#being a queer man in this community genuinely is the worst sometimes

[davidtennantgenderenvy]

Addressing The Tinhatters: A Statement in Solidarity With @dtmsrpfcringe And Others

I've been active in this fandom for a little over a year, and in my time here I've kept my slate pretty clean. I try not to involve myself in drama and discourse, and when I see something I don't agree with online, most of the time I keep it to myself. I've been aware of the blogs I refer to in this post basically from the onset, but I've stayed quiet, partially to not come across as disrespecting others' opinions and preferences and partially to protect my peace and my own life as a creator. But what started as mostly harmless, if a bit unhinged and delusional, behavior, has turned on some fronts into unimaginable cruelty the likes of which I never imagined this fandom to be capable of. As someone who it seems people in this fandom have come to respect, I think it would be unfair and selfish for me to stay neutral any longer.

Fanfiction has been a genuinely transformative force in my life. It has helped me discover so much about my own relationships to love and desire, and I would never want to tell anyone that it is wrong for any ship to be that source of inspiration for them, including RPF. Nor do I think, as I've said, that it's inherently wrong to have speculative thoughts about David and Michael's sexualities. As someone who has been lucky enough to interact with David several times now, and probably will again, I choose not to do so myself in a public forum out of respect, but curiosity doesn't have to be invasive, and David and Michael being in loving partnerships with women certainly doesn't mean they can't be attracted to other genders too. There's nothing wrong with liking the idea of a relationship between David Tennant and Michael Sheen, or even, really, with believing they might have feelings for each other. If that's all you're doing, this post isn't about you. What I absolutely cannot excuse is the proliferation of hypocritical, nonsensical, and nasty rumors about the women in their lives.

Nothing Georgia Tennant or Anna Lundberg seems to do is ever good enough. Every expression of positivity is curated and phony, anything that could be perceived as negative vile and mean. I see these women attacked on a daily basis as partners, as mothers, as actresses. Georgia is simultaneously presenting a false ideal of a perfect, happy family for her own gains, while somehow at the same time being too irresponsible and incompetent to be a proper parent. Anna, a still young and up and coming actress herself, is expected to perform the ideal of an affectionate partner on social media, is perceived as unsupportive of Michael when she doesn't, when in reality she may simply be trying to make a name for herself in the industry without people solely associating her with the man she loves. Both of these women share in David and Michael's advocacy for marginalized communities, sometimes in different, more or less obvious ways. David and Michael are always brave and sincere, while Anna and Georgia's actions are always self serving and performative, though no evidence is ever given to indicate that the things they post or charities they support are any sort of cover or deflection. Nor are there ever any reasons given for their perceived lack of onscreen talent, other than that they're "boring" or don't have as many jobs as their husbands- never mind that both of them are in an extremely competitive industry and get perfectly respectable amounts of work, especially for mothers of young children. Worst of all, I've seen them accused of things as awful as child abuse and rape, all for the crime of simply being married to the wrong men. It's all so horribly gendered too, David and Michael often referred to as the "men" while Georgia and Anna are reduced to negative stereotypes of nagging, shallow gold diggers. As a fandom populated with so many queer people, many of whom, myself included, have found freedom from gender roles with Michael and David's characters' help, I thought we knew better.

I've been lucky enough to meet both David and Georgia now, and have witnessed firsthand the easy, joyful affection they have for each other when no one of consequence is watching, the way they giddily hold hands on the street and make each other laugh while tenderly looking into each other's eyes even and especially after sixteen years together. Georgia when I met her was incredibly kind, down to earth, and approachable, and my partner, who's met her several times more than I have, gushes about her constantly- how funny, authentic, and intelligent she is, and of course, how much she and David love each other, how they look out for each other and adore each other's flaws and quirks. David of course still gushes about Georgia every chance he gets in speeches and interviews, her strength and brilliance as well as her beauty, and Georgia, while maybe not always as effusive, shows her love for David in plenty of ways, the beautiful candid photos she takes of him, for instance. There's such a soft, painterly tenderness and fondness in them, for the man, not just the dazzling star everyone else gets to see. Her David, gentle, devoted, goofy, aging, melancholy, imperfectly perfect David. Where would we be without Georgia giving us these little glimpses of him? I suspect the same people who deride Georgia's social media presence as try-hard, cringeworthy, artificial, would feel a bit differently if one day they stopped coming.

I can't speak as clearly on behalf of Anna and Michael, but the accounts I've gotten of her and Michael's relationship from eyewitnesses have presented it as no less loving than David and Georgia's, albeit in slightly different ways. Even then, why should I have to? She doesn't owe me anything. I doubt anyone who's made the posts accusing Anna and Georgia of being nasty baby trappers has ever had children. There's no such thing as a perfect mother, and even one child is a massive task. It's normal to not be a shining ray of affection all the time, and Georgia I know more than makes up for it with her fierce love and support for her children in all of their endeavors. Georgia is also a diagnosed neurodivergent woman, and so many of the remarks I see directed at her are clearly discriminatory and often directed at women with her diagnoses. Everyone coos over how charming David is when he shows signs of being AuDHD, but the second his wife does too, she's careless and cold. And don't even get me started on when photos of Michael and David looking anything less than beatifically happy get interpreted as them being miserable due to their wives treating them so poorly. THEY'RE HUMAN BEINGS!!! NEUTRAL FACIAL EXPRESSIONS EXIST!!! WOULD YOU BE A SPARKLING RAY OF SUNSHINE IF YOUR DISNEYLAND RIDE GOT STUCK!!!

I say all this now not even because I think I have any hope of stopping the people in question, but because one of the main fighters on the front of the opposition, @dtmsrpfcringe, has been both a wonderful online friend to me and dealt with even worse abuse than that which gets hurled at Anna and Georgia on the daily. When my blog was briefly overrun by TERFs in light of the Tennant/Badenoch/Sunak drama, Tori was the first person to stand up for me, and as she recieves more vitriol in one day than I've ever experienced in my entire life online, I think I've taken far too long to do the same for her. This woman has dealt with doxing threats, attacks on her character, and most horrific of all, wishes of death upon her and her baby. No one would blame her for stopping, but she has remained steadfast in her mission to call bs where she sees it, and she shouldn't have to do it alone. Tori, I think you are so brave, and I am proud to stand in solidarity with you against the misinformation, meanness, and misogyny that threaten to corrupt this fandom we call home.

Even after all we've been through over the past couple of months, I still believe the Good Omens fandom and David and Michael's individual fandoms to be places of kindness, empathy, and inclusivity. Which is why such cruel behavior (because there's no other word for it) is utterly disappointing and baffling to me. You should be utterly ashamed of yourselves. You're the exact kinds of people David and Michael speak out against on a weekly basis, and I guarantee that if you engage in the kinds of behavior I've highlighted here, they would be disgusted with you. Or maybe they'd simply pity you, because your lives are so empty that you've decided the only way to fill them is to sacrifice the reputations and peace of innocent women on the altar of a relationship that in all likelihood takes place solely in your own heads.

And if you read all this and find you still ship David and Michael, which even I do sometimes, well, there's always polyamory.

I'm sleepy! good night and kindly fuck off! - Lauren

[denimbex1986]

'When it was announced that Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal would be starring as lovers in All of Us Strangers, a film written and directed by Andrew Haigh, fans were buzzing on social media about what the combination would deliver. This was no surprise: Andrew Scott – already a celebrated actor from roles such as Moriarty in Sherlock, the ‘hot priest’ in Fleabag, and Gethin in the incredible 2014 film Pride – and Paul Mescal (Normal People, Aftersun) are the definition of queer catnip. Under director Haigh’s masterful eye, the end product is an enthralling exploration of what it means to be queer in today’s Britain. Even ahead of its general UK release, the film has already made an impact and literally shifted the language we use about gay/queer representation on screen.

Haigh – acclaimed for past feature films Weekend and 45 Years, as well as HBO series Looking – has crafted a tender examination of love in the shadow of shame. An enigmatic dive into the pain and pleasure of finding affection in another man through the constrictive confines of emotional isolation, All of Us Strangers excels on so many levels.

The premise: forty-something Adam (Scott) meets Mescal’s twenty-something Harry, and the pair begin a love affair that has Adam revisiting his childhood home and conjuring up the ‘ghosts’ of his dead parents. And no, that’s not a spoiler, it’s just the opening scenes of a film that examines a love affair between two gay/queer men of disparate ages whose very different life experiences have brought them unexpectedly together. What happens next? Well, that’s for you to discover in a movie theatre near you. Essentially, All of Us Strangers is one of the most enthralling films of the 21st century to explore British gay identity, and Scott delivers quite possibly the performance of his career to date, one that dances between visceral suffering and emotional vulnerability.

Here, Scott talks to Attitude about bringing his character Adam to life on screen, working through shame, and the power of sex as a means of communication.

Cliff Joannou: A good place to start is to say that I really related to the film. I grew up in Croydon not long after director Andrew Haigh did, so the environment and era that it was set in really resonated with me.

Andrew Scott: You’re joking me.

For real. Even that shot with you as your character Adam walking through the Whitgift Shopping Centre, I was like, ‘Oh, that’s a little bit close to home.’ That’s exactly what it looked like when I was a kid. What resonated most with you in the story? For me it was very much the setting and location, being a young child in the UK after the worst of the AIDS crisis.

I suppose it was the dynamics within the relationships, that was what I found most authentic. And there’s two storylines within the movie, and both of them I found to be really, really beautiful and very actable. The scenes between Adam and his parents are genuinely extraordinary. And what’s so lovely is when I was in LA after the film had come out, and audiences had started to see it, and I’m really getting such a strong sense that people really do appreciate the nuance of the film.

I think the chief value of the film, for queer audiences particularly, is that it recognises that the dynamic within families isn’t always necessarily as dramatic, perhaps, as it is portrayed sometimes in stories about coming out, in the sense that it’s not fully embraced acceptance and nor is it outward rejection, but for a lot of queer people it’s somewhere in between, so that brutality and intolerance and doubt can exist alongside real love within families.

Absolutely. I like how frank the conversations are between Adam and his parents. I also like how early the conversation about Adam’s sexuality comes up with his parents.

What I love about that scene is that he doesn’t want to come out to his mum, he doesn’t want to have a coming-out scene. He’s a man in his forties, and he’s lived a life on his own for 30 years, so he wants to tell her about himself, and that includes, of course, him being gay, so he tries to be offhand about it, but also, I think my challenge was to show that he deeply cares what she thinks as well. And when she starts to be loud and wrong and reveals some prejudice in her questions, it enrages him.

But I think that exists alongside a real deep need for her to accept him, too. I think that scene is just so beautiful because it’s something, of course, that he’ll have thought about given the fact that he lost his parents 30 years ago. One of the things that I find really moving is when people talk about having lost their parents and never having come out to them before they died. I’ve talked to 60-year-old men who say, “I never got to do that.” And I think that really takes up a lot of people’s time.

Did you discuss with Andrew [Haigh] any of Adam’s wider backstory or did you create one for yourself? Where had he been in that time in between?

