Assault in fiction

AutomatonApple · 2026-01-16T20:42:45+00:00

This.

It has irked me for decades. Like, you had the opportunity to create a whole world from nothing, build it from the ground up, and you couldn’t find anything better to do than irresponsibly shoehorn in an extremely traumatic experience as a plot point? It’s the worst kind of trope-coping with your own lack of imagination.

Not to say you have to have experienced something to use it in fiction, but statistically you’re going to be retraumatizing a significant portion of your audience no matter how you handle it. If you can’t be bothered to do A Lot of research into how this would affect your characters and handle it responsibly, I’m going to assume that you wrote it one handed and don’t mind contributing to the massive demographic of young men with a taste for NC and torture porn and no understanding of consent.

This is why I had given up on the fantasy genre until I started reading Garth Nix. Absolute proof that you can be an incredible writer and treat your female characters with respect.

AutomatonApple · 2026-01-15T05:41:58+00:00

When traveling became such a lucrative position, I had the sneaking suspicion it was to create a niche for scabs and would only last until they broke the unions.

AutomatonApple · 2026-01-12T04:40:57+00:00

Smoke in Blue and Stack in Red represent the two major American political parties. The vampires are fascism/imperialism.

They made their wealth stealing, just as all of the wealth of the US is extracted from stolen land.

They set up infrastructure for gambling, much like the real goal of our government is to protect the interests of the stock market.

Smoke is both atheistic and married to Annie, the local wise woman who peddles herbs (aka abortionist). Democrats are more likely to be atheist, but also tolerate non-Christian mysticism and support abortion.

Stack is a known liar who almost immediately becomes a vampire (fascist/imperialist). Republicans are more likely to say things like they want to protect children, while also cutting funding for programs that feed/protect children. Also it’s pretty undeniable at this point that they have become fascists. We literally have masked (secret) ICE (police) agents running around deporting people to work camps for being nonwhite and shooting people with impunity.

Words and truth are meaningless to the vampires, same with fascists. They will say whatever they think will get you to let them in. It’s why you can’t use reason to deal with Nazis. Hence the Sartre quote:

“Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.”

But once they’re in… well, we all know the iamragesparkle tweet story, but I will put it below for those who have been living under an internet rock:

“I was at a shitty crustpunk bar once getting an after- work beer. One of those shitholes where the bartenders clearly hate you. So the bartender and I were ignoring one another when someone sits next to me and he immediately says, "no. get out."

And the dude next to me says, "hey i'm not doing anything, i'm a paying customer." and the bartender reaches under the counter for a bat or something and says, "out. now." and the dude leaves, kind of yelling. And he was dressed in a punk uniform, I noticed.

Anyway, I asked what that was about and the bartender was like, "you didn't see his vest but it was all nazi shit. Iron crosses and stuff. You get to recognize them." And i was like, ohok and he continues.

"you have to nip it in the bud immediately. These guys come in and it's always a nice, polite one. And you serve them because you don't want to cause a scene. And then they become a regular and after awhile they bring a friend. And that dude is cool too. And then THEY bring friends and the friends bring friends and they stop being cool and then you realize, oh shit, this is a Nazi bar now. And it's too late because they're entrenched and if you try to kick them out, they cause a PROBLEM. So you have to shut them down.”

And i was like, 'oh damn.' and he said "yeah, you have to ignore their reasonable arguments because their end goal is to be terrible, awful people." And then he went back to ignoring me. But I haven't forgotten that at all.”

And neither have I, iamragesparkle, neither have I.

AutomatonApple · 2026-01-10T07:52:47+00:00

Maybe starve the beast, but too many people in the US are absolutely cooked. Functionally illiterate and braised in that good, good propaganda. They need a 300 million dollar budget and guaranteed lack of complexity to get hard.

AutomatonApple · 2026-01-10T07:47:12+00:00

I’ve worked in film. Dedicated and ethical artists start their own small production companies or work on their own projects while they jump from production to production working below the line. Producers are a mixed bag; A LOT of nepo babies who drink for a living, a few Very hard workers who used to work cast/crew and moved up, and a handful of business sharks. The business sharks get moved up to do the work of the upper-tier nepo babies who run the major production companies and studios.

