#the thing about accidental transphobia is that it's understandable. it's expected. but it still hurts | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

piracytheorist · 4 years ago

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So I went down some t*rf tags the other day to find which blogs I should block, as you do, and of course in order to avoid accidentally blocking people who were mocking the ideology or sarcastically agreeing with it, I actually read the posts there and scrolled down some of the blogs.

And with some of the things I saw... it made me understand how they reel people in. In some of the stuff they said, I understood them. I understood their struggle, and their anger, and I got how their feelings could make them burst out the way they do in their blogs. Also the fact that many of the blogs I scrolled down and blocked were by women between the ages of 15 and 19 didn’t help. That’s the exact age where you do the most reckless, the most emotional, and the least experienced thinking. It’s when you think of something and immediately think you’re right, because you’re not developed enough, neither mentally, nor emotionally, nor from the aspect of life experiences, to know better and reflect on how well developed your thoughts are.

And to see them act the same way older t**fs do, like in the ages of 26+... it’s fucking scary. It genuinely feels like a cult, where teen women, frustrated with the misogyny they experience, come to a website to vent out their feelings about that and find passionate adult women agreeing with and supporting them and saying that they’re in the right to hate men and trans women... it solidifies their at then immature thoughts.

Like, give me one (1) cis woman who during her mid- or late teens didn’t hate men, even for just a few months, in reaction to being treated as lesser just for having a female body. Just one. I specifically did. I was, for a couple of years actually, believing the bullshit going around that “Girls are more mature than boys”, that “Girls love truly, boys only want sex”, that “Women are statistically smarter than men” etc etc. But then you grow up, you reflect on those thoughts and you go like “Damn older people are right when they say that teenagers do stupid stuff sometimes”.

And that’s the thing with being a teenager; it’s the time to do mistakes, it’s the time to screw up, to vent out your frustrations, and when you grow older and have more life experience, look back at how you used to think and say “Wow, cringe. Good thing I grew out of that.” Absolutely not saying that everything teenagers do is stupid, if anything, most people start discovering themselves at that age. But that’s it; it’s a start. And on that road you’ll make mistakes, you’ll reflect, you’ll change your mind, you’ll learn, you’ll grow. The things that you start connecting with as a teenager which you keep on in your adult life also change, in the way that you look at them deeper, you understand them differently... it’s like with favourite films. Any movie you love as a teenager and as an adult, you’ll have a different mindset on the two occasions. Even if it brings you back to those times, you still have developed and you see it in a different way. Both ways may be positive, or fundamentally similar, but they’re still different, maybe one is the evolution of the first; it’s still not 100% the same. Because you grew up. It’s kinda sad, in a way.

So the issue I have with indoctrinating young women into the t**f ideology from so early on, is that it’s an ideology based on hate. By saying that women are only those who experience misogyny, you’re basically normalizing misogyny and abuse, and averting the blame. You’re saying that it’s expected from men to be misogynistic, and that women should band together against the oppression... instead of looking into why men are misogynistic and looking how you can inspire change in that. It’s victim blaming, basically.

By saying that “trans women are not women because they don’t grow up experiencing the effects of misogyny and patriarchy on themselves” (in a way that’s bullshit but as a cis woman I can’t expand on that, read trans women’s stories instead), you’re putting the responsibility of erasing misogyny on trans women. And again, you’re normalizing the abuse, and you’re defining your gender by the abuse you went through.

Like, fuck no. I was bullied for more than half my school life. It has impacted me greatly, many of the emotional scars I carry them still, my character has been affected by the abuse I went through, but by fuck no does it define me. I choose to try to be kinder. I choose to see abuse as wrong. I choose to be an educator so that I can help bullying stop being a thing in the schools I’ll be teaching. And not because I feel ashamed, or that I pity children who are being bullied, but because I want to make this world a better place, because I believe in teaching the younger generation into not perpetuating any kind of hateful ideology.

That’s not what t**fs do. They just say they hate men and perpetuate the idea of female supremacy... as if women, even women who are privileged in every way other than having a female body, can never do wrong.

Like on one hand, they deify JKR who said that “I am not a victim, I do not pity myself and I’m growing out of my trauma strong” in a very, very victim-shaming way, and on the other hand they define their femininity on the fact that they’re victimized by the patriarchy. Make it make sense.

And in general, it is still an ideology based on hate. When you take a group of people that are struggling both on the inside (either through gender dysphoria or through the pressure of not feeling free to express themselves) and on the outside (either because they’re bullied if they act “out of the gender norm” or because of transphobia if they come out), and you hate on them, when you put the entire responsibility of erasing unrealistic expectations on beauty and appearance for women on that specific small group that’s in a fundamentally disadvantageous position... bro I don’t know what you call it, I call it targeting. You have your frustrations with the patriarchy and sexist men, and because those people won’t listen to you - mostly because they’re privileged and assisted in that by the system they create - and you take it out on a group of people that’s just trying to live their lives in a way that doesn’t hurt anyone.

Like, I saw someone being upset by people comparing t**fs to nazis because she’s Jewish and I’m like... how the heck can you not see the similarities? How can you grow up Jewish and not see that it’s wrong to target an entire group of people, massively hate on them, say that they “have an agenda” just because they want to be themselves and aren’t hurting anyone? How can you not see that cherry-picking the unkind or misled ones and defining the entire group by those few people is wrong?

In fact, how can you not see that “trans women are perpetuating Hollywood’s beauty standards for women” has the exact same basis as “immigrants of colour are stealing white people’s jobs”?

And you may say, “Lillpon, you’re doing the same with t**fs right now. You’re going out there and blocking them after having said you hate blocking people” and I’ll say, I am not hating on them. As I said, I’m scared by seeing how many of them are teenagers, but at the same time, it’s telling. It’s a cult-like mentality, it finds people who are frustrated with how they are treated, who feel wronged, who feel they’re in an unjust world, and it takes those feelings and targets it to one specific group or characteristic. For t**rfs, that’s the XY chromosome set. For neo-nazis, that’s non-Caucasian races. The whole “finding young people who are alone, who see that the world is unjust, who feel no-one listening to them and indoctrinating them to an ideology of hate” is point-blank exactly how neo-nazi groups work. Here is a very interesting TED talk on the matter by a former neo-nazi, if you’re interested.

Also, I never said I hate blocking people, or that I think it’s wrong. I just don’t think it’s something to be proud of, and in fact I’m not proud for blocking those people, I even feel a little guilty as I understand how many of them are just victims of indoctrination.

You’ll say, “But Lillpon, a lot of neo-nazis are spoiled, privileged white men! How can you know how privileged t**fs are??” And to that, I’ll turn communist and whisper in your ear, “The privileged are few. They’re the minority. And they depend on the lower classes fighting against each other so that people forget that it’s the privileged who make all the laws and standards that hurt all the lower classes.” To that extent, you can never, never know who truly hides behind the blogs and twitter accounts with “r*dfem lesbian” on their bio. There are many occasions, especially on twitter, where accounts that claimed to be queer poc were found out to be run by straight white men.

... So, who can guarantee that everyone running a blog with “r*dfem lesbian” on their bio is actually a cis, lesbian woman? And again, on its basis, it’s the same.

Neo-nazism is putting the blame on people of colour; that not only causes a rift between neo-nazis and poc, but also between neo-nazis and white people who oppose them. It’s in fact a pawn so that the white people in power - the people who are responsible for the problems poc and lower class white people face - can avoid having everyone against them. They give poc and less-racist lower class white people a scapegoat.

T**f ideology is putting the blame on people born in male bodies - absolutely no matter what their character is. Again, that causes rifts between t**fs and cis men, t**fs and trans people, and t**fs and cis women who support trans rights. Instead of focusing on seeing how we can stop cis men from being sexist - which of course will inconvenience the men in power who rose so high because misogyny is holding women back - we’re fighting against each other. It’s again, a pawn, a scapegoat, to distract us from blaming the one who’s truly to blame.

If anything, if you’re a t**f, the fact that what you do is helping the white men in power - because absolutely nothing you or your friends can do can affect them in a negative way - should be a reason by itself to not be a t**f. But what do I know.

#anarchist lillpon coming out #long post

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rushingheadlong · 5 years ago

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You Could Know Me - A dad!Roger gen fic

Summary: You knew that coming out as non-binary wouldn’t always be smooth sailing, but you weren’t expecting to face rejection at every turn. Luckily your dad, Roger Taylor, is there to support you no matter what.

Wordcount: ~2,800

Warnings: Transphobia and coming out, including being afraid of a parent’s reaction, though there is no transphobia from Roger. Given the subject matter there’s a heavy dose of H/C in this, but it has a very fluffy and happy ending.

Notes: Written for an anon request for Reader being present!Roger’s kid who comes out as non-binary, with everyone else being unaccepting and Roger being the best dad ever. Y/N is the notation for the Reader’s chosen name, and D/N is the notation for their deadname. I’ve left their parentage unspecified, so you can fill in the blanks as you please.

(Turns out, I have a soft spot for writing trans!Readers and once I started working on this I just couldn’t stop. I hope you like it, anon, because I loved writing it ♥)

“I just don’t, you know, get it,” your best friend says, and you feel that familiar pit in your stomach start to grow. “I mean, you’re either a boy or a girl, yeah? You can’t just make up other options.”

“I’m not making up- look, some people are born one thing but that’s not who they are-”

“Yeah, but you’re not telling me that you’re now the opposite gender, you’re trying to tell me that you’re… something else.”

You had explanations prepared before you started this conversation. You had memorized how you were going to define your non-binary identity, how you were going to debunk the idea of a gender binary, how you were going to explain the history of “they” as a single-person pronoun. Except you haven’t even gotten to the pronoun conversation yet, because despite all your preparations you weren’t expecting to be met with so much hostility from someone you had considered your closest friend.

And now when you need them the most all of those explanations are gone. Your mind feels filled with static, anxiety ramping up into outright panic, and you shove your hands into your jacket pockets to hide how badly they’re shaking. “Listen, I don’t- if you don’t understand that’s fine-” It’s really not, though. “-but I just... I just want you to support me in this.”

Your friend sighs. It sounds annoyed, and your heart beats painfully fast in your chest. “Look, D/N…”

“It’s Y/N.” You had told her that at the beginning of the conversation.

“Yeah, I’m probably not going to remember that.” She makes a show of glancing down at her phone, but you can see that the screen is black without any notifications. “Listen, I’ve gotta go. We’ll talk about this later, okay?”

It takes you a moment to find your voice, and by the time you finally say, “Okay,” she’s already walking away.

You stay where you are for several long minutes, blinking back tears and swallowing down anxiety and feeling so stupid for thinking that your friend would be any different than anyone else you’ve tried to come out to.

Because you started with the LGBT+ group at your university, only to find that there were no other trans people there and the cis members looked at you with suspicion when you gave your pronouns. So instead you checked out a trans youth group in the city, which ended up being full of binary trans people making their way through a series of transitions that you’re not even sure if you want yet.

You had gone to the student services office to see if you could get your name changed on your university paperwork and you were immediately dismissed. “Come back with proof of your legal name change, or an override letter from your advisor,” you were told. So you had gone to your advisor to plead your case and he had looked at you with pity, and recommended that you go to the health center to get resources to deal with your stress and “confusion”.

And you went to the health center, because maybe talking this over with a therapist would do you some good. But once you had said you were non-binary the therapist had started with a line questioning that you weren’t comfortable with: How’s your relationship with your parents? Did you have a difficult childhood? Do you feel unheard or unnoticed in your daily life?

You left her office with a second appointment made under your deadname that you don’t think you’ll be going to, and more confusion in your heart than when you first walked in.

You sniffle a few times, and wipe at your eyes, and finally leave the place where you had met your friend. Ex-friend, now, probably, and fuck that’s not a thought you think you can handle right now. You don’t think you can handle much of anything at the moment, to be honest. Even simply being in public is making your skin crawl, and you hurry home as quickly as you can because at least there you’ll feel safe.

You throw your bag down on the floor and curl up in a ball on the couch, and everything just hits you at once. You start sobbing, remembering the look of disgust on your friend’s face, the way the therapist constantly misgendered you, the uncomfortable feeling of being both too trans and not trans enough depending on where you went, and having no idea how you’re supposed to navigate this confusing path when you’re so fucking alone.

You just want someone, anyone to support you in this. You want someone to call you Y/N and “they” without stumbling over name or pronoun. You want that so badly that the wish feels like a physical ache in your chest. Hell, you’d even take the mistakes, you’d take the slip-ups, you’d take the accidental misgendering and deadnaming as long as it was accidental. As long as it meant that someone cared enough to make the effort to try.

You’re crying so hard that you don’t hear the door open or the quiet footsteps that announce someone else’s arrival in the house. It’s not until you feel a hand pet your hair and a gentle voice ask, “D/N, dear, what’s wrong?” that you realize your dad is home.

Roger is crouched down on one knee in front of you and he looks worried, understandable considering that he found his child bawling their eyes out on the living room sofa. “I- I-” you try to explain, but your breath catches in your throat and before you can stop yourself you’re crying again.

Roger wraps his arms around you and you bury your face against his shoulder, soaking his shirt with your tears. “It’s alright, D/N, whatever it is, it’ll be alright,” he says, trying to soothe you, but his words and your deadname only ratchet your anxiety up even more.

It’s not alright and you don’t know how you’re going to explain this to your dad without coming out and you can’t do that, you can’t, because if he freaks out and reacts like everyone else you don’t know what you’re going to do-

“D/N, D/N, dear, you have to calm down,” Roger says, rubbing one hand along your back. “Try to match your breathing with mine, yeah? In… and out… and in again…”

Your first inhale is a desperate gasp, quickly choked off by another sob, but Roger is patient and he keeps coaxing you through each breath, grounding you until the panic attack subsides and your crying finally stops. “Feeling better?” Roger asks quietly. You shrug, as best you can with your dad’s arms still around you and your face still hidden against him. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not particularly,” you mumble.

It’s a response that you know isn’t going to fly, and you’re not surprised when Roger sighs and says, “Yes, well, I’m a little worried about you now. I just want to know if everything’s alright.”

“Obviously not.” Roger pokes you in the side and despite yourself you manage a small smile. You pull back, wiping at your eyes for a moment before Roger gently pulls your hands away and rubs at the tear tracks on your face with his sleeve. You can see the concern in his eyes and it makes you feel guilty enough that you find yourself saying, “I, ah, I had a fight with a friend this afternoon.”

“Must’ve been one hell of a fight.” Roger offers you a small grin, but it does little to comfort you as you remember exactly how the conversation with your friend had gone.

“Yeah, it was,” you say in a small, watery voice. “I don’t… I don’t think we’re friends anymore, actually.”

