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#like that basically made us feel ashamed for being nonbinary and me specifically for being unlabeled
sunkern-plus · 7 months
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i know there should be more yuri (because of this website being the yuri website and the woman prioritizer website, and i agree as a woman prioritizer), but...there should also be secret third thing, secret fourth thing, and secret fifth thing stuff too (n/n stuff, women x nonbinary stuff, and men x nonbinary stuff)
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starrbar · 8 months
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Okay so Yin Yang Yo! was my absolute FAVORITE fucking show when I was a young kid, like I dunno, 10 to 13 years old. I recently revisited the show and well, I've outgrown the writing QUITE a bit. I'm in my late twenties now. But it's still very nostalgic to me, and I figured hey, I got a few light-hearted ideas, so I'll scribble em down and post em somewhere.
One of my favorite characters from YYY was Yuck because he was cute and scruffy. I like scruffy. And I probably enjoyed his voice acting too.
Anyway, I spat out some ideas for how I might rewrite the episode "Yin Yang Yuck" for a fanfic or something, but I'm too busy to write a whole fanfic, so here's the raw juices.
So first, I don't like how flippant the beginning is. Yin and Yang fight daily, and often physically, so it seems silly that this one time only, they would create life. What's a specific thing Yin and Yang would do in this fight that's different from others?
Let's say they've both been learning a new move that's high level. Master Yo taught them the basics, but neither of them can successfully use it. Hell, Woo Foo Aura might be good for this? Putting aside Aura Or Not cause I'm just having fun here.
Yin has a partial grasp on the idea of it because she'll happily express love and passion, but Yang is too embarrassed to express himself and he tries not to feel those vulnerable emotions. So let's say Yin gets REALLY pissed at Yang one day (hopefully over something much less dumb than what started their fight in canon) and she gives in to using her anger for her aura instead, and Yang does the same, even though his anger is normally performative and light-hearted. The two of them genuinely set out to hurt each other in some way, which is what flares up their worst traits—traits they're directly channeling into physical Woo Foo energy.
Their auras reject them because of their misuse of their emotions to fuel the power, and instead they clash and combine. The sheer power creates a new being made of both of their worst qualities, topped off with hatred for each of those qualities and their good ones as well, because well, they were feeling some level of hatred for each other in those moments.
He calls himself Yuck because he is full of self-loathing and awful contradictions, and because the parts of Yin and Yang that love one another despite their differences did not get transferred to him. Yin and Yang are left without the ability to feel any negative hateful emotions. Maybe sadness? But not anger. Not the desire to harm.
I also just realized that yeah, I'd make Yuck nonbinary because he was made from a boy and girl who perform their genders in such AGGRESSIVELY normative ways, but I could buy that he uses he/him because nobody in this family knows what nonbinary is and Yuck isn't really concerned with it, but he still finds that he's completely being perceived either way. He doesn't care about his pronouns, etc.
He's also not really in a position to figure out what identity makes him feel right? Because again, he's just made out of awful traits. He's ashamed of ALL his interests and all his circumstances (and Yin and Yang's circumstances), so he lashes out any time someone tries to be nice and understanding towards him. He's disgusted by Yin and Yang's sugary sweet kindness. He's driven to violent rage when someone so much as steps in his way. He snaps at people when they seem to "have a tone" or look at him grumpily or don't respond to him quickly enough. He perceives every action someone takes in the worst possible light. He's miserable.
Master Yo is alarmed at what Yin and Yang did, and especially that it resulted in a new living person being made. He decides that it would be the most humane to split him back up and send his traits back to the twins, because they're incomplete without being able to work through them naturally, and Yuck is a being created purely to hate and hurt. However, Yuck doesn't want to die, of course. So he attacks.
Master Yo can easily kick his ass tbh. There's no reason little level 2 Yuck should be able to beat a Woo Foo master. But maybe Yuck has hostages. He doesn't attack Master Yo directly, he keeps him away by threatening others. Yin and Yang have to come up behind him and try to take him by surprise, and then they have to "kill" him to his face when their surprise attack fails. It pains them both to do this, but they have to be whole again.
After the fight, they're back to their normal selves and Yuck is gone, and they still feel like they just did something cruel....
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army-of-mai-lovers · 3 years
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author interview tag!
tagged by @maipreciation (tysm for tagging me ily) 
Name: Arthur/nonbinary-crafter-aang on tumblr/airnomadenthusiast on ao3 (fun fact that used to be my tumblr url too but I like this one much better) 
Fandom(s): I have engaged with other fandoms in the past but I am ashamed of those parts of my life so just atla/lok forget that I have ever mentioned being in any other fandom.
Where you post: ao3 (though I post hcs on here as well and I have a post series I am currently procrastinating) 
Most popular oneshot: bad girls basically all the major teenage girl characters of ATLA are a gay friend group and they form a band, also Mai has a giant crush on Ty Lee, shenanigans ensue. This one was written at one of my darker points re: not being able to see my gay friend group (my gaggle, if you will) and it made me really happy to write about these girls supporting each other and connecting with one another through music. 
Most popular multichapter fic: far and away it’s the greatest of them all, my only fic to ever get over 100 kudos (the celebration of which was the genesis of my very first fic recs post.) I’ve talked about it a fair number of times but basically Toph and Bumi duel, Toph wins (look me in the eye and tell me Toph wouldn’t win if she and Bumi dueled, bryke), and then Bumi finds out that she doesn’t really have anywhere to go now that the war’s over, so he invites her to stay at the palace in Omashu with him as his Earthbending teacher, shenanigans ensue. it’s definitely very close to my heart. 
Favorite story you’ve written so far: if I had to pick a favorite I’d pick victory lap, which is a Suki-centric fic set after the war in which Suki’s trauma and the pressure of constantly being there for everyone kind of catch up with her and it all becomes a bit of a mess. I think in this fandom we have a tendency to idealize Suki (because she’s not fleshed out enough in canon) and I wanted to kind of break that image. I love Suki to death but she’s not perfect and I wish more people would give her the time and space to exist as a complex human being. So yeah, that’s why this is my favorite. 
Fic you were nervous to post: keep the world at bay, for a lot of reasons. I knew that this was going to be long and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to keep myself going through the writing of it (I’m committed to it but it’s hard knowing that I have so much work still ahead of me). Additionally it’s an Avatar Sokka fic and I know people do not like those, and I totally understand why and you’re free to have your opinion but I just wasn’t sure if anybody was going to vibe with it you know? and even if somebody vibed with Avatar Sokka as a concept maybe they wouldn’t vibe with nonbender Zuko or Waterbender Yue or the twelve different redemption arcs (I’m exaggerating but also everybody’s getting redeemed) or the way I want to portray Iroh or any number of things because there is so much canon divergence in this and I as a person have such a different perspective than bryke. But so far it’s going really well, I think I’m managing everything all right, and I’m hoping I can actually pull this off! 
How you choose your titles: usually song lyrics, but sometimes I’ll have a really good idea for a title (as with sore loser and victory lap--it just worked and the symmetry makes me really happy.)
Do you outline? yes, heavily! I didn’t with tgota and it caused a lot of problems and so ever since I’ve tried to have something in front of me that tells me where I’m going. The outline’s not super duper specific though because I usually want to give myself room to improvise. Pretty much every OC you’ll see in any of my work was made up on the spot (the ktwab outline had Zuko interacting with “the crew” and then while I was writing I decided who Akemi and Captain Fukuhara would be, and it ended up working out beautifully so now I do that for all my fics) 
Complete: 4 out of 7 on ao3
In progress: of what I have posted on ao3, three of those fics are in progress (not ready to make nice, let him fly, which should probably be done soon bc it’s a twoshot, and the aforementioned ktwab) 
Coming soon/not yet started: Bumi fic, Ty Lee fic, and wuko coffeeshop au are all in the process of being outlined and researched. I’m starting Ty Lee fic after I finish let him fly, and I’m starting Bumi fic after I finish not ready to make nice (like let him fly, Ty Lee fic will either be a oneshot or a twoshot, probably a one shot, and like not ready to make nice, Bumi fic will probably be multiple chapters but not in the 40-70 range like ktwab and wuko coffeeshop au, so I have all my bases covered) 
Do you accept prompts? usually around follower milestones I do! people never send them to me so it’s kind of a moot point but when I reach my next milestone I will put out a post saying that I’m accepting prompts, so watch out for that. 
Upcoming work that you’re most excited about: tbh Zone has been getting me pumped about writing this Bumi fic so I’m excited about that, and the Ty Lee fic very much feels like Something I Need To Write the way victory lap did so I think whatever comes of that is going to be really good and really sad. 
tagging @the-hot-zone @listless-brainrot @kahtara @katarahairloopies @junesbiceps (if you’ve already been tagged in this or you don’t want to no pressure!) also if anyone else wants to do it pls feel free, I’d love to read about your work!
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adhdtoomanycommas · 4 years
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Emotional Disregulation, Privilege, and White Girl Tears
Hello all, it has been a few months since my last ADHD essay, and what a few months it has been. In case you’re reading this in the future (since tumblr has no date stamps), I am writing this in June 2020 when in the midst of a global pandemic, police are responding to massive protests against police violence with even more police violence, and a lot of white people are thinking more than ever about the privilege we have experienced. I have been thinking about writing about my (cis white female) experience with privilege where neurodivergence, race, and gender intersect for a while, and have hit the point where these ideas have been bouncing around in my head long enough I need to write them down.