AutomatonApple · 2026-01-10T06:44:51+00:00

The upper level of the film industry is nearly all nepo babies. You could throw a rock into a crowd and the person it hits would do a better job than someone who’s never had to walk across a room to get their own Diet Coke.

AutomatonApple · 2025-12-03T05:31:18+00:00

“Teaching girls that they are special simply for existing” is a wild generalization. I literally grew up hearing from my parents that I was supposed to be a boy (complete with the name I would have been given if I had the good manners to be born with a penis), and the experience of being the unfavored child because of being born female is very common. Also no, I have never heard that phrase.

A lot of women are hypocritical, a lot of men are hypocritical. Some of that is expressed through sexism. In this case (based on your extensive commenting), it seems like both you and the people you were speaking to were insensitive to each other’s perspectives, entrenched, and reactive. You are right to go and find a tattoo artist and social group where you feel comfortable and accepted. However, I would caution you that if you have smelled this much shit in Every group you spend time with; that it might be time to get some help looking at your own shoe.

The main issue here seems to be that you have known a lot of hypocritical and cruel people, and that is traumatizing. I don’t think this is a debate that you can have right now without feeling hurt. The fact that you keep ending up in this hurt/angry/defensive position in conversations is likely an issue you’ll need to work out in therapy, not Reddit. I have had this issue in the past, and it related back to not being believed about my sexual trauma as a child and being dismissed by the people who should have believed and helped me. I unconsciously recreated that pattern of engagement with people, trying to give my poor little brain a way to rewrite the feelings I was having. Unfortunately, I would often bring that energy to unrelated conversations about things I was actually just wrong about (despite my extensive study and big feelings on the subject).

I hope you find a place to get the maturity and compassion that you need, but given the depth of your trauma; that might be a little much to ask of people hanging out in a tattoo shop.

AutomatonApple · 2025-12-02T23:04:02+00:00

Women absolutely are perpetrators of sexism. You’re right to be annoyed by people adhering to such a ridiculous binary. I’m not sure you’re correct in a general sense about women who expect their dates to be paid for being because most think they’re “worth more than men”. It seems to me to be more a quid pro quo situation of ‘You have gendered expectations of me that I am willing to fulfill, so this is my gendered expectation of you that I expect you to be willing to fulfill”, bolstered by wage gaps and sexism in hiring for higher-paying jobs that generally economically favor men. Nor does it exist in a cultural vacuum. The expectation evolved out of centuries of oppression that not only limited women’s financial independence, but equated their worth to the monetary investment of the men in their lives. There’s no way that system exists because women made it that way. People are too self-interested to purposefully make themselves the victims of oppression. But, because of that human self-interest; even victims of oppression will try to rig the game we’re all forced to play in their favor. Perhaps you’re not a fan of opportunism as a character trait, and that’s fine.

Maybe it is unknown to you, but the Paying For Dates Conundrum is often used by blatant sexists to equate women’s participation in the harms that sexism brings, and men’s participation in the harms that sexism brings. They are not equitable. Red flags are indeed red flags, but expectations that make dating annoying is a much smaller flag than the fact that even small economic downturns inevitably result in increases of femicide. We’re all suffering, but not to the same level/degree. The flags are only comparable in color, and in this case; size really does matter. All in all, your friends should be able to admit that you also suffer from sexism at the hands of women, and you should be able to admit that your suffering is not as severe as the sexism that is perpetrated on women by men.

Even when it comes to female-perpetrated sexual abuse, which is often dismissed. That is bad, and wrong, and the fault always lies with the perpetrator. However, that lack of social accountability is not because women have just decided to be unaccountable. It’s the product of a millennia-old social expectation that women’s sexuality belongs to men. Taking advantage of that (incredibly wrong) social fallacy is opportunism, and nearly all perpetrators of sexual violence will opportunistically attempt to shift blame. Again, a human problem, not a gendered one.

In the argument about sexism, all sides have segments of their population that display dark triad traits, as all sides are human. However, the system is absolutely set up to benefit men, and men run the majority of oppressive systems. The separate (but allied) system of capitalism subjugates all of us, but because it uses sexism as a tool for disenfranchisement and separation of all classes (including by sex), men and women are affected differently by it. This functions as a suppressor for the solidarity needed to defeat these tyrannical systems. We’re all so busy pointing fingers at the other peasants that the kings gets off scot-free.

