#personal essays

[academic-vampire]

Should I title my big, final portfolio like this?

[disillusioneddanny]

Substack

Hi friends, I have published a substack where I am now going to be sharing personal essays, commentary on fandom culture, original short stories, and poetry. If you'd like to support me in non fandom endeavors, please considering subscribing and supporting me. Right now it's all free and there is no obligation to pay anything.

I just want to see if I can do this writing thing beyond fanfiction and your support would mean a lot to me.

Subscribe to Dis

Click to read Dis, a Substack publication. Launched 21 minutes ago.

[misstatianaythumbtzen]

So… I Finally Read The Way He Made Me Feel

Disclaimer: This is just my personal reflection. This isn’t meant to prove or disprove anything — just to share how the book felt to me as a reader. I encourage anyone reading this to keep an open mind and read the book themselves if they’re interested.

I just finished reading The Way He Made Me Feel by Tatiana Thumbtzen, and honestly, it was heartbreaking. Not just because of the Michael Jackson parts, but because it’s really a first-person account of her life and emotions during that time. It didn’t feel like a polished autobiography — it felt raw, like you were reading someone’s diary, which makes sense since the book was based on her journals.

While reading it, I found myself putting myself in her shoes — more in a “this feels relatable” kind of way. We’ve all had moments where emotions take over and logic gets pushed aside, and I think that’s something a lot of readers can relate to here. For me, the book wasn’t really about Michael as much as it was about Tatiana — her experiences, her feelings, and her perspective.

You can tell the book wasn’t heavily QA’d or overly edited, and honestly, that made it feel more real to me. It’s messy at times, emotional, and not always perfectly clear — but that’s kind of the point. She wrote it from a place where her thoughts and feelings were all over the place, and I don’t think that makes her delusional or unreliable. It makes her human.

What really hurt to read was how often she seemed to be played, dismissed, or made to look foolish by people around her. I’m not saying this as someone “shipping” her and Michael and just because they're my favourite tandem or taking sides — I’m saying it from a place of empathy. I genuinely felt like she was taken advantage of at different points, and that’s hard to ignore. At the same time, I think she comes across as a strong and intelligent woman who survived a lot emotionally.

I’ll be honest: some parts of the book were confusing, especially timeline-wise. Because of that, I found myself reading forum discussions and other sources alongside the book just to better understand what she might have been trying to say. I’ve also only read excerpts from her other book, King of My Heart, so I’m taking everything with a huge grain of salt. Speculation is easy, but none of us were actually there.

That’s really the key point for me: this is her account, her experience, her truth. We don’t know everything that happened between her and Michael, or what else was going on in their individual lives, or who else may have been involved behind the scenes. Because of that, I think it’s important to approach the book with an open mind and not jump straight into judgment.

I also want to say, if you’re new and curious about the book, it’s available on Jetzi, and honestly, credit where credit is due for preserving and sharing Michael-related history, including this book.

At the end of the day, I don’t think this story needs to be endlessly dissected or turned into arguments. Tatiana and Michael were — and are — human beings, not characters. Whatever truly happened between them is something we may never fully know, and that’s okay. Respecting privacy, nuance, and humanity matters, especially when it comes to people who lived so much of their lives in the public eye.

[shazleen]

PROM QUEENS AND KILLER TEENS is a zine collecting art and short essays (by me!) reflecting on the teen movies that shaped me, and the innate monstrosity of girlhood.

I'm gonna be dropping a mini run of the zine & the PDF version on my shop this Friday!

[marthascharpingwrites]

Stepford AI, Women’s Sacrifice, and the Cycles We’re Expected to Accept

I recently read an essay that has stayed with me far longer than most online writing does.

“They Built Stepford AI and Called It Progress” by Abia Womosu examines how emerging technologies are not neutral innovations, but reflections of the cultural values already embedded in the systems that build them. In this case, the essay explores how AI is being shaped in ways that reward compliance, pleasantness, emotional labor, and erasure—qualities historically expected of women.

You can read it here: 🔗 https://abiawomosu.substack.com/p/they-built-stepford-ai-and-called?r=6f38r

What struck me most was not just the critique of technology, but the familiarity of the pattern. The language may be new. The mechanism may be digital. But the expectation is ancient.

That recognition connects directly to my own recent essay, The Ouroboros of Women’s Sacrifice: Breaking the Generational Cycle, where I explore how women are often taught—explicitly and implicitly—to contort themselves into systems that require their depletion to function. The ouroboros, the snake eating its own tail, felt like the only honest metaphor: sacrifice framed as virtue, endurance mistaken for destiny, and cycles that repeat because they are rarely named.

You can read my essay here: 🔗 https://marthascharpingwrites.wpcomstaging.com/2025/02/21/the-ouroboros-of-womens-sacrifice-breaking-the-generational-cycle/

Read together, these two pieces feel like they’re in conversation across time and medium. One looks forward at what we are building. The other looks backward at what we inherited. Both ask the same quiet but urgent question: who benefits when women are optimized for disappearance?

