#the same goes for cis “traditional” women

[finnsworldz]

the quote of all time

[olderthannetfic]

"Why I don't write F/F" thread proceeded just as unproductively as I expected. It wasn't about moralizing about the women not writing F/F, it was a question about why personal reasons for avoiding a configuration aren't reflected in opposite directions by other groups. Unlike race, gender has an almost 50/50 split, there's a scale to the proportions not there for other types of identity category. "The femslash police suck" is a factor I can understand. But why wouldn't "personal reasons I just don't feel it towards this configuration" end up an even distribution across the population? The expectation for women to write about women isn't a moral rule, it's that if you allow the logic "men in control of stories write about men (and that's why more mainstream stories center men)", then the flip side is, well, why people clamor for more women behind the camera and in the writers' room. Either accept the logic for both sides or challenge it for both sides. Instead we have the worst of both worlds, we accept it for one side and challenge it for the other. Where's the parallel universe where this imbalance somehow resulted in a different quadrant being the smallest proportion of ships?

--

Why wouldn't "personal reasons" be even? Because the kinds of issues people face based on their demographic aren't.

But I think the larger factor is how socialization affects choice of hobbies and volunteer efforts. Cis men and cis women, on average, go in for different flavors. The dudes tend to be more bothered by the idea of "not getting anything back" for what feels like work. When they do do unpaid labor, it's often the kind that accrues glory and career prospects rather than less showy social ties. Open source coding projects where they can be important, yes. Writing fanfic, no.

Looking up any analysis of volunteering and unpaid work that makes such-and-such a part of society function will get you a lot of discussion of this gendered difference. It's pervasive.

Of course, this is just a broad trend. Plenty of guys do write fanfic, and when they dominate a fanfic space, we see tons of fic focused on the female characters they find attractive, including f/f fic.

And if you're asking about cis gay men specifically... well... again, gendered socialization means that the issues faced by cis lesbians and cis gay men are not equivalent. The reasons and ways that people employ allegory to talk about things "too close to home" will likewise not be exactly the same. Traditional US gay male culture goes in for drag and for an obsession with Hollywood divas and The Golden Girls. Plenty is being mediated through female personas; it's just not translating into fanfic specifically. But most people making "Leave the fujoshi alone" arguments are not thinking about cis gays: they're thinking about people in messier identity categories.

The biggest difference is not behavior but simply that cis men are a small minority on FFN, AO3, and Wattpad, the three big fanfic archives. (Some ancient FFN research found that it was 78% female, and that's the archive known for having more men!) The places with more cis guys are much smaller and don't get talked about as much by most fandom history and fandom meta types from the AO3 side of things.

The reason cis men's taste in favorite characters isn't being "pushed back against" isn't a double standard: it's because:

Cis men simply aren't that relevant to site-wide trends on AO3

and

2. The reverse pattern does happen all the time with vanishingly little m/m and lots of f/f

You sound like you think we'd make this fanfic-specific argument about pro media. In fact, plenty of queer women are open that they produce original f/f but not f/f fanfic or they produce f/f fanworks but not fic. A lot of the "too close to home" arguments are specifically about the kind of id fuel, naked-in-public vibes of AO3-style fanfic. Writing that is less id-driven may not feel that same way. A given woman might have a much easier time writing a mystery novel about a lesbian detective who never gets laid on page than a steamy f/f bodice ripper.

The parallel universe you ask about exists. It's horny imageboards full of fan art of anime girls.

The reason you sound judgmental and are getting "unproductive" responses is that you're phrasing things as though we're refusing to solve a problem. In reality, we're attempting to analyze the situation that exists. It's a descriptive approach.

[i-arch-my-backula]

Queer slasher head canons

So it's pride month and I'm feeling very queer and trans so I'm going to be talking about my queer headcanons for slashers. I know I'm talking about gender and sexuality in a modern context in this and these slashers aren't set in modern days mostly so do with that what you will. These are also my opinions so don't yell at me if you disagree

Bubba Sawyer has a very fluid gender expression and I love that for him. He's kind of all over the gender expression spectrum so it makes sense in my mind that he uses the masks as an excuse to express his queer identity. He does see himself as a man sort of, but if he learns that he doesn't have to be a man he'll be so relieved. He also has a preference for women when it comes to romantic interests but it doesn't matter too much.

OG Michael Myers mostly grew up in a mental insitution so he doesn't really know much about gender or gender roles. He doesn't see why it matters if a man wears a dress or a woman wears pants and has short hair, he's killing them either way. He just honestly doesn't care about gender too much, call him whatever you want. The same goes for sexuality. He doesn't find people attractive often, but if someone's attractive, they're attractive.

Jason Voorhees grew up being told he's a boy and he feels comfortable with the title of being a man, not that he really hears people referring to him as a man that often. I feel like he sees gender as a more basic thing and if you say you're a woman, you're a woman, if you say you're a man, you're a man. He might not totally understand identities outside of that but he'll learn with time. He grew up not knowing anything about sexuality and he just thought only men and women could get together but he's learned over time that any gender can be with any gender and he's left it at that. He honestly does prefer women but if a man's hot, Jason doesn't mind checking him out.

Harry Warden just like Jason grew up being told he's a man so he's never felt uncomfortable with the title of being a man. He likes being a man and he prefers to stick to more modern terms of being masculine and stuff like that. He'll be a little confused about people who don't stick to traditional gender norms but again, he'll learn over time. Raging homo in the closet. He's grown up being told that straight is the only option so when he finds out he's mostly only attracted to men he's a little worried. If only there was a nice handsome man to help him overcome this.

Billy Lenz doesn't care if you call him a man or a woman or something else, he's still going to harass you over the phone. Billy guesses he's a man because that's what everyone says he is so why should he care. I feel like he's all bark and no bite when it comes to his phone calls. This man will say the smuttiest, juicy, toe curling, moan inducing, mouth watering sentences over the phone and the minute you go to confront him he's back tracking. I put him somewhere on the asexual spectrum for this. As for sexuality he does have a preference for women but in the end, hot people are just hot.

Stu Macher is a cis guy. He's always been comfortable with being a guy and he likes being a guy in general. He grew up thinking everyone was comfortable with wanting to date anyone regardless of gender but he found out that he was the only one later on. He's attracted to everyone regardless of gender so this man is a fruit.

Billy Loomis is also a cis guy. He's happy with being a guy but he is a little insecure in his masculinity. I feel like he's never felt many enough because he's bi and he's just trying to find ways to make up for it. But of course Stu is someone he can confide in when he's feeling this kind of way.

[bluedalahorse]

Complicated queer media feelings beneath the cut…

Is anyone else feeling… I dunno… complicated about the part where we have Heartstopper, Red White and Royal Blue, and likely more YRS3 promo happening all in the same month?

I find a kind of enjoyment in each of these, so on one hand, I’m happy about it! (YR is my dearest fandom love right now about which I have many deep feelings, Heartstopper brings me joy and is what I’d watch with my middle school kids if I had kids, and RWRB is more on the “fun popcorn media” side of things for me but also has a lot of government humor that I laugh at as a person living in DC who gets subjected to motorcades etc.)

And I also think it’s awesome that queer rep has come a long way since when I was in high school, and there was only kinda Will and Grace and Willow on Buffy and you barely heard about some kids watching Queer as Folk if they were lucky enough to have HBO and parents who weren’t weird about it.

And and at the same time I know I’m going to be looking at my dash like, huh, that is a lot of mlm romance kissing between photogenic cis men.

Which. Again. Is progress? But also I’m a not-skinny aroace homosocial queer who is very interested in the stories of women and nonbinary people as well, and stories about friendship as well as relationships that reject traditional definitions. I want sweet romantic moments in my stories and decent makeout scenes but I also want stories about how queerness can challenge capitalism and hegemony and how we can create new families of choice and so on.

