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Ok, so after my bestie @yinhai17 gently encouraged me (by which I mean—I threatened her to do it, and she just kept on enabling me with back-and-forth private messages), I decided to do an in-dept analysis of the fight that Scott and Stiles had in Season 5A, episode 9: “Lies by omission” (the “not all of us can be True Alphas, some of us have to make mistakes” scene), and why it had escalated that way.
Disclaimer: This is an essay based on a personal opinion. Everyone is encouraged to have their own, but this was done with no other purpose than to write a bit of self-indulgent piece.
Also a footnote: this is just a quick exposition and lots of rambling of what I consider personal evidence that grounds my points, more than a well-thought analysis, so if anyone is feeling quite like it could’ve been written/structured better—yes, it could’ve. I know. I will probably edit it in the future when if I figure a better way to phrase everything.
Part 1: Stiles’ insecurities.
After Scott was bitten, Stiles had begun to fear that the longer Scott became used to being a werewolf, the more he knew and interacted with the supernatural, the farther he grew from him, and the less he needed him:
The first scene we are explicitly shown this is in Season 1, episode 12. After kidnapping him and getting the information he wants from him, Peter goes on to tell him how he had bitten Scott that night in the woods because he needed a pack, and how it could’ve, had the situation proven otherwise, easily been him instead. He naggs him a little, tells him all the good things that have happened to Scott so far that don’t include Stiles, and he tells him how they have happened because of the bite—and then proceeds to offer the bite, telling him this way Stiles and Scott could be equals, “or even more”. Stiles rejects it because, “I don’t want to be like you”, by which Peter calls him out on his lie and tells him “you’re only lying to yourself.”
(It is implied in this scene, given how Peter had phrased his answer, that had Scott been the one offering the bite, he would have gladly accepted it.)
Fast forward to Season 5, Episode 1—It’s the senior scribble episode. There’s this scene where Stiles and Malia are in the Jeep, just outside of the BHHS, and Stiles is nervous because he fears that after high school all of their friends will grow apart, just like it happened to his father and his high school friends. Malia reassures him that it’s going to be okay, and that he shouldn’t worry because that’s not going to happen. It doesn’t really do much to make Stiles feel better, though, and it later proves to be foreshadowing to his inner conflict through the season.
Part 2: The killing of Donovan?
So we, the viewers, know for certain what really happened with Donovan. He tried to kill Stiles several times, injured his shoulder and chased after him to the library, Stiles kicked him off the metal stairs whence he fell over some loose pipes that went through him and killed him. It wasn’t really intentious murder, it was a self-defense kind of thing. But that’s not how Stiles felt it had been, because of several reasons.
Stiles had been watching from almost the very beggining how Scott, despite having all the reasons and the bloodthirst, refused to kill or intentionally hurt others:
It first started when they suspected that Derek had killed Laura (which was later proved as untrue) and he suggested they should kill him.
Then when Jackson became the kanima and the only option left was for him to die, how Scott had refused to do so and found another way to save him.
Then in 3A, when he refused to kill either one of the alphas and Jeniffer.
Then in 3B, when he—with Deaton’s help—found a way to exile the nogitsune out of Stiles’ body. And even then, he didn’t even try to kill it, or at least not in any traditional way.
Even when there were professional killers after them, he only threatened them one time, and then gave them to the FBI.
So we see a pattern of Scott not being willing to kill people that threathen others, even when it puts others in risk, because he believes murder isn’t the answer. And Stiles had been there, at his side, watching him steadfastly looking for another way to do the right thing, to not take another person’s life. And he had thought to himself, “well, if Scott truly is the embodiment of everything that is righteous in the world, then if I want to remain by his side [now that he is a werewolf and doesn’t need me as much anymore] I should at least try to abide by how he sees the world.”
So in his mind, Scott would believe him a murderer, independantly if Scott really thought that, because they hadn’t discussed it yet. And because he had been keeping it to himself and because imaginary!Scott had already condemned him, he exploded the way he did when Scott confronted him.
Part 3: Theo’s machinations.
After Donovan’s body had been taken care of, only two people were aware of what had happened really at the library—Stiles and Theo.
Stiles had been wary of Theo from the very beggining, extremely so. After all the fucked up things that had happened to them so far, he was justified in it. A shape-shifter whose origin they didn’t know of had just attacked Scott. Then comes sweeping in Theo, just in time to save Scott from being murdered. The right moment at the right time. That had never happened to them before, especially with someone unkown and it just screams suspicious to Stiles.
