#take up ACTUAL allyship or shut the fuck up

[luulapants]

@mock-speed is so funny and smart and correct ❤️

Reminder that word 👏 policing 👏 is 👏 not 👏 activism 👏

Things that are not actual threats to people with mobility issues:

Words that used to be medical terms and are now insults used in ways completely divorced in meaning from their origins to the point that most people haven't even made the connection between the old meaning and the new one

Things that are threats to people with mobility issues:

Lack of ADA compliance in buildings

Rental scooters/bikes left on sidewalks

Inadequate snow clearing on sidewalks

Paternalism

The glue factory

Lack of public transit

Hills

A liberal virtue culture which prioritizes virtue signaling over practical activism

[gender-euphowrya]

the notion of "rainbow capitalism" has actually fucking rotted people's brains

[liverbiver9]

Act Four Notes: 後悔莫及 (Too Late for Regrets)

On AO3

Relationships: Jiāng Yànlí & Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn; Jiang Yanli/Original Character; Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn & Wēn Níng | Wēn Qiónglín & Wēn Qíng; Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī/Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxian

Characters: Jiāng Yànlí; Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn; Original Characters; Wēn Níng | Wēn Qiónglín; Wēn Qíng (Módào Zǔshī); Wēn Níng | Wēn Qiónglín and Wēn Qíng’s Mother; Lán Zhàn | Lán Wàngjī

Additional Tags: Time Travel Fix-It; Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Jiāng Yànlí-centric; POV Jiāng Yànlí; Genderqueer Wèi Yīng | Wèi Wúxiàn; Trans Male Character; Kid Fic

Hello!

TBH I considered posting this fic here but I truly can’t be bothered to figure out how to put all the links and everything so I’ll just post the whole fic once it’s finished on AO3. In the meantime, I have literally So Much to say about this fic because it’s been rotting my brain for weeks now, and there’s only so much I can fit in the author’s notes, so here we are!

DON’T READ PAST HERE IF YOU DON’T WANT SPOILERS

Act four:

Ahh, this is the end of Cai Yiben and Jiang Yanli's love story. Next time we'll be diving into teen wangxian.

The original ending for this fic actually had them fuck off to a cottage far away from everyone after essentially blowing the Wen clan up. But I decided it was much more politically savvy and cool to have Cai Yiben take over the Wen clan and take on the identity of her late husband--who his new wife TOTALLY MURDERED! I'm sure there's a Taylor Swift song or something that correlates to this.

Hi hello I'm never going to shut up about Jiang Yanli creating wuxia HRT for her trans husband. Ultimate act of trans allyship and a perfect courting gift. She really is the perfect person.

I think Jiang Yanli should've gotten to poison a room full of men as a treat. She deserves it.

The name Blood Soaked Sky [血淋天, Xiĕlíntiān] is based on the word blood-soaked [血淋淋, xiě​lín​lín] and the characters for Nightless City [不夜天城, Búyètiān chéng], which was originally translated as Nightless Sky on accident because the original introduction of the name in Chapter 17 does not end with the character "城" for city. (I'm pretty sure this works but who knows--I do not speak or read Mandarin, and though I had my friend proofread some of the names others I just went with because it sounded right.)

I'm so happy with how this fic turned out. It rotted my brain for months before I wrote it, and even after writing it haunted me!! Jiang Yanli deserves a happy ending, and Wei Wuxian deserves to have a real parent for once. Things won't be perfect, of course. This fic didn't delve into what the Jiangs of this timeline were doing and what happened to baby Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli, and I don't think I ever will. If someone else wants to, by all means go for it! For now, I've said all I needed to say about this world. Thank you for reading this story of mine!

[rhisardthewizard]

The fact that they don't do it.

The fact that trans women do not commit assaults in any statistically meaningful way, is my proof.

This is just you. Saying the same shit. In a different way.

This is just you, saying that trans women are men and that men are predatory and hiding your internalized misogyny behind my genitals, despite the fact that I am a cis woman who is telling you, full chest, that I have experienced violence at the hands of cis men and still, full chest, acknowledge the womanhood of trans women and and their need and right to be welcomed in the spaces of women.

I am assuming you're an Afab cis female because whooooo boy you'd better be if you're gonna speaking from the position you're speaking from. I am telling you, you have shared bathrooms and locker rooms with trans women. You have shared changing rooms at the beech with trans women. And it has never been a problem.

Every cis woman you know has shared a "female" space with a trans woman, and it has never been a problem.

Do you know how I know? Because everyone minds their own business in bathrooms, lady. And because you can't tell just by looking at someone whether or not they're trans. And if you or any cis woman you have ever known had experienced a problem with a trans woman in a "female" space, you'd have mentioned it, and probably never shut the fuck up about it.

But you haven't.

So you are forcing a group of people to shoulder responsibility for violence that they have nothing to do with, because you don't actually believe that those people aren't the group responsible.

My allyship is that trans women and women and should be allowed to shit in peace without having to justify their existence. They are women with a right to women's spaces. They take nothing from cis women and they enrich the collective definition of womanhood. They are my sisters, and whether you like it or not, they're yours too.

Trying to keep them from the table is just you, perpetuating violence against women.

It's fucking amazing how many people will pull the "a woman stated her oPiNiOn and got AtTaCkEd for it" because they don't see women as people and think we're just a boxable monolith whose collective skirt they can hide their bigotry behind. As a cis woman, TERFs need to shut the fuck up, you don't speak for us.

The whole TERF mindset is that women are automatically weaker and more vulnerable than men. That ANY woman is more fragile than ANY "man" and thus we need to be constantly protected from scary transwomen because our delicate constitutions make us immediate and automatic damsels. That any person assigned male at birth is going to be stronger, more athletic, than anyone assigned female at birth. It's just misogyny; it's just using us to dehumanize trans people (but especially trans women) based on the presumption that cis women are weak and must be protected.

Based, also, on the baseless assumption that trans people are dangerous or predatory despite a vanishingly small percentage of /any/ crime being comitted by trans people.

Women are not a monolith. We do not have one collective experience of womanhood. Not all of us, even AFABs, experience periods, and even our periods are wildly varied experiences. Not all AFAB people grow boobs (yall have heard of the Itty bitty titty committee). Some of us naturally grow facial hair. Some of us naturally grow chest hair. Some of us are small and waify, some of us are fucking tanks.

Some of us are willing to dig our heels into outdated and dangerous prejudices based on deeply-internalized misogyny and insist that we are ALL delicate waifs who need to be protected from the "threat" of "men".

Some of us aren't that fucking stupid.

But all of us are individual people with individual personal experiences that shape what aspects of ourselves we associate with our own womanhood.

A boring person would say its the ability to shed our uterine lining right into our underwear.

That person needs a life and several hobbies.

And all TERFs need to stop using us cis women as an excuse for your own hate and bigotry. We're not here for it, you don't speak for us.

I'd share a locker room with 1000 trans women minding their own fucking business before I'd ever feel comfortable sharing a locker room with a single terf trying to peek in my underwear to see if I'm a "real" girl.

[leighlew3]

Something I've noticed that applies to media: Performative Allyship sucks, sure it could be a bridge so ppl can reflect on double standards society has but only if ppl are open to the idea that lgbtq+ groups in the case I'm thinking about have it bad as actual lgbtq+ ppl say it is and if people want to fake being supportive but not consider the root issues, then it's better to say so flat out so lgbtq+ ppl know not to waste time on them as an ally about issues instead of silently being judged.

Indeed.

