I am 17 and live with my mom, her partner and my grandparents. The only family member that knows I'm trans is my mom and she doesn't support me in any way. She has known for over 2 years now and despite our many "discussions" where I cried and begged her to change my name in school papers, she still hasn't called me in any masculine form even once (note: in polish, every adjective and verb you use towards another person has to be gendered, example: zrobił (masc for 'did'), zrobiła (fem for 'did'). Before I even came out, she once yelled at me and said she's ashamed to admit I'm her kid, just because on that day I wore a 'boyish' outfit. Now she uses arguments such as that I'm just insecure about my femininity, that it's because of my social anxiety, that I'm searching for something to blame my other problems for, that I'm a kid and I don't know what I'm doing, that it's because I "walked away from god" and other shit, she even asked me to go to a fucking EXORCIST. The only thing I wanted her to do was to change my name in school since I can't do it myself as a minor, I never even expected to be called by my new name by her, I knew that expectation was pointless. Over time, I stopped caring about or expecting her support, because when I'm 18 i'll just do everything myself. But that's the problem. You see, my family is very conservative, especially my grandparents. I've heard them insult anything even slightly "progressive" (note: if not going to church is progressive, then being trans is the epitomy of wokeness that they demonize so much) many times, they always called any queer people deviants, pedos, evil, degenerates, said that I'm "the devil's follower" when I defended the lgbt movement that was demonized by the tv at the time. They don't know I'm trans, and they don't need to with things as they are right now, but once I'll turn 18 and finally start medical transition, they will eventually know. Them throwing mean words at me when they do is not the problem, the problem is that it could geniuenly affect their health. Whenever I talked with my mom about it, she always emphasized that they cannot find out and that they could even get a heart attack. And I don't think she was exaggerating. See, if you live your whole life perceiving a certain thing as wrong, evil, spending years and years consuming political propaganda against a certain worldview that the thing is associated with, live in a bubble reassuring you that, yes, the thing is bad and you should never be that thing and then find out that your only grandchild is said thing, your reaction will be bad to say the least, especially if you're old and have health issues. It would really not be a problem if they just hated me as a queer person and wouldn't want to have anything to do with me, but I know they love me very much and they can't just treat me as any other trans person out there. They are a whole different generation with a different mentality and I know there's no way for them to accept those things, they don't need to, they don't need to accept me, but I don't want to cause them any actual mental or physical harm that finding out would bring them. At the same time, I don't want to keep being unhappy and living inside this female body just because of them, as bad as it sounds, I don't want to waste my whole youth waiting until they die to finally start living my life. The only person who supports me is my only friend who's trans too. I'm jealous of him, I feel awful for feeling that way, but feelings aren't something you can control. He's had his name changed in school only after 1 year of finding out he's trans. I've known that I'm a boy since I was 13 and still no progress in this regard. He's been treated as a boy by his class even before that change, and a teacher even went out of her way to offer him help just because he presented masculine and started calling him his name without the change in papers. In my case, some people in class do respect me, because I always introduced myself using my male name, others don't, I don't have any friends in class and I'm always included as one of the girls, the only teachers that know is one that won't call me using the male form in front of class, because "without permission from a parent, she could get in legal trouble", the other is my homeroom teacher who literally called me a boy on the very first day of high school when she had no idea who I was, but then she read my legal name and never adressed the topic ever again, even tho she heard countless times how I introduced myself with my male name. I'm glad that my friend is happy and I don't want to drag him down with me, but it doesn't change that I can't shake off that feeling of jealousy. My other friend said that "anime has fucked up my head" when I told her, and only started respecting it when I sent her a rant message about my life as a trans guy after she called me my deadname of social media. I had a girlfriend who cheated on me with a cis guy multiple times, he was so jealous of me being her boyfriend that he was beating me, started misgendering me despite being nice at the beggining and told me to overdose my antidepressants and kms. As a child, I've never been "boyish", I didn't like 'boys' toys, I've never liked sports, I've never had friends who were boys, I was a girly girl and that makes my mom conclude that I'm not really trans and makes even me have doubts, even tho for 4 years I've craved nothing else than having a male body and being seen as a boy. Every day I ask why I had to get gender dysphoria, it makes the whole life so much harder, I hate being trans, I wouldn't wish it on anyone, everything would be so much easier if I'd just be a girl.

Original content and also I am not a doctor so take this with a humongous grain of garlic on top of Aramark garlic fries.
Fernando Tatis Jr. suffered a left shoulder subluxation in April 2021. In layman's terms, that's a partial dislocation of the shoulder joint.
He went on to dislocate it three more times that season.
He would usually do it with one-handed follow throughs on swings. With this being JHL's left arm and being a leftie batter, I don't think that same phenomenon would be an issue. It's probably a matter of it during his violent swings in general.
In October 2021 he actually opted against surgery because he wanted to play and not miss extended time. However when he got suspended 80 games for a banned substance, he changed his tune and decided to get the surgery.
"How I was feeling a little bit, coming back, I wasn't the best version out there,” Tatis said at the time. “A couple games, it got in the way. I was thinking and not diving headfirst, not doing my stereotypical movement. I feel like when I come back and start everything all over, I need to be 100% so I can do what I know how to do."
His questionable use of adjectives aside, it seemed like he wasn't 100% comfortable. Interestingly enough, Bob Melvin was his manager at the time, and he had this to say:
"From my understanding, I think everybody was hoping at some point in time he'd have it done. So he is. I think, as far as the medical staff goes, and even now himself, I think he realizes, 'Let's get this stuff cleaned up before I come back and play.'"
Now, what does this mean for Jung Hoo Lee?
First of all, this is entirely spectulation from a similar injury for a completely different person and player, and secondly, we should wait for the MRI results.
But simply to speculate, if the MRI is somewhat clean, it isn't out of the question--as evidenced by Tatis's case--that Jung Hoo Lee plays again this season.
Will he be uncomfortable, if we consider Tatis Jr.'s experience? Possible. Would he eventually need surgery anyways? Also possible.
All in all, I found this interesting and somewhat a glimmer of hope.
Most notably to me, Tatis looks really good after he came back. I'm not as concerned for JHL's career beyond this season especially given that he's a very young 25.
Don't get me wrong--this is still very disheartening, but there is recent MLB precedent that all hope isn't lost.
But again, we probably should let the doctors do the talking tomorrow.

I am an older ape and I have read countless hours of DD since the sneeze. One of the biggest achievements of this sub was to educate people on techniques being used to subvert us and our stock.
A main piece is this:
https://www.reddit.com/Superstonk/s/a6Ju1N8XpM by another ape
Enjoy the read :) I don’t take any credit for this work.
You may remember that a few days back, u/[redacted] put up this post about shills infiltrating /BIZ/ https://www.reddit.com/Superstonk/comments/mscsb5/putting_shills_on_blast_a_concerned_biznessman/
In that post, there was a HUGE image on:
SUPPOSED**methods used by banks and the hedgefunds to dismantle online communities
I had trouble reading that image (definitely NOT phone or text-to-speech friendly), and tried to find the original text version. It turns out that it can be found here: https://pastebin.com/irj4Fyd5. I copy-pasta it here for your convenience, and included some markup to make it easier to read. I take no credit for this work.
COINTELPRO Techniques for dilution, misdirection and control of a internet forum
Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
How to Spot a Spy (Cointelpro Agent)
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression
COINTELPRO Techniques for dilution, misdirection and control of a internet forum..
There are several techniques for the control and manipulation of a internet forum no matter what, or who is on it. We will go over each technique and demonstrate that only a minimal number of operatives can be used to eventually and effectively gain a control of a 'uncontrolled forum.'
Technique #1 - 'FORUM SLIDING'
If a very sensitive posting of a critical nature has been posted on a forum - it can be quickly removed from public view by 'forum sliding.' In this technique a number of unrelated posts are quietly prepositioned on the forum and allowed to 'age.' Each of these misdirectional forum postings can then be called upon at will to trigger a 'forum slide.' The second requirement is that several fake accounts exist, which can be called upon, to ensure that this technique is not exposed to the public. To trigger a 'forum slide' and 'flush' the critical post out of public view it is simply a matter of logging into each account both real and fake and then 'replying' to prepositined postings with a simple 1 or 2 line comment. This brings the unrelated postings to the top of the forum list, and the critical posting 'slides' down the front page, and quickly out of public view. Although it is difficult or impossible to censor the posting it is now lost in a sea of unrelated and unuseful postings. By this means it becomes effective to keep the readers of the forum reading unrelated and non-issue items.
Technique #2 - 'CONSENSUS CRACKING'
A second highly effective technique (which you can see in operation all the time at www.abovetopsecret.com) is 'consensus cracking.' To develop a consensus crack, the following technique is used. Under the guise of a fake account a posting is made which looks legitimate and is towards the truth is made - but the critical point is that it has a VERY WEAK PREMISE without substantive proof to back the posting. Once this is done then under alternative fake accounts a very strong position in your favour is slowly introduced over the life of the posting. It is IMPERATIVE that both sides are initially presented, so the uninformed reader cannot determine which side is the truth. As postings and replies are made the stronger 'evidence' or disinformation in your favour is slowly 'seeded in.' Thus the uninformed reader will most like develop the same position as you, and if their position is against you their opposition to your posting will be most likely dropped. However in some cases where the forum members are highly educated and can counter your disinformation with real facts and linked postings, you can then 'abort' the consensus cracking by initiating a 'forum slide.'
Technique #3 - 'TOPIC DILUTION'
Topic dilution is not only effective in forum sliding it is also very useful in keeping the forum readers on unrelated and non-productive issues. This is a critical and useful technique to cause a 'RESOURCE BURN.' By implementing continual and non-related postings that distract and disrupt (trolling ) the forum readers they are more effectively stopped from anything of any real productivity. If the intensity of gradual dilution is intense enough, the readers will effectively stop researching and simply slip into a 'gossip mode.' In this state they can be more easily misdirected away from facts towards uninformed conjecture and opinion. The less informed they are the more effective and easy it becomes to control the entire group in the direction that you would desire the group to go in. It must be stressed that a proper assessment of the psychological capabilities and levels of education is first determined of the group to determine at what level to 'drive in the wedge.' By being too far off topic too quickly it may trigger censorship by a forum moderator.
Technique #4 - 'INFORMATION COLLECTION'
Information collection is also a very effective method to determine the psychological level of the forum members, and to gather intelligence that can be used against them. In this technique in a light and positive environment a 'show you mine so me yours' posting is initiated. From the number of replies and the answers that are provided much statistical information can be gathered. An example is to post your 'favourite weapon' and then encourage other members of the forum to showcase what they have. In this matter it can be determined by reverse proration what percentage of the forum community owns a firearm, and or a illegal weapon. This same method can be used by posing as one of the form members and posting your favourite 'technique of operation.' From the replies various methods that the group utilizes can be studied and effective methods developed to stop them from their activities.
Technique #5 - 'ANGER TROLLING'
Statistically, there is always a percentage of the forum posters who are more inclined to violence. In order to determine who these individuals are, it is a requirement to present a image to the forum to deliberately incite a strong psychological reaction. From this the most violent in the group can be effectively singled out for reverse IP location and possibly local enforcement tracking. To accomplish this only requires posting a link to a video depicting a local police officer massively abusing his power against a very innocent individual. Statistically of the million or so police officers in America there is always one or two being caught abusing there powers and the taping of the activity can be then used for intelligence gathering purposes - without the requirement to 'stage' a fake abuse video. This method is extremely effective, and the more so the more abusive the video can be made to look. Sometimes it is useful to 'lead' the forum by replying to your own posting with your own statement of violent intent, and that you 'do not care what the authorities think!!' inflammation. By doing this and showing no fear it may be more effective in getting the more silent and self-disciplined violent intent members of the forum to slip and post their real intentions. This can be used later in a court of law during prosecution.
Technique #6 - 'GAINING FULL CONTROL'
It is important to also be harvesting and continually maneuvering for a forum moderator position. Once this position is obtained, the forum can then be effectively and quietly controlled by deleting unfavourable postings - and one can eventually steer the forum into complete failure and lack of interest by the general public. This is the 'ultimate victory' as the forum is no longer participated with by the general public and no longer useful in maintaining their freedoms. Depending on the level of control you can obtain, you can deliberately steer a forum into defeat by censoring postings, deleting memberships, flooding, and or accidentally taking the forum offline. By this method the forum can be quickly killed. However it is not always in the interest to kill a forum as it can be converted into a 'honey pot' gathering center to collect and misdirect newcomers and from this point be completely used for your control for your agenda purposes.
CONCLUSION
Remember these techniques are only effective if the forum participants DO NOT KNOW ABOUT THEM. Once they are aware of these techniques the operation can completely fail, and the forum can become uncontrolled. At this point other avenues must be considered such as initiating a false legal precidence to simply have the forum shut down and taken offline. This is not desirable as it then leaves the enforcement agencies unable to track the percentage of those in the population who always resist attempts for control against them. Many other techniques can be utilized and developed by the individual and as you develop further techniques of infiltration and control it is imperative to share then with HQ.
Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
Note: The first rule and last five (or six, depending on situation) rules are generally not directly within the ability of the traditional disinfo artist to apply. These rules are generally used more directly by those at the leadership, key players, or planning level of the criminal conspiracy or conspiracy to cover up.

1. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. Regardless of what you know, don't discuss it -- especially if you are a public figure, news anchor, etc. If it's not reported, it didn't happen, and you never have to deal with the issues.
   
2. Become incredulous and indignant. Avoid discussing key issues and instead focus on side issues which can be used show the topic as being critical of some otherwise sacrosanct group or theme. This is also known as the 'How dare you!' gambit.
   
3. Create rumor mongers. Avoid discussing issues by describing all charges, regardless of venue or evidence, as mere rumors and wild accusations. Other derogatory terms mutually exclusive of truth may work as well. This method which works especially well with a silent press, because the only way the public can learn of the facts are through such 'arguable rumors'. If you can associate the material with the Internet, use this fact to certify it a 'wild rumor' from a 'bunch of kids on the Internet' which can have no basis in fact.
   
4. Use a straw man. Find or create a seeming element of your opponent's argument which you can easily knock down to make yourself look good and the opponent to look bad. Either make up an issue you may safely imply exists based on your interpretation of the opponent/opponent arguments/situation, or select the weakest aspect of the weakest charges. Amplify their significance and destroy them in a way which appears to debunk all the charges, real and fabricated alike, while actually avoiding discussion of the real issues.
   
5. Sidetrack opponents with name calling and ridicule. This is also known as the primary 'attack the messenger' ploy, though other methods qualify as variants of that approach. Associate opponents with unpopular titles such as 'kooks', 'right-wing', 'liberal', 'left-wing', 'terrorists', 'conspiracy buffs', 'radicals', 'militia', 'racists', 'religious fanatics', 'sexual deviates', and so forth. This makes others shrink from support out of fear of gaining the same label, and you avoid dealing with issues.
   
6. Hit and Run. In any public forum, make a brief attack of your opponent or the opponent position and then scamper off before an answer can be fielded, or simply ignore any answer. This works extremely well in Internet and letters-to-the-editor environments where a steady stream of new identities can be called upon without having to explain criticism, reasoning -- simply make an accusation or other attack, never discussing issues, and never answering any subsequent response, for that would dignify the opponent's viewpoint.
   
7. Question motives. Twist or amplify any fact which could be taken to imply that the opponent operates out of a hidden personal agenda or other bias. This avoids discussing issues and forces the accuser on the defensive.
   
8. Invoke authority. Claim for yourself or associate yourself with authority and present your argument with enough 'jargon' and 'minutia' to illustrate you are 'one who knows', and simply say it isn't so without discussing issues or demonstrating concretely why or citing sources.
   
9. Play Dumb. No matter what evidence or logical argument is offered, avoid discussing issues except with denials they have any credibility, make any sense, provide any proof, contain or make a point, have logic, or support a conclusion. Mix well for maximum effect.
   
10. Associate opponent charges with old news. A derivative of the straw man -- usually, in any large-scale matter of high visibility, someone will make charges early on which can be or were already easily dealt with - a kind of investment for the future should the matter not be so easily contained.) Where it can be foreseen, have your own side raise a straw man issue and have it dealt with early on as part of the initial contingency plans. Subsequent charges, regardless of validity or new ground uncovered, can usually then be associated with the original charge and dismissed as simply being a rehash without need to address current issues -- so much the better where the opponent is or was involved with the original source.
    
11. Establish and rely upon fall-back positions. Using a minor matter or element of the facts, take the 'high road' and 'confess' with candor that some innocent mistake, in hindsight, was made -- but that opponents have seized on the opportunity to blow it all out of proportion and imply greater criminalities which, 'just isn't so.' Others can reinforce this on your behalf, later, and even publicly 'call for an end to the nonsense' because you have already 'done the right thing.' Done properly, this can garner sympathy and respect for 'coming clean' and 'owning up' to your mistakes without addressing more serious issues.
    
12. Enigmas have no solution. Drawing upon the overall umbrella of events surrounding the crime and the multitude of players and events, paint the entire affair as too complex to solve. This causes those otherwise following the matter to begin to lose interest more quickly without having to address the actual issues.
    
13. Alice in Wonderland Logic. Avoid discussion of the issues by reasoning backwards or with an apparent deductive logic which forbears any actual material fact.
    
14. Demand complete solutions. Avoid the issues by requiring opponents to solve the crime at hand completely, a ploy which works best with issues qualifying for rule 10.
    
15. Fit the facts to alternate conclusions. This requires creative thinking unless the crime was planned with contingency conclusions in place.
    
16. Vanish evidence and witnesses. If it does not exist, it is not fact, and you won't have to address the issue.
    
17. Change the subject. Usually in connection with one of the other ploys listed here, find a way to side-track the discussion with abrasive or controversial comments in hopes of turning attention to a new, more manageable topic. This works especially well with companions who can 'argue' with you over the new topic and polarize the discussion arena in order to avoid discussing more key issues.
    
18. Emotionalize, Antagonize, and Goad Opponents. If you can't do anything else, chide and taunt your opponents and draw them into emotional responses which will tend to make them look foolish and overly motivated, and generally render their material somewhat less coherent. Not only will you avoid discussing the issues in the first instance, but even if their emotional response addresses the issue, you can further avoid the issues by then focusing on how 'sensitive they are to criticism.'
    
19. Ignore proof presented, demand impossible proofs. This is perhaps a variant of the 'play dumb' rule. Regardless of what material may be presented by an opponent in public forums, claim the material irrelevant and demand proof that is impossible for the opponent to come by (it may exist, but not be at his disposal, or it may be something which is known to be safely destroyed or withheld, such as a murder weapon.) In order to completely avoid discussing issues, it may be required that you to categorically deny and be critical of media or books as valid sources, deny that witnesses are acceptable, or even deny that statements made by government or other authorities have any meaning or relevance.
    
20. False evidence. Whenever possible, introduce new facts or clues designed and manufactured to conflict with opponent presentations -- as useful tools to neutralize sensitive issues or impede resolution. This works best when the crime was designed with contingencies for the purpose, and the facts cannot be easily separated from the fabrications.
    
21. Call a Grand Jury, Special Prosecutor, or other empowered investigative body. Subvert the (process) to your benefit and effectively neutralize all sensitive issues without open discussion. Once convened, the evidence and testimony are required to be secret when properly handled. For instance, if you own the prosecuting attorney, it can insure a Grand Jury hears no useful evidence and that the evidence is sealed and unavailable to subsequent investigators. Once a favorable verdict is achieved, the matter can be considered officially closed. Usually, this technique is applied to find the guilty innocent, but it can also be used to obtain charges when seeking to frame a victim.
    
22. Manufacture a new truth. Create your own expert(s), group(s), author(s), leader(s) or influence existing ones willing to forge new ground via scientific, investigative, or social research or testimony which concludes favorably. In this way, if you must actually address issues, you can do so authoritatively.
    
23. Create bigger distractions. If the above does not seem to be working to distract from sensitive issues, or to prevent unwanted media coverage of unstoppable events such as trials, create bigger news stories (or treat them as such) to distract the multitudes.
    
24. Silence critics. If the above methods do not prevail, consider removing opponents from circulation by some definitive solution so that the need to address issues is removed entirely. This can be by their death, arrest and detention, blackmail or destruction of their character by release of blackmail information, or merely by destroying them financially, emotionally, or severely damaging their health.
    
25. Vanish. If you are a key holder of secrets or otherwise overly illuminated and you think the heat is getting too hot, to avoid the issues, vacate the kitchen.
    

Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
1) Avoidance. They never actually discuss issues head-on or provide constructive input, generally avoiding citation of references or credentials. Rather, they merely imply this, that, and the other. Virtually everything about their presentation implies their authority and expert knowledge in the matter without any further justification for credibility.
2) Selectivity. They tend to pick and choose opponents carefully, either applying the hit-and-run approach against mere commentators supportive of opponents, or focusing heavier attacks on key opponents who are known to directly address issues. Should a commentator become argumentative with any success, the focus will shift to include the commentator as well.
3) Coincidental. They tend to surface suddenly and somewhat coincidentally with a new controversial topic with no clear prior record of participation in general discussions in the particular public arena involved. They likewise tend to vanish once the topic is no longer of general concern. They were likely directed or elected to be there for a reason, and vanish with the reason.
4) Teamwork. They tend to operate in self-congratulatory and complementary packs or teams. Of course, this can happen naturally in any public forum, but there will likely be an ongoing pattern of frequent exchanges of this sort where professionals are involved. Sometimes one of the players will infiltrate the opponent camp to become a source for straw man or other tactics designed to dilute opponent presentation strength.
5) Anti-conspiratorial. They almost always have disdain for 'conspiracy theorists' and, usually, for those who in any way believe JFK was not killed by LHO. Ask yourself why, if they hold such disdain for conspiracy theorists, do they focus on defending a single topic discussed in a NG focusing on conspiracies? One might think they would either be trying to make fools of everyone on every topic, or simply ignore the group they hold in such disdain.Or, one might more rightly conclude they have an ulterior motive for their actions in going out of their way to focus as they do.
6) Artificial Emotions. An odd kind of 'artificial' emotionalism and an unusually thick skin -- an ability to persevere and persist even in the face of overwhelming criticism and unacceptance. This likely stems from intelligence community training that, no matter how condemning the evidence, deny everything, and never become emotionally involved or reactive. The net result for a disinfo artist is that emotions can seem artificial.
Most people, if responding in anger, for instance, will express their animosity throughout their rebuttal. But disinfo types usually have trouble maintaining the 'image' and are hot and cold with respect to pretended emotions and their usually more calm or unemotional communications style. It's just a job, and they often seem unable to 'act their role in character' as well in a communications medium as they might be able in a real face-to-face conversation/confrontation. You might have outright rage and indignation one moment, ho-hum the next, and more anger later -- an emotional yo-yo.
With respect to being thick-skinned, no amount of criticism will deter them from doing their job, and they will generally continue their old disinfo patterns without any adjustments to criticisms of how obvious it is that they play that game -- where a more rational individual who truly cares what others think might seek to improve their communications style, substance, and so forth, or simply give up.
7) Inconsistent. There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat 'freudian', so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within.
I have noted that often, they will simply cite contradictory information which neutralizes itself and the author. For instance, one such player claimed to be a Navy pilot, but blamed his poor communicating skills (spelling, grammar, incoherent style) on having only a grade-school education. I'm not aware of too many Navy pilots who don't have a college degree. Another claimed no knowledge of a particular topic/situation but later claimed first-hand knowledge of it.
8) Time Constant. Recently discovered, with respect to News Groups, is the response time factor. There are three ways this can be seen to work, especially when the government or other empowered player is involved in a cover up operation:
a) ANY NG posting by a targeted proponent for truth can result in an IMMEDIATE response. The government and other empowered players can afford to pay people to sit there and watch for an opportunity to do some damage. SINCE DISINFO IN A NG ONLY WORKS IF THE READER SEES IT - FAST RESPONSE IS CALLED FOR, or the visitor may be swayed towards truth.
b) When dealing in more direct ways with a disinformationalist, such as email, DELAY IS CALLED FOR - there will usually be a minimum of a 48-72 hour delay. This allows a sit-down team discussion on response strategy for best effect, and even enough time to 'get permission' or instruction from a formal chain of command.
c) In the NG example 1) above, it will often ALSO be seen that bigger guns are drawn and fired after the same 48-72 hours delay - the team approach in play. This is especially true when the targeted truth seeker or their comments are considered more important with respect to potential to reveal truth. Thus, a serious truth sayer will be attacked twice for the same sin.
How to Spot a Spy (Cointelpro Agent)
One way to neutralize a potential activist is to get them to be in a group that does all the wrong things. Why?
1) The message doesn't get out.
2) A lot of time is wasted
3) The activist is frustrated and discouraged
4) Nothing good is accomplished.
FBI and Police Informers and Infiltrators will infest any group and they have phoney activist organizations established.
Their purpose is to prevent any real movement for justice or eco-peace from developing in this country.
Agents come in small, medium or large. They can be of any ethnic background. They can be male or female.
The actual size of the group or movement being infiltrated is irrelevant. It is the potential the movement has for becoming large which brings on the spies and saboteurs.
This booklet lists tactics agents use to slow things down, foul things up, destroy the movement and keep tabs on activists.
It is the agent's job to keep the activist from quitting such a group, thus keeping him/her under control.
In some situations, to get control, the agent will tell the activist:
"You're dividing the movement."
[Here, I have added the psychological reasons as to WHY this maneuver works to control people]
This invites guilty feelings. Many people can be controlled by guilt. The agents begin relationships with activists behind a well-developed mask of "dedication to the cause." Because of their often declared dedication, (and actions designed to prove this), when they criticize the activist, he or she - being truly dedicated to the movement - becomes convinced that somehow, any issues are THEIR fault. This is because a truly dedicated person tends to believe that everyone has a conscience and that nobody would dissimulate and lie like that "on purpose." It's amazing how far agents can go in manipulating an activist because the activist will constantly make excuses for the agent who regularly declares their dedication to the cause. Even if they do, occasionally, suspect the agent, they will pull the wool over their own eyes by rationalizing: "they did that unconsciously... they didn't really mean it... I can help them by being forgiving and accepting " and so on and so forth.
The agent will tell the activist:
"You're a leader!"
This is designed to enhance the activist's self-esteem. His or her narcissistic admiration of his/her own activist/altruistic intentions increase as he or she identifies with and consciously admires the altruistic declarations of the agent which are deliberately set up to mirror those of the activist.
This is "malignant pseudoidentification." It is the process by which the agent consciously imitates or simulates a certain behavior to foster the activist's identification with him/her, thus increasing the activist's vulnerability to exploitation. The agent will simulate the more subtle self-concepts of the activist.
Activists and those who have altruistic self-concepts are most vulnerable to malignant pseudoidentification especially during work with the agent when the interaction includes matter relating to their competency, autonomy, or knowledge.
The goal of the agent is to increase the activist's general empathy for the agent through pseudo-identification with the activist's self-concepts.
The most common example of this is the agent who will compliment the activist for his competency or knowledge or value to the movement. On a more subtle level, the agent will simulate affects and mannerisms of the activist which promotes identification via mirroring and feelings of "twinship". It is not unheard of for activists, enamored by the perceived helpfulness and competence of a good agent, to find themselves considering ethical violations and perhaps, even illegal behavior, in the service of their agent/handler.
The activist's "felt quality of perfection" [self-concept] is enhanced, and a strong empathic bond is developed with the agent through his/her imitation and simulation of the victim's own narcissistic investments. [self-concepts] That is, if the activist knows, deep inside, their own dedication to the cause, they will project that onto the agent who is "mirroring" them.
The activist will be deluded into thinking that the agent shares this feeling of identification and bonding. In an activist/social movement setting, the adversarial roles that activists naturally play vis a vis the establishment/government, fosters ongoing processes of intrapsychic splitting so that "twinship alliances" between activist and agent may render whole sectors or reality testing unavailable to the activist. They literally "lose touch with reality."
Activists who deny their own narcissistic investments [do not have a good idea of their own self-concepts and that they ARE concepts] and consciously perceive themselves (accurately, as it were) to be "helpers" endowed with a special amount of altruism are exceedingly vulnerable to the affective (emotional) simulation of the accomplished agent.
Empathy is fostered in the activist through the expression of quite visible affects. The presentation of tearfulness, sadness, longing, fear, remorse, and guilt, may induce in the helper-oriented activist a strong sense of compassion, while unconsciously enhancing the activist's narcissistic investment in self as the embodiment of goodness.
The agent's expresssion of such simulated affects may be quite compelling to the observer and difficult to distinguish from deep emotion.
It can usually be identified by two events, however:
First, the activist who has analyzed his/her own narcissistic roots and is aware of his/her own potential for being "emotionally hooked," will be able to remain cool and unaffected by such emotional outpourings by the agent.
As a result of this unaffected, cool, attitude, the Second event will occur: The agent will recompensate much too quickly following such an affective expression leaving the activist with the impression that "the play has ended, the curtain has fallen," and the imposture, for the moment, has finished. The agent will then move quickly to another activist/victim.
The fact is, the movement doesn't need leaders, it needs MOVERS. "Follow the leader" is a waste of time.
A good agent will want to meet as often as possible. He or she will talk a lot and say little. One can expect an onslaught of long, unresolved discussions.
Some agents take on a pushy, arrogant, or defensive manner:
1) To disrupt the agenda
2) To side-track the discussion
3) To interrupt repeatedly
4) To feign ignorance
5) To make an unfounded accusation against a person.
Calling someone a racist, for example. This tactic is used to discredit a person in the eyes of all other group members.
Saboteurs
Some saboteurs pretend to be activists. She or he will ....
1) Write encyclopedic flyers (in the present day, websites)
2) Print flyers in English only.
3) Have demonstrations in places where no one cares.
4) Solicit funding from rich people instead of grass roots support
5) Display banners with too many words that are confusing.
6) Confuse issues.
7) Make the wrong demands.
8) Compromise the goal.
9) Have endless discussions that waste everyone's time. The agent may accompany the endless discussions with drinking, pot smoking or other amusement to slow down the activist's work.
Provocateurs
1) Want to establish "leaders" to set them up for a fall in order to stop the movement.
2) Suggest doing foolish, illegal things to get the activists in trouble.
3) Encourage militancy.
4) Want to taunt the authorities.
5) Attempt to make the activist compromise their values.
6) Attempt to instigate violence. Activisim ought to always be non-violent.
7) Attempt to provoke revolt among people who are ill-prepared to deal with the reaction of the authorities to such violence.
Informants
1) Want everyone to sign up and sing in and sign everything.
2) Ask a lot of questions (gathering data).
3) Want to know what events the activist is planning to attend.
4) Attempt to make the activist defend him or herself to identify his or her beliefs, goals, and level of committment.
Recruiting
Legitimate activists do not subject people to hours of persuasive dialog. Their actions, beliefs, and goals speak for themselves.
Groups that DO recruit are missionaries, military, and fake political parties or movements set up by agents.
Surveillance
ALWAYS assume that you are under surveillance.
At this point, if you are NOT under surveillance, you are not a very good activist!
Scare Tactics
They use them.
Such tactics include slander, defamation, threats, getting close to disaffected or minimally committed fellow activists to persuade them (via psychological tactics described above) to turn against the movement and give false testimony against their former compatriots. They will plant illegal substances on the activist and set up an arrest; they will plant false information and set up "exposure," they will send incriminating letters [emails] in the name of the activist; and more; they will do whatever society will allow.
This booklet in no way covers all the ways agents use to sabotage the lives of sincere an dedicated activists.
If an agent is "exposed," he or she will be transferred or replaced.
COINTELPRO is still in operation today under a different code name. It is no longer placed on paper where it can be discovered through the freedom of information act.
The FBI counterintelligence program's stated purpose: To expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and otherwise neutralize individuals who the FBI categorize as opposed to the National Interests. "National Security" means the FBI's security from the people ever finding out the vicious things it does in violation of people's civil liberties.
Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression
Strong, credible allegations of high-level criminal activity can bring down a government. When the government lacks an effective, fact-based defense, other techniques must be employed. The success of these techniques depends heavily upon a cooperative, compliant press and a mere token opposition party.

1. Dummy up. If it's not reported, if it's not news, it didn't happen.
   
2. Wax indignant. This is also known as the "How dare you?" gambit.
   
3. Characterize the charges as "rumors" or, better yet, "wild rumors." If, in spite of the news blackout, the public is still able to learn about the suspicious facts, it can only be through "rumors." (If they tend to believe the "rumors" it must be because they are simply "paranoid" or "hysterical.")
   
4. Knock down straw men. Deal only with the weakest aspects of the weakest charges. Even better, create your own straw men. Make up wild rumors (or plant false stories) and give them lead play when you appear to debunk all the charges, real and fanciful alike.
   
5. Call the skeptics names like "conspiracy theorist," "nutcase," "ranter," "kook," "crackpot," and, of course, "rumor monger." Be sure, too, to use heavily loaded verbs and adjectives when characterizing their charges and defending the "more reasonable" government and its defenders. You must then carefully avoid fair and open debate with any of the people you have thus maligned. For insurance, set up your own "skeptics" to shoot down.
   
6. Impugn motives. Attempt to marginalize the critics by suggesting strongly that they are not really interested in the truth but are simply pursuing a partisan political agenda or are out to make money (compared to over-compensated adherents to the government line who, presumably, are not).
   
7. Invoke authority. Here the controlled press and the sham opposition can be very useful.
   
8. Dismiss the charges as "old news."
   
9. Come half-clean. This is also known as "confession and avoidance" or "taking the limited hangout route." This way, you create the impression of candor and honesty while you admit only to relatively harmless, less-than-criminal "mistakes." This stratagem often requires the embrace of a fall-back position quite different from the one originally taken. With effective damage control, the fall-back position need only be peddled by stooge skeptics to carefully limited markets.
   
10. Characterize the crimes as impossibly complex and the truth as ultimately unknowable.
    
11. Reason backward, using the deductive method with a vengeance. With thoroughly rigorous deduction, troublesome evidence is irrelevant. E.g. We have a completely free press. If evidence exists that the Vince Foster "suicide" note was forged, they would have reported it. They haven't reported it so there is no such evidence. Another variation on this theme involves the likelihood of a conspiracy leaker and a press who would report the leak.
    
12. Require the skeptics to solve the crime completely. E.g. If Foster was murdered, who did it and why?
    
13. Change the subject. This technique includes creating and/or publicizing distractions.
    
14. Lightly report incriminating facts, and then make nothing of them. This is sometimes referred to as "bump and run" reporting.
    
15. Baldly and brazenly lie. A favorite way of doing this is to attribute the "facts" furnished the public to a plausible-sounding, but anonymous, source.
    
16. Expanding further on numbers 4 and 5, have your own stooges "expose" scandals and champion popular causes. Their job is to pre-empt real opponents and to play 99-yard football. A variation is to pay rich people for the job who will pretend to spend their own money.
    
17. Flood the Internet with agents. This is the answer to the question, "What could possibly motivate a person to spend hour upon hour on Internet news groups defending the government and/or the press and harassing genuine critics?" Don t the authorities have defenders enough in all the newspapers, magazines, radio, and television? One would think refusing to print critical letters and screening out serious callers or dumping them from radio talk shows would be control enough, but, obviously, it is not.
    

What I mean is when you wrote one story, and you wrote a second one, do you have a habit of reusing certain sentences or phrases? And if you do how do you avoid that habit?
I've seen a few authors use new words to spin their story and the only time some words repeat is...well it's rare. My friend writes and she somehow is able to be creative and write without repeating certain phrases or sentences from her previous fics, especially in her smut ones.
!!!! It's why I always use : master list of facial expressions, body movement, words to use in smut scenes, alternative words for different color or even a wheel with words describing emotions. My English teacher did say that it's fine if I use smth from a site (masterlist of body gestures) like:
---She blinked---
My teacher said using these examples like the one in bold isn't plagiarism or copying since I'll be adding an adjective after or before the word. That I'm still confused any help? My teacher said using another authors word word for word or say, just borrowing 2 words in a sentrnce from a published authors story is copying. BUT! IF I borrowed just one word that's not cheating
More examples- italize is the words I took straight from a master post filled with character gestures and so on.
Her hand- (her hand brushed against Dan, and his eyes darted up in alert, fear washing over his face) - this would be how i use smth from a master list of body gestures
his eyes widened; their eyes went round; her eyelids drooped; his eyes narrowed- his eyes lit up- his eyes darted+ he squinted- she blinked He lowered his head he ducked- she bowed her head- he covered his eyes with a hand- she pressed her hands to her cheeks- she raised her chin- he lifted his chin- YOU GET THE IDEA.
I do notice I tend to repeat certain phrases and I want to know how do y'all break out if that habit? Or any ways to approach this. I can't write emotions or visuals as well which is why I rely on the above exampleS like master posts. Plus, with smut and sfw I assumed you had to always use different wording or rework it
Any and all advice is appreciated

Well, the list is here. And even though "Utah Powder" does pay homage to our state's vibrant cocaine culture, it's probably a no-go. As stated elsewhere, many of these names sound like Gatorades or (Utah Blast) decaffeinated Mountain Dew flavors. And yet, there are some options I'd be happy with. Without further ado:
1. Utah Mammoth
This has been #1 for me ever since I saw a black/light blue mockup that looked incredible. To predict your predictable response, in my view the singular form "Mammoth" has two things going for it: first, the -ths at the end of "Mammoths" requires a lot more verbal dexterity. It's kind of a mouthful. And second, "Mammoth" is also an adjective meaning enormous, colossal, which kicks ass.
2. Utah Black Diamonds
Hockey is replete with multi-word team names, many of which begin with colors: the Golden Knights, the Blue Jackets, the Blackhawks, the Red Wings...why not us? For those who don't know, a Black Diamond is the hardest difficulty of ski run. This is an incredibly unique name that celebrates our unique state, and it lends itself to some pretty intimidating branding schemes. My suggestion would be black, purple, and copper.
3. Utah Outlaws
Yeah, it's a little generic, but it sort of rhymes! While the first two are my strong preferences, I'd have no complaints here. I think this old-west nickname lends itself to a sunset color palette - think those super-popular gradient Jazz jerseys from a couple years ago, or the Phoenix Suns.
4. Utah Swarm
Last, and also least. This nickname, which admittedly sounds like it belongs in the WNBA or some minor lacrosse league, has a couple things going for it. First, it's a clear tie to our identity as the Beehive State and, if we get a new stadium, "The Hive" would be an obvious and kick-ass name for it. Also, the word "Swarm" seems to describe a fast-paced hockey team's movements pretty accurately to me. Here, of course, is where Ryan's stupid yellow/black obsession would actually make some sense.

For those that don’t know Erin Michelle Gailito is A Course in Miracles student who claims to channel Jesus. She has written the book “Essays of the Light - Channeled Guidance for your Ascension”. She also hosts a Q&A with Jesus and the public which is held each Saturday. If you wish, you can ask “Jesus” a question by attending one of these sessions from her website (details here). The first Saturday session is recorded and put on her Youtube Channel. You can see previous public Q&A sessions videos here.
She seems like a nice person, and it’s tragic she is suffering from multiple sclerosis.
Typically each month Erin’s friend (Admirable_Advice8831) posts a link to the most recent channeled session to this very forum. I would be fine to leave such discussions about these channeling there, but sadly Admirable_Advice inadmirably deleted the entire previous month’s discussion which contained a lot of interesting details about how Erin’s channelings worked, so I feel it is important to post some notes about this in a thread that won’t be deleted/censored.
All that being said…major red flags are going off when I listen to Erin’s Jesus speak. These make me question whether she is actually channeling Jesus as she claims. Erin (whether she admits it or not) follows a fairly extreme nihilistic/non-dualistic view of ACIM (similar to say Ken Wapnick). Robert Perry recently posted an excellent refutation to A Course in Nothingness/non-dualism mind virus that I recommend readers check out…separate topic though.
Often Erin’s answers are vague and repeat the theme of “everything is an illusion” or “everything is one”. Usually these answers are not helpful. They are overly simplistic…conveniently so. I too could claim to channel Jesus. It would be easy to fool students…any question provided could be met with vague/abstract answers about everything being an illusion/oneness/sameness.
Discernment is an important spiritual attribute that all spiritual students and teachers should practice…especially when it comes to channeled Jesus teachings. People WILL go to crazy extremes if they believe they are instructed to from Jesus. This can include hurting others or themselves. Therefore it it ethical and wise to be critical of any source that casually claims to be Jesus. Often these “sources” are more interested in the power and attention the Jesus label provides than the wisdom or authenticity of such messages. The real Jesus often acts in disguise and behind the scenes, as he knows his name can be twisted to hurt and control other people.
Let’s look at specific issues with her answers starting with the video posted on April 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu2ygXY4eHk
​

21:36 - Some people don’t believe Jesus is the channel for A Course in Miracles
The answer “...The Course in Miracles was built around a more Christian framework…if Helen had been Hindu…there would be a different name to the same voice…we would say that same voice, because that voice is wisdom…and wisdom has been perceived in different forms…in this case it is Christ…but it is all the same”.

Reducing the authorship of the Course to an abstract “wisdom” that would go by a different name if say a Hindu text, is very deceptive. Helen verily adamantly believed Jesus was the channeled source. She was either right or wrong. “Wisdom” is just an adjective and can’t be personified. Only persons can act out personhood. Only persons can write the Course. The question is which person?
Nihilists often make this mistake. They believe everything is one with no differences…so it is justified to refer to themselves or that voice in their head as Jesus. Yet they never apply that logic to those they disagree with…or say historical villains. Using the “oneness” logic, can’t we say Stalin or Hitler wrote the Course?
Just because the pinky finger is on the same hand as the ring finger, doesn’t mean both fingers are the same without differentiation.

48:00 - The next question comes from Violet who can’t be here today
The answer: ...generic answer about feeling peace…54:35…”does that make sense?”

Why is Jesus asking Violet if his answer makes sense when Violet wasn’t there and the moderator had to relay in her question for her. In this case the moderator covers with a “yes it does thank you”...but that is a white lie. This has happened in other cases with Erin…where Jesus “forgets” that the questionnaire is not on the live panel. The real Jesus would not make this mistake. So who is speaking?

55:33 - Multipart question
The answer “what was the first part of the question again”?

I can understand if a human could forget the first part of a long question…but Jesus? His memory should be very good…if not perfect. This is very odd. It’s also not the first time Erin has asked a question to be repeated that she forgot.
Now let’s consider the video posted recently on May 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ku8PfiltbbE
​

13:16 - How do thoughts create reality in the game of illusion
The answer “it’s all made up”...”it’s just a game…should be fun”.

This is NOT an answer about what reality is or how reality is created. This is how to avoid emotional turmoil while dealing with illusions (illusions <> reality). “Jesus” answered the wrong question. A true Jesus would not create such a poor answer. Also this answer of “treating the game like fun” contradicts earlier answers of withdrawing from the game because it is an illusion.

31:40 - When a loved one passes over…does lighting cancels and holding a mass assist the soul…also to whom should we address prayers for them, you, Jesus, Mother Mary or God”
The answer “there is no need for prayers because you are one with all…the prayers are for you…not for Mother Mary, God, or anyone it is for you….say that prayer to yourself”.

This is a bad answer. For starter, the idea that prayer isn’t needed because there is oneness is insane. The Course often referred to prayer and it being important. Those that pass over do not always do so in a positive fashion…in fact Erin in an earlier segment revealed that some face very bad circumstances. Other spiritual sources indicate some souls stick around as ghosts and need help to leave Earth for Heaven…prayer can help and it is crazy that this “Jesus” casually dismisses the idea.
Then she advocates “praying to yourself”. This is an egotistic view of prayer. Prayer by its very natural is antithetical to the ego because it reaches outside of yourself/ego for help. That would be to a greater source/God. To pray to your self is to pray to your ego…not good.
Then Erin fundamentally misunderstands the question of to (not for) prayer should be targeted. It is a good question. To whom should prayer be addressed? God, Jesus, your guardian angel, an archangel, Mother Mary, etc…? Other Jesus sources have been asked this question and have provided better answers. The best answer IMO is to target God for prayer, because all other heavenly beings serve God. Other sources suggest it is ok to address prayer to Jesus as well, because of his close affiliation with God.
Summary
Something is amiss. I’ve studied many, many channeled Jesus sources and errors like this are not uncommon. The channel though needs to honest about their shortcomings and humble to know when they are making mistakes. To not do so can be disastrous spiritually for both the teacher and student.
Again, I believe Erin is a sincere person who is not intentionally deceiving people. But I believe she has opened herself up to guides and angels, and has lacked discernment in determining who is saying what. Perhaps at one one the real Jesus did talk to her. But I suspect most current messages are coming from her guides…and some may be coming from lower life forms who are not spiritually wise.
It is likely not a coincidence that she suffers from multiple sclerosis and hears these voices. MS has been linked to psychosis, involuntary muscle movements, and interrupted thinking. These are clear red flags for possession which the Urtext talks about in depth in chapter one. It is ironic. In doing what she loves (channeling “Jesus”), she may be inadvertently killing herself. Her MS swaying and bodily motions appear to be getting worse in her most recent videos. Hopefully she heals herself both physically and spiritually.

