I AM WHAT REMAINS. @thelordvader - Tumblr Blog

restoreour-innocence

as the poets say… (insp)

#Star Wars #Obi Wan Kenobi #Anakin Skywalker #ah shit this one popped off again

tomatette

Billy Hargrove

more

Bonus:

#Stranger Things #Billy Hargrove

fnsilvicot

Stalker, SSL Katja's horse.

idk but when I try a new drawing program, I always draw this horse

#Starshine Legacy

fnsilvicot

SSL Katja's horse, Stalker.

#Starshine Legacy

donnerpartyofone

It's hard to say this without sounding like a right wing dickhead, but the thing about progressive spaces is that they may naturally attract people who are always on the lookout for excuses to start a fight. Like you can find yourself faced with someone whose political outrage is totally justified, and whose humanitarian ideals are right on the money, but simultaneously they are carrying a ton of psychological baggage about being wronged and getting revenge, and they will exploit literally any opportunity to live out this psychodrama with anyone in their line of vision. I have thought of several related anecdotes since I started typing this post, but I'll limit myself to the thing that inspired it, which is that I just visited this ultra-lefty cafe/bike shop/community gathering space where I've heard that the proprietor is constantly in a fight with everyone around her. When I paid for my stuff I noticed that there was no tip option, but I thought I had heard something about this, so I snuck away to look at the website and it made me really glad I didn't ask! I think there should have been a really enticing and exciting way for her to say "I've decided to be the change I want to see in the world, so I'm paying my baristas a full living wage, I'm making sure EVERYONE feels welcome and comfortable here, and I'm selling products I believe in!" -- but instead all the web copy sounded more like "You're either with me or against me, you're a fucking piece of shit asshole if you can't handle the inclusive atmosphere here, and by the way tipping is for fascist cavemen and if you ever try to tip someone you are refusing to relate to them authentically and you are enforcing a dangerous and evil power dynamic that should be purged from human society (so therefore I pay my staff well)." Like everything she stood for was totally agreeable, but why did she have to put it like it was directed at her worst enemy, rather than at the kinds of people she wants to attract? If the word on the street is to be believed, the reason for this posturing is that she spends quite a lot of energy making as many enemies as possible, and she probably likes it that way. I guess I'm just reminding myself, and perhaps others, that while one might think of "politics" as being broadly social and theoretical, no individual can fully separate the political from the intimately personal. Even somebody who seems to want to uplift and protect their fellow humans may be getting some perverse inner satisfaction out of that valiant crusade, and you may never realize it until you find yourself in a confusing fight with them.

author-by-night

I ran a LARP for a few years explicitly aimed at being queer friendly and accessible, and eventually cut it short mainly for this exact reason. You wouldn’t believe the amount of abuse my staff and I took for reasons that felt genuinely insane. I got called ableist for telling someone they couldn’t be invincible in my game of make believe, more than once. Defended myself, multiple Jewish players, and a conversion student from accusations of antisemitism based on alleged lore we’d never written / suggested / that simply and plainly did not exist in game. Had a staffer try to talk to someone about how a joke she made was uncomfortable only for this person to retaliate in epic proportions full white woman crocodile tears style, trying to get this staffer removed and eventually escalating into a full public hate campaign when she didn’t get her way. All that’s still just the tip of the iceberg.

Progressive spaces are naturally populated by traumatized people, and unfortunately trauma makes people more difficult. (I’m not excluded in that. No one is.) Running a progressive space is doubly difficult because a lot of left-facing trauma was inflicted by authority, so you’re setting yourself up to be the windmill that someone tilts their displaced rage at. I don’t really know what the solution is, but I do know that this is one of the huge reasons it’s so hard to find community: the people with a bone to pick can’t reach the ones who actually hurt them, but they’ll sure find you along the way, and the safer they feel around you the safer they’ll feel coming after you.

ariaste

Once again I am begging everyone to read Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss.

Voss spent 25 years as a hostage negotiator, meaning that his job was to talk to guys on the phone who had literal guns to innocent people's heads. He KNOWS how to compassionately de-escalate a conflict and have productive, constructive conversations with people who are highly activated and reactive.

Especially if you are neurodivergent, read this book. The communication tools are specific, concrete, easy to implement, and will dramatically reduce the psychic damage you're taking just from trying to navigate the conversation.

elodieunderglass

My mother was like this! Traumatised by childhood, and convinced that everyone was withholding justice from her, she spent her whole leftist life tilting at windmills, and fell into conspiracy thinking (“it’s not paranoia if they’re all out to get you.”) she will beef with anyone, rapidly making and losing friendships based on their perceived inability to appreciate quite how much Justice she needs. They’re either with her or against her, and even the faintest detectable eye-glazing during a trauma-dump, or an attempt to talk about themselves, is evidence that they’re not sufficiently dedicated to condemning her abusers. She’s really quite tiresome! She was genuinely abused! She has antibodies against the kind of support that would help!

she eventually became quite right-wing through conspiracy theory indoctrination, and while she doesn’t recognise this at all and still identifies as progressive, parrots the most toxic conservative talking points. I believe she’s super TERF-y at the moment for some reason. We don’t talk. A lonely way to live, but at some point the pattern has repeated to much that it must truly be the preferred way to live.

thepittsource

THE PITT 1.03 & 2.08

#The Pitt #Frank Langdon #Cassie McKay

sabertoothwalrus

they ruined our “investing at x notes” gag

wickedsnack

robbing at 1596 notes

aletheyass

why deny myself the pleasure of which i’m already accused (being a cunt)

operafish

"this post has only 20 notes" factoid actualy just statistical error. post has 10020 notes. Reblogs Georg, who reblogged the original post and got 10000 notes on their reblog, is not an outlier adn should absolutely be fucking counted

sparrowsabre7

"OK, Mr. Stover, we need a novelisation of "Revenge of the Sith", nothing too fancy, people aren't generally all that bothered by them."

Matthew Stover: "I am going to write the most heart-wrenchingly poetic tragedy the Star Wars galaxy has ever seen and every other line will go harder than an adamantium diamond."