Topic: The Chit Chat Thread

@GirlVersusGame Just edited my comment to include my full response! Hope it's not getting in the way of your already replying, haha. And no worries, I'll happily read whatever you have to say whenever you say it!

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@Ravix Haha, don't make me blush! I think all it takes to have a good conversation with someone on the internet is a genuine interest, and that's the same vibe I'm getting from you. Whether you feel you write as well or not, it's all that matters.

You have my permission to call me a "basic b---"" as that is unapologetically what I am! Maybe I will post her in the Music Thread. I just always feel so incredibly out of place in that thread as I know the type of music I listen to is generally not what many on here would be into, haha. "Hold Me Closer" is fantastic! I'm probably less of a Eurovision gay than you are (😉), but that one has definitely stuck with me. Great taste!

The concept of Romans but with an emo look made me chuckle. Hilarious to think of them like that. Maybe when you were presented with the choice you just didn't have enough liquid persuasion yet? Just kidding, it's good that you were able to tell your boundaries and that this wasn't for you! Better than leading someone on only for you to later realise it's not what you're looking for. Must've broken this poor guy's heart either way! (If emos have heart that is...?) Yup, the whole counter-argument you mentioned where you'll ask a person when they chose to be straight is my go-to as well. I don't remember signing any forms turning me gay, but maybe I was under the influence when I signed it. I love that you faux-flirted with people like that just to make them uncomfortable. Dangerous for you in the moment maybe if you did it with the wrong person, but that's a good ally if I ever saw one! I think what I can appreciate the most in a straight person in terms of sexuality is not that they simply are accepting, but when they feel confident enough in their own masculinity that they would do stuff like that because they know it doesn't change anything about them and their preferences. I have a friend like that who will happily act stereotypically gay with me and totally go for it in the moments where we think it's fun to. We both know that's not the type of person he is, but he's not afraid to go there if the situation calls for it. I think there's nothing more masculine than someone who is happy to do that, because it shows that they're comfortable enough with their own identity that they don't need to constantly show it off to prove to people how masculine they are. That's just insecurity.

In terms of what you said regarding not always being emo though, of course that makes total sense. It also does when you put it in the context you put it in where this mostly comes out on late nights where you're all together. You're in a safe space then to truly be yourself and out how you feel. You're right, those are the moments where all the best deep talks happen and connections form! That said, I will now imagine you in my head giggling with the typical emo fringe reading my comments whenever I make a joke. You might not actually laugh at all of my jokes, but it's the narrative I'm choosing to go with.

@Tjuz I still haven't read your reply but I did skim the top and saw something about do I resent it. I won't even fully answer that yet, I'll say I resent what I've seen it to do to people and I'm not talking about riches, I'm talking about very heavy duty generational wealth. Some of this will sound really strange but I've had a long time to carefully place everything I'm about to say, I've taken a lot of past and present day experiences and formed a hypothesis which focuses heavily on empathy and why I have some very strong feelings about what wealth actually does to a person.

I have to use my cousin as an example, she was my best-friend growing up. We were probably six years old when we really forged a strong bond, we played together, watched every Disney movie together and knew all of the sing along versions too. We would stay in each others homes and would use the same bedroom but had separate bedrooms. I was maybe eleven years old and she was maybe twelve. I woke one night to the feeling of something touching my hair and when I opened my eyes she was standing by my bed staring at me. It was the exact same stare I get when I read something really quizzical like theoretical physics I adopt that stare when I'm trying to understand complex theories and formulas. She was studying me, trying to understand how I worked but the hair stroking put me to sleep. The next day we were playing with a toy that had buttons and pictures. You press one and it would say 'this is the zoo keeper we have lions in the zoo - rawr' and it would do this for different animals. She moved closer and started to pet my hair again, and then we formed a game called kitty and person. It was just children playing, it evolved into chocolate buttons for tricks, there were adults around us and no one questioned it, even when it got to the point of saucers of milk and again not one person said a word. This was our friendship and we normalized it because the adults did. Then one day we were at her home and we were being summoned to dinner, she turned and said 'no kitties at the dinner table' before I could even say anything her Dad closed the door and they went to dinner, I sat down and did some drawing. As an adult I can see the issue there, a major one. She was slowly compartmentalizing people and animals but she wasn't doing it based on biology like you would normally do. She was doing it based on behavior and on the response given to her action. No one corrected her. Then I thought back to when we used to play dress up and how controlling she was, she always wanted to be the stylist not the model.

