Posts made by Kestrel

@Sunny said in What do you eat?:

@Kestrel

There are a lot of people who are more concerned with not starving to death right now, who need to feed their families right now, that do not have the PRIVILEGE to be concerned with how food is sourced.

If you're eating what you need to in order to survive and don't have the privilege of choice, then you have my sympathy and 0 room for shame.

That includes homeless people accepting handouts, people recovering from eating disorders for whom additional restrictions/concerns can be dangerous, single/busy/working parents who rely on convenience foods in order to feed large families, people living in food deserts and remote locations, etc.

But if you have the time and ability to educate yourself, batch cooking vegan meals can be incredibly cost effective. Also: rice and beans are way, way more nutritious than I don't know ... McDonalds happy meals. And it's what a lot of people the world over (Latin/South/Native America, China & Southeast Asia) live on as a staple, so you know, where checking your privilege is concerned ... the idea that this is bad is a Western thing.

I'm not out to judge anyone, I just like helping people who are interested in it become better informed on veganism. So if you fall into that category and the only thing holding you back from going vegan is concerns that it'll be expensive, you're misinformed, and I'm offering resources to help with that. There is 0 need for this to become an emotive topic.

@Rinel said in What do you eat?:

@Kestrel

The privilege of the vegan position is that it generally consists of white people of a very specific subsect of society seeking to divorce lower class groups from culturally meaningful foods while ignoring issues like food deserts.

Food deserts are a valid point but associating veganism with white people isn't.

Buddhists, hindus, jains and rastafarians have for generations embraced veganism & vegetarianism as part of their culture either as an ethical standpoint or by necessity. In most parts of the world, and throughout most of history, meat was and still is a luxury; in terms of pure logistics it always has been and still is much more expensive to manufacture than vegetarian cuisine, and the only reason it's cheaper to buy in the West is because OECD countries subsidies animal agriculture to the tune of over $52bn a year. (That's how much it was in 2012; I couldn't find more recent stats.) That comes out of your taxes, by the way, and contributes to food & economic inequality in the countries bearing the brunt of manufacture for us, such as Brazil, where indigenous communities are being displaced in order to clear room for cattle ranches.

This is a cookbook I own; I bought it in New Orleans where I also ate at an extremely cheap, local-favourite vegan diner called Sweet Soulfood in the Tremé neighbourhood. I recommend using the "look inside" feature to see what the author has to say about embracing veganism as a reclamation of his African heritage from the malnutritious effects white colonialism has had on his communities, and the disproportionate impact Western cuisine has on black people in America, who have higher incidences of chronic disease such as diabetes and various heart conditions.

Another book worth reading is The China Study, which documents how the westernisation of traditional Chinese cuisine has led to higher rates of cancer, diabetes and other chronic diseases which were previously unheard of in rural communities until American exports and advertising started gaining traction.

Here's another first person account of a black woman who pursued vegan cuisine in order to benefit her local community: https://youtu.be/X3B905qQ-mE

I've been vegan for seven years. I'm grateful for the recent changes in accessibility with companies like Beyond and Impossible, but before vegan cheese and imitation meat burgers became a thing, most of the vegan options and recipes I used to educate and feed myself came from Chinese, Indonesian, Ethiopian, Thai, Vietnamese, Indian, Mexican, Caribbean chefs, communities, restaurants and influencers. Tofu has been a cheap convenience in the East long before white people discovered it; rice & beans were a Latin/South/Native American staple similarly; and India has the largest vegetarian population in the world. I'm lucky enough to live nextdoor to a korean supermarket where I buy all my rice, beans, tofu, enoki mushrooms and bok choy in bulk.

Calling this a white thing is whitewashing.

And that's just on the cultural front; there is much, much more to dissect on a geopolitical level, when you consider that the devastating effects of climate change — driven in no small part by animal agriculture — will impact most severely the poorest and most underprivileged populations of the world, especially those living near the equator or in forests being burned for cattle — or that the UN has long since estimated that veganism alone has the potential to end world hunger. (Source #2: As have other scientific publications.) Meat is a wildly inefficient means of feeding our growing global population.

I remembered this thread and wanted to share this video on it, for people labouring under the misconception that veganism is privileged:

https://youtu.be/DuIUssE9BF4

£15 for four days' worth of nutritious food: breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert.

