#stop fetishising the 50s

[legion-gringo]

// this is heavy and personal //

It's supposed to be my 4 year HRTiversary but something happened.

A few months back I stopped feeling as much like a girl, then I started taking T as well as E, then I stopped taking E, then I stopped wearing women's clothing then I stopped wearing makeup. I might go back to E/being a girl at a later date, but I might not.

Now I wear suits, use the men's toilets, go by he him pronouns, and I'm happy - or as happy as I was as a girl. I still feel trans, but I'm not really transfeminine at this point, and I'm clearly not transmasc either.

I don't think i count as transmisogyny affected, even. I just seem to most people like an effeminate gay man (they're not wrong, but it's more complicated than that, same as it is for anyone really)

I don't have any regrets - I look at my tits (small and perky) and I think they're neat. I like that estrogen gave me a softness and a connection to my emotions I had previously been lacking, but I like that T has given me the composure and poise to push back the tears and communicate to ppl how I feel instead of just falling apart and letting people see how I feel from that.

It's hard though. Am I detrans? Not really but I do make some people uncomfortable, I suspect. Or a joke that I could have made without a second thought suddenly becomes a minefield of "is he allowed to say that"

There's another detrans grifter in the media. This one is complaining that testosterone made him bald so he "may as well" keep being a guy even tho he regrets it. Fuckin idiot. Men go bald. If I go bald I think I'm gonna cry, (only I can't cry now.) Does this make me a hypocrite?

What's a HRTiversary anyway - it's a big deal for some, for others it's just "the earliest date possible they could get on hrt."

There's other people like me, irl and online, doing similar things - retransitioning rather than detransitioning - but I don't really feel that connected to them either. I know people desperate to tell you that they're a boy (but a girl really!!!!) and try and look as clocky as possible - this reads as weirdly transphobic against the tboys. There's a way to honor and appreciate trans beauty without fetishising clockiness, that's chasershit to me.

Idk where I'm going with this tbh. I don't really understand it but I am starting to resent the constant attempt by other trans people to categorise me into something safe, or at least nameable .

"so have you detransitioned"

"no"

"so you're still a girl"

"kind of but not really"

"are you a man?"

"yeah I guess"

"oh you're nonbinary"

"no"

"oh! You're genderfluid"

"idk no I don't think so"

"oh you're just nonbinary but you don't like the word"

"..."

It's funny as well how many people are completely in denial about what's happening in the same way that my family/coworkers were at the start of my first transition.

*turns up to a party in a suit*

"gurl you look amazing"

*uses men's bathrooms*

"wow she's so fierce"

*gently corrects misgendering*

"Hun you are so butch"

What I've really learned as well is how fuckin godawful girlie culture is from the outside. You go to a trans night in London and everyone's making the same tired jokes about praise kinks and headpats, catgirls and thighhighs, whether they're 19 or 50. Some stranger tried to pat my head at a punk gig my girlfriend was playing back in april and I told her to go fuck herself. If I tried that now I'd probably get booted from the community. Fuckin hell we got Imogen Binnie, Lou Sullivan, yknow there's actual cool parts of The Culture that you can engage with/riff on (like Jackie Ess did with Darryl and its links to Nevada) - why are we content with memes about sword lesbians and blahaj?

I'm part of the problem, too! I did that stupid "gifted boy to burnout girl with a praise kink" post from last year that I've seen go around twitter, Facebook, insta, tiktok, I'm feeding the cultural rot.

I fully expect to lose followers over this, cause it's upsetting to hear. i avoided detransitioners (still not a word i identify with) like the plague ever since i transitioned, not just cause they're normally creepy and weird but i think i genuinely believed that they'd somehow social-contagion me (Torrey Peters is occasionally capable of making a salient point, turns out!)

Anyway whatever. Burn it all down. Love and solidarity to my trans siblings, if this is creepy and weird to hear, catch you on the flipside in like 6 months when i get bored of this and go back to being a girlie

[dominikadecember]

Finally! 6x15

Tax season, taxes are so weird. In the UK unless you are self-employed, the taxes just come out automatically. You don't need to put yourself through this whole thing.

Wait, if your paper records are gone that means you don't get audited? Doesn't the government monitor bank accounts and shizzle? I don't understand taxes.

Okay this dude is so weird. Did he wash his hands? Because I would seriously order a perp to wash their hands before I arrested them. I'd make a very bad cop.

Wtff???? He just??? Did he take something???

WAIT A SECOND! ARE Y'ALL GONNA TRY TO PUT ATHENA THROUGH SHIT????? NUH UH!!!! ATHENA GRANT NEEDS TO ENJOY HER LIFE!!!!!! LEAVE HER ALONE!!!!!!

Omg, eddie and chris at shannon's grave, my heart, my boys, also can gavin be any more adorable??? he is such a good actor Lmao @ Bobby, was that your attitude as well a couple eps ago???? Don't think so boo.

Same chim, i'd but as much ice cream as i could if it was 50% off. Chimney basically saved the ice cream from being thrown away Maddie. Say thank you.

Lol, taxes. JEE YUN IS ADORABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Lmfao, 'papa jail', this kid man

Yes, call an accountant! Someone who knows what this shizzle is all about. RAVI IS STILL AROUND!!!!! Loving the whole lots of testosterone in the kitchen. Once again 911 showing that what is considered domestic work is not waiting on women. ALSO THAT COP WHO USED THAT THING TO BREAK THE DOOR WAS SO TINY AND SHE WAS SO COOL BARGING IN AND BREAKING DOORS!!!!!!!!

Eddie, you just can't control your heart eyes can you?

Basically, shell out and get an accountant.

'And that piece of advice is....' I guess we will never know. Le sad. Wait a sec, wasn't Marie dead? Why isn't anyone saying anything? I think I need to rewind. It is. What the hell is going on????

Lesson learned, heels are evil but will save your life.

Buck and Eddie in action is lovely to see. Ravi is hot as hell so confident. But seriously, isn't she the dead one?

Oh ffs.

Death Doula? What is that? I am judging. Very hard. This is weird to me. I am feeling weirded out.

Awwww Eddie. You feeling alone?

Okay, is it me or does Buck seem into Natalia more than she is into him? Oh, there's that spark. Death really interests you, huh? I'm weirded out by this girl. She likes death so much.

This whole thing is so weird to me and makes me uncomfortable. It feels like it's fetishising death. I am not okay with this so much.

CHRIS HAS HOMECOMING???? He is so grown up. 'We've got time' THESE ARE NOT EDDIE'S FAMOUS LAST WORDS!!!!!!!

Chim why you sizing everybody up??? It's not prison. Not yet. Omg the conspiracy. Tax fraud??? How why??? How??? Lmao genuine. Damn. They will let really get you on anything. OH MY GOD STOP TALKING. This IRS officer is so done with idjits.

Natalia weeeeeeirds me out. Why is Buck so into her??? What makes him attracted to her??? Is it because he has an odd relationship with death at the moment? This episode is weird. I'm uncomfortable with all of this.

I relate to eating in the office so much. Is CSI theme going to start playing anytime soon? OH SHIT. OH SHIT. OH SHIT. ATHENA IS GOING TO TRACK THIS POS DOWN! Athena was following good detective instincts, that's all. How did he take off the bracelet without ripping it apart? ATHENA IS AWESOME OKAY SHE JUST IS. Man, I'd love to have money. But honest money, not evil like this douche. Athena is such a badass. Lmao 'not again' same here. Try to get away now assface! Wait, is he now dead dead? For realsies?

Aw, she's died. That's sad.

Eddie. My poor bby.

I love jealous Eddie. Oh now I get the memes. Because like what the fuck indeed? What are the writers even trying to do? I need someone else's perspective on this conversation. I need @matan4il's perspective because I'm uncomfortable with this conversation as well and she can always make everything better.

Yes! Smart Madney.

MADNEY ARE GETTING MARRIED???????? OH MY GOD YAAAAAAAAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Also getting married for tax purposes is very true. My bff and her hubby mostly are in love but they also wanted those benefits.

AWWWWWWW CHRISTOPHER!!!!!!! HE IS SO CUTE!!!!!!!! Throwback to Buck!!!!!!! Shannon and Chris!!! This is making me emotional!!!!! The fact that Eddie now feels comfortable enough to go to his parents last minute shows his progress. Also his mum is still being yah know.....

You're right Josh! Chimney is not Doug. Completely different situation.

OMG HE IS LOOKING AT RINGS?????? OMG.

Welp, it's over. This episode made me feel very uncomfortable and I'm not sure how to feel about any of it. Except that Chris and Jee are super cute.

#dom watches 911

[heyhilana]

Quick question since one of your p3dro rpf pieces came up on my timeline and grossed me tf out… why is there an obsession with writing smutty rpf about a queer man pushing 50 in which he’s constantly fetishised for being Latino/speaking Spanish? It’s really embarrassing and I hope he or his family/friends/loved ones never see them. (And we know that he searches his name in social media so…)

Like writing smut about a fictional character is completely different to writing fantasy smut fan fiction about an actual person who might be in a relationship (and is currently suspected of being in a relationship with a man his own age)

since you’re bold enough to ask me anonymously, people write rpf’s about pedro and other actors all the time. normally i write about his characters but that was a request that i got so i did it. it was cute, it was light fluffy smut and remember, it’s fantasy, so there’s nothing wrong with it. and why would his family go looking for it? i’m sure they wouldn’t see that anywhere and pedro wouldn’t go looking for fanfiction of himself.

as far as speculation on him being in a relationship, how am I supposed to know that? that’s his personal life, something that i think would be kept private so why you or anyone else would be obsessed with that is beyond me. he’s never made a comment on a relationship from my understanding so it’s none of our business to speculate on it because well, that’s what normal people do. because now you’re telling me that since he might be in a relationship that i shouldn’t write stuff about him? basically speculation of a relationship = no more writing rpf’s.

and it’s not an obsession with writing rpf’s about an actor/actress. it’s a fantasy that just allows writers and readers to get away. it’s not a fucking crime. and as far as him speaking spanish do you even realize that I’m Latina too? it’s not about it being fetishized it’s just that, oh i don’t know, he’s chilean so he would speak spanish? and why even bring up his age? like, wtf? so because he’s 50 he doesn’t have sex or something? give me a break if you’re so upset with me writing an rpf about him. block me for all i care because you sound crazy.

note to everyone else that reads this: yes, i write rpf’s about pedro from time to time. one of my highest liked fics is an rpf. if you don’t like that, i’m not going to stop doing it. either block me or just ignore it. and if you’re going to complain about it, at least have the balls to take off the anon and say it to me.

#lana asks #lana things #i really don’t have time for the nonsense

[ineffablelexiconlad]

The writers that let Solangelo kiss as if they were in 50 shades of grey like-

I get it. You want some good interesting kiss. But they are f o u r t e e n. Stop. Fetishising!

#i'm sorry i've been ranting a lot about fanfics #i love you ofc #but there are some things #nico di angelo #solangelo #will solace #heroes of olympus #percy jackson #percy jackson and the olympians #trials of apollo

[rantingcrocodile]

febfem isn't about quantifying attraction it's about choosing to partner with women. a febfem whose attraction leans heavily toward men is still a febfem. and it doesn't erase bisexuality anymore than butch erases lesbian, it's bisexual exclusive and the b stands for bisexual.

febfem was created BY bi women FOR bi women, we get enough hate from non bisexuals and we don't need hate from other bisexuals as well. we need a word for ourselves to build community and describe our unique experience, don't shoot other bisexual women down

I'm going to copy and paste what I actually said again, because this kind of ask is actually really useful.

Febfem women: try challenging any internalised biphobia by putting "bisexual (febfem)” in your bios to stop distancing yourself from your bisexuality. Being a febfem is a manifestation of your bisexuality. It’s a qualifier for your bisexuality. Don’t fall into the trap of starting to treat it like this space’s version of “pansexuality.”

What you're trying to argue is that the qualifier is more important however the individual bisexual woman's bisexual attractions manifest.

It's still a qualifier.

Realistically, when it comes to actual, individual experiences of bisexuality (without any politicisation or feminism that you're talking about!) we have "febfem" for bisexual women who are bisexual, but who heavily and naturally prefer other women, and we have "pansexual" for the bisexual women who are around the "50/50" when it comes to naturally mixed attraction to both sexes.

