#you don’t have to be bi or pan to include those folks

[yearning-butch]

Not to queer discourse but like. People claiming to be bi lesbians or pan lesbians need to do some fucking research. Lesbianism is inherently exclusionary! If you have any attraction to men, you are not a lesbian! If you are a man, you are not a lesbian! Lesbianism is specifically defined as (and always has been defined as) non men who love and are attracted to non men.

[scretladyspider]

Asexual and aromantic are not “spicy straight trying to be special LGBT”.

This argument, much like “you’re not really bi/pan if you are with someone of the opposite gender”, asks for visibly performative queerness then ignores the inherent queerness in these experiences.

If being straight is being allosexual, heterosexual, heteroromantic, alloromantic, and cisgender, all at once, then a person only needs to not be one of these to call themselves queer if they want to.

This always ruffles feathers, but..cishet isn’t the inherent opposite of queer.

Allosexual — not ace or under its umbrella

Alloromantic — not aro or under its umbrella

cisgender — aligning with your gender assigned/designated at birth

Heterosexual— sexual attraction to the opposite gender

Heteroromantic — romantic attraction to the opposite gender

If all aces and aros were cishet, which we’re not but just for the sake of this example, how would this detract from the queerness inherent in asexuality and aromanticism? Each are complex spectrums of a fundamentally different experience than the world teaches us we should have.

Aces, aros, and bi/pan people in “straight passing” relationships are often lumped into cishet as a way of delineating “not queer”, regardless of other factors. But this dismisses queerness and asks for specific, unnamed perimeters to be met for it to be recognized.

When presented with ways that experiencing little to no sexual attraction, or little to no romantic attraction, are in fact in opposition with the expectation for everyone to have both (allonormativity and amatanormativity or amanormativity respectively), people don’t accept it. Or rather, they don’t accept it as a thing on its own. Sometimes this means getting treated as if you’re just trying to be edgy, as if proclaiming you’re part of a marginalized group gives social media clout or something. Other times it’s just not treated as enough on its own by other queer people.

This happens in ace and aro spaces too. Cishet is used often as shorthand for “not queer”, directly pushing away aspecs who may be cishet and also ace and/or aro. It doesn’t seem intentionally exclusionary, but unintended exclusion is still exclusion.

This reflects, also, the expectation of performative queerness that is thrown at bi and pan persons both in and out of queer spaces. There are also many aces and aros who are bi and pan, and who may or may not be cisgender.

The reality however is there is no way to “perform” queerness that is satisfactory to all who demand it. The result this odd sort of existence where when one appears queer “enough”, that is used as weaponry against them, but when it isn’t, it’s used to exclude queer people from queerness.

And the real kicker is asexual and aromantic are enough. Bi/pan folks are still their orientation regardless of what their relationship looks like. Gender is it’s own thing, separate from the others, but related because this all ends up being a pile of queer identity spaghetti.

Regardless of how queer a person appears to you, or if you understand their individual experience… Ace is enough. Aro is enough.

The demand for performative queerness is used to try to defend from harm, but it ends up attacking anyone not visibly queer enough to the beholder.

We need to be more explicitly inclusive — especially in our own spaces, but also outside of them when talking about how queerness operates. If someone else’s queerness makes your idea of queerness more complicated, that’s not a bad thing. Learn from that, and let them be.

If you see someone is ace or aro and then see they’re more like you than you thought they could be, or that they don’t engage with it how you expected, that’s not a reason to be exclusionary. It’s a reason to try to expand what you include in your idea of queer.

Once, you needed someone to include you to feel comfortable in your queerness.

Set your ego aside and extend a hand to those you don’t quite understand. Be inclusive. Especially if someone’s relationship to their queerness challenges what you thought was possible.

thank you for reading if you like this please consider contributing to my moving expenses, there’s $425 to go and anything and everything helps

you can also find my blog, my links, my socials, read/listen to interviews, or just say hi here on my linktree

thank you again for reading and remember to be inclusive! Other queer people are not your enemy. have a nice day!

[capricorn-0mnikorn]

What you'll find here (refreshed Intro post, 8 October, 2024)

I generally post whatever is on my mind, especially contemplative and/or silly. Disability rights, queer rights, literature and the arts are perennial subjects.

Rest Assured: I will never make a “Reblog, or else you’re a bad person,” or “Reblog, or else bad things will happen.” post.

(Though I may ask for signal boosts, if someone is asking for specific help / advice, and needs to get their message out)

What counts as "Good Manners" around here:

Don't be mean. There's no need to be mean. Remember, wherever you go, there you are.

Praise what you enjoy before criticizing what you don't.

When you do give criticism, let it be reasoned ("It sucks!" isn’t reasoning).

Don't belittle, or mock, people for the things they enjoy (or what they don’t enjoy, either, respect people’s squicks, even if they seem odd to you).

If you must post provocative things, aim for provoking laughter, and provoking thought.

Remember that anger can splash onto innocent bystanders, and people "reading over your shoulder." If you must have an argument with someone in particular--rather than an argument for or against an idea--take it somewhere else (Send a private message or ask to the person)

When in doubt: Puns!

My blocking policy: When I get a notification that I have a new follower, I check, and I will block

Blogs I suspect of being a bot.

Ableists . (Link to the American Wikipedia article on Ableism). This includes anyone who supports for Autism Speaks; I see a blue puzzle piece, I block immediately. I will also block people who repost images, and remove the Image Descriptions.

TERFs, as flagged by the app Shinigami Eyes.

Self-appointed LGBTQ+ Gatekeepers: Those who want to exclude Asexual, Aromantic, and Bi- (or Pan-) folk in M/F relationships, from the Queer Community.

Speaking of the Queer Community: Any user that tags my posts with “q-slur." Since "Queer" is widely accepted through academic consensus, I use it freely. If that word makes you uncomfortable, you would not be happy here.

Any blog (or Anon who sends a message to my Inbox) that discourages voting in United States elections.

And Finally:

With help and suggestions from many others (some of whom wished to remain anonymous) I designed the Disability Pride Flag (Which is different from the Disability Rights Flag of the U.N.). Here is the flag as designed for computer monitors, mobile phones, and other backlit screens:

To the extent possible under law, Ann Magill has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to Visually Safe Disability Pride Flag. This work is published from: United States.

I also designed a version in fully saturated colors, which I recommend for physical media, such as actual flags, tee-shirts, print materials, etc. (Since physical media is more likely to be viewed at a distance, and atmospheric haze naturally filters bright colors).

I've put the full saturation version behind the cut (But please use the version above for online art):

[musclesandhammering]

Spn Opinions That’ll Have Me Burned at the Stake Pt. 2: Electric Boogaloo

I’m back and bitchier than ever. For reference, here’s part 1.

• Season 5 wasn’t that great.

• D*stiel isn’t real, it’s a sucky ship, and that confession scene was just the writers pandering to the rabid deancas fans cause they knew they were the only ones still watching the show lol. And they left it ambiguous enough that they could still say it was meant platonically if they needed to.

• I hate how they watered down both angels and demons post-season 5ish.

• I liked Ruby 1.0 better than Ruby 2.0.

• I hate Honey!Cas. They just did that cause they didn’t know where to take his story from there, needed him out of the way, and thought it would be funny. It was insulting.

• Jack should’ve been played by an actual child so everyone’s abuse of him would resonate with the audience for what it was (casual fans are brain dead and need to be spoon fed).

• Victor Henrikson deserved more time on the show.

• I said it in the last post, but Alex is way more interesting than Claire and should’ve been given the lead role in the wayward sisters storyline instead.

• Dean is canonically straight and for Christ sake if you guys wanted bi rep, there’s about a thousand other characters that are strongly coded or implied to be bisexual (including Sam!) but y’all didn’t focus on them because it wasn’t actually about representation, it was about making it more plausible for your dumb fetishised gay ship to actually happen (spoiler: it didn’t).

• Season 3 and Season 6 were some of the best ones, you guys just don’t have any taste.

• Claire is not Castiel’s daughter and saying she is erases Jimmy and insults her, and even Cas himself acknowledged that on the show.

• Castiel is canonically NOT gay and Misha constantly saying he is is annoying and airheaded. He’s been attracted to women IN THE SHOW and he’s not even really male, so calling him a Gay Man is reductive and just plain wrong. Also, it’s veeery sus that- given how bi/pan folks are even more underrepresented than gay people- that one of the rare times where the bi/pan label actually fits a character BETTER in CANON……. the allies and monosexuals adamantly reject it. Hm.

• “Curing” vampires or werewolves or demons shouldn’t have been a thing.

• The Winchesters cause most of the bad shit that happens and then they just force supernatural beings to fix it for them- tell me again how they’re Super Special Heroes.

