*:･ﾟ💗GABRIELLE ROSE

Something a little interesting that sidled into my 'suggested' feed on Instagram over the past 2 days, first a major figurine producer are releasing for preorder, a premium Supergirl figurine based on an illustration and licensed comic book cover art made by Artgerm. Totally legal, made under the direction of DC comics, but observably, they didn't consult with Artgerm at any point despite clearly following the concept, proportions, and style of his original art in their licensed reproduction. And then, a post by Jhonen Vasquez, to clarify for his followers, that the new comic book series recently announced for Invader Zim was made without any consultation with him - again completely legally, where the IP was sold a long time ago, but where a prior comic book series was made with his overseeing eye and feedback and he has previously been involved in all things Zim. So we can see a shift here, a conscious choice to omit the original artist's voice when recreating their art.

What can we learn from this? The corps do not view the artists themselves, even literally among the top and most successful visual artists in the world - as having any value or insight to offer in the recreation of their own art. They simply see a valuable IP to recreate in the case of Zim, or where obviously Artgerm does not own the Supergirl IP, yet his derivative version of her, and specific recognisable artstyle and vision, was considered appealing enough to warrant a $2599 figurine being made in its image (at 299 quantity) and sold - without any input from the artists themselves.

The idea of having the option of receiving valuable insight and direction from incredibly skilled and appealing artists, artists who are specifically the people in the world with most expertise in creating that specific product - and choosing not to have that - instead choosing to flounder around on their own, using a team to make the art or product without the insight of the person who created it, that's baffling to me and shows a very clear disconnect between where consumers see the value (which is the artists, their unique outlook and unique insight and how that is expressed creatively and visually) and the corporations, who only see the output as the value, being a certain arrangement of shapes and colours and ideas, fully divorced from the minds that made them.

There's been a bit of an online movement for a while now where women are speaking about men, and women's rights and things like that - but it's in a sort of empassioned, obsessive way, every post is a variation on these themes. It is not based on facts, solely personal opinion. There is no attempt to create conversation or change, the apparent goal is simply to polarise. What they say is extremely weighted in one direction - only one gender can behave immorally or unkindly according to them. There is no sign of them showing hobbies, art, normal life - it's entirely a soapbox for an issue they seemed oblivious to for the first 90% of their lives, usually, and presently, spent surrounded by the men they are now criticising, for example they will say they have sons and a 20 year marriage before stepping on their soapbox. It always seemed a bit off to me, bearing in mind I've been online since 2004 and these women are 30-40+ and had nothing, and I mean nothing - to say on these topics until about 2 years ago, but the 'sl4ve advertisement' posted yesterday made things quite clear. (See link below)

I've been on the internet long enough to know these women pretending to be wise and enlightened now are the same ones who would viciously attack another woman for saying something incredibly mild ten years ago. What they are doing now is essentially their villain spiel; 'poor unfortunate souls' from the Little Mermaid, Scar's conversations with Simba.

It is so widespread and overt it's hard to grasp because realising the numbers of people doing this...there are large numbers of manipulative women now dedicated to pretending they are safe for their target victims. Just as the internet has always been utilised to help predators seek victims, and people used to use it appropriately cautiously - dragonlady255, no ages and faces and such - some women have now realised they can use their status as a 'femosphere' influencer to source victims for themselves.

These women are attempting to target, and present themselves as safe for vulnerable women e.g. divorcees with young children, teenage runaways etc, so they can utilise their labour and resources. Bearing in mind these women are also still presently surrounded by the men they now criticise, to me is resembles something akin to the role of a pimp/madam where they are the female face of a male enterprise.

They are, in effect, leading vulnerable women to themselves, and behind themselves are husbands, brothers, friends - but these femosphere women make sure not to visually or narratively represent them. You will rarely or never see a male face or presence on their account in order to pretend they are working independently.

The clearest display of the end goal for these 'enlightened' women was the veiled 'sl4ve' advertisement I screenshot. The goal of making your whole online image, an obsessive attempt to prove you're safe specifically to vulnerable women while not being one, nor having any experience with being one yourself, and the goal of their attempts to sympathise with the needy - is to lure the vulnerable and needy so they can take advantage of them.

Bearing in mind there is no sense of charity, no offer of help, all they share is polarised personal opinion intended to attract a specific audience. In fact, as we can see from the 'sl4ve advertisement' what they are offering their target audience sits somewhere between demanding months of unpaid 24/7 labour or a $7 per minute charge. They are attracting a certain audience while offering said audience nothing except a request for resources.

Normal kind people live their lives, working, creating, socialising. They don't create a persona solely for the purpose of baiting vulnerable women with fake 'sympathy'. They don't run 'women's circles' that cost thousands, they don't post hundreds of videos of their extremely one sided 'truth' about a specific gender. Enlightenment is not found through division and black and white thinking, nor rigid worldviews of restrictive, stereotypical male/female dynamics. It is similar to the manosphere, male influencers saying the most ridiculous things to easily influenced men, but more insidious because it comes in a better disguise. Just like the Disney villains they inadvertently emulate, it comes with a disguise of sympathy and empathy.

At least the manosphere people are exhibiting what more closely resembles an insincere political campaign, finding weak points and offering terrible and short-sighted 'solutions' to those issues. The female version of the manosphere identifies weak points, then attempts to crawl into their hearts and minds via a convincing imitation of sympathy. The goal of manosphere influencers is to get subscribers and podcast listeners, that is, career success for themselves. They don't care about targeting specific individuals. The female 'enlightened' faux feminists of 2026 are seeking specific female targets to extract energy and resources from in person.

