#so long as they get to hate on trans people

[jikupikus]

trans!curly / jimcurly / mdni

In all ways Curly is someone who Jimmy wants to be.

He’s kind, he’s handsome, he’s a leader, and people respect him. He knows what to say and when to say it, and others listen to him like how a dog listens to a master. Curly doesn’t even demand esteem, he just gets it, and it pisses Jimmy off.

It’s been that way for a while, and all Jimmy can do is stomach it. He doesn’t know what happened, what strings Curly had to pull, but he tugged those strings and is now sitting pretty on his pedestal looking down from his rosy spot onto the other crew members– onto Jimmy.

The worst part about it is that Curly isn’t even a man, or at least not one in the technical sense. Jimmy remembers when he was a scrawny little girl with poofy long blonde hair that his mom wouldn’t allow him to straighten or cut. He remembers Curly’s braces, and how he would mispronounce words and stumble over his sentences. He remembers the skirts he had to wear because he wasn’t allowed to wear pants, or anything “revealing” for that matter that wasn’t what his stuffy fucking Pentecostal parents approved of.

They met at a church that Jimmy didn’t attend with a chain link fence surrounding the perimeter overlooking a busted white trash trailer park. His mom used to talk shit about that church and how fake everyone is, how they will say “bless your heart” to her when she was on the front porch hitting the glass pipe right before CPS showed up in Jimmy’s front lawn with a nosy cop the next day.

“Remember when my mom used to have a nasty meth addiction and get so addled that she’d accuse us of stealing her spoons?” Jimmy says off handedly one day in the cockpit.

“I don’t think she liked me much,” Curly muses, brow puckering. “Then again I don’t think she liked anyone.”

Jimmy leans over in his chair, his brows creeping up his forehead. “No, she didn’t. I think the meth fried her brain,” he says. “The only time she didn’t do meth was when she was pregnant with me.”

Curly looks over, a smirk playing on his lips. “What did she do instead?”

Jimmy’s face fell, but he played it off. Curly didn’t mean anything by it, maybe. He definitely did, actually. Jimmy crosses his arms, affronted. So much for playing it off.

Sometimes Jimmy’s emotions got the better of him like now, but he can’t help the visceral annoyance that creeps up in him like an invasive vine.

“You fucker,” Jimmy spits. “She wasn’t clean, as you know. I don’t know why you had to go there, but heroin.”

Curly’s eyes flit over to Jimmy, expression apologetic in its own manipulative way. He hates how Curly wilts at any backlash; it’s pathetic in how he behaves like a kicked mutt at any ounce of criticism.

Maybe he’s a little too hard, maybe. Whatever, Curly can just deal with it.

“I… didn’t know. Sorry. I was just joking”–

“Shitty joke,” Jimmy states flatly. “Don’t know why we can’t have a conversation where you don’t make a comment at my expense. It’s kind of annoying.”

Curly’s mouth draws into a taut line, obviously affected by the weight of Jimmy’s words and how they land so heavily on his shoulders. He twists the knife regardless.

They’ve always been that way together, and Curly has always been too sensitive for his own good. Too appeasing, placating. He has never told Jimmy no nor has he ever defended himself. Jimmy thinks his leadership is ill-placed because even if he is well respected and people listen to him, he’s a big fucking pushover. It’s goddamned irritating.

He found that out when they were kids, when Curly forked over his sour gummies because Jimmy threatened to beat his nose in with a rock. Not once did he claim that Jimmy couldn’t hit a girl, nor did Curly ever use any method of defense. He gave up just like that.

Curly is the same now as he was then.

Jimmy sighs, arms unraveling. “Relax. I’m not mad or anything. Don’t get so worked up over something so trivial.”

Curly deflates. He drags his hand down his face, smoothing out the lines of exhaustion that creases his skin around his nose. Dark circles paint his eyes from lack of sleep, his normally bright blue gaze dull and lacking life.

