#gay alliance toward equality | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

hellomynameisbisexual · 1 year

Text

I was in college when I experienced bisexual erasure for the first time. I was part of a GSA (Gay-Straight Alliance), and many of my friends were members. At the time, I had a boyfriend, and my friends asked me: ‘So Tom, now that you have a boyfriend, does that mean you’re gay now?’. At the time, I didn't realise that what had been said was an act of bisexual erasure – I knew nothing about it. To them, it was just a joke, but to me, it was painful and upsetting, although I couldn't quite put my finger on why.

I ended up calling out my GSA, most of whom were friends. In both moments, the event and the call out, I felt a depth of discomfort that I haven't felt in years, possibly ever. I remember instances of being asked, ‘are you attracted to anyone in this room?’ – the stereotype about bisexuality being that I am automatically attracted to everyone. Recently, in the park with a friend, we overheard a conversation along the lines of ‘if you date girls, you’re a lesbian and nothing else’. I sometimes feel that around every corner, people erase my existence.

I don't often see myself in TV and film. When I do, I am actively objectified, and my sexuality is painted negatively (Glee, Sex and the City, Insatiable, The Real O'Neals). All this comes together to form a mess of internalised biphobia. Am I being gay enough? Am I being straight enough? All I am is 100 per cent bisexual.

Biphobia and more

Biphobia has been prevalent globally for decades and was defined in 1992 by Bennett as prejudice experienced by bisexuals from straight and gay individuals. It’s when others don’t view bisexuality as a valid, unique, and legitimate sexual orientation. These prejudices are born from negative attitudes, beliefs, views, and stereotypes that are hurtful towards bisexual people or perceived bisexuals.

While bisexual erasure has existed for a long time, the actual term was coined by law scholar Yoshino (1999). The Royal College of Psychiatrists has recently defined the term as: ‘ignoring, removing, falsifying evidence of bisexuality from a source and in its extremist form can perpetuate that bisexuality does not exist’ (Watson & Smith, 2020). When bisexual people internalise society's negative social beliefs and apply them to themselves and other bisexual people, that’s internalised biphobia (Hayfield, 2020).

It's also worth defining the ‘four monos’. Monosexuality relates to an attraction to a single-sex or gender, while non-monosexuality is an attraction to more than one sex or gender. Monosexism describes the negativity shown to individuals who do not identify with monosexuality (Hayfield, 2020). Finally, mononormativity refers to cultural or social norms which assume that everyone is or should be monosexual (Hayfield, 2020), and it’s also used around the assumption of monogamy.

I come from a perfectly accepting family, yet I have experienced binegativity and biphobia in a variety of forms in my life. They are just as problematic as they sound.

Examples

One of the most common examples of biphobia from both straight and LGBTQ+ individuals is that bisexual people lie to themselves and are gay or straight, and bisexuals are confused in their attraction. Christina Dyar and colleagues (2014) reported that this is especially prominent when bisexual people are in relationships because people assume that both individuals in the relationship are gay or straight – women are particularly likely to be assumed to be gay or on their way to being so. Bisexual women in different-sex relationships can also experience a specific form of ‘acceptance’ from a straight male partner, relying on the man’s eroticisation of female bisexuality. This eroticisation can lead to an increase in depression in bisexual women in different-sex relationships as a direct result of being treated as sexual objects instead of equals.

That paper also showed that bisexual women in different-sex relationships report elevated depression symptoms and higher frequencies of binegative exclusion and rejection by lesbians and gay men than bisexual women in same-sex relationships do. There is a great irony in this – the supposedly accepting LGBTQ+ community perpetuates the exclusionary practice, feeding the belief that because bisexual people like multiple genders, they are not gay or straight enough to belong in either community. It must be particularly upsetting for bi people to seek to find others ‘like them’, only to then not fit in (an issue highlighted by Irvine (2017) and Weiss (2004)).

Another example of biphobia is that bi people may self-define on the basis of attraction to multiple genders, but others may require ongoing ‘proof’ to consider them bisexual. Flanders and colleagues (2017) found that bisexual participants felt pressured to engage in sexual behaviour to provide evidence of their bisexuality, and when doing so, they did not always use safe-sex practices. Their research also indicated that the assumption that bi people in monogamous relationships had ‘chosen their side’ was associated with individuals changing their behaviour to avoid being misidentified—this negatively impacted sexual or mental health.

Think about this for a second. In a monosexual community, would a person feel pressured to engage in sexual activity, risky or otherwise? It sets an impossible double standard that implies bisexual people need to be in a constant cycle of having sex with individuals of more than one sex to prove their bisexuality.

Bisexuality has even been erased from the legal map (Marcus, 2020). In 2020 the United States Supreme Court decided a landmark LGBTQ rights case, Bostock v Clayton County. The decision affirmed that Title VII's sex discrimination protections extended to gay and trans employees, but there is no mention of bisexuality or bisexual people. Bisexuality is again assumed to be a subset of being gay and not its own unique identity. And we see biphobia in the media too. In the hit show Glee, Kurt, the gay character, responds to Blaine, who is questioning his sexuality after a drunk kiss with a girl, by saying: ‘Bisexual is a term gay guys in high school use when they wanna hold hands with girls and feel like a normal person for a change.’ This is just one of many examples – see the GLAAD report ‘Where are we on TV’.

Double and multiple discrimination

Double discrimination is where individuals are discriminated against by both straight and gay groups or individuals for being bisexual (Weiss, 2004). Research by Friedman et al. (2014) concluded that bisexual people face behavioural, psychosocial, and biomedical consequences of marginalisation and isolation from straight and gay individuals/communities. A systemic absence of positive attitudes toward bisexual people may be one of several complex factors that continue to drive higher rates of poor health outcomes among bisexual men and women (Dodge et al., 2011), including poorer mental health (Mereish et al., 2017).

Bisexuals can be seen as confused about their sexualities and as untrustworthy to romantic partners, with Matsick and Rybin (2018) outlining how prejudice comes in part from people discounting the authenticity of bisexuality and wanting to know a bisexual’s ‘true allegiance’. Negative experiences stemming from LGBTQ+ communities can be particularly challenging for a bisexual person to comprehend and process (Weiss, 2004). Such exclusion and alienation can rob an individual of their sense of community acceptance, causing a severe impact on their mental health (Ross et al., 2010).

Furthermore, bisexual people can also experience multiple discrimination based on ‘the intersections of gender, race and ethnicity, disability, class, and other factors’ (Hayfield, 2020). A 2019 study by Doan Van and colleagues found that bisexual people’s discrimination experiences could be ‘additive’ and based on other marginalised parts of a person’s identity. Bisexual people have to navigate their other stigmatised identities, such as a person of colour or a trans individual. This discrimination that comes on multiple identity fronts is detrimental to an individual’s mental health (Ross et al., 2010). There is very little research surrounding multiple discrimination and its effects on bisexual/plurisexual people, and it is vitally important that there is more research into multiple and double discrimination.

Burden and buffering

Much early psychological research missed out on bisexuality or legitimised anti-bisexual discrimination as it classified bisexuals as either gay or straight based on the gender of their current partner. Barker and Langdridge (2008) found that psychological research that feeds into popular culture (e.g. news and media) leans into bisexual erasure through dichotomy and biological explanations. An example of this is a 2005 New York Times article 'Straight, Gay or Lying?', which publicised a psychological study conducted in the same year. Gerulf Rieger and colleagues had found no physiological attraction in bisexual men towards women, only the self-reported bisexual attraction before the experiment began. Attraction matters to a lot of people, but bisexual people exist.

I come back again to the mental health burden: Operario and Mak (2020) found that bisexual individuals have a greater risk of depression and anxiety than gay people and that sexual identity stresses occur on intrapersonal, interpersonal, and community levels. And bisexual women are twice as likely to have an eating disorder if they are out than a straight woman (Koh & Ross, 2008). The same research found that bisexual women who publicly identified as bisexual, compared to a lesbian who was not publicly identified as a lesbian, were 2-2.5 times more likely to have experienced suicidal ideation in the last 12 months.

Surely, finding a community where we feel we belong is key? In a 2017 study of US women, Jaclyn Lambe and colleagues found that perceived binegative discrimination and internalised binegativity were significantly correlated with self-esteem and depression but only internalised binegativity predicted self-esteem and depression. Importantly, participation in a bisexual-specific community at high levels (i.e., daily to 2 to 3 times per week) reduced the impact of internalised binegativity on depression (although not self-esteem).

Simple, then – participate in a bi-community. Unfortunately, research conducted in Australia by Mclean (2008) concluded that while some bisexuals were active within lesbian and gay communities, many were not as they feared rejection or discrimination due to their bisexuality. Additionally, those who did participate in lesbian and gay communities kept their bisexuality hidden most of the time due to the fear of being made unwelcome.

Statistics from the UK bear this out. The 2018 LGBT in Britain Home and Communities report by Stonewall surveyed 5000 participants, 30 per cent of whom were bisexual. 30 per cent of bi men and 8 per cent of bi women felt unable to be open about their sexual orientation with any of their friends, compared to 2 per cent of gay men and 1 per cent of lesbians. A further third of bi people are not open about their sexual orientation to anyone in their family, compared to 8 per cent of lesbians and gay men. The survey also found that 50 per cent of bisexual men and 43 per cent of bisexual women have never attended LGBT specific venues and events in their local communities, compared with 33 per cent of lesbians and 27 per cent of gay men. Shockingly, 27 per cent of bisexual women and 18 per cent of bisexual men had experienced discrimination or poor treatment from the LGBTQ+ community because of their sexual orientation compared to 9 per cent of lesbians and 4 per cent of gay men.

Stonewall followed this with the LGBT in Britain Bi Report in 2020, revealing that 31 per cent of bisexual people (male or female) had experienced a hate incident. 75 per cent did not report it out of fear that the police would not take their case seriously. Furthermore, the report concluded that 76 per cent of gay people are out to all their friends compared to 36 per cent of bisexual people, and 63 per cent of gay/lesbian people are out to all their family members, compared to just 20 per cent of bisexual people.

It’s also worth noting that increasingly, people are identifying with other terms that relate to attraction to more than one gender. They may have experiences which are both similar to and different from bi people. Stonewall's 2018 Celebrating Bi Inclusion in Secondary Schools guide states, 'Young people who are bi or who identify as another term such as pansexual or queer are more likely to deliberately harm themselves (67% and 79% respectively) than lesbian or gay young people (59%)'. There is no beating around the bush here; young non-monosexual people self-harm at higher rates than their gay counterparts because they are bullied for being attracted to more than one gender.

What can be done?

Whether it is coming out, experiencing discrimination, or a hate crime, we’re seeing common factors; the fear of discrimination and biphobic assumptions about what the LGBTQ+ community should look like. This can have a seriously detrimental effect on the psychosocial wellbeing of bisexual people. Yet little has been done in practice to improve protections and support for bisexual individuals.

First, simply consider the possibility that someone might be bisexual rather than either straight or gay.

Second, create and implement evidence-based psychological interventions to support bisexual and plurisexual minorities. These interventions should strategically target identity stress at multiple levels to help bisexuals struggling with anti-bisexual discrimination. The demand for this type of intervention is supported by psychological literature – House et al. (2011) highlight a severe need for suicide prevention and self-harm interventions among LGBT youth.

Furthermore, according to a Stonewall School Report (2017), 76 per cent of LGBT students did not know what bisexuality was. To put that in context, in a school of 1000, if 20 per cent of the students were LGBT, 152 of those LGBT students would not know what bisexuality was. The same report also found that one in three bisexual students (35 per cent) are bullied for being bisexual in school. This indicates a crucial need to create a comprehensive sexual health education curriculum inclusive of bisexual, plurisexual, LGBTQ+ and heterosexual identities. House et al. (2011) suggest that community education on gender and sexual orientation-based discrimination and its negative impact on bisexual people would positively increase the trend towards greater acceptance. Social and psychoeducational awareness programs in schools and colleges, illustrating the damaging effects of anti-bisexual discrimination, could transform a monosexist culture to make it more accepting of non-monosexual people.

Universities can play their part too. While I am yet to reach my final year of study, I do not feel represented in the curriculum so far. We’re talking about one of the most prominent areas of psychology, human relationships, yet much of the classic research ignores or erases my experiences. It’s time for bisexuality to stand as a unique identity.

