#“i can and do respect you being queer but i draw the line at literal mondterfucking”

[kawareo]

The bg3 community has a big problem with not thinking the characters are pansexual, when they clearly are, here's all the bad takes i've heard (this from queer people) on tiktok/twitter/etc "Minthara is a lesbian and HATES men" "Gale only like women, and only feminine ones" "Wyll is a gentleman, he would only date women" "Karlach clearly only has dialogue talking about men because of her heteronormative upbringing" These people are insane

Where is that post about how bitchy or mean women in media are always headcanoned as lesbians

Minthara hating men is funny to me though because ingame she openly admires and respects both Ketheric and Gortash for their leadership and/or war mindset

Gale 'i quite enjoy your musk' Dekarios suuure likes only femenine women

I'm standoffish around Wyll so I might be reaching here, but to me it sounds like calling him a Gentleman is just a nicer way of calling him boring. (Also, why couldn't a gentleman date a man??) But also Wyll openly fawns over how pretty Astarion is and about Halsin, more than once, and that's just from the top of my head

Oh wow, a big muscular lady is a lesbian? Call the news, we have something groundbreaking. (I'm still playing a Wylach romance so I do have a bias but cmon) Idk what heteronormative upbringing they're talking about though. Having a mom and a dad? In a world where homophobia doesn't exist and never has? It's so stupid, especially with Karlach whos whole thing is being open and honest about her feelings; but sure, make up straws to reach for that explain away her straight up stating that she wants to fuck a specific man

Headcanons are one thing (like personally, i see Minthara as being slightly more into women than she is into men, and opposite with Karlach) but ffs I don't get it why people need to argue about canon so much when it's literally spelled out for them

Tbh I didn't know this was such a big problem, but i guess it just means I'm happy here in my oblivious corner where people make sense

[piscadilly]

lost a follower for having critical thinking skills amazing

[gffa]

I saw your post defending the way Jedi adopt the children/accept them into their culture, and I absolutely loved it! It was so well-informed, and you are right: It is all there in the original content!

I find it very ironic that many people spew these lies about the Jedi when that’s exactly what the Empire did. Iirc, this argument of Jedi being “kidnappers” was actually fueled by Emperor Palpatine and the Empire in their campaign against the Jedi. They wanted to discredit them and make the people turn against them so that they could erase them all more easily. So I find it very ironic that these lies are now being upheld by some people as the truth. (Really, have people forgotten the Empire was created bases on the Nazi’s and their own racist strategies?)

You are not inmune to the Empire’s propaganda.

Please correct me if I’m wrong. I’m not as good at pulling examples and proof from all the SW content as you are.

Hi! Thank you for the very sweet ask! Navigating stuff in fandom like this can be difficult at times, because there has to be room for compassion and tolerance for disagreement, like it's fine if people disagree with my views, I'm not your mom, I'm not telling you want to do or say, especially since this is fiction, these are made up space stories. But there also has to be room to understand that sometimes our commentary on fictional stories are echoes of reflection of real world attitudes--we can't just go around spewing racist, sexist, homophobic commentary and be like, "It's just fiction, you can't get upset!" There's no easy line for any of this, no single hard set in stone rule for when it's truly just fiction and when it's an echo of a real world attitude, especially in Star Wars, which often draws influence from a lot of non-Western sources and traditional Western sources. (My general rule of thumb is: I think it's fair to criticize those things through the influences they have, but if your criticism is then ended with, "So that's why we shouldn't have or acknowledge any Buddhism/Black people/queer people/women in Star Wars!" then fuck right on off with that.) And I also understand a lot of the anti-Jedi attitudes (or at least what I've personally experienced of them) because I've talked a bunch of times about how I started out as pretty Jedi-critical myself! I did the whole, "They had grown stagnant and refused to evolve with the galaxy, so they needed to be wiped out." thing because nobody had framed it explicitly as what it was: a genocide. It wasn't until a friend and I were talking and they mentioned that lens of it that it just sort of crashed down on me, oh, that's literally what it was and genocide is never justifiable. I did the whole, "The Jedi failed Anakin and taught him to repress his emotions." thing as well, because I saw it all over the place in fandom and just automatically folded it into my view, until I went back and actually watched Lucas' movies and Lucas' animation (first six movies + first six seasons of TCW) and read his interviews, which blew me onto my ass when I saw Obi-Wan being supportive of Anakin, when I saw Anakin not listening to the advice he was given, when I saw that Jedi were expressing emotion all over the place, when I saw they were respecting other Force traditions in the galaxy. I can't speak to why so many people think badly of the Jedi, there's probably a thousand reasons and I'm only vaguely aware of like half of them, but I do think that it's often unpopular to promote the idea of emotional regulation already being achieved, instead of something to be struggled with. I think we're all primed by a lot of mainstream media saying that an explosion of anger is what will save the day. I think there's so much anger in the world today that we're all angry and being told to let go of it feels really insulting at times. (But, as someone who has lost years of my life when I was younger to anger, I gotta say, I am so much better off having let go of as much of that shit as I can. It was poison in my veins, carrying that anger around. I lost so many friendships and opportunities and just time to being miserably mad about stuff.)

I'm getting off topic of the kidnapping aspect about the Jedi, but a lot of it starts to swirl together in what I've experienced (especially people who try to put this stuff on my posts--thankfully, that's died down/I block the people who won't respect boundaries) and so I kind of bounce from one aspect of it to another.

I do think it's good to talk about these things--both from "it's fun to analyze the content of the story on a meta level" perspective and "here's how this echoes into and from the real world" perspective, like I enjoy saying, okay, here's what's actually said in the movies/TCW, but also I think talking about how the Jedi are Buddhist influenced is important because that means they're going to have values that are meant to be reflected in that and Western fandom has a really big problem of being derisive about non-Western influences or automatically saying they're wrong. (I come from anime/manga fandoms, let me tell you, it's a big problem.)

And, yeah, in a way where it's really awful, but I think one of the most well-done things Disney's Star Wars has done is that it's really focused on showing that the Empire was a fascist one and the propaganda they used about the Jedi are ones that are super relevant to the conversation.

[sailorblossoms-snowbaz]

Baz & biting Simon

(And why I think it’s ok if he never wants to do it)

I never thought about this before (maybe because I don't get the appeal of a vampire's bite, what with all the blood and the stabbing and being poisoned and the pain, but other people finding it hot isn't my business) (neck kisses though... that I get). I have seen the arguments in favor of Baz biting Simon, ranging from "I think that would be good for Baz's character development" to "I personally think it's hot." I accepted them (hell, I might have even thought of or written a biting scene considering the former, I don't remember) and that was that... until I saw the arguments in favor of respecting that Baz doesn't want to bite Simon.

For starters, one needs to consider what biting Simon would mean. People have read Baz's vampire nature as connected to his queerness – he often thinks about them in the same breath (very grimly including "which one is the one getting me discriminated against right now" scenarios... "I don't know if Daphne means me getting cured of the vampirism or the gayness" kinda puts homophobia on the same level as being against vampirism).

In that vein, Baz being alright with biting Simon as part of sexy times is seen as synonymous with Baz fully embracing his queerness; Baz loving every part of himself just like how Simon loves every part of him. This is where I would usually call it a day, but... actually, I don't think it's right to completely lean on the vampire identity as synonymous with his queer identity 100%. As a metaphor, it's not the only thing it can represent (I once read a good meta that saw the ways he has to plan around it etc as a metaphor for disability). In a more literal sense, the books give you enough to question the WOM's treatment of vampires. But seeing vampires in Las Vegas getting smart about drinking blood without killing doesn't erase the predatory nature associated with them... so I think it's a delicate conversation that needs to know where to draw lines, where to connect, and where to separate things.

I think much comes out of the scene where Simon says there's "nothing about you I don't want." But one also needs to consider that, while Simon absolutely means it (which is a powerful thing to convey to Baz, who has always felt he's loved in spite of who he is) when asked about why he wanted Baz to bite him, his answer to that specific question is not "I think that would be good for you" but "I personally think it's hot" (even if wanting to be with Baz when he hunts and "they should see him draining a deer!" or something highlights that it makes Simon happy and proud to see Baz getting his needs fulfilled without shame, "I want him to bite me, specifically" is more about Baz's hotness, compared to Simon wanting to try kinky stuff). And you can see that without him having to say it: when Baz is asking him about past sexual experience, Simon keeps trying to change the subject, eventually going to "I want to focus on actually sexy things, so you should let me watch you drink the nasty little rats I lovingly helped you catch."

