#the problem with internet discourse is The Everything about internet discourse

[elvisqueso]

for some reason, the "cishets at pride" discourse is still going on and i only ever really see the One Tweet about it (which is usually a Sign that it's not actually as big of an issue as the rest of the internet made it seem), so I went to look at OP's tweets to see if there was more context and here's what I've learned:

the original tweet was meant to be a joke (i guess)

it exploded when other people took it personally (understandable, bc the internet) and then the Discourse started

the broad summary around the joke's sentiment is really that many queer women (especially queer women of color) are feeling less safe at PRIDE and in other queer spaces as more non-queer people become comfortable attending those spaces

their fears are generally reasonable and based on personal experiences with (usually white) cishet men harassing/assaulting them in places where they were meant to feel safe

they also feel that the community at large doesn't support them or believe them when they try and voice their fears

the other side— which took the tweet personally— are (i think at the general core) people who've often felt alienated in queer spaces bc they don't "perform queerness" in a certain way and so felt they weren't welcome at PRIDE or in queer spaces unless they conformed to someone else's ideas of queerness

basically, you have two sides with valid positions talking past each other. bc the internet

i think the thing to learn here is that the queer community at large needs to recognize that while it's REALLY GOOD that PRIDE has become more accessible and so "mainstream" society is becoming more accepting of queerness (and perhaps making people feel safer and more comfortable being out publicly in general as a result), there's also a responsibility to look after the vulnerable members of the community and not ignore them if they say they're feeling unsafe (because the previously more exclusive space is no longer as exclusive).

we should keep in mind that predatory men have ALWAYS invaded queer spaces with the express purpose of harassing queer people— especially queer women. that doesn't mean we need to constantly be on guard if a dude with a dick happens to be in the area (that's no way to live), but we do need to be realistic bc there is, unfortunately, a LOT of historical precedent.

he might not show up on your arm, but if a guy is at the event and he isn't acting right, then the community needs to stand by its most vulnerable members and protect them first.

at the same time: queerness is not actually an exclusive lil clique. it's a broad swathe of humanity. if you really, really can't feel safe or comfortable at public events bc you can't handle being around a certain kind of human to the point where you can't go to PRIDE bc some of those humans are gonna be there? that's 100% a you problem. have a private party about it with people who agree with you. then maybe talk to a therapist about finding a way to manage your phobia, bc that's what that is.

tl;dr: we need to take better care of each other.

[litres-of-cocaine]

okay as much as i agree that groups under the lgbtq+ umbrella are stigmatised by other people in the community please be so fr and stop calling it ‘double discrimination’ you just want to say ‘monosexual privilege’ but are aware people get kind of mad about that

[gibbearish]

so this post has been made unrebloggable now (shocker) but ive been feeling the need to address it since i saw it on my dash multiple times, so let's explore how lying on the internet works. more specifically, how blending truth, lies, and omissions to whip uninvolved people into anger works, because i think this is an excellent example and that pointing out the misinformation and the tactics used to spread it here is important, both in correcting the specific falsities but also in helping recognize similar tactics in the future.

so here we have several things that are technically true: staff has been very openly shitty to trans women for a long time and them banning predstrogen is clearly part of that, there is currently a movement regarding discussing transmisandry/transandrophobia, transmisogyny and transphobes sending transphobic asks is by far nothing new, and baeddel is/was a slur. however, among all of this are half-truths, unprovable speculation, or outright lies made to make you believe these events are originating specifically from transmascs.

firstly, the transandrophobia movement has been drastically misrepresented here in the same way it has been for the whole argument, "they're just trans MRAs" has been repeated so many times now that i'm gonna be hearing it in my dreams when i'm 80. i can understand not being willing to address the nuance of that whole discourse in one post that isn't directly focused on that, i'm certainly not, but in this example it's not unwillingness to address a complicated topic, it's a deliberate misrepresentation to frame one side of the discussion as The Evil Bad Ones That Can't Be Trusted. additionally, this post IS about that discourse and is just pretending it isn't to mislead a wider audience, so refusing to address it at all beyond this brief mention is deliberately misleading people about the goals of the group because They're The Other Side Of The Discourse. "transmisogynists" is used as a buzzword here, it doesn't actually refer to Anyone Who Hates Transfemmes, it refers to Transmascs Who Discuss Transmasc-Specific Oppression Using A Word They Coined To Point Out That Queer Spaces Have A Big Problem With Masculinity and just. doesn't tell you that's what it means, relying on the structure and framing of the post to create the Transmisogynist = Transmasc association in the audience's head so op doesn't have to say it outright (and of course the implied Transmasc = Transmisogynist association that follows because creating THAT association is the Actual Point of this post). the mentions of transmascs in this post are designed to look like afterthoughts, op says "typically those who espouse transandrophobia" to make it look like they're saying there's other people they're referring to here too, but almost everything in this post draws from the transandrophobia discourse. some random cis transphobe in texas has never heard the term baeddel in their entire life much less used it in a debate about transphobia, this is an intercommunity argument through and through, but op is trying to mask the fact that they're just referring to "transmascs who disagree with me specifically" and make it look like it's part of a wider trend. and again, i'm not going to go into the nuances of transandrophobia here, but i highly recommend reading some of the theory on it by @nothorses (x) and @genderkoolaid (x) because the "theyre just trans MRAs" argument kinda just collapses under its own weight as soon as you look into it even a smidgen. i've linked a couple broad overviews there but they both discuss it frequently and in-depth, specifically nothorses has a pinned post linking to many different discussion threads that i would recommend checking out if you do want to learn more about what the actual conversation surrounding these words is.

