#post-sedation dysphoria is a thing

[dono-harm-totonystark]

#if they growl get a muzzle#you are protecting yourself your team the owner and patient#if sedation is an option do it#dont risk getting bit if you dont have to

I feel like that's a gross oversimplification. Each animal is different. You may have a grumbly cat and cat muzzles are generally poorly tolerated. I find even throwing a towel over the cat's face is less 'homicidal inclination'-inducing than a cat muzzle. You may have a dog who is so terrified or has such bad associations that the very act of seeing/getting approached with a muzzle makes it go ballistic while it would probably actually be fine with gentle handling without it. You may have a dog with a facial conformation that renders muzzles useless (most brachys I've had don't really keep a brachy muzzle on (and not even mentioning the stress), and chihuahuas are bastards for getting out of theirs, for example).

Also, I personally dislike the idea that sedation fixes everything. Sedation isn't neutral to the body. If you have high ASA scores you may be unnecessarily putting the animal's health at risk, and you may not always be able to accurately assess ASA with a stressed animal as OP has said. For example, if you haven't been able to take bloods and check kidneys, how do you know that this old vomiting dog you're giving benzodiazepines (contraindicated in liver insufficiency) or acepromazine (metabolised by liver & kidneys and causing possibly kidney-wrecking hypotension) is actually able to metabolise it? And what if the owner simply cannot afford to sedate the animal and the procedure doesn't actually require it? (e.g. ultrasound) And don't even get me started on neurological patients, like epileptics or spinal-trauma patients whose spines may become even more unstable when you sedate them and relax the muscles holding the spine in place!

I have some genuine horror stories with vets being too trigger-happy with sedations leaving me animals that bleed for hours on end after waking up or even straight up die (bouncing back from hypotension), or are metabolising the GA for 3 days straight, or or or. And I am yet to see a study that definitively supports using sedation for mild procedures (and isn't paid for by the pharmaceutical company that makes the sedatives). All of them seem to show that it all depends on an animal.

I've had a dog who had to be muzzled and sedated to get his nails trimmed for years until I gave him some treats and very gentle approach in a quiet environment, and yes, it took a better part of an hour but I got his nails trimmed without any extra measures. I had a cat who would go absolutely manic out the back but I took bloods off of him with his owner holding and he didn't even flinch. I routinely do conscious X-rays and stitch-ups with just an opioid/anxiolytic and local anaesthesia, to good effect (I don't have the time or the staff to faff around with sedating every single thing.) I genuinely cannot remember the last time I had to actually sedate a dog with anything more than some meth/buprenorphine for anything that wasn't a genuine abdominal surgery.

And aggression isn't homogenous either. Hell, in the last week alone I have had 3 growling cats and 2 growling dog who were just. growly. All bark, no bite, let us do everything we wanted with very little handling, just grumbled all throughout it. One of them was a parvo dog who was so hypovolemic he wouldn't be a candidate for even the lightest of sedations and he was growling every time we so much as looked at him.

In total, not a lot of cats and really very few dogs are actually genuinely murderous. Most of them are just scared, and a lot of the time extra measures just add on to their fear (more people to hold, muzzling, needles etc. etc.), while a lot of the time they benefit from one-person low-stress handling with the owner present and/or a preventative anxiolytic given before the appointment and being seen during the less busy times + waiting in the car so they don't get amped up by a dozen other animals in the waiting room. So many of them act better for me because I do as much as I possibly can in the consult room without moving them around and because it's literally just. quiet.

I would highly recommend looking into trigger stacking and fear aggression triggers to minimise the need for extreme measures.

How do you get vitals on an animal that’s growling? Not like trying to attack but just making the anger noise. Like, don’t you need to have at least an idea of heart and lung sounds before sedation? Also, since animals are pissed/stressed generally, how do you know if the vitals are necessarily accurate? The critter might have a fast heart rate but is that pathological or just because it doesn’t want to be at the vets office?

Sueanoi here.

If we're sure the animal will not attack, I will keep listening until there is a quiet 1 (one) second of lung sound that I can catch.

It won't be as accurate as a calm animal. but it's still something.

Once it's established that it's likely safe for a LIGHT sedation. The animal is sedated and vitals are checked again. Most likely I will order an X-ray if the heart-lungs are the concern.