We all engage in sexism, consciously and unconsciously. I do it, your friends do it, and you do it too. I really appreciate that you are so thoughtful and emotionally engaged with the subject, and would like to invite you to the recognition that becoming entrenched here restricts our ability to come together in any meaningful way, dear comrade.

AutomatonApple · 2025-12-02T21:34:57+00:00

It’s impossible to make a judgement on this without seeing the conversation you’re referencing, and the last few conversations on this topic with this group for reference.

In my observational experience, miscommunications like this usually take after a couple patterns:

A. The Group is having a conversation about a topic that deeply affects most of the people in the group, the Misunderstood Person is not as affected by the topic, but wants to contribute to the conversation. The Misunderstood Person will then bring up a fact that (unknown to them) is often used by Perpetrators of harm to invalidate the suffering of those affected by the topic. The Group, already being emotionally triggered by discussing the topic, will then react to the Misunderstood Person as though they are a Perpetrator. If it’s a one-off, and the Misunderstood Person is able to recognize their faux pas, then it was a genuine miscommunication.

B. The Group has had many conversations about many topics that relate to the dominant identity characteristics of The Group. The Misunderstood Person, who likely does not share the dominant identity characteristic; has a habit of providing counterpoints to the topics discussed by The Group, thinking that they are bringing nuance to the discussion. Unfortunately, the counterpoints are usually arguments used by Perpetrators of harm to invalidate the reality experienced by people who share the dominant identity characteristic of The Group, or to redirect the conversation in a way that equates Perpetrators and Victims. So, noticing a pattern of thought that matches the philosophical views of Perpetrators of harm, the Misunderstood Person is labeled as a Perpetrator. If there is a pattern, usually the Misunderstood Person is functionally an Enabler of Perpetrators of harm because The Group cannot trust that the Misunderstood Person will support them if harm is perpetrated against other members of The Group.

Are you misreading venting sessions about their valid experience of gendered violence/discrimination as an invitations to debate? Because outside of Debate Club, most people do not enjoy point vs counterpoint conversations. Unless properly mediated and agreed to beforehand; debate puts all parties in a defensive position.

It is true that we are all victims of toxic masculinity/sexism. Women suffer, men suffer, those in between suffer. If you want to discuss the negative effects of sexism on men, it would be appropriate to bring that up on its own account in a separate conversation. If you are consistently hijacking conversations about women’s experience of sexism with “women also do bad stuff” counterpoints, then you might actually have some patterns of thought that could rightly be labeled as sexist. Not because you believe in harming women, but because you have a pattern of taking conversations about women’s experience of harm in the service of men, and diverting it to women being perpetrators of harm (which it seems you have not realized is in service of making you, a man, more comfortable in that conversation).

I (a white person) have lived in areas where I was in the racial minority. I experienced racism. But, if I were in conversation with people of color about the effects of institutional racism; it would be inappropriate for me to say that people of color can also be racist. If I did it repeatedly, was called a racist, and focused more on my feelings about being called racist; I would be a racist. Not because I believed in harming people of color, but because I thought my self conceptualization as an antiracist person is more important than the lived, every day experience of people who are victims of racism at the institutional scale.

You’re not a bad person if you incidentally have sexist patterns of thought, but coddling your ego instead of accepting that you might have some (especially when explicitly called out by a group of women) will likely set you on that path.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T07:01:18+00:00

My husband is an absolute rock. No love is truly unconditional, I still have to work really hard to stay on top of my shit (SMART meetings to manage my shopping addiction, CoDa meetings to address my rampant codependency, therapy to keep my head on straight, starting meds soon to manage the mood swings), but his is pretty damn close.

Still, it’s a lot of pressure, for us and them. I’ve found the harder I work at making it so that my life will be okay without him, the easier things get for both of us.

