enforcer's slimyboy thoughts

super happy icy fun destroy rebuild until god snows shop

More Meteor Falls > https://rentry.co/i39gqd4r

Sitoh was one of my aliases in 2021-22, but the young and cute Loremaster isn't solely author appeal. His existence helps to foreshadow what we'll learn about the Draconid worldview on tech, animum manipulation, Pokemon training, etcetera during Arlo's vision. He also gives the boys someone approachable who can phrase things in ways they'll connect with, establishes that even though Arlo's mom was an asshole, the rest of that side of his family / heritage is legitimately proud of and likes him (well, before he went off grid), and has a good reason to be bilingual. Also, he establishes that the Draconids are a living culture and avoids being a Magical Indigenous Person or Asian Sage archetype, although the canon portrayal of Draconids is so bad that anything would be better.

(They're introduced sabotaging a scientific effort to prevent the world being destroyed by a natural disaster in favor of having Rayquaza do it, whom they can't summon without the player because Zinnia isn't a sufficiently good representative of her own culture. Also, only 2 of them are seen alive, so check off the "dying race" stereotype, and their plot introduces the utterly nonsensical Mega Evolution Multiverse concept.)

psst, the hallucinogen / Pokemon toxins slash hormones / mega stone dust mixture Arlo's gonna drink for this is not that different from shadow formula, see the whole moral / theme of Arlo's character arc. basically we're triggering a nicer and more controlled version of his reverse mode dreams.

Also, I've read some interesting stuff about how even if they're not conscious, letting patients pick the music that plays when they're going down for procedures with sedatives still improves morale and outcomes.

uh, also relevant to Sitoh's animum studies major is Braiding Sweetgrass which we read some excerpts of and similar stuff from Indigenous biologists in my religion and ecology class, re: realizing "hold on, this is the same thing". And we'll see that throughout Arlo's vision re: the ancestral Draconid traditions of Mega Evolution and "Infinity Energy".

None of this is Pokemon canon, except for the Draconid people living in Meteor Falls, worshipping Rayquaza, and being the original users of Mega Evolution. I have taken that and run off with it, even though I don't otherwise consider remake games to exist, because I think Draconids are neat and have since I first played OmegaRuby in 2017

This is part of why he's so damned mean in the RRverse, although I do feel kinda bad for him since he is also getting screwed over by being Ronnie's canonical love interest. (Whitney [probably...] is easy. I just had Ronnie ghost her for 3 months and then all the scene journalism calling him gay.)

He's always been the brains of the operation and more mature in general (e.g. being capable of long-term behavior change and recognizing people as willful agents even if he's not in love with them and/or they're female), but he's a lot like Ronnie in a lot of key ways. You can understand why they imprinted on each other so hard. He's the main initiator of all the EtF-side beef (I will shout from the rooftops for as long as it matters that the Ronnie / Craig feud is a myth because that's my biggest and most controversial research finding) for a reason, although he fails to hide how legitimately heartbroken he is and is extremely huggable even at his nastiest since unlike Ronnie, he probably bathes and wouldn't bite.

While I enjoy the concept of Ronnie cuddles hence all the art I commission of him with Arlo, the idea of snuggling any version of Ronnie myself feels viscerally wrong. Max has no such issues, although the modern version I respect too much and is also extremely married.

He isn't going to be getting a human with ears and tail version for the reasons that I respect him too much, the modern version has clearly set boundaries separating himself from EtF / FIR / Ronnie and is just a normal guy, and he wouldn't be meaningfully visually distinct from Ronnie in my art style.

natural born killers (band) only has one EP, but they’re so cute. mostly because it’s Max trying to pull the uno falling in reverse card after he got kicked from etf in 2012 but it’s clear his heart isn’t in it because he’s a good egg and also I get the impression he was very uncomfortable with being considered the frontman, see how he left vocals on VNB as soon as he could. he is a damned good vocalist though

ok, I had a bad dream, my back hurts, and I smashed my finger in the bathroom cabinet this morning, but at least the new yogurt tastes correct.

