#or less binary I guess?? idk

[organized-chaotic-disaster]

Does anyone else like... feel less cis while on their period?? Like, a lot of the time I'm good with seeing myself as "girl, mostly" but I find that around my period I often start feeling less girl than I usually feel?? A little less gender perhaps??

[averlym]

" just...come here. just sit here with me" (...that one scene from princess momonoke, click for better resolution)

[pikachu-deluxe]

would be nice if i could look at myself in the mirror and be able to say i'm looking at me

[caassette]

been on tumblr less than a week and already Trans Discourse is on my timeline front page dash...

idk i kind of just feel like...there are actual real threats right now in the world to all trans people, and like. trying to create in-groups and out-groups within the community is the most braindead thing you can do

they are killing us. they want us dead. any time you try to segregate one fraction of the queer community from another, their job gets a little easier. let me give you an example that happened recently in Texas while I was living there:

June 2022: Log Cabin Republican Praises Trump, "Don't Say Gay", Trans Hate

Also June 2022: Texas GOP's New Platform calls gay people "abnormal"

Log Cabin Republicans are essentially gay conservatives. And as part of trying to be accepted, under Trump, they decided trans people were the out-group and that gay people (specifically, white cisgender gay men) were the in-group.

If I had to guess, they probably figured so long as they also pointed the finger at us and called us groomers and said we were fetishists, they would be more accepted in the republican party.

Guess what happened? Not that! Instead, the Texas GOP, in 2022 (Two Thousand And Twenty Two) decided that being gay was once again Not Okay!

This is what I'm getting at: in queer spaces, always, always, there must be solidarity. There is no such thing as someone who is "not gay enough", or "not really trans", or "just looking for attention."

I, myself, am a binary trans woman. My current partner is a genderfluid transmasculine nonbinary person. Do I spend hours talking with them about how they do or don't face certain forms of oppression, or about how their identity is less valid than mine?

Of course not! We kiss and hold hands and fuck and have empathy for each other.

As a queer person it is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to be one hundred percent accepting, validating, and encouraging of ALL QUEERNESS, because the second you decide to draw the line, the oppressor wins.

Maybe you're not a Log Cabin Republican. Maybe you're not advocating for trans genocide while being in a same-sex relationship. Maybe you just, idk, use the word "theyfab." Or you think pansexuals should "just call themselves bi."

It doesn't matter that the line you've drawn is farther left, or smaller, or excludes less of the community.

What matters is that you've drawn it at all.

[transgenderpolls]

I know this probably isn't the right place to ask so feel free to ignore this, but if I was AMAB and consider myself a guy, want to be perceived as a guy and present as a guy, but dislike having male genitalia and feel sad that I can't *have* kids does that have a name? Could that be considered non-binary? I tried going with "fem" pronouns for a bit but never got used to it. I've asked a few trans women but they've both said "you're simply an trans girl egg" and I've asked a trans guy and he called me a fetishist so idk?? I don't mean to be disrespectful to the community, sorry if it is

that doesn't have a specific name in the sense that "if you want these things then you must be X identity" but what you describe does sound like dysphoria. it doesn't have to mean that you're trans, especially if you fully identify with your agab. it does NOT automatically mean that you're repressing a desire to be a woman or something other than a man. like, i know plenty of cis men who tuck full-time bc they don't like their dicks. it's especially common with gay men. and a wish that you could give birth is, by itself, simply that. there are trans men who want to do it and it doesn't make them less of a man, so it doesn't inherently make YOU less of a man to want it, either.

the thing that makes you any particular gender is your decision to identify with something that feels authentic to you. you don't have to worry about meeting any qualifiers for what can be "considered" non-binary - if you want to identify with it, then do it! though it sounds like you have indeed thought about it a lot and done some experimenting already, and have come to the conclusion that you like being a man, so i guess you just have to decide whether or not you value a non-binary identity.

exploring your identity is a good thing but do it because you want to, not because you feel pressured to, and certainly not because other people have told you that it's inevitable you'll find something repressed buried deep down in there. and also do NOT worry about being "disrespectful" via your own identity. you can do literally whatever you want. hope this helps.

