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moonlitconfessionsmoonlitconfessionsromance@mastodon.social
Oct 8, 2026, 8:16 PM
Selkie stories are quietly the most brutal romances in folklore. A seal-woman comes ashore, sheds her skin, a fisherman hides it, and she has no choice but to stay. She marries him. Has his children. Seems content for years.
Then one day she finds the skin. And every version agrees: she walks back into the sea and doesn't look back.
Nobody telling those stories calls it a love story. It's about what happens when the only reason someone stays is that you hid the door.
#folklore #romantasy
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Replies

John Timaeusjohntimaeus@infosec.exchange
Oct 9, 2026, 1:37 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance
It's amazing how many selkie stories there are. There's even one from Oceania but it's dolphin instead of seal
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NilaJonesNilaJones@zeroes.ca
Oct 9, 2026, 6:08 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance
They always sound to me like the fantasies of a man who doesn't want to admit what really happened, or doesn't want to tell the kids
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Hanno Zullahzulla@infosec.exchange
Oct 9, 2026, 6:42 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance I'm genuinely curious to hear your opinion on "Song of the Sea".
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ZumbadorZumbador@mefi.social
Oct 9, 2026, 7:33 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance It's so interesting how these stories cross cultures. There's the Crane Wife in Japanese folktales and the Swan Maiden in Scandinavia. I'm sure there are more. Also fascinates me that they're all about animals who can appear as humans
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Nike LeonhardNike_Leonhard@literatur.social
Oct 9, 2026, 7:41 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance
Same in Germany with swan-maidens (Schwanenjungfern). Men steal their feathered skin and force them to stay, do housework and bear children. Only men will call that love. It's slavery. And of course: If the swan-maiden will accidently find her feathers, she will fly away.
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Toby Jaffeytobyjaffey@mastodon.me.uk
Oct 9, 2026, 8:01 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance as a sea kayaker, I’ve always been interested in the intersection of selkie myths with reality. Greenland kayakers did land in Scotland in skin boats dressed in seal skin and couldn’t paddle without their skin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finn-men
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Holliehollie@social.coop
Oct 9, 2026, 8:57 AM
@tobyjaffey @moonlitconfessionsromance I didn't know this about the kayakers! Thanks for sharing! What a neat bit of data.
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David W. Jonesdancingtreefrog@mastodon.social
Oct 9, 2026, 8:17 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance A tale of female abduction and rape. 😞
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👻🕸️💀🦇🎃🕯️mk30🕯️🎃🦇💀🕸️👻mk30@tilde.zone
Oct 9, 2026, 9:20 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance @Tattie there's a similar story I read once that's from an island in the western Pacific. 2 sisters with wings fly to a particular island to visit this one beach that they both like. A man who lived there stole one of the sister's wings and she ends up stuck with him. Eventually she finds her wings and leaves him to go back to her island. Moral of the story: never steal a woman's wings 🪽
(On a side note, I think it's telling that there are no stories with lessons like that in judeo Christianity, only in the "heathen" traditions 🙄)
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👻🕸️💀🦇🎃🕯️mk30🕯️🎃🦇💀🕸️👻mk30@tilde.zone
Oct 9, 2026, 9:26 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance @Tattie also, the wicked men in these stories should be grateful that all she does is leave! She could have stabbed him in the neck before leaving, ya know???
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TattieTattie@eldritch.cafe
Oct 9, 2026, 11:57 AM
@mk30 I read the whole thing as a comment on gender relations. Like, across history and cultures women have often been "happy enough" with marriages they've been constrained into, and wouldn't actively wish their husbands harm, but these marriages are prisons nonetheless, and the women will always perceive that even if the man does not. No matter how kindly he treats her. No matter how well he provides.
As a trainee person-centered counsellor I understand the seal or the swan or the dolphin to be a woman's "organismic self", her animal needs, her personal desires, before society tells her what she should be and how she must behave. And we always feel the pull to live true to that self.
@moonlitconfessionsromance
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David W. Jonesdancingtreefrog@mastodon.social
Oct 9, 2026, 9:59 AM
@moonlitconfessionsromance And think of all those ancient Greek gods chasing after goddesses for the purpose of raping them, and the only defense was for the *goddess* to change into something like a tree that the god couldn't rape.
Gods were gods, gods were gonna rape, nothing to do about.
Our civilization has been sick in this area for thousands of years. 😞
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Dmitry Tantsurcreepy_owlet@mastodon.online
Oct 9, 2026, 1:09 PM
@dancingtreefrog @moonlitconfessionsromance Zeus would be on Epstein list for sure
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