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politalysis · 3 years ago

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# What has happened to JK Rowling?

Growing up in the early 2000s immediately made Harry Potter a huge part of your childhood. Even if you never read the books or watched the films, you can probably name the three main characters. Even if you weren’t interested in Harry Potter in the slightest, you probably know your Hogwarts house. It’s incredible what Harry Potter did for our generation all over the world. Children would stay up on their eleventh birthdays anxiously awaiting a Hogwarts acceptance letter, knowing full well that owl was never going to come. Our imagination kept the dream of going to Hogwarts and learning magic alive anyway. Even now at the age of 23, I can for the most part keep a conversation flowing with anyone who has read the books or even just watched the films. You could even go as far as to say it was our generation’s Lord of the Rings.

JK Rowling came from very humble beginnings. She suffered with depression in her childhood and early teens, and lost her mother to multiple sclerosis in 1990. These struggles inspired her a lot when writing Harry Potter. She channeled her grief and pain into her writing. In 1992, she married a man she had met whilst living in Portugal, but Rowling suffered domestic abuse at his hands and the couple separated a year later. She lost her job and moved to Edinburgh in Scotland, where she had to sign up for welfare benefits, which left her a poor and depressed single mother spending her time writing in coffee shops. When she finished writing Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, twelve publishers rejected the opportunity to publish the book. Once someone finally agreed to publish the book, it became the best selling children’s book of the year.

We all know how the story goes from there. Rowling wrote six more Harry Potter books, eight films were made, and Rowling went from a poor vulnerable single mother to a multi millionaire in the space of a few short years. Harry Potter is now a global brand estimated to be worth about $15 billion. The last four books have each consecutively set the record for the fastest selling book in history. Rowling is now the richest author in the world, with a net worth of $92 million. But as well as money, JK Rowling has over 14 million followers on Twitter. This gives her massive influence as well as money. Rowling seemed to initially use this influence for good, spreading mental health awareness, LGBT inclusivity, interacting with fans and creating a website for all us Harry Potter fans to determine our houses and let our wands choose us.

I remember being 8 years old when Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince was released, and I was attending a religious school where some parents complained and called to ban Harry Potter over the controversial decision JK Rowling made regarding Dumbledore’s sexuality. Rowling had made the claim that Dumbledore was gay. Looking back, the controversy was ridiculous and I can only imagine how embarrassed some of those parents must be. I also remember as I got older, re-reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows I noticed more that the emotion behind Dumbledore’s relationship with Grindelwald was one he held with a romantic love. So years later, when several members of the LGBT community attacked Rowling for only deciding Dumbledore’s sexuality after the books were written, I publicly defended her with my knowledge that that simply wasn’t true. I had this image of Rowling in my mind, that she had always been on the right side of this debate. She had always been inclusive and supportive of LGBT people as far as I could see, and I just didn’t understand the issue. Rowling had always expressed a centre-left political perspective, and although I didn’t agree with all her views, they seemed relatively uncontroversial.

When Harry Potter and the Cursed Child was released, I hated it. It was a literary disaster, completely disrespectful of the original book series, the characters were a shell of the characters we had grown up with, the plot was almost deliberately ridiculous and overly elaborate and I immediately dismissed it as not canon. I have never forgiven JK Rowling for publicly stating the book was canon. She almost destroyed a whole two decades of her own hard work and the franchise that she’d built that had been like a home for a whole generation. All because she wanted to grab a few extra quid for a terrible book she didn’t even write. To this day I can’t help but wonder if she has even read the book. If I had written the masterpiece that is Harry Potter, I would view the Cursed Child as an insult. Perhaps I’ll even write a review one day, just for fun. Rowling also annoyed me by going back on her story, regretting pairing Ron and Hermione together and not pairing Hermione with Harry. Ron and Hermione are my favourite couple from the story, and their relationship had so much meaning. I couldn’t believe that the author who wrote such a clever and consistent relationship between two beloved characters could ever regret it. At this point in my life, I was beginning to wonder if perhaps Rowling was losing her mind. It was almost like she was trying to destroy her legacy.

As more years passed, the Fantastic Beasts films were released. The first film looked promising, but the second film was yet another disaster. Again, it was inconsistent with the franchise as we knew it, for some reason Hogwarts was full of people wearing 3 piece suits instead of the robes they wore in the Harry Potter series and Minerva McGonigall appeared as a teacher despite the fact that canonically there is no way she could have been old enough. The film was a disaster with both fans and critics hating it. Amongst this mess came controversy in December 2019. Rowling lost all respect she had once held amongst the transgender community when she made a public statement supporting Maya Forstater, a British woman who lost her employment tribunal case against her employer who fired her over transphobic comments. Six months later on June 6 2020, Rowling criticised the term “people who menstruate” and stated: "If sex isn’t real, the lived reality of women globally is erased. I know and love trans people, but erasing the concept of sex removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives." Rowling’s views on these issues were heavily criticised by GLAAD and even by the actors from the Harry Potter movies including lead actors Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson.

Rowling published a 3,600 word essay in response to the mass criticism of her views four days later. The essay did her no favours, as she wrote: “When you throw open the doors of bathrooms and changing rooms to any man who believes or feels he’s a woman then you open the door to any and all men who wish to come inside.” She seemed to be suggesting that trans women are often just men disguised as women in order to trick or even harm other women. This obviously angered the transgender community even more, and women’s refuge shelters that allow trans women were reporting no rise in violence as a result, children’s charities that support gender non conforming children were criticising Rowling, she was being made to give back awards and ultimately Rowling was labelled a Trans exclusionary radical feminist, a term often abbreviated to TERF.

JK Rowling is the perfect example of how money and influence can make someone forget their roots so easily. For someone who survived poverty, domestic abuse and sexual assault, she is so lacking in self awareness and how the things she has said and done can be harmful to transgender people. It is widely reported that transgender women are at more risk of harm in female restrooms than cisgender women. With acceptance becoming the norm, transgender people are feeling more safe to come out now than ever before, and so the rise in numbers of the community is huge, especially amongst our generation who grew up with Harry Potter. For a young transgender teenager to grow up wondering how Hogwarts would accommodate them, only to hear the author who gave us Hogwarts in the first place disapprove of equal rights for transgender people, must be very disheartening. However, JK Rowling has proven that she has no idea how powerful the legacy her books created really is. She was tasked with following up the Harry Potter series, and what she gave us was inconsistent and very poorly written screenplays. I have read better sequels on tumblr. Lots of them. Hogwarts doesn’t belong to JK Rowling, it belongs to the fandom. And I’ll be willing to bet my last penny that if Professor McGonigall witnessed any bullying of transgender students in her classroom (or indeed the girls bathroom!) she’d absolutely defend the victim without a moment’s hesitation. Hermione would decorate the Gryffindor common room with little blue, pink and white flags in support of a transgender first year who’d just been sorted into Gryffindor. Luna Lovegood would sit and befriend any trans student who looked lonely, and Ginny would dish out a bat bogey hex to anyone who dared pick on them. No matter what JK Rowling thinks, Hogwarts is not hers to ruin. It is ours. Regardless of what makes us different, Hogwarts is our home.

#jk rowling #harry potter #hogwarts #gryffindor #hufflepuff #ravenclaw #slytherin #gay dumbledore #trans rights #edinburgh #professor umbridge #fuck rowling #cursed child is not canon #ron and hermione #lgbtq #lgbt representation #writing

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igirisuhito · 4 years ago

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Hi! I’m bidoofgodofdestruction. I want to say that I’m so sorry for having spread false rumors about your fic without reading it. That was wrong of me and stupidly transphobic. You don’t have to forgive me, or even respond to this, but I’m sorry to you for making accusations. Have a good day.

Hi Bidoof. First of all, I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to freely talk about some issues near and dear to my heart. I want to expand on how problematic these kinds of actions are. Why am I making an example of you in particular? Well, to put it simply; you annoy me.

(Just so you know: Bidoof's “unpleasant run-in” with me was me telling her that she shouldn't judge writers for what they write. You can see my exact post linked here) Is there anything wrong with venting on your blog about a fic you weren’t fond of? No, not really. Begging people to send you asks to feel better? Annoying, but, whatever. Putting said vents in the fucking TAGS? Yeah uh, don’t do that. I would have preferred it if you directly messaged me to voice your qualms on my “Tags” (no, she didn’t even read the fic!) but you can’t, because you have me blocked. Actually, I even have you blocked, hence why you had to send this anonymously. Instead you yell out into your little echo chamber to get the approval from like minded followers on how gross my “Tags” are. If said followers hadn't said anything, you wouldn't have felt any remorse. You blocked someone trying to explain to you that you cannot judge the fic by its tags alone. Shout out to Nanacka, by the way. Absolutely lovely artist.

Judging a book by it’s cover aside, I wanna talk about why this exact kind of thing is so problematic. How looking at LGBT content with a significantly more critical eye is killing content for LGBT people.

You guys remember Dream Daddy right? The game that people criticised so harshly, not because of the plot line or the story or the art, but because of the way it portrayed it's little gay universe? Receiving criticism over being unrealistic, or appealing to female masses, even having uncompleted work in the coding dragged out and judged. That criticism then extended to fanartists, and eventually hype died out for the game because people were afraid of making content for it.

Who would want to make an MLM dating game after seeing a reception like THAT? Have you noticed how every other queer visual novel-esque dating game that has come out since gives you the option of a cishet relationship? And how most of them don't receive the same criticisms Dream Daddy did?

There's also the issue with calling things "gross and fetishistic". With criticising content because it may cater to fujoshis. You see, the inherent TERF rhetoric with calling women consuming queer media "gross and undesirable" aside, some of us gay men just want that? Sometimes as a mentally ill gay man, I want to read about an unhealthy relationship between my two favorite characters. This doesn't mean I like them any less. I'm exploring something I wouldn't want to explore in my real life. These aren’t real people, this is a fantasy I can explore through fiction, experiences I can connect to.

I have healthy relationships in my personal life, and I have had many that weren’t. The ability to explore these themes in a safe place, to be able to self analyse, is a critical skill and I think something everybody should indulge in. It has helped me to learn how to identify abusive behaviour before it has grown out of control. Being able to see characters I relate to go through similar things to what I have is important to me, and in my opinion, vital to good representation. Not everyone goes through trauma gracefully.

Like, do you know how much fanfic involves gay men having sex without any prior preparation? Yes, it can lead to misconceptions, but doesn't that more point to flaws in our education system? It is not my duty to teach the underaged child reading my fanfiction, written for adults, that perhaps they should wear a condom.

I've gone way off topic. I just, never expected this to be the fic that got me squinted at, you know? A fic about two boys with vastly different sexual experiences fumbling around each other trying to figure things out. This is severely wholesome.

You may think you are being a good ally, defending the rights of a transgender character. Their right not to be lewded or fetishised or used as a plot device. But in doing so, you risk belittling the experiences of trans people who relate to said character. Or shit, in this case, even, the trans author who wrote said character based off their own experiences! But you wouldn't know that, right? You didn't even fucking read it. You read the content warnings and drew your own conclusions.

Which brings me back to Bidoof, and her desire to constantly dictate what she sees in fandom. She defends it by saying "oh this is my comfort ship you're ruining my comfort ship". That's ridiculous for a multitude of reasons, people are comforted by vastly different things. You are comforted by your favourite couple holding hands, I am comforted by my favourite couple tearing each other apart in a toxic relationship I am so glad I would never be a part of. We are different people with different tastes, you cannot control fandom.

And girl, leave Red the fuck aloooone omg. Don't think we don't see your vagueposts when you put them in the fucking TAGS!! You vagued about her in a server that she was in and then were shocked when she saw it. Everytime you say these things, they get back to the person. Every single time. My friends reached out to me about this, mutuals/acquaintances reached out to me, even people I've never spoken to reached out to me.

I've seen you vaguepost about a 14 year old in a server she shared with you. In my eyes, knowing you are an adult, that's detestable behaviour. You're a hypocrite and a bully, acting as though you're doing the right thing because people have the "wrong opinions" telling people to "act normal". Seriously you can't see for a second how blatantly horrible that sounds?

I'm just going to say, please don't send Bidoof hate. That's not going to solve anything. My fic is fine, I will survive, and I'm grateful to have actually seen her apologise, even if I do not forgive her. I'm honestly more angry over the fact she thinks it's fine to continue to be such a bully, or that she's justified in doing so.

Sorry to have made you "ill" with my wholesome trans porn. Don't worry, you won't have to see any of my "nasty" stuff in the tags from now on.

#Ask #Anonymous #Sorry about how damn long this is haha #I am just tired of how rude people can be #long post

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lisadreaming01 · 3 years ago

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Abuse is hellish.

I have never written anything on Tumblr. I am not part of the usual Tumblr demographic but I dont want to post this on Facebook for reasons that will become obvious. I have complex PTSD because of a childhood that could be a Stephen King novel due to the fact that I am a trans female who grew up in a time and in a religious semi-rural conservative household where it wasn't acceptable to be other than hetero and CIS.

I was abused by a parent who used my body like a rag doll. Holding me against the wall while I was hit with anything that she would swing and then hit again when I was curled up in a ball screaming for her to stop. She said that I wasn't given permission to cry so I was hit more because of my refusal to stop crying and stand there while she hit me. I was hit with her open hand, leather belts, including the buckle. her shoes, my fathers shoes, yardstick broken until they could not be swing, wooden spoons and small pieces of lumber on occasion. My siblings ran up and hid in their room instead of defending me.

I had to pick up free yardsticks at the county fair and pick out the wooden spoons that she bought knowing full fell how they would be used. I was 10-12 and this was normal to me because I didn't know any different. I learned to wedge myself under my bed to try to escape her. When she came home from work in a bad mood I knew full well that I was going to be hit because it always seemed to be my body that got the brunt of her anger.

She claims that her father did it to her so she earned the right to do it to me. She a has also claimed that my pediatrician told me to do it or the teachers told her to do it. She has told me that I am stupid because I never learned to play her game. Se said that it wouldn't be as much fun to hurt me if I would learn not to cry or react when she does it, so its my fault and I need to stop reacting and learn how to play the game.

Please dont hit children or hurt them because not child should have to spend the rest of their life trying to recover from their childhood. Please stop because you only teach the child that love hurts and violence is acceptable.

She was a nurse so she knows what she did was wrong because she would have to report bruises of a child came in to the ER but somehow she got a pass when it was my body and my life. A teacher in grade school saw the bruises and I was sent to the principals office but nothing was done about them and she didn't stop. Nobody even told me what she was doing was wrong. Its all I ever knew and it hurt.

I was a straight A student in school for elementary and middle school and still it wasn't good enough for m her. My teachers wanted to move me ahead a grade or more in 3rd grade because I wasn't being challenged but my parents refused because it would have put me in the same grade as as older sibling and she was more important than me.

I was bullied at school and then hot when I got home because my clothes were torn and dirty because of the bullies hitting and chasing me. She said it my fault that they were doing it so I was the problem and not those who were hitting or chasing me home from school because I was different.

I was beaten because I wanted to play with dolls instead of the trucks and cars they bought for me. I still dont know what love it because love to me was the days that I wasn't being hit, screamed at or threatened. I loved the library because I was safe and there were books to read. She called me FREAK or FAGGOT. I was often told that she brought me into this world, she could take me out of it and could make another one just like me.

I am still living with that person because I am on disability and I dont have any other place other then the streets or a shelter where I am not safe and dont get the trauma care that I need to even survive, so I am forced to care for my elderly abuser while she gets even more angry. People look the other way and blame me for the problem while my health deteriorates. I’m not even safe from my own family who have attacked me in the hospital, HIPPA violations, and harassed and assaulted my Drs.

The police know about the abuse and the local adult services know about the abuse. I thought that people with mental health had to the right to be safe from harm and abuse, but the abuse still goes on with threats of harm, threats of physical abuse, calling me names, intentional loud noise and other abuse. I was threatened with sexual assault by a caseworker and nothing was done about it, even after I reported it.

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argyle-s · 5 years ago

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On Supercorp

So, I am aware that, among certain circles, I have a bit of a reputation as an “anti”. Anti-Supercorp, Anti-Lena. I’ll admit, the reputation is well deserved. I have, over the past few months, made a lot of anti-Lena posts. Since Septemper 25 of this year, I have posted more than two hundred posts with the “anti lena luthor” tag.

Now, I’ve never really been a quiet fan. Even before I started making posts tagged anti lena luthor, I was on the Sunshine Protection Force’s block list, because I dared to make a meme for a ship that Vv doesn’t approve of as a gift for a friend. I once dared to point out that Kara was more likely to go to Alex with a question about something she didn’t understand, and got called a ‘granny stanning fuck’. I got harassed to the point of taking down one of my fics because a bunch of teenagers in the Sanvers fandom didn’t like me writing about Alex and Maggie engaging in self destructive behavior. Oh, and I had dared to write posts criticizing Lena’s behavior.

But why the sudden, vehement dislike of Lena and the Supercorp ship?

In order to explain that, I have to explain a bit about who I am. I am a 43 year old bisexual trans woman. I transitioned about 2 months after my 42 birthday. I grew up in a deeply religious, homophobic, transphobic home. My grandmother and her second husband were my primary care takes for the time I was about 6 months old, until he died when I was 16. I finally managed to move out when I was about 21. By the time I moved out of my grandmother’s house, I was already involved with a woman who was ten years older than me.

I was abused for the first 34 years of my life. First by my Grandmother and her husband, then by my intimate partner. When I was a child, I got the full buffet. Mental, emotional and physical abuse. My Grandmother liked wire and plastic fly swatters. Her husband liked leather belts, his firsts, and on one notable occasion, a buck knife. I at various times watched him try to murder one of my uncles with said knife, and try to choke my brother to death. He was a prescription drug addict, and his moods were as unpredictable as his choice of drugs each morning. I met my ex, who was my first girlfriend, when I was 19 and she was 29. She spent two years grooming me. We first slept together when I was 21 and she was 31. We were together for 13 years, and the best thing I can say about her is that she never hit me. The physical abuse stopped when I was sixteen and my grandmother’s husband died, but not being hit doesn’t mean that twenty-two years of my life weren’t filled with horrible abuse and violence.

