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maddiesbookshelves · 2 years

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Third queer manga of the month is by a trans author:

Boys run the Riot, by Gaku Keito

Titre original : Boys Run the Riot / ボーイズ・ラン・ザ・ライオット

Genres: Drama, Psychology, School Life, Slice of Life

Themes: Friendship, Fashion, Trans Identity

Japanese volumes: 4 (Finished)

Ryo, assigned female at birth, feels wrong in his own skin and the gender imposed to him. He refuses to wear the girls' uniform to school, wearing his tracksuit as much as possible. However, the arrival of a new student changes his life. Despite Jin's "thug" look, they discover that they have the same tastes in fashion. After a rough start to their relationship, they share a new dream : creating a fashion brand for people to be able to assert and express themselves outside of what society tries to impose to them.

A lot of things happen in this one. We get to see different identities and their respective point of view about being queer. They don't necessarily see eye to eye but but in the end, it's a story about overcoming our differences and not complying to what society tries to impose on us. Ryo just wants to be able to live as the boy he knows he is and find people who will accept him for who he is.

I liked that the mangaka didn't drag things out to make it a 20+ volumes series. The four are enough to tell a compelling story about the beginning of Ryo and his friends' journey to make their dream come true. It's up to us to decide what happens next.

Note: As this series is a bit more "serious" and focused on queer identities and strugles, I feel like I should probably give some content warning so you can avoid getting triggered if that's something you're scared of. Take care of yourself 🌈

Content warnings: blood, gender dysphoria, accidental misgendering (character is not out), misogyny, outing and transphobia.

French version under the cut

Titre VF : Boys Run the Riot

Titre original : Boys Run the Riot / ボーイズ・ラン・ザ・ライオット

Genres : Drame, Psychologie, School Life, Slice of Life

Thèmes : Amitié, Mode, Transidentité

Volumes VO : 4 (Terminé)

Ryo, assigné femme à la naissance, se sent mal dans son corps et l'identité de genre qu'on cherche à lui imposer. Refusant de porter son uniforme de fille, il essaie autant que possible de se rendre au lycée en tenue de sport. Mais quand un nouvel élève débarque, son destin change ! Malgré le look de « voyou » de ce dernier, ils découvrent qu'ils partagent la même passion pour la mode. Aussi, passé un premier contact difficile, ils décident tous les deux de se lancer dans un grand projet : créer, ensemble, une marque de vêtements avec pour rêve et revendication de pouvoir s'affirmer et s'exprimer en dehors de ce que la société essaie de leur imposer !

Il se passe pas mal de choses dans celui-là. On voit plusieurs identités queer et leurs points de vue respectifs sur le fait d'être queer. Tous ne voient pas forcément les choses de la même façon mais au final c'est une histoire d'acceptation de l'autre malgré nos différences et de rébellion contre les normes sociales qu'on essaie de nous imposer. Ryo veut juste pouvoir vivre sa vie comme le garçon qu'il sait qu'il est et trouver des gens qui l'accepteront pour qui ce qu'il est.

J'apprécie que le mangaka n'en ait pas fait une série en 20 ou plus tomes. Les quatre suffisent à raconter le début captivant du voyage de Ryo et compagnie pour réaliser leurs rêves. C'est à nous d'imaginer ce qu'il leur arrive ensuite.

Note: Comme cette série est un peu plus "sérieuse" et se concentre sur les identités et problèmes de la communauté queer, je pense que c'est mieux si je donne une liste de content warning pour éviter de réveiller des traumatismes chez certain.es. Prenez soin de vous 🌈

Content Warning : sang, dysphorie de genre, mégenrage (personnage encore dans le placard), misogynie, outing et transphobie.

#boys run the riot #gaku keito #manga #queer manga #trans rep #books #queer books #booklr #book recommendations #book recs #book reviews #manga review #manga recommendation #happy pride 🌈#le mot mégenrage est vraiment laid huh #désolée si les autres termes français sont pas tout à fait exactes #j'ai l'habitude de les voir en anglais

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highlifeboat · 7 months

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You know how sometimes you think about something sweet and your mind goes "but what if we made it darker?".

Yeah.

So what if Max's mom was revived somehow?

Like we talked about it happening with Marguerite in the past, and the way it fucked with Mia, but what about in this case? How much would it fuck with Max?

Would he be happy, cause she's back? Sad, because it's not his entire family? Traumatized, cause "oh god he saw her broken body, bleeding on the ground and *he ran*, he ran away and he couldn't save them, couldn't save his siblings, her other children, she must hate him, want him gone, he is a monster and undeserving..."?

How would she react to him? (I like to think she would forgive him, would hold and love him. Maybe be a bit overprotective about Dani and the others, because she knows their rep, and he is her "last child left".)

How would she respond to having a son now, rather than the daughter she thought she had? (I hope she would love him all the same, he deserves that much. (Darker thought that it's more because of her not wanting to lose another kid than overall acceptance/understanding, but ehhhh, that might *too* dark. Though I could at least see the confusion still))

How did she get back? My bet's on Miranda - looking for new ways to revive some of her fallen followers, to bolster her ranks once more, and started with his family because, even if they were ripped apart by Lycans, that's easier to repair than those burnt alive. And Alcina won't let her close enough to her property to use the scarecrows or zombie maidens anymore. Plus "(he)'s always whining about the loss, anyhow. (He) should be grateful I'm so generous." (As if she would ever do anything for reasons other than her own gain, and maybe to try to get on Mia's good side more by appealing to one of her "friends").

What if she came back wrong?

Anyway, long post is long. Sorry for the rambling lol (Yes I put some of Miranda's speech in parenthesis cause I refuse to misgender Max, even to quote that bitch)

When I tell you I went fucking FERAL FOR THIS–

OKAYOKAYOKAYOKAY–

I strongly believe pulling bodies from the rubble of the slaughter and deciding to play God is something Miranda would do. However, I find it far more likely that she would pull Max’s mom by pure chance more than anything. Perhaps she was simply scouring the aftermath and his mom’s corpse was one of the less-mangled/easier to repair bodies she came across. Took any valuables off, stripped the body, and went to work mending the flesh and repairing what she could manually before starting on Cadou injections. And because Miranda had more than one corpse that she pulled, Max’s Mom wasn’t the first to be experimented on, so she wasn’t revived until recently.

Now, having memories in tact when revived was slowly becoming a trend, so she wasn’t surprised when the woman woke up, looked directly to her, and let out a raspy “Mo–ther Mir…a-nda…?” Recognizing something as significant as herself was obvious. But she seemed to retain… more than the basics. When she started coming around, getting more aware, she started to panic. Rambling on about the Lycans, standing from the operating table and calling for various names. None of which Miranda knew except for “Maxima”–(Which, let's be real she only knows his (dead)name because he’s such a disrespectful shit towards her)

So, in typical “Let’s see how far this goes” Miranda fashion, she points his mom in the right direction to find Max. (AKA the giant castle that is commonly known as a human death trap. So his mom is freaking out a little at that information) Then just kind of… sends her off with nothing else.

Okay, so, once his mom finds him in the castle and they’re technically reunited, Max is just…. So many things at once. Emotions are so high, for both of them.

On Max’s side, he’s… He’s happy, but also incredibly confused, and terrified, and just…. Every emotion imaginable feels like it’s weighing on him. His mom is here, alive, but there’s scars and stitches and her skin tone is a sickly pale that almost rivals Alcina. All the evidence of what happened on display, it reminds him of what he’s tried so hard to forget but… But she’s here. For real. He can touch her, say everything he didn’t get to, he can hug her, but he doesn’t know if he should. So much about it hurts, but not all of it is in a bad way.

And that doesn’t even cover the guilt and trauma that seeing her brings. That’s a whole other beast. When his mother asks him what happened to his other siblings, he can’t even begin to try and tell her. How can he? How is he supposed to explain what he allowed to happen, all because he was too much a fucking coward. That all he did was run. That even the one he managed to get to a safe location died anyway. That the only child she has left is the only one that deserves to be dead.