However, we know that the term "pansexual" didn't turn out to be a quick and easy, "I'm a pan bisexual because my bisexuality means that I feel attraction to/fall in love with whoever clicks," it turned into virtue-signalling, "I'm a pansexual because I'm not transphobic like the people that call themselves bisexual, please don't call me transphobic, I'm a Good Trans Ally," like it's an entirely separate, pro-trans sexuality instead of the truth that they're just bisexual. It was politicised.

It's exactly the same with "febfem." There are plenty of bisexual women that are using "febfem" as a quick and easy, "I'm a febfem bisexual because my bisexuality means that I'm a bisexual woman primarily attracted to other women and hardly feel attraction for men, so I'm most likely to naturally just feel attraction to/fall in love with other women over men," but it's also turned into, "I'm a febfem because I'm not a gross bihet who obsesses over men and will probably partner with men like the women that just call themselves bisexual, don't worry, I'm a Good Feminist," like it's an entirely separate and feminist sexuality instead of the truth that they're just bisexual.

Really think about it. Why do you see "call yourself bisexual too" as an attack, and why aren't you thinking about exactly why you're so resistant to accepting that you're simply bisexual as well as the politicisation?

Since I'm being blunt this morning, how on earth do you expect to built a feminist bisexual community that prioritises partnering with women in a space where the majority of bisexual women have massive internalised biphobia? Why don't you care about building a feminist bisexual community first, when we're splintered to the point that biphobes deliberately pit us against each other and laugh as they achieve their own goals thanks to so much internalised biphobia in bisexual women? When febfems are so fetishised and the term is expected of bisexual women to be seen as "good" if they talk about their bisexuality? (Yes, I see the feminists that call themselves "bisexual" in their bios and then carefully never mention bisexuality, like the "bisexual" in their bios is an apology, don't worry about that.)

You're saying "our unique experience" like I wouldn't be using the exact same label as yourself if I felt like adding it in, since it would be just as true for me? Are you presuming that any mention of internalised biphobia automatically must mean that I can't be female exclusive in my political preferences now?

You see now why I'm ruthless when it comes to internalised biphobia.

Nobody else is challenging you to actually sit and think.

#crocodilian answers #I'm here with the harsh truths because hardly anyone else has the guts to just come out and say it #and there are plenty of bi women who will feel the exact same way #but who are too scared to admit it #It's why I keep silently gaining followers and yet hardly any even dare to like posts lol

[justkeeptrekkin]

1) congrats on finishing a book!! 2) absolutely dont want to devalue how painful agent rejection is. i totally get that. i've been there and will be there again in the soon future. but 20 rejections is like ... not much? its not enough to get down on your writing about. it doesnt mean your perfect agent isnt out there. 20 rejections means you go back to the query letter again, revise that first chapter, and start the next round of queries. this is round one. 50-100 rejections is COMMON (1)

“(cont) not getting many full requests until draft 4-6 is COMMON, not getting an agent until book 3-4 is VERY COMMON. honestly making it in publishing is just a matter of stubbornness. its really hard not to get down about your writing because of some rejections. but the only people who get published are the ones who keep keep KEEP writing and keep trying. if you believe in yourself, keep going!!! dont stop believing in your projects. tell yourself you'll make it one day & dont stop until you do”

**

Thank you anon, this is really cool. It’s nice to hear from someone in a smiliar position. <3 This is a very kind and motivational message.

It’s unfair, because... I used to work in the publishing industry so i know how hard it is-- and yet I still get down on myself! And instinctively think it reflects the quality of my writing more than the state of the industry. And that is so WRONG because the industry is the one that’s fucking fucked, bro.

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about how agents and editors say that they’re looking for Fresh New Voices and how they then always seem to publish the same thing over and over, never following through on their promises to diversify. They rarely seem to know what they want?

For years agents have been saying they’re looking for POC authors and yet the industry is still severely lacking in that. (I’m not poc, but it’s appalling how white the industry is, something that needs to be fixed now more than ever.) They say they’re looking for LGBT+ voices (which I do fall under) and then come back and say ‘sorry sweaty, that’s not the Right Queer Voice for us :/ only commercial queer that we can fetishise, please’. They talk big talk about expanding literature and looking beyond the conventional and then... don’t asdkflajs

Basically I’m just shading massively on the publishing industry. I hated working in it, I’m glad I’m out of it, and I’m going to have this book published one way or another. Just to give those bitches a big middle finger.

POC authors, LGBT+ authors, everyone from under-represented corners of society who are writing books about your experience: you are AMAZING and you DESERVE to have your voice heard. Even if one straight white lady called Patricia is sitting behind her desk and says no.

#writing #my writing #ask #anon #writeblr #publishing #diversity in media

[tinkdw]

While it’s (hopefully) too early to be frustrated; but I saw you mention in another ask that your leaning towards a less explicit dean/Cas ending. That it’s like executive interference that’s stopping it which is like so disappointing considering.... like every other show on the CW has pretty main gay characters. Do you think it’s just Dean and Cas are too big? Or is it like executives left over from an old era...?

@occamshipper I think is it the best person for the ins and outs of the show but basically the entire “the cw has other gay characters so why can’t dean be bi” argument is extremely flawed and ingenuous.

The show is produced by WB. It’s sponsors are different, as most shows are. The show predates the CW. The execs of the shows between one network vary anyway, but even more so when the show is essentially an insource. The show is also the biggest (or one of the biggest but I think the biggest) source of revenue, with 50% of the audience in the USA which is the audience that matters to sponsorship, being republican homophobes.

So yes, there are other characters on cw who are queer but are some easily fetishisable teenage lesbians and one show where everyone is queer and was labelled as queer from the off so the people who wanted to avoid it could and those who were drawn to it could be, the same as a middle aged macho man dude coming out as bi a decade and a half after republican gun touting rednecks fell in love with him?

Not the same situation.

On top of the actual sponsorship / execs involved etc not being the same.

It’s just absolutely not the same thing at all.

[romaniassexdungeon]

Pretend - epilogue

Pairing: OzEst

Oh shit, we did it. Sorry for the delay, but here's the epilogue. Thank you to everyone who's read this far, and thank you to everyone who's been with us for the journey. It was a super fun, depressing ride for us as writers, and we hope it was too for you readers. Thanks again, Finn and Ciaran out

Also written by @kanz-frafka

Read full fic on AO3

...

Eliisabet was 67 when she saw her son get married.

She didn’t know what it was about this milestone that made her wonder just what she’d missed. If she could - maybe - put her pride aside to try and reconnect with him. Maybe it was just that after so many bad decisions, his life seemed to be on track. Despite marrying that awful Cooper man, maybe she could be proud of him one day.

All he needed was some guidance. And discipline.

She knew what she knew about the last fourteen-odd years through Layla, bumping into her at the supermarket. Neither was exactly fond of the other. She supposed Layla had more right to hate her than she would have liked to admit to herself, but it wasn’t as if Eliisabet was totally in the wrong. Logan was the boy who ran feral the way he did; that Cooper woman had no right to criticise her. She’d only been raising Eduard to behave.

It wasn’t like her to crash a wedding. Maybe when she was young and stupid she would’ve turned up somewhere unannounced, but 50 years did a lot to a person. She’d been worn down. Sometimes she felt nostalgic, but mostly she was embarrassed. She’d been so childish once. Anton, for all his flaws, had at least sanded off the edges in that respect.

She stepped inside. It was a small, tacky reception, but everyone was laughing and joking. Eduard was dancing with that Cooper man, and Eliisabet had never seen him smile like that. She couldn’t particularly remember him smiling, let alone in a truly happy way. He’d always been such a serious child. She couldn’t picture him, even then, running wild with Logan. Layla said he was just more comfortable in his presence. That was probably a jab at her parenting. Layla had a lot of those.

She watched him for a moment. He parted from Logan and grabbed Layla by the hand, spinning her under his arm and laughing.

Maybe she was the one Eduard felt comfortable around. Should Eliisabet be jealous of how her son looked at another woman? Layla hadn’t given birth to him, hadn’t raised him, not really. He hadn’t lived with her until he was practically an adult. But Layla was getting all the credit, all the wedding invites, all the family Christmas cards.

Of course, Layla was the one Eduard ran to when he was acting up. The one who coddled him through every bad decision. She had ruined him, let him think things were fair, fostered all the naivete he had until it got the better of him. Of course she was the one he invited. Eduard was easily led.

No wonder he ended up in hospital. Eliisabet didn’t even know what that was about, but she suspected it was that stupid Densen man. She’d warned Eduard about him. Or maybe it was Cooper. Or Eduard’s own terrible decisions. Either way, she’d said it was no good, that he could never be happy with a man. There was something unnatural about it, and the gays would never be happy going along with their nonsense. She normally wouldn’t think about it, but Eduard seemed determined to fetishise being with men. And where did that get him?

Except he looked overwhelmingly happy with Logan. Happier than Anton had ever looked in all the time they’d been married. She told herself it wouldn’t last, and stopped thinking about it.

He glanced back at him, still dancing with Layla, the brightest smile on his face. Tino was there too, drinking at his table. She hadn’t seen her nephew in even longer, and he didn’t look happy to see her. He was the first in the room to spot her. He fixed her with an icy look, then got up, tapping Eduard on the shoulder and whispering something in his ear. Eliisabet wondered if she should leave.

But then they met eyes. His smile dropped, like she would hit him if he kept it. He swung Layla into her husband and excused himself for a moment.

He was letting his emotions show. The boy was horrified, disgusted, a little scared. Then his face twisted into a scowl. Logan touched his shoulder, asked him a question, but he brushed him off, storming across the floor like a tornado in a tuxedo.

He’d grown, or maybe he was just shorter in her memories. He towered over a lot of the room, but the way he carried himself almost made him look smaller. There were ugly little raised scars on his face, none longer than her fingernail, but enough of them to make his whole face look ghastly. He really ought to have done something about them, especially if he was getting married. Nobody wanted to look at that.

“Eliisabet,” he said in a stiff voice. It stung, hearing him call her that. Deep down, she missed being his “Ema”, but there was no way she would say that. Especially when he was choosing to be so disrespectful.

“Eduard,” she said, just as frosty.

“What are you doing here?”

“It is your wedding. Your parents are supposed to be at your wedding.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t invite you.”

“Well, why didn’t you?”

“Why would I? You never turned up to anything else Mrs Cooper and I told you about. And more importantly: I don’t want you to be at my wedding .”

“Why does that matter? I should’ve been invited, as should your father.” Not that Anton would have shown his face. He missed his son, but would never admit it, not even at gunpoint. She’d still seen his glances at the one photo they kept out of him, a school photo. And she knew he was keeping the graduation photos Layla sent, hidden away somewhere after claiming he’d torn them up. Aside from the occasional rant about washing his hands of the boy, Anton never spoke of him.

“This is my wedding. I’m inviting people I love. You don’t- you don’t fit into that category.”

“Am I not good enough for you? I did everything to keep you happy. And you aren’t an easy person to keep happy.

Eduard wrinkled his nose; he wasn’t going to be persuaded this time. “You did nothing to keep me happy; you didn’t care if I was happy. Or eating. Or safe. To be honest, I think you preferred it when I was miserable.”

“You always were ungrateful. You know how hard it was to be your mother? I did everything I could.”

“You didn’t do shit.”

“I raised you. And you’re throwing it all back in my face.”

“You’ve been leaving me to fend for myself for as long as I can remember. You threatened me not to tell anyone because you knew it was wrong. You took every opportunity to make me feel like shit, you punished me for doing anything I enjoyed, you only cared about how smart I was, how quiet I was, how I made you two look, and you threw me out of the house when I wasn’t good enough for you and your impossible standards.”

“And it made you-”

“Shut up. Shut the fuck up. You were my parents. You were the only people I had in the world until I met the Coopers. I could’ve died so many times, and all you and Anton would’ve cared about was how right you were.”

“And we-”

“Eliisabet,” Eduard said firmly, “I don’t want to hear it. You’re too late. I don’t even believe you’re at all sorry. I don’t know what you want from me - money, an organ, a verbal punching bag, I don’t care. You’re not getting it. I mean, where were you when I graduated? When I went to hospital? Twice, actually.”

“I didn’t-”

“Don’t give me that. I know you know. I almost died and you couldn’t even be bothered showing your face.” He shook his head then waved her away. “And you know what? I’m glad. The last thing I needed was you acting like I was just doing it for attention, or whatever.”

“Eduard-”

“Just go. Alright? I don’t want you here. If you wanted to be a real mum, you should’ve started when I was a baby.”

Eliisabet glared at him. “That is no way to-”

“Go. Before I call security.”