So eventually we arrive at: it makes Baz uncomfortable to be asked this. It causes him distress, even. The fact that Simon would be into it, by itself, or even as motivation is... not a good reason to challenge Baz's feelings. One should never do anything they don't want or feel comfortable with sexually for someone else's sake. Centering Simon's desire over Baz's comfort is... well. Even more when Simon himself is just discovering desire and what it means to him – at this point, he doesn't actually know what he would be into, so he's just saying shit. All Simon actually knows is that he's into Baz, and all Baz-related things are a turn on (just like how Baz is like "wouldn't have considered myself a tail guy, but since Simon has one..." before giving him a tail job.) More importantly, I think Simon means it when he promises he won't bring it up again upon noticing Baz's distress. Simon wants to take care of him and make him happy – he won't push Baz to do anything that makes him uncomfortable (especially since Simon has experience with unwanted sexual situations, which has very likely contributed to his issues with intimacy) (I have many posts about that, finding them though...)

Then comes the point about self-acceptance. About how Baz deserves to love every part of himself as much as Simon loves him. Realistically, a lot of us have parts about ourselves that we don't like, parts that we can't change, but become okay with them by negotiating with them. Perhaps not really comparable, but just for the sake of giving an example: disliking one's body shape, but learning how to dress in a way that flatters it. Finding features we like and highlighting them. Learning how to manage bad moods.

I don't really think Baz needs to bite Simon to find any sort of self-acceptance. Baz is a natural caretaker. He has a soft heart. Even in a fight where he's in actual danger, he holds back – he doesn't want to hurt others (and only snaps if Simon is in danger or gets hurt). The predatory nature of a vampire goes against Baz's very core. And an essential part of that predation is in making humans targets. In putting humans at the bottom of a food chain. This is not something Baz can separate from a vampire bite, and he's not the type to be into about whatever role-power-play shenanigans that someone else could get out of that. When someone in Las Vegas is taking a sip, they have enough practice to let the human walk away alive, but for convenience – they don't give a shit about the actual human (I imagine people died in the process of figuring out when to stop and in mastering the control required for it). On top of that, Baz has trauma around hunting (killing) in a way that hurts him (pets). Simon is the person Baz loves the most – what Baz needs is not to put himself in a "predatory role" when Simon is the target. He doesn't need to put Simon in a position where there is even the slightest chance of Simon getting hurt, and worst of all: of Baz being responsible. Just the thought it's traumatizing for him. When Baz chooses to only eat certain types of animals (because pets too feed into his self-hatred) he's already negotiating with something about himself he doesn't like. He's turning something he hates about himself into something he can accept. Into something he can live with. I do think Baz has issues he needs to work on, but I don't think modifying his diet is required. The way in which he figured how to solve his drinking needs is pretty good when considering Baz's essence, his wants and needs. When considering how Baz wants to live his life.

Which takes me to health and immortality. Another argument in favor is that Baz will look more "healthy" if he were to drink human blood... but what else is there? Are optics important if Baz is still able to function healthily with his dietary choices? The only other thing human blood brings in this universe is immortality, something that's so unthinkable it's actually paralyzing for Baz. I've seen the idea that Baz should embrace that too; I disagree, and I fail to see an argument strong enough in favor ("it would be cool" for him? the hell it would). Immortality too goes against Baz's very nature: the idea of outliving everyone he has ever loved, for someone like Baz, would be the worst kind of torture. The fact that drinking human blood is the key to living forever just means there's actually not a single reason strong enough for Baz to have a change of heart. On the contrary: it's a good reason to fucking double down on his stance. "He could just take a little sip; enough to gain some color but not enough for immortality" But why? He can barely control when his fangs drop, why would he bother doing all that, when it implies trial and error with something that could risk Simon's safety? He wouldn't do it even if it meant just Simon getting a bit dizzy and shit.

Finally, there's the argument on why people would rather respect Baz's wishes. The thing that made me reconsider every single point in favor of biting and not finding them as strong as this. It's very simple, really, so I'll be brief here: it's the idea of having a boundary or hard line that others can't understand... that others believe it's something to "get over," that "can't be good for you," and needs to be changed. Something one "should grow out of," which heavily resonates with people who are in the acespectrum (I think the writing in these books are very ace friendly) or who are aromantic, or don't want to drink alcohol or do or want anything that society pressures us to do or want or else "something is wrong with us."

Baz not biting humans is a boundary that matters to him, even if biting doesn't end in death... His own experience with getting bitten sucked ass, anyway. It changed him in ways beyond his control – his boundary is how he gains control of who he is, and how he sees himself. It provides comfort. So when the author says "I might change my mind someday, but I think this boundary is important for him to maintain" and wants to honor that, I'm inclined to support it.

[nikoisme]

Regarding the "it's fine that you're queer, just don't show it." line I agree with you and share your feelings, It makes me so incredibly frustrated, because this is a very prevalent attitude where I live (along with the more extreme negative attitudes).

Like. People go "I don't care that someone's queer, I'm neutral about that", but 90% of the time that "neutral" means just "I'm not going to directly harm them or wish death upon them, but I don't want to see, hear, think or talk about them"

Hearing that "it's fine you're gay, just keep it in the privacy of your bedroom" is just... you're not even allowed to hold hands with your partner on the street because that can put you both in danger (yes, unfortunately here it is a very real fear. I know that there are countries, where things are better, and where the worst you'll get is a rare insult or a mean stare, which, don't get me wrong, it's still not pleasant, but it's not as bad as a constant threat of physical assault or worse). And I'm not even talking about being trans. This isn't "neutral" this is just negative and it makes me so angry, when people act like this.

The worst part, they don't even realise what the problem is and how incredibly suffocating being forced to live like this is. You either treat queer people as people and don't try to erase (or worse, completely stop) their existence and let us be or you don't. Simply not wishing death upon queer people and not harming them for existing isn't as great of an achievement as those people think it is...

Sorry, if this was too negative. You don't have to respond and also, if you don't like getting rants like this, please feel free to say so. I wish you all the best, your blog is a very nice place and your art is wonderful, thank you for existing)))

Long rant ahead whoops!! cw for queerphobia and mentions of violence

Oh you put it all so perfectly! The experience here is exactly the same. "Just keep it within four walls, why do you have to rub it in our faces" is one I hear constantly. They will see a same-sex couple just holding hands and immediately see it as if they're having sex in public or something. Like,, just holding hands is something so explicitly sexual, to them apparently. Like you stated, they will say "i am neutral about it", but they are neutral only if you don't show you're queer. They are "neutral" only if you aren't actually yourself. I was honestly shocked how many times the conversation would go from that "neutrality" to mockery to downright violence. So whenever i hear someone say "as long as they don't push it on me", i always put up my guard. Because i don't know if it's "i don't mind that you're queer, you're still the same person i know and you deserve to be loved, respected and have basic human rights" or just masked hatred.

They will literally claim that queer people aren't discriminated, but actually privileged because they have "their damn parade" and representation in media. They say that they will get all the accommodations of life, society and economy purely based on the fact that they are queer. Apparently this all "comes from the west", like i am actually from the west and not,, y'know,, literally from here?? Born here?? Raised here?? Had the same chaotic-ass childhood like my peers?? But apparently it all goes away just because i am queer? Idk man it all really disconnected me from my culture and identity, and i am still uncomfortable with that (but i'm slowly trying to heal that! Drawing slavic mythology helps :DD)

"They aren't discriminated, they don't actually face any harassment", there were cases of queer people literally being murdered here. If it was a cishet person, it would be breaking news. But since it's a queer person, no one speaks about it. Harassment is bad, but when a queer person is being harassed it's their fault? Because they couldn't keep it to themselves? There is no protection here towards queer people when they face discrimination and harassment. The government does nothing.

