#not why you experience yourself that way

[scarlet97531]

Love these tags. Ever since we realized some of us had accidentally given ourselves secondary therian identities and started identifying as otherlinkers, the way it’s treated in therian and otherkin spaces has bothered us a lot.

We’ve come to dislike the overwhelming emphasis on “involuntary” experiences in defining all kinds of identities. The nature of an identity does not change because of it’s origin. If you identify as an animal you identify as an animal. Otherlinkers tend to have all the same experiences as therians do, the phantom limbs, the mental shifts, kin memories, species euphoria and even dysphoria. The only difference is where the identity comes from, and personally i dont think thats important enough to warrant being defined as something entirely different.

What i dislike even more than the separation of the communities on it’s own is the *reason* for that separation. The reason there is such an emphasis on involuntary experiences in the first place is essentialism. As in the belief that people are born a certain way and cannot change. This emphasis on involuntary experiences is an attempt to avoid being forced to conform by saying that conforming is impossible. The problem is that this does nothing to challenge the real problem, the source of bigotry itself, the belief that the norm is ideal and anything outside of the norm is bad until proven otherwise. The belief that if it is *possible* for you to conform then you should.

The problem with trying to conform to this belief by defining yourself by what you cant change is that it does nothing to help people that *can* change but dont want to. For example plural people, people with CDDs. The default treatment goal for plural people is final fusion, conformity, despite it being known that final fusion is very very flawed and for some systems outright impossible, often causing more problems than it solves. Meanwhile the *option* of functional multiplicity is right there, and much better option for most systems, and yet most professionals will not even mention it and it is often seen as “anti recovery”.

Making the *choice* to not conform is seen negatively by most of our society, so minorities try to frame their experiences as essential, something they were born with and cannot change, in an attempt to avoid being changed. In the process they throw voluntary, chosen, non essential identities under the bus, believing just like their own oppressors that anyone who has the choice to conform should, and anyone who doesnt is inherently *different*, and less “valid” for doing so.

Feel like we should normalize have a choice about who we are!

You choose to be a lesbian? That awesome!!

You choose to be a boy? Good for you, I hope you're happy.

You choose to be a paraphilia? That amazing!

You choose to be black? Amazing, come by if you want any tips for me.

You choose to have ADHD? That's great!

People don't have to go through dysphoria to know who the really are! You CAN be transgender be choice, you CAN choose your sexuality, you CAN be who ever you to be by CHOICE.

[a-dragons-journal]

How exactly is being otherkin any different than being transracial by idea? I’m not pro-transracial, but I can’t really formulate an argument on where the difference is and why one is okay while the other isn’t

The difference, in my opinion at least, basically comes down to the fact that race and ethnicity are things other real people deal with and which have big cultural impact for a lot of people; species is not. You can't hurt theriform wolves by identifying as a wolf because wolves are not people and are not aware of any of this. Dragons may be people depending on the dragon, but they don't exist physically in this world to have an opinion. You can, however, hurt people of color by identifying as transethnicity and approaching it in a disrespectful way.

And I say it that way because if I'm honest, transethnicity is one of those transIDs where I'm... a little torn on it. I can understand the feelings and experiences they're describing, but I struggle to find a way to engage with the idea of being transethnicity that isn't going to wind up being racist in one way or another. And while I haven't exactly spent a ton of time in radqueer/transID spaces, when I've gone into their tags and such to do a little research on them, I have overwhelmingly seen transethnicity people being kind of if not extremely racist about it. The experiences are not inherently harmful, but it's really easy to slide into engaging with those experiences in a way that's harmful.

And yet... in this community we have, for example, fictionkin whose fictotypes are a different race than them all the time, and sometimes that's very important to who their fictotype is and how they view the world. And that works out fine. I think the primary difference is that fictionkin are generally expected to acknowledge that they're not a part of that group in the present and can't speak on the group's issues or experiences as if they were, whereas the minute you put a trans- label onto the word, the expectation is that you should be treating a trans[x] person as if they're [x]. (And if it's not, then... why are you calling it trans- anything to begin with when that's what trans- means in an identity context?)

So, I do genuinely believe that they're having these experiences, but... idk, there has to be a better way to frame and engage with those experiences. I don't know what that is, but it's got to be out there somewhere, though it may not be a one-size-fits-all answer. (And maybe there's a transID community out there that's found it, I don't know.)

Anyway, open invitation for POC to give their thoughts on this, since they've probably got better-constructed ones than me; if I'm honest, I haven't spent all that much time thinking about this issue. I think about it on and off here and there when it comes up and then it gives me a headache so I move on.

[tuliptiger]

Where are the positive Arcane posts brothers. My brothers. It's such a good show and gives us so much and there's SO much to explore. Even if you don't like LoL, as an enjoyer of the show and a player of the game they're really unrelated.

BUT LoL gives the base of the world and so you've got a show that's detailed and full of life and potential with this pool of basic lore and world building to draw upon.

And hey. It isn't perfect a lot of people have a lot of valid complaints and dislikes of what happened and how they happened. I definitely do too but the WAY it's written and HOW it's written lets you fill in so many gaps and make your own world for the most part.

My big hang up is it seems people fill that space with negativity. If you don't like it you can make it better? The space to fill is there without rewriting the characters or events, why let yourself ruin the show for yourself when you could enjoy it? Nobody controls how they feel and if you don't want to like it that's your choice but if you HAVE the choice? Why not take it and run with it you know?

