#shatteredsys

I’ve seen some art with the line “the future is plural!”

I hope it isn’t.

People who aren’t part of systems can also experience plurality for a variety of reasons, such as religious beliefs, and for them, plurality can be a beautiful and positive part of life. Something that our system yearns for desperately.

When someone expresses a desire to embrace plurality in their future, it doesn’t necessarily mean they are advocating for a form of plurality rooted in trauma or harm. There are many healthy expressions of plurality that exist. This is why plurality alone isn't included in diagnostic criteria—because the experience can be vastly different for those who aren’t systems.

For those of us who may have faced challenges within our own lives and systems, it can be hard to imagine these other forms of plurality. But it’s important to remember that we have an opportunity to educate and connect with other plurals, who can help spread awareness and understanding. They could help us learn how to develop better relationships with our systems by teaching us things they do in theirs.

Up until now, I’ve avoided writing on anything in her POV because I’ve been scrambling to thoroughly research DID so I don’t misrepresent the disorder (I don’t have it, myself). So far, that’s meant rereading the DSM-V chapters on DID and PTSD. I’ve also attempted to interview two of my friends who have DID, which has met with marginal success; both view their alters as individuals with separate personalities and motivations, but one has mostly had the same alters since it realized its alters were there, with a few exceptions, while the other experiences erratic melding and splitting and discovery and disappearance of alters on a nearly biweekly basis. Aside from the fact that the former friend claims it can deliberately call on specific alters to front and describes its alters as having interpersonal relationships with one another and having “rooms” they sometimes lock themselves in to be alone, I haven’t learned much else (what for all that they have I Forgor My Name Sometimes Because My Life Was/Is Hell Disorder).

I’m wanting to branch out to get a sense of other peoples’ experiences to the best of yall’s abilities to describe them, so as to get a better idea of what DID feels like from the perspective of someone with the disorder. Do your alters have “rooms” that they can retreat to? Are they always present and giving you their input, wanted or otherwise? Do you have alters that don’t seem to fulfill a “role” (ie protector, persecutor, caregiver, etc)? How do you feel about them? Do your alters have opinions about each other? Do they even know about each other? Do they speak to you with words, or do they mostly communicate through emotions/vibes and pictures? Do they communicate with you at all?

Genuinely, I’m not sure what to ask about because of how little information I have on what DID looks like for people who have it. I don’t even know if the questions I asked were insensitive or not! I’m kinda blind here.

If anyone wants to share their experiences with me, I’d be forever grateful, and you have my word that I will keep whatever information anyone gives me between us, even if explicitly and without doubt given permission to do otherwise. And, for extra security and comfort, I have anon activated if you wish to keep your username to yourself.

Regardless of if anyone reaches out to me, I wish you all the best.

As in, discrimination against minorities is not punk

As in, abelism is not punk

Therefore endos aren’t punk

Updated version!

We're not typically an essay kind of blog, but there's something l've been turning over in my mind since l've seen it.

I have the post pulled up now actually, and about 11 hours ago @/the-alarm-system "recoined" (stole) the term systempunk in a long post, as well as designed a flag with its own meaning and I want to sort through some of it.

I also have a few personal pet peeves about their flag design, given that it's color palette clashes and the flag is way too busy. I don't expect it to spread far given that it violates several rules of good design (saying this as someone who has been to school for graphic design.)

I will not post it here, because I don't care to spread it any more than this post already may.

Their flag slightly predates my own version of the systempunk flag, but given that theirs was created for a separate concept with a stolen name, I maintain that we were the first.

We begin with their definition of systempunk.

“A term or Subculture surrounding the liberation of plurals and the critique of psychiatry."

First issue lies here. Both the destigmitization of dissociative disorders and critique of the psych field are extremely important discussions to have!

But they are separate discussions. There is absolutely overlap, but combining the two here is kind of shooting yourself in the foot, because then the conversation in that tag will be disorganized.

Have a systempunk movement AND an anti-psych or psych-critical movement. That way people can easily find the relevant discussions and terms.

This is followed up with a bit about the harm the psychiatric field has caused (not delving into that as that's not what this blog is about) and then circle back onto "the future is plural."

This is not one of the instances where OP means it in the "the future is destigmitization" sense, as they are pro endo. (On a side note, even ignoring the endo use of the phrase-- if I need to read about a slogan to understand the meaning of the slogan, it's a bad slogan. The point of a slogan is to communicate a concept quickly.)

The flag has black and brown stripes akin to the progress flag to represent systems of color, which is the only part of the design we have no critique for, but are describing anyway just as a bit of information.

The purple stripe stands for:

“Endo solidarity... endogenic systems are continuously harmed by antis who remain uncritical of psychiatry."

Once again, we are mixing two expansive concepts into one term.

The term anti-endo doesn't imply a position one way or the other on the psychiatry discussion.

Some anti-endos swear by the DSM5, others don't. Anti-endo is a term that means anti-endo/ endo-critical. That is all it means.

There is a difference between holding the DSM as the complete authority on mental illness and saying that a trauma disorder is caused by trauma.