Small disclaimer: Right now I'm not sure if I should be writing anything about anything since we all ought to be listening and amplifying black voices --I'm there are much better resources out there about race and neurodivergance especially, and I have no intention of talking over anyone, especially given my limited experience. But given that the audience for my last essay here was in the single digits, I doubt I need to worry too much about talking over people at the moment. Please know that I am writing this now primarily for myself, and if it ever gets an audience later, forgive me for writing it now when there are so many more important things going on and more important people to listen to.
I will do my best to stay in my lane here, so I'm just going to talk about how my privilege has affected the perception of one of my ADHD symptoms If you don't want to read some rambling white/cis anecdotes about how white privilege and gender norms affect the perception of ADHD, by all means skip it. If you're still here, maybe it can be the start of a conversation as I would love to hear some other perspectives and experiences here. And maybe, just maybe by the end of it I will learn to spell privilege right on the first try (I really want there to be an A in there, or maybe a D. Privaledge? Sounds about right.)
As I mentioned in my previous ramble, I’m a cryer. I cry a lot, not just when I’m sad but sometimes when I’m happy, when I feel guilty or ashamed, and especially when I’m angry, or frustrated, or overwhelmed. I learned recently, as I was seeking my diagnosis, that emotional disregulation is a hallmark of ADHD. We feel things strongly, and uncontrollably and have trouble restraining ourselves from expressing those feelings. This is experienced by almost everyone, if not everyone, with ADHD and it’s only not part of the diagnostic criteria because it’s hard to quantify—there are a lot of good general resources out there to learn more about this, I’m not an expert, I’m just here to share my own experience.
Story time. When I was in fourth grade, I punched another girl in the stomach. For what felt like the millionth time, when the teacher told everyone to find a partner for some activity, everyone partnered up and I looked around to find that I was the left-over. I was an outcast for a lot of reasons at that age. I told myself for a long time it was solely because I was the lone atheist (actually agnostic but I didn’t know the term at the time) in a deep south bible-belt school, but with the benefit of hindsight I have also realized that (partially probably due to the ADHD) I was also pretty weird, and probably very annoying. But whatever the reason for my ostracism, it was already weighing heavily on me when the teacher assigned this girl to work with me, and she gave me the biggest exasperated sigh and eyeroll like she would rather do anything else. So I punched her.
I now realize that this is probably a pretty normal response for a kid with untreated ADHD—the combination of emotional disregulation and poor impulse control means we often lash out. But with none of the adults in my life knowing that at the time, surely I was disciplined for my seemingly-random violent action, yes? No. I cried, and I got away with it.
That’s not the whole story, I did get several weeks of sessions with the school counselor, and I was made to write a very thorough apology letter (and made to rewrite it repeatedly as the teacher thought of more things I should add and repeatedly declared my handwriting not good enough, to such an extent the exercise definitely felt more punitive than reconsiliatory), but I ultimately I didn’t get expelled, I didn’t get suspended, I didn’t even get detention.
The girl I punched was black. This wouldn’t be relevant to the story at all, except that in retrospect I have to wonder if the consequences would have been the same if our roles were reversed. If a black girl (even a neurodivergent, ostracized, and frequently bullied one) had lashed out the way I did and punched a white girl, I expect there would have been a lot more consequences for that, even if she cried afterwards. And if a black boy had done the same, he wouldn’t have been perceived as troubled and in need of help, he would have been perceived as dangerous. And as we all (hopefully) know by now, that perception can have life or death consequences.
I’m sure that was neither the first nor the last time that crying, and people’s perception of me crying (as a cute little white girl with freckles and big brown eyes) has gotten me out of trouble, or gotten me what I wanted one way or another, but it is the most dramatic example I can think of. I want to emphasize that I have never cried to get what I wanted on purpose—I have spent way more time trying not to cry than trying to cry, the only time I’ve ever cried on purpose has been in theater exercises. But I’m sure a lot of white girls in the same position I was in (with or without the undiagnosed ADHD and emotional disregulation) have realized the way they could use peoples responses to their tears to their advantage. They probably grow up to be Karens who use their tears to get out of traffic tickets, get free stuff from store managers, and to sic violent police on black people who inconvenience them. (Aside, the only time I have been pulled over as an adult, I was trying so hard not to cry that the cop thought I was acting suspicious and asked a bunch of extra questions. I still got the ticket.
I tell myself that those people use their emotions on purpose to manipulate people, that I'm different, I would never do that. But I have to wonder if some of those same women tell themselves the same thing after the fact. I don't think it's enough to avoid intentional manipulation and intentional harm-- not anymore. We as white women need to do be conscious enough of how our emotions are perceived and prioritized to act proactively to avoid unintentional harm as well. For those of us with ADHD, this may be harder than for neurotypicals, but that makes it all the more important for us to think actively about this. I'm not sure yet what this means for me personally, besides removing myself from a shared space if my emotions threaten to become the focus where they shouldn't be, but I would welcome input on this.
I want to talk about gender more generally here as well. ADHD is dramatically underdiagnosed in women, and I have to wonder if some part of this is because emotional disregulation lines up so nicely with the stereotypes of women’s emotions in the first place. Oh, you cry a lot? Of course you do, you’re a woman. One can only wonder how many oldey-timey diagnoses of “hysteria” were actually ADHD. Even now women with ADHD are usually misdiagnosed several times with things like depression or bipolar disorder before we are tested and diagnosed properly. This wasn’t my experience, but after basically doing a bunch of research and self-diagnosing I was able (thanks to a great deal of economic privilege) to pay to go directly to an ADHD specialist. I also walked into that office with an extremely thorough bullet-point list I had compiled of reasons I suspected I had ADHD—it was probably the easiest diagnosis the doctor ever did. So obviously having ADHD while female isn’t the best combination, but when it comes specifically to crying easily that being treated as relatively normal definitely meant I had an easier time with it than my brother did.
My brother (who is nonbinary and uses a variety of pronouns—I’ll probably alternate between they/them and he/him here because it is important to the story that they were perceived as male at the time) cries just as easily as I do, and just as often. When we were little kids, this didn’t make too much of a difference. They’re a couple years younger than me, and little kids are expected to cry more. They haven’t been diagnosed with ADHD, but they and I both strongly suspect for a variety of reasons, this included, that they have it too—I believe they were flagged for it in school, probably for frequently talking out of turn, but I don’t think they were ever tested formally. He got in trouble in school a lot more than I did, for similar outbursts, and while he got quite a few of those same counseling sessions (white privilege at work again), he got more actual discipline as well. But the perception of our tears landed differently, especially as we got older.
For the most part, the scorn leveled at my brother’s tears didn’t come from our parents. My mom, (who, while also not officially diagnosed, I can almost guarantee is where we got the ADHD genes from) cries as easily as they and I do, so she understands it. My dad would certainly prefer to think of himself as an enlightened modern man who would say it’s ok to cry, but he has his share of ingrained toxic masculinity despite himself. I don’t think I ever saw him tell my brother directly to “suck it up” or “act like a man,” but I do think after puberty or so he started responding to my brother’s tears with a sort of exasperation that he never directed at me.
The real difference was in how we were treated by our peers. By the time we got to high school, if I would cry at school, my peers (even ones who weren’t necessarily my friends) would probably ask what was wrong and try to help or provide comfort, or at least would leave me alone and give me time to pull myself together. When my brother cried at school, he was mocked. Relentlessly. Once bullies figured out that he cried easily, he was targeted and goaded specifically for it. They would find any little thing they could to get under his skin (right down to the most childish with rhyming nicknames) and troll him for fun. I wish I could say that I stood up for him, but I never did. I can tell myself this was because I didn’t see it happen in person, being two grades ahead, but I could have made an effort. Although, since he was almost certainly targeted at least in part for perceived failure to live up to masculine gender norms, I’m not sure if having an older sister try to come to the rescue would have helped or made things worse. At this point it’s years past, so I suppose speculation on what I could have or should have done is pretty moot at this point. Suffice it to say, this particular symptom which rarely did me any harm made my brother’s life a lot harder.
I may talk more about different perceptions of my brother’s and my ADHD symptoms in a later essay/ramble/entry/whatever, in particular how it affected out academic performances, but that’s for another time.
Again, I’m not sure if there are any greater conclusions here. There are a lot of ways emotional disregulation can present, and I really only addressed this one small aspect of excessive crying, but it is a good example of how even lesser-known ADHD symptoms can affect our lives in cascading ways, and the way people perceive those symptoms (due to various more visible identity factors) affects us as well. If you read all of this, thanks, and if you have any experiences you’d like to share with how your emotional disregulation has been perceived by others, I’d love to hear them. Until next time!
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rai-jin-andro-jin · 4 years
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Non-Binary Week 2020
Day 2 + 3 because I missed yesterday:
Day 2 (July 13): Coming to terms
This day is for coming out stories and how you realised you were nonbinary.
Like a lot of people, I grew up with the belief that sex and gender were the same thing; there were two genders, and because I was born with female parts, I was completely and undeniably female. And what it meant to be female was just as rigid: gender roles up to the ears determined what I wore, whether I cut my hair, what I said, what I didn’t say, who I hung out with, who my enemies were, who I could trust, what careers I could have, who I could be attracted to, and what I could think about.