And for some of the texts I’m talking about, the canon definitely delivers? Things feel balanced? YR explores the class system with so much skill, and makes me ask powerful questions about justice and identity and such. It also has incredible female characters, including Sara as B Plot Protagonist driving a significant part of the story. (I wish I could find more fanfic from female characters’ POVs. I wish there were just as many “can’t wait until they get their happy endgame” posts about the Sara-Felice friendship as there were about the Wilmon romance, and I adore the Wilmon romance. I just love everything else about the show alongside it, and sometimes I find myself desperately craving discussion about the other aspects of the show while not knowing how to find ways of engaging about it.)

Heartstopper—I love how a multiqueer friends group is so centered in the story. Nick and Charlie are the main characters but Charlie’s friendship with Tao matters as much in the first season as his romance with Nick. I love how the show chose to have Elle carry a significant subplot in season 1 (although they could do better with that) and I am hopeful that we’ll get an ace discovery story for Isaac in season 2 and I’m looking forward to seeing more Imogen and we get a new disabled character and we’ll also get Tara and Darcy being Tara and Darcy! I don’t really follow people for Heartstopper necessarily, because it’s not really something I analyze or write fic for, but, you know, there’s a lot of it that goes around and I have generally positive feelings about it. I’m curious about what parts of the show and what characters people will choose to focus on.

RWRB… well, it’s been a long time since I’ve read the book, but I’m sort of holding off on comments until I see what’s different between the book and the movie.

Long story short I think I’m going to feel great about these various mlm pairings individually, because they’re all distinct personalities with stories and such, but I’m going to be feeling kind of weird and overwhelmed about the attention and gif visibility and squeeing that mlm romances between photogenic cis men get in aggregate.

But also also. Maybe that’s on me for not being into something like Yellowjackets fandom or not spending more time browsing the tag for XO Kitty. So the problem could also be me. I mean who knowsss?????

[peoplesrazor]

Part one

I've mentioned to a few of you that I'm a bit under the weather, hence I've made fewer posts lately. But I ain't going to let Lily try to paint a bunch of disparate people with a single fascist brush. You ain't going to misunderstand Umberto Eco in front of me and not get it tossed back at you. I will, however, cut it into two parts.

First, what do I mean by disparate? As I've mentioned in other post the Lily Orchard Critical community is not a community in the traditional sense. We don't meet down at the local lodge and go over what we are going to talk about. We don't elect each other to do the talking, we don't push agendas, and we aren't all coming at this from the same place.

Just off the top of my head, Lily Critical includes former fans, former victims, media critics, transmen, transwomen, gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, NBs, cis men, cis women, pansexuals, people from every generation online and numerous others. We, as a group, have exactly one thing in common and it's in our name. Lily Critical.

Secondly, I'd be more forgiving of you invoking Eco if I thought you understood the things he spoke about. The fact that you didn't even get the name of his list right is a clue that you did not understand. It's called “Eternal Fascism: Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Blackshirt.” If you must shorten it, at least call it Ur-Fascism. If you are wondering who cares about that:

Umberto Eco, for one. He was a semioticist. He was very much into the meaning of things. I think he'd take the fact that you didn't say Ur Fascism as a sign you don't really understand Ur-Fascism.

Now to argue your point, such as it is. None of us think you are a strongwoman. We don't think you're the boogiewoman or anything else of that stripe. In fact, most of us point out, nearly daily, that you aren't as powerful or as much an authority as your fans think.

You want to hear it, Lily? Okay, here goes. You didn't obliterate Steven Universe. You really didn't do anything but co-op talking points that were already popular with SU's critics and, in at least two cases, copy them almost word for word. You probably did influence some of your fans to keep spewing those points, but you didn't invent those points.

We are, again, allowed to disagree with those points and are, again, allowed to point out the awful things you say about the creator.

Not a single bit of this makes us transphobic, or stalkers, or even fascists. That's just ridiculous. In fact, when I make my next post I'll actually point out that doing that to an entire group of people is actually one of the 14 points. I've actually danced around this othering before, but didn't outright mention Ur-Fascism, because I didn't want to be inflammatory.

Flame on, I guess.

[pftones3482]

Hello and good evening. I am a long time follower of yours on this platform. If it isn't too much of a hassle, I would like to ask you a couple of questions.

I am a college student from Europe and I an currently working on my bachelors degree. The subject of my degree is on the subject of current social issues in America. As I've been following you for the past few years I have come to the understanding that you are rather well informed about what goes on in America. Far better than I (an outsider) am at least. So, I thought that it would be a good decision on my part to ask for your opinion on what are the five most important or talked about social issues in America. As well as what you think the best or most reputable sources to use for research on these topics are.

If this isn't something you feel like commenting on for whatever reason, then feel free to ignore this message. Or if you believe that there are better people to ask about this, can you please steer me in their direction. Thank you for your time.

Kind regards.

P.S. I tried to send this as a direct message, but Tumblr continued to give me a 'could not send' error message. I don't know why that happened, but apologies if this causes you any inconvenience.

Oof, this is a long one to answer lol.

First and foremost, I want to say that I myself am not a reputable source. I actually get a lot of my information from first hand experiences of people on TikTok (blah blah TikTok isn't reputable yadda yadda I KNOW, but first hand accounts of people's lived experience are always more reputable than some random commentary by a white man on CNN). That being said, I can link a few people directly to follow, but I've struggled a lot to find ONE news source in recent years that isn't biased. I tend to just compare multiple sources to hear what all of them are saying (and everyone should be doing that anyway).

As far as "most important or most talked about" social issues, those vary person to person in the US. The social issues I find most important are not going to be the ones my neighbor finds most important. And keep in mind going into this I'm a cis white woman. I am part of the LGBTQIA community, I'm disabled, but I also hold a lot of privilege that many of my fellow Americans don't. And that's definitely going to skew my thoughts.

For me, personally, the top five most important social issues in the US rn are (in no order):

1. Land Back. Native Americans have had their land stolen from them for CENTURIES, and it is crucial we give it back to them. They actually care for the environment around them in a way that white rich men don't. Native people have existed peacefully with wildlife since the dawn of humanity, are humane in hunting practices, and care for the land they use. They deserve their homes back. The atrocities committed towards the Native community are horrendous (they've lost language, family, traditions), and they need better protections as a whole.

2. Trans rights. Specifically with trans youth, but overall in this country trans people are facing more and more discrimination in terms of legislation. There have been hundreds of bills introduced against them in the last few years alone, and all they're trying to do is survive. Especially trans people of color, and even more specifically trans women of color - they're all struggling in this country.

3. Public schooling/libraries. This one's broader, but we are seeing a huge educational gap between the last 15-20 years of schooling. We're teaching for tests, not to learn. Schools should not be funded based on local taxes, they should all be given the same funding from the government to give children an equal opportunity across the country. Teachers need higher wages and smaller classrooms, and children need HELP developmentally. Less tech, more hands on. Libraries, similarly, need significantly more funding and protections, and the censorship in both spaces is getting out of control. Children are not thriving in school because of the "No Child Left Behind" act - it needs to be revoked, because it doesn't help any child actually get the education they need.

4. The police. Specifically, their treatment of the black community and their authoritarian complex within the states. Funding needs to be heavily divested and frankly the entire industry needs to be scrapped and replaced. More of their "services" need to be allocated to mental health professionals/EMTs, and they should be required to go to school for psychology/humanitarian studies/cultural relations. No one should be allowed to shoot a person after only six weeks of training. No one should get a paid vacation after taking a person's life. Cops in America are disgusting, brutal, racist pigs, and they are a big part of the reason why we cannot move forward as a country.

5. Housing/minimum wage. We have a MASSIVE housing crisis going on right now, and it's in large part due to the fact that our national minimum wage stagnated at $7.25 in 2009 - 15 years ago. While many states are above that now, it's still LEGAL to pay that rate nationwide, and people in the service industry make even less. Because of this, and inflated housing costs, people literally cannot afford to live here. There are virtually no programs to assist many of our homeless people, no care for them in general, and every day I have to walk past people begging for money who I can't help because I also don't have it to spare when there are people literally buying billion dollar dresses to wear once and then throw away. We have the infrastructure in this country TO house everyone, and it costs more to police homeless people than it would to house them long term. (This also goes hand in hand with our substance abuse problem/mental health crisis as a country, but that would take way too long to type out)

There's way more I could get into - taxes, the voting system (and specifically how much we need to get rid of the electoral college and implement ranked choice voting), queer rights, women's rights, the return of Hawaii to Hawaiians, reproductive rights, etc. I struggle to pick because so many social issues are important for different reasons.