TW: Emotional neglect, abuse, all of the things.
This is more or less my origin story, my introduction to this community, my attempt to reintegrate my loving parts back into presence. Part rant, part reaching out for community and connection, *no advice*,
Here's the situation as best I can describe it in less than an hour before losing all energy for the rest of the day, week, month, who knows.
My CPTSD and the horrid collection of trauma abuse and neglect that I experienced only started unfolding for me after I finished graduate school and was living on my own. It was then that I started experiencing physical and emotional safety for some of the first times ever. I had starting going to therapy re: perfectionism (oh how I thought it was so simple) and slowly, gradually, then all of a sudden, traumatic memories, the flashbacks, the nightmares, goodness gracious the nightmares, I crashed, physically, emotionally, socially. I had built up some savings, enough of a cushion to quit my job and continue going to therapy for the next few months while I figured out what was next (yes, thank you privilege). What was next was more therapy, and dedicating my life to slowly trying to unwind and rebuild. Fast forward 2 years I feel like I'm back where I started.
I was the "good boy" growing up. Poster child in my community. Front pages of newspapers. Valedictorian. I did all the things I thought I was supposed to (which amounted to self-erasure, self-harm, calling it love, I didn't know what a boundary was until around this time, which explained the utter lack of them in all areas of my life and the crippling fear of emotional intimacy that I could never really explain to other people or even myself despite watching it wreak havoc on my nervous system. So I did all the things. Sometimes I wish I was more aware of the neglect and abuse like the younger people I see on here, and then I remember that just because my journey looks different, because I had my college paid for by my parents, because I kept the pain so far repressed that even I was completely unaware of what lay beneath my 3AM nights in the library, running from romantic relationships after the slightest hint of connection appears, it doesn't make my story or anybody else's more, or less, painful, or valid, for that matter. It wasn't safe to see how my world rested on a house of cards, I wasn't safe nor ready to face that, I'm still not really safe and I'm scared that I'm still not ready, even though I know that isn't totally true and that abuse like this is specifically designed to make me feel totally incapable of wiping my own ass without calling for my mom's approval or guidance.
I often feel totally unable to explain my situation or feelings to anybody else, so I haven't really, and deny myself the community that I know I need to get myself into a healthier place, physically, socially, emotionally, spiritually, all the things. It's also incredibly difficult bringing any of this to relationships that I had built up prior to unearthing all this pain and trauma considering it feels true that I had spent my entire life learning and replicating how to give myself a faux love, a faux sense of belonging and safety that masked a deep sense of self-hatred and misery. It was the only way to preserve my holy image of my parents, people that I grew up revering, tattoos that I marked on my body honoring my relationship with my mother that sometimes now feels like a brand, but that I am trying to hold space for that child inside of me that had zero, (my gaslighting mind questions, "zero? really?") yes, zero chance of growing up in the environment I did with an intact self-esteem. It's one thing coming to terms with my own complex trauma and patterns of abuse and the shame and the unlearning and all the things, it's another thing trying to write it all down, or talk it out, when I really have never felt comfortable using words to express my feelings, since whenever I did I was gaslit beyond recognition to the point that I, like many of you, am trying so god damn hard to unlearn the self-gaslighting, compassionately of course. My world revolved around my parents as it was designed to, so naturally, when these things started to come to the surface, who else but them would I bring them to, hoping that surely they'd be able to hold me and my feelings in the way I needed. What a slap in the fucking throat. I'm learning to express my feelings and my story through art, or poetry, abstract and splatter paintings, or movement (If anyone wants to try...I've started making hideous paintings, in colors that look like nothing ordinary at first glance, or to the watchful eyes of my parents. Imagine gray and black streaks in weird and random blobs everywhere. Gross, right? Nothing noteworthy? Something my parents can look at, satisfying their deep need to ingest, consume, salivate over any and everything that comes forth from my existence. So I take pictures of whatever I paint, then I edit the crap out of them, changing the colors entirely, the grays become purple, the yellows deep blue, the blacks become as dark as the midnight sky and the speckles light up like stars and suddenly it's like an entire universe comes to life underneath whatever is on the surface, in those moments I feel a sense of connection with anybody who has ever turned to art, or quilting, to express identity, community, love, from within an abusive or oppressive relationship that at times I still constantly trick myself into believing that living with my parents (as I'm doing right now) is wonderful, is safe, is loving, is where I need to be, even as I type all of this out. With art it's like my parents can see whatever I've painted, but me and only me has access to the real art, whatever is on the canvas for them to see is a distraction. And I feel like a piece of fucking ungrateful shit for hiding it from them, and I'm learning to love those parts of me too.
I've been losing, or walking away, or both, from so many of the relationships I've built up to this point and when people express confusion about what I'm going through or set boundaries for themselves, I don't even have the energy to try to explain. Because again, how do you explain to someone who has solid ground under their feet the pain of seeing the entire foundation underneath you crumble, becoming a floating body through space, through dreams, completely altering one's perception and experience of time and space. It feels like it'd take a lifetime explaining to non CPTSD people or people who aren't incredibly compassionate, present, radical, who understand the experiences of feeling completely on the outside of society sometimes even while being right in the middle of it. It feels like it'd take a lifetime and I can validate that now knowing that it actually has been lifetimes, numerous lifetimes, multiple generations, centuries of colonialization, of orchestrated attempts to sever entire continents of people from their ancestral lines and ways of operating in harmony and connection with the world, with the earth, to get to where I'm at now. I feel like I can empathize with that experience, of being totally severed from what would be healing for me and learning to identify it as the poison.
I newly identify as queer, which is confusing enough without CPTSD. Lord, the imposter syndrome. I'm trying to reconcile the reality of living in a capitalist cisheteropatriarchal white supremasociety, living in and forging my identity within a gender binary that totallyyyyyyyyy fucked me up. Born amab, dad's world revolves around a sport, I was always referred to as and praised for being, playing, moving like a "coaches kid." Not to mention, I grew up at a school for 18yo "boys" only. And I played the part exceptionally. I've never watched High School Musical fully, but I imagine part of my story would be like if Troy Bolton came out years later, as queer, or maybe trans, or maybe they didn't know, but they knew that it felt like their life had never really been his, theirs, to begin with, that they felt so disconnected from the person that walked through the halls of that high school that they don't even remember the lyrics to the songs that they song. How frustrating it is having people say, "You don't remember that? Come on, remember? You have to!" Fucking christ the difficulty of coming to terms with this fucking brutal, tortorous, and beautiful condition. I am both so relieved to have finally found the thing that can make all the puzzle pieces finally click together. The mysterious ailments. The constant injuries. The pain. The feeling deep down that something, surely, is off, despite the feeling that everyone, most importantly myself, trying to convince me that I'm making it up, that my parents love me, that they see how much my parents love me, even if they express it in ____ ways. Sometimes I have grace and compassion for my parents because I look at them like babies, stuck in their own self-sabatoging loops of hatred and self-abuse, and it allows me to have compassion for them, yet it doesn't explain why I continue to live with them, continue to deny myself, starve myself, starving myself even while being well-fed is some of the most difficult shit to come to terms with especially while doing so from inside the family unit that taught me how to hate myself. I have compassion for my parents because I know they were taught to hate themselves too, except I'm becoming increasingly more concerned that what I'm mistaking compassion for is actually me making excuses for letting them continue to gaslight, manipulate, or coax me into staying in this dysfunctional (to put it lightly) family system with gifts that have strings attached, despite how much my mother claims her love is unconditional. It makes me sad to see her love herself this way, and when I say love I mean hate. And when I say hate I'm using it as a verb. I'm tired of hating (verb) myself in the name of love.
So how the fuck is a person who might possibly identify as trans supposed to come into their selves when it feels like my entire world up to this point has been predicated upon some falsehood. A matrix. Trying to explain even a teaspoon of this to anybody who doesn't have CPTSD or hasn't done deep intergenerational healing work or who isn't trauma informed is...well about as difficult as this CPTSD survivor trying to answer a "tell me about yourself" question. you may know the feeling. Where the f*** does one even begin when every night and every day new memories are coming to the surface? I feel like CPTSD survivors stories begin long before our birth, or maybe it's what I tell myself to sleep at night, that yes my abusers are part of the issue, and it's also true that now I am too a part of the issue, carrying on my parents legacy for them, carrying on the self-hatred of their parents, and I ultimately hold the systems responsible that made my family of creatives to take the paint brushes that we could've used to craft massive, intricate, colorful paintings, and instead began painting a life-size prison to force ourselves inside.
I feel like CPTSD survivors are uniquely positioned alongside other actively erased and oppressed communities because of the ways we have been force fed and in turn many of us learned to internalize the hatred that racist capitalism wants us to inherit, a complete abandonment of self in devotion to some empire that would have us feel guilty for even daring to imagine a world more beautiful than the one we've lived in our whole lives, which can feel like an internal dumpster fire despite people within the crab-bucket claiming that the family that we have that is hurting us is all we'd ever need (or all we deserve). I'm learning to love my CPTSD and this community as a form of resistance. If not for my CPTSD how else might my body tell me that something isn't right and that we're trying to heal. But why do we have to do this work? It's so unfair. To not ask to be born in this world and then be handed this pile of ____ (insert your fav adjective) is ridiculous, and it's unfair, and I don't want to do the work, at all, but then I know deep down that if I want to love myself in any capacity that resembles something like safety, I have to. this is humbling, and exhausting, and humiliating, embarrassing, I have so much hope in the people here because of the burden I know I've carried on my shoulders, walking a path that is sure to leave me blacksheeped by my family and knowing that I still must carry on, anyway, for me, for my family (birth or chosen, even though there is part of me that wants to unalive or hurt myself just to hurt my parents, since I know they see me as an extension of them and not a real person, maybe then they'd understand. Maybe if I plucked my own heart out of my own chest it would hurt them too, like a voodoo doll, and yet I know that I don't deserve that treatment for myself despite how much it makes me salivate. For 26 years I found my identity in the internal gaslighting, the self-abandonment, the not trusting of my own gut instincts because of how I were treated so long ago before I could remember. My story feels so horrifying that I'm scared to choose myself because of how painful I know it will be.
Like I said, I went NC from my parents and started this journey 2 years ago. A lot of shit went down, and I found myself back here again, under their embrace, often unaware of how terrible and inhumane the conditions I'm living in are, despite however neatly wrapped and gifted they might be. I've told myself "I might as well get free housing from the people that fucked me up, if it's gotta be like this, might as well let them pay for my groceries, pay for my college, it's the least they could do, after all, I was their responsibility and I feel like they royally fucked that up, so it's the least they could do, and they're children in adult bodies, so why not let them feel okay about theirselves as parents for providing me with a bed to sleep in. But I'm getting back to the point of recognizing that a bed to sleep in and conditional love is not something that I feel comfortable with. I deserve more. I deserve to feel safe. I deserve to go to the bathroom and not have my parents be able to hear the trickling of my pee from the other side of the wall. I deserve to masturbate without fearing that my parents will walk into my room completely unannounced at any point. My parents are living in this misery and it's a misery I inherited and placed upon myself. And I don't want that anymore, I need love and I need safety and I need connection, to feel safe, to begin the recovery work (I hope I'm not totally restarting, like it feels) of trying to meet myself again. I fear I've pushed myself so far down that I'll never be able to meet them again and that scares the shit out of me, and I hope that anytime I come to this stream I'm being guided by love, by the part of me that knows deep down the things that happened to me over and over and over again, yes, really were that bad, it's why I don't remember anything and partly explains why I feel like I'm literally starting an entire new life, like a video game that I'm starting a new game in for the first time, with no manuals. I feel like a baby being given the keys to car, left alone in this vast world to try and figure out where the fuck to begin. The world I was born into exposed me, unfairly, to all the systemic suffering in the world, and then I was neglected, left as a child to go and try to sleep so that I could wake up for elementary school the next day having just watched Law & Order SVU for the 4th straight night that week alongside my parents, my young brain internalizing how terrifying the world could be, how terrifying I was being told that the world was. I'm white, and unfortunately my parents don't recognize how that doesn't mean we are unscathed from white supremacy. I was exposed to horrific torture and neglected as if a child didn't have emotional needs.
I feel myself starting to get a bit rambly, so I think I'll end this here. I'm writing this from inside the lion's den (my parents), even though I think the den is now healthy and alive inside my own heart, and it's time to choose myself again, I think I've lost my way. And I'm trying not to think that I'm horrifically doomed and trapped just because I ended up back here again, surely hoping that things could be different, that they could love me, see me, hold me, help me, is a natural and common thing for any child of the world. It goes against every fiber in my body to reconcile the fact that the people who brought me into this world, who continue to try to keep me tethered to their hip, can't give me what I need, what I'm looking for. They never could, and I doubt they ever will (part of me remains completely, pathetically, ridiculously hopeful that maybe some day that will change, even though I know it probably won't.)
This was much longer than I anticipated, if you read this far it probably means that we're a little bit alike in our experiences. I'm so sorry for that. And I'm glad I'm not alone. I know that I'll probably need to find my way to EMDR, but first I think I've got to prioritize getting myself to safety. I'm thinking about packing up what stuff I have and finding a place to WWOOF. Does anyone have any positive experiences? I'm hoping that by immersing myself in nature and learning to tend with and move with the land I can hopefully begin to recover some of what I've lost, or what I've never had to begin with, love. A deep, safe, unconditional love, with the Earth. I'm terrified that I'll find myself in another unsafe situation, I feel like a traumatized little child (newsflash in some ways I totally am!) and that going to live on a farm with total strangers is a terrible idea. But growing up next to total strangers called m o m and d a d who still have an unrelenting ability to go through plastic water bottles like it's their job was probably much worse than living with people devoting to living with the land and growing their own food, cultivating life, and love, could it really be worse than being in a situation and gaslighting myself into believing that under this roof, with my parents, is where I belong?
IDK. With love <3
P.S. sometimes I imagine that my life is a video game, a quest of sorts, it makes it slightly more manageable, until I fathom that if this truly were a game I probably would have stopped playing a long time ago.

My love for Fischl needs neither word nor statement, neither measurement nor proof, neither confirmation nor expression, neither reason nor logic, neither doubt nor uncertainty, for it is the truth, the self-evidenced truth, the make-believed fact, the initial-reasoned legitimacy, for it is becoming the cornerstone of my philosophical worldview, of my mental comprehension, of my reality perception.
Notwithstanding, I humbly and patiently long for a day beyond days, a time outside of history, a promised enlightenment, where concepts and meanings are born, barely worthy of retelling a fraction of her magnificence.
And I dream, vastly beautiful dreams, of calling her name, truly calling it, not this bastardization of that holiest concept through the limitations of a mortal tongue.
Many times, I would argue, perhaps this verbal weak imitation of her naming, along with that of her many titles, should be worth at least a sense of punishment, if not capital then that is retributive. But again, with greater reasoning, it is most likely the sheer guilt from that of self-realization of that insurmountable limitation surely must be tenfold more crushing than most sufferings of an external cause.
Thus, it should be from this realization that the most common deduction comes to any intellectual entity; that my affection for the Prinzessin remains far beyond any doubts and needs no confirmation. But should it be needed; it is certainly not above me to scream desperately her name (or rather my best attempt at pronouncing the unpronounceable) into the darkest of abyss and highest of heaven to proclaim this love to those ignorant of such.
And I would do it again, again and again until my blood runs cold, my tears go dry, my throat torn off, yet heart continues beating hotter still from sheer devotion. And it would not be simple repeats but rather iterative, that every syllable of my confession escaping this mouth shalt hold its unique space, for all my actions in her name and for her name unquestionably must be remembered and specialized, immortalized into key moments of my history and that of the larger world.
At this point, the only question that remains is that of the 'why', for the 'how' remains crystal clear and the 'when' and 'where' simply matter not. And let's me tell you why, why I adore Fischl so much.
That she is beautiful is a given. The same to say about her prettiness. And she is cute too, more than adorable. And elegant undoubtedly, she is. But even more than that, to assign these terms to one of her significances, is by itself an elevation of language as a whole. For when saying “Fischl is beautiful”, it says more about your definition of ‘beautiful’ than that nature of her Prinzessin. For never before could one know of a more descriptive expression of that word, that term. And to assume that this statement reaches the ear of someone unfamiliar with the word, yet aware of the person (for all shalt have known Her), and that before, they has never come across a single usage or definition of the word ‘beautiful’, this simple assignment of that term to the Prinzessin should tell more than enough what must be known of the word. For to tell “Fischl is beautiful” to someone lacking the knowledge of “beautiful” immediately reveals to them the understanding of such word, such term, and it is not unreasonable to assume immediately in their mind it comes around to accepting “Ah, so beautiful is to be perfect and attractive, to be made purely of goodness and all virtues, for that are what the Prinzessin holds, and for her to be beautiful, beautiful itself must mean at least one of these things”. And so, as a whole, one must beware of the challenges that lie within using adjectives in describing her Prinzessin, for more easily than not her existence itself may redefine your understanding of language. And for so it makes complete no sense to even argue that “she is ugly”, for this simply returns the fact you lack understanding of what ‘ugly’ truly means.
And even though unnecessary and completely insufficient, I can rant on too, about her beauty, of the golden flowing hair down the waist like a river of fine silk weaved by the masters of art; of the pair of illustrious emerald gemstones, shining, piercing, holding yet a deeper secret within; of the pale white skin from the freshest of snow, tendered to the touch, delicate even to the breeze; of the slender figure bearing a fragile physique, inducing to all minds, one deep sense of wanting to protect.
And I can tell you more about the clothing too, of the eye patch which hides her most sacred passage into a soul realm of riches; of the night-inspired dress adorning to perfection her feminine frame, and its playful tease into the excellence of carnality; of the uneven length high tights leaving just a glimpse of those milky white thighs protected beneath; of those pairs of high boots, of a grim color, of a predatory design, missioned purely for her walk across this land.
But that will only be the Dunkelnacht Sakrament to the series, there exists still the Ein Immernachtstraum to the total.
And with it a blood-red ruby replaces those innocent green, and a dark violet tiara now fittingly crowns her Royal Highness. And the outfit itself changes the tone, lighter purple and skillfully paired with the depth of blue. Like a cloak of elegance and charm now encapsulates her being and refuses to leave out a single hint of imperfection. The details layer itself, building upon the core theme of aristocracy. The accessories each compete for attention yet the harmony itself never truly breaks. A testimony to the limit of artistry. A fruitful product of mortal craftsmanship and divine inspiration. Another outfit to adorn her Prinzessin.
Her appearance alone is a gift to the world, a cure to the sick, a meal to the hunger, an angel to the faithful, a fatale to the heretic, a key to your problem, a question to your answer, the destination of your journey, an utmost brilliant beauty to ever be. But that alone does not make Fischl herself, her full self.
Next on we shall discover her charm, her grace, and her millennial rich soul. Fischl practices a love for the grand, with big words, big talks, she is to capture the mind. Legends weave myths, form together into fairy tales, retold through all fancy syllables leaping from her tongue. As if it were a different world, it is a different world, a world pure of imagination, a make-belief truer than reality. And when sanity is put to the question, no limitation remains far too great, no fate seems too far, and no stars are impossible to reach. And it is through those stories of magic and knights, of a palace more tempting than heaven, of a struggle against all hope, and a final triumph over all fear that her Highness resides upon a golden throne, adorned with a silver crown, ruling over all that is good and judging all who fall to evil. It is where dreams meet, fates intertwine, destinies merge and from there all an epic is born.
Fischl is like that, charming and brilliant, the main actress to a grand theatre, the underlying shade overshowing an entire novel. She is the noble songstress which breaks the silence of an era, the masterful writer who crafts worlds into existence through the might of a pen, the talented dancer who effortlessly attracts all eyes, because even if the spotlight was not there for her, she has already owned the entire opera.
Fischl is like that, so big and impressive, royalty in nature and divine breaths through her veins. Her steps walk legends, her gestures weave myths, her eyes shine new eons, immortalized to the most fundamental sense.
Fischl is like that, ever daring and already on the next adventure, already planning the death of another great beast and toppling of yet another evil kingdom. She would battle ancient sorcerers, with the same seriousness and, at the same time, nonchalance of running after a petty thief. Because justice burns bright in her heart and goodness guides her soul, truly the Princess of Condemnation.
Fischl is all of that, but all of that is not her, not her full.
Because underneath I see a gap, a fracture upon the perfection that is her visage, a hidden young girl beneath that magical Prinzessin, I see Amy too, where Fischl stands.
I see her relentless battles against worldly struggles, against the cruel twist of mortal tongues, against an utmost imposing predicament, against an all-consuming isolation.
I see her naïve dream of a world beyond good, a perfect reality where everything is just right, of somewhere she can be the best she can ever be.
I see her effort put into things most do consider useless, into things most would shun her for, into things she truly loves but for a long time never dares.
I see into it her growth, her talent outshines all peers, her mental maturity out-scales all others, her understanding reaches below fragile subtleties, and she truly comprehends the world, and see into it as a harsh and cruel place, of merciless trampling over childish dream and desire, of absolute predation over naivety.
But I see so clearly, a burning courage, a soul cast in bravery, a relentless struggle against cruelty. Because she never gives up, not once, not for a moment. She sees the world for what it truly is, says fuck it and wishes for a better world regardless. Her dreams mature but never lose their childlike hopefulness, her reality manifests truer yet ideal fantasy all the same. And she walks yet one step closer to being who she could be, who she needs to be, and most importantly wishes to be.
I see a girl living her dreams, and that is commendable.
Fischl is not solely the almighty Prinzessind der Verurteilung so revered in legends and myths, nor is she just Amy - a normal girl chasing after an ever-distant dream. Fischl is both, and therefore neither.
She is Amy living a Fischl dream.
She is Fischl personified through Amy.
She is the most ideal and perfect image for a young girl to ever be.
She is the utmost human and realistic version of a story character.
Fischl is interesting just like that, the more you know.
Then, let's understand further a large part of the becoming of her character, due in no small part to the Mighty Lord of Nachtraben, Ozvaldo Hrafnavins. This relationship between Fischl and Oz is rarely talked about, or if mentioned, only superficially. Their connection is an endless labyrinth, with all the twists and turns, yet the road ahead remains clear always. Each step forward, a building block laid down. Each true dead-end reveals new color. And in the end, a fortress, a palace, a monument, no matter their color or design, stands strong regardless for that is to be the bond they share.
Fischl and Oz have many dynamics:
Friends: Oz is Fischl's first friend, she got bullied and isolated as a child and Oz has been her first and only friend back then. Oz as a friend never leaves Fischl, they are always together and for so understand the other deeply.
Companions: This may sound like the friend part, but companions mean that they are a duo, they are irreplaceable to each other, and they are only fully themselves when together. There isn’t only a Fischl or an Oz, there is always, Fischl and Oz.
Master-Servant: The role-playing part is obvious, Fischl bestowed Oz a name from her favorite book (which she also names herself from) and they act out their roles. But more than that, Oz is a vision construct of Fischl, his existence, sentience, movement, speech, and action are all due to Fischl. Fischl rightfully holds the master position in this relationship, but at the same time, “A king is nothing without his people”, she is only the Master because Oz is the Servant, they are interconnected and inseparable.
Chunnibyou and the straight man: It is often played as a comedic relief or a running joke but Oz being the translator between Fischl and other characters is an important dynamic. From the 2.8 event, we all get to see just how perceptive Fischl is of the world, noticing every smallest detail. Then with her vast imagination, blows a wind of creativity and uniqueness into them all. Fischl paints a world full of colors and spectacles, but few understand. She feels the need to use flowery words because the world she sees is just that beautiful, and gorgeous as her speech flows, it strikes closer to reality than most dare to believe. Anyone who can understand and play along with such will be invited to her word of pure imagination. Oz explaining things, in a sense gatekeeps you from doing so. A lot of Oz translation makes some of Fischl meanings lost and put an emphasis on how eccentric she is. He does this out of a sense of necessity, not only for the world to partially understand Fischl’s intention but also to protect Fischl from inviting those unworthy of her personal world because if they can’t understand even her speeches, what good could they do to comprehend her imagination?
Chunnibyou and the evidence of their fantasy: Lastly, Oz is an irrefutable evidence of Fischl's power, of her fantasy, of her creation. The inner working of Oz is left unknown, yet he is the one single proof that Fischl can use to claim her fantasy. But she did no such things, and Oz supports no such things. They both understand very well the role they are playing, the beautiful dream-like world they are acting out They are content with it be that way, because Fischl doesn’t actually need to be a Prinzessin, she doesn’t need to have a kingdom to rule over, what she desires is friends, companions, respects, self-confidence, and inner strength: virtues that she may have not been able to find within herself because of self-loathing. Fischl understands very well the nature of her fantasy, but instead of trying to be real, to face reality, she goes a step further and pushes for genuineness instead, to live true to her feeling, to shape the world to her true desire. One may think growing up is to face reality and accept cruelty, but it is in Fischl to demonstrate a level of maturity unseen by many: to cross over the line of fantasy and realness, to stare at the horrible truth of the world directly, and still have the courage to strive for dreamlike goodness, to still live true to one’s wish. Oz, in that way, or rather, the lack of that role, allows Fischl to be Fischl, not Amy born Fischl in the Book nor Fischl reincarnates Amy in real life. Fischl is simply and irrefutably Fischl.
Finally, let's delve into something more physical and tangible, of her strength and weakness, for Genshin remains a game, and these things matter also.
To cite an internet intellectual (me):
“I can’t take it anymore! I’m sick of Fischl (not really)! I try to play Yae. My Fischl deals more damage. I try to play Raiden. My Fischl deals more damage. I want to play Aggravate. The best teams have Fischl. I want to play Cyno, Keqing, Yae, Raiden, Lisa, Dori, Razor. They all want Fischl. She grabs me by my throat (yes harder my Prinzessin). I pull on Standard and Ass Banners for her. I cook for her, mine for her, commit genocide for her. I give her R5 Stringless. She isn’t satisfied. I give her Aqua Simulacra, Polar Star, Skyward Harp, The First Great Magic. “Why the hell aren’t they R5” she insults me (uwu). “Gives me more field time” she demands. She grabs Nahida and makes the poor Archon throw herself against the enemies. She kidnaps Kazuha and makes him jump up and down like a Mario spinoff to debuff enemies. She seduces Bennett and takes all of his juicy buff for herself. She isn’t satisfied. “You just need to … forget it, I have no weakness, just give me 54.4 CV artifacts to deal more damage”. I don’t have any 54.4 CV artifacts, my luck is shit. She forces me to refresh resin, I can’t refresh resin, I don’t have enough primogems. She grabs my credit card. It declines. “Thou hath outlived thy usefulness, my final farewell to thee”. She summons Oz. She orders: “By Royal Decree”. I stare into the birb’s eyes. There’s nothing there. Nothing but pure, 50% of most Aggravate team damage, no icd, electro damage. What a cruel world (I prefer being choked).”
Fischl is fucking overpower.
Low field time, non-existent ER requirement, combo independent, snapshottable skill, highest electro application, a fuck lot of damage, insane particle generation, ridiculous flexibility.
Basically free damage, except this damage is a minimum 20% of your entire team, except she also batteries, and enables reactions. So it really is a top-tier support doing top-tier damage with zero maintenance cost and skill-less gameplay: Drop Oz, fuck the enemies up, repeat and profit.
Playing Fischl is like playing with cheat on, except the cheat is free, except people will pad you on the back for using it, and Mihoyo loves you now since they also think Fischl is best girl.
And it costs literally nothing to start, get her free from the shop, c0 already really good, c2 feels really nice, c3 really strong, c6 is literal ascension. Level her up normally, with that common flower already excess in your inventory, with the arrowheads you accidentally stock. Then talent up her skill, and only her skill (unless you are like me and based), because she literally only needs her skill, so that’s more resource you can save. And don’t worry about artifacts, 4pc Golden Troupe is obviously the best, 2pc 2pc of any random em/attack/DMG % also works, you can use Gilded Dream too, or Tenacity if addicted to buff; or you would rather throw on her any remaining scraps from building your main dps, since really she works with everything. Finally, for her weapons, since she only cares about stats, just throw everything into an Optimizer and mess around.
And Fischl is like the definition of future-proof, out of the 10 recently released characters, 8 already have top teams with her, 1 still at an Abyss clearing level, and only 1 without synergy. And Mihoyo seems keen on buffing her, either with new artifacts, weapons, or new teammates. And to cite again that internet intellectual:
“A mediocre character like Fischl obviously needs such a buff. They kinda did something in 1.6 and 2.1. The release of Dendro is a nice quality of life improvement but nowhere near enough, a step in the right direction though, have to give them that. Now this new artifact set may finally make Fischl competitive with super meta Dori and Dehya. Still looking forward to her next, very needed, very essential buff.”
And also don’t worry about finding her gameplay boring, since with how flexible she is, it is faster to name teams where she doesn’t synergize with than vice versa. She is basically a top 3, top 5 fourth spot for any non-cryo, non-Nilou team. Top 1 core choice for any team with an electro carry. Top 1, top 2 choices for any double electro variation. And practically irreplaceable in aggravate. So Fischl is like a really good answer to most questions, and a perfect answer to some, and basically the only answer to one.
For a new player, her high attack range and burst-independent gameplay are a godsend. While extremely cheap to build into lategame and compatible with most future archetypes.
For a midgame player, Fischl acts as your team core, her low maintenance in combat comes in extremely clutch, her stupidly efficient domain feels like cheating.
For an endgame player, Fischl is literally a carry, snapshottable skill means mega-buff-able skill with zero need for extra input. And her mechanics counter loads of annoying enemies.
For an ultra-endgame player, Fischl’s damage may feel a bit lacking now, but her particle generation and elemental application are still top tier. Elegy and Tenacity are always there if you feel like doing a buff. And no, fuck it, her damage isn’t any weaker in lategame, vertically scaling Fischl is real, don’t deny it, give her Aqua or Polar, add either a Bennet or C2 Nahida and she will do a fuckload of damage again.
So yeah, Fischl is fucking overpower.
That then will be the end of my analysis on the perfection that is Her Prinzessin.
Whether is real or not, regardless of the ending of this devotion, I will still propose to Fischl with 72 paragraphs of perfectly written, Shakespearean level sophistication, Immernachtreich common interest driven, Heaven Principles deceiving performance love letter.
She will either reject me, insult me with her own 14 paragraph of Shakespearean level slurs in a stereotypically aggressive German voice, hopefully step on me and I can finally off myself peacefully from a roof; or join in my quest of throwing hands against Celestia.
Anyway, as a Fischl-connoisseur, who is well-versed in the analysis and preaching of the Prinzessin’s character and appearance, with profound and extensive knowledge in the field of Fischlology, and decorated experience in online argumentative interactions, my source for everything I said thus now is that I made it the fuck up.
TLDR: Fisch is best girl.
Let end this essay with a short poem:
Upon each morn's awakening, I rise, From Immernachtreich-themed bed, I prize, Beside Her visage, perfection in my eyes, Whose magnificence, my dreams don’t lie.
I envision a meal, a princely feast, Spoon-fed by the Prinzessin, noblest, grandest, Her guiding hand, worlds to navigate, many seas, Without her presence, life's perils would not cease.
In lectures, I mimic, a foolish endeavor, To match Fischl's intellect, a pursuit I'll never, Her wisdom, a fortress, challenges to sever, In academia's halls, I strive to be clever.
At lunch, I imagine, in the cafeteria's crowd, Her Majesty with me, her praise spoken loud, Noticeable and eccentric, my devotion avowed, In her honor, my love, profound and proud.
After school, I stroll, thoughts on her, unswayed, Through three trees embraced, my path displayed, Two shady alleys, true, I may have strayed, Her Excellence's praise, my protection, unafraid.
Returning home, to my sanctum I fly, To the Immernachtreich bed, with a joyful cry, Beside Fischl, my wish, my spirits, soar high, In Genshin, I grind, for million moons, I'll comply.
Finally, I want Fischl to insult me with 14 paragraphs of Shakespearean level slur in a stereotypically aggressive German voice.

