#westerner culture

[wesleysniperking]

usopp positivity post #10

I know I’ve said this a few times, but I really do find it amazing how people can find a connection with Usopp on a personal level. It’s truly amazing. It’s like a hug.

I was talking to my mother the other day about Usopp because she asked about what he’s been doing in recent events (Egghead). I proceeded to tell her all about it, and ramble a mile a minute. In my zone. Like I’m giving a TedTalks about him 😅

I was talking to her about Usopp’s backstory and I mentioned how the fandom perceives it as idyllic and not as traumatic as his comrades. But she said that Usopp’s backstory is one that a lot of people can relate to. It’s realistic and easy to connect with. And something on a very human level. Losing a parent and having to go at it alone, in everyday human life…that’s definitely traumatic. And yes, this is supposed to be a positive Usopp post. Just let me finish my point.

What I liked about my mother’s words was that she sounded like my fellow Usopp fans who defend this point constantly. She didn’t have to be on the internet to understand this point. She doesn’t go on the internet at all. Seriously. This isn’t the only time she’s sounded like a true fan without any qualms. Verbatim.

She 100 percent believes in the cause.

So, happy Mother’s Day to Mom’s who listen to their child ramble on about something they wholeheartedly love.

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[lgbtlunaverse]

The world exists in such a baffling state of simultaneous sex-aversion and sex-hegemony. Every social platform on the internet is trying to banish sex workers to the shadow realm but I can't post a tweet without at least two bots replying P U S S Y I N B I O. People are self-censoring sex to seggs and $3× but every other ad you see is still filled with half-naked women. Rightwingers want queer people arrested for so much as existing in the same postal code as a child and are also drumming up a moral panic about how teenage boys aren't getting laid enough. I feel like I'm losing my mind.

[ashleyloob]

every time I see non Asians go by Asian names online I get whiplash bc I'm like o shit another one of me!! then I find out they are a white weeb from Arkansas going by Haru that can't name more than 3 countries in Asia

[folkfashion]

Spanish maskers, Spain, by Ashley Suszczynski

[mintjeru]

香港人 miku!! 🇭🇰🇭🇰🇭🇰

open for better quality | no reposts

[spirk-trek]

she is to me what leia's gold bikini was to straight boys

[kimberly40]

[feministfang]

If you are a white western woman, stay away from brown men and never say yes to their marriage proposals. Brown men have this disgusting obsession with winning a white woman as a trophy wife because they love showing off to everyone in our south asian culture they made a woman from west, who they always assume to be an independent free girl, do traditional labour for them and live under their domination. Bringing a western woman down under the patriarchal hierarchy somehow raises brown men’s value in our culture.

If you are a brown south asian woman, stay away from white men and never say yes to their marriage proposals. You might think white men would be less misogynistic because western culture is more liberated than our south asian culture. But that’s not the case! The fact that women in west have a lot more freedom than us is the entire reason white men desire to pursue someone from patriarchal cultures. They don’t want to marry you to free you from this oppressive society, they want to marry you because they expect you to provide them with traditional labour.

[sonyaheaneyauthor]

I've almost reached my breaking point with this genocide in Ukraine. I'm older than most Tumblr users, so I was being yelled at in university tutorials in the early 00s for talking about the Holodomor, and being told that "If it happened, Ukrainians deserved it for being Nazis".

I was out there in 2007 when we had the worldwide march for the Holodomor to be recognised as a genocide, only for so many countries (the USA being one of them) to tell us that they won't do it because it might upset russia.

I remember when russia invaded in 2014 and Obama said it wasn't his business, and that russia can decide what happens in Ukraine. And then he sent Ukraine fucking helmets and "hygiene kits" instead of the military aid he was supposed to.

My family in Donetsk walked out of their homes with their lives packed in plastic shopping bags nearly eleven years ago. But people prefer to believe the russian lies that Donbas wants to be part of russia.