Of course no one would ever admit they're just faking it or only in it for the money or whatever else, but the reality is it would be better for fake allies to just shut up, go away and not involve themselves in LGBTQ business/media. Many have almost been doing more harm than the phobes lately in media. At with least the openly phobic, you know who to look out for, root against, stay away from, tune out, vote against, block, etc. But people who claim to be an ally -- or even make supposed claims of being a member of the community so they can give “hot” aka harmful takes that hurt the collective -- who intentionally and knowingly (and in some cases repeatedly) perpetuate harmful practices like queerbait and BYG and worse yet then gaslight, mock, or dismiss audience members they've hurt?

I mean this in the nicest possible way: just fuck off. Leave the community alone. Don't write LGBTQ characters, don't work on LGBTQ-focused projects, don't slap your Pride flags and emojis on social media when you know the second you do harm within your content you'll block and dismiss LGBTQ people who call you out. Just... fuck off. There’s plenty of heteronormative media for you to work on. Throw a rock in any direction and you’ll find it. 

Buh-bye. Don’t need ya.

And for those who really do try, sometimes fail, or mess up but own it, and are willing to listen and learn? Great! Just don’t make the same mistake twice. Because the community doesn’t give third chances. 

[crossguild]

quick thots on how to actually create a safe space for poc from a leadership position, keplace week, and racism in the wolf 359 fandom

1. white people need to get educated about racism and racist microaggressions and shut them down WITHOUT PROMPTING when they see it. not wait for poc to speak up, not wait for someone to call it out first, not ignore it and hope no one noticed-- we did, and we see the silence as complicity. we see when they point out homophobia and transphobia and ableism and just ignore racism because it doesn't affect them personally.

2. they need to not immediately get defensive when it's pointed out, IF anyone even speaks up about it. the moment they do, they've lost trust and any opportunity for a good-faith learning opportunity even if they walk it back later. we don't care how good their intentions are, their actions have already demonstrated that they'll defend whiteness and white supremacy as a kneejerk reaction, and take any gentle critique of their implicit biases as a personal attack. there's no walking that back.

3. writing 'poc are welcome', 'this is a safe space for poc', 'racism will not be tolerated' is 100% meaningless when they're actively alienating all the poc in their space. i've been in spaces where white people unfailingly change the topic from race to lgbt headcanons, nd headcanons, and literally any other kind of hc or discussion instead of learning, building, and engaging on any conversation about race just because they don't feel totally comfortable in it. they refuse to shut down racism or racist microaggressions, and that directly contradicts any 'racism is not tolerated here' rule.

4. white fans will infantilize and fetishize characters of color to an egregious degree. some of the worst perpetrators are people who claim to be "fans" of the character when what they're actually doing is projecting stereotypes and/or their own experiences onto a character who has nothing in common with them. poc are constantly forced to empathize with, learn about and relate to white people who have nothing in common with us; we recognize it when they refuse to do the same.

5. if all of the mods and leadership in a space are white, that's a huge red flag. if they can't find poc in their community willing to take on a leadership role, or if they do and that person is used as a token, is not supported when they actually bring up and act on racism, they've been abjectly failed.

6. we see white people forcing identities that THEY relate to onto characters of color and getting really fucking mad when anyone disagrees or has a different interpretation, in ways that they don't do with any white characters or any other kind of identity. i've never seen white people get viscerally angry or uncomfortable at the implication that lovelace is dominican instead of costa rican the way they do at the idea that she might be bi, but that's also because they don't care enough about lovelace to think about her culture and identity beyond what they can project on her. again, fully transparent.

7. zero out of the 7 sign-ups for keplace week in the server are straight (and this isn't including people who didn't sign up but still plan to participate), five are woc, all are interested in a (platonic OR otherwise) dynamic between kepler and lovelace because the infantilizing, entitled and reductive ways lovelace is treated when portrayed by white people in this fandom has basically made us sick of minkowski/lovelace, which is a ship i & most of us DO like but which i trust none but my mutuals of color to write.

8. their assumptions about how qpoc engage with and perceive them as characters and as a dynamic are racist and irrelevant to me, but it would be a lot less obvious if they learned to keep it in private platforms instead of indulging in this pathological need to display their ignorance in public. lots of people in my server aren't interested in the ship! most of them go 'don't get it, but there's plenty of other stuff for us to engage in that we actually enjoy!' or 'i never thought about it before, but i'm willing to listen' instead of immediately doing the pettiest and most obnoxious thing they can think of.

9. podcast fandoms are notoriously racist, as are all fandoms, and to create a space that's genuinely comfortable and engaging for a diverse group of fans is a constant, ongoing and active choice that everyone has to engage in. if you aren't making that choice every day, you are perpetuating the racism and alienation. the difference is stark in who feels comfortable contributing and the kinds of conversations we can have, and at the very least i'm glad i have this space and friends to share it with.

10. this is a server i made in response to seeing a larger wolf 359 server, and the way they refuse to engage on race and make excuse after excuse as to why that's okay yet still trying to claim allyship to poc. there were multiple, gentle attempts to address it, all brushed off or aggressively shut down, and i'm a happier person for not being a part of it! white "allies", once again, proving themselves to be a joke. but we've been saying that for years.

11. you know. we weren't gonna be very public about this event from the outset, but after seeing this aggressive and obtuse reaction (to the point of leaving the server) from some white members, we decided to be a little more public and enthusiastic about it! the fact that white fans reacted with passive-aggression and pettiness was expected, and entertaining every step of the way, since we honestly never expected better.

12. i don't expect this to reach the people who are the most egregious about it, nor do i expect it to percolate or change anything even if it does, but that's not why i wrote this. i wrote this 'cause i know there's lots of wolf 359 fans of color, and i've rarely seen these issues addressed in this tiny-ass fandom. i don't speak for everyone, but i do speak for myself, and either way i've found my community! i hope everyone else is able to do the same.

[pricemarshfield]

bite the bullet

A post-season one Vi character study. Read on AO3 here.

The idea of letting go of Powder--Jinx makes Vi physically ill. The beatings in Stillwater, falling off a cliff into the dregs of the Lanes, watching the light leave a kid's eyes--none of it compares.

Caitlyn doesn't get it. She tries to explain it once, but words aren't her thing, never were. She's all fists and dumb muscle and maybe a pretty face, to those so inclined.

Powder was the smart one. Jinx is something else entirely.

--

A week ago, if someone had told Vi she would've mourned the loss of most of the Council members, she'd have laughed in their face. Those rich fucks had sat in their literal goddamn ivory tower while she had rotted, beaten and bruised, in their prison. Their enforcers had killed her family, crushed her city, taken her from her sister. Vi was Undercity through and through, and fuck any Piltie that thinks differently.

She almost wishes she could say there's a part of her that still feels that way. But the pain on Caitlyn's face had taken even that from her, so now she's someone else entirely.

The wreckage is bad. The tower they'd robbed had cracked; this had collapsed.

Not everyone in the room had died. Jayce had lived, a coldness to his face that Vi doesn't care for, the harsh twist of his expression familiar. Some sickly guy had survived, didn't even seem too phased by all of it. Caitlyn mentions some woman that Jayce keeps visiting in the hospital, another Councillor, apparently a voice for peace. It's unclear if she will make it, but she has so far. A Noxian had sworn allyship with Piltover over it in the now-inevitable war.

They'd gone quiet after saying that, looking at Vi like she was going to protest. She'd just stared at her hands until Caitlyn had stepped in front of her, explained how she'd been kidnapped by the person responsible and how no one was more dedicated to finding her than Vi.

She's got to hand it to her--it's a hell of a spin.

Other than those three, the only survivor is a man made of clockwork who only needed his head. Caitlyn's mom? Not so much.

Caitlyn's dad--Vi's got to find out his name--has been the real champion of these past few days. It's not that he's some pillar like Vander was; he cries, easily and openly, when he sees Caitlyn again. But he lets Vi stay with them, doesn't comment when their daughter leaves her cushy room for the admittedly-still-cushy guest room he let her stay in, helps her run her injuries under cool water and disinfect it with iodine.