See: the 'advertisement' And how many more 'advertisements' are there now as these women get more confident that their manipulation is working? The biggest target for them is women under 25 who won't know, as I do, that these 'opinions' emerged from thin air 2 years ago.

Recently, I saw a married woman with children post a campaign on Instagram to find a young blonde woman she met on a plane while traveling with her family. The young woman had helped her with a technical issue which made her flight smoother regarding seating arrangements. She didn't have a name, just blonde, 20s, Derry. The woman was sourced within 24 hours, her family and friends posting about her personal life in the comments and in messages, removing her privacy even though it was stated she herself had no social media. The woman's husband was not mentioned in any of this, but what are the optics of a man sending out an online search party for a young blonde he saw on a plane.

Because a marriage is a partnership, meaning in effect, the young blonde's privacy was sacrificed in order for both of them to 'find' her. The woman's husband now knows the young blonde's name, location, and ample personal details shared by family and friends. The implicit trust given to a strange woman that would never have been given to her husband had he posted the same request (it would rightfully be viewed as sleazy) but the end result - him getting her personal details - is the same.

Why are we trusting strange women on the internet, as if they materialised from thin air and their lives are not closely involving unseen others? Very few people exist as the independent character they represent themselves as online. People need to think of the full picture before implicitly trusting any female face. Because like in this instance, 'trust' can mean all the viewers of that viral post (which had 20k likes) know know the blonde woman's details. All the men behind the scenes now know the blonde woman's details.

What does 'fame' mean in 2026? The only thing that differs a celebrity from an ordinary person, where I always thought there was no difference, the difference was always an illusion - where some ordinary people with not extraordinary skills would be on the cover of magazines, star in movies, feature on tv shows - what made them different was simply the spotlight being selectively shone onto them. Someone decided to highlight that person, out of the dozens or hundreds or thousands with identical appearance and skills.

The crass simulacrum of 'fame' is 'talent shows' which I stopped watching in 2010, when it was evidently just people being put through a wringer, exhausted and emotionally manipulated, and every 'behind the scenes' interview was just them sobbing from exhaustion. The format of a 'talent' show is, just like how celebrity works on a larger scale, a very small number of people selecting a very small number of people to arbitrarily promote and tell the public to appreciate and emotionally invest in. Somehow that small number of people are assumed to have magic talent in selecting artists to be enjoyed by the masses, when those same masses are fairly capable of determining what they enjoy seeing and hearing without the 'help' of these small number of people.

The internet has proven this without a doubt, the general public are all pretty excellent at determining what they want to spend time seeing and hearing, they don't need help doing so. The small number of 'judges' or 'investors' or 'industry' on a wider scale have no greater ability to recognise artistic skill or allure or charm than any randomly selected group of people have. They are, and prior the internet, were very effective at being, self appointed controllers of what 'talent' is or is seen to be.

The 'talent' show format would erase the middle area of talent, only showing the 'best' and 'worst' so they shame the untalented and praise the talented, while ignoring the vast middle area and I'm sure countless talented people who didn't play well with the half a dozen self appointed arbiters of taste.

So being 'selected' made them different. The only other thing that made them different is how they looked: The cosmetic enhancements that made celebrities appear visually different has become very accessible and normalised due to internet publicity and research-aided access to surgeons. People now also have access to a more vast array of makeup and haircare, both skillsets and cosmetic items. Even veneers are becoming commonplace.

So what is different once selection is evened out, people now able to choose what they want to see and hear regardless of who is being promoted to them. And appearance is evened out, people now able to choose what they want to look like, including whatever cosmetic enhancements they might associate with fame.

What does fame mean if a band with 50 monthly listeners on Spotify has the same or more talent and appeal than one pushed in front of millions of eyes? What does fame mean if thousands of ordinary girls on tiktok and instagram can compete in style, allure and charm with all the 'top' models and actresses? Did it ever mean anything? It was always a very small number of people selecting a small number of people to push, never due to them being the best, maybe nepotism, maybe they paid their way, maybe they played nice. I never really understood why the small number of people selecting another small number of people was accepted as representing the interests of the public.

Everyone 'knowing your name' never meant they liked you, I think the visibly terrible time so many stars have had over the decades can tell you that. Awareness isn't support, fame is not protection, it would be perfectly healthy for any human to seek privacy over many eyes.

However for people with natural artistic skill it is a conundrum, if you are introspective enough to hone an artistic skill you are also introspective enough to know how fraught with danger being 'known' is. Yet you will naturally want people to see and enjoy and share your work. And if you can make some sort of living from it, even better.

Money-seeking is another connected topic but needless to say; it's all nonsense beyond the basic human needs of survival, water, heat, shelter. Having 'wealth' as a sign of success is as much a meaningless arbiter as 'fame' is when wealth is often tied up, and delivered, via hands of another small number of people deciding where exactly (and to whom) to funnel it.

For an artist it means *being* the product rather than selling a product - a terrifying prospect when combined with the endless eyes of strangers and your life being micromanaged by those investors - I think the only artists who can consider being 'wealthy' are ones who already were, because when it is being 'given' by certain hands it has certain small print and demands which a mere human brain and body can not healthily survive.