“I guess I’m more sensitive than I normally am. I haven’t slept well at all since we’ve disembarked, maybe averaging one to two hours of sleep a night.” Curly explains himself to Jimmy. It’s another compulsive habit of his, one that makes Jimmy’s heart swell.

He likes that he can wiggle his fingers in the cracks of Curly’s otherwise pristine surface. Curly is riddled with small, hairline cracks, and Jimmy knows exactly how to chip away at his vulnerabilities.

Jimmy will claw his way up Curly’s pedestal and drag him down to his level.

“You need to relax, Captain,” Jimmy presses. He takes Curly’s hand off the center console, holding it in his own rough, calloused palm as his heavy lidded gaze lingers on his friend.

Curly drags his hand out of Jimmy’s grasp and stretches. “I don’t know how to relax,” he says. It isn’t a complaint, but the truth.

In all actuality, as Jimmy knows, Curly is a tightly wound ball of anxiety. During their more intimate moments when there weren’t eyes and ears trained on them, Curly has said so himself.

Only the cockpit and sleeping chambers lack cameras. Jimmy swivels his chair, now facing the door.

“I can help you relax,” Jimmy says, turning his thoughts over in his head. “If you’ll let me, that is. If you won’t shy away like you always do. If you won’t deny me like you did when we were shitty hormonal teenagers.”

Curly’s face flares pink.

[cardentist]

The post that was screenshot: [Link] This post with the reply by catgirlforeskin: [Link] A convenient post that I wrote going into it about my gender yesterday: [Link]

obviously I would suggest reading the original post, as it has context for what was being said in those screenshots.

ahem

So Like, We Just Hate People Who Aren't Binary Huh?

We See Someone Come Out About Being Genderqueer And Talk About Their Own Presentation And Sense Of Self On Their Own Post And It's Immediately Responded To With "You're Fetishizing Trans Women By Thinking That You Have Anything In Common With Them."

let's review !

1: I made a Vent Post where I responded to a Cis Person, I made my own post and crossed out their username because I didn't feel like they did anything Wrong, but I wanted to discuss my feelings on it anyways!

2: these feelings were that it's upsetting that people don't seem to think about the trans perspective when discussing gender Stuff, or how marginalization in general plays a factor when discussing representation in media.

3: within Two Notes I got someone crawling into my replies and dms to talk down to me for being trans masc, so I expressed frustration that That's something that happens to me.

4: THEN somebody responded to That to insist that me expressing frustration about people lashing out at marginalized men was harmful to trans women.

you'll notice ! I was a trans person speaking about my own feelings on my own post, responding to a cis person and someone who explicitly harassed me. I did not mention trans women in this post, because it was a vent post. I explicitly say in my response to that post different kinds of trans people venting about their experiences does not imply or take anything away from other sorts of trans people.

so ! what we're left with is !

1: people being Furiously Angry that I would say that all trans people are capable of being hurt and that all trans people deserve to speak about their feelings, enough to rip things out of context and lie

2: People Just Unironically Saying With Their Entire Chest That A Trans Person Who Considers Themselves Both Masculine And Feminine Is Transmisogynistic, Because Being Genderqueer Implies That You Don't See Trans Women As Real Women. Somehow.

so like. where do we go from here huh.

firstly, there's an awareness. I need people to be Aware that this is something that is happening. that we've reached a point where people hate trans mascs so much that they're willing to tear them down for talking about Their Feelings in response to Cis People.

that we've reached a point where people get so blindly Angry when someone suggests that trans people should all be treated with dignity and respect that they're willing to act like this.

I Need people to share things like this, even if it's not this post specifically. because I Need People To Understand the kind of vitriol and hatred that trans mascs are facing simply for being visible At All.

if people aren't aware then they Will end up supporting and spreading this kind of harassment without realizing.

[alittlewitchyplace]

I feel this as well. I'm 33. I've had so much fear and anxiety and anger for as long as I can remember. I've had crippling depression for years. My mother, who I used to be really close to has been sucked into right wing politics, particularly regarding trans issues and it breaks my heart and makes me so angry.

