#like imagine needing to know people’s medical history to respect their pronouns

[seraphserpant]

Ngl I’m glad the anti trans from trans discourse on tik tok is like “when the stinky kid names arson wants to sit next to you” and not like “IF YOU DON’T DRESS EXACTLY TO CONFORM TO GENDER STANDARDS AND/OR ARE NB YOU NEED TO BE DENIED ALL HEALTHCARE AND KYS NOW” (even tho there is some of that sentiment it). Not to say it’s not bad but it’s a great step up from 2010 tumblr/YouTube trans on trans discourse.

[literallytataposts]

I want to introduce to my male OC

faceclaim: Rudy Pankow

Basic Info

Full Name: Alex Matteo

Nickname: Alex

Age: 23 years old

Date of Birth: July 15, 2000

Place of Birth: Los Angeles, California, USA

Gender/Pronouns: Male (he/him)

Sexuality: Heterosexual

Relationship: Single

Species: Human

Ethnicity: American-Italian

Blood Type: O positive

Likes:

Music (playing guitar, going to concerts)

Movies and TV shows

Sports (basketball, soccer)

Traveling

Spending time with friends and family

Dislikes:

Injustice

Arrogant people

Crowded places

Standing still

Routine

General Appearance:

Light blonde brown hair

Blue eyes Average height (1.75 m)

Body Athletic

Casual and laid-back style

General Personality:

Extroverted and sociable

Funny and playful

Loyal and protective

Determined and ambitious

A little impulsive

Hobbies:

Playing guitar

Watching movies and series

Playing sports

Traveling

Reading

Occupation: Film student (aims to become a director)

Strengths:

Creative and imaginative

Communicative and persuasive

Born leader

Determined and persistent

Good at solving problems

Weaknesses:

Impulsive and impatient

Stubborn and proud

Sometimes gets carried away by emotions

Can be a little self-centered

Lack of experience

Physical Traits + Appearance

Alive/Dead: Alive

Height: 1.80 m

Weight: 80 kg

Hair Color: Light Blonde Brown

Hairstyle: Short and messy, with some strands falling over the forehead

Eye Color: Blue

Body Type: Athletic and muscular, with broad shoulders and a slim waist

Other Physical Characteristics:

Wolf tattoo on the right arm

Scar on the left side of the face, the result of a motorcycle accident

Wears tactical and functional clothing, such as cargo pants, a t-shirt, bulletproof vest and military boots

Backstory

Childhood and Adolescence:

Alex Matteo was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He is the son of Italian immigrant parents who worked hard to provide him with a good life.

Alex was always an active and adventurous boy. He loved sports, especially basketball and soccer. He was also a brilliant student and had a special interest in history and literature.

During his teenage years, Alex got into some trouble. He was a bit rebellious and would often get into fights. However, he also had a good heart and was always willing to help others.

Enlistment in the Army:

After graduating from high school, Alex decided to enlist in the army. He wanted to serve his country and make a difference in the world.

Alex underwent rigorous training and became an elite soldier. He was known for his courage, determination, and leadership skills.

Alex served in several missions around the world, including Iraq and Afghanistan. He saw the horrors of war firsthand and it changed him forever.

Return to Civilian Life:

After several years of serving in the military, Alex decided to return to civilian life. He enrolled in college and began studying film.

Alex was still traumatized by his experiences in the war, but he was determined to move forward with his life. He joined a support group for veterans and began therapy.

Alex met Sam, an army medic, and fell in love with her. Sam helped him overcome his trauma and find a new purpose in life.

Return to the Army:

When a new threat emerged, Alex decided to return to the military. He knew his skills and experience were needed to protect his country.

Alex joined a special operations unit and was sent on a dangerous mission. He and his team had to infiltrate enemy territory and eliminate a terrorist leader.

The mission was a success, but Alex was seriously injured. He spent months recovering in the hospital, but eventually made a full recovery.

Present:

Alex continues to serve in the military and is determined to make a difference in the world. He knows that war is a necessary evil, but he hopes that one day the world can live in peace.

Alex is a decorated war hero and a respected leader. He is a role model for all who know him.

[il-ballo-della-vita-maneskin]

Hi, could I please be matched up with a member of the band?

I’m from New Zealand, my pronouns are she/her. I have dark brown hair and blue eyes (not sure if relevant but I have braces). I’m the third of five children and my parents are divorced but I live with my dad.

I’m an introvert at first but after people get to know me for a while, I never shut up around them. My sisters would say I have a very “loud” personality

My hobbies include working out at the gym, doing my makeup, learning about different times in history (I love medieval history). I vape and smoke weed.

I’m autistic, have borderline personality disorder and have ADHD which I take several medications for and can’t ever miss a day of them.

My favourite band besides Måneskin is 5 Seconds Of Summer

i’ll go witht thomas for you<3

i think they once said thomas is the one who parties the most out of them (or the one who gets drunk the most? sorry, can’t remember) so i think he would love that your personality is loud, though he would completely respect that you are introvent at first. he’d take you to parties he knows you’ll feel comfortable at and the two of you would always have much fun.

he likes to watch you do your makeup, and would often ask you to do his. he’d also gladly let you practice on him. imagine putting him eyeliner and removing his hair from his face and when you are done he says something like: “you’re so talented, amore mio” :’)

he’d learn all about medications you take and would always check if you took them, without ever bothering you. he wants you to be able to count on him for whatever you may need, so he did so much research and is now very informed.

just a cute little idea: it’s raining outside, two cups of hot tea are set on the table, while thomas and you are peacfully sitting on the couch, your lags on his lap. he is reading aloud a historical book you two found in library yesterday. his voice is steady and he is focused on what he is reading, though his gaze still wonder in your direcrion every once in a while. he can’t help it. how is he supposed not to look at you, the only sight his eyes crave?

have a lovely day❣️

[comrade-meow]

This is a transcript of a speech by developmental biologist Dr Emma Hilton delivered on 29 November 2020 for the ‘Feminist Academics Talk Back!’ meeting. This talk was originally published by womentalkback.org

Sex denialists have captured existing journals We are dealing with a new religion

Thank you for the invitation to speak today, as a feminist academic fighting back.

As ever, let’s begin with a story. And, trust me, by the end of this talk, you’re going to know a lot more about creationism that you expected:

1. In the 1920s, in concert with many other American states, the Tennessee House of Representatives passed the Butler Act, making it illegal for state public schools to: “teach any theory that denies the Story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible.” In other words, banning schools from teaching the theory of evolution.

Three months later, Tennessee science teacher John Scopes was on trial, charged with teaching the theory of evolution, a crime he was ultimately found guilty of. He was fined £71 – about £1064 in today’s money – so it could have been an expensive affair for him, had he not got off on a really boring administrative technicality.

Yet, despite the evidence against him and his own confession, he was an innocent man. Scopes was not guilty of teaching the theory of evolution. He admitted to a crime he had not committed. He even coached his students in their testimonies against him. So why would he admit to this wrongdoing of which he was entirely innocent? Why would he contrive apparent guilt? In protest. In protest against a law he viewed as fundamentally incompatible with the pursuit of scientific truth.

2. The history of creationism and education laws in the US is turbulent and often opaquely legalese, especially for those of us unfamiliar with US law. Some of the methods of the wider creationist movement, however, will be immediately recognisable as they are employed by a new movement, one which seeks to erase another scientific truth, the fact of sex.

Method 1. The framing of human classifications, whether it’s species or sex, as “arbitrary”. This leads to the premise that such phenomena are “social constructs” that need not exist if we chose to reject them. That truth must be relative and consensual. Never mind that these “arbitrary” classifications appear to be surprisingly similar classifications across all cultures and civilisations.

It also necessarily spotlights tricky boundary cases – not really a personal problem for the long-dead evolutionary missing links, but a very real problem in the modern world for people whose sex is atypical and who are constantly invoked, even fetishized, as “not males” or “not females” to prove sex classification is somehow no more than human whimsy.

People with DSDs have complex and often traumatic medical histories, perhaps struggling to understand their bodies, and they deserve more respect than to be casually and thoughtlessly used as a postemodernist “gotcha” by the very people so horribly triggered by a pronoun.

Method 2. The distortion of science and the development of sciencey language to create a veneer of academic rigour. Creationists invented “irreducible complexity” and “specified complexity” while Sex denialists try to beat people over the head with their dazzling arrays of “bimodal distributions arranged in n-dimensional space”.

Creationists, unable to publish in mainstream science journals because they weren’t producing, well, science, established their own journals. “Journals”. Sex denialists have captured existing journals – albeit limited to more newsy ones and to occasional editorials and blogs about gender (which is not sex), about how developmental biology is soooo complicated (which does not mean sex is complicated – I mean, the internal combustion engine is complicated but cars still fundamentally go forwards or backwards), about how discussing the biology of sex is mean (OK, good luck with that at your doctor’s surgery). Many such blogs and articles are written by scientists who simultaneously deny sex to their social media audience while writing academic papers about how female fruitflies make shells for their eggs (no matter how queer they are), about the development of ovaries or testes in fish and about how males make sperm.

