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pombeom · 6 months ago

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remember this? | taesan fic (nsfw)

pairings: dance!au, enemies/exes to lovers, mean!dom taesan x sub!reader, street dancer! taesan x ballerina! reader warnings: mirror sex, slight exhibitionism, teasing from taesan (this is probs gonna be a given in all my future taesan fics atp), reader is tough until she soon isn’t…,name calling, slut shaming, nicknames, raw sex, hair pulling, dub con, tit sucking, dirty talk?, rough sex, creampie, fluffy ending a/n: i love myself a good enemies to lovers so this just had to be written :/

With the competition getting near, you found yourself seeing more of the studio than your own home. Out of all your teammates, you were the chosen one so naturally you felt the pressure this put on your skills and ability. Attending a renowned dance academy had its advantages but being given the responsibility to represent your school was both an honour and a burden. This only meant you had to put in the extra effort to show your worth to both the academy and the judges. You needed to prove yourself.

Ever since being selected at the audition, your rehearsal schedule has been vigorous. Aside from the compulsory competition practices set by your dance teacher, you’d booked the studio for an extra few hours each day to get in the practice. With each step and each turn, you felt the choreography being etched into your body until till there was no more room for error, for the competition was now only days away. Everything you had worked for so far was about to play out in just a few days.

“Alright, I think that’s enough for today. Just make sure to work on your turn out. It’s a little weak on your arabesques,” your teacher comments whilst packing her things away.

“I noticed too. I’ll work on it now.”

“Now? Aren’t you going home?”

“No, I booked the studio for a few more hours so I can practice a bit more.” You weren’t supposed to let her know, but it slipped out. Your dedication wasn’t as well-received as you’d expected.

“Y/n. What did I tell you. Our class schedule is enough. The first few weeks I understand but it’s getting out of hand now. You practically live here. Soon you’re going to end up overworking yourself which will affect your performance at the competition. We can’t afford to lose it again. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Miss Everett. But since I already booked it for today, can I just use today as one last extra practice,” you begged, trying to see her into reason.

“Fine. But if I hear you in the studio past 10pm, then I might have to ban you from being able to book it for extra sessions in the future and I’m sure you don’t want that. Understood?”

“Yes, Miss Everett.”

“Good,” she nods approvingly, granting you one of her rare smiles, “I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

“Have a good evening!”

The door slams behind her as she leaves the room. It was just you in here. You and your reflection. Casting your eyes upon yourself, you pull your legs into an arabesque, noticing your sickled foot. Shifting its position, you attempt to get it into the right alignment when the door crashes open once again.

Immediately dropping your leg back to the ground, you turn your eyes to meet his sharp gaze in the mirror. His lips instantly lift into a soft smirk, teasing you for being alone in the studio once again. He’d intruded on your private space and with that thought your blood boils as you grit your teeth awaiting an explanation.

“What a surprise! You’re here again,” he exclaims, his tone flooded with sarcasm.

“I booked the studio so of course I’m here. Can’t say the same for you though,” you scoff, ensuring your irritation was explicitly conveyed, “I don’t enjoy being interrupted mid-practice.”

“I’m sure you don’t. But I booked this studio.”

“No. You didn’t. You’re in another one. I booked it for 8pm today.”

“The confirmation message says otherwise.” He shows you his phone, confirming the date and time of the booking and you run to check your phone immediately. 8pm Tuesday. You’d booked it for the wrong day. Your face turns red, embarrassed to admit your mistake to him.

“Now if you don’t mind, can you leave. I’ve got to practice.”

You slumped over as you begin slipping off your pointe shoes, complaining to yourself about his bad attitude.

“Is that mumbling I hear?” The arrogance visible in his voice and composure as he crosses his arms, looking down at you in front of him.

“No. You must be hearing things,” you state, standing back up once again, “now, if you move, I’ll be on my way.”

“What if I don’t?” his smirk had only grown longer since the time he’d first entered, only causing your irritation to explode within you.

“Han Taesan! Move out the way!”

“Woah woah, calm down Shorty.”

He knew you hated that nickname and yet he continues to insist upon using it. You dropped your bag back on the floor, pushing his shoulders with all your might. Your brows arched into that of anger as you continue to hit against his chest, pushing him towards the mirror until he’s cornered against it.

“Call me that again and you won’t know what’s come over you.”

“Is that right? Shorty?”

It doesn’t take him long to turn you around, slamming your back against the glass. His arms cage you in between his chest, his face inching closer to you. Heart beating faster at the lack of space between you, you put up with your act of anger, grabbing the fabric of his t-shirt, moving him even closer to you.

“I fucking hate you.” The words come out through the grit of your teeth.

“Is that so? What are you going to do about it?” His infamous smirk once again plastered across his face, almost as if he was diminishing your sense of being. It didn’t help that he stood towering over you, standing at a head taller.

Without a cue or warning, his arms shift place to instead wrapping around your waist almost swallowing your entire being.