What would positive change look like to me?

Freedom to live without fear of anti-bisexual discrimination

Inclusion in educational curriculums (Uni subject, sex ed etc.)

Respect for bisexual people irrespective of gender or race

Equality among all communities (straight, gay, bi and wider LGBTQ)

Ultimately, all I ask is that you treat your bisexual friends, family, colleagues with respect and kindness; whether they're out or not, it could benefit them more than you think.

- Thomas York is a second-year undergraduate student at Bath Spa University. [email protected]

Editor's note: This article was originally published online on 26 April 2021.

References

Alessi, E.J., Meyer, I.H. and Martin, J.I. (2013) ‘PTSD and sexual orientation: An examination of criterion A1 and non-criterion A1 events’, Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 5(2), p. 149.

Barker, M. and Langdridge, D. (2008) II. ‘Bisexuality: Working with a silenced sexuality’, Feminism and Psychology, 18(3), pp. 389-394.

Bennett, K. (1992) ‘Feminist bisexuality: A both/and option for an either/or world’, Closer to home: Bisexuality and feminism, pp. 205-231.

Bradford, M. (2004) ‘The bisexual experience: Living in a dichotomous culture’, Journal of Bisexuality, 4(1-2), pp. 7-23.

Brewster, M.E. and Moradi, B. (2010) ‘Perceived experiences of anti-bisexual prejudice: Instrument development and evaluation’, Journal of Counseling Psychology, 57(4), p. 451.

Carey, B. (2005) ‘Straight, gay or lying: Bisexuality revisited’, New York Times, 5.

Carey, K.B., Norris, A.L., Durney, S.E., Shepardson, R.L. and Carey, M.P. (2018) ‘Mental health consequences of sexual assault among first-year college women’, Journal of American college health, 66(6), pp. 480-486.

Chan, R.C., Operario, D. and Mak, W.W. (2020) ‘Bisexual individuals are at greater risk of poor mental health than lesbians and gay men: The mediating role of sexual identity stress at multiple levels’, Journal of Affective Disorders, 260, pp. 292-301.

Cox, N., Berghe, W.V., Dewaele, A. and Vincke, J. (2010) ‘Acculturation strategies and mental health in gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth’, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 39(10), pp. 1199-1210.

Cox, S., Bimbi, D.S. and Parsons, J.T. (2013) ‘Examination of social contact on binegativity among lesbians and gay men’, Journal of Bisexuality, 13(2), pp.215-228.

Dodge, B., Herbenick, D., Friedman, M.R., Schick, V., Fu, T.C., Bostwick, W., Bartelt, E., Munoz-Laboy, M., Pletta, D., Reece, M. and Sandfort, T.G. (2016) ‘Attitudes toward bisexual men and women among a nationally representative probability sample of adults in the United States’ PLoS One, 11(10), p.e0164430.

Dyar, C., Feinstein, B.A. and London, B. (2014) ‘Dimensions of sexual identity and minority stress among bisexual women: The role of partner gender’, Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity, 1(4), p. 441.

Flanders, C.E., Dobinson, C. and Logie, C. (2017) ‘Young bisexual women’s perspectives on the relationship between bisexual stigma, mental health, and sexual health: A qualitative study’, Critical Public Health, 27(1), pp. 75-85.

Friedman, M.R., Dodge, B., Schick, V., Herbenick, D., Hubach, R.D., Bowling, J., Goncalves, G., Krier, S. and Reece, M. (2014) ‘From bias to bisexual health disparities: Attitudes toward bisexual men and women in the United States’, LGBT health, 1(4), pp. 309-318.

Hayfield, N. (2020) Bisexual and pansexual identities: Exploring and challenging invisibility and invalidation. Routledge.

House, A.S., Van Horn, E., Coppeans, C. and Stepleman, L.M., (2011) ‘Interpersonal trauma and discriminatory events as predictors of suicidal and nonsuicidal self-injury in gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender persons’, Traumatology, 17(2), pp. 75-85.

Hummel, K. (2011) Glee. Fox, 20 February.

Irvine, M, 2017. The Adverse Impact of Biphobia on Bisexual Individuals (Doctoral dissertation, Adler School of Professional Psychology).

Koh, A.S. and Ross, L.K., 2006. Mental health issues: A comparison of lesbian, bisexual and heterosexual women. Journal of homosexuality, 51(1), pp. 33-57.

Lambe, J., Cerezo, A. and O'Shaughnessy, T. (2017) ‘Minority stress, community involvement, and mental health among bisexual women.’ Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity, 4(2), p. 218.

Maher, M. (2020) 'How hiding my bi identity affected my mental health', Stonewall.

Marcus, N.C. (2020) ‘Bostock v. Clayton County and the Problem of Bisexual Erasure.’ Nw. U.L. Rev. Online, 115, p. 223.

Matsick, J.L. and Rubin, J.D. (2018) ‘Bisexual prejudice among lesbian and gay people: Examining the roles of gender and perceived sexual orientation’ Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity, 5(2), p. 143.

McLean, K. (2008) ‘Inside, outside, nowhere: Bisexual men and women in the gay and lesbian community.’ Journal of Bisexuality, 8(1-2), pp. 63-80.

Mereish, E.H., Katz-Wise, S.L. and Woulfe, J. (2017) ‘Bisexual-specific minority stressors, psychological distress, and suicidality in bisexual individuals: The mediating role of loneliness’, Prevention science, 18(6), pp. 716-725.

Rieger, G., Chivers, M.L. and Bailey, J.M. (2005) ‘Sexual arousal patterns of bisexual men’, Psychological science, 16(8), pp. 579-584.

Ross, L.E., Dobinson, C. and Eady, A. (2010) ‘Perceived determinants of mental health for bisexual people: A qualitative examination’, American journal of public health, 100(3), pp. 496-502.

Ross, L.E., Salway, T., Tarasoff, L.A., MacKay, J.M., Hawkins, B.W. and Fehr, C.P. (2018) ‘Prevalence of depression and anxiety among bisexual people compared to gay, lesbian, and heterosexual individuals: A systematic review and meta-analysis’, The Journal of Sex Research, 55(4-5), pp.435-456.

Sexual Offences Act 2003 Section 1(1) England/United Kingdom.

Sexual Offences Act 2003 Section 1(3) England/United Kingdom.

Sigurvinsdottir, R. and Ullman, S.E. (2015) ‘The role of sexual orientation in the victimisation and recovery of sexual assault survivors’, Violence and Victims, 30(4), pp. 636-648.

Sigurvinsdottir, R. and Ullman, S.E. (2016) ‘Sexual assault in bisexual and heterosexual women survivors’, Journal of bisexuality, 16(2), pp. 163-180.

Stonewall (2018) Celebrating Bi Inclusion in Secondary Schools. London: Stonewall.

Stonewall (2018) LGBT in Britain Home and Communities. London: Stonewall.

Stonewall (2020) LGBT in Britain Bi Report. London: Stonewall.

Stonewall (No Date Available) Conversion Therapy.

Straub, K.T., McConnell, A.A. and Messman-Moore, T.L. (2018) ‘Internalised heterosexism and posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms: The mediating role of shame proneness among trauma-exposed sexual minority women’ Psychology of Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity, 5(1), p. 99.

Trade Union Congress (2019) 1 in 5 bisexual people have been sexually assaulted at work. London: Trade Union Congress.

Trade Union Congress (2019) Sexual harassment of LGBT people in the workplace. London: Trade Union Congress.

Van, E.E.D., Mereish, E.H., Woulfe, J.M. and Katz-Wise, S.L. (2019) ‘Perceived discrimination, coping mechanisms, and effects on health in bisexual and other non-monosexual adults’ Archives of Sexual Behavior, 48(1), pp.159-174.

Walters, M., Chen, J. and Breiding, M. (2011) ‘National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey 2010: findings on victimisation by sexual orientation’.

Watson, F. and Smith, M. (2020). Bisexual Mental Health.

Weiss, J.T. (2004) 'G.L. vs. B.T.: The archaeology of biphobia and transphobia within the U.S. gay and lesbian community' Journal of bisexuality, 3(3-4), pp. 25-55.

Yoshino, K. (1999). The epistemic contract of bisexual erasure. Stan. L. Rev., 52, 353.

32 notes · View notes

eddieheart · 3 months

Text

Brokeback Mountain

I re-wrote the ending to brokeback mountain because I hate myself

- Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist fall in love on a lonely old mountain. It's a whirlwind romance that grips them by the soul.

- By the end of the summer when they're asked to leave neither can bare to separate, so they don't.

- (at the beginning you don't see Ennis with a car but further on you do, so I'll just assume he had a car but lived in town) So they sell one of their cars (the worse one of the two) and get the little beginnings of a nest egg

- At first they're just driving around aimlessly, not putting down roots anywhere. While working at a ranch they hear some of the guys talking about going to Alberta to work on the oil rigs

- Jack is immediately all for it, Ennis isn't sure, but after a while they decide to go. It's really good pay, in a similar place to where they are now and they can avoid the draft. (Win win)

- (in Alberta, 1970, a roughneck would be payed approximately 27,000 dollars a year, in today's money that's about 212,000)

- They eventually make enough to buy an apartment together, which passes fine enough under the guise of two bachelor roommates, who can't afford a place of their own.

- Eventually they hear about club 70 and Flashback (both gay bars founded around 1970) in Edmonton, only about 45 minutes from where they live

- It soon becomes a common place for them to hang out.

- While at the club they discover 'Carousel Capers' (newsletter of club carousel) a monthly newsletter for gay people that had started in 1969.

- They also discover GATE (gay alliance towards equality) that started in 1971-72. The alliance had an actual building which included a drop in center and a resource center. They provided peer counselling and speaker referrals all while still fighting for gay rights.

- It takes a long time but eventually they even visit the center.

-It's during one of these visits that they meet Margret 'Peggy' Walters and Winnifred 'Fred' Murphy, a lesbian couple in the same area

- They both share their woes about living as a gay couple in the area and how at a certain point it's hard to pretend to be just roommates

- They all become fast friends and continue to meet up regularly. While having coffee one day Peggy shares a thought, marriage, marriages actually. Those of Ennis and herself as well as Jack and Fred, for tax purposes and also convenience.

- It's during the spring that they get married and it's summer when they take a 'honeymoon' at Brokeback mountain.

- The girls love the solitude and everyone keeps their distance during the stay.

- The second day of their drip, when the sun gets real low, a mix of amber, crimson and violet, the sky peppered with ghosts of stars that Ennis falls to his knees before the love of his life and pulls out a small gold ring.

"I don't say much, and I don't know much either, but what I do know, is that I love you Jack Twist, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you."

- Jack let's out a brash fit of laughter, running off for no more than a minute. He jogs back to where Ennis is sitting and collapses to his knees, sliding towards him, a ring in hand. All the overwhelming fear and anxiety Ennis had been feeling quickly fell away.

- Jack stared deeply into the eyes of the man he's sure he wants to spend the rest of his life with, putting a free hand on the other man's cheek as he speaks.

"Ennis Del Mar, I- I just can't quit you, and I don't want to neither. I've spent every day since we've left thanking whatever god that'll listen for you, cus you- you're the best thing that's ever happened to me. So, Mr. Del Mar, wanna get hitched?"

- They end up laugh crying and falling into each other, both making slapdash moves for other's ring and pushing them onto they're fingers.

- One day while working on the rigs, Jack gets into an accident. Work normally last 16-20 hours a day, and they work almost every day, sometimes 7 days a week. Because of this, Jack in his sleep deprived and overworked state, passes out, hitting his head on piece of metal machinery.

- Ennis is rightfully terrified and it takes a few days for Jack to actually wake up. When he does, Ennis decides that they are never going back to the rigs.

- They merge what little nest eggs they've saved up with the girls and buy a ranch.

(The price per acre in 1988 was 374, and they bought 500 acres)

- There's a little house on the property which they all refurbish together. It's technically two smaller houses merged together, each with they're own mailboxes. One says Ennis + Peggy (for Jack and Ennis) and the other says Jack + Fred (for Peggy and Fred)

- Each couple had their own side of the house, but they all spend most of their time together like one big family.

- Because they have so much land, they don't have to worry about anybody seeing anything they aren't suppose to, so they don't have to keep behind closed doors anymore.

