#its either misogyny or homophobia that actually gets in the way

[orionchildofhades]

"x character gets in the way of x ship" "y character gets...*

guess what mother fuckers

Polyamory

"lily gets in the way of jegulus", "regulus gets in the way of jily"

james has two hands.

[chaifootsteps]

just me or is the whole 'saying this is like fanfic is homophobia' framing kind of frustrating? like just to list out the tropes that have come up so far in HH/HB:

female character is written as an evil shrew who gets in the way of the m/m pairing

relationship that starts with rape/dubcon rewritten into true love (this one is probably more common in bad BL manga but I'm willing to bet there's some overlap)

character is the child of a mob family

portrayals of rape/sexual assault treated as titillating / used for drama

portrayals of domestic violence/abuse used mainly to get viewers to feel sorry for a character instead of making them sympathetic on their own terms

abusers/rapists being all powerful monsters solely to torture the victim as much as possible

characters are either Good or Bad and writing is heavy handed about driving this point home

writers has one character they stan and baby above all others and not only the writing but the world bends around them as they eat up more and more screentime while the actual main characters are shoved to the side

writer has one character they hate and they hate other people liking them so they derail them in the most obvious way possible

writer has one pairing they despise and go out of their way to make them seem familial to shame the fans who ship it

writer has intended pairings in mind but they just kinda happen regardless of how much work has been put in to give them real chemistry

the plotlines jump all over the place with no consideration given to the differing stakes each create or audience fatigue when too much is introduced at once/too many hanging threads are left, similar to what happens in unplanned serialized fiction. consistency and worldbuilding errors abound. conversations/events that seem like they should change the status quo kinda don't but there's so little way to tell which one is which that audiences cannot gauge the stakes and either stop being invested or just take the show as it comes since there's no point anticipating anything being done with a lot of its characters & plot points

too many characters, often some of whom don't serve much purpose but the writer is way too attached to to ever cut out (looking at you, Andrealphus & Vassago)

characters are rewritten on the fly. due to the lack of planning their arcs start and stop or get quietly dropped when the writer tires of them

pervasive attitude of misogyny - female characters are underwritten, bitches, dumb or accessories to the men. The world revolves around the (usually white) m/m pairing/s

the main premise is dropped in favor of shipping drama or character shilling

etc.

There's probably more but those are the big ones - like s1 wasn't perfect but s2 really does feel like it became fanfic of itself. I understand Viv being frustrated if it seems like a broad dismissive brush instead of specific critiques, but there's a couple of problems here:

when people give specific critiques she either misrepresents their points to frame them as bad faith (tacitly encouraging her fans to do the same), complains people keep making the same point or writes defensive threads about how people just don't get it because, for example, the show totally demonstrates Millie has qualities other than Wife and Violent

when people say something 'feels like fanfic' as far as I've seen they aren't immediately using it as shorthand for 'it has LGBT characters'. usually when they expand on their points what they're getting at is a lack of planning and a lack of experience or competency in the writer that gives the whole thing impression of being done by an amateur who's either young or still learning their craft, or both

it's the same lack of experienced hands that resulted in the opening of Hazbin being so amateurish and lacking the sense of having actual episodes until other staff writers were brought in to clean up the mess

like yeah I don't like the implication that 'fanfic=automatically bad' since I've read some good stuff myself and maybe people could be more specific; but usually this critique is coming from people who actually like fanfic, who've read a lot of it and who recognize the tropes from the worst fanfics out there in Viv's work

Viv's little "Um, actually, fanfic is good and queer and so if you use it as an insult towards my shows, you're homophobic" snit is one of the more rancid things she's said. When you lay it all out like this, it really does go to show how her stories embody all the worst, most harmful tropes bad fanfic -- and bad writing in general -- has to offer.

[liminalpsych]

Queer reading of Vulgate pt 2: Intro pt 1

preface | intro pt 1 | intro pt 2

The introduction is written by the translator of The Quest for the Holy Grail, E. Jane Burns. Burns begins by laying out the context of the Vulgate Cycle's structure, its history and development, and the different expectations historical readers have brought to the text.

Which underscores how expectation colors perception.

What happens if we imagine the possibility of multiple writers with different backgrounds, views, progressiveness, and agendas? Instead of assuming heteronormativity, homophobia, toxic masculinity, misogyny, and a single unified author with a singular agenda and vision - what if we stay open to the possibility of a different concept of gender than we're used to? What about possible queer subtext and the possibility of queercoding in medieval fiction, not just in modern fiction?

What if we look for those things, rather than assuming and looking for explanations that match the modern stereotypical assumptions of medieval people/writers/beliefs? (After all, it's those modern assumptions that lead to the phenomenon of "history will say they were roommates," or the all too common error of "woman buried with warrior stuff? must be religious, can't possibly be because she actually fought.")

That's what I mean by reading with a queer lens. Because most of the time, these works are read with a heteronormative, gender-normative lens, just unconscious or subconscious as a bias, and so any queer elements are missed entirely.

(Like. I still don't understand how anyone can read the passages with Galehaut as anything other than Extremely Gay. How do you miss that? Yet so many people assume it's "comrades" and "bros" despite the text going out of its way to say that it's more than companionship. Because of the default, unexamined lens that they're using.)

….anyway. off the soapbox. Back to the intro.

"Many literary historians… have mistakenly sought in Arthurian romance a recognizable ancestor text for the modern novel" and are disappointed in the somewhat disjointed conglomeration of the Vulgate. They then either dismissed it as incoherent and terrible, or defended it as having an underlying coherence and attempted to legitimize it by imagining a singular author (or unifying editor).

"The unwieldy mix of spiritual and chivalric modes that crisscross unevenly throughout… mark the Vulgate Cycle as a product of the emergent social and political tensions in thirteenth-century France," with the popularized chivalric tales of knights from the mid-twelfth-century getting infused with Biblical allusions and Grail mysteries around 1200. Prose had a more religious connotation and association than verse, which was more recreational (condemned sometimes as "vain pleasures").