“Do you remember this? You used to love being wrapped up in my arms,” he taunts, giving your waist a squeeze.

The past flashed in front of your eyes. The times when you were both so carefree, messing around in bed almost every other day and on nights when he wasn’t deep inside you, you’d be watching your favourite shows, or cooking dinner together. Before he disappointed you and left you to fend for yourself as he gave you up for his first love. Dance. You knew well enough that a dancer’s love will always remain with their art, you just didn’t know that that love couldn’t be shared with another person. Maybe you didn’t love your art as much as he did. Maybe that’s why you were so hurt by his betrayal. Those maybe’s slowly tore you apart after your breakup. You swore to yourself to love your art just as much as Taesan did his, if not even more. You became obsessed with the idea of being more dedicated to your dancing than he was. But where did that lead to now?

“That was then. Back when you weren’t a fucking jerk.”

“Do you ever miss it?”

“Miss what?”

“This.”

Within seconds he lifts you up, wrapping your legs around his waist, as he uses this as his gateway into getting even closer to you. The cold mirror presses against your half exposed back with the goosebumps travelling down your spine.

“Do you ever miss me holding you like this, knowing what comes after?”

“Taesan…let go,” your voice was weak, knowing you didn’t mean it.

Your attempts to push him off only resulted in him tightening his grip around your thighs. It was embarrassing how quickly you folded, with each push getting weaker as your arms became jelly under his touch.

“I’ll let go when I want to. Now be a good girl and take me like you used to.”

Dropping you to the ground, his hands wandered around your body effortlessly, meandering through the familiar curves. The straps of your leotard fell down your shoulders as he pulled them down revealing your half naked torso. The only thing blocking him from you was the black bra he gifted you on your anniversary 3 years ago.

“Still got this, huh?” He teases, pinging the strap of your bra.

With ease, he removes it from your body, staring intently at your perky tits as your nipples hardened upon contact with the cold breeze of air. Whilst one hand goes up to play with your nipple, his mouth takes care of the other, sucking around the skin of your boob.

“Fuck! Taesan. Stop!” Your words said one thing whilst actions meant another. Your handed tangle into his hair pulling him closer to your chest, heightening the sensations of his mouth on your sensitive buds.

The sound of a pop bought you back to your sense as he released himself from your tits. He scans the rest of your body before ripping your nearly tied skirt off your waist and pulling down your leotard to the floor, along with your tights and panties.

You felt so exposed standing naked in the vastness of the studio. The studio which you saw as the holy grail as it stood by you through thick and thin. It felt wrong to be in such a vulnerable state in a place where you knew you were going to be in the next day with your unsuspecting teacher.

“Turn around,” he commanded.

One swift move and your facing your naked form in the mirror as he pushes your head against the mirror, pulling your lower half closer to his as he begins grinding his clothed dick against you.

“Fuck, you’re dripping. Such a slut aren’t you?” You peer down at his grey joggers, noticing the evident wet patch you’ve created which only turned you on more.

His slow pace picks up and his actions almost emulate him fucking you despite being fully clothed as he grabs your hips, pounding them against his tented cock.

“Taesan, please!” Your moans were stifled as he pushes against your head harder, the mirror fogging up against your face.

“Please what? Use your words. You were given a mouth for a reason. Or was it so you could suck my cock like the slut you are? Remember how feral you used to go over my dick?” His chuckle echoed through the room, only further getting your closer to your orgasm.

“Taesan, fuck me. I need you inside me. I wanna cum.”

“My bitch wants to cum does she? Didn’t you say you hated me just a few minutes ago? Now you want my cock inside you pounding you like I used to?”

“Mhmm! Please!” Your begging was received with his devious laughter. He loved the control he had over you and deep down you knew you loved it to. You missed it.

“Only because you insist.”

He pulls off his T-shirt over his head in one swift move, then immediately removing himself of the remainder of his clothes, allowing his hard, long cock to spring free. He aligns the tip over your throbbing core, pushing in half his length before pulling back out again.

“Is this what you wanted?” He asks before repeating the same action.

Taking matters into your own hands you begin sinking your hips down onto his dick, taking it all in as it hits the top of your cervix.

“Who said you could do that? I’m in charge, don’t forget.” His hands take their place on your hip, gripping it so firmly as to disallow you from moving it any further.

He pulls out his length completely, leaving you whining over the loss of contact. It only takes him a few seconds before he slams it back in, sharp and strong as the vibrations hit your throat, leaving you gasping for air as you let out a strangled moan.

“You like that bitch?” Your frantic nodding only boosts his ego as he repeats it once more, before he sets up a rhythmic pace of thrusting into you.

It doesn’t take long for you to re-familiarise yourself with his veiny cock, going dizzy at the way he’s stretching you out.

“Faster! Please!”

“My baby wants me to go faster? Only if you look at yourself in the mirror. Watch how well you’re taking me.”

You instantly move your head from the mirror, feeling hazy at the sudden shift in position, Taesan continuing to fuck your brains out.