revised song of the day: Dragged Under - Never Enough

song of the day (woke up feeling too shitty to have restraint so you get a cliche deal with it): Pierce The Veil - King For A Day

I know that having supportive parents makes you an invalid trans person but it isn't all sunshine and rainbows; the relationship my mom and I have now is a product of active work on both of our parts. we sucked when I first came out

the 2fa app I use is called "2faguard" so whenever I open it I usually end up typing "2fag" into the searchbar to start and I think that's neat

learned the word "truesona" today and I don't like it at all

(Art Fight allows fan characters and AU versions of canon characters, but they need to be visually distinct from their original copyrighted forms. I haven't made original alternate refs for Spark and Arlo because I...like their canon designs, but the dragon arc opens up options. I've seen Pokemon fusions, anthro Pokemon, and anthro / animal AUs of canon human characters on Art Fight before, so I think if I make them both at least 30% visibly nonhuman and maybe give them alternate non-canon outfits...of course, I don't have a good sense of what Spark would wear other than his canon outfit.)

Re: Arlo / Ronnie...I like the concept of Ronnie Cuddles (TM). I like thinking about them and looking at art of them especially if I don't have to draw it. I can't snuggle him myself. The thought is just grossly wrong even for the cute version and I'm not sure precisely why. Arlo can snuggle as much as he wants, so he does.

Thinking I might make Distinct Enough For Art Fight Non-Canon Kemono Spark a Zapdos / Luxray fusion instead of just a Zapdos. Gives me more to play with and to make him similar in human to beast ratio to Dragon Arlo. Course, I kinda like art of Ronnie and Arlo better so he isn”t a high priority.

I wish I had more than one optical drive. Of course, I'm not sure if I could rip more than one CD at once even if I did. (When I get my next [desktop] creative workstation, it will have a built in optical drive which should make ripping faster than going through USB.)

ok, I am going back to the grocery store and eating cereal for breakfast today because even though the out date on the lid is June 10, the yogurt I got yesterday tastes WRONG; it is extremely sour and has a strange aftertaste so is triggering the You Have Been Poisoned alert.

they also didn't have liberte Greek so I got the Atlantic store brand so it could also be that I just don't like that kind, but it does not taste like I expect yogurt to. I might go to sobey's because while I don't get points from them, last time they had liberte grec and the better veggie nuggets which Atlantic didn't

I am inclined to believe the body if it says something tastes like it has gone off because natural selection didn't raise no fool

Meteor Falls intro: https://rentry.co/5ogywz7p

The Dudesverse / RRverse backlog has not been forgotten, but for whatever reason, my description writing sector has not been online, so I'm trying to write sections as dialogue / scripts and figuring I can fill in the rest later. I'll also be able to do more ergonomic typing with a desk; I have been doing most of my stuff except webinars on the iPad and phone because neither being on my bed or on the kitchen table works that well with the laptop for extended periods.

tag yourself; my gender is "candlestick maker".

I FINALLY HAVE MEDICARE! (I applied in September, then had to submit a document revision in January because they didn't accept my lease and I had no other proof of residency when I applied. This has been the main obstacle in my arc since December when I finally got the SIN office to recognize that I exist.)

Now I just need a job and I'll maybe feel like a real adult...

...I wonder if I can do a red velvet base with some sort of appropriately colored liquid inside, if I find the right bakery, for maximum symbolism...

see, this is why I need someone to humor my emo night requests, so we can ritualistically consume the slime as a primal horde and absorb his powers

primal horde being a reference to a Sigmund Freud writing we read and ripped to shreds in anthropology of religion which posits that the origin of the sky-father deity is that every caveman ever killed and ate their alpha male and then felt bad about it

Does anyone make photo cakes of a reasonable size to be consumed by one person? I'm contemplating my committed-to bit for when FIR breaks up, which will happen any day now...but one of my goals for the semester is to not cross the streams, so I would rather not explain to classmates or my mature professional adult housemates who this guy is and why I got a cake with his face on it. I suppose I could rent a room at a community center and put out flyers for a literal Ronnie Radke Is Over party, but I'm unsure if anybody would go.

