#the understanding of Othering/Otherness is so ridiculous stupid

[rosenclaws]

Hi!! I’d love to see you do the prompt “Don’t tell me you love me unless you mean it.” with Logan! Was thinking of the reader who’s so self loathing of her own powers opening up for the first time towards Logan 🥺

warnings: angst/fluff, Logan has interesting teaching methods lol

600 follower drabble masterlist

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a/n: So this also...turned into more than a drabble oops. I got carried away I can't help it asdflk;h. Anyways I totally got inspired by ATLA for some of the logan pep talk if u can tell lol.

The mansion was so lonely. It shouldn't be but it is. Especially for you. Brought here as a child you grew up here. You were excited, hopeful that maybe you could start a new life here. But then your powers went haywire.

Just when you thought things could be different your emotions got the better of you. Fire raged through the mansion and you couldn't stop it. The more you panicked the worst it got.

When the flames were put out all you could see was the destruction that ravaged the once spotless mansion. It was an accident. Charles knew it and so did everyone else but that didn't stop the whispers, the fear. You never wanted this.

You did all you could to suppress your powers for years. Leaving the school and never looking back. Years passed and you managed to live a quite life. You went to work and went home. It was a lonely life but you couldn't hurt anyone so it you learned to live it.

Then one day you got a letter from Charles. It was a matter of such importance that you had no choice but to return. It was weird being back.

It was in the dead of the night that you found yourself alone. Just as you remembered. This time wandering through the halls of the mansion. Your fingers traced the familiar paintings and furniture. A frown coming over your face as you trace the faint scorch marks that still remain.

"So those were you." A deep voice startles you.

You feel a light flame escape your fingertips as you shove you cross your arms and hide your hands away. There stands Logan with a cigar in his mouth. You breathe a sigh of relief as you lower your arms.

"Sorry, didn't meant to scare you." He holds out his cigar and you roll your eyes. He's been trying to get you to use your powers, to light his damn cigars because he's too lazy to reach into his own pocket.

"Come on, just a little flame." He says with a smirk.

"Can I help you Logan?" Though you're glaring he can see that small smile.

You and Logan were unlikely friends as you put it. The two of you understood each other. Understood the want to hide away. Don't get close and you won't get hurt. Even with that mantra somehow you were each others exception.

Maybe it was stupid but having Logan was nice. He was nice in his own weird way. Looked out for you, joked with you on the rare occasion. Plus he was easy on the eyes, but you don't let yourself go there. Love...it's just not meant for you. You don't do love and neither does Logan. Even if you want it, even if sometimes he finds his way into your dreams.

"Nope." He gestures for you to follow him so you do. Walking quietly through the halls until he leads you outside. A chill washes over you step outside.

"Just a little light for me sweetheart?" Okay the first time was charming but now it's getting annoying.

"Will you quit it." You snap. Logan raises an eyebrow and you sigh. Sitting down on a bench and looking down at your hands.

"You know I don't use my powers anymore."

"I know."

"So why do you keep asking?" He shrugs and sits down next to you.

"Because, I think you're being ridiculous."

"Excuse me?" You scoff. You clench your fists as you glare at Logan.

"So what you burned some wood big deal. That really all it takes for you to run?"

You're hurt and confused where the hell this is coming from. You thought he'd understand you but clearly you were wrong.

"You know what Logan fuck you." You hiss as you stand up.

Logan grabs your wrist before you can walk away and in a fit of anger you push him away. Flames coming out of your hand and hitting him square in the chest. You gasp as his flannel catches fire. Without thinking you press your hand and kill the flame.

"Logan I-"

"Stop." He grabs your wrist and points to an empty fire pit.

"Light it."

"Logan I can't."

"Yes you can sweetheart," He tilts your head towards him. Looking at you with a sparkle in his eye.

"Trust yourself." You take a deep breath and send a fireball into the pit, lighting it up.

Your hand tingles as you use your powers for the first time in a long time. You wait for the other shoe to drop. For the fire to rage past what it's meant to be but it never does. Slowly you hold your hand out focus, the fire slowly gets smaller until it's snuffed out. You stare at your hand in awe. Control. You had control.

"Fire is destruction." Logan interlaces your fingers with his. He's got this smile that you've never really seen before.