One day I stopped seeing her. Three months went by and I thought she was away in another country because I'd spent a whole summer in South Africa and knew people sometimes did that. The door opened and her Dad walked in with my Mum, it was a big room so I didn't hear the conversation but they were staring at me so I knew they were talking about me. He took me outside, sat me in a car, the driver got out and started putting bags and cases into the trunk. They said we were going to visit my cousin, I thought airport. We were in what you would call the suburbs, trees, isolated etc, lots of our families lived in close proximity, I knew all of the different turns and which home they lead to.

We didn't go to the airport or to her home. Instead we drove for two hours (I watched the clock display) then stopped at what you call a gas station, both of them got out and talked very briefly, the driver went inside and my Uncle started the car and we drove again, which was again odd because he didn't drive. After about twenty minutes we arrived at some really big gates, bigger than mine so they stood out, we drove for again for I don't know how long. It was a very long drive way, until we reached a big building that to me looked like a hotel. I could see through the glass door, it had a reception and concierge staff. Someone came out and they both brought whatever was in the trunk inside. My Uncle came back after a while, turned on a TV in the (headrest?) then left again. An hour went by and nothing, so I climbed from the back through the seats and tried the doors and they were locked. Then I went to the back again and climbed up to look through the window, tint means you see out but no one sees in.

I saw the person who helped with the bags etc and I'm sure he knew I was there. It felt like he was looking right at me and doing nothing. There were curtains on the sides of the back windows too but they were open, I was sure he saw me. Almost three hours passed and he finally returned, said something like 'there we go', started the car, drove back and switched with the driver, they turned on the radio for the back of the car and talked among themselves, I only heard the music, brought me home and that was it. Years later I found out it was a home for girls with behavioral problems. If I counted right she was there for six months and when I saw her again she treated me no differently. The last time I was home (recently) we sat down for a movie, she patted her lap and I lay my head there just like before. It was no different, instead of chocolate buttons it was truffles. My Partner watched and I know he felt like something was off. I kept glancing over to try and read his face, my parents never said a word either. My cousin formed that idea of who or what I was as a very young child, no one guided her out of that pattern of thinking, I'll be home for Christmas soon and it will be exactly the same.

The way we did play is technically something I do with my Partner too but it's more like something we do when he comes in from a trying day and wants to spend some time with me without expending himself further, we both benefit and we're consenting adults. It's not draining for either of us, just quiet time but with that actual tactile connection. Then after an hour or two he brings me out of it and tells me to go do something more productive, he knows the distinction between those headspaces and it's all very natural and caring. Why did a twelve year old have that mindset, adults were always around us and sometimes a couple of feet away and no one called it into question. The same way my parents didn't question a sixteen year old (legal where I was) with a forty two year old man, then after my first three dates they set me up with that 24/7 lifestyle dynamic. They saw nothing wrong with it, nor do they today, they think it's an easy way to keep me in line and stay goal originated.

Over the years I started meeting other what you would call old money families, I'd spend a long time in Paris and they'd act the exact same way. We were different nations, different cultures and the only thing we had in common was that wealth. They were very odd, and that's a lot coming from me. Just so strange and cruel, for absolutely no reason other than they could be. I treat those around me like they are my friends, if they are coming to make the beds then I want to have a conversation with them, the same if someone brings me tea I actually say thank you and ask them about their day and show them what I'm doing in a game, I ask about their families, I probably ask them too much but I want to get to know them not their name tag. So many people I know don't. They don't see them as their equals and that's the normal thinking, but I think fudge that. I talk to everyone and sometimes they don't talk back but I always try.

I once met a family in America, of a similar standing and there it was again. One of the boys told me that his parents would leave for vacations, not take him and his carers would look after him. That happened to me too, it was making sense. I remembered my grandparents on my Dad's side. They came from a similar background, they had banks, post offices, shops and they raised their children to be lawyers, and business men. My Mum would bring me to see them, she'd talk to my Grandmama and they'd have tea, then once my Mum would leave she'd usher me into the TV room, and leave. This happened every time I visited, apparently she'd just go shopping. I'd ask people where she was and they said not to worry just watch TV. So that's what I did, hence I've seen so many movies, there are TV channels that show nothing but movies.