You see yourself in the mirror, face and hair disheveled as you look up to meet Taesan’s lust filled eyes. Just as he promised, his lace picks up making your legs wobble. If it weren’t for his hands holding you up, you were certain you would have passed out. You drop your head as the pressure builds up in your core, your vision going blurry with the build up of tears.

“Look up. I told you to watch yourself in the mirror.” His hands grab ahold of your ponytail, pulling it backwards to your head faces the mirror once again, “I want you to watch yourself fall apart on my cock. Look at you. Fucked dumb already?”

“Taesan…Ahhh! I’m gonna cum!” Your whine screeches throughout the room, desperately praying the room was soundproof.

“Fuck. Me too. Cum with me.”

The last few thrusts were sharp and calculated as his hand wanders down to your leaking pussy, stroking your swollen clit. Seconds later, your orgasm explodes, the tingling travelling throughout your body as you drop to the floor, your legs finally giving up on you. Taesan’s cum erupts out of you like a volcanic eruption, staining the polished wooden floors in sticky white.

“You missed this didn’t you?”

You had no energy left in you to respond but that was enough for Taesan to figure out the answer.

“I’ve missed you.”

His confession appeared out of nowhere as you lift your head up to meet his. He was now crouching on the floor to be level with your glowing face.

“Taesan…”

“If you don’t want me back, I understand. Just know that there’s not a day that goes by where I’m not thinking about you. From the way you laugh to the way you fit in my arms, I’m always thinking about you.” His words were much more gentle than they were before. You were reminded of your past once again.

“I missed you too Taesan, in more ways than you can imagine. You broke my heart yet you were all that I could think about.”

“I never should have abandoned you. My dance is important but never as important as you, baby. I’ve realised that too late.”

“It’s never too late. I want to be held by you again. I want to kiss you like I used to and simply live like we did before. Before we were all-consumed by dance.”

“I want to go back to that. If you’ll let me, can I ask you out? Will you be my girlfriend again?”

Pulling him closer, your arms wrap around his neck, attaching your lips to his, the kiss was soft yet passionate enough to have your stomach fluttering from butterflies.

“Yes. Of course I’d say yes. Let’s have a do over.”

Competition day rolled around as both you and Taesan paced around nervously in your respective changing rooms. You mentally go over the choreography which you had injected into your limbs and calm down the nerves.

“Y/n, go up to the stage please. You’re on after Set 14. That gives you 3 minutes.”

You nod your head and thank the runner before heading over to side stage where Taesan is already awaiting your arrival. He picks you up in a warm embrace, spinning you around before placing you back down, caressing your cheek fondly.

“I know you’ll be great! Now go and show them that you’re my girl. Good luck, Shorty.”

“Fuck you, Taesan.” You giggle, slapping his arm playfully at his teasing remark.

“You can but after you perform. I’m on in a bit too. So how about tonight? We can have a celebratory fuck.” He raises his eyebrows, nudging you as you hide behind your hands.

“We’re in public for God sake! Stop messing around.”

“Who said I’m messing around?”

“Ugh. You’re lucky I love you.”

“Indeed I am.”

“Y/n, you’re up. Make your way to your starting position please.” The runner calls out as you give Taesan one last hug before making your way onto the stage.

His mischievous smile removed you of all your nerves, leaving you instead with confidence that you’ll perform your piece to the best of your ability, which you did considering you came 2nd place in ballet out of 32 dance schools across the country. Moreover, Taesan won first place for street dance, having you both jumping around in your tight hug.

“I guess we do deserve a good fuck after this then. I’m so proud of us,” he taunts, as you nudge his shoulder.

“I guess we do,” you reply, running off as he chased behind you, catch you by your waist and wrestling you down onto the couch in your changing room.

His eyes scan the room to make sure the door behind you was closed as he whispers, “Do you think you can wait or do you wanna let me fuck you now?”

“Now? Are you kidding?”

“Well, yeah. As long as you stay quiet.”

#boynextdoor #boynextdoor hard hours #taesan smut #taesan #taesan boynextdoor #taesan x reader #taesan fic #taesan ff #boynextdoor ff #boynextdoor smut

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contentloadingandstuff · 5 months ago

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What is a Husband's Role? - Liyue Girls x Male!Reader

A/N: Exams might be over for me, but now, of course, I got a notice that I have to submit myself to a military assessment, compulsory for all men in their 19th year of life. Wonderful. Anyway, enjoy! CW: None.

Question: Who is a husband to you? What is his role?

Beidou: Well, it's quite simple. Y/N is a tough guy, one that's not afraid of taking the world on his shoulders if need be. He handles things in my absence, keeping the Crux’s land-based businesses afloat. While I don't take him out to sea that much, I'd rather have him well and good just in case, he's more than adequate at running the fleet. Me? Heh, he always has my back. Whenever I drink, he stays sober and makes sure I'm taken care of and back home safely and he keeps my bunk warm at night. He's one hell of a man in the sheets too- Why are you blushing, eh? Not the kind of answer you expected? A gal has her needs, I'll have you know.