• It shouldn’t be possible to make angels human by removing their grace, because (unlike demons, werewolves, etc) they were never human to start with. If you drained me of all my blood, I wouldn’t magically transform into another species, I’d fucking die.

• Making Billie go crazy was dumb.

• Rowena was one of the most interesting and charismatic characters on the whole show- they just didn’t know what to do with her character.

• The archangels, Lilith, and Azazel should’ve been the biggest threats on the show. No other knights of hell, no god and his sister, no Cain, nothing like that. Having every villain just get progressively more overpowered made the show unbelievable and repetitive and annoying.

• The kernel sanders king of hell guy was hot.

• Dean is misogynistic as HELL, homophobic, likes racist porn, is a narcissist, pervs on teen girls, & thinks all non-human people should be exterminated… and that is all CANON.

• Most of John Winchester’s abuse is fanon.

• Fans portraying Cas as a smol bby who colours in colouring books and has a bee plushie is so fucking annoying.

• Instead of having so many gigantic cosmic storylines with god and his sister and alternate dimensions and even the angel and demon tablets, they should’ve just scrapped those and made the stein family and the bmol and the alpha vampire storylines way bigger than they were. Less cosmic stuff, more earth-based stuff.

• They ruined Lucifer’s character post-season 5. Before that, he was more sympathetic and reasonable than Michael. After, he was a spoiled child hurting people for fun.

• Everything from season 7 on is garbage. All of it. There’s bits of goodness here and there but overall seasons 7-15 are trash.

• How the fuck are there actual people who are deangirls and hate Sam?? The space where your brain should be is empty, I swear to god.

• If there was gonna be any lgbt rep in the Wayward Sisters group, it should’ve been Jody and Donna instead of Claire and Kaia. Those two were boring as hell and had zero chemistry or build-up, but Jody/Donna had plenty of chemistry and was very believable.

• Meg has the best and most realistic redemption arc of anyone on the show.

• Chuck was not likeable or charismatic enough to carry off as big of a villain arc as they gave him. Also that whole thing was stupid and WAY too Out There.

• All the angels should’ve been aroace. All the demons should’ve been pan.

• I stanned Cole so hard up until he changed his mind about hating Dean. That was disappointing.

• Sam went through the same shitty childhood Dean did (plus Bonus Abuse on top of it) and he didn’t turn out Like That.

• I cannot think of a single person that was asking for a spin-off about the Winchester family, like that has to be the most boring thing.

[posi-pan]

https://www.tumblr.com/toyherb/748434177303658496/geiser-i-know-pansexuality-is-not-just-going-to?source=share

i saw this and do you know if this is true or not? because it made me sad / feel bad because before i came out (i didn't have plans to, at first) i was thinking long and hard on which labels fit me to the point of having sleepless nights because of it and then i found out about pansexuality due to this blog and that made me feel peaceful inside and that's how i figured out that this label fit me.

and now everyone on that post is like: think long and hard on the labels you use!!!! i don't want to exclude anyone. i don't want to erase anyone. this label just fits me. it fit me then, it fits me now. it's as simple as that.

sorry to dump this into your askbox during pride :((((

that post is absolutely not true. i have many posts on here calling out the idea that pan is somehow damaging bisexuality or whatever. pansexuality is not biphobic, individual people are. if someone is saying something biphobic, it’s because of their own flawed thinking or understanding, not because of whatever their sexuality is. funny how many heterosexuals and gay men and lesbians say horribly biphobic things, yet i don’t see any viral posts about how heterosexuality or gayness or lesbianism are biphobic. that logic only applies to pansexuality, i guess. *eye roll* it’s almost like the goal isn't calling out biphobia, the goal is spreading panphobia.

(and let’s not forget that pansexuality and pan people did not create any of these misconceptions about bisexuality that panphobes always talk about. those existed before pan got any kind of mainstream visibility. and don't believe panphobes when they say pan folks “changed the definition of bisexuality” either, as that’s just another panphobic lie.)

you don’t have anything to worry about. the only people doing damage are the people who make and share those kinds of posts telling people they’re queerphobic and hurting the community because they use a different word. pan has always existed and wasn’t created to be biphobic or transphobic and has always been welcome in the bi community. claiming otherwise is what’s wrong and damaging.

and idk when op posted that, but the earliest replies i saw were from 2020, so it’s interesting that people are sharing a years old post where the go-to example of a pan person being biphobic is even older: miley cyrus in 2016 saying she hates the word bisexual for putting her in a box. which. i remember that and pan folks, including myself, were criticizing her word choice. (even though she simply said she doesn’t like that label for her own sexuality and feels it’s too restrictive for her own sexuality and feelings. which isn’t queerphobic ffs. queer people of all kinds feel certain labels are too restrictive or don’t fully encompass their feelings. like. why is it only bad when a pan person says that about bi? i’m so tired of the double standards. also, where are these people when bi celebs are spreading biphobic narratives? they’re awfully silent then.)

please try not to give panphobes like that the time of day. their words have no weight because they’re rooted in hatred and queerphobia. they do a good job of masking their panphobia in supposed sadness about biphobia or concerns about the community (and sometimes wrap their message in faux intellectualism), but all of that rings false when you know where they’re coming from and what their intentions are. pan people are just trying to live our lives as authentically as we can, with language that feels true to us. panphobes on the other hand are actively spending their free time trying to make other queer people feel bad for *check notes* using different words. as if that isn’t the most ridiculous thing in the world.

i hope this helps make you feel better!!! and no worries about sending this during pride!! 💖💖💖

[shygeekysub]

Welcome to my horny posting

You can call me Macs or anything else you like. Mid/upper 20s genderfluid bi sub.

Working on getting this intro together but feel free to send asks or DMs for anything except unsolicited nudes.

Harder kinks ahead, including

CNC

monsterfucking

masochism

DNI:

Homophobes/biphobes/panphobes etc (I’m one of them queers)

TERFS/SWERFS/transphobes/“gender crits” w/e (I’m one of them transes)

Pedos or w/e you’re calling yourselves these days

MINORS

detrans-/misogyny-/sissification-/feederism-focused blogs (ykinmkato👍)

ED blogs

This post is still under construction…

but I don’t care what your gender is or what you look like I probably want you to ruin me talk to me

(last updated May 19, 2024)

Rambly gender stuff under the cut

Are you a man? No

Are you a woman? No.

What are you then? Idk man, neither? None? Both? All? Non-binary butch is probably the closest, but it varies. Transmasc?

Can you tag the q-slur/d-slur/f-slur? If you can’t handle “queer,” “dyke,” or “faggot,” you probably shouldn’t be following queers, dykes, or faggots. I’m all three.

I have issue with you using butch to describe your gender while not being a lesbian: historically, bi/pan women-aligned and non-binary folks have been enthusiastically welcomed into sapphic spaces, trying to put hard limits on amorphous concepts like sexuality and gender is both ineffective and unnecessarily exclusive, and infighting only helps those who want us destroyed

I don’t understand what you just said: stfu and worry about real problems before Leslie Feinberg haunts your ass

[gaylorvader]

Platonic Lady Dimitrescu x ftm reader

Summery:One of the new maids refuses to wear the maid uniform, Lady D thinks he’s trying to be rude but really he’s just dysphoric about it.

Word Count:599

Warnings:getting accidentally misgendered once

(A/n this might be kinda shit cause it was just a random thing I started daydreaming about. Hope you enjoy tho.)

“You have to wear one"

“I’d rather take my chances with those wolf things outside.”

She rubbed her face. You were recently brought to Castle Dimitrescu to be a maid, the woman you were talking to was trying to teach you what to do.

“You have to wear it otherwise the ladies will turn you into wine.”

“Like blood as wine or blood mixed with wine?”

“Mixed with wine to my knowledge.”

“Hannibal Lector eat your heart out.”

She started laughing at my pun.

“I’m glad you caught that, I was proud of that one.” You smirked

“Yeah that was a good one.” She chuckled.

“But back on topic you need to wear that, I was being serious about the being turned into wine thing.”

You just shrugged. “Can I not just wear this.” You gestured to your current outfit, she just sighed.

“If you die its not my fault.”

“Ok.”

The woman, who you learned was named Angela, was showing you around and telling you what you’d be doing when your tour got interrupted.

You hear a woman clear her throat behind you, and when you turned around it was the 9 foot tall ruler of the castle.

“Ah! Lady Dimitrescu.” Angela bowed, pushing you to do the same.

“You" the lady said looking at you. “what is your name?”

“Y/n.”

She just looked at you before turning to Angela. “Why isn’t she wearing a uniform?”

You could see how nervous she was so you answered. “It’s not her fault. She tried to get me to wear it for like, 10, 15, minutes, but I refused to.”

The lady just stared at you, glaring slightly. “My office, now.”

Angela gave you a sympathetic look as you followed Lady Dimitrescu.

