#ESPECIALLY those who are marginalised in other ways too

[sometimesraven]

When Brianna was killed I couldn't log on to tumblr or facebook without seeing posts about her. There were vigils held locally for her.

Not even my local trans support group has said a word about Nex. I had to post about them myself. This silence is deafening. I'm exhausted.

[yuri-for-businesswomen]

someone has never lived with a coke addict. lmao

no but for real i see these posts a lot and while the basic idea is 100 % correct (drug addiction and homelessness are not personal or moral failures and people affected deserve respect and dignity), they usually take a direction or have implications i dont agree with.

first off, drug addiction is not a class issue. people of all backgrounds are drug addicts. ceos too. so i dont know what this has to do with leftism? as someone who struggles with substance abuse and for that reason has lived with and been around addicts, there are good reasons for people to be biased against them. in active addiction, many people are erratic, unpredictable, and egoistic. being wary of active addicts is self-preservation, not „bourgeois“ or whatever the reference to leftism is supposed to imply. this is also partly a gendered issue because men tend to exhibit addiction, egoism, and aggression at higher rates than women.

secondly, especially at the intersection of homelessness and drug addiction - i see a lot of these posts taking the direction of „mind your business if a homeless man is next to you mumbling to himself“ etc - it seems these people also romanticise what drug addiction with nothing to lose can do to a person. a friend of mine was hit in the face by a homeless man walking by, someone else i know was stabbed by a homeless man after they took him in. just because someone is underprivileged you dont have to stop listening to your insticts and keeping your distance to erratic and intoxicated men who seem like they might do something unpredictable. this doesnt just mean homeless men by the way, i dont trust any men exhibiting this behavior, and yeah would possibly call the cops if someone like that hung around my home or work (never have though).

on the other hand, when a homeless woman was hanging out in the hallway i let her be. my neighbor wanted to call the cops but i told her not to. personally i dont even care if she shoots up there, but if i had kids i might not want her around either.

are homeless drug addicts vulnerable and more likely to be harmed than harm someone else? yeah. do cops and doctors treat homeless people like shit? yeah. these are important conversations to have, but i wish they would happen without romantisation.

talk to any woman who has worked with homeless men, myself included - marginalisation is not virtue. many still harrass and even assault women. and these posts never take a gendered perspective: how most homeless and drug addicted women land in prostitution, how they are not safe in homeless shelters because of the men, etc.

im not saying op here said all of this but from the tone (and the tags and reblogs) it struck me as one of those posts that shames people for being alert around drug addicts and alcoholics when there is ample reason to, especially if youre a woman and theyre a man. and they never take a gendered perspective which is really important in this context, as it usually is.

[thranduel]

if mike and el stay together and byler isn’t endgame, the writers would be sending the most awful message.

firstly, a little girl escapes a lab she grew up in after being abused and traumatised, and starts dating the first person that shows her kindness after spending less than a week with him?? really? she gets kissed when she's 12 years old after a few days of knowing him when she can’t communicate at the same level as the other characters (there’s a line where lucas says mike’s 3 year old sister talks more and this was included to prove that el was definitely NOT ready to be shoved into a relationship) and she doesn’t even understand the concept of romance at all. she doesn’t even know who she is as an individual person (her likes, her dislikes, her fashion sense, her type when it comes to crushes, her favourite foods, how the world outside the lab works, literally nothing about herself at all) and she doesn't even know the meaning of the word "friend" and has to be taught what it means. yet she still gets forced into a romantic relationship with someone she didn’t even have time to develop a friendship with first while still basically being strangers? HOW is that healthy? how are people seriously okay with that?! (and before anyone starts, i’m NOT saying that she couldn’t eventually get into a relationship. of course she could. but it happened WAY too quickly when she wasn’t ready at all and people need to acknowledge this).

secondly, another abused and traumatised child is gay and in love with his best friend, and they’ve made him suffer the entire show while thinking he’ll never be loved back?? even when all the other kids were happy in season 3 and getting into romantic relationships, will didn’t have that. he got absolutely nothing, except being excluded and shoved to the side. what kind of message are they sending to only do this to the main gay character? why do all the other kids get to be happy and experience love? especially after how they included homophobic slurs in season 1 about will, it would be absolutely disgusting to leave him with unrequited love. gay people go through enough pain and suffering in real life, so why would anyone want to be reminded of that while watching a fictional show with a character that they relate to and find comfort in? shawn levy said their show is an anthem for the marginalised. how is making the gay kid suffer sending a good message for those who are outcasted and oppressed in society? it’s just hurting people. it’s making them think they’ll never find happiness and it’s also allowing the homophobes to win. it goes against everything this show has fought for and why it was created in the first place.

another thing that’s absolutely ridiculous is the massive difference between mike’s relationship with el vs his relationship with will. mike and el’s relationship lacks trust, honesty, communication and understanding, while mike and will’s relationship has all of those things and more. what kind of message are they sending if they keep mike and el together but keep mike and will apart? why are they telling people that it’s okay to stay in a relationship with extreme emotional attachment and codependency due to shared trauma when you don’t even feel like an equal to your partner? mike and el literally admitted they don’t feel like equals. they’re both insecure in this relationship and they feel inferior to each other. they’ve made each other feel like shit in every season (except s2 since they didn’t even see each other until the end). how is it okay to tell people to stay in a relationship like this?

and finally, why would the writers think it’s okay to use will as a plot device to force mike and el back together while he continues to suffer? mike is will’s best friend. he’s his safe place and the boy he loves most. and yet the writers have made will sit back and watch him with someone else while he suffers alone. they literally put him in almost every mike and el scene in season 4 just to rub it in even more. then they had the audacity to turn a very personal and meaningful scene that was supposed to be about mike and will ONLY and made it about el, because of course they did. it’s like mike and will can’t have anything for themselves anymore. will’s painting and his feelings for mike were something extremely personal and they made it about el in order to mislead mike and push him into telling her he loves her. it’s messed up on so many levels and i don’t understand how anyone thinks it’s okay.

