#... should not be seen as inherently bigoted ?

[hotsugarbyglassanimals]

i feel like there's a stark difference between criticism of specific labels (which do not form or exist in vacuums) and denial over your material reality (the experiences that you have decided a specific label fits) and people online could really learn the difference between these two scenarios

[smokestarrules]

there’s a really interesting phenomenon going on that I've seen mostly on twitter in which people are pretending The Last Jedi and the other Sequel movies is and was always good, actually.

it seems to me as if there's a new consensus that the people who did and still do dislike that movie are those mad about Rey being a woman, Finn being a black man, etc, and while I'm a thousand-percent sure that's true, that some people hate that movie for stupid and bigoted reasons, it doesn't change the fact that The Last Jedi (and truly, the entire Sequel Trilogy) is just flat-out a bad movie.

All three of those films suffer hugely because all three are fundamentally different at a ground level. They are inherently disconnected in a way that a trilogy should not be, leaping from idea to idea that the next film inevitably squanders. There is no consistent storyline other than 'First Empire Bad'; there is barely any buildup to to the reveal of Palpatine, Kylo Ren as a character flip-flops between tortured badboy to Maybe Redemption Arc and back. It's not because he's conflicted, it's because everything is simply inconsistent.

Finn and Poe are done huge disgraces by the end of it all, Kylo Ren having been deemed more important and heroic than they are, and The Love Story is just terrible. The end of The Last Jedi sees Kylo Ren successfully assassinate Snoke, which is a pretty cool fucking thing to happen, but Rise of Skywalker squanders the aftermath of that idea with the rushed redemption.

These are movies that feel like each one was supposed to have its own subsequent trilogy; put together, they're a mess.

[autolenaphilia]

It's interesting how intellectually inconsistent the arguments against "problematic" kinks like fauxcest, CNC and ageplay is. Like the anti-kink people get very heated about those kinks for "fetishizing/romanticizing" abuse. And the thing is, that's true for bdsm in general. It relies on roleplaying power inequalties, which would be very abusive if they were real.

That was in fact the argument of the 70s radfems who created the type of anti-kink discourse that relies on exploiting feminist concerns about abuse. They were against all forms of bdsm, including among (cis) lesbians. They used the same arguments we see against fauxcest and CNC today, for what is normal bdsm play.

And the radfems kinda lost this battle of the feminist sex wars, probably because it alienated a lot of the cis women they were recruiting from. Nowadays queer people of all genders do a lot of bdsm and anti-bdsm views don't get a lot of airtime.

Nowadays you see this anti-bdsm rhetoric mostly among proud terfs who use it to prove their hardcore bonafides. (Although I've seen some tenderqueers who admit that they think all bdsm is problematic too.)

And i think that's because the anti-kink people have decided to do a strategic retreat on this question. The radfems took a too extreme stance and alienated people who they otherwise could have recruited. So they have gone for easier targets. Kinks which are seen as extreme compared to "normal" bdsm, like fauxcest and CNC. And they target individual transfems accused of being into or even just "defending" these kinks with callouts and mobbing instead of condemning all the cis gays and lesbians into bdsm.

This leads to intellectual inconsistency. It's fine to play with whips in the bedroom,but doing CNC play is evil. One type of roleplaying abusive relationships is fine, but the other is bad. It's obvious hypocrisy to broaden the appeal of the message.

And of course, their transmisogynistic bias is obvious and I and others have noted this before. And even if the anti-kink people weren't transmisogynistic bigots, they will naturally target us for their moralistic crusade out of opportunism. We transfems are easy targets for callouts on these subjects, because transmisogyny primes people to easily view us as perverted sexual predators and those doing the callouts tend to have tme privilege over us.

And as I said before, the 70s radfems anti-bdsm position and their transmisogyny were intertwined. Janice Raymond literally diagnosed trans women in "The Transsexual Empire" with sadomasochism, something she views as inherently pathological.

And of course their arguments are bullshit anyway. Like sure a lot of kink fetishizes abuse, but I don't see that as a reason to condemn the people doing it. I don't see why I should care if someone gets off on a rape fantasy or CNC roleplay, because it's Not Real. I don't care about fictional murders for the same reason. Most arguments to the contrary tend to rely on the arch-reactionary concept of sexual degeneracy: "if you do enough fauxcest and CNC it will warp your mind and you'll eventually rape your relatives for real, or inspire someone to do so." It ignores the material societal conditions that lead to abuse in the real world.

[daniclaytcn]

at this point i think we should just start calling it what it is. oh, you think eddie, a latino character, is growing a mustache in order to assimilate with a bigot? why? what is it about his character specifically that makes you think he'd do that? (nevermind the fact that canonically, eddie will tell people in positions of authority to fuck off if they annoy him.) oh, you think eddie, a latino character, is inherently predisposed to Toxic Machismo and generally issues with his masculinity and greatly fears being seen as gay? why? what is it about his character that makes you say that? (nevermind the fact that canonically there's no evidence of these things and eddie is someone who goes out of his way to be gentle and silly with his son and makes sure that he'll never grow up the way he did.)

[axolotlofficial]

Adultism is..

