ethereal havoc

Mostly ace memes and sanders sides, with a dash of animal pictures thrown into the mix. She/her or they/them pronouns please :)

[aro-bot]

idk can we stop…treating a.ce disc.ourse like it’s some haha funney cringe compilation or whatever the fuck because it fucking destroyed the entire ace and aro communities. there is no solid aspec community on tumblr anymore (which was by far the biggest number of aspec ppl). exclusionists took our community and fucking smashed it to pieces and y'all treat it as this fucking stupid joke when they traumatized, gaslit, and abused an entire group of queer people back into the closet. fuck every single person who doesn’t take that seriously.

[showmesomeoneinnocent]

My personal experience is just that, but it’s really indicative that I have watched almost every single ace and aro person I know, irl and online, actively recloset themselves as a direct result of the consequences of The Disc Horse™

I watched irl queer groups disintegrate bc a few ppl who got into leadership positions used that to make the space hostile towards ace ppl (among others as well), saw friends go from being loud and proud aces n aros to actively avoiding any mention of it and letting ppl assume their sexuality. I myself, having been IDing as ace for 10 years at least, have in the past couple since this whole “"discourse”“ came into being, actively and intentionally stopped telling anyone at all that I’m ace. To put that in some kind of perspective, I am incredibly out as trans and will actively out myself pretty constantly except to total strangers I will never see again. I feel safer telling ppl I’m trans than ace. Especially in queer spaces. It’s fucked me up so much I didn’t even quite grasp how much but today my therapist asked me for the first time about like romantic relationships and I physically could not say I am aro and ace. Completely incapable, utterly frozen, and I just kinda let her believe what she will. Ironically the fact that I’ve gone from being willing and ready to tell ppl I’m ace as just another facet of myself to entirely unable and unsolicited to tell anyone, is probably a thing one might want to talk w one’s therapist about.

This has really fucked not just the community at large but fucked up individual ace ppl in so many ways. It’s not something “funny” or remotely harmless, it’s absolutely devastated us.

[swampgallows]

for people in the notes looking for “elder” aces, i just wanna say that i’m 28 years old and am also desperately searching for that representation. i first found out about asexuality through tumblr when i was 21 and started identifying as asexual when i was 21-22 (around 2012). i’ve sought other online ace communities but nothing compared to tumblr. i mean, props to aven for existing as a repository of resources but in terms of just chatting with other aces “in the wild” as it were, tumblr was the perfect place.

but then this fucking shit happened. around 2015 is when it really kicked into high gear. “discoursers” or exclusionists or aphobes or however you want to refer to them consider asexuality to be a joke and that everyone who identifies as ace is a cringey cishet college-aged white girl who loves dr who. recycled biphobia, homophobia, and even terf rhetoric made its way into the mainstream tumblr conscious by reframing the arguments to target ace people (you’re only X because you’re ugly/can’t get laid; you aren’t part of the community if your partner is of a different gender; maybe something happened to you to make you this way; have you had your hormones checked?; by accepting this identity you are allowing the oppressor to infiltrate our spaces; etc.). you know, in case you think this is just about “snick snack” memes.

this has alienated ace people of color, who already struggle with desexualization/hypersexualization, disabled aces, ace survivors, trans aces, mentally ill aces, neurodiverse/AUTISTIC ACES (you guys get REAL fuckin nervous when i highlight that the majority of your jeering about aces’ perceived awkwardness, missed social cues, infantilization/dehumanization, or “unfuckability”/“cringey-ness” are repackaged ableism, especially considering that a good percentage of the ace community is also autistic), and both young AND older aces. 

younger people are being discouraged from exploring the possibility of being asexual by exclusionists for reasons that vary from internalized homophobia to asexuality being a side effect of SSRIs. they are being told that they are “actually” something other than what they say they are, or that they are broken, or that they’re too young to know, or that our ace identity is simultaneously something that must be excruciatingly examined to determine its “cause” yet so irrelevant that it’s unworthy of discussion or representation—”nobody cares that you don’t want to have sex”. i WISH i had known about asexuality as a teenager, as a kid. I wish i had saved myself from so much grief, abuse, pain, and corrective rape by not subjecting myself to experiences that i hoped would “fix” me. 