Ganyu: My husband is the light of my life. Y/N treats me like a precious flower, tending to my needs and admiring me like the most beautiful thing in this world. When he holds me, he does so with utmost care and attention. His affection makes me feel safe and loved. Thanks to him, I learned to balance work and life again. But even when I'm on the clock, he visits me everyday for my midday nap. All of his support has been crucial for my self-esteem and my efficiency at work. Without him, I don't know where I would be today. Hm? T-too scientific…? I'm s-sorry, I've just been thinking about it a lot…

Hu Tao: Ah, yes! My partner in crime, my muse, and the man ensuring the continuation of the Hu bloodline! Aiya, whatever would my world be without him? It would be as bleak as the space between life and death, with me - a sad, wailing soul, eager to find the comforting warmth of another… I'm lucky enough to have it already. His role in this marriage is not just being my lover, but being my best friend too! He's always open to my shenanigans and eagerly listens to all of my poetic scribbles, praising me and giving constructive criticism in equal measure. Y/N is not deterred by my work, and never ever turns a cold shoulder towards me. He's there when I want to mess around, when I need help or when I just want to lay in his arms and twirl his hair. Mm, I can already picture our lovely heirs! I hope they'll have his eyes~.

Keqing: I would like to confess something, if that is alright with you. Before I became a wife and a mother, I didn't truly understand what I was fighting for. I have been taught to work towards the preservation of an abstract idea of Liyue, a homogeneous mass of people and the land along with it. I fought for it, yes, but now I know that I didn't truly comprehend what Liyue is. When I first woke up alongside my husband and when I first held my daughter in my arms, I finally understood. I understood that I'm fighting for the people, not as some vague collective, but as individuals. I'm working and fighting for husbands such as Y/N, wives such as myself, and children like my own. I would give my life for my loved ones a hundred times over, and I can work twice as hard, knowing that I do so for the future of my family and every other family in Liyue. My husband opened my eyes, and for that, I am eternally grateful.

Lan Yan: Hey - that's no way to think about your beloved! Love is not inherently about being useful to each other, it's more about feelings and companionship. For example, I can't say that taking Y/N with me when picking rattan is making the process easier or faster; I could easily do it myself. But I invite him just to have him near. Hearing his voice comforts me, and to be honest, I've been by his side so long that I just feel… off without him. What if it stormed, or what if night caught me by surprise? He would be worried sick, I'm sure… Or what if I met a ghoul or a jiangshi while out? I m-mean, I have a Vision and everything, but is it wrong to feel safer around my big, strong husband?

Ningguang: I find it fairly obvious - he is to support me, to comfort me and to keep me company. If you would like a more personal take on the matter, I'd say that Y/N, for me, is a precious antique - surely the most valuable of all. His role is to be a feast for my eyes and my heart, nothing less, nothing more. I wouldn't want to drag him into my business, as that would be foolishly risking his life. His role is to satisfy my emotional and physical desires - after all, true fulfillment in these areas cannot be bought by Mora.

Shenhe: Well, I learned that a husband's role is… Hm? You want me to answer in my own words? Oh, I see. Then… I used to think that a husband is meant to give his wife children. It is what I thought for most of my life, until I met Y/N. Y/N’s presence, his words and touch, cause a comforting warmth to spread through my chest. I learned that this is what love truly means. It's a sense of safety, but it is exciting all the same. I want him closer, but my usual dark visions do not appear in my mind. I do not feel the pressure of my soul straining against the red ropes. He calms me, he makes me feel safe. Now I understand the importance of having a soul to share one's life with. I understand now what the word ‘husband’ means. And I am… happy with Y/N by my side.

Xinyan: I love Y/N because he honestly loves me for who I am. No matter if I rock and roll or feel in the mood for something softer, he'll jam out to it with me. And he's one hell of a guy, let me tell you! He's not afraid to go all in with me, no matter what. I thought about going on tour? He's there with me. I wanna save some Mora to upgrade my guitar? You guessed it, he pitches in as much as he can! I feel like stealing him and partying the night away? He never says no. That's the best man a gal can ask for!

Xianyun: Hmph. Are you implying One's choice of husband is poor? One will have you know that Y/N is of the finest sort - a body that would make the gods of old jealous and a mind that rivals One's own. It is the latter that’s of utmost importance - One doesn't see a husband as a mere nod-along, but as a man that is capable of challenging his wife's character and inciting her to grow. As such, don't be concerned by Y/N arguing my points at any point in time. It is what One desires, and loves about him the most.

Xiangling: Ooh, where do I start! My hubby is the best sous chef in the world - he makes sure that the kitchen is stocked up, clean and well organised, letting me focus on my favourite part - cooking! Whenever I need to get ingredients, he takes my place in the restaurant. Sometimes we go out together to get some new ingredients and experiment a little. He's good at cutting up meat, hunting down that meat and defending me if any of my ingredients decides it wants to snack on me. And, when we camp for the night, his cuddles are just the best! Both my dad and Guoba approve of Y/N, so I suppose my taste in boys isn't that bad after all.

