#trans person. i've seen trans women also complaining about this and they are right to be upset for being excluded too.

[therevengeoffrankenstein]

i'm sorry but actually yes it is an issue that x reader fanfictions as a genre are primarily focused on straight (presenting) relationships with primarily cis female readers. the answer is not that the cis women writing these fics are bad or should stop, but just that they should consider branching out (and i'm not forcing them to! just a suggestion of diversifying their portfolios! which they don't have to do!)! and also that other non cis female writers should be being uplifted, too, in addition to all the straight cis female reader fics.

[punkeropercyjackson]

Why Percy Jackson is a transfem character and always has been

So!!Obligatory 'i'm a trans man,not a trans woman' disclaimer but this analysis is based purely off 1.Percy's canon personality,relathionships and story and 2.Irl transfeminine experiences that i know a lot about thanks to having a lot of transfem friends.Said friends have also listened to my reasoning behind tgirl Percy and agreed with me if not having the hc for her already and every other transfem Pjo fan i've seen i don't personally know also say her narrative is trans woman's one too and they always understand Percy's characterization better than anyone else in the fandom(certainly better than 'himbo/malewife/babygirl-coded/slutty bisexual Percy' believers)and as a Percy kinnie it's been the take that's felt most correct to me ever since i first read Pjo,10 years ago much,MUCH before i even realized i'm queer.So with that,let's dive into why Percy is a girl quasi-canonically,including that Rick Riordan has refered to her as straight but never cis!

Trigger warnings:Misogyny,child abuse,ableism,Luke's canon pedophillia and grooming with an alluding to how it applies to Percy being female(that is not dived into!),a slang word for pedophile that's used as an insult to P*rcicos potrayal of her and internalized transmisogyny

Percy's personality

Now,as i've said before,Percy's not all that actually gendered as male-Meaning,none of her attitude or behavior or interests are masculine and are misenterpreted as such due to misogyny and gender essentialism.Percy has poor social skills,anger issues,merciless tendencies,a strong sense of justice,self-worth problems,a very odd sense of humor that always lands and respects women to the point of thinking they're better than men and none of these are gendered traits but a mix of audhd-dyslexia and trauma.The last one is arguably actually a girl thing even if there's an in-universe reason for it(good mom,deadbeat birth dad,abusive stepdad,most antagonists being older men in power and the first older person she thought she could trust was just manipulating her)

Percy also frequently complains about having to act like a stereotypical guy to have to fit into society's standards because naturally,she's just not-She's completely unconvential even amongst 'other male' demigods and this is reguarly commented on.In fact,there's a whole plot in Titan's Curse of her proving to the Hunters that she's NOT a normal 'man' and it's a huge thing that's reinforced as true the whole franchise!Zoe was right about cis men being ass and that's not 'r*dical feminism' and ngl a lot of y'all are telling on yourselves because she never talked about biology in her misandry,especially because Zoe appears to be around the same age as Thalia physically and mentally so it's super icky to throw t*rf accusations at her because she's traumatized by ancient greek men,one of the worst kinds of men ever!And Percy's totally unlike them despite being amab and identifying male not because 'not all men' but because she's actually a woman

This is a direct contrast to how she talks about and interacts with other girls-Almost every female character earns her worship on first meeting,even if she dosen't like them as people.She puts a heavy emphasis on them being girls in her narration and some dialogue too and her descriptions of them are so admirative they come as envious with her own insecurities in her looks.Percy is severely lacking in any kind of masculinity and Piper even pointed this out based on her vibes alone after hearing all about her at camp and thinking she'd be a macho man based off how people talk about her and i'm unsure if this is a common phenomenom but i frequently see and hear people say daughters tend to look like girl versions of their dad's and Percy is said to be identical to Poseidon but with softer features and the idea Percy should tie herself to masculinity due to it being expected of amabs is contradictory to canon's messages in addition to it's irl sexist implications and the sea is frequently associated with femininity(mermaids and sirens,calling ships 'she',pearl jewelry,the term 'Beach Bunny',the moon controlling the tides,etc)

And small final note:The rock music scene is filled with transfemmes and has been for a long time and while blue things are usually associated with boys,it was Percy's mom who got her to love them

Percy's relathionships

Almost all of Percy's friends growing up were girls-Annabeth,Silena,Thalia,Bianca,Zoe,Clarisse and Rachel vs just Grover,Beckendorf and Nico.She thinks The Stolls are annoying as shit with their 'boys will be boys' beat and she hates male gods on sight and implies she finds them being super conventionally attractive to be offputting instead of appealing.Nico had a crush on her until they got closer and realized she's not an ideal man like he thought she was and therefore 'cute but not his type'(I have no opinion on Solangelo but i got beef with the shippers for making this about blonde hair and blue eyes instead of transfem Percy,especially the trope of Percy acting like a kiddy fiddler over what Nico said as a joke)and she takes responsibility of him post Bianca's death and Nico exclusively wishes for older sister figures,never old brother ones

Percy and Rachel is a classic irl dynamic between transfems and their afab friends:Dating to exes to even closer friends.Rachel is a pretty typical lesbian if we're applying irl wlw things too and Annabeth is clearly a huge lesbian-Like seriously,she only ever showed attraction to Luke and Percy and Luke was comphet in her words('You were like a brother to me but i never loved you')and lesbians experiencing attraction to uncracked eggs is semi-common and she's got tons of subtext with Piper and Reyna and shows a strong distaste for the expectations of cisheterosexual womanhood,mainly femininity.Reyna is yet another comphet lesbian-coded who was into Percy.Clarisse,textually butch,calls her 'Prissy' and Piper,canon unlabeled sapphic and gnc,described her as not masc enough for her taste

Percy's relathionships to older male characters combined with her transfemininity,youth and constantly being described as 'other' from ordinary half-bloods by them function with no need for change as a potrayal to how corrupted men in power treat girls-Not women,underaged girls as Percy is 12 at the start and 18 now and we've yet to get interactions with her and male gods in the current canon timeline so all their abuse of her and innapropriate undertones in their behavior towards her were when she was underaged.This includes but is not limited to:Ares' condesension and (non-sexual) assaults,Apollo's very possible constant flirting that would definitely be textual if Percy was intended as a girl by Rick seeing as Apollo had no problem hitting on the Hunters and Reyna and her entire relathionship with Luke.Luke is canonically a serial pedophile,implied to sleep with Kelli and a raging misogynist and Percy was one of the first victim's of his gaslighting and he tried to kill her after framing her his crime against the gods in an isolated area they'd been alone in together a lot and widely noted to have accidentally been writen flirting with her throught the series by the fandom so i can't help but take Luke.rcy as a male explotation and grooming narrative

Artemis,an archaic symbol of lesbians,loves Percy and considers her above any man.Aphrodite gave Percy advice on her looks by saying everyone deserves to feel perfect in their skin to achive true perfect beauty.Persephone,one of the og csa narratives,said she likes Percy because she's 'brave' with the implication being that again,she can tell Percy is different from usual 'male' half-bloods.Hera is the goddess of traditional marriage and holds a violent resentment towards Percy for disrupting the system.Percy at her core is meant to come across as like a male god but not actually being one and actively not wanting to become one out of hate for authority and traditionality

And another small final note to a section:Frank is trans man-coded(his arc is about being emasculated and saying 'fuck you!' by making his own manhood and Mars' blessing is explicitly compared to testosterone and gives him a huge confidence boost)and they're paralleled as fundamentally similar yet also fundamentally different,Nico and her act like an eldest daughter and a middle brother where she's a pseudo-mom to him and queer siblings and Jason falls under transmasc norms(the ex-wolfkid thing,positive and healthy masculinity,creating a new self after loosing his old idealized one and Team Dad)and instantly became Percy's best friend and is her complimentary foil and 'counterpart' so transmasc4transfem realness

Percy's story(and how it all comes together and would've been improved by canonizing her as a trans woman)

Percy Jackson means 'Outcast who looks out for other outcasts'.She's so unique as a character because she was and is still genuinely a huge weirdo,not just nonhuman,she is human even if it's only half-That's only half of who she is(She's totally a Gwen Stacy variant btw).Being a trans girl would do nothing but enchance her core aspects but also work as a fixit to various canon writing problems!