and older people like me, who in the grand scheme of things is uhhh really not that much older than the majority of tumblr, are ridiculed for having a presence on tumblr in general, let alone as an asexual person. aces over 30? 40? 50? unicorns. conjured rhetoric. people straight-up don’t believe they exist. people ten years my junior attempt to deny and erase the lived history of aces by saying asexuality was “invented” only ten years ago. i have been terrified of attempting to enter Q* spaces irl because i have heard from even my IRL gay friends that aces do not belong, that “it’s not important enough to form an identity around”, that we are not oppressed enough or we just desperately want to be oppressed. 

i have only heard in passing of people much older than i am who are ace. i have absolutely zero examples to turn to of people like me continuing to live a long life or any evidence that i am worth loving unless i become a parent, which i don’t want to do. when you’re a teenager there’s more discussion about sexual boundaries, but what about dating in my 30s? what adult is going to be satisfied knowing i can never validate their sexual attraction, unless they were ace like me (less than 1% of the population)? am i forced to be alone forever? you can imagine how bleak my future feels. 

it pisses me off that i’m seen as a curmudgeon who “just doesn’t get the young people’s humor” when i have to beg people that i consider friends, for the eight billionth time, to stop making/reblogging jokes about how “cringey” aces are or are tongue-in-cheek declaring themselves to be aphobes, and then those people try to assuage me with respectability politics about how it’s about “THOSE” aces on tumblr and not, yknow, me, who is “one of the good ones”. and since the jokes themselves are so juvenile, it further compounds on the poor social graces and stoicism assumed of asexual people if I’m getting upset over ace war criminal moodboards or whatever the fuck. EVERY time i post about asexual ANYTHING on tumblr, to this day, i lose followers. without fail. people dont bat a lash when i spam 20 untagged posts in a row about a fandom they dont care about but i post two positive words about asexuality and theyre gone.

the environment promoted on tumblr condemns asexuality as a social deficit, as an attack on other Q* identities, as a subject of derision and embarrassment, as an identity lacking in “woke” capital, and makes every effort to expunge us from communities we have already belonged to in favor of making our own while also actively seeking out and dismantling those communities. if tumblr really is in its last days, i sincerely hope that these awful practices will die with it. 

[starberry-kat]

this picture was taken in 1973, asexuality has been part of the lgbt+ community longer than you’ve been alive.

[loverofsomanythings]

The first mentions of asexuality as an orientation are from a leaflet published in 1896 and the X on the Kinsey Scale for non-sexual was added in 1948. It was not invented by white teenage old girls on Tumblr.

ASEXUALITY WAS NOT INVENTED BY TEENAGE GIRLS ON TUMBLR.

For more information on sexual history read this http://wiki.asexuality.org/Asexual_history

Before aromanticism was used as a term there was non-limerant. Limerance described romantic attraction and so a non-linemerant person didn’t experience romantic attraction. It has a lot of similarities to aromanticism and it’s first documented appearance was in a book called ‘love and limerance’ published in 1979.

Aromanticism was also not invented by white girls on tumblr.

AROMANTICISM WAS NOT INVENTED BY WHITE GIRLS ON TUMBLR.

Tumblr might be the first place you saw these terms and where they are most used but the orientations were not invented here maybe the words were first used by a lot of people on here but the orientations not.

[infiniteglitterfall]

(Image transcription: The sign behind them reads: “YEA - IT’S A HEAVY TRIP. BUT! This is a chance to CHOOSE YOUR OWN LABEL instead of having someone else do it for you: straight, asexual, lesbian, bisexual, anti-label, dyke separatist, ?, lesbian feminist, [something partially obscured but i think it might say anti-sexual], or whatever”)

[lovinnelily]

When I saw the picture I just started crying and what came after it… I cant, is like someone put a hand on my shoulder and said “is okay to exist” and I’m sobbing right now.

I did know I needed this. But I never thought it would get me to tears. I never knew I needed it for me, to show to myself, to tell me it’s fine to be me.

I can’t stop crying, fuck.

[infiniteglitterfall]

💖💖💖💖💖💖💖

This is why representation is important. This is why visibility is important.

Sometimes I see exclusionists shooting their mouths off about how the way you can tell aces aren’t oppressed is that our main need is for representation, that our positivity posts are about being valid.

And I’m just like… you have maybe temporarily forgotten what it is like to not see yourself reflected anywhere?? You maybe have been lucky enough to find people like you in history and in media before you came out?? Perhaps you are blissfully unaware that if you don’t have that kind of representation, the only messages you get are that you are a shitty gross broken person that doesn’t have any worth????? Possibly you do not know the effect of hearing that from both the straight and the “LGBT” communities at once??

