#been seeing Much Discourse about this on the internet lately for some reason and that's my 2 cents

[kazz-brekker]

i feel like everyone on here saying that even if rhaenyra peacefully took the throne daemon would definitely cause a civil war to make sure one of his sons succeeds her are forgetting that (a) daemon's eldest daughter was going to be queen of westeros one day and his grandchild through her would be heir to the throne (b) daemon is like 15 years older than rhaenyra so barring her death in childbirth or some unexpected accident she would probably outlive him anyway

[cherrymoonvol6]

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[19catsncounting]

I Got Really Into Anti/Proship Discourse And Read +30 Academic Studies - My Findings

(It’s a Yapfest but the whole post is a very long essay and study on morality and fiction and children’s safety and rape culture with a fuckton of freely accessible academic articles and resources on the subject, and I want to talk to other people about it. For a shorter abstract with all the articles and more easily ignored yapping, see my shiny new Carrd:)

It’s been a little shocking lately to have certain discussions with some parts of fandom. I spoke about shipping/harassment and how that contributes to the death of fandom on TikTok assuming that younger folks are just really, really intense about preventing sexual violence, but the more I saw the words “morally wrong” and “disgusting” and “addiction,” the more I thought about this guy-

That’s Jerry Falwell, and I fucking hate this dead guy. You see, Jerry Falwell was a preacher who hated porn, feminism, and homosexuality. And I'm seeing his rhetoric and reworked quotes a lot.

Jerry would say stuff like:

“Pornography hurts anyone who reads it - garbage in, garbage out.”

“Someone must not be afraid to say ‘moral perversion is wrong.’ If we do not act now, homosexuals will ‘own’ America!”

Jerry wanted people to believe that it’s possible to see so much sexual content that it warps your sexuality, because he was gay and wanted to think that was due to thinking about gay sex too much. Jerry did not have a lot of evidence to prove that homosexuality was harmful, so he relied heavily on how “morally distasteful” it seemed to be to suburban Americans.

I spent the majority of my teen years arguing against Jerry’s rhetoric for the right to live as a lesbian online, and I never thought I’d see morality rhetoric in people I’m otherwise very politically aligned with. And I definitely never thought fandom of all things, in all its beautiful subversive glory, would seriously start advocating for censorship, anti-porn, and to consume fanwork with moral purity.

So, I’d like to have a deeper discussion on it, both here on Tumblr and on TikTok, but that does mean checking a few things at the door:

Personal feelings decide your personal life. What you feel is valid for you, not anyone else.

In general, things that do not cause direct and undeniable harm should not be broadly prohibited just because they’re weird or distasteful to the majority of folks. Ex. Loitering does not cause harm and is a tool of systemic oppression.

The discussion of “fictional CSEM” is the most inflammatory fork of this and it is often used to derail these kinds of conversations. This is all I will say on it - the legal status of explicit visual depictions of minors is muddy. In the US, there is just one dude in Utah who pled guilty for possessing explicit lolicon he bought by mail order without also possessing CSEM with real children, and explicit writing about fictional minors has been settled as protected free speech. Dedicated organizations from the NCMEC to Chris Hansen have asked that fictional content is not reported as CSAM as it is not actionable and clogs up finite resources. 90% of NCMEC reports were not actionable last year. There are studies suggesting that virtual CSEM or other non-victim alternatives could reduce actual child harm, but there is need for further research.

We’re all in agreement that untagged NSFW is not cool, and kids deserve kid-only sections of the internet. People who are triggered by or dislike problematic content deserve to be able to not see it. 👍

 (I’ve seen the argument that blocking tags/people should not be required - sorry, PTSD still requires that you manage your triggers, up to and including swearing off platforms just as I have sworn off bars/soap brands/etc to avoid my triggers.)

I have found a lot of accessible and free articles and studies that I will link throughout so that we can discuss the fact-based reasoning, in an effort to have a civil conversation.

(Also because we are not flat earthers, we are Fandom, and if we’re going to be annoying little shitheels in an “Um Actually” contest, we’re going to have the sources to back it up.)

Minors and Explicit Material

I’m not supporting minors engaging with explicit material. I have such little interest in the subject that I’m not even going to bring in articles, but you can feel free to. I personally engaged with explicit material as a preteen of my own free will and did not find it to be harmful, and the majority of people throughout human history have been exposed to explicit material at an early age with varying degrees of harm. There are undeniable legal and harm-driven differences between a 12 year old girl looking at Hustler on her own, a 14 year old boy being sent nudes from a grown woman, and a 6 year old viewing PornHub. (And I think the guardians of that 6 year old should be charged with grooming just like the woman, tbh.)

Personal Disclaimer

I’m an adult survivor of CSA and incest. I’m a happily married adult. I don’t personally like lolicon/shotacon/kodocon. I don’t like kids. I don’t like teens. I’m personally not attracted to underage fictional characters. I have family, the idea of fucking any of them makes me want to throw up and die, so I don’t write or read RPF of my family.

I am really, really fucking intense about preventing sexual violence, supporting survivors, and fandom, which is where this all comes from.

I read and love problematic fiction - my favorites are ASOIAF, Lolita, and VC Andrews. The most “problematic” thing I’ve personally written are Lucifer/Michael fics from Supernatural back in 2012. They are “brothers” in CW Christ, not blood. They do not have any blood.

Gen Z and Online Grooming

In 2002, a survey of 1500 minors from 10-17 found that 4% had been solicited for sexual purposes by an adult online.

In 2023, that number increased to 20%.

While the linked 2023 Thorn report suggests that the vast majority of these inappropriate interactions happened on platforms that allow for interpersonal communication, which by and large minors were greatly discouraged from and had less access to in the early 2000’s, a trauma-informed approach does not allow for blame to fall on the children. The guardians of those children have monumentally failed to restrict and educate before giving children the means to access those platforms.

It is my uncited but personal opinion that the increased rate of grooming, as well as an increased interest in combating rape culture, has led to well-intentioned individuals to become digital vigilantes attacking those who they hold responsible for their traumatic experiences in a search for catharsis and justice denied for themselves as well as a desire to make the internet safer for other children, whom they are increasingly aware are entering online spaces unsupervised at distressingly young ages.

Is harassment and bullying bad for perpetrators of it?

Before we get into how ship-related hate campaigns do not affect predation or combat rape culture, we should acknowledge that it’s actually pretty harmful for the people who cyberbully. Not just in the legal/social consequences, but people who participate in cyberbullying and cyberhate campaigns have higher rates of depression, estrangement from their parents, self-effacing habits, social anxiety, lower empathy, and so forth.

One study suggests that the treatment and prohibitive for cyberbullying, which contributes to a culture of cyberhate and a lower likelihood to report or confront other incidents of harassment or toxicity online, can be combatted with media competency to increase empathy along with other important life skills.

Some Common Pro-Censorship Myths

“Pornography is Addictive/Consumption of Pornography Leads to Increasingly Hardcore Imagery And Ultimately Real-World Violence” - The American Psychological Association does not recognize Porn Addiction as real and the DSM-5 does not classify it as an addiction. Additionally, many methods used in articles claiming that porn is addictive or causes users to seek out more hardcore material were flawed or biased. There is actually some evidence that compulsive porn use, the closest you can get to a porn addiction diagnosis, is associated with shame and the user’s belief that pornography is morally wrong, which sex-negative attitudes encourage.

“Jaws caused shark culling” - That's unfortunately a simplification that ignores a LOT of surrounding context. WW2’s modern naval battles with an increase of ship sinkings and thus contact with sharks prompted the invention and use of shark repellant by aviators and sailors in the 1940’s. The most deadly and famous shark attack of all time was the USS Indianapolis sinking in 1945, which led to 12-150 deaths. The 1974 book Jaws by Peter Benchley, which was the entire basis of the movie, was inspired by One Fucking Dude who started shark hunting tours and overall seemed to have a really immaculate vibe. The interstate highways that finished in the 1950’s increased beach tourism in the 60’s and onwards, inspiring the American surf culture, further increasing the cultural desire to purge sharks for the new swath of beachgoers and their fondness for using surfboards which make them look like seals to sharks. Additionally, 1975’s Jaws inspired a huge desire for education about sharks, and the relationship between problematic media and education will be the core of this yapperoni pizza.

“The Slendermen Killings/Other Fiction Inspired Crimes” - The ACLU states that “There is no evidence that fiction has ever driven a sane person to violence.” Inspired crimes are indeed no less tragic, and thankfully rare, but people who suffer from inability to discern reality and fiction do not necessarily need fiction to commit violence. The “Son of Sam” murder spree was not inspired by a book or movie, but instead Berkowitz��� auditory hallucinations.

“Violent videogames DO cause violence” - After a great deal of funding and study, the American Psychological Association has concluded that teens and younger may have increased feelings of aggression and not necessarily physically violent outbursts as a direct effect, but older teens and young adults do not encounter statistically meaningful rates of aggression.

“Your brain can’t tell the difference between fiction and reality” - Factually incorrect. Children as young as 5 years old can tell the difference, and they can even be more suspicious about “facts” that come from sources they know also host fiction, such as TV shows.

“This stuff shouldn’t be online because it can be used to groom a child” - While I could not find specific statistics on how often pornography is used to desensitize child victims, nor how often that is specifically used in online grooming, and especially not how much of that pornography is made from fictional characters - out of a mixed group of convicted offenders with adult and child victims, 55% of offenders used pornography to manipulate their victim. I would never refute that explicit fanart or fanfic could be used to desensitize a child, but that is by far not the only tool (asking about sexual experiences/identity, making jokes, etc is extremely common grooming behavior), and there is no evidence to suggest that it is used to a statistically significant degree. In my own anecdotal experience, normal vanilla legal pornography is used with far greater prevalence, and there isn’t a similar movement to shame its production for that possibility. Nor should the creators of any material, pornographic or otherwise, share blame in the actions of a predator.

The Fiction Affects Reality Carrd

(No hate to the person who made it, in fact I give props to them for trying to find unbiased sources, I just want to point out that their interpretations of their articles are kinda flawed and one of their studies is a kind of a perfect example on small and culturally biased samples.)

Reading Fiction Impacts Aggressive Behavior - (I cannot access the full study but this article is the primary source used in the Carrd and it goes into detail) - A study showed that 67 university students were more annoyed with a loud buzzer after reading a short story about a physical fight between roommates compared to a story with nonviolent revenge. However, this study was conducted at Brigham Young University, the same campus where we got a whole video series of hot ethical takes like “I’d rather shoot a kitten than drink coffee,” so uh. Yeah. Kind of a prime example on why it’s important to have large and culturally varied sampling. (Another BYU study with 137 BYU students being odd about moral ambiguity in fiction, just because I’m starting to add Dr. Sarah M. Coyne to my list of “Sarah’s That I Dislike.”)

Your Brain on Fiction - a NYT article that describes Theory of the Mind and how fMRIs captured how readers’ minds would light up centers of muscle control when reading sentences like “Peter kicked.” The quote “The brain, it seems, does not make much of a distinction between reading about an experience and encountering it in real life; in each case, the same neurological regions are stimulated” is speaking of motor functions. Emotional centers of the brain were not included in the study.

How Fiction Changes Your World - a Boston Globe article that actually describes how people who read more fiction are more empathetic and tend to believe in a just world. It does not state that the empathy a reader feels for fictional characters extends to corrupting their moral compass. In fact, there’s such a thing as a “fictive license” to explore taboo themes more thoroughly because it is not real - 123 participants were interviewed after watching two actors play the part of detective and murderer being interviewed, and participants who were told it was fake had more varied and inquisitive responses.

The Social Impact of Books - Actually reuses the previous study about the just world, so point remains. Empathy is understanding, not mirroring.

Is Problematic Fiction Good for Survivors of Trauma?

It absolutely depends on the individual.

Writing expressively about traumatic experiences has been shown to be effective to reduce depression, or more effective in reducing dysphoria and anxiety than talking to fellow survivors, and Written Exposure Therapy is broadly prescribed to survivors of trauma, with one study centering on car crash survivors finding that WET resolved their PTSD symptoms and continued to be effective after a year.

