#more important than stopping your actual oppressors.

[snekdood]

i hope all the terfs looking at my blog rn are able to grab me a beer and maybe make me a sandwich perhaps while they’re at it

[rantithesis]

Science literacy is so important and extends further than being able to read graphs and statistics and goes hand in hand with historical literacy and we really need to start integrating science and history classes. It’s so important for class consciousness that you accept science as a sort of half-truth, NOT because science itself is not to be trusted, but because you need to learn to ask the questions like “Why do we collect so much data on this issue and not on others? Who decides an issue is worth studying? Who is funding the sciences and what are their priorities? Is that really a scientific mystery or has it been deprioritized?” because especially for women and black people those answers are heartbreaking but necessary to developing a full social and class context.

[squidgirlautism]

Genuine question: what do you mean by you're neither a zionist nor not a zionist? I keep hearing how not choosing a side makes you an oppressor, so I want to know your opinion on it.

Wasn’t going to answer this bc you come into my house demanding my opinions after I explicitly stated I wasn’t sharing, and I refuse to be labeled by people who have no idea what they’re talking about. I’ll clear the air anyway since you’re politer than the others in my inbox

I don’t consider myself a zionist because Israel already exists and I do not believe any state has an inherent right to exist

I am not an antizionist because the movement is rife with extreme antisemitic rhetoric and I do not believe Israel should be torn down tomorrow. I do not agree with the existence of a state of Israel because that goes against my principles, however I recognize that this isn’t a perfect world, and that tearing Israel down will be very dangerous for Jews considering circumstances and historical precedent. While I don’t mean to imply that the citizens of the surrounding countries all want to kill Jews, it is enough of them that I do not believe that those who don’t want Jews gone can reasonably stop them. I am not willing to entertain the idea of risking 7mil Jewish lives because of a belief that people can be good when historically, if there is an opportunity to kill Jews, Jews get killed. + the term antizionism was popularized by Soviets and the Syrian Nazi Party, so I’m not exactly eager to go calling myself that

Since this is still not a perfect world and a “glorious revolution” will not save us, I support landback movements, which would include the current state of Israel

No one “has” to pick either “side.” This isn’t a game, it is actual people’s lives. The idea of being the “oppressor” for refusing to be labeled as either is a silly notion that shows someone has no idea what is currently going on with the i/p conflict nor the history of it. Varying forms of nonzionism or complex nuanced opinions is a pretty common thing for Jews, and it’s even more common for Jews to recognize Israel as a current important thing. It doesn’t have to be an “us vs them” to get lasting peace for Jews, Israelis, and Palestinians

[spidey-bie]

Hobie x ARFID Reader

Warnings: emetophobia (if you squint), eating disorder

He's the type of person who'll sit with you as you eat even if you're a slow eater

"Didn't you say you had to go to HQ today?"

"Miguel and those other wankers can wait. I have more important things to do here."

People have stopped complaining about you eating slow ever since you've started hanging out with Hobie.

(He probably lectured them about eating quickly is a part of the grind mindset and how capitalism has once again plagued society so much that we can't even eat meals without thinking about how to best optimize our time. In this essay I wil-)

Please don't hoard your food, your personal food disposal is literally right there

He will not let you force food down either refer back to the above point.

Never explicitly states anything about the excessive amount of Pepto Bismol you own. However he does distract you away from it after each meal if it's a habit you're trying to break.

He also finds creative ways to motivate you to eat

"Did you really just put on a puppet show with a sock figure singing about how you can't fight the power on an empty stomach?"

"Yeah."

"Siiiigh ig I gotta go eat now. Like Shobie the sockman said I can't fight against my oppressors if my stomach is giving me away."

Learns how to prepare your safe foods

He's a fairly decent cook. But if he doesn't know how to cook something he'll experiment before giving you the final product.

Also he doesn't say anything if you ask for foods to be finely chopped or cut because of excessive fear of choking.

If there's something he can do that'll make eating easier for you he'll do it no matter how strange it might seem.

He will distract you as you eat if that helps you. Probably goes on and tells a story from his day or something new about one of his interests.

He doesn't get upset or irritated if your safe foods change up

You looked down at the plate of food set down before you. There was nothing wrong with it. It was actually a food you'd grown comfortable eating for the past couple of weeks yet the sight of it now made your stomach turn.

"I can't do it. I'm sorry."

"What you apologizing for? You didn't do anything wrong."

"I know." Your vision began to blur. "But I thought this one would've stuck around for a bit longer."

"Don't worry about it I've got some safe foods in the fridge for you as backup."

He will find ways to sneak foods with the vitamins you need into your food if you ask him to.

He tells you he's proud of you for whatever you eat that day or if you try new foods.

"I'm proud of you for eating."

"Bie I'm only eating a child's portion of food."

"Oi. Don't put yourself down. Something is better than nothing."

(A/N: You just gotta love mourning over the foods that you can't eat anymore 🙂. Anyhow this wasn't as heavy as I thought it'd be. Actually got some heartfelt scenes in here. )

[lilianade-comics]

With your new portal shenanigans Cheesemelt AU, I'm now picturing the "You exist to serve ME!" scene, except it's mid-to-late in the story... and Dani's the one who says it.

By this point Vlad's bonded with Dani and is working to keep her safe instead of hurt her. She's trying to attempt something really dangerous that she's certain will bring her to Danny, Vlad's trying to stop her because he's certain it won't work and could end up with her badly hurt or a ghost herself. And Dani's stressed and desperate, snaps, and spits out the line, shocking and hurting Vlad but, even moreso, shocking and scaring herself. One of those "Oh god, what am I doing" moments.

All this results in her panicking, possibly breaking the binding on Vlad, and booking it, because she's twelve and panicking. Cue Vlad having to accept that he actually does care for her even without being forced to do what she says, track her down, and insist on helping her anyway. Maybe he makes some excuse like, "If you die here you'll definitely become a ghost and then I'll be stuck with you forever," but in that special Vlad way where it's super obvious that he's lying.