- Fred learns to weld and becomes a trades woman, While Peggy prefers to say home, take care of the house and cook. Ennis and Jack get a herd of sheep, some cattle and a few horses.

- Now that they have the money Jack even gets himself a roping horse, a young mare named Sunny that he trains himself.

- The house and barn are near constantly filled with music, the radio is always playing. It's partly because Jack read something about animals being happier when they listened to music and partly because Ennis doesn't have the heart to tell him he's wrong.

- After a while when they're all good and ready, Peggy and Fred propose having children. So not long after that, Ennis and Jack get jiggy with a plastic cup and Peggy and Fred get real familiar with a turkey baster.

- Jack desperately wants a little boy and has for quite a long time, Ennis is the more apprehensive of the two, but as soon as the older man gets a glimpse of his little baby girl all his worries melt away.

- It's then that they're all renamed, Ennis becomes Daddy, Jack becomes Popa, Peggy is Moma and Fred is Mom. They all wear their titles with pride.

- Peggy had two girls each a year apart and Fred has a little brown eyed boy.

- As it turns out, it's quite difficult for four people to decide on baby names. But after a first 10 months of deliberation, and another year for their third they decide on Alison, Jackson Robert and Marie.

- After having the babies Peggy starts to work in town to help raise some more funds for the kids and Ennis and Jack become the best stay at home dads you've ever seen.

- Ennis actually learns to cook and Jack is a diaper master, though he'll never admit it to anyone else.

- Though the old clubs are closed by now and the paper long gone, GATE (which was renamed to GLCCE, the Gay and Lesbian Community Centre of Edmonton) is still around. They all decide they can spare the extra money for a ranch hand and post an add at the center, hiring a young boy named Henry.

- Though they somehow end up with two hands because of Henry's codependent relationship with his girlfriend Danny.

- At first the guys are shocked that they hired a gay boy who turns out to have a girlfriend. But soon after, Danny the spitfire (as she's renamed) educated not only the boys but Peg and Fred too, on bisexuality, genderfluidity and what it means to be transgender.

- They all get very up to date on gay culture. (They haven't been getting out much since the kids... and the sheep)

- Each of the kids learns how to ride horses at four, but all of them have already (and continue to) gone on rides with their dads.

- Buts it's their youngest Marie that really takes a shine to it, horseback riding with such ease it's as though she's just walking.

- Eventually Marie even gets her own little colt, which she names boots, and starts training to barrel race (and to rope just like her popa)

- Their first trip as a family is to Brokeback mountain. Ennis and Jack sneak away in the night, watching the sunset and basking in the joy of their lives.

"Lookit how far we've come. I really love you Jack."

"And I really love you."

- On the last day they take one big picture as a family. The kids get it framed for their anniversary, it still hangs in their dads' room.

- Though they came to love Henry and Danny they eventually left the ranch. At the ages of 23 and 22 respectively the pair got married, the blended family being invited of course. They come empty handed, seemingly without a gift, but they're harbouring a splendid little secret.

- After returning from their honeymoon, they all meet up again at the shared house for dinner and their wedding present is finally given.

"Are you gonna tell them or am I?" Peggy asks with a smirk.

"So, I know y'all are grown now, but Ennis and I- and Fred and Peg," Jack adds after a side glance from the girls. "We made you a little something."

- The four of them, plus the kids, lead the newlyweds through the property and about ten acres in they peep a little dirt road. The road in turn is connected to the Main Street (on the opposite side of the property) and to a sweet little bungalow.

- Upon realizing the house is for them they both burst into tears and become (officially) member of the family.

- Marie goes on to become a rodeo star, a trick riding, barrel racing, calf roping badass. A true rodeo Queen.

- Jackie Jr. graduates early and gets a job as a mechanic in town and occasionally joins his younger sister at the rodeo, as a roping duo. At first he'd been interested in bull and bronk riding but after a long and stern conversation with both his dads about the dangers he decided against it.

- Alison turns out to be the wild card of the family, deciding to go to school to become a doctor. (Never did Ennis, or Jack or that matter, think that he could make a kid that intelligent, but fuck if she wasn't a smart cookie)

- Though he's a man of few words, Ennis gives heartfelt and genuine goodbyes to each of their children. Jack as well, tucking his head into the side of his now (really freaking tall) kids, hiding his tears in bursts of 'I love yous' and 'I'll miss yous".

- Now that they're all empty nesters the house feels a little too lonely, a bit quieter too, even though the radio is still always playing. So Jack and Ennis decide to start fostering, (though technically on paper it’s Ennis and Peggy and Jack and Fred)

- They take in the kids that no one wants, the belligerent teens, the abandoned toddlers, homeless kids, the reckless boys and the defiant girls. Kids that have no other options.

- They end up with 6 year old Toby, 14 Christin and 16 year old Randy and they love every minute of it.

- Jackie Jr. is the first to get married. His wife is a sweet young thing named Stella, she comes from a hard working family and desperately loves their son. They build and move into another house on the property, not too far from Henry and Danny.

- Allison finished her schooling at a big fancy, (as Ennis puts it, "smart kid school") and now lives in the city, she's had a few boyfriends, and girlfriends, over the years but still hasn't settled down.

- Ennis gets a little nervous every now and then, about Allison and if she feels as lonely as he did when he was a young kid. Jack always pulls him back though.

"Just because she isn't married doesn't mean she ain’t happy, I mean, think about us, about Peg n' Freddy, when we were kids we was happy, unmarried and very happy just being with each other."

"Allie knows she's loved, we tell her all the time, she knows her family will always be on her side, no matter what."

- Danny and Henry adopt a little boy named Tommy. (Ennis thinks the fact that all their names ending in 'y' is weird but only ever says anything to Jack)

- Marie is the next to get hitched, her and her partner Randi, whose full name they still don't know.

- Jackie Jr. and Stella have their first kid, a little girl, Ennis Jr. (Both her granddads cry when they hear the name)

-That fall Peggy has a stroke and can't work in town anymore. Now she stays home with the boys (and the kiddos). At first it's really hard for all of them, she can't do what she used to be able to, things Peggy had mastered are now nearly impossible. But over time they all become accustomed to the new normal.

- All the kids come home when they hear about moma. Allison quits her job in the city and becomes a family doctor in town, she says it's because she doesn't like the fast paced nature of the big city and prefers to be closer to her home anyway.

- Marie comes back from her rodeo tour but only stays a few weeks (at the request of her mother) and soon gets back to travelling.

- Jackie Jr. is blessed with a set of twin girls, Winona (Winny) and Pauline.

- Marie gets pregnant and has a baby girl, Jacklin (aka. Jack the third, or Jack Jr. Jr.)

- Needless to say the house is loud again, constantly bustling. Little kids running wild, their foster kids are grown, but Toby stays in the family house. He loves taking care of the kids, so he starts taking night courses at the community college for childcare.

- Every once and while someone will come in (just out of the blue, with no warning, like it should be) and find the two men laying together, gently holding onto each other, radio playing softly in the background.

- As an anniversary present the kids arrange a trip to Brokeback, they take the whole family. Jack and Ennis fall asleep holding each other in the place they fell in love, the sounds of their children and grandchildren running around in the distance.

- They get a surprise about a week later when a new framed photo joins the other on their bedroom wall, this time with their grandkids too.

- Jack falls down the stairs. He nearly breaks his hip and Ennis decides to get a stair lift. At first Jack refuses to use it, but eventually folds one day. Ennis sits in the chair calling Jack over, he pulls the other man onto his lap and distracts him with a chaste kiss as he pushes the down button. Jack doesn't fight him over the 'stairs chair' anymore.

- Gay marriage gets legalized, they find out by watching the local news like they do every night. Ennis bursts into tears, looks over at Peggy and says 'I want a divorce' before turning back to Jack with a smile.

- They get married in the summer, on their anniversary. The kids walk them down the isle, Jack III brings the rings and both cry when reading their vows.

- They go to bed that night, staring into each others eyes, holding their husband, they're husbands now. Jack curls onto the bigger man's chest and they both stare at the pictures on the wall, where it all started, Brokeback mountain, the radio playing softly in the background.

———

Link to source list:

2 notes · View notes

mariacallous · 2 years

Text

(New York Jewish Week) — The New York County Supreme Court ruled that Yeshiva University must recognize a campus LGBTQ pride group.

Judge Lynn Kotler directed the Modern Orthodox university to provide the YU Pride Alliance “full equal accommodations, advantages, facilities, and privileges afforded to all other student groups at Yeshiva University.”

Tuesday’s decision caps a dispute that dates back at least to 2020, when seven LGBTQ student activists and allies filed a complaint with the New York City Commission on Human Rights charging the university with discrimination. Administrators had overruled a student government decision to recognize the gay pride group.

In her ruling, Kotler said that Y.U. is chartered as a non-religious organization and as a result is subject to New York City Human Rights Law.

In its court filings, Yeshiva University acknowledged that while it was incorporated as non-sectarian, it was guided by its religious beliefs. “The court’s ruling violates the religious liberty upon which this country was founded,” a Y.U. spokesperson told The Commentator, a campus newspaper.

Gay sex is forbidden by nearly all Orthodox interpretations of Jewish law, although attitudes toward individuals who identify as queer have eased somewhat in Modern Orthodox settings in recent years.

The Manhattan-based university intends to appeal the decision.

Jewish Queer Youth, a nonprofit representing the interests of gay Orthodox Jews, hailed the ruling as “a victory for human dignity, mental health and safety on campus,” Rachael Fried, executive director of JQY and a Y.U. alum, said in a statement.

12 notes · View notes

rockislandadultreads · 2 years

Photo

Non-Fiction PRIDE Picks: Audiobooks to listen to

Listen, We Need to Talk: How to Change Attitudes about LGBT Rights by Brian F. Harrison (Contributor), Melissa R. Michelson

American public opinion tends to be sticky. Although the news cycle might temporarily affect the public's mood on contentious issues like abortion, the death penalty, or gun control, public opinion toward these issues has remained remarkably constant over decades. There are notable exceptions, however, particularly with regard to divisive issues that highlight identity politics. For example, over the past three decades, public support for same-sex marriage has risen from scarcely more than a tenth to a majority of the population. Why have people's minds changed so dramatically on this issue, and why so quickly? It wasn't just that older, more conservative people were dying and being replaced in the population by younger, more progressive people; people were changing their minds. Was this due to the influence of elite leaders like President Obama? Or advocacy campaigns by organizations pushing for greater recognition of the equal rights of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) people? Listen, We Need to Talk tests a new theory, what Brian Harrison and Melissa Michelson call The Theory of Dissonant Identity Priming, about how to change people's attitudes on controversial topics. Harrison and Michelson conducted randomized experiments all over the United States, many in partnership with equality organizations, including Equality Illinois, Georgia Equality, Lambda Legal, Equality Maryland, and Louisiana's Capital City Alliance. They found that people are often willing to change their attitudes about LGBT rights when they find out that others with whom they share an identity (for example, as sports fans or members of a religious group) are also supporters of those rights-particularly when told about support from a leader of the group, and particularly if they find the information somewhat surprising.

This Book is Gay by Juno Dawson

Lesbian. Bisexual. Queer. Transgender. Straight. Curious. This book is for everyone, regardless of gender or sexual preference. This book is for anyone who's ever dared to wonder. This book is for YOU. There's a long-running joke that, after "coming out," a lesbian, gay guy, bisexual, or trans person should receive a membership card and instruction manual. THIS IS THAT INSTRUCTION MANUAL. You're welcome. Inside you'll find the answers to all the questions you ever wanted to ask: from sex to politics, hooking up to stereotypes, coming out and more. This candid, funny, and uncensored exploration of sexuality and what it's like to grow up LGBT also includes real stories from people across the gender and sexual spectrums, not to mention hilarious illustrations. You will be entertained. You will be informed. But most importantly, you will know that however you identify (or don't) and whomever you love, you are exceptional. You matter. And so does this book.

The Book of Pride: LGBTQ Heroes Who Changed the World by Mason Funk

THE BOOK OF PRIDE captures the true story of the gay rights movement from the 1960s to the present, through richly detailed, stunning interviews with the leaders, activists, and ordinary people who witnessed the movement and made it happen. These individuals fought battles both personal and political, often without the support of family or friends, frequently under the threat of violence and persecution. By shining a light on these remarkable stories of bravery and determination, THE BOOK OF PRIDE not only honors an important chapter in American history, but also empowers young people today (both LGBTQ and straight) to discover their own courage in order to create positive change. Furthermore, it serves a critically important role in ensuring the history of the LGBTQ movement can never be erased, inspiring us to resist all forms of oppression with ferocity, community, and, most importantly, pride.