so, after framing the movement this way, they go on to say that the reason predstrogen was banned wasn't /just/ because staff has a long and established hate boner for trans women, but because the transandrophobia movement was teaming up with TERFs to mass-report her and other transfemmes, and implies that this is part of a deliberate conspiracy between Transandrophobia Truthers™, TERFs, and staff. you'll notice that there are no, say, screenshots of transmascs saying theyre deliberately reporting her or of that they're working with TERFs, behind-the-scenes lists of people who reported a certain account, or any evidence for this beyond "she was a trans woman, they're trans men who hate trans women, she got banned, so these must be related". which i find especially funny now given that photomatt has continued melting down about this since it happened and made it pretty clear it yknow. was just part of staffs ongoing hate campaign against trans women that has been going on much longer than the transandrophobia debate? and that maybe the fact that The Literal CEO is having a personal meltdown about this might explain where that could be coming from or at least why it's been allowed to continue for so long, moreso than any individual users reporting someone could? but i digress.

who reported what account is completely unprovable as a casual user unless people directly admit they did it, so to bring it up like this begs the question of what actual reasoning they have for saying it beyond trying to tie a current display of bigotry into an unrelated discourse. that's not to say it's impossible people who discuss transandrophobia were wrongfully reporting her, because again, thats something we have no way of knowing, and the internet is a shit place so i wouldn't be surprised. but given the circumstances and the rest of the lies here, i have my doubts about this being an actual yknow. Thing That Happened rather than just another lie to make people mad at transmascs. now one could make the argument that op wasn't saying transmascs are /deliberately/ teaming up with TERFs/staff, that "teaming up" was just a poor choice of words to refer to multiple groups who happen to have the same goals in mind at the same time but aren't actually coordinating with one another, but given the deliberate misinformative slant of the rest of the post and the overall phrasing in this section, i have trouble extending that grace. regardless, however, that doesn't change that who is reporting who isn't something verifiable, so stating it here as a confirmed fact is disingenuous at the absolute best, and a lie chosen specifically because it's unprovable at worst. if op /does/ have proof that transmascs have been teaming up with TERFs to get trans women banned, not including that with this post is just uhhhhh dumb, and if op /doesn't/ have proof then Why Would You Go Around Telling People That's What Happened Unless You Were Lying To Them On Purpose With Ulterior Motives.

next, op goes on to discuss the rise of the term baeddel. now as i said before, the truth here is that it certainly was a slur and certainly can still be used as one, again the internet is a shit place so i would be a fool if i tried to say "no one is using this as a slur". however, this is once again a drastic misrepresentation of the situation. baeddel's rising use is due to certain trans women reclaiming it and aligning themselves with the original group's politics, namely that femininity is good and masculinity is bad (aka terfism 101), with the added caveat that by abandoning femininity for masculinity, transmascs are evil and betraying devine womanhood and their community by putting more Evil Manhood into the world. of course that in turn is a drastic oversimplification of their politics and i highly recommend checking out this post with an actual in-depth exploration of the history (and without my added flavor), but the important part to note here is that this is not a term transmascs just Started Using one day because they hate transfems so very much as is implied here, its use is directly tied to a group of people saying "hello, here is what i am, and here is what this word means about what i believe," so others went "ok, these specific beliefs are called this." bringing up the fact that it historically was a slur is misdirection here, when you look closer this is almost a 1 to 1 translation of TERFs crying that TERF and radfem are slurs because People Don't Like Their Politics And Therefore Them, so the name for their politics is used negatively, so therefore it's a slur. that argument just has a little more oomph behind it this time because It Was A Slur Originally. and again, that isnt to say no one is now using it as a slur, the rate of decay for online discourse is ridiculous so it being boiled down to and used as "evil transfemme" has certainly already happened, but to act like /every/ use of it is a slur is literally just a lie, when you self-identify with a term based on your shared politics with the original group then you do not get to claim everyone using that term to describe those politics is doing so exclusively to attack you. also this part is entirely speculation but given that op's url is basically just. baeddel switched around to dae bel, i would hazard a guess that they perhaps are indeed aware of the origins of its re-use? but again, that's entirely unprovable and based just on wordplay, but like. given the Everything here i wouldn't be surprised. now, there's definitely an argument to be made about calling users baeddels based just off of their politics when they don't personally self-identify with it, if that constitutes calling someone a slur and if TIRF should be used instead, but crucially, that is not the argument being made here. the argument being made is "ANY AND ALL use of this term is calling someone a slur," and that literally just Isn't The Case.

finally, to tie the whole post off, op reminds us 1) if you hear anything bad about any trans woman ever, it's probably a lie to make her look bad, and 2) if you hear anyone say anything about transandrophobia, disregard everything else they have to say because they hate trans women. not "be critical of the things you see or get sent" or "be on the lookout for things following a certain pattern," a unilateral "anything bad is probably fake and anyone who uses the bad words is probably evil." that is not something someone does if they are genuinely trying to raise awareness of an ongoing trend, that is what someone does when they want you to turn your brain off and be mad at a group no matter what they say.

so yeah, in summary, do be critical of the things you see and be on the lookout for certain patterns, because sometimes people will just Lie to you. or, sometimes people will tell you portions of the truth while leaving out crucial bits so that you'll come to the conclusion they want without anyone being able to say they lied to you without typing up a thirty paragraph long hell post. transmisogyny is absolutely a problem on this site and there are 100% valuable conversations to be had about it and its presence within the trans community, but this post is not that. this post uses real transmisogyny and the wrongful termination of a trans woman's account as set dressing to say that it was all because of evil transmascs who run the trans community behind the scenes conspiring to take out transfemmes, so you should ignore anything they have to say because All of it is secretly motivated by transmisogyny. they're never discussing transandrophobia because it's something that actually effects them, they're doing it to hurt trans women by saying they have it worse. they're never telling you about shitty things a trans woman did to spread awareness, they're lying to make her look bad, or even if it's true they're only talking about it as part of a hate campaign because she's trans, they wouldn't care otherwise. they're never using a specific term because People Use That Term For Themselves, they're calling someone a slur because they hate trans women. there's always an explanation you can think up that ties it back to transmisogyny, and op says that instead of assessing all of what someone says and the context behind it to determine if that's what's happening, you should assume transmisogyny is the answer and refuse to engage any further as soon as you see a word you've been told is bad.