[girlcalledwhatsername]

God give me the strength to not pick fights with people complaining about how every person who says anything about what helps them or others with their mental illnesses not following it up with a disclaimer of "you still need meds and therapy tho!!". There is no Single way to heal. Those therapies are often traumatising especially if you're suicidal and mention it to your therapist and they put you in a ward for it or because of the sheer amount of trauma a lot of people have with their therapists abusing the power they hold over their clients. And you'd think the blind faith in psych meds that were already founded on bogus science that was never properly proven to be true (the brain chemistry model) would at least dwindle now with the studies showing there's no correlation between serotonin and depression after all. Further readings and an organisation working on community based alternatives.

Another one and you can look at associated pages to find more, anti-psychiatry is the roots of mental health advocacy by mentally ill people who are marginalised and abused and oppressed by the system of psychiatry, it's nothing new and anti-science. Psychiatry is not an institution that is based on honest science.

I cannot believe the callousness of going to people or to creators or blogs or whatever that are talking about self care, about community care, about what helps them survive their afflictions, and having the audacity to say "you still need your meds tho, tell everyone mentally ill people need meds otherwise this is irresponsible and anti-science" no the fuck it's not. Therapy can help many people but it can and does likewise harm a lot of people too. People have the right to choose their treatment and choose how they want to heal from their traumas, you don't get to dictate that Western medicine has to be advocated by EVERYONE for them to be serious about their mental health. Psychiatric survivors are already traumatised by Psychiatry and speaking out about it and advocating for themselves and being thrown under the bus by people who don't care enough to organise and create a community that we can rely on.

Blind faith support for Psychiatry is Not Woke, it is Not Pro-science. And expecting people to advocate for it every time they so much as say "this comfort item helps with my disorder and distress!" is genuinely disgusting behaviour.

[aroace-cat-lady]

so uhhhh ahhh long rant incoming sorry~

I'm sure you're aware of this whole Matty situation...

I just need to say that I cannot support Taylor after this, for me, this is absolutely where I draw the line. Personally, I believe that knowingly dating a bigot, a racist for example - this is someone who has unashamedly admitted to watching racist torture p**n, imagine how twisted you have to be to do such a thing - it automatically means that you are also racist, because, as per *my* definition of racism, racism doesn't have to be outright saying racial slurs and actively harassing poc, I definitely classify this indifference and condoning of bigotry as racism too. You *cannot* claim to be an activist and proceed to associate yourself with someone who is against everything you apparently stand for, unless it is of course, purely performative and somewhat for your own benefit. You cannot seriously claim you stand with people of colour, trans people, jewish people, muslims, every marginalised group basically, yet associate yourself with someone who clearly doesn't??

I understand some people are conflicted, I mean so was I for perhaps an hour after it was confirmed, it is hard when someone who you might idolise, who you believed would advocate for you is actually incredibly apathetic, and who has proven that countless times but especially this time, that they didn't truly mean what they claimed... But how can one not draw the line at bigotry? You can't just shrug it off by saying "I love her but this is wr-" that means nothing, you can't seriously call her out for something and say you love her in the same sentence, does that even count as holding her accountable? Equally bad are those who are "looking the other way" so you simply just don't want to hold her accountable and then be held accountable yourself for not doing so.

Additionally, if you're going to date a literal bigot, and you are aware of the colossal platform and influence you hold, why would you do it publicly- oh and with a fanbase obviously including the groups said bigot has openly discriminated against?

Unfortunately, the main responses I've seen to this situation are: swifties who idolise taylor to an unhealthy extent attempting to defend and condone even matty's actions, the performative activists who pretend they care but continue to talk about how much they adore her and basically just shrug it off, those who are fully aware its wrong and look the other way, and the literal minority who hold her accountable. Oh, said minority's feelings tend to be dismissed and invalidated and belittled by the former 3 groups. Oh, and also, said minority is primarily poc. hmmm.

Something particularly annoying that people are doing is attempting to making this about misogyny when it quite obviously isn't ("ofc you guys are blaming a woman for a man's actions"). I swear, I have seen not one person who has even implied that Taylor is to blame for Matty's actions. We are holding them both accountable because they are both shitty. Matty is unquestionably worse, but does that mean Taylor shouldn't be held accountable? Really? People saying this either... have zero understanding of the situation OR just don't want to hold her accountable and want to *out-woke* us or something and I think most of them are guilty of the latter

btw you don't have to comment on this or anything idk I'm just upset lrpekfos;rjdlgi

Oh I'm commenting don't worry about that

Just!!! Ugh!!!

I'm so. Outraged. And disgusted. He's just another privilege white guy who doesn't care at all about making fun or offending ppl that are different from him and that doesn't even try to understand or respect them. He's the worst brand of white bread out there.

And most white fans are being so awful about this. Oh you're just making it about yourself oh she's just not thinking oh he's not that bad oh I actually think he's becoming a better person because of her. Shut up. Shut up. Just shut the fuck up.

I really don't know how to feel about Taylor right now. Like, all I can think about now is how a lot of ppl have said for years she's racist cuz she has never toured on latam. How there's literally no explanation for that. And I ignore all of that cuz, dude, it's Taylor??? She's one of the few ppl that actually try.

But. Is she?? Cuz she isn't trying a lot right now. She apparently doesn't care. Sure, she stands for human rights and say Vote Blue!! and all that, but at the end she doesn't seem to think that being racist antisemitic islamophibic etcetc count as a red flag.

I just hate feeling like this. I've always respected and admired Taylor, but I really just can't respect her right now. But I don't seem able to pull away from her.

I mean, I literally love her songs so much I learned a second fucking language thanks to her. My relationship with my sister got a lot better because of her music. I've met incredible ppl because I started blogging about her.

I guess I'm so disappointed and kind of heartbroken right now. Like, I got this feeling of you didn't just betrayed me, you betrayed all of us and, worst of all, you betrayed yourself

It's just a lot.

[on-wednesdays-we-eat-the-rich]

I'm posting about autism again.

