Togetherness

Chronic lurker syscourser. ₊･˚⊹✨About🪐⊹˚･₊

[cambriancrew]

We've brought this up a few times before but I really think that terminology describing littles and their relationship to their age would be helpful. The terms we use are age aligned and age unaligned. Age aligned littles, like our little Alice, are as close as possible to being actually the age they identify as while still being in an adult brain. Age unaligned littles, like our Sunni used to be*, only look young, feel young, act young, or otherwise have an internal age that does not match their actual capabilities and level of understanding.

There's just as much a problem with treating all littles as age aligned, as there are problems with treating all littles as age unaligned.

=====

*She's still younger than the body by a significant amount, but no longer a little, just a younger adult.

[sophieinwonderland]

i hope the radnormal person recognizes that they are literally the person saying "of course i'm normal! i don't have to act faggy just because i'm gay" in that picture explaining what is not reclamation.

🤣

That is too perfect!

That's exactly what the 'normals are doing!

And also, thank you so much for that image! I hadn't seen it before, but I imagine I'm going to get some use out of that in the future.

[alpha-miku]

I am not transDID.

My whole identity label hinges on the fact that my plurality is not disordered. My participation in many facets of tulpa community depend on being non-disordered.

This is why so much of syscourse will never go anywhere. It hinges on accepting that plurality isn't inheritly disordered, and many people just don't understand how that could be possible. So, to them, we're faking a disorder.

Blagh.

[cambriancrew]

When people say they were born plural, it's in the same sense that people say they were born gay or born to be a writer. People aren't literally saying they had same sex attraction the day they took their first breath. Nor are they saying they were writing stories before they could hold a crayon.

They're saying "This is innate to who I am. I have been this way as long as I can remember. I cannot be any other way."

That's the same thing we protogenics are saying.

We Willows obviously did not exist as separate minds from the moment we were born.

But we've been this way going back to our earliest memories - which go back pretty far, earlier than most people have memories. We did a lot of memory review and training from early childhood and that helped.

Anyway.

We DO have spiritual beliefs that include us being four souls from the time of ensoulment (which we disagree on when exactly happened - conception? First heartbeat? First breath?) but that's a separate view from that of what we normally talk about with our plurality, which we do from a psychological standpoint. We don't argue our spiritual beliefs outside of our system. We might, if you catch us on a good day, explain those. Today is not a good day. (Just normal-for-us chronic illness things, nothing to do with syscourse!)

[sophieinwonderland]

Okay but... That's not true at all!

And like, at a certain level, you have to know that's not true!

The first tag on your post is "anti tulpa"!

It's pretty well known by now, even in sysmed circles, that our community started completely disconnected from the general plural community. The first tulpamancers started over on 4Chan before broadening to other websites!

Daemonism also developed independently, a practice which was inspired by His Dark Materials. And long before that, we had soulbonders.

Non-traumagenic plurality has independently been discovered many times in many different forms!

So hate to inform you, but if none of you were here, we still would be!

[neiviele]

Also soulbonding too! And otherkin multiples/hosts - they did take a lot from the natural multiple community at the time but even then a lot of their experiences were spiritual/non-traumagenic in nature. All of these communities would have existed with or without the CDD community!

[syscourse-scientist]

question for people of all syscourse stances: if someone was psychotic and experienced their hallucinations as coming from other people, specifically the same few other people, would you consider this to be a plural/system experience? if not, what differentiates this experience from a plural/system whose alters/parts don't front, in your opinion?

EDIT: i'm not implying that they're the same, i'm just curious about why exactly you personally believe they aren't or are! thank you all for sharing your thoughts :P

[neiviele]

It depends on how they experience it coming from other people. Other physical people (as in telepathic communication?) Probably not. If they mean just other people they can't see or feel, maybe.

But then it leads to the question, are they psychotic or are they just wrong about how they're interpreting things? (Since many clinical plurals get misdiagnosed with psychosis because they don't describe their alters in "the right way" or because they experience it in a non-typical but otherwise plural way. I would argue they're plural, but also it depends and should be determined on a case by case basis.

[alpha-miku]

"Corporations discovering plurality would be a good thing"

☝️No. Probably not.

1. "There's nowhere to buy plural pride merch." Alt community merch should stay in alt communities. Buy your plural merch from plural people on Etsy or make it yourself. The heart and passion of artists will always be better than the soulless reproductions of corporations.

2. "The "big debate" would stop being an issue bc brands would be pro-endo!" Did queer discourse get better after corporations picked up queer pride? No. It didn't. The "big debate" in syscourse wouldn't cease to exist, it would become publicized. Do you want random singlets flocking to your system spaces to oogle you? To ask invasive questions while you're trying to live life? I certainly don't.

