#i'm so sorry to folks who have drawn things For Me Specifically and i have not gotten to you.

[starflungwaddledee]

also i want to again apologise for how phenomenally behind i have been with reblogging/responding to artworks on here, including art drawn for me or propaganda for the tournament!!

i'm hoping to start getting to my backlog for this VERY soon, ideally within the next two weeks. so you may start to see an increase of this on your timelines. and if i haven't yet gotten to your artwork don't worry, i most likely have it in my drafts!!!

[spicymancer]

So just wanted you to know, "yellow" is a common slur against Asian Americans and so Huang Feng, being a Bruce Lee (whos an Asian man) clone and all could raise some eyebrows to your intentions. And before i get accused of white knighting, i am Asian

Thanks for reaching out! This is honestly something that might be important to discuss and I appreciate your attempt at broaching the subject delicately. More after the jump.

So to start. I am also Asian. Specifically Chinese American.

As an American born Chinese, I have a weird relationship with my Asian heritage. I have a bad accent when I speak Chinese and most of my upbringing and cultural understanding is very American and western-centric. So I have certain biases at play here that I fully acknowledge. My experience is not universal. But these characters are drawn from that experience.

Huang Feng is a reference to Bruce Lee's performance as Kato in the Green Hornet. Dà Huángfēng being a Chinese term for a hornet.

The character is also narratively implied to be a secret moonlighting identity for the Yellow Ranger in my made-up sentai team. (Who, due to my own decision to always refer to the characters by their Ranger color, is literally just called Yellow by the other members of the cast.)

This is also a reference. Specifically to one of my greatest inspirations, Thuy Trang (Rest in Peace), who played the original Mighty Morphin Yellow Ranger. She was one of the first "Cool Asian Characters" that I encountered in media targeted at me as a child, problematic color choice aside. I sincerely adored her and her giant robot Saber-Toothed Tiger.

To be honest I have a complicated relationship with "Asian Themed" characters in media. So often saddled with cliché stereotypes: Martial Arts, dumplings, nunchucks, etc etc.

But the thing is, even as I roll my eyes whenever I see the Fighting Game character that is The Chinese One who wears a rice hat and a qipao. Or when one is literally just Bruce Lee. I do also immediately main that character. It's a bit of a guilty pleasure. Taking what representation I can get with mixed feelings. Similar to my enjoyment of sexy anime girl art even though it's all rooted in pretty uncomfortable sexist and objectifying aesthetics. A lot of my work comes from a place of exploring my own sexuality/identity. These characters are, partly, my own attempt to explore Asian themes and ideas for myself.

I would love to say that I'm trying to "reclaim" the term or something but I'm just some internet artist drawing cute anime girls and monster smut. For me, playing with these clichés is just another way of being self-indulgent.

Not really defending these creative choices so much as explaining my perspective on them. I totally understand if all this turns folks off! I fully respect those who don't vibe with my work and wish them all the best. It's a big internet and I'm sure they can find something super great to enjoy elsewhere!

Anyway, sorry for the long rambly post. Despite the fact that I'm posting this on Tumblr, I am not super mentally equipped to engage in Discourse, so forgive me if I don't respond to the tags on this.

So I'll just leave y'all with a neat article by Kat Chow discussing the history and usage of the color Yellow in regards to Asian Identity.

[insomniac-ships]

Hi, sorry if this is a dumb question, but are there any blogs for people that are ex-anti? I used to be one since I was in my mid-teens, but given how anti culture has shifted, I've spent the past few months re-examining my place in the community and find that I no longer fit in, if I ever really did.

I think I was drawn to a lot of the critical and analytical aspects of it bc I'm an obnoxious nerd and like to be Loud and Annoying about my opinions. However, as the community progressed, I started becoming uncomfortable by others with my (perceived) shared stances as they would use it as justification to bully, harass, and encourage proshippers to kill themselves. Not all of them do that, but as we've all seen, too many of them do and it really sucks. I have also never fully bought into the idea that what someone enjoys in fiction, no matter how deplorable, automatically equates to what they are irl. At worst, I had some misguided notions about people's capabilities to make healthy choices for themselves and that's as far as my concern about ships went.

I think the final straw for me is antis sending CSEM material to the moderators at AO3 as well as a situation antis were apparently circulating CSEM of a proshipper from when they were being abused at age three. That's just beyond horrific.

Sorry for the text wall! I hope you have a good day.

Heya! No such thing as a dumb question, so no worries. To answer your question though, I don't actually know if there are any blogs out there specifically for ex-antis.

My blog is a safe space for folks trying to get out of those toxic circles, and I know a few other proshippers out there are also happy to give ex-antis a judgment-free place to start over, talk about their experiences, or just exist.

⭐ Hey! If you're a proshipper who is chill with ex-antis, please consider reblogging this! ⭐

And in case you need to hear it today, anon: you did good. It can hard to break away from environments like that, where people are kept in check through paranoia, fear, and the risk of being totally ostracized. I'm glad you were able to step away from that. ♡

[traegorn]

Hi! I'm not sure if youre necessarily the best person to come to with this question, but a friend of mine is trying to figure out their wedding and wants to do a handfasting, but is worried about cultural appropriation. This friend isn't pagan, wiccan, or a witch but also isn't Christian (we are usamerican though, so "traditional wedding" here would be a Christian ceremony and they arent keen on that), and also isn't Celtic or anything from that region (theyre Chinese but thats a complicated thing for them). I dont know whats drawn them to a handfasting specifically, but they've always been kind of interested in these things (they've known me for most of the decade I've been pagan). Anyways sorry for giving you maybe more info than was needed, if you know anything about cultural appropriation wrt handfasting or anyone who might have more information, I would really appreciate it!

Okay, folks these days are so jumpy it's frustrating. Cultural appropriation isn't about never using something from another culture. It's about closed and open practices, it's about dominant groups taking from marginalized groups, and it's about the complex power dynamics in our society.

In short: it's okay to use things from cultures other than your own as long as it's not a closed practice or from a marginalized group.

Handfasting is not from a closed or marginalized culture.

Relax.

I hope it's a nice wedding.

[objectum-kinkfessional]

HI book anon again replying to another anon replying to me lol

I didn't expect someone to give me advice, thank you! To be honest, I am always so nervous to even do anything because I mostly work with 70+ years old books and the fear of accidentally hurting them is very real, but also they're just so beautiful it hurts. It doesn't help that I am drawn to old books specifically BUT ALSO you're so right about them not being appreciated enough, especially when the donor got them from older relative. Those poor things were probably shoved in some attic for decades and weren't properly taken care of and handling them with care and dignity is the least I can do for them. Some chaste kiss on the cover or gentle strokes on few pages then and there as bonus for being so brave. Godspeed to all folks who adore old objects btw, it's tough to show affection to them but it's worth it.

(also I'm sorry mod for sending so many asks about old books I just have a lot to say about them-)

[blazehedgehog]

Hello, I have a strange question to ask

I've been having some existential crisis about my understanding of art, but mostly when it comes to Sonic

I'd like to belive that there's no valid answer or approach to enjoying something that speaks to you and partaking in it no matter what, if folks have a better time relating to the musical side of the series and not many other aspects of it, that's fine, like a different era and aesthetic, no problem and I'll encourage it in practice. And I find telling someone "you have low/high standards" offensive honestly, it's way too assumptious.

But I'd be lying if the sea of criticism and hot tales online doesn't get to me, making me question maybe I'm wrong, maybe some opinions are more valuable than others. Like I know my preferences, but what if it all comes from ignorance, or me being lenient on others experiences is some sort of creative failure. Maybe the people who want their specific vision of what they love are onto something and are owed that, even tho it would put folks at even more odds.

I find it very disturbing, the idea of an absolute truth and aiming to find it is very comforting but I just hate the idea as well. It would mean disregarding voices that never had the chance to be heard, perspectives and experiences that don't fit within a coherent vision.

Like I'm from a country that was sanctioned to hell and my first language isn't English nor japanese so Sonic was never accessible for me, so I'm inherently biased against someone telling me something I enjoy is not for me.

A bit of followup to that ask: What I'm trying to say is that while I want to support artistic integrity and respect authorial intent, I just the idea of art being treated like a religion and words of artists (and in sonic's case forgotten manuals sometimes lol) to be treated like holy scripture with a specific "vision" or "direction" everyone should follow Also sorry for lengthy ask

This is definitely a hefty subject to be sure.

I spent 12 years as a paid critic. I wasn't paid very much, and the site wasn't very big, but I still took the job seriously enough that I developed a sense that at some point, you just have to plant your feet and establish your own opinion. You can't walk on eggshells around everyone forever. Battle lines have to be drawn for you to be who you are.