Fast heart rate isn't a big problem. We're listening to the sound of each beat of the heart. A murmur can be heard through a fast heart rate, although it's harder.

[femalefail]

I can't sleep.

I keep thinking about my body. I want to tell its story and even if you will not open your mind or sacrifice your time to it, I need to get it out so I can rest.

TW: sh, ed, sa, su!c!de, gender dysphoria, hospitalization

When I was first given this body, I couldn't have imagined the trauma that would come along with (presumably) having XX chromosomes. I was an innocent child in my mother's arms. An early Christmas gift from the deity in Heaven my mother so often cried out to for hope. I couldn't have known that I was fated to experience a chain of events that some might say resembled body horror.

When I was a small child, I was fascinated with life. I loved to watch plants grow and seasons change. I wanted to know what made life take such forms as bugs and fish and ferocious beasts and humanity. I loved to learn about the same forces who created me. I couldn't have known that these were the same forces that would destroy me.

When I was 11, I would stand naked in front of the mirror and sob. I would run my hands over myself, hoping that I could tug and pull my tiny curves back into straight lines. When I couldn't, I would scratch my hips with thumbtacks and broken razors. I couldn't have fought the urge to hurt myself.

When I was 12, I was a quiet girl, but there was turmoil brewing inside me. I wouldn't give in to nature's curse. I ate as little as I could to show the forces that created me that I was in control of my body, not them. I would scroll through pro-ana Tumblr. I read posts from all over the internet about how other people struggled with their bodies and with their lives. I came across videos of people treating their gender dysphoria and I remember instinctually denying that I was like them. Yet I lingered on that content. I watched them experience the joy of outwardly becoming who they are inside and I would shed happy tears for them. I couldn't have known that I would feel that joy firsthand one day.

When I was 13, I found my first boyfriend. He was my age. He liked playing a game called 'firetruck.' I also figured out how to shave my legs. I still don't understand why I was expected to devote so many hours of my weeks to ridding myself of my excessive, thick body hair. I couldn't have chosen to leave it alone, because the last time I did, a boy called me Gorilla Girl. I couldn't have known that my efforts were literally in vain.

When I was 14, I started to get the hang of the 'period' thing. After years of bleeding through my favorite jeans and wrapping sweatshirts around my waist to hide the stains, I figured out how to blend in. I had it worked out despite having a cycle that, for most other girls, would land them in the doctor's office. The pain was immeasurable, but I was told that there were many other girls who felt the same pain. The doctors said my flow would be normal once I matured. I couldn't have known I'd been lied to.

When I was 15, life became a blur. My inner turmoil broke loose and my parents saw it. My mother, who saw me as a beacon of hope, learned that there was no hope for me. She brought me to doctors who tried every medication they could to help my psyche. Every medication helped sedate me for a short while and then I would spiral again. I would end up in the ER, wishing I wouldn't cling to my life. I wished I had some control over the forces that kept me alive and destroyed me. I wished I could destroy myself. I couldn't have known that this wouldn't be the end of me.

When I was 16, I felt I was already dead. All the memories and love for life that I had collected as a child were tainted by the fresh trauma of being in lockdown facilities. I was still on medication that didn't work. It only numbed me. It only allowed the inner turmoil to simmer undetected. The scars on my body grew in numbers. I couldn't have known that I would live to be an adult with those same scars.

When I was 17, I was trapped in a relationship with another boy. He would say he loved me and then call me a bitch an hour later. He would say he loved my body and then violate it on the same day. He said he would love me no matter what, but when I asked him if he would kindly stop calling me a woman, he laughed. I was with him for two painstaking years. I couldn't have known that the threats he always gave me when I tried to end the relationship were empty.

When I turned 18, I was freshly out of yet another psychiatric hospital. I cried a lot that day. I didn't want to be an adult. I never wanted to grow up in such a horrid way. I looked back at my teenage years and wondered what forces were really behind this. I wondered if maybe there was a deity and they hated me. I couldn't have known it would get worse.

After I turned 19, I told my parents I wasn't a girl. My mother said she already knew. She had stopped attending church due to the other members' hateful words towards the community she suspected her children belonged to, but she still often cries out to her deity whom she loves. My father didn't really understand, but that didn't stop me from going on HRT with the health insurance his job provides. He didn't seem to care to stop it either. My parents were desperate for anything that might make me their beacon of hope again. We couldn't have known that my curse would prevail even through male puberty.