I have so much grief for everyone who's being pushed down, people who need things like abortions or trans healthcare who might soon not be able to access safe forms of that help... I'm scared for myself, as a gay, disabled, hispanic person. I depend on my disability support to get the help I need, and I know I could lose that now and I'm barely scraping by financially as it is.

I'm angry for everyone who couldn't be bothered to actually be objective and intelligent about who they put their support behind. Who took the word of an extremely unreliable person at face value. Who believed that the leopards would never come to eat their face.

It all really sucks... But I think all we can do is just try to have hope for the future. We need to stand for what we believe in and show people that we're not just going to go away because they hate us. I'm hanging on, and I hope the rest of you can as well. We can get through this. It will get better, but we need to do all we can to help get it there.

I don’t know how to explain this well…but I’m 30 years old and I feel like I’ve had to ‘sacrifice’ my entire adult life to unprecedented times, the pandemic and daily anxiety over hateful politicians and whatever rights they want to take away on any given day and I’m just so fucking tired

[notesbynor]

Okay i finally finished MisMag so i can have opinions on the discourse.

TLDR: good effort but could be better

They did a good job critiqueing HP from a world building POV, and a racial diversity POV with most of the people on the table and the PCs being POC

But i think the main/loudest problem about JKR more than anything is that she's a proud TERF. They should've adressed that by having actual trans main characters and people on the table (i know Erika is trans, but Dream/K themself didnt even consider being trans until the final episode).

They can do better than just saying "fuck TERFs" by actually having trans representation especially transfem rep which i KNOW dropout has (Persephone is RIGHT THERE)

And like, even the cis players can choose to have trans characters (like Oscar Montoya playing Rue in ACOFAF) but no they just chose to make cis characters.

It's kinda sad because i KNOW what dropout is capable of in terms of representation and inclusion. They do care about representation and i know that. But at the end of the day i think MisMag kinda falls short on that aspect.

[rivetgoth]

I’m a huge proponent for anyone should have access to whatever tools they need to do whatever they want to their body etc but ngl it makes me sad seeing the number of AFAB transes who speak of taking testosterone as this almost like, unfortunate thing you gotta endure to get a set list of Desired Changes, or this sorta like, thing you gotta compromise on, with this whole list of negative effects that you gotta risk if you want the positives or whatever, and just constant posts that are functionally like “how long do I have to be on T until I can stop?” or “I want XYZ changes from T but I don’t want ABC changes,” and like it just frustrates me because to be frank I love testosterone. I love everything about being on it and I consider it a miracle that modern medicine has made it possible to access this hormone exogenously if we can’t produce enough of it ourselves. I feel like fundamentally my lack of proper T levels had a negative impact on me until it was corrected and I don’t feel like I was truly myself until I began HRT. Literally the only negative thing about it at all is the frustration that I’m dependent on an outside source for the rest of my life rather than able to just make it myself but there’s no doubt in my mind that I want to be on it for the rest of my life. While maybe a bit pedantic I don’t view T as having side effects, I don’t even necessarily view it as a medication in the traditional sense, it’s just an artificial way for me to correct my body to the state it already should’ve been in. I was overcome by relief after taking my very first dose when I was seeing 0 changes and even as the initial excitement has naturally died down over the years that relief is something I never take for granted. If I could keep every change T has given me and stop taking it I still wouldn’t because beneath all the desire for the changes there is an innate desire to just be on testosterone. I just idk dude I wish that HRT at least within the FTM / transmasc community was viewed with more reverence and the perspectives of those who view it as genuinely a life saving and necessary resource were given a little more voice. I think the entire idea of hormonal dysphoria and the need to alleviate it by correcting one’s hormone production separate from the laundry list of the possible more visible changes and side effects and what’s desired or not or what’s permanent or not etc etc of HRT is seen as weirdly archaic in lots of mainstream FTM spaces and it’s a bit frustrating and isolating.