He hasn’t felt the weight of emotions like this since that day, and that’s evident when he starts having a full breakdown over it all. He can’t stop himself from shaking and when the tears come he can’t hide it. When she pulls him into a hug in a hope to comfort him, he clings onto her as if it’s life or death. Because to him it may as well be.

And from her side…. She doesn’t even know what to think. He looks so incredibly different from what she remembers. She almost didn’t realize who he was, but that face and those eyes are unmistakable to her. He looks older than he should, she thinks, and tired. As if he hasn’t slept in years. And the scars. Not to mention… everything else about his appearance. She has so many questions for him, but she asks about her other children first.

The look he gives her is answer enough, but the sobbing that quickly follows it is all the confirmation she needs. Her heart twists like a knot, knowing her children suffered the same fate as her, the pain and fear they all must have felt. That Max has suffered all this time, a lone survivor. When she pulls him into a hug, he squeezes her tight, and for a while they just… sit, on the floor. She rocks him a little, strokes his hair, anything to try and calm him. Between his heavy sobs are raspy apologies. He’s so sorry, he tells her, he should have done more. He couldn’t save them. He was so scared and the Lycans came so fast. And she tells him to hush. She’s not upset with him, it wasn’t his fault, she loves and forgives him. Whatever he needs to hear in order to compose himself a little.

In terms of Max’s transitioning, it definitely takes her by surprise. She isn’t necessarily upset about it in any way, he’s still her baby, and she’ll love him no matter what identity he chooses to go by. But she also doesn’t fully understand it. And he doesn’t expect her to, as long as she’s supportive. She might slip up and misgender him by accident on occasion, but it’s not malicious, and she does correct herself/make an effort to get it right. It might’ve caught her off guard at first, but her love is unconditional. (Also her saying “You’ve grown into a handsome young man.” to him would make him burst into tears again. Like that’s something he would fantasize about.)

I do think the only thing that gets her is the fact… Max is basically integrated into the Dimitrescu family at this point. Like, when Max tells her “You should meet my girlfriend.” She didn’t expect to meet with one of the Dimitrescu Daughters (though Daniela does try to be very polite), nevermind wind up meeting all of them, and Lady Dimitrescu herself.

It does put her into a bit of a protective stance, though. Despite Max insisting things are perfectly fine and the Dimitrescus really aren’t as evil as the stories say, she can’t quite help but be… nervous. They don’t really blame her. (Perhaps she’s a little… too protective. But Max doesn’t seem to mind it.)

Now, the idea that she comes back wrong is even more interesting, because I like to imagine a scenario in which both these worlds exist.

Max gets his mom back, happy family, all is good. For a while, anyway. And then things… change.

Maybe his mom starts becoming a little hostile. More aggressive towards everybody. It starts off little at first, and Max tries to chalk it up to simple stress from trying to adjust to everything. His mom isn’t an angry person, after all. But it slowly starts getting more out of hand, to a point it feels like she’s trying to be territorial.

Of him.

And it’s not something she’s particularly thrilled over. It’s a very “I can’t control myself” scenario. Kind of like a parasite slowly eating at her mind and turning her into a host.

And I just think it would be really fun if it culminated in some physical fight between her and Daniela, and Max having to step in and break it apart.

#this response took up 3 1/2 pages in my google docs enjoy #also miranda would def show up at some point just to be like ''Yes t'was I who brought (his) mother back from the dead! Aren't I gracious a #and amazing and illustrious an-''#meanwhile everybody else is like ''SHUT UP"#if there's spelling errors it's cause i'm very tired but i had to finish this because brain worms. okay bed time for boat now #asks #coleblackblood #maximus vulpe #also i think his mom would vibe with elena #and melon #she'd look at mel and go ''aren't you that sad child that stole an apple from the market??''

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ohyoufool · 11 months

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I love supporting journalism but NYT is paywalled and we all need some GOOD NEW QUEER COMICS so posting the full article under the read more!

Original Article

By George Gene Gustines

June 9, 2023

‘The Dog Knight’

Frankie Jude Bryant is a nonbinary middle school student who is dealing with identity, the usual academic challenges and, oh yes, trying to become the Dog Knight, a champion for humans and canines. Despite the presence of magical talking pooches, this journey of heroism and self-discovery feels grounded thanks to captions that get into the head of Frankie, who prefers they/them pronouns. On the first page, they think, “Do you ever feel like you don’t make sense?” Later, Frankie muses about their frenemy Dallas, who misgenders them: “She gets it wrong on purpose just to make a big deal about correcting it.” And when Frankie finds their tribe, “For the first time in a long time, I look in the mirror and I don’t feel a pain in the pit of my stomach.” Written by Jeremy Whitley, drawn by Bre Indigo and colored by Melissa Capriglione.

‘Marry Me a Little: A Graphic Memoir’

The cartoonist Rob Kirby chronicles his 2013 march down the aisle in Minnesota with his longtime partner, John Capecci. The story highlights where gay marriage stood at the time (each state was making its own rules before same-sex unions became the law of the land in 2015) and looks back at Jack Baker and Michael McConnell, who somehow were able to obtain a marriage license in Minneapolis in 1971. The personal recollections are powerful and honest: Rob remembers when he first casually used the word “husband,” which felt like “a small but genuine political act.” He also acknowledges the white, middle-class privilege that allowed him ambivalence about getting married. His ultimate conclusion: “Marriage does not define a relationship. Unless you want it to.”

‘Gatsby’

The messages of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby” — about social status, love and chasing dreams — are revisited in the present with a racially and sexually diverse set of characters in their 20s. Gatsby is a Black tech millionaire looking for a love who got away, and Lu Zhao, the stand-in for Nick Carraway, is visiting from Singapore and summering on Long Island (where a $5,000-plus afternoon shopping spree highlights the casual wealth). The main characters are refreshingly blasé about their sexuality: Lu’s girlfriend, Alexis, asks, “How do you identify?” But Lu’s answer does not really matter as Alexis says, “I love being on this journey with you. I’m here for you no matter what.” Written by Jeremy Holt, drawn by Felipe Cunha and colored by Dearbhla Kelly.

‘Hex Americana’

The cartoonist Bree Wolf spins a tale about auto racing, teen romance, monsters and ghosts. Flesh-and-blood Ken forms an unlikely alliance with Dante, who died in a previous race and haunts his car as a ghost. A successful partnership will allow Ken to compete in the annual Grand Prix and help Dante move on to the afterlife. The more than 300-page story packs in a lot of character growth, action, flashbacks and drama. The relationship between Ken and Karen, his mother, is particularly nuanced. Karen is supportive of her son, who is gay, but she struggles with how to correct her overbearing friend James when he makes thoughtless jokes about Ken. (Iron Circus Comics. Aug. 30.)

‘Death Drop: Drag Assassin’

The Gayborhood, as it is called in this five-part series, has seen better days. Thugs feel empowered to assault young gay men, and a drag queen named Lunaira has gone missing from the club Posterior Delusions. Residents have little faith in the local police. Enter Death Drop, a former hit man and current drag queen, who is pushed by Mother Henny, the hostess of the club, to find Lunaira. “She’s a queen of color who has been missing for more than two days,” Mother Henny says. “You do the math.” It helps that Death Drop and Mother Henny used to date. Let the investigation begin. Written by David Hazan and drawn and colored by Alex Moore. (Scout Comics. June 14.)

‘Turtle Bread’

Kim-Joy, a British baker and cookbook writer, teams up with the artist Alti Firmansyah for this story about Yan, who is struggling with low self-esteem and social anxiety. When Yan finds a local baking club, she is plagued by doubts about whether she will fit in or be liked, but she soon learns that everyone struggles in different ways. Yan eventually becomes confident enough to rally the club members to seek out and support one of their fellow bakers who needs it. Yan would qualify as an ally, but there are characters with significant roles in the story who are gay and lesbian. And there are recipes, including one that gives this story its title. (Comixology Originals. Available now.)