In this study, which sadly is not available online but it is too important to leave out completely, survivors of CSA were given fictional novels about CSA and in closely reading and analyzing those stories, were able to understand their own experiences and were indeed drawn to write about their own experiences as well.

Engaging in problematic fiction, like all fiction, allows for consent as well as control. If at any point a survivor does not feel in control or wishes to stop, they can at that instant. They can even rewrite their narratives and take control of their story in fictionalizing and changing the account. They can even try to understand what their abuser felt through fiction, which is helpful considering that the vast majority of survivors had a relationship that had been positive and even loving with their abusers at times.

Is Problematic Fiction Good for Everyone Else?

It again depends on the individual.

Antis might be a little right that most people don't want to read problematic stories. In a study exploring whether fiction can corrode morals, 83% of study participants stated that they would prefer not to read a short story justifying baby murder if they had the choice, even if that exploration isn’t inherently harmful.

This very small sample study of 13 participants discussed how young women interpreted sexual themes in writing, including explicit fanfiction, and how that was beneficial and informative to explore sexual desire and examine healthy and unhealthy relationships in a safe and controlled environment.

This meta-analysis further discusses how problematic and sexual themes in YA literature are useful to illustrate what sexual violence looks like, and begin educational conversations through those depictions to break down harmful myths such as “if she didn’t scream, she wanted it.”

Empowered by the “Fictive License” previously cited, problematic fiction can be beneficial for anyone who desires and is capable of consuming and analyzing it.

This study analyzing abusive aspects of three films - Beauty and the Beast, Twilight, and 50 Shades of Gray - concluded that these abusive themes should be discussed to increase recognition and awareness, not censored based on those problematic themes.

This study of 53 women were asked to read different versions of fictional intimate partner violence flags, or “toxic behavior” like surveillance, control, etc. In every version of the story, whether the female or male had those behaviors either courting or committed, the women recognized the behavior as wrong.

Another study that reading allows for the moral laboratory to explore morality in fiction without decisive impact to corroding moral permissibility.

Is There Ever Any Point Where Fictional Interests Definitively Speak On Someone’s Morality?

In short - not really. Loving Jason Vorhees does not put you at risk of murdering campers as long as you know he’s not real. Writing Wincest does not mean you look forward to family reunions, as long as you know incest isn’t okay in the real world. The real world, where real people are harmed, is where you find the measure of someone’s character.

This Psychology Today article is the best source I could find for quotes from a fantastic book ‘Who's Been Sleeping in Your Head? The Secret World of Sexual Fantasies’ by Brett Kahr regarding taboo sexual fantasies and how they are not only common, but not inherently harmful.

There are people who enjoy problematic media in an entirely nonsexual sense, of course. I myself don’t get off on problematic media - I think it’s just interesting to explore different experiences, and I think that can be revolutionary.

Additionally, fantasies in general have almost always been in the vein of “things you don’t want to really happen in reality.” In a study of 351 asexuals, more than half reported that they fantasize about having sex, but that doesn’t mean that they actually want to. You can fantasize about dating Billie Eilish - it doesn’t mean that you’d be happy dealing with celebrity culture.

(I personally fantasize about the internet being just for adults, but in practice I think that would be incredibly harmful and isolating for at-risk youth and LGBTQ teens) Fantasies always pluck out only the bits of reality that you want to engage with.

If You Get Off On Fictional Kids, You’re Attracted to Something About Them Being Kids

Not inherently, surprisingly. Wearing a schoolgirl uniform is a pretty common roleplay, and it’s not meant to “fool” the participants into thinking they’re indulging in pedophilia. There’s a wealth of emotional and sexual nuance in that specific kink - innocence and virginity play, tilted power dynamics in ‘scolding’ the uniform wearer for dress code violations, even the concept of a sexually provocative “teenager” can be played with without shame, because the world of fetish and fantasy is separated from condonable actions for the vast, vast majority of adults. (The only study I could find on this is this small study of 100 white guys found on Facebook, which itself states it is not definitive, found that while there might be correlation between attraction to children and interest in schoolgirl uniforms, there is no proof of causation. AKA, the rectangular pedophile might indeed like square schoolgirl uniforms, but not everyone - in fact, the majority at nearly 60% in this very survey - that likes square schoolgirl uniforms is a rectangular pedophile.)

Even sexual age play between adults is not indicative of pedophilia because it exists in a setting between two adults who fully understand that the mechanics are completely fake, allowing the power dynamics that would be abusive between an adult and child to be ethically explored.

I don’t have an official-looking study to cite, but I have asked people who like content about underage fictional characters why they do so. Overwhelmingly, a lot of the ones who like underage age gaps like the fantasy of an older and more experienced character taking a younger one under their wing, to have the opportunity to commit violent and blatantly objectifying harm and yet try to create what inevitably does not truly pass as consent, but seems near enough to the characters. Some think that the characters themselves have an interesting chemistry. Some read underage fic and still imagine the characters as adults. Some like to explore the feelings of shame that the older character must feel and how they mentally compartmentalize to go forward with the relationship, and how the younger character found themself in that vulnerable position - which is exploring a harmful situation through fiction to understand how it could play out in real life.

People who like fictional incest like exploring the shameful components of that taboo relationship - and I have seen a lot of works that compare how bad incest could be to other harms, like the Gravecest route in a game with parental cannibalism. And then there are folks who like analyzing the codependency of having one person fulfill every social need - family, friend, lover, AKA Wincest.

What makes a predator if it’s not just sexual attraction?

90% of CSA survivors know their abuser, discrediting the still-entirely-too-popular Stranger Danger myth. And shockingly, only 50% of abusers are pedophiles.

That means 50% of child molesters do not have sexual interest in children because they are children, but they victimized children because they are more accessible in lieu of adult partners, with increased rates of incest.

While I could not find a specific study on the relation between dehumanization/objectification of child victims and child molesters (and if you find one, please send it to me!), this study speaks on dehumanization as a precursor to adult sexual violence.

This study, conducted on convicted child molesters in prison, showed that child molesters tend to fantasize about children while in a negative mood, further contributing to the theory that child victims are dehumanized prior to abuse.

This very small sample study found that in a mixed sample of internet only/contact crime/mixed offenders, offenders who had contact with children had lower rates of fantasizing about children.

In short, half the time a child predator is someone who wants to offend against a child regardless of attraction to the fact they are a child.

Resources To Recognize Grooming/Abuse Victims/Predators

I would absolutely be remiss to not share my collection of resources to help detect signs of abuse/grooming as well as warning signs of a predator who may be targeting elders/women/teens/children:

Darkness 2 Light is a fantastic resource overall, this page details stages and signs of grooming.

RAINN personally helped me through my PTSD journey, and this article detailing the signs of sexual trauma in teenagers is thorough and non-judgemental

Signs of abuse as well as warning signs of predation that does not use gendered language nor play into the Stranger Danger myth.

Education, not Censorship

I think a lot of the energy against taboo content among young people still has a lot to do with the desire to end rape culture. The tools that we Millennial Tumblrinas gave you Gen Z kids were snatches of leftist theory, deplatforming, and voting with your dollar, so it’s reasonable to think that removing taboo content like pedophilia, incest, rape fights rape culture.

It doesn’t.

Rape culture is fought by education. Comprehensive sex education, education about consent. Talking about what consent looks like, what sex can look like, what rape can look like.

There should be more taboo content to talk about these things, to show all the shades it can look like. From a violent noncon to fics that aren’t even tagged as dubcon yet still are in shades that are hard to suss out, we should talk about it.

A Non-Empirical Example Of Good Media Analysis and Education to Combat Rape Culture

Let’s use the example of Daemon and Rhaenyra Targaryen’s relationship in House of the Dragon. Canonically, in both the book and the show, they have a romantic relationship that appears for the most part to be positive (the show being more contentious but I dedicated an aside to Sarah Hess and our beef at the bottom of my Carrd, but feel free to ask how I feel about writing producers with any variation of the name ‘Sarah’) despite an age gap, a sexual relationship that began while Rhaenyra was a minor, and incest - the problematic hat trick if you will.

I have seen anti-Daemyra shippers condemn Daemyra shippers for “Condoning grooming, age gaps, pedophilia, and incest.” Which is not just a broad, inaccurate, and harmful statement, it’s not at all constructive or educational analysis.

It would actually be beneficial to say “Daemon is grooming Rhaenyra as a teenager with gifts, devoted attention that takes advantage of her isolation and vulnerability, frequent nonsexual touches, the extreme desensitization to sexuality in the brothel visit,” etc etc. And even so, it is not useful to say that people cannot still ship the relationship and acknowledge those aspects. They might want to further explore the issues of consent in their dynamic in fiction, they may want to strip away some of them with narrative reimagining. Some might want to ignore the taboos completely and indulge in the fantasy entirely, and some might find the actors hot as hell - AKA, anyone who watches the show.

It’s honestly a little similar to me in how Jerry Falwell would tell his followers not to watch or read or take in any media that dealt with homosexuality unless it was condemning it - even Will & Grace was on Jerry’s shitlist. And so, Jerry’s followers missed out on a lot of media that could have educated them about queerness, could have humanized queer people for them - and that did not make queers go away. Just like ignoring or shutting out media about incest, rape, and other forms of sexual violence doesn’t make those things go away - it just tends to make you less informed, and little less capable of empathy towards people affected by those subjects.

So let’s stop shaming those that ship a complicated dynamic - you get less fanworks exploring those taboos, and less of a discussion overall. You shut down the morality lab of fiction, and to be honest, it’s wet sock behavior.

Some FanFiction Specific Studies

How dubcon fanfiction can flesh out the intricacies and messiness of realistic consent

A review of darkfic written about Harry Potter in 2005 (which, I will personally attest has never been outdone in how profoundly taboo those works were)

Interviews with 11 Self Insert writers who wrote on themes of rape, abuse, control, yandere, etc, and how that was beneficial to some who had experienced sexual violence themselves

Conclusion:

H…holy shit, you actually read all of that?? Congrats dude! That is a lot of time and brain power to dedicate to any one thing!

By the way, I am not really gifted at writing articles or any of that junk, and I tried to make my hyperlexic ass a little more accessible instead of bringing out all the $5 words. I am literally just an autistic who took a couple technical writing classes over a decade ago and really wanted to sort out my thoughts and try to have a platform for discussion. Also, I am really fucking bad at math. I failed two different college level statistics classes twice each. Gun to my head, I could not tell you what a standard deviation is, which is why I worked entirely with the percentages.

And I do want to have a discussion! I would in fact like to not report anyone for sending me gore or death threats or any of that stuff! I don’t think everyone will agree with me, in fact I’m certain that you could find studies that contradict some of mine, and I’d love to discuss them!

I’m sure it will still be tempting to throw around accusations of pedophilia because sometimes, confronting your previously held beliefs is incredibly uncomfortable. If you could not do that, that would be great? I don’t like being compared to someone who profoundly abused me just because I have a different opinion on how to combat rape culture and empower survivors. If you can do that, I’ll do my absolute best to be cheerful and welcoming and respectful as well. 😁

PS - I’m also not really going to be phased if you call me weird or cringe - I am. Always have been. Cringe, weirdness, and autism have made me do and capable of doing some fantastically neat and impressive stuff. But if you try to say something like “proshippers are too yucky and weird to be in fandom” - I’m going to have to refer you to your similarity to Kate Sanders of Lizzy McGuire fame, you “prEpz >:(“ - [My Immortal, legendary author unknown]

[dapg-otmebytheballs]

I hardly ever go on twt (it's too open it's too exposed it's too algorithmcally driven nowadays, it's not my thing) but ofc as many others have pointed out, that kinda dogpiling and harassment over anything that's not meeting a purity standard is not exclusive to twt, it happens a ton on tumblr too. I don't say this in defence of twt (bc I don't have a horse in that race anyway) but more to explain why I say anything about this stuff happening on another platform: I don't want to get complacent. I don't want to act like it's something we are unaffected by here, I have seen people driven off, harassed, doxxed, gossip about them spread through public and private channels, all over some random fics or posts that didn't pass a purity standard (or often because of some personal conflict which people dogpiled on and used vague accusations to weaponise against someone they had personal beef with, that's also common enough)

On twt of course rage bait and seeking engagement means something more than it does here because of algorithm reasons, but even so we should know not to tolerate dogpiling, not to tolerate doxxing, not to tolerate harassment campaigns because that's not something tumblr is free of. DnP have never minded fic of themselves we know that already. Hey have read and joked around with smutty fic about them, they have outright seriously said that they don't mind the fic. They are also as of late using quite sexually charged language in their videos let's be real. As someone else pointed out, anyone who is still watching dnp is being exposed to nsfw language like that already. Anyone who is uncomfortable with talk and content that's nsfw in any particular way has the responsibility themselves to not engage.

