parodeity | subnautica ic inbox 2.0;

It's mine, you gave it to me, even if it is wrong.

[ dave says, like he can't actually turn on charm when he tries. USUALLY WITH KIDS OR HOMURA THESE DAYS. ]

So, you think I have PTSD. [ no. try again. a breath. he curls his fingertips up just enough to brush dirk's. ] I...have PTSD.

[ saying either phrase is impossible to do in the annoyingly joking tone he'd been using earlier about the charm thing, but even so dave shoots for light and unbothered. it'd pass if anyone else were the judge, but it sounds slightly manic to anyone who actually knows what he sounds like when - well, when he sounds slightly manic. the list is pretty damn small. ]

[There it comes. Dirk hears the breath and feels the touch. He measures his own breath, stays calm. Tries to give that calm back to Dave as best as he can.]

I can't diagnose it or anything. I'm not a psychiatric professional, and I have a ten minute dissertation on mental health labelling and 21st century pathologizing that I'm not going to dump on you right now, unless you want to hear it, in which case we can talk about the history of the DSM and how homosexuality was considered a mental disorder by it up until the 1970s.

[pause. so much for calm.]

Sorry. Does... it help to think about it like that? To put a name to the things you sometimes experience and feel.

I don't know.

[ it's not a dodge. or it isn't meant to be one. ]

I never used to try to name things. Even the whole...not 100% straight thing I didn't really try to, like, label for a long time. Let alone anything bigger. I'll let you know when I figure it out? [ ... ] What's the dissertation's main points?

Pathologizing is a way of containing and controlling deviations from the norm, which means that anything that seems like a problem to a contemporary society is considered either crime or disease. That's how homosexuality ended up in there. It was deemed harmful to society and the person who had it. In this case, and in others, it is a way to identify, contain, and then punish those who don't obey social conventions.

Diagnoses and labels from the DSM control and regulate what is or isn't worthy of treatment. There was, for example, a major controversy about gender dysphoria being in the DSM because it indicates that gender non-conformity is illness, but takin' it out meant that insurance companies wouldn't relegate funding to people who wanted hormone therapy or reassignment surgery. Its decisions on these things therefore make determinations on resource allocation.

The DSM rigidly defines mental problems as binary, on-or-off. You meet a certain number of symptoms, therefore you have the disease. You don't, so you're fine. Individual details get lost under the broadness and rigidity of labelling and people slip through the cracks or get categorized and treated in ways that don't help them. This is resource allocation again, as well as errors in methodology.

Treating this sort of thing as a question of mental illness, which is to say disease, is in some respects metaphorical. That is, in common language, disease and illness are considered problems of a biological nature with the body which need to be treated to restore the body to a fully functioning state. It doesn't refer to the mind which is sometimes a matter of a chemical unbalance, yes, but sometimes it's environmental damage, sometimes it is not following the standard demonstration of things, sometimes it's habits and behaviors, sometimes it's a state of being that you'd like to get surgery to fix. Pulling all of that together under the concept of disease turns those which are not biological problems into metaphors of biology. It makes pathology out of things that aren't from literal pathogens.

[The main points are not brief. Sorry, Dave. He pauses, then.]

One of the reasons I don't like to term myself 'gay' is because I don't like the idea of being part of a culture that limits and defines me by my sexuality. At the same time, I understand how important it was to identify that way for people in the past. It gave them an identity to form communities with, a way to find each other and to organize for political action. For some people, saying it made it real or helped them understand themselves better. When it came to labelling my sexuality, I've always felt false and caged in, in the manner of needing to live up to certain expectations and requirements. So it isn't a thing that helps me, and it bothers me when others apply that label to me.

I think all the same things about labels in sexuality carry through over. It can be damaging and limiting, and you can lose yourself under generalities and expectations. But. [Dirk looks down. It's still hard to say, and his words slow over it.] It helped when you said I was suicidal? It made it feel more like a valid thing I could ask for help with, instead of just a thing that was fundamentally broken about me because I am in every possible way a failure at being a human being.