"Why are you doing this?" she asks after Caitlyn's passed out next to her, low to avoid waking her up.

"Doing what?" he asks. Vi gestures towards her injuries as best she can. He shrugs, and adds, "My daughter likes you."

Vi doesn't have it in her to be embarrassed, though she's sure this moment will hit her later in like a week and a half and make her trip over her own feet. "She's got a good heart. I'm sure she likes a lot of people."

Caitlyn's dad snorts. They both shut up for a second as Caitlyn shifts on the couch, but she just presses her face further into the pillow and stills again. "Yeah. You know, the first time we caught her with a girl in her room, Cassandra shot a hole in the wall."

Vi doesn't laugh. (She hadn't actually known her name.) "What did Caitlyn do?"

"Blew up at her," says Caitlyn's dad, smile dropping. "Biggest fight they'd had in years, actually. The girl was fine, of course, my wife is--was a better shot than that." He trails off, and this time, Vi lets the silence rest, even if she doesn't think she really got an answer to her question.

--

The first night is fine. It's the comfiest bed Vi's ever been in, but she's too tired to linger on it, crashing easily and dreamlessly.

The second night? Worst of her life.

Second worst.

Well, third.

She takes awhile to fall asleep, tossing and turning and wondering if Caitlyn's dad would give her a painkiller so she doesn't have to be up any longer. When she does eventually pass out, she dreams of Powder, laughing as she jumps on the couch of their old place next to Mylo and Claggor and Vander's bleeding bodies, higher and higher while Vi, tied up in a chair with a smoking bullet hole, begs her to stop.

Eventually she falls somewhere Vi can't see her with a sickening crunch, stands up. Vi can barely see Powder through the tears, but she stands taller. There's a gleam of pink in her eye, and Vi's jaw cracks as something hits her--

She wakes up on the floor, Caitlyn shaking her awake, saying she's having a nightmare, it's not real, it's not real, it's okay, as she says it's not it's not it's--

--

Vi sneaks out of the Kiramman house the night before they're supposed to have the funeral. No one in the Undercity will admit to seeing Jinx. No one admits anything to Vi now--best she gets are sympathetic frowns. Attacking Silco? That would've kept her a hero. But the people on his team--

She throws one more person through a wall before she sneaks back up. No one glances at her twice on her way back to the house.

--

At the funeral, Caitlyn's expression is completely blank. Jayce has an arm around her, the casual physicality of someone you've grown up with grating on Vi's nerves a little. But she bites it back, takes Caitlyn's hand, lets Caitlyn squeeze it until she's sure at least one of the bones has fractured.

She wraps up her knuckles on her way down to the Lanes that night, and it's fine. She gets one person who says that all of Silco's crew has gone way underground, with this imploring expression.

The night after that, she breaks into his house when he doesn't answer to find him strung up and riddled with bullet holes, words she can't make out painted over the walls again and again and again.

Caitlyn has to track her down two days later, completely without sleep and having broken more bones than she has in the rest of her lifetime, demanding people tell her where her sister is, what she's doing, what anyone knows, no matter how banal.

"You know, it took me ages to get down here," Caitlyn says conversationally as though she hasn't just watched Vi punch someone in the chest so hard they passed out. "If you'd wanted to keep looking--"

"You don't need to be here," Vi says. It comes out too rough, too angry, but Caitlyn keeps walking forward anyway, supports her as they climb back up to Piltover. "You didn't--"

"Of course I did," Caitlyn snaps, before she calms down with a deep breath. "We're in this together now."

And they are. Obviously. Vi looks back at the undercity and sees a pair of eyes, reflective like a cat's, blink once at her before they vanish.

--

That night, she dreams that she's the one hanging from that guy's ceiling, covered in glitter and with all the nails and scrap that Powder would fill her old bombs with imbedded in the soft and vulnerable parts of her. Jinx is staring at her, smiling exactly like Powder used to with a knife at Caitlyn's throat.

"Please don't," Vi begs, even though talking just tugs at the rope a little more.

"You could've still been my family," Jinx yells, smile dropping in an instant to this blinding, incandescent rage. "We could've been sisters!"

"We are," Vi says. "Nothing's ever gonna--"

The red spray of Caitlyn's blood hits Vi in the mouth, coppery and warm, and she wakes up nauseous.

--

Vi goes back to the Undercity the day Piltover makes their declaration against Zaun official. Here, people stare at her like she's a threat, something Other. She can't find Ekko when she goes looking, the path to where he was somehow different. So she goes back to the house of the guy who's name she never even bothered to ask.

No one's cleaned up the blood, but the body's gone. She sits in the chair and waits.

"What do you think you're doing?"

It's not a surprise to see Jinx; it's why she came down here. But Vi's heart aches when she looks up to see her sister, eyes different, face blank like Caitlyn's at the funeral. "Powder--"

Jinx's hand twitches towards her gun.

"Jinx."

Jinx relaxes. "So what? You want to give me a second chance? Not interested."

"I know," Vi says. "We can leave. We'll make a new life somewhere else. The Freljord."

"Too cold."

"Ionia."

"Booooring."

"Ixtal."

"I'd rather blow it up."

"I don't care," Vi says, too-loud. "You can pick."

"Ashes of Piltover or nothing," Jinx says. "But you wouldn't even kill one enforcer. So I'm good."

"Why do we have to kill anyone?" Vi asks.

Jinx leans in and puts a hand on her gun, as if daring Vi to move away. She should, and she doesn't. "You were all for it back when I knew you. What happened to that spark, huh?"

"Powder, this isn't you--" Jinx pulls the gun up to level at Vi's forehead, and she flinches back before she can stop herself.

"That's what I thought." Jinx says, quiet. "Yeah, it is." The gun goes off, and Vi wakes up in the chair.

She makes her way back to Piltover alone.

--

Caitlyn's found a lead. She hasn't told Vi, but she isn't hiding it either--the conspiracy wall next to where they've slept each night has all of the crime scene photos and a new map of the Undercity.

Vi stares at the red pin next to the A in ZAUN on the map for hours before Caitlyn catches her at it.

"Vi! I--"

"Don't," Vi says, sounding tired even to herself. "I get it. I don't--I can't blame you."

Caitlyn walks closer, sits next to her on the bed. Their legs are close enough that they're brushing. She takes a long moment before she speaks. "Every way I slice it, if I go after your sister alone, one of us comes back in a box."

Vi flinches. "You don't have to do that. You don't have to. I can do this myself, no one else needs to get hurt."

"It's war," Caitlyn says, sounding far older than she or Vi is. "People are going to get hurt."

"I know," Vi says, and she does. "I just don't..."

The thought trails off, and Caitlyn puts her head on Vi's shoulder. "I wish we didn't have to do this."

"Yeah," Vi says. "I'm glad I'm gonna do it with you, though."

Caitlyn stills. "Did you mean for that to sound like innuendo?"

Vi laughs, more startled than actually amused. "No, actually. That's all you."

Caitlyn smiles; she can feel the curve of it against her neck. "We've got to stay another day; Dad's getting us some extra ammo and some gauntlets for you."

"Nice of him," Vi says. "What's his name, by the way?"

"So impolite," Caitlyn says teasingly. "Not even bothering to ask."

"Yeah, well--" The back of her neck feels warm, more from the person teasing her than the teasing itself. "I bet you don't even know my full name."

"Violet," Caitlyn says, immediately. "What? I read your file."

Vi snorts and shoves her off, only to roll on top of her. "You don't know everything about me, you know."

Caitlyn smirks up at her. "Not yet."

"That a challenge, cupcake?"

"Don't call me that," Caitlyn says, but she's still smiling.

