#and the gender essentialism.

[rjalker]

anyways do you think Martha Wells will write about any kind of oppression that is not literally just "dangerous people are oppressed because they're dangerous" in her new book, Witch King????

Because this has been the whole basis for the oppression in:

The Murderbot Diaries

The Books of the Raksura

The Fall of Ile-Rien

City of Bones

and that's just fucking racist.

Murderbot is distrusted and feared because it's got guns in its arms and could crash a space station into a planet in twenty seconds if it felt like it. It's literally confirmed that it can hack even high security government systems without a single moment of trouble. It spies on everyone around it at all times, even after it's no longer forced to.

The Raksura are distrusted and feared because they literally evolved to mimic other species so they could sneak into their cities and eat them once they'd gained their trust. And also they look exactly like their cousin species, which still does literally mimic other species to eat them!!!! The Raksura are stronger and faster than any other sentient species they meet. They don't need weapons because they have razor sharp fangs and disembowling claws and even spines on their backs. Not to mention they could just pick you up and drop you.

In The Fall of Ile-Rien, wizards are distrusted and feared because most wizards literally just use magic to be evil and torture people. People who have spells cast on them are shunned and ostracized (except when they're not because Martha Wells forgot about her own rule) because a lot of the time, the spells cast on people are fucking curses to make them kill people and go out of control. Including curses that takes years to take effect.

In City of Bones, the main character's people were literally genetically engineered to replace everyone else after the apocalypse.

Martha Wells has written oppression to always be "dangerous people are oppressed because they're dangerous" and that is literally just fucking racism and so many other forms of bigotry it's not even funny!

Real fucking people are not oppressed because otherwise they'll fucking kill everyone around them.

Her work also relies very heavily on biological essentialism, and gender essentialism.

[marshmellowtea]

i desperately need people to realize there's a difference between "women need to coddle (cis) men's feelings even when they're being misogynistic uwu" and "we shouldn't tolerate misogyny but actively keeping men separate from women and treating them like they're inherently dangerous to women is only going to worsen the problem (and also this mindset causes IMMEASURABLE harm to nonbinary, trans, and intersex people, who are already incredibly at risk right now)" and i need people to realize that NOW

[s-exy-sapphillean]

All the shit going on is already upsetting enough but it rly is devastating to keep seeing posts bashing trans men for asking to be included in conversations about reproductive healthcare, trans safety and hrt right now, at a time where solidarity and community is so fucking important

And unironic posts along the lines of "don't forget to include trans men in your no-dating-men practice".

And a post about how trans men aren't safe to date either because they're rapists too with replies full of this

Gender essentialism will doom us all. The fascists don't even need to "divide and conquer" anymore because y'all are just doing that shit for them for free.

[ablueberryblogs]

I don't know what trans man need to hear this but you're allowed to be angry. It doesn't make you evil. You are allowed to experience all possible emotions without apology and still be a good man.

*this is about trans men specifically, do not derail. You are free to make your own post*

[anghraine]

It's always been intriguing to me that, even when Elizabeth hates Darcy and thinks he's genuinely a monstrous, predatory human being, she does not ever perceive him as sexually predatory. In fact, literally no one in the novel suggests or believes he is sexually dangerous at any point. There's not the slightest hint of that as a factor in the rumors surrounding him, even though eighteenth-century fiction writers very often linked masculine villainy to a possibility of sexual predation in the subtext or just text*. Austen herself does this over and over when it comes to the true villains of her novels.

Even as a supposed villain, though, Darcy is broadly understood to be predatory and callous towards men who are weaker than him in status, power, and personality—with no real hint of sexual threat about it at all (certainly none towards women). Darcy's "villainy" is overwhelmingly about abusing his socioeconomic power over other men, like Wickham and Bingley. This can have secondhand effects on women's lives, but as collateral damage. Nobody thinks he's targeting women.

In addition, Elizabeth's interpretations of Darcy in the first half of the book tend to involve associating him with relatively prestigious women by contrast to the men in his life (he's seen as extremely dissimilar from his male friends and, as a villain, from his father). So Elizabeth understands Darcy-as-villain not in terms of the popular, often very sexualized images of masculine villainy at the time, but in terms of rich women she personally despises like Caroline Bingley and Lady Catherine de Bourgh (and even Georgiana Darcy; Elizabeth assumes a lot about Georgiana in service of her hatred of Darcy before ever meeting her).

The only people in Elizabeth's own community who side with Darcy at this time are, interestingly, both women, and likely the highest-status unmarried women in her community: Charlotte Lucas and Jane Bennet. Both have some temperamental affinities with Darcy, and while it's not clear if he recognizes this, he quietly approves of them without even knowing they've been sticking up for him behind the scenes.