StoryCorps: Outloud by Ari Shapiro (Host), Dave Isay (Featuring)

StoryCorps recognizes the profound historical importance of capturing the stories of the LGBTQ community and the urgent need for this work to happen now. StoryCorps OutLoud is a multi-year initiative dedicated to recording and preserving LGBTQ stories across America. "OutLoud" honors the stories of those who lived before the 1969 Stonewall uprisings, celebrates the lives of LGBTQ youth, and amplifies the voices of those most often excluded from the historical record. The end result is a diverse collection of stories that enriches our nation s history. StoryCorps OutLoud sets out across the country to record and preserve the stories of LGBT individuals, along with their families and friends. OutLoud is a project undertaken in the memory of Isay's father, psychiatrist Dr. Richard Isay. Professionally credited for helping to persuade the mental health community that homosexuality is not a mental disorder, Dr. Isay was himself a closeted gay man for many years. He came out to his son at the age of 52 and, in 2011, he married his partner of 31 years, Gordon Harrell, before passing away suddenly from cancer on June 28, 2012. On June 28, 2014, the 45th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, StoryCorps inaugurated OutLoud, a three-year project to capture the experiences of L.G.B.T.Q. people. In particular, the project will seek stories from young people, minorities and those who lived before the uprising, which was a response by gays to a police raid on the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village and helped precipitate the gay rights movement.

#nonfiction #non-fiction #non fiction #PRIDE #LGBTQIA #Books for Pride #to read #tbr #booklr #book picks #audiobooks #reading recommendations #Book Recommendations #book recs #lgbtq #lgbtq books #library books #books on hoopla

15 notes · View notes

mwplanet · 1 year

Text

Colourfully You!

Insight about and a summary of events from GSA week

By Katrina R.

GSA Button Sales

Photo by Sarah Emery

The Gay-Straight Alliance, also known as GSA, is a club at Mary Ward open to members of the LGBTQ+ community and allies to discuss topics and issues related to the community. The club creates a safe and accepting space for all students to freely express themselves. After weeks of preparation, GSA week was celebrated from November 28th to December 2nd 2022! The fruitful week involved a multitude of activities and events, such as button sales, trivia, a pride flag scavenger hunt, goodie bag sales and a $2 civvies day! All proceeds from the civvies day went towards Covenant House, a charity that serves homeless, at risk and LGBTQ+ youth. In addition, the hallways were embellished with informative posters about a plethora of LGBTQ+ figures in history!

Angela P., a grade 10 member of GSA was asked what GSA week meant to her.

“To me GSA week really means bringing the community together especially after a tough year of COVID. I feel like community building is really important, especially here at Mary Ward. We’re bringing awareness that GSA exists, it’s a place that’s safe for people that are LGBTQ+ and there are people who are in the same age group who are going through the same thing and we’d love to be a support group for them,” was the remark given.

When asked what they wanted students to learn from GSA week, a handful of different and meaningful answers were given from the teachers involved in its planning and execution.

“I want students to learn that everyone is to be accepted for who they are regardless of how they identify and that people do identify in different ways, so it’s really important for us to make sure that all students understand that and that regardless of gender identity, gender fluidity, everyone is to be accepted and treated with respect,” responded Ms. Arturi.

“I want students to take away that we are all equal, just because we are different in terms of who or what we like, we’re all still created in God’s image and we should all be treated with dignity and respect. Many of the famous people you see out there and many of the people you look up to do have ties to LGBTQ relations, so don’t be surprised. We’re not the same, we’re different in a good way and together is where we belong,” proclaimed Mr. Russo.

“I want students to learn that they don’t have to be part of the LGBTQ+ community to join GSA because it is a gay-straight alliance, it’s for anybody to join and support each other,” exclaimed Ms. Figueiras.

With a fun lineup of events and activities that took place, GSA week has truly brought the community together and established acceptance, recognition and inclusivity!

#katrina ross rodriguez #community #gsa week #lgbtqia2s+#mary ward planet #mary ward

1 note · View note

adamwatchesmovies · 2 years

Text

Fifty Shades Darker (2017)

While I didn't enjoy this film, that doesn't mean you won't. No matter what I say, the people involved in this project did it: they actually made a movie. That's something to be applauded. With that established...

It’s hard to say if Fifty Shades Darker is a better film than the first. Large chunks of it undo the conclusion of Fifty Shades of Grey or reiterate what we already know. On a technical level, it’s probably worse, but I enjoyed it more. Does it matter? This is a bad second film and I’m sure it’ll be followed by an equally lousy third.

After assuring her that he’s ready to open up about his traumatic past, Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan) convinces Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) to have a second go at their relationship.

On paper, Darker sounds like it’ll be worth a damn, particularly if you already wasted your time with the first film. There’s a helicopter crash, a transparently evil creep after Ana, we finally get to see the often-mentioned “Mrs. Robinson” (Kim Basinger) and there’s even a part where someone is threatened at gunpoint! Those tiny blips seem to indicate excitement up ahead, but unless your mental capabilities are impeded by significant blood flow towards your nether regions, don't bother. That helicopter crash? It’s so ineptly shot there isn't a second of tension. Worse, it’s so unnecessary it could’ve, and should’ve been, excised from the plot.

As a whole, this story is messy. Ana’s boss Jack Hyde (Eric Johnson, whose character is so obvious it’s pathetic) does things that in hindsight don’t make much sense. Characters like Christian’s mother, Grace (Marcia Gay Harden), and Ana take some shocking betrayals either way too easily, or in a way that makes you wonder if they didn’t know all along and are being overly dramatic to put on a show. There still isn’t any chemistry between the two planks of wood that are Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson, though at least she seems to be having a bit more fun in her role as Ana flip-flops between inviting her boyfriend’s sexual deviancies and chastising him for being a weirdo.

The film begins by undoing the ending of Fifty Shades of Grey and sprinkles hints of a plot in its first half-hour via some new characters. Then there’s a whole lot of nothing until the last half hour. At this point, director James Foley hastily drops a couple of bombshells to warm us up for chapter 3. In between, there are exactly two good scenes. The first has Ana and Christian playing a game of pool that might get you steamed up. It’s a sensual moment where the winner will decide what kind of fleshy display awaits us. The other takes place on a boat and shows us our couple smiling. It doesn’t sound like much, but briefly, they make you think maybe these two people could be in love, instead of pretending to be for the sake of this idiotic storyline.

If you stick around for the end credits of the Unrated version, you get a sneak peek at Fifty Shades Freed, which I’m certain will deliver more boredom than eroticism. I do hope the three sinister characters in this picture will band together in a Legion of Doom-style alliance, that could be fun. Nothing I can say will deter the cultists from calling Fifty Shades Darker even better than the first. For the rest, there are many other better, shorter, more exciting, more sexy films available to you. (Unrated version on Blu-ray, January 26, 2018)

#Fifty Shades Darker #movies #films #movie reviews #film reviews #James Foley #Niall Leonard #E. L. James #Dakota Johnson #Jamie Dornan #Eric Johnson #Rita Ora #luke grimes #Victor Rasuk #Kim Basinger #Marcia Gay Harden #2017 movies #2017 films

1 note · View note

geshertzarmeod · 3 years

Text

In Other Lands Character Arcs

(Spoilers Abound)

I’m thinking about how the character arcs of all three main characters from In Other Lands center largely on moving away from what their families expected of them, even as each of them doesn’t necessarily think moving away from that is possible. And how it’s their relationships with each other that help them move in the directions they actually want to move in, and believe in their abilities to forge their own paths and lead fulfilling lives. Even if it’s not what their parents or home communities think a fulfilling life entails. This culminates in their refusal (along with Golden) at the end of the book, to let anyone else influence them when it comes to deciding where to be stationed. They’re ready to choose their own paths, together.

There’s something deeply appealing to me about this as a queer person, even as queerness (as defined by orientation or gender) is not actually a central factor in the shifting of each character’s relationship with their families. Actually, the character who comes closest to that is Serene, who is presumedly straight, but whose pushback against the rigid gendered expectations of her society so challenge her community that she and Golden are essentially banished at least for a time. This is only tangentially queer, I’d say, because she does this not for herself, as she seems to proudly fit & identify with elven womanhood, but recognizes the false limiting of manhood within her society and fights fiercely for Luke, Elliot, and eventually Golden, who I’d say is GNC for sure. For Luke, it’s not his being gay but his being monogamous and waiting longer than they expected (though he’s like, still 17!!! that’s still young!!!) to become sexually or romantically active that is off-putting to his family. For Elliot, his father is shocked not to see him with a man, but to see him happy (cue my tears).

I was just thinking this after reading Girl, Serpent, Thorn especially, but I really love when queer books parallel queer narratives of shame and struggle and difference and growing pains, with queer characters, but about issues unrelated to their being queer (especially when they’re about magical/fantasy elements). Then we get to relate to queer characters and see them process a lot of the feelings we have experienced, but also get to see them be loved and value and supported unconditionally in their queerness. Anyway, for an individual analysis:

Luke Sunborn

First, because I know a lot of people might not have read it, I’m going to quote Luke’s perspective from Wings In The Morning:

There were reasons Luke hadn’t kissed anybody. The Sunborns, as a family, loved life and loved love, and treated it as a game. It was fine for them: it worked for them.

Luke had always known that a riot of brightness and different loves and leaving someone laughing was beyond him. He wanted kindness and steadiness: he did not want someone who would leave. He wanted love that would last. (location 2527 in my kindle book, I can’t tell what page)

Luke, the Sunborn champion, expected to excel in battle, and love (read: have sex) freely and easily and non-monogamously, becoming an avid reader because of Elliot - something his father is shocked by and a little ashamed of. Learning Elvish because of both of them. Breaking border camp rules, threatening superior officers, to protect Elliot, and to support Serene, even as he continually complains about it and, on paper, would always argue that those choices are Not Okay and Very Bad. Luke, whose bashful shyness around his crushes, whose concern over his first kiss, whose choice of Elliot as a partner, is incomprehensible to his family, snapping, “I don’t want anyone else,” at the elves. He’s chosen Elliot, even as Elliot still doesn’t at all believe it at that point, and he’s happy with that decision. Elliot’s his choice, and only Elliot. Notorious Sunborn sexual voracity be damned.

Luke’s journey is also largely about him working through his external, and later internalized, biases against magical creatures. It’s pretty clearly an analog to xenophobia, and Luke expresses more disgust, disdain, or fear, the more different a culture is from the one he grew up in. This obviously becomes internalized against himself, when he realizes he is half-harpy. He literally represses his wings from coming out, he sees harpies as monsters and includes himself within this. It’s awful, and it’s sad, and it’s a mixture of Elliot’s meticulous research and adamant arguments that harpies are people, and that Luke isn’t a monster at all (and neither are harpies and other non-human creatures), and Serene’s calm acceptance of him, that helps him move through this.

This xenophobia, although clearly ingrained since childhood, don’t seem to be coming primarily from his family (certainly not from his mother) but from the culture of the borderguard in general. To me, it is implied that his father might at least casually buy into a lot of this, although he would never extend it to his son. It also is an interesting dynamic as related to the other two’s relationships with family, because Luke coming to love and accept himself, and to open his mind about non-human creatures, is actually him coming closer to his mother, rather than moving away. In my view, a part of why he bought in so clearly to this prejudice coming from the general bordercamp culture is because he was pushing away from his parents in the first place - he saw his parents being so wild and free in a way he knew he could never be that he pushed himself into the opposite side, into “reason” and restraint and conservatism. What he needed to learn was how to hold his more “traditional” wants and needs (although like, he’s kind of wrong about that. Elliott Schafer is not the traditional kind quiet love he’s imagining, and he didn’t want that anyway) while still celebrating all of the different approaches and cultures and loves out there, and that’s what he’s learning alongside Elliot and Serene. And he does this partially because Elliot’s love for him as a half-harpy is, according to his previous beliefs, just as wild and out there as his mother’s affair with his biological father, or all of Elliot’s flirting with various magical creatures. And as he accepts Elliot’s love, he accepts that too.