NB municipal elections are May 11th. This is completely irrelevant to me until and unless I can get citizenship, but I'm not voting for anybody who doesn't bother translating their sign. Yes, most areas aren't THAT bilingual, there's no way to make it look good from a graphic design standpoint (especially with close cognates where it just looks redundant, which most political terms are), and I suspect anybody regardless of language will catch on that a sign with a person on it near a polling place in advance of election day is a campaign sign. But, like, especially since NB is legally bilingual on a provincial level so even more so than Canada as a whole, it's a basic gesture of consideration and attention to detail.

Of course, thinking about it, I also think that if you know there's a notable non-English-speaking population in your jurisdiction, you should translate your signs even if it isn't an official language. But not doing so when running for office in a legally bilingual region (especially in Moncton which is also both on a city level) is just lazy.

Ideally, with the library debloated, shuffling all becomes viable again, so I can (re)learn song titles from more recent assessments.

Another song of the day I can't find. Part of the problem is that since I have a lot of artists in my library with similar sounding voices and vibes, I'm not totally sure if the two lyric snippets in my head are from the same song. The ones I remember are something that sounds like "how could they become intertwined?" and a repeated refrain of "screaming for salvation". I think it's either Bleed From Within or Sylosis, but I didn't find anything that sounded right on the latter on AZlyrics before it DDOS kicked me out.

Booted up 4thewords and the description-writing section of my brain immediately shut down, so here's some disembodied dialogue for the RRverse Award Show story, which is on the backlog and along with In Which Zane Is Produced (tbh, I'm considering rewriting that one entirely because it's been around since 2023 and I'm not sure if I like the draft anymore), finishes off the main RRverse arc -- this one is the aftermath / conclusion to Ronnie's Awakening, where we see how the rest of the scene reacts to the new Escape the Fate lineup and Ronnie's coming out.

Based on a reverse image search, it's the logo for the fictional biker gang from Sons of Anarchy, a show I have little to no desire to watch, but it's also frankly rather generic as far as edge imagery goes and I like scythes.

It's not from someone horrible which is what I was concerned about.

I went to a vinyl expo today. I was kinda underwhelmed, although I wasn't expecting much to begin with since I'm about 30 years younger than the target audience and my tastes are much more recent. My interest in vinyl is 0 because I'm sorry, no album after 1990 has any reason to be on it.

There was a strong focus on metal, which was cool, but I was hoping more vendors would have CDs or other music paraphernalia (patches, posters, etcetera) than did. Still had yields that made the 5 dollars for admission worth it, although maybe not the taxi especially since there's nothing else in the area.

I'll only go to the vinyl expo if I can bike there. Had to take a cab because my e-bike is still at the slime house until my mom comes up with a van to get the rest of my shit; I can't take my bike on the bus.

Not sure whose logo the gun-scythe is and I don't normally like guns as part of edgy imagery, but it reminded me of the stereotypical impractical anime weapon. I thought it was cute, and it came for free with the larger Slipknot patch.

Today's song of the day is something I can't find. I know it contains a section of lyrics that SOUNDS like "save your wishes for the sky", but I can not find that on a web search. I thought it was Hail The Villain but it's not. So, either I misheard the lyrics, it has no documentation online, or both, and I don't remember the artist or title.

damn it, despite knowing quite well that Ronnie is the one who plagiarized, I can't look at the rolling stones lips without taking damage and having to remind myself of the realities of popularity

https://file.garden/ZvBqN3lQEnLVuczj/Ronnie_Gets_A_Flea_Bath.md(2).txt

Ronnie gets a flea bath, and also some sad homoerotic tension.

Saskia is attested as Max's girlfriend in the DIYLF liner notes, which is good enough for me and I refuse to consult creepy unsourced celebrity websites. (His current wife would be very anachronistic; I think as of their most recent anniversary announcement they only mentioned having gotten to know each other 3 years beforehand.)

I feel really bad for Max in general in the RRverse, but it's also historically accurate. Dude isn't proud of it and unlike some people, has matured, but he can and did get NASTY in regards to Escape the Fate Drama, both with Ronnie and when he got kicked out in 2012. He still comes off even more so than Ronnie as a poor little heartbroken puppy when he does so (No Escape and the only surviving audio interview where EtF talks about Ronnie are both absolutely wrenching, especially since Max sounds like he's about to cry), but he can dish it out.

