#irl experience and culture AND those stereotypes lmao

[pan-de-queer]

was thinking of this post (i also have a screenshot of the post at the end) and now i can't stop thinking of a uni!supercorp au set in the fucking philippines like

au is set in 2016. this is very vital to the story

lena's an international student to dlsu manila for a term (i was thinking business rich kid [so dlsu] and not lawyer/politician rich kid [admu]) bc when lillian suggested she join an international exchange program lena decided to choose the country the farthest away from lillian's influence (luthor corp has no hold in most of SEA [minus singapore obvs] and lena chose the philippines mostly because of the slightly less difficult language barrier) and majors in both science and business courses

kara got into up diliman through blood, sweat, and tears. her parents were researchers during the marcos era who were killed during martial law. kara was adopted by the danvers as jeremiah was the zor-els' co-worker and eliza was a traveling doctor. the danvers took kara and alex back to the states (usa) but kara wanted to figure out how and why her parents died and the ph is a great place to get a journalism degree so she studied up on not only the language but ph culture, history, and news as well before transferring to the ph the summer before her third year of high school. alex got a job as a medical consultant in the ph soon after and the two live together in qc (quezon city)

kara and lena meet when lena accidentally finds herself in the middle of a protest march passing through taft (kara started in up manila, not diliman hahaha)

she has no fucking idea what it's about

kara assumes lena's part of the protest and asks if she'd like to borrow one of her signs but then lena's like "what the fuck is happening"

"we're protesting marcos's burial in, uh, the national cemetery for heroes," kara explains and lena still looks so lost and kara feels both bad for the woman and awestruck that someone so beautiful exists. "marcos, like, ferdinand marcos? the country's ex-president that declared martial law, plundered the country in horrible debt, and then was banned from returning?"

lena knows some of those words, she thinks. she'd studied up on philippine history a little bit before she arrived but the textbook she'd read felt incredibly racist if not colonialist, but she's sure she read about a president declaring martial law before, so she nods as if she gets it

the protest keeps marching forward and lena finds that she can't really escape the crowd unless she wants to get crushed, so she sticks closest to kara who's both a friendly (gorgeous) face and also has the closest accent to hers

kara shares with lena more details about why they're marching and helps translate some of the more unfamiliar words of their chants

almost twenty minutes after lena accidentally joined the march, practically drenched in sweat but too moon eyed towards the blonde to care, lena finally asks where they're marching to

"to the cemetery in taguig."

taguig. taguig city. more than two hours away on foot

"oh."

when kara sees lena's face fall, she gently takes lena's wrist and manages to maneuver them to the side of the protest, away from the wave of people. kara asks what's wrong and lena admits that she's already super fucking tired and would never be able to finish the march

kara understands and decides to accompany lena while they wait for a grab ride to arrive. as lena orders her ride, kara texts her activist and journalism friends to let them know that she won't be at the final rally anymore

while they wait, they learn more about each other and find themselves even more smitten than when they first met (sometime during this part, kara also gives lena one of her extra shirts [because she's a seasoned commuting pro and knows to never leave home without an extra shirt and small towel] so lena's just looking super comfy and cute in kara's shirt)

when lena's ride arrives, kara double checks the grab because she's That Kind of person before helping her in

"thanks for waiting with me. it was nice meeting you," lena says and kara smiles, wide and toothy.

"it was nice meeting you, too. ingat!" and kara closes the card door before she remembers to even ask for lena’s number

still, the lack of contact details doesn't deter her. she knows enough about lena that hopefully dropping by dlsu more often would mean being able to see her again

and she does

anyways if this was a short fic I'd def end it around here with kara and lena getting that date but if it were a long fic then i'd 100% make kara investigate and study the ejks (extra judicial killings) during duterte's time and lena learning and falling in love with the ph the way kara has which includes lena learning how to commute (which someday, when she leads l-corp, means that she helps build and fund a better fucking public transport system)

this was suuuuppppeeer fun to even just think about and I can't promise I'll write it but just this idea has me pumped! hope the 3 pinoys who see this enjoy 💕

*edit: here's parts 1.5, 2, 3, and 4

[phregnancy]