I eventually escaped. I got lucky. My brother got remained to an abuse survivor, and the more she and I interacted, the more she picked up on the signs of abuse. It took her years to coax me into standing up for myself, and when I finally did, when I finally stood up to my ex and said ‘you’re abusing me’ she immediately threw me out. It was honestly the kindest thing she’d ever done for me. She literally released me from the promises and commitment I had made to her, and let me walk away from the hellscape of that life with a clean conscience.

I walked away, but not without lasting injury, and permanent scars. I have depression, anxiety, CPTSD and an eating disorder. I’ve spent long periods of my life dealing with suicidal tendencies. And I was, at the time I walked away, a 34 year old closeted trans woman.

What does all of that have to do with Supercorp you ask?

Pretty much everything.

Kara Zor-El has been my favorite Superhero since I was about 8 years old and say the Helen Slater movie for the first time. Up until that point, Superman has held the crown, but I felt a much deeper connection to Kara than I ever did as Clark. It would be decades before I really understood why she resonated so strongly, but my love for Kara has always been there.

Then 2015 rolled around, and Supergirl premiered, and I was blown away. This was a version of Kara that I connected with so much more deeply that any other version. This was everything I had ever wanted. I fell in love with the show, and with Kara Danvers. I felt a kinship and a connection to the character at the time in my life when I was struggling deeply with depression and anxiety.

As ridiculous as it may sound, Supergirl was a lifeline. The show filled me with so much hope that I could survive, that I could make it. Kara was a roll model. She’s been through something horrible, and she came out of it and all she wanted to do was help. And no matter how hard things were, no matter how cruel the world was to her, she still had hope, she still had strength, and she still did everything she could to help.

I came out the summer between the first season and the second. Told the world that I am bisexual, that I have gender disphoria. I did it in the wake of the Pulse Shooting.

A few weeks later, I got Kara’s symbol tattooed on my arm. Below it are Cat Grant’s words. “Hope in Stronger Than Fear.” I did it as a reminder to myself.

Then season two started.

I admit, I didn’t pay much attention to Lena at first. Cat, who I loved was gone, and I was swept up in Alex’s coming out storyline. Lena was just kind of there. I didn’t really connect to her. But what I did see... It bothered me. The alien detector storyline in her second episode left a sour taste in my mouth. The fact that she put Kara's life on the line by telling Lillian that Kara was investigating her. It wasn't really until the end of Ace Reporter (2x18) that I really noticed just how uncomfortable her character made me. There was something about that final scene between her and Kara that just didn't sit right. Looking back, I think it's because that's the first time (at least that I remember) that Lena shifts the responsibility for her behavior onto Kara. It's subtle, it's all the in the subtext of what she's saying, but it's there.

The next disturbing moment is in 3x02, and the confrontation between Kara and Lena. Kara sets a boundary. She tells Lena the problem she is having in personal, and that she doesn't want to talk about it at work. Lena, instead of respecting that boundary, instead of backing off, immediately punishes Kara for daring to not share every detail of her life. Yes, Kara was not doing her job, but Lena's obviously knew Kara was having issues, and she came down on Kara the way she did to punish her for having boundaries and feelings.

From there, Lena's actions towards Kara get more and more questionable, and I will not go through and innumerate all of them. I've done so in a number of other posts. But there is a slow but steady building of a pattern of abuse between Lena and Kara, with Lena as the abuser and Kara as the victim. It gets progressively worse. The pattern is clear. Lena expects Kara to be completely emotionally available to her at all times. She feels entitled to Kara's every thought and feeling. She expects and allows Kara to perform all the emotional labor in the relationship. And any time Kara doesn't to all of this, any time Kara sets a boundary, or isn't available at Lena's whim, Lena punishes Kara for it. The clearest example of this, prior to the Lex reveal, was in American Dreamer (4x19) when Lena lays into Kara for not being there for her.

And ultimately, that's what is going on in season 5. All of Season 5 so far, with the exception of Crisis, is Lena's attempt to punish Kara for not making every single part of her life available to Lena. And there is a dangerous level of escalation to Lena's abuse that we see, even before the season starts. In the preview, we see that there is a clear desire, on Lena's part, to physically harm Kara. It wouldn't actually be the first time. Lena allows Kara to get hurt by not telling her that the forcefield will hurt her if she uses her x-ray vision on it back in The Fanatical (3x19). It's a horrible moment, but I'm not including it in the pattern of abuse directed towards Kara, because at the time, Lena didn't know Supergirl and Kara were the same person. I realize some people are going to point out that what was say in the VR simulations were just that, simulations, but Lena does, eventually, especalate to physical abuse in Tremors (5x07) when she cages Kara in ice and exposes her to Kryptonite.

Now that I've laid out all the back story here, let's address the original question. Why am I so vehemently anti lena luthor and anti supercorp?

Because watching Kara and Lena's relationship feels very much like watching the nightmare of my relationship with my ex play out in front of my eyes. The slow escalation of abuse. The gaslighting. The punishment for having feelings. The inability of Kara to hold any part of her life back from Lena without being punished for her. Kara is one of my favorite characters in all of fiction. She has been for 35 years. I feel a personal connection and kinship to her, and watching her be abused so badly and so long, until we get an entire episode like The Wrath of Rama Khan (5x08) where she sounds like nothing so much as a battered woman defending her abuser, is painful. But worse than that, watching the Supercorp fandom glorify and romanticize it, watching then take delight in "the angst", is horrifying.

Kara is being abused by Lena, and the Supercorp fandom is out there cheering Lena on. They are claiming that the abuse is absolutely justified by the fact that Kara kept a secret. They are baying for the escalation of violence against Kara by Lena.

It's disgusting. It is.

I don't expect this post to change the minds of the Supercorp die hards or the Lena die hards. But there are people in this fandom who are going to see the fandom holding up Kara and Lena and screaming 'relationship goals'. I hope they see this post, because there are people out there who genuinely need to hear that the dynamic between Kara and Lena isn't health, it isn't okay, it's nothing to be emulated or envied. The relationship between Kara and Lena is sick, and toxic, and abusive. If anyone *ever* treats you the way Lena treats Kara. Run. I don't care what you've promised them. I don't care what committments you made. Run. Just run.

Because that kind of abuse will wear you down, it well tear you apart. It will make you long for death. It will make you dream of putting a gun in your mouth.

I know. Because it did all of that to me.

That's why I have two hundred plus posts tagged anti lena luthor.

But I'm not tagging this one that way, because it's not hating on a character to tell the truth. And the truth is, Lena Luthor is an abuser, and she's a villain.

#supergirl #lena luthor #kara danvers #supergirl meta #abuse #domestic abuse #abusive relationships

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theshedding · 4 years ago

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Don’t tell people not to laugh.

Friends, today is not a day to be shamed of your joy and hope. Wave your flag HIGH. Some people would have you to believe you should hide your glee, your excitement or your elation at finally seeing the caravan of retribution, cosmic justice and old-fashioned “reaping and sowing” reach the gates of its own demise. You should not. The universe is doing what it’s doing and, acknowledging that as the only “justice” we can be sure to have, or hope for, is well-earned and beyond our control. But just in case you still feel a bit self-conscious about the universe’s timing:

Remember the children -as young as babies- in distress, traumatized from parental separation, with ID numbers written on their arms as they’re shipped around the US quietly on night flights, lodging in Best Western hotels while this administration claimed they are “keeping families together”. Remember how their family members -pre pandemic- were packed in cages so tight no one could even lay down and SLEEP and how lawyers went to COURT on their behalf to advocate for them having access to basic hygiene products and influenza medications.

Remember the "shithole" Bahamians (a former Caribbean free-slave society with "Black Leadership") that were denied temporary refuge in the US after a monstrous hurricane stalled over their island homes for nearly 3 days-destroying their entire habitat, food/water supply & livelihood. Think of all the Republican politicians & White Americans who then joined in to support and affirm this un-neighborly treatment, who hide their tax-free profits in their banks and HAPPILY vacation there each year but proudly expect the service of Bahamian people during their pseudo-Caribbean "getaways”.

Remember the Puerto Ricans 🇵🇷 (& Vieques, Culebra, USVI 🇻🇮) who were told they were too "Lazy" to deserve adequate FEMA relief; relief that was sitting in cargo bins and supply ships stuck in port for weeks while surviving families, children & the elderly scoured around the island for water & food. Remember how the big ‘White Man’ and his posse flew in on a PR gambit to cover-up administrative incompetence. How they forced the hand of local government officials to “erase” lives by agreeing to concede lower death counts. How he threw paper towels at human beings in need of food and water from across a room, delighted with the televised spectacle of groveling survivors to cover-up an ill-prepared disaster response. How he required literal “thanks and praise” for benevolently distributing resources which they are entitledto by law, then flew back to the states, lied on those same leaders and then told the citizenry (overriding the NOAA) the same monstrous hurricane was "changing course" to Western Florida and Alabama because he knows better about meteorological science.

Remember the families of Paradise California-having lost all their life’s possessions, standing in the ashes of torched forests, had to acknowledge the welcome of a man who couldn’t bother to offer condolences let alone research the name of the very town he traveled to for a photo op. How he then minimized their devastation by recommending those agencies and families "rake leaves" like the Scandinavians do-to combat a Climate Change phenomenon he believes is a hoax.

Remember Heather Heyer, who lost her life, run over by a speeding driver in a crowd-on film, who's mother wasn't offered so much as a condolence card for the loss of her only daughter during a protest against Nazis HE STILL WONT CONDEMN, that descended on her hometown to spew epithets, obscenities while terrorizing ethnic, religious and sexual minorities with old-fashioned torches one fine Friday evening. Remember how it looked and sounded to witness the chilling resurrection of the chanting ghosts in our country’s violent, barbarous history be welcomed in equivocal affirmation by a head of state, staff and colleagues.

Remember Khzir Khan, his wife and fallen son who are to this day still mocked, denigrated and roundly dismissed for their immigrant history and military service-to this country's ideals and imperialistic motivations in their own places of birth -whilst simultaneously offering up White soldiers and their families who served in the same wars as the epitome of American valor, respectability, 'legitimacy' and political currency. And how he later condemned his own Defense leaders as being hungry for war to satisfy a “military industrial complex”.

Remember the vile ‘mysogynoir’ directed at Rep. Fredrica Wilson (FL) by his Chief of Staff, himself a gold-star military father, caught blatantly lying about material facts he used to denigrate her concerning the death of a Black soldier and his grieving widow. How he defended a callous condolence call and gaslight an entire press corp to bolster an unpatriotic narrative of a Black soldier that "He knew what he was getting into"...and never apologized for it.

Remember the Trans women and men serving in the Miltary who woke up one random morning to read on Twitter that their hard work and dedication was now a distraction and “threat to cohesion” because their identity had become "too expensive" to sustain. This after being assured their jobs and “LGBTQ rights” would be honored beyond 2016. Remember the grift of inter-agencies, the re-allocation of Defense funds towards a border wall “Mexico would pay for” and the $84 Million in subsidies for erectile dysfunction medications for male military officers (in contrast to “overspending” claims on Trans hormonal care). Remember this vulgar scapegoating to satisfy a group of mysogynistic theocrats and non-profit “interest groups” self-defined by Biblical “principles” and simultaneously bearing the most false of witness against these their neighbors.

Remember the show hearings with Dr. Ford, a victim of sexual abuse, white patriarchy and the most acute manifestations of rich, male, Christian privilege, who was not be afforded a thorough background investigation into her abusers and the veracity of her case; who was eventually mocked and discredited by grinning Senators eager to affirm a petulant, entitled drunk of a pious Juris Doctor, just so he could rule in favor of a “Muslim Ban” from a guy who pledged a “total Muslim ban” before being sworn-in to office. And the irony of discrediting Ford’s testimony on ‘insufficient’ evidence while being employed as a result of 10 years of election campaigns exploiting fears of coming “Sharia Law” they claim mistreats women places like Iran and Afghanistan.

Remember the nearly $110 million dollars for a 2017 Presidential inauguration still unaccounted for but nevertheless was somehow needed to hire acts like The Rocketts, the “US Border Patrol Pipes & Drums”, celebrity season winners on “America’s Got Talent” or the high-priced “1st Calvary Division Horse Calvary Detachment”. Remember how he got an inauguration: through outright lies, mockery, demonization of Latinos, the Disabled, the American Indigenous (remember “Pocahontas”?) and Blacks/African-Americans…before insisting the public believe an easily refuted lie about crowd and attendance.

Remember the dead that are still being killed overseas in various theaters of war: the dead Kurdish people (a.k.a. our “allies”); the dead soldiers for whose lives someone received a $100K bounty payment from Putin; the dead migrant adults and children who succumbed to abuse, infection and disease in holding cells (pre-Covid); the charred bodies trapped in their neighborhoods from fires raging in the West; the traumatized and/or dead protestors shot by sanctioned White vigilantes in cities “protecting businesses”; Black/Latino men and women shot by law enforcement or the 72 y/o Buffalo man with a permanent brain injury pushed to the ground by a “task force” of colleagues dutifully walking away as his blood spills on the sidewalk; the 205,000 DEAD of Covid-19, a purported “Democratic Hoax” that would miraculously disappear by Easter 2020, yet could be sufficiently treated with ultraviolet lights, “injections” of cleaning solution and for which -according to this man- “no one” has died even from (including your friend or your family member). He calls them “no one”.

Oh, and lest we forget-he is said to have only paid $750.00 in Federal taxes as a BILLIONAIRE…in the 10 years. Not to mention having allegedly RAPED or SEXUALLY ASSAULTED over 25 WOMEN.

As you tell me and everyone else not to “laugh”, dismiss or revel in this President’s current status, or that of his staff and family, REMEMBER THAT.

-R

#TrumpHasCovid Covid19 2020 TSMadison Retribution

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stevenuniversallyreviews · 5 years ago

Text

Episode 121: Rocknaldo

“I don't love that. I don't accept that.”

Ronaldo Fryman has always been annoying.

From his first speaking role in Cat Fingers, and his first starring role in Keep Beach City Weird, this has been obvious. He’s selfish and insensitive, dominating every conversation he’s a part of and refusing to respect viewpoints that differ from his. He works well in small doses, where his grating nature can be properly diluted, so it’s understandable that an entire episode of Ronaldo at peak Ronaldo is not a widely beloved entry in the Steven Universe canon. But even though I can’t stand watching Rocknaldo, I actually, uh, kind of love it.

That’s a hard “uh, kind of” though. It’s tough to separate my emotions about this one, because I respect such an incredible portrayal of toxic fandom, but I hate toxic fandom so much that I don’t enjoy spending time with it, even as parody. This isn’t an episode I’m ever in the mood for, but it’s just so good at what it’s doing that I can’t stay mad at it.

Ronaldo’s propaganda is first played for laughs, with Steven’s bewilderment at what he’s reading (“They’re adding mind-controlling minerals to our water suppl—they hate men?”) and the vaudevillian back and forth of Ronaldo’s Rock People talking points and Steven’s quick and absolute dismissals. Ronaldo’s embarrassment is a bit of a surprise considering he’s never seemed capable of such a sensation, and his willingness to admit he’s wrong seems like a good sign, but oh boy does that attitude not last.

The mindset that led Ronaldo to make his bad faith arguments in pamphlet form (which he calls Ronalphlets because heaven forbid we get the idea that it’s not about him) persists, and it’s so much worse in conversation than as printed media. It’s not enough that he impedes on Steven’s personal space, but he checks off multiple key items on the Pathetic Internet Troll I Find Useless List (or “PITIFUL” if we’re using proper jargon). He’s casually sexist. He negs Steven into accepting his intrusions. He gatekeeps the concept of being a “true” Crystal Gem, which is lousy in a bubble but so much worse in practice because he’s doing it to an actual Crystal Gem. He gaslights by stating his incorrect views as obvious facts, complete with his own lingo, to make Steven question his own validity. And perhaps worst of all, he takes advantage of Steven’s empathetic nature to pretend that a tolerant person must accept abuse.

On the one hand, Ronaldo’s extreme behavior can be chalked up to severe sleep loss; that’s certainly the angle the episode goes for. But on the other, his toxicity begins well before he decides to stop sleeping, and as someone whose record for consecutive waking hours is an inadvisable thirty-six, fatigue will make you cranky, but it won’t make you more conniving. In cartoon world it’s a clean device to up Ronaldo’s awfulness in a way we can walk back from, but ugh he’s still a trashfire. Zach Callison always deserves kudos, and Rocknaldo is no exception, but Zachary Steel wins out here for capturing such a loathsome version of his character.

A key ingredient for Rocknaldo is timing. Steven just had a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, and this is our first glimpse at how it’s changed him, so what better way to test our all-loving hero than to pit him against a black hole of selfishness? He’s grown a lot since Keep Beach City Weird in a way Ronaldo hasn’t, and while his instinct is still kindness, now there’s a welcome dose of teen moodiness mixed in.

It takes a while for Steven to realize it’s a grift, but beyond this slowness being a necessity for the conflict of the episode to work, it makes sense for where he’s at this point in the show. Again, kindness is an instinct for this kid, and even when Ronaldo starts getting infuriating, we’ve seen Steven be patient with him before. He’s also got that martyr complex revved up: this isn’t the first or last time he’s been willing to suffer to make someone else comfortable. He knows how much it sucks to be called the wrong name by now, so he’s the only person who consistently calls Ronaldo “Bloodstone.” And considering Rose Quartz wasn’t what he thought, he now feels that he must double his efforts to be his best self to compensate.

Also important is Steven’s willingness to defend his friends from the start, calling the term “Rock People” offensive and defending the Gems’ decision to leave Ronaldo behind on a dangerous mission. He can take Ronaldo’s lousiness all day, but finally snaps when Connie’s worthiness is insulted. It’s sweet that he sticks up for people, but it’s a bummer that he probably would’ve put up with Ronaldo even longer if the only one suffering was himself. Steven would do anything for his friends, but he’s not doing much for Steven.

This is why Ronaldo is the ideal antagonist for an episode coming off Steven’s space adventure. Steven’s selflessness contrasts perfectly with Ronaldo’s selfishness, but instead of a story about selflessness being good and selfishness being bad, we see how selflessness isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Yes, it’s good to care about others, but it’s also important to have boundaries and enough self-respect to defend yourself; this isn’t even the first time we’ve gotten this message, but it bears repeating. There’s are limits to tolerance that trolls will always exploit (“White Nationalists aren’t welcome here? So much for the ‘Tolerant Left!’”), and on a show about empathy we need for Steven (and the audience) to see that empathy doesn’t mean being a doormat.