Avoiding conflict with strangers is one thing. But you have to express yourself, your intents, and your feelings at some point. By its very nature, that means you are going to be dismissing someone, somewhere. I don't think that can be avoided. Somebody out there will love the thing you hate, and that WILL generate a conflict.

What really and truly matters is how you are prepared for and handle that conflict. Not every disagreement has to be thermonuclear warfare. And sometimes you might want to defuse, and the other person doesn't. To me, that's just part of life. Have opinion, will argue.

I realize this is easier said than done, but if this kind of stuff bothers you, then... don't let it. It's the internet. If something is bothering you, it's easy to get away from it. Nobody is making you remain in the same argument for days or even weeks on end. Maybe this is just something that comes as you get older, but at some point I realized I valued my time more than just yelling at other people online all the time.

So I... stopped doing that. I put my thoughts out in to the world through places like this blog or my Youtube channel, and if people have a problem with the way I express my opinions, I try to express them better. I don't attack back, I just try to identify what they aren't understanding. Rarely does it start arguments anymore. Does it mean my opinions are right? Probably not. Not entirely, anyway. What even is right and wrong in this context? It's all just perspective.

And once you realize that, the idea of drawing a line in the sand, planting your feet and expressing your opinion, all the arguments and disagreements it may generate just become different perspectives. It doesn't mean you're wrong, it doesn't mean they're wrong, because nobody is wrong. It's all just from where you're looking at the thing from.

Given that we're just talking about Sonic the Hedgehog, and there are no guns, or knives, or real violence happening, ultimately you have to realize: who cares? Find your own happiness. This isn't the fate of the world. It's a cartoon hedgehog. And though you may have started an argument today, the sun will still rise tomorrow. Free yourself and enjoy it.

[charrfie]

i like to ask these questions about peoples interests when they need something to talk about...are there any songs that remind you of spamton? any songs that remind you of alien nine? :3 hope you get feeling better soon!!

Hi anonymous thank you so so very much for your question, pondering this alone has helped me reroute my focus, it's very helpful. I appreciate you asking a lot <3 I got very detailed in answering this so I'm putting it under a read more, please enjoy

Surprisingly with as adoring as I am of alien 9, I don't have all too many songs that I directly associate with it? Something about that interest of mine feels very different than all my other interests in which I'm drawn to associate songs with characters or the source material itself. And I'm not sure I could name that difference for you exactly, that's just how it seemed to turn out. I think maybe because alien 9 feels more like a profound open-and-closed art piece rather than something you can delve into just for fun. It has something to say; it's a serious and heavy statement, no more. Not to say I have an issue with folks who *do* decide to delve deeper into it in terms of fandom or song associations, I personally just don't have that pull towards those elements of it. Sometimes I will hear a song though that has a instrumental backing track very similar to the alien 9 ost, and being that it's ost is very striking in terms of how it's arranged, that always sticks out to me. Very sorry I don't have more of a proper answer to give you here!

As for spamton, I have plenty believe me. I was actually just talking to my boyfriend about this the other day, but I tend to associate a lot of 60s and 70s music with him rather than anything else! The playlist I have for him actually doesn't have very many modern songs on it. But before I share any specific songs for this I want to write up a little bit of a reasoning as for why this is.

If we go along with the implications of his origins, we can assume that spamton was born in 1978. He obviously wouldn't have grown up alongside a vast amount of 60s and 70s music right when it was released for this reason, but I think its similar to how a majority of kids grow up listening to music their parents/past generations used to listen to... just kind of a thing you run into and then latch onto bc its such a foundational thing in childhood. That applies to spam too!! I've always imagined music from that time period to be his favorite. It's either easy listening or it's a good dancey tune, both of which are winners in my book. I do believe he'd appreciate the calmness of easy listening 60s/70s actually. I know a lot of people say "oh yeah show this dude hyperpop or some other crazy shit he'd love it" but I truly have to disagree... it feels like that'd overwhelm him if you ask me, he needs something to temper his own erratic nature. Not to mention how it may sound kind of similar to certain phone calls he may or may not have received. Might be pretty unpleasant, to say the least

All this being said: here are a few songs which remind me of him!

Heaven Can Wait by Dean Martin is a really big one for me which is. Slightly embarrassing (๑-﹏-๑) I admittedly do associate a lot of romantic 60s/70s songs with him because well for one I think he's just the type to listen to stuff like that. But also I am love with him. Hope this helps. It's a good song regardless!!

Fairly obvious I feel like but Cars by Gary Numan is also a very big song for him I think. A focus on cars... phone motifs... mentions of "images" in the sense of visions and/or perceptions of someone... generally just an anxious demeanor and sense of wrongness present throughout its entirety... this song's got it all

As for a relatively modern one (2001), the newest song that's come to remind me of him is I Want Wind To Blow by The Microphones. The lyrics are very reminiscent of him to me! Particularly the second verse

Very long-winded answer to your question but I hope this gives you some insight! I'd be happy to provide more songs or explanations if need be. Feeling much better after writing this thank you very very much anon I hope you have a wonderful night

[jayplat]

Ya know, as a paraphile who fully believes I will never act on my paraphilia, it hurts to see folks not understand that there is a difference between someone who hurts others and someone with a paraphilia. Sometimes there is overlap, yes, but every paraphile I know and willingly talk to (specific to those with supposedly harmful paraphilias) has no intent to harm anyone, they just happen to have a "distasteful" attraction that can cause harm if acted on. Yes, there are obviously paraphiles who do bad things, but there are non paraphiles who do those same things. And there are paraphiles who never do harmful things. I don't even look at fucking, drawn erotica or read smut if it has to do with my specific "harmful" paraphilia.

I am in the same boat as many anti paraphile folk. I don't want "pro contact" people to be near me. It disgusts me. But I also know I'm still a creature with feelings and I'm just as complicated as everyone else. I'm not a time bomb waiting to explode. I'm not a monster in disguise. I'm not going to hurt anyone. I'm just another one of this world's creatures that was dealt a shitty hand that I'll have to deal with.

And before you all tell me to go to therapy, do your research! I'm in therapy. I talk about my paraphilic attractions in therapy! Clearly I'm not imprisoned for just experiencing the feelings. And it's actually helpful and leads to less offenses if paraphiles, ESPECIALLY PED OPHI LES, can talk about their attractions in an open, safe space.

Sorry for rambling I'm just. So tired of being hated for something I am constantly aware of and hate about myself as well. I'm not saying it's a sexual orientation but it is just as unshakeable as the fact I'm queer.

[nothorses]

Hey, I mean, it's been a year- I'm happy to reflect and re-evaluate.

I spent about a month doing research for this post- ranging from internet searches (of all kinds) to interviews (which I posted separately here and here), and the dilemma I ran into was essentially:

Like you noticed, most Baeddel blogs have been taken down. There are actually quite a lot of Baeddel-originated posts left over, but the problem is that they tend to be quippy one-liners that don't spell things out super clearly, and tend to exist more as part of a larger contextual understanding- or are intentionally phrased in such a way as to appear inoffensive at first glance. The other problem is that the other posts are mostly just vague bigotry, without explaining the internal logic.

And the third problem is that enough of these beliefs are accepted at face value today that a lot of folks would see "this is normal" instead of thinking about the underlying reasoning.

So the challenge I was facing was, essentially, the fear that citing sources that didn't spell themselves out would net me backlash from people who needed handholding through it. Which I consider pretty valid, considering the harassment campaign I was dealing with at the time.

The closest thing to a solution I could come up with was to use sources that did spell those beliefs out more explicitly- which did tend to be critical, but which were also consistent enough with each other's claims that I felt there was validity to them- and to encourage people to then look further into compilations of firsthand sources that would make the larger picture clear. (Like these ones: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] which I also linked in the OP.)

In regards to MYC specifically: Her blog has been deleted. There was no possibility of tracking down firsthand sources for everything, and similar to the issues I had with Baeddel posts overall, her posts tended to be quippy one-liners that sounded good on first read and made up a larger picture. My solution to that was similar; lots of secondhand accounts that were more concise/succinct and in keeping with each other, a couple of relevant posts/words from her, plus a link to a relevant tag on her blog that had been archived.

The TERF post was included for this quote:

"And then you have the earliest mtf theorists on tumblr like radtransfem and ciscritical-not-cisphobic – drawn to radical/lesbian feminism – around whom the baeddel group coalesced and their ideology developed, i.e. “radical transfeminism.”"

As it was also discussing MYC and her ideology. Again, regrettable to use shitty people as a source; also happens to be a connection other people have made. And the fact that radical feminists themselves connect Baeddelism to radical feminism does seem significant here.

That said, I could absolutely have included a disclaimer on that, and I didn't. I should have done that. I'm sorry.

I can also recognize where some of these claims come off as transmisogynistic stereotyping; the worst of these are claims that individuals have made in their own posts, which I linked for entirely different reasons.

I don't think MYC was "grooming" cis men, and I have never claimed that. What I did say was that the idea that cis men are "potential trans women" also lead to the belief that trans men are "irredeemable"; we had womanhood handed to us, and we rejected it, and that makes us Worse. This isn't an uncommon idea, and MYC was far from the first person to bring it up; it's extremely common for cis women to feel we've "abandoned womanhood" and try to punish us for it. But it's part of the way she and others view trans men, and that's relevant.

The unfortunate reality of criticizing trans people on the internet is that inevitably, transphobes will hop on board for all the wrong reasons and turn it into a reason to harass trans people. They'll add their bigoted bullshit to the conversation, and then you have to scramble to distance yourself from them while onlookers start to draw conclusions about your Real Intentions. Again, I could have done this better in my post; I'm sorry I didn't.

The "turn me into a girl" site was included because I remember looking into it at the time and feeling it was in line with the claims from the paired post that also linked it, but on second look, I can absolutely see that it's pretty genuine and wholesome. I also had mistakenly interpreted that post to mean that the site was created by MYC & co., but again, I jumped to that conclusion and I can see now that it isn't true. (Honestly I'm not sure why- my guess would be the context I found that link in, but what that was or if it existed is a mystery to me now.) That's my bad- I should have looked more closely.

And like... you got me, I'm not a historian. I'm also not a journalist. I do genuinely apologize for failing to look more closely at that source, and for failing to properly contextualize others. I do genuinely appreciate that you took the time to look through those sources, and I appreciate the feedback from a historical documentation standpoint.

I also don't think it's fair to call the whole thing bullshit, considering the arguments you're using show that you also failed to read and/or comprehend... honestly, a good majority of the post.

You ask why any of this matters, and funnily enough, there's a whole section dedicated to answering that question in the post: "Why It Matters".

You ask where the source texts are, but you literally quoted the answer:

“Baeddelism” was only one name for a set of beliefs that existed long before the specific term did, and hasn’t gone anywhere since the original Baeddel movement died down." So where are the source texts for this ideology? Where is the Baeddel manifesto? Influential and thus potentially dangerous ideologies have books written and published expounding them, where are the baeddel books?

The "Baeddel" clique was a group of people who shared certain beliefs that had already been popularized (hence the inclusion of MYC, who is known for popularizing a lot of the foundational beliefs). They centralized and amplified those ideas amongst themselves, they gave themselves a name, and then the abuse they enacted turned people off from them and they quietly disbanded. But those people and ideas didn't go away.

The point of this post is not to say "look out of anyone calling themselves a Baeddel"- though people absolutely should. The point is to talk about the ways in which radical feminism has influenced the trans community as a whole, using Baeddelism is a microcosm and example.

You say that radical feminism is inherently incompatible with any kind of trans acceptance, and I agree with you!

I said it in the OP, but Baeddelism was never really about Empowering/Protecting Trans Women or whatever; it was about empowering a specific group of white, "fully transitioned" (or trying to be), binary trans women. The ideology actively hurt trans women. The movement fell because they aggressively defended someone who raped a transfemme.

Baeddels tried to make radical feminism work for trans women, and it fucking didn't. The trans community still tries to make radical feminism work for us; it still fucking doesn't!

Radical feminism believes that womanhood is biological and that misogyny is The Root Of Oppression because of ~biological woman factors~. "Trans-inclusive" radical feminism follows the same tenants, but they drop the bits that make it logically incoherent when trans people are included; worst is the "gender is a choice so you should choose to be a woman" version, but the more popular versions insist that your real gender is always present in you and shapes your life from the beginning (true for some trans people, but not a universal experience).

It doesn't hold up, but like, you're asking for texts and books and manifestos from a loose ideology developed by some would-be academics on the internet. You're saying that this can't exist if it doesn't have formal academic writings, but the point is that this is less of a coherent ideology, and more of an interaction between radical feminism's influence on the queer community as a whole, plain old bigotry, and crab-in-a-bucket mentality. It doesn't need to follow solid internal logic; it just needs to sound good in a 100k note tumblr post & empower some abusive people to keep abusing.

I'm not comparing this to TERFism ("TIRF" isn't even my word). It's not a coherent movement on the scale of radical feminism. I'm outlining a set of common beliefs that already existed and continue to exist, and how they briefly came together even more potently to prove their inevitable harm to others.

I'm asking people to recognize that those ideas still exist, to point them out and talk about them, and to try to prevent that harm from occurring again- either in a Baeddelism 2.0, or just in the way these ideas more passively influence the queer community and trans theory.

Let's Talk About Bæddels: A Comprehensive Retrospective

(This post on Medium)

(@thequeer-quill's video reading)

Disclaimer

This post is not claiming that trans women do not suffer, or do not suffer as much as other groups of trans people. It is not claiming that all trans women are Baeddels (or adjacent), nor is it claiming that trans women oppress anyone else.

Transmisogyny is real, and requires much more acknowledgement than it currently receives. The trans community is very much capable of transmisogyny, and often does enact or enable it; likewise, trans people also often enact and enable transphobia against other parts of the trans community.

If you take only one thing from the following, take this:

We all need to work on being better allies to each other. None of us can gain anything without the rest of us.

Setting the Stage for Baeddelism

We can’t talk about Baeddelism without talking about Tumblr user @monetizeyourcat (“Cat”), and the ideology she popularized on the website in the early 2010’s.

Cat was a loud voice with a huge blog in the early days of Tumblr. Most of her popular content was humor-based, but she also championed an ideology that synthesized certain aspects of feminism, transfeminism, and communist ideals. Cat’s ideology is better explained here, and can be further explored here, but this is the foundation:

Manhood is inherently oppressive, and cannot exist outside the context of oppression.

Gender can be, to some extent, a choice.

Because of the above, one’s gender is an ethical choice with ethical consequences.

Being a man is, therefore, ethically harmful and wrong; particularly if you are giving up womanhood in order to be a man.

Being a woman is, therefore, ethically correct; particularly if you are giving up manhood in order to be a woman.

You may recognize some of the ideas here as a version of Radical Feminism: namely, the idea that manhood/men are inherently oppressive, and that womanhood/women are inherently victims.

All Cat had to do was map Radical Feminism onto the trans community. If manhood is Bad, and men are Bad, then trans men who reject womanhood in favor of becoming men are Bad. If womanhood is Good, and women are Good, then trans women who reject manhood in favor of womanhood are The Best. Which, of course, would also explain why society hates them more than any other trans person (something taken for granted by Cat and many others at the time).

This foundation was built upwards into a more complicated system of beliefs: cis men were viewed as “potential trans women”, people who did not yet know whether they were trans, had not made that choice, and could, conceivably, still choose to be women. As such, cis men were often seen as “better” than trans men. Trans men were encouraged to detransition, men in general were encouraged to reject their manhood in favor of womanhood, and “sissification” became a hallmark “joke” that the community forming around Cat latched onto.

The “gender is a choice” part of this ideology is a bit hard for most trans people to swallow, and Cat herself did not entirely ascribe to the idea that gender was always a choice. Still, even if men were intrinsically and inherently men, and even if they couldn’t simply choose not to be men the way she had, the idea remained that the so-called “ethical consequences” of being a man, and the harm this did to The Collective, vastly outweighed the personal harm suffered by “remaining” or “becoming” a woman. It was, in short, more ethical to suffer dysphoria in pursuit of womanhood than it was to accept one’s manhood.

It’s unclear whether Cat ever identified as a Baeddel, and she certainly didn’t begin the movement herself. She was definitely close to it, though, and many attest that her ideology constituted the building blocks of the Baeddelism movement.

Establishing an Ideology

The first post on Baeddelism was by Tumblr user @unobject, on October 2nd, 2013, and liked by @lezzyharpy, also one of the original Baeddels:

(Credit to @AcesArosandEnbies)

This post first provided the name and defining ideology of the Baeddel movement. The conclusion drawn from the post was, essentially, that because the root of the word “bad” was “baeddel”, and because “baeddel” referred to intersex people and “womanish men”, this old English slur was proof that transmisogyny was the worst form of bigotry; and even, perhaps, the root of all bigotry. (It’s worth noting that this etymology is likely inaccurate and ahistorical, along with problematic in several other ways.)

While @unobject was the first person to make this connection, @autogynephile (“Eve”) eventually became, in essence, the figurehead of the movement. Of the other Baeddels, some of them were explicitly aware and supportive of the ideology behind Baeddelism, some of them were young or newly-out trans women seduced by the personalities involved, and some of them were tangential enough to the movement that they didn’t really even know what it was. Baeddelism was a sort of trend, for a time, and many participants wore the name without entirely knowing what it meant.

