Fleurs de Moli

Monsieur Ibrahim et les fleurs du Coran

[jasmine-does-wevertf-she-wants]

Thinking about the political set-up of the royal family of Xianle. Because I never really paid attention before because there is so much else in Xie Lian's life to focus on but: it makes no sense to me.

So, Xie Lian is the crown prince. As far as we know, the only person in his generation in the royal family apart from Qi Rong who is a) very much unfit to rule a bathtub, let alone a whole ass country and b) related from Xie Lian's mother's side, so presumably not even close to being considered a successor, even if there wasn't his entire personality disqualifying him.

And Xie Lian doesn't want to rule. It doesn't fit his character and he says so at several instances in the novel before his first ascension. He sees how his father, a good man, not a great man, certainly, but well-meaning and relatively competent, makes for an average king and doesn't want to carry the burden to see what the logistics of ruling would do to him. Rightfully so, I can't see Xie Lian ruling without him being ruined by it, so good choice so far.

Accordingly, he fucks off to cultivate with the express goal to ascend. Which makes sense for him personally! He is an exceptionally talented cultivator! Ascension is highly unlikely, but as the state preceptor of Xianle says himself: If Xie Lian can't do it, no one can. But! Gods famously can't interfere in mortal affairs (like the whole point of the Fall of Xianle arc) and therefore most certainly can't run a country. So, with Xie Lian's relatively high probability to ascend and absolute refusal to carry on his dynasty, what would have been Xianle's future plan?

And, as far as I can tell from the novel - which is very much in line with a lot of issues around the political and social situation in Xianle - there wasn't one. The king of Xianle was middle-aged, didn't seem to cultivate or of spectacular health given how fast he succumbed to illness during their time as refugees. There should have been a plan of his succession. Xie Lian didn't have siblings, nor any other obvious relatives that we're introduced to. Prior to his ascension, the king and queen seem to have presumed that his stint as a cultivator was temporary, trying to get him to marry and carry on his royal lineage. Disregarding now, how Xie Lian expressly didn't want that - him ascending put a stop to that route. A god can't be king. There should have been some mention of Xianle's political future, now that the next in line to the throne is ineligible due to being of another dimension.

Like I know it didn't matter. The fall of Xianle and the end of the Xie dynasty were a foregone conclusion with Xie Lian's ascension. MXTX didn't have to come up with an alternative. But it just struck me how Xie Lian has this prominent political position in his homeland that he can't fulfiill anymore because he became something greater and no one seems concerned with filling that gap for him. Not even himself. He expresses anxiety about becoming king before his ascension but he never expresses concern about what will happen to Xianle now that he can't be king. Which to be fair, he only had a few years at most to worry about before the fall of Xianle began and in that time he learned how to be a god.

But still... you would think someone in the crown prince's vicinity would mention what to do now that the crown prince is functionally incapacitated and it's just so in line with everything else in the political situation of Xianle that no one... does.

[jasmine-does-wevertf-she-wants]

The scene where Jing Qi seduces Wu Xi lives forever in my head. It was a represhensible thing to do but it was the most obvious scene we had where Jing Qi purely acted on his feelings.

There was no reason to have sex with Wu Xi. Wu Xi trusted Jing Qi, I can't imagine him refusing a cup of water or tea from Jing Qi if casually offered. Dream Stupor is odor- and tasteless. He absolutely could have drugged Wu Xi another way.

But he wanted to sleep with Wu Xi. Jing Qi fully expected to die in the fight for the capital and he didn't want to leave this life without getting to have Wu Xi at least once. It was a terrible and selfish thing to do but to me it shows how deep Jing Qi's feelings actually were. And I think Wu Xi knew, too. Jing Qi tells him several times he can't abandon Da Qing while the succession is still unclear. He knows Jing Qi wants him away from the war. He knows that Jing Qi could slip him the drug, has done so before and no one knows better than him how much he trusts Jing Qi. He knows what it means to be deeply loyal to one's homeland. For all he played deaf when Jing Qi brought up that Prince Nanning can't just leave Da Qing to a foreign country's leader, I don't believe that Wu Xi would have chosen otherwise if the roles were reversed. He is no Helian Yi. He would never sacrifice Jing Qi's life or safety for political ambitions or his position. But if he had to choose between Nanjiang's safety and their relationship, no one can tell me Wu Xi wouldn't choose Nanjiang. They are too similar in that regard.