Steven’s patience fuels the episode, but the wheels are greased by the Amethyst and Pearl’s disdain. It’s a minor part of Rocknaldo, but I’m not sure I could survive how grating Ronaldo is without some backup from the Gems.

Garnet may lead a slow clap at Steven’s rousing speech on the nature of acceptance, but Amethyst is happy to crack jokes at Ronaldo’s self-seriousness, down to that perfect impression near the end of the episode. Meanwhile, Pearl openly hates the guy. We don’t even get Sassy Pearl (perhaps the greatest Pearl of all), she’s just bluntly dismissive as a refreshing antidote to Steven’s hospitality. She doesn’t bother to remember his ridiculous new name because she refuses to humor the notion that he’s a Gem, and it totally works for me; misnaming is played for drama when Steven is concerned, as befits the trans allegory that comes to a head in Change Your Mind, but Ronaldo is a human belittling Steven’s identity by pretending he shares it, so “Bloodstone” isn’t worth getting right to her (it helps that “Fryrocko” is also a delightful thing to call somebody). This jokey take on names works in the moment, but more importantly primes us for a more serious take in our last scene.

The final conversation, after a rare time jump, does salvage Ronaldo somewhat. He apologizes and admits he was acting like a jerk, and remains dedicated to helping the Crystal Gems in his own weird way. But the root of his problem isn’t gonna up and go away, and that root, again, is selfishness. He doesn’t fit in because he would rather the world adjust to meet his whims than take a single step towards self-improvement, so he chooses to see himself as “the ultimate outsider.” I guess it’s nice to find a positive spin on qualities you’re not great at, but it reeks of self-importance in a way that’s true to the character but is still frustrating to watch. Ronaldo is very good at being who he is, but I just don’t have much patience for intentionally annoying characters.

Still, we get that lovely moment of Steven talking about his name; it’s not a big revelation that folks only call him Rose Quartz when they’re mad at him, but verbalizing it shows that he’s aware of the pattern. The issue of his name will pop up more and more, becoming a cornerstone of both the Season 4 and Season 5 finales, so it’s nice to discuss it in a calm moment so we can keep Steven’s opinion in the back of our minds when things get messy. Ronaldo, to his credit, asks permission before sharing this story on his pamphlet, and evokes fellow emotionally-challenged antagonist Zuko in his attempt at solidarity. (Fun fact: in no other way is Ronaldo similar to Zuko.)

Moving from Zuko to Zuke: I don’t know where Rocknaldo’s production lined up on the timeline of the Steven Universe fandom's worst elements harassing Jesse Zuke, but I hope Zuke got some level of catharsis in portraying such “fans” in this pathetic manner. Speaking as a guy with a blog, calling Ronaldo “just a guy with a blog” is perfect putdown for a loser that makes himself feel big by pretending to know how to run a ship better than the captain. Imagine if I spent every post saying how much better of a storyteller I am than this crew. Ugh.

Fandoms can do great things, but man are they pros at doing horrible things. During the week that I wrote this review, a 15-year-old Super Smash Bros player got yelled off the internet for beating an established player in an incredible fashion, because while the community adores a young upstart, they can’t stand when that upstart is a girl. And no, I’m not saying the entire fandom did it, just as the entire Steven Universe fandom didn’t target one of the show’s best boarders (note that this article was written when Zuke still went by Lauren), but there are more than enough Ronaldos in every community, and it’s up to people who comprehend the basic tenets of empathy provided by a show they claim to love to stand up to such bullies.

If you don’t like Rocknaldo, that’s just fine. Because you shouldn’t like how Ronaldo acts in it. Liking something doesn’t give you the right to harass people, so do your part in shutting that nonsense down.

I’ve never been to this…how do you say…school?

Just give us an episode with Peridot, Yellow Pearl, Peedee, and Ronaldo trapped in a room already.

We’re the one, we’re the ONE! TWO! THREE! FOUR!

I hate watching this episode, but that doesn’t mean I hate the episode. It does its job very well, which is worthy of admiration even if I’m probably never going to watch it again now that this review is done.

Top Twenty

Steven and the Stevens

Hit the Diamond

Mirror Gem

Lion 3: Straight to Video

Alone Together

Last One Out of Beach City

The Return

Jailbreak

The Answer

Mindful Education

Sworn to the Sword

Rose’s Scabbard

Earthlings

Mr. Greg

Coach Steven

Giant Woman

Beach City Drift

Winter Forecast

Bismuth

Steven’s Dream

Love ‘em

Laser Light Cannon

Bubble Buddies

Tiger Millionaire

Lion 2: The Movie

Rose’s Room

An Indirect Kiss

Ocean Gem

Space Race

Garnet’s Universe

Warp Tour

The Test

Future Vision

On the Run

Maximum Capacity

Marble Madness

Political Power

Full Disclosure

Joy Ride

Keeping It Together

We Need to Talk

Chille Tid

Cry for Help

Keystone Motel

Catch and Release

When It Rains

Back to the Barn

Steven’s Birthday

It Could’ve Been Great

Message Received

Log Date 7 15 2

Same Old World

The New Lars

Monster Reunion

Alone at Sea

Crack the Whip

Beta

Back to the Moon

Kindergarten Kid

Buddy’s Book

Gem Harvest

Three Gems and a Baby

That Will Be All

The New Crystal Gems

Storm in the Room

Like ‘em

Gem Glow

Frybo

Arcade Mania

So Many Birthdays

Lars and the Cool Kids

Onion Trade

Steven the Sword Fighter

Beach Party

Monster Buddies

Keep Beach City Weird

Watermelon Steven

The Message

Open Book

Story for Steven

Shirt Club

Love Letters

Reformed

Rising Tides, Crashing Tides

Onion Friend

Historical Friction

Friend Ship

Nightmare Hospital

Too Far

Barn Mates

Steven Floats

Drop Beat Dad

Too Short to Ride

Restaurant Wars

Kiki’s Pizza Delivery Service

Greg the Babysitter

Gem Hunt

Steven vs. Amethyst

Bubbled

Adventures in Light Distortion

Gem Heist

The Zoo

Rocknaldo

Enh

Cheeseburger Backpack

Together Breakfast

Cat Fingers

Serious Steven

Steven’s Lion

Joking Victim

Secret Team

Say Uncle

Super Watermelon Island

Gem Drill

Know Your Fusion

Future Boy Zoltron

No Thanks!

6. Horror Club 5. Fusion Cuisine 4. House Guest 3. Onion Gang 2. Sadie’s Song 1. Island Adventure

#rocknaldo #steven universe #su #steven universally #review

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dent-de-leon · 5 years ago

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I’ve seen you blogging a lot of Dragon Age (and a lot of other ppl I follow too, honestly) and I was wondering if you could tell me a bit about it. It seems pretty cool!

oh ya sure!! oh boy this is gonna be a lot lmao,, but,, Dragon Age is an RPG by Bioware–they also made Mass Effect and Knights of the Old Republic, in case you’ve heard of those–and the DA series are easily some of my favorite video games. They go super in depth with lots of lore and there’s tons of world building,, I’m embarrassed by the number of fantasy Elvin words I know and I can tell you way too much about the history of fake countries cause that’s where I’m at lmao,,

To try and summarize: the first game is called Dragon Age: Origins, and the focus is very much on fleshing out and playing through a backstory that you handcraft for your PC. You can be everything from an elf trying to reclaim their lost history, to a privileged human of the ruling nobility, a sheltered mage that’s locked away from the rest of the world for “their own good,” a dwarf just trying to survive whose always been a fighter at heart–skilled enough to champion a tournament, and so on. I played the City Elf origin and it just about killed me.

The appeal here is you can start with various different branching paths and backstories, all of which culminate in your character becoming a Grey Warden. Essentially, DA has these monstrous sort of demonic creatures called darkspawn and usually they’re very disorganized and attack at random. But sometimes there’s a more powerful demon that can connect to them and control them as a kind of hive mind; they become a more organized army force, and spread a “Blight” and its taint wherever they go–it causes sickness and a long suffering death, makes the land completely uninhabitable, lots of bad shit. There’s only been four Blights before Origins, so they’re pretty rare, usually centuries apart.

In the event of a Blight, the only thing that can stop the lead demon and its army is a Grey Warden. They’re a,, supposedly “neutral” party in political affairs; they’re meant to be an outside force from other armies and they aren’t divided by nations or anything, if you’re a Warden, you’re a Warden everywhere. So they’re also kinda above the law. Wardens can requisition land and resources, forcibly recruit condemned criminals and high ranking nobles alike–“anything to stop the Blight.” They’re elite warriors, and the only ones who can actually sense the darkspawn. That’s because they’re already tainted by them. You drink some darkspawn blood,, probably you die, but maybe you don’t,, and if you survive,, congrats!! You’re in the Wardens. Forever. You can run, but they’ll probably find you. There’s really no running from the fact that the taint will get you eventually in a few decades though. In Origins you end up being one of the only two surviving Wardens left to defend the country of Ferelden during the Fifth Blight–you have to travel the country, gather allies, try to prove you’re not a war criminal, save the whole world, and don’t forget to pet your dog :’)

Dragon Age 2 is a lot simpler to talk about with all that context out of the way–you’re Hawke, a Ferelden refugee fleeing from the Fifth Blight. The Warden saves the world and everyone throws a big party just as you’re getting settled in your new city. Kirkwall is…a lot,, real creepy place. Maybe it’s that it used to be the center of the Imperium’s slave trade and is still called “The City of Chains.” Maybe it’s all the centuries of blood magic and death that’s seeped into the walls. Maybe it’s those architecture plans you find for the city that point out it’s been built in the shape of one big magical glyph. But there’s something weird there and the whole place is incredibly unsettling. Way more demons crammed into one city than most of the country combined, templars ready to turn on every mage in sight, there’s a lot happening in that one little place.

I always say that other Dragon Age games are more about the player, but DA2 is really about your party members. It’s your companions’ stories–Hawke is sort of this unsuspecting bystander that just gets dragged under by all the city’s malevolent machinations. And ultimately–accidentally, so very unfortunately–they wind up at the very epicenter of it all. Maybe it’s about Hawke, a snide, sarcastic refugee just trying to provide for their family and take care of their friends. But it’s probably more so the story of a quintessential Byronic antihero tortured by his past and sparking a war for mage freedom, or a charming pirate captain in search of her mysterious lost treasure and who knows more about the city’s supposed “invaders” than she lets on. Or the silver-tongue dwarf with a love of telling stories, and a penchant for extravagant lies–the narrator of it all, and entirely unreliable.

At its core, DA2 is about mages and templars. The mages typically being locked away in towers known as Circles because they’re seen as “too powerful, a danger to themselves and others,” etc. They’re guarded by knights that work for the dominant religious order known as Templars. Only the Templars frequently harass and systematically abuse the mages in their charge instead of “protecting” them. Ultimately, it’s also about betrayal and redemption, how far someone can go before they’re beyond redemption, etc.

DA2 always hits this very melancholic note that neither of the other games quite reach. I think it’s because Origins and Inquisition are very grandiose in scope and scale,, you’re a chosen hero,, you’re saving the world,, the player is incredibly empowered. But in DA2, it really does feel like you have no power. Like you’re just trying to scrape by and look out for the people you care about. Like everything keeps going wrong no matter how hard you try to help, like you’re a failure to your family and somehow lost your friends. DA2 is confined to a single city and so much smaller in scope and scale, but the little glimpses of intimacy that you do get from that unique experience really hits you in the end.

Lastly, there’s Inquisition. You can choose your player’s race like in Origins, but you don’t really get to play out your backstory or anything, you’re just kinda thrown right into it. Inquisition is very go big, so everything is big–lots of exploration, lots of questing, LOTS OF DRAGONS,, THIS GAME IS IMPORTANT SOLELY FOR THE 13.5 DRAGONS YOU GET AS OPPOSED TO THE 1-2 IN EVERY OTHER DRAGON AGE GAME,, SERIOUSLY LACKING ON THE DRAGON PART THERE HONESTLY IT’S KINDA FALSE ADVERTISING,, but yeah I’d say DAI is the most like an open world sort of deal,, very classic high fantasy like Origins (though not so brutal or grisly like Origins), very You are the Chosen Savior stuff,, big departure from Hawke running round the sewers

DAI builds directly off the previous games and decisions players made in them, but it’s also actually very easy to jump right into with no info on prior games. I’d say it’s also the most user friendly, and it’s probably better for new players to start with it to see how they like the world. Combat and mechanics in Origins can be very tedious, and parts of it just haven’t aged well. DA2 is easier mechanically, but much more punishing and harsh with its consequences. DAI is very forgiving by comparison, and you won’t accidentally get party members killed for the calls you make. And while DAI is very lore heavy, I think it’s the perfect place for newcomers to kind of run around and try to explore the living breathing world crafted from that world.

The essential plot is that you’re following on the heels of the Mage Templar War, and rogue members from the Chantry (church basically) are looking to upstart the Inquisition again, a huge military organization that waged holy wars back in the day. You end up accidentally being in charge of everything because, and I quote, “You killed everyone who was in charge.” Oh yeah, there’s also demons tearing open rifts from their world into yours and you’ve been blessed/cursed with a magic mark on your hand that makes you the Only One who can close those rifts and save the world. Build your army, get drunk with your friends after slaying dragons, dance with your partner after usurping the empress at her own ball, try not to get torn to pieces by the magic in your own hand, get good at reading tarot cards, and maybe don’t romance the Elven God of Trickery on your first (heartbreaking) play through,,

Lastly, there’s actually a fair amount of queer characters in DA, which is pretty cool. And a lot of them are romanceable partners for your character, so you can definitely play a queer PC. So,, off the top of my head–Bi characters (and romance options): Leliana and Zevran [Origins], Fenris, Anders, Isabella, Merrill [DA2], and Josephine [Inquisition]. There’s also Iron Bull, and he’s a pan character who’s romanceable in Inqusition. Dorian is gay and romanceable, and Sera is a romanceable lesbian, both also from Inquisition. Krem is a trans man and Maevaris is a trans woman, the former is a side character (and best friend of Iron Bull) in Inquisition, while the latter only appears in supplementary sources like comics, but she does get mentioned from time to time in Inquisition as Dorian’s close friend. Oh! Also--Solas and Josephine’s routes in Inquisition don’t culminate in a sex scene, so lots of people headcanon them as asexual. And you can also swing Dorian’s romance so it doesn’t have a sex scene if you wanna romance him but kinda play an ace Inquisitor, which is cool! Sorry for the long rant lmao but uhhh, I hope this helps?? :’)

#dragon age #the very unfortunate thing here is i lov da so much if anyone ever talks to me about it i will never shut up lmao im so sorry

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ruffiorocks · 5 years ago

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The show is called 'Supergirl'.

OK, I couldn't think of a good enough title for this post.

I've never been a massive twitter fan, but recently I've been reading comments on the weekly official Supergirl posts and/or looking at #supergirl and a lot of what I'm seeing is people calling for the show to be more about the other characters.

One in particular character people are calling for more of or stating IS the show is Nia. Now I LOVE Nia!! I also think it's fantastic they have the first Trans superhero! But no matter how good, funny, adorable etc Nia is she isn't what makes the show good. She's part of the show, not the show itself. Supergirl survived 3 seasons without Nia and should Nia ever leave (I hope not) the show would still survive without her. To say that Nia is the show and you only want more Nia is a bit of an insult to Supergirl herself and the previous seasons.

Another character is Lena. Now anyone who follows me or even reads my posts will know I LOVE Lena! I would watch a Lena Luthor solo show or Katie McGrath doing Ted Talks as Lena, and i will defend her to the very end. Now we've got that out of the way, Lena is like Nia, she is an additional character who makes the show great but isn't the heart of the show itself. We all survived watching Supergirl season one without Lena and as much as I would be devastated if she left I wouldn't stop watching the show if she did. We know Lena was only meant to be in a few episodes but was so popular she became a season regular. That makes her amazing and obviously a fan favorite to a lot of people (me) but the show would still be Supergirl if she wasn't there. I love Lena but it isn't the Lena Luthor show.

Mon El was another one, he was a love interest and an additional character. Again, anyone who has read my posts will know I'm not a Mon El fan, but I don't attack him or his fans. But the show did feel like it became more about him than it did about Kara. Every post I see on Twitter or Instagram has demands that the show should or NEEDS to bring him back. That the show isn't the same anymore without him. Now you're entitled to miss your favorite character but to demand the show NEEDS to bring him back is another insult to Supergirl herself. Supergirl was a great show before Mon El turned up and it is still a great show now that he is gone. Before anyone says 'no it isnt' I would counter that argument with 'well your obviously still watching it or following it to know what's going on, so you have to have some interest in it'. If you're not watching it because you miss Mon El or demand he should be back then all i can ask is did you even watch Supergirl before he turned up at all? Have you even given it a chance now he's gone? The show wasn't and still isn't called 'the Mon El show'.

Those who want more James Olsen? Now we ALL know I can't stand James. So less James for me or no James at all would make my day! And no I'm not racist before anyone bothers to jump to that conclusion. It is possible for a character of color to be disliked because people don't like the character and nothing to do with skin color. I read 'we want more James!' 'give us back Guardian Corp', 'they did James dirty' . All I can say is again this isn't The James Olsen show either. James' storylines have sucked for the past couple of seasons, even the writers don't seem to know what to do with him. There was that one episode with Marcus that was good. He had that story he told to Lena about racial profiling but then when he had that moment to empathize with him they then wrote him as being a complete dumb ass and revealing his identity and we all know where that led. The whole Guardian storyline was atrocious (to me) but demanding more of him?

I saw someone say that they we're happy Lex Luthor was in the show because now the writers will see that Superman is who people really care about 😑 all I can say to that is if Superman is all you care about why the hell are you watching a show called 'Supergirl'? My guess at best is that it's a guy who is actually 💯% devoted to watching Supergirl and he enjoys it but can't admit that even to himself which is kind of sad. Then again it could have been a girl.