“Now, don’t say that,” Roger says. “Believe me, I’ve had some nasty arguments with some very dear friends in my time, but once you both cool down and can talk it out…”

You shake your head. “I don’t think there’s any coming back from this. She thinks I’m crazy, or a- a freak.”

Roger frowns in obvious confusion. “Why the hell would she think that?”

It’s always been easy to talk to your dad and now you’ve gone and said too much without realizing it. So you don’t answer his question and Roger sighs again, a little more frustrated this time. He stands up with a small groan, his joints protesting at the movement, and sits next to you on the couch, wrapping one arm around your shoulders. You want to lean into his embrace but you hold yourself stiff and apart, afraid to let down your guard for fear of saying something that will irreparably ruin your relationship with your dad.

“Listen, D/N, I hope you know that you can tell me anything,” Roger says. The more he calls you by your deadname the more you struggle not to flinch at the sound of it. You know he’s not using the wrong name on purpose, but that doesn’t make hearing it hurt any less. “I don’t care if you’ve murdered someone, you’re still my kid and I’ll still do anything I can to help.”

He sounds so sincere that for a moment you don’t think about the terrible reactions you’ve had from everyone you’ve come out to so far. You just think about how this is your dad, the one who’s always been there for you no matter what, the one who’s supported every decision you’ve ever made even if he didn’t agree with it, the one who’s always been your rock even as he lets you forge your own path in life.

He’s Roger Taylor. He was close friends with Freddie Mercury, he’s a patron of Cornwall Pride, and he’s never shown even the slightest hint of homophobia in your entire life. And transphobia may be a beast of an entirely different nature, as you’re quickly finding out yourself, but you have to believe that he’ll be equally accepting of your gender because you don’t think you can keep struggling forward on your own anymore.

Of course, actually getting the words out is slightly more difficult, especially as your anxiety spikes again at the thought of what you’re about to do. “I… Well, I…”

“Take your time with it, D/N, there’s no rush.”

And that’s a perfect, albeit unexpected, opening. “Actually, that’s… I don’t want to be called D/N anymore.”

“Alright,” Roger says, without a second of hesitation. “What would you like to be called instead?”

You take a deep breath. “Y/N.”

“Y/N,” Roger repeats, and your heart sings at the sound of your true name being spoken without derision or disdain. Roger grins at you and adds, “Good choice. I like it.”

You laugh, a little breathless and a lot nervous, and say, “Thanks. But that’s not- that’s not everything.”

Roger gives you the space to collect yourself, staying quiet for once and simply waiting for you to finish your explanation. You take another deep breath and let it out slowly. Your dad’s arm is heavy around your shoulders, the silence between you nearly suffocating as you open your mouth, struggling to find the right words at first before you manage to say, “I- I also want to be called “they” from now on.”

This time there is a pause from Roger and you wait, heart hammering in your chest, for the few too-long seconds before he finally says, “I can do that. Can you explain why, though?”

“I’m non-binary.”

The words hang in the air and you think you’ve never been more terrified in your dad’s presence than you are in this moment, waiting to hear his response to your announcement. Part of you wants to bolt out of the room before he says anything. A much larger part of you doesn’t want to move out of his hug, irrationally afraid that this may be the last one you’ll ever have. You know he loves you, but he’s also of a certain generation, and you’re not sure which of those facts is going to win out in this situation.

“I’m afraid I don’t know what that means,” Roger admits. “You’re gonna have to help an old man out here.”

“It’s a transgender identity, only instead of a binary man or binary woman I’m…” Something else, you had intended to say, but you remember your former best friend sneering those words at you and they stick in your throat, and you find that you can’t finish your sentence.

“So you’re transgender, then,” Roger says. You nod, staring down at the floor instead of at your dad. “But you’re not strictly a man or woman… something in-between, then? Or neither at all?”

You shrug. “Something like that, yeah. It’s just... I’m non-binary. That’s it.”

“Okay,” Roger says easily. You look up at him, hesitant, afraid that despite his words you’ll find a look of disgust on his face, but the only thing there is the same love and acceptance that you’ve known your whole life. You can feel tears well up in your eyes again, and Roger’s face softens as he says, “Oh, Y/N…”

Hearing him use your real name so easily sets you off and you start crying again, burying your face in your hands until Roger coaxes you back upright and holds you close to his chest. You don’t even know why you’re crying anymore, except that you feel fragile around the edges, like there’s nothing you can do to hold back your emotions anymore now that you’re no longer hiding this last part of yourself.

Luckily the tears stop quicker this time, and when you sit back up you’re quick to apologize with, “God, I’m so sorry, I don’t know why I’m being such a crybaby about this-”

“Hey now, don’t apologize,” Roger tells you. “You’ve had a hell of a day, I think you’re allowed to be a bit emotional.” He wipes your tears away again and maybe it should make you feel babied, but it’s such a familiar act from your dad that it’s a comfort to have him do it now. It’s a small assurance that coming out really hasn’t changed anything.

Still, you can’t help but ask, “Are you really okay with all of this?”

“Of course,” Roger says immediately. “You’re still my kid, Y/N. This doesn’t change that. And honestly, I already told you that I’d help if you murdered someone, this is absolutely harmless in comparison to that…”

You do smile at your dad’s attempt to lighten the situation, but you’re entirely sincere when you tell him, “Thank you anyway. You’re… Well, you’re actually the first good reaction I’ve had so far.”

Roger’s face goes stormy at that, but his voice stays even when he says, “Right, you said you had a row with your friend...”

“And my academic advisor said I was “confused”, and the LGBT group on campus clearly didn’t want me there…” You shake your head, as if you can physically remove those thoughts, and you say, “Sorry. I don’t want to think about that now.”

“That’s fine,” Roger says, though it’s clear he’s not alright with even your brief summary of your previous attempts to come out. “But listen, Y/N, if you ever want me to throw a lawyer or two at your uni to sort shit out…” You laugh at the suggestion, and Roger just grins. “What? What’s the use of being rich and famous if I can’t use that to make things easier for my kid?”

It is a tempting idea, but not one you’re really capable of seriously entertaining at the moment. Instead you stand up, pulling your dad to his feet as well, and say, “You can use some of those Queen royalties to order takeout instead.”

“You have plenty of pocket money to order your own food, Y/N,” Roger tells you, but it’s a token protest at best and although he sighs and makes a show of rolling his eyes he’s already pulling out his phone to order the food. “What do you even want, Y/N?”

“Are you going to call me Y/N in every sentence now?” you ask instead of answering his question.

Roger raises an eyebrow at you. “Does it bother you?”

“No. Not at all.” On the contrary you love hearing someone finally call you by your real name.

“Then yeah,” Roger says. “Seems like I have twenty-odd years of calling you the wrong name to make up for, after all.”

You can feel tears prick at the corner of your eyes again, but this time you manage to hold them back. You hug your dad tightly and whisper another, “Thank you.”

Roger presses a kiss to your temple, his beard tickling your skin. “Of course. I love you, Y/N.”

“Love you too dad,” you say, and you mean it with every fiber of your being. None of your previous horrible interactions seem to matter anymore because you know your dad has your back. And with Roger Taylor in your corner, you’re pretty sure you’ll be able to get through anything else that’s thrown in your path.

#roger taylor fic #roger taylor fanfic #roger taylor fanfiction #queen band fic #reader insert fic #transphobia tw //#my fic #roger #(I don't actually know how to tag a reader insert gen fic?? so I hope this works lmfao)

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sanderssidesfanfiction · 5 years ago

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We’ll Carry On - Chapter Thirty

We’ll Carry On Tag

General Content Warnings: Sympathetic Deceit Sanders, Substance Abuse, Abandonment, Minor Character Death, Transphobia, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Dissociation, Bullying, Homophobia

August 25th, 2000

Emile gave both his parents one last hug. “Thanks Mom, Dad. I promise I’ll call soon,” he said.

His mom and dad just smiled as they packed the last of his things in his car together. “You’ll do fine, Emile. Don’t feel pressured to call us if you can’t do it every week,” his mom advised. “Of course, I won’t object to you calling every week, but...”

Emile laughed. His dad gave him a hug. “I’m so proud of you, son. Go out and get that degree, so you can be the world’s best therapist, like you’ve been wanting to do since you were twelve.”

“I will,” Emile promised. “And I’ll call when I can, and write when I can’t, and I love you both.”

The three of them hugged, before Emile drove all the way to his college, teary-eyed. This was it. He was on his own, figuring out what he wanted to do with his life. It was nerve-wracking, but also incredibly freeing.

He already knew he was going to miss his parents, though.

July 13th, 2019

Logan was fiddling with his hair in his room, pulling faces in the mirror he was holding up to mess with it. “You doing okay, Logan?” Emile asked.

“Fine,” Logan said, voice only cracking a little. “Just want to look presentable to your parents.”

Emile shook his head fondly and walked over, fixing Logan’s cowlicks with a little hair gel. “You’ll do fine, Logan. You look your best when you’re relaxed. Don’t stress so much. My parents are going to love you and your brothers.”

“I hope so,” Logan said softly.

“I know so,” Emile asserted. “They fell in love with Remy the second they met him, and immediately asked me when I planned to pop the question. In front of him. They’re just like me, in that sense. So just treat them with the same respect you give me, and you’ll do fine.”

Logan nodded. “Would a tie be too much, then?”

Emile smiled. “I would say no, but only because I know you love wearing ties anyway. There’s no need for your Sunday best around my parents. They’ve seen some silly pictures of you anyway, from your brothers’ escapades and your reactions. They’re not going to expect you to be poised all the time, or even want that from you.”

“I’m not used to grandparents being understanding,” Logan muttered.

“I know,” Emile said, helping Logan with his tie. “But you’re going to do great, understand me?”

Logan nodded as a car door closed outside. “That must be them,” Emile said with a smile. “Let’s go greet them, shall we?”

Vanellope was waiting at the door, tail wagging as she watched Emile’s parents through the screen door. She squirmed excitedly as Logan put her leash on and walked out of the house with her to greet Emile’s parents. Emile followed Logan out, keeping a steady hand on Logan’s shoulder. “Hey Mom, Dad! It’s been a little while!” he laughed.

“I know it has, you missed Christmas!” his mother scolded, but she was smiling. “You never missed Christmas with us before!”

“We didn’t want to shock Roman quite that soon,” Emile said, walking over and giving his mom a hug. “Dad, how are you?”

“Still stunned that I get to meet five grandchildren. I wasn’t even expecting one, let alone five!” his dad exclaimed.

Emile laughed and he hugged his dad, as he heard the front door open more behind him, and he could hear Roman chatting with Virgil and Patton. The three of them grew quiet as Emile stepped back, and they looked decidedly uncertain. “Mom, Dad, you can see Logan, holding Vanellope; he’s sixteen. Roman is the second oldest and second tallest; he’s twelve for one more week. The twins are Patton and Virgil, Patton is the one who looks like me, and Virgil is the blond; they’re both eight. And...where’s Dee?”

“Inside,” Roman said. “He’s attached himself to Ami’s leg and refused to let go.”

Emile laughed. “Well, then, you’ll see Dee when you go inside and Remy finds a way to walk around without hurting him. He’s six.”

His dad shook his head. “How do you accidentally adopt five kids, Emile?”

“Well, I told you I was a sperm donor in college, right?” Emile asked.

His dad stared at him blankly for one, two, three seconds. Then, he started to laugh. “Wait a second...all these kids...are yours? Biologically?!”

“Uh...yeah,” Emile said, scratching the back of his neck. “Whoops?”

His dad only laughed harder. His mother shook her head fondly. “Well, I always knew you were destined for chaos, Emile, but this isn’t quite what I was expecting.”

“Yeah,” Emile said. “Shall we go inside, though? I can grab your bags.”

“Nonsense, we can carry our own bags, Emile,” his dad said. “You get that lovely husband of yours and our youngest grandson.”

“Will do,” Emile said with a laugh. He walked back inside and could hear faint murmuring as he entered the house, no doubt Logan introducing himself. “Hey, Rem, Mom and Dad are here!”

He could hear quiet murmuring from the kitchen and he followed the noise to find Remy hugging Dee, who was shaking like a leaf. “Rem?” he asked.

“Dee’s worried about the new people,” Remy said softly. “Apparently new people usually weren’t good in the past.”

“Aw, don’t worry, Dee, Mom and Dad will love you,” Emile said. “They’re your grandparents, how could they not like you?”

Dee looked at Emile uncertainly and signed, “What if they want me to talk?”

“They know that you prefer signing to speaking, Dee, and they’ve been trying to re-learn sign to talk to you in your preferred language,” Emile explained. “My parents want to accommodate you as much as possible. I got it from somewhere, I didn’t just spring out from the ground wanting to help everyone I saw.”

Dee still looked uncertain.

“Look, you can stay with Ami if you want, or you can come with me, both of us are going to wind up in the living room with your grandma and granddad. And if you get overwhelmed, you’re always free to leave,” Emile said softly.

Dee nodded and signed, “I’ll stay with Ami.”

“Okay. If you want, you can help him with drinks, but don’t cling to his leg so that he can’t move, okay? He likes seeing my parents too,” Emile said.

Dee nodded and Emile moved back through the house to the living room, where Logan was sitting with Vanellope in his lap on the floor, and Roman, Patton, and Virgil were playing together on one of the couches, while his parents were on the other. “Dee and Remy should be in shortly,” he informed them.

“That’s good,” his mom said. “Logan was just telling us about his transition, and how much you and Remy have helped him.”

Logan turned a bit pink. “I mean, I wouldn’t have started my transition at all without Dad and Ami by my side,” he said. “It’s only fair to thank them, and give them the recognition they deserve.”

Emile smiled. “I’m happy that you feel more comfortable in your skin, Logan. Everyone deserves to feel like themselves.”

“Seconded!” Roman exclaimed.

“Thirded!” Patton and Virgil said at the same time. “Same hat!” they said, pointing at each other.

Logan laughed.

Remy walked in, and Dee wasn’t quite clinging to Remy’s legs, but he was hiding behind them. Emile’s parents were the picture perfect definition of surprised. “Oh, I think I see one more grandchild!” his dad exclaimed. “Is this Dee?”

Dee poked his head out from behind Remy and offered a wave.

“Hi, Dee,” Emile’s mother signed. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Dee offered a shy smile in return as he signed back, “Likewise.”

Both of Emile’s parents smiled as Remy gave them both glasses of water. “Here you guys go. I know you must be tired after the long drive.”

“Thank you, Remy,” Emile’s mother said, standing up and kissing Remy on the cheek.

Dee looked shocked, as did Patton and Virgil. “What, have you guys never seen positive familial affection before?” Roman asked.

“My mother would sometimes to that to me,” Logan offered. “Even if she wasn’t the greatest person in the world.”