Percy is femme so that'd give us positive girly girl rep to make up for all the pick me feminism.Annabeth'd have no reason to lash out and give her mixed signals since she's not a boy so their dynamic is improved.Nico's crush fades upon finding out she's a girl so they become best friends and found siblings like they were always meant and wanted to.It causes shifts in the plot that bring a bigger focus on the girlhood aspects of Greek Mythology seperate from romance retellings and a much needed change too:Percy as the hero of the Great Prophecy.Luke was a raging misogynist,a racist,a child groomer,a fucking pedophile and an entire fascist who lied about revolution to ruin society instead of fixing the system.Percy is a lifelong punk,an anarchist and a proffessional instigator and was trying to stop Luke's fuckery from 12 to 16-She's the greatest greco-roman hero ever.TGP was operating on Ancient Greek logic but Pjo isn't Ancient Greece,it's Percy's story-How she forced the gods to change with no choice by SHOWING how much stronger and more etheral she is than them

BUT WAIT,THERE'S ONE MORE FINAL NOTE!!!!!Percy would be a million times happier as a trans femme than as a cis man.She gets to transition and not have to be an ordinary male she's NOT so she starts loving and accepting herself way more as she changes into who she wants and deserves to be and we should all want that for her too.The truth is she's nothing like Hercules,she's unimpressive as a man,Nico believed she was a real male hero but she failed at being a performance of it based off what he knew of men and now they're cool and he thinks Percy's cute but not like that,she thinks aggressively male men are wicked and not all that handsome,Rachel made her feel normal because she's not a normal girl (either),Annabeth has princess hair and had a makeover at a magic spa and she strikes fear into hearts in a way only girls can and she wants all that too,she also wanted to be treated like Thalia so bad,Jason is the Superman she's been waiting for her whole life

She's the mom to Nico and Hazel Sally was to her,she's a rocker chick,she was on the swim team in high school and went to protests and did charity events with that frizzy neurotic girl she's attached to the hip with,she loves burgers and desserts,she's got streaked hair,she uses 2000s and 90s slang completely unironically and she just wants people to think she's normal but still get to be herself.The sea does not like to be restrained

[transmascpetewentz]

Moving The Goalposts: Infighting, Exorsexism, and Transandrophobia

I want to start this off not by getting directly into the meat of my theory, but instead by showing all of you a post that I came across today that illustrates exactly what I am talking about when I say that transandrophobes, and specifically TEHMs in this case, move the goalposts in a way that causes infighting within the trans(masc) community. This is a post by a pretty well-known TEHM whose blog I've been watching for a while.

What Jackson is doing here seems pretty obvious on the surface. He's making fun of nonbinary people who were AFAB because he perceives them as fakers and/or trenders. However, when you take a look at some of the other things that he believes, you realize that it just isn't that simple.

This is a post by one of Jackson's mutuals on here. If you don't know what some of these phrases mean, "trans heterosexual" refers to gay trans people (in this case, it's likely focusing on transmascs, but this rhetoric harms transfem lesbians too), and "trans homosexual" refers to straight trans people. What lavenderlad is trying to do is infantilize non-straight trans people, acting like we are complaining about nothing (maybe hysterical, even) for pointing out the oppression that we face from cishets and cis queers alike.

But it goes even deeper.

This right here is a very interesting post, specifically because lavenderlad seems to have changed his tune completely. As opposed to infantilizing us like in the previous post, he has now switched to transandrophobic conspiracy theories about how we are apparently some sort of dominant societal force despite being less than 2% of the population. My antisemitism radar is going off right now, too, because this sounds suspiciously like your average antisemite talking about Jews. He went very quickly from treating us like we're little girls who can't do anything to treating us like evil, scary men who are trying to invade his space.

He moved the goalposts because it was convenient for him at this moment to contribute to the oppression of gay trans men.

To elaborate, there's a specific type of transandrophobia seen in these circles that Jackson and lavenderlad are using. They are applying both maleness and femaleness to us. They infantilize us like we are women, and use our perceived femininity to justify gatekeeping us out of their spaces, while also using very common anti-gay male and generally anti-marginalized male stereotypes such as us being inherently aggressive, invaders, our bodies disgusting, etc. It's exorsexism, plain and simple.

And I feel like these posts show us how transandrophobes and transphobes in general can cause infighting within the trans community. A feminine nonbinary person might look at Jackson's first post and go "see! trans men have so much better than me!" but in fact, trans men, both binary and nonbinary, aren't actually treated any better. The grass is not greener. Trans men who try to conceal our birth sex and/or transness are considered liars, trying to invade spaces we don't belong, and more; but trans men and transmascs who do not try to pass, who don't try to conceal our transness, are accused of being "not really dysphoric."

Do not be fooled into thinking that transandrophobes would like you better if your gender expression was different. They don't want trans men to be displaying our transness, they don't want us to go stealth, and they don't want anything in between. They want us to be cis. Do not argue with your trans brothers about who society hates more; because society will see you as whatever will prove a transandrophobe's point. Address the root problems of patriarchy and transandrophobia instead of letting infighting eat us alive.

[trans-androgyne]

This is the anon you asked to hear what tme meant to me. I also dislike the idea that trans women and femmes are the only people with a meaningful relationship to transmisogyny but I also don't think it is unfair to say that there are people who don't experience it and have nothing to say on the subject. I've never experienced transmisogyny, and I don't have a lot to add to the conversation. I don't mind clarifying my relationship to it. "Exempt" is a strong word if taken literally, but to me, it is just the sentiment that it doesn't personally affect me in any noticeable or harmful way, which is fair and accurate. If people are venting about real experiences with tmes being prejudiced and ignorant, then I can't take offence because it is true that people who experience less transmisogyny are more likely to not understand it or contribute to the problem.

At the same time, I do understand why other trans and intersex people do feel like they have shared experiences with trans women and femmes or have things to add to the discussion. I don't think it is fair to shut people down on identity alone. For instance, I once saw someone use a fictional example of an intersex woman being harassed by a store owner because he had mistaken her for a trans woman. Their conclusion was that the incident was intersexist because the woman was intersex, not trans. I take issue with this because it interrogates the victim's identity rather than questioning the motives and biases on the aggressor. To understand what happened, you would need to understand both intersexism and transmisogyny as well as how both forms of oppression have roots in oppositional sexism.

As for whether this fictional person or real intersex people would be tma is, in my opinion, up for them to decide, probably based on a lot of factors I don't know such as how frequently things like this happen or if there are other overlapping experiences. So long as the conversation is happening in good faith, people should be able to determine their own relationship to transmisogyny.

Still, trans women and femmes should be leading the conversation; they should be able to push back on people misrepresentating the nature of transmisogyny in good faith without being ignored or accused of being aggressive.

Again, i won't deny that there are problems with the way some people use these words (I think you are right about there needing to be less of a binary) but a lot of trans women and femmes find these terms helpful for now. The language might need to evolve, but I don't think it is completely broken.

A lot of problems with the tme/tma binary would be solved by letting people opt into whichever they felt fit their life better instead of the current situation of assuming others’ relationship to transmisogyny based on their identities. I worry that the tma label would still be a gatekept club considering how people treat it currently, but it’s possible that could change.