I don’t know if anybody has studied this (I’m gonna find out!) but I would bet a lot of money that that stuff has a huge impact on health, and that it’s a big part of the reason that m-spec and a-spec people (including aros) have such incredibly high rates of things like suicidality.

We’re valid. We have worth. We are incredible people, part of incredible communities and cultures and histories. We deserve to exist, and the world is much better off with us.

[vaspider]

There were older aces on here. I watched 2 ace folx in their late 30s, one in her early 50s and one in her late 40s get chased off of here by constant harassment. I’m in contact with all 3 on other platforms and have been friends with all of them for 5+ years, so.

One of them specifically came to Tumblr to be a resource for younger aces (the one in her late 40s) and left in horrified disgust over the level of direct, awful harassment she received.

So, yeaaaaaaah, they’re out there, and Tumblr dis.course succeeded in making Tumblr so vile to them that they left.

[imfemalewarrior]

I also want to point out the exclus also usually have sideblogs for this stuff, so they can choose when they engage in dis.course, but us Aces can’t choose to engage or not engage in it, because we are always Asexual. 

We especially can’t escape when it’s purposefully flooded into our positivity tags. 

So: I am asexual. I hate it when people are actively working to shove us back into the closet and fracture our community when we have been acknowledged as existing since ancient times, and when we have had a term to name ourselves since the 1900s. 

This is our history, we have always been here, we will always be here. 

-FemaleWarrior, She/They 

[whiskeyandfiction]

This Black trans girl ALWAYS has y’all back. You’re more valid than the folks trynna oppress their way to happiness ❤️

[fuckyeahasexual]

Hey so I'm an asexual lesbian and lately I've been getting in the mood (a little bit late whoops) for pride stuff, so I've been looking up lgbt prides things. But every time I've searched asexual stuff, the discourse always ends up coming up. I found on twitter especially just searching the word asexual brought up mostly discourse posts. I'm still kinda closeted so my only real connection with the community is online. I guess I'm just asking are asexuals really that hated in the lgbt community?

“Are asexuals really that hated in the lgbt community?”

Nope!!! Every community survey that I’ve ever seen over a number of years suggests aces are accepted by 90% of people in the community, and there are countless big name lgbtq orgs that either passively or actively advocate for asexuals themselves.

“But Rose, online is real bad!! How could it be only 10%?” I say in summarization of your ask. It can be real bad, especially twitter. Because twitter refuses to do anything despite both myself and AVEN talking to their Pride Open leaders directly. In part because they don’t enforce TOS and by nature of how twitter works (via an outrage engagement loop) it makes twitter’s results EXCEEDINGLY negative.

This is why I really remind people to not self exclude themselves. Because the community is overall very accepting.

[lambyrinth]

A little something.

[fuckyeahasexual]

The ace flag was literally among the most collaborative effects to make a community symbol, I’ve at least personally ever seen, and used all the existing asexual symbolism that came before it. (The flag itself was made in 2010. )

The biggest icons of that time were largely a shades of grey gradient which drives me up the wall when people think asexuality has to be an absolute. (Or just make up complete bs that can be easily fact checked) Also given how threaded internet forums work and how google searches the internet it’s all really easy to check and even sometimes learn new stuff. 

For example here’s a super cool thing about it I never heard in my 7 years of being here what feels like 24/7/365.  It is believed purple was added by AVEN in 2001 as a secondary color to that prism based diversity symbolism. Specially choosing the amethyst crystal shade for it’s relationship to the Greek story that mentions a nymph named Amethyst (or Amethystas). In it, Dionysus was hitting on her and she wasn’t into it so Artemis helped protect the nymph by turning her into white quartz. Dionysus then showed he made a mistake and poured wine over the amethyst stone, staining it purple.

Here’s some art from a different version of the story where Dio was less hitting on her, and more accidentally on purpose annoyed with her and risked a mortals life via the threat of tiger. And then Dio cries wine in remorse turning the stone purple.

As you can see above a white to purple gradient. Whatever the original version of the story the heart of it is: Artemis saved someone from harm and the person who caused the harm realized their grave mistake. 

