#and if that was the intention I don't think the transition would result in this squeaky clean style of humor

[bubblesandpages]

The only figures from her life I can think of who do crack jokes are Mylo (who we pretty much exclusively see fail at them) and Ekko (where is comes off as a much more natural extension of his personality as a child, before morphing into a much more cutting form of criticism/defense as a young adult).

Now Mylo is someone who is locked in an almost silent game of one upment with Powder due to how similar they are, and how much he's unable to separate his own self image from the way he sees her. They're both physically weaker then their other two siblings, their skills tend to lie in the mental rather than the physical, the one form of physical activity we see them both engaged in is firearms—where Powder easily wipes the floor with Mylo—point being there's plenty for them to compete in.

Jinx's humor could be her almost continuing to compete with Mylo even after he's gone. But like his own underdeveloped humor, it largely comes of as strange, likely due to their shared lack of confidence, and possibly as a consequence of her trying to make her humor unique to her.

Ekko's a little different. He's actually funny.

But more than that he's charismatic—something that can't really be said for Mylo or Jinx (at least not conventionally). He's effortlessly good in whatever situation you drop him in, never clams up (outside of, like, literal trauma episodes i.e. Benzo's death, the shimmer attack once Jinx shows up) whether he's ripping off a rich Piltie like Jayce, face-to-face with Enforcers on a citywide manhunt, or fronting a resistance group, it's almost enviable how he glides through social interactions, and a lot of that effortlessness is expressed alongside his humor.

I think that effortlessness would be appealing to someone like Jinx, especially after she's decided that she can't remain as the same "weak" girl who thinks she's been abandoned by everyone who once cared for her. You often observe how people around you act, and achieve certain responses from those around them as you grow up—this could just be Jinx observing this behavior in Ekko and trying to emulate that ease using humor—missing the point where this isn't a fear response from him the way it is for Mylo and Jinx, or the source of his success in social situations—it's a result rather than the source of his ease.

Imitation is often an imprecise art, and coupled with it being a fear response from Jinx, you end up with some imprecise results. If I was feeling generous, I might be willing to cede that Jinx's more "appropriate" and arguably successful attempts at humor in season 2 are a result of her finally being confident in who she is (thank you category 5 Family Trauma Event 305 subheading: Tea Party) and letting go of both competition and imitation for genuine humor that's a natural extension of her new found sense of self.

I find jinx's relationship with humor to be very fascinating. Jinx wasn't really a funny child. We never really saw her crack a joke, it just seemed like she wasn't that kind of kid who could find humor in any situation and found it easy to hold around. But as she gets older we see that she frequently uses humor in her day to day life, specifically to help ease her out of uncomfortable situations. Jinx's sense of humor for the most part is quite inappropriate, not in an obscene way but in a way where the things she says just aren't suitable and create a lot of tension. Not only does she use humor to navigate these situations, but she also will forcibly laugh to relieve stress, as though it's some kind of coping mechanism she's developed. She laughs nervously when Silco expressed his disappointment in her, she laughed nervously when she reunited with Vi and saw Caitlyn, she laughed nervously when she showed the gem stone to silco, she laughed nervously when she was stapling her leg, etc. Jinx does use more humor in season two but to me it's significantly reigned in and more appropriate for the most part.

One of the earliest jokes we get from her is "Sisters, right? Can't live with them, can't stuff them back in the old baby maker." This is a really uneasy joke and Jinx reacts accordingly, she instantly laughs this off while cringing. Another instance where she makes an insensitive joke would be at the commune "ask for a healer, get a metal fortune cookie...looks like you got a couple (conditions). " She uses humor to make threats, "I feel like we got off on the wrong arm. How about we try to other?" "Don't move, silly. I might hurt you." "I paid your girlfriend a visit this morning. I made her a snack."

To me this is fascinating because you would think her humor would come from her youth, a mostly carefree period of her life where she was surrounded by peers, not her isolated adolescence. Like, where is this humourous influence coming from? Sevika and Silco, the two people jinx was closest to at the point aren't funny people. They do have their theatrical moments but humor isn't their strong suit. Where did this change of her's come from?

[velvetvexations]

Trans KLCK getting accidentally misgendered by one of the Bad Kids in Freshman Year because they just honestly didn't realize she was a girl and said "he" in casual reference to someone they didn't know.

Trans KLCK holding on to that as she continues to pile up on reasons to hate them.

Trans KLCK interpreting making fun of her name as transphobia, which Porter and Jace encourage.

I'm divided on if I want/am expecting Oisin and Ivy to be completely evil or not. It seems like there are now good odds they're The Actually Bad Rat Grinders, in which case maybe Oisin knows KLCK was taking things the wrong way and just didn't say anything because he didn't care/rage is the name of the game, and Ivy very much seems like the kinna person who doesn't necessarily hate trans people but is like, "what's all the fuss about?" and gets mildly annoyed when corrected about pronouns.

But if not, and Oisin and Ivy are just as much victims of Porter and Jace as the others, I can see a world where the rest of the Rat Grinders were fully behind KLCK's mistaken belief the Bad Kids are Like That.

Either way it'd be hilarious since Kristen is, I think, Ally's one and only non-trans PC so far. AU where Kristen transitions to Kris and averts the Rat Grinder grudge.

Anyway, this is not me trying to make KLCK/the Rat Grinders more sympathetic than they are in canon, I still think they have plenty going on for them to have been frustrated with and have had that frustration manipulated by trusted adults in their lives, grooming them into dealing with that frustration in the worst possible way for their own benefit. I just like this idea.

[arachnidsgrip88]

Mahito x Transmasc Reader. Excuse my poor knowledge about hrt. mostly mahito being a freak. MDNI.

Mahito adores seeing the changes in your body ever since you've started testosterone. Initially he found it silly that you would try and change your body without his help. He literally specializes in this stuff and you'd get the results you want right away, no prescription needed. Despite that, you insist that you transition properly and safely. In order to soothe Mahito you assure him that he will be able to check up on your bodily changes as much as he'd like, to which he cheers up.

After quite a few checkups, it becomes extremely clear to you which change is his favorite. Whenever you agree to let him check up on you, he always inspects your bottom growth first. He thinks it is just so cute!

"So sensitive!" Mahito coos, lubricating his finger with his own saliva as he gently rubs your bottom growth and intently watches for your reaction. "You've definitely gotten bigger. I'm almost glad you wouldn't let me just transfigure you a dick, it's so cute like this..." He runs his inhumanly long tongue against your cock, drooling a little. He can't help it! You've been so constantly aroused recently, he can smell it, and you always smell so good. He gets off the floor and onto your bed, sitting between your legs. "Let's see..." He murmurs to himself before tugging his pants down to free his dick, pressing it against yours and relishing in the size difference. "So small compared to mine... Cute cute cute." Mahito rambles on, voice high and whiney even as you complain to him how unfair that is when he can change the size of his dick at will.

