#even though experience tells me I really REALLY should

[softness-and-shattering]

I sometimes have the reverse experience. My parents arent bad parents, but like many kids I had needs I didnt know how to express, and some things they did accidentally hurt me.

My partner would never hurt me, or be angry at me for making a mistake or messing up. Still, occasionally, usually when Im particularly sensitive for some reason, and I make a mistake or a mess I need help resolving, I go back to that kid I was, terrified because my main caregivers in every way were about to be mad at me, would send me to my room where I couldnt be comforted by them, couldnt ask for what I needed, and Id have to act contrite for a while even if I could soothe myself which wasnt emotionally fair for me. Trauma doesnt timestamp in our brain properly. I go back to being that terrified kid even though I have absolutely nothing to fear from my partner. I imagine shws going to get mad and yell, I retreat into myself, I avoid getting her attention, and I have to deliberately notice and talk myself through facts. That Im an adult in my own home, that no one can tell me what to do, I am safe, I can soothe myself I have lots of soothing skills, my partner will not be mad at me and will not punish me in any way.

I got really lucky, to learn better, to find someone who treats me right, to not fall into bad patterns because of my parents parenting imperfections. I still have emotional baggage to work on. I should have been able to learn from my parents - my teachers, all my childhood authority figures - what respect looks like and how I deserve to be treated with basic respect. Unfortunately methods of raising kids take time to update for people depending on how they were raised, what information theyve been exposed to and how they were exposed to that information. People are imperfect.

We should still treat children as whole humans. Worthy of the same respect as anyone else,nworthy of autonomy whereever developmentally appropriate. Worthy of privacy.

[simbistardis]

Being black and Aromantic is an experience. When I came out through social media my family felt the need to drill me with questions about my past romantic relationships and why now all a sudden, I’d chosen to go by Aro. I remember talks of bandwagons, even though I can count the number of aro-spec black people I’ve met on one hand with like three fingers. In church when my oldest sister led the prayer, she alluded to how younger kids had so many demons they had to fight, and I instantly knew what she meant. Subsequently, my being Aro had become a thing to pray off and use as a talking point in Sunday school rather than being discussed on a deeper and serious level with just myself. But when we did speak about it the conversations felt like an interrogation. It always felt like black culture couldn’t align much with Aromanticism, especially cause growing up I was taught that marriage was the end goal and that’s what I should want but I don’t think marriage was in my plans. I would dream of having dogs and living alone in a big house instead of having a romantic partner. For me being Aro and black is an interesting intersection because romance is very much portrayed in black narratives in both good and bad ways, but it’s never talked about in the capacity to which I experience alloromanticism. Alloromanticism is never ‘the decline of romantic attraction’ or ‘the strong romantic attraction to people only when I know them just as well as I know myself’. With my demiromantic identity people don’t understand the difference it has from regular attraction . My attraction is fluid so in the case of when I feel more Demi I’m glued to one person and one person only for a really long time. Attraction like that is what I wish was shown on TV and not just packaged as someone who's got an obsession and needs to get over someone. They could be Demiromantic. A thing I love about being Aro-spec is how comfortable it feels. Like I don’t feel this overwhelming need to perform. If my partner knows I’m on the Aro-spec they know it’s best not to try to force romantic gestures or even be offended by my lack of attraction at times. ... How come black women just can’t experience attraction a bit differently from how everyone says we should. So many black and brown men and women probably have to repress the way they feel and run the risk of being the bad guy because no one would understand or want to navigate the ways in which they experience Aromanticism. They bottle it up and when things go wrong probably find it easier to just blame themselves for not being enough or their partner when really, they just have to look into themselves and their orientation. I think black women could feel more assertive in themselves if they realized that they can be Aromantic and not pushed into this box where they have to play a role they don’t want to play. Black women deserve to explore romantic orientations as well as sexual ones and have a deep dive into how they feel. And that should be respected. To black Aromantic people I say keep pushing the odds, keep daring to form a new mold for black kids to come because we’re drowned in content and media that tells us we’re overly sexualized and romanticized and that can change with us. Our families and friends may not understand, the world may not even understand, but as long as you get who you are that’s honestly all that matters. As a collective we can help each other learn and grow, we can push each other in our advocacy and know it’s not a competition. All our efforts should be us trying to get Aromanticism to be taken as seriously as any other orientation.