When I entered college, I was away from a lot of these forces that policed my life. For the first time, I was asked on a daily basis to think for myself: and I couldn’t just point to another adult, or the Bible, or to anyone else to explain why I lived the way I did. I had to be able to support myself and my stance and my beliefs. When I was asked to do so, I realized I didn’t even agree with half of the beliefs I held; the other half I discovered were rooted in lies and misinformation about other people, specifically minority groups.
So, over my three-year college career, I grew and changed. I came into contact with different ideologies and was allowed to choose for myself what I wanted to believe and why. I shed traditional femininity both slowly & quickly -- I got an undercut in my hair, stopped shaving my body hair, and wore more comfortable/practical clothes (which ended up leaning toward “masculine” in my case). I still identified as female though -- it was my way of defying traditional gender stereotypes and screaming “I’m breaking the rules and I’m still a female -- respect me or step out of my way!”
During my final year of college, I shaved off all of my hair. Also during this time, I started to discover that I was not straight, but in fact attracted to more than one gender. I first identified as bisexual, but over the next couple years came to embrace the label “pansexual” as well, as I found it less limiting and more inclusive from a linguistic perspective (though I myself consider bisexuality and pansexuality to be basically synonymous in my case). Past college, I started to recognize how the world saw me. Not only did I sometimes tread in the butch lesbian sphere, but I also was misgendered as male quite often, especially after my haircut -- an occurance that didn’t bother me, and instead entertained and intrigued me. I wasn’t trying to pass as male, nor was I interested in transition. I didn’t identify with male pronouns, but they didn’t bother me either. I thought these instances were fun and proved that gender was more fluid than most people realized. It gave me a window with which to play with my own gender.
In the next year or two after college, I found more comfort in dressing androgynously. I didn’t try to present as purely masculine or feminine, nor did I try to lean either way. Instead, I strove to view myself as neither. I identified for a while as androgynous, as it felt detached from both sexes and genders. I enjoyed finding clothing that made my gender appear questionable, and I loved to blur the lines of my presentation. I did it because I could, because it felt the most authentic. I felt like I was showing the world who I truly wanted to be, and how I wanted to be treated. I wanted to be free of the confines of what society deemed was male or female, masculine or feminine. I believed and still believe that no one should ever be gendered at all unless they ask to be. I believe that everyone should be able to define who they are to others, and should be fully respected for it. So often, so many of us are given only a few options, if any at all, and told to make do. We are told that if we stray from these norms, we are unattractive, unwanted, and just doing it for attention. But in reality, we just want to be seen and loved for who we are, for who we choose to be.
Non-binaryness seemed foreign to me for a while. Informed by my upbringing and lack of information, I saw the non-binary identity as something I didn’t fit into. I didn’t meet all the requirements in my head -- non-binary people were other people I knew, other people who’s lives and experiences were different and thus more legitimate than mine. Because of that, I hesitated to identify as non-binary for a long time. But then, as I did more research, read more personal accounts and stories, and connected with friends in real life who were queer and non-binary, I felt like I belonged. I realized I was allowed into that unattainable “non-binary club” that I had built up in my head because it actually wasn’t unattainable at all. It was a community full of people with a wide array of experiences. And mine was not an unfamiliar or unwelcome one. I looked upon the word non-binary, and I realized, with utter joy and happiness:
“That’s me!”
Shortly thereafter, I came out to my friends on social media, and then to some of my family. I went from she/her to they/them, and I wasn’t ashamed or embarrassed, for the first time ever. I felt supported and validated by my friends, more than I ever thought was possible. It was the greatest feeling to finally find a piece of myself.
Even now as I explore the plethora of non-binary identities, I’m still discovering myself. Non-binary describes me just fine! But if we’re getting specific, I don’t have any ties with gender at all, and I’m actively trying to unlearn my gender conditioning to be the best person I can be. That is why I also identify as agender.
It’s a crazy thing to wrap my head around, even as I’m still overjoyed to have a label that explains me and my existence. But the overwhelming feelings that course through my body are ones of happiness. I have a place in this world, whether I know my name/labels or not. I always have had a place, and I always will. And now more than ever, I fight for my place and protection, as well as others’ whose identities are shunned, their protections & rights denied. I want everyone to experience the joy of belonging, not because they fit a mold, but because they’re happy with their own choices and identity. I hope everyone can experience that fully, in all the ways it can possibly occur, for all identities imagineable.
Day 3 (July 14/International Nonbinary People's Day): Nonbinary Joy
Share all things positive about being nonbinary!
I think these can really apply to any gender, sex, orientation, etc., but these are just catered to my personal experience! I think if I had to name this phenomenon, I would call it “Gender Liberation.” So here’s what it feels like to be liberated from gender and gender expectations:
You can wear whatever the hell you want and watch people get real confused.
You get to use they/them pronouns, or whatever pronouns you want; language no longer ties you down!
You get to call yourself whatever you want! You get to choose your name.
All those horrible expectations that make you uncomfortable? Gone.
You get to connect with other non-binary people and hear about their beautiful experiences.
You get to interact with the queer community, which is a beautiful, accepting, and loving collection of people who defy cultural norms and exist exactly as who they are, unapologetically. They are a wonderful group of people to look up to. Anyone who lives and loves to the fullest without shame is one to look up to.
You get to wear your hair however you want and nobody can tell you otherwise.
You get to think about the world without the shades of a binary lens! Turns out the world is so much more colorful!
You get to have awesome flag colors.
You get to have awesome discussions about gender.
You get to be unapologetically complicated, because everyone is way more complicated than their gender, but now, you actually know that and are allowed to exist that way.
I mean, look at the word “non-binary” and tell me that isn’t just the most freeing thing you’ve ever read. Look at the word “agender” and tell me you didn’t just breathe a sigh of relief. No more fucking stupid-ass rules!
Did I mention that you’re allowed to be fully authentic without judgment? Did I also mention that you can finally unlearn all that self-judgment and internalized gender roles?
Gender is fully opt-in.
Now that you’re liberated from all those awful rules and head-spaces, you can think about more important things, like for example: cute people, your favorite books/shows/movies, yummy food, plants, cats, simple joys, arts and crafts, making friends, falling in love, nature, doggos, the whole earth.
Also, now that you’re liberated, you can help to liberate other people by fighting for their rights, because you know that people like you (and people not like you) are being denied basic human rights every day around the world; now you know about it and you know they deserve better, so you can use your voice to help educate and inspire solidarity and community.
Wow, there’s like so many things you can do and be, and no one can tell you not to anymore. Looks like you’re truly confident and happy with yourself! :) That sounds like autonomy at its best!
What *isn’t* awesome about being non-binary?? Absolutely nothing.
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yougotmyshareofit · 4 years
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January Book Reviews
 So I inhaled a lot of books in January despite school starting back up again (not good for my productivity that’s for sure), so I thought I’d give some quick book reviews on them because a lot of them were real winners.
1.  Ziggy, Stardust, and Me // By: James Brandon
Ok this book was absolutely beautiful. After finishing it, I couldn’t do anything but sit there completely in awe. The characters are amazingly written and the author portrays the difficulties of being LGBTQ+ as well as a person of color in the ‘70s with such cutting emotion. It brings up a lot of issues and prejudices that were prevalent at that time, which was really enlightening. All in all, it was probably my favorite book out of all of them this month and I couldn’t recommend it enough. 
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Summary: “ The year is 1973.... And homosexuality is still officially considered a mental illness. In the midst of these trying times is sixteen-year-old Jonathan Collins, a bullied, anxious, asthmatic kid, who aside from an alcoholic father and his sympathetic neighbor and friend Starla, is completely alone. To cope, Jonathan escapes to the safe haven of his imagination, where his hero David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust and dead relatives, including his mother, guide him through the rough terrain of his life. In his alternate reality, Jonathan can be anything: a superhero, an astronaut, Ziggy Stardust, himself, or completely “normal” and not a boy who likes other boys. When he completes his treatments, he will be normal—at least he hopes. But before that can happen, Web stumbles into his life. Web is everything Jonathan wishes he could be: fearless, fearsome and, most importantly, not ashamed of being gay. Jonathan doesn’t want to like brooding Web.... But he’s drawn to Web anyway. Web is the first person in the real world to see Jonathan completely and think he’s perfect..... For the first time in his life, he may finally feel free enough to love and accept himself as he is. ”
2. Something like Gravity // By: Amber Smith
This book was pretty heart-wrenching and also very beautiful. I liked how real and honest the author was at portraying Chris’s struggles with being out as transgender and the amount of trust he had to have to open up to Maia. It was a lovely story that showed that someone can be in your life for a short amount of time, but still change it in ways you never thought were possible. Highly recommend as well.
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Summary:  “Chris and Maia aren’t off to a great start. A near-fatal car accident first brings them together, and their next encounters don’t fare much better.... But they’re neighbors, at least for the summer, and despite their best efforts, they just can’t seem to stay away from each other. The path forward isn’t easy. Chris has come out as transgender, but he’s still processing a frightening assault he survived the year before. Maia is grieving the loss of her older sister and trying to find her place in the world without her. Falling in love was the last thing on either of their minds. But would it be so bad if it happened anyway?”
3. Frat Girl // By: Kiley Roache
So this book was a pretty entertaining and humorous read. I really liked the trope that the author used -- a feminist girl dealing with all the crap that goes down in a frat house. It was also pretty enlightening for me and showed the different sides of feminism, as well as struck down lots of stereotypes that both feminists and anti-feminists have, which was really cool and interesting. Although I enjoyed this book, at times I felt that I was just reading the same scene over again, so I feel like the author could’ve been more concise. However, I still liked it a lot and thought it was an entertaining read.