The current editor-in-chief at Nature, the first female to hold this position, studied sex determination in worms for her PhD, and she now presides over a journal with an editorial policy to insert disclaimers about the binary nature of sex into spotlight features about research on, for example, different death rates in male and female cystic fibrosis patients.

The authors of the studies are not prevaricating or handwaving about sex, but the editorial team is “bending the knee”. I used to research a genetic disorder that was male-lethal – that is, male human babies died early in gestation. I’d love to know if this disclaimer would be applied there.

Method 3. Debate strategies like The Gish Gallop. This method is named for Duane Gish, who is a prominent creationist. What it boils down to is: throw any old argument, regardless of its validity, in quick succession at your opponent and then claim any dismissal or missed response or even hesitation in response as a score for your side. In Twitter parlance, we know this as “sealioning”, in political propaganda as the “firehose of falsehood”, although Wikipedia also suggests that it is covered by the term “bullshit”. So, what about intersex people? what about this article? what about an XY person with a uterus? what about the fa’afafine? what about that article? look at this pretty picture. what about what about whataboutery what about clownfish? The aim is not to discuss or debate, it is to force submission from frustration or exhaustion.

Method 4. The reification of humans as separate from not just monkeys but the rest of the living world. The special pleading for special descriptions that frame humans as the chosen ones, such that the same process of making new individuals, common to humans and asparagus, an observation I chose because it seems superficially silly – it could have been spinach – requires its own description, one that accounts for gender identity.

3. In the Scopes trial, which saw discussion of whether Eve was actually created from Adam’s rib and ruminations on where Cain got his wife, Scopes was defended by a legal group who had begun scouting for a test case subject as soon as the Tennessee ban was enacted. This legal group claimed to advocate for:

“Freedom of speech for ideas from the most extreme left such as anarchists and socialists, to the most extreme right including the Ku Klux Klan, Henry Ford, and others who would now be considered more toward the Fascist end of the spectrum.”

The legal group so keen to defend the right to speak the truth, in this case a fundamental, observable scientific truth? The American Civil Liberties Union, a group whose modern day social media presence promotes nonsense like:

“The notion of biological sex was developed for the exclusive purpose of being weaponized against people.”

and

“Sex and gender are different words for the same thing [that is] a set of politically and socially contingent notions of embodied and expressed identity.”

and shares articles asserting that biological sex is rooted in white supremacy.

Since the Scopes case, the ACLU have fought against many US laws preventing, or at least compromising, the teaching of evolution. I cannot process the irony of a group of people historically and consistently prepared to robustly defend the truth of evolution while now denying one of the most important biological foundations of evolution.

4. How do we fight this current craze of sex denialism? A major blow for creationism teaching was delivered in 1986 while the US Supreme Court were considering a Louisiana state law requiring creationism to be taught alongside evolution. The Louisiana law was struck down, in part influenced by the expert opinions, submitted to the court, of scientists who put aside their individual and, as one of them has since described “often violent” differences on Theory X and Experiment Y, to present a unified defence of scientific truth over religious belief. 76 Nobel laureates, 17 state academies of science and a handful of scientific organisations all got behind this single cause, and made a very real change.

Support for creationism has slowly ebbed away and the US is in a much more sensible position these days, although I still meet the occasional student from a Southern state who didn’t learn about evolution until college.

Sadly, one of the Nobel laureates has highlighted how unusual this collective response was and that he could not imagine any other issue that would receive the same groundswell of community support. Although he forged his career listening out for the Big Bang, so maybe I need to go through the list and find the biologists.

Part of the problem petitioning biologists to speak out is not necessarily fear of being cancelled or whatever, but simple lack of awareness of the issue, or incredulity that it is being taken remotely seriously. I’ve been working on a legal document and was discussing with a colleague about my efforts to find a citation for the statement, “there are two sexes, male and female”. He laughed at the idea that this would require a citation, told me to check a textbook, then realised that this statement is so simple that it would not even be included in a textbook.

And he’s right. I can find chapters in textbooks and hundreds of academic papers dedicated to how males and females are made, how they develop, how they differ, yet very few that feel the need to preface any of this with the statement “There are two sexes, male and female”. It is apparently something that biologists do not think needs to be said.

But of course, I think they are wrong, and that we live in a time where it does need to be said, where some aspects of society are being restructured around a scientific untruth, and where females will suffer.

Without recognition of and language to describe our anatomy, and the experiences that stem from that anatomy, mostly uninvited, we can neither detect nor measure things like rates of violence against women, the medical experiences, the social experiences of women and girls.

And, as for creationism, the reality of sex perhaps needs to be said by those with scientific authority, in unambiguous terms. Otherwise, we are living in a society that tolerates nonsense like there is no such thing as male or female, that differences evident to our own eyes are not real, that anatomies readily observable and existing in monkey and man alike do not actually exist. I’m sure this last assertion has the full support of the creationist community. And perhaps, as for creationism, a true tipping point will be tested when it is our children being taught these scientific untruths, or worse, when it is illegal to say different.

5. At the end of his trial, the only words Scopes uttered in court were these:

“Your honor, I feel that I have been convicted of violating an unjust statute. I will continue in the future, as I have in the past, to oppose this law in any way I can. Any other action would be in violation of my ideal of academic freedom—that is, to teach the truth as guaranteed in our constitution, of personal and religious freedom.”

I do not exaggerate when I say we are dealing with a new type of religion, a new form of creationism and a new assault on scientific truth. I also do not exaggerate when I say it may take a high profile court case to rebalance the public discourse around sex. There is only so far letters and opinion articles can go.

Two things I predict: 1. It will not be defended by the ACLU, and 2. With the recent proposals on hate speech law, it will probably involve a Scottish John Scopes, who finds themself in front of a judge for the seditious crime of discussing the sex life of asparagus at their dinner table.

Dr Emma Hilton is a developmental biologist studying aspects of human genetic diseases, and her current research focuses on a congenital motor neurone disease affecting the genitourinary tract, and on respiratory dysfunction in cystic fibrosis. She teaches reproduction, genes, inheritance and genetic disorders. Emma has a special interest in fairness in female sports. A strong advocate for women and girls, Emma tweets as @FondofBeetles.

[werevulvi]

I wanted to write a bit about sex segregated spaces, in regards to people who pass as the opposite sex. This is not actually about trans people, as much as it is about the safety, integrity and general rights of male-passing biological women. I am not the only gender non-conforming woman who gets tossed out of female only spaces, based on the false presumption that we’re men. I do not care about validating trans women, or even trans men, for that matter. I care about real life practicality, risks and safety for ALL women, not just those who look conveniently clearly female, which starts with accepting that some women, whether they've medically transitioned or not, pass as male. And none of them should have to feminise themselves to access female only spaces. Whether that be to ensure safety from males, or to just take a leak.

The fact that I choose to keep my beard has almost nothing to do with that I'm male-passing. It may be my strongest "male" feature, but it's hardly the only one. I still pass as male with a clean shaven face, which makes shaving my beloved beard rather pointless, in my opinion. I would realistically need to go through more than just facial hair removal to pass as my own sex again. I'd probably even need facial feminisation surgery, hair transplant, voice feminisation and full body hair removal, at the very least, to even get close to passing as female again. But even then, I'd probably STILL be read as a trans woman, i.e. male. And even IF I did all that... WHY should I have to mutilate myself (a second time) by buying into harmful patriarchal beauty standards, which would worsen my dysphoria and reduce my comfort in my own skin significantly, to be allowed the safety of male-free spaces?

Does that sound feminist to you? Because to me, it's incredibly misogynistic, and strongly counterproductive. To uphold patriarchal gender roles for the safety of women... is the most insanely anti-feminist double standard I can possibly ever think of.

To lay out my argument on this topic, I'm going to use my own experiences as examples a lot. Mostly because I cannot with any conscience speak for anyone else than myself, at least not in such detail and with such harsh judgement. But I'm sure a lot of my experiences are applicable to other masculine women as well.

First off, I still consider myself gender critical, but my allegiance to radical feminism has been waning lately. This is mostly due to that although I agree with the base premise of radfem, I tend to disagree with the proposed solutions to almost all of the issues, because to me they come across as unfounded beliefs (yes, BELIEFS) that "it would just work" without much of any evidence to back up such a claim.

And when it comes to trans people, I've noticed a lot of... shall we say, willful ignorance, going on among many radfems, which does affect opinions on gender abolishion as well as sex segregated spaces to appear rather... intellectually dishonest, to be frank. Although this is not intended as a call out by any means, I merely want for people of all sides of the radfem/gender critical/pro-trans fence to stay critical and keep questioning everything, even one's own beloved ideology. Which I don't see a lot of. Instead I see almost religious defending of radfem as the ultimate/perfect ideology... oh, guess where I've seen that before? I've come to believe that "hivemindedness" is probably part of every possible ideology out there. Even radfem.