Anyway! Just- love the new AU, it gave me Thoughts (obviously), thanks for all the delicious Cheesemelt content you've been making! ^U^

Ahh, thank you for the ask! I love your thought process here. I've had a thematic moment in mind that's quite similar to this! But first, some additional important context for the AU in question:

Vlad is a widely disliked, smarmy, ambitious independent warlord/general vampiric nuisance in the political landscape of the ghost realm. He's been vying for the title of Ghost King for ages, trying to get Pariah Dark and his court out of the picture so he can take the throne. It is the BIGGEST POSSIBLE blow to his enormous ego that he got himself bound to the will of a little girl and is being paraded around like her manservant. So he's trying to trick her into releasing him, trying to be unhelpful, trying to be mean, trying to do ANYTHING to get out of the situation with his reputation intact. He figures out pretty quickly that her brother is none other than a certain infamous pain-in-the-neck ghost boy, and just grits his fangs because at least if he's stuck with Dani, he'll learn where Danny's hideout is and can set fire to it. But at the same time, he's low key getting emotionally attached to Danielle because Vlad has no friends and is desperately lonely and hungry for attention.

Dani has been raised to believe that ghosts are untrustworthy, tricky beings (similar to how the fae are perceived in folklore), and doesn't think twice about proactively magically binding the first ghost who approaches her. She needs Vlad to help her find Danny and lead them both out of the ghost realm, and then he can go back to whatever nefarious activities he likes. He's not allowed to hurt or betray her while under contract, so she's not really worried about him (although, she was really hesitant to discard the blood blossoms she brought along. They guaranteed no ghosts could grab her, but they also made it impossible for Vlad to fly her anywhere her feet couldn't take her, so she had to get rid of them!)

Now Danny himself. He was around three when he fell into the ghost realm through a spirit ring drawn by his parents. It's been ten years since then. The way the ghost realm works here is that if a living person spends too long in it, they WILL become a ghost, i.e. they die prematurely. Crucially, Danielle doesn't know this. So Danny is fully a ghost by this point, doesn't really remember much of his life, and is playing a Peter Pan/Robin Hood role alongside his band of fellow child ghosts Ember, Poindexter, Youngblood, and Cujo. They're regularly causing mayhem for the oppressors of the realm, which prominently includes Pariah Dark and Vlad (Danny isn't a fan of either of them, and Vlad truly isn't sure if he's more annoyed by Pariah or Danny).

So! When this disheveled human girl comes rocking up to his secret hideout and tries desperately to convince him that she's his long lost twin sister here to bring him home, part of him is tempted to at least hear her out, but the other part that's backed up by his crew just knows this reeks of a trap set up by one of his enemies to lure him somewhere. ("seems like something Plasmius would do," says Ember). He ultimately tells a heartbroken Danielle to get lost because he can't take the risk just because he's curious.

Now we arrive at Dani's lowest moment. Her brother is a ghost, he doesn't want anything to do with her, and her entire quest is crumbling around her. She staggers back to wherever Vlad was waiting for her (and he isn't surprised she came back empty handed. He was, after all, already familiar with Danny.) Dani then has a complete breakdown! Because she's a child stuck in a different reality and her brother is dead and Vlad didn't tell her that he already knew. Vlad feels a little guilty, but his ego won't let him admit this, so he argues with her instead. How could this foolish child have possibly thought her insane quest would succeed? The odds were always against her and she never should have even tried something so pointless and dangerous.

Dani throws some iteration of the "I hate you/you exist to serve me" lines at him, shocking herself and REALLY making Vlad feel bad, and then she releases him from the binding and elects to find some way to convince Danny to listen to her on her own. Vlad looks visibly upset but is like "Fine! That's exactly what I wanted in the FIRST PLACE, stupid girl"

Vlad is happy to be free, but his emotional attachment to Danielle won't let him abandon her no matter how much he wants to, because her wellbeing matters to him, bizarrely. So he takes matters into his own hands.

He surprise "attacks" Danielle in front of Danny and co, dangling her by her ankle from high in the air and launches into a natural villain monologue about how well this pathetic girl did leading him directly to Danny Phantom, and how he doesn't need her anymore, and "Oh, Daniel, can you believe that your own sister came to me thinking I would help her find you? Using her was so easy." and then he drops her so Danny can catch her.

A fight ensues, Vlad makes a swift and flashy exit, but not before exchanging a knowing glance with a shocked Dani, who now understands that Vlad just secured her Danny's goodwill in the only way he could; by being a villain.

There's more to this AU, but that's a pretty significant moment in it! Thank you for sending me your thoughts, I love when people interact with my silly AU ideas and come up with cool ideas for them!!! <3

[punkeropercyjackson]

Todomomo antis are some of the most performative ass 'fandom activists' i've ever had the displeasure of knowing.From the violent biphobia and lowkey trans erasure,to the pushing white western ideals of queerness onto two japanese teens who heavily reflect their specific heritage in multiple ways,to the making fun of minors for not knowing how to write peak m/f romance-Most of who grew up to be queer btw and still love Todomomo!!!,to the brainwashing minors who had figured out they're queer early on to be their little minions to bully other kids in the fandom,to the straight up lying about Todomomo playing into gender roles or being an 'arranged marriage' or 'boring' as if Shouto and Momo aren't two of the most autistic-coded characters in all of shonen and shoving Momo out of the way as Shouto's most important friend after Izuku to replace her with whatever guy who he's never even looked in the general direction of they shipped him with

And in the same breath,without a HINT of irony,shipped Dabi's disabled actual punk ass with a cop who's literally the definition of cishet fuckboy and gaslight him so he could murder his best friend for having DID that Dabs was ACTUALLY in love with and he mercilessly brutalized Bird Buttmuch over it.Not to mention that almost none of them awknoledged all the chemistry between Minajirou because they'd assigned Momo as the ONLY girl Jirou is allowed to like as if she couldn't just be polyam and has more parallels to Erasermic than Shinsou/Kaminari does AND!!!!!They never expanded Momo herself nearly as much as they did the guys,meanwhile i've been out here building up a Momo multiverse for years where she gets to be all kinds of cool and the protag with Shouto as her love interest and arm candy and whenever Shouto was the protag,i always wrote them as a duo of equals since that's what they are canonically and it's the whole reason they're my otp

Go outside,touch the skin of other queer people,read lgbt history that isn't just you skimming over gay men and lesbian parts and leaving it at that while having to think of what the T stands for when asked,stop basing all your knowledge of gay and trans relathionships off oppressor and opressed to lovers fics and then maybe you'll get to enter an actual one.If you found out all the ways in which i'm queer after years of figuring myself out,you'd call me slurs then hurl

[roachliquid]

Dissecting some examples of rhetoric that tries to force trans people into privileged/oppressed dichotomies (CW transphobia, transmisandry, misogyny, biphobia, aphobia, exorsexism)

NOTE: This list is not comprehensive. The point isn't to cover every possible piece of bullshit rhetoric, but to educate people on the common problems and logical errors that characterize these kinds of claim. As such, this is mostly going to cover shit that harms transmascs, because that's the material that I know the best. This is not a claim that this bullshit only goes one way. It can happen, has happened, with ANY group cast as the oppressor.