For the purposes of this conversation I am tme. My problem isn’t complaining about specific real “tmes” being transmisogynistic, but complaining about them as a group often in situations not even related to transmisogyny. Tme people are seen to oppress tma people and therefore any attack on them is seen as justified. People have told us to kill ourselves and “die faster” and said we’re the worst kind of trans people and more—from examples I’ve seen go unchallenged. This is a broader problem with people thinking they can “punch up” at their oppressors in any cruel way they want no matter what, like KAM. If the tme label continues to be used, it cannot be used as a synonym for “malicious transmisogynist” without contributing to the divide among the community.

I don’t want to strip language from transfems. I am uncomfortable with the way these terms are currently being used. I hope their use is able to evolve and ideally drop aspects that aren’t useful while broadening everyone’s understandings of transmisogyny as a system.

[sapphicsvibes]

Okay then, so what do you think of groups that exclude afab people? I've been seeing tons of transfems groups being exclusionary to afab people, but I haven't seen you complaining about that before. Not only is that misogynistic, but it's heavily transphobic. So why just complain about 'afab only groups' if transfems can have anti afab groups?

Gonna try my best to answer this as someone who is not trans fem.

*also I am speaking about perisex people as a perisex person—this post doesn’t have anything to do with, nor am I speaking about intersxism*

But over the past few years, there has been a lot more overtly exclusionary language, like afab, used that often ostracizes transfems from queer spaces. within the trans community, trans women (esp indigenous and black trans fems) are the most oppressed and face the highest level of abuse, violence, homelessness, etc. When I say violence, I also mean vioelnce in the way they are treated within trans/nobinary spaces, and how terf language has become more and more acceptable to use to keep them out.

There are trans and nonbinary groups right now, who use afab as an identity and specifically list trans fems as their oppressors/enemies. These groups/people who identity with the term afab and use it as an identity usually do not want trans fems in their spaces.

And that language isn’t just exclusive to Tumblr.

I remember going to a cafe and saw a flier asking for participating for an autism study, and it’s like ‘we want queer people and women - afab only please’ and no one saw anything wrong with that.

There are afab exclusive trans/queer spaces everywhere and it is so normalized. And it pushes this idea that transfers do not belong in these spaces because they are harmful to afabs.

Meanwhile, transfems are still the most brutalized in the queer community, they still face the most homocides, cases of homelessnesss, etc. they are not represent in legislative spaces and are often denied jobs in queer places. 

The trans/queer community has adopted transmisogynstic language and in using that, has painted trans women as their oppressors and gives transfems no space or platform to feel included. 

And what’s worse is many spaces have started referring to transfems as ‘amab’ when transfems don’t even use that term to refer to themselves because transfems don’t have anything in common with most amab people who aren’t transfem — which a lot of people…don’t get…and idk why….

Anyway, with all that is happening and all that will happen with how terfy trans/queer spaces are—I don’t think it’s wrong that transfems don’t want to be lumped in with people who paint them as oppressors, rapists, and who exclude them. I don’t think it’s wrong for transfems not to want to be lumped in with people from the community who identify with a term that has literally excluded them, and a term that terfs use. With how shitty the trans, queer, nonbinary community treats them, why would they want a space where those very people who excluded them can ruin.

As a black nonbinary transmasc person….I really don’t ever shame groups that kick out their oppressors. Transfems not wanting afab people in their communities when for years, afab people have hurt them, painted these harsh pictures of them, excluded them from trans AND womens spaces while using harmful language isn't bad.

and of course, this wouldn't have been a problem if the term afab stayed in intersex spaces. if perisex non trans fem trans and nonbinary people didn't adopt these terms and misuse them, and make afab a fucking identity that people actually eqaute to being trans masc/nonbinary/ etc.

it's so funny that we have people who call themselves afab, proudly, getting upset that transfems are like 'no afabs please' and having the audacity to call it misognsytic and transphobic.

bitch, you started it in the first place!!!!

[molsno]

im the genderkoolaid complainer anon from earlier just saw your response- that transunity shit is soo bullshit 😭 (saying as a black person) its literally all lives matter for trans mascs. most trans men from Real Life aren't even that annoying ey're just the most insane vocal minority. i could get behind transunity if it was like uplifting trans ppl of any flavor no matter what (ex: trans mascs standing with your trans sisters when faced with transphobia/transmisogyny(noir), trans fems standing with their trans brothers when faced with transphobia/transmasc hatred then making out about it) but its just like ":/ Why are the girls getting more attention than me!!! I have it worse than them!!! [totally not bio essentialist]" It's crazy. literally most online subset of mascs. there's a reason many of the truthers r white they've never experienced or know what basic intersectionality is

I mean yeah I'm all for trans unity in the sense of sticking up for each other against transphobes and supporting each other when we're in need, but like there has to be an acknowledgement that the things we go through are not exactly the same and that there are privilege dynamics between us even as fellow trans people. I generally like to assume good faith, so I feel like some of the people who are suckered into transunitism genuinely believe that it's good-natured and don't realize that it's spearheaded by a bunch of transmisogynistic trans guys. I'd like to think that some of them can actually be shown the truth, but they need to be willing to listen to trans women first.

and yeah, you're absolutely right. I've compared it to "I'm not a feminist, I'm an egalitarian" plenty of times before but all lives matter is a great analogy too. a lot of poc have pointed out that transandrophobia truthers are mostly white, and I've definitely seen that too. it makes sense then why they all view oppression as strictly interpersonal, rather than being anything systemic.

something I've also noticed is that they use the fact that black men are portrayed as more dangerous and are thus subjected to more violence as proof that antimasculism is real. now, I'm white, and I'm fully aware that because of that I don't have the nuance to describe the causes of this phenomenon in detail, but it just seems so callous and cruel to use the violence black men face as a tool to strengthen their ideology. and in doing so, they explicitly ignore the fact that black women (and black trans women especially) are ALSO subjected to violence due to being portrayed as a threat to white cis women and white children. it's just another way that transandrophobia truthers demonstrate the biologically essentialist "afab = vulnerable, amab = dangerous" attitude that they've all internalized, which is wrong for many reasons, one of which being that afab people are only portrayed as vulnerable if they're white.

[drdemonprince]

History anon here with appreciation and a couple clarifications:

The worst thing *I* could be was a trans man, not the worst thing *anyone in the world* could be. I realize I didn't write this super clearly, so that's on me, but I was talking about the worst felt sense of identity I specifically could have. Like, being a murderer would be worse, but you don't come to be a murderer by keeping yourself up at night, wondering whether it best describes who you are. I thought I could force myself to hold a different identity, one that wouldn't be betraying the feminist values I was surrounded by and looked up to.

I didn't say anything about how my experience compares to trans women, though for the record, they were also treated terribly in the spaces that hated me, and I also stood up for and worked with them. Most of my academic scholarship has been focused on trans men because that's the area where I'm most passionate and qualified, but that's my personal work right now, not some sideways way of putting others down.

I didn't know you'd been hanging out in trans masc spaces in the early 2000s. High five for guys who survived those days.

I don't use Tumblr, so I don't have an @ to give you. This account I'm posting from? It's technically a work account I set up for a job almost a decade ago that decided it didn't want the page after all, so it's still linked to my email. There's no other way for me to reliably contact you that I know of, but if you think of something, I'm totally open.

Hey there, thanks for the clarifications, and sorry to have mischaracterized what you were aiming to convey in your first message. You have a lot of experiences and knowledge that I'd love to learn from more to the extent you are fine with sharing.

