#because of your terf behavior and think that your online friend

[rotting-batcorpse]

-🫀

[olderthannetfic]

Okay, I need advice: I'm in a very tiny fandom (like less than two dozen active people and everyone knows each other) and one of the women in it is kind of freaking me out.

We became mutuals because we had some good discussions on some of the characters we liked, but I soon became sort of uncomfortable with a lot of her online behavior whereas simultaneously she's DM-ing me more and more.

She's one of those people who's a hardliner on the issues she cares about (mostly feminism- and SA-related) while talking over people when it comes to issues she doesn't care about (mostly racism and related things). And I see a lot of her trying to intrusively police how other people talk/act, derailing people's posts, arguing with people online over the most stupid shit (where not even her own opinions come off as overly coherent - this week she'll argue something along the lines of "men are evil" and the next she'll argue that people are "demonizing masculinity" - I'll add for clarification that she's not a TERF and supports trans rights but boy... Does she sound like one sometimes) and then digging through people's profiles to find and publicize minor transgressions and bad takes, passive-aggressive vagueposting, and going into mental breakdowns over the most innocuous of online interactions.

TBH she scares me. As someone who suffered through toxic people getting overly attached to me, I genuinely sometimes get a physical reaction when I see her lashing out on the dash.

And she keeps initiating conversations! And sometimes I don't reply or bring the conversation to a natural closure and she keeps at it, or sends me random fics of hers to read that I don't have the heart to tell her don't interest me or whatever. And recently when she disagrees with something I reblogged she direct messages me to rant about it - with a lot of sort of indirect language because she doesn't want to offend me but I can see the intent. The last couple of times I replied politely because I cared about clearing misunderstandings on the topic but next time I'm just gonna tell her I dislike it when she does that.

I really want this person to stop interacting with me, to be honest, and all my polite hints to the effect go unnoticed. But the fandom is so small I feel awkward and uncomfortable about unfollowing or blocking her. I don't think she's too bad of a person, she just comes off as very... Mentally ill, I guess? And since I've tried to be polite so far I feel like it might come out of left field for her?

TBH I feel like something about her behavior also triggers some kind of freeze/fawn reaction inside of me that I don't often get and consequently don't know how to deal with.

So I need impartial advice because I don't see the situation clearly myself

--

To summarize, a person who is a walking red flag wants to be friends, and you can't easily ghost her because the fandom is small.

I think you have to accept that there is no low-conflict way out of this.

That's what's holding you back, right? You don't want more drama and you know it's coming. I think you already know in your heart of hearts that you need to get away from her even if it's a pain in the ass.

Step one is to stop responding to her DMs. That will probably make her reach out more, but you should keep not responding. If she escalates and attacks you over it, block her.

The more you offer reasons or try to gently hint, the more that will encourage her. I don't think that's true of everyone, but I do think it's the case here. This is both because it doesn't sound like she's good at perceiving or respecting boundaries and because she inspires a bad lack of ability to assert boundaries in you.

I agree that it's unfortunate that you can't stand up for yourself or tell her plainly when she's out of line, but since you can't and that probably won't change any time soon, you'll need to protect yourself a different way. Sometimes, we just have to avoid people who are bad for us even when it's an us problem. (And here, whoaaaa red flags, so I don't think it's just a you problem anyway.)

There are many sad, lonely, needy people in the world. Some of them are officially mentally ill in some way with a diagnosis. Some just need things they aren't currently getting. That sucks...

But it's also not your job to fix.

[saintverse]

forgive me on possible poor wording on this post (suggestions and discussion are welcome and open) i'm really not feeling well right now and i struggle with articulating myself because of brainfog.

tumblr is an echo chamber but if you say that you're accused of being a fascist or whatever when it's just plainly and simply true. it's genuinely wonderful to have an online space dominated by autistic people and leftists but the disadvantages of such a space rear their head quite quickly when you think about it for more than five seconds.

(there is NOTHING inherently wrong with the way autistic people think vs allistic people think, merely i think a lot of us struggle with the same issues that can sometimes inhibit our understanding of the world around us and experiences different from our own)

autism being the norm is fun and cool until you try to explain the nuances of like, for example, online behavior. because i think a lot of us struggle with black or white thinking that goes unquestioned and it can lead to really unhealthy habits. like yeah terfs are shitty people and we should reject their ideas, but spending your spare time sending random people on the internet gore is really weird, is giving them more attention than they deserve, and is overall a waste of time that can't be good for your mental health. and if you explained to anyone offline that one of your hobbies is sending gore or suicide baiting people on the internet, even with those people being bigots, they will be weirded out. it's not healthy to put that much emotional energy into your oppressor. it's just weird. go for a walk or something, girl. i can't watch this.

(creating public campaigns against specific terfs just gives them more of a platform and a weird victim complex. most importantly, you're putting your transfem friends and mutuals in danger by exposing them to this shit and giving transmisogynists a way to find them!)

(i don't say any of this to be shitty about autistic people i just think our brains are wired or whatever to make it really easy to fall down weird pipelines. hence why 4chan was filled with a lot of autistic white dudes. a lot of us are fairly susceptible to rhetoric if it goes unquestioned and aligns with our personal unchallenged world views.)

another example, if you say the r slur in real life everybody is just going to think you're saying the r slur. the average person (who also is chill with the r slur and probably uses it themselves) will be like haha yeah. and the average autistic or intellectually disabled person will be like oh good god i need to stay away from them. but for some reason people on here think they can reclaim the r slur by using it as a slur online (especially when they themselves are NOT intellectually disabled and have ZERO right to reclaim that term). you've all been infected by 4chan brain and you don't even see it because you've convinced yourself being a coldhearted edgy bully is cool and that being shitty to, for example, people with social anxiety is funny and aligns perfectly with your progressive persona (you reblog posts about social justice but you're a dick to everyone you've ever met and you have no friends because you're a negative person who is genuinely unpleasant to be around)

image credit goes to: @batmanreturnsnineteenninetytwo

and did you know that randomly deciding to make asexuals or polyamorous people (people who deviate from the norm) the butt of your jokes and calling them freaks and shit is actually progressive? everyone has just been slowly and slowly becoming more mask off disgusting and it's wild to me. on tumblr.com, you people are being shitty to anyone who deviates from the norm? i mean. who am i kidding. this website hates trans women and people from the global south more than anything so i haven't believed tumblr was a truly "forward-thinking" space since i was a naïve young teenager.

people who lose their shit about tankies. people who clutch their pearls about misandry and "transandrophobia"... people who accuse all palestinians of being scammers. people who send suicide bait and debate with bigots they should really be ignoring. people who make fun of people with a complicated relationship with sex or with social anxiety. you freaks are everywhere and you're all ridiculously reactionary, you just dress it up as progressivism and how to be cool on the internet or whatever. i'm SOOOOOOOO tired...