That changes when he kills Donovan. Some episodes later, Theo confronts him about it, of how he had seen it all and he could talk with him about it. Stiles had been defensive at first, because he thought that what he had done was unforgivable, that he may have done it in self-defense, but it still had been a murder. Theo tried to comfort him, to soften him up, so he would open up to him, telling him it had been self-defense and had it been him he would have done the exact same he just did. And Stiles breaks, and kind of accepts what Theo had been telling him. The scene radically changes because of the Parrish subplot, but the fact of the matter is, Theo had gained—in a way—Stiles’ trust.
The story Theo tells Scott, however, is another entirely different.
He tells him of how he had come too late, how Stiles had cold-bloodedly murdered Donovan and how he couldn’t even try to save the other, because Stiles was brutally smashing his head with the wrench, and how he had been trying to justify it to himself ever since—that maybe Stiles had done it in self-defense, that maybe Donovan had threatened his dad and he made sure he wouldn’t touch it. Point in case, he makes it sound like it had been intentional, and that Stiles had enjoyed killing him. That he had gone against Donovan unprovoked and just started to beat him senseless with the wrench.
Part 4: The fight in question.
Because they hadn’t yet encountered a murder that could be avoided, Stiles thought that Scott’s motto would apply the same way to him. In the car scene, he told Theo that if Scott ever found out that he had killed someone, he would never forgive him, “I’m gonna lose my best friend, I’ll lose Scott”.
Stiles knew, logically, having a Sheriff as a dad, that what he had done was self-defense. He had probably even seen a dozen of cases just like that when he was snooping on his father’s files, so it wasn’t the first difficult case that he had heard of. But he was in shock after what had happened, and while he had seen it happen to other people, insofar it had only been a study-case, so he had no way of gauging how it would truly affect him when it happened to him.
So he picked the easiest coping mechanism that he could think of—ignoring the problem until it went away, or it blew on his face, whichever happened first. So many things were happening all at once that he didn’t even had to do it consciously. But it was still nagging at him, and he grew more axious of how it would blow the longer it went on without being discussed, the longer he hid the truth from Scott, the worse it would do. He knew this could irreparably break their friendship, if it went badly.
After Theo tells Scott his version of what had transpired, he doesn’t really know what to say or what to think. So far, Theo hadn’t proven to be unreliable, but he thought he knew Stiles. And he knew the other wasn’t capable of doing what Theo had described. Was Stiles capable of murdering someone? Yes, he would believe that. But unprovoked and as cold-bloodedly as Theo had described? He was reluctant to believe so.
But he didn’t want to believe Theo was telling him a lie, because he hadn’t wanted to believe someone else telling him about when Void had posessed him, and look how well it had served him then. So he decides to confront Stiles about it.
When Stiles shows up at the vet clinic, Scott shows him the bloodied wrench that Theo had given him. After Stiles doesn’t deny that it had been his, the first thing that Scott asks is:
“Why didn’t you tell me when it happened?”, to which Stiles replies “I couldn’t.”
Then Scott tries another approach. He asks “Did you kill Donovan?”
Stiles doesn’t deny killing him. He says “He was going to kill my dad.” Doesn’t even elaborate on it.
The miscommunication in this scene happens in this part, because while Stiles had a right to be on the defensive, he was trusting that Theo had told Scott the truth, and the Scott was asking him about why he had killed him, even if it were self-defense. In a simmilar fashion, when Stiles didn’t deny killing Donovan, and when he adds that it was to protect his dad, he corroborates Theo’s version of the story. Theo had previously told Scott that he thought it had happened because Stiles wanted to protect his father.
Stiles had been dreading this moment for a long while. This was the exact scenario he had imagined that would happen if Scott ever found out he had killed Donovan, nevermind that it was self-defense. So he didn’t care anymore, and threw every punch he had. Told him how he was fed-up with Scott’s way of viewing things, of how even after he tried he couldn’t live up to his standars.
Afterwards, Scott asks: “So, you had to kill him?” emphasis in had. Stiles looks at him flabbergastered, because that was the one thing that Scott had decided to fixate on.
He answers, “He was going to kill my dad.” And Scott tells him “But the way it happened... there’s a point when’s not even self-defense anymore” thinking of what Theo had described to him. Stiles, at this point, still thinks that Scott had been given the real version of the events, so he doesn’t know what to say. If Scott doesn’t believe that is self-defense, then what could be?
Scott tells him that he wants to believe him, and Stiles says that he should believe him, then. By this point both Scott and Stiles don’t know how to solve this—Scott because he thought Stiles had truly done the thing that Theo accused him of, and Stiles because he thought that he had lost his best friend forever.