Back to the point: the internet has evened the playing field for everyone; it is even more starkly clear how these 'celebrities' were never unique, simply chosen. Interestingly and baffingly, while this is all so clear, while access to a wide array of culture and art has never been faster or easier, stan culture survives somehow, people queue for hours or days to see some mediocre pop artist, camping outside stadiums, set up mini cliques and fan accounts online and hand out printed 'numbers' in queues for concerts, deciding with no authority that they can singularly number and file the audience they are also a part of, telling them, once again with no authority but a lot of gall, where to stand both in and outside the venue in General Admission/floor standing tickets where they are in fact allowed to stand wherever they wish (or have sharp enough elbows/strong enough grip on the barrier to sustain)

They then 'watch' said concerts with their phones held aloft so the average viewing height is 7ft. Because being there means posting about it online. Being there means sending your phone to watch it for you while you stand by as its dutiful assistant and handler.

They, still choosing to be an underling to a false god, selected by a team in a boardroom meeting to finance and promote - the artist that is perfectly mediocre, that will never inspire an original thought or positive feeling, if they offer 'rebellion' it will be written and performed in a way that invites no criticism to the topics raised, merely a singing of topical catchphrases without conclusion - while offering no recognisable 'art' they offer a distraction and a place to charge your credit card - i digress.

There is a certain 'millennial style' which I must avoid, I am realising today. Irregular choice's Instagram tagged tab is a good summary of what I mean, but even the more refined versions still scream millennial:

Colour palette: primary colours and very limited palette in images e.g. 2 shades of pink with red highlight

Makeup: bold makeup - no details, each clothing item is single colour and simple texture, or has a garish pattern (stripes, leopard print etc)

Accessories: no detail in accessories

General posting style and account theme: Mememe - main character syndrome

Politics/other areas/textposts: Lengthy posts where you speak as an authority on something you know nothing about/have no say in

Modern version:

Colour palette: varied hues, many colours or muted colours. The bright colours are borne from millennials uploading 600×400 pixels to be viewed on blurry screens, they had to stand out with limited visibility (literally)

Makeup: more subtle makeup with more attention to detail. People are used to seeing high res faces in closeup, clown or stage makeup is not needed. If you are uploading low res and or clown makeup in ~current year~ it looks like you have something to hide. (I do like low res and images with photo effects, however it is dated and also is not as trusted in a time of AI and people analysing details for 'signs' of generation. Blurs obscure the details they will be studying) (sidenote this is also because people use a lot of face filters to create the desired effect versus using makeup to create colour/form, so people *see* less visible makeup while actually observing a significantly altered face)

Accessories: small details since they can be seen now, headdresses, jewellery, intricate fabrics like laces, beading, embroidery can be appreciated now. Millennials didn't do it online because you literally couldn't see them

General posting style and account theme: you are not the main character and won't receive attention for simply being ~there~ as early adopters to the internet did. You need to inform, educate, entertain or inspire, since there are plenty of people who are simply ~there~ to compete with you. It takes 10 seconds to upload a video now, people used to spend hours filming, editing and transferring from cameras to laptops, now filming, editing and uploading can all be done on one app in a short time

Politics/other areas/textposts: you don't need to speak as an authority on something you know nothing about because the experts will also be online now. People can refer to them for information on the given topic. Speaking on things you *are* an authority or experienced in is wanted, but releasing statements about things you have no involvement in is not expected nor required. Anyone asking you to do so is trolling; they know you are not an authority and also as a follower of yours should be able to surmise your viewpoints via the art you create; an announcement isn't needed.

The modern way to express yourself is to make it clearly a personal expression versus a statement - a video expressing a personal feeling or emotion is much better received than a long text post announcement on the same topic. Making art to express a sentiment is best of all (in my opinion)

2 hours later and out of 123 replies and 16 quotes, I am genuinely the only concerned one 😅

I think I am seeing a pattern, combined with something disturbing I saw at the end of last month, where if you present anything as 'good news everyone' Futurama style, people's covid-melted brains will be unable to parse subtext, historical relevance, past situations and consequences, and will simply respond in blind celebration.

Just wanna post this as an example of the absolute gall of some people.

Context is an EGL fashion girly (who is an absolute angel and her fashion is so beautifully curated including handmade accessories) posted that a public park tried to charge her $50 for taking a selfie with her phone.

This commenter comes out with multiple inappropriate accusations which you could see are irrelevant by taking 10 seconds to check her profile. Including:

1. Accuses OP of monetizing her content with 0 proof. It's a personal fashion account, she does not advertise or do sponsorships, and viewership is not high enough to profit from.

2. Implies she owes thousands and that taking a selfie with your phone is comparable to renting the space for an event with dozens or hundreds of guests

3. Accuses her of having 'a whole ring light contraption' when the video they are commenting on is clearly a selfie in natural light

4. Accuses them of 'potentially' making 20k a month from a brand deal (none of this happened just unverified strawmen)

5. 'For something the garden doesn't align with' once again it is a selfie while wearing a beautiful dress

6. 'Like adult content' 'or...crossing boundaries in public spaces' literally accused OP of filming p0rn, once again they were fully dressed and took a selfie with their phone (jesus christ)

7. Backpedal to imply they are not malicious when everything they've said has been malicious (they identify as a former park volunteer in another comment) so they're calling themselves 'old and wise' here after accusing OP of multiple insulting lies

8. 'They might not want to be affiliated with your brand' which implies OP has a brand (false) and that it's something inappropriate (extremely false)

Just unmitigated gall all generated in one tiny comment thread. It's actually unbelievable how far people will go to play devil's advocate in situations where it's clearly irrelevant, makes you wonder if that counts as targeted trolling or just a generally inappropriate person who cannot read a room.