"Lady readers, in particular, were exhorted after 1200 to abandon the deceptive tales of Arthurian knights." Which supports the idea that one of the primary audiences for these stories were women! Women of the 1200's French court, in the case of the French romances, though I'm sure readership extended beyond that.

This is another example of how expectation shapes perception. There's a tendency for modern readers to assume that medieval literature will be dry, dull, misogynistic, homophobic, etc… and so I've seen people assume that the vast numbers of unnamed ladies/maidens/queens are a product of misogyny, of being seen as too unimportant for distinct names.

And certainly there was systemic misogyny in the culture, just as there is nowadays - but I don't think that's the core reason for the nameless female characters. It doesn't match up with the Vulgate's characterization of these women as clever, competent, independent, and saving knights more often than being saved by knights. (Nor does it match up with how many women are named.)

I've heard a theory (probably on Tumblr somewhere, I can't remember where) that the unnamed women are the equivalent of "y/n" ("your name") in modern fanfic. Reader-insert. Perhaps the author(s) expected women reading the story to project themselves onto the characters, and so made extra room for them to do so.

…But back to the introduction once more. Burns unravels the idea of a single author or even a solid, novel-like coherent narrative for the Vulgate Cycle, and arrives at this:

"The Vulgate Cycle then provides us with a text that is not a text in the modern sense of the term, a text that is always fragmentary but always a composite of more than one text, a text located somewhere and uncertainly in the complex relation between many narrative versions created by many authorial if not authoritative hands.

"The literary map accurately representing this cycle of tales would contrast starkly with Lot’s set calendar. It would be a map that changed continually as we move through the narrative terrain it charts. Although it might incorporate on one level and for the text of the Prose Lancelot in particular the existence of a predictable calendar of events, a map detailing the whole of the Vulgate Cycle would have to reflect a much looser and more flexible narrative structure.

"It would be a map with no fixed perimeter, and no set or authorized format, a map that could shift and reshape itself at successive moments and with successive readings."

A shifting mélange of a narrative, flexible and unbounded, containing multitudes, eluding attempts to define or confine it into one single known element…

…Well. That sounds like the very definition of queer.

[nuancefem]

trans activists often forget that it isn't just trans-identified and nonbinary-identified people who can suffer from what they call cissexism or gncphobia. some people who aren't identifying as trans or nonbinary actually may face worse anti-gnc oppression than some people who claim the label, and get talked over by people who have no fucking clue what it's like. they just refuse to stay in their lane.

this is why any label that is nebulous enough for ppl to remain unchanged while identifying as such, and have no specific experience or behavior needed to belong to the group and be able to claim the label, will never be an accurate enough way to decide if someone has been more or less oppressed under the gncphobic/sexist (and of course heavily misogynistic) patriarchy. this is why often non-trans gnc people can be super frustrated by how they're treated by tras as some super privileged group shielded from horrific treatment by gender roles lovers, especially rightwing men. tras can be very out of touch, which doesn't go well with genuine lgbt/feminist activism spaces where we're genuinely trying to make positive change and actually talk through complex issues to find solutions to all the fucked up things the patriarchy has done to marginalized people. especially female/ofab people and people who are actually perceived as female in their day-to-day lives, or people who are visibly very gnc to a degree that pisses off patriarchs. trans/cis are often useless labels outside of denoting people who use different pronouns than their usual sex-assigned pronouns, or people who have dysphoria. otherwise, it gets incredibly vague and often includes people who for all intent and purposes live very gender conforming lives and truly are shielded from gncphobia, misogyny and transphobia/cissexism, as much as they hate to admit it.

the trans activist community claims to be against sexism and against rigid gender roles and all for embracing gnc people, yet gnc people who don't fit neatly in their usual cis/trans dichotomy get told they're either repressed and need the trans label, or they're bigots for saying they do face gncphobia and cissexism, at times more than some trans-identified folks. fighting patriarchal gender roles is more complex than simply identifying out of it. protecting gnc people, whether they identify as trans or not, is more complex than only protecting those who enjoy the label. protecting dysphoric people also means protecting those with reverse dysphoria and advocating for better healthcare in regards to transition, and more support in detransition-related surgeries, laser treatments etc from society. fighting against sexism also includes fighting sexism within your own spaces, and not assuming anyone gnc must hate being in their sex category and aren't female/male coded enough to still align with their sex. it also means discussing how not all trans people actually face cissexism, transphobia, sexism or misogyny irl and they need to learn to be good allies to those who do, whether they identify as trans or not. ofab/female people and transmisogyny-affected people also need to be good allies to one another, and not position one side as inherently less oppressed than the other in every aspect.

y'all also need to learn to respect ALL sexualities, including sexualities that involve the person's sex/"agab" without guilt-tripping or saying conversion therapy rhetoric. trans activists need to be more self-aware and grounded in reality. things are getting really ridiculous and it's why so many tras are peaking and flocking to radblr. it has its glaring issues, ones i am very critical of as are many radfems, but we at least have more tolerance for free speech and nuanced discussions and we absolutely refuse to ignore normalized homophobia against homosexuals (as in the og definition of the term) and blatant anti-female/ofab oppression in tq+ spaces. it can't stay this way forever!!

[popstart]

Misogyny is so incredibly normalized its actually insane. Theres batshit levels of casual misogyny thrown around in td, and im fine with it for plot and stuff, but that tweet of terry mcgurrin saying there's no homphobic characters or whatever. Like okayyyy i see your priorities.