We known now that is not true, and that Scott realized he had been in the wrong for trusting Theo about this, instead of trying to get the truth out of Stiles, and tried several times to ask for Stiles’ forgiveness. But I believe that that particular moment hadn’t been only about Stiles’ killing of Donovan, because several things had built up to that point. And this rambly essay was written to illustrate on it.
phones love to go "do you want to clear up .3 GB by deleting these cherished pictures that you havent looked at in more than 30 days?" while also installing random apps and AI bullshit you didnt ask for. and you cant even uninstall half the apps
gil carrying oz to bed and kissing his hair and feeling him breathe against him and holding his whole weight and bringing him somewhere safe to rest and tucking him into bed so he's as comfortable as possible and sleeps well <3 gil staying by his side and soothing him if he has any nightmares <3
"I sort fics by kudos and only kudos on stories with high kudos counts, why aren't there more stories with high kudos, I ran out of things to read." You're part of the problem.
"Authors artificially inflate comment counts by thanking people, I can't find anything with a real comment count to read." No they fucking are not, they're grateful for engagement.
"I can't read anything under 100k." That's the majority of fics you're ignoring, most novels aren't even that long.
"I don't have time to look for the incredibly rare diamond in the rough, so I won't read anything below a certain amount of kudos, comments, and hits." Those fics are popular because people gave them a chance and then snobs like you found them.
"I won't read anthing with a single typos." You made typos in that sentence, get off your high horse.
"One singular author didn't thank me for commenting, I'm never commenting on any fic again so I don't get burned." You're punishing people because someone didn't give you engagement they don't owe you that they might not have seen.
"This fic is three months old, it's so old, it doesn't matter if I comment or kudos, it's old." Fics do not have expiration dates, comment and kudos.
You're killing your fandoms with your snobbish behaviors.
Have you seen one of these dipshits? If you post regularly on ao3, chances are YES, but more likely you didn't notice nor suspect it was a bot. Sometimes they start off nice, or even praise you before getting nasty out of nowhere, like so:
But much like Grok, their newest obsession is nazism.
I don't know where they come from, or what purpose this could possibly serve other than suicidebaiting random people in the internet, I guess; but apparently they've started parroting names from real users to send these comments and shifting their general length to go by undetected. Maybe those are scrappers trying to train 'reviewbots' to be sold as part of some scam service promising to give feedback for newbie writers, who the fuck knows.
Here are more examples of the tone and backhanded compliments you can find in these:
If you regularly post on AO3 or interact with writers in it, please pass this along so they don't feel insane receiving bombs in their inbox. This is ridiculous.
ADD-ON to this situation: I've seen more than a dozen people now relate that they've received suspicious comments of this nature including a request to talk with the author on Discord. (claiming that they see comic potential on your fic and want to discuss it, etc.) I know for a lot of you this is going to sound obvious, but for the young people in the crowd:
Do not share your Discord user with any unidentified user or anonymous guest on AO3. No well-meaning stranger is going to ask for your Discord user in public. This leaves you vulnerable to password/credit card/data harvesting and multiple attacks.
Nintendo hatedom is crazy because like wdym y’all think the switch 2 not having an OLED screen and having inflation pricing is the most anti consumer, discourse worthy thing they’ve ever done but peach’s VA finding out she got recasted the day Mario kart world launched isn’t worth raising hell over or talking about whatsoever???
I’m sorry to everyone who found out peach got recasted through a post of me venting my frustrations ;-;
She posted about it on her instagram and the people who make hating Nintendo their whole personality have not said a single word about it because they’re still stuck on the damn console not having an OLED screen and that pisses me off to no end
if you want to hate nintendo, hate them for forcing games preservation orgs to take down countless ROMs they have no intention of selling again, suing the creators of emulation software, threatening legal action against free fan projects for series they've long since abandoned that do not compete with any contemporary product. hate them for collaborating with the FBI to saddle an actual 51 year old human man with $14.5 million in debt that will be garnished from his wages for the rest of his life all because he helped make a fucking dongle that made switch piracy slightly easier. hate nintendo for their scummy mobile games and conservative values and bad labor conditions, not because you personally can't afford their stuff anymore.
like yeah, the switch 2 price tag is hilarious, the increased cost of their games is hilarious, the fact that they're charging ten bucks for a glorified user manual is hilarious and absolutely worthy of critique. but acting like this is either the first or the worst of their sins just makes you look like a gormless fanboy who would have no issues with nintendo if you were still able to afford their stupid overpriced toys, and who will go right back to having no issues the instant you can scrape together the funds to buy a switch 2. absolutely grow the fuck up.