"They have the same rights as us, what more do they want?" i don't know man just not living in constant paranoia hmmm??? Pride parades, rare as they are, are always under threats of violence from anti-gay protestors. I think a lot of people here don't even think queer people are actually people. Usually queer characters here are the laughingstock in media. They are portrayed with such horrible stereotypes (the worst ones are gay men=pedos), to the point of sometimes dehumanizing them. There is just so many terrible misinformation. I am queer as fuck, my gender is transed, and i know nothing about some of the downright bullshit they claim. A few weeks ago i had to listen through "the gays and their agenda" thing. And i'm not kidding, someone said "you will be asked to change your sexuality to get hired. Soon you will have to out yourself as straight. Straight people are the actual minority". It was so dumb it was almost hilarious.

But while sometimes i can get a laugh out of their willful ignorance (they lowkey won't acknowledge intersex people), it can get really draining, really fast. At this point i am just exhausted and sick of it. Sometimes I'm just exhausted of being around my family, friends and classmates and knowing, deep down, that they wish people like me wouldn't exist. Listening to them talk about "all the things they would do if they saw a [insert f slur]" and fearing if they would do it to you. Not speaking in lgbtq+ themed conversations because you don't agree with them - and all the shitty things they say are, in a way, faced at you. I'm not out to anyone irl exactly because of this, so while i don't face harassment aimed specifically at me, it does get hard sometimes. The silent ostracization from your own culture, history, religion etc. just feels really bad. Not to get too into it, but all of it really really fucked me up, and it took me years to come to terms with myself. It's sad feeling like i simply don't belong here. Sometimes it makes me wanna scream in anger, sometimes it makes me wanna laugh, sometimes it makes me wanna just throw up, cry, sleep and sometimes i just spiral. I usually have a "lmao fuck them. I like myself and i don't care what they think of me" attitude (queer spite that i mentioned once HAHAHA), but I actually do care because sometimes the odds of me having a normal life in which i am happy with who i am and i don't live under the constant fear of being, y'know, KILLED,, they just seem nonexistent.

I don't think they understand queer people have hobbies, friends, families, interests, dreams. We do the same things as them, we eat sleep laugh cry. They will claim we make our queer identity the only part of ourselves, like it's our entire personality - but when you tell them you're queer, they stop treating you the same, as the same person you were before you told them AND STILL ARE!! They will treat you as "not cishet", something that is "sick" and wrong and just doesn't belong.

This got really personal real fast, but good god it feels good to get it all out. There is so much more i didn't cover, mostly because even typing this down made me really tired. And it's not a bad thing!! In a way i am really exhausted from staying silent about this, so this was nice. I guess like a big "FUCK YOU" to everyone around me who is like this LMAOO. but tHANK YOU this ask put all of the frustration into words much better than i could hahaha!!

[britcision]

The number of people who seem to think that it’s good and normal for them to want to personally approve of any piece of art for it to exist are fucking baffling to me

“Oh I don’t condone incest ships so no one should be allowed to write them”

Do you condone war crimes?

Do you approve of violence and oppressive governments?

Do you approve of torture and whump?

Do you fucking approve of teenage bullying?

We’d lose ALL MODERN MEDIA if we only ever told stories about things that are pure and good and clean, and the queer community would never be a part of it

Gay people HOLDING HANDS are treated like they’re fucking in the street by conservatives

You will never be pure enough, clean enough, respectable enough for the people who want you dead

Alan fucking Turing, without whom the Allies never would have won World War II, was chemically castrated because he happened to be gay as well as a genius

He killed himself

He was a hero by every single measure of the word, and he was driven to suicide because nothing else he was, nothing else he did, mattered to the people that were so sure homosexuality was wrong

Why the hell would being a milquetoast little queer who never consumes questionable content, never even glances at anything that makes them uncomfortable, save you?

He was an influential cis white man who fucking saved the civilisation that decided being gay made him a danger to kids, and he could not be allowed to just live his life

People like dark shit

Being taboo is literally part of the thrill, because it’s something that people don’t fucking go out and get in their normal life

There is no line in the sand that you can draw and say “this type of content is always bad and has no place in society” that will not immediately be used to silence minorities first (and usually only)

Spend a damn week enforcing the same purity standards on all your entertainment that you do on fic

Hint: you’ll never watch Game of Thrones again. Or 99.9% of historical fiction or fantasy. No war movies, which actually do have a negative effect on people

No more cop shows, procedurals, murder mysteries, and oh, if you like horror? Whole genre’s gotta go

The world has fucked up shit in it, and people will create and consume it in media. All you’re doing by trying to personally fucking judge the standards of fan content is making yourself look like an asshole

No one’s grabbing you by the fucking neck and making you read fic you don’t like

Show the same courtesy and keep your damn hands to yourself too

It’s none of your business what other people like until it affects you personally, and all this “fiction affects reality”? If you truly believe that aim your ass at Hollywood and Disney, the biggest creators of the most fucked up fiction

They never do

Just target fan communities and creators that they think they can bully into obeying

Not a single one of their actions would be allowed in the pure fiction utopia they want to police us into

[lordelmelloi2]

Idk how many times I have to say it but if you support incest/incest "kink" unfollow me, my blog is not for you. I'm tired of people acting like the fantasy aspect of kink has nothing to do with reality. No one takes incest survivors seriously in general & the societal attitudes currently towards incest & incest survivors are leaning towards this type of abuse's normalization. When a group is already disenfranchised to that point where incest abuse is denied en masse or normalized within media and at times encouraged in certain groups, it is not something that IMO can be practiced as a kink without it being harmful. The same goes for any "kink" that roleplays pedophilic attraction. There are types of kinks that can say something about someone's perception and treatment of members of certain disenfranchised groups, if you know anything about kink and its impact on society or literally anything about psychological dynamics of kinks at all you would know this. Kink is not exempt from analysis. Anything to deal with the psychological dynamics of pleasure is not exempt from analysis nor is it something that should be simplified into "well it's just pretend" or "it's between two adults" as if all kink exists within a vacuum. It's the same reasons why even largely open queer kink communities draw hard lines at raceplay and other forms of roleplay in that vein. It's not a "moral panic" it's simply seeing how these attitudes affect the world around us, and centering survivors in the conversations about these sorts of acts. Centering those who have survived these types of abuses are the way that we stop the cycles of intergenerational abuse. And -- I should add -- the idea that you are not in control of what you do or do not find sexy, what kinks you do or do not engage with, the idea that you can not control your own sexual desires is a concept that denies yourself the agency over your own sex life and erodes your boundaries. This isn't to say that all desire is inherently harmful, but that desire to replicate specific abuses can and will cause you to lose boundaries that otherwise would give respect towards survivors of those abuses. Sexualizing incest, sexualizing children, those are not attitudes that exist in a vacuum. They are attitudes that affect survivors today and assist in grooming more victims of these abuses. Nuance is required in kink. Do not let people convince you that kink exists in a vacuum.

*Disclaimer: I'm someone involved in IRL kink communities, I go to forums, I know elders etc. everything that's involved with anything relating to sexuality deserves nuance and acknowledgment that kink does not exist in a vacuum and that this is still something that affects your psychological interpretations of certain things. Grace is given to those who are coping but when things spill into real life, when it begins to harm survivors and cultivate unsafe spaces for survivors... when it's an abuse that's normalized within society it's not subversive or deviant or whatever. It's already normalized. I do not speak as someone from a sexually repressive household -- actually vastly the opposite -- and I do not engage with reductive bad-faith takes about "puritanicalism" since half of the people who talk about these issues don't even know what that means or what context the term even applies to.

My blog is a safe space for incest survivors, CSA survivors, COCSA survivors, and grooming survivors. It will always be a safe space for abuse survivors. I will never condone abuse or the normalization of abuse and will always be critical of attitudes that contribute to the normalization of said abuses. I am fundamentally anti-abuse. I will never condone attitudes that contribute to abuse.

[rjalker]

Extremely funny (and by funny I mean aggravating) to me that other people who use neopronouns want to have strict definitions of what makes something a neopronouns or not, with the definition they've chosen excluding people.

"Something can only be a neopronoun if it was created after 1800!"

so you think thee/thy/thou/ect. as personal pronouns aren't neopronouns?

Why use a definition that /by definition/ is going to exclude people who face the same challenges?

By the above definition, it/its pronouns aren't neopronouns.

How does that help anyone? Are you going to argue that people who use it/its pronouns aren't marginalized? Are you going to argue that society as a whole is more accepting of it/its pronouns than other neopronouns?