This takes place after the award show (new years 2006-7 / 2023-24 in OTL), so Max is aware that Arlo exists and begrudgingly tolerates Ronnie having a new boyfriend on "I want my beloved to be happy" grounds, but he's still pissed at Ronnie. Especially in the present moment. He'll be a little calmer in the award show sequence where he's just talking to Arlo.

We are not going to see any future werewolf nonsense with Max, because in both timelines, he is retired from the scene and just some guy and has set clear boundaries in regards to Ronnie. Also, since everyone in my art style is similarly androgynous and cute, a kenomomimi version of Max wouldn't be that visually distinct from Ronnie.

Max calling Ronnie a junkie falls in the category of things I don't feel okay with commenting on (Ronald's drug problem is off limits, as is anything about prison that isn't his own fault or directly FIR related), but it is absolutely something that a pissed off version of him would say in-universe. Characters can be inappropriate about IRL-extant trauma, but I can't be.

The whole story is an excuse for my silly little Neopet, but why not milk it for historically accurate to EtF lore pain?

Unsure what 2 do with daily songs if I repeat myself…hasn’t happened yet @ least

A smile from the trenches - if dreams were real

Arlo's monologue during this segment: "awww... oh shit."

Obvious telegraphing is obvious, but more fun than just namedropping Max in the narration. Let them connect the dots...

(will be finished tomorrow and then maybe I can return to the backlog ... this is an attempt to return to creative writing with something that has less going on and is pure fluff. the remaining ones are pretty light and fluffy since we're past Reverse Mode III but still have more character action and generally more there there.)

Finished the Lingo Legend Canadian French curriculum. That feels like it went by shockingly quickly. Guess I'll do review mode until I finish the farmstead quests?

I think I started sometime in January. I don't have a good idea of how much French LL contains. January to May isn't an unreasonable length for a semester class, but I feel like there is more in there than there is in one semester of 101 and it's daily?

https://file.garden/ZvBqN3lQEnLVuczj/Ronnie_Gets_A_Flea_Bath.md(1).txt

In case you can't tell from the telegraphing, the blue-green recolor of an Onyx Valentine Varwolf is Max, and things are going to be extremely awkward when the sun comes back up. I wasn't sure about what to do with Ronnie Gets A Flea Bath, but had the concept for an introduction to Neo!Max (who is canon, but his human form has absolutely no interest in Ronnie or weird science anymore, and since OTL is retired from the scene and has set clear boundaries separating himself from Ronnie, I would feel weird OC-ifying him even if he has something to do. No Escape, Ronnie's Awakening, and the unwritten award show story are ok because they're DIYLF / TDIMIY lore fanfic. This Max is fully separate from Escape the Fate so is just a guy who also is just some guy in real life.) and realized they made sense to merge.

As for why Max is a werewolf, this will never be revealed in-universe because he's not spending any more time near Ronnie and his weird science nonsense than he has to, but basically, since Ronnie sold his soul so they could get Edge Famous TOGETHER, they have some sort of conceptual animum link which didn't go away when they broke up. Since Ronnie has gotten a major animum emissions boost from Arlo's shadow aura rubbing off on him, the time travel, and the werewolf thing, enough spillover happened whenever Ronnie transformed over time that eventually it managed to also turn Max. Which he does not want any part of.

OTL Ronnie and Max might have something similar going on -- Max is pretty much immune to slime since he knew Ronnie before he became That, but does get headaches whenever Ronnie is being egregiously stupid even without being told what he's doing.