Scrolling on tiktok with the sound off and I come across people reacting both to Paramore Hayley's recent song and a recent Lily Allen song, both about different forms of known cheating. One is Hayley (based on fan comments/their song analysis) had an affair with a longtime bandmember while married to someone else, and according to the lyrics of this recent song, it was no longer after she/they were divorced. (Idk the details I don't go here, just based on fan comments) Ergo, the draw was the fact it was an affair.

And Lily's song is about her open marriage but 'there had to be payment... had to be with strangers' but based on these lyrics, the subject of the song cheated with someone she/they knew. And it strikes me that people with the cheating psychology cannot be loyal for a very simple fact: if the thing you have is something you, in your mind, are trapped or forced into, the affair is, in your mind, the 'freedom', then even if the affair becomes legit, the players moves places and now the affair person becomes the thing you are 'forced' to do which requires escape, via affair once again. It's never about desire, better, change. All of is a play you are running in your own head, you will always be the 'captive' until you become honest and at peace with your true self, whatever that may be. Unashamedly being yourself in the company of each other seems to be key to all healthy relationships, including friends and family. It makes sense the person feels more comfortable with the limited expectations within an affair - the requirement to be your true self is completely absent in an affair and offers comfort to someone who is always running from getting to know their true selves. And once the affair becomes legit, suddenly they are required to be their true selves once again and they feel unsettled.

It strikes me that people who 'perform' as a career will find it harder than anyone else to be truly at ease with themselves and in company. And that includes in certain high profile office careers, even - if you are in meetings for hours every day 'performing' and repeating the right phrases to the right narrative, is that much different from someone on stage? The only difference is the high profile office based career doesn't need to be enjoyable to watch. But it's still a facade put on the majority of the day. And how easy is it to switch off and be truly yourself, when you are rewarded for the act? Especially to be yourself in company - the act has received approval from a wide audience, the real self has likely not received much approval except from a handful of people. So how secure and confident will you feel to be that person?

In regard to cheating, it's a fault in the psychology of the person with the relationship; they can't feel safe, themselves, at peace, at home, trust, all that stuff - instead they put themselves in the psychological role of captive. And it's purely psychological if you're talking 2025, western world. There is no literal reason to be 'trapped' other than a pervading intrusive thought or feeling, or an indulgence of insecurity or dishonesty, if a relationship is wrong you leave it. To cheat is to take the role of captive in a play in your own mind.

The person who is disloyal doesn't have the correct psychological attachment/emotions/thoughts about the current partner and the disjointed or incorrect thoughts - that of being somehow 'trapped' and needing to rebel or escape - aren't fixed by any players changing roles. The people involved are almost irrelevant, because the problem doesn't arise from anywhere else but the cheater's own mind.

The thoughts arise from disorder, essentially they are unable to trust, be themselves, feel comfort with their partner, that isn't solved by cheating or changing partners, because the problem is their psychology.

An affair is never a legit relationship and someone who follows that pattern - of viewing themselves as a rebelling captive in their own mind - cannot ever have a legit relationship. With anyone. And finding peace and comfort both within yourself, and being able to share that peace with someone else, is a singular task which takes years of effort. People used to mock the idea of someone travelling to 'find themselves' (particuarly where it was essentially a holiday) and travelling can be so hectic that it is another form of running away. Finding yourself is more likely achieved through stillness, through nothing. What do you feel once you take everything else away. What do you want once you take everything else away. I think these thoughts are easier to arrive at if you live in the present, if you enjoy analysis and study, if you do not humour your beliefs with fantasy and illusion.

'Everything else' is duty, habit, money, expectations, history, assumptions, the truth is something very simple. Like me realising 'I will make sculpture when I'm older' is something I could do now, back in 2016. Or me realising the only movies I enjoy are animation, fantasy, sci fi, (and some musicals) and to collect them, in the same year. Deciding those things are small but large; to admit I should work on these art projects now instead of some mysterious future date - to decide that also means giving up on different career aspirations. To accept the genres I enjoy means admitting what genres I don't. Accepting elements of your own psychology also means making peace with some things you don't like, or don't want, or that don't fit into your ideal future. So I think it's difficult to do, while seeming so simple, because to be honest with yourself means truly loving what you love, being what you are, but also means some things need to be left behind.

So it makes sense the person who cannot be at peace with themselves, also have confusing relationships. Because admitting and enabling yourself to love a person also means leaving some people behind. It almost seems like, the root of the person who cheats is a mess of dishonesty - about things as small as likes and dislikes. Food preferences. Habits. Opinions. And because they can't make a firm opinion or a firm sense of their own self in other areas, they mimic this uncertainty in their relationships. And the discarded hobby isn't going to become collateral damage but the discarded person is. The question of how to seek peace and solve this? Probably not by writing songs about it and making it a topic of discussion among strangers. Maybe them doing so is a cry for help in itself; they ask: why am I doing this? Why are they doing this? To that you could ask: What's your favourite food? And then: what's your real favourite food?

The other artists will relate, admire, buy, and be inspired. The normal people will relate, admire, buy, and be inspired. The narcissist will be jealous, imitate, pretend to admire in a shallow way, buy but with the expectation of 100x back to them, and intend to take - not be inspired but take your energy and anything you've attained in life.