Not with a huge amount of detail because I suppose I thought of what benefit was that going to be. There were certain things I sort of thought about a little bit, but my biggest challenge, and all of our challenges, was to make those scenes as authentic as possible. We shot in Andrew’s childhood home, and that was such a brave thing for him to do. And I felt very much that if I were to think about any backstory, I wanted to think about my own; I wanted to bring my own stuff. To bring not necessarily my own biography, because it differs a huge amount from the character’s, but certainly my own emotional biography, as I call it.

It feels like such an extraordinary privilege to be able to play a character like this. And I wanted to give as much of myself because it was cathartic for me. I never thought that I would be able to watch a film like this, let alone be at the centre of it, so I wanted to be able to take that opportunity to express myself in some way. Why pick an imaginary backstory from somewhere else? I wanted to bring as much of myself as I could, because I feel like that’s what the audience is going to relate to the most.

There’s a bit early in the film when Adam meets his parents’ ‘ghosts’ for the first time, and he says, “Everything’s different now.” It’s such a powerful line as it highlights the character’s inability to let go of the past because doing so means he has to confront his present unhappiness.

Yes, exactly. Well, I suppose one of the best things that you can do as an actor is to say things to feel one thing but to say something else. That’s always what you want as an actor. A lot of the real interesting lines in the film are where people are saying one thing but meaning something else. When Adam says, “Everything’s different now,” I’m not sure that he fully believes that. He believes it in some way. But one of the things that I really love about the story is when Paul’s character of Harry talks about his estrangement from his family and he’s somebody who’s in his twenties.

I’m not sure the generational difference between Adam and Harry is the most interesting thing about the film. I think one of the big changes, of course, is the presence of Aids, when Adam would’ve been growing up. I certainly know that the shadow of Aids was very looming when I was growing up in the nineties. And, of course, that’s going to affect the way we think about sexuality in the sense that we’re going to feel like we’re going to be punished for being physical or for expressing love.

There’s another impactful moment where Adam says, “I thought if I fucked anyone I’d die.” It took me a while to get my head out of that space and allow my sexuality to be something that I enjoyed and recognise that it was not a threat to my life. How was your journey to finding peace with your sexuality?

Oh, it’s one of the wonderful things, the emancipation from that. I feel so incredibly… I suppose I just enjoy being gay so much on so many levels, I think it’s such a wonderful thing to me. It’s an extraordinary gift to my life and just to be able to see the real beauty in being gay is completely wonderful. The older I get, just the more I feel so lucky to have been born gay and that pervades my life in the sense of all my friendships. I have so many amazing queer friends in my life now that I just adore.

What’s very sad for some of us is that we avoid those kinds of people when we are shredded in our own shame. To be around other gay people highlights something that you don’t want to see, but when you do want to see it, it becomes completely wonderful. I feel such a huge sense of camaraderie with other queer people now, and without sounding too hippy about it, I feel like I just want to spread that love and positivity in our community because we’ve come such a long way, and it’s important that we are kind and look out for each other and celebrate how uniquely different and how fucking wonderful that can be.

That’s beautiful. I remember when I was younger and less comfortable in my identity, I avoided going to Pride, I felt it was a little bit too in my face. Now as I get older, I go there with my nieces, and we watch the parade, and there’s a tremendous sense of healing that comes with being around the community. And the broader the community gets, the more all these letters in that ever-expanding acronym stand out, the more beautiful it gets.

When I see two people of the same sex holding hands walking down the street, I’m like a little weirdo. I’m smiling at them. They’re like, ‘What’s that dude smiling at us for?’ Because I just think it’s so wonderful. It’s easy what you say about everything is different now. It’s something that I always feel when people say, “Oh, it’s 2024, you’ve got to get with the times.” I always find that preposterous because, and I mean this so vehemently, that different forms of sexual identity and gender identity have existed since the beginning of humanity. They have existed and will always exist until humanity ends. In 2084, they’re going to look back at us and think, ‘My God, those people were so old-fashioned.’ Sexuality, that’s not a fashion, it’s a natural state of being.

When I watch the relationship between Adam and Harry, there’s no point at which you feel like the sex scenes are being played for the audience’s titillation. It is one of those kind of rare sex scenes that actually drives the narrative forward, that it is important to the story.

Sex is just communication, isn’t it? It’s just physical communication rather than verbal communication. And what needed to be communicated is how I think we see Adam as somebody who hasn’t been touched by anybody or touched anybody in a long time, not just sexually, but he needs affection from his parents, and he needs love and sex and affection from his lover. And I think just seeing that tentativeness and the way Paul plays a character who’s a bit more sex-positive, so to speak… Their communication is really strong in that scene. I’m so proud of it. I really am because I feel like they represent the characters so beautifully.

How did you arrive at that point of playing those scenes in that way?

We didn’t over-rehearse it. We knew that those scenes, particularly the early ones, had to have a sort of frisson. And we had an intimacy coordinator, which can be very helpful for the simple reason that if you’re able to talk to somebody about your fears or what you want to show, what you don’t want to show, or what you think it should be and what the narrative of the storyline is, you have that base of safety. It actually makes you feel like you can do whatever you want. Because frankly, you just know that if there’s something that you don’t like, you’re contractually protected, and it won’t end up in the movie.

Andrew [Haigh] is really good. Sometimes when you do sex scenes, it can be like, ‘Oh my God, D-Day.’ And you are a bit nervous, of course, because you take your clothes off in front of strangers, but he’s like, “It’s just another scene,” so you don’t want to overdo it. But chemistry is a really interesting thing. You’re basically just listening to see what the other person is doing physically in the same way you would in a dialogue scene. And you can talk about that as much as you like, but until you’re actually there, it’s not alive in that way, so it’s just about listening, but just listening with your body, basically.

There’s a line in the film where Adam tells Harry, “Things are better now, but it doesn’t take much to feel the way that you felt.” Is there an instance where you remember, ‘Oh, that’s the first time I was made to feel shame?’

I don’t think that there is one particular point, but I do think if we could erase the assumption in our society that everybody is straight until proven otherwise, it would make an enormous difference to people. And by that, I mean that we don’t say to our six-year-olds, “You’re going to marry a princess, and have you got a girlfriend?” I remember when I was a teenager and people said, “Have you got a girlfriend?” I would say no, and I wasn’t necessarily lying, but you feel like you’re lying by omission.

For me, what happened is that you desexualise yourself slightly. And I think that what happens for a lot of teenagers is that there’s a conspiracy of silence around you, and that is a lonely place to be. And I think that’s where we become very hardworking, that we pour our energies into something completely different in order to correct what we imagine is a flaw in our character.

Some people go the opposite [way], where they become self-destructive; you can be super hardworking and incredibly ambitious, or you can just completely go off the rails. You think, ‘Well, I have been rejected, so I’m just going to go crazy.’ It affects our psychology in so many different ways. It may not necessarily be something that’s actually happened to us; it could be just forecasting what you think might happen, and that forecasting happens when we read about prejudice or other horror stories. The way the media talked about gay people when I was growing up was absolutely disgusting and fearmongering, and I still think we have to be very careful in not just the media, but in the way that we consume media and what we stand for. That we call out that kind of cruelty and intolerance. Language matters.

When we read the opposite, when we read positive things or see representation on screen, when we see ourselves, we think, ‘Oh, well, we can forge a way in the world.’ That’s why I think a movie like this, it is so incredibly important because it’s incredibly compassionate and tender, but it also doesn’t erase the fact that it’s painful and it can be lonely being gay. And there’s a certain thorny path that we all have to go to in order to find love, not just in another person, but in ourselves.

The clip from the Hollywood Reporter where you talk about the use of the term ‘openly gay’ went viral and has likely changed the way we refer to out queer actors in future forever. What went through your mind when you saw the reaction to that?

There’s something about that phrase that makes me uneasy about what it implies. Particularly now. You don’t put ‘openly ’in front of most attributes or characteristics. And I think we should maybe look at retiring it. And I know I’m not alone in that. The response to the clip reflects that. I do understand that historically we need a word to recognise the fact that there are sometimes people that are gay but for whatever reason aren’t able to be open about it. I totally get that. And so, I just feel the word ‘out’ does that. It’s just simpler. It does the job, and with less implications.'

[serfuzzypushover]

How can you be a lesbian while also liking men? I thought the definition of lesbian was a non-man that only likes other non-men? (This isnt meant to be rude/accusing i just genuinely dont get it & want to learn)

no worries i can understand why you might be confused!

starting off i wanna say i dislike that definition. creating a secondary binary of "people who are men" and "people who aren't men" is at worst transphobic and at best counterproductive.

there's lot of ppl, lesbians included, who simply do not fit into one of these categories. bigender, genderfluid, heck, plain just nonbinary—those gender identities are ignored while using this language, because any one of these can include identifying as a man in some way

of course, i understand this definition was created to be more inclusive but it only ends up being restrictive, which in my opinion goes against queerness itself. If a strict definition of a label works for you by all means use it! but not everyone will feel the same and forcing it upon others is just plain wrong

the original meaning of the word lesbian in a queer context was "queer attraction towards women" and it included any woman* who had relations with women. mono lesbians, bisexual dykes, afab dykes ect (*using the gendered language of the time here) and i personally prefer this one. It includes a good number of ppl with similar experiences, it isn't restrictive to anyone who might identify with the word or community in an unconventional way and it also doesn't center the identity on who you aren't attracted to.

expanding on gender identity and lesbians, queer men have been welcomed in our spaces for a long while now. butches sometimes identify as men, there's trans men who feel connected to the label and use it for themselves still, even after finding out their gender identity(that's me hii!). it is rather silly to acknowledge these lesbian men in our spaces and not expect lesbians to be attracted to other lesbians

tldr; gender is fake, queerness is individualist and expecting everyone to follow strict rules in how to express personal identity is anti-queer

[battle-of-alberta]

hypothetical comic where calvin goes to therapy for being a bisexual disaster among other things.

so like. i deliberately don’t say one way or the other where on the platonic-romantic spectrum ed and cal fall on because of a lot of reasons but mostly just because i think the tension and ambiguity is 1. most interesting/funniest and 2. most accessible for multiple readers who want some room to imagine, particularly because being aroacespec i get that romance repulsion Happens sometimes. It happens for me occasionally so I don’t want to lock anything in stone, at least for the main duo the story centres around.

that said i do have a whole hypothetical mental image of “if it was a romo/sexual relationship, this is how the characters would theoretically react over this range of time/historically.” because I love hypotheticals that don’t have to be “canon” and because I am interested in queer history as a queer person myself, especially in this province where... well. if you know you know.

Now that i am getting paid real money to actually research queer history locally? I think about it way more.

on to the hypotheticals if you are interested...

- i think calvin would have had an awareness of his slightly-fluid sexuality at the very least from the 70s on, especially because sexuality was such a huge part of white collar oil man culture in some of the worst most misogynistic ways but also for other reasons. I think he definitely would have started questioning what was “normal” and “acceptable” at that time, but I think he learned very quickly not to ask too many questions. He did grow up on Bible Bill’s radio show in the 30s, which set this tone of repression, eugenics, and hostility that we are still reeling from.