[screambirdscreaming]

I used to like saying "gender is a social construct," but I stopped saying that because people didn't tend to react well - they thought that I was saying gender wasn't real, or didn't matter, or could be safely ignored without consequences. Which has always baffled me a bit as an interpretation, honestly, because many things are social constructs - like money, school, and the police - and they certainly have profound effects on your life whether or not you believe in them. And they sure don't go away if you ignore them.

Anyway. What I've taken to saying instead is, "gender is a cultural practice." This gives more of a sense of respect for the significance gender holds to many people. And it also opens the door to another couple layers of analysis.

Gender is cultural. It is not globally or historically homogeneous. It shifts over time, develops differently in different communities, and can be influenced by cross-cultural contact. Like many, many aspects of culture, the current status of gender is dramatically influenced by colonialism. Colonial gender norms are shaped by the hierarchical structure of imperialist society, and enforced onto colonized cultures as part of the project of imperial cultural hedgemony.

Gender is practiced. What constitutes a gender includes affects and behaviors, jobs or areas of work, skillsets, clothing, collective and individual practices of gender affiliation and affirmation. Any or all of these things, in any combination, depending on the gender, the culture, and the practitioner.

Gender encompasses shared cultural archetypes. These can include specific figures - gods and goddesses, mythic or fictional characters, etc - or they can be more abstract or general. The Wise Woman, Robin Hood, the Dyke, the Working Man, the Plucky Heroine, the Effete Gay Man, etc etc. The range of archetypes does not circumscribe a given gender, that is, they're not all there is to gender. But they provide frameworks and reference points by which people relate to gender. They may be guides for ways to inhabit or practice a gender. They may be stereotypes through which the gendered behavior of others is viewed.

Gender as a framework can be changed. Because it is created collectively, by shared acknowledgement and enforcement by members of society. Various movements have made significant shifts in how gender is structured at various times and places. The impact of these shifts has been widely variable - for example, depending on what city I'm in, even within my (fairly culturally homogeneous) home country, the way I am gendered and reacted to changes dramatically. Looping back to point one, we often speak of gender in very broad terms that obscure significant variability which exists on many scales.

Gender is structured recursively. This can be seen in the archetypes mentioned above, which range from extremely general (say, the Mother) to highly specific (the PTA Soccer Mom). Even people who claim to acknowledge only two genders will have many concepts of gendered-ways-of-being within each of them, which they may view and react to VERY differently.

Gender is experienced as an external cultural force. It cannot be opted out of, any more than living in a society can be opted out of. Regardless of the internal experience of gender, the external experience is also present. Operating within the shared cultural understanding of gender, one can aim to express a certain practice of gender - to make legible to other people how it is you interface with gender. This is always somewhat of a two-way process of communication. Other people may or may not perceive what you're going for - and they may or may not respect it. They may try to bring your expressed gender into alignment with a gender they know, or they might parcel you off into your own little box.

Gender is normative. Within the structure of the "cultural mainstream," there are allowable ways to practice gender. Any gendered behavior is considered relative to these standards. What behavior is allowed, rewarded, punished, or shunned is determined relative to what is gender normative for your perceived gender. Failure to have a clearly perceivable gender is also, generally, punished. So is having a perceivable gender which is in itself not normative.

Gender is taught by a combination of narratives, punishments, and encouragements. This teaching process is directed most strongly towards children but continues throughout adulthood. Practice of normatively-gendered behaviors and alignment with 'appropriate' archetypes is affirmed, encouraged, and rewarded. Likewise 'other'- gendered behavior and affinity to archetypes is scolded, punished, or shunned. This teaching process is inherently coercive, as social acceptance/rejection is a powerful force. However it can't be likened to programming, everyone experiences and reacts to it differently. Also, this process teaches the cultural roles and practices of both (normative) genders, even as it attempts to force conformity to only one.