"But it's also life, it's beautiful. You're beautiful." You bite your lip as he squeezes your hand. There's a fear that you'll burn him without thinking but he heals. You can't hurt him.

"Why are you helping me?" Why does he care this much? He didn't have to do this, you're not a student and yet here he is. Pushing you past your worries.

"I..." Logan tries to find the words. You're right he doesn't do this but he did for you because, well because..."I love you sweetheart."

Your eyes cloud with tears as you take in his words. He doesn't mean it can he? I mean, it's does he understand what that means. What it means to love you.

“Don’t tell me you love me unless you mean it. Please." You don't think you could handle it. He's already got your heart and it won't take much to crush it.

"Are you doubting me? I'm over a hundred years old I know what love feels like." Logan brushes your lips with his thumb, he's not great with words but he knows what he feels. No one can tell him any different.

Your eyes flutter shut as he kisses you. He smells like cigar smoke and he tastes like honey. The kiss a little rough, you can tell he's trying to hold back. To be gentle which he's not always great at. You pout when he breaks the kiss, already wanting more.

"Later." He promises after noticing the look on your face.

You walk back through the mansion hand in hand. It's better at this hour, no prying eyes and whispers. For now it's just you and him. Though something does cross your mind as you reach your room.

"Did you...Were you trying to make me mad on purpose?" He smirks and pulls out another cigar from somewhere.

"It worked didn't it?" Unbelievable.

"You're an idiot Logan, what if I couldn't control it? What if I burned down the mansion, again?!" Logan rolls his eyes and kisses you again. Pushing you against the door. Your thoughts turn to mush as he kisses your neck.

"You aren't the monster you think you are." He whispers and you freeze. His words hitting you like a brick. Logan knows what it's like to be a monster, a weapon. He's the monster if anything. But you? You could never be. Not in his eyes.

Before he leaves he hands you his cigar. You shake your head and laugh. Holding out your hand you produce a small flame and he lights his cigar.

"Was all this just so I could give you a light?" You ask teasingly. Logan chuckles and presses another kiss to your cheek.

"Absolutely." As much as you want to invite him in your room, you decide to wait. Rushing anything with Logan is the last thing you want. You want the time to be together. A good fire needs to grow before it becomes a roar.

"Goodnight Logan."

"Goodnight sweetheart."

Your fingers slowly unlace as he walks away. You don't want him to go, fearing that this is just a one off night. There's no way you can have control so easily but then he looks back at you. He's got this look on his face that makes you feel like everything is going to be alright and for once you believe it.

[olderthannetfic]

Im neither a proshipper nor an anti at this current stage in life, but at one point i was an anti i guess? And I hate it say it, but looking back, I understand why. I don't think I actually gave a fuck about Harmful Fanfic or whatever, it was just a substitute for therapy that i couldn't get at the time (because "literally neurodivergent and a minor" or whatever, but like...actually literally neurodivergent and a minor LOL).

As weird as it sounds like, no one cared about my ACTUAL PAIN, and that made me feel EVEN MORE PAIN, so i took it out on ppl who shipped "abuse", or whatever.

It's so stupid now, as an adult who is mentally better than I was then, but as ridiculous as it was, seeing someone ship an "abusive" ship or a "queer erasing ship" (like a canonically gay character with someone of the other binary gender)...it felt eerily similar to the actual abuse I was facing and the stress that everyone was putting on me to find a boyfriend or ask why my (closeted lesbian) self didn't like any boys.

But it was so much easier to keyboard warrior about how people who ship Bad things are Bad people, than it was to fix any problems in my actual life because...well, the actual problems in my life COULDN'T be fixed. That isn't a learned helplessness thing, there was genuinely nothing I could've done. So pissing off Shippers was, like, a vessel for that, and it *felt* like I was getting to lash out at the same people who were ACTUALLY hurting me, even though that obviously is not the case. Funny thing is, it wasn't actual fandom discourse that made me switch sides, it was getting to learn more about youth liberation movements and stuff, because it was then that I recognized the actual structures that were making me hurt.

