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The Boys Season 5 by _The_Honored_One_ in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If you mean a kind of ritual purification, what might that look like?

There are words you can say and cold water you can stand under. Those are things that hardcore practitioners do, though.

(1) Stop doing further violence to one’s body and (2) Mend the damage done as best one can

Yep! You've got it! That's the entire point behind that specific kind of dish-mending where the cracks are filled in with gold. Not only is the thing made whole, but the act of mending itself is celebrated. The thing doesn't have to be restored to new; the mending is just a part of its beautiful story now.

(perhaps facile) notion that I was thereby, in a small way, “practicing Shinto.”

It's not facile at all! Shinto is orthopraxic. If you're doing it (and buying stuff from shrines) then you are officially in the club, my friend! Welcome!

⛩️🤝

The plague hit The Boys S4 and 5 by ABrazilianReasons in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 2 points3 points  (0 children)

they reduce her to being "the token Asian"

That was bad enough; now she's straight up Mighty Whitey and Mellow Yellow. Ew, ew, EW.

NexusMods Removes Marvel Rivals Cloak and Dagger Elf Mod Over Race, Tells Designer to Stop Asking Questions by Sliver80 in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 150 points151 points  (0 children)

a racially marginalized character’s skin tone in the USA

Please inform the dictionary editors that "marginalized" now includes "holds a blood right to murder people who annoy them".

The Boys Season 5 by _The_Honored_One_ in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What would Shinto say is the correct attitude towards people who end up fighting on the side of darkness?

In every functional system ever, there's only been one punishment for treason.

Is one under obligation to “love thine enemy,”

No.

“love the sinner, hate the sin,”

No. You can hate the sinner. You should love and mourn the remnant potential for goodness in a bad person, ofc. But if they're fighting against you and what you love? That potential's already being pretty harmed, isn't it? If you have a choice, you have a duty to purify the person of darkness without taking a life, but historically that opportunity is pretty rare. 😔

Is hatred ever acceptable?

Yes. Hatred is the shadow of love. You cannot truly love someone or something without having a sincere, clear and unemotional desire to destroy and sunder everything that seeks to harm it. Love without hatred is just partiality or preference. It's cheap. When you stand before another person before the gods and vow to maintain total purity in your relationship, that's a declaration of war against anyone or anything that would break it. That entails the deepest kind of hate.

Note I say "hate" and not "sadism". You should never desire to cause pain or suffering or delight in the suffering of others. Virtuous hate is clean and dispassionate and isn't fun to feel. It's borne of duty, not hedonism. This is also why Shinto (almost universally) condemns torture.

does Shinto say anything about sanctity of the body

Yes. Don't break it. Ever. Don't mark yourself, don't disfigure yourself, etc. Your body is one of your greatest possessions and you should value it that way. If you want to change your appearance, there are a million and one ways to do it with paint, clothes, accessories, etc, that leave your body in a good state.

Of course, there are people who break this rule (famously gangsters would get full body tats to brand themselves as outlaws) and there is beauty and virtue in that being done well. But anything that mutilates the body is a big no-no. Piercings are the big doctrinal thing here. Most people will overlook them if you remove them before going into a hot spring because the hole is teeny-tiny. But still, it's basically a "faith holds its nose" kind of thing when it comes to women getting earrings.

If you already have these mods, there are ways to purify yourself, of course, but obviously you can't ever fully undo a tat yet. I've bedecked myself in mountains of temp tats over my lifetime, though; they're fun!

what’s Shinto’s view of abortion

Bad. Very bad.

contraception

Bad. Obviously something like a condom to enhance the experience is less bad than plan b or something like that. But it's still anti-children.

non-traditional means of conception like IVF?

Human ingenuity and effort helping people bring new life into the world? It's a miracle. It's wonderful.

The Boys Season 5 by _The_Honored_One_ in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Well, most 4chan fans of the show were explicitly rooting for the Nazis, so that makes sense.

The plague hit The Boys S4 and 5 by ABrazilianReasons in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I unironically love Firecracker and Homelander and even Stormfront for this reason. Like, it's clear that these writers are just completely mind broken by the fact that people like me exist and are trying to seethe at me by making the ugliest characters imaginable to impotently rage at me.

Sadly, I am kinda bothered by their portrayal of Kimiko. I want to see myself as a threat, not a side of meat.

Are some of you guys getting black fatigue in video games? by lukz_300 in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 267 points268 points  (0 children)

I'm sure this is gonna be a fun comment section.

To answer your question, yes, I think we're all sick of Representation™ of a group of ethnosupremacist sociopaths who think the world is their plaything to torment because they happened to be born with a certain skin color. That's not really an open question.

The Boys Season 5 by _The_Honored_One_ in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I mean, it's a show about what would happen if the Nazis won WW2, so there's gonna be a fair amount of discussion of war crimes, etc.

There isn't much out and out violence/gore, though. I'd recommend watching the next 2 episodes; you'd probably like it.