The assumption that kids being in school is inherently better than kids not being in school

Thinking it's a human rights violation when employers limit access to toilet facilities, but an overexaggerated non-issue when teachers do it

Being able to say "Children should be seen and not heard" without getting the same backlash as any other bigot

The existence of the Troubled Teen Industry

Thinking intergenerational friendships are inherently suspicious

Referring to violence against children with cutesy nicknames like "spanking"

Treating kids "talking back" to their parents as the height of disrespect

The belief that a respectful child is an obedient child

Media with realistic portrayals of child abuse being deemed inherently "less kid friendly" for it, rather than being used to educate kids in similar situations

The fact it's still not completely normal and expected for a kids show to be able to have a character get a nosebleed onscreen

Being able to forgive parents who yell at, threaten, or hit their children, but not kids who are "disobedient" or "disrespectful" to their parents

[ihaveanaversiontodecisions]

okay I am not involved in the current call out drama personally but it's made its way to my Twitter feed and im so genuinely confused because have none of you interacted with fandom before?

yes, the jrwi boys explicitly stated that there is a hard boundary against rpf about them and that they do not want to be shown nsfw art/ fics of their characters. these are reasonable boundaries to have, and they should 1000% be respected.

HOWEVER: they also explicitly said that they could not stop people and they're RIGHT. fandom is, at its core, weird. people write weird, gross, and even immoral shit all of the time. thats what tagging systems, scrolling, or blocking fan creators is for. for example: i really hate arthur being shipped with either of the twins or the twins being shipped together. i think its gross. so i exclude tags, and i scroll. its that easy! weird stuff will always exist on the internet, and nsfw works in the jrwi tag have some of the highest hits. many people read and write these things casually, and that isn't inherently wrong.

it's completely understandable that the jrwi guys dont want to see the characters that they put pieces of themselves into in nsfw situations. SO don't show them!!! as a general rule, you should not be showing, @ing, or sending creators of any media your fanwork, especially if it's suggestive or gorey. THAT is what a boundary looks like. fandom is not for creators anyways, and involving them in it tends to break many creators boundaries, even in more innocent situations (as a general pattern I've observed)

the person who made the call out post is a minor. they are likely steeped deeply in purity culture and have not interacted with fandom much. HOWEVER, calling specific people out by name is not a cool move. these are not bad people. they aren't being bigoted or doing harmful things irl or in the community, and their fan content is relatively harmless as well. they are simply creating things that people feel uncomfortable with on a personal level, and instead of blocking or scrolling, people have decided that they are morally bad people. and that's just... wrong?

sorry about this rant but writing "weird" or "gross" things is not a cancelable offense; it's a part of being in fandom. I am begging anyone who is genuinely upset by this to click on a supernatural or mha tag on ao3 and scroll for 3 seconds. I promise people writing correctly tagged gore or porn that will never be seen by people who don't want to see it is not the end of the world.

love you to the people who got called out and have been getting hate anons if you see this. yall are cool as hell

[heyftinally]

Y'all are going to like this one.

SWIFTIES DON'T TOUCH THIS POST WITH A TEN FOOT POLE, I SWEAR TO FUCKING HELL-

So my friend sent me this article, and I'm going to tell you why I think it's complete bullshit.

1) wishing us a happy Pride month is the BARE MINIMUM. As someone with her presence in the media and social influence, she could - and should - be doing SO much more than just wishing us a happy pride four days in.

2) "the singer has been an advocate for the LGBTQ+ community" not a good one. She seems to only remember us when it's convenient or benefits her in some way. Case in point:

2018 - "When it comes to feelings and when it comes to love and searching for someone to spend your whole life with. It's all just really really delicate. You know?" Taylor then performed her song "Delicate."

2023 - It’s painful for everyone, every ally, every loved one, every person in these communities.

In the first example, the intentional song reference comes off as extremely tacky. This is people's LIVES you're talking about. People are MURDERED for who they are and who they love (or don't love). This isn't an appropriate time to pull out the "oh-so-quirky" act and be cutesy.

In the second, the fact that she can't even center queer people in their own experience is so, SO telling. I promise, however painful it is for allies, it's 1000x worse for us to LIVE it. Allies don't have to wonder "am I going to get hate crimed wearing this?" before they leave the house - we frequently do. To not acknowledge that shows me that everything she says is performative at best.

3) I wouldn't call what she does "advocacy". She mentions us every now and then when it's convenient for her, profits off of us when we fit her marketing plan, and I've yet to find where she actually apologized for the homophobia in the original version of Picture to Burn. Also, she's real good friends with Travis Kelce's dad, who is a raging transphobe (and I bet his kids are, too). You don't get to call yourself an ally if you willingly allow the people around you to be violent bigots.

4) "always" is a strong word for someone who seems to show her support situationally at best. The full quote was "The way for that to happen is for us to continue to keep pushing governments to put protections in place for members of the LGBTQ community. And I promise to always advocate for that." Yet she doesn't do that.

