#because it’s so wild to think this way as ‘feminists’

[jewishbarbies]

really weird to me the way ppl who identify themselves as feminists act about female celebs. like, I saw so many women outright bashing florence pugh because she was dating an older man they considered ugly and acting like it was some attack on them, because then they couldn’t fuck her and she wasn’t dating a woman. there’s women right now hating on sydney sweeney for “being a pair of boobs” as if she intentionally signs up for roles expecting to be treated like nothing but breasts by the director, and it’s not people in charge making creative decisions to purposely turn her into Just Boobs. like. how are y’all feminists if this is how you treat women and view these situations? I don’t understand.

[mbat]

also tbh if i ever did make a relativity falls au where mabel was the author, i wonder how different the concept would be between bill staying as a man or if i made him a woman instead

i just feel like a small change like that would affect how the whole thing felt by... a lot

[cosmogyros]

It is fucking amazing how often I have to unfollow people for bodyshaming others related to their choice to shave or not. And the fascinating thing is that this judginess is ALWAYS aimed at women. Men who don't shave? Fine. Men who do shave? Also fine. It's their body, they can do what they like with it, right?

But as soon as we're talking about women, suddenly it's totally okay to prescribe what they ought to do about their OWN bodies. I never used to see this many "women shouldn't shave" posts here, and the recent uptick is concerning to me.

I understand that it's rooted in a pushback against patriarchal norms that pressure all women to remove their body hair. And I fully support that. But you've gotta understand that if you react to these norms by saying "women should all shave? actually no, women should NOT shave!" ...YOU'RE STILL BEING SEXIST. You're still saying that women "should" do something different with their bodies because YOU think they ought to.

It's absolutely wild to me how often internalized misogyny can be revealed by simply asking oneself "If the genders were switched, would I be saying this (in any context except as a joke)?" And if the answer is no, then... maybe don't say it.

Freedom is always more revolutionary. Letting people make their own choices is always more revolutionary. If you react to someone's attempt to enforce a certain standard by attempting to enforce the opposite standard instead, you are not on the side of freedom.

[inkskinned]

so one of the things that's so horrifying about birth control is that you have to, like, navigate this incredibly personal choice about your body and yet also face the epitome of misogyny. like, someone in the comments will say it wasn't that bad for me, and you'll be utterly silenced. like, everyone treats birth control like something that's super dirty. like, you have no fucking information or control over this thing because certain powerful people find it icky.

first it was the oral contraceptives. you went on those young, mostly for reasons unrelated to birth control - even your dermatologist suggested them to control your acne. the list of side effects was longer than your arm, and you just stared at it, horrified.

it made you so mentally ill, but you just heard that this was adulthood. that, yes, there are of course side effects, what did you expect. one day you looked up yasmin makes me depressed because surely this was far too intense, and you discovered that over 12,000 lawsuits had been successfully filed against the brand. it remains commonly prescribed on the open market. you switched brands a few times before oral contraceptives stopped being in any way effective. your doctor just, like, shrugged and said you could try a different brand again.

and the thing is that you're a feminist. you know from your own experience that birth control can be lifesaving, and that even when used for birth control - it is necessary healthcare. you have seen it save so many people from such bad situations, yourself included. it is critical that any person has access to birth control, and you would never suggest that we just get rid of all of it.

you were a little skeeved out by the implant (heard too many bad stories about it) and figured - okay, iud. it was some of the worst pain you've ever fucking experienced, and you did it with a small number of tylenol in your system (3), like you were getting your bikini line waxed instead of something practically sewn into your body.

and what's wild is that because sometimes it isn't a painful insertion process, it is vanishingly rare to find a doctor that will actually numb the area. while your doctor was talking to you about which brand to choose, you were thinking about the other ways you've been injured in your life. you thought about how you had a suspicious mole frozen off - something so small and easy - and how they'd numbed a huge area. you thought about when you broke your wrist and didn't actually notice, because you'd thought it was a sprain.

your understanding of pain is that how the human body responds to injury doesn't always relate to the actual pain tolerance of the person - it's more about how lucky that person is physically. maybe they broke it in a perfect way. maybe they happened to get hurt in a place without a lot of nerve endings. some people can handle a broken femur but crumble under a sore tooth. there's no true way to predict how "much" something actually hurts.

in no other situation would it be appropriate for doctors to ignore pain. just because someone can break their wrist and not feel it doesn't mean no one should receive pain meds for a broken wrist. it just means that particular person was lucky about it. it should not define treatment.

in the comments of videos about IUDs, literally thousands of people report agony. blinding, nauseating, soul-crushing agony. they say things like i had 2 kids and this was the worst thing i ever experienced or i literally have a tattoo on my ribs and it felt like a tickle. this thing almost killed me or would rather run into traffic than ever feel that again.

so it's either true that every single person who reports severe pain is exaggerating. or it's true that it's far more likely you will experience pain, rather than "just a pinch." and yet - there's nothing fucking been done about it. it kind of feels like a shrug is layered on top of everything - since technically it's elective, isn't it kind of your fault for agreeing to select it? stop being fearmongering. stop being defensive.

you fucking needed yours. you are almost weirdly protective of it. yours was so important for your physical and mental health. it helped you off hormonal birth control and even started helping some of your symptoms. it still fucking hurt for no fucking reason.

once while recovering from surgery, they offered you like 15 days of vicodin. you only took 2 of them. you've been offered oxy for tonsillitis. you turned down opioids while recovering from your wisdom tooth extraction. everything else has the option. you fucking drove yourself home after it, shocked and quietly weeping, feeling like something very bad had just happened. the nurse that held your hand during the experience looked down at you, tears in her eyes, and said - i know. this is cruelty in action.

and it's fucked up because the conversation is never just "hey, so the way we are doing this is fucking barbaric and doctors should be required to offer serious pain meds" - it's usually something around the lines of "well, it didn't kill you, did it?"

you just found out that removing that little bitch will hurt just as bad. a little pinch like how oral contraceptives have "some" serious symptoms. like your life and pain are expendable or not really important. like maybe we are all hysterical about it?

hysteria comes from the latin word for uterus, which is great!

you stand here at a crossroads. like - this thing is so important. did they really have to make it so fucking dangerous. and why is it that if you make a complaint, you're told - i didn't even want you to have this in the first place. we're told be careful what you wish for. we're told that it's our fault for wanting something so illict; we could simply choose not to need medication. that maybe if we don't like the scraps, we should get ready to starve.

we have been saying for so long - "i'm not asking you to remove the option, i'm asking you to reconsider the risk." this entire time we hear: well, this is what you wanted, isn't it?

[punksocks]

Lilith & His Femme Fatale (18+ Only)

**I tried to make this general but it’s about seduction, I couldn’t pull it lol (fr minors dni!)

*Just based on my observations, only take what resonates

Often Lilith in a man’s birth chart gives less information on him and more information on the type of woman that’s his femme fatale. The type of femme that gives this complex dynamic to the relationship. I would say, similarly to Plutonian influences, this sort of connection charged with such intensity tends to elicit the extreme reaction of either repelling him or making him at least a bit obsessed with finding a way to “obtain” the Lilith person in the relationship.

I think this is always related to Lilith’s folklore of being the untamable wife. He loves her because he can’t control her. But he still wants to try (not always but often imo). Not being able to control her and her seeming so wild and free is one of the many reasons the Lilith person usually brings out the shadow side of the masc person in their connection.

