You bleed because you don't floss.

How many woo-woo-to-fascism pipelines do we have to create before we accept that any system in which we agree to prioritize what makes people feel good and comfortable over objective, observable reality is inherently prone to radicalization. How many times are we going to act shocked that people who refuse to accept scientific evidence in regards to crystal energy and repressed memories then move on to refusing to accept scientific evidence in regards to vaccines and chemotherapy. How many times are we going to hold people's hands and tell them of COURSE it's okay to believe things just because they Feel Right and not because you have even a shred of evidence and then act shocked when they start believing the people who tell them that all their problems are caused by minorities?

Scientifically speaking, it is observable reality that some people are born with severe gender dysphoria that is alleviated by transitioning. This is settled science; almost every study ever done shows massive benefits to transitioning with virtually no medical regrets or drawbacks. The exact mechanism that causes some people to feel this way is unknown, but the scientific evidence shows that it clearly exists and transitioning is unquestionably an effective treatment for dysphoria.

In social terms, while human sex is roughly bimodal, gender is a complete social construct. Very few people are arguing that there are zero biological differences between cis men and women, which would be denying objective reality imo*. However, gendered pronouns and clothing and such aren't objective realities, they're just some shit we made up and we can change them whenever we want. It's not any weirder for someone with a penis to want to be called "her" and wear dresses than it is for someone with a vagina to do so. Honestly, it's much weirder that we're still gendering clothing at all.

So in this case I would say that scientifically, skepticism demands that we accept the existence of trans people, and socially, it demands that we let people decide how they wish to be addressed and perceived, whether they be cis, trans, or in between.

Synopsis: When Akane asks Masaki to help her dye her hair, she is reminded of an old client at her salon.

"Mom?" Akane asked as she stepped into the living room where Masaki was sitting at the dining table, watching TV and winding down for the evening.

"Hm? What is it?" Masaki replied. She glanced up to see Akane pinching a lock of her own hair, examining the end.

"Can you dye my hair the next time you cut it? Like, just the end?"

Masaki couldn't help but smile at the request. Her daughter just became a teen and is already taking full advantage of Masaki's expertise as a hairdresser to express herself. She couldn't be happier.

"Does your school even allow students to dye their hair?" Masaki had to tease her daughter a little. Akane has always been like this, rarely thinking about the consequences of her actions. But who can deny her when she's so eager to achieve her goals?

"Well... A ton of girls have their hair dyed! And I never saw them get into trouble... so it must be okay, right?" Akane gave a cheeky smile, a mischievous glint in her eyes as she pleaded her case.

"Alright, alright. What color were you thinking?" Knowing her daughter, it wouldn't be something natural, but that still begs the question.

Akane lit up at the question, clearly agonized over the question herself before coming to make the request. She held out two dye swatches. "I was thinking maybe vermillion red, y'know, like my name?" She said excitedly. "But cherry blossom pink feels like a bolder choice, it's brighter and more obvious, right?" Akane inquired. Masaki could tell she was leaning toward the latter.

"Pink huh...?"

The bell on top of the salon door jingled, signaling the arrival of a customer.

"Welco-" Masaki started on instinct until she glanced over to see the now-familiar pink that would show up around once a month. "Ah! Oume-san, you're just in time for your appointment, please come sit down." She greets the young mother and her son warmly. Masaki went about preparing a chair for her customer.

The young woman thanked her while taking a seat. "How do you want it today?" Masaki asked. She had grown familiar with the duo over past appointments. The single mother worked at a bar and made just enough to maintain her appearance for customers and pay the bills for her and her young son. He's a few years older than Masaki's own daughter, and the absolute sweetest child she had the pleasure of meeting. He always flipped through the magazines in the shop, suggesting different hairstyles for his mom, and he never failed to compliment her new look after each appointment, even when it's just a trim.

"Hmm, what do you think, Haru-kun?" She asked her son, who was already flipping through a catalog. After flipping a few more pages, he shuts the book and let out a dramatic sigh.

"None of these pictures are inspiring me," he held his hands out and shrugged. "You're already so pretty mom, but I suppose making your bangs shorter so people can see your eyes will make you even more beautiful." Haru said with a bright smile.