Also for those unfamiliar with Veganuary, there's a lot of support available right now if anyone wants to try it as a New Years' Resolution.

@eye8urcake one of my nieces had similar issues when she was born. It was very taxing on my sister who had some difficulties feeding her and, as a consequence of her physical issues, the child developed infantile anorexia.

The good news however is that Elle has blossomed into a lovely, healthy young woman. Although it's kind of fucked that this is what it apparently takes to have the right look, she's worked as a child model (with very close supervision) so you know, she has remained underweight but apart from that she's vibrant and physically active. I recently made the cross-continental trip to attend her Bat Mitzvah and I honestly couldn't be prouder. She's smart, brave, sassy and morally-driven. So those issues do not define her though understandably, her mother will always worry.

@surreality said in Health and Wealth and GrownUp Stuff:

Never give up your right to argue (barring spaces that disallow it for whatever reason, provided said reason is reasonable, obviously).

No, really.

Sometimes -- and I think I can say with some confidence that it has happened here a whole hell of a lot, really -- it leads to pointlessly gripey angst.

But even then, it means people are thinking. Brains are working, even if they're wandering far afield of sense now and then. (We're all susceptible; it's part of being human.)

Brains working is good.

It's OK to disagree with people. Most of us were socialized to be pleasers to some extent or another, in some way or another, but those ways tell us 'don't speak up and don't argue or disagree'. Well, fuck that.

If you wanna avoid it because it's causing undue stress in your life, or is otherwise doing you harm? Go for it; always take care of you, y'know?

Just don't do it because someone else tells you 'you should just fall in line', that it's pointless, or similar. Those people are the ones the word 'defenestration' is best used in regard to.

I'm not giving up my right to disagree with people; I'm just going to try and stop getting into heated political debates etc., though we'll see how long I can keep that up tbh. (I wasn't kidding when I said I was already finding it to be a struggle.)

I'm opinionated and honestly it's bad for my mental health. I need to stop caring what strangers on the internet think or feeling like it's my job to tell them why they're wrong because it's ineffective and accomplishes nothing other than souring the community and bringing out my worst side. I don't want to be that kind of person. I don't want to feel angry/emotional all the time. I feel enough climate/political grief as it is without letting the toxicity of faceless strangers poison me.

EDIT: gl with your ER appointment, also.

@Rinel: I do know adults who are genuinely happy. I am not one of them. At risk of sounding like I'm peddling new age bullshit though, the closest indications I've found for what makes them happy is a combination of community, family, physical activity and ikigai.

Some of this can be chased; some of it is down to luck. I can't choose my family so on that front I'm a bit fucked, but I know the closest I've felt to peace has been doing fulfilling work in a team of like-minded people in a remote enough location that we had to spend a good amount of time together bonding etc. Good luck — to both of us.

I just wanna ride a dragon and blow up fascists, and if I can do at least one of these things, I am so in.

@GreenFlashlight don't ever quote Ben Shapiro @me, you sick fuck.

I made a New Years Resolution to stop arguing with strangers over the internet.

It's been just under 9 hours and I'm already struggling.

This is a bit off-topic but I wanted to share some (in some cases very strange) reflections I've had on this thread and some of the comments I made on it 3 weeks ago.

@Kestrel said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

@Pandora said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

@Kestrel said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

A while ago a friend told me they got banned on Arx for sexist behaviour.

Eye twitching.

Did they mention how many times they got banned?

It's not Azazello.

I'm pretty sure it was just the once but I didn't really follow up on it. I don't know the full story, I just gave a sympathetic ear when they griped about it. Their version of events didn't sound so bad, but it's the only version I heard. I'm not in the habit of vouching for people in situations I didn't witness that I don't know anything about.

So, ironically, this guy I mentioned here, my friend who never gave me any red flags, who seemed like the most normal person ever, who's listened to me rant ad nauseam about feminism and never expressed disagreement ...

Anyway I still don't know what happened over on Arx but I heard a very troubling and convincing first-person account about him, unrelated, from someone who's known him much longer than I have, and it was much worse than just "sexist behaviour". Not stuff I care to share openly, especially as it's not my story to share, but I'm pretty mad at myself now for the fact I was defending him less than even a month ago.

Also at this point starting to turn into a bit of a misandrist, I guess they were right about the evils of feminism all along. I just don't know how much more disappointment I can take from the nice, normal, perfect seeming people around me.

