#mashposting is THE only tag i've ever used that consistently

[thebreakfastgenie]

Can you please tag your Billy Joel posting? Thank you!

I really don't know if I can. I'm not much of a tagger. I mean I did start tagging mash but that feels different somehow?? I mean this is the nicest, no hard feelings way but if you don't want to see Billy Joel posting I'm not sure following me is for you. I mean look at my blog lol the theme is Billy Joel right now and it's in my bio and has been for some time.

[thebreakfastgenie]

Sadly that post you reblogged has a lot of the markers of being made with a less than healthy dose of anti-trans rhetoric, whether they meant to or not. The relating it to BLM as a movement is particularly disingenuous and a completely false equivalence. Your blog has been such a hotbed of Capital T Takes recently, and even though I think you are intelligent and genuinely want to come to these conversations in good faith, it sometimes just feels like you want to court controversy a little. Which. You do that at the expense of people who follow you. You take the time to tag Mash content but were openly begrudging when an anon asked you to tag hurtful discourse. I think you think you are somehow more open-minded or high-minded or less reactive than the average tumblr user, but yet you seek out replies on a post to ridicule… when you could just… not. You’re constantly fighting fights that don’t need to be fought - as if removing gendered language from discussions of bodily autonomy hurts the movement, or as if anyone actually needs you to say ANYTHING about what bisexuals deal with, or as if anyone wants to know what you personally think about this month being Disability Pride Month! Just stop! Please I’m BEGGING you, consider having these intellectual discussions in other spaces, or at least tag it all with SOMETHING. And maybe - though I feel you’ll ridicule all of this but I have to say it anyway - take the time spent ridiculing emotional reactions to posts in analysing and evaluating what caused it? You’ll take this as hate mail but it’s just… I think you are dabbling in intellectual curiosity at the expense of real people. You really are.

I'm not really sure what to do with this ask because there's a lot of personal stuff in here which, like, whatever, but I think the more important thing is sticking up for that post.

a lot of the markers of being made with a less than healthy dose of anti-trans rhetoric, whether they meant to or not

I've talked about this before, but I think it bears repeating. Looking for "markers" of anti-trans rhetoric is a fool's errand. Either a post is transphobic or it isn't. Acknowledging the connection between misogyny and laws that primarily affect women is not anti-trans. Equating acknowledging sex-based oppression with being anti-trans is actually what TERFs want.

I do not believe the BLM comparison was disingenuous at all. I also don't know OP's race or experience with BLM and I'm not going to make assumptions about it. I do think you have to be careful, because race and gender/sex are different, but there are legitimate parallels. It's well-documented that women are basically expected to put every single other marginalized group ahead of themselves. Pointing out that other marginalized groups are not treated the same way is legitimate.

I also believe that in certain contexts removing gendered language does hurt the movement. I recognize not everyone agrees with that. But the fact is that the people who are restricting abortion are doing it to restrict the bodily autonomy of women. It does also affect some people who are not women, but women are the target and the vast majority of people affected. Misogyny is gendered.

I did not seek out comments to get upset about. The comment I responded to showed up in my notifications, because that user reblogged it from me. I don't ever seek out comments to respond to. I respond to posts I see on my dash and to comments that people add to my posts and to asks I am sent.

I am making an effort to tag discourse posts because some of the people who have requested it are people I like and care about. I don't think I've expressed reluctance, just a hope that I won't need to use it. I tag mashposts because I was asked to and I've mentioned many times that I don't know why that one stuck and that it's the only tag I've ever used consistently.

You can believe me or not but I'm not courting controversy (except maybe with fandom nonsense sometimes). I used to do that. I'm surprised every time one of these things blows up.

I acknowledge there have been more Takes recently. This is just because I have happened to see more things that bugged me enough to post about them. I don't expect this to continue, but who knows? Also, I've gained more active followers recently, so Takes are more of an event instead of the 0 note posts I used to make in peace. I regret some of them. I don't think my feelings about disability pride month, specifically as I've seen it discussed on tumblr (since although I know it's been around from googling it, I have not seen it mentioned literally anywhere else this year), were out of line, but I do regret the post just because I don't think I was prepared to explain the nuances in the detail they deserved. But here's the thing:

This is my fucking blog. I have used it for, among other things, posting my thoughts, feelings, and opinions on a variety of topics for the last ten years. If you don't like it, you don't have to follow it, and neither does anyone else.

The "hatemail <3" tag is reserved for the messages calling me a fucking cunt.