Alt!Ronnie has no EE slime nonsense going on because unlike OTL, he didn't participate in the fight in the desert and therefore didn't die and get improperly revived / replaced by an alternate version, but he did still sell his soul to the Bureau of Edge back in high school.

the design of big ears, big paws, weirdly skinny tail except with a fluffy tuft on the end, and overbite with cute little fangs is straight from Neo. the color highlight on top of black is both a pun on Max's last name and because in one interview from 2008, he decided on blue for "what color of crayon would you be", plus the black and green color scheme of TWIO and his cute little teeths and bangs from that. cyan is also the glow color of his very short lived magical boy super mode from No Escape (before Ronnie eats him for refusing to participate in sexy magical boy Ronnie Slime Super Mode mass murder)

Lingo Legend unit 39/40 is idioms, and I'm tempted to start using literal translations of these because they don't not make sense in English and idk if that's a Norman conquest thing or what.

Btdubstep, other than looking up "poire" because it's been a while since the fruits unit, and "pogner" which is apparently a Quebec-ism, I was able to literally translate these without assistance.

E.g. (using LL's translations):

"J'écris comme un cochon." > "I have bad handwriting", lit. "I write like a pig."

"Il chante comme un casserole." > "he sings poorly", lit. "he sings like a soup pot."

"Tu as le bras long." > "you have influence", lit. "you have the long arm."

"Coupons la poire en deux." > "let's meet halfway", lit. "Let's cut the pear in half."

"Ce n'est pas le crayon le plus aiguisé." > "he is a little dumb", lit. "He's not the sharpest pencil." (My first thought was wondering if "not the sharpest tool in the shed" is related.)

"Jeter l'argent par les fenêtres" > "to pour money down the drain", lit. "To throw money out the window."

"Se pogner la beigne" > "to be lazy", lit. "To catch (? this one isn't on word reference; apparently it's specifically Quebecois) the donut."

https://www.je-parle-quebecois.com/lexique/definition/pogner.html

it has nothing to do with him, but OG!ViolentNewMax has a ghost frog now because it's too cute to zap over

If you don't like the weather anywhere in North America that isn't tropical or desert, wait 5 minutes.

https://barrypopik.com/blog/if_you_dont_like_the_weather_wait_five_minutes_weather_saying

"A popular Nova Scotia saying is 'if you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes.'" -- news in clinic waiting room

That's a popular saying EVERYWHERE that isn't in a equatorial, hot desert, or otherwise locked climate.

And it's not Ronnie being inappropriate for polite company, or that I'm trying to deny being any of those things. Far from it. It's legitimate philosophical issues with and/or things I don't connect with in all of the above.

"Queer culture":

• Romance and sex don't really factor into my calculations at all, and tbh, my relationship with gender isn't clear cut. I'm more of a guy than not, but I'm still genderless and much more of a snake.

• I have little interest in most pop culture, period.

The "indie web":

• using political language and issues that demonstrably hurt people for cultural posturing and refusing to admit that is what they're doing. no, having a website is not political action.

• disturbingly blatant ableism

• following distorted versions of 90s / 00s trends is still algorithmic and also feels silly and insincere

Online autistic community:

• I have literally never encountered any autistic self-advocacy organization, or writing by neurodivergent people, that acknowledges that giftedness exists. Far more common is saying that "gifted kids are all just autistic / ADHD", blaming being called gifted for trauma, or saying that the word "gifted" is inherently ableist and/or that "autistic geniuses" don't exist and are problematic stereotypes.

• Literally all of my autistic traits are inseparable from being 2e, even the classical stuff like sensory perception, verbal communication, and special interests.

Alterhumanity:

• blatant bio, psych, and animal behavior misinformation

• too much focus on spirituality and hostility towards psychological explanations, which doesn't align with my worldview or how I experience being a snake guy

• actually serious writings are pretty much all by and for mammals

(ya boy ended up on them.us and got existentially dysphoric; why do I keep doing this?) I keep hoping that one day, “queer culture” or the “indie web” or the online autistic community or alterhumanity or similar will flip a switch and connect with me, and it just doesn’t. I feel more kinship to being emo in 2006, even knowing that it wouldn’t actually be compatible with being openly trans or autistic, than I do to being…anything in 2026, because even outside of the mainstream platforms it’s all the same shit. I am not online. I do not care about memes or discourse, and don’t see indie web posturing and Neocities LARPing as any meaningfully different. 2000s “nostalgia” just feels silly, insincere, and inaccurate and “emo revival” is actively offensive because revival implies it was dead. On one hand, it’s affirming to call myself a time traveller or displaced in time, which I have been doing more recently.