this post is discourse recruitment masquerading as a public service announcement that doesn't offer you any routes to actually learn more about what's going on, it just tells you Here's What's Happening, Here's Who's Evil And Should Be Ignored, And If You Disagree You're Also Evil And Should Be Ignored. content of the actual post aside, i think anything framed that way should be taken with a MASSIVE grain of salt and this would have raised my alarm bells even if i wasn't already pretty familiar with the arguments, people who genuinely want you to know something just because it's good to know will give you options to learn more or encourage you to actually use your critical thinking to assess things, not tell you to sit down and shut up and ignore anyone who disagrees with them.

anyways i guess tldr

[batsarebetterthanpeople]

why do so many people keep calling ed izzy's abuser? I thought it was kind of funny how wrong they were at first because I love being right but at this point I feel like, if you really believe that why do you even like this show? where the main love interest is a violently abusive indigenous man? that sounds boring as shit. what would possess the writers of the show for them to make such an awful decision?

but then I think, if this many people believe it does that mean I'm the one who's wrong? or is it that the creators fumbled that storyline when they should have been clearer about it? or maybe it's just that most people on here have had their reading comprehension scorched away by Sherlock Holmes conspiracy theories and Steven Universe discourse. I can't tell. sometimes I think the internet may have been a mistake.

No they're wrong here's what's going on. People all read this shitty fic called Hell or High Water where Ed was everything the Izzy stans say he was and then instead of realizing that Ed is sad everyone regressed into thinking that the Kraken Era TM was going to be incredibly violent, like serial killing blond men because they look like Stede levels of violence. Even if you didn't read HoHW you saw art or read fic from people who had engaged with this fic and succumbed to it's premise. So there's been this background radiation of misunderstanding what the Kraken is on the fandom for several months. So inevitably when Ed did some mild violence and then attempted suicide by threatening murder until the crew took matters into their own hands, which is not abuse or torture by any stretch, btw, it's a murder-suicide at worst (I say at worst because I consider it fuckery-suicide I don't think Ed was trying to kill people I think he was trying to force them into a situation where they thought it was kill or be killed so that they would choose to kill him, but that is my interpretation and you are free to think it's a botched murder-suicide I have no problem with that), which, murder is something the show has never condemned and if it did it would be horribly inconsistent. So anyway, Ed's whole Kraken Era was categorized in the show by him being sad and doing so many drugs and begging someone please god anyone to kill him and trying to break Ned Low's record out of the evil boredom, but because it had a murder-suicide element to it and Izzy's toes were getting removed and he waved a gun around at everyone once (in a way that felt to me like he was trying and failing to work up the nerve to blow his own brains out but I digress) people who liked HoHW and were mad that people had called it out were like "see hes being violent HoHW author vindicated" as if anything Ed did rose to the level of that fic

And you want to know how I know this read is bullshit? Because when I watch the show with people who don't read fic or interact with the fandom and then I gauge their reactions without showing my hand they all implicitly understand that Ed is reacting to Izzy in a way appropriate to how pirate captains react to threats from subordinates. The spectrum of reactions has been from "hey isn't it weird how Ed was the Kraken because his dad was abusive and now he's the kraken because of Izzy? Maybe there's something there but idk" to "I don't think you can apply the logic of domestic abuse to a pirate captain and first mate but also Izzy had it coming" to "I cannot feel bad for Izzy after last season, I'm sorry." To "lmao Izcel" and I've showed this show to roughly everyone I know. The only thing I can conclude from the fact that people who don't engage with OFMD fic almost unilaterally thinking that Izzy is in the wrong and then coming online to see people thinking the opposite is that Izzy as victim and Ed as abuser is pure fanon, like how Stede is a cinnamon roll who talks like Azeriphael.

But anyway yeah you're completely right about the fact that this would be a bad show if they decided to make Ed into a domestic abuser. I don't want to watch a rom com about a domestic abuser falling in love and I don't want a show that decided to make it's indigenous lead abusive when the stereotype of indigenous men as abusers is still to this day used as an excuse to separate indigenous children from their families and put them with white Christians in order to erase their culture. Good thing OFMD didn't make Ed abusive, so I still like the show.

[abrisaber]

The Main Problem With This Community

I'm gonna be transparent here, I fucking hate Social Media as a whole. I don't understand what gas leak has infected the brains of every single internet user, but the levels of toxicity I see on a daily basis on every single website I go on is unfathomable.

It's impossible to have any sort of meaningful discussion about Helluva Boss or Hazbin Hotel or anything for that matter on this website, and on all websites. Because regardless of where you are, it's always going to be a massive dick measuring contest. People who claim to hate the show but are the first ones to watch every episode will spew uncredited personal attacks on the creators, and people who claim to love it will ignore it's glaring, obvious flaws because they'd rather live in an echo chamber than address that their favorite show is problematic.

And look, I'm not going to be that toxic hater who says if you like Vivziepop's work you should be burned at the stake, and I'm not going to be a blinded fan who thinks that the show is secretly a masterpiece if you squint your eyes and tilt your head.

I don't really like Helluva Boss anymore, and to be honest Vivziepop has completely lost any respect she's had from me. But I continue to watch the show and continue to critique it because I like to analyze media.

My main probably with this whole community, people for and against both shows, is that there's literally no point in any of these discussions. When I make these long winded posts about HB or HH, I make them because I want to have a discussion about the actual contents in the show. I don't make them to ignite discourse about why Vivziepop is evil. and I don't want to hear any of your bullshit rebuttals to anything I say if you can't disagree with me without calling me an anti or a hater or whatever. I don't follow their social media, I don't study the drama. I watch the show, and then I talk about it, plain and simple.

If you think Vivziepop is problematic and you want to roast her over the coals, by all means. If you think Vivziepop is the messiah and everything she makes is pure gold, by all means. But if you bring that stupid elementary school bullshit into my replies, into my reblogs, into my page, you are dirt to me. I don't give a fuck. If you can't have even a fraction of an intellectual conversation without acting like Helluva Boss killed your grandma, then I don't wanna fucking hear it. I'm not an anti page, I'm a person with original opinions.