Yelan: A woman my age, and in my line of work, can't be blamed for giving up and thinking she'll be alone until the end, right? That was the Yelan my husband met a few years back. And yet here I am today, a married woman. I knew I was missing out, but I just couldn't imagine how delightful it feels to have someone propping up my back - not for a mission, or a profession, but for life. My husband is my safety net. His arms are my hideout where I can rest from the stress of my daily work. I never want to lose him, which is why I have him stay low and always keep the eyes of my most trusted agent on him. Nobody is going to sneak up on my man - not while my heart still beats.

Yun Jin: His use? Ah, I think I can answer that with a single word - adventure. I always dreamt of journeying across the outside world, and love is such a journey. Y/N is my companion on it, holding my hand whenever I feel scared or unsure, standing steadfast by my side. He lets me experience so many feelings and emotions I could only imagine before he took my heart… Hehe, stories of love I sing in opera don’t come close to experiencing a husband’s warmth yourself.

Yanfei: Well, who else would listen to me ramble on about my passion other than my lovely Y/N? I swear, no matter how many versions or iterations of Liyue’s legal history I read out to him, he never gets sleepy! He even asks questions and actually remembers what each chapter was about, can you believe that?! Hehe, seriously now; he’s a great partner, both in life and in a discussion. Y/N makes some room in his schedule for visiting me at work every day of the week, and always brings some mean snacks with him. Oh - you have to try his crab cakes, they’ll blow your socks off! And who ever said that guys can’t cook, right?

Thanks for reading!

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rosewind2007 · 2 years ago

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Okay: she’s added a reference to rogue SecUnits going rogue which wasn’t there before, SPECIFICALLY:

Which, may I point out I identified in my Rogue Meta as a “thing”:

This meta uses the anagram1 KATH (see previous meta Rogue/s! ) this stands for Kill All The Humans. My particular headcanon is that in some Corporation Rim long running serial (the obvious candidate is Valorous Defenders) the SecUnits who go rogue have the catch phrase “Kill All The Humans”, in a manner reminiscent of the Daleks’ “Exterminate”, or The Borg’s “Resistance is futile!” (Or the Vogon’s “Resistance is useless!”—depending on your childhood).

Read it and weep:

Rogue meta & Rogue meta part one

This is originally chapter 2 of a short story, Expurgate on AO3 (link provided below)

Murderbot and Humans and Augmented Humans

Murderbot frequently (82 times across the 6 books) refers to this apparent dichotomy between humans and augmented humans. It’s a dichotomy which may be unique to Murderbot’s perspective (or perhaps not).

In All Systems Red Murderbot says:

“Humans and augmented humans in close quarters with murderbots is too awkward.”

“It was based on a standard research group’s uniforms, and meant to be comfortable inside the habitat: knit gray pants, long-sleeved T-shirt, and a jacket, like the exercise clothes humans and augmented humans wore, plus soft shoes.”

“I popped the joint on my left arm so I could move it in a way not usually compatible with a human, augmented human, or murderbot body.”

“Bots who are “full citizens” still have to have a human or augmented human guardian appointed, usually their employer; I’d seen it on the news feeds.”

So there are four (4) occasions where Murderbot makes this distinction (which implies augmented humans are not the same category as humans).

I would also note that in All Systems Red Ratthi says:

“The practice is disgusting, it’s horrible, it’s slavery. This is no more a machine than Gurathin is—”

This implies some people see augmented humans (like Gurathin) as more like machines.

So, to restate, this dichotomy is (canonically) first mentioned in All Systems Red.

NB There is only one work which (in universe) pre-dates All Systems Red, the short story “The Future of Work: Compulsory”. In that ~1,000 word piece Murderbot doesn’t mention augmented humans at all. Maybe none are around, maybe the story is too short.

My e-books have ~35 lines per page ~7 words a line=>245 words a page. So “future of work” would be ~4 pages long: the book with the most mentions per page is Exit Strategy and that’s one within per ~9 pages.

A short story set pre All Systems Red where Murderbot mentions humans and augmented humans would change matters!

All Systems Red starts out with MB pretending to be a governed SecUnit. This is apparently a pretence no one (human, augmented human, construct or bot) has seen through in four years. This would (one must assume) include technicians familiar with constructs: but no one has spotted that MB is a rogue. Murderbot is, to be fair, behaving a lot like a SecUnit would normally behave (except for its obsession with watching media), and just doing its job.

But somehow Gurathin spots it, I reckon as early as page 38 (my e-copy):

Then Gurathin said, “What about your systems?”

Of course Gurathin later takes advantage of MB being incapacitated to confirm it is indeed rogue, and finds its “private name”. So, in All Systems Red, the one augmented human is indeed a threat to MB; though I would wonder if this is an ‘augmented human’ thing or a ‘Gurathin thing’.