This concept of Darcy-as-villain is not just Elizabeth's, either. Darcy is never seen by anyone as a sexual threat no matter how "bad" he's supposed to be. No one is concerned about any danger he might pose to their daughters or sisters. Kitty is afraid of him, but because she's easily intimidated rather than any sense of actual peril. Even another man, Mr Bennet, seems genuinely surprised to discover late in the novel that Darcy experiences attraction to anything other than his own ego.

I was thinking about this because of how often the concept of Darcy as an anti-hero before Elizabeth "fixes him" seems caught up in a hypermasculine, sexually dangerous, bad boy image of him that even people who actively hate him in the novel never subscribe to or remotely imply. Wickham doesn't suggest anything of the kind, Elizabeth doesn't, the various gossips of Meryton don't, Mr Bennet and the Gardiners don't, nobody does. If anything, he's perceived as cold and sexless.

Wickham in particular defines Darcy's villainy in opposition to the patriarchal ideal his father represented. Wickham's version of their history works to link Darcy to Lady Anne, Lady Catherine (primarily), and Georgiana rather than any kind of masculine sexuality. This version of Darcy is a villain who colludes with unsympathetic high-status women to harm men of less power than themselves, but villain!Darcy poses no direct threat to women of any kind.

It's always seemed to me that there's a very strong tendency among fans and academics to frame Darcy as this ultra-gendered figure with some kind of sexual menace going on, textually or subtextually. He's so often understood entirely in terms of masculinity and sexual desire, with his flaws closely tied to both (whether those flaws are his real ones, exaggerated, or entirely manufactured). Yet that doesn't seem to be his vibe to other characters in the story. There's a level at which he does not register to other characters as highly masculine in his affiliations, highly sexual, or in general as at all unsafe** to be around, even when they think he's a monster. And I kind of feel like this makes the revelations of his actual decency all along and his full-on heroism later easier to accept in the end.

------------

*The incompetently awful villain(?) in Sanditon, for instance, imagines himself another Lovelace (a reference to the famous rapist-villain of Samuel Richardson's Clarissa). Evelina's sheltered education and lack of protectors makes her vulnerable to sexual exploitation in Frances Burney's Evelina, though she ultimately manages to avoid it. There's frequently an element of sexual predation in Gothic novels even of very different kinds (e.g. Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries of Udolpho and Matthew Lewis's The Monk both lean into this, in their wildly dissimilar styles). William Godwin's novel Caleb Williams, a book mostly about the destructive evils of class hierarchies and landowning classes specifically, depicts the mutual obsession of the genteel villain Falkland and working class hero Caleb in notoriously homoerotic terms (Godwin himself added a preface in 1832 saying, "Falkland was my Bluebeard, who had perpetrated atrocious crimes ... Caleb Williams was the wife"). This list could go on for a very long time.

**Darcy is also not usually perceived by other characters as a particularly sexual, highly masculine person in a safe way, either, even once his true character is known. Elizabeth emphasizes the resilience of Darcy's love for her more than the passionate intensity they both evidently feel; in the later book, she does sometimes makes assumptions about his true feelings or intentions based on his gender, but these assumptions are pretty much invariably shown to be wrong. In general the cast is completely oblivious to the attraction he does feel; even Charlotte, who wonders about something in that quarter, ends up doubting her own suspicions and wonders if he's just very absent-minded.

The novel emphasizes that he is physically attractive, but it goes to pains to distinguish this from Wickham's sex appeal or the charisma of a Bingley or Fitzwilliam. Mr Bennet (as mentioned above) seems to have assumed Darcy is functionally asexual, insofar as he has a concept of that. Most of the fandom-beloved moments in which Darcy is framed as highly sexual, or where he himself is sexualized for the audience, are very significantly changed in adaptation or just invented altogether for the adaptations they appear in. Darcy watching Elizabeth after his bath in the 1995 is invented for that version, him snapping at Elizabeth in their debates out of UST is a persistent change from his smiling banter with her in the book, the fencing to purge his feelings is invented, the pond swim/wet shirt is invented. In the 2005 P&P, the instant reaction to Elizabeth is invented, the hand flex of repressed passion is invented, the Netherfield Ball dance as anything but an exercise in mutual frustration is invented, the near-kiss after the proposal in invented, etc. And in those as well, he's never presented as sexually predatory, not even as a "villain."

[shamebats]

[donutdrawsthings]

When I went into Classic Who, I didn't expect to meet the silliest Billy there ever was.