His mom let out a giggle and patted him on the head. "Then that's what I'll get." She turned her attention back to Masaki. "Just a trim on the bangs today."

Masaki went straight to work, spraying down her clients pale pink locks with water, identical to her son's. The boy is right, his mother is beautiful. As she trimmed, Haru chatted with both of the women, saying silly things to make his mom smile. Masaki couldn't help but glance at him and his own shaggy hair when an idea popped into her mind as she finished up.

"Oume-san, how about giving Haru-kun a trim too? On the house." She suggested, dusting off loose hair from the apron and brushing out her client's new do.

"What?! I can't possibly bother you like that! Besides, you must have other appointments to get to," replied the young mother.

"Please! Don't worry about it, a trim won't take long. Besides, doesn't Haru-kun's face deserve to be seen too?" Masaki smiled down at the boy, who was just as shocked as his mother. For once, he didn't have much to say.

"Well, I usually do it myself, but having a professional do it for once would be nice. Right Haru-kun?" She asked. He replied with a shy nod.

"Then I'll get to work!" Masaki wasted no time giving Haru a booster seat and tied an apron around his neck. As she trimmed, more of the boy's features were revealed, showing just how much he resembled his mother. Same cheeks, nose, and those gorgeous, sparkling eyes. "You can really tell you're related," Masaki mused.

"Can you?" His mother smiled at the comment. "He is a handsome boy, isn't he?"

"Mooooom," Haru whined, clearly not used to showing his face and getting compliments.

"It's true, you look just like your mom," Masaki assured him as she made one last snip, turning the boy around to see himself in the mirror.

He looked at himself and his new haircut, then to the next mirror at his mother, as if he's playing a "find the difference" game. "Well, a compliment for me is basically a compliment for mom, so I guess I'm okay with being called handsome," he tried to say in a nonchalant manner, but his red ears betrayed him.

The duo thanked Masaki for her work as they left. They would continue to be regular customers for a while after, but Masaki realized they haven't visited in a few years. She wonders abiut them from time to time and can only hope the young woman found a better job and moved somewhere nice.

"I think pink would suit you," Masaki confirmed one of Akane's choices. By now, her own daughter is as old as the boy who visited the salon with his mom that day. The pink dye sample is exactly the same as the two's hair color.

Akane beamed. "Right? So you'll do it?" She asked excitedly.

"Sure, sure, of course. Now go to bed! It's getting late, you don't want wake up tired for school!" Masaki chastised as Akane ran back to her bedroom, giggling and thanking her until she shut the door.

Masaki sighed at her daughter's antics, but a warm smile slowly crawled onto her face. "Anything to make people see how beautiful you are, Akane."

I had a thought, and it’s not super well formed, but I kind of feel the need to throw it into the void.

Originally posted by azumarrill

Nanami Kiryuu from Revolutionary Girl Utena begins the series as perhaps the most immature and absurd character and even has a tendency toward cruelty. This tendency appears to be more out of a sense of selfishness than sadism, but it’s there nonetheless.

But throughout the course of the series, her maturity excels, and aside from Utena and Anthy themselves, may possibly be one the the most disillusioned character at the end of the show. This is especially remarked upon by the fact that she isn’t introduced to the duels until closer to the end of the first arc, but the turning point in her arc comes even before Touga’s, a character who’s always giving the impression of maturity and adulthood and shown in relative positions of power and was perhaps the most deeply involved in the duels at the beginning of the series (aside from Akio and Anthy of course).

And that just seems so fascinating and important to me. Especially when we consider how closely her journey parallels Anthy’s, and that one of the greatest turning points for her in her disillusionment almost definitely comes from seeing the point Anthy’s come to in her journey. Of seeing Anthy’s steadfast (and eternal) love for a man invested in holding up the patriarchy can end up looking like and doing to you. Seeing what role participating in the patriarchy does to a person and what it demands of them. She gets an entire episode afterward fighting the idea that it’s something that could happen to her, and by the end of the series, seems to learn that it can—if you play the game.