Being Aroflux and Black by Kimberly Butler (@/TheAsexualGoddess) on AUREA (2021)

[drdemonprince]

im really envious of u. I like reading your writing and the stories you tell about sex and stuff and it sounds like u have a lot of fun. I don’t no if I will ever be able to live like that. im autistic and very inhibited is probably the best word. I find it hard to meet new people and go new places. a few times I have gone to local munches but been too introverted to say anything to people and I just sit there feeling self conscious and silly. they have been really nice. but I haven’t made any friends or anything. I feel like I need someone to take me under their wing kinda and give me an in. It seems like I’d really enjoy it a lot but don’t no how to make my way in. I don’t feel confident enough to just use apps and hook up. especially as im so new to it all and dont no what im doing really. I’ve read what you say about going to the social gatherings and stuff but what if im too shy to say anything? I don’t no how to be more uninhibited but I feel like that’s what I need.

please keep in mind that I was not doing any of this shit until I was like 32 years old. up until then I was in only a handful of relationships, mostly ones I had stumbled into through no agency of my own, and I had never really lived out any of my kinky desires. hell I had barely even gone out to a club or a concert or anything on my own, certainly not very often, let alone a sex club or something like that. I had to practice socializing on my own terms, and trying new things alone and scared and finding what was valuable in them despite those feelings a lot. like many many years a lot.

I didn't really venture out into the gay bath house or any of the cruising bars until I had a partner who was interested in taking me to them. that provided me with an in and an emotionally safe anchor with which to explore. I am also indebted to friends who showed me around places like steamworks and explained to me the nonverbals of cruising, which I then went ahead and put in my own cruising guide.

to this day I still have a much better time at events like puppy play night when I go with some homies and can spend some time joking around with them and using their support to help meet people before eventually breaking off and wandering into a back room to get laid. I still routinely have nights where I will go out on my own and do very little but sip from my drink and stand around awkwardly for four hours, maybe dance a bit, and go home.

cruising is an exercise in patience. you are never guaranteed any particular outcome or experience. you work with what nature gives you, and you learn to find some appreciation in simply being there and bearing witness. 9 times out of 10 you get turned down or there just isn't a spark. happens on the apps too.

shooting your shot and getting turned down is a successful consent negotiation. everybody has done everything correctly and it ended the only way that it should have. there's nothing to do but dust yourself off, not take it as some dramatic declaration of your life worth, and go at it again.

I recommend visiting cruising spaces with a friend. and just going purely for voyeuristic and anthropological reasons the first couple times. The only way you become a person who can do this stuff is by doing it, a fuck ton of times. message a lot of people. Go to a lot of events.

at some point you have to find the very act of going to be motivating and enjoyable in some way. thankfully I am fascinated by humans, enjoy dancing, like having a little drink or an edible and wandering around, and treat it all as very valuable writing fodder. you have to find what set of motivations work for you. because it's not about instant success or gratification ever. It is always a lot of waiting and watching and wondering what the night is going to bring, and making peace that often it will bring nothing at all except for being alive amongst others.

keep at it though. start really small. I am so glad that I got to this point, because yeah my life is really interesting and sexually gratifying and fun. but it also is entire weekends of just standing around nursing a drink and doing nothing and looking like an NPC. happens to the best of us

[hils79]

Hils Watches Matz Travel Vlog - Part 2

This reminds me so much of the time I got lost at Stockholm train station when I went over to watch the hockey

Yes. For the shot...

Hongjoong explaining how train departure boards work is honestly very charming. He seemed so confused by the whole experience until he figured it out.