Serene-Heart-In-The-Chaos-of-Battle

From the first moment we meet Serene we know she ran away from home to join the border camp. She’s chosen to join the humans, to fight alongside men, to learn about the borderlands from a human perspective and use that to create an alliance and to create peace. She enters a world where she is looked down on, where she is sexualized and punished for trying to swim shirtless, and has to fight hard to take the classes she wants and have the opportunity to prove herself as she wishes. Instead of deciding her parents and community were right and going back to the elves, she digs her heels in and with Elliot and Luke’s help, fights back, fights to excel at the border camp and make things different and better, and prove her detractors wrong.

Not only that, but she learns to respect men in a way she was not raised to do, learns to treat men as equals and partners, always defending both Elliot and Luke when her community disrespects them. This prepares her for her relationship with Golden (although Elliot still helps her along a lot, especially with their written correspondence) and ends in her and Golden essentially eloping after Golden ran away to fight alongside her. It’s also important that she accepts Golden fighting alongside her. That was not at all a given, especially as even towards the middle of the book, she seems to be thinking of human men as capable of fighting and strength and other “womanly” qualities, but not necessarily believing the same of elven men. She’s chosen a nontraditional path and a GNC partner in Golden, and for the time being, her closest family is not her blood but her beautiful boyfriend, her swordsister, and her loved and loving best friend Elliot.

Elliot Schafer

Last but the opposite of least is Elliot. What Elliot learned from his family is that he will come to nothing, that he will be forgotten, and that he will not be loved. I am so angry on this child’s behalf, for the ways he was neglected not only by his parents but by everyone before Serene. The ways his father had no interest in him because all he wanted was Elliot’s mother back (and I love Elliot’s observation that even if his mother did come back, his father wouldn’t know what to do, and would not be happy). The way his teacher literally accepted a small bribe to just...... leave him at the entrance to the borderlands, and none of the students cared. The way his mother not only left when he was a child but knew who he was the second she saw or even heard about him at the bordercamp, and never bothered to tell him, or show any interest in him whatsoever.Elliot has been taught, over and over again, that he is unwanted and uncared for. That he has to go it alone, and fill his own needs.

Elliot learns to respect Commander Woodsinger and to know that while she doesn’t necessarily love him, she knows him, and appreciates who and what he is, and sees value and strength in it. She, unlike his previous teachers and school professionals, understands him, and likes him, and values him. She’s not warm, but she’s a positive presence in his life, and part of him learning to believe he has value just as he is, and not just because he spitefully decided it to go against what everyone else has told him, but because it’s actually true.

He didn’t want his parents and his peers and the adults who have let him down to be right about this, so he does dream of being loved back. But he shows himself fully prepared to be the one who loves more in relationships, especially with Serene. He’s ready, at first, to take all she’ll give him, and revel in each part of it, even if it doesn’t match up to his love for her. It’s not until the moment he turns down Serene’s final advance (when she’s clearly settling for him) that he realizes how much he wants to be chosen first. And he believes that’s possible, and worth waiting for (and that in the meantime, he will help Serene up and help her find what she truly wants too).

Elliot knows Serene loves him. She shows him he deserves love, and in his devotion to her, Elliot begins to excel and challenge himself and learn to see his brand of obnoxiousness as something that might not be everyone’s taste but isn’t inherently bad. He trusts Serene to love him, at least as a friend, but he doesn’t trust that Luke will, because Luke reminds him of all of the kids who hurt him in the past.

And that’s why the slowest arc of this whole book is probably Elliot realizing that Luke.... actually likes him. Actually wants to be around him, and enjoys his presence, and even like-likes him - loves him even. It just can’t compute for him. And so we get basically an unreliable narration for most of the book regarding Luke. Elliot’s “aha” moment about Luke rewrites years of his life, shifting his understanding of so much of their lives together. And it solidifies Elliot’s discovery that he can be loved exactly as he is, obnoxious and annoying and all. He’s found people who love him for it, and they’ve chosen him, and they’re going to stick around.

222 notes · View notes

unrestedjade · 3 years

Text

Baseless Ferengi headcanons no one asked for and that get increasingly queer-navel-gazing and self indulgent because the horrible space goblins have consumed my brain:

- Mobile ears, because if hearing is so well developed and important to them they should be able to aim those big stupid radar dishes. Also because then they can emote with them and that's cute. THE AESTHETIC IS PARAMOUNT.

- Since they canonically sharpen their teeth with chew sticks and sharpeners, their teeth must grow continuously. So I submit: subcultures that let certain teeth grow out as a fashion/political statement. Ferengi punks and anarchists with 5" tusks. Ferengi with all their teeth filed flat (mom and dad HATE it).

- Corollary to the above, most of their teeth are crooked. At the least, they don't share our fetish for straight teeth. What if their teeth are deciduous, and there's no point in trying to force them into perfect alignment, since they'll just fall out and get replaced? So like, sharks but their teeth can also grow longer with no limit. WHAT HAST EVOLUTION WROUGHT ON FERENGINAR :V

- Parents nagging their kids to sharpen their teeth "or they'll grow up into your brain and you'll die :)"

- Personal space? Don't know her.

Okay I need a cut because there's too many now. WHOLE SOCIETY OF GAY HOMOPHOBIC UNCLES AND AUNTS GO I HAVE A PROBLEM

- I can't remember who on here put forth the idea of them having retractable claws but Yes. :3

- Pushing back against the worst canon episode a bit but: relative ear size being the only obvious sexually dimorphic trait, and even that having enough of a gray area that the only way to be 100% sure you're talking to a male or female Ferengi is if you do a blood test. Unless they're intersex! *shrug emoji*

- This is why they're so fanatical about gender conformity and their Victorian "separate spheres" attitude to men and women's roles. Capitalist patriarchy is fragile! And as artificial to Ferengi as it ever was to Humans! (self-indulgenceeeee about gender shiiiiit)

- You know how with domesticated rabbits, the rabbit getting groomed and paid attention to is the boss? Yeah. Go ahead and paint your bestie's nails, just don't be surprised if she cops a little bit of an attitude with you from then on.

- Their fight/flight/freeze/fawn instincts skew heavily toward the last three, and what a lot of other species read as annoying sucking up is the Ferengi in question feeling anxious and unsafe. Especially if they don't feel integrated into the group. Even being at the bottom of the pecking order is better than not being in the flock at all.

- If they DO opt for fight, it's ugly and typically their last resort. Bites or scratches will get infected without intervention-- microbes that their immune system can handle could cause big trouble for aliens. You might wanna check for full or partial teeth that break off and get lodged in the wound, too.

- Too many of these are tooth related but I don't care. :B More teeth stuff: you know what else has teeth that grow constantly? Puffer fish. Likewise, Ferengi can chew up mollusk shells as easy as potato chips, and they need the minerals for their teeth. (Imagine grandpa Sisko offering Nog a crayfish for the first time and watching as he just...pops the whole damn thing in his mouth and crunches away...)

- Their staple foods seem to be grubs and other arthropods, high in protein and fat. I've unilaterally decided their cuisine also involves a lot of edible fungi, ferns, plant shoots and seeds. Gotta get those vitamins. Overall flavor profile leaning toward umami, vegetal, and fresh herbs, and pretty mild (or "delicate" if you wanna be snooty about it, which a Ferengi probably would let's be real).

- Not much sugary food. I'm basing this solely on Quark's aversion to root beer as "cloying". Which could definitely just be his personal preference, but most of the people I hear hating on root beer cite the actual sassafras/sarsaparilla flavor (saying it tastes like medicine) not the sweetness. Nog might be the weirdo outlier for being able to enjoy it.

- Their home planet isn't bright and sunny, so their eyes are better at discerning shades of gray in low light conditions, with relatively weak color vision. Which could explain why they dress Like That.

- Conversely, human music has a reputation for stinking on ice because a lot of it is juuuuust lightly dissonant or out of tune because we can't pick up flaws that small. Ferengi can, and it drives them up the *wall*.

- Music? So many different kinds. Traditionally, maybe lots of percussion and winds, and water as a common component of many instruments to alter pitch or tone. Polyphony out the ass. Some of the modern stuff is an impenetrable wall of sound if you're not a species with a lot of brain real estate devoted to processing sounds. Pick out one melody to follow at a time.

- Yes, back to teeth again I'm sorry. It's a sickness. At some point in their history, pre-chewing food was just something you did for your baby or great grandma as a matter of necessity. Possibly your baby gets an important boost to their immune system and gut biome from your spit. At some point takes on a more formal intimacy aspect and gradually drifted from something all adults and older kids do to something only women do. Your husband and older kids have perfectly functional teeth, but you love them, right? =_= (Think old memes about husbands being useless in the kitchen if little wifey isn't there to cook, but even more ridiculous. Ishka was right about everything but especially this. Thank you for making your family chew their own food, Ishka. Not all heroes wear capes. Or anything!)

- How did they get started on the whole men: clothed vs women: unclothed nonsense? My equally stupid idea: men just get cold easier. Those huge ears dissipate a ton of body heat. Cue Ferengi cliches like "jeez, we could be standing on the surface of the sun and my husband would put on another layer." At some point, again, this got codified and pushed to ridiculous extremes in the name of controlling women and keeping everyone in their assigned box, to the point that women just have to shiver if they really are too cold and men have to pass out from heat stroke if the alternative is going shirtless, because That Would Be Inappropriate.

- Marriages default to five years, but they're also the only avenue for women to have their own household or any stability. Plus their religion places no emphasis on purity save for pure adherence to the free market and the RoA. So, curveball to the rest of their patriarchal bullshit: female virginity isn't a concern in the least. Bring it up and they'll rightly side-eye you.

- Family law is absolutely bonkers and lawyers that specialize in it make BANK. I feel like custody would default to the father usually but oh wait, the maternal grandfather has a legal stake in this, too, and your next father-in-law is asking HOW many kids are you dragging into my daughter's house, etc etc. Growing up with a full sibling is way rarer than growing up with half or stepsiblings, since it usually takes both men and women two or three tries to find someone they vibe with. (Not love, unless you're super cringe.)

- A misogynistic society is a homophobic society. Imo those flavors of shittiness just come in pairs. Homosexual behaviors are fine within certain parameters (aka "always have sex with the boss") but not on your own terms. To add spice, bisexuality is their most common mode (because I'm bi and these are my hcs for my fics I'm not writing, so there), but capitalism demands fresh grist for the mill so you better get het-married and pop out some kids you lowly peons. You have a choice so make the proper one. :)

- Corollary to the above, that doesn't keep all kinds of illicit "we're just friends with quid-pro-quo benefits for realsies" affairs of every stripe and every gender from going on everywhere. Many Ferengi have a lightbulb moment somewhere in early adulthood when they figure out their dad's business partner or the "auntie" who visited their mom every month had a little more going on.

- Plus there's way more gender non-conformity and varying degrees of trans-ing than the powers that be have a handle on. Pel isn't unique, even if most would have to somehow make it out into space to be able to thrive.

Damn a lot of these are just my personal bugbears plus THE GILDED AGE BUT WITH HAIRLESS SPACE RODENTS ain't they

- Women can't earn profit, okay. But lending or "lending" things to each other isn't commerce, riiiiiiight? To be assigned female is to master navigating a vast, dizzying barter/gift economy. Smart boys and men leverage this, too, and there are splinter sects that view this as the purest expression of the Great Material Continuum.

- Of course plenty of women make profit anyway, and just do their bast to dodge the FCA. The tough thing about insisting on using latinum as currency is that cash can be so hard to track, you know?

- Because of the RoA, guys are discouraged from doing favors or giving gifts without setting clear expectation of getting some return on investment. This can twist into an expression of friendship (and of course women do it too), and the ledger will keep cycling between debit and credit among friends for decades. A common mistake aliens make is to tell them recompense isn't needed without explaining why, or return their favor or present with something that zeroes out the debt. The Ferengi will assume you want to break off the friendship. (I cribbed this from dim memories of an African studies course I took in 2007 and whose textbook I know I still have but I can't frigging find it...)