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Summary: “For Cassandra Davis, the F-word is fraternity—specifically Delta Tau Chi, a house on probation and on the verge of being banned from campus. Accused of offensive, sexist behavior, they have one year to clean up their act. For the DTC brothers, the F-word is feminist—the type of person who writes articles in the school paper about why they should lose their home. With one shot at a scholarship to attend the university of her dreams, Cassie pitches a research project: to pledge Delta Tau Chi and provide proof of their misogynistic behavior. They’re frat boys. She knows exactly what to expect once she gets there. Exposing them should be a piece of cake. But the boys of Delta Tau Chi have their own agenda, and fellow pledge Jordan Louis is certainly more than the tank top wearing “bro” Cassie expected to find. With her heart and her future tangled in the web of her own making, Cassie is forced to realize that the F-word might not be as simple as she thought after all.”
4. I wish you all the best // By: Mason Deaver
UGH THIS BOOK!! I inhaled it in literally less than 24 hours and I LOVED it. Classic angst (like a lot of angst) with a happy ending and it was so so good. Definitely a close second for my favorite this month. I just loved all the raw emotion that the author portrayed and how real they were with the mental and emotional struggles the characters faced. So amazing, highly recommend.
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Summary: “When Ben De Backer comes out to their parents as nonbinary, they're thrown out of their house and forced to move in with their estranged older sister, Hannah, and her husband, Thomas, whom Ben has never even met. Struggling with an anxiety disorder compounded by their parents' rejection, they come out only to Hannah, Thomas, and their therapist and try to keep a low profile in a new school. But Ben's attempts to survive the last half of senior year unnoticed are thwarted when Nathan Allan, a funny and charismatic student, decides to take Ben under his wing. As Ben and Nathan's friendship grows, their feelings for each other begin to change, and what started as a disastrous turn of events looks like it might just be a chance to start a happier new life.”
5. All for the Game Series (The Foxhole Court, The Raven King, and All the King’s Men) // By: Nora Sakavic
So I downloaded these as ebooks on my iPad, which turned out to be a terrible idea because they ruined my productivity at school for a literal week. A. WEEK. Basically I would read these in class rather than pay attention, but you know whatever it’s fine I’m fine. Anyways, I loved this series so so much. I wil say that the first book was good, but kind of confusing for me because there were so many different names and backstories that I literally could not keep track of all of them. However, it gets better as the series goes on and I inhaled all 3 of these books pretty quickly. I loved the main characters and even though the backstories were kind of confusing at times, they also made the plot super interesting and intricate so I guess you win some and you lose some. All in all, you gotta read this series cuz it has all the best trope and there’s lots of angst (seriously SO much)  and lots of mystery. Good stuff.
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Summary (book 1): “Neil Josten is the newest addition to the Palmetto State University Exy team. He's short, he's fast, he's got a ton of potential—and he's the runaway son of the murderous crime lord known as The Butcher. Signing a contract with the PSU Foxes is the last thing a guy like Neil should do. The team is high profile and he doesn't need sports crews broadcasting pictures of his face around the nation. His lies will hold up only so long under this kind of scrutiny and the truth will get him killed. But Neil's not the only one with secrets on the team. One of Neil's new teammates is a friend from his old life, and Neil can't walk away from him a second time. Neil has survived the last eight years by running. Maybe he's finally found someone and something worth fighting for. ”
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pikaflute · 5 years
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Being wrong is hard work. We as people like to be right and correct all the time. Being wrong feels....well wrong. You feel ashamed for your mistakes and like total shit when you’re wrong. We strive to always be correct and right all the time, but you’re never going to be right all the time. Hell, even as I’m typing this I know I’ve been wrong and time to time I fuck up. 
But see, I and many other people change frequently. I am not the same person i was when I started this blog back in 2014. I’m much more aware of the consequences of my actions as I’ve grown up and matured and am more aware of fuck ups I make. Changing and growing up is hard, and many people are stubborn and don’t want to do it. Taking accountability has to put them in this awkward confrontational spot that makes them actually take responsibility and they don’t want to do it.
With that in mind, I’m here to say shut the fuck up. So what? You’re wrong. Admit that you fucked up. Apologize. Take responsibility for what you did an become a better person.
The elephant in the room is obviously Gaud. This is not their first time up to the tumblr discourse bat, and while, yes, sending death threats is a little extreme, fans of Gaud seem to think that’s all that is happening. But it’s not. People just want accountability. They want Gaud to just apologize cleanly for lesbophobia and saying the nword while Gaud is not black.
But Gaud either refuses to apologize cleanly or just, dismisses all criticism as angry trolls who are TERFs (their fans did this more than Gaud themself did) or not really black ("Due to the details of call out culture, it’s difficult for me to ascertain if any of the criticism I’ve begun receiving is from actual black voices, or if (as I suspect) it is almost entirely from the group of trolls who have been targeting my blog over the last few months, and appropriating minority voices as an excuse. I am very ready to listen to feedback and criticism about the post in question, but from black voices specifically. If I was disrespectful, I want to fix that. But I’m damn tired of trolls speaking for (and erasing) minority voices as an excuse to harass people online.“).
The first apology regarding the lesbophobia was okay in theory. However, their tags say and I quote “#the only purpose of these dumbass shitposts is to make people laugh #while also feeling the need to check under the bed for monsters” which seems a little disingenuous, as if to say “i don’t know why everyone is so mad, these were just jokes”
No you may be wondering why I said in theory this apology was good. Well this reply popped up calling angry and upset lesbians abusive shitheads and Gaud basically agreeing with what they said. Yeah real fucking sorry huh. Not to mention basically pubically posting the urls of angry lesbians who were rightly felt mad at their lesbophobia as “hatemail”.
Their second more recent apology was even worse. If we’re not counting how they basically don’t believe many people criticizing them were not black they don’t even apologize for using it. They say “I chose not to censor the word when copying the quote b/c Sam purposely uses it as a powerful final note to her speech, and at the time I was concerned that censoring it would be dishonest, and catering to white discomfort.” This is excusing it, it’s not even an apology. They even start the post with “ I’ve been accused of using the N word.“ as if they don’t even know what the problem is. And they use it again in that “apology post! They basically learnt nothing!
This is also not addressing the female socialization comment they made which is transmisogynistic. Specifically in the tags of this post (now deleted) said “ #i’m nonbinary but i’ve been socialized and perceived female my whole life which means there is a huge overlap bt the female experience and my experiences.” Whether Gaud meant to or not, this in itself is transmisogynistic, as TERFs use it to say trans women are not real women since they have been “male socialized” instead of female socialized. I am not a trans woman myself, so my knowledge is pretty limited, however the callout I have linked in the bottom of this post does go into it in more detail in the transmisogynist section
So why did they delete the tags? Well, they made this post after deleting said tags. You may notice that isn’t apology, this is an attempt to garner sympathy.  And before you say it, yes Gaud made an apology in the replies of the original post they made. But why only in the replies? Just posting a really shitty post that is like “well these meanies don’t like me because I can’t apologize correct!” just makes people like you even less.
Finally, in this post they admit they cannot take criticism. But this reply sucks. They say they’ve never learned how to process criticism from their parents/adults (ignoring the fact that responding to criticism depends on you specifically and also they literally just shifted the blame of them no being able to do as their parent’s fault what???). They also say they can’t reply correctly to criticism because of “angry scrutiny & criticism from anonymous internet users who may or may not already have decided I’m irredeemably”. Which is like...huh? You can’t reply to criticism because people don’t like you for the thing that they’re criticizing you for? What are they supposed to do then? Gaud also employed self-deprecation “Or I’m a shitty garbage person who should delete their blog." and specific tags such as “im sorry for bumming ya’ll out” which is more of a cry for sympathy than an actual apology.
In conclusion, Gaud needs to learn how to apologize and handle criticism. They need to realize that people who is criticizing them is not a hater out to get them, and have valid critiques. Sometimes people are going to be angry, but you can’t dismiss someone because they’re angry at you. As someone who is autistic as well, I understand that communication can be difficult but you need to take responsibility regardless. As I said earlier, just admit that you fucked up. These wishy washy and sympathy grabbing replies aren’t going to cut it.
Not everyone is going to like you Gaud. Not everyone is going to forgive you. And that’s okay! I think personally if you apologized without trying to make yourself seem like the person who’s been wronged more people would see that as a step in the right direction. It’s just so far, every attempt Gaud has made has not done that as I’ve explained.
And to Gaud’s fans, wanting Gaud to properly apologize is not callout culture. It’s wanting an adult to take responsibility for their actions.
Here’s a more in depth callout post for gaud to read at your leisure as well. TW: for rape, pedophilia, antisemitism, incest, anti black racism and lesbophobia.
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vaguely-concerned · 5 years
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SO I DID GET TO SEE GOOD OMENS AND TL;DR IT WAS EXCELLENT, I AM EUPHORIC
more thoughts and spoilers under the cut!
the FUCK YEEEEEEEAAAAAHs:
- mr gaiman you did it you made it even gayer I never even believed it was possible what is this 6000 years pining slowburn nonsense 
*ahem* to be more serious about it I loved that the show takes the emotional throughlines from the book and somehow both heightens and deepens them. 