[roobylavender]

i am a fan of initially one-sided love stories not to excuse or encourage some idea of entitlement to another or on the other hand something akin to self-debasement, but because there is some tenderness in recognition. here is this one person who has taken the time to understand you without recompense without reprieve and all your life you go on thinking no one can hear you but they can hear you. they understand. they know. it may take you years to realize it but they have been here the whole time waiting for you to hear and understand and know yourself. waiting for you to be as kind to yourself as they hope they are to you. wading through the wreckage and saving of it what they can bc every piece is precious and worth holding onto. a curator's love. there's something weighty about it

[goblin--girrrl]

An introduction.

Hi! I'm goblin--girrrl, and this is my space for long, arguably enduring and borderline erratic ramblings. My interests include, but are by no means limited to: film, books, horror, dystopian media, fantasy, psychology, sociology, girlhood, and the internet. If any of that piques your interest, then please stay a while. I can't guarantee that anything I write will be grammatically correct (I have no excuse other than pure laziness), nor can I guarantee any form of consistency (I have no excuse other than laziness), but I can guarantee that what I do post will at the very least be entertaining. If I get anything wrong, please correct me! I love to learn more and will add addendums as and when I am corrected or find new information in the form of reblogs. And for now, that is all, so have fun, get cosy and (hopefully) enjoy my corner of the internet ☽⛤☾ goblin--girrrl

[hopeymchope]

Hope's Peak and... Whatever is Going on with the "Talents" They Study

Hope's Peak Academy! Where only the greatest talents are invited to focus on the areas in which they excel (and to be studied by the staff).

The people working at Hope's Peak Academy in Danganronpa (whether staff, scientists, or Steering Committee) are pretty consistently presented as being dedicated to researching and understanding the nature of talent. They talk like talent is this hazy concept that only certain people somehow possess, so they're out to crack the code of its mysterious origins.

We have top men working on the origins of talent right now. .... TOP. MEN.

Now, I know we all eventually learn just how much of a shitshow HPA was and how corrupt its primary operators were. But the evidence of their crimes is mostly focused on how they take their interest in "Talent" much too far. So long as it furthered the study of "talent," human experimentation, endangering the lives of students, and much, MUCH more were totally on the table as far as HPA's Steering Committee was concerned. Which is very bad, yes.

However! I think the issues with HPA's intentions ran even deeper. The people in charge weren't just corrupt; they were also stupid. And this is evidenced by many of the "talents" they identified and researched.

See, Hope's Peak makes no real distinction between the types of talent they identify and accept into their walls. Even though there's a MASSIVE DIFFERENCE between the talent of someone like Junko Enoshima vs. that of someone like Fuyuhiko Kuzuryuu. Y'know?

(I strongly doubt I'm the first to observe how bullshit some of these "talents" are. But since I can't find any other conversations about this on Tumblr, I'm going to move forward with making my own commentary. Sorry?)

BTW, consider this: If Komaeda were somehow born earlier and was an adult by the time the 77th Class entered HPA? He could've easily been one of the staff members putting Hajime into that metal coffin.

In descending order of "I can see why they were interested" to "WTF is this," here are the four core types of Super High School-Level "Talents" that Hope's Peak Academy welcomes within its hallowed halls:

(DISCLAIMER: I include V3 students as some of the examples cited below. YES, I know they don't attend Hope's Peak in their game's main storyline. However, they attend Hope's Peak in both UTDP and DRS. That's good enough for me; you can always ignore those examples if you disagree.)

CATEGORY (A) Talents that seem to come innaately/naturally to those who have them. These are either your wunderkind types, or they otherwise gained their talent seemingly overnight. — (e.g., Yasuhiro Hagakure, Junko Enoshima, Nagito Komaeda, Miu Iruma)

My Thoughts: Okay, SURE. I get why you'd want to study how this can happen and where these kinds of skills come from. No notes.

CATEGORY (B) Talents that are developed over a lifetime of practice and/or hard work. Most Hope's Peak students we know about seem like they slot into this category. — (e.g., Nekomaru Nidai, Mikan Tsumiki, Kaede Akamatsu)

My Thoughts: My first reaction is "What is there to study/research about this?" Do the Hope's Peak staff not know that working on something for a long time can make you get way better at that thing? Y'all reminding me of Hajime in the now-classic @reddpenn comic where he is legitimately shocked to learn people can gain skills through practice. :P But HOLD UP; let's give them the benefit of the doubt here for a sec. Perhaps Hope's Peak's personnel are wondering why only some practitioners of these talents can reach such a noteworthy level of skill by the time they're teenagers? That's the most reasonable conclusion to draw about the inclusion of these students.