It’s important to acknowledge that as much as there were dedicated members of Baeddelism, and as much as there was a unified ideology behind it, there were also individual Baeddels who did not understand- let alone support- the ideology.

That said…

The Belief System

Baeddels essentially built upon the foundation of @monetizeyourcat’s ideology that had been gaining traction on Tumblr in the years prior, with some additions that ultimately defined their movement:

Transmisogyny is the form of oppression from which all (or most) other forms of oppression stem.

Privilege is granted on the basis of assigned sex. (“AFAB” or “Assigned Female at Birth” vs. “AMAB” or “Assigned Male at Birth”)

These fundamentals of Baeddelism were essentially a rebranded form of Radical Feminism, much like Cat’s ideology. In particular, they drew from the Radical Feminist idea that misogyny was the “primary” form of oppression; that which all other oppression stemmed from. Baeddels only tweaked this idea to replace “misogyny” with “transmisogyny”, which led to the rest of the conclusions Baeddels drew:

Men are inherently oppressors, and women are inherently oppressed.

Trans women are inherently victims.

Because only AMAB people can experience transmisogyny, they are inherently more oppressed than AFAB people.

“AFAB Privilege”: The idea that within the queer and/or trans community, AFAB people receive unique privilege and positions of power that AMAB people do not.

There is no “transphobia” separate from “transmisogyny”. All transphobia stems from transmisogyny first, and transphobia as it impacts non-transfeminine trans people is incidental at most.

It’s important to note that these ideas were not all as universal as the first two, and different individual Baeddels held them to different extents.

Trans Lesbian Separatism

… was what the movement was ultimately defined by, as the logical conclusion of their other beliefs (much like Lesbian Separatism was the logical conclusion of Radical Feminist beliefs).

Baeddels believed that only trans women can understand, or be truly safe for, other trans women; therefore, contact with anyone who was not a trans woman was deemed “dangerous” and highly discouraged.

Trans Men

… also played an important role in Baeddel ideology, and the resulting treatment of trans men is what is often remembered today. Baeddels generally believed the following, either explicitly or implictly:

Trans men are not oppressed, nor marginalized at all.

Trans men do not experience transmisogyny.

Trans men do not experience misogyny, even prior to transition.

Trans men have access to male privilege.

Trans men have an easier time passing, and frequently go “stealth”; thus benefiting from male privilege as well as cis privilege.

Trans men are often (or always) misogynistic and transmisogynistic, and are not held accountable for this.

Trans men actively “choose” manhood even when presented with the “option” of womanhood.

Trans men oppress cis women.

Trans women enacting violence on trans men is “punching up” at oppressors, and therefore not only permitted, but encouraged.

Trans men become aggressive and violent when they go on testosterone HRT.

Nonbinary People

… are often overlooked when summarizing Baeddelism, but Baeddels did have plenty to say about them. Baeddel ideology relied on the idea that privilege was granted on the bases of assigned sex, and nonbinary people’s genders were thus treated as irrelevent; they essentially did not believe nonbinary people truly existed.

CAFAB nonbinary people are either trans men attempting to invade women’s spaces, or cis women pretending to be trans.

CAMAB nonbinary people are actually just trans women who haven’t accepted it yet. They must transition, or they are transmisogynistic.

Intersex People

Intersex experiences, and intersex history, were often co-opted and erased by Baeddelism. This was often more a byproduct of their beliefs than an overtly-stated idea, but most notably, the term “Baeddel” itself is likely more applicable- if not exclusively applicable- to intersex people, rather than trans women. Making their reclamation of it as a “transmisogynistic slur”, or their claim that the word’s existence means that “transmisogyny is the root of all oppression”, incredibly ignorant- if not actively harmful misinformation.

Notably, Baeddels also believed that intersex people- being “more androgynous” (a harmful misonception)- were able to pass more easily as the opposite assigned sex, and that intersex people even within transfemme spaces had “intersex privilege”. Some even believed, and openly claimed, that intersex people were “hermaphroditic”; a slur against intersex people, and typically implying that the individual has both sets of reproductive systems simultaneously.

Trans Women

… did not receive universally positive treatment, either. Baeddelism was very much a cult-like group built around the firmly-held conviction that they were absolutely correct, and that anyone who disagreed with them was The Enemy. Trans women who disagreed with them were generally seen as brainwashed and self-hating, and trans women who did agree with them were expected to subjugate themselves to the ringleaders of the movement.

Within Baeddel circles, trans women were most frequently victimized by the abusers allowed to run rampant because “trans women do not, and cannot, harm anyone else.” - Including, apparently, each other.

“They were also bad shitty abusive people in general. “… a bunch of them passed around a pile of smear campaigns and false rumors about virtually any trans woman that they had a even the slightest animosity for. Including the victim of the kinkster rapist. They’ve done other fucked stuff, like chased two twoc off this site for trying to make a zine, but yeah. That’s like, just some of it. I’m not up for going over the messy details of the whole shitparade “Full disclosure, I made a lot of excuses for these sacks of crap, even while they were out there spreading false crap about me […] I wasn’t aware of the worst shit they were doing until much much later." - @punlich

Inside the Movement

Though individual Baeddels often existed in vastly different social circles from each other- particularly offline- those who lived through the movement highlight commonalities in their experiences.

One interviewee recounts the manipulation present in their initial involvement with the movement:

“It came to me at a point where I was very quick to weaponize anything anyone told me about their experiences, because I was always a fighter. I’ve been an activist for a long time, you know, and when these trans women would come to me with their experiences I would believe them. I wanted to. But the way they acted didn’t add up when compared to what they were saying. I felt really lonely there, and stupid all the time. I felt like I was being a bad trans person.” […] “Online they were more willing to say things that were, for lack of a better word, stupid. They would say things that lacked any kind of logical sense. But in person, they would go into this kind of toxic femininity- this weaponization of weakness. And I think that’s because online they were often in these echochambers, but in person they had to rely on much more subtle manipulation.” - Vera

It seems at points that the environment created within this movement- and the social circles that composed it- was almost cult-like in nature and in need for control.

“It was very isolating. I didn’t see my friends for a while, I was kind of just living with them, cooking and cleaning for them, starving myself, and slowly growing crazy. I was just being consumed by this weird academia and theory that had no basis, because everything was online and Tumblr-based.” - Vera

When Bæddels Took Them: An interview and reflection on the Bæddelism movement

Perhaps most chilling, however, are the patterns in their attitudes toward sexual assault. One interviewer recounts being subject to sexual assault, and upon posting about their experience to a Facebook group, being met with hostility from Baeddels present in the group- who quickly used their social influence to have them banned from some of their only support systems at the time.

“I ended up with pretty much no one to talk to about the experience at a time when I was already really, really struggling, and it’s one of several factors that led to me dropping out. “The Baeddel who got me banned also messaged me directly at some point during all of this, and I tried to get her to understand the pain she was causing me. She basically laughed it off and said it was my fault. She seemed to find a lot of joy in how much it hurt me, and blocked me soon after.” - Anonymous

Another recounts sexual consent violations from a friend-turned-Baeddel:

“[My ex-friend] had previously been fetish-mining me for her mommy kink. I was freshly estranged from my own mum, and she stepped in to be like, “I’m your new mum now,” and would pester me to call her “mum” in Welsh- as at that point she was going by a Welsh name. I played along, but it transpired that she was basically using that to get off, and she had a thing for infantilising transmascs and being this mum/mom figure.” - Luke

And yet another interviewee discusses verbal sexual harassment during interactions with another Baeddel:

“I had one [Baeddel] directly tell me that I’m beneath her as a trans man, and that I should “Shut my smelly cooch up” and only use my voice to uplift trans women. I was a minor at the time. “She then sicced her followers on me, and they bombarded me with messages telling me I’d “never be a real man”, that I needed to “sit on the side and allow them to have the spotlight”, and even telling me to kill myself- because I was inherently toxic to them. I was 16 years old, pre everything, and I couldn’t even pass at the time. They didn’t seem to care that I was a minor, or a newly hatched egg.” - Anonymous

Brushes with Bæddels: Recalling the Bæddel movement

While Baeddel ideology itself does not explicitly condone or excuse sexual assault, it’s striking how common these stories are; especially considering how small in numbers actual Baeddels were.

It was, in fact, this exact problem that would eventually cause the movement to dissolve.

The Downfall of Baeddelism

Sometime between the group’s formation in 2013 and their downfall near the end of 2014, @autogynephile (also “Eve”), the defacto “ringleader” of the Baeddel movement, began what Baeddels referred to as a “transbian safehouse”.