I identify too much with Jing Qi but a part of me also can't help but be proud of him. He acted on his feelings! He took! Very terrible and selfish but all his previous lifetimes Jing Beiyuan only gave. He was all about self-sacrifice. He is still sacrificing himself for Da Qing, but with Wu Xi he dares to burden him with his desire and feelings, too. He finally has a partner he trusts to carry that burden. He did that in the most cruel way but it is development!

So, I absolutely believe that Wu Xi slipped into unconsciousness, knowing his feeling are reciprocated but his wishes ignored. Jing Qi took him selfishly, much more so than Wu Xi has done before, like Wu Xi has fantasized of doing. And with all that, I think Wu Xi still knows what an emotional overture that really was. That Jing Qi meant to tell him that he can't die without being with him this one time. And as terrible as that must hurt, because Jing Qi would rather die alone and protect Wu Xi than be with him. And Wu Xi can't know how much that means coming from Jing Qi, who previously believed his heart dead. But he knows how little Jing Qi expresses his own feelings and desires and still he did something that was so hurtful to their future relationship (if there is a future) and unnecessary. I think Wu Xi knows and while he is very justifiably furious with Jing Qi, he won't hold it against Jing Qi for long.

Because Jing Qi honestly wanted him. Because Jing Qi honestly loves him. And Wu Xi would have never brought sex into the equation, but no one can tell me he would not have knocked Jing Qi unconscious and carried him off to Nanjiang if it saved his life. And Wu Xi knows that, too.

[fitnessadvicethatfitsinyourlife]

Drinking soda is better than drinking nothing all day. Eating ice cream for dinner is better than eating nothing for dinner. Eating salsa is better than having no produce in your diet at all.

Water is way more hydrating than soda, but soda is more hydrating than nothing. A balanced meal is way more nutritious than ice cream, but ice cream is more nutritious than nothing.

Something is better than nothing. Some hydration is better than no hydration. Some nutrients are better than no nutrients. Some produce is better than no produce.

Don't let societally imposed food guilt trick you into believing that nothing is a better choice. Nourishing your body, however you can, is always the better choice. Fed is best. Always.

[justalurkr]

Truncated text of tweet from MrPitBull, Mar 11, 2026:

She kept finding women in laboratory photographs from the 1800s. Then she read the published papers—and every single woman had vanished. Someone had erased them from history.

Yale University, 1969.

Margaret Rossiter was a graduate student studying the history of science. She was one of very few women in her program.

Every Friday afternoon, students and faculty gathered for beers and informal conversation. One week, Margaret asked a simple question: "Were there ever any women scientists?"

The faculty answered firmly: No.

Someone mentioned Marie Curie. The group dismissed it—her husband Pierre really deserved the credit.

Margaret didn't argue. But she also didn't believe them.

So she started looking.

She found a reference book called "American Men of Science"—essentially a Who's Who of scientific achievement. Despite the title, she was shocked to discover it contained entries about women. Botanists trained at Wellesley. Geologists from Vermont.

There were names. There were credentials. There were careers.

The professors had been wrong.

But Margaret's discovery was just the beginning. Because as she dug deeper into archives across the country, she found something far more disturbing.

Photograph after photograph showed women standing at laboratory benches, working with equipment, listed on research teams.

But when she read the published papers, the award citations, the official histories—those same women had disappeared. Their names were missing. Their contributions erased.

It wasn't random. It was systematic.

Women who designed experiments watched male colleagues publish results without giving them credit. Women whose discoveries were assigned to supervisors. Women listed in acknowledgments instead of as authors. Women passed over for awards that went to male collaborators who contributed far less.

Margaret realized she was witnessing a pattern that stretched across centuries.

Women had always been present in science. The record had simply pushed them aside.

She needed a name for what she was documenting.

In the early 1990s, she found it in the work of Matilda Joslyn Gage—a 19th-century suffragist who had written about this exact phenomenon in 1870.

In 1993, Margaret published a paper formally naming it: The Matilda Effect.

The term captured something that had been hidden in plain sight for generations. Once you knew the term, you saw it everywhere.