Eliisabet reeled at that. She hated not being the one in control. “I am your mother, Eduard.”

“I have a mother, and she was never you.”

Eliisabet made a face like she was sniffing curdled piss, but backed down. She could bully Eduard all she wanted, but she would never plead with him. She turned around and walked out the room. Behind her, she heard Layla comfort him. She heard all the sharpness drain from his voice as she told him she was proud. What had he ever done to deserve her pride?

...

Layla was 52 when Eduard became her son.

No, that’s a lie. He always had been.

Layla was 52 when Eduard became her son -in-law. And she couldn’t have been more proud of her boys.

After standing up to Eliisabet, Eduard went back to Layla for another dance, brushing off her concern and pride alike. He seemed to have shrunk into himself a little - she always got under his skin - but once he started dancing with her, he became himself again.

He was doing that a lot now, becoming himself. His real self, not back to that scared kid Logan had dragged in all those years ago. Eduard talked to her about his life, what he was hoping to do in the future. Marry Logan, adopt the children, get a promotion, or even start his own business. He could do what he wanted, he told her. Logan insisted that his life wasn’t over once he reached his thirties. Layla laughed at that.

“I could build you a website for your art,” he told her, “or set you up on some of the existing sites, but they’ll want a share of the profit.”

“You think I could? I’m a little old for all that computer stuff.”

“Never too old to learn. I’ll set it up for you, and I’ll show you how to do it all by yourself,” he awkwardly patted her arm, and she hugged him in return.

“I’m proud of you, you know?” she told him, “I always have been.”

“I mean, I haven’t done anything pride-worthy,” he mumbled. “I never got into Cambridge, I would have lost my job by now with all my days off if I wasn’t skirting by on talent alone, I’m a messy, mentally ill disaster, I-”

“So? I’m proud of you. You’re a wonderful young man.”

Eduard looked like he was going to cry. “Really?”

“Really. I couldn’t imagine a better person for Logan.”

“Even…?”

“Well. Huna was good for him too. But you’ve always been like a son to me.” She patted her chest. “You’ve always had a special little place here.”

Eduard grinned. “I’m gonna tell them you said that.”

“Oh, please don’t.” She looked up at the ceiling. “I’m sorry, Huna!”

They laughed, Eduard leaning on her shoulder. “I miss them. I mean, not as much as Logan does - he still gets sad about them a lot - but they were a good friend.”

She nodded, a grim smile on her face. “They were always so easygoing with the family, you too. Now that I think about it, you’ve both always tried so hard to be part of the family, and you were all along.”

“When did you start thinking of me as…” Was it too forward to say-?

“My son?” Layla supplied. Eduard nodded. “I mean, you were always welcome, and after a few visits, I was already thinking of you as “one of the family” but then I found out about your parents and, well, I knew life was gonna be rough for you. I knew you needed someone behind you. And if that wasn’t going to be me and Logan - both of them, that is - who would it be?”

“I don’t know where I’d be if you hadn’t. Probably still with Gunner or something.” Or dead. He laughed but they both knew he meant it.

Layla took his hand and squeezed it reassuringly. “How is it all? How’s therapy?”

“Good. It’s actually been really helpful. Still a lot of days where… yeah. But mostly not as bad as… like, even a few months ago.”

“I’m so proud of you, you know that? So proud.”

Eduard nodded, and finally burst into tears.

“Oh no, oh, my baby, are you okay?” Layla was immediately up to hold him. Eduard clung to her. Layla smelt like home almost as much as Logan did. She smelt of the Coopers’ house - paint and freshly-made bread and the flowers Layla kept in a vase she’d let Logan and Eduard paint when they were little.

“I’m fine, mum,” he sobbed, “I just- I love you. So much.”

“I love you too, Eddie. You’re a wonderful young man.”

...

Jānis was 26 when he met a strange man.

He was outside smoking his way through an anxiety attack when the tallest human being he had ever seen awkwardly scooted up next to him. Jānis wasn’t sure whether or not to acknowledge him. He coughed. Jānis offered him a cigarette.

The man took it and thanked him. “Is this Eduard Mets’s wedding?”

Jānis nodded.

“Right, right,” the man handed him a parcel. “Wedding present. Can you make sure he gets it?”

“Don’t you want to go in and give it to him yourself?”

The man squirmed. “We’re… not on the best terms. And his husband told me to never bother them again.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You’re not his ex, are you? I’ve heard people talk about what happened. He was in hospital.”

“Not his ex, no. I just… I did some bad things. I want to make it right. Properly, this time.”

Jānis looked at him, frozen. He’d done bad things to Eduard, then? Should he refuse the man’s request, then? But what if he got upset? What if he got angry? What if Eduard got upset that he’d refused to take the present? Maybe he should not mention it to him. But then the guilt would eat at him for the rest of his life.

The man made a face. Guilt? Remorse? “Please,” he insisted, “I really am sorry. I- I know he won’t want to see me, but - please - give him this.”

For some reason, Jānis wondered if it was a bomb. Was he that sort of man?

“Who are you?”

“Lars,” he gave a cough, “Lars Mooren.”

He wasn’t Gunner, at least.

Jānis squinted. “Alright, I’ll give him your present.”

Lars broke into a smile - slight but relieved. “Thank you.”

“You’re sure I’m not going to get told off? I’m not being your messenger if it’s going to get me told off.”

“You’re a grown man, you’re probably not going to get told off.” He squinted at him and looked him up and down. “You- you are a grown man, right?”

“I’m just short,” he assured him.

“Sorry.”

“I get it all the time.” Jānis stubbed out his cigarette. “See you around?”

“See you around.”

He came back inside, clutching the present. Eduard and Logan were deep in conversation with someone’s distant relative. Eduard was clinging to Logan, looking down at him with more love than could be contained in one man. Scared to interrupt, Jānis stood there, attempting to be in Eduard’s line of sight, with the box in his hands. Eventually, he was noticed.

“Jānis!” Eduard smiled and wandered over, “you doing okay?”

He nodded, awkwardly thrusting the package into his hands. “From a… Lars?”

Logan and Eduard exchanged a glance.

“Where the fuck is he?” Logan grabbed Eduard’s arm protectively.

“Uh… he was outside. You know him? Tall guy?”

“Was? Where is he?” He flexed, looking around and making sure to keep as close to Eduard as possible.

Eduard stepped in front of him. “Hey. Baby, we’re not getting into a fight at our wedding, alright?

“But-”

“No. This is our night. Not his. We got a present out of it. Let’s just leave him alone.”

Logan opened his mouth, but his face softened. “Fine. Sorry.”

“No, no, it’s- it’s okay. But I’ve been sober a good while, I don’t want him to fuck that up. Let’s just take the present and carry on. Okay?”

Logan nodded. “Okay. Sorry baby. You’re right.” He reached up, kissing his forehead with a great deal of difficulty. “It’s our day.”

The whole time, Jānis was stood there with the present, feeling like shit. “So… do you want this, or…”

Eduard smiled at him. He wasn’t quite reassured. “Sure, give it here. Might as well get something out of him.”

He wondered if he should open it there. Seemed better to get it out of the way, rather than put it with the beautiful, unopened presents everyone else had gotten them. He looked at the pile. Reilly was feeling the presents again, trying to see what was inside.

“Oy,” Logan growled, “no peeking.”

Reilly scowled and went to dip chicken wings in the punch. Logan didn’t have the energy to stop it, turning back to Eduard and his present.

“It was nice of him to bring something. I guess.”

Logan leaned his head on his shoulder. “You don’t have to make excuses for him.”

“I’m not. But it was nice of him.” Eduard opened the present. It was a copy of Pulp Fiction .

“You know what? Tarantino sucks, but another DVD for the collection’s another DVD for the collection.”

“We’ll put it behind something,” Logan nudged him.

Eduard nodded and put the DVD on the table. “Doesn’t matter. It’s our day, not his.” He took Logan’s hand. “And I want to dance with my husband.”

...

Harry was 16 when she fell in love for the first time.

The wedding was a lot of fun. She hadn’t been to one since her dad and Hunapo’s. She’d been allowed to invite some school friends, but honestly, they were outgrowing each other. Cassandra always hung out with Melissa’s lot these days. Plus there was the boy talk. Cass had always been the type to fawn over celebrities and dumbasses in the year above, but lately it was bothering her more and more that she couldn’t relate.

She’d rather be with Josefina anyway. She’d come along with João, but other than him and Harry she was alone, sitting quietly at her table and eating breadsticks. Harry waited for an out from her great-uncle’s monologue about his own wedding, then went over to her table.

“Josefina!”

She looked up from eavesdropping on her dad’s conversation. Her eyes lit up and she hugged her. “Harry! You alright?”

“Yeah. You look lovely. I mean- the dress does. And also you. Your hair.”

“Thanks. You look lovely too. You make a nice… bridesmaid? Is that a thing when there isn’t a bride?”

Harry shrugged. “Dad doesn’t do tradition. Ed does. It was a weird compromise.”

“It looks nice on you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I mean… you always look nice.”

“I do?”

“You do.”

They were quiet for a long moment. Nobody was quite sure where to go with the conversation.

“I’m sorry,” Josefina mumbled, “I suck at people.”

“It’s alright, mate. I still like you.”

Josefina laughed. It registered to Harry that she had just said something unbelievably dorky.

“Parties just get me all overwhelmed. Not that this isn’t lovely.”

Harry thought for a moment. “There’s a whole building. Doesn’t stop at this hall.”

“You wanna, what, sneak off? Isn’t this your dad’s wedding?”

Harry shrugged. “Second wedding. Nothing I haven’t seen before.”

She laughed. “Aren’t you a romantic?”

“Do you wanna go explore this place or not?”

Josefina thought about it, stuffed a canape into her mouth, and gave Harry her hand. “Let’s do it.”

Harry led her out. A flight of stairs was roped off, but she lifted it for Josefina to duck under.

“You sure we’re allowed?”

“It’s a rope, not a cop.”

That didn’t stop them tiptoeing their way up the stairs nervously, as if they’d be caught at any moment.

“What are we even looking for?”

“Somewhere to hang out, I guess.”

The stairs took them up to a little dark corridor.

“This is kinda creepy. I like it though.”

She puffed out her chest and tried to look tough. “I can beat up any ghosts that try to bother you.”

Josefina took her hand. Harry immediately dropped the act. How was she meant to be tough now?

She smiled up at her. “Thank you.”

“Uh huh.” Smooth, Harry.

“Where do we go from here?”

“Pick a door, any door.”

Josefina grinned at her and went for the closest one, still holding onto her hand. “Locked.”

“Shit. Try this one?”

Josefina managed to open it this time, revealing the perfect little room. There were chairs dotted around and little boxes of miscellaneous stuff shoved into a corner. Harry flicked on the light switch. “Jackpot.”

They plopped themselves down on the floor, ignoring the chairs.

“Nice little spot,” Josefina decided, making herself comfortable. Suddenly, Harry imagined people asking them how they met at parties like this one, well into the future. Her dad ran my dad’s NA meetings. Maybe a bit of a downer, but a story was a story.

“You know what it needs?” Harry asked, lying on her back to rest her legs on a chair, “Snacks.”

“Which ones?”

“Dunno. Shoulda grabbed a plate of those wings from the buffet. And some sweet stuff too.”

Josefina hopped up to her feet. “I’ll be back in a second.” She winked Harry’s way and disappeared.

Harry lay on the floor, eyes on the ceiling. Her heart was going pretty fast - was there red bull in that lemonade she’d had? She hadn’t been running but her heart was trying to find its way out of her ribcage. Maybe she was having an allergic reaction.

To Josefina? Who was she kidding?

Josefina came back with two glasses in one hand, a plate piled with buffet food in the other, and a bottle of wine tucked under her arm.

Harry grinned at her. “Josie! Here, let me help you with that.”

She gave Harry the plate, then put the wine carefully down on the floor and sat down facing her. “It’s more like “Juicy”.”

“What?”

“Not Josie. Portuguese names, man. Joo -sefina.”

Harry laughed. “Alright, Juicy, then.”

“You’re gonna be calling me that forever now, aren’t you?”

“Forever,” she nodded, mouth full of sandwich.

Josefina chuckled and poured them each a glass of wine, just as Harry started singing to her.

“Blame it on my juice, blame it, blame it on my juice, baby.”

“Blame what on your juice, exactly?”

“Huh? I don’t know.”

“Well, as the juice, I wanna know what it is I’m getting accused of.”

“Underage drinking, apparently.”