[fernlessbastard]

Opinions on transfem/Trans woman c!Wilbur? If you havent already, since its a slightly popular Hc w c!W

honestly I'm mostly indifferent ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

it's not for me, but like I've got no particularly strong feelings either way. I can absolutely see a lot of reasons for that reading - it all does fit, so it's not a matter of there being no justification, but more so just personally I just don't hold that headcanon

the thing with either of them being trans is that like, I am for some reason oddly attached to Quackity being specifically and strictly a man who's into men, or at the very least masc individuals - maybe it's cause I just started off with that "hc" (I mean it is kinda pretty heavily canon - I don't recall him ever flirting with a woman). Wil being mtf would obviously make all of that very complicated - each time I start to think about it I can't help but think if 1. is there any way for Q to still be into Wil without that invalidating Wil's gender identity 2. is there any way for Q - a gay man - to have feelings for a woman that doesn't invalidate his sexual identity Like, exceptions happen, but mm idk It's obvioulsy completely different if you hc Q as pan/bi/homoflexible/whatever else, but yeah personally I'm just really attached to the idea of Q being strictly homosexual

When it comes to the nonbinary umbrella it's kinda similar (with both being amab) - with Wil it works i'd say, there isn't as much of a conflict with Quackity's sexuality, but again, I'm mostly indifferent and you do you; with Q it just kinda doesn't quite fit for me - idk he just has relatively binary man vibes imo

in regards to other combinations of one/both of them being trans: > Wil's ftm - yeah sure I'm down with that, good for him, I don't actively hc that but like yeah no conflict there, plus I guess it'd explain how he had Fundy - though fantasy mpreg makes it so much funnier > Q's mtf - idk personally i just don't feel it in the slightest. He doesn't really give me any of those vibes. Especially considering things like the fact that he's short, has longer hair, is/used to be a sex worker (with presumably male clients), is heavily (and at the very least primarily, if not exclusively) into men, canonically has a big ass, etc, so it just really doesn't sit right with me to then have him be mtf - I just want some more representation of those characteristics in men for once, y'know? It's just feels like it's perpetuating stereotypes. Of course there is no wrong way to be trans - if you're trans, you're trans, and that is valid and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. But we're talking about a fictional character, so if we have a character that's amab, likes men, is a sex worker, is short, has long hair, isn't trying to be this stereotypical "perfect big strong alpha male", is emotionally invested in their romantic life (which additionally is messy), then turning around and saying "woman" just feels like we're just going off stereotypes, and ignoring an example of a great, rare, pretty subversive representation of a man who might come off as feminine at times, but is still fully a man, and all those things that are stereotypically assigned to women and a fem gender identity don't make him any less of a man. Especially the fact that he's into men - it does personally just immediately remind me of all the "a gay man is just a woman" talk (and maybe it's cause I'm from Poland and in my 20s now so i really did grow up hearing those sentiments quite a lot). And obviously i'm not saying that that's what you're doing when you hc Q as mtf, but i am explaining my personal headcanons and reasonings for them, as well as reasoning for why I don't headcanon other things. > Q's ftm - ok so, it fits. And I really really hate that it fits. It would make so much sense but holy fuck guys I cannot handle that ok - I'm ftm, and if he's cis then I can like at least partially remove myself from all of that... but if he's ftm then holy fucking shit everything just hits so much harder like guys I'm not strong enough to handle the pain of seeing this much of myself in him ok I will simply collapse, like him being seen as an object and sexualised and put down and belittled and pressured to be all submissive and shit just hits so completely different if you see it through the lenses of him being ftm and let me fucking tell you I am NOT ready for the breakdown thinking about it and how similar and in some cases identical to my own experiences it all is would cause m > ANYWAY with them both being trans it's just a combination of my previous thoughts as they apply ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

hope that answers your question UwU anyway ha ha bye--/lh

[anti-terf-posts]

Sometimes I remember that time my mom said "you're a man? What about those big boobs?" Which was

Deeply disturbing to me

I'm non-binary, use he/they/neos (unfortunately in Spanish i have to settle for él and my neos but like she doesn't use them anyway :< )

And also!! I remember distinctly she saying she found easier to call me by my neos than by he which is

