To be completely clear about my position: Racism is bad and the police are being incredibly terrible right now.
I could make many more strident statements, but in the interest of my own mental health and that of others:
Feeling guilty is not a form of activism.
Spending all your time checking your privilege is not itself virtuous. Guilting other people by saying that "if you aren't spending all your time thinking about this, you are a bad person" is not effective praxis. In my experience, it leads to people getting stuck in guilt spirals. Triggering someone else's OCD episode is not helping the world.
I think guilt-as-an-end-in-itself is a remnant of Puritan culture, a form of self-punishment that you were supposed to engage in because you were afraid of God. I can't be sure of this, and even if I was, I don't know how I'd back it up with citations. But my parents were Asian immigrants, so I inherited a rather different set of neuroses, and this is what I see.
Human brains were not built to watch helplessly as people suffer far away. Bystander PTSD is a thing that exists. It is OK to pull back and focus on what you can control in your life. It is OK for you to take care of yourself and the people around you. We need to support each other emotionally, too.
It's a lot of work - real work - to be trans, to deal with PTSD, to have chronic health issues. If you, like me, are severely depressed, if you have OCD, if you have CFS/ME, if all you can manage to accomplish on a good day is rolling out of bed and you're lucky if you manage to cook an actual dinner: Existing while disabled, continuing to live and find occasional moments of joy despite being "objectively unproductive", is already a protest. You are defying capitalism and ableism by continuing to exist.
As the information leaflet in an airplane says, you need to put on your own oxygen mask first before you help others. Otherwise you will pass out and be useless for both yourself and anyone else.
Please take care of yourself. Please take care of each other.
A lot of the people I know with very serious mental illnesses end up living pretty ordinary lives around experiences that other people find unthinkably, unendurably horrifying. “I don’t want anything more than death, and I’m not sure if I’m going to make tofu with peanut sauce or rice with kale and yams for dinner.” “I believe I am an Evil Overlord, worse than Hitler, and I am cleaning the cat’s litterbox.” “Every time I look in the mirror I want to vomit, and I’m so excited about the new Marvel movie.” “The demons are telling me to draw pentagrams on the walls, and my mom forgot to buy tampons.” Eventually, the Worst Thing just becomes an everyday annoyance.
And the thing is… that’s hopeful. Because it means that if the Worst Thing happens you can cope. People have coped with what you’re going through and worse for thousands of years. You will get used to it. Normal life goes on. Most of the time, when you say “if this happens my life wouldn’t be worth living!”, your life can still be worth living, if you choose to make it so. Your life might not be as happy as it could have been. It might suck. But it can still be worth living.
– “Radical Acceptance”, by Ozymandias @ thingofthings
(Why am I posting this now? Why am I posting this here? Someone asked me what the premise of Glitch was. And to me? It’s this.)
I'm starting to understand why I haven't been able to write for the blog recently, and I think maybe it's because I outgrew Replay Value.
I'm not exactly sure when it happened. But this is something that happened at some point: I lost the urge that drove me to write stories of tragedy.
I started to understand that people could be there, that I could be really and truly safe, that it was possible to heal some of the wounds, and in the process my internal narrative changed. I started to have a different template for "how a story is supposed to go", and I started using it.
This was not an unexpected development. This is stuff I worked for, in therapy and roleplay and writing, and I deliberately pulled myself open to let these kinds of things enter in. I am still doing so.
And yet this change of narrative was not what made Replay Value stop being compelling. Because there was something else holding me to it too.
One of my greatest dysfunctions, in the past few years, has been that my brain believes that everything having to do with Replay Value AU was fundamentally my fault. RV Classic factionizing and breaking? My fault. The forum going stale from disuse? My fault. GGTG not writing anymore? My fault. (It goes on like this for a while.)
So I couldn't very well abandon Replay Value. I felt a responsibility and an obligation. And for a long time I carried that weight.
I remember that I put a passage, in the beginning of the book, about how I was scared of recovery because it would mean that the stories I could tell might change.
This - this outgrowing - is what I was afraid of, when I said that.
But the circumstances are different enough that I'm okay with that now.
And I think what changed is that I feel like I've made up for what I've done. I can see people using what I wrote. GGTG himself told me that it was incredible that I managed all of this. A lot of people from RV Classic found me again, and I put them back in contact with each other.
Most of all, though, I've preserved the qualities of the setting that made it so important to me. I've mixed in some of who I've become, since - there's research and information there that I wished I could have started out with - but the center of it... I think that the center of it is intact. Because I can see what kind of people look at Replay Value and are compelled to play with it, now, and I know them.
Replay Value showed me a reason to live, even when I couldn't comprehend that a way out existed. I wanted to preserve that. And if it can be that lifeline for anyone else, then spending two years writing a book will have been worth it.