“You don’t have to have any if you don’t want it.”

“No, I want some.” She took the glass off her and took a long slurp. She made a face.

Josefina laughed. “You like it?”

“Sour.”

“I’ll have it if you don’t want it.”

“I’ll adjust,” she assured her, taking another sip, “Since we’re celebrating.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I want to.”

“In that case,” Josefina raised her glass. “Cheers!”

Harry clinked their glasses together. “Cheers!”

“You sure you’re okay, missing out?”

“It’s fine. Got to get away from all the distant relatives somehow. Like, yeah, I know I’ve gotten bigger, Gran, that’s how human bodies work. I shouldn’t be mean to my gran though. She’s cool. She’s a painter and stuff. And my Granddad’s a musician, he has all these guitars and...” And she was rambling. Fuck.

“They sound nice!”

Josefina was grinning at her. Harry was just focusing on not spilling her wine. “They are nice. They really like Ed too. He and my dad go way back. Like, Ed helped look after me when I was little and he and dad were in uni. I barely even remember it, but I remember Ed used to sing to me sometimes if I couldn’t sleep. And dad would stand in the doorway and pretend like he wasn’t watching him. And then Dad married Huna, who was great, and I still miss them, but after that Ed was just… I dunno. Gone. Next time I saw him, I only, like, kind of recognised him. Not just because it had been a long time ago either. He looked different. And that was right after Huna died too, and everything was a mess and he was just kind of there, sitting at the side. He was… dunno. Must have had some mental health stuff going on, now I look back at it, ‘cause he barely ever left his room, but he told me and Rei how he was actually a super cool ninja and-” She trailed off. Josefina was looking down at her knees. “Sorry, I don’t know why I’m telling you this shit.”

“You’ve got quite the family life, huh?”

Harry nodded. “Yeah. I think the ninja thing was a lie. He’s kind of a weenie.”

Josefina nodded in agreement. “What do you think happened?”

“No idea. They never let me listen, and Ed’s too quiet to eavesdrop on.”

Josefina raised her glass. “To fucked up families.”

“To fucked up families. And to my dads.” Harry clinked their glasses together.

“Gotta love fucked up families.”

“You too, huh?”

Josefina took a sip. “He’s been clean a while now, but my dad… he overdosed when I was little. Like, 8, maybe? By accident, of course. And I found him and I thought maybe he was dead. And my mum broke up with him, and I didn’t see him again for like three years because she wouldn’t let me. I’d hear him call sometimes, and she’d usually be shouting at him, and then eventually she let me go over to his, just for a day. It was a good day. He treated me.Took me out bowling, to the museum. I was just happy to see my dad again, you know, we’ve always been close. And after that it was a weekend, And then every weekend, and now we have a good routine going, I’m at his every other week, and they’re on speaking terms again. But it was rough when I was little.”

Harry wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. She opened her mouth, but didn’t know what sounds to make with it. She settled for wrapping an arm around Josefina. She leaned her head against Harry’s shoulder.

“My first step-parent died when I was 12.” She wondered if this sounded like she was making this about herself. She wished she could stop running her mouth sometimes. “And I’ve never met my mum. Or, I probably have, because I’ve been in her pussy, but you know what I mean.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s… I have Dad. And I had Huna. And I have Ed now. I don’t think I need a mum.”

“Still. Hard to lose someone.”

She nodded. “Hard. I think Ed tried to kill himself. About two years ago. He and dad never tell me anything, but I’m not stupid.”

Josefina nodded. “More wine?”

Harry held out her glass. “Please.”

They sat in silence together. Not awkwardly, not desperately searching for words to fill the air. Just drinking in one another’s warmth. The music downstairs was muffled, but it was loud. She heard a song Eduard liked to play in the car, or while he was baking, shimmying his shoulders as he pummeled dough into the counter. She didn’t know its name, but it made her smile. She found herself tapping her fingers in time against Josefina’s shoulder. She picked up on it and stood up, her hand outstretched to her.

“Dance with me?”

“With- yeah!” She took her hand and pulled herself up. “I don’t know how to-”

“You don’t have to. Just move in whatever way you want.”

“Alright. I can do that.”

She tried not to look too much like her dad’s dancing and failed spectacularly, but it was worth it - Josefina was grinning and the room was lighting up. On impulse, Harry took her hands and swayed them. Josefina went a little pink, but she held onto Harry’s hands.

“See? You’re a good dancer.”

“Well, you’re teaching me. I’m learning from the best.”

“You’re a good learner though.”

...

Tino and Lyubov were 32 when they each gave a speech at their best friends’ wedding.

Tino’s was funny to no one except him, Logan and Eduard. He tried to not make the jokes too dark - it was a wedding, after all - but Eduard had given him the task of keeping it lighthearted and giving that job to Tino only ever went one way.

“He was always a bit nerdy,” Tino was saying, “film nerd, computer nerd, regular nerd. I always thought he needed to go outside and “Marvel” at a pair of titties for once.”

Everyone laughed, even Eduard. Logan started making his pecs dance under his shirt. He laughed harder, blushing.

“He was lovely to have as a cousin, though,” Tino continued, “when the family got together for Christmas and my parents were throwing plates at each other and Ed’s parents were bitching about everything and Vanaema was silently writing them all outta her will, Ed and I would go upstairs. We’d play games and stuff, but one year, we were about thirteen, Ed went on his new laptop, typed in “naked women” on Google Images, then got so scared at his dad finding out he cried until he threw up.”

Eduard buried his face in his hands. He’d tried to forget that.

“He then chucked water over the laptop and buried it in the garden. When his dad asked about it, a few weeks later, he told him he was mugged on the way to school.”

Eduard made a face. He’d been grounded for that. They said he should’ve been more careful. No wonder he always went to Mr and Mrs Cooper for, well, everything. Advice, food, affection, even love. It was a small comfort that the Coopers loved him, when compared to the people who were supposed to be his parents. Eliisabet had carried him for 8 months, given birth to him, and neither she nor Anton appeared to muster even the smallest affection for him.

It was a depressing train of thought to be inspired by his Best Man’s speech. His mother’s appearance had shaken him a little. Logan squeezed his hand.

“I do love him, though,” Tino continued, “and I’m so, so glad we ended up being friends. He’s smart and he’s kind and he’s the strongest person I know, even though he’s got the arms of a blow-up sex doll and a torso Ethiopian children would donate food to.”

No one was laughing, except Logan, loud and thunderous in the stone-cold silence. He slammed his hand on the table, whilst, next to Tino, Berwald looked like he wanted to sink into the ground. Eduard just had no idea how to react. He should’ve proof-read Tino’s speech first. The worst thing was, he kind of wanted to laugh too.

“I’ve never known a better friend. I’ve never known anyone so resilient. And I’ve never known a better match for him than Logan, even if the bar there is low. No offence, Lyubov.”

Both Eduard and Lyubov stared awkwardly at their plates, but neither minded. Eduard would always love Lyubov, but as a dear friend, and that was okay. He needed good friends to keep him out of trouble. She was good for a little bit of quiet. They met up for coffee when they could.

“I realised Logan was perfect for Eduard when someone who will remain nameless - let’s just call him Captain Smegma - got himself injured. Captain Smegma really fucked things up for Ed. And my first thought when he got injured was that Logan did it. My second thought was that Logan would do it. My third was that anyone who would beat the shit out of Captain Smegma for Ed was the right guy for him. He needs people behind him. And if the time they accidentally butt-dialed me is any indication, Logan’s happy to be behind him.”

Eduard buried his face in his hands. Tino leaned over to him. “Suffer.”

“Knee-dialed, actually.”

“Doesn’t change things.”

“When is this speech planning on ending?”

“I’ve got pages of this.”

“I hate you.”

“This is the build-up, man. You haven’t even heard the climax. Much unlike me, the time you knee-dialed me.”

“I will go back in time and murder our Vanaema so neither of us have to exist.”

“After hearing that? Not complaining. You moan like a hentai girl.”

“Tino!”

Lyubov nodded in agreement. So did Logan.

“Traitors!”

“Anyway,” Tino stood up straight, addressing the other guests again, who had just had to learn more than they would have liked about Eduard’s moaning habits. “the truth is, I always knew Logan was the guy for Eddie. He was the one making plan after plan to save him when he was going through hell with Captain Smegma and he’s the one who’s taken care of Ed since we were kids. He’s kind. And he makes Ed smile like I don’t think anyone else can.”

Eduard looked at Logan and smiled.

“See? Like that. Sickening.”

Logan smiled back and kissed him. 16-year-old Eduard was quaking. He felt warm and safe, like everything was going to be okay. People started clapping. They were clapping for him and Logan, and their happiness. The room was full of people who wanted the best for him, who wanted him and Logan to feel safe and be in love. He wasn’t a fan of being clapped for, but it still made him grin through his blushing.

He’d never been alone. It was just Gunner had been very talented in convincing him otherwise. And now the trick had worn away, Gunner was out of his life, and things were looking up.

He’d won.

“Logan and Eduard, everybody. Lubey, take the floor.” The polite shower of clapping didn’t drown out Logan laughing at “Lubey”.

Lyubov got up, adjusting her dress and trying not to look nervous. “Not quite sure how I’m going to live up to that speech, but I’ll do my best. I- I met Ed and Logan at uni, and-” She was already tearing up. “And now they’re here. When Ed asked me to be his - and I quote - second best woman, I… well, initially I wondered if your ex doing a speech at your wedding is a little frowned upon. Logan told me to suck it up and do it. He also requested that I tell the next person who tells me I’m brave for being up here to shush. Or, something a little less nice.”

She glanced around, fiddling with the strap on her dress.

“Despite everything,” Lyubov continued, “I’m glad to have grown up with them. We were a right little squad, Eduard, Logan, me,” she faltered, “Hunapo. Honestly, I’d always thought nothing would change if Ed and Logan got together. Weird thing to think about your boyfriend, but it is what it is. They loved each other. I didn’t like thinking about it back then, but now it feels right, seeing them together.” She tipped her glass at Logan. “No hard feelings. You and Ed are made for each other.”

Logan smiled sheepishly.

“I could talk about all their embarrassing moments,” she continued, “especially Ed’s, but it just feels too mean.”

“Coward,” Tino called out.

She ignored him and raised her glass. “To Logan and Eduard, the most amazing couple I know.”

...

Logan Sr was 56, far too old to have his tie around his forehead and sing classic rock with the wedding band, but he was going to do it anyway. His boys were happy, he’d consumed his weight in lager, and he was going to have fun. And when he was eventually kicked off the stage, he went to tearfully congratulate the happy couple.

“My boys! ”

Logan begrudgingly accepted his rib-crushing hug. “Have you had a few too many, dad?”

“Nonsense.” He kissed his cheek. He had a very wet mouth. “I’ve had just enough.”

“So, no more?”

“Well, I didn’t say that. ” He laughed and tried to look Eduard straight in the eyes. His height made it very difficult but he figured it out eventually. “Eduard.”

“Yeah?”

“Give me your face.”

“My- what?”

“I can’t reach it. Could you be a dear and crouch down a little for me?”

Feeling a little bit stupid, Eduard arranged his legs into a squat. “Is this okay?”

“Perfect.” Logan Sr put his hands on either side of his face. “I just- I wanted to tell you. I remember when you were a tiny little boy. You were so small.”

“Thank you.”

“I mean, you looked about four until you were fifteen! You shot right up! All of a sudden my son’s best friend was a skyscraper!”

“I remember.”

“You got so lovely and tall. And lovely. You turned into such a lovely man.”

Eduard glanced at his husband for rescue but Logan was too busy trying not to fall off his chair laughing. Traitor.

“You’ll be good to my Loggie, won’t you? Even though he smells a bit funny sometimes.”

“I will. Promise.”

He hugged him. “You were always such a sweet kid. It was a shame about your parents. And ears.”

“What’s wrong with my ears?”

“Nothing, son. You grew into them.”

“You did,” Logan Jr agreed.

Eduard sighed. “I did.” He saw the school photos every day on his way to bed. He’d looked like a satellite with a bowl cut.

“But look at you now! You’re so grown up! You’re getting married! You’re tall!”

“Well. It comes with being 32.”

“Such a tall man. And a good one! You look after my little boy, won’t you?”

“I promise.”

“Logan, you look after my other little boy.”

“We’ll take care of each other,” Logan promised, “Why don’t you sit down for a bit?”

Logan Sr nodded. “Might be best, son.” He let the couple carry him back to his seat, and wife.

