as the pain got progressively worse and more frequent. To the point I was going to the ER once or twice a week. 

Eventually, the ER doc accused me of being a drug addict and said “The next time you come in here you’re not getting morphine. I’m cutting you off.” And he hands me a brochure for FUCKING REHAB.

Shortly after that I started working and got insurance so I started seeing a PCP and OBGYN. 

I’d tell them about my pain and they’d give me birth control and say “This is part of being a woman.” That was it. No sonograms or TVU’s. Birth control. 

I don’t know how many OBGYN’s I’ve seen over the years trying to find someone to listen to me. Between them, PCP’s, and ER’s Doctors, and Clinic doctors, upwards of 15 I’d guess. Some who saw me as a patient for 5 years or more. 

In 2015 the pain skyrocketed. I couldn’t run, couch, sneeze, etc. without being in extreme pain. I had an extremely physically demanding job that required me to have to restrain violent people sometimes and I reached the point where I couldn’t do my job. I passed out from the pain at my job twice. I could barely stand on any given day. I couldn’t sleep for the pain. If my bladder was full, it hurt. Taking a shit left me crying. I couldn’t have sex with my partner. I was borderline suicidal. 

And I’d been doing everything right. Everything they said. I took my birth control, changed my diet, had lost 80lbs or so, and STILL I was in pain. 

Then I found my goddess.

A wonderful OBGYN who actually listened to what I was telling her. She did blood draws and sonograms and actually took the time to give me a physical exam and palpate my pelvis. 

She said, “You know, I cant confirm 100% without actually looking inside you, but I’m 95% sure you have endometriosis.”

She sat me down and explained what it was ( a doctor explaining things HOLY SHIT!) and why it happened and we talked about my treatment options. 

I’ve toughed it out almost a year but I’m finally scheduled for surgery. I get my hysterectomy (which I opted for after considering a number of factors) in April and I’m so excited but here’s my question: 

Why did it take 13 years?

[godslayerbabe-deactivated201906]

Were You Born Under The Gaslight?

When applied to a family, the gaslight treatment is a special form of dysfunction. It happens when you, a child, receive messages or encounter experiences within the family which are deeply contradictory. Messages which are opposing and conflicting; experiences which can’t both be true. When you can’t make sense of something, it’s natural to apply the only possible answer:

“Something is wrong with me.”

Today, scores of children are growing up under a gaslight of their own. And scores of adults are living their lives baffled by what went on in their families, having grown up thinking that they, not their families, are crazy.

I have seen gaslighting cause personality disorders, depression, anxiety, and a host of other lifelong struggles. Receiving contradictory messages that don’t make sense can shake the very ground that a child walks on.

The Four Types of Child Gaslighting:

1. The Double-Bind Parent: This type was first identified by Gregory Bateson in 1956.  The double-bind mother has been linked by research to the development of schizophrenia and Borderline Personality Disorder. This type of parent goes back and forth unpredictably between enveloping (perhaps smothering) the child with love and coldly rejecting him.

The Message: You are nothing. You are everything. Nothing is real. You are not real.

The Gaslight Effect: As an adult, you don’t trust yourself, your validity as a human being, your feelings, or your perceptions. Nothing seems real. You stand on shaky ground. You have great difficulty trusting that anyone means what they say. It’s extremely hard to rely on yourself or anyone else.

2. The Unpredictable, Contradictory Parent: Here, your parent might react to the same situation drastically differently at different times or on different days, based on factors that are not visible to you. For example a parent who is under the influence of alcohol or drugs one day and not the next; a parent who is manic at times, and depressed other times, or a parent who is extremely emotionally unstable. Whatever the reason for the parent’s opposing behaviors, you, the innocent child, know only that your parent flies into a rage one moment and is calm and seems normal the next.

The Message: You are on shaky ground. Anything can happen at any time. No one makes sense.

The Gaslight Effect: You don’t trust your own ability to read or understand people; you have difficulty managing and understanding your own emotions, and those of others. You struggle to trust anyone, including yourself.