I remember sitting at home on the 17th of July 2014, hearing about russia shooting down MH17, and feeling my blood run cold because the initial reports said the aeroplane was full of Americans. Being so sure that the USA might finally live up to the Budapest Memorandum and get involved in the war.

Of course they didn't.

And then the Malaysians went and protested at the Ukrainian embassy, as if they were to blame for being invaded by their genocidal neighbour.

I remember being at a protest at the russian embassy in Canberra just after Crimea was annexed, and the only people who turned up for us were other Ukrainians. Soon after there were massive protests for Palestine and BLM from Melbourne to Dublin and beyond. Ukrainians are too white for leftists and too foreign for right-wingers to care about.

More people dumped buckets of ice on their heads than supported us.

I spent Easter 2016 in a hotel in Ukraine. 8.5 years ago I was the only guest who wasn't a soldier on leave from the war.

Now I go on reddit and see that Americans are discussing how Ukraine "has a neo-fascist problem". Um, you guys just voted for Donald fucking Trump?

Then I see an Australian journalist say that the US election result means that America is "becoming like Eastern Europe". No. Eastern Europeans aren't Nazis. They suffered more under the Nazis than anyone.

We're always on our own. Millions upon millions of Ukrainians have been killed in the last ninety years, millions more sold into slavery in Germany (including my grandparents), hundreds of thousands sent to gulags (including the entire population of my grandmother's village), and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands dead or missing now, but we're still not seen as worthy of caring about.

I have family members whose dead bodies have been lying on battlefields for over a year. One killed in Bakhmut, a city that no longer exists. Another taken hostage from Mariupol, a city russia bombed to the ground. The mass graves there can be seen from space.

We can't get the bodies back because russia has colonised the area. I have a relative who was moved on from fighting in Vovchansk because there was no point fighting for another city that no longer exists. My relative who was taken hostage in Mariupol was starved and tortured for 2.5 years.

And then last week our city's magazine had a three-page interview with the russian ambassador, explaining why his country "has" to commit genocide in Ukraine. The editor laughed at my aunt when she phoned to register a complaint.

But teenaged tankies on sites like this will mock Ukrainians' deaths, stick a fucking hammer and sickle in their profile, and lecture people like me about things they know nothing about.

The world needs to end its ridiculous love affair with the russian federation.

[otaku553]

Save me yi nine sols

(You should play nine sols it’s very very fun)

[rabbits-of-negative-euphoria]

you open yourself up to the devil by celebrating Halloween in the same way you open yourself up to the devil by celebrating St. Paddy's or Mardi Gras.

if you play ouija or try voodoo, you open yourself up to the devil. if you dress in a slutty costume or take psychedelics in a cemetery, you open yourself up to the devil.

likewise, if you get wasted on Guinness in downtown Savannah, you open yourself up to the devil.

if you twerk half-naked for plastic beads on Bourbon Street, you open yourself up to the devil.

these kinds of bacchanalia are by no means inherent to the holidays in question, and in fact, are extremely recent perversions of traditions which go back centuries. Centuries of Christian history.

[bingsoo-jung]

I said this in the comments of someone else’s post, but I’m going to say this here. Taash identifying as non-binary is good actually, and in fact better than the dev’s making up some new term for them. Let’s get into it.

So for a bit of background, I’m non-binary and Thai. If you don’t know, Thai has specific terms for different gender-sexual identities, they’re quite old, they date back a few hundred years. However, the thing about culturally specific terms is just that, they’re culturally specific. The reason you use them is because you are tied to the culture in such a way that you gender-sexual identity cannot be disassociated from it. Because, to be clear, these terms are never just about your gender or sexual identity. They encompass a role you play within society itself.

For instance, in Thai culture we have tom/tomboys. These are AFAB folks who occupy a masculine societal role and date women. If you’re AMAB you cannot be tom. If you’re transmasc and feminine? You cannot be tom. If you’re transmasc and not attracted to women? You cannot be tom. If you’re transmasc and mostly date men? You cannot be tom. If you’re transmasc but don’t particularly feel like taking care of the girl you date, taking her out, being the ‘man’ in the relationship? You can’t really be tom.