5) what she speaks out, I've noticed that it's nearly always in the states that primarily agree with her. We don't see a whole lot of her "inspiring ally" speeches in places like Texas or Florida. But I've seen plenty of them come out of already notoriously queer-friendly places. If you aren't willing to face the heat of the difficult places along with the comfort of the easy ones, you don't get to call yourself an ally. Allyship is not easy. Anyone remember when Lady Gaga advocated for us in Russia, under threat of arrest, and her response was "arrest me, Russia! I don't give a fuck!"? Yeah, I've never seen even half that level of true commitment from Taylor.

6) STOP. MAKING. STRAIGHT GIRL SONGS. "GAY ANTHEMS"!!!! FFS it's such a slap in the fucking face of REAL, ACTUALLY QUEER ARTISTS that y'all keep calling these piss pathetic straight girl over produced crap songs "anthems". Fucking stop it. If they aren't queer, they don't qualify to be a queer anthem or icon. Start supporting ACTUAL queer artists with ⅛ this energy, for the love of FUCK. This bullshit pisses me off. Do you need a list of queer artists? I'll make you one by hand if you promise to stop trying to label Raylor Swift's straight girl shit songs as "gay anthems".

7) rainbows and gender subversion are not exclusively nor inherently queer. If that's our bar for "gay anthems", the bar is so low Lucifer himself needs a damn Webb Telescope to just barely see it from hell.

[elumish]

If you are interested in examining, broadening, or diversifying the media that you read, write, and engage with, I think one of the most important things to recognize is that you can have legitimate feelings based in reality that are also bigoted or discriminatory.

I was talking to my parents this weekend about Republican voters, and one of the things that I was saying is that there are a lot of people whose political views reflect a social and economic insecurity based in a loss of jobs, lower purchasing power and a diminished ability to do things like buy a house or provide for a family compared to their parents' or grandparents' generation, a relative loss of political power compared to fifty or a hundred years ago, and a preference for people saying that they can bring us back to the world of a few generations ago where someone like that would have relatively more power in the world.

That relative loss of social, economic, and political power is real for some people (as a percentage of representation in state legislatures, Congress, and the White House, white people and especially white men do have objectively less say in government than 50 years ago). But it also can't be disentangled from racism and misogyny, where that loss of power is seen as an unbalancing of a previously equal (or at least preferable) scale rather than something inching closer to proportionate political representation and economic opportunities.

You see this with TERFs, too, in a different direction--it is a reality that women are more likely to be sexually assaulted by a man rather than another woman, and changes must be made to society to reduce rates of sexual assault. But it's also inextricably tied to bigotry and discrimination, both with the (incorrect) belief that trans women are actually men and with the belief that sex segregation is what will keep women safe (among other things).

What does this have to do with you?

A lot of the reasons I see people giving for not engaging with female characters or characters of color, or characters with other marginalized identities, are similarly based in some level of reality while still ultimately having racist or sexist or otherwise biased underpinnings to them.

It's true that there are social and political power disparities between men and women and that many M/F stories involve those, whether intentionally or not--but a refusal to engage with anything but M/M stories because you want to avoid those disparities indicates both an inability to picture a story where those disparities are not present/relevant and the viewpoint that M/M stories are inherently neutral (and so lacking those power issues) while F/F are inherently not neutral.

It's true that many female characters and characters of color are underdeveloped or not characterized well in canon, but the overwhelming fan engagement with underdeveloped white male characters indicates that white male characters are seen as neutral or blank canvases while female characters and/or characters of color are seen as just bad characters who it's not worth engaging with.

It's true that people often connect better with characters with similar traits to them, but a refusal to write or engage with most/all characters of color because of an inability to connect emotionally with them indicates a feeling that POC are inherently emotionally different from white people in a way that makes them impossible to relate to emotionally for white people.

My point here is not to shame anyone who holds these beliefs or says these things. We are all (including me) in the process of identifying and actively untangling and discarding our own internal biases (or at least we should be), and the first step to that is looking at your own actions and really trying to figure them out. This is hard and takes years or decades, because we are in a society where beliefs like these are pervasive.

So if you are interested in doing that, I recommend looking at reasons that you've given (if only just to yourself) for what characters and what types of stories you read/write/engage with and really sitting with them.

Identify what it is that's really the problem, and then try to find stories that do something different. Do you not like female-led romances because there might be a risk of pregnancy? Try some stories where there's no pregnancy. Are you uncomfortable reading one that describes certain body parts? Try a closed door story. Try a new genre. Try a different author. Try something you're not sure you'll like. Try something new.

You can do this with writing, too. Try writing a M/F story, or a F/F story, or a story with no romance at all. Try writing a story focused on a non-white character. Try fleshing out a female character who you think is underdeveloped in canon, if you write fanfiction. You might find that you enjoy it far more than you thought you would, once you let yourself write it the way you want.