- Flirting, they do a lot of it for a lot of reasons. Roddenberry made it clear that they're just straight up pretty horny, but there's no reason it can't pull double duty for building alliances with other people, smoothing over feuds or disagreements, or cementing friendships. Ferengi who are ace and/or sex-repulsed are possibly viewed similar to the way we'd view someone who's "not a hugger/not big on touching" and if they flirt just don't get offended if it doesn't go any further; aro Ferengi don't garner much comment aside from an occasional "wow how badass, never falling in love with anyone."

- where to even start on making sense of the Blessed Exchequer??? Like seriously, what is this literal prosperity gospel insanity, I need to force myself to re-read Rand and like, some Milton Friedman for this shit. Help.

- fuck I'm probably going to actually do that, RIP me...

#ds9 #star trek #meta #ferengi #i love them Too Much help #reliving my brief libertarian phase from high school from the opposite direction #my heart wants to make them simultaneously as queer and as repressed as possible #i didn't even make it to the goddamned blessed exchequer my head is too full #i will find beauty in this vulgarity if it kills me #this is too long #why did i spend my time this way

138 notes · View notes

huskymaine · 2 years

Note

7, 11, 16, 18, 26 for Naruto Asks For 7 (Except Kakashi Vs Obito battle, Of course)

For 18 (Except Kakashi LOL)

Aye aye, Captn!

7) which battle was your favorite (Except Kakashi Vs Obito battle, Of course)

Kakashi and Team 10 vs Kakuzu and Hidan XD XD

Okay okay, my favorite non-Kakashi battle is Naruto vs Pain. The graphic is dynamic and downright funny. Madara vs Alliance Shinobi is the fight that equals Kakashi vs Obito in awesomeness imo, but I pity those Alliance Shinobis too much while in Naruto vs Pain's case I kinda hate Pain/Nagato before he used Rinne Tensei so I felt happy for every blow he received from raged Kyuubi haha.

11) how would you wear your headband

Can I wear it on my chest? Dunno, my head is quite strong and it seems like a waste to wear a piece of metal on my hard forehead. Or maybe I wear it on my neck, especially near my artery.

16) how long have you been into naruto

Honestly my experience in Naruto fandom is quite on-off. I think every millennial kids from my country binge watching Naruto after coming home from elementary school, and I remember debating about Byakugan vs Sharingan with my real life bestie when we were like 10 (I am huge Neji fan back then). Then when I was 14 I was following War arc intensely because at that time Tobito reveal truly chilled my back and peaked my interest, but then got bored by fillers and when I went to college I remove all of my Naruto episodes T_T then recently at the end of 2021 I was recommended a fanfic about Jinchurikis (I recommend you to read this beautiful fic, it's funny and heartwarming and the pairing is platonic SNS). Anyway the Jinchuriki I like in the fic is Yagura a.k.a Sanbi's Jinchuriki, then I searched info about Yagura and Sanbi, and thanks to Sanbi's strong relation with Team Minato tragedy I remembered why I really like Tobito reveal and Kakashi's massive mindfuck haha

18) favorite character (Except Kakashi LOL)

OBITO! I mean obviously, Tobito reveal is what brought me back to Naruto fandom after all. For some reason I can't comprehend, Team Minato's tragedy moved my heart so much when I was 14 and now, like even thinking about them clenched my heart. I also like the twist of a very nice boy, a pure entity in Kakashi's memory, turned into a Harbinger of Disaster who literally started all the shits that happened on canon. I was like, disappointed hard by his multiple horrendous action but also that bastard has audacity to make me cry on his death scene and flashbacks. I wanna smack him but also pitied him so much and want to wrap him in a warm blanket. While for Kakashi I won't even rudely pity him because pretty sure his mental strength is way waaaayyyyy stronger than mine and anyone I know (I will still choke Kishimoto to be so sadist toward him though, Gai's revival is the only thing that saved him from my murderous mode).

26) favorite uchiha

Uchiha Obito of course hehe. Love him as my bunny little Obito, love him as dorky Tobi, love him as menacing fake Madara, love him at unhinged Obito who just so angry at the world. Also, let's be real here, Kamui is the coolest Sharingan ability XD XD

#ask game answers #I mean Tsukuyomi is cool yes #but Kamui is the best *chef kiss*#and Kotoamatsukami is boring #(hide from Itachi and Shisui fans)#thanks for the ask!#kakashi appreciation

5 notes · View notes

rhetoricandlogic · 2 years

Text

Gary K. Wolfe Reviews Black Water Sister by Zen Cho

June 30, 2021 Gary K. Wolfe

Zen Cho quickly earned a reputation for wit and style with her debut novel Sorcerer to the Crown, with its entertaining but sharp critique of racism, sexism, and colonialism in Regency England, but the novel also introduced a powerful Malaysian witch. Malaysian magic played a more central role in the sequel The True Queen, but none of this should have surprised readers of Cho’s first book, the Crawford Award-winning Spirits Abroad, which will be reissued later this year in an expanded edition from Small Beer Press. The stories in that collection were rich in Malaysian and Chinese lore, and so is Cho’s new novel Black Water Sister. With its contemporary setting, family tensions, and issues ranging from cultural homophobia to predatory real estate development, it may seem a departure for admirers of the Sorcerer Royal novels, but in fact it rings closer to home than almost anything I’ve seen from this talented author. If she was playing with Regency romances in those earlier novels or with wuxia traditions in her novella The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water, here she’s writing in a voice that is utterly contemporary, with a setting that derives from acute character observation rather than historical invention. As much as we might have enjoyed her version of Regency England, those of us unfamiliar with Malaysia come away from Black Water Sister practically feeling we could make our way around Cho’s vivid portrait of Penang without a guidebook.

That is not to suggest that the novel lacks supernatural fireworks. Jess Teoh, an unemployed Harvard grad who had moved to the US as a child, has to return to Malaysia with her parents after her father loses his job, mostly as a result of a serious illness. Not long after, she begins hearing a distinct voice in her head, which turns out to be her recently deceased grandmother Ah Ma, a delightful cross between a cantankerous meddling relative and a more ominous manipulative spirit. Ah Ma has failed or refused to move on because of unfinished business, some of which involves a real estate magnate whose latest development involves destroying the shrine of a local goddess, the Black Water Sister of the title. Jess’s involvement with her grandmother and the goddess – either of whom might take over her body and lend her unexpected strength – leads to some harrowing confrontations with corporate gangsters, including an attempted rape and murder which some readers might find disturbing, but also to an odd near-alliance with the son of the predatory real estate developer.

Along with the supernatural elements is the tale of Jess’s own family, which is compelling in its own way. Jess and her parents have been taken in by a wealthy relative in Penang, at least until her father can earn enough money to afford their own home and, as if Jess didn’t have enough problems adjusting to a society she barely knows and trying to deal with a meddlesome ghost in her head, she’s not yet told her parents that she’s gay, or about her lover Sharanya, whom she hopes to eventually join in Singapore. (The mostly offstage Sharanya is a fairly amorphous character we could do to learn more about.) One of Jess’s more unsettling visions doesn’t directly involve battling ghosts or gods or gangsters, but rather the fear that Jess’s sexual orientation might cause her wealthy relatives to evict her whole family, given Malaysian attitudes toward homosexuality, which the novel doesn’t shy away from. Black Water Sister is suspenseful enough as a supernatural adventure to keep most readers enthralled, but it’s equally engaging on the level of purely mimetic fiction, examining the very real issues of family, culture, and identity that haunt Jess as much as her family ghosts. But then, maybe that’s what family ghosts really are in the first place.

#Zen Choo #Black Water Sister #mahreviews #long post

4 notes · View notes

trans-advice · 4 years

Link

[NOTE: we changed the bullets to numbers in order to help with readability of this relatively long post. there is no other purpose for the list numbering.]

Redistribute resources to support Black trans liberation and survival! Split a donation to all the orgs listed on this page OR allocate specific amounts to individual groups. Then be sure to share this page once you're done.

**All funds donated go directly to the groups listed via ActBlue. Feel free to reach out to them if you have any questions**

Last week, many people shared that it was hard to track down a centralized place to find a list of specifically Black trans groups. This page is part of an effort to create an easier way for people to find and donate specifically to Black trans work and people right now. We know that this list is not complete, and it will be continually updated. If you have questions or would like to add an org in your area to this page, please email: [email protected].

The groups listed in this first section only accept donations through PayPal, CashApp, or Venmo. Please support their important work by clicking over to their websites here:

Trans Sistas of Color Project Detroit: Exists to uplift, impact and influence that lives and welfare of transgender women of color in Detroit.

En-Poder-Arte (Colombia) Founded by an Afro-Colombian trans woman and other trans women of color. A few months ago, they launched a community house, which provides safe housing to Black trans women and trans women of color.

F2L Relief Fund: Provides commissary support (and legal representation & financial assistance) for incarcerated LGBTQ and Two-Spirit POC in NY State.

Middle Tennessee Black and Indigenous Support Fund: A community fund for Black and Indigenous queer and trans folks living and participating in rural Middle TN, with a goal to foster wealth redistribution in its larger community, direct the funds to Black and Indigenous community members, and build the leadership of Black and Indigenous community members.

Tournament Haus Fund: Mutual Aid fund for protestors and Trans/NonBinary BIPOC in the ballroom scene in Portland/Tacoma/Seattle.

TAKE Birmingham: A peer support group for trans women of color to come together and share their narratives. Also organizing around discrimination in the workplace, housing advocacy, & support for sex workers.

Black Excellence Collective Transport for Black NYC LGBTQ+ Protestors: Raising funds to provide safe transport for Black LGBTQ+ Protestors.

Kween Culture: Provides programming towards social and cultural empowerment of transgender women of color.

Black Trans Travel Fund : A mutual aid project developed to provide Black transgender women with the financial resources to self-determine safer alternatives to travel, so they feel less likely to experience verbal harassment or physical harm.

Heaux History Project: A documentary series and archival project exploring Black and Brown erotic labor history and the fight for sex workers’ rights.

Homeless Black Trans Women Fund: Supports Black Trans women that live in Atlanta and are sex workers and/or homeless.

Reproductive Justice Access Collective (ReJAC): A New Orleans network that aims to share information, resources, ideas, and human power to create and implement projects in our community that operate within the reproductive justice framework.

Rainbow Sunrise Mapambazuko/RSM (Democratic Republic of Congo): Fights for the Promotion of the rights and equality of LGBTQ people in DRC and is today facing this covid-19 crisis which further weakens Black LGBTQ people and more particularly transgender Black women.

Compiled direct donation links for individual Black Trans folks A compilation of direct donation links to Black trans people, including GoFundMes and CashApp handles. Email address on page to add to this list.

Below are the orgs you can support through the split donation form (on the right, if you're on a computer, or below if you're on a mobile device):

For The Gworls: This fund provides assistance to Black trans folks around travel to and from medical facilities, and co-pay assistance for prescriptions and (virtual) office visits. ⁣

Black Trans Fund: The first national fund in the country dedicated to uplifting and resourcing Black trans social justice leaders. BTF seeks to address the lack of funding for Black trans communities in the U.S. through direct grantmaking, capacity building support, and funder organizing to transform philanthropy.

Nationz Foundation: Provides education and information related to HIV prevention and overall health and wellness, while inspiring the community to take responsibility for their health while working towards a more inclusive Central Virginia for LGBTQIA+ identified individuals.

Trans Justice Funding Project: Supports grassroots trans justice groups run by and for trans people, focusing on organizing around racism, economic injustice, transmisogyny, ableism, immigration, and incarceration.

Third Wave Fund: An activist fund led by and for women of color, intersex, queer, and trans people under 35 years of age to resource the political power, well-being, and self determination of communities of color and low-income communities. Includes rapid response grantmaking, multi-year unrestricted grants, and the Sex Worker Giving Circle.

Unique Womens Coalition: The first Los Angeles based supportive organization for and by Transgender people of color, committed to fostering the next generation of black trans leadership from within community through mentorship, scholarship, and community care engagement work.

Black Trans Women Inc.: A national nonprofit organization committed to providing the trans-feminine community with programs and resources to help inspire individual growth and contributions to the greater good of society to meet its mission of uplifting the voice, heart and soul of black transwomen.

Black Trans Men Inc.: The first national nonprofit social advocacy organization with a specific focus on empowering African American transgender men by addressing multi-layered issues of injustice faced at the intersections of racial, sexual orientation, and gender identities.

