I have really mixed feelings about Jasper getting a redemption arc.

And this is separate from the “it’s boring when every character gets a redemption arc” argument (which I more or less believe but isn’t the point here).

What makes me nervous about a Jasper redemption arc is the message it will convey to the target audience, children. So far, the show has done a beautiful job conveying abusive relationships and their dynamics via Lapis and Jasper. It’s even hit a little too close to home for myself and others.

The thing that concerns me, though, is implying that abusers can and will change. Don’t misread this: there ARE abusive people who, with time and serious effort/intervention, are able to become healthier people and genuinely change. However, Jasper has been the prominent example of an abuser so far, and so I worry that it could imply that abusers can usually or will frequently change. This, sadly, is NOT the case.

It’s not that abusers shouldn’t have redemption arcs. It’s that we need to be realistic in the messages we send so that we don’t leave viewers thinking that if they just wait out long enough then their abuser will change.

pukakke:

also can i just say that i really love that Alone at Sea covered toxic relationships in a way you never see in media. sometimes abuse isn’t just a villain and a victim. sometimes you both do awful things. sometimes you even crave the abuse. but that doesn’t change what it is: it’s still abuse. and you’re still allowed to stand up for yourself against it. 

lapis-lazooli:

people are taking lapis’ words as a “confession that she abused jasper.” it’s not. she’s self blaming. this is what victims do. lapis wasn’t innocent, but she didn’t abuse jasper. it was mutually toxic, but jasper is still very visibly the abuser here. stop blaming victims for their symptoms.

(Source: ichigotchipng)

Holy Shit This is Some Damn Good Social Commentary

I was perusing the YouTube as per usual, and found a new channel. Half of it’s videos praise great examples of animations, and the other half shred apart atrocious examples of animation. Several of the atrocious examples are Family Guy, and TheMysteriousMrEnter gives some of the BEST commentary I’ve seen in regards to the issues played off by Family Guy.

In this video, he rips apart the victim-blaming and mockery of abuse that takes place in “Screams of Silence: Story of Brenda Q”. 

This is such a good video to watch, and I’m thoroughly impressed by how well he articulates his analysis and criticism. Other topics he shreds Family Guy for covering poorly are other forms of abuse, sexual harassment, and so on. Seriously give these a watch, like DAMN.

I’m giving a standing ovation to TheMysteriousMrEnter.

Keep doing the good work of the world, sir.

Originally posted by yourreactiongifs

phicore:

respect abuse victims who are angry. who want to break things and get violent urges and violently hate their abuser.

respect abuse victims who are scared. who can’t talk about it. who can’t tell anyone about it. whose abusers are a biggest fear.

respect abuse victims who love(d) their abusers. who are in a relationship, were, who were raised by their abusers. who can’t stop loving their abuser. 

respect abuse victims who aren’t over it and never will be. respect abuse victims who don’t deal in healthy ways. respect abuse victims of all sorts, as long as they aren’t dealing with their abuse in a way that is harmful to others (ie racist, ableist, etc), there is no wrong way to cope or react to abuse

(Source: phinomenal)

usukiland:

socialjusticesummoner:

dragondicks:

bogleech:

anti-feminism-pro-cats:

bogleech:

anti-feminism-pro-cats:

unadulteratedpiratepizza:

socialjust-ish:

franslair:

makahisea:

bogleech:

soapsock:

the-eagle-atarian:

unadulteratedpiratepizza:

bogleech:

I don’t want to hijack that other thread where women are discussing this but I am not a woman and I experience the same thing when a man raises his voice; an instant emotional shutdown like he might flip out and kill me any moment.

It has to come from how we tend to raise women because I never spent time with anyone but my mother, grandmother and their friends - other women - at almost any point in my childhood to mid-teens and was never exposed to men until I started working as an adult.

Even a man who is saying friendly things loudly enough does it. It instills like an instant “do what he wants and stay quiet or try to flee” brain-response. I turn into a silently nodding, smiling robot.

