#this post is barely even about ofmd anymore lol

[ourflagmeansgayrights]

Hey! On your poll I was going back and forth between yes and secret third thing BECAUSE I do think Izzy displays homophobia in the show. However, I interpret the incident you referred to as mostly misogyny i.e. that "real men don't show feelings." I think the derogatory words and actions towards Lucius and Stede are way more homophobic, but they're connected for sure.

I think the emphasis on boyfriend is making fun of him for being emotional that a man he loves isn't there and he wanted to remind him that (to Ed's understanding) Stede didn't care enough.

Tldr - izzy is homophobic for reasons outside of this scene, but his gorilla grip on societal standards of men bleed into his view of queer men, especially those who aren't "masc" enough for him

anon my beloved i must apologize in advance bc i had a very weird and emotionally draining day today and i am very tired right now. so i don’t know that this is going to be coherent. but also i like this ask and i want to say words about it before that poll expires tomorrow so i’m just gonna slap some shit together here and hope it makes sense

so first thing’s first, i definitely agree that izzy does homophobia all over the show. the reason i picked out this scene and that line specifically is because imo “pining for his boyfriend” literally sounds like a dumb middle school boy bullying his classmates on the playground. which is to say that it sounds like the most simple-minded homophobic taunt in the world. like i always think abt this scene in the last season of the magnus archives when the main character and his boyfriend roll up to some dumb meathead bully type who goes “who’s this, your boyfriend?” and the whole fandom was like “wow i can’t believe this guy is homophobic.” bc even if the bully is literally correct and the guy is actually his boyfriend, saying “boyfriend” in that tone is saying “boyfriend” like it’s an insult. which, clearly, is homophobic.

so yeah mocking ed for the pining bit is kinda more on the “boys don’t cry” misogyny side of things like you said, but the way izzy tilts his head and draws out the first vowel in “booooyfriend” to me reads like the single most straightforward and undeniable instance of izzy being homophobic in the entire show. bc even if (and this is a big if) izzy doesn’t actually care abt ed having a boyfriend and is just trying to goad ed into being blackbeard again bc izzy needs blackbeard to feel safe, the way izzy is choosing to go about bullying ed into being blackbeard again is through grade school level homophobic taunting.

however you are not wrong that there is also misogyny going on in that scene. and that is because these things are all so deeply intertwined it’s impossible to say where one ends and where the other begins. and this is where i don’t think i’m going to be able to maintain coherency lol but i’m gonna do my best!!!

like the thing with homophobia is that at it’s core, it’s about men not doing gender right. bc gender roles in western society are a fucking shitshow and the expectations for how men and women are supposed to behave extend into every facet of people’s lives. like we all know the basic “boys don’t cry, women are caretakers, men are tough and macho, women are soft, men are hard, etc etc” stuff. but one of the biggest areas where society has strict expectations of how men and women should behave is about sexuality.

men are expected to be attracted to women, obviously. but also men are often expected to be overtly sexual. having a high sex drive is tied to many guys’s concept of their own masculinity and their sense of personal identity. like this should feel like common knowledge right, the idea that some guys build their identity around “getting bitches” or whatever?

(the societal expectations for women and sexuality are a whole other shitshow that people have written entire essays and articles and books on, but im not gonna get into that here bc we’re talking abt ofmd, and this show is focusing on challenging society’s ideas about what it means to be a man)

the other thing with gender roles, and with male gender roles specifically. is that of the two genders that western society has expectations for, manhood is seen as superior. so when a guy is unable to perform masculinity to society’s standards, he is seen as less than a man. and what’s less than a man?

a woman.

men who fail to adhere to a certain expectation of masculinity are insulted by being likened to women. it’s why guys will literally say “don’t be such a girl about it” when another guy gets emotional about something. hell, it happens to stede in the show!! calico jack calls him “the big gal,” the british describe him as “a heavyset woman in a silk dressing gown.” stede is someone whose gender presentation does not match what is expected of him At All, from his clothes to his crying to his picking flowers to just his mannerisms and how he is. and stede has faced constant ridicule because of this.

so like. it all gets real tangled together. and a lot of the time it’s hard to say which is “more” present, homophobia or misogyny. insulting a man by calling him gay, insulting a man by comparing him to a woman, those things go hand in hand. having a gorilla grip worldview on how men “should” behave leads people to policing how men, both cishet and queer, perform gender and experience attraction.

so like, izzy’s general vibe of not caring if ed has gay sex, but absolutely caring if ed bottoms during that sex and caring if ed actually falls in love and cares about a man? that concept of masculinity, which calico jack is also shown to adhere to? homophobic. just like how his treatment of stede and lucius for being “less masculine” is homophobic.