I went back and forth on Raph for a long time. I did consider a few diagnoses for him but here’s the thing—he doesn’t meet criteria for any of them. Either he doesn’t have all the symptoms or the symptoms he displays resolve.
See, a huge difference I noticed between Raph and his brothers is that the effects of what they’ve gone through don’t stick around with Raph like they do his siblings. Naturally, I started to consider why.
Simply put, Raph has more of what we call resilience than his siblings. Resilience in terms of psychology means that he bounces back and adapts to change readily.
Does this mean he didn’t have a reaction to the trauma they went through? Not at all. But Raph’s responses are receptive to change.
After they’re forced out of New York and his brother is hurt, Raph weeps (with support) and expresses his anger. He also devotes himself to helping his brother in a very productive way; they fix his swords together and discuss what happened while they do so (though we only see some of this). They PROCESS it.
After the battle on Ch’rell’s ship, Raph once again expresses his rage but then finds a productive means of healing—in this case, he steps into the leadership role Leo is struggling with and becomes a voice of reason for his brothers.
His means of helping are directly connected to outcomes of the trauma. This allows for continued processing of emotion even when it doesn’t feel like it. Raph is able to really accept and handle all the emotions their crazy lives give them.
Important to remember not everyone exposed to trauma gets #PTSD or a long trauma response. Only about 17%. Raph appears to fall outside that statistic, surprisingly.
As odd as it might seem to say, I think Raph’s anger served as a protective factor for him and I’ll tell you why:
Anger and Sadness are alarm emotions. Part of their purpose is to alert our support systems when we need help. Sadness is a much more subtle alarm but anger is loud and blaring.
Because people know Raph has temper, when his alarm goes off, they respond. When Raph is struggling, he has the support to work through things. Raph is also practical—not logical, but practical. Once his anger is spent, he’s the first to identify what needs to happen. Even if he doesn’t like it. I think we see this especially true in Season 4 when he realizes Leo isn’t at his best so he chooses to step up.
Another thing worth mentioning—Raph’s anger gets noticeably better as the series goes. Part of this is due to gaining more supports (Casey, Mrs. Morrison, Angel, etc), part of it is by gaining more coping skills (knitting especially forces him to slow down and be calm) but also he grows. While we don’t know how old the turtles are in the beginning, most series start them around 15.
Hormones are absolutely insane during puberty and I doubt that’s different for mutant turtle boys. The earlier ages of puberty are often the hardest as the body tries to figure out a balance, leading to outbursts or shorter tempers being more frequent. I think a lot of Raph’s earlier, more intense, anger can definitely have some influence from hormones. Some boys are more sensitive to it or they produce more. As Raph matures and grows, that naturally mellows out.
Lastly, let’s address the elephant in the room. The pipe vs Mikey incident. I think this is one of those blind rage situations where a perfect storm of circumstances came together—given we never see Raph have an outburst like that again. So let’s see:
—just lost his home he had from childhood (and presumably a lot of sentimental items)
—had his family attacked
—emerged topside for the first time since childhood, with separation from his father during this mess
—is in early/mid puberty with no support aside from his brothers and father
—is most likely feeling powerless given recent events
I think Mikey’s taunting was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back with a whole bunch of pressure that had been building up. And he actually handles the aftermath pretty well.
We see immediate regret, removing himself from the situation and he actually gains a confidante in Casey Jones that serves him through the rest of the series! And seeing Casey Jones demonstrating the kind of behavior Raph knows he has. Having to see it I think really drives home that motivation for Raph to improve.
And he does. He grows, uses coping skills, learns to reach out to his family (in his own way) and while he remains hotheaded and impulsive, it’s manageable.
So, would I give Raph a diagnosis? Truthfully…no. In order to have a mental health diagnosis, it has to be interfering negatively in your life and by the end of the series, Raph pretty much has his stuff handled.
Could he still benefit from some impulsivity therapy and development of coping skills, maybe a little more anger management? Yeah, but it’s not to a clinically significant level.
Raph gets V codes! (Or Z codes if you’re outside the USA)
What the heck are V codes, you ask?
V codes are indicators of something a client is working on but it’s not severe enough for a full blown diagnosis. So, things like siblings issues, housing issues, some need of more coping skills etc.