Originally posted by gifsforthemasses

Imagine being this weak, holy crap.

It must be hard to exist when you’re scared of your own goddamn voice.

My voice never dropped during puberty. It’s quiet and high-pitched. Also, I am talking about people actually shouting, because they’re angry or excited. That’s not everyone every day.

I have social and noise anxiety due to abuse experiences, thanks.

“haha it’s so funny how men being legitimately unpredictable and terrifying scares people, wtf can u believe that??”

how is talking in a loud voice unpredictable and terrifying?

how are you being scared of your own shadow count as other people’s problem? or a social issue, for that matter?

Bogleech, I have a question for you.

You say you have noise anxiety due to abuse.

But in your OP you say you were raised around women and only interacted with men during work later in life.

If that’s the case doesn’t that mean the noise and abuse was caused by women?

Doesn’t that mean that you’re fearful of a gender that hasn’t done anything to you because of the actions of the other gender? Shouldn’t women raising their voice be the terrifying thing for you?

Or was there a male abuser somewhere in your childhood you just didn’t want to mention?

“And yeah, I grew up in a household full of screaming and verbal abuse so I just go blank as soon as anybody seems angry. “

Wow

When people caught lying their ass off.

I had a father who fought loudly with my mother. I spent no personal time with him or directly interacted with him most of my life. What’s the “lie” supposed to be, exactly?

It’s incredible how wounded and upset all these “anti feminists” are in a post where I didn’t actually belittle, stereotype or blame men.

Or it would be incredible if that wasn’t literally all these bloggers have ever done.

Hmm okay. So you spent like no time with him yet you’re magically triggered by loud voices? @takashi0

Hooooooly fucking shit are you seriously not grasping this simple concept or are you pretending to be this obtuse to drag personal shit out of someone?

I spent no time with my father for most of my upbringing because most of what he did was come home from work and start rampaging. I hid in my fucking bedroom with a locked and barricaded door.

Are you not understanding ths because you somehow count that as “spending time” with someone? Is that what you consider “interaction” with a parent or direct “exposure” to a human being? Being in the same building? No wonder you’re a fucked up wannabe troll who brags about being “anti fat acceptance” and describes feminism as a “hate group.”

This wasn’t even a rare or unusual scenario, I guarantee you know multiple people whose experience with a parent was largely identical. I didn’t think I needed to spell it out this much because 1) it doesn’t change anything about the conversation and 2) anyone exercising a modicum of comprehension skill or imagination can get what sort of situation I was alluding to.

How fucking typical is it that these same disgusting orcs who wail about “misandry” and “unfair standards for men” are the ones who see a man talking about his experiences with abuse and decide to mock & hassle him for being “weak”, purely because he doesn’t agree with their own political views. That sure is some caring being shown to a male abuse victim right there mmhm

this is exactly what I’m talking about

anti-feminists are completely reactionary. they don’t stand for shit. they sit here and SUPPOSEDLY hate feminists for shit like not supporting male victims of abuse but OOPS guess what? in my experience, feminists are the ones supporting us, and anti-feminists are the one exclusively harassing us.

funny how that shit works

fuck anti-feminists forever

I cannot believe how rude these ppl are… wtf. You complain about feminists only focusing on women yet look at you guys. Look what you’re doing to this guy.

I’m sorry for your experiences, OP. If you need to talk don’t hesitate to message me.

How pathetic do you have to be to laugh at and heckle someone about their trauma? To have the audacity to belittle someone and undermine what they’ve gone through… anyone who harassed the OP in this post is absolutely vile.

Guess what? I’m not a girl, and I have a panic reaction to any time a cisgender male raises his voice, or when I’m near a man who appears angry or frustrated. I have PTSD because of emotional abuse and harassment I went through when I was young- the trauma lasted “only” a month but even that much exposure was enough to forever change my perception. Time doesn’t suddenly make the abuse okay- whether I was threatened and harassed for a day or a month, it was a real and serious experience that was able to cause lasting trauma.