So, anyway.

One thing I come across time and time again is the belief (yes, I dare say "belief") that people never pass as the opposite sex, although it's mostly directed at trans people, this very much applies to people who are just gnc as well. Let's not forget that. And this belief seem to often lead to that transitioned/gnc people can just use the space intended for their biological sex, no problem. However, this is not the case. There is a problem. Very many trans people, and some gnc people, pass well enough to at least blend in enough to not raise much of an eyebrow among the opposite sex, and to most definitely stand out as an outsider among people of the same sex. OR they pass barely enough as either sex, and thus stand out as an outsider among both the same sex and the opposite sex, which can cause similar problems with single sex spaces.

There's also the thing that it generally is easier to pass as the opposite sex among complete strangers, compared to people who know you/your background. They tend to read you differently, depending on that.

At least in my experience, complete strangers assume I'm male and don't even as much as raise an eyebrow about how male I come across as. They accept their false assumption at face value. And why wouldn't they? 99,97% of people who "look like me" are biologically men. Then people who know I'm transitioned, but didn't know me pre-transition, tend to see me as a female who looks very convincingly male, whether that makes me a masculine woman, trans man, or any other (female) label in their eyes. They claim to be able to "see" my female nature, yet they somehow had no idea before I told them about my true sex. Then people who know about my history and saw it happen from the time before my transition (now only really my family) never quite succeeded to see me as anything other than a gnc woman. To quote my dad: "You look like a woman who's trying to look like a man." Although I'm sure my mom and sister don't have quite as harsh views about me, lol. They still seem to see me the way they always have, regardless of what name or pronouns they use for me.

This matters, because although people who know I'm transitioned and may even have witnessed my transition from the beginning, struggle to see me as a man (which I respect entirely and I'm VERY careful to not push wanting to be seen/read as anything in particular, but also, people do not want to be rude, especially irl) that does not go for people who have never even seen me before the moment I walk into... say, a public bathroom. To them I cannot possibly be anything other than a man, and it's almost impossible to change their view of me as male once their brains have registered me as such. I need to conjure up pretty fucking compelling evidence to shatter that view they have of me.

This is important, because it means I cannot feasibly use female only spaces, unless someone else (who is also female) vouches for me and explains my situation for me. This is, most likely due to people being more likely to believe an unlikely explanation when it's told by someone else, because maybe I could be lying; and only someone of the same sex as me can accompany/escort me into female only spaces, obviously. But even then, there's a ton of tension around my presentation. An air of distrust, basically. The question that hangs in the air: "Is that a trans woman?" even after they've been given a thorough explanation of my situation. It's uncomfortable for everyone involved. Imagine how it goes then if I'd just show up unannounced, and without someone to vouch for me. I just get booted on sight.

Yes, I can whine about this all day, but that is NOT my point.

My point is that I'm either directly, or implicitly, unwelcome in female only spaces, despite being biologically female, because of my transitioned appearance... despite I'm not even on testosterone anymore since 2 years ago. Sure, most gnc women (whether transitioned or not) don't seem to have turned out quite as passable as me, but clearly, it happens. So let's stop pretending that it doesn't.

So with that in mind, I don't always have access to a gender neutral space. Like for example when I travel with the ferry that goes between my island and the mainland of my country, there is only men's bathrooms and women's bathrooms. No third option. That's a 3 hour boat ride, and with my coffee drinking habit, I will need to pee at some point or another while aboard that ship, alright. And no, peeing in the ocean is not an option, as squatting over the railing would be incredibly dangerous, and most likely not even remotely allowed. Granted, I don't take the ferry often, it's just the most clear example I can think of. Because it's my only means of transportation to/from the mainland, except from flying, which is incredibly expensive, less reliable and obviously an environmental hazard. So when I do have to use that ferry, I'm kinda stuck with my choices.

So then, am I better off going with the men's or women's bathroom? I am much more likely to be left alone to do my business in the men's, so even though that is not the space I want to be in, nor do I think it's "right" for me to be there, sometimes it's even a bit scary, other times even impractical if there's only urinals and no stall, and it's absolutely not validating at all - it's the only bathroom that I can realistically use, without too much trouble. And I don't want trouble. But I also hate having to put my own safety on the backburner for the perceived safety of other women, who are not actually at any higher safety risk when left alone with me.

So, onto the more general, political aspects of this issue:

Women in male only spaces may be less of an issue in regards to safety, at least for the majority of people (men) in that space, especially if the woman in question passes as male. No one gives a fuck, generally. But problem is then that she is at far greater risk than the majority of people (women) would be with a single male, in a female only space. As I think a group of women against one male is generally less risk towards the women, when compared to a group of men against a single female, which can be extremely dangerous for her. Although I've so far never been faced with any sort of violence in a male only space, let's not pretend that my presense in a male only space is somehow LESS dangerous for me, than how dangerous the presense of ONE male in a space with a whole group of women, would be for those women. Statistically and realistically, I'm at a far greater risk than they are, and no, I do not have any more choice in the matter than they do.

Thus, this kinda skewed idea of safety and choice, becomes a question of ethics, I think.

Furthermore, I'm a person of principles, and it wouldn't sit right with me that if males should never under any circumstances be allowed in female spaces, but females could be allowed in male spaces. I refuse to be a hypocrit on purpose! No, if males should never under any circumstances be allowed in female spaces, then females should also never under any circumstances be allowed in male spaces. OR, if females CAN under some special circumstances be allowed into male spaces, then males should be allowed the same in female spaces. Both of these solutions pose serious problems, which I keep seeing being brushed under the carpet a lot, and that annoys me.

But if we go with the first idea, of barring people from using opposite sex spaces altogether, then where the fuck do I pee? Should I utilise my "right" to use female spaces, despite making everyone uncomfortable and feeling threatened by my presense, as well as risking being kicked out and forced to use the equivalent male spaces anyway, which is exactly what that idea is meant to prevent - or should I completely avoid being in places which I know does not have a gender neutral bathroom, such as the ferry? Would that not be discrimination? Which is the most reasonable option here, what is the most practical, what's wrong and what's right? Do I even have a RIGHT to use female bathrooms, and if so, how do I prove it, considering my ID still says I'm male?

Trans men aren't gonna be nearly as willing to use female only spaces, and trans women definitely not eager to use male only spaces. But aside from that validation factor, I have the exact same struggle as trans people do on this particular point. Quite often they do toss and turn at which bloody bathroom to pick, not just out of validation, but because they genuinely struggle to figure out which one is the best option for them practically. Especially if they don't quite pass as either sex, and most and foremost just wanna do their business without unneccesary drama.

Also, to clarify: barring trans people from opposite sex spaces is NOT discrimination, as they never belonged there to begin with - but leaving them with no other option than to pee themselves, is. Which means that I think it's fucked up to barr them from those spaces BEFORE having solved the problem of "if they can't go there, then where?"

Perhaps I'm the only one around here who cares about males' integrity, safety and human rights. But even if so, I should not be the only one to care about gnc females' integrity, safety and rights. Male-passing females, whether transitioned or not, whether bearded or not, are still female, and if we don't want them in female only spaces, and not in male only spaces either; why? Because they "chose" to medically transition and/or dress in men's clothing?

Yeah, well, in most cases of transitioned females, they transitioned because of dysphoria, which no one chooses to have. It's a medical condition. Barring people from spaces they'd otherwise be welcomed into, due to the visual outcome of the treatment of their medical condition... is ableism. Barring a woman from a female only space she belongs in, solely because her unusual physical appearance freaks you out... is ableism. Also, simply being gnc and being viscerally uncomfortable with presenting femininely is also not a choice. And even if it was... shouldn't it be? That's why I cannot roll with that sorta solution. I dunno if it counts as a form of discrimination by definition, but it just smells a lot like it from where I sit. That it's no more right to toss me out of, or give me trouble, in a women's bathroom, than a masculine women who also passes as male but who has not medically transitioned.

That said, however, women's safety DOES matter a lot to me. Hence my reluctance to join their spaces, despite being a woman myself. I guess, what I'd want is complete sex segregation to work in my favour, but I can't promote a rule that would discriminate against me. I'm sorry, I just can't. I desire FUNCTIONAL sex segregated spaces, but realistically they cannot function. Truth is that the only womens spaces I've been allowed into since I began passing as male, are "trans inclusionary" ones that openly allow in trans women, ironically. I care about the safety of other women, and their right to have their own spaces... but not at the expense of my own rights, as a fellow woman. To say otherwise would be a crime against myself. I really wish this could be solved in some way that would work in practice, but honestly I don't think it can anytime soon. Not without some seriously tried and proven, practical and humane methods to check what sex people entering single sex spaces actually are.

That is the reality that people have to face. And personally I'd rather focus on women's rights than trans rights, but as a woman who's medically transitioning, I'd shoot my own foot no matter which one I'd choose. That's quite a dilemma.