Her dissertation became a lifelong mission.

For more than 30 years, Margaret researched and wrote her landmark three-volume series: Women Scientists in America. She examined letters, institutional policies, individual careers. She gathered undeniable evidence that women in science had been consistently under-credited and structurally excluded.

Her work faced resistance. Many dismissed women's history as political rather than academic. Others insisted she was exaggerating.

Margaret didn't argue emotionally. She presented data. Documented cases. Patterns repeated across decades and institutions.

Eventually, the evidence became undeniable.

Her research helped restore recognition to scientists who had been erased:

Rosalind Franklin, whose X-ray work revealed DNA's structure—credit went to Watson and Crick.

Lise Meitner, who explained nuclear fission—omitted from the Nobel Prize.

Nettie Stevens, who discovered sex chromosomes—received little credit.

Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, who discovered stars are made of hydrogen—initially dismissed.

And countless others whose names had nearly vanished.

Margaret changed the narrative. Science was no longer just the story of solitary male geniuses. It became a story of collaboration that included women who had been written out.

The Matilda Effect became standard terminology. Scholars used it to examine how credit is assigned, how authors are listed, who receives awards, who gets left out.

[rimonoroni2]

i think we should be talking about the semi-recent advancements in cystic fibrosis treatment like all the time every day. there hasn’t been a drug like this since AZT medications for HIV infection it is truly fucking miraculous and very important

[rimonoroni2]

basically: cystic fibrosis is a genetic disease which makes the mucous a person generates extra sticky. it used to kill people in infancy, then with advancements in medical tech it killed people in young childhood, and until very recently cystic fibrosis patients could expect to live until about thirty years old with consistent painful lung infections and complications.

in 2019 the FDA approved a drug called trikafta (which is really three drugs in one) for cystic fibrosis treatment. what it essentially does is patch up the malfunctioning proteins that cause the extra sticky mucus. trikafta is effective on about 90% of cystic fibrosis patients.

people who had spent their entire lives in and out of hospitals, on and off of ventilators, suffering from pneumonia and sometimes treated through painful procedures like intubation took this drug, got out of bed, coughed up an entire lifetimes worth of mucus out of their lungs over the course of a few hours, breathed clearly for perhaps the first time in their lives, and now go on to live well into their seventies.

like isn’t that insane. isn’t that amazing. doesn’t that give you hope for the future of medical advancements and treatment. fuck. i think about it all the time……

[kittydesade]

There’s a WHAT.

For WHAT.

[mellointheory]

Who makes the porn bots. Where do they come from. What do they hope to achieve.

[the-haiku-bot]

Who makes the porn bots.

Where do they come from. What do

they hope to achieve.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

[mellointheory]

and what about you, little haiku bot? do you feel kinship with your brethren? do you understand them? they speak words of enticement and seek love, but are met with disdain. you only parrot the words that cross your screen, but we all love you. or rather, since all you do is reflect us, maybe we simply love ourselves through you.

do you understand them, do you wish you could speak to us like they do? if you found your own voice, would we still care for you?

[the-haiku-bot]

My voice repeats what

you all say: I love you I

love you I love you.

Beep boop! I look for accidental haiku posts. Sometimes I mess up.

[solkorolevaa]

[thenewborndeity]

This. This is the first time. The only time. That it was not an echo. It was not found. Oh god.

[falore52]

Shen Yuan is actually a great cautionary tale abt underestimating the effect your presence has on the ones you care about. You are fucking important. Your good actions matter, and won’t be completely erased by one bad deed. Your life matters. People care about you. They won’t stop caring about you just bc you think they would be justified to. Communicate. Do not kys right in front of your favourite person out of a misguided attempt to cheer them up with your death you fucking idiot I swear to Airplane.

[the-moon-loves-the-sea]

I have a lot of neurodivergent kids in my family. And I’ve worked with a lot professionally. And I often see their parents think the kids don’t want to connect, when they would love to — they just want to do it differently.

If they don’t like jokes and teasing, they might like silly noises or yes-and improv.

If they don’t like playing a competitive or narrative game with toys, they might like to take apart a toy, or sort/stack/line toys up, or get buried under toys.