100% a line of thinking inspired by this very spot-on post, as well as the interaction that had in the comments with @deepseasmetro - thank you!

tumblr is a flimsy ego-boosting platform that's filled with bullies who hide behind their politics and relationship with oppression meanwhile they don't give a fuck about anyone who has less than them, who has it worse than them. it's all about the oppression olympics, looking cool, and punching down. obviously most of us with a head on our shoulders know this already but it truly never ceases to astound me tbh 😐

it's the same people posting inspiring poetry & textposts about kindness and love and small animals that are out here telling teenagers to kill themselves!

anyway. while you're here please donate to hamada and mohammed and heba and her father bakr ⭐️

[bioethicists]

Your post about unfollowing people who’re really combative online made me think about someone in particular. Apologies if this is out of nowhere so feel free to ignore.

If somebody (with thousands of followers) who isn’t a part of a specific marginalised group habitually seeks out bad takes regarding them to dunk on, isn’t that a little weird? I’m not talking about defending your friends when they’re facing discrimination or dunking on the main bigot character of the day, but regularly seeking out bad takes from small accounts that’d otherwise never seen the light of day.

It’s nobody on here I’m referencing. I feel a little crazy because this person gets heralded as a huge ally and has a lot of people in this marginalised group who’re really devoted to and defensive of them but it just really rubs me the wrong way because they seem really discourse-brained more than anything else.

yeah haha ironically i think some of the ppl on that post are seriously missing the point (which i probably could have made clearer) in terms of some of them are like. people who clearly think being told they're racist is the same as the type of behavior i'm talking about.

but also yes! this is more what i meant- people who are seeking out fights with those who would otherwise never get any attention! especially when it's takes that are NOT popular or the response is just totally disproportionate. or just building a social media brand off of over-exaggerated hatred/meanness towards people who "deserve it". it reminds me of all the cis people on here who constantly reblog shit about like... putting terfs in meat grinders but then never even lift a finger (or, more likely, are part of the mob) when trans women are sexually harassed or viciously bullied.

i don't think joking about harming bigots is some grand moral wrong, but it's often just gratuitous in a way where... are you actually expressing outrage or are you using the performance of outrage to get followers? what if that outrage is directly putting people in danger (e.g, if you find a terf with 45 followers + start sending her death threats, is that helping anyone or is it potentially provoking more violence, which you know full well you will NOT be the primary target of). i can see how this behavior can result in members of certain groups defending you, because if nobody has shown their willingness to defend you, isn't it refreshing to see someone who will? it's not so simple, either, cuz i do think ppl who do this do CARE, but i'm not sure the way that they care is sustainable or would hold up to a real, complex situation where allyship is needed.

it's so contextual + i'm not arrogant enough to pretend like i'm the one who can see the context right 100% of the time. this is a little sappy but i feel like the difference is whether the root of the anger is love/hope or if its fulfilling your own desire to lash out/release tension/look good. like "i'm pissed because i care about my trans siblings + it hurts me to see them treated this way + nobody else is saying shit for them so i'm stepping up" vs "raging online meets a need in me that i'm not willing to acknowledge + here's the perfect target". not exactly that simple but sometimes u can tell someone would be a kiwifarms bro if they didn't need social capital from a different crowd, ykwim (which btw we regularly learn that certain leftists will comb through + disseminate kiwifarms shit if it fits their vibe, which is an automatic red flag to me that you only care about drama, not morals)

it reminds me of how some "callouts" are clearly written with the intention of preventing harmful people from maintaining the power to do more harm (e.g x popular artist sexts underage fans) while many others are clearly written with glee about someone turning out to be Bad (e.g x popular artist has a private twitter that i, op, SCROUNGED to find, where they say horny things about genshin impact characters)

[lily-orchard-gossip-blog]

If Lily really does follow some of these blogs (and I’m sure she does), it would be neat if she could read this message:

She goes on about how for YEARS she’s been the victim of constant harassment, criticism, “stalking”, etc.

Her friends defend her to hell and back on how she doesn’t deserve this, and she’s a sweet wholesome pun-loving woman who is just the damnest sweet thing.

Lily’s rebuttal for this CONSTANT criticism is that these people are mad at her for “not liking the cartoon show”, “weebs butt hurt about their anime porn” or “because she’s trans and/or Native American”

And I have to ask her; really? Do you genuinely believe that? Do you honestly think that there would be so much time dedicated to debunking your videos, MULTIPLE gossip blogs discussing your work/behavior, or even this many people talking about you via tumblr when your posts get, what, 20 notes max?

Speaking as a past fan, I don’t talk about you negatively because of your cartoon opinions. I don’t post on these blogs because you don’t like anime. And I CERTAINLY don’t give a shit about your identity (TERFS f**k off challenge)

I engage with these blogs because I think you are a horribly judgmental and toxic person, and the more people know this the better.

You wish death on people who have different political ideologies. You send your fans to harass people you don’t like past and present and show NO remorse (not even a “please don’t harass these guys” obligatory message). You CONSTANTLY view people who AREN’T YOU or your friends as opposition, even YOUR OWN FANS. You invalidate artists and have absolutely no respect for animation as a medium. You have this unmovable victim complex where you absolutely refuse to take ANY responsibility for your words/actions. It’s always someone else’s fault.

You perpetuate the horribly toxic setting of no one being allowed to say anything (and I mean ANYTHING) you don’t like at risk of making you upset. People can’t even like a different GAME as you without you throwing a bitch-fit.

Going off her own accord on this sort of behavior: Lily is a flat-out abusive woman.

But it’s her job to stay online and say what she wants to say.

She has a PLATFORM. She gets PAID BY FANS for her to do what she does. She has not changed since her Brony persona where she encouraged victims of bullying to beat their bully’s skulls in, and she continues to slip her toxicity into other fandoms like WoW and TOH.

People don’t hate you because of your takes, heritage, gender, or whatever your friends say people criticize you for.

People hate you because you’re a f**king toxic asshole.

That’s all I have to say. Duces ✌️

.