(I think everyone, men/women/enbys/etc, all tend to act out of feminine and masculine energies. The energies of giving and receiving. Action and reaction. Lilith usually throws some upheaval into this because as an untraditional feminine she embodies it all. She dominates whilst not taking any action. Lilith’s sort of chaotic energy throws a wrench in the binary imo. She’s feminine but the effect she has on and within others often puts her outside of the spectrum. I’m speaking about the effect on masculine folks because I believe Lilith pushes them into a power struggle mindset due to her effects and due to our society -and Lilith’s origins- being very patriarchal. With traditional feminine energies there is also a power struggle effect but it’s more like rooted in the feminine power. Like women usually have a default role of using subservience to their advantage- as much as they can- under patriarchy. So the tension with people embodying Lilith manifests in this tension of trying to make the Lilith people conform or outcasting them. There can be underlying s*xual dynamics to this but it usually works out differently/less directly than it does with masc folks.)

Anyway that’s why I believe men/masc people react in such a charged/obsessed way to Lilith energy and why I think it tends to result in this sort of femme fatale dynamic. Now let’s get into it !

-Lilith in Aries: For Lilith in Aries, he’d love an unstoppable woman. Like I noted before (in credit to @zeldasnotes ) this is a strong indicator of a man being a feminist (we love to see it). So this could also indicate a strong attraction to someone that’s in their power, that holds their own, and that is very independent and strong in their own right. He may find himself pushing back on this type of femme, but being impressed and compelled by her when she does take the lead (his mars could show how this dynamic would play out). (You may find yourselves vying for dominance in the connection)

-Lilith in Taurus: A hyperfeminine woman. Obviously, femininity looks different across cultures, but some traits that could show up here would be: a woman with curves, a killer hourglass figure that turns heads; a woman that seems luxurious and well dressed; a woman that feels soft and smells great. Essentially being a Venusian sign, Taurus in Lilith would be absolutely smitten by a beautiful woman that embodied all that soft feminine energy (and took his money lol) (speaking of which, could be a s*x worker or trophy wife type- someone that needs a lot of money/luxury to keep around)

-Lilith in Gemini: A thinker, a woman that outwits you. Someone that keeps you mentally stimulated by challenged your knowledge. Someone that will always make you guess. Very book smart, may be curious about the taboo. Someone that gets their kicks from debating you and testing your textbook knowledge. May also be smitten by dirty talk, talking about the taboo in their intimate time together.

-Lilith in Cancer: A nostalgic nurturer that makes you feel at ease. May embody the bad traits that make you feel especially vulnerable (like familiar toxic behavior). Lilith’ archetype is often an antithesis of cancer’s traditional influence of being the emotional nurturer, so we’d have to assume a bit of corruption here. Just as easily as you could be fueling toxic behavior I’d assume you’d just as easily receive it. So mascs can project onto you and desire to leech off of your nurturing energy.

-Lilith in Leo: A diva. The one that’s in the spotlight without trying at all. Like a burlesque dancer, beautiful and radiant and practically untouchable. Speaking of which they may be smitten with a femme known for her s*x appeal. Whether that’s from having a lot of past partners or being a model or being in s*x work depends on the situation. The Leo person would likely want exclusive access to you after they get their hands on you though (fixed placements can be very possessive, it’s a whole thing)

-Lilith in Virgo: someone with their life together. (I said what I said 👀). A sort of that girl as the kids say :0. She has a meal plan and a routine and a 5 year plan. I’d also wager that this placement is the most likely to have a thing for someone that has their shit so together that it makes the native feel less than. Someone that could shame them and make them feel flawed and insignificant at the drop of a hat (a hat? The hat? Ok). Also likely to be someone that is really subtle but quietly freaky. A good candidate for workplace affairs 🤷🏾‍♀️

-Lilith in Libra: a bombshell babe, a true beauty. Someone who embodies very classy energy. A popular girl, one that you sort of have to work to get the attention of. (A gorgeous femme that distracts others with how beautiful and effortless she is. Pinup material and just as untouchable. Trophy wife vibes but not as intense as Lilith in Taurus (unless this is a 2nd house placement 👀). Also someone that brings a lot of balance and beauty to their surroundings. (She may attract envy due to her looks as well)

-Lilith in Scorpio: S*x personified. Someone with that intense vibe (one of the most likely placements to attract Lilith heavy femmes). Someone that has a presence that holds a lot of power. And a lot of intimate experience or at least a fearless attitude about those taboos. Someone that makes him want to explore those fantasies as a knee jerk reaction (within reason ofc). Someone that can see right through him. Someone that they struggle to gain power over. (Also pretty likely to have a power imbalance or some sort of taboo attached to the dynamic)

-Lilith in Sagittarius: A traveler, a girl struck with wanderlust. Someone you get attached to even though she’s always out of reach. Someone who loves debating and adventure. A philosopher that never stops learning and daring you to broaden your horizons. May be someone from outside of your culture as well. Or someone with a religious background you find socially taboo.

-Lilith in Capricorn: Boss babe all the way. Someone that intimidates others easily and that works very hard. A social climber. A person that knows exactly what they’re after, in that go getter sort of way. Someone mature. Lady in the streets, freak in the sheets. Another possibly of meeting at work, or at least after some sort of public interaction. Another connection where both people are likely vying for dominance. Likely to have themes of restriction show up as well.

-Lilith in Aquarius: manic👏🏾 pixie 👏🏾dream👏🏾 girl👏🏾 (I’m dead*ss). The quirky girl that stands out from the crowd. One of kind in a rebellious way. The other side of fae energy, which is to say that she would be a detached trickster of sorts. Hard to predict, philosophically outside of your comfort zone, impossible to pin down, etc. Someone that forces you to think outside of the box- whether you like it or not. Could bring out the k*nkier side of you. Also pretty likely to bring out the nerdier side of you, for some reason. (Aquarius intelligence ??)

-Lilith in Pisces: fae bae, full stop. A girl like a daydream. Esoteric and ethereal. A person that may be a bit spacey but they’re off floating in space somewhere. Someone creative and subconsciously addictive. Someone that tends to appear in their dreams and tends to be on their minds a lot.

Further Notes:

-Air is most impressed upon by intelligence and uniqueness; water by an emotionally immersive and passionate connection; fire by passion and being dazzled by the person; earth by their material luxury, ambition, and physicality

-water and fire tend to become obsessive over s*xual connections the fastest imo, but it can really mentally affect air and earth placements (it’s that I’m not obsessed but they’re thinking about them all the time and doing god knows what about that 👀)

-fixed Lilith placements can make a masc person a bit more obsessive and possessive over the Lilith energy (especially if they have a fixed Venus/mars)

-Cardinal Lilith placements tend to like to be challenged over taking the lead/dominance in the connection, if underdeveloped they can be rather controlling to their partners as well

-When Lilith is close to a masc’s personal planets I’d say that he may have some sort of archetype/karmic lesson around Lilith heavy femmes (just a significant impact on his life and attitude)

-Houses can show how these energies connect (I wrote this up but the draft deleted itself and I just couldn’t lol 🙃)

[rose-maidenn]

Astro observations 1

Tropical + Sidereal

Tropical

If you have mercury sextile venus as a women your voice gives you an upper hand in your career , example Sofia Vergara being famous for her acting as well as her unique voice , lana del rey for her vocal range , Rihanna , Kim Kardashian memes lol .

