NO Neutralities Can Exist in Religion
We are either ranked under the banner of Prince Immanuel, to serve and fight His battles, or we are vassals of the black prince, Satan.
“To whom belongest thou?”
C.H. Spurgeon
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A: B cuts their hair into a bowl cut, which I’m officially neutral on, and they give them a sword, which I’m officially positive about. Everyone should have a sword.
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Forgotten History-The Swiss Airforce during WWII.
Although Switzerland remained neutral throughout World War II, it had to deal with numerous violations of its airspace by combatants from both sides – initially by German aircraft, especially during their invasion of France in 1940. Zealous Swiss pilots attacked and shot down eleven German aircraft, losing two of their own, before a threatening memorandum from the German leadership forced General…
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My (M20) girlfriend (F22) says I’m emotionally not there and too hard on myself. How can I take steps to improve?
I’m not sure where to start. My (M20) girlfriend (F22) and I had had a discussion a couple of days ago where she told me that she feels like I’m not emotionally available and that I’m too hard on myself.
During some of our conversations I don’t know what to say, or I don’t have much to say. Or I don’t feel like doing anything. I’ve expressed before that I’m also not getting that from her too. She’s been going through a tough time too with work so I understand, and she’s not wrong.
And as for me being hard on myself, it’s true. It has harmed my ability to feel loved. Or feel anything really. I’m my own worst critic and it’s a long standing issue. It’s an issue I’m very well aware of and I do want to get better but I don’t know how. I’m in my third year of university currently and in the midst of coop in which I have been getting rejected from jobs grades and confidence take a hit, you know how it is.
And my physical health, well it’s never been good I have some chronic and episodic physical health issues. I was diagnosed with eczema a month ago now. I’ve been so mad at it because it’s hindered my ability to even unlock my laptop and just be normal again. I don’t think I’ve gotten past the idea of me not being normal. That’s not even including the additional medications I have to take and what not but that’s a longer story for another time.
I’ve been going to therapy for about 3 years now, but I’m limited to 5 sessions per term through my university so I’ve been trying to spread them out. And otherwise I just don’t have enough money to pursue other things right now. She’s not wrong at all but I just don’t know what else to do and so I need some ideas.
But I do really love her and I’m really committed to her. I know I’m a bit young to be thinking long term but I’d like to get there with her. So I really want to be better and I don’t think I’m usually this bad and I know I can be better, I just feel stuck. If anyone has advice on what I can do, I’d love to hear it.
What resources can your therapist provide for you to support yourself on your own due to the limited sessions? Surely, they must have plenty of workbooks, guides, activity sheets, potential support groups, etc. they can suggest to you to supplement the meager therapy you have access to.
Positivity can be hard. So start first with neutrality rather than negativity. Begin a daily mindfulness practice to help you catch yourself being negative and critical. When you do, stop. Notice the thought. Correct it to something neutral instead of self-effacing. “I hate that I’m not normal now. I’m so useless and pathetic.” -> “Eczema sucks, and it’s normal to be frustrated at how it impacts me. That doesn’t define me as a person.” Then find something else to do instead of indulging in an argument with yourself. You might read, journal, game, play sudoku, do homework, etc.
Do you regularly journal? You do now. The reason talk therapy is so effective is because communicate is a huge way that we process emotions and events. Journaling can be greatly effective because it mirrors communication. It is better than just introspecting because it forces you to articulate your thoughts more and you’re less likely to ruminate and spiral because you find it boring to write the same thing down over and over again. Just 5-10 minutes of a stream of conscious every other day can have great benefits, especially for things like processing grief (which is what you are doing as a result of your diagnosis).
Keep going. It will get better. <3
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what ARE YOU doing right now?
Ooooooooooops *if* I have to tell you
then I just made a mess
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Neutral Civic Tradition
When people describe something as a neutral civic tradition, they’re pointing to a form of public ritual that:
- belongs to the whole community
- isn’t controlled by any one social class
- isn’t designed to elevate a particular ruler or elite
- functions as a shared cultural practice rather than a political tool
In discussions of Roman religion, this phrase is often used to contrast older republican religious practices with the later imperial cult that were established in outer provinces like Britain.
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Net neutrality was back, until it wasn’t
The fight for net neutrality never seems to be truly won or lost.
Federal net neutrality rules have been on and off for the past 15 years. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) passed the Open Internet Order under President Barack Obama in 2010, prohibiting ISPs from blocking or throttling lawful internet traffic, the baseline rule of net neutrality. Then, at the request of those ISPs, a…
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Good is always getting better and bad is always getting worse: the possibilities of even apparent neutrality are always diminishing.