Edited 2017-01-13 06:39 (UTC)

[ like dirk did when dave brought up hal, dave kind of groans but then just. lets the dissertation he asked for happen. it helps, but not because of the information. he's been known to ask rose to ramble at him to distract him, and that was halfway why he asked dirk what it was he wanted to say on the topic.

he won't interrupt. he can actually listen when he tries to. but at the end dave will sit up straight. ish. which means he pulls his head off of dirk's shoulder. he doesn't stop the really quite frankly pathetic barely finger touching thing that is happening or scoot backwards, though? so this situation is just kind of dumb directly in dirk's space but making contact only very strangely. ]

Do you ever listen to yourself speak? You even said it earlier. Is that...is that how you think about it now? That you're not broken or a failure or anything else. You're just a kid adapting to a new not so hot situation after thirteen years of a crap one and three more of a sucky one?

[ does it help to think about it like that? ]

No. It doesn't help, exactly, not...always. I don't like thinkin' about...illnesses or diseases like you said. Rose callin' it what it was at the volcano...helped. Because I didn't want to have to say what it was to her, so I just explained it, and let her name it. Sometimes - sometimes I think calling it by name helps. But mostly - mostly what helps, when I'm not disbelievin' it, is you tellin' me it's okay not to be okay.

[ and out of a sense of fairness: ]

I don't mind the label of bisexual, exactly, but I don't really like the expectation that I have to be one way or the other and that I have to actually say either?

[There's a moment of panic when Dave sits up straight and then Dirk parses what he means and. Oh. Right.]

You're calling me a hypocrite again. You must really like reaching that level of metahypocrisy.

[HE IS SAYING. He has to say it. But, you know, the listening thing. He will follow along.]

I'm trying to think of it like that more. It's on and off. But... the thing that it's okay not to be okay. That's really all I was trying to say. Whether or not you've got a label for what's going on is irrelevant to the fact that it's okay for you not to be okay.

[beat]

My research into the 21st century indicated American culture was really idiotic about bisexuality.

Fun family bondin' activity. You call me a hypocrite while you're bein' a hypocrite and I call you a hypocrite about that and then it all starts all over again. Or well it ain't fun exactly, but this is apparently the dumbass paradox cycle we're lockin' ourselves into here.

[ metahypocrisy: the saga. ]

I'll...work on tryin' to believe you about it. [ it had been a relief to believe it for a few minutes here and there? dave gestures to dirk's communicator with his free non fingertips touching hand why is that still a thing ] Things like that make me think - it isn't. But if you try, I'll try.

[ there's another out to take here rather than discussing that, though, so ]

21st century American culture was idiotic about a lot of things, but yeah in general when it existed in the media it was like, you know. Weird in a lot of ways. Did the whole you liking x y z is a phase because you also like a, and that's easier, or...whatnot? I honestly did not spend much time thinkin' about sexuality like at all as a kid. I mean, I regurgitated whatever I absorbed through the media, but I never sat down and thought about it. It straight up did not matter to me at the time. And most of the macho bullshit I spewed was because I thought it'd, you know, be what Bro wanted and also just to hide insecurity central. So.

Edited 2017-01-13 07:07 (UTC)

All of our family bondin' activities are fun. [That particular g-drop was indeed to tease Dave.

He softens, though.]

Working on it is good. We can both put that in our columns. Beside eating regularly.

[They are very not okay, collectively. The out is kinda interesting to Dirk? He's always found it fascinating. Except the last part catches his attention and.]

Wait. Did you. Did you think your Bro was straight?

I guess??? Dirk, I did my best to never think about Bro and sex at the same time and he made it really hard. I didn't want to know, I guess? And he was like.