--

The day they leave, Vi goes back to the building where her family died. Caitlyn lets her grab the toy from the table where it's been abandoned. She takes it with her. God knows what she'll do with it other than wasting space in her bag, but it felt wrong to leave anything at Powder's chair.

Silco's body's been taken, too. Vi wishes she had it in her to feel sorry for whatever her sister's going through; she barely manages to keep herself from spitting on his chair.

"Ready?" Caitlyn asks.

Vi grins. Caitlyn's kind enough not to call her on how fake it is. "As I'll ever be."

[daxieoclock]

(re: the post i just reblogged)

tme people have an unfortunate tendency to weaponize their allyship towards trans women and transfem nonbinary people in order to maintain this sense of near-ownership over transwomanhood through shepherding those they deem to be inexperienced in trans terminology or the “truth” about their transhood (or, in some cases, those with mental/learning disorders who struggle to maintain “appropriate” articulation of their own identities).

This is most immediately noticeable when tma people are corrected about the way they describe their own identities, but can sometimes take the form of these fucked up mentorships orbiting around hypervigilant correction, turning the very personal process of figuring out ones gender into a one-size-fits-all way for the tme shepherd to prove their their own knowledge on the subject. This knowledge is a source of self-worth for the shepherd, it plays into their sense themselves as who can “help others” and be a noble good person by educating those who do not know better – even if they’re doing so by speaking over the very people they proclaim themselves an ally of and ignoring those who tell them that they’re being creepy or just fucking incorrect. Often such pride in one’s sense of correctness is directly predicated towards BEING stubbornly uneducated about a subject, as they reject any evidence that might contradict the sense of reality they’re so proud of, and it’s no different here.

And of course these people are so often the “fuck t**fs i hate t**fs” crowd who focus a vast majority of their allyship towards performatively slinging hate towards the vague concept of trans exclusive feminism without ever actually taking the time to understand it enough to be able to recognize its dogwhistles among their associates. Their obsession with kindness through violence also manifests towards perpetually showing the tma people around them each and every little bit of violent transmisogyny they can find, “signal boosting” reports of hate crimes or sharing in graphic detail a new disgusting thing some random t**f has said in order to critique it. Which often times is utterly self-serving and does less than nothing to actually help the trans women and transfem nonbinary people unlucky enough to be friends with such self-appointed shepherds.

p.s. yes i am using catholic imagery on purpose because this shit like this is so often driven from applying puritanism and this concept of proxy-parenthood onto something as complicated and personal as fucking GENDER

p.p.s. reblog this post but if you’re tme shut the fuck up or you owe me 20 bucks

[letitrainathousandflames]

Dude you've been dealing with SO MUCH SHIT like an/tis and te/rfs and just blastin back at them like a badass and just.. You're amazing. I know myself and many others here LIVE for your presence/ 🌟🌟 I hope you can get some goddamn peace for a while, tho.. even if you handle it like a boss, it still has to suck 🥺

Thank you, hun! It does suck but not as much as it would for past me. Honestly, I've been going through such an amazing process of growth the past couple of years, I became really serene about things that just... don't matter, y'know?

Going through depression, having some real bad times w/ panic attacks, learning about my autism and adhd diagnosis... all of that in a short time span, just put so much in perspective for me.

Now I look at fandom wank and I kinda wanna laugh; i get some suicide bait ask like "if you ship X and Y then you should k*ll yourself" ... that would've been harsh on depressed, fragile little past me, but current me? I go like "damn bitch the brainrot got you bad, get better soon?", delete the ask and go play the sims like zero fucks given.

About the te/rfs i'm actually glad that they're directing their efforts towards me rather than some trans person who's in a fragile place mentally. Their words are meant to hurt trans people, and while the highly empathic side of me hurts at that, it's something I can brush past and gladly punch back with a smile.

This is why allyship is so important. This is why we have to protect one another.

This is why, when I had to leave a conversation that was growing increasingly homophobic and making me distraught, the same cishet brother I mentioned (who these te/rfs are sneering about) noticed my discomfort, stepped in and told the person to shut the fuck up.

Allyship is so important. It's so important that the LGB's stand for our trans siblings. It's so important that the cishets take a stand for the queer community and use their privilege in our favor. It's so important that the white ppl in the community open space and lift the voices of queer people of color, and that the ableds boost the voices of the disabled, etc etc.

Because it's too painful to defend your own right to exist. You get emotional, you start crying, you find it hard to find the words. So it's extremely important to have people that are willing to shield you and speak on your behalf when you can't find the energy to do so - and also to shut up when you can speak, and listen.

It's what I try to do, and what everyone should do as well.

[non-binharry]

I really just..... cannot imagine taking personal offense to the idea of a stranger being trans because it ruins your sexual fantasy and causes your notions of masculinity and femininity to combust..... and thinking you’re not transphobic??? if they were as woke as they thought they were, they’d realize harry’s gender identity doesn’t have to effect what he in louis do in bed. and even if it did, we do not know that nor do we know them like it do Not Matter dhjdhdjdndkdjd

they'll claim that's not the reason, they'll claim they're against people being invasive of harry's privacy, they'll say we shouldn't have thoughts about harry's gender, but then they'll also turn around and try their damnedest to PROVE that harry isn't trans by mocking everything we say, by seeking out things that invalidates what we believe, and then call us freaks and plagues and say we need mental help and say we only believe these things because we want harry to be a woman for our bottom agenda, even though trans women and trans femmes can top and we're not stupid enough to believe otherwise because we're trans and we know better, while stupid cis bitches who think they have their allyship all figured out can't shut the fuck up for five minutes to actually listen to anything we say, all because they'll have to admit that everything they believe about hl is a lie. but calling them transphobic is harsh and trivializes the meaning 🙄🙄

[meltdownwillbeawesomethisweekend]

abby, a straight woman with a gay fetish, lecturing an actual gay man over a story she MADE UP IN HER HEAD would be infuriating if it weren't so fucking laughable. I'm far from a ryan fan but give me a break. she's so pathetic.

She needs to take a step back and stop trying to talk over LGBT people over LGBT issues. She’s not our Messiah, we don’t need her fetis ... a sorry protection. We don’t her homopho ... sorry allyship ... She needs to shut up about things she doesn’t understand the first thing off ... We know she needs the attention to live but come on can’t she have a bit of dignity

[lantern-hill]

i feel like some of y’all don’t realize that making fun of straight/white/cishet people is supposed to be done in context. like those jokes and statements are meant to be made in retaliation or critique of a certain type of priviledged behaviour from those groups. i see a lot of rlly young people who don’t know the context of these jokes making them and y’all need to reevaluate. 

ppl don’t make those jokes bc “it’s funny to make fun of those groups and they deserve it,” that’s a dangerous attitude to take. those jokes are specifically made to critique White Priviledged Perspectives, compulsory heterosexuality, etc. 

young people see these jokes that people make in context and they catch on and start doing the same thing, except without the context and it’s not good, y’all. things like “can white people shut up” “can straight people shut up” are meant to be used when someone is being obnoxious about their privilege or obtuse about someone else’s lack of privilege. 

and yet i sometimes see that attitude bleeding into things that have nothing to do with that privilege context. it’s annoying, it’s wrong and it should stop. as a WOC who is cishet, i see both sides of this, the sides of the minority and that of the majority, and it’s not good. 

it creates an “us and them” approach, it alienates allies, and while i agree and know that allyship should not be conditional to an oppressed group being nice to allies, of course i do, i also would never alienate a white or male ally like that. don’t get me wrong, i enjoy the occasional in-context chuckle at men or white people, but not out of context, and not constantly. 