The misogyny that is just casually in the show can get genuinely upsetting to watch sometimes. Women are constantly disrespected and paraded around as objects. Duncan saying to courtney whats for dinner woman. The double gold at the babe Olympics shit. The men are allowed to pull two girls but as soon as a girl pulls two guys shes the devil and should kill herself (gwen, bridgette, even courtney in the case of scott) And characters are reprimanded for being sexist in the show, but it doesnt feel like it happens enough

And again, im ok with it for the plot and stuff. (Also its a show from 2007. Its gonna be far from unproblematic) but it reflects HARD in the fandom. The people that blame Gwen and Courtney for the love triangle stuff? Insane. Actually genuinely insane. They either actually believe it can be someones (that just SO HAPPENS to be a woman) fault for being cheated on, or they just say that to piss people off who sympathize with courtney (or even gwen in the case of duncan fucking Breaking Into The Bathroom to kiss her. She was coerced into that kiss)

The list could actually go on and on and on.

The way people say bridgette is a bad person for getting coerced into a kiss even after apologizing while they completely forget geoff making eyes at other girls and calling them hot

The way people fawn all over noah and cody despite being in a minimal amount of episodes and/or never having that large of a role, while hating female characters in similar alleyways of screentime or usage

The mass popularity of mlm ships compared to wlw ships. Total drama has a pretty wide array of female characters that are just as developed or even more than the most popular male characters/ships. The usual excuse of female characters just being underdeveloped/bad characters and therefore unfun to ship doesnt apply.

I saw someone called homophobic for saying a lot of mlm ships feel like mlw ships but for people that dont want to write a woman

And its not like thinking one of these things automatically makes someone a misogynist, but it feels like everyone harbors some kind of misogynistic thinking. Its exhausting. Like you have to fight back so hard only for no one to care and for people to tell you youre exaggerating. the moment theres any SEMBLAMCE of homophobia, people dogpile them, but the rampent misogyny gets nothing done about it. Im tired

[lesser-vissir]

This might at some point make it out of drafts, but having had someone ask me to explain why I think the black genocide framework isn't useless or accurate, I wanted to get some notes down about that.

Now obviously, whether systemic racism (and by extension all systemic oppression) constitutes genocide is a purely semantic issue. Under a more traditional definition of genocide, it obviously does not. Systemic oppression often lacks intent by virtue of being a self perpetuating system. Moreover, genocide has always been a matter of scale, and less than 1 in 100 dead is pretty solidly outside the traditional boundaries for genocide.

However, using the definition proposed by the black genocide framework makes them systemic oppression genocidal definitionally so long as it causes disproportionate harm to a specific group.

Of course, unsaid in all of this is that other systemic oppression must therefore also constitute genocide, which is part of why I think the expanded definition isn't particularly useful. Where is the line drawn? I think you could argue very heavily that gay people face a genocide under that definition. The AIDS crisis becomes a genocide and in many ways so do the other systemic issues surrounding homophobia. Trans people quite obviously face a genocide under this definition as well, especially trans women. The global south is under a near constant state of genocide by this definition.

But we can also move to lesser greviences. Are women being genocided? There is undeniable systemic misogyny, some of which is quite severe. Under this definition, it would be fairly trivial to argue as such. Same with diabetics and disabled people in general. Pretty much any group could conceivably call their oppression genocide using this definition.

This overly broad definition turns any instance of oppression beyond a personal level into genocide, and that's part of why I don't think it is a useful framework. It makes the term genocide meaningless.

However, it is important to meet the original proponent of the theory where they were at. Namely that they did not believe systemic racism was actually genocide either! The usage of the term was rhetorical sleight of hand in order to generate momentum towards ending systemic racism.

The goal was two-fold: first to galvanized members of the black community by stressing the extent of their oppression, and to force non-black and especially white people in the US to treat systemic racism with the seriousness that they would treat a genocide. (Which as we know means they wouldn't care but🤷)

Seeing as this only really works for a short period of time before either the public rejects the new definition and no longer considers it a genocide, or the term becomes watered down and genocide loses its status as the most evil thing that can be done, the strategy has long since lost any effectiveness.

Which leads me to the second big issue I have with the theory: it breeds a conspiratorial mindset in its followers.

I mean, we've all seen some of the posts coming out of the community that believes in that, especially the seme/uke duo. It just,,, does not accurately describe reality lol

If you took them at face value you would believe that the vast majority of the black us population was either dead or in prison, which just isn't true.

And, I'll open up a little here, I live in a majority black area of Chicago. While it's certainly not a rich area, the people living her are doing quite well for themselves. No one's going hungry, they've got some disposable income, things aren't great but they're not bad.

I'd wager that experience is closer to reality than some of the genuine delusions I have seen posted online wherein there is no hope for black usamericans to live a stable of happy life.

Finally, there is no political utility in describing systemic oppression as genocide. What original political utility it had has been spent, and it now is an active detriment in terms of mindset. Moreover, there is nothing gained in terms of theoretical understanding of the forces that shape systemic racism, nor does such a framework provide any solutions.

Plenty of scholars have addressed this topic, both from within the black community and without, and the best argument against this framework is that it simply does not offer as much as class-based analysis or other analysis of systemic oppression which offer actual paths towards fixing these issues

In fact, many have argued, such as Orlando Patterson, a reductive framework like this one actively hinders progress forwards as it removes black people's agency and frames them as perpetual victims, undermining the nuaced intersections of race, class, and culture that actually shape the dynamics at play.

We can see this quite clearly among a lot of the usual offenders, wherein it is clear they believe black people are ontological victims. It's part of why they lash out so hard whenever the relatively privileged positions of black usamericans is brought up.

Anyways, that's my thought on that. It's a pretty rough post, written while high in the middle of the night, so please interpret this generously and don't get hung up on specific wordings. It's not a treatise lol

[hainethehero]

also: Well you see, I found it kind of shocking the way a heap of seemingly ride-or-die buddie shippers dropped buddie and eddie like a hot potato the second that a side character man with a questionable past kissed buck.

Boy do I have news! Not everybody was a Buddie shipper and "jumped ship" or "betrayed the cause". Some people ( a fucking lot) did not need Tommy showing up for not riding the Buddie train. They never did in the first place. Maybe that is where the confusion comes from? Every Buddie shipper only gives a damn about Buck and Eddie so long as there is the potential to kiss? And since every BT shipper is an ex-Buddie shipper...then sure, I guess. Eddie can die in a ditch now? Again, pure projection.