- his victorian upbringing combined with this 1930s ethos plus all the nostalgic romanticism built up in the 1910s is the emotional soup that makes calvin hallucinate that he’s actually a normal person who CAN have the job and the wife and the white picket fence and 1.5 kids occasionally. He tries not to overthink it most of the time.

- i expect this conversation didn’t take place until the 2010s. despite calvin’s cushy workplace benefits i think mental health, therapy, etc. especially for someone in such a traditional conservative environment was just not considered even if it was available earlier. and talking about sexuality? forgetaboutit. that said, I think calvin is more progressive than we give him credit for sometimes and I actually think he would be most likely out of any of them to seek this kind of stuff out

- likewise i think after his falling out with ed he does a bad job of patching things up, but once he puts his mind to using his knowledge and skills of being a people person and being genuinely interested and excited about organizations in his city, he figures out how to talk about it with people in his own way. i think when people think about queer history they tend to think of the bar/club scene and it’s more than that, especially after certain events in canadian, american and international queer communities. so by the time he goes looking, there are already resources that have been operating for decades! I don’t know much about the specifics of calgary queer history (yet) but i know that these things absolutely exist to this day.

- eventually some therapists have to learn to work with immortals which they definitely did not cover in their certification.

[lucienne-thee-librarian]

For the choose violence ask game: 3,4, and 7 for The Sandman

Thanks nonny! I see how hard people lit up for the Choose Violence ask game and I'm like...you know what I gotta give the people the salt we've all clearly been craving 🤣

3 and 4 (worst take you've ever seen on tumblr/what was the last strae that made you block someone) I'm combining into one cause I fortunately haven't dealt with anyone actually harassing me on here, over fandom drama specifically anyway (yet). OKAY so you all are going to hear about the cold take I saw that lives in my brain rent free that made me unfollow and block a mutual in a fit of rage and bafflement.

Picture being me, a month or two ago. I'd recently followed someone on the spot cause they'd had such a good meta about queer!Rose headcanons. They followed me back. Cool. Everything's Gucci. And then I realize how much of their blog is Dreamling. Okay, I can tag filter or unfollow if it bothers me.

And then I saw them dead ass go into the part of the comics where Ishtar is talking to Dream in Brief Lives, and she says "You really don't like women, do you?"

(Which, ouch, but given his previous behavior, not at all an unfair comment.)

And this person's takeaway was, I shitteth you not, a rambling diatribe about how maybe the reason all Dream's relationships keep failing meanwhile he's friends with Hob Gadling, is that maybe...he's not that Into Women!!

Yeah. Seriously. Definitely not the emotional problems, lack of consistent communication and ability to maintain a relationship long term for various reasons, Definitely not the pride and anger problem that got him to send Nada to hell, which literally the entire arc of Season of Mists involved him trying to fix, no, all this can be waved away with what might as well have been a longer-winded version of that corny ass 2000s era meme "Sometimes a man...hurts a woman...because his soulmate is a man!!" And before you ask - no, this person didn't appear to be joking. I seriously wanted to believe it was satire but NOPE. So now you all have to suffer the knowledge that some people (because it was being just reblogged uncritically to praise) seriously think like this. I swear I lost braincells that day.

7. What character did you begin to hate not because of canon but the way the fandom acts about them? Well...oh you know. Hobert Gadling. Easy.

Look, I was never His Biggest Fan for. Obvious reasons stated below, but he's interesting when you look at him as a direct parallel and contrast to Dream - both of these men/man-shaped beings are immortal and have done absolutely horrendous, unforgivable things to others in their long lives, between Dream's sending a woman he supposedly loved to Hell for breaking it off with him, and Hob's participation in the slave trade. And now, the question is...what do they do with this? How do you live with yourselves, having done things you can never make up for? DO you choose to go on living? Then again the critical difference between them among others - Hob has the ability to choose to maintain his immortality, or not. Dream doesn't - or doesn't feel he can safely choose to abandon the role he was born into.

But the sheer SCALE to which the fandom has constantly, utterly erased the worst of this man's atrocities, like flat out refuses to acknowledge they even exist in both show and comics (it would be one thing entirely if they cut that bit out of the show I'd understand people going feral over show Hob then, but. They did not so where's people's excuse) so they can push him and Morpheus into the mold of their ship is...honestly kind of amazing (derogatory) and has driven me to wanting to grind my teeth every time I saw the ship and eventually, him, until I recently finally wised up and filtered tags. And what also irks me - that they've taken OVER the fandom to the point where it's getting genuinely hard to impossible to go into the tags of any other characters including Rose and Lucienne especially without MOST OF IT being about them being sidelined as cheerleaders in some way for this ship. And if you tag filter and block then that just means their tags are suddenly vastly diminished or full of "this post has filtered tags" "this post has filtered tags" "this post-" ughhhhhh.

[lex-n-weegie]

Elaborating more on thoughts relating to this post on a separate post so I don't take away from OP's points. There's a chance that none of this will make sense, or perhaps I'll come off as hurtful, and if either case happens please please please DM me or reply to this. Genuinely, I want to be a good person, don't be scared to approach. I'm just 18, I'm not gonna chew you out for anything

All of it is going under the cut because really, I'm just rambling and putting random thoughts together. Some swears, negativity, all that kinda junk, and I know it'll be long(also rbs are turned off because I do not want to deal with drama, college starts in a week)

I've never gotten any hate from the community for anything, I'll be upfront on that. I've only gotten 1 hateful ask in my entire time having this blog and the previous one I accidentally deleted. Irl is a slightly different story, but that isn't important to this. The worst I could even tell you specifically relating to the selfship community is not getting a lot of engagement on my posts, not getting asks when I rb ask games, and sometimes the occasional blocked out of nowhere by someone I believed I was friendly with.

I hope I've been nice in this community as well, I've been doing my best to be welcoming, open, and kind to anyone I come across. I also try my best to not complain about certain things(like lack of engagement), or even venting about irl stuff. Sure this is my blog, I can post whatever the hell I want, and to some extent I do, but I also try to have this place be one of comfort and recluse from the world. That what selfshipping was for me when I was younger, and it still kind of is, so I want others to to have that as well.

Admittedly, it's why I don't talk about real life issues often if at all. People can criticize me for that, but honestly I don't think it's fully necessary for me specifically to do so. I don't have enough followers to where me speaking about things would do much. Everyone who follows me would know about them already, and I would just be stating something that should be obvious to anyone who knows me even surface level(like killing trans/queer folk for being themselves is horrible, women should have control over their own bodies, black/poc people are equal to white people, etc etc). Genuinely, logically, I don't see any instance where I actually need to bring it up.

Also also, while yes, I'm lucky that I haven't gotten any hate, I do know people who were chased off of their own platforms because of the characters they liked, or even because they didn't know EVERYTHING about something. Their own f/o's creators or source material, an acquaintance/friend's f/os, or whatever else there is. I know of a person who was forced out with fire and pitchforks because they specifically liked a different version of a character, one where they weren't bad or anything. But because of the similar name garbage, people believed they liked an undead man who happily and openly murdered people and chased them out.

And honestly? The community has such double standards and is sometimes super online. I know I know, I'm a terminally online person too, I'm a hypocrite, but I still try to bind myself to reality and realize when some issues are, in all honesty, fucking stupid. You know how many people I've seen selfship with murderers? Not just "oh they're so misunderstood 🥺" characters either, I've seen Chucky(both human and doll), I've seen Jason, a bunch of different characters who openly enjoy murdering, who manipulate and torture, and almost none of them are openly hated or chased out with the same hatred and anger I've seen others get treated with. It's because it's not wrong. If it's not a real murderer and the person doesn't want/fantasize about doing that irl(basically bad mental issues), who cares? Genuinely, what's the issue? None, because most people don't have a problem at all with it unless it's a specific character they don't like much apparently.

As well as this, people are expected to know so much in this community. The dos and don'ts, who's right and who's wrong, what traits make a character wrong to selfship with, and the smallest mistake or unknown information can get their head on a stick. Ik a kind of big situation happen a few years back that's similar to what I'm talking about, but it's not the only thing I've citing. This has happened before, it's not a one time occurrence. Oh, you didn't know that this person you follow has an f/o who's some kind of abhorrent person? Well, to the shredder with you then. Oh, this person has an f/o who was once a bad person but has since grown and is doing good now in their source material? Well, you and the majority only know them as a villain, so go scream at them for liking such horrible things.

I'm not saying everyone is like this ofc, I'm not thinking that "oh the whole selfship community is bad I'm the only good one here. :(((" It's just that either a majority or perhaps a very loud and active part of the community are, and it sucks. The double standers suck, the demands lots have are so much, sometimes it could feel like more of a hassle than anything.

And I'll admit, I think most of it comes from the fact of what selfshipping IS. It's a form of selflove and everything, but it can go to far. "Too much of a good thing isn't a good thing for anyone." Too much confidence can make you an asshat, too much kindness can make you a doormat, too much of a specific profession or environment can make you jaded, and too much selflove can make you selfish and narcissistic. It's a safe space away from things, yes, but when you demand others do what YOU want because it'll make you more comfortable, it's just a whole mess. You need to block the tags, you need to block the people you don't like(you don't even need a good reason, blocking is free), it's up to you to curate your online experience. Like someone's art but hate a specific ship? Block the tag and keywords. This one Selfshipper annoys you and nothing else? Block them. Stop vagueposting and being so negative. You can say you're sad because you saw someone else shipping with your main, but don't name drop or be so specific that someone could figure out who.

I'll admit, the last bit comes from my own annoyances and experience. I stopped talking or joining any selfship servers because I had negative experiences. One situation specifically had someone upset that I shared an f/o with them that they were uncomfy sharing. I told them I don't talk about them often, and anytime I do I'll spoil it and have a warning. But it wasn't good enough for them apparently because they'd "click it and see/read it anyway." When they then went on to vent about it for more than a full day in the server's vent chat, it really felt like they wanted me out so they could be comfortable, all because they couldn't control themselves.

I'm sorry to be so mean, but sometimes you gotta man up. It's okay to not want to share, your f/os truly loves you, but it doesn't mean you're allowed to make demands out of others. You can ask for a tag to block, or a warning so you don't have to see, but that's all you can do.