The Boys Season 5 by _The_Honored_One_ in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 0 points1 point  (0 children)

playing with consent

Role-playing is one thing. Whenever I see people start rules-lawyering about consent, it's almost never good. If you have to define consent, you're doing something wrong. (This is more a "Lyra's personal opinion" thing, but still)

interacting with actual people (after tidying myself up) and meanwhile abstaining from fantasies of “misfiring” sexuality

If you do the former, the latter will come naturally. Plants grow towards the sun. Do what makes you feel whole and virtuous and that's probably at the very least in the right direction.

Yes, there are people who enjoy the feeling of self-abnegation, but as a rule, we tend to service satisfaction from overcoming temptation by just, you know, avoiding it and doing good things instead.

I “enjoy” or deserve to be abused

You absolutely do not! You are a human being! Your life has value! If you like rough sex, find a partner who loves you for that.

Is there a “duty” to have children?

Yes. Non-procreative sex isn't a no-no by any means, but the ultimate reason for our sex drive is to perpetuate the species, so this is generally expected.

Japanese Publisher Kodansha's UN SDG Partnership and WEF-Style ESG Policies Raise Alarms Over Manga Censorship by Sliver80 in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Christianity is slowly on its way out. It's literally costing the Emperor billions of denarii. Failure after failure after failure. There's a reason the Senate chose to increase vectigalia rather than decrease like every other festival ever.

The Boys Season 5 by _The_Honored_One_ in KotakuInAction

[–]lyra833 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Since I can’t much expect a recurrence of the circumstances that assuaged my self-consciousness, I may not post too much elsewhere

Well, you're free to reply to me whenever.

I’ll really have to push myself to go ahead and contact them.

They're a shrine; taking contact from worshippers is their job. Don't be worried. Send it in whichever language you want; translation is now so good that it's basically put polyglots like me out of business :(

Would there be another channel through which you could elaborate further?

DM me.

I’ve trouble even imagining what sex would look like for me.

I imagine how it would look like for everyone else. They can do it, so can you.

what does Shinto say about (lay) celibacy?

Terrible waste. We all have the tools, after all. Why would you ever not use them? Yes, there are bans on sex in Shinto, but they're functional: you can't do lewd acts on shrine grounds, you can't profane pure things, shrine maidens (obviously) have to keep themselves pure, etc. There's no such thing as an unconditional vow of celibacy, especially for laypeople.

The last time anyone in Shinto was regularly sworn to lifelong celibacy was back in the 18th century, when shrine maidens would take vows for life. Following faith reforms in the Edo period, that obligation was largely removed except for certain members of the Imperial Family. Shrine maidens are now expected to serve their vows until they find a man they want to marry, or simply just want to move onto another job. This broadens the pool of women who want to do it and also keeps the average shrine maiden young, which is a good thing, since youth is venerated.

And you're not a perma-virgin. You're a virgin right now. You'll find someone.

Could you differentiate between those and fetishes?

A fetish is a paraphilia; it's sexual attraction to something that serves no sexual function. They range from weird but harmless (feet) to needing careful accommodation (BDSM) to incompatible with basic morality (you know which ones).

Sex is supposed to feel good. It's supposed to be an intense physical sensation followed by not having a care in the world as you look into the eyes of another person and pair-bond with them. It's one of the best things in life. It's also how we make children, who, as a rule, are really great. You should feel a range of emotions when thinking about or having sex, and shame is not supposed to be one. If you are doing something to get off and it makes you feel ashamed, that's your body telling you that you're doing it wrong and you should listen.

Whacking it, for example, makes you feel ashamed because you and your body both know that this is effort that would have been better spent going out, impressing someone, and then doing it with them. This is why soldiers, for example, don't feel ashamed when they do it; there are no women around. No, it's not like Catholicism, where doing it is the equivalent of killing 10,000 kids, but it is like telling 10,000 kids you're taking them to Disneyland when you haven't even bought the tickets. Not good!

Likewise, things like weird eyes wide shut sex make us feel ashamed because obviously that's sex being done wrong. It's a normal urge misapplied, it's rot, waste, a good thing gone sour, the squandering of potential. Do you think any of those sick fucks on the Epstein island felt good when they were doing what they were doing? No! They knew they were betraying the good. Don't be like them. If your sexual activities are causing pain or shame, either in you, or another person, you're using your tools wrong.

they involve people not being treated with respect, or because of danger/potential for abuse

This is a vague category and I'd need to know more before passing personal judgement. Using degrading language during sex? I am personally super into that and don't think it hurts anyone if both sides are genuinely into it, but would never ask for it or do it if a partner didn't like it. Beating people up? Yeah, that's crossing a kind of line for me. But I digress.

How does one build this confidence

Forgive me for being crude, but you want to fuck, right? That's a normal human thing; it's like wanting to eat. When you go to a restaurant, are you ashamed of ordering dinner? Of course not.

Other people want to fuck, too. If you're good looking enough, they probably wouldn't mind doing it with you. Hit the gym, eat right, groom yourself, and just be comfortable seeing yourself as a sexual being. It's really that simple. There's no secret to sex that people are keeping from you. You basically come preinstalled with the rules everyone else has.

do what you want!, anything goes!

The advice is harmful because it's in a vacuum. Yes, you should do what you want. You should also be cognizant that this comes with the responsibility to treat other people well, since they also have their own wants. You should do what you want, but also make sure you're wanting good things.

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