3. The Appearance-Conscious Family: In these families, style always trumps substance. All must look good, or maybe even perfect, especially when it’s not. There’s little room for the mistakes, pain, or natural human shortcomings of the family members. The emphasis is on presenting the image of the ideal family. Here, you experience a family which appears perfect from the outside, but which is quite imperfect, or even severely dysfunctional, on the inside. This can stem from Achievement / Perfection focused parents (as described in Running on Empty), or from narcissistic parents.

The Message: You must be perfect. Natural human flaws, mistakes, and weaknesses must be hidden and ignored. You are not allowed to be a regular human being.

The Gaslight Effect: You feel deeply ashamed of yourself and your basic humanness. You ignore your own feelings and your own pain because you don’t believe it’s real, or that it matters. You tend to see and focus on only the positive things in your life, which fit into a particular template. You are extremely hard on yourself for making mistakes, or you put them out of your mind and simply pretend they didn’t happen. You may be missing out on the most important parts of life which make it worthwhile: the messy, real world of intimacy, relationships and emotion.

4. The Emotionally Neglectful Family (CEN): In this family, your physical needs may be met just fine. But your emotional needs are ignored. No one notices what the children are feeling. The language of emotion is not used in the home. “Don’t cry,” “Suck it up,” “Don’t be so sensitive,” are frequently uttered by the CEN parent. The most basic, primary part of what makes you you (your emotional self) is treated as a burden or non-existent.

The Message: Your feelings and needs are bad and a burden to others. Keep them hidden. Don’t rely on others, and don’t need anything. You don’t matter.

The Gaslight Effect: You have been trained to deny the most deeply personal, biological part of who you are, your emotions, and you have dutifully pushed them out of sight and out of mind. Now, you live your life with a deeply ingrained feeling that you are missing something that other people have. You feel empty or numb at times. You don’t trust yourself or your judgments because you lack your emotions to guide you. Your connections to others are one-way or lack emotional depth. Even if you are surrounded by people, deep down you feel alone. None of it makes any sense to you.

Were you born under the gaslight? If so, you are not alone. You are not invalid or crazy or wrong. it’s vital to realize that you have been, by definition, deeply invalidated. But “invalidated” and “invalid” are not the same. “Invalidated” is an action, and “invalid” is a state of mind. You can’t change what your parents did and didn’t do, but you can change your state of mind.

SOURCE: [ x x x x ]

[godslayerbabe-deactivated201906]

I’m very glad this post is going around. I didn’t think it would get this many notes, since I usually just love posting articles I can relate to. But anyway I’ve been reading the comments people have been leaving on it and I’m glad that I’m not alone in this. I’m also reading how some people are just figuring things out in regards to it, or still actively experiencing gaslighting. Reading all the different experiences people have has been interesting and it’s also shocking at the same time how so many suffer or have suffered at the hands of their parents. I think it’s very important for those to be aware of how powerful gaslighting can affect a person negatively and/or that it exists and is a very real thing that can leave a detrimental effect.

[scyphozoic]

THE THIRD ONE OMG i did not realize ther was a term for this

[kaninchenzero]

re: 3: my mom used to pinch me and my brother until we told her we loved her. in public.

[okbjgm]

LEMMY, XENA, AND ME

so, a few weeks ago, after word of my being hired to write/executive produce NBC’s reboot of Xena: Warrior Princess got out, i was contacted by a very nice reporter from a major pop culture magazine for a story about upcoming reboots/relaunches/revivals. 

i answered the questions, ran them by my collaborators to ensure they approved of the message, and off they went… and then i got word that because of the recent death of legendary motörhead frontman ian frazer “lemmy” kilmister, the magazine scrapped the story in favor of an extended tribute section (which, by the way, is absolutely righteous and legit - lemmy was an icon and a heavy metal warlord and should be celebrated).

the nice man who interviewed me has, very graciously, allowed me to put the full text of our q&a here. most of this i have already said in tweets and press from a few weeks back - but here is the entirety of what i can currently say about this project, and will most likely be able to say until there’s a completed script!