-C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength
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Dear Heughan Observer Anon,
I don’t think this is a new kid on the block. By the blogger’s own account, they are a long time lurker, who decided to bring something to this shambolic table.
Theirs is an articulate, informative, balanced and well presented blog. This is refreshing and to be very honest with you, preferable to the endless rehashing of the same old, same old 📷carrousel, at least as far as I am concerned. This is also preferable to the collective fretting, emotional overload and tiny shuttle games born out of pure boredom, frustration and FOMO.
The fact that it equally welcomes Antis, Shippers and even the Shrieking Banshees corner is absolutely normal and the blog’s initial statement is so far respected. It provides the sort of safe middle ground where I could see people who would probably not stand eachother, exchange opinions in a civilized way, without the intolerable arrogance of You Know Who, in the mix. This blogger positioned themselves in neutral gear. An observer, not a player. And remember: if that blog is Switzerland, on this fandom’s fractioned map, it may be useful to note Switzerland only joined the United Nations in 2002. Long after 1945, and for very specific reasons I will spare you.
So, I can only welcome more balance and less empty cackling, entitlement and insults, in this community. But I am also waiting to see if the neutrality promise will be kept. It’s not an easy manifesto, but their entire credibility depends on it.
Like you, I am reading these posts on the regular. At this moment, it would be unfair to speculate. Let them unfold their trade, for I think they know what they are doing. I have no other sentiments to share, other than genuine curiosity and good will. We are not running in the same lane, and that is ok, Anon. I’ve never hidden my own bias and they are no competition, nor do they want to be. It’s the hypocrisy I cannot stand. This blogger did not show any, until now.
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I saw a sign for gender neutral toilets today and I thought: Gender neutrality implies the existence of gender partisans.
Then I remembered: Conservatives, they are the gender partisans.
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Unlock Your Courage: The Path to Transformation
There comes a moment—a turning point—when we rise from fear into courage. This is the gateway to transformation. Courage is the energy of truth, integrity, and empowerment. It whispers, “Yes, I can.” It fuels resilience, sparks action, and anchors us in the belief that we are capable of meeting life head-on.
From this place, we ascend into neutrality, where we release the need to control or…
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“Neutrality” is a tool of censorship
ALTAll forms of knowledge creation and meaning-making are shaped and crafted by power relations and the justification for those relations. A common way to shape knowledge and meaning is to reframe the denial of atrocity by those in power as a “debate.” This tactic creates a rhetorical “Schrödinger’s cat” in which the atrocity is simultaneously happening and not happening, according to who you ask. It turns the material reality of the situation into a hypothetical thought experiment that the audience is invited to debate forever, with any conclusion being cast as “biased.”
For a well-known example, oil lobbyists tried to suppress the scientific consensus on climate change for decades, and a significant amount of media aided in this by shaping all reporting on climate crisis into a “controversy.” Reporting construed economically motivated denial as another “point of view,” and positioned their own journalism as being “neutral” and “objective” in presenting “both sides.”
This “neutrality” constitutes a social reality in which, to be regarded as “neutral” one must never speak plainly about the facts of the atrocity. It is censorship through more subtle and manipulative means. It is a tool of power.
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I’m currently having an introspective moment and looking deeper into this aporagender side of my bigender identity. I’m not sure what my relationship is to neutrality other than that it is a passive aspect of my maleness, something that “softens” it into something more like demimalehood. But I’m also aporagender, and I relate to the part of the definition that says it’s a “strong and specific gendered feeling.” Neutrality is not strong. It can influence. It can combine with other elements. But it doesn’t feel like it’s “strongly gendered.”
I’m thinking that my neutrality ebbs and flows, that some days my genders are closer to neutrality while other days my genders move farther away from it. And because this is a change in the presence of gendered aspects or qualities, but my genders themselves don’t change, I don’t consider myself genderfluid or genderflux. Instead, it’s more like the neutral-to-maverine elements that make up my aporagender identity move along a sort of spectrum back and forth. Sometimes neutrality is entirely present, sometimes it moves away completely and it’s more of a maverine element, and sometimes it’s somewhere in between (some kind of “neumav” situation.)
I don’t know. I’m just speculating right now. I do like the word “element” here to describe the qualities and aspects of my genders. It just feels right, and I’ll probably use it more often. Maybe I can view my aporagender identity as having the quality of aporinity, which is made up of neutral and maverine elements.
And hell, I’ll even say that asteresque can be made up of maverine elements. If it wants to be. It can be whatever it wants. It’s aporine, so that encompasses both neutral and maverine qualities.
- Your Bigender Big Brother 💙💚
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“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.”
Desmond Tutu, clergyman (7th October 1931-2021)