Sometimes I read bottom Dan fic from a few years ago and I'm like "who are these people?" lol. It's like people totally disregarded Phil's personality in order for him to fit the stereotypical mold they'd cast him in. It was the same for Dan tbh. Lbr the only reason why people thought Dan was the bottom is bc he's younger and more outwardly feminine than Phil. The idea that bottom= submissive and top= dominate is flawed anyway, but also...Dan is not submissive. He's quite bossy and controlling. In the past, I'd even say he could be domineering. I don't see their dynamic as even being Dom/sub tbh. It's more of a playful power struggle. Except Dan fights by asserting dominance and Phil fights by being cute and whining until Dan gives in or being an absolute menace and annoying Dan into submission lmao

rewriting this for the third time because my app keeps refreshing </3 but i agree with alllll of this. putting it under a cut because i got way off course and went on a tangent lol

someone recently said that they can tell who of us have been actively engaged in diverse irl queer communities (clubs, bars, sports leagues, activism groups, etc) vs who of us haven’t and i’ve been thinking about that a lot in regards to this. obviously nothing wrong with not engaging with your irl queer communities, some people don’t have access or don’t feel comfortable or simply don’t want to and all of that is fine - but you do have to work harder to unlearn a lot of heteronormative concepts like these and you have to familiarize yourself with queer culture and history (outside of social media). people’s outward presentations of masculinity and femininity have nothing to do with their sexual preferences, and dan has shared that exact sentiment in so many words (wondering if people think he’s a bottom because he’s slightly more feminine, and then discouraging that narrative as a whole). i also think there was a lot of hyperbolizing with their masculine and feminine presentations, because for a long time dan really was not that feminine and phil really was not that masculine. they were both emo nerd boys who played video games and drank too much soda. even now with personas like sister daniel, that really is not the height of femininity in queer culture or drag culture.

i think there’s also something to be said about people’s lack of familiarity with queer culture showing in people’s thoughts on them being in an open relationship and also 2009 bottom dan.

i don’t particularly care about the open relationship discourse one way or another, but a lot of mlm relationships are open. there are studies and statistics on this, gay men are the most comfortable and open to open relationships. if they hooked up with people when dan was touring or even just someone every now and then, it wouldn’t be as shocking as some people make it out to be. i also think there’s a problem with people conflating open relationships with polyamory, and those two things are often very different. people in open relationships tend to be committed to each other, but will sometimes want to have noncommittal sex with other people. polyamory is having multiple committed relationships (romantic or sexual). clingy phil and possessive dan having noncommittal sex with other people wouldn’t change that they’re still clingy x possessive. and if you’re actively engaged in irl queer communities vs online echo chambers you’ll learn this.

i’m getting way off course here lol but then in regards to people thinking 2009 dan was bottoming as a default, that’s been a pet peeve of mine since forever because it shows a lack of familiarity with mlm relationships. it’s extremely unlikely that dan’s first gay sexual experiences were being on the receiving end of anal sex, that takes time to get used to (with yourself and with a partner) and often isn’t most men’s first gay sexual position. they also weren’t together long enough until phil got his first apartment to have dan be familiar enough with anal to take phil’s dick every time he visited. i know everyone thinks little twink dan taking phil’s big dick is so hot, but big dicks can be painful and are something you work yourselves towards. and y’know, who knows what actually went on in that bedroom so much cherry everywhere, but i do think we should dispel some of these beliefs that again are playing into heteronormativity (little feminine dan taking big masculine emo phil)

dan has always been bossy and controlling and he was quite confident with the people he was comfortable around (phil + other youtubers + his audience) and then grew to be a confident person in general. i see them as a real brat x brat relationship with them being bratty in different ways (bossy/teasing vs whiney/pushing buttons).

here’s my last thing (thanks for reading this novel if you made it this far) - there is a difference between knowing all of this, and still just preferring bottom sub dan x top dom phil because you think it’s hot, vs believing there’s no other dynamics that could exist because of heteronormative stereotypes that you are actively playing into. like what you like and have fun! but please work on educating yourself and unlearning heteronormativity. sorry for the spiel!

[humanitys-strongest-bamf]

heblooooo 💖 gimme 1 and 8 woah for the ask game pleeeease

hi dream!! sorry for late response, i fell asleep sdklfjlsdjkf

cw for some racism mentions because i talked about my struggles with being abc growing up

send me some asks (✿◡‿◡)

1. what are 3 things you'd say shaped you into who you are?

hmmm, guess it's time to drop some kat lore LMAO tldr; my struggles with my mental health, fanfiction, and being a third-culture kid ➼ i struggled with my mental health a LOT throughout adolescence and then esp when i headed off to college. bullshit happened that i don't wanna trauma dump about, but i sought refuge through finding communities that also struggled with chronic mental health conditions. started volunteering with them and kinda realized that this is the field i wanna go into! so it provides me with a lot of motivation that i was really struggling to find during that time, which kinda pulled me out of a depressive slump (which is also why i'm worried that i'm not motivated for school/work right now because i'm terrified of falling back into That Place™)