Dee just shook his head. “Mama didn’t do that for me in ages,” he signed.

Emile just sighed. “I really wish she would have,” he said, “Because you deserve it.”

Dee came over and hugged Emile and Emile hugged him back. “I know, it’s still hard,” he murmured.

“It’s always hard,” Dee signed as he pulled back.

“I know,” Emile said softly. “But you’ll get through it. You’re one tough cookie.”

“I was overbaked?” Dee asked.

Emile laughed. “You know what I mean,” he said.

“Yeah,” Dee agreed. “But taking things literally is what I do.”

“I know it is,” Emile said. “That’s one of the symptoms of being autistic, actually.”

Dee furrowed his eyebrows. “Really?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Emile said. “It’s really interesting, actually. There’s many different symptoms, and people rarely have all of them, because it’s such a varied spectrum! But that’s a fairly common one!”

Dee made an interested noise in the back of his throat and grinned, his tongue pushing against his bottom teeth, making one of them shake. He jumped and felt at it in surprise.

“Ohhhh,” Patton said. “Dee, you’re starting to lose your baby teeth!”

“What?!” Dee asked in clear alarm.

“No, it’s okay, that’s normal!” Patton exclaimed, jumping off the couch and baring his teeth. “You see how some of my teeth are way bigger and some of them have gaps?”

Dee nodded.

“That’s because I lost a few of my teeth, and my adult teeth have started to grow in! It’s normal! Don’t worry, it just means you’re growing up!”

Dee’s face was shocked. He felt at his tooth. “It’s not very loose,” he signed.

“It gets looser the more your adult teeth grow in,” Patton explained. “Until eventually you can just pull it out with no pain!”

“Pull it out?” Dee asked.

“Well, yeah,” Virgil chimed in. “That’s how you make room for the adult teeth. But it’s okay! Because the Tooth Fairy comes at night and gives you money when you lose a tooth if you leave it for her!”

Dee’s eyes got really wide. “Really?!” he asked.

“Yeah!” Virgil said. “It’s been a while since I’ve lost a tooth, actually. Some of mine have to be getting loose soon.”

Emile watched the exchange fondly. His father cleared his throat. “So,” he paused for a minute, before he grinned. “Have you kids ever played a good game of badminton?”

“Dad!” Emile exclaimed with a laugh. “Are you seriously trying to convert them to sports already?!”

“Badminton can be fun,” Logan said. “It was one of the games I played to get my gym credit fulfilled in school, and I found it to be entertaining, and easy on the body.”

Emile’s dad pointed at Logan. “You. I like your style,” he said with a grin. “I brought a badminton net that we could set up in the backyard. Does that sound good? We could play a round or two.”

“Sure!” Logan agreed. “I’d have to change out of my binder, but I’d be game.”

Patton squealed and Logan cringed. “Pun not intended!” he exclaimed, pointing at Patton.

“Patton figured out what puns were in a joke book the other day, and he’s been trying to come up with them ever since,” Remy explained to Emile’s very confused parents.

“Puns are fun!” Patton exclaimed. “They’re like the kinds of jokes my friends dads would say when we’d go over to their houses to play!”

“Well, they are often called ‘Dad jokes,’” Roman said.

Patton stared at Roman in shock. “Really?!” he asked excitedly.

“Really,” Roman said with a laugh.

They all slowly moved outside, and the second Logan came out in a tank top and sports bra, Emile knew that Logan was not intent on losing against his grandfather in the game. “Logan, sunscreen!” Emile advised before Logan could get off the deck.

Logan looked at him in exasperation but obligingly sprayed sunscreen on his arms and legs, and smeared some on his face and neck. He pulled a face as he rubbed the excess sunscreen off on a napkin. “That stuff feels disgusting,” he said.

“I know, but it will help,” Emile said. “Now go on and play the one sport you find enjoyable.”

Logan gave him a smile and ran into the yard to help put up the net and grab a racket. Roman grabbed one as well, and Emile’s father did too. Remy laughed and called, “I’ll join for doubles!” taking off his jacket and donning his sunglasses, grabbing the fourth and final racket they had.

Emile’s dad teamed up with Roman and as he hit the birdie over the net, the game began. There was running and shouting and a lot of laughter, and Emile watched them with a smile on his face from the safety of the deck. Dee was playing with Vanellope, and Patton and Virgil were refereeing, which left Emile and his mom with some much needed time to catch up.

#we'll carry on #sanders sides fanfiction #emile picani #remy sanders #deceit sanders #logan sanders #our creations #danger gays

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ryuutchi · 5 years ago

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Dearest Yulegoat [Mirrored Yuletide Letter]

[General]

To start with, if you're writing fic for me, I love you. I'm going to be happy just to be able to share my fandom love with someone. You'll notice I throw a lot of ideas out-- feel free to take one, take many, take none. I know how hard it can be to settle on an idea once the assignments come in. So I'm offering a bunch of options that I will enjoy. None of these suggestions are hard and fast requirements. They're here to give you an idea of what's going on in my head and what my preferences look like. My current blog is ryuutchi, over on Tumblr. I can't promise it will be helpful, but in the interest of helping with the stalking process, feel free to check me out over there. I like: Plot, adventures, banter and dry humor, happy endings, over the top AUs (steampunk, noir, organized crime, rum-runners, harems...), casual physical intimacy, emotional interdependency, bad decisions and poor coping mechanisms, hurt/comfort and whump-with-comfort, loyalty and morality confusion, worldbuilding, identity porn, questionable healthy attachments, seeking out physical affection, accidentally caught feelings, power-play, porn, gen, slash, femslash, het, any rating you feel comfortable with (for violence and/or sex), bittersweet things that are heavy on the sweet, Happily Ever After/Happily For Now endings I don't like: Deathfic, gratuitous angst, character-bashing, introspective character pieces, five times fics, mommy/daddy kink, A/B/O universes, contemporary social issues as the main focus/issuefic, sad or hopeless endings. (Also the standard DNWs: scat, watersports, necro, mpreg, homophobia, transphobia, etc) No Game No Life - Kamiya Yuu: Sora, Shiro The Series: They are both NEETs and Hikikomoris… but on the internet, the genius gamer siblings Sora and Shiro are known as the undefeatable “__” (blank). Sora and Shiro’s talents and skills are so abnormally good they are considered as urban legend. One day, they are challenged by the god of games to chess and are victorious. As a result, the god summons them to Disboard, a reality which revolves around games. Intent on maintaining their reputation as the undefeated gamers, Sora and Shiro plan to conquer the sixteen ruling species and to usurp the god of games... NGNL is a series of light novels, of which 6 have been translated (PDFs can be found here, or bought legally at any online bookstore). The No Game No Life anime can be found on Crunchyroll here. Request: The fact that Shiro and Sora literally cannot be separated from each other is one of the dynamics that I like about the series. I really enjoy codependent siblings as a Thing. So I would be happy if you played with that dynamic. Plotty gen for this series would be great-- it's always fun when one of them is much better than the other or they have to separate and execute plans while relying solely on the intuition of what their sibling will do. Alternately, someone kidnapping Sora and Shiro having to play a game to get him back while they both battle their inability to get anything done alone... I'd love background on them, where they tried to separate or were forced to separate and failed to function, or where one or the other tried to interact with other people (maybe a gamer who tracked them down) but were either terrible at it, the other one quietly sabotaged the budding relationship, or the third person got way too freaked out by the way Sora and Shiro act around each other. Future fic would also be great-- King/Queen Blank or even the Gods Blank, after they've beaten Tet. What does that look like? What kind of world are they making for themselves and each other? I ship them, but do not expect other people to, so if you want to write shippy fic (with aged up Shiro!!!) for them, I will be surprised but happy. I will happily admit to wanting kinky sex games. Extra Details: For reference, I've read through volume 8 of the light novel, watched the anime and the movie. I am not precious about spoilers for this series, so feel free to use later information. I know this series isn't everyone's cup of tea, with the sheer amount of fanservice and Sora's utterly otaku personality and the pseudo-incest thing with the 12 year old. Personally, as is probably obvious from the request, I'm less interested in the fanservicey characters, and much more about the dynamics of Shiro and Sora's relationship. I love the way they know exactly what the other is capable of and trust each other completely and whole-heartedly. Whether you write something small and domestic or big and plotty, for me the core of NGNL is that they love, care and respect each other in a way that is beautiful but also extremely unhealthy. If you want to go the shippy route, again, Shiro needs to be aged up appropriately-- it's always been interesting to me that Sora understands that it is inappropriate to sexualize his underage adopted sister, while Shiro goes out of her way to help sexualize other women for Sora's entertainment. There's a part of me that wonders if she's planning ahead for when she is old enough to be an "appropriate" (in age, if nothing else) sexual partner and is trying to get Sora to lose his virginity ahead of time. selector infected WIXOSS: Aoi Akira, Igarashi Rumi | UlithThe Series: WIXOSS is a popular trading card game in which players battle against each other with fighters known as LRIGs, using cards to support them. Certain LRIGs are able to communicate with their owners, and the girls chosen to wield them are known as "Selectors". Selectors are given the chance to have any wish granted by winning battles against other Selectors, but should they lose three times, their wish will be reversed into a curse instead. The main series, selector infected WIXOSS, follows a girl named Ruko Kominato, who becomes a Selector after receiving an LRIG that she names Tama. As she and various other Selectors battle it out for the sake of their wish, Ruko finds herself drawn into the dark, sinister world of WIXOSS, discovering that, win or lose, there is always a price to pay. The anime can be found on Funimation here Request: So, you know how in my "general likes" I said I don't like "gratuitous angst"? In this fandom, there is no such thing as "gratuitous". Darkfic is absolutely welcome here. The thing I am most interested in here is the manipulative, awful relationship that Akira has with Ulith-as-Iona. Like, I love them all, and for some reason in this fandom, that comes out to "please break them". Exploring their adult lives and how their relationships and the Wixoss game affected them in the future would be amazing. What else happened to them? What are their careers like? What are their home lives like? Are they... living together? Does some sort of magic continue to be a theme in their lives? Feel free to write in-universe plot or no-powers universe, or some horrible Madoka or Yurikuma Arashi or other magical girl thing, where they can all be horribly manipulative lesbians together because that's magical and wonderful. OTOH, if you want to write codependent-but-vaguely-functional adult Akira and Iona/Ulith being horrible assholes and having adventures of some sort (magic, detectives, idk) that is ALSO A+. I mean, I like happy endings, and if you can come up with something heartwarming (or "heartwarming") I'm not going to complain. Extra Details: Evil lesbians are Problematic, I know. But Akira was one of my favorite characters from the word go and (if you're paying attention to my fandoms as a whole) I really really like codependent or unhealthy relationships. I love her love/hate relationship with Iona and with Ulith, and the way those two characters sort of get mixed up for Akira specifically. If you want to play with Iona and Ulith's personalities and interactions as well, that would also be pretty fun. I'm also down for other types of AUs, like they have to get their shit together and track down someone who is killing Selectors, or they become selectors as adults and not girls. I know they're young, but given that this is a super-fucking dark canon, I am totally cool with dubiously consensual sex either on or off-screen. FANDOM: Yoroiden Samurai Troopers | Ronin Warriors (Shuu Rei Fuan | Kento Rei Fang, Mouri Shin | Cye Mouri) The Series: Ronin Warriors, known in Japan as Yoroiden Samurai Troopers (lit. "Legendary Armor Samurai Troopers"), is a Japanese anime series and manga adaptation created by Hajime Yatate. It's the story of five teenage boys, given mystical armor to protect the world from the evil Arago. 1000 years ago, Arago nearly succeeded in taking over the human world when Kaosu managed to defeat him. Although Arago's soul is banished to the demon world, his armor is left intact. Kaosu divided the armor into nine separate armor suits. Each armor will choose its bearer, and together they will fight Arago. At least that was the original intent... Although Arago manages to corrupt four sets of the armor, the last five remain safe. It's a bit like Power Rangers, only grounded in more serious traditional Japanese cultural trappings. Being created in the 80s, the art style is a little wonky, but it's an enjoyable thriller and is somewhat more focused and serious than a lot of sentai shows. The anime can be found on Crunchyroll here Request: I love Shuu/Shin with Shin being snarktastic and Shuu being smug and solid and dependable. I used to frequent the Minkland archive back when this fandom still kinda existed, and was forever disappointed that the skinny pretty boys got tons and tons of fic and Shuu was just sort of there in the background. (If you used to read Mink and Jink's fic, I will be so happy I could cry if I got that sort of cracked-out porny fic with Shuu, okay. Due to that formative influence, if you want to GO FOR THE AU, GO FOR IT WITH GUSTO. I've always wanted nanshoku/samurai AU. Or, you know, hooker fic, or dark!troopers fic, or harem fic or something like that. I also like found-family fic, gen-ish mysteries and adventures-- more fighting Massive Cosmic Evil, and curtainfic. Futurefic is also awesome, where they get on with their lives, maybe together or maybe trying to keep their friendships intact when there's no massive Cosmic Evil to keep them close. Extra Details: If you used to read Mink and Jink's fic, I will be so happy I could cry if I got that sort of cracked-out porny, possibly AU fic with Shuu, okay Fics I especially enjoyed from that archive: The Grand One The Clit Club Chronicles The Harem Vinyl Wagashi Cherry Zima Threesome Theater of Magic Due to that formative influence, if you want to GO FOR THE AU, GO FOR IT WITH GUSTO. I've always wanted nanshoku/samurai AU (see this image). Or, you know, hooker fic, or dark!troopers fic, or harem fic or something like that. My usual ships are Shin/Shuu, Shin/Ryo, Touma/Seiji and Ryo/Nasuti. But I multiship and am willing to run with anything-- I'm a Sex With All Teammates sort of person, so fivesomes and alternate pairings are not a problem for me. Dragon Prince Trilogy - Melanie Rawn: Ianthe of Princemarch, Sioned of River Run The Series: To blatantly steal someone else's review on Amazon: "Melanie Rawn created a world and a people that gives everything you could possibly want in a fantasy world. It gives love, hate, peace, war, magic, royalty, commoners, children to take over the next generation and best of all; dragons." I want to say "if this wasn't the matched fandom you should go out and read them right the fuck now', because I have read these books So Many Times. They're high fantasy novels about politics and the prince of a desert and magical people who communicate via sunlight and can conjure fire. AND DRAGONS. Also a lot of interpersonal and romantic maneuverings. It's a high fantasy politics and romance romp of somewhere ~550 pages. If that sounds interesting to you, pretty much every used bookstore I have ever been to has at least one copy of these books. I think they spawn on bookshelves or something. The books are also available in ebook form here (Kindle) and here (Nook) for 3 bucks. Please read them. (TW for rape in the first book) The Request: I love everything this series chooses to be. It's fun and cheesy and fantasy, which the best thing in the world. I've always thought that Ianthe had a serious hate-crush on Sioned and part of the reason she was so vicious and fucked up was that whole "you must marry a guy and expand the empire or your useless" thing when maybe she didn't want to do that. Ianthe's always been one of my favorite characters because she's brilliant and ruthless and clearly takes joy in clever plans that go well. Of course, being the villain in a cheesy fantasy, she got no depth whatsoever, aside from that whole sexually liberated, taking male consorts thing (which is AWESOME, okay.) Sioned is also awesome and brilliant and kick ass. Her hesitance in the first book while she decided what she really wanted to do was pretty great, as was the fact that she promptly made friends with Tobin and pretty much every character not designated "villain". It seems like up through Ianthe's death, they're playing a game of brinkmanship. (Which isn't to say I don't like Sioned and Rohan together. They're bookTP and totally awesome.) As for prompts, I normally prefer plotty fic to introspection. I feel like the whole sunrunner thing lends itself well to espionage, so political thriller, or murder mysteries or something would be great. If you want to do plot-what-plot involving these two-- either sex or just the sort of dancing around/pigtail pulling that would be great. Threesomes with Rohan-- also acceptable! Hell, if you want to do an AU where they end up together instead of Sioned marrying Rohan-- or alternately, an AU end to the trilogy, where Ianthe never died in the fire and ends up taking over as High Princess and making the Desert monarchs' lives hell and discovering her powers. Or something where she knew about her powers all along. Or Sioned, I don't know, realizing she kind of did think Ianthe was attractive. I also really enjoy Pandsala, but I didn't find her dynamic with Sioned and Rohan quite as engaging, even though she also did some bad-ass stuff in the long run. Her weird push and pull backstabby, politicized sisterly thing was interesting, though. Extra Details: Okay, like I said, I think this series is the cheesiest fantasy series in the WORLD and in a lot of ways it's one of my first nostalgia fandoms. If you haven't read them, they are kind of ridiculously long (Like, GRR Martin-long), but they're quick reads despite that and rather less depressing than a lot of high fantasy. It's silly in the way that "adult fantasy" that takes itself way too seriously can be. A lot of the main protagonists actively enjoy each others' company and that's as much integral to the book as the politics and dragon-slaying. That said, I kinda asked for a semi-serious plotty story. But if you want to run with the "it's cheesy fantasy" and want to write about Ianthe rescuing princesses or Sioned running away to be a knight and abducting Ianthe away from her toxic father, or something silly, I say get down with your nerd self and run with it. I've only read parts of the second trilogy, and the second generation aren't really very interesting to me. If you want to write future-fic, I would prefer that it continues to focus on the original generation (no matter how much I love Andry, Pol just seems like kind of a jerk).