Every space every person every blog and account is not going to be minor friendly sfw, that's just how it is, and we shouldn't expect people to take responsibility for other people who might see their stuff. If minors are entering spaces that host adult content be it any social media site or youtube or ao3 or whatever, it's up to minors (or their guardians) to keep away from content that could be bothersome by blocking tags and people or filtering content. But that doesn't make it the responsibility of every adult just living their adult lives to never say anything nsfw bc some minor might see it bc that's just ceding ground to the "keep every part of the internet child safe and family friendly" kind of shit social media sites have been pulling which both 1) makes the waters murky and makes spaces much more dangerous for minors and 2) in practice is only used to get rid of queer shit as we have seen on tumblr

When discourse starts up anywhere it's gonna have people think on it at least and form opinions and share ideas, and I only bring this up because I hope we can keep away from repeating harmful ideas, and especially from causing hurt and harm to others in the community just because we didn't ike something they wrote or said.

Tldr: Dogpiling and harassment does happen on Tumblr also and should never be seen as acceptable. DnP have never minded fic. "Think of the children" rhetoric is harmful. And a side note: 'porn addiction' is not real it's pseudoscience

[skye707]

How would the riddlers react to someone coming out to them as trans ? I really love your blog !! always bring me comfort when i feel a little down, so i have to ask this

Unburied - That's awesome! I mean he already hypothesized as such (of course he knows, he can read people like a book), but he waited for you to tell him yourself. So, as much as it is a welcoming feeling for you, he feels just as loved. Someone trusts him enough to open up that very personal aspect of their life to him? He could shed a tear, but he won't. Not the look he's going for.

ZY - Disregard for gender norms and societal pressure to fit into a finite box? That's pretty metal. His core belief is that human progress is all about thinking outside the box, and someone who has the guts to challenge centuries old thinking is definitely capable of such. You've got his respect, that's for sure.

Dano - Oh! Okay, wow. He's a little internet cretin, so he's more than familiar with the ignorant discourse that too many people experience when making the decision of coming out. So, naturally, he is now going to be your own little watchdog online. No, he's not going to tell you, he's gonna do it behind the scenes you might say. Point is, if you decide to come out publicly, no one is going to bother you. For any reason.

YJ - Ah, that's so cool. You trust him enough to present the truth about yourself. That makes him feel super special and warm and fuzzy, and now he's a stuttering mess again. Even goes a little pink in the cheeks. But also, he's a little jealous of your confidence. That's a huge decision! Maybe you could give him some pointers?

Gotham - I see, interesting. Tell him more, if you're comfortable with that? He's such an analytical little bean; he's got to know everything! More than that though, his friend has just released new information to him about their personal life. As such, he needs to file all of it away in his little mental filing cabinet for later use.

BTAA - Ah, congratulations, kid! A metamorphosis, you might say. How artistic! That gives him an idea for his next puzzle!! Next time you see his beautiful face on the news, you can hold close to your heart the knowledge that you and your spectacular story of self-realization played a key role in the creation of his magnum opus.

Arkham - That's great, now help him move this piece of scrap metal out of the way. This Ed is not overly concerned with the details of the human body. Machines are more his speed. Don't mistake the disinterest for insincerity, though. He does care that you thought so highly of him that you would come out to him. He's just emotionally constipated; his own emotions included.

BTAS - Really? How intriguing! Like Gotham, he wants all the information you can give him. Not just so he can say he has the info, he genuinely wants to do everything he can to make you feel comfortable and safe around him.

Telltale - Hm, congratulations. He doesn't even flinch. Grandpa has been everywhere and seen everything. Absolutely nothing phases him. However, does it seem like he's being a little nicer to you lately? A little less grouchy? Probably not, but maybe.

(p.s., I'm really happy for you, anon! You should always be yourself, no matter what that looks like, and I hope the people in your life hold the same sentiment 💙)

[commander-gloryforge]

okay bit of a ramble incoming but. me and writing, we havent had the best relationship lately, mostly because ive been dealing with imposter syndrome a lot, and writer spaces dont seem to be as welcome as they used to be to me. but for the past months ive been trying to get into a more healthy mindset about writing. its just difficult because many of the author communities im apart of dont seem to agree with said mindset.

so. heres a thing that happened. theres this book series, a ya romantasy, that kind of went viral on booktube/booktok for being mostly shitty. i've watched a couple of reviews of it, most of them negative, can generally agree with most criticisms of the book, and it is, in my mind, ticked off as a "bad book". dont be like that author, dont do what she does, dont write like this, everyone will hate your book.

me and my father were sitting in the garden, next to eachother, me writing and him listening to an audiobook. he tells me about how good it is and how much he likes it. theres dragons, its so cool, its such an interesting world, he's at book two now and cant wait for the third one to be released. to my surprise, its the exact book that booktubers everywhere talk shit about. now ive seen people on the internet that liked the book, but theyre just some guys on the web and i dont know them and their opinion doesnt mean much. but my dad? i know him. i know his tastes. and he likes it.

and i think that made me realise something. i still dont like that book, but someone, a person whose taste and opinions i (usually) value, does. he doesnt care about the plot holes that others see, he doesnt know about the discourse surrounding certain tropes, he likes it because its fantasy, and theres dragons, and theres magic, the fact that theres a disabled protagonist is cool to him, and THERES DRAGONS! and so many other people also like it. for whatever reason.

its a "bad book", apparently, thats what most people call it, but to some its a good book. and if someone just constantly keeps finding issues with a book, then it wasnt for them in the first place wasnt it? critiques and negative reviews and rants are still valid and, i'd say, needed. but in the end, they dont matter much. the book isnt offensive or "problematic" or anything but it really is just kinda bad and people still like it and it really is fine.

my writing is gonna be bad to someone. my writing style is convoluted and kind of silly and just. bad. okay. and there are people that still like it. that doesnt mean i dont want to improve and get better as a writer, i do. for the people that like my stuff, for myself, i will get better, but like. its fine. im fine. someone will like what i write. there will be bad parts of my writing that some people will hate, and some will ignore, and thats the fact for every book and every kind of art.

ill be fine. ill just keep writing and things will be fine.

[brandileigh2003]

why do you think athors are unhappy and taking fics down?

This has been talked about a good bit lately.

Search fandom etiquette. Or fandom discourse. Others have worded it better than I can

But, what it comes down to is ... Each author is different. The way their fic has been received, the way that comments, anons, negativity, etc all effect them.

You mention being happy. I don't know that it's that.... Exactly. It seems like fandom is shifting. And that's natural in some ways. But. Things that have been rough... Personally and to some posts I've seen... Is that negativity and people being rude seems to be on the rise. In comment sections and inboxes.

And I know that some people say don't put your work on the Internet if you don't expect some criticism.

But. This is something we do for free. Bc we love it. We want to explore this world and the characters.

And fandom has always had golden rule of don't like don't read.

Except people are ignoring that. Or else they are just going over the line of the unspoken... If you don't like it, don't say anything about it. Not publicly where the author can see it.

I've seen the potluck example. We're all bringing something we put time and effort into. If you don't like green bean casserole, then please just pass over my dish. If you think that you like green bean casserole but you don't like a specific ingredient I used, just don't eat it. You wouldn't get it and then complain loudly to someone about it or tell me it's awful.

The second thing that's been talked about lately is positive interaction with authors. There's been a drop in commenting lately and I'm sure there are lots of reasons.

But it can still be discouraging. I know that we're not owed comments. I know. However. We spent time creating this and many of us do crave for someone to tell us so, or ask questions, to know it impacted someone, to know what reader liked. Or we find out it's being rec'd and talked about other places. Which is awesome, and there's nothing wrong with that. What is a bit discouraging is-- a lot of authors would probably never see people giving positive thoughts and love to the story, and that a very small percentage, if any tell it in a comment or message.

But these conversations are easily found on reblogs by many mutuals.

So I am but sure if you're really asking if I'm unhappy and why I personally pulled my fics (and if not, I apologize). but I will touch on the "why" a bit.

I will admit that I got too caught up in that part of it, the validation, I guess you could say.

It was making me sad and discouraged with numbers. Or that I would get negative feedback. Or if something didnt "do as well" as my average.

And that made me realize that right now, I'm just making myself unhappy. And (besides the people who gave the negative comments or asks) that is ultimately on me.

Because at the end of the day, I should write and share bc I love it. I have a story that I want told, a certain characteristizations or situation.

I shouldn't write for validation reasons even if it amazing to know my work was enjoyed.

And then I should see that any interactions are a positive.

So. I tried to separate from that. And having them hidden takes out the numbers game.

And I've reread a few of my stories, and enjoyed them just listening and trying to not go into I need to edit this mode. So that has helped.

I actually also posted something anon to test it out and will pull it if I do obsess. I also turned off anon comments and ppl can't find me here.

And I've had wonderful people send me kind messages and support lately and that does make me remember that there are such wonderful people in the fandom and they very much outnumber those who are loud and rude.

And I've been sitting with that. Hanging out in my little bubble, looking at kind things that people have been saying.

I've been trying to start reading more wip, the backbone of fandom, trying to comment as much as I can on any of the things I'm reading and let others know they're seen and appreciated.

So. I'm not unhappy. I'm blessed actually. I have good fandom friends. I have amazing fics being written for free that I can read and have an escape.

I think that these posts and ones I've written out reblogged is just trying to spread info a bit about what some of us as fanfic authors are looking for.

[basedkikuenjoyer]

A very cool one to finally check off the list. I have been familiar with Serial Experiments Lain since I first got into anime fandoms in the early 00s. Even had the first DVD volume in my collection. But there was always other stuff I wanted to finish more and I felt like I got the basic idea enough to like, recognize when something else was referencing it. Know a lot of people who'd call it their favorite and it was easily one of the most influential anime of the 90s.

And now I've finished it. Series is kinda infamous for being hard to really summarize but the gist of it is we start on a schoolgirl committing suicide. Her classmates get emails from her after. One quiet girl Lain gets sucked into the digital world as a result. Shit gets weird. Really weird. Truth be told, the plot is secondary to a lot of cool aesthetic choices and ruminations on the growing relevance of computers and networking technology in society. Coming out in the late 90s, Serial Experiments Lain deserves its modern reputation for being prescient about that. Seeing it properly start to finish today though? What are my thoughts with the lens of hindsight?

It's...quaint. Might sound like I'm trying to be edgy saying that but at about the halfway point that's all I could think. Because it kinda feels like we're coming out the other side. There's a reason a series like Frieren, advertising itself from the jump as after the journey, has been such a blazing wildfire recently. I might have some criticism of specific "discourses" or whatever but on the whole you are seeing something shift as Zoomers take the stage. I think that'll click about the halfway point there. The oldest there by any definition are still under 30 and all. There's only so much culture can reflect your impact...but the more I see that taking shape the more I see the balance emerging. Y'all don't have that little shred of entitlement my generation has from growing up in "good times" so when you get a little older and learn how much you can influence things more locally...y'all like, do it instead of coming up with a bunch of excuses.

Point being, that's kinda how Lain feels watching it today. I've watched us go through the peak of prescience, circa 2014, and then it went supernova, and now we have a world where Facebook is increasingly a graveyard of AI comments under AI images. That specific example of the dead sending messages through the wires...yeah it's an annoying nuisance spam bot spoofing. Social media is a ticking time bomb, advertisers are gonna catch on. Not to go all Dead Internet Theory and all, but it has hit a point a good chunk of it is fake.

Meanwhile a site that tried to keep a bit of the old Internet alive like Tumblr is having a Renassiance. When you grew up with the Internet, you gained that resistance because the worst aspects of its impact were limited by the technology. Now people are learning how to compartmentalize it better. Nostalgia for the days of the corner computer desk reflects that.

Lain was kinda creepy and weird and thought-provoking in 2004 when I first saw a bit of it. But in 2024? This oddly nostalgic comfort food show. And I know that doesn't apply equally because Paranoia Agent is something I have more nostalgia for and it still hits that unsettling tone. I think the difference is Lain using high tech aesthetics so much whereas...you could kinda do Paranoia Agent in any era.

[artificialwizard]

Venting and rambling about ai art discourse

Feel free to ignore this + this isnt an invitation to argue back and forth with me about ai

My tag system on main for years now has been

#art = abstract art

#representational art = all non-abstract art

( + #dreamscape = art that can't be neatly categorized as abstract or representational + art that reminds me of dreaming )

Bc at the time I created this tag system i was very fed up with abstract art and modern art being dismissed as Not Real Art by some assholes and i wanted to put abstract art first in my space and have representational art be the one that needs a descriptor to differentiate it from "normal"/"real" art

Currently holding myself back from doing something similar to be petty about the never ending ai art backlash/discourse

Haven't been posting my abstract art or ai art online much lately but i still make a lot of both (+ getting back into writing and prob won't be posting much of that either). Sharing art online, other than with close friends, seems like hell to me rn.

Maybe someday i'll start posting my art again it just sucks that anytime i go on any social media from discord to youtube theres an 80% chance i see people shitting on the artistic mediums that i'm most passionate about

And its not like the ai hate train has slowed down the rancid attitudes around abstract art lol, not that I'd stop making AI art if abstract art was more respected

Abstract art is the easiest and most rewarding way for me to express myself creatively and it gels so well with my perfectionism issues bc perfection is Not the point (except when it is, but then its an artistic choice not a constant obligation for every piece). A piece about grief doesnt need to have perfect straight lines or symmetry, the art can be messy if it suits the tone I'm going for.

And AI image and music generation is very exciting to me! I've always been curious about what it would be like getting to see the creation of a new way of making art and its been very cool being able to somewhat follow AI innovations since 2018 and then get to experiment with it myself once more ai tools became accessible!!

Whether im the ai art im making is abstract or representational, i love not having full control over the result! I love bouncing ideas back and forth with the AI. I love having to combine my visual art skills and my language/description skills.

I use midjourney et al. the same way I'd make my OCs in dressup games while brainstorming ideas. Mindless doodling that can often lead to writers block breakthroughs.

I also use midjourney et al. to make quick vent art when I'm feeling strong emotions just like I'd do in my sketchbook or in my digital art apps.

And sometimes i'm using ai to spend hours trying to make something very specific i want to create.

Idk its all just tools to me. Midjourney. Paint Tool Sai. Pen and paper. I get the same joy/relief out of making art with all of the above

Im not aiming for fame or money, i make 0-200$ a year from art, usually 0. I just want to have a little corner of the internet to share my images and reach a handful of ppl who appreciate them and want to discuss abstract & ai art with me thats it. Im not coming for your art job, i dont allign myself with corporations aiming to further disadvantage workers in artistic industries or artists who freelance

Anyway reason #2 i slowed down on posting art is grief has been kicking my ass these past 4 years. Lots of deaths in the family + death of a friend. some relationships were fractured and im grieving those as well.

Reason #3 is started full time library job in november 🎉 its wonderful and its exhausting and im still finding my rythm after years of being chronically un(der)employed and/or in college, but hopefully once life settles down more ill have more and more time to spend on art and writing

Havent vent posted in ages and it feels weird doing it on one of my art blogs so im going to end this with two of my recent(ish) pieces on grief, first made in onelab (not ai, android art app i make 80% of my digital art in) and second in midjourney

Thanks if u read all/most/some of that :)

Think i just needed to be like "man this sucks" so i can move on to "anyway! Art time >:)"

[beardedmrbean]

[Huey Zoomer anon]

You know I been thinking about the handling of abuse and dysfunctional family and how for some reason a lot of people just realizing the generational trauma…is there any millennials abuse survivors around? Were you taught to be narcissistic as fuck?

Me getting in social media: Man I hope I can find other people like me- why the fuck do most supposed abuse survivors have MY abuser narracism and victim complex?

Also people complain about how many villains these days have a sob story or a “redeemable” enough…actually I think a figure out

You see a lot of leftists are upper middle class people who grew up in a black and white society. They didn’t see the flaws of America until the 08 crash and going to college. Hence why they bitch about American imperialism

But when you a black person who learn their grandmother was a crackhead…and seeing generation after generation of single mother raising…

The left: You know that America did a lot of evil shit?!

Me: I was born on the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr ASSASSINATION! And my elders hammer down the rights I was born with were the PRIVILEGES during their childhoods

Sorry set up, so imo a lot of leftists grew up in the Hollywood oversimplified views of history, especially WW2, its miracle that allies didn’t start killing each other after Hitler died

But anyways, I think a lot of writers was to show that many villains have legit grips…but that like many fractions in history

Germany was fucked over by the Treaty of Versailles hence why Hitler and the Nazis gain power. Many criminals organizations was created to the lack of support and resources government created

Didn’t we all learn that but mid teens…or did these modern writers only knew the PG versions of historical events because of their shitty colleges and schools.

Thank fucking god assassin creed and hetalia encourage to research history and society more than the coastal fucks (not you) who make more in a month than I do in a year

There's trauma and abuse in every generation, we all just process it differently, tail end Gen-X and millennials were the ones who managed to finally make getting help a bit more ok, we still had things like Prozac Nation but managed some big strides there, but we were also guinea pigs for treatment and coping styles as well as classification.

There's that and the internet has a think about making all that shit currency you can trade for validation points.

Also people complain about how many villains these days have a sob story or a “redeemable” enough…actually I think a figure out

That's not new, though people have gotten more aggressive about it lately.

Post on here years back 'the only good nazi is a ex nazi' that one started up a whole world of discourse from the 'I want to hold people responsible for life' crowd, they get mad when someone turns their life away from hate and then proceeds to get other people to walk away too.

Not sure why, instead of one less nazi there might be dozens less as a result of their actions, some people would rather go with violence I guess.

Look at the folks that called Daryl Davis a white supremacist.

Sorry set up, so imo a lot of leftists grew up in the Hollywood oversimplified views of history, especially WW2, its miracle that allies didn’t start killing each other after Hitler died

Stalin knew better, given how much of his stuff was lend/lease.

Didn’t we all learn that but mid teens…or did these modern writers only knew the PG versions of historical events because of their shitty colleges and schools. Thank fucking god assassin creed and hetalia encourage to research history and society more than the coastal fucks (not you) who make more in a month than I do in a year

gotta look round and find the good stuff, then get other people involved in it.

If you do things like YT music or Spotify and take the free option you'll sometimes get a advert that's just some bands song, the record companies pay for that so they can wear people down and try to get that song stuck in their heads no matter how bad it is.

The idea crosses over into a lot of media, if they can make something seem like something everyone is involved with peer pressure and the need to be included takes over.

There's so much psychology involved in marketing, it's nuts.

Gotta manage to grass roots the actual good stuff, or at least the stuff you like and would like to see more of, if there's money to be made off of it someone will make it.

[pumpumdemsugah]

I’ve seen you post about the vagueness of ‘queerness’ in the past and tbh now I get it. This isn’t the only reason lately a lot of my friends who were queer have started dating men and it’s so interesting to me. Anyone can do what they like but as someone who has known I was gay since I was a kid—I cut my arm at 9, and when my friends mom hugged me to her chest and when her boobs pressed against my face?! Yeah that was the end of ‘straightness’ for me. Discovered a whole new world that day fr—and came out at 18, the idea of ever ending up with a man is a nightmare lol. Like sometimes I get these intrusive thoughts about men and honestly it makes me gag every time. For the most part I don’t even see them and that’s how I like it but a lot of my friends are like that and then bam, boyfriend. Granted these same people rebuke the lesbian title at every turn so maybe I should’ve seen it coming but it’s so weird to hear people go on and on about being gay and then come to find out they mean in an aesthetic way because ‘pussy is gross’ lol.

Lool how you knew you were gay

The problem with modern inclusivity is some of are just straight. Not ohh bi dating a man and considering how much easier it is to do that, it's going to happen but heteros that grew up on a social media that thought being straight is cringe and they aren't cringe and they think women are pretty so 🏳️‍🌈 when they actually aren't. The same thing goes for most American internet 'leftist'. Bruv you're just embarrassed of calling yourself a liberal because it's cringe

People don't want to admit that the current community is infested with heterosexual and hide behind are you saying they aren't bi? You think pum pum is off putting and the genital discourse has been a gift for these people. In 3 to 5 years minimum, many will look back and not want to admit that they encouraged straight people with entitlement issues to call them homophobic slurs because of " reclamation" and ran down anyone that rightfully clocked on.

[dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram]

I'm maybe a bit late to the party, but I do think there's been some important American-specific context missing from the larger conversation about the Taylor Swift and Matty Healy stuff, and the fan response to it. I'm not saying the context changes the larger discussion about what politics is and what people should be trying to do, but I think it does have explanatory value for what people are thinking about, what references they might have in their head.

First, I think there are two distinct issues that have been unfortunately blurred by the broader discourse, largely because of an accident of timing. Matty Healy first appeared at Taylor's concerts in Nashville, seemingly confirming the relationship that had been reported in the tabloids (because they'd also said he'd be there). At the same time, a lot of fans who had been disappointed in Taylor's lack of explicit statement about anti-LGBTQ legislation in several of the states on her tour created an expectation or hope for themselves that Taylor would say something in Nashville about the TN drag ban, because in the past she's centered her political statements as a citizen of Tennessee. And obviously, Taylor did not say anything, and so I think you have these two largely separate things - Matty Healy and her silence on these bills - being mixed into the same conversation in ways that aren't very productive. (Tbh I personally don't find celebrities speaking out on bills like this to be very politically useful, but I also think if Taylor felt that way she probably shouldn't have publicly said the phrase 'I promise to always advocate' for protections for LBGTQ people. Like, questions of political efficacy aside, I do think there's very valid space for fan disappointment.)

So, that said, I think some part of the fan backlash Taylor is receiving is about her silence on these bills, not fans wanting her to dump Matty Healy (and some people have been very good about separating these threads of argument, some people have been deliberately combining them into a larger statement, some people have just been blurring them completely). And while I don't really think yelling at celebrities on the internet to speak up about terrible legislation is effective politics at all, I do think I kind of see where it comes from, which is where the context comes in. To make an extremely complicated story much shorter, one of the early waves of the current anti-trans panic resulted in an anti-trans bill passed in North Carolina in 2016. For complicated and largely racial reasons, organizing political action in NC is extremely difficult (also in 2016, a UNC democratization researcher declared that NC technically couldn't be considered a democracy. it hasn't gotten much better, an abortion ban was passed there just last week after an elected representative who was elected as a Democrat explicitly on a platform of protecting abortion rights abruptly switched party affiliation last month and voted for the bill, giving Republicans a veto-proof majority - it's a wild and deeply unsettling story.) However, what did happen in the wake of the 2016 bill was a massive cultural backlash - concerts in the state were cancelled, TV and film projects were moved, businesses pulled out of the state, the NCAA refused to consider the state as a potential venue for the incredibly lucrative men's basketball tournament while the law was still on the books - and ultimately the worst parts of the law were repealed in 2017 in response. A lot of young Americans at that time experienced that as a major soft power/cultural rebuke that led to actual political change, and so I think calling on cultural figures with a lot of soft power like Taylor Swift to at least say something is an attempt, if clumsy (the economic harm was much more effective than the cultural rebuke), at recreating that moment, especially as more and worse bills are being passed with nothing like that 2016 consensus response. Like I said, I don't think it substantially changes the substantive points you've been making about what is and isn't politics, but I do think it's useful for understanding the reference points young Americans may be holding in their heads (consciously or unconsciously).

Thanks for this ask anon - I found your thoughts and perspective really interesting.

You made me realise that I haven't been very curious about the calls from fans for Taylor Swift to speak about politics. It's a response to the world that combines putting a lot of emphasis on the political importance of speech acts and also really expressing desires to control what other people do - both of which I find very annoying. But this is a good reminder that even (or maybe especially) things that annoying to me are worth being curious about.