Something something queer view of time but it’s more of an asynchronity metaphor. On the other, it’s lonely and frustrating and pisses me off that all these “communities” that claim to speak for me…don’t. Even when they’re talking about things I experience, it isn’t my culture. That isn’t me. As far as I can tell, my relationship with…existence, even when I use labels or connect with some aspects of experience or language, is entirely bespoke. Nothing fully fits.

It’s liberating to reject subcultural distinctions — there is only The Enforcer and I have no obligation to abide by your standards just because I am trans or autistic or a snake or have a website. But it also means that I don’t “belong” anywhere unless I make it myself and I get no external validation.

Gods, I hope my emo night etcetera plans work. I need this more than you know. I’m outside of time, but maybe I can at least get some physical space back. Haven’t been from anywhere since I graduated.

i promise i'm working on something really cool in meatspace; we're making things happen and advancing our edge quotient. just gotta write the email which is the most important and also least fun part of all this...

gods i hate duckduckgo's layout and results so much they both suck even without the ai bullshit

at least getting mistaken for a DDOS attack is better than getting the "are you thinking about suicide?" pop-up, which has also happened to me while looking up music

I should know by now that no column about tech is worth reading. I'm not even that into tech for its own sake, so all it does is make me mad with shit journalism and baseless bullshit generator hype. "AI" does not warrant or deserve rights, and if you use it you don't either, at least not for anything you used it to generate.

got this cool toonie from the bank while getting bus fare today

i'm here because of (a) civil rights, (b) climate survivability, and (c) much lower odds of any random stranger being both bigoted against me personally and armed, but also the money is way prettier

more colored coins if you're curious

Thinking about FR vs. Wajas and how despite sharing very similar mechanics, they have near opposite attitudes about breeding and exalting, and I'm curious about how that came about. I'm not objecting, but I like FR's system more: Wajas makes it so that breeding costs money, which you can't make back unless you can sell the offspring to other players. The exalting equivalent is actively disincentivized in gameplay with piecemeal "rewards" and stigmatized by the playerbase, with breeding to exalt referred to derogatorily as "puppy milling". Whereas on FR, fodder breeding and exalting is an expected and encouraged part of the economy. If you're against it, you're considered a noob who doesn't understand game mechanics.

So what ends up happening on Wajas is you don't get the equivalent to weird XYZs or Stock The Pond, and it produces an overall bland Waja population because everyone is breeding for the market outside of customs. So you get the top "subbreeds"...and that's basically it, and I don't find that fun. You can play with the demo, yes, but what got me into FR was mashing my dragons together at random and seeing what pretty stuff came out, and Wajas actively discourages that sort of experimentation.

My theories for why the culture is so different are as follows:

1. Dogs exist in real life. Dragons don't. The whole point of pet sims is that they aren't real animals, but breeding canines in bulk for disposable profit has real life uncomfortable subtext that doing the same with dragons doesn't. Also, the explanation Wajas uses is not good: your Wajas are sent to a "crazy cat lady" animal hoarder archetype NPC, and they aren't portrayed as especially sapient so unlike FR dragons, you can't say they're going of their own will.

2. AFAIK, FR had exalting from day 1, so the economy grew up around it. I think Wajas added the OWF later, but that still doesn't explain the aversion players apparently had to it -- it apparently had to be nerfed because players were bulk breeding high stat Wajas to exalt for profit, to which my response when I read about it was "so?" Yes, it resembles puppy mills, but it's a perfectly valid playstyle and these aren't real animals. They don't feel suffering. Folks using it to breed specifically for profit is an unavoidable side effect of the mechanic, but I think that letting players experiment and do breeding projects knowing they can make back what they spent on pears would produce a more interesting population and make new players more inclined to breed. I would consider economic shift from fodder breeding to be worth that, so I am curious about why Wajas players apparently didn't.