[thelesbianpoirot]

i love your blog i wish i could reblog things from you without being blocked by my pro trans mutuals :( the state of feminism and identity purity on this platform is so horrible

aww thank you, I understand anon I have ran several fandom blogs, and know how everyone monitors each other's behaviors, mainly "terf" interactions. If you reblogged from me you'll get a message that says "stay in line" and you'll have to say 20 hail marys (TWAW) and still you'll be on a watchlist. Don't worry, I was once in your shoes, I had a couple radfem/lesbian/or just outspoken women's blog bookmarked, and I would just browse their blog and never follow, like or reply to in fear, because I wanted to keep my online friends formed over videogames or movies or whatever. They can't see your thoughtcrimes, you are free to think on whatever you like!

[boreal-sea]

If you are a TERF or a radfem and you want to stop being a TERF or a radfem I can help you.

I haven't been in your exact shoes, but I've worn similar ones. Let me see if this story seems familiar to those of you who were "blackpilled" or "radicalized":

I was on a forum when I was in my early 20's. It was about women's health, and I hung out on the abortion debate forum threads. I hung out there long enough I ended up becoming one of the moderators.

As time went by, I became a bit offput by the way some of the pro-choicers treated the pro-lifers: being rude, sometimes even personally insulting people and crossing what I felt was the "line" of defending women's rights and just being plain old aggressive.

Sometimes, it seemed to me that the pro-lifers were the ones being abused and oppressed, not the pro-choicers. So... I went and found a popular pro-life forum. I started reading their point of view. I can't clearly remember if I was doing it to "know thy enemy", of if I was already feeling sympathetic to their point of view. I only knew that the health forum was a Pro-Choice zone and the pro-lifers were treated like invaders, so I think I wanted to go to the Pro-Life zone and see what it was like over there.

This did not make me popular on the health forums, and I remember I got removed from modship and banned for defending some of the pro-life users and telling off some of the pro-choice users for what I felt was ove-the-top behavior. I lost all of those friends and that whole community because I was defending pro-lifers.

You can see where this is going.

So, I now only had the pro-life forum for community. And at first, there was a lot of love-bombing and "patient" explanation of their viewpoints. There were a few people there who were aggressive to me, but I mostly avoided interacting with them. I was slowly indoctrinated into the pro-life way of looking at things. I still felt that a woman should have the right to abort if she was going to die, but I was, at one point, so deep that I was against abortion in the case of rape and incest. I, regrettably, made Gaia Online pro-life art collectibles.

Cringe.

Anyway, I was now in my mid-twenties. Again, this was over 10 years ago so the exact sequence of events is a bit fuzzy, but I remember getting into more and more arguments with some of the more aggressive forum members. At some point, one of them, an older man, decided to google the email I'd used to sign up for the forum with, and found my LiveJournal. He basically cyberstalked me, and tried to use posts I'd made over there to prove I was a bad person. This thoroughly freaked me out, and of course none of the moderators on the pro-life forum did anything about it.

Eventually, I left.

I ended up becoming pro-choice again pretty much instantly; I don't honestly think I was ever truly pro-life in my heart. I was saying what my new friends were saying, I was playing along. I could see the surface logic of their arguments and didn't know how to refute them. I never really truly internalized any of it - and for that, I'm fucking grateful.

So those were my cringefail years spent as a pro-lifer, all caused by the inciting incidents of seeing pro-choice people be "mean" to pro-lifers online.

So if you saw a trans person being mean to a terf online, and decided to go check out what the terfs were saying, and accidentally fell into their hole...

You can crawl back out again. And I'm here for you when you do.

[rjalker]

actually yes I am giving this its own post.

April 2024:

Sapphic-boy said some bullshit in the notes of this post defending sexual harassment.

I responded in a reblog with:

I'm putting this in a reblog instead of the replies because I don't want it to get lost and I don't feel like putting up with an arbitrary character limit.

People in the notes of this post are insisting that insults like "suck my dick" aren't sexual harassment or rape threats.

People, I know the internet just loves to normalize sexual harassment and other kinds of abuse, but it is 2024. You people literally cannot go around saying that telling someone to suck your dick is not sexual harassment.

That is literally the fucking definition of sexual harassment.

The entire point of telling someone to suck your dick as an insult is to literally sexually humiliate and degrade them. That's the entire point. That's why you say it.

That's literal sexual harassment.

No, it does not become magically okay because you're trans and you're doing it to "own the TERFs". Sexual harassment is always bad, no matter who's doing it or who the victim is. And yes, when you tell people to suck your dick as an insult, they are literally the victim to your sexual harassment, no matter who else they are or why you don't like them.

It is 2024. You people are adults. You are literally required to know how not to sexually harass people. And if you are arguing that telling someone as an insult to suck your dick isn't sexual harassment, you've failed step 1. You are literally sexually harassing people and now you're defending it.

You are not making the world a safer place for victims by normalizing sexual harassment like this. You do not get a free pass to sexually harass people because you're trans and you think you're progressive and you have good reasons for hating the person you're sexually harassing.

Yes, it is in fact, literally, sexual harassment and a rape threat to tell someone to suck your dick as an insult. The only reason you think it's not is because you're the one doing it so you think it's fine now.

Just because you're on the internet and not in a dark alleyway does not mean blatant sexual harassment stops being blatant sexual harassment.

Just because TERFs are the first ones to call you out for blatant sexual harassment doesn't mean your behavior is actually perfectly fine and not sexual harassment. That's literally fucking not how this works.

If the entire fucking point of your insult is to sexually humiliate or degrade or threaten someone? Guess the fuck what? That's sexual harassment!

Telling someone to suck your dick as an insult is literal sexual harassment! It is a rape threat! The only reason you think it's not is because you and your friends have normalized it and desensitized yourselves to it!

This kind of behavior is not fucking okay, no matter who you are or what your politics are or how progressive you think you are!

It is 2024. You people have all got to learn how to not sexually harass people. This is getting absurd. None of you would pass even the most basic fucking How Not To Sexually Harass Your Coworkers computer course at a minimum wage job.

Stop sexually harassing people if you call yourself progressive. Stop telling people to suck your dick as an insult if you call yourself progressive. Sexual harassment is always bad, no ifs, ands, or buts about it! Yes, even if you're trans! Yes, even if you're doing it to bigots!

Stop defending blatant sexual harassment 2k24! I shouldn't have to keep saying this shit to people who claim they're progressive and care about other people!

Watch some basic fucking How Not To Sexually Harass people videos! Go fucking find the websites that explain the concept of sexual harassment to children! Go do literally anything except double down on sexually harassing people!

Just because you are online does not make sexual harassment any less horrible! Just because you don't like the person doesn't mean it's okay to sexually harass them!

Morals are still supposed to fucking exist no matter who they're applied to! That the entire fucking point of them!

Sexual harassment is bad! Telling people to suck your dick as an insult is sexual harassment is bad! This is not a fucking difficult concept and I shouldn't keep having to explain it to adults who should know how to not sexually harass people by now!