"Trans women are publicly shamed and bullied for being trans. Trans men are 'just' invisible, so they're privileged because they don't have to deal with that!"

"Transphobes want transfem people dead. But they just want transmascs to detransition, so transmascs have it better."

Both of these are examples of oppression Olympics - claiming that one group is really privileged because their oppression doesn't look as bad. It's also misleading as hell, because it never explores what the actual consequences are of what's being done to AFABS/trans men - for example, that invisibility exacerbates the difficulty of finding transmasc-inclusive resources, or that the reason many transphobes want us detransitioned is so that we will be "sexually available" to them (I.E. they want us as sex objects and breeding stock, which is not all that better than death).

"AMABs are hated no matter what they do, because they're either seen as perverts or Evil Men. AFABs can avoid being seen as either simply by detransitioning, convincing society at large that they are harmless, vulnerable women."

And here's yet another example of the claim that being forced to detransition isn't "that bad", as if gender dysphoria and the pain of being in the closet are magically washed away by the healing powers of society's overwhelming love and support for women. And the assumption that that exists is a problem in itself, because misogyny? Racism? Islamophobia, fatphobia, literally everything that causes people to clutch their pearls and treat others like absolute shit? Apparently none of that matters at all, literally any (supposed) cis woman can say "jump" and society will start tripping over themselves to do so.

"Nonbinary trans people aren't really trans, they just want to be because they think it's cool. They need to accept their cis privilege and get out of the way."

Folks, this is literally oppressor logic. Queerphobes have been trying to deny people rights since day one on the basis that their identities don't fit into mainstream concepts of gender expression. Are you trans, but mainly attracted to people of the "opposite" sex? Then you're not really trans, because normal people are straight. Are you bisexual? No, you're "really" straight or gay, because people are only attracted to one gender. Asexual? Bullshit, everyone's attracted to someone. Nonbinary? That's not a real gender, or if it is, it's not as important as my binary one.

You get it. This logic has been re-used and regurgitated so many times that it's mostly bare wires and bits of vomit. And yet people are still using at least half of the versions I just mentioned, plus more that I didn't have energy to cover. And all of it stems from the same, laughably conceited premise: that the mainstream model of gender and sexuality is so close to perfect that your understanding is all it needs to finish the puzzle.

I'm going to stop this here, because it's very tiring to write, but hopefully this helps to battle some of this nonsense.

[air-of-the-waterfall]

Goddard is definitely power hungry, but it's also deeper than that. He has such a raging inferiority complex it's not even funny. Actually, watching Carson Lusk and the Thunderhead bicker passive-aggressively is hilarious, but I digress.

On pg. 228 of Scythe, Goddard writes in his journal that "I do not miss my so-called relationship with the Thunderhead... The absence of [its] uninvited intrusions into our lives is a blessing... Without the crutch of a higher power, I am the highest power I know, and I like it that way."

He wants control and resents the Thunderhead, and that makes sense now that we've seen his backstory in "A Martian Minute." Instead of supporting him when he's having a rough time, the Thunderhead repeatedly decides to sass him and be a bitch (I say that affectionately, but still). It makes him feel powerless, siding with his parents against him instead of looking out for his best interests. It justifies this by telling Carson that the Mars colony work is more important than anything on Earth. His response is, "Blah blah blah. The Thunderhead was so full of itself. If it really cared about him the way it always claimed to, it would find a way to get him off this rock" (pg. 132 of Gleanings).

The Thunderhead prioritized the broader picture over Carson's personal goals, and there is always an ethical debate to be had about the needs of the many versus one. Neither of them was necessarily wrong on that front before Carson got the Scythedom involved. Interestingly, when it's time to launch another space effort at Kwajalein, the Thunderhead and Cirrus are adamant that no one will be forced to take the journey even though this project is important to humanity. This indicates a shift in priorities for the Thunderhead. It learned from watching Carson that the journey would be jeapordized if anyone was unwilling.

Carson isn't selfish to want to leave Mars, but when he's denied and belittled, he escalates into destructive and definitely selfish behaviour. The Thunderhead probably should have predicted that if it knew him so well. It made that mistake, underestimating a human's determination and overestimating his empathy. History is full of cases like Carson/Goddard who felt slighted and blew it out of proportion (literally).

The first chance Carson gets to align with the Scythedom, an entity above the Thunderhead's jurisdiction, he takes it, and he taunts it while he's in the control room with the reactor. When he later discovers the atolls, he interprets them as a slap in the face from the Thunderhead, who went behind his back and undermined all his power and plans. He then takes this rage out on Rowan and Citra to try and compensate for that insecurity. Even more interestingly, by attacking Kwajalein and forcing unprepared people to escape to the spaceships, Goddard does to them exactly what he resented about his own childhood.

What interests me the most is how this story ties into discussions about systemic power and violence. Cirrus says that Astrid is being selfish for harming humanity's chances in pursuit of her own goals, just like the Thunderhead thought Carson was selfish. The difference is that Astrid and the Tonists are victims of systemic injustice and Carson was a teenage boy who didn't get his way. If Carson had been patient (seeing as he's immortal), he could've gotten what he wanted without killing anyone. Astrid could not afford to be patient because her people were being slaughtered. It's a reflection of how people like Carson make themselves out to be victims while oppressed minorities are shamed for fighting back.

It irks me that Greyson as the Toll refuses to let Tonists fight back against the scythes. Mendoza is not a great leader and his motives are corrupt, but he's right that one can't bring a knife to a gunfight (or you can't politely ask someone to stop beating you). The "if you use violence against your oppressors, you're just as bad" argument is ineffective and just continues cycles of oppression.