I have a friend who grew up in the SF Bay area in the early 2000s and was a trans guy then, and from them I've gathered little threads here and there regarding how trans men were seen and treated at the time (all the trans guys were expected to be bottoms, not just for the reasons that's such a Thing today, but also because in feminist spaces it was seen as the appropriate position for a trans guy to be relative to a cis woman, within the community hierarchy)... there are certainly big elements of the scene and regional differences that I know next to nothing about, when it comes to trans guys experiences at the time. I think the Midwest queer/feminist scene was probably very different in a lot of ways. It certainly was very sex negative. I'd be curious to hear a lot more about the ambassador program pushing for trans male inclusion at the bathhouses that you mentioned, and more about where you're from in general.

For all that I challenge contemporary complaining about "trans male invisibility," it really is true that gay trans men were completely excluded from the communities I was around back then, and I didn't really feel that we could exist (though I had known some bi trans guys at that time). That certainly kept me from transitioning for far longer than I otherwise would have. And I feel like I have witnessed the canonization of Lou Sullivan happening in real time here on Tumblr... even more recently than much of the advocacy that you shared about. He just was not on my radar or someone that anyone in my circles was talking about until a few years ago. But I guess it's not surprising that radfems who considered gay men to be privileged perverts weren't speaking about him. Man Columbus Ohio sucked dick

I'm not sure how best for us to get in touch, then. My twitter DMs are open too. I keep most of the rest of mine shut for lots of reasons. Funny that your account is a brand account on here...are you the Dennys tumblr account

[papirouge]

the recent 2edgy4me rounds of "um ackshually it's okay to commit infanticide/abandon an infant in a dumpster if the mother doesn't want it, what if she was scared" is like the most base lizard-brain take I've seen in a while, what's worse is it's not even the first time people have unironically put forward post-birth abortion (aka infanticide) as a practice we should view neutrally (eugh). or there are those who think it's okay for a woman to continue to do drugs even if she knows she's pregnant and thus willingly harming her developing child. and if you aren't okay with either of the above you're just a misogynist!!! stop trying to control women!!! etc. etc.

like radblr sometimes imitates male sociopathy too closely lmao another one I love is people claiming they're pro-choice but also get mad when a woman didn't abort when "she should have." umm sweatie it's her body her choice is it not? if she wanted to keep her baby what business is it of yours?? this seems like an almost exclusively American attitude for some reason, I'm thinking because the average American is so politicized and fanatical. literally cannot have a normal conversation about any of this without being called a million names and told to kill yourself, radfems on this website are more civil to trans identified males than they are to pro-life women, even liberal or Democrat or atheist pro-lifers, I respect some radfem tumblr users but most of them are just so lacking in self-awareness it's kind of pitiful

It all boils down to radfemistan biggest ideological inconsistency that every choice women make should be critically instigated (shaving, plastic surgery, make up, etc) UNTIL it comes to abortion. Either women have to question every of their choices, or they don't.

Oh, and I might get a lot a shit for that but IDC : the growing trend of women to defend abusive women under the dArvO thing is crazy and they all come off as abusive psycho themselves using coping textbook psychology gotcha to excuse their destructive personality. IDC what radfem say patting themselves in the back for not making fun of Amber Heard (congratulations for being a... decent human being??) they were the first to harass, and bullying pro Depp WOMEN (calling them "Deppford wives"). They even rejoiced when it's been revealed a girl who was pro Depp killed herself (don't know if it was related to her bullying).... Everytime I see a dumb radfem/feminist quote that "Chateau Bunny" xitter girl I get major red flag because that batshit crazy chick was full on invested into those bullying campaigns targeting (young) girls whose only crime was defending Johnny Depp. Bunch of deranged no life witches....

I'm absolutely not here for their dumb historical revisionism of them acting like they were the only one to stand for "women" when they were in the socials streets harassing women for thought crime. They were there to defend a hot blonde millionaire woman from defamation allegations they somehow projected into - that's all.

You're absolutely right about feminist oddly having a bigger commitment harassing fellow women than men. There were plentiful pro Depp moids, as far as a I know.

I understand there's no "perfect victim" and that you can violently react to violence inflicted to you firsthand, but what I don't understand is that they act like this shit was a prerogative of women. I'll never forget how those feminists were like "there's no perfect victim" to defend Amber Heard .....while dragging all the nasty shit Johnny Depp did decades ago to prove he couldn't possibly be a victim himself. Or because he was richer or older... Wasn't Heard richer/more famous than her ex she was infamously arrested for physical abuse? That her stans argue the openly LGBT female officer that came on the scene was lesbophobic?? And then they use the fact the ex gf withdrawing her justice complain is evidence nothing actually happened, because WE ALL KNOW DV victims NEVER backtrack when they take action against their abuser? 💀

If genders were reversed, we all know those women wouldn't go to all those hoops to defend Heard shady past, but we all know why they do that...

That's what I dislike the most with abortionist/feminist : they're so duplicitous and hypocrite you can't never rely on them to be remotely consistant on the broad scale. I'm absolutely not surprised a bunch of them turned pro white supremacists when it came to kill Palestian women bc it was an opportunity to kill "rapists Muslims".

They have the same destructive mindset with their anti tra obsession, now rubbing shoulders with know racists rightoids known to not give a shit about women's rights unless it comes to shit on (alleged) trans people. It was first Kiwifarm and now xitter bluecheckmarks muskophants they screenshot as gender"expert". We are in the trenches.

[boreal-sea]

why is it that any time someone tries to talk about issues men face there's always someone else responding with "so you think systemic misandry exists?? that's misogynistic" like..... the only people i've ever seen act like systemic misandry exists are those white straight cis able-bodied traditionally masculine men complaining about how women having rights oppresses them and if you can't differentiate between that and a man of color/queer man/disabled man talking about his experiences, that feels like a you problem, honestly.

Because many people are only capable of thinking of things in binary opposites: "If X is true, then Y must be false". Including those cishet white men. They think that if women get rights, then men must lose rights for that to happen.

It's how people somehow managed to turn "trans men face oppression" into "So You Think Trans Women Oppress Trans Men!?!?!?!"

For some folks, they just can't imagine a world where two things are true at once. They can't imagine a world where women are oppressed for being women, and where certain kinds of men are also oppressed for reasons linked to their manhood.

Because to them, if all women = oppressed, then all men = oppressor. But if you say "ok, but some men = oppressed", they think you must mean "ALL WOMEN = OPPRESSORS!"

No. All women are oppressed for being women, and also, some men are oppressed for an intersecting collection of identities that intrinsically includes their manhood.

And it's incredibly difficult to talk about nuanced subjects to people with binary, on/off, black and white, everything-or-nothing thinking. It's not impossible, it just involves a lot of backtracking, excruciatingly repetitive clarifications, and luck that the person you are talking to will stop knee-jerking at everything you say and actually think about it for two seconds.