Uh

Interesting I guess

Cause I've been correcting her, and not once she has called me by my neos (also she did a making fun of me for using neos which is very funny in retrospective because (I'm providing translation):

Mom: bueno, entonces refierete a mí con -jota (ok, so refer to me with -jota suffix)

Me: vale carajota (I don't know how to translate this but I didn't realize what I said for like 10 seconds; in short, it's an insult. She laughed a lot tho)

And also in a less funny note she implied I go by he/him because I want to replace my father (VERY abusive) which is uh not good. I have told her several times to not compare me to him

Does anyone else's family misgender you when they get angry at you????? That's not very poggers as the youth would say

Anyways hi!!!! Sorry for the long ask ^^"

I found your blog today and wanted to share stuff idk

(I can't tell if this is a vent or not, so I apologize if anything i say is insensitive) but that is kinda funny to me in a way 😭 Like why on earth is it easier to use neos than he/him? Of course, I only speak English, so it's very possible it's different in different languages ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[gacha-incels]

genuinely dont get why western pjmooners dont get treated w the same level of disdain as like. western hp fans or like on a more similar Bad Company level western niji fans. like idk man if a company cant treat their workers right who gaf abt what they have to say abt capitalism and marginalization? theyre clearly not doing the work?

yeah this is frustrating for me as well. I genuinely see many westerners here, on twitter and other social medias talking up the company and its games for being progressive or anticapitalist (this kills me for limbus company especially, like at least have a little shame about this one) and just not mentioning their role in the surging amount of misogynistic witch hunts still happening in South Korea, their incel pandering, their suing of labor unions, their treatment of the artist monggeu. I guess for many of the western fans and audience it’s not happening directly to them, where they live or to people who they consider like them so they don’t care. there aren’t thousands of posts being blasted out per day reiterating this issue again and again like people do with harry potter. there shouldn’t have to be for you to take this issue seriously just because maybe less people in the west know about it. Seriously I feel embarrassed for the people that need it explained to them in this way like “ok, you see these issues you clearly don’t give a shit about (project moon- misogyny and labor rights, happening in the east). what if you imagined them as something you do care about (harry potter and transphobia, happening in the west)?” furthermore, for the fans who consider themselves progressive, it seems not to really “hit” them how serious this issue is and how equally serious project moon’s actions were. these aren’t flippant little mistakes the company made. look at the reaction it caused from project moon’s long-standing female fans and how much they try to explain the gravity of these actions to westerners. you would think learning about these things, which many of us have written about in English and Korean, would have anyone who sees themselves as allies for women’s rights and unions sounding the alarm about this company. but mostly you will see them talk the issue down (“vellmori left on her own” is the latest baffling explanation), saying it’s just how things work in South Korea so poor little company project moon just had to fire her and they can’t actually be misogynists 🥺, you know this type of thing we’ve seen etc. but I guess because Limbus Company gives the façade of some anticapitalist story and there’s a non-binary gacha protagonist and you like the character design then everything’s fine? It’s worth supporting an antifeminist company? if you were boycotting hogwarts legacy and someone told you it’s fine because you can make a non-binary player character would you think ok nevermind this is fine now? like how do you explain it to these people? Do you really need it explained like everything is fucking Harry Potter? i know I’ve probably written this same thing before regarding fan reaction so I’m sorry if this seems derailed maybe, but it hasn’t stopped being a frustrating situation to continually watch happen and I agree with you.

[famdommcfanface]

An analysis of alcemy for the Magnus Protocol!

I have just finished the episode I have found a list of alchemical symbols let's fucking gooo baby. Just to clarify it is my belief these are the new entities. I know it would probably be better if they were less rigidly defined but I love sorting things and am hyped!!! This is going to be long so strap in (not all of those though they're just to illustrate)! I am so sorry if you use dark mode (like me!) these images are almost all transparent.

1: Mercury!

Referring to both the metal and the planet, go wild. Mercury is all about transcending boundaries as it's kind of both a solid and a liquid (it's not but whatever), specifically the boundary of life and death, possibly even transcend death. That seems relevant. Also related to snakes so if snakes show up... probably mercury. Also if we ever get some sort of white queen in a chess way? Mercury. It also represents the mind, or spirit maybe? It's got a lot going on. Colin said it'd make the world end. Fuck yeah probably why not.