[bucephaly]

Hi! quick question: if i have confirmed Cherokee ancestry (which I'm working on currently and likely do) even if it's a small amount, is it okay/not appropriation to identify as "two-spirit" (though i don't think that's super accurate in terms of Cherokee-specific traditions, but i think i have heard that cherokee gender roles tended to be more flexible- correct me if i'm wrong.) I'm definitely white + don't know much about Cherokee culture/what is acceptable in terms of being a part of the community.

Ok a big disclaimer that I'm also white and disconnected and this is a very complex topic. But I have looked into this some so I'll try to share what I've learned and ofc check the replies for if anyone has chimed in with corrections or added anything etc

'Two spirit' is a pan-native term used as an umbrella for the many distinct cultural 3rd [or 4th 5th +] genders that many native cultures have or had. I think the consensus I've seen is that it's distinct from just being native and LGBT. And you Have to be native to be 2spirit, there have definitely been nonnative appropriating it

I would say to be 2 spirit you would have to be involved enough in your culture and community to take on community roles according to the cultural 3rd etc gender. Like.. I'm trans and gay, but I'm culturally disconnected. I dont consider myself two spirit, because I'm not in those community roles because I'm disconnected. 2spirit means something specific and it means more than just being trans and native.

As for what the actual cherokee systems were, I'm not sure if I should share what little I know about that on a tumblr post, but I'll say not much of anything has survived to the present. And be careful if you do research it, as an author claiming falsely to be cherokee has written about cherokee 2spirit stuff before but they're a weirdo pretendian. So don't trust anything from a Qwo-li Driscoll.

But yea basically 2spirit isn't just 'LGBT native' and ive seen lots of reconnecting people go 'oh I'm native? I can use this cool native-only term now!' As if it's just a fun thing for natives only just to look cooler or smth, it has more meaning than that and most of it is specific to the culture.

As always, native folks feel free to chime in in the comments

[flying-cat]

People don't want character redemption they want a revenge plot from a story that was never supposed to be about revenge

[katetorias]

yes a sense of unity and collective “You” is good for systems to have but why are some people on this website acting like letting alters have individual sense of selves is going to tank your chances of recovery. denying parts their selfhood would involve not listening to them, accommodating or helping them feel happy (which is really hard to do as part of a system!!! for obvious reasons!!!!!)

forcing them to consider themselves just one person when their lived experiences do not match up with that is literally making things worse. some systems feel like they have been just one person their whole life, some don’t! some systems are very differentiated from each other, some aren’t!!

systems are as uniquely individual as literally every person on earth! everyone on this planet has lived different lives from each other and in turn will experience the same things differently from one another. that is like a very simple thing to grasp. it is very easy to not be ableist.

[yume-fanfare]

do you guys ever think about this

[pleasedontcareaboutme]

It's missing my father hours rn so imma just dump a bunch of pictures here and cry

( sorry i don't know the source of anything I just had them on my phone)

(also dont read the tags i just need to let it out lol)

[angelnumber27]

violently forcing myself to have better days

[ct-hardcase]

one thing I have noticed in the last few years of discourse about star wars canon is the attitude from some parts of fandom, where when people go "hey, I don't like this problematic aspect of canon/I don't like that this canon significantly contradicts the other", others will respond, stating that star wars is a tapestry of stories, and that it's fine, actually, because you can just take the parts you want and/or to just cobble one's own canon together from whatever.

this isn't bad advice per se, and if that's someone's preferred way of interpreting canon or dealing with discrepancies, I'm genuinely happy they reached that solution (hell, I even do it myself sometimes—rey mind-tricking finn and poe in the tros novelization is something I absolutely choose to ignore on account of it being ooc and not in the movie), but the majority of the time, I like treating canon as a puzzle that I can put together, and when some of the pieces simply can't fit right, or if there's blatant disrespect to the other stories in the tapestry (hi, caleb in tbb), I don't think it's wrong to be pissed at that and expect the corporate entity managing the product to do better.

[biblically-accurate-dca]

KILL!!!!!!!!!

[gayofthefae]

Found a new, concise way of putting it that I'm gonna try and remember so I can reuse it:

To say, as a straight person, that a queer character's queerness is out of the blue or unrealistic is to claim that they understand the queer experience to be able to identify inaccurate representation of it.

To call a character's queerness out of the blue as a straight person is to claim full understanding of the queer experience.

[hanzajesthanza]

"the michael kandel translation of "the witcher" short story can't hurt you!!"

the michael kandel translation of "the witcher" short story:

[danothan]

tough pill i have to swallow is realizing that “getting better” doesn’t mean “getting to do more things,” getting better for me means taking better initiative in protecting myself. and THAT means making sure i do LESS things

[clovesnz]

Something I love sm about like neurodivergence being more understood now among ppl my age is that I don’t try and mask my stims anymore and it makes potentially overwhelming experiences so much more enjoyable or easier to handle. Like certain experiences used to be hard for me to be present in because of how overwhelmed I was but now I can wear a mask and headphones and shake my hands and click my teeth as much as I want and suddenly I’m having an amazing time. And I 🫶 my audhd friends for understanding and being the same as me gah it’s nice to be understood 😩💖

[bioaccumulation]

lov my chemical romance... but hate stadium tours so much...