“us and them” approaches are so dangerous and so discordant with intersectionality- constantly making ooc (out of context) jokes about straight people works against bipoc straight, trans straights; ooc jokes about white people work against lgbtq+ and otherly disadvantaged white people; etc, etc. dissing m/f relationships works against bi and pan people, etc, etc. 

a good example is “men are trash.” This is an acceptable statement in the context that it is often used in, which is against the patriarchy, against widespread misogyny, etc. however, actually just saying “men are trash” without the attached context is bad. a 12-year-old who sees people making “men are trash” jokes on the internet will probably not understand the history and context behind this. they will just think “men are trash” and not know and probably not question why, and that hurts lgbtq+ men, it hurts male victims of assault, and fuck it it hurts straight white cis boys too. 

although it’s important for minorities to be able to make these in-context jokes without being burned at the stake, it’s also important for majority kids growing up to see that there is a way to be good. yes, i know that minority kids also need to see this. that’s a different issue. 

a white kid who grows up seeing white person jokes without knowing context is either going to start hating the people who make these jokes or hating themselves, and both are not good!

i’m not saying that people should be congratulated for being allies or for not being shitty majority people, and i’m not saying reverse racism or heterophobia is real, they aren’t, but i do think a lot of y’all need to cool it a little bit with the majority jokes.

[wholeanimal]

Quietly Shitty Men

“There is a specific type of person who will siphon the gas right from you because they’ve never learned how to shine their own light.” My ex is engaged.  That shouldn’t bother me, should it?  Oh, but it does.  It bothers me because I saw it coming.  Tell me, what makes a woman “crazy”? Is it when she follows her own instincts? Or is it when she suppresses them? Is she crazy for sensing something is wrong, or crazy for acting like it?  It would be one thing if this was someone new. Good luck and God bless.  It would be another if he said, at any point in the relationship, how he felt. That he was anxious or nervous or angry or scared or hurt or apprehensive or lost. You know, feelings.  I can’t blame a person for having feelings. Had he stepped up and said “you know what, I can’t stop thinking about my ex, I want to give it another try with her.”  That would have been fine. Not in the moment, but nine months later, I wouldn’t be feeling like this. Feeling like I’ve just clicked the last piece of the puzzle into place. 

It wasn’t me. It was, obviously, never me.  I wouldn’t still be putting myself back together after riding the world’s shittiest, least exciting roller coaster.  I wouldn’t be having nightmares that I was somehow still dating him, still subjected to his unfortunately not unique brand of emotionlessness and quiet disdain. Like I was the freak for feeling.  When things were really, truly over, that’s when I learned the most about who he was. I remember sitting at the kitchen counter, having a silent panic attack, wondering where I was going to live, what I was going to do, how I was going to make this all work. The pandemic and riots had hit my neighborhood hard, and I was trying to imagine starting life over when everything else was figuratively and literally crumbling.  Granted, I can’t remember the conversation word-for-word, but this is my best attempt.  “What’s going on?”  “Nothing, I’m just freaking out.” “Why?” “I have to move. I have to start over. I have to figure out so many things.” “Yeah, well...” “What?” “I just don’t know why you’re so upset.” “Are you fucking serious?” “Yeah. I don’t know why you have to have so many emotions.”  “Do you mean now, or in general?” “In general.” I was about ready to fly apart.

“You don’t...understand...why I have EMOTIONS?”  ”Yeah. I guess I just don’t see the point.” I don’t remember much after that. I remember going back upstairs and crying so hard I vomited. So much made sense: it wasn’t that he couldn’t empathize with me. It’s that he saw no value in it. Only his emotions were valid. Anything beyond that was simply not worth caring about. It was chilling, and nauseating, and heartbreaking. My heart broke many times over the course of the month I spent living there after we decided to part ways. I had several conversations like this, where I realized just how long I had been having a one-sided relationship. It also made me feel white-hot, clench-fisted RAGE. How DARE he?  NOTHING about his daily life would change. He would wake up in the same bed, go down the same set of stairs, putz around his merry fucking way. He wouldn’t have to spend a dollar or dime sorting out what came next. Me, on the other hand? I lost my job the same day I found my apartment.  I wanted to claw the paint from the walls I had meticulously restored. I wanted to splinter the floors I had paid to have refinished. I wanted to take all this hard work with me, somehow, to show that I had not truly given up everything. That I had something left. I’m not writing this for you to feel bad about me. I’m more than fine.  I’m not looking for words of encouragement. I don’t need them.  I want him, and other quietly shitty men, held accountable.  Nothing my ex did was actually abusive. It was juuuuust under the line, just enough for him to be able to walk away with his hands up, all “Guess it just didn’t work out!” And I know, I KNOW I’m not the only one.  He made me feel crazy and stupid and weak and small and pathetic. I contorted myself into impossible shapes, trying to make the relationship work. I did things he would never do, that I would never do again. I moved across the country. Twice.  I downplayed all the porn he watched. I pushed the fact that he had an active FetLife account out of my mind. I ignored my dealbreaker about being with a smoker - something he claimed he quit, then started up again in secret, then held against me when I called him out. Making me the bad guy.  It got so bad, I suspected I had R-OCD, or relationship-based OCD. That was my only explanation for how I was always so anxious and he was always so calm. It was MY fault that something felt off. He was aware of my tendency to blame myself, and used it against me. Then, he would get to be the patient, understanding boyfriend while I broke down again and again, hating myself for being so “weak.” I wasn’t weak. He was keeping me in the dark on purpose, because it was easier to do that than to, I don’t know, be fucking honest?! 

Every time I got really bent out of shape, when the little slights and coldness and disdain had built up to a breaking point, he would let me say (or scream) my piece, and respond: “You’re right.”  Wow. Thanks!  I see now that you don’t have to do much work on yourself when you just agree with the person who is upset with you.  I’m also not writing this to paint myself as an angel. Yes, I was frustrated and confused and upset, which came out in outbursts of tears and anger. But the difference is, I was trying to connect with him in everything I did.  He was trying to push me away. it dawned on me, during one of those horrible post-breakup conversations, that he had fully checked out many months ago. I finally asked him to define a phrase I had heard him use during couples counseling (another suggestion of mine). “What do you mean by ‘I’m deeply invested in your happiness?’” “What?” “Well, like an investment, do you mean time, money, emotions? Or do you just want me to be ok?” “Yeah, that.” “Ok. so you just want me to be “okay”.” I’ll take “Performative Allyship” for 200! I’ve told myself I should have known. Should have left sooner. Should-ing myself to death, sparing him from any fault. Remember, he’s the long-suffering partner of an overly sensitive woman. Another wince-worthy excerpt from couples counseling: Our therapist asked us, at the end of a session, to each tell the other something we loved about the other person. I turned, with tears in my eyes, and told him I appreciated how consistent he was. I was always able to count on him being stable and calm.  He told me he liked how nice and clean I kept the house.  Cool! He could have saved himself about six months of this bullshit if he had just spoken his mind. I wonder, now, if he even had the capacity. But no, he preferred to wait and let me figure it out on my own, until I was so depleted that I was having almost nonstop migraines. But, just like the sibling who can’t get into trouble because they’re “NOT ACTUALLY TOUCHING YOU!!!”, nothing he did was exactly abusive.  But it was plenty shitty.  Mr. Social Justice. Mr. Feminism. Mr. Don’t Comment On That Topic Or I’ll Shut Down Emotionally. Mr. We Have To Move Away From Montana For Vague Reasons Including Racial Tension Which I Never Actually Experienced But That’s Reason Enough For Me!  And when we got to Philadelphia, it was Mr. Why Don’t You Take More Walks Outside Even Though You Get Harassed and Followed? You’re In The House Too Much (Yeah, Even Though It’s a Pandemic).  He’d spend hours on the phone talking to the nurses he helped at work. But when a woman in need lived in his own house, ew, gross! Too close to home!  There’s a line in a very funny Chris Fleming song called the “Grad Student Shuffle”, which takes the absolute piss out of white male graduate students. A few of the lines apply, but these especially: Call yourself a community organizer Even though you’re not on speaking terms with your roommates! Stand tall and look mindful Even though you're addicted to porn! C'mon! Now close your eyes Say fair enough "Fair enough" Now you are doing the Grad Student Shuffle I’ve gone back and added to this post a bunch of times since I wrote it. I like having a record, even if it’s one-sided. I realize I’m writing this as much for myself as I am for anyone else. To put my story down somewhere, and not to be too concerned if it’s fair or balanced. What happened to me wasn’t fair or balanced.  Which reminds me of the worst confrontation we ever had.  It was just an hour or two after we decided to break up. It was a sad, but quiet conversation. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t relieved. I went upstairs to let the new reality soak in, and asked if I could steal a puff from his vaporizer. Not weird, right? What was weird was that I felt like a guest in his room. We kept separate bedrooms, which I highly recommend to any couple who can spare the space. But there is a difference between having the option of separate spaces, and feeling relegated to separate spaces. I didn’t feel welcome in his room, and he made no secret of it.  So, as usual, I asked to go in.  He had left his laptop open on the bed, and I stared off into space as I waited for the vaporizer to heat. I must note, here, that I am not a person who digs. I will run circles in my own brain, but by and large, i leave stuff alone. So I didn’t go looking for what was already on the screen, which was a conversation between him and his best friend.  I read maybe a couple sentences before realizing, oops, probably shouldn’t. It was enough to see one exchange, less than two hours after we had officially broken up. “That sucks, man. How long do you think til you’ll be back on Tinder?” “I don’t know. Probably before she moves out.”  I’d like to say I don’t remember what happened next, but I do remember. I marched down two flights of stairs, yanked two giant plastic bins out of basement storage, and rage-packed everything I owned outside of my own room in less than ten minutes. 