➼ 100% fanfiction and participating in fandoms. i've done it since i was like 9, and officially began writing/rp-ing when i was 12 (coincidentally when the mental health issues started LMAO). to this day (obvs), it's my comfort thing. even when irl is hard, i can at least seek some refuge in the fictional world. ➼ prob being a third culture kid? i always struggled as a kid with feeling like i'm not "chinese enough" to fit into asian communities, but also didn't fit into "american" communities because i'm not white lmao. so like in adolescence, i tried to embrace asian stereotypes to fit in. that didn't go well. in young adulthood, i tried to vehemently deny any part of my heritage and insist that i was too "white-washed" in an attempt to fit in through that. that didn't go well either. now i'm able to embrace both! like the fact that yes i am abc, i (and other third culture kids) have experiences that are different from people that grew up in china and are also different from americans that have been here for generations that do not have any sort of obvious non-american/european heritage.

8. any reacquiring dreams?

i'm dumb and it took a minute to figure out what this was asking ksdjflksdf i'm assuming it's asking if there's something i wanna do that i'd like to do again but missed the opportunity the first time?? probably undergrad tbh. like if i never got involved with Certain People™, then things would have been so much better. i never really got to enjoy the romanticized college experience that everyone seems to talk about and i do miss it. or rather, i'd love to have those years of freedom + no real responsibility that my friends commonly talk about. i probably still would've realized that i'm not a partier regardless, but being out late and just generally having a good time and being able to let loose on the weekends would have been something i would have liked to experience.

[fiovske]

I hate the framing of multishipping as a solution to fandom problems when more often than not the problems are racism, homophobia, misogyny etc and not people's shipping preferences. Shipping isn't activism and different modes of fandom behavior aren't a solution to bigoted behavior. And when there isn't a bigotry problem, not multishipping is just a preference with no moral ramifications so why are people so pressed about randos online expressing disappointment?

yep lmao its like sure I have the privilege to turn a blind eye towards the racism, homophobia, misogyny in a fandom idk what yall are pressed about? like??? SW has a HUGE impact on popular culture and when the harm done onto its IRL poc cast and crew is ignored and dismissed by the studio itself, it validates those who spew hate towards these women/poc in the first place! the studio’s silence is their compliance and the fact that they WILL cater to these fans’ preferences both on/off screen --like letting reylo be canon and completely erasing Finn’s arc TFA set him up to be the co-lead, if not the romance arc for Rey as well!!! and Rey was supposed to be the lead!!! and Poe as The Pilot, they were supposed to be THE trio!! and if they chose to let Rey remain single w/o a romantic lead and have Poe and Finn be together romantically instead-- what a story for the gays we would’ve had!! there was the potential for from the beginning!! instead they made Finn a BARELY supporting character as time went on, and made Poe, played by a man of Guatemalan descent, ultimately be a drug smuggler... it perpetuates irl racist stereotypes into the story. 

not to mention the amount of unwarranted unjustified HATE and death threats kelly marrie tran and john boyega got bc of being poc and a part of the cast AT ALL. disney was silent thru all of this. instead they gave Kyle Ron more screentime and an arc so inconsistent and atrocious idk how they call it a redemption lmfaooo the JOKE. they sidelined rey, they sidelined poe, they sidelined finn-- everyone to make space for The Tantrum Throwing White Boy. infuriating. they validated the fans who mostly MADE the racist comments by making reylo canon. bc most of them WERE white women who shipped reylo, this is just the truth. ofc poc fans are mad! as they should be!!)

but coming back to the task at hand, yes. multishipping is not a ‘solution’. if thats ur preference good on you, dude. but if other people prefer something else, its not your place to tell them that they arent allowed to enjoy it, esp if them enjoying it is not causing any harm at all. and them expressing disappointment and sadness is obviously not your place to gloat. the kind of holier-than-thou attitude some multishippers have, lmao. sit down. chill out. if minorities being mad about representation makes you upset maybe you should assess that on why it affects YOU instead of thinking of urself better than them somehow for having the privilege of not being affected negatively as they did. if you’re tired of the ‘drama’ as you so call it... take time off and block people. curate your own internet experience. its that easy.

[canallynwrite]

I bring asks: 2, 4, 7, 12, 13, 17, 26, 29, 30

thank you!