I was never a fan when Superman turned up. I like the guy that plays him and I don't hate the character or the episodes he's in. I just preferred it when he was just a siluette or someone Kara spoke to via instant messenger. Bringing him into it as an actual character kind of took the shine off of Supergirl for me. Thought I'm glad they had her kicking his ass.

The same goes for Lex Luthor, I like Jon Cryer's Lex, but the moment I heard he was coming into it I wasn't happy. He isn't Kara's villian. It felt like the writers just wanted to go down the cliche Lex V Superman road but since they couldn't do that without bringing on Superman for multiple episodes they decided to just swap him with Kara. He doesn't even real feel like Kara's villian. To me it feels like the real fight is between Lena and Lex with Kara just getting in the middle of it. The writers have always had a Luthor V Super storyline since season 2 when they brought in Lillian Luthor. That's what was so great! We knew Lex existed but he was in prison, so we had another big bad Luthor and it was a woman. I've digressed.

For the people on Twitter and Instagram demanding on every post that Supercorp needs to happen? Or 'make Supercorp canon you cowards!'? I'll probably make myself unpopular with my fellow supercorp shippers here by condeming comments like that but all i is can say is 🖕. I LOVE the idea of Kara and Lena as a couple, but I'm well aware its a head canon and is extremely unlikely to ever happen. But I feel the fans (not all of course, me being a clear example) spamming the comments with demands and insults isn't the way to get what you want.

I think the biggest problem that shippers have, Supercorp, Karamel, Karadox, Karaolsen, Agentcorp, Reigncorp, GuardianCorp all seem to forget is that the show isn't about ships. The show is and always has been about Supergirl herself. When I see comments on the posts/previews the majority of comments are about SuperCorp or Karamel and not about what is actually going on plot wise. I feel you are missing out on the show because you're to wrapped up in what you want to happen.

Yes I know that the show has often moved away from Supergirl, an example being the above when it became more about Mon El, that's something I'm not on board with either. But sending out hate to the writers isn't going to fix that issue.

If you're going to be in a mard about something be in one in regards to what is actually happening plot wise. Like disliking the COL, the snow expects you to hate on that.

I went off track in a few spots there, but the point is the show is called 'Supergirl' so why not talk about that rather than ignoring her completely and demanding more of other characters? Or making Kara's whole storyline important only due to who her love interest may or may not be. Also it's obviously fine to comment #supercorp endgame, it's not hurting anybody. But when you cross the line into 'make Supercorp canon you cowards' you've taken all the Innocent fun out of it and you start making everyone who likes the ship look like an ass. The same goes for writing about Karamel. I'm sorry you miss them but demanding Mon El come back in every post isn't going to make it happen. Lastly to the actual trolls? Shipping Supercorp or Karamel or whatever isn't a crime or hurting anyone so f**k off! Supercorp shippers, the Karamel shippers are allowed to miss Mon El, the same as you would miss Lena if she was gone. Having useless arguments about him being a slave owner or not a slave owner or if he's an abuser or not an abuser anymore etc etc. Is old, tiresome and completely irrelevant now that he's gone. You've already won because he's gone, so let people ship in peace. Karamel shippers? Let the Supercorp shippers ship in peace as well, commenting consistently that Lena and Kara aren't gay and it can neverer happen isn't achieving anything at all. Commenting under a simple Supercorp comment with negativity isn't big or clever.

Lastly I get that when you see what you perceive to be injustice on social media you feel the need to attack those people head on. The fact is you dont. This is a TV show, no one gives a rats ass what you have to say and you will pointlessly argue and no one will change their stance. Whenever I see someone say something about Lena that is completely untrue just to justify not liking her it annoys me, at least use a real reason. But I don't attack them personally or comment on their comments. I block them, and then as I'm doing now I let my frustrations out on here. Try it, it's very therapeutic and less drama involved.

That was a jumbled mess of words for 2am but don't send hate, if you do you'll have missed the point entirely.

#supergirl #lena luthor #kara danvers #supercorp #anti james olsen #lex luthor #nia nal #superman #lilian luthor #anti mon el #karamel #anti guardian

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homenum-revelio-hq · 5 years ago

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Welcome (again) to the Order of the Phoenix, Gabe!

You have been accepted for the role of non-biography character CORA CHITTOCK with the faceclaim of Hunter Schafer! We were thrilled to see a veela character in a non-fanon way and can’t wait to see what you bring to the veela lore! We are so excited to see what you do with Cora!

Please take a look at the new member checklist and send in your account within 24 hours! Thank you for joining the fight against Voldemort!

OUT OF CHARACTER:

NAME: Gabe

AGE: Still 22!

TIMEZONE: GMT-3

ACTIVITY LEVEL: Pretty solid, eh? I always go missing in the weekends because it’s Official Socializing Time, but then I make up for it during the week, mostly

ANYTHING ELSE: Nope!

CHARACTER DETAILS:

NAME: Cora Chittock

BLOOD STATUS: Half-Blood/Half-Breed (Veela)

AGE: 18

GENDER, PRONOUNS, and SEXUALITY: Trans girl, she/her/hers, lesbian. She can’t imagine her transition is anyone’s business, so I wouldn’t think that is something she’ll talk about at all these days, but her sexuality is definitely public knowledge, as she makes it her mission to make it obvious whenever the opportunity for it presents itself. She’s heard it too many times before that her interest in women is simply another cheap tactic to rebel against veela expectations, and she likes to assure everyone that nope, the 12-year-old knew what she was talking about, and she’s still very much gay.

HOUSE ALUMNI: Slytherin

ANY CHANGES: I wrote this myself, so nope!

CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

PERSONALITY:

Cora is an avocado – soft on the outside, hard on the inside. Some may argue – and she would argue with those some – that she doesn’t even have a soft exterior at all. Nothing is what it seems with her. There was no hesitance from the Sorting Hat when it sent her straight into Slytherin, its booming voice making the announcement as soon as it touched the first strand of hair on her head, much to her sister’s dismay.

Being a veela wasn’t something she was conscious of until somewhere around third year. Or, at least, it wasn’t something that bothered her before that. It wasn’t hard to fit in right from the first day at Hogwarts, life was easy to navigate as an eleven-year-old that almost everyone feels inclined to like; Cora used to love the attention. She had many friends, teachers liked her, there was nothing to complain about! That’s what most people think about veela, anyway, and it might be true for a while, but only until you’re no longer a child. People’s intentions change. Her classmates’ friendly smiles and high-fives became inappropriate remarks and catcalls down the hallway. She went from Good Friend to Object of Desire in what felt like the blink of an eye and she despised it.

And no one cared, she quickly learned, about the veela complaining about getting too much attention, being too liked. It’s like complaining you have too much food to eat, or a bed too comfortable to sleep in! At least it’s how everyone saw it. Even her family refused to acknowledge the issue. Get used to it, they’d say. Welcome to the real world!

Cora isn’t one to sit idly by while someone has to deal with any sort of abuse – not herself, not anyone else. She learned quickly that no one else seemed to care about her fight, but she wasn’t gonna fight any less because of it. She just had to become her own fortress.

Her charisma and charm are still there, but now, every time she smiles, she’s baring her teeth. Every flip of hair is weaponized, every bat of eyelashes is a threat. She learned how to defend herself before anyone had a chance to do something more than hide behind catcalls and love letters. There are several expectations when it comes to veela, and she’s willing to break every single one of them, if she can. She’s still friendly and flirty when she wants to be, but she’s loud. Self-assertive to the point of brashiness, energetic and sarcastic, with the mouth of a sailor and a tongue sharp enough to kill. Every bit of her is a quiet armor, the pieces carefully collected and glued together over the years, though she still sees everything with unbeatable humor. Her skin is as soft as her edges are sharp and she’ll always throw the first punch. She refuses to be the fragile little fairy-thing made to cater to the fetishizing ideal of acceptable half-breed, and she won’t apologize for it.

She still keeps her fair deal of friends around, even though nowadays she prefers those who don’t seem to react to her much. Her defenses are up so high that it’s become a problem – maybe she has thrown a couple fireballs at one or two innocent people who she thought were following her, yes, can you blame the girl? –, but she’s pleasant company when she’s not climbing up on any tables and delivering speeches about half-breed rights that no one wants to hear.

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF FAMILY:

The Chittock sisters never really met their mother. It’s a complicated story, really – at least that’s what Cora heard all her life. Their father, an eccentric wizard devastated by the loss of his beloved veela companion, never told his daughters what really happened. When they were little, he would tell them these crazy fantastic stories of how their mother was and why she had to leave, but that only lasted a couple of years, until the girls grew up and realized these were products of his mind. And terribly inconsistent stories, at that.

He’s not crazy, Cora would say, but he’s, perhaps, not the most sane man she’s ever laid her eyes upon, sure. He’s a conspiracist and a bit of a nutcase, but he has a heart bigger than his body, and that’s how he raised his daughters to be. He loves them more than anything, and they know it.

Cora has a good relationship with her family, through and through. She loves her sister, even if they pick fights with each other sometimes, and she loves her dad even if he insists on cooking and burning the dinner every single night. They’re not too supportive of her feisty ways, and they would surely lose all the hairs on their head if they knew about her finding her way into the Order, but she’s not planning on telling.

Despite the absent mother and the lack of explanation that comes with it, the girl has never felt like anything was missing from her family. In fact, before she was even a teenager she’d already stopped asking questions about her mom’s fate, knowing it would only sadden her father and get her some nonsense response in return. Her family’s not a big one, but it’s perfect, as far as she knows. They’re as good of a support system as any, she thinks.

OCCUPATION:

Cora works at Eeylops Owl Emporium, at Diagon Alley. It wouldn’t be hard to get any sort of part-time job with the Veela charm turned all the way up, and while Glenda chose a much more artistic path with her own show, Cora decided she didn’t want all of that attention. No, instead, as soon as she was out of school, she marched right up to her favorite shop in Diagon Alley, and sweet talked until they gave her a position in there. It’s her dream job, for the moment, even if it pays terribly. Her family is quite wealthy and she doesn’t plan on moving out immediately, so it’s not like she needs piles of money. Here, she gets to hang out with the pretty little birds for most of her day, and it’s incredibly soothing. She thinks it might be the Veela bird-like tendencies that make her feel so comforted to be surrounded by the little winged animals, but she won’t question it. The owls keep her calm, and they seem happy to have her around, and she gets to help little eleven-year-olds to pick new friends. It’s a pretty fun job.

ROLE WITHIN THE ORDER/THOUGHTS ABOUT THE ORDER:

Cora still feels a little out of place in the order, but only because she’s new and hasn’t quite figured out who she can trust yet. She remembers some of these faces from school, but back then she’d been so busy perfecting her skills and learning defenses and dodging creeps that she would rather forget that time entirely, start fresh. The tiny self-conscious part of her worries she might be too brash for the crowd her age and too young for the older people, and that she’ll float somewhere in between, but she’s willing to make her presence known either way. She believes in their fight. She also, perhaps selfishly, believes she can have more of a voice if she has a group like this to back her up, and maybe she can convince them to join some rallies for half-breed and veela rights, while she’s at it. She certainly has been trying to make that happen for a while now. Cora sees the war for how heavy it is, and she knows how easily the tides could change against her, as a half-breed. As much as she vowed to fight her own battles, now she seeks protection, too. She knows no one is gonna survive on their own and if she can do something to help this end quicker, then it’s her duty to do so.

SURVIVAL:

Cora still lives with her family, and doesn’t plan on changing that anytime soon. Her father may be a nutcase, but their little hut in the middle of nowhere might also be the safest place she knows. She doesn’t know what it is about it that makes it feel so secure, but it does, at least for them (he told her once that her mother had enchanted it before she left, but he also said a number of ridiculous things, so she doesn’t believe it). She’s easily overlooked when it comes to this war. She’s a half-breed, but an acceptable one, one that society may praise from time to time, when it fits them. It’s just her and Glenda’s luck. Most people don’t seem to care about what the half-Veela are up to, and the rest who do, only care because they feel enchanted by them, so it’s mostly a win-win when it comes to hiding.

RELATIONSHIPS:

Cora doesn’t do relationships all that much. She’s never had a romantic relationship with anyone, nothing that ever went beyond some meaningless fooling around – even though there was and still is a lot of that. She likes the affection, she craves a human connection like that, but she doesn’t feel like she can have it until she learns to reel in all of her Veela charm. She’s still too young, too insecure. Even if she’s learned to keep most of her unwanted charm in, nowadays, she knows some people can still be affected. And how can she trust their affection, then? How can she know if the pretty girl who wants to date her won’t lose all of her interest suddenly, the day Cora learns to control her abilities better? She can’t. The line is blurry between someone loving you for the energy you put out, loving how you make them feel, or really loving you for who you are. She’s not willing to take any risks.

For that reason, she’s been known to still deliberately use her charisma here and there to get what she wants, but she tries to keep close to people who aren’t affected by her blood status at all. At least, those, she knows she can trust. Some specifics:

REGULUS BLACK: It’s not like they’re childhood friends or anything, but Cora might risk saying they were the closest friend she had in Hogwarts. It was a confusing, chaotic time back then, and when people started reacting differently to her, she found comfort in Regulus’ blatant indifference. She’s not fully convinced they even like her at all, as a friend or general company, but she still likes to hang out with them when she can.

DORCAS MEADOWES: They met because of Cora’s brief panic in fifth year, when a poor, sweet boy asked to be her date on a trip to Hogsmeade and she was too tired to be mean or blunt, as she usually was. Dorcas happened to be walking by, and Cora took the opportunity to grab her hand and yank her over before declaring she couldn’t accept the invitation, as she’d be going with this Hufflepuff, instead. She paid Dorcas back for any inconvenience by buying her some Pepper Imp on the trip, and she still occasionally helps distract her from her job nowadays, by visiting Flourish and Blotts and bringing candy.

OOC EXPLORATION:

SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS: Cora/women is what I ship and Cora/dudes is the anti-ship, that’s pretty much it. Let my lesbian daughter thrive.

WHAT PRIVILEGES AND BIASES DOES YOUR CHARACTER HAVE?

Cora’s fatal flaw when it comes to biases is probably the fact that she wants to be an advocate for half-breed rights, but the truth is that she has no idea what that even means. She might wave that flag around and call people out, and she may get mad if anyone trashtalks any type of half-breed around her, but has she ever stopped to listen to another half-breed? Absolutely not.

Her concerns are very personal and Veela-focused, she doesn’t know what the other species are going through in the current society, and certainly not in this war, either. She wants to help everyone, genuinely, but she’s too caught up in the stuff Veela have to go through. They’re a particular type of half-breed, the model minority type, they are the ones who get invited to parties and get to escape from the general population’s scrutiny. On the other hand, they’re also victims to a lot of abuse and prejudice, and that’s the battle she’s (wrongly) focusing on. She says her fight is for all of the half-breeds because she knows her voice will have more of a reach that way, and she genuinely thinks it’s the right thing to do, to try and help others.

That being said, she is still a pretty sheltered half-Veela girl who lives a good, wealthy life, she’s never even seen many of the half-breeds she claims to be trying to help. She’d still be wary of a half-giant, and twist her nose at a half-goblin’s appearance.

Almost the same goes for her view of muggleborns, too. Circumstantially, the majority of her friends – and fellow housemates, back in her Hogwarts years – are purebloods or half-bloods, which means she hasn’t really ever heard from the muggleborns what they go through, and what they want. She’s angry, and loud, and she wants to be an activist for everyone, but she isn’t great at studying her causes.

WHAT ARE YOU MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO?

Absolutely NOTHING, I’ve heard this place is horrible!!! Yuck!!!! Delete my number!!!!! No but on a serious note, I’m dying to explore all of the Veela world and create a sensible, more inclusive lore for it (suck it, JKR). And this character is one that I’ve had in mind for months now, in sort of an abstract form, living somewhere in my brain in the room of Characters That Already Have a Voice But No Background Or Story. So I’m looking forward to finally flesh it out and write her!

PLOT DROP IDEAS:

I’m terrible at these BUT I’d be down for the Order wanting to use her Veela charm for something, like use her as bait or a distraction, because she would probably hate the idea of doing that and i’d love to watch her get pissy.

Also any opportunity to get her to use the fire hands, obviously, that’d be amazing.

ANYTHING ELSE?

A Headcanon:

Not really into sports at all but tried to get into the Slytherin Quidditch team out of sheer spite because everyone kept saying Veela were only good for mascots, not for playing. She almost made it in as a Beater, which she’ll deem good enough to prove people wrong as long as she doesn’t have to ever do that again. Yes, she’s still bitter about it.

EXTRA FOR NON-BIO CHARACTERS:

PAST:

Cora Chittock grew up to be pretty alright, all things considered. Despite her absent mother, her father and sister were all the family she needed, and she lived a sheltered life until she entered Hogwarts. There was where she discovered what being half-Veela really meant – and how she would have to try her best to repress that part of herself, if she wanted to stay safe. As a good Slytherin, of course, it was bite or get bitten. The charm and charisma that she flaunted as a child quickly turned into unwanted attention from her peers the second that hormones came into play. Everyone thought she was spoiled to complain, a rebel without a cause, but they didn’t know what it was like, to receive all these looks from people she had no interest in, people she didn’t like. She had all the attention she could possibly want, but loneliness still stung. Learning to be part Veela was learning to handle the harassment that came with it, and that was a hard lesson to learn.

PRESENT:

School had been hell for Cora, but now she’s finally found her footing. She worked hard to perfect her abilities to the point where her Veela charm is mostly controlled nowadays, and it makes her feel more confident than ever; she knows when she can, and should, display it around freely. That doesn’t mean all the past years haven’t left a bitter taste in her mouth. Now that she graduated Hogwarts, she wants to make sure people understand and listen to her side of things, too. Her people are still harassed every day, she’s not letting anyone forget that. These days, she can easily be found trying to organize marches and protests for half-breed rights, even if most of them fall through. She snuck her way into the Order as soon as she heard rumours of a resistance group existing at all, and she’s ready to give everything to fight this war. She believes in the group, she trusts her peers and she’s got her combat boots laced up and ready. Finally, she’s making the difference she wants to make in the world, right?

FC CHOICES: Hunter Schafer (truly my one and only, love of my life, but also to add other good names to the list because other rps need more representation anyway: ), Loiza Lamers, Hari Nef

#marauders era rp #lsrp #bio rpg #marauders rpg #harry potter rpg #homenumaccepted

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unproduciblesmackdown · 6 years ago

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so being abused the entire first 2 decades of your life: what’s up with that? Night Posts Edition

- classic when finding some “uh oh relatable!” content abt various Disorderres and there’s some thing like “many symptoms overlap with ptsd” and it’s like ooh which one is applying to me?? i mean spoilers the idea that The Grouping Of Non Nt Traits And Experiences Into Distinct Classifications is not actually...an exact science and for all intents and purposes it makes no difference if i am going “oh god #me” at an informative post about adhd if actually its ptsd acting exactly the same anyways so. but yknow it’s wild n zany being like “am i overstepping my bounds b/c this was caused by coping with trauma possibly? what audacity” and etc when it really....that doesnt matter....

- also ugh @ retaining things that downplay abusers’ responsibility for their actions (in specific things you’re personally dealing with, not like, as a general stance) and shift blame onto yourself like........you have to get so used to treating someone’s Abusive Behavior as something inevitable that you can’t ever expect them to stop doing, and thus pretty much considering someone abusive like a force of nature because they’re just gonna do what they’re gonna do whenever they next get Set Off rather than like.......a person who is responsible for their own behavior and in control of their own choices and like. especially zany when you’re a kid and they’re your parent so there’s the Power Imbalance of them being an adult and the other power imbalance of them being in control of your whole existence. but so like even just the other year i was taking the blame for calmly speaking back to a grownass man close to thrice my age raging at me and saying like, not verbatim but the idea of like “ugh i know it was partly my fault for even saying anything back to him because i knew he’d just continue to yell but unfortunately i just refuse to weather that kind of behavior without standing up for myself at all anymore” but like no!!!! that’s shifting all the responsibility for this other person’s behavior onto myself, like i Made him choose to shout at me at like 4am because he sucks and has some kind of superiority power trip issues. cuz i am well within rights to respond to anyone addressing me and it’s Not my fault at all that he chooses to react the way he reacts.

- also that i was ready to excuse my being blamed for this by others because they were closer to that person than they were to me and i was gonna be like “okay i Get wanting to defend someone who’s closer to you” but no!!!! actually!!!! i may get it but i don’t condone excusing anyone’s horrible behavior in the least just cuz you know them or they’re friends or family or something. in fact that’s terrible. i’m just primed to be Used To It because of the weird situation of parental abuse where there’s other people also trapped in this location and daily life with an abuser and if someone “causes” the abuser to start being shitty then they’ll get blamed / resented for that. me and my siblings seem more like friendly acquaintances b/c we had to be pitted against each other in these kinds of ways for eons until we were all in our teens and got some more Space and kind of realized that we weren’t each others enemies and got closer and my dumb little brother was old enough to stop being a whiny binch and Owed me for helping him with math hw over the phone from 2 hrs drive away lol.....jk, sort of.....we did get along great eventually but then i left thanks to said abuse and us talking via twitter isn’t at all the same as us being able to talk in person :/

- also one thing that sometimes Strikes me is that when i’m like blandly recalling incidents of abuse like “oh yeah, that time” it bothers me less to think about stuff that happened to me specifically than to think about times it was Other people who were being treated that way. the latter was always equally or probably more upsetting and it always felt just as bad in the moment anyways, there was no major distinction in the Abuse In Progress experience if it was directed mostly on you than on other people

- all my life i’ve also been super stubborn which never helped and even Abuse MaGee would have to try to get creative with Disciplinary Systems and there was this golden “punishment” which was eat dinner in your room by yourself and i was like oh my god can i really. the horror of Family Dinner was like, this dark comedic farce playing out in that house for all our lives. christ. speaking of being stubborn this one time my sister cut my toe with a knife (half accidentally) because i refused to stop swinging my legs despite her holding the knife under the table lol and i also refused to tell on her b/c we were All In This Together (that is, Us vs The Abuser, which always took precedence over any internal conflict in our faction lol)

- always remembering how my “’”””””””defining”””””””””” trait was always getting good grades except the only reason i ever felt this pressure was the time my sister caught shit for getting a C, and i wasn’t even getting A - F letter grades yet and was already like jfc guess i can’t like....get a single C ever.....the joke is i’ve always been a godawful student who hates school, i just also managed to get great grades fairly easily, b/c of the devil probably. i’m sorry

- love to wonder what interests i might have been able to explore if i didn’t want to hide anything i was genuinely interested in and other True Thoughts And Feelings from my ‘rents. who knows!!! even now i’m not sure what i like and my vague ideas about it are all mostly In Theory and i don’t have any hopes and dreams b/c of never being able to really consider my own interests and desires and also because when every day of your life is basically spent in survival mode about everything else, that’s not really conducive to having dreams and ambitions. see also: like, being really poor

- The Weird Experience when only one of your parents is abusive and the other parent is also experiencing spousal abuse and so like, even though they’re your parent, you know that they don’t really have equal power as the abusive one because they too are being abused? it’s a complicated thing b/c that’s how every individual experience with abuse is (complicated). and so you’ve got this bizarre situation where maybe someone cares about you but they can’t really protect you from this other person. and like, my dad is crap and in some areas even a crappier person than my abusive mom and also i hate him, but i only hate him for certain things lmao not for being abused or some ways he tried to deal with it. i know what’s trash and what’s not

- the zany experience of No One Will Help You Ever.....lucky for me i eventually figured out on my own that what i’d been living with all the time had actually been abuse for real all along! and yet still i knew that like, there wasn’t much i could immediately do with that information because..........yknow, what do you actually do. i was basically already 18, so. and even if i hadnt been. there’s nothing to do for it!! just sucks to be you, basically. but an exception is that when one day i texted my friend to ask if i might be able to leave my house overnight and crash at their family’s place for a little bit, their parents immediately were like Yes Of Course and they let me stay there for a week and were very nice about all of it. between them and the nice trans lady who gave me some more Housing Assistance by letting me stay in her spare room for like, most of december.....my Allies. plus someone who talked to me via online once i bailed on my ‘rents! if they read this they know who they are and they have continued to be so kind and generous ugh love and appreciate you

- god just individual occasions of “THIS bullshit that i went through this one time” of especially ridiculous incidents.....i could go on for eons

- sort of tangentially related and related to the first point but ugh specific memories of Moments In Which It Continued To Be Revealed To Me That I, Individually, Was Prone To Being Kind Of Socially Ostracized.....like my ass started noticing that shit as soon as i was around other kids aka preschool aka 4 yrs old.......like i’m usually somewhat withdrawn and cautious and quiet in social situations especially what with the association that “misbehaving” = trauma exposure so, yknow, that might be a way that you’re pressured into just keeping to yourself and keeping your head down. but talk about “i don’t really relate to other people my age” lmao like i always preferred interacting with adults really while by and large dealing with the other kids felt like a challenge that i was never gonna actually come out on top of and i still remember individual Efforts i’d make to ~fit in~ and Participate that just fell flat or got me actively excluded....Ugh City........and it’s like, i could make a list of Social Traits i think i have that help make it difficult for people to be interested in interacting with me, or “contribute” to those joyous occasions when you get to sit back and take in the thinly veiled contempt directed at you by various shitheads, but like, even that’s not really the right way to explain it. its kind of more a Greater Than The Sum Of Its Weird Parts sorta combined experience where i guess i just have this kind of Negative Je Ne Sais Quoi that gets ya the social brushoff / rejection. c’est ce que c’est. the joke is i actually like people and socializing In Theory, i just usually don’t get to do it. shoutout to the advanced relatability of alana calling everyone Acquaintances b/c i literally did/do that lmao......like are we friends if we don’t talk all that often? it’s part on me cuz i’m crap at being the person to initiate conversation cuz too often i assume i’d be an annoyance and also b/c conversation with me is like, not great lmao but still......ce’st l’a v’ie

anyways (clip from that fuckin song where it’s like WHO CAN RELATE lmao.mp3)

#long post //////#the entire first quarter (at least lol) of my life being Devastated By Abuse means i get to complain about it whenever i feel like it

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aridara · 5 years ago

Text

I’ve seen that this list of bad-stuff-that-feminists-SUPPOSEDLY-did-to-harm-men is going around again recently.

So, I’ve decided to simply copy-and-paste my rebuttal here, with slight modifications. Now with added quotes!

Okay, I’m going to number each single link Takashi0 provides. If it’s something that I’ve already talked about, I’ll be very brief about them, because there are 138 (if I didn’t miscount) links, and I can’t repeat myself every fucking time.

Feminists threaten to kill woman for saying men need abuse shelters.

1 No proof that it was feminists who threatened, in any way, Pizzey.

Feminists prevent a meeting about male suicide.

2 The meeting did happen. It wasn’t prevented from happening, nor did the protesters tried to via violent means.

Feminists stage mock murders to scare men.

3 No mainstream feminists defended them.

Feminist attacks male cartoonist and is hailed a hero of feminism.

4 Solanas wasn’t “hailed a hero of feminism”, neither back then, nor now.

Feminists shut down forum for battered husbands.

5 No proof that it was feminists; the forum continued.

Propaganda campaign against male fathers wanting custody.

6 Unsourced claim.

Feminists wish to slander accused names before convicted.

7 Feminists pointed out that protecting the names of those accused of rape while denying the same to those accused of crimes like murder or terrorism is patently unjust. This from Takashi0’s own source.

Try to shut down female prisons.

8 Becuse they don’t work - reconvictions and suicides were unusually high. Moreover, the release only involved convicts with light sentences that weren’t threats to society.

Create rape laws that exclude female rapists.

9 Suspicious source (see here); also, no word about whether those laws passed or not. Not to mention that, given the massive epidemic of rape on women in India, they really neded to sort out their priorities. (See also this thread.)

Make it impossible to charge women with rape.

10 Due to how Israel’s trials go, a man’s testimony trumps over a woman; if that law was in place and a woman can’t prove she has been raped (which is hard to prove), then the rapist could use this “non-conviction” as “proof” that she raped him and score a conviction. Also, the law only applies to a woman forcing the victim to penetrate her; if a woman penetrates a victim with a body part or object, even without this particular law she’d still be charged with rape.

Feminists against equal custody.

11 They’re against using 50/50 custody as the default; this is because it has repeatedly demonstrated that the most beneficial thing for the kid is to be able to stay with the parent that took care of them the most.

Female felons should serve home sentences.

12 Should read “Female felons should serve home sentences if they aren’t violent, but have parental duties, since we can’t just throw children in foster care”.

Told judges to be lenient on women.

13 Because they’re more likely to have parental duties or mental illnesses. It’s still a case-by-case procedure.

Feminists cover up female domestic violence.

14 Murray-Straus cites only ONE case where a publication was blocked, and offers no proof that it was feminists, nor the details of the case. The rest of his argument is basically “Feminists don’t talk about male victims of DV, this means that they are preventing everyone from helping them”. Sure. So is the World Wildlife Found. </sarcasm>

Feminists don’t want the gov to help unemployed men.

15 Feminists pointed out that there were various female-dominated jobfields in difficulty, too. And they didn’t ask for men to not be helped - they asked for women to be helped too.

Feminists launch campaigns to help girls only while boys are doing worse in every facet of education.

16 There still is a wage gap, a pay gap, a hiring gap, and a promoting gap. That’s the reason for those pro-girls campaigns.

Males who were raped as a child still have to pay child support.

17 The most recent case is from 1996, all of those cases haven’t been picked by any newsource whatsoever, and male rapists can get child custody for the children born from those rapes in these days.

Women should have the right to put a child up for adoption before the father gets custody.

18 The father in question didn’t have custody in the first place.

Feminists against beyond reasonable doubt when it’s male rapists.

19 Penal cases are based on “innocent unless proven guilty beyond any reasonable doubt”. Civil cases - what the article was about - are based around “preponderance of evidence” which, as the article’s author puts it, means “the relevant body looks at all the evidence and rules for the party it thinks has the stronger case”. So, basically, slagartehfox wants civil cases of rape - and only rape - to have the same restrictions to evidence as penal cases.

5 rights feminism ignores for men.

20 This is actually a 5-in-1 bullshit list. (Also: JudgyBitch? Really?)

Men already have the right to decide whether to keep or terminate their own pregnancies. Oh, wait, JB wants men to be able to decide for others’ pregnancies. What next, does she wants to stay at home on sick leave when a colleague has a broken leg but she’s perfectly fine?

Feminists ARE the ones taking male rape seriously. MRAs… not so much. (See point 4 of this post of mine.)

Feminists aren’t the ones shaming men for talking about their feelings or admitting that they have mental problems - misoginysts are the ones shaming other men for being “weak”, or rather, “feminine”. (See here and here.)

Again: feminists aren’t against 50/50 shared custody being the default because they assume that women are “naturally” better caregivers - they’re against it because favoring the kids’ “primary caregiver” is more beneficial for those kids.

Feminists HAVE spoken against forced circumcision, and they aren’t preventing anyone from trying and solve this issue. MRAs? Only speak about it in discussions about FGM, in order to paint feminists as penis-cutting monsters. THAT’S IT.

Feminists blame males for their abuse.

21 Tries to demonstrate that women commit the majority of DV act by referencing the study that uses the Conflict Tactics Scale, which, among other things, doesn’t differentiate single incidents from repeated behaviours, doesn’t differentiate acts in self-defense from acts of abuse, and doesn’t consider at all sexual assaults and rapes.

The primary aggressor clause where only men get charged with abuse.

22 Unsourced claim. Also: no proof to disprove that the vast majority of DV offenders are men.

Shame men into going to war.

23 The White Feather Movement was created in the first place by far-right nationalists.

Feminists dismiss female child rapists.

24 The Honey Badge Brigade did, in fact, lie. The HBB stated “95% of abused boys in juvenile facilities reported being attacked/coerced by female staff“. This “statistic” doesn’t appear anywhere in the cited source; what is written is “Among the estimated 1,390 adjudicated youth who reported victimization, 89.1% were males reporting sexual activity with female staff only, and 3.0% were males reporting sexual activity with both female and male staff” (p.23). How is “sexual victimization” defined in the survey? “Sexual victimization—any forced sexual activity with another youth (nonconsensual sexual acts and other sexual contacts) and all sexual activity with facility staff“ (p.7). “All sexual activity with facility staff”, even if consensual and legal.

Feminists say men can’t talk about domestic abuse.

25 Question: where did Costello said “Men can’t talk about domestic abuse”? Answer: Nowhere - Takashi0 made that up!

Feminists mock a man who has his dick cut off.

26 Pretty much no feminist has defended that one. And before you say “No Ture Scotsman!”: we’re at 26 links so far - 30, if you consider the JudgyBitch one as 5 different points. Up until now, Takashi0 managed to drag up only 3 istances of feminists doing something awful - and ZERO istances of those people being defended by the vast majority of feminists.

Strawmanning MRA members.

27 That’s because MRAs are misogynists. Hell, have you forgot the existance of Pick-Up Artists (”I hate women but I want to have sex, here’s some ways to coerce them into sex”) or Men Going Their Own Way (”I hate women, so I don’t want to think about them, let me talk over and over on the Net about how women are awful”)? People can’t discern sides of the manosphere because they’re pretty much all characterized by misogyny.

feminists attack church.

28 The video depicts a (probably feminist) protest in front of a church. Not an “attack”. [EDIT 19/01/2016: Apparently it was a protest against Argentina’s massively fucked-up laws on abortion, which severely limit them. They’re the reason why 80.000 women per year end up in the hospital due to complications caused by illegal, non-sanitary abortions… and are arrested for having an abortion if they survive afterwards. And only 1 in 8 abortions (out of 450-600.000 per year) in Argentina are performed legally.]

Feminists transphobia

29 Congratulations: you finally found a sizable group of feminists that are legitimately awful (Trans-Exclusionari Radical Feminists, or TERFs). Too bad you’re way too late for the “Feminists should care about trans* people too, not being transphobic!“ by about a quarter of century.

Feminists slander the MRM

30 Repeated link - see 27.

Again,

31 Nope, the article is accurate. There is no systemic oppression of white cishet men (Systemic oppression isn’t just “I am discriminated against”, you also need a social system that upholds said discrimination to a systemic level - and there is no vast majority of women/POCs/lgbt+ people oppressing white cishet men); MRAs really did try to slander the Don’t Be That Guy campaign with their “False rape accusations are an epidemic, stop encouraging them!” bullshit (which has been repeatedly proven to be false); pretty much none of the issues MRAs worry about are caused by - or prevented from being solved by - feminists; and, in fact, the MRM has done nothing at all to solve those issues, preferring instead to attack feminists.

And again,

32 Elliott Rodger was literally dripping with his own misogyny. He regularly frequented first PUA sites, and then the PUAHate subreddit. His violent misogyny was pretty much the final consequence of the general manosphere’s misogynistic rethoric. Also, feminists didn’t claim that Rodger was a MRA, the Daily Kos did. And no, despite what the Honey Badgers can say, Futrelle wasn’t involved.

Call them terrorists.

33 While peole do think that calling the MRM “terrorist” is quite excessive, there’s no denial of the massive amount of hate present in it. Here and here manospherians justify Lepine; here’s proof that the Tom Ball manifesto stayed on AVfM’s front page for way too much time; and here, here and here are the manospherians’ opinions on Rodger. They aren’t terrorists - they’re cheerleaders for terrorists.

Feminists say Men can’t be raped.

34 Broken and probably repeated link - see 9.

Feminists defend female raping minor.

35 ………Barbara Ellen is a prominent feminist? Oh, right, I forgot - she’s a woman, and she’s saying something you don’t like, therefore of course she’s a feminist. (Meanwhile: MRAs believe that a minor boy “having sex with” an adult woman is something enviable: 1, 2, 3.)

Feminist defends why fucking an 8 year old boy isn’t rape.

36 Zero proof that kermitismywaifu is a feminist. In fact, it seems he’s NOT.

Feminists primary aggressor clause discriminates against males.

37 WAVA is already gender-neutral. Plus: if the MRM wants male shelters, then why didn’t they do like feminists did and fund them?! Hell, with WAVA you’d easily get financial aid from the government!

Feminists cover up female domestic abuse stats.

38 Broken link, but probably a repeat of 14.

Woman smashing bottle in mans face in public. Nobody gives a fuck.