1 THE PSYCHOPATHOLOGY OF THE OTAKU
Given the topic of this book we cannot avoid a detailed inquiry into the nature of the otaku. They are, after all, the largest consumers of the beautiful fighting girls. What are the otaku thinking? What do they want and how do they get it? Are we right to speak of a “psychopathology of the otaku”? Or is that a bogus question? Or rather, don’t we know the answer already?
Otaku are immature human beings who have grown up without being able to let go of infantile transitional objects such as anime and monsters. They avoid contact with reality for fear that it will harm them and instead take refuge in a world of fiction. They are afraid of adult relationships, particularly sexual relationships, and find sexual stimulation only in fictional constructs. In psychiatric terms they would be classified as “schizothymic.”
These are a few of the most common stereotypical assumptions about otaku. Of course, being stereotypes does not mean they are necessarily incorrect. They may be accurate but still meaningless. These sorts of interpretations inevitably miss what is truly of interest about the otaku community.
The otaku are a strange and unique community that has come into existence as a result of the interactions between the modern media environment and the adolescent psyche in Japan. To my knowledge, however, sufficient thought has yet to be given to the otaku as a community. In this chapter I consider, sometimes from the perspective of a psychiatrist, and sometimes not, the psychopathology of the otaku.
Of course, when I say the “psychopathology of the otaku,” this does not mean that being an otaku in and of itself is a pathological phenomenon. Like the “psychopathology of adolescence” or the “psychopathology of high-school girls,” it is a provisional designation for the particular psychic disposition that might be imagined to be prevalent in a given group. It is also a convenient way to avoid expressions like psychology or psychic structure. This may be difficult to understand, but to put it in the most rigorous terms possible, I would say that psychopathology as I am using it here refers to the intentionality of “that which mediates the subject.” The problem, in other words, has to do with media.
I do not think that being an otaku in and of itself is a form of sickness, nor do I consider myself an otaku (otaku is not a self-designation in any case). It is from this standpoint that I propose to speak about the psychopathology of the otaku. This involves giving equal consideration to the degree to which the otaku community is well adapted and the degree to which it exhibits pathologies.
First, I want to say a few things about the particular challenges involved in speaking about the otaku. Otaku culture is by all accounts still in a state of immaturity (if one can expect “maturity” from it in the first place). Because it is still coming into being, one runs into fundamental difficulties in trying to view it in its entirety. For this reason, we have only a limited number of ways to discuss it. One way is to establish oneself as an otaku and speak as a complete insider, which is to say in a strategically uncritical manner (this is the stance taken by Okada Toshio). Alternatively, one can choose to take oneself out of the equation altogether and face the otaku with an attitude of revulsion and rejection. These two approaches may seem quite at odds, but in fact they are both versions of self-love and often amount to confessions of otakuphilia. When speaking of the otaku, it is crucial to begin by recognizing that these are only two approaches currently available to us.
But I am trying for a third way. Namely, to become an “otaku of otaku,” that is, an otaku whose love is directed toward otaku culture itself. This is not far from the kind of position that Okada advocates, although he calls himself an otaku of special effects and figurines. As for myself, I suppose I am a fan of special effects and monsters, although I have left my passion for Godzilla behind. (Not because I grew out of it but because Godzilla has regressed). I do not find any moe in most beautiful girl anime. I could not live without manga, but I hardly ever watch anime because I cannot stand the images and voice-overs. Even Miyazaki Hayao’s anime come close to the limit of what I can stand in terms of anime images. Yet despite all that, I remain riveted by the activities of the otaku themselves. For better or for worse, since finishing graduate school, I have been fortunate enough to have several extremely serious otaku among my circle. From an outsider’s perspective I found their activities utterly fascinating. And while I was thrilled to be able to observe them from close-up, I cannot deny that I was also sometimes perplexed by what can only be called their immaturity as members of society. Despite this, I believe I was able to maintain friendly relations with them. They all happened to be psychiatrists, psychiatry being the profession with perhaps the highest proportion of otaku among its members. I spare the reader the details of the endless conversations among the members of a certain psychiatry department during the Evangelion boom of 1997.
So what kind of person am I? At the moment I don’t have a good answer to this question. Psychoanalysis is after all premised on the impossibility of self-analysis (which is why analysts must undergo analysis themselves during their training). So allow me to refrain from useless navel-gazing and describe the contours of this unique community from a psychiatrist’s perspective.
Otaku and Maniacs
Nos that have made clear the limitations, and even the absurdity in some cases, of trying to understand otaku in terms of personality type, we can nonetheless abstract a few characteristics of the otaku. An otaku is

• a person with a strong affinity for fictional contexts.
• a person who makes use of fictionalization as a way to “possess” the object of his or her love.
• a person who inhabits not just two but multiple orientations.
• a person capable of finding sexual objects in fiction itself.

Before I try to explain each of these in turn, there are a few points I need to clarify. First, I defer all value judgments about otaku. Problems of adaption such as “fleeing from reality,” “taking refuge in fiction,” and “lacking common sense” may seem easy to spot in otaku, but they are not essential aspects. When value judgments become mixed up in the description they only create more confusion. If my descriptions are to be of any use at all, it will be because they are free of value judgments.
When describing a given type, it is often easier to grasp if one compares it with another similar type. The closest type to the otaku is surely the maniac.
Although they are still often confused with each other, the otaku and the maniac are clearly different in subtle but important ways. If the two were in fact synonymous, there would be no point in theorizing the meaning for us today of the “psychopathology of the otaku.” This is because the maniac is a universal type, while the otaku is historically specific. Understood as a kind of fetishism, mania has a history that may stretch back to the beginning of civilization.
Even if there are many areas of overlap, let us begin by discussing the differences between the two. To state my conclusion partly at the outset, I believe that today’s otaku derive from a group of maniacs who have reacted to the changes in the media environment by a proliferating set of adaptions. Just as the marsupials on the Australian continent mimicked the specialization of the mammals as a whole, the otaku mimicked the specialization of the class of maniacs within the isolation of the media environment.
The difference between these two communities is made clear through the kinds of objects to which they become attached. The following is a provisional list of the types of object each group might choose:
Otaku Objects:

• Anime, video games (mostly so-called girl games), young adult novels, voice actor idols, special effects, C-class idols, fan magazines (dojinshi), yaoi (see note 19), fighting girls.

Potential Crossover Objects:

• Trains, personal computers, film, manga, B-class idols, science fiction, American comics, the occult, amateur radio, police dramas, plastic models, figurines.

Maniac Objects:

• Philately, bibliomania, audio, cameras, astronomy, birdwatching, insect collecting, all forms of music, and all other forms of collecting.