Because I've seen a couple of posts making the rounds that I've had some Feelings about but I only just managed to put them into words.

The posts are something along the lines of "neurodivergent people are making jokes about neurotypical people and Clearly this means neurodivergent people think neurotypicals aren't real". Or, to shorten it slightly: "neurodivergent people are oppressing neurotypicals by making jokes about them".

I have made a post already in which I semi-comedically argue against this idea, but I thought I might as well write an essay about it too just to make sure I'm being completely clear.

For a little bit of context, here are the kinds of jokes neurodivergent people make about neurotypicals (taken from pins in my autism board on Pinterest) (just to clarify, neurodivergence is not limited to autism and covers a whole bunch of different disabilities; the reason these jokes are mostly about autism is because I got them from my autism board. I'm sure people with other disabilities have made similar jokes.)

Obviously there are other examples but these are my favourites. Especially the last one, it's hilarious.

Why do we make these jokes?

Because they're funny

To parody the kind of mocking we get from neurotypicals by turning it back on them and showing how silly it is

To let off steam after a frustrating social interaction

Probably more reasons because I don't speak for everyone

Very rarely do I see a neurodivergent person make a joke that is specifically meant to hurt, harass or alienate a neurotypical person. However, those are all common reasons that neurotypicals make jokes about us.

You can apply the same logic to basically any marginalised group. For example, we see a lot of queer people make jokes about straight people, right? Always silly sarcastic things like "straight people have no fashion sense". Why is this a common joke? Because it's a very common stereotype that queer people, especially gay men, are fashionable and wear pretty clothes. Also, we get a fair bit of confusion from straight people about popular gay fashion. So making this joke is both a response to the confusion, and often judgement or piss-taking, and a reclamation of a stereotype that has been used in a derogatory way.

It's a very similar concept with neurodivergence. Many symptoms of disabilities, for example, autistic special interests, have been commonly seen as something bad that needs to be changed, and have only recently been reclaimed by the neurodivergent community as a good thing that brings joy. Special interests are still made fun of by people who don't understand them. We get called obsessive, annoying and childish. So if we make a joke like "I guess neurotypicals don't have interests" in response to this, it is not to make all neurotypicals feel bad, or to separate them from us, but to point out and laugh at the ridiculousness of telling us off for something that 1. we have very little control over, and 2. is not even a bad thing.

I don't know if neurotypicals are under the impression that neurodivergent people can't be sarcastic, but if that's the case it would explain rather a lot, because they seem to always take everything we say really seriously. Whereas if they say something about us that is actually hurtful and damaging, and we call them out on it, we have to listen to them call us overdramatic snowflakes and tell them that yes, we can in fact take a joke. The difference is that what they're saying is rarely actually a joke. Because they believe it. For hundreds of years, they've learned and been taught to believe that we're some kind of alien species, that we don't even count as human beings, that we either have no feelings at all or we express our feelings too much, that we need to change everything about ourselves to live up to their standards, and that we should never have existed at all. And when we retaliate, they tell us we're hurting their feelings. They say, "you know neurotypicals are still people, right?" and it's exactly the same thing that straight people do to queer people, that cis people do to trans* people, that white people do to POC, that men do to women, that any privileged group does to any marginalised group as soon as they show the slightest bit of resistance. All of a sudden you're the victims and we have to be reminded that you're People and you have Feelings and you can't take even a little bit of criticism because if you do you'll spontaneously combust. You're the ones who have been dehumanising us for as long as you've known about our existence, but sure. We could stand to be taken down a peg or two, right?

I'm reminded of James Acaster's stand-up routine in which he took the piss out of other comedians like Ricky Gervais for making transphobic jokes.

"I'm An EdGy CoMeDiAn, It'S mY jOb To ChAlLeNgE pEoPlE! Yeah because you know who's long overdue a challenge? The trans community."

I'm just going to leave that here. Feels like its fits.

[thegirlmirage]

I look up to all trans women. But finding queer heroes can be tricky to navigate because fame is inherently poisonous, and a lot of the way discourse is shaped online it's very easy to condemn people.

I myself suffered from a broad attack from a community I was in that started with me speaking out about being misgendered and mistreated, and it got turned into "well don't believe Rose because she's a bad trans person we have trans friends to prove it."

And I've ran into this issue with trying to identify with other known trans content creators. There will come places (especially with whiteness and wealth) where criticism of those privileges becomes ignored. It would be easy to say that they're resistant to criticism because of always being criticised but I think that it just comes down to not knowing and not feeling like they need to know better, which is how those privileges behave anyway.

To me, my oppression has always linked me to other oppressed people. The poor and the embattled and the weird and ostracized will always be my family more than someone with it all figured out. There is a social cost to thinking like this.

So I end up feeling quite disconnected to some trans people. Perhaps it's foolish for me to expect just because someone has overcome the brutal imperialsm that keeps us from feeling safe to be ourselves, that they would be able to see the other oppressive junctors in the world and act accordingly.

Bringing it back to condemnation, any personality online will at some point have to deal with a snap group judgement, and for marginalised people this is often constant, scaling with intersectional marginalizations. People who have survived this world may struggle to fit with a society that demands adherence to stricter social rules, especially because we are here because we survived. We are often quite badly harmed by what we've been through, and we will struggle often to fit a narrow view of what's considered expected behavior. We are human. We won't have perfect responses, we can be wrong. It's therefore easy for us to suffer more when the judgement arrives.

If I'm looking for someone trans to admire, it's not uncommon for me to hear why it's not a good choice. And there are legitimate reasons to question them, because of course, fame is evil, it's more a miracle that people come out of it balanced at all, but also there is tighter judgement on those people for their marginalization such as being trans.

So it leaves me with this feeling almost, like I can't trust my own kind. If I'm following blogs are they inclusive of other ethnicities? Do they believe in fat liberation? Would they look on an unfortunate person with compassion or indifference?

So I have to temper my feelings of admiration. I have to remind myself that realistically, placing anyone on a pedestal is dangerous. I have to deal with my disappointment that trans women are just human too, they're not just angels. They shouldn't need to be exceptional to be worthy of my praise.