3. "We would get more media recognition." Idk about traumagenic systems, but as a tulpamancer I don't want big media companies to try to tackle the complexities of my life and practice. I don't trust them with that. Bigger media companies can't even portray DID in a respectful way, how can I expect them to do so for any other plural identity?

While I would love a world where plurality is more widely recognized, getting the concept picked up by big corporations comes with downsides that have poisoned other communities in a recognizable pattern. I don't want that to happen to this community.

[neiviele]

Hey, hope you don't mind me syscoursing back?

1. I actually agree with that, but as it stands there's not many plurals doing that right now (possibly due to syscourse suppressing creativity???) and some plural merch can't be made by hand by just anybody due to most people lacking the technology (I for example cannot make a sterling silver plural symbol as I am not a metalworker, but would gladly buy from someone who could!) If I want certain plural merch I'm either going to have to invest in learning the trade to make it (unfeasible for me personally, in reference to silver jewelry) or I would have to go to a person who can make it. But if they get many requests for that plural merch and they start making it en masse, they would (if it kept selling) have to sell it to a corporation, if it were that popular and they wanted to keep making more money (ex. putting it in stores like Walmart or Amazon), which many sellers do if they get that big.

2. I would say it actually did? At least nowadays I don't see as much "nonbinaries are fake" or "bisexuality isn't real" talk from inside the community, and if I do it's from fringes of the community or wider society, not as much mainstream. Even though the in-community discourse is now stuff like "is transandrophobia real?" and "TME/TMA" stuff, LGBT+/queer people are more accepted now in Western society overall. The debates have gotten more meta, but I think it's still so much better than it used to be.

Also, with regards to "singlets coming to gawk at us and ask invasive questions" they kinda do that now, just in smaller numbers. However if corporations actively showed support for it it would imply that we are worth caring about (as in actively supporting) and that we're not just what the stereotypes say.

3. The way I was thinking about it, just having the symbols in the store would lead to a conversation, because people would notice it and ask "who are these plurals?" Corporations supporting it implies that this is a somewhat serious identity they chose to take a gamble on financially, so it might lead media companies to follow suit and also take us seriously. Right now a lot of people either see plurality as DID (so a pathology they don't take seriously) or roleplaying, imaginative young adults (which they also don't take seriously). So there's no real reason for them to take plurality seriously, especially when shock value sells more than anything else.

But a corporation actually investing in this stuff (and actually having products sell) signals that it is important, and these people are a significant portion of society to take note of. Like, Target would have to have a pretty good reason for having a section of its store dedicated to plural jewelry or children's clothing for adult-bodied littles. There would have to be a good reason people are buying this stuff, and they would have to take it seriously.

Also the way I see it the media will tackle us eventually, we might as well aim for the best case scenario instead of hiding and hoping they never find us.

[neiviele]

Probably a (slightly unserious) hot take, but I think corporations discovering the plural community would be a good thing:

There'd be plenty of plural pride to buy. Right now you can only get it from a few select vendors on Etsy (or Amazon, if you're buying ampersand products) but it'd be nice to be able to buy plural merch anywhere in the world, or get a plural necklace as a gift like how couples in those holiday advertisements do

Syscourse would likely die out as corporations would be pro-endo (as most corporations want to get as many people as they can buying their stuff) and in all likelihood if corporations started advertising their stuff at us we'd likely argue about that instead, so it's a win-win

We'd get more media recognition that way, if that is a thing people want (I know some plurals want us to be more well-known, and I think a store selling plural merchandise would prompt good-faith questions instead of the ones that arise from media coverage. We'd basically be doing things in reverse here)

(If you're wondering how you could even get plural merch into a store without being well known, as long as there's a demand for it, or an established seller makes a move and decides to sell it, it could go through.)

[sophieinwonderland]

I think one thing that really blows a hole into the sysmed narrative of who the hate group is has been which side actively has to make stuff up and to lie in order to fake being persecuted.

I recently saw a blog talking about endogenic systems allegedly calling traumagenic systems "traumoids."

This is a term that... As far as I can tell, doesn't exist.

They claim it does. Maybe somebody saw it once in a discord server or a sysmed sent themselves a hate anon using the term once. I have no idea where this came from because I can't find it on searches on Tumblr or on Google aside from sysmeds claiming that it's a thing.

And if I can't find the source for it, I also do want to point out that there would be no telling if it was from an endogenic system or just a traumagenic pro-endo, if it wasn't completely made up.

This is always something that I found rather unfair about the term "traumascum." That particular term is one that actually is real, although sysmeds love to use it to affirm their persecution complexes far more than it has ever actually been used by pro-endos. And it's a term that has been largely condemned by the vast majority of the endogenic community, AND it was coined by a traumagenic system!

A traumagenic pro-endo coins an offensive term. The endogenic community largely condemns it. And somehow the endogenic community gets blamed for it.