So where my opinion stands on this right now, is basically this: I think female only spaces should only be for biological women, but I'm reluctantly okay-ish with males who pass as female utilising female only spaces, and vice versa for females in male only spaces. However, this does not feel ideal at all. It's a compromise. Ideally, I want such spaces to be entirely sex segregated, and for even people who pass as the opposite sex (like myself) to be allowed into spaces of their biological sex. My appeal here is both realistic practicality with the reality that some people really do pass as the opposite sex, as well as the safety, rights and integrity of male-passing women.

[honibee-arts]

dramatic villain nie huaisang and hero jiang cheng? maybe nie huaisang flirts with the hero while jiang cheng is kinda horny but has a duty to fulfill?

Just a warning this gets a little steamy but its a kind of pan to the window vibe. I will mark this as NSFWish text to be safe though.

"Jie, I don't think I can get all of these people out of here in time.” Jiang Cheng panted into his headset, holding the crumbling ceiling up with one arm, watching the people run out.

He heard his sister sigh, her manicured nails clicking against her keyboard.

“Lightbearer and Moonbeam should be on the scene in the next two minutes.” she replied.

“Jie, I don’t have two minutes. This building is going to collapse in the next thirty fucking seconds.” 

“A-Cheng, language.”

“I’m holding up a building, I don’t even have super strength. I’m gonna die like this. Can’t you tell them to hurry up?” He grit his teeth. He’s going to have a fucking hernia and broken bones after this shit, and he was going to make that stoic asshole Lightbearer pay for his goddamn medical bills. He probably had more than enough money.

“They’re going as fast as they can, A-Cheng.”

“And your boyfriend couldn’t come and help?”

“A-Xuan’s taking A-Ling today so you could patrol, remember?”

“It’s hard to remember when I’m being crushed.”

Jiang Cheng widened his stance, pushing the crumbling ceiling back up with both hands, growling in pain. Black spots began to gather in his vision, his static flickering across his visor from the strain on his suit. 

“We’ll take it from here, thank you, Violet Spider.” Came Moonbeam’s firm yet gentle tone, taking the weight literally off of Jiang Cheng’s shoulders.

“About fucking time.” He wheezed, taking a deep breath as his arms dropped by his sides, wincing in pain.

“Would appreciate some gratitude.” Lightbearer huffed petulantly as he helped his brother carefully lift the falling ceiling back up, holding it there in an eerie white glow.

Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes as the remaining people rushed past them, scrambling to get out of there as quickly as possible. Jiang Cheng didn’t blame them in their haste, not one bit. He didn’t like being the one to hold that shit up.

“Are you alright, A-Cheng?” His sister asked in his earpiece, the display on his visor recalibrating.

“Yeah, yeah. Just. Exhausted...” he stood back and caught his breath.

“I’ll make sure to have some lotus rib soup for you when you get home, A-Cheng. I’ll check over your injuries too.”

“A-Jie, you don’t need to do that.”

“Aiya, hush. It’s nothing. I’ll check what the damages are to your suit too.”

“A-Jie...”

“No buts, A-Cheng.”

He sighed and looked down, his hair falling over his visor as he stared at the rubble beneath his feet.

“I’m going to have the longest goddamn nap in history after this.”

“You deserve it, A-Cheng.” A-Jie hummed. “Thank you, A-Xuan.” she said softly, sipping what Jiang Cheng assumed was a cup of tea handed to her by her boyfriend.

In his visor, purple warning symbols flared up in his periphery.

“A-Cheng-”

“On it.” He said as he spotted a flare of green a few blocks away. Gritting his teeth against the ache in his arms, Jiang Cheng jumped up onto the wall of the nearest building, scaling it as quickly as possible and sprinting across the rooftops.

Sometimes, only sometimes, Jiang Cheng hated this fucking job. Sure, he could have a normal 9-5 job and earn a stable income, but no, he just had to be born the son of Yunmeng’s protector and inherit her powers and mantle, along with a load of fucking pressure. He just had to have been trained intensely by his mother, day in and day out from the second his powers manifested at 11. He just had to have had the heroes instinct and the motto of “Attempt the impossible” drummed into him since he was a child.

As much as he wanted to push back against his instinct to protect in favour of his exhaustion sometimes, he couldn’t stop himself. 

The blasts led him to the Jin Corporation office building in Yunping, only a half mile from the crumbling building he was just almost crushed under.

“A-Jie, the source is coming from the Jin Corp. offices in Yunping.”

“Mm. I saw. The building that you were just in was a Jin owned business too.” She replied thoughtfully.

“Does your boyfriend know anything about someone that might have been slated by his father? Cousin maybe?”

“Nothing. I know Jin Guangyao had a complicated relationship with Red Blade. There were rumours about him having something to do with his retirement.”

‘Retirement’ had been a delicate way of putting what happened to Red Blade. When Jiang Cheng had first come onto the hero scene, Red Blade had taken him under his wing. He had been something of an older brother figure, despite being the protector of Qinghe rather than Yunmeng. 

He had been familiar with Jiang Cheng’s abilities, having also been mentored by Jiang Cheng’s predecessor. Everyone knew and respected Red Blade. His super strength and speed was matched by none, in his prime he could leap a building in a single bound and punch a meteor out of the sky without so much as a single scratch. With all that power however, came a price. Red Blade had been prone to feral rages which were difficult to pull him out of, very few people could. Moonbeam seemed to be the only one beside whoever was in his ear all the time who could do it.

About six months ago, Red Blade had disappeared for three days. Moonbeam had found him snarling and bleeding from his eyes, his right arm severed and his eyes white. How Red Blade had survived, Jiang Cheng had no idea. After a few weeks in a medically induced coma, Red Blade had announced his retirement and hung up his mantle for good. Only Moonbeam was said to know what had happened to him following his retirement. There was sometime unspoken between those two that Jiang Cheng couldn’t quite figure out but stank of probably resolved sexual tension.

“Shit!” Jiang Cheng cursed, narrowly avoiding a blast of green energy, rolling onto the nearest roof and ducking for cover.

“A-Cheng.” A-Jie chided.

“Like you didn’t say worse when you were being shot at.” Jiang Cheng argued, sending a bolt of violet lighting back.

“Back in the day, I didn’t run my mouth like a sailor, A-Cheng.” 

“I bet you don’t miss this part of heroing, huh?”

“There are times I am grateful I took a permanent maternity leave, yes.” She replied. “A-Cheng! On your left! Someone’s coming your way, and its not anyone on the Lotus servers. Be on your guard.”

Jiang Cheng nodded and raised his hackles as a a figure cloaked in blinding green energy floated onto the building, their black heels clicking against the concrete roof. As soon as the figure was close enough, Jiang Cheng shot a bolt of lightning in their direction, yet, to his horror, it was deflected easily.

“Come on out little spider, I won’t hurt you.” The figure said.

Jiang Cheng swallowed thickly and stepped out, hackles still raised.

“Aiya, so defensive. Put your arms down so I can see your pretty face. I won’t try anything.” Jiang Cheng slowly lowered his arms but kept his guard up, stance firm. “So stubborn. That’s better though, hello handsome.” 

The figure was slender, androgynous with long, dark hair that shone in their eerie green glow and flowed behind them in the wind, their eyes afire with the energy that seemed pulse from their entire being, almost drawing Jiang Cheng in like a moth to a particularly deadly yet hard to resist flame. Their body was wrapped in a skin-tight leather-like substance with mesh panels, leaving even less to the imagination, half of their face obscured by a mask that started at the neck and wrapped around his mouth and nose.

Jiang Cheng swallowed thickly, ready to burst into action whenever necessary.

“And what should I call you?” Jiang Cheng said steadily.

“Well, I go by he/him pronouns, but I do quite like it when sexy men like you call me beautiful.” He giggled, bouncing on his heels a little. “Binary terms are horseshit anyway, gender is a social construct.”

“Not what I meant but. I don’t like misgendering people. Even if they’re tearing up half the fucking city. So. Thanks.”

“Well, I haven’t really given myself a name yet.” The man hummed, snapping open one of the fans in his hand and fluttering it lightly. “Kinda just wanted to do one thing and hang up the whole thing I guess.”

“And you wanted to what, not get caught?”

“Well, something of the sort.”

“And you assumed you could do this tearing up half the city looking like a green lava lamp dressed like a hooker?”

“A-Cheng! Be nice!”

“Yes, listen to your sister, A-Cheng.”

“How do you know that!” Jiang Cheng snapped, his hands sparking.

“Whoa, whoa, easy hot stuff, I mean you and your family no harm. You have your headset on way too loud and everyone can hear you saying A-Jie so. Go figure.”

“Alright... I’ll be more mindful in the future.”

“He seems genuine, A-Cheng. I’m going to log off for now, but I’ll keep an eye on your vitals and see if you seem like you need help.”