[legallybrunettedotcom]

idk if you've already talked about brat but i'd love to know your opinion on the album (if you've listened to it)

hi, jade! i have listened to it, quite a lot now. i have a lot of conflicting, incoherent thoughts. so when it dropped, i thought well, that was okay. fun pop, dance music. then i go online, i open youtube and suddenly see there's a bunch of videos, essays, reviews etc. about the album all with the title or thumbnail saying "revolutionary", "changed the music" etc etc. and i'm like am i going insane? does this album deserve this much attention and discourse? it's quite difficult to escape the album if you're online a lot, so some of those songs just nestled inside my ear. decided to give it a few more listens and it definitely grew on me. like maybe i do want to be going crazy to this in a club. it's obvious sophie's spirit is still somewhat present here, two of them collaborating on vroom vroom ep did change the pop music and we've seen this shift towards something more experimental and avant garde in pop. i think charli's always been a bit too mainstream for indie, and too indie for the mainstream. brat is unique, but also still very much charli. i think what she did expertly is crack the marketing strategy. we know music alone isn't enough anymore, you need a whole "aesthetic", you need to build your own world and lore. y2k, party girl persona but make it vulnerable. the specific shade of green on the cover is now associated with this album and everything that comes with it. "oh, green eye-shadow, that's so brat of you." how long that reference will last, we're yet to see. we're still very much in the whirlwind of brat summer after all. using lowercase as song/album titles has been quite popular for a few years now and ig it's this attempt at casualness, yk carefully curated carelessness, but it also reminds me of those lyric videos i used to watch when i was 12. when the remix with lorde dropped, ngl, i did tear up a bit, but i also can't help but be a bit cynical, like this too is marketing. the music video for 360, i didn't enjoy the song that much, 365 is better but also i understand you can't have one without the other, but the music video specifically sums up the entirety of brat imo. the criticisms i've seen of it are all on point, like "myopic, self-referential for ppl who live in 4 neighbourhoods in nyc/la, reminder that you're not on the list" all of that is correct, but on the other hand, it's pastiche, you have these internet famous women congregating in an ugly restaurant deciding who will be the next it girl and choosing a random waitress, a reminder that everyone can be a hottie, the it girl, the cool girl whatever. ok, that's cute, but like... i'm still not on the list. it's difficult for me to believe you aren't enjoying your fame and pedestal status, but i think she's also aware how easily you can be replaced as soon as the public gets bored. i also felt a bit insane when people started analyzing the lyrics, like specifically the song apple and being flabbergasted that it's about family and familial trauma, because the apple has been such a widely used metaphor for family since the 19th century. it felt like she was receiving the taylor swift treatment, which is funny considering that one song, yk acting like this has never been done before. of course it hits if you don't read and you don't listen to a lot of different music. in general my problem with a lot of discussions surrounding musical artists nowadays is how a lot of people seemingly have no understanding that music wasn't invented a mere 10 years ago. i'm ranting, and i'm saying a whole lotta nothing, but all in all, i do ultimately enjoy the album, like it's obviously fun and silly, and sexy and i love dancing to it. it will probably end up on my favourite albums of 2024 list, but i just don't see it as revolutionary. i could say "oh that's mother" and "those that get it, get it and those that don't, don't", but i feel like that kills any meaningful conversation and the art of criticism, which is not something i'm good at, but it's not just about "consuming" art, we have to discuss it too.

[septembersung]

I remember years ago when I was in my no-smart-phone era, I’d given it up, talking with a friend about how if there were other people out there doing the same low/no tech thing, and there certainly are, by definition you wouldn’t hear from them. These would not be the people with vlogs or even blogs. They’d just be… out there, living their un-teched lives. And I keep thinking lately about how in Discourse all you see online are examples of the people who are putting themselves out there to be seen. Which is probably why there’s always such a startling disconnect to me between the women I know in person - a really varied bunch - whom the outside world would probably indiscriminately label “tradwives,” and the online image of Catholic, stay at home, homeschooling, moms.

Maybe what’s tripping me up is the false sense of community the internet creates. The fomo is real. And the influencers create this sense of, only these few and exclusive cool people can do x y z. But in reality there’s a ton of people doing it, and doing it well, without recognition, just because that’s what they think is best for their family.

This post brought to you in part by me ruminating on what it means to make food “from scratch” and how I do know an actual lady who makes literally everything from scratch (she thinks store bought tortillas are a convenience food. And let me emphasize she is whiter than I am, which is saying something, there’s nothing cultural going on there.) and how I’ve been relying on bulk frozen foods for lunches and that’s not sustainable financially or super healthy, and I really have to solve our lunches problem this week asap.

No insights here, just a muddle of half baked thoughts.

[garbagechocolate]

I mean, this is the internet, the straight characters are going to be drawn and written having gay relationships, the AroAce characters are going to do the same by giving them a very active romantic life, and none of that should matter because this is content MADE by fans, It's not Canon. I think we would all be more at peace if those who enjoy making content about Moon having a partner didn't impose the idea on others or try to justify it. Suffice it to say that this is an AU. Do not waste time or effort trying to convince others that the idea is better than the original, will not succeed.

LIKEWISE, it is just as important that those who DO NOT like couples content simply IGNORE or block the blogs that produce it. Because going to artists' or writers' publications just to make them feel bad because they like a ship is not cool.

This is internet dude, if you're sad because there isn't enough material of Moon being an AroAce, do it yourselves. Defend the canon you like by making content and not crying bothering those who make contrary content

(Waddles in) I was just explaining why I don't like solarmoon. It's not a very big deal. But also, excusing everything with "but it's the internet" is stupid. Added on, the Aspec community has every right to be upset about people shipping moon for the sake of shipping moon. If a character was confirmed to be YOHR sexuality, but people around you disregarded it or used the excuse that it's a spectrum to ship how THEY want to, it's just. Bad. Like you COULD ship them, but if you're going to do that while keeping that they're aroace I'd expect you to handle it while acknowledging that at many times, aro people just don't fall head over heels in love. If anything it takes time. Or sometimes we do, but the feeling dies off when it's reciprocated. The problem comes with the fact that they do not acknowledge it at all and that they ignore it.