If as a man you have mercury sextile venus it shows up as an upper hand in your thoughts and creativity , often times men with this placement are very soft spoken and understanding , in a dark way they could be manipulative as well . They mostly create a world of wonders for themselves and have distinct contributions towards art or way of life . Eg : Walt Disney , Ewan Mcgregor in big fish

Scorpio men give high school bad boy vibes , their upper body might be larger then their lower body , fellas don't skip leg day

Wanna start content creation or wanna be a singer , check your moon sign , a popstar might become popular based on the emphasis on either vocal range, lyricism, performance (credits to the instagram reel i watched lol i lost the link ) eg : scorpio women embody the performer persona most strongly , for example: Beyonce , Miley Cyrus , Lady gaga etc (vedic - Vishakha)

Cancer sun women mostly embody the trashy girl aesthetic.

Though widely considered meek , the cancer sun embodies a badass feministic yet kind vibe to them eg : Princess Diana , Selena Gomez , MIA, Frida Kahlo , often turn out to be revolutionaries and make changes in their own fields .

Pluto in the 5th is an amazing placement for fashion designers or in the field of marketing in the field , eg: Coco chanel , Miuccia Prada , Donatella Versace etc . 5th is the house of creativity and pluto being in it bring something out of the ordinary to make the person famous.

Pluto in 5th might also suffer from a turbulent childhood often with home relocation or absent parents

Mercury in 9th might be forced to grow up earlier , these people embody wisdom beyond years, often time resulting in void eg : Drew Barrymore, Mila Kunis lying about her age to get roles , Brooke shields .

Mercury in 9th is also a good placement for writers, eg : Sylvia plath , Agatha Christie, Emily Bronte .

Sidereal

Purva Bhadrapada women are very activist and stand for what they believe in , they make really good points in an debate👏

Punarvasu sun will give you fuller lips . Mostly downturned

Gemini men often have a wild chemistry with Sagittarius men 😭😂 the gemini man either admires the Sagittarius or hates them , like a frenemy vibe .

Libra men have the rake energy they flirt with everyone but they also make you feel like you're the only girl 😭 tf

Moon conjunct Saturn is said to give a bad relationship with mother but I have observed that if it is in the 12 th house it actually gives a good relationship, as there's more understanding .

As a jupiterian myself I won't advise to dye your hair blonde if you have prominent jupiter ,it makes me even more delusional. I would recommend brown for grounding and inviting creativity in your life .

Idk mars dom men are too good to me I like them so much, I've seen that in other cases as well so I will say jup dom 🤝 mars dom.

Rahu doms are underdogs yall , mostly people underestimate them until one day they put all their energy into something and prove themselves .

Uttara Ashadha girls act as they're stupid but they're observing so much , they might have really captivating eyes , puppy eyes if I say .

If two people have asc-moon synastry , they love each other and loathe each other because of their similarities , their is also a tendency of copying the others gestures or fashion .

Ketu doms push people away and then say they're lonely , it takes a lot to understand the inner rich world of ketu doms , which I think venus doms get to a degree.

Rohini people have a certain liking towards the metal of gold , and it will bring you auspiciousness if you buy them gold.

That's all for today hope yall enjoyed , I think you can read both observations interchangeably hehe I tried a new format hope yall like it . Dm me if you want to book a chart reading or an astrology reading 🫶

Thank you for reading

[genderkoolaid]

i try not to fall into the trap of idolizing the prehistoric past, or applying a extremely general label to something in the past or making sweeping generalizations. because people in general and specifically leftists + feminists have a history of using the past, especially the people we know the least about, as rhetorical fodder. and yk humans being any which way in prehistory means as much for innate human nature as a preschooler thinking their teacher sleeps at school. it's a very understandable thing to believe/do and it's a very human thing but that doesn't mean it holds some Ineffable Truth About Who We Are And Will Always Be. there being misogyny or ableism or hierarchy or war etc. in the ancient past does not mean that misogynists/ableist/warmongers etc. are in the right. and we should be careful not to jump to assumptions about the past without respecting that each society was made of real individual people who existed without regard for our ideological battles in the future. and they also did not exist to represent Every Single Society in their wider cultural group. read the dawn of everything a new history of humanity etc etc

that being said i am getting emotional over çatalhöyük and neolithic societies and what little information we have on how they navigated gender. just the idea that it really didn't matter as much as we think it needs to. equal burials and equal diets. and like you don't even need the idea of a Primordial Mother Goddess cult. people with vulvae could equally participate in phallocentric cults focused on hunting wild animals because why wouldn't they? why would the presence of a penis mean they wouldn't be involved? can you imagine that? the potential for a society where sex is at once so unabashedly present in your culture yet not a dividing factor in life?

[im-ovulating]

Ok so since you volunteered...EEEEE🤭🤭

I've had this thought on my mind for a while...how do you think a relationship with Alec,Paul, and Embry (separately please) would be/how would they react if they were in a relationship with reader who is slightly more traditional. She likes to cook and clean for them, and she likes to make their plate and hand it to them (paul and embry only for obvious reasons, lol).

Reader is more traditional in this way that she enjoys it but still modern and a feminist because she doesn't do it because "she's a woman and that's her job" or "it's her place" bullshit sje does it because it's a sinple way she shows affection and that she loves them. If you can add in them defending reader and getting all protective when someone says something like "you're lucky man... to have a woman who knows her place, " and they're just like "stfu she doesn't do this because of your misogynistic ideas she does it because that's how she shows love and loyalty"

(A/n: Before anyone asks- yes, yes I do think that Alec's is funny. I laughed writing it so that's all that matters lmao)

(I feel like I got a little too cookie cutter with Paul and Embry, but what can you do when you're already on your 3rd rewrite?)

Word Count: 908

Summary- Request above^^

Warnings: Misogyny (not from the boys), Decapitation in Alec's lol

Age Rating: None

Alec, Paul, Embry (separate) x Fem! Reader: Tradition

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

Alec:

"Say it again." Alec's fangs are bared inches from the lower guard's face as he pins him to the wall.

He had been making his way through the halls towards your shared quarters when he heard one of the new guards commenting about you. Normally he would have left it - it's a new guard, he's going to be killed in a few weeks' time anyway after all (Caius simply doesn't have the patience to deal with newborns), but this time was different.

It was different because it wasn't the usual comments about you being human; it wasn't the comments on what it must be like to be mated to one of the elite guards. No.

It was a comment about your more... traditional habits. The way you let him take control on most things, the way you tend to pick up around the castle despite there being lower vampires in the coven that tend to that.

What had made the normally calmer of the twins snap were the words, "At least the human knows her place is serving men."

"SAY IT!" He snarls, voice echoing off the stone walls of the castle.

"I-" The newborn starts to stammer. Before he can even start his second word, Alec's grip on his neck tightens, forcing a web of cracks to shoot up the guard's neck and splinter his face.

It only when his fingers dig in enough to finally snap the guard's head clean off that he steps back, eyes nearly black and wild and his chest heaving with unnecessary breaths. As a final disrespect, he boots the decapitated head down the hall, relishing in the sickening crack when it hits the far wall.