I think one silver lining is it's made me more compassionate an adult. While I don't have any defense for the antis who do actual horrendous stuff like doxxing or sending death/rape threats, etc, I do have a lot of defense for the ones who were like me and would just make posts talking about how Wrong it is to ship certain things. I know that not all antis are in the same place that I was once was, and some are just genuinely immature brats, but it's like. . . I get it, you know?

The cycle of abuse/bullying is weird and it's not often a 1:1 "I had an abusive parent so now i'll be an abusive parent", sometimes it's the chronically online stuff like I did. It's also why I'm careful-careful to not engage and to just block or, even try to have a mature discussion if I can, and if the person I'm talking to is just "a little bit annoying" rather than "actual bully doing/sending illegal stuff". A lot of them just want to be heard, I think, and it really makes me sad that this is the way they choose to be heard...but also i get it, because i was that.

--

Yup. We often discuss anti tendencies in this framework.

People want control over their environment when they have none. They want the world to make sense and for there to be simple rules they can follow to Never Mess Up. This is a very common reaction to trauma and also typical of brains that like order and neat boxes and a world full of justice and logic.

The trouble is that a critical mass of "I'm just pointing this out" type posts does tend to make all the other teens with an issue around moral scrupulosity implode. (And let's be real, plenty of the antis themselves are secretly into dark content and are trying to pray the gay kink away.)

I have some sympathy, but I'm still going to tell people they're sealioning when they are and tell them they're flat out wrong about how fantasies work, not sugar coat it because they're probably a delicate teen. There's no need to be excessively mean or treat people as irredeemable, but I also don't like how we talk endlessly about compassion for teen antis and not for teens targeted by antis. It's similar to how there are all those complaints like "Hey, I work hard to manage my mental illness, but all the support seems to go to people who are letting their issues rampage..."

[firstkanaphans]

RE your tags on the bromance thing - I think I allowed myself to get a little panicky earlier when seeing a few people talk about there potentially being more, and whilst there are a few points made that I can understand, I do feel like the amount of worry I’m seeing it maybe a little preemptive?

Like, I do agree that it feels stupid to put TayNew in a bromance series; if they wanted two actors that are close & have worked together before, why not Tay and Off or New and Gun or something? BUT I did see that Tay and New actually wanted to do a bromance series together, so there’s part of me thinking that this was THEIR choice to do this series and not give it to some other actors. (And let’s be fair, I don’t think there’s anyone else who could have made this show so warm, angsty, and lovely.)

I feel like GMMTV has really been embracing their BLs a bit more if I’m honest, and sure, they do queer baiting in their non-queer shows, but who doesn’t? You can watch anything on Netflix or whatever and find ‘bromances’ that are severe queer baiting.

I kinda feel like sometimes people pile on GMMTV a bit much, all because they’re kinda like the biggest company in the drama community that does decent queer dramas? I don’t know if that’s just me being blind to their flaws, but I sometimes think they get a little more hate than other production companies and not always deservedly? (I mean I know they aren’t perfect and I call out their bullshit myself, but I feel like sometimes it’s ‘cool’ to hate on them?)

Sorry if none of this makes sense and I’m rambling - it’s almost 2am and I really need to sleep 🤣

In my opinion, these claims that GMMTV is going to pivot to bromances because they’re less gay and more profitable are absolutely baseless. Bromances are not new to GMMTV. They’re not even new to TayNew as I believe I’m Tee, Me Too was a bromance as well. Like you said, P’Dome explicitly stated that TayNew wanted to film a show together that was not a BL. Should they not be able to? And weren’t these same people complaining just days ago that CPs are never allowed to act outside of their CP? Now, they’re mad when they do.

What people are losing their marbles over is literally just the cast and crew having a good time with the fans. Did they play into the shipping aspect both onscreen and off? Of course they did! What writer worth their salt would have passed up such a perfect opportunity? But to me, it didn’t feel malicious. It felt like P’Dome was just having fun and giving Polcas a little nod. I almost feel like it would have been more strange if he hadn’t.

People certainly don’t have to like bromances, but it’s like We Are all over again where people were saying its very existence was indicative of the fall of the genre as we know it. And that’s just utterly ridiculous. This isn’t a queer story where the queerness was censored. In fact, there were explicit queer themes throughout. This is just a platonic love story and a lot of people who may not be interested in romantic relationships have found immense value in that.

Like I said in my tags, P’Aof is the Director of Content Production at GMMTV, meaning he is literally the one in charge of what content is being produced, and I’m choosing to trust the gay Thai man who has dedicated his career to this. He has such a passion for telling queer stories. Why would he stop now?

But like you said, it’s become hip to hate on GMMTV. And look, I don’t like corporations either, but let’s not pretend like GMMTV isn’t really fucking gay. Because they are. This is not a company that has ever shied away from explicitly queer content and is actually making more of it than ever before, so I’m not going to fault them for adding a few shows for the straights too. And if they have to make het stuff, I would much rather sit through a bromance than anything else.

I mean Jesus Christ. Peaceful Property was fun. I had fun. And it was also really good—easily my favorite offering from GMMTV all year—so if they want to make a hundred more bromances just like this, I’m certainly not going to complain about it. Some people just don’t want to enjoy anything.

(And go to sleep, Pip! It’s late 😂)

[boy-gender]

How do you deal with guilt around being a man, and like generally feeling like you're "betraying women" or choosing to be something bad by transitioning? It's something I've really been struggling with..

I sort of have two answers for you.

The first is a bit glib, but I think you've got some bioessentialism to unlearn, anon. I know that it's probably not a belief you arrived at yourself- rather, a bunch of hateful radfem douschebags have so often repeatedly said shit like that, that you're a traitor, you're failing feminism, youre just trying to escape the patriarchy, you're mocking what women are, men are evil and youll become evil especially with testosterone. That kind of crap.

Genuinely I do not give it any thought. It's ridiculous on the surface, so I write it off as misguided and inane. There is no logical way to justify grouping an entire half of the population together, deciding that the one thing they have in common (being men) is somehow the defining trait about them (because nothing else is being taken into account, like their sexuality, ethnicity, trans or intersex status, poverty level, where they live, whatever) and then also deciding that one common trait is the root of all evil. I've personally had a lot of experience with people doing this with certain mental illnesses- particularly cluster B personality disorders- and deciding like "yes this one thing about you makes you evil. You have Evil Person Disorder," and seeing how stupid that was, I just applied it elsewhere. Humans are far too diverse, nuanced, and contradictory for any flat rule like "all X people are bad" to ever be accurate. If it's not accurate, it's not useful, so I don't judge myself by it. I literally just block the people spewing that shit and let it slide off like water on a duck. I have enough warped internalized beliefs from my upbringing- I'm not adding more when I can immediately and obviously see their flaws.

So my advice is to block anyone you see saying that shit. You might be beginning to internalize it because of just how often you see it- so you need to cut that off at the source. Radfems are not and never will be allies; they do not have "some good points." Their movement was specifically designed by conservatives to uphold white supremacist capitalism, and nothing that comes from that is ethically correct. I'd suggest picking up Mothers of Conservatism by Michelle Nickerson. A lot about the origins of the radfem/female separatism movements are detailed there, created by fundamentally conservative women. With this new 4B movement shit on the rise, it's helpful to understand how fucked up and wrong they've always been from the beginning. My second answer to you is to look at what manhood means to you. If you don't think you can be objective about this, ask a friend to help. List the traits you associate with what *you* personally want to be as a man, what you hope you transition towards. Do you want to be a financial provider? Do you want to defend your community? Do you want to be generous? Brave? Do you want to be an expert in a special interest? Do you want to make lots of friends?

Make a list of those traits. Then look at them, divorced from the idea of gender. Is being a financial provider "bad?" Is being generous bad? Or brave? Or having lots of friends? Are any of these things bad in isolation, or does your guilt about them come from their association with manhood? Is that /your/ association, or did other people cause you to think there is an association?

For me, I had two formative male relationships as a child. My father, and my maternal grandfather. My father was an abusive piece of shit who liked to pick me up by the throat and slam me into walls, threaten our pet cats, scream at me until I dissociated, called me slurs, hated my opinions on anything, belittled me, believed only in capitalism, is a social darwinist capitalist schill, hates my mom, treated me like a servant and punching bag, and is a miserable fuck with no friends.

My grandpa was an old man who loved scotland and tartan and scottish terriers even though he never had one, loved each of his cats which he had all the time. He collected coins and read about history, he made model planes. He watched judge judy with me and talked about the cases and if we agreed with her rulings; he watched the news from multiple different outlets a day and taught me to weigh them against one another. He loved sitting on the porch and watching neighborhood kids play, and he drank a lot of lemonade. He was a brilliant chemist, provider, raised 4 kids in near poverty, then raised 8 grandkids after that. He would sneak me chocolate malt balls as a "vitamin" and he would tease my grandma by pretending to pick up and lick his plate after dinner. He taught my uncle to garden who then taught my cousin, so all my life gardening has been "mens work" to me. He was soft spoken, curious, patient, and mischevious. He loved my grandma for 60 years until he died.

These men have nothing in common except that they were men. Being a man didnt make my grandpa evil because he chose not to be. Being a man didnt make my dad evil either; he's an evil fuck because he made that choice. They are both sentient beings, who can use logic and emotions alike. One chose poorly. It never made sense to me as a child to assume all men would be like my dad or like my grandpa, because they were both men and they weren't at all like each other. Some categories are just so broadly diverse that they aren't really helpful- if I ask you to picture a mammal, do I mean a monkey or a mouse? Does "sea creature" mean a giant ass blue whale or a tiny piece of plankton? "Man" as a category is too broad to make assumptions about. I know it sounds circular and reductive, but the only thing that makes someone a man is...being a man. Nothing else.

I find it helps to look at a diverse array of men, to see all that men can be, especially men not like myself or the men I know. What does it mean to be a man in rural Yunnan farm country? What did it mean to be a man in medieval europe? What is it like being a gay black man from california, or a hunter living off the grid in appalachia? What does it mean to be a man in a culture where long hair is masculine, or where harvesting plants is masculine, where being a doctor is masculine? What about cultures where adornment is masculine? Hell, what about animals? What's it like to be a male lion vs a male house cat? What do I think about male cardinals, who are the bright lovely red ones, whose color is meant to draw a predators eye to them and away from the female cardinals and their nests?

To me, gender is an all you can eat buffet. It's customizeable. You can pick up or ignore or throw away any traits you want or don't want. Grab things that are feminine in your culture and incorporate them into your manhood in a subversive, gender nonconforming way. Take things that are masculine that make you happy, that you're reclaiming in a way because you may not have been allowed to do/be them before. Fill your gender with the ideals and aesthetics you like. You are fundamentally changing manhood by being a man, by being a different kind of man than any other man. If there are 4 billion men on the planet, there are 4 billion different 'microgenders' of man.

Seems silly to write off an entire 4 billion people as inherently evil and incapable of either goodness or change. It's just illogical. For me, that's enough to discard the idea wholecloth. If it doesn't make sense, I'm not wasting my time with it. That's not an ability everyone else has easily though, so you take the time you need. Try to look at yourself as objectively as possible, as an outsider. As you transition, have your actions become more evil? Are you committing sexist acts? Have you literally betrayed all the women you know somehow? Do you feel yourself becoming less kind, less patient, less interested in equality or the preservation of life? I'm betting, since you're nervous about it enough to ask, that none of those things are happening to you. Do not let yourself be gaslit into believing you are becoming something you're not. Look at your actions, your words. Look at your values and how you live up to them. If you don't see any sudden discrepancy, then you know anyone who tells you you're becoming evil by becoming a man is straight up lying to you. They're projecting an idea onto you that doesnt fit reality; trying to put a round peg in the square hole. Be curious, be objective. Do not be misled, and for those who try to mislead you, hit them with a chunky block button.

[radlymona]

I feel like this person accidentally perfectly described what the meaning of "q*eer" is nowadays, without touching on how removing it from its initial usage as a slur against gay men is homophobic. (Presumably) Gen Zers have a fundamental misunderstanding of lgb history because larpers have appropriated the word for their own cause, and this is just normalised????

The secondary, terrifying aspect of this, is that anyone perceived as not ~normal~ is now being lumped in with lgb people, something activist groups have spent decades fighting against. That's why kinksters, furries, polyamorous people, and heterosexual men incapable of romantic love are now considered q*eer regardless of whether or not they experience same sex attraction.