—

1. The word is that Lucy Lawless won’t be returning, but will anyone from the old show coming back (either in the same roles or in cameos)?

It’s way too early for that. Our first order of business is to create something that will be undeniable - to both the existing fans and, hopefully, a new audience. Down the line, in success, if there is a way of bringing back members of the classic cast with both a legitimate narrative intention, and respect to both the extant series and the new, who am I to say no?

2. Will this be a true reboot, starting over from the beginning, or just new stories set in more or less the same continuity as the old show?

This will be a true reboot  - but because it is produced by Rob Tapert and Sam Raimi, who stewarded the original - not one as radical as some of the fans fear. At some point someone used the word “modern” to describe the sensibility, and some of the fans misunderstood that as saying that we were putting Xena in the present-day: nothing could be further from the truth. To us this is an opportunity to make a truly female-driven, sword-and-sandal, period epic set in Bronze-age Greece - and to build on the success of the classic, original series to launch an event series we hope can return year after year… not unlike Doctor Who.  

3. What would you say is the enduring appeal of Xena? Why does the character still captivate?

I would be downright goatish to not acknowledge that Lucy Lawless and Renee O'Connor are pivotal to the enduring appeal of the characters. As a fan of the original series, my love and respect for their work knows no bounds… but I would also love it if the net result of this production is to make them to Xena what Sean Connery is to James Bond, or William Shatner is to James T. Kirk - or, more aptly, Lynda Carter is to Diana Prince. Most importantly, I believe that the physical and emotional iconography of the characters, the armor, the Chakram, the fights and battles, and most importantly, the enduring bond of friendship and love between Xena and Gabrielle as polar opposites - warrior and bard - have endured because they communicate a message of hope and possibility to a large and diverse audience. Xena: Warrior Princess is a heroic tale about the search for redemption: this is archetypal material.

4. Do you have any sort of start date/timetable yet?

The network has commissioned a pilot script based on a season-long arc. We are only now beginning to put that pilot script together and the network will decide our future based on that - so we are a bit of a ways away from an air date!

[taraljc]

OK, but I still hope for a Ted Raimi appearance. Because Ted Raimi.

[okbjgm]

i love ted - i wrote his biggest episode of seaquest!

[defunct1010203]

I. Am. So. PSYCHED!  I cannot stop being psyched for Xena.  It cannot happen.

[suspected-spinozist]

I’ve seen a lot of posts of the genre “don’t pick on teenage girls who ship problematic things, because they’ve just been brainwashed by corporate media that presents abuse as love,” and it makes me sad. 

First and foremost, that we’re at a point where people need to be told not to harass teenagers over which fictional characters they want to fuck other fictional characters and in what circumstances said (fictional) fucking should occur. Second, the brainwashing thesis collapses when you take a step back and realize that mature, responsible, and even occasionally male adults are also into this stuff. 

And, third, because teenage girls are, as it happens, capable of making choices. People, even young and female ones, have individual personalities and preferences, and like the things that they like for reasons. “Teenage girls are conformist zombies” looks about as good on feminism as it did on misogyny. If everyone who shipped Edward/Bella or Kylo/Rey was at an increased risk of intimate partner abuse, that would be one thing, but i’m not at all convinced it’s true, and implying that they can’t tell fiction apart from reality is insulting. 

[anghraine]

girls and women stanning/shipping villains as they always have is vastly less disturbing than the fact that we now feel the need to call ourselves trash and garbage because of it

[anghraine]

woobies (again) and arrows

I recently listened to some guy reviewing ATLA, which was … okayish, but I found myself getting progressively more annoyed as he talked about Azula. He looooved Iroh’s “she’s crazy and needs to go down” and went on a tangent during “The Beach” about how her preoccupation with her mother couldn’t explain much if anything about her development because she was evil even as a small child, obviously she’s just an inherently awful crazy person for no reason.

Keep reading

[defunct1010203]

When you want to write a meta

then discover some wise person has already covered 90% of what you wanted to say better than you ever could phrase it, so you just re-blog all their stuff instead.