Some even take the story further, saying that in ancient Greece, wine goblets were carved out of Amethyst to protect royalty from getting too drunk and making fools of themselves in the same way Dionysus had before them. 

Which not only makes my pagan heart happy to know forever now know the ace shade of purple has Artemis meaning, but also that shade of purple meant that people were reminded to ‘not make the mistakes of the past and make fools of ourselves that harm people who aren’t interested.’ 

[digenovanicolo]

s/o to kids that know they’re probably not straight but won’t let them self think about it. You’ll get there

[digenovanicolo]

s/o to kids that know they’re probably not cis but won’t let them self think about it. You’ll get there

[an-ace-up-your-sleeve]

You’ll be okay

[bakwaaas]

unpopular opinion: mental illness can make people behave in extremely toxic and sometimes even abusive or manipulative ways. relationships and friendships with mentally ill people can be extremely difficult, unpleasant, or even harmful. though this may not be intentional and i have sympathy for those who struggle with this, other people are allowed to remove themselves from your life for their own happiness and sanity. they are not bad people for this. the idea that someone *has* to stay with you while you heal or help fix you is wrong, people are allowed to prioritise themselves. it’s on you to seek therapy and heal. being mentally ill doesn’t give you a pass to behave in toxic ways and hurt others.

[mad-dyspunktional]

Reminder that there are people who identify as just asexual and don’t even use the split attraction model even though they also don’t experience romantic attraction. 

I don’t know why this so confusing considering the majority of allo people will identify as just bisexual, pansexual, etc without using the split attraction model even if they also experience biromantic, panromantic, etc attraction.

[bahookies]

someone: where do you see yourself in 10 years?

me: 

[sleepsafe]

i like all those secret dogs underneath very stealthy

[fuckyeahasexual]

Why do some aces not use the split-attraction model?

This is an incomplete list of reasons

1) Somw older aces to just use asexual because the usage of the split attraction model is relatively new and they might pre-date that community shift (not the models origin) and decide they don’t want more to use more labels

2) They might say other sexualities don’t have to denote their romantic identity and decide it isn’t very personally empowering for them to do so while everyone else is assumed not to use the SAM

3) There’s a bunch of aros aces who will label as such if pushed but really prefer one word. This is normally because one aspect unequally caused them trouble in life, or unequally brought freedom and having both labels may derail a conversations focus because it’s another label that can be targeted as unacceptable

4) As someone who does feel queer in a number of ways, it’s often really annoying to have to come out over and over and over for each label and each new group so they might prefer a “I’ll tell you the labels you need to know. I don’t owe coming out with everything I am to everyone 24/7/365

5) I have noticed that aces who are ace but not really active in the community will also just call sometimes call themselves ace and say things like “I don’t want a relationship because I’m asexual.” And it’s a situation of just because you are something does not mean you are a queer theorist on the matter or have the most up to date phrasings on the manner. 

The model is there to help people. It was never designed to be the new standard that every human being must follow. And I think policing when and how a-specs label themselves not only tears a rift between ‘dedicated Aro spaces’ and ‘dedicated Ace spaces’ but leaves Non-SAM a-specs and Aro aces feeling displaced.

[babyanimalgifs]

I hope this Bashful, young and cute Wombat brightens your day. 

(Source)

[sjdsjkdlskdas-deactivated202012]

oh to be as bashful……as young…….as cute……as THIS wombat…..

[somnolentsuggestions]

looking up at night and realizing omg !!!!! stars !!!! - i dont think i’ll ever outgrow that

[aspecpplarebeautiful]

It’s OK if different types of attraction are jumbled up for you. It’s OK if you’re not sure what type of attraction or attractions you’re experiencing.

[sugargliderowl]

Thoughts About Remus' Playlist

So as usual, this is my first reaction/rant/analysis about the playlist! This time, it’s Remus’ Playlist. I think it’s going to be cursed. But a… good cursed, if that’s a thing. As usual, feel free to add on to this! It’s good to share thoughts and talk about meanings, even making predictions about the future! 

General Overview Before Listening: I love Yugen_sama ‘s artwork; her style makes me happy! Also, Remus doing that? TOTALLY HIM. Just looking at the choice of songs does mirror Roman’s playlist in a way with their own anthems, Tenacious D, maybe an etc. We’ll have to see on that. His explanation with all the emojis is definitely him, and I think that’s all I can say. Just look at it.