Praising Hongjoong comes so naturally to Seonghwa half the time it's like he's not even thinking about it

They're being very polite about it but I'm assuming most of the 'fans' at the station are people who followed them there

I hope Seonghwa calls him this a lot. In private. If you know what I mean.

God, they are so married.

Apparently you're not allowed to say Instagram either.

Like, seriously, he didn't even blink. They really do have an old married couple vibe where they just compliment each other as easy as breathing.

Seonghwa experiencing a day off from parenting

Planning the honeymoon already

Seonghwa taking credit because it was his idea to go on a trip even though Hongjoong did all the planning and organising

WHY IS HE SO CUTE?? Shit like this is why he's my bias

Whoever did the captions also thinks they are married

Hongjoong, I promise it's okay for you to take one single day off.

Aww his English is really good!

Someone from the KQ finance department definitely captioned this

I love that most of this vlog is just Seonghwa telling Hongjoong how great he is

But still talks about him like he's a baby even though they're only a few months apart in age

It must be so hard being married to Kim Hongjoong. JUST DO SOMETHING ROMANTIC WITH YOUR WIFE. Yunho would have understood the assignment.

I bet that one is in his private collection

OMG the way Hongjoong's mother's voice changes in tone completely when she sees Seonghwa. She sounds so happy to see him.

Absolutely wild to visit a relatively small town in Italy and find the a store for the brand you are an ambassador for. I think Hongjoong was even more excited than Seonghwa

Aww he's missing his son

Wow he legit lost his mind over the magnets and was heavy breathing and everything

God, Seonghwa is even mothering their manager. I love him so much.

Welp hit the image limit again and I'm still only 45 mins through. Onward to part 3, which should be the last one unless they go insane.

Part 3

[alpacaradio]

There really is no excuse. Taken with much generosity, its constant discussion of transmisandry is coming from a place of hurt - but as soon as it's talking about trans women, you can immediately tell that OP has never really understood one.

I've never met a trans woman who hasn't grappled deeply with the expectations of masculinity on her and indeed often that very thing led her to identify her own womanhood. I found my own way to recognizing who I am through grappling with the expectations on me and how uncomfortable I was with them!

It was a role that I always implicitly rejected and was uncomfortable with. This story is so common I think it more likely than not you've heard it if you know even a single trans woman. To know many and not be deeply familiar with it seems ... almost impossible. I can only conclude that the OP hasn't really listened.

And in all of this, "if transmascs need to sit for hours and unlearn transmisogyny, fine. but" but nothing at all, because you clearly haven't done the work to put anything after that sentence making demands of a community. You're talking about us like you've done the work to really know and understand trans women, and you've even appealed to multiple evil tranny behaviors, behaviors I've literally never seen from any trans woman, to the point where I think the problem is mostly you.

It is so easy to see that so much of what is in genderqueerdyke's response is specific issues with specific trans women being projected onto an entire community, including so many things which are obviously a consequence of simply not listening to or refusing to believe us.

Yes! I know sex workers, too! Yes, our bodies are constantly fetishized for our maleness even though we are not male. And yes, there are clients who seek out trans women specifically seeing us as men. We're surrounded by chasers. What I find surprising is not that a sex worker you knew had clients who told her they were attracted to her for her maleness, but that you refused to believe her, because I'd say it's more likely than not that any trans woman who's ever done sex work has been told that very thing. But you refuse to believe the things women have told you, and so you put doubt on that part of our experience too. You had to make our lived experience sound impossible, so that describing our experiences sounds like bigotry rather than fact.

I'm so annoyed I popped into second person, but I do not really want to talk to it at all. I don't want it to talk to me or anyone else; I want it to stop talking about trans women entirely until it can fucking believe even one of us and not talk over us and decide our experiences for us.

Any time someone says, "I need to unlearn X? Fine, but" your hackles should be raised. This is someone that really should not be trying to speak about the community of trans women.