I guess that explains why my motivation ran out when it did. Everything necessary for the book got written, so as far as that part of my brain is concerned, the book is done. (Mind you, some of the last bits are ones that I've only written into the local copy on my computer; I'm going to need to generate a new PDF, at the very least.)
I did say I was going to do editing and layout. I did say I was going to add illustrations. I don't know if I am still capable or willing to do either of these things, because the driving force that let me do this project is gone.
As to whether I'm keeping this blog, I'm currently thinking about refocusing on wider tabletop-related stuff. But I'm not sure if my brain will let me pull it off, given that the name of this blog and everything is pretty deeply tied into the Replay Value stuff.
...I'll try to still be here. But I can't promise.
Also, I am writing again because I am finally on enough antidepressants again. This should last for a while; considering that my last antidepressant Randomly Stopped Working after two years, it probably won't last forever, but I'll worry about that if it happens.
(Randomly Stopping Working is something that sometimes happens with SSRIs, generally after taking them for a relatively long time. Some people seem to be immune to it. Other people seem to go through it especially often; the most often I've heard it happening is six months apart. But please don't worry about this until it happens. There are a lot of SSRIs in existence, so it isn't hard to deal with.)
In RV, if you are witness to horror or other things that may emotionally wound, you are subject to a miraculous attack by the setting itself. This does not preclude other cases of taking a Wound where "it didn't really happen", because I do still think that that kind of Wound exists too. But this is more specific.
Emotional trauma inflicted by the setting itself is a Bleak miraculous attack, from the campaign convention [Your mind will break before your body does.] It is a singular miracle (not a sustained action). However, since this is a Campaign Convention and thus an Affliction, it also has 2 Auctoritas!
You are allowed and encouraged to try to use miracles in retaliation, or in defense, but any such miracles must have Strike added to them in order to work.
This emotional attack comes in two levels:
Lesser
This is a level 3 miracle. If you do not defend against it, its effect is to put an Obstacle 2 in the way of doing anything other than "being emotionally hurt or talking about being emotionally hurt", which can only be removed by resolving an Issue.
If you choose to take a Wound instead, it is a Serious Wound, with the usual effects.
Greater
This is a level 6 miracle. If you do not defend against it, its effect is to put an Obstacle 2 in the way of doing anything other than "being emotionally devastated or talking about being emotionally devastated", which can only be removed by starting and resolving an Issue directly related to the traumatic experience itself. (Unlike with the Lesser version, you have to use an Issue that you started after this effect happened to you for it to count.)
If you choose to take a Wound instead, it is a Deadly Wound, with the usual effects.
Making Answer
Yes, this is a Bleak effect. Yes, you may attempt to Make Answer against it.
But.
Remember that this is a game that is dedicated to exploring these kinds of emotional effects without flinching. Remember that Making Answer is something that is ultimately under the control of the person creating the Bleak effect (in this case, the HG). And remember that Making Answer is a last resort, for when you have no other powers left to you.
If you are a Replayer, it is not special to have art, or a hobby, or family. Every Replayer has something to live for. That is simply a fact of how Replayers are built - I mean, the section in the Replayer lifepath for a "lifeline skill" is required to create a character at all.
So your job, if you choose to try to Make Answer, is to convince the HG - the world - that even if these things are not objectively special, your particular attachments are strong enough that you, specifically, may yet endure.
I cannot promise that this will work; because it probably won't, not in the kind of game that this is. I cannot even promise that this is better than not trying to defend at all; Sburb may simply choose to tie your proffered heartstrings together and use them to tear your entire heart out.
But courage is not only about stepping up to kill evil, or leading daring expeditions into the depths, or publishing a political manifesto.
Sometimes, deciding that you will live in the face of despair, and not just survive, is the most courageous thing you can do.
"What it comes down to," she said, "is that I'm raising someone's kid for them."
Carl looked her straight in the eye for the first time in a while. "And some heavy shit just went down," he said.
"Some very heavy shit, yes."
Carl nodded.
"It's so heavy," Miranda said, "that I don't even know if this girl is alive or dead."
Carl glanced up at the fancy old clock on the wall, its face yellowed from a century and a half's accumulation of tar and nicotine. "If she's alive," he said, "then she probably needs you."
-- The Diamond Age, Neal Stephenson
another Ritual
There is, as always in this game, a fundamental barrier between those outside a session and those inside a session. Because, if you are outside of a session that is going wrong, the only thing you can provide is your words. And if those are not enough...
...well. I have experienced that particular kind of helplessness many, many times; and I would not wish it on anyone.
This is a Ritual designed to be invoked during the Grand Melee, but if you replace “against the Black King” with some other target, you may be able to use it with other Rituals as well.
Characters who are inside the session in which the Grand Melee is happening are referred to as “those present”. Characters who are outside of the session in question, and who thus have no method other than their words to help, are referred to as “those not present”.