When you arrived at the lady’s office she told you to sit and she sat behind her desk.

“So why won’t you wear your uniform? I can only see it as a move of disrespect.” She asked you.

“No, it’s nothing to do with you at all.”

She raised an eyebrow before leaning back I’m her chair. “Than please, explain yourself. Quickly.”

Well either you tell her the truth and maybe die anyway or don’t and definitely die, you had the feeling she’d see right through any lie you tried to tell. “Welp, here we go" you thought.

“So basically, um-"

“Out with it.” She said clearly losing patience.

“I’m trans.”

You could practically hear the record scratch in her head. She sat forward again, arms on the desk.

“What?”

“Ya know, like transgender? Like I’m a trans guy?”

She thought for a moment. “So you didn’t want to wear a dress because it would cause you gender dysphoria, correct?”

Your eyebrows shot to your hairline. You, didn’t expect that.

“Uh y-yeah.”

She chuckled. “I may be old but I still know things.” She paused. “Hm, usually we wouldn’t allow a manthing to work here but we can make an exception here.”

“Wait really? Like you’re not gonna turn me into wine?”

She laughed. “No we're not. Here in house Dimitrescu we support lgbtq people, in fact at least half of those working here are lgbtq. Me and my daughters included.”

“Really?”

She nodded smiling. “Yes. I’m a lesbian, my daughter Daniela is pan, Cassandra is bi, and Bela, well she’s not sure exactly but she’s definitely not straight.”

You laughed. “Man us lgbtq folk really do gravitate to each other.”

She chuckled as well. “Yes it seems we do. I’ll contact Donna about getting a suit for you.”

“Thank you.”

“Of course.”

“How are you alive?!” Angela exclaimed.

[farmerlesbian]

Hi okay so on the man/men topic again. I’ve been thinking about it (sorry I’m slow I take time to think about things) and I think I haven’t explained myself well. I don’t want to keep hammering on this or anything like that’s really not what I want for this blog but I don’t want to leave it like muddled. 

When we said we didn’t understand ‘sapphic men’ we weren’t trying to be mean spirited or judgmental, just being honest that we didn’t really understand it. Just wanted yall to know where we were coming from. I should have said that at the time. Not making sense, having confusing or seemingly contradictory identities is pretty common for our community (the lgbtq+ / queer community). I would request that folks keep it well-meaning and not mean-spirited in the replies and our asks and stuff, thanks. 

As many people have said, the lines are blurred between things, gender is wacky and confusing and language is used in unusual ways. Different people use the same words to mean different things, and different people use different words to mean the same thing! I’m not going to try to make clear definitions or boundaries or hard rules, because it’s always going to be fraught. Instead, I’ll throw a bunch of words at you, a moodboard of words as I like to say, and you can read them and figure out what I’m trying to go for and figure out for yourself what it means for you and go from there. 

I’ll put something about this in our about page as well. What I’m going for is, if you feel like you should be ‘allowed’ to follow us, and are being unjustly asked to unfollow, just go ahead and continue to follow, it’s fine and we literally won’t even know. If you feel like this blog helps and you feel at home here, then that’s fine! If you’re like “well they said no men, but I’m a gender fuckery dyke lesbian man, I should be allowed to follow too!” yeah sure, then go for it. You know your gender better than we ever could, determine if that rule (which is really just a request that we hope people respect) is for you or not. If you’re like “well I’m a guy, I always have been... but something about this blog makes me curious, I just want to learn...” that is so okay and fine, follow and know you’re welcome 💜 

If you feel straight-up like a man, like a man-man, a binary, nothing else man, whether trans or cis, then I’d ask you to not follow. Yes, including gay men, and trans men who used to be lesbians. I love you all and you’re my friends and brothers and siblings and we’ll go hang out in other places and I’ll follow you and reblog you on my personal blog and trans guys you can give me advice in the trans facebook groups and we can go hang out on instagram and youtube and all the other places but just, this is a lesbian blog haha it’s mainly for lesbians. 

Also, if you’re a woman, or nonbinary and not gay/queer/lesbian/bi/pan/sapphic/wlw/questioning and you know you’re not, also ask you don’t follow! so, like straight people or people who aren’t uh those things I just listed. 

Alsooo if you don’t really know what you are, don’t use labels/terms/identities that’s fine. Mod horseshoe doesn’t really use identity labels or terms, it’s fine! As we will just keep repeating, use your best judgement. 

I know it’s easy to want a quick yes-no answer, have it clearly decided for you, where I give you “permission,” but in this case it’s really gonna have to be up to you bud 💖 You’re gonna have to figure it out on your own 

[forgotten-queers-event-week]

Hey folks! Took a bit for me to get back around to this; I got a new job and then a rarepair week hit, but I'm back!

The interest check survey got 46 responses, and 36 of those were people indicating they would be interested in participating.

I'm going to answer a few of the questions I got in the final section, and I'll make a post with general information later today.

Questions and concerns presented in the interest check survey:

Does the work have to be posted on tumblr or can it be posted somewhere else?

I will be making an AO3 collection, so people will be able to post there as well. If you do not have a tumblr, I will reblog here to the event blog.

some hesitation about poly just from the number of threesome fics in fandom already - obianidala, bailbrehaobi, codexwan, etc. not entirely sure there's any solution for that, however, and it would be good to see less straight (hah) triad works

While Star Wars does have a relatively high amount of threesomes, I would argue that they are not actually polyamory, as often as not, just a threesome. It's also a fairly small fraction of the overall whole; Star Wars is just so big that even that small fraction feels like a lot.

I intend to keep the polyamory prompt.

Just general interest about the details of the event- dates, additional rules, etc. I like the overall concept but don’t particularly want to end up in a fandom war by accident (just a general Star Wars fandom observation, not an accusation of those proposing the event)

I will be addressing this later today! The primary rules will be no bashing, tag appropriately, and keep the prompts and theme in mind when writing.

I probably won't be able to do much creating until like may cause grad school is eating my brain

We are currently looking at late June.

day 3 might be better phrased as bisexual or bicurious?

Nope! Day three “it may be M/F, but that doesn’t make it straight” is meant to touch on all those 'straight couples' that get flack at pride parades, even though:

One or both is bi or pan

One or both is trans

One or both is ace/aro

Any variation that is not cishet, honestly

If I adjust phrasing, it will be to “it may be M/F, but that doesn’t make it cishet”

I'm gay but don't really relate to the other categories so I'm not sure how I'd participate without taking away the voices of others or creating for an experience that is not my own.

Create away! You don't need to be writing about the dark and heavy vagaries of a queer existence; a sketch of a character waving a pride flag counts!

If you do want to work on something that is heavy or more complicated, there are plenty of queer people in fandom. You can probably find someone willing to help you brainstorm or look it over for major red flags.

With the event centered around queer characters - and I assume mostly being participated in by queer creators - I think it would be a good idea to have it in the event rules that aphobia/transphobia/etc must be tagged in fics. I'd also like to know if it's canon-only or if OCs would be allowed too, since that wasn't mentioned in the post. Either way, the idea sounds great and I'd love to participate.

Noted! Proper tagging etiquette is a big deal to me, and while I will allow wiggle room (e.g. if a person thinks it may bloat their tags to include everything, they can go with 'see author's note for warnings' and I will consider it due diligence), including proper warnings is a big deal.

I hadn't thought about OCs yet, but my instinct is that they can be included.

“Ace and aro spectrums” rather than “ace and aro spectrum (singular)” would be better since they are separate identities that don’t always overlap.

A good point! I'll adjust, going forward.

You had me at an ace day 🥺 also idk if I'd be able to participate in writing (deadlines for other projects in abroad for the first two weeks in June) but i would DEFINITELY consume content!!

As mentioned a little further up, we are now looking at late June.

This is an extremely weird thing to put in this box, but my friend sent the post about this challenge to me all pissy because "I don't know why poly people would be on here ahead of regular gay men and lesbians", and it made me, a genderfluid bi ace person, almost blind with rage. Thank you for making a space that specifically opens doors to identities that are less inherently known and understood in real life.

Absolutely baffling take from your friend, considering the theme is 'the queers we don't talk about,' so the entire point is to talk about stuff that is... not 'regular' gay men and lesbians. That. That's a bit of a red flag, oof.

I'm glad you're excited!

[gayfrenchtoast]

Okay fine we're doing this. I havent read the books and I'm probably not going to I've only seen the movies so I'm sorry if anything I say is contradictory or has already been stated.

So! Descendants 3 was kinda shit and I dont like it but especially because of the ending because everybody was like "oh yeah island is open and we're all happy with no worries or implications about free villains or people being spiteful about being imprisoned for years!" In fact if anything they joked about those things.

The island is basically its own culture, I can't say how long it's been around, long enough for some almost adult kids to be about and to develop a kind of community.

