#building an online community

[mossy-aro]

ultimately i think my insistence on aro positivity honestly is as much a political stance as a personal one.

when i say aro positivity is crucial and that i dislike doomer-ist posts that express sentiments like 'I hate being aro so much I wish I was dead instead’ it's not because I don’t think there can and should be a space for negativity and acknowledging self-hate, or the many ways being aromantic can really suck sometimes. i find that to be very important!

that being said. there is smth here about how self-hate posts are sometimes just arophobia that we inflict on ourselves. and when we put that out into the ether it (intentionally or not) can become arophobia that we inflict on other members of the community. i think there absolutely needs to be a place for negativity and the expression of anger and frustration and self loathing even - these are all good things to talk about because these are things that we experience. that being said, it can also be genuinely upsetting and triggering to people to have what is essentially arophobia shown to them and then have that be validated by other aspec people. your personal thoughts can affect your wider community on a level you may not anticipate. and i understand it i truly do! it took me so long to be able to recover from accepting being aroace - it threw my entire world off kilter and made me question everything about my place in the world.

but my insistence on aro joy and positivity is because ultimately i do believe that building is at the core essence of it all. that ultimately discussions and the purpose of community should be about construction, not destruction. and this is both a personal and a political stance. talking about how much you hate yourself and cultivating online discussions/spaces where negativity about aspec identity is the main and only theme is destructive - if that’s where we let the conversation end. these thoughts can and should be used as a vehicle to look for a path forward!

joy and positivity create a space where the focus can become on forging a path forward, on construction, on community building instead of tearing ourselves and others down with negative thoughts. it’s not productive or healthy when it stops at a place of negativity - it becomes actively destructive to the essence of community.

and i do think that this is especially poignant considering the fact that being any kind of queer, but especially aromantic (and/or asexual) means forging a path for yourself and making your own happiness where there is no obvious way forward. our communities exist mostly online (right now, anyway), there is little recognition of our existence in the real world, the effects of amatonormativity are both pervasive and actively dehumanising, and there are legal, economic and social structures in place actively making our lives more difficult. yes that all sucks! it’s good to acknowledge that. we need to in order to change it. but more importantly, that’s not the end. we are still here and our happiness, our future is for us to determine. even if we can’t change the laws or society, loving yourself and understanding aromanticism as a political identity (as well as personal), as a radical worldview, and as a protest against amatonormativity is essential for both community and personal well being. the personal is political.

tldr. i guess my point is that as a community, we should focus on building, improving, and nurturing ourselves and each other (construction) as opposed to destruction. we should recognise aromanticism and asexuality as political identities as well as personal ones and rely on community and self-love in the absence of anything else as a form of protest and political power. destruction (the recognition of everything that is wrong) is essential as a starting point - but where do we go from there? we rebuild.

[iirulancorrino]

The Green brothers are doing effective altruism better than maybe 95% of people who identify online as effective altruists.

[anthropoetics]

next year's resolution is to reach out more & try my best to find communities where i feel like i belong

[genericpuff]

hate to be cynical on main but it really do be like this every single time a new "not like social media" art platform comes out of the woodwork and then people migrate to it in droves just to find out the only other people using it are other artists that they're competing with for any scrape of viewership from an increasingly oversaturated internet that didn't exist when we were teenagers in 2009

[iliterallydecepticanteven]

I just. Like fuck dude. 170 million users and it's gone. Like if you're someone who gloats about not using tiktok this post isn't for you so scroll on.

But like tiktok for all its flaws was incredibly useful for me and others. I learned about what maladaptive daydreaming was on tiktok and realized I'd been doing it constantly for escapism and how terribly it was impacting my life. I learned all sorts of fun recipes to try out and incorporate into my meal rotation. I learned about plasma donation as a source of supplementing my income and how it's not as scary as most people make it seem. I got tips on buying a new car and how not to screwed over with financing. I learned little ways to improve my cats' health and what to avoid for them and easy enrichment ideas. I found cheap outlet websites to buy overflow clearance items for cheaper than in store and save some money. I got an insight into how fucked the healthcare system is from the doctor's perspective and how to best handle that if I wanna go into that field. I found tons of fun music, movies, tv shows, anime, books, manga, video games, and crafts to try.