But it's more complicated than that. Certainly putting even more pressure on trans women to behave better is just more of the same. I think about how rife eating disorders are among us and how even with my most femine looks I do not feel I am girl enough societally to do things like buy groceries.

And we do need uplifting too. I had been in such a gender euphoria haze that once things settled I was horrified by just the extent of my mental health when times weren't in boom. So we do need someone to see our qualities and praise them, and to love and adore them not in spite of what we are but because of who we are. But I think that person is me.

I wish of course that every trans person would rush to embrace me and we would see eye to eye and celebrate our joint survival but... not everyone wants to do that. For all the thousands of images of celebrating skinny trans women with 3 wives doing DJ sets there's so many more people who are just desperately trying to fit their gender into the world they already have. People who might not seem exceptional or have big projects to their names.

I think about how I was regarded when I didn't have HRT. I passed zero percent. I thought I was ugly and I couldn't see how I could possibly change anything about that. And I think there's a tendancy for queer spaces to sometimes even outright reject people like that, especially if they subscribe to any ideas about being anti what they perceive to be men.

It's those girls who need the princess treatment. It's they who we should be elevating and celebrating and caring for.

[enbycrip]

Stuff I am finding difficult about the nurse’s strike:

There is a huge outpouring of stuff about “our NHS” and “our nurses” which is both brilliant, and unfortunately also currently being used to really beat and dogpile with abuse anyone who speaks up about shitty treatment, including medical disableism, they’ve received from nurses and other NHS staff.

Medical disableism is *incredibly* prevalent and leads to serious issues for a huge number of (I’d say likely most) disabled people. This partially reflects the disableism rife in the UK public - nurses and other healthcare workers are not immune to the barrage of right wing political messaging - and partially some serious structural issues in medical education.

I 100% support the nurse’s strike - because they are workers, and people, who deserve decent pay and conditions in their working life. It is a very difficult job, not only due to the emotional labour required in a caring role, but because they are dealing with an enormous amount of politically-motivated chaos as the Tories systematically underfund the NHS in an attempt to destroy it. I 100% support and approve their action to fight that bullshit and improve their situation.

However; this does not make nurses either “angels” or above reproach. It makes them humans suffering difficult conditions who deserve support to better those conditions - like other workers facing capitalist bullshit and exploitation.

It does not change that nurses, like other healthcare workers, and other carers, are in a power relationship with their patients which puts them in a position uniquely capable of abusing those patients. Particularly when those patients are already physically and/or emotionally vulnerable due to illness and/or injury, and/or they belong to already marginalised groups such as BIPOC, queer folk, and/or disabled folk.

It takes a lot of care and awareness not to abuse those power relations, and plenty of nurses, other healthcare workers, and other carers, don’t. They often perpetuate the systemic abuses marginalised people face, and sometimes they abuse vulnerable people on an individual basis too.

All these facts exist *together*. *All* of these things are true.

I’ve seen a *lot* of people raising abuses and disableism they’ve suffer be hit with “what, you want us to be the US?” This is such a fallacy in so many ways - notably 1) the issue of medical disableism is systemic, and fucking *hell* it exists in the US 2) disabled people tend to live in poverty and thus are in an even worse position in the US.

But most of all, it’s a fallacy because *exposing abuses within and criticising a system does not mean wanting to destroy it*. It’s about *wanting to improve it*.

It’s an example of the same issue that constantly arises with climate change protestors being screamed at if they ever use a car. It is entirely possible, indeed, essential to live within a system and yet *desperately* attempt to improve it.

I’m asking everyone who sees this to:

1) support the nurse’s strike, because it’s *essential* to support a large group of low-paid workers fighting to improve their working conditions

2) speak about the fact that it is possible to do this *and* want to improve how nurses treat patients, especially marginalised ones

3) actively go in to support any marginalised folks you see being dogpiled and abused for speaking up about medical disableism and medical and caregiver abuse.

Part of how systemic disableism operates on a social level is to treat anyone caring for disabled folks as “angels”, above reproach. Whether they’re paid to do so or not.

What this perpetuates is

1) disabled people being conditioned to accept any abuse they receive. The message is “be grateful you’re not just being left for dead”. Which is ridiculous. Disabled people are people. We deserve decent lives free from abuse like every other person.

2) people in those professions being conditioned to accept low pay and shitty working conditions. Because they’re “vocations” you do because “you’re an angel” who doesn’t think about money. Which is also ridiculous. Workers in every profession deserve decent pay and conditions for the work they do, and carers, systemically, don’t. Carers, systemically, are abused - they work long hours, for crap pay, and often in shitty conditions.

As a disabled person, I *want* carers to be paid and treated well. Because I’m a decent human being who wants other humans to live decent lives, AND because I think carers who are paid and treated well do their jobs of caring for vulnerable and marginalised people better.

Also: FFS, if you have any ability to do so, put pressure on Labour to actively support the strikes or change their bloody name.

[fictionkinfessions]

@ anon with transfem + nonhuman biology kintypes: I’m intersex and TMA, so probably one of the people uniquely qualified to talk on this given I can speak regarding both.

And, look, provided you’re not claiming to experience or personally understand the oppression we face and are listening to us about our oppression, it’s fine. You can relate to your previous experience, you can miss your body and your identity from past lives (or something similar if you’re not spirikin), you can feel a loss for your body and your experience having changed, there’s nothing wrong with that. I think most of us experience that in a variety of different ways, some things requiring more introspection and work on unlearning stuff than others, but it is fairly normal.

The issue comes from if people think that because they’re kin w someone who experiences these things, they can talk on the issue; your kin experience is never going to be a 1:1 experience for those that people who experience it in this world. This is especially true in the case of kinning non-humans with non-human biology bc of dehumanisation and all that, plus if your biology was normal for your people, you won’t have even an inkling into what the intersex experience is for us. Same still holds true for the TMA experience though, as a TME person will never experience transmisogyny that isn’t misdirected.