The Isle is a place of poverty, people are dirty and on the street, eveyone steals from each other and most people don't put much effort into appearance upkeep (personal or of the sourounding area) not because of laziness or being "evil" but because they clearly don't have time or luxury to do such things or possibly even the clean water. Does the Isle have clean water?? How to they get electricity??? Someone tell me!

Another thing that I've noticed is easy to see but is not much explicitly said is the unique style of those on the Isle. As previously stated they don't have much but those who have the most "power" and such on the Isle are the best example of this As they have the most colourful outfits. However these outfits are often made out of patches and ripped things put together, even salvaged things like nets and chains as we can see on thing like Uma and Harry's outfits in D3 they make the best of what they've got and they do fantastic because their outfits are intricate and detailed and just tell you everything you need to know about them. Which is why it's a damn s h a m e when the original VK's ajust their style to be more like Auradon's. That's not an improvement! Be proud of where you came from!! It's like they forgot what it was like being on the Isle in D3!

Moving on, here's something that was touched on in D2 but not enough. Equality. On the Isle there is basically equal opportunity as in saying everything is shit and nome cares what gender and presumably what sexuality you are as long as you can work. Sexism is shown to be almost casual in aurodon from the looks of it, Chad makes sexist comments and litterally none else says anything or seems to see anything wrong with it except Jay who caves to pressure from peers and expectations. He does redeem himself because he's from the isle and he knows you shouldn't give a shit about anyone's gender or anything. If they can do something and ask to be included you give them that opportunity. The sexism is also implied in the way that the rule book has men written specifically in the first place and that it has taken until then for anyone but boys to be allowed on any kind of sports team. We never see it! It seems to be the hetronormative veiw where the boys do sport and girls do cheerleeding and other genders? What other genders? Never heard of that? BAD AURADON!! I bet there's so many trans folk on the island just living their lives, thinking Aurodon is the better place and not knowing that it's a cis het filled nightmare.

Okay no I'm headcannoning now, if their are now a bunch of Isle kids at auradon prep they find it fucking aweful the way all these preppy royals are treating them and make the first LGBT club in Auradon. There is lots of pushback and they get bullied a fuck ton for making themselves the most prominent queer folk in the school until a fight breaks out and the club demand that they should be treated better, taking all the evidence to fairy godmother who is very hesitant because COME ON she's never been that great she is biased to Auradon kids and if putting away those in the Isle is brought up she is all on it, she is jelly spined about doing anything against the royal kids. So the kids are like "Fine, if you won't help us we'll take this to the King himself!" Well mainly the queer mom's of the group (you know the ones I'm talking about) who lead the others and protect the anxious queers as they storm to Ben at his fucking locker and demand an audience because they are being harassed and bullied and none is doing anything. Ben had no idea there was even a LGBT club (too busy ig) and is gassed there is one for a moment before he's like "wait people are harassing you?" So Bisexual King Ben gets his lovely Bi wife and they start coming to club meetings and investing in the pins and stuff the club makes. Most club members are pleased but the queer mom's are apprehensive that this will help until some assholes come to the club to do their usual bullying only to find King and Queen Beast themselves siting there with rainbow bracelets and bi pins and all trying to have a nice old time eating their fucking cupcakes what the fuck are yall doing? The bullying dies down quick once they realise it ain't gonna fly, the other OG VK's that hear about this become members and very protective over their queer children. Did I mention Dizzy and Ceila are a part of the club? They're girlfriend's. Celia is one of the queer moms. Harry becomes one of the biggest protectors over the group as the pan dad. He's been going around snogging everyone and anyone wholl snog him everyone already knew he was queer they just didn't have the balls to try and bully him over it as much as they bullied the lil club members. But now Harry can often be seen in jackets and shit with pan and general queer patches and pins and running around with his gay children yelling "MOVE WE'RE GAY!!" He totally calls them his queer crew. Anyway as a result lots of queer royals start coming out of the woodwork, obvs Lonnie is one of them, and the club eventually serves to bring members of Auradon and the Isle close together.

Where was I? Yada yada auradon expects girls to be pretty princesses and boys to be brave knights or dashing princes. It's shit and should stop being portrayed as good. Moving on!

Food! One of the things we'll established in all movies is that the food of the Isle is shit compared to food of Auradon. The Isle has no fresh fruit which likely means its almost impossible for things to grow there which is fair because again there doesn't seem to be much fresh water and there are always clouds overhead so no sun. Maybe there is some people trying really hard to grow stuff but the general attitude of the Isle seems to be "there is no time for that" and fruits are forgotten so much that the VK's litterally don't knownwhat they are when they come across them. That and anything containing sugar. Actually it's mention by Dizzy and Celia that they enjoy the fact that the cake dosent have dirt or flies so basically food there is terrible. We don't see much food on the Isle but what we do see seems to be beans, eggs, chips and shellfish. Basically protine and carbs that can be easily stored and produced. To be fair beans are kidna good for you but they're likely a sign that if they get any imports from the mainland it is canned stuff. Prison food. There's probably some chef villain that is trying their best to make good food out of the shit but honestly the Isle dwellers should be angry that they've been deprived of good food for so long not happy they're finally been given decency.

Moving on, music! Auradon dosent have nearly as many musical numbers it seems, the Isle songs have a distinct style, to them, the villains that basically "founded" the place were masters of the dramatic songs (with backup or solo) so banging music is basically ingrained in the music's culture, even for battle as we see with the fight between Mal and Uma in D3. Meanwhile Auradon seems to have mainly romance and "I want" songs. Even Audrey's villain song is basically an I want song.

Okay let's talk about the Villains. We've established that the VK's are not inherently bad. However not all of them can be totally good and there are legit OG Villains just kinda chillin on the Isle. They've obviously lost quite a bit of their power, motivation and sanity (isolation will do that to ya as they lost everything and the VKs know no different) but deadass? They were bad guys. You can try to rehabilitate them sure but you've basically just let them free roam, they could make a runner and you wouldn't get the chance. They were also shitty patents which is brushed over/joked about in the interaction between Carlos and...man I feel bad I forgot her name deadass their relationship seemed to come out of nowhere in the second film she didn't seem interested in them at all and friendzoned them multiple times I'm pretty sure Disney did that becaue queer kids were relating to Carlos and headcanoning them as queer (which they deffinatly are) but deadass their mom is an attempted animal murderer and has hurt her child as we can see from how they're afraid of her and her rhetoric and yet it's "haha I'm afraid to meet your ma!" "Me too cus im a dog! Lol!" Fuuuuck offfffff

I think I'm running out of thoughts so here's a last one for now; with the magical barrier down a bunch of magical Villains kids should be coming out for the woodwork. We know Mal has magic basically stored in her so it's is possible, she technically doesn't need the spellbook to do magic it is just inherent to her. So with the diverse range of people from the isle there are deffinatly magic folk in there. Actually if we're following Disney movie law I saw something mentioning Jay being half Genie and yeah! He should be half Genie! Jafar got turned into a Genie he's probably only human because of the barrier! Oh also Ben should be able to go beast on command as long as he had a better beast form than he did in the movies. And give him back the beard and fangs like fuck you he looked so much better

Okay I'm done for now

[ace-aro-pride-toronto]

Details for Toronto Pride Parade & Trans March-- RSVP please!

Hello people,

Here is the info for the Trans March (Friday June 24, 2022, meetup by 7:45pm) and the Pride Parade (Sunday June 26th, 1pm meetup)-- friends/allies welcome!  

Please RSVP  (toronto.ace.aro.pride@gmail.com)-- Pride Toronto has set things up differently this year, so RSVPs are necessary for the Pride Parade and helpful for the Trans March.

Please make sure to read both the specific Trans March & Pride Parade info as well as the General Info below, as there is some new stuff this year-- like no plastic bags!, a new Parade line-up process (and masks encouraged). And please let us know what signs to bring for you.

1) Trans March: Friday, June 24th, 2022-- check in by 7:45pm

meet up at south-east corner of Church & Hayden, ideally check in with the Group Leaders sometime between 6:30-7:45pm (picture-- similar to previous years, just south side of street)

the rally starts at 7pm and the march is at 8pm

(One of the speakers happens also to be part of the Toronto Aces & Aros community, and will apparently be speaking about the importance of police/prison abolitionist queer/trans politics)

2) Pride Parade: Sunday, June 26th, 2022

meet near the check-in tent at 1pm (#B26) at Charles St. E and Ted Rogers Way / Jarvis street (which is south of Bloor) -- NEW LOCATION THIS YEAR (it's a somewhat awkward intersection)

it's actually a little closer to the Sherbourne subway station than the Bloor/Younge station and there will be WAY fewer people at Sherbourne (and it looks like they now have elevators)

Note: The way they are doing things this year will make it harder for any late-comers to join us-- which is why RSVPs are necessary (so we know who we’re waiting for, etc.)