[emotional-moss]

”bi girls stop bringing your boyfriends to gay clubs” “just saw a man in a lesbian club” “keep seeing straight girls in lesbian groups” “why was there a man in the womens support group” how did you know they were men. oh it’s because they looked like men! that’s a completely valid reason and totally not indicative of any transphobic opinions! quick question how do you feel about butches and transmascs and trans women who don’t pass

[degenderates]

“women love inherently different from men...oh but btw trans women are still women and included in this!!:)))” you are still boxing people into 2 distinct immutable categories

[cardentist]

people fixate on bi-lesbians as being problematic despite bi-gay men existing (as well as any and every combination of sexuality and romantic attraction you can think of) because terfs and radfems deliberately don't want bi women to associate with lesbians and are deeply invested with framing attraction to men As Bad. a sentiment which has invaded queer culture inside and out, intentionally And incidentally.

people fixate on straight cis aromantic men when straight cis aromantic women exist because framing aromantic people as inherently predatory and dangerous by the simple nature of existing is easier to do when you intentionally force the association with predatory dangerous behavior displayed by (and associated with) misogynistic men.

people are still bigoted against bi-gay men and woman aromatics (and any flavor of trans within these groups), but pay attention to the way these conversations are Framed and it's clear the way gender essentialism is being used as a tool to control the narrative.

radfems' gender essentialism says you're supposed to think men are inherently scary, inherently take advantage of women, so Naturally (it is assumed) a man who is sexually attracted to women but not romantically attracted them Must Inherently be predatory and scary. and now you're being asked to take that feeling of unease you've been manipulated into feeling and associate it with the entirety of a sexuality.

bi-lesbians are threatening to radfems because they want to draw inherent lines between these two groups. insist that attraction to and with a man is inherently dirty and dangerous. the same reason why "gold star lesbian" is a radfem concept. if it turns out that the lines between sexualities, between identity as a whole, is blurrier than they want it to be then that Must be framed as inherently dangerous.

if a single Kind of a marginalized group is being singled out to convince you that this group is dangerous or that they don't belong It's For A Reason. they're trying to manipulate you based on Biases (their biases and the ones they hope you have). the reaction to this isn't to abandon the type of person they're convinced are the worst of these groups, it's in solidarity.

aromantics who are men aren't any different from aromantics who are women, bi-lesbians deserve to live in peace just as much as bi-gay men. don't let people control the narrative Either by cutting down vast array of experiences that exist within any given identity, Or by convincing you that particular kinds of people within your communities are lesser than.

[biracy]

In general quite fascinating how "boys who liked bionicle are girls now" is called "gender essentialism" by like Radqueer Terfs DNI posters but "the thread of Girlhood Uterus Vulva Trauma connects all (cis) butches and trans men, so that's why I can reblog photos of trans men to my men dni blog in my #dyke tag" isn't. Lmao

[tepli-mravenci]

The other day I was on a walk in the evening with two of my friends (both girls) and we were talking about how safe or unsafe we feel in different places at night and one of them said she always carries a pocket knife with her and the other one said

"See now I feel pretty safe, you have a knife, I'm tall and" she turns to me "your gender presentation is weird enough to confuse a potential attacker."

I've never felt more gender validation in my entire life.

[lesspopped]

unintentional subtext is not queerbaiting. intentional subtext is not queerbaiting. queercoding is not queerbaiting. queer themes are not queerbaiting. queer themes in works by cishet creators are still not queerbaiting. writers of any gender identity/sexual orientation seeing fans pick up on queer themes and intentionally playing up those themes as much as they can get away with are not queerbaiting. chemistry between actors is not queerbaiting. chemistry between actors who then decide it’s more interesting that way and lean into it is not queerbaiting. a real cishet person behaving in ways that do not perfectly and completely fit with your idea of what cishet people of their gender are supposed to be is not queerbaiting. I am going to scream

[genderisafuck]

Gender essentialism is still cringe if it is directed against cis people btw. Ive basically had someone say to me that cis people are biologically incapable of understanding less normalized gender identities because "their brains work differently". If anyone has this opinion please come forward now so i can block you thank you. The reason cis people dont understand gender in the same way trans people do is because trans people are naturally more exposed to the discussion about gender because we have to think about it a lot. Cis people, who have never doubted their identity, obviously dont think about it as much, if at all.

Cis people arent inherently more stupid than us, or less capable of talking about gender on a biological level. What would that even look like???

[actualalivecreature]

stop associating testosterone with only men and estrogen with only women. thanks.

[starsifter]

Stupid ass reply to this post but hey sure I'll bite. No. I don't. Because I have neither of those things and I'm manly as fuck. Nananabooboo and all that.

Like I said, all terfs are fucking stupid.

Anyways hello to all my manly men with breasts and no facial hair and no penises. Hello to my feminine trans men and trans guys with high pitched voices. Hello to all trans men, love you guys, I am one of you and we're manly as fuck. Pre-op, post-op, or no-op. HRT or no HRT. Don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise.