#to be primary gender locked imo

[limelocked]

abo anon here. randomly remembering i sent an ask and seeing your blog name made me rub my hands like a fly that just landed. Yes yes it is all going according to plan, this is all my doing/j

i still have the ask and a now growing google doc of abo worldbuilding written as if im a poor unfortunate earth scientist whos found these weirdos on a distant planet and started observing them for fun and profit

here have a table, on the house

[self-loving-vampire]

As someone who does find tma/tme useful I kind of see them as similar to like, "person of color", where there are clear issues with the literal meaning (racism isn't just based on skin tone, there's minorities that don't have dark skin, less useful the further from a US context you get, etc.) but I still find it useful just to have a term for "primary targets of this bigotry"

Although part of the reason I like it is that I also consider a good few categories who aren't transfem tma. Like, at least a good amount of people who identify as femboys, crossdressers, drag queens, etc, especially those who present fem (or wish they could present fem, since there's surely a resson they don't if so!) all the time in their daily lives are, imo, still primary targets of transmisogyny even if not transfem.

...And I'm pretty sure a lot of the people who go to bat hard for tma/tme would be very mad at that statement, so I'm honestly not sure what utility they get from it lol

I do kind of hope that the idea that being transfeminized is like, a thing done to certain people by society (rather than just self identity) becomes more mainstream on Tumblr though, because I do think that's a better articulation of the concept that better uses of tma are gesturing toward.

Yeah, that's one thing a lot of people could learn from the book. A lot of the groups it happened to did not conceive of themselves as specifically trans women in a modern sense but they get hit with a lot of the same stereotypes. I recall one of the examples given in the book was even a cis man who crossdressed and danced specifically for economic reasons.

I think the comparison to PoC is reasonable enough, but I notice the boundaries for who is "TMA" get policed much more unreasonably than the ones for who is a person of color. It's like if people were taking all of the issues you bring up about its literal meaning and seriously using them to gatekeep who counts, resulting in some absurdities.

It often even results in claims that if you grew up with a certain AGAB you have one particular set of experiences and could not possibly understand the other set, even though it's often things I know for a fact affect even cis women. While statistics might suggest different rates, I'm really skeptical of the idea of completely gender-locked upbringings and experiences that are just beyond understanding if you were not born with certain parts. It kind of reminds me of when radfems act like only AFAB people are ever raised to be submissive or experience sexual violence as if child abuse isn't a normal thing that affects people of all genders.

[sister-dear]

Whoever your favorite Link is, do headcanons for them, please and thank you

sdflsadfj More? You are too kind. ❤

My fav is Sky, but Four, Legend, and Wild are all up there with him so...

Four Headcanons!

Disclaimer that my headcanons for Four probably shift and change the most out of any of the Links depending on what I’m wanting out of a given story.

Four still lives with his grandfather at the forge. His dad was in the picture for a time but it was brief and they never got very close. He has a very good relationship with Grandpa Smith.

Very private. He’ll be friendly or at least pleasantly social with people, but it takes him a long time to actually warm up to them. Dude has excellent customer service skills; he knows how to read a room.

Trades constant, ruthless short jokes with Dot. They’re as bad with teasing and shit-talking each other as Wind and Tetra. Dot is taller than him but not by much.

The vast majority of his community loves and is supportive of him. I go back and forth on the degree to which his colors are public knowledge, but at least a few members of Hyrule Town are aware of them and are friendly towards whichever part of Four happens to walk through their doors.

Closet gremlin

Being separated for as long as he was during Four Swords meant the colors became just individual enough that when he re-merged it did not go smoothly. He had to relearn how to walk, talk, eat, everything. Immediately post adventure he was completely bed-bound, relying on soft foods, and barely communicating. It took intense therapy to get him back on his feet, which Dot made sure was provided to him. Grandpa Smith was his primary caretaker and so played a large part in his recovery; it’s part of why they’re still so close. Eventually he recovered the ability to split, which helped significantly. It meant he could split up to work out the problem when his colors started clashing instead of getting sucked into his own head and locking up.

All of that recovery took a minimum of two years, probably more like three or four. So for this to work and him to be ~17 by the time of LU he’d have been about 13-14 on his second adventure. Younger than I think the actual characters of the canon manga and game were meant to be, but imo it works with the art style of the game.

Grandpa Smith knows the colors as individuals and considers all of them his grandsons.