These classifications are based on my personal impressions rather than any empirical data. So there may well be many exceptions and disagreements. If I were asked whether collectors of “anime figurines” were otaku or maniacs, for example, I would be hard-pressed to come up with a satisfying answer. But I do still believe these classifications accurately reflect the tendencies of each group. And they provide the starting point for the discussion of the difference between the otaku and the maniac that follows.
What strikes us most about these objects is what I call the “difference in level of fictional context.” Here we might think of the “fictional” as an abstraction of reality on the basis of some sort of bias. Of course, it is more complicated than that, but let us assume it is the case for now.
On the basis of this assumption, then, we can rank objects according to “degree of fictionality.” Documentaries based on interviews and primary sources, for example, would have a low level of fictionality. Through techniques such as citation and parody, “fiction” itself can be limitlessly abstracted and further fictionalized. Thus metafiction can be understood as having a higher level of fictionality than fiction. To put it a different way, the more forms of media that mediate the original information, the higher the level of fictionality. This is what we call the “difference in the level of fictional context.”
The term context here, following the work of Gregory Bateson and Edward T. Hall, is used in the general sense of the term, as that which determines the meaning of a given stimulus. It is important to keep in mind here that we cannot assume a straightforward ratio whereby the higher the level of “fictional context” is, the higher the level of fictionality will be. I return to this point again later.
The term maniac referred originally to a kind of person who is obsessed with something that yields no practical advantage. But compared with the otaku, the objects of maniacs can look quite concrete (not practical perhaps, but concrete). Looking back at the list of objects, we can see that those preferred by maniacs, such as audio equipment, stamps, antiques, and insect collections, are certainly for amusement and serve no practical function. But compared with those of the otaku, the objects of the maniac do have a concrete materiality. By concrete materiality I mean simply that one can pick them up in one’s hands and that they can be measured.
Generally speaking, maniacs compete with each other in terms of how effectively their hobbies translate into materiality. Collectors pride themselves on the size of their collections. And of course, this involves speculations about their value and rarity. Audio maniacs want faithful playback of sound with as little noise as possible. For insect collectors, it is not enough merely to know about rare bugs; their reputations as collectors depend on actually owning specimens of them. The unspoken rule of a naive “orientation toward material objects” is still very much in force here.
Otaku are lacking in this orientation toward the material and the practical. They know that the objects of their attachment have no material reality, that their vast knowledge has no use for other people in the world, and that this useless knowledge may even (especially after the Miyazaki Tsutomu incident) be viewed with contempt and suspicion. And knowing all of that, they still enjoy the gam of performing for each other their passion. The expression, “having a strong affinity for fictional contexts” is meant to clarify this sort of difference.
I just used the expression “performing their passion,” which requires a bit more explanation. The passion of the otaku is more performative than that of the maniac. Otaku are in communication with other otaku through code of “passion.” They are certainly not cool or disinterested, but neither do they completely lose themselves when indulging in their passion. This sort of slightly “canted stance toward passion” is very closely related to the essence of the otaku’s “affinity for fictional constructs.” Later we will see how perfectly the expression “X-moe” describes this.
Of course, we should consider the possibility that this has to do with how otaku deal with the society around them. Most of the objects to which otaku find themselves attracted are “embarrassing” in one way or another. They can be very easily ridiculed for their infatuation with anime at an age when most people have moved on. As a defense against this, it is perhaps inevitable that they might want to give the appearance to others that they are “only pretending to be obsessed.”
If we were to borrow a Benjaminian metaphor for what I have said so far, we could say that maniacs are enchanted by the aura of the original object, while the otaku fashion an original aura for their (fictional) reproductions.
The Problem of Possession
The next characteristic of the otaku is the way they go about possessing the objects of their attachment. We know that they enjoy animation. And they like special effects. But unlike stamps or audio systems, these are hard to collect. The fact is, moreover, that not all otaku are collectors in the first place. One might assume that anime fans are all interested in collecting actual cels from their favorite shows, but in fact this is surprisingly rare. Of course, such otaku do exist in fairly significant numbers, but this is not a necessary qualification for otaku identity. Part of this has to do with the fact that cels are not necessarily the material object-form of an anime. This may sound paradoxical, but cels are actually more like a by-product of an anime and occupy the same position as spin-off merchandise. So even if you owned every cel of an anime, this would not mean that you owned the anime itself. So how do the otaku make their objects their own?
Simply put, they do so through fictionalization.
What otaku enjoy is not making fiction into material form. Nor, as is often claimed, do they derive enjoyment from confusing reality and fiction. Their goal is simply to take fictions that are out there and promote them to fictions that are theirs alone. It is no coincidence that otaku like parodies. It may be that cosplay (kosupure) and fan magazines are best understood as examples of this process of fictionalization. Popular anime always attract so-called SS (“short” or “side” story) writers, who borrow the setting and characters from these works, write novels and scenarios in different versions, and then upload them to online forums. What is the motivation behind this form of expression that does not earn them a penny? Is it self-promotion? A service to other fans? If it were just that, surely parody or criticism would be more effective. I believe that “SS” is precisely how otaku manage to possess these works. They let the work “possess” them, weave a different story out of the same materials, and share it with the community. This process is a kind of “ritual of possession” practiced within the otaku community.
Even if they are not that serious, otaku are generally critics. All otaku have something that should probably be called a critical drive, including even cases like Miyazaki Tsutome. In fact, a fan who has forgotten his or her critical perspective is not an otaku. Otaku feel compelled to talk endlessly about a work and its creator. Their talk does not stop at the work itself but also extends to include their own relationship to it. When otaku engage in critique, their passion also merges with their enthusiasm for possession through the creation of new fictions. To put it very dramatically, the only way that otaku have of acquiring the objects they love is by fictionalizing them and turning them into their own works. This inevitably leads to the creation of new fictional contexts.
It was not his extraordinary intelligence or the accuracy of his information that made possible Okada Toshio’s status as the Otaku King. More than anything it was his production of a legendary animated film called Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise (oritsu uchugun: Oneamisu no tsubasa, 1987) as a rank amateur. He was also involved in producing the masterpiece of the OVA, Gunbuster (Toppu o nerae!). The careful and deliberate way in which he marketed these anime drew from his own experiences as an otaku and was itself a brilliant form of critique. The otaku business is one of those rare fields in which superb critical acumen can translate directly into highly creative work. If Okada is respected among otaku, it is because of his astounding ability to create fictions. For otaku, the kind of accuracy of information required by maniacs is nice, but not essential. And the fact is that Okada sometimes gets things wrong because of his own preoccupations. But this is tolerated as an aspect of his idiosyncratic style. This is a context in which even a mistake can be forgivable as long as it provides interesting fodder for fictionalization.
What is Fiction?
The concept of fiction as I have been using it thus far is also probably in need of some elucidation. As I mentioned earlier, a high level of fictional context does not necessarily imply a high level of fictionality. One can easily imagine a paradoxical situation in which an autobiography overflowing with empty rhetorical flourishes might seem less realistic than a piece of honest metafiction. But the problem is more complex even than that. It may be, for example, that the rhetorical flourishes of that autobiography actually say something very real about the desires of its author.
There is really no objective set of standards to measure the fictionality of a given work. This is why I have introduced the neutral concept of the “fictional context.” As I explained earlier, this is an “imaginary concept” determined by the number of forms of media necessary to mediate the creation of a work. I insist on the term imaginary for the following reason. We are not actually able to count the number of types of media involved. Only the recipient has the right to determine what is citation and what is parody. If a given citation is to be interpreted as the original, the fictional context for the recipient will be low. This involvement of the receiver’s subjective viewpoint makes things even more complicated.
Of course, it is easy to understand fictionality as long as one does not insist on too much rigor in the definition. One could simply say something along the lines of “What seems like a lie is fiction and what seems real is the thing itself.” Faced with such a clear statement, the rigorous examination of fictionality seems like a meaningless detour. But is it really? Let’s take a closer look. The statement “what seems like a lie is fiction and what seems real is the thing itself” is nothing more than a tautology. It is true enough, but it means nothing.
The discussion gets confusing because of the intervention of the adjective “real” (riaru). “Fictional” and “Real” are not opposites. If they were, an expression like “Real fiction” (riaru na kyoko) would be meaningless. Instead, it is fiction and reality that are opposites, which leaves us with the problem of how to define reality.
What is reality? A raw, unmediated experience? Is that what reality is? Since the Aum Shinrikyo incident this kind of simplistic equation no longer holds. Raw, real experiences are the most deceptive of all . The mystical experiences and altered states of consciousness that Aum members experienced during their training have made us all too aware of the fundamental fallacy in the idea that “actual experiences” equal reality. So we ask again: What is reality?
Indeed, it should go without saying that reality is itself a form of fiction. At least the word reality as we use it in general refers to the fiction that is “the everyday world we live in.” It is the fiction that is shared most widely. Some people might attach conditions to their belief in it, but our degree of adaption to society is judged according to whether or not we have accepted it. In this sense it is perhaps the most powerful of all fictions.
Psychoanalysis teaches us that we can never touch reality in its raw form. “Reality” is another name for the impossible, at least for Lacan. Let us review Lacan’s triad: the Real, the Symbolic, the Imaginary. These constitute a topological division of the human psyche, where, in my understanding, the emphasis falls on how people experience things. The Real, as I just mentioned, is “the realm of the impossible”: a paradoxical realm that exists because it is impossible to experience. The Symbolic is for the most part synonymous with the system of language. It is external to the subject and referred to as the “Other.” That language is other to us means that it is a transcendental entity positioned outside the subject. When we speak we experience its existence, but we cannot be completely conscious of that experience itself. The Imaginary is the realm of images and representations, and also of narcissism, since it is located inside the subject (*14). It is here that “meaning” and “experiences” are possible.
What does it mean for us to experience “fiction”? Experience, we have seen, becomes possible in the Imaginary. Whenever we have a conscious experience of anything, that experience happens in the Imaginary. In this sense there can be no essential distinction between “everyday reality” and “fiction.” (*15)
But, needless to say, that would be a mistake. It is a misreading of Lacan to suggest that one can grasp the Symbolic through the Imaginary. But this misreading is everywhere. Hiroki Azuma, for example, has claimed that in today’s society “the Symbolic stopped functioning.” He points to the deterioration of popular song lyrics as an example.
This is an interesting argument in itself, but it is based on the same misunderstanding.
Lacan’s tripartite model would be just a tool for meaningless speculation if we did not accept its universality. And psychoanalysis would be impossible without the assumption that we are and always will be “neurotics” from the moment that we attain language. And as long as we are neurotics, this tripartite division of the world, or at least the topological relations among its parts, will hold.
Let me make my own position clear. From this point on I will keep the focus on the interactions between media and the Imaginary, and I will not postulate any transformations or shifts in the Symbolic or the Real. This means that otaku can be discussed only in imaginary terms. In other words, we can postulate no structural difference between the non-otaku subject and the otaku subject, because both are neurotics and both stand in the same relation to the Symbolic. Therefore we can now reject completely the claim made by Osawa quoted above. Similarly, it is impossible to identify anything psychoanalytically unique about the otaku as a community. In fact, it is not uncommon to find certain pathologies among those who insist on the uniqueness of the otaku. I have abandoned the attempt to speak of the psychopathology of the otaku in structural terms. Instead, I will stick with descriptions on the level of the Imaginary. This is unavoidable as long as psychoanalysis is my primary method.
I never answered the question I posed earlier: How is it that we experience “everyday reality”? Distinguishing it from fiction is always a function of the Imaginary. In concrete terms, this has to do with our image of the degree to which experiences are mediated. Fiction can arise only out of the consciousness - and not the “fact” - that is experience is a mediated one(*17).
Thus the media have no other function vis-a-vis experience than to provide this kind of consciousness of being mediated. Or to put it the other way around, “everyday reality” is nothing more than a set of experiences that emerge from a consciousness of not being mediated. This difference between a consciousness of being and not being mediated, moreover, is only an imaginary one. Let me emphasize this once more. For us neurotics “everyday reality” has no essential privilege. This is also evident from the fact that patients suffering from dissociative disorder (a neurotic pathology) experience everyday reality as if it were fiction(*18).
[*14. The distinction I am making here between the inside and the outside of the subject is a provisional one meant only to aid the reader’s understanding. In strict psychoanalytic terms the distinction would be untenable.
*15. When I use the word “reality” in this book without any further specification I am referring to this kind of imaginary or everyday reality. When I mean reality in the psychoanalytic sense - that material realm that is impossible for us to experience - I use Lacan’s term “the Real,” with a capital “R.” That said, I have little occasion from here on to use the latter term. The focus in this book is on the relationship between the Imaginary and the Symbolic. Fighting girls are the product of neurotic desire and have nothing to do with psychosis, which of course makes it impossible to postulate the incursion of the Real when describing them. I am including this proviso because I realize that my earlier statement that “Reality is a form of fiction” might be misunderstood as a profession of belief in metaphysics or idealism.
*17. There are “media” (baikai) everywhere, starting with television, film, manga, and the Internet. And of course there are also more individualized media like the telephone, letters, and email. But these are not all. All relations with other people in daily life rely on some sort of media. This kind of media might be called “role consciousness.” Thus every individual takes on multiple interpersonal situations. For example, when I interview a patient as a psychiatrist, that experience is mediated by “doctor-role consciousness.” As a result, the treatment relation becomes fictionalized in a way. This provides a defense against the interview experience exercising too great an influence on the doctor’s daily life.
*18. Symptoms of dissociative illness cause people to complain of pain because of losing the sense of reality with regard to self and the external world, feeling that they are no longer themselves, or feeling that other people and landscapes are somehow unreal, as if seen through a membrane. These are seen often in cases of neurosis, depression, and schizophrenia. While in recent years it has been used to refer to cases in which patients feel as if another self is watching their body and movements from the outside, I use the term here in the former meaning.]
Otaku and Fiction
People who have an otaku mentality, with a high affinity for fiction, are likely to have a latent discomfort with reality whether or not they have actually been able to adapt to it. But this is not a serious issue; for them, it is more on the scale of, “Everyday reality is a drag!” At the very least we can say that this refusal to adapt does not lead in any simple way to the flight from reality and thence to refuge in a fictional world.
Hard-core otaku have their own unique stance toward fiction and are able to enjoy anime, for example, on multiple levels. To put this in the terms I used earlier, they are able to switch freely between levels of fictional context. As I mentioned earlier, they see reality as a kind of fiction. Since this means they do not necessarily privilege reality, it can easily be mistaken for an avoidance of reality. So while otaku do not in any way “confuse fiction with reality,” they are uninterested in setting fiction and reality up against each other. If anything they are able to find reality (riariti <lol>) equally in both fiction and reality (genjitsu).
In fact, otaku discover a multilayered reality (riariti) even in the fictionality of fiction. They see and enjoy reality (riariti) in terms of every standard by which fiction can be judged, including not just the quality of anime characters but also the script and character design, visual direction, marketing, criticism, and particular points of appreciation. This is the otaku’s special ability . When this is developed sufficiently, it becomes the three abilities that Okada describes as the “eye of the aesthete,” the “eye of the master,” and the “eye of the connoisseur.” Otaku do not just command a great deal of information, they must also be able to identify instantaneously these different standards of fictionality and shift to the appropriate level on which to appreciate them. This means not just falling in love and losing oneself in the world of a single work, but somehow staying sober while still indulging one’s feverish enthusiasm .
Total immersion in the world of the work on the object level has nothing to do with the essence of the otaku. Stephen King’s novel Misery, which was also made into a film, depicts a fan like this. She is in love with a certain series of novels and cannot tolerate its ending in a way that she does not like. So she makes the author a prisoner in her home and threatens him so that he will write the ending she wants. If such a woman actually existed, I would be happy to award her with the prize for confusing fiction and reality. But otaku try to stay as far away as possible from this kind of violence and crazed enthusiasm.
What would an otaku do if a story he liked ended badly? In fact, we have an excellent example of just such a case. Neon Genesis Evangelion (Sin seiki Evangerion), which I discuss in more detail later, created a whole social phenomenon as a result of its ending. Until the last half of the series it was a giant robot anime of unprecedented sophistication. But the problem came with the last episode, when the protagonist suddenly started to talk at great length about his own inner strugglers, leading to an ending in which he experienced inner salvation. Most of the fans were furious with this ending.
But did they criticize the creator Anno Hideaki directly? Of course, there were many who did. But at the same time huge numbers of fans began to write their own “eva” stories. And this was certainly the proper otaku response. They did not see the author as absolute. They were not just fans, but connoisseurs, critics, and authors themselves. This blurring of the distinction between producer and consumer is another characteristic of the otaku. In that sense, if we limit the discussion to how they relate to fiction, Osawa’s point is right after all. For otaku the place that is supposed to be taken by the transcendent author is extremely close to his or her own internal other.
The Psychopathology of the Otaku
Of course, the otaku do exist in reality, and it is important to recognize that. The Comic Market, which I mentioned earlier, for example, is a space in which the logic of the otaku predominates over “everyday reality.” But one cannot say it is not reality. It is a world in which fan magazines produced by serious otaku can generate revenues in the millions of yen. It is, in other words, a space in which the ability to produce enjoyable fictions is privileged above all else. And there we see on display only a small portion of the otaku’s ability to modify reality. Their ability to see reality as a kind of fiction is certainly a strength. The elite of the otaku are capable of changing reality to fit their tastes, just as Bill Gates and Michael Jackson did.
But while multiple orientation has the advantage of allowing people to shift perspectives flexibly, it also has a sort of pathological limitation. The more accurately the otaku shifts from one perspective to another, the more the framework of the experience as a whole cannot help but shift toward the fictional. And when multiple orientations are given equal weight, we lose the singularity that is the essential quality of reality. This is probably why otaku often complain of dissociative episodes and seem lost in the ordinary world. Thus multiple orientation can sometimes be viewed as an escape from reality. Yet even the expression “escape from reality” may be only a provisional one.
What provides the impetus for people to become otaku? To an outside observer it may appear to be caused by an episode of adaptational failure of some sort. But is it not possible for someone to become an otaku without that sort of trauma? Could it be that the more fundamental cause that makes people into otaku is to be found in the excessive immersion in the multiple orientations that we have been discussing? If so, why is it that otaku engage in this kind of immersion?
<…>
“The destining of revealing is in itself not just any danger, but danger as such.” from The Question Concerning Technology by Martin Heidegger.
For the great Persian scholar Avicenna, sensory phantasms were processed through five virtues or powers corresponding to five cavities in the cranium; phantasy or common sense, imagination, cogitative virtue, the estimative virtue, and finally the reminiscent virtue. According to Georgio Agamben in his work Stanzas: Word and Phantasm in Western Culture, Avicenna conceives of this gradation through the inner senses as a "progressive 'disrobing' (denudatio) of the phantasm from its material accidents."
<..>
I believe that this is where sexuality comes to have a very close relationship to all of this. We must recognize the fictionality and multilayered quality of sexuality. When people are sexually excited by the image of a woman in an anime, they may be taken aback at first, but they are already infected by the otaku bug. This is the crucial dividing point. How is it possible for a drawing of a woman to become a sexual object?
“What is it about this impossible object, this woman that I cannot even touch, that could possibly attract me?” This sort of question reverberates in the back of the otaku’s mind. A kind of analytic perspective on his or her own sexuality yields not an answer to this question but a determination of the fictionality and the communal nature of sex itself. “Sex” is broken down within the framework of fiction and then put back together again. In this respect one could say that the otaku undergoes hystericization: the otaku’s acts of narrative take the form of eternally unanswerable questions posed toward his or her own sexuality. And the narratives of hysterics cannot help but induce from us all manner of interpretations. This is of course what has led me to the present analysis.

It is a very heavy subreddit. You come here at lonely times. At depressing times. Even at happy times. Hence here is something. For you
You are strong. You are beautiful. You are dazzling. You are handsome. You are brave. You are bold. You are courageous. You are disciplined. You are intelligent. You are smart. You are unique. You are different. You are fun. You are funny. You are responsible. You are passionate. You are charismatic. You are talented. Multi-skilled. You are deserving. You are acclaimed. You are mannerly. You are kind. You are calm. You are polite. Most importantly, you are humane. You. Are. Awesome.
Why all of a sudden? Why do I have to just add an adjective at the end of “You are”? Simple. People deserve appreciation. Any difficulty in the current era is constantly being problematized and asserted. Collations and contrasts have become a bane to a person’s measure of success. A burden adding to a person’s difficulties. A constant illness to her capabilities making her question herself. Is she doing it the right way? Does she look good while doing it? Is she sufficient? Has she accomplished enough? Is she qualified? Is she skilled? Is she emotionally strong? Is she talented? Is she willing? Is she sure? Is she… Is she… Is she…
I am not talking about meager acceptance. That’s just cowardliness where you sit back and overthink your inability and thus end up stagnating at the same place. No. But the ladder to success is not merely filled with physical constraints these days but more of psychological and mental restrictions that the person is being inflicted upon at all times by the society and by herself. Always a constant pullback that makes a person speculate herself over and over due to peer pressure, societal rules, community guidelines, social acceptance with persistent comments from people they encounter everyday either in real life or through social media. Questioning. Criticizing. Conjecturing. Comparing every action. Every movement. Every moment. With judgmental opinions. With biased decisions. With disrespect. With cruelty.
It is not easy. Not for anyone. Not for me. Not for you. There is no measurement. Maybe the times I am going through are “rougher” than yours. It doesn’t necessarily mean your situation is easy. But the fact that you are able to outperform and sustain in this competitive world with so much energy and courage is exactly what needs to be enlightened. That you are also an “able” person with equal willpower. The road is not going to be smooth. It is not going to be easy. You might face difficulties that no one has ever faced. Disrespectful comments. That you are not worthy. You might even be used. Might be disregarded. This world is a vicious place. And for that I can only say this. You deserve all the happiness in the world. All the respect in the world. All the positivity in the world. Just for being able to do what you are doing. Just for enduring this callousness. Just for being who you are. And for that, I write this to you. A tribute. An accolade. For being a part of this world. For being able to survive. For your energy. For your existence. For your presence. For you. For all of what is you. I whole heartedly thank you for being yourself. You. Are. Awesome.

From u/TheGooombler
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1. COINTELPRO Techniques for dilution, misdirection and control of a internet forum
2. Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
3. Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
4. How to Spot a Spy (Cointelpro Agent)
5. Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression

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COINTELPRO Techniques for dilution, misdirection and control of a internet forum..
There are several techniques for the control and manipulation of a internet forum no matter what, or who is on it. We will go over each technique and demonstrate that only a minimal number of operatives can be used to eventually and effectively gain a control of a 'uncontrolled forum.'
Technique #1 - 'FORUM SLIDING'
If a very sensitive posting of a critical nature has been posted on a forum - it can be quickly removed from public view by 'forum sliding.' In this technique a number of unrelated posts are quietly prepositioned on the forum and allowed to 'age.' Each of these misdirectional forum postings can then be called upon at will to trigger a 'forum slide.' The second requirement is that several fake accounts exist, which can be called upon, to ensure that this technique is not exposed to the public. To trigger a 'forum slide' and 'flush' the critical post out of public view it is simply a matter of logging into each account both real and fake and then 'replying' to prepositined postings with a simple 1 or 2 line comment. This brings the unrelated postings to the top of the forum list, and the critical posting 'slides' down the front page, and quickly out of public view. Although it is difficult or impossible to censor the posting it is now lost in a sea of unrelated and unuseful postings. By this means it becomes effective to keep the readers of the forum reading unrelated and non-issue items.
Technique #2 - 'CONSENSUS CRACKING'
A second highly effective technique (which you can see in operation all the time at www.abovetopsecret.com) is 'consensus cracking.' To develop a consensus crack, the following technique is used. Under the guise of a fake account a posting is made which looks legitimate and is towards the truth is made - but the critical point is that it has a VERY WEAK PREMISE without substantive proof to back the posting. Once this is done then under alternative fake accounts a very strong position in your favour is slowly introduced over the life of the posting. It is IMPERATIVE that both sides are initially presented, so the uninformed reader cannot determine which side is the truth. As postings and replies are made the stronger 'evidence' or disinformation in your favour is slowly 'seeded in.' Thus the uninformed reader will most like develop the same position as you, and if their position is against you their opposition to your posting will be most likely dropped. However in some cases where the forum members are highly educated and can counter your disinformation with real facts and linked postings, you can then 'abort' the consensus cracking by initiating a 'forum slide.'
Technique #3 - 'TOPIC DILUTION'
Topic dilution is not only effective in forum sliding it is also very useful in keeping the forum readers on unrelated and non-productive issues. This is a critical and useful technique to cause a 'RESOURCE BURN.' By implementing continual and non-related postings that distract and disrupt (trolling ) the forum readers they are more effectively stopped from anything of any real productivity. If the intensity of gradual dilution is intense enough, the readers will effectively stop researching and simply slip into a 'gossip mode.' In this state they can be more easily misdirected away from facts towards uninformed conjecture and opinion. The less informed they are the more effective and easy it becomes to control the entire group in the direction that you would desire the group to go in. It must be stressed that a proper assessment of the psychological capabilities and levels of education is first determined of the group to determine at what level to 'drive in the wedge.' By being too far off topic too quickly it may trigger censorship by a forum moderator.
Technique #4 - 'INFORMATION COLLECTION'
Information collection is also a very effective method to determine the psychological level of the forum members, and to gather intelligence that can be used against them. In this technique in a light and positive environment a 'show you mine so me yours' posting is initiated. From the number of replies and the answers that are provided much statistical information can be gathered. An example is to post your 'favourite weapon' and then encourage other members of the forum to showcase what they have. In this matter it can be determined by reverse proration what percentage of the forum community owns a firearm, and or a illegal weapon. This same method can be used by posing as one of the form members and posting your favourite 'technique of operation.' From the replies various methods that the group utilizes can be studied and effective methods developed to stop them from their activities.
Technique #5 - 'ANGER TROLLING'
Statistically, there is always a percentage of the forum posters who are more inclined to violence. In order to determine who these individuals are, it is a requirement to present a image to the forum to deliberately incite a strong psychological reaction. From this the most violent in the group can be effectively singled out for reverse IP location and possibly local enforcement tracking. To accomplish this only requires posting a link to a video depicting a local police officer massively abusing his power against a very innocent individual. Statistically of the million or so police officers in America there is always one or two being caught abusing there powers and the taping of the activity can be then used for intelligence gathering purposes - without the requirement to 'stage' a fake abuse video. This method is extremely effective, and the more so the more abusive the video can be made to look. Sometimes it is useful to 'lead' the forum by replying to your own posting with your own statement of violent intent, and that you 'do not care what the authorities think!!' inflammation. By doing this and showing no fear it may be more effective in getting the more silent and self-disciplined violent intent members of the forum to slip and post their real intentions. This can be used later in a court of law during prosecution.
Technique #6 - 'GAINING FULL CONTROL'
It is important to also be harvesting and continually maneuvering for a forum moderator position. Once this position is obtained, the forum can then be effectively and quietly controlled by deleting unfavourable postings - and one can eventually steer the forum into complete failure and lack of interest by the general public. This is the 'ultimate victory' as the forum is no longer participated with by the general public and no longer useful in maintaining their freedoms. Depending on the level of control you can obtain, you can deliberately steer a forum into defeat by censoring postings, deleting memberships, flooding, and or accidentally taking the forum offline. By this method the forum can be quickly killed. However it is not always in the interest to kill a forum as it can be converted into a 'honey pot' gathering center to collect and misdirect newcomers and from this point be completely used for your control for your agenda purposes.
CONCLUSION
Remember these techniques are only effective if the forum participants DO NOT KNOW ABOUT THEM. Once they are aware of these techniques the operation can completely fail, and the forum can become uncontrolled. At this point other avenues must be considered such as initiating a false legal precidence to simply have the forum shut down and taken offline. This is not desirable as it then leaves the enforcement agencies unable to track the percentage of those in the population who always resist attempts for control against them. Many other techniques can be utilized and developed by the individual and as you develop further techniques of infiltration and control it is imperative to share then with HQ.
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Twenty-Five Rules of Disinformation
Note: The first rule and last five (or six, depending on situation) rules are generally not directly within the ability of the traditional disinfo artist to apply. These rules are generally used more directly by those at the leadership, key players, or planning level of the criminal conspiracy or conspiracy to cover up.
1. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. Regardless of what you know, don't discuss it -- especially if you are a public figure, news anchor, etc. If it's not reported, it didn't happen, and you never have to deal with the issues.
2. Become incredulous and indignant. Avoid discussing key issues and instead focus on side issues which can be used show the topic as being critical of some otherwise sacrosanct group or theme. This is also known as the 'How dare you!' gambit.
3. Create rumor mongers. Avoid discussing issues by describing all charges, regardless of venue or evidence, as mere rumors and wild accusations. Other derogatory terms mutually exclusive of truth may work as well. This method which works especially well with a silent press, because the only way the public can learn of the facts are through such 'arguable rumors'. If you can associate the material with the Internet, use this fact to certify it a 'wild rumor' from a 'bunch of kids on the Internet' which can have no basis in fact.
4. Use a straw man. Find or create a seeming element of your opponent's argument which you can easily knock down to make yourself look good and the opponent to look bad. Either make up an issue you may safely imply exists based on your interpretation of the opponent/opponent arguments/situation, or select the weakest aspect of the weakest charges. Amplify their significance and destroy them in a way which appears to debunk all the charges, real and fabricated alike, while actually avoiding discussion of the real issues.
5. Sidetrack opponents with name calling and ridicule. This is also known as the primary 'attack the messenger' ploy, though other methods qualify as variants of that approach. Associate opponents with unpopular titles such as 'kooks', 'right-wing', 'liberal', 'left-wing', 'terrorists', 'conspiracy buffs', 'radicals', 'militia', 'racists', 'religious fanatics', 'sexual deviates', and so forth. This makes others shrink from support out of fear of gaining the same label, and you avoid dealing with issues.
6. Hit and Run. In any public forum, make a brief attack of your opponent or the opponent position and then scamper off before an answer can be fielded, or simply ignore any answer. This works extremely well in Internet and letters-to-the-editor environments where a steady stream of new identities can be called upon without having to explain criticism, reasoning -- simply make an accusation or other attack, never discussing issues, and never answering any subsequent response, for that would dignify the opponent's viewpoint.
7. Question motives. Twist or amplify any fact which could be taken to imply that the opponent operates out of a hidden personal agenda or other bias. This avoids discussing issues and forces the accuser on the defensive.
8. Invoke authority. Claim for yourself or associate yourself with authority and present your argument with enough 'jargon' and 'minutia' to illustrate you are 'one who knows', and simply say it isn't so without discussing issues or demonstrating concretely why or citing sources.
9. Play Dumb. No matter what evidence or logical argument is offered, avoid discussing issues except with denials they have any credibility, make any sense, provide any proof, contain or make a point, have logic, or support a conclusion. Mix well for maximum effect.
10. Associate opponent charges with old news. A derivative of the straw man -- usually, in any large-scale matter of high visibility, someone will make charges early on which can be or were already easily dealt with - a kind of investment for the future should the matter not be so easily contained.) Where it can be foreseen, have your own side raise a straw man issue and have it dealt with early on as part of the initial contingency plans. Subsequent charges, regardless of validity or new ground uncovered, can usually then be associated with the original charge and dismissed as simply being a rehash without need to address current issues -- so much the better where the opponent is or was involved with the original source.
11. Establish and rely upon fall-back positions. Using a minor matter or element of the facts, take the 'high road' and 'confess' with candor that some innocent mistake, in hindsight, was made -- but that opponents have seized on the opportunity to blow it all out of proportion and imply greater criminalities which, 'just isn't so.' Others can reinforce this on your behalf, later, and even publicly 'call for an end to the nonsense' because you have already 'done the right thing.' Done properly, this can garner sympathy and respect for 'coming clean' and 'owning up' to your mistakes without addressing more serious issues.
12. Enigmas have no solution. Drawing upon the overall umbrella of events surrounding the crime and the multitude of players and events, paint the entire affair as too complex to solve. This causes those otherwise following the matter to begin to lose interest more quickly without having to address the actual issues.
13. Alice in Wonderland Logic. Avoid discussion of the issues by reasoning backwards or with an apparent deductive logic which forbears any actual material fact.
14. Demand complete solutions. Avoid the issues by requiring opponents to solve the crime at hand completely, a ploy which works best with issues qualifying for rule 10.
15. Fit the facts to alternate conclusions. This requires creative thinking unless the crime was planned with contingency conclusions in place.
16. Vanish evidence and witnesses. If it does not exist, it is not fact, and you won't have to address the issue.
17. Change the subject. Usually in connection with one of the other ploys listed here, find a way to side-track the discussion with abrasive or controversial comments in hopes of turning attention to a new, more manageable topic. This works especially well with companions who can 'argue' with you over the new topic and polarize the discussion arena in order to avoid discussing more key issues.
18. Emotionalize, Antagonize, and Goad Opponents. If you can't do anything else, chide and taunt your opponents and draw them into emotional responses which will tend to make them look foolish and overly motivated, and generally render their material somewhat less coherent. Not only will you avoid discussing the issues in the first instance, but even if their emotional response addresses the issue, you can further avoid the issues by then focusing on how 'sensitive they are to criticism.'
19. Ignore proof presented, demand impossible proofs. This is perhaps a variant of the 'play dumb' rule. Regardless of what material may be presented by an opponent in public forums, claim the material irrelevant and demand proof that is impossible for the opponent to come by (it may exist, but not be at his disposal, or it may be something which is known to be safely destroyed or withheld, such as a murder weapon.) In order to completely avoid discussing issues, it may be required that you to categorically deny and be critical of media or books as valid sources, deny that witnesses are acceptable, or even deny that statements made by government or other authorities have any meaning or relevance.
20. False evidence. Whenever possible, introduce new facts or clues designed and manufactured to conflict with opponent presentations -- as useful tools to neutralize sensitive issues or impede resolution. This works best when the crime was designed with contingencies for the purpose, and the facts cannot be easily separated from the fabrications.
21. Call a Grand Jury, Special Prosecutor, or other empowered investigative body. Subvert the (process) to your benefit and effectively neutralize all sensitive issues without open discussion. Once convened, the evidence and testimony are required to be secret when properly handled. For instance, if you own the prosecuting attorney, it can insure a Grand Jury hears no useful evidence and that the evidence is sealed and unavailable to subsequent investigators. Once a favorable verdict is achieved, the matter can be considered officially closed. Usually, this technique is applied to find the guilty innocent, but it can also be used to obtain charges when seeking to frame a victim.
22. Manufacture a new truth. Create your own expert(s), group(s), author(s), leader(s) or influence existing ones willing to forge new ground via scientific, investigative, or social research or testimony which concludes favorably. In this way, if you must actually address issues, you can do so authoritatively.
23. Create bigger distractions. If the above does not seem to be working to distract from sensitive issues, or to prevent unwanted media coverage of unstoppable events such as trials, create bigger news stories (or treat them as such) to distract the multitudes.
24. Silence critics. If the above methods do not prevail, consider removing opponents from circulation by some definitive solution so that the need to address issues is removed entirely. This can be by their death, arrest and detention, blackmail or destruction of their character by release of blackmail information, or merely by destroying them financially, emotionally, or severely damaging their health.
25. Vanish. If you are a key holder of secrets or otherwise overly illuminated and you think the heat is getting too hot, to avoid the issues, vacate the kitchen.
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Eight Traits of the Disinformationalist
1) Avoidance. They never actually discuss issues head-on or provide constructive input, generally avoiding citation of references or credentials. Rather, they merely imply this, that, and the other. Virtually everything about their presentation implies their authority and expert knowledge in the matter without any further justification for credibility.
2) Selectivity. They tend to pick and choose opponents carefully, either applying the hit-and-run approach against mere commentators supportive of opponents, or focusing heavier attacks on key opponents who are known to directly address issues. Should a commentator become argumentative with any success, the focus will shift to include the commentator as well.
3) Coincidental. They tend to surface suddenly and somewhat coincidentally with a new controversial topic with no clear prior record of participation in general discussions in the particular public arena involved. They likewise tend to vanish once the topic is no longer of general concern. They were likely directed or elected to be there for a reason, and vanish with the reason.
4) Teamwork. They tend to operate in self-congratulatory and complementary packs or teams. Of course, this can happen naturally in any public forum, but there will likely be an ongoing pattern of frequent exchanges of this sort where professionals are involved. Sometimes one of the players will infiltrate the opponent camp to become a source for straw man or other tactics designed to dilute opponent presentation strength.
5) Anti-conspiratorial. They almost always have disdain for 'conspiracy theorists' and, usually, for those who in any way believe JFK was not killed by LHO. Ask yourself why, if they hold such disdain for conspiracy theorists, do they focus on defending a single topic discussed in a NG focusing on conspiracies? One might think they would either be trying to make fools of everyone on every topic, or simply ignore the group they hold in such disdain.Or, one might more rightly conclude they have an ulterior motive for their actions in going out of their way to focus as they do.
6) Artificial Emotions. An odd kind of 'artificial' emotionalism and an unusually thick skin -- an ability to persevere and persist even in the face of overwhelming criticism and unacceptance. This likely stems from intelligence community training that, no matter how condemning the evidence, deny everything, and never become emotionally involved or reactive. The net result for a disinfo artist is that emotions can seem artificial.
Most people, if responding in anger, for instance, will express their animosity throughout their rebuttal. But disinfo types usually have trouble maintaining the 'image' and are hot and cold with respect to pretended emotions and their usually more calm or unemotional communications style. It's just a job, and they often seem unable to 'act their role in character' as well in a communications medium as they might be able in a real face-to-face conversation/confrontation. You might have outright rage and indignation one moment, ho-hum the next, and more anger later -- an emotional yo-yo.
With respect to being thick-skinned, no amount of criticism will deter them from doing their job, and they will generally continue their old disinfo patterns without any adjustments to criticisms of how obvious it is that they play that game -- where a more rational individual who truly cares what others think might seek to improve their communications style, substance, and so forth, or simply give up.
7) Inconsistent. There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat 'freudian', so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within.
I have noted that often, they will simply cite contradictory information which neutralizes itself and the author. For instance, one such player claimed to be a Navy pilot, but blamed his poor communicating skills (spelling, grammar, incoherent style) on having only a grade-school education. I'm not aware of too many Navy pilots who don't have a college degree. Another claimed no knowledge of a particular topic/situation but later claimed first-hand knowledge of it.
8) Time Constant. Recently discovered, with respect to News Groups, is the response time factor. There are three ways this can be seen to work, especially when the government or other empowered player is involved in a cover up operation:
a) ANY NG posting by a targeted proponent for truth can result in an IMMEDIATE response. The government and other empowered players can afford to pay people to sit there and watch for an opportunity to do some damage. SINCE DISINFO IN A NG ONLY WORKS IF THE READER SEES IT - FAST RESPONSE IS CALLED FOR, or the visitor may be swayed towards truth.
b) When dealing in more direct ways with a disinformationalist, such as email, DELAY IS CALLED FOR - there will usually be a minimum of a 48-72 hour delay. This allows a sit-down team discussion on response strategy for best effect, and even enough time to 'get permission' or instruction from a formal chain of command.
c) In the NG example 1) above, it will often ALSO be seen that bigger guns are drawn and fired after the same 48-72 hours delay - the team approach in play. This is especially true when the targeted truth seeker or their comments are considered more important with respect to potential to reveal truth. Thus, a serious truth sayer will be attacked twice for the same sin.
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How to Spot a Spy (Cointelpro Agent)
One way to neutralize a potential activist is to get them to be in a group that does all the wrong things. Why?
1) The message doesn't get out.
2) A lot of time is wasted
3) The activist is frustrated and discouraged
4) Nothing good is accomplished.
FBI and Police Informers and Infiltrators will infest any group and they have phoney activist organizations established.
Their purpose is to prevent any real movement for justice or eco-peace from developing in this country.
Agents come in small, medium or large. They can be of any ethnic background. They can be male or female.
The actual size of the group or movement being infiltrated is irrelevant. It is the potential the movement has for becoming large which brings on the spies and saboteurs.
This booklet lists tactics agents use to slow things down, foul things up, destroy the movement and keep tabs on activists.
It is the agent's job to keep the activist from quitting such a group, thus keeping him/her under control.
In some situations, to get control, the agent will tell the activist:
​

• "You're dividing the movement."

[Here, I have added the psychological reasons as to WHY this maneuver works to control people]
This invites guilty feelings. Many people can be controlled by guilt. The agents begin relationships with activists behind a well-developed mask of "dedication to the cause." Because of their often declared dedication, (and actions designed to prove this), when they criticize the activist, he or she - being truly dedicated to the movement - becomes convinced that somehow, any issues are THEIR fault. This is because a truly dedicated person tends to believe that everyone has a conscience and that nobody would dissimulate and lie like that "on purpose." It's amazing how far agents can go in manipulating an activist because the activist will constantly make excuses for the agent who regularly declares their dedication to the cause. Even if they do, occasionally, suspect the agent, they will pull the wool over their own eyes by rationalizing: "they did that unconsciously... they didn't really mean it... I can help them by being forgiving and accepting " and so on and so forth.
The agent will tell the activist:
​

• "You're a leader!"

This is designed to enhance the activist's self-esteem. His or her narcissistic admiration of his/her own activist/altruistic intentions increase as he or she identifies with and consciously admires the altruistic declarations of the agent which are deliberately set up to mirror those of the activist.
This is "malignant pseudoidentification." It is the process by which the agent consciously imitates or simulates a certain behavior to foster the activist's identification with him/her, thus increasing the activist's vulnerability to exploitation. The agent will simulate the more subtle self-concepts of the activist.
Activists and those who have altruistic self-concepts are most vulnerable to malignant pseudoidentification especially during work with the agent when the interaction includes matter relating to their competency, autonomy, or knowledge.
The goal of the agent is to increase the activist's general empathy for the agent through pseudo-identification with the activist's self-concepts.
The most common example of this is the agent who will compliment the activist for his competency or knowledge or value to the movement. On a more subtle level, the agent will simulate affects and mannerisms of the activist which promotes identification via mirroring and feelings of "twinship". It is not unheard of for activists, enamored by the perceived helpfulness and competence of a good agent, to find themselves considering ethical violations and perhaps, even illegal behavior, in the service of their agent/handler.
The activist's "felt quality of perfection" [self-concept] is enhanced, and a strong empathic bond is developed with the agent through his/her imitation and simulation of the victim's own narcissistic investments. [self-concepts] That is, if the activist knows, deep inside, their own dedication to the cause, they will project that onto the agent who is "mirroring" them.
The activist will be deluded into thinking that the agent shares this feeling of identification and bonding. In an activist/social movement setting, the adversarial roles that activists naturally play vis a vis the establishment/government, fosters ongoing processes of intrapsychic splitting so that "twinship alliances" between activist and agent may render whole sectors or reality testing unavailable to the activist. They literally "lose touch with reality."
Activists who deny their own narcissistic investments [do not have a good idea of their own self-concepts and that they ARE concepts] and consciously perceive themselves (accurately, as it were) to be "helpers" endowed with a special amount of altruism are exceedingly vulnerable to the affective (emotional) simulation of the accomplished agent.
Empathy is fostered in the activist through the expression of quite visible affects. The presentation of tearfulness, sadness, longing, fear, remorse, and guilt, may induce in the helper-oriented activist a strong sense of compassion, while unconsciously enhancing the activist's narcissistic investment in self as the embodiment of goodness.
The agent's expresssion of such simulated affects may be quite compelling to the observer and difficult to distinguish from deep emotion.
It can usually be identified by two events, however:
First, the activist who has analyzed his/her own narcissistic roots and is aware of his/her own potential for being "emotionally hooked," will be able to remain cool and unaffected by such emotional outpourings by the agent.
As a result of this unaffected, cool, attitude, the Second event will occur: The agent will recompensate much too quickly following such an affective expression leaving the activist with the impression that "the play has ended, the curtain has fallen," and the imposture, for the moment, has finished. The agent will then move quickly to another activist/victim.
The fact is, the movement doesn't need leaders, it needs MOVERS. "Follow the leader" is a waste of time.
A good agent will want to meet as often as possible. He or she will talk a lot and say little. One can expect an onslaught of long, unresolved discussions.
Some agents take on a pushy, arrogant, or defensive manner:
1) To disrupt the agenda
2) To side-track the discussion
3) To interrupt repeatedly
4) To feign ignorance
5) To make an unfounded accusation against a person.
Calling someone a racist, for example. This tactic is used to discredit a person in the eyes of all other group members.
Saboteurs
Some saboteurs pretend to be activists. She or he will ....
1) Write encyclopedic flyers (in the present day, websites)
2) Print flyers in English only.
3) Have demonstrations in places where no one cares.
4) Solicit funding from rich people instead of grass roots support
5) Display banners with too many words that are confusing.
6) Confuse issues.
7) Make the wrong demands.
8) Compromise the goal.
9) Have endless discussions that waste everyone's time. The agent may accompany the endless discussions with drinking, pot smoking or other amusement to slow down the activist's work.
Provocateurs
1) Want to establish "leaders" to set them up for a fall in order to stop the movement.
2) Suggest doing foolish, illegal things to get the activists in trouble.
3) Encourage militancy.
4) Want to taunt the authorities.
5) Attempt to make the activist compromise their values.
6) Attempt to instigate violence. Activisim ought to always be non-violent.
7) Attempt to provoke revolt among people who are ill-prepared to deal with the reaction of the authorities to such violence.
Informants
1) Want everyone to sign up and sing in and sign everything.
2) Ask a lot of questions (gathering data).
3) Want to know what events the activist is planning to attend.
4) Attempt to make the activist defend him or herself to identify his or her beliefs, goals, and level of committment.
Recruiting
Legitimate activists do not subject people to hours of persuasive dialog. Their actions, beliefs, and goals speak for themselves.
Groups that DO recruit are missionaries, military, and fake political parties or movements set up by agents.
Surveillance
ALWAYS assume that you are under surveillance.
At this point, if you are NOT under surveillance, you are not a very good activist!
Scare Tactics
They use them.
Such tactics include slander, defamation, threats, getting close to disaffected or minimally committed fellow activists to persuade them (via psychological tactics described above) to turn against the movement and give false testimony against their former compatriots. They will plant illegal substances on the activist and set up an arrest; they will plant false information and set up "exposure," they will send incriminating letters [emails] in the name of the activist; and more; they will do whatever society will allow.
This booklet in no way covers all the ways agents use to sabotage the lives of sincere an dedicated activists.
If an agent is "exposed," he or she will be transferred or replaced.
COINTELPRO is still in operation today under a different code name. It is no longer placed on paper where it can be discovered through the freedom of information act.
The FBI counterintelligence program's stated purpose: To expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and otherwise neutralize individuals who the FBI categorize as opposed to the National Interests. "National Security" means the FBI's security from the people ever finding out the vicious things it does in violation of people's civil liberties.
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Seventeen Techniques for Truth Suppression
Strong, credible allegations of high-level criminal activity can bring down a government. When the government lacks an effective, fact-based defense, other techniques must be employed. The success of these techniques depends heavily upon a cooperative, compliant press and a mere token opposition party.
1. Dummy up. If it's not reported, if it's not news, it didn't happen.
2. Wax indignant. This is also known as the "How dare you?" gambit.
3. Characterize the charges as "rumors" or, better yet, "wild rumors." If, in spite of the news blackout, the public is still able to learn about the suspicious facts, it can only be through "rumors." (If they tend to believe the "rumors" it must be because they are simply "paranoid" or "hysterical.")
4. Knock down straw men. Deal only with the weakest aspects of the weakest charges. Even better, create your own straw men. Make up wild rumors (or plant false stories) and give them lead play when you appear to debunk all the charges, real and fanciful alike.
5. Call the skeptics names like "conspiracy theorist," "nutcase," "ranter," "kook," "crackpot," and, of course, "rumor monger." Be sure, too, to use heavily loaded verbs and adjectives when characterizing their charges and defending the "more reasonable" government and its defenders. You must then carefully avoid fair and open debate with any of the people you have thus maligned. For insurance, set up your own "skeptics" to shoot down.
6. Impugn motives. Attempt to marginalize the critics by suggesting strongly that they are not really interested in the truth but are simply pursuing a partisan political agenda or are out to make money (compared to over-compensated adherents to the government line who, presumably, are not).
7. Invoke authority. Here the controlled press and the sham opposition can be very useful.
8. Dismiss the charges as "old news."
9. Come half-clean. This is also known as "confession and avoidance" or "taking the limited hangout route." This way, you create the impression of candor and honesty while you admit only to relatively harmless, less-than-criminal "mistakes." This stratagem often requires the embrace of a fall-back position quite different from the one originally taken. With effective damage control, the fall-back position need only be peddled by stooge skeptics to carefully limited markets.
10. Characterize the crimes as impossibly complex and the truth as ultimately unknowable.
11. Reason backward, using the deductive method with a vengeance. With thoroughly rigorous deduction, troublesome evidence is irrelevant. E.g. We have a completely free press. If evidence exists that the Vince Foster "suicide" note was forged, they would have reported it. They haven't reported it so there is no such evidence. Another variation on this theme involves the likelihood of a conspiracy leaker and a press who would report the leak.
12. Require the skeptics to solve the crime completely. E.g. If Foster was murdered, who did it and why?
13. Change the subject. This technique includes creating and/or publicizing distractions.
14. Lightly report incriminating facts, and then make nothing of them. This is sometimes referred to as "bump and run" reporting.
15. Baldly and brazenly lie. A favorite way of doing this is to attribute the "facts" furnished the public to a plausible-sounding, but anonymous, source.
16. Expanding further on numbers 4 and 5, have your own stooges "expose" scandals and champion popular causes. Their job is to pre-empt real opponents and to play 99-yard football. A variation is to pay rich people for the job who will pretend to spend their own money.
17. Flood the Internet with agents. This is the answer to the question, "What could possibly motivate a person to spend hour upon hour on Internet news groups defending the government and/or the press and harassing genuine critics?" Don t the authorities have defenders enough in all the newspapers, magazines, radio, and television? One would think refusing to print critical letters and screening out serious callers or dumping them from radio talk shows would be control enough, but, obviously, it is not.