Like I hate to break it to you (except no, I don't) but it/its pronouns are literally treated as /even worse/ than other neopronouns 90% of the time.

And same with they/them pronouns! Yeah, sure, /queer activists/ and other people actively fighting for trans rights are fine with using they/them as singular pronouns, but most people still act like it's an impossible request that's too confusing and impossible to accomplish.

I've seen multiple instances of people being hold that they/them is too confusing, can't they just make up some new pronouns instead?

Literally:

[ID: Two of the first halves of the "I can excuse racism" meme, now edited to say, "I can excuse neopronouns, but I draw the line at" "calling someone and it" and "calling one person 'they'". End ID.]

Just because some Queer people are accepting of they/them pronouns does not mean people who use they/them pronouns have the same privileges as those who use he/him or she/her.

Literally just look at any fictional character who uses they/them pronouns, and look at the way the fandom has to fight tooth and nail to get people to stop misgendering them. Look at Kris from Deltarune and tell me people who use they/them pronouns are treated with just as much respect as those who use he/him or she/her. The majority of people literally think a character using they/them means their pronouns and gender are up for the reader to decide! Even when the story they're in explicitly tells you otherwise!

Look at any fucking section of The Murderbot Diaries fandom, and tell me people who use it/its pronouns are treated with just as much respect as those who use he/him or she/her.

People who use it/its pronouns aer told we need to just use they/them, because calling someone an it is dehumanizing and wrong no matter what.

People who use they/them are told they just need to make up brand new pronouns, because using "they" for a single person is too confusing and impossible.

If you decide that people only belong in the neopronoun community if their pronouns were invented after 1800, you are excluding so many people, many of whom are literally treated worse than other neopronoun users most of the time.

How can you be Queer and then turn around and say that "no actually, Neopronouns are the one thing that must have a strict, unwavering definition set in stone, so no, you don't belong, because your pronouns are older than mine, so that means you do not face any of the same challenges I do, even though you often explicitly face even more criticism than I do?"

I've literally had people who use nothing but neopronouns tell me that I can't use it/its pronouns because they're evil and dehumanizing and bad, and I just have to use they/them or pick some "acceptable" neopronouns.

The entire point of the neopronoun community is to support people whose pronouns are not accepted by society. If you set up a strict, unwavering definition of who is and is not allowed in, you are literally excluding so many fucking people who need the exact same support.

It/its are neopronouns because one of the people I told my pronouns to in real life laughed, then waited for me to also laugh, saw that I wasn't laughing, and went, "Wait, you are joking, right? You can't really expect anyone to call you an it, right? Tell me you're joking." Then literally stormed away when I told them no, I wasn't joking, my pronouns were in fact it/its.

They/them are neopronouns because have you literally ever just fucking talked to someone who uses they/them pronouns? Have you never seen the way people treat those who use they/them pronouns?? Do you pay attention at all??

Just because they/them pronouns are **Sometimes** seen as more acceptable than neopronouns doesn't erase the fact that they're also **Sometimes** seen as less acceptable. And neither of those instances erases the fact that people who use they/them are constantly misgendered, looked down upon, and viciously mocked.

= = =

Ask yourself these questions:

"What do I hope to gain by excluding people who use it/its and they/them from the neopronoun community?"

"Who does it help that I am excluding people from the neopronoun community?"

"What am I trying to accomplish by excluding people?"

"Why do I think it's important that it/its and they/them not be considered neopronouns?"

= = =

If your answer to any of these questions is, "Well, I'm looking for new pronouns to try out..."

congratulations.

That's what the terms nounself pronouns and novapronouns are for.

The Neopronoun community is for everyone whose pronouns are not accepted by society as a whole. Unless you're going to pretend that people who use it/its and they/them are treated with the exact same level of respect as those who use he/him and she/her (which inherently makes you an asshole), any argument you make to exclude them is just going to make you look like an exclusionist jerk.

[ID: The meme of four hands clasped in solidarity, with the four arms labeled, "Novapronouns", "Nounselfpronouns", "they/them pronouns", "it/its pronouns". The center is labeled, "Neopronouns". End ID.]

The goal should be building the community and supporting eachother, not policing who is or is not allowed in because they don't fit some arbitrary, uber-strict definition.

Being Queer is about breaking down walls, not building them.

The Neopronoun community should be supporting eveyone whose pronouns are not accepted by society, and that includes people who use it/its or they/them.

[ghostonly]

How to have a good internet experience in 8 easy steps

#1 - Stop having a bad faith interpretation of every thing you read

If you think something someone said might have been something you disagree with, instead of starting an argument, ask them to clarify or ask them specific questions about what they said

You will be so surprised to find that half the people you assume are being shitty or negative just didn't phrase what they meant very well

#2 - Learn to block people

It's free, it's easy, and it will save your life. Tired of someone tagging your stuff with characters from a fandom you don't like? Don't try to control them by telling them not to, just fucking block them. Less upsetting to them, less work for you, less inflammatory, more effective.

#3 - Don't share your entire backstory with strangers on the internet

No one is entitled to your information - not your pronouns, your age, your sexuality, your location, nothing.

Share the things that you're comfortable with, but remember that the more you share, the more vulnerable you make yourself to attacks. Like, do not share your triggers in your bio. You are giving abusers and harassers a to do list. Keep that shit private for your own safety.

You can get harassed, you can get stalked, you can get doxxed. Internet safety is real and necessary and the less we care about it, the more we set up future generations to get hurt through the internet

#4 - Learn to say, "It's none of my business."

Don't understand someone's desire to use neo pronouns? None of your business. Can't understand why someone is a furry? None of your business. Curious about how someone who talks about being poor can have a Starbucks in that last selfie they posted? None of your damn business.

If you don't like certain things on your dash, unfollow or block people. If you don't understand how someone can identify a certain way or do a certain thing or like a certain thing or feel a certain way or literally anything, just remember, it's none of your business.

If you have genuine questions from a place of good faith (i.e. what inspired you to use neopronouns?/what do you pronouns mean to you?) Go for it. But if you're only asking questions to draw negative attention to someone or make them feel bad or to other them, you're just being a nosy asshole.

Minding your own business is also good for you because - and I mean this genuinely - feeling entitled and superior is fucking exhausting. I know, because I've been 20 before. You will have a way better time online if you just stop caring about shit that doesn't concern you

#5 - Learn to lurk

Lurking is frequently seen as a bad thing, like someone who's lurking is somehow being creepy. The truth is, lurking is a great way to learn. More people should do it.

For example, if you're new to a community, spend some time consuming content and information from that community without saying anything. This goes for fandoms, queer spaces, disabled spaces, cultural spaces, etc.

Nothing is worse than being in a community for years and someone popping in for the first time in their life and airing their opinions loudly and with zero respect for the space. A great example of this is that post someone made about the leather pride flag. You know the one.

(If you don't, basically, someone said that the leather pride flag is embarrassing and insulting to the queer community and has no place at pride and then got schooled by hundreds of people about how the leather pride flag is one of the oldest flags in the queer community and leather daddies and leather dykes were the people on the front lines protecting other queer people from cops back in the 80s and 90s)

So basically, learn the history of a community, research your opinions before you decide they're your opinions, and keep your ignorance to yourself until you're not ignorant anymore. Not only is this better for community spaces, you won't have 9000 notifications of people telling you to shut the fuck up

Learning to lurk to educate yourself about a space also makes actually speaking in that space a lot easier

#6 - Stop believing everything you read

I'm not talking about stupid funny stories. Believe them - it's not hurting anything to get a laugh out of something that may or may not have happened.

I'm talking about news and current events. If you hear that some celebrity did something and there are no receipts, go and find the receipts or discard it. People spread misinformation on here all the damn time. It's like a game of telephone and, unfortunately, a lot of small creators end up getting slandered and canceled because of it.

#7 - Quit wasting energy on hating random shit

Being annoyed by a certain fandom is one thing, but actively hating things that other people do just because you're not into it is such a waste of your energy. Not only are you actively putting more negativity into the world, you're wasting your own time on things that upset you.

Focus your time and energy on the things you do like and quit scrolling through Tumblr user AnimeIReallyHate7648's discourse blog. You might think it's fun, but there comes a point where hating something goes from kind of fun to actually obsessive and unhealthy for you as a person.