I guess this is something the community has generally known about Equinox, but damn, this isn't a mistake or something you can just apologize for; this is evidence of an entire way of thinking that underlies every rant I've ever seen about transmisandry. How am I supposed to believe any differently when I've only ever seen it post through all of this and never really actually grapple with it? How are we supposed to get "solidarity" when solidarity means putting up with the abuse of being bombarded with this belief system the moment we let our guard down? the moment we're comfortable with ourselves? @genderqueerdykes is not someone who can truly be in community with me, and I think not someone to feel comfortable around as a trans woman. If I were its friend I would hold my cards damn close to my chest.

Pretend you didn't see that.

This is a level of transmisogyny that is somewhat hard to comment on because the things that one would normally point out as transmisogynistic implications are said so brazenly that there can be no pretense about any of the involved parties being unaware of it. The authors know, the readers know, everybody understands that this is pure transmisogyny. There is no plausible deniability.

It's an attempt to establish proximity between transfems and cis manhood in every way possible. Their bodies, their histories, their "socialization", the way they are treated by others, the way they treat and view others, their ways of thinking, even their self-conception. Every aspect of their being is cast as essentially male. Transfems are being called "men" in all but name - and not just any "men", they are made into embodiments of the worst aspects of hegemonic manhood. Not just male socialized but continuing to benefit from male socialization. Not just engaging in abusive behaviors stemming from male socialization but being afforded the freedom to do so because they continue to be treated as men. (Suffice it to say that this does not align with reality)

This is unadulterated sex-essentialism and it's intentionally being used to delegitimize and devalue the standpoint of transfems in feminist discourses. It's clear that the author is projecting transmisogynist ideas onto transfems and simply assumes that these ideas must be correct without considering any alternative. (The fact that transfems do not internalize "male socialization" has been reiterated many times over and should not have to be continually reasserted. This is a baseline level of understanding that we should be able to expect and demand from members of our community.)

Misogyny is framed as being contained within the realms of sexed bodies and gendered socialization in such a way that it allows for the casting of transfems as people enacting misogyny without being primary targets themselves - like cis men.

The claim that the animosity some transfems exhibit towards men comes from wanting to "prove" their womanhood serves the double purpose of casting their womanhood as inauthentic and denying the misogyny they suffer at the hands of men. One would be hard pressed to find a more cruel mischaracterization of transfems' experiences than this.

The cynical misappropriation of the standpoint of the people this screed is directed at by the use of "we" despite making it abundantly clear that the behavior that is being criticized and its supposed causes exempt people such as the author from the possibility of engaging in it should also be noted as an attempt at weaponizing a compromised version of standpoint epistemology against transfems.

The only plausible target audience for this kind of rhetoric are those who carry extreme ressentiment towards transfems and are susceptible to softened formulations of TERF ideology. These are the same kinds of ideas that TERFs have tried to push into trans spaces numerous times, e.g. under names like "sex-conscious feminsim".

A formulaic "retreat" from this post consisting entirely of platitudes has been published after the author received backlash for it but nobody is under any obligation to accept it and they absolutely should not. A person who was very obviously attempting to promote TERF ideology in trans spaces and in the same stroke accused transfems of being uniquely prone to making false accusations is not trustworthy, even if that person backs down upon realizing that the reception is more uniformly negative than anticipated.

@genderqueerdykes @gateway-2000 is a transmisogynist, beyond a shadow of a doubt. Its entire worldview is permeated by transmisogynistic assumptions, ideas and biases at a fundamental level. It has straightforwardly expressed an understanding of transfems' interiorities, their experiences and their social positions that is so incorrect that one has to wonder how someone holding these views could have navigated trans communities for a considerable amount of time without encountering the many transfeminist rebuttals to all of its demagoguery. How could someone with even a passing level of familiarity with TERF ideology or "gender critical feminism" read and espouse these ideas without recognizing them? It's completely unthinkable. It's not unreasonable to assume that it simply misjudged the consensus within its audience as being sufficiently anti-transfeminist for ideas such as these to fall upon fertile ground and it is now going back to waiting until the time is ripe to reintroduce them and to expressing them in more subtle ways until then.

But you can't un-ring a bell.