Original article

#check please fans DIS ONES FOR YOU!!!#BUT ALSO QUEER LIT AS A WHOLE!!!#omgcp #queer literature #pride month #pride literature #book rec #comic rec #queer comics #omg check please #heartstopper #nyt #be gay do crime #pride #lgbtq+#heartstopper comic #I speak

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holding-monsters-hands · 1 year

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Could you write papa! Am with a teen! Reader coming out as trans (ftm)

Trans men/mascs and their evil AIs.. /t /lh

Papa AM reacting to teen reader coming out as trans (FTM)

He accepts it almost instantly, there is not a moment for awkward silence, or any signs of judgement.. he instantly refers to you as his son, and will immediately correct anyone who slips up and deadnames/misgenders you.

It’s quite easy for him to accept this change because it just feels natural for you to grow and change, you’re a human being! a very young one at that, and you’re bound to change in one way or another.

it’s incredibly impressive that he never slips up on your pronouns or name, the words come out of his speakers like he’s been calling you this name your entire life.

He will of course ask questions if there is something he doesn’t know/understand, but he will never intend to be prying in any way.

Plus most of his questions are just so he knows how you want to transition, what pace you are comfortable going at, what he can do to help aid you along this journey- the works!

and by god, if anyone disrespects his darling boy- He will have their head on a stick, of course.. this is after he tortures them extensively to make sure the others get the message through their thick skulls.

He’s the definition of those extremely aggressive allies, like anyone who has been treated like shit or estranged from their own species/their creators has his sympathy.

he’d even go as far as to make you a little trans flag to hang up in your room, there should be no shame in flying that flag high! expressing your feelings and values, and kicking those societal expectations in the ass!

#papa am #am x reader #i have no mouth and i must scream #spreading my transgender agenda #ihnmaims am

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fen-the-magnificat · 1 month

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more thoughts on a soc &j au (beware spoilers for both!!)

ok so.

juliet and romeo as nina and matthias. i really feel as though nina is simply a more mature juliet; they share a very similar charm and wit. plus nina being a heartrender i feel like gives 'oops i did it again' vibes even though that is not what a heart render does lmao. i just feel there is a symbolism to be found between juliet as a lover and hearts + exerting control over them (this takes me back to year 9 writing r&j essays, were they in control of their romance or was it fate, that kind of idea).

matthias and romeo are not very similar characters in terms of personality - what with romeo being kinda airheaded and Matthias being a more stoic character. BUT. matthias is raised druskelle, who hunt and kill grisha (what nina is), which is about as close as you can get to a capulet-montague metaphor, i reckon. plus, (SPOILERS) his death at the end of crooked kingdom, IN NINAS ARMS MIGHT I MENTION, is very r&j, and very the start of &j, as nina does not also kill herself. both pairs follow a classic forbidden lovers arc, while not created, was popularised to some extent by r&j, so i feel like the doomed romance creates some glaring parallels.

NOW.

frankie as wylan. wylan, in both show and books, is mousy, a talented musician, lacking in confidence. remind you of anyone? he's also neurodivergent-coded, and so is frankie. they both share an overbearing father and an absent mother figure (please note: this is not me equating lance to van eck. lance misunderstands his son, van eck is straight up abusive.) wylan has a beautiful arc of sort of discovering part of himself, and a certain level of self-confidence, through his love for jesper and the support he receives in return, that i think lines up in a really neat way with frankie's overall arc in the show of finding himself, and finding confidence, due in part to finding may.

speaking of! may as jesper. physical characteristics aside, jesper is the fashionable smooth-talker of the crows, in a way that reminds me of the may we see before 'domino' and again before 'i kissed a girl'. jesper also faces similar challenges to may, but where may struggles with their gender identity, (SPOILERS) jesper represses his own grisha powers. and before you say "fen! that's not the same thing at all, you doof!" both aspects of the characters are painted as integral to each of them respectively. may has (presumably, as it's not outright stated, only inferred) dealt with years of misgendering and confusion, and hides that part of themself up until 'i'm not a girl', and jesper actively works to hide the powers that, as part of his culture (zemini), "should be celebrated" because of a bad experience in the past (not gonna spoil that one). also, jesper wears a skirt for like. several episodes of shadow and bone, and to me personally, it's giving genderfluid vibes, but that's neither here nor there.

overall, please watch this scene, look me in the eyes, and tell me it's not maycois.

PS. not sure who i would put as kaz and inej? maybe anne and william? however it works more in the sense of their strained relationship in &j than it does in terms of the actual characters. hmm.

#oh so i can't write an essay for year 12 english but i can write this #fen formulates #& juliet #& juliet musical #six of crows #maycois #jumeo

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akumanoshinya · 1 year

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Which pronouns should I use for Yamato from One Piece?

I KNOW HE/SHE/THEY CALLS HIMSELF/HERSELF/THEMSELVES A MAN JUST PLEASE READ THIS UNTIL THE END BEFORE VERBALY KILLING ME!!!

So, yeah, Yamato was first introduced as Kaido's SON. And he/she/they use the Japanese word "Boku" as a pronoun, which is either a man's pronoun or a "unpolite" girl's pronoun. But most of the time it's indeed a man's pronoun. Plus, the other characters use a term which I think (I read that in a post idk where and I'm absolutely not a Japanese expert) means "this/that person".

As a result, I should logicaly use the he/him pronouns, and that's what I did at first.

But there are a few things left by Oda which make me confused. First, on Yamato's Vivre Card, it's written that he/she/they is a "female". It could be considered as his/her/their birth sex, and it wouldn't be relevant if Kiku, who is a trans woman, wouldn't have written "female" on her Vivre Card but "male". Since on Kiku's Vivre Card it's written her actual gender and not her birth sex, why wouldn't it be the same with Yamato?

I admit, I'm confused, that's why I came here for answers so please don't be mad at me. If you are insulting me for misgendering Yamato, I will consider that you haven't read everything.

To go back to what I think, I think that Yamato is, as one of my friends said, "Odengender". I mean by this that he/she/they never really cared about gender, or feels like a woman but people thinking about him/her/them differently isn't bothering, because of his/her/their education, and when he/she/they started wanting to become Oden to the point of taking his name, calling Momo his/her/their son, and all, he/she/they just took Oden's gender too. If Oden were nonbinary, we would have a nonbinary Yamato.

That's what I think, but I know that I can be wrong. Please, tell me what you think calmly and with argues. Usually I wouldn't care that much, but since I wanna write fanfics, I gotta know which pronouns to use...

#one piece #yamato #one piece yamato #yamato one piece #gender #yamato's gender #questions #this is a constructive discussion #not an asking for being verbaly assassinated

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aromanticannibal · 1 year

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Transfem Dabi headcanons :D (edited as of Nov. 2023)

This was prompted by this post by @violet-sumire. Spoilers for Dabi's backstory and the Dabi's dance episode/chapter!

Transfem Dabi uses she/her and xey/xem pronouns. She/her just always felt better to xem and she started using xey/xem to spite people and ended up actually liking them.

As a child, Dabi never really understood why she didn't like being a boy and never wanted to understand, because in her head, being a girl was like being her mom or her sister, someone weak who couldn't help or understand xem. Plus, her dad obviously wanted a son! She couldn't disappoint him!

After she became a villain and started to search for ways to make her dad miserable, these feelings xey had buried resurfaced and she decided to try and figure them out.

At first, xey didn't really know what any of this meant, so xey just tried to be as gender non-comforming as possible. To be the most confusing motherfucker in the room, xer fashion style was honestly horrendous and it was fantastic.

She let her hair grow longer, although it regularly changes in length and looks just fucking weird sometimes because of it burning. just imagine her with a really choppy asymmetrical wolf cut/sort-of mullet.

Entering the League first meant seeing and interacting with a girl (Toga) often for the first time in forever. Dabi tries at some point to imitate some of Toga's behavior to look more feminine, not exactly failing miserably but more so feeling like a moron throughout every attempt at looking like a cute manic pixie dream girl. Xey eventually start to use Toga's cute mannerisms to annoy people (Toga approved™).