***  We continue to invite (non-ace/non-arospec) queer/trans community members who don't have other groups to march with (also by RSVP), especially bi/pan and/or trans/non-binary folks, particularly those with more radical politics (i.e., anti-racist, anti-colonial, anti-ableist; police/prison abolitionist politics,etc-- all messages generally consistent with Toronto Aces & Aros Respect Guidelines).***

We will be including some police/prison abolitionist messaging in our group. We are also mindful that we are a politically diverse group: if there is anyone who is more comfortable with more standard ace/aro "we exist"-type messaging, we will make sure to organise our group physically with that at the front so it is clear our group is politically diverse.

General Info details about both marches below

Please dress for the weather and consider sunscreen. The events are rain or shine. The Pride Parade especially will involve waiting around on the street for a long time before marching.

Pride Toronto this year is taking a very strong "anti-litter" stance. They also have banned all plastic bags and want to minimise/eliminate single-use plastics, especially at the Parade. 

Please bring whatever water and snacks you might want-- just make sure you also bring a reusable bag to keep any "litter" with you.

Note that Pride Toronto does not allow any group names or logos on signs or clothing other than for the "registered" group. They also don't want unredacted swear words like "fuck", etc. (common asterisk work-arounds, e.g., "f*ck" are allowed)

While the events are outside and there are no mask requirements, due to the crowds, masks are encouraged.

Because we are expecting smaller groups than in past years, we are not bringing all the signs. When you RSVP, please let us know if there are any pride signs you'd particularly like us to bring for you (in addition to the large banner and both ace and aro pride flags)!

[panstories]

Sunday Editorial: I Am Not Bisexual

I used to be bisexual.

When I was 15, I discovered the label pansexual for the first time, and it opened my eyes. I think it won’t be surprising to many pansexual people that my discovery that I was genderqueer was tied heavily to pansexuality, and to the idea that nonbinary gender identities weren’t just an afterthought or something to be folded into the binary when discussing attraction, but worthy of consideration on their own, worthy of a label to specify you were attracted to everyone, because some people might not be. It’s a story I’ve heard many times from many genderqueer pan people.

I called myself bisexual before that, because it was the only word I knew to describe attraction to multiple genders. I knew there were more than two, and I knew that bisexuality encompassed attraction to more than two, but there’s a unique kind of radicality to pansexual, the way it openly defied bigots’ expectations, the way I’ve had exorsexists try to tell me I can’t be pansexual because my label’s etymology itself fundamentally disagrees with their entire world view.

That is what drew me to the label when I was 15. And it is partially what’s kept me here. I do still technically fit the definition of bisexual, and I always have fit it, but I am fundamentally no longer bisexual. There are people who are simultaneously bi and pan, but I am not one of those people. My experience of being queer, especially as a pansexual person, is completely irreconciliable with the concept of me being bisexual.

Author’s note: It’s worth noting before I go into this bit that this is by no means a blanket statement about all bisexual people. The bi community is full of many lovely and supportive people who uplift other mspecs. This section is not about them. While it’s unfortunate that a few bigots have ruined an entire label and community for me, that does not mean the label or community itself is bad, just that I cannot see myself identifying with it.

That being said, I have never felt any sense of belonging to the bi community, or support from it. Maybe if I had lived in an era where pansexual and bisexual communities were considered one, where pansexual people were explicitly included in bi activism and bi organizations, I might have felt differently. Maybe I would have also identified as bi, or considered myself part of the “bi umbrella”. But when I have spent my entire time in the queer community being told I am taking bi resources, that I am not free to celebrate bi awareness days and weeks or I am “invading” bi spaces or bi positivity does not extend to me, it is impossible to feel that way. The bi community does not want me, and I do not want it. I have gotten hate and threats from people with bi flags in their profile pictures and “battleaxe bi” in their bios, and I have never felt safe around bi people and in bi spaces, even inclusive ones, because there’s always the thought in the back of my mind that someone hates me, or wants me dead, or has friends who feel that way and sees no problem with it. This isn’t just a difference of opinion. It’s a matter of safety. I can’t be in bi spaces, because there are people there who see no problem with suicide baiting or threatening violence against me and my community.

There is so much focus in queer spaces on reassuring bi people that their identity is whole and complete, and they should not feel less queer than monosexual gay men and lesbians. But I think less focus is given to assuring pan folks of this fact, and of assuring them that they do not have to be bi to fit into the broader community. So I am here to tell you exactly that. If you are pansexual, you are complete. You do not need to use any labels you do not want to. You do not need to call yourself bisexual if you don’t want to. You have a community, and you have a culture, and you have your own history. You’re enough.

[betoomuch]

12.9.21

Today I admired myself in the mirror as I dressed a little more masculine. I felt good. I have always loved dressing this way and mixing that with a bit of femme, vice versa. That’s me. Which is why androgynous ass Teyana Taylor on Sweet Sixteen was a huge deal for me as a young girl. 

I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means for me to be a Queer identified person. Growing up I’ve repressed my interest in anything other than cis boys/men.

 I could go back to my earliest memories and think about my friends and I playing “house” where I was the daddy and they were the mommy and when we put that baby to sleep to do what “grown folks do”.... You know… kiss and dry hump LOL. I could go back to those memories of me as a young girl exploring in secret and it validates what I've always been…. A fucking dyke LOL jk.

No but seriously. I think about the fact that as a teen before I even started dating, my mom would ask me If I was gay since I didn’t bring any boys home for her to meet. How kissing my girl friends in High School was just for “fun”. How my first boyfriend looked at me and said “you look like you would like eating pussy” and this all validated that even others knew I was Queer. What did I do though? Repress, repress, repress. Conform, conform, conform. 

I’ve always been uncomfortable with labels, I never said I was straight. I knew I wasn’t fully comfortable with that because even if I thought it was just sexual I knew I had some type of interest in women. I acted as a straight person would though, my tongue could only speak the language of heteronormativity. My planned out future included a fly ass husband who would impregnate me and spoil my ass. Women couldn’t be my future. 

When I got out my long ass straight ass first relationship, I wrote in my goals for the year that I wanted to “Fuck a Woman for the first time”. Sexualizing women made it more comfortable for me to explore my sexuality. You know a little internalized misogyny always helps :) 

The first time I did, I fucking fell in love like WTF? What a typical lesbian experience LOL. That shit GOOD, it was fast. deep. It was hot. Passionate. Filled with undeniable love. It was the first time I ever felt a love that was fully safe. It was scary ass fuck. 

Over the last year, I’ve been unlearning so much of my heteronormative ways of thinking, speaking and acting. Relearning. Redefining. Reconnecting. It’s been such a journey to come into myself. 

I don’t identify as Bi-sexual or pan, I’m just a queer woman that likes what she likes. Getting to say that out loud proudly and being outwardly queer with my partner has been such a joy. Letting myself finally let myself to intimately love someone who isn’t a cis man. Affirms that lil queer ass girl fucking around with her lil friends. Sheds light on a part of me that’s always been there waiting in the shadow of this hetero ass world. 

I never resonated with the action of “coming out”, I personally feel like I’m warning someone that I eat pussy. I wouldn’t have to come out as straight so why would I as a queer person? You’d figure it out as if I share my love life or experiences. It's no secret but to me a pride flag doesn't have to be a part of my IG bio, I will not sit my family members or friends or colleagues down and look into their eyes and tell them that I like what I like especially not the ones that may be homophobic. 

Now that I am tapping into my full authentic self, I get to mentor and help other women who had to repress their queerness and are nervous to take that leap. I get to be the one that young girls look to as an example of a Queer woman and inspire them to be that fully. They get to come to me and tell me about the girl in class they’re crushing on and how they got their first girlfriend. It brings me tears of joy. 

To young Ashley, baby you iz gay. Do gay shit, it good :) 

And to any queer babies that have yet to bloom, be patient and be kind to yourself. Do things on your own accord. 

It hasn’t been easy but I am so proud to be here and growing. 

Song- Only If - Steve Lacy.

Con mucho amor y passion, Ashley Hernández aka Odd Ashley. 

[back-to-louis]

I’m an anti but also I just wanna know what would happen if the crazies are right and it is real💀there’s a .0000000000000000001% of that happening bc faking a child doesn’t exist,, but imagine how insane that would be. How do u think us(antis) would react if that happened? I’d honestly just say” k cool” and move on w my day cus I love Louis and don’t harass him bc of ships but like how would YOU react?

Oh, there's a lot going on here.

So first, let's please not call anyone "crazy" - conspiracy theorists are not crazy.

Now, you say "faking a child doesn't exist (- but what if it did?)" But that's not the question to start with. "Faking a child" is doing a lot of work to refer to a lot of individual actions, none of which exist.