Respectfully, I'm out here arguing for the validity of endogenic systems because we are one and people like us need to have our voices heard. A traumagenic system calling another traumagenic system a mean name isn't my problem. Nor is it the problem of endogenic systems anywhere!

It's not my job or the job of other endogenic systems to go out and start policing traumagenic on tramagenic hate speech.

But despite the fact the term traumascum is well known to have originated with a traumagenic system, and despite the fact that it's been condemned by actual endogenic systems, somehow endogenic systems like ourselves end up getting the blame for this. That's because even when a sysmed learns where the term came from, they never bother correcting it within their own communities. Their communities are built on hate, hate for systems like ours, and they cannot ever allow the truth to get in the way of that.

Sysmeds are so desperate to portray themselves as the persecuted ones, and endogenic systems like ours as the persecutors, so they have to constantly make up lies about our community or blame us for things traumagenic systems did.

[sophies-filter]

This isn't how "natural" is used in these contexts though...

It's used to contrast "environmental." PTSD isn't natural. It's a response to one's environment.

It's natural as the term would be used in a nature vs nurture debate.

Now, "natural" plural wasn't a good catch-all for all non-traumagenic systems because like, someone with a ghost from another universe in their body is clearly on the supernatural end of the spectrum. And of course, systems like ours that are intentionally created (sort of) aren't really "natural" either. The capacity was natural, but the system itself only exists because of environmental factors.

It's not a good term as it was used for a number of reasons, but it does accurately describe the protogenic systems who report always being plural.

[cambriancrew]

I think it's important to keep pluralphobia as a term. It is definitely under the ableism and saneism umbrella, but it has its own nuances and those are important to talk about.

If it weren't important to talk about the specifics, we wouldn't have specific terms for different kinds of bigotry. We'd just call it all bigotry, and claim that sexism, racism, ableism etc are terms that shouldn't exist.

But those specifics ARE important.

Pluralphobia isn't just ableism. It's specifically a subtype of ableism against the idea of being many individuals in the same body and brain, regardless of whether you experience other symptoms of CDDs or whether you identify as plural or not. I do think a better, more inclusive term could be coined, but it's what we have now and I think it's, for now, a good enough term to use in discussions.

When people are afraid because they think you're demon possessed, that's pluralphobia.

When people think you must have a headmate that's hiding murderous intent, that's pluralphobia.

When people ask gross invasive personal questions like if you have a super kinky headmate, that's pluralphobia.

When people assume that by saying you're plural you must be so delusional you can't take care of yourself, that's pluralphobia.

Yes, those are all ableist. They're also a particular kind of ableism specific to the experience of being many individuals in the same body and brain.

And yes, we've experienced all of those and more, and being able to discuss that particular type of ableism is important so we can properly combat it, and so we can unite together with other people who've experienced it.

[sophies-filter]

These are not actual .gov websites!

The actual .gov domain is just ".gov" not "gov.sz" or "gov.zw".

.gov as a domain is exclusive to the United States government and cannot legally be used by other countries.

Also, a government website's reliability depends entirely on the agenda of that government. Some may be trustworthy, but it would be pretty stupid to put blind faith into nations that are known for spreading fake propaganda and lying to their citizens.

If we're just focusing on the US, that's just supporting Nazis who are running it. But if you include the knock-off government sites, then there are tons of fascist nations and theocratic dictatorships! Should we trust the CCP's gov.cn site? Israel's gov.il?

What started this was sysmeds arguing that you can't trust .com sources and should only trust .gov (and .edu) sources. That was problematic enough when it was just about the actual .gov domain in the United States. But if you're expanding it to ALL countries, that's even worse!

More than anything though, I find the insistence that .gov websites are super reliable because you can just trust governments so much to be a bootlicker mentality.

And sysmeds should go do some self-reflection on why they're so desperate to lick the boots of big brother.

[singtiple]

Just read a very interesting fMRI study on non-disordered plurality. It's a peer-reviewed study that was published in 2019 to the scientific journal Medical Hypotheses, and worked on by 11 different researchers.

They scanned a small sample of people who, despite not having trauma or any mental health condition, developed distinct multiple identities during meditation. The brain scans showed activation patterns in some of the same areas of the brain that are also seen in DID as well as the dissociative symptoms of PTSD.

This supports the hypothesis that plurality exists on a continuum from healthy to disordered!

I'm super excited to see more studies like this in the future. It will be invaluable in deepening our understanding of plurality, dissociation, and the brain.