[ how to put it. dirk saw a lot, but clearly this part didn't like...carry over. ]

He was like the dudebro kinda 21st century guy you'd absolutely fuckin' hate. Maybe it was "ironic" and I just wasn't a high enough tier to understanding it like always, but all the stereotypical gamer guy skateboarder magazine tropes basically held true and he adhered to them like it was the fuckin' Art of War or just part of the irony ninja honorcode. When gay shit came up, it was mostly the, you know, haha that's soooooooo gay kinda thing or for laughs or what the fuck ever. Not that we talked? But he like. Wrote shit on blogs sometimes or wrote reviews on the magazines. It was all mostly unsettling on some level. I mean, I guess the naked guy dolls handcuffed together should've maybe been a tip off? But I'm really good at just, tryin' not to see sex toys or items when I do not want to, bein' buried in fuckin' sex puppets aside since at that point it is hard to just play it cool and pretend you're not seein' what you are seein'. That stuff was just always around, so it never...stuck out.

Edited 2017-01-13 07:17 (UTC)

I. Have a lot of concern for the unsettling aura of inappropriate sexual content, and definitely that's top tier in my critiques of his parenting, you know, below the actual physical abuse and mind games and traps, but still pretty high up there, and maybe those are things to address and we can do that now if you want, but he.

I was a dudebro?

[help him]

Yes??? Was that not. Obvious. I haven't made that obvious. Shit you didn't know me when I was thirteen years old.

[ dave makes a face. ]

Like, the shit I did for the ironies was all mostly shit he did on some level or another for...maybe? The irony? I can't for sure say that. He did like...some cool stuff? He was good with computers or whatever and had some ideas that might not be all bad, like I said, but which I was in no position to like appreciate or pay much attention to? But even then you have...way different ideas. But everythin' was always so extreme with him and it was usually just not in a good way and in retrospect he honestly seems more like a caricature or just a violent robot so I'm not really sure "dudebro" is even the correct term, it's just that like, a lot of the shit he was into was along those lines and I picked it up because...reasons.

Oh my God, why is my alternate universe self so unpalatable on every imaginable level.

[JUST LEAVE HIM HEAR TO DIE he puts his face in a hand. Only one hand because he's keeping that other hand there barely not much at all making contact with Dave's hand. BUT THIS HAND, THE FREE HAND. It's the hand for pain.]

Also. I will never bring up sex near you ever again. Sorry for every time I alluded to it ever.

Just. Don't ask Rose for examples of the shit I said at that age. I talked a big game about absolutely fuck all and at least when I talk about nothin' these days it ain't like that.

[ talking himself up. actually, he has generally started to do the reverse.

he still prefers it. ]

Is...what, really? Is that what you wanted to...address re: "inappropriate sexual content"? [ does this mean dirk won't give him condoms again praise be ]

Yes. Sorry? I didn't really think about. I'm sorry.

[He will die now and never ever ever even tease Dave about handholding again.]

Hoooow could you have known? I like. Told you about puppet porn sites and the puppet cabal, but I...

[ ... ]

It is kind of hard to convey the level to which Bro did anything with words only.

I noticed you get flustered by these things? I just didn't think. Of that. In... terms? You're always discussing dicks, and also asses, and how hot various moms are. So I didn't put it together.

[God no. God why.]

Never again. I promise.

I don't mind jokin' about it? Or, well, I am used to jokin' about it but sometimes it gets taken a little too far, mostly by Rose. Like, I have never bothered to censor my humor because I can't, I just.

[ ... ]

I am maybe not as invested in some of that stuff on a personal level, or at least do not think I will be consistently for a pretty long time? And also I could happily live without ever seein' another sex toy again in my entire life, I'm pretty sure.

But we don't have to stop, like, discussin' dicks and asses in the funny way, because they are objectively hilarious?

[he parses most of that through his shame but one bit confuses him.]

I thought you were bisexual, not asexual.

[beat]

Or we can not talk about that, and instead talk about how hilarious dicks and butts are. Or something otherwise less horrifying, like how I sit around thinking about how nice death would be.

I'm not asexual. I just...do not want to have sex right now?