- it really is phenomenally faithful to the book and the stuff it adds is mostly a m a z i n g. it kept me perfectly engaged despite me knowing what like 75% of the dialogue was going to be
- david tennant doesn’t quite go for the same energy as how I imagine crowley in the book -- in my head he’s more... idk how to explain it but the vibe is more someone grinning a bright fixed ‘this is totally my suave face’ grin while clearly continually going ‘oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck’ internally haha, to me he’s slightly less... mercurial? trying to play his cards closer to the chest? but you know what show!crowley is fucking hilarious too and I do like what they’ve done with him being less of an optimist at the core and more enjoying the world through his connection with aziraphale -- the sense of underlying loneliness you get in some places in the book has really been dialed up, he just wants a friend :( (which incidentally seems to be part of the reason he fe -- sauntered vaguely downwards too; he mostly wanted to hang out with someone, and today he still doesn’t really fit in with either the angels or the demons) 
- I can’t believe they managed to capture the feeling of ‘Under the ash and soot that flaked his face, he looked very tired, and very pale, and very scared’ on screen; it’s one of the moments of the book that really stuck with me and it worked so well here too, especially since the fallout of the situation stays with him longer
- this version of aziraphale is just. so lovely. so so good, literal precious angel who almost got his head cut off for crepes, I totally see why crowley persevered through the ages and his own intimacy issues, good call my friend. thank you michael sheen, every time this character showed up on screen I was filled with joy and delight
- I’m completely undone by how incredibly mutual their friendship is in this -- despite crowley being the more active in asking for connection it’s obvious all the way through how much aziraphale genuinely adores him and enjoys his company (even though he knows he shouldn’t and so continually needs to give himself some plausible deniability)
when aziraphale’s voice breaks as he’s like ‘don’t go’ after they’ve argued in the park and he’s just tried to pretend they’re not even friends? hahahahahahaha ouch my fucking heart
- sister mary loquacious was the most endearing thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life, give that actress all the roles she’s got the charisma of the gods
- “not only a southern pansy, sergeant -- the southern pansy” got through and it was glorious (ditto shadwell’s naming schemes, I for sure thought that wouldn’t be mentioned but it’s so incredibly funny)
- crowley repeatedly and openly just... begging aziraphale to go off to the stars with him what the fick-freckedy-fuck
- Of the horsemen Pollution was my absolute fave (so cool and unsettling and nonbinary rep!!!!!!! also they feel like the youngest horseman in such a deep way, every credit to the actress that was great) and I really enjoyed the twist on Famine, making him seem more intense and hungry himself as part of his nature as opposed to in the book where he’s basically like... diet vetinari lol
- G A B R I E L  he was so perfectly awful... absolutely no redeeming features whatsoever he’s just a piece of shit all the way through and John Hamm was clearly having the time of his life with it and I too was living 
- crowley crying in the bar because he lost his best friend and there’s no point to even try to run away anymore if he’s alone, he’s just waiting for the end of the world ;____________________________________________________; what an addition, such a thoughtful way to steer his character arc, wonderful, spectacular
in the book it’s more about him finding his way through the fear and desperation and having lost everything back to his core ‘actually... fuck this there’s no situation I can’t snake my way out of let’s goooooooooo’ self, which is admittedly really cool and satisfying, but it feels like a shallower thing than finally reaching a point where he can no longer pretend he doesn’t care or doesn’t want things. (also... the way his will to live reignites the moment aziraphale needs him fjskadlfhaskdhfksldhfslkahdf “I’ll come find you” INDEED fjksdafhsdlfhsdalfh) 
- also a nice tiny change: the implication that reason he can drive the bentley through the flames is that he loves that car so fucking much, he’s invested so much of himself and his emotions in it over many years, like a sort of microcosm of how he feels about the actual world (and specifically humanity’s presence in it) that produced it
- the child actors were uniformly precious, and the kid who played adam got me right in the feelings. the sort of comedic sociopathy of kids thing going on in the book is downplayed, which means I was feeling all the more protective of this sweet sweet kid who just loves his dog and his friends and fjsdfklasjkh
- *sigh* my embarrassing crush on david tennant has been lying dormant these last few years, simply waiting for its chance to rise from the depths like a kraken yet again, and I am slightly unsettled that what really made it surface this time was him dressed up as evil Mary Poppins + the bathing suit, socks included. ah well the heart uh wants what it wants I guess 
- crowley is awfully quick to suggest child murder for someone who’s blatantly not willing to harm a hair on a kid’s head himself lawl the two of them just juggling the ‘but maybe you could like... quickly murder him so we could avoid all this???’ ball back and forth before madame tracy finally knocks some sense into them 
- the actress for madame tracy did such an amazing job that I literally forgot aziraphale wasn’t actually possessing her, ART
- fellas... is it gay to blow up a bunch of nazis for your ~*best friend*~ and save his books while actualfax romantic music swells in the background... asking for a friend 
- “anywhere you want to go” :):):):) oh no
- to be Sad at you for a second here... why the fuck did aziraphale immediately assume crowley wanted the holy water to use it on himself? is there like. a story here we don’t know. is this the fallout of going to check wtf the spanish inquisition was all about. I’m almost afraid to ask
- to be even Sadder: that ‘For Terry’ made me cry and I’m not ashamed to admit it
the awwww... okay I guess you can’t have EVERYTHINGs:
- the scene where crowley and aziraphale get wasted together after the antichrist is delivered is not quite as funny as it is in my head, but then I don’t think anything in the physical world could be as funny as the way I imagine them just like somberly leaning over the table at each other with little regard for personal space and drunkenly expounding on dolphins, so I’ll forgive it
- CGI satan was completely unnecessary and not even very well designed *shrug emoji* the whole point of that scene is that we never get to see him, just the mounting dread as he’s getting closer, and then the wordless reveal of who Adam considers to be his dad and that’s all that matters and even the devil is powerless against it... loved the ~*godfathers*~ giving a little literal angel/devil on my shoulder pep talk, tho, that was incredibly sweet
- ...the maggots huh neil. couldn’t leave them out huh. what a world it would be if we didn’t get to see a bunch of people get eaten by a writhing roomful of maggots huh. 
- ETA: actually one more: I refuse to accept this version of DEATH, hashtag not my reaper
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trisockatops · 6 years
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Written for the new Nonbinary and Generally Not Binary blogging carnival @carnivaloutsidethebinary with the August topic Questioning and Exploration.
A blogging carnival is a blogging event where bloggers take turns hosting topics surrounding some general theme and anyone who feels inspired can respond. This carnival is specifically about Outside the Binary Genders.
So here’s my story of how I came to identify as nonbinary and genderqueer.
Chapter 1: Cis
I both never thought a lot about gender and thought a lot about gender. Thanks to a heavy dose of internalized misogyny, sometime in elementary school (4th and 5th grade, I think), I stopped wearing dresses. I associated femininity with weakness. I wasn’t ashamed to be a girl, but I didn’t want to be seen as weak and associated being girly with being weak. I avoided the color pink altogether. I never wore makeup.
In late elementary or early middle school, I have a specific memory of going to local amusement park with my cousins. I was wearing an oversized gray tee and had my hair cut short (I had my hair long until 5th grade and then loved how freeing and light short hair was; I am a creature of comfort above all else and long hair is too time consuming for me). My boobs hadn’t really grown in yet (not that they ever got that large, thankfully). We stopped at some snack truck, probably for something like dippin’ dots. And the man running the food truck referred to me as “sir”. And I was in a foul, hateful, depressed mood for the rest of the day. I didn’t want to dress any differently but I HATED being thought of as a boy.
It wasn’t until mid to late high school that I finally came to the realization that being human meant being comprised of both feminine and masculine parts and that this was okay. I experimented with wearing skirts and allowing myself to come in contact with the color pink. I still never wore makeup and didn’t really get into dresses. But I was more more happy and at ease with who I was.
During HS, I also started to become a blossoming little feminist reading about and standing up for women’s rights. I also met someone trans (binary), who I became really good friends with.
I was secure in being a woman, though, and very proud to be one. I never questioned my gender. Or maybe I just didn’t really know I could?
At some point, as we all began maturing, there was a disconnect between my experiences and those of my friends. As an asexual, though, that was something very common to me and, considering a lot of the disconnected experiences had to do with sexual interactions to which I was pretty oblivious of, it seemed and even still seems like that could at least be a part of it. But I’ll get into this a little bit more next.
Chapter 2: Questioning
Just as I was entering college, I got into an abusive relationship that lasted my entire bachelor’s experience. I finally escaped my last semester (I went for 4.5 years).
Turns out that you work hard to hold things together while you’re being abused because you have no other choice. I thought I would be fine. I could just finally be free. I could do things again. Maybe I could even be happy again? Instead, depression that I’d suffered from ever since early HS came crashing back down on me tenfold. I had a lot of unprocessed baggage that I hadn’t even known I’d had. It was a long, hard period of inner turmoil and distress and severe self-hatred for me, coming to terms with what I’d been through.
I know questioning is never easy. It’s frustrating and confusing. You doubt who you are. It’s just a haze of wtf and never really knowing or understanding anything and not even being able to voice how you’re feeling. If not because it wouldn’t be accepted than because you simply don’t even know how you’re feeling, so how the heck are you supposed to be able to explain that?
But my questioning came on during an already intense bout of confusion in working out the trauma I’d endured and how to continue living after it. Now, I had begun expanding my feminism by researching other bigotries. I’d heard of being nonbinary and had precursory knowledge of what it meant, but it wasn’t until after I escaped my abuser that I felt pulled to learning more about it. I followed a lot of nonbinary blogs trying to figure out what it was and what it meant and how it felt. And somewhere along the line, questioning how I felt about my gender started slipping in with questioning how and why to go on living.