2: Salt

This is one that is not included on one list I have but is on the other. I'm not guaranteeing all of these are significant I'm finding it hard to find a definite list. If you look into just all the alchemical symbols they've got loads and I doubt they're all significant. Anyway. Salt is the physical body in this trifecta (we'll come onto that). Very to do with physicality, the body, honestly might manifest in a few ways similar to the Flesh. Also to do with purification? In general but also 'purifying' the body which I think medieval people meant in a good way but sounds evil to me. There is also of course, seperate to the whole alchemy thing, salt circles and all that. You've seen supernatural you know what I'm talking about. Although that's also to do with purification.

3: Sulphur

Or sulfur, if you are American. This one's actually got a few different symbols but let's go with this one for now. Honestly, and I know we shouldn't be comparing these to the TMA entities, but this one's pretty desolation. It's all dry heat and masculine destructive energy. Yeah this one's 'masculine' and mercury's 'feminine' for some reason, I doubt that will come up. Which I guess makes salt non-binary. This is the red king, too. This is the soul in the 'tria prima', Mercury, salt and sulphur, which were the three first elements apparently, and also cause disease? Idk. That might be relevant. Hell's meant to smell of sulphur, that tells you most of what you need to know. Again, we've all seen Supernatural. Colin said something about this making you go mad. I think yeah sure but less spiral-type mad more slaughter-type mad.

4: Air

Right, onto the four basic elements. These all have a humour related to them too and air has blood for some reason. Air is life and light and God and passion and all that good shit. I have to imagine it's gonna have some vast shit going on too because I don't think Jonny can help himself, but it's also to do with being changable and generally quite nice. Oh also ideas and creativity. All that good shit!

5: Earth

Basically the opposite of air. The 'masculine counterpart' as all these websites keep saying. It's associated with salt, which makes sense, and is all about stillness and being grounded and again, I feel like there's going to be some buried attributes in there. It's got the humour black bile which is all about sadness and shit. Most of the four basic elements are fairly self-explanatory.

6: Fire

You know what fire does. Passion, emotion, love and hate and all that. Although honestly in an alchemical way fire seems to be more emotional. So far (and I am writing these as I look into them) if you want something based around physical destruction you're gonna wanna look at sulphur. Its humour is yellow bile.

7: Water

Water, humour is phlegm, connected to mercury, honestly alchemically I can't find anyone having much to say about it but y'know. It's water. BUT I HAVE THINGS TO SAY ABOUT WATER. Okay so this has gotta be the deep, right? The whole mix of the buried and the vast thing with the sea? That killed the girl Alice saw? Or at least was involved with the death. It's all very water.

8: Lead

Right, onto planetary metals! Which Mercury kind of also was but hey ho. So, Lead is associated with Saturn. So, alchemists believed that lead was the base metal, that all other metals were just lead that had turned into something else. Which means it's really important but also kinda sucks, and is why people kept trying to make it into gold. So lead is also to do with change but also kind of purity as they thought it 'purified' into gold. Also associated with the Roman god Saturn/Greek god Chronos, who are both to do with time so that might be involved.

9: Tin

To do with the planet Jupiter. It seems to be connected to wisdom and maturity and education and all that. BUT ALSO. It is connected to Lady Mowbray, hell yeah. Because I watched a video about the arg and noted that on the back of Lady M's assistant's clipboard or whatever is this symbol which I recognised at the time as Jupiter! Now. What does tin have to do with dogs and eating people. As far as I can tell fuck all. I thought I'd misremembered for a moment and it was actually the Saturn symbol because that would work with cannibalism at least but no Lady Mowbray seems to serve... tin. Which is kind of funny. I get the connection to nobility at least, Jupiter is king of the gods after all, but as far as I know he doesn't hunt people with dogs? Idk.

10: Iron

Related to Mars and, as I'm sure you can tell, men. Because these fuckers loved gender. Similar to fire it's all about anger and passion, but also seeing as Mars is the god of war I don't think it's beyond belief we've got something similar to the slaughter on our hands here.