Can sometimes get lost in his own head if the colors are having a strong disagreement or he’s otherwise having a bad mental health day. It usually reads as kind of dazed/out of it/stumbly to those around him

Quite comfortable in crowds, royal court, high society, society in general.

Dislikes cats

Little gay man. The individual colors might have differing sexualities and genders (heck, he’s young enough for all of that to still be changing and developing) but they are all attracted to boys to at least some degree so Four as a whole identifies as gay.

Violet’s first crush was Shadow, and at least some of those feelings carried across to Four. At the very least he considers Shadow to have been a friend.

Nothing will make Four pull his hair out faster than people doing things they shouldn’t to their weapons. To him, smithing is an art form. Four takes the care and quality of all of his companions’ weapons very personally. 

Four is something of a jack of all trades when it comes to weapons. He isn’t just a sword guy; he’s perfectly capable with a bow and quite likes bombs. His fighting style involves lots of rolling and dodging and redirecting momentum. He just can’t afford to take as many direct blows as someone bigger.

When at home, Four can and does split into his component colors all the time in order to get more shit done or just give himself some mental space. When he needs to settle himself mentally into one body, he usually turns to smithing. It’s one of the few activities all of the colors love equally. 

Protective of Sky, who is something of a kindred spirit. They’re usually the first to notice if one of them is having a bad health day, though Four tends to put a lot more effort into hiding his bad days than Sky does.

I headcanon that the boys all met up in pairs first, then those pairs joined up before finally coming together in one big group. In that little scenario, Four met Twilight first. He was Minish size and Twilight was a wolf, so they knew one of each other’s secrets from the start. The reciprocity of that appeals to Four, as does Twilight’s level head, so he began to trust Twilight a lot faster than he usually would with someone.

Will get up to shenanigans with Hyrule, Wind, and Wild. Those four are all definitely still teenagers, and sometimes you just gotta try out whatever hairbrained scheme your buddies have cooked up this time.

Moar: Wild | Sky | Legend | Hyrule | Warriors

[milkshakedoe]

le thoughts

something that bothers me about lesbian discourse i’ve seen, and a large part of why i’ve stopped really self-identifying as a “lesbian”, is how even among very well-meaning trans-positive groups or groups of lesbians who are trans themselves (at least online), a major problem always remains IMO not fully resolved: how to deal with closeted and questioning amab trans people, or people with nonstandard gender lacking the language to articulate it, without seeing them as Men in some degree.

it’s not that many don’t try, and i’m certain there are (and i know) very many lesbians who would (rightly) affirm in a heartbeat that such people are not "men”. but i’ve never seen a satisfying argument that really lays our anxieties to rest. as much as the idea that political lesbianism inherently supports transfems as a function of “centering women” or “the lesbian” may feel validating to transfems laboring to define themselves as clearly as possible as “not a man”, within the political framework often assumed by lesbian feminists i don't think this is a problem that ever can be really resolved.

----

in popular discourse about oppression there is the idea that oppression is a sort of relationship of individual wrongdoing, the “responsibility” for which ultimately lies at the feet of individuals, even if those individuals are seen as a “structural” group. in this worldview it is “men” who, as a collective of responsible parties, for their own self-benefit and pleasure, commit violence against women and those who aren’t men.

it’s controversial perhaps, but contrary to what you may hear on this site, there is no ‘secret cheat code’ for women to liberate themselves from patriarchal society when it’s all around them. it’s good and necessary to understand that you don’t have to date men, but the truth is that regardless of whether or not you date men we live in a misogynist society and trying to separate from it by divesting ourselves from Men - even where we don’t explicitly call it “separatism” or even “divesting” - isn’t going to save us, and the idea that we can become more or less liberated or more or less revolutionary or what have you by refusing Men and relationships with Men on the basis that Men are the source of oppression by virtue of being ��Men” rests on flawed assumptions about gender that cause problems for transfems, and all of us.

the idea that “men” simply oppress women out of a kind of individual self-interest that either they are individually born with, or is somehow transmitted to them by their social man-ness (or their “privilege” makes pursuing their interests inherently detrimental to others, to put it another way), is not really compatible with an understanding of transness that goes further than saying that trans people were “born this way”. although many people, especially trans feminists and lesbians, are aware by now that thinking of trans people as being “born” trans is as mistaken as saying people are “born gay”, those that (rightly!) try to help defend transfems from accusations of “male privilege” still tend to latch on to narratives that essentially say the same thing.

that is, even if we recognize that babies can’t have gender, we say that transfems at least had decided their gender more or less from the point where they could first make conscious social decisions, and as such must be seen as having always been girls or non-men. therefore, when transphobes yammer that all people in patriarchal society are subject to “socialization” which corresponds exactly to assigned gender and defines their gender, we can answer: no, transfems were subject to transfeminine socialization, which decisively qualifies them as always having been feminine.