Then he discovers frotting probably. Might write a proper fic about this I don't know if its too self indulgent. Who gives a freak

[electraslight]

the loss of the addiction angle in Kevin's character in the transition from ogs to uaf really shows to me the flaws in uaf's writing compared to ogs's, at least in terms of Kevin's redemption.

Kevin's energy addiction is a key part of his character in ogs. it's implied to be why he swings so drastically from being good to Ben out of the kindness of his heart to trying to kill hundreds of people in mere hours, and it seems like this has been going on a while, shifts in mood correlating to his energy consumption. the addiction is why Ben and Kevin break apart, because Kevin's behavior because of the effects of the drug and his pursuit of it stop them from being healthy friends. Ben never stops believing Kevin might have the capacity to change, though, trying to see through the person the drug created to the person inside, like him sparing Kevin in framed and helping him out in grudge match. Kevin is, at this point in his life, dangerous, but he's still a kid, and Ben's failure to protect him weighs heavy on him for the rest of his life. you see this narrative and think well, if he's redeemed later, this should be important. recovery should be hard, especially when he seems to have been in survival mode for years. it must be hard for Ben to trust him afterwards, especially with the sheer amount of pain they've put each other through, Kevin especially, because of his addiction.

in uaf, Kevin is already good. he can still absorb things, but they don't hurt him now, they aren't a compromise he makes, sanity for safety. he's a con man, he makes measured plans and scams, not drugged out bids of random violence. he's calm, mostly, and he's a good guy now, and he'll help Ben because he has "honor", and he no longer thinks of life totally selfishly. this, I feel, is a cop out.

main characters aren't really allowed to have rough edges in uaf, and when they do, it seems jarring and out of place, or a result of weird writing. Ben's transition from being a little too kind for Ben to being unreasonably cruel in a way he never was as a child is strange, unfitting of how perfect the show wants him to seem. gwen's random bouts of insulting Kevin or pettily harping on him for things he apologized for seem strange when paired with how kind she usually is to him. and Kevin, Kevin is a "bad boy", but not in a dangerous way. all of his crimes are amorphous "things he's done" that they never elaborate on, his scams not cruel but only conniving. even when mutated, he still seems lucid, way less vengeful and violent than he was as a child. he's not an addict. why would he be? he's a good guy. he's changed. even at times where it seems obvious to show that he's "fallen off the wagon", they don't mention it.

I feel like this leads into a larger discussion about uaf, mainly about character flaws and the white sheet covering specifically the alien trio. character traits that got lost in translation, Ben's hobbies, Gwen's love of technology, Kevin's addiction metaphor. especially in terms of flaws. in uaf Ben's "flaws" fluctuate, sometimes being perfect, sometimes randomly getting an ego, losing it, then gaining it back. Gwen in uaf has no stated flaws, or at least ones that are intentional, but because of that, the ones she accidentally has are more toxic and weird than she ever did as a child. and Kevin? he's an amorphous concept. vaguely criminal. vaguely angry. a doormat. what's the issue with writing Kevin in a way where he really does feel like a homeless kid with addiction problems and enough trauma to have that dead look in his eyes forever? I don't know. I don't know where I'm going with this. give Kevin a little violence back.

[habitual-truant]

"Naoto isn't trans! Kanji isn't gay! You obviously don't understand their character arcs at all!"

I'm allowed to be critical of the homophobic and transphobic narratives that are in persona 4. Obviously in canon kanji is straight and Naoto is a cis girl, but it pisses me off when people decide to say "you don't understand their character!" because I do. I KNOW Kanji's arc was about toxic masculinity. I KNOW Naoto didn't like being a girl because she wasn't treated fairly and taken seriously for it. I KNOW they aren't queer. But they should have been.

Throughout persona, a person's shadow has been some part of their unconscious mind, the exact part varying from game to game, but the general consensus being that it's the part of the self that's unknown for whatever reason. In persona 4, its the part that is repressed and rejected. Characters defeat their shadow and gain their persona from accepting that their shadow, a manifestation of the things they hate about themselves, is in fact a part of them. It's not exactly the same for Kanji and Naoto though. Kanji's shadow is the result of internalizing what others say about him as the truth, and Naoto's is the result of rejecting what other people think of her, and repressing the reasons why they think those things. Unlike the other characters who's shadows entirely come from their own emotions and thoughts, Kanji and Naoto's shadows come from how other's perception of the two affects them.

Kanji's shadow is a "gross pervert" that lusts over men. Based off of the other characters and how they defeat their shadows, you would think he has internalized homophobia, and that by accepting his shadow, he accepts being gay. But, its the opposite. Kanji accepts he's straight despite liking feminine things. He accepts that he's NOT gay. I understand the intentions. I know his shadow was the way it was because he was accused of being gay and made fun of for liking girlish things, and he internalized it. I know his arc is about toxic masculinity and unlearning it. But Kanji was attracted to men before his arc. He all of a sudden magically becomes straight after accepting his shadow. "But he had a crush on Naoto, who ended up being a girl!" Yeah, I understand. Doesn't change the fact that Naoto presented as a boy, and was completely socially transitioned. At that point, Kanji had literally no reason to think that Naoto was a girl, he completely saw her as a boy. The writers backpedaled on his attraction to boys. It implies being attracted to the same sex is something you can change, and that it's worth changing. Not to mention, his entire arc is played off as a joke. his shadow is a "pervert queer" because its "haha funny" for a masculine man to like men. It's a mockery.

Naoto's shadow isn't nearly as insulting, showing the main focus of Naoto's arc; nobody respects her as a detective because she's a teenage girl. However, Naoto herself says she doesn't like being a girl when her shadow reveals the fact that she's a girl. Yes, it's because she's ridiculed and disregarded because she's not a man, but she's still uncomfortable as a girl and actively chooses to present as a boy, even after gaining her persona. She is undeniably transcoded, at the very least, before she accepts her shadow. She accepts that she's not taken seriously, that she IS all the things that people look down on her for being, and that she IS actually a girl. Again, while not doing a complete 180, the writers back out of Naoto wanting to be a boy. Even though her arc isn't as abysmally insulting as Kanji's, it still sells the narrative that trans people need to accept that they "aren't trans, just pretending,"

No matter how you look at it, the "moral of the story" for both Kanji and Naoto is that being gay or trans isn't something you should accept about yourself. Both Kanji and Naoto have queer themes in their stories, even if the writers backed out and effectively gave the opposite message. They're queercoded, end of story. For us queers to reject the homophobic + transphobic themes and decide "no, actually these characters ARE gay" is completely reasonable. Who are you to tell us that we aren't allowed to reject the honestly disrespectful writing from a triple A game franchise? Why wouldn't we dislike the way the characters are written? And why do you only complain when its the two characters that are so close to being queer rep?