SisTers/Brothers PGH: A transgender drop-in space, resource provider and shelter transitioning program based in Pittsburgh, PA.

Love Me Unlimited for Life: A catalyst that helps our transgender community members reach their goals and fulfill their potential through advocacy and outreach activities.

My Sistah's House Memphis: Designed to bring about social change within the Trans Community in Memphis, by providing a safe meeting space and living spaces for those who are most vulnerable in the LGBTQ+ community.

Black LGBTQIA Migrant Project: Builds and centers the power of Black LGBTQIA+ migrants through community-building, political education, direct services, and organizing across borders. BLMP is providing cash assistance to Black LGBTQ+ migrants and first generation people dealing with the impact of COVID-19.

Taja’s Coalition at St. James Infirmary: Empowers their community in navigating housing, medical services, legal services, and the workplace, as well as regularly training agencies in the SF Bay Area.

Marsha P. Johnson Institute: Helps employ black trans people, build more strategic campaigns, launch winning initiatives, and interrupt the people who are standing in the way of more being possible in the world for BLACK Trans people, and all people.

Black Trans Protestors Emergency Fund organized by Black Trans Femme in the Arts Collective : Supports Black trans protestors with resources like bail and medical care.

Black & Pink Bail Fund: A national prison abolitionist organization dedicated to dismantling the criminal punishment system and the harms caused to LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV/AIDS who are affected by the system through advocacy, support, and organizing.

Black Visions Collective (MN): Black Visions Collective centers their work in healing and transformative justice principles and develops Minnesota’s emerging Black leadership, creating the conditions for long term success and transformation.

SNaPCo: A Black, trans-led, broad-based collaborative to restore an Atlanta where every person has the opportunity to grow and thrive without facing unfair barriers, especially from the criminal legal system.

Brave Space Alliance: Created to fill a gap in the organizing of and services to trans and gender-nonconforming people on the South and West Sides of Chicago, where very few LGBTQ advocacy networks exist.

Okra Project/Tony McDade and Nina Pop Mental Health Fund: Provides Black Trans people with quality mental health & therapy. Also addresses food security in Black trans communities.

House of GG: A nonprofit, founded by legendary trans activist Miss Major Griffin-Gracy, that is raising money to build a permanent home where Transgender people can come, feel safe, and be part of a growing network of Southern trans people who are working for social justice.

TGI Justice Project: TGI Justice Project is a group of transgender, gender variant and intersex people -- inside and outside of prisons, jails and detention centers -- challenging and ending human rights abuses committed against TGI people in California prisons, jails, detention centers and beyond.

Trans Women of Color Collective: TWOCC exists to create revolutionary change by uplifting the narratives, leadership, and lived experience of trans people of color.

Youth Breakout: BreakOUT! seeks to end the criminalization of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth to build a safer and more just New Orleans, organizing with youth ages 13-25 who are directly impacted by the criminal justice system.

Translash: A trans-led project uses the power of individual stories to help save trans lives, shifting the cultural understanding of what it means to be transgender, especially during a time of social backlash, to foster inclusion and decrease anti-trans hostility.

TRANScending Barriers: A trans-led trans-issue focused organization whose mission is to empower the transgender and gender non-conforming community in Georgia through community organizing with leadership building, advocacy, and direct services.

My Sistah's House: A trans-led nonprofit providing first hand experience as well as field research to create a one-stop shop for finding doctors, social groups and safe spaces for the trans community, providing emergency shelter, access to sexual health services, and social services.

Dem Bois: A national organization with the mission to provide charitable economical aid for female to male, FTM, trans-masculine identified person(s) of color ages twenty-one years old and older for them to obtain chest reconstruction surgery, and or genital reassignment surgery in order to help them on their journey to live a more fulfilled physical, mental, and self-authentic life.

G.L.I.T.S: Approaches the health and rights crises faced by transgender sex workers holistically using harm reduction, human rights principles, economic and social justice, along with a commitment to empowerment and pride in finding solutions from our own community.

Emergency Release Fund: Aims to ensure that no trans person at risk in New York City jails remains in detention before trial; if cash bail is set for a trans person in New York City and no bars to release are in place, bail will be paid by the Emergency Release Fund.

HEARD: Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of Deaf Communities: Supports deaf, hard of hearing, deafblind, deafdisabled, and disabled (“deaf/disabled”) people at every stage of the criminal legal system process, up to and including during and after incarceration.

Black Trans Advocacy Coalition COVID-19 Community Response Grant: Works daily to end discrimination and inequities faced in health, employment, housing and education to improve the lived experience of transgender people.

Princess Janae Place: Provides referrals to housing for chronically homeless LGBTQ adults in the New York Tri-state area, with direct emphasis on Trans/GNC people of color.

The Transgender District: Aims to stabilize and economically empower the transgender community through ownership of homes, businesses, historic and cultural sites, and safe community spaces.

Assata’s Daughters: A Black woman-led, young person-directed organization rooted in the Black Radical Tradition. AD organizes young Black people in Chicago by providing them with political education, leadership development, mentorship, and revolutionary services.

Collective Action for Safe Spaces: A grassroots organization that uses comprehensive, community-based solutions through an intersectional lens to eliminate public gendered harassment and assault in the DC area.

The Knights and Orchids Society (TKO): Strives to build the power of the TLGB community for African Americans throughout rural areas in Alabama & across the south, to obtain our dream of justice and equality through group economics, education, leadership development, and organizing cultural work.

The Outlaw Project: Based on the principles of intersectionality to prioritize the leadership of people of color, transgender women, gender non-binary and migrants for sex worker rights in Phoenix, AZ. Ensuring our rights and health as a first step will ensure the rights and health of all sex workers.

WeCare TN: Supports trans women of color in Memphis, TN, through education, and empowerment, with the goal to ensure that transwomen of color have the same equity and quality of life as envisioned.

HEARD (Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of Deaf Communities): Supports deaf, hard of hearing, deafblind, deafdisabled, and disabled (“deaf/disabled”) people at every stage of the criminal legal system process, up to and including during and after incarceration.

Community Ele'te (Richmond, VA) To establish unity, provide safe sex awareness and education, linkage to resources, emergency housing assistance, and empower the community to make positive lifestyle decisions.

TAJA's Coalition: An organization dedicated to ending violence against Black Trans women and Trans women of color based in San Francisco

Black Trans Task Force: (BTTF) is an intersectional, multi-generational project of community building, research, and political action addressing the crisis of violence against Black Trans people in the Seattle-Tacoma area.

The Transgender District: Aims to stabilize and economically empower the transgender community through ownership of homes, businesses, historic and cultural sites, and safe community spaces.

Trans Sistas of Color Project Detroit: exists to uplift, impact and influence that lives and welfare of transgender women of color in Detroit.

Black Trans Media (Brooklyn, NY): We are #blacktranseverything storytellers, organizers, poets, healers, filmmakers, facilitators here to confront racism and transphobia trans people of the diaspora committed to decolonizing media and community education

Garden of Peace, Inc.(Pittsburgh, PA): Centers black trans & queer youth, elevates and empowers the narratives and lived experiences of black youth and their caretakers, and guides revolutionary spaces of healing and truth through art, education, and mentorship.

House of Pentacles (Durham, NC): HOP is a Film Training Program and Production House designed to launch Black trans youth (ages 18-35) into the film industry and tell stories woven at the intersection of being Black and Trans. We have a simple mission: to train the next generation of Black trans storytellers and filmmakers, to leverage our brand to get Black trans filmmakers paid projects in their communities, and to pay Black trans trainees to work on HOP projects that further the stories of Black trans people globally.

Minnesota Transgender Health Coalition (Minneapolis, MN): is committed to improving health care access and the quality of health care received by trans and gender non-conforming people through education, resources, and advocacy.

RARE Productions (Minneapolis, MN): Arts and entertainment media production company for LGBTQ people of color that promotes, produces, and co-creates opportunities and events utilizing innovative artistic methods and strategies.

Baltimore Safe Haven: providing opportunities for a higher quality of life for transgender people in Baltimore City living in survival mode.

Transgender Emergency Fund of Massachusetts: recently helped organize a Trans Resistance Vigil and March through Boston, in place of the Boston Pride Parade that was cancelled due to COVID-19.

Semillas: In Borikén/Puerto Rico, our trans, gender non-conforming and queer communities are facing many obstacles to our survival, and not only due to Mariá.

Street Youth Rise Up: Our campaign is to change the way Chicago sees and treats its homeless home free and street based youth who do what they have to do to survive.

Trans(forming): A membership-based organization led by trans men, intersex, gender non-conforming people of color, to provide resources and all around transitional support.

#donation post #trans resources #signal boost #signal boooooost #black trans lives matter

81 notes · View notes

channarroo · 3 years

Text

Not to beat a dead horse but imagine Sakura saving Karin in 484 instead of Naruto saving her. Under the cut because it is GAY and LONG and also SAKUKARI heavy

SPECIFICALLY imagine instead of having Sakura hesitate and Sasuke getting the jump on her, picture her jumping into action from the get go when she sees an injured girl just lying on the floor covered in blood and, as Sasuke is now made aware that the rest of team 7 are nearby and he might have to put up a fight, he goes to bite Karin again, gingerly picking up her wrist and...you know...

BUT WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW!!!

Sakura seeing her teammate, so far removed, that she LEAPS into action and grabs Karin from him. As she takes Karin back to her side, making the same sinister eye contact with Sasuke that Naruto had in his place, no man coming to save them!! She so softly places a tiny Katsuyu on Karin after examining her wounds, making a very shounen hero™ promise to finish her healing personally ( yes she is holding her flexed muscle, you don’t even need to ask ). Sakura, already aware that she’ll be forced to fight Sasuke now or risk feeling guilt over his future actions later knowing she could have subdued him, feels a small ‘annoying’ slip past her lips as Sasuke advances towards her. She doesn’t even give him the CHANCE to choke her, grabbing his wrist and flinging him as she puts up such a good fight.

A Sakura so sure of herself she can punch a dent into his susanoo and make a small opening (even if she can’t break it- yet ). Much more matured, she uses her knowledge of Konoha’s Great Clans Techniques on the battlefield ( even if previously everyone around her had tried to convince her that book smarts meant nothing if you had brawn ) and pinpoints the weaknesses in Sasuke’s sharingan, and his character, calling him out the same way he had done her when she misstepped as a child. She grieves for that detached young boy she thought she truly loved, but now she’s older, and she so selfishly feels the need to take on the burdens of the people Sasuke’s hurt (Naruto, the Raikage, Karin, who knows how many else while they’ve been apart?) and make amends.

Showing off her near masterful manipulation of her chakra (cuz hello they’re fighting on water duh ) and Sakura being allowed to show her progress by actually exchanging blows and landing her own. She continues beating down the restored Sasuke who KEEPS doubting her and her skill as they do a GREAT amount of damage to each other ( cuz let team 7 be equal challenge ). It only comes to an end- despite how short their actual fight is, it feels like hours to her- as a concerned Obito kamui’s Sasuke away, recognizing the same bone breaking, skull shattering techniques that only her master could have taught her ( even if the force of her punches are much more denser and heavier than Tsunade’s ).

She never hesitates to save Karin, she still cries for her all the same, her warm tears mixing with the blood on Karin’s cheek. Instead of Kakashi, she carries the young woman back to Konoha, all the way making such natural conversation to break down such a sad girl’s exterior. This time, she so kindly talks to Karin, refuting any claims that her actions were unnecessary or the insistence that Sakura at least bite Karin to repay her debt for saving her from Sasuke. A subtle apology at the way Karin’s been deceiving the earnest, naive and unbearably brash girl. Sakura, as stubborn as she is, can’t begin to imagine the idea of another shinobi owing her anything when she performs her duty as not only a medical-nin, but as a girl who can’t bear to see another girl hurt. ( Yes in the gay way. )

Karin, an equally stubborn girl, can’t help but think of how she is undeserving to bask in the soft, ticklish, but eroded with hard edges hidden beneath a light pink chakra of somebody she can’t even begin to be honest with. She wonders if she can tell Sakura her ulterior motive for joining Sasuke’s ‘team’, she refers to it sarcastically. She notes the way her, Juugo and Suigetsu were disregarded for Sasuke to reach his true goal. Not that hers were innocent, of course. She had planned to do just the same as soon as she reached hers as well. So in that regard, maybe her alliance with Sasuke was some sort of divine punishment?

