#life outside the internet

[bobcatmoran]

Despite the *gestures vaguely in the direction of the US presidential election* there is at least one good bit of news on my personal front. The results of my annual mammogram, which I started relatively early and do religiously because of family history, came up as, "We want to do a secondary mammogram and also an ultrasound, because we saw something suspicious."

Insta panic on my part. But! I went in for the second mammogram and also the ultrasound (and lemme tell ya, getting your breast lubed up and having a thing rubbing all around it, especially near your nipple is hella awkward), and thankfully, the result was non-cancerous cysts and also I just have dense breast tissue that mammograms aren't great at scanning.

Like, ideally I wouldn't have had to get my breasts squashed twice in the space of a few weeks, but it's a lot better than having undetected cancer.

All y'all fellow breast havers, please make sure to have your annual mammograms starting at age 40 and earlier if you have a family history of breast cancer. Do a self-exam monthly — it's how my mom found her cancer. Trans men, even those who've had top surgery, you're not exempt, and even cis men can get breast cancer.

[bobcatmoran]

I graduated high school in 2001. I met T my freshman year. Can't remember how, but they (you'll see why I'm using that pronoun in a moment) wound up joining our friend group at lunch.

T's gender was…ambiguous. They wore baggy clothes that were more in line with the style for guys at the time, but they also had a high-pitched voice. True, there were still some guys our age whose voices hadn't changed, but those were getting to be fewer and fewer as time passed. Plus, they were sitting at lunch with a bunch of girls, which no guy ever did unless they were A Boyfriend. Their haircut was short, but not so short that it couldn't be a girl's.

I didn't really care one way or the other — T was game for using the school's admin password ("nimda," or "admin" backwards) to put grainy cartoon jpegs on the desktops of the computers we were on in our horrendous "Computer Tech" glorified keyboarding class that we were both in because it was a prerequisite for all other technology classes. We were continuously doing things that drove the teacher crazy, mostly because she couldn't figure out how we were doing it (she said on the first day of class that she only knew how to use Windows/DOS and the class was taught on Macs). That, to me — a fellow in arms for antagonizing a horrible teacher — was way more important than whether they were a boy or a girl. T refused to confirm either way.

Some of my friends, however, decided that having someone of ambiguous gender was unacceptable — you had to be either a boy or a girl, you couldn't be both or neither. (I agreed that you had to be a boy or a girl because being non-binary wasn't a thing I'd learn about until years later, but I, again, didn't really think it was that important.) One of them, during sophomore year, somehow managed to get ahold of a childhood photo of T — in a dress. And during a field trip to a local water park, T showed up in the girl's locker room — in an orange, one-piece, women's bathing suit, and clearly very uncomfortable with the attention they were drawing.

So that was that. Except it wasn't.

T refused to be called a girl. They were clearly not ok with it, and when we learned about sex chromosomes in biology, they said that they had Klinefelter Syndrome, which we had all just learned about, and were trying to figure stuff out. That didn't seem to match a lot of what we knew (underneath the baggy clothes, T had a MUCH bigger cup size than expected, and they generally met zero of the syndrome's physical symptoms), but it shut up my friends about it, and we went back to doing the no-pronoun dance.

I still have zero idea exactly how T identified, or if they even quite knew themselves — this was the late '90s, after all, and the idea that there could be anything beyond the gender binary was not something that a bunch of 15 year olds in the suburban Midwest knew about. We didn't even have any out gay or lesbian students in our school of 3000 pupils.

I lost touch with T after sophomore year. Whether they dropped out, or their family moved, or they transferred schools I don't know, but they stopped going to my high school. I hope wherever they went that they did ok for themselves and that they found happiness.

I graduated high school in 99.

There was a student at our school named Wayne.

Wayne was gay. It was obvious. He was unable to stay in the closet even if he wanted to. To make matters worse, he was also Black. From a bullying standpoint, that was not a great combo. Both Black and white students made fun of him relentlessly. He was ostracized from the only community that may have given him protection. Only us theater kids stuck up for him, but not to significant effect.

Wayne was bullied so much that at one point he finally snapped and attacked his bullies with a lunch tray. I was actually seated in perfect line of sight and just sat there chewing my soggy fries in stunned silence. It didn't even seem real as I was witnessing it. The image of him wailing on his main bully as the food on his tray flew off is permanently logged into my long term memory.