11: Gold

Connected to the sun and therefore does not have a classical god I can interpret. Damn. Maybe Apollo? Gold is about having gay lovers. No. So gold's big thing is that it doesn't corrode. Something about staying as you are, the opposite of Air's changability, sort of similar to earth... I could make something out of this.

12: Copper

Well hello ladies. Copper actually has a cooler symbol but I suspect we're sticking with these. Connected to Venus, obviously, which is all about attractiveness and desirability because copper is a very pretty metal. Personally, I would say episode 2 is to do with copper. I don't know if ink5oul themself is (I think they might sort of span entities) but what's her name from the episode and her obsession with looking good seems very copper to me. I know I'm not sorting all these episodes (yet! I have to relisten first) but this one jumped out at me. Copper is also to do with love, of course. I feel like one reason maybe the desire theory got so big is a lot of alchemical elements are to do with love and desire, so that just sort of bled through?

13: Silver

That's right, it's the moon! Very to do with mystery and weird shit. I think if you get the non-literal elements of The Dark you've got Silver. Also keeps away evil, again, Supernatural. Although it also has to do with tides so I think there is a very small chance that actually this is the Deep? I doubt it though.

14: Antimony

So I wasn't going to do the mundane elements because they're less likely to be important (you'll see) but some of them are really interesting! I might not do them all. Anyway, antimony is about the wild and animalistic side of human nature, and is to do with wolves. That remind you of anyone? A certain... aristocratic milf? I know she's connected to tin but it should be antimony okay??

15: Arsenic

Arsenic is cool, we all know it. It's my mum's favourite element on the periodic table. Anyway. Swans? It's to do with swans. Apparently it transforms its appearance like a cygnet to a swan. It also fucking kills people which I'm not convinced the alchmists were aware of.

16: Bismuth

Nobody knows what they were doing with bismuth. RIP. Also, I don't know my astronomy but that is taurus. Does that mean anything? I looked into the metal; it's quite pretty and people get it mixed up with tin.

17: Magnesium

Oh boy. It's hard to extinguish once it's lit, so it represents eternity! That's gotta be something babyy! Some combination of the end and the vast and all that.

18: Phosphorus

They thought phosphorus trapped light. I know it's easy to say this from a modern perspective but alchemists were fucking dumb. I feel like I could disprove this. But they were the first scientists so we have to be nice to them I guess...

19: Platinum

Supposedly a combination of gold and silver, hence the symbol. Possibly something about being bound to something... idk.

20: Potassium

Or potash. Didn't seem to have much historical context. But I believe it has very important modern context.

21: Zinc

They burned zinc to get what they called 'white snow'. You fucking idiots snow is already white.

That's it! Honourable mention to horse dung, which is a more obscure element but gets its own symbol and everything.

also soap and urine and all sorts of shit so I think we should stop there. What have we learnt? Possibly nothing! One of these has got to be to do with plants - I assume earth? That would make sense. One's something to do with luck from the sounds of things and I have no idea what that is, hopefully someone knows more about alchemy than I do for that. There's definitely some sort of watcher and I think either that's the eye crossed into this dimension or possibly mercury? I don't think the names are going to be these because honestly imagine Lady Mowbray being like hey I serve Tin. She's probably going to say Jupiter but we all have to know in our heart of hearts. It's just fucking tin. I am very tired I am going to bed.

[greyauras]

Just wondering something. Is this idea that I cooked up in my head at 4 am a good one? Basically to sum up the tags, TFT/NB GhostSoap except Ghost is a retired veteran and Soap is a university student... continued

⇓⇓

(in what? Idk but I'm open to suggestions...engineering? Like some cool welding stuff? Because what do you need chemistry for in day to day life? See, this is why I'm stupid.) They become roommates due to both of their low income on an ad (they work at a bookstore together maybe?), become friends over the years and enjoy living together.

Simon is a trans man (which means afab) who never elaborated that he was trans or anything. He's never "said" it but he's very open about it, (walks around shirtless, doesn't care about periods but it's obvious that he has them, there's a box of pads in the closet)

(I'm using he/him pronouns just to make all of this easier to type out but I think the order of preference would be They/He/She? Possibly switching the he and she around depending on the "mood". Yet last night I thought she/he/they…)

Soap is an AMAB who's not very comfortable with how people see him. The way he sees himself is very confusing. He's comfortable "being" a man but doesn't "want" to be a man and doesn't feel the most comfortable in those roles. (Still enjoys traditionally masculine things and of course any gender can do this) But that's what's confusing, he knows that clothes are just clothes and people can wear whatever they want but it goes past the feeling of just wanting to wear pretty clothes. As you might've guessed (it's dysphoria).