You round the corner just in time to see Alec standing over the headless body, his eyes slowly fading from pitch black to their usual crimson.

"Are... are you alright?" you ask hesitantly, approaching him carefully.

Alec nods, pulling you close. "I couldn't let him speak about you that way," he murmurs into your hair.

"What way?"

He just shakes his head, breathing in your scent to calm himself.

Paul:

At the first pack bonfire you've been invited to, you're busy helping Emily serve food to everyone when you overhear an older member of the tribe talking to Paul. "You're a lucky man," he says, nodding in your direction. "Having a woman who knows her place. It's rare these days..."

Paul's reaction is immediate. His body tenses, eyes flashing with anger. "Watch it," he growls, his voice low and dangerous. "Y/n doesn't do shit to fit a dumbass outdated role."

The man backs away, surprised by Paul's intensity. You feel a warmth spread through your cheeks, touched by Paul's defense of you.

Later that night, as you're cleaning up together, Paul wraps his arms around you from behind. "I'm sorry about earlier," he murmurs into your hair.

You turn in his embrace, meeting his eyes. "Don't be. I loved how you stood up for me."

"I just hate when people assume things about you," Paul says, his brow furrowed. "You're the most kickass woman I know. You take care of me because you want to, not because you have to."

You reach up, smoothing the wrinkles between his scrunched eyebrows. "And because you don't do it yourself," you jab, lightly.

A small snort leaves him and he leans down to kiss you gently. "I love you, baby."

"Love you too."

Embry:

The calm and peace of Emily's house is quickly broken by the whooping and excited shouting of the pack as they come clamoring in. When they catch the scent of all the food you and Emily have been making, they rush into the kitchen, crowding around the table.

You smile, watching as the boys' eyes light up at the sight of the feast. As always, you take pleasure in preparing a plate for him, carefully piling his plate full. When you hand Embry the plate, his fingers brush yours, and he gives you that warm, appreciative smile that never fails to make your heart skip.

"You don't have to do that," he murmurs, but his appreciative smile tells you he loves it.

"I know," you reply, handing him the plate. "But I want to."

"Thanks, babe," he says softly, just for you to hear.

As you both sit down, one of the newer, younger pack members makes a comment. "Man, Embry, you're lucky to have a girl who knows her place."

The temperature in the room seems to drop. Embry's eyes flash dangerously, and he's on his feet in an instant. "What did you just say?" he growls.

You place a calming hand on his arm. "Embry, it's okay."

"No, it's not. Listen to me and listen good," he addresses the newcomer, his voice low and intense. "She doesn't do this because of some outdated, misogynistic idea of a woman's 'place'. She does it because that's how she chooses to show love and care. It has nothing to do with obligation and everything to do with her heart. So keep your ignorant comments to yourself."

The teen manages to stammer out an apology and as the tension slowly dissipates, Embry sits back down, his hand finding yours under the table. You squeeze it gently, a silent thank you for his defense. In that moment, surrounded by the warmth of the pack and Embry's unwavering support, you're reminded once again why you fell in love with him.

[hadesoftheladies]

when feminists talk about separatism, we're not saying it so women "deny men sex because that's all they want us for." it's because romantic relationships with men are uniquely exploitative and VITAL to the functioning of patriarchal society (even without giving birth to their children). romantic relationships with men also mean:

-extra domestic and emotional labour (constant servicing of men)

-sacrifice of independence (financial and physical)

-increased risk of sexual and physical violence (for you or women and children around you)

-prioritization of men and less engagement with female peers (he WILL take priority over everyone else)

-giving energy and resources that men then use to energize themselves without giving back in any (or any equal) way

men get their energy from using and abusing women, especially when it comes to a shared domestic sphere. the home is the wild west for women. always has been. it is why it is frequently the focal point for feminist theory and practice.

"but he's not like that. i know him."

do you think every victim went into the relationship knowing the truth? it's nice to think that you're above things like death, sexual violence or betrayal, but it's not true. you can't just vibe or hope these things away.

you can risk it, but this isn't just some whimsical choice. this is years of your life for this man. even your entire life. your relationship with him WILL affect your health and lifespan and resources. even if you don't practice separatism, it's nonsensical to discuss it as extreme. it's perfectly reasonable given history and the current culture of men. it's a perfectly reasonable and effective strategy to advance women's liberation.

[darylsfavoritegirl]

HEYYYY IM HONESTLY SO FUCKING EXCITED WHAT DO YOU THINK ABT THESE HEADCANONS bc i wanted to do smth like for a while i just never could come up with anything but its easy in a sense sooo here you gooou

SFW

• I don't think his mommy issues are necessarily sexual, sometimes you would do something that would invoke that "motherly" "safe" or "warm" feeling inside of him. He would never be able to understand what it was or would tell anyone about it. It'd be one of the reasons why he'd care for you as much as he did. You'd make him feel safe by saying something or embracing your arms around him in a certain way which would make him commemorate his mother, though because his mom died when he was young, he wouldn't be able to understand it at all bc he doesn't consciously remember those moments with her. This man fr would think you'd cast a spell on him :D

• I just know this man is a feminist in the core. Growing up, he'd always hear Merle running his mouth about women and how they were like this and they were like that, overall his ignorant, blunt, dumb thoughts about women. He would witness his dad going off on benders with different women each time and how he'd vulgarly talk about them later. And hell maybe he's disrespected women or been really cruel to them but he still regrets it to this time and yeah we all know this man suffers in redemption, always trying to make up for his past mistakes and wrongs. Yet I'm %100 sure he loves seeing women thrive, turning into their best selves or just witness them be real badass and it might even give him some kind of arousal 👀👀. He is into that shit. I said what I said.

• One of his love languages is definitely showing you the places he'd used to spend his time in. Could be a special spot in the woods, could be a small cabin he'd used to get lit with people. Hell it could be random corner in town whenever you'd have to be in downtown for various reasons. He wouldn't even mind if those places brought him bad memories or unpleasant ones. He'd just like being there with you, doing whole ass story times and watch you react them with a wide-eyed expression. He did have a weird and a "crazy" life before the fall that'd make him feel like he was on mushrooms everytime just thinking about it. He'd love letting you know more and more about his past. It would just give him a reassuring feeling deep down. He would feel like it would bound you two together.

• That.man.has.a.sweet.tooth. He loves anything that has sugar. He'd always snack on candies or cookies or chocolates after a hangover. Or when he'd be on drugs. Sugar wakes him the fuck up and he loves the energy boost. He'd carry some candies in his pocket back in the day, eating them throughout the day when he'd feel his blood sugar dropping.

• He is definitely a car-date type of guy. He got more into it after the apocalpyse started and he met you. Sometimes you'd go on runs and you could sit in the car for hours, smoking, eating, talking or yk👀👀 if supplies you found weren't an emergency need. He absolutely savored those moments. You could sit for hours without speaking, in a complete silence. He appreciates quietude.

NSFW

• I know him having a breeding kink is well known and acknowledged but he's insane about it that it hurts. He loves seeing you all squirmed and whiny underneath him with all his cum inside of you, some of it dripping down your thighs. You couldn't always find the right pills for unplanned pregnancy risk and it WOULD drive him crazy to not be able to it.