Here's a link to the study. From the abstract:

"In this study we report on five very uncommon 'hypnotic virtuosos' (HVs) free from any psychiatric disorder, spontaneously undergoing the emergence of multiple identities during neutral hypnosis; this allowed us to check the relationship between their experience and fMRI data. During hypnosis the subjects underwent spontaneous non-intrusive experiences of other selves which were not recalled after the end of the session, due to post-hypnotic amnesia. [...] Our results and their contrast with the available data on fMRI in DIDs allows us to draw the hypothesis of a continuum between the healthy mind – where multiple identities may coexist at unconscious level and may sometimes emerge to the consciousness – and DIDs[.]"

[cambriancrew]

For the record.

To a certain degree we ARE a public person, and when we become published authors will become even more so. Can't exactly hide under a paper bag or daft punk-esque helmet when doing readings at bookshops and book signings and conventions etc.

We're not shy about our personal history as it relates to plurality, and if the opportunity comes up we'll gladly talk about our plurality in further public interviews.

That's a risk we're willing to take for ourselves.

And this has been something we've considered since we were 15 and first deciding on a pen name.

And it's been something we've considered in recent years when thinking about changing our legal name. (Which, when we eventually get around to it, will not be to our pen name or a variation of such. Our mom thinks it will be though, and we'd like to keep her thinking that way, for a variety of reasons. Mostly that arguing over our name change with her is exhausting. She can call us whatever, even our birth name, don't care enough to fight it for the umpteenth time. She's not even our biomom and yet we inherited her stubbornness, but at some point you have to learn to pick your battles.)

However. This is a risk WE chose to take.

Other people in syscourse *have not*.

And being a creep and bragging about having private info gained by being a creep is not a good look. Sharing how you found it where other worse creeps can find it is not a good look. Implying you could doxx people but won't, when you've shared private info before so who's going to trust you with this? Again, not a good look.

It honestly feels to me that certain people got so addicted to the headrush of digging into the details of Sunny and Mitsuki that now they're looking for their next target.

How about we just don't target anyone??? Be a good person???

[cambriancrew]

"Oh I'm not threatening to doxx you. I'm just pointing out that I have the ability to and already know things like your real name etc that I could release at any time. Not that I'm going to but I coooould. Oh and now I've pointed out ways other people could do it but I'm innocent I swear."

That's not innocent, that's genuinely creepy, dangerous behavior.

If you genuinely cared to help, you'd point out dangerous things in private and you wouldn't use them to dig up private info. And you wouldn't point out things where people who are more malicious could use them to cause actual harm.

To you it's a game. To anyone else, that's creepy and dangerous - and even more so because you view it as a game.

[cambriancrew]

Just a friendly little reminder to everyone in general and @sysmedsaresexist in particular:

Doxxing with the intent to cause harm or emotional distress is a crime in the United States.

Tumblr has a lot of information on you including your precise location based on your IP address and, if you've set up two factor authentication, they have your phone number which can be used by law enforcement to get information from your mobile phone service provider to track your name and address, and will give that information to law enforcement if you commit a crime. And not only that, but even for prepaid carriers that don't have your address, things like people you've called and texts you've sent and received are also things that can be gotten in a subpoena.

Tumblr, like all companies that operate in the US, has to comply with subpoenas.

And if you log in with your email and your email has two factor authentication on it, your phone number can be subpoenaed from your email provider too.

Also, threatening to doxx someone can be reported to Tumblr.

Have the day you deserve.

[sysmedsaresexist]

Everyone is doxxable

It's not a threat, it's a statement about any of us-- you, me, them, them too

Syscourse is an extremely volatile space-- we've seen that in the released chat logs

Don't EVER let your guard down online, especially in discourse spaces, don't let your ego get so big that you think you're above it

It's terrifying what technology is capable of, Google lens specifically has a thing for glasses

Here's some things you can do to protect yourself:

1. When someone calls you a lonely loser on the internet, don't post a picture of you and your partner and a house in the back just to prove you're getting some, it's not worth it (or any other variation of this scenario, don't rise to the bait)

1.5. Don't post like a hundred other photos of yourself on your public discourse account, you make a lot of people very angry, this is a terrible idea

2. Don't post a near identical photo of your business photo to your discourse account, I don't think it's good for business anyways, those aren't people you want as clients

3. Don't put that you're in the process of changing your name to your well-known pen name on your real life Facebook with your current name on it (what are you going to do when that IS your legal name??? How does that work?)

4. Don't have a documentary made about yourself, the producer will likely go on to share more than you want them to (that's what Laura calls it)

5. Don't do multiple amas about yourself that can be referenced years later

6. Don't share pertinent information about when, where, and what position you used to work to win arguments

6.5. Don't put your real location on your profile if you've been legally certified in any way, past or present (this is genuine real advice)

7. Don't claim to be undoxxable

Most importantly

Don't do all of the above and then be like

When someone points out you've shared something dangerous

Like okay, you telling on yourself?

"I posted something somewhere I shouldn't have and someone noticed, help"