And it's all gone. Just like that.

This fucking sucks.

[solarpunkpresentspodcast]

Happy 2025, friends. We are excited to announce that we are rolling out a new Patreon tier... and it's only $1 USD! With this tier, you can access our new monthly video call / hangout, a perk that is included with all other tiers now. Ariel and Christina will alternate hosting these chats in their respective time zones, using the Jitsi video platform, and each hangout will have a loose theme or a few questions to get the conversational ball rolling - although it's certainly not required to stick to the topic ;)

I don't think any of us can say for certain what 2025 will bring, but it's getting real dark out there, and there's a lot that actively tries to break us up due to gender, race, class, etc so we stay in our own little silos and can't organize or even converse together. So we want to be intentional about curating community, especially amongst our followers and fellow solarpunks.

Anyway, here is the link to our Patreon, where you can check out our shiny new $1 tier if you are so inclined: https://www.patreon.com/solarpunkpresents

Hope to see you online later this month!

[cecoeur]

To this day, I still feel really sad about what the media did to Daniel because in the end, the rumor that he would drive in the Daytona 500 didn't happen, but people at that time looked down on him all over because they believed the clickbait and no one had enough sense to apologize to Daniel for believing their reporter.

Those people don’t see daniel as a person and therefore would never consider the need to apologize for anything said about him. To random twitter users and even motorsports journalists and commentators he’s a commodity to trade on and nothing more. To a certain extent I get - it’s a business and he’s also a product in a weird way - but somehwrere in maybe the last handful of years, it’s become more than just that.

I think even with an increased level of access and engagement (or maybe because of it) there is this removal of personhood when you talk about someone online because there’s this lack of intimacy that online spaces can cultivate. Even if your name and picture are attached to an account you’re still removed enough that you forget you’re talking about a real person. I think you see that with more than just athletes or celebrities too. I see it all the time in comments on a random person’s tik tok. When we communicate in digital spaces we often don’t consider that we are talking to and about real life human beings. It’s kind of a fucked up consequence of the rise of the digital age and social media. The ability to communicate is better than ever but the emotional intelligence around that communication not so much. (I went on a real tangent here and I’m not sure that it fully makes sense or explains what I mean in regards to people talking about daniel in media or online spaces).

It’s also funny (and by funny I mean sad) how the most personable are often afforded the least amount of personhood. We saw and heard proof of that all last year when every driver was considered “someone you just have to feel for” but that was never a consideration when speaking about daniel. I think people got so comfortable talking shit about Daniel specifically through the McLaren years that they just don’t consider it to be abnormal or inappropriate. It’s how he’s been talked about for years - so much so that he even joked about it in THAT instagram post (that haha will haunt me forever) - and it’s just generally accepted as the norm, even amongst credentialed media professionals.

[elllteo]

Creators I love you but it's time to wake up

Among rumors about our tumblr user data being sold off to Midjourney/Generative AI, recent Extremely transphobic events (that have been ongoing) coming to a head, another extremely concerning internet censorship bill being pushed in upper levels of government, and a general air of frustration over how the site belongs to and is operated by perhaps the second stupidest CEO (second only to twitters own) of our age, I'm very done with the last few vestiges of what the old internet held for artists.

And if you're reading this, you probably are too.

I know we're tired. We are all tired. It is not always viable to pack up shop and move, again and again and again.

From tumblr to twitter to anywhere else we've ever grown up posting, things no longer work. Our audiences are kneecapped by aggressive and hostile algorithms, our reach is abysmal - if we aren't shadow-banned or silenced for one (transphobic) reason or another, we're thrust into an ever growing pit of hostility where the only thing that drives clicks is fighting and contention.

