Piggybacking off of my Akamomo headcanon about nicknames, I'd also like to think post-Extra Game, as the Teiko gang's bond becomes stronger, everyone slowly transitions to referring to each other by their given names. Akashi is the last to do it and is very hesitant about it because of the very specific implications of him referring to his friends by their given names. But they reassure him that it's fine and he doesn't have to worry about trying to differentiate which personality is in control anymore since his other self canonically vanished after Extra Game (even though I have my own separate thoughts about it but whatever). This is the first time he's had the pleasure of referring to his friends this familiarly out of affection, and he realized how great it felt to finally get to this level of friendship after years of thinking it would never happen because he thought he ruined everything in Teiko.
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okay sorry but when angel says “unlike me, she won’t have to go through it alone” (or smth like that) and cordy says “you’re not alone.” i get so pissed. for no actual real reason other than the fact that no, he’s not alone right now but he very much WAS ALONE. it just feels like she almost is invalidating how he feels, and what he went through, alone.
he knows that he’s not alone, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel alone. or that’s he not allowed to feel alone. there’s also something about the way she says it like she’s annoyed at him. and it just makes me so angry. i know she has good intentions in reminding him he doesn’t have to deal with things on his own anymore, but that doesn’t remove the fact that he did for over a hundred years. a hundred years where he was alone in every sense of the word.
*screams*
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There's much going on in the scene where Simon basically expresses his disinterest in labeling himself (outside of "baz-sexual" lol which sounds funny but that's Simon genuinely communicating something with the vocabulary he has available). I think the funniest thing though is that he's basically like "I don't know shit but let me tell you nothing about my relationship with Agatha can be used to say I'm bisexual, especially not sex". And by funny I mean kinda sad and a bit concerning actually.
On a more serious note, I think it's really interesting to see how Simon reacts to different labels. He never really wonders whether he's bisexual, his struggles with attempting to define identity are entirely centered on his feelings for Baz. He even finds a way to, I kid you not, make female boobs about Baz. Gay and Baz-sexual are the only labels he wrestles with, and even gay is something he considers because Baz is a man. It's also interesting that this doesn't change even when presented with the possibility that bisexuality could be a word that describes his experiences.
I think so much is encapsulated here. First of all, Simon does struggle with internalized homophobia (that hesitation before the whole man and boy exchange), and we see him trying to move past that in the third book (Baz noting he gets off with public displays of affection despite "worrying about looking gay" and how that's probably connected, the "gay at ikea" scene). But I don't think he struggles with internalized biphobia–it's just not even on his radar at all. Simon can be very quick at solving things once he has enough information, and I doubt he needed any time to realize why his boyfriend, who knows he has an ex-girlfriend, might think he's bisexual. And he's put off by the idea. Look at that No being italicized for emphasis. He has such a strong rejection of being labeled as bisexual, and I think this is all about him rejecting the idea of his past relationship with Agatha being understood as romantic love and sexual attraction, even before he finally processes and voices that "it was all just going through the motions, I'm not sure I even felt anything at all".
Worth noting that he's in agreement with Agatha on this. She was there, and in hindsight, she doesn't think the guy was ever into her (a feeling she already manifest when breaking up with him, when she's describing their relationship as feeling non-existent, and still feeling unwanted after being together for 3 years)
She equates this to the way Baz, known homosexual, was never into her either.
Worth noting too that the label conversation is at the beginning of the chapter that has Simon dragging himself kicking and screaming (literally) through the realization that he was never really into Agatha in that way, he just assumed that must be it while they were dating, ignoring anything that indicated otherwise. But Simon really had to be aware of this on some level that he just wasn't acknowledging for him to be able to reach some answers when Baz's questions make him look back. Again, the rejection of seeing his past relationship with Agatha as romantic love/attraction had to be there on a subconscious level for him to have the instinct to be put off by being labeled in this way because of it.