And here's where it got weirder, I can't understand this part. One day she did bring me shopping, we went a toyshop, she had me pick the toys I'd liked, then just leave without them. It was like she was giving me a choice then cancelling it out. But at the same time she did give me toys, just not that day, she seemed to get something out of giving me the illusion of choice. The burger I probably mentioned before, that was her too. We were out and I wanted to try fast food for the first time, I was given a huge burger, took maybe two bites and apologized that I was full. She wrapped it up and put it in my bag then we left for a funeral mass, after church there was a reception with drinks and such, cake too I wanted cake, out came the burger which was now cold. She made me take some more bites, after that we left for someones home, more food more refreshments and again with the burger.

She made me finish every piece, throw up, then bring me home. I told my Partner about that very recently because he'd ordered a burger for me while I was in the restroom (what I mean by someone else choosing meals) He didn't get audibly angry but he was fuming, he had them take it away and bring something else. I thought that was normal behavior, now I think it's psychopathy and it's not just on one side.

My other Grandmama was different, I loved going there. She was very proud of her gardens, knew all her flowers and picked berries for tarts that she actually baked. One day I was sitting in the grass talking to some flowers (I was a weird child) and I felt someone come up on me, that feeling you get when you feel like a wild animal is about to pounce. I looked up and it was a different uncle, he looked terrifying and I ran, right across the grass, the gravel and straight up those stone steps, I got maybe half way up when he caught me and start to strangle me and bang my head off the steps. I didn't remember anything after that but apparently the guys pulled him off me and (this I only learned a couple of years ago) I'd actually died, they even said I was blue like in Avatar. It turned out my Grandmama was ill and it was terminal (she hid it from me) she wanted to bequeath her estate and holdings to me. However if I was out of the picture my Uncle would stand to inherit it all because he was her son.

He was no pauper, he had a home in the countryside for his wife, a home in the city for his girlfriend, at least three vehicles and at least two businesses. I'd visit one of his antiques warehouses from time to time and just experience the history of what I could see. What I'm saying is he was in no way struggling, it was pure greed. He was going to remove me from the picture, vanish me and take it all. That's also psychopathy, there it was on both sides and again the only thing that connected the two was money, greed and power. I think the things I saw as a child which I'll never repeat were done to remove my empathy, if I cared too much they'd see it as a weakness and try to toughen me up in other ways, it never worked. I'll tell you a stupid example and you can laugh about this. I rotate my stuffed animals so ten out of almost two hundred always get that daily bed space, I spend time arranging them so each one is paired properly, then I'll enter the room again if I think I did it wrong. I obviously know they aren't real but they have faces, back stories and such. I've been doing that my whole life and never stopped. I think that's empathy, I care about living things and people too, a lot, especially animals. I once threw someones rifle into a river because they had shot a deer and that didn't sit with me well. I paid for it obviously but I was so angry. I would have loved a pet deer, I would have let them stay in my bed, washed them etc, everything, but they just wanted to shoot it. That makes no sense to me, I was never brought hunting again.

I've seen examples of people in my family and in others without empathy over and over again, which is why I said 'I think we do it to ourselves', I really do. If I'm right then they just gave up on me at a point and that pack mentality labelled me as a weak so they recycled me into something else. I don't want to hurt people, I understand shooting back if they shoot first but that's provoked. There are other examples too of course but my cousin really stands out because she never changed. I saw a lot of wrong in Paris and these people didn't just own the street they owned the area code, their behavior was generational. It's how they raised their children, it was normal. In TV shows you see families use love to raise children, then the child understands love and in-turn projects that love outwards to others, they aren't unaliving each other or doing all of the other things I won't mention. No one ever said to me 'this is love' it's something I found from TV shows and internet places where I shouldn't have been. When people say 'this corporation has no soul they just made one hundred people redundant before Christmas', that's why.

They don't see those people as human, not at all. They see them as statistics and numbers, they move numbers around to make a profit and that's simply all they care about. I hear how people at the top talk about people at the (bottom sorry) and it just feels wrong. I see people being treated in the absolute worst ways in some places I visit, those really dark corners and it just kills me sometimes. I love my family of course but I know there's no reciprocated empathy. That's why I live this kind of lifestyle, I can carry out an action to make someone else happy, do my absolute best, strive for nothing short of perfection and once I get that 'good job' I know I did it right and then I feel happy for it. We don't use the L word, no one ever has, just being enough is all I need. No one taught me how to feel, I learned in my own way. It might not be perfect and I can't do it alone but I do know that right from wrong. That's why I resent, what that power and wealth does to people especially when it's generational. My family goes very far back, they still operate on those same policies that got them to where they are now, there's no such thing as 'enough' never enough.