----

but the problem with this idea is that it takes “socialization” entirely at face value and ends up performing the same function: peoples’ gender largely isn’t decided by them; it was locked in once before a person’s social being really came to exist, and can’t change again. it denies the possibility that anyone who considers theirself to have been a “man” at any point in their life could ever be something different. it takes away trans peoples’ agency - and more importantly, it denies the possibility that patriarchal gender could ever really be transcended, since if cis peoples’ genders and interests too are basically locked in at toddlerhood if not at birth, then how can we ever envision doing away with it all?

so to be clear: it’s not “socialization” that makes peoples’ gender. if there is anything to be said about socialization, it is that gender is constituted not by socialization but by individual agency in response to that socialization, struggling against the conditions imposed upon them and what they've been told to accept.

but ultimately, the problem with all of our attempts to grapple with closeted and questioning people lies in the privilege framework itself. so long as we still take the idea of “privilege” seriously - that there are these identity categories to which people “belong” and which essentially determine their self-interests or the effect that pursuing their interests has on others (”mens’ privilege means that their benefit inherently comes at others’ cost”), which amounts to the same thing - then men can only be understood in such a way that ever being associated with men or seeing one’s self as a man (up to and including being attracted to and dating men, “gaining privilege” by becoming a “collaborator” of sorts) makes one inherently tainted with privilege and therefore wrongdoing for which one must be “held accountable”, that is, they must “pay for their crimes”.

----

when we see gender and oppression this way, yet try to understand transfemininity in a way that doesn’t give credence to “male privilege”, we run into irresolvable problems: we end up having to define all transfems as effectively always having been feminine as long as they were conscious, which may be the case for some - but thinking this is how it always works makes cis society seem inevitable and impossible to dismantle in the end. and because the privileged must always be “held accountable” for their privilege we have to say that, well it’s unfortunate but good feminists must treat “men” as inherently guilty of the sins of being men until they can prove otherwise that they are not really men. because if we try not to see people who call themselves men in this way, then the entire framework of resistance to patriarchy built on privilege starts to break down.

paradoxically, in defining privilege as a relationship of individual wrongdoing flowing from the social category to which one allegedly belongs, “privilege” sees people not really as people, but as mere representations of abstract categories: individual “men” become really mere physical appendages of the abstract category of Men, and become individually defined as oppressors, while non-men in turn likewise become defined as personifications of their position within gendered oppression. but there is a way out of this mess. i find it more useful and compelling to see people first as individuals who are potentially involved in structural dynamics but not inevitably so. while abstract social structures really do exist, and often dominate us, compel our actions, and structure our spontaneous consciousness (our understanding of the world before any analysis), again, it is our individual agency struggling up against the conditions imposed upon us that defines who we are, and defines our structural relationship to the world in turn.

furthermore, punishment is the logic of capitalism. as the Soviet legal scholar Evgeny Pashukanis wrote, the idea of equivalent punishment to an equivalent “crime” can only arise in the context of capitalism and the commodity fetish. capitalism is a society where we relate to other people first and foremost as owners of commodities and where we obtain almost everything we need to live and enjoy life through buying and selling. in capitalism, the underlying logic of commodities - the logic of value, where two objects are socially held to be equal in trade regardless of their concrete properties that actually make them useful to humans - comes to seem like the primary natural property of all commodities. and because commodity owners always interact first through the comparison of their commodities, and not through a direct social relationship, it comes to seem as though all human relationships are really properties of commodities themselves which can be exchanged: the legal commodity of “rights”, or “dignity” as David Graeber might put it.

the logic of punishment knows no concept of healing and problem-solving, only a very simple math equation: so long as the offender has not served their sentence and “paid their debt”, justice remains unserved, and so the sin of privilege which makes one harmful regardless of one’s intent must always linger with those who were supposedly tainted by it. even if we can define all transfems who’ve realized their gender as having been always women, we find ourselves failing on a collective basis to help those who still lack the language or confidence to articulate themselves.

we can do away with all of this horrible nonsense. if we are really to do justice to transfems in a way that doesn’t frame us as in some sense "privileged” or “men” or a natural aberration within cis society or see cis society as inevitable, we can and urgently need to abandon notions of privilege and punishment.