Like a lot of people, I doubted myself and what my feelings, which were vague and undefined, actually meant. I had never questioned my gender before. In fact, I had felt solidly like a girl and had been proud of it. Was that a lie or was this a lie? And my abuse complicated things. Was I just feeling this way because I was traumatized and dissociating? I was definitely dissociating, specifically from my genitalia and my body. At the time, I never connected this with it possibly being dysphoria. For me, it was just a reaction to my trauma. But was I just rejecting who I was in order to cope with what I’d been through? Was I just faking this gender confusion? Was I an intruder? Was I just trying to be more special?
Yet I couldn’t stop reading and researching and looking up new terms. I believed I was faking and intruding but... I didn’t want to be.
One day i came across a post by someone talking about how they were nonbinary afab and one of the signs looking back that should have been a sign was that they’d never really experienced street harassment. They weren’t catcalled like their friends and family were. They’d never felt the need to walk to their car with their keys between their fingers or call a friend and tell them to expect their call when they finally got home.
It was the first post about being nonbinary that I connected with and related to. I wanted to cry. That was me. That was one of the huge disconnects between my experience and that of other women’s. I clung to that post, that other person with this shared experience that could potentially mean I wasn’t just an invader. That maybe there was a reason I was so conflicted and in internal uproar.
Still doubting and confused and coping with my trauma, though, I soldiered on. I waited to have that perfect moment of clarity, that spark of recognition, that magical moment where I read a gender term and everything fell into place. 
But nothing ever clicked.
I found and reblogged dozens of terms that... just weren’t me. I found and reblogged a few that were really close. But... something just wasn’t perfect. Didn’t feel right. Nothing ever fit like a custom glove. They were nice terms. Good terms. But they didn’t seem to be mine.
After months (maybe half a year or more) of questioning and researching and struggling... I was tired. I had compartmentalized a lot of my trauma. I was ready to think about other things.
I decided to stop torturing myself trying to find that perfect term that may never come. I basically raegquit questioning. I chose to identify as nonbinary and just leave it as that. Even through the doubt, the fear, the unknowing confusion.
Chapter 3: Nb & Gq
Three or so years later, I was talking to someone I’d met in an exercise class. I don’t remember how it came about, but he was sharing and I think he was telling me about going between periods of asexuality and hypersexuality, and so I shared that I was asexual and (now) aromantic (caedromantic, actually), which led to him coming out as agender. I excitedly stumbled over telling him I was much the same, that I was nonbinary. We talked about how this felt to each of us and how we expressed it. It was the first time I’d ever said I was nonbinary out loud. And that’s what made me realize that somehow, slowly, over time, I’d actually come to really identify with and as nonbinary. It took years, but I’d finally accepted and come to terms with being nonbinary.
That was a huge revelation to me. It was such an exciting moment. I don’t know when or where it’d happened but it seemed to have just happened over time by giving myself a little time and patience.
After that, I began participating more in online nonbinary communities. In doing so, I heard and learned more about being genderqueer. I was also learning more of the queer community in general (after closing in a decade of never feeling a part of the LGBTQIAP+ community since I dealt with it mostly online and gatekeeping efforts have only become louder and louder). I liked the meaning and statement. I feel connected to nonbinary, but I have since also begun identifying as genderqueer as well. To me, they mean different things that I relate to in different ways. They’re both meaningful to me, though it has taken a couple more months to understand what each of these labels and identities mean and how they relate to me.
Unfortunately, I still haven’t come out to anyone but that one agender person, but I now know better who I am. I am sure there are more discoveries and understandings to be made. I am happy to finally be in a place where I can look forward to these future revelations rather than just being frustrated at not understanding. I learned to let go and that the experience is more important than the label.
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max1461 · 3 years
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So, I’ve never really talked seriously about my GeNdEr IdEnTItY on here but I feel like it might be helpful to do so. Or, less my “gender identity”, and more my... complicated gender feelings. This is a long post and probably interesting to nobody but me, but I appreciate anyone who reads it anyway as I’m kinda in a weird place at the moment and wondering if anyone else shares [something like] my experiences.
The thing is, I used to feel really intense gender dysphoria. I felt it basically from as long ago as I can remember, up until my early twenties when it just sharply faded. This is not an experience I have heard others talk about, and it’s come with some odd side effects, idk.
When I was a little kid (like, maybe 4-8 years old?) I was extremely open and adamant about refusing to follow gender norms. I didn’t have any concept of “trans” or “nonbinary” (I had never heard of those ideas), but I had a very strong sense that I had been born the wrong sex. I would frequently say stuff like “I shouldn’t have been born [assigned gender], I should have been [other binary gender]” and I didn't really think anything of it? Like I wasn’t embarrassed or ashamed to want that, it was just this matter-of-fact thing in my mind, I should have been born the other way. I also absolutely hated being lumped in with my agab in peoples’ minds, and in order to avoid that I would refuse to take part in gendered activities of any kind, or even associate with other kids at school of my agab. I was extremely dedicated to doing nothing that was associated with my it. (Of course, I did end up doing stuff when I didn’t realize it was associated with my agab, and actually ended up with a fair number of pretty “typical” gendered hobbies in retrospect, but anyway).
As I young teenager, I remember feeling pretty sad about things. I had just resigned to the idea that I was always going to be my agab and there wasn’t anything that could be done about it, and it just felt kinda hopeless. Then at like 14 I learned what trans people were (from a specific reddit post, a transition timeline that made it to the front page, to whose OP I shall be eternally grateful!) and I just felt such intense happiness and excitement that this was just, a real thing. Like, that one discovery just, changed my whole perspective on things? And knowing that changing my gender was a possibility arguably made my dysphoria worse, I think, but I also started to feel gender euphoria for the first time. Like, when I did something that felt gender-affirming, it just made me so intensely, intensely happy. I would spend hours daydreaming about being [other binary gender] and just the thought that it was a real possibility felt so amazing and made me so happy (it was also quite scary).
Mental health wise, that was also (for other reasons) the absolute worst period of my life. I was very unhappy, and I remember that literally the only emotion that was able to cut through my anxiety was that gender euphoria. Like, literally, that and that alone got me through my teenage years.
Anyway, based on all that, I was pretty sure I was binary trans. Like I was thinking about transition and planning for it and everything but like. As I got in to my early twenties, concurrent with my mental health improving drastically, my gender feelings started to just fade? Like, I didn’t feel that intense dysphoria anymore, but I no longer felt the euphoria either. And obviously, not feeling the dysphoria is nice... but not feeling the euphoria is really, really sad to me. I think about it a lot, actually. There isn’t anything that makes me feel that intensely anymore. It was this huge part of my life, by far the strongest positive emotion I had experienced at the time, and it’s just, 95% gone now. And I kinda don’t know what to do? To be honest, I’d take the dysphoria back in an instant if it brought the euphoria back too. But things just don’t have that impact anymore. Anyway, that’s when I started identifying as non-binary, cause I just, didn’t know what to make of it all.
And idk, that’s where I am now. And I’m never met or heard about anyone who has had this kind of experience, so I don’t really have any sense of... what to do? Like, is it possible to have been “formerly pre-transition trans”? And want to be that again?
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curlyjoe7 · 4 years
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This Is Very Important To Me
So Please Read Everything
~❤️🧡💛💚💙💜~
Okay so umm, hello again everyone! This post is hard to make. It’s also kinda awkward regarding the fact I recently came out regarding my sexuality. But here we are again I guess. Hi, my name is Lux and my sexuality has changed a lot throughout my life. I grew up having crushes on every kind of person but refused to acknowledge it. Until I hit puberty at 13 and thought I was a lesbian. I spent that whole year thinking I had to choose between which gender I liked and which I didn’t until I was 14 when I realized I didn’t have to choose and started identifying as bi. Then at 16 I heard about pan, I didn’t really know much about it and had no idea that pan and bi can sometimes be the same thing. I wasn’t sure about dating nonbinary people but I was sure about dating trans men and women and I thought that was what made me pan. Which was incredibly miss guided, I realize.
Eventually I grew into it because I did become the definition, I was attracted to all genders and was totally cool with dating a nonbinary person so I didn’t worry about it. And then about a month or so ago I came out as omnisexual due to a recent discomfort in the pansexual identity. I also thought since it was more tailored to my identity and because I have OCD, it was better for me. Though in the back of my mind, I knew it wasn’t me. I’ve known who I truly am for awhile. Basically the moment I heard the term. I knew it was me right away since I’d had felt that way for as long as I can remember. But I was uncomfortable. I felt like a freak. To be completely honest, I was ashamed of it. I still partly feel that way.
So I hid it deep down so I never had to deal with it again. I turned to omnisexual to try and convince myself I wasn’t what I am. To tell myself I’ve been uncomfortable with my sexuality simply because it wasn’t as specific. Which is just. Not the truth. I even hid behind my gender for the reason of why I am so uncomfortable with particular things. To pretend. To feel better about myself. Because I’ve always accepted my gender more than this. Way more than this. And my gender is the reason for some of my discomfort, just not mostly like this is.
And I’m sorry. To the omnisexual community for making a fool out of you guys (or at least feeling like I did). To the community I’m about to mention. For hiding this for so long and only accepting it when it came to other people. But, mostly, I’m sorry to myself. For not accepting who I am. For hiding it until it fought it’s way out through pain and vulnerability. I am who I am and I need to admit it so here goes:
I’m ace. More specifically I am greysexual or grey ace. I am a member of the asexual community.