I'm almost 20. My scars are healed and I refuse to make more. I have come to terms with the fact that I'm disabled. I've also accepted the fact that the many ways I hurt my body have stunted my growth. I'm still in the process of getting diagnosed, but I feel like I'm dying every day. I self-medicate at the beginning of every waking moment to numb the pain. My doctors say I should stop self-medicating and then run tests that tell us nothing about the specific horrors of my body. My joints hurt more and more as time goes on. Every single one of them. My muscles are always weak. Pelvic pains and bleeding persist even though I got an IUD inserted and my doctors told me that the intense dysphoria that plagued me monthly was a thing of the past. Now, instead of bleeding monthly, I bleed every day. Eating hurts. Walking hurts. Using the bathroom hurts, and on top of that, I have to use the women's bathroom when I'm in public and fear for my safety regardless. I don't sleep well. I don't think well. And I'm so exhausted. I don't know what to do. I know I will look back on this and think, "You couldn't have known." But it still feels so hopeless. For so many years all I wanted was to destroy myself and now that I'm falling apart, I don't want to be. I worry that HRT has worsened my symptoms but even if that were so, I would still be subjected to bodily horrors without it. I'm not sure there is a way to lift this curse.

I don't know what you, as the reader, are supposed to take away from this post. I just need to say something. I suppose if you are not a trans person, you could gain some sympathy from this post. If you wonder why puberty blockers work and are advocated for, here's an example of the trauma that puberty can instill in a child. I'm a walking example of it. I have the scars to prove it. If you are a trans person, I suppose you could take away from this that you are not alone. We all have stories and I say we should tell them, even if some people are not willing to hear. Even if they resemble body horror in some cursed way. I need to share my story before it eats me up inside.

Also, if you are a trans person, I want you to remember that in many instances, you couldn't have known what to do. I want you to continually remind yourself that you aren't to blame. I often wonder why this is my curse. I want to feel trans joy and I do, but I still hurt. I wonder what I did to deserve this. I wonder when this will be over. I guess I can't know that either.

The story of my body is with you, Tumblr. FF

[ferigrievance]

saw @/spacecaving’s post on things shes done as hermitcraft members so i made my own lmao

etho - can recite mutiple gtlive/game theory fnaf videos by heart

bdubs - slept for two days straight and didnt realize until after i had altered my calendar, planner n shit because i thought i had fucked up the dates

iskall - changes outfits frequently because of gender dysphoria. wears a full face of makeup almost every day

doc - got the first yellow and red card on my soccer level. the yellow was because i had asked an opponent to apologize to my team mate for running them over, then a red card for shooting the referee a thumbs up right after.

ren - was kin assigned jacob black. im allergic to dogs

grian - made a shirt that said wife haver and walked out my room and was confused why my parents were yelling at me. im gay

mumbo - accidentally stole like four different plants from two different parks n they are now growing in my room

scar - started a studyblr and was active for like a year, went on hiatus, came back and posted w the caption “im back from the dead” and then got locked out of the account

impulse - accidentally elbowed a friend in the face and knocked out two teeth that actually needed to be removed at the doctor later that day because they had startled me

tango - had a notebook with penises all over it for science class and justifed it saying that its science class and its just part of the human anatomy. a week later every single persons notebook had penises on it

keralis - studied russian for a year n a half. only remembers how to say egg (яйцо)

gem - has a pair of picture frame earrings that have rick astley on them. not a single person has noticed. ive had them for over a year

pearl - puts cheese, milk, whipping cream, butter and egg in my ramen. im lactose intolerant and allergic to egg

stress - has a small container from my grandpa, the only thing in it are two hands that are probably from a figurine of some kind but i dont. own any ??

cleo - saw emma langevin wearing teeth earrings and forgot that humans arent the only things with teeth, ended up making earrings out of my own teeth

false - forgot that i cosplay and left my wig head with a black wig still attached to it on top of a bookshelf thats across from my bedroom door. i also frequently has hallucinations of jack walten who has black hair and white skin , so i walked in room at three in the morning, saw the wig head, and started crying in the middle of the hallway

cub - was mistaken as my dads wife when i was 12

hypno - hid in the lost and found bin at the front of the history classroom during a shooting drill (?) and fell asleep. woke up the next day with teachers in the classroom having a meeting because there wasnt any class that day

jevin - won a raffle for a toy knockoff playdough at school, ate it in front of my class

joe - singlehandedly caused inflation at the kidzania near my house when i was like. eight

tfc - paid mcdonalds to work there for a week, ended up getting food poisoning

beef - was heavily sedated after getting teeth removed and wanted to have plain pasta at like 4am. tried to boil them and nearly burnt the house down. i thought i had cooked the pasta noodles and ate them raw

wels - had to write an essay on a important person at school, wrote it on gundahm tanaka and got a perfect score

xb - was building something out of legos when i was like six, i put a red two by two lego in between my teeth to hold and and ended up swallowing it

xisuma - kicked a toy car and hurt my ankle, decided that kicking a brick wall would make it better, ended up breaking my ankle

zedaph - dug up worms and ate them every day from the big potted tree beside the school bus while waiting for it to leave. ended up derooting the tree from four years of work and it was removed

[the-scarecrxw]

trans jonathan thoughts / low-key drabble under the cut :) (cuz nsft and it got long)

first off, my backstory headcanons. He came out pretty soon after puberty bc he was immediately hit with the "oh everything about this is WRONG" feels. Gerald Crane may be an asshole who forcefully injects concentrated fear into his son, but he's not transphobic, so he helps jonathan transition.

While they go through the process of getting his name changed and getting approval to start testosterone, he gets a progestin IUD [psst, it's a surprise tool that will help us later ;)] because it massively reduces periods, which helps his dysphoria a lot.

He gets his name legally changed to Jonathan, and he's on testosterone for about two years until the events of the show. In the hospital and Arkham he is not provided testosterone.

.

He's initially put in the women's wing and called "Miss Crane" because they weren't able to get his gender changed legally and it kills him so he begs and cries to be moved to the men's wing but the staff keeps refusing, claiming "oh it's for your own safety :))) we have to keep you here." but Jonathan gets so sick of it (I imagine the scarecrow, along with being visually scary, threatens him and stuff verbally, and maybe pulls on Jonathan's deep rooted fears and mocks and misgenders him) that he makes a sui attempt and after that they're like "okay okay you can stay in the men's wing but don't say we didn't warn you!!"

First week is okay because he spends it in the infirmary, then he's released to the masses. Misgendering gets both better and worse. Staff refer to him masculinely, but it's some of the other inmates who mess with him now.

He's terrified of showering with the other men. The first few times he cried in his cell afterwards because the whole time he felt hungry eyes on his body. Thin waist, perky little breast, and that thing between his legs. He knows it's probably been months-- years even since these men have seen a feminine body. He's lucky he didn't get jumped immediately.

Because of his constant anxiety his hallucinations get worse, so he spends a lot of time sedated in his cell. And in this drugged haze, flittering in and out of consciousness, is the first time he's assaulted by other inmates. Afterwards he doesn't remember much. Mostly the pain. Feeling like he was being ripped open. He wakes with bruises on his hips and wrists, blood and other things dried to his thighs and bedsheets. He doesn't tell anyone, he just scrubs himself clean and cries until he's dragged out for breakfast.

Eyes on him again. Whispering in his direction. He tries to ignore it along with the throbbing pain between his legs while he's sitting down. On his way back to his cell afterwards he gets cornered by a large man and forced to his knees, cock shoved down his throat. He cries the whole time and the man laughs. Afterwards he just sits there for a little bit, disgusted in himself. He's covered in spit and cum and grosser things.

He cleans up in his cell again and notices his underwear was soaked through. something about being used turned him on massively. He was used like a whore and he hates it. Especially because it made something in his stomach coil and made his cunt throb in a way that wasn't painful. shamefully and quietly, he jerked himself off while imagining what had been done to him the night prior, limp body spread out willingly before his assaulter, cock splitting him open. Its so vivid he could almost feel the warm rush of cum inside his pussy. he couldn't help the broken moan that slips past his lips when he orgasms. muffled wolf whistles and cat calls quickly pull him from his post orgasmic haze and Jon is immediately embarrassed that he was overheard. of course he was overheard. each cell door has a grate at the top.