But on a less cynical note, I should've given @faraday more of a benefit of the doubt because I did read her AresMUSH policies on harassment and they all seem pretty legit to me, though I still think the principal idea proposed by @Pandora on this thread is a good one — more tools can't hurt.

If anyone needs me I'll be in the kitchen, aggressively chopping up a cucumber with a shiny new pair of jade glasses.

I think it's important to emphasise some policies that you feel make your game different from other games.

I'm a bit of a perfectionist so I tend to always think about how the things around me, even if already very good, could always be made better. If you are too then I'm sure you've played on games and thought, 'OK, this is neat, but I wish ...' Add those policies to your game; the wishlists, the divisive ones. The controversial ones.

Be Excellent To One Another is honestly a policy I don't at all care for. Not because it's a bad policy, but because it's cliche. What does excellent mean? Whose excellent are we talking here? Be specific.

When I read a game policy that makes clear they will not tolerate sexism, racism, homophobia etc., tolerate OOC harassment, sexually inappropriate behaviour, paedo shit — while some might think these things shouldn't need to be said, as far as I'm concerned they really do, because the handling of these issues historically on other games I've played hasn't been perfect.

Being specific in this way also tells me something about your values as a staffer, which will make me feel safer playing on your game and likely be a draw in and of itself. After all while your role as staff isn't to be my best friend, I think being able to actually like, approve of and respect a game's staff is always good for player morale and comfort.

You will scare some people away — but are those people you wanted to attract in the first place?

@Roz said in Good TV:

Orlando Jones talked a bit more in-depth here about the whole thing.

So they fired Orlando Jones and hired Marilyn Manson?

Oof. That's a big oof. That's a mega yikes.

I ... just yikes.

Maybe they'll want to add Johnny Depp to the cast, while they're at it. And hire Woody Allen as a writer?

What's Roman Polanski doing these days?

I feel sincerely bad for Ricky Wittle. Guy can't catch a break.

@Admiral said in Good TV:

https://io9.gizmodo.com/orlando-jones-has-reportedly-been-fired-from-american-g-1840432889

Well that's a shame, I liked that show, and he was the best part of it. Guess I won't be watching Season 3 and onwards.

EDIT: Scratching my head here as to why anyone would make this decision. Did they read the book? Did they read that chapter in New Orleans? Why on Earth would anyone think Mr Nancy's speech was "too much" for a show based on this book?

Horribly sick with the flu, I binged the entirety of You in a single sitting with the help of a lot of tea and tissues.

Creepiest and most addictive show I've seen in a while.

@Pandora said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

@Kestrel said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

A while ago a friend told me they got banned on Arx for sexist behaviour.

Eye twitching.

Did they mention how many times they got banned?

It's not Azazello.

I'm pretty sure it was just the once but I didn't really follow up on it. I don't know the full story, I just gave a sympathetic ear when they griped about it. Their version of events didn't sound so bad, but it's the only version I heard. I'm not in the habit of vouching for people in situations I didn't witness that I don't know anything about.

I scrolled back through the thread to see where or if @faraday was being dogpiled because I wasn't reading the thread that way at all, and it made me wonder if that comment was referring to my one specific comment @ them. What I saw was @Pandora propose this idea and the vast majority of responses saying 'nah that's not necessary'. I upvoted the OP when I first read it, then went on with my life and came back a few days later to some confusion, because I'd assumed there'd be a unanimous +1 consensus and evidently that was not the case. Otherwise I wouldn't have bothered posting at all because I wouldn't have assumed my voice would add anything to the discussion that wasn't already being said.

I was wrong, and I saw a lot of people agreeing with @faraday, so felt the need to back the underdog.

To clarify I have a lot of respect for @faraday. I have no idea what she does/doesn't do on her games to ensure things run smoothly, as I haven't played a game she's staffed, so can only base my responses on what was said on this thread.

In particular, this —

@faraday said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

@Pandora My policy is simple: Work it out amongst yourselves. If you can't or aren't comfortable doing so, contact staff to help mediate.

— I take some issue with as criticism of @Pandora's proposal.

Whether intended or not, the phrasing of this policy, as expressed here in particular, can come across as pretty victim-blamey. I can only speak for myself that it wouldn't in any way encourage me to come forward with any complaints I had, because it implies that doing so isn't the adult thing to do, and makes me somehow lesser. It also puts the person complaining on equal footing in staff's eyes with the person they're complaining about, as a baseline.