Because the thing about culturally specific genders is that they come with a lot of rules. Being tom isn’t being non-binary. There are cis women who are tom, and there are non-binary people who are toms. You do not get eschew gender roles in these cases. You are quite literally taking one on. You have a role and place in society that has been made for you, and you are expected to carry it out.

Because of this, none of these terms are a one-to-one for other identities, and nor should they be. Being kathoey or hijra is not the same as being a trans woman or non-binary, and visa versa. You can be kathoey and not be trans. You can be trans and not be kathoey. Being aqun-athlok or any other specific term shouldn’t be either. The idea that it is, is more ahistorical and inaccurate than the word non-binary itself. Giving Taash some new, culturally specific term, would inherently tie them to a culture, and one perhaps that they didn’t feel apart of. Especially since Taash’s entire story is about struggling to figure out where they belong. Arguably the biggest issue with their story is that you have to make them decide, and fundamentally tying them to a term would’ve compounded that problem.

The reason I identify as non-binary and not a tom, is because I am not occupying some specific role in Thai culture. Despite living in LA, I rarely interact with other Thai people who aren’t my family. I do not live in a cultural context that would allow me to identify as a tom.

The thing about terms like non-binary, or trans, or agender, is that they’re meant to be acultural terms encapsulating the concept of truth to oneself and ones identity. Whereas culturally specific terms aren’t, they’re about the role you hold in society and where you fit in. It’s about your identity within a status quo. Taash is a character who is eschewing societal roles, and breaking the status quo, giving them those terms just wouldn’t work.

And finally? Using non-binary itself allows the writers to very specifically say where they stand. There is no space given to transphobes. You either accept that DA is queer-friendly or bust. And that’s a very important stance to make in an era where trans and non-binary folks are being actively targeted. There’s no ‘well Taash isn’t actually trans or non-binary they’re [insert term here]!’ Because people would’ve done that, we know they would’ve. This means people can’t do that. They have to just say that they have an issue with the term, and thus we can call them for what they are. Transphobes. Plain and simple.

So yeah, Taash’s identity does have nuance, it has a lot of it. And to be honest with you, I wouldn’t be surprised if Trick Weekes, a non-binary person whose wife is First Nations and thus from a group with culturally specific gender identities, knows about the difference between something like two-spirit and trans. And to be honest with you, using something like non-binary has nuance I doubt was actually afforded to Krem, considering they cast a cis woman to play Krem.

So yeah.

[trans-androgyne]

"Manhood is fundamentally shaped by the patriarchy and cannot be separated from it." What a sad view to have of gender, and one that directly harms trans men and mascs.

Do you realize how close that is to what TERFs believe? I’ve encountered so many of them that go off about how gender is inextricable from patriarchy, only existing to oppress women. That's where the term "gender critical" comes from. They think gender should be abolished entirely instead instead of preserving what brings people comfort and euphoria. They see trans people transitioning as inherently upholding patriarchy, including believing that trans men are just oppressed girls betraying their sisters by trying to move up in the gender hierarchy.

Gender has existed without patriarchy and it will again. I'm sorry to tell you this, but by saying the two are inextricable you are letting colonizers win. My ancestors lived in a matriarchy before being colonized by Spain and inundated with Catholicism--yet we still had gender roles, ones in which women were respected and had power. We certainly were not unique for that.

What happened to "smash the patriarchy"? Please don't just accept that this is the way of the world, that to be a woman means to be a victim and to be a man means to be an oppressor. My masculinity is queer, not gender-conforming. I resist the patriarchy by my very existence, as do other trans men and mascs. If you want to be inclusive and supportive of all trans people, you're going to have to expand your view of gender beyond what the patriarchy has taught you.

[wifegideonnav]

[folkfashion]

Bwa dancer, Burkina-Faso, by Carol Beckwith and Angela Fisher

[lyricthecat-12]

Take a look at this!

A new independent pilot with a very fun premise and with a lot of potential as well as a beautiful and careful soundtrack and animation