Also. I'm not crying or whining about it. I never EVER liked Solarmoon but I've never made much of a big deal out of it. The most was making a post on Twitter saying if you ship solarmoon I'll probably be unfollowing? I understand that shipping discourse between these two robots is so, so weird, but it doesn't change the fact that I personally feel very uncomfortable around it because it seems like incest to me.

I already have the Solarmoon tag blocked and I was explaining to the other anon why I don't like the ship. That's all <3 I also have. Thoughts. About the first thing you said and characters being hc different sexualities but that's a topic for another day.

[edenfenixblogs]

I would appreciate if you deleted my reblog post from your website. I am not familiar with the part of tumblr where people think it is okay to screenshot your statements and reblog them on the internet. I do not consider that normal discourse. I never once said the things you accused me of in your post. I did not call Jews white. I said that Jews can be both white and non-white plainly because whiteness is emphatically not real.

If I misinterpreted your words in my post, please reblog this post with your feelings and opinions about Jewish people. Or you can reply to this post. If I have misinterpreted your words, I will happily delete the post.

Unfortunately, I have had far too many people do antisemitic things in the comments of my posts — as small as using microaggressions to suggest that I am somehow selfish for experiencing antisemitism to outright telling me to kill myself for saying that I support Palestinians and hope for a future where Israelis and Palestinians can live peacefully (because I do believe Israelis should continue to live) and when I go to respond to those posts, the person has blocked me to prevent me from responding or deleted the comment so that I am left feeling gaslit as if I’m upset about something that never happened. This is a common form of antisemitic psychological warfare in the internet age.

For that reason, I will not be deleting my post with your comments while I remain unsure about how you feel about Jewish people.

We are experiencing a terrifying uptick in antisemitism to the point where I am unable to go a single day without experiencing it. Right now, my blog exists in part to document how the world feels about Jews during this time.

HOWEVER, I am more than willing to admit that I may be oversensitive and hypervigilant about your specific comments. I do have PTSD and after months of nonstop isolation, death threats, and other antisemitic rhetoric flooding my life, I absolutely believe that my symptoms may be making me see and feel hostility that you did not intend. If that’s the case, then I apologize.

But this blog seeks to validate Jewish pain and trauma during this time as well as to document my own personal experience of antisemitism so that I don’t convince myself “it’s not that bad,” which I am very prone to do in the face of trauma. And this leads to horrendous problems for me personally.

I will also say that I do consider screenshotting to be a normal part of discourse, but not the end of discourse. I welcome you to elaborate your thoughts or engage in more discussion on the topic.

But you wrote words on a public post on the internet. And I wished to highlight that response. Because it felt extremely invalidating and dismissive of a very real, lived, and ongoing trauma experienced by me and most other members of the diasporic Jewish community. That trauma is known as conditional whiteness—wherein we are treated as “white” until we are too visibly Jewish or Israel becomes unpopular or any number of other reasons—at which point we are forcibly ejected from our social circles. This has led to generations of Jews never feeling truly welcome in any peer group. And the ongoing wave of extreme antisemitism has made our culturally traumatic worst fears into an ongoingly traumatic reality for the past 8 months. And whether or not you meant to ignite those fears and traumas, you did so. For me and for all the other Jews responding to you with frustration and anger right now.

Everything you say on the public internet is public speech. And if you wouldn’t post it on your own blog or say it to a human being’s face, you shouldn’t post it anywhere.

That said, I do not believe that one bad screenshot or communication defines you as a person. I am capable of being wrong and am happy to admit when I am. We all make mistakes and shouldn’t be defined by them. People grow and evolve. What happens next is up to you.

You are correct that whiteness is a social construct. And that construct is wielded in a shifting way against Jews and has been for generations. I will not delete my post, but I welcome further discussion. I don’t hate you. But I am scared of you. I am scared that you hate me and my people, because so many people do and have shown that they do.

I extend this invitation to you with an open heart and in good faith. Please attempt to respond in kind.

[blueskyscribe]

~Earthspark spoilers~

So there was a lot I didn't like about Season 2 (batch 1) . . . but I do want to mention something that I've seen a lot of negative "discourse" about that I actually didn't have a problem with: Aftermath and Spitfire being inherently troublesome from the moment of their creation.

There's been this ongoing trend in internet media criticism to look at everything through a lens of realism. I've even seen a few people complaining about Robbie and Mo being in dangerous situations, like they're real children. But they aren't. They are fictional characters who exist so that real children can have fun imagining that they, too, can fight bad guys alongside their cool robot friends.

The Chaos Terrans are fictional robots created by a mystic artifact, an artifact that was fractured and malfunctioning when they were 'born'. I am not worried that kids will extrapolate that real children--who are not robots and not created by mystical artifacts--can be born evil based on seeing a cartoon using the very common Evil Clone trope. Please give children some credit.

Predacons and Maximals were created very similarly in Beast Wars. Any time a Maximal protoform pod crashed, BW Megatron & Co would try to reprogram it into a Predacon, and if they succeeded then the new character would instantly join their faction and start burning the surrounding forest with a flamethrower or whatever. It's a conceit to hurry the new character into the plot, because it would be extremely boring if every new Beast Wars character spent three episodes philosophizing and studying Cybertronian history before choosing a side.

The goal of fiction is not to perfectly mimic reality.