Tbh I think a majority of buddie shippers feel like they have a monopoly on the fandom, and that anything that happens with either character, has to be related to buddie somehow.

I see it all the time in the comment sections of the cast and the show's main accounts. It's becoming unbearable because even if it's a post about other characters, they somehow manage to make it about buddie. The entitlement is real.

This happens all the time, too. They get so obsessed (to an unhealthy level) that they assume the entire show is gonna change its whole storyline and arcs, just because they ship two characters together, not realizing that buddie has been quite literally has never been canon.

If it does become canon, then great! I love Buck and Eddie together. But it's disheartening and quite embarrassing (im sure the cast is sick of it) to see how they've absolutely showed their convenient care for racism (only when it involves their fave yt man), homophobia and wilful ignorance when it comes to Buck and Tommy. All that rah-rah and not one of them ever had this much smoke for Gerrard- the ACTUAL racist.

I'm sure they're breathing a sigh of relief though, that at least Tommy wasn't a woman. They won't have to expose their barely concealed misogyny like they did with Ana, Shannon, Taylor etc.

[libertineangel]

i want to add on to what you and @pirate-radios were saying about punk and politics by saying that while british punk was intended from the start to be political in the sense that its founders had clear left-wing ideologies they believed in and wished to include within the subculture and the music that doesnt mean every single british punk understood any of that or agreed with it either. the damned, despite being in the same circles as the sex pistols and the clash who were the bands to first bring true leftist politics into punk (if you discount the mc5 that is), didnt care much about politics and their manager, who owned stiff records, was outright hostile to mclaren and rhodes in part due to the fact that their political beliefs clashed with his own (tho ofc captain sensible would go on to link up with crass and get into socialism during the 80s which makes his current altright nonsense so painful to see) british punk has always been at war with itself over politics. bands aside, a lot of fans just flat out didnt Get It, esp when punk went mainstream in 1977 and the straights started to flood in. i always say this but when punk first was brought over to england via the sex pistols that shit was gay as hell! but as new ppl flooded in and punk stopped being a close knit group of arty weirdos the gayness got pushed to the side and a lot of bands who joined the bandwagon late like sham 69 were outright hostile towards the parts of punk that queer ppl had latched onto so heavily (i get why sham 69 and the like were so hostile to the fashion aspect I Get It but lets be honest most, if not all, of that way colored by homophobia and misogyny)

Very true and correct and important as always! And on the subject of that rejection of punk's queerness I think it's also very important to recognise that, fundamentally, "leftist" is not really a cohesive coherent ideological label that stands for all things progressive - most the more overtly political punk is, at its core, of a rudimentary populism more than any actual concrete ideology, they make big loud calls for young working-class unity and take aim at the rich or the businesses or the Thatcher/Reagan governments but let's be honest how many even of the most serious "anarchist" punks genuinely read Bakunin, or Kropotkin, or Goldman?

That kind of workerist populism, as we're seeing with many of the current Western far-right movements, is a haven & breeding ground for bigotry. The equating of good honest blue-collar work with traditional masculinity and national pride is hardly a subtle thing, and as such you can very easily find people with superficially "leftist" views when it comes to things like trade unions and wealth distribution while at the same time being viciously homophobic and misogynist - case in point, Sham 69 as you mentioned were deeply hostile to the perceived artsy gay current within punk while still writing songs full of working-class social commentary and opposing (however toothlessly) the National Front skinhead presence in the scene.

[scumashling]

Thooughts on Redo of Healer/A Whump Rewrite

CW: mentions of abuse, physical torture, noncon, misogyny, homophobia and slavery below

Incoming long post. It does have a point.

So, awhile back before I made this account I decided to do an endurance watch of a somewhat infamous anime entitled Redo of Healer. For those of you blessed with ignorance, Redo is a dark fantasy harem romance/rape revenge story based on the light novel of the same name by Rui Tsukiyo.

Set in the Kingdom of Jioral, a kingdom currently at war with the Demon population and built on the slave trade of the demi human population, the story follows Keyaru, a Healing class hero, who after 4 years of being enslaved for his uniquely miraculous abilities, (and enduring a fuck ton of emotional, physical and sexual abuse along the way) embarks on a brutal quest for revenge against his sadistic former party members/tormentors, (Bullet the Cannon Hero, Blade the Sword Hero, and most prevalently, Princess Flare, the Magician Hero who orchestrated his drugging and imprisonment.)

He gets Flare first, escaping prison, cornering her in her own soundproof bedroom, and proceeding to torture her physically and eventually violently raping her. So, now that he's gotten his revenge, does he just kill her? Call it a day and leave her a broken, ruined mess like she did to him? I mean. What more could he possibly do to bring her lower?

He changes both their faces, fakes both their deaths, erases her memories, and when she comes too, he tells his named is Keyaruga (groan) her she's his loyal attendant and lover, dubs her Freiya, and immediately coerces her into having sex with him. They then embark on a journey to destroy the Kingdom she doesn't know is hers.

Along the way, he slowly begins recruiting more girls into this party/builds a harem, often by coercive or outright nonconsensual mean like drugging/brainwashing and having a lot of sex with

Setsuna- A slave demi human wolf girl named that he purchases as a battle slave/it's okay she wants to be a slave because he's just so great

Kureha- A knight of the Kingdom who Keyaruga who he drugs and raped after she attacks him

Eve-a extremely powerful demon girl. The only one he doesn't coerce into fucking him

(note: below is all my subjective opinion.)