This was apparently intended as a place for unhoused trans woman lesbians and trans women who, in general, had sworn off contact with men; the ultimate goal of the lesbian separatist ideology at the core of the Baeddel movement. It was thus also referred to as a “commune” by some, and as a “cult” by others.

One occupant of the “safehouse”- Elle- later posted to Tumblr that they had been raped by Eve during their stay, and detailed their experiences.

The Baeddels, rather than believing the victim and ousting the rapist from their movement, chose to close ranks around Eve.

Various reasons were given for this:

The victim must be lying

The victim- and anyone who believed them- was simply transmisogynistic.

Anyone who disagrees with the Baeddels is an Enemy Of The Movement, a “carceral thinker”, and a danger to trans women as a whole.

Trans women are incapable of sexually abusing anyone.

“Standing with Eve” was the ultimate sign of loyalty to the movement, and thus a mark of pride and honor.

It was okay to keep being a Baeddel no matter what, because Rape Accusations Should Be A Personal Matter.

(You can read more about Eve’s own denial of these events here and here.)

Years later, even people involved in the initial group have spoken out against the movement and actions of those involved:

(@lezzyharpy was one of the original Baeddels, and one of the first people to like the first “Baeddel” post by @unobject).

This was not the only instance of abuse by people associated with Baeddelism.

Elle posted their statement on August 4th, 2014; between that time and September of the same year, another user by the name of Quinn posted about her own experiences with abuse at the hands of @monetizeyourcat. Cat’s roommates in Seattle posted about their experiences with Cat shortly after Quinn did. Both parties alleged that Cat had been a manipulative and abusive roommate, friend, and partner.

Cat first attempted to argue the accusations, then later admitted that they were true and left the site. Her blog still contains her parting message. It has been pointed out that this is not necessarily an action taken in good faith and desire for growth.

The reception of her abuse allegations followed a similar pattern to Eve’s: people who ascribed to her ideology, Baeddels included, believed that Cat was not and could not have been abusive, as a trans woman. Others ignored warnings about her past and potential future actions, citing transmisogyny as the reason she must have been accused at all.

It has also been pointed out that Cat’s ideology (and, relatedly, Baeddel ideology) was extremely conducive to abuse- if not entirely constructed in order to allow abuse.

Why It Matters, and Why Baeddelism Never Really Fell

Baeddelism itself has seen multiple attempts at resurgences by various individuals, including documented experiences with self-proclaimed Baeddels as recently as 2018- well after the movement first “fell” in 2014.

Most proponents of “Baeddelism 2.0”, a revival of the original movement, argue that the abuse that occurred within the original movement was either completely fabricated by detractors (sound familiar?) or, at minimum, not actually inherent to the ideology.

And, of course, there are some original Baeddels still active on Tumblr today.

Baeddelism never actually went away.

“Baeddelism” was only one name for a set of beliefs that existed long before the specific term did, and hasn’t gone anywhere since the original Baeddel movement died down.

What the Baeddels did was put a name to the ideology @monetizeyourcat was cultivating before them, and what Cat did was popularize, centralize, and justify a way of thinking that had existed before she ever made her blog.

This ideology has since been referred to, loosely, as “TIRF-ism”: Trans-Inclusive Radical Feminism.

It is rare that anyone actually refers to themselves as a “TIRF”, and there is no real centralized TIRF movement; rather, a loose collection of radical feminist beliefs circulates various transgender spaces. The validity of these beliefs is generally taken for granted: of course (trans) women are The Most Oppressed People; of course (trans) women are Inherently and Unequivocally Victims In All Situations; of course (trans) men are Inherently Oppressors; of course (trans) men are Dangerous and Evil… and so on.

Like Radical Feminism, and subsequently Trans-Exlcusive Radical Feminism (TERF-ism), those ideas are fundamentally dangerous.

The defining tenants of radical feminism are that misogyny is the root of all oppression, and that rather than misogyny being an issue of power and control on a society-wide level, it is instead, or also, a matter of oppression and privilege on an individual level: men are always oppressors, and women are always victims.

These beliefs fundamentally exclude and erase the experiences of other marginalized people.

Namely, people of color and indigenous people, who’s experiences with and concepts of gender do not fall within the strict and rigid lines that white, western, colonialist people’s do.

Radical feminism is not a redeemable ideology. It cannot be reshaped into something good. It is fundamentally broken, and the movements born from it- lesbian separatism, political lesbianism, TERF-ism, TIRF-ism, and Baeddelism- are proof enough of that. They each promote only surface-level variations of what is fundamentally cult-like thinking: only the in-group can be victimized. Only the in-group is safe; the out-group is inherently and universally dangerous. Only the in-group understands you. All members of the in-group are, fundamentally, incapable of abuse.

We cannot allow these ideas to be perpetuated within or without the trans community.

Learn the Signs & Prevent the Harm

Here’s what we can do to prevent this from happening again:

Learn what Baeddel ideology and TIRFism look like, even detached from the name.

Learn what radical feminism looks like, even detached from the name. Even from people who claim to oppose radical feminism.

Act on dogwhistles. Call them what they are.

Do not allow people to downplay the harm all forms of Radical Feminism have caused. Remind each other that Radical Feminism is not a redeemable ideology, and seek out other branches of feminism instead.

Remember the harm that has been caused. Remember that it will be caused again if these things are allowed to go unchecked.

Listen to and uplift marginalized people. Allow them to speak to their own experiences, identify their own needs, and name their own oppression.

Remember who the real oppressors are, and do not pit marginalized people against each other. The people perpetuating and benefiting from transphobia are cis people- and more specifically, cis people in power.

Build solidarity with other marginalized people. One group of trans people cannot gain liberation without liberating all trans people, and one group of trans people cannot be targeted without the rest of us suffering as well.

Remember that there is no group or identity incapable of enacting abuse, violence, harassment, or other harm against another. Victimhood should not be determined based solely on an individual’s identity.

Remember that there are no acceptable targets for violence, cruelty, harassment, and abuse.

Red Flags to watch out for:

Using, or interacting with people who use, “Baeddel” as any form of self-description.

Downplaying the harm original Baeddels did: calling them “misled”, their actions “mistakes”, etc. without acknowledging the specific issues.

Obfuscating, ignoring, or erasing the abuse and rape allegations against members of the Baeddel movement.

Obfuscating, ignoring, or erasing the harm done to other transfemmes by Baeddels.

Dismissing, erasing, punishing/ostracizing, disavowing, or treating with suspicion transfeminine people who do not agree with Baeddel or radfem ideology. Insisting all or most transfemmes agree with Baeddel or radfem ideas.

Claiming TERFs only target, harm, or have ill will for trans women/transfemmes. Using “TWERF” or “TWEF” instead of “TERF”.

Claiming transmasculine people should not have any say in conversations about misogyny, transphobia, and/or TERFs.

Talking about “AFAB Privilege”, or otherwise implying that AFAB people share any qualities aside from being assigned female at birth.

Referring to trans people by AGAB, TME/TMA distinction, or even transfemme/transmasc frequently or exclusively; actively erasing or not allowing room for nonbinary and intersex experiences that do not fall within those binaries.

Implying men- cis or trans- would be better if they were made into women instead.

Implying attraction to men, or being a man, is somehow a “curse” or a “burden”, or otherwise unfortunate.

Implying a fear of men, including trauma-induced phobias, should never be healed from or sought treatment for. Implying men, cis or trans, cannot also experience trauma around men.

Treating trans men or transmasculine people as “acceptable targets” in any way; for harassment, for abuse, for misgendering, for inducing dysphoria, etc.

Implying transmasc dysphoria is “toxic masculinity”

Characterizing transmascs as hysterical, whiny, delusional, crazy, or otherwise using feminine stereotypes.

Implying it is femininity, specifically, that is targeted by the patriarchy; that feminine people are targeted more than masculine people, etc.

Using “listen to transfemmes” to silence other groups of trans people, and otherwise implying transfemmes are a monolith who happen to agree with you.

In general: espousing the ideas, fundamental or otherwise, that defined the Baeddel movement. (including TIRF and radical feminist ideology)

This list is not comprehensive, nor is any one thing on this list 100% certain to indicate that someone is a Baeddel- or if they are, that they are necessarily dangerous. It’s important to keep in mind how many people are groomed into this movement and abused within it; some of those who espouse Baeddel rhetoric may themselves be victimized by others.

But until we recognize these ideas for what they are and where they’ve come from, history can only repeat itself.

Educate Yourself and Others

It would take a long, long time and a lot more space to detail all of the damage done, the people hurt, and the dangers of continuing to allow these ideas to be perpetuated. Instead, I have compiled some resources and references.

