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Mixed opinions on things underlying today’s octopus discourse, really
I’m not “people have never told me I’m less literal-minded than they expected from the neurotype” level of literal-minded but it’s still… a lot, and that’s a constraint through which my life has operated and will continue to indefinitely
So I end up in a staring contest with queer theory more often than I’d actually like, in terms of the fundamental /normality/ with which people expect that their language is “obviously” metaphorical, versus me and my baggage from assuming people meant what they chose to say
Which means I’m not sure what I think, because I’m not sure what standpoint we’re supposed to be working from, because a) the way my brain works means “actually it was figurative” feels like a missing stair, b) I’d often be more interested if we were just being literal! I’m tired
In a context completely opposite (and, in fact, usually knee-jerk opposed to) theory, I managed to grow up with the simultaneous impression that the way my sexual orientation works was overall extremely average, and that it was dealbreaker-obscene if—only if—it was me personally.
This was significantly more intuitive (at its core, it’s “other people make sense and there is something wrong with me”—hardly advanced doublethink) than “people are being metaphorical because no /real/ person would /ever/ be interested in /that/.”
So! It comes with baggage.
So! It comes with baggage.
(“Is a fictional octopus still a glorified metaphor, though” I think at least nods to most of what’s still just 100% obscure to me.)
Anyway, context collapse says it’s not obvious in a vacuum that someone would not bang the octopus in real life (this is not a good idea) and I slightly suspect that any straight answer I get about non-extant octopodes from people who think otherwise will be… painfully straight?
Or maybe we were on roughly the same page all along and I grew up extremely online! At which point we’re back to “I need to talk to you about the online.”