I wanna stress that while it is a very Whump heavy story, Redo is extremely Not Good and I cannot recommend it. And I'm not just saying that because it's a rape porn with high production values (though it has a pretty intolerable amount of extremely brutal rape for anyone who either doesn't have a hardcore CNC kink or who's brain isn't broken from reading violent fanfiction at age 13 like yours truly),it is genuinely one of the worst written pieces of fiction I've ever read. The pacing is terrible, the magic system is generic , the dialogue is atrocious, try character designs are so mediocre ( wow another hot girl with gigantic tits? How did you come up with that idea?!), the villains are all vile depraved power tripping rapist idiots who immediately get their comeuppance by the equally vile protagonist, who is always one step ahead is also so insufferably smug. Its also extremely edgy and lazy in regards to how it treats shit like slavery (pure shock value pretty much,). Because plot and theme is not the point though, the torture porn is.

Redo of Healer is also, and I cannot stress this enough, extremely extremely homophobic ( if you disagree that's fine you're allowed to be wrong <3) I won't go into it too much bc this post is already long but Blades character can be be described as every horrible stereotypes about lesbians stacked on top of each other in a trench coat. The author is so transparently trying to offend me by writing her this way that she actually has the opposite effect and gives me the giggles. Which now that I type that out is kind how I feel about the whole story. it's a pretty terribly male power fantasy about a terrible violent man who sexually tortures slightly more terrible violent men and women. And quite frankly, when I watching it , all I could think was "I could write this so much better."

Because see, even though everything I said before about redo is true, i also find it incredibly interesting:

There are a lot of Whump tropes in redo. Slavery, dehumanization, beatings, bastards Whumpees getting revenge on lady Whumpers, conditioning I think? intimate and sadistic whumpers, mind control whump, non consensual drugging, human pets. Theres prob more I forgot. They aren't handled well but they are there.

I love the rape revenge genre. I have vivid memories of getting together with my teen girls friends and watching Jennifer Hills and Hailey Stark tear apart some bastards. Based shit.

Redo is the first male victim on female perpetrator rape revenge media I've come across. it is also, the first I've seen where a victim makes their rapist into a willing sex slave as part of their revenge.

There are story elements and themes that do hold potential, specifically around power and the places lines between victim and abuser get blurry. Eg: Keyarga assumes locking away Flare's memories has made her into a new person, because Freiya is so sweet, and Flare is an abusive bitch. He eventually has to come to terms with the fact that he didn't erase Flare. They are they same person. Freiya is sweet because she has none of Flares life experience, and is with someone who shows her love and appreciation. More if this instead of a smug asshole fucking hot women because he can

When I found myself disgusted I briefly entertained the thought that I might be sexist. analyzing that thought for more then a minute I realized that ridiculous. I don't hate it for being a male rape revenge, I hate it because it's a male power fantasy. And I hate it because of Keyarga. Because he is a man who is constantly drugging and brainwashing recruiting women who cross him into his slave battle harem, all of whom he rapes has sex with aside from Eve, and even if he's not framed as a good person, he's framed as a badass. People who feel entitled to hurt others because they were hurt are not badass. They are pathetic. And more importantly, they are broken. Any story about people like him worth it's salt with acknowledge that.

TLDR I am re writing Redo Of Healer as a Serious Story about a Bastard Whumpee Who Brainwashes and Enslaves his Whumper, and Falls in love with her in the process.

It's still in its early stages. I have some picrews, some plot outlining and the basic jist of how I want to change about the characters and what I want to keep, and my partner, who's more familiar with fantasy RPG stuff, is helping me develop the magic system into something more interesting. But I do want to thank this community because I've been stewing on this horrifying story about torture and the nature of power for so long wondering who would want to read it and now that I've learned of Whump I know there is actually a chance that there is an audience.

Anyway, I've been typing way too long. I will post more about this at another time.

Also a reminder, I am new to writblr and to tumblr in general. Im still finding my footing in terms of some of the functions of the site and the etiquette/social norms/terminology, or like, the ways people follow each other's writing? Idk where I'm going with this just please keep that in mind

[shivology]

okay. one day i will stop talking about islam but it's not gonna be today. anyway, to overcorrect on post-9/11 islamophobia, a lot of liberal spaces infested by the types of muslims who will call you islamophobic and disrespectful of their culture when you call them out on their homophobia or transphobia and who will deny the infestations of misogyny and antiblackness and antisemitism in their (our) communities because Um Actually You Don't Get The Full Context, have started to almost . idk the word but like, deify? whitewash? sugarcoat? islam as if it's like. One Inherently Good Singular Ideology Misunderstood By White People For Racism Reasons. when yes, obviously, islam and muslims who live in the west are oppressed, but that's not all islam is. and it's such disservice to act like Islam cannot be oppressive to so many people who do live in the global south living either directly under islamist rule or just in conservative muslim-majority communities, to say that no actually we're a peaceful religion and we WORSHIP women actually! like to gaslight people who have actually been forced to wear the hijab, who have actually been victims of misogynistic honor-based violence, who have actually been pulled out of school to be married off to a 50 year old man because "the prophet did it so it's islamically ok!"

and it's tricky to talk about because you don't want to fuel islamophobia (which, like antisemitism, is obviously a legitimate tangible thing, but also can be weaponized) also it is so fucking ANNOYINGGGGG to watch discourse on islam be led by people who have never experienced oppression fueled by islam like sure you're a good ally to guys like mohamed hijab but also people like sara hegazy mahsa amini etc etc all these people are real people who were tangibly hurt in the name of islam. there is a reason why a man like andrew tate felt it was ok for a man like him to convert to islam and there is a reason why so many Muslim men welcomed him with open fucking arms. you're sure not a good ally to queer people and atheists and christians and jews who have been tangibly hurt in the name of islam.

and we can discuss the doctrine itself, we can talk about the effects of colonialism, we can talk about how no actually islam doesn't say that lets not conflate between ~ real religion and corrupt regimes but the thing issssss. religion is literally what you make of it. it is an idea. there is a book and you take what you take from it. there is no such thing as "the correct way" to practice religion, especially when all Abrahamic religions have the capacity to be peaceful AND the capacity to be violent. what is REAL representation? who are you to say what real representation is, anyway? who decides what is extremism? why do you, personally, get to pick and choose who and what represents a certain religion?

islam, like Every Religion Ever, manifests itself in different ways depending on ur social context. whether you have the means to exact oppression via religion or whether you are disenfranchised because you're an ethnic or racial or religious minority. religion has and always will be used both as a tool for good (community building, etc) or for evil (daaesh, lol) it's not about religion itself. it's about how you use it and its place in the social pecking order.

anyway. tl;dr. i hate oversimplication and i hate overcorrection. quite frankly, it's orientalist and racist, to assume that an organized religion followed by over a billion people in most countries in the world, all believe the same beliefs. even if u think these beliefs are "good." here's over a billion of us and some of us are bound to be cunts! statistically.