So what part of ... anything... are you curious about what would happen if true?

What if Louis were actually gay? Well, if Louis were actually to come out as gay at some point in the future, by stating that he is gay, because that's how you come out as gay, it wouldn't actually make anything else that has been reported in his life a lie. Gay men who have come out have also had real girlfriends and wives prior to coming out (Elton John, Ricky Martin, Lance Bass, Vincente Minnelli, Bryan Lourd - if you haven't heard of those last two, look them up!), real sex with their girlfriends and wives, had real biological children with their girlfriends and wive, and still been gay. So, if Louis were to come out as gay at some point in the future, nothing changes for me as a fan because it doesn't imply anything about any other part of Louis' life other than that he would have come out as gay. Welcome to the family, well done, etc. And even if he were to come out, he could come out as bi, or pan, or otherwise part of the LGBTQ+ community, which would make it doubly reasonable that his stated relationships and his son were and are realistically part of his life.

This is what is meant when antis (meaning, people who live in the reality-based portion of this universe) say that "of course closeting exists! Of course sometimes artists and actors and performers and ordinary regular folks may be in the closet for years before coming out as gay or bi or pan or otherwise part of the LGBTQ+ community!"

Are you still with me?

So when you ask, "what if [larries] are right?" What exactly would they be right about that would change anything that Louis has said about his life, or that anyone who knows and loves Louis has said about his life, that I or other antis might have feelings about?

* What if they're right that Louis has been forced by some record label, management, or "other" contracts since 2010 to pretend to be in specific relationships with specific women who are similarly contracted to pretend to be in a relationship with him, including cohabiting, sharing pets, spending time with family members, sharing mutual friends who all vouch for these relationships, etc. despite having had different management and record labels to the ones he signed with in 2010?

* What if they're right that Harry has been forced to do so with similar contracts despite also having different management, agent, record label, etc. to the band AND to Louis over the course of these years?

* What if they're right that one or more of these contracted entities identified one woman and contractually compelled her to pretend to date Louis and pretend to be pregnant parallel to her parents having contracted... a surrogate... to carry THEIR baby... (are they simultaneously contracted to the multiple record labels, management agencies, etc. too?) ... and of course contractually forced Louis to go along with all of this, sign a birth certificate, have his family confirm for years that he has a child, have this child in his mother's obituary, continue to see this child even as the child is almost six years old, etc.?

Which part of any of the above, if any, are you wondering how I would respond if "Larries got right?" What exactly is the part you'd say "k cool" about "because you love Louis and don't harass him because of ships?" What do ships and love of Louis have to do with any of this?

If I have a better idea of what I'd be responding to, I'd have a better idea how I'd respond to it, if it's anything other than "Louis comes out as gay or otherwise LGBTQ+ (which doesn't remotely imply any of the rest of this stuff)," which I addressed here.

[posi-pan]

(Okay so I tried to search your blog before asking this in case you’ve answered it before, but tumblr’s search is stupid and it wouldn’t work lol so sorry if you have already answered stuff like this!)

But I’m a little confused with something I keep seeing people talk about and I feel like you’re a good person to ask to explain this since 1. I trust your responses lol and 2. your answers are always simple and straightforward. What exactly is a bi/pan lesbian? And why do people dislike them so much?? Is the dislike warranted (like are they genuinely harmful etc?) or is it just more queerphobia? I’ve tried looking it up before but tbh every answer I read feels way too complicated for me to grasp it and it just makes me more confused. Are they just bi/pan with heavy preferences? Or is there a whole other explanation that I’m just not seeing/not understanding? I just really wanna understand, thank you in advance 🥺

so, thank you for thinking my answers are simple and straightforward. i usually feel like i’m making absolutely zero sense or being unnecessarily longwinded lmao. but yeah, i think i’ve posted something about this before, but nothing too detailed.

anyways. an mspec (either pan, bi omni, ply, etc.) lesbian is someone who uses both an mspec label and the lesbian label. there are a lot of different reasons why someone might self-identify this way. some of those reasons include:

being attracted to women and nonbinary people (this isn’t saying people attracted to women and nonbinary folks can’t be lesbians. it’s one way of acknowledging nonbinary doesn’t mean “basically woman” and lesbian attraction can include more than one gender)

being mspec-sexual and homoromantic or mspec-romantic and homosexual (this is a use of the split attraction model, and saying you’re, for example, “bisexual homoromantic” or “biromantic homosexual” is a bit more of a mouthful than bi lesbian)

using the historic definition of lesbian (lesbian was an umbrella term for all women attracted to women before it became known as exclusive attraction to women due to lesbian separatism)

being unsure if you’re mspec or lesbian and trying out both labels

being attracted largely to women with very rare attraction to men

i’m sure there are other experiences amongst mspec lesbians, but these are just off the top of my head.

the “discourse” surrounding mspec lesbians (and mspec gays) is entirely new and queerphobic. this identity has existed for decades without issue. women have been identifying as bi lesbians for a long time. one of the more historic uses of it that isn’t very common now is that it represented women who were attracted to men and women, but socially were only involved in women/lesbian spaces, or were only interested in having relationships with women. it had more to do with the combination of their sexual and political identities.

people hate the identity so much because they don’t understand it and honestly, don’t want to. many people have been sent sources on it and they just ignore it. they have decided it’s somehow harming “real” lesbians and that’s that. they don’t want to learn otherwise.

they bring up the argument that the identity says lesbians can like men, which one) one person’s identity doesn’t say anything about someone else’s and two) some lesbians do like men. that’s just a fact. and always has been. there have always been lesbians who were attracted to and involved with men.

they also bring up the argument of if lesbians can like men, what do we call people who are only attracted to women (and sometimes some nonbinary people), and the answer is always, whatever those individuals want to be called. labels don’t exist for us to apply to others. they exist for us to claim for ourselves and give meaning to based on our personal experiences and feelings.

but yeah, this identity isn’t harming anyone. it has never harmed anyone. it’s simply a different way of good faith self-identification. if that’s how someone makes sense of their identity, which is not clear cut, black and white for everyone, then why does it matter? how is someone using a historic queer identity harm anyone? it doesn’t. queerphobes just fell for assimilationism and hate their own community when they queer in a way that’s different or confusing.

i think i covered most things on this topic. here are some links if you’re interested in some further reading:

carrd with sources and info on mspec lesbians

tumblr with sources and info on bi lesbians

thread of sources on mspec lesbians/gays

thread of historic examples of bi lesbians/gays (this one is by me!)

post of historic examples of bi lesbians/gays (this one is also by me!)

i hope this helps you better understand! i feel like i wasn’t as clear as i could’ve been. please feel free to ask more questions if you have them!

[popculturebuffet]

The Owl House: Enchanting Grom Fright: Happy Valentine’s Gays

Happy Valentine’s Day owl ladies, gentleman and non-binary folks! It’s time to finish off this holiday in proper style with a LONG overdue review of enchanting Grom Fright and even longer overdue coverage of the Owl House.  The Owl House was one of the best debuts of last year if not THE best, only in contention because Close Enough also started last year and looks to surpass regular show in terms of quality. But with stunning animation, tons of representation, and colossal worldbuilding. And given how i’m on record for thinking Star Vs went so far down the tubes they bumped into where Cthulu is sleeping, it’s nice to have another magic based show that seems to be on the right track: carefully building i’ts world, supporting cast and for today’s topic main romance. It also rather than just obliquely hint one character was bi and the other pan, actually goes out of it’s way to have a bisexual protaginst with a gay love intrest. As my good friend @jess-the-vampire has brought up quite a bit, star had plnety of options. .but no willingness to actually campaign for any queer rep, the way Gravity Falls head Alex Hirsch tried to, he still gets credit for trying, and Owl House creator Dana Terrace gets full credit for. 

Terrace got her start working on Gravity Falls in line production before working her way up to directing for ducktales, being instrumental in how Webby was animated and how she moves and acts, and being the director for several classic season one episodes including “Woo-Hoo!”, “The Spear of Selene” , “Day of the Only Child!” which was one of my faviorites from season 1 and “The Beagle Birthday Massacre!”. And while I can’t 100% confirm she’s the only part responsible for starting Weblena, given she was director on an episode where a lot of the romantic subtext was in the visuals, she certainly helped so thank you Dana. Thank you a lot. Their adorable. Point is she’s a talented lady and wasn’t satisfied with directing, so she pitched her own show, combining tons of ides and stuff including of all things, Pokemon Red. I checked the article wikipedia had sourced, it was one of her happy childhood memories as it was one of the last things her dad gave her. Awwwwwww. That’s as sweet as it is painful. She’s also currently dating Alex Hirsch, something I was entirely unaware of but find also adorable. Point is i’m glad I looked into her as she’s a very nice person, and very much my kind of weirdo and i’m happy for her sucess and her singuarly weird show that sprung from that sucess. 