And it seems like some really great commentary about how girls need to grow up and mature faster just to escape some of the traps and abuses of the system they live in. Not that they should grow up faster, but how it’s a literal method of survival to mature more quickly. Nanami exceeding other characters seems to remark also on the fact that not every girl manages it. In fact, plenty don’t. And it doesn’t mean those girls aren’t worthy! They’re trapped in a system so well implemented, it can be hard to see, and not all of them end up faced with such obvious abuses early enough to see them for what they are.

But Nanami does. She sees through the system before Miki or even Juri in many ways. She sees through it before Shiori or Kozue. I think the most telling indication that she has surpassed most, if not all, of the supporting characters of Revolutionary Girl Utena is shown through her discarding her student council clothes and revoking her role in the duels in the last episodes. She’s recognizing the game, the system, is the problem. It’s not the way she’s playing the game, it’s not some flaw in herself that means she didn’t make it to the end; the game is rigged and doesn’t even have her best interests at heart at all.

There could probably be some debate as to whether or not Utena even realizes this going into the final duel: whether she still believes in being the prince for Anthy or goes to the final duel not to continue to play the game for the games’ sake but rather for Anthy—to save Anthy from the game.

Originally posted by kaiserine

Seeing this gif here by @kaiserine triggered these thoughts. Because this is the moment she’s trying to talk Utena out of the final duel, is trying to explain, in words she doesn’t entirely have, everything she now knows and understands about the whole system. And she cares about her fellow woman. But that last expression, that last expression says she knows she can’t convince her—that Utena has to learn for herself, but Nanami wishes she could save her that pain. Of course, Nanami here also doesn’t know Utena’s full story, so this scene could look a lot like Nanami being dense or not understanding. But that’s not exactly the story here.

Nanami is not wrong in knowing that the duels are predicated on a false premise. The final duelist isn’t going to revolutionize the world or find something eternal: they are going to be a tool for the continuation of a system that doesn’t care about Nanami or Utena as free and full people. She just doesn’t know that Utena isn’t doing it to ‘revolutionize’ the world or to ‘find something eternal.’ And even if she did, she’s viewing Anthy as an abuser at this point and not a victim (though it’s interesting to note that she could have tried to use what she saw happen between Anthy and Akio here to convince Utena, but she doesn’t, which may show some empathy on her part in not using this moment to essentially throw Anthy under the bus. Even while she sees Anthy as complicit, some part of her is recognizing her as a victim), so while her intentions are pure toward Utena, on a casual viewing, it can be easy to miss just how far Nanami has come from the start of the series and her ridiculous plots to bully and belittle Anthy out of a simple yet powerful bout of jealousy.

if you're smoking it, you are going to be coughing a lot. you are going to be breathless a lot. your breath and smell are gonna be real bad.

if you're going to be snorting it. do you want to have a permanent sniffy nose? this is how you get a permanent sniffy nose.

if you're injecting it. you will develop weird painful spots and also itchiness.

in general: you are gonna be so tired and you will feel so evil and your sleep will not be normal and you will be pooping way too much or way too little and it will also stink and you will have really bad headaches. and your memory will get worse.

with alcohol - you will unlock evil nausea and grogginess and also you will have crazy dreams and general brain fog

with opiates - do you want to be itchy forever. this is how you be itchy forever.

with psychedelics - basically you will never feel hungry or tired again and no matter how much fun you think it is it is actually hell on earth to not be able to reset your body and you desperately need a reset and you have misplaced the button for reset.

with meth and the associated family -- You will feel your heart in places your heart should not be and also this never goes away

also not fun: spending money on things you cannot afford. and the slow realisation that you promised to never lose control. and then you did.

"i already experience these" Great. It gets worse. It gets so much worse.

"well I can't be addicted to stimulants because I have ADHD / opiates because I have chronic pain" I need you to know. This is a lie. The primary difference on why people experience withdrawals is the strength of the dosage. Also ignores the amount of disabled people who ended up addicted because they could not find their medication otherwise.

Lillith’s Red Carpet

“May I have this dance?”

“Who’re you calling ugly?”

HOWEVER. A lot of these chapters are musical numbers that take less time when adapted to animation. If they make it work, this season could end with a cherry on top: