Queer Autistic Sys

We met in college, we shared a class together, and we had fun! Now ask me, how did I handle the DID at first? Was it bad or hard? Fuck man it never even crossed my mind. I didn't know DID was even a disorder until my partner told me a year and a half after being close friends and also rooming together. There was no way that I would have been able to guess that even with a gun held against my head.

As a singlet who had 0 experience with it my first thought was "I have no idea how that's possible, it sounds fake." So obviously what I said was "Okay cool." And I listened. When my partner spoke about their experiences, I listened and I learned. Because that's what you do when you don't understand something.

And we talked. We talked so much because now my partner didn't feel like they had to censor a part of them. They didn't have skirt around topics. Or straight up lie. What would have happened if I had said "That sounds fake" instead of my (awkward) "Okay cool"? Would my partner ever have felt as safe with me if I had done that?

I feel like that's something people forget sometimes. Even in spaces meant for people with DID, OSDD, and other pluralities. People have different experiences -- some you may never understand unless you listen. Let these people talk and teach you what they've gone through. I listen to my partner to learn about DID. My partner listens to people who are endogenic to learn about their experiences.

if we, as a community, agreed to just start using different terminology (parogenic, thoughtform, etc rather than "tulpa"), could we all just move on with our lives and put this stale syscourse to bed?

if we agreed to those terms, would the newly-minted "no longer anti-endo" accounts on this site accept that created systems exist?

There's a saying that if you give an inch, they'll take it a mile. And I think it applies here.

A lot of the same syscoursers pushing the anti-tulpa narrative today were pretending months ago that the term "endogenic" was synonymous with the fantasy model, and pretending to be offended by it.

The anti-tulpa Carrd that started a lot of this originally claimed thoughtform was appropriative too, and not long ago, I saw a syscourse post saying that it's not just the term that needs to change, but that the entire tulpa community is racist and people changing their terms need to cut ties with the community as a whole.

This isn't a popular talking point yet. But this would be the next step if people changed the terms they refer to themselves by but continued to share the same guides and resources that are aimed at tulpa systems and be part of the tulpa community.

Anything associated with the word tulpa will be treated as if it's tainted.

This also is going to be applied to existing studies into tulpa systems. I mean, it already has been. I've seen countless anti-endos dismiss studies of tulpamancy on the basis of alleged appropriation.

What they say is that they want us to change terminology.

But what they actually want is for us to not associate with the tulpa community, not to provide links to the decade of tulpamancy guides, and not link to tulpa studies as evidence of endogenic plurality.

Budging on the term just gives them leeway to move further into attacking deeper associations with the tulpa community.

As for reaching an end... the tulpa discourse always manages to come back, but usually only for a week or two at a time. I don't really care if some people want to fill the syscourse tag with anti-tulpa rants until they wear themselves out.

Please learn the definition of “synonymous” Sophie. No one said it was a synonym to the fantasy model, they said it was related to.

That discourse also wasn't about changing the word, it was simply about acknowledging that its origin was harmful even if it had changed meaning now (and that its current meaning was okay)

The anti-Tulpa carrd was not what sparked this convo. Frankly I don’t remember what sparked it but that carrd has been around for a loooong while. Turns out, people are still offended by racism!! Who knew?

Ah yes, a single syscourse post said that. Totally something everyone agrees on! /s

If you bothered to look past the edge of your nose, Sophie, you would see it’s predominately pro-endo systems arguing with you, because the term is appropriative. That’s it!! They JUST want the term changed!!!

Regarding all the sources still using the word, you literally would just need to provide a disclaimer that the word isn't in use anymore currently but old resources from before the community improved still have it because they cannot be modified in a lot of cases. Honestly not that hard to provide those disclaimers

"It is my spiritual and religious right to kick dogs. I am NOT kicking puppies, and anyone who says that I am is ablest and spreading misinfo. Everyone knows kicking puppies is bad so OBVIOUSLY I'm not kicking puppies. I am kicking dogs because it's good for my mental health so if you tell me to stop you are telling me to DIE which is so fucked up of you. STOP HARASSING ME. I've sent you so many death threats and heinous asks and you STILL tell me to stop kicking dogs. I'm not hurting you! I'm just kicking dogs!

Let's look at what Moving The Goalposts actually is:

Description: Demanding from an opponent that he or she address more and more points after the initial counter-argument has been satisfied refusing to concede or accept the opponent’s argument.

Logical Form: Issue A has been raised, and adequately answered. Issue B is then raised, and adequately answered. ..... Issue Z is then raised, and adequately answered. (despite all issues adequately answered, the opponent refuses to conceded or accept the argument.

If anything, the reason I have the two arguments prepared that I do is because of the anti-tulpas moving the goalposts. Or at least not having the same goalposts.

The first argument is that the modern tulpa is appropriation because it's based on a Tibetan Buddhist practice. To this, I point out that basically nothing of Tulpamancy, including the name, is actually based in Tibetan Buddhism.

The next argument they make is that the roots of the tulpa are appropriative. This, I counter by pointing out the involvement of Lama Kazi Dawa Samdup in forming the ADL tulpa, and that it's a result of an exchange of two cultures.

Tulpamancy is not based directly on Tibetan Buddhism, but a new concept that was created by the sharing of different cultures.

This is not moving the goalposts and the points are not contradictory.

I... think this has gotten taken out of context.

So far, there aren't any ethnic Tibetans from what I've seen who have commented on the tulpa.

I did write that I'm skeptical of information coming out of the region, but the context was about any surveys or statistics about opinions of the Dalai Lama and how he's regarded there. It wasn't about the tulpa itself, but about the claim that the Dalai Lama isn't an authoritative source on Tibetan Buddhism.

What I mean is that if I were living in Tibet, and somebody came up to me conducting a survey about whether I supported the Dalai Lama, and I knew other people who had been arrested or disappeared for displaying pictures of His Holiness... I might not answer that survey honestly out of fear that it might be some sort of trick to round up dissenters or at least to put them on watch.

My problem with this whole debate is that everyone is speaking for the Tibetan people. I cite the Dalai Lama's statements as an example to other non-Tibetans as to why it's probably not appropriative, since the Dalai Lama is an actual authority on Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism.

Of the voices who have weighed in, there are Tibetan Buddhist on both sides, some claiming it's appropriative and other claiming it's not.

But of all of these Tibetan Buddhists, I don't think any have stated that they're ethnically Tibetan. They're usually people of other ethnicities who adopted and practice Tibetan Buddhism.

(I think a huge part of the confusion in this conversation stems from people thinking "Tibetan Buddhist" is a Buddhist who is Tibetan, rather than a specific school of Buddhism, or several schools of Buddhism, that originated in Tibet.)

The whole debate is just non-Tibetans arguing about what's harmful for Tibetans, and has been spear-headed by anti-endos looking to make up reasons to attack one of the most-researched and scientifically-backed forms of endogenic plurality.

How do you expect to prove somebody's internal experiences with current technology?

You're missing the point of the papers I cite. It's not about proving that endogenic plurality exists. The types of brains scans necessary to even start this process hasn't started yet. It's about demonstrating a scientific consensus that it does.

MPD was acknowledged as a real disorder for a century before the first brain scans could be done.

It was acknowledged as a real phenomenon because notable psychiatrists looked at it and believed their patients were experiencing what they said they were.

Likewise, the fact that many psychiatrists are looking at endogenic plurality today the same way puts us about on the same level of validity as DID had in the 80s before the neurological evidence started stacking up. Except where DID was controversial in the psychiatric field, endogenic plurality is considered a real thing by nearly every psychologist and psychiatrist who has researched it aside from the ones who deny all multiplicity.

The mounting academic support from educated professionals IS the evidence.

But don't worry. The brain scans are coming too.

And yes, I do also cite studies that refer to hallucinatory voices in psychotic hallucinations as dissociative parts of a person's system and suggest using DID treatment in addressing those voices.

Hallucingenic systems are valid and sometimes fall in the endogenic spectrum.

I sincerely hope that's not true.

Part of the reason I cite sources is so others can read them and educate themselves on plurality.

I realize not everyone has the time or the attention, but I would hope that people actually take the time to look at many of the articles themselves. I encourage people to not blindly take my word on anything scientific and to read the sources directly.

I even try to mention Sci-Hub for viewing papers that are behind paywalls, but I'm nervous about linking directly to Sci-hub since anti-endos have tried to get me banned before and would definitely jump on me linking to what's essentially pirated material as a way to get rid of me.

Also, just for the record, I never cite the tulpas and mental health study as evidence of endogenic systems existing. The author isn't a psychiatrist or psychologist, so their opinion isn't really to that fact.

I do cite it when people claim tulpamancy is unhealthy because the survey is useful in that specific context.

But if I'm looking for academic support of endogenic plurality, my go-to is Variety of Tulpa Experiences. The author is a psychiatry professor at McGill University, and the book was peer reviewed and published by Oxford University Press.

you know, it's cosmically amusing to me that you're not responding by reblogging to my original post so that i'd see it, not tagging me, or even mentioning me by name so that we have the ability to engage in, y'know, an actual discussion. as far as i'm aware, i don't have you blocked, you don't have me blocked, and i'm personally pretty open about mentioning your name on my blog, so i would've expected you to do the same for me.

for reference, here is the full post that sophie refuses to link. i feel like being able to read the full post would be useful.

i have a lot of things to say about this response, but more than anything else, i want this response to display to people how racist sophie and the pro-tulpa side is by exposing the deeper thought processes behind a lot of the things she says.

let's start by talking about how the ADL tulpa came from a book written by a white, western woman in the 1930s. getting help from someone who is a part of the culture means very little when you are not a part of it, and don't speak the language. the potential for parts of the culture to be mistranslated, misrepresented or misunderstood by ADN, by accident or on purpose, is simply far too great to take a book this old, almost 100 years old actually, seriously. not when we have much more recent books and websites we can go through to use as more accurate, modern sources on the subject.

she only uses the book and props it up as something worth listening to in the modern day for purposes outside of historical educational reading simply because it agrees with her and is thought to be the origin of the western tulpa. she does not care about how old or outdated it may be, or how any of the political climate surrounding the thought processes of the author affect her ability to accurately report the traditions and experiences of the tibetan people.

i'm reminded of a discussion in a book about how people in africa would refer to themselves with words like "tribe" in english, because that's the word that the white westerners gave them, even if they would not necessarily describe themselves with words that have the same connotations as "tribe" does in their own language.

things like this happen in modern day research of non-western cultures by western researchers. if you think that this wouldn't have happened in the 1930's, even with the purest of intentions, you're just plain ignorant.

the next part of the post is... a contradiction.

The first argument is that the modern tulpa is appropriation because it's based on a Tibetan Buddhist practice. To this, I point out that basically nothing of Tulpamancy, including the name, is actually based in Tibetan Buddhism.

Tulpamancy is not based directly on Tibetan Buddhism, but a new concept that was created by the sharing of different cultures.

so, does tulpamancy have a connection to and base in buddhism or not?

these statements seem pretty contradictory to me, as if she's changing the argument of how connected to tibetan buddhism tulpamancy is depending on the argument she's trying to make. she mentions a cultural exchange to show that it is not appropriative, because the cultures used to created it were healthily exchanged rather than appropriated. that would mean that a not insignificant portion of tibetan buddhist practice likely would've had to go into this new creation.

but you then try to say that none of tulpamancy is based in tibetan buddhism, or "basically nothing" of tulpamancy, to downplay its connections to one of the cultures it originated from to support your other argument that the two are too unrelated to criticize their connections.

you can't have your cake and eat it too, sophie. this argument doesn't make sense.

oh, and for the record, you are moving goal posts. you just did, right here:

So far, there aren't any ethnic Tibetans from what I've seen who have commented on the tulpa.

nobody anywhere has mentioned ethnic tibetan buddhists and who may or may not be one until right now, in this post, where you said it.

you go on to mention that there's not enough clarification between buddhists who are tibetan (i.e. ethnic tibetans) and tibetan buddhism, as in, the specifically tibetan practices of buddhism. this might be a useful distinction in certain arguments and discussions, but here, it isn't. this is a terrible argument because it directly implies that tibetan buddhist converts are somehow not affected by the appropriation of their culture, or should not have a voice in how they personally are affected by the appropriation of their culture, simpy because they're converts.

she's moving the goalposts of who is "allowed" to be listened to because too many people from a particular side of the discussion are not tibetan buddhist enough for her to listen to. but don't get me wrong here: she would not listen to ethnic tibetan people if they said anything either, simply because they disagree with her and she cannot use them to support her argument.

she also seems to think that ethnic tibetan buddhists haven't mentioned anything on this particular subject in either direction. sophie, how are you deciding this exactly? because it sounds to me like because someone hasn't specifically outlined that they are ethnically tibetan, and have rather stated simply that they are tibetan buddhists, that you are simply assuming.

this one sentence right here just displays that sophie does not and will not ever care about the voices of (tibetan) buddhists if they disagree with her, and when you criticize her for disagreeing with a buddhist on a subject she is in no position to be asserting herself as an authority over, she will ignore you or continue moving the goal post of who she believes should be "allowed" to have an opinion she respects. the catch, of course, being that she will never respect the opinion of a person who disagrees with her. she will only ever find reasons to argue with it or reasons that their points are invalid.

I did write that I'm skeptical of information coming out of the region, but the context was about any surveys or statistics about opinions of the Dalai Lama and how he's regarded there. It wasn't about the tulpa itself, but about the claim that the Dalai Lama isn't an authoritative source on Tibetan Buddhism. What I mean is that if I were living in Tibet, and somebody came up to me conducting a survey about whether I supported the Dalai Lama, and I knew other people who had been arrested or disappeared for displaying pictures of His Holiness... I might not answer that survey honestly out of fear that it might be some sort of trick to round up dissenters or at least to put them on watch.

i see where she's coming from here, which is why it's important to speak to actual tibetan people, diaspora or actively in tibet, on the subject rather than looking at statistics, because there are a lot of different ways that "supporting" the dalai lama can manifest, and it is a crime to openly support the dalai lama in tibet.

(i also want to note that while i searched, i couldn't find a specific statistic that talked about how tibetan buddhists felt about the dalai lama (diaspora otherwise), just that the country is vast majority buddhist, so i can't say for sure how accurate it is that tibetan buddhists do or don't support the dalai lama. the intial anon said tenzin gyatso, the current dalai lama, should not be trusted because he was a slave owner pre-exile, which is a fair point, however, not how religion tends to work in reality.)

however, as someone who is not living in that political climate and has no personal connections to the subject, it's presumptuous for sophie to continue bringing up the CCP, CCP propaganda and the authority of the dalai lama, especially when the quote in question that she is using from him is incredibly vague and broad, and does not get into this particular subject of cultural appropriation. especially especially when she only ever seems to care about the CCP and its propaganda when she can use it to discredit tibetan buddhists who disagree with her as a gotcha (be it ethnically tibetan or living in tibet, diaspora or converts).

Of the voices who have weighed in, there are Tibetan Buddhist on both sides, some claiming it's appropriative and other claiming it's not. But of all of these Tibetan Buddhists, I don't think any have stated that they're ethnically Tibetan. They're usually people of other ethnicities who adopted and practice Tibetan Buddhism.

there's a lot here that bugs me in these two paragraphs.

basically, what she's saying here is that the tibetan buddhists who have come to talk about the discussion surrounding tulpamancy aren't tibetan buddhist enough for you to listen to them because they're converts and not directly raised into the culture, yes? that is what you're telling me? you're telling me that it is somehow impossible for a tibetan buddhist convert to have a nuanced and informed opinion of the subject because they're a convert? that it's impossible for a tibetan buddhist convert to be affected by cultural appropriation?

do you know how you sound right now? because you sound like exactly half of an eleven pound black forest ham.

the implications of the argument you're making are not things i think you want to be arguing.

please note that she has carefully not explained why she doesn't respect the opinions of tibetan buddhist converts, and what measurable harm would be done by allowing tibetan buddhist converts to speak on the subject of the appropriation of their religion and culture, so allow me to speculate: it's because they disagree with her and are anti-endo and she doesn't like it, so she's going to keep moving the goalposts until she gets something she does like, at which point she will respect the argument because it's in her favor, and only because it is in her favor.

(I think a huge part of the confusion in this conversation stems from people thinking "Tibetan Buddhist" is a Buddhist who is Tibetan, rather than a specific school of Buddhism, or several schools of Buddhism, that originated in Tibet.)

so which kind of tibetan buddhist do you, white western woman and local non-buddhist, consider to have a more valid opinion on the subject?

she will not outline the harm it allegedly does to ethnic tibetan buddhists to have converts speak on the appropriation of their culture because this is a discriminatory talking point she pulled out of thin air and does not justify.

tibetan buddhist converts who are not from tibet have more of an authority on the subject of the appropriation of tibetan buddhism than sophie does, as someone who is not currently a tibetan buddhist. she doesn't even understand all the reasons that a person would convert, even those who are ethnically tibetan themselves.

in short, in this entire section, sophie is touting how we need to listen to tibetan buddhists on this subject and how people are continuously stepping on tibetan buddhists to speak over them, while ignoring how she as well has and is ignoring tibetan buddhist opinions on this subject simply because she does not agree with them, and is excusing it under the guise of what boils down to "they're not tibetan buddhist enough for me to listen to".

as i said in the original post she's responding to, at this point i care less about the word or practice of tulpamancy itself than i do about the arguments that she uses to justify her use of the word and the thought processes behind them, and the thought processes that sophie has going down are racist.

and as for the next section... this is much more my personal wheelhouse.

sophie, honey, i'm not talking about the fucking brain scans. why do you assume that i somehow believe the only way to prove the existence of endogenic systems is to do brain scans? you are fighting against a talking point that YOU made up here.

this is a blatant example of sophie being eager to make assumptions about the opposition and generalize their beliefs based on how she wants to interpret their arguments and not what they're actually saying. in other words, she just brought up a strawman argument instead of discussing the actual argument i was putting forward, which was that research into endogenic systems at all 1) does not prove that they exist, 2) does not mean it is good research, and 3) does not mean that endogenic systems are actually a rich field of study with decades of research behind them to comb through.

another one of her implications here is that i do not believe in endogenic systems, which she implies in her wording simply because i disagree with her and nothing else, so obviously i must be an anti-endo.

brain scans by themselves aren't going to prove endogenic systems exist, and depending on how they're done, they don't prove much other than something is happening that is distinguishable from "typical" brains/brains that do not experience this phenomenon. that is all they do. they're not magic, and it takes time, effort and research into brain scans to interpret what this or that marker on the scans actually mean, and whether or not they support the arguments.

just because we have brain scans of people with DID does not inherently mean that every brain scan of people with DID proves the existence of DID. what they can instead point to is that we can see the psychological scars left on people after they endured chronic and severe childhood trauma. it's not until we get to the studies researching the physical effects of switching between alters that things start to become more substantial in regards to proving the existence of DID.

brain scans are not the only way to prove the existence of a mental illness. far from it, in fact, and the fact that you seem to think that brain scans are the end-all be-all of research into DID, the one thing that proves the existence of DID beyond a shadow of a doubt when we've had the disorder's existence proven for several decades without them, shows that once again, sophie is trying to act as an authority on something that she knows very little to nothing about.

she has not looked into DID research in the slightest, much less older DID research, but she's trying to act like she knows anything about it. this is not new behavior from you, sophie, and you need to knock it the fuck off.

researchers go through the effort to study, define and differentiate the disorder in various ways. they are not simply listening to their patients with no critical thought.

similar to how we would know if the megalodon still existed or not because we would be able to observe its impacts (or lackthereof) on the ocean's ecosystems and theorize from there, we can observe the impacts the disorder has on a patient and determine from there, without brainscans, what the patient is experiencing.

furthermore, you don't need brain scan research to prove the existence of endogenic systems, you need more research in general to prove their existence, as well as being able to distinguish their existence from that of DID so that the two experiences are less easily confused between each other.

we need a hell of a lot more than psychs just listening with all of their hearts and believing what their patient is experiencing is true to prove the existence of endogenic systems.

sophie has constructed an argument i did not make and refuses to engage with my actual point, which is actually that the evidence you have doesn't prove their existence, it largely just proves that people believe in it and that it should be researched more.

Except where DID was controversial in the psychiatric field, endogenic plurality is considered a real thing by nearly every psychologist and psychiatrist who has researched it aside from the ones who deny all multiplicity.

a) you're acting like DID isn't still controversial in many ways. it's largely believed to be a real disorder in the field, yes, but that doesn't mean everyone agrees on its course, phenomenology, symptomology and treatment, and that we are believed and taken seriously at every turn when we aren't.

b) you're also acting like endogenic research is a richly developed field that has worked for a long time to prove its worth and to prove the existence of endogenic systems when it hasn't. the people researching endogenic systems believing in them doesn't prove anything, it just proves that they believe in it.

The mounting academic support from educated professionals IS the evidence.

a) what support exactly? because like i just said, professionals simply believing in the existence of endogenic plurality does not mean anything if they don't make an effort to prove its existence. that is the hard part and the work that actually needs to be done, that endogenic plurals are so hesitant to actually acknowledge when it comes to research into endogenic plurals.

b) for the last time, YOU made up the brain scans point. YOU made the assumption that the only evidence i'll take is brain scans when that makes absolutely no logical sense.

I sincerely hope that's not true.

unfortunately, it is. i know this from personal experience with posting the sources and links to the sources of certain papers while citing certain sections or screenshotting them, that people less experienced with reading academic literature often will not read your sources if they are confident you know what you are talking about.

this is why you have to be clear beyond a shadow of a doubt on what the paper is saying, why you feel it's relevant to this subject, and most importantly, what it's actually proving (or trying to prove, and how well it does these things), and you have to be able to elaborate on these aspects of your source if the parts you're citing are complicated, if you just need to break down the paper into something easier to read if you want to summarize it, or why you consider it to be good or bad research.

i'll admit that i haven't seen you post a paper in a while because i don't follow you and i don't particularly care to start now. but from what i remember about you, you are very quick to jump into everything being about endogenic systems when it may not be.

that paper about what you're claiming are "hallucinogenic systems", for example. maybe this is a nitpick, but from what i know, "plural" is an opt-in identity based on a lot of different things, and with something as subjective as hallucinations, whether or not someone with hallucinations identifies as a hallucinogenic system is largely going to be up to how they personally perceive their hallucinations, not you.

this paper says a lot about a potential treatment option for hallucinations, and that's great that it seems to be working for the patient(s) in question, but:

a) i would hardly call this "DID treatment", and the fact that you are once again goes to show that you don't know that much about DID and its treatment, and

b) you are shoving the label of plural onto these people who may not want to identify that way for various reasons. you're jumping the gun. not saying that people can't identify as a hallucinogenic system, but let's not push the label onto people who are currently unaware of the label or undecided on whether they identify with it. like i said earlier, plural identities are opt-in, not opt-out, and you're projecting your own beliefs onto a stranger.

But if I'm looking for academic support of endogenic plurality, my go-to is Variety of Tulpa Experiences. The author is a psychiatry professor at McGill University, and the book was peer reviewed and published by Oxford University Press.

this means very little in the grand scheme of the research, particularly in this case if it's not serving to prove the existence of tulpas/endogenic systems. this doesn't prove much, except for the fact that this phenomenon needs to be more well studied.

I even try to mention Sci-Hub for viewing papers that are behind paywalls, but I'm nervous about linking directly to Sci-hub since anti-endos have tried to get me banned before and would definitely jump on me linking to what's essentially pirated material as a way to get rid of me.

honey, you're not going to get banned for that, and i'm being genuine there. link sci-hub. link the firefox sci-hub extension. give the safe link that shows you how to access z-library properly. introduce your followers to the internet archive library and worldcat. it's going to be fine.

I have no idea what this is talking about and don't think I ever had a paper like that on my Studies and Research page.

oh, yes you did. i'm sure you don't remember because at this point it might've been a year or two ago, but i very specifically remember an argument between you and JAS, and even more specifically, JAS emailing the author of said paper to show that she openly disapproved of her paper being used that way and posting screenshots. but maybe that paper isn't on your list anymore, which is good. it's almost 5 in the morning and i don't particularly feel inclined to go digging for the discussion through the tumblr archives.

TLDR:

sophie is continuing a pattern that she has displayed for years by talking big without saying anything substantial, using arguments that don't make sense, contradicting herself, pulling out strawmen, and making assumptions about her opposition, all while being extremely indirect with the people that criticize her, if she responds at all.

her arguments justifying use of the word "tulpa" are arguably even more racist than using the term itself.

last but not least, your opinion will always be invalid to sophie unless you agree with her, and if you disagree with her in nearly any capacity, she will call you an anti-endo whether you believe in/support endos or not.

in short, sophie is not a good-faith discourser, she only cares about appearing right and educated to the people that follow her.

for context: this was avianadonis's reply to my post criticizing two of sophie's biggest talking points in a recent post where an anon in an ask criticized her for moving goalposts on discussion of tulpamancy, and refusing to listen to tibetan people when they spoke out on the discussion of tulpamancy and cultural appropriation. i don't agree with everything anon said because some things were wrong, like the location of tibet, but i like that they actually bothered to criticize her for these things.

and well, i'm pretty sure i clearly outlined all of the problems i have with her arguments in the original post i made, which would qualify as my arguments against hers, but sure, i have the day off so i will elaborate further.

my arguments against hers are the following:

a) she's speaking for tibetan people when she doesn't live in tibet or understand the political climate of tibet and what activists in tibet are doing to try and liberate themselves--it's more than likely there are tibetan activists in and out of tibet fighting against the CCP because where there is oppression and propaganda, there are people fighting back against it with everything they've got, even in small and non-violent ways; such as referring to the chinese takeover of tibet not as "the peaceful liberation of tibet" as the CCP refers to it, but rather as "the chinese invasion of tibet". this shows you plain as day how tibetan diaspora view and understand the situation.

you're telling me that she can't listen to tibetan diaspora, (in this incredibly niche discourse, where it may be difficult to find many tibetan buddhists or tibetan people/diaspora on tumblr getting into this discourse, mind you), on how their culture is treated by westerners? all while she's continuously citing a book written by a white woman in the 19-fucking-30s.

she is speaking as a white person, presumably in the west, and speaking for tibetan people, and saying that she can't even trust them on their own issues because of the CCP propaganda.

and yet she, in spite of all this, believes that she has any authority to be speaking for a group of people currently under chinese control against their will, and their diaspora.

that is white saviorism at its finest.

i'm not going to pretend to be an expert on tibet because i'm not. i did a rough wikipedia page read on a couple of things related to tibet and the chinese takeover and went from there.

but what sophie is doing, and i know this because it takes an ignorant person to know an ignorant person, is outright pretending she has more knowledge and understanding than she actually does on the situation, and has decided that the tibetan people, living in tibet or not, are not reliable on what does and doesn't harm them and their culture because of CCP propaganda and because she disagrees with them, then used a vague quote from the dalai lama to justify taking aspects of tibetan buddhism, where she truly has little understanding of the actual practice it comes from.

at this point, i care less about the discussion of the word tulpa itself and more about the racism and white saviorism and pseudo-intellectualism that sophie uses to justify using the word and what that says about the people that follow and agree with her. because jesus fuck, it's kind of horrifying.

and every time a tibetan buddhist comes in and criticizes her, she ignores them because they're anti-endo, or because she assumes they are and labels them as anti-endo regardless of if they are or not.

and b) she's openly admitting to refusing criticism for citing papers that don't support her arguments. at all. be it because they are assuming tulpas/non-dissociative systems exist in the first place without proving it, because they're clearly about complex dissociative disorders and not endogenic systems (and by clearly, i mean outright referring to trauma an dissociation), because they're outright trying to disprove the existence of complex dissociative disorders with the fantasy model, or because they're about psychotic people hearing voices, and the alternative treatments outside of medications to treat the voices, (not herbal remedies; talk therapy and engaging with the voice(s) with a trained professional).

this is all part of a larger pattern with sophie. she bullshits, she pretends to know more than she actually does on these subjects, and acts like she has any ground on which to stand and call herself an authority, and when people have genuine criticism that she can't bullshit against and twist to make herself look smart to her followers, she ignores it. and people eat it up because she seems nice and polite and seems educated, even when responding to horrific vitriol.

nobody bothers to read the papers she cites, nobody bothers to check her sources, they assume that she will do all those things for them and that she is a trusted source without looking into it themselves. i know this because i have had people cite to me papers that are not valid evidence for endogenics existing, (such as the survey that finds people with tulpas have better mental health than they did before, without proving they exist and even outright stating that this survey can't prove they exist), and a friend recently had someone in a discord server openly admit to citing a paper without reading it first. there are carrds compiling "evidence" that endogenic systems exist where the people openly admit to not reading the papers, and very even if they did, they obviously aren't being critical about it because they're acting like a survey that doesn't attempt to prove the existence of endogenic systems somehow proves the existence of endogenic systems.

i can't remember if she still has this paper on her list or not, but someone emailed the author of it and said that not only was her paper not about endogenic systems, she didn't approve of her work being used in this manner because it was about functional multiplicity as a valid healing option for DID alongside final fusion. not endogenic systems.

look, i don't hate endogenic systems. because of the fact that there's a lack of research into whether or not endogenic systems exist and because i choose to believe in the ideology of live and let live, i mostly don't care what endogenics are doing with themselves as long as they're not actually hurting anyone, and while many people have varying definitions of what that means, i personally don't find the existence of endogenic and nondissociative systems to in and of themselves be harmful. i just hate that so many of them are so desperate to prove themselves against the hate that they're becoming ignorant in the face of how science actually works in order to do it.

leaving everything up to one person that they uncritically follow.

many of them are buying into the pattern that sophie has consistently been putting out for a couple of years now, and i find it so disgustingly disingenuous because she's giving many endogenic and nondissociative systems a false sense of hope to prove themselves when that's not what's actually happening; from repeating debunked arguments to citing papers that actively go against what she's saying, to consistently, time and time again, showing us that she has not read a lick of literature on complex dissociative disorders. all the while, ignoring any and all criticism that she can't twist to make herself look good.

all this to say that sophie has a long pattern of pseudointellectualism--pretending to know what she's talking about when she doesn't, and bullshitting herself every which way to make herself sound smart and educated. then, most infuriatingly, refusing to respond to valid criticism that actually bothers to bring her claims into question, and referring to all of her critics as anti-endos whether they actually believe in endogenic systems or not.

There’s a difference between “nobody is listening to me!” And “nobody is agreeing with me!”

Recently I heard some shit going on and this person kept saying “nobody is listening to me” or “I’m not being heard” or something around those lines. But. The fact of the matter was that they were being heard. People listened to them. The people were just not agreeing with this person. But instead of hearing the perspective of the other sides this person doubled down and continued the “nobody is listening to me” idea.

Unfortunately you can still be wrong even when you think you’re right. It quite honestly happens to everyone. What matters is being able to understand the big picture and moving on.

If I find out someone thinks I’m wrong or says I did something wrong I listen to them. Fuck a good example is when I made this blog. I made it kind of as a silly thing to post some ideas with my partner while poking fun at a pair of people who shared a lot of similarities with us but used their platform to promote some hateful stuff. When I was asked to change the blog name I did! I changed because looking from their perspective is was a shitty thing to do. Did I mean it that way? No. Did I think it was shitty? Nope. But I changed the name because I’m mature enough to acknowledge that it could have hurt someone even if I think they’re hurtful.

On the other hand my father for example complains about me never listening to him. In regards to his personal beliefs about oh I don’t know, trump. And if people deserve a living wage. Or maybe people shouldn’t starve. Do I hear him? Yes I do! Do I listen to his arguments? Yes, usually against my will admittedly. But do I agree with him? Absolutely not. But because he knows he’s right and I’m not agreeing with him, that means that I’m just not listening.

i hooked up with a queer person who used all the right language and did all the right things, but then they told me they only date ppl who were afab, regardless of gender. they’ll fuck ppl who were amab but they won’t date them, only afab ppl. the further we got into the convo, it became clear that the reason they only wanted to date ppl who were afab is bc we are more likely to have been socialized to take on the brunt of the domestic and emotional labor in relationships. that hookup ended up lasting over an hour bc they kept interrupting sex to complain about their ex wife. by the end i was practically shoving them out the door because i was so uncomfortable.

the guy i’m hooking up with right now is very cis and found me through the ftm tag on grindr, so he was specifically looking for trans guys. he told me he’s into trans guys because he likes sleeping with masculine people, mostly men, but he also likes the way vaginas feel. could that be seen as fetishistic? sure. does it feel that way to me when we have sex? nope. he uses gender affirming language without even being asked, he tells me he’s super into my body and gets excited when he notices that i’ve grown more hair or had a t dick growth spurt. he likes my body because it’s trans, and i’m perfectly okay with that.

I personally think that a lot of people have decided that "being attractive to something non-normative" = "fetishizing" which... Is just blatantly not true. But it's how you end up with people who think that someone who is explicitly (and perhaps only) attracted to trans/genderqueer bodies is an evil fetishizer instead of, you know. Someone who likes that kind of body. Same vein of thinking as people who think that those who are attracted to fat people are all chubby chasers with a fat/feeding fetish instead of just people who find fat bodies attractive.

Like imo? There is no fucking difference between saying "Oh yeah, I really like guy pussy" and "I really like big dick and muscles." It's just what you like, and I hate that when someone expresses that they like something that is seen as "not normal"- not a straight, cis, white, abled, thin body, people act like it's a fetish or it's objectifying. Because what that says, at least to me as a fat genderqueer transmasc, is that being attracted to me as I am is inherently not normal and not good. And that is a fucking SHITTY message to send.

The problem with trans chasers and chubby chasers and "fetishizers" (and honestly, people really need to like, read up on what a fetish is because I'm sick of seeing it used as some bad thing all the time, it's not) is that they treat people as not whole people. Whether, as in the example above, they take advantage of actual or perceived trauma and behavior associated with one's assigned gender, or as a personal example, they're only interested in sleeping with you because they've "never fucked a fat chick and hear that you girls give awesome head". People who do that shit see the people they go after as experiences or novelties, or as something exotic. A sex object that they can use.

First off, I'd like to apologize to @sysmedsaresexist and @queerautisticsys y'all are right, I was generalizing in the post. I knew what I was talking about, but I didn't communicate that well out of anger, and I just got more angry with your responses. I have now calmed down and thought it through, and again, you're right.

Second off, this post wasn't made to generalize. "Support singlets" (I've never heard that term before I think its really funny) are not the target of this. Systems who do not share their systemhood for privacy reasons are not the target, and singlets who are well educated and are informed by other systems (depending on the context) are not the target of this.

And now - who I was targeting in the previous post was the singlets who are misinformed about DID, either not knowing what it is, only "knowing" things through the stigma around the disorder, or the singlets who have done minimal research and decided they are a medical professional now.

These people, who will state that they are a singlet, and in the same breath and state "these are my views on syscourse" and put all the "DNI [supporting or not supporting a system origin]" are usually the same people who will see "I have a [inset MCYT] alter" "I have [large number] of alters" "I use [neopronouns]" and immediately fake claim the system. These are also the people who participate in syscourse and shove their opinion into things and talk over the community.

Literally copied and pasted from this last post -- "Allyship is not about voicing your opinions above the community it's about saying you're an ally and then sitting down and shutting the fuck up."

I still agree with this statement. But I also agree with @/sysmedsaresexist's statement that a lot of it depends on context. Just as the cishet family members of a queer person are allowed to speak about queer issues, as it also effects them, these "support singlets" and other well informed singlets are allowed to speak about OSDDID issues, because it also effects them. the people this statement was aimed at was the actually random people who do voice their opinions over the community

I am not one to dictate others boundaries. People's DNI's don't concern me other than when I want to, yk, interact with them. I was just angry from seeing that in peoples DNIs very often.

Also copied and pasted from this post - "if you're a singlet you have no right to have opinions on what makes a system valid or not, or how our opinions "hurt" the community (with either argument)."

I don't agree with this statement, as it was worded horribly. I agree that if you are a misinformed singlet who came looking for discourse, you have no right to have an opinion or voice it as fact.

When talking about singlets who actually know nothing about OSDDID or systems in general, let alone syscourse, I fully agree with this statement still. I've seen singlets fake claim systems and then turn around and talk about "But saying endos aren't real systems is harmful for the community!! :((( you're a bad person I bet you're faking too!!!!!" and vis versa, saying that if you think endos are real you're horrible.

Anyways, this is who that post was aimed at. I made the post out of anger and it wasn't clear.

For the record, I 1000% agree that people who don’t know what they’re talking about shouldn’t be talking about it, and that DOES happen a lot. I just often try to give the benefit of the doubt.

Thanks for posting about it and saying it was made out of anger. I think it’s easy for people (myself included) to forget the emotions behind posts. I walk into syscourse expecting nuance and then rarely get it, so it pisses me off — which is I think where these sort of dumb arguments start.

I get you guys may be trying to be inclusive or make your blog a safe space, but if you are a singlet, shut the fuck up. It is not for you to talk on. I ALSO get that you might have done research. But if you do not have DID or any other dissociative disorder, then shut the fuck up.

You don't seem to understand that this is not your disorder to talk about or dictate. System's origins are none of your business. You don't have the right to "agree" or "disagree" with them, for any purpose. Shut the fuck up.

This is especially frustrating because its ALWAYS on endos. I couldn't give a fuck less about endos, that's another topic for another day, but endos are none of your business. Like, do y'all even understand WHY there is discourse behind endos? If you can't answer that then take that stupid system shit out of your DNI bc I'm sick of seeing it. Even if you can answer that, I don't very much care, because like I said if you're a singlet you have no right to have opinions on what makes a system valid or not, or how our opinions "hurt" the community (with either argument).

Allyship is not about voicing your opinions above the community it's about saying you're an ally and then sitting down and shutting the fuck up.

People who don't share private information aren't my issue. I'm not actually concerned with the discourse. I don't look at a person and think "you're a random person with an opinion I don't like so fuck you actually" I look at the information given to me and I either do or don't form an opinion.

I've looked at the information given to me, and decided that its bullshit for those people to say that and think they have a right to think it. I also say this bc those are usually the people who will see "I have a [inset MCYT] alter" "I have 100+ alters" "I use [a multitude of neopronouns]" and immediately fake claim that system.

I’m pissed because this is something that pops up it’s ugly head constantly. People get on my partner (who is well researched and has been with me every step of the way) for being a singlet. Your post didn’t clarify at all that you only cared specifically about the brand of individual who knows ACTUALLY nothing.

I get you guys may be trying to be inclusive or make your blog a safe space, but if you are a singlet, shut the fuck up. It is not for you to talk on. I ALSO get that you might have done research. But if you do not have DID or any other dissociative disorder, then shut the fuck up.

You don't seem to understand that this is not your disorder to talk about or dictate. System's origins are none of your business. You don't have the right to "agree" or "disagree" with them, for any purpose. Shut the fuck up.

This is especially frustrating because its ALWAYS on endos. I couldn't give a fuck less about endos, that's another topic for another day, but endos are none of your business. Like, do y'all even understand WHY there is discourse behind endos? If you can't answer that then take that stupid system shit out of your DNI bc I'm sick of seeing it. Even if you can answer that, I don't very much care, because like I said if you're a singlet you have no right to have opinions on what makes a system valid or not, or how our opinions "hurt" the community (with either argument).

Allyship is not about voicing your opinions above the community it's about saying you're an ally and then sitting down and shutting the fuck up.

I get you guys may be trying to be inclusive or make your blog a safe space, but if you are a singlet, shut the fuck up. It is not for you to talk on. I ALSO get that you might have done research. But if you do not have DID or any other dissociative disorder, then shut the fuck up.

You don't seem to understand that this is not your disorder to talk about or dictate. System's origins are none of your business. You don't have the right to "agree" or "disagree" with them, for any purpose. Shut the fuck up.

This is especially frustrating because its ALWAYS on endos. I couldn't give a fuck less about endos, that's another topic for another day, but endos are none of your business. Like, do y'all even understand WHY there is discourse behind endos? If you can't answer that then take that stupid system shit out of your DNI bc I'm sick of seeing it. Even if you can answer that, I don't very much care, because like I said if you're a singlet you have no right to have opinions on what makes a system valid or not, or how our opinions "hurt" the community (with either argument).

Allyship is not about voicing your opinions above the community it's about saying you're an ally and then sitting down and shutting the fuck up.