We're tired. We're so fucking tired. We aren't businesses, we aren't content mills, we cannot keep this pace that modern social media has set for us, to wring every ounce of creativity out of us to profit from and leave us rotting.

The key to staying afloat here, and I cannot stress this enough, is to stay connected to your peers.

Pack up and move as units if you must. Exodus from the sites that are killing us. Push your entire friend group of artists to move from one site to the next that promises you a kinder experience.

Art drives movements, it drives change, it is all that encompasses being human. If you take that away from the shitty places, they will be left with nothing but a cesspit of inhumanity and the people who follow you will be more incentivized than ever to move with you.

Yes, this is terrifying. There are no guarantees. There never was, and never are, and never will be.

But stay connected. Stay human.

Support each other and be willing to hold hands and jump when we all - as a group - need to jump from the flames we're all trying to convince ourselves wont kill us before rescue comes.

Rescue isn't coming, rescue will be found hand in hand with each other. I'm offering you my hand, please take it. There's always a new start, there are always helping hands reaching for you. You have to look up from the doom-scroll long enough to see and take them.

[an-ruraiocht]

sometimes it's like. i don't really wanna have an opinion about this in public because i don't feel that strongly. but a lot of people are having ill informed opinions about it and i don't feel i can offer correct information without also an opinion. so i just have to suffer

[virtue-boy]

Went on a transandrophobia truther blog and instantly saw this ..

1) love the slight of hand where he says "being trans" instead of actually identifying any positionality or god forbid mentioning WOMANHOOD as a type of positionality in his post which allows him to call trans women men and completely disregard the experience of the closested trans WOMAN. Telling that your argument hinges on "after transitioning to a man I am exactly the same as a woman undercover as a man"

2) just say you're not on T and you don't know anyone who is. Like as someone who's passed as male on an off for my whole life and now fully passes as male all the time thanks to T I low key snorted reading this... Liiike let's be for real here passing as a man (and doubly so if u are binary and have the pronouns to match) and passing gives you privilege out the fucking wazoo and I literally think about it every time I leave the house, meet new people, take blue collar jobs, interact w people on public transit, walk around at night, go to gay clubs, bond w male overseers, look for roommates, etc. This is obviously extremely racialized as much as it is gendered, but there is literally not a single "privilege" I had as a girl (that was assumed to be a guy 50-70% of the time) that I lost as a guy.

3) Also how do trans men "inherently defy patriarchal manhood" I literally know a trans guy who went to jail for domestic violence against a woman like trans men are incredibly capable of accessing and enacting patriarchy and thinking ourselves justified in accessing patriarchal homosociality. Like we are literally becoming men and we don't just magically exit the patriarchal society because we aren't the men at the top of the make food chain.... a la R.W. Connel. Being trans men means we lose some for being trans but we win some because we are men. Like gay men are frequently denied their masculinity but it would be dodo brained to act like gay men have no male homosociality they can access or that no gay man has ever accessed male homosociality. Like if u believe that you actually don't know any gay history Attttt Alllllll 😭 like genuinely. We also earn more money per dollar than women in our same gender modality, that doesn't sound like "inherently defying patriarchal manhood" to me that sounds actually like a pretty typical social positionality for oppressed and marginalized men. Like in my own friend groups, at school, and in my music and promotions scene being an (openly trans) man actually has granted me actually a lot of homosociality that I can draw on.

