To let bleeding birds die..

TL;DR - I'm leaving bird site dot get fucked, thanks for all the fish to everyone who wasn't a complete ass, if you want to stay in touch I have a discord server, email me for the deets.

If you've come from my Twitter account, you've probably wondered why I'm leaving that cursed site.

In brief, over the past 5, going on 6 years that I have been on that site, I have been at the vanguard in political topics and advocated for freedom above all else, even if I have gotten a wee bit vitriolic and maybe hypocritical at times. I saw the birth and later end of the GamerGate movement, and the subsequent shockwaves it caused in the Comic and Anime communities. I saw Brexit, Trump's election, and the growing extremism and partisanship of the population of my country and of the west at large.

I've never claimed to lean accordingly one way or another - even though I do lean left, I have a gross distaste for the Democratic Party, and the Republicans are a similar plague. I have grown depressed by the state of affairs, and unlike other transgender women, I will use this opportunity not to bite the bullet and end it all, but to cut off the parasite and use my resources and time gained from its' severance in more fruitiful pursuits, such as getting my life back on track, eventually returning to the workforce, resuming my transition (which had been sidetracked by my mother's failing health and ensuing death last year), and pursuing my dreams and potentially, leaving America for Japan.

I know, the last one sounds weeby, but the thing is that the mess that is this political situation in not just America, but the west, is atrocious, and I don't want to be around when the large brown biomass collides with and thereby, discombobulates the rotary air flow device, if it ever does.

But, You're still left wondering what other reasons I have, I bet.

I'll explain why in a series of reasons here:

HATRED

"Hatred only breeds more hatred. It all just feeds on itself." 
- Kei "Edge" Nagase, 2nd Lieutenant, Osean Air Defense Force, later, Executive Officer, Razgriz Air Command Squadron

Anyone who follows me with any semblance of interest knows I've quoted Nagase more than I can count, with it almost always being that phrase. And yet if she were here, she'd most likely berate me for engaging in it, and letting myself fall to it.

She was a role model for me, someone who seeked truth and peace, the freedom of the sky, and the stars thereby, even. And this site has caused me to betray one of my favorite verses of hers.

I can't help but when faced with the lunacy and belligerency of certain parties, of all stripes and walks of life, retaliate in kind, or even worse. I've even humored hypothetical dreams of genocide, where I lived in a world where radical ideologues were put on stakes, burned alive and the idea of even humoring such thoughts was feared.

But by humoring such thoughts, I became the very demon I wanted annihilated. For once, that bastard Exodite from back in Discovery Freelancer would be right about me being a hypocrite. But the thing is - I'm more than aware that I was. And I feel that it'd take getting away from the hatred I see to eventually be liberated from it, even if it meant saying goodbye to those who made dealing with it on a daily basis worthwhile.

There are exceptions, of course - but name one day where you didn't go through that hellsite and find someone attacking someone else, be it over politics or video games or anything else, or calling for a person or group to be harassed, doxxed, bullied or blacklisted, or something akin to such crass behavior. If you were me, or many people I know who shared such behavior with others, either to call it out or, to engage in it themselves.

I understand you may feel attacked if you're one of the people who engaged the latter. Consider this a writ of forgiveness. You're only human. But I hope when you're done reading this you keep my actions in the back of your mind when you start to feel hopeless and it manages to involve that cursed site.

That website has caused more losses in my faith in humanity than anything resembling a gain. The only thing that made it worthwhile was me making jabs and jokes at the expense of the hateful and willfully harmful and calling out their bullshit.

I never sought clout like others. The idea may have been present in the back of my head, my id clamoring for popularity, but how I presented myself, and my opinions on that site, were mine at the time they were written. I stood by my virtues as they evolved, never making a heel turn as far as I am aware - without damn good reason - excluding my biggest hypocrisy. They may have changed as the years went by, but in the end, Nodoka Hanamura, is nothing more than a girl named Nikki. And that girl's heart slowly became filled with ugly, egregious hatred. And now I'm getting the plunger and uncloging the drain so it can finally, hopefully go down.

But.. that's not the only issue.

POLITICS
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” 
― H.L. Mencken
This ties heavily into my last point, but for the love of Lyoko, the two problems are so close they could tie the knot and not a soul on this mudball would bat a fucking eye. People on that accursed site oft more than not force politics into everything on both sides of the pond. Trans flag in a game? It's promoting 'degeneracy'. Someone dare draw a girl attractively? It's 'sexist'. When looking for quotes to help decor this post to briefly bring home the point, I had a field day defining how I had grown tired of politics on there, but then I realized that Mencken had hit the nail on the head for the reason *why* I had grown tired of it on that site.

The overwhelming majority of people are fighting strawmen. Some on the right may claim that the LGBT community is wanting the approval of pedophilia when an overwhelming majority of LGBT people, even those I dislike for their ideals - we at least share the mindset that we are not condoning the grooming and sexual abuse of minors. Some on the left may claim that those who disagree with them are every bad word under the sun, when under sunnier skies, far from the hatred born of the state of affairs of our society, we could potentially get along, or rather, an overwhelming amount of us.

But sadly, many people on both sides overwhelmingly put politics before all else, and I was slowly turning into one of them. It was corrupting my personal fanproject, SOAA - at one point, and to this day I have daydreams relating to seeing the nation at the center of the project engaging in political behavior that is out of character at best and extremely disgusting at worst, thanks to my demons running rampant in my head, but I have thankfully caught myself before I stared into the abyss for just long enough to become the center-left equivalent of madmen like Mike Myers or Billy the One Angry Sperglord, as I often call him.