I urge you to check these out, bookmark them for later, or whatever else works for you! (They’re also all much, much shorter reads than this has been.)

@baeddel-txt and @rejectedbaeddeldiscourse, two blogs dedicated to documenting various posts and beliefs held by original Baeddels.

Another blog’s tag for Baeddel history.

Baeddel.net, another archive of Baeddelism.

@AcesArosEnbies thread, and @gothmyths thread, on Baeddelism.

@quinndolyn’s recount of Baeddelism.

My own post on the origins of the Baeddel movement.

My own post including posts from Baeddels (and others) as recently as 2018.

An archive of assorted Baeddel posts.

[glamorousruins]

Art Dump #2

continuation of this post!

sighs as I place this bad boy down

So I had this big idea of something I wanted to do for my mutuals. So basically, my love language is gift-giving, right? I wanted to draw a headshot and a little sketch page of the yuusonas/yuus (or just any character of my mutuals) and gift it to them!! Either for being my mutual and putting up with my incoherent daily screaming or whatever.

Now here's what happened:

Life happened, not enough time happened, and at one point I started to really dislike how I drew the current headshots :')))). My style had begun to change when I looked back on this and it bugged me so much that I'm currently abandoning this batch and starting from square one again orz.

Regardless, the characters (in order from left to right) belong to @ai-0uch, @twstlibrary, and @twstedstoryshop !! So sorry that I didn't do your characters justice

But anyway, if you want separate headshots of them lmk! Trust me, I'll do them right one-day orz

ok this is an older sketch but one of my favorite ones regardless

This was inspired by a concept by my homies @smalltasteofhoney and @187-mg!!! Blowing a kiss to you both <33

This sketch is a result of their Idia x reader x Cater fic and everything that went on in the discord server lmaooo I'm sorry but you cannot convince me that Idia is not a discord mod and Cater is scamming him by being his discord kitten. It's literally canon, Cater told me

anyways, it's ugly and old but Imma do a redraw of this one!! Fun fact, this was the first time I've ever drawn Idia lmao

Okay so under the cut will be the NSFW drawings! This does not include sexual stuff smh, I mean yandere, gore, blood, bruises, cuts, etc !! So please beware of that

Okay, so I mentioned in a post that Ru, my version of Yuu, tends to get in fights!! More often than not, he gets his ass beat

While I have to develop the lore more, there is this specific Savanaclaw student who particularly likes giving Ru a hard time. I just wanted to draw the aftermath of said fight! You'll see that his clothes are a bit burnt at some parts and that's because it's hard to win a fight where magic is being used against you

Especially if you are magic-less:')))

anyways, I'm not too happy with this one but it is what it is

SLASHER TREY SLASHER TREY AJUQWHGEVW

Okay so on the discord server we were talking about this one Micheal Myers fanart and how for some reason it gave off Trey vibes???

So I present to you: Micheal Myers!Trey~~~ Ok. So it's terribly obvious idk how to draw blood. I kinda gave up on this one because I couldn't get it in a way I'd like but it's alright. There is another version of Trey smirking at us but I didn't finish it

If anyone wants to see it then I'll finish that one though

please don't ask where his glasses are- idk where they are ok

YAN RUGGIE AAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Ok so I was trying to draw Ace smiling for an ask but then it morphed into yandere Ruggie somehow??? I am actually still working on this one atm and this is currently my Latest drawing- I figured I'd share it anyways!!

I am in love with how it coming out so far... his eyes are my favorite part

he's just so... *swoons*

Anyways- that's all folks! Hope you enjoyed this little dump lmao

Hopefully, this can show that my art style is slowly getting better orz auaghhh. Though it's very obvious that I only like doing headshots/portrait-like drawings. And that's because I do!! I like making drawings as if they are a photo still in time that you're looking at. I like making the things I draw seem like a photo taken at random and my drawings are the result

This is also an excuse to not draw bodies but ignore that

[maxellminidisc]

I really do not understand where this whole idea of lesbians and bisexual women branching off into individual identities and communities being a bad thing stemmed from but god it frustrates me as a bi woman/bi person in general and as a person who loves many many of my awesome big sexy lesbians friends.

Bisexual women and lesbians may have congregated as the same group once but we're not anymore, and thats FINE and its actually a good thing! Because despite the overlap in experiences as women who are attracted to women (and yes I am including trans women when I say women), bisexual women and lesbians still have significant differences in experience and marginalization unique to their attraction that need to be addressed as separate communites because being aware of these differences provides a basis for us to tackle said issues in a way that is specifically conscious and adapted to our individual communities and forms of opression. God I hope that makes sense lol

Like as a WHOLE community we ALL have overlap in experiencing homophobia or bigotry directed as us for not conforming to gender and expression the way cis heteronormative society wants us to (i.e butch lesbians, effeminate gay men, trans/non binary people who do not pass/choose not to pass, etc) but we all as individual communities in one, face individual types of marginalization that we need to talk about so that those who don't experience it in the broader community and outside of it understand us.

For example cishet society hates lesbians for NOT being attracted to men and being attracted to women instead, it hates gay men for being attracted to men and not women, bisexuals are scrutinized for the fact that we have fluid attraction, trans folks but particularly trans women are hated for being women despite the assigned gender that society expects for them to conform to and at the same time intertwine that specific transphobia with misogyny which thusly creates transmisogyny (I'm sorry of I phrased this badly, I would absolutely appreciate correction!), etc. It is incredibly important that we acknowledge those specific and DIFFERENT experiences that we are targeted with because other wise it'd be like being blind to each others suffering.

And in the case of lesbian and bisexual women, trying to lump us in as one big group again erases the history of opression lesbians specifically face and fought for being women who do not show attraction to men and for being women who love women and take joy in sexual and romantic pleasure in loving women, and to do so proudly, despite societies insistence that women have to be with men. For bisexual women it creates and perpetuates the god awful attitude that bisexuality as an identity is simply not enough all in its own. It is yet another unnecessary ammendment made to bisexuality because y'all dont want to question the internalized issues you may have with it. Lesbianism excluding the attraction to men is not a threat to those of us who have attraction to women ALONG SIDE an attraction to men in ANY capacity, that is literally what bisexuality is for and that's ENOUGH!!! Some bisexuals are drawn more to women than men, but still acknowledge that part of them is still attracted to men and guess what, THAT'S STILL BISEXUALITY AND ITS FINE!!!! There is literally 0 need to impose an attraction to men on to lesbians like AT ALL and acting like we have to go back to being the same group does exactly that.

And to top it off, lesbianism does not exclude nonbinary folks and trans women just as bisexuality doesn't exclude nonbinary and trans people as a whole; trying to lump us in together with attraction to non binary people as an excuse is fucking stupid and gross. Because again, you're perpetuating the lesbophobic belief that all lesbians are trans exclusionist and the biphobic belief that bisexuals are transphobic and limited or binary in their attraction.

I of course haven't even touched on the specific difference of how bisexuality and lesbianism differ in terms of social impact such as ipv, addiction, depression, etc. There are lots of studies and statistics that show the numbers are different between us and even between us and the rest of the community! Being able to be separate respected communities allows us to see the impact of biphobia and lesbophobia as two specific forms of oppression and find the right kind if help and resources for us to heal as lesbian or bisexual women!!!

Do you like not literally see how trying to make us one big group with 0 acknowledgement of how significant our difference are is harmful?

[powermetalhag]

Hello i noticed you wrote a thesis related to MCR - a friend of mine is writing one too so if you have any resources you could share that'd be really helpful!!!

Sorry for the late response, I was away from home for the week and had to wait until I was back at my computer where the articles I used are favourited. I hope it's not too late, but if it is, maybe someone else will enjoy these links.

I didn't actually write a thesis about mcr (i think i phrased my tags badly in the post you must've seen). I wrote a sociology essay about the ways that emo is constructed through the body, which involved an analysis of an anti mcr rant from 2003 punknews which I got from a thesis someone else wrote. That thesis was incredibly interesting and likely has a lot which relates to mcr that your friend could use. I unfortunately only found it when I only had time to read a few chapters, but it was so good I'd love to finish it someday. It was "It's not a fashion statement, it's a death wish": subcultural power dynamics, niche-media knowledge construction, and the 'emo kid' folk-devil by M Daschuk. It can be read here:

https://harvest.usask.ca/handle/10388/etd-06032009-151109

I didn't read much that was specific to mcr, but I could share links to some articles which I found useful or interesting in case they help? It's been a while so I don't remember as much as I'd like about which ones were good out of my long list of bookmarks.