After that, he's a little more willing to let the men take him. He'll still puts up a little fight and protest, but he loves the moment they finally pin him down and force their way inside him. The first time he gets a cock in all three of his holes he cums the hardest he ever has.

The staff knows what's going on but they dont do anything to stop the assault of this teen boy, infact they even join in sometimes.

.

In season four when he's broken out of Arkham the first time he initially assumes it's because these men want him sexually, but when they say it's because they want his father fear toxin it's an immediate breakdown. The past years have been very good at keeping away his Demon, the sex and constant rush of good feelings kept It at bay. now It was back, and worse than ever.

He becomes Scarecrow, and vows to never let himself be taken advantage of again.

That vow doesn't last long, but Jervis' long fingers stroking his inner walls aren't so bad. He's gentle with him (at first) and it's a welcome change. He initially hates the feminizing terms Jervis calls him, and harshly protests them. But Jervis gently grooms him into loving them. He loves being a good girl and spreading his legs for his daddy's big cock. and Fuck, is it a big cock. Biggest he's ever taken. Jervis loves to pound into him and grind against his cervix, and press down on his stomach where his cock bulges out. Jervis caresses his stomach and murmurs about how he's going to breed him, fuck a baby into his womb.

At this point he knows it's only a matter of time, his IUD won't last forever, but a part of him gets excited at the thought. Getting bred by his daddy, clenching down and milking up every drop of his cum. Feeling his stomach grow and expand under his hands, all for his daddy.

But it's all just a fantasy, Jonathan's no idiot. He knew pregnancy would wreck him with dysphoria. When they break out together Jonathan gets a new IUD. Just in case.

Jerome joins in sometimes, he likes making Jonathan choke on his cock while Jervis fucks him. Sometimes they switch. Jervis likes to cum deep within him, while Jerome loves painting his skin with his cum.

.

and those are uh. all my thoughts, mostly. besides my season 5 thoughts but I'm writing that as a fic so I must shhh

[realtransfacts]

Hey. So you're aware, the pap smear ask comes off as really ableist. Plenty of trans people have anxiety and/or dysphoria around genital exams, sometimes to the point of anxiety attacks or needing to be sedated for the procedure. Now, yes people do need to get things check on every once and in a while, but that's not the problem. The ask essentially told people to get over it, without giving any coping mechanisms. Thats what makes it ableist. I'd like the blog to acknowledge, and correct this.

You’re right, it’s not that easy for everybody and I’m sorry for posting something that implied that it was. Do you have any suggestions for how to better phrase these things in the future?

[kaidoesthe50s]

Week 2 of the 1950s Experiment

First of all: My sincere apologies to the followers of this new venture! Unfortunately, my cycle hit and I have been completely and utterly under the weather. Between dysphoria and disproportionate amounts of cramping and headache, I was in no place to make posts. 

Moving on: 

Week 1 saw us adding new rules to our ongoing dynamic, as seen in Kai and the 1950s Experiment. Week 2 saw a brief mitigation of those rules; particularly the “look cute when Sir gets home” and having a drink ready when He arrives home. Unfortunately, my pain levels and deep need to just stay in bed and hide under a mountain of comforters surrounded by my stuffed-animal army prevailed. He was more than gracious enough to encourage this need, and more than one dinner this week was pre-packaged and highly processed. 

My houseboy heart is a little ashamed of that, but it’s more important that I take care of my health than that I stay strictly true to an experimental addition to a healthy D/s lifestyle. I followed the letter of the rule, if not the spirit: dinner was made, in one way or another. I am at peace with that, mostly. In the future, I’d like to keep healthier frozen food on hand vs a bag of honey barbecue chicken strips that are heavily breaded with more sugar and sodium than anyone rightly needs. My local grocer sells frozen chicken cordon bleu, and chicken kiev that, when served with a fresh salad or steamed veg, would be much more health-conscious. 

Convenience shouldn’t come at the cost of our health, physical or mental. But, when both physical AND mental take a dive, I’m not above sending Sir for asian takeout and begging to be allowed to stay home from even that small venture. 