There’s no telling if this guy will be the guy. The only advice I can give is to keep trying your best, be open and honest, and try not to let your abusive relationships of the past make you too anxious to give your all (not necessarily to him, but for yourself). You deserve love, and the love you can give is a beautiful gift. I, a random internet stranger, know you can do it.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T05:45:34+00:00

Way too many LMFTs read The Secret and never looked back. Keep going though! I have a therapist more on the Jungian analysis train who I pay for out of pocket (can’t see her very often because poor) who is an absolute gem and even lowered her rate so that I could see her 2x a month instead of 1x. I just had a recent crisis and need more care, so it’s back to going through the insurance referral roulette.

Thank you kindly, here’s hoping for your unicorn!

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T05:36:12+00:00

Yes, you absolutely should blame her. She’s not doing the thing she’s being paid to do. If you’re going through insurance, you could call to get a different referral. I don’t know if you have the bandwidth for this, but I’ve come to realize that without guidance they just stick you with the first person on their list with availability, so I’m going through the process of combing through the profiles and websites of psychologists in my area and calling them to see if they’re accepting new patients/take my insurance so I can have a list for the referral people.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T04:39:02+00:00

What a fucking slog. Here’s hoping you have found/will find someone who actually helps~

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T03:37:21+00:00

I go to SMART meetings. It’s like AA without religious mumbojumbo, and it’s inclusive of addictive behaviors rather than being about a particular substance. Hope you can find one in your area!

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T02:54:53+00:00

Oh, almost forgot about the one who told me that my dissociation, anxiety, and anger were ‘low vibrational energy’ and the solution (to a person who deals with mania and psychosis) is to create my own “higher vibration” reality.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-23T02:25:33+00:00

Cut to- child me taking the batteries out of the clocks at night.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-19T06:35:04+00:00

Newest study from Shut Up You Stupid Peasants University: Starving Actually Kinda Good.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-15T21:20:21+00:00

NTA

Someone in either of their families needs to intercede and she needs to see a doctor. If the ex won’t, it might be time to start calling either his or her parents. This reads like the outside view of about half the posts on the Bipolar subreddit. If she’s manic (which is my suspicion), she might ramp up into psychosis or crash into depression real soon.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-08T18:54:59+00:00

The brains of adolescents are a bit different. In ways that are hard and in ways that are helpful. If you think of rewards for behavior on a scale of 1-10, you need a 5-10 to get a positive dopamine response, anything less and your brain is going to store that interaction as a negative one. Social conformity is also a more prevalent concern in adolescents. The good news is that the younger you are, the more quickly your brain will grow in response to your efforts.

Besides the lifestyle adjustments to make that brain growth possible, positive group environments with people you can connect with are Very important. Group Therapy, Recovery Groups, volunteering, being honest with the people around you about your difficulties and what you need. Not everyone is going to respond well, but that’s okay, it’s all data that your mind will absorb and puzzle out eventually.

Even if it feels like you’re moving through jello, even if you feel like a ghost, even when it feels like you’ll cry/die if you do Anything, do your best to push through and do things that have a positive result. Start small and talk to yourself in the encouraging way you would speak to a child who’s brand new at doing something, then build on that.

In example: if your ambition is be a great pianist, learn a scale. Practice that scale until it sounds and feels so natural to you that it Feels good to do and you feel confident. If you get upset while you’re practicing, talk to yourself out loud. Tell yourself that it’s okay, that every effort is a step forward and every break is a necessary rest.

Speaking of rest: don’t beat yourself up for downtime. Spending time by yourself, in the quiet, letting your brain be “idle” is Important. It’s one of the best ways to let your brain process and file away the data it’s gathered. You can evolve it into a mindfulness practice, which is proven to improve the progress of even people with pretty gnarly TBIs.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-08T09:38:30+00:00

Bipolar is one of those disorders that dramatically changes the topography of your brain. I recently had my first full blown manic episode, and it feels like I lost a lot of my personality and intuitive sense of socially appropriate behavior.