We’re going to assume Raph is self pay so I don’t HAVE to give a diagnosis (Yes, some insurances require this and it is one of the reasons why diagnosis of ‘mood disorder unspecified’ exists)
FINAL DIAGNOSIS:
V61.8 Sibling Relational Problem, High Expressed Emotion Level Within Family
V62.4 Target of (Perceived) Adverse Discrimination or Persecution
V62.89 Victim of Terrorism or Torture
V62.22 Exposure to Disaster, War, or Other Hostilities
V15.49 Other Personal History of Psychological Trauma
The best part about being asexual is knowing that you will never be honeypotted. I often picture myself as a mark in a James Bond movie who has information or something and Daniel Craig saunters up in his sexiest tux to seduce me and I’m just like “No thank you” no matter what he does and then he has an existential crisis and walks away in a daze then sends in Moneypenny cause maybe I just like women and I’m like “hey girl, no thanks” and send her away as well and they just never get the information. I am an immovable plot piece without even knowing it. Sorry James but I defy the tropes of your genre.
"I'm immune to being honeypotted," the asexual autistic thinks smugly.
Someone at the cafe sits down right across from them. "I'm sorry to bother you, but I heard you were a Star Trek fan?"
Playing it cool, the asexual autistic says, "Yeah, I watched the original series as a kid..."
"I loved Spock," the new person says. "I'm almost ashamed to admit to all the Mary Sue hurt comfort fics I wrote as a teenager about him where I was rescuing him from evil android women who wanted to marry him..."
"Oh my God, you too?" the asexual autistic says.
Three hours later the spy who prepared for this assignment by binge watching all of Star Trek (it took several weeks to watch all the episodes of all the series, and they cheated by reading Wikipedia for the plots of the movies) and reading all the fanfic the asexual autistic ever wrote, and checking out the bookmarks and likes they've made publically available, has all the information they needed to get. They also now have a weirdly intense interest in Star Trek themselves, and they're collaborating with the asexual autistic on a fanfic about Data.
Saw a post about how halal and kosher meat will likely be the only reliably safe options in the US because their safety and cleanliness standards aren't dictated by what's the barest legal minimum that government food safety regulations demand.
So you're like 5 years away from "ever notice how the musulmans and jews never get sick from bad meat? clearly this is proof that they are poisoning us" right now.
For those of you who don't know, Jewish people had fewer fatalities during the Black Death because they practiced better hygiene than Christians. In response, a number of Christians began to speculate and assert that Jews were actually spreading the disease by poisoning wells, which led to violence committed against Jews. The Wikipedia page on the persecution of Jews during the Black Death has more information on this. If you see this old conspiracy theory pop up in a new form like this, do not fall for it.
@princesandromeda said: Tú ya sabes que voy a pedir del 14
Kuroko dimension traveler
There was Akashi talking with Coach Sanada. And Kise was on one of the benches, texting something on his phone.
That was weird.
“Ah, Tetsuya, I heard you resigned from the team. Did you change your mind?” Akashi’s smile, not entirely unkind, had a certain sharpness to it now that… well, it was better not to think of that.
(He had worked so hard, too. So very hard to save them, his friends. And if this wasn’t some weird dream or hallucination, then he would have to start over again.)
“Where’s Midorima-kun?” He asked, instead of answering Akashi’s question. Miracle or not, Midorima was never one to skip training.
His former captain looked perplexed, like he couldn’t believe what he had heard.
“Who is that?”
For the longest time, Kuroko had believed that Akashi didn’t have a sense of humour.
“Midorima Shintaro. Left-handed, has green hair, Oha Asa firm believer, threes specialist. Where is he?” He even made sure to enlist them slowly, so Akashi heard him correctly. “Is Midorima-kun sick or something?”
Now it wasn’t only Akashi looking at him weirdly, but also Coach Sanada. Kise had stopped typing bored at his phone, and looked at Kuroko like he had swore off or something equally uncommon of him.
“Perhaps you might not be as recuperated as we had thought you were from the concussion, Kuroko-kun,” said Coach Sanada, his voice soothing like one does to a hurt animal. “The person you’re looking for isn’t on the team.”
Kuroko was pretty sure that he did a face. A scowl deforming his lips.
Because what was the meaning of this?
“Perhaps you should stop attending the training as well, Tetsuya. Don’t worry, nothing too bad will happen in your absence.” Akashi then grimaced, like it physically hurt to say this. “Imaginary friends included.”
He gripped tighter his hand into the shoulder strap from his school bag.
“My mistake, then.”
Kuroko didn’t notice Akashi’s pensieve face looking at him walking off the basketball court.