In the spirit of the 50s, I sent Sir out on more than one occasion during my monthly horrors. The first was to a work-related function, where He saw some old friends and colleagues from His coding academy. Encouraged because there was little I could do at home, and there was no reason why He should miss it. The second was a jaunt across town to hang out with another coding friend, again without my presence. I’ll admit to a little emotional vulnerability in that area, since ordinarily I would have asked to go along, or, barring that, to be out doing my own thing with friends at the same time.  However, since there was still very little I was physically up for, I chose the better part of valor and stayed home. A bit of gin and lemonade soothed my fraying emotional edges, as did a nice long chat with my secondary partner. Their consideration, compassion, and light conversation kept me from dwelling on my perceived shortcomings, and had the blessed additional benefit of distracting me from my physical condition.  In the midst of all that turmoil of pain and emotional over-hormonal flux, I managed to make it to the gym a grand total of one time {1}. I am, at the least, supposed to be making it three times a week. My failure in that arena, while perfectly understandable, upsets me almost more than the lack of full dinners. I am, after all, prepping for surgery and preparing myself for intense recovery periods where I will not be allowed to be physically active at all. So, to lose out on two, if not four, workouts is upsetting. So too, is my apparent inability to feed myself while in that state. I’ll spare you all the horrific details of my diet over this past week, but allow me to assure you they included microwaved cheesy tortillas, granola bars, and copious amounts of juice and tonic. Minimal amounts of tinned mandarin oranges and jello were also consumed. /shame.

So here ends our two weeks of experimentation! 

What are we keeping: 

The new rules all seem to work pretty well for us; especially with the ‘outs’ in place for when I am, truly, unable to perform. We’re still looking into a few new outfits for fulfilling the “Look Cute When Sir Gets Home” rule. 

We’re also adding a few rules about personal upkeep; nail care and such; and giving Him more control over my appearance re: jewelry and makeup colors.

What are we leaving: 

Not much! The alcohol in Sir’s welcome home cocktail should be a little less frequent. The daily scrubbing of bathrooms, floors, and kitchen surfaces doesn’t need to be DAILY, but more bi-weekly. 

What did we learn from Week 1: 

Do what you can with what you have. This applies to food, exercise, and personal appearance.

Time and effort will never truly go to waste if you take pleasure in the doing.

A clean, well-ordered home is its own reward.

More rules do not necessarily equate with a better-run life, but they certainly make it more interesting and engaging!

What did we learn from Week 2: 

It’s important to adequately communicate potential physical shortcomings when engaging in this sort of experiment. 

Hinging your performance on, well, performance is the quickest way to set yourself up for failure unless you negotiate your ‘outs’ if the “housewife” has long-term, chronic conditions.

A splash of gin or whiskey goes a long way towards making a happy, more sedated partner. 

Putting time and effort into your appearance is the fastest way to make you feel more attractive, and appealing to your partner.

Verbal appreciation; particularly after perceived failures; soothes the conscience and calms the mind. 

Love and compassion for your partner will NEVER be outdated!

This experiment has, on the whole, been a rousing success! My level of trust in my Sir has only deepened, so too has my security in our relationship. Since the addition of my secondary partner, I have also had much more of an outlet for all the sorts of romantic inclinations that were poorly done in my Primary relationship. {Having a verbally demonstrative partner vs one that is, on the whole, uninterested in overly fluffy romanticism, or sappy texting.} Having begun to strike a noticeably harmonious balance between the two, my life feels more intact and complete. 

With my Sir, I am well able to be the submissive, demure houseboy that I have longed to be from our inception. With the new rules and added structure, my place in our home has been even more clearly delineated. That structure, in turn, puts my anxieties to rest and my need for a firmly outlined “place” to reside at ease. Being given a space for my still-clinging-to-life femininity in the wake of my gender identity solidifying itself as heavily leaning; if not utterly; masculine, is also a Very Good Thing. The offer to inhabit that space and perform those duties offers a peace and contentment that was difficult to find in previous relationships. 

Here, I am able to choose between presentations, and the expectations remain the same regardless. Whereas, in my previous marriage, the unspoken expectations on my ex-husband’s part killed the desire and drive to perform before it was even fully realized. {To say nothing for the lack of appreciation or acceptance of my gender, varied presentation, and need to engage romantically with more than one partner.}

In finding those hopes and desires more fully realized and being encouraged to explore all these avenues that lead to my happiness and peace, I have at last found true contentment. An inner peace that drowns out the confusion of my past. This is what I was meant to do, and how I was meant to do it. 