#8 - Unlearn purity culture

This is a big one guys. What is purity culture? It's referenced a lot, but I think a lot of you don't know what it is.

In short, purity culture is when people take many nuanced situations and try to divide them into black and white categories. There's the Good category and the Bad category. The problem is, life is not in black and white. You can't put a neat line down the middle between good and bad. This kind of thinking is extremely regressive. Ask any therapist alive and they will tell you that black and white thinking is unhealthy and often a Symptom of Something.

So, what happens is, someone sees something on the good side and spots something they think is morally objectionable in it and says, "this can't be here, it needs to go to the Bad side." (Cancel culture). The problem is, people are always on the lookout for anything wrong in the Good - constantly looking for impurities so that they can completely sanitize things and therefore be free of sin. So they will look harder and harder and harder and keep moving things to the Bad side of the line until there's basically nothing left on the Good side.

This ends up meaning that perfectly good media is canceled because every character in it didn't make the perfect, right choice every time. It damages media in that it demands characters be completely flawless - something no human is. When a character does something that's actually problematic, even if the media doesn't condone the behavior, instead of engaging with it and using it as an opportunity to learn and teach other people why that wasn't okay, people who subscribe to purity culture throw the baby out with the bathwater, saying the entire piece of media should be canceled because its creators support the problematic action of that character (even if they don't).

This entire line of thinking is extremely unhealthy, heavily informed by Christianity, infantilizes adults, assumes no one can distinguish fiction from reality, and promotes censorship, which has a long and sordid history.

I could go on about this at length, so if anyone wants a full post, just let me know. But the point is, purity culture is bad for community, it's bad for media, it's bad for healthy emotional and intellectual development, it's bad for interpersonal understanding and empathy, and it's bad for you.

Unlearn purity culture and you will be a happier person. If all else fails, remember step #4.

[phantom-noir]

People are taking the Four explanation way too far. Saying Jojo is trans-phobic and Queerbating. Seriously? Can you get your dang head out of the clouds?

For example, "Well the group laughed at wild for the Vai clothes, thats trans-phobic."

You've gotta to be kidding me man, its clear that there is nothing trans-phobic about it.

You think it's a little funny that your friend is carrying around revealing female clothing, maybe he cross dresses? Maybe they belong to someone else? They all have a laugh about it. I dont get how the heck that's trans-phobic. You don't have to be trans or queer to cross dress, maybe you just like feminine clothing. (This can go the opposite way, maybe you like more masculine clothing.) You can also be queer and cross dress too! Thats perfectly fine! Are you trans and wear feminine clothing to show your identity and feel more with yourself? A-Ok girl, you go for it!

It's just something seen as unexpected from Wild, so they tease him about it, they're interested, wanting to know the story. Wild gets embarrassed about it. There's nothing more too it. It literally a draw back to what Urbosa says in Wild's game, she also teases him about "wearing that outfit again."

Along with that, Jojo saying that Four isn't a system is apparently putting down those with D.I.D. I dont see her hating on the headcanon, she's simply explaining that, that wasn't her original plan for his character and explaining how the system works in further detail.

I like to think that more than half of you know, that she's had lots of the story planned out for a very long time. And the comic itself is a much slower process. He most likely wasn't going to be a mental system the entire time. Is that bad? Do all characters that share a similar trait with Four have to have a system, no, they don't. Can characters be a part of a mental system? Of course they can! Can there be headcanons of Four being a system? Of course there can be! Can those with D.I.D. still relate to him? Sure, that's up to you!

Along with that, some were pointing out the the chart about Twilight not being a Furry, Werewolf, or Otherkin/Therian. How that those people were clearly displayed poorly, and maybe even being made fun of within the post. I get that, and I understand that. I'm a furry myself, I make furry art, and I make fursuits. And the way Jojo displayed a furry as a smelly person in a gross costume with flies flying around it? While it may be a little disheartening, its funny. I can easily see it as a joke. And even if it wasn't, you don't HAVE to like them anyways.

Then again, being a Furry doesn't mean you need a fursuit, or even a fursona, you don't need to be an artist etc. All being a Furry means, is you like Anthropomorphic animals. There's two definitions of being a Furry, the identity and what a "Furry" is, a furry IS an Anthropomorphic animal, and an Anthropomorphic animal is an animal with human like characteristics. Some of those characteristics can be: human like emotions, talking, and emotional expressions.

This goes for Otherkin/Therians too, though they are completely different from the furry definition. Many therians don't identify as fully human, or don't identify as human at all. And some, may just feel as though they have a deeper connection with animals than they do with their human self. Theres plenty more to it, no one is the same.

Theres a whole lot more I can say to this. But I think that a lot of people just need to take a chill pill. Stop trying to force false facts in between the lines that don't exist. Be respectful to other peoples headcanons, be respectful to whats canon. I'm sorry that it came off a little dissapointing to a lot of people, even I'm slightly disappointed myself, I thought it might have been a bit more detailed than what it was. Sadly its not, its just what it is. Don't try to force headcanons on to people, dont try to shove what you think is better story wise down other peoples throats. Let's not harrass people, and call Jojo phobic.

Could you just calm down and take a breather?

TLDR: The community is taking it a bit to far. Share your two-cents, but don't harrass people with it.

[artbyblastweave]

BLASTWEAVE what does steven universe have in common with watchmen?

Both Steven Universe and Watchmen are groundbreaking entries in their respective genres that demonstrate a deep understanding of the appeal of the genre they’re working in, and engage with their ideas on a previously unheard-of level for the medium. That breaks ground and clears the way for what other works in the genre can get away with. 

Steven Universe showed that, well, first of all that you can make a cartoon that’s fundamentally ideologically queer beyond a few side characters, but also that you can have an emotionally intelligent and mature children's cartoon where the character nuance and depth and development are all taken very seriously. Watchmen showed that you could write serious and interesting narratives about superheroes if you were willing to roll with the crazy. (Neither of them was the first to do the things I’m ascribing to them, but I do think that they’re what made it stick for their respective fields.)

In doing so, though, both works create/created a catch 22 for all future works in their genre. Part of what made both of them so good is that they were willing to critically unpack and air out the ugly implications of their format that usually get chalked up to suspension of disbelief, and now that that’s out in the open it becomes very difficult not to think about how any other given work is or isn’t addressing those issues- even if they aren’t equipped to address those issues in the scope of the story they’re trying to tell. Watchmen asked questions about who sanctions superheroes, what qualifies you to do that work, where the line is between heroism and fascism or if there even is one, whether the agency to act means you have a right or a duty to act, whether anyone who seriously bought into the superhero thing could possibly be doing it for good reasons, and, if they somehow were, how long you can care with the intensity necessary to be an effective hero without suffering burnout (not long.) I literally can’t think of a single superhero thing worth reading that isn’t in some way in conversation with Watchmen - you now kind of have to answer those questions, explicitly or implicitly, even if your books thesis is “Alan Moore sucks eggs and being a superhero is very sustainable and fantastic.” If you just leave the question of whether your superheroes are justified completely unaddressed, there’s an uncomfortable discordance there, because we’ve seen the extreme end of that sliding scale in the form of the Comedian and if the narrative doesn’t engage with what makes the protagonist not Edward Blake, it can feel worrisome. If they try and then botch it it can feel alarming.

Steven Universe has a similar thing going on, at least for me. It’s the only unironic, non-parodic children’s series that’s really, seriously unpacked how fucked up and traumatic it would be to grow up as the archetypical All-loving Spirited Saturday Morning Cartoon Protagonist, how warped and dysfunctional a household that enabled that lifestyle could be at its worst, and what the future looks like when your whole childhood was centered on a now-ended conflict. ( a lot of cartoons flirt with that last one but don’t commit.) I’ve seen jokes and intended-as-cracky fan theories about this for years, surrounding lots of other cartoons (Ben 10, Pokemon, Powerpuff Girls) but almost never with the assumption that the creators are on the same page as them. I’ve seen stories that are post-modern reimaginings using the same general archetypes or whatever (Venture Brothers) but that’s not this! SU told an entertaining story earnestly, and then engaged with the emotional fallout of the story it told, with an unheard-of breadth and depth. A whole season of unpacking! No other show has ever been allowed to sink that much effort into closure. That’s usually what Fanfic is for.