39 Oh, right, I remember when they’ve tried this before. How many times have they done the play? And how many times they’ve shown the one istance where nobody helped?

Jezebel mocks men who are abused.

40 Jezebel critiqued the faulty CTS study. Bad taste? Sure. Plenty of feminists admit that. We’re still waiting for MRAs to stop bringing up that massively flawed study.

Feminists make sure the gov doesn’t spend money on male shelters or male research.

41 Same argument as 37. Why don’t MRAs fund male shelters? Oh, right, because they don’t give a shit about male victims.

Female on male abuse in public is at best ignored, and at worst celebrated.

42 Where’s the unedited footage? Where are the bystanders’ reactions? (See point 39)

Public stops a man from abusing a woman in public, same crowd laughs when the roles are reversed.

43 Oh hey, it’s the #ViolenceIsViolence fraudolent video! See here for details!

No funding for male shelter.

44 Again: WAVA IS GENDER-NEUTRAL. There’s this guy who’s asking for help to build this shelter, but have any of you ever heard MRAs raising their asses and doing something to help building those shelters? Nooooooo! (Also: good job spreading that “there are no resources for men” narrative. Apparently MRA’s prefer to tell male victims that they cannot receive any help, than to direct them towards actually existing resources like this or this or this…)

Founder of Canadas only male shelter for abuse forced to close due to lack of funding before committing suicide.

45 Did feminists cut off his fundings? No. Did they prevent anyone from supporting him? No. Did MRAs raised money to help this guy? No.

Feminists threaten to kill woman for saying men need abuse shelters.

Feminists prevent a meeting about male suicide.

Feminists stage mock murders to scare men.

Feminist attacks male cartoonist and is hailed a hero of feminism.

Feminists skewed the Definition of Domestic Abuse, resulting in only male abusers being arrested and female abusers not.

46-50 Repeated points - see 1, 2, 3, 4 and 22.

Feminists’s DV training hurts Police training

51 Misleading title. What happend was: a husband attacks a man. He claims that it was self-defense because, he says, said man attempted to attack and rape his wife. The wife had previously given a taped statement to the police, stating that the man wasn’t armed. She then refused to testify in person by invoking marital privilege. Not “feminists’s DV training”.

Feminist Mary Koss denies malerape victims.

52 Koss doesn’t “deny male rape victims”. She simply states that for the purpose of researching the subject “forced to penetrate” should be a separate category.

53 Broken link to a page named “Sommers”. Possibly, it portrayed these debunked statements of her.

54 Link that shows that Koss, in her survey, attained herself to the local (Ohio) legal definition of rape because otherwise her critics would’ve dismissed her survey “because she broadened the definition of rape beyond the reasonable”. They still tried to discredit her that way, though.

Feminists violently protesting against Warren Farrell at U of Toronto

55 Repeated point - see 2. Also: no acts of violence were made.

A mob of feminists at a recent protest attacking and sexually molesting a group of Rosary-praying Catholic men who were peacefully protecting the cathedral in the city of San Juan from threats of vandalism.

56 Repeated point - see 28. And there was no “attack” or “sexual molesties”.

Feminists disrupt a forum for battered men

57 Repeated point - see 5.

Feminists fought a law for equal custody to be the default if both parents want custody and neither parent is unfit.

58 Broken link to Glenn Sacks. Also: probably repeated point (11).

Multiple times.

Feminists started a campaign against Father’s rights groups

Feminists fought against laws granting men anonymity until charged with the crime of rape—not convicted, just charged.

Feminists fought against a law to end to the justice system favoring women simply because they are women, and giving men harsher sentences simply because they are men.

Feminist fought against men want equal treatment when victims of domestic violence, and to not be arrested for the crime of “being male” under primary aggressor policies.

Feminists in India and Israel fought against femalerapists being arrested, charged and convicted of rape.

Feminists fought against a economic stimulus for male-dominated job such as construction, etc.

59-66 All repeated points - see 11, 6, 7, 8, 21, 9, 10 and 15.

Feminist fought a law against Paternity Fraud.

67 The link only states what the “Revocation of Paternity Act” is. Not that feminists fought it. In fact, a search for “feminism revocation of paternity act” pretty much only brings up anti-feminists sites linking to the same webpage.

Feminist Harriet Harman has publicly requested employers to hire women in preference to White men if both job candidates are equally

68 It was basically affirmative action, it was for women and ethnic minorities (and yes, there IS discrimination against them), and most importantly it was NOT a law proposal and thus there was no obligation for those firms to follow.

Equality Minister,feminist Patricia Hewitt, was found guilty of breaching the Sex Discrimination Act by “overlooking a strong male candidate for a job in favour of a weaker female applicant”.

69 Congratulations: you found a woman doing a Bad Thing. And? Are you claiming that feminism as a whole is bad because of one woman, but that one of the biggest MRM websites putting up a libelous “criminal registry” is the action of an extremist fringe? Or that widespread hiring biases against women don’t exist because of this one woman being biased?

Elected in 2009, the lesbian feminist prime minister Johanna Sigurdardottir has vowed to “end of the Age of Testosterone

70 Do you know what the “Age of Testosterone” refers to? The 2008-11 Iceland financial crisis, caused by aggressive economic policies opposed by, among other groups, feminist groups.

Feminists want to peeing while standing illegal

71 False description - that left party is pushing to exchange stand-only toilets in male restrooms with sitting ones. Newsflash: you can pee on a sitting toilet while standing up.

Erin Pizzey had to flee the UK because she and her family received death threats and her dog murdered all because feminists didn’t like that she discovered women were equally as violent as men.

72 Repeated point - see 1.

Also Suzanne Steinmetz and her children received death threats and bomb threats she discovered that the rate at which men were victimized by domestic violence was similar to the rate for women.

73 No proof that it was feminists.

Richard Gelles and Murray Straus have all received death threats from feminists, simply for publishing their findings (that female-to-male family violence was equal to the rate of male-to-female violence).

74 No proof that it was feminists.

75 Yep, it’s the CTS study. Debunked.

Feminists say Men can’t be raped.

Feminists defend female raping minor.

Feminist defends why fucking an 8 year old boy isn’t rape.

76-78 Repeated points - see 9, 35 and 36.

Most feminists backed studies are bullshit.

79 This doesn’t prove that “most feminist backed studies are bulshit”. All this proves is that people have forgot to actually check the BOJ statistics.

Beyond reasonable doubt doesn’t apply to rape.For men only

80 A college hearing is considered akin to a civil lawsuit, and thus it isn’t bound by the same restrictions as a penal trial. Plus, even in the rare cases where the school does take disciplinary action against a student accused of sexual assault, 75-90% of the time it’s a token punishment - if the school decides to give any punishment in the first place.

Feminist changes mind on rape culture when her son is falsely accused.

81 False rape accusations are awful. The fact that they exist doesn’t change the fact that rape culture exists, or that way more often is the accuser that gets disbelieved (including by the police), or that false rape accusations are no more common than false anything accusations.

Feminists primary aggressor clause discriminates against males.

Feminists cover up female domestic abuse stats.

Jezebel mocks men who are abused.

Feminists make sure the gov doesn’t spend money on male shelters or male research.

82-85 Repeated points - see 37, 38, 40 and 37 (again).

Feminists prevent a meeting about male suicide.

Feminists stage mock murders to scare men.

Feminist attacks male cartoonist and is hailed a hero of feminism.

Feminists shut down forum for battered husbands.

Propaganda campaign against male fathers wanting custody.

Feminists wish to slander accused names before convicted.

Try to shut down female prisons.

Create rape laws that exclude female rapists.

Make it impossible to charge women with rape.

Feminists against equal custody.

Female felons should serve home sentences.

Told judges to be lenient on women.

Feminists cover up female domestic violence.

Feminists don’t want the gov to help unemployed men.

Feminists launch campaigns to help girls only while boys are doing worse in every facet of education.

Males who were raped as a child still have to pay child support.

Women should have the right to put a child up for adoption before the father gets custody. Feminists against beyond reasonable doubt when it’s male rapists.

5 rights feminism ignores for men.

Feminists blame males for their abuse.

The primary aggressor clause where only men get charged with abuse.

Shame men into going to war.

Feminists dismiss female child rapists.

Feminists say men can’t talk about domestic abuse.

Feminists mock a man who has his dick cut off.

86-110 All these points are a repeat of links 2 through 26.

feminists attack church.

111 Repeated point - see 28.

Feminists shut down a festival about gender equality for including men.

112 That’s not what happened. What happened was that the sponsors realized that CAFE had nothing to do with equality and everything to do with MRAs and misogyny, and ran away from them.

Feminists hope MRA’s die.

113 Correction: ONE person who defines themselves as “feminist” and who doesn’t have any relevant spot in feminism whatsoever hopes that MRAs die.

Feminists against fathers day.

114 #EndFathersDay is a troll tag created by 4channers.

Feminist makes up fake assault stories.

115 Again: only 2% at best of rape accusations are false. There is no epidemic of “false rape accusations” or “made-up stories of assault”.

Female reporter bullied by feminists at the National Young Feminist Leadership Conference

116 Yes, because telling someone “Your conservative magazine isn’t welcome here” is totally bullying on par with what feminists face. </sarcasm>

The Wage Gap is a myth.

117-121 Besides the fact that the wage gap has been always correctly labeled by feminists as “How much female workers collectively make/how much male workers collectively make“, there’s some small factoids such as: women are penalized if they get pregnant more than if they take a pause from their jobs from any other reason; women are penalized if they try to negotiate their salary; there’s hiring and promoting biases; and even if we consider a man and a woman doing the exact same job/efficiency/hours worked, there’s still a 7% difference.

Women Now a Majority in American Workplaces

Labor force participation rate for men has never been lower.

122-124 How is this a problem? Feminists aren’t “stealing jobs” or “preventing men from taking jobs”.

Women in some cases make more than men.

And their husbands dont have a problem with it either.

125-134 Still doesn’t negate the existance of the gender wage gap.

Women CHOOSE to stay away from STEM field

135-138 Still doesn’t negate the existance of biases against women in STEM. (Here’s two examples.)

Did I mention that at least 50 of these links are repeats? Good fucking job, Takashi. Good fucking job.

#debunking antifeminism

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defendtranswomen · 6 years ago

Link

I am too sick to write this article. The act of writing about my injuries is like performing an interpretative dance after breaking nearly every bone in my body. When I sit down to edit this doc, my head starts aching like a capsule full of some corrosive fluid has dissolved and is leaking its contents. The mental haze builds until it becomes difficult to see the text, to form a thesis, to connect parts. They drop onto the page in fragments. This is the difficulty of writing about brain damage.

The last time I was in the New Inquiry, several years ago, I was being interviewed. I was visibly sick. I was in an abusive “community” that had destroyed my health with regular, sustained emotional abuse and neglect. Sleep-deprived, unable to take care of myself, my body was tearing itself apart. I was suicidal from the abuse, and I had an infected jaw that needed treatment.

Years later, I’m talking to my therapist. I told her, when you have PTSD, everything you make is about PTSD. After a few minutes I slid down and curled up on the couch like the shed husk of a cicada. I go to therapy specifically because of the harassment and ostracism from within my field.

This is about disposability from a trans feminine perspective, through the lens of an artistic career. It’s about being human trash.

This is in defense of the hyper-marginalized among the marginalized, the Omelas kids, the marked for death, those who came looking for safety and found something worse than anything they’d experienced before.

For years, queer/trans/feminist scenes have been processing an influx of trans fems, often impoverished, disabled, and/or from traumatic backgrounds. These scenes have been abusing them, using them as free labor, and sexually exploiting them. The leaders of these scenes exert undue influence over tastemaking, jobs, finance, access to conferences, access to spaces. If someone resists, they are disappeared, in the mundane, boring, horrible way that many trans people are susceptible to, through a trapdoor that can be activated at any time. Housing, community, reputation—gone. No one mourns them, no one asks questions. Everyone agrees that they must have been crazy and problematic and that is why they were gone.

I was one of these people.

They controlled my housing and access to nearly every resource. I was sexually harassed, had my bathroom use monitored, my crumbling health ignored or used as a tool of control, was constantly yelled at, and was pressured to hurt other trans people and punished severely when I refused.

The cycle of trans kids being used up and then smeared is a systemic, institutionalized practice. It happens in the shelters, in the radical organizations, in the artistic scenes—everywhere they might have a chance of gaining a foothold. It’s like an abusive foster household that constantly kicks kids out then uses their tears and anger at being raped and abused to justify why they had to be kicked out—look at these problem kids. Look at these problematic kids.

Trans fems are especially vulnerable to abuse for the following reasons:

— A lot of us encounter concepts for the first time and have no idea what is “normal” or not.

— We have nowhere else to go. Abuse thrives on scarcity.

— No one cares what happens to us.

This foster cycle relies on amnesia. A lot of people who enter spaces for the first time don’t know those spaces’ history. They may not know that leaders regularly exploit and make sexual advances on new members, or that those members who resisted are no longer around. Spaces self-select for people who will play the game, until the empathic people have been drained out and the only ones who remain are those who have perfectly identified with the agendas and survival of the Space—the pyramid scheme of believers who bring capital and victims to those on top.

My first puberty was a nightmare—faced with the opportunity to make my second one a healthy, healing experience, I was instead abused and broken. The community practiced compulsory BDSM sexuality, which was deeply inappropriate considering it was one of the only visible spaces for trans people interested in making games. I didn’t need that coercion in my life; I needed safety and mentorship.

I spent those years of my early twenties not making connections or gaining valuable socialization that I had missed in my youth, but being exploited and brainwashed in nightmarish isolation. I was scared away from the “inclusive” coding spaces, the “inclusive” conferences and their orbiting alt events, and everything else that people like to pretend is available for trans fems.

Things escalated at the Allied Media Conference of 2013. Unfortunately I was traveling alone. People from the abusive community overheard me asking about safe-space resources in Oakland and became angry that I was seeking to escape their community. I was intimidated in person by someone who had a great deal of social power over me. I had a panic attack and went to the bathroom to dry heave and cry. Shortly afterward, threatening messages began bombarding my Twitter and my phone, and the community began to develop a coordinated political response to my desire to leave. People suddenly stopped talking to me, and I felt the icy net of isolation drawing tight.

This was the only time a conference responded appropriately. AMC apologized, notified their security team to check up on me, and encouraged me to submit a talk next year. I came back and ran a workshop (with two friends for security) and a small amount of healing was possible.

This reintegration was not made anywhere else. I was excluded from the vast majority of game spaces because of what happened to me. Of course, the multimedia nature of AMC meant it had the least stake in preserving the reputation of games and other things that matter more than people.

When I got back home, I was kicked out of my housing. I later learned that the community had been contacting my landlord for months prior to the actual eviction, as well as spreading rumors throughout my field. These seed rumors are a common tactic in those spaces, cultivating a brittle structure around people that can be shattered when necessary.

Living was my sole attempt at innocence.

ATTACK

One of my abusers was sent a list of the nominees for the upcoming games festival Indiecade. Unfortunately, I was on the list. I ended up winning an award, ostensibly to recognize my feminine labor in the areas of marginalized game design—years of creating access for other people, publicizing their games, giving technical support, not to mention the games I had designed myself. Instead of solidarity from other marginalized people in my field, I was attacked.

Anyone else getting that award would have been able to just … get that award. But people like me aren’t allowed to just have careers. Feminist culture saw fit to give a pass to every man and every cis woman who got that award, but when a trans fem from a disadvantaged background stepped up, she somehow happened to be the worst. The culture was fine with me as long as I was window-dressing, but daring to excel got me kneecapped.

They spread rumors that I was sending harassing messages to people, even as the messages streamed one-way toward me. They said I controlled a misogynistic mob and was using it to attack people. (I had never been more alone.) I was called a pedophile, a rapist, an abuser (the typical dog whistles used in feminist spaces to evoke the dangerous tranny stereotype invading ur bathrooms.) Even when the rumors were debunked, even with a history of co-habitating respectfully with partners and a history of being a respectful tenant, the damage was never repaired. The purpose was to keep firing until I was gone, until every possible bad thing had been said about me.

The reputation game was used to paint a vulnerable, isolated trans girl, too scared to leave her room most days, as having power which she did not have—power which my abusers, veterans of queer and artistic scenes with decades of institutional privilege, did have.

It happened without warning or recourse, without a single attempt at conciliation. Multiple times I had noticed tension building and had asked explicitly for mediation. Each time this was refused. When you’re exiling someone for petty political reasons, it works best when they can’t tell their own story. By privately vocalizing concerns that I was being abused, I became a public target—presenting a false chronology to observers.

Previously their ostracism had been silent, made simple by the fact that no one cared about what happened to trans fems who made games. The fact that my games had inadvertently made me visible meant that the attack had to be devastatingly public, my fake crimes commensurate to the amount of disgust required to repel me. This is the danger of the token system—it elevated me to a level of violent politics I was unprepared for.

Very few people want to defend a target of disposability. I was told by one person that she couldn’t risk losing her job, another that she didn’t want to become a target too.

I was threatened into not defending myself, gaslit into silence, told that people knew “things” about me that were never explained. When I asked how I could do accountability, when I said I would do whatever they wanted, they said that I was “incapable” of accountability, that my crime was unknown and my sentence was permanent. That is the point where the body starts to die.

My attackers were expert pathological liars who had been getting away with it for years—entire fictional realities playing out on their social-media accounts like soap opera. Escaping from abuse is the most certain way to become painted as an abuser, and being an abuser is the most sure way to be believed. You know how movies are realer than reality? How the sound effects and physics become so normalized to us that reality seems flat and fake? Talking about abuse is kind of like that. Abusers know what sounds “real.” They are like expert movie-effects artists. Victims are stuck with boring fake reality.

SOCIAL MEDIA AND HEALTH

Social media is significant to my story because for a long time it was my only outlet as a disabled individual barred from many physical spaces, and a way to express myself artistically when traditional outlets were closed to me. However, it came with its own set of problems.

When I told another trans person that I had been abused, I was told in response that my follower count on Twitter was higher than hers.

I tried talking to people about my poor health, how I needed to withdraw and have space. After unfollowing most people related to games, a subject which was quickly becoming a trigger, I was told that I was “manipulative” for unfollowing, and my following list on Twitter was scrutinized and brought up as evidence that I still followed certain games people and that I was doing this to hurt people.