I'll read what you posted in a moment.

@FuriousMachine I think you are safe, we talked for hours back and forth between the two threads. Music until the sun came up.

@Tjuz

Oh no... So my first thought was it was going to be a strangley similar feeling song to Cornelia Jakobs, albeit a different style, which threw me at the start because of the proximity of me mentioning her, but then it only took a few seconds listening to be like... oh... f***. Yeah... So I was not prepared for that. And it may have also given me a wet face.

I've moved this to chit-chat as I feel it is far more than just music, and it gives me a chance to perk up by then replying to the other stuff.

But, damn. That rocked me. And then the ending where she is basically breaking down as it fades out... just in case the ol' face isn't wet enough.

So yeah, what you have shown me is the essence of what I consider emo, but in pop form. Some Emo is poser emo, some is devastatingly open and soul rendering. This is soul rendering. That is not basic at all, b****! You absolutely tricked me 😫

Anyway... Composure recovered. Never feel you would be out of place in the music section, you posting may encourage a new user to come forward and talk about what they like, you never know. And if not, no great loss, I might check stuff out if i' tagged. I'm going to post Cornelia Jakobs after anyway, as that will basically sound lile butterflies and candyfloss when compared to Xana 🫥

Imagine away. I did try the fringe thing once upon a time, and hair straighteners were used for a period. Weirdly unexpected flashbacks to the feel and smell of that. But as in all things, I just don't have the patience or desire to present any full image, just to be me however I feel like being. I did enjoy hair dye and black nail varnish though 😄

Oh, yes. I am basically the ultimate man, kind of you to point it out 🫡 It must be declared from rooftops at least twice monthly! And no, we will never know what could have happened, maybe one more shot of sambuca, one more 'slippery-nipple' and i'm sat here on a throne of men, with a few pet emo chick's crawling around doing my bidding. We will never know. We will never know 😛

So that is me generally brushing off anything positive being said with humour. But, I appreciate your words. I'm glad that you have someone that is like that, that you can be ultimately free around and that has your back like that. So much so that it gladdens even my black heart 🖤

@Tjuz I'm going to answer little pieces at a time and update this.

If I understand correctly, that has more to do with the societal position you're in, right? I assume Coca Cola is available in Russia much like everywhere else. As for the story you gave with the invasion and your base building game, it sucks that people are so instantly reactive.

• Most Russians I know drink those soft drinks and use Western products, even during sanctions it finds it's way in. Largely because we already had those channels, ports etc. If you ask me those companies honestly don't care. It's about profits for them, they can say one thing in the public eye but do something different in the reality. It's not that soda is a kind of 'you can't drink soda, you must drink this champagne instead!' I was just not allowed soda, maybe it was the sugar, maybe it makes children rebellious but it was strictly forbidden so by the time I did try it, very strange taste. Doritos I might try some day, but I'm not in a hurry. I think you don't miss junk-food if you've never had it and when I see some of those they look a little artificial.

I think people are so quick to react when it's a no pun intended - a Mob mentality. They slot into one unit of thinking a kind of hivemind and need to follow the leader. Also so many people couldn't previously even find Ukraine on a map, it was that much of a follow the leader attitude. Social media drummed it up further with so much uneducated quotation on both sides, it's like when I saw what happened in Israel and they were showing videos of captured Israeli generals but I recognized the insignias as Armenian military staff that the Azerbaijani's had captured in Baku. I think social media was needed but not false figures and fake news, that goes for both sides. When you can confuse people you can control them, you teach them to fear, show them an offer of protection and slowly over time their rights and freedoms erode. I know a lot about that. I've been to places like Syria and Iraq, so much was lost for nothing. I had such a different view of Syria before then, it was all hidden so well. Now I know the truth, I've seen what a barrel bombs can do. Another fresh example is my time spent in the Balkans last month (hence why I speak Albanian) parts of Kosovo are riddled with unexploded landmines, most likely left on the way out. That's not military strategy to me, it's collateral damage. Unfortunately our armies exceed in that department and I don't like it, I don't believe in innocent people losing their homes, their lives.

In fencing there's a balance, you respect the other person, you know where you stand and you know where they stand, it's equal footing and it depends on skill. It also involves respecting your opponent, you work in unison and in a kind of chivalry. There are penalties for going out of those bounds and you don't use excessive force. I don't see that in modern military engagement, I saw a lot of propaganda from both sides. My attitude wasn't 'we're going to win' it was 'why are we doing this'. I was been given a story and I couldn't believe it, so when people reacted with fudge you (insert name here) I took it onboard and did what I understand in war. Dismantle and get out, I tore that thing down as fast as possible. I've had to leave places fast before, actual real life places and my mind went into standard operating procedure. I didn't want to erase my work or myself but it's all I knew.

