#because that is NOT a radfem

[ocularose]

[trixxedheart]

It is amazing how the "people that love and uplift transwomen" website will instantly fucking maul a transwoman if she even remotely insinuate that using radfem rhetoric harms trans people

[direquail]

One of the many things I find funny and irritating is the slant of a lot of interpretations of Alecto's name (that it's about feminine rage)--on this here wlw internet in the year of our lord 2024, it's easily made to figure as rage against God, or rage against patriarchy, or religious oppression, and therefore an allusion to the idea that she's going to get her vengeance on John for betraying and oppressing her somehow, but like

John is the one who named her Alecto. He's the one who named her that. So, naming her "Alecto" is alluding to the embodiment of John's rage--their rage, since they are joined inseparably (John even explicitly says that when he first perceives her: "You wouldn't stop screaming. You were so scared. You were so goddamn mad").

He says of Alecto to Harrow, "In a very real way, you are [Alecto's] children". At a very surface level, Alecto is (depending on the text or tradition), one of the Furies--famously, in several surviving Greek tragedies, who punish Orestes for the crime of killing his mother. In fact, in Aeschylus' Oresteia, they declare that they are specifically bound to avenge matricide.

So the name "Alecto" alludes to the nature of John's mission and how he sees it.

It also implies that his divine rage, the rage that gives him power, the power that makes him divine, that he either represents or wants to represent, is feminine rage. He was chosen by Earth (which, Furies are sometimes the daughters of Gaia); he is her champion, however he's managed to fuck that up. Once the truth of that comes out, it becomes clear that all of his power comes from her.

And that's why you get statements from Tamsyn Muir like:

“[T]he God of the Locked Tomb IS a man; he IS the Father and the Teacher; it’s an inherently masc role played by someone who has an uneasy relationship himself to playing a Biblical patriarch. John falls back on hierarchies and roles because they’re familiar even when he’s struggling not to. Even he identifies himself as the God who became man and the man who became God. But the divine in the Locked Tomb is essentially feminine on multiple axes – I think Nona will illuminate that a little bit more."

So yes, he plays the role of Emperor and God and Teacher, with all of the things that implies. And I don't think it should be discounted. But he also is (and partly sees himself as) the chosen champion of a goddess, or what is for all intents & purposes for a human like him a goddess. He is her avenger, and while she sleeps, her avatar.

And I don't think we're meant to read him purely as a parasite who's taking advantage of her to gain power for himself, either. Or an oppressive, Kronos-like figure. Especially if you consider Palamedes' theory of the Grand Lysis, even if he was purely motivated by desire for power before (which I really doubt), there are parts of each in the other, now. What was clear and separate before is uncertain and interpenetrated. Is his rage his own, or hers? Is his mission of revenge his, or hers? If he wants power, is that his own selfishness, or her desire to survive?

And does it matter?

[dukeofankh]

While I am still worried by the increasingly radfem tone on Tiktok, all the grumbling aside...It was cool to come on here and be reminded of the like, sex positive and non-radfem version of feminism today. Like, you know. The side that won the Feminist Sex Wars, and for good reason.

That hasn't consistently been the case on here, like, I left for a good chunk of time, largely because the radfem and crypto-radfem stuff got REAL bad after 2016. But like...there has been a noticeable shift. I see so much awareness and pushback on that sort of stuff, a lot of it being done by trans men, and sex workers, and other great folks. It might not feel like it, especially some days or when you run across a particular post but like...

Like, other spaces are years behind y'all. Most of them honestly don't seem to even acknowledge that there even are different schools of feminist thought, much less discuss the differences and engage in intra-community dialogue. I dunno if it's the algorithm vs. lack-of-algorithm difference, or just the fact that some people have been in these communities for several decades at this point, and there's a lot of wisdom here.

There isn't exclusively wisdom here, but hey, it spreads here. People pass good stuff along, not just the bad...but emotionally arousing stuff. That does feel like it's the lack of an algorithm at work. But that lack just means that the website isn't getting in the way of the good and hard work being done to like... make sure we see everyone in this struggle as whole and complete people. Even people who are kinky, even people who are horny, even people who are men.

So yeah. Thanks.