I 100% understand and respect people who disagree with the headcanons, but those who mock and make fun of people who do consider Kanji and Naoto to be queer? That's something I can't accept.

TL;DR: People choose to interpret Kanji and Naoto as queer because of the queer themes in their arcs. The same themes that the writers completely backpedaled on, and ended up implying harmful things on instead.

[jellolegos]

could you talk more about rhaenyra's sword? i saw your comments on twitter and thought they were really interesting!!

of course! I love to talk about hotd :)

Mandatory disclaimer: what didn't fit in the twitter 200 characters is that I am by no means an expert, and I think this would fall even further outside of my research area than the late mediaeval palaeography stuff did, so just my layman's take :)

Something I noticed thanks to the BTS videos that were circulating this week is that the crossguard is much stubbier on the sword Rhaenyra picks up than on Blackfyre and Dark Sister.

vs.

On rewatch, their sword is clearly more reminiscent of a Merovingian (or Frankish) sword, than any of the other ones we've seen.

(An example from the BM, Sutton Hoo)

Merovingian/Migration Period/Carolingian/Viking swords all carry this distinctively shorter crossguard, evolved from Roman spatha. They usually have an equally stubby pommel, which grows to be more standardised in the period of Frankish export with 3-5 lobes, transitioning from Merovingian/Migration period to Carolingian/Viking swords. The lobes are obviously not applicable to the show sword since it has decorative dragon wings, but you might be able to see the resemblence of a weighter and wider pommel when compared to other swords we've seen in the show.

(HotD heirloom, a 'Viking sword' from the BM)

Since we also got confirmation that it is Valyrian steel, if we can assume the sword evolution in HotD parallels Western Europe, then we know that this sword predates Dark Sister and Blackfyre and pre-dates the Valyrian conquest.

(an illumination of a wielder of a Frankish 3-lobed pommel sword in the Stuttgart Psalter vs. Visenya's longer crossguard sword in the show manuscript)

Why does it matter?

I was I had a more articulate way to put this but it feels like another example of Rhaenyra's tension between her inheritance derived from Valyrian heritage and her struggle to make manifest that inheritance, employing Valyrian aesthetic over a practical combat weapon. We see both practical swords (if memory serves, one of those is Harwin's?) with wider crossguards and this heirlooms on the table, but she reaches for this one specifically.

Importantly, we actually see why those stubby crossguards fell out of favour in the fight between Jacerys and Aegon in the training yard. In the scene the wider crossguard allows Jacerys to catch and thrust Aegon's sword to the side. Although the inward taper on Rhaenyra's sword might have served a similar function (allowing someone to 'catch' a blade), the stubby (and, like in real life, decorative) crossguard would have likely resulted in the wielder losing an arm. Therefore we know that Rhaenyra's heirloom would be at a disadvantage in real combat.

Thus, we are presented with two themes of her sword: it is ancient and deeply Valyrian, and it is almost certainly useless (think someone brandishing a flintlock).

I find the sword design a totally enchanting detail and one that really enriches her arc for the season. Through the sword choice, along with her gravitation to Visenya, her adoption of an increasingly Valyrian dress code, and the messianic themes in the scene with the dragon seeds, we see Rhaenyra struggling with assembling a patchwork of diplomatic and martial authority over a shoddy semi-divine Valyrian blueprint in an ultimately futile fight toward the Iron Throne.

I love Rhaenyra as a character deeply for it, and love the show for making those choices, what a beautiful and subtle way to flesh out some of the tension between all of those competing factors.

I think the obvious caveat is that this analysis assumes 1) HotD sword evolution is the same as Western European sword evolution and 2) that this design is intentional. The former obviously cannot be 100% true, there were no Roman spathas lying around in Valyria just as there were no dragons in Aachen. I don't know that we can assume the latter is true either, I'm not entirely sure it was intentional and I'm not sure if they had a set mediaevalist or similar to consult on the swords, I think there were enough mistakes in the manuscript to make me think not... but I could be wrong!

Admittedly, I think this can veer into 'the curtains were just blue' territory, and I debated whether or not I wanted to post that twitter thread at all. But what I will say is that I think analysis of art (be it props, colouring, lighting, etc.) can be a venerative exercise as much as an intellectual one. I want to, in my own life as much as possible, push back against passive consumption of media, so if it's overanalysis then it's overanalysis! Honestly, hearing different interpretations on the same media is the best part of fandom, so maybe it was intentional maybe it wasn't, but how fun is it to try and understand it anyway.

There are 22,000 of you now, so maybe this will find the right ears: KEEP THIS AS RHAENYRA'S SWORD FOR S3, ITS A GREAT CHOICE :) (or if you are hbo's propmaster, dm me and tell me I'm right!)

[theriverbeyond]

How aware is cam that pal is synthesizing testosterone in her body in between my teeth?

fic link here

HMMM I actually never thought about that when writing, but I would say if Cam doesn't know for sure that Pal is doing it, she would probably assume it is a possibility.

In-universe, I made up the idea that trans necromancers have something called the "endocrine reflex", where their bodies reflexively attempt to synthesize the correct sex hormone at puberty -- not to the extent of full binary transition, because I don't think non-Lyctor-necromancy allows for such a complete overhaul of ones own physiology (especially without conscious and sustained effort), but it would be noticible to a Lyctor looking in, and without further intentional intervention would result in hormone imbalances that potentially externally have similar results to stuff like PCOS or gynecomastia. maybe more or less extreme depending on the individual.

but back to Cam, I think that this would be a known phenomenon in the Nine Houses, so Cam would probably be able to put together the assumption that when Palamedes is active within her body, his soul may be reflexively attempting to synthesize testosterone. I don't think she would have a problem with it if she did know -- Cam's Whole Issue is that she doesn't consider herself to be her own person, seperate and independent from Palamedes. So like... even though I DO think that Cam deserves a little T, as a treat, I think it's impossible to seperate any personal gender fuckery she might have going on with her fullbody devotion to being Palamedes'.

[chaikachi]

I think we can possibly get rg crumbs with Neo teasing Ruby as Oscar even more🙏 let's pray for the crumbs 🙏 it's been 84 years 🥹

I literally JUST wrote an analysis of this and threw it on twitter like 2 days ago. I had been meaning to put it on my personal blog but you, dear anono, have given me incentive to put it here instead.