I have found my Home, and I’m not leaving!

[mentaldisordercartooncharac-blog]

The trickiest thing about tumblr is its level of anonymity, and the ability it gives a person to not be entirely truthful about who they are. You can be whoever you want to be! Nobody will know. You can roleplay anyone and no one can question you. In most cases, this is a good thing. Protecting one’s privacy is important, especially online. But in a lot of cases, it creates awkward situations where you might need to question the legitimacy of someone’s claim because they’re dropping red flags that they’re lying just to have an excuse to be abusive and avoid criticism, but in doing so you risk being labeled -phobic or -ist or a horrible person in general for daring to invalidate someone’s experience or abuse.

so when I see someone throwing a tantrum all over ship tags and equating shippers with pedophiles, while blatantly misusing that word in the same sentence as claiming to be CSA survivors themselves, that really makes me doubt that they’re being entirely truthful about their trauma, and that they’re likely just making up some story out of the mistaken assumption it will add some legitimacy to their false accusations. If you were really a victim of child sexual abuse, you wouldn’t belittle it so candidly just for a cheap attempt at policing strangers on the internet, you wouldn’t exploit it as a manipulation tactic, and you’d have a little more respect for the term (and actual survivors of it) and use it appropriately.

that goes for the transtrender thing too. Believe it or not, I dislike transphobes and terfs as much as the next guy, but when it seems like being a trans guy is the new iteration of last decade’s empty boast of “not like other girls”, and then seeing so many teenagers on here who have clearly never experienced dysphoria in their lives and are solely using that identity as a means to shit on girls for shipping the wrong ship and backing up their reasoning with “well AS A GAY MAN~~ I’M TELLING YOU HOW STUPID YOU ARE BECAUSE I’M TOTALLY A GAY MAN THEREFORE I’M THE ULTIMATE AUTHORITY ON GAY MEN,” you’ll see why I’m so doubtful of a lot of people about who they claim to be. I doubt actual trans men would dedicate such a large portion of their leisure time to yelling at strangers on the internet over inane trivia, because I’m assuming they’d have bigger fish to fry, and actual real life problems to worry about. And probably also a considerable level of empathy on the subject of bullying and harassment, so…needless to say, that sort of behavior would likely be, erm…beneath them. Also, maybe let’s not appropriate that identity, because I imagine it’s demeaning to actual trans guys and the shit they’ve had to go through when all you’ve done is tapped off a hasty afterthought of pronouns in your bio and then assume to speak for them.

There’s also the implication it carries that it’s apparently a lot more beneficial on this site to be othergendered than it is to be female, that we’re still stuck in this shitty online culture where being female is still considered unfashionable and the Absolute Worst Possible Thing a person can be and that claiming to be anything but female is ideal, but that’s a conversation for another time. It’s just, illuminating, I suppose. 

Don’t think I don’t feel bad for pointing this out. I really don’t intend to invalidate anyone’s identity or past abuse, but when it seems like most of you are simply using those labels as weapons for the lone purpose of being huge steaming shitbags to people in fan spaces, you’ll understand why I can’t really take anyone seriously, and why my knee-jerk reaction on this site is to immediately disbelieve that anyone is really who they say they are and not just catfishing for catfishing’s sake. It’s a red flag that goes up whenever someone makes claims as to their identity or education or general worldly experience, when everything about their personality and claims suggest otherwise. Like CSA survivors misusing the word pedophilia, presumed law students making serious accusations of federal crimes with absolutely no evidence to corroborate it, trans people whose only motivation to be on this site is bullying and harassment. 

Pardon if I’m way off base here, I don’t mean to assume what might be considered “normal” behavior for any of these groups of people, but these traits seem a little out of character for those identities, so you’ll forgive me for my skepticism. I think a lot of people here are exaggerating a little about who they say they are. I know it must have been unpleasant, but accidentally stumbling across your parents’ porn stash doesn’t make you a CSA survivor. Occasionally attending a paralegal night class at your local community college for burnouts and recent divorcees doesn’t make you a law student. If you really want to make a convincing case for any of these things that you kids are impersonating, you need to start…well, playing the part a little more convincingly. You’re too obvious in your lie. 