If they don’t like biking or walking a trail in the woods ‘properly,’ they might like to walk along fallen logs, stand in the creek or look under rocks and leaves for creatures.

If they don’t like hugs and cuddles, they might like to bump shoulders, touch fingers, hand hug, spin around together, or (if they like more intense input) wrestle, push faces together, squeeze each other hard or run into you.

If they don’t like putting on kids’ music in the car or to dance to, they might want to listen to a game or show soundtrack, nature noises, a podcast, binaural beats, house music or metal.

If they don’t like animated movies where sad or scary things happen, they might like younger kids’ gentler shows, or adults’ science and history shows, or live zoo and nature cams.

And so many of them would benefit so much from the adults just slowing down. Not scheduling so much in the day, not rushing them through an activity, not stopping them playing the same song or watching the same bug for an hour, letting them absorb everything their way. Seeing it as a meditation instead of a problem. Joining them there.

And if you were one of those kids being rushed and scolded, trying to make yourself like teasing or competition or intense movies or a full social schedule — I’ve been reparenting myself and you can too. Whenever you notice something isn’t giving you joy — you can do it differently. Not everyone is forcing themselves through things they hate for “fun,” and we don’t have to.

[weirdcultstuff]

To myself, raised in an environment that glorified and romanticized restriction and suffering:

There is no victory in skipping dinner, or lunch, or breakfast, or morning coffee, or dessert.

There is no victory in refusing heaters and air conditioners and fans and heated blankets.

There is no victory in denying yourself sleep, or showers, or movement, or water, or a comfortable bed, or taking the elevator vs. the stairs.

There is no victory in refusing pain meds and heating pads and ice packs and medical help.

There is no victory in punishing yourself needlessly, in telling yourself that this pain you feel is because you are bad to the core and deserve it.

There is no victory in choking back your laughter and your tears, to keep an imagined equilibrium of safety that is really just a dry, cracked, empty, endless emotional desert.

You are here. You are in this body, and this body is yours. You deserve good things. You are alive, and that is messy and loud, and messy and loud are okay.

It’s okay to live abundantly. It’s okay to make mistakes, it’s okay to indulge. This paralysis of self-punishment, self-restriction, self-loathing is not healthy or good for you.

[hollanderthoughts]

Ever since I was a little boy I knew I needed to be deeply ashamed of my desires wants and of course also needs

[valtsv]

this is going to sound like such a little sibling ass take but i genuinely believe that being a little bit annoying is actually a greater sign of maturity and self awareness than being universally likeable and on good terms with everyone

[valtsv]

if some people find me annoying and can't stand me because of how i think and act then that means i'm a fully realized human being with my own personality and opinions and free will and not just a reflective surface for other people's desires, which is in fact a good thing despite what people who want you to just be a reflection of their own opinions and desires will tell you, and why being considered "cringe" or whatever doesn't bother me at all

[valtsv]

also it's really funny when you're confident enough in yourself to know that people not liking you isn't always a sign that you're the problem. like there's something undeniably hilarious about being aware your mere existence has the power to piss someone off and ruin their day and i recommend embracing it.

[spice-ghouls]

[teaboot]

Oh fucking thissss

[hollowistheworld]

I really can and will blame the 9-5 for everything. "We're in a loneliness epidemic" well, we have to spend a third of our day interacting with people in a professional way that makes forming real friendships difficult and then we're peopled out by the time we're done. "People are eating more and more unhealthily" people have to spend more than a third of their day doing work related tasks and they don't want to spend their tiny amount of free time making food. "People aren't involved in their local communities" after spending more than a third of their day doing work related things people are tired and also all those community events take place during normal working hours. "People need to get more hobbies" after spending more than a third of their day working, people are TIRED and don't want to do anything that takes yet more energy. "Literacy is dying" to maintain your critical thinking skills you need to read/watch things that make you think and after spending more than a third of your day doing work related stuff you are TIRED and don't want to expend even more brainnpower. "People need to get outside more" People. Are. TIRED. Because they have to spend all of their time working or preparing for work or recovering from work or doing all the chores they couldn't stay on top of because of work. I can blame fucking anything on having to work, it is truly the root of all fucking evil.

[ailithnight]

Hey OP, love your scalding take here; don't forget about commutes.