I think that's it, sorry for all the emotion. As I kept writing I kept wanting to say more. I hope it makes some sort of sense lol

[lightningfilledsaber]

i read your tags on that one post and it's insane how close our experiences were. im certain it was a different trans woman but i had the EXACT same experience with a man-hating transphobic autistic sex pest trans woman who was afraid of being treated like a predator but was fine treating other people the same way. you're not the only one who's suffered this way and im glad you were able to get out of there too

While I do appreciate the support from this ask (and this is not meant with any aggressive/mean/etc tone toward you at all!) I do want to be very, very, clear; I would not describe my ex friend as a sex pest at all. Not even necessarily "man-hating," either, though she definitely had a gender essentialism issue she needed to deal with. I'm not comfortable going into detail but not only did I not have a single sexual experience with her, there are only two incidences I was made to feel sexually uncomfortable around/by her specifically, it was at worst a miscommunication issue. But really it was just sometimes you do or say something that accidentally makes someone uncomfortable but doesn't necessarily cause harm. That's how I feel about those instances, though in the context of all their other behavior, was still by virtue uncomfortable and something I would've liked to hold them accountable for (though AGAIN, not because I feel they were being sexually predatory, this is just a very nuanced situation)

The situation and relationship I had with both of them was very, very nuanced. I'm still struggling over how to identify certain things and processing the sheer amount of shit I was put through; but at the end of the day, most of the harm was perpetuated by her partner, my ex best friend. She was absolutely not innocent, and did blatantly cross and ignore my boundaries and made me uncomfortable frequently, but I can confidently say it wasn't sexual. Neither she or her partner are sex pests or sexual predators or anything like that.

Now that that's out of the way! Genuinely thank you for this ask. I'm deeply sorry you had a similar experience and it's very reassuring to hear I'm not alone lol. It's not something I always feel comfortable talking about, as I don't want to invite terf rhetoric painting trans women as inherent predators, but also there's been this idea in certain queer circles recently to "combat" that rhetoric (which only ends up spewing the same man-bad, woman-good gender essentialism but in a trans "INCLUSIVE" way) by saying that somehow trans women are incapable of doing wrong which is just as damaging (and isolating to any kind of victim of harmful behavior). In reality, your identity, your background, etc etc does not exempt you from nor does it make you more susceptible to harming others. You can cause harm no matter who you are, and that's why I constantly stress the fact that the issue I have with my ex friends is not just their treatment of me; but the fact that neither of them truly held themselves accountable or WORKED on their behavior at any point and in fact enabled each other's behavior toward me. I have never pretended to be a perfect friend but I know I tried my damndest every single day to communicate clearly and effectively what I would do better (not JUST when an issue arose, but ACTIVELY worked on myself even while things were "good") and what I needed and expected of them. I was instead met with blatant disregard for my comfort, my time, and again my boundaries. They did not give a shit about me, just what I could do for them. And it's isolating as hell when the people who hurt you are also trans themselves. Especially when they fear judgement and persecution just for being trans (or their disorders!), while in the same breath doing exactly that to you. I'm glad you were able to get out of your situation as well, thank you again for this ask.

[unclevladscorner]

Book Review/Analysis- The Orchid and the Lion

It took me a while to get through this book, but HOLY MOLY was it a good read.

Before I start- this is a highly sexually explicit novel. At it's core, it's a dystopian sci-fi, but it's also a book about relationships, queer community, sex work, and BDSM.

The plot largely revolves around Dorian Vidales and Laith Ritter. Dorian is a genderqueer gay man, fem Dom and the star sex worker at La Vie Boheme- The premier brothel on the James Baldwin space station. Located halfway between Earth and Mars, the station is a haven for LGBTQIA+ people and others who've fled oppressive Purity Laws on Earth.

Laith Ritter is a newly arrived transplant. He travels to the space station in hopes of building a new life for himself, and he hopes to connect to a relative who mysteriously dies just before the novel opens. The story largely revolves around the dual plot lines of Laith's training to be a professional sub and the investigation into the murder of his uncle, Sam Beecher.

Laith essentially lies on his resume when applying to work at La Vie Boheme, saying he's comfortable with many sex acts he's never heard of. Dorian is put in charge of Laith, and given a month to train him. Dorian; while attracted to Laith, has a difficult time with the unfamiliar feelings of falling head over high heels for the man he's now tasked to train. The budding romance is fraught with challenges as each man has their own baggage, none more so than Dorian himself.

The high points are very high, and the low points are very low. For a debut novel, Gabriel Hargrave knocks it out of the gods-damned park. I would give this book a million and one stars if I could, I think it's that great. This is going to be a long talk, dissecting some of the themes and plot of the book. WARNING: There will be spoilers ahead!

First off, I am super grateful that all the sex depicted in the book is fully consentual; and while there are moments of violence, they are handled in ways that did not trigger my own PTSD. This is a rarity for me, and I'm always glad when I can get through a sometimes difficult read without feeling re-traumatized.

I feel like the characters are portrayed in a raw, but dignified light. Dorian is a mess, he masks his feelings from himself and has an incredibly difficult time accepting both loving another person and having that love returned. Laith is relatively well composed on the outside, but he harbors deep trauma from both his military service and his years on Earth living as a stealth transgender man.

That being said, all the characters in the book feel very real and well rounded. Their hopes, dreams, trauma, and motivations all read with deep emotional sincerity. Even at Dorian's worst, I deeply sympathize with him b/c he genuinely believes he cannot be loved, and he feels the need to self sabotage his new relationship at various points for various reasons.

Laith is also deeply compelling. Hiding behind a mask of calm composure, his emotional armor is different but very parallel to Dorian's own. He finds freedom and acceptance in Dorian's training. Dorian; in spite of his objections, wants the best for Laith and never does anything without consent and regular safety checks.

Laith starts the book very ambivalent about his choice to become a sex worker, and ends the book surrounded by a family of friends and love he'd never dreamed of before. Shy at first, he slowly opens up to Dorian, the trust they build feels both unbreakable and all too fragile as the two men navigate one another's fears and trauma.

Laith's ability to have agency over his own body; to name it and refer to it in terms he's comfortable with, and to choose how in what way he has sex (Which is admittedly a LOT of ways lololol), is deeply satisfying. I feel like even in the realm of transmasculine penned works, trans men and transmasculine bodies are still often filtered through a cis feminine lens. This book; and Experience Points By N. A. Melamed, are two I've read that I deeply connect with as the authors embrace their own deeply personal trans experiences to pen very real feeling and authentic transmasculine characters. It makes me feel seen and proud of my own transmasculine body, emotional scars and all.

In spite of everything that happens, Laith and Dorian's deep bonds keep them together through both internal and external conflicts. The love between them is raw and and feels delicate at times; but in spite of this, they find a way to navigate the difficult situations they find themselves in and back to one another in a very deeply real way.

[aemiron-main]

Hey!! I just wanna say that i adore your analysis posts!!! Like your brain!!!!?? How do you even think of these???/pos

Literally adore how detailed and thouroghly explained these are, and the fact that you pay so much attention and thought to mike's character is honestly so nice. (He's my favorite character and not a lot of people appreciate his complexity like you do)

Your recent post about my mike's guilt over his queerness made me lost my mind man!!! Literally like JAIL JAIL

Thinking about how like Mike feels a sort of guilt for his feelings for Will. AND OMG the way you said that "him asking Will he's the bad guy cause he doesn't why either" IS SO GOOD!!!! CAUSE YES!! if you're don't look into it deep enough, it sort of comes off as condescending or retorical, but Mike is LEGITAMATELY ASKING THAT!!! HE DOESN'T KNOW!! He feels so helpless that at this point, he's rather Will just blame it on him cause he doesn't even know what's done wrong!!!

The thing with the wheeler's household is like you said!! "They don't tell each other what they've done wrong!!" And that's so important when it comes to your kids, cause they NEED to know what they've done wrong, you NEED to tell them in order for them to learn and grow as a person.

But they don't do that, so that manifests as smth that Mike has, which is just unrelentless guilt for everything regardless of what he thinks is his fault or not cause even if it wasn't obvious, it still is right?, he thinks that everything he does is to blame. Because then what else?? He doesn't know how to recognize faults cause he's never been taught to!!

It's always "you should know better" and people expect him to know what's he done wrong instead of COMMUNICATING!!! and so he internalizes that which makes it even worst.

Cause now it's not "Oh i'm to blame for everything" now it's "I'm to blame for everything AND i can't even figure WHY either"

Anyways i'm rambling and probably not making sense, but like it was fun rambling about him. LOVE YOUR POSTS KEEP IT UP!! :DD

AAAAAAAAAAAA HELLO ANON OMG THANK YOU SO MUCH!! THATS SO SWEET OF YOU!! i honestly have no idea how i think of it, the spirit of stranger things just possesses me and then i black out and write analysis LMAO (seriously though my brain just loves spotting patterns and i love analysis and sometimes i just stare at random screenshots/scenes until my brain puts some random puzzle piece together)! AND THANK YOU AGAIN OMG??? IM SO GLAD YOU THINK I APPRECIATE HIS COMPLEXITY BC I LOVE HIM SM TOO HIM AND WILL ARE MY FAVES AND JUST AAAAAA!!! <3 <3 <3

ABJFFJBH IM SORRY IM TAKING MYSELF IN!! LOCKING MYSELF UP FOR THAT POST!! AND YES YES YOU SEE THE VISION YES MIKE IS LEGIT ASKING THAT AND IT ALMOST SEEMS CONDESCENDING BUT HES BEING GENUINE!! And the fact that will can't even give him an answer?? No wonder mike's so upset after that- will's unintentionally doing the same thing that mike's parents do, he's not answering Mike when mike asks what he did wrong. But will doesn't realize that mike's genuinely asking, he just thinks that mike's being snarky because he doesn't KNOW that mike DID try to call!! AND YES EXACTLY!!! KIDS NEED TO KNOW!! And yes yes YES you're so right about mike's guilt!! He's never been taught to recognize fault in the proper way, YES, that's such a good way of putting it!!!

"It's always "you should know better" and people expect him to know what's he done wrong instead of COMMUNICATING!!! and so he internalizes that which makes it even worst." EXACTLY!!! EXACTLY!! PEOPLE EXPECT HIM TO KNOW BETTER BUT NOBODYS EVER TAUGHT HIM!! YES!! "Cause now it's not "Oh i'm to blame for everything" now it's "I'm to blame for everything AND i can't even figure WHY either"" EXACTLY YES AGAIN TOTALLY!!! And in his mind, if he can't figure out WHY, then he can't figure out how to FIX IT either- which leads down a dangerous road of seeing himself as inherently the problem like his existence as the problem and so then the only way to fix his existence is to end it. AAA YOU MAKE TONS OF SENSE!! I LOVE UR THOUGHTS!!! and thank you so much i will DEFINITELY keep the posts up!! <3 <3 <3

[disastergay]

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again--all polarized discourse can be divided into three categories:

identity vs. ideology (ace discourse, fascism, antisemitism, ableism, islamophobia, homophobia, transphobia, antiblackness, etc.)

ideology vs. ideology (shipping/fiction discourse, radical feminism vs. inclusive feminism, liberalism vs. socialism, etc.)

identity vs. identity (kink at pride, TMA vs. TME discourse, white/cis passing discourse, etc.)

the reason this community keeps going around in circles, repeating the same talking points and regurgitating the same old rhetoric, is because very few of us actually take the time to stop and step back to examine the underlying causes; the reasons why these arguments keep popping up in the first place. 