Gender regulates access to certain levers of social power. This one is complicated by the fact that access to levers of social power is also affected by *many* other things, most notably race, class, and citizenship. I am not going to attempt to describe this in any general terms, I'm not equipped for that. I'll give a few examples to explain what I'm talking about though. (1) In a social situation, a man is able to imply authority, which is implicitly backed by his ability to intimidate by yelling, looming, or threatening physical violence. How much authority he is perceived to have in response to this display is a function of his race and class. It is also modified by how strongly he appears to conform to a masculine ideal. Whether or not he will receive social backlash for this behavior (as a separate consideration to how effective it will be) is again a function of race/class/other forms of social standing. (2) In a social situation, a woman is able to invoke moral judgment, and attempt to modify the behavior of others by shame. The strength of her perceived moral authority depends not just on her conformity to ideal womanhood, but especially on if she can invoke certain archetypes - such as an Innocent, a Mother, or better yet a Grandmother. Whether her moral authority is considered a relevant consideration to influence the behavior of others (vs whether she will be belittled or ignored) strongly depends on her relative social standing to those she is addressing, on basis of gender/race/class/other.

[Again, these examples are *not* meant to be exhaustive, nor to pass judgment on employing any social power in any situation. Only to illustrate what "gendered access to social power" might mean. And to illustrate that types of power are not uniform and may play out according to complex factors.]

Gender is not based in physical traits, but physical traits are ascribed gendered value. Earlier, I described gender as practiced, citing almost entirely things a person can do or change. And I firmly believe this is the core of gender as it exists culturally - and not just aspirationally. After the moment when a gender is "assigned" based on infant physical characteristics, they are raised into that gender regardless of the physical traits they go on to develop (in most circumstances, and unless/until they denounce that gender.) The range of physical traits like height, facial shape, body hair, ability to put on muscle mass - is distributed so that there is complete overlap between the range of possible traits for people assigned male and people assigned female. Much is made of slight trends in things that are "more common" for one binary sex or the other, but it's statistically quite minor once you get over selection bias. However, these traits are ascribed gendered connotations, often extremely strongly so. As such, the experience of presented and perceived gender is strongly effected by physical traits. The practice of gender therefore naturally expands to include modification of physical traits. Meanwhile, the social movements to change how gender is constructed can include pushing to decrease or change the gendered association of physical traits - although this does not seem to consistently be a priority.

Gender roles are related to the hypothetical ability to bear children, but more obliquely than is often claimed. It is popular to say that the types of work considered feminine derive from things it is possible to do while pregnant or tending small children. However, research on the broader span of human history does not hold this up. It may be true of the cultures that gave immediate rise to the colonial gender roles we are familiar with - secondary to the fact that childcare was designated as women's work. (Which it does not have to be, even a nursing infant doesn't need to be with the person who feeds it 24 hours a day.) More directly, gender roles have been influenced by structures of social control aiming for reproductive control. In the direct precursors of colonial society, attempts to track paternal lineage led to extreme degrees of social control over women, which we still see reflected in normative gender today. Many struggles for women's liberation have attempted to push back these forms of social control. It is my firm opinion that any attempt to re-emphasize childbearing as a touchstone of womanhood is frankly sick. We are at a time where solidarity in struggle for gender liberation, and for reproductive rights, is crucial. We need to cast off shackles of control in both fights. Trying to tie childbearing back to womanhood hobbles both fights and demeans us all.

Gender is baked deeply enough into our culture that it is unlikely to ever go away. Many people feel strongly about the practice of gender, in one way or another, and would not want it to. However we have the power to change how gender is structured and enforced. We can push open the doors of what is allowable, and reduce the pain of social punishment and isolation. We can dismantle another of the tools of colonial hedgemony and social control. We can change the culture!