The normal person and other artist will interact minimally but positively, keeping boundaries and respect, if they purchase they will do so with minimal contact and no issues. The narcissist will persistently present a shallow imitiation of 'fan' or 'artist' behaviour; an imitation of admiration but not actually understanding or observing specifics. An imitation of admiration for aesthetics but none of their aesthetics are original. They can't make good art. If they do it's a copy or low quality, unsellable, unappealing. They mostly put all their effort into the facade of being an art admirer or artist, but see past the facade and there's nothing there. Someone who says they admire music but doesn't want to hear it and thinks they should be praised for listening. Someone who says they admire paintings but they own no paintings.

Someone who can't consistently be who they pretend to be, meaning they need rest and recuperation from the facade before they can repeat it. This was particularly easy in the past online, where infrequent posting was normal; now daily posting is expected it's more difficult to maintain a consistent facade.

Why is someone putting on a facade a problem? Because if you let the narcissist close to you, they will, while seeing your worth and wanting to take it all, will convince you you are worthless so you will submit to them and give them your energy, money, and life. The facade is the lure so you drop your guard. They create an appealing imitation of what you are so you trust them before they take it all from you. Along with longlasting physical and emotional damage.

They are the biggest threat to an artist and they are guaranteed to swarm around any artist, consistently and regularly. You will see the signs, everything is about them. Look at me. Why isn't everyone looking at me. Actually the most important thing about your lifetime of work is how it affected them for 5 minutes, maybe they bought a t shirt or caught a bus. That's more important than your lifetime of work and you should treat it accordingly.

They like to believe if they throw you £5 you can be their eternal servant and energy source, because while they initially approach with shallow 'admiration' without insight or analysis, they believe you are inferior to them and exist to serve them. The gaslighting that an artist can experience while simultaneously having energy, traits and skills they want to drain while being treated as subhuman. You are both valueless and highly valued - they will never admit the latter.

They might act like your lifetimes work is a hobby or novelty. They won't compliment but will say copypaste phrases without sentiment. They might write or say lengthy paragraphs where they repeat your words back to you with slight rephrasings and misunderstandings, like a chatbot, or will find something simple you did which doesn't require observation and sarcastically act like it is the second coming of Jesus. Praising something meaningless while overall treating you as servant, worthless, and demeaning your work and very being.

Of course, if they acted how they really feel they would not gain access. So you get vapid, copypaste 'praise' and imitation which doesn't create happiness or inspiration, no thought evoked, it is just the entry fee to your attention. At the end, the artist will be left near dead, emotionally and physically, in disbelief that someone would adopt an entirely fake personality, be a skinwalker, and insincere appreciator, with the intent of slowly draining every drop of life from you. They actually, most of all, want to see you fail, see you suffer, and access to you is needed for that to happen. An enemy in the package of an 'artist' or fan.

How to spot:- 'selfish online content or 'art' either it has no meaning or it's just about them.

- Not consistent. The feelings and opinions they claim to have do not evenly and equally present themselves day after day, they appear randomly and inconsistently

- They are a grown adult, claim to be an art appreciator and make it their personality, but don't make any art, or if they do, it is unoriginal, meaningless, or plain bad. If they have the intelligence to put something together, it may seem almost ai generated - disconnected, without purpose or meaning or sentiment. The purpose of the 'art' is to create a persona to present to others, rather than help other people, inspire, or express sentiments (inb4 people can make whatever art they want - sure they can but if someone is trying to insert themselves in your life in a negative way, this is one way to spot them. Generally it will be an adult, of course budding artists will have incomplete ideas. But if they are 25+, call themselves an artist, but with incomplete, meaningless or skillless, traced, copied, uninspired etc 'art' it becomes a red flag imo)

- victimhood/sob story. Most people who actually have had bad lives, are suffering or have suffered or been vulnerable, keep quiet about it. You don't announce your vulnerabilies to a crowd. The narcissist will make their sob stories part of their personality as a way to draw attention from sensitive people, and also monopolise care that other people need.

- They are actually jealous of the vulnerable because of the attention and sympathy they may receive (see; munchausen)

- A true artist can only make good art by being honest, caring and attentive about other people. The narcissist can never make good art because they have no actual care for others, they imitate attention and care in order to gain access to another artist's attention (the attention of the artist themselves plus the attention *they* will receive from others is coopted and intercepted).

But they never actually think about anyone other than themselves; it is not interesting to them. They are a fan of nobody, an admirer of nobody, everyone other than them is seen as inferior and dull. So if they claim interest they want your *things* whether that be attention, skills, social network, money, fame, business. They do not admire or care for you. How can you tell the normal person, fan or artist from the narcissist - quickly?

The normal person, fan or artist will not try and insert themselves into your life. They won't attend every public appearance you do, show up at the front and every meet and greet (or artist stall, gallery show, and so on) to ensure you see them. (Meaning you *seeing them* or them forcing you to look at them was the goal, attending at the back or not trying to *be seen* is different, still a bit strange if it's more than a couple of times imo but the insertion/boundary crossing is the issue) They will not talk about your family members or pets by their first names as if you are close. They will not repeat something you posted, said, part of art, etc as if it was a personal conversation you had or reference it like it was an in-joke. They don't use phrases which imply you know each other 'meet' 'last night' 'last weekend with' 'spent evening/night/with' in reference to public sightings (performance, con, stall, etc) 'been with/been a supporter or for x amount of time' in reference to how long they followed you.

All these personal phrases are inappropriate and leading. I have even seen people say things like 'it has been the longest relationship of my life' to refer to admiring an artist for many years. All of this stuff is verbally inserting themselves into the artist's life and are red flags. You might think it's normal but 90% of fans and customers don't do this. It's easy to admire something without trying to act like you are a part of the thing, which these behaviours and phrases do.