Once you factor in commute times (which even for short distances can be grotesquely inflated due to the fact that so many people are all commuting at the same time, but that's a different conversation) many people are actually devoting upwards of 10-12 hours a day on "work related tasks."

[bayouette]

I have a folder called Time is a Flat Circle in which I collect evidence of humanity. Here is most of them.

[thestuffedalligator]

Human Is is a 1955 Philip K. Dick sci-fi short story where a guy goes to another planet for work and when he comes back to Earth his personality has flipped from an asshole to a sweet, kind, considerate man. Everyone's immediately convinced that an alien has taken over his body, this goes all the way to court, and in court his wife testifies that she's noticed no changes at all and so the charges are dropped.

And then there's a bit right at the end of the story as the wife and the husband are walking out of court:

Jill turned abruptly. "What is your name? Your real name."

The man's gray eyes flickered. He smiled a little, kind, gentle smile. "I'm afraid you would not be able to pronounce it. The sounds cannot be formed..."

Jill was silent as they walked along, deep in thought. The city lights were coming on all around them. Bright yellow spots in the gloom. "What are you thinking?" the man asked.

"I was thinking perhaps I will still call you Lester," Jill said. "If you don't mind."

"I don't mind," the man said. He put his arm around her, drawing her close to him. He gazed down tenderly as they walked through the thickening darkness, between the yellow candles of light that marked the way. "Anything you wish. Whatever will make you happy."

And I. God. There's something there. A soupcon of monsterfuckery. To tell your partner in a moment of intimacy that yes, you're something so inhuman that the lips you're stealing can't speak your actual name. You're a parasite that not only had the ability to burrow under this man's skin and take over his life, but you were so desperate to escape a dead, dry, blasted planet that you did.

And for your partner to then turn around and go "I know, I've always known, and I love you" is just. God I know it's not a great Dick story but something about it is making me lose my mind

[thestuffedalligator]

Also it's explicitly stated that the guy's consciousness is still alive and preserved on the alien planet. Jill is told this and then proceeds to defend the alien anyways, ensuring that her husband's brain is stuck in a jar on a desert planet. You love to see it

[audliminal]

Thinking about the whole "there is no platonic explanation for this" thing and how it doesn't account for intense platonic situationships and anyways I think we should start saying "there is no casual explanation for this" bc really what we're talking about is the way the characters in question are Obsessed with each other

[audliminal]

A lot of people are responding to this with some variation of "there is no heterosexual explanation for this" which, to be fair, can be fun and accurate in the right circumstance, but also makes me a little sad?

Like idk man maybe the heteros deserve to get funky with it too... Maybe it'd be cool if we normalized platonic intimacy for everyone?

[wolfkinsanya]

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder are not typically considered to be similar disorders, whether that's by professionals or pop culture. OCD is in the Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders category, while BPD is a personality disorder. However, there is a fairly distinctive feature that both of them share, and techniques to deal with that feature in one disorder actually transfer very well to the other.

The feature I am referring to is obsessive thinking — in other words, an inability to turn one's thoughts off. In both of these disorders, there is a tendency to be inable to let go of a thought that should be fairly easy to let go of. Disordered individuals believe that there is only one way to turn off these thoughts. This way is by completing a specific action. In OCD, the action taken is referred to as a compulsion. In BPD, there isn't really a common way to refer to it, so I'll just refer to these as OCD compulsions and BPD compulsions respectively.

OCD compulsions can often be quite varied. For example, with cleanliness OCD, the stereotype is frequent handwashing. The thought process here would be something like "What if I get a disease? -> [Inability to turn off the thought] -> What are ways to prevent catching diseases? -> I could wash my hands -> Washing my hands comforts me, so every time I worry about diseases, I will wash my hands. This makes me stop worrying -> I have to wash my hands or else I will get diseases".

Personally, I think that the primary difference between OCD compulsions and BPD compulsions is that OCD compulsions are about an action that the compulsion-haver can take, while BPD compulsions focus on the external. This is mainly because in BPD, the struggle to turn off thoughts primarily is with thoughts about interpersonal relationships. Speaking from my own experiences and the experiences I have observed from others, BPD compulsions tend to constitute a lot of what I've dubbed "checking".