[pondscummy]

the "also sick" comment isn't like "btw I'm SICK, how dare you not know" it's me saying I'm sick like how 2/3 of my roommates are

but like I'm so;;;; it feels so rich that L is like wtf do you want from me about me not replying for 45 minutes when I had to beg his gf over hours and hours of texts every so often to not force me to sit in unwiped shit after my surgery bc she had openly told me she just didn't rly feel like setting up the attachable bidet after telling me for weeks she would, and I never ever got a reply from her or L ever acknowledging that they were wide awake hanging out and laughing while I was like stuck in bed barely able to move begging for follow through on a commitment they made in advance and i eventually had to spend over $100 to hire someone to come out the next day and do it for me and I had to hold my shit for hours lmfao

like L is sooooo great at couching things in flawless tumblr wellness speak but only to talk about how valid they are for not showing up for you and how fucked up it is that you MIGHT ever have a moment where you can't be 100% there w them. like idk what to tell you I've been laying in bed with a sore throat and cough and fever passing out and waking up to roll over in buckets of sweat like the rest of the house. I do genuinely get being annoyed by a lack of response but it's also right back to this whole thing about Always assuming I'm mad at them which is legit one of the only things that actually makes me mad fjdkddhk like bro I do not THINK about you when you're not acting like I'm a bomb about to blow (also, as an aside -- we all take turns buying TP and it's usually me who does it like it's not out of pocket for me to say hey you are the One person who is out of the house already rn, can you get this on your way bc None of the bathrooms have back up rolls and one is totally out and I had to text our sickest roommate telling her to use the bidet and drip dry like.... "am I the first person you asked" yes bc you are the person who makes the most sense dumbfuck. I'm not being "overly needy" toward you or whatever jfc)

they literally told me at one point that the reason they're so scared of me is that my face is "triggering" for them when I'm angry or not feeling good and puts them "back in a really bad place" they have seen my face angry literally 3 times and each time it was on my way back to my room to decompress and each time I said nothing to them other than that I was in a bad mood and I was going to go to my room. I didn't yell either I just said it normal. like I genuinely feel gaslit here like I'm this horrifying monster of a man when it's like dude sometimes people are mad I don't know what YOU want from ME!! I do all my venting here where they can't ever see it even tho we've blocked each other, I censor their name like anyone even knows who they are, I isolate to chill out and it's literally been less than a handful of times like should I fling myself from the roof??????? would that fix it???

I literally know it's bc I'm a man too. none of this was like this until my facial hair came in more and it got crazy worse after I got top surgery and they're so so vocal about how much they despise men and think men should all fuck off and die and there's only a handful of acceptable men that they've personally vetted. despite them pretty clearly having a trans woman fetish bc they only date or look at porn of trans women and they do the whole step on me mommy thing about it even tho their gf has complained like. lmfao you're just a baby te//rf even tho you ID as trans masc yourself. like that's all this even is. I'm a big (5'3") scary (spent the whole weekend w my coworkers asking if I was 12) man who's obviously going to snap and kill you all bc sometimes I *checks writing on hand* get frustrated and go lay down about it

[country-wizard]

Expression and Desires

Lately I have been feeling a sort of way

I tried on my mother's bra

I pictured it like how a boy would try on his

Mom's clothes

I don't wear bras haven't in a long time

Always sports

Mom has the weird wire ones

I didn't hate what I saw

Not in a urge or desire to transition

Back to a woman

But more of a never thought I could look 

Like that

They didn't quite fit right 

It wasn't to big but it wasn't to small

Some weird in-between 

Though I guess I don't really know how bras

Are meant to fit in the first place

Lately I found myself wearing 1 of her tank tops

Originally for a party under my button up

But also because I like how it looks

The word in my head when i see myself

In the mirror in that tank top

Butch

I wouldn't describe myself as butch any other time

I have never identified myself as 

A women who is more traditionally

Masculine

Though I used to be called a tomboy

It's a nice word but doesn't describe me

I wouldn't even feel comfortable using it if It did

I don't feel like a woman 

I don't want to be a woman 

Yet lately when I picture myself in that

tank top

Or

 wire bra 

I see a part of me I've never seen before

A hint of something I've always wanted

Femininity 

I wore an outfit once 

Tank top, sweater, and  jeans and then  i had a crisis 

I saw a person dressed masculine

Regretted dressing like that 

It was a cute outfit though and I sometimes

Think back to it

I've worn dresses I think they're rather 

Nice pretty even

They look weird on me

Sometimes I want to wear them though

I can't they look weird

I become a woman

Sometimes I stare at myself in the mirror

Before I shower 

Naked completely bare

I cup my hands over my chest and try to

Flatten it with my hands

I think about the days it'll be gone 

In bed late at night I think about having a 

Dick

I'll never have one even though I wouldn't complain

I wish it could be like my fantasies as a kid

I could have my parts and a dick 

My chest could go from flat to busty in a matter of seconds 

It will never happen

I read a lot of fanfiction

Written by queers who write queers

The amount of porn I've read with people

Bodies similar to mine yet so different

Farther along in journeys

They make me feel like I can be loved

Lately though they've been making me question

I've seen a lot of art with trans characters 

With boobs and all 

Men or not 

It makes me wonder if I can be similar 

Can i still be viewed as me with a chest of meat

They make me believe so

Yet the urge to rid of them is overpowering

Sometimes I don't want to read fics

With others like me 

2 cis men 

Not out of some sexual fantasy 

But to dream 

I align so much with masculinity

It's hard to picture me in anything but

It's why I don't align with those whom love woman 

The way other queer woman do

Or nonbinary folk who love woman

But instead I find myself drawn to men 

The desire to be a man with another 

It's one of my reasons I wish things were a bit different down there

Even though I don't truly want to become a man

Perhaps

Definitely

I don't think I'll ever know gender is weird

I don't feel like a man or a woman But sometimes

I wish I could be one 

It'd be so easy so simple 

I wish I could shape shift my body 

Not of a change of gender but a change of appearance

It makes me dysphoric when I do it with clothes 

I like how I dress I just want the anatomy to be different 

Sometimes I want the clothes though 

To feel pretty and/or handsome 

Like lace under a suit 

They should make boxers with lace hem

It'd be funny and I'd be their #1 buyer

Everything looks weird on me though

Nothing fits my shape

Yet sometimes I think on skirts

And suit pants 

I think I would like lace under suits almost as if a little surprise

A treat for my eyes not to be sexy 

But to scratch an itch I have

To satisfy a feeling 

I wish I lived alone 

Owned a wire bra

To feel like a boy wearing his Mom's dress

When she isn't home 

To wear it around my house feeling odd

Alone with nobody to judge 

Not a feeling of discomfort or happiness

But something else 

Un-word-able 

When I live alone 

I'll wear my wire bra and I'll wear my packer 

And I'll sit and feel weird 

Not bad 

Just weird

It's like pain something I can't describe 

When I get top surgery 

I'll wear my packer and my inserts for my wire bra

And I'll think 

This is just like my fantasies 

[staenless]

I'm gonna be vulnerable with you guys for a sec and express what I'm certain is about to be an unpopular opinion; I fucking loath how Tumblr talks about TikTok, and specifically women and girls on TikTok. Don't like, don't read, I just honestly have to get this off my chest cause I'm mad

Like I see SO many posts about how popular TikTok trends, which are almost always mainly popular with women and girls, are self infantalising, promoting unhealthy behavior and societal views and literally killing feminism. I am not joking. I see so many of these posts. And like the craziest shit is the people posting this are SO certain of themselves and these buck-ass-wild opinions that they cannot even see the fucking hypocrisy of claiming these women are "self infantalising". Like you don't see how you taking one look at a TikTok trend, not knowing shit about it, and then deciding in your infinite wisdom you just HAVE to educate these imbicilic girls is fucking infantalising.

You're literally saying "these silly little girls with their "Girl Math" are portraying themselves as srupid and idiotic, and I am now going to call them srupid and idiotic for making a video where they rationalise purchasing certain luxuries to make themselves happy, because women like this are the reason we don't have gender inequality!" like it's sooo fucking patronising, bad faith and very clearly comes from someone who saw like, two videos and an essay ass post from one of their fellow fear-mongering online friends and decided to condemn these silly fucking idiots for their blatant internalised mysogyny. I, the supreme poster with wisdom beyond their platform however, am impervious to internalised mysogyny.