Simon notices the way that his friend/roommate looks less confident and hides under big clothing that Soap usually doesn't wear. Basically this worry of change in confidence and personality makes Simon think that Soap is in an abusive relationship or something and tries to get him to open up about that. So no matter what, Simon is supportive, just guessing the wrong issue. (Maybe miscommunication needs to be added as a tag…)

But anyways, that's a very short summary of that. And basically, Soap struggles with the feelings of being a perverted faker (he's not but that's a common doubt) and being too masculine while also not liking too feminine. As there's some masculine attributes he likes about himself (body hair).

I haven't written anything, I just made a draft and this is all just floating feelings in my head. (In my head I said 3 chapters but this is getting too long? All this shit would have to be covered in at least 5) I just wonder if it's not a good idea because it hits a sensitive spot somehow. 😭

I'm a trans guy (AFAB) but never had any experiences with androgyny and non-binary feelings. I'm very binary...very dude like. So I obviously also have NO idea what being AMAB with any other gender identity would be like. (So Simon would be struggling with the same thing)

So feel free to tell me the differences between Bigender and Demigender (Demigirl/Demiboy). I just feel that's how a Soap that I've made in a TFT (that's not FTM4FTM) universe of them would mostly identify as. I've seen people hc Ghost as Agender before. I can totally see it. But never anything for Soap.

I looked up these attributes and feelings as if I was the one struggling myself and thought "Yeah that's what they would relate to". 💀

(the results were Bigender and Demigender if you couldn't tell but apparently there's a difference between them. Which I would like to know. Because maybe what I'm trying to describe is Gender-Fluidity.)

This is probably going to flop because I yapped too much (683 words? Omg bro stfu, no one wants an essay) but I'm not going to a place like reddit for this to know if it's morally incorrect. (I don't think it is but I would like a second opinion basically)

[communistkenobi]

ive never seen any star trek stuff before i started watching tos recently, and ive been liking it a lot but the level to which i like it is definitely not proportional to how good i think it is. like its good but its also kinda shit in a lot of ways, they had kirk say the gender binary is a universal constant, most of kirks Blonde Love Interests Of The Week show zero agency in the romance or sometimes the plot in general, they constantly defy the "dont fuck with alien cultures" rule bc Other Cultures Are Weird And Need Us To Fix Them, and also its just kinda dumb sometimes! i like it mostly because A) the character dynamics are really fun and B) i love seeing the 60s bleed through the script and getting to psychoanalyze the writer based on the thematic storytelling ("this is about the cold war. this is also about the cold war. this is- yup you guessed it the cold war, theyre feeling anxious about nukes again this week. this ones about the writer hating religion. this ones about integration. surprise twist this ones an implicit criticism of solitary confinement. this ones about the cold war again but this time its a really weird but ballsy take"), but its still very much a show from the 60s written by incredibly flawed people so of course its going to be flawed? its been interesting to watch it as a shadow on the cave wall of american politics from that era and ive been having fun but idk why anyone would try and say its not politically fucked in a lot of ways. like its fine you can like this old show and also admit that the writers were not actually all that enlightened about colonialism

I really really like the show! and honestly I genuinely like that it’s openly a piece of American Cold War propaganda, I think it’s very interesting and entertaining as a living historical artefact. I’m less interested in critiquing any one part of it because I feel like the misogyny and orientalism and ableism and etc are not flaws grafted onto an otherwise uncompromised whole, they are an integral part of what tos is and what its place is in the broader popular culture. Like I do not think you can subtract any of those qualities and keep tos enact at the end it, because those gendered and racial and abled assumptions are baked into it, as they are in a lot of sci-fi. And I find the reactionary and bigoted elements just as compelling as the good parts, not because they don’t offend my political sensibilities but because I want to appreciate “the whole text” for what it is and what it does. For me they aren’t things to be ignored or blocked out, they are part of how I enjoy the show and how I understand it as a piece of art.