I personally view the Russian government and the people of Russia as entirely separate things.

• Thank you truly, that's how I view every friend I've ever met in places where you conform or become tagged as a trouble maker and they get removed. That's why that UAE thread bothered me. Sometimes we live under such conditions but that doesn't mean we agree with them. Like gay rights, I just see love as love, love comes as a God given right, not a government given right.

Some people of course take the cards they're handed and run with it not looking back, but you've given me ample examples that you will look critically at the position you're in and try whatever's within your capability to share the privilege with whoever you can.

• When your life is that deck of cards you learn to read the rest of the deck, each key figure of the court are organized in a way that makes sense, when you see that order on a daily basis and the kind of undying loyalty to that court you understand how to play the game. Maybe you shuffle it a little and gamble to create a better outcome. I've tried to help a lot of people and any time it backfired I paid dearly but that person was playing another game. I had strong feelings for him, and I knew he was lying to me, it went against every other conversation we ever had. He was putting up a front and I saw right through it. He only saw the potential jackpot and was willing to try to use deception to get it. Poker is about the cards not the words and he had only words. My logical mind kicked my heart out so to speak (it was automatic) and I told someone offline, I threw away any notion of him ever caring about me.

Verbal calls aren't binding in Poker, neither was he. That's how my mind dealt with it, I saw it as a game he was playing with my heart and something kicked in to logically deal with the situation. Which might be why I feel trauma differently, it became a lesson and one I cling tightly to even today. I didn't want to hurt him, I didn't need a hit and run (Poker) I didn't even see it as cashing out. I wanted to leave the table and go back to playing Bridge with someone more worthy of my heart, Bridge isn't about lucky shortcuts and certainly not about bluffing, it's about respecting the other player. Something he obviously never had for me to begin with.

This might be somewhat of a forced comparison, but it reminds me of when invisible minorities would have certain codes (whether verbal or material) that would sign to the other person that this is a safe person to approach. It seems to me that this is the same in a way, but the message is simply different.

• I understand codes more than I can even talk about. Every community has it's own codes of conduct, some make it visible for example with ink and if I went to venture out into the hall right now I might see such a person. I have no ink because once again that's part of that gender divide and of a kind of ranking system, much like military. The more stars one has the higher their rank. The visible symbol I adhere to is mainly for when we are out and about but under his roof a collar is exactly what it sounds like. One might sparkle, the other might not, and maybe there are different types. Sometimes you need to choose functionality over fashion.

I'm so sorry to hear about your father. The way you've described him makes him sound like a wise man and one that serves as the antithesis to the negative portrayal of the elite in media. It's horrible that you can't fully know what happened (even though it sounds like your gut feeling is the worst-case scenario)

• That goes back to my post about empathy. Some people have none and they make power plays to benefit either themselves or others. He was a good man, maybe he didn't always have time for me and maybe he could have done more to stop certain things but he did care in his own way. I think it's a show of strength when you can sit quietly in a room with a person who could do something like that and simply do nothing. All I see are people react, my reaction is personal choice, the choice to do nothing is still a choice and goes back to what I said about Viktor Frankl 'Everything can be taken from a person but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances'. My circumstance puts me in a room with that person and my choice will always be to do nothing, I'm not afraid of them. I'm afraid of myself and I don't want to lose my humanity, I've fought too hard to keep it.

Do you feel like part of the reason he moved you to the UK for schooling was also because of the danger? The way you described it sounds like that wasn't the primary reason for you, but I can imagine your family would've dealt with a very similar issue as the people who were sent there exclusively for safety reasons.

• This is tricky, you know how fire crackers sound? I was once at a funeral service when I heard what I thought were fire crackers, they weren't. I've heard a lot of fire crackers since then. In most developed nations a bad business deal doesn't result in that, people talk it out they don't fight it out. That's what I mean by soldiers. It doesn't get reported. It becomes a kind of feud and it never ends, Albania is similar. there's a tradition known as Kanun, it's more tribal, more secluded and it's very old. It's the embodiment of an eye for an eye, to those tribes and clans it's part of their culture. It's a kind of code of law, you have to respond in kind. When you grow up in that system you have to either learn to protect your self (boys) or be protected (girls) It doesn't end with children, I won't go anywhere without that security net. Going out with one person in a city like London is a luxury, back home it's many and that's the rule for a lot of people caught up in that system. It's the strength in numbers mentality and mostly preventative. I like to think of it as having something and not needing it than needing something and not having it. It's different for boys/Soldiers, they do what they do and they grow up very fast, they have their own way of doing things and it's more upfront.