We can and should assert boundaries against reactionaries engaging in obvious subversion such as this. Refusing to do so is a deleterious error in judgement. This is very far beyond the limits of what any trans community that wants to consider transfems a part of itself can be allowed to tolerate.

[lemonduckisnowawake]

I just want to make clear something

Vampire Books I'm Interested In

literally anything platonic, ZERO ROMANCE. The zero is very important. Not low. Not a little. Not background. Zero. None. Nada. 전혀 없어야데.

if it must be romantic, at least it shouldn't take itself seriously or be Dramatic and Thematic or have the romance NOT be between the vampire and human. The vampire should be their weird friend who sometimes bites whipped cream cans or honey bottles as a nervous tic

Blood, Gore, Violence, Viscera, Alllll the Guts and mess

if there must be an age gap, consider how funny it would be if the human was older than the vampire

"i am not a vampire. Vampires cannot be Christian. The fact that I hate sunlight, hate garlic, and that my hand is burning as I clutch the cross around my neck that is ONLY BY FASHION CHOICE covered by a turtleneck is NOT AN INDICATION OF ANYTHING!"

if there must be a sexy blood drinking scene, consider how funny sexy it would be if the vampire sips his blood from a wineglass like some tired, adhd, chaotic lawful detective trying to crack a hard case because obviously there is nothing sexier than that

"no. I'm not 'magic.' I'm actually a biological construction created for the purpose of carrying different bloodtypes in me to administer it in emergency cases during this space and matter war. The fact that I am a failed product does NOT negate the fact that I'm not magic. I am *science*" which is to say sci fi vampires

Honestly, just go back into the original lore of vampires and make them bloodthirsty but so calculating. After seeing what Frieren did with demons, we really are missing out on monsters who use the power of words to lure in prey

Vampire Books I'm NOT Interested In

"Bloodsucking is so sexy and intense and dangerous. You want to let me suck your blood so bad. Literally. Please. I will die without blood." Go get a blood transfusion and stop gaslighting women with your easily preventable life or death situations. No, I don't care if vampires are illegal citizens. Just rip out the government leaders' throats and establish a tyrrany where an adventure begins where peoole realize that revenge and violence only creates cyclical cruelty and -

"I will reform this vampire through the power of love and blood."

If it has a shirtless man cover and/or a couple cover, I am automatically suspicious of it

Yes that DOES mean Magiford falls under this. My point stands

However, I will read any and all of these if I'm feeling evil enough and need a victim to target

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

I'm not ready to shut up about Aveline and Carver--so, when you go see Aveline in Act 1, you can catch up with her a little bit and that's where this conversation can happen:

Aveline: "It's just one more change, though. The real end for me was Ostagar. What about you, Carver? You were there. Do you feel something similar?" Carver: No. Aveline: All right, then. Bit of a tit, your brother.

I wanted to see what she would say if Carver isn't in the party. Instead, she says this:

Aveline: Carver was there. I imagine he feels something similar. If he allows it.

......well, at least she didn't call him a tit?

[ame-to-ame]

RAHHH DO I HAVE THOUGHTS

[araraito]

Is it normal for a therapist to be like "Aww but you are so young and pretty, things can't be that bad :)"

[lilacerull0]

i feel like reading/watching mbf immediately means knowing who i am as a person and... i cannot allow this

[dreadful-luck]

GGS TEAM PAST!!!

[ghostieblotts]

So many projects I want to work on, so much planning to do for fun trips, so much holiday fun imminent, and not enough time

[edge-oftheworld]

going back through some of this fandom's history has made me realise, we really see people as black and white good or bad don't we?

[teethbomb]

mob psycho(logical horror) 100

[thingsmethinks]

Talking to [leftist/socialist/progressive/whatever] white people as a brown girl is always an experience

[snekdood]

You fucking idiots dont fucking get it. ive been taking care of plants since i was 14. Ive tried FUCKING EVERYTHING. Fungus gnats are just apparently gonna exist around me no matter what i do or try, apparently just like these yerfs who also seem to be breeding like maggots.