#double bager

I don’t think I’m a Badger? I value groups and being in groups but if a group I’m in starts being stupid about something important, I’m out of there. Like I was hanging out with this group of women and making friends with them and then they started sharing Qanon stuff and I was like NOPE BYE. I lost my parents to Qanon (estrangement, not death) and I have zero respect for anyone who spreads that. 

Number one reason a Badger will leave a group - they perceive the group to be hurting someone who they consider people. QAnon stuff definitely hurts people, and dehumanizes people, and there’s a lot in there to make a Badger nope right out. I get that your parents (or at least your Dad) are toxic Badgers who probably dehumanize a lot, but I promise you that they’re the exception. 

I’m feeling angry just thinking about it again. I did leave a bigger community I was more invested in after my Lion best friend convinced me it was toxic and I still feel awful about it. 

Wait, do you feel awful about leaving, or awful about being part of the community in the first place? (or both?)

There was all this covid misinformation being spread and two of my friends were being mistreated. I didn’t want to leave all my friends but I’m high risk and felt so uncomfortable and also angry at these ignorant jerks putting everyone at risk. I tried to talk to important community figures and turn them against the person who was acting badly but they didn’t care and almost everyone who did care decided to stay in the situation anyway. I still feel really betrayed by that and I miss everyone so much. Not the people I didn’t know, but the people I was friends with or getting to know better. I’ve tried to find a new social home but it’s just not the same.

I realize that all sounds super Badger-y. 

… it really, really does. I’m even getting some badger secondary with that particular “leverage the community” style of problem solving.

BUT I’m not always fair. Like if something is wrongfully in my favor, I feel a twinge like I’m doing something wrong but I’m poor and life hasn’t been fair to me and I need to take what I can get. 

That twinge is what I’m interested in. You value fairness. You would like to be fair, and it bothers you when you’re not able to be. 

I’m not going to be obviously unfair but you can only be burned so many times before you stop trusting others to have your back. Oh lord am I a really burned Badger? 

Yeah, now you sound like a Burned Badger. 

I remember in middle school I was super into my hockey team and it was so great, we were all friends. Then most of my friends left the team and it was horrible and I was suddenly the outcast and got bullied. And then I changed schools the year after that and the groups i joined there all treated me badly and suddenly my attitude is screw the team, as long as I look good for the college scouts we can lose every game by 10 points for all I care. 

You’re talking a lot - a lot a lot - about groups you’ve been a part of. How important those groups are to you, how devastating it’s been when they fall apart, and how awful it feels when you don’t have one. 

Wow. Okay so I’ll spare you the original scenario I was going to give about how I need to eat fish for health reasons so now I can’t be vegetarian and does choosing myself over my ideals make me a Snake. 

Oh screw that. Putting your “ideals” above your HEALTH makes you an Exploded Badger. Even framing it in that way makes you an Exploded badger. 

Because I don’t really see fish as “people” like I do pigs and other farm animals. 

Okay. I’m seeing a Burnt + Exploded Badger Primary here. I definitely see young badger, latching on to your parents but also getting in trouble with things like propaganda and peer-pressure (the Aphrodite thing.) I’m not getting much of a sense of who you are. Even the experience of being “sucked” into causes - subsumed by causes and communities - it doesn’t feel that way if you’re a Lion.

You’ve talked about three separate important communities, and how difficult it was when they fell apart. You left because you realized they were hurting people (and also with your friends to back you up.) With such bad luck with groups, I’m not surprised you burned, and I’m really not surprised that you’ve got a pattern of making tiny communities around one or two people.

I get that you don’t want me to tell you that you’re a Badger, I get that you’ve got bad associations surrounding that… but still. 

For my secondary: I have gadgets and knowledge but that’s mainly for specific situations/hobbies.

Give me details! What specific situations? What does that mean.

 When I research, it’s not for fun but to make sure I’m doing something right. 

Okay, I’m calling it. Badger secondary. This idea that there even is a “right” way to do things is a very Badger thing. 

When I’m in trouble, I go to trusted sources and relevant support groups to figure out the best course of action if it’s not something my close friends know enough about. 

Problem solving strategy:

Ask close friends (Badger)

Ask support groups (Badger) 

Research (Bird)

I definitely treat recipes like spells, like you do, unless the recipe is WRONG in which case I’ll fix it if someone insists on using it. Once a friend just started improvizing a recipe while we were cooking together and I thought I was going to have an aneurysm. 

Badger.

But I don’t need to believe the lie unless I’m taking that too literally (as one does). I used to be horrible at hiding my feelings so I’m not sure what changed but unless I’m just DONE or it’s something egregious, I can put on a happy face now and just focus on what I agree with or like. 

That is a description of mirroring, yes. With a bit of Badger performance on top.

I can lie but it feels uncomfortable/unnatural. Like one time someone made this joke that I thought was really not okay and everyone was looking at me so I convincingly but very uncomfortably pretended it was funny even though inside I was thinking “wow what is wrong with this person?!” 

That’s very Badger primary - you want to keep the peace, the greater good is keeping the peace. And you slapped on a bit of a Badger performance to do it. You clearly didn’t like doing it, it didn’t make you feel good, you wanted to just match the groups vibe. 

One thing I’m noticing with your submission in particular is that you’re dealing with very extreme opinions. You just dropped in QAnon? That is EXTREME. It functions like a cult, and that’s not a controversial opinion. You’re talking about situations where you need to lie in order to feel safe. And that muddies the waters, because if I’m just looking for ways to fly under the radar and get myself out of the situation? I’d say anything. I figure most anybody would. 

Or when someone interrupted my friends and started asking intrusive questions out of nowhere and I wanted so so badly to tear them a new one for being so horrendously rude but my friends were being very kind about it so I just seethed inwardly while forcing myself to smile.

You need to get yourself some better communities. 

I’m really bad at sticking with things. I barely have any free time these days and I’m so tired and my executive function issues just don’t allow me to keep up with Duolingo or my knitting projects or even the book I was super excited about last week but now it’s dead to me.

Sounds like your secondary is getting kind of burnt. And this does sound like a Burnt badger secondary to me.

I really can’t improvise aside from just joking around about things and being silly. I can be very blunt but it’s less “I’m always the same” as “if someone is wrong, they’re going to hear about it and why would I be wrong to make them feel better?” And I used to be controversial for a laugh in the past but that was because everyone thought it was funny. If people I care about or who can make things harder for me get upset about something I say, I panic and try to pivot. 

🤦🏻‍♀️ I’m basically Mr Darcy aren’t I? I’m a double Badger. I’m going to go watch Pride and Prejudice now and think about my life.

Yeah. You’re a Double Badger. 

(I don’t really like most Double Badger characters though? They’re usually too soft and nice or just…boring).