(contd: me going on a long rant about online discourse and debate styles)

**disclaimer: I want to preface this by reminding you that most if not of these debates are manufactured in one way or another, and thus my acknowledgment of any discourse’s unfortunate existence should not be interpreted as me “picking a side” or agreeing that the buzzwords I’m using are “good and useful”

in identity vs. ideology debates, you have one group that’s made up of people who share a trait that is inherent for most if not all of them, and another group made up of people whose only connection is a common, underlying belief that the identity of people in the former group is inherently harmful in some way and thus needs/deserves to be excluded at best, or eradicated at worst. 

typically, the ideology side is bigoted and will try to convince you that the issue is two identities or ideologies being pitted against one another in an attempt to legitimize their bullshit, and put the marginalized community at a negotiative disadvantage. this is why the language surrounding ace discourse evolved to dividing people into “inclusionist” and “exclusionist” categories--to redirect the conversation away from a marginalized group and muddy the waters, making it more difficult for newbies and outsiders to figure out that “exclusionism” (in this context) is just a fancy word for “bigotry.”

in ideology vs. ideology debates, you have two distinct groups who only share their respective differing beliefs. each group believes the other is inherently harmful in some way, and needs/deserves to be excluded at best, or eradicated at worst. however, because neither one is directly marginalized or privileged for holding these ideas, there is less of a sense of urgency when it comes to these discussions. 

people involved in these debates will often try to convince you the other side has a cultlike ideology while their own side is actually being discriminated against based on identity, again, with the intention of legitimizing their ideology while also attempting to badmouth the opposition. sometimes there is a clear ‘correct’ ideology, other times there is not.

identity vs. identity is the most notorious and difficult to navigate of the three, as well as the easiest to spot, given it’s often blatantly absurd. you’ll see people spit out takes that are meant to pit two or more marginalized communities against each other, fueled by a) the belief that said communities cannot hope to coexist, or b) the desire, as a privileged outsider, to “troll” or “divide and conquer”. 

this discourse is the most insidious of all, because the other two very often masquerade as this one and vice versa--many TERFs who are less radicalized will try to convince you that, while trans people and women [read: cis women] are both undeniably disenfranchised by the patriarchy, there is “simply no hope” for both marginalized groups to safely exist and get access to life-saving resources. they will try to convince you that because said resources are high in demand and low in supply, women [read: cis women], who “clearly have it worse”, deserve said resources more, and fuck any trans person who is selfish enough to take said resources away from them.

though, there are some examples of actual and legitimate identity vs. identity discourse; namely “kink at pride” discourse. among members of the online LGBTQ+ community, there is a genuine belief that it is impossible for both kinksters and LGBTQ+ people to share safe spaces during pride events. 

people try to make this into an identity vs. ideology debate (puritans/homophobes vs. queer sex workers + flamboyant queers OR p*dophiles and other sexual predators vs. queer minors + queer survivors of trauma) or an ideology vs. ideology debate (what is consent really? where do we draw the line?), but these efforts don’t and can’t change the fact that both being kinky (inherently deviating from society’s sexual norms) and being LGBTQ+ (inherently deviating from cisheteronormative society) are both things people are marginalized for. despite having different needs, both communities do have a strong overlap, and thus the talking point of each community’s shared identity (as opposed to having a shared ideology) is inextricable from “kink at pride” discourse. 

you also see this with people who say “there is no good reason for someone who ever identifies as a man or masculine-aligned, under any circumstances, to enter a safe space meant solely for women and feminine-aligned people, let alone use their resources”, as if it’s ~impossible~ for someone to be both at once, let alone a closeted man/”masc-aligned” person who’s unable to access any "”proper”” resources without outing themself. regardless of your intentions, pitting two marginalized groups against each other is not an acceptable thing to do.

TL;DR: the first step to finding the heart of an argument--and dismantling any harmful or inaccurate beliefs circulating within said argument--is to identify what kind of argument it really is.

[wenellyb]

I saw what you said about the Mackie situation not being black and white and I completely agree. There were parts of his statement that made me as a queer person uncomfortable however I don’t think he’s homophobic nor do I think that this is even as big a deal as anyone is making it out to be.

It frustrates me that people can’t understand that I can say “I think there were parts of his statement that were slightly hurtful/tone deaf” and also say “I don’t think Anthony Mackie is a bad person” at the same time.

Honestly I feel like if we all collectively decided to stop talking about it, it would be infinitely better than whatever the fuck is going on the Sambucky tag.

Yes, you are right,

I'm staying away from this whole mess as much as I can because there seems to be only 2 sides and everyone is mixing everything up, thinking that this is a shipping issue only and that it's a problem for Sambucky shippers... And I hope people realize that this is not the discussion here, even though some people want to make it about the shipping.

Just to clear things up, about the shipping part, first of all, the Variety interviewer mixed up some parts, and put whatever they wanted in the written interview, but even if Anthony had said that didn't see Sambucky as romantic or anything, it would be his right... He's an actor, he has his script, he's not responsible for what was written in the script...I hate people making it about shipping and saying that actors should always give vague answers when talking about ships so people can keep their hopes up and use their imagination.

But I also know from experience in other fandoms that if Anthony had given a vague reply about Sambucky some people would have complained that it was queerbaiting. There is no winning with the fandom so let's stop trying to frame this as a Sambucky ship issue I'm tired of people trying to frame this whole story as a shipping issue:

- Oh Anthony doesn't support Sambucky, our ship is dead

- And I'm also tired of people pretending that the accusations/comments are just from jaded Sambucky shippers who are mad because Anthony didn't say what they wanted to hear about the ship.

I will not be talking about the shipping part and I feel like the people who are focusing on the Sambucky part are completely missing the point.

Can we just talked about what happened? Yes, he was clumsy in some of the wording, but I saw nothing in that interview indicating that Anthony was homophobic.

But it doesn't mean that some of his sentences weren't rooted in homophobia...( I don't know how to phrase this so I hooe you understand).

And I don't understand why it is so hard for people to acknowledge it without villainizing him-

Whether we like it or not, we live in homophobic societies, and Anthony himself has acknowledging that he was brought up in communities where homophobia was present and he did a lot of growing and learning.

And sometimes he can use the wrong word, or sentence... It's not just Anthony, it's literally anybody on the whole planet..

A lot of people have internalized homophobia, and Anthony is one of the rare Hollywood male actors who has acknoweldeged it, and worked on it and he showed his support the LGBT community on many occasions.

And yes, clumsiness, mistakes and wrong words happen, but the correct behavior isn't behaving like nothing happened.

But NO... People want to make 2 teams, and 2 teams only...

1. Anthony is homophobic

2. Anthony did nothing wrong

Yeah well, none of that is true and acknowledging it POLITELY and without insluting and throwing slurs is possible. I mean it should be possible... but some people don't seem to understand that.

People know full well that what Anthony saying about fandoms wasn't homophobic, the discussion of the toxicity in some fandom circles is an ongoing one is spot on.

But on the other side, people know full well that even though what he said wasn't homophobic, and we could understand the general idea, he didn't word things perfectly and was mixing stuff and I don't like it when they pretend they don't understand why some people were hurt by what Anthony said...

Also, when you say something similar to "guys can't be close anymore or hang out at a bar together without being seen as gay" you make it sound like being seen as gay is a problem... And it seems inoffensive but in reality, the implications can be hurtful...

I have absolutely no interest in taking part in a debate where people are just stating stuff and not interested in having a discussion.

And honeslty I am 100% in the Anthony Mackie defence team because people on the internet do not know how to raise an issue without being rude or insulting, which is why I will support him when needed, but I'm also not here to pretend that I don't understand why some people are genuinely upset and that the people who are genuinely upset are not just shippers upset about the ship.

(And of course there are shippers upset about the ship but I cannot do anything for them)

I need other people to stop missing the point on purpose or unintenionally and pretend the discussion about homophobia is unfounded. But it's complicated because some people have been waiting for the moment a Balck actor missteps so that they can be racist in peace.

Tumblr is the worst place to engage in any discussion because 90% of the users are already on their high horses and have chosen the position they will have until the end of the debate.

I hate doing that... I enter the debate, learn new information, adapt and change my mind if I need to.. .Like at the beginning, I read the interview but I didn't know that there was also a podcast, and that some of Anthony's answers during the podcast had been misplaced, so I took that information account as well.

Why do we always have to have firm positions...

The only thing that I'm very cautious about is that Anthony is a Black man and the fandom and the Internet in general have a tendency to be harsher with Black men than with their White counterparts...

People who have never supported Anthony is the first place come and insult him and everything, but don't even try to go deeper and actually read the article or try to learn more?

And that also explain why some of the people defending Anthony are more defensive (me included) because when the racists come into the equation it becomea just awful... And that's why Anthony needs a strong support system in the fandom.

If there hadn't been people pushing back and supporting Anthony, you can be sure that what you would have seen in the Sambucky tag would have been 10 times worse and Anthony would have been the target of all that.

The other 3 posts I have made on the topic, more of less saying the same thing that this wasn't the best time to discuss this... when evryone was talking in the heat of the moment.

HERE HERE and HERE

I'm so sorry I was tired while writing this, so if some parts don't make sense let me know and I will explain it better, I just wanted to reply to you today.

[popculturebuffet]

House of Mouse: Mickey and the Culture Clash (Commission by WeirdKev27) or “What the Hell, Clarabelle?”

Hello, hello, hello... I wish I could say I was in good spirits but i’m tired, have covid induced chills running down my spine.. and oh yeah there was an armed insurrection i the captial last night that showed just how broken this country was. And while Monster Bash would still be relevant... I couldn’t do it. I admit to being unable to do an episode where the millitant racist nutjob who harms people runs off into the night, and does much worse in later episodes, while the people she harassed are arrested the night after a bunch of millitant, racist, sociopathic, selfish nightmares sieged the captial, killed a woman, raised the fucking maga flag over the buildling and took pictures like they were goddamn heroes.  We got a stark reminder, not a wake up call, not an opening a REMINDER of just how badly broken our country is last night, and it wasn’t till this morning I found out just how BAD it was. The deaths, the flag, the fact josh fucking hawley, MY STAT’ES SENATOR and registered piece of shit, raised  A FUCKING FIST IN SOLIDARITY, which gives me the crippling fear his stupidity and unabashed racisim and support of a cou could mean riots at best and attempted uprisings at worst and who knows what kind of hate crimes against those of color and those in my own queer community. I am afraid, tired, and I am pissed and I feel we could ALL use something wholesome, warm and far removed from the shit going on. And in my hour of need to figure out something like that to put on the schedule.. Kev brought up a wonderfufl idea.  Every month this month till the end of it Kev is going to comission one episode of a show near and dear to both our hearts that has it’s 20th birthday this month. House of Mouse. He was intitally going to request Pete’s One Man Show, which is one of my faviorites, but was ironcially one I already planned to cover next month to celebrate both the show’s anniversary and Pete’s Birthday. But since he was happy to wait till then to comission it, he instead asked for another classic and one with easily my faviorite character on the show: Moritmer Mouse. 