Overall, Goddard/Carson's relationship to the Thunderhead digs deep into power relations and their consequences. He seeks power to boost his own ego, and so he fights against the most powerful entity no matter what the cost. He knows the Thunderhead will always be better than him, and that infuriates him.

[demon-girl-izalith]

I think we should keep something in mind this Christmas/holiday season. As the Christian narrative floats around, the white swaddled newborn plastered on billboards, and the focus on what's "sacred" and "holy" circulating through churches around the western world...

The body being "sacred" has nothing to do with some fucked white European idea of chastity or purity. It has absolutely EVERYTHING to do with making sure people are able to feed themselves and their children, not be straight up poisoned by pollutants, or fetishized and exploited for profit. Holiness has nothing to do with being clean or looking your Sunday best.

It was never actually about "purity" or "virginity" or "cleanliness". If it was, why the hell would Jesus have been crucified? The real historical dude said stuff that pissed off people in power so much they fucking merked him. Nothing pisses off agrarian feudal lords or modern capitalists more than telling the masses that they aren't simply morally justified, but on the side of GOD when they steal medicine and food for their children. If you don't believe me, I highly recommend reading William Herzog's "Parables as subversive speech", read about what theologians actually think historical Jesus was talking about all those years ago. Whether you believe in God or not, think religion is a plague or pray a rosary every night, I think keeping this in mind is like super important.

Christianity becomes dangerous and, in the opinion of this demon girl, blasphemous when it is removed from the context of its social cause, when it's co-opted by those in power and disarmed of the radical rhetoric that it was born from originally. I think that's exactly what we see in broader society. I think that an entirely rational response to this is to equate all of Christianity or even all of religion with evil... But I think there's nuance here.

To be clear, I stand with the satanists who support the fight for separation in church and state by chastising the corrupt institutions who have become the opposite of what they claim to espouse. I stand with the atheists who keep the naive theologians in check, and offer peace to the people who have been ravaged by the monster modern Christianity is to so many. Don't stop doing what you're doing. If Jesus was standing here today he'd be standing with you. You're fighting modern day pherisees out here and I'm for it.

Now, this is not to say there aren't problematic things that were always present in the Christian religion, of course there are. And they're quite abundant. I think Christians need to be very aware of that as well. There's nuance there. What I'm calling for here is a realization that the religion of the oppressed is not the same as the religion of the oppressor, and that the religion of the oppressed, when not stripped of its merit and co-opted by systems of greed, can be a force for good. And when we use that lens to look at this bizarre spectacle we call "Christmas", we can learn some interesting stuff.

What I'm saying is, if you're trans, gay, whatever, for the love of God, literally, please LIVE. Listen to your friendly demon izalith. By existing as who you are, you are sacred. Don't let the people wearing robes and claiming to be on the sides of angels and "God" tell you who you can or can't love, or what you can or can't be. If there is a God out there, and he's with those punks, then he's no god. I spit on his name. Angels are overrated anyways... It's the demons, the poor person who steals from Walmart to feed themselves and their children, the prostitute who is proud of their job and the life they work hard to sustain, the fat trans person who goes to Christmas mass in goth makeup... It's those people who the religion was originally made for. It wasn't made for the rich, the white, the straight, the normative. It was made for us. For all those people who are downtrodden, cold this winter, unable to buy food, scared and tired. Fuck that shit they used to traumatize us and belittle us when growing up. It's all lies and venom anyways. If no one loves and accepts you, this demon will.

[quillkiller]

I’m sorry but you think makeup is anti-feminist? What 😭

im gonna hold ur hand when i say this… but yeah i do… and i think so because it is..

makeup brands don’t and never will care if you’re doing your makeup just because you ’want to’ or because it’s ’fun’ <- AGAIN I SAY THIS AS A BUTCH DYKE WHO STILL FILLS IN HER EYEBROWS AND EYELASHES EVERY SINGLE DAY

feminism isn’t just being of the opinion that men and women shoule be equal. you can’t just say that you’re a feminist as if that actually means something. feminism is feminist theory and ideology that has been forced to be made because of a patriarchal world. feminism isn’t what i personally think is anti feminist or not anti feminist— there’s generations and generations of feminist theory, feminist studies and feminist arguments that i make sure to keep up with!! that i study to form an opinion !

and as i said in the tags. i wear makeup too. i do a lot of things that could be considered anti feminist, but what’s more important is that i have to also like myself. being aware of the fact that you engage in ”anti feminist” behaviour isn’t the end of the world. it’s the end of the world when we pretend that we don’t. we’re not free from spreading misogony just because we’re women. we’re doomed to always have to be aware of what we’re doing ! we’re doomed to be women. we’re doomed to have to recognize that we’re brainwashed and sometimes we have to recognize that we like it.

feminism is hard work and should be hard work. it’s not as easy to just say that you’re a feminist and be done with it. you have to actively claw your way out of the the patriarchal choke hold. you have to recognize that you’re teaming up with your oppressor. and i am NOT immune to this either. not at all !!

anyway. i would recommend ’bad feminist’ by roxanne gay which is one of the first feminist theory books i read. she talks a lot about how sometimes it’s better to be a bad feminist than not be a feminist at all. that your health and comfort levels are more important than not shaving your legs or stop doing your makeup. that it doesn’t have to be either or ! but that it’s still important to be aware of how you engage with anti feminist rituals and ideals.

sometimes being aware is simply enough ! rather than closing our eyes, putting on our makeup, doing our skin care routine and say it’s a feminist choice just because we chose it ourselves. womens free choice doesn’t mean the patriarchy doesn’t gain from it ! and if the patriarchy ends up gaining then it’s inherently anti feminist <- but that’s also an absolutely impossible way to live. because you also have to LIKE yourself. and be comfortable. and sometimes its just scary. like how i find it scary to not fill in my eyebrows or eyelashes. atleast i dont tell myself its a feminist choice just because i made it

heres roxanne gay talking about ’bad feminist’

[nikadd]

gonna complain abt biphobia for a second so if you think im automatically annoying bc of that it’s ok, just scroll past. idgaf

for the past few weeks on twitter and in the past on tiktok and im assuming here as well (im just not verging into those waters on here) i’ve seen a lot of weird and annoying things being said abt bisexuals and bi women in general and it feels like one of those things where somebody picks a specific type of a member in a community (here being “a white cis bi girl with a white cishet boyfriend”) as like the so called representative of the entire community and bc it’s like the supposed closest person to being the oppressor then all of the criticisms get to stick. it’s like when ppl add “white” in front of “woman” to make their criticisms not sound misogynistic.