I, personally, bought several hundred love pears with FR currency, because I don't have as many active goals on FR so am more willing to spend gems / treasure. I enjoy mashing my wolves together at random and seeing what happens, even though that's essentially punished in-game. Then I release the offspring to the park (pool for other players to adopt for free), and if they're deemed "low quality", I do not give a fuck. If one player with aesthetic sensibilities similar to mine sees one of my pups in the park and thinks they're cool and different from the standards then it's worthwhile.

Song of the day: Blessthefall - Oathbreaker

flight rising might be improved if you blocked everyone who posts on that “current thought” thread

also transhumanism is literally just eugenics but that is neither here nor there

my relationship with the body is no longer directly adversarial but it is still as much an obstacle to my conceptual true self as it is an embodiment of it. I would much rather be an abstract concept (or at least have scales and a tail), but sure as hell would never want to be embodied in technological form because biolife has better self-repair mechanisms and has had millions of years to work the kinks out.

yogurt is like cheese where unless it is thick / Greek / hard and sharp cheese (or melted cheese is also fine), it will trigger my gag reflex

In other news, I don't know why the body keeps waking me up at 4 to 5 am with physiological complaints but I wish it would stop. It doesn't seem notably related to when I eat dinner or go to bed. I'm blaming either practicum or my persistent congestion. At this point it's most likely just residual, hence why I feel fine in public (99% sure I am not contagious), but I don't want to spend the night in Red'ville until it subsides.

Also, Liberté Mediterranien is not the same as and is much worse texturally than Liberté Grec, which the superstore did not have last time.

This is a large part of why I distance myself from the "indie web" community, because, well, I have seen actual peer reviewed papers claiming "digital autism" is a thing. Unless you are very careful about focusing on the platform designers and algorithm over the actual "content" or people watching it, it's pretty much impossible to do anti-tech like that without being ableist, because that's what it's ultimately about. Just because you are not explicitly saying "phones make your kids autistic / ADHD and that's bad" doesn't mean that isn't what's coming across, and I vastly dislike that both my ed support postbac and a "community" that claims to be anti-capitalist and shit don't realize that.

Let's unpack what "technology destroys Real Play and Real Socialization and Attention Span" is implying about what forms of those things are valid before using it for points, shall we?

If you liked Pokemon cards, Vines, All Your Base Are Belong To Us, cereal box blind packed toys, or similar as a kid, you don't care about mindless catchphrases or encouraging gambling; you don't think kids' interests are valid. I already wrote about this last year, but good job to whatever asshole used "hyperfixated and brainrotted" to describe modern society for encapsulating why I detest the entire concept of "brainrot". (Kids who use the term for a genre of media are fine. I'm referring to its use derogatorily / in popular media as a moral panic.)

Hyperfixation is a uniquely autistic and ADHD experience. It is not a synonym for liking something or a cultural fad. For all intents and purposes, it is a culturally exclusive term: if you don’t experience neurodivergent hyperfixations yourself or are not writing about someone who does, you should not be using it. It DEFINITELY is not a synonym for “brainrot” or similar “what kids enjoy is inherently bad and harmful”, which you also should not be saying at all. I recently saw someone describing modern society derogatorily as “hyperfixated and brainrotted”, which good job textualizing the subtext.

Even outside of that, I have seen more and more general media outlets using “hyperfixation” to mean “fandom” or “current cultural vogue”, which…no. Genericizing culturally specific or diagnostic terms takes experiences that are not yours and robs people of vocabulary to accurately describe their own experiences, which in this case, is being done to something that is already isolating — ask anybody who experiences them; actual hyperfixations are worlds away from the fleeting fads the term is being applied to, or even media “fandoms”.

Autism and ADHD are as much cultures as “disorders”, and you should not be genericizing vocabulary referring to either of those things. The more a term is used generically, the fewer people actually understand what, say, “triggered” or “gaslighting” really mean or the AAVE origins of most slang, so the harder it is for people who actually experience those things / belong to the communities who made those words to find accurate information and be taken seriously when talking about themselves.

ID verification is not going to stop people from accessing porn or toxic rhetoric. Who it will stop is kids, poor people, and people in rural areas who can't just use a VPN from accessing healthcare and information, and that's what it's really about. (And giving platforms more data to sell.)