Operating from a position of 'innocent until proven guilty', this makes perfect sense. In the case of most existing systems, you don't know what happened, your job is to find out and treat the situation without bias to start.

What @Pandora is proposing is a lot more clear-cut and I would feel much more comfortable coming forward under such a system, because it would mean all I have to say to staff is 'I used red and they continued', which is an explicit rule violation that doesn't require any kind of mediation or consideration, in theory. It gives me the immediate upper hand should I complain. The problem-player in this case is plainly evident.

A while ago a friend told me they got banned on Arx for sexist behaviour. I was surprised by this news because they'd never displayed sexist behaviour anywhere I'd personally seen (and I'm one of those diabolical loud-mouthed feminists you hear so much about from insecure men). But I wasn't there, I don't know what happened, and accept that maybe they behave totally different around me vs. around others. If they'd told me something like 'someone used a flag that means I'm supposed to cut that shit out but I just couldn't help myself', I wouldn't have to wonder whether anyone was being reasonable in accusing him or just jumping the gun.

@bored said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

Which leads me to the thought that it's not merely a matter of having the commands or not. We've had them, they're not magic bullets. It's really about building an overall structure of all the involved parts: staff policy (and follow-through), overall player culture, individual willingness to act, and the appropriate OOC tools. This kind of thing is trivial to code (its what, basically just an emit and maybe a staff channel echo?), but it's hard to implement culturally and see adopted.

Well, the more the merrier I say. Is there such a thing as putting too much effort into making your community comfortable?

I also don't know about anyone but even in less stressful contexts, i.e., where there's clear and enthusiastic consent present, I don't know that I've ever been upset about knowing just how much my partner (or RP partner) cares that I'm enjoying myself.

A quick flash of green on both sides also has the benefit of being a feelgood, warm & fuzzy trust-building tool.

The last time I told someone on a MUSH that they were making me uncomfortable and that I wanted space, they took offence to it, started passive-aggressively complaining about me on the MSB gripes thread, and persistently continued sending me pages indicating that we needed to talk about it sooner or later, despite me repeatedly (exhaustingly) trying to outline for them the fact that I have a mental health condition they were exacerbating and that I simply didn't want to continue.

I didn't actually say anything about how much I hated this to anyone but them (and my bestie, @dev, who was driven away by the same fuckstick) until maybe a year later, at which point that game's staffer reached out to me to mention they had an inkling about who I was referring to (as like here, I didn't mention them by name) and reassured me they would've done something had I come forward. Which is very comforting to know; I don't blame that staff-member at all for what happened here.

At the time though, me & @dev were just these two randos who'd wandered into what seemed like a really tight-knit community, and on +pub all we ever saw was that fuckstick brown-nosing staff, going on about how they'd known them for years and would follow them to the grave and beyond; there was this player we really liked, who was in an RL relationship with the fuckstick; I started avoiding her even though she seemed really cool because I imagined he might be bitching to her about me and I didn't want to go there.

Anything that could've simplified this would've been great. In fact I'd take it a step further and suggest that it could be beneficial for OOC communication channels, not just scenes. If a pages convo gets flagged red it needs to stop. If issues persist and staff can see there've been a lot of red/yellow flags etc., they know there's something worth investigating here.

It could even be useful on public channels, like say someone makes a seemingly innocent antisemitic/sex joke about me, I might throw out a "yellow" to let people know that hey, while I totally get you're just joshing around and being cute, I'm actually not cool with this and would like it to stop.

Can't count the number of times I could've used that on Discord and the like where I had to grit my teeth and let someone know in a public server that unless I know them IRL and they buy me beer and we're in private and maybe actually dating, oral sex jokes directed at me are not acceptable banter.

@Ganymede that's totally fair, I'm just drawing conjecture here in trying to understand where people are coming from. MSB is such a progressive community compared to a lot of others I know, so I'm just scratching my head a bit as to why this idea is rubbing so many people the wrong way. I wouldn't expect it here.

Also just to break the ice here this is for you.

@Kanye-Qwest said in Personal Agency for Personal Boundaries:

@Pandora It's a good thread, and a good thing to have a discussion about. I wish we could get a group of people who are not comfortable telling others "please don't do this/contact me/whatever boundary" and see what they would feel comfortable doing, because that's my hurdle.