obviously nobody is required to engage with it in the same way, and if those things are deal-breakers (or even if you want to ignore them) then that is completely fine, I’m not your dad etc, but I think part of why I’ve been getting so much pushback from people about bringing these things up is because they are primarily invested in it as a character drama with the word “socialist utopia” pasted on top of it, and so they are engaging with tos is an idealised expression of their political values. Which isn’t novel, that is like the default mode of engagement with art online (and I am not exempting myself from this), but if you bring up the racism or colonialism or misogyny most people invoke “but it’s socialist!” as a blanket defense, as if that’s at all responsive to any of those descriptions of the show.

anyway I ALSO really like the show as character drama, legitimately Kirk and Spock are really fun characters and I’m very invested in them individually, but my main enjoyment of Star Trek is that it’s American mid-century space-race propaganda, and a lot of it is deeply reactionary as a direct consequence

[velvetvexations]

if were talking tv shows and movies, i find that while most portrayals of trans men arent as outright obviously violent, the narrative clearly dislikes what theyre doing and thinks theyre making a bad decision. take max from the l word, a show that clearly cares more about how transitioning will ""hurt"" other people and the beauty of being ""female"" than caring about a trans man getting to be happy.

i mean, "disgusting predator" isnt the only way to be treated badly, and famously trans men arent really depicted in mainstream media, and a lack of representation isnt suddenly good because its trans men. i guess its a grass is always greener on the other side situation.

I don't even think it's that! We're in a new age of maximum casual queer representation across all media, and sure, at this point it's kinna still somewhere between "oh, hey, television is starting to have Black characters appear on-screen" and the ideal you see more of in smaller works, but regardless it's almost always either non-binary people (I imagine because they're easier to signal) and trans women. I've talked about this a few times before but it's always blown me away by how many transmasc people I've been surrounded by relative to how often they appear in media - even the smaller works.

I'm also like, not entirely sure what media everyone is watching. Did people start accidentally subscribing to The Daily Caller or what? It's hard to think of "mainstream media" that's still full-on Buffalo Bill (and even Silence of the Lambs was more a problem for it's misunderstood impact than it's actual content.)

Even like, The L Word with trans men, I'm not denying that was a major landmark in queer media, but between that and the examples I see people give for negative portrayals of trans women, it feels like people are focusing way too hard on the past and not stuff that's come out in like...the last decade and a half. Which makes this whole thing about pitting representation against each other crazy to me.

Like, maybe I'm wrong? But literally I saw this post about how bad transfems had it in media and every single thing either came out in the 20th century, was a television show (Family Guy, South Park) that began in the 20th century and is mainly watched by middle aged people who think they're still counter-culture, or one movie that was released in the past decade but was a hyper obscure box-office bomb.

So right now it's like, okay, even if we accept trans women did previously have it worse, if we did grant that, it feels like that's much less of an issue now and that trans men being underrepresented is more of a problem that needs addressing instead of obsessing over boomer shit?

Except like, no one was even really saying "we need to prioritize transmascs in media" in the first place, right? Like that anon just came in and was like, transmascs have it so easy because their media representation is so good and ours is so bad, and it's like, okay, well, let's examine that if you're going to bring it to the table completely unprompted.

IDK if I'm out of line here but it sincerely puzzles me.

[livseses]

One thing that's frustrating sometimes in syscourse is the way origin is treated as this binary between endogenic and traumagenic. While frequently there's a 3rd mixed origin option present, or an "unknown" category, those just feel reinforcing or complicit in this dichotomy. Like, you can be one or the other, or both, or unsure where you fit. But it's gotta be one of those.

But what if you're neither? What if you don't have origins? What if you abjectly refuse the narrative that there was cause or purpose to your system's formation? What if the mythology you build for your system's formation bucks at these labels? What if you find the question faulty?

Idk, this is more or less a vent at the centrality of origin in system spaces I guess. Makes us feel out of place. It almost feels like asking us the origins of our genders or orientations. Or to put a -genic label on our spiritual beliefs. It's either an irrelevant question to us or one that's so complex as to be unanswerable with a couple of labels.