The Interesting Pattern of People Using Oscar Against Ruby

This kicks off primarily in v7, which makes sense since Oscar and Ruby are thrown into conflict as early as episode 2. The conflict is a result of Ruby lying to Ironwood in an attempt to protect him and the rest of their team... But it's clear from the start not everyone agrees with that decision.

Of those that don't agree, the loudest seem to be Oscar and Yang. The latter of which - who is our first example - chooses to bring it up with Ruby in front of their whole team when they're on their first mission with the Ace Ops. Except Yang doesn't just voice her own thoughts or feelings, she makes a point to to ask Ruby how Oscar feels about it. Which was not the fairest way to go about it if you ask me. Especially seeing how Ruby reacted. It's also VERY INTERESTING how that scene directly parallels what it transitions into: Oscar posing those same concerns to her. Except unlike Yang, he found Ruby when she was alone so they didn't have an audience to witness their conflict.

From there, we have a slightly more subtle example: Ironwood. And by 'subtle' i just mean he doesn't say it as directly with his words or actions as the other examples we're discussing here. We do know that their conflict for this volume is centered on their disagreement of what to do with Ironwood... and the show reminds us of that by constantly framing the two separated by him.

Whether it was Ironwood's intention or not, he did manage to drive a wedge between the two of them. And while this conflict does keep them apart for a while... it doesn't work as well as it could have. The first example of this is in episode 7 where Oscar and Ironwood are having their talk near the winter vault.

Ironwood: Do you believe in me? Oscar: I do believe in you. But not only you.

It is very clear Oscar is talking about the other leader in this situation: Ruby. Showing that despite their disagreement, he still does stand by and respect Ruby's decision. Even in this photo, while they are still separated by Ironwood, they are agreeing with each other about what to do:

That scene is then directly followed by the infamous "Schnee Manor Fumble" where the the two finally agree to tell Ironwood the truth and regain some trust in each other.

And as much as I would love to analyze this scene in even more depth, it will have to wait for another post.

For now the next example: Cinder

In V8 when she sabotages their portal plan, it's literally the first thing she says and I still don't know why. Cinder saw the vision of them making this plan, but it was a group endeavor. And the only things we saw Oscar say were the technicalities of how Atlas would fall when using the staff... So what exactly was she referring to? and why did she mention his name specifically?

And then last, but certainly not least: Neo.

We saw this back when the v9 teaser clip first dropped however long ago and it was a topic of BIG DEBATE. Many argued there was no significance behind why she chose Oscar of all people to turn into... but I have to disagree.

In tandem with all these other examples, there is a narrative pattern formed of people specifically using Oscar as a way to twist the knife at Ruby. Yang, Cinder, and - depending on if you view his contribution as intentional or not - Ironwood. Which makes Neo the 3rd or 4th person to do this.

Neo has a vendetta against Ruby. We know this. We know that Yang was an easy choice to hurt her because they're sisters. We know Penny is a good choice because they're close friends and Ruby already lost her once. But Oscar? Why Oscar?

Why did she pick him first? And why did she specifically use a mirage of him when he's covered in bruises and burn marks when she has seen him cleaned up multiple times? To that I have two answers.

The first: because she was there at the Schnee manor and saw them interact in the entryway.

And what she saw convinced her that the two of them were close. Close enough that using Oscar's face against Ruby - especially one battered and bruised - would be an easy way to hurt her.

I'm not trying to use this argument to say that Ruby has feelings for Oscar. I think in canon she is largely too preoccupied with the weight of the world on her shoulders to think about that right now. But we DO know that Oscar feels some type of way about her.

And that even if it's not established in canon as romantic yet, Ruby and Oscar are close. That they do have a relationship built on mutual trust, respect, and understanding for being in similar situations. As clearly displayed in show as well as backed up by Miles in this cameo.

But at the end of the day, there is a very strong emphasis on her connection to Oscar since his debut, which characters within the narrative are noticing! (just look at Nora's face here)

But that brings me to my 2nd point as to why Neo chose the characters she did: Because the writers wanted us to see that.

Animation is expensive and so much meticulous detail and intent goes into everything that we see. They wouldn't have just chosen those characters arbitrarily. They chose those three characters on purpose and I think it largely has to do with how those characters relate to Ruby's arc for Volume 9. So lets go down the list in more detail:

Yang

Once again, it is a bit self explanatory. Her and Ruby are sisters with unresolved conflict that has been building for a while now. Some of it from their upbringing, but a lot of the more recent struggles being Yang's habit of calling Ruby out or disagreeing with her in front of groups of people. It was mentioned at the start of this post, but there are two other examples that come to mind. The beginning of v8 and more recently, v9e3.

In the first, she is arguing with Ruby in front of a room full of people and they all get to see her leadership called into question. The second, we see Ruby's patience around this habit starting to wear thin. I'm not trying to say Yang is wrong to express these things, but the way she goes about them is often not very considerate of Ruby's feelings. Especially her feelings tied to leadership, which is a big theme for this volume.

As mentioned in the v9 trailer, someone says "You seem to be carrying a rather large burden". However, we can see very clearly Ruby's not carrying it well at all and that she is well on her way to breaking under that pressure. A pressure and insecurity that Yang has unfortunately contributed to even when she's trying her very best to be supportive.

Two brief side notes:

Blake and Qrow are also guilty of hurting Ruby in this way unintentionally, but I don't want to touch on them in this post so it will have to wait for another meta

VERY INTERESTING that right before this shot, Yang says "My plan for mantle didn't work out either... but we got Oscar back". Which is a very nice callback to the last time she brought him up to Ruby at the beginning of v7.

But back on track to the next illusion Neo uses:

Penny

We know this one is a big one. The two have always been very close and Ruby is quite protective of her in light of having already lost her once. We saw Ruby admit to this for the first (and pretty much only) time on screen when speaking with Oscar in the Dojo during v5. (yet another scene I would like to dissect more in detail in a later post)

Ruby: When Beacon fell, I lost two of my friends. Penny Polendina and Pyrrha Nikos. (...) Ruby: Pyrrha... Penny. I'd be lying if I said it didn't hurt. That I didn't think about them every day since I lost them.

We also see Ruby passes out when she hears that Penny didn't survive the fall. Then later she gives a eulogy of sorts over the sword that she got from Jinxy. So this plot around Ruby's grief towards Penny is going to be very prevalent this volume.

And lastly:

Oscar

Why him when he didn't fall with them? Well, because we already had a parallel setup between him and Ruby in relation to "The Girl Who Fell Through The World".