At the end of ASR Murderbot heads off, initially blending in with the crowds (where it would look to an untrained eye like an augmented human). It then approaches a bot-pilot:

“It could have ignored me, but it was bored, and greeted me back and opened its feed for me. Bots that are also ships don’t talk in words. I pushed the thought toward it that I was a happy servant bot who needed a ride to rejoin its beloved guardian, and did it want company on its long trip? ”

So, interestingly, Murderbot initially (when approaching another machine intelligence) claims to be a bot.

Artificial Condition starts off with Murderbot disguising itself as an augmented human, walking through a transit ring. It is flustered by a newsfeed image of itself, where it is identified as a bodyguard. This indicates that an image of a SecUnit out of armour in casual clothes won’t flag visually as a SecUnit or construct—if this image has been widely available. It rattles Murderbot who then ends up not traveling on its initial choice of transport (delayed due to a coincidental hauler accident).

Due to this serendipitous accident it meets ART. (I can’t be the only one to wonder if it really was an accident ?)

It again tells the ship-bot that it is a free bot, a story (we all know) ART didn’t believe for one moment. ART lets MB settle in then introduces itself, and here we get a bit of explanation from MB:

“the presence in the feed was too big and diffuse for a human or augmented human, I could tell that much even through the feed walls protecting it. And it sounded like a bot. When humans speak in the feed, they have to subvocalize and their mental voice tends to sound like their physical voice. Even augmented humans with full interfaces do it.”

So Murderbot here explicitly describes bot presences and human and augmented human presences as detectably different in the feed. After a somewhat shaky start, ART helps Murderbot make a rather more impressive and effective augmented human disguise …this includes surgical modifications. Which clearly is a bit of a game changer.

In this book there are twelve (12) occasions when Murderbot makes the explicit distinction between humans and augmented humans.

So Murderbot seems to be thinking about the distinction quite a bit here.

Consider this exchange, prior to ART’s “makeover”:

That stung a little. “I can pass as an augmented human.” Augmented humans are still considered humans.

Murderbot reckons it can “pass” as an augmented human and it specifically states that augmented humans are still considered humans : the fact it feels obliged to state that seems germane. The use of “pass” in this context clearly has connotations of racial identity and gender identity. Which is rather beyond the scope of this little essay.

In Artificial Condition we have an augmented human who is, indeed, a (wannabe) threat to Murderbot and a very genuine threat to Murderbot’s humans. Tlacey is bad news. She also owns a construct, the ComfortUnit with whom she appears to have a pretty close (you can be close in a deeply unpleasant way) relationship; she even treats it like a SecUnit at times (or sends it to do a SecUnit’s job). BUT the threat the augmented humans are supposed to pose to Murderbot is that they’ll spot it for what it is, a rogue SecUnit: Tlacey fails to do this, despite the ComfortUnit figuring it out pretty quickly.

So here we have MB disguising itself against discovery by humans, augmented humans, constructs and bots, with varied degrees of success.

So far it seems that bots (well, ART—though we never know what that original bot-pilot actually believed) and constructs (is Tlacey’s ComfortUnit exceptional? we don’t know, it certainly seems to figure MB out fast—even identifying that it’s a Ganaka Pit SecUnit) are more likely to recognise MB for what it is (a rogue SecUnit) than humans (augmented or not).

As long as the human in question is not Gurathin.

The next book (Rogue Protocol) contains a record number of named augmented humans! It also starts off with MB on a transport with humans and augmented humans, none of whom see through its disguise as “Rin”, an augmented human. This is despite it spending twenty six (26) cycles with them. Remarkable performance from MB.

Back to the named augmented humans: Wilken and Gerth are both augmented (and both are threats to Murderbot’s humans—Don Abene’s crew—and by extension Murderbot) and there are also Vibol and Kader (on team GoodNightLander). On this adventure Murderbot impersonates firstly an augmented human security consultant when talking to Miki over the feed but has to come clean that it’s a SecUnit immediately it meets the humans (and augmented humans) in the flesh (its weapons ports are showing apart from everything else). And again, no one (though see below) and specifically none of the augmented humans spot that it’s a rogue.

I’m going to say that I for one reckon Miki knew right from the start MB wasn’t what it said it was. I think Miki saw straight through Murderbot’s “disguise”, because I am very much on team “Murderbot grossly underestimate Miki”—a team you don’t have to be on but let me present you with their first encounter:

“Miki the human-form bot followed, then stopped. It turned, and looked up at the drone I was riding. Its head cocked and I could tell it was focusing in on the camera.”

And when it introduces itself as Rin:

“That’s not your real name. I could tell through the feed it was genuinely confused. It doesn’t sound like you.”

But, regardless, Rogue Protocol has a lot of named augmented humans.

The big surprise for me is therefore that Rogue Protocol has the fewest mentions of all the books of the human/augmented human dichotomy—just three (3) mentions in the book:

“It was also bot-driven, no crew, but it carried passengers, mostly minimum to moderately skilled tech workers, human and augmented human, traveling to and from transit stations on temporary work contracts”

“I’d grabbed the first friendly cargo transport and after a seven-cycle trip I disembarked on a crowded transit hub, which was good, because crowds were easy to get lost in, and bad, because there were humans and augmented humans everywhere, all around me, looking at me, which was hell.”