He, of course, had no idea. Nuanced as a fucking turtle, he told me he was going out for a walk, and then asked if something was wrong.  I let him have it. Everything that had been building inside of my body came spewing out, all at once. I stumbled over my own words, laughing-crying-screaming-asking him what the fuck he was thinking, who the fuck he was, and what the fuck was this relationship? Was any of it even REAL?  He had nothing to say.  And that, my friends, was my main mistake. Thinking anything I could ever do could ever get a reaction out of him. Could ever draw the sort of love or support or attention that I used to get from him, before he decided to turn off the tap. 

I spent another month there until I could finally move out. I could tell he was annoyed that I was still there. I remember telling him people aren’t disposable. They don’t disappear when you decide you’re done with them. Thirty days was the absolute minimum I could manage, and even that was an incredible feat.  He asked me to watch the dog, the one he adopted only a couple of months before, while he went out. I remember thinking, “Am I watching this animal so he can go out on dates? No fucking way.” I still don’t know, and I’m glad I don’t. 

He’s not the only quietly shitty guy. There are many. I’m sure bunches of them are being congratulated on their engagements or promotions right now, by people who have never dated them. Have never had the soul-wrenching realization that oh, this person who told you you were their dream and their angel and their moon and stars actually decided like a year ago that they just weren’t feeling it and didn’t have the balls to tell you.  But, feel free to question reality in the meantime! 

Women reading this, beware. There are men who hold up their hands and shrug and say shit like “I wish her the best” and know to use phrases like “emotional labor” to fake enough self-knowledge to start a relationship that they don’t know how to finish.  I encourage you to ask questions. Find out how much they know about themselves. How long their relationships tend to last. If their friends really know them. If they change jobs frequently. If they move states frequently, and why.  But most of all, know yourselves. Know that you deserve to have your questions answered, your emotions validated, and your opinions heard. There are plenty of quietly shitty men to choose from.  You don’t need to choose one. 

[a-room-of-my-own]

I love the irony of Daniel Radcliffe's response to JKR. The queer crowd cheers on the cis white man for taking a shallow stance on an issue he'll never have to experience first hand, rather than listening to the woman and creative force behind his whole career raising legitimate concerns, and don't see the problem. Wild hypothesis : what if cancel culture was... misogynistic?

Wild hypothesis I know! 😂

That's identity politics for you. The only thing it manages to achieve is to simplify and polarize every single debate it touches. It's also very successful in discouraging allyship by presenting it as almost suspicious, and by judging people through a borderline ridiculous micro-privilege grid.

On a surface level, the idea that people should listen to people who are concerned by an issue, and respect their life experience, is a good one. But the post-modern crowd has taken it to such an extreme that now, liberal discourse is impossible to distinguish from segregationist, racist discourse. Nowadays, if you don't care about black people's problems, and feel like they should live in their own neighborhoods away from you and your children, you just have to phrase it like this: "I don't feel legitimate, as a privileged white person, to have a public opinion about black people's struggles. If I speak up, I invisibilize black voices. Also, I think black people have a right to live in their own communities, so their unique culture is not preyed upon by white people. With their own schools, their own black-owned business, and their own security system". Like a ghetto, but in a woke way. But look at how effective it is at manipulating people into thinking a regression is actually a good thing.

It works the same way for women's issues. Listening to women and prioritizing them in feminist debates? I'm all for it. But since "woman" is a part of the micro-privilege grid I was mentioning earlier, their victim status has become paradoxically aspirational, just like being gay. So you see people trying to forcefully fit into womanhood, or homosexuality, like Cinderella's step sisters in the crystal shoe. And once they have forced themselves into that criteria, they magically rise on the oppression scale. They're women more oppressed than women, gay people more oppressed than gay people. And now if you're a man who thinks women should just shut the fuck up and let you have your fun you just have to use the IDpol thesaurus and everyone will clap when you are, in fact, just a misogynistic piece of garbage.

During the last 20 years, identity politics has achieved exactly nothing in terms of social progress. It's the most ineffective social movements I have ever witnessed. It's useless at battling the extreme right, worse it helps it rise to power. It fails at defending minorities, and worse it throws them under the bus. It's the best ally of the conservative right, no wonder billionaires keep pouring millions into organizations that promote it.

[marithlizard]

Ace Attorney: Rise From the Ashes (Day Two, Investigation Former) (part 4)

(There’s so much to speculate on at this point in the game that I ended up just plain narrating all the events in detail.  It was fun to write - but is it fun to read? Or do people prefer the less wordy format?)  Today on Ace Attorney, we have our mission clear in mind:  bring down Stinkyhead Gant the police chief,  thereby saving both Lana Skye's life and Miles Edgeworth's career.  And oh yeah we should probably figure out who killed Detective Goodman.

Twice.

Simultaneously in two different places. Could be twins, but my money's on the second victim being someone else dressed up in a white trenchcoat and fedora, and Gant was playing elaborate word games at the trial to technically not lie about it.    No idea why. 

A quick review establishes that the two crime scenes are 30 minutes apart by car, and then we're off to the parking garage to do Science(tm), I guess?

Ema announces that no body was found in the evidence room murder.  Huh.  That certainly wasn't mentioned at the trial!  How, exactly, do you ID a  nonexistent body? In particular, why would you think it was someone who was provably elsewhere and also dead?

Also Ema: Murder, sure, but my sister would NEVER erase evidence,  that's unthinkable!

She's all excited about spraying for blood traces. And she has a point that we can't trust the police. Pink glasses on, new game mechanic engaged, and... we find some splotches right next to the car trunk.  Not enough for a fatal knife fight, though.  Lana's shoe has more blood on it than the ground.

Hello, lunchlady.  You're  much more friendly today.  Though your bentos are no more appetizing than usual.

Angel Starr:  Yes, I totally lied about  these key facts to make my enemy seem more guilty. But you haven't caught me in any lies about these OTHER things, and that's what's important!  