I don't know how I would respond to these but I'm gonna make a narc avoidance plan for my future art business because over years of being online, and also my personal life, I have seen it all. I think if someone says something like that to me, I will reply with very clear legal english, them: 'seeing you last night' me: 'I'm glad you enjoyed watching my public performance at (location/online), thank you name/username' them: 'Longest relationship of my life' me: 'I'm glad you have been an online follower of my art accounts for such a long time, thank you name/username' just clarifying statements.

If you reply vaguely, it confirms their misleading statement especially to an outsider reading or overhearing. I also think this behaviour is offputting to potential new fans and customers, imagine going into a shop and there's a weird gaggle of people who don't work there or contribute in any way, but who stand near the till for hours saying strange things - that's the narcissist 'fan' who camps out online and in person to 'lay claim' to the artist they want to subsume.

I think people have free speech (not in england but, theoretically) and are free to express themselves. However I think certain statements and behaviours are inappropriate and are red flags for narcissist fake 'fans' which artists need to be aware of. Normal people tend to keep to themselves, the best type of fans quietly admire without any attempts to imply public connection or history as described above. I think one of the reasons artists are afraid to succeed is the psychological toll of dealing with certain types of people. Over the last year I think I've gained greater understanding and I could handle it now. Every scenario needs clarifiers and deterrents to prevent narcissists having any power over the artist they want to subsume. It's something I didn't really think about until 2024 and actually is a major risk for all artists. Because your enemy puts on a disguise as another artist, or fan, and the red flags or tells are reasomably subtle.

But once someone like that has personal access, they can cause immense destruction or d3ath, as dramatic as it sounds, and they will convince you, truly, that your life doesn't matter anyway and your d3ath will have no impact. It's difficult to be faced with this, a person who wants you d3ad but keeps you around because they want to drain your energy and all that's good about you.

The internet now is fasscinating to me as someone who watched what was a pretty bad time around 2016-2020 where someone could 'cancel' you with a video or Twitter thread if they had a big following. With 'For You' becoming the new feed instead of 'following' it has led to a really interesting effect.

For example, in the past few days a woman posted a long critique video on 'the worst concert she ever attended' with some very fair criticisms. (The artist basically does a lot of crowd interaction bits which are theoretically good for audience involvement, but not appropriate for the age group of his audience which is around 14-15) Currently her critique has 5.2mil views and 752k likes and her followup videos have a similar good ratio suggesting agreement among the viewers.

The artist made a response video with a similar ratio to this random girl - that alone is fascinating because it shows there is equal support to both 'sides' which didn't use to happen. It used to be battledome. There are also multiple response videos from fans with likes between 800 and 20k. All within about 3 days of the initial critique video. So this is really fascinating to me because it means creators with big followings have lost the (negative) power they had before to 'cancel' someone since someone with 50 followers can get a million views on a video if it's interesting or relevant enough.

Which gives all sides of the story a chance to have their say rather than just the ones with 'power' - and that has been seen with this example with the artist, fans, fans of the support artist, and general viewers all having an equal say. I think this is actually a wonderful thing, as is the speed of interaction. Nobody has time (nor the captive audience needed to watch it) to make a one hour manipulative video like they used to on Youtube. If your response is over 7 days later it's old news, with exception of parody videos which have a slightly longer lifespan.

So this ensures the conversation is quite organic because people don't have much time to prepare if they want to jump onto the topic in time. The way the internet used to work in 2016-2020 used to stress me out a lot because it gave too much power to whoever had attained a large following, this way of running gives airtime to whoever is compelling and reacting to the current conversation in an organic and sincere way. The scripted 1-2 hour videos are no more. 5-10 minutes is now 'long'.

DIsclaimer this is a very good, catchy song, how I heard it was another girl doing a great cover of it on Tiktok, and I clicked the tagged account. But there is something to be said about the context and whether this is really the voice of the people vs the establishment.

Caught a British artist from the South East/London shilling ~tradwife propaganda~ complete with glitzy matching dresses, backing singers and curled bobs, and even has a video stood next to Nara Smith (if you know you know, literally infamous for shilling tradwife propaganda) saying they are twins. What does shilling tradwife propaganda get you? 7 brit awards in one year. 9 million streams in 5 days 3 million streams in 1 day. Graham norton show, NFL halftime show, US concert sells 75,000 tickets immediately, singing at the Oscars, mind you she has 2 million followers. One US artist I've seen with over 1 million followers still doesn't have enough fans or followers to tour. The numbers aren't adding up. Obviously a lot of money is being funnelled into this.

But seeing this from someone from my general geographic region is more overtly a massive lie, there is plausable deniability if I see a woman from the US doing this as they have a very different recent history and laws, and from what I can see more gender disparity or uneveness than in the UK. In the UK men and women are generally considered equals, relationships are expected to be 50/50 financially ergo you pay half the rent and bills, and this is established from the first date. Men are not seen as providers (and certainly not as gift givers, I have walked past many an angry man as he stomped home with his £3 flowers on valentines day, it does not come naturally to them here) and to hear a London girl singing about wanting a big diamond ring and a husband with the (actual) backdrop of British men who will spend max £10 on you on any given day. It's just so absurdly, blatantly a lie. I don't mean this as offensive to British men or to imply they *should* be providers, it just simply isn't the culture here in any corner of life. There aren't people of certain political persuasions who believe this, there aren't pockets of the country who believe this, across the board the opinion and expectation is the same which is we are equal. And that is mostly a good thing until you hit the uneven emotional and physical workload within a cohabiting relationship, but in every other area is is a good and positive thing.