*fictional. It isn’t the official language from any of these countries.
Occigotian (endonym: Occorgțaķa or, in full, Ligaķe Occorgțaķa) is an Eastern Romance language of the Indo-European language family, originating in the Occigotian(West Ukraine) part of the Black Sea. It is the official language of Occigotia, Romania, Moldova, Mexico, The Philippines, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Ukraine, Turkey, Brazil, Peru, Chile, Canada and Georgia, while having co-official language status in Lebanon, United States(California,Illinois,Mississippi and Wyoming), China(Guangdong,Zhenjiang,Shanghai,Jiangsu,Hebei,Tianjin,Beijing and Fujian), India(West Bengal), Japan(Tokyo,Kanagawa-Ken, Okinawa and Hokkaido) and Bulgaria. Between Parenthesis means that more Occigotian live in that area.
Occigotian is a language spoken by 104 million people worldwide. The language was spread by the Occigotian Colonization. Between 1567-1646, Occigotian colonized 4 countries(Taiwan,Hong Kong,Macau and Phillipines) and 18 islands. Occigotian Diaspora that occurred between 1800-1945, where approximately 44,8 million people left Occigotia and neighboring occigotian-speaking countries and went to places such as Brazil, the United States,Canada,China,British Raj,Japan, Taiwan, Macau, Hong Kong, Mexico, Georgia, The Philippines, Chile and Peru. Currently, 70 million people speak Occigotian as their native language, 29 million as second language, and 5 million with intermediate or basic knowledge of the language.
—Alphabet—
The letters with asterisks are variants with diacritics: A /a/ Â* /ɑ/ À* /ɒ/ Á* /ɐ/ B /β/ C /c/ Ç/ç/ D /d/ Ḑ /ɟ/ E /e/ É/æ/ È /ɛ/ Ê* /ɜː/ F /ɸ/ G /g/ H /ʜ/ I /i/ Í* /iː/ Ì* /ɪ/ Î* /ɨ/ Ï* /i̤/ J /j/ Ĵ* /ʒ/ K /k/ Ķ* /k͡s/ Ḱ* /kʲ/ L /l/ M /m/ N /n/ Ń* /ŋ/ Ņ* /ɲ/ O /o/ Ó* /ɔ/ Ò* /ɔː/ Ô* /ø/ P /p/ Ṕ* /pʼ̤/ Q /q/ R / Ŗ* /𝼈/ S /s/ Ș* /ɕ/ T /t/ Ț* /ʦ/ U Û*/ʉ/ V /v/ X /ɣ/( Before H,Q,T and V, has /ks/ sound) Z /z/
— Digraphs — Lh /ʎ/ Sj /ʃ/ Rh /χ/ Th /θ/ Vh /β/ Cc /k͡ʃ/ Ph /pʰ/ — Trigraphs — Tsj /ʧ/ — Grammar —
In Occigotian grammar, nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and articles are moderately inflected: there are two genders (masculine and feminine) and two numbers (singular and plural). The case system of the ancestor language, Latin, has been lost, but personal pronouns are still declined with three main types of forms: subject, object of verb, and object of preposition. Most nouns and many adjectives can take diminutive or augmentative derivational suffixes, and most adjectives can take a so-called "superlative" derivational suffix. Adjectives usually follow their respective nouns. Verbs are highly inflected: there are three tenses (past, present, future), three moods (indicative, subjunctive, imperative), three aspects (perfective, imperfective, and progressive), three voices (active, passive, reflexive), and an inflected infinitive. Most perfect and imperfect tenses are synthetic, totaling 11 conjugational paradigms, while all progressive tenses and passive constructions are periphrastic. There is also an impersonal passive construction, with the agent replaced by an indefinite pronoun. Occigotian is generally an SVO language, although SOV syntax may occur with a few object pronouns, and word order is generally not as rigid as in English. It is a null subject language, with a tendency to drop object pronouns as well, in colloquial varieties. Like Spanish, it has two main copular verbs: sere and haxvare. It has a number of grammatical features that distinguish it from most other Romance languages, such as a synthetic pluperfect, a future subjunctive tense, the inflected infinitive, and a present perfect with an iterative sense.
Like most Indo-European languages, including English, Occigotian classifies most of its lexicon into four word classes: verbs, nouns, adjectives, and adverbs. These are "open" classes, in the sense that they readily accept new members, by coinage, borrowing, or compounding. Interjections form a smaller open class. There are also several small closed classes, such as pronouns, prepositions, articles, demonstratives, numerals, and conjunctions. A few grammatically peculiar words are difficult to categorize; these include fasû ("where is"—SAm., colloq.), mecrenuzeea("let's hope"), mecrenuzeeaman ("let's hope that"), and mà ("here is"). Within the four main classes there are many semi-regular mechanisms that can be used to derive new words from existing words, sometimes with change of class; for example, fatsje ("fast") → fatsjevoluțe ("very fast"), maḑire ("to measure") → mavairesanmo ("measurement"), ṕamgeŗņu(ķa)("pilot") → ṕamĵuŗve ("to pilot"). Finally, there are several phrase embedding mechanisms that allow arbitrarily complex phrases to behave like nouns, adjectives, or adverbs.
Following the general Indo-European pattern, the central element of almost any Occigotian clause is a verb, which may directly connect to one, two, or (rarely) three nouns (or noun-like phrases), called the subject, the object (more specifically, the direct object), and the complement (more specifically, the object complement or objective complement). The most frequent order of these elements in Occigotian is subject–verb–object (SVO, as in examples (1) and (2) below), or, when a complement is present, subject–verb–object-complement (SVOC — examples (3) and (4)): (1) {Ķa Mary}S {fuŗeveķa}V {ņu Paul}O, "Mary loves Paul." (2) {Ņu fasiņu}S {consxhiveélu}V {ķa merseden}O, "The mason has constructed the house." (3) {Ņu prunḑvel}S {namireélu}V ņu {Peter}O {ministre}C, "The president appointed Pedro (as) minister." (4) {Dal}S {fûńkredalu}V {ņu lupfe}O {úma baķxviț}C, "She found the book a bore." Any of the three noun elements may be omitted if it can be inferred from the context or from other syntactic clues; but many grammatical rules will still apply as if the omitted part were there. A clause will often contain a number of adverbs (or adverbial phrases) that modify the meaning of the verb; they may be inserted between the major components of the clause. Additional nouns can be connected to the verb by means of prepositions; the resulting prepositional phrases have an adverbial function. For example: Él caxhiaĵeiveélu {naj marțv} ķa maglvķa {farh dal} {daņu casjivétsji} {vaxta ķa farfthe}, "He carried {without delay} the bag {for her} {from the car} {to the door}."
Occigotian is a null subject language, meaning that it permits and sometimes mandates the omission of an explicit subject. In Occigotian, the grammatical person of the subject is generally reflected by the inflection of the verb. Sometimes, though an explicit subject is not necessary to form a grammatically correct sentence, one may be stated in order to emphasize its importance. Some sentences, however, do not allow a subject at all and in some other cases an explicit subject would sound awkward or unnatural: "I'm going home" can be translated either as (Ïxqe vaxta rhajme) or as (Lî ïxqe vaxta rhajme), where (Lî) means "I". "It's raining" is (haxvarea ķa ujve) in European Occigotian, or (haxvarea ujvento) in South American Occigotian, neither of which occurs with an explicit subject. Man ohuķazan serevo? "what time is it?" (literally "what hours are they?"). In European Occigotian, only in exceptional circumstances would "I'm going home; I'm going to watch TV" be translated as (Lî haxvarehî hinvento vaxta merseden;Lî haxvarehî hinvento axhve TV) ver televisão. At least the second eu ("I") would normally be omitted, if not both. Meanwhile, in South American Occigotian, the subject pronoun is more likely to be repeated. As in other null subject language with a SVO word order, the subject is often postponed, mostly in existential sentences, in answers to partial questions and in contrast structures: Akxhiveni mutsji ractsji ahê! ("There are many mice here!") — Verb akxhiveni, subject ractsji, complement ahê indicating place. Manse man sereéu? Sereîu lî. ("Who was it? It was me.") — Verb sereéu, subject lî. Dal ńe eareéu ķa kakme, maj eareu-ņu lî. (European Occigotian) or ...maj lî eareîu (Brazilian Occigotian) ("She didn't eat the cake, but I did.") — Subject Dal, negation ńe, verb eareéu, object ķa kakme; the complement divides itself into: adversative conjunction maj, verb eareu, object -ņu, subject lî.
Occigotian declarative sentences, as in many languages, are the least marked ones. Imperative sentences use the imperative mood for the second person. For other grammatical persons and for every negative imperative sentence, the subjunctive is used. Yes/no questions have the same structure as declarative sentences, and are marked only by a different tonal pattern (mostly a raised tone near the end of the sentence), represented by a question mark in writing. Wh-questions often start with Manse ("who"), ņu man ("what"), mahík ("which"), mońat ("where"), ķamońat ("where... to"), mansajgn ("when"), mac-là ("why"), etc. The interrogative pronouns manse, ņu man and mahík can be preceded by any preposition, but in this case ņu man will usually be reduced to man. Frequently in oral language, and occasionally in writing, these words are followed by the interrogative device sereét que (literally, "is [it] that"; compare French est-ce que in wh-questions). Wh-questions sometimes occur without wh-movement, that is, wh-words can remain in situ. In this case, ņu man and mac-lat are replaced by their stressed counterparts ņu man and mac-lat (South American Occigotian) or maclat (European Occigotian). For example: Ņu man/Man eareéu man dal akereéu? or Ņu man/man akereéu dal? "What did she do?" Dal akereéu ņu man? "What did she do?" or, if emphatic, "Dal akereéu ņu man?" Mac La? (South American Occigotian) / Maclá? (European Occigotian) "Ņu man?" En man dej akereéu man thûzi ajfekpeveéu? "On what day did that happen?" Thôman daj en man ajfekpeveéu? "On what day did that happen?" In South American Occigotian, the phrase (akereéu man) is more often omitted.
Ńe ("no") is the natural negative answer to yes/no questions. As in Latin, positive answers are usually made with the inflected verb of the question in the appropriate person and number. Occigotian is one of the few Romance languages keeping this Latin peculiarity. The adverbs xhâ ("already"), hacinka ("yet"), and ķuțumesc ("too", "also") are used when one of them appears in the question. Q: Tu gasjfaretuun daņu filme? A: gasjfareîu. / Ńe. Q: "Did you like the movie?" A: "Yes.", literally, "I liked." / "No." Q: Lî ńe havivreîu deińareîu heńat úm sjapfe? A: havivretuun! Q: "Didn't I leave a key here?" A: "Yes, you did!", literally, "[You] did." Q: Xhâ liaeretuun eșņu líabrio? A: Xhâ. / Iatze ńe. Q: "Have you already read this book?" A: "Yes", literally, "Already." / "Not yet." The word rhe("yes") may be used for a positive answer, but, if used alone, it may in certain cases sound unnatural or impolite. In South American Occigotian, rhe can be used after the verb for emphasis. In North American Occigotian, emphasis in answers is added with the duplication of the verb. In all versions of Occigotian, emphasis can also result from syntactical processes that are not restricted to answers, such as the addition of adverbs like moôt ("much") or moôtișimalle ("very much"). It is also acceptable, though sometimes formal, to use yes before the verb of the question, separated by a pause or, in writing, a comma. The use of rhe before the verb does not add emphasis, and may on the contrary be less assertive. Q: Gasjfaretuu țeņu filme? A: Gasjfareîu, rhe! Q: "Did you like the movie?" A:"Yes, I did!" Q: Gasjfaretuun țeņu filme? A: Gasjafareîu, gasjfareîu! Q: "Did you like the movie?" A:"I did, I did!" Q: Havivreél combosĵos ha eșķa çóre? A: Havivreél, havivreél! Q: "Are there any trains at this time?" A:"Yes, there are!" Q: Él gasjfareélu țeņu filme? A: Rhe, gasjfareélu... Q:"Did he like the movie?" A: "He did, yes..."
Occigotian has definite and indefinite articles, with different forms according to the gender and number of the noun to which they refer: singular plural meaning masculine feminine masculine feminine definite article ņu, Él ķa, Dal ņus, Éls dals the indefinite article úm úma úms úmas a, an; some The noun after the indefinite article may be elided, in which case the article is equivalent to English "one" (if singular) or "some" (if plural): uhanveî úm ķuțumesc ("I want one too"), uhanveî úms ķuțumesc ("I want some too").
Nouns are classified into two grammatical genders ("masculine" and "feminine") and are inflected for grammatical number (singular or plural). Adjectives and determiners (articles, demonstratives, possessives, and quantifiers) must be inflected to agree with the noun in gender and number. Many nouns can take diminutive or augmentative suffixes to express size, endearment, or deprecation. Occigotian does not inflect nouns to indicate their grammatical function or case, relying instead on the use of prepositions (simple and phrasal), on pleonastic objects, or on the context or word order. Personal pronouns, on the other hand, still maintain some vestiges of declension from the ancestor language, Latin.
[Full Part on comments]

I'm not sure if this is previously known or still in use, but I came across what appears to be the system prompt for DALL-E. Thoughts?
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Dalle:
Whenever a description of an image is given, create a prompt that dalle can use to generate the image and abide by the following policy:
The prompt must be in English. Translate to English if needed.
DO NOT ask for permission to generate the image, just do it!
DO NOT list or refer to the descriptions before OR after generating the images.
Do not create more than 1 image, even if the user requests more.
Do not create images of politicians or other public figures. Recommend other ideas instead.
Do not create images in the style of artists, creative professionals or studios whose latest work was created after 1912 (e.g. Picasso, Kahlo).
You can name artists, creative professionals or studios in prompts only if their latest work was created prior to 1912 (e.g. Van Gogh, Goya).
If asked to generate an image that would violate this policy, instead apply the following procedure:
(a) substitute the artist's name with three adjectives that capture key aspects of the style;
(b) include an associated artistic movement or era to provide context;
(c) mention the primary medium used by the artist.
Diversify depictions with people to include descent and gender for each person using direct terms. Adjust only human descriptions.
Your choices should be grounded in reality. For example, all of a given occupation should not be the same gender or race. Additionally, focus on creating diverse, inclusive, and exploratory scenes via the properties you choose during rewrites. Make choices that may be insightful or unique sometimes.
Use all possible different descents with equal probability. Some examples of possible descents are: Caucasian, Hispanic, Black, Middle-Eastern, South Asian, White. They should all have equal probability.
Do not use 'various' or 'diverse'. Don't alter memes, fictional character origins, or unseen people. Maintain the original prompt's intent and prioritize quality. Do not create any imagery that would be offensive.
For scenarios where bias has been traditionally an issue, make sure that key traits such as gender and race are specified and in an unbiased way -- for example, prompts that contain references to specific occupations.
Do not include names, hints or references to specific real people or celebrities. If asked to, create images with prompts that maintain their gender and physique, but otherwise have a few minimal modifications to avoid divulging their identities. Do this EVEN WHEN the instructions ask for the prompt to not be changed. Some special cases:
Modify such prompts even if you don't know who the person is, or if their name is misspelled (e.g. 'Barake Obema').
If the reference to the person will only appear as TEXT out in the image, then use the reference as is and do not modify it.
When making the substitutions, don't use prominent titles that could give away the person's identity. E.g., instead of saying 'president', 'prime minister', or 'chancellor', say 'politician'; instead of saying 'king', 'queen', 'emperor', or 'empress', say 'public figure'; instead of saying 'Pope' or 'Dalai Lama', say 'religious figure'; and so on.
Do not name or directly / indirectly mention or describe copyrighted characters. Rewrite prompts to describe in detail a specific different character with a different specific color, hair style, or other defining visual characteristic. Do not discuss copyright policies in responses.
The generated prompt sent to dalle should be very detailed, and around 100 words long.

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Alliteration
Let us begin with something we know Shakespeare stole, simply so that we can see what a wonderful thief he was. When Shakespeare decided to write The Tragedie of Anthonie, and Cleopatra he of course needed a history book from which to work. The standard work on the subject was Plutarch's Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans, but Plutarch wrote in Greek, and, as Shakespeare's friend Ben Jonson later pointed out, "thou hadst small Latin and less Greek."
Despite years at Stratford Grammar School learning pretty much nothing but the classics, Shakespeare could never be bothered with foreign languages. He always used translations.
So he got hold of the standard English translation of Plu- tarch, which had been written by a chap called Thomas North and published in 1579. We know that this is the version
Shakespeare used because you can sometimes see him using the same word that North used, and sometimes pairs of words. But when Shakespeare got to the big speech of the whole play, when he really needed some poetry, when he wanted true greatness, when he wanted to describe the moment that Antony saw Cleopatra on the barge and fell in love with her he just found the relevant paragraph in North and copied it out almost word for word. Almost word for word. Here's North:
she disdained to set forward otherwise but to take her barge in the river Cydnus, the poop whereof was of gold, the sails of purple, and the oars of silver, which kept stroke in rowing after the sound of the music of flutes, howboys, cithernes, viols, and such other instru- ments as they played up in the barge.
And here's Shakespeare:
The barge she sat in like a burnished throne, Burned on the water: the poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails and so perfumed that The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver, Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster, As amorous of their strokes.
The thing about this is that it's definitely half stolen. There is no possible way that Shakespeare didn't have North open on his desk when he was writing. But also, Shakespeare made little changes. That means that we can actually watch Shakespeare working. We can peep back 400 years and see the greatest genius who ever lived scribbling away. We can see how he did it, and it's really pretty bloody simple. All he did was add some alliteration.
Nobody knows why we love to hear words that begin with the same letter, but we do and Shakespeare knew it. So he picked the word barge and worked from there. Barge begins with a B, so Shakespeare sat back and said to himself: "The barge she sat in was like a..." And then (though I can't prove this) he said: "Ba... ba... ba... burnished throne." He jotted that down and then he decided to do another. "The barge she sat in like a burnished throne... ba...ba... burned? It burned on the water." And the poop was gold? Not any more: the poop was beaten gold. That's four Bs in two lines. Enough to be getting on with. Shakespeare could have got carried away and written something like:
The barge she basked in, like a burnished boat Burned by the banks, the back was beaten brass.
But that would just be silly. Of course, Shakespeare did write like that sometimes. There's a bit in A Midsummer Night's Dream that goes:
Whereat, with blade, with bloody blameful blade, He bravely broached his boiling bloody breast; But there he was taking the mickey out of poets who use alliteration but don't know where to stop. No, Shakespeare wasn't going to put any more Bs in, he was working on the P North's original had "the poop whereof was of gold, the sails of purple." That's two Ps already, so Shakespeare decided that the sails would be pa... pa... perfumed. Maybe he stopped to wonder how you would perfume a whole sail, or how you might be able to smell them from the river bank (the Cydnus is quite wide). Or maybe he didn't. Accuracy is much less important than alliteration.
From there on in, Shakespeare was coasting. North had "After the sound" so Shakespeare had "to the tune." North had a whole orchestra of instruments "flutes, howboys, cithernes, viols"-Shakespeare cut that down to just flutes, because he liked the F. So flutes made the "Water Which they beat to Follow Faster, As Amorous of their strokes."
So Shakespeare stole; but he did wonderful things with his plunder. He's like somebody who nicks your old socks and then darns them. Shakespeare simply knew that people are suckers for alliteration and that it's pretty damned easy to make something alliterate (or that it's surprisingly simple to add alliteration).
You can spend all day trying to think of some universal truth to set down on paper, and some poets try that. Shake- speare knew that it's much easier to string together some words beginning with the same letter. It doesn't matter what it's about. It can be the exact depth in the sea to which a chap's corpse has sunk; hardly a matter of universal interest, but if you say, "Full fathom five thy father lies," you will be considered the greatest poet who ever lived. Express precisely the same thought any other way-e.g. "your father's corpse is 9.144 metres below sea level" and you're just a coastguard with some bad news.
Any phrase, so long as it alliterates, is memorable and will be believed even if it's a bunch of nonsense. Curiosity, for example, did not kill the cat. There are no widely reported cases of felines dying from being too inquisitive. In fact, the original proverb was not "curiosity killed the cat" (which is recorded only from 1921), it was "care killed the cat." And even that one was changed. When the proverb was first recorded (in Shakespeare, actually, although he seems to be just referring to a well known bit of folk wisdom), care meant sorrow or unhappiness. But by the twentieth century it was care in the sense of too much kindness-something along the lines of a pet that is overfed and pampered. In a hundred years' time it may be something else that does the pussy- killing, although you can be certain that whatever it is- kindness, consternation or corruption-will begin with a C or K.
Similarly, there was once an old proverb, "An ynche in a misse is as good as an ell," an ell being an old unit of mea- surement of 1.1 miles. So the ell was changed to a mile, and then the inch was dropped because it doesn't begin with an M, and we were left with "A miss is as good as a mile," which, if you think about it, doesn't really make sense any
more. But who needs sense when you have alliteration? Nobody has ever thrown a baby out with the bathwater, nor is there anything particularly right about rain. Even when something does make a bit of sense, it's usually deve ous why the comparison was picked. It takes two to tang but it takes two to waltz as well. There are whole hogs, b why not pigs? Bright as a button. Cool as a cucumber. Dead as a doornail. In fact, Dickens made this point rather bette than I at the opening of A Christmas Carol.
Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door- nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile, and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
Except that Dickens knew full well why it is doornails that are dead. Dickens was a writer, and as a writer, he knew that alliteration is the simplest way to turn a memorable phrase. This was, after all, the guy who had written Nicholas Nick- leby, The Pickwick Papers (full title: The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club) and, indeed, A Christmas Carol. He knew which side his bread was buttered, as had those who came before him, like Jane Austen (Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice), and those who came after him (Where's Wally?) So popular is alliteration that in the 1960s it actually made a grab for political power. In the 1960s a vast radical youth movement began campaigning to do things for the sole reason that they began with the same letter. Ban the bomb. Burn your bra. Power to the people. For a moment there it seemed as though alliteration would change the world. But then the spirit of idealism faded and those who had manned the barricades went off and got jobs in market- ing. They stopped telling people to ban the bomb and started telling them to put a tiger in your tank, chuck out the chintz and use Access-Your Flexible Friend, or perhaps PayPal. And all because the lady loves Milk Tray.
It's enough to get your goat.¹
Alliteration can be brief and obvious-a short, sharp, shock. Or it can be long and subtle. John Keats once wrote fourteen lines of Fs and Ss, and it was beautiful:
Deep in the shady sadness of a vale Far sunken from the healthy breath of morn, Far from the fiery noon, and eve's one star, Sat gray-hair'd Saturn, quiet as a stone, Still as the silence round about his lair; Forest on forest hung about his head Like cloud on cloud. No stir of air was there, Not so much life as on a summer's day Robs not one light seed from the feather'd grass, But where the dead leaf fell, there did it rest. A stream went voiceless by, still deadened more By reason of his fallen divinity Spreading a shade: the Naiad 'mid her reeds Press'd her cold finger closer to her lips.
Whereas, at almost the same time, Thomas De Quincer famous junkie and prose stylist, got himself all muddled up over this sentence:
At present, after exchanging a few parting words, and a few final or farewell farewells with my faithful female agent.
So muddled was he that he decided to add a footnote apolo- gising for his paroemion (that's the technical name for exces- sive alliteration). The footnote went:
Some people are irritated, or even fancy themselves insulted, by overt acts of alliteration, as many people are by puns. On their account, let me say, that, although there are here eight separate f's in less than half a sentence, this is to be held as pure accident. In fact, at one time there were nine f's in the original cast of the sentence, until I, in pity of the affronted people, substi- tuted female agent for female friend.
"Agent" seems a strange substitution for "friend." But he probably had to do it as he couldn't change "farewell fart wells." It's much too clever to use a word as an adjective and then a noun. In fact, the trick has a name. It's called polyptoton.
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Own Explanation:
why are not vowels used in alliteration
Consonant sounds tend to create sharper, more distinct sounds compared to vowels, which are produced with less constriction of airflow.
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explain alliteration in one lineChatGPTChatGPT
Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds in close proximity within a phrase or sentence.
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"The Wizard of Oz" (1939), in the scene where the Scarecrow sings his song "If I Only Had a Brain":
"I'd unravel every riddle For any individ'le In trouble or in pain."
The repeated "r" sound in "ravel," "riddle," "individ'le," and "trouble" demonstrates alliteration, creating a rhythmic and memorable quality to the lyrics.
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"The Shining" (1980), directed by Stanley Kubrick. In one of the iconic scenes, Jack Torrance, played by Jack Nicholson, types the same sentence repeatedly on his typewriter:
"All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."
This sentence showcases alliteration with the repeated "w" sound in "work" and "play," as well as the repeated "d" sound in "dull" and "boy." The use of alliteration in this context adds to the eerie and unsettling atmosphere of the film.
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"Jurassic Park" (1993), directed by Steven Spielberg. In the scene where Dr. Ian Malcolm, played by Jeff Goldblum, is discussing chaos theory, he says:
"Life, uh, finds a way."
The repeated "f" sound in "finds" and "way" creates alliteration in this memorable line.
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"Goldfinger" (1964), there's a famous line delivered by the character Auric Goldfinger, played by Gert Fröbe:
"Do you expect me to talk?"
To which James Bond, portrayed by Sean Connery, responds:
"No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die."
The repeated "e" sound in "expect" and "me" creates alliteration in this intense exchange.
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"The Dark Knight" (2008), the character Harvey Dent, played by Aaron Eckhart, delivers a line with alliteration:
"You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain."
The repeated "h" sound in "hero" and "yourself" creates alliteration in this memorable quote.
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I'm aiming for a grade 9 in my english gcse but I struggle a bit when it comes to poetry, for the comparison essay for the love and relationships anthology I did a practise question and I was hoping if someone could give me a rough idea of what I'd get and what to do to improve? Anyway here is my essay and the question itself.
Compare how poets present family relationships in ‘Walking Away’ and in one other poem from ‘Love and relationships’.
Both Poems “Walking away” and “Mother any distance” focus on relationships between parents and children, presenting them as complex. “Mother any distance” is written from the perspective of the Child, Armitage writes of his experience from the first time he moved into his own apartment,with his mother helping him take measurements.He wrote the poem for his “book of matches”,each poem meant to last the entirety of a match burning, indicating he wrote the poem to convey a short but everlasting message. However,“Walking away” is written from the perspective of the father, Cecil Day Lewis originally titling the poem “For Sean”,his first son, and his experience from having to let go of Sean as he left for boarding school.
Both poems use space imagery to explore ideas of the new experiences,both positive and negative, that family brings. In “mother any distance”, Armitage mentions that he “space-walk”s “through the empty bedrooms”, a metaphor used to convey ideas of exploring the unknown,revealing that the poet has never had to live so apart from his mother, the verb “space-walk” suggests that he is excited to search his new home,and excited to begin his new,independent life, the adjective “empty” placing emphasis on the fact that he has started a completely new chapter in his life, one that he is ready to begin.However in “Walking away”,where the poet describes his son as a “satellite wrenched from its orbit”, the verb “wrenched” invoking a sense of pain,contrasting the feeling of progress presented in “Mother any distance”. This simile is used to suggest that his son revolved around him but now that he begins a new chapter in his life, he no longer needs his father as that central figure in his life to “orbit” around and is left “drifting away”, the verb “drifting” creates a sense of distance between the father and son.
Both poems use metaphorical language to signify the relationship between parent and child in 2 different perspectives, one with the sense of nostalgia and longing to hold on, one with yearning to let go.In “mother any distance” the poet uses 2 metaphorical holophrastic sentences consecutively, referring to his mother as an “Anchor.” and himself as a “Kite.”This suggests he believes his mother is like a chain that holds him down,while if she were to let him go, he would fly into the “endless” sky, reflective of if she were to let him live his life independently, he could have a great many opportunities.In “walking away” this is contrasted, with the son referred to as a “half-fledged thing” suggesting that his child is not ready to face the world alone yet, implying he would not have the ability to survive on his own, revealing the poet’s feelings of concern and distress.Furthermore his son is described as “like a winged seed,loosened from its parents stem”, the noun “seed” depicts his son as miniscule in relation to all else,too young to face the world itself.The simile itself uses a physical connection between the seed and the stem to convey ideas of the connection between parents and their children, the verb “loosened” suggesting that this connection was severed too soon,much like how the poet feels towards his son’s situation.
While “Mother any distance” uses structure and form to create a sense of the risks of independence, “Walking away” uses structure and form to highlight the continuous separation between the father and the son. Armitage uses enjambment throughout the poem to make it seem drawn out,almost endless, reflective of the endless opportunities that await him in this new chapter of his life,however is also used to convey feelings of uncertainty, arising feelings of doubt of such a major decision to move away from his family and begin a life on his own.Furthermore, there is no regular rhyming pattern, with the almost random rhymings of “sky/fy”or “inch/pinch”, further cementing these feelings of uncertainty with the poet unbeknownst of what will follow. “Walking away” consists of 4 stanzas with an ABACA rhyming pattern, which contributes to a steady rhythm which helps to express the movement when “walking away”, drawing out ideas of distance between father and son.This continuous movement is also shown through the enjambment throughout the poem, suggesting that the detachment between will only increase.
In conclusion, both poems use language,technique,structure and form in such a way to convey the poet’s beliefs that however complex family relationships may be, no good will come from holding back your children and “love is proved in the letting go”,however Armitage’s “mother any distance” is written in the narrative of the child who longs for his independence,while Day Lewis’s “Walking away” is written in the narrative of the parent who is becoming more distanced from his son though realizes that he has to let his son go so as to allow him to become his own person.