When you enforce that gender divide so strongly you aren't just telling that one person that they are weak, you are marking them as weak to anyone else who might be looking for a way in. People have all kinds of reasons to want a way in and it's almost always by force. I don't want to hurt anyone but I don't to be hurt either. I might not agree with certain customs but I understand the need to protect a person over trying to protect your money, I'd always choose the person.

Being sent to England was two-fold. It wasn't London first, it was the countryside, near a certain school. That was the education part which quickly collapsed. The second was the Person I was with. He was a close friend of my Dad's and he knew how broken certain things or pieces were. He sort of adopted me in a way and helped me to fix those pieces. He was also what you might call a strict disciplinarian but he never did anything without reason, not once. He made sure I was home schooled, made sure I had books, talked about what happened in those chatrooms and offered a way to make sense of it. I accepted and carefully learned the ropes so to speak, he saw it as one of the only ways for me to make sense of what happened.

I started to shut-down once that chat server was taken down. I'd had three years of someone talking to me, showering me with all kinds of compliments, effectively bombing me with love and dictating a schedule that wasn't his to give, but I did every single thing he said and with a smile too. Each day I raced to my computer to learn something new, it was a global group and I had one million questions for each one of them

It was a school of sorts and I don't say that lightly they actually had a school roleplay room for only adults and used to joke about having a real one. It was far past routine. And again no one questioned why I was on my computer all night, they were just happy to have me out of the way. I'd become so dependent on him so fast, I wanted to make him happy because he completed something I was missing. I yearned for his approval because his approval was engagement. It was like the butterflies feeling but daily, it didn't even matter if he wasn't talking. I'd hear his office a lot of the time, and hear his sectary coming in and out and just sit doodling and listening to music and talking/listening to random people.

His schedule become mine because no one gave me one, there was previously no bedtime it was sleep when you are tired, he gave me that schedule. If someone (I don't like the word staff) is there to bring you food and refreshments then that's what they do, no more no less, then they'd leave. They never asked questions either. When he was gone I just lost it, there was no rebelling, just nothing there. It wasn't even really the adult things he showed me, it was that older figure who seemed so wise, warm, protective, and I knew that if I wanted to feel happy all I had to was to make him happy, there were awful things going on in those rooms and he was selective enough to shelter me from some of the things I'm so glad I didn't see. I was happy with him but for all of the wrong reasons. I wasn't looking it as a future thing because I had none, I don't even think I knew the days of the week. I was lucky if I knew what planet I was on when he was gone.

I'll tell you one of those crazy head-games one of the others played on me because it shows how far gone they are too. When I was told that girl died in a car crash I was devastated, maybe a week later one of them said he was her brother and he could bring her back from the dead. I believed him, all he did was log back into that account and I thought I was witnessing real magic, I thought she came back from the dead to talk to me. That really messed me up for a long time because I wanted other people to come back to life and they didn't. Then of course I found out she never existed. It's mindblowing how anyone could say that to a child.

It's fascinating to me to see you describe Moscow as having such a class divide, when the Western view of Russia is always heavily intertwined with the ideals of communism and/or socialism.

• It's a huge divide and it's right in-front of peoples eyes. When I said the dead person in the snow I meant I saw an actual dead homeless person in the snow, no one cared. I did care, some people live in Russia others survive. I see ordinary Russians as surviving, to me that makes them survivors. Some people still hang onto that old Communist ideal but they want the lions share, for most it's Capitalism. They got too much of a taste for it when they carved up so much industry overnight, then those conflicts started. It was about taking what you can by force, it still is. Hence our armies are in another country unprovoked.

These are the kinds of thoughts that are so hard to differentiate from the Russian stereotypes you've been taught as a Westerner

• A lot of those are real, the old joke that everyone has an Uncle who is an ex KGB or a Gangster, that's normal enough when consider how big of a security state we are. We protect our own abroad too, not just at home. I can't elaborate there. I'll give you an example of a stereotype, Oligarchs/New Russians are such a stereotype that for a time you could buy jokebooks all about them, and little statues of business men. But it's real and people would judge me as one without knowing the difference. Maybe if I had the boy's ink, but then they might run away too.