[likeawolfatthemoon]

i am literally so tired of the multiple album variants discourse. just don't buy them!!! i haven't purchased a single piece of physical media of taylor's since 1989 (honestly i think that was even gifted to me) and i have had no problem accessing any music of hers i've wanted to listen to ever. if you want to be a collection completionist, that's your choice. if it's becoming too expensive, it can be your choice to stop!!! nobody is forcing your hand. taylor does not have a moral obligation to put out fewer things so you can have all of them, she's a capitalist billionaire and she's not secretive about that. like it's valid if it hurts your feelings that you can't afford everything, I guess, but genuinely why are we stillllllllll talking about this. like im just having fun looking at the pretty pictures knowing damn well im not going to buy a single one of these and will be streaming them and taylor will be a-ok with my streaming revenue rather than the revenue from my album sales. and as for the bonus tracks? i love piracy and she knows 100% that people who listen only on streaming but WANT to hear those will be listening to pirated versions...like she already leans in to the fact that there's thousands of people watching concert livestreams every night. she understands how the internet works. she is not missing those sales. we already know it's going to be the biggest album of the year and break records bc she's taylor fucking swift and everything she touches turns to gold. she's just having fun making more little content things to release bc that's how she knows to interact and excite us now. you don't have to buy them if you don't want to. like...genuinely start trying to change your perspective on this, y'all are making yourselves soooo upset and it makes me sad for you. not in a mean way, but in a like...you should be having fun, how can i help you have fun way. y'know. stream music, interact with fandom, you don't have to buy everything to be a fan.

[velvetvexations]

I find it really telling that the people involved in the "dropout needs more transfem rep" discourse are TME/TMA users. Strange that there's an overlap but, should have expected useless tumblr discourse from the tumblr discourse crowd.

lol it's not that strange because it's an entirely invented problem

the way that people try so hard to divide the trans community into a binary over and over and over again drives me up the wall, whether its tme vs tma or the constant lumping in of all trans people into either transmasc or transfems!! like in regards to the whole recent dropout conversation (recent example) someone mentioned that there aren't any transmascs either. Dropout's trans representation is largely, if not entirely, nonbinary people, and yet somehow this conversation is somehow entirely focused around how few transfems there are. but oh no, because (loud sarcasm) transmasc and afab nonbinary people are both tme therefore they're basically the same thing right? and no one cares if i say act as if they're the same thing, right? so stupid.

Tribalism is poison.

I feel so fucking misunderstood right now by someone I used to trust. I literally have issues with splitting and I was fucking open about that, but then they bitch at me for being an evil transphobe because I've come to distrust tme/tma people AS AN INTERSEX PERSON, something they LITERALLY TALK ABOUT THEMSELF. I thought it was a safe space to vent there but now I have one less fucking place to go I guess. 'weaseling out' of what, having fingers wrongfully pointed at me? I vented about that, just to have more fingers pointed at me. fucking christ.

and if that wasn't bad enough my so-called friends aren't fucking bothering to pretend to care either. I hate everything.

hi, same misunderstood anon. 'bully' HA! all I did was express disdain for intersexists, but apparently that makes me a toddler and a 'bully'. how fucking insulting. I thought this person had better reading comprehension than that.

Sounds like they should get fucked.

so many people on the internet just. experience one thing and make assumptions about everyone else’s experience

like. trans men on here who pass or whatever will be like ‘well um ackshually i have never personally experienced any discrimination unique to me being a trans man and also have privilege over trans women so you need to shut up about being discriminated against specifically for being a trans man’

privilege when it comes to trans people is entirely fucking dependent on the person and largely influenced by factors that are not about which direction we are transitioning in

for example. i am a trans man. i am also autistic and mentally ill

(trigger warnings for discussions of ableism, specifically against psychotic people and autistic people, and transmasc-specific transphobia for the next few paragraphs. i will put in brackets when the trigger warning is done)

i am not treated like ‘trans’ or ‘man’ or ‘woman’. i am treated as an animal that does not understand anything and needs to be hurt and forced back into its place because how DARE an animal like me try to sit at the table with people

people assume that i know nothing. i cannot be trusted to determine my own identity. people try to convince me that i’m just genderfluid or just nonbinary

if i got aggressive or angry pre-testosterone, then it was because i am autistic and overreacting. now that i am on testosterone, if i get aggressive or angry, it’s because the testosterone is making me that way

i experience a very specific overlap between ableism and transphobia and the specific ways in which it is weaponised against me tie directly to the fact that i am specifically a trans man

for example, a real interaction: ‘you experience psychosis. you can’t possibly know that you’re trans. it’s a delusion, you silly, stupid woman. you don’t know reality. you’re not a man.’

^ this has happened before. because i am psychotic, and was afab, it’s assumed that i’m unreliable even about my own identity, so they brand me as a hysterical psychotic woman who needs her medication dose upped

another example. ‘no. don’t go on testosterone. don’t get top surgery. you’re ruining your gorgeous female body. autistic girls don’t understand gender, anyway. you’re just a tomboy.’

^ in these interactions, people do the usual anti-transmasculine tirade about ruining my body. except they also weaponise my autism against me, and say that i’m just an autistic girl who doesn’t understand gender and cannot possibly be trans

(trigger warnings end here)

privilege as a trans person is SO dependent on factors outside of which way you are transitioning. i have privilege over some transfems. some transfems have privilege over me. some nonbinary people have privilege over me. i have privilege over some nonbinary people.

i don’t usually experience transmisogyny. none of my transfem loved ones experience the specific anti-transmasculine transphobia that i do. my transfem girlfriend passes better than i do, even though she’s pre-everything. i very rarely pass, even though i have been on testosterone for months. some of my transmasc friends pass while being pre-everything. it all varies immensely from person to person

being a man in of itself isn’t a source of oppression, but it definitely influences the ways in which you are oppressed. some of my transfem loved ones go through the world in much easier ways than i do. some don’t. the level of privilege a trans person has largely depends on things like race, wealth, disability, and environment, among other things. the specific direction in which you are transitioning, from my observation, just changes the stereotypes and concepts weaponised against you. it doesn’t seem to dictate the severity of your oppression. it just seems to influence which specific things people use to oppress you

And they will never, ever want to acknowledge that it's possible for trans people to have privilege over each other in different circumstances despite the fact that most readily acknowledge the possibility for trans men to have privilege over trans women exists and do everything in their power to lift them up in those situations.

"and the cat is there" how is a cat. TMA?????? can anyone explain meowth being TMA. Are we being fucking for real here?

Well, I mean, he is sapient lmao.

TMPickmEs... I'm stealing that now holy crap that's so good...

I'm very funny.