[hxhhasmysoul]

should I read jjk

idk, probably not

Its power system is very much an homage to Nen and powerscaling makes as little sense in JJK as it does in HxH, bless the authors curse the fandom.

Gege also sometimes uses anticlimax effectively like Togashi. The story, similarly to HxH doesn't overly concentrate on just one character.

I think Yuuji is an amazing protag, on par with Gon or Killua. I love the main villain and I very openly simp for the other main villain, as a character he's ok too.

Other characters are more hit and miss, some I love some I'm fed up with, and I won't say who and why because that would spoil the whole thing.

There's a lot of: things are set up and then pay off later in the story, a little like putting a puzzle together.

It fails at a lot of things it tries to do. It is rather left leaning for a shounen, and has some very strong leftist themes, but it's very uneven in handling some them, it doesn't always stick the landing.

It tries things and it fails. Gege seems to have got fed up with it half way through and seems to desperately want to wind it down, you can actually see where there were likely supposed to be character moments or plot developments and well they are condensed to off screen and exposition dumps, one fight feels like it was written by an editor or ghost writer from Gege's notes. ;-;

To me it's beautifully drawn but that's a personal preference.

I need to get traumatised by the story to get into the fandom. HxH took me for an emotional ride, JJK in its best moments too. I'm emotionally attached to Yuuji like I'm to Gon and Killua. I will always love it for what it did to me at its peak, no matter what Gege does to finish faster.

The fandom is atrocious. The either true lack of reading comprehension or willful misinterpretation is shocking. People has no attention span, they don't remember what happened earlier in the story, they will say lol what did I just read, and instead of reading the chapter again write that jjk makes no sense, that those who claim to understand it are lying, that it's boring and mid because they don't know what's going on in it. Some characters exist in fandom mostly as fanon and fans will openly reject canon. People will literally argue with manga panels. The transphobia, misgendering, thinly veiled homophobia, misogyny concealed as terfy "feminism" and racism are pervasive in the fandom. They will often be used to perform morality and write about how awful the author is. A lot of people think it's a cute joke to write very vile, violent things about the author, whenever the story doesn't go their way.

If you want this kind of mess in your life, then sure, read it. Maybe you will get attached to it, maybe just think it's whatever, no harm no foul. But if any of the above makes it not worth your time then it's understandable to ignore it, there's so much other stuff out there. Have you read the Summer when Hikaru Died?

__ edit

also, if you choose to give it a try start with the main story and maybe read Zero (the prequel) just before the Shibuya Incident ark starts. The writing in Zero is much weaker, the world is much less fleshed out.

[theinfinitedivides]

this is so random but i would love to hear your opinion on mydramalist as a fellow asian drama lover. because it’s obviously well known as a reliable wiki of sorts in dramaland but i beg to differ. (the only plus i feel being the summary and cast list for info)

i mean, i’ve not seen a single comsec w more than two brain cells as a whole? there’s always complaints about female leads rooted from misogyny, they are never happy about story progression, and i just find so many of them kinda dumb sorry lol. like zero media literacy to be found, insufferable arguments, etc. the star ratings are rly just given to popular dramas w high profile actors too.

and i personally find it disheartening that so many ppl end up referring to mdl when considering dramas because so many gems are then lost and not given appreciation.

anon. anon anon anon if you know the way i sat straight the f*ck up when i saw the notification and then read through this ask bc yes. yes to everything here that is exactly it. almost three fourths of what i've watched this year was either 1. not received well by the general MDL crowd (Moon in the Day. where is the taste brethren to not like MITD and not even for reasons that actually make sense), 2. received well but had a good chunk of people bitching in the comment section, or 3. received well but had the main point of the show (and its relevant characterization) go over their heads. (The Worst of Evil aka TWOE comment section, i am f*cking looking at you. i can count on one hand the number of people who understood what that show was supposed to be about) the one fourth that managed to escape was bc the toxicity did not reach the comment section and everyone was pretty f*cking civil. alas if only it could be like that all of the time

case in point for the ratings example, since we've already briefly tackled the lack of media literacy—j-dramas on MDL are notoriously rated much, much lower than either k- or c-dramas. half of the time that's bc there are less users watching (and rating) them therefore the average is lower but the other half it's bc people simply do not understand good media when they see it. don't get me wrong there's some freaky ass sh*t in the j-drama world that i would not touch with a Grinch level pole but to see MDLers out here talking about how slow j-dramas are and that nothing's happening. have you considered that you are either watching the wrong genre or you shouldn't be watching j-dramas in the first place bc their entire setup and general narrative framing arcs are not your style. have you even thought about that for six seconds or are you too busy expecting it to read like a typical tropey rom-com k-drama with your trending oppas. (no hate on my tropey rom-coms with [most of] said oppas, i need them when i don't want to think i just want to see sh*t on my screen and scream about hot people and the Hand Umbrellas in the Rain and the Back Hold when the male lead catches the female lead before she falls and you have the fifteen second focus on their faces just looking at each other)

and the misogyny. oh God do not get me started on the dichotomy that was the Cult, as we affectionatly called ourselves, on the feeds while THEE sageuk of the year My Dearest was airing (beloved show [that i still need to finish. JangChae i'm sorry ily life hates me like the mf it is 😭], beloved commentary on the feeds. they saw the vision on the feeds) vs the sh*tshow that was the landmine field of the comment section (the takes i saw on Gil Chae, Eun Ae AND Ryang Eum respectively.......... the misogyny wasn't enough we had to add the homophobia into the mix. buy one get one free deal fr fr). you mad man. that sh*t was insane there was a point i banned myself from scrolling farther than the cast section until the show finished airing. i kid you not on average they didn't have even half a braincell. maybe a quarter of a quarter of one. f*cked up just say you are not decent people and go

this is not to say that all of MDL is like this. i have gotten tuned into absolute masterpieces of content (and have tuned others, amen) bc of a comment comparing a show i'm watching to another one or a review being posted in the feeds about a film with less than 500 people interested. i have reconsidered my choice to not watch something after having spirited discussions in private messages discussing the pros and cons of the premise and whether they managed to get it done without f*cking sh*t up. i still contribute semi-regularly by adding relatively unknown actors and crew members to the database so they can get the credit due them. if you know where to look, you can get some good sh*t out of that place. problem is most users who are new to both the site and East/Southeast Asian cinema as a whole don't know where to look, and the cycle continues, and the ratings continue to be skewed/bloated and no one pays attention to the plot, if there even is any to pay attention to.

tl;dr: begging people to not let MDL be the be all end all for their drama recs a la 'well MDL doesn't like it so i won't watch it'. babe we have said MDLers complaining about how the ratings on Viki are too high but in my entire time watching dramas i've found that in the past two to three years the Viki ratings are making more sense than the MDL ones. sit with that for a sec. when you're done branch out and see the world (literally and cinematically), i promise you will be a better person for it

[somechillthoughts]

ok this is my first ever tumblr text post (or whatever u call it) but i wanna just ramble about something interesting i like of always sunny.

(btw i'm not that far deep into sunny either, i just know a lot from clips and compilations)

one thing that always interests me when discussing sunny through a queer lens is that charlie is one of (if not the only) member of the gang that doesn't really lean that heavy into patriarchal, toxic masculine stereotypes unlike the rest.

dennis is a prolific sex addict who uses sex as a way of dominance over women and to fuel his egotistical behavior, constantly using women as sex objects and trying to portray himself as "the leader" of the gang (which he kinda is).

mac's constant inner fight with his own sexuality and religious/conservative upbringing made him conceive this persona of what a man is supposed to be. he shows off this posture of machismo that is clearly all a lie to keep his true emotions and feelings coming out, not to mention him trying to get his father's attention throughout his life made him adapt a lot of his harmful traits as well.

dee being the only women of the group has its faults surrounding herself with men who don't treat her at all good, but she's always able to throw that same shit to the other women in the show who she seems to think are competition, competing for male validation and a way of feeling superior to women beneath you.

frank is the oldest and more traditional of the gang, constantly displaying bigotry wherever he goes, this including instilling patriarchal and misogynistic tactics cause he doesn't know better (or just doesn't care). his constant homophobia towards mac in the early seasons to then his coming out episode is clear of a sort of insecurity and this old school way of thinking of how men should be.

but charlie? he's a whole different case all together.

ofc all the gang is bigoted, especially when it comes to misogyny and following patriarchal ideals, but when it comes to charlie, he doesn't really exude that kinda idea at all, maybe not even to the same extent as the other men. he's seen as the more open and comfortable in his masculinity, not really trying to be this macho man that he knows he can't be. he's very open with being effeminate, not afraid to question gender, and wouldn't mind partaking in roles that are specifically meant to be for women. (he even crossdresses for fun and to go to the bathroom). this could just be because alot of sunny fans like to headcanon him as non-binary/trans (which i also do as well), i think it could go deeper than that.

now, ofc with that being said, the others in the gang sometimes don't follow the same rules they put on for themselves (dennis wears makeup, mac's motherly nature, frank able to express his emotions with others, dee's camaraderie with other women at times) but it's usually one-off moments and sometimes doesn't even last a season, while charlie's like this (from what i know) throughout the whole show.

idk i just really like always sunny and the show is incredibly gay once u start digging for it and i like the charlie headcanons alot so yeah. sorry if this didn't make sense. i will probably do a remake of this when i actually finish the show but who knows. lemme know what y'all think

[pixelkip]

I cannot understand how american """"centrists"""" (see: slightly less right than the alt-right) who are "neutral" either way think they sound reasonable. My family is so insistent that trump getting re-elected is fine at best and completely neutral at worst and keep going on about how he was "so good for the economy" and "well it's not going to affect your life so why are you so worried" (yes, they actually fucking said this to me) first of all I do not just care about what happens to me. Shocking I know. But also as a queer woman yes the fuck it will. Like oh it's so nice that they added the right to abortion to our state constitution!! Can't imagine how that could ever be changed surely there won't be anyone in a position of power that has a higher authority than states that would ever want to do anything to override that!!! (/s if that wasn't clear) my parents claim to be against all forms of misogyny, racism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, as well as the genocide being committed against Palestinians. Or at least say they are and convince themselves they are so they can sleep at night. And still they cannot fucking comprehend how a rapist and convicted felon who has made it abundantly clear he is in opposition to all of what they claim to support, and has admitted to actively helping sabotage ceasefire efforts, would be goddamn devastating to have as president. But of course they don't believe he's any of those things. Every single piece of evidence of every obviously horrible thing he has done or said is, to them, is either taken out of context, not true, exaggerated, or Not That Bad, Actually. or if they can't claim any of that, then they'll decide its a worthy sacrifice since they think he'll help the economy or whatever shit. They think the worst thing he's done is sound like kind of an asshole whenever he speaks publically. I know this sounds so ridiculous and backwards and I wouldn't believe anyone could fucking think like this if i didnt live with these people. Maybe my family are outliers, but it just seems like so many people are either living under a rock or so Marianas-trench-level deep in denial about what they're supporting that they've become completely disconnected from reality.