“Having fun?” asked Layla, the skin around her eyes crinkling.

“Yes dear,” he kissed her cheek. “Just saying how proud I am of the boys. Look at them! Married!” He patted Eduard’s jacket. “After everything, you’re still standing, both of you.”

Eduard pulled him into a hug, burying his face in the man’s wild, curly hair. “I love you too, dad,” he mumbled.

...

Logan and Eduard were 32 when they finally got married.

As everyone was winding down, Reilly having finally wheeled themself to exhaustion and fallen asleep on Layla’s lap; Harry still nowhere to be seen, huddled up in a strange corner of the venue with Josefina; and Lyubov currently trying to outdrink Tino and sing all the parts of Bohemian Rhapsody; Logan and Eduard escaped outside into the garden.

“Good day?”

Eduard nodded.

“Shame about your mum. And Lars.”

Eduard shrugged. “I can handle Lars. I think he was genuinely trying to say sorry. I don’t want to see him, but the sentiment’s there.”

“And your mum?”

“My mum doesn’t even know I did drugs. Or tried to kill myself. Or anything .”

“Back when we were kids, “my mum doesn’t know about the drugs” was a good thing.”

Eduard laughed. “I mean, yeah, but I’m a grown-up now. And I almost died.”

“Don’t think you’d have had to worry about that back then.”

“How so?”

“Because, Eddie, you were too much of a dweeb to get your hands on any.”

“Fair.”

There was no one around, so Eduard took a chance and kissed Logan’s cheek. Logan smiled and kissed his back.

“I love you,” he whispered. Eduard nodded.

“I love you too. Thanks for… well, thanks for everything. Thanks for marrying me.” Did he sound stupid? He felt like he sounded stupid. Logan still looked at him like he wasn’t, though.

“Well. It’s been years since I’ve seen you in a suit. You really pull them off.”

“You say that like you’re wanting to do the honours for me,” he teased.

“Well… maybe after everyone’s gone home.”

“Maybe?”

“Maybe, maybe.”

They drifted into comfortable silence. Logan watched him as they rambled through the garden, amongst hedgerows and neat flowerbeds. He looked at Eduard not only like he was worth something, but that he was the most important person in the world. Once or twice, he got so distracted watching him that he walked straight into a hedge. Eduard pretended not to notice, but he was blushing in the gloom.

Logan smiled to himself, looking down at his shoes. The flowerbed was rich with plant life, neat little stones almost hidden in the gloom. He bent down and picked up an especially smooth one.

“What’s that?” asked Eduard, watching him wipe compost off it.

“Wedding gift,” he replied. “Good things happen when I get you a rock.” He passed it to Eduard, who looked down at it in silence. It was grey and cool, and fit happily in his palm. “I know it doesn’t have any fossils,” he added, “but it’s still a cool rock.”

“I like a cool rock,” Eduard leaned against Logan’s arm, admiring the stone before slipping it into his pocket. It would go nicely with the first rock Logan gave him, on his shelf, in his and Logan’s bedroom.

“I think things are looking up,” Logan stroked his hair. “I know it doesn’t feel like it, but we got a lotta life ahead of us.”

Eduard nodded. “I think we’re gonna be okay.”

#ozest #APH Australia #APH Estonia #hetalia #aph finland #aph ukraine #aph netherlands #APH Latvia #aph oc #pretend #Hetalia Fanfiction

[momo33me]

A picture can say a thousand words, but in today’s ever-connected world, the good ones can generate even more retweets. A viral image taken in Gaza by photojournalist Mustafa Hassona, which depicts a bare-chested Palestinian protester holding a large flag and wielding a sling, has achieved both of these feats.

The photograph was taken as protests continue on the border of Israel. Gaza's health ministry said 32 Palestinians were wounded as demonstrators threw stones at Israeli forces, who responded with tear gas and live fire. The image has provoked a huge reaction online, with social media users likening it to Liberty Leading the People, the iconic Eugene Delacroix painting of the French Revolution.

From the moment we sleepily check our phones in the morning, most of us are bombarded with information and imagery, some of which can be disturbing. This photograph is undeniably striking, but the online reaction displays a worrying tone of detachment in the face of human suffering that is becoming all too common.

Paintings such as Delacroix’s have decorated gallery walls for centuries. Encased within ornate gold frames and protected by glass, their figures are distant, providing us with the romantic fantasy of a world gone by. They might be based on historical events, but our minds can easily decipher that there’s nothing real behind the flat oily surface of the canvas.

But Hassona’s photograph couldn’t be more real. Behind its palpable kinetic energy and visual dynamism lies one of the most desperate human rights situations in the world.

The flag bearer, identified by Al Jazeera as 20 year-old Aed Abu Amro, is one of almost two million people that are trapped on the tiny Gaza strip, unable to leave. This year has seen hundreds of deaths at the hands of Israeli forces, who have been condemned by the United Nations for using “excessive force” against protestors. Unarmed medics, such as 21 year-old Razan al-Najjar, are among the fatalities. A 12 year-old boy was shot dead earlier this month. A UN report has warned that Israel's blockade will make Gaza, the world’s third most densely populated area, “uninhabitable“ by 2020. 97 per cent of the territory’s drinking water is undrinkable and there are only four hours of electricity a day.

These facts are distressing to read. But this hopeless situation has been facilitated by governments across the world enabling what will one day be universally accepted as crimes against humanity.

Romanticising the image of a desperate man taking on an army allows us to justify its circumstances and distract ourselves from the grim truth that, in the real world, David rarely defeats Goliath. Aed could die today, tomorrow, or the week after that. If he keeps protesting, it is almost an inevitability.

Protesting is, of course, a choice. But it is also a choice for Israel to continue flouting international law by building on Palestinian land and planning to demolish Palestinian villages – a potential war crime. It was a choice for the US to deliberately inflame the situation by moving its embassy to Jerusalem, causing unnecessary bloodshed and anguish. Left to swelter without a trace of hope in what is essentially an open air prison where 50 per cent of children express no will to live, as the world looks the other way, is there not a chance we would all do the same?

In the most tasteless responses, social media users have remarked on Aed’s chiselled jaw and physique. This overt fetishisation of his suffering is obscene, but the idea that the pain and anguish of marginalised groups is a price worth paying for beautiful art is a notion far older than even the paintings of Delacroix.

From Asad’s chemical weapon attacks in Syria, to the bodies of refugee children washed up on the beaches of Europe, images have a radical, empathy-spreading power that can change the world. But the flippant reaction this particular shot, of someone literally risking being shot, represents our growing detachment from pain and lack of collective responsibility for it.

Don’t let this photograph fool you: there is nothing beautiful or poetic about the oppression of Palestinians. Beyond the lens, the constant misery of wasted life and unnecessary death in Gaza continues - we must not let that drift out of focus.

#Palestine #Israel #occupation #Gaza

[pass-the-bechdel]

Dollhouse season two full review

How many episodes pass the Bechdel test?

100% (thirteen of thirteen).

What is the average percentage per episode of female characters with names and lines?

44.96%

How many episodes have a cast that is at least 40% female?

Eleven, six of which had a cast of 50%+.

How many episodes have a cast that is less than 20% female?

Zero.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Eighteen. Twelve who appeared in more than one episode, five who appeared in at least half the episodes, and two who appeared in every episode.

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Thirty-three. Twelve who appeared in more than one episode, four who appeared in at least half the episodes, and one who appeared in every episode.

Positive Content Status:

Rubbish. As with the first season, the show suffers seriously for having no moral compass, it indulges in misogynistic violence and voyeuristic sex crimes as a mainstay, and any attempts to critique its own content are marred by hypocrisy and excuses (average rating of 2.76).

General Season Quality:

Also rubbish. While the majority of the cast are doing a fantastic job despite flimsy, problematic material, and there are a bare few episodes that could be considered good, altogether there’s no cohesion to the story, it lurches and fast-tracks and skips over anything that seems like it would have been a good concept to explore, and in the process it manages to lose any semblance of being about something. It’s just an excuse to stretch some acting chops on different kinds of character templates, and even that, it did badly.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) under the cut:

...so. I guess it’s a ‘nevermind, then’ on the exploration of any of the show’s own invoked themes re: personhood et al. I really thought they did more in that arena, but outside of a handful of single scenes sprinkled across the series, they really never did dig in to their existential concepts or anything that could approximate a broader narrative purpose beyond ‘let’s get Eliza Dushku to embody common sexual fantasies’. It’s ok to do some prompting of meta discussions for the audience and then leave them to fill in the blanks with their own musings, but not at the expense of bothering to say anything about your own subject matter. If you don’t have anything to say, then don’t ask people to listen to you. Keep your gross rape fantasies to yourself (or share with your therapist, damn), and leave the storytelling to people with a story to tell.

Everything that was wrong with season one is still entirely intact in season two, they fixed zero of their problems - they’re still fetishising and excusing rape, shamelessly objectifying and brutalising women, steeping the series in misogyny for no discernible reason, failing to achieve a basic moral underpinning to their content, underusing their quality acting assets while over-using their worst ones, and of course - as above - completely ignoring the need for a cohesive purpose to their own story or even just a ground-level sense that they knew what they were doing (or at least what they WANTED to be doing) with the arc of the narrative. Indeed, not only were all of the first season’s flaws intact, but season two even managed to make many of them worse! Off the top of my head, I’m not sure they made a single good character decision in the entire season, but I’m gonna save that conversation for the full series review so that I can properly compare the changes from one season to the next; there are plenty of other sins in season two to keep me busy for now. The lack of a moral anything (compass, backbone, compunction, whatever you want to call it) became a much bigger problem as the show attempted to escalate the scope of conflict with outside forces - largely, the Rossum corporation who runs the Dollhouses in service of their E-vil Plans - despite its own characters having committed all the same atrocities variously and knowingly, and the sketchy characterisation did a poor job of convincing that some magical moral something-or-other had taken hold between the seasons to give these characters new ethical dimensions that aren’t just blind hypocrisy. But, the biggest flaw of the season - relevant to all other issues but most especially to the lack of a central narrative theme or sense of meaning behind it - was the arc of the...’story’ that the season told. It was a Goddamn disaster, kids.

Pro tip: if you happen to, say, make a tv show that performs badly in the ratings in its first season, but you score a second season anyway, and you’re not confident that you’ll ever get a third...don’t try to jam all of the possible plot you imagined for a long-term series down into one season. It’s also probably a good idea to NOT end your first season with an ambitious flash-forward to an apocalyptic future which you are now irrevocably committed to bringing about in your regular narrative in spite of having only thirteen episodes to do it; a problem compounded by the inclusion of ‘flashbacks’ within that flash-forward, depicting events that you have now made canon only to turn around and nullify your own story by changing your mind about how to have it unfold (in the course of insisting on trying to make the whole thing unfold immediately, with plot that should have taken at least half a season to be explicated instead being fast-tracked into the subplot of a single episode). Don’t do that. Especially, don’t do that if you’re gonna ditch any kind of meaningful character arcs or thematic discussions or anything which would give your story a sense of purpose or cohesion or a mission statement of any kind (have I mentioned that yet? It’s mildly important to storytelling). Choosing to roll out a series of rapidly-accelerated plot events with all the nuance removed for streamlining is patently useless - you’ve removed everything that would make those plot events have value. That’s assuming that there were character beats (beats! Not beatings! This show has an excess of the latter; criminally few of the former) or narrative explorations or conceptual deliberations or somesuch in the original plan, anyway, and the first season did not do a great job of suggesting that there were (just...a better job than season two did). At any rate, better that you spend your time well and sadly never get to conclude the story like you wanted, rather than screwing over your own idea trying to just deliver the cliff notes. Cui bono?

Let’s consider what we got this season: thirteen episodes, and the first three are total Imprint of the Week fodder. A certain amount of episodic adventuring is expected, yes, but it’s a good idea to actually inject some useful plot machinations in there at the same time, and the first three episodes were very weak on both the one-off plot and the inclusion of significant long-term detail. The first two episodes are especially bad for being boring, inconsequential, and failing to capitalise on any interest drummed up by the end of the previous season; both also include teensy extra scenes of Senator Perrin pursuing his investigation into the Dollhouse, though neither creates any tension or interest around it, they literally just amount to ‘here is a guy, he’s gathering evidence’. It’s not exactly a thrilling or detailed introduction to the ‘Dollhouse plant in the government’ plot which comes to a head in a two-parter a few episodes later and then never impacts the story ever again. The story has no chance to build before it’s over: it’s introduced, it escalates, it’s nonsense, and then it’s done (the fact that the entire plot turns out illogical in the extreme really, really steps on any attempt at relevance or use). If you’re not gonna try and make the plot thread at least functional, why waste two whole episodes on it? You’ve only got thirteen, and you already wasted the first three! 