Honestly I'm just so fucking worn out by the whole TMA/TME thing and the "trans women are the only people who are known about by transphobic cis people and the only one who's suffering matters" because I, a (closeted thankfully) trans man, just had to deal with my coworkers going on a MASSIVE rant about how little girls are chopping their tits off and mutilating themselves and getting "frankendicks" and shit.

But sure, trans men are beloved by all and are accepted by the transphobic cis people-

The transphobes at your workplace are probably outraged over little trans girls detransitioning.

happy warless weekend or at least im 80% sure its the weekend rn. my friend asked me for help starting crochet and i got to autism all over the place about it

Hell yeah! Doing things with friends is important.

It’s kinda crazy how so many people are speculating about your identity just because you have opinions they don’t agree with. It kinda reminds me of that one Hamilton fanfic writer who faked her whole identity to win arguments on tumblr, I guess they think you’re the sequel to that or something? Lol

I knew someone who faked being Black, years and years ago. Wild time.

Wait i wasn’t paying attention to the discourse for a second and am clearly behind on the plai/dos stuff, did Aabria actually block her bc of her dumbass “wah too many TMEs” callout??? That’s SO funny but genuinely Aabria (and everyone else) deserves financial compensation for having to see plai/dos’ & her little circle’s unhinged transphobic misogynistic etc takes

that's what she claims lol

honestly completely expected, people like that always melt down when you just ignore them and refuse to engage because at heart they're high school bullies who enjoy knowing they're tormenting someone with a faux-progressive coat of paint and it's incredibly transparent lmao. like sorry you tried to pick on someone who's established enough that you can't utilize your dead blogging website following to effectively ruin their life this time, might wanna go back to picking smaller targets like another trans person with 10 followers online

Aabria is 6 feet and one inch of invincible badass. You cannot start shit with her and expect to win.

Another day, another *** trying to get her followers to at- tack some random disabled guy she doesn't like (totally not because he's disabled…)

Better to block and ignore the feral little idiot. She doesn't have that much of a following and it's always appeared to me even the regular TRFs think she's too mask off to platform.

[onlyplatonicirl]

ANYWAYS ENOUGH SHITTY DISCOURSE!!!!!!

I'm going to lay out my rules and EVERYTHING YOU CAN EXPECT FROM THIS BLOG. IT WILL BE WORDY BECAUSE I WANT TO BE AS CLEAR AS POSSIBLE AND LEAVE NO ROOM FOR MISINTERPRETATION

I do NOT create content that is NSFW, Problematic, or that has "Extreme" dark themes. You will never see content depicting inc*st/n0n-c*n or even vanilla NSFW or anything like that like that from me, I am not comfortable with it! I would also ask that no body discuss/bring up anything in regards to it either! i.e., please don't bring up dreamm/re, or any other severe darkships. I do not have a "dark/nsfw alt" either on any other website, I am just uncomfortable across the board. Please respect that.

I will NOT reblog problematic content. You just straight up will never see me discuss it anywhere (unless im telling people to stop talking about it LMAO)

I will reblog artwork from other artists!! I do not police or do a deep dive of a person's blog before I reblog their artwork if I enjoy it. It is up to you as a internet user to curate and navigate your experience once you leave my blog. Someone else's blog has nothing to do with me, nor does it mean i am "promoting them" ???? Unless someone is a GENUINE homo/transphobe, racist, groomer, genuine piece of shit with proof, I will block them and delete the reblog. But I will not engage with proship/antiship discourse as it has gone way too far way too quickly.

If I interact with and am friendly with other blogs who create "problematic" (mostly just dreamm/re, because of this fandom that's kinda the biggest problem here lmao) content, then that's all I'm being - friendly. I know this is crazy, but im not "supporting" people. People are not political campaigns. Being friends with people and being friendly with them does not mean I agree with and support every decision they have ever made in their life. I am being kind to them as another human being on this planet. If you don't like them that's fine, but I find it really shitty when people try to get mad at me for things that the guy standing next to me did. Again, once you leave my blog and go to another person's blog, you are on a whole ass other person's blog.

I will not engage in label discourse, I will not engage in toxicity of any kind, and I will not engage in ANY sort of drama. Keep all that shit out of here. My blog is just for me to have fun and be silly on, do not bring weird shit here. Be NORMAL!!!!!!! WHADDA HELL!!!! ITS NOT HARD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

anyways the yapfest is over. Be normal and kind. or else a shadow creature will literally eat your toenails off your toes and you will wake up and they will be FLESH STUMPS.

[ikkiokuma]

just finished mgs2 and i have nowhere else to take my thoughts so i’ll just dump them hear for my little internet vacuum:

> the AI/simulation plot twist is really interesting but at the same time doesn’t feel like it was resolved in the best way? outside of the patriots being a typical shady organization controlling literally everything, the explanation the AI colonel gives about human mind control feels at least a tiny bit more unique that your typical 1984 premise and excuse…i only have to wonder the aftermath of raiden and rose’s relationship with such a huge rift torn between them through the course of this game (which feels like it goes largely unaddressed considering raiden basically proposes to her after their reunion?) i think his character has a lot of good potential and their connection could have undergone some kind slow burn rebuild to make it more satisfying (it’s not like i didn’t root for them sometimes! tho im aware they are actually quite toxic tho)

> i’m also thinking of the people on twitter engaging in discourse about whether mgs2 is anti-AI to which i think it’s pretty clear that kojima encourages us to exercise our free will and critical thinking in this digital age…though raiden doesn’t outright say “fuck the patriots”—who are ostensibly using such a program to try and keep the masses ignorant, complacent, and dependent—in this game, his decision to pick his future for himself entirely goes against the AI colonel’s impression that everything in the simulation could decide the kind of person raiden becomes. to me mgs2 (along with being more explicitly about life in the digital age) takes the idea of free will or destiny from the first game up a notch with the question of: hey, what if it your future wasn’t just programmed for you by birth but by a simulation which you regard as the truth? it’s interesting to see this blend of themes (that the persona franchise decided to create two separate games based on, funny enough) work together in a new context