Reminder: Before we go on, a little reminder for your safety. The songs can be quite… a handful. If you know about Remus’ personality and interests but still wanna read the overall analysis, go to the TL:DR at the way bottom without reading the specific song analysis. If you remember the TW from the video, that really applies here. Stay safe. 

Song Analysis:

Keep reading

[wasirauhlpsds]

#BlackLivesMatter - Petitions to sign.

14-year-old Joāo Pedro was killed by the Rio de Janeiro police. Joāo was shot at his home and his body was taken by the Rio de Janeiro police. His family waited 17 hours until receiving news of his whereabouts. They finally found his dead body at a medical examiner’s office. The family counted 72 bullet marks on the walls of the house.

George Floyd was murdered by a Minneapolis police officer.

George was handcuffed and restrained and being completely cooperative when this all went down. The officer put his knee on George’s neck choking him for minutes on minutes while George screamed that he could not breathe. 

Bystanders beg for the police officer to take his knee off George’s neck, but the officer didn’t listen and continued to choke him. 

Petition for the punishment of Minneapolis police officers after the assassination of George Floyd.

Julius Jones has only 122 days before being executed for a crime he DIDN’T COMMIT. Julius has lived on death row for almost 20 years, and is held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day. He is allowed one hour of sunlight a day, and three showers a week. Every minute we wait to take action, Julius is suffering. Every second that goes by brings Julius closer to being executed for a crime he didn’t commit.

Tony McDade was a transgender black man who got killed by police in Tallahassee. No one is talking about it.

A 12-year-old girl has drowned in the River Irwell in Greater Manchester.

Greater Manchester Police said it was treating what happened as a “tragic incident” and did not believe there were any suspicious circumstances.

Ahmaud Arbery was chased and gunned down by Travis McMichael, son of retired Brunswick investigator Greg McMichael, under the father’s and son’s pretenses of witnessing a burglary in Satilla Shores of Glynn County.

Jennifer Jeffley was 15 years old when she was arrested for the murder of Maria Palomina. A murder that she did not commit. Innocent of the crime that she was convicted of, Jennifer has been behind bars more than 20 years serving a life sentence.

Regis Korchinski-Paquet was murdered by Toronto Police. A call was made for a domestic incident and Toronto police officers were present on the 24th floor in a High Park apartment building to “observe” 29-year old, Regis. Shortly after, she allegedly fell off the balcony.

Sean was a victim of police brutality. He was running from the police and was on Facebook live. The police officer tased him while he was going down and then shot the man 14 times in the back.

On October 4th 2016 Amiya was stepping off of  her school bus and was hit and killed by a car.

11 months later my family and I met with the District Attorney John Weddle and Sadie Gardener. Neither of them took the case seriously and it showed because shortly after that my family was informed that Karen Carpenter would not be charged.

On June 7th, 2019, Emerald Black a pregnant, black woman, and her fiance were pulled over by police officers after coming from a doctors appointment.

The officers spoke to Ms. Black’s fiance while she stayed in the car.

The officers began to order her out of the car. Ms. Black was clearly pregnant and she had let them know  that she had just gotten back from a doctors appointment where she was also  informed that she was at a high risk for a miscarriage. Despite this, the officers yanked Ms. Black, still in her hospital clothes, and threw her to the ground. They taunted her, piled on top of her, and stomped on her stomach causing her to miscarry. The stomp had  also left a shoe mark.

Chrystul Kizer is an incarcerated trafficking survivor who is being charged with life in prison for acting in self-defense against her trafficker.

The punishment that Chrystul is facing for defending her own life signals that black women and girls have no selves to defend.

Tamir was only 12-years-old when he was shot and killed last year by a Cleveland police officer as he played in a park with a toy gun. Timothy Loehmann, an officer in training, shot and killed Tamir within two seconds of arriving at the park. The police car hadn’t even fully stopped before he began shooting.

Siyanda was racially abused and beaten by a group of people. After defending herself - instead of being protected by the justice system - she was sentenced to 4 ½ years of prision.

One month ago, a division of the Louisville Police Department. performed an illegal, unannounced drug raid on Breonna’s home. Not a single officer announced themselves before ramming down her door and firing 22 shots, shooting Breonna 8 times, killing her.

Alejandro is a innocent 15 year old, African American who got shot 7 times while walking to Boone High School, in December of 2018. NO ARREST HAVE BEEN MADE!!!