I'm super impressed that you speak seven, almost eight languages! Are they all on a fluent level, or just a few fluent while the rest is basic conversational?

• A big part of that is travel, socializing and having such a mixed family. English is almost fluent, French is fluent, Albanian is better than my English, I can understand most Slavic languages because they are so similar. I picked up Italian from an ex girlfriend, very crazy girlfriend. I got by in Mexico with the Spanish I had, Czech I learned from spending so much time there and again there were enough similarities. I have no Mandarin, no Japanese (both of those are extremely difficult) I have a little basic Arabic, I can understand Serbian enough for a basic conversation because again it's so similar but I have to speak it very slowly due to the structure. I was listening to Serbian pop music maybe an hour ago and Albanian rap just before that.

I think English and Arabic are the hardest. English because for example 'breath in, breath out', but if you breath out on a glass window and it remains it's 'breath' but sounds like brett. Those small nuances trip me up some times, German goes right through me and I understand none of it. If I could learn one language it would be Breton. It's from Northern France and is currently endangered, I think it sounds lovely in song. Maybe in forty years it ill be extinct. It's not as hard as people think to learn a new language, at least if it's your choice. I think like a lot of things it's time, I'm fully aware that people have schedules, jobs, etc but think of all the free time you might spend on a game. And then there's the reason for even needing a language. I think English schools teach a small variety and then you choose one. I have no idea about America.

As for your entry into and exit from the film world, it sucks to hear that your passion was so quickly extinguished.

• I was but I'm not anymore. Almost every person I met in the film industry were there for the money, almost every musician was in the music industry for the music. Their morals are oceans apart. I think it's that Actors need the spotlight to play to, a musician just plays, often for themselves. With film it's not bad at a kind of surface level, the higher you go the worst the people get. All of those stories are real, it's systematic and expected.

It's not surprising to me at all that when you're in that world of what is, essentially, constant transactions.

• That's what wealth actually is, one big transaction after the other, until you wake up one day and realize you were a transaction too, because like I said we do it to ourselves. If we can do it to ourselves then anyone is fair game.

I do believe as a general rule of thumb that the more power a person has within any setting, the more it'll corrupt them. I'm sure there's maybe a few exceptions you can point to here and there that people would argue are ethical people in power.

• On the surface they might look ethical but the walls have ears, I've learned not to be surprised anymore because every one of them has skeletons in their closet. I've only ever seen it result in taking liberties either with things or with people.

I never considered that gaming could be such a useful tool at letting you get out of your comfort zone and meeting new people of all walks of life

• It's one of the only ways I found that provided a level playing field and then allowed me to convert that interaction into good conversation but it's in the past. At the start it was great, I met a lot of people on games like Littlebigplanet from all of the world and we started to click with some things. Then moved from game to game until somehow I had seven hundred PSN friends, I don't miss it at all. It's one of those things that are how you say good while it lasts. I should miss it but I don't.

Ohhh, it's very interesting to read of the dynamic where you questioning your husband is you questioning your parents. It makes total sense in a marriage and family like that, but I'd never seen it that way. Questioning your parents in the place you're in is, I'd presume, probably the most disrespectful thing you can do. I actually thought that metal music was a lot more political than you're telling me. I thought the appeal of it was a lot of "raging against the system" and such, but it sounds like it's a lot less politically challenging than that. Maybe I'm thinking more of genres such as punk or the like. This is where my limited music taste fails me!

• Husband? I honestly almost choked laughing sorry. I'm not married, Partner/Owner is absolutely not Husband. I believe in our D/s dynamic but marriage to me sounds like real slavery and there's a big difference between a submissive and a slave. Which I'm sure sounds wild to hear that comparison. To think you'd have more freedom being Owned by someone than married to them. Everything is still in my name, my parents are extremely particular with that. I've never signed anything over to any man, including my Ex. I'd be happy never getting married I don't understand marriage at all. It would be questioning my parents because they set up our arrangement, his family and our family are associates but absolutely not by married. We can tighten bonds and bind relations without having to go through a church. I respect marriage as a concept and all of the pomp that goes with it, also the part where you get married in the eyes of God. It might be hard to understand but there is a there is freedom in having someone else control of that freedom. Hence also having a girlfriend, I would never give up having both. It's two parts of the puzzle that when connected helps me see clearly. I don't think that Metal was rebellion, I think it was a type of music that no one understand so they had no idea what I was listening to. The other night a band called Chvrces was blocked by my browser and I tried all kinds of VPNS. When I asked on the DeepWeb they said they allies of gay rights, so my browser was absolutely blocked. It's that serious now, they are seen as extremists because of just standing up for difference. My parents always viewed Metal as 'noise' they never saw me as rebelling, they saw it as damaging my ears. Screamo especially.