Are you going to tell me that I’m overreacting, or that I’m amusing for my mental illness? People have, and all that did was stop me from seeking help and turning to self-harm and other awful things to cope.

Abuse is abuse; that doesn’t change regardless of gender. If you find abuse comical in any way, shape, or form, you are truly a vile and pathetic mess. How much do you have to hate your life to seek entertainment from hurting others? Why not take that energy and work on becoming a less disgusting waste?

nbgems:

nbgems:

just because a ship is fictional doesnt mean it cant hurt people

when abuse survivors such as myself are exposed to untagged abusive or toxic ships clogging a main tag it can upset or trigger them

our feelings and experiences are valid and just because the thing upsetting us is “fictional” it does not make our feelings any less real

please respect abuse survivors

hey this is just a request but if you feel safe to reblog this could you maybe consider doing so? i think this is kind of important and so many times people speak over abuse survivors on these issues and say that our feelings dont matter. i think it might be good for this to be spread around a little

viva-la-dalish:

Here’s the thing: the problem with Twilight was not the fact that Bella was female and Edward was male. The problem with Twilight was it romantiscised controlling and abusive relationships. Switching the genders doesn’t fix this problem, and neither would making all of the characters female or male as I’ve seen some tumblr posts suggest. In every situation it’s still fucking gross and abusive. Abuse isn’t limited to the controlling male and controlled female dynamic. (Also the problematic werewolves wtf, but I’m not qualified to speak on that). 

countrprts:

skeptikhaleesi:

• Abusers can do nice things for people they are not abusing.
• Abusers can do nice things for people that they are abusing.
• Abusers can otherwise seem like nice, caring, supportive people when they are not actively abusing someone.
• It does not mean they’re not fucking abusers.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I’ve always felt guilty for developing PTSD. I’ve always felt like I’m just being dramatic because the abuse was never physical- it was emotional, verbal, and sexual harassment. But he never touched me, so I tell myself that so many others have been abused so much worse, and I hate myself for having PTSD, because I think I shouldn’t. 

About a year after it happened, I had to tell someone- so I told someone anonymous on the internet. They told me I was overreacting and that I should just let it go- other people have it worse. After that, the only people that knew were my best friend and the anon I never spoke to again. My parents didn’t find out until over three years after it happened. I tried so hard to hide it because I felt like I a faker for “getting so upset over nothing”.

Sometimes I still do. Sometimes I still tell myself it wasn’t physical so why do I get so worked up? Why do I have flashbacks and nightmares? I’m trying to accept that my abuse was valid and my feelings are valid, but I’m others won’t, and I’m afraid they’re right.

ask-an-mra-anything:

like one thing I REALLY want abuse survivors to know is that emotional abuse is a very serious type of abuse because I get a lot of emotional abuse survivors saying things like, “I know others have it worse, at least they never hit me. I feel bad that I’m complaining when people experience physical abuse too.”

Please, please, I beg you, as someone who experienced a lot of violent, physical abuse, I want you to know that I find your abuse to be just as valid as my physical abuse, and I never, ever want you to downplay the damage your emotional abuse did. Emotional abuse was a very real part of my abuse as well, and it was just as damaging as the physical abuse I experienced. and I have permanent injury from my physical abuse.

Emotional abuse is horrifying, and the pain it’s caused you is absolutely valid. never downplay it. never act like you should be grateful it wasn’t worse. you deserve to feel what you’re feeling because it should have never, ever happened to you.

ask-an-mra-anything:

glitteringworlds:

GOD I am so so tired of stories about abusive fathers who turn out to be ~complex~ and have reasons behind their actions.

Like, it’s not even about whether or not I like the characters it’s about the fact that fiction NEVER just lets us look at a shitty dad and say “he’s shitty, get this child away from him and, if it’s what they want, let them never have to deal with him again”

especially considering so many abusers work any angle to justify their abuse