“ART had altered my configuration so scans wouldn’t read me as a SecUnit, and I had written myself some code to make sure I behaved more like a human or augmented human.”

Which seems counter-intuitive. I’d note (just because it’s struck me before) that Rogue Protocol is the only book where Gurathin is not mentioned by name. Clearly this also strikes me because I have a strange fixation on the Gurathin/Murderbot relationship. I am not lacking self awareness here.

So, after our strangely dichotomy-less Rogue Protocol we move on to Exit Strategy where Murderbot meets back up with the PresAux Team! Including everyone’s (if not Murderbot’s) favourite augmented human, Dr. Gurathin. Now if, as I do, you think that a lot of this “humans and augmented humans” is actually all very much linked (subconsciously?) to Gurathin then you might expect a bit of a flurry of mentions of the dichotomy.

Exit Strategy does not disappoint such expectation. There are nineteen (19) mentions. This is the highest absolute number of mentions in the novellas, but also the highest number per page given the increasing length of the novellas across the series. It means the dichotomy is mentioned every 9 pages or so. The values for each of the books is given below, as “mention density” which I prefer to the “mentions per x no. of pages value”:

All Systems Red, 5 mentions 119 pages: density 4.2

Artificial Condition: 8.9

Rogue Protocol: 1.9

Exit Strategy: 11.4

Fugitive Telemetry: 9.6

Network Effect: 5.8

Let’s look at that as a graph:

[ID: mentions of the human/augmented human dichotomy in the Murderbot diaries as a bar chart, showing a high in ES and an anomalous low in RP/end ID]

It’s like poor Murderbot has all sorts of stressors being thrown at it, and one response it has is this mentioning “humans and augmented humans”. Of course despite MB’s expectations of him, Gurathin basically saves its life in Exit Strategy by operating the manual release. Gurathin is also there for it when it comes round after taking over the gunship.

The next book (in universe chronology) is Fugitive Telemetry. Here Murderbot is back with its Preservation Aux “crew”. Which is so great! Including Gurathin, with whom its relationship has blossomed; Gurathin even going so far as to blatantly tease it. I love this book. It is the only book set entirely in on Preservation Station. We’ve already gathered that Gurathin’s augments are at least a little unusual for Preservation? Of the original survey members Gurathin is the only augmented one, as Murderbot points out (before the whole “it calls itself Murderbot” thing when it’s perhaps more warmly inclined to him):

“He was the only augmented human in the group, so maybe he felt like an outsider, or something, even though the others clearly liked him.”

In Fugitive Telemetry we also get this information (as exactly how common augments are is something open to discussion):

“(None of them were augmented humans—apparently it wasn’t common to be feed augmented in the polities outside the Corporation Rim that used Preservation as a waystation.)”

In Fugitive Telemetry the dichotomy is mentioned seventeen (17) times. This is near the peak of Exit Strategy, but it is also a longer book.

There are clearly enough augmented humans on Preservation Station for Murderbot to comment that:

“For a name, I could use the local feed address that was hard coded into my neural interfaces. It wasn’t my real name, but it was what the systems I interfaced with called me. If I used it, the humans and augmented humans I encountered would think of me as a bot.”

The outcome of the meeting the quotation above comes from is that Fugitive Telemetry is the first book where Murderbot is operating openly (a lot of the time) as a (rogue) SecUnit. But it does disguise itself when it arrives to rescue the refugees in the life-tender:

“Oh, shit, my stupid, stupid feed ID that identified me as a SecUnit. Just as the hatch slid up, I switched it to the last one in my buffer, the Kiran ID I’d used on TranRollinHyfa.”

It is, of course, in this identity that SecUnit is discovered by Human One (and/or others) who shoots it. These are humans in a hugely stressed condition, who must be utterly terrified so I don’t really blame them. Human One, from what she says, knows SecUnits (she also spots that the armored hostile isn’t one).

So SecUnit, Murderbot, is again identified through its disguise BUT again it isn’t by an augmented human.

Throughout the novellas, Murderbot mentions the humans/augmented human dichotomy time and time (82 in total) again BUT only once is an augmented human a threat to it specifically by seeing through its disguise (be that as a governor modded SecUnit, or an augmented human). It does have its disguise seen through on various occasions by bots (ART for sure, and I would suggest Miki), constructs (Tlacey’s ComfortUnit) and by Human One.

So the idea (which apparently originates from Martha Wells herself) that MB notes the presence of augmented humans because they pose a unique threat doesn’t seem supported by the text so far. It would, logically, make sense—if augmented humans are immersed in the feed they would be more likely to notice something odd about MB’s disguise persona (as the machine intelligences appear to) BUT in canon the only augmented human to do this is Gurathin, who wants to know “how it spends its time” and has noticed some anomalies in the feed.