Now, I have been on research mode online all this year too. The amount of videos and comments I've imbued, I can say with confidence that 90% of comments women write about male partners are ones of disappointment. Ranging from, in their hundreds to thousands each time, "I have been married 10-50 years never received a Birthday cake despite getting my husband and children one every year." "I gained several chronic illnesses which cleared up after splitting with my ex." "I do the main bulk of all housework, care for children, chores, maintenence etc in my family my husband does nothing." "Life is easier now I'm divorced because I have one less child to care for." Imagine seeing these comments in their thousands for the last year (and onwards) and then seeing a song about 'where is my husband' 'I would like a big and shiny diamond ring' and then seeing it's from a British girl when you (and she) knows full well that 'providers' are not the culture here. Propa propapropaganda I will have to make a song of my own about things like this. And there is some context about the 'diamond ring' aspect - when you think of songs like 'diamonds are forever' or 'diamonds are a girls best friend' and you see old movies where women receive expensive jewellery and gifts.

That is not the culture in the UK, I can't speak for elsewhere but £25 from argos is the expectation. But context wise, the reason why expensive jewellery was important was as insurance in a time women were not allowed their own bank accounts or credit cards. The insurance meant in a breakup or walkout, they could sell that jewellery or those designer clothes. This always confused me like why would anyone want those things - it being the only way a woman could safely store her money and it all makes sense. It is a major plot point in some of those old movies. So then read the lyrics in my screenshots, what is the implication of a woman singing this in 2025 with the backdrop of it not representing British culture, while elsewhere, there is a conservative push to roll back women's rights to the times we couldn't have bank accounts. And suddenly the cute, catchy song is insidious.

(Screenshots below)

7 Brit awards 6 in one year...(this is a lot from my memory of watching Brit awards a long time ago, I would say 2-3 for one artist in a year is more common)

This is very cute and if you didn't know Nara is known as a tradwife shill you might not question this, but this is basically a massive dogwhistle to those who are aware

Nara's weird cooking videos

Calling that song 'retro pop' and one of the type of comments I have seen thousands of over the years

Didn't take bad screenshots intentionally I was trying to get the text here, 9 million streams in 5 days (with 2 million followers...) and 75,000 in the queue for NYC gig

3 million streams in one day and NFL halftime show (this is a big deal and pretty unheard of for a relatively small British artist)

The stage show straight from the 50s shown on terrestial TV (the audience who would watch this skews normie and older so they might be unaware of the greater context surrounding this song)

Performing at the Grammys and Oscars. This is an abundance of accolades for someone who, in social media terms has a normal amount of followers. Most people with the 1mil 2mil range are still in their sponsored post era at best, generally they are on the independent side and husting. I very rarely if ever see this level of industry support combined with that follower count. So to be receiving these many accolades and placements when the followers are on the average side means there is big financial backing from the higher ups.

And she also has a song with Mark Ronson, who made Back to Black with Amy Winehouse (coincidentally I saw earlier today, a video of him playing back her first demo recordings of Back to Black with him, as people in the comments were comparing voicenotes after Taylor Swift's recent ones were released) and every video has comments comparing their speaking and singing voices. So I think she is being pushed as the 'next' Amy which is a topic unto itself.

The troublesome part of the lyrics, above, which are the same parts included in every viral tiktok clip. This song actually has a lot of lyrics but every clip is mostly focused on this section.

Hard to phrase what I mean to say and be clear, basically people who treat others with no kindness or care, yet demand *they* recieve kindness and care, are manipulating and gaslighting everyone else in their own belief they are special/above others. And nobody is immune to manipulation, even when you are aware and know it's happening/try and avoid it, you can internalise their mistreatment and not have an accurate view of yourself as a person, or think you are somehow incorrect in your judgement, because you are party to an extended gaslighting campaign to distort your reality. I struggle with this my whole life because I look under the rock and feel sorry for the creepy crawlies I find under there, try and help them, only to find the people who avoided them were correct. And a bug will always be a bug.

I remember once a very long time ago on a online forum I used to use, populated by creepy crawlies I felt sorry for, a woman had been abused by one of these creepy crawlies somehow instinctually searched and opened the forum to see a very disgusting post about herself, detailing a personal and sexual interaction she had with this specimen, who incidentally considered themselves to be a good person. She took it upon herself to inform everyone in real life that he knew, how he treated her and what he did, and was treated with derision and scorn. Despite being bad people, they found her morality/reaction to be the absurdity. I went back there for one day in 2021, they hadn't changed, in fact they had gotten far worse and I hightailed it out of there. Why do I think bad people can change when I have never seen it happen?

There were very few women on there, that person wasn't me. Instead I KNEWW they were bad people and partly would use it just to see what they would say about me since they loved doxing and lying about me constantly while they remained anonymous - and partly used it as a social training ground of sorts since there was no delete function. One day I messaged all their moderators asking them to delete my accounts, and thus posts, and one person did thankfully. (And actually after my one day visit in 2021 they implemented a delete function since I did the same thing in speedrun, I asked a moderator to delete all my posts that day which they kindly did)

I think the getting my accounts deleted was 2012, and the 24 hours in and out was at the end of 2021, I don't know what I expected to find but I was a bit surprised to find a 'hermits huddled on abandoned planet terrified and attacking outsiders' kind of vibe. And all the same people were still there. Funnily enough my online friend (for 6 years or more, maybe 2008 to 2016 something like that) was the very first person to interact with me (liking my thread) while not knowing who I was. But yeah I have given an immense amount of my time to misanthropes in my life and why? (genuinely I cannot tell you) I think because I have personally educated myself, changed and grown, I expect others can, but they ~☆can't☆~ or maybe won't.