One of the best things House of Mouse did was bring back Mortimer Mouse. Introduced in Mickey’s Rival, Mortimer was an ex of minnies who showed up for one short to be a dick to mickey before running off and leaving Minnie at the mercy of a bull he pissed off. He also weirdly kept electrodes and a car battery in his pants. The short itself is.. not great mostly because Minnie dimissies Mickey rightfully being pissed someone is hitting on his girlfriend in front of him, making jokes at his expense, and generally being a pillock as being jealous... which yeah, yeah he is. Most of the time jealousy and supscison of your partner is ugly, gross and damaging to a relationship.  You should trust them unless you’ve been given good reason not to, and if your paranoidly jealous about every friend she has she could be attracted to.. get some fucking help. Seriously, I need to, not for this for various other problems, but get some therapy to help with your trust issues or if your just being the kind of dick who naturally assumes men and women or men and men or women and women or men and nonibinary persons, or women and nonbinary peeps and so on and so on cannot be friends if they could possibly be togehter romantically... grow up.  I say all of that because those are serious underlying issues and I didn’t want it to seem like for a moment I was supporting them... and because sometimes i’ts OKAY to be jealous, to either just feel a little jealous of someone, or to you know be irate because your girlfriend’s ex is hitting on her in front of you and she’s being entirely receptive to it. 

So yeah i’ts really hard to feel bad for minnie’s bull attack or find the ending sweet after Minnie was you know, what ramona said for an entire short. However my point for this rant, besides giving out about the short again because I clearly didn’t enough in my Mickey Birthday Special, is that Mortimer is still pretty great. He’s a frat bro in the 40′s sense sure, but the idea of a local douche hoping to swoop in and woo minnie away, who has an oddly specific sense of humor and a bizzare, memorable and wonderful walk, seriously the short is worth watching for mortimier’s “I got two car batteris in my pants’ walk, is a good one. While he’d naturally show up in comics and what have you Mortimer just sort of vanished. But clearly someone on the House of Mouse staff, and Mousewerks before it, agreed because Morty was made easily one of the best and most recurring characters in the HOM, and often more prominent than Horace or Gus. While he still tried his old “I’m gonna do your common law wife act” a few times he was mostly there to be an annoying douche when the ep needed one and to be taken down a peg by everyone in the house. And that VERY MUCH includes Mickey. That’s also part of why I love this show bringing him back: It gives Mickey someone besides pete to give out too on a regular basis. He’s still his charming self about it but it’s lovelyt os ee Mickey sarcastically roast someone. And I honestly attribute the main factor of his sucess on the show to VA Maurice LaMarche. While his original VA, Sonny Dawson, was fantastic.. it’s Maurice who very clearly made the character his. While others like Jeff Bennet have taken over since i’ts Maurice who gave him his signature “ha-cha-cha” catchphrase, swagger and signiture voice. And no i’ts not lost on me that one of Maurice’s OTHER best roles is another cartoon mouse.. and I now very badly want him to meet Pinky and the Brain. But yeah, Maurice just oozes the smarm that defines mortimer for me, oozes condescinon and assholery and he, is., glorious. He was a faviorite as a kid, he’s a faviorite now, and Disney needs to use him more.. and also have Maurice voice him for wonderufl world of mickey mouse, though Jeff Bennett is not bad at all I just prefer the master at the role. 

So obviously, after the nightmare of an evening america had yesterday, an episode not only about how wholesome mickey and minnie are but about Mickey teaming up with Mortimer was EXACTLY what i needed. So pitter patter, this is Mickey and the Culture clash. As always for house of mouse i’ll be chonking it up and since this one starts right with the wraparound, and sicnce you know I spent a godo few pagraphs going over mortimer and he’s only IN the wraparound this episode... let’s start there

Mickey and the Culture Clash: Don’t Go Changin, To Try and Please Me So we open the episode and the review proper with Mickey performing a banjo sernade for Minnie, their song in fact. It’s a really sweet scene.. that’s quickly ruined by Clarabelle being an asshole, who says i’ts a bit crude. Minnie counters that while “It’s not mozart”, it’s nice and she clearly likes it and the gesture. Instead of you know leaving it there like a good friend, like she’s SUPPOSED to be to Minnie in most continuities, Clarabelle.. takes the things she said and her having to run out to wrangle pluto out of context, painting it as her thinking he’s not sophisticated and then running out because of it. Oh and she tops it by pointing to a classified add from a MM looking for sophisticated companionship. 

It just paints Clarabelle not as Minnie’s friend or a chatty gossip, but as a heartless bitch who has no trouble implying one of her best friends would cheat on her boyfriend TO HIS FACE, and is fine wrecking a perfectly lovely relationship just to have more to talk about. Seriously she starts gossiping to everybody on top of it just in case you thought Clarabelle was a decent person in any shape this episode. She’s the one thing about this episode that dosen’t work despite being integral to it.. well two but hte other thing is a small, end of episode gag we’ll get to. This.. this is an integral part of the plot. It also relies on Daisy and Donald being absent for the episode for what I can only assume is their annual sex decathalon because otherwise the second she heard about her friend doing this, before reassuring Minnie, Donald would be holdiing her while Daisy beat the absolute shit out of her for hurting thier closest friend and not bothering to take a look into anything when leveling such a rough accusation at Minnie. In a really stellar, really well paced episode, Clarabelle being so heartless stands out. It’s also, might as well get this out of the way, teh final episode not inlcuding the two holiday specials.. and it’s a good note to go out on otherwise, I just can’t ignore the obnoxious cow in the room.. in both senses of the word. 

So yeah Mickey’s trying to be fancy, and Mortimer gets a good dig in about him reading “You having trouble sounding out the words”, but once he hears what’s going on, or rather once he realizes mickey things Mortimer’s personal add is in fact his girlfriend cheating on him, he decides to help Mickey. And to his credit for this con.. Mortimer actually thought things out on how to trick his rival, and his plan here is douchey as hell but incredibly genius: he offers to help mickey and while that’d normally be suspcious he offers a genuine, and very mortimer explination for helping him become a bit more sophisticated to win minnie back: if Minnie finds a handsome, sophisticated guy to date, what chance does MORTIMER have against that? At least with Mickey, in his deluded egocentric view of things anyway, he has a shot at beating him. 

So Mickey classes it up a bit, taking some sopshitcated stances when announcing and trying to woo minnie by talking in ye olde english. When that fails, she just finds it silly but charming, Mickey finds Jose.. hitting on her.

Just.. I expect better from you man. Woo ladies all you like as long as your respectful but I expect better than to hit on someone else’s girlfriend.. which granted he has but given the last time we saw him do that, he nearly got stabbed a bunch and the last time he agressively hit on a woman he got punched in the beak as he should, you’d THINK he’d of learned something. Seriously once again Donald is only missing because this time Daisy would be holding Jose down while Donald hit him. Or possibly they’d take turns. Point is Jose REALLY shoudln’t be doing this and knows better.. marginally. But.. it is in character enough so ti’s not as bad as Clarabelle the homewrecker. 

So Mickey tries being fancy and goes on to do poetry instead of letting O’Malley and the Alley Cats play.. which is a nice running gag the series does as they NEVER get to play.. which while funny is a shame since I love the Aristocats. So then we finally get what Mortimer’s been playing at, he swoops in, claims MICKEY dosen’t need HER, and uses the same personal add to trick her. See, while what Mortimer’s doing is vile.. unlike clarabelle I can repsect it at least. I don’t condone it and i’m glad he gets foiled.. but as a bad guy plan it’s pretty clever and for someone like Mortimer whose usually pretty incompitent.. it’s pretty suprising he could pull this off. It’s still pretty damn low and scummy, no question, but props to being able to outwit and nearly outplay two people who deal with your crap on a regular basis and still convincingly conning both.  Thankfully while he tries to take Minnie out Mickey, in a great visual gag, puts two and two together, and busts out their song, with Mickey and Minnie heartwearmingly reuniting on stage as seen above. Then we get that gag I mentioned not liking: Mickey gets Morty back by planting a false marriage proposal from Moritmer to Clarabelle, again under MM and he gets carried off.. HAHA HE’S BEING FORCED INTO A MARRIAGE HE DOSEN’T. LAUGH. LAUGH AT IT. The gag just really hasn’t aged well, as otherwise it’s clever Mickey used Mortimer’s own trick against both him and the person who caused all of this but really.. Clarabelle gets no real compuance. At worse sshe finds out she was tricked.. but she again you know tried to break up her close friends relationship for shits and giggles. But .. it’s at the very end of the episode and very easy to ignore, so it dosen’t really bother me too bad, and compared to some gags of the type i’ve seen, it could be MUCH worse.  Overall this wraparound is one of the series best and a good one to go out on. it has a simple premise, a brilliant antagonist plot, some great bits from all involved, and even a great Belle and Beast cameo. All in all a really good wraparound only hampered by a sexist and dated ending and Clarabelle being portrayed as ...

She’s the worst, in the world. Okay onto the shorts.

Mickey’s Piano Lesson: That was a Fun One

It really was. It’s a simple premise: Minnie wants MIckey to do a piano recital and he decides “I don’t need practice i’m mickey mouse. “ And it’s REALLY nice to have a short that has, rather than aw shucks mickey, shenanigans mickey. While thanks to the new shorts we’ve had tons, it’s still nice to get one in the House of Mouse era, and it’s just fun to see Mickey take the usual donald roll of letting his overconfidence punch him in the face> It fits both though: Both are everyman and while I lean towards the duck, to no one’s shock, Mickey is just as capable, and his lack of practice comes off less like the angry and hostile way donald would dismiss it and mroe just loveable procastination. And as someone who REALLY struggles with procastination I related to this short, as Mickey does everything else he’d rather do from bathing the dog to skydiving till Minnie, in a great bit informs him everyone from the president, to several dignitaries from other countries, to a televised audience will see. We then get two really great and really beatuifully animated bits as MIckey wrestles with the notes on thep age then fights with his piano as he performs, still pulling it off but destroying the thing and rightfully earning a glare form his girlfriend. Just a fun, slapstick short with a great premise. 

Dance of the Goofys: Scary Children Set to classical music, this one has a bunch of goofys as Fairy’s, who are making the flowers go and the one who sleeps in ends up saving the king from a horrifing looking little brat. He reminds me of Montanna Max a bit.. speaking of which Creer Summer recnetly announced Elmyra won’t be in the reboot. And while this does make me fear actually good characters like Fifi, Montana Max, and more will be cut like the animanics reboot and I do feel for Cree not getting to be involved and hope they find another roll for her as, given her status in the industry she deserves better.. THANK FUCKING GOD. I’ll go into this in another review I have planned for the future but unlike the cuts made to animaniacs this was a REALLY good decision i’m really greatful for. Thank you crew thank you. 

Back on topic, it’s just a fun, really beautifully animated short about the goofies and hteir shenanigans with a really great high concept. 