Oscar: She brushed off her bumps and bruises, for nothing hurt worse than the loneliness in her chest. Oz: I recognize that. The Girl Who Fell Through the World. Oscar: I shouldn't be surprised you're so familiar with fairytales. Oz: I've lived through my share of them. How are you holding up? Oscar: I thought the idea of falling through Remnant into a new world was... exciting. I never understood why she was so sad when she finally made it back home. But now it makes more sense. Oz: She wasn't the same girl anymore.

Oscar relates because of how he was thrown into this adventure and how it's changed him... and the same can be said for Ruby. Except instead of the call to adventure choosing her, she chose the path herself and then fell into that fairytale first hand. Literally. Into an arc that seems to be telling her that in order for her to grow, survive, and to rise up from the fall she just had: she needs to change. Just like Alyx did. Just like Oscar did.

Unkown Voice: What if you could leave Ruby Rose behind? Shed like an old coat. What might happen... if you don't?

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand that's all i've got rn. there are so many crumbs i have built myself a damn loaf of bread, my friends. and i have very few doubts that Neo won't try and use a mirage of Oscar against Ruby again. if you got to the end, thank you for reading and let me know if you'd like to see more of this stuff or if you'd prefer I keep it on my non-art blog @gatheringkeepsakes. Until then... RG CANON OKAY BYE.

[katyspersonal]

Maria doesn't wear a Knight's Wig

Okay, earlier today someone asked me what I think about the theory that Maria's ponytail is actually just a (detachable) Knight's Wig.. I honestly don't believe it!

Knight's Wig is that it is, indeed, a wig and not only the ribbon itself! But the thing about it is that it is described (and shown) to resemble a flock of silver hair!

^ Here you can see that Maria's ponytail is the same color as the rest of her hair, described as "ash-colored" (灰, hai), not "silver" (銀, gin). (The ingame lighting does make her hair look blond, when on "clean" model her hair is definitely more grey, so that's why I double-checked that original script ( x ) uses different terms for their hair too, since grey/ash and silver are certainly similar!)

^ There is another instance of Cainhurst attire imitating the silver hair look with the Queen's guardians helmet, though this one is a little more vague because... well, this might be very thin slivers of actual silver for a decoration, rather than a similar thing to a Knight's Wig, since it is said to be made of silver as sort of protective charm:

I personally like the idea that this is both! To be honest, I've had a discussion with more details about it here ( x ), but that post in short: significance of imitating silver hair is placed in how it reflects the biggest mastery and devotion to the Queen of Blood! It is something exceptional rather than ordinary! Moreover, it probably has to do with being undead... The only canon Cainhurst characters with actual silver hair are the Forsaken Castle Spirits (commonly referred as Bound Widows), with the living prototype having "normal" hair:

It is hard to say if the silver hair is the result of dying and "living" again, or their hair turned silver when they lived! There is an unused Vileblood who does have silver hair and red-ish eyes, but he is... well, unused. Otherwise, silver hair are a thing of undead Pthumerians like Queen Yharnam and Pthumerian Descendant + Elder, both undead.. But all are blood magic users! So, Maria would not wear a symbol of the intention to become that, as someone who distastes the blood antics of her clan, as much as she still honors the design of her home otherwise!

^ Stage transition of her battle like this is also a cut content, but funny enough, they seemed to have this intention too :') With the hair becoming silver as a testimony of fully giving into blood!

^ This is also a potential other note towards why her ribbon is just the ribbon!

All in all, I think the idea about detachable ponytail-shaped decoration is funny, but there seems to be a significance connected with silver hair that just would not translate into making a similar decoration but with custom hair color instead! And we also can't tell what Bloody Crow's hair color is underneath that helmet, he could have accomplished the silver hair state

[valla-chan]

Was looking at that recent 'girlhood is a spectrum' post and it's wild how common it is for trans women to lose like huge chunks of memories from when they were a kid due to such strong detachment. I assumed this was a lot less common than it is but it's also quite validating in a way.

The level of memory I have for my childhood is never very strong but never totally gone either, I have all the resulting mental affects and hobbies and speech patterns and interests and stuff still, and I do strongly remember playing various games and whatnot but a lot of IRL occurrences are either wiped or hold no emotional significance for me. A lot of photos I remember the photo being taken or shown or edited but I don't remember how I felt or being at that location unless I've been back there more recently.

I really dont think cis ppl understand that growing up trans basically means that your entire sense of self and belonging in the world is disrupted from the moment you are old enough to be aware of your own body and social role?

I would say "I don't know why it feels so traumatic to grow up this way" but I think that realistically I've heard enough people talk about it that I kinda do now, which is that when it comes to gender roles, trans women are basically considered the most undesirable thing you can be, especially when being "male" is always seemingly on the table of possibilities of how to be, and that is basically the most desirable role for others to put you in. And being that basically requires that you throw away all personhood as you were meant to be and want to be, in favor of causing no waves.

And it's like... That shit never really goes away for a huge chunk of your life? As a kid I wasn't even aware I was even doing it! but looking back it feels so intentional, that even though I didn't know the reason, the mechanisms that enforce masculinity and suppress femininity were acting up on me from day one. And you subconsciously have this feeling that something is wrong but it's never validated, never discussed, rarely even ever made aware of let alone FELT, ffs.

I felt like an observer for my life, a pair of eyes that would eventually turn into a person, or maybe not... And I loved activities where my self could be expressed through things I Did rather than who I Was. Providing thongs for others to make them happy, creating content on the early web, being good at school and getting good grades, etc etc... you learn to Be what you Do, you learn to Be what you are Not, you learn to Hate what you Are.

And I really do mean that, I really did learn to hate what I was, iirc! It seems all too common that trans women would have an interest in women's culture, such as fashion, female puberty, sex appeal, identity, anything that could be put through a male-enough lens to pass as something normal to other males in your peer group and family, even if done with this constant layer of irony and uncertainty and emptiness...

And now it feels like that was all a dead end. The person I do remember being, from when I dig deep into what I do remember, is basically not a lot like me outside of hobbies/interests and humor and masking.

Really who I am now is actually based on the complete opposite of who I was as a kid, which is to say, I took everything I liked that I wasn't socially allowed to, and I shoved that onto an abstracted female character in my brain for safekeeping.