I was pressured not to post about certain things I cared about (“crystals,” ”slime”) and not to use my favorite emoticons. I was pressured to join in social-media smearings of other trans people (which I frequently rebelled against, to my detriment) and to RT things I didn’t want to RT.

My twitter was incompatible with the rest of the network because I mainly posted poetry-style tweets that had no connection to anything else. I would be accused of subtweeting or encoding hidden messages into my tweets. People would associate random words in my tweets with some random thing going on in their life that I surely must be commenting on.

Social media became a scientific metric for my abusers, a set of numbers and behaviors to obsess over and divine hidden messages. The games network constantly abraded against my nonparticipation—my desire for a safe, therapeutic online space, not a competitive one.

Feminist practice of declaring privilege and marginalization became a way to collect information about victims: Look at someone’s profile bar for their elemental weaknesses. Being frank about my health problems was never an advantage for me in feminist spaces, only something to be used against me. I was an object, an invalid on a bed that could be infinitely manipulated and extruded through social media to fit the agendas of a thousand bored strangers.

The ethereal potential of the net had become rigidly hierarchized and numbered to the point where I could be managed and controlled as efficiently as if I were in 3-D space.

MOBBING

CALL-OUT CULTURE AS RITUAL DISPOSABILITY

Feminist/queer spaces are more willing to criticize people than abusive systems because they want to reserve the right to use those systems for their own purposes. At least attacking people can be politically viable, especially in a token system where you benefit directly by their absence, or where your status as a good feminist is dependent on constantly rooting out evil.

When the bounty system calls for the ears of evil people, well, most people have a fucking ear.

When I used to curate games, I was approached by people in that abusive community who pressured me not to cover a game by a trans woman. Their reasoning was blatant jealousy, disguised under the thin, nauseating film of pretext that covers nearly everything people say about trans people.

When I rejected their reasoning and covered the game, the targeting reticule of disposability turned toward me. What can we learn from this? Besides “lofty processes in queer/feminist spaces are nearly always about some embarrassingly petty shit,” it’s about the ritual nature of disposability, which has nothing to do with “deserving” it. Disposability has to happen on a regular basis, like forest fires keeping nature in balance.

So when people write all those apologist articles about call-out culture and other instruments of violence in feminism, I don’t think they understand that the people who most deserve those things can usually shrug off the effects, and the normalization of that violence inevitably trickles down and affects the weak. It is predictable as water. Criminal justice applies punishment under the conceit of blind justice, but we see the results: Prisons are flooded with the most vulnerable, and the rich can buy their way out of any problem. In activist communities, these processes follow a similar pragmatism.

Punishment is not something that happens to bad people. It happens to those who cannot stop it from happening. It is laundered pain, not a balancing of scales.

If a man does something fucked up, all he has to do is apologize, if that, for feminists to re-embrace him. If a trans fem talks about something fucked up that happened to her, she is told to leave and never come back.

MOBBING

A common punishment for infanticide in the Middle Ages was living burial. This was a feminine-coded punishment, often reserved for women, one that allowed execution without having to actually be there at the moment of death. This line of thought pervades feminine punishment to this day.

One of the most common tools of exclusion is through mobbing, which is rarely talked about because unlike rape, murder, etc, it’s not easy to pin it on a single person (or scapegoat). Mobbing is emotional abuse practiced by a group of people, usually peers, over a period of time, through methods such as gaslighting, rumor-mongering, and ostracism. It’s most documented in workplace or academic environments (i.e. key points of capitalist tension) but is thoroughly institutionalized into feminist, queer, and radical spaces as well. Here is why it is horrible:

1) It has an unusually strong power to damage the victim’s relationship to society, because it can’t be written off as an outlier, as some singular monster. It reveals a fundamental truth about people that makes it difficult to trust ever again. People become like aliens, like a pack of animals that can turn on you as soon as some mysterious pheromone shift marks you for death.

2) The insidious nature of emotional abuse: How do you fight ostracism and rumors? They leave no bruises, they just starve you.

3) Mobbing typically occurs in places where the victim is trapped by some need or obligation: work, school, circles of friends. This can prolong exposure to damaging extremes.

For these reasons, PTSD is an almost inevitable outcome of any protracted mobbing case.

In ideological spaces, this damage is exacerbated by the fact that the victims are often earnest people who take the ideals to heart and can’t understand why the culture is going contrary to its own messages. They appease, self-incriminate, blame themselves—anything to be a Good Person. They don’t want to fight. Fighting sickens them.

From a report by the Australian House of Representatives Education and Employment Committee: “90 percent of people being bullied make the comment: ‘I just want it to stop.’ They don’t want to go down a formal path, but just want the behaviour to stop.”

Those who participate, even unwittingly, feel compelled to invest in the narrative of victims as monsters in order to protect their self-conception as a good person—group violence creates group culpability. For their ego they trade the career, health, community (and sometimes life) of the victim.

MOBBING AS WITCH HUNTS

One lesson we can draw from the return of witch-hunting is that this form of persecution is no longer bound to a specific historic time. It has taken a life of its own, so that the same mechanisms can be applied to different societies whenever there are people in them that have to be ostracized and dehumanized. Witchcraft accusations, in fact, are the ultimate mechanism of alienation and estrangement as they turn the accused—still primarily women—into monstrous beings, dedicated to the destruction of their communities, therefore making them undeserving of any compassion and solidarity.

—Silvia Federici

The term witch hunt is thrown around a lot, but let’s look at what it really means. Witch hunts, as discussed by Silvia Federici, were responses to shifts in capital accumulation, as is slavery. To jury-rig the perpetually self-destructing machine of capitalism, huge amounts of violence are required to obtain captive labor (fem and non-white). The effect is to devalue our labor as much as possible, and to destroy the bonds between marginalized people.

You see this in games and tech spaces where the intense amounts of competition and capital accumulation, both physical and social, are a breeding ground for mobbing. But the popular two-sided discussion of mobbing as carried out in numerous clickbait articles ignores the fact that mobbing goes all the way down—even as white cis women struggle for safety, they participate in the exclusion of others, creating a hierarchy of labor and competition. Because mobbing is a form of capitalist violence, the popular discussion (conducted by those who are intricately entwined with the flow of capital) must omit the nuances of mobbing in favor of a narrative that is about replacing uncool regressive masculine consumerism with liberal feminist consumerism.

When the people who are scapegoated happen to be from the most disadvantaged backgrounds, the culture calls it coincidence, clutching our respectable counterparts to their chest like pearls, a talisman of tokens to ward away reality.

SEXUAL MENACE

I saw a queer black woman, struggling to survive by her art, falsely accused of rape by a white queer. The call-out post was extremely vague and loaded with strong words designed to elicit vigilante justice. Immediately, hundreds of other white queers jumped on the bandwagon. Many of them likely didn’t know either of the people involved.

Accusations of sexual menace are a key weapon used against marginalized people in feminist spaces, because it arouses people’s disgust like no other act—the threat of black skin on innocent white, of trans bone structures on ethereal cis skeletons. It’s as common for many of us as cat-calling or any other form of ubiquitous harassment that cis feminists talk about, except no one wants to talk about it. It’s a way for the dominant people in the group to take us aside and say, you are not welcome here, or do this thing you don’t want to do or I’ll ruin your life. But frequently it happens without any particular thesis, just as a general tool to keep us destabilized and vulnerable. Don’t forget who you really are in the unspoken hierarchy.

Mobbing uses these rumors to trade a vague suspicion for the actual reality of violence. It’s like turning the corner and watching someone on the street having their teeth kicked in by a mob who assures you that just before you appeared, this person had committed some mysterious act which justifies limitless brutality.

DAMAGE

PTSD AS DISPOSABILITY ALCHEMY

I was, in effect, beaten until I had brain damage, over a long period of time. Unlike some other survivors of trauma, I was unable to heal because I was never separated from the source of the danger. I was never given the chance to vent, to express myself, to tell my side of the story—but I had to keep working, harder than ever, while being constantly exposed to violence.

The pressure on me was not merely to survive but to display no signs of the incredible amounts of damage pouring into me daily. To never display the slightest hint of anger, to never cry, to not argue with people telling me horrible things. Every hint of damage was an excuse to further isolate and demonize me.

The cost of resisting disposability was PTSD. It was catching a lethal amount of negative energy with my body and becoming a poison-processing factory.

My job is wired to give me electric shocks. What do you do when your alternative is homelessness?

“The allostatic load is ‘the wear and tear on the body’ which grows over time when the individual is exposed to repeated or chronic stress.”

“Stress hormones such as epinephrine and cortisol in combination with other stress-mediating physiological agents such as increased myocardial workload, decreased smooth muscle tone in the gastrointestinal tract, and increased coagulation effects have protective and adaptive benefits in the short term, yet can accelerate pathophysiology when they are overproduced or mismanaged; this kind of stress can cause hypertension and lead to heart disease. Constant or even irregular exposure to these hormones can eventually induce illnesses and weaken the body’s immune system.”

To cover up the abuse and protect the “reputation” of the games industry, it was deemed worthwhile to lower my lifespan, weaken my immune system, and permanently damage my body.

Even if I drink multiple cups of water before bed I wake up with severe dehydration. An interesting side effect of being a trans fem on hormones is that spironolactone (an antiandrogen) is a diuretic, so the dehydrating effects of stress are added to the dehydration of my gender, tipping it over to agonizing extremes, the unspoken tax of pursuing both gender and a career. The amount of water in my body is political.

I wake up feeling burnt. Damaged. Corroded. I crawl up from an insane, nauseating, unreal pit and slowly come back to the world. I have constant headaches.

By the end of the day my neck and left arm are aching from nervous tics.

I forget things rapidly. Triggers leave me exhausted or panicking at inconvenient times, sometimes for days or weeks.

My hair fell out in handfuls. I still have a nervous tic of running my hands through my hair to pull out loose strands.

Having PTSD is like breaking a limb and never being able to rely on it as strongly. The sudden weakness of standing on it wrong, suddenly being unable to hold something, a fatigue and spasm of nerves.

It became difficult to diagnose other medical problems because of the all-consuming nature of the symptoms. It became difficult to talk about what happened to my body in general. When my hairdresser asked, the only way to explain the damage was by saying I had been in a car accident.

Attacks on marginalized artists go beyond merely denying them access to networks; they also damage a person’s faculties of expression.

For a long time, PTSD deprived me of the privilege of being a multitemporal being. The space of time I was able to safely think about shrunk to about a minute. Larger projects, the kind most tied to commercial value and to the media coverage apparatus, were difficult for me due to the traumatic potential of expanding my aperture of time.

The diversity-centric system expects more jobs to fix the problem, ignoring how long we’ve been damaged and made unfit for their jobs. They encourage the Strong Woman stereotype because it means taking the damage onto ourselves. We need more than jobs; we need social reintegration.

COMMUNICATION

INABILITY TO SHARE STIGMA

Traumatic events destroy the sustaining bonds between individual and community. Those who have survived learn that their sense of self, of worth, of humanity, depends upon feeling a connection to others. The solidarity of a group provides the strongest protection against terror and despair, and the strongest antidote to traumatic experience. Trauma isolates; the group re-creates a sense of belonging. Trauma shames and stigmatizes; the group bears witness and affirms. Trauma degrades the victim; the group exalts her. Trauma de-humanizes the victim; the group restores her humanity.

—Judith Herman, Trauma and Recovery

The worst thing is not having other survivors to commiserate with. I can think of people who went through similar situations and were defended, re-integrated. Their stories are paraded through feminist spaces, saturated through social media, and every time I’m exposed to them, I feel less safe, not more. This enhances my feelings of dehumanization: “Why was I not worth protecting in the exact same situation? I must not be human like them”.

I often have the overwhelming physical sensation of having a dead person in my life, someone as close as an identical twin. The sensation is of me being the only one still alive after a terrible accident, lingering like an unshriven thing. The inability to share stigma is even worse than the original act of violation. The greater part of a wound is its inability to heal.

INADMISSIBLE NARRATIVES OF ABUSE #1

The typical narrative of abuse on social media doesn’t include the problems of the most vulnerable, like how public verbal harassment may only be an ultimately minor part of a trans fem’s exile.

The most skilled abusers know that a good exile is done with pure silence, through the whisper network, by having the person wake up one day and have every second or third person she knows or who practices her profession block her and/or stop talking to her. No one tells her why. She has to painstakingly talk to every friend, every contact, every person she would normally have a cheerful conversation with. The electric shocks of knowing that every simple human interaction you have with a friend or stranger could turn into a nightmare of victim blaming or worse, a cold iciness where they pretend nothing is wrong. Imagine repeating that experience hundreds and hundreds of times, with no way to end it. After the noise, the long years of silence are what kill us.

The backchannels that should be used to protect people from abusers and rapists are instead used to protect abusers and rapists. Any usefulness these channels have is reserved for Real Women. No one warned me about any of the comically large number of predators in my professions. I was considered unrapeable, unabuseable, not worthy of protection. A trans fem can try to talk about her experiences of abuse for years and have no one listen, but the instant one of her abusers smears her, everyone is alert and awake.

One reason it took me so long to talk about my experiences was that I associated being able to speak against abuse with being an abuser. Because every abuser throughout my life was so good at being believed, I thought that being believed was the exclusive domain of abusers.

This is why my first months in therapy were spent convincing me that I wasn’t a sociopath, crazy, abusive, or any of the other terms I had been brainwashed with. Abusers don’t spend years disabled by those thoughts because they don’t care if they hurt other people.

INADMISSIBLE NARRATIVES OF ABUSE #2

And when verbal harassment does occur, it’s often cloaked in feminist language, making it impossible to fight.

If they call a woman a bitch, people comprehend that as misogyny. But they call trans fems things that are harder to respond to. Rapist, pedophile, male conditioning, etc. They call us things so bad that even denying them is destructive. Who wants to stand up in public and say they aren’t those things? Who has the privilege to not get called those things in the first place?

When I look at a cis woman these days, the first thing I think is, I bet no one ever casually called her a rapist.

TRASH ART

When it was really bad, I wrote: “Build the shittiest thing possible. Build out of trash because all i have is trash. Trash materials, trash bodies, trash brain syndrome. Build in the gaps between storms of chronic pain. Build inside the storms. Move a single inch and call it a victory. Mold my sexuality toward immobility. Lie here leaking water from my eyes like a statue covered in melting frost. Zero affect. Build like moss grows. Build like crystals harden. Give up. Make your art the merest displacement of molecules at your slightest quiver. Don’t build in spite of the body and fail on their terms, build with the body. Immaculate is boring and impossible. Health based aesthetic.”

Twine, trashzines made of wadded up torn paper because we don’t have the energy to do binding, street recordings done from our bed where we lie immobilized.

Laziness is not laziness, it is many things: avoiding encountering one’s own body, avoiding triggers, avoiding thinking about the future because it’s proven to be unbearable. Slashing the Gordian Knot isn’t a sign of strength; it’s a sign of exhaustion.

Although I’ve fashioned this reflection in a manner that some may find legible, it is not a fair representation of my sickness. Writing these paragraphs has taken constant doses of medicine, fevered breaks, a few existential timeouts, and a complete neglect of my other responsibilities. When I tried in true form to write – in my realest moments of sickness – all that emerged were endless ellipses and countless semi-coherent revelations.

—Alli Yates

With the trashzine, I tore up the pages because I didn’t have the time or energy to bind them. I put them in ziploc bags—trash binding. In this new form they were resistant to the elements and could go interesting places. I hid one in Oakland under a bridge, and posted coordinates online. Someone found it.

When read, they come out of the bag like my thoughts—fragmented, random, nonlinear. If dropped they become part of the trash.

SOCIAL DYNAMICS

COMMUNITY IS DISPOSABILITY

There are no activist communities, only the desire for communities, or the convenient fiction of communities. A community is a material web that binds people together, for better and for worse, in interdependence. If its members move away every couple years because the next place seems cooler, it is not a community. If it is easier to kick someone out than to go through a difficult series of conversations with them, it is not a community. Among the societies that had real communities, exile was the most extreme sanction possible, tantamount to killing them. On many levels, losing the community and all the relationships it involved was the same as dying. Let’s not kid ourselves: we don’t have communities.

—The Broken Teapot, Anonymous

People crave community so badly that it constitutes a kind of linguistic virus. Everything in this world apparently has a community attached to it, no matter how fragmented or varied the reality is. This feels like both wishful thinking in an extremely lonely world (trans fems often have a community-shaped wound a mile wide) and also the necessary lens to convert everything to profit. Queerness is a marketplace. Alt is a marketplace. Buy my feminist butt plugs.

The dream of an imaginary community that allows total identification with one’s role within it to an extent that rules out interiority or doubt, the fixity and clearness of an external image or cliche as opposed to ephemera of lived experience, a life as it looks from the outside.

—Stephen Murphy

These idealized communities require disposability to maintain the illusion—violence and ostracism against the black/brown/trans/trash bodies that serve as safety valves for the inevitable anxiety and disillusionment of those who wish “total identification”.

Feminism/queerness takes a vague disposability and makes it a specific one. The vague ambient hate that I felt my whole life became intensely focused—the difference between being soaked in noxious, irritating gasoline and having someone throw a match at you. Normal hate means someone and their friends being shitty toward you; radical hate places a moral dimension onto hate, requiring your exclusion from every possible space—a true social death.

CURATING QUEERNESS

An entire industry of curation has sprung up to rigidly and sometimes violently police the hierarchy of who is allowed to express themselves as a trans or queer person. The LGBT and queer spheres find it upon themselves to create compilations of the “best” art by trans people, to define what a trans story is and to omit the rest. Endless projects to curate, list, own, publish, control, but so few to offer support and mentorship.

The stories that reflect poorly on alt culture are buried in favor of utopianism that everyone aspires toward but where few live. People feed desperately on this aspiration, creating the ever more elaborate hollow structures of brittle chitin that comprise feminist/queer culture.

To find the things I wanted in queerness, I had to find those who had been exiled from it, those who the name had been torn from.

