#tw albiesm

Note- This post is edited. Reason is at the end. Please reblog the edited version as the original is unintentionally albiest.

I joke and laugh about Leon Pokemon being a dummy idiot (affectionate). He can't even find his way to the largest building in a city without assistance. But. Like. I started thinking about all the ways Chairman Rose took advantage of that over the years. Telling Leon what to say. How to act. Who to be. To say nothing of the sponsors on his cape. How much power do they have over Leon's persona? Where does he end and they begin?

And THEN I thought about how the League works in Galar. It's just...a much bigger thing than elsewhere in the Pokemon world. Simple gym battles take place in massive stadiums. How many of these battles occur per week, let alone per day? They are part of every person's life, even if they are just a spectator. And the sponsors/League controls the entire circus. Rose's intentions weren't fantastic. You expect me to trust the nameless corporations?

Also, how many Pokemon were scooped out of the Wild Area to train for glory, for a sponsor, for money, for power? How many were thrown away, unable to measure up to the standards of an extraordinarily complicated and demanding League? How many Trainers only care about being as strong as Leon, not caring about the well-being of their Pokemon?

We saw Hop do this. Admittedly, he is not malicious and Bede was crawling under his skin. But there are malicious Trainers out there. If not for the fact you need a sponsorship to participate in the League- this bottlenecking how many Trainers can participate- Galar's ecosystem would be in fucking shambles.

And speaking of Bede, his entire identity revolved around victory and power thanks to- surprise surprise- Chairman Rose. Only when he met Opal did he finally reach his potential...and even that involved shifting from Psychic types to Fairy types. Meaning his Duosion and Gothorita had to be either released or retired.

And I didn't forget about Piers the Rat Man and Spikemuth. Rose told Piers to move to a far away location with a Power Spot to enable flashy Dynamax battles. Piers told him to fuck off. Thus his gym is in backwater nowhere where few Trainers dare to dread and the whole town has been swallowed by crime and poverty. Did I mention Piers blames himself for Spikemuth's current state? Meanwhile, this is- once again- Rose and the League/sponsors having more power than anyone has the right to possess.

Combining these factors, you get a society in which the Trainer and Pokemon- provided they are strong enough- are a product. A commodity. Something to wow audiences and nothing more. Trainers like Hop are left in the shadows of the greats. But the greats are decaying giants, dangling from slowly snapping puppet strings.

This system doesn't go away because Rose is gone. In fact, Leon takes over as League Chairman. But how much of the new leadership is really Leon? Outside of battle, the man has his struggles. I can see the Battle Tower and Galarian Star Tournament being his ideas. But there's more to running the League than that. How many people- including his sponsors- are vying for power in the background?

If I didn't sell you on Galar being a dystopian nightmare yet, there is so much pollution the local Corsola are effectively zombies. Much of it probably comes from the stadiums- powering the screens, keeping the lights on at night, possibly energy from Dynamaxing. Electric-type Pokemon could debatably cut down on the pollution but like- how many Pikachu do you need?

It's a shame there was so much sleeping on SwSh because there's so much insidiously good shit bubbling just under the surface. I think if it was canonically explored people would like Gen 8 more (even if it ended with a reinforcement of status quo like Gen 5). But GameFreak had been afraid to make digs at its own formula since Black and White. The League does exist in other regions, albeit it's not as secretly dark as this. Addressing the Galar League could put a foot in the door to question the entire series.

•we've been doing this for centuries!!!

•if you knew basic genetics, you would know that two nondisabled people can have a disabled child.

•bold of you to assume that they are weak. Lot of them can and will kill you.

Me: I wrote an autistic character based on my own experiences as an autistic person. His condition was more severe as a young child, but did not go away entirely. This character does not reflect all autistic people. Autism is a spectrum, and different people display different symptoms due to various factors (including treatment/early intervention, which I had). I'm not trying to write about all autistic people with this one character.

Dumbshit Fuckface: So autism goes away as you age?????? If you intervene early????? Does that mean there's a cure????? 👀

Asshole Dipwit: This character is offensive because he doesn't reflect my specific experience with autism!!!! You need to rewrite him from the ground up NOWWWWWW!!!! 😡

Me:

I'm autistic. 24/7. Just because I'm verbal doesn't mean I'm not autistic, nor that I can stop being autistic specifically to Be Brave and Do a Hard Thing.

I get extreme anxiety over things that does not matter to a normal person. Especially new things. And also things that cut me off from my hyperfixations. Plus things I cannot control. This is because I am autistic.

My brain stores Pokemon abilities easier than money-related matters. I can barely figure out how the job sphere works, either (networking? is that a Digimon thing?). This is because I am autistic.

Sometimes my headphones are loud and I wear them around the house in places people don't like. I am stimming. This is because I am autistic.

Just because my autism gives me writing/drawing/academic-related benefits does not mean it is not a disability. My brain is a computer that allotted too much memory to my hyperfixations. So there's not a lot of room for anything else (work, money, social interactions). When I can't interact with my hyperfixations or do something that must pull from the "smaller knowledge banks", I become anxious or shut down. This is not how a neurotypical brain works.

I love the millionaire who has everything she wants except the protagonist. I love the huntress whose pursuit of the protagonist grows more personal with each failure. I love the mother who sets forth to "fix" her autistic son and makes it the world's problem. I love the woman who used to be ugly, but was given beauty and magic and misused both. I love the woman blinded by "love", who forgot she's the girl who grew up too soon. I love the women who fear death so much that they'll last for eons, ruining the lives of generations.

Me: Yeah why?

My brain: Add some albiesm to that OC's backstory all nice and project-y like for me, ok? :)

Me: Sure, whatever.

Time: *passes like gas*

I might be reading too much into it but as an autistic person (verbal), I'm just... confused? How is stimming a "good person radar"? Why are you using the "autistic people are pure gentle souls" trope in the first place?