To be honest since I have been refusing to admit it for years, I am just proud of myself for typing out the words.
It even feels a little too personal to admit, I feel incredibly vulnerable and naked saying it. But I don’t want to be ashamed anymore and I’ve been open with everything else so I want to do the same with this. I need to. To love myself I need to accept myself completely. What is greysexual you might ask? It is someone who’s sexuality falls in the fluid area between asexual and sexual. Somedays they are sexual and sometimes they aren’t. For me, I find my sexuality doesn’t just go back and forth between asexual and sexual but also demisexual. I find sometimes I feel sexual, sometimes I feel asexual and sometimes I feel demisexual. At times I feel like sex is the most disgusting thing ever and if any sexualizes me I get severely uncomfortable and grossed out. Sometimes I want to feel sexy, I will want to be wanted by anyone and be okay with the touch of a stranger.
Sometimes I’ll only be sexually attracted to you if we have a deep connection. And I’ve been this way for a very long time. I’m severely uncomfortable with the topic of sex around most people. I can’t bare to hear sexual assault stories as they give me panic attacks (I’ve been running from the tv whenever anyone watches SVU severely disturbed since I was a kid). I cried when I hit puberty not just because I didn’t want to be a girl but mostly I didn’t want to be sexualized. I started growing into my body at 8 years old and I felt like an object. I couldn’t bare the thought of being seen in that way. I still sometimes can’t. I wear over sized clothes to hid my body so no one can sexualize it. I wear no bra because it gives me anxiety and makes me feel like everyone is looking at them. I fear the gynecologist cause I’m so uncomfortable with the topic of sex it has to be on my own terms with someone I trust.
And it’s really hard for me to trust many with that, I barely trust anyone with that. My body is intimate and having to share it with someone I don’t want to feels like sexual assault. I know it sounds crazy but it’s true. The gynecologist is literally my biggest fear. I’ve been told that I’ve needed to go to one before and I fell to the floor in the isle of a Walgreens in tears, shaking and screaming that I just can’t do it because of it. It ruined my whole day. So yeah. It’s been this way forever and for awhile I thought I was demisexual but stuffed it down. Until I realized it didn’t fit me did it come back up to the surface. I didn’t want to be ace. I didn’t want to have a romantic orientation different from my sexual one on top of being agender/nonbinary.
I felt like people wouldn’t take me serious and make fun of me. But I can’t deny the truth so here we are. I know the reason I started becoming uncomfortable with pansexual then was because I knew I wasn’t but now it just feels wrong to even id as panromantic, like the identity is an empty shell of who I used to be. And omni feels like I lie I hid in to deny the truth so I’m going to go with biromantic from now on. It just feels like it’s actually me, maybe because I feel guilty for being so misguided about pan in the beginning, idk but it doesn’t matter as long as I’m happy. And I’m still attracted to everyone, I still would like to date anyone of any gender and of either sex so that doesn’t change. I’m still me. I’m just becoming more comfortable with my identity. And actually admitting who I really am. I am an agender, biromantic grey ace. And my identity is valid.
I am not stupid or over complicating anything. I am not a freak. I am me. This was really hard to admit but I’m glad I am finally doing so. I don’t want to hide who I am in 2020. And I want to say thank you to my friends and brother for reassuring me that I am not a freak and supporting me. That I am valid. Those words, even if few, meant a lot to me. Probably even more than you could imagine. It gave me the confidence to finally accept something I have known that I am but denied for so long. It’s hard but I want to love myself and in this year, I will.
Even if it hurts. Even if tears falls. Even if I am forced to forgive and forget. To burn bridges and build new ones. I am going to accept what I can’t change and change what I can. I am going to forgive myself and be happy. It’s been 6 years this March of being severely depressed and whilst I know I can’t fix it completely. I am going to do my best to treat it and actually take care of myself. And I hope you all do the same for yourself. I love you all and you are valid and beautiful as fuck. Especially me and my fellow aces <3
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spirkism · 7 years
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on why queer isn’t a bad word
I’ve read quite a few posts from either viewpoint and so far I’ve kept my mouth shut on how I feel about this because I didn’t want to polarize - but lately I’ve seen more and more of the “but it’s a slur!!!” arguments and couldn’t take it anymore. I went on a twitter rant but promised to make a more organized and put together post so here we go. (it got quite long, I apologize)
there are a lot of wonderful posts about this out there already but I decided to still mention the points made there because honestly the more people hear it the better. feel free to approach me and I’ll link you to some of those other posts!
as a little backstory: I’m from Germany - aka a non-English speaking country and that actually plays a part in it but more on that later. I’m in my mid-twenties and I’ve identified as queer for about 7ish years now. I used to be very well connected in the community, especially the trans community and had some older friends who were there in the beginnings of our (German) community. so I know the history.
okay so, I’m just gonna list some points now in no particular order:
1. yes. queer is used as a slur. so is gay. so are basically all the other identities we have. because some straight people are assholes and are afraid of everything that’s different. BUT. queer has been reclaimed AGES ago. our forebearers fought long and hard to take it BACK from the straight people who stole it to hurt us. freely handing it over to our opposers now would be nothing short of trampling on our community’s history and invalidating the sacrifices the generations before us have made. also. “queer history”, “queer cinema”, “queer studies” are all legitimate (academical) terms. academics don’t cuss in their descriptors (and college courses).
2. queer is so much more inclusive than lgbt(+) or any of those acronyms. sure you could go lgbtqiaapf... but honestly that’s getting a bit ridiculous and frankly confusing. so for the sake of this argument we’ll stick with the “original” acronym LGBT. it mentions all of four identities. FOUR. out of the multitudes there are. I personally happen to have one of my identities mentioned there. that’s not a lot. but still, it’s something. my aroace nonbinary friend doesn’t have any. “but there’s the plus!” you say. great. a plus. lovely. how would you feel being represented by a plus that doesn’t tell you anything about what it actually means? exactly. that’s not representation at all. who tf even knows what that plus means. no mention of nonbinary people, fluid people, pan people, ace people, aro people, and the list goes on and on.  that’s why it’s an amazing umbrella term. everyone can find a place in it.
3. it’s welcoming. this point is kind of tied to my second one but it’s important in its own right so I decided to give it its own number. it’s welcoming to questioning people. you know you’re different? not straight? but are you pan? are you bi? are you ace? or maybe aro? are you trans? are you non-binary? who the fuck even knows. it’s hard. I’ve been through multiple of these and it SUCKS. so having a community who goes “hey we don’t care how exactly you identify, we don’t mind if you haven’t figured it out you, you have a place here, you’re safe here and no one is gonna police your identity or gatekeep you” is super important. trust me.
4. it’s often easier. if I want to let somebody know I’m “not straight” without going into the details of my identity, queer is just a lot simpler and the other person will immediately understand what I mean. sometimes I just don’t wanna let somebody know all of my identities. sometimes I really don’t feel like educating people on all the terms I use. but I still want to let them know I’m part of the community. and honestly sometimes saying “hi so I’m a pansexual gray-aro gender-nonconforming trans guy” is too tiresome/long. “hi I’m queer” is concise and understandable to pretty much everyone. sure, if you’re a cis gay dude, lesbian or bisexual person you can just use one of those words - good for you (no really, it is good for you and I’m happy you have these terms). but who tf (that isn’t as deep in the community as I am and/or on tumblr) is gonna know what I mean when I talk about my identity? fucking no one. you can’t really use “I’m LGBT” as a descriptor for yourself. saying “I’m gay” doesn’t work either cause then a) I might feel weird cause I don’t actually identify as gay and b) there’s gonna be shouts of “but you’re not gay, you’re not allowed to use that word!” - well what am I gonna use then? exactly. QUEER. that’s where my nationality comes in as well. here no one knows what the fuck ace / aro, nb or even pan is. but they know what queer is. it’s like that in a lot of the non-english speaking world. get out of your US sometimes, folks.
5. this one is near and dear to me. queer is so much more than just an identifier telling people you’re not straight. it’s more than a label. more than a community. especially in the beginnings of our history it was most often used to denote that you’re different. you’re not the norm. and you don’t wanna be. you’re proud of being different. you’re celebrating being different and you’re not ashamed of it. it means you don’t want to assimilate, don’t want to emulate the “normal” lifestyle, don’t want to be that “well, he has a husband but you know, he’s not really gay, he’s just like us” guy. (nothing wrong with having a house with a picket fence and two children though, okay, I never said that! I actually want that myself) the celebration of difference has always been a strong suit in our community. and personally for many of us. this is where my other “oddities” and differences interwine with my queer identity. I suffer from anxiety. I’m kinky. I’m a witch, I’m questioning my religious beliefs, I don’t give a fuck about gender roles and I’m just a general oddball. and that’s how I LIKE IT. I’m good that way. heck, I’m fucking GREAT that way.
there are quite a few more arguments to be made for the word queer but these are the ones I feel are most important.
so yes, I’ve identified as queer for a long while and I will continue to do so. as well as use it as an umbrella term for our community. if you personally come up to me and ask me not to use the word queer for you specifically of course I’ll accept that - but don’t you dare tell me how I can and cannot identify myself and my community. as cis gays and lesbians you might not need the word queer. and that’s good for you. (no really, it is). but as someone who isn’t one of these things, for so many of us, queer is a word we desperately need (for the reasons listed above and more). so PLEASE don’t take it from us. a lot of work and love went into that word and it would be devastating to lose all that love and hope and sacrifice. we must not let this divide us. we must stay strong as a community, ALL of us, especially in the current times. 
so no, I have never nor will I ever tag my identity as a slur and I urge you not to either. if for personal reasons queer is a triggering word for you, there are countless ways to get around that (just like with any other trigger - use tumblr savior, xkit or any other of those options). but don’t ruin it for the rest of us.
this has obviously just been my very personal opinion - feel free to add on to this!  I welcome discussion about it - with people who agree with me but also people who disagree - the only thing I ask is to please stay civil and not to become personally attacking.  thank you. sorry for making such a long and personal post but I just had to after all this time.
so to end this with an all time classic: WE’RE HERE, WE’RE QUEER, DEAL WITH IT.