My attitude to making music and art is it doesn't have to be perfect, a lot of what people found to be lifechanging music in past decades is, listening now with our current tech (not fuzzy radios) - poorly mixed with clunky instrumentals, doesn't matter though because the meaning and motive behind the music is what people find inspiring. I stumbled upon two random poems on tiktok the other day which I thought were very meaningful, from someone with 22 followers, and my comment was the only comment. Meaning comes from intention, not from perfection and not from fame, two things people chase now. They chase perfection because of the illusion of eternal content streams, they think they are competing with eternity. And fame because they see numbers instead of people, and think big number good. But what actually matters is meaning, motive, intention, expression and that is done best without trying to create perfection.

Thinking about male strength, societal expectation, and safety. In short, I would not expect a man to defend me (physically, I do expect someone to defend me verbally and also with letters/emails/etc because that's what I do. I can always fight with my brain, but not my fists - brainfog is real, but if you are really dedicated to the bit you can still get things done😅) and well, I am a formerly chronically fatigued person, who I realise has hypermobility and EDS traits, and who dislocated their own shoulder 3d sculpting a doll a couple of years ago...I don't find physical strength appealing in the slightest. So not only do I not expect it but many expressions of it are offputting to me.

I got chronic fatigue in about 2004, approximately 16 years before an estimated 36% of the world got long covid. (Based on the linked study, and accepting the reality that near 100% of people have got covid at least once but likely many times in the past 5 years - except the most covid conscious who isolate and mask, which is a visibly tiny minority)

Now, daily I see articles scroll past about symptoms I had for over a decade but nobody ever talked about. About how these symptoms negatively affect every aspect of your life. Now, still as a healthy person - still living during a pandemic, so I take many precautions to be covid safe because I know how hard this is to shift - I have pale, sensitive skin that cuts, marks, burns and scars very easily. I have to be very clean and free from viruses and infections because they will attack me to the degree they attack a child and be hard to shift - sensitive skin combined with hypermobility is a whole other category of weak nerd.

So guess what kind of man (or anyone) I would feel safe near. It's not a person who can easily disolocate or break my bones. It's not someone who is out and about all day and rolling around in fields playing sports and who never washes their hands and whatever else, because I will get skin infections and viruses and be a goner before you can snap your fingers. It's not someone who is rough with other people and expects them to take it because *I will break* as I always think of the teddy saying in AI, clinging on to the robot boy.

Luckily, I do live in a country where hyper masculinity is not the expectation, so not every man falls into the category of guaranteed harm. And the women who match those men are women who don't fear for their lives or health in those men's company. They will not bend, break, cut, or infect the way a child would. The people who are able to maintain relationships with men are those unafraid of dislocation, breaks, cuts, bruises, infections and viruses. And I don't mean to imply they are received with violence, more that some people can receive these things in everyday life depending on lifestyle and behaviour. And it's rare to see or meet a man who is, well, see above. I actually saw an interesting man last year on the tube, he was with friends who were ignoring him past the point he was too weak to stand, a few minutes into their conversation. It was a younger man (maybe mid late 20s) with a wooden walking stick and a long brown braid, and smart clothes. (Maybe a Jewish man in retrospect, but the three friends were dressed regularly) He obviously had some sort of long term leg injury or so. If it was temporary, he wouldn't have the nice wooden walking stick nor the personality I could see expressed. People with temporary injuries have temporary walking aids and jolly demeanours, disability a mere blip in their otherwise healthy lives.

I saw his friends keep chatting while he was sat some seats away out of earshot (rather than move the conversation to him) and I just thought he looked very interesting and I wanted to know more. I am not a person who is attracted to strangers for the reasons detailed above, the majority of people can physically hurt me without even trying to, another tube ride, a man much heavier than me stepped on my foot while I was not in his way, but luckily I was wearing boots - the women with him was a similar size and stature but I would have broken bones within days if I had to sustain company of someone like that. And regularly sustained injury is not attractive to me. So a gentle personality, which can't be observed in a stranger and must be studied over time, is needed to even consider sharing space with someone. That means no aggressive movements that stress me either, no indulgent or anti social behaviour that deprives me of food, sleep and whatever else. A calm and unselfish, considerate personality since stress and food and sleep deprivation affects physical health, increases chances of accidents, and is detrimental to healing. So back to this man. As he was leaving I said 'you look very interesting, what's your name? I want to see if I can find you online' and he seemed to have never heard this before and be completely unready for such a question, he was friendly but surprised and said he didn't use social media much but his name was matthew (i think) as he went out the door I said 'what's your surname?' He answered but it was indecipherable (two or three syllables) and he nearly fell over at that point so I left him to it. (I was seated, this was like a 20 second interaction) Partly I did that because his friends were ignoring him despite him being the most interesting person among them, but I think there was some affinity (not that we would know since I outwardly appear healthy) with the long-term chronically something. I could sense a sort of polite resignment and bitterness that only those who have been 'weak' and ignored for a long time get. (They left the train because one of the other three guys realised they were on the wrong tube line entirely for their destination, I interacted after the other three had left, they were standing close to the door)