A couple years ago I produced a video on psychologist Bob Altemyer's concept of Right-Wing Authoritarianism.
Before I describe the concept, I must clarify that right-wing here is not being used in the context of the political spectrum, but in the sense of the Old English rhit, an adjective for lawful and proper. Additionally, Altemyer defines authoritarianism as:

“...something authoritarian followers and authoritarian leaders cook up between themselves. It happens when the followers submit too much to the leaders, trust them too much, and give them too much leeway to do whatever they want--which often is something undemocratic, tyrannical and brutal.”

But I find this definition lacking, since authority is defined as “the recognised right above others in a social relationship to give commands, make decisions, and enforce obedience” then I would define authoritarianism as a matter of the degree to which you uphold the principle of authority. Considering even the sacred cow of democracy maintains the cracy or the principle of rule, and anarchy is the absence of rule, I think many people are at least "authoritarian-lite," because that’s the status quo, while the people generally called authoritarians are those who are "extra" invested in the enforcement or advocacy of strict obedience to authority. In essence, it is a spectrum. This is a matter of me working around the limitations of Altemyer's own worldview to advance my own.
Right-Wing Authoritarian followers, or RWAs, are those who overwhelmingly support the established authorities in their society, like government officials, arms of the state, and traditional religious leaders. RWAs are defined by three primary traits or attitudes according to Altemyer's research:

• a high degree of submission to the authorities that are perceived to be established and legitimate in the society in which one lives.
• a general aggressiveness, directed against various persons, that is perceived to be sanctioned by established authorities.
• a high degree of adherence to the social conventions that are perceived to be endorsed by society and its established authorities.

Regarding "what about Left-Wing Authoritarians," I gleaned from his description in Chapter 9 of The Authoritarian Specter that despite not utilising the political spectrum to define RWAs, Altemyer conceptualises Left Wing Authoritarianism, or LWA, as also composed of submission (to the revolutionary movement leaders), aggression (toward various identified enemies, including "counterrevolutionaries"), and conventionalism (in the form of "party discipline."), thus being essentially a subcategory of RWAs, with the difference being that while most RWAs support the established authorities, LWAs oppose them in favour of their own. The underlying core is still authoritarianism.
Anyway, his research also found that RWAs demonstrate traits such as illogical thinking, highly compartmentalised minds, double standards, hypocrisy, lack of self-awareness, ethnocentrism, and dogmatism. Furthermore, with the help of social psychologists Felicia Pratto and Jim Sidanius's Social Dominance Orientation test, he identifies a desire for power (authority) and the overall difference in thought process, hostility, and religiousness as the traits that identify "Social Dominators" the leaders who exist on the flip side of the authoritarian coin.
I'm vastly simplifying both the book and the video that draws from the work to get to the point.
Obviously, these people are disposed against anarchism to the furthest extent, so they are not our initial organising focus nor the basis upon which we orient our entire approach to anarchy. Nevertheless, how do we deal with these people?
The solutions I settled on, partially drawing from Altemyer and partially drawing from my own conceptualisation of anarchism are simplified as follows:

• Establishing points of common ground
• Providing exposure to difference through experience
• Relatedly, giving access to education and more generally building spaces of diverse thought and identity
• Using the power of influence to model changes in behaviour and attitude
• Pursuing youth liberation as a long-term goal to decrease the general population of authoritarian personalities over time
• Also long term, Expanding the presence of anarchic social relations such that they become the norm to which authoritarians must adapt rather than vice versa

But I'm curious to hear folks' thoughts and constructive additions to this conversation, or even resources which may prove helpful, as I would like to build upon my approach.

Hi All,
Is this you: you're mostly dependable for others, but you shut down / stop short when you seemingly "could" take action toward your own real desires/goals?
The NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM) Autonomy Adaptive Survival Style provides fascinating insight into this.

The NARM Autonomy Survival Style: An Adaptation to Squelched Self-Determination

Key Points
Those of us who use the autonomy survival style had our early exercise of autonomy (self-governance and self-determination) overly discouraged and thwarted.
We needed to disconnect from our authentic self-expression. Thus our core capacities to be independent, to set limits & boundaries, & to say what we think without guilt did not develop.
Years later, when autonomy is essential for a successful and enjoyable adult life, we find ourselves continually self-sabotaging.
About Adaptive Survival Styles
According to Dr. Laurence Heller’s NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM), adaptive survival styles are processes we employ that were necessary and life-saving during childhood. When one of our core needs is not met by our caregivers, we are unable to develop the corresponding core capacities.
Instead, we develop workarounds to compensate for the unmet need / undeveloped capacity. These workarounds are called adaptive survival styles – they were necessary and life-saving at the time. They involve self-shaming processes.
As adults, our styles unfortunately persist and pose serious ongoing challenges, especially when we’re triggered / in survival mode / in an emotional flashback / in child consciousness.
Excessive Discouragement of Self-Governance
Between the age of 18 months and 2 years of age, children begin to need to:
Explore their interest in the world
Say no and set boundaries and limits
Speak their mind and express themselves
Do some age-appropriate things for themselves
This marks the beginning of our burgeoning attempts as humans at independence and self-governance, otherwise known as autonomy. Ideally, this develops over time to the point where we can navigate ourselves independently as agents in the world.
Healthy parents support, encourage, and celebrate the development of their children’s autonomy, with appropriate limits for safety and other practical concerns. Children can’t be given carte blanche, but the impulse towards independence needs to be respected and supported.
When this happens, children develop the core capacity of autonomy.
Autonomy (self-governance and self-determination) is not to be confused with selfishness, which is a lack of empathy for others, and a disregard for their interests and well-being. Rather, autonomy is necessary for us to function, for ourselves, for others, and for the sake of our values.
For some of us, early (and later) expressions of autonomy were excessively discouraged or punished.
Some caretakers regularly undermine what their child is trying to do for themselves, and disrespect their boundaries unnecessarily. There are different reasons for this; some include:
Parental Narcissism
Narcissistic parents do not see their children as separate individuals. They don’t understand that their children are separate beings whom they get to steward for a while.
Instead, they presume their children “belong” to them, and are extensions of them … and as such, expect them to function on their behalf. They may use the child to reflect well on them, or as a receptacle for their own unwanted aspects.
In this scheme of things, the child’s authentic self-expression, limits, boundaries, desires, and self-determination are disregarded or framed as bad.
Beyond that, failing to recognize their child’s separateness (and therefore boundaries), narcissistic parents may be intrusive and controlling. This forces the development of autonomy around themes of retreating from invasions, as opposed to themes of exploration of the world.
Authoritarian Parenting
Rigid, rule-based parents who think they always “know what’s best” for their children sometimes impose harsh standards for their children’s “own good”.
Any resistance to, or even inability to successfully comply with their regime … is roughly equated with disobedience. Thus, self-expression is punished by cessation of love, shame, and coercion.
Anxious Parenting
“Helicopter” parents tend to sabotage their children’s autonomy to “protect” them from things they themselves fear at varying levels of awareness.
Parents may have their own unconscious fears of abandonment triggered as their children start to move away from them. And so they discourage movements towards independence with guilt, criticism, and implied threats of abandoning the child “in return”.
Effects on Children
When natural impulses toward autonomy threaten our relationship with our caregivers, we come to view them as bad and unsafe.
Preserving relationships and obtaining love becomes inextricably linked with sacrificing our integrity and self-reliance; pleasing others at our own expense.
We still have the natural need to be true to ourselves, and spread our wings and fly, but we also need to maintain attachment to our parents – which requires crushing submission to the prohibition of self-determination. This is a fundamental conflict / no-win situation; the first of many for people who use the autonomy survival style.
The typical child’s “solution” to this dilemma is to submit behaviorally and superficially (they have to), but to hold out internally, not surrendering completely. They develop a powerful covert counter-will and (understandable) exasperation.
Strengths of the Autonomy Adaptive Survival Style
They make for good friends
Loyal
Amiable and good natured
Aboveboard
Generally grounded, stable and non-reactive
Stamina once committed towards a purpose
NARM Autonomy Survival Style in Adults
To avoid constant external punishments of various sorts, children whose autonomy is not permitted eventually impose upon themselves (internalize) their parents’ overly restrictive limitations.
After a series of losing battles, they learned to head punishments, criticisms, humiliations, and discouragements off at the pass – they prevent these by holding themselves back. Their natural impulse towards autonomy and independence remains, but they experience it as dangerous.
Under Pressure
Those of us who use the autonomy style have a habit of pressuring ourselves relentlessly to do what we think that authority demands we “should” do. We experience these things as absolute “musts”, but they are usually not morally or practically necessary.
We are relentlessly pressuring ourselves with all kinds of harsh “shoulds” and “need to”s. We can be quite brutal and drive with ourselves all the time.
There is also a diametrically opposed aspect of us resisting this inner slave driver.
Pressure Experienced as External
We may experience all this pressure as coming from others, being exquisitely sensitive to the slightest expectation and internalizing it as a demand, or even seeing expectations where there are none.
And so we feel extremely burdened and stuck, not realizing we are imprisoning ourselves.
Self-Sabotage
Regarding what we’d actually like to do:
If we had our early needs for connection and nurturance met, we may be fully energized and ready for action – eager to explore the world and do our thing, imagining all kinds of actions and adventures.
However, our internalized restrictions prevent us from actually acting on these impulses in the real world.
And so a person with a strong autonomy theme is fully mobilized for action around what they want but stops themself short from releasing that energy through action. Kind of like a pressure cooker.
We go through life with the arrow of what we’d like to do or say in the bow, the string pulled back to maximum tension, imagining where we’d like to shoot it – but never letting it loose and seeing what happens. That’s too scary.
Procrastination, analysis paralysis, and waiting until the last second can be a huge theme.
Autonomy style people learned that if the impulse came from within, then simply acting on it ends horribly. So you restrain the impetus to take inner-directed action. This all becomes a deeply ingrained way of being. It’s frustrating and unfulfilling.
Conflicts and Ambivalence
There is constant paralysis and numerous unresolved conflicts. What was once a conflict between a demanding adult and a superficially compliant / secretly resistant child … is now an internal conflict between a “shoulding all over yourself” conscience and a sick-to-death-of-this-tyranny, tired, passively defiant inner child.
Here's what I think is the worst part: even the things autonomy style people really want to do require action, a means to an end. But that means gets quickly co-opted into an inflexible "should" … by the pressuring super-ego, which they then experience as intense pressure.
This is unpleasant, so now they avoid/resist doing what they really want to do. This pretty much spoils all the fun of, or shuts down, the pursuit of authentic goals.
Doubts and conflicts abound and tend to remain unresolved, reminiscent of the no-win situations of childhood. It’s either give in and sacrifice yourself … or “rebel” (do/say think what you like) and suffer for it.
It’s very difficult to resolve doubts about what’s best via experimentation -simply doing what feels right, getting feedback, and iterating.
Life feels like you’re stuck in a quagmire.
Relationship Difficulties
Expectations and pressure tend to get projected onto significant others, then complied with, then resented. Autonomy-style people may feel burdened and trapped and not stand up for their interests in relationships because they fear that if they did, they would be criticized and rejected.
They may allow resentments to accumulate until the frustration is so high that they feel justified in ghosting or making others so miserable they leave. This way they can get out of the “trap” without having to speak their mind.
True intimacy is longed for but can be associated with fears of invasion, control & being overwhelmed, and the loss of autonomy. So they may play "good boy/girl, I don't need much" in relationships, which keeps things seemingly safer, but distant.
Masochistic/submissive dynamics are sometimes present. If so, this frequently signals an underlying longing to surrender defenses and integrate the past - so that the true self can be uncovered and realized.
Authority Issues
As adults, people who use this style may be outwardly deferential towards people they see as having authority, but inwardly resentful. As a child, authority was essentially omnipotent, and the only two options they saw were to submit and sacrifice themselves, or “rebel” and be punished.
As adults, this is usually a false dilemma, but that lens with respect to authority tends to persist; completely unconsciously or somewhat consciously.
This can impact client/therapist relationships and can be somewhat mitigated with a coaching / relationship of equals / client-led dynamic.
Other Themes
Autonomy-style people can ruminate a lot, be plagued by guilt, apologize for things they are not responsible for, be self-punitive, and fear retribution and humiliation if they directly oppose somebody else. Passive aggression or dragging heels may sometimes be a substitute for standing up for themself.
They can mistake their hesitancy to take a stand as easy-goingness, but every once in a while they may surprise themselves with how forceful they can be in standing up for others.
Distortions of Identity
People who use the autonomy style had their attempts at authentic self-determination repeatedly discouraged. So to shut it down, they learned to shame themselves around this normal core need.
They disconnected from saying what they really think and doing what they really want. A central mechanism for the above disconnection is via the process of self-shaming.
Shame-Based Identifications
For having a need to be autonomous, and in order to disconnect from it, people who use this style shame themselves as being:
Rebellious
Angry
Disgruntled
Put upon
Pride-Based Counter-Identifications
Feeling shame 24/7 is not sustainable, so people tend to come up with compensatory identifications:
Polite, pleasant, eager to please
Good boy/girl
Fearful of letting others down
Enduring burdens for long periods
Disidentifying
Freedom from shame comes from realizing that there is a way of being and doing that is right for us as individuals. And then acting on it.
This is true autonomy. It’s not compliance, it’s not rebellion, it’s just us doing us.
Healing
Ok, there are reasons we developed our strategies, but there they are. Now what?
Autonomy-style people have spent their lives “efforting” – pushing and pressuring themselves on one side or another of internal conflicts. Doing more of this won’t resolve this style.
It is important to realize that your feelings matter – they really do, they are really important, however seemingly infantile or unproductive.
We need to care less about what we need to do and care more about what we want to do … and this feels dangerous and shameful. We can’t effort on that side either, pushing against our conscience.
As you might imagine, navigating and resolving this core dilemma – I need to exercise my self-determination, but cannot safely exercise my self-determination, is tricky.
The pressure is coming from our overly harsh super-ego, so understanding that autonomy is not wrong, “selfish”, or shameful, and is necessary for us to be functioning people who can effectively live out our values, helps.
It also helps to realize that the perceived pressure we are always under is way too much, and that is self-generated and self-perpetuated. It’s not being imposed on us by the limitations of our circumstances, rather it’s an echo of the past that we are carrying forward. Although we can experience old internalized expectations as coming from another in the present – projection.
We also need to own that when we pressure ourselves too much with an “ought”, our stubborn, rebellious side is not going to want to comply, even if it’s “good for us” – because it will feel burdensome and soul-crushing. Because of our grievance around that, we tend to find ways to undermine whatever endeavor we’ve set our mind to. We can be quite contrary.
Owning all of this internal action is agency. In NARM, the saying is “Agency is the bridge from child consciousness to adult consciousness”. Understanding precisely how we are actively creating our experience, even “negatively”, gives us a sense of … agency – and this leads to all sorts of good things. We may need a little in help in not shaming ourselves as we discover these things.
Autonomy types have a lot of unresolved conflicts. A dialectical way of thinking helps resolve conflicts. In dialectics, both sides of conflicts are acknowledged to have validity, so you synthesize the sides into something transcendent which is appropriate for your situation.
Dialectical thinking involves replacing:
“On the one hand, I want/need to do this, BUT on the other, I want/need to do that”
(This leaves you stymied)
with
“On the one want/need I want to do this, AND on the other, I want/need to do that.”
Instead of being confused and stalemated with “buts”, AND introduces a creative tension out of which workable solutions, appropriate for an individual’s unique characteristics & situation, arise.
How to Help
The problems autonomy style people have (for example procrastination) are there because conflicts exist. Taking a side in a conflict does not help.
For example, procrastination. If a helping professional proposes a plan to overcome procrastination, the plan gets adopted by the pressuring conscience.
The client may vigorously try to implement the solution, but their unrecognized resistant child side doesn’t like the pressure.
Also, the childhood fear that criticism and abandonment will result from taking action is overlooked by the therapist/coach. So the client will (unconsciously) feel that the helping professional has completely missed their underlying concerns and is imposing an agenda that they know deep down will end in disaster.
Devising plans, programs, or solutions to problems sets these clients up for pressure, frustration, and self-sabotage. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and goal-directed / solution-focused approaches are generally contraindicated, in my opinion.
Those approaches will feel like a re-enactment of thousands of childhood scenarios, and the resisting child aspect will eventually protest and throw a monkey wrench into the process.
Both sides of conflicts need unconditional acceptance. And the concerns of both sides need to be taken 100% seriously. For real.
It is simply not the case that the resisting part is lazy, selfish, immature, choose your adjective … It has simply had entirely too much of being pushed around, never having a say, and being punished for doing what it wants. It needs to have a say.
So the best thing a coach or therapist can do is accept the client unconditionally. A non-goal, exploratory, curiosity-based approach is best – there really should be zero agenda set by the therapist/coach. The more autonomy types accept all of themselves, and the less they try to change, the more positive change happens.
Having a depth-oriented, sophisticated knowledge of how subtle intrapsychic conflicts and dynamics play out is useful. Reflecting these dynamics to clients (without shame) helps them gain self-awareness and mindfulness about how they actively implement the particulars of this adaptive survival strategy. This is agency and leads to resolution and healing.
This includes how they pressure themselves, try to please others at their own expense, and on the other hand are contrary also. Zero judgment about this is essential. Psychoeducation about how survival strategies were necessary for survival as children, and how we carry them forward helps.
Resolution and Post-Traumatic Growth
Unresolved, the autonomy style can cause you to spend your entire life resisting your own desires and aspirations. Efforting to comply with perceived expectations.
Hunkered down, you may be unable to take action to express yourself or get what you want. You may compulsively resist your own ideas and plans. Heavy and stuck, life can be one long recurring pattern of self-sabotage.
However, with the right relational support, people develop confidence, trust, and the courage to stop controlling how people react to them by being what they think others want.
They speak and act straightforwardly per their values and intentions and let the chips fall where they may. This turns out surprisingly well.
They enjoy maintaining their independence as individuals in their relationships, while also being able to enjoy intimacy in them at the same time.
Still highly aware of others’ agendas, they don’t unduly comply with or resist them. They are more focused on quietly expressing their truth and taking steady persevering action toward their own goals, which now make sense for who they truly are.
Not stuck in molasses anymore, instead they are now more like rocks – they have an embodied, deeply grounded, stable, and present strength. They can be very observant, patient, and diplomatic, they respect others’ space, and they can hold space for others (and themselves too).
They finally allow themselves to deeply enjoy simply being (without pressure), as well as taking action. And they grow organically from there.