Just as I was starting to get the "nobody cares, nobody's reading" grumps about Parallax again... two people here mention it out of the blue, and a total stranger on Birdsite retweets my pinned tweet about it out of the blue. ^______^

I had replied to the latter's tweet about the importance of distinguishing the _portrayal_ of something problematic from the _approval_ of something problematic.

Specifically, she was (rightly) angry at people getting all Woke And Cancel-y over her putting "normal"-seeming abusive people in her stories... when her whole issue was that _she_ grew up thinking abusers were always strangers and monsters... and never recognized the abuse in her own life until she was an adult. And all she wanted was for there to be some representation of people who were abusive but complex... and thus, of the people they abused.

I think I'm gonna keep her in mind and ping her when we're on Chapter 2... when the cracks in the Mixolyne bois' relationship with their Elders start to show. I owe her a debt of gratitude for making me realize this _is_ a story about parental abuse in some ways. Maybe the fact it's all allegorical stuff about coldly indifferent worldminds, treating their genetic spawn as pawns, will make it easier to digest for some people.

In the meantime, I'm just palming my face over how every. damn. generation. seems to have to relearn this lesson of "Showing it doesn't mean you support it." I grew up angry at the right for thinking that way. It was a formative part of my personality development. And now it REALLY creeps me out that it's our side doing it.