> sitting with the full weight of otacon’s backstory is kind of crushing. i know it’s not the worst thing ever but something about his tragedy feels all the more pointed when you think about how vulnerable he was…how he was basically abused and groomed and still blames himself to this day because he doesn’t know any better at all? it’s just such a heavy burden for someone so young to bear—an illicit affair and the death of your father because of your actions would mess anyone up in the head (im genuinely surprised he’s not worse than he is right now). his loneliness is so interesting because to a certain extent it’s self imposed by his own inaction (waiting to be loved instead of seeking it out for himself—some kind of self-esteem problem, maybe?) and for the first time in years solid snake manages to break down his walls and they form this beautiful mutual connection that i think holds so much more weight than any potential female relationship the games try to force him into (also with the fact that he seems into women that would only be somewhat unhealthy/toxic for him something something childhood trauma something something twisted conception of romance tragic doomed heterosexuality but he could find everything he looked for and more in the man who’s stayed beside him this whole time but i digress) otasune is so beautiful to me and i’ve been thinking more about how it really is only them against the world and burying my head in my hands i think im going to develop heartburn because of these fools and if anyone has good fic recs i would love for them to be sent my way im going to start writing essays about them again ffs. also something something otacon really is at his best self when he’s around snake—confident, in control, and a little sassy when he wants to be—which honestly makes him that more attractive … snake truly brought the best out of this nerd god bless

> pliskin is sooooooo gorgeous in this game i wish snake wore his hair down more i genuinely think i grinned like a maniac every time i saw his beautiful face on my screen 🤤🤤

> gameplay wise the game honestly doesn’t feel as bad as the first one (i was fucking struggling in the original)…fingers crossed the rest of the games will be somewhat similar difficulty to get through

now on to mgs3!! i’m so excited for snake eater yayyyyy

[imerian]

Here goes little essay about everything going on with Logan bc i have a lot of thoughts that I want to organise a bit .

I'm not sure where i want to start bc there so much to this whole situation with Logan and Williams but I'll firstly discuss today's fp1.

I hate what media portraying Williams got, yes they fucked up and critique is fair but there much more than just critique online. I tend to believe that the gave logan repaired chassis not bc they disrespect him but bc his car is tuned to alex and tune new one to him is faster than redoing both of them. It may give him some disadvantages that it's too bad. The part that I'm really sad about is that Williams didn't clarify any of this and we never gonna know for sure. It all doesn't exclude possibility of this just being decision but somehow i find it unlikely.

Another part that i have a lot of emotions about is today's crash, i hate it and people's responses so bad bc firstly we never gonna know is it car or logan bc once again we can't be sure with how Williams talked about it, but even if it was logan i can hardly blame him bc amount of pressure on him js insane.

He wasn't ready for f1 when he was brought into it, everyone already said that. Plus he constantly compared to oscar which isn't fair, you can look at their cars for example (bc in this sport they matter a lot, fact that somehow a lot of people forget) or where their teams are. I remember how in f3 oscar told that he was excited to fight with Logan and that shows for me that logan can do better it's just his circumstances that are unfortunate. He's season in f2 also was really good, he obviously couldn't get first place with domination of filippe but he still did his best.

Another thing about f2 is how much pressure he had there because Williams announced him as their f1 driver even before season finished and it put Logan on a spot bc he could actually become that driver only if he finishes in top three. And he did!!

But you can see how than, in his first f1 season and eveb now amount of pressure doesn't go down, he constantly needs to prove himself or he'll get kicked out of sport, same sport that his family sacrificed all for him to get in.

I absolutely don't understand his haters, especially those that compare him to alex at least because comparing them is stupid with this big of experience gap. Same discourse i see about lando and oscar which is also stupid because at the moment lando is objectively better at least because of his experience, and oscar doesn't need to be better than him, he needs to learn and get that experience himself for any comperasing to make sense.

Big problem with Logan is that he can't get that experience to grow as a driver, even alex said that it isn't stange that he crashes that much in his first season bc Williams car is hard to work with. It was Alex that said that, same person that car was made for so i think it's pretty good evidence. Also that was ghe reason why u was very excited to see Logan this year because he would finally have car that made for him as much as it was made for alex. And then the season started :)

In first two races he couldn't prove himself in any way bc of the reasons that wasn't in his control and what happened in Australia is just horrible for him as a driver. But i really hope that his patience will help him to hold his seat for the next year. As much as it sucks right now if him helping the team can improve his chances for the seat next year than it matters most, bc even of he has shit year he could have another one to prove himself ( which i think will absolutely happen at one point or another of his career if it continues)

In the end i want to add that i believe that James have good intentions bc even knowing how negative internet going to be he made that decision in Australia for the team. As logan fan i was very sad about it but i hope that with same good intentions for team he will keep logan that already shows how supportive he is to the team and with their growth it's probably exactly who they need at the moment

[max1461]

Everything that brings me any amount of joy that I mention on here ends up becoming a topic of debate.

I cultivated a debate-y circle not by accident; I engaged in lots of political discourse and so on, especially in the early days of this blog, because I actually like debate. I've said it many times before. I find it interesting and intellectually productive to argue about politics and philosophy specifically. The problem is that I didn't really realize that the debate would not stay restricted to these topics on which I had invited it. I was unwittingly cultivating a space in which I couldn't talk about any part of my life, any hobby, any opinion, etc., without people feeling implicitly invited to comment negatively on it, to critique it, to take as open for argumentation.

I am not really interested in arguing with strangers on the internet about these things. I respect people who want to do that, and want to be in a community where those are the norms, but I do not like it. It actually makes me feel really bad.

I've been spending a lot less time on here recently, and I'll probably keep doing that. But I do want to keep engaging with this place. I'm just not really sure how in light of these norms. It's quite unpleasant to me!

I am happy to defend the ideas I put out there as such. The writing that I produce, the #society longposts. But I don't like constantly being asked, basically, to defend everything else about myself on here. It sucks.

Some people seem to have effectively avoided it. "Curate your experience" they often say. But if I did that to the extent they advocate, it would probably just end up curating away the things I even come to this place for!

Maybe not, idk.

Well anyway.