I would highly suggest looking into transfem + intersex activism stuff and learning about transmisogyny and intersexism to ensure you’re aware of the issues we face and the way these things impact us now, in this world. It will also go a long way into avoiding romanticising our oppression, which is a huge issue I’ve seen in the past (less so these days, but I’ve been in the kinmunity for over a decade, so I’ve seen some shit lol). I don’t think it’s malicious when it happens, but it is misinformed and it’s important that we as a community work to create safer spaces where we don’t incidentally alienate others — this goes for just about everything, not just transphobia and intersexism too.

One important thing on intersex stuff that should be addressed ASAP though: aliens whose bodies are normal for their people aren’t intersex, intersex is a word that specifically refers to those of us whose human bodies fall out of the sex binary. Using it to refer to aliens fundamentally misunderstands what the meaning of intersex is. It’s a word used to describe a category that doesn’t biologically exist but a term needs to in order to describe a type of oppression (much like how race isn’t a biological fact, but it’s a term we need to describe our oppression as PoC). Not mad, just that it might take a bit into your learning journey for you to come across this info, so it’s probably best for me to address it now.

Basically, if don’t try to claim identities that aren’t yours to take in this life and don’t romanticise our struggles, it’s perfectly fine. Kin stuff is complicated, and it can definitely inform your experience of gender and what you may or may not want out of transition if that’s an approach you choose, but doing the work surrounding it is important in making yourself a safe person to be around for kin who are more marginalised than you in one area or another.

Take care, and I hope you find this all helpful; it’s a complicated conversation, so definitely listen to anyone else who also has stuff to say — everyone’s gonna have varying opinions on things

🎊

[ofmermaidstories]

really appreciate the effort that u put into making reader as gender neutral as you can- and how u don’t add descriptions to how reader looks. i cant tell you how many times i’ve had to stop reading an x reader fic that mentioned reader having blue or green eyes, blonde hair, etc. (or when they describe reader as being paper thin). like yeah some people do have those features but NOT everyone…and the ppl who don’t have green eyes and blonde hair (etc) features wanna be included in x reader fics too u know? anyway. yeah. thanks. <3 love your writing btw!!!! 😅

LOL, hi! i will continue to try my (very human) best with the neutrality. 🌷 it’s the charm of the x Reader niche! neutrality with personal descriptors—because you’re trying to cater for as much of the audience as you can, within whatever role you’re giving the Reader in your fic! whether that’s assigning them as a trope like a Pro Hero, or a Childhood Friend, or giving them a specific background that’s important (and informing) to their identity and thus their experience of the world at large—like a POC, or being plus-sized, or living with a disability. Going through a illness, or a life-changing event—idk, i think these are all types of specificities that add more nuance and fun to a piece without dictating a Reader’s shoe-size.

because!! this is the thing!!! specificities are fun—but they’re fun when they’re insertable. humans are at once emphatic and selfish, LOL; we can imagine losing our entire town in a war, or our mother in a tragic building collapse, or being marginalised in a way that we might not otherwise be—but mention we go through all that and that we have piercing amethyst (non-Quirked) eyes at the same time? eh… LOL.

i consider x Reader fics to be their own genre, with their own genre-rules. second-person pov, scant personal descriptions, etc etc. and because i find it fun, i give myself extra rules (it’s fun to me!!!!! reeee!!!!!!!)—like, for instance, there are certain words i either won’t use to describe our Reader or our Reader’s actions, or will use sparingly, depending on the context: like pretty. giggle. delicate. curvy. jeans!!! (i personally think they can be indicative of a size range, depending on how Reader is wearing them, but maybe that’s me projecting bc i hate jeans and i wish they had never been invented <3) just stuff like that! stuff that makes me pause and go, hmm, okay, what kind of person/image is this suggesting to me? using second-person POV to write in gives you so much like, room to play with, when it comes to describing how someone might view themselves/be viewed by others. especially with a romance, where all we want is to be seen! it’s a great opportunity to be like, okay, maybe i don’t want to be seen for how prettily i can giggle—maybe i want to be seen for how easily i laugh with other people.

however,,,, (and this is a big however) i (me, merms) do think that i (again, me, merms) can say this stuff simply because writing with those aforementioned rules makes writing these x Reader fics in general more fun for me (merms). and it’s fun for me because i’ve had my amethyst-eyed, white-haired character days. when i’m not working on fics, i’m busy chipping away at my original fiction, third person, where we have green-eyed skinny blonds and curvy girls with long wavy dark hair like—any and all need for description i have, i get it out in other ways LOL. which means i can afford to approach x Reader fics as a different type of challenge. i would never begrudge (the often younger) writers who are here because it’s fun, and want to write about a Y/N who has amethyst eyes and white hair. Y/N has always, always been their own character—the specificities we give them (or don’t) has always just been in service of making it easier to project onto them. an adventure is an adventure, and at the end of the day it doesn’t matter the cloak we’re wearing for it—as long as we get to the end of it safely. 🌷💕📖

[caustic-light]

There’s some shit going down in the yugituber community right now and it made me wanna point something out that a lot of leftists don’t really understand, even if they can recite the theory of it.

The left and the right recruit from the same pool of people. And those people are disenfranchised and marginalised people. Most people under capitalism are marginalised, because capitalism relies on economic disparity to function and as such poverty is actively marginalised. This creates a massive and ever increasing pool of disenfranchised people ready to be radicalised into either direction, splitting society and creating conditions for the rise of fascism over and over again. This is part of how capitalism sustains itself.

This means that the people who are radicalised towards the right are not fundamentally different from those who are radicalised to the left. The main difference is which kind of ideology they are exposed to and how they were raised. Marginalisation on other axes affects this, too, of course, so people who are marginalised on axes of gender, sexuality, race, disability, ect skew more left while more axes of privilege make right wing ideology easier to accept. Right wing marginalisation sells you an idea of your privilege entitling you to something better than what capitalism is willing and able to give you and scapegoats other marginalised people as the guilty party. It lives off of dividing the economically disparaged.