[daddyd0nt]

You’re either being purposely obtuse or intellectually dishonest but what you are saying is literally patriarchal brainwashing and so bafflingly sexist that you clearly either hate AFAB people or don’t take harm against us seriously. It’s “transphobia” to demand and maintain sex segregated spaces? Transphobia isn’t the violent males who kill trans people, it’s the AFABs who won’t sacrifice our PHYSICAL SAFTY to protect AMAB ego? Classic AMAB entitlement. Yall tell on yourselves so loud. SRS does not erase male socialization idgaf how dysphoric a AMAB person is their emotional comfort should not be prioritized over AFAB safety. You really think it is acceptable for a AFABs to be victimized so AMABs can feel validated in some weird postmodern sense of constructed identity? We don’t need to check genitals I would have no problem with the manliest most masculine most passing trans man in an afab space because no matter what hormones or surgery are involved they cannot rape and impregnate me with their penis the same way an AMAB person could. We don’t need to check gender if we normalize beating the dog shit out of AMABs who threaten us and disrespect our safety by entering our spaces. D you think AFAB trans people should be put in male spaces, not only bathrooms but hospitals and prisons, where they will be at an even greater danger risk of rape than a AMABs trans person and also stand to suffer greater biological consequences since an AFAB person who gets raped by an AMAB one runs the risk of pregnancy. Also trans AMAB people commit sex crimes at an even higher rate than cis AMAB people, they are literally the largest recorded demographic of sex criminals, and I should sacrifice my safety and let them into my spaces (which again did not START segregated they became that way because AMAB people could t be trusted not to rape/assault AFAB ones)?

Also “capitalism is real because it impacts me in a negative way but all other forms of oppression where I might be considered the privileged one in the dynamic is just hysterical people distracting from capitalism” you aren’t even trying to be subtle in your misogyny go join MGTOW.

“If you include trans people who are also oppressed by patriarchy in your fight against patriarchy but don’t include your oppressors who benefit from patriarchy regardless of gender presentation you are hateful I hope you understand this uwu” literally such a long form way to say you don’t want AFAB people to have a movement where we address our own needs because AMAB people can’t emotionally cope with any reminders that they are privileged under patriarchy exclusively for being AMAB.

I have no problem with trans people, I know and love a good amount of people of both sexes who identify as trans. I trust them fully. That doesn’t mean that women who don’t personally know them are obligated to trust them. And it’s not just bathrooms, I spend a LOT of time in institutions specifically high security mental hospitals for violent/psychotic patients including people sent over from the jails for being too mentally ill to incarcerate. I have to take sleeping pills at night and fall unconscious in a room with these people where I’m only checked on every 15-30 mins which is PLENTY of time for something bad to happen. I don’t want to risk having to share that kind of space with an AMAB person. If trans AMAB people don’t want to be housed with cis ones, they can do the legwork and create those spaces for themselves like AFAB people did they do NOT have the right to commandeer our movement and literally erase our rights and protections because not allowing AMAB people into these vulnerable spaces might give them the big sad. My not wanting AMAB people in AFAB spaces is not from not knowing them, it’s because I DO know them and listen to what is said about AFAB people in TRA spaces and know just how AMAB they are in their entitlement to everything from space to sex.

“You are letting fear define your politics” YEAH MY GUY IM FORCED TO LIVE LIKE A FUCKING PREY ANIMAL!!! Some fear is completely rational. AMAB people can not be trusted in AFAB spaces and your suggestion that I should be okay with even a fraction of a percent of AFABs being physically harmed so AMABs feel emotionally validated is absolutely disgusting and proves how patriarchal you are.

Gender is literally fake and varies from culture to culture. Sex based oppression is real and fucks over the lives of AFAB people worldwide. I’m not basing my politics on protecting feelings, I’m basically them on protecting AFAB people from actual tangible oppression.

"OP is a terf" is a thought-terminating cliche meant to keep you from questioning the status quo and keep you afraid of being labeled a heretic should you come to your own conclusions about anything.