In comparison, he's much more nuanced and complicated about gay as a label. He's not prepared to think about it at the beginning, but it's something he keeps coming back to. He says he's not gay "immediately" here but at the end of the chapter he goes "maybe this makes me gay, or maybe this just makes me yours". And this is all because of his feelings for Baz. He's not ever like "I'm into dudes in general so I reckon that makes me gay". The questioning is always in the line of "the love of my life is a man, does that make me gay?" and he brings up the possibility of only being into Baz more than once... which takes me to Baz going "if he's not gay or bi what does that leave? straight is certainly not an option" and well! It leaves the ace spectrum, for instance, my good guy.
I also think Simon going "I never thought I was straight, I never thought about my sexuality at all" is interesting, because even though it aligns with how he lived for so long not really thinking, part of being allosexual is knowing instinctively when you're experiencing attraction too, and it's an acespec experience to need forever to decide if you're feeling attracted to strangers. And Simon really can't offer examples of him feeling attraction that doesn't involve Baz! In fact, he says it to himself: he has only ever wanted Baz, and he's thinking this in the context of thinking about sex.
In short: everything about Simon rejecting bisexuality is about him rejecting the idea that he felt romantic love/attraction for Agatha, and everything about him wrestling with the gay label is centered on his feelings for Baz.
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how and why is there discourse about whether or not certain queer identities exist/if people should be allowed(???) to use them. why is "people know their own identity better than you ever could, and they're the only one who get a say on what they are" such a tough concept to grasp
i think if you find yourself offended by the label someone uses (especially if they're a stranger) or think it invalidates your own, it's a good idea to look inside yourself and question why that may be. more often than not, it's a result of insecurity or uncertainty of your own identity (or many other things, but i won't make a whole list here). whatever reason it is, until you resolve it, you shouldn't take it out on people for having an identity you don't understand
many have said it before but it's worth saying over and over. infighting only helps our oppressors. conservatives don't care if you're a cis gay or a xenogender aegosexual aplatonic lesbian, they hate all of us either way. trying to fit in by going for people who are easier targets for them isn't gonna help you, it'll just alienate you from your own community, and you're never gonna please them. the momentary rush you get from hearing you're not like "one of /those/ gay people" is not worth it and is gonna do more harm in the long run, i assure you
also, it is important to me to say this, but having some less than nice kneejerk reaction caused by confusion about an identity you don't understand doesn't mean you're a bad person or anything. as long as you aren't mean to that person, and you take a second to think smth along the lines of "wait a minute, this isn't any of my business" after having said reaction, you're good 👍 a lot of reflexive reactions we have to things are ingrained into us simply by. well. living in a society 🤡 and you're not terrible for having those thoughts. it's your actions that matter, and your second thought (the "wait, why did i just think that?") is more defining of your actual character and morals than your reflex. i know that having thoughts like this, even tho they're unwanted, can very easily make one spiral, so it's important to me that whoever needs to hear this knows this doesn't make you a bad person 🙏 you're good, keep taking actions to be good, accept other people even if you don't understand them, and you're on the right track :)
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hi so i just finished bridge to terabithia and now i’m unwell and my eyes are red because i’ve been crying before i’d even reached 20 minutes of it for i actually knew what was going to happen and by the time i reached an hour something something i just straight up sobbing screaming into my pillow. and now it’s 12 am and i’m still thinking about them. because god, look at them, how they were, the little world they lived in, wouldn’t you just love that, to run away, to escape, to grasp that childhood naivety and innocence that you lost a long time ago, to feel the sun in your skin and the air in your lungs and to paint fantasies and laugh and play and run hidden away from the world and find an old run down tree house and decided to make it your own little shelter and pin up canvases on the worn wood and paint and let your creativity goes wild and have someone understand you and gets you and do it with you, and wouldn’t you just love to have something so constant, so sincere, so genuine, so pure, so real, that there wasn’t anything else. if i knew i was going to cry this much, if i knew how much space this movie would make in my life, i wouldn’t have started this movie tonight. i would have been in peace on the floor of my room, not realizing how badly i actually want something like this even though i would never unironically admit this to anyone in my life or even myself when i’m outside of the familiar place of my mind, for that matters
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