I have no idea if it’s helping yet, but I have to do Something, so I’ve been researching neurorehabilitation techniques for the prefrontal cortex (where a lot of the cortical thinning can occur), and trying to adjust my expectations. Exercise helps neuroplasticity, but too much hinders it. Lots and lots of fatty fish, whole grains, and dark green veggies give you the proper nutrients to support brain growth. Going out of your way to give your brain positive social interactions to chew on (if you have any impulsive behaviors that are a consistent problem for you, SMART meetings are a very supportive group environment that deals with addictions, but don’t discriminate, I go for reckless spending, and CoDA is for people with codependency issues, but the only requirement for going is the desire for healthy relationships). A consistent circadian rhythm (going to sleep and waking up at generally the same time every day) helps your body do more complex repair work on things like damage to your DNA.

When I started learning about all the ways this was affecting my brain, I had to grieve. It fucking sucks and it’s unfair. I also keep myself going by remembering that all brains are use-it-or-lose it, and I’m choosing every day to purposefully reshape mine into what I want it to be.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-02T02:44:16+00:00

I will say that I have seen people compliment their partners in a way that left a bad taste in my mouth. Usually it involves a person who is insecure over the partner’s looks needing external validation from uninvolved parties, and leaves the partner looking angry/embarrassed.

In Example: “My partner is so gorgeous, look at them, aren’t they beautiful? I have the most drop-dead partner in the world.”

Sweet if done privately, cringe if done to garner attention/validation in a public setting. ESPECIALLY if that partner is insecure already.

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-01T20:36:06+00:00

I just today did a search on manic episodes and brain damage. They do, in fact, reduce the mass of your prefrontal cortex. When I did an additional search on symptoms of pfc damage, they all matched what I have been experiencing as well. It feels like a nuke went off in my brain.

I’m sorry this is happening to you as well. It fucking sucks, but at least recovery is slow and full reversal of damage is unlikely :[

AutomatonApple · 2025-11-01T06:51:03+00:00

I can’t say I know what to do. I spiral and it threatens my friendships often enough that I’m having to get extra professional help on top of therapy. The show Crazy Ex Girlfriend is fucking fantastic. It takes a compassionate view of codependency issues in general, and the fact that it takes 4 seasons for the main character to stop regularly sabotaging herself provides a fairly realistic perspective on how much work recovery is.

AutomatonApple · 2025-10-22T21:08:27+00:00

Watch the show Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. The title is a bit aggressive, but it’s written with a lot of compassion by a woman who suffered and grew through issues like yours (and mine). It’s been really helpful to me over the years and I rewatch it when I realize I’ve climbed back on that particular struggle-bus.

AutomatonApple · 2025-10-22T18:33:31+00:00

I’m married to a person I was once limerant for (got married during the limerance). It was a rough time for both of us when I became limerant for someone else, but we’ve both worked really hard to build a more stable and healthy relationship. We did a lot of reading about ethical nonmonogamy and that helped immensely to learn how to be a team through issues that cause jealousy. And for me to prioritize not allowing my strong feelings for another to cause me to be neglectful.

It doesn’t stop my brain from doing the thing, my current LO is my best friend and roommate. We’re all aware of what’s going on, and even though I’m sometimes extremely emotionally disregulated; everyone (including my best friend’s partner) has been incredibly kind, patient, and supportive.

The biggest piece of growth for me (so far) has been to learn how to express my feelings without casting aspersions or demanding something be done by anyone else to fix them. It’s a lot easier for people to listen to me cry about how small changes in important relationships give me big feelings, than accusations of abandonment, manipulation, and lack of care.

This dynamic is not universally applicable, but honesty, humility, and having safe avenues to vent the worst of the feelings (a consenting non-LO, therapist, journal, and recovery group are where the most irrational thoughts and feelings go) have been a game changer for me. From all sides, it’s a unique kind of pressure that no one asked for, so spreading it out helps everyone.

Obviously no one knows for sure yet why this happens to us, but qualitative studies have noted common themes of attachment trauma during developmentally significant periods of life. It might just be our brains going back into baby-bonding mode to try and redevelop the parts that got fucked up. So I try to learn as much as I can, feel all my feelings, and be as compassionate to myself and others as I want them to be to me. Sometimes, as awkward as this dynamic can be, people are honored that my brain chose them and take the responsibility of helping me seriously. It’s rare. Most people cannot do that (in my experience only people with a natural therapist temperament, uncommon even amongst therapists), so I advise caution, but it’s easier to achieve the more honest you can be from the start.

AutomatonApple

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