As far as people to follow, here's a small list of people who tend to cover the majority of topics I've listed:

Rynnstar - they do a great job covering all kinds of issues, really can't recommend them enough to follow

Mercury Stardust - lot of people know her as the "handyma'am" but she also talks about a lot of these issues, especially those faced by the trans community.

Ellaequeue - Land Back discussions, Mexican American, overall great person, love their posts on my fyp

Ebony Warrior Studios - a black veteran openly speaking out against our military complex, as well as delving into other social issues. He's also a voice actor!

These folks are also all pro-Palestine which we love to see.

Again - not a comprehensive list. None of them are traditional news sources. But they've all lived their lives in their bodies, in our society. And I think if you don't know where to start on US social issues, these people are an easy way to learn more and find more people to follow.

News sources are great, when vetted correctly. But most news sources in the US are heavily skewed one way or another, so if you're trying to learn about social issues, you need to talk to the people directly. Not read articles about them (general statement, not directed at you lol).

I appreciate the ask, and wish I could give you more in the way of sources. But again, I tend to get my news from people first and THEN look up information to confirm. If I'm going to pick one news source right now, it's going to be Al Jazeera. Any media that Israel bans is okay in my book 😌 They cover more than just Israel/Palestine, in case you weren't aware!

I hope any of this helps, and if any of my followers have people/sources you trust, feel free to drop them in the replies.

[heraheir]

GET TO KNOW THE MUSE

Name: Camilo Alejandro Cruz

Deity Connection: Champion of Hera

Nickname(s): Cammy

Age: 20

Date of Birth: December 12

Religion: N/A

Place of Birth: Houston, TX

Race / Ethnicity: Mexican and Italian - German

Gender: Cis Male

Pronouns: He/Him

FAMILY

Father: Hector Cruz

Mother: Maria Cruz

Siblings: Thalia, Edward, Ricardo

Children: None

APPEARANCE

Height: 5'8"

Weight: 150lbs

Build: Slim- Athletic

Hair Color: Black, brown highlights

Eye Color: Dark Brown

Usual Expression: Bright with a room lightning smile.

Tattoos: None

Piercings: none

Clothing style - He has a mixture of flamboyant and masculine styles. Often sheer or see through tops or crop tops mixed with blue jeans. Or polo shirts or jerseys complemented with booty hugging shorts. He is very fond of his shoes, he will always be in a pair of Air Jordans, Nikes, or Chuck Tyalors.

Distinguishing Features: Soft Boyish Looks, Bright and Innocent Smile.

PERSONALITY

Positive Traits: Nurturing and Kind

Negative Traits: Passive and Emotional

Hobbies & Interests: Medicine, Gardening, Swimming, Writing, Music

Sleeping habits: He tends to wake up early in the morning no matter how late he goes to sleep. And when he has the opportunity, he loves to shower before bed because he doesn't sleep well if he has the dirt of the day on him, or enjoy the cool breeze of the night.

Living Arrangements: Hera's Cabin

Position: Bottom

BIOGRAPHY

He grew up in a upper middle class family, where he didn't want for much but his family still worked hard to maintain everything that they had.

He was always a outgoing kid, but he was never one that was wild and playful like most boys - he was someone that would tend to gardens, cook, clean, and things that the girls or women did, it often pissed his father off, because he wanted all of his son's to be tough - but his eldest brother and his mother always protected him from his father's traditional viewpoints.

His school life was very fun for him, because he was popular and fit in with a lot of the crowds - he was cool and laid back, so he could fit in with the popular crowd or those that didn't care to be seen or recognized.

He got his first boyfriend in high school and it was a big deal, because he was captain of the lacrosse team and his boyfriend captain of the football team - they were the couple of the year. But little did Cammy know was the cheer captain was sleeping with his boyfriend... everyone knew. And it wasn't until a high school party that he found out. Embarrassed, hurt, and scorned Cammy wanted to act out and do something dangerous - but he felt a presence... a Godly presence that stopped him and told him to move on.

It wasn't another two years when he felt that presence... when he was in the same situation, he had forgive said boyfriend, but he was back dealing with his infidelity and this time he was about to show his boyfriend and the mistress his wrath - but before he could he was met by Hera. And she told him that she was picking him to be her Champion.

Leading him to head towards the camp to learn how to fully be a Champion or whatever that meant.

TBC.....

[estheruary]

This is a lot so I'm sorry in advance.

I think the internet loses all nuance when you start down the "you're saying something similar to <people you shouldn't like>" path. A broken clock is right twice a day and we've all experienced heartbreaking: the worst person just made a good point. When you have groups typically positioned opposite one another but reaching for the same thing I try to take it as a sign there's something bigger going on.

Part of the freedom to express your gender how ever you damn well please includes wanting to adhere to traditional gender roles. It goes nowhere trying to paint men and women who enjoy and find comfort and fulfillment in them that they're unwittingly falling victim to or perpetuating an oppressive religion. And "divine feminine" feels like this but formally divorced from religion -- "I don't have to be feminine but I'm doing it on purpose for me." And I say this as a lesbian in an egalitarian non-heteronormative relationship. The queer community applies a crazy amount of pressure on our members to break down gender roles which is fundamentally the same sin as impressing traditional gender roles on others. In a world where the overwhelming majority of cishet people choose to adopt traditional roles and presentations of masculinity and femininity you end up putting trans people in a tough spot where they're made to feel guilty doing exactly what every other cis person does.

And that's a great segue to back into divine feminine because I think it's a chance to understand cis women through the experience of trans women. Even if they don't use the phrase the trans women I know naturally cling to that special spark because it defines their identity as women. It's something that is both theirs and shared with all other women -- something that no one can ever take away from them. And grabbing that mirror and pointing it at myself I feel the same way. It's fundamentally an abstract thing, an indelible mark on my soul that forever makes other women my kin in a way, however small, that men or otherwise non-female identifying persons aren't. I have no problem with gender dual citizenship or temporary visas. And even your spark lives in a quantum superposition it doesn't mean it isn't there sometimes when observed or somehow invalid.

Breaking down gender roles is also where the "it's easier to not get misgendered in the midwest than on the coast" idea comes from. As the Venn diagram of gendered behavior gets closer to a circle the space for trans people who want or need to occupy "man \ woman" or "woman \ man" or even enbys who want to occupy "¬ man ∧ ¬ woman" gets smaller and in a cruel twist of fate people read your gender using *only* your bone structure which is just gender essentialism disguised as being progressive. Being able to project your gender to others using means that are generally in your control is I think a good thing.

So I'm not at all gonna say anyone (including myself) is right or wrong but I don't think that there are any easy answers. I do think there's at least a case to be made for keeping the gender binary around specifically so the people who fall in different places on it or outside it can be recognized as such.

I do wish that "oppositional sexism" was a more commonly known term. It was coined as part of transmisogyny theory, and is defined as the belief that men and women, are distinct, non-overlapping categories that do not share any traits. If gender was a venn diagram, people who believe in oppositional sexism think that "men" and "women" are separate circles that never touch.

The reason I think that it's a useful term is that it helps a lot with articulating exactly why a lot of transphobic people will call a cis man a girl for wearing nail polish, then turn around and call a trans woman a man. Both of those are enforcement of man and woman as non-overlapping social categories. It's also a huge part of homophobia, with many homophobes considering gay people to no longer really belong to their gender because they aren't performing it to their satisfaction.

It's a large part of the reason behind arguments that men and women can't understand each other or be friends, and/or that either men or women are monoliths. If men and women have nothing in common at all, it would be difficult for them to understand each other, and if all men are alike or all women are alike, then it makes sense to treat them all the same. Enforcing this rift is particularly miserable for women and men in close relationships with each other, but is often continued on the basis that "If I'm not a real man/woman, they won't love me anymore."