Anyone who is not present during the Grand Melee may invoke this Ritual by saying: “And we watch.” This adds everyone to the round-robin order.
Standard ritual actions for those not present are as follows:
You say "Pass" to skip your turn, if you don't think you can say anything relevant
You express worry and hope for those present against the Black King
You reflect on the relationship you have with one of those present in front of the Black King
You recall a time that you yourself took a Deadly Wound in a fight against a Black King, or (if you're referring to backstory from before the game started) an injury/sacrifice of comparable magnitude from a previous Black King fight
You encourage those present against the Black King to fight harder
As usual for Rituals, a Will surcharge is imposed on trying to do anything other than these specific actions.
The separation between you and those present is the usual Obstacle 2 and Auctoritas 2 imposed by session boundaries. During this ritual, it is also considered a Bleak effect. On your turn during the ritual, you may attempt to Make Answer against it...
...and if anyone present/fighting is Defeated by a Wound directly inflicted during the fight against the Black King, this barrier momentarily falls, allowing one of you to formulate an Intention or miracle that will be able to reach through for as long as you can sustain it. (You are allowed a bit of time to negotiate which one of you is doing it, but you can't take too long or the window closes.)
There will still be an Obstacle to attempting to, say, punch the Black King through your computer monitor. (Because duh.) And you can't gain Beats for those present; it is their fight alone. But you can cast Sburban Magics across the void, or create a helpful Bond for them to use, or try to summon some sort of shield to protect them.
Recently, I saw another post arguing that the existence of Hell (combined with Christian vilification of LGBT folks) proves that God is evil, and that rebellion against God is morally proper.
This is not an old argument. Even putting aside Gnosticism and Satanism, Mark Twain toyed with making a rather similar one - that Hell disproves God - in the climax of his bizarre, unfinished short story “The Mysterious Stranger”. And there are quite a few popular stories released recently - compelling stories with valuable things to say - which have chosen to cast God in the role of the wolf and devils in the role of an outside-context escape route.
Nor is it an argument we can simply dismiss, especially as Hell has traditionally been described by those who claim Christ’s sanction - that is, as a punishment imposed deliberately by God. Especially as common as it is for people to sell the wolf’s hunger or Procrustes’s hospitality as though it was God’s love.
...I do not like to think about Hell. I don’t even like to think about Heaven. I don’t post about them often here, certainly not in any detail. “The world to come”, the knowledge that death is not the end... these are a source of hope. But focusing on rewards and punishments, rather than the value and joy of goodness-for-its-own-sake, has always seemed to me like it puts the cart before the horse.
But that does not, on its own, answer the problem.
So instead, I suppose I should begin by saying that I, for one, do not believe in a God who deliberately condemns to eternal punishment.
I do not believe that the existence of Hell is, or can be, just.
Indeed, I can’t see how I could believe in such notions. The idea that there would be any earthly harm, no matter how great, which deserves Hell is gibberish to me. The idea (which I have even heard put forward from the pulpit) that one can deserve Hell merely by turning against God, based on some ad baculum sophistry like “the greater the authority, the greater the punishment for rebelling against it”, seems to go beyond gibberish into a direct attack on the nature of justice, and a slander against God’s holy name.
And yet, despite all that... I cannot bring myself to rule out the idea of Hell entirely. Jesus is too desperate in his ministry on Earth for the danger to be entirely illusory. So much of his preaching warns us that time is running out, both his and ours, and that beyond a certain point it will be too late to enter into the Kingdom. That there is something that can destroy both body and soul, and that this we should fear, more than any earthly danger. That wickedness, whether from individuals or from authorities, will bring disaster upon them, though not the sort of punitive lightning from heaven that many would assume.
I can only conclude that Hell must exist, as a matter of cause and effect. As some unavoidable logical consequence of the circumstances under which we currently exist.
I believe, also, that Jesus came to show us the way out. That the Good News which Jesus came to tell us is fundamentally about the way out. That the way out is to share in love (and thus, a desperate warning against hoarding what ought be shared), and to welcome outcasts in love (and thus, a desperate warning against condemnation, which creates new outcasts).
I’m not a theologian or a metaphysicist. I couldn’t even begin to speculate on how it works, the whys, the underlying cosmology that makes "the Way” the way out, opened by Easter, that escapes an inescapable corpse fire which would otherwise be too far away for even God to reach.
But I reject, utterly and absolutely, the idea that God ever wants or chooses to pile even one more body on that fire.
I reject, utterly and absolutely, the idea that Christianity ought to condemn people, especially for who they are. I reject, utterly and absolutely, the idea of a God who wants us to hate or ostracise, and I reject it no matter the underlying doctrine that claims to justify that conclusion.
How could I support it, when both my own conscience and Jesus's own words have warned against it? How could I, when the Good News tell us over and over that such a path will bring us only our own destruction?