like there are lots of things that are very much issues that bisexuals face in higher numbers than either gay or straight ppl do (such as ipv, for example), and nobody is talking abt it, but if we ever just express annoyances abt micro aggressions or negative stereotypes abt us (that feed into the material oppression we face! the stereotypes abt us being sex-obsessed and promiscuous freaks actually does lead to ppl thinking we can’t say no to sex and that we would cheat on them which leads to physical and emotional abuse!), then suddenly everybody is like “why are yall complaining abt it” “i wish i had your issues” “biphobia isn’t real, what you’re complaining abt is homophobia” “yall chose to date men” “who’s stopping yall from dating men” and it’s like…

we (cis bi women) understand that if we are dating men or somebody who is read as a man on the street then we benefit from being read as straight, but it’s weird when ppl keep talking abt “the real life” when we are talking abt how we are treated within the queer community or we want to address specific things. like many of us DO understand the sense of scale of things, we are not equating homophobic hate crimes to the micro aggressions, but if everything we say is conflated to just being micro aggressions we are blowing out of proportion, then it becomes difficult to address actually important things!

and i do think some of my fellow bisexuals have fallen into a weird pick-me-girl meme within the community, e.g. “i’m attracted to every woman ever and like 3 guys” which sounds like we are supposed to suppress our attraction to men to feel accepted in the queer community and act like it’s such a chore to be attracted to or be in a relationship w men. and im not even talking abt many of them coming to realize they are lesbians, which is good for them! but it just became one of those annoying things ppl just regurgitate and i don’t actually believe that it is an actual way many of them view their attraction, but they want the good queer points so they say it.

and i understand many lesbians’ frustrations w newly-out bi women expressing how they are intimidated by the idea of approaching a woman, but i think sometimes ppl are too quick to call it lesbophobia and that we think that lesbians are scary bc THEN apparently we aren’t living in “the real life” in our heteronormative world where we are taught how to be w men only? like i guess in this situation we don’t care abt what goes on outside of the community. and im glad many queer women are able to overcome it but we often forget how difficult it is to figure it out! and ppl online keep talking abt how weird and homophobic it is for bi women to say this when we should actually be scared of/intimidated by men bc they are more likely to abuse us… which is such a piss on the poor type of misreading of what we are saying. but also victim blaming once again.

like i’ve been out as bi for like 9 years now, had VERY strong feelings for multiple girls over this time (like i’ve had to tell some ppl im bi and not a lesbian), currently in my first ever relationship - and yes it’s with a man. and if i was some kind of famous person on the internet, people would be saying im settling, or im faking my queerness, or looking into my past relationships and seeing nothing there bc ive never dated anybody before. so what then? suddenly im not bi bc i’ve never gone out w a girl? like in my case i never even dated men before bc i rarely like somebody enough to want to go through w anything AND i need to know that they like me first as well so im actually always surprised to find out that ppl date ppl often but that’s neither here nor there.

like all those tweets abt billie eilish abt how she “chose to date an abuser before she ever dated a girl” or dove cameron “making a song abt being a better boyfriend to a girl and now dating yet another man” make me so upset like do they need to go out and date a girl for some kind of queer points for ppl to shut up abt it?

another thing i saw was like “a girl is gonna go to a queer bar or pride, dance and flirt with girls, and then go home to a boyfriend 💀” and it’s like okay so yall don’t want us bringing our boyfriends to queer events, that’s fine (not that my bf is straight and might also enjoy going to a queer event as he’s also queer but who cares abt that, right?) but then we also can’t go to a queer event by ourselves either? like not all queer events are singles-only events! and flirting doesn’t mean you’re being led on! sometimes ppl flirt just because! why does it mean that i need to stop going to queer events that i’ve been going to before dating my bf just bc im w a man now?

like ppl act like it’s not even worth to come out for a bi woman if she’s gonna date a guy / already is in a relationship w a guy. like maybe my identity existed before my relationship and might even exist after it? like im my own person or something?

like i’m so tired of ppl online being “heartbroken” over a hot woman (bonus points if she “looks” gay) being w a man - as if you ever had a chance w her if she was single! or acting like being w a bi woman means that she’s gonna leave you for a man! like it sounds weirdly incelish when i see other queer women online being like “oh ofc a girl i was dating left me for a man 🙄” and it’s like maybe she just started dating a man after you but you’re making it sound like she hated being with a woman and cheated on you with a man and you get to have this high horse about it. like im sure there have been instances where two women broke up and then one ended up w a man and even got married or something but i’ve seen too many ppl paint these situations like ultimate betrayals. like if she left you for another woman it would have been better?

like i know that there are some bi women who Have said/done things that led to these thoughts/complaints, but like the way we (queer women as a whole) have been engaging in these conversations has been very alienating. like there ARE things we need to address within our community (e.g., “everybody is a little bi”, “hearts not parts”, “don’t worry i’m bisexual” when dating trans ppl, etc) but i genuinely often feel more comfortable talking to other bisexuals abt it bc i think some things SHOULD be addressed within the bisexual community first bc it shouldn’t be on other ppl to address these things like we gotta clean our own house yk but it’s often difficult to do so on the internet bc anybody could chime in and divert the attention and take things out of context.

tldr i hate these conversations and all the jokes abt biphobia bc ppl think it makes them more progressive or feminist or whatever and seriously addressing these things suddenly makes me “one of those bisexuals” or whatever. like i know im saying all the stuff we’ve all already said in 2014 in all those “reblog if you believe that bi ppl are bi and not just half gay half straight” but i feel like ppl only agree w this in theory and not in practice and actively believe that every bi woman is a lesbian in denial or a straight woman w a fetish. and it’s fucking annoying.

and yeah it might sound like i’m a chronically online tumblr sjw abt it but the internet queer spaces are like a third space for many ppl and it’s disheartening to see these things and then feel like ppl are just keeping their mouths shut abt it offline but still believe and think this way.

…AND THATS ALL JUST ABT BI CIS WHITE WOMEN.