• He just loves to see you messy beneath him. Hair all tangled, thighs shaking uncontrollably. Your fingers digging so deep on his shoulders that you'd cause his broad shoulders to bleed sometimes, he loved it. Your eyes are all glossy with pleasure. You both would love to go wild and leave sloppy kisses on eachother's bodies and wouldn't mind them drying on your bodies at all, leaving it all sticky.

• He loves being submissive as much as he loves being dominant. You can't convince me otherwise. If you gained his trust, he will be all yours, all needy beneath you while you ride his soul out of his damn body. Again, he adores a badass woman, a woman to take the lead. You would place your hands on his chest and sometimes hold his strong large biceps and he wouldn't dare to move an inch. He liked being vulnerable like that.

• He is just so patient it physically throws you over the edge. He'd get so close making you cum and he'd stop, teasing you with his tip or fingers or sometimes his tongue. He'd smirk at you and even make fun of you in a taunting way to overstimulate you and don't worry he'd make up for it with better ways. He knows what he is doing. It's just come natural to him.

• It's safe to say you are the one who teases him in the public most of the time, your feet tracing his legs up until it stops on his bulge under the table and he'd give a stern stare, trying to shrug and look indifferent as others would notice his suddenly-changing demenour. However, there'd be boring Alexandria dinners that Deanna would host and if you sat next to eachother, he'd place his large hand on your thigh and even dare to slip a finger on the fabric of your panties, starting to rub his middle finger harshly in circles while having full ass conversations with people and try to hide his subtle smirk bearing his face. He would do it rarely yet he'd be so good at it because no one would suspect a thing, he'd always make it look like he was resting his arm on your lap. You'd squirm under his warm touch and heat waves would wash all over you while trying to look normal as ever. And believe me, after those nights, when you'd confront about him about what he did at a dinner with 20 people, he'd act as if he doesn't understand a thing you're saying or would say "Don' kno' what yer talkin' 'bout." while shrugging his shoulders and turning to his side with a wicked grin.

FOOTNOTE

well this actually took shorter than i thought idk why i believed it would take me couple of days to finish one lmao i deadass wrote this in like an hour max ???? anyway i wish there were more but idc i was so impatient to post one of theseeee :)))

[lesbianrobin]

not to return to the drama of yesterday/invite more but the terf accusations are wild because like. the whole fucking thing is that it's trans exclusionary radical feminism. what makes terfs terfs is the transphobia particularly transmisogyny.

and accusing somebody of being a terf for. being mean to a fictional man. is like... first of all i actually don't think they believe anything they're saying like i do think they're just trying to use social justice language to make themselves seem justified but BESIDES THAT. it is actually so insanely transphobic and misogynistic to act like Being Mean To A Guy is equivalent to trans exclusionary radical feminism. terfs are not primarily hurting men they are primarily hurting trans women!! it is quite literally in the name!!

but "terf" has been watered down so much that now people just use it as an insult against any lesbian they don't like. if you commit the crime of not worshipping men then you are actually a radical feminist which means you are also a transphobe and now people can attack you for not liking men but in a Woke Progressive way. it does not matter your actual ideology or even if you're trans yourself All that matters is that you dared to not center men 24/7.

and the worst fucking part of all of this is that as always trans women are being shouted over and disregarded! these people don't CARE about trans women all they care about is bullying dykes. and they're losers so they invoke trans women as some bizarre justification for their actions while doing Nothing to aid or advocate for trans women. it's just like such hateful loser behavior and it pisses me off.

[mythsandheather]

What I hate the most about LO is that Rachel is making the romance between actual gods backward. Aphrodite and Hephaestus were a couple but Aphrodite found him repulsing so she cheated on him with Ares. Even after that cheating on Hephaestus, Ares, and Aphrodite were the only sane couple in Greek myths. Apollo had his fair share of lovers (if you exclude Daphne) with him being in love with BOTH male and female and how does Rachel do justice to his character? By making him a R*****

The saga of Ares, Aphrodite and Hephaestus is often terribly misunderstood and LO is no exception, except that she weaponises it in her narrative and portrays it arguably at its worst.

The original story of these three is often stripped down to the bare basics along the lines of either “star-crossed lovers and ugly loser dude who got in their way” or “bad slutty woman cheats on poor helpless (but still ugly loser) dude with angry frat bro” and it’s wild. It’s a story, at least how I see it, about love, pain and compromise for what you need for yourself.

Hephaestus is hurt, angry and traumatised by his parents abuse of him, specifically Hera, and so he traps her in his specially made throne. He has a point to make and for the first time in his life, he will not be ignored.

Aphrodite is offered as the prize for freeing Hera, without her consent, and so is also hurt, worried and angry, especially when Hephaestus wins her hand. She is handed off to a man she barely knows, let alone loves, and can’t do anything about it

Ares is both not strong to free his mother, nor able to keep the woman he adores from being handed off to someone else — his own brother, no less, and has to just sit and watch. He is humiliated, he is hurt, he is angry.

The retelling I like the most is from Stephen Fry’s Mythos, where Aphrodite and Ares are already engaged when the throne incident happens, Zeus assuring them that surely since Ares is the strongest, he’ll be the one to free Hera. Even Zeus is humanised. Aphrodite’s hand being offered is him making a rash decision to motivate the other gods out of his desperation to free his wife.

When Hephaestus arrives and frees Hera, it’s not what anyone expected and Hephaestus makes it very clear that he’s not doing this to get the girl, so much as to make it clear he’s a force to be reckoned with.

He had Aphrodite seperate shortly after their marriage and she goes on her way with Ares while Hephaestus goes about his work, now with the respect he wanted for his craftsmanship. Ares, Aphrodite and Hephaestus are all on relatively amicable terms as later stories unfold too, especially compared to the fighting of the other gods.

In some versions, Dionysus intervenes and convinces Hephaestus with some alcohol both to free Hera and not to pursue Aphrodite, and Hephaestus agrees.

Now, you might be looking at all this and thinking “wow, what a nuanced tale and what a mature way everyone ended up handling it! Everyone here is flawed yet you like and relate to all of them! Surely this would make a great adaptation for a ‘feminist retelling’!” You’d be wrong.

Ares is a douchey dudebro who is obsessed with Persephone cuz reasons and exists to say every oversexualised, gross, objectifying thought Rachel herself has while drooling over her self insert but can’t make Hades say cuz he’s supposed to be a gentleman.

Aphrodite is a petty caricature of influencers and Kim Kardashian and her hyper sexualised nature is a bad thing and entirely her own fault when something bad happens to her. She’s also purple. I will never not be mad about Aphrodite not being pink.

She and Ares break up because -insert slut-shaming, not like the other girls logic to defend Persephone- here and she marries Hephaestus.

Hephaestus is set dressing, at best. Every cool attribute he has is stolen and given to Hades and instead of being ugly due to injury or physical deformity and this being a source of how mistreated he is, he’s just…black-coded and with prosthetic legs. If that made you slightly uncomfortable, it should.

Speaking of minorities being taken, chewed up and spat out by Lore Olympus, that brings us to Apollo. Poor, poor Apollo. One of the most beloved and influential of the Theoi, literally unrecognisable and reduced to being the self-insert’s r*pist because, you guessed it, reasons.

Let me add to all the people saying it, because it needs to be repeated; APOLLO DID NOT ASSAULT PERSEPHONE IN THE MYTHS OR ANYWHERE EXCEPT LORE OLYMPUS.