[corporatecoinings]

DRAGONQUEER/DRAGONPUNK

Emojicode : 🐲🌈🔥/ 🐉🌈🔥

LINK TO THE OFFICIAL DRAGONQUEER/DRAGONPUNK CARRD

A new label! Dragonqueer/dragonpunk (either name works, same thing!) is a queer stance about not being afraid to show how prideful you are about yourself, not being afraid to show yourself, or at least have a desire to want to express how you TRULY are and give the bird to the societal norm standards and those that hate you, existing to spite them; dragonqueer/dragonpunk beings can still live in caves (be closeted) too, however. A major aspect to dragonqueer/dragonpunk is also hoarding a shit ton of labels that describe yourself! Dragons love their hoards :) 

Due to history of dragons, they are seen as either evil and terrifying or benevolent and kind. Dragonqueer/dragonpunk aims to be both; be punk, be scary, be yourself, be unforgiving for who you are while also being a kind-hearted and loving being. There are dragons of all kind; western, easter, wyverns, wyrms, hydras, and so there is too in queer communities. Whichever kind of dragon you are is completely up to you, and you alone; you decide who you are. 

Dragonqueer/dragonpunk supports/believes…

LGBTQ+, MOGAI, LIOM, etc.

Xenogenders, neopronouns, etc.

Neoagabs/xenoagabs

Good-faith labels

Systems of all origins

Arissomei, desirdae, chronosians, aldernic, aldersex, allions, vesil, vior, xenonatured, eiment, etc.

Otherkin, therians, non-humans, alterhumans, etc.

Neurodivergent, mentally ill, disabled beings

Beings with munchausen's syndrome, factitious disorders, etc.

Hypersexuals 

Gender hoarders / gender collectors 

Multigender / polygender / etc.

Safe and anti-contact paraphiles (not acting on illegal shit??? This should make sense.. If its harmful. Dont act on it.)

Microlabels

Atypical dysphoria

PLUR

M-spec lesboys, turigirls, etc.

Contradictory labels

Systemarchy 

Pluralpunk/systempunk

Furries

Age/pet regressors

MAD pride

Reclaiming labels you can reclaim (queer, dyke, fag, freak, etc.)

Anti-psychiatry

Being endogenic/willogenic is not the same thing as being “transplural”

Educated self-diagnosis

Fiction affects reality

You can be trans without dysphoria

You can be a system without trauma

OC x canon is epic as long as its legal

Objectum and robosexuals

Supporting ex-cops, ex-gov, ex-military, ex-radqueers, ex-transids, etc. that have left their community and wish to recover

Abortion rights, womens rights, animal rights, etc.

Atheism

Kink at pride (when there are no bodily minors)

BDSM (as long as everyone consents and there are no bodily minors)

recovering/ex-religious beings

Consentual recovery for those that want it 

Supporting victims 

Dragonqueer/dragonpunk does NOT support/believe...

Harmful and pro-contact / neu-contact zoophiles, pedophiles, necrophiles, etc. (yet again if its harmful dont fucking do it)

Minors in nsfw communities, minors in kink, or having public kink where minors are around

That “all men should die” or “all women should die”

Harassing innocent cishets

Active radqueers and transids/transx

Terf, radfem, transmed, sysmed, etc. views

Harmful religion

Demonizing or stigmatizing disorders

Singlets in syscourse

“Superstraight”

Heavy political views, such as conservative and liberal

Proshippers, comshippers, darkshippers, etc. (how hard is it to say no illegal, abusive, etc. ships holy shit)

Lolitas and shotas

Racism or prejudice of ANY kind

Ableism

Forced recovery

Mental asylums

Exclusionists

Bigots

Dragonqueer/dragonpunk is neutral on...

Religion in general (dragonqueer/dragonpunk is inherently atheist)

catqueer

THIS IS THE OFFICIAL DRAGONQUEER/DRAGONPUNK. PEOPLE THAT WANT TO "RECLAIM" THIS LABEL WILL BE FACED WITH FIRE !!!

@ghosting-plural-userboxes thought you'd wanna see this, just comment if you want us to remove your tag from this post ^-^

[artist-issues]

yo, some of the stuff on your blog has finally given me the ability to articulate something I haven't been able to before. (this'll be long but I don't think you'll mind lol)

the reason I've had such an issue with a lot of the "think critically of your media" sentiment I see online, is that people aren't really thinking critically about what a story(media) is saying, but what potentially bad thing it could be saying.

people would say "remember that no story is perfect!", but then demand stories be perfect anyway and condemn them as problematic for... not even their actual flaws, just perceived and potential flaws. stories would be condemned as saying something bad just because you could force a bad thing out of them, even if the argument wasn't logically sound. you could never enjoy something without a constant disclaimer of "I pretty promise I'm aware of the bigoted tropes and I don't believe them 😁" . it was exhausting.

as an example: I've seen people condemn the trope of robots or aliens (non-human people) acting like autistic people as implying autistic people aren't human... but it does not at all logically follow "this robot acts autistic, therefore if you're autistic, you're a robot", and none of the stories I know of with autistic "coded" aliens and robots are used to communicate that! yet the trope gets accused of that, even though it usually just exists to say "people should be treated as people even if they're weird", or ask "what if you don't fit in?" or "why do we(humanity generally) act this way? what if we didn't?" etc.

there's nothing inherently wrong with that trope. it's not actually saying anything bad, but people would twist it into saying something bad, and get angry at the pretzel they just made for being twisted!

but that's not actual critical thinking! you're not analyzing something to find out what it is, just what the worst possible thing it could be is (even if it doesn't logically follow). like that cursed mirror from "the snow queen".