[cuntwrap--supreme]

I've been doing a lot of grocery delivery in the country lately, so I ordered myself a nice bumper sticker so I fit in with everyone else's stuff :)

I've seen a lot of these lately, but they were all of a pride flag I don't recognize. Not sure which gender/sexuality has the red and white stripes with the blue with white stars in the corner, but I guess it's an ok design. The rainbow is the traditional LGBT flag, though, so I feel it symbolizes the collective queer community a little better and will be a little more noticeable/recognizable than niche flags, like this stars and stripes guy.

[boxwinebaddie]

hi nina!! can we plz see some of the char sheet youre doing?

AWWWW!!!! this is so sweet, omg. ;-; <3

i fucking LOVE character sheets sm; it is a relic from when i first broke into writing online and used to tumblr rpg ( cringe ). i just feel like they really help you see and understand your characters and figure out what they look like, how they act, what their motivations are, etc.

but yes!!!! i spend a lot of time on them and i haven't had a lot of time...recently, so i haven't been able to work on the ones i have for The Nasty Nina Boys From ( Fine As ) Hell, but you can have this little section i started on appearance in the ravenstan one ( he has been on my mind a lot lately, i srsly love him so much, he's my baby )

i'll drop it under the cut for you <3

-uncle nina, tumblr rpg survivor, char sheet queena

[kjzx]

I've been playing slitherio these past few days, and after some time messing around with nicknames and my own experience with the stuff, I've realized anger is something very easy to weaponize. On my second attempt of having "trans rights" as a nickname I killed a huge ~5k point worm as a teenie tiny 200 point worm simply because it was so desperate to kill me specifically. Anger makes your life harder, but it also makes people really unwise. I fucking bet this is in "the art of war", even though I haven't read it.

[libraryofbronze]

Honestly, this is the sort of thing that all of us who deal in dark kink one way or another have to deal with. I remember when I first started writing darker stuff - bondage, noncon fantasies, that sort of thing - I was genuinely haunted.

''Am I a bad person for writing this stuff? For enjoying it?''

It was made worse because I was writing what I liked. I remember trying to deal with it at first. A sheltered girl who felt the need to write hardcore stuff as a way to cope with the world while worrying that this made her a bad person. In a sense, I suppose that worry was a good thing? it made me examine myself. I introspected a lot. I actually thought out what I was doing and why I did it, and the conclusions I reached I still hold to this day.

Fantasy is fantasy. It's human nature to be attracted to the extreme, drawn to the abyss. We're like moths to a flame in a way. We know that in reality, what we dream of would be horrible. It would hurt people, it would destroy lives. But there is a part of us drawn to the *fantasy* of it. To the game of it. Just so long as we know we can put that game down at the end of the day and come back to a world where everything makes sense.

Writers like me - I don't want to speak for you here since I am sure you have your own conclusions and feelings on the matter - we create fantasies. We weave forbidden tales. We satisfy the desire for dark things in a safe way. I won't say that we don't walk a thin line. We absolutely do. People can consume what we create in an unhealthy way. We need to be aware of that. We have to hold it in our minds.

But we can also help people.

Some people - many people - deal with their traumas, their fears, their worries about the future with sex. The most basic example of that is the classic BDSM surrender thing. Where a sub just wants to surrender, to let their guard down, to *not worry* for an hour or so and relax into a world where they're taken care of and they don't have to make decisions. For them, the lack of control isn't a punishment, it's a release. And they have the right to experience this. For some of them, it's the only release they get.

But it goes further than this. Sometimes for people who face prejudice and bigotry in real life, whose lives might very well be in danger and who face suffering for who they are, fantasies like this are a safe way to engage and cope with those facts. This is true both now and in the past. During World War 2, Nazi porn was massive among people who could be targeted by the Nazis. You know why? Because if you take something scary, something terrifying, something that wants to hurt you and you make it sexy? In a sense, you're removing it's power. You're taking control. You're telling it that you won't be scared of it. You'll take it and use it as fuel.