I had known a little bit about the laws in North Carolina and the backlash, but I hadn't realised that this was the lesson that at least some people had taken from it.

America is a terrifying place to be right now and the question of how to fight is a live and active one. And what really matters is that people are fighting collectively. People learn so much from trying to change the world alongside other people - and the idea that we're stronger together than we are alone is true of developing strategies as well as anything else.

I also totally get having an emotional reaction and a desire for something from the celebrities you follow. If you check my posts in the lead up to the Irish repeal referendum, or the 2019 British election - I really wanted 1D members to say 'Vote Repeal' and 'choose socialism over barbarism'. That feeling is a really normal part of being a fan and was there even though that I learned who Harry Styles was as I learned that we had nothing in common politically.

But the reason I write this is because I think it's so important that people don't let that feeling drive their political analysis (and what you say suggests that it might be).

I had an anon that said that the reason that they wanted a 1D member to speak out is that the 1D members voice was so much more powerful theirs. And that's what worries me - that people are ignoring the potential of building collective power - and instead hoping that someone who already has power will make change. And there's just no evidence that that works (quite the opposite).

There was lots of useful celebrity contributions to the American Civil Rights Movement of the 50s, 60s, and 70s. But it was fundamentally the same contribution that hundreds of thousands of people played across the US. Celebrities often had more money, and could sometimes reach particular audiences and create iconic issues. I'd never deny the impact that Aretha Franklin, or Muhammad Ali, or Tommie Smith and John Carlos. But there was work to be done in every single city and town across the US - and people did it. The actions those people took only had power within the context of hte wider movement they were connected to.

I do think it's worth at this moment looking at history and seeing how people have resisted in the past and what they've managed to do. And I think that shows how much it takes to change, and that any one person's voice can only be a tiny part of something bigger, even if they have a massive amplification system.

If I was going to sum up what I'm trying to say - there's nothing wrong with wanting Taylor to say something, but to think that whether or not Taylor says anything is politically important to the cause - is denying your own power.

[cyarskj52]

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MR. KEKE PALMER'S BOYFRIENDUPDATED JULY 17, 2023

Keke Palmer’s Boyfriend Doesn’t Know His Place

Keke Palmer and Darius Jackson. Photo: Rebecca Sapp/Getty Image

Is this how a second gentleman should be acting? After a video surfaced of Usher serenading Keke Palmer at his Las Vegas show on July 5, her boyfriend Darius Jackson decided to share his opinion on the family matriarch’s dress. “It’s the outfit tho.. You a mom,” he wrote on the Elon Musk app. Mr. Keke Palmer’s Boyfriend was saying her outfit — a black sheer, long-sleeved polka-dot dress with a bodysuit peeking out underneath — was unfit for a mother to wear in public. According to his misogynist logic, moms shouldn’t have fun at concerts in cute little black dresses because that is a threat to the traditional family. “We live in a generation where a man of the family doesn’t want the wife & mother to his kids to showcase booty cheeks to please others & he gets told how much of a hater he is,” he added in his follow-up tweet. Mind you, he and Keke are decidedly not married. The couple have been dating since 2021, and their first child was born in February of this year. “This is my family & my representation,” he kept going, for some reason. “I have standards & morals to what I believe. I rest my case.” He has since deleted his profile and scrubbed photos of him and Palmer from Instagram.

Twitter, however, kept up the fight. The internet dug up Jackson’s old tweets, which include seemingly defending police brutalityand liking a post that calls Tracee Ellis Ross a “female loser” for posting a topless picture of herself at 50 years old. The petit-incel vibes combined with conservative ideas about family and policing isn’t going to get a lot of Palmer fans on his side. The two people at the center of Jackson’s ire appear unbothered through it all. Palmer posted a picture in the allegedly offensive outfit on Instagram with the caption, “I wish I had taken more pictures but we were running late!” Meanwhile, Usher liked a tweetwhere a user understood Keke’s behavior, saying, “It’s Usher like cmon now. I could see if it was Jacquees,” where Jacquees replied, “😂😂 Leave me out of it.”

Despite Jackson’s departure from the internet, Palmer is rightfully not letting his misogynistic words go. She’s now selling merch reminding moms that they can be hot as well as an empowered parent. “One thing is certain and one thing is true, IM A MOTHA, through and through! ‘IM A MOTHA’ and ‘Stevie to the bullshit’ shirts available NOW!” captioned Palmer on Instagram with a video where she sang to her baby. “To all my mom’s out there, how did your baby change you?? Mine empowered me! On such another level, my perspective changed because when my baby is good I’m GREAT! Look at that face! Gratitude galore.” Palmer is even alluding to the baby daddy drama in her live shows. At Broccoli City Fest Sunday, Palmer changed the lyrics of “Bossy” to reflect her mother status. “Lil booties matter, my son gave me some ass/ I’m my own boss and I got my own cash/ I don’t need a *****, only thing I need’s a bag.” A couple days ago, Jackson was just Palmer’s low-key man; now he’s generating enough online discourse to last for weeks. Embarrassing.https://www.instagram.com/p/CuVoiM5r_iF/embed/captioned/?cr=1&v=14&wp=744&rd=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.vulture.com&rp=%2F2023%2F07%2Fkeke-palmer-boyfriend-usher.html#%7B%22ci%22%3A0%2C%22os%22%3A17773%7D

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[eeriefeelingsat3amuwu]

Okay, so I just do not involve myself in discourse. It’s not worth my time. The Block button exists for a reason and I intend to use it as frequently as I need to to make my Tumblr (and any other social media) experience better for myself.

Not everyone shares my view on this and that’s obviously fine. If you like arguing with people on the internet about your very important opinions, go for it.

But maybe. Maybe you could not post this bulshit in the main tags for things. I opened up the mcc tag on here bc I wanted to see some cool fanart and learn what I missed from other streams, since I always only watch one pov and maybe switch for dodgebolt.

Instead, I found a shitton of people hating on Dream. This was not the first time. This is not Twitter and even if it was, maybe don’t take out your incredible rage on someone on social media. If you Gotta, go complain to your friends in a gc (assuming you have some) or die mad about it. Punch a Wall, kick a pillow, but don’t fill maintag with discourse about players.

Not everyone is as interested in seeing your hot takes as you are.

Also, I was watching Dream the entire time. How much of his pov did you watch before writing out that essay about him babyraging and being rude in chat? The dude was salty, obviously. He got first and then had to redo it, tried to cheese it and got fucked by his own hubris.

He was salty and kinda pissed afterwards, but he specificaly said that he does NOT want people to hate on noxcrew and that obviously, technical issues happen, but that it could've been handle differently.

Him being 'toxic' in the chat a bit after ace race and during hole in the Wall? If you watched his pov, you'd know he was making a joke of it and trying to get his head back in the game.

He himself said multiple times that he was just babyraging and that he was upset at loosing a first place, esp in a game that was played as late as ace race was and a game that has that big of a bonus for winning. It did cost him the first individual and it did cost his team first place points wise. He was not incorrect there, from what I saw.

Anyways, it was super entertaining to watch yellow and they absolutely deserved that win. Dream is not a seven times winner (5 canon wins let's gooo) just because of luck. It was great watching them pull back from fourth to second in SoT, wich is litteraly my favourite game and I was really glad it got picked. And that dodgebolt- lmaoooo, it was the most hillarious thing I've seen in a while.

All in all, this mcc was super scuffed, really fucking fun to watch and I can't wait to watch more vods tomorow, seems like it was a wild ride from every pov (specifically excited for Wilbur ace race and Tommy...just Tommy in general). Excited for the next one!

And stop spouting discourse in the main tags. <3

[allthefilmsiveseenforfree]

Dear Evan Hansen

You may have seen some ~online discourse~ about the film Dear Evan Hansen, an adaptation of the 2016 Broadway musical, and you might have wondered what all the hubbub is about. I mean, it’s a feel good story about a senior in high school, Evan Hansen (Ben Platt), who has some pretty severe anxiety and depression. While trying to fulfill an assignment from his therapist to write a letter to himself, his letter gets picked up by another student, Connor (Colton Ryan) - and later that day, Connor kills himself. Connor’s grieving parents and sister Zoe (Amy Adams, Danny Pino, and Kaitlyn Dever) are desperate to learn more from the boy they think was Connor’s best friend - after all, Connor’s suicide note was a letter addressed to “Dear Evan Hansen.” And, as you can imagine, Evan tells them about the unfortunate mistake and sits with them in their grief as they struggle to pick up the pieces of their lives. 

Just kidding! He lies to them, repeatedly, elaborately, expansively for months, constructing an entire false friendship with Connor that never happened, and ingratiating himself into the wealthy nuclear family he never had, in large part because he wants to get into Zoe’s pants! THIS IS THE PROTAGONIST OF THE STORY. Oh, and it’s a musical so there is a lot of singing and crying and singing WHILE crying and sometimes crying and not singing at all. But the #inspiration, you guys. 

Things I liked:

Pretty much everything but the story and Ben Platt’s performance. The supporting cast is stacked, and all of them do a great job at elevating material scraped directly out of a diaper worn by someone who just chewed their way through a copy of the DSM-5. 

A couple of the songs are damn catchy - “Waving Through a Window” and “You Will Be Found” are standouts for a reason - and here’s the thing, Platt sings them well. But as you’ll discover, there’s a lot more to a movie musical than just singing your part. 

Stephen Chbosky, the man behind every deep thought I and a lot of people in my generation had in 2006 after he wrote The Perks of Being a Wallflower, is a pretty good director. I particularly enjoyed the fanvid-type cuts in “Waving Through a Window” in conjunction with the lyrics, and his use of interstitial shots to flashbacks (and sometimes flashforwards!) is a neat little bit of shorthand that I thought was used sparingly enough to be effective. 

Amy Fucking Adams. She’s holding on so hard, so desperately to the idea of who her son could have been, rather than the reality of who he was, and she is full of such deep pain that is masked by an almost endless supply of patience with Evan and relentless positivity. All this made me want was Enchanted 2 even worse than I already did. 

Super into everything Zoe wears - the costuming department did a great job, and now all I want to do is live in mom jeans and baggy sweaters.

Did I Cry? I teared up a couple of times because I’m not a completely heartless bastard and when Amy Adams offered Evan Connor’s college money, my heart broke for the lie Evan had thrust upon her, and Julianne Moore’s song got me good, because she’s just a single mom to Evan who is doing her goddamn best. 

Things I hated more than the time I dropped a frozen gallon container of fruit cocktail on my pinkie toe in my parents’ garage and it turned black and I thought it was gonna fall off:

Ben Platt is 28 years old. He originated the role of Evan Hansen on Broadway, so in many respects it makes sense that he plays the role in the movie, except for the one kinda sorta important thing where he looks like a wizened old crone standing amongst a sea of children doing his best twitching, cringing Hunchback of Notre Dame impression. If you want someone to convincingly play 20 years their junior, hire Paul Rudd. Otherwise, please don’t ask me to believe that this supposed 18-year-old has crow’s feet. 

And that twitching nervous energy is a huge part of the black hole at the center of this film - he’s playing to the cheap seats and walking through the halls of his high school like a wet chihuahua. It’s an excruciating acting choice to watch - he doesn’t just have anxiety, he is on the verge of a nervous breakdown seemingly every second of every day. Like honestly, where is only-mentioned-never-seen Dr. Sherman, because this young man’s meds are NOT WORKING DR. SHERMAN. 

There’s such a lack of self-awareness on behalf of the writing, directing, and performance by Platt. There’s one song, “Sincerely, Me,” that offers the only glimpse of commentary about what Evan is doing, by pointing out the malicious ridiculousness of him writing a series of fake emails as proof of his and Connor’s friendship. 

Also what high schoolers email this much?? I know this was written in probably 2014 or so, but has a bitch never heard of a text? Even a DM? This whole plot is constructed around the premise that high schoolers are just constantly, constantly emailing each other. 