When I took the plunge into Gamergate all those years ago, I was awoken to the political battlefield that went unseen behind my back, and like those reading from back then - I picked up my proverbial helmet and gun, and joined the shitshow. Suffice it to say for those familiar with the workings of the US Military (of which I was never a member, but always had a interest in) - I felt from mid-2019 to present day - that I was on stop loss, and much like those who rode Mr.Bones' Wild Ride - I wanted right the fuck off.

And as such, I'm putting down my gun, throwing off my helmet, and walking away from the political front on that hellhole. But yet, there's one more reason for why I'm leaving.

DRAMA

“The whole world can become the enemy when you lose what you love.”
― Kristina McMorris, Bridge of Scarlet Leaves

The quote may seem irrelevant, but drama oft leaves one bereft of focus on why they bother. Often being uphill battles when you're on center stage, or off-stage, as it were. I years ago, cast aside Drama, after all the E-celeb 'autism', as it was put back in the day tired me of it, and the shitshow that was my Administration at YSFlight Headquarters drove a nail into the coffin and The hot mess that was Ouroboros poured cement in the grave. These days I aim for humility and truth, only standing up for myself when I am damn certain that I'm not in the wrong. It's why all these years later I came out to defend myself over comments I made in the SL Aviation community a few years ago that landed me in tepid water only to really amount to nothing of importance years later. It's so that I have my bases covered if it ever comes to light again - so that whatever drama comes my, and MIRAI Group's way thereby - dies a short and idle death if it relates to such behavior.

What comes to mind most of all is related to politics but outside of it is things relating to people just doing what they love, and one person getting into a tizzy, usually for clout, to drag them through the mud, because their life is so uneventful and they have nothing better to do with their lives then be the adjutant-commandant of the 8492nd Helen Lovejoy brigade, or for unbearable shitheads to think they're Agent 47 in Hitman Absolution but with a IBM Keyboard and a Broadband Modem, to go and ruin someone's day because they dared say, do or be something they dislike, and drag it out until Razgriz rises from the depths of the Gulf of Mexico to rain apocalypse tacos on our asses when we least expect it (which at this rate, with how things are going, won't be any time soon.)

People like these, especially those who go after artists, or companies who mean no malintent like (insert artist who drew or did anything even remotely resembling something controversial and got backlash) or Dominos' Pizza for examples of both - more often than not, recieve the opposite treatment from me, and I often implored others to do the same. I considered, and still consider these clout chasers, these internet vigilantes to be parasites. Nagase may scowl at me for calling them that, but quite frankly that's the only time if any from this point out where I'll be holding my opinion on a group of people. Regardless of political alignment, regardless of nationality or ideology - these grifters contribute nothing to society and are no better than the people who cry wolf.

Of course, there is often just cause to call out people. Harvey Weinstein was one. Jeffrey Epstein was another. There are many just causes for things, but over menial things that at the end of the day, when decided by the fates that ordain our existance, would in the chart of things of value- be at the bottom rung of what would be called - de minimis - I've come to side with them and realize that I shouldn't bother. Parasites will be parasites, and they feed off my anger, be they for or against me. WOPR said it best when it said in WarGames: "The only winning move is not to play".


DETERMINATIO

"To all things.."
- Subtitle to Mission 15, Chandelier - Ace Combat 6 : Fires of Liberation
At the end of it all, for these three reasons, the banning of numerous friends of mine, and the overall negative mood I have felt there, I have decided to leave. I think the fact that I have not once, outside of the introduction, mentioned Twitter by name, only alluding to it by saying "that site", and prior calling it a hellhole and other derogatory phrases both on it, and in private with others - says volumes about my feelings on the matter. 

This is not to say that my presence here held no value.

I found many amazing artists from the platform, made bonds that last to this day, and memories that when looking back deep enough, shine in the pool of dark red blood that is the hateful place that is 'bird site dot com', as my Second Life Mother, Chacha Nu Vaughn called it.

I used my platform at times to make jokes, sometimes at others' expense, yes - but not just to get a chuckle out of myself, but to help others get through the shitshow with me.  I divulged parts of my life, which even though I never outed my true identity - I was wholly truthful with all of you about. 

And now unbound from the accursed character limits of that site, I leave the following for those who joined me over the years - piece by piece of the whole:


To the artists who brought color to my day in a dreary depressed mess, I thank you. I may have never had the chance to commission those I appreciated most, but I have tried to follow those from Nihon and elsewhere on Pixiv if they're there. I'll try to make a habit of touching base there. Even if we never talked, or you never knew I was even here - Thank you.

憂鬱な落ち込んだ混乱の中で私の色をもたらしたアーティストに感謝します。私が最も感謝した人に委託する機会はなかったかもしれませんが、日本やPixivの他の場所にいる人がいる場合はそれらをフォローしようとしました。そこでベースに触れる癖をつけてみます。私たちが話したことがない、またはあなたが私がここにいることを知らなかったとしても、ありがとう。

To those I met in GG and lost touch with in the 'casualties' of that hot mess and beyond - Thank you for your kinship and god speed, you unbearable bastards.

To the friends I made along the way, who decided to follow me to Discord into my little den, I thank you for sticking with me, even if you're just lurking. If you're the latter, don't be afraid to peek your head out to say hi.

And to those who are staying behind as I depart, as it were - I do not blame you. I wish all of you the best of luck in life, and if there are pearly gates up above - I will see you there and buy you a beer with the waifu, maybe introduce you to my parents or some shit, fucked if I know. Maybe we'll meet before the world ends or we're all dead. All in all, I'll miss you all, but this is for the best.

To quote Vera Lynn -

"We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when, but I know we'll meet again, some sunny day."

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