Just Boys Being Each Others One And Only

So I recently got fully caught up with the JJK anime and am now on chapter 176 of the manga because I was bored. I basically went through a “wow I get it” moment when it comes to why people like this series so much.

While reading though, one thing I found interesting is that Gege-san seems to really like Nietschze. Nihilistic philosophy, especially passive vs active nihilism, comes up a lot in this series. You mainly see it in characters like Geto, Gojo, and very much with Mahito. The meaning of life or “the meaning of the soul” is a common question that comes up, with each character having their own views on the meaning of themselves and their place in life.

I’ve been liveblogging my experiences in a discord server and me and another person have real interesting conversations about how Geto seems to symbolize the passive nihilist, while Gojo is the active nihilist or the absurdist. Mahito is basically a twisted form of active nihilism.

The passive nihilist is a person of resignation, it is described as a person of weak will that views nihilism as the end to life and nothing beyond that. They often fall into violence or herd mentality in a scramble to give themselves some meaning or accept destruction. Nietzsche described it as “pessimistic Buddhism”.

The active nihilist is basically the exact opposite. Through the destruction of the meaning of life, they go in to construct new ones by their own will and ideal. They are free and of strong will and are often opposed to authority figures and find rebellion in their creative meanings of life.

I think this is a pretty good reflection of Geto, Gojo, and Mahito. Geto, who spiraled due to the shattering of his ideals and resorted to despair and destruction to find a new one. He became resigned from world, resigned from others. Gojo’s past ideals were also shattered, but through that he built a new one. He is completely absurd and humorous even in serious times, but he ultimately cares a lot about aiding the future generation and does so by rebelling against the higher ups of Jujutsu Society.

Mahito is an interesting case. His whole character is basically just a philosophical analysis of nihilism and the meaning of life and the soul. He is creature of free will to the most dangerous degree. That, since there is no meaning to life that means one has the free will to control other’s lives, or even take them away. He revels in the despair that he spreads, he fully believes that he has the free will to do so.

Now, the reason why there is probably so much “meaning of life” talk in this manga is because it has a lot of Buddhist imagery, so it’s possibly an analysis in Buddhist philosophy- but I still think that this manga can be viewed through the lens of nihilistic analysis!

I find manga that get philosophical like this so intriguing! I’m excited to continue reading.

i will defend to the grave that literary analysis IS enjoyable and a valid hobby but it's amazing how a hyperfixation on The Character will have you writing essays for fun

BREAKING NEWS: Writer discovers for the millionth time that they can write whatever they want. Join us now to see if the lesson will stick.

I really think everyone needs to truly internalize this:

Fictional characters are objects.

They are not people. You cannot "objectify" them, because they have no personhood to be deprived of. They have no humanity to be erased. You cannot "disrespect" them, because they are not real.

Ahem-

Saw a post about the reading order of a beloved author and how their early books are a bit rocky and mediocre. Imagine if we created a writing environment that believed in and supported people, so that they could start with a slightly dumb story, and be given the connection/resources/validation/support to grow over the course of a lifetime. They wouldn’t have to hit the ground running with a splendidly workshopped series, an mfa, and an audience of TikTok followers who have promised to buy it, so that all a gatekeeper needs to do is collect the money. They could just be a chicken shed cleaner, or a mediocre small-town journalist writing one column a week (which is a job that people used to have and support an entire family - imagine writing 500 words a week and having that be your whole day job lmao) with a bad book, and forty years later they’d be a Great.

I’d like to live in a world with more Greats. There are a lot of chicken shed cleaners who are Greats and we’ll never know them.

I do not want it to be like “back in the old days” where it was only men (with housekeeper wives) writing mediocre books. I want secure material circumstances for people, and I want time for them to do something that may never “pay off.”

hihi, i saw prev anon sharing fics, may i as well? （*＾-＾*）i mostly bookmarks fics with pretty prose so most of these are just beautiful words that make you Feel

itafushi first love, late spring (please drop everything and read this now it is my heart. my soul) here and where you are (amnesia au. it's dripping tears) the bull and the china shop (very cute!! pining omg) if i could swallow the sun (very beautiful prose) in the eaves of a home we will never own (this made me cry with no dialogue and less than 2k words) there will be time (fuck t. s. eliot, the essay) (Lots Of Pining)

satosugu aperture (very underrated) His One and Only (what if geto gets his body back?) maneater (10k of heart tugging prose) DERIVATIVES (breathtaking second person prose) i bet you kiss your knuckles right before they touch my cheek (pure PAIN)

gen/multiple moth light (gen sss trio) something tangible (itfs, stsg, nbmk and others, jjk uni coffee shop au!! ongoing and very fun to read) were love a blessing for us (gen, itadori and nanami's relationship he's his dad aghhh) subliminal (getou pov where he's aware that his body isn't his)

Thank you! Another recs for anyone who need this!

I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not a bad writer. I'm not

I wanna write. I really don't know why it's hard for me to write these days, it's just that I read so many great works and I tend to subconsciously compare myself then I start thinking 'this isn't good enough' and I get demotivated like a fragile little bitch

Problem is, if I don't write, there's no way it's gonna get any better. I'm better off writing shit then writing nothing at all. Writing the most amateurish poor sentence ever will get me closer to being good at writing than not doing anything ever will, so why am I so afraid to try?

I need to learn to be okay with writing 'bad' writing. I need to be okay with not being automatically great at something, because that's not how masterful writers are made.

Skilled writers, good writers come to be that way because they continue without stopping. They write, scratch, write, write some more and scratch some more and give up and do it over and over again.

They're good not because they haven't written anything bad. They're good because writing something bad did not stop them.

Not because they haven't fail. But because they pushed through despite failure.