We need legislation now that prohibits police officers from shooting unarmed citizens!!!

[starcrossedcherik]

none of you 5k reblogs signed shit without links, don’t bullshit me.

Joao Pedro

George Floyd - petition accomplished!

Arrest all four - petition accomplished!

Julias Jones

Tony McDade

Shukri Abdi

Ahmaud Arbery

Jennifer Jeffley

Regis Korchinski-Paquet

Sean Reed

Amiya Braxton

Emerald Black

Chrystul Kizer

Tamir Rice

Siyanda Mngaza

Breonna Taylor

Alejandro Vargas Martinez

Hands Up Act

Look, I get it. There are a lot, it took me 30 min to link everyone’s petitions. but we have to do more than The Bare Minimum if we are going to root out institutionalized racism, and the Black Community is Done with our insincerity

edited to add: DO NOT donate money through Change.org btw. as a blogger I follow pointed out on insta, the majority of money from Change.org fundraisers does not go to the cause, it goes to Change.org “”advertising costs”” even though they host ads on their platform to pay for that cost

[roach-works]

what’s up it’s june and a great time to reaffirm that aspec people belong in the queer community

[etherealhavoc]

Sanders Sides Rainbow & Foil Theories (Warning: Very Long)

Disclaimer: other people may have come up with some of these ideas before, but I didn’t look to any other posts for reference when making this one.

Rainbow Theory:

Rainbow theory is already widely accepted. The sides each represent a color from the visible light spectrum [ROYGBIV] with Roman being red, Janus being yellow, Remus being green, Patton being blue, Logan being indigo, and Virgil being violet. That, of course, leaves the implied existence of an orange character we have yet to meet, who will be referred to as Orange from this point forward. There’s further support for this character in several scenes, including when Virgil tells Thomas “Do not allow him [Deceit] or any of his friends to stick around that long ever again!” after SVS1. This implies that Janus has more than one friend – Remus and another side we have yet to meet. The existence of Orange has been further supported by the thumbnail of SVS Redux, as there is an empty character slot next to Remus:

The rest of this will hinge on the rainbow theory being supported as well as the existence of Orange, given that there is already a lot of evidence backing up these ideas.

Foil Theory:

Setting that aside, the rainbow theory along with the introduction of Remus as “the dark side of creativity” has led to some speculation that each of the sides has a foil. Some versions theorize that each ‘light’ side has a ‘dark’ counterpart. However, Roman is the one who coined the light vs. dark dichotomy, and some of the other sides (most notably Virgil at the end of Intrusive Thoughts) have rejected this terminology. Virgil corrected Thomas to say “the others,” and in  SVS Redux, Janus made it clear that he was not an evil snake boi, he was just a snake boi. The entire rest of that episode supported his claim – Janus may have manipulative tendencies, but what kind of evil character advocates for self-care? It seems to me that none of the sides are truly good or evil, they just all have different perspectives on the world and think a bit differently. In the end, they all have the goal of doing what’s best for Thomas. Their different approaches do tend to create conflict for Thomas, mainly because there isn’t always a clear right or wrong to choose from.

However, it’s possible that the sides could still have foils. Just because these differences aren’t clearly centered around good vs. evil doesn’t mean that different sides can’t come from opposite perspectives. Keeping this in mind, here is my take on the foil theories. First, let’s look at a traditional color wheel:

Looking at this, we can try to find the sides… yellow for Janus, Orange, red for Roman, purple for Virgil, Blue (but it’s a dark blue) so blue for Logan, and green for Remus. But wait! Patton is missing (or Logan, if you decided to use the blue for Patton). This doesn’t work because the color wheel traditionally used for art isn’t the same as the colors on the visible light spectrum. This puts a dent in attempts to use primary and complementary colors to decide on foils for the characters. Yes, Roman’s red and Remus’ green are clearly across from each other and that is the most clearly established pair, but it’s hard to match up the rest of the sides that way when either Patton or Logan are missing. So, in order to properly use color theory to support the theory that each side has a foil, it’s important to keep in mind the differences between the traditional color wheel above and the visible light spectrum (which we can just go ahead and look at now).