That's also human nature, and it's something that many people - people who don't deal with it because they're lucky enough not to be threatened in that way - don't really get. They look at, for example, noncon fantasies and think it's about guys lusting after a world where they can just fuck a woman no matter if she wants it or not. There are some people like that, I won't lie. But there are also girls who use it to cope with a fear that they might one day *live* in that world. There are women who were forced into encounters like that and who use stories to contextualise their experiences and reclaim their power and control.

There are trans girls who write and get off to stories focused on transphobia and misgendering, not because they're self-hating but because those are things they deal with every day and they need a release.

And these days, as things skew more and more towards the worse in the real world, releases like this are only going to become more important.

tldr, humans when given the choice will usually choose horny over scary. A lot of people are having to make that choice right now. Dark kink like the sort of thing we produce can be a release for those who desperately need it. Also, apologies for spinning off your post into one of my own. It got me thinking and I wanted to put my work words to it.

Kink in the Hard Era

I got a message recently. It succinctly told me to end my life. Interesting how we can do that in three letters!

Normally, I ignore such missives. This time, however, I engaged. I asked why I should die.

The answer was simple: "you're a misogynist loser".

And you know what...? I get it. I do. This kink, involving power, mind control, gender roles and all that good stuff is a lot less fun when reality seems to be turning fantasies into nightmares.

I trust that everyone here knows I'm not a misogynist, right-winger, complete asshat. But if you need to step back from my content, I absolutely understand. To be honest, I'm not conflict-free in my head about it.

My hope is to provide a place for play, for fantasy; a haven where we can explore power dynamics without the inherent malignancy of hierarchy. But, as stated in my bio: this is all fantasy. Always has been.

And if you are truly a misogynist, transphobe, racist or any other flavor of pond scum making the real lives of real people harder and more dangerous: kindly fuck off.

[kumakuma-circus]

just randomly remembered that during my like 10+ attempts at the shadow yukiko fight i more or less consistently ran out of revival beads so yosuke was just dead (well unconscious but whatever) on the ground for like half the fight gfhfjvhfhfhd-

[shigussy]

i keep getting tiktoks of these younger gen z kids referencing a time they did something relating to fandom in public and now they're embarrassed by it and everytime i see one i sit there thinking over all of middle and high school and having genuinely 0 moments that i feel embarrassed by, like i definitely did a lot of shit these kids would be embarrassed by but i think these are all just really fucking funny

also photographic evidence of the kinda kid i was. these are from 2014/15 when i was in 8th grade

-desolation row one shot(still on wattpad gerard way/reader smut)

-twerk it on (mcr crack fanfic no longer on wattpad but i have another fic in my library called twerking in taco bell which definitely ALSO used for my reading log)

-frank iero must die(a serial killer/assassin frerard fic, still on wattpad)

-hair (really vague maybe a phanfic? nowhere in my wattpad library rip)

my binder i used in 7th grade i had a blue one that looked pretty similar to this for 8th grade but idk where it went, also the parts i scribbled out are my full legal name i had written on it. i wrote it normally and then the big spot is where i wrote my name REALLY BIG in elysian code from the vladimir tod books. also the lines are from when i used an exacto knife to cut up some papers and forgot that my binder was underneath

in conclusion yall can now see why im so shameless about talking about shigaraki the way i do

[prontaentrega]

i have to keep conciously reminding myself that i am non binary

[fooltomery]

any other nb ppl who are transmasc and ID'd as binary trans for a while have a "im not a man" moment and it was a relief? like thank god i dont have to put up this front anymore type of relief

[tipytap]

reminder this pride month that labels are tools to describe and discover yourself, not rigid cages you need to be stuck in ❤️

reminder that it is always okay to change what labels you use 🧡

reminder that it is always ok to not identify with a label at all 💛

reminder that it is not your job to police how other people identify based on abstract criteria 💚

reminder that you are under no obligation to tell anyone how you identify 💙

reminder that if you do change your labels or discover something new about yourself, you werent “wrong” for identifying how you did, you have simply grown and changed as a person 💜

happy pride month yall 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️