The book Nothing feels good: punk rock, teenagers, and emo by Andy Greenwald provides a ton of history and insightful points about emo, but it stops before the point that mcr took off as far as I'm aware (I don’t think they’re mentioned). So it's kind of about a different era, but a lot of points will still be relevant. I remember it having interesting things to say about what emo means to people and gendered narratives in emo songs, and emo's relation to youth (I think there were some interesting points in the jawbreaker chapter about the adolescent quality of emo and emo fan's aversion to letting their idols grow up.)

Ridiculous suffering on youtube: digital parodies of emo style by Anna Johanssen and Hans T Sternudd was really useful for illustrating the cultural backlash against emo and how that was often tied up with homophobia, enforcing gender norms, and a callousness toward mental illness, suicidal people, and the emotionality of teenagers. I don’t have a link, but dm me if it sounds useful and you’d like some screenshots of my pdf. There was another very good article about anti emo sentiments which was based around posts in an emo forum, but I can’t find it right now. Hmu if you’re interested and I can look harder.

Exploring dress and behaviour in emo subculture by Kaci Schmitt had some good points but I don’t remember it that well. But it had some interesting things to say about glam rock influence on emo and the key areas where emo differs from glam (I.e gender nonconformity in glam having an over-the top ‘carnivalesque’, escapist quality vs gender nonconformity in emo being a punk-like expression of authenticity). Could be worth just searching the keyword glam. Can be read here:

https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1466&context=etd

This one is probably not very relevant, but I'm including it just in case because I found it interesting, it’s:  Why alternative teenagers self-harm: exploring the link between non-suicidal self-injury, attempted suicide and adolescent identity. Their study finds that even when you adjust for socio-economic factors and victimisation, teenagers who identify as emo, punk or goth are still more likely to self harm or experience suicidal ideation than non alternative teenagers. Then they attempt to explain why this might be. I think one of their main guesses was that the personality profile typically drawn to these cultures might coincidentally also contain traits which leave them predisposed to that sort of thing. Another was that it was a sort of social contagion. Can be read here:

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1471-244X-14-137

Sorry for making this so long and not having anything more relevant. Hope it can help a little.

[turianhousewife]

I realise I'm part of this conversation since I made the post on the kaidan overhaul mod.

I didn't do it to disparage the efforts of modders, I LOVE modders and I think what people can do with games was amazing.

My critique was mainly that for me, as a poc with naturally textured hair, the overhaul mod specifically felt strange. Primarily because he was never a character who had straight hair in canon. He's one of the only ME characters who has canonically textured hair. So to see an enhancement mod that specifically goes out of its way to remove that unique feature from him struck me as strange, and added to a large pile of generalised micro-aggressions that people with textured hair face.

I love Kaidan, always have done, always will do. He's the character that feels like home, a proper source of grouding amongst the ME cast. I physically cringe when fanfics (particularly the shakarian ones) cast him as a lovesick puppy or the jealous type. Hell Kaidan has even inspired some of my own characters, I think he's a great personality to have around. And of course I've drawn him too. So seeing folks removing something that's a part of him that I value for the sake of enhancement did strike me as upsetting, and I made a post according to those feelings. I'm sorry if I created/added to a negative chorus, but I also think it important to have critical fandom discourse about these things. Hopefully we can strike a balance of being respectful and productive about it.

I'm so tired of seeing all those posts complaining about Kaidan mods... we get it you hate primitives Kaidan and you hate mods that give him "straight hair" (even though there's only two of them and they mimic the vanilla hair cap shape).

crazy idea, but maybe make your own mods instead of complaining about what's already there?

[quillquiver]

Feel free not to answer I just wanted to say I think the whole approach to "season 16" is very much so an age thing. I PROMISE that's not me calling you old lol I just mean a lot of people who are super into it are in their late teens/early 20s and a lot of the people who are super not into it are late twenties/thirties/whatever. I say this as someone in their early twenties having a blast. I think it might have something to do with how fandom/the ways fans interact with the works is evolving, like me and a bunch of us were on spn tumblr as 13/14/15-year-olds and grew up with that old tumblr energy that invited this sort of mania, whereas people who were older at the time or had been in other fandom spaces before didn't really participate in that. I think a lot of us are very self aware and "tinhat" because it's legitimately fun for us. I'm not criticizing you at all because I totally get what you're feeling, your posts on it just made me think a lot about this.

No, this is great! I am definitely from a different generation of fans - and I’ve noticed a divide in age as well. I guess I’m just curious how people have the energy? Or is it that things aren’t taken so personally?

For context: when I started in fandom, it was something that had an element of seriousness and responsibility because it had to be - it wasn’t something talked about, and you didn’t flaunt yourself because you didn’t want to drawn attention to yourself or the community for legitimate fear of getting your shit taken down and being slapped with a lawsuit. I started at the very, very end of that, and because it was hard to find, and because there was community responsibility involved, there was a code of conduct that had to be learned and adhered to. So like, being a fan is serious to me, and it’s an important part of my identity.

I have been in SPN fandom for the better part of a decade, and on tumblr for longer than that. So I know that energy! It’s great! I just feel that it’s shifted from motivating fanworks to encouraging this weird grief spiral, where everyone constantly seems to be angry and upset, and then couch those emotions in social justice in order to legitimize them - when, to my mind, feeling them should be legitimizing enough! Fucking revel in your emotions, this is a space built to process them, specifically. We made a space for ourselves to do that.

I guess I feel like a lot of engagement in fandom just feels very high stakes now, when it used to be this really nice, low-stakes environment way more conducive to relaxation. Sure, there would be serious drama that would kick up every now and then, but it was never sustained like this. I saw posts of people who seemed to be legitimately upset there was no new drama from the KoC podcast - and I’m confused, because before 15x18, drama was something we all generally agreed to try and avoid. Or at least, we knew exactly who was wont to create it and steered clear if that wasn’t our thing.

But this is everywhere. I’m not kidding; I have probably unfollowed more people than I ever have because I’m trying to get my dash somewhere back to normal and nothing is working. Almost every other post across my dash involves some kind of academic theory or willingly buys into network conspiracy--Jensen’s silence is sexy, but given the atmosphere in the fandom right now, is anyone actually surprised he or Misha haven’t spoken up? No one knows what their NDAs look like, and if it were me, I’d keep my trap shut out of sheer self-preservation. 

And like, I love tinhatting. I have been cockles a cockles tinhatter for a long-ass time and I enjoy the hell out of it. But - and I’m definitely gonna sound old here - I feel like there’s an element of respect, not only for the cast, but honestly, mostly for the community at large, that seems to have been obliterated in the SPN renaissance. I think that because lots of young folks grew up at a time where fandom was generally widely accepted, and now are being catered to, and they have forgotten that this is an actual community, and that what one person does reflects on all of us. Tagging the cast in shippy posts? A big no-no. Because I can tell you right now that the person you’re tagging might see your username and think of you as an individual, but you are part of a community that has been Perceived for a long-time, and your behaviour reflects on alllllll of us. 

And last thing, I swear, but like. The posts. The posts that just say the same thing in different words: from different blogs, from the same blogs, all with this air of manic self-importance that ratchets my anxiety up to 11.... what is with that??? These things rack up hundreds of notes and I am mystified because not only have we covered this years ago, we covered this last week and the post is dated 30mins ago. There’s this obsession with being right and finding the truth and being smart and just rehashing that over and over and it’s exhausting to me. 

And I know I am currently coming off as an old fart who’s complaining about young people and screaming get off my lawn but I am genuinely curious: Is it that I just take things very personally? Is it that everything rolls off you loyal s16 followers? How the hell do you have the energy for this? Don’t you want to process your grief? Are you grieving? How do you interact with works? Like, how, from your perspective, is that changing? 

These are legitimate questions, and this was very long, so if you’re reading this I’m sorry. 

[marshmallowprotection]

Sorry to bring this topic back now, but I'm honestly glad to see you talking about the passport tequila(?) thing. I haven't read your passport post yet because I wanna avoid spoilers for the passport just in case I manage to get it one day (but it'll take a while till that happens, seeing Cheritz still isn't shipping to Finland and I still haven't got the bodypillow I ordered from them in May), but I've seen two pictures of some of its contents already. The second one a photoset of him and MC (which btw was seriously adorable and made me wanna get the passport immediately, man he's so cute) and the first one I saw was the doodle of Saeran being passed out.

My friend messaged me about it, also pretty devastated and disappointed that the artist had drawn something like that in the passport, completely forgetting his past and trauma with alcohol. Honestly, because it was the first ever thing I heard about the passport's contents and the first doodle I saw, I was really disappointed and felt hesitant about ever getting it. I went on a whole rant about it back then and then later started feeling like I overreacted a bit...