[8-evil-annoying-catboys]

trying to separate the trans community into two categories will never fucking work. it’s not that simple. even if it seems like it should be that simple, there will be people you would sort into one category in theory who will fall into the other category, and people who do not fall into either category, and people who fall into both categories (either at the same time, or at different times or in different situations, depending, obviously, on the nature of the categories/dichotomy). this is especially true if you think of these categories, in your mind, as being based on coercively assigned birth sex, when by the actual definition you use they are not actually based on that, but based on, for example, perception by our oppressors, or self-identification, or individuals’ opinions, or anything else.

arguing about who goes where, and trying to exclude each other, and not listening to each other only hurts us. seeing each other as freaks (in a negative way), basing your activism exclusively on people who you see as being the same as you, refusing to acknowledge either systemic patterns OR individual lived experiences that defy the expectations set in place by systemic patterns, and ANY OTHER INFIGHTING only hurts us. if we’re going to survive the current political climate, it is of the utmost importance that we STOP FUCKING FIGHTING EACH OTHER and start fucking PROTECTING each other.

transunity is the only way we will make it out of this without being, at best, battered down and chased out of more and more and more places until there is nowhere left for us to feel safe, and at worst, fucking massacred. stop parroting gender essentialist AND bioessentialist rhetoric. stop beating up our own for slight missteps and misunderstandings.

and don’t you DARE read this and think that i’m not talking to you. i’m even talking to myself, partially, bc we all have biases to unlearn and i’m not exempt, bc literally no one fuckin is.

follow other trans people who have different opinions than you (but, like, not if they directly hate on people like you bc that’s bad for your mental health, i’m not saying that, i’m saying bridge the gap). follow intersex people, whether they are trans or not. follow multigender, genderqueer, agender, nonbinary people, and make a point to seek out those who were not coercively assigned the same sex at birth as you were, and those who are intersex especially if you’re perisex. follow binary trans people who are not the same gender as you. follow trans people who ARE the same gender as you but are intersex. widen your horizons and break out of your echo chamber. for the love of the entire community, PLEASE seek out bloggers who are vocal about transunity. if you safely can, then go to pride and other irl community events/spaces. seek out irl trans friends of as many different genders as you can possibly find.

just. god. please. stop fighting. we need to use that energy to protect our WHOLE community. we will have time to settle intracommunity disputes once it’s safer for us to exist in general. it sucks that we have these disputes in the first place, and i want to solve them as much as the next person, but they are not the same as the vitriol we are facing from all directions.

and maybe, just maybe, if we actually fight as siblings and protect each other, we can break down our own biases during that fight, and the intracommunity issues will be less intense by the end. it’s not guaranteed, and if it does happen, it won’t apply to every single person in the whole community, but… still… wouldn’t that be nice???? if we all gained a better understanding of people in our community who aren’t the same as us???? don’t you want that, too??

[drbased]

One of the best ways to force TRAs to admit that transwomen are males, that they have been socialized as males and that they belong to the male class, is to push the concept of the "afab trans woman"

I left this ask unanswered for a while because I know exactly which user sent this and I don't really care for their arguments. But I'm going to use this an opportunity to address something that I think is really important for feminists and leftists when arguing online.

I don't really care about forcing TRAs to admit things. I'm much more interested in enriching the discourse of the choir I'm already in.

Arguments online are performative first and foremost; they're rarely if ever about trying to actively persuade the person you're talking to - they're much more about using sass and wit to try to control the conversation and make yourself look like the stronger person. Zero integrity is required to engage in an online argument - and those with ther crappier but more confident argument will always win out (plus if that argument supports the status quo and the oppressors class(es) within it, then said argument will take even less effort to convince people). Unless you're absolutely watertight in your argumentative strategy, you've basically already lost, and you've wasted your time. The ones who do decide to argue a lot end up looking vaguely irritating on your dashboard; discourse is irritating because you have to sift through a bunch of arguments you already know are wrong and bad intertwined with a bunch of arguments you already know are good and right. But the argument never seems to stop, despite how supposedly 'good' all those arguments are. The discourse goes on and on. By arguing with these people you're being baited into wasting time and energy.

I'm not here to say that nobody should say words to the opposing side, and by all means I sure can't stop you if you want to. The problem is, if the facts are on your side, the odds are stacked against you. You're fighting against mainstream status quo opinion and a collective of rhetorical tactics which are more effective than the truth and compassion will ever be. TBH I think the most effective arguer on this site is opabinia, but that's because she never wastes time actually arguing, she just sealions the other side over and over again until they give up (and, seemingly, deactivate??). But could you say she's ever actually convinced anyone, or has she just made our side go 'yassss girl!' over and over? Has she turned arguments from performing for them into arguments that are performing for us?

The Jehova's Witnesses are a cult-ish Christian denomentation infamous for knocking on people's doors and asking them if they've heard the good news; they will then attempt to convert that person to their religion. As studies have shown, this method of converting people is bad. It has such a laughably poor success rate that you'd be forgiven for thinking that conversion isn't even the point. And theorists have indeed posited that the 'point' of doostep conversion attempts is not actually to convert, but rather to strengthen the in-group through shared experiences - the members bond with each other through how much they are rejected by those outside.

Before I end this I also want to point out that trying to use the 'afab trans woman line' is weak as all hell to me. A lot of radfems seem to be under the impressionn that genderists haven't got excuses and workarounds for the most basic of arguments about sex. If these people cared about facts, then, well, we wouldn't have a genderist on our hands. You can't just 'trick them' - well, maybe you can the teenagers I suppose, but IDK I personally find arguing with teenagers online to be kinda gauche. Trans activists have their party line that gender is assigned at birth, and that's what dictates their life experiences. An 'afab trans woman' cannot exist because to them, because the whole damn point of being trans is that your gender is different from what you're assigned at birth. At best you can piss them off, get them to say hypocrisies with a straight face - but once again, that's just entertainment. Maybe it'll change their minds years later when they look back and cringe, idk. I personally think the odds are stacked against us and it's much more worthwhile to charge up our arguments for ourselves and so we're better at changing the minds of people who aren't already on the defensive.