I think it’s great, and that shows like Infinity Train and The Owl House are able to go as hard as they do largely because of Steven Universe’s precedent- but no matter how good a cartoon is, I can’t watch them without having this voice in the back of my head going “Oh, these children are going to grow up to be broken wrecks, bar an extensive and harsh healing process that kinda hurts to watch, huh.”

The issue is that not every cartoon can be Steven Universe, where the project was to thoughtfully and sensitively unpack this stuff. It’s a fair bet that we’ll probably never see a show with that exact project again (not least because of the loss of novelty value.) You’ve got your own stories you wanna tell that’ll run their own course, mostly aimed at children, there objectively isn’t narrative or financial room for most stories to unpack these assumptions if that wasn’t the goal going in. For example, Gravity Falls had pretty tight storytelling and a narrative that absolutely had room for a post-script "where-do-we-go-from-here” plot- it sped-run the “oh no, childhood’s ending” thing- and it’s pretty telling that the aftermath, healing process, interpersonal relationships and so forth are one of the things that that fandom heavily fixates on. The narrative had such a clean ending that it made people go looking for the mess. That’s not bad! It’s how most storytelling works! But now I look at any cartoon with kid heroes that’s meant to be taken even marginally seriously and go, Oh. Win the battle, lose the war. Then I feel sad. The contrast, of course, is that most superhero works actually can be, and in fact benefit from trying to be like Watchmen, because all the questions Watchmen raises about the ethics of power are also just.... like.... the most interesting storytelling hooks if you want to write a cape thing with real themes. They’re the kind of stories we’d have gotten years prior naturally if not for the CCA boondoggle. Admittedly it kinda creates a different problem where most “good” cape media is inescapably self-referential and draws on picking apart the conventions of a 60-70-year old canon that hasn’t been in wide circulation in years. But! I also think there’s a stronger obligation there to keep superhero fans in check- if your superhero thing isn’t making the reader question the ethics of violence and individual heroism in the face of systemic injustice, you wind up with people who unironically think Frank Castle is a role model to be emulated. We all know that guy. Children’s media doesn’t really produce that guy the same way, although it can draw them in from other corners. Superhero media often needs to be self-critical in a way children’s cartoons don’t always have to be.

[msfcatlover]

This is probably ignorant, but as an asexual that ships constantly and reposts a lot of mushy physical affection where’s the line drawn between enjoyable romantic gestures and sexual stuff for you?

That is a fuzzy & incredibly arbitrary line that is very hard to draw and will be different for every person, but if you’re asking about my personal comfort zone with the topic… Honestly, I’m pretty close to standard Safe For Work art guidelines. As in, “If your boss saw this over your shoulder at work, are you in danger of being fired?” So, kissing & cuddling are fine, wandering hands & sloppy make-outs is getting risqué, beyond that it comes down to how clothed they are and/or whether actual, literal sex acts (contact with primary sex characteristics,) are involved.

Now, the line between sensual & romantic is a lot smudgier (as someone who experiences sensual attraction but not sexual, lemme tell you, that takes a lot of figuring out,) and there are plenty of people who’ll tell you actions we usually take as romantic can be expressed platonically, especially in queer platonic relationships (which is when your relationship with a friend is not romantic from either perspective, but does not follow the expected societal rules for a platonic relationship; these also vary dramatically from person to person, and can only really be defined by the people involved, but generally involves a friendship being more precious than any romantic relationship ever could be.) That is generally not my reading of romantic-coded actions, but I feel like I ought to bring it up.

Thanks for asking, Anon! And I think you were very respectful about your phrasing. The split attraction model can be confusing, especially given how things bleed into eachother & societal standards varying from place to place, but if I can steal a metaphor, it’s a little like identifying colors. Where exactly blue becomes teal becomes green can be hard to pin down and will vary from person to person, but you probably know red when you see it.

Unless you’re a very specific kind of color-blind, which can both massively complicate the process before figuring that out and means that once you do know, you’re even more aware of just how subjective it all is.

I hope this helped, and didn’t just make everything more confusing. It’s all very wibbly-wobbly, I’m afraid. Also, I just woke up, so my coherency may be *wobbles one hand* ehhhhhhhh. Sorry if this was completely tangential.

[citadelspires]

Been thinking a lot about gender lately (I say as if I am not always thinking about gender) and I have reached a point where it fully has settled in how much the world and everyone in it is so strictly enforcing the binary in a way that just absolutely sucks, and even infects my own way of thinking despite my being a non-binary individual. Honestly I’ve had a lot of personal revelations about how my own thought processes and such have been rewritten by the binary focus, and since thinking about that and finding those points in myself so I can combat those binary focuses I’ve been so much happier with gender related things and my mental health has been better. So this post is being made in hopes someone else finds it helpful too.

The main point of thinking and realization I’ve been doing is how the binary is so strictly enforced by so many people in so many spaces. That’s the biggest issue honestly. LGBTQ+ people might be reading this and be like “oh yeah it’s so annoying how the Straightsᵀᴹ do that” but like. no. I wish I wish LGBTQ+ spaces didn’t do that. But honestly? In both my own personal experiences and in so many of the ways I’ve seen time and time again the LGBTQ+ community, especially on online spaces, reinforce their own version of the binary, the death grip so many queer people and communities have on the binary view of the world is even worse.

There’s a lot of things I want the general world to handle better when it comes to non-binary gender viewpoints. But in the end, all of those desires are quality of life things, I don’t actually care what they think of me. But the queer community is supposed to be the space where inclusion and acceptance is happening. This is the place where I am expecting to have the fact that gender isn’t binary respected, and to have people act like it. And people really like to think that just saying “oh yeah non-binary people are valid” is doing that. There’s so much more to it.

To be honest this obsession with the binary isn’t even limited to hurting non-binary people, if anything they’re not even the ones getting the worst of it. Really paying attention and actually getting into it I feel like queer spaces, especially online, have created our own brand of purity culture. And it fucking sucks. I’m not just throwing around buzzwords there, it’s seriously happening. There’s a hive mentality of like. A girl needs to always be interested in other girls or femmes and no one else. A boy can only be interested in other boys or mascs or no one else. As if there isn’t so many other ways humans can express themselves and their relationships that are just as queer. And sometimes even the people who are willing to admit that those types of queer relationships exist maintain the obsession with Pure Queer kind of, anything less than the “gayest possible option” (a sentiment that already makes me want to throw up) is inherently lesser. Do y’all know how many people this fucks up?

This hurts nonbinary people

This hurts ace people.

This hurts aro people.

This hurts bi people.

This hurts pan people.

This hurts straight trans people.

It’s fucked up.

And even beyond the scope of relationships the obsession with binary reaches all the way into peoples personal identities, which is where my experiences as a non-binary person really show up in this.

The response to coming out as non-binary is consistently (or at least consistently enough to be deeply unsettling) an expectation that you will choose to be transfemme, transmasc, or a literal perfect balance of androgyny.

We have no obligation to base our gender around the only two people are willing to respect.

The non-binary experience is NOT drawing a line between “Male” and “Female” and then picking a spot to land on. The non-binary experience is vast, three-dimensional, and beautiful. We didn’t stop limiting ourselves to one of the binary options just so we could pick from three or four variations. There are countless genders and options and your relationship with your own gender is something no one else has the right to dictate. Regardless of how it makes people feel, non-binary people are allowed to have genders that cannot and should not be forced into an explanation revolving around its relativity to the binary.

It’s insanely frustrating because as much as there is an expectation for amab nb people to become transfemme/androgynous or afab nb people to become transmasc/androgynous as if nb is just Diet mtf/ftm Trans, even people talking about how “we should respect non-binary people who are comfortable aligning closer to their birth gender” (which, Yeah Of Course We Should) leave out the part where Those Aren’t The Only Three Options.

I’ll be honest. I was born male. When I was questioning my gender and settling on non-binary I defaulted to sprinting in the direction of femme because that just felt like what I was supposed to do. And for a while there it was alright, because I had spent so much time perceiving myself as a male that the perception of femme was fine. But eventually it began to weigh on me, and it began to have all of the problems that being male in the first place had.

I did not escape one binary prison just to lock myself in a different one.

I’m not masc. I’m not femme. I don’t owe you androgyny to your desired specifications. I’m non-binary. When it comes to how I’m non-binary and what that looks like. The only one who gets to decide that is me.