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hellagaypokemon · 7 years
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What's up with sense8? I haven't seen it myself, but I thought it was supposed to have decent lgbt representation?
that’s what everyone thinks until you look at it deeper.
like, ya know how someone can say something and you agree with it based on the assumption that the speaker is a decent human being, but then you find out more about their politics and realize what they said had a deeper meaning you didn’t know that makes it actually really, really awful?
what I’m about to tell you about this show is just like that.
the biggest, most awful thing about the series, that is one of those ‘you wouldn’t know it without outside info’ things, is that the authors have a serious gay conversion fetish, and this show is literally that fetish played out on the big screen, where they can make money off it and normalize it in the minds of the masses.
now, for those of us who haven’t watched the show and aren’t familiar with it’s content/plot, the very basic premise is that 8 people become psychically linked (becoming the “sens8″), and basically become part of one giant poly relationship complete with physical and psychic orgies.
seems innocent enough, but once you know more about it, both in the show and outside of it, that becomes really sinister.
if you go to the creators’ fb pages and go back to before the show started, you’ll find both of them, along with other crew members, are obsessed with poly gay conversion.
if you’re not familiar with this particular fetish (first of all, consider yourself lucky, and turn back now if you want to maintain your blissful ignorance), it’s basically getting gay people into a poly m/f relationship (usually a bi person and a het person, for example, a lesbian dating a bi woman who also has a boyfriend), and very slowly, over time “turning” the gay member to make them bi. this is done through the same tactics that cults use (which you can see a lil run down here in a more familiar context if you’re unfamiliar with that) but the ones pertaining to this particular situation look more like shaming gay member for not being more affectionate with the other partner (ie, the bi woman chastizing the lesbian for not wanting to be affectionate with her boyfriend), or the other partner joining sex without permission, ex: the bi woman and lesbian having sex and the man coming in and joining on multiple occasions, only touching the bi woman at first but then going further, all while ignoring and shaming any protests from the lesbian.
it’s defended as “exploring sexual fluidity”, but if the fact that it’s only aimed at making gay people feel m/f attraction isn’t enough of a tip off, that’s literally the new term for conversion therapy (which, for the sake of not going off on a tangent, I will explain in detail with sources at the bottom of this post*)
now, you may be thinking that this sounds awful, but confused as to how this relates to the show. if you haven’t heard, the creators themselves stated when asked about mid-way through season one, once the connection happens and everyone is connected, they feel each other’s feelings, and therefor everyone is now pan.
that’s right, the two gay characters now feel m/f attraction, and are shown enjoying m/f sex (physical btw, not just ‘someone else I’m linked to is having sex while I’m having sex therefor it’s like we’re all having sex with each other at the same time’, no, actual physical m/f sex). in fact, not just enjoying it, but loving it. which is identical to the creators’ fetish. the only difference is it happened instantaneously rather than having to wait for the brainwashing to take affect, making it seem a lot obviously homophobic.
now, you may be thinking that that’s ok, cause there’s straight people that are now pan! that must even it out, right?
no, it doesn’t, cause there’s still a lil problem with that. I mean, it’s still literally gay conversion, making gay people not gay anymore, and nothing can ever even that out, but the straight characters aren’t actually changed. for all intense and purposes, they stay straight. we never see them express same-sex attraction, and they only ever have m/f sex, while the previously gay characters are shown having m/f sex and loving it multiple times. that’s not a coincidence or an accident.
and also, that excuse is even more bullshit when you notice, even though it was said that they’re “all feeling each other’s feelings” their sexuality seems to be the only part they each feel. you have men and women connected, including a trans woman, yet none of them are now nonbinary, nor do any of them ever feel the trans woman’s dysphoria or gain any dysphoria of their own (nor does being connected to men lessen or worsen the trans woman’s dysphoria). this whole “feeling each other’s feelings” ONLY applies to sexuality, and only actually affects the gay people, whom remember, the creators love “fixing”.
and that’s just the main plot of the show! there’s also two gay men who are outside the sens8, who are constantly harassed by a woman who is completely obsessed with gay men.
now, this type of woman does exist irl, they’re known as “f*ghags” in the west and “fujoshi” (meaning “dirty girl”) in the east. they’re basically woman who are the female equivalent of straight men who think lesbians exist for their pleasure. they consume as much gay porn as they can, and harass actual gay men, because through their consumption of us (gay people) in fiction, they’ve forgotten that we’re actual people and do not, in fact, exist for their pleasure.
and that’s literally all she does. she consumes them like they’re her fave anime ship. she literally watches them having sex, and takes pictures of them without their knowledge or consent (most likely for her to squeal over later, since at the time she was too busy masturbating to them), and when confronted about this, when it’s shown how terrified one of the men is to be outed should that physical and undeniable proof fall in the wrong hands, he’s attacked and chastized by the other gay man, his own partner, for not considering the straight fetishist’s feelings, who’s upset that he doesn’t completely love how much she fetishizes them.
literally their only real part in the plot is for the narrative to shame gay men for not loving and embracing how straight female fetishists treat them, through things that are straight up straight people bullshit. (that whole ‘why won’t you come out of the closet, are you ashamed of me???’ thing is complete hetty bullshit, as is a gay man not only being ok with a straight girl treating them like this, but chastising his own partner for not being ok with it. that shit, just straight up does not happen)
and this is literally just the first season stuff, as I refused to learn any more about the show. this tbh, is beyond enough for me to know the show is 100% shit, but fyi, there’s also a fuck ton of racism I haven’t even touched.
you can say on the surface, it has representation/is diverse, and while that’s true, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s actually more regressive than a show with a 100% straight white cast. and just cause the creators are part of the community doesn’t make them exempt from bigotry.
another even better example if you’re still confused as to how that can be, a black gay man is the head writer for the Dear White People TV series, who’s goal with the show was to challenge how black gay men are viewed and portrayed in the media, and he wrote a “lesbian” teacher having an affair with her male student and denying it by continuing to claim she’s a lesbian (can’t have an affair with a male, student or otherwise, if you’re a lesbian) while he makes comments to his classmates about how she “isn’t a lesbian when she’s with [him]”, rolling lesbianism not being real and lesbians being pedophiles/predators all into one awful caracature of a character.
just cause he’s a gay man doesn’t mean he can’t be homophobic, and perpetuate specifically lesbophobic stereotypes.
just like how just because the creators of sens8 are trans and made a show full of diverse characters doesn’t mean they can’t be homophobic and racist. just like how just cause a show is diverse doesn’t mean it can’t be the mouthpiece for bigotry. bigotry doesn’t only come from the completely privileged in shows that only have token minority characters.
and that goes for everyone. I see far too often “I can’t be homophobic, I’m [insert non-straight sexuality here]” and it’s bullshit. you can be part of the community and be wildly homophobic. my byf page is full of links to both straight people and other LGBT people who could not hate lesbians more if they tried. hell, I’d be willing to bet my list of links is more diverse than the show.
so I hope that this has helped you and anyone else understand just how awful this show is by itself, and just how much of a blessing it is that it’s been canceled.
now, *conversion therapists have “realized” that the word “conversion therapy” has a “negative connotation” and so they’ve basically re-branded themselves, and moved the goal posts. “conversion therapy” is now known as “SAFE-T”, meaning “Sexual Attraction Fluidity Exploration (in) Therapy”, which, in their own words:
“The [term sexual fluidity exploration] accuratelyconveys that the therapist is not being coercive but merely assisting individuals in a client-centeredexamination of their sexual attractions.” […] “[it] does not imply that categorical change is the goal […] nor does it imply that change which is less thancategorical in nature cannot be meaningful and satisfying to clients” […] “Scientifically, the fluidity of sexual orientation (and, for our purposes, especially same-sexattractions) for many women and men is now beyond question” (here misquoting quoting Lisa Diamond, even though her actual study proved the opposite, that lesbian sexuality is in fact, not fluid)
what this means, for those who may be confused, is basically, they no longer want to make a gay person straight, instead they aim to make us bi, as it’s easier to convince someone through grooming and brainwashing that they have an attraction they actually don’t, in addition to the one they actually have, rather than completely erasing one and replacing it with another.
which is exactly what the creators are obsessed with, as are tons of other content creators. there’s been an increase in straight and bi authors creating stories that specifically revolve around a lesbian learning of her “sexual fluidity” and finding a man she just can’t resist, while the authors insist that it can’t be conversion therapy because they made the lesbian go from gay to bi/gay with an exception instead of gay to straight.
so yea, when I say this series is wildly homophobic on a level deeper than most people realize, I really, really mean it.
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