You are under no obligation to involve yourself with people on the right. But if leftism can not approach these people at the common point we both experience, being failed by capitalism and marginalised for it, leftism has failed. It’s part of the capitalism -> fascism -> capitalism cycle that leftism has to separate itself by default on a basis of ideological purity from the people who are being targeted by the right, so that the liberal center and the far right can crush growing leftism with every repitition of the cycle. A part of leftism needs to be to have compassion and understanding towards the right, even when we have to draw a hard line in the sand towards them at the same time. Part of the balance act is to understand the nazi as a human person who has been indoctrinated with fascism and who is fundamentally no different from us, possibly less lucky, while still being able to throw them out of the bar, knowing if we don’t, it’ll become a nazi bar.

To be able to draw that kind of line a lot of leftists disregard the importance of understanding and compassion towards the right. and by doing that we become a tool in their rise to power. We judge the past of people, rather than engaging with the present, we create strict moral codes, we push for no tolerance, no nuance positions on anything we can fight, we long for a yes or no rule set and we seek to outcast and punish without a moments hesitation. We are afraid to acknowledge the inherent mess of humanity and ethics and we suffer because of it. We make leftism inhospitable to anyone but people seeking positions of power to kick down from and those who believe strongly enough in leftism to be leftists in spite of how leftist spaces operate. To live in a panopticon of our own creation does not make for political insight, and it especially doesn’t make for human understanding.

And it has always happened. There is a reason leftist infighting is a meme older than fire. During fascism’s rise to power in italy and germany we neglected the fight against them because we couldn’t stop arguing amongst our own. In a lot of ways anarchists and ml’s hate each other more than they hate fascists. Add soc-dem’s to the mix and boy does it not get better. At the time leftists in germany watching the rise of Hitler have commonly said “What’s that gonna change? We’re already under crypto fascism, going mask off doesn’t matter.” But it did. And it was more important for the left here to remain ideologically pure to their own metrics than fight the rise of fascism until it was too late.

I live in western germany. There is a lot of worry here about how the ever present crypto fascist party, the AfD, is incredibly popular in the east. And the way we talk about them is incredibly void of compassion, pretty much just attributing it to easterners being stupid and gullible. Meanwhile the east has spent decades under the control of the soviet union, failed by a system that calls itself communism. When germany was reunited, it wasn’t so much a reunification as an annexation. We didn’t form one new country, everything in the east was bought up immediately by investors and landlords in the west and other western countries. As a result, not much changed. Now fascists come along and point at how both the glorious left and the enlightened liberal center have failed them and we, here in the west, have the audacity to laugh at them and call them stupid for falling for it.

[marveltaughtmetoread]

Not trying to directly shade anyone but saw a post recently which was anti Taylor Swift because 1) she's overplayed and mediocre, 2) she doesn't deserve her awards because the awards ignore marginalised groups, 3) 1989 sucked and 4) releasing is giving her another chance to 4a) shame a closeted man for being 4b) a womaniser 5) there was also an underlying message towards her not being political in the right way throughout the post

And I just wanna weigh in because Taylor gets a lot of unbridled hatred for what amounts to not being everyone's cup of tea and being popular, like you don't have to like her but so you have to hate her to this extent???

So let's break it down

1) Yeah Taylor Swift is probably overplayed, but that doesn't mean she's not talented, as a fan of hers, her inescapable presence currently is a bit much for me, like no artist deserves this much attention

but she's still a good artist, you don't get to be this big by not being talented, look at all the celebrities who tried to break into music and just weren't good enough, she has to have been talented to get where she is, doesn't mean you have to like her, I hate Nicki Minaj but I also have to admit that she is massively influential and clearly talented to have that influence

2) yeah, the academies are bigoted, and they do ignore marginalised talents, especially those who are vocal about their politics, but this doesn't actually have anything to do with Taylor, like you can argue that she should be bringing attention to the issue and uplifting smaller artists but you can't blame her for the awards being rigged against the marginalised, also she still has to be talented to win the awards because there are a lot of white cishet able-bodied musicians out there, and she still beat them

I get your point and I too hate the awards being bigoted but why are you blaming and holding one artist responsible for this systematic issue, why is Taylor your punching bag for this

3) 1989 isn't my favourite album of hers but once again it not being to your taste doesn't make it a bad album, like Demi Lovato's early work isn't to my taste so I just don't listen to it

4a) who the hell are you to assume Harry Styles' sexuality, Harry is openly gender nonconforming, he openly dates women, whether or not he identifies as queer is none of our business and feeling entitled to him being queer is messed up, do you know how many celebrities have come out and talked about how harmful it was for them to have the public assume their sexuality and have the public decide that they were secretly closeted or in Kit Connor's case act like he was queer baiting the audience for his assumed straightness

You do not have the right to act like you know anyone's sexuality, get off your high horse

4b) Taylor Swift writes songs about her life, she uses her songs as a journal, all of her public relationships have been attached to songs she wrote, she herself actively tries to avoid attaching any particular ex with her songs, she used to encode their names into her songs when she was a smaller artist and a teenager but she stopped doing that as she got bigger and the public scrutiny around her heightened, 1989 specifically alludes to trying to keep her relationships out of public eyes, and being hunted by the media

the media attention on her relationships is not something she enjoys and the speculation around who she dates is something she actively tries to shut down, she's not trying to ruin any of her exes

This I think we can contrast rather clearly with other artists who have written songs attacking their exes and inspired mass public backlash against them, such as Olivia Rodrigo whose hatred was so palpable in her songs that people wrote her ex and his new partner death threats and harassed them even as Joshua Bassett was in hospital with a failing heart, and when you listen to the actions Olivia describes it's not worth it, when you contrast Olivia and Joshua's songs it reads as a teenage relationship that broke up making the death threats fucking ridiculous and disproportionate

Taylor Swift songs have never inspired that same level of backlash, despite describing what sounds like abuse or at least being taken advantage of in some of them, because she doesn't write from a place of anger, her songs tell stories, and give a more balanced view of relationships, people hate her exes for what her songs reveal about their actions but she's not inspiring mass hatred, you have to be actively listening to the lyrics and a massive fan to care about her exes, and, when she performed Dear John on the Eras tour, she prefaced it by essentially saying 'I don't need you protecting me, don't go after him', trying to prevent exactly the reaction Olivia Rodrigo's songs inspired

Back to the shame over being a womaniser, Harry has said he felt flattered by her songs and it was Taylor whose reputation was bashed for dating too much, because, in our sexist society, it is mostly the women who get vitriol aimed at them for who they date not the men, so I don't know how you could think to level this argument against her, like she was very clearly the one being shamed over her body count not Harry??