And it becomes even more obvious when you look through this person's posting history and they only ever talk about female-dominated trends (and when I say "female dominated I definitely include trans women here because I've seen posts complaining about how trans-women will call themselves girls and it's totally contributing to the societal infantalisation of women. These posts reak of terf-yness and seem to forget that men also refer to themselves as boys. "one of the boys" "me and the boys" it's almost as if using the child-centric gendered term denotes a level of carelessness and whimsical fun. "women's night" or "mens night" sounds severe and responsible. "girls night" or "boys night" sounds lighthearted and carefree. But God forbid we consider other influences on the language we use, it's clearly a way of infantalising women and stripping them of their agency, especially when it's women using these terms, reclamation and terms of indearment are for men only.). Mewling, a trend mainly popular with men and boys, originates from the looksmaxxing community, which is a branch of the wider manosphere/incel community. Where are your hand wringing posts about a trend popular with young men and boys that can be traced back to the incel community, a community that has produced actual fucking terrorists and murderers. A community where men advocate for women having their rights stripped away from them. But these wise bloggers seem fucking blind to mewling, or maybe in THIS instance they're able to understand that looksmaxxing was appropriated from the incel community in a effort to mock them, and mewling is an ironic continuation of this mockery. Well just ignore that videos about how to get that mewling jawline, which could lead down a rabbit hole to genuine looksmaxxing posts, to actual incel community. That's not important, but you know what is? Some earing disorder centered accounts made "girl dinner" posts showing how very little they ate, so girl dinner is a super harmful trend that promotes eating disorders.

The difference between Mewling leading to Inceldom, and Girl Dinner leading to an Eat Disorder is that women are fucking srupid and easy to manipulate, while boys are either too smart for this or cannot be held accountable for being radicalised or any of their actions really, so why even bother.

Do you understand my frustration here?

Okay sure, maybe some of these people genuinly DO care about TikTok promoting unhealthy beauty standards, or unhealthy traditional gender roles or just general unhealthy and dangerous ideas to be promoted to young women. So why don't they? Where are posts discussing trad wife influences who encourage their followers to give themselves fully to their husbands control, usually leading to white supremacist ideas. Where are the posts about "witches" (in commas because I do not think these people are genuine practicing witches, not because i don't respect or recognise wicca as a religion) who convince their followers to go off psychiatric medications because their mental illness is actually a divine gift, or that their womb is a sacred female blessing where all their power lies, and that this energy is submissive and caring like a hearth (that women without wombs aren't women at all, they lack this natural inclination to submission and motherhood that a divine goddess bestowed us, the real women, who need men to balance our divine energies). Where are call outs of influences who promote skin care and makeup products they don't use, making young girls buy and buy and buy in hopes of looking like their idols. Hell, where are the call outs for influences who encourage their users to stop using fucking sunblock, either because it's anti-aging and part of the toxic beauty culture, or that scientists are lieing to you and it actually causes sunscreen (I've even seen posts on Tumblr promoting ditching your sunscreen because of the whole "anti aging" angle. I think some Northern Hemisphere people are genuinly so fucking dillusional they very preventable cancer isnt a problem. Hi, I'm from the Southern Hemisphere, wear fucking sunscreen every time you go outside, skin cancer is real, the sun causes it, having melanoma lazered off is expensive.) For Christ's sake what about the MLMs???

These people who loooove talking about how their shitting on popular TikTok trends is actually feminism never discuss ACTUALLY harmful content on the app. They just look at whatever is popular with women and girls, think up a bad faith argument, and then send off posts complaining about it. Girl Dinner is going to cause eating disorders, girl math discourages women to study in stem and encourages them to act stupid, everything showers are upholding unfair beauty standards, these women are destroying society as we know it! Like you reek of mysogyny, and you probably won't read this post because your too busy getting sucked into a community of reactionaries who can't stop crying about how younger generations aren't media literate and don't know how to use Microsoft Word and use TikTok as google and all these other big bad scary headlines you never bothered reading the actual article for. You'll reblog screenshot of women saying "university is so hard, I wish I could just drop out and be a house wife" where Malala left a frown emoji comment and go "looks at these insolent hussies, I bet Malala is so sad they're wasting a gift she fought for!" as if women haven't been making the same joke for years and years, with no intent to follow through, because university is fucking hard and an idealized housewife life seems easy on some days. Malala got the fucking joke, she left a silly emoji to express 1) some women don't have this opportunity and 2) I'm sad not all women have this opportunity but 3) I can recognise how difficult studying is, and that sometimes an idealized version of life is easier to imagine, I get that you're just venting your frustrations but I'll leave this funny little emoji to remind you to keep working hard. She gets the joke. The girls posting, get the joke. I got the joke. But you choose to lament.

So yeah, I'm super annoyed by the way people on Tumblr act like women on TikTok are stupid, incapable or critical thinking, and stripping away women's rights. Instead of actually talking about ways women's rights are taken from them, or harmful communities that sell radicalisation and mysogyny to young girls, you chose Girl Dinner, I bet they're really proud of that choice too.

[manie-sans-delire-x]

you know i care about you immemsely but i got a lot to say.

i haven't been any of these anons but they've been right, it honestly is a minor change to the English language. ppl that are against it or see entitlement in it don't recognize their privilege. the way you're talking about it seems kinda super pointless. i have my own gripes with afab and amab as indicators, but you're clinging to these ideas with such a death grip, and i need to tell you it genuinely is the smallest change. i get that like there's a lot of room for you to not acknowledge your privilege or whatever, but something common in the phrasing/language you're using reminds me of how language changed reluctantly from everyone, if not the majority of ppl, saying "nigger" to them saying "black person." now ofc there are ppl that say "african american" and a good chunk of us that would much rather just be referred to as "black people" but that's not something I'd let a white person handle the debate on (and in this context african American and black people on an argument of terms doesn't equate with the debate between using female/male vs afab/amab). so the fact that people are upset that someone who isn't trans or doesn't identify as trans is making these comments about redundancy and genuinely fighting back makes sense, like your behaviour seems concerning.

now biology doesn't just go away when you change the terms, people know this and acknowledge this, and can acknowledge that biology is in fact more complicated than simple male or female in the first place, and that our designations of such are asinine. your way of thinking is just a little too traditional if you're caught up on change needing to be evolutionary, and that society is meant to cater to the majority. just because that is the way we live doesn't mean it's the way we should live. lest we forget that "should" in all its connotations is a subjective term. it's taken a lot of constant outspoken behaviour for any of us to get this far, you're seeing changes occur as you grow because there's more space for it with all the media we have and the effort people have been putting in since time has had some effect.

besides all that though, you did say "everyone else is forced to be fine with being called afab/amab/cis," but like i can't think of any women in my life that have enjoyed being referred to as "female." like that genuinely has been a red flag in both men and women for years now. we have grown to use sex based terms for the sake of bigotry, and the people that want to oppose said bigotry offer changes and your idea is to spit on them. you're calling them word obsessed but you're pressed over the logistics of using afab instead of just saying female.

but also language is intricately tied to genocide, eugenics, and any type of bigotry, it has an impact, people WILL believe the words they say and will act on it. you want to say people have a lot deeper problems going on that they should explore, but what you don't understand is that this is a way of exploring. the change in phrasing is not that big of a deal, you're not getting dumber, you're not losing anything, but if you want to say it's entitled to change, anyone else can easily say it's entitled to stay the same. people can and will and have identified how bigotry has been maintained over the years, and the language and behaviour you use has been a part of said continuity. like think of how it's considered inappropriate to use self deprecation as jokes, and how changing that has had more positive outcomes for ppl than just continuing to degrade themselves casually.

you can simply acknowledge that there are aspects of people trying to use afab and amab that are redundant and move on, but I've seen you get caught up on all these gender related things and complain and get stumped and belittle them each time. idk homie, maybe take a course in gender studies for fun or something.

1- Its not a small change to change the whole English language my dude. And what about every other language and culture? Them too? That is entitlement to an extreme. Demanding the entire world change for 1% of the populations feelings. Are animals no longer female and male? Are humans not animals anymore?