We're so much more comfy with labels like DID and Soulbonding. Not origins, but flavours.

[your-bigender-big-brother]

I changed my legal sex to nonbinary but I don't really consider myself nonbinary anymore. Sure I have nonbinary genders, but not just them. I also feel non-binary degenders me in some way, though I'm demiagender.

How to feel? I also experience emotional dysregulation so it's also that. But I'm not fully wrong after all I guess? I read similar experiences on tumblr about yesbinary ppl.

I also saw jurixalt term on neopronouns and relate to it more than my identity. Actually I'm going in a cassflux phase idk

Honestly, I'm not sure what to tell you. Legal sex is a weird concept anyway, and I wish we didn't have it at all. Whether we have dozens of options or just two, we're going to eventually feel limited by it. It's nice to be able to choose more than M or F to put on one's I.D./license, but it really sucks when even changing it doesn't feel right. I'm sorry you have to deal with all that and I wish I knew how to help.

If your legal marker is something like X, maybe you can decide to define that for yourself? You can decide that X, for you, means demiagender rather than nonbinary. Maybe you see it as representative of your existence outside of both binary and nonbinary. I'm not sure how non-binary legal sex markers work though.

I hope things become a little less confusing for you. Maybe someone here has some advice to share? - 💙💚

[shadowslocked]

Mmmm I get wanting egg deaths for tasty drama, it’s really fun! I even wish Dappers first death had been kept because Bads reaction was really good (tho I also don’t mind them reversing it due to game glitch)

But I don’t really vibe with the idea that the eggs dying NEEDS to happen for stories sake particularly in a role play setting. It’s hard to find the exact words for why I’m bothered by it, but I guess it just the idea that the story is only at its most compelling when the eggs die doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Like, surviving danger, living despite the the hardships? That’s just as interesting! That’s an equally good story and having less death doesn’t diminish that!

And I guess it’s like, it starts to feel like people want a death so badly they’re willing to overlook any unfairness to make it happen. Like being mad that Ramon’s death was reversed even though it was made clear it was because the Binary Monsters admin broke a rule that the admins themselves had in place. If they had decided to keep the death it would be s major red flag to the role players that any rules the admins have in place will be broken just because they want to.

“Your bunker is supposed to be completely safe? Not unless the admins change their minds!”

Ehhhhh, idk man, I’m not gonna fault people wanting more drama, just don’t really vibe with the push that egg deaths are the height of storytelling or absolutely necessary.

[obstinatecondolement]

Suicide mention cw (I'm fine, just talking through some of my thoughts about the use of terms like 'unalive')

I think the thing that I find most annoying about TikTok style euphemisms is that there are already many conventionally understood euphemisms for most of the words they are trying to bowlderise past (imagined?) censors. Like 'he unalived himself' ?? For fucks sake, as if people haven't been saying 'he took his own life' and the still more vague 'he sadly lost his life to mental illness' and been understood perfectly well for years before the term 'unalive' was a gleam in the eye of one of these Newspeak enthusiasts.

It just feels very trivialising of the serious subjects they are talking about?? Like I know that the register of different words is entirely culturally constructed and it is entirely arbitrary for me to think 'unalive' is more disrespectful than 'took (their) own life' but also like I think that the arbitrary values people place on the words we use to speak about serious topics is worth respecting!

Idk, I guess my thing is that if a large number of people think it is trivialising suicide to use 'unalive' as a censorship dodging euphemism—which they do!—then I think that is a good enough reason not to do it. Almost everyone has lost someone to suicide, or will at some time in their life, and for me it is not worth making them feel like you're diminishing their loss with silly-willy baby talk.

I am definitely kind of conservative about word choice though, and I chose singular they over neopronouns because I had this idea that using something that had been in conventional use for hundreds of years would seem less silly to cis people, which, like, is very telling of my own internalised issues and also I don't think that cis people who are going to think the concept non-binary people are silly can be so easily won over, lol.

But Idk, I do still think that for the TikTok bowlderisation thing, people should just defer to any of the many polite euphemisms that already exist and will not be jarring to their audience if they feel the need to talk around something, because I feel this is not quite the same scenario as the issue where I was embarrassed to use neopronouns because of internalised transphobia.