Maestro Minnie: Brahm’s Lullabye: Simply Irresitable Another simple but clever and lovely to watch one, and one I like quite a bit more. Minnie is conducting some living violins to Brahm’s Lullabye to get a baby Violin to sleep, and we get some really beautiful shots of her as she does so.. only to get comically interuppted by other insteruments turning up the noise. Not much to say on this one as it’s short and simple.. but sometimes short and simple is just what you need and the fun premise nad really beautiful especially for tv animation at the time visuals really sell this one.  ONce again, good stuff. 

Overall: This was a REALLY good note to go out on. While as I said the Clarabelle stuff can eat my entire ass, everything else is really damn good and I highly recommend checking this one out. Next time, in about a month, we’ll be looking at Pete’s spotlight episode for his birfday. While you wait tommorow we have my first look at legend of the three cabs. But for now, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. 

[throwaninkpot]

RotT reactions part 2!

costis, what are you doing here, shouldn't you be in roa? shouldn't you be with kamet? costis, where's kamet? what happened to him? tell me!

"who really owns anything?" eugenides, you utter meme.

if tattoos a custom in eddis, does. .....does helen have tattoos? oh my word, please tell me helen has tattoos, she would look so cool.

so, so, so, horrible invasion, giant army, logistics of war. it's very terrible and interesting, but where kamet? where my boy? is he okay? costis just LEFT him behind, bc he had to get word back to attolia, I don't blame him, I love him. but is kamet okay????????????????????

rip to all the cottage fic people probably wrote about the two having a chill time in roa. (idk, I haven't checked.) megan said we can't have nice things.

"find yourselves another king" uhhhhhhh, gen?

gen said no more king, now only Thief and Hot Consort To The Sexy Queen.

awww, sophos gave him a book of poetry for his birthday. I love sophos.

"attolia says she leaves with you" *spends several long minutes clutching at my chest repeatedly as I am Overwhelmed*

you know the quote in koa about a careful dance of shafow and unsubstance but under it all, a real marriage of two people? that's literally this. the queen is surely calculated her possible responses to gen, amd this is either a Pointed Message to gen or to the barons, and I'm still not sure what gen is up to actually, but also. she loves him, guys. they're in love. "she leaves with you". they're in love.

"I asked her to leave with me on our wedding night" of course he did.

"except me, I can do anything I want" :'D

they're too soft. I cannot.

go, costis! save your boy!

..........is this where I formally apologize for rolling my eyes back in 2016 when people shipped teleus/relius? I genuinely did not see this coming.

megan said okay, we've been on our best behavior, it's been 25 years, she will sprinkle in a little canon queerness. and then upended a flour sack of it on us.

"he had to bend to keep his lips on hers until she reached the ground" they're too cute, this is illegal.

oh, now THAT'S some soap opera level nonsense. how awkward was it for gen and helen knowing his father was a spurned lover of her mother

sometimes soldiers. I am eating this stuff up.

they get no apology. h*ck the pents. maybe they should have chosen an ambassador that didn't force himself upon women.

"where sounis's father positively beamed with approval at his son, eddis's minister of war glowered. the high king, slumped in his seat, catching his father's glare, slumped even further." it be like that.

ten to one. oof, oof, oof.

okay, the solution is, one of gen's sisters should beat up cleon and therespides.

gen. you were the one paying him. I don't know why I'm ever surprised by the tangled schemes you wrap yourself up in.

every scene that the four monarchs are together, just having a good time and loving each other and sounding so much like the young people they are, every time, it makes me happy.

the fandom tried to figure out at what age boys left the dorms in Eddis, didn't we? I think we settled on 12 or 13. gen killed someone before he was 13. hachi machi.

he called him "my brother sounis". awww.

"without cheating" is that what we're calling godly visits now

eugenides will give me a heart attack, I swear.

they call it return of the thief bc this is the most like himself gen has acted since the crenellations in KoA.

(fitting that this is the book with a neuroduvergent pov, bc I have never happy stimmed more in my life than during the chase scene.)

when he starts windmilling, now I am afraid. oh please, megan, don't let him be hurt.

thank the gods.

helen wearing an eddisian uniform. heck yeah! gnc helen rights continue!

"it was the last lighthearted moment for a long time" :(

they're leaving the city, and I'm suddenly remember the comment from back in book of pheris 1 about an attack by a tomb. am afraid.

it's loving the magus o' clock. he treats pheris so well.

irenides baby......2!!!!

"I don't understand" you and me both, sophos.

"I think they have to show their worst selves sometimes in order to be sure that even at their worst they are loved" I need a minute.

I love tactics and logistics, but I wish I could picture this my head. the map doesn't actually help me figure out where the forces are in perspective.

megan really wasn't exaggerating when she said eugenides's first reaction to seeing an elephant is "I want to steal one."

"he muscled up his other arm and said he would destroy the Medes single-handed" these books are giving me a stroke. megan, that pun was beautiful.

"I have found Kamet!" I'm going to be sick. he had better be okay. he was supposed to be free of nahuseresh.

nasty man had better be lying. my kamet had better be okay.

oh, costis. okay, okay, alright.

why is cleon's death so sombering. I think it's bc I just reread "Thief!", and met him as a teenager in that. I think it's bc it says he's one of three cousins that died that day, and gen already lost so many cousins during the war in QoA. I loved the country of eddis when I was first reading these books and forever after that, bc it's so full. there's a very communal child-rearing system and gen has these packs of cousins, even if most of them spent their childhood bullying him, I loved the idea of having so much family around you. he's running out of family.

oh. I went back to reading from writing that, and. stenides. oh.

I said I wanted gen's siblings, but not like this.

well, here's some cairns. presumably the tombs pheris's foreshadowed earlier. here we go, something bad is going to happen.

Something Bad Happened.

oh, no, Hilarion. D:

*tiffany haddish voice* NOMENUS??? HOW COULD YOU DO THIS. I PUT YOU ON MY BINGO.

the man at the cairn. the god on the battlefield that megan referenced? but eugenides called him a dead man. so not a god. so, did he recognize him as someone he knew to be dead?

"my cousins know not to trust my tears" once again, gen's hail mary is the fact he's a little snipe.

he says he needs a heavier rain, and the gods deliver.

f in chat for nomenus. he was a snake, but still.

"and by my oath to my god, now and for my life, Thief of Eddis." YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, Philo. :(

rip to Legarus and his Awesome Beauty.

they want to kill gen in The Thief? eddis's council wanted to kill him? I'm reeling from all the backstory this book is revealing.

not quite how I had the apotheosis pictured, and yet. *sufjan steven's ascension plays in the background*

"I say it three times, Fordad. It will be so. It will be so. It will be so." holy heck.

someone get in here and analyze that for biblical symbolism.

HE CALLED DOWN LIGHTNING. HOLY

narration only calls him eugenides in that scene with the lightning. significant.

"feeling the tremor in it, he opened his arms to catch the king as he fell." he has fallen and been caught by his god and fallen and been caught by his dad.

I think we'll call the interregnum an interlude into the underworld, if not a journey into.

oh, gods, relius.

for a former spymaster, he sure trusted too easily.

he could have had his farm in the gede valley, but he stayed to help irene and gen. oh, relius, relius.

sejanus has a saving grace afterall.

dite and sejanus protecting each other, and pretending to hate each other so that sejanus at least can be on good terms with their father, that all clicks into place when you know about their older brother who they probably loved just as much.

crying crying crying over Sejanus and Pheris.

the minster of war. D:

at least nahuseresh is dead.

gen lay down to sleep by his father's corpse.

the patrimony divided in three. a triangle.

sophos/helen baby!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I love that gen, knowing his cousin and also being a little sneak who notices everything, figured out helen was pregnant before sophos even did.

f for sejanus. he wasn't as bad as he seemed, and not nearly as bad as he almost was.

oh, xenophon died, too. he of the wooden cannons and receiver of the infamous "I love stupid plans" line.

why is everyone dead. :(

"they're at the pickets, both of them" oh, thank you, jesus. TWO PEOPLE WHO AREN'T DEAD. MY BOYS.

she dreams of Eddis empty. there's no words for the relief I feel.

twinssss!!

and yet they don't tell us the name!!!!! what was the MoW's name??? what is their son's name??? megan!!!!!!

gen holding his daughter for the first time and offering to pitch her off a roof. I don't even have words.

hector. hector. hector hector hector.

rooftop dance!!!!!!!!!!!

HE'S OKAY. RELIUS IS OKAY.

(you couldn't give us one costis and kamet dance? no, it's fine.)

peace. peace. peace.

crying.

[darlington-v]

HELLO YES IS ONE OF(?) THE FELLOW TRANSMASC BEEDUO ENJOYERS, RESPONDING AFTER A MULTIDAY DELAY.

CANT BELIVE THAT HANDHOLDING SHIT.

As someone else who has (on a certain level) like, made that connection, of someone I can be very affectionate with, but am still in the gender closet with for various reasons. I can absolutely understand your impulse and the preassure... a lot of my hesitation is based around a fear of going against some kind of perceived "ground work" in that relationship. And then I get frustrated because in this relationship and others i just would not have to think so much about this and how I present myself if I had just been born a cisguy. I am also just yearning for bro friendships where I'm just perceived as a dude from the get-go, even if I end up acting ""feminin"" or some shit.

But when I think about all the relationships I've had, I wouldn't want to have "skipped over" any of them, even if I wasn't, or didn't start by presenting my truly authentic self. I can't bring myself to regret or fully resent any of those connections, even if in my heart I can't always regard them as 100% "valid" or "genuine" in the context of how I know I was/am perceived and how I present. I dunno, I hope that makes sense, and helps in some way... I guess what im trying to say is, even if I have wishes and yearnings of how things could be different, I still am happy to have had the relationships I've had.... and I know ill just keep meeting new folks and either things will work out or they wont, and that'll be ultimatly for the best...

But hughu its also kinda silly when I think about it, that some internet dudes make me confront and think about all this shit. But it also does make sense too.

I don't know its very hard to explain, feel free to just ignore all this.

yes!!!! i TOTALLY understand this!

it's really frustrating because i would love to seek out other communities and environments that may lead into relationships similar to that of like??? SAME AFFECTION????? but im afraid to put myself out ANYWHERE new because i don't want to be perceived as like... woman-lite or anything. i don't want anyone to have to rethink how they perceive me i just wanted to present in the way that i feel.

similarly to what you said, i don't want to build something on "ground-work" i know i'll have to break down and like. make the REAL ground work pretty much?

and yeah! same! i get frustrated as well because it would just be much easier to deal w/ if i was just. cis. but i don't dwell on that too much, luckily

however i still run into the same issue: (more long winded venty shit below, ur invited to me being extremely vulnerable on the internet have fun)

how can i deal with this and make this easier for myself? is it... achievable even? like! yeah! how can i simply start new relationships with this... pre-established certainty of "that is a Boy! a BONAFIDE boy!" like... not even cis but just.

i struggle with the idea that most people who aren't trans will like... not... TRULY respect my identity? like behind closed doors. which is something i know a lot of trans people struggle with and honestly that is... our own issue in regards to trust. if no one throws and red flags that they don't actually respect your identity, then you really just have to trust that they do.

it's just... honestly putting conditions on like. your trust i guess. PERSONALLY. like im putting conditions on myself such as: if i present masculine then people will respect my identity and assimilate to how i identify, even if i don't present that yet.

which... usually isn't the case? people may take longer to assimilate but if someone is going to respect you, you can usually tell. or i feel like i can.

however. i guess. i want to shortcut the assimilation? but it's unfair to me to just put myself on hold until i don't need to ask people to like. REALLY understand liek HEY. THAT PITCHY MOTHERFUCKER IS A DUDE. because it's hard. and i, in my tiny pea brain, feel like a shortcut would just already be presenting male boy man MASCULINE. however, like i said, it's unfair for me to put that on myself bc that's a LONG time to wait!! that's coming out, getting a new wardrobe, and ALSO getting HRT!! that doesn't just happen in one day.

i explained to some friends that like. sometimes i wish i could just present a certain way and then no one could really ever know me intimately.

and it's definitely not that im... ASHAMED of being trans!! it's very nice and cool! however i feel sad that like... we're still adjusting as a society in terms of like... gender i guess? like... i do not want to be seen as woman-lite by anyone. in any degree. and sometimes you need a deeper understanding of gender to get past like... the weird like. ok he's... he's boy but like kinda not boy??