2- You compare calling someone a female or male to a slur? Really? "But that's not something I'd let a white person handle the debate on" So then why are people who (according to them) arent female or male deciding what words to use and what they mean?

And ok, lets compare it to race for a second. So youve said repeatedly before that a transwoman understands what a woman's upbringing is like, despite not being treated socially or legally as a girl or seen by others as a girl. So if a white person put on black face and says they identify as black, could they claim to know what its like to be born and grow up as a black person? Why not, by your logic?

If someone accepts transgenderism, they have to accept trans-race, even trans-species. It follows the exact same lack of logic and is all feelings based. If you feel it, you are it. In fact trans-race is way more logical, because unlike sex, someone actually CAN be half black, half white, 1/4 asian whatever. They can move to a country and learn their language and customs. They can get citizenship. Race is a social construct, right? We know this. Humans havent evolved long enough to create true distinct races. So who are you to say now that they cant do that? You bigot.

3- "I can't think of any women in my life that have enjoyed being referred to as "female." Its not about enjoyment its about objective reality. Most women have no problem at all being called a female in any kind of academic, professional, or medical context because we ARE female. The only ever problem there ever was with the word "female" was when it was used by misogynists to demean us- for being female. (Woah hold on I thought womens oppression and misogyny had nothing to do with our sex- wild). It was always about the context in which it was used, and the intent behind it. I think you know that.

4- You sound like you think getting rid of the words female and male will decrease misogyny and bigotry. Its not the word that the problem, its the attitude that there is something wrong with being the word, with being female. Hey, say we're "reclaiming" it if that makes it easier for you. The very fact that you dont think its a big deal, to erase our sex's existence... As if we arent already pushed to the side and erased from history.

5- "But if you want to say it's entitled to change, anyone else can easily say it's entitled to stay the same." No cuz see, entitlement is about prioritizing your own wants and needs above everyone else. Above the vast majority, thinking that you are special. People cant be entitled to something 99% of the world agrees with and lives by, with a basic concept thats been present though out all of history in every culture.

I encourage you to study womens history and current world issues that womens are facing, although it certainly wont be fun. Women's oppression is so blatently sex-based that its a slap in the face to deny that, and painfully idiotic.

You're smarter than this Nix, jesus christ. Begging you to get a grip.

[dis-astre]

hi to the new people in the les mis fandom joining bc of joseph quinn, it is lovely to have u all with us and u are more than welcome, however u should know that bbc enjolras (and the whole bbc adaptation) is nowhere close to the original character and everything he represent.

while joseph quinn did a really good job at acting enjolras, the way the writers wrote his character was bad and out of character. obviously, and it's normal, an adaptation will always have its own interpretation of a character, and that's what's make fiction so great. but i think u need to be aware of the fact that it's not a good representation of what enjolras' character is and what his character has been representing for over 150 years (i could go into details and maybe will but it's late and i'm working early tomorrow).

i also wanted to say, as a reminder that, while it's completely fine to simp for enjolras (no one is immune to him, whether he's played by aaron tveit, joseph quinn or anyone else) and find him hot (because he IS hot or because he's played by joseph quinn, again, i get it; i don't find moustachjolras hot but damn that man is find irl), u need to be aware that enjolras is a queer character. it's stated multiple times that he has no interest in women, never has and never will. his character has been an important representation for the queer community, him being compared to a lot of gay historical figures (and i'm not going to start with the enjoltaire); but also for the aromantic and asexual community and trans community. his character is very likely to be aroace; and victor hugo describe him as being very androgynous looking, looking like a young woman. and while i don't want to talk on behalf of the trans community, i've seen a lot of post and fanfictions headcanoning him as trans, and i think it's very important to have that kind of representation in such an important piece of classical literature.

so please, be aware that the y/n fanfic and nswf y/n fanfic with female character x enjolras can be really disturbing, especially for people who have been in the fandom for a long time and are really looking up to his character and kinning him. don't just reduce him to hot-man-u-wanna-do-the-dirty-with when his character carries so much importance and has for decades. and i promise, caring about a character's whole essence and personality doesn't make them any less interesting or hot (quite the contrary actually).

also, let's not forget how we collectively hated on the casting choice when it first came out and i find it a bit odd to suddenly change our mind just bc it's the same actor who plays eddie munson. i personally think we were right to complain, bc it WAS a bad casting choice considering all the physical description of enjolras we had (and yes, in les mis, his physical appearance matters of lot).

we are not trying to gatekeep our fandom. on the contrary, i think it's really pretty fucking cool to have new people finding an interest in a 160yo book ! and for me, u guys are more than welcome to join our sad silly little fandom. but we just want u to be aware of all of this (and maybe some other issues that do not cross my mind rn) and be educated so we can all be drama free.

ok i'm done now, sorry for the long post, welcome again to the fandom, and if u decide to stay be ready for the tears and the pain caused by mr victor hugo ! bye bye, with love, a little french fan

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Hey, its the anon that sent you that trans ask a bit ago! I have another question if that's ok? This time I'm trying to understand pronouns. In your answer to my last ask, you were talking about how we need to respect the pronouns that people choose for themselves. I was wondering if pronouns are tied to gender? Like from my experience most cis males use he/him, but I've seen some stuff about he/him lesbians? What is that. I'm not trying to be rude or anything, I genuinely don't really get it. Are pronouns like favorite colors? The person just chooses whatever they vibe with regardless of their chosen gender (or ungender for those who are outside of the binary)

oh hey dude, welcome back! first off I would like to thank you for the phrase "ungender," which I will be peppering into my vocabulary starting immediately.

so, what's the deal with pronouns? starting at linguistics 101, a pronoun is just a word that can be substituted for a noun or group of nouns in a sentence. that includes words like "I," "you," "we," and "us," but the most commonly discussed and debated pronouns are those that are implicitly gendered.

the basic assumption in English is that he/him/his are pronouns used to refer to men, while she/her/hers are for women and they/them/theirs are for either groups of people or someone whose identity is unknown - for instance, saying "they all went running together" or "someone lost their wallet here, I hope they come back to get it."

as with many cultural norms that are often taken for granted, this rather simple binary approach to language becomes incredibly complicated as soon as you acknowledge that not everyone can be easily parceled off into male/man/he/him and female/woman/she/her boxes!

your comparison to favorite colors isn't a bad starting place, because - much like favorite colors - the seriousness with which people take their pronoun usage can vary wildly from person to person. and much like having a favorite color, none of those preferences are wrong!

for some trans folks, having people use the correct pronouns is a very big deal, because it indicates that the people talking to and about them recognize and respect their gender identity. also, it's just kind of shitty if, say, you're a trans woman who gets referred to as "he" all the time, even if some of those are by people making sincere mistakes, because every instance of misgendered puts the burden on a trans person to either speak up for themselves and potentially cause a scene or just sit quietly and take it, both of which are pretty depressing options. this is a big part of why including your pronouns when you introduce yourself and wearing nametags or pins with pronouns listed are such a big thing in so many queer spaces - it can seriously cut down on the hurt people experience when they get misgendered, and it helps normalize the idea that someone's appearance doesn't necessarily indicate their gender or the correct pronouns to use for them.

for other queer people, their relationship to their gender can be so nebulous and variable that they're comfortable using multiple sets of pronouns - he/they and she/they are both common - or not having any preference at all. I include myself in that category - while I have no problem with the pronouns that people generally default to when they talk about me, I also really don't have any beef with other pronouns getting thrown into the mix. every once in a while someone throws a he/him my way and I think that's simply delightful. it's hilarious, frankly, and you'll never catch me complaining about it, because it's not necessarily any more right or wrong than she/her or they/them or anything else people can think of.