“Alright...” He heard the line go quiet, her lotus icon in the corner of his visor going totally transparent. 

“Is it just us?” The man asked. 

“Yeah. Just us. So. What the fuck is your deal?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“The Jin corporation have fucked plenty of innocent people over, but there are also innocent people in that tower you’re trying to destroy.”

“They’re collateral. I’ve accepted those losses.” The man said, his demeanour turning cold suddenly.

“Are you fucking crazy?”

“You wouldn’t understand my motivations.” The man turned around and stared ahead at the slowly burning building ahead of them.

“Ugh, what is it with villains and cryptic bullshit? I can’t let you wreck the fucking building, okay?”

“Watch me.”

Jiang Cheng lunged and grabbed his arm, earning a blast of green energy to his solar plexus that sent him staggering. Today was not his day. 

“If you want a fight, then fine.” The man said, rolling his shoulders. “I’m just sorry I’ll have to kick that glorious ass of yours.”

Jiang Cheng felt his cheeks flush. 

“Oh please, the spandex doesn’t hide shit.” The man said before lunging at Jiang Cheng.

Yeah, okay. This was a day Jiang Cheng really hated his fucking job. His muscles screamed with exhaustion as the man tackled him to the roof, straddling him and pinning his arms above his head. Maybe he was tired and his resolve was slipping, or maybe he had been rocking a semi for a fair amount of the fight and could admit this man was fucking hot despite his different side of the law.

The tightly coiled strength in his deceivingly slender limbs forced Jiang Cheng down as he straddled his lap. As he brushed his groin, Jiang Cheng let out a slight groan.

“Hold on,” The man said, sitting back. “Are you hard? Does fighting me turn you on?”

“Sh-Shut up! Are we gonna fight or not?!” He struggled under his grip.

Fuck, okay. The man was right. This was humiliating. Why does he enjoy this?

“I dunno, do you want some help with that?” The man purred, his long, thick lashes fanning over his cheeks as he leaned in closer, shifting his hips ever so slightly and earning another groan from Jiang Cheng.

“Are you crazy? I’m meant to be fighting you!”

“I know but, I kinda like this vibe we have going. Do you?”

Jiang Cheng bit his lip and looked away, nodding.

“I need a verbal yes.”

“You care about that?”

“I’m an anarchist not a monster, damn. Answer me.”

“Y-yes.”

“Yes what?”

“I... I like... this.”

“And is it a yes that you consent to this rooftop encounter?”

“C’mon I already said-”

“Yes or no spider. I won’t take that horseshit for an answer.”

“... Yes. I would like you to. Help me out.”

“Good,” he hummed, hooking a black gloved finger in his mask and tugging it down, revealing soft, pink lips pulled into a suggestive smirk. “I’m glad to be of service.” and he leaned down to press his lips to Jiang Cheng’s.

[mememanufactorum]

Halo: Combat Evolved quote starters

* FEEL FREE TO SHARE AS YOU PLEASE, NO CREDIT NEEDED. CHANGE PRONOUNS OR ANYTHING ELSE AS DESIRED.

-The Pillar of Autumn-

“All I need to know is, did we lose them?”

“So, where do we stand?”

“Let’s give our old friends a warm welcome.”

“Move like you got a purpose!”

“When we meet the enemy, we will rip their skulls from their spines and toss ‘em away, laughing!”

“We’re gonna blow the hell out of those dumb bugs until we don’t have anything left to shoot ‘em with!”

“We stumbled onto something they’re so hot for that they’re scrambling over each other to get to it.”

“I don’t care if it’s God’s own anti-son-of-a-bitch machine or a giant hula-hoop, we’re NOT gonna let ‘em have it!”

“What we WILL let them have is a belly full of lead and a pool of their own blood to drown in!”

“Come on, we’ve gotta get the hell out of here!”

“Sleep well?”

“So you did miss me.”

“With all due respect, this war has enough dead heroes.”

“Don’t get any funny ideas.”

“Now would be a very good time to leave!”

“Sure you wouldn’t rather take a seat?”

“We’ll be fine.”

-Halo-

“Can you hear me? At last! Are you alright? Can you move?”

“There’s nothing we can do.”

“They must be looking for survivors.”

“Welcome to the party!”

“I thought we were in real trouble.”

“Another bandit droppin’ in behind us, they’re tryin’ to flank us!”

“We couldn’t save them…”

“We’re in a bad way, we’ve got wounded here.”

“They’re all dead.”

“There are weapons and supplies everywhere but I can’t find any bodies. Maybe somebody made it out of here alive?”

“Maybe they took cover in that structure. Let’s check it out.”

-Truth and Reconciliation-

“So how do we get inside the ship if it’s in the air? The Corps issued me a rifle, not wings.”

“The Corps ain’t payin’ us by the hour!”

“Don’t open fire until you hear the enemy return fire on us. That should let us keep the element of surprise.”

“Let ‘em have it!”

“Alright! Are we bad or what?!”

“Mother of God… I never thought I’d get close to one of these things.”

“If we’re gonna board that thing, we need a plan.”

“That’s us: The few, the proud, the expendable.”

“Contact, enemy in sight!”

“Man, there’s always something…”

“Maybe nobody’s home?”

“Contacts! Lots of contacts!”

“Ya HAD to open your mouth!”

“We’d be sitting ducks in that narrow space.”

“Alright, everybody stay cool. Yell if you see anything.”

“I’m going to call for reinforcements. There’s no sense going in with anything less than full strength.”

“Coming here was reckless, you know better than this… Thanks.”

“Aw man, we’re trapped in here! We’re screwed! We’re screwed, man!”

“Time for a little payback.”

-The Silent Cartographer-

“We’re approaching the LZ, it’s gonna be hot!”

“Get set to come out swingin’!”

“Anyone else see what I see? How are we supposed to get around that, huh?”

“Okay, people, we got company comin’. Let’s set the table.”

“I hope your analysis is on the money.”

-Assault on the Control Room-

“This is as far as I can go.”

“Roger that. Make it quick.”

“Glad you could join the party!”

“They did their damndest, that’s for sure.”

“I wouldn’t have given us a snowball’s chance until you showed up.”

“Aw crap, let’s get the hell out of here, man!”

“You stow that garbage RIGHT now.”

“Shut up. Show some backbone.”

“It’s time to earn our pay.”

“It’s gonna be a busy day.”

“Looks like that armor wasn’t so tough after all! Let’s mop up the rest of ‘em!”

“Man, these guys are like cockroaches!”

“Anybody else hear that? Aw, man…”

“They’ve got us pinned down over here!”

“That terminal, try there.”

“You all right?”

“Never been better!”

“You can’t imagine the wealth of information! The knowledge, so much, so fast… It’s glorious.”

“So… What sort of weapon is it?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Let’s stay focused.”

“It’s something else… Something much more important.”

“They must have known, there must have been signs!”

“Slow down, you’re losing me.”

-343 Guilty Spark-

“Stay back! Stay back! You’re not turning me into one of those things!”

“I’ll blow your brains out! Get away from me!”

“Don’t touch me, you freaks!”

“I won’t be like you! I’ll die first!”

“Find your own hiding place! The monsters are everywhere!”

“Play dead! That’s what I did… Played dead…”

“They took the live ones… Oh god, I can still hear them!”

“Just leave me alone!”

“They’re gone! Get it?! Gone!”

“They won’t get me!”

“I don’t wanna be like them…”

“Why do we always have to listen to this old stuff?”

“Watch your mouth. This ‘stuff’ is your history. It should remind you grunts what we’re fightin’ to protect.”

“Better it than us.”

“You ask ‘em real nice the next you see ‘em. I’m sure they’ll be happy to oblige.”

“I mean – look at it. Something... Scrambled the insides.”

“Maybe there was an accident? You know, friendly fire or something?”

“Real pretty. Friend of yours?”

“Right. Well, let’s get this door open.”

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this…”

“You always got a bad feeling about something.”

“We’ve been lost out here for hours.”

-The Library-

“Ah, I am a genius… Heeheeheehee!”

“Oh, hello!”

“Oh, that’s a good idea!”

“Oh, how unfortunate.”

“Ah, a pity.”

“Please, stop being human.”

“That is totally unnecessary.”

“We have much more important business here.”

“Please control your temper.”

“Are you finished yet?”

“Please conserve your ammo.”

“If you do not follow me, you may become lost.”

“Please stay close. Time is short.”

-Two Betrayals-

“Is something wrong?”

“Splendid. Shall we?”

“Unfortunately, my usefulness to this particular endeavor has come to an end.”

“Odd. That wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“I’ve spent the last 12 hours cooped up in here, watching you toady about, helping that thing get set to slit our throats!”

“Hold on now. He’s a friend.”

“Oh! I didn’t realize. He’s your pal, is he? Your chum? Do you have any idea what that bastard almost made you do?!”

“Sod off!”

“What impertinence! I shall purge you at once!”

“You sure that’s a good idea?”

“How… How... How dare you!”