House of M - New X-Men: Academy X: Any The Series: I'm surprised it took me so long to nominate and request this fandom. I love New X-Men and was GUTTED when Decimation forced them into killing off so many of the characters. If you've never read it, New X-Men: Academy X was an X-Man title in the mid-00's, focusing on entirely new students at Xavier's Academy, being taught by the more established characters. Some of the New X-Men have managed to escape and become general Marvel characters in their own rights (David Alleyne, for example), but for the most part, they were just teenagers at school who rarely got caught up in larger plots. 616 New X-Men were about teenagers fighting, and coming to grips with the fact that they're being raised and taught to go sacrifice themselves for a Greater Goal. They're all wonderfully, horribly traumatized teenagers with powers. The plots were fleshed out and realistic, and when they weren't they were still interesting or fun. This request isn't technically for that. It's for the House of M megacrossover from 2009. Wanda Maximoff, mutant reality shifter and sometimes-crazy-lady, decided that mutants should run the world. SO THEY DID. And suddenly the lives of our young students become very different. Half of them after still "New Mutants", working towards peace, and the others are "Hellions", SHIELD trainees in a violently anti-homo-sapien state system. I've always felt that House of M as a narrative concept has been dismissed too easily by Marvel fans, because there are so many pieces of worldbuilding left unbuilt. I'm most interested in seeing it from the eyes of younger participants who are being trained or have been trained for their places. What does that world look like? New X-Men: Academy X can be found online here: https://viewcomics.me/comic/new-x-men-2004. The House of M crossover runs for issues 16-19. The Request: There's a lot here to play with because the authors never really got to play in either the Academy X OR the House of M sandboxes long enough to do all of their ideas justice. So I'm going to lay out some of the stuff I liked most about NXM in general and HoM in particular. The nom is for HoM, but I think HoM is most interesting in conversation with the standard 616 universe, alongside having the fun YA action stuff and the complicated interpersonal relationships. For example: in 616 Josh joined the Reavers and pretended not to be a mutant until he was confronted with Laurie nearly dying. I can imagine a bunch of different scenarios for House of M that would lead to where we see Josh and Laurie in the HoM comics (Laurie undercover with the New Mutants, and Josh working as an interrogator alongside Kevin). Laurie's introversion in 616 juxtaposed against her brazen treachery and clear control over her skills in HoM. HoM shows Kevin in a full decontamination suit, but we know in 616 that his ability is blocked by wearing synthetic fibers (I imagined this to be a interrogator scare tactic, but it could be any number of other things). Kevin and Josh's relationship in 616 is fraught, especially with Josh's previous experiences with anti-mutant activists and the fact that Kevin killed his father when his powers manifested. But they seemed to work together well in HoM. And speaking of Kevin-- how did his powers manifesting actually pan out in a universe where mutants aren't seen as a threat? I have to wonder whether there's some concept of "acceptable casualties" because some peoples' powers clearly manifest first in dangerous situations. Alternatively: Fluffy Josh/Kevin with a backdrop of torture, murder and state violence. I ship mostly Josh/Kevin because rivals-to-lovers and boy-who-kills-anything-he-touches/boy-who-cannot-be-killed is Great For Me. I also love the abuse of powers and manipulation involved in being interrogators/torturers(/murderers?) for the House of Magneto. They work together, they hurt people together, but maybe they also... smooch? THAT SAID! Adding Laurie to that ship is always a great way to fuck up and destabilize them! Especially in HoM, where we know she's already keeping secrets and can and WILL use her pheromones to fuck with people. And David! OH, DAVID. The only real New Mutant in this request. Does he have previous relationships with Josh and/or Kevin? I don't mind David/Noriko, but I also ship David with Kevin and Josh, and also Tommy and Teddy from Young Avengers, if you feel like exploring other parts of the HoM world. I have never considered David/Laurie before, but if you want to give it a whirl, I'm down. As for David-- His responses to state violence (as evidenced by the Hellions and SHIELD) are clearly different from the rest of the requested characters, and it would be interesting to explore David and his experience of this universe. Are his powers still restrained the same way? I know he supposedly dies at the end of the HoM mini-arc, but we never see them die, so feel free to write David managing to crawl off and plan to take down everything and everyone. A specific DNW for this fandom is Josh/Rahne. I don't mind the relationship having existed and impacting the characters, but only as a past relationship.

Extra Details:

SENSORY DETAILS. When it comes to magic and meta powers-- especially ones that aren't battle-oriented-- is what they feel like. What does it MEAN for David to be able to know anything someone else knows? What does the emptiness and fullness of it do to him? Josh's powers are all tactile and his body actively changes after trauma (in 616, first by turning him gold, then by creating black spots on his skin after he kills someone for the first time). Does his power always alter him, but usually in unnoticeable ways? What can he know and feel from a touch? Same for Kevin-- does withering sate a hunger, or make him feel worse? What would it feel like if he touched Josh? And Laurie... I'd love both her thought-process and the sensory details of what she's doing. Can she smell her own pheromones? Do they ever affect her? What does she feel like when she's manipulating people so subtly that they barely notice a passing smell? If you want to bring in other 616 knowledge and see what it looks like in HoM, that's cool. So is bringing in other HoM storylines. There's a throw-away line in Luke Cage's HoM crossover that the Runaways are known as an organized crime group. Cage himself runs a resistence cell (and given the end of the NXM crossover, David seems like he'd be willing to throw in with that lot). Young Avengers, the other New X-Men who weren't given much screentime in the HoM crossover-- I'd love any of that. Young Justice (Comics): Match, Tim Drake

The Series: Comics are confusing! This request is for the late-90s version of Young Justice by Peter David, which consisted of Robin, Impulse, Superboy, Arrowette, Secret, and Wonder Girl, along with others. It's very much a young-heroes-trying-to-make-their-way. Unlike the newer show, this Young Justice tended to be left on their own without much of a guiding hand. It was a very 90s comic, with very 90s fashion and a lot of nod-nod-wink-wink in-jokes. I love it because it's a series that always wore its humor on its sleeve. It's an affectionate look at young superheroes, and allowed them to react to teen problems alongside the more standard superhero tropes. There's the possibility for angst and darkness (and once they graduated to Teen Titans especially, that came up more), but they were allowed to be both hurt and upset AND fun and cheerful. The comics weren't available collected until last year (it took them TWENTY YEARS JFC), and it's well-worth buying from your local retailer, but you can also find them online here. The character I'm requesting first appeared in Superboy's solo series (starting in issue #35), which can be found here and again in the first volume of Young Justice: Sins of Youth. The Request: SO! I have always loved Match in the original YJ and Superboy comics, and the writers gave him really short shrift. We have a clone of Kon, who is as smart, if not smarter, can pretend to be Kon for extended periods of time— but every time he tries, people get hurt or die. I’ve always wondered how Tim felt that he literally couldn’t tell his best friend from an imposter. And then Match went and ran off and disappeared and no one ever seemed to consider what he was doing, after thousands of his/Kon’s siblings/clones were murdered essentially in front of him and the Agenda fell apart. (I’m not entirely surprised that Kon didn’t pay attention to all of those clones of him dying, but think about it from the standpoint of someone for whom those were supposed to be an army of his siblings. What a way to get survivor’s guilt.) Did Match go to Lex? It doesn’t seem like it, but given that as Kon’s clone, he’s technically Lex’s son too, it’s a possibility. Or alternately! He got himself out of the superhero game and did something else! What was it? I’d also love for a story about him wanting to be a super and have that family that Kon and Clark have, but being shut out of that world because he’s a “villain”. Or him getting that family after so long. Or him showing up at the Kents’ place because “fuck it, if Kon can have this, so can I” and it goes… well or poorly, depending on you. Or him finding his own family in a place that is separate from the who superhero thing, and Kon or Tim or Clark stumbling on him. Or Lex trying to use him— whether or not it works is up to you, although I’d love for it to touch on Match’s need to be part of something larger— after all, he was built and trained to be the vanguard for an army that was summarily murdered in front of him. Tim's refusal to even vaguely hint about his real identity during this time is fun too-- we have two boys who are both hiding their identities in different ways. It makes me wonder if Tim COULD have figured Match out, if the Sins of the Youth plotline didn't happen or was delayed somehow, because he seems to have all of the pieces of information. Or maybe Match-as-Kon was the only person Tim revealed part of his real name too, and has to deal with the ramifications of trust. Actually, Tim and the Issues Of Trust is the YA novel that I'd love to see Tim and Match (and Kon and the rest of YJ) star in. Bring back Mr Sarcastic (PLEASE bring back Mr Sarcastic) and Alvin Draper. Bring back the way that Tim hides by burrowing under identities and performances, and collects information on everyone he knows. I love detective stories and, out of all the Bats, Tim has always struck me as one of the best actual detectives, rather than crime-fighters. So Tim getting lost in a mystery will always make me happy. There's also something interesting about a group of young teens fighting for their own autonomy and identity. At this point in Tim's story, I think he was still thinking of the Robin thing as almost an extracurricular, and probably grappling with how hard it is on him physically, as well as mentally. So, I guess struggling for a coherent snse of self and agency are really interesting touchstones in this fandom. ALSO, MY DEEPLY HELD RARE PAIR FROM THE 90s: Tim/Match! See above, re: Match being present for Identity Crisis instead of Kon. I’d love Match to be trying to follow Kon’s footsteps re: Cassie, and being way more into Tim, which leads to Tim being confused and into Kon. Also any of the above prompts can include Tim (maybe Tim tries to help cushion a meeting between Match and Kon or Clark! Or maybe he just ends up Match’s sugar daddy. I’m down.) Although this request is ripe for dubious identity weirdness with Match pretending to be Kon, I'd really prefer that you focus on Match getting to be his own person, even if there's some pretending-to-be-Kon in there. Extra Details: This has been a lowkey love of mine for literally decades. My absolute favorite gift of all time was original pages from one of the Superboy issues where Match appears for the first time. And as I've grown older, my love for this rare, obscure character has deepened. Also, as I've grown older, I've begun to want more adult!Match, or growing up!Match just because the idea of growing up in the margins of superhero culture after everything that happened to him is really interesting. He was straight-up groomed and brainwashed, and then the Agenda was gone, so how did he cope? What is he doing now? What kind of adult does he make? This request is specifically for the mid-90s comic, so feel free to stick to that. But if you read the 2010-era Teen Titans and want to explore some later story choices-- like Match becoming Bizarro-like, Slade making him part of Titans East, or his fear that Jericho would hurt the Titans in his body, or save Match from Superboy-Prime, I'm not going to complain. (Personal headcanon time: I think Slade was trying to mind control Match with the same stuff he used on Rose, and it caused the Bizarro-like symptoms). I also love Elseworlds and mirror!verse stuff too. As I've said elsewhere in the letter, I really prefer Happily Ever After/Happily For Now stuff, and I prefer my bittersweet fics heavy on the sweetness. Please give Match the love and affection he's always deserved. But also, please feel free to make both Match and Tim HURT first.