For a long time I hated how I looked. I felt this desire, this Need, for my body to look different, to be different. For many trans people (newsflash non-binary people are trans, get used to it) that’s totally a valid thing! It’s okay to not be comfortable in your body. But for me? At least in terms of my prior desire to change aspects of myself, that desire was motivated by a need to “Look More Non-Binary.” That’s the problem. I’m supposed to need and want all this stuff to have my non-binary card be validated or whatever. But honestly? I’ve had a revelation, I actually don’t really mind my body or how I look. I kinda like it actually. I was so focused on the external certainty that “this is what a non-binary person looks like” I wanted to meet these qualifications without ever really thinking about how I personally felt about them.

Here’s the thing.

There is nothing I will ever be able to do in my entire life that will make me look more non-binary. That entire thought process is laughably backwards.

Non-binary is not something I can change myself to look like.

I already am. Nonbinary looks like me.

[kaypeace21]

i’m a survivor too, and i found that certain scenes/stuff will said just really struck me as ‘csa-survivor’-like? i felt a bit uncomfortable about headcanoning it happening to someone else, especially for a fandom as wild as this one, but your metas have really been a comfort to me because they’ve been able to pick out and explain things that i couldn’t necessarily find the words for myself.

and yeah, i would love to have a character like me that is powerful and who finds love and who gets a happy ending. the people who call the theory disgusting always kinda hit wrong with me because although csa is a difficult subject, we shouldn’t be ashamed about sharing it. they sound like they’re trying to say that it’s a bad topic to talk about and implying that it can’t happen to kids, which uhhhhh-

(i’m sure that’s not what they mean, precisely, but it’s still what they sound like, and i wish that they would stop implying that we can’t exist, especially in popular media. we do, and i’m not gonna pretend we don’t, and if they feel uncomfortable with the topic they can just use the block button. we deserve to have some well written representation just as much as anyone else. also, i really really hope that will gets a happy ending.)

anywayyyy i love your theories and i can see your post in the tag so i think you’re fine?? have a good day ❤️❤️❤️

SORRY, this ask took so long to respond to. It always warms my heart to hear other survivors speak and say they found comfort in my theory.

Yes, I think I and a lot of c*a/r*pe victims (subconscious or otherwise) were triggered by some of the symbolism/visuals in s1-3. And s3 made it hard for most of us to ignore the past imagery- since s3 wasn’t as subtle.

I get why people have reservations about the theory. But the debates to the contrary are usually just plain offensive. Or people trying to be respectful but being the opposite. There’s the obvious bad-apples . I got many anons after part 1 of my DID theory saying it “ruined/tainted byler”, and “if that happened to Will i’ll stop shipping byler” , or that it  “ruins the best gay character” ,  and to “remove the post immediately”. And this was when I was open about being a gay c*a victim. I obviously blocked them. Many survivors don’t come forward because they’re afraid people will see them as “tainted”, “ruined”, “ just their trauma”, or blame them for what happened. So yeah, it pisses me off when people say similar stuff about Will (and thus other c*a victims). Not even diving into the messed up psychology about byler/mileven shippers (knowing i was a lesbian c*a victim) but purposely spreading bs rumors about me being a p*do that was into Will/Noah-all because of the theory. -_-

Then there’s the people who try to be “respectful” but literally do the opposite.

I’ve heard numerous times it’s somehow “less offensive” to just use r*pe imagery to make monsters scary. Rather than have  the monsters have that imagery cause Will created the monsters from his memory/imagination-and st is a story of Will healing from that trauma. SORRY- I disagree. Using the worst experiences of peoples’ lives (and triggering their trauma) for no real purpose- except to make their monsters scarier to the normal/general audience who haven’t gone through it so won’t be triggered like us - is MORE OFFENSIVE to victims! NOT LESS! At least to me.

Then there’s the people who say “c*a should never be talked about (in stories).” Which I disagree with. V*ctims have already been told by ab*ser’s  and enablers of the ab*ser- to never talk about what happened to us  . So it rubs A LOT of us the wrong way when people say this.  Because (subconscious or not) you remind some of us of the people who used to hurt/silence us. People say this -simply for their convenience (like ab*sers) and cause deep down they’re uncomfortable with our existence and equate the despicable act to us the innocent v*ctim ...or just want to deny the horrible reality of the situation (like many enablers who deny the truth and hurt us because they don’t want to accept reality) . And 1) It brings us back to a time where they told us to NEVER talk about it- and makes us feel like we did something wrong when we didn’t! 2) Every psych professional says with-holding/keeping the ab*se a secret is detrimental to our mental health.

Plus, there’s a HUGE difference between sugarcoating/minimizing trauma or WORSE glamorizing, condoning, or romanticizing C*A in stories (ex: pretty little liars) VS showing how the action is wrong, causes trauma, but showing recovery and happiness is still possible for v*ctims.  if the story shows how accurately traumatizing it is (instead of minimizing/glamorizing it)- it’s incredibly rare for that character to get a happy ending. Having a story about recovering from that type of trauma and finding happiness despite such hardships would be amazing for US survivors! We rarely get stories with a happy ending-  it’s more harmful to us survivors to never see ourselves get happy endings in tv/film/books. How can some survivors (in a dark place) think there’s a light at the end of the tunnel- if it’s never shown?Also if Will has DID too- it’s good mental health rep, along with queer rep (and survivor’s rep.) All 3 groups rarely are treated well or get happy endings in media. A lot of people may feel more heard, seen, and a bit more hopeful for the future - If Will (and other characters) get a happy ending.

And even though st has many themes- like say homophobia. To try and hand-wave all the disturbing  r*pe imagery away  as ‘Will is just gay so the monsters are like that”. IS SOOOOOO offensive. Trigger warning for examples. I’m sorry what part of Max saying when Billy had c*nsensual s*x it’s “good screams” but when possessed by the mf he causes Heather to do “bad screams” read as gay???! Having the possessed ch*ke/dr*g people before throwing them in trunks (like it’s implied Lonnie did to Will -since Jonathan checked Lonnie’s trunk for Will in s1)?Tying their arms and legs up/ g*ging  them and  getting on top of them and saying “stay VERY still it’ll all be over soon”-before a monster shoves it’s tentacle into someone’s mouth and inserts a goo - just gay??? Similar to the sentient vine/shadow monster forcing itself down Will’s throat. Let alone Will saying things like “he made me do it”, “i felt it everywhere”, or being tied to a bed and screaming “help! stop! it hurts! let me go!” While Jonathan is the only one who’s visibly triggered by this and has to literally turn away and hug someone . Or barb, billy, and El spiting up a white liquid from their mouth (similar to will spitting up a slug and lying to his mother about it ).El/billy touching a suspicious looking slime with their hand and looking at the substance confused . El drawing Papa with 3 legs (the middle one being shorter) ,  trying to undress in front of the boys , and Benny saying “I think she’s been ab*sed or something”.The theme of ab*sive dads- brenner , Lonnie, and Neil . Even when the demogorgan (called in d&d the “deep father”/ in the show “a man without a face”) attacked Barb it’s chopped up with scenes of Nancy having c*nsensual sex (the monsters are doing the opposite symbolically). There’s way more examples but NO- to try and hand wave /equate ALL OF THIS to just “gay imagery” or an “a*ds metaphor” is WAY more problematic. And just offensive (specifically to gay people) than just admitting what it may actually represent. R*pe imagery and gay imagery is NOT THE SAME THING!

Also ST has never been a kid show- maybe rewatch the show and see the rating of tv-14 . Goodness sake- s1 has a st*ged su*icde, k*dnappings, m*rder, discussions of physics, h*mophobia, and s*x (with stancy in s1 & jancy in s2-s3). S2/3 discuss at their finalies recovering from tra*ma . S2 had gra*ic de*ths,  a man causing a women br*in damage/ and faking her m*scarriage, and a gang of vigalantes k*lling criminals. s3 had critiques on capitalism /media/s*xism, many d*eaths, and questionable imagery like the prior seasons. The Duffers constantly reference  movies & events from the 80s (capitalizing on 80s nostalgia /subverting 80s motifs that middle age people  from that time remember)! Those people were their intended age demographic . Most 80s centric refs go over most kids’ heads (heck a lot went over my head too since I wasn’t alive in the 80s XD).The Duffers even said in the book “worlds turned upsidedown”  “it’s not a kid’s show despite having kids”. And maybe it’s a coincidence but when Lucas in s3 hands Will the “devil’s baby” firework (a hint about Lonnie) he says “18 and over only.” Which idk is a weird/random af line unless it’s foreshadowing that the show will get darker about various themes- and maybe even change ratings.