COMPLAINT AND PURITY

there is nothing “wrong” with a politics of complaint but there are several risks like developing a dependent relationship with “the enemy” politically neutralizing oneself by dumping all of one’s subversive energies into meaningless channels or reifying one’s powerlessness by identifying with it because it makes one virtuous complaint becomes a form of subcultural capital a way to morally purify oneself —Jackie Wang, the tumblrization of everyday life

Popular feminism encodes pain into its regular complaint/click cycle, keeping everyone on the rim of emotional survival. Constant attack, constant strength, constant purity.

Lacking true community, the energy spent is not restored. Those with more stability in their life can keep up the cycle of complaint, and those with lower amounts of energy are filtered out, creating culture that glorifies a “strength” not everyone can access.

There is immense pressure on trans people to engage in this form of complaint if they want access to spaces—but we, with our higher rates of homelessness, joblessness, lifelessness, lovelessness, are the most fragile. We are the glass fems of an already delicate genderscape.

Purification is meaningless because anyone can perform these rituals—an effigy burnt in digital. And their inflexibility provides a place where abuse can thrive—a set of rules which abusers can hold over their victims.

Deleuze wrote, “The problem is no longer getting people to express themselves, but providing little gaps of solitude and silence in which they might eventually find something to say. Repressive forces don’t stop people from expressing themselves, but rather, force them to express themselves. What a relief to have nothing to say, the right to say nothing, because only then is there a chance of framing the rare, or ever rarer, the thing that might be worth saying.”

ENDING

People talk about feminism and queerness the way you’d apologize for an abusive relationship.

This isn’t for the people who are benefiting from these spaces and have no reason to change. This is for the people who were exiled, the people essays aren’t supposed to be written for. This is to say, you didn’t deserve that. That even tens or hundreds or thousands of people can be wrong, and they often are, no matter how much our socially constructed brains take that as a message to lie down and die. That nothing is too bad, too ridiculous, too bizarre to be real when it comes to making marginalized people disappear.

Ideology is a sick fetish.

RESISTING DISPOSABILITY

— Let marginalized people be flawed. Let them fuck up like the Real Humans who get to fuck up all the time.

— Fight criminal-justice thinking. Disposability runs on the innocence/guilt binary, another category that applies dynamically to certain bodies and not others. The mob trials used to run trans people out of communities are inherently abusive, favor predators, and must be rejected as a process unequivocally. There is no kind of justice that resembles hundreds of people ganging up on one person, or tangible lifelong damage being inflicted on someone for failing the rituals of purification that have no connection to real life.

— Pay attention when people disappear. Like drowning, it’s frequently silent. They might be blackmailed, threatened, and/or in shock.

— Even if the victim doesn’t want to fight (which is deeply understandable—often moving on is the only response), private support is huge. This is the time to make sure the wound doesn’t become infected, that the PTSD they acquire is as minimized as possible. This is the difference between a broken leg healing to the point where they can run again, or walking with a limp for the rest of their life. They’ve just been victim-blamed by a huge number of people, and as a social organism, their body is telling them to die. They need social reintegration, messages of support, and space to heal.

— Be extremely critical about what people say about trans people, especially things said in vagueness. The rumor mill that keeps trans people out of spaces isn’t even so much about people believing what is said, it’s about people choosing the safest option—a staining that plays on the average person’s risk aversion.

— Ask yourself if the same thing would be happening if they were white/cis/able-bodied.

— “Radical inclusivity recognizes harm done in the name of God.” —Yvette Flunder

Marginalized spaces can’t form healthy community purely from rejection of the mainstream. There has to be an acknowledgment of how people have been hurt by feminist spaces and their models.

— A common enemy isn’t the same as loving each other.

— Don’t be part of spaces that place an ideal or “community leader” above people.

DREAM

On January 18, 2015, I woke up from a dream. It was early morning, still dark. I felt very sad that the dream wasn’t real. I wrote it down, like I’ve written down all my dreams for the last eight years.

“She was my abuser. She came to my house on the island. I begged her to stop what she had done, to clear my name. She would not. It had been two years of being abused like a child because of her. I turned to walk deeper into the house. I looked back. She had a knife. She stabbed me. It was the happiest dream of my life. Because finally an abuser had done something to me that people would pay attention to. When I woke up my entire spirit was crushed because I had not been stabbed. I felt the weight of all these years of abuse. I wished so badly I had been stabbed.

I pulled the knife out. I wrestled the knife away. I called my friend to come over and help me.

I walked along the beach of the island and saw for the first time how PTSD had numbed and corroded every perception I’d had since that August, this debilitating disease. I finally felt the brightness of the air in my lungs, the color of the sand and the waves. It was so beautiful. I just wanted to experience all the things that had been stolen from me.”

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ravenmorganleigh · 6 years ago

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This is about the erasure of lesbians, which is pandemic. Lesbian erasure is global: Lesbians are being erased from every aspect of society, in both state-sponsored male violence and individuated violence. Lesbian erasure is in our families, our places of worship, our schools, our workplaces. Lesbian erasure is, increasingly, in our own LGBT community. Lesbian erasure is even, at times, within our lesbian selves.

There are many ways to erase a lesbian. As almost any lesbian can attest, that erasure begins with our families of origin telling us we aren’t really lesbians or it’s just a phase or we are really just tomboys or we are too pretty to be “dykes” or God wouldn’t approve or we’ll never have children if we hook up with women or we just haven’t met the right man or sometimes, all of the above.

The attempt to erase our lesbian identity broadens as we begin to out ourselves in the world beyond our families. That experience can be harrowing. Many lesbians become substance abusers in an effort to blunt the pain of lesbophobia and the concomitant pressures of the closet or the risk being rejected and despised from even those people we thought respected and loved us, such as friends or co-workers.

Some lesbians attempt suicide. Others attempt heterosexuality. Some transition as FtM only to transition back when they realize they were lesbians and not men, like their trans men friends.

Despite the prevalence of lesbians in heterosexual pornography as titillation for men, society has deemed lesbians best not seen, not heard, not existing. To that end, from our own families to the state, lesbians are being erased.

The literal erasure of lesbians through murder has been, especially over the past decade, statistically on the rise. Lesbians are being killed all over the world just for being lesbians. Even as you read this, the state-sponsored erasure of lesbians–the femicide of lesbians–in nearly half the countries of the world doesn’t even elicit headlines.

Which is a double erasure.

In 79 countries it is illegal to be a lesbian. Illegal to exist. Laws specific to and solely addressing lesbians and gay men are not less in 2015, they are more. In fact, as the West provides superficial acknowledgment of lesbians and gay men, mostly through changes in marriage laws, in other parts of the world harsher penalties for lesbianism and homosexuality are being created and implemented, causing terror for millions.

Not all such crimes against lesbians are state-sponsored. Many are religious and cultural in origin. Honor killings are a weapon against women in a range of Muslim nations and lesbians are among the women threatened by this practice. Even a cursory Internet search turns up dozens of articles on honor killings of lesbians or lesbians fleeing the threat of honor killing. In Gaza, which Al-Jazeera reported last March led the world in honor killings, lesbians attempt to flee into Israel to escape death at the hands of their own families. But honor killing is not just a crime perpetrated against lesbians in the Middle East. In June 2014 a black lesbian couple, Britney Cosby and Crystal Jackson, were murdered in Texas. James Cosby, Britney’s father, was arrested for the killings. The alleged motive was saving his family’s honor from the sin of the couple’s relationship. The couple was survived by their young son.

In South Africa, corrective rape of lesbians has become so common it is now considered pandemic in that country. More than half of all lesbian victims are also murdered. These rapes and killings are often at the hands of gangs and are especially gruesome. One young woman had her intestines ripped out through her cervix. Another was raped with a toilet brush which ruptured her uterus. Eudy Simelane, a lesbian soccer star in South Africa, was gang raped and beaten and stabbed to death. She had more than 100 wounds, even on the soles of her feet. Noxolo Nogwaza was raped and stabbed multiple times with glass shards. Her skull was shattered. Her eyes were reportedly gouged from their sockets.

International rights groups assert there are more than a dozen such rapes each week, though not every lesbian is killed in the process. Pearl Mali reported that when she was 12 years old, she was raped for the first time by an older man that her mother brought home from their church. He raped Pearl in her own bedroom, which he did daily until she was 16. Mali told the New York Times, “My mother didn’t want me to be gay, so she asked him to move in and be my husband. She hoped it would change me,” she said.

It only traumatized her.

Corrective rape has also become commonplace in Jamaica, one of the world’s most popular tourist destinations. Keshema Tulloch, 33, a Jamaican lesbian, was attacked in Kingston last year and then shot by police for attempting to defend herself against the man beating her. She was arrested and charged with attempted murder. No charges were brought against her attacker nor the police officer who shot her but international rights groups are trying to free her.

Maria Barin, from a family originally from Iraqi Kurdistan, was murdered in Lanskrona, in southern Sweden, stabbed to death by her brother in an honor killing because she refused to marry a man to help her family financially.

Lesbians are being stoned to death in Saudi Arabia, burned at the stake in several African nations, beaten to death in India, raped and hanged in Cameroon, raped and set on fire in Nigeria.

The first time a lesbian is reported to law enforcement for lesbianism in Sudan, she is given 1,000 lashes in public. One thousand. The lashings often result in death.

In Russia, lesbians are imprisoned for “defiling” Russian culture where some mysteriously die.

Kygyzstan is implementing a new and highly repressive law aimed at lesbians and gay men which begins with imprisonment. The same thing is happening in Egypt where being a lesbian or gay man is now illegal.

All this violent erasure yet lesbians do not make the news. There is no “Lesbian Day of Remembrance.” Even the word lesbian is erased from a majority of news outlets which use “gay” as inclusive of gay men as well as lesbians. Among the major websites using this language are even the left-leaning Think Progress.

Violence against lesbians is on the rise, but news reports of it are rare. Last week a young lesbian couple in Ireland, Roisin Prendergast and her girlfriend Ciara Murphy were left bleeding and unconscious following an unprovoked attack in Limerick. The only comments on this crime I saw on Twitter were my own.

Lesbians seem only to become news when we object to our own erasure.

For nearly two years I have been writing about Aderonke Apata, a native Nigerian who has been fighting to remain in the U.K., requesting asylum, because she fears death in her native country. This is a not unreasonable fear, as she has explained to me in several interviews for Curve magazine, because lesbians are killed for being lesbians in Nigeria. And in the 11 years Aderonke has been in the U.K., members of her family have been killed and other lesbians seeking–and denied–asylum have been returned only to die.

Jackie Nanyonjo died in Uganda on 8 March 2013 after being deported from the infamous Yarl’s Wood detention center where Aderonke herself, along with many other lesbians seeking asylum, has been detained. Another Ugandan lesbian, Prossie N, was seriously ill at the time of her deportation in December 2013. Prossie N has been in hiding in Kampala ever since her deportation while activists attempt to get her back to the U.K.

Now it is Aderonke fighting for her life.

On March 3 Aderonke appeared in London’s High Court to challenge the Home Office’s refusal to grant her asylum. As she had explained to me in an interview last year, she was forced to submit what she considered pornographic videotape of her having sex with her fianceé, Happiness Agboro.

But the London Home Office, which has been denying that lesbians are lesbians for decades, has determined that Aderonke can’t be a lesbian because she has had children–like at least a third of all lesbians.

As Aderonke explained to me, the fight to stay in the U.K., which she now considers both her home and the place where she feels safe from persecution, despite the treatment she has received at the hands of the Home Office, has left her physically and mentally fragile. She has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress (the circumstances of her fleeing Nigeria where her former partner was killed are harrowing). In 2005 she attempted suicide.

The argument the Home Office is making against Aderonke is that she can’t be both lesbian and heterosexual. But as she explained to me, she has always been a lesbian. Like many women, however, compulsory heterosexuality was imposed on her by the state as well as the culture in which she lived in Nigeria. Which is why she fled.

There will be a ruling by the end of the month on her case at which point, if the Court does not find in her favor, she will be deported to certain death in the place she no longer considers home and which has enacted even more stringent anti-lesbian laws since she fled more than a decade ago.

The outrage I feel over Aderonke’s case–her voice is calm and lilting when she talks, but the frisson of fear is there, understandably–is far from singular. Last week lesbians were arrested in Russia and tossed into jail. Word of their condition has not been forthcoming. Last month a local lesbian activist in my city, Kim Jones, was killed in broad daylight while waiting for a bus. Her killer came up behind her and shot her in the head at point blank range.

I could list case after case after case of horrifying attacks on lesbians and murders of lesbians. But why do I have to? Why must I plead for an end to lesbian erasure and a recognition of our status–or lack of status–in the world?

A recent furore erupted on social media between some lesbians and Owen Jones, a columnist for The Guardian UK. Jones had been opposed to the letter calling for an end to the no-platforming of lesbians that had appeared in The Guardian and been widely discussed and debated on social media and which I previously wrote about here.

Jones had written a column which many objected to in which he basically re-wrote gay and lesbian history to put trans women at the forefront of the Stonewall Rebellion, erasing the lesbians who were actually at the forefront as well as the gay men, all of whom risked their lives in the days of that battle.

In the volleys that followed on Twitter between U.K. lesbians and straight feminists, the canard that lesbians are transphobic if lesbians don’t consider trans women as sexual partners was tossed into the mix by Jones, who seemed to have blocked every lesbian in the U.K. who has a presence on social media calling each “obsessively transphobic” as he tweeted on the morning of March 4.

On March 3, I witnessed an exchange between him, Helen Lewis, deputy editor of the New Statesman, a British actress I know and a de-transitioning trans man. The exchange consisted of Jones calling my friend a homophobe and his totally ignoring the comments of the former trans man who actually could speak to the issue of dating gay men as a trans man.

The debate was over whether Jones, a gay man, would perform cunnilingus on a trans man, which, not surprisingly, appalled him as gay men are not sexually interested in women. (Just like lesbians are not sexually interested in men.)

I personally find this whole debate over who gets to play with the bodies of lesbians (and gay men) intrusive and have since it was first raised several years ago as an issue being forced upon lesbians. But perhaps Jones should have considered that fraught history when he told lesbians that if they didn’t accept trans women into their beds, they were transphobic. (And I will note here that there are women and men who are happy to be partnered with trans women and I know several. But that’s not the issue under discussion–lesbian sexual autonomy is the issue.)

When the tables were turned and Jones, as a gay man, was asked to accept trans men into his bed, Jones cried “homophobe” at the lesbians asking him to embrace what he had previously proclaimed was the moral and political duty of all lesbians everywhere to accept. Their autonomy be damned.

Goose/gander, pot/kettle, ultimately, hypocrite. If Jones cringes at the thought of opening the trousers of a bearded trans man to find a vagina, then perhaps he should understand this might be the same response of a lesbian unveiling a penis where she expected a vagina.

Gay men, while still suffering the very real threats imposed by actual homophobia (which was not what the U.K. lesbians of Twitter have any ability to impose, even if that were their intent, which it is not) are not under any of the same proscriptions as lesbians because they are not female. Oppression is not a contest–despite some wanting to make it so–but from within the confines of the LGBT community, it is beyond offensive to accuse lesbians of anything other than choice for their sexual desires or lack of same.

This is where erasure comes into play.

Lesbian sexual identity and choice is being eroded, erased and elided. This is being done by the literal obliteration of lesbians by state-sponsored violence, by the “corrective rape of lesbians” (imagine the 12 year old Pearl Mali being given the worst sort of reparative therapy by her very own mother), by the harassment and violence, by the firings (lesbians face more job discrimination than any other group within the LGBT alliance), by the enforced and compulsory heterosexuality of every society on earth. Aderonke Apata has been forced, by men, to provide not just spoken testimony and a pending marriage license, but also a sex tape of her having sexual relations with her partner to “prove” her lesbianism to the men who want to erase that aspect of her identity–the very identity that puts her and millions of other lesbians at risk of imprisonment and/or death.

If Jones is crying homophobia at being asked to accept a trans man as male, how is he not transphobic when he insists, as do many, that a lesbian who says she does not want a penis in her bed is transphobic?

Lesbian sexuality should be off limits from men–straight, gay or undecided–under any and all circumstances. It is the one thing–our own beds, our own bodies–that we have been able to keep sacrosanct from an outside world that either tells us we think we are men if we are butch or tells us we really are straight if we are femme and tells us what we can and cannot do with our lives and our loves every second of every day in every place on earth.

When you–be you straight, gay, bi, trans, queer, questioning–tell a lesbian what she should do with her body, you are no different from the presidents and prime ministers who want to wipe lesbians off the face of the earth for choosing women over men, choosing ourselves over what others would have us do.

In February the Lesbian Helpline in Chennai, India, was opened to offer support and services for lesbians who are nearly invisible in India. The helpline was established following the suicide pact of two married women from Chennai who set themselves on fire rather than be separated. The Indian Community Welfare Organisation which runs the helpline says many women are still afraid to come out as gay because of the violence they might face from either their families or Indian society.

But increasingly the problem at the helpline is that men are calling looking for the phone numbers of lesbians. For sex.

This is what lesbians face. This is what erasure looks like–the endless effort of men, either deliberately and maliciously, as arbiters of the state, or simply ignorantly, like Jones with his Twitter tirade against all lesbians.

Lesbians are being no-platformed out of our very existence, whether through the insidiousness of silencing or the oppressive demands of compulsory heterosexuality or through violence that at best leaves us shattered and at worst, dead. Lesbians deserve the same level of autonomy as any other group, be it minority or majority. If you aren’t supporting that autonomy, then you are inadvertently or directly a participant in the erasure that is perhaps slowly but very definitely steadily, wiping us off the face of the earth.

Victoria A. Brownworth is an award-winning journalist, editor and writer and the author and editor of nearly 30 books. She has won the NLGJA and the Society of Professional Journalists awards, the Lambda Literary Award and has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. She won the 2013 SPJ Award for Enterprise Reporting in May 2014. She is a regular contributor to The Advocate and SheWired, a blogger for Huffington Post and a columnist and contributing editor for Curve magazine and Lambda Literary Review. Her reporting and commentary has appeared in the New York Times, Village Voice, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe and Philadelphia Inquirer. Her book, From Where We Sit: Black Writers Write Black Youth won the 2012 Moonbeam Award for cultural&historical fiction. Her novel about violence against women, Ordinary Mayhem, was published in February 2015. Her book on lesbian erasure will be published in 2016. @VABVOX

#corrective rape #homophobia #lesbian erasure #lesbians #owen jones

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