I know it’s probably not intended to be homophobic how Apollo is treated in LO, but fuck it, that’s how it smells to me, so that’s what I call it.

Every character, every relationship, every story serves to boost the Rachel x Mads fapfic Persephone and Hades love story and it’s nasty. How the fuck are you gonna call yourself a folklorist and do this?

[mixelation]

i've finished reading xiran jay zhao's iron widow! here is my review so far (contains spoilers, including the "twist" at the end). my tl;dr is that it starts as a fun revenge story but both the quality of the narrative and the writing itself decline over the course of the novel. you might like it if you want a power fantasy where the main character is unapologetically violent and selfish, and you don't mind cardboard characterization or shallow worldbuilding. if you want a nuanced take on how misogyny functions in a society, a book about strong female characters (as opposed to a singular, capital Strong Female Character), or you find descriptions of anime-style action scenes cringey, you this book may not be for you.

on to the full review ->

iron widow is a scifi-fantasy YA book set in alternate timeline china, where humanity battles invading alien "hunduns" using gundam-esque giant robots called "chrysalises." a lot of the worldbuilding draws on the aesthetic and certain social norms of ~old timesy~ china (iirc zhao has stated they pulled inspiration from lots of time periods, but my familiarity with both historical china and chinese historical fantasy is very low, so i am absolutely not the person to label anything beside "the past"). so you have people checking tablets and riding around in hovercraft and using modern slang, but a lot of Aesthetic elements are more traditional, and society is deeply, deeply sexist in a way that.... feels old-fashioned (wording chosen to set the Mood apart from how modern misogyny tends to work). for example, the main character has bound feet but also uses phrases like "railed on."

chrysalises, the giant robots, work by the pilot channeling qi. for whatever reason that's not really well explained, they require a copilot to boost their control/power over the chrysalis. think "drifting" in pacific rim, except here when pilots are not compatible with their copilot (this seems to rely largely on "qi levels" and pilots don't seem to have control over it), the "weaker" copilot can become overwhelmed and die. in this setting, the main pilot is always male the copilot always female, with the copilot usually dying. this part of the premise as it is described on the back of the book confused me as a setting for a ~feminist~ story, because why would men always win in a wild mind-meld, battle-of-wills situation? however, the main character slowly figures out that it's not that men are inherently stronger pilots-- it's that women are always paired with a male pilot the military has tested to be stronger (based on qi levels), and then later one of the plot twists is that the chrysalises are designed to weaken the female copilot. this is because, in the way sexism works in this society, "families wouldn't send their sons to be pilots if they knew they could be killed by some girl." (not an exact quote, but what one character gives as the explanation)

weaker female copilots are called "concubines" and teenaged girls are frequently sold to the military to be concubines. if the concubine survives, she's dubbed a "balanced match" for the male pilot and they become quasi-married. more on this later.

this leads us to wu zetian, a "frontier peasant" who offers herself up to be a "concubine" (co-pilot). we learn that zetian's older sister was sold off by their family to be a concubine, but was murdered by her assigned pilot. like, regular murdered, not killed by a psychic link the way most concubines are. so zetian, having a shit home life, and under pressure to sell herself as well, decides she will enlist and then murder her sister's killer.

now, i had a lot of fun with the beginning of this story. but in order to get into this book, you have to accept upfront that zetian is very firmly the main character, and she is always right and ridiculously strong, clever, and resilient just because. she runs her mouth even at the risk of violence, and is usually meant to be right about whatever she's saying. she rejects her role in society just because, and she decides she doesn't care if her whole family is punished or even killed for her actions because they're terrible to her, and the reader isn't really expected to criticize this. despite having no formal education, she always knows what she needs to know to logic her way through things successfully, and she can strategize and debate on par with people whose literal jobs it is to do these things.

for the first ~25% of the book, this is fun. zetian has decided fuck the system, fuck her family, and fuck her own life-- if they're going to kill her, she's bringing her sister's murderer down with her. she doesn't care about having to endure demeaning tests or people insisting on putting her through painful make-up routines. this is a girl who just has murder on her mind, and it's pretty entertaining.

then, she's shoved into the co-pilot seat of a chrysalis with the man who killed her sister as the main pilot, and through some messy mind-scape battling, she kills him. she takes control of the chrysalis and wins the battle. and then..... the book sort of stops having a real plot, and everything slows down.

see, in the first chunk where we're reading a vengeful murder plot, everything is centered around this one goal. zetian's extreme personality makes sense because we're reading about someone who's actively thrown her life away for revenge. we're on board with it and we wan to see how she manages it. this premise allows for an unhinged protagonist making unhinged decisions.

so what happens next, if she accomplished her goal a quarter of the way in? the military decides to pair her with a character called li shimin, who is the current top pilot. he's the top pilot in that pilots are given scores (their battles are televised and they're treated as a celebrities) and also he has the highest qi level. he's also a convicted murderer and was recruited off death row. sounds fun, right? wrong. shimin is a cardboard cut out of a man. he barely speaks. the only thing he really does is drink and fight people. he gets into physical fights with little provocation. the narration makes a big point of really driving home how big and intimidating he is.... and also how he's an ethnic minority. i cannot comment on if this was meant to reflect any real world group or how they're treated, but overall shimin's characterization make me slightly uncomfortable AND he's just not very interesting. later we find out he's an ex-scholar who murdered his whole family after walking in on his brother raping someone (yeah, i..... idk), and he used to write poems. i think this was meant to make him seem more fleshed out, but the character writing needs a lot of work, so "ex-scholar and poet" is a very informed trait.

if you've followed the buzz on this book, you'll know one of its "draws" is that the end game ship is polyamorous. so, zetian has a second love interest. his name is yizhi and he's the fifth son of the richest man in the country, and he made friends with zetian before the start of the novel. the way they met and bonded doesn't super make sense, but i'm willing to buy into it. yizhi has been infused with SLIGHTLY more personality. he signs up to work for the military as a strategist, which is how he gets to hang out with zetian and shimin. his contribution to the plot is mostly just that he has money to throw at problems. oh, and he can give their chrysalis a boost of qi for extra power and starts hanging out with them in their cockpit during battles. why others don't also do this, and why pilots need to parasite a copilot instead of just having other people around for extra qi, is never explained. zetian has a line where she says something like "don't you know a triangle is the strongest shape?" so i kind of dig what i think zhao was going for (that they balance each other better than just two of them would), but it's not really a realized theme.

okay, so if zetian killed who she wanted to kill, then what's the rest of the book about? good question! it's a little unclear. zetian survives copiloting with shimin and they're declared a balanced match. then the buddies of the pilot zetian killed try to kill her. then the military tries to kill her AND shimin by sending them into battles when they're too tired. then zetian asks yizhi's rich dad to help them with their PR so the government will stop trying to kill them. then they decide to "take back" a province the hunduns took over years ago. then zetian realizes the chrysalises are rigged against female pilots and they go and kidnap and torture a guy to make him confess to how it's done. then they go to take back the province and zetian finds the cryopreserved body of an ancient emperor and his dragon chrysalis. oh, did i not mention him? yeah he's some legend that gets brought up a couple times and then suddenly he's there at the end. but he doesn't do anything. he just agrees with everything zetian wants to do, for some reason, and what she spontaneously decides to do with her new giant robot is go take over the government. she kills multiple people. then the book ends with them finding out they're on the hundun's native planet. okay???