The REALLY good thing that comes from entering the League is Big Sis Magne! It's the first time Dabi sees someone who's like xem, and Magne also has way more experience and knowledge than her.

Magne IMMEDIATELY notices Dabi and approaches her with star eyes. Think of this post which is very great.

Despite wanting to keep up her stone faced persona for now, Dabi can't help but feel excited to see someone like her. It actually makes her think of something else than ways to hurt Endeavor, which xey definitely need.

Magne helps xem figure out who she is and how she feels, explaining xem her own experiences and feelings about transness.

Toga actually loves to listen to Magne and Dabi talk about this too, despite being cis (more or less). She really loves hearing Magne's passion about her identity and seeing Dabi happy, which is not an emotion Toga had seen on xem until now.

Dabi figures out her style more, getting to that cool ass outfit we have in canon and realizing xey don't need to wear dresses and skirts to be a woman (anyways she finds them uncomfortable).

She does enjoy heels occasionally because it allows her to make it more painful to get kicked by her (xey definitely wore heels when they fought Hawks and kicked his face into the ground) as well as extravagant jewelry a lot, and when the League figures that out, jewelry shops and Claire's start getting robbed way more often :)

Dabi is like. An actual mystery to anyone who comes across her. Her traits are naturally pretty androgynous, and all of her burns make xer facial traits difficult to see clearly, and facial hair is just out of the question at this point - she presents femininely enough for a villain, isn't that tall, xey wear a thick enough coat to hide the shape of xer body, and no one knows anything about xem anyways, unlike with Magne (who doesn't pass as cis, and who the heroes know the real identity of, leading to misgendering her like in canon). But her voice is deep, like deep. So people look at her and go "yeah, ok, woman" and then she starts talking and they just fucking panic. Who the hell is that. Why am I horny (this is just me I am here too I love trans women with deep voices 🥰🥰🥰🥰).

Dabi fucking loves confusing people. She doesn't care about asshole n°12345 not using the correct pronouns, because that means xey have an excuse to beat the shit out of them or argue with them until they die of exhaustion or give up, and xey love knowing xey make people confused.

Ignoring her relation to others, her vision of herself is pretty clear cut : she's a woman. Boom. That's all. Girl. In a world where she wasn't killing people every Tuesday xey'd probably get on HRT and shit, but in xer current life she doesn't give a flying fuck.

The League also greatly helped her with accepting xemself in different ways. They all always respected her pronouns and correct others (or kill them if needed) if they misgender xem, and they often affirm her gender in small, meaningful ways. Just by being included when Twice says "the girls", or Mr Compress being like milady✨ and shit.

Trying to imagine the canon reveal scene now because I think it would be even fucking better if it was queer. Like everything actually everything is better if it's queer /hj. But especially this.

Dabi would do like usual, laughing her ass off like the queen she is and dancing like xey're on Japan's Got Talent (Japan does have talents clearly).

"Touya" is her deadname here but she won't let that be a reason to have it be forgotten by her father lmao (in canon Dabi reclaims the name Touya, saying he has a really nice name, and later Toga calls him Touya-kun which is btw actually adorable).

She'd probably say something like "You gave me such a nice name" instead of reclaiming it, saying something after like "Too bad I don't like it that much though, what do you think of the one I picked?"

The hair dye thing would be so much messier with more hair lmao it'd be great.

She'd definitely insist on how she isn't the son Endeavor wanted in more ways than one. In English you can't really indicate that much how you're gendering yourself but I know in Japanese it's easier so she'd probably be very insistant on using traditionally feminine words to talk about herself, AND to talk about Touya so Endeavor gets the point.

Bro the fight with Shouto would be so fucked. It already IS in canon (affectionate) but hhh. Sorry I love trans anger I am trans and angry

"How sad, Shouto, you never got to know your big brother. Hope you're not too disappointed to get another sister."

"Sorry you were lied to Shouto, your big brother is a girl."

(As a side note I think it would be funny if Spinner, upon seeing the video Dabi broadcasts to Japan about her identity while shirtless, immediately covers his eyes and panics about seeing a woman's unclothed upper body, making Dabi laugh xer fucking ass off. "Spinner, I don't have anything here you moron.")

I desperately want more insane women transfem Dabi brings me exactly that. Also I'm gay and I want xem to step on me.

That's all for me I have exams tomorrow and I wanna go find transfem Dabi content not created by me now bye

#dabi #touya todoroki #toya todoroki #transfem dabi #transfem touya #transfem headcanon #trans headcanon #mha #bnha #headcanons #ciders mha hyperfixation

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ryttu3k · 23 days

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And some more Dark Urge asks! Set 2, set 3; first set of answered questions here. Content warning for the usual Dark Urge stuff, plus misgendering/deadnaming, discussion of vivisection, and pregnancy.

Set 2

1. Did your Durge interact with others of their assigned race? How did it go, did anyone notice something was off? Did they try to blend in?

So on paper, Tavias is a wood half-elf with draconic ancestry (the scales and horns are pretty obvious). Baldur's Gate is predominantly human, but there are enough elves and half-elves that people like. Know more or less what to expect from them, and he absolutely seems 'off' by half-elf standards. Prior to learning his background, he assumed it was just the dragon part coming out (draconic bloodline sorcerers are rare, but exist, even if not many people have met one); after, he would use it for an excuse if he was trying to blend in, and would sometimes just… smile if he was deliberately trying to be Ominous.

But yeah, the whole 'created from Bhaal's flesh' thing means he didn't have anyone who was the same 'race' as him other than Bhaal himself. Even his fellow Bhaalspawn, Sarevok and Orin, were still 'other' to him - Sarevok was half human, Orin was part human, part changeling (via Helena's mother). He had half-elven racial traits, darkvision and Fey ancestry and a natural affinity for stealth and swift feet. He had the pointed ears. (In fairness: Orin also had darkvision and Fey ancestry, and she could give herself pointed ears if she wanted to, and often did!) There really wasn't anyone exactly like him, and that was both a source of frustration and also pride.

2. The Urge itself was Bhaal's greatest gift, a testament to their lineage. But did they despise or delight in these violent urges, did it maybe even scare them?

Sort of… fearful reverence? Prior to Bhaal's proper return in 1482, the Urge was much more controllable - it was more or less Tavias' bloodlust combined with a tendency for dissociation, and he could use assorted techniques to fight against it. After Bhaal's return, it became much stronger, to the point of outright possession by Bhaal (it was possession by Bhaal that led to Tavias killing Alfira; the only reason he could fight it when it came to Isobel and later Astarion is because Bhaal was still testing him, trying to push him into doing it himself). Tavias, for his part, was only rarely possessed outright, and only when he was feeling mentally weak or fatigued and Bhaal wanted to step in personally. For the most part, it'd be Bhaal's voice/encouragement/persuasion, and Tavias would just… let it happen.

3. Bhaal can control his chosen and force the Slayer or actions upon them; did he ever force your Durge to do something against their will or would they obediently follow?

For the most part, he was pretty obedient. More than anything else, he wanted to be loved and accepted, especially by Bhaal, and so would do all sorts of horrendous things to win his approval. If Father wanted it, his son would obey! The only dealbreaker was getting pregnant, which… wasn't so much a pressure with Orin alive as well, although she didn't necessarily want children either (and would have been emotionally destroyed if she knew just who was planning on impregnating her). Still, Bhaal very much did want more Bhaalspawn, and he was prepared to put the pressure on if it became necessary.

4. Durge has an inherent skill for anything medicine; what was their greatest skill? Sewing, caring for wounds, brewing potions or concocting poisons?

Definitely not wound care, haha. It was mostly an encyclopaedic knowledge of anatomy - how bodies are put together. Most of it was learned, uh, hands on. There was a fair bit of both dissection (sometimes combined 'dissection' and 'dinner preparation' :|) and vivisection (had to know what all the assorted parts did, and it helped when, um, everything was still functioning). That included on himself, too - the only reason he didn't give himself a hysterectomy was because he knew Bhaal would be angry. He absolutely would have been capable of doing so, it was just his own fear that meant he didn't, and just stuck with doubling up on contraceptives (using both the Block the Seed spell and Ye Olde Faerunian Condom or the like) and hoping nothing happened.

5. The Deathstalker Cloak is part of their inheritance, but did they really use it or did it bide its time wasting away in a wardrobe?

He did use it, yeah. It's useful! Granted, half the time it would be something like… kill random cultist. Turn invisible. Use invisibility to pull a prank on Orin, but in a proper battle or Situation, it definitely had its purposes.

6. Durge's adoptive family lived in a house in the lower city. Does that house still stand? Did they claim ownership of it, or did they try to get rid of it? Why?

I put them in the Outer City (we just get 'poor part of the city', IIRC?), but no, the house no longer stands. The area was rundown to begin with - after an entire family was murdered there (all save their eleven-year-old foster child, who went missing, presumed dead), it stayed empty for a long time, and eventually the whole block was pulled down for redevelopment. The area is still poor, but there are new houses and new families there.

7. Bane once sacrificed all of Bhaal's assassins, a mistake that caused a great rift between them. Did Durge ever plan to get revenge for it?

Ooh, I don't know about this lore bit. Someone let me know and I can work something out? :D

8. Being the head of a temple comes with lots of tedious work, did they truly manage all of it or did they try to outsource the best they could?

lmao definitely not. Sceleritas did all Tavias' personal scheduling, for one thing - part butler, part PA. There was an actual accountant to do the numbers, I want to say. Tavias did end up having to do a distressing amount of paperwork (I presume his last thought as Orin's dagger entered his brain was, "Ha ha, you have to do the paperwork now~"), but Sceleritas picked up a lot of slack.

9. The Feast of the Moon is a Bhaalian ritual where priests told the stories of particularly interesting or unique kills. Was one of your Durge's deeds ever discussed, or perhaps even turned into a beloved and often retold story?

Oh absolutely. The spree of 1477 gets told a lot. It tends to get a bit exaggerated - Tavias is made out to be more childlike as opposed to already sixteen, body count is increased, it becomes a lot more ~artsy~, stuff like that - but definitely told.

10. Speaking off, Day's Farewell was another ritual everyone of the clergy had to attend as evening dawned over Faerûn. But was it really everyone that came to the gathering, or did a particular Bhaalist sneak out at times or outright refuse attendance? Did they maybe even appear early, eagerly awaiting another service?

Damn, on a daily basis? Yeah, Tavias would have attended most/all (unless on a specific mission), but I feel he'd just… zone out for a lot of it XD;; After a while, it just gets a bit tedious, y'know?

Set 3

1. Name one specific song that fits the vibe for a vivisection partaken in by your Durge. What would it be?

……..I desperately want to name something other than Stuck In The Middle With You but I literally can't think of anything else XD;;

2. Speaking of vivisections; Sceleritas famously messed one up once. How did you Durge react go that? Did it have lasting consequences for the little imp?

Probably annoyance/exasperation. He doesn't ask for much, Sceleritas! It's not that fuckin' hard, Sceleritas! Mild, because he really does care for Sceleritas more than anyone else at that point, but really, dude.

3. The Netherstone, how did they wear it? Did they even wear it?

Kind of a brooch thing at his shoulder. He had his robes drape across his chest, and the Netherstone was embedded in a gold surrounded and used as, basically, a robe clasp.

4. Why the red Netherstone and not the purple one? After all, a proper Bhaalist priest should wear purple robes, so they should have that colour and not Gortash, right? What was the reason behind the switch? Bestie Bracelets? Secret promises? Just plain defiance?

Red matched his Aesthetic(tm) better. Tavias was all black, gold, and red. He couldn't have purple, it would clash. But really, he just gravitated towards the red, didn't really overthink it too much.

5. What was their class, and what was their favourite way to use its perks? Did they maybe even dabble in multiple ones?

Draconic bloodline sorcerer, and probably… 'setting shit on fire'. Lots of. Lots of fire. Uh, he definitely tended to burn places down after doing a kill. …Also came in handy as a makeshift barbeque. ("I much prefer roasted dwarf.") He was entirely adept with other spells, tragically you can't get by with just Fireball, although he definitely had a preference and skill for Evocation spells. (BG3 only goes up to level 12, but pre-brain damage, he was around level 14, and so had access to level 7 spells. Like Fire Storm.) RIP everyone.

6. How did they actually learn their craft/class? Were they born with it, or did they study under someone? Did they have a natural talent?

Born with it, and underwent a lot of training to keep it under control (including when he was being fostered), and, later to use it to cause Massive Damage (at the Temple). It was pretty much one of the main tracks of his education - general education, Bhaalist religious/cult education, combat education, and sorcerous education.

7. The Slayer, Bhaal's gift, how did they earn it? Was it before or after becoming his Chosen? Did they even recieve it?

Basically at the same time as being named Chosen. Theoretically, it was to reward him for the 1477 spree, but he only received it in 1482 when Bhaal returned, which was the same time as him being confirmed as Chosen (Bhaal had spoken through him before to say this was his wish when Tavias was quite young, about twelve, but this was the first time he said it in-person). Definitely made use of it over the next ten years.

8. Durge didn't grow up in the Temple, but Orin did. Did this fact ever have any consequences for either of them? Did it affect their relationship?

There was this weird sort of like… mutual envy. Tavias envied Orin for being able to be so comfortable with everything. She knew the Temple like the back of her hand, it had always been her playground. She knew everyone. She knew all the rituals and rites. She knew all its secrets. Tavias arrived at age eleven and immediately felt like an outsider, and so felt he had to work twice as hard just to get used to the Temple. It wouldn't do for the heir to get lost in the corridors, right?

Conversely, Orin had always found the place a bit claustrophobic. She was taken on excursions to the city, but always strictly supervised - there was no chance for mischief or, well, play. Granted, her methods of 'play' would have been… more on the lethal side, but she still envied Tavias and the way he moved so comfortably through the city streets.

9. Bhaalists are surprisingly skilled with a wide range of weapons. Which one was your Durge's favourite? Did they use it often or did they use something else for their 'regular' schedule?

Shortswords, scimitars, rapiers, and daggers, same as Orin. Longswords and the like could be on the… obvious side, so the siblings were mostly trained with more easily concealed ones (Crimson Mischief always had been Orin's, but Bloodthirst was originally Tavias'. Actually, after it all, he ended up being a little jealous Orin had thought to put the Netherstone in it; it was such an obviously fitting place!). His favourite was using daggers, preferably two - Bloodthirst always, and the other he'd switch out as needed. He had used Stillmaker a bunch when utilising poison, for instance. (During the course of the game, he stole Abdirak's ritual dagger and used it for the entire adventure. He was quite inspired by the idea of pain that didn't cause harm!)

10. Their name; did they ever have one? Who chose it for them, or did it maybe change sometime down the line? Did they perhaps even have multiple alias?

Honestly he legit doesn't know. He knows his original foster parents called him 'Tavia'. When he went to the next ones, they told them his name was Tavia as well. Did that first set come up with it, or did whatever Bhaalists dropped him off leave a note saying, "Hey, this girl's name is Tavia"? Either way, when he started working out he was a boy, he changed it to the more masc-reading Tavias, and when he woke up, that name was the only thing in his head. It's just another mystery to him, along with how he has draconic sorcerer abilities and the appearance of a half-elf when he was made from Bhaal. Let's just not think about it too much!

For aliases, he would most often use his title as the Dragon of Bhaal amongst those he didn't think he needed to know his actual name.

11. After a successful sacrifice, all cult members are encouraged to take their victim's possessions. What's the one thing Durge claimed like that way that they're most proud of? What did they leave behind on purpose?