Also, Style is the only song which alludes to (the man everyone's assumes is) Harry even slightly being a womaniser because he's seeing other women but can't stop thinking about Taylor, which is followed up by Taylor saying "I've been there too a few times" which feels to me like they're both guilty of not moving on even as they are seeing other people, so how is Taylor shaming him for it????

5) Taylor not being political in the right ways is a fair criticism, a lot of people are disappointed in her lack of involvement in politics, what little involvement she does have is shown to be left wing, but it's rare, breadcrumbs scattered across albums and events

I think she's actively trying not to use her influence to be involved in politics because she wants us to be involved, to vote, but she doesn't want to have the power to influence us on her politics and I can see why this is not enough for a lot of people

I personally don't mind, I agree with her trying to not get involved in shaping her fans politics because a person of Taylor's influence getting involved in politics scares me

I don't want every celebrity under the sun giving us a political opinion because they're just not qualified for it and I think Taylor recognises that, so uses her influence sparingly but if you do want your music to be political, it's okay to dislike her for this

[collectionoftulips]

do you prefer modern au's or regency era ones?

What a lovely question, thank you ❤️ (I apologise for this absolutely massive response you probably didn't ask for, it's a ride and I apologise!)

If it's to read, I really like both. Regency era just hits a certain way and I love the way Regency-set stories have to/usually explicitly engage with the way societal structures impact relationships and that these pressures are not insignificant on their influence on a numerous fronts (who is seen as desirable, what gets seen as desirable, the impact of finances in relationships, the corroding potential of status on genuine affection, etc). Of course, these things are as alive as ever in contemporary society, but I think Regency stories allow for these things to be more openly explored because it's set in 'the past' (even though my own personal experience of contemporary dating is that it is not too dissimilar to Regency era; before it was how many houses you owned etc, now it's how many holidays you take - which becomes often a proxy for questions around disposable income etc). I think modern AUs can and often do explore these concepts a fair bit, but they are rarely as upfront about it (compared to Regency). This I think is a reflection of the fact that we are living in a time when social inequalities are made to be seen as 'insignificant' or 'irrelevant' in relation to forming relationships, when they in reality are not insignificant (as any person belonging to a marginalised identity on a dating platform would tell you).

With modern AUs, I love reading the room to play authors get afforded in translating these characters to contemporary times and the choices they make in doing that, and even with the same general premise etc, two stories can look very different in hands of different authors. That's really exciting and cool. I also love the idea that these characters will ultimately find each other in any universe, despite any circumstances. What can I say, I love love.

If it's to do with writing, I think I'm increasingly leaning towards modern AUs a bit more. I quite frankly feel like I'm very inadequate at writing Regency. I know some general things about the time period and the gender politics of it in particular, but I'm really not that brushed up on what the day-to-day stuff in Regency era looked like (I also find that there isn't enough accounts of how daily life looked for what would now essentially be called working class people, and that's very frustrating to me on a number of different levels, especially as I can't seem to bring myself to stop adding in class themes in my stories). Writing Regency era also makes me very conscious of the gaps in my own education around, for example, how Indian society looked at this time period. Of course, there's also the GIANT shaped 'colonialism' shaped hole in setting fics in Regency for this pairing. I'm not a fan of their 'love solved racism' take from S1 that the show just seem to run with, despite that it has some really serious implications.

Alternatively, I don't really want to be in a situation to essentially try to write colonialism 'back into' the fandom. Firstly, because I think colonialism is/was so deeply abhorrent in a way that I don't think can ever fully be captured in any words, or at least especially those that would be written by me. Second, if colonialism was a factor in a fic set in Regency era, I would want to burn the entire ton to the ground and there would be no way of getting around that everyone in that circle's wealth would be directly related to colonial practices, and therefore I have absolutely no interest in redeeming and humanising people that deny the humanity and inherent value of others (which is one of the many many outcomes of colonialism). Thirdly, I would never want to create content that would be traumatising for anyone, because I believe fandom should be a fun and welcoming space. And again, the colonialism thing just really hovers in the background for me a lot. And then there's the gender politics of it all as well that makes it really dicey and the classism.

I guess the short of it is: writing Regency requires so much and also involves making so many decisions about stuff that I don't feel great about. Doesn't mean I won't try to create something that I hope might be fun or valuable for people, but it does increase my anxiety a lot because with certain writing choices I have to do, I don't feel like there's a 'correct' choice, and my inner perfectionist gets really disappointed with myself if I get stuff wrong.

Modern AUs are also plagued by similar factors, but I feel more equipped to navigate them in a better way. Of course things like classism, sexism, racism, neocolonial structures etc are factors that influence and I think about when writing, but modern AUs allows one to sidestep the mess caused by the 'love solved racism' take, which is really the thing that causes the most anxiety in me when writing Regency because... well, it just makes so many things not add up.

I don't hate writing Regency but I've realised that it makes me very anxious. Modern AUs don't cause exactly the same feeling.

Sorry for this massive dissertation! Thank you so much for this question ❤️

[thranduel]

i am SO sick of people and their stupid excuses for will’s love being unrequited. there is absolutely no reason for that to happen and if it turns out that way, that’s the most cruel and pathetic thing they could do.