I say they wasted the first three episodes, but arguably, it’s more than that: episode four was ‘Belonging’, with the unfortunate decision to explain how Sierra came to be in the Dollhouse by expanding on the existing rape narrative with her abuser, Nolan, and while the episode in itself mostly works (in spite of itself, really), it’s not of any long-term importance outside of some character building/expansion, which is not a complete waste of time but, also, is not turned to a particular purpose. We didn’t need to lose an entire episode on this; we could have built and expanded upon character while dealing with some meaningful plot content, instead of indulging that ol’ rape obsession some more. Similar flaws exist for most of the other episodes of the season - though not entirely useless, spending an episode on an unfocused and largely meaningless Alpha visit in ‘A Love Supreme’ or fast-tracking through Victor’s backstory with the overly-ambitious and ultimately irrelevant military tech in ‘Stop-Loss’ is not a good use of the limited time the series had left to tell its story. And then there was the terrible ‘Meet Jane Doe’, which gave us a time-skip and a bunch of rushed plot to do with Echo learning to master the many personalities composing her identity while Topher mocked up a doomsday device out of thin air back at the Dollhouse: the single most excessively stupid example of what should have been at least a half-season’s worth of plot, instead crammed down into a ridiculously contrived subplot in a single episode. If you’re gonna try and tell several season’s worth of plot in thirteen episodes, you gotta COMMIT, man: hard plot, every episode is essential, every one of them advances your central narrative in some significant way even when it appears you’ve just done an episodic plot, it’s all vital to the endgame. Don’t think you’re gonna tell a few years of story in three episodes, and spend the rest of the time on fetish fantasies. Don’t be that stupid. 

As I noted when it happened, ‘The Attic’ is the only genuinely good episode of the season, and not least because it’s the only episode that does a passable job of making it seem like the plot has actually been going somewhere, for a reason, and with intention. It’s still very much a too-little-too-late situation, and the episode does all the heavy-lifting on introducing the puzzle pieces to complete the plot at the last minute, rather than having any of those pieces seeded at an earlier point in the series (the way that pre-planned things in a story that is going somewhere for a reason usually are). It gives us a last minute mystery to solve - who is Rossum’s shadowy founder? - though that turns out to be a very ill-advised mystery (for the calibre of the reveal, for the stupid convenience of having a shadowy founder to rail at, and for the obvious pointlessness of pretending that there’s a singular Boss Battle to be had that will magically dissolve the power of the corporation and its various pre-established players (Harding, Ambrose, and now the addition of Clyde 2.0 as well as ‘the founder’)). It also gives us a final mission - to take out Rossum’s mainframe - though that turns out similarly ill-advised in a more low-key way, since ‘we took down their computers’ is a patently idiotic way to ‘win’ (it’s laughable to pretend that any of the characters could be fooled into thinking that blowing up the Tucson facility would be anything more than an inconvenience to a global medical research corporation with thousands of employees and billions of dollars in resources and a trillion opportunities to store information on non-networked computers or on paper or in any of their numerous potential ‘legit’ published scientific proofs, etc, to say nothing of the fact that the physical tech and the people who built and used it are all still there, and yep, so are all those other Rossum higher-ups and probably even the founder himself, waiting on a harddrive to be put back into play). It all makes for an incredibly weak finisher to the ‘main’ plot, and that’s before we pointlessly bounce into the future again to show that, oh yeah, it WAS all meaningless and our characters are fucking morons who made no difference to anything with that explosion-y mainframe bullshit! The potentially-clever game-changer idea of including the flash-forward to the Thoughtpocalypse at the end of season one becomes a mistake now, when it calls for the waste of the finale on concluding a whole wild story development that the show never got a chance to actually develop at all. Eek. This is not how you storytelling, y’all. 

Heavy sigh. Honestly, I really, really thought this show would give me more to talk about, because at first glance it looks complex and stocked with conversation starters and potentially polarising content. Upon analysis, however, the complexity is a sham, the show itself starts no conversations, and the content lacks the nuance necessary to create oppositional interpretations. Ironically, it turns out as empty as the dolls are, simplistic, lacking the self-awareness to reflect on itself and the basic comprehension to fathom morality. It has no personality, no drive, and though at times it shows glimmers of understanding that there could be more to its existence than catering to shallow pleasures, ultimately it never focuses well enough to follow that anywhere. Even its transgressions are bland and predictable, worth calling out - as aggressive misogyny and rape fetishisation always is - but not worth picking apart in detail (because - shock horror - it’s not morally complicated and full of shades of grey, it’s just bad and wrong: it’s very simple and easy to follow, Whedon. Get therapy). If the Dollhouse is all about giving people what they need, well, I think I know what Joss Whedon needs: to shut up, and leave the show-creating to someone who hates women less, and knows how to string an idea into an actual story, more.

#Dollhouse #Dollhouse season two #Bechdel Test #female representation #full season review

[anexlarrieblog]

Omg. On the topic of larries appropriating Louis' mannerisms. These 30, 40, 50, 60 year old grown women saying, typing, making signs and just using, in general, the word "fook" and "fooking" on the daily. The secondhand embarrassment I feel when I see it is excruciating. These are grown ass humans who SHOULD have a fully developed sense of self but are mimicking this chav persona like it makes them cool. Grow a self esteem and stop it. Right now. And stop flipping the bird while you're at it.

Look I’m not a fan of age shaming anyone and think you can be a fan of anyone regardless of your own age and stage in life. But yes you’re right Larries are embarrassing all round, especially the grown woman who spend their days fantising and fetishising about two mens imaginary sex life. It’s sad and they need to get a life and they should really know better.

#that two p*ppies is the worst #ask #anon #Larries be larrying

[hadarlaskey]

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings

“Moving on is an American idea.” Discussing the passing of her grandpa, Katy’s (Awkwafina) Chinese immigrant family is bantering with her about her Westernised perspective on life and death. Amid its audiovisual bombardments, cultural mishmashes and genre hodgepodges, Marvel’s first Asian superhero film, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, is anchored by this incisive, all-encompassing line about legacy, grief and identity.

Channelling quintessential Chinese philosophies of genealogy and equilibrium, the film simultaneously showcases Marvel’s creativity and the diversity of the Chinese diaspora. It is a major step forward for on-screen representation of America’s racial mosaic.

Nearly 50 years after its title character made his Marvel Comics debut among martial-arts fetishisations, Shang-Chi’s timely release launches a high-profile counterattack against the rampant surges of Sinophobia and anti-Asian violence over the past year. From the outset, lead actor Simu Liu’s effortless relatability and unwavering screen presence serves to reassure Asian audiences.

“Cretton lets the cultural specificity and emotional intimacy of Shang-Chi shine through.”

Opposite Hong Kong cinema icon Tony Leung Chiu-wai as Wen-Wu, Shang-Chi’s immortal warlord father, Liu holds his own as the grassroots superhero on a self-redemptive mission to stop Wen-Wu from abusing the power of the Ten Rings, an ancient weapon that has conquered worlds for centuries.

Correcting Marvel’s racist past, director Destin Daniel Cretton and his team rewrite the comics’ ‘Yellow Peril’ character Mandarin into Wen-Wu. The renaming of this character is symbolically subversive, as “Wen” (文) means “intellectual depth” while “Wu” (武) means “martial prowess”. Striking an enigmatic balance between “Wen” and “Wu”, Leung commands the screen at his will as the film’s brooding antagonist, fixated on desire and vengeance.

Like father, like son. Shang-Chi and Wen-Wu mirror each other in their turbulent, traumatic relationship haunted by a mutual loss. This relationship brings to the surface the core Chinese value of family: the ones who came before us live inside ourselves, and we do not fight for power but for the ones we love.

The film’s female characters are equally well-written, exploring the intersectionality of Chinese feminism: Awkwafina once again shows her electric star quality as Katy; Zhang Meng’er’s Xialing dazzles with her sassiness and martial arts skills; Fala Chen and Michelle Yeoh’s sister-duo Li and Nan embody the transcendental composure of Tai-Chi. They are Shang-Chi’s family, friends, mentors, fellow warriors – and all heroines on their own, rising up against patriarchal entrapment and persecution.

The latest indie darling recruited by Marvel, Cretton lets the cultural specificity and emotional intimacy of Shang-Chi shine through. Paying tributes to various wuxia and Kung-Fu classics, he infuses this high-stakes fantasy epic with cyberpunk stylisation and thrilling action set-pieces. The result is not only a fan service joyride that comes full circle, but a self-reflexive commentary on the spotlight that Asian filmmakers and actors have always deserved in Hollywood.

ANTICIPATION. Marvel’s first Asian superhero film with a sensational cast. 4

ENJOYMENT. An anachronistic pastiche of wuxia and sci-fi that is executed unbelievably well. 4

IN RETROSPECT. A metatextual antithesis to the racism and whitewashing in Marvel’s own history, and a cinematic celebration of the Chinese diaspora on and off screen. 5

Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton

Starring Awkwafina, Tony Chiu-Wai Leung, Simu Liu

The post Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings appeared first on Little White Lies.

source https://lwlies.com/reviews/shang-chi-and-the-legend-of-the-ten-rings/

#movie

[addershade]

A Semi-Stuctured Rant on Antishipping, Fujoshi Culture and the monetization of Homosexuality in Japanese and American Media

Antishippers are homophobic and it's bothering me. But also so are fujoshis and that bothers me too

Part One: Antishippers

Where there sails a ship ship so to the antishippers let fly their flags. A common argument I see painted on the bows of their warships is 'This character hasnt been stated as gay yet don't ship them with them.'

This is such a problematic sentence I don't even know where to begin. The fact that people view the default state of sexuality as 'straight until declared gay' creates the stigma that being homosexual is in some way deviant or taboo.

As an example: nobody has a problem with Todoroki being shipped with Momo despite them having minimal character interaction and very little shared dialogue in the show. Yet because they have been seen together in one (1) episode it has even been assumed canon on the same level as Izuku and Ochako which it quite simply is not.

Compare this to Bakugo and Kirishima who have several scenes together, most in even more intimate settings than Todoroki and Momo (study date, walking home at sunset together, the money scene, the rescue, I could go on) yet since the creator has not OUTRIGHT stated that either of these two are gay they have been assumed straight. Antishippers never go after TodoMomo in the same way they do KiriBaku.

I've seen people go as far as to say it would never happen, the creator would never do something so radical as to include one (1) gay couple. Despite the already pretty strong LGBTQ+ presence in the show with characters like Tiger, Big Sis Magne and Toga. These three have their own problems (an issue for another time) but they are there and that's a big step forward that people like to forget about.

Also, is the concept of 'we don't get good gay representation in the media so we write our own' really such a hard thing to grasp? Because it shouldn't be. Gay representation in media is scarce and even if its there it might not be handled sensitively (cough cough banana fish cough) and people naturally would want to go out of their way to provide it for themselves. Because representation is important. Straight, cis, white men really wouldn't understand because they are represented in literally everything all the time so I geuss they can't really fathom not being able look at the main character and go 'it me.' Which is why they put up such a fuss about every single time a woman is cast as the lead role. In anything. But I digress.

My point is basically this: Characters with undefined sexualities are obviously going to draw people in and be used as a comfortable, familiar and interesting starting point to create someone you can resonate with on a deeper level. Especially if there's nothing contradicting your head canon. And even if there is, who cares? There's plenty of straight characters already, representation is not pie and also they aren't real people so thats an extra helping of 'it shouldn't bother you.'

Oh I forgot to mention this rant only extends to fictional character antishippers because I think shipping real people is icky and shouldn't happen regardless of sexuality.

Part Two: Fujoshi Culture

Yes there are straight gals and guys that fetishise it (the male version is a fudanshi at least get it right people) and that's gross and unforgivable please stop doing it.

I would argue however this epidemic is caused by the fact that media, eastern and western alike, refuses to normalise gay relationships. Which means they see it as this sick fetish thing and call it 'sinning.' The literal terms fudanshi and fujoshi are derogatory and paint enjoying 'yaoi' as a guilty pleasure, something to be ashamed of and ridiculed.

And I'd bet my bottom dollar that Japan would want to keep it that way because it does work to sell their mangas.