I'm going to round this off with promoting a youtube series that every feminist and leftist needs to watch: Innuendo Studio's The Alt Right Playbook. I have referenced a couple of his videos here, specifically Control the Conversation, which I consider a must-watch for anyone frustrated with the argumentative tactics of groups like conservatives and trans activists. Now, he does lump in 'terfs' with this perception of the alt right, but that's just part of this territory (if you can handle the misogyny and bigotry of platforms like the Spectator and Daily Mail, I'm sure one little mention of terfs in a powerful leftist piece of work shouldn't be a problem); the actual content has been foundational for me in understanding how the right wing operates and understands the world. They're all short watches, and they're incredibly well-written. If you like my insight and how I write about things, well, youtube essays such as these have been formative in how I analyse and write about the world. A strong broad understanding of how people and the world operates in general makes you less susceptible for falling for bad arguments and rhetoric and makes you a stronger, more coherent thinker, speaker and writer.

[metvmorqhoses]

We have been mutuals for years but I’m going to step away now because I cannot in good conscience follow someone who supports the work of a dangerous bigot like JKR over the human rights of a marginalised group. Wish you the best.

In wishing you a warm farewell right back, I feel compelled to use the occasion to clarify, and for the last time, a thing or two - even if, to be quite honest, I absolutely don't consider this ask worth a response.

I do believe in certain principles though, and I think it important to state them from time to time, so I'll make this one exception in indulging underwhelming attempts at self-righteousness for the greater good.

You know, there's really nothing wrong in stopping interacting/following/liking a person for whatever intimate reason, you have every right to and you owe no one an explanation. It's quite telling though that you felt compelled to inform me, and anonymously.

This tells me you weren't actually seeking a constructive discussion, nor an explanation (you would have DMed me, or at least told me off anon, since "we have been mutuals for years"), but rather you were after that little high that small people reap from believing to have obtained, however briefly, the moral high ground over another, the effective shielded reward of the online moral policing that coincidentally always comes without consequences, since you are not even putting your face behind your egregious "good conscience".

You feel entitled to judge me for the art that I supposedly enjoy (already a ridiculous argument in itself and one that reaped real victims throughout history), after years of being my mutual, and don't even have the courage to actually face my reaction (and my unfollowing).

The fact that you cannot even appreciate how sad this all is for you as a person already frames the matter perfectly in itself. But still.

Premising that I don't need to justify the reasons I like what I like and that you should intrinsically have known you have no right whatsoever to send people messages like this, morally speaking, and also premising that I find genuinely embarrassing even having to explain such banalities to another rational being, the fact that I coherently keep liking a work of fiction that I have liked since I was six years old (specifically finding fascinating two villains and a dynamic that I explore in my own hyper-realistic way and that it's probably the farthest from any of the author's preferences as one can get), without suddenly and hypocritically finding all sorts of terrible crimes against humanity in it to reassure myself of my inner internet-approved wokeness, does not absolutely mean I share or second JKR's ideas or behaviours.

As a normally intelligent person, I'm fully able to separate the art from the artist. If people had truly used throughout history your narrow reasoning, art would have literally gone extinct thousands of years ago. We couldn't even safely read the Bible. You cannot expect to only like the artistic product of "morally"-approved people (by whose standards, moreover? What makes your opinion more important than anyone else's? Or you are an oppressor too?). You cannot quality-check artists, people, not even really committing yourself to the task, because you could never really know what's truly in a person's heart. This reasoning is simply childish and nonsensical.

I do not share JKR's views only because I like some of her characters from 25 years ago. I do not support her only because I enjoy psychoanalyzing her villains from time to time. I actually never liked JKR even while everyone else idolized her. But that never prevented me from genuinely liking what I like without pretending or idiotically forcing myself not to in the name of being TikTok-approved.

And finally, as much as I find some of her ideas disgraceful and baffling, as much as I absolutely do not support those ideas, at this point I find it much more important to support her right to think, believe and state whatever she likes without constantly risking harassment (or way worse), thanks to people like you, after all not that different from her and in some aspect even worse, who believe to have the right to "cancel" fellow human beings because of their ideas.

No one has more right to speak their mind than another, people. Freedom of thought is the backbone of culture and humanity. The fact that she is able to speak her mind disgracefully, is also the reason you are able to speak your mind against it.

The culture you are validating is dangerous and disgusting. Think about it.

[moontheoretist]

When Empire supports a wannabe Empire

War in Ukraine and Genocide in Gaza are two examples of how USA as a country chooses who to support. Ukrainians and Gazans are both victims of oppressors that want to KILL them all. If USA was a normal country that cares about people, they'd support Gazans as much as they do Ukrainians. But unfortunately, USA is not such a country, and it was known long before now. USA as a country only supports those that suit their political and capitalist agenda at the time. USA hates Russia, so they support Ukraine, but I can as well imagine that if USA was ever in a good relationship with Russia and had a lot of money to make from supporting them, they wouldn't support Ukrainians at all, just like they don't support Gazans dying in the most horrifying act of genocide we saw in recent history. Israel is shooting at civilians, who they call "human animals" and USA's president is proud to support it.

Israel and USA want to create Greater Israel together at the cost of civilian lives of innocent Palestinians, because they only care about power and power alone. They don't see Palestinians as people at all.

Israel spreads propaganda about Palestinians that says they are less than human, that Israel should have been ashamed to even create, because it's the exact copy and paste of nazi propaganda that killed THEIR people around the world, and USA stands and claps at their genius ideas. But I guess they don't care as long as Israel can acquire that land for their precious country and USA can get someone in the Middle East that they can use to control it. I don't know & can't even comprehend how both USA's government and Israel's government can live with themselves knowing that they are building their alliance and political presence in the region on genocide of innocent people.

Oh, and if you doubted my Russia = Israel comparison, then know that Israel is doing something fishy on Lebanon/Israel border. Specifically, they're lighting fields and mountains on fire, not letting firefighters in to put down those fires and are killing anybody who comes closer.

And you know what is the most annoying? That if Americans don't use the narration of "our tax dollars pay for it" then they won't have enough people actually caring about the issue. For some unfathomable reason people care more when they know their money was used to do this. Because people think that taxes are stealing the money from people, and hell, maybe in USA that's real, looking at their shitty healthcare system, education system etc. but it's still vile to some extent that some people can only care if their money were taken from them and used to do something horrible, and wouldn't care otherwise. Wouldn't care that bombs are dropped on innocent people if those bombs were not funded by their money. And funnily the exact same argument can be used against them to make them despise helping Ukraine, because "why should their tax dollars go to some foreign country", yes? I saw people like this. I don't know what is wrong with those people at all.