“it’s realistic” - this is a FICTIONAL show with an alternate dimension, monsters and kids with telekinesis. stop pretending like you give a shit about what’s realistic. stop acting like you care about “historical accuracy” only when it comes to gay people. and by the way, there WERE gay people that were happy in the 80s too, believe it or not. they existed, and they were happy. but again, this is a fictional show, so regardless of what’s “realistic”, they can let a gay character be happy. it’s not that difficult, especially for a show that was literally created for outcasts and those who are marginalised (the duffer brothers and shawn levy said this themselves).

“it’s part of the main storyline. will needs trauma so vecna can target him” - will already has enough trauma. that doesn’t mean he has to end up unhappy with unrequited love. i would understand if he THINKS it’s unrequited and it’s affecting him and vecna uses that against him, but it can’t end up with it staying unrequited. a gay character’s love for his best friend is not a plot device to traumatise him even more with just so he can end up without him. that’s disgusting and unfair.

will has suffered since he was a child. A CHILD. he has been abused, bullied, outcasted, excluded, kidnapped, possessed, traumatised and is still suffering mentally every single day. he has not had a genuine moment of happiness and he’s never experienced romantic love and thinks he never will because he’s gay. what kind of harmful message would they be sending if they keep this boy unhappy? the most kind, loving and selfless character in the entire show who has sacrificed more than enough for everyone around him??

there was NO reason to make will be in love with mike since the beginning if it was going to be unrequited. there was no reason to make mike and will’s relationship different from everyone else and show that they’re the closest and understand each other better than anyone else if they weren’t going to end up together. that’s it. it’s that simple. stop saying “it’s realistic” and stop saying “it’s for the storyline”. stop acting like it’s okay for them to use a gay character’s trauma and struggles and heartbreak as a plot device while leaving him unhappy. stop acting like it’s okay that they used him to repair mike and el’s crumbling relationship while his own heart broke in the process. there’s nothing okay about it.

[thelegendofj]

Not that it really matters, but for the record, I'm not a "tw*tter refugee"- I've always despised that place. I have dropped in there every now and again (but had to limit my time on there for mental health reasons because something on there would make me feel like crap literally every time. Tumblr has similar issues with certain attitudes etc. but it's still easily one of the better 'social' sites on the whole internet) and semi-successfully made an experimental account there with the specific intention of curating the HELL out of it and only 'allowing in' anything/anyone with good vibes, but... yikes, I don't think that's possible anymore, and I refuse to even slightly support musky odors in any concievable way.

I've been on Tumblr since... geez, 2011...? And only really left my main account for a while because of the NSFW ban, not that I even chose to post any to this account? I checked in on it every now and again, but It always felt way too quiet. I lost some great internet buds who left because of that ban, and my trans internet experience got exponentially worse because of it too. I'll always miss those pre-NSFW ban days, it's not been the same since. I have also still been hanging out on my less than SFW side-accounts to keep whatever I could of that former trans-validating online existence, but I made a point to distance myself from "main" tumblr because it just depressed me by that point.

I might be back a bit now. I have been for the past week or so. Largely out of spite against tw*tter and the stinky whiny babyman, but it is a bit more alive here now.

There's still some attitudes and vibes I don't fully gel with, but maybe that's a me thing. Recently realised there's like a 99% chance I've been suffering from bad ADHD my whole life, and especially the rejection-sensitive-dysphoria part of it. I don't intend to start arguments or anything like that, some things just scrape against me really bad, and I'm always aware that I hold some opinions that would be openly mocked on here if I dared mention them (nothing bigoted at all- I'm a big supporter of LGBTQ+/PoC/disabled/neurodivergent/marginalised people/*insert whoever the right hate here* etc. etc. etc.) and always will be) and that makes me really uncomfortable, but it should just be in a 'we're not all gonna think the same' way, not a 'person A doesn't think person B should be allowed to exist' kinda way.

Basically, I regularly seem to have slightly unpopular opinions because I'm a weirdo kook who's always exploring new and crazy ideas, and that makes me always feel a little on the defensive. I'm sensitive, I'm maybe over-optimistic/utopian/head in the clouds, and I'm gonna keep pushing for things to be better for everyone in whatever little way I can. I have to hold myself back like a rabid dog from getting mad at stuff online on occasion, but that's not what I wanna be, I just struggle sometimes.

This has turned from an explanation about my social media life to a weird rant about online discourse and my struggle with it, but that's just... how my brain goes sometimes.

Though both are important, I really want to focus on bringing/encouraging the good rather than just attacking the bad. I may slip sometimes, but that's my aim, anyway.

"Be excellent to each other! Party on, dudes!"

- Bill and Ted knew what was up.

[cruelsister-moved2]

me n jodie were talking a bit ago about how in media when they do occasionally appear, butch lesbians are overwhelmingly paired with other butch lesbians even though its not that common of a dynamic irl. and the reason i care isnt bc im like grrr we need more feminine representation or whatever and like butch4butch couples are important and deserve representation too anyway. the reason i think its notable is because (especially with the super gender conforming, conventionally attractive by very heterosexual standards feminine lesbians we usually see) i think it comes from the fact that people see butches as so unattractive they cant understand how anyone but another equally unattractive person would want them. they see one woman who they find attractive and appealing and in their mind she could get and would choose another woman who is also attractive and appealing to them, and a butch is the furthest thing from that in their mind. they have no idea that we could have an entirely different standard and like many of us intentionally seek women who are hairy and buzzed and broad bc we love it and find it attractive (and also by extension that those women are like that on purpose not just because they tried to be attractive and failed or something). its like a deliberate language of desire between us where butchness literally appeals perfectly to that gaze & ik plenty of butches who like intentionally perform butchness for a femme audience as well as the (more talked abt) other way around. so i dont think its fair to say that there is like specific disdain reserved for the act of being attracted to butches as much as its a symptom of a system that views a gender conforming woman as the least attractive being on earth and can only comprehend them being settled for by others they perceive as of equally low value, never actively desired and valued. so if ur claiming theres some specific kind of marginalisation for being attracted to butches then the fact butches who like other butches dont get as much of this specific kind of flak as more feminine women do would seem to imply that like butch4butch attraction is privileged, rather than the fact that the universal disdain with which masculine women are regarded is whats at the heart of this ultimately