Nagisa really sums up the whole issue in 50 percent off here's the clip:

https://youtu.be/c_xwtbrXbZM

Part Three: Western Focus

I just want to point out how half hearted and overly subtle these relationships have to be, like you're sneaking it past the republicans like the producers dirty little secret.

Good examples from both sides are Bubbeline, KoraSami, All of Voltron and Literally Any Gay Man In Anime Except Yuri on Ice. Although Yuri on Ice is still pretty coy about admitting that their characters are in a gay relationship.

KoraSami, Bubbeline and Shiro x Shiro's flashback buddy are all western depictions. Being gay in western media is much less commercialised and much less marketable, which is why the main issue with all of these were the writers pushing for something that was then only really confirmed either in: a very heavily fought for kiss last episode or the love story told entirely in (two bros chilling in a hot tub style) flashbacks where said love interest dies in the same episode. None of these are good representation and I don't think I have to spell out why.

Anyway this is another video that sums it up better than I can

https://youtu.be/TOj4WfQPNlk

Part 4: The Bad, The Worse and the Ugly

tw: s*xual a*sault mentioned (part 5 is safe)

I'll be quick

Anime like Banana Fish and Black Butler really like to perpetuate the stereotype that gay men are only gay because they have been r*ped by sick, twisted older men.

As a gay man who has been s*xually a*ssulted in the way that they like to pretend defined my sexuality I can say that this is insulting, triggering and Never. Ever. Handled. Properly. Anime has some issues with sexuality as a whole but it really takes the cake when characters like Ash are abused in real time in the anime and then it's used to 'justify' their promiscuity with men moving forward.

Banana Fish in no way handles the sexual assault tactfully, no matter what people have said to me.

This is an extract I agree with heavily from a pretty well written article (Banana Fish spoilers) :

I mentioned earlier the finale sent an awful message to new viewers. Ash’s story was about survival so for him to easily give up, in the end, sent a horrible message to survivors of sexual violence because it not only told them a moment of vulnerability would get them killed, but the only way survivors could find any peace was through death. The fact that Ash gave up, told survivors they could never escape from their traumas and despite all their efforts, they would never be able to heal from their abusive circumstances.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/thatnerdyboliviane.com/2019/01/21/banana-fish-a-bittersweet-experience/amp/

'Kill your gays' is a bad trope in any case but really was an especially poor choice here.

Part 5: Sex Sells and Gay Sex Advertises

I've mentioned above how manga and anime likes to package gay relationships into problematic little bundles and sell it to straight women as a curiosity or oddity. But I really think that it needs to be talked about more. Things shouldn't be more interesting to you just because they're gay, and fetishising minorities is never okay in any context.

I think it's important to note that really the attitudes in both Western and Japanese media are actually the exact same. That being, Gay people are 'others' and should at all costs be hidden away into corners. The only real difference is that Japan is known for selling that kind of content, lumping it in the same category as tentacle hentai and... I don't know any other categories but the point stands. Whereas western media tends to just sequester it into a corner and hope it gets past censorship boards and Karen's. Money is at the forefront of both of these descisions.

It's a real problem that both sides of the anime culture are so problematic. One side is way too into it and the other can't begin to process it.

Here's a video by the same person that covers basically the same ground that's concerning me so much.

https://youtu.be/t3FKlqDocQ4

Part 6: In conclusion

I feel like this is something that is worth being angry about. I'm just sick of how being gay is treated at the moment in anime, tv and film, and how it's being received by straight audiences. The LGBTQ+ community barely seems to get a real say half of the time because people are too busy being head over heels that the author confirmed in an interview that a character is bi or gay but never follows through with it in universe. Or when you try and create content for yourself and get criticised like you were supposed to be happy about what little representation you get in mainstream media. Like shows do the bare minimum and then we're supposed to be happy about it. But I ain't. And I don't think many other people are either.

TLDR:

Gay people being treated like a taboo little secret on both sides of the issue is insulting and gross and never leads to anything good.

#Youtube #Gay #Anime #Shipping #Antishipping #bubbeline #voltron #my hero academia #legend of korra #fujoshi #Fudanshi #queerbaiting #rant post #lgbt pride #lgbtq #lgbt rights #banana fish #ash lynx #Yaoi #Yuri #lesbian #gay #bi #transgender #queer

[isitandwonder]

The Female Gaze

I think, in the end, it was about the women, not the gay. I think the groundbreaking new thing BBC Sherlock wanted to do was to strengthen and re-evaluate the role of women in Sherlock Holmes adaptions. But that went horribly wrong.

Mofftiss always said they wanted to right something with their adaption that everybody else did get wrong. Well, what could that have been, as Holmes has even been portrayed as a mice? We all hoped for Johnlock… as this has been a reading of the canon especially appreciated by female/queer fans, because it takes into account a somewhat different interpretation from the cis white het male reading. Sherlock Holmes is somewhat ideal as a character to captify female readers - as he retorts to thinking and talking and not to violence in the first place to solve a problem, which are classic female strategies. Holmes mostly employs his brain and not his fists - which sets him apart from most male action / crime solving heros in a way women can relate to (but remember Gatiss’s poem, advocating a more physical Holmes? Making him into a cis white male het hero…?) 

But as S4 clearly showed us that Johnlock wasn’t the goal - what else could have been the new, groundbreaking thing everybody had gotten wrong before?

Especially around TAB, but also before, Mofftiss talked excessively about the role of women in Sherlock Holmes adaptions; that the Zeitgeist when the stories had been written didn’t allow for many strong female characters. TAB was sold as a story about strong women and their empowerment - which sparked anger, because the women were portrayed as murderous furies. I’ll return to this later. The point here is that there were even panels at Sherlocked in 2016 harping on “Women in Sherlock”, emphasising their importance.

So, I think what Mofftiss felt necessary for a modern adaptation was to strengthen the role of female characters. Only, the brave thing then would have been to make Holmes and Watson both female. Which Mofftiss didn’t.

This got very long and is therefore continued under the cut.

As Mofftiss said themselves, instead they played heavily with the longstanding homoeritoc interpretation of the stories (feminising Sherlock and Watson?) - which appealed to gay and female and gay female fans. And, surpirse, surprise, they dig this; not the allegedly new / stronger female characters. But it was just a joke to the writer - whereas they were serious witht heir female characters like Moll yor Mary or Eurus. I think this misunderstanding of what the fans and the writers wanted respectively led to the train wreck of S4 (think about the Mary feature for the cinema screenings, for example, much hated around here!)

There is a great post going around about the male gaze in Sherlock. I’m sure every female person has been subjected to this sort of male gaze. Subjected, not enjoyed it. And that was one mistake. Mofftiss might not have seen what their characters were actually doing, how they were looking at each other - because they are male writers. To them, such a gaze is the normal look on the world. But not for female persons. For them, such a look is sexually charged. Mostly derogatory, or at least predatory. If a man looks at a women like Sherlock looks at John or vice versa, it’s a look of lusting after. Women / female persons see and know that, because we have to identify and interpret this look over and over in out lives to stay save. Men haven’t. For them, such looks might even be nothing special. But it is. This is one example where men and women read their reality differently. Therefore, female fans interpreted these glances in a sexual way, what Mofftiss couldn’t understand. They thought we were hypersexualising their show, because they are not accustomed to interpret such looks as the female fans are.

Therefore, they had no idea why so many (het) female fans read so much Johnlock into their show, as they just wanted to play with it a bit as a homage to Billy Wilder. This bafflement formed an unholy alliance with Mark Gatiss’s hate for fag hags, an ugly word for (het) females fantasising about gay men. He hates and mocks those women since League of Gentlemen days. He never tried to understand why women might have this kink in the first place. Gatiss seems to see those proclivities as perverted as many women see lesbian scenes in het porn. But there’s a difference.

Het porn is mostly made by and for men. The f/f scenes in it are almost always foreplay. Two women get it on, but a soon as a man enters, they go down on him. It feeds the idea that lesbian sex is just something women resort to when no man is around - otherwise they would, of course, go for the ‘real thing’ - an opinion that fuells the idea that lesbians just haven’t met the right man yet etc. In short, this opinion states that lesbian sex is not real sex. This is, of course, a derogatory view.

And totally not the same as (het)  women enjoying gay porn! First, gay male porn is taken seriously as a sex act between two men. I’ve never seen it as interpretated as foreplay for f/m action. Never have I seen two guys making out, then a female enters and they are suddenly all over her. Male gay sex actions stays just this: only guys getting it on. And women watching can do this like “Well, two (3, 4, 5 …) dicks are better than one”, but they can also feel save while doing so: No woman will be subjected to anything in male gay porn. There’s no female character to compare oneself to and be found lacking in looks etc. There’s no violence against women in these movies, no abuse, no reducing them to their sexual organs, no exploitation of female sexuality. Women can just sit back and enjoy male gay porn without feeling involved. And some women like it, because, as with the male gaze, male sexual attention towards females can be predatory, violent, looking for a conquest etc. And some (het) women just don’t like that. So they escape to gay porn, where they might even identify with the taking side.

This is not necessarily deranged fetishising of gay m/m sex. Women have a sex drive as well, get over it, Mr Gatiss. Everyone sins differently, so, please, no kinkshaming. It can be a confident expression of female sexual desires. Only, female sexuality somewhat seems to scare men.

Paired with this misreading of women enjoying gay porn as a fag hag fetish was the idea that the female fans who shipped johnlock are mostly teenage girls/virgins - and this seems apparently not the target group those writers want to be admired by. But honestly - can a 14-year old virgin write something like The Cold Song? A Cure For Boredom? PiaLR? That’s not to say that young girls shouldn’t write fanfic - on the contrary, they should, to explore their sexual identity and proclivities in a save space. But I’m quite sure that most of this fandom’s best writers are the other side of 20, 30 and even 40 or 50. Because it needs experience to write really engaging sex scenes. Experiences I hope 14 year old girls simply don’t have yet. So, here’s another misunderstanding / misconception the writers have about this fandom (and they are not very eager to correct it, despite Moffat’s somewhat encouraging words towards fanfic writers. In the end, they can’ tget over themselves, it seems).

But somehow mature, sexually confident, intelligent women seem to frighten Mofftiss, despite their idea of  giving women more room in a Sherlock adaptation. Why? Because mature, confident, feminist women KNOW that two men simply can’t strengthen and enhance female characters like they deserve it. Mofftiss knew that they couldn’t live up to feminist expectations, so they dismissed it outright, while even gaslighting female fans by ‘Look, we gave you great female characters, stop complaining!’ (And don’t get involved with  this perverse thing called johnlock either).

Look at how Mofftiss have done this:

Molly is a het woman, constantly humiliated by Sherlock, yet still pining for him. She was the first new character invented by Mofftiss for their show. But not as a strong character, only as a female character. Even when she finally emancipates herself, she chooses a boyfriend ridiculously looking like Sherlock. That at least earns her a condescending kiss from the object of her desire. Bah! And when under stress, because Sherlock is shooting up and her engagement is over, she is only allowed to turn to the male form of stress relieve - violence. She slaps Sherlock! Why does she not talk to him, offer help, involve their friends? Because that would be the female approach, but that is unfathomable to the male writers.

Same with Irene (in canon a  confident artist who wants to get married, not in the slightest interested in Holmes). In the BBC version, she becomes a lesbian (see above re: the value of lesbian sexuality) = has not yet met the right man (Sherlock). This is awful, becoming straight for Sherlock! I don’t mind the naked scene in her house so much, though. It’s not overtly sexualised, but can be read as self-confident and sexually assured. But I hate the wardrobe scene. Lara Pulver looks great in that green negligee and suspenders - but why was this scene necessary if not to charge the show hetero sexuall?. In the DVD comments, Mofftiss joke around that loads of people (men) suddenly hung around the set while this scene was filmed - to gaze at Lara Pulver in underwear. That is not funny, that is sexism! That is not a joke. She was displayed as a sexual object - not for herself or character growth, but for the pleasure of others. She was reduced to a sexual object for the male gaze, despite her character being a self-professed lesbian. Arghhh!

Mrs Hudson, on the other hand, is the devoted mother hen - another cliche. Only, in S4, she gets warped - again, like a man would want it, by having her drive an Aston Martin (cars=dicks). But it’s not even hers - she got it from her husband. She didn’t run a cartel, she was just typing… Giving her a fast car is not empowerment! Empowerment would have been to tell her tenants to brew their own tea!