Everything - and I mean EV-ER-Y-THING - about Evan’s relationship with Zoe is so creepy and disturbing that with a soundtrack change, this could easily be a horror movie. He attempts to get her to like him by describing to her all the things her brother noticed about her - oh wait, I’m sorry, all the things HE noticed about her while he was skulking in the shadows following her around for years, watching every move she made, and it ends with him singing repeatedly “I LOVE YOU” because following a girl around and never having a conversation with her or knowing her at all is love, right? This was clearly written by the same people who chose “Every Breath You Take” as their wedding song because Sting is hot and they never actually listened to the damn words. 

And it gets about 10 billion times worse when Zoe goes to Evan’s house alone, takes him up to his room, and sings “I don’t need reasons to want you” and that was the moment I was that person I hate in a movie theater and I pulled out my phone to Google who wrote the music and lyrics to the musical (we were in the back row of the theater no one was behind me THIS WAS AN OUTRAGE EMERGENCY) and of motherfucking course it was written by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, 2 men who heard about meeting an actual human woman from a friend one time but otherwise are unfamiliar with the concept. 

Lastly, enormous serial killer vibes from Evan sending unlabeled flash drives anonymously through the mail with no note in an attempt to right his wrongs. That’s not catharsis, that’s how the next installment in the Saw franchise starts, with Evan in a Billy the clown doll mask showing up on the screen and asking if you want to play a fucking game. 

Also, I know it’s not possible for the narrative to justify this in a way that could be satisfying based on Evan’s actions, but what is with this thing where single working-class mom Julianne Moore is turning down rich people’s money for Evan to go to college? Like, obviously we can’t have that happen in the movie but in real life, fuck your pride! Take those rich people’s money!

I also know how movies work but nothing annoys me more than a giant group of high schoolers all getting beeps and boops to indicate text notifications all at the same time because I don’t know a single person under the age of 55 who keeps their ringer on. That shit is on vibrate AT MOST, and I feel like that’s a millennial thing. 

The emotional climax of the film is obviously Evan’s WAY TOO LATE confession, but the idea that it’s prompted by Connor’s family suddenly getting a lot of internet hate is, frankly, laughable. If Sandy Hook taught me one thing, it is that no tragedy is immune from trolls who live only to cause other people devastating emotional pain on the internet. That shit starts day 1. Apparently no one involved in this production has ever been on Twitter?

Also it feels like there should have been a dog somewhere in this movie and there was no dog, so points off for that too. 

Perhaps Dear Evan Hansen isn’t nearly as deep as it aspires to be. Perhaps it’s a morality play, a simplistic message of “Don’t lie, kids, lying is bad!” Major studio movies wrap themselves up with a nice bow at the end so everyone can feel good about themselves and leave with a happy ending, but the moronic cruelty on display here makes that feat feel impossible. We’re left with Evan in an orchard, reading Connor’s favorite books and staring into the big blue sky with all the self-actualization he’s earned now as a lil treat. And if Evan Hansen looked like an actual 18-year-old, it would be a lot easier to extend more empathy to him and his not-fully-developed prefrontal cortex, but it’s a little harder with this fully-grown, weathered man who was old enough to remember seeing Liar Liar in theaters. 

Dear Evan Hansen, 

Get some actual help and a haircut and maybe you can grow up enough to have an actual healthy interaction with any other living person, ever.

Sincerely, 

Me

If you liked this review, please consider reblogging or subscribing to my Patreon! For as low as $1, you can access bonus content and movie reviews, or even request that I review any movie of your choice.

[potteresque-ire]

Can you talk more about the usage of the word "wife" to talk about men in the BL context? I've noticed it in BJYX (particularly with GG), in the (English translations) of MDZS, and then it came up in your recent posts about Danmei-101 (which were super helpful btw) with articles connecting the "little fresh meat" type to fans calling an actor "wife." My initial reaction as a westerner is like "this is very problematic," but I think I'm missing a lot of language/cultural context. Any thoughts?

Hello! First of all, for those who’re interested, here’s a link to the referred posts. Under the cut is arguably the 4th post of the series. As usual, I apologise for the length!

(Topics: seme and uke; more about “leftover women”; roster of feminisation terms; Daji, Bao Si & the origin of BJYX; roster of beautiful, ancient Chinese men; Chairman Mao (not part of the roster) ...)

[TW: feminisation of men]

In the traditional BL characterisation, the M/M (double male) lead pairing is essentially a cis-het relationship in disguise, in which one of the M leads is viewed as the “wife” by the creator and audience. This lead often possesses some of the features of the traditional, stereotypical female, but retaining his male appearance. 

In BL terms, the “wife” is the “uke”. “Seme” and “uke” are the respective roles taken by the two male leads, and designated by the creator of the material. Literally, “seme” (攻め) means the dominant, the attacking / aggressive partner in the relationship and “uke” (受け), the passive / recipient (of actions) partner who tends to follow the seme’s lead. The terms themselves do not have any sexual / gender context.  However, as male and female are viewed as aggressive and passive by their traditional social roles, and the attacker and recipient by their traditional sexual roles respectively, BL fandoms have long assigned uke, the passive, sexual “bottom”, as the “woman”, the “wife”. 

Danmei has kept this “semi” and uke” tradition from BL, taking the kanji of the Japanese terms for designation ~ 攻 (”attack” is therefore the “husband”, and 受 (”receive”), the “wife”. The designations are often specified in the introduction / summary of Danmei works as warning / enticement. For MDZS, for example, MXTX wrote:

高貴冷豔悶騷 攻 × 邪魅狂狷風騷 受

高貴冷豔悶騷 攻 = noble, coolly beautiful and boring seme (referring to LWJ)  邪魅狂狷風騷 受 = devilishly charming, wild, and flirty uke (referring to WWX) 

The traditional, stereotypical female traits given to the “uke”, the “wife” in Danmei and their associated fanworks range from their personality to behaviour to even biological functions. Those who have read the sex scenes in MDZS may be aware of their lack of mention of lube, while WWX was written as getting (very) wet from fluids from his colon (腸道) ~ implying that his colon, much like a vagina, was supplying the necessarily lubrication for sex. This is obviously biologically inaccurate; however, Danmei is exempt from having to be realistic by its original Tanbi definition. The genre’s primary audience is cishet females, and sex scenes such as this one aren’t aiming for realism. Rather, the primary goal of these sex scenes is to generate fantasy, and the purpose of the biologically female functions in one of the leads (WWX) is to ease the readers into imagining themselves as the one engaging in the sex.

Indeed, these practices of assigning as males and female the M/M sexual top and bottom, of emphasising of who is the top and who is the bottom, have been falling out of favour in Western slash fandoms ~ I joined fandom about 15 years ago, and top and bottom designations in slash pairings (and fights about them) were much more common than it is now.  The generally more open, more progressive environments in which Western fandomers are immersed in probably have something to do with it: they transfer their RL knowledge, their views on biology, on different social into their fandom works and discourses. 

I’d venture to say this: in the English-speaking fandoms, fandom values and mainstream values are converging. “Cancel culture” reflects an attempt to enforce RL values in the fictional worlds in fandom. Fandom culture is slowly, but surely, leaving its subculture status and becoming part of mainstream culture. 

I’d hesitate to call c-Danmei fandoms backward compared to Western slash for this reason. There’s little hope for Danmei to converge with China’s mainstream culture in the short term ~ the necessity of replacing Danmei with Dangai in visual media already reflects that. Danmei is and will likely remain subculture in the foreseeable future, and subcultures, at heart, are protests against the mainstream. Unless China and the West define “mainstream” very similarly (and they don’t), it is difficult to compare the “progressiveness”—and its dark side, the “problematic-ness”—of the protests, which are shaped by what they’re protesting against. The “shaper” in this scenario, the mainstream values and culture, are also far more forceful under China’s authoritarian government than they are in the free(-er) world. 

Danmei, therefore, necessarily takes on a different form in China than BL or slash outside China. As a creative pursuit, it serves to fulfil psychological needs that are reflective of its surrounding culture and sociopolitical environment. The genre’s “problematic” / out of place aspects in the eyes of Western fandoms are therefore, like all other aspects of the genre, tailor-made by its millions of fans to be comforting / cathartic for the unique culture and sociopolitical background it and they find themselves in. 

I briefly detoured to talk about the Chinese government’s campaign to pressure young, educated Chinese women into matrimony and motherhood in the post for this reason, as it is an example of how, despite Western fandoms’ progressiveness, they may be inadequate, distant for c-Danmei fans. Again, this article is a short and a ... morbidly-entertaining read on what has been said about China’s “leftover women” (剩女) — women who are unmarried and over 27-years-old). I talked about it, because “Women should enter marriage and parenthood in their late 20s” may no longer a mainstream value in many Western societies, but where it still is, it exerts a strong influence on how women view romance, and by extension, how they interact with romantic fiction, including Danmei.

In China, this influence is made even stronger by the fact that Chinese tradition  places a strong emphasis on education and holds a conservative attitude towards romance and sex. Dating while studying therefore remains discouraged in many Chinese families. University-educated Chinese women therefore have an extremely short time frame — between graduation (~23 years old) and their 27th birthday — to find “the right one” and get married, before they are labelled as “leftovers” and deemed undesirable. (Saving) face being an important aspect in Chinese culture introduces yet another layer of pressure: traditionally, women who don’t get married by the age agreed by social norms have been viewed as failures of upbringing, in that the unmarried women’s parents not having taught/trained their daughters well. Filial, unmarried women therefore try to get married “on time” just to avoid bringing shame to their family.

The outcome is this: despite the strong women characters we may see in Chinese visual media, many young Chinese women nowadays do not expect themselves to be able to marry for love. Below, I offer a “book jacket summary” of a popular internet novel in China, which shows how the associated despair also affects cis-het fictional romance. Book reviews praise this novel for being “boring”: the man and woman leads are both common working class people, the “you-and-I”’s; the mundaneness of them trying build their careers and their love life is lit by one shining light: he loves her and she loves him. 

Written in her POV, this summary reflects, perhaps, the disquiet felt by many contemporary Chinese women university graduates:

曾經以為，自己這輩子都等不到了—— 世界這麼大，我又走得這麼慢，要是遇不到良人要怎麼辦？早過了「全球三十幾億男人，中國七億男人，天涯何處無芳草」的猖狂歲月，越來越清楚，循規蹈矩的生活中，我們能熟悉進而深交的異性實在太有限了，有限到我都做好了「接受他人的牽線，找個適合的男���慢慢煨熟，再平淡無奇地進入婚姻」的準備，卻在生命意外的拐彎處迎來自己的另一半。

I once thought, my wait will never come to fruition for the rest of my life — the world is so big, I’m so slow in treading it, what if I’ll never meet the one? I’ve long passed the wild days of thinking “3 billion men exist on Earth, 0.7 of which are Chinese. There is plenty more fish in the sea.” I’m seeing, with increasing clarity, that in our disciplined lives, the number of opposite-sex we can get to know, and get to know well, is so limited. It’s so limited that I’m prepared to accept someone’s matchmaking, find a suitable man and slowly, slowly, warm up to him, and then, to enter marriage with without excitement, without wonder. But then, an accidental turn in my life welcomes in my other half.

— Oath of Love (餘生，請多指教) (Yes, this is the novel Gg’d upcoming drama is based on.) 

Heteronormativity is, of course, very real in China. However, that hasn’t exempted Chinese women, even its large cis-het population, from having their freedom to pursue their true love taken away from them. Even for cis-het relationships, being able to marry for love has become a fantasy —a fantasy scorned by the state. Remember this quote from Article O3 in the original post? 

耽改故事大多远离现实，有些年轻受众却将其与生活混为一谈，产生不以结婚和繁衍为目的才是真爱之类的偏颇认知。

Most Dangai stories are far removed from reality; some young audience nonetheless mix them up with real life, develop biased understanding such as “only love that doesn’t treat matrimony and reproduction as destinations is true love”. 

I didn’t focus on it in the previous posts, in an effort to keep the discussion on topic. But why did the op-ed piece pick this as an example of fantasy-that-shouldn’t-be-mixed-up-with-real-life, in the middle of a discussion about perceived femininity of men that actually has little to do with matrimony and reproduction? 