“Enough!”

“Is it true?”

“But you already knew that. I mean… How couldn’t you?”

“Left out that little detail, did he?”

“We have followed outbreak containment procedure to the letter. You were with me every step of the way.”

“Why would you hesitate to do what you have already done?”

“We need to go right now!”

“Last time you asked me, if it were my choice, would I do it? Having had considerable time to ponder your query, my answer has not changed.”

“Get us out of here!”

“If you are unwilling to help, I will simply find another.”

“That’s NOT going to happen.”

“So be it. Save his head, dispose of the rest.”

“No, that’ll take too long.”

“You have a better idea?”

“Something tells me I’m not gonna like this.”

-Keyes-

“Right. Sorry.”

“Don’t be a fool… Leave me…”

“We need to jump now!”

“He’s delirious! In pain! We have to find him!”

“You know what he’d expect… What he’d WANT us to do.”

-The Maw-

“This thing is falling apart!”

“We’re not gonna make it!”

“We’ll make it.”

“You did that on purpose, didn’t you?”

“Let’s get to work.”

“I leave home for a few days, and look what happens.”

“I’m afraid that’s out of the question, really.”

“Oh, hell.”

“You can’t imagine how exciting this is! To have a record of all our lost time!”

“Oh, how I will enjoy every moment of its categorization!”

“I am shocked. Almost too shocked for words.”

“Why do you continue to fight us? You cannot win.”

“Okay, I’m coming with you.”

“Do you require medical attention?”

“Oh, how touching.”

“Your behavior is not in accordance with established protocols.”

“Why do you continue to ignore your task?”

“Are you perhaps ill?”

“Your behavior necessitates repair and revision.”

“Things are gettin’ noisy down there. Everything okay?”

“If we move now, we can make it!”

“We’re cutting it close!”

“Fancy a look?”

“Did anyone else make it?”

“We’re all that’s left…”

“We did what we had to do.”

“No, I think we’re just getting started.”

[heeres-suffering]

Be More Alluring: a Personality Swap AU

[pic description and source will be at the bottom of this post, under the read more]

Start of summary:

“You need to be more alluring.”

"... don’t you mean attractive?”

“I do not. Your attractiveness is adequate, Brooke; if you want to mask your apparently latent queerness, you have to make them want you straight. Isn’t that why your step-father defended you?” 

Brooke Lohst is a loser.

But you know what? That was okay.

She always knew she was a weird one. The intensity of her affection for puppies, picture books, and near-constant daydreaming has lasted well-past a normalcy she can’t seem to grasp; when coupled with her inability to befriend anyone (besides the similarly self-identified loser Michael Mell), it’s not a surprise the rest of her peers have left her behind.

However, there were... ah, worse things in her life to worry about then some mild bullying. She liked her passion well enough, and all of her true insecurities went largely unnoticed, so any insults or weird looks rarely lingered in her mind. It’s not like she was a constant target either, which helped a lot. All in all, she just planned to hunker down, wait out the awkwardness of High School like everyone else, and move on to the rest of her life... 

Except.

When Brooke develops a crush on a girl she’s never talked to, after years of avoiding fairy tale romance and trying not to think about the inevitability of marriage (or how finicky her attraction to boys is in the first place), it feels like her whole world is about to cave in. She’d do anything to make sure her parents, especially daddy, never find out... including buying an edible super computer from the loudest, tiniest guy in school.

End of summary.

Alright!

Hi, hello, it’s Mod Seb, and here’s an AU I’ve been rolling around for a few days! You are free to do with this concept whatever you want, but I wanted to introduce it with a good chunk of the info I’ve already worked out in my head.

So. As the CWs are... too numerous, I’m going to go with a blanket “Dead Dove: Do Not Eat” label and encourage you not to read the rest of this if you have any big darkfic triggers that could be upset by mere mention; this isn’t a fic tho, so descriptions of anything awful won’t last long. 

Although, I will mention upfront that Brooke isn’t a binary lesbian. I know the description might read like I’m setting her up to be 100% homosexual; she’s bi with a strong preference for girls, and anyone who presents soft enough in gender or appearance. If it wasn’t for the end-game pairings, her unfamiliarity with smaller details/history of the LGBTQ+ community, and general “gay newb” status, she’d likely ID as a bi lesbian!

(ships and everything else under the Read More)

Okay. That out of the way, there’s quite a number of pairings; I’m pretty sure it’s a super polyamorous and sexual AU, though you’re free to change this list as much as you’d like:

[bolded are end-game ships. italics physically hook up at least once. strike-through means they were in a relationship but break-up in some way before the ending. (H) stands for healthy, while (T) is toxic and/or noncon. underlined characters are pining for the other and may never confess their true feelings]

Brooke/Christine (H), Brooke/Rich (H), Brooke/Jenna (H), Brooke/Michael (H), Brooke/Chloe (T), Brooke/her Daddy (T), Brooke/Squip (H), Brooke/Jeremy (soft T at first bc of mirrored canon-compliant manipulation, H later on), Brooke/Squip/Jeremy (H), Brooke/Squip/Jeremy/Rich (H), Rich/Moses (H), [insert every form of Rich/Mo/Squip/Jeremy here] (H), Jeremy/Chloe (T), Jeremy/Michael (H), Michael/Christine (H), Michael/Christine/Mr. Heere (H; no, seriously), Madeline/Brooke (H)

This is, of course, a role swap AU where Brooke and Jeremy trade places based on my personal lore for their home lives. I always have some pretty fucked ideas as I don’t imagine MB is a great place with great adults, and I pick and choose which parts of canons I use and which I don’t. 

There is no definite ending planned in mind as this isn’t an outline; it’s meta (or an imagine or w/e) for an AU that you’re free to do whatever with. 

So,

The big difference is that Brooke was picked by Michael, while Jeremy was picked by Chloe. Jeremy is trans and hadn’t come out yet; if Chloe had known he was a boy, she wouldn’t have grabbed him. In contrast, Michael’s never gave a shit about potential friends genders.

Jer and B’s personalities... are altered some. Not ALL the way, but kiiinda fusing into their roles, kinda tweaked (I'll get back to that).

The main point of this for me was Brooke/Squip/Jeremy, with B/Jer having a MUCH stronger focus than in canon, and a really bad Chloe acting as one of the major villains.

Michael gets roped into Chloe’s shit, even tho he's still generally a good guy here, bc he's worried about B and thinks she can't properly take care of herself.

While B DOES have a strong crush on Christine, she’s the opposite of the Squip’s “goal”; that’s (obvs) masking, or making passably digestible, her queerness.

Her Mom and step-’Daddy’ have reacted to her friendship w/ ‘openly gay moms, also very flamboyant and GNC’ Michael... poorly.

Michael thinks the solution has to be “act as aggressively yourself as you can, and if they reject you, you know me and the mom’s have a space for you”. This works for him bc he’s permanently hyper-visible, what with all of his own marginalized identities. But, not only has she flied under the radar in comparison to him for years, he doesn’t know everything about her life.

In fact, he doesn’t know most of it. She’s very good at hiding things.

Meanwhile, Jeremy, one of the more popular ‘boy... ish’ (we’ll get to this, too) people in school, is mid-psychosis and self-destruction. He actually has schizo-affective disorder--as is the case with all of my versions of Jeremy--which he needs medication for. Combined that with so many bad influences and trauma, he can no longer fully control himself or his life.

The way he handles this (badly) is to ‘whore around’--which, besides being Chloe’s pet, is kinda why he’s so popular. Nobody respects him, but he’s viewed some form of favorably.

Jeremy is in a relationship with Rich, but he won't let him get as close/protective as Rich wants; Mo and Rich were doing their own man-whoring (but healthy, just droppin’ panties and making dudes and chicks swoon--yeah, Rich is out as bisexual, this is a very ‘the Squips are a good thing’ AU) to gain their standard reputation, but in the course of that, they got together with Jeremy and it became... complicated. Both of them are very "nnn" about how bad his life is for Jer.

The way that their personalities are altered is... okay. To explain this, I have to talk about my characterization of canon-Brooke and Jeremy in relation to this, starting with Brooke:

I imagine B as just a liiittle below the line of "all the way there" for sorta-similar reasons to Jeremy here: trauma, and Chloe (which is why that’s what Jeremy gets in this, it’s just WAY worse when compounded by everything else). She’s also--like me, and like almost every character I write as a result--autistic, in a near-permanent state of “not enough accommodations” and over-stimulation. This leads to a lot of dissociation and a very wandering mind, as well as being perceived as a bimbo or dumb blonde or w/e misogynistic bullshit is projected onto her by the boys she dates (she’s also much more down the middle bi outside this AU).

So, going back to how she is for this AU: she's actually not super nerdy, despite the close connection she and Michael have. Honestly, it’s their general neurodivergent weirdness that bring them together, and so she’s mostly adopted her nerdy interests through him, whether directly a thing he likes, or finding a whimsical variant that fits her tastes.