#yuletide #dear yuletide author #no game no life #selector infected wixoss #wixoss #yoroiden samurai troopers #dragon prince #young justice #new xmen

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thealpacalypse-archive · 6 years ago

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i-haveno-lyfe

replied to your post

“A handy guide to avoid accidental transphobia”

I totally agree with everything you said and all, but on a side note, when you said we don't have to go into detail of his past trauma because it may trigger trauma for Trans people who went through it, isn't that what any writing is like? Yeah sure the trans issue is way more sensitive than other topics, but a lot of gay movies/stories that give an insight into how bad it was for them at the start or being in a shaming society...etc can trigger gays who went thru that-

-also goes for writing about the suffering of a mental illness to ppl with that illness, abusive relationships, losing a close individual, losing a pet, cutting, bullying... Surely whatever you write or indulge into will trigger someone at some point due to some sort of PTSD, so I don't think it's a valid point to use (though what makes it valid is whether you're writing it just to add for no reason or is him being trans the whole focus of this fic you're writing)

Also, really not hating at all and agree with most of what you said, but your view would differ greatly if a trans wrote that fic and decided to write about his 'trauma'. I do understand how irritating it can be to see a cis person 'fantasize about the suffering' but have you considered they may actually be very informed about it or know someone like that close to them? I just think you generalized a bit. Otherwise, very appreciated post

okay so let’s unpack this.

writing as a way to deal with trauma: yes, absolutely, for many people, a way to work through the pain they’ve experienced can be through fiction. I didn’t say no one should write about trauma. I just pointed out that there’s a notorious pattern of cis people writing stories about trans folks that are almost exclusively about the pain and suffering of it. I also asked kindly to put trigger warnings on posts and fic that deal with heavy transphobia, because that’s what people need to be able to engage healthily and in a healing way with media that deals with their trauma. Seems pretty reasonable to me.

everything can be a trigger: yeah, sure, and some triggers are so impossible to predict that we can’t possibly tag everything. but transphobia isn’t one of these triggers that are hard to predict, and if you think about it, it should always be seen as negative instead of like, the song “Somewhere Over The Rainbow” which is a personal trigger for me - the song is harmless and nice, and i’m not gonna judge anyone for singing it, but instead remove myself out of the situation. Transphobia is inherently bad, so it’s to be expected that it’s gonna upset people. So the responsibility to make it safe is for the people talking about it, not for the people triggered by it. which again, is not saying that no one should write about any trauma ever, just that it’s a sensitive topic that should be handled as such, i.e. by tagging stuff appropriately and thinking extra hard about why you’re writing about it in the first place.

the question with representation for me is always: who benefits from it? who is it for? The issue with a lot of trans storylines in media these days is that it’s written and directed by cis people, acted by a cis person, and its target audience are cis people. It’s cool when cis people want to write stuff about trans characters because hey, the more representation the better. But if I write a character from a marginalized group, I always ask myself “who benefits from this story?” - do i write a black character because hey, black people lack representation in media and i wanna do my part to support them? or do i write that because i wanna gather ‘diversity points’ and be seen as cool and #woke? if it’s the first one, then my instinct should always be to take a step back and reconsider when black people tell me what i’m doing is harmful. oftentimes when cis people write about trans people, they don’t do it for us, they do it for the entertainment of other cis people, actually harming trans people at the same time, by spreading misinformation, stereotypes, and ignorance. And especially if writing about the negative, hurtful aspects, you should consider long and hard why you want to do it and who you want to entertain with it. Wanna write a story about a trans character? Sure, go ahead, but keep your audience in mind - if you’re writing about us, it shouldn’t hurt us, but help us.

“they might be very well informed”: again, i never said cis people are not allowed to write anything, and I never said anything like ‘all cis people are inherently bad at writing trans characters’ or anything like that. I never said that, and I never targeted that post towards any specific cis people, so no, i haven’t considered who ever might actually know a proper amount about trans issues, just as much as I haven’t considered all the other people who could possibly think this post is targeted at them. At the beginning of my post i say that it’s for cis people who want to avoid being transphobic, and who are afraid to accidentally mess up, and the post was there to give those people pointers on what they might want to avoid or be careful about. It’s absolutely your choice to decide if that applies to you. Also, no matter how well informed an ally is: if an actually marginalized person speaks up and expresses their discomfort, it should never be an ally’s place to say “but actually, this isn’t problematic” or “but actually, I know your experience better than you, so I have a right to talk about it even though it makes you uncomfortable”. That’s not good allyship. Just because you know someone it doesn’t make you an infallible expert. Just look at the loads of autism mums who are actually spreading misinformation and harming their autistic kids while claiming to know their stuff when it comes to autism.

It would be different for a trans writer: Yes, absolutely, and I’ve said that much in my post. That’s why this post is targeted towards cis people. I would never think of telling a trans person not to write about their own personal trauma, or not to worry about a trans character wearing a binder too much. We make different life experiences, therefore it’s different. Not even the cis people close to us make the same experiences like us - they may catch glimpses, maybe get a good look at the bigger picture, but they cannot possibly know to the full extent what it means to be trans. I once read something on a writers blog that was along the lines of “as a white person, you can and should write black characters, but you can’t write a story about what it means to be black.” And I think that applies to all marginalizations, and to writing trans characters as well. Cis people can and should write stories with trans characters, preferably with the guidance and (fact checking) help of actual trans people. But since cis people will never know what it’s like to be trans, their stories about what it means to be trans will always be lacking, incomplete, relying on stereotypes and limited information, and because of that, they will be useless or even worse, harmful for trans people. Which is not to say that everything trans writers publish is absolutely pure and non-harmful, it’s just putting things in a different perspective. The book Dreadnought by April Daniels is a perfect example for this - April Daniels is a trans woman herself, and her main character is a trans girl. The story is about this girl becoming a superhero while dealing with some pretty hardcore stuff like transphobia and abuse among other things. It sure isn’t pleasant for me to read that, but I still absolutely value it because I can rely on the fact that the author is always on the character’s side, and that the negativity is a lived experience that will not prevail. In that, it is healing, because I know that April Daniels doesn’t want her hero to suffer, she wants her to grow and heal. Oftentimes with cis authors, I can’t be sure about that, just like I can’t be sure when straight writers put queer characters in their stories - I never know if or when they’re gonna get killed off for shock factor, or just treated like garbage in general.

I hope that cleared things up. I never forbade anyone from writing anything - I just gave a few pointers for those who wanted and needed them, at the same time explaining my personal discomfort with some things I’ve seen. That’s all.

#i-haveno-lyfe #my posts #whoops that last bit turned into a bit of an ad for the Dreadnought books #but it's just such an excellent book!!#long post

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queerquiggle · 6 years ago

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I hate going back onto this topic—it's old, expired, and how can we expect to move forward when we keep pushing ourselves back? We can't take a step forward because we keep tripping over this. However, certain recent circumstances inspire me to touch the topic again, and make another announcement, in case others might not be up-to-date.

I know I was an asshole three to four years ago. I was ignorant, transphobic as hell, and self-righteous about it. I couldn't see it then, but at least I see it now. It tickles me when I interact with others of the same conviction, and seeing that reflection of myself is discomfiting.

I'm sorry that I was an ignorant jerk, but I was incapable of seeing it, and no amount of people yelling at me and attacking me was going to make me see it. It made me hide in my comfortable ignorance, and I ended up digging myself deeper into my phobia. It isn't a cop-out; I honestly wish people could understand how their hateful reactions to my ignorance just intensified it. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I also know there was a better way to treat it. How can you learn when people keep yelling at you? Every time I tried to improve, I felt like I just kept getting pushed back. I ended up closeting my improvements and, later, my own transgender identity. I ended up suppressing a lot and stumbling a lot more.

Admittedly, I apologised technically only once, but I know I could say “I'm sorry” until I'm blue in the face, and certain people will still pretend I didn't say anything, or don't even know I said anything because they rely on secondhand accounts instead of reading my blogs for themselves.

Regardless, I'm sorry I was an asshole. I'm sorry if I accidentally hurt people. I'm sorry I was stubborn about it. I wish it had never happened.

But I'm not sorry for who I am today, which is vastly different than certain people will lead you to believe. I've learned. I've grown. I've found my identity (pronouns: shey/sheir/shem, correct name: Sinclair). You can see for yourself. Check out any of my blogs. I even have a secret “trans education” blog. It's been a long time since I was that person you read about in a cis person's accounts.

I may have been transphobic, but I was still never a TERF. I'm not a radical feminist, and I never made any distinction between cis- and transwomen. I was just plain transphobic—nothing more, nothing less, and nothing political. I cherish and honour women of all kinds.

I don't know what more I can say. I do know that nothing will ever be enough. You said you wanted apologies, so I gave them. You said you wanted improvements, so I made them. But what good are they when you prefer to cast me out completely, when you ignore everything good that I've said and done and keep your head in the sand? You can't ask for something, but then ignore it when it comes. Can't ask for someone to get better, and then turn them away when they do—that isn't fair.

(And you certainly can't use their past to justify invalidation of their identity—like, say, ignoring their correct pronouns and preferred name, instead referring to them by their pre-transition information. Just a little heads-up. I was downright transphobic, and even I didn't intentionally deadname and/or misgender a trans person no matter how much I disliked them.)

What more do you want? What more can I say or do? I'm not being sarcastic, I'm genuinely asking—my ask box is open, if you have anything beneficial to say. How many more times can I apologise? How many more years of proof do you need before you realise your accusations have long been invalid? Seriously, go look at my main blog, or any of my pages. Hell, go check out my anti-transphobia campaign. You'll realise you're promoting a fallacy. If you're still not “convinced” and still prefer to live in the past, then there's nothing I can do. Honestly, if you can't see change and can't see what you asked for, you can't act like I owe you anything. I did my part. I'm sorry I was an asshole. There's nothing I can do but continue forward. You can move forward with me, or stay back there, but I'm not responsible if you choose the latter.

I tag my apology posts and other such things with “archive,” so if you want to see the beginning of change (actually, it was the middle of change—the beginning was far earlier, but hidden), please go to QueerQuiggle.tumblr.com/tagged/archive. I implore you to see and judge for yourself, rather than running on the secondhand judgment of another.

#neotag #neopets #not neo #double-tagging for exposure #drama #queerquiggle #transphobia #archive

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folie-a-disappointment-blog · 7 years ago

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problems that i've seen in the ace community

yes, we are capable of having problems and we definitely do

1. slut-shaming - i wish it was obvious that slut-shaming isn't okay. a lot of times the ace community does it unknowingly and accidentally, but it's still wrong and we need to address it. having sex isn't a bad thing and neither is feeling sexual attraction. not every non-ace is hypersexual and driven by the promise of sex. it's an unreasonable and sometimes harmful generalization. also, this whole "ew sex no i'm ace wtf" attitude excludes sex-positive aces and aces with a high sex drive. asexual only means the lack of sexual attraction, not the repulsion of sex (although some aces are sex-repulsed).

2. lesbophobia - you know it happens. i often get the argument "but a lot of lesbians are aphobic, too!" and while that is true, we can't expect them to change if we aren't going to change.

3. reclaiming - sometimes we reclaim slurs that don't belong to us. if someone who is targeted by a certain slur is uncomfortable with us using it, we should stop using it. these slurs were never used against us and while some people are okay with us using them, many aren't and we need to respect that as they are the ones who should have the final say on the matter.

4. AIDS jokes - they're not funny and they're harmful to people affected by AIDS. also, aces aren't immune to AIDS as it can be transmitted through things other than sex. people die from AIDS and i really don't see why anyone thought it was funny to joke about it.

5. equating aphobia to homophobia/transphobia - aphobia is a real thing that happens, but it is nowhere near as extreme as homophobia and transphobia. systematic oppression against aces rarely happens, when systematic oppression against gay, bi, trans, etc. people is very relevant in societies across the world. of course there are many situations that invalidate or hurt aces, and i'm really not trying invalidate that, but we have to accept that it's not as bad as the oppression of other LGBT in most instances. arguing that "aces face just as much oppression" is never going to change the mind of an exclusionist because it generally isn't true. both groups face difficulties and each of their struggles are valid, but we can't equate them.

6. making unrelated things about us - this one doesn't apply to everything LGBT+ related, but sometimes there are things that JUST pansexuals experience, JUST nonbinay people experience, etc. and aces will try to find a way to apply it to themselves even when it's completely unrelated. this is one of the reasons people accuse us of shoving ourselves into LGBT spaces, because we sometimes literally do. of course, sometimes you're just posting a relatable thing that aces and other LGBT+ experience similarly, but if it's not related maybe consider leaving it for another time.

7. aggresiveness toward exclusionists - we can't ever expect to make people see our side of the argument if we're accusing them of terrible things. shouting out hateful words is definitely not going to make them want to accept us. please be tactful in your arguments.

8. acting like cishet aces don't benefit from straight privilege- they do! maybe in some instances a cishet ace will benefit less than a cishet heterosexual, but they definitely still benefit from it. it's not a terrible thing, but we have to stop denying it and work together to change the fact that straight privilege exists.

9. forcing the label - i don't see this happening too often but i shouldn't see it happening at all. if someone is: not looking for a relationship right now, not in a relationship, never been in a relationship, is a preteen child who hasn't experienced puberty or crushes, etc. it does not automatically mean they are ace. also calling famous LGBT+ people ace when they're not ace is confusing to me because if some specifically says "i'm bi" you can't just say "no you're ace actually". like i said i rarely see this happen but i still wanted to address it.

feel free to add more because i know i only addressed a few. i'm not trying to invalidate aces with this post just please understand that we are not incapable of having flaws!

#ace #asexual #acediscourse #discourse

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eeveelutionsforequality · 7 years ago

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Hey mods, I’m gonna preface this by saying that if you can’t answer this that’s understandable. I’m a trans guy that’s been out (to varying degrees) for a little under 3 years now, but whenever somebody misgenders or deadnames me I always have a really hard time correcting them. I get this irrational fear that they’ll get super mad at me, or that they’re really transphobic and will harass/attack me. Do you have any tips for gaining confidence in correcting people? Thanks!

I think it really depends upon the context, like, how to act, how to react, how safe it is, what to say, how to get the confidence - they're all things that you tend to have to judge on a case by case basis. There are some situations where I don't correct because it's a random shopkeeper that I'll never see again, so it's ultimately just an effort that I don't personally feel the need to exert (it triggers dysphoria when they do it, obviously, but it's already been triggered by the time I need to correct them, so I'd rather scan my stuff and leave than dwell on that moment).

When it comes to my family, with my birthname, we found a compromise - when I was younger they often used to shorten my birthname to one of two masculine nicknames. I let them call me those nicknames now - I know that my family doesn't like the name that I picked for myself, or my reasons for picking that particular name, so I don't force them to call me that, especially since there's another viable option.

My family does misgender me consistently, and rather than correcting them on it I talked to them about how they feel - they told me that they accept me, that they value me as me, and they did the typical "I don't think of you as a girl or a boy, you're just you" speech, and I know it came from a good place even if it's a cliché that can sound invalidating. The way I see it, they're not thinking about gender, it's not on their minds like it is for me - to them "she" is just the natural word to say because it's what they've said for two and a half decades, it doesn't mean "I think of you as a girl" in their heads, there's no depth or underlying meaning behind their use of the word.

However, they do make little efforts to validate my identity or to show that they do support me - they buy me mugs or towels with "mr" or "his" on them, for example. If I jokingly say something like "I hope you don't expect me to wear a dress to the funeral." they'll say something like "It's a funeral not a drag show. Just wear your usual emo shit." They'll often say something like "typical bloke" if they catch me looking at an attractive woman on the TV or if I burp after a meal.