[ but maybe that was obvious with the whole working back up to being comfortable touching people. ]

I don't know. I mean, I've had...interest? Just not in. Everything. Or probably as frequently as would be normal. I was too busy wantin' - lower key shit. [ see: handholding and hanging out. it took him years to consider doing anything further on a serious level and right now that's back to being not viable. ] I wasn't fully comfortable with the idea even before all this. I'm not...entirely thrilled about always bein' in control in the way in which I would have been expected to be, but I also don't want to be out of control. It's somethin' I could ignore in smaller scenarios but if it ever went further, I'd probably panic to some degree. I already feel really uneasy in nonsexual romantic scenarios wherein I'm expected to have the lead full stop in a manner which makes me feel kinda...somethin'. I just. I'm sure someday I will maybe revisit the issue when I am less fucked up over everythin' else, but maybe I should just let it lie for now?

[ why the fuck is he saying any of these words. shit. ]

Rose said it was "mature" of me if not the most mature option available, and she is literally the smuttiest person I know. So maybe it's okay.

[Dirk is notably not bothered by this at all. Like, super disturbed by his own fuck-ups still, but totally at ease with the conversation in this phrase.]

Rose is right. Putting the things you can't handle to the side while you sort out your things is usually a pretty good idea. Especially in terms of this, it's fraught with issues if you push yourself past your comfort zone. There's a reason me and Jake firmly kept ourselves to friends-only contact until we had done more work on ourselves and our relationship. You just really are better off not tangling things up worse forcing yourself to bring that in at the moment.

I broke up with Vantas, anyway.

[ it's actually on topic to the topic although none of this is on topic to the main purpose of the discussion. ]

I think we were supposed to be talkin' about sayin' no?

Edited 2017-01-13 08:13 (UTC)

Do you want to date him again one day?

[He thinks it's a fair question. It was Dirk's own choice with Jake, after all.]

Or I can talk about saying 'no.'

[ that question rose didn't ask. ]

I don't think it's a good idea as long as our control issues and everything else are directly oppositional? Like I...don't actually want to be Chuck Bass. But also I can't do the romance thing right now and I don't know what the timeframe will be for actually being able to do all that stuff, and I'm not sure I can commit to doing the stuff he needs me to be doing. There were a lot of reasons I kept fucking up and hurting him, and I don't know if I want to get into them all. I'm tryin' not to think too hard about it; dude falls in love easy and may be datin' Rin by the time it's an issue I can give a second look into. Or like, almost anyone who is not me would be a better option at this point. Which I knew would be a thing when I said we should cool it, and - I love him and hope he finds someone who makes him happy. I told him not to worry about me if a thing came up.

[ he's just fairly certain he'd need to get his shit sorted before it could be him, off the meteor. and maybe karkat would need to work on his stuff, too, but dave has no idea how to broach that because he never has had. it'd be all around better if karkat dated someone who could help him with...everything, actually. ]

So, let's just talk about saying 'no' instead.

Hm. I'm not exactly a stranger to directly opposite issues in a romantic partner. If you ever decide you want to take another look at it, I'll listen to whatever.

[He does, after all, REALLY know his ropes when it comes to ruining relationships. He's very sure Rin and Karkat aren't going red and that if they did it would incite more relationship drama but. The gossip can stay elsewhere.

Close eyes, breathe.]

I think we have somewhat different ideas of what being given a choice means. Neither is wrong, but they stand to a certain degree in opposite corners. From what I understand, you think of choice as a freedom from having another's will imposed on you. Like I said, that isn't wrong. There is no choice if someone is making the decision for you. My idea of choice, on the other side, is the freedom to express your own will. That isn't wrong either, as obviously there's no choice involved if you aren't being given an opportunity to make a decision.

It does put us at a point of some confusion here, however. You're worried about whether or not I'm able to say 'no.' My worry is whether or not I'll be given the option to say 'yes.'

I promised to work on friendship. That's about all I can handle there right now.

[ more importantly. right. ]

What's the list of decisions?

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