Are there better ways to use American dollars than to help genocidal maniacs? Of course, but maybe don't make it a core of your argument when people are dying. It distracts from the real issue: the genocide.

Still, it's important to stop the USA from funding this genocide. Not because American citizens' money were taken, but because funding genocides is evil. Nobody should be doing that, especially not the country that is supposedly standing for freedom. The most powerful country in the world could destroy many other countries by simply funding the wrong people, and we can see that now in Gaza. USA's help is contributing to saving Ukraine, but in Gaza the same kind of help offered to Israel is a reason why this genocide happens so quickly. The reason why Gaza is leveled into rubble as we speak. It's terrifying.

And yet...

USA's president is denying the genocide. He is claiming that people are lying about how many Palestinians were killed. To the point that the Health Ministry in Gaza had to release a 212 pages long document including all the names of victims of Israeli attack (and those don't include people that are missing or whose bodies can't be identified).

The UN Security Council voted recently on a resolution to condemn violence against ALL civilians, while calling for humanitarian pauses to the fighting in order to get aid into Gaza. You know what was the ONLY country that voted against it? Yes, United States of America.

USA vetoed the resolution that was supposed to help people.

USA's government doesn't care about people. They are caring only about their own interests. And I'd really want to say that EU is better, but it's not when the EU's President Ursula von der Leyen claims that "Europe stands with Israel" to the absolute outrage of people and European countries like for example Ireland whose EU representative almost screamed that von der Leyen doesn't speak for her country and doesn't speak for Europe. She doesn't. There are people in Europe who deny the genocides too. People of my own nationality saying shit that makes me ashamed I share the country with them. Because how can someone say something like this when innocent people are dying? Do they have no empathy, no heart? I can only hope there are more people who care than those who fall for propaganda and spread lies.

Israel now cut off internet in Gaza, so we couldn't see what they are about to do to the people. They were targeting journalists and their families before that... but now? They are going to keep bombing the innocents. And if someone is still alive after, that feels like it will be a miracle. Imagine you live in Gaza and know you may not survive what is going to happen and have no way to say goodbye to your family living abroad, or a way to tell your story before you are gone.

Is that really "justice" USA fights for? Because it doesn't feel like any type of justice. If they support what Israel is doing right now, they're not supporting justice. They're supporting genocide of innocent ppl. And I will say it as many times as it's needed. Because it's the truth.

I'm loosing hope in humanity, but we need to keep it alive. Because if not we, then who will stop those govs from committing crimes? We're powerful, but often don't realize how much power we wield. We have to use it to help in any way we can. Scream, show them we all care.

Here are some links that may help to stop it all:

https://linktr.ee/nooraldayeh

https://linktr.ee/justgraciegrace

[bestshipsmackdown]

Hey, so what I’m not going to do is be posting messages on here about why XYZ creator is problematic. Especially when I know for a fact that the entire team working on XYZ project have been doxxed and harassed. I absolutely am refusing to add to it.

If you don’t like XYZ or ABC that I post about, you are more than welcome to unfollow. But assume that I do have eyes and ears and am far too aware of exactly what people do behind the scenes. Unless XYZ creators are inciting violence and/or cruelty towards a minority, I cannot in good conscience sic mindless classless cancel culture minions to harass them. Not that that tactic even works. But that’s a whole other topic.

Unfortunately, putting up socially relevant materials about anything these days will incite violence by people who think that they are on a pedestal for being “morally more correct” than the people they are attempting to destroy. And I simply do not want any part of contributing to that mentality. And since the influx of twitter users coming back to tumblr, the toxic fandom mentality has risen back to what it was before those same people left tumblr during the mass adult content ban.

If this was back in 2013 I might have posted the message that caused this PSA, but alas, I’m not a middle schooler anymore. And I’m far too old to placate and/or prove how woke I am to anons.

The anon was polite in wording which is the only reason I thought about responding to it. However, as the rules state: internet etiquette. “curate your own experience.” I curate my internet experience to be mostly Ao3 centered. I do not center my internet experience around lambasting creators for every single one of their flaws. That sounds absolutely exhausting and I have such a low tolerance for seeing just how ugly this world is. There’s some creators you can’t avoid how nasty they are, because they scream it from the rooftops, so the best you can do is report them or block them.

Being socially conscious in this world means realizing that not a single person in this world does everything correctly. Not a single person is good. Not a single person is evil. Not a single person is worth supporting or believing in. Not a single person is worth wasting time on. Everyone is bad. And not one person can be redeemed without having everything they’ve ever done wrong being thrown back into their face. Everything is owned by a corporation. Corporations keep people in poverty whether it be their workers, their consumers, or the people they exploit to get materials from.

You will never see me saying that a creator of anything is good or should be supported. Because I cannot. Because I will always be wrong if I do. That’s the bleak reality. And that’s why the toxic nature of the internet and its ideas on morality make being alive in this time such a pain in the ass.

While everyone in this world is flawed and immoral, you have to stop finding the things to hate in everyone. You will always find things that people have done wrong. That they shouldn’t have done. That are not okay. And if all you can see is the worst things people have done, you will never see the good things.

And sure. There are some people who do things that are so far beyond wrong that they cannot be looked at without that standing out as the most important thing about them. Their failures as a human outweigh any good that has or could ever come from them. But often times, the world just isn’t that black and white. If you ignore the shades of grey, you will never see what color you really are. You will become exactly the evil that you believed you were stopping.

Anyways I don’t know if that all makes sense. But I’m just so tired of people. The more energy you spend on things like this, the less you have to fight actual oppressors. The focus should be on taking down the infrastructure. And you need the shades of grey to be on the correct side in order to battle true evil.

Being kind and compassionate and aware of people is important. Reflecting on yourself and trying to be a better person than you were yesterday is important. And everyone should be doing that. But the fact is, not everyone will. And they are far less likely to when they know that the only thing they will ever be seen for is each of their missteps. That if they make any new mistakes, it will all be linked back to their previous ones.

And idk about the rest of you, but I just don’t have the mentality to keep a mental list of just how good or bad each and every person on this planet is. I’m just here to make two or three or four or more characters kiss each other, because I’m a romantic. And sometimes making a few dudes kiss is just enough to pretend the real world doesn’t exist. That everyone, I’m trapped on this earth with, aren’t horrible in one way or another.