But as she sat, arguing with such a childish kunoichi back to her run down village and slyly absorbing her abundance of chakra ( and charming wink, even if it’s just to assure her the village is close and she can get a proper check up ), Karin has to think: why dwell on a distant past when a pleasant future is just within reach? That is, if she’s as deserving as the rosette keeps insisting.

...

In a quiet little moment alone in her hospital bed, a few rooms down from Karin (who she cannot stop visiting, despite Shizune’s protests), Sakura is allowed introspection away from Naruto’s remorseful eye. Although she still cries for Sasuke, she realizes that being a shinobi isn’t about waiting for the higher ups to assign a mission and completing it to task like mundane paperwork, never expressing doubt with the system. It’s challenging it at every step and being the hero (you) your friends need, because that’s what a good hero does, not a shinobi. And those terms are not synonymous.

#naruto #sakura haruno #sakukarin #also sakura saving karin doesn't throw off the minakushi parallels because an uzumaki is still being saved by a smart weirdo at the end of #the day lol #💭.txt #im not here anymore so i guess i can post drafts lol #its uhm...something

35 notes · View notes

theliterateape · 3 years

Text

I Like to Watch | Shang-Chi and The Legend of the Ten Rings

By Don Hall

Hearts and Minds

The United States posited a slew of reasons for invading and occupying Afghanistan. Some were justified, others were falsified. The reason given most often was the amorphous win their hearts and minds nonsense as if any country could be won over by occupation at home and ridicule from across the ocean.

Hearts and minds are not won over with force or material goods. Hearts and minds are won over with ideas and those ideas cannot be sledgehammered in but more subtly presented. Those ideas have to be normalized.

Back in 2008—clearly a big year for LGBT rights—the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation did a survey of more than 2,000 U.S. adults 18 and older and found that two in 10 of them had changed their views of gays and lesbians in the previous five years to a more favorable one.

Their reasons? 34 percent said their views were influenced by seeing gay or lesbian characters on TV, and 29 percent said it was by a gay or lesbian character on film. Hollywood has been streaming LGBT characters into American homes for decades. The arc of inclusion may be long, and it bends towards pop culture.

Characters in comic books have advanced the conversation. Although independent comics lead the way with characters like Maggie and Hopey in Love and Rockets, for years the Comics Code Authority—and cultural attitudes—limited the role of LGBT characters in mainstream superhero titles. Over the last couple of decades, however, LGBT characters like the reimagined Batwoman and Green Lantern Alan Scott have made their way into comics, and both Marvel and DC have featured superhero storylines that featured same-sex marriage.

No question that this is a wonderful thing for those LGBT consumers—seeing someone like you on a big or small screen is important and valid. That, however, is not the most important part of greater and more diverse representation in pop culture. What increased exposure of those most marginalized does, more than anything else, is win the hearts and minds of the majority of Americans.

This is the same for black Americans. In recent years, we see more and more black men and women on our screens, in our Netflix queues, on television and Hulu. For millions of Americans (and not merely white Americans) this slow reminder of the humanity of black Americans de-stigmatizes and expands the reductive monolithing of 14% of our population away from stereotypes and into the homes of people far less likely to encounter blacks in their communities.

Contrary to the concept that America is fundamentally racist, I'd argue we are fundamentally segregated. The flyover states with the majority of Americans unexperienced in the multicultural experiment (Iowa, Kansas, Arizona, Maine, Nebraska, Utah, both Dakotas, Vermont—all of which have less than five percent of the entire state population who are black) are populated with people who watch movies and television.

These folks who have little contact with black Americans on a daily basis have representation in their theaters and homes every weekend and every night. They spend their money (but more crucially, their time) watching The Protege, Candyman, Summer of Soul, Escape Room: Tournament of Champions and All American, Insecure, The Chi, and The Equalizer. This is significant and, while foments often glacial changes in attitudes and mores, grows a deeper understanding and empathy with every viewing.

Which brings us to the MCU. Arguably a juggernaut built upon the successes of white male protagonists as the MCU has gained in worldwide popularity and influence so has Kevin Feige's commitment to expanding those cultural boundaries with increased inclusion. Black Panther is far from the best Marvel movie or even comic book movie in existence but it was a cultural moment that a major studio had never before created.

Sure, whole communities of black people buying out theaters so that black children could celebrate seeing heroes who looked like them was significant but more significant was that millions of white fanboys watched an all-black cast in a movie that included Afro-futurism and incredibly badass black women at its core play out in their backyards.

The Master of Kung Fu

Shang-Chi was created by writer Steve Englehart and artist Jim Starlin, debuting in Special Marvel Edition #15 in 1972. Created as a response to huge television success of Kung Fu, the character was originally known as the son of Fu Manchu and, when the rights to that character were denied, became the son of Xu Wenwu, the Mandarin. At one point, he was a part of Heroes for Hire which featured both Iron Fist and Luke Cage.

It is notable that the genius of Marvel is in connecting the past with the coming Phase 4 whether by intention or retroactively. The Ten Rings army was responsible for kidnapping Tony Stark way back in 2008. Jumping ahead to Iron Man 3 we meet Trevor Slattery, the fake Mandarin and then a Marvel One Shot that shows Slattery kidnapped from prison to meet Xu Wenwu. All in set-up for the latest MCU addition.

More like Thor than the typical origin film, Shang-Chi dumps right in the middle of things. The movie begins with the backstory of Xu Wenwu (Tony Leung)—narrated entirely in Mandarin Chinese by Jiang Li (Fala Chen)—and his possession of the ten rings. In the comic books the rings were on his fingers with each designated with a power. Now, they're more like martial arts practice rings, five on each arm and capable of pretty much anything the special effects team could come up.

Then we meet Shang-Chi (Simu Liu) and his friend, Katy (Awkwafina). The two are a winning combination and, wonderfully, are not romantically involved. Parking cars by day, singing karaoke by night until, on a San Francisco bus, the Ten Rings gang (lead by a giant white dude with a laser sword for a right hand) attack him for a pendant left by his deceased mother.

Shang-Chi doesn't need those magical rings to completely kick ass—he is the Master of Kung Fu without them. The sequence is fun, fast, clean, and ends with Katy contributing to the graces of saving an entire bus load of citizens while Shang beats the shit out of the thugs.

And off we go. A Macau fighting club run by his sister that is like an underground MMA for magical beings. An escape on the side of a building fighting ninjas. Some flashbacks informing the secret city behind the trees where his mom came from and how Shang became the warrior he is at the hands of his father. A water map on the floor. Sir Ben Kingsley and a faceless furry with wings. More backstory. Two dragons. A showdown. An arrow. Two end credit scenes.

It's a fucking Marvel movie, after all.

The lengths the director (Destin Daniel Cretton) goes to find authenticity in everything from language, customs, and dress to be a fully realized Asian American film as well as a superhero ride is laudable. His treatment of Xu Wenwu is one more in a chain of villains who seem less villainess and more driven by sorrow or justifiable rage.

Early MCU baddies were nuts. The Red Skull (power hungry madman), Obadiah Stane (power hungry madman), Malekith (power hungry Dark Elf madman), Ronan (power hungry...you get the picture). More recently, the MCU is moving away from the Good vs. Evil narratives and presenting a more complicated version of opposing forces in the universe.

Thanos, while a genocidal monster, was still persuasive in some way. Not the insane, cackling lunatic one would naturally associate with villainy but a being with a sense of purpose who does not see himself to be the bad guy. Kilmonger from Black Panther is the same—his rage is justified and only his means are nefarious. Xu Wenwu is less an evil warlord and more a grieving widower weary of conquest and unable to connect with his children.

Making even the master criminal relatable while simultaneously rooting for the hero is no small feat. It demonstrates a complexity of thought and perspective one would not expect from superhero movies and represents opportunities for the discussion of who our bad guys are in the non-cinematic world.

Combining that sophistication with an increasing diversity in who are the heroes—black, Asian, Latina—makes everyone relatable.

That's the crux of the foothold pop culture has on change. Make everyone relatable and even the kid in Kansas who has only known the two Korean kids in his class can find purchase of the magnificent multicultural country we continue to forge.

#Shang-Chi

3 notes · View notes

granvarones · 3 years

Text

Like most people, I learned about Nicki Minaj and her love of the color pink during my early gay social media days on Myspace and Tumblr. I was in middle school navigating insecurities that come were flamed by a culture of “boy team vs. girl team” gym activities and the suffocating male gender norms of “hard vs. soft.” But it was the very discovery of Nicki Minaj and her “Playtime Is Over” mixtape that I not only became a stan—or a “barb” according to the world fandom, but I found a way to tap into parts of myself I was still trying to figure out.

The mixtape pushed boundaries in Hip-Hop and introduced us to Nicki’s rap style that includes a genius play on words, metaphors, and theatrics. It was all of this as well as the mixtape’s now-legendary artwork that hinted at her Barbie persona that left my 12-year-old self captivated. I began to make connections to what her presence in Hip-Hop was slowly doing to how I was navigating gender and sexuality. I could remix and define it myself. I could think outside of the box of what the world was telling me.

By the time I began the 9th grade, Nicki and Trina were two of my favorite artists. Nicki Minaj had released her last mixtape “Beam Me Up Scotty.” The artwork depicted her as a superhero that Hip-Hop and Pop music certainly needed. It was clear that she was coming to the rescue. My high school didn’t allow students to have their phones in the building due to fears that students would cheat on tests. Fortunately, there was always a student that snuck their phone into the school like contraband so that we could blast “I Get Crazy” and “Itty Bitty Piggy” during lunch. Nicki had the students organizing! In 2010, I was attending a high school that was anything but affirming of LGBTQ students. And it was difficult on just about every level. Friends and I attempted to establish an official GSA (Gay-Straight Alliance/Gender & Sexuality Alliance), or maybe it was an unofficial Barbz Club. We weren’t allowed to as part of the series of unofficial policies. Not only did this remind us that the school was hostile towards LGBTQ students, but there really wasn’t a place for us to connect inside or out of school. Some days at school were so bad that I didn’t want to go back to school, and I loved school!

youtube

After numerous high-profile features, Nicki finally released her debut album “Pink Friday,” on November 22, 2010. The unofficial GSA/Barbz Club was supported by a guidance counselor, Ms. Williams, and a science teacher, Ms. Jacobson, who offered us the classroom to convene and of course listen to the album. The album peaked at number 2 on the Billboard 200 and marked the second-highest debut week in the history of female hip-hop recording artists.

“Pink Friday” was just what 10th-grade Armonté needed—an embrace of the different, the fun, the pink. It’s wild to remember how just a few years ago hip hop was still seen as straight and cisgender male-dominated. The genre was especially known for its stigmatizing opinion and lyrics about LGBTQ people. Through Nicki’s genre-bending music and creative style, especially her campy pink wig, she carved out a space in hip hop for “outsiders” to enjoy and relate to.

youtube

“Pink Friday” was a cultural moment. Two of the album’s singles “Super Bass,” and “Moment 4 Life,” are not only hip-hop classics but are two of the most influential pop songs of the last 20 years. “Pink Friday” wasn’t just a rap album, but one that equally celebrated pop and R&B. A quick “Nicki Minaj Pop-Rap” Google search will send you down the rabbit hole of critiques and opinions about Nicki’s blend of the multiple genres. Most critiques, current and in the past, are still unable to grasp a Black woman’s ability to exist outside of more than one genre at the same time.

“Pink Friday” made it clear that Nicki Minaj was an out-of-the-box artist that would continue to challenge binary thinking and create a new path. From appearing as a guest judge on American Idol, fashion deals with K-Mart and Fendi, and major collaborations with MAC and OPI, Nicki has shown the heights of where a rapper can go with their career. Not only has Nicki Minaj given fans music and accessories, but also a constant nod that it’s okay to be different through her colorful costumes and wigs. Since its debut, Nicki Minaj has released hundreds of features, three chart-topping albums, and made appearances in movies. Her charisma, endurance, and talent has inspired a generation of fans to be true to themselves and fight double standards.

Today I celebrate the birthday of Nicki Minaj, a global phenomenon that continues to encourage me to think, move, and be outside the box.

#nicki minaj #queer #gay #afro-latinx #storytelling #latinx #granvarones

11 notes · View notes