Obviously, unlike Jeremy, she doesn’t mind being called a loser. She does any insinuation she might be queer. This including anyone who calls her gay or a dyke.

She has too much Cis Male Trauma (unlike canon, where it comes from both cis angles) to really entertain the idea of a Traditionally Male Partner. This means she skews HEAVILY towards hard GNC guys at the very least, and generally finds herself most interested in the idea of enbies and women. she's also not super into butches tho, bc her trauma mixing with her sexuality has latched on to Strong Masc People Are A Threat. 

An expansion on her interests, in canon and otherwise: animals, ASMR/sensual service work (including massages and stuff), spending hours just sorta sitting by herself and letting her imagination wander, fairy tales, and YA-and-under fantasy books.

(Here, she tries to avoid het or f/f romance... except that, this past year or two, she’s started really like m/m stuff--esp after getting REALLY into drag shows, which she could enjoy safely since girls like Chloe have gotten into them too; in canon, she’s a romance fanatic)

Now... this is one of the really darkfic element; she's fucking her step-dad. 

She does this so that he doesn't walk out on her, her mom, and her little sister*. Her mom has a good-enough job as a standard office woman, but he makes enough to pay the rent on their nice townhouse and all the bills she can’t. So, after he expressed interest in Brooke and then casually mentioned he could always just leave if she wasn’t comfortable, she reluctantly entered a relationship with him

(* = her sister is currently know as her brother; he’s like 12 or 13, and started showing signs of trans/queerness which have been Heavily Discouraged. Brooke worries about him a lot)

((I didn’t use she/her pronouns bc I’m not entirely sure he would change them? This is an OC Oli created at the beginning of our interest in BMC, and we haven’t worked on him at all since, so how his characterization will be is up in the air))

Canonically, Brooke's "in love" with her daddy, which is a self-imposed delusion; if she actually addressed it, she’d says she’s well aware that’s not true, but it's so much easier to pretend when you’re cornered like that. Brooke’s life blows.

She’s a lot more honest to herself about hating him here; still, she tries to be as polite and generally-friendly as she can, doing what he says whenever he wants.

OKAY, THAT’S BROOKE. If any of that is badly described or potentially-offensive, it’s just bc I glossed over SO MUCH DETAIL, even in that amount of it!

So. Jeremy.

I don’t have to go over him much and we’re all mostly aware of how I feel about him and also I don’t have the energy to do this again--

(just... read my fics The Devil at your Door or hello yesterday or something... eyyy actually do that, my ao3 username is Sedusa, blah blah blah ANYWAY)

--but basically: He's still very nerdy, like, he’s super into film as well as video games (which is another constant for me), but after being largely ignored in elementary, he's been trailing behind Chloe at her orders since they were in 6th grade. As a result he isn't very open about... any of his interests.

In 7th grade, he came out as trans to everyone. Chloe was furious, but at the same time, intrigued; this was around the time Chloe gets her own... ah shit I gotta go into that too--

--yet another hc of mine is that Chloe gets a Squip on accident around this time at a party (there was one in a “”candy bowl””), and from there, she claws her way up the ladder. I... will not go into that much, but her Squip was crippled by the drugs and alcohol in her system, and therefore largely at her mercy. She’s used his power to manipulate certain things about herself and to sharpen her focus on popularity to the point she’s full-blown Alpha Bitch.

Man, I’ve had to go on so many tangents, I apologize.

Anyway, she drags Jeremy around as a punching bag. She constantly mocks Jeremy's transness, even though she usually calls him by his correct name and pronouns.

This has made the rest of the school follow her lead, hence why I said “boy-ish”; he’s popular, he’s technically ‘well liked’, but nobody really takes him seriously. This is compounded by Chloe’s refusal to let him dress in 'dorky' casual clothes, and, as he’s both too poor to afford designer clothes and also generally hates popular guy fashion, he has to wear the hyper femme clothing Chloe specifically tells him too/

As such, people call him a boy but largely see him as either an idiot, a slut, an attention seeker, or all of the above.

So of course, in Brooke's place, his neurodivergence is more prominent than ever; every day he slips further into this psychosis and self-infantilization haze, as his his mom leaving, his dad severely depressed, Chloe's sexual violence, and other repressed trauma (see: my fic hello yesterday on ao3) all weighing on him. This makes him INCREDIBLY regressed, like, all the time by Junior year.

And then Brooke's Squip (IE: canon Squip) falls in love with Jeremy extremely fucking hard. He pushes her to date him as a way to compromise on her queer desires, since Jeremy is technically a boy, and certainly a few other straight-ish girls have hooked up with him in the past.

WHEW. That is a fucking lot. To wrap this up, lemme go over the interpersonal relationships not already mentioned, and what directions I think it takes.

First off, Madeline has a more prominent role, as I quite like her tbh; she’s a sex worker, she has her own Squip, she’s one of Chloe’s most hated enemies, and she gravitates towards both Brooke and Jeremy. She’s also Actually French, Chloe’s just weird.

(Anyway she prolly sees through Brooke’s straight act and asks her why she’s pretending to be a good little cishet. It rattles Brooke.)

Chloe is scum. This bears repeating. She DEFINITELY rapes Brooke at the Halloween party, and becomes obsessed with her, along with already being obsessed with Jeremy and Jake. 

Jake, by the way, has a lot of regressive behavior and impulsiveness bc he’s been in an abusive relationship off and on with Chloe for years now.

Speaking of Jake, moving on to his best bro: Rich doesn’t set himself on fire. He’s having a good time with his Squip.

But.

He IS set on fire at the Halloween party.

Instead of the Smartphone Hour being about Rich's instability, it's actually about the mystery of Someone Did It To Him But No One Saw Who It Was, They Were Disguised.

The answer relates to the fact that Rich and Brooke are ALSO hooking up, after she’s already with Jeremy, bc he Properly introduces her to him and the three of them hit it off really well.

(She initially wasn’t interested, but while Rich is loud and still kinda abrasive, his Squip doesn’t drive him to act like a bully--and in private, his nerdiness is really obvious and he’s extremely gentle with her and Jeremy. Add to that that he’s bi and trans*, when Brooke connects best w/ queer men over cishet one, and it off-sets his masc-ness enough to make him an Exception.

* = I always imagine him as trans. See: all of Vanceypants fics.)

Sooo... the culprit is actually Brooke's daddy, who sees her with this obvious heartthrob and Cannot let that be.

Chloe convinces Michael that the Squips are Very Very Bad and has him team up with her to force Brooke into drinking Red, with the intention to convince him to kill himself after to get him out of the way, bc she’s really going nuts at this point.

Eventually, he snaps out of it when he and Christine get together (he’s thought he was Full Homo all of his life, but Christine’s prolly genderqueer-ness makes him realize “oh shit, I’m bisexual”) and she starts to question why he’s acting the way he is towards Christine.

He also definitely has a crush on Jeremy and during his time with Chloe he kinda tried to flirt a little but couldn’t really... he’s not up for dating someone as sexually active and a push-over as Jeremy is in this.

However, when he snaps out of Chloe’s manipulation, he and Christine approach Mr. Heere to convince him to straighten up and help Jeremy and also bc they really need an adult to successfully fight Chloe.

This requires a month+ of Christine getting him to see her psychiatrist (the one who prescribes her ADHD meds). Jeremy spends the majority of his time staying with Chloe, and very rarely comes home to gather things or to make sure his dad is eating/still alive, as much as he can remember to in his own haze of mental illness. Anyway, point is, he doesn’t know Christine and Michael are there often... not that, in the course of growing close to Mr. H, they both fall for him hard and it becomes one of my stranger OT3s.

(God, Jeremy goes through a lot of shit in this, tho.)

Pre-Squip, Jenna was kinda-sorta Brooke’s friend--or, well, friendly. However, she’s actually full blown “oh my God she’s wonderful” in love with Brooke.

Brooke isn't aware of that, esp since Jenna tries her not to be around her a lot. She's also trying to hide her own queerness, bc she’s a trans woman and she knows Chloe finding that out would be extremely dangerous.

Eventually, Chloe succeeds in making Brooke take the Red months after canon usually ends, w/o Michael’s help. If you’re curious, Red doesn’t affect her normal Squip bc she’s had him too long and a lot of his receptors and stuff are damaged, so it’s the second one she gets in canon that turns off.

This plan backfires, however, as Brooke’s Squip comes back with a physical body w/ help from Rich and also-bodied-now Moses.

With a body, and shenanigans, Mo and Squip take out Brooke’s daddy too. His life insurance more than makes up for the loss of his income, as it’s a sizable amount. Now that Brooke feels more empowered and strong, she overrides her mother’s neglectfulness and takes control of the household w/ her boyfriends*, comes out as queer, helps her sister transition, and begin to heal from all of this trauma.