---

all this to say: your method of asking "what is this story trying to say? what did this story say? and is that true?" is so much better and such a realer example of "critical thinking" than what gets passed off for it a lot of the time.

I appreciate this and agree with all of it!

[sepublic]

Shoutout to my obscure faves, the Demon Hunters; I like how they're objectively pretty terrible people, attempting to steal someone's home and kill their house demon and kids for it.

But at the same time, Eye Patch is seen rooting for Eda's escape from the petrification ceremony because solidarity, and is later chill with the protagonists during the Bonesborough Brawl.

The BATTs rescue Good Hair from the covenscouts (because solidarity), which is obviously framed as a good thing. Good Hair joining a coven anyway out of fear, and her near-death from the draining ritual, a bad thing. Prim became a friend to Eda at some point and her joining a coven was also tragic.

My point being: They don't have to be perfect victims to not deserve genocide, the demon hunters don't deserve to be persecuted for unjust reasons. The people of the isles as a whole don't have to be morally perfect to not deserve genocide; Lilith did some terrible things but her abuse in the coven was unjust, as another example. As an individual, Adegast was a jerk who had it coming by people he actually wronged, and acted independently of the coven; But to judge an entire group for that is inherently absurd.

This is also why I love Boscha having her moment in For the Future, because unlike other characters, we've seen her be pretty awful, fully of her own volition and enjoyment without anyone really forcing her to, even advising against it in Amity's case. We know Boscha had no excuse for the stuff she did prior to meeting Kikimora; And indeed, she still managed to become leader of Hexside before that, and one could say her listening to Kiki's tyranny was kind of the natural evolution of Boscha's own bullying and obsession with domination.

But not being a perfect victim doesn't change the fact that she IS a victim in this situation, she's a minor with no other adults to rely on, being manipulated by an adult who is fully okay with murdering kids and has learned abuse from the best. And I think that's a good lesson for kids watching who DID do some bad things and might regret it, or question if they 'deserve' to get better because of that; But they want to, so they can and should!

This and the Demon Hunters means that for whatever conflict people might have, they definitely have a vested interest in protecting one another from a bigoted state, even if not from each other haha. There's not really a scene where an antagonist gets their comeuppance by being arrested, because if they were already targeted by the state for unjust reasons, then this would just validate its tyranny. Fittingly, the prison we see in Latissa is replaced by a hospital, which encapsulates the shift from retributive to restorative justice here.

[avelera]

Thinking about blasphemy and Good Omens right now and I can't help but notice an interesting phenomenon around some discussions I've seen about the Second Coming and Jesus Christ being a character in S3.

Namely, I see much more underlying discomfort around the possibility of the show poking fun at the figure of Jesus Christ than I do with any other prediction discussion or discussion around religion in the show.

On the one hand, I completely understand how poking fun at the Antichrist dogma from Revelations doesn't feel particularly blasphemous, where poking fun at Jesus does. The Antichrist is a stock character of horror at this point. Many more disrespectful teams than Gaiman and Pratchett have played with that story. It's barely even considered poking fun at Christianity to have Adam, the son of Satan, be a good kid in Good Omens. But Jesus is a very important figure to Christians all over the world. There are devout Christians who truly love Jesus and no one wants to be a jerk by just outright disrespecting a figure that is dear to so many.

But on the other hand, expecting Good Omens to not make fun of Jesus is a bit absurd to me. Literally saying, "I don't think the satirical religion show is going to satirize religion because it might upset people." Gaiman hasn't shied away from messing with religion or religious bigots before. He gleefully shrugged off attacks over God being a woman, or Adam and Eve being portrayed by people of color.

The Book of Job is lampooned in Season 2. I know it doesn't feel like it to many people here, but the reinterpretation of the Book of Job in S2 definitely registers as blasphemy on some religious scales. It is satirizing a religious text after all.

Saying that angels and demons fall in love and worse, have that love be portrayed by actors of the same sex could be seen as blasphemy at the very least on the level of saying God is a woman. And by the way, it's not like these religious texts say "God is whatever you want the entity to be" or "God is a woman if that makes you happy". Hell no, the Bible is extremely damn clear on God being male. The official position of the Catholic Church is that God is male. Official Catholic dogma is incredibly anti-female in terms of inherent holiness, women cannot become priests, even nuns are dependent on a priest to deliver the Sacraments, it's a huge deal and they are not planning to change any time soon and it is totally unambiguous.

Making God explicitly female might not seem like a big deal since films like Dogma, another religious satire, did it in the 90s but to True Believes in the official doctrine, that is a form of blasphemy.

Good Omens is by definition a blasphemous work. How offensively blasphemous it is really depends on the devoutness of the viewer. And I find it interesting the extent to which there's something of a knee jerk, "Oh they won't do that!" in terms of further satirizing religion in the show about religious satire. As if Jesus hasn't been satirized in other mainstream movies before like the aforementioned Dogma or Life of Brian.

And here's the thing, my personal opinion is? Blasphemy is good! Blasphemy laws on the books mean it's ok to punish, hurt, or even kill a person for making fun of religion or just doing the religion wrong. Human progress has been frozen in place by blasphemy laws, sciences have progressed when blasphemy laws ease or often while deliberately concealing their efforts from authorities in places where blasphemy laws or laws that were otherwise based on the dominant religion exist.

If anything, I am actually a bit uncomfortable with the idea that Good Omens should hold back on lampooning a figure like Jesus Christ. If devout Christians will make laws that determine what other humans can do with their bodies based on their religion, then their religion should absolutely be open to outright mockery without punishment or ramification to anyone. Of course on an individual level I wouldn't wish to be offensive to someone sincerely religious but at the same time, I am also violently anti-censorship of any kind. And blasphemy and religious mockery are often right at the heart of censorship debates.

The world is a better place when we can openly mock religion.

I'm not going to caveat that as an opinion. Being able to openly and without fear discuss, criticize, and mock religion is an incredibly important part of any free society. The battles over this right have been vicious and bloody and are actively ongoing around the world. Just as an example, anti-blasphemy laws were on the books in Ireland until 2020, there was a huge campaign to have them removed because other countries were pointing to them as an example of why they should keep and exercise such laws.

My point is that I suppose this is something of hyperbole or alarmist or overly strident. I can understand people wanting to be decent about not openly mocking a figure of such importance to so many like Jesus. But quite honestly? I hope Good Omens does whatever it pleases with mocking Jesus. I hope they don't hold back. I hope people remember that being able to mock religion is really important, especially when representatives of that religion are actively trying to clamp down on the rights of others.

And honestly, if religious people are offended they should just not watch or they should develop a thicker skin if they expose themselves to such discourse. Religion and Christianity in particular is an active part of the public sphere. It is worthy of discussion. Public discourse often includes mockery, especially of the powerful and of powerful forces that steer the course of nations, like Christianity.

And I think it's important for Good Omens fans, who are a very progressive group, not to cherry pick and moralize over what satire or blasphemy is permitted. All satire should be permitted. All blasphemy should be permitted. The religious bigots don't care if you think God being a woman is ok but making fun of Jesus isn't. It's all the same, anything but glowing praise is criticism to some of these forces. Open discussion is far more important and yes, that includes mockery, and silly discussions in a silly show about an angel and a demon who avert the Apocalypse and fall in love.

[creation-help]

but what about pedophiles and rapists? /genq

[In regards to this post]

I'm gonna assume this is in good faith because of the tone tags. Normally I'd ignore this bc it looks inflammatory, and is missing the point of what the post in question is trying to make.

Let me put it as clearly as possible. The government should never, under any circumstances, have the power to take away your Human Rights, period. The post itself states this. The point is that they apply to everyone and can't be revoked.

But what about pedophiles and rapists?? Did you know public urination can land someone as a classified sex offender? Did you know in some states of America, they're lobbying for it to be a pedophilic sex crime to be seen in drag, around children? Or anyone under 18yrs of age? Or in public places, at all?

For one, the government is not unbiased in defining what constitutes as a pedophile, sex offender, or rapist. They don't even persecute all of those criminals, especially if they're rich, white or otherwise privileged! People get killed by cops for so much less. There are still problems with this. The state should not get to control who "deserves" death or violence inflicted on them.

So, what About pedophiles and rapists?

-What about them? They're still human.

The moment we start allowing a person's deeds to erase someone's humanity, and therefore the protections every living being inherently needs, we can start labeling anyone we don't like as inhuman. That's not what we want. And we especially do not want a state full of very biased, out of touch and potentially bigoted people (people like everyone else, flaws and all) to make decisions like that. I hope you understand this.

This isn't about how much you hate pedophiles and rapists, or sex offenders, or murderers. This is about humans. All of them.

[olderthannetfic]

I think you've talked before about how it's wrong to assume the only people who enjoy taboo kink like race play are bigoted white people, right? Tumblr's search remains garbage. I've been trying to formulate some thoughts on it after seeing some videos on "bad books" but I don't really know enough about real world kink culture to know what's valid critique of racism or anti-kink just hiding behind it. So I remembered you'd mentioned the topic at some point and might have some thoughts?

--

Well, first, one should apply basic logic: If shittons of women kink on the ways in which society abuses women, why wouldn't at least some ethnic minorities kink on the way society abuses them?

Second, social media overflows with jackasses saying "Listen to POC" as a thought-terminating cliche, but it's good advice as long as you grasp that you do have to evaluate which people you're listening to and what basis you have for trusting that they know something about a subject.

Honestly, I don't think this topic is that complicated. There are just a lot of cowardly white people around who are too scared of ever being seen as wrong to be willing to do a little research or stand up for anything even remotely controversial. They'll parrot the first anti they run across but not bother to engage with the comments of nonwhite kinksters who are long-time community members with informed opinions.

The person I'd listen to, personally, is Mollena Williams-Haas, a kink educator and submissive. She has talked about race play here, among many other places.