Instead of pointing out that we have no reason to trust ANY of her testimony,  Phoenix muses that the photo she took must have a Clue in it.  Hm.  Re-examining it, I see:

Lana still has both shoes on and they do not match the shoe submitted as evidence.  Clue or low production values?  

 Lots of blood on her trenchcoat, no scarf, gloves, she's about to shut the trunk.  But she didn't, since the crime scene outline tape shows the body was hanging out of it when found.

I dunno, man.  The Clue eludes me. We ask Angel about her past as a detective instead. I get the distinct sense she is bragging about having tortured suspects.  

Ema rises ten points in my estimation for a perfect delivery of the obvious food-poisoning insult.  Angel barely notices, though; she's too busy being bitter about the case that got her fired.  The SL-9 incident - same name as the tag on the knife, no surprise there.

Our victim Goodman was the lead detective on the case, she says.  The knife was the murder weapon (duh), and in her  eyes the case isn't over.  (Goodman probably thought the same. Does Lana?)  But it seems that's all she wants to say.   We give up and head to the police department.   There's another crime scene that could use a dose of Science.

The moving doll is still out front.   Inside, the head detective won't talk about the situation, but will brag about his plush version of the doll.   The other detective at his desk is working on his Agatha Christie fanfic.  I'm not exactly sensing grim determination to avenge a fallen colleague, here.

We reach the security guard office.   Cheesy cowboy decor, eleven booze bottles plus a full glass right on the front desk, and a line set up for hanging laundry. Somebody sleeps under his desk and has no fucks left to give.  A lasso "trap" in front of the inner door looks like something set by Wile E. Coyote on an off day.

Ema's imagination is good enough to compare her sister to a cactus - but not good enough to think of using the ID card in our inventory to get into the evidence room.  Or looking up stuff on the conveniently unguarded security computer.  Instead we stand around waiting for Marshall until I give up.

Detention center:  Lana is being interrogated.   Will she be charged with both deaths, common sense not being an obstacle around here?     But no, Phoenix remembers that Gant said they'd caught a suspect for the second murder.  I really hope it's not Gumshoe.

The Prosecutor's office doesn't seem to be available right now.   With no other options, we head back to the lunchlady and try again.   I throw everything in my inventory at her this time.    To my surprise, she has some solid observations to make:

- If Angel hadn't witnessed the crime, Edgeworth would've been the obvious first suspect.  ...Was that the plan?  I assumed before that she was planted at the scene as a witness, but now I'm not so sure.

- She's backed off from her blind rage against Lana enough to admit that it's very odd for such an organized person not to have brought her own murder weapon.

- She could've taken her photo from the overlooking guard room, instead of spending five minutes running all around the edge of the parking garage and climbing a high chain link fence.  Her testimony looks fishy because of that.

Ema points out that lying on the stand is fishier.  Angel retorts that her testimony was "disregarded" before in THAT case, and she was determined not to let it happen again. Do tell, lunchlady.   Vent your bitterness at us.

And she does.  (Flashback image:  Angel, Goodman, and Marshall bent over a  map, with a fourth person mostly hidden by the speech bubble.)    The prosecutors, she says, were desperate for decisive evidence of guilt.  They did not find it...so they used fake evidence to convict and execute the suspect.  And then fired or demoted all the detectives involved.

Oof.  So, falsified evidence *isn't* common practice here,  depite the rumors about Edgeworth.  It's so rare and so unacceptable that this level of coverup was needed to prevent major scandal.  Angel has reason for her hatred of prosecutors - but who exactly was responsible?  Edgeworth was new on the job at the time.   It would have been Lana, pressured by Gant.  And that's why Lana has been a cactus ever since.  

I still don't like Angel, but she's smart enough to recognize Phoenix will serve her ends. She gives us an actually tasty-looking lunch!  I thought it was a present in recognition of allyship, but no, it's a bribe. Presumably the smell of steak will lure someone back to his assigned guard post.

Ema blurts out her concern for Marshall, who apparently was a lot nicer before SL-9 and did not use to refer to her as a baby cow.  Angel assures us Marshall is not one of her many boyfriends.  I'm not sure why this makes Ema feel better, but it does.

Back to the PD we go with steak in hand.  

Gumshoe is not arrested! He'd tell us who is, but we only have one piece of protein in the inventory and there's no need to trade it for the name.   I can easily imagine who would be "having a good cry" in detention...but I can't imagine him doing murder.  Even the judge wouldn't buy a whopper like that.

Waving the steak around at the security guard office fails to summon Marshall, so we head back *again* to lend the Sniveling Mailman a handkerchief.   (Phoenix is racking up a lot  of taxi or subway expenses, here.  And he won't have the heart to bill Ema if Lana is convicted.)

S.M. Meekins,  left hand thoroughly bandaged,  can't imagine himself doing murder either.  He is very confused and very loud.    I am confused too, about why the guards haven't taken his portable  loudspeaker away.    But his garbled tale of woe clears things up for me if not for our heroes.

Meekins saw a "suspicious person" in a white trenchcoat and fedora on the monitors in the guard office, went into the evidence room and asked him for his ID. The guy pointed a knife at him and Meekins freaked out  and tried to attack. Then he fainted and awoke alone with a bleeding hand.  Soo...There's no body because nobody died.  Gant is just *claiming*  there was a murder because

well um because

Why would he claim that???  It's easily disproven.  The security videos would normally show what happened clearly so they must've been deleted,  or the cameras weren't working.  And Marshall was not at his post.  

Ema, bless her heart, connects the lack of dots and points out there was no murder - so why is Meekins in jail?  Apparently there IS a security tape, I was wrong, and it shows the crime...and that it really was Goodman in the evidence room.

Twins? Lies?  But which parts are  lies?   I throw some inventory items at Meekins just in case, and he recognizes the knife.    The broken-tip knife with the SL-9 tag that was found in Edgeworth's car muffler, wrapped in Lana's scarf.   Meekins is incoherent so Phoenix  writes it off - but I don't.  

Twin Goodmans AND identical knives is too much even for this series.  And that means the real lie is about the time.  Goodman was not in the evidence room and the parking garage simultaneously.  He was in the evidence room first, perhaps? Getting the knife?    But the security video must have timestamps...

I really want to see this security tape now.   So we take our meat back to the police department, only to find Gant bullying the chief on duty. You.  YOU ARE EVIL AND CONFUSING.  I'm going to leave a 1-star review on ratemyvillain if you don't organize your nefarious plot better.

Gant is demanding that everything of Goodman's be found/removed, down to the trash in his wastepaper basket.   (But he's happy to stop and chat with us and slander Edgeworth some more, with a bonus suggestion that Phoenix too is corrupt for having "proved" his innocence last game.)

The duty chief must not like being bullied, because he shows us something he kept back: a lost item report Goodman half-filled-out  on the day of his death.  It doesn't say what was lost.  His ID,  perhaps?

Surprisingly (suspiciously),  Gant is willing to let us investigate the evidence room. He even gives us a guest ID card.   And Marshall finally deigns to show up to work, though with the clear intention of not actually doing any.

Meat:  deployed Marshall:  impressed Me: ...those two ARE dating, and moreover communicating in a secret code of boxed lunches.    It suits them.

"Steak filet lunch" apparently signals "render all assistance".   Marshall willingly admits he's a grade-A slacker and doesn't even bother to understand the security system.  (That explains the lasso.)  He still doesn't want to tell us what the SL-9 case was about, but reminds us it was officially closed two days ago on evidence transfer day.    

(That's the key to everything that happened  on the day of the murder, isn't it?  Goodman took the knife (and maybe more?) from the evidence room to keep it from being permanently "archived".   He was killed for it - but someone protected it by hiding it in the car muffler, and now it's in the court record.    That knife must be the key to solving SL-9.   ...And that's why Gant showed up at the courtroom! He must be *so pissed* that this deadly piece of  evidence is back in the public eye, it's a real danger to him.  Okay! Now I have the shape of what we're dealing with.)