One common "progressive" form of oppositional sexism is an idea often put as the "divine feminine", that women are special in a way that men will never understand. It's meant to uplift women, but does so in ways that reinforce the idea that men and women are fundamentally different in ways that can never be reconciled or transcended. There's a reason this rhetoric is hugely popular among both tradwifes and radical feminists. It argues that there is something about women that men will never have or know, which is appealing when you are trying to define womanhood in a way that means no man is or ever has been a part of it.

You'll notice that nonbinary people are sharply excluded from the definition. This doesn't mean it doesn't apply to them, it means that oppositional sexism doesn't believe nonbinary people of any kind exist. It's especially rough on multigender people who are both men and women, because the whole idea of it is that men and women are two circles that don't overlap. The idea of them overlapping in one person is fundamentally rejected.

I think it's a very useful term for talking about a lot of the problems that a lot of queer people face when it comes to trying to carve out a place for ourselves in a society that views any deviation from rigid, binary categories as a failure to perform them correctly.

[panzershrike-pretz]

Hello Pretz! Hope you’re doing well 💙

🎶💯🔱🌈🎄🍎❤️🧡🖤 for the OC ask game for any OC you’d like to talk about!!

HI LOUUUU!!! Holy cow this is a lot :0 I LOVE IT KEKEKEKEKEKEK I chose Pansy because I'm in a Pansy mood uwu

murder woman✨️

----------------------------------------------

🎶 MUSICAL NOTES — what type of music does your oc like? do they listen to music very often?

Pansy likes to listen to music as she works! She's really fond of rock and metal, though she can't escape the 2000's white girl music listener allegations... (she appreciates Katy Perry and Taylor Swift, ok???)

I can't quite take off the image of her dismembering someone while blasting California Gurls on her headphones-

💯 HUNDRED POINTS SYMBOL — share three random facts about your oc that others may not know.

1. Pansy knows up to 7 languages! She's able to speak English, French, Spanish, Russian, Greek, German and Portuguese! (I obviously won't ever write her speaking anything other than english and portuguese, tho :3 not risking any mistakes)

2. Although she knows she's a terrible being, she has some boundaries that she will rarely cross. Pansy doesn't mindlessly torture kids nor friends, she won't kill someone she knows enough (by attaching a face, name and history to someone, she loses the hability to torture/kill them without a heavy conscience) and won't kill animals unless, at the worst case scenario, in self-defense.

3. She was a Witch before meeting Regulus and turning into a Wight! She was hometaught by her grandma, who once was an extremely talented Witch, but she lost her power after turning into a Wight. Shess may not have a wand anymore, but she has a gun which is pretty much the same-

🔱 TRIDENT EMBLEM — can your oc swim? do they enjoy swimming?

No, actually! She comes from a very old, traditional and rich family where she was expected to be a proper lady, so while her brothers went to play on the lake, she was forced to stay at home learning how to properly behave.

She wanted to learn how to swim, but life got in the way and, well, not everything are fields of flowers-

🌈 RAINBOW — what is your oc's sexual orientation/gender identity? what pronouns do they use?

Pansy is a cis bisexual that goes by she/her!

At the moment, she's in a kind of situation between Regulus, Drabek and Nicola. Just bouncing between them- (consensual workplace relationships except the work is to dominate the world 💞)

🎄 CHRISTMAS TREE — what is your oc's favorite holiday?

Pansy doesn't celebrate any holidays anymore, due to Regulus strict laws and sheer hate of the gods.

In private, she kind of prays to the War Gods, Esmae and Sindresh'al, but she refrains from pertaking in rituals or holidays of anykind in any God's name.

As a kid, her favorite was the Night of Dragons, celebrated at the end of March, honoring the demi-goddess Artemis Drakeborne! The Night of Dragons is when women come together to dance around a burning pit at night, singing songs and reciting stories and tales about dragons of all kinds, to gain Artemis' blessing and protection. Usually they spend the whole night doing those rituals, burning herbs and enjoying a feast of wine and raw meat.

Lambs and fish are sacrificed and burned in the pits, in a belief that it'll protect the women and their families from any possible dragon attack. Legends say that the dragons smell the burned creatures in the women's fur and spare them and their family, as a show of gratitude.

🍎 RED APPLE — where was your oc born? do they still live in/around their place of birth or do they live somewhere else? how do they feel about their birthplace?

Pansy was born in Hampshire's countryside, near North Wessex, at the Grave's Manor, in England. She spent most of her life there, until she convinced her parents to send her to study abroad in Belgium - where she was convinced to join Regulus cause and became one of his most loyal followers.

She hates her birthplace with a burning passion, as she thinks her family and position in politics restrained her from having the life of her dreams as a dragon expert.

Now she just lives wherever she is needed for her missions, since Wights are able to blend in anywhere. She never spends more than two weeks in the same place.

❤️ RED HEART — what are three of your oc's positive traits?

1. Pansy is a woman of her word. If she swears something, she'll go to any lenghts to keep it up. A promise is a promise, no matter if good or bad.

2. She learns very easily and that's the reason Regulus sends her to the most missions. She's able to blend in really nicely by imitating the accents and way of speaking or acting of any place in any point in time, as long as she knows the language.

3. She has a lot of confidence in herself and that's what keeps her going.

🧡 ORANGE HEART — does your oc tend to prioritize family or friends?

Herself-

And then friends.

The only family member she'd never hurt is her youngest brother, Alexander, who she loves very much, even if Regulus thinks he's a waste of a boy-

🖤 BLACK HEART — has your oc killed or seriously wounded anyone before? have they broken someone's heart and/or broken someone's trust?

Yes, she has. A lot.

Pansy's main job is to kidnap peculiars for the illegal trade (or to collect their souls) and to eliminate whoever mildly inconveniences Regulus.

She's pretty known between black market dealers and authorities alike. She's built a name for herself and a fame that preceeds her, which mean she had to kill, injury, torture and betray a lot of people in her wake.

She has never knowingly broken anyone's heart tho- if anything, she was the one who was left broken hearted by ex-lovers in the past.

[sixpossumsinaclownsuit]

Unpopular LGBTQ+ opinions, from someone who is trans/gender-nonconforming and queer…

Content Warning: potentially triggering topics below regarding physical and social dysphoria

Hot Take: Amab Women/Transfemmes should not compete with Afab Women/Femme-presenting athletes. Please hear me out… 

I think the same goes for afab Men/Transmascs with Amab Men/masc-presenting. Simply because, despite all the other social hurt-feeling Christian bullshit surrounding Republican ideas, there is one core concept that cannot be ignored…

Amab people have higher athletic performance averages than afab people. You see it in P.E. scores… guys have to have a 12 minute mile and girls have to have a 14 minute mile, etc etc… there's evolutionary evidence and scientific research behind these numbers, and while the binary addressing and social treatment of these numbers is pretty much all bullshit, the numbers still exist. 

"But there are plenty of cis/afab women who outperform cis/amab men" 

But why of course. But this isn't about individuals, this is about averages, averages that have long since been acknowledged which is why we have the separately gendered football/american soccer teams, track teams, etc… 

This is where people get pissed at me from both sides. Ready? Here it is…

Do away with the gendered bullshit all together. No women's team or men's team that is inherently binary and ineffectual. 

Women and men (afab and amab people) have different body types and structures, even after surgery and hormone treatment. But team sports should have room for both types of bodies… shorter, stouter bodies and abilities have certain positions in American sports like football and baseball, and I'm sure there's other sports likewise. I'm track/field there's pole vaulters and hurdle jumpers, sprinters and long distance. 

We see it all the time in wrestling, both traditional wrestling teams and performance wrestling like the WWE. Wrestlers are determined by weight class and ability, not gender. You see Rhea Ripley absolutely floor men, and vice versa. Why can't all sports be determined this way, by physique and skill alone?