2 - HOW DID YOU DISCOVER YOUR SEXUALITY? TELL YOUR STORY.

for context: i’m biromantic asexual!

i was one of those kids who didn’t even know that it was actually possible to like girls as well as guys, so i only really discovered the lgbt+ community after i entered middle school and got access to the internet. the first time i actually thought about being anything other than straight was when my friend came out to me as bisexual. now, my first (or second, whatever) thought was: “does she like me?”

and nobody wants to be the person who thinks their not-straight friend of the same gender is into them just bc said not-straight friend came out to them, so after doing some research i did some self-reflection and realized my actual feelings were more akin to something like: “i hope she likes me.”

for the rest of the year i tried to convince myself that she was the exception to my straightness and was definitely not crushing hard on her. then at the end of the year i started dating someone who, after we dated for a week or so, came out as a trans dude, and i sort of just accepted my bisexuality. the last bit probably doesn’t make sense, but he was in the middle of figuring out his gender, so for a while he identified as a gal and that was when i first really acknowledged that yes, i am indeed very not straight. him coming out as trans just hammered my bi-ness. looking back on it, there were many signs that i was not straight at all. i just had zero language for my feelings!

my asexuality was just always there, tbh. i found out about asexuality after i accepted my bi-ness so as soon as i learned what it meant i just went ‘yah, that’s me. i’m ace.’

4 - WHO WAS THE FIRST PERSON YOU TOLD? HOW DID THEY REACT?

uhhh, apart from the dude i was dating, probably the aforementioned friend who’d come out to me as bi. she was really happy for me and we celebrated my first coming out experience together!

7 - WHAT IS ONE QUESTION YOU HATE BEING ASKED ABOUT YOUR SEXUALITY?

i try not to get mad at ppl asking questions, bc i know that it is Quite Possible to not know much about sexuality (for the longest time i didn’t know ANYTHING) but biphobic and acephobic questions in general really get my goat. yes, asexuality is a thing that exists; no, i’m not going to cheat on my partner just bc i’m bi.

12 - WHAT’S THE STUPIDEST THING YOU’VE HEARD SAID ABOUT THE LGBT+ COMMUNITY?

tbh, any time a straight person starts talking about the lgbt+ community like they know everything about it and are Great Allies i have to roll my eyes. jordan, you’re straight as uncooked spaghetti and cisgender, please stop pretending your opinions have any authority here just bc you read a few articles on gender/sexual fluidity and have a gay friend or two. 

but, on a more well-known note, the stupidest thing i’ve heard would definitely have to be anything that those assholes who claim that the lgbt+ community includes pedophiles have ever said. that idea is both stupid and enraging.

13 - WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE THING ABOUT THE LGBT+ COMMUNITY AS A WHOLE?

i’ve seen lgbt+ people say a lot of stupid shit, even against other sexualities (especially against asexuality), but as a whole the lgbt+ community is extremely accepting and seems to have so many little niche corners for every possible interest or hobby. like, u want lgbt+ writers??? u got it, pal. a group lgbt+ athletes??? u may have to look a little harder than for the lgbt+ writers but damn, they’re there! blogs about lgbt+ animals in nature??? yes, that does exist!

it’s such a large community, filled with so many different types of people, which is what i love about it!

17 - HAVE YOU BEEN IN A RELATIONSHIP? IF SO, HOW DID YOU MEET?

i’ve been in two! and am currently in,,,, something? it’s a little complicated. we both know we like each other (and i wish we were dating!) but we haven’t “””officially””” decided to go out. 

the other two were a) some dude i broke up with after two days lmao; we won’t talk about him, and b) the dude i talked about earlier! we met on a roleplaying forum for ppl in our area when we were younger and really hit it off. i asked him out two or three months after we met, and we were together for about six months before going off ‘n on. we “””officially””” broke up after a year or so bc he needed some time to himself for his mental health.

26 - WHAT IDENTITY ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE YOUR YOUNGER SELF?

well, for pre-middle-school me i’d sit her down and give her an hour long lecture on the lgbt+ community and recommend her some books w/ lgbt+ characters. she doesn’t know that being bi is possible so i’d also pull up an irl bi person as an example. for questioning!me, i think i’d just advise her not too push to hard against the idea of being bi. if you continue to like girls (and you will) then that’s okay and not something to tear yourself up about.

29 - WHAT IS SOMETHING YOU WISH PEOPLE KNEW ABOUT BEING LGBT+?

a) we are, in fact, a very wide spectrum of individuals, and stereotyping irl people does not help anything. being interested in women does not make me super butch; it makes me, me.

b) being lgbt+ is most certainly not all peaches and if you act like it is then you are Very Wrong Indeed, my friend. tbh, i don’t have much for this point besides complaining about that one straight person who called themselves an ally but still tried to police who i came out to and implied that if i wasn’t okay with having my sexuality shouted out to the world in the middle of a crowded cafeteria then i must be repressing myself. so, yeah, don’t be like that person, kids.