In this, we can clearly pick out each side from Virgil to Roman. However, because the visible light spectrum is based on wavelength, it’s linear and that means that no colors are clearly across from each other. When you put these colors in a wheel, keeping the proportion of the wavelengths comprised by each color the way they appear on the spectrum number-wise, the result looks like this:

This shows a comparatively smaller amount of orange and indigo to the rest of the colors, but also doesn’t show opposites or complementary colors as clearly as the traditional color wheel. Remus and Roman are still largely across from each other, but they don’t line up perfectly. It’s also not a stretch to say that based on this color wheel, Janus and Logan would be foils, and Patton and Orange would be foils. However, based on this wheel, Virgil could either have two foils (Janus and Remus) or none at all. These pairings make sense based on what we’ve seen so far, although Virgil’s case requires additional analysis.

[Side note fun fact about the pink in the second image above: it’s not actually part of the light spectrum, our brains invented the color pink to fill in the gap between violet and red when we could sense blue and red light but no green]

Now to break down each of these pairings and why they make sense…

I don’t need to go too much into detail as to why Remus and Roman would be foils – they both encompass creativity and exist in an almost binary way, probably because Patton and Roman (and therefore Thomas) view creative things in a strictly good vs. evil light, as discussed in the Intrusive Thoughts episode. There isn’t a lot of room for grey area here. Now, I personally think that neither of them are strictly good or evil but rather encompass the ideas that Thomas sees as acceptable vs. unacceptable, but that’s not quite relevant to this discussion.

Next, Janus and Logan could reasonably be each other’s foils. I know that some people make a case here for Janus and Patton, but not only does that not match the color wheel, it also makes less sense than Janus and Logan in the context of the episodes. The clearest pair we have so far is Remus and Roman, which is largely due to Roman’s very black and white view of good and evil. When Remus enters, he immediately knocks Roman out. Similarly, nearly every time that Janus has made an appearance except when masquerading as Patton, he has removed Logan from the picture. In SVS1, he impersonated Logan in a manner that seemed intentionally see through. If he had actually put in a significant effort, it seems like he could have gotten away with the impersonation. So, if that wasn’t his goal, what was? Well, his goal could have been to exclude Logan entirely. When Logan finally appears, he says “You guys are doing a courtroom scenario… without me? Unacceptable” before being immediately shunted to the back of the room by none other than Janus. In SVS Redux, Janus allows Patton to skip all of Logan’s input (the button was yellow and black, Janus’ colors, and a cane similar to Janus’ cane in the Lilypadton fight pulled away the text pop-up), and then takes Logan’s place again – effectively excluding him from this episode as well.

Aside from that factor, Janus and Logan argue in a similar way. Both of them use facts, the difference being that Logan simply presents his facts in a mostly objective way while Janus uses facts and theories to support his own personal argument. Even when Logan uses facts to prove a point, he tends to use entire theories that he personally agrees with. Janus picks and chooses bits of fact and theory that support his point, and often uses them in a way that borders on manipulative. His style of arguing fits with a Mark Twain quote I like: “Get your facts first and then you can distort them as you please.” Both Janus and Logan think and argue in a logical manner and use outside references for support, and the differences in the way they do this supports the idea that they could be each other’s foils.

The dichotomy between Patton and Orange involves a lot more speculation, mainly because Orange as a character doesn’t exist yet and we have no way of knowing for sure what that side of Thomas will represent. However, there have been a few clues so far.

Mini theory time: the orange side represents Thomas’ more aggressive emotions, primarily anger. This makes sense just in general, but also because that part of Thomas clearly exists, but has not particularly been addressed. Logan threw a crumpled-up notecard at Roman in a clear display of anger, the sides argue in a clearly emotional way frequently, and most recently, Thomas’ enraged entry into his house after the wedding took place under orange lighting. That could have been a coincidence, but Thomas and the rest of his team put so much thought and effort into each episode that I’m going to treat that lighting as purposeful.

Now, an interesting thing about these instances is that Patton, the side who is supposed to be in charge of emotions, never seems particularly angry even when the other sides are. When Thomas came in seething after the wedding, Patton seemed horrified by the outbursts and swearing, but not visibly upset about how the wedding went at all.