If you think this reblog is derailing the original point of the post, then maybe next time don't defend literal sexual harassment in the notes of the post and make me have to see it when I was just looking for TERFs to block -.-

Please just fucking stop defending sexual harassment. This is not something I should have to ask people who claim to care about others.

Sapphic-boy responded with, on April 11th 2024:

Suck my dick.

and said stuff in the tags or whatever about me "not surviving in the real world" if I actually know how to recognize sexual harassment in its most basic, blatant form.

Sarcasm: Because you know, grown adults responding to criticism of bad behavior like 12 year olds who say slurs for fun or like any middle aged Republican man is definitely showing how progressive you are. End sarcasm.

No, seriously, people, you are adults and you think you're progressive but then when you're told that what you're doing is literally the definition of sexual harassment, you decide to react the exact same way any random shitbag Republican would?

Seriously? And you call yourself progressive? You think you're a good person? But your response to being told what you're doing is the definition of sexual harassment is to now do it on purpose, knowing exactly what you're doing?

This is the exact same reactionary shit you claim to hate conservatives for! Why do you think it magically becomes okay when you do it?

And, I hate to break it to all you fucking creeps, but just because you and your creepy friend groups have desensitized eachother to how horrible sexual harassment is, does not in fact magically make sexual harassment okay. If you think telling people "suck my dick" is, and I quote "the normiest insult ever"...

that's not a defense of your behavior, that's a condemnation of you and everyone you hang out with who encourages this kind of blatantly horrible behavior.

Sexual harassment is still sexual harassment whether it's being said in a scary dark alley or over the internet. You do not get a free pass to sexually harass people for any reason, and if you and your friends have become so desensitized to how horrific your behavior is that you literally are now incapable of even admitting that telling people to suck your dick as an insult is sexual harassment...

You need serious fucking help. You people are adults. No one should be having to hold you hand and explain to you that the most basic form of sexual harassment is in fact sexual harassment and is inexcusable and bad no matter who's doing it or why you dislike the person you're doing it to.

No, it doesn't matter that TERFs sexually harass trans people all the time. The entire fucking point of morals is that if you have them, you treat other people with basic respect even if they don't return the favor. TERFs sexually harassing trans people does not make it magically okay for trans people to sexually harass others. That's not how this fucking works. That's not how anything works.

Especially if you then turn around to sexually harass other trans people the exact same way. Now your argument that 'it's okay when it's TERFs' doesn't even apply, so you just need to admit you enjoy sexually harassing people more than you do having the most basic fucking morals.

Literally go and research how to not sexually harass people. It is your moral fucking responsability to not sexually harass people.

[sandover-days]

⁔⁔⁔ JUST STAY WITH ME !

DISCLAIMER: this needs to be redone!

hi there! you can call me pup or bow, and this is my sfw agere blog! i use he/it/(any)neos/they (in order of preference) and occasionally use she/her for myself ^^ i am a minor even outside of regression. i'm pretty sure i usually regress to one of these two age ranges depending on circumstances and what my brain feels like: 0-2 (or maybe 0-3, i'm not sure. i just know it's very, very small) and 4-6. when i'm small (and even when i'm big!) i love kirby, blues clues, bluey (the essential /j), lps, and way more! lps 1012 and tabby/lps 460(mostly her 2d promo art, because that's how she looks in new puppy on the block) are two of my biggest comforts!! i'm also fictionkin, my known kintypes are rico from beatcats, lps 1013/the puppy from the lps figures/the lps friends game, and daxter from jak and daxter (canon divergent in his case) ! not all of these sources are child-friendly, just a warning (COUGH canon daxter COUGH) i might start taking requests for something on this blog, but i don't know what, and i make no promises. this blog will mostly be used for viewing and requesting agere content. ramble posts will not be tagged in anything other than my blog-specific tags. any fandom agere i might post will be tagged with "[fandom name] agere" but not "[fandom tag]" as i am rather shy about people not in the sfw agere community seeing agere content for my fandoms, especially since i'm probably very recognizable.

⁔⁔⁔ DNI

please do not interact with this blog if your blog is or you are: lgbtphobic/terf/truscum/similar, transid/transx/similar, nsfw/kink/minors dni(i'm a minor and this is an agere blog, i don't have a problem with sexual stuff i just don't want it near this blog fir obvious reasons), pedo/map/shotacon/lolicon, ddlg(+variants)/abdl/ageplay/petplay/cgl) or sexualize agere or childlike behavior in general, anti-agere/petre or think of it as a trend/cool aesthetic thing, think regression must be cute and/or positive and cannot contain negative emotions or dark aesthetics, think diapers in agere are inherently sexual, proship/comship/anti-anti/similar, pro-ed/pro-self harm, anti-mogai, anti neopronouns, anti otherkin/therian/fictionkin, harry potter fan, dream smp fan (or fan of any of the people in it-- i can't be bothered to find out who's relatively unproblematic), discourse blog, support cringe culture, think regressors being romantically involved OUTSIDE of their regression is kink (i haven't regressed on the platform i talk to them on most of the time in a long while but when i did my partner would sometimes hang out with me if they were online and nothing in those interactions was sexual or even really romantic)

⁔⁔⁔ DISCLAIMERS & BOUNDARIES

i am neutral on label discourse such as mspec lesbians/gays and contradictory identities. i am not diagnosed with anything and do not claim to be. please do not refer to me as a "little" or call my regression "littlespace," it makes me very uncomfortable (for like no reason?? the terms aren't inherently nsfw why is my brain wonky about them). i often use alternatives that include the words "tiny" or "small," but you can get creative! you also may use the terms in reference to yourself or others when talking to me, just don't use them to refer to me. i have nothing against the terms, they just aren't my thing. i am not looking for a caretaker/caregiver/whatever word you wanna use. the reason there's nothing about serious irl stuff in the world on this blog is because all that gets put on my main blog which is not hooked to this one; i am not ignoring these events. i may miss jak a lot, but i'm not looking for him as my mems of him are romantic and i already have a partner whom i love very very very much <33

[the-ocean-is-trans]

my review of dear wendy by ann zhao is under the cut. going to be upfront and say that i DNF the book, i got about 2/3rds of the way and had to stop.

i'm going to start with what i liked about the story. i enjoyed the depiction of jo's family, especially her two moms and jo's close relationship with them. i liked that the fact that jo would go to her moms for comfort, and the fact that she went to school close to where they live was never treated as a bad or immature thing for her to do. this feels pretty important for a lot of anxious young college students actually; it's okay to want your family close as you navigate being an adult. i also found the scene where her 12 year old brother comes out as straight very endearing, and a fun flip of expectations but one that felt quite real for the context of her queer family.