Tl;dr, body types and physical structure based on sex defined at birth cannot be ignored in an environment dependent on physical ability. This does not mean to deny trans people ability to identify the way they want or to play on the teams/in the sports that they want, but rather to eliminate the topic of gender altogether and make a unisex world of sports where physical capacity is the only deciding factor in an athlete's scoring, standing and team position. 

[olderthannetfic]

I do think a lot of the problem and the reason that more people (like the ones who seem to think that "top/bottom as myers-briggs personality types" jokes are exclusively coming from female-centric fandom spaces rather than gay male offline culture - which, btw, ignores that a whole bunch if not most female fanfic writers are themselves queer and there's a similar set of jokes and stereotypes in the lesbian community, but I digress) don't seem to understand what offline queer culture is like on here is that way too many of the people setting the tone for this in The Discourse on Tumblr are very young people who are newly out. In particular, a huge amount of the gay men on here who are telling people how very Problematic this is (when they're getting it from gay men and not circular discourse among other women in fandom who are claiming to speak on gay men's behalf) is coming from young gay men who don't have much of a community offline, and especially young gay trans men who often aren't yet presenting as male outside of the Internet. It's really hard to talk about, because it so easily risks saying those people's identities aren't valid - and like, we've seen TERFs weaponize that discourse to suggest that gay trans men involved in fandom are just straight women who identified too hard with their blorbos or something, as well as the endless use of "passing privilege" to suggest that bi people in F/M relationships are "basically straight" - but I think one thing people need to understand better is the difference between "your identity is valid, your personal experiences with homophobia/transphobia/etc. are valid" and "your judgments about the larger community that your identity makes you a member of are valid." Like, you do actually have to participate in a community to be able to be able to talk about what the consensus in it is, what the cultural norms are. You have to actually look up the history in order to know that history. If you're going to speak on behalf of All Gay Men you probably should know some beyond yourself - including ones who are not Very Online and/or aren't active in fandom - and that goes for both cis and trans gay men. (And the same is true for every subdivision of LGBTQ+, I've seen similarly bizarre takes about "lesbian culture" from 17-yro lesbians who clearly haven't talked to any outside of Tumblr and insular, dramatic Discords.)

Like, to use an analogy here to another kind of oppression: say you have a black person who was adopted by a white family very young and lived in an exclusively white neighborhood and doesn't know any other black people. Obviously, they are still black, and obviously they still experience racism (probably especially because they're an outlier in that community). Obviously, their own understanding of their identity and their experiences with racism are valid. But they aren't necessarily going to have any better of an understanding of the broader black COMMUNITY - cultural traditions, history, etc. - than a non-black person who was similarly not exposed to that community. They can only speak for themselves. And someone who isn't black but grew up near/in black communities (for instance, perhaps another transracial adoptee who was adopted by a black couple? or even just a non-black person who grew up in a heavily black neighborhood) might actually have a better sense of that broader community/culture than they do.

And this isn't a hypothetical. I've heard stuff like that about feeling like outliers in black American culture from everyone from the aforementioned transracial adoptees; to multiracial black people who were raised primarily by their non-black family; to black people who are recent immigrants from Africa rather than descendants of slaves; to black people from Europe or other parts of the Americas, who have some similarities in their culture but it's not completely 1:1. And especially from people who are some combo of the above. They have an understanding of themselves as black and of their relationship to race and racism, of course, but don't really feel like they have a particularly strong understanding of The Black Community or The Black Experience as we understand it in the USA.

I think what a lot of people don't understand is that newly-out queer people are often like that. A lot of other marginalized identities - like being a cis woman (this applies less to trans women unless they've known from early on) or being a POC - are ones where you grow up with an understanding of what that means and often a connection to a broader community that gives you some kind of consciousness of what it means to be A Woman or Black or Asian or whatever. But with queerness, it's usually not something you fully understand about yourself until adolescence or adulthood, and even when you do, you don't necessarily have access to a "community" around that until that age because you're probably being raised by cis straight people. You have to take time to discover that community and learn about it, and the culture and history that goes with, and when you start out you're going to be just as ignorant as a straight cis person who is similarly isolated from queer communities. (And frankly, a straight person with a lot of gay friends might know better than you do at first! As a lesbian with a lot of gay male friends, most of whom couldn't care less about my slash fanfic hobby if they even know about it, that's precisely why I know that these takes on Tumblr are so bizarre)

(Disability is the interesting one because it sometimes overlaps with this, sometimes doesn't - and one of the big divides in the community IME is around people who have lifelong understandings of themselves as "disabled" vs. came to it more recently, whether because the disability itself is a new thing or just their diagnosis of it. A lot of people in the second group can have very similar experiences and act in similar ways to newly-out queer people, and I know because I've lived both myself, lol.)

I think people have taken the idea of "everyone is the best expert on their own experience with oppression and their own identity" and distorted that into some weird essentialism where being gay or bi or trans or whatever gives you automatic understanding of "queer culture" or "queer history" without having to do the actual work of talking to people, participating in that community, studying history, etc. but that's just not true. Anyone can study that history and get to know those people. And yeah, as a queer or trans person you'll have a better opportunity to really deeply know and be part of that community than straight cis people with queer friends ever will, but you still have to like. Actually put yourself out there! You're not going to find it by just discoursing in a vacuum of ignorance.

--

Sadly, to all the Olds, this is very, very obvious, but there's no way to make it obvious to the people doing it. It's a matter of experience.

[oli]

The sooner people start realising that gender is something forced on us/assigned by society based solely on a dangly bit or no dangly bit when we’re born, the sooner people will understand others desires to have the choice rather than accept what society has deemed one’s “gender”.

And for those in the back of the class who aren’t paying attention (looking at you here Ben Shapiro): Gender is not the same as Sex.

(To illustrate the point I’m keeping this simple to 2 genders and sexes, I know in reality it’s more diverse)

Sex: male of female - dictated by biology (chromosomes and what not)

Gender: man or woman - totally made up by society as a way to assign societal traits to a human

Sex is the science/physical bit, determined by chromosomes and physical biology. Usually dictates how the body will develop, hormones, body hair, and most obviously reproduction abilities. And as we all know, physical characteristics are a broad range, from huge lumberjack to petite ballet dancer and everything in between. Your genes and chromosomes decide what you look like, and that can be anywhere from exceptionally male or female, to more androgynous. Human beings vary greatly between race and sex, I think we all understand this to be a spectrum.

Gender is a societal construct that determines a whole load of things, but the most obvious are clothes, makeup, hair styles, jobs (still), leisure activities, education options, and in some parts of the world the ability to drive for example, the list goes on.

Take clothes as the most obvious example; in the western world women’s have a much wider access to clothing options than men do, so if a male wears a dress many people will still raise an eyebrow, but if a female wears a suit (a traditional “man” outfit) no one blinks an eye. Society has accepted females wearing suits but not males wearing dresses.

Now extrapolate that example out to ALLLL the other things that are separated into “men or women” things, none of which are inherently “male or female”. Heck, men used to wear dresses all the time!

Just like sex, gender is a spectrum too, but not a linear one. And gender is fluid too, it can change over time, even on the same day.

Just let everyone be whoever they want to be, stop forcing YOUR preconceived ideas of what a male or female human should look like, or present to the rest of the world.