the last 75% just reads like a bunch of things happening because why not. this by itself isn't necessarily bad, but the events are not well connected nor do events get set up in a way where you understand why they occur in the order they occur. zetian stays angry and determined, but her actual overall goal evaporates and instead it just feels like every few chapters she just decides on a new thing she wants. one could argue her overall goal is "claiming agency" or "survival," but they narrative doesn't really carry either of these themes through. for example, in the first quarter of the book, zetian repeated emphasizes she's ready and willing to through her life away if she can get her revenge, and i believed that. but after she miraculously survives.... that willingness to throw her life away vanishes, but not in a "character has undergone development" way. it's just not there anymore.

the writing isn't amazing in the first quarter, but i thought it was fine. it steadily declines over the course of the book, making it feel like a rough draft where zhao was losing steam. instead of getting to see characters interact and play off each other, we just read descriptions of events and conversations. this is nitpicky, but one thing that was starting to drive me crazy through out the book is that the narration frequently would be like "oh, earlier so-and-so showed me this" and then it would be something that could have EASILY just been included at the beginning of the scene and would have also been INTERESTING to see.

the world has a lot of elements going on, but there is a huge problem with telling and not showing, so even with lots of details, the worldbuilding feels shallow. for example, despite zetian saying defeating hunduns has to be a priority, i don't know what happens if hunduns successfully invade an area. we're never shown a ransacked village or hunduns killing anyone but unnamed pilots. the narrative spends a lot of time talking about different element qi and the advantages and disadvantages of each element, but this never actually becomes plot relevant. the pilots are paraded out to the public as fancy celebrities and zetian and shimin have photoshoots for PR, but this also never really becomes plot relevant besides being well-liked being something zetian decides would be a good idea for a few chapters. we don't even know what zetian's relationship with her sister is like, even though she decides to die seeking revenge for her.

i want to expand on that last part a bit. zetian states repeatedly that she wants to help save other girls from becoming concubines, and yet no stakes are attached to this. shimin accidentally killed a concubine he was in love with before the start of the book, so we get some flashbacks of her, but otherwise we never see the impact (or lack of impact) of these young girls' deaths. like, that character really only exists as a tragic backstory for shimin. there's no sympathetic concubine character that dies to drive home the point (although there IS a mean concubine character that presumably died and zetian never thinks of again); there's no meeting a family that misses their daughter; there's no dramatically prying open a cockpit to free a concubine. there are two other female pilots who are balanced matches, and one is a bitch to zetian and the nice one backstabs and attempts to kill her later. zetian never sympathizes with another girl or woman for more than a few lines, including her own sister, so it is unclear why saving girls is so important to her. there's a brief moment where the "nice" female pilot points out to zetian that living in poverty and being terrified of hunduns attacks likely contributed to the various types of misogynistic abuse going on in her family and that providing more support for them would help them.... and zetian sympathizes with her mother for maybe a paragraph.... and then at the end of the book she decides to murder her family. Uh. Okay? Oh, and when the "nice" pilot betrays her, she says it was because the military had her kids and was threatening them. zetian decides to literally crush her to death. Feminism, I guess.

when i read through reviews of this book, the negative ones largely complained about zetian as a character. i always take reviews complaining the main female character is a bitch with a grain of salt, because often they're just bullshit and also i like horrible women. i liked zetian alright for the first two thirds of them book, although she starts to come off as weirdly arrogant at some point. (she starts to refer to herself as one of the most powerful women in the world due to her qi level, even though this does not help her physically, politically, or socially, and she has very little actual agency until just revives a frozen emperor at the end and goes off the rails.) however, this time i think the complaints are merited. you ever read a dark harry fic? or a "naruto gets chased by villagers, becomes powerful and murders them all" type fic? it's like that but if those types of writers were 5% more aware of social issues. zetian is self-righteous about wanting to change the pilot system, but her actions do not indicate she actually gives a shit about anyone but her and her boyfriends. so in the end it seems like even though she's preaching about saving girls, she's actually going, "me! what about me! how dare you do these bad things to ME!" which like. obviously it's fine to be angry about wrongs done to you, but it comes off like she's less upset about systemic problems and more upset the systemic problems happened to HER. there's a lack of nuance and character work that would make or explore this difference.

hmm, what else. i don't really have specific compliments or complaints about the romance aspect, other than the inter-character relationships aren't really built up well. there's definitely effort put into the zetian-yizhi and zetian-shimin relationships, it's just that.... neither of the boys have a ton of personality....? also there's a few oddly placed asides about zetian not feeling ashamed of having two lovers, which feel more liek they're there to justify it to the reader than zetian's actual internal monologue. it's okay, zetian. i did not for a second think you were a shamed of a single thing you've done.

The top review on amazon says, "Wow… this is everything you could want from a science fiction novel." Iron Widow is sci-fi the way Star Wars or Pacific Rim are sci-fi: it's fantasy with robots. Except there's no loving descriptions of engines revving or switches being flipped. There's not even cool little alien dudes; I don't even know what a hundun looks like.

[ladyloveandjustice]

I want to expand on what I'm talking about. And I said a little bit extra in the comments:

There's just some posts that have been going around about how to solve the issue of men swinging real right in America right now,which does have an impact on society. some guy was saying he was attacted to the right bc they were all 'welcome brother' but in the left people resent him. I think it's just. It's easier to go to an idealogy that's like 'you're entitled to this' than an idealogy that says 'hey you're not entitled to everything but you could be more emotionally healthy and kinder to other people and". That's something simply being nice or making them feel good won't ever fully fix. The "rewards" for being in the right will always feel more immediate for white men.

It's not unique to men to feel alienated in an idealogy that wants you to challenge yourself. At the same time, more kindness to everyone, emphasis on acceptance, less volatile language toward each other, will help the community be stronger over all. it is a difficult conundrum, but I don't think it comes down to 'we don't make men feel special enough

It also ignores I think, that white men DO get rewarded in leftist spaces too. a lot. Men will get a ton of adoration for saying something vaguely feminist than if a woman says it a lot of the time, and so on a so forth, everyone loves a sweet guy...I think that's something that already happens.

But let's get back to volatile language:

We always say guilt isn't going to help anyone and it isn't about guilt. But I think we need to admit that no, we do try to make people feel guilty and ashamed a lot. And not framing it around that most of the time would do a lot.

I've seen posts straight up saying it's a bad thing to want to survive and live happy lives and take actions to do this because (x) bad thing is happening. You know, the most basic human instinct? And that's not going to win over people. You may not like that, but it's not.

I don't think that needs to center on women helping men feel special about themselves. A lot of us are asked to take care of men all the time and it's exhausting. Men on the left can focus on being more positive about the concept of manhood if they want, but asking women to do the work. is just....yeah that's just the patriarchy.

I do think examining things like black masculinity etc is great though. If you have another marginalized identity, it will intertwine with masculinity in very specific ways that will be used against you, just as it is with femininity or being outside both those concepts (yet the world assigns you one anyway). I totally get that masculinity is used as a weapon against both gay men and gay women, in different specific ways. And I think at least learning about that and supporting efforts to stop this makes one a better person.

On the other hand. it would be insane of me to ask a Black woman to make a Black man feel special and accepted for simply being a man if she doesn't want to do that. Like. absolutely wild.