So yeah, I had a lot more success just talking to my family and being casual about it - showing that I appreciate the little things that they do, and finding middle-grounds and understandings rather than just expecting them to be fully capable of meeting all of my needs - but I don't actually correct them at all.

Ultimately, I don't know the people in your life, I don't know what tactics to use, how to talk to them, what they think, so I can't really tell you how to broach the topic with them or how to word the corrections. I think people disagree on the etiquette of it all too - like, some people interrupt, some just cough, some say "You said 'she'" at the end, while some say "It's 'he'", some go passive-aggressive, some go sympathetic, some like an apology, and some (like me) really dislike having too much attention drawn to it.

Sometimes I'll correct people in casual, safe social situations, like if I'm hanging out with friends of friends - but even that's rare, it's more likely that they either notice somebody else calling me 'he' and catch on, or my friends correct them for me. Sometimes I correct people in "official" situations, like when somebody on the phone says "Can I speak to Mr [awesome name]?" and I say "That's me!" because I've no other choice (and even those aren't definites, like I've actually said "Sorry, he's not in right now!" on a call to my MOBILE PHONE to get out of dealing with it). If I can avoid correcting, I will - I don't correct plumbers who look temporarily confused at the name on the form before they decide that they aren't paid enough to care, I don't correct doctors who literally have my medical records right in front of them (my brain just goes "They're probably having a rough day, it's a rough job, this has nothing to do with me, I'll let it slide" - it's not empathy, I have no clue if they're actually stressed, I'm just like "If I convince myself that they are then I'll feel better").

In fact, I once had a very long phone call for a bill or something where I tried to correct the person on the other end, they didn't believe me, I tried again, they still didn't, and eventually they came to the conclusion that "my dad" had given me the answers to the security questions so that I could pretend to be him while he was passed out drunk. I was so fed up that I just went with it, and because I had the answers to the security questions it didn't really matter, they had to allow my fictional seven year-old daughter to take the call. I ended up pretending to be my own non-existent child, who was failing at pretending to be me.

Another time, a transphobe decided to protest my pronouns in an LGBT+ group that I volunteered at, by interrupting anyone who said "he" and incorrecting it to "she" - my friends and strangers alike. It was annoying more than anything, like, people were trying to have a casual conversation and they kept getting interrupted and sidetracked into dumb arguments, regardless of whether I was even there that day. I don't think I ever responded to it, I don't think I had ever even corrected him in the first place. I would just blank him, but my friends would bite the bait and try to defend me... in the end, that just gave him what he wanted.

Anyway, as you can probably tell, I'm not very confrontational - I prefer to either remind myself of why that person's opinion doesn't matter, or talk myself into believing that the person doesn't have any ill intentions behind the misgendering, rather than making an effort that (for me) costs more than it pays.

So, with that in mind, my advice for you is that there's always another possible reason that somebody misgendered you - a slip-up, stress, tiredness, they've got a lisp and they actually are saying the other pronoun and somehow you can't notice it on any other word... I'm pretty good at convincing myself that it isn't personal. Maybe getting into the mindset that "misgendering = mistake" and out of the mindset that "misgendering = transphobia" could help make it easier for you not to feel afraid, and thus make it easier for you to feel comfortable correcting people - more often than not, it is just an honest mistake. It's very contextual, but there's almost always other behaviours or a pattern to the misgendering, an overt maliciousness, in cases of transphobia - a couple of instances of potentially accidental misgendering don't mean anything, and it no more indicates transphobia than calling a zebra a giraffe by mistake indicates hatred of zebras.

I think it comes down to assessing the situation, asking yourself "Is this worth it? Am I ever going to see this person again?" and then asking yourself "Is this a conversation that I want to start with a correction, or do I want to bring it up separately?" - a twenty-something at a party is probably open-minded enough that "Oh it's 'he'!" will be met with "Okay, cool!" and that'll be that, but your grandma might need a gentler approach the first time. If they already know, and it's just them slipping into old habits, ask yourself "Is it worth interrupting this conversation, or should I let this one slide and then bring it up at a later date if it keeps happening?" - if it's a casual chat with a sentence or two each, then it's easy to add in just a "he" without ruining the flow or seeming impolite, but if they're sobbing in your arms as they tell you the story of a tragic argument that they had then it's probably best to let that one slide. You know what I mean?

Like, I try to treat it the same as I would treat them saying "for all intensive purposes" instead of "for all intents and purposes" - and that way, if I don't correct them then in my head it's just a grammatical error that I didn't correct, it doesn't mean anything.

Most people aren't transphobic, like the most likely reaction for you to get will be "Okay" in a variation of tones... sometimes it's "Okay!" sometimes it's "Ooookaaaay".

Think of it this way: If somebody walked up to you in public and said "I am a self-confessed transphobe, I hate those transgenders, they are terrible." would you start yelling at them, would you harass them, or would you just be like "Ooookaaaay"? People don't tend to kick off or act ridiculous, in person at least, regardless of how they feel or how much they hate you. There's a really small chance that the person actually has a negative opinion of trans people in the first place, but even if they do then they're not going to attack you, they'll just say an exaggerated "Ooookaaaay" or maybe raise their eyebrows.

Sure, there are some people out there who will be shitty and rude - a really tiny proportion of people who just have no personality and rely on making everybody around them uncomfortable to validate their "I have the unpopular opinion and that means that I'm right" complex. Those people don't deserve a second of your attention or any of your happiness, just blank them. They just want attention, they want to get a reaction out of you, they want to wind somebody up - apathy hurts dickheads more than anything, just count to ten and remind yourself that their opinion of you should mean as little to you as my opinion of The Queen means to her. Let it slide, and give your energy and attention to those who earn it.

At the end of the day, it's better to focus on the good, to encourage the good. You should be surrounded by people who respect you for who you are and refer to you as you want to be referred to - it's what you want, it's what you deserve - find those people, spend time with those people, and feel free to cut out anybody who responds cruelly to a polite correction. Politely correcting people who care about you is helping them to be able to help you, helping them treat you how they want to treat you.

Remind yourself that the people in your life love you, the people who deserve to be in your life love you, that they want to refer to you correctly, but that people can't learn if you allow them to keep repeating the mistakes without even pointing them out. You wouldn't let a child keep ending sentences with commas, you'd tell them each time they did it and say "You need to put a full stop there" - that's all you're doing when you correct these people.

They might struggle, they might need reminding a lot - just be gentle, polite, patient, and understanding.

TL;DR - don't put so much weight on it, don't mentally view misgendering as a sign of transphobia, there are so many reasons that it could have happened and everybody makes mistakes, it's just a grammatical error, most people aren't transphobic, people tend to conceal their feelings and behave appropriately even if they are, the people who love you want to learn and you're just helping them do so, but you possibly asked the wrong person because I literally allowed someone to think that I was a neglectful alcoholic father to avoid the hassle of continuing to correct them.

~ Vape

#Mod Vaporeon #when I say 'family' I mean the handful of family and family friends that I still talk to #my family and history is pretty complicated #sorry that this isn't the best advice but I hope that something in it was useful #also I'm sorry I'm tired and not wording great

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harrypotterfirsttime · 4 years ago

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JK Rowling’s essay about why she’s a TERF: Full Overview

Be forewarned, this is going to be LONG. I started reading the Goblet of Fire today and saw that JK Rowling has written and posted an ESSAY about why she’s speaking out about her blatant transphobia. I never intended for this blog to be about her, but since this is happening while I am attempting to read the series for the first time, I feel compelled to address it.

“This isn’t an easy piece to write, for reasons that will shortly become clear, but I know it’s time to explain myself on an issue surrounded by toxicity. I write this without any desire to add to that toxicity.”

I cannot fathom how she believed this would be a good idea and not add to the toxicity surrounding this issue. During pride month. When Black Lives Matter is protesting for equal rights. How is this necessary?

“For people who don’t know: last December I tweeted my support for Maya Forstater, a tax specialist who’d lost her job for what were deemed ‘transphobic’ tweets. She took her case to an employment tribunal, asking the judge to rule on whether a philosophical belief that sex is determined by biology is protected in law. Judge Tayler ruled that it wasn’t.”

First of all, Maya didn’t lose her job. Her contract was simply not renewed by her workplace, something that she was not entitled to under any law. JK Rowling also continues to falsely assert that Maya’s belief was that ‘sex is determined biology’, when she actually asserted that under no circumstances is a trans woman a woman nor a trans man a man, and the judge ruled that it did not fit all five necessary limbs to be a philosophical belief (it actually only failed the last one). The judge ruled that the ‘under no circumstances’ part of her assertion was absolutist, and that is what ultimately failed the fifth limb. [source]

“My interest in trans issues pre-dated Maya’s case by almost two years, during which I followed the debate around the concept of gender identity closely. I’ve met trans people, and read sundry books, blogs and articles by trans people, gender specialists, intersex people, psychologists, safeguarding experts, social workers and doctors, and followed the discourse online and in traditional media. On one level, my interest in this issue has been professional, because I’m writing a crime series, set in the present day, and my fictional female detective is of an age to be interested in, and affected by, these issues herself, but on another, it’s intensely personal, as I’m about to explain.”

Not much to say here, except that this paragraph is meant to tell us that she’s considered including this debate in a fictional book she’s writing for some reason, and that she has allegedly had time to talk to all of these extremely knowledgeable people who all failed to inform her that trans people don’t actually hurt her or take anything from her.

“All the time I’ve been researching and learning, accusations and threats from trans activists have been bubbling in my Twitter timeline. This was initially triggered by a ‘like’. When I started taking an interest in gender identity and transgender matters, I began screenshotting comments that interested me, as a way of reminding myself what I might want to research later. On one occasion, I absent-mindedly ‘liked’ instead of screenshotting. That single ‘like’ was deemed evidence of wrongthink, and a persistent low level of harassment began.”

First off, this goes against the statement a spokesperson made for her when this happened, stating that she had a ‘clumsy middle-aged moment’ and liked the tweet by ‘holding her phone incorrectly’. The tweet she liked also had no content that she could research, it was a baseless claim that men in dresses get more solidarity than cis women (which I won’t even dive into, we have so much more to cover). [source] I also won’t dive into the use of ‘wrongthink’ as if we are all characters in George Orwell’s 1984, simply because nobody is controlling her speech, she is simply facing consequences for the shit she chooses to fling at the wall.

“Months later, I compounded my accidental ‘like’ crime by following Magdalen Burns on Twitter. Magdalen was an immensely brave young feminist and lesbian who was dying of an aggressive brain tumour. I followed her because I wanted to contact her directly, which I succeeded in doing. However, as Magdalen was a great believer in the importance of biological sex, and didn’t believe lesbians should be called bigots for not dating trans women with penises, dots were joined in the heads of twitter trans activists, and the level of social media abuse increased.”

Just take a moment to laugh at the fact that she misspelled Magdalen Berns’ last name. But to clear things up, yes, Magdalen was suffering from a fatal aggressive brain tumour, but no, she was not a brave young feminist, she was an extremely outspoken transphobe, who regularly made videos misgendering, slandering, and twisting the words of trans people and trans activists in order to victimize herself. The vast majority of trans people will agree that you shouldn’t date anybody that you don’t want to date, or have any kind of sex with anyone that you don’t like. But Magdalen took it a step further, and said that NO lesbian could have sex with somebody with a penis and still be a lesbian, and NO lesbian could have a penis, despite trans lesbians continuing to exist to this very day. [for sources, Magdalen’s twitter and youtube channel remain active]

“I mention all this only to explain that I knew perfectly well what was going to happen when I supported Maya. I must have been on my fourth or fifth cancellation by then. I expected the threats of violence, to be told I was literally killing trans people with my hate, to be called cunt and bitch and, of course, for my books to be burned, although one particularly abusive man told me he’d composted them.”

Can we salute the man who decided to tell JK Rowling that he composted her books, because that’s absolutely hilarious. But really, I just want to point out that no matter how many threats of violence JK Rowling thinks she is getting, transgender people are subjected to much more abuse both online and in real life, and it affects their wellbeing much more directly than simply being called a cunt or a bitch on twitter. [source] While JK Rowling thankfully isn’t killing trans people, she’s disappointing so many of her LGBT+ fans who looked up to her and found comfort during their childhood in her books that encouraged people to be brave and be themselves.

“What I didn’t expect in the aftermath of my cancellation was the avalanche of emails and letters that came showering down upon me, the overwhelming majority of which were positive, grateful and supportive. They came from a cross-section of kind, empathetic and intelligent people, some of them working in fields dealing with gender dysphoria and trans people, who’re all deeply concerned about the way a socio-political concept is influencing politics, medical practice and safeguarding. They’re worried about the dangers to young people, gay people and about the erosion of women’s and girl’s rights. Above all, they’re worried about a climate of fear that serves nobody – least of all trans youth – well.”

I’ll tackle this paragraph from top to bottom. Firstly, the reason you believe the overwhemling majority of people supported you is because many of those who don’t (myself included, until now) simply rolled their eyes and ignored you, because you are not worth our time. We have lives to live that are unconcerned with your bigotry. Second, I hope those people who were working in fields dealing with gender dysphoria and trans people have since left their jobs, because they have no business serving a community who they secretly harbour unsupportive ideologies about. And finally, the idea of supporting and helping trans people (specifically trans youth) is DANGEROUS to young people, gay people, and women’s and girls’ rights is simply false. No women’s rights have been repealed in favour of trans people’s rights (mainly because trans women continue to shockingly be women). In fact, trans youth with parents who are very supportive and affirming show a statistically significantly lower rate of both depressive symptoms and suicide attempts. [source] [specific graph]

“I’d stepped back from Twitter for many months both before and after tweeting support for Maya, because I knew it was doing nothing good for my mental health. I only returned because I wanted to share a free children’s book during the pandemic. Immediately, activists who clearly believe themselves to be good, kind and progressive people swarmed back into my timeline, assuming a right to police my speech, accuse me of hatred, call me misogynistic slurs and, above all – as every woman involved in this debate will know – TERF.”

I can completely understand taking a step back from Twitter for mental health reasons (perhaps we all would have been better off if this had been an indefinite hiatus). To be clear, no activists are claiming the right to police your speech. People are speaking up against your speech because it is hateful and contradictory to current research about transgender people and the best way to treat and support us effectively. Some people maybe using misogynistic slurs, which I don’t condone, but let us be clear that TERF is not one of them.

“If you didn’t already know – and why should you? – ‘TERF’ is an acronym coined by trans activists, which stands for Trans-Exclusionary Radical Feminist. In practice, a huge and diverse cross-section of women are currently being called TERFs and the vast majority have never been radical feminists. Examples of so-called TERFs range from the mother of a gay child who was afraid their child wanted to transition to escape homophobic bullying, to a hitherto totally unfeminist older lady who’s vowed never to visit Marks & Spencer again because they’re allowing any man who says they identify as a woman into the women’s changing rooms. Ironically, radical feminists aren’t even trans-exclusionary – they include trans men in their feminism, because they were born women.”