The bully he attacked had blood all over his face and went straight to the nurse. Other than superficial cuts, he was not injured.

Before the attack, Wayne went to teachers for help. He went to guidance counselors for help. He went to the principals for help.

He did all of the things you were supposed to do. No one helped him. They wagged a finger at the bullies and warned them to stop.

Wayne's lunch tray melee was the only thing that worked. His bullies stayed far away from him. But a week later Wayne was expelled and the bullies were given no punishment.

So... no.

No one in my school talked about being trans.

Because the only way to survive being openly queer was to bash people with a lunch tray.

[sariphantom]

Risecember 2024 Day 1: Ice Sculpture

[nicollodangelo]

"radqueers are chronically online and have no friends outside the internet"

so close! yesterday I went to my friend's house, who lives in my city, it's a system, it's a 🐾 and 💀 and of legal age (chrono)-

we smoked 🍃 , we drank some vodka (I thought it was horrible), he dyed my hair pink, I took a shower at his house (and I couldn't turn the shower off), he even lent me a little dress saying he thought I would look cute in it, and we recorded some videos together

I don't know what you guys think radqueers are like outside of the internet, but we're not super weirdos that no one wants to talk to, most of us have other characteristics besides being radqueer, we are... perfectly normal? we also have family, friends, school....

[glowsticcc]

chosen.

[qqquib]

this is a great time to remind everyone to go offline, to talk with your friends, to engage in content that's fulfilling, to go outside. to live a life that has meaning away from the internet.

[biancadoes1]

Good morning ! first of all, I really appreciate your blog! It allows me to keep up to date with the latest news on Lukola! There's just one thing that upsets me: apparently after the photos leaked (monstrous!), L's mother deleted subscriptions. She now has 39 followers and A is still one of them...Not R or any of L's friend group. This proves that A seems to be close to the family...It really upsets me because I think she is no longer with L and she seems to be problematic...Maybe she is mainly friends with L's sister, I don't know. What do you think?

I don't know that this followers thing has even been confirmed or its just people talking again.

If anyone has a receipt please let me know.

Also, I believe Antonia is friends with his sister. We all have differences of opinion and there are a number of different theories, but since I lean in to the PR theory, it could be likely Antonia is known as a friend and that's why she follows.

Either way, it doesn't mean a damn thing. Please stop with the likes and follows.

Y'all are driving my ass crazy with this.

[elisadoreyou]

defending brody and jason from weirdos on the internet isn’t enough i need to buy a gun

[bobcatmoran]

Holy crap, most of the local school districts have canceled classes due to cold tomorrow. Do you know how COLD it has to be for classes to be canceled in Minnesota just for that? When I was a kid, we still went out for recess unless the windchill was -10F (~-23C) or below.

[alaskan-wallflower]

hot take but maybe people should stop harassing/stalking the outsiders cast.

[wis-art]

Women, so pretty, so shaped, i am so lesbian,,,

[jinstronaut]

some 5am thoughts bc my cat woke me up:

solo stan’s and solo behavior can kick rocks

there is no right or wrong way to use a tracked tag — ppl have lives and ppl are busy, don’t get mad bc someone isn’t reblogging something within 2 hrs of it being posted. some of us use a tag to catch up since we’re too busy to be here 24/7, that’s not a bad thing.

if you’ve never ever ever spoken to someone personally you don’t get to speak on who they are as a human being. if you’ve never actually reached out and had a convo with someone abt who they are you’re doing a disservice to them and yourself when you just assume things abt them based on perception instead of fact

most importantly HOBI IS HOME so let us celebrate 😌🎉✨💖

[quins-makeshift-menagerie]

You know. I’ve been debating this for weeks now but I’m kind of upset with your decision to have a baby. You were one of my favorite Mewtwo artist but now it feels like you’re just throwing your fans to the side like we’re trash. Don’t we matter to you at all? We’re the reason you can even make anything on Patreon but now you’re going to leave us with an unfinished story? Way to make us fee appreciated and loved…

Anon do you like

Need a hug??? /gen

[ghostoffuturespast]

Honestly, getting real tired carrying and supporting other folks around here when most of them aren't returning the favor...

[catboymoments]

tip: I am so fucking mad

[moomeecore]

im actually really good at admitting when i dont know things its just that people keep talking to me about things that i know a lot about and am objectively correct on