[nuancefem]

tras are often using tma (transmisogyny-affected) and tme (transmisogyny-exempt) in feminist/lgbt discourse. transmisogyny is a specific form of oppression that only those seen as omab/male and gnc, or transitioned, face the blunt of. though thanks to genetics or transition, transmasc people can get conditional transmisogyny if they start passing as omab/male and gnc enough to receive transmisogynistic hate. some transfems stop facing transmisogyny in their day-to-day interactions, like how some transmascs stop facing misogyny in their daily lives once they pass as male.

but the thing is, there is also misogyny-affected people...

and misogyny-exempt people.

as controversial as it is to say, some transfems are actually exempt. you can be transmisogyny-affected, yet misogyny-exempt. or you can be misogyny-affected and of course transmisogyny-exempt.

you only face transmisogyny if you are seen as transfem. as omab/male and transitioned, or "too" gnc. you are either mistaken as transfem and face conditional transmisogyny, or you're transfem and directly affected by all or most aspects of it.

you only face misogyny if you are seen as female/ofab, and because bio/cis men are overwhelmingly opposite-sex/agab attracted, they will do certain bad things only to people they're attracted to. which is why there's a big issue of transfems omitting being transfem until they're naked with someone, and then receive violence for it bc the guy is suddenly in bed with someone he's not attracted to, and often ofc they're already bigoted as well. either way, the transfem in that scenario may have faced bad shit with this dude prior to the sex scene, but that bad shit was while she was seen as female/ofab. it was conditional, because once the transness was revealed, she started instead facing transmisogyny. which isn't a subcategory of misogyny, but very much its own thing, especially with transfems who have mismatched secondary sex characteristics; the bio/cis men can be attracted to some parts but not others, or they are into them but they're obviously fetishizing them and treating them like a kink, as is common in porn unfortunately. either way, transfems can face conditional misogyny, and unconditional transmisogyny.

cis/bio women and transmasc people can sometimes face conditional transmisogyny if they are thought to be transfem, but also face misogyny unconditionally, due to the body type they were born in & their childhood/socialization; even they cannot truly identify or transition outside of their marginalized class. abortions and female/ofab rights will always affect them deeply, and be a threat to their own human rights. if they lived in a different country, having their sex/"agab" revealed could mean being legally owned by male/omab people. so anyone ofab/afab/etc is directly affected by misogyny and face it or are affected by it unconditionally, while transfems are directly affected by transmisogyny no matter their transition status, even if they stop passing as transfems and pass as female/ofab. but they can only face misogyny conditionally, bc once their transfem status is known, it becomes transmisogyny instead of misogyny. transmisogyny is more a related mutation of misogyny. some transfems face misogyny in their regular lives, some face transmisogyny instead, and some face a mix of both depending on circumstances etc. i wish normie tras understood that this is not meant as an insult, it doesn't mean transfems don't face any struggles or harm from the patriarchy. sexism/gncphobia is deeply related to the patriarchy anyways, and even transfems who don't pass as female still often face homophobia & severe gncphobia, at times violent. that isn't easy either. but still a different struggle.

we need to become more comfortable with having a mix of privileges (not facing certain struggles) and disprivileges (facing certain struggles and being uniquely affected by them in a way that even other marginalized people aren't). it's okay to not be oppressed in every single way, on every single axis. it's truly okay. let's accept it.

oppression under the patriarchy is complex. we can accept diverse experiences and make sure everybody gets a voice on issues that directly affect them. tras really need to understand this.

[dillybilly]

Funny how you got that one anon ask stating valid issues with One Piece and Oda and then you start posting over on X that Sanji lusting over minors and his sexual assaults aren't bad or problematic.

Just going to say that your misogyny is very much starting to show and that is not a good thing.

In regards to the previous anon. They were not “just trying to give valid criticism”. If they wanted a “nuanced discussion about the problematic elements of this piece of media” they wouldn’t do it through an anon message on tumblr. It’s obviously just a cheap scare tactic to try to paint me in a bad light because I chose to draw fanart for a series they were told was problematic. (Assuming you are not the same person, which I can’t rule out as a possibility)

As for me supposedly “defending Sanji and saying his actions aren’t problematic”. I don’t recall ever doing that. I’m actually pretty against Sanji doing that; he’s my least favourite Strawhat for that reason. However, that isn’t something I made very apparent and I don’t like the idea that I’m keeping up an appearance I don’t want to, so I went through my Twitter myself to see any mentions of Sanji that may paint that sort of image.

If you’re referring to this post, you misread it. I was expressing frustration that Sanji’s harmless crossdressing was seen as “just as bad” as his streak of harassment. Unfortunately, the One Piece community on Twitter has a massive problem in terms of its homophobia and transphobia that either doesn’t get addressed, or it’s affirmed. Sanji’s time in Kammabakka queendom is a good example. I do not like this arc, the portrayal of the Okamas are highly transmisogynistic and dated; but people take more issue with the thought that Sanji was enjoying his time expressing himself, which is arguably the least problematic aspect.

Unless you’re talking about this tweet, which in that case: Oh my God, you are such a baby.

Sanji has a lot of negative aspects to his character that makes it hard for other people to like him. However, Sanji tends to be written to have a lot of likeable qualities as well, which makes him liked by other people. It is not within my, or anyone else’s jurisdiction to tell other people how they can feel about a character. Similarly people should be allowed to dislike him or find him problematic. However, there is no right or wrong way to feel, and it should not be a judge of someone’s own character.

It is very telling that you apparently saw me “defending Sanji’s problematic behaviour” on Twitter and instead of confronting me here, you come to my tumblr instead and provide no context to back up your claim just to make me look as bad as possible. You do not care about what is or isn’t right, you just have a fetish for ��exposing’ people.

Also, call it Twitter, you bot.