When I look back even harder I remember that I even had alternate account for her online which I would use to have conversations with myself or my friends to see how it was to give these thoughts a voice or something. It's hard to recall the reason, except I guess, I suppose, that there was no outlet; no other way for these ideas to escape without driving me crazy since I didn't know transition was even possible let alone an option for little personless me, how am I supposed to adapt my identity if I don't have one? (Checkmate liberals)

And I guess ultimately it's all been said by people more eloquent than me, it's all been gone over in my own head already, but I think everyone's story is worth something, and I need to learn to value my own for what it is. I wish that I could learn more from what I was crushing down and putting aside onto fake characters and projecting onto others... Maybe more so than learning, id like to experience it. But there's no real way to go back to childhood, let alone one that I made up to cope with my real one, despite my real one being pretty damn cushy on the outside (aside from some shit but this post is not about Fathers and whatnot)

Cause right now I feel like I don't really have a relevant childhood to point back to or take comfort in, aside from origins of hobbies and other material interests. It's not comforting. No matter how many facts and images I do manage to dredge up, I don't Feel it. Even the sweetest memories I can fish up actually hold... basically no emotion. I've done shrooms, and seen my friends access and address pivotal moments of.their childhood while tripping, and coming out the other end refreshed. For me it's just blank slate, but I still feel like a kid. (Fulfilling in its own way yeah, but 2 bad trips has deterred me from going back to that for quite some time now.)

Now I guess I'm at the point where this is something I become aware of quite often and feel quite sad over. Something akin to derealization took a lot of my early 20s as well, and with all these things combined, I feel like I don't really know how I got here- despite the fact that I can trace it back through events and factually say, yeah, that's how it all went down. I've seen those services where you can upload childhood photos and have them photoshopped to be the opposite gender in order to help relive dysphoria over past... And I won't lie I have considered it, just to see! But it would be fake... It would be like acknowledging that I am fake, or something. Or that I literally come from a rebound of suppressed emotions that boiled over, rather than actual lived experiences (once again excluding most hobbies cause those are tried and true. Keep feeling the need to put this disclaimer as it it matters.)

And like, I dont want to be fake. I don't even really want to be trans, I don't think I ever wanted to be, I just wanted to be myself from the get-go. I personally subscribe both to born in the wrong body and identity changed over time cause realistically it's like, both? There was no belonging in my body, only crude fascination in what a mess everything was; how nothing seemed to align to anything I was supposed to be, despite never once actually realizing that for myself. For a long time that being funny was enough to get me by.

So I guess to make this post worthwhile, because I desperately want to ask this:

How do y'all cope? This is not rhetorical, btw. How do fellow trans ppl, esp transfems but really including any mostly fully transitioned person, deal with this feeling of not really having a past or at least one that feels applicable? How do you rationalize and happily exist with the knowledge that your personal development happened through made up characters and unassuming daydreams? How do you learn to connect and live your younger self when you hated him (/her) even while being them, and who actively sabotaged your own existence for safety reasons?

I feel like I've had about 5 years out of my 25 to get up to speed on what type of person I am, as to not waste any more of my youth before it's gone. I feel like I should have had 2 decades of this like everyone else; like my age suggests. I feel like I got cheated out of experiencing life as a human being that had time to develop and find myself before having to worry about money and independence and adulthood.

I have an ask sitting in my askbox asking about my favorite story from highschool and I would absolutely love to tell a story but it wouldn't be a story about me. I don't have that many stories about me. I don't know what to talk about when people talk. How do y'all cope with the feeling of it? Can you? How do you be okay with having childhood toys that mean something to you but you can't recall moments with them? How do you love your family to that normal level when you only remember key events? How do you come to terms with never having been to school as yourself? How does any of this ever get resolved??? I cannot bear to keep wishing and yearning to be present in my own past without being vocal about it, how do you do it y'all???

Hope you liked the random images from my phone, I wanted to make this post more fun to read than a giant text wall lol. Happy holidays and good luck to all people who are struggling to reconcile identity, self, family, and this time of year!

Please reblog, this may be a personal post but I am hoping it connected ya with others!

[jesterraconteuse]

Ok I hate what Watcher is doing too but y'all can't say they aren't anti-capitalist if you're gonna say Dropout/Game Changer team is. I get the backlash but be consistent

I mean as a creator I get wanting to have full control over your content. But this just... Doesn't seem well thought out, even from a financial standpoint.

Anyways, still fuck YouTube. I kinda just wish creators had their own platform but I fear it would just go down the same way YouTube did

Edit: had some thoughts I wanted to add. I don't think this was done with ill intention. I don't consider it a betrayal of fans as much as a really bad mistake. I feel like there were much better ways to do this.

I don't agree with comparing it to Dropout in the sense that they had a lot to work with before making the jump.

But also they don't have as much as Good Mythical Morning. They can't upload near daily. They haven't been building up money consistently for years. Yes GMM uploads it's main content for free but the situation is different.

But there's a few things, in my unprofessional opinion, that made this clumsy and reckless.

The build up to this being a cool and hype moment when honestly it's truly somber to see YouTube fall from being a bastion for creatives and how capitalism gatekeeps creativity.

How sudden it was. This might have been quite a bit different if it was a slow transition to having some content on Patreon and going from there.

When. It's hard times for everyone right now. Not just us but them y'know? However I don't know these people or their financial situation so I can only give the benefit of the doubt. But dropping this so suddenly and with the current economic crisis.... This would be the result.

They're just too small, and have not nearly enough history as Watcher to pull this off.

Like it or not, in a capitalist society we're not entitled to free content. Because everything takes money to make. It takes money to breathe. To have quality of life. And creators do deserve to get paid for their work.

But in the end this justifiably broke the trust of viewers. Even with their justifications to make this jump the execution was poor and not well thought out.

Overall it's just depressing and worrying.

Keep in mind with yourself that a lot of creators are getting more and more fed up with YouTube. For good reason. It's another apocalypse for YouTube right now

Edit 2: also I just wanna say things can be bad idea without being capitalist. Shocker/s. Don't forget YouTube is the big cesspool company here. Watcher is 25 people. Wanting to be in control and have a consistent income to create without relying on an unreliable system isn't bad.

But the way they did it? Well you can see for yourself how it's going

[not-poignant]

ah another question for you then! what was Jack and Pitch's reaction over everything that happened post Game Theory à la Gwyn and his alignment + unseelie kingship? they're not really mentioned in TCOFT and the other interludes as far as I've read them. I'm really curious what they think in general... if they've got the news at all

Hi anon!

I've actually answered this question a bunch, but a long time ago, so I'll find some responses for you. It's a really interesting question but the answers are all very tragic and heartbreaking.

They're not mentioned in The Court of Five Thrones because they no longer exist to me in that universe, and they were formally removed and replaced by the Nightingale and Terho the Mouse Lad (I don't know if you read it, but there's literally a story with this name bridging between Game Theory and The Court of Five Thrones which bridges this transition!)

And the reason for that is, TL;DR, Jack and Pitch would loathe Gwyn for the events of Game Theory, (link is to the long response), and it's entirely likely that Jack's PTSD would relapse in the process. As a result of that I think of SAL and Game Theory as two separate timelines.