I think it's dangerous to say that you "should" feel trauma from the grooming situation. I think the way you've experienced it where you still feel like you gained something valuable from the experience and can retroactively recognise the issues that were at play is honestly a way healthier way of dealing with it. I

• I did try to understand what Ravix said about trauma and I understand the English meaning. It will sound awful but I think there was a trade off, I lost something and then over time gained something. I like helping organizations who combat this sort of thing. There's not enough being done about it it because parents simply don't understand how easy it is to snare a child. The attitude I always see in the cases that organization deals with are 'not my child' but it was your child. You can't raise children on tablets and consoles and expect a sort of babysitter role from a device. I enjoy gaming but I know it's a gateway that the wrong kind of people do exploit. Tonight I looked through an old PSN account and scrolled all of my messages, everything from 'let's go on mic don't tell anyone' and 'I'm giving you permission' so much slipped by but I didn't understand. It's probably why I did have so many friends and parents need to do better. They can prevent this from happening if they gain that awareness and send them outside to play, not sit them on a tablet all day.

You're better off for being able to move past it and talk about it so candidly.

• I have to. When people don't speak up it becomes an almost non issue and once Roblox landed on the PSN I went into overdrive. They have a history of protecting the offenders and punishing the victims. For me it was a forum just like this and it happened so fast, just click one link and it was done. I'm amazed at how fast he did it and how fast I went with him. He did it like a magic trick. First it went to a site and I used that for maybe a week, he always knew when I was online and would say 'such a person will appear any moment now, watch this' and they did. He knew because he was using a program that worked with the site but he could use externally. To me it looked like magic, I was enthralled how he knew so much. I didn't know the other girls on that ice skating forum were him. He'd say 'I know what your favorite flower is' and he was right, or 'I know what scares you' again he was right because girls talk but they weren't real. I had maybe twenty four friends on that forum and at least eight of those accounts were him. Imagine trying to rotate eight accounts, but he did. It was so cunning and so patient. It was a game, he did it very slowly and was probably keeping notes as he went.

I couldn't understand how he did so much of it until we left the surface web. It had been magic and it kept me engaged. Then I saw that the group was his, moderator you say in English and thank God because he did keep me safe. I wasn't to be online without him, no one was to talk to me without going through him first, I know I was lucky. After two years I think he was starting to regret what he did, like I said he started seeing me as a person, they don't always. I find it really important to recognize the tricks and methods used to do that. There's a couple of aspects that I wouldn't describe because it was too dark but I always put every other detail on the table, it's the only way to understand that predatory mindset. Every one of them in that room were hiding a secret, their spouse, family, neighbours didn't know. They perfected staying hidden in plain sight, the women too. It wasn't even strength in numbers because they operated solo offline, they'd been doing it so long that they'd evolved and no suspected a thing.

It's funny that people will use the term "too smart for your own good" against you, when in reality it sounds more like they mean that you're too open-minded for your own good.

• I never looked it at that way but it's interesting. It never came up until t.A.T.u. and my questions about gay people. I just didn't understand why it was okay for two girls to be together but not two boys. I must have hit on something because that was the end of the discussion and it didn't come up again until I said I liked both boys and girls. And even today, even after talking to you I'm still very confused about sexuality. Now it's gone from taboo to actual extremist material. It didn't hit me until maybe a day or two after we first talked.

I saw how strange it sounded (to you) for a heterosexual male to treat having two women (who were together as a trophy) I sort of mentioned it to my Partner and he instantly changed the subject. I said I thought God says who can love who, not governments. I still don't understand why we're beating people up for love and putting them in jail. I ask and still 'it's just wrong' but then 'I like girls too' 'but you are a girl' it makes no sense. It's confusing the ever loving fudging Christ out of me and all I can think is they turned my preference into a commodity. It's the only answer I have. It just feels like even love is one rule for me and one rule for everyone else. Nor can I understand the dangers of being gay, only the danger of being gay when it's against the law.

You guys can chit chat

@kyleforrester87 We've been talking all weekend into the AM and are getting caught up on previous posts.