#this was...a lot

[stevenrogered]

INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE | 2x05, "Don't Be Afraid, Just Start the Tape"

[maxbegone]

Oh, and uh, you wanna know why I'm really in therapy?

9-1-1 → 9-1-1, WHAT'S YOUR GRIEVANCE? (4.04)

[nikatyler]

NO

NO NO NO

NOPE

GRIM REAPER COME TAKE MY BUDDY ;-; WHY IS HE JUST LAYING THERE

[thatsmylog]

[maxwelljacobfriedman]

Not only does Jeff Cobb run Sanada around the ring like he weighs nothing, he caps it off by mocking Sanada’s paradise lock and crowd work

[homefryboy]

based on this, but tbh @das-mucke gave me the idea

[soracities]

Would you be able to explain a little more what you mean by notions of positivity that separate you from your body?? And give examples of body positive that Don’t do that?? Thanks :)

“Hello, can you explain more about positivity that seperates body from the person? It sounds interesting but i couldn t grasp the idea fully. Also i think it is very brave of you to say this opinion, in this time when positivity is worshipped and supported by capitalism.”

Honestly, I just don’t like the idea of looking at my body or focusing on it in a way that isn’t, at the same time, focusing on myself. If I love and accept myself, as a living, breathing, contradictory but worthy person, then I’ll love my body too, because my body is included in that idea of This Person, on the same level as everything else. I don’t want to designate it any special status or focus on it in a way that makes me forget this. For me, if I love and accept myself first, then by extension I will love and accept my body, whatever that may mean for me–but loving and accepting my body first doesn’t always mean I’ll accept myself. That’s why, for me, I don’t think there is a body positivity that doesn’t do that because it’s already in the name–if I’m looking at body positivity first, I’m always, no matter what, looking at how other people will think and see and evaluate it.They value me, therefore, I can value me–and so I am here, but my body is there. But I just want Me. I value Me, therefore, I value my body because it is Me too–just as my laughter is Me, just as my way of speaking is Me, just as my flaws and shortcomings are Me. 

I don’t want to think of it as a separate thing to be grappled with, or as the vital foundation toward any sense of acceptance and self-love because there’s just too many conditions that can influence that. I want to believe I’m important because I’m a human being and I’m alive. I exist, my body exists as part of that ‘I’–that is enough for me (and, therefore, my body) to matter and be deserving of respect.

I’m not attacking positivity or saying it’s bad–it can be a wildly radical act, especially for those whose bodies are marginalised and/or politicised, and I’m not talking about that. I’m speaking from an able-bodied perspective, responding to the kind of body positivity that I’ve grown up with that has still assumed able-bodied as the default. And while I get where that particular mainstream body positivity is coming from, it still feels lacking to me because so often it’s simply about expanding beauty standards. All bodies are (physically) beautiful–therefore they matter. All bodies are beautiful, yes–but that’s not why they matter. And they’re not beautiful because you can fit your body to look like the example they’ve given, and can now be accepted. You also–and I think this is my main issue–can’t establish what’s beautiful without implying, however subtly, that there’s something that isn’t beautiful, which is why the same mantra resurfaces over and over. They matter because these are real human beings and an aesthetic acceptance should not be what makes them seen as such. 

I don’t want to elevate my body (beauty) and I don’t want to despise it (not-beauty). I just want it to be. I want stretchmarks, lumps, bumps, discolouration, scars, sagging, and all the other shapes and textures and limitations a body takes–that my body takes–to just be, without needing to quantify any of it. I don’t want to have to tire myself out constantly reminding myself that all of these are still beautiful. Beauty should not come into it. Bodies shift and morph and roll and take on so many shapes and I want that to be accepted as just another thing that bodies do, without saying “but that’s still beautiful too!” For me, I don’t want the ‘But’. I’m tired of ‘Buts’ and ‘Too’s’ and ‘Stills’.  

The only way I can think to explain it further is with Walt Whitman–anytime he celebrates the body, it’s because he celebrates being alive. Life is the thing for him–and because life is the thing, everything that falls under it is something sacred: rivers, leaves, birds, people–children, the elderly, his lovers–it doesn’t matter; it is all a revolving, vibrant whole. An I am you, you are me, and we are they and us and everything, kind of thing. He doesn’t isolate any one thing and his foundation isn’t the body, no matter how much he sings of it. It’s Love. And because it’s Love, it extends to everything.

I don’t know if that makes any sense, but that’s what it comes down to for me. I’m not doing anything brave at all–these are just my feelings and all of it is entirely personal to me so I’m by no means trying to make any broad or categorical statements on anything. And as I said, I’m speaking from an able-bodied perspective and that’s the only place I can speak from. Body positivity means different things for different bodies and I’m not here to speak for other bodies whatsoever. This is just how I feel.