But not gonna lie, it kinda upset me too because it just seemed so OOC for him to do? You pretty much already put how I feel about it into words really well. I just don't think he'd drink alcohol, seeing that's pretty much where his trauma came from, and also when I think about the friends and mutuals I have who've had alcoholic parents and swore to never drink themselves thanks to that, and how Saeyoung doesn't wanna drink because of his mum and they share that trauma…

Then after talking about it with a few friends I began to think that hey, maybe he wanted to try it out once and already after ONE sip went "too bitter DX" and didn't want more. He likes sweet stuff anyway, even if he didn't have all the trauma, I doubt his sweet tooth would like the taste of alcohol. The first impression my friend and I got was that he was DRUNK, but nah, now he just looks like he's suffering because it was too bitter lol

But then I saw someone here mention that it might not even be an alcoholic drink (or that he passed out from the heat) and hey, I'm just gonna go ahead and headcanon that now, it was just way too bitter for him

In the end I do think that the artist who worked on that passport wasn't entirely aware of his past, which is a shame. Or just didn't think about it. I think someone told them to "make some cute and funny doodles of him" and they thought "hey drunk Saeran lol that could be funny and cute" without thinking about it more, and that's how the doodle became a thing

You’re still waiting for that? Jesus, I hope that the mail service is able to open up soon for your country and that it’s okay for them to ship things around. It’s been a while now, I would’ve thought that they might have been able to work around to get it to you! Well, precautions are precautions, and those are important when the world is like this but huh. Odd that it’s not working around yet. 

It really unsettled me when I saw it. I thought, “Okay, maybe it’s not actually just straight-up tequila or booze, I can rationalize this away as something else cause it’s really not okay to me.” I know someone said in the post that it’s on the Wiki that Saeran’s not a big fan of soda because it gives him headaches, and I know that feeling, so if one wants to think it’s soda, they can. It’s easy to say, well, it’d be possible that it’s the dry heat of the country and he’s flopped over from that after finally getting something chilled. 

It’s easier for me to rationalize it in that manner instead of saying that it’s alcohol even though it’s clearly intended to be seen as that. I’ve unfortunately got similar trauma and I see myself in the Choi boys. Do you know how rare it can be to find characters that are adults that don’t drink or aren’t invested in drinking culture as a whole? I’m fine with people enjoying their vices and doing things in moderation but—

I just cannot relate to it. I’m nearly 24 and I cannot stand even the smell of that stuff. It’s fine if you enjoy your wine or liquor or whatever, it just feels in such poor taste to draw out someone drinking that has made it very clear that they aren’t comfortable with drinking, and they shouldn’t have to explain out their trauma to have their feelings justified. The whole, “Just one sip, it won’t really hurt you,” is so toxic.

Can’t tell you how many times someone has told me that when I’ve made it very clear that I’m uncomfortable with that and I would rather chug dish soap than be subjected to booze. 

I’m proud of Saeran for how far he’s come in his AE. I sincerely am, emotionally he’s doing so much better and he’s working on himself, but I really don’t see him or his brother ever trying alcohol. There could be a point where maybe they just say, “What the hell did she even see in this? What do people even see in this stuff?” and they try one singular sip, and go: “Yeah, no, this isn’t the thing for me, no thanks.” 

I’m cool with that if that is what they choose to do. It’s their body, their trauma, and their choice. 

Saeyoung and Saeran have very clear trauma from Alcoholism. It’s made very clear from the both of them that they don’t drink. Seven notes that he’s about as straight-laced as they come when it means alcohol or smoking. Unknown can’t really be counted as a smoker, he literally used that as an excuse during the SE to contact Mint Eye. So, I’ve never read him as a smoker, either. It was a good excuse. Neither of them gets involved with addictive vices that are legal for you to use. 

I struggle with fanon content sometimes because I’ll find stories or imagines where the writer has shown Saeyoung or Saeran drinking, and I just have to nope out of that setting. It’s not cute or cheeky. I personally don’t answer any requests that involve the boys drinking because I’ve made my stance very clear on the subject and how I feel about depicting characters that do not want to drink and have made it known that they do not want to drink as drinking. The rest of the RFA? Sure, some of them drink occasionally, fairly in moderation, which is alright. 

The Passport itself is really cute, no spoilers, but that’s the only thing within its contents that made me uncomfortable. The rest of it was definitely worth what I paid for and it made me smile if that’s any comfort to you. It’s just that one little doodle that just... yeah, I think I would go with your theory on this one, and that being that the artist might not have known specifically about the brothers or what they’ve dealt with in their lives, and just went with a cute idea they had and it’s not really anything huge. 

It’s fine to drink and all, but it’s equally important to respect when someone says that they don’t want to do it. That is a personal choice, and I just wish more folks would consider Saeran and Saeyoung’s feelings on the matter since it’s been stated in the canon plenty, specifically by Saeyoung during his Routes events in the game, and you can infer from Saeran fairly easily given what he was subjected to in his life. 

TLDR; It’s fine to drink when you want to do it, and there’s nothing wrong with it in moderation; but, it’s important to respect that not everyone wants to drink or get involved with that sort of stuff. 

[christian-witchy-business]

So I'm a 16 year old looking into being a Christian witch, because I'm feeling drawn to that path, and I feel like God wants me down this path as well. I've told my mom, and she accepts me, so now my next path to take is finding something right for me. So, that being said, maybe have any advice for a newbie? Thanks 😊

Hello! Congratulations on discerning a new path for yourself and welcome! I’m so glad your family is accepting of your desire to pursue a non traditional form of Christianity.

I have three major pieces of advice.

First, you do not need to be a specific “archetype” of witch, especially not at first. You don’t have to come into this saying “I’m a Green Witch” or “Im a Hedge Witch.” You can take time to explore what paths interest you and research those further. Let yourself get interested in various different types of magic and don’t bind yourself to one idea. If you like cooking, look into food magic. If you think you may like divination, start learning tarot. Think spirit work is cool? Do some research and learn how to protect yourself before you start inviting things into your home, but go for it. Mix and match your interests and don’t let anyone tell you that you have to pick just one.

Second, remember to center your faith. There are some great Christian witch blogs here and some Christian blogs that, while not inherently witchy, are very open to mysticism and folk magic. Off the top of my head I can think of @adhdcatholicwitch @hymnsofheresy @mysticismmess in particular. Go hunting through tags to find others. Remember that God is central to our faith, not magic. Yes, magic does cool stuff, but God is the river that all that power comes through. We can’t do anything without God and, as Christians, our devotion to God needs to come first. Pray. Do devotionals. Light candles and burn incense and talk with God. Chat with Saints if that’s your thing. Read the Bible and work to understand it beyond what you were taught in Sunday School and mass. @queerlychristian has some amazing sermons and material on interpreting the Bible beyond a literal guidebook or rulebook.

People (both witches and regular Christians alike) will try to tell you that this isn’t an acceptable path and that Christians can’t dabble in magic. Finding a healthy and strong relationship with God will help you persist in your path despite the opinions of others.

Finally, be careful who you learn from and what you practice. Magic is cool, there’s so many different things to explore and rituals to learn! But remember that not every ritual is from an open religion or culture. Learn what terms and actions are closed to you. Stay away from people who claim that there’s no such thing as a closed practice. Most indigenous magic systems (Native American religions, African religions, Indigenous Australian, etc.) are closed and many others require initiation and training. Also, Kabbalah is a Jewish practice and anyone who tries to tell you it’s fine for a Christian because “it’s the same God” is probably antisemitic. Check out @will-o-the-witch for more info on Jewish witchcraft and how to be a good ally to Jewish people (who aren’t just Christian Lite™️). Note that staying away from them doesn’t and shouldn’t mean that you are the equivalent of a 4 year old putting their fingers in their ears and going “la la la not lisrening.” It means not practicing closed traditions. Learn about them, know what Voodoo actually entails. Ask questions about what the evolution of root work in America was. Know which Native American groups practice what types of religions. Ignorance is not the same as respect.

Also, if you plan to follow Norse pagan blogs, make sure you do a quick scroll through the blog before following. Most are amazing people with great resources but unfortunately white supremacists have decided that Odin and Thor loooove and support white supremacy (spoiler: they don’t) and have hijacked the religion. 99% of Norse blogs are great, just be on the lookout for Nazi bs. Also, be wary of any witches that deny the presence of male witches or say anything about how witchiness is derived from womanhood. This is usually a calling card for transphobic behavior. There are a lot of TERFs in the witch community.

This got long and I’m sorry. If you have more specific questions, feel free to DM me and we can chat more. These are my major tips when starting witchcraft on tumblr.

Tl;dr: 1) explore what you love, 2) remember to be Christian first, witch second, and 3) be aware that there are racists, transphobes, sexists, and assholes in the witch community and be somewhat on the lookout for them.