Her comments boil down to it being about consent. If kinksters want to play with a concept and everyone involved is on the same page, it's not the business of outsiders to tell them it's off limits.

Playing with heavy topics in an agreed upon way is completely different from having that thing sprung on you without warning. We're used to making this distinction when people are playing with the trappings of rape but, somehow, lose our goddamn minds when the topic is racism.

Now, yes, there are plenty of gross white creeps who think nonwhite kinksters will inherently be interested in this sort of thing and should cater to them... but how is that any different from your usual pest in a bar chatting up uninterested parties and refusing to take no for an answer? The problem isn't squicky kinks that many of us don't want to hear about: The problem is jackasses treating others as a fantasy and/or kink dispenser instead of a person with feelings and needs.

Frankly, most of the arguments against this sort of kink are your usual "As a woman, you should be setting a good example!" bilge that's leveled at all submissive women but on steroids because a woman of color is extra, extra, extra responsible for living her whole life as An Example. (And I notice that it's generally submissive nonwhite women who come in for the most abuse even though plenty of other dynamics exist. Quelle surprise.) It's bullshit. People should mind their own damn business.

As for "bad books"... Are we talking bodice rippers with nonwhite heroines or what? Are we back to colonizer romance wank? Books about characters engaging in race play in a BDSM context? I think it's reasonable to critique books that don't seem to know what they're doing—e.g. not seeming aware that a rape scene is one—but stupid to worry about iddy trash that is trying to be iddy trash. People will always like socially unacceptable id fodder. Some books will always cater to that.

[pokegyns]

alright so an argument i’ve recently had with a particular person on here is what initially motivated me to make a post about this, but it’s something that’s overall been bothering me a lot in trans spaces, so i have decided to talk about it.

it’s a known fact that trans people are very sensitive to any talks of biological sex, and that they refuse to analyze or hear out any form of sex-based oppression, however sometimes this discomfort can truly delve into a more dangerous territory. if we cannot talk about sex-based oppression, we cannot have feminism. something that has seriously been circulating around trans spaces recently is a very serious form of sex-based oppression denial, one that crosses the borders of “i’m uncomfortable with talks of biological sex because i’m dysphoric”. the outright refusal to acknowledge that female people are legitimately oppressed in ways that male people never will be, the outright denial of deathly forms of misogyny such as medical & reproductive misogyny that systemically only harm those born female, bold & vocal statements such as “transmisogyny is worse than misogyny” [why are you borrowing & coining a word that originates in *misogyny* if you are going to blatantly & boldly undermine the existence of misogyny?]– those aren’t harmless statements, and are actually actively contributing to the medical negligence of female bodies. they are supporting the continuation of this mystification of female bodies, the underresearched nature of female bodies; by refusing to acknowledge the very factual reality of the male body being seen as default, creating fallacies, hypothetical situations & people, engaging in whataboutism & overall denial of reality, to support their weak arguments of female oppression not existing on its’ own & genuinely asking questions such as, “what makes an afab person more oppressed than an amab person?” [but then again continuing to use the word “transmisogyny”, when, by their logic, the word would be an oxymoron, since they do not recognize misogyny as an actual axis of oppression], they are essentially saying, “medicine is correct for neglecting the female body, following the male model as the default, and should continue doing so”.

“what makes an afab person more oppressed than an amab person?”, they ask. “there isn’t some inherent oppression faced by afabs!”, they shout. well, i’m about to answer their so kindly articulated questions, although i’m very aware they are going to dismiss my words as bigoted attack against transfeminine people, as bio-essentialist propaganda, and “terf shit”. although male people absolutely can & do face sexual assault & rape [and the rates of prostituted & sexually exploited & brutalized trans women are alarming; which is something that should most definitely be discussed in feminist circles, as it is an issue of transmisogyny, which is equally damaging & oppressive], the ability to be impregnated is an additional vulnerability. the ability to get someone pregnant puts you in the privileged position here, no matter how uncomfortable that makes you feel. next up, female puberty is a very traumatic experience, as is female socialization. the stigma surrounded around “girlhood”, being locked away from freedom while seeing all your male peers enjoying a childhood of leisure– how is this not an advantage? add on the societal stigma around growing breasts, getting your period, developing a more adult-ish female body type– all of those are female-specific issues [trans women can add their insights about their experiences with hormone reassignment therapy & share their struggles with gender childhood trauma & unique discomfort with socialization + forced/unwanted male puberty, and their insights are more than welcome & appreciated]. furthermore, female infanticide is still unfortunately a form of oppression that we have yet to end, and bringing up the homicide of trans women is not at all comparable to this. a parent does not know their male infant is going to be sex incongruous, and this very much protects the male baby from being aborted or literally femicided after birth for being female, which is, quite literally, tangible proof of female-specific oppression existing on its’ own, starting even before or from birth, without any other accompanying & contributing factors. to add on, female genital mutilation is likewise still a sexist practice that is yet to be stopped. as is the existence of child brides. as are abortion bans.