Isn't any coded tool you give them to use in the moment, in scene/conversation essentially the same as saying 'hey could we not'? If the aversion is fear or wariness of conflict or insulting the other party, would throwing a card on the scene not trigger the same anxiety?

I feel like the more something is coded into the game and thus totally normalised, the less of a big deal it seems to use it. Especially if it cuts out any need for actual human interaction/communication, which can be like, hard, for some people.

There's a MUD called After Earth which has a "graphic" command which I think is a pretty neat idea:

Helpfile for Graphic

Class: Command
Syntax: graphic

Graphic is used to indicate that you are uncomfortable with the content of the RP, either due to its violent nature, sexual content, or some other reason which would justify omitting, editing, or otherwise toning the RP down to a more acceptable level.

When this command is used, all persons in the room should comply and reduce the level of detail. It should not require clarification or lapse into OOC discussion.

See also: MUDSEX, TURNS

Mudsex (TS) is also never supposed to occur without use of a "consent" command.

Helpfile for Consent

Syntax: consent list
consent give <name> [note]
consent revoke <name> [note]
consent alert <name> <reason>
consent check <name>
consent request <name> [reason]

All players are required to seek and obtain consent prior to engaging in sexually explicit roleplay.

The consent list command lists all characters that your character has provided consent to. Consent give <name> will add a character to the list, with an optional note if desired. Consent revoke <name> will remove consent at any time, also with an optional note.

All players are required to confirm that they have received consent before pursuing sexual intercourse using the consent check <name> command. Likewise, a player can OOCly declare their character's IC intentions with consent request <name> with an optional reason.

The consent system is PRIVATE. It does not report to staff unless a player uses the consent alert <name> <reason> command to tell staff that something is wrong.

See also: MUDSEX

All good stuff, IMO. Reading these help files significantly increased my immediate level of comfort and confidence in deciding to play this particular game.

Just having these kinds of policies documented, knowing there are very strict, specific systems in place that don't require me to go through the (perceived to be) taxing process of reaching out to and then negotiating with staff.

I will also say that staff reputation goes a long way. I don't play Arx; theme-wise it's just not my bag, I'm not into L&L stuff. But I've only heard good things from friends, who inexorably gossip because that's just kind of the way it goes in this community, which means that if I did decide to play Arx I would probably feel a lot more comfortable approaching its staff about any potential issues.

It's not often that I agree with @Pandora on anything and honestly it's kind of surprising that of all the possible topics on MSB, this is where the line appears to get drawn between me, the popular community consensus, and her, based on past experiences. But for example, I can't think of any situation where it would ever occur to me to reach out to the staff of Haven to express that I'd encountered an issue with another player, as they have a notoriously bad reputation when it comes to dealing with this. (Unless I specifically just wanted to raise a stink up about it without any expectation that they'd actually do anything on my behalf, for cathartic/venting purposes.)

EDIT: Although speaking of Haven, I like the difficult prisoner system.

I have to wonder if the pushback from some of the people on this thread like @faraday (hi, sorry, I'm your biggest fan but your responses here just baffle me) may also be somewhat game-culture based.

If you're exclusively active in the kinds of WoD games that get circulated and advertised on MSB, maybe you can't fathom why it can kind of seem like a big deal to reach out to someone, or to staff, and let them know there's a problem. Maybe you're used to playing exclusively with people you've known for years, and pretty much the only circumstance you'd encounter where someone might need to reach out is akin to a buddy nudging you with an elbow and giving the stink-eye to some strange newcomer who doesn't seem to be doing things the way we do things around here.

But then picture someone like me — I generally feel like more of an outsider in this community, as I don't exclusively play MUSHes and came across my first MUSH only a few years ago — it can be pretty awkward to speak up, as the newcomer, in a circumstance where I might worry that I could be perceived as stirring up trouble in an established community.

Furthermore, on a lot of non-MUSH MU* that I play, OOC communication is seen as a bit of a bigger deal, in that it generally shouldn't happen without very good reason, and may even be an opt-in system. I like this because tbqh I don't come to these games to socialise, I come for pretendy-fun-times and to do what I love most in this world (other than maybe cuddling cute animals), which is creative writing. Having to actually talk to other players via pages to set up a scene or whatever is just a hurdle that I feel obligated to surmount, not something I would actively choose to do for the hell of it, 99 times out of 10. (That is not a typo.)