CATEGORY (C) Talents that are only noteworthy because these students demonstrated some above-average skill relative to their age or because they garnered attention through one specific incident. In other words: These individuals aren't nearly as exceptional as those in the previous two categories of talent, but at least they seem pretty decent at what they're being identifed for? — (e.g., Mahiru Koizumi, Shuichi Saihara, Kaito Momota)

My Thoughts: I hope I'm being clear enough about what I mean by this category. But if not, I'll try to clarify: Shuichi was supposedly recognized for his talent solely because he caught one murderer. Mahiru's photography is almost solely portrait photography and therefore not particularly noteworthy to most photographers; she's just pretty good at the one thing she happens to do. (And in truth, her mom's reputation probably played a role in her own Hope's Peak invite.) Kaito being able to pass a basic Astronaut screening exam at a younger age than is usually allowed is neat, but it's not like he's been an exceptional trainee or even gone into space; he's just the "Ultimate Astronaut" because he cheated his way into taking a test early and did surprisingly well at it. Maybe we're meant to think "Oh, Kizakura or whoever could somehow tell these students have the innate potential to be truly spectacular" or somesuch?? But that interpretation requires putting a lot of faith in this questionable-ass system (and the one HPA scout we're familiar with — a known alcoholic). Do these people REALLY demand further study? Is there ACTUALLY anything to be gained by learning about their "talents"??? I... can't see it, y'all. I don't get it.

CATEGORY (D) Talents that aren't even really a talent at all, they're just a position/title someone gained by being born. — (e.g., Fuyuhiko Kuzuryuu, Sonia Nevermind, Keebo)

LIVE HINATA REACTION

My Thoughts: Okay, so MAYBE Sonia was recognized by Hope's Peak as the the absolute pinnacle of refinement and royal behavior or something? But I kind of doubt it based on her actual behavior (and weird interest in serial killers) in DR2. And there's no way in hell that Fuyuhiko is the baddest-ass Yakuza, even among teenagers. You scratch that kid slightly. and you get the babychild undernearth. And Keebo? His talent is HIS OWN EXISTENCE. His "talent" is actually just his creator's talent, FFS. He's not even "High School"-AGED in reality; he's just programmed to operate at a mental capacity of approximately teenage-level. So ultimately, I'm asking: What is there to STUDY about any of these?! These aren't even TALENTS, frankly! These have got me wondering if there's some other reason to include these particular students... like perhaps Hope's Peak wants to extend their tentacles into the power/influence afforded by Novoselic royalty/the Yakuza? Or perhaps they wish the leverage Keebo's A.I. technology in their own pursuit of creating of an "Ultimate Talent"? Point is: THESE 'TALENTS' ARE SEVERELY SUS. (I have to wonder if the larger public and Reserve Coursers ever complained about how sketchy some of this shit sounds?? SURELY they did.)

ADDENDUM/NOTE: There are also those who hover between the various categories I've cited. This includes those who might be a mixture of two categories, or those whose background is hazy enough that it's not clear whether they always had their talent (A) or developed it over time (B). But I think the above list encompasses everyone we know about, either in one or multiple categories.

CONCLUSION: Hope's Peak is so vague and weird about what they define as "talents" that it's tough to say what on Earth they believe they're studying over there. Because the methodology they were employing for identifying these talents is super loose, they're inviting over SOME fascinating subjects right alongside a bunch of teenagers who... really can't reveal much of anything about anything?

How did Junko Enoshima learn to easily analyze the patterns all around her to the point that she was able to accurately predict most outcomes? GREAT question! You may genuinely be able to unravel something about inborn skillsets and unusual brain development from such a case.

How did Mahiru Koizumi become a great photographer? Uhhh, she observed some stuff from her mom and just tried a decent amount of portraits, I suppose. But she's not even that amazing frankly, she ain't taking any award-winning pictures or using any particular artistry. She's just good at smiling portraits. That's it. You ain't gonna learn shit from this.

How did Fuyuhiko become the Ultimate Yakuza? Because YOU decided he was! And that was just because of his inherited leadership role! He has NO special talent, wtf are you idiots doing?!?!

ANYWAY, that should cover all of the Hope's Peak students we've ever me—

Oh, right. There's ONE weird half-exception to this list, which I guess I'll explain for anyone who wants to be extracirricular about this topic.

BONUS! Outlier Case: Makoto Naegi (in DR1 only)

My Thoughts: In the original Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, the player/viewer/reader is made to believe that Makoto Naegi possesses no talent at all. Instead, Naegi was merely this year's winner of the annual drawing at Hope's Peak, and THAT IS IT. He was just drawn from a proverbial hat, and his presence is just a randomized factor. And SURE, by the end of the game/manga/anime, he's declared the "Ultimate Hope," but it's not like he was brought into the school based on that talent, so that's not particularly relevant. What I'm saying is simply this: DR1-era Naegi is the only known Hope's Peak student who doesn't fit into the above four categories. ............ Though this was later retconned, of course. Stories such as Makoto Naegi's Worst Day Ever (which came out alongside the first release of DR2, a mere two years after DR1 first hit PSP) and Danganronpa 3 would state that Naegi always possessed some unpredictable form of Komaeda-style inborn "luck" even if he wasn't necessarily aware of it. Which slots him into category (A). AS SUCH, he was only an outlier for literally THE FIRST INSTALLMENT OF THE SERIES. And since the first installment didn't really delve as much into the sketchy, obsessive ways the Hope's Peak scientists chose to study their roster of "talents," his outlier nature isn't really relevant anyway. I don't feel any need to justify "Makoto Naegi as portrayed in 2010-2011 continuity" for his inclusion in the class roster.

..........................but if I DID have to do that, I'd say including him among the students makes him the Control Group. :P