IT'S JUST. MMM. BEING PERCEIVED AND NOT INTERPRETTED CORRECTLY IS VERY TERRIFYING AND I HATE IT AND UR RIGHT BEING CIS WOULD BE EASIER, I DON'T NECESSARILY WANT TO BE CIS, I WOULD JUST LIKE TO EMULATE CISNESS WHILST REMAINING QUEER WHICH I DON'T EVEN KNOW IF IT'S POSSIBLE.

however same!!! the relationships i have now i love and i care very deeply about and i feel that like... even though they've known me before i was like "ok masc and he/they" and shit like that, i do feel like they understand like

*points* boy!!

however when it comes to strangers it's so... scary. and like IDK. ITS SO FUNNY BECAUSE I'VE NEVER HAD TO DEAL WITH THIS BEFORE. AND IT'S WHY I WANT TO LIKE? EXPLORE THE COMMUNITY FOR OLDER TRANS PEOPLE. LIKE HOW DO YOU DEAL WITH THIS???? how can you just BE OKAY when like... introducing yourself to strangers.

how can you just let... strangers in?

which is also *THROWS THINGS* THE WORST PART!!! I WANT TO BE A CONTENT CREATOR BUT I DON'T WANT TO WAIT!!!! I WANT MY VIEWERS TO GO BOY BOY BUT THEY WONT BECAUSE I HAVE NO FORM OF PRESENTATION BESIDE A PERSONA AND A VOICE AND MY VOICE IS PITCHY!!! ITS SO HIGH AND PITCHY!!!

and it's frustrating!! because i don't want an audience who doesn't like understand BOY!!! NOT WOMAN-LITE!!!!!!! NOT WOMAN GOING THRU PHASE!!!!!

BOYYYYY!!!!!

TLDR;

being trans is hard and i just don't want to be seen as woman-lite. i want to bee seen as like cis boy but trans. like i think i'd take more kindly to someone being like "omg i didn't even know you were trans!" to like someone infantilizing me and calling me a sweet little boy bean. and thats a lot easier between close friends! even though they have heard my voice and they've listened to me talk about being trans! they understand. and strangers?? have the potential to not. like they might? but what if they dont... and that's. Scary.

[crazygaysex]

i think i got trapped in a diet terf feedback loop on tiktok for a while there. very like, All Men Suck and Incapabel of Human Critical Thought Or Empathy type of stuff. it does feel very good at first to vilify an entire group of people for the ways you feel humiliated by hpw you’ve been socialized/treated  and to feel superior to them but it’s counterproductive and not at all nuanced as it turns out. it truly does just validate the behavior of the worst men out of them

i feel kinda guilty for the amount of “man bad” sort of shit i’ve spouted in turn for some months there when i was really probably just mad about how a few men have treated me personally likethere’s clearly like a shit ton different varieties of man experience which make it difficult to make general statements like that that lump queer men, men of color etc all under that umbrella of Bad, which if ur white is not a great look, and does def tread into terf territory trying to exclude trans men from this on the basis they’re socialized as women or whatever

 i hope nothig i said during that time came across that badly, cause i was rly just trying 2 work thru my feelingd about dating straight guys  and 2 communicate that i only want to be with other queers and not cishet dudes anymroe (went thru a moment where i thought i was a enby lesbian bc of the masterdoc/not really Loving dating cishet boys in my life ever but was like well i would def date bi men or trans men or whateverelse  though cause being queer we would have an Understanding of sorts,so as it turns out am just a Queer 4 Queers, comfortably settled for the moment with genderfluid/bisexual if anyone were to ask. but also every relationship i am in especially rn is super homo andgay legally)

i dunno i’ve bene on a Journey a Metamorphosis if you will this year in Januaryi was crying in the shower a lot cause i was convinced i was a lesbian after reading the masterdoc and watching the contrapoints shame video on loop and didnt know wat to do about my bf at the time.. i like fundamentally do not relate with any version of myself before like march. i do feel a lot freer now not constantly worrying if straight guys think im attractive or watever and its a genuine rrlief to not seek them out romantically ever again, which was truly nerve wracking  and sometimes terrible and/or agonizing lol i think i just am not fulfilled by that relationship dynamic, not that men are bad or evil, my ex bf is a genuinely good guy. i am simplie a lot more confident not trying to be a GirlFriend and more comfortable being w another queer person. like this is the key emotional connection missing from all my relationship w cishet guys apparently. it hit me like a goddam bus genuinelyi thought everybody was putting on airs or delusional when they talked about being in love before this so

but anywasy moral of the story is it’s nonsensical to base your views on entire groups of people off emotionally satisfying generalized statements and projections of your own experience crazy rigth! so be careful out there i guess! i learnt my lesson human experience is obviously so extremely nuanced that making straight-faced blanket statements ever is not helpful and very bad for your own critical thinking skills/worldview and I am Not Immune

[gettin-bi-bi-bi]

1. A lot of times on lgbtq media, I’ll see things that include all wlw but will be labeled as for lesbians. Like “lesbian term”, “this song for lesbians”, or they’ll be posts or media talking about “lesbian only” experiences that could apply to all wlw. What bugs me is that bc lesbian has a very strict definition, I really don’t feel included in these. Whereas “gay” is an umbrella term and I often feel like I wouldn’t have these problems as a bi man cause I feel like gay covers me.

2. Lesbians of course have their own things, but I’m only talking about stuff that def includes all wlw but is called “lesbian”. Like “lesbian” couples that may have a bi women in them. I feel like there’s this split between communities bc any time I see a bi girl use the term lesbian(not as a label; for anything else) there gets so much crap thrown. While I know bi men prob feel that same sometimes, gay is such a universal term that I don’t see it as much. Idk if that’s invasive of me to feel

disclaimer: I was typing and typing and.... this kinds turned into a rant so. Take it or leave it, I don’t know how much sense I’m making. You know, up until ~50-60 years ago the word “lesbian” just meant every woman who had sex with women. That 100% included women who also had sex with men. (Note that at the time those labels were about sex acts and not about an identity based on attraction.) So many lesbians back then were what we would now call bisexual or pansexual.

However, lesbian separatists and “political lesbians” (basically the OG radfems) decided that a true lesbian should not have anything to do with men. And thus they started to exclude bisexuals from lesbian spaces and terminology and we were forced to make our own community. Which we did.

Now in the last couple years, especially on tumblr, there’s been this attempt to “reunite” lesbians and bisexual women into a shared community called “wlw” or “sapphic”. Unfortunately there’s still lesbian separatists. And that’s how you get entire campaigns on tungle dot hell where people recycle radfem rhetoric to tell bi women we aren’t “allowed to use butch/femme because those are just for lesbians” and other historic revisionism like that.

Most of the time I see people use “wlw” or “sapphic” it's bi/pan women who make that effort. And I notice a development in which the same thing happens to wlw/sapphic as it did to “lesbian” back in ye olden days: bisexuals are being told to keep their mouths shut about their male partners because “this is wlw safe space and this shouldn’t be about Straight Things” and as a result many think that “sapphic” is just a synonym for “lesbian”.

And note that this is all something that happens in relatively niche online communities like tumblr. When we’re looking at mainstream media then it’s a whole other piece of cake because mainstream media, especially when created by and for cisgender heterosexuals, just doesn’t fucking care about these distinctions. Sometimes it’s “just” ignorance and not even malicous - they just really don’t know the difference. Sometimes (often times!) it’s textbook bisexual erasure.

Personally, I totally get how you feel. I don’t feel connected to the “lesbian community” at all. I have a couple of lesbian friends but I don’t engage in any lesbian community events (even though Berlin has plenty to offer). I don’t feel like I have anything to add there and frankly, I don’t feel like I can openly talk about the fact I am bisexual and dating a man.

Even terms like “wlw” and “sapphic” - even though I do use and appreciate the sentiment behind them - don’t really give me a sense of community or belonging. Maybe that’s also a generational thing. I also don’t feel like I have one type of attraction that’s sapphic and then another type of attraction that’s [insert adjective] for men (and another again for enbys?) - all of my attractions are bisexual so I don’t feel comfortable describing my attraction to women as “sapphic” bc it implies that it’s something different than my attraction to other genders. But again, that’s just my personal feelings. I don’t mind those terms and I don’t mind if someone would use those as umbrella terms for me or as identity labels for themselves - go for it. I just don’t feel any significant connection to them personally.

I’m also a petty asshole though so if some event or media or whatever is advertised as “lesbian* .... party / movie night / pride / book club” then I’m just like, well, I’m not a lesbian so that’s not for me, guess they’ll be missing out on getting to know me. And I get even more pissy when they add in small print “*also welcome to bisexuals” because if you wanna make an event for lesbians and bi women then why not advertise it as that? Putting us in parantheses or small-print is at best tone-deaf and at worst an expression of how little they value us.

Many lesbians aren’t actively biphobic and would never want to exclude us and would actually genuinely welcome us. So, don’t take this as me slagging off all lesbians. However... many, especially the younger ones, are still incredibly oblivious to the history of their own label (because radfems work very hard at erasung that history so it doesn’t include bi and trans women) as well as ignorant about the struggles that bisexual women have to face in particular both in mainstream society as well as within the LGBTQIA+ community. They often don’t realise how alienating it is for us to always only being an after-thought at best. Which is kinda hilarious given that they often (rightfully!) voice the same criticism when everything is made about cis gay men and lesbians are just the after-thought.

So long story short: I get it. It sucks. That being said, bisexual men also face a lot of issues and biphobia affects them in some specific gendered ways that are also pretty shitty. They really don’t have it better or easier then other bisexuals when it comes down to biphobia.

Now, you can either say “fuck it, lesbian stuff is for me, too” and ignore all the separatism and basically reclaim your rightful place in this community. Or you can stick to the bi community and seek out media/events that are explicitly for all the queers.

Maddie