In conclusion I identify as cis+

I’m a cis man sure but i also wanna opt out of the gender binary. None of that shit is my fault or my responsibility and i don’t want any part of it

[violentviolette]

throwing my opinion in for some reason, the reason i personally bristled at the 'feminine and delicate' part of ur post (which i wholeheartedly agreed with) wasn't the word feminine but the word delicate, and if someone referred to a vagina as delicate i'd be equally skeeved out, like the word is just so wrapped up in purity culture weirdness that referring to women's genitalia as delicate just feels icky, ya know?

see I completely understand that reaction and the place it comes from is not at all invalid

but it is inherently a view that stems from a very white and afab experience and thus it unintentionally completely misses the intersectionality that is needed in this discussion

trans women are gatekept from traditional feminity much in the way black cis women are. they are denied the right to be shown and described in ways that misogyny forces onto white afab people

when was the last time u saw in mainstream settings a trans woman or a black woman described as delicate? dainty? soft?

name any mainstream depiction of trans women who are soft and delicate flowers in need of saving and worthy of adoration and love?

that view is misogynistic when applied to white afab ppl because it is forced onto us, thats why it feels revolutionary to see white afab ppl being shown as masculine and strong and indipendant

but that experience is exactly the opposite for trans women of all races and for cis women of color (especially black women). they are majority depicted and described as masculine and hard and tough and abrasive and violent

so for those demographics being seen as traditionally feminine, as dainty and delicate and soft, is what's revolutionary and what feels more empowering

talk to any black woman and I'm sure a lot of them will talk about being sick of the "strong independent black woman who doesnt need love" trope. they want to be seen specifically in the ways society has denied them

same too goes for trans women. not all trans women obviously because no demographic is a monolith and butch trans women exist and their experiences are just as relevant and important

but for the most part, we have this inherent knee jerk reaction as a transmisogynistic society to not want to associate trans women's bodies with traditional feminity

and I think peoples discomfort with that part of the post in particular is very telling in just how uncomfortable that notion makes ppl. the notion that trans women's bodies, their penises, can be delicate and soft and feminine

I have gotten the most push back on those words specifically and I dont think thats a coincidence. people are uncomfortable with viewing penises in these ways and it is literally just because of how deep all of our own transmisogyny (and racism) goes

[yallemagne]

Transfem Jonathan Harker Headcanon

[it’s a screenshot of @sweetpotato-schvitzie​ asking me to elaborate on my Trans Jonathan post.]

Rubbing my mischievous hands together now, I made that post a while ago hoping someone would say “tell me more”. Thank you. Also sorry for how long this elaboration is gonna be. 

Uhh, TL;DR: Jonathan exhibits several feminine traits and associates femininity with comfort and safety, and I like to view that as him being transfeminine.

It has been said numerous times by numerous people that Jonathan fulfills the traditional damsel in distress role for the entire start of the book. Along with that, he just seems to find the most comfort and camaraderie amongst woman instead of men. Now, one can just take this to mean that Jonathan is a feminine cis man. That’s important representation as well. But I’m queer, so I take this route. 

So. The Girls’ Room. You know, the room where Jonathan nearly got eaten by The Girls? That Room. 

It’s the one place in the entire castle that Jonathan feels comfortable/safe in (for as short a time as that was), and the reason why is the feminine energy of the room. While he’s writing in his journal, he compares the action to a hypothetical lady using the same desk to write a love letter. He’s so comforted by the room that he goes against Dracula’s orders to never sleep anywhere but the room already provided to him. 

After being attacked by the Weird Sisters, he hesitates to call them “women” as they are a twisted version of what he knows women to be much like Dracula is a twisted version of what a man is. You could read this as “oh this is just some period typical misogyny”, but I prefer to view it from a queer lens. Jonathan, being unknowingly transfem, prescribes positive traits and feelings towards women and womanhood. Kind of a reverse of Van Helsing saying Mina is masculine because she’s smart, Jonathan says “this room is feminine because it makes me feel safe :)”. Therefore, the women that make him feel unsafe are, to him, less feminine, maybe even masculine. 

When Jonathan is next heard from after escaping the castle, he’s been staying at a hospital full of nuns and he’s won over all of them with his sweetness. This is an idea I kind of explore a bit in my fanfic, Orice: he’s able to recover to a point because he’s surrounded by women who provide sympathy and confidence. Sister Agatha tells none of his secrets, not even to Mina, and that is a display of great loyalty that Jonathan wouldn’t have gotten if, say, he were transferred to Seward’s asylum instead. 

Later, Jonathan holds Mina’s arm when they walk, letting her lead him as a man traditionally would lead a woman. This is established as something he’s always done, not just now during his recovery where it would make sense if maybe he’s unsteady on his feet. I don’t think it was a conscious decision on his part to hold Mina’s arm, but surely she has talked to him about the connotations of doing so, and clearly they’ve both decided to carry on anyway.

Then, the men. Now, you’d expect in maybe any other media that Jonathan would connect immediately with the other men in the cast and Mina would be, to them, an extension of Jonathan. However, this is reversed. Mina has time to bond with each of the other men in their team one-on-one, and the only one-on-one meeting Jonathan gets is with Van Helsing, who spends the majority of the time talking about Mina. These are Mina’s friends. Jonathan appreciates them because they’re an extension of Mina, and they feel the same about him. 

Now, it’s notable to point out that all the other men are nearly obsessed with masculinity (except Quincey, he’s a masculine ideal, but he doesn’t rally about how great manhood is like the others do). They’re kind of like... some weird Victorian equivalent of a fraternity. Jonathan doesn’t really fit with the rest of them, but he follows their commands and cues as he’s expected. Even when he’s “one of the guys”, he settles into a passive role. Just point to the vampire, and he’ll slash, but he wouldn’t dare speak up if say, Van Helsing came up with a real sexist plan to leave their most competent member from the group because how could he argue with Professor Macho Man?

This has gotten very long, and as for citing examples from the book and reframing them under a queer lens, I’ve kinda run out of the best examples. Once Jonathan starts getting vengeful and violent, he kind of takes on a more traditionally masculine role of a raging Achilles. I do have more to say though, most of it being complete headcanon and fanfiction fodder. If anyone wants me to get into that, just ask. 

[natmasthestinkylizardliker]

Hi so being as you directly quoted me I just wanted to respond, I did read your whole post, contrary to what you thought would happen in your tags.

ok immediately im done being charitable. what the fuck. what the fuck is this nonsense? why? what the fuck are you saying? oh my god.

well I'm glad you went into this post with such a charitable perspective to begin with, it's a shame the only response you actually gave a charitable interpretation to is the one you agree with.

"disappointed in my transfem siblings honestly n truly. educate urselves" is not saying "huh its kinda disappointing trans women don't get to enjoy this artform like everyone else". Like, if that's genuinely how you interpret that statement then perhaps you need to take a moment to consider how you understand tone conveyed through text, because a look at the tags of that addition show that they are just making the same point you are.

Now that post might not have been trying to be condescending but the way its written it kind of is.

yes, it is condescending. as are you.

maybe some of these women ARE educated and still hold a negative opinion and that is totally fine. but the pushback goes beyond just that

this is you being condescending, I, and many other trans women, are educated on the history of drag. we are forced to be because it is constantly foisted upon us as vital knowledge for trans women, to "know where we came from". I'm sure there's nothing untoward implied by that idea at all.

BUT putting that aside, yes, drag is not some mystery that we're all discovering for the first time right here on tumblr.com, many of us (including me, as this is my perspective!) have actually been to drag shows and know drag performers in real life and have read about the history and influence of drag, so it's great that we're still allowed to hold negative views about it, thanks!

um? which cis people? cis people within the queer community? cishets? those are already two wildly different groups to sample, but apparently it's just cis people.

gosh, forgive a girl for being flippant in a one line post on tumblr, perhaps she should have written a nice breakdown of all the different cis groups who respect and accept drag more than they do trans women, instead of writing a pithy response to condesention.

fine ok whatever maybe there's a point to be made about how crossdressing (an important tradition that's been a thing in the queer community for a long ass time) is easier to accept in a temporary performance than as part of a permanent stable identity.

see, you do understand, without further articulation, what the pithy one-liner was trying to convey. shocking.

now we get to my bit (yay!) so I feel like I have to remind you of the first part of my response, that you ignored to rant about how offended you were that I don't like drag queens being platformed instead of trans women when talking about issues that affect trans women.

see that bit, where I say I don't think drag is bad in general or that people shouldn't do it?

what is the point of this harsh anti-drag queen stance?

there isn't one, because that's not my stance.

are you on the side of the anti-drag bills in congress?

this question was answered in my post, perhaps you should respond to that.

this is fucking extreme.

yes, the extreme stance "drag queens are not trans women"

do you think these bills exclude drag queens and cisgender crossdressers?

nope, but then I don't think restrictions on puberty blockers or hormone therapy or gender affirming surgery or changing your name and gender marker on your government ID affect drag queens or cis crossdressers as much as they do trans people, do you?

do you think the transphobic us govt will just give these people a pass?

that depends, do I think drag queens and cis crossdressers are affected by right wing terrorism? yes.

do I think that this is equivalent to what trans people are going through, to the extent that they are functionally interchangeable? no, of course not, it's deeply transphobic to suggest that.

do you the most homophobic cishet legislators can even differentiate between a trans woman and a drag queen and a cisgender gay man and a bisexual man who happens to be a twink?

yes.

just to unpack this, yes, there is a clear difference between being trans and being a twinky cis guy. a difference that is immediately and viscerally apparent even to the most blinkered homophobes.

as for drag queens, yes they hate us all, and there is a concerted effort to conflate trans women with drag queens, but many people do understand the difference.

not everyone does, but that is a problem that is not helped by the way that drag queens specifically are platformed to speak over and instead of trans women on trans womens' issues. (which is what I expressed frustration with in the post you are responding to.)