I get people wishing nothing bad ever happened to Will or Jonathan. And being apprehensive and not trusting the Duffers to do such a story justice (cause it’s difficult to do). But personally i trust them to do so tastefully with tact and not be exp*itative, (overly gr*fic) or offensive to v*ctims. You can disagree and think the show is about something else (or not trust the Duffers)- but it’d be great if people could stop using these other messed up talking points. While trying to appear ‘(fake) woke’ and like they care for victims- cause we see through it that you really don’t.

Have a lovely day anon ❤️ ❤️ ❤️

Update- I just really agreed with and appreciate the tags in this reblog

[earthpodd]

Do you ever feel like you don't fit in the bl fandom being a male? Sometimes I feel like I don't belong despite being a part of LGBTQ+

I actually do sometimes feel like that. The majority of the BL fandom is composed by women, who are the actual target audience, but as a queer man myself, I feel drawn to it because it's still infinitely better than whatever half arsed representation western shows gives us. Most of the time I can't bear to read the comments or stuff most of the BL community says because it reminds how they treat it with objectification and some sort of "guilty pleasure", I guess it is better when you interact with the part of the BL community that is actually made up of other queer people, it gives more of a sense of belonging because we treat it with more respect and can draw a line at what's wrong and problematic. Still, getting back on the main issue, being a BL fanboy will always make it difficult for you to feel like you belong because how few and rare we are. I can literally count on the fingers of a single hand how many I've met, and I've had this blog for 3 years now.

[whentherewerebicycles]

hey ummm im tipsy too because it's my flatmate's birthday and I'm literally a lesbian woman but sometimes I worry I might not be lesbian and it scares me because I'm scared of men but sometimes I think a man is attractive (like my flatmate) and idk why I'm msging you about that, sorry if it's weird. but you seem to have very valuable insights about life that not many others have (somehow?? idk?) and I respect and appreciate that.

oh it’s not weird! i think one thing i have learned is that it is 100% okay and healthy to hold your own sense of who you are lightly, and to not feel so attached to a particular label that you don’t allow yourself lots of space to grow and change as you have new experiences or meet new people who bring out different facets of yourself. to me the label of ‘lesbian’ is not an Essential and Immutable Truth about who i am (ie something that can never shift or change over time). instead, using that label speaks to a decision i’ve made about how i want to orient myself in the world, how i want others to perceive and interact with me, and where i choose to channel my energy & attention.

when i first came out i spent many, many years feeling like i had to justify and “prove” that i was “really” a lesbian and that i was ~~~pure~~~ of any flickers of attraction or interest in men (there’s a conversation about internalized biphobia to be had there, but we’ll save it!!). i have described this phase (which i think characterizes many young or newly out lgbtq people’s experiences) as “the push,” because for me it was basically like, to get myself emotionally, intellectually, and socially free of the rigid constraints of compulsory heterosexuality, i had to PUSH really, really hard, to get enough distance between myself and all of that stuff. i had to shove it as far away from me as possible to lessen the chance that it would suck me back in. that was a normal and necessary part of moving into a more openly queer identity, and for many women who identify as lesbian the “push” involves completely disavowing any past interest in men or relationships with men or emotional attachments to men.

the push isn’t a bad thing! like i said, i think it is quite necessary at first, especially since women are subject to even more of the “are you sure? i mean, you’re not really gay, right? maybe you just haven’t met the right guy / maybe it’s just a phase / maybe you just couldn’t get a guy to like you / maybe you’re just afraid of men so you’re pretending you like women” bullshit than gay men are. but it’s a phase that i think most people eventually are ready to move out of (well, unless you are on twitter, and then you just live in the wake of the push forever and ever i guess). and that’s because it can be quite an intense and anxious headspace to live in, as you often feel a lot of pressure to “figure yourself out” (ie pin down what exactly you are -- are you a “real” lesbian or not?), as well as a lot of pressure to prove to yourself as much as to other people that you are who you say you are, or whatever. so it’s stressful to live there, and it also requires you to draw a lot of really hard-and-fast lines (like, “this is what a REAL lesbian is, and i’m only REAL if i follow all of these rules or check off all of these boxes all the time, and if i slip up maybe i’m not actually a lesbian, and i’m lying to myself and everyone else”).

over time i’ve come to hold my own identity more lightly, and to demand less certainty and fewer fixed answers of myself (and of others, too!). the identity label i use doesn’t really matter all that much to me - what matters is 1) that i am able to arrange my life and relationships in a way that makes me happy, and 2) that others respect the choices i make (something that’s not always within our control). right now, “lesbian” is the word that i like best as a descriptor, but i also know that labels are very, very generic categories that almost have to be emptied of specificity and nuance in order to encompass a very wide range of people. to borrow & repurpose a phrase from the transfeminist theorist emi koyama: there are as many ways of being a lesbian as there are lesbians. lesbian is just a general catchall umbrella category for an incredibly diverse range of lived experiences, histories, self-understandings, sexual and romantic choices, life narratives, etc etc.

if lesbian is the word that works for you or feels like the closest approximation to how you want to identify & be perceived by others, then call yourself a lesbian! it is completely and totally fine to be a lesbian who sometimes finds men attractive, or who finds herself attracted to a specific male friend. there’s nothing wrong with that! personally, i am a lesbian who has had important emotional and physical relationships with men in the past, and it’s possible that in the future maybe i’ll meet someone who i really click with who happens to be a man. it’s not maybe something that i would go looking for, and if it did happen, it would certainly prompt some soul-searching, as does any new experience that surprises us or complicates the stories we tell ourselves about who we are and what we want. but holding my identity labels and my sense of self loosely means that i don’t have to feel as threatened by the possibility of changing desires or a shifting understanding of who i am & how i want to arrange my life.

my real true belief is that the vast majority of people are probably capable of forming deep emotional and physical attachments to any kind of person, if the circumstances were right and the person was the right person at the right time and we were open to the possibility of an attachment. i think that very few human traits or preferences are ‘hardwired’ into us in fixed and unchangeable ways. in general, most of our traits are influenced by a combination of nature and nurture, or genetics + experience. so like, idk, maybe some of us who are born cis women are slightly more predisposed than other people to find other women attractive. but nurture, lived experiences, environment, social and culture influences, and the stories we tell ourselves about who we are all play a much, much more important role in determining how we make sense of that predisposition, and whether we come to use words like “lesbian” to identify ourselves. so the type of rigid, stridently defended boundaries or definitions we often feel the need to invoke & defend during the "push” are even less useful here, because how could a fixed set of black-and-white labels (which, btw, only emerged in the last 100-130 years) possibly encompass or account for the wonderful heterogeneity of human experience?

anyway i guess this is all a very long way of saying that i think your worry is completely understandable, and certainly something i spent many years of my own life feeling! but i also think it can be nice to hear from other queer women that there’s a place a little further beyond that, which is basically just this realization: i am who i am, and i accept myself as i am right now, while also understanding that “who i am” will continue to evolve & change my whole life long. you are a lesbian if you say you are a lesbian, and if you want to have a crush on your male flatmate or find a male celebrity attractive or even try pursuing something with a male partner, that’s okay: it doesn’t mean your lesbianism isn’t real, or that you are now going to be pulled back into a compulsory heterosexuality you worked hard to push yourself away from.

but it also doesn’t mean that lesbianism is where you have to stay forever, just because that’s where you’ve landed or what has felt right for you up until now. it’s completely okay, normal, and healthy to allow yourself that space to change. maybe you’ll move into a phase of your life where “bisexual” or “queer” or “pan” will feel like a closer approximation or a better shorthand for how you understand yourself & want others to understand you. or maybe you’ll come to find some other word that you like better, or maybe you’ll decide that you don’t even want or need a word to live your life the way you want. the point is that you aren’t fixed in place. you are free to explore and to experiment and to try out different ways of orienting yourself in the world. and you should do so, in ways that feel exciting and affirming and right for you.