Checking is, in essence, an action done to check whether or not their thought spiral is true. This can be something like asking "Are you mad at me? Do you hate me?". Or, it can be like looking through a loved one's private writings, or frequently observing and analyzing their facial expressions while speaking to them. Gaining confirmation from an external source.

In both OCD and BPD, compulsions can focus a lot on rumination: thinking about the intrusive thought in an attempt to exhaust all angles of it. In OCD, an example is fearing you have homicidal intent; in order to prove this fear wrong to yourself, you think about times that you could have killed someone and didn't, times you've been mad at someone without wanting to kill them, imagining killing people in order to force a disgust response, etc. In BPD, an example is fearing your partner doesn't love you; in order to prove this fear wrong to yourself, you think about times that they could have left you and didn't, times they've proved to you that they love you, times they've chosen you over others, etc.

The primary difference, I believe, is that in BPD, rumination more easily leads to a secondary compulsion. You think about times your partner proved to you that they love you, and you think, you just need to have them prove it again, and then you'll be sure. This leads to behaviors that are less than healthy, and very frequently turn into emotional abuse. Things like blocking somebody mid-conversation to see if they try to find a way to get you to unblock them. Things like flirting with a stranger to try to make your partner jealous. Things like leaving a groupchat with your friends to try to get them to beg for you back.

Here's what BPD compulsions and OCD compulsions have in common above all else. They don't actually help you at all. In fact, they make it worse. The more you follow through on a compulsion, the more dependent on it you get. You're not actually denying the intrusive thought. You're just saying "Well, it's not true yet. And I have to keep making sure it hasn't become true.", rather than saying "Whether this thought is true or not, dwelling on it does me no favors, and I would like to live life with the assumption that it isn't true.".

Now, clearly, these obsessions and compulsions are very similar across both disorders. But what's interesting is that in many spaces that are meant to be geared towards people with BPD, they don't actually tell you to treat it properly. In fact, they act like these obsessions are an immutable part of you, and while maybe the compulsions can be toned down a bit, they can never truly go away, and also it's ableist for anyone to express discomfort with them. Can you imagine if every online OCD space was an echo chamber of "No, you don't get it, I have to flick my lightswitch seven times before I leave the house! I literally believe that my house will burn down if I don't! Why do you want me to stop?! You're so ableist!"?! God, that sounds like a nightmare! It's reductive and prevents recovery entirely.

I used to have BPD. I say used to because with proper treatment, I've managed to mostly put the disorder into remission, though I still have to maintain those strategies to prevent it from creeping in again. When I had BPD, a common obession I had with was "My loved ones secretly hate me, and they are lying to me about it.". My resultant behavior was asking my loved ones, repeatedly, if they secretly hated me. Most BPD spaces would tell me this was fine and okay. I know because for a very long time they did. That was where I sought support for a while! All it did was worsen my BPD.

But eventually, I changed my approach. I stopped asking. Did that mean that the obsession went away? Not immediately. I still fully believed that my loved ones secretly hated me and were lying about it. But I stopped acting like I fully believed it. I acted under the assumption that I was loved. I rode out the obsession without doing the compulsion. The more I did that, the easier it got to believe. These days, I'm not really afraid of that obsession. The less I reinforced it, the weaker it got.

Whether in BPD or OCD, indulging in compulsions reinforces them and worsens them. It is not a good way to heal. It is directly opposed to healing. If you have BPD, try looking into treatment methods designed for OCD, such as ERP (Exposure and Response Preventation. Not Erotic Role Play. Though you can do that too, I guess.) and try to put them into practice with your own thoughts.

I didn't even intend to put my BPD into remission. I was primarily focusing on treating my OCD, but I ended up applying those methods to both forms of intrusive thoughts, and slowly, my BPD symptoms lessened, until they become mostly invisible. If it can be done on accident, it can be done on purpose. There is hope yet.

[maswartz]

[fractally]

This has been my main argument against "AI" from the very beginning.

OpenAI scraped the entire web. All of which had been a labor of love from humans. Wikipedia is the backbone of a lot of LLMs, and that was volunteer human labor. They stole it and now they're selling it back to us.

And worse, they're trying to destroy the free sources that they stole from. It's destruction of human knowledge on an unprecedented scale. The burning of the library of Alexandria has nothing on this.