Or look at Sally Donovan - the only WoC on the show apart from Hooper, who’s Asian (why are there no muslim women, disabled women etc on the show btw? Why is the female empowerment almost exclusively done via white women?): She calls Sherlock a freak, has an affair with a married man, who is an idiot, is sexually insulted by Sherlock for that in front of her collegues, and, in the end, is presented as a traitor, engaging in Sherlock’s downfall. Whereas Anderson is kind of redeemed later in MHR and TEH - nothing like this is waiting for Sally.

Or look at all of John’s girlfriends! Presented as jealous of Sherlock, helpless (Sarah), frustrated (Jeanette), some described as ugly (the one with the nose, the one with the spots). All of them are left by John for Sherlock the minute Sherlock asks him - now, imagine being one of those women. Would you like that? John treats those women like shit, not with respect.

I’m not going into the Mary story here, enough has been said about her. But just imagine for a moment being married to a closeted gay/bi man, secretly pining for his best friend… John treated Mary not much differently as Sherlock treated Janine.

Speaking of Janine! She’s befriended by Mary to get to Magnussen, courted by Sherlock for the same purpose, abused by her employer… only to get dropped by her fiance and dragged by the yellow press. The last thing is presented as her revenge - but at what cost? Picturing her as some kind of tabloid whore, as Sherlock says. What kind of treatment for a female character is this? Why again reduce her to a sex object?

Even Lady Smallwood is not allowed to be a strong independent woman - she is shown chatting up Mycroft!

Or Vivian Norbury! The old, lonely cat lady, still clinging to her dead husband.

And Eurus? Both Holmes brothers can channel their intelligence and use it for something good - but not the sister. No, as any female person, she just wants male attention and goes mad because she’s just too smart for her own good… seriously?!

I could go on and on… but I think you get the message. Mofftiss wrote female characters into the show and thought that would be enough to modernise the gender issue in the Holmes’s stories. But Mofftiss are not able to write strong, empowering female characters because they are men. They live in a men’s world (remember Hooper, who had to become a man to be successful?). That means, for example, that they reduce women to their sexuality, and advocate they resolve problems with violence, like the women in TAB. Think about it… why did they not just leave their husbands and settle somewhere in the country, together, supporting themselves with needlework? Well, that doesn’t sound very exciting, does it, but it was the female way back in Victorian times. You could leave your husband and seperate. Or you could poison him - but not shoot or stab him. 

There’s a sad truth to poison being a woman’s weapon - because usually, a man is stronger in hands on combat. Therefore, a man who beats his wife to death is usually just sentenced for manslaughter - it happened at the spur of the moment, no killing intended. But a woman who wants to get rid of her abuser has to do this when he sleeps, for example, or via poison or drugs, to be able to overpower him. This is mostly seen as cunning by the courts, which is a feature proving murder. A woman freeing herself from an abuser is seen as guilty of premeditation (= another feature of murder), whereas a man who beats his wife over many years unitl she dies from his abuse is exculpated exactly by this prolonged abuse, because he couldn’t expect the wife to die from his violence - as she lived through it for many years.

Sorry, but this is where the male gaze leads us - to a world made up and after male standards. But applying those standards to women is not empowering - it is still subjecting them to the male prerogative.

And many feminist fans see this (now) and ask why this happened. They criticise the male writers for this. Who kind of pout now, feeling perhaps misunderstood, as they wanted to give us strong female characters in a modern version on Sherlock Holmes and believed they succeeded with Eurus, Molly and Mary, even giving her the last word. And they don’t understand why we we don’t like it. Instead, all we wanted seems to have been gay porn! (Honestly, if we want to see dudes fuck, we know exactly where we can get that, Mofftiss). 

They can’t come around to our view of what is and has been going on. They can’t see us the way we are, because they have a totally different perspective and no inclination to change that. They think our criticism is juvenile, that we are ungrateful - as if the very idea of a largely (queer) female fanbase being grateful towards male showrunners isn’t fucked up to the extreme!

As I said at the beginning - if they wanted a Sherlock Holmes adaption that empowers women - make Holmes and Watson female. If you don’t want to go there - leave them as they are, together. No women are needed - especially not like Mofftiss wrote them. Explore Holmes and Watson’s friendship, and see where it takes you… Johnlock didn’t come out of nowhere. Holmes isn’t the typical 19th century male - he’s moody, thin, pale, likes music… all then and now characteristics associated with feminity. Perhaps that’s why he has such a broad, devoted female fanbase? Perhaps it would be empowering to allow us our reading and make it canon?

The first step, if you want to give women an empowering modern Sherlock Holmes adaption, is: Take the female fans seriously!

#sherlock #what went wrong #mofftiss #writing #female characters

[funnythingshere0-blog]

After the reaction to A Very English Scandal, we need to talk about why we find camp men so funny

New Post has been published on https://funnythingshere.xyz/after-the-reaction-to-a-very-english-scandal-we-need-to-talk-about-why-we-find-camp-men-so-funny/

After the reaction to A Very English Scandal, we need to talk about why we find camp men so funny

With the conclusion of the BBC’s A Very English Scandal – the dramatisation of the Thorpe affair in which former Liberal leader Jeremy Thorpe stood accused of attempted murder by his alleged former lover Norman Scott in the seventies – comes the news that things might not be all dead and buried. The attempted murder case has been reopened after police admitted that they may have incorrectly concluded that Andrew Newton, an airline pilot allegedly hired to carry out the killing, was dead. 

The original scandal, as well as the resulting court case that saw Thorpe and three others acquitted against charges of conspiracy to murder, all makes great fodder for a Sunday TV drama. It is a very bizarre and ever so British scandal, where not even the alleged murder could go to plan. Still, when the adaptation’s director, Stephen Frears, stopped by The Today Programme on BBC Radio 4, he seemed somewhat unable to acknowledge the seriousness of the issue, especially pertaining to Scott’s complaints that the adaptation reduces his experiences to comedy. 

“He complains about it being comic,” Frears said on the show. “The truth is, Norman is a very, very funny man… Jeremy Thorpe was very funny. There were jokes in the papers every day… You cannot stop it being comic.”  

A Very English Scandal review: Grant gives a Bafta-worthy performance

Indeed, Scott himself has said that he can see how the whole set up – the dead dog, the failed murder and the sheer tweeness of the scandal – was darkly humourous. “It is very laughable,” he said during a documentary on BBC Four, “but it’s also very, very serious.”  

Scott isn’t wrong. An attempt on someone’s life, regardless of sexual orientation or social standing, is pretty much up there on the serious scale. Watching the courtroom scenes from A Very English Scandal, though, you can see that the consensus at the time was that the homosexual context of the allegations and Scott’s own effeminacy were funny. What’s disconcerting, albeit unsurprising, is that in 2018 Frears still sees the case through a lens of humour. Sure, it works for a TV show and quite well at that, too, but to negate Scott’s own feelings about the portrayal of the scandal is to enforce a disturbing tradition where homosexuality and campness in men is reduced to the butt of the joke. 

Admittedly, campness and effeminacy have long been used for gags. But for those people who live their lives eschewing traditional masculinity and for whom campness isn’t a humourous affectation, the fetishisation by comedy of their behaviours, style or speech ultimately diminishes their experiences as a human being. Because of your campness, you are no longer autonomous, but labelled and grouped together as one entity. 

Personally, I have had my identity overstepped by straight people in order for them to make comparisons to people like Alan Carr or early Scissor Sisters-era Jake Shears (both of whom I adore but bear very little resemblance to in any way). This is done in order for my queerness to be palatable. In other words, anodyne. You see it more today when a femme gay man gets their experiences narrowed to calls of “Yas queen!” and “Slay!” by RuPaul’s Drag Race fans.

UK news in pictures

50 show all

Yet, this problem isn’t just a hetero one. Within the gay community itself, femmephobia and camp-shaming is a tangible problem. The generic mating calls of #masc4masc men on dating apps and in gay clubs diminish the desires and wants of those who don’t conform to traditionally masculine ideals. The media that caters to gay people just enforces this monotony. And in those rare moments when campness is celebrated, it’s still reduced to flamboyance and never given the erotic weight bestowed on upon their straight-acting counterparts. 

Clearly, it doesn’t take a degree to see that this all stems from a fear and demonisation of femininity. A man behaving in what’s perceived as a traditionally female way is funny because it’s considered abnormal. And it’s considered abnormal because femininity of any kind is viewed as wrong. That campness and comedy are interlinked shouldn’t be all that surprising – making people laugh is better than aggressive displays of homophobia, even if it does come at the expense of your own identity. 

Nevertheless, it feels like we should be past all that. If someone wants to use their campness or effeminacy for comedy, they should absolutely do that. But to assume that just because someone is camp their experiences are immediately comedic is, in 2018, reductive. Surely it’s time to close the chapter on dehumanising camp and femme men. If not, we might just rebel, one limp wrist at time.

[shiratorizawaheadcanons-blog]

Stop fetishising people’s sexuality

Other people’s relationships are gratification for fujoshi. Shipping has its limits and some people just love to break this boundary. The sexuality of the queer community is often infantilised to the point where their relationships can be seen as ‘ground breaking’ or more meaningful than that of a straight couple’s. Upon looking into the medium’s that have been given from both the west and the east, there comes a limit as to what one can call “supporting homosexuality” and crosses the line of fetishizing homosexuality.

Within every fandom, there exists a ‘yaoi’ (boys’ love) subculture that seeks to ship almost every character that they can. Sometimes referred to as fujoshi, these ‘rotten women/fallen girls’ have been dubbed this pejorative term for lovers of romantic relationships between males. Escapism is a major factor as to why fandoms can amount to masses of fans and why gay relationships are viewed of as so highly. As this word suggests, escapism is the avoidance of the unpleasant actions people take to relieve persisting feelings of sadness. Yaoi is a form of pornography that is aimed at a readership that is 90% female and 50% heterosexual with a dynamic that mirrors the typical idea of a heterosexual relationship; a dominant and a submissive. Yaoi has stemmed from multiple issues but one that can explain this dynamic is the fact that the female readership is almost 70% of its content creators as well; yaoi fills the market niche for female sexuality in the masculine domain of pornography so they are free to objectify characters just as much women in typical pornography can do to a submissive. Females are often the subject of objectification so yaoi gives these women the platform to exert their own female sexuality without getting involved themselves.

Often, people have called a yaoi a disrespect to a creator’s work (imi nashi, no meaning, within the abbreviation) as it takes away from the standards set by a content creator. A writer can put forward a genuine friendship between two characters yet their affection towards each other will become synonymous with that of lovers. Using the ‘Four Loves’ one can attempt to apply ‘eros’, sexual love’ onto a normal friendship, when the love that better describes a relationship would be ‘philia’, an affectionate regard of people as equals and as friends. Gay couples will often be stigmatised despite further developing culture so ‘supporters of gay rights’ try to grasp at straws for confirmation of a ship being canon, meaning a hazy guess over what defines ‘philia’ and ‘eros’, just to find justification. For example, looking at someone just to confirm if they’re okay (refer to IwaOi after the Karasuno/Seijou match and during Karasuno/Shiratorizawa) suddenly becomes a big deal when genuine concern can be exhibited by friends as well. A relationship between two people of the same gender can change a story dramatically, but this does not mean that their plot will be derived together through ‘eros’.

Now, this last point may be hypocritical considering the fact that on this blog, our requests are at least 70% NSFW, as condensed by Yong over the period of December (this takes into account requests that have been deleted for numerous reasons). We, as real people, are unable to engage with characters as they are not real. We can express thanks to creators, actors and the like but the actor and creator is not the character. Philosopher Kendall Walton argues that what we experience when watching horror is not fear but quasi-fear, an almost but not quite. Quasi-emotions can account for love of fictional characters, so lust but not quite and love but not quite. The main reason we immerse ourselves in fiction anyways is to experience that which is not in our normal lives. This can mean the gratification that is derived from escapism is just a way for us to feel a sort of emotion and why we get attached as a fandom, because we are almost there but not quite. It can be argued that feelings that we feel for characters are not ‘complete’ emotions, not fully developed in comparison to what we have with humans, but this is completely an idea.

Will we be stopping the NSFW asks on this blog? Considering that it’s 70% of our askbox, it’s very unlikely otherwise this page would die down. I mean, I do find it a bit weird that there are fans who are in their late thirties fantasising over what a fifteen year old boy could do to them in bed but that’s a whole new topic to be discussed. However, the fact that people fulfil fantasies through the creation of homosexual characters does feel strange when you have your sexuality treated as something sinful or put on a pedestal for people to gawk at.

#sen is sinning #sen's studies