(* = Rich and Mo move in, as does Jeremy eventually, after graduation; Jeremy gets a psychiatrist and a therapist and prolly has to go through some intense outpatient care and possibly a stay in the hospital, before finally making major breakthroughs and looking like himself again. The five of them are now happy and in love.)

Chloe, after her arm gets twisted by the Squip’s protective presence so thoroughly, gives up on Jeremy and Brooke to focus on Jake. This too gets abandoned when Rich and Mo help him cut her off, and so she stays in her own popularity bubble, bitter, until graduating and going to a community college in a different state.

All in all, things work out well in the end, but getting there is a long, difficult process. This AU fascinates me immensely and feels like a great way to examine some of my really dark headcanons about MB, as I think it’s a town similar to Derry in Stephen King’s IT--as in, just chronically The Worst Place Ever, with this, like, miasma of low-key despair around it. People adjust and don’t question it, which is why so much of BMC is this flippant dark humor in the face of some highly questionable shit.

I’m so sorry this post is so long (I’ll be uploading it to AU under my usual Sedusa account, as metas like this are more than allowed), but I really adore these characters and the way they can be twisted around, so I had a lot to say!

Thank you for reading <3

-mod Seb

image description: virtual-like stairs pointed forward and bathed in neon yellow and blue to represent Brook and Jeremy, which I’ve modified from the original blue-only design.

source: x (link description: a free Wallpaper Flare image that I found off Google Image’s “filtered by ‘labeled and reuse with modification” feature) 

[musiccosmosru]

Our clients come from diverse communities with varying needs and rich backgrounds. We may not always know how best to support them in their journey to wellness. In this article, I hope to specifically address the ways in which you can support your trans and gender nonconforming clients. Educating yourself on working with trans and gender nonconforming individuals will not only benefit your business but also your clients’ lives.

Being an advocate for underserved communities is a lifelong passion of mine. I have had the privilege of serving members of the LGBTQIA+ community as well as folks in larger bodies virtually my entire time as a coach. By sharing some of my experience and things I’ve learned along the way, I hope this information supports you in your work as well as your personal life.

The more you learn and practice being an effective support person, the more you’ll notice how truly needed you are.

Depending on where you live and how diverse your area is, you very well may be the only service provider your client encounters who has any competency whatsoever working with gender diverse clients.

1. Update Your Intake Forms

Language is important — the terms you use on your forms as well as your conversational terminology absolutely need to be in alignment with your clients’ terminology. If you haven’t already updated your forms to include trans-inclusive language, now is the time.

For example: are you currently asking your clients their “sex” or “relationship status?” If so, why?

Consider what it is that you’re hoping to learn by gathering this information. Instead of asking about one’s “sex,” try asking for their pronoun* instead. While “gender assigned at birth” is the preferred terminology for “sex,” remember that if you’re not directly working with an individual’s sex organs, you don’t need this information.

Clients will disclose information when and if they deem it necessary. Note that when you ask about surgeries in your intake, your client may or may not disclose any gender confirmation procedures they’ve had.

You can offer opportunities for clients to share more about themselves and feel more comfortable by offering open-ended questions when possible instead of checkboxes. You don’t need to prepare a form for every possibility; you can allow your clients to choose the language that suits them best!

2. Respect Confidentiality

Clients gender identity, gender assignment at birth, or sexual activities are absolutely no one else’s business. They are in fact only our business if it directly affects our ability to serve them.

If a colleague asks you any personal questions about your clients (for example, trying to “figure out” their gender identity), it is your responsibility to respect their privacy and potentially use it as a teaching moment for your colleague. While trainers aren’t required by law to follow HIPAA standards, it’s certainly respectful, adds to the integrity of the coach-client relationship, and is likely to be recommended by your certifying body’s code of ethics.

3. Understand the Medical Procedures

There are several procedures that individuals may receive and I’m going to discuss the two most common procedures. I will include resources at the end of the article as well for you to refer to if you would like more information.

It is important to note that not all trans or gender nonconforming people choose to pursue surgery as an option.

Even when surgery is something that an individual would like to pursue, accessing surgery may not be an option due to the cost, lack of insurance coverage and lack of providers in the area.

When people do not have access to a surgical procedure that they need in order to feel comfortable in their body, it can drastically change their relationship with their body, their feelings of safety, and their ability to feel comfortable in fitness or wellness spaces.

The two most common procedures are vaginoplasty and mastectomy with chest reconstruction [1].

Considerations When Working With Individuals After Chest Reconstruction

When working with folks who have had a chest reconstruction it is common, but not always the case, that the individual may have a history of chest binding. This is a process that folks use to minimize the appearance of breast tissue and some may have done this process for years.

Because binding is restrictive there is likely some work to be done to encourage your client to breathe deeply and fully, and to address restriction along the sides of the chest and lats both pre- and post-chest reconstruction. It’s also not uncommon to see an exaggerated kyphotic curve (i.e., rounding of the upper back) with these clients.

In attempting to correct any postural dysfunctions, it’s important to be gentle and understanding — realize that your client’s gender identity and safety may be in play with this posture. I strongly encourage my clients to spend some time on their own, in a safe space, working on their breath, filling their chest and belly fully, allowing their chest to expand.

I also work with them on increasing mobility in the lats and armpit areas as well as their upper back with a roller or lacrosse ball. This will greatly support them in increasing their range and freedom of movement. Often with these clients, I focus work the back muscles more than the chest muscles.

In addition, when using tactile cues (touching to cue) always ask permission first, no exceptions. Trans and gender nonconforming individuals are more likely to have experienced physical violence in their lives than their cisgender counterparts [2].

Considerations When Working With Individuals After Vaginoplasty

When working with folks who have a had a vaginoplasty, there are a few important things to know, starting with what it entails, both in terms of the anatomy involved and the potential exercise indications both pre- and post-vaginoplasty.

A vaginoplasty is a extensive two- to six-hour procedure that removes one’s existing penis, testicles and scrotum and creates a vaginal canal and sensate clitoris.

I would suggest any client seek out a trans-competent pelvic health physical therapist one month prior to surgery and then again about two weeks post-surgery. Ideally, their surgeon will have an appropriate referral for them, but it’s always a good idea as a coach to have your own referral network.

Individuals may take four to six weeks off of work to recover from this surgery. This surgery will make walking difficult for quite a while, though short repeated walks can help in the healing process. All bodies are different, of course, but you can expect to not work with your client for several weeks to two months post-surgery.

When work with the client resumes, be aware that walking and sitting on any kind of cardio equipment (such as a bicycle) may still be uncomfortable. Also note that with a vaginoplasty comes the risk of prolapse, therefore it is important to avoid the valsalva maneuver or holding one’s breath while lifting [3]. I always cue to exhale on exertion, and my suggestion would be to address core stability, breathing and pelvic floor before anything else.

There are several articles already on the GGS blog about isolating and training the pelvic floor muscles; this includes strengthening as well as learning how to relax the pelvic floor muscles. Those recovering from a vaginoplasty will need to learn how to intentionally relax the pelvic floor when they start dilation procedures, which will start one to two weeks post-surgery.

Dilation is a process of post-operative care that involves inserting a dilator inside the vaginal canal to preserve its shape and depth, and that should be continued to some degree for the duration of the person’s life. With this in mind, it’s important that your client has the capacity to intentionally relax their pelvic floor muscles.

4. Stay in Your Scope of Practice and Refer to Trans-Competent & Body Respecting Providers

In any given session I may find that my client needs a service I am not qualified to provide. It could be a mental health counselor, a Health at Every Size dietitian, physical therapist, and the list goes on and on. I do not try to fit myself where I do not belong. I am a strength and life coach and that’s where my expertise ends. I am always trying to expand my list of referral partners.

I work with populations who are consistently underserved and finding other trans-competent providers isn’t always easy and I consider it a part of my job as coach. This means doing the work of calling or visiting an office and making an appointment to speak with someone about their practices and experience serving trans and gender nonconforming patients.

If you think this is time-consuming or a challenge for you, imagine what it’s like for your clients.

Do yourself a favor and do the work. Your clients will appreciate it immensely and you will make yourself known as a coach who truly cares about your clients.

The author would like to thank Daniel Dugi III, MD and Sandi T. Gallagher, P.T. of OHSU Transgender Health Program for their help in reviewing this article.

Read also: Creating Welcoming Gym Environments for Trans and Gender Nonconforming Athletes

References

Standards of Care for the Health of Transsexual, Transgender, and Gender Nonconforming People, 7th edition, The World Professional Association for Transgender Health, https://www.wpath.org/media/cms/Documents/SOC%20v7/SOC%20V7_English.pdf

Hate Violence Against Transgender Communities Fact Sheet, Anti-Violence Project, National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs, National Advocacy for LGBTQ Communities, https://avp.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/ncavp_transhvfactsheet.pdf

Meltzer, T, MD, Vaginoplasty procedures, complications and aftercare, Center of Excellence for Transgender Health, https://www.healthline.com/health/transgender/vaginoplasty#recovery

Additional Resources

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