speaking of other things people can think of - some folks prefer using what are known as "neopronouns" which are generally meant to be detached from gender. some sets of neopronouns include xe/xem/xer, ze/zem/zir, and e/em/eirs. I'll say right now: learning to incorporate neopronouns into your vocabulary can be difficult, and that's okay. making the effort to learn and use them if you meet someone who prefers them is what matters. the folks who use these pronouns are being super brave trying to create a space for themselves by inventing language where there previously was none, and I salute them.

to answer your question about he/him lesbians - they're great and I love them! there's a long and rich and BEAUTIFUL history of lesbian expressions of butchness and masculinity, and for some lesbians that extends to wanting to be called by pronouns that are traditionally used for men. some of those lesbians might also take testosterone or otherwise consider themselves transmasculine and/or nonbinary while still being lesbians while others will eventually find the most joy identifying fully as trans men; the world of lesbian gender expression is nuanced and lovely and holds space for a great deal of ambiguity. likewise there are gay men, especially those with particularly feminine or otherwise gender nonconforming presentations, who prefer to use she/her pronouns; bounce rapper Big Freedia is a notable example.

it's also worth noting that many people who are 100% cisgender sometimes dip into adding they/thems to their pronouns as a gesture of solidarity and support to normalize the use of gender neutral pronouns, which I think is cool and rad. this can sometimes cause confusion on the part of onlookers - most recently, actor Rahul Kohli became aware that some fans were under the incorrect impression that he's nonbinary after he changed the pronouns in his twitter bio to he/they - but honestly, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing! uncertainty can be a great conversation starter and make space for a lot of learning.

in short: sure, pronouns can be a lot like favorite colors. some people pick one early on and stick with it forever, some people change it up every day. some people refuse to pick just one, and some people don't have a favorite at all. for some people their favorite color is an extremely serious matter, and for others it's all about the vibes. all that really matters is that when somebody tells you their favorite color(s), the polite thing to do is accept that and behave accordingly.

[lovee-infected]

I enjoy reading character analysis to understand them more and I've also noticed that some insert fics are like too exagerated and their personalities are far from the canon twst. I think some writers are just basing their fics to others and and makes conclusion about it and ignore important details or text on their cards?* And as a reader, I do sometimes think that "this" character are like that. Like Vil, being portrayed as narcisstic and beauty obssessed charac, I think he isnt like that and theres more to him than we think. Sorry for the long ask✌️

You're totally valid anon and I see your point, you know while I agree that each idea and interpretation on characters is worthy on its own and no one is bound to having a specific opinion or belief, getting too wild with personal fantasies and ignoring the originals can totally ruin the writing. Characters are often mischaracterized especially in reader insert fics and the most annoying part is that almost everyone is making the same mistakes about him-! Like some of the noticable mistakes would be:

(1) Femininely has nothing to do with Vil's terms of beauty

Oh lord what can I say- It's even against what Vil himself directly said through chapter five and how he cleared his point on male and female equal, and you can tell he is pretty strict about it.

Like did you just forget what he told Epel when he complained that he doesn't want to act like a girl: “a boy getting embarrassed about ‘acting like a girl,’ -- what year is your head stuck in??? did you take a time machine from 100 years ago??”

He doesn't seem to be one to appreciate the concept of labeling beauty as a female-only thing and on the other hand, he doesn't really seem to like the way women can be looked down on while being compared to men either. He seeks equality, and beauty wasn't ever defined as a feminine act in his dictionary; while there are tons of requests asking for: Vil forcing their trans s/o to wear more feminine clothes/ Vil asking their fem! s/o to wear more feminine stuff an look cuter/Vil complimenting s/o's appearance for not being feminine enough/... And literally TONS of requests like this. Please, you're forgetting one the most important parts of his personality, he considers male and female to be equal and it's so hecking important to show that he holds respect for all genders nonetheless.

(2) Vil's maturity is often ignored

Honestly, within all twst characters Vil's maturity on its own really impresses me. From the way he speaks to how serious and sincere he is all I gotta say is this man is waaay different from the way he's charactetized in most of the fics. Idk why but, he's sometimes charactetized as a guy who's ready to boil you alive if you dare touch any of his expensive make up pallettes or eyeshadows. Oh please, Vil isn't an angry child.

Also he often decides to keep his anger in, though you can tell when he's mad by just looking at his face. Clinching fists, trying not to talk and most likely, walking off or asking people to leave him alone until he calms down a bit is most likely his usual way of expressing his anger, but I've seen him being described as a loud, feral figure like Riddle is! Oh god no- Are you just ignoring how calm and collected Vil often tends to be?

(3) What's with the potato fetish?

While it's canon that Vil can sometimes call people around him potato. You may like to know that in some languages, potato is translated as "Apple of the ground", which can be an interesting reason of him using this nickname for people.

Watching Vil call students potatoes can be as entertaining as watching Malleus play with his tamagotchi, but again, it's important to realize that you don't have to only use potato when you're thinking of what Vil might say in a reader insert/situation!

Come on there are hundreds of different statements and sentences you can use other than just 'potatoes' and it'll get boring to read him saying the same nick name over and over in a fic. Good lord of course this isn't the only word he uses in communication so please try to avoid using it too much. This, is NOT the only word that he knows to use! (Seriously though I've seen being used like 6 times in a 500-word drabble)

(4) Please avoid spreading false information about him and his personality

Funny how I'm saying it here, but don't forget that you do not own him! Vil Schoenheit is a property of Disney/ Aniplex and all, which means that no one can certainly decide on his sexuality/ background/ unexplained character details unless it's officially announced.

Why am I saying this? Because some people are seriously going to far! I've seen people attacking others saying that Vil's pronouns are She/Her and not He/ Him like: EXCUSE ME...???

I don't want to get into details explaining how this drama is going but I've got to say something anyway, YOU DON'T HAVE THE RIGHT TO DECIDE ON HIS PRONOUNS! None of us do!

It's totally okay to have your personal preferences on his pronouns or anything else, but you must avoid spreading such information and forcing them on others as long as they aren't confirmed! Please keep your headcanons for yourself and don't confuse the fandom with them. Everyone's free to have their own headcanons but it's never okay to force them on others!

(5) Vil has a LOT to talk about other than just beauty!

Man... sometimes I feel like the fandom is just doing him dirty. Most of the reader inserts, fics , and even Vil memes have something to do with beauty while it's important to try and look through his personality as well instead of just sticking with the beauty aspect.

For example, through the Halloween event, I couldn't be any more surprised when Vil found the crying child who had lost their parents through the crowd and instead of just leaving them to headmaster or asking someone to take care of them he actually started to play with the child and entertrain and confront them on his own! That was probably one of his sweetest moments through the whole game and it really changed my mind about him! It was great to know that Vil as well can have a softer side when it comes to children, just imagine how good this can be used while writing a father AU for him!

His talents on the other hand need to be recognized, for example: his acting skills back in the ghost marriage proved how much of a great actor he can be and this can also give us lots of ideas to use in writings. On the other hand he's much of a celebrity on his own ( Woop- he's also got 2m followers on magicam) which gives us another great plot to write for him.

The way he is around close friends, how he compliments them and gets complimented by them in return, the way he manages Pomefiore and tries to put the students into doing their best in using their skills and lots of more interesting details that can be found through his stories are there to tell you that he's a lot more than just a beautiful Queen. A considerable part of his background as well is going to be released at he end of chapter 5 (Yes baby after the overblot Vil) and I hope that gives us all the opportunity to come up with stronger personalities and plots next time that we're describing or even, characterizing Vil!

Lmao I kind of rushed to finish this so I didn't get to talk about him as much as I wanted to, but hope that this is useful anyway.