[queerliblib]

An update on how things are going: we've hit 60% of our fundraising goal in just 5 days! We're so touched by all the notes of support, encouragement, and enthusiasm for this project. <3

[deepspaceboytoy]

is there any hope for me at all if im a virgin at 23? if i tried hard enough i could probably lose it- i wipe my ass and know how to read, which puts me ahead of most men- but my gender dysphoria gives me such a massive disconnect from myself and my body that i dont think i know myself well enough to be a good partner to someone, either in a short-term sexual encounter or a long-term romantic relationship. and honestly, i just dont want to have sex as a man, but i lack the material conditions to transition, so im stuck. i feel like its a moral failing that im a virgin this late in my life, like no matter what my actual feelings or opinions are, im no better than the most terminally online neet. i dont know if i even actually want sex or if i just want to have it so i can feel equal to my peers. idk. im sorry for dumping this in your inbox but i like how mean you are and im kinda hoping that youre just gonna tell me to kill myself lol

Took me a while to compose the response I wanted for this but I want to start off by saying there’s no wrong or right age to have sex for the first time, especially for us lgbts. Shit’s hard both out there and inside our heads and it doesn’t help that there’s immense societal expectations to lose your v card young. I have friends who are several years older than me and still waiting or they don’t experience attraction or they just want to focus on shit other than their sex lives and no matter what your reason is for not having lost it, it’s perfectly fine. Under no circumstances should you take my dumb fuckin horndog ass any sort of barometer for where you are in regards to your relationship with gender. Honestly, I know it feels like it sucks that you haven’t had any sexual experiences but from the way you described your gender issues that may be for the best, I have a lot of friends who hadn’t reconciled their identity yet and rushed into sexual relationships because they felt they needed to or it was expected and it really hurt them or set them back, I think inside the struggles you’ve been having is a good awareness you may not be in the right space right now for sex.

Sex is a tough one because everyone’s relationship to it is vastly different. I talk a lot about casual relationships and short flings but it’s not a one size fits all either so don’t let the way I talk about it influence how you want to approach your sex life, now or in the future.

Lastly, I’m not gonna tell you to kill yourself because despite appearances I am a less caustically hostile rude asshole now than I have been on here, we could charitably call it personal growth. You’re in a rough place in your life, just like a lot of our community, and that’s both perfectly understandable and not at all a moral failing. Ultimately, if you’re looking for a guide on sex I’m a bad person to come to because I have what I think for most people would be a pretty unhealthy relationship with it. It works for me and when it doesn’t I seek out longer, more serious relationships, but each person is different. Focus on yourself and doing the things you need to do to become more comfortable with yourself first and you’ll find that it unlocks sexuality in a huge way. For me, that unlocking came in high school when I realized I really fit in well with the freewheeling casual stuff, but like I’m sure I’ve said in here before, it’s not a one size fits all. You’re doing fine

[1mnobodywhoareyou]

I don't know if i can properly articulate my frustrations with the all the "get offline" rhetoric re: online activism and advocacy, specifically surrounding covid and I'm confident that it's already been said better by someone else, but I'm still gonna try.

do people not understand that online is all some people have? it's the community they can access. it's the activism and advocacy they CAN do? for a myriad of reasons. but most notably because offline community is UNSAFE for them?

the dismissal of online advocacy and community and activism misses the mark so hard and is deeply ableist and it sucks so much when the most trusted sources of leftist organizing and education let themselves fall into that same trap. it's bad enough that they've decided that covid (and long covid) are no longer concerns for THEM personally, but it's entirely next level when they also dismiss what people are able to build for themselves in the rubble left behind.

if what you mean is "seek other voices and opinions and thoughts" then SAY that.

yes, I used to be deep in my one little corner of the internet and held some deeply isolating and radical (not in a good way) beliefs. But i sought a new home for myself (here) and I've been able to inform what I see there with what I see there with other things i intentionally seek out and I can build a well-rounded belief system accordingly.

but i didn't need to "get offline" or "touch grass" for that.

[hexesandroses]

My period is making me feel a certain way so it's time to project onto Dottore

[pa-pa-plasma]

begging cosplayers to look at fursuit tutorials because like. why are you reinventing shit. why are you taking the hard way around. furries have had moving parts & quadsuits & furring & buckethead & body part tutorials for years. "how do i make moving cat ears" furries can tell you. if you let them. take my hand