But yeah the reason they're never mentioned again is pretty intentional, I stopped wanting them to be a part of the series long before Game Theory ended. I want Jack and Pitch to keep their happy ending, and they can't, if they're involved in the Fae Tales canon. Eventually they'll be written out of it!

[who-is-page]

🌃 ThisIsAPlaceholderSoPeopleDon'tThinkIWroteThisPic Follow

~~~

🌇 OkayNowHere'sMySection Follow

(I spent like ten minutes writing a response to this post + some of the reblogs that it had accumulated and then the OP disabled reblogs JUST as I hit post, but by god I am gonna say my bit. I've removed OP's name from the post and they've deleted the body of the post on their main blog, so don't any of you try looking them up to bother them, either.)

I'd also like to add on to this discussion regarding criticism and the points that have been brought up there-- it's true that no one is free from criticism, as OP points out in the original post. But having that sort of hyper-aggressive attitude towards fiction, especially without taking potential authorship into account (or worse, taking it far too much into account to the point where you harass the person who wrote it), can result in unintended harm towards real people. It's how you end up with situations like Isabel Fall de-transitioning and winding in a psychiatric institute under suicide watch because people mistook a transgender author's exploration of a transphobic stereotype as a topic as a story intended to be a transphobic stereotype itself.

The Vox article about Isabel has the quote, "Sometimes, the path to your personal hell is paved with other people’s best intentions" (Source). I think that's a very poignant and relevant perspective, where sometimes people--like OP--may think that they, as global citizens, have a duty to uphold morality and righteousness in their online spaces for the safety of themselves and their communities... but in actuality, their actions end up having negative effects far, far beyond their intentions, and don't end up protecting or saving anyone much at all. It can be a hard pill to swallow to realize that, but the real actions that people do in retaliation to fiction often create far, far more damage that the fiction ever does existing on its own. For another example, just look at the creator JoCat, who left his YouTube career this year because of the harassment he faced due to his 2020 35-second long video game animation and song, "I Like Girls" (a genderbent parody of Lizzo's Boys that he'd verbally improved on the spot during a Twitch stream). In his goodbye post, he wrote:

"[...] Granted, a lot of this has been primarily on twitter, where I could simply log off and ignore the haters, but no small amount has leaked into other parts of my regular day to day that is harder to ignore - private DMs over discord and twitch, suspicious packages being sent to my family - but I’ve always kept quiet about it because speaking out about it publicly, defending myself, any reaction to it would just encourage more, and be presented as my own fault as well. But if that’s the tradeoff to do something like share the things I make that I’m proud of on the internet, seeing as I’m writing this, it’s probably an indicator that I’m just not cut out for it, and the best thing for everyone would be to stop and pursue something else. Despite being very grateful for what this job has done for me and my family, I’m simply not strong enough to keep doing this if it means having to just accept this kind and amount of distress." (Source)

I think there's worthwhile conversations to be had about the necessity of criticism as a tool to critique common issues with genre, tropes, and popular media in fiction. But I feel like what is being spoken about here, in this post and in these examples-- criticism not as a tool of critique, but as a personal and direct attack, an unveiling of what the criticizer interprets to be the secret and impure Self of the artist or author--is another beast entirely, and one that typically shouldn't be brought to the forefront. It's turning real, thinking individuals into monsters in the eyes of audiences ready to devour them for the slightest transgression, and does that actually help anyone? Rarely do artists and authors deserve to be publicly ridiculed en-masse for their work to the point where they walk away from it, and doing so doesn't actually help make positive changes in any way... because the people who you could have those important discussions with, about the things that both you are critical of in certain genres, writings communities, stories, tropes, etc have now packed up their bags and left.

Everyone is familiar with the "You are not immune to propaganda" Garfield meme. And while it may be funny, it's also true. People make mistakes and create things which are unintentionally insulting, either because the author is leaning on offensive stereotypes or tropes without realizing it, or because the author isn't worldly to the baggage that certain subjects carry within them (such as people who reference Lovecraft's work without having the background information that he was a horrible racist, sexist, and xenophobe). But heckling them and telling them that they're secretly terrible people and should never create anything ever again isn't going to inform them about these subjects. It's going to result in them getting defensive, prickly, and running off. There is no net gain to this scenario. The amount of Good in the world has not increased from this interaction.

This all isn't touching on people who intentionally play with stereotypes or tropes in their writing, nor is it touching on the inherent religious bigotry and Christiancentrism wrapped up in the idea of someone's fictional stories or writings being reflective of their innermost desires and morality, because this is getting pretty long. But I wanted to put out my own thoughts on this in addition to what's already been said.

[moreteethplease]

Devlog: You Died On A Tuesday

> Play it here!

You Died On A Tuesday is a short piece of prose - a set of bones, if you will - made in bitsy for the 75th Bitsy jam, with the theme "waiting". It is a contemplation on grief, resilience, and healing.

Devlog under the cut.

I wrote You Died On A Tuesday one sleep-deprived night in a sudden fit of inspiration. The first portion (everything in the ribcage scene and first blank transitional screen) almost seemed to write itself. At first I thought it might be a bit Too Much, but with the encouragement of a friend, I sat back and allowed my brain to take the writing where it wanted. I'm fairly happy with the result.

The biggest problem I faced during the making of this game is that I had written prose but no idea what to pair it with. It's not the first time I've written something that is more prose than game, and a lot of my bitsy games meet that description, but usually I have a good sense of what sort of art I'm going to pair it with.

After a bit of thinking, I decided to start with a simple beating heart. I love making animated scenes in bitsy, even though it's quite time-consuming. The second thing I made didn't end up getting used: a simple bunch of flowers meant for the final line.

I was happy-ish with the flowers, but I fell in love with how the beating heart looked, so I decided that the game's visual backdrop for its writing would be organs, body parts, and bones.

All of the art in this game was made with the use of CC0 images and vectors, either as references or for direct conversion into pixel art.

Thoughts Behind The Game

While this game is fictional, it draws from some of my own thoughts.

I think I'm a fairly resilient person, and I've weathered my fair share of storms. I won't go into detail about them, but this has taught me how to grieve, process trauma, and move on, which is perhaps ironic because those storms also gave me C-PTSD and DID. But I digress.

A while ago, I found myself in a conversation about old married couples who often die within a year of each other—sometimes within days! My partner and I have been together for 9 years, and we both have every intention of growing old and grey together. A dear friend of mine pointed this out and said that we were likely to go out like those old couples do. I agreed at the time, but later that night, I thought about it and realized I wasn't sure if the grief would be enough to kill me. And then I also realized that there would be few things more horrifying to me than managing to move on entirely from my partner's death, as I have done for many loved ones before.