The culture on MUDs etc. may often also actively stigmatise the idea that you're even allowed to be uncomfortable with a scene. Like, don't be a baby, this is a mature game, a mature community, you need to buck up and just be OK with whatever the game throws at you. Also whatever happens IC is IC and you're not allowed to try and control your game experience through OOC means. Don't want your character raped? Have your character fight back, or report the incident IC to a police character, don't just bitch about it OOCly.

Just telling people in games with these kinds of cultures that it's actually OK to not want to deal with something, and giving them a command to put on the brakes without needing to figure out how to actually express that could be kind of revolutionary.

So maybe you're thinking, OK, but I run a WoD MUSH, so this doesn't apply to my game or my game's culture, and I have that A+ open door policy etc.

That's great but if a lifelong MUD player wanders into your game — if you're intending to leave that door open as opposed to just sticking with a group you know and are super comfortable with — then they may not be used to your vastly superior culture just yet, and an easily tracked, documented system like this may be preferable for them personally based on the other kinds of game cultures they're used to.

Speaking for myself, I'm pretty rubbish at evaluating and respecting my own personal boundaries.

It's not something I'm proud of. I realise it's also no one's job to do it for me. But when I look back at nearly every single incident where someone I personally knew, who was active in my circle (as opposed to like a stranger grabbing me or something) was making me uncomfortable, there has always been a nagging voice of doubt in the back of my mind suggesting that maybe this isn't as big a deal as I'm making it out to be, maybe I should just brush it off, maybe I'm being paranoid, maybe this is really my fault because I led that person on or encouraged them or tried to be their friend or don't have sufficient evidence, etc.

While a fairly pathetic aspect of my personality that I'm suitably ashamed of, I don't think I'm alone in just having been badly socialised this way.

Furthermore even in cases where it's pretty clear-cut, I would often be hesitant to come forward out of fear of potential consequences/fallback on me, for example if I thought my harasser was on good terms with staff, and that comparatively my social standing/currency didn't give me sufficient leverage, if it's my word against theirs, etc.

So honestly, anything that simplifies the process for me of having a documented, simple, coded way of putting the breaks on something is of benefit for me.

Do I deserve/need to be coddled this way? Sure, no. Is it anyone's responsibility to make sure I'm comfortable but my own? Also no. But we live in an imperfect world and if it was just me out there being affected by this, I'd likely care less, except 99% of the time when someone's bothering me this way I end up finding out that I'm not the only person they're doing this to, which makes me care 10 times more.

Anything to facilitate and make it easier for people like me to come forward serves in protecting not just their fragile sensibilities, but the general wellbeing of the game at large.

EDIT: It also means I don't have to weather the anxiety inducing process of politely reaching out to someone who makes me uncomfortable, with an excess of smileys to assure them I mean no harm, to gently indicate that while I think the best of them and know they didn't mean to, they have made me uncomfortable. Which is always fucking exhausting especially if I'm already — and I will use that word — in a "triggered" state.

@tek said in The Dark Side of online Role-Playing:

also, the grooming shit happens a lot more than you think if two people IN THIS THREAD ALONE experienced it.

To be frank, grooming happens everywhere, and I'd personally be much more worried about it happening IRL than online. The style will vary depending on the platform but I don't think online roleplaying communities present a higher risk than say, after-school activities or even just literally attending a school where they're in contact with adult teachers.

I think the most important thing you can do is just teach your child how to recognise problem behaviour.

My sister's been starting her daughter on "consent training" pretty much since she was born. She's encouraged myself and other family members to always ask for permission to hug her, and teaches her child that if she doesn't want to hug a person for whatever reason, she doesn't have to. This is distinctly different from how my sister and I were raised, where our parents pretty much just told us to go hug our grandma and just put up with being smothered with kisses etc. While totally harmless, these culturally ingrained lessons can just as easily make other, less innocent behaviours seem equally harmless later on, when they shouldn't be. I appreciate that this child is being raised early on to know that no one is allowed to breach her personal bubble without her express consent, under any circumstances, even if that person is a trusted family member/friend etc.

The biggest thing that makes children targets is that they don't understand what's happening until it's way too late.

MSB makes me glad I'm too dead inside to TS these days, lol