I'm not sure if OP knows that and is choosing to cast anti-endos in a bad light, or legitimately confused. However, OP is a syscourse blog who is on a lot of blocklists and is spammy in the tags, and has likely been blocked by anyone who isn't also out looking to pick immature fights. (This is a system who made a post in all caps calling for an endo raid on #systempunk.)

Continuing directly from the last quote:

“[Antis] are against the liberation of plurals and deny a plural future in order to push singlethood onto others."

It's possible OP is referring to final fusion, which the anti-endo community is not a monolith on either. Most people we've interacted with are supporters of functional multiplicity (including ourselves.)

Most likely however, they mean that anti-endos "push singlethood" by telling endogenics that they can't have a trauma disorder without trauma.

And I could go into a whole tirade about that, but dozens of systems have done it before and I doubt any pro-endos have gotten this far. I am writing this for the anti-endo and on-the-fence audiences.

Visit @antimisinfo's helpful masterpost for a list of legitimate sources.

OP seems to believe that by “forcing” this singlethood, we are contributing directly to the oppression of systems. Hypocritically, OP themselves are contributing directly to the oppression of trauma victims.

Endogenics are not part of the "diverse experiences of plurality” (we are diverse, but united in origin) given that they don't exist. And if they did, they would have such a fundamentally different experience than trauma-formed systems that both groups would need separate language and tags to have space to themselves.

And endos already have a well-established punk tag for themselves. It seems they won't be happy until they chase trauma victims out of every space they create for themselves and steal every term. They've already stolen even the medical terminology used for CDDs.

The yellow stripe of the flag is meant to represent those with actual CDDs. Once again, psych stuff is brought up. However, I do agree with OP that those who do not want final fusion should not be pushed into it.

The pink and white stripes of the flag are entirely dedicated to anti-psych points. I think this would do wonderfully on it's own flag. But bringing the large range of discussion the anti-psych movement encompasses and the large range of discussion the CDD community has into the same tags is going to make it monumentally difficult to find the conversations you're wanting to have, and weaken both communities considerably.

There is a line of barbed wire across the flag that is partially for the same anti-psych movement as well as in favor of protecting and defending endogenic "identities." The ampersand stands for plurality.

There are fangs on the flag as well, encouraging systems to be loud and proud about their existence. And I agree that systems should make themselves known. However, endogenic systems don't exist, and their promotion will continue to drag us down.

I have read testimonies about traumagenic (real) systems being fakeclaimed or denied treatment by healthcare experts who, through exposure to endos, came to the conclusion CDDs are fake entirely.

Real systems seeking treatment and help after a lifetime of horrific abuse are being denied care.

Not to mention the setback of social acceptance by endos.

Super excited because we love madpunk and unfortunately pluralpunk is filled w endos. And honestly, we hate using the term plural for ourselves because it’s almost always used by endos and endo supporters.

If you want to keep endo posts off your dash, here is a list of some tags they frequent so you can add them to your filtered tags!

Please let me know any tags to add! I’ll update this post! :)

To filter tags, go to settings —> general settings —> filtering

On to the List!

- Endo/endogenic/tulpamancy/etc— tags that are the names of their concepts

- Pro endo

- Endo safe

- Endo friendly

- Actuallyendo

- Inclusys/exclusys

- Sysmed

- Traumascum

- Pluralgang (most tags with “plural” in them get a lot of endo attention unfortunately)

- Enexto

- Enexswe

- pluralpunk

- pluralcore

- Traumaendo

- Mixed origin

Recently, I shared a technique I use when I’m in pain to my partner, a technique that I thought was fine and normal, and he just shook his head and said “that’s sad.”

This keeps happening to me.

Said technique was that I can shut off the majority of my pain by pretending the affected part of the body is not part of me and is like a piece of clothing/inanimate object attached to me.

Sure the pain is still there but it’s… filtered? Walled off? It’s like putting on noise cancelling headphones at a concert. It’s much less intense and I’m able to focus on other tasks without bothering with it, when otherwise I might need to hassle with painkillers (or ask my parents/teachers/doctors for help.)

I learned quickly as a kid that my distress was, apparently, always exaggerated, and always an excuse.

I discovered I could do this as a kid and learned to disconnect from my whole body easily, instantly, on command, in order to escape whatever situation I was in. I literally used to call what I now know is a dissociative disorder “leaving my body,” or just “leaving.”

And I leave a lot even on a daily basis. When going to see my psychiatrist, I waited in mental catatonia while my body chatted with a nurse and I got my vitals taken. It felt like I wasn’t able to even process what I was looking at. Reality and my senses are very loose, and sometimes I forget them.

And despite knowing I have a dissociative disorder, I didn’t realize that “disconnecting” part of your body from your consciousness wasn’t how most people automatically respond to discomfort? Or at least pain?

So it felt like being hit by a car when I was faced with proof that I am physically disabled.

I still feel stupid when I take breaks, or painkillers, or use a mobility aid. Like I don’t need them. I can just switch the pain off and make it feel like distant discomfort.

But if I do that, all my senses are dulled, and so is my reaction time, and my spatial awareness, even more of my grasp on the passage of time, and some of my motor skills.

…

I want to know if this is something anyone else experiences. I’m sure others do, but I feel really alone in this.