Marshall hasn't bothered to look at the security tape, but from what Meekins told us, other officers have.   (Wait. Is that a safe assumption?  Since all that matters is Gant's official talking points. they could simply be claiming the tape shows Meekins stabbed Goodman.   I'd say this was implausible but I live in the US in 2020. ) 

Ooh, this looks useful - a list of every use of the card reader on the day in question.  4 different IDs are recorded.  2 of them must belong to Goodman and Meekins.   One is nothing but sevens, that's certainly not ominous.  

Next: the evidence room!

[officialthiamlibrary]

Do you guys have any long slow burn AU fics to rec?

We sure have! 😊 Enjoy!

(Please not that this list only contains stories over 30k.)

Anchors by @thiamlife

Liam Dunbar has had enough of being out of control. So he decides to shut his wolf off for awhile… the only problem is it could end up getting him killed.

Theo Raeken had never been good with feelings. But he can’t fathom the idea of losing the little beta. So he makes it his personal mission to help Liam find his way back to the supernatural. Lines will be crossed and there may be no coming back from it.

[NR / 42.2k / complete]

Vargary by @lovelylittlegrim

Liam is worried everything will go to shit once the elder pack members leave Beacon Hills.

It does, of course, but he has Mason and Corey there to help him out.

He also, surprisingly, has Theo Raeken.

[TeenUp / 38.5k / wip]

Just too good to be true by @raekentheoryarchive

Liam has the worst luck when it comes to girls. Things just keep crashing and burning. Mason tries to convince him that maybe it’s time to come out, to date a guy instead, but his best friend won’t hear it. So he and Corey decide to find him the ultimate date, someone who’s exactly his type—snarky, tendency to punch people, and tough enough to put up with their volatile friend. Bad boy Theo Raeken is the perfect fit, despite his murky past and caustic personality. And the fact that he won’t do it for free. What could go wrong? // 10 Things I Hate About You AU.

[TeenUp / 56.2k / complete]

Midnight into morning coffee by @pettigrace

In an anger fit, Liam slashes his social studies teacher's tires. Enter Theo, who is an enigma surrounded by rumours, saving him. In return, he just wants Liam to pay his lunch. Easy, right? Liam would have never guessed the lane he starts walking by accepting the deal.

[TeenUp / 138.5k / wip]

On the same side by @teen-wolf-af

Liam is an FBI agent. Theo is an untouchable drug lord. There's a chase, some grudging trust, and finally the falling in love. It may seem unlikely, but in the end, they find themselves on the same side.

[TeenUp / 101.7k / complete]

Compared to the moon by @flyde

Theo Raeken is back in Beacon Hills. He is an outcast in a world where people show their true colors as actual colors beneath their skin, because Theo himself is a blank page. Joining the lacrosse team, he hopes for one last shot at finding a real place to belong. But things don´t start off too great, especially not between him and the team captain, Liam Dunbar.

[Explicit / 143.8k / complete]

Desolate by @glitter-cake20

Liam involuntarily becomes an Alpha. He refuses accept the new wolf and instead runs away, leaving Beacon Hills behind, and takes to a small cabin in the Colorado mountains for refuge, mostly from himself. He subdues the alpha wolf in him... Until one day when he has absolutely no choice but to let it out.

[Explicit / 60k / complete]

I can't not love you by @raekentheoryarchive

Liam's a little lost in life. His latest relationship has fizzled out, his best friends are about to be married, and he’s rapidly realizing he doesn’t want to be the best man without a date. So, inspired by their tale of rekindled romance, he decides to track down all his exes and figure out which one was right for him all along. The problem is that several have been out of contact for years, and he has no idea where they are. The solution? His promiscuous, struggling musician neighbor Theo, who happens to have dabbled in the police academy long enough to be good at digging up dirt and finding people. But time is running out, the wedding countdown clock ticking ever closer, and if Theo can stop flirting with him for maybe five seconds and find his former flames, he might have a shot at this. || What’s Your Number AU.

[TeenUp / 48.6k / complete]

Wilful Entrapment by @RedCoral

Theo looked at him from head to toe in the dingy bar they were at, his expression thoughtful and deadly serious as he said, "So tell me Liam. Are you sure you're not a parking ticket? Because you've got fine written all over you."

Liam laughed so hard, he almost fell from the barstool. "Oh my God. Is that what you're going with?"

"Did you know people are more likely to laugh at the jokes of people they're attracted to?"

[TeenUp / 41.9k / complete]

Tougher Than The Rest by @glitter-cake20

Theo is horribly self conscious about his body, but a pair of blue eyes sees him for what he truly is.

[Explicit / 44.1k / complete]

The Last Of Us by @raeken_09

A bizzare fungal infection breaks out all over the world, causing people to lose their minds and turn into infected monsters. The remainder of civilisation was quarintined in cities while soldiers kept a close watch on who goes in and out. The McCall Pack is fractured when it proved that the bites of the Infected were deadly to werecreatures. After a careless night out to just be normal teenagers Liam and Mason are bitten. So why does Liam live to see te morning?

[Mature / 50.3k / complete]

Vacancy Signs by @lovelylittlegrim

Theo and Liam are in Manhattan negotiating a pack allyship when the zombie apocalypse breaks out. Now, the two of them have to find their way back to Beacon Hills without getting eaten by zombies or killing one another.

[Explicit / 89.6k / wip]

Just like a tattoo, I'll always have you. by @mmmwddd

The pack has just defeated the Ghost Riders and for now everything is fine. At least until Liam’s sixteenth birthday when his soulmark shows up with a name that he was not expecting.

[NR / 31.4k / complete]

Happiness is a four-letter word by @glitter-cake20

Liam goes out looking for trouble, instead he finds the beginning of a road that could change everything for him.

[Explicit / 93.4k / complete]

Highway to Hope by @flyde

Theo has been obsessed with this youtube guy who posts videos of himself singing in his car. Watching every video there is of Liam, Theo finds himself falling in love. When Liam's songs get more and more sad and dark, Theo starts worrying. The shadows beneath Liam's eyes get darker in every new clip, his voice huskier, his driving a little too fast, a little too reckless. Paying close attention, reading between the lines, Theo can tell Liam is not okay. And then the catastrophe happens.

[Mature / 41.4k / complete]

Scepticism by @sweetest_thiam

Everyone told Liam to avoid the kid in the hallway, but that scrutinizing gaze was just too tempting.

[TeenUp / 50.9k / wip]

Red by @extrasteps and @ajp-37

Theo returns from hell but has lost all of his powers, including his chimera status, making him completely human. He also has a red string of fate wrapped around his left wrist, connecting him to Liam, the one who brought him back. When Malia attacks him, she nearly kills him, and Liam and Lydia step in, all but forcing Scott to bite him and make him a werewolf. Making Theo pack, and the growing connection between him and Liam, changes the whole outcome of season 6.

[Explicit / 134.1k / wip]

We Who Wait by @wolfenboyb

Liam is the son of a local preacher struggling to get good grades, to fit in, to live up to his father's expectations. Every spare moment is spent at the church or school, much to his best friend's annoyance. So when Mason drags Liam out to an underground all-ages punk rock show he's thrown into a world that frightens and excites him. Especially when he meets Theo, the pink haired, in-everyones-face vocalist that gives no fucks and causes trouble where ever he can. And he has a close eye on the preacher's son.

[TeenUp / 83.3k / wip]

The boy I shouldn't want to love by @dan13la-blog-blog

Liam comes back to Beacon Hills after years, when his mother decides to get remarried. His big shock is finding out that his new step-father's son is the same guy that back then in elementary school used to bully him, making his life a literal hell...

[Mature / 161.6k / wip]