"Wow, that sure is morbid!" Don't worry, I won't grieve something that—fingers crossed—won't happen for a few more decades. But I did think that these thoughts were something I wanted to make art about, and this bitsy jam came about at the exact right time.

Thanks for reading this far down! If you'd like, you can play this not-quite-game here:

[sammygender]

Choose violence ask game. 16 and 21. ❤️

ask game

thank u sm for enabling me to be a hater

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing

well dstiel obviously though i do understand why people like it so much. it's because they're stupid.

aside from that.. oh wait this one is so random and no hate whatsoever (in fact only love) to people who like it but i don't really like transmasc dean in a canon setting. as an au it's incredibly interesting but i see it as occupying similar space to a cis girl dean au in a way where it definitely is..... an AU. in canon like. yeah no. that's NOT a trans guy im sorry. trans guys can be annoying dont get me wrong. but you'd have to be VERY special to be annoying the way he is. also he wouldnt transition for ages cause hes dean winchester and he likes to conform to and in fact play up his expected role. so he certainly wouldve not transitioned in the canon when we see him.

i dont feel this way at all about transmasc sam however. he'd be the same pretty much. as would transfem sam who we all know i adore. anyway i'll probably change my mind in a week and get obsessed with transmasc dean and post 20 times in a row about it and you are all allowed to pelt me with rocks.

21. part of canon you think is overhyped

this was surprisingly hard. in the interest of being interesting and not just going for 'destiel' or something, i'm actually going to say kripke era. it IS my favourite era!! its objectively the best in terms of writing, atmosphere, plot, characterisation. like no contest, obviously. in fact when i recommend the show to people i tell them just to watch the first 5 seasons (while planning on baiting them into continuing after swan song by going 'but its suchhh a bad ending for sam :(( dont you want to see what happens next.....').

so i use 'overhyped' very loosely to mean that despite me recognising it as objectively superior to the rest of the show, i don't actually hugely enjoy a lot of it that much more than i enjoy later on? a lot of my favourite parts of supernatural are heavily built on in the later seasons, or even introduced then. sam & lucifer's cage dynamic and everything resulting from it. the gadreel violation and in fact most of sam's..... everything. ofc this is all present in kripke and it's explored much Better and thematically and gothically and its just more atmospheric and intentional-seeming. whereas late seasons is kind of like this hodge-podge by different writers where you get these insane and intentional gems amid a bunch of white noise. but i just.... im a late seasons kind of person!! i loved buffy s6!! i enjoy works jumping the shark and i enjoy what art becomes when it already has so much to build on. shrug emoji.

like. ok. what first made me compulsively obsessive over supernatural (after the dean daddy issues, which i HAVE to admit hooked me........this is why im the ultimate critique of deangirls, because i was one for 3 seasons <3) was sam & azazel, the metaphor & violation present in his whole demon blood storyline. obvi this is kripke era. and i have to give kripke era credit for it. but a lot of what i consider fundamental to sam & this theme of uncleanliness especially in regards to assault and violation in some way is just soo built on post kripke. his cage trauma in s7. 8x21's "i'm not clean" speech. every compounding incident that happens to sam and his body, from gadreel possession to chuck in s15................

BASICALLY this is to say not that kripke era is really overrated but that so much credit is given to it at the expense of late seasons, when the domestic horror, cycle-of-abuse-sitcom, gabriel's tv show style thing it becomes is actually such a huge part of my enjoyment of spn. and wow i never thought i would be saying this. but i watched riverdale so idk what i was expecting. sigh. but really. what other show is giving us toxic polycule made up of brothers and an Angel of God coparenting the devil's child... also the devil happens to be brother #1's (sam is brother #1) abusive ex.... and hes currently fighting the polycule for custody rights. also the kid was born last week and hes 15. like sorry this is so fundamental to my supernatural. i could never rewatch and stop at s5. i rewatch late seasons eps all the time. ALSO LATE SEASONS SAM WINCHESTER. LIKE. COME ON. EARLY SEASONS SAM IS OVERRATED COMPARED TO LATE SEASONS. <3

[tanadrin]

I consider myself bi but selected the poll result for lowered sexual attraction if the person had different genitals that what I expected. I'm assuming here that "sexual attraction" includes an actual desire/plan to fuck. If there wasn't any intent to *have sex* then I wouldn't find that person less physically or aesthetically hot. For me these two aren't always the same. Primarily the reason I went with that result is that at this time in my life I'm already partnered up with a couple of people I really enjoy having sex with, though I have a few sexual proclivities I don't share with said partners, so when I'm talking with people I'd wanna get into a sexual expirience/relationship with, I've got a few kinks/dynamics/configurations on my bucket list that I'm actively pursuing, (where genital configuration is relevent to those desires) and to be honest, prioritizing based on limited time and energy. I think my answer would be different if I wasn't currently partnered, or had endless time and energy, or felt like all my niches were fulfilled and was just purely dating/hooking up for the novelty of fucking new people (which I do also enjoy but again, finite resources). But, lately, I've mostly been using apps to meet people so usually it's pretty easy to figure out quickly if we're compatible sexually.

The real sexual hang up I do have is that at this point, I have pretty much written off other trans men/afab trans people as potential sexual partners, because of my dysphoria (though I have had great sexual partners in the past who were trans men, this is a thing that developed for me a few years ago and I don't actually expect it to be a long-term/identifying peice of my sexuality, it's just what's happening right now). So if I found out after chatting with a guy that he was trans masc (and I kind of don't care about his surg status/actual genital configuration! it's much more about the weird comparison games I can get into that are substantial boner-killers), I think I'd politely decline to take it further at that point.

Also given the amount of responses you're getting from trans people who previously considered themselves asexual or on the ace spectrum before transitioning/hrt, I find it pretty funny that I haven't run into many people with that expirience irl! I always thought it made sense given that sexuality and gender seem to have a lot to do with each other for a lot of people (I certainly thought I was ace until at least a year or two on T), though I doubt that's innate we live in a society that puts a lot of weight on the interconnectedness of those two.

Anyway don't know if that explains my answer much or just adds to the soup, but I'm digging all the responses.

I'm assuming here that "sexual attraction" includes an actual desire/plan to fuck.

Interesting. I assume that when people talk about "sexual attraction" they explicitly do not mean "an actual desire/plan to fuck." Attraction usually precedes such desire, and can exist even when no follow through is possible or wanted: monogamously paired people, for instance, experience attraction to people who are not their partners all the time.

I know for some people (e.g., many demisexuals) the two might be much more causally connected, but for people like me--i.e., who are pretty horny and have a pretty intense visceral experience of sexual attraction to lots of different people--the two can be quite unconnected. I'm attracted to loads of people I neither could nor would actually have sex with!