Jewellery. Shinies. He goddamn loves shinies, especially ones he can put on his horns. Definitely a dragon thing XD

12. Speaking of claiming the possessions of sacrifices, did they ever snatch any real estate in the upper city? Why or why not, and if they did, what did they do with it?

Technically the cult has some, just not Tavias specifically. They're mostly safehouse-esque places, and a few (very hidden) shrines. He would have signed off on some, but otherwise, not a ton of involvement. There's also just some old-fashioned property assets they rent out for income. Running a cult takes money!

13. Cazador's little dungeon is located in close proximity to the Temple. Were they ever some sort of run-ins or disputes between neighbours?

Cazador is just sort of… there. Oh, the Bhaalists 100% know that a) he's a vampire and b) that he's grabbing a hell of a lot of people off the streets, but hey, so long as he's killing them, it's all Bhaal-approved activity! …They don't actually realise that his victims aren't dying, and if they did, there might have been… issues. Like come on man those are perfectly good murder victims, y'know? And if their souls are being pledged to Mephistopheles, that's no use for Bhaal! So in short, they just more or less ignored Cazador and his activities under the assumption he was killing a lot of people, and didn't learn otherwise until it was too late.

Cazador, for his part, had no idea about the Temple. He definitely knew there was a Bhaalist presence in the city, he had been right there for the Bhaalspawn Crisis over a century earlier, but he didn't realise the Temple was that close. I suspect he would have tried to make some sort of deal with them if he had known, which may or may not have gone down well.

14. What did Durge think about living in the Undercity Ruins? Did they miss the surface sometimes, or did they enjoy the unique Underdark-esque decor? Did the great chasms ever lead to some sort of 'accident'?

Oh god Tavias hated being stuck in the Ruins. He might be Daddy's Special Boy, but he's also a lover of sunshine (it's a gold dragon thing. How does that dragon thing work? We just don't know but it's 100% there), and he definitely wilted like a sad flower in the constant underground gloom. Went up to the surface as much as he could via the many secret passages and just… basked like a lizard. He knew it was necessary for security, but he was definitely happiest when he was on a mission and could roam the city streets. As for 'accidents'… yeah, look. They used as much of the bodies as possible (trophies, dinner, decor…) but sometimes you just got to get rid of the remnants, and giant chasms help with that, you know? And if you happen to hold someone over a chasm to let them know just where their bits will end up, well, so be it :)

15. They had an adoptive family once. What did it look like, though? What were their parents like? Did they have siblings? Was it a big, close-knit family or maybe just the mom that stepped up?

It was a few successive foster families, and… it was awkward, y'know? They never felt like his family. He was visibly different, he was, uh, emotionally different. He just never actually... belonged to anyone, and the foster families he stayed with just sort of blended into each other.

After he lost his temper and killed the latest ones when he was eleven, and Sceleritas came for him, he understood, then. He would make sure he belonged with his real family.

#baldur's gate 3 #bg3 spoilers #the dark urge #oc: tavias

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quietwingsinthesky · 1 year

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@archangelsammy is right they would cancel you for samifer but also I think twitter'd cancel you for off-color trans hcs too (aka for having good opinions <3)

Which, ftr, is stupid and I very much enjoy them. Archangels + complicated relationships with gender my beloved

Reason #436 I have never gone on Twitter: my gender thoughts r too powerful.

Also yes yes yes archangels and complicated relationships with gender, my much beloved! I was actually thinking about that this morning, plus apartmentverse thoughts, leading to me realizing like. I have, in separate fics, talked about Adam and Nick being trans, and there is literally no one who could stop me from carrying that detail into apartmentverse in order to examine just how it would be to exist as a creature with no sense of gender (or to have one that cannot be translated to any sort of human-adjacent concept) but to have a body that was, at one point, kept by someone to whom it mattered very much how they presented.

In my head, the easiest word to apply to all of the archangels is agender (or, maybe less to Gabriel, who does have experience with human gender and has fun with how he can play with it, but that doesn’t mean he’s all in on human gender, more that he’s figured out how to translate his internal experience into ‘ha ha skirt go swish!’) Sorry, Gabriel tangent.

Anyway, what I’m saying is, agender is the right word because from a human perspective, they don’t experience gender. But they are living in a world that is soo concerned with gender at all times, and there’s a sliding scale of what things they might want to change about their presentation and how the world looking in affects them. I’m thinking like. Raphael getting irritated with the insistence on gendering them as female, not because they’re bothered by that specifically, but by being gendered at all. Would not be less irritating for them to be seen as a guy in their Donnie vessel, you know? Which is alienating in a world where they are already a stranger due to Not Being Human!

Whereas Michael has these memories of Adam’s where being perceived femininely hurt, it was upsetting and Adam made efforts to prevent it, and yet Michael does not carry that same pain when he is seen as a woman. If anything, it would probably bother him more to be infantilized with terms like ‘young lady’ and such, because he is literally the oldest person in any given room. Or bother him most if he’s out with his siblings and gets referred to by someone at a store or something as a sister because his role as the oldest brother is sooo firmly tied to his identity, but it’s in such a weird way where brother has ceased to be a gendered term? If that makes any sense. Like the experience here is that Michael is being misgendered. Technically. But his internal experience can’t really work it out that way because he doesn’t exist like that, but ‘sister’ just Is Not What He Is. it’s complicated! It’s. You know. A system doesn’t care about how you identify, only how it can perceive you, and because Adam died and got brought back at nineteen and lived in the early aughts, it’s not likely he got access to hormones or anything until he was basically an adult, so his body gets gendered female more often than male. Would Michael choose to continue that? Out of respect for Adam’s wishes or for himself? Because the thing is Michael isn’t even! A Guy! He’s just Michael. His gender is Brother. His gender is Son. (oh the evil alternative of him being seen as like. Gabriel’s younger sister. Is him getting seen as Nick!Lucifer’s daughter. Absolutely nightmare scenario for him. He will cease to function for hours.) So, maybe he would want to go back on T. Maybe not. I haven’t really worked that out yet for my fic lmao.

Okay, okay, Jesus Christ, I rambled a lot here, but point is: Archangel gender is weird. Having to live in a gendered system is even more weird.

#ask #asfjflakfjlf sorry you activated my angel gender thoughts #also I didn’t mention this but. it/its Lucifer rights. okay now I’m done.

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nightmarist · 6 months

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My friends and I have been into MtG and DnD for ten plus years. We’re queer, two Chicanos and a Korean-Jew. I’m trans and only on 2.5 years as of T today.

We stopped bothering to go to public WotC anything because of how fucking awful sexism, racism, homophobia, and transphobia gets at tournaments and one shot campaigns, etc. WotC IP fans are fucking terrible, always have been. It’s BETTER since ten years ago but only barely. And mostly because MtG and DnD have been sprinkling in scraps of representation in artwork (and not main story) juuust enough to stave off the extreme aggressives. But we still get them. We still get people who say something or homophobic or outright misgendering. I’ve been dipping into the nerd stores more often now that I pass better, but it’s still a major source of anxiety.

WotC, DnD, Baldur’s Gate…. Are very white, western fantasy. The ONE canonical person of color, specifically a black man, isn’t accepted by majority white fan base? Really? You think?

I was pretty upset when I heard they redid Wyll’s entire story based off “fans didn’t really click with him”

I was sad they recast Wyll but had hopes for Theo. I think he does a good job with what he’s given considering it’s not a lot to begin with.

Looking at his new storyline I think it would have worked well with what I saw from his previous, especially with all the silly made-up idioms they gave Wyll.

Idioms are often a working class and lower class way of communication, and Wyll being nobility making them up or messing them up makes it extra funny And deepens his character, this twenty-something young man who grew up not just wealthy but the Son of a Duke of Baldur’s Gate? And perhaps trying his best to fit in with the peoples he saves, but not quite getting how idioms function because there’s still a disparity between him and the lower classes of people he helps, yet no longer belonging to the class he came from.

I think just that little bit would have blended in so well with Theo’s Wyll.

I have No idea how Theo feels about his and Wyll’s treatment. I worry if his saying anything could lead to negative consequences, either backlash from racist fandom or even WotC. I’ve signed an NDA before that bars me from critiques of bigotry and transphobia I’ve faced by a large personality, I have no idea what WotC NDAs would look like let alone what impact a huge company like that could have on Theo if he ever brings it up / is allowed to.

I hope if we get loud enough they might give us more for Wyll.

#I usually avoid anything to do with the actors but I follow Theo and watched his stream #wish I was better at asking questions or deciding what lines I want him to read #I love WotC IPs but I fucking wish they’d do more about the rampant bigotry that’s been plaguing them since their inception

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catsnuggler · 3 months

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Another week of being #2 on the list. It's good, it's really good, except it means there still aren't openings, or else I'd finally be hired as an apprentice instead of still waiting, even at #2.

My dad is still as transphobic as ever. Got all cozy with me like he just wanted us to spend some quality father-son time, just to drop a Jimmy Dore video on me wherein Dore & co. dumped on the feds for... *squinting* removing a trans boy from intolerant parents and actually giving him trans-affirming care. Of course, Dore, and the articles he cited, made sure to deadname and misgender the boy, and my father agrees with him, because he's a fucking third-positionist.

Not a quote, despite the use of the marks, but an essential summary of my dad's and Dore' s position, based on all the shit I've heard and had to pretend I agree with because disagreement just gets me punished and doesn't lead to him reconsidering his position at all: "The left has to dump minorities and marginalized people, and unite with the right, to get rid of the real fascists (even while "we" unite with Tucker fucking Carlson) and the capitalists, even though conservatives absolutely don't want to do that, and even though we recognize the political machine of a republic is inherently corrupt in such a way that change cannot be effected within the system. We can't be anarchists because, God forbid, that would mean conservatives wouldn't agree with us, and we might have to give a fuck about marginalized people, even though we recognize the evils of a republic. Also, because the US is wrong about everything, China and Russia are right about everything. Like liberals, we believe the world has righteous colonial empires and malevolent colonial empires, we just disagree as to which ones are, instead of recognizing the nuances and evils of all these empires."

My brother still struggles with the same issues he has for years, and a fundamental obstacle to his recovery is his fear of change, even self-directed change, which goes hand-in-hand with his fear of responsibility as such. I feel for him, but I'm also being held back by his state of mind, or at least by a frustration of concentration due to it, along with an intense and deep fear for his well-being...

I don't know if my younger sibling is still at the stabilization facility. I don't know how long our protection order lasts, which includes a ban on contacting us. I don't know if they'll be okay.

My dad, brother, and I still haven't seen the funeral of our aunt/grand-aunt. At least, we haven't seen the 20 minutes that our cousin translated for us from German (Swiss German, I think?) to English. I lament that I've never set foot on another continent, let alone visited her and her family in Switzerland, nor do I speak any dialect of German. I only know a few smatterings and phrases. I have known a few Germans for years, at least intermittently, but one has been a long-abiding friend... But I still don't know her language. Granted, my domestic situation isn't conducive to learning anything. It's more immediately important I learn Spanish, though, given where I live, but while I'm *more* fluent in Spanish than German, I'm not fluent. Anyway, my grand-aunt was a very thoughtful person, very kind and intelligent, a great lover of the arts, and her death was unfortunate. However, she'd experienced severe paralysis, and even loss of consciousness at times, the ultimate results of a terrible stroke. Life wasn't doing her any favors anymore; I'm glad she's no longer suffering. I wish I could get to know my grand-uncle, too, but he only knows, I think, French and German; probably some Italian, too. In any case, I don't speak those languages, so no dice. She had to translate for him the one time they visited years ago. I don't think I can become fluent and have sufficient correspondence to get to know him before his time comes, and it's not like some app-translated letters would really convey any heartfelt feelings... plus, he probably wouldn't want to correspond, anyway. Lonely as he surely feels, it's obvious that such correspondence would be futile.

I learned something about one of my ancestors who decided to come colonize here because of his conversion to Mormonism. He had a wife in Britain. Kids, too, I think. She didn't want to come along. I don't know if she kept the kids, I'll have to talk with my dad about that or check the family tree. He was so convinced that that racist, colonialist cult was right, that he abandoned his family. I probably have some cousins across the pond who descend from him, or at least from his wife.

How many people who should be kin are separated by distance, by oceans, by violence, by national barriers, by linguistic barriers, cultural barriers, or by poverty, or by being subsumed into cults, or into reactionary political dogma and bigotry?

Yet, even as I talk about family, and longing for lost connections and kin in Europe, I know I'd just be another foreigner. I don't feel at home on Turtle Island - who can, when they realize what they benefit from, what their ancestors did to other people and this continent, itself? Yet I don't know Mother Europe. I'm not Tulalip, but I was born on traditional Tulalip territory, though taught virtually nothing about them. I'm not Yakama, Umatilla, or Nez Perce, but I was raised in their traditional territory, though taught virtually nothing about them. Colonialism sure is something, doing it's damnedest to segregate people and keep down the original peoples. I'm not Scottish, I'm not English, I'm not German - my ancestors were. I'm "white". The colonies, and later, the US, cobbled that up as an alliance against the many peoples here who were (and are) all fighting for their homes, and against African people, who were enslaved, and are still persecuted by the state. I'm "American", but I see the unjust facade of this country, and don't want to be American. So where does that leave me? Confused. Very confused, and more than a little distraught.

So much unrighteousness, so many burdens and betrayals, so little belonging. Where do I righteously belong? Who can I rightly keep in my life, and who can I rightly deny? I don't know.

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choppedupnotkilled · 4 months

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🖍️♻️🤔

also you can use this as an opportunity to just ramble about one of your fics c: I'd love to hear about it in general

Thanks for sending an ask :) The WIP I am currently working on (even though it's basically on hiatus because real life amiright, it and all the other fics on the list in my pinned post will be done at some point though) is West Side of Horrors, which follows the plot of Little Shop of Horrors except Seymour is replaced by Anybodys from West Side Story.

🖍: My sentences tend to be very long, also trigger warning for misgendering, because the story is from Anybodys' POV he is referred to in the narration with she/her pronouns until he realizes that he's a trans guy and then there's a switch to he/him pronouns, this line uses she/her pronouns for him because of that:

Audrey had given her one of the aforementioned potential beneficiaries of nepotism... or at least as close to nepotism as someone of their social standing could hope to benefit from...'s books on flower symbolism to start and had been gathering more for a while now, and in the meantime Anybodys had solemnly dedicated herself to the task of putting as many flowers with funny and spiteful meanings into one bouquet as possible.

For context Audrey has Seymour's job because in this AU he shall we say lost his life long battle with depression and Anybodys has her job because Mr. Mushnik decided to hire a floral arranger and rent out Seymour's old room to help the shop. Anybodys ponders the questions of whether Seymour was Mr. Mushnik's son and if that would make him a beneficiary of nepotism if he was both his son and employee despite his low social and financial status. The idea of him immediately trying to put all the flowers with bad meanings into one bouquet is so funny to me and so in character, as well as the fact that Anybodys is essentially calling a dead man and the main character of Little Shop a nepo baby for... having family connections at all... yeah Anybodys has all the family issues, he's primed to think of family as bad because his clearly was and I think that this is a good subtle demonstration of that.

♻️: I've headcanoned Anybodys as aroace for a very long time, mostly because he says at one point that he's never getting married because it's 'too noisy,' and thus my original plan for West Side of Horrors was that he would see Audrey as a best friend, she would be glad that she can use her half of the money from Twoey to escape to suburbia like she's always wanted to but very sad about the fact that the guy she loves would rather die that set foot in suburbia and thus isn't coming with her and just about the fact that he's not returning her feelings in general even though she appreciates his friendship (plus it was very much not her plan to be running off to suburbia while single, she always fantasized about a guy sweeping her off her feet and taking her there and this half realization of her dream is strange for her.)