i've also seen some criticism of the book saying that it was childish and immature to write characters as romance and sex repulsed, which i actually think is completely fine. some aroace people are romance and sex repulsed. if this doesn't represent you that's fine, but it might represent someone else's experiences. what i found childish and immature was literally everything else about the narrative.

the central conflict of the story (if it can be called that, because it was so trite) was about the two characters having...differing opinions on how to give relationship advice on their respective advice column instagram accounts ("dear wendy "and "sincerely wanda", for sophie and jo respectively)? but we are never shown why sophie has the conviction that wanda's advice is bad, or why it's bad to jokingly respond to people's relationship queries, and from jo's pespective, we don't get why she is motivated to sometimes give real advice, sometimes answer with a joke, and overall why she engages in the online discourse with wendy. i could not tell you what these two main characters motivations are, and i think sometimes in the narrative they even forget why they are fighting. the online insults also came off like they were written by someone who has never once witnessed any type of interpersonal conflict and was just giving an approximation of what human behavior is like.

we are told (not shown) that offline sophie and jo are this bonded pair of best friends, but all we get from their relationship dynamic is one of them saying some bland queer truism (TERFs are bad, it's hard to find other aroace people) and the other agreeing. seriously, most of the book is either internal monologue or external dialogue that comes off as the author preaching her own opinions. there is no character development.

in addition to lacking any character development, the characters are shown acting in truly bizarre and wildly selfish ways, but we are told that this behavior is...idk meaningful? deep? there's no self awareness. for instance, we are told that sophie has "mommy issues" (the actual phrase that sophie uses in front of her college professor, which that was also a whole thing) but we aren't ever shown any conflict with her family, and the couple conversations we get with her and her parents are a little stilted but overall pretty loving? like i'm also aroace and chinese and i do think zhao captured the conversational tone of an immigrant parent quite well, but i was not left convinced that there was much estrangement there. sophie even complains that her parents are only paying her tuition so that she will cross-register in some MIT classes???? seriously, complaining about your family paying your tuition???? in this economy???? this isn't shown with any amount of criticality. i think it would have been compelling to have sophie share this opinion, and have someone else challenge her on it, you know, in a way that causes some growth and reflection, maybe even portray some nuance in that yes it can suck to have your parents force certain expectations onto you AND there is inherent privilege in their support. in a book striving so hard to share it's political opinions, the missing race/class politics felt very noticeable.

then there's jo, who tries to keep her one roommate and close friend from professing her romantic feelings to her other roommate and close friend. we know jo is doing this because we have been told time and time again that she is afraid of all her friends ending up in romantic relationships and leaving her behind. which is actually kind of an interesting fear/motivation to have, and pretty relatable as an aroace person! unfortunately it's not developed well. the roommate/friend accuses jo of being "selfish" when she finds out which yeah, actually that behavior is pretty selfish, but rather than having jo reflect on her behavior or experience any kind of growth at all, we are just shown her crying and breaking down and not going...anywhere after that. not even so far as to realize that the thing that is keeping her friends at arms length is her intense fear of losing them, which i thought would be the logical conclusion of that arc?

overall, the narrative came off as being appropriate for middle grade, but the fact that these were supposed to be college students really threw me. i actually think if the novel was adapted to be a middle grade novel it could have been a bit more successful, because the central conflict feels much more fitting for way younger characters. it would have been amazing to read about these aroace characters' experiences of loneliness, estrangement, and building platonic love (ostensibly what the novel is about/being marketed as) but instead we got a bunch of shallow platitudes, preachy comments about queer discourse, and jokes that fell so flat I would not have known they were jokes but for the characters being described as "bursting into laughter".

look, there's a lot of pressure on young queer authors of color to shoulder the burden of representing their very underrepresented communities, which i don't think is at all fair. i'm not trying to judge this book on it's "quality of ace rep". it's a book about aroace people, and just like there are bad books about straight people, we should also be allowed to have a bad book about aroace people and not have it's quality be used as a cudgel to beat down a marginalized author. i do sincerely hope that ann zhao continues to write, and further develops as an author, because the premise of the book was promising, and i think with some more maturity, could have been handled quite well.

[annbourbon]

DNI List & General blog info:

DNI list:

First things first. If I don't like you I'll block you without even interacting with you so choose your words carefully. Now that that is clear, here are some of the most common things that will get you blocked from my list.

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Also known as Things You Need To Know About This Blog.

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[shinra-makonoid]

Making points doesn't mean "teRfS sHowIng IgnOranCe." Your attitude toward ANY question or criticism of queer discourse shows YOUR lack of critical thinking skill and cultic behavior. Actually this is why people are leaving queer community online/offline. One critical opinon and they get called "terf" and treated like a criminal. Your attitude is not healthy at all. You care more about policing & controlling others than about actual oppression or violence.

Bro you just don't understand biology and have moot points about society and use it to hate on people who are already vulnerable. I call you terf. Do you prefer me to call you guys victims of a hateful ideology fueled by conservatism? People stuck in the dark ages? Scum of the Earth? Stupid cows? Let me know I'm fully open to change the way I call you guys, no problem with me, TERF is just faster.

Radical feminism in general have much more in common with cults rather than "queer ideology", like the dimension of self help ("you can "fix" your gender identity if you believe it hard enough/if you do these steps), sacred bodies, recruiting vulnerable/confused people and manipulating them, rejection of medicine/technology, separation from family/friends for who do not believe the same way, internal belief that anyone who isn't in the group is an enemy to convert or destroy, etc. I don't have the same "ideology" as most of my LGBT friends, in fact we would probably disagree on a lot of things and I'm probably one of the less woke I know in my surrounding. I get blocked by "queer ideologues" constantly for not believing the same thing as they do. That's definitely far from cultist behavior.

Finally, in regards to my supposedly lack of critical thinking, I don't think you did even half of the thinking process that I did. You can look in the timeline of my Tumblr, my views changed with time and is pretty nuanced today. I looked at the large majority of arguments displayed by everyone that I could find. I've went on Twitter talking With GCs, I've debated many times with TERFs here, I've listened to many celebrities arguments, I've even talked to people who did researches on AGPs like Blanchard and Cantor, I've looked through scientific researches not done by them also. Not only did it made me lose any faith in feminism as an ideology (which also allowed me to talk to MRAs and see their views with an open mind), but it also showed me how much shit people make up and how much political environment can influence your beliefs surrounding your body and the "Truth" everyone seems to proclaim to have. I think i asked myself and other more questions about that subject than you ever did in your whole life, or your view wouldn't be "buhu you're the cultist! We can't spread misinformation, sophistic arguments and hate you freely without being called a mean word" (picture of the tiniest violin playing a sad song 🎻)

3/4 years ago I thought pretty much there would be a "lot of detrnaistion" because I was also worried for those poor people who got "mixed in gender ideology". And then time passed, and although I did know a few detransitioners, there is no data available today which is anywhere near what I used to parrot before. Even some detransitioners are starting to claim that they were recruited by radfems politically.