ALL of these people fall under the umbrella of icky sinful queer. all of them. which is the entire reason we need solidarity in the first place.

and the solidarity that I want to see, from drag queens specifically, is not accepting the invitation of cis news organisations to speak on our behalf.

i can get being frustrated (which is all the original poll really measures) but this goes beyond that. this is about the question what do with we DO with our frustration.

I'm posting about it on tumblr :)

this shit is bad. this is the textbook example of the queer community turning against itself instead against the actual cishet oppressors. while yes cishets are chided lightly in these reblog chains for being bad (what else is new?) the vast majority of the words and analysis in this thread go towards shitting on other queer people, either drag queens directly or cisgender queer people who don't differentiate enough between transfems and drag queens or whatever.

actually, drag queens speaking for us, and TME queer people not differentiating between trans women and drag queens are the ones turning on our community and shitting on other queer people.

I am not a drag queen. trans women are not drag queens. some drag queens are wonderful allies, some drag queens can be incredible and accepting and sometimes can really help new and exploring trans women on their path to finding what presentation is right for them. hell, some drag queens are trans women, but trans women are not drag queens, conflating the two is transmisogynistic.

Like... telling trans women to be quiet? the snarky post saying for trans women to educate themselves on the history of drag is not silencing trans women.

yes it is, it clearly is, you even agree with it, you just don't like it being called out because then you might have to examine your own kneejerk "these filthy trannies need to shut up about being mistreated" reaction for what it is.

it is literally inviting trans women to stay in this discussion and potentially find value in this artform. that is not just shutting trans women down entirely.

we are in this discussion. we have stayed, we just disagree with you. saying "stop talking and go read history" is literally shutting us down and telling us we only hold the opinions we do because we are ignorant.

in fact, it kinda feels like that is what is happening to the cis queer people and cishets who like drag.

no one has said you're not allowed to like drag, no one has said drag is inherently bad or wrong or shouldn't exist, (some) trans women are literally just saying "I don't like it and I don't like how people assume I must just because I'm a trans woman and I don't like being treated like a drag performer by cis people" which, I'm sorry but if that offends you, maybe you need to go away and think about why that is instead of expressing that through lashing out at us.

i dont' have any pulitzer prize winning arguments to make the trans women who inevitably will disagree with me see what im so concerned about. i don't know what string of words to use to get people to understand why i find this so threatening to the future of the queer community's existence. we NEED to disagree with each other respectfully. we NEED to have constructive dialogues. but what i see in this post specifically is evidence of trans women being radicalized against the rest of the queer community in real time.

I'm sorry I used the word fuck a could of times when expressing my dislike of something, but you really don't need to treat it like I'm calling for the banning of drag. literally no one in the responses to this poll has done that.

expressing frustration about our mistreatment isn't us causing infighting. pointing out that something bad is occuring isn't wishing that bad thing into existence, it already exists, you just weren't affected so didn't realise before now.

but again. what is the response? what do we DO with this information? well apparently spend a lot of time shitting on drag queens ig.

I mean, you could actually read some of the responses, where several suggestions have been made, including my own.

people who are not trans women should not accept invitations to speak on our behalf, people should not associate being a trans woman with being a drag queen, here's a suggestion from @estrogenesis-evangelion's reblogs

how is that for suggestions for what to DO with this information?

the saddest thing of all is that in a lot of ways i agree with the idea that being expected to just adore drag in an uncritical uncomplicated manner because you are a queer is very annoying at best and deeply hurtful and insulting at worst.

so you do understand what we're saying, you just don't like that we're saying it.

i basically have no reason to like modern drag in and of itself save for its association with the queer liberation movement and that history. i have positive feelings of drag not because of any of the times i went to a drag show and enjoyed it (a grand total of zero times) but because of the importance in my heart to support any kind of intentional gender bending in society. whether that's gender bending like they do in the new york balls in paris is burning, gender bending by being born one gender and transitioning to the other later, or gender bending by being a man indiscernible from any other cisgender average joe but still preferring to want to be with another man, i NEED to support all of it because all of this makes me safer as a queer person.

good for you, but none of us have been saying we don't support drag's existence. we have simply been begging, pleading with you and other TME queers, to understand that we are not drag queens.

we are not men putting on a costume for a performance for entertainment.

we are women.

sadly, it seems the separatist movements have already taken root. it seems as though individual factions of the queer community are dividing against each other in a time when gay rights have become mainstream but QUEER rights on the whole are more threatened than ever, basically the perfect breeding grounds for resentment and infighting to get out of control.

trans women being driven out of queer spaces are not separatist, we want to be involved with other queer people, with organising and solidarity and mutual aid. but we also want our identities to be treated with the same respect as everyone elses.

a queer person or organisation that does not recognise that we are women is not an ally to trans women, it is an ally to the right wing forces that seek to kill us all, and they are giving them a toe in the door by throwing us under the bus to delay their turn at the wall.

i want to emphasize the need for queer solidarity. the need to accept people even if their queerness feels like its brushing up against yours. and then i want to ask every queer person on here alongside every straight ally to ponder deeply what the POINT of this rhetoric is.

queer solidarity is not disrespecting trans women's identities by conflating us with drag queens. as has been repeatedly said in other reblogs of this post, we don't hate drag, we don't hate drag performers, we just want tme people to understand that we are not interchangeable.

no i mean it. do it. ask yourself what the point is in being this militant against drag queens?

we are not.

or ace people? or intersex people? or any other hypothetical group that isn't your neck of the queer woods? why is this group of queer people gaining rights a bad thing for you? why? can you say why? and if you can, is that a valid enough reason to go to war with the rest of the queer community?

perhaps you should be asking yourself, why does seeing trans women expressing that their identity is different and distinct from drag something that upsets you this much?

perhaps you should be asking yourself why trans women asking for the right to represent themselves and their interests instead of being spoken over and spoken for makes you so defensive that you cherry pick their responses to rant about queer solidarity.

why, in a discussion about trans women, do you repeatedly draw equivalence between them and cis gay men?

do you think that, with so many trans women sharing similar experiences and opinions, there might be a genuine issue here that needs addressing? or do you think that there is something which just makes all of those shared perspectives less important to you?

maybe you are the one who should be brave in examining your own biases, when trans women are talking about being treated unfairly, why does this make you angry at the trans women instead of the unfairness?

I've gotta admit I think about this one a lot for many reasons. I'd really love to see what others think

[goosefeathercore]

Reasons Why Tree WC is a Trans Icon!