Because the whole point behind the state’s “leftover women” campaign is precisely to get women to treat matrimony and reproduction as destinations, not beautiful sceneries that happen along the way. And they’re the state’s destination as more children = higher birth rate that leads to higher future productivity. The article is therefore calling out Danmei for challenging this “mainstream value”.

Therefore, while the statement True love doesn’t treat matrimony and reproduction as destinations may be trite for many of us while it may be a point few, if any, English-speaking fandoms may pay attention to, to the mainstream culture Danmei lives in, to the mainstream values dictated by the state, it is borderline subversive.

As much as Danmei may appear “tame” for its emphasis on beauty and romance, for it to have stood for so long, so firmly against China’s (very) forceful mainstream culture, the genre is also fundamentally rebellious.  Remember: Danmei has little hope of converging with China’s mainstream unless it “sells its soul” and removes its homoerotic elements. 

With rebelliousness, too, comes a bit of tongue-in-cheek.

And so, when c-Danmei fans, most of whom being cishet women who interact with the genre by its traditional BL definition, call one of the leads 老婆 (wife), it can and often take on a different flavour. As said before, it can be less about feminizing the lead than about identifying with the lead. The nickname 老婆 (wife) can be less about being disrespectful and more about humorously expressing an aspiration—the aspiration to have a husband who truly loves them, who they do want to get married and have babies with but out of freedom and not obligation.

Admittedly, I had been confused, and bothered by these “can-be”s myself. Just because there are alternate reasons for the feminisation to happen doesn’t mean the feminisation itself is excusable. But why the feminisation of M/M leads doesn’t sound as awful to me in Chinese as in English? How can calling a self-identified man 老婆 (wife) get away with not sounding being predominantly disrespectful to my ears, when I would’ve frowned at the same thing said in my vicinity in English?

I had an old hypothesis: when I was little, it was common to hear people calling acquaintances in Chinese by their unflattering traits:  “Deaf-Eared Chan” (Mr Chan, who’s deaf), “Fat Old Woman Lan” (Ah-Lan, who’s an overweight woman) etc—and the acquaintances were perfectly at ease with such identifications, even introducing themselves to strangers that way. Comparatively speaking then, 老婆 (wife) is harmless, even endearing. 

老婆, which literally means “old old-lady” (implying wife = the woman one gets old with), first became popularised as a colloquial, casual way of calling “wife” in Hong Kong and its Cantonese dialect, despite the term itself being about 1,500 years old. As older generations of Chinese were usually very shy about talking about their love lives, those who couldn’t help themselves and regularly spoke of their 老婆 tended to be those who loved their wives in my memory. 老婆, as a term, probably became endearing to me that way. 

Maybe this is why the feminisation of M/M leads didn’t sound so bad to me?

This hypothesis was inadequate, however. This custom of identifying people by their (unflattering) traits has been diminishing in Hong Kong and China, for similar reasons it has been considered inappropriate in the West.

Also, 老婆 (wife) is not the only term used for / associated with feminisation. I’ve tried to limit the discussion to Danmei, the fictional genre; now, I’ll jump to its associated RPS genre, and specifically, the YiZhan fandoms. The purpose of this jump: with real people involved, feminisation’s effect is potentially more harmful, more acute. Easier to feel. 

YiZhan fans predominantly entered the fandoms through The Untamed, and they’ve also transferred Danmei’s  “seme”/“uke” customs into YiZhan. There are, therefore, three c-YiZhan fandoms:

博君一肖 (BJYX): seme Dd, uke Gg 戰山為王 (ZSWW): seme Gg, uke Dd 連瑣反應 (LSFY): riba Gg and Dd. Riba = “reversible”, and unlike “seme” and “uke”, is a frequently-used term in the Japanese gay community. 

BJYX is by far the largest of the three, likely due to Gg having played WWX, the “uke” in MDZS / TU. I’ll therefore focus on this fandom, ie. Gg is the “uke”, the “wife”.

For Gg alone, I’ve seen him being also referred to by YiZhan fans as (and this is far from a complete list):

* 姐姐 (sister) * 嫂子 (wife of elder brother; Dd being the elder brother implied) * 妃妃 (based on the very first YiZhan CP name, 太妃糖 Toffee Candy, a portmanteau of sorts from Dd being the 太子 “prince” of his management company and Gg being the prince’s wife, 太子妃. 糖 = “candy”. 太妃 sounds like toffee in English and has been used as the latter’s Chinese translation.) * 美人 (beauty, as in 肖美人 “Beauty Xiao”) * Daji 妲己 (as in 肖妲己, “Daji Xiao”). 

The last one needs historical context, which will also become important for explaining the new hypothesis I have.

Daji was a consort who lived three thousand years ago, whose beauty was blamed for the fall of the Shang dynasty. Gg (and men sharing similar traits, who are exceptionally rare) has been compared to Daji 妲己 for his alternatively innocent, alternatively seductive beauty ~ the kind of beauty that, in Chinese historical texts and folk lores, lead to the fall of kingdoms when possessed by the king’s beloved woman. This kind of “I-get-to-ruin-her-virginity”, “she’s a slut in MY bedroom” beauty is, of course, a stereotypical fantasy for many (cis-het) men, which included the authors of these historical texts and folklores. However, it also contained some truth: the purity / innocence, the image of a virgin, was required for an ancient woman to be chosen as a consort; the seduction, meanwhile, helped her to become the top consort, and monopolise the attention of kings and emperors who often had hundreds of wives ~ wives who often put each other in danger to eliminate competition. 

Nowadays, women of tremendous beauty are still referred to by the Chinese idiom 傾國傾城, literally, ”falling countries, falling cities”. The beauty is also implied to be natural, expressed in a can’t-help-itself way, perhaps reflecting the fact that the ancient beauties on which this idiom has been used couldn’t possibly have plastic surgeries, and most of them didn’t meet a good end ~ that they had to pay a price for their beauty, and often, with their lowly status as women, as consorts, they didn’t get to choose whether they wanted to pay this price or not. This adjective is considered to be very flattering. Gg’s famous smile from the Thailand Fanmeet has been described, praised as 傾城一笑: “a smile that topples a city”.

I’m explaining Daji and 傾國傾城 because the Chinese idiom 博君一笑 “doing anything to get a smile from you”, from which the ship’s name BJYX 博君一肖  was derived (笑 and 肖 are both pronounced “xiao”), is connected to yet another of such dynasty-falling beauty, Bao Si 褒姒. Like Daji before her, Bao Si was blamed for the end of the Zhou Dynasty in 771 BC. 

The legend went like this: Bao Si was melancholic, and to get her to smile, her king lit warning beacons and got his nobles to rush in from the nearby vassal states with their armies to come and rescue him, despite not being in actual danger. The nobles, in their haste, looked so frantic and dishevelled that Bao Si found it funny and smiled. Longing to see more of the smile of his favourite woman, the king would fool his nobles again and again, until his nobles no longer heeded the warning beacons when an actual rebellion came. 

What the king did has been described as 博紅顏一笑, with 紅顏 (”red/flushed face”) meaning a beautiful woman, referring to Bao Si. Replace 紅顏 with the respectful “you”, 君, we get 博君一笑. If one searches the origin of the phrase 博 [fill_in_the_blank]一笑 online, Bao Si’s story shows up.

The “anything” in ”doing anything to get a smile from you” in 博君一笑, therefore, is not any favour, but something as momentous as giving away one’s own kingdom. c-turtles have remarked, to their amusement and admittedly mine, that “king”, in Chinese, is written as 王, which is Dd’s surname, and very occasionally, they jokingly compare him to the hopeless kings who’d give away everything for their love. Much like 傾國傾城 has become a flattering idiom despite the negative reputations of Daji and Bao Si for their “men-ruining ways”, 博君一笑 has become a flattering phrase, emphasising on the devotion and love rather than the ... stupidity behind the smile-inducing acts. 

(Bao Si’s story, BTW, was a lie made up by historians who also lived later but also thousands of years ago, to absolve the uselessness of the king. Warning beacons didn’t exist at her time.)  

Gg is arguably feminized even in his CP’s name. Gg’s feminisation is everywhere. 

And here comes my confession time ~ I’ve been amused by most of the feminisation terms above. 肖妲己 (”Daji Xiao”) captures my imagination, and I remain quite partial to the CP name BJYX. Somehow, there’s something ... somewhat forgivable when the feminisation is based on Gg’s beauty, especially in the context of the historical Danmei / Dangai setting of MDZS/TU ~ something that, while doesn’t cancel, dampens the “problematic-ness” of the gender mis-identification.

What, exactly, is this something?

Here’s my new hypothesis, and hopefully I’ll manage to explain it well ~

The hypothesis is this: the unisex beauty standard for historical Chinese men and women, which is also breathtakingly similar to the modern beauty standard for Chinese women, makes feminisation in the context of Danmei (especially historical Danmei) flattering, and easier to accept.

What defined beauty in historical Chinese men? If I am to create a classically beautiful Chinese man for my new historical Danmei, how would I describe him based on what I’ve read, my cultural knowledge?

Here’s a list:

* Skin fair and smooth as white jade * Thin, even frail; narrow/slanted shoulders; tall * Dark irises and bright, starry eyes * Not too dense, neat eyebrows that are shaped like swords ~ pointed slightly upwards from the center towards the sides of the face * Depending on the dynasty, nice makeup.

Imagine these traits. How “macho” are they? How much do they fit the ideal Chinese masculine beauty advertised by Chinese government, which looks like below?

Propaganda poster, 1969. The caption says “Defeat Imperialist US! Defeat Social Imperialism!” The book’s name is “Quotations from Mao Zedong”. (Source)

Where did that list of traits I’ve written com from? Fair like jade, frail ... why are they so far from the ... “macho”ness of the men in the poster? 

What has Chinese history said about its beautiful men? 

Wei Jie (衛玠 286-312 BCE), one of the four most beautiful ancient Chinese men (古代四大美男) recorded in Chinese history famously passed away when fans of his beauty gathered and formed a wall around him, blocking his way. History recorded Wei as being frail with chronic illness, and was only 27 years old when he died. Arguably the first historical account of “crazy fans killing their idol”, this incident left the idiom 看殺衛玠 ~ “Wei Jie being watched to death.” ~ a not very “macho” way to die at all.

潘安 (Pan An; 247-300 BCE), another one of the four most beautiful ancient Chinese men, also had hoards of fangirls, who threw fruits and flowers at him whenever he ventured outside. The Chinese idiom 擲果盈車 “thrown fruit filling a cart” was based on Pan and ... his fandom, and denotes such scenarios of men being so beautiful that women openly displayed their affections for them. 

Meanwhile, when Pan went out with his equally beautiful male friend, 夏侯湛 Xiahou Zhan, folks around them called them 連璧 ~ two connected pieces of perfect jade. Chinese Jade is white, smooth, faintly glowing in light, so delicate that it gives the impression of being somewhat transparent.

Aren’t Wei Jie and Pan An reminiscent of modern day Chinese idols, the “effeminate” “Little Fresh Meat”s (小鲜肉) so panned by Article O3? Their stories, BTW, also elucidated the historical reference in LWJ’s description of being jade-like in MDZS, and in WWX and LWJ being thrown pippas along the Gusu river bank. 

Danmei, therefore, didn’t create a trend of androgynous beauty in men as much as it has borrowed the ancient, traditional definition of masculine Chinese beauty ~ the beauty that was more feminine than masculine by modern standards.  

[Perhaps, CPs should be renamed 連璧 (”two connected pieces of perfect jade”) as a reminder of the aesthetics’ historical roots.]

Someone may exclaim now: But. But!! Yet another one of the four most beautiful ancient Chinese men, 高長恭 (Gao Changgong, 541-573 BCE), far better known by his title, 蘭陵王 (”the Prince of Lanling”), was a famous general. He had to be “macho”, right?

... As it turns out, not at all. Historical texts have described Gao as “貌柔心壮，音容兼美” (”soft in looks and strong at heart, beautiful face and voice”), “白美類婦人” (”fair and beautiful as a woman”), “貌若婦人” (”face like a woman”). Legends have it that The Prince of Lanling’s beauty was so soft, so lacking in authority that he had to wear a savage mask to get his soldiers to listen to his command (and win) on the battlefield (《樂府雜錄》: 以其顏貌無威，每入陣即著面具，後乃百戰百勝).