strawmanning & using whataboutism, such as “there are cis women who cannot menstruate! there are cis women who cannot get pregnant! there are cis women without uteruses! there are cis women without *insert female organ*!” is not going to negate the fact that *trans women inherently remain without uteruses*. it is not going to negate the fact that historical medical misogyny, such as the misogynistic claim of “female hysteria” was intrinsically linked to uteruses. it is not going to magically make trans women the primary victims of the abortion bans. it is not going to negate the reality of negligence of female bodies in the medical field. it is not going to negate the historical reality of female people being unable to open their own bank accounts up, and male people of all sorts being able to. in no way am i saying that medical & reproductive misogyny are the only sorts of misogyny, nor am i claiming that period stigma is *the central* aspect of misogyny & *the deciding factor* to who experiences the worst of misogyny; all i’m saying is, that even female people who personally cannot menstruate/don’t have specific female sex characteristics/are intersex– still are systemically affected by medical misogyny & period stigma. trans women can experience female-specific misogyny when assumed to be female, medical misogyny is not the only form of misogyny nor is it the most important one, trans women can & do experience social misogyny, economic misogyny, cultural misogyny– but they are not experiencing medical misogyny. that being said, medical transphobia can absolutely be deathly, and should not be ignored in feminist discussions.

it is not a violent threat to your humanity to acknowledge that oppressed people are oppressed in different ways, holy fuck. it should not be seen as a direct attack against a minority group to analyze intersectionality & different forms of bigotry. we all have experiences that are equally valuable & we can all equally contribute to the fight against oppression, with all of our differing struggles & diverse battles. neither oppression is worse. both are fucking bad, and both suck equally, having both overlaps & differences in their manifestation. you just have to realize that you sometimes are, in fact, the privileged one. cis women may be at advantage in other situations, but you are at advantage in other situations. we all need to be good allies to each other. medical neglect of female people is real, but so is the medical neglect of transfeminine people. they manifest in different ways, which isn’t dangerous to point out, and it should be pointed out. neither is inherently worse or more traumatic & important than the other. both are oppressive to the core, and both stand in the way of feminism & anti-patriarchal action. it’s not going to fucking kill you to just be mature for once. i promise you.

– mod zoroark

[thorne1435]

(1st off, i am a trans man) personally, it makes me slightly uncomfortable when other trans men center their own experiences. don’t get me wrong, we have a right to talk about our issues, but i can’t help but feel like there’s a victim complex going on when some guys say that TERFs are “just as dangerous” to trans men or that baeddelism is a relevant issue (while brushing the misogyny and toxic masculinity in the ftm community under the rug). the fact that you made a post about trans unity and the first ask you got was about how trans men aren’t supported enough by trans women? but like, is that true? is it not ALSO an issue that trans women aren’t supported enough by trans men?

Okay, I hear you, and I acknowledge that I (unfortunately) have fairly limited experience with trans men but I don't know if I like the idea of discounting what they have to say as "a victim complex."

They just want to be heard. And I think they have a right to be upset, given how little representation trans men are given in media. I never saw any discussions on transmasc issues until I came to Tumblr. Never saw it on YouTube or Reddit. Online leftist circles--and even online trans circles!--don't talk about trans men! So, y'know what? If they're being a little melodramatic about their issues, maybe it'll off-set the lack of any knowledge of their issues in the first place.

And also, I think toxic masculinity and misogyny are sort of part of being a man, right now? Which certainly isn't to say it's inherent to men, but society does encourage it. That's what I think should change about being a man. This goes back to societal misandry, I think. Toxic Masculinity is just a manifestation of societal forces that encourage men to behave in unhuman ways, and I think it would be immature of me to expect trans men to perfectly avoid that, in their pursuit of masculinity.

Gender is a performance. We are all looking for the role that makes us most comfortable, but the baggage attached to the roles isn't something you can side-step so easily. Cis people have an advantage on this front, in that they are capable of proving their masculinity or femininity via means other than pure performance. Society *expects* them to be men or women and that means they can gesticulate towards genitalia whenever they're called into question. (They don't always do that, and it's sort of transphobic when they do, but the ones who are comfortable with themselves might say something like that, all the same)

A trans man will uphold toxic masculinity the same way that a trans woman will submit herself to misogyny: it is in pursuit of the perfect encapsulation of the role. Unless we feel like we adequately perform the role inherently, we are inclined to tolerate--and ergo embody, to an extent--the negativity present in the roles we desire.

I believe that lowering the standards for who can be seen as valid in masculinity will alleviate quite a bit of misogyny, whether that misogyny be among transmascs or cis men. So, in saying that, I hope I also illustrate why I'm quick to jump to their defense while also tacking on my ideas about societal misandry and its toll on men.

On the subject of whether or not transfems actually don't support transmascs...I guess I wouldn't really know. I'm not in trans communities because I don't live in a place where that kind of community could show up. I imagine this problem is being blown out of proportion a little bit, but the ask I think you're talking about did say that it was sort of a Tumblr thing? And internet discourse is just...fuckin...so unbelievably shitty. So I'm not too worried about it.

I mean, I'm not going to immediately assume any transfem I meet is inherently misandristic or otherwise bigoted towards transmascs, but I'm still gonna go to bat for transmascs if they get shit-talked, y'know?