The first two sentences in this paragraph are true. Viv Smythe, a trans inclusive cis radfem, is credited with coining the term TERF to describe her fellow radical feminists who are ‘unwilling to recognize trans women as sisters’. It has also become widely used to describe feminists who exclude trans women from their feminism, even if they are not radfems. [source] I don’t care about who has been called a TERF, all I need to know is that they are transphobes, which they should feel equally disgusted at the fact their behaviour warrants the label. Trans men do not want to be included in radical feminism because we were ‘born women’, and JK Rowling including this as if it is an excuse is appalling. Trans men are not women, therefore we do not appreciate radfems claiming to support us based on their obsession with what genitals we were born with.

“But accusations of TERFery have been sufficient to intimidate many people, institutions and organisations I once admired, who’re cowering before the tactics of the playground. ‘They’ll call us transphobic!’ ‘They’ll say I hate trans people!’ What next, they’ll say you’ve got fleas? Speaking as a biological woman, a lot of people in positions of power really need to grow a pair (which is doubtless literally possible, according to the kind of people who argue that clownfish prove humans aren’t a dimorphic species).”

I cringed hard at ‘speaking as a biological woman’, because that’s just the kind of language that TERFs consistently use to make it clear that they are NOT under any circumstances to be mistaken for trans. The notion that these people, institutions and organizations are ‘cowering’ out of fear of being transphobic as opposed to wanting to openly support and welcome trans people as they would any other person is extremely biased. And as a last note, people using clownfish are trying to show that sex is noy cut and dry binary, it varies between species, and there is so much more to it than ‘XX vs XY’ and ‘penis vs vagina’ like JK Rowling and company seem to think.

“So why am I doing this? Why speak up? Why not quietly do my research and keep my head down?

Well, I’ve got five reasons for being worried about the new trans activism, and deciding I need to speak up.

Firstly, I have a charitable trust that focuses on alleviating social deprivation in Scotland, with a particular emphasis on women and children. Among other things, my trust supports projects for female prisoners and for survivors of domestic and sexual abuse. I also fund medical research into MS, a disease that behaves very differently in men and women. It’s been clear to me for a while that the new trans activism is having (or is likely to have, if all its demands are met) a significant impact on many of the causes I support, because it’s pushing to erode the legal definition of sex and replace it with gender.”

I don’t think anyone will argue that JK Rowling’s charitable trusts and funds are a bad thing. But her need to specify that these have an ‘emphasis on women and children’, imply that survivors of domestic and sexual abuse cannot be men or trans people, and for some reason pointing out that MS can present differently in men and women, are all red flags that these are issues she’s injecting into her charitable efforts, as opposed to actual threats to the causes she supports. The fear that transphobes have over people being classified by the gender they experience and walk through life presenting with instead of the genitals they have underneath a few layers of clothes is ridiculous, especially when you strip it down like this.

“The second reason is that I’m an ex-teacher and the founder of a children’s charity, which gives me an interest in both education and safeguarding. Like many others, I have deep concerns about the effect the trans rights movement is having on both.

The third is that, as a much-banned author, I’m interested in freedom of speech and have publicly defended it, even unto Donald Trump.”

The movement to secure equal rights and protection under the law for transgender people will not have a negative effect on children or education, other than allowing kids to learn more about the diversity among people they’ll interact with throughout their lives. And once again, nobody is trying to tell you that you cannot say these things, only that you will face consequences for saying them, like Donald Trump does daily. Trans people and activists don’t even have the power to affect the right to freedom of speech, so this is a moot point.

“The fourth is where things start to get truly personal. I’m concerned about the huge explosion in young women wishing to transition and also about the increasing numbers who seem to be detransitioning (returning to their original sex), because they regret taking steps that have, in some cases, altered their bodies irrevocably, and taken away their fertility. Some say they decided to transition after realising they were same-sex attracted, and that transitioning was partly driven by homophobia, either in society or in their families.”

There is a lot to unpack in this paragraph. And I don’t have the room in this already much too long post to dive into detransitioning, so I’ll say this: it sucks that some people transition only to realize they shouldn’t have. But these people are a staggering minority of people who do transition, and there is no external person they can blame for believing them when they relay their symptoms (as doctors are supposed to do) and acting accordingly, with the patient’s consent. The issues I have here are the language JK Rowling uses to say young women are transitioning, purposefully misgendering trans masculine people. And implying that people are transitioning because they are gay, because their families or society push them to not be gay and instead transition, is absolutely laughable. Studies have already shown that society as a whole is much less accepting of transgender people than they are of gay people and lesbians. [source]

“Most people probably aren’t aware – I certainly wasn’t, until I started researching this issue properly – that ten years ago, the majority of people wanting to transition to the opposite sex were male. That ratio has now reversed. The UK has experienced a 4400% increase in girls being referred for transitioning treatment. Autistic girls are hugely overrepresented in their numbers.”

There are a number of factors that could have led to such an increase in referrals, and no studies have a definitive answer, though most speculate that the increase in acceptance and visibility of trans people is likely a major contributor. [source] Additionally, I personally believe that more trans women seeked transition years ago because it was impossible to be accepted as a trans woman without fully medically transitioning, whereas trans men could get by without transitioning and simply presenting as their gender. Now that transition is more acceptable and available, trans men do not need to hold themselves back from transitioning, but unfortunately, with more visibility has come more vitriol that is specifically aimed at trans women, and this could discourage them from transitioning or coming out at all. I won’t dignify the statement about autism in afab trans people being prevalent other than saying that cis people can be autistic, trans people can be autistic, and implying that neuro-atypical people cannot make informed decisions about their bodies and healthcare is abhorrent.

“The same phenomenon has been seen in the US. In 2018, American physician and researcher Lisa Littman set out to explore it. In an interview, she said:

‘Parents online were describing a very unusual pattern of transgender-identification where multiple friends and even entire friend groups became transgender-identified at the same time. I would have been remiss had I not considered social contagion and peer influences as potential factors.’

Littman mentioned Tumblr, Reddit, Instagram and YouTube as contributing factors to Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria, where she believes that in the realm of transgender identification ‘youth have created particularly insular echo chambers.’”

Lisa Littman’s study can be read here. There are a multitude of issues with this study, and many big names in psychology and gender studies have spoken up about the issues in her conclusions and in the methods to begin with, which are unscientific and deeply flawed. [source] The biggest flaw, in my opinion, is that the study interviews parents of trans youth as opposed to the trans youth themselves, and takes the parents’ limited knowledge of their child’s inner thoughts and experience as fact without consulting the trans person at all. Additionally, recruitment for the study was mainly done through anti-trans organizations. All of this information is available in the original study and in the rebuttal. Because of this, I cannot take anybody who cites Lisa Littman or her study seriously, because it is not credible whatsoever.

“Her paper caused a furore. She was accused of bias and of spreading misinformation about transgender people, subjected to a tsunami of abuse and a concerted campaign to discredit both her and her work. The journal took the paper offline and re-reviewed it before republishing it. However, her career took a similar hit to that suffered by Maya Forstater. Lisa Littman had dared challenge one of the central tenets of trans activism, which is that a person’s gender identity is innate, like sexual orientation. Nobody, the activists insisted, could ever be persuaded into being trans.”

There are reasons clearly stated above why Lisa Littman and her work should be discredited for publishing this work and claiming it to be a study (especially because it was not published in any journal and was therefore not subjected to peer-review). Also, for argument’s sake, why do people like JK Rowling take people’s word for it when they report their sexual orientation, but not their gender? Why should one be recognized as innate, but not the other? Both can only be determined by the individual and their internal thoughts and feelings and urges and sense of self. Nobody can be persuaded to be trans any more than anyone can be persuaded to be gay, or lesbian, or bisexual.

“The argument of many current trans activists is that if you don’t let a gender dysphoric teenager transition, they will kill themselves. In an article explaining why he resigned from the Tavistock (an NHS gender clinic in England) psychiatrist Marcus Evans stated that claims that children will kill themselves if not permitted to transition do not ‘align substantially with any robust data or studies in this area. Nor do they align with the cases I have encountered over decades as a psychotherapist.’”

I didn’t think it needed to be said, but a single psychiatrist’s experience is not representative of the entire reality. Many people misquote studies in order to make them work for their agenda. Studies show that trans people have higher suicide attempt rates, not higher rates of actually killing themselves. To insert personal experience like Marcus Evans did, I attempted suicide multiple times, and experienced high levels of depression and anxiety directly tied to my gender dysphoria, all of which has been alleviated since being allowed to medically and socially transition. There are hundreds if not thousands of other trans people who will report similar struggles to myself.

“The writings of young trans men reveal a group of notably sensitive and clever people. The more of their accounts of gender dysphoria I’ve read, with their insightful descriptions of anxiety, dissociation, eating disorders, self-harm and self-hatred, the more I’ve wondered whether, if I’d been born 30 years later, I too might have tried to transition. The allure of escaping womanhood would have been huge. I struggled with severe OCD as a teenager. If I’d found community and sympathy online that I couldn’t find in my immediate environment, I believe I could have been persuaded to turn myself into the son my father had openly said he’d have preferred.”

Comparing having OCD to suffering with gender dysphoria and all the side effects it can have (many of which she listed here) is offensive. So is saying that she, too, may have transitioned, because she clearly is very comfortable as a cis woman. Trans men do not transition to escape womanhood, we transition because at our core we know we are not women and this causes us deep turmoil, on top of all the sexism and misogyny we face as a result of moving through the world being perceived as women while in the closet. Comparing the admittedly terrible experience of growing into a world riddled with sexism and misogyny to that same experience topped with multiple deeper levels of emotional turmoil is just not a comparison any cis person can make or attempt to understand, which is difficult to hear and accept for JK Rowling I’m sure. If there were online communities when JK Rowling was struggling with severe OCD, she likely would have found sympathy in other people who have OCD. The following implication (out of nowhere) that there are trans people online luring in teenagers with unrelated mental health struggles trying to ‘persuade’ them to transition is just ridiculous and I cannot believe she attempted to make this comparison.

“When I read about the theory of gender identity, I remember how mentally sexless I felt in youth. I remember Colette’s description of herself as a ‘mental hermaphrodite’ and Simone de Beauvoir’s words: ‘It is perfectly natural for the future woman to feel indignant at the limitations posed upon her by her sex. The real question is not why she should reject them: the problem is rather to understand why she accepts them.’”

More people than JK Rowling is probably aware of feel ‘mentally sexless’ in youth, because they have no crippling discomfort regarding their gender identity, and either do not feel pressure to prescribe to gender stereotypical behaviours or actively rebel against it. According to brain studies, everyone is technically a ‘mental hermaphrodite’ because there remains to be no such thing as a male brain or female brain. [source]

“As I didn’t have a realistic possibility of becoming a man back in the 1980s, it had to be books and music that got me through both my mental health issues and the sexualised scrutiny and judgement that sets so many girls to war against their bodies in their teens. Fortunately for me, I found my own sense of otherness, and my ambivalence about being a woman, reflected in the work of female writers and musicians who reassured me that, in spite of everything a sexist world tries to throw at the female-bodied, it’s fine not to feel pink, frilly and compliant inside your own head; it’s OK to feel confused, dark, both sexual and non-sexual, unsure of what or who you are.”

Just to clarify for JK Rowling, trans men and trans women both existed in the 1980s, and long before that. If she had been a trans man, she would have been able to pursue a social or medical transition. Those trans people in the 80s also turned to books and music to get through their struggles. It has been long documented that women and girls have negative feelings towards their bodies that are mainly rooted in the misogynistic society we all have to grow up in, and it’s a battle that trans people fight to end alongside cis women. I think JK Rowling will also find that trans people are at the forefront of making it known that gender roles and stereotypes are not necessary and should not be the standard for being a man or woman; women do not need to like pink, frilly things and men do not need to like monochrome, masculine things. Trans people are also huge advocates for finding yourself and living your life in the way that is most authentic to you, without focusing on whether your body is ‘male’ or ‘female’ and fighting against stigmas surrounding that obsession.

“I want to be very clear here: I know transition will be a solution for some gender dysphoric people, although I’m also aware through extensive research that studies have consistently shown that between 60-90% of gender dysphoric teens will grow out of their dysphoria. Again and again I’ve been told to ‘just meet some trans people.’ I have: in addition to a few younger people, who were all adorable, I happen to know a self-described transsexual woman who’s older than I am and wonderful. Although she’s open about her past as a gay man, I’ve always found it hard to think of her as anything other than a woman, and I believe (and certainly hope) she’s completely happy to have transitioned. Being older, though, she went through a long and rigorous process of evaluation, psychotherapy and staged transformation. The current explosion of trans activism is urging a removal of almost all the robust systems through which candidates for sex reassignment were once required to pass. A man who intends to have no surgery and take no hormones may now secure himself a Gender Recognition Certificate and be a woman in the sight of the law. Many people aren’t aware of this.”

First of all, the number of kids who “desist” from their gender dysphoria are not reliable. Mainly because the methods in these studies are not robust (ie one study defined gender dysphoria as exhibiting any behaviour that was not typical of their gender, such as boys playing with barbies and girls playing with monster trucks; another study classified subjects that did not return to the clinic and did not follow up as desisters without confirming). [source] Additionally, studying children who do exhibit true gender dysphoria, the main factor determining whether it will persist or desist seems to be the intensity, and not at all related to peer relations. [source] Trans people wishing to transition medically may no longer need to subject themselves to extensive and unnecessary therapy to convince medical professionals that they are who they say they are, but they still need to wait on very long lists for our turn to access hormone replacement therapy and surgeries, and can spend all of that time being sure that we are indeed trans and want these medical treatments. JK Rowling is also purposefully misreporting facts in regard to Gender Recognition Certificates. In order to get one, one must be over 18, have lived as their true gender for at least 2 full years, and provide two medical reports (one from a gender specialist and another from a general practitioner) citing that they have gender dysphoria. If they have not had any medical transitional treatments, the medical reports must state whether they are waiting for them or why they are not pursuing any, in direct contradiction of JK Rowling’s assertion that any man can get this certificate. [source]

“We’re living through the most misogynistic period I’ve experienced. Back in the 80s, I imagined that my future daughters, should I have any, would have it far better than I ever did, but between the backlash against feminism and a porn-saturated online culture, I believe things have got significantly worse for girls. Never have I seen women denigrated and dehumanised to the extent they are now. From the leader of the free world’s long history of sexual assault accusations and his proud boast of ‘grabbing them by the pussy’, to the incel (‘involuntarily celibate’) movement that rages against women who won’t give them sex, to the trans activists who declare that TERFs need punching and re-educating, men across the political spectrum seem to agree: women are asking for trouble. Everywhere, women are being told to shut up and sit down, or else.”