Now that part of it’s out of the way the episode itself was an uphill battle as you’d expect. As anyone familiar with this blog is aware, but just in case your new, you tend to hear me bitching about Disney’s handling of queer represntation a LOT

For the most part Disney’s pretty bad at it: There was the string of “FIRST GAY CHARACTER IN AN X” they had going for a while.. that consisted of a character I dind’t realize was gay, a kiss I didn’t see, and a talk with a character who I honestly wouldn’t of been looking for had disney not patted themselves on the back with some giant sized hands because htey saved some pym particles for that occasion. Ducktales was unable to have Penumbra come out as gay more clearly because I don’t know Ducks can’t be day.. but they can be IMPLIED to be gay or pansexual as hard as the crew possibly can so they win anyway. Pixar was able to have a gay lead character for one of it’s sparks shorts out and even focused on him coming out of the closet and it’s very good and something I WILL give Pixar credit for... but not Disney Plus who go out of their way to not mention the lead being gay.. despite the fact the short opens with a gay space cat riding a gay space dog out of a rainbow and then it being revaled our lead is in a relationship not long into the short. My point is the idiots who won’t watch this for having gay characters are just going to turn it off, who cares what they think, why are you like this Disney. They need to do better, and be better and i’m getting tired of this shit.

That being said... this episode is a step in the right directoin as despite having to get past one obstructive asshole, not her words but damn if it isn’t the truth, as the rest of hte execs were fine with having a gay character, Terrace fought hard for it and WON, having a clearly gay character, and a clear road to a gay romace as the lead one, all because she wanted some representation in her works. So to honor this, I present this review in honor of love, effort and saying screw you to not having represntation because money. Join me under the cut and allt hat. 

We open in the owl house, in the owl house, duck dodge push and shove, it’s how we show our love in the.. you get the point. Luz is learning yet another Rune, this time plant runes.. and already something I love about the series pops up: the fact Luz’s rise in skill is gradual but noticable. Each spell noticably improves in potency with time,  going from simple lights to shaping them into simple constructs, and learning to control or time her spells and glpyhs so they launch she she says so, with each one getting more powerful the more she learns. And on top of that osmething I just noticed on rewatch of this episode is her tecnique in finding them evolved, something I dind’t notice the first time because I hadn’t fully caught up and checked this one out to see if Disney would actually let them go through with it.. and they did. Point is her first spell is found by accident, her second by realizing how her magic works fundemntally, both require skilled deduction and on the fly thinking and casting, so she’s already pretty skilled.. but now sh’es ACTIVELY seeking out a new spell here for the first time. She knows how she gets them, she knows each school is tied to a form, and she likely got the plant from williow since that’s her thing and she’s a saint. A demon but also a saint. They can have those too. It’s what I assume relicor is. 

I miss that goblin demon bat man. Point is it shows an evolution in Luz’s thinking: while it’s a subtle thing she took a more proactive approach this time even if it took a lot of practice.. and it pay soff as by the time of her next rune, while it’s once again sorta handed to her she has less time to learn it, almost none, and finds it singed onto a ball.. and learns it effortlessly to the point where by the next episode it’s a crucial plot point. IT’s subtle but clever character progression, and stuff I really enjoy, showing our hero going from a bit inept but not helpless or incomptient.. to a force to be reckconed with and far more clever and strategic than yo’ud expect given her sometimes reckless and almost always happy go lucky attitude. 

Luz worries teaching King about the internet was a bad idea because he gets excited about a literal cat fight which .. yeah... it was a bad idea but not because of that.. but because next he finds someone saying the earth is flat and she wisely yanks it away. It’s.. very sad that the absolutley maddening and easily debunked flat earth theory is still RELATIVLEY more sane than the stuff we’ve had pop up during the trump era and the cornoavirus pandemic. 

But one of the main conlficts of the episode pops up as Luz’s mom messages her and Luz can’t bring herself to tell her anything and just sends a thumbs up.  I do think this episode helps even things from the pilot a bit as it was a bit lopsided: While I got that Camillia was genuinely struggling with how to deal with Luz, and was offered an out and had to take it... the fact she sees NO problem with the normalcy camp, which comes off intentioanlly or not a sa parallel to conversion camps or camps to make autistic kids “Normal”. And as someone whose both bisexual and autistic, I naturally relate to luz way more as someone whose intrests sometimes just don’t quite fit with everyone else, and who dosen’t get how bad some of their actions were.  THat’s why this episode feels like a necessary course correction: Luz is shown to genuinely love her mama and feel guilty.. but we see camilia genuinlely loves and supports her daughter a bit more. While it was clear from the pilot this shows it more, with her genuinely just wanting to know her daughter’s okay and checking up on her, and giving me the feeling that possible consequences or no if something bad WAS happening or she didn’t hear from her for a long time, she would’ve drove up there to get her. It feels like the writers realized the implications they accidently created and wanted to fix it, though I can’t say for certain. But if so good on you for course correcting, not every show does that. 

But King encourages her, telling her she’s doing the right thing by lying and to “trust the demon on your shoulder”. Keep this in mind for later, but that joke is great on it’s own. But soon i’ts time for school and Hooty.. barfs out Luz’s books for her. 

I haven’t been this disturbed since.. (Looks at the clock) About 2 maybe three hours ago when I watched a man have, if apparently shorter than the oriiginal cut as I wanted to see everyone else’s reactions dammit, sex with hiis car which was possesed by the mad ghost of his dead wife. Because that’s the kind of stuff i’m into when i’m not reviewing stuff. And before that Tinky.. just everything about tinky. 

I do not have enough time to get into TInky here or why he exestially horrifies me. Or why Jeff blim is a living god. I will save that for a proper review if I have the time tomorrow. Point is I saw a lot today and that still tops it. Willow and Gus are likewise grossed out and want to leave. 

Cut to school where Luz wonders what’s with all the decorations.. that remind me of this honestly

And frankly given the whole state of the boiling isles it REALLY wouldn’t surprise me if the decorations were indeed well cooked faces. But i’ts Grom time, which means elaborate gromposals (Some Dude asks Skara out with a beating heart and an elaborate medical proposal.. which.. points for effort. And for using an actual heart. Couldn’t get one for mine. ), dancing and someone being chosen for Grom Queen. WHich Willow hints isn’t as nice as that sounds. Before we can get into that though Amity bumps into them and gets into a tizzy before meekly greeting “Luz.. and Co”. which.. not going to lie.. is my faviorite gag of the season. Just htw way she adds them and just the way Willow and Guz both smile widely at it as if to say “That’s us!”. Amity drops a note and snatches it back. This will be important later, you all know why, point is Amity becomes Grom Queen.. and is heavily depressed with Luz following her to find out why.  At the gym.. she does indeed ifnd out why: Turns out Grom is not some mutation of an earthname but is based around a horrifying entity lurking beneath the isles, Gromethious the Fear Bringer, who emerges from his slumber once a year and must be fought back and brings out his target’s greatest fears. Just like groundhog day only with less time loops and rodent abuse. Amity is scared of hers, and i’ll obviously get into this more later, and Luz simply suggests asking bump to opt out and Amity appricates the support. Awwww. 

Luz heads home and we find out Eda is chaperoning and King is mcing. Eda is also rocking a suit. Just damn girl, damn. But Luz considers taking her place.. and gets laughed at, with Eda assuming she’ll have to save her and King just being kind of a dick. I mean he’s a loveable thoroughly cuddly dick but he’s still a dick... just more like a stuffed plushie of one.  So basically exactly like Tinky. Look I mention him more than once in this review he dosen’t put me in the bastard box. It’s a great system.  Naturally this makes Luz more determined than ever to prove herself and she finds Amity in the night, with Amity having been unable to get out of it.. and Bumps a resonable guy, he just wants a substitute and no one wants the job.. except Luz who galdly volunteers and insists ntohing scares her before the giant spider on the back of her head proves otherwise. Because of course it does, spiders are fucking terrifying. Kill then all.. except the pokemon ones. Galvaltula are sweethearts. As are Ariadoses. Sweethearts who can elctorcute or poison you but still. 

So the next way Luz begins preparing.. and by that I mean it’s time for training. Sadly we don’t get an episode of Luz and Amity getting trapped in an 80′s fashion montage... I mean yes Rise of the TMNT also did that plot the same year, but we had two diffrent plots about someone getting trapped in an eldtrich sitcom and a THIRD this year, all entertaingly unique. Though we do get Luz pulling out an otter suit that’s adorable and she sadly still hasn’t worn yet. “This one says i’m an otter, with a dark side”. She also got thrown out of a school dance for.. wearing an otter suit. Okay the other things we saw in the pilot were understandable but htis is just.. baffling. Who cares what you wear to a dance as long as it isn’t horribly racist of nothing at all. 