That leads to the reasoning behind Patton and Orange being foils. In both of the other pairs, the two sides in question seem to have the same primary function. Roman and Remus both represent creativity, but in two different ways. Logan and Janus both think logically and back up their reasoning with facts, but Logan presents the facts as objectively as possible while Janus manipulates them and presents them in the way that best serves his purposes. Patton’s primary function as stated is morality, but he views the world through the lens of emotion. He said himself that morality as he sees it “all comes back… to empathy.” If Orange also represents Thomas’ emotions, with a focus on the negative and aggressive ones that Patton seems unwilling to even entertain, it would make a lot of sense for them to be foils. It’s hard to say exactly how their perspectives here would differ, considering that Orange doesn’t even canonically exist yet, but based on the hints we’ve received so far, the emotional dichotomy here is plausible.

Finally, we have the options for Virgil’s foils or lack thereof. If Virgil has two foils, they would be Janus and Remus as based on the light spectrum color wheel above, and at surface level this seems plausible. After all, the two other sides that Virgil seems to most vehemently dislike are Janus and Remus. However, it seems more likely that Virgil has no foil whatsoever. Neither Remus nor Janus view the world through the same lens as Virgil. Remus comes closer, as intrusive thoughts tend to be things that Virgil is understandably anxious about, but Remus doesn’t view these things as worst-case scenarios, and he likely doesn’t even regard them as realistic. He just seems to take joy in chaos and venturing into creative territory that makes others uncomfortable. Janus, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to think similarly to Virgil at all. In the end, it’s more likely that Janus and Remus make Virgil uncomfortable because he feels like they are a threat to Thomas and not because they are acting as his foils.

On the other hand, if we take the pairings as previously mentioned and leave Virgil with no foil we could rearrange the color wheel to accommodate that and it would look like this:

This gives everyone a clear opposite except Virgil, but also would leave a strange gap between green and yellow that would not naturally exist. However, it would make a lot of sense in the context of the Sanders Sides universe for Virgil to not have a foil. While all the other sides clearly align with either the ‘light’ or ‘dark’ sides (which hopefully will receive alternative titles at some point, since none of them purely represent good or evil), Virgil has settled somewhere in the middle. The entire “Fitting In (Hogwarts Houses)” episode was about how Virgil didn’t fit neatly into a box even though the others more easily seemed to. Virgil’s role as anxiety is to protect Thomas. While all the sides want the best for him, none of them are as clearly protectors as Virgil. Historically, Virgil’s namesake was likely a Roman poet named Publius Vergilius Maro and called Virgil, who in Dante’s Inferno had the role of guiding Dante through hell. That role may have been literal in the story, but Virgil’s role for Thomas seems to be guiding and protecting him through situations that feel like hell, or that induce panic.

If Logan and Janus view the world through logic, Patton and Orange view the world through emotions, and Roman and Remus view the world through creative potential, Virgil views the world through the lens of worst-case scenarios. His job is to get Thomas out of these worst-case scenarios with as little damage as possible. None of the other sides have this same outlook, that we’ve seen. The orange side might, we haven’t seen him yet, but he isn’t even plausibly opposite of Virgil on the color wheel. I feel confident in my theory that he represents the other side of Thomas’ emotions.

If anything, Virgil is his own foil. He sees worst case scenarios, and he can and does use that knowledge in two opposing ways depending on his goal at the time. Sometimes he uses it to protect Thomas, like when he panicked and told Thomas to get rid of his phone. The fight or flight response is firmly in Virgil’s territory and this is an ancient and essential defense mechanism in humans against danger. However, Virgil sometimes uses his worldview to scare Thomas or simply to prove a point. In the Embarrassing Phases episode, he purposefully upsets Thomas and the other sides in order to get the point across to Thomas that, as he puts it “when you reduce a piece of my history to just a "phase", you ignore everything that I went through. Who I was when I scared you all the time is no less real than who I am now.” Note the second part of that quote – Virgil used to be one of the ‘others’ and scare Thomas all the time, and that was real. Now, he works with the ‘light’ sides and aims to protect Thomas in a less scary way than he did before. He’s the same character, but the Virgil he was before the Accepting Anxiety series and the Virgil he is now could certainly be foils to each other.

That turned out much longer than expected, but I’ll end with a short summary. Based on the rainbow theory and a color wheel using the visible light spectrum, the foil pairs are as follows: Roman and Remus, Logan and Janus, Patton and Orange, and Virgil (who could be foils with nobody or possibly with himself). Each pair perceives the world through a different lens, but uses that primary function or worldview in contrasting ways. None of the sides are good or evil, that’s not the dichotomy here, they just have different ways of trying to do what is best for Thomas.

[too-ace-for-this-space]

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