[aliciavance4228]

"Medusa x Perseus" Why don't you guys ship Bellerophon with Chimera? Or Heracles with the Hydra?

[girlthativealwaysbeen]

pata hai last kuch din i was very busy with my project kyunki final dena tha and binding karni thi etc to wo karwayi then i went to the bookfair bekaar tha then parso submit karne jaa rahi to subah accident hogaya (bhai ki bike skid hogayi and we fell down) and now i have a big ass blue bruise on my upper thigh and my parents don't even know lmao and kal ek science conference thi to i had to sit in an auditorium for 6 hours listening to accomplished people speak. that's what you missed now your turn

omg i knew everything in this except for the accident cause i stalk your blog vigorously everyday are you okay!!!!!!!!!! did you get tetanus shots!!!!!!!!!! also on your upper thigh oh no that's where future jiju is supposed to write MINE na as per our beloved song guilty as sin?

[ficmeouttahere]

this is entirely atlabeths fault btw

[steakout-05]

having social anxiety on tumblr dot com is so fucking frustrating cause like. i'll see a post i like and want to reblog but i do it with so so so much embarrassment because my brain's just thinking "oh god oh fuck im being so stupid right now what if op sees it and thinks im annoying" but like. they realistically would either not care at all or be happy about someone reblogging their post so like what the actual fuck am i afraid of??? but here's the kicker. the reason i have social anxiety in the first place is because i HAVE experienced these comically horrible social experiences of being judged and insulted for no reason before. multiple times. recently. the possibility of this happening is not a 0 chance. i have legitimate reasons to be afraid. and that is. actually horrific

[laughinglynx]

.

[k00ldino]

slamming my head against a brick wall WHYYYY WON’T IT LET ME FILL OUT THE FAFSA WHY WHY WHY WHY

[atthebell-moved]

once again wilbur obviously knows tntduo comes across as romantic & homoerotic, they explicitly flirt and have feelings for each other in canon. his statement at vidcon was based off how stupid the question was-- they asked if they were dating/had been on dates and he said no bc yeah. they never dated. they did absolutely suck face in canon, but there were no dates.

he did not say there were no romantic feelings, and he obviously felt weird about answering without talking to q about it (clearly quackity does not give a fuck, lol). imagine doing stupid gay roleplay with your friend and then being asked in front of a huge in-person audience if you meant it slash r or slash p as if you are the sole authority. id say stupid shit too 😭

[echthr0s]

it's Over the Garden Wall season and every year I think about how frustrated I was with that series for reasons I couldn't explain and no one else seemed to get until I finally figured out on my own that it was a combination of media illiteracy and cultural mismatch that was the problem

I have a much bigger capacity for Not Understanding media now because I can now figure out why I don't understand it (and I can usually figure out how to learn whatever I'm ignorant about OR make the decision to go by vibes and what it feels like to me instead), but the worst feeling was trying to enjoy something that other people seemed to think was the holy grail of the medium and going "what... what is happening though"

[lettersfromthelevant]

i swear, every pride month, i end up unfollowing like close to a dozen people--including mutuals--because everyone just gets completely politically unhinged and horrible. either it is aphobia, misogyny, or antisemitism, but soooo many people just go off the rails with it. i dunno what it is about this month, but where i used to look forward to it, i've begun to absolutely dread it.

i used to love pride online because irl pride is so hostile to jews (it isn't that much better here, tbh) and i could at least participate here, but where it used to be mostly sane, it has quickly spiraled into homophobia/biphobia/aphobia, misogyny, and exploitative regressive politics where the entire point of pride is sidelined to appeal to some fucked up groups that this website loves propping up as mascots. no one on here seems capable of being normal about forgotten marginalized groups, like women, aces, and jews. it even has a lead up sometimes; the lead up this year felt like pms, my dash has been so bad the past couple weeks and today the floodgates opened. i haven't seen this much unmasked misogyny and aphobia in a long time and it is only day one. this year is gonna suck, i can just feel it.

all this to say, if i end up unfollowing you and you're a mutual, it isn't personal. i'm just getting close to my wits end

[girlthativealwaysbeen]

sometimes my bestfriend is like an angel in disguise istg

[drakonovisny]

am i supposed to take this seriously after all the shit she's said and done before?

lmao