Damn you flanders and your glorious ass. Point is Amity shows up and threatens hooty’s life because.. he’s hooty. The fact he isn’t dead already is a testiment to how badass he is and how much money he’d cost Eda to replace. Owl Tubes don’t come out of a stygian hole in the unvierse every day you know. That’s only every three years. It’s basic styigan owl tube science. 

But Amity wants her to be ready and that she’ll have to face her greatest fear.. and cue hooty popping up, poking amity in the face and asking if she wants to know her greatest fear. Really he can clearly hear everything in the house given he heard that, so he heard the death threat he just chose to ignore it. That.. was a mistake. And by mistake I mean we get a hilarious cut to the outside of the house as Luz tries to stop her love intrest from murdering her second mom’s tube monster. The result is some bandages and an eyepatch. To be fair that last one was just flaring up from a  previous beating. 

For this solem task of training, Amity has brought in her local disaster bisexuals.. aka her twin siblgins Eldric and Elmyra, whose greatest fears are dying alone and being stuck with Eldric. Both understandable. They conjur luz’s greatest fears which are.. some of the funniest shit I heard all year.. and also very relatable. Human souls in cat bodies, which is genuinely terrifying good job Luz, Jerks on the internet who mansplain things, relatable, and soy milk. 

But Amity knows this is just the openign act. it needs to be something deeper.. so while Luz dosen’t realize it’s probably her mom issues she brings up her issues with her other mom: that Eda dosen’t think she can do this. Hence we get a giant eda putting Luz in a babychair. Before we can unpack how wrong that sentence sounded, Eda comes out, and marvels at how hot giant her is. But she’s quickly distracted from sex with a giant version of herself, which is not an easy feat, by the relization “Wait Luz is going to fight grom isn’t she.. fuck i’m going to have to save her”, though Luz holds firm on doing it to prove she’s fine and dosen’t need to be saved constantly. it’s a good conflict. Eda IS right that Luz is not ready for this alone, that she’s overcompensating and that Eda would, in normal circumstances be the one to rescue her. As we’ll see it’s not her who does it but still, were this any other foe she probably would be. But Luz’s motivations are equally understandable: She wants to help her friend not have to do this and she wants to prove she can do it. She just wants her mentor, the only person in her life up to meeting her that GNEUINELY supported her in magic to respect her. To have faith in her and actually see how far she’s come. And given how her own mother writes off her dreams, if not unrealistically, and before this she had no friends or support system to speak of outside her mom, it’s easy to see why this is so improtant to Luz: she just wants to make the one person in her life whose ever support her actually think it was worth it when in truth Eda already thinks it does and just dosen’t want her to die. 

She’s just not good with talking to her or not condescending to her as her own ego is stacked sky high, probably because the whole curse thing meant Eda was an outcast by default and the system wants to either chain her to one form of magic and one only or shackle her to them as a hired goon. Her ego, while justified, is also a defense mechanism: a way to shield herself from the fact almost no one cares about her and one of the few people who DOES, dosen’t care what she wants or needs. Once the curse happened she lost just about everything and had to rebuild and thus build up walls around herself and kept everyone else at arms length till Luz changed her for the better. It’s just a tragic clash of two wills both with similar problems but both unwilling to talk about them. 

But with time up, our heroes need to get to the diggity dance. So they indeed do and we get some fun sight gags, Willow makes corsages,  that one girl with the cresent head somehow ended up with Mathomule and is not happy, as anyone who ends up with him should. And it’s time for Luz to face her destiny.. in a tux with a tutu because of course, and Amity likes it because also of course. 

IT’s time to rumble, with King getting nervous due to eda’s prodding about mcing since his co-mc gus is really good at it, and introducing our champion.

No wait sorry he’s still trapped in Mojoworld. no it’s still Luz who shows off a seasons worth of skill by easily dispatching the first few fears and saying to grom let’s finish it.. before grom puts a tentacle on her head. 

It’s to downlaod her fear.. which is Camillia. Granted we could all see it coming but still Luz obviously can’t fight her own mother or her own overwhelming guilt.. her mom did hurt her.. but she gets why and just loves her and wants her to be proud but dosen’t know what to do: tell her the trutha nd possibly loose a happy and fufilling life or wait until it all blows up. It’s a painful choice. So luz and king end up running. King runs first because he can’t handle it and Gus talks him back into the groove while Luz runs away because she can’t fight her own mom, understandable, and Gus encourages king to lead the crowd which he does. Amity and Eda follow Luz. 

So Luz is backed down, facing down a monster tha’ts going to go on to everyone else next if she fails... and Eda prepares to interfere.. but it’s AMITY who faces her fear and dives in. And we find out just what her fear was as grom turns into a humanoid shape and rips the letter in half.. it was a grom invitation. Though conviently the who it’s adressed to was ripped out. 

And yeah not going to save this one: It’s Luz. You know it I know it I didn’t even hide it in the intro. Even before the reveal in a bit it was obvious. But it also makes perfect sense. I’ve avoided talking about her character arc up to this point because I was waiting for now. Amity’s growth is the third major arc of the season behind Luz’s slow learning of magic and eventually induction into hexside and eda’s curse, which I lump in with Lilith chasing her since both were mildly entertwined and then entirely are once the reveal hits in the finale. When we meet her she’s an outright bully.. but we slowly see there’s more there. That she’s not really HAPPY or content, is contstantly under pressure by her family name, is outright bullied by her own siblings who don’t understand her. So Luz coming in, seemingly only being intrested in magic because i’ts neat.. understandably bothers her. She’s not a great person, bullying her old best friend because tha’ts what’s expected and being close with outright bullies because of that.. but it’s through Luz she starts to grow, realizing Luz is genuinely nice and genuinely sorry for any trouble she caused Amity, and evne then both cases were causaed by Amity’s own dickishness and outside forces, so it’s easy to see why she defrosts faster. Her siblings realize they’ve genuinely hurt her, and actually try to be good siblings from then on and help her, and slowly Amity learns to truth luz, trust in her, and accept her... and thus accept her feelings for her. There are gradual hints she’s growing attracted to her.. but her walls had to come down first, and it wouldn’t of worked from the outset. The show cleverly has the two build a genuine friendship, two opposities who work well together, so when feelings do happen it feels natural. It’s not “I’m in love with this person because I have to because you can’t be friends with someone your attracted to” bullshit or anything like that, cough star vs cough, it’s just well built catching feelings. I’ts how this kind of thing SHOULD go: niether went in intending for this to happen.. it’s just happening. 

And Amity’s reluctance is painfully understandable, as Luz is the ONLY friend and support she has. Sure she and willow are patching things up, but WIllow would understandably choose luz over her and she’s terrified of loosing the one good thing in her life. Of course Luz would either say yes, and probably will some day, or let her down gently, she’s nice.. but it’s also understandable to be afraid that someone won’t take the reveal well. I’ve been there trust me, it’s easier when you let it out even if you get rejected, but I get it being hard to let out because you don’t want to loose a friend. I did not, and niether would she, but I can see why she wouldn’t want ot take the plunge. At least not yet. We’ll see this summer hopefully. 

But we do get a shiptastic, gorgeously aniamted scene of the two dancing an fightin gin perfect synch, combinging luz’s new use of plant magic with amity’s mastery of abominations resulting in the two utterly decimating grom, likely in part because with two fast moving targets he can’t get a lock on and likely nees more fear and mass to attack multiple targets at once. Or just more tendrils. it’s a quick, beautful sequence that’s utterly glorious, being framed as romantic as any hetero scene of the type and rightfully so. A triumph and well deserving of this praise. 

Our heros have won, get crowns, and King gets praise. All is well.. except Luz drops the crown once she gets home because she feels like she failed and feels lost about her mom.. though at least king gets it “I’m king and queen, best of both things!”. You tell em sister. 

So we end with Luz genuinely responding to her mom, with some montage stuff as we see Gus and Willow poke a fear blob, willow fears bugs, understandable and Gus fears clowns... 

Also understandable. Though I didn’t put up a bug picture because

And Amity looks out folornly into the night. Camilla responds to Luz.. and mentions letters.. which while Luz brushes those off.. we see someone sent them. And by someone I probably mean king since we now know only eda and him had acess to the portal, and given he was actively encouraging her to lie.. yeah i’m supscious. But we’ll see next season. For now this episode is fan fucking tastic, showing off tons of character development, being representative and sweet as all hell.. and being really funny. Tons of great gags in this one including the turtle guy from an earlier episode being forced to be adisco ball.  This is easily the series best so far and if you haven’t checked it out, please do it’s fantastic as is this show. Check both out. Until the next rainbow i’ts been a pleasure. Tommorow more disney shenanigans this time with pete. And also more of this possibly we’ll see what I get done. 

Goodnight everybody!