[imminentlydeadlined]

Can’t speak for everyone by any means but a few thoughts on this and the previous post:

1) Number of alts: complaint level can definitely can relate to sexism (see also: people getting mad about Hinoka 2 when she was introduced on the same banner as Shigure 2,) but I think by this point it’s more that “popular character has five alts” is old news. Our first five-alt instance was in 2018, and by this point the list of five-alt characters is at 10, (more if you count gender-split avatars.) Especially given that Ike’s a popular lord and has split forms to some extent from the two games, and I’m not surprised it’s not been a subject of much discussion.

2) Weapon type: agreed that it’s pretty unfortunate, but it’s also fairly expected. Non-seasonal alts mostly run on weapons the character can actually use, and Ike’s pretty locked down there. His one seasonal alt could have run a lance or tome, but honestly when Intsys is asked to pick which character who can’t normally use magic gets a tome weapon for their seasonal, it’s pretty reliably been a woman. I think at this point I’m mostly just glad Ike doesn’t color/niche overlap too badly with the other Tellian characters I want to run him with. 

3) Powercreep generally: the Fallen banner could definitely be considered standout in terms of gender ratio, with Ike being the “primary” unit and Lyon arguably the most notable meta-wise, but I don’t think people are wrong to point to a trend of 2020′s banners being, on average, a female lead unit and an unremarkable male demote, regardless of outliers like this one. Out of ten non-8% banners, seven had a female lead, and two of the remainder were a mixed-gender Duo leading instead. Of the year’s demotes, so far none have been female (which could be fairly considered a problem of its own, since high-availability is a pretty positive trait imo, even when it comes with lower likelihood of prf and good stats.) I’ve certainly seen people happy to get a strong Lyon alt, but I don’t think those people are going to change their stance on the trends until the percentages adjust more notably. 

Honestly if nothing else, you’d think people would be more upset about Ike’s fifth alt just being another sword guy alt.

Keep reading

[artificial-aesir]

otherkin challenge

this is supposed to be a 30 day thing but i’m bored so!!

1. What name do you go by? What is the significance of it to you? I prefer not to be locked down by a single name. I go by a name i’d rather not share on this account mostly in real life, interchangeably with Jude and Akira among friends. I’m not opposed to being referred to as any of my primary or secondary kintypes, though!

2. How old are you? (If you don’t mind sharing.) What is the gender you identify as? I’m almost 20, and I identify as masculine nonbinary. 

3. What is your Otherkin/Therian species? Most of my kintypes are fictionkin, but otherwise--lion, demon, wolf, and cat.

4. How long have you known you were Otherkin? How old were you when you Awakened? Gosh... I guess I always felt a very loose sense of “self” so you could argue I’ve always had a sense of it. I was 16 when I started thinking I may be otherkin, and I was 18 when I finally embraced it. It’s helped a lot as a way of categorizing otherwise dangerous headspaces. 

5. How did you find the Otherkin community? I’m a furry, so I found it through that initially. Quite a few friends I met through a fandom RP community on tumblr also were kin so that helped.

6. How does being Otherkin affect your life? It’s really had a positive impact on how I cope with my mental illness. Aside from some weird moods coming about with relation to fronting kintypes on occasion and certain media affecting me deeply, it’s really not something I’d say is visible for anyone else in my life. Mostly it helps because I can break down elements of myself into more easily definable faces.

7. Are you “out of the metaphysical closet?” If so, to whom? Pretty much anyone who knows me well enough to associate online knows I’m otherkin.

8. How did/would your family react to you being Otherkin? My family would probably just think it’s some furry thing and not really care. My sister is very understanding and tolerates my ramblings, though. 

9. What does being Otherkin mean to you? I guess mostly it means I get to/have experienced lives beyond my own. It drives my wanderlust. It inspires me to create. It’s a means of viewing the world through many lenses. 

10. How do you believe you came to be Otherkin? Is it a physiological connection? Were you reincarnated? Explain. I think this sort of almost spiritual connection to certain personalities and beings came about for me as a means of coping. For most of my life I have been suicidal and dissociative; having no sense of self, I think it crept in place of my perceived lack of humanity. 