So just a little litmus test the next time you find yourself arrogantly opening any rebuttal with “As a _______, I’m telling you with unassailable authority that you’re wrong/immoral/harmful for liking this thing”, perhaps delete that and try again with something a little more substantial. Because for any of you that haven’t yet made it to sophomore-level debate class, that is a fallacy called “Appeal to Authority,” and it fails from the start because it assumes an individual’s dubious claim on an identity/experience gives them justification to speak for all people in that group. 

This is flawed because it doesn’t rule out the imperfections of personal bias or intersectionality. Instead of using your identity to condescendingly explain why you’re right, try using factual evidence or actual statistics from reliable sources and studies rather than anecdotal evidence. We’re in a post-truth world now (in case any of you haven’t peeked out from under the tumblr-echo-chamber-induced rock you all obviously like to hide under and haven’t noticed), and you’d do best to not contribute to it if you want anyone to take you even remotely seriously when you claim to represent the rights of all those innocents and Others that make up the downtrodden minority of society. Just remember, anecdotal evidence cannot be proven, and it’s useless because literally anyone can just make up some bullshit and apply it to a situation to make themselves look right. 

You know who else does this? Donald Trump. Donald Trump and his lackeys. This little missive is directed mostly at fandom antis, but this can apply to anyone on here who claims to be of any left-leaning persuasion: maybe don’t do that, because you start looking like the very people you claim to oppose, and it weakens every argument you’ll ever make. And I have faith in all of you, that you’re better than that. That you’re smarter than that. Even if your anecdotal evidence is true, it’s inadmissible because it can’t be proven. And it shouldn’t be, for that matter, because you don’t owe that to anyone. All it’s going to do is result in some asshole at some point coming out with their own anecdotal data that’s made up or highly embellished for the sole purpose of belittling yours, and then you’re at an impasse because A) you just spilled your most painful, humiliating memories in vain and B) you either have to acknowledge both accounts or acknowledge neither, and everybody loses. You’ve achieved nothing.

So we’re not here to play oppression olympics or win edgiest blogger award. There’s this really gross thing about tumblr where people are pressured into exposing their traumatic histories and deeply personal information in order to validate enjoyment of their fucking hobbies, and in turn it inspires the children harassing them to “beat the score” or whatever, and that’s when you have them firing back with really dubious accounts of their own, more seriouser trauma that makes them totally righter than you!!! (and is in actuality just a regurgitation of a Law & Order episode they saw once, and very obviously never fucking happened). Fake Tumblr Stories are everywhere, we all know this, we’ve all encountered plenty, but you’re not allowed to question the veracity of any of them or you risk being labeled an abuse apologist or victim blamer or something.

That’s fucking psychotic. Someone shouldn’t have to bleed their darkest moments to some snot-nosed 16 year old brat just to keep from being harassed or falsely reported as a pedophile, and some asshole who arrogantly self-identifies as the fucking moral police shouldn’t be so obsessed with getting the last word on trivial nonsense that they feel obligated to play this woker-than-thou pissing contest with people who have experienced *actual* trauma. I mean, do you kids not see how completely unhinged this behavior is? You children need to be fucking sedated. You’re goddamn nuts. I fear for the day we have to rely on you assholes in the job market, because you’re just gunna fuck everything up. You’ll always be failures. You’ll make a trainwreck of everything.

For lack of a better word,

Yikes. 

Anyway, the point is just a reminder that your identity shouldn’t be relevant when you’re trying to prove a logical point or have any of your arguments taken seriously, if you really are right or justified in your stance. If your argument has any basis in sustainable fact, then your gender/orientation/mental illness/personal history will have no impact whatsoever. So lying about them really isn’t worth it and gains nothing. Just be yourself! I know at the tender ages of ~14-20 you’re desperate to be recognized for how unique you are and you’re struggling to be celebrated as a special individual when you’ve done absolutely nothing, but realistically…that’s a pretty tall order, there are like 7 billion people on the planet, so nothing you can make up about yourself will ever really be that impressive. Stop trying so hard and enjoy your fucking childhood.

And if you find you can’t make a stable argument without using a desperate appeal to authority like that, then maybe you should reassess your stance on things because chances are, it’s because you’re wrong.