In my fiction this meta accompanies, Amena points out that in mentioning “humans and augmented humans” Murderbot is possibly constantly harping back to its initial discovery by Gurathin. He is the first and only augmented human who actually realizes this potential threat: that of revealing who and what Murderbot actually is, a rogue SecUnit.

Brief note on Network Effect:

Network Effect is a slightly odd book to deal with (it’s a novel, clearly: but there are other things at work). It has multiple POVs (MB, MB2.0 and Three) and it has flashbacks in the form of the HelpMe.files. I find it hard for this sort of brute force analysis to make direct comparisons with the novellas. The dichotomy this meta centres upon is mentioned 26 (twenty six) times, the highest absolute number BUT Network Effect is a novel, over twice the length of the longest novella (449 pages vs 178).

However, worthy of note are the augmented assassins:

One of the flashbacks features two augmented humans, who are a threat, but again not to our favourite rogue SecUnit’s “identity”. They are a special sort of augmented humans too: “less sentient than hauler bots” (direct quote there) kept drugged and docile and needing a human handler. These are augmented humans who Murderbot describes as more like machines than anything else. From Murderbot’s description (and yes, I don’t regard Murderbot as an altogether reliable narrator) are these two “more a machine” than a SecUnit? It’s probably an interesting discussion, especially as Murderbot explicitly refers to them as “less sentient than hauler bots”, a type of bot it doesn’t rate highly on the intelligence stakes at the best of times… As early as Artificial Condition “When constructs were first developed, they were originally supposed to have a pre-sentient level of intelligence, like the dumber variety of bot. But you can’t put something as dumb as a hauler bot in charge of security for anything without spending even more money for expensive company-employed human supervisors. So they made us smarter. The anxiety and depression were side effects.”

So here it contrasts the intelligence of SecUnits with that of hauler bots, again in a derogatory way: “as dumb as a hauler ”.

Of course there is also the issue of what an “augmented human” is to MB: is it simply a human with augments (of any sort) or when it refers to “augmented humans” is it thinking of a category it has defined? This topic is, for now, beyond the scope of this essay.

#rogue meta #updated future of work compulsory #future of work compulsory

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thatsatricky1 · 10 months ago

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𝐍𝐞𝐰𝐛𝐢𝐞 | Lee Jeno Smau

𝐏𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: Lee Jeno x F Reader.

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: Angst?, Cursing, Suggestive, more to be added lol.

𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞𝐬: University au, spin on fight club au, social media au; smau, written parts, angst, fluff, slow burn, humour, (one sided) enemies to lovers, hidden identities.

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 7

𝐑𝐮𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐍𝐞𝐨 𝐓𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐧𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 𝐂𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐮𝐬:

1. Only grades acceptable are B+ and above.

2. Negative and derogatory wording about Neo is strictly forbidden.

3. Uniforms must be worn exactly as shown in the uniform guide with no alterations.

4. Tardiness won’t be tolerated, there is no excuse for being late.

5. No Female and Male contact is permitted, only during contact sports or circus in circumstances with granted permission.

6. All homework, assignments, projects and school activities must be completed by the set timeline and are compulsory.

7. No outside help is allowed, this includes outside tutors and Ai programs, on campus tutors will be provided with a fee.

If these rules are not upheld, there will be strict consequences such as suspension and/or expulsion. One or more rules could lead to an immediate expulsion if decided by the faculty.

These are the strict guidelines Neo university students must follow without question or backlash through their years at Neo Technology. Failure to comply with said guidelines never ends peacefully. Many students end up leaving Neo Technology in their earlier years in their majors and courses due to Burn out or expulsions.

Those who manage to go through to graduation in their majors/degrees are always guaranteed a good future, having this university campus on one's resume/Cv is an automatic ticket into high end jobs. Previously graduated students have been seen working in higher up positions in multiple different areas. There hasn’t been a recorded failure on Neo Technologies graduated classes so far.

Many students fill out the same requirements that go to Neo Technology, Wealthy family backgrounds, academically well adjusted and above average in multiple areas shown through their previous education and lastly well connected individuals with higher up contacts. With one outlier.

The one student with a scholarship that is picked out every year. AKA the charity case to make the university look fair. However this scholarship is given to a first year, every year in all majors, whether they make it through to graduation is their own hardship. Those who drop or or get expelled will be replaced with a new student in that year they dropped out.

Due to unseen and unfortunate events a scholarship student in their graduation year passed away from ‘natural’ causes, meaning a new scholarship student would be taking their place in the graduating class of 2024 in the business major area and courses.

Many outsiders condemn Neo Technology for their strict ruling and how faintly it seemed to act more like a high school then university due to its strict regulations rather than the relaxed ruling one mostly knows from being a university student on campus. However words and thoughts do nothing to change how Neo Technology continues to move forward with its education agenda.

𝐑𝐮𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐅𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐂𝐥𝐮𝐛:

1. You don’t talk about Fight Club.

2. You do NOT talk about Fight club.

3. If someone