11. What do you hope the Otherkin community will be like in ten years? Are you for public awareness or against it? Why or why not? I don’t think I’ve been a part of the community long enough to really speak on this. uwu

12. Do you have phantom/astral limbs? What are they and how often do you feel them? Very, VERY rarely I get sensations on my shoulder blades like there is possibly a wing there, alternatively a tail. Really most of my experiences with kinstuff occur in the absence of other feelings (which, with manic depression and PTSD are relatively regular sometimes).

13. Do you mental-shift? Have you ever harmed yourself or someone else during one? I suppose I do! I have definitely harmed myself with certain kintypes fronting, although less so because of their influence and more so because of their lack of intervention (if that makes sense). With some fronts more positive or optimistic attitudes push through more easily. 

14. Have you ever mental-shifted at a time when it could be considered inappropriate? Not that I can think of.

15. Do you Astral Project or practice aby occult crafts? I do not. 

16. Do you feel you are any sort of danger to society? Nah. I’m just a Sad Person doing my best to get by. 

17. Does your nonhuman identity complicate every day life for you? If so, how? On occasion kintypes add confusing feelings or impulses to my day which can be frustrating I suppose! Things like “I really want to bite that object” or “I am dying for a piece of meat Immediately”. 

18. Why do you believe you are here as a human? Heck if I know, honestly. Being not really spiritual, I guess it’s hard to say there’s a reason at all I’m here. My personal goal is to help others, though.

19. Are you active among the Otherkin community? Sort of? I have a lot of kin friends but this is my first real specifically kinspace besides my twitter of the same name.

20. Are you religious? What faith do you follow? Does it contradict with your Otherkin or do you feel that the two are synonymous somehow? I think the closest I have to any sort of spirituality is my otherkin-ness. I’ve never been religious.

21. Have you ever been emotionally, verbally, or physically harassed simply for being Otherkin? No, fortunately. 

22. Do you feel you are oppressed because you are Otherkin? Not really. Anti-kin stuff is mostly just a nuisance, like any other community that laughs at “cringe” stuff imo.

23. What is your take on fictionkin/mediakin? What about machinekin and appliancekin? I’m very much fictionkin so I see it as totally valid. I think it’s easy for some people to kind of “make up” kintypes but also, it’s harmless and I think as long as it stays that way it doesn’t matter HOW they experience kin-ness; another person’s experience should not cheapen our own I guess. I kind of relate to machinekin because of a deep draw to glitches/viruses, also? I know someone who is jam kin though so like. Whatever you are, whoever you are, if you’re a decent human being you’re pretty good in my book. <3

24. Did the awakening process seem relatively easy, or difficult to you? Why? I think embracing my kintypes in a way was embracing a huge part of myself I often tried to ignore. With my kintypes came a flood of experience and emotion tied deeply to trauma I’ve experienced and my mental illness, so it was kind of difficult to really accept it for a while. 

25. What do you think of the information provided online about Otherkin, is it relevant or not? Like anything, some is good and some is bad. Otherkin is something experienced differently by everyone since it’s so personal in nature, so I think only so much can really be conveyed online. 

26. How has your Otherkinity/Therianthropy defined you as a person? Do you think it has given you morals that you didn’t have before? It hasn’t defined me as a person really. Rather, it gives me a way of easily showing others who I am! I’ve picked up some hobbies and interests because of my kintypes, though haha. It definitely deepened my belief that people should be judged on their actions, not appearances and experiences, as well. 

27. Have you learned any life-long lessons due to your Otherkinity? Something important that embracing my otherkinness has helped me realize is that it’s okay to be yourself, even if other people think it’s “weird”. There are people out there who will accept it, hear you out, and maybe even have shared similar experiences. Me being kin and embracing it hurts no one and helps me deeply in expressing otherwise abstract or suppressed emotions; if people dislike that, they aren’t the kind of person I want to associate with. 

28. What do you want to do with your life? I want to open a cafe where people can relax and not have to worry about appearances for a while. <3

29. Do you have any tips for young and newly-Awakened Otherkin? Don’t be bothered by anti kin stuff! Just block them and be yourself. Otherkin, otherkin-questioning, whatever, you do you.

30. Anything else you’d like to share with us? If you have a kin twitter, you can follow mine here! It’s very much just for musing and aesthetic stuff haha.