#ask #anon #mine #txt #og #ofmd #ofmd meta #our flag means death #izzy hands #izzy critical #s1e10 #this post is barely even about ofmd anymore lol #i’m sorry i have no idea if any of this makes any sense at all i am so fucking tired rn #also my throat hurts from yelling ahahahaaa

[its-afucking-mess]

The reason I'm on hiatus/have abandoned this account indefinitely

My masterpost (used to be pinned but is replaced by this)

I remember when I was just reading fanfics before I tried writing, I always wondered how people could abandon their unfinished works or their account. And for a while, after I became a writer, I had the same inquiry.

Many people who stumble across this account probably see the announcement that "I'm on hiatus" and possibly expect me to return. This post goes on to clear the air for the reason I am NOT returning to this account likely any time soon, at least not under the same brand I had in the past.

I have to make a disclaimer to my mutuals, all people I considered (and still do if they do) friends of mine. My leave has nothing to do with anyone in specific, I have come to this decision purely from a general standpoint.

So, the part anyone who cares is curious for; why is sofi abandoning the account? Why is its-afucking-mess now going to be an account devoid of any new content past February? (I think it's February). Well, there are a few things that have contributed, but I'll mention the most important ones, at least by my standards.

I lost interest in being a strictly maneskin-related blog. Now, I hear you say, "No one stopped you from being a multifandom account!", and I will agree with you to a point. There are over ten works on this blog that are related to the band, mostly self-insert stories. I had a feeling that making the account more open to other fandoms couldn't work, not at least like it had in the past (this account was a teen wolf blog once, then an underverse blog with three works that have become private). Back then I had barely any notes, so rebranding wasn't difficult. Now with over 300 followers, rebranding would not only disappoint a lot of people (since the works some enjoy would be virtually gone) but also prove difficult.

It had always been my thing to be in multiple fan spaces, even if there always were periods where one fandom would be most prevalent in my activity. I had been hoping maneskin would prove a fandom that would be stable, one that I would be able to always be in no matter the ocassion (like how marvel, select youtubers and certain series are). That wasn't the case unfortunately, and it honestly was a genuine fear of mine to have to admit that I've fallen out of it. Well, here I am now admitting that another, major reason for leaving the account is not liking the band as much anymore. I'll still enjoy their songs, and see their pictures on instagram and smile knowing that they are genuinly good people with kind hearts, and that's the extent of it. Maybe I'll visit some fan works that had captured my attention, but that's about it.

Saying that family/friends had found the account had been a white lie hiding the true reasons I wanted to leave the account. At least I consider it a white lie. My mental health also had been at a low around the time the blog had been officially dropped, but finding a book series again and rediscovering an author I truly enjoy helped me pick myself up again. And while that is the fandom currently occupying my mind space, I still have a certain 'freedom' to enjoy in parallel my spiderman, deadpool, and ofmd obsession, without feeling obligated to limit myself to one thing.

In addition, my writing has certainly diminished, and now I feel like I actually do it for fun, instead of when I was active here, where I felt obligated to post something related to writing often. This brings us to the third major reason, that I had started to feel like my hobby was a job that I didn't even get to enjoy as much. I still write, occasionally (Allie knows all about it lol) on ao3, I still make small notes and au's for all kinds of fandoms. I just don't bother to be frequent, consistent, or worry about opinions (while validation is nice, I don't actively seek it). I have found time to be more consistent with my studies and seeing my friends.

At last, I think the fate of this blog has been made quite clear. All the works will stay uploaded and I will be making no changes to the blog content. I am aware of certain risks that come with leaving my works 'unsupervised', but honestly if someone wishes to pass my work as theirs because they are that desperate for attention, let them be I guess.

Final note: Obviously, I am still going to exist on Tumblr. I have made an account that I am currently active on, and I have made it how I deem it should be, for my personal standards. The account is @crisssis if you would like to follow me for some reason, but I am very careful with who I choose to follow back for the sole reason of not wanting to flood my feed with posts I would not enjoy. My messages on that account are open (I think if not my asks sure are) if you would like to talk to me or send me something, however, I will not be doing anything that I don't want to. Just a disclaimer. This post is getting pinned and my master list is linked on the top of the post.

Love,

sofi <3