You know what we say? Only the stupid never change their minds.

If people are being recruited into hate groups it's often because they have something to gain from it or recruited by people fear mongering them by showing them a dozen of videos of weird people doing weird stuff or out of context shit or criminals that are not even 1% representative of the whole population, or shwoig them doctors being like "in my totally unbiased view this is harmful :'(". Basically manipulating them by using common biases that we know are associated with the human brain and constantly exposing them to it, and forming communities obsessed by those content. Researches done with the scientific method are less trusted than people with political agendas, which is crazy.

Actual oppression isn't being called TERFs online and being offended when I correct you on your bullshit. Stay mad.

[cacodaemonia]

I wanted to thank someone who recently messaged me with information I had been unaware of regarding @leias-left-hair-bun having said some racist and transphobic things and then been dismissive and rude to those who tried to explain to her why those things were hurtful. To be clear, this is not a call-out post so people will go harass her (if she comes back online). Don't do that. But since I didn't know about it, I thought others might not as well, and I'm sure many of you would like to be aware of this kind of thing, as I wish I had been.

I won't name names, but to the person who alerted me, thank you again! I spend very little time on Tumblr, block and filter a lot of usernames, and don't scroll, so I'm very grateful that this individual took the time to have a conversation with me rather than sending vague anon asks, like a couple I've gotten in the past few months and just went ??? at.

I also wanted to apologize for hurting anyone inadvertently with my lack of knowledge. I didn't intend to hurt anyone, but it doesn't matter that I didn't know—I should still apologize. And I realize that's probably worthless, but it's all I have to offer besides letting people know the basics of what happened.

@omiomicron, @leeleebee, @alamogirl80, and I approached LLHB (only one of us spoke with her so it wouldn't seem like we were ganging up) as people who have been friendly with her, though I know others have done the same to no effect. It was made clear that we wanted to help her understand why she had hurt people in order to prevent her from doing further harm, but also that we didn't think she had done harm intentionally. Harm is still harm, whether or not it was intentional, but in any case, she refused to accept any responsibility for the things she's said, and was more focused on semantics and her opinion on other people’s pain, rather than the pain itself.

I'm a firm believer that, when you know better, you should do better, so when LLHB simply insisted we would have to agree to disagree over some very serious, fundamental issues, we decided the conversation was over and blocked her.

As I said, this is not a call-out post, but I think the matter is serious enough that I had to point out who was involved or it would just be another useless vague post. Everyone is racist to some degree or another because of the society we live in, and that's not an indictment of anyone's character, but if you are given an opportunity to change your views and behavior, and don't take it, that's something that shouldn't be overlooked.

The specifics of this instance aside, I want to talk about why this situation occurred in the first place.

The individual who kindly contacted me also pointed out how things become very siloed on Tumblr, since people often have to block others for their own sanity. I, for example, block many usernames and filter those usernames from tags and post content so that I don't see their posts when people I follow reblog from them.

Related to this, a couple months ago a friend of mine pointed out something I hadn't realized: in TCW fandom there's a small group of very aggressive, vocal antis who lumped in "problematic" shippers with racists, pedophiles, TERFs, etc. We were constantly bombarded with vague but abusive messages made up only of buzz words meant to evoke moral panic over fictional writing. The messages were so abusively vague and hurtful that it was a matter of protecting one's mental health to ignore them. I want to make it clear that calling out racism is not harassment nor being abusive. However when antis conflate legitimate criticisms of racism with shipping discourse it is very hard to separate out which were genuine call outs of racism and which were harassment under the guise of performative action. Antis do use racism as a buzz word in their harmful repertoire but not all racist call outs are anti behavior.

It's really unfortunate, too, because I and many people I know started out supporting the unwhitewashTBB movement and those heading it. Most of us have the same anti-racist goals in RL, after all—though I choose not to participate in activism on Tumblr because I personally think it's one of the worst places for it. But when I saw how hateful and cruel many of the people in that movement were to others (including BIPOC with differing opinions on fandom issues), I stopped reblogging their stuff and eventually unfollowed and blocked them. My opinions on racism and whitewashing haven't changed, but because of that movement's obsession with policing others' opinions on fandom matters, and viciously attacking anyone who disagrees on fandom matters, I stopped supporting them.

To be clear, this is not an excuse for my own ignorance of LLHB's behavior, but more an observation of how unproductive it is to try and lump fandom discourse together with RL issues like racism. While fandom racism and racist media is a big issue and people should be educated on it, the problem is people are unable to separate fandom discourse from it. This is the package deal of being in fandom but a clear separation of fiction and reality would minimize incidents like this.

In any case, all this has made me realize that interacting on Tumblr in anything more than a cursory, fandom-only way is a waste of time for me and only opens the door to cause harm. I'll also admit to being pretty damn salty that, while I stood up to the antis to take the heat off others and try to make people less fearful of openly shipping clone characters together, only one person could be bothered to tell me I was associating with someone who had said nasty things and point me in the direction of evidence.

I'm in fandom to escape from the trash fire that is real life, as are many of my friends—BIPOC, white, queer, neurodivergent, etc.—and I recognize that my ability to nope out of this situation is a privilege that many people don't have. But I'm not going to sacrifice my own mental health to be involved in a community that is toxic and harmful towards anyone who has differing opinions on fandom issues. It's not just racism anymore but rather anything that doesn't fit into some groups' ever shifting moral goalpost. I am not on Tumblr 24/7, and I don't feel that anyone should be held accountable for missing out on the avalanche of posts related to fandom discourse and drama. Personally, I don't have the spoons for any of that bullshit.

I still don't condone racism but from now on I'll be filtering anything relating to discourse, RL issues, antis, fandom police, etc. and will probably not read or respond to comments on or reblogs of this post.

[rotationalsymmetry]

Obviously I’m going to regret everything because this is the internet, but —

Social media conversations are not like non-social-media conversations, or at least not most of them, and people cannot expect them to follow the same rules.

If I’m talking on the phone with my uncle, I can get into the weeds of “ok let me gently walk you through why that thing you just said was kind of ignorant” and if I’m having dinner with my parents and they get someone else’s pronouns wrong a few times I can be patient with that and if a friend makes a joke that has somewhat racists overtones I can be very gentle pointing that out. That’s because I know all of these people. Most of the ”fuck you fascist” stuff on the internet — some exceptions of course and he’s not wrong that there is a also phenomenon of internet groups rigidly policing for perfectly consistent ideology within the group and that’s toxic as fuck and I avoid those groups when I recognize they’re doing that and recommend that everyone else do the same — does not actually happen between people who know each other, who have a relationship, who have reasons to assume good intent.

It’s pretty consistently the online equivalent of something like this: you and your friend are having a conversation that you want to have while on a bus or at a restaurant or walking down the street or whatever, and some complete fucking stranger leans over to tell you you’re wrong (you’re probably female and he’s probably male. In person. Not necessarily on social media, where the risk of getting physically assaulted is different and power plays out differently.) And you tell the dude to fuck off. And yeah part of that is they’re wrong in the content of what they said, or at least you think they are. But also part of it is they’re barging in on your conversation, and people generally don’t bother with polite when pointing out a stranger’s rudeness if, again, they’re not worried about the small but concerning risk of physical assault. (Or perhaps of looking overly aggressive to someone they actually care about.)

If Tim Minchin actually wants to try to change the minds of random strangers who like to pick fights on the internet he’s welcome to, and so is anyone else. I suspect it’s a more constructive use of time when you put ideas out there and allow people to come to you, but maybe talking kindly to people who are spoiling for a fight might work as well, I don’t know. But virtue signaling is not the only reason people get gnarly on social media, and I don’t think most people are really under the illusion that calling out strangers is an effective way to change their minds. They do it to get them to fuck off with minimal inconvenience on the part of the people who want to just continue their conversation without being sea lioned. And yeah of course there’s also cases where people could be kinder without encouraging more casual asshole behavior, but are pattern matching and going “oh I guess this is how people talk about social justice.” The problem there imo isn’t that people ever get hostile when declining invitations to internet debates with strangers. The problem is failing to recognize when contexts are different and behavior appropriate to telling strangers to fuck off is not appropriate to pointing out to a friend that they’ve said something kinda clueless.

Finally, there are multiple related non-conservative categories of people that are not the same. Liberal is not progressive is not radical, and none of these things are entirely the same as the social justice movement. The goal for white etc people who want to be good allies is often a better world for everyone. But that’s not necessarily the goal of a marginalized person on social media talking about their marginalization — often in practice the goal of a black person talking about race online isn’t To Make The World A Better Place, it’s to vent with people who see things the same way — likewise for a trans person posting a “terfs fuck off” image, or a woman complaining about the manspreader on the bus, or an activist who does their real work offline and comes online for the memes. Social media is primarily social, it’s the equivalent of hanging out with friends or at least people you kinda know with beer or pot and nowhere you have to be for a little bit, it’s downtime. And people (mostly) want to be able to be down, to not be on, to not be doing work. And sometimes the most efficient way to do that is to tell people that you don’t really want to socialize with to go fuck off. And maybe to call them something that will discourage them from sticking their nose in your business again next time. Anyways, that’s what my compassionate side has come up with the times I’ve been told to go fuck off, fascist, and to go check my privilege, and so on. (Even if I still think they were fucking wrong about the rest of it. People get to be wrong about things when they’re trying to just talk about their lives with friends.) (And part of this is coming from a place of being very aware that I’m worse than average at picking up on social cues, so if someone else thinks I’m fucking up socially usually they’re right.)

And as far as in-group call-outs go, I think there’s a lot to be said for groups that normalize streamlined call outs: ones that neither spend extra words on insulting the person nor extra words on being super gentle, but just do the equivalent of “your fly is open.”

“that’s a slur.” “Use x term instead of y.” Etc.

In person with people you know and like when you don’t have that norm established, it can be worth doing the dance of “I don’t mean that YOU are a racist, of course it goes without saying that your intentions are beyond reproach, I just mean the thing you said is maybe possibly sorta kinda not maximally anti-racist” or whatever, and hope that that works. But damn it’s nice when you can just go “oh, use this other word instead” and the other person goes “ok, sorry, I didn’t know, it’s edited now” and that’s the end of it.

Tl:dr sometimes people are prioritizing personally having an acceptable social media experience over changing the world, and that’s ok.

[just-antithings]

I will say, the first time you see a mutual or friend reblog something with anti undertones, message them about it.

I know it's easy to get anxious and angry when you see obvious anti posts on your dash - that's the defensive feeling we've all built up after putting up with this shit for years - but when messaging someone, be as kind and as careful as you possibly can.

start with the basics: emphasize that you respect them and enjoy their blog. say that you saw them reblog that one post (and link the post if possible), and you're concerned for them, because the post seems to have some terf dogwhistles in it. ask what their opinions are about the post, and how they feel about the topics in the post.

if they're a full-blown anti or react with anger and violence, you have your answer - communicating with them won't help very much, and you can unfollow them and move on. tell them that you disagree with their points but that you're not trying to start an argument, you just wanted to know what they thought.

if you want to and have the spoons for it, offer to continue the conversation later. thank them for their time, say they're free to talk to you about these topics if they want to know your thoughts, and disengage calmly.

on the other side of things, if the person reacts with relative politeness, try to gauge how they felt about the anti post. they might not know its origins in terf rhetoric! but there's a chance they may have already bought into some of the messaging. if you can, reframe their opinions in a way that makes sense to them and shows that you care about how they feel. some examples:

"Yes, of course! Protecting children is very important, and in fandom, it's our job to properly tag our fics and art so that parents can help their children avoid them. Minors engaging with NSFW content (problematic or not) is a big problem these days, because internet education has really slipped since the 90s."

"We should definitely find better ways to teach kids how to avoid content that's not meant for them. Parents and guardians need to learn how to develop trusting relationships with their kids, so they can have those tough conversations with them about how to spot grooming and abusive behavior online. Kids should always have a trusted adult they can tell if they see something online that makes them uncomfortable."

by reframing the "think of the children!" argument that antis love to post about, you can focus on what the real issues are when it comes to protecting children - and if the person you're talking to is open to this discussion, it can help lead them back from tipping over the anti edge.

remember guys: the anti-ship movement uses cult-like manipulation techniques to draw people in. if you show people in your fandom that you're open to kind conversation about topics related to protecting children, you may be able to help people break free from the anti mindset - or at least, step away from it if they're not fully in the "cult" yet.

I'm not saying that it's your job to do this - it's a lot of work to have these discussions online, and even a good talk can be emotionally exhausting. but if you have the spoons for it, you can really do some good, and show people that you're reasonable, good, and safe to know - the opposite of that quote about Lord Byron.

providing a safe space for people who want to leave the anti movement is one of the best things we can do to help them - the same with survivors of any cult or cult-like religion.

great advice!

[liquorisce]

the conversation around “hating men” is a nuanced one

while you weren’t the one to make the statements within your last reblog the content very much irks me and it seems like you agree with what was said at least in some aspects.

black and trans men are not being killed and discriminated against bc they are men they are being killed and discriminated against bc of the minority they belong to. throwing these minority groups under the bus in a attempt to make a flawed point is an issue not to repeat myself but there is nuance and intersectionality to this conversation. using their identities as gotchas for the sake of “defending” them is so odd considering the perpetrators of most of those crimes against them are men.

women are not claiming they hate men and then going onto murder them, they are not killing men who don’t smile back, nor are they beating them black and blue at a moments notice. It is men who perpetrate this behavior and it them who are the common assailant. obviously it’s not all men and i hope you understand that.

I can sympathize with young girls who claim they hate men bc they see the terrible things men do to others, I can sympathize with grown women who express their hatred of men and ache with resentment and hurt, but mostly I can sympathize with them because I know at the end of the day I know that these women and girls have sympathy for the other side even in all of their “hatred”.

I’m not at all playing the “who has it worse” game but we see how black women, indigenous women, women of color, white women are the ones being brutalized in double and triple the amounts men are for the sole reason of being a woman.

There’s just such a major difference between teen girls on the internet saying they hate men and grown men being violent and cruel to anyone they choose. Misandry doesn’t exist I’m sorry. until I see (I pray not) men dropping in the same way women do because of women i will never take the idea of misandry existing seriously.

It’s in China where we see a young woman being dragged out of a restraunt to be beat by men because she refused to sit with them, it is in Canada where we see little indigenous girls being plucked off the streets and being taken advantage of, it is in America where men pluck away at black trans women freely without punishment, it is my friends who have no attraction towards men being pushed into marriages back home or be killed in the name of “honor”

I’m sorry for being very high strung and bothered by this but as someone who I genuinely respect I am very conflicted at the reblog and statement u put out.

Hi friend! I appreciate you discussing this with me. and I am in agreement with most things you have mentioned. and I think the crux of that post and your feelings can coexist, I will try in my own clumsy way to explain why I think so.

answer below bc some of it is personal, I hope you will be patient with where I am coming from

i actually agree with a lot of what you say. i am also from a similar place with women being forced to marry men, where child marriages are common, where honour killings are rampant because of the dishonour a girl brings to her family. i am not discounting any of that. and I will fight those till my last breath.

i fully recognise the terror women go through just because they are born women, and I am tired of screaming it to the rooftops. i also will stray away from the "not all men" thing, but I still stand by the point that following a lot of the online man-hating discourse invariably leads to terf circles. i followed it myself and found myself in places that made me very uncomfortable.

i think the crux of that post is simple "values ought not to be assigned by gender" and the slope is slippery going forward bc by now intersectional feminism really ought to include queerness as well. (and it can) . even more so than "values ought not to be assigned to gender" is the fact that quite often it is an entry way into the clutches of radfems. ONLINE. i mean its just an unfortunate thing that is getting really loud of late.

frankly the point that really resonated with me is somewhat personal. i have a cousin who is a transman who is struggling with transitioning. and has faced immense bullying at the hands of young girls who called him awful things like gender traitor, and essentially cause a lot of mental harm to a person like him who has grown up on the internet with these girls as peers, who talk about misandry like it is a cool thing. consider it from his pov: having been raised as a girl along with its patriarchal pitfalls and expectations, to finally try to seek comfort in his own skin by identifying in his true gender, only to see that the feminism that led him there is suddenly so hostile to him. it is a stupid thing IMO, but this stupid thing can really contribute to severe anxiety and depression amongst young queer folks. and it is just not necessary. i don't think it is wrong to speak out on that front while also speaking out against the horrifying experience of living as a woman.

There’s just such a major difference between teen girls on the internet saying they hate men and grown men being violent and cruel to anyone they choose. -- this is true, and I think there is a big difference and it is ok to talk about the former once in a while. i think especially young girls can be taught to have nuanced conversation at a young age to avoid turning out like JKR, bc we can talk to them about these things and make them aware of the effect they have on their peers. if you think comments by these girls are "harmless" I just want to point out that it is not. i don't think we can equate the kinds of harm they cause, bc it is radically and disproportionately different but it can still be called out. i believe that's what the post I reblogged spoke to. it is probably not cishet men who are harmed by this but by queer individuals, and I think there is space in my politics to include both.

also while i say it can be called out-- I think the context you bring up and the context of that post are wildly different and should not be used to derail from each other. they are different and can have their own spaces and should not be compared to one another.

misandry does not exist - no it doesn't, not really the way misogyny does, but yet girls use the label in a trendy way (and this underlying 'coolness' concerns me honestly) and cause harm to their young peers perhaps inadvertently or perhaps purposefully. either way, a small minority is affected and when they talk about it (like OP who is a part of this minority), I think it should be respected. i would not want my cousin to talk about his experiences and be shot down. bc it harmed him and his experience deserves to be talked about as long as it is not talking over the experience of women who are oppressed, bc like I said they are two distinct things that deserve their own space.

MOST IMPORTANTLY IT IS HOW EASY IT IS TO FIND YOURSELF IN TERF CIRCLES! WITH THE MAN HATING DISCOURSE! i cant repeat it enough and I worry for the young girls growing on the internet, bc I worry that they will not grow up with the sympathy that some of us other women have for men despite our frustration with them. they grow up with an algorithm that pushes non-nuanced arguments in 160 characters that are similar to the posts that they engage with. so they fall deeper and deeper down a rabbit hole that is concerningly trans exclusionary radfem. that is deeply concerning to me, bc it shapes the politics of a generation of girls, who could instead be pushed into inclusive feminist values and activist work.

also the post in specific responds to talk of andrea dworkin who is very staunchly radfem and has been met with a lot of criticism even within feminist circles. i looked it up and maybe you could too and you might understand a bit better the pov of that post in specific

thx for the talk! i hope i could explain myself properly

in case i couldnt explain myself on OP's blog you will see that he also agrees with what you are saying but the main point he wanted to make is about how such talk is quite often a dogwhistle for terfs and if you see a lot of the hate that he has received, you will see that he is not far wrong T_T

i fear the internet just has the loudest awful people and I hope ppl stay safe from them