This is a headcanon i’m really passionate about, so i decided to make a post about it! I’m going to refer to tree with they/them for this post, I know he canonically uses he/him and the erins did not intend him to be trans, but this is a headcanon post! i also don’t really specify gender because i kinda think you could interpret this as tree being either enby or transfem, really anything other than cis lol. I also headcanon tree to be autistic, and I could definitely talk about how that overlaps with this headcanon, but I have plans to make another post about some of my favorite autistic headcanons!

starting with tree’s roots:

1.) tree is, incredibly ironically, named earth by the sisters. tree later renames themself and shows a strong disconnect/general distaste for their old name. i view earth as their deadname, and i think it’s very symbolic of the incorrect expectations placed on them. they fail to connect with the name earth and the male gender just as they fail to connect with the earth itself, all of which were things expected of them because they were born AMAB, and expectations that they would never meet because they aren’t a tom. for the rest of the post, i’m going to refer to tree with their preferred name, so just know that when i’m talking about their time with the sisters, they were still being called earth. but in this headcanon, i view them as having been ‘tree’ all along, just as they were enby or a she-cat all along!

2.) growing up with the sisters, tree is incredibly distressed by the ‘tradition’ that they’re supposed to follow because they’re AMAB. tree is seemingly the only male sister in the group who has a problem fitting into this box. the toms in the group are supposed to leave on a journey, while the she-cats stay and help each other raise families and build a home together. tree is insistent that they can be helpful around camp and take care of the kits with the other sisters. they feel a strong sense of belonging with the family and domestic aspect of the sisters, while the toms typically feel a disconnect from it in their culture.

3.) it becomes increasingly obvious that there’s something different about tree when they and the toms their age are supposed to learn to ‘speak to the earth’. speaking to the earth is established as a trait that all toms in the sisters are born with, and it comes naturally to them with no problem. every time that tree tries, they hear nothing. they do their absolute best and ultimately put in way more effort than the toms, who all got it first try, but by the time that they’re supposed to leave, they still lack the ability entirely. i interpret this to be because the earth communicates with the mind of sister toms, not their bodies. thus, despite having a male body, tree is unable to form this connection because they’re not a man. and the earth can recognize this when others can’t.. so basically..the earth is based af and sees tree for their true gender, not their assigned sex at birth!

4.) when tree and the toms are forced to leave, the toms are perfectly content and maintain a good relationship with the sisters, on the occasion that they do run into the sisters again, they’re on good terms. this is not the case for tree, who feels that they were kicked out and abandoned by the women in their life who were supposed to support them. to the toms, this is an exciting journey and they have the earth as a companion to guide them, while tree is completely and totally alone and lost, almost as if this life was not meant for them in the same way it’s meant for toms.

5.) tree eventually comes across their father, root, who is the first cat in their life that they actually felt understood them. their father was also uncomfortable with the sister’s traditions, and is the first one to affirm tree’s experiences and by extension, their gender. the time that tree spends with their father is the biggest development of tree’s character in canon to me, so the same goes for this headcanon. firstly, when tree introduces themself, they aren’t sure what to tell root because they realize that they no longer want to associate with the name given to them by the sisters. root suggests that they should give themself a new name. renaming yourself is not exclusive to trans people, and of course some trans people choose to keep their names (and that’s valid!), but the moment when they chose to name themself tree has always been a moment that i really interpret as tree beginning their transition with their supportive father. tree and root become super close and tree learns so much about themself as root continues to encourage tree to do things their own way. (tbh you could interpret root as being trans too, or just an understanding ally) tragically, root dies, and tree worries that they’ll be lost without him, but root does his best to reassure tree that they can continue to be their authentic self without him, and not to let anyone try to change them. in later books, we can see how much tree took this to heart, as they are very unapologetic about being ‘different’, and they generally don’t care what others think.

in other books:

6.) during the conflict with the sisters over skyclan’s territory, tree agrees to come along and attempt to mediate. moonlight is very excited to see tree, and she expects tree to act like the sister toms that they’ve re-encountered before, who are usually very content with their situation and excited to talk about their journey, maintaining a positive viewpoint of the sisters. much to her confusion, tree is very cold and obviously not happy to see the sisters, and she attempts to question them about this, calling them ‘earth’. tree calmly but very firmly corrects that their name is ‘tree’ now, a moment that reminds me a lot of the way someone might react to being called their deadname by a family member. when the sisters express confusion as to why tree is living in a clan now, tree briefly explains that the clans gave them and their family a safe space that they did not have growing up.

7.) tree initially has a difficult time fitting into traditional clan life, and they struggle with feeling out of place. tree has no desire to patrol borders, and they don’t want to go on hunting patrols either because they have a very alternative method of hunting (pretending to be a bush) and don’t intend to change in order to conform. at this point in their life, I see tree as a fully transitioned she-cat or enby cat, and they’re now very confident in their identity, refusing to ever pretend to be something they’re not again after their childhood of pretending to be a tom. to me, small differences like their hunting method represent experiences that a trans person may have, while a cis person wouldn’t understand. i see the push for tree to go on patrols as representative of a push for them to conform to traditional gender roles, which they refuse to do. tree eventually finds a place in skyclan, who i personally think would be the most accepting clan due to their history of acceptance towards daylight warriors.

8.) skyclan eventually learns to appreciate tree for who they really are, and come to respect tree’s wisdom and accept their way of life. however, when tree goes to their first gathering, the other clans are not as accepting. they don’t understand tree, so they automatically assume that tree isn’t fit for clan life. through their skills as a mediator, tree eventually proves that they are just as valuable as any other clan cat, they’re just different and there’s nothing wrong with that. tree’s opinions eventually become more respected because they offer a new perspective. tree is a trans cat who grew up and transitioned outside of the clans, so they have life experiences that a cat born in a clan just wouldn’t have, even if they were also trans. i think a lot of skyclan cats could be interpreted as trans, so I like to think that younger trans clan cats or even cats who are just questioning their identity come to tree for advice from an older trans cat who’s already transitioned. because I still headcanon tree as being mates with violetshine and being the other biological parent of rootspring and needleclaw, I think that tree would also be asked about the experience of being trans and same gender attracted by cats who may be confused. it just kinda becomes part of tree’s job as a mediator to be an ally and help other queer cats, as well as offer personal anecdotes to educate others, and I think they would thrive in that job.

9.) tree’s whole relationship with their son, rootspring, leads me to also headcanon rootspring as trans, but I see him as transmasc! rootspring is initially embarrassed by tree, which I interpret as a little bit of internalized transphobia. he thinks that if tree wasn’t so ‘weird’, then the other apprentices would treat him better. the emphasis on tree being ‘different’ can he interpreted in many ways, but because of everything else, I see it as an emphasis on tree being trans. then, rootspring suddenly develops a ‘weird’ power exactly like his parent. only tree can fully understand, and rootspring turns to tree for guidance. i see this as rootspring realizing that he’s trans too, and turning to his wiser trans parent, asking tree questions about their transition. tree helps rootspring to become more comfortable with his unique ability and eventually, rootspring learns to be proud of he and tree’s power. this is a parallel to root’s relationship with young tree, and tree strives to become the supportive parent that root was to them. to me, this is representative of tree helping rootspring overcome his internalized transphobia and embrace his identity as a trans cat. at one point, tree even pretends that it’s them using the power in front of the other clans, because rootspring isn’t ready for them to know. this represents tree discretely protecting rootspring from being outed as trans before he’s ready, instead bringing the focus to their own transness since they’re comfortable with it.

10.) now comes the emotional part when tree encourages rootspring to go meet the sisters. tree emphasizes that they can’t face the sisters again, but that they want to give rootspring the opportunity to know his own family in a way that tree never got to. the part that I found so interesting and fundamental to this headcanon, is what rootspring learns while he’s there. the sisters tell rootspring the same thing they told tree, that speaking to the earth just comes naturally to all sister toms and all you have to do is listen. except, when rootspring tries, he immediately picks up the ability in the same way that tree’s littermates were able to. to me, this immediately confirms that it was never something tree was doing incorrectly, but rather it was just an ability that they never had to begin with because they aren’t a tom. i think everything ties together really nicely when you look at rootspring as trans too, because then we get to see the opposite outcome. rootspring may be AFAB, but on the inside he’s a tom, so the earth views his mind the same way it would for any other tom. it really completes the headcanon that the earth views your true gender for me, and that’s why I think that tree is a trans icon!