I find it hilarious that JK Rowling believes that 2020 is more riddled with misogyny than the 80s, and even the 90s. There is only backlash against feminism that isn’t intersectional and purposefully excludes groups of people for reasons rooted in ignorance and bigotry, like TERFs. Her personal belief that things are worse for girls are not reflected in society as a whole for a multitude of reasons. Although I’ll give that Donald Trump being president is a failure of the American people and highlights the bigotry of Americans, it is completely unrelated to trans people, and I’m not sure why it is relevant. I’d even argue the existence of incels is due to the fact that women are no longer forced into relationships and marriages the way they used to, no longer have to find a husband because they can work and live without leaning a man for financial stability, and can say no to sex with less repercussions (except a very small minority of men throwing tantrums about it). Comparing trans people fighting against TERFs and wanting to re-educate them to incels, Donald Trump, and misogynistic men is just a blatant attempt to derail the conversation. JK Rowling refuses to see that she is not being told to shut up because she’s a woman, she’s being told to shut up because there’s a transphobe. (On a lighter note, this reminds me of the post of a comic where homophobes were told to hit a beehive like its a pinata, and Christians got upset for being targetted, without Christianity ever being mentioned....seems relatable here)

“I’ve read all the arguments about femaleness not residing in the sexed body, and the assertions that biological women don’t have common experiences, and I find them, too, deeply misogynistic and regressive. It’s also clear that one of the objectives of denying the importance of sex is to erode what some seem to see as the cruelly segregationist idea of women having their own biological realities or – just as threatening – unifying realities that make them a cohesive political class. The hundreds of emails I’ve received in the last few days prove this erosion concerns many others just as much. It isn’t enough for women to be trans allies. Women must accept and admit that there is no material difference between trans women and themselves.”

I think all trans people will admit that people with vaginas have shared experiences because, well, they have the same body part, the same way all people with arms can relate to having arms. What we are arguing though, is that womanhood is not tied to having a vagina, or the struggles that come with having one, even though those experiences may be shared by many women. Many women may also share the experience of playing with barbies or being part of a soccer league as a child, neither of which have to do with being ‘biological women’. Pushing the absurd accusations of segregation and some weird political plan, trans people don’t pretend that we’re the same as cis people. There are material differences between trans women and cis women, and between trans men and cis men. There are also material differences among cis women and cis men. Our argument is that these material differences are not a valid excuse to exclude us from being women and men.

“But, as many women have said before me, ‘woman’ is not a costume. ‘Woman’ is not an idea in a man’s head. ‘Woman’ is not a pink brain, a liking for Jimmy Choos or any of the other sexist ideas now somehow touted as progressive. Moreover, the ‘inclusive’ language that calls female people ‘menstruators’ and ‘people with vulvas’ strikes many women as dehumanising and demeaning. I understand why trans activists consider this language to be appropriate and kind, but for those of us who’ve had degrading slurs spat at us by violent men, it’s not neutral, it’s hostile and alienating.”

Trans people are not claiming that being a woman is a costume, or an idea in anyone’s head, or a pink brain or any gender stereotype. Men do not know what it is like to be a woman. I have absolutely no idea what it feels like to be a woman, because even when presenting as one, I did not feel womanhood or any kinship with other women, because I knew that on a deep level I was not a woman. But on to less personal experiences. Inclusive language shouldn’t have quotation marks around it. Those you call female people (which I call afab, or assigned female at birth) do not all identify as women, and do not all like the label female. Therefore, using inclusive language such as ‘people who menstruate’ and ‘people with vulvas’ includes all the women who have vulvas and menstruate (because not all cis women do), and also includes the people who do not identify as women or associate the word female with themselves, despite menstruating or having a vulva. This is not an attack on women, this is not the same as misogynists using these facts to degrade women. It is simply language being used in a more encompassing way that in no way harms cis women, no matter how much JK Rowling or any other transphobe tries to play victim.

“Which brings me to the fifth reason I’m deeply concerned about the consequences of the current trans activism.

I’ve been in the public eye now for over twenty years and have never talked publicly about being a domestic abuse and sexual assault survivor. This isn’t because I’m ashamed those things happened to me, but because they’re traumatic to revisit and remember. I also feel protective of my daughter from my first marriage. I didn’t want to claim sole ownership of a story that belongs to her, too. However, a short while ago, I asked her how she’d feel if I were publicly honest about that part of my life, and she encouraged me to go ahead.

I’m mentioning these things now not in an attempt to garner sympathy, but out of solidarity with the huge numbers of women who have histories like mine, who’ve been slurred as bigots for having concerns around single-sex spaces.”

It goes without saying but obviously I am sad to learn that JK Rowling is a survivor of domestic abuse and sexual assault. It pains me to know she went through something so traumatic and that her daughter also either witnessed or experienced similar horrors. I do however have a problem with weaponizing these experiences as a reason to continue being a transphobe.

“I managed to escape my first violent marriage with some difficulty, but I’m now married to a truly good and principled man, safe and secure in ways I never in a million years expected to be. However, the scars left by violence and sexual assault don’t disappear, no matter how loved you are, and no matter how much money you’ve made. My perennial jumpiness is a family joke – and even I know it’s funny – but I pray my daughters never have the same reasons I do for hating sudden loud noises, or finding people behind me when I haven’t heard them approaching.

If you could come inside my head and understand what I feel when I read about a trans woman dying at the hands of a violent man, you’d find solidarity and kinship. I have a visceral sense of the terror in which those trans women will have spent their last seconds on earth, because I too have known moments of blind fear when I realised that the only thing keeping me alive was the shaky self-restraint of my attacker.”

Again, I am deeply saddened knowing that JK Rowling had experiences that caused lifelong struggles for her at the hands of someone she gave her trust to and had to endure throughout her first marriage. It is interesting that she feels she is able to sympathize with trans women who suffer similar abuses, despite her blatant disregard for trans people’s struggles on display throughout this essay.

“I believe the majority of trans-identified people not only pose zero threat to others, but are vulnerable for all the reasons I’ve outlined. Trans people need and deserve protection. Like women, they’re most likely to be killed by sexual partners. Trans women who work in the sex industry, particularly trans women of colour, are at particular risk. Like every other domestic abuse and sexual assault survivor I know, I feel nothing but empathy and solidarity with trans women who’ve been abused by men.

So I want trans women to be safe. At the same time, I do not want to make natal girls and women less safe. When you throw open the doors of bathrooms and changing rooms to any man who believes or feels he’s a woman – and, as I’ve said, gender confirmation certificates may now be granted without any need for surgery or hormones – then you open the door to any and all men who wish to come inside. That is the simple truth.”

‘Natal girls and women’ is another transphobic dog whistle. There is a non-offensive way to say this, which I am sure if JK Rowling has done all the reading she has claimed to do, she must have stumbled upon the word ‘cisgender’ at some point. It effectively communicates the same information without alienating trans people and implying they are less than cis women. Trans women are not ‘men who believe or feel like women’, and this long standing myth that cis men will use the guise of being a trans woman to gain access to public bathrooms and changerooms has been thoroughly debunked, because trans women have been using women’s bathrooms and changerooms for years with no issues. [source] And scroll up for the claim that Gender Confirmation Certificates are given out to any man who decides to be a woman for a day above, this is just more misinformation, no ‘simple truth’.

“On Saturday morning, I read that the Scottish government is proceeding with its controversial gender recognition plans, which will in effect mean that all a man needs to ‘become a woman’ is to say he’s one. To use a very contemporary word, I was ‘triggered’. Ground down by the relentless attacks from trans activists on social media, when I was only there to give children feedback about pictures they’d drawn for my book under lockdown, I spent much of Saturday in a very dark place inside my head, as memories of a serious sexual assault I suffered in my twenties recurred on a loop. That assault happened at a time and in a space where I was vulnerable, and a man capitalised on an opportunity. I couldn’t shut out those memories and I was finding it hard to contain my anger and disappointment about the way I believe my government is playing fast and loose with womens and girls’ safety.”

First of all, JK Rowling is blatantly lying. The Gender Recognition Act Reform has been completely shelved by the Scottish government in light if the more pressing need to fight the coronavirus on April 1st, and I cannot find any updates on this being considered by the government. [source] The only trans related news out of Scotland I can find is that on June 5th, the Scottish government included trans women in the definition of women in guidance for school boards, which will have none of the effects that JK Rowling is fear mongering about. [source] Again, I am upset to know that JK Rowling is a survivor, but she is using this revelation as a weapon to make people fear that it will happen to others as a result of trans people gaining access to the same public spaces as their cis counterparts. Women’s and girls’ safety is NOT being put at risk by trans people using a bathroom or changeroom.

“Late on Saturday evening, scrolling through children’s pictures before I went to bed, I forgot the first rule of Twitter – never, ever expect a nuanced conversation – and reacted to what I felt was degrading language about women. I spoke up about the importance of sex and have been paying the price ever since. I was transphobic, I was a cunt, a bitch, a TERF, I deserved cancelling, punching and death. You are Voldemort said one person, clearly feeling this was the only language I’d understand.

It would be so much easier to tweet the approved hashtags – because of course trans rights are human rights and of course trans lives matter – scoop up the woke cookies and bask in a virtue-signalling afterglow. There’s joy, relief and safety in conformity. As Simone de Beauvoir also wrote, “… without a doubt it is more comfortable to endure blind bondage than to work for one’s liberation; the dead, too, are better suited to the earth than the living.””

This is misinformation. On Saturday evening, JK Rowling took issue with inclusive language being used in an informational and medical piece about coronavirus, which is in the best interest of getting the information out to the necessary people. I would stop reading an article that said it was concerning the health of women or females, because I do not consider myself a member of either category. I have, however, menstruated in the past, and continue to have a vulva, and if an article used that language, I would continue reading, because it would concern me. She then went on to strangely imply that trans people were removing the right of gay people and lesbians to be attracted to the same sex, which has never been true, and I don’t have time to get into the same-sex vs same-gender attraction debate, nor is it relevant to her original tweet. It’s ironic that Simone de Beauvoir’s quote relates more strongly to trans people and activists fighting for liberation instead of continuing to be bound by a transphobic society.

“Huge numbers of women are justifiably terrified by the trans activists; I know this because so many have got in touch with me to tell their stories. They’re afraid of doxxing, of losing their jobs or their livelihoods, and of violence.

But endlessly unpleasant as its constant targeting of me has been, I refuse to bow down to a movement that I believe is doing demonstrable harm in seeking to erode ‘woman’ as a political and biological class and offering cover to predators like few before it. I stand alongside the brave women and men, gay, straight and trans, who’re standing up for freedom of speech and thought, and for the rights and safety of some of the most vulnerable in our society: young gay kids, fragile teenagers, and women who’re reliant on and wish to retain their single sex spaces. Polls show those women are in the vast majority, and exclude only those privileged or lucky enough never to have come up against male violence or sexual assault, and who’ve never troubled to educate themselves on how prevalent it is.”

The only people who have any reason to feel any negative way about what a trans activist might say to or about them is a transphobe, so I can only assume the people JK Rowling is talking about are transphobes. The following sentence is just more fear mongering about ‘woman’ being redefined to include trans women, as if that somehow invalidates cis women or puts them in any more danger than they were in before. Predators are predators regardless of the existence of trans people existing. Trans people are not, nor do we have the power to, infringe on any right to free speech or thought, but transphobes will continue to face consequences for their speech, in way of trans people and activists exercising our own freedom of speech. The assumptions made about people who are okay with trans people in single sex spaces are baseless and completely unfounded, only biased assumptions that serve JK Rowling’s personal agenda. Even if these polls are true (she offered no sources), just because public majority agree with something does not mean it is right. History has multiple examples of this.

“The one thing that gives me hope is that the women who can protest and organise, are doing so, and they have some truly decent men and trans people alongside them. Political parties seeking to appease the loudest voices in this debate are ignoring women’s concerns at their peril. In the UK, women are reaching out to each other across party lines, concerned about the erosion of their hard-won rights and widespread intimidation. None of the gender critical women I’ve talked to hates trans people; on the contrary. Many of them became interested in this issue in the first place out of concern for trans youth, and they’re hugely sympathetic towards trans adults who simply want to live their lives, but who’re facing a backlash for a brand of activism they don’t endorse. The supreme irony is that the attempt to silence women with the word ‘TERF’ may have pushed more young women towards radical feminism than the movement’s seen in decades.”

Again, more fear mongering, because women’s rights are not being repealed or altered by granting similar rights to trans men and trans women. I find it entertaining that JK Rowling ironically fails to see that trans people are not the loudest voice, when she has clearly been the loudest voice internationally and has gained huge amounts of attention from her words, much more than any trans person has about this subject. Gender critical people feigning concern for trans youth aren’t excusing the harm their ideology does to trans youth (one example is the idea that trans youth must wait until 18 or even 25 to transition to be sure, and not ruin their fertility or body). Then comes the idea that the ‘good trans people’ who agree with JK Rowling and gender critical feminists and TERFs are getting a bad name from the trans people who just want to be allowed to change for the gym and pee in the right changeroom or bathroom. If more cis women are becoming transphobic, it has much more to do with loud voices like JK Rowling than it does with trans people, again, just fighting for equal rights and protections under the law.

“The last thing I want to say is this. I haven’t written this essay in the hope that anybody will get out a violin for me, not even a teeny-weeny one. I’m extraordinarily fortunate; I’m a survivor, certainly not a victim. I’ve only mentioned my past because, like every other human being on this planet, I have a complex backstory, which shapes my fears, my interests and my opinions. I never forget that inner complexity when I’m creating a fictional character and I certainly never forget it when it comes to trans people.

All I’m asking – all I want – is for similar empathy, similar understanding, to be extended to the many millions of women whose sole crime is wanting their concerns to be heard without receiving threats and abuse.”

I find it deeply troubling that JK Rowling chose this moment to come out as a survivor. It is extremely manipulative, claiming not to want sympathy, when she knows all decent people will feel hurt for her going through such experiences, and weaponizing it for her transphobic agenda. JK Rowling cannot expect empathy and understanding from any trans people or activists until she stops actively advocating and spreading ideology that directly works against the fight for equal rights and protections for trans people, that in no way infringes on the rights and protections for women. Until she stops trying to twist everything about trans rights into her own victimization, she will be stuck in the classification of transphobe, and TERF is she continues to align her views with radical feminism.

#jk rowling #transphobia #terf #important #long post #not hp

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