And it's it's rarely about that, is it? When we say "celebrate men" it's not bringing any unique experience into it. It's about white men. They're the ones who make up most of the alt-right.

Communities in the right are not compassionate but because they offer some form of reward and companionship they can seem like that. As much as people are lured in by "welcome brother" or whatever, those same people will on the right will mock any person who steps outside the strict roles that have been set.

So....we need to abolish to same roles. I think we need to focus on how we talk to people. On supporting people when they're trying.

It also comes off in how we talk to each other about basically I can harshly tell someone who has privilege over me-- a white man or straight person ect ect-- their guilt about their privilege does nothing, I'm not interested in guilt and what we need is action. But let's be real. Telling someone "you benefit from a system that makes other people suffer" is going to make someone feel guilty. And yelling at someone for feeling guilty isn't going to make that better. I think we avoid saying the truth and say what's the core of it-- no, it's not your fault you were born a certain way and now you benefit from something. A society hundreds of years in the making made that happen. And that sucks, that you basically have no choice but to be complicit. And it sucks way, way more for the people who are kept down by that system. So we need to change society. We can do it together. It's not to "make up" for you existing. It's because we care about each other. I want this for all of us, because when we see each other as whole people and are treated equally, it benefits all of us.

This is a not a "men are uniquely punished by the left for being men, we need to celebrate masculinity, stop being so mean" thing. It's a human thing. It's about the way we talk to each other and try to weild guilt towards people in general. People want to feel good about themselves. They want some kind of acceptance. If you're constantly made to feel bad, it can be hard to want to stay. This is something everyone feels, because we all have a selfish instinct.

People don't like feeling guilty. That's just how people are. It's promoting compassion, rather than hatred and resentment, that's going to help us in the end.

But me simply saying that isn't going to change much. Humans feel hurt and lash out too. When horrible things are happening to us, we resent people that don't understand that or are part of that. The paradigm shift will be hard. Not everyone will be able to do it and I don't think that's wrong.

Everyone gets frustrated by a class of people where a lot of them have more power and try to push them down. Nobody wants to talk to someone that's trying to hurt them.

That's why it needs to be someone like me who could explain racism 101 rather than idk. making a person of color say 'well white people don't feel special and accepted for being white. poc we must be nicer. let's celebrate whiteness because the right does and that's why white people are drawn to it, they feel accepted." listen to how ridic that sounds. you are literally asking for a white history month. That's the same thing you're doing when you're talking about manhood like this. The onus is not on the discriminated group to reach out to those harming them. That's up to others in the community.

But as a broader thing...We just need to figure out what the end game is. Do we want to yell and guilt trip, or do we want more people in our corner? What's more important, the end goal or if someone knows all the right lingo or matches up to your opinions exactly? What do we need to rally around? How can we take care of each other? If we're kinder to the community, more people will follow.

Anyway this is the last time i'll say some big thing like this and tag it. I don't like doing this on tumblr for a reason.

[transandrobroism]

What are your thoughts on women choosing bears over men

i think that's where you end up when you view men as inherently dangerous just by virtue of being men.

and i do get why people pick the bear and defend picking the bear - it's Schrodinger's rapist and stranger danger PSAs and all the statistics about violence against women etc. i understand where that fear comes from. but a lot of it stems from radfem rhetoric that has wormed its way into mainstream feminist discussions and produced this take that men are The Problem - not because of learned behaviours, not because of the patriarchy, but just because of something inherent to men and masculinity that means men are always a danger.

so whilst i'm sympathetic to the fears that lead to women going "i'll take my chances with the bear!" i do think it's worth reflecting on why exactly so many people would rather meet an apex predator than a fellow human being who happens to be of the Wrong Gender. the scenario doesn't specify that the man in the woods is doing anything threatening: he's not wearing a MAGA hat or blasting Andrew Tate podcasts on his bluetooth speaker or leering at every woman who walks past on the hiking trail. he's just some guy in the woods minding his own business. is it easier to imagine a sympathetic wild animal than a sympathetic man? why?

and the thing is, i'm old enough to remember a time when the feminist actions du jour were things like slut walk and 'take back the night' because the whole point was women shouldn't have to be scared. that women deserve to walk around in public and feel safe. somehow we've gone backwards on that to where women living in abject terror of 50% of their fellow humans is defended as the "feminist position" and going "that seems kinda bonkers actually maybe that should not in fact be how women experience the world" is anti-feminist. how did we get here. what went wrong.

the fear of men and choosing the bear are usually justified by talking about statistics on male violence against women. these statistics point to very real problems, but the talk of stranger danger and choosing the bear elides the fact that. statistically. you are more likely to be harmed by a man you know than by a stranger. over 85% of sexual assault victims knew their attacker beforehand (see this NIJ report and this BBC article). or see the UN Women report on global violence against women: "While 55 per cent of all female homicides are committed by intimate partners or other family members, only 12 per cent of all male homicides are perpetrated in the private sphere." Or this report from the BJS in America: "76% of female murders and 56% of male murders were perpetrated by someone known to the victim". The same report also states that 21% of male homicide victims were murdered by strangers, compared to 12% of female victims.

based on actual statistics on violence rates, men are more justified in fearing strangers than women are. but the "stranger danger" myth persists, and it feeds into the radfem narrative that yes, men are an existential threat and inherently violent just for existing, and yes you should be terrified of every strange man you see on the street. it's worth asking: who benefits from this? who benefits from women being scared of strangers all the time? given the high rates of domestic violence and other violence directed at women by men they know, family members, partners or ex-partners, fathers, brothers... who is benefitting from a population of women terrified to walk into the woods alone?

the most dangerous man in the woods is the one you brought with you.

[tbcanary]

the thing that drives me crazy about this costume isn’t even necessarily the constant ass shots and the weird way her tits look with that white accent. like, sure, those things drive me insane, but i’ve been dealing with that kind of thing for dinah the entire run, so whatever.

the thing that makes me actually insane is that helena is usually shown to very carefully consider her costumes and both what they represent and what they invoke.

in cry for blood, for example, she draws on visuals of priesthood and faith, because those are very important to her and part of why she does any of this in the first place.

like. sure, it’s kind of a weird costume (affectionate), but it has significance and thought and it works. she’s invoking a theme, she’s making a statement, go off.

and, even earlier, she talks about the idea of using a costume in huntress (1989). the run has a LOT about her relationship to the huntress as an idea — her desire to leave it behind, versus the knowledge that she can’t actually do that. it also includes this panel:

that’s only somewhat related, but you know. she thinks of the huntress as an extension of her cowardice, this sort of monstrous part of her that she struggles with constantly. so the silhouette is very dramatic and wild - the big hair, the huge cape. it fits in thematically.

even when you look at helena wayne, some of these themes carry through. she has a white cross on her chest, it’s drawing on the cross Helena Bertinelli wears at her throat, we see it, etc.

and the birds of prey costume. instead of doing literally any of this. went for a white pattern that kind of invokes a cross, but not really. and. this:

it’s just like. part of a broader issue I have with Simone’s run in that, for all it claims to be feminist and powerful, it really just reduces characters — Helena, in particular — to the sort of catty 2000s mean girl stereotype that was already everywhere. no thought to the depth, no thought to the backstory. just make it hot.