This should be emphasised: Gao’s explicitly feminine descriptions were recorded in historical texts as arguments *for* his beauty. Authors of these texts, therefore, didn’t view the feminisation as insult. In fact, they used the feminisation to drive the point home, to convince their readers that men like the Prince of Lanling were truly, absolutely good looking.

Being beautiful like a women was therefore high praise for men in, at least, significant periods in Chinese history ~ periods long and important enough for these records to survive until today. Beauty, and so it goes, had once been largely free of distinctions between the masculine and feminine.

One more example of an image of an ancient Chinese male beauty being similar to its female counterpart, because the history nerd in me finds this fun. 

何晏 (He Yan, ?-249 BCE) lived in the Wei Jin era (between 2nd to 4th century), during which makeup was really en vogue. Known for his beauty, he was also famous for his love of grooming himself. The emperor, convinced that He Yan’s very fair skin was from the powder he was wearing, gave He Yan some very hot foods to eat in the middle of the summer. He Yan began to sweat, had to wipe himself with his sleeves and in the process, revealed to the emperor that his fair beauty was 100% natural ~ his skin glowed even more with the cosmetics removed (《世說新語·容止第十四》: 何平叔美姿儀，面至白。魏明帝疑其傅粉，正夏月，與熱湯餅。既啖，大汗出，以朱衣自拭，色轉皎然). His kick-cosmetics’-ass fairness won him the nickname 傅粉何郎 (”powder-wearing Mr He”).

Not only would He Yan very likely be mistaken as a woman if this scene is transferred to a modern setting, but this scene can very well fit inside a Danmei story of the 21st century and is very, very likely to get axed by the Chinese censorship board for its visualisation. 

[Important observation from this anecdote: the emperor was totally into this trend too.]

The adjectives and phrases used above to describe these beautiful ancient Chinese men ~ 貌柔, 音容兼美, 白美, 美姿儀, 皎然 ~ have all become pretty much reserved for describing beauty in women nowadays. Beauty standards in ancient China were, as mentioned before, had gone through significantly long periods in which they were largely genderless. The character for beauty 美 (also in Danmei, 耽美) used to have little to no gender association. Free of gender associations as well were the names of many flowers. The characters for orchid (蘭) and lotus (蓮), for example, were commonly found in men’s names as late as the Republican era (early 20th century), but are now almost exclusively found in women’s names. Both orchid and lotus have historically been used to indicate 君子 (junzi, roughly, “gentlemen”), which have always been men. MDZS also has an example of a man named after a flower: Jin Ling’s courtesy name, given to him by WWX,  was 如蘭 (”like an orchid”). 

A related question may be this: why does ancient China associate beauty with fairness, with softness, with frailty? Likely, because Confucianist philosophy and customs put a heavy emphasis on scholarship ~ and scholars have mostly consisted of soft-spoken, not muscular, not working-under-the-sun type of men. More importantly, Confucianist scholars also occupied powerful government positions. Being, and looking like a Confucianist scholar was therefore associated with status. Indeed, it’s very difficult to look like jade when one was a farmer or a soldier, for example, who constantly had to toil under the sun, whose skin was constantly being dried and roughened by the elements. Having what are viewed as “macho” beauty traits as in the poster above ~ tanned skin, bulging muscles, bony structures (which also take away the jade’s smoothness) ~ were associated with hard labour, poverty and famine.

Along that line, 手無縛雞之力 (“hands without the strength to restrain a chicken”) has long been a phrase used to describe ancient scholars and students, and without scorn or derision. Love stories of old, which often centred around scholars were, accordingly, largely devoid of the plot lines of husbands physically protecting the wives, performing the equivalent of climbing up castle walls and fighting dragons etc. Instead, the faithful husbands wrote poems, combed their wife’s hair, traced their wife’s eyebrows with cosmetics (畫眉)...all activities that didn’t require much physical strength, and many of which are considered “feminine” nowadays.

Were there periods in Chinese history in which more ... sporty men and women were appreciated? Yes. the Tang dynasty, for example, and the Yuan and Qing dynasties. The Tang dynasty, as a very powerful, very open era in Chinese history, was known for its relations to the West (via the Silk Road). The Yuan and Qing dynasties, meanwhile, were established by Mongolians and Manchus respectively, who, as non-Han people, had not been under the influence of Confucian culture and grew up on horsebacks, rather than in schools.

The idea that beautiful Chinese men should have “macho” attributes was, therefore, largely a consequence of non-Han-Chinese influence, especially after early 20th century. That was when the characters for beauty (美), orchid (蘭), lotus (蓮) etc began their ... feminisation. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which started its reign of the country starting 1949, also has foreign roots, being a derivative of the Soviets, and its portrayal of ideal men has been based on the party’s ideology, painting them as members of the People’s Liberation Army (Chinese army) and its two major proletariat classes, farmers and industrial workers ~ all occupations that are “macho” in their aesthetics, but held at very poor esteem in ancient Chinese societies. All occupations that, to this day, may be hailed as noble by Chinese women, but not really deemed attractive by them.

Beauty, being an instinct, is perhaps much more resistant to propaganda.

If anything, the three terms Article O3 used to describe “effeminate” men ~ 奶油小生 “cream young men” (popularised in 1980s) , 花美男 “flowery beautiful men” (early 2000s), 小鲜肉 “little fresh meat” (coined in 2014 and still popular now) ~ only informs me how incredibly consistent the modern Chinese women’s view of ideal male beauty has been. It’s the same beauty the Chinese Communist Party has called feminine. It’s the same beauty found in Danmei. It’s the same beauty that, when witnessed in men in ancient China, was so revered that historians recorded it for their descendants to remember. It doesn’t mean there aren’t any women who appreciate the "macho” type ~ it’s just that, the appreciation for the non-macho type has never really gone out of fashion, never really changed. The only thing that is really changing is the name of the type, the name’s positive or negative connotations.

(Personally, I’m far more uncomfortable with the name “Little fresh meat” (小鲜肉) than 老婆 (wife). I find it much more insulting.)

Anyway, what I’d like to say is this: feminisation in Danmei ~ a genre that, by definition, is hyper-focused on aesthetics ~ may not be as "problematic” in Chinese as it is in English, because the Chinese tradition didn’t make that much of a differentiation between masculine and feminine beauty. Once again, this isn’t to say such mis-gendering isn’t disrespectful; it’s just that, perhaps, it is less disrespectful because Chinese still retains a cultural memory in which equating a beautiful man to a beautiful woman was the utmost flattery. 

I must put a disclaimer here: I cannot vouch for this being true for the general Chinese population. This is something that is buried deep enough inside me that it took a lot of thought for me to tease out, to articulate. More importantly, while I grow up in a Chinese-speaking environment, I’ve never lived inside China. My history knowledge, while isn’t shabby, hasn’t been filtered through the state education system.

I’d also like to point out as well, along this line of thought, that in *certain* (definitely not all) aspects, Chinese society isn’t as sexist as the West. While historically, China has periods of extreme sexism against women, with the final dynasties of Ming and Qing being examples, I must (reluctantly) acknowledge Chairman Mao for significantly lifting the status of women during his rule. Here’s a famous quote of his from 1955:

婦女能頂半邊天 Women can lift half the skies

The first marriage code, passed in 1950, outlawed forced marriages, polygamy, and ensured equal rights between husband and wife.  For the first time in centuries, women were encouraged to go outside of their homes and work. Men resisted at first, wanting to keep their wives at home; women who did work were judged poorly for their performance and given less than 50% of men’s wage, which further fuelled the men’s resistance. Mao said the above quote after a commune in Guizhou introduced the “same-work-same-wage” system to increase its productivity, and he asked for the same system to to be replicated across the country. (Source)

When Chairman Mao wanted something, it happened. Today, Chinese women’s contribution to the country’s GDP remains among the highest in the world.  They make up more than half of the country’s top-scoring students. They’re the dominant gender in universities, in the ranks of local employees of international corporations in the Shanghai and Beijing central business districts—among the most sought after jobs in the country. While the inequality between men and women in the workplace is no where near wiped out — stories about women having to sleep with higher-ups to climb the career ladder, or even get their PhDs are not unheard of, and the central rulership of the Chinese Communist Party has been famously short of women — the leap in women’s rights has been significant over the past century, perhaps because of how little rights there had been before ~ at the start of the 20th century, most Chinese women from relatively well-to-do families still practised foot-binding, in which their feet were literally crushed during childhood in the name of beauty, of status symbol. They couldn’t even walk properly.

Perhaps, the contemporary Chinese women’s economic contribution makes the sexism they encounter in their lives, from the lack of reproductive rights to the “leftover women” label, even harder to swallow. It makes their fantasies fly to even higher, more defiant heights. The popularity of Dangai right now is pretty much driven by women, as acknowledged by Article O3. Young women, especially, female fans who people have dismissed as “immature”, “crazy”, are responsible for the threat the Chinese government is feeling now by the genre.

This is no small feat. While the Chinese government complains about the “effeminate” men from Danmei / Dangai, its propaganda has been heavily reliant on stars who have risen to popularity to these genres. The film Dd is currently shooting, Chinese Peacekeeping Force (維和部隊), also stars Huang Jingyu (黄景瑜), and Zhang Zhehan (張哲瀚) ~ the three actors having shot to fame from The Untamed (Dangai), Addicted (Danmei), and Word of Honour (Dangai) respectively.  Zhang, in particular, played the “uke” role in Word of Honour and has also been called 老婆 (wife) by his fans. The quote in Article O3, “Ten years as a tough man known by none; one day as a beauty known by all” was also implicitly referring to him.

Perhaps, the government will eventually realise that millennia-old standards of beauty are difficult to bend, and by extension, what is considered appropriate gender expression of Chinese men and women. 

In the metas I’ve posted, therefore, I’ve hesitated in using terms such as homophobia, sexism, and ageism etc, opting instead to make long-winded explanations that essentially amount to these terms (thank you everyone who’s reading for your patience!). Because while the consequence is similar—certain fraction of the populations are subjected to systemic discrimination, abuse, given less rights, treated as inferior etc—these words, in English, also come with their own context, their own assumptions that may not apply to the situation. It reminds me of what Leo Tolstoy wrote in Anna Karenina,

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

Discrimination in each country, each culture is humiliating, unhappy in its own way. Both sexism and homophobia are rampant in China, but as their roots are different from those of the West, the ways they manifest are different, and so must the paths to their dissolution. I’ve also hesitated on calling out individual behaviours or confronting individuals for this reason. i-Danmei fandoms are where i-fans and c-fans meet, where English-speaking doesn’t guarantee a non-Chinese sociopolitical background (there may be students from China, for example; I’m also ... not entirely Western), and I find it difficult to articulate appropriate, convincing arguments without knowing individual backgrounds.

Frankly, I’m not sure if I’ve done the right thing. Because I do hope feminisation will soon fade into extinction, especially in i-Danmei fandoms that, if they continue to prosper on international platforms, may eventually split from c-Danmei fandoms along the cultural (not language) line due to the vast differences in environmental constraints. My hope is especially true when real people are involved, and c-fandoms, I’d like to note, are not unaware of the issues surrounding feminisation ~ it has already been explicitly forbidden in BJYX’s supertopic on Weibo. 

At the same time, I’ve spent so many words above to try to explain why beauty can *sometimes* lurk behind such feminisations. Please allow me to end this post with one example of feminisation that I deeply dislike—and I’ve seen it used by fans on Gg as well—is 綠茶 (”green tea”), from 綠茶婊 (”green tea whore”) that means women who look pure / innocent but are, deep down, promiscuous / lustful. In some ways, its meaning isn’t so different from Daji 妲己, the consort blamed for the fall of the Shang dynasty. However, to me at least, the flattery in the feminisation is gone, perhaps because of the character “whore” (婊), because the term originated in 2013 from a notorious sex party rather than from a legendary beauty so maligned that The Investiture of the Gods (封神演義), the seminal Chinese fiction written ~2,600 years after Daji’s death, re-imagined her as a malevolent fox spirit (狐狸精) that many still remembers her as today.

Ah, to be caught between two cultures. :)