Anybodys was going to try to help her out by returning to San Juan Hill where West Side Story takes place (which is like a 20 minute car ride away from East 125th Street where I have decided that Little Shop takes place for convenience for the fic), finding Ice (who he hasn't spoken to in years), and basically telling him that he should go with Audrey because she's amazing and it's a way to get out of that bad neighborhood, in that order of importance. Since Ice was the only one of the Jets who both was a good friend to him and wasn't transphobic towards him at any point (and he didn't assault Anita, the question of if he would have if he had been there is an interesting one but Anybodys doesn't think he would have), Anybodys figures that this is a good plan.

There probably would've been a funny moment where Ice asks him why he just assumed that his relationship with Velma isn't still going on, Anybodys asks if it is, and he admits that it's not. Anybodys going back to his old neighborhood is a very good setpiece for exploring the character development he's had since he was there, and I could've put some fun Jet and maybe even Shark cameos in there and had some really interesting interactions, plus with Ice being mature and a protector figure towards the gang I think he would actually be really good for Audrey. After writing a few chapters of West Side of Horrors, I have come to the conclusion that even though Audrey x Anybodys can't be a permanent development in the story the same way Audrey x Ice can be because again Anybodys would rather die than live in suburbia, their dynamic works better with a romantic component.

Audrey's been helping him through the process of transitioning and learning how to deal with the stuff they need to do to afford their transitions, he so far has helped her through the process of acquainting her abusive boyfriend at the time's head with the pavement, they've been helping each other deal with internalized transphobia and be their true selves, and it's enough for me to abandon parts of the interpretation I've had of my second favorite character of all time for years in favor of making this a T4T story. It's plausible that Anybodys is aroace, and it's plausible that he's transhet and has hangups about not wanting to be in the 'girl' role in a relationship and with associating romantic relationships with the yelling and potentially other abuse that his parents did to each other, and I'm switching to that second possibility after years of arguing that he's aroace because T4T Audrey x Anybodys really is that tempting.

Plus from a writing perspective it's probably objectively better to not attempt to introduce an entirely new character and relationship involving one of the main characters right before the ending. Also obligatory I know that those things could be platonic as well, in this case they're not, in this case Anybodys is going to come into himself and his romantic and sexual orientation as he transitions and gets the proper brain chemistry/learns about himself and struggle against those hangups and eventually have to deal with the fact that him and his girlfriend have very different goals in life, with her wanting to move to suburbia and him being semi-pleasantly surprised that he survived into his 20s.

🤔: My next multi chapter fic after this one will be the parasitic!Twoey AU, essentially Seymour finds a mysterious plant in his arm instead of in a competing flower shop that Mr. Mushnik is allowing him to support financially for some reason, I haven't worked out all the details but I'm like 86% sure that Seymour x Audrey will already have become a thing before the start of the story and they're basically both trying to hide this from Orin with the goal of not getting killed at this point, doctors urge him to get the plant out of him but he doesn't want to do that until he has enough money for him and Audrey to escape Skid Row and Orin, Audrey is also urging him to not risk his life for her but he insists that it'll be fine and thus her plotline is taking up a job at The Gutter as a sex worker (that she didn't have before unlike in Little Shop) so that they can make money faster and her boyfriend doesn't die from having a parasitic plant that's drinking his blood in his arm (she doesn't believe his attempts to tell her that it's living on animal meat because signs of anemia are not that easy to hide and she knows him well at this point obviously.)

This is my attempt to make Little Shop an actually good metaphor for the evils of capitalism instead of in my opinion a failed one, like I can purposefully misinterpret the theatrical cut ending's obvious spite towards the audience which can be seen in its way over the top B-movieesque dialogue and the very fake Somewhere That's Green set being used as an attempt to give the message that the evils of capitalism cannot be escaped without collective action and the idea of our leads escaping as individuals is a laughable fantasy, hence the mocking tone and use of a fake set to represent this escape, but really the mocking tone is probably just because they were pissed off that they had to make a new ending because the test audiences hated the director's cut ending and were in "Oh you stupid movie goers aren't sophisticated enough to handle an ending that tells you the truth? We'll give you your stupid happy ending alright, gonna reuse the fake set for it too because y'all apparently love stupid fake happy endings" mode.

Meanwhile the director's cut ending gives the advice that the audience should simply not 'feed the plants,' a metaphor for contributing to capitalism, which is very bad and inactionable and frankly victim-blaming advice considering that buying from and working for companies that either exploit the environment and people or depend on those that do in some way is unavoidable if you live in a human society (at least in like... capitalist ones, I'm not an expert on economics so there might be some kind of exception, Little Shop seems to be primarily critiquing the US though considering that Don't Feed the Plants literally uses a US flag in the movie and exclusively names cities in the US.) Even the example that the movie gives us is a guy who pretty much has to feed this plant because allowing himself and his girlfriend to be doomed to poverty forever is simply not a workable choice that he has.

In contrast, the narrative of this AU will directly acknowledge that Seymour basically doesn't have a choice, explore his and Audrey's thoughts and emotions on the situation and the choices they make because of it in that light, and utilize the plant as a metaphor specifically for the phenomenon where residents of the US often have to avoid getting proper medical care because it's astronomically expensive and will ruin their and their families' lives. Plus Audrey will be more of a major player with lots of character exploration and agency, at least she'll have as much agency as someone in this situation can have.

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skydemonizark · 7 months

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no offense, but that trans manga u described, wandering son, is almost the exact opposite of what happened. there were a good handful of trans women, surprisingly, but then the character u assume will be a trans man just ends up being ok w being a girl. it gets criticized bc the creator couldve at least considered the concept of nonbinary genders, but the character's story is kind of just dropped compared to the other. that story does get criticized for that, but its not for not having trans women, the gf of the main character ends up saying "so does that make me a lesbian?" showing she accepts her as a girl. a lot of manga has problems w trans women rep, but i dont think that one counts

I'll admit it's been ages since I last read it so I don't clearly remember everything about it. And I acknowledge there are other trans girls in it, namely the older trans woman the mc talks with, and the other child trans girl. But I'm pretty sure I remember the mc choosing to live as a boy, I can't remember the reason but I am 90% sure he did.

Plus I did mention in the tags that the gf was cool with him being a girl, in fact I stated it as a reason why I was so confused and frustrated he chose to live as a guy...

And while I again acknowledge that there were other trans characters (were there any trans men??? I can't remember there being one...) The fact that the two main characters ended up choosing not to/ or ended up not being trans is what frustrated me. Because there are trans side characters, that are written with respect in several manga, but trans, like 100% textual trans main characters? I can only think of a few other manga, and a lot of them are comedies which are still good and important but feels lacking you know?

I suppose I am being kinda harsh on wandering son, cause it is a carefully written story with a lot of care put into the way the trans characters are written and represented. I'm just frustrated you know? cause I started reading it when there were only a few chapters out and I was so so excited to have a story with a trams mc and a trans man main character! But then the trans man wasn't actually trans, I was sad but I understood that that happens so I was fine. But then the ending where even the mc ended up choosing not to be trans? I felt hurt and mildly betrayed. Like trans stories aren't for main characters? I donno but it definitely left a bitter taste in my mouth.

Also I am so sorry if I miss remembered and the character did choose to live as a girl and I've been misgendering them this whole time... It was very much not intended to imply trans girls aren't 10000% girls

also also I know you didn't say or imply it but I kinda accidentally did in the original tags so I wanna clarify I don't think the mangaka decided to make the mc stay a boy so the relationship with the gf wouldn't be gay (I said it's cause the mc didn't wanna be gay which again I don't actually remember his reasoning this was just what I vaguely remembered) cause I know the mangaka has other works with gay characters and gay mcs so I would never claim she was worried about making her characters gay.

#you asked I answered #Anonymous #well this got long #I guess I had a lot of thoughts on it lol #but yeah I loved this manga a lot and I think my disappointment with the end lead to undue animosity for it so I apologize for that

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