30 - WHY ARE YOU PROUD TO BE LGBT+?

how persistent lgbt+ people - of the past and present - are. throughout every age and every culture, no matter if lgbt+ ppl are oppressed or accepted, you will find lgbt+ people. some are harder to find, because of hate towards people like them, but look hard enough and you will find them. even when lgbt+ people were persecuted, they were there. even in places where they could still be put to death today, they’re there, and they’re fighting.

the pink triangle was what nazis marked gay men with in concentration camps, but lgbt+ people, most notably the AIDS movement, have reclaimed it, taken it back and turned it into a positive symbol for lgbt+ people.

and that is why i’m proud to be lgbt+. to stand with these people is an absolute honor.

[sunstriderling]

celticwarriormoon replied to your post:hey lmao im too much of a smallpeen to come off...

You know, as much as I love McHanzo, I can’t help but agree with all your points. I’m in the same boat when it comes to depictions of characters of a certain race in my fics, except it’s worse for me because I have next to zero experience with both Japanese AND American people and customs. I have never been to either country, and unfortunately do not know many people from them irl either. Makes it hard when I’m writing/drawing to get my portrayal of McHanzo exactly right But I’ve always disagreed with those who believe that you should only like/draw/write about/ship characters of a certain race if you are of that race. I understand the need for positive representation and debunking of stereotypes. But you’re not automatically entitled to “own” those characters just because they’re the same nationality as you. Others can enjoy them too. I could easily tell others to stop enjoying Moira content because she belongs to people from my country and my country only. But that isn’t true. I think as long as people are aware of the problems that exist with representation, that they should be free to enjoy characters of whatever race they want. BTW, ludwigplayingthetrombone are like the least “offensive” McHanzo artist I can think of. It’s bizarre to me that this person directed their asks at them, not at the people who genuinely do fetishize McHanzo 

I mean, I’ve had a longer-than-an-hour exposure to one (1) American in my entire life outside the Internet (I hosted an American dude who wanted to apply to a school in Finland for like two days), and have never stepped one foot upon the continent either, but American culture is easier to depict solely because of how widespread it is in media. Exposure to it is almost impossible to avoid, and entirely so if you live, say, in Europe. The worst shit I’ve gotten for my depiction of Americans is that I use British English to do so, which is apparently the worst offense and you should never use any other variation of English than the Official American English if you write about Americans, or if the United States exists in your story in some shape or form. :P Anyway, yeah, writing USA is infinitely easier than writing Japan solely because one of these things has infiltrated everything in the media I’ve consumed since the day I was born and the other thing just exists relatively quietly in its own plot of land somewhere over yonder way.

The writing advice of “only write what you know” is legitimately one of the worst, most garbage pieces of “advice” ever given to mankind by anyone, ever. Writing is all about learning, about finding new perspectives; the same goes with reading. You don’t only “read what you know” - that makes no fucking sense. Every story is an adventure, a journey into the unknown. As it fucking should be. If you only write what you know your stories will never evolve, and neither will you as a writer. You will stagnate and your imagination and your human potential will wither. Human beings were not made to sit idly inside their four walls, never looking out the window to see what else is out there - we’re all dreamers, and writing is dreaming. And the thing about fiction and media in general is, exactly, that it belongs to everyone. You have to be careful when you’re treading over someone else’s land, their experiences, their culture and their heritage, but at the same time, without the freedom to create and consume these works of fiction, we don’t have stories anymore. It’s a balance between respect and risk; you will always make mistakes along the way, but just as you need to listen and learn from them, others have to accept that as a human being, you will be imperfect. Especially when it comes to learning.

There’s also a very important thing in here about how powerful fiction is in its ability to teach: when you write about a foreign culture, you set yourself within that picture. If you put the smallest effort into portraying that culture, you will inevitably learn about it, and its customs and its people will become closer to you - you’ll form a personal relationship to them, which makes you more open to them, and has the potential to spark a thirst for learning more. Telling people not to touch characters, stories and subjects that “belong” to other cultures is telling people not to cross those lines, to separate and segregate, and this is how fear and prejudice breeds. Racism, especially unintentional and subconscious racism, draws its strength from ignorance and humanity’s instinctive distrust of the unknown, particularly when it comes to outside groups of other human beings. In this case, allowing people the opportunity to connect safely via stories, via fiction, and form sometimes very deep personal relationships to characters that are written to represent a group of real people, is crucial in teaching them acceptance and openmindedness.

So, yeah. There’s that.

Also @ fandom: if Overwatch ever gets a Finnish character, you have my explicit permission to fuck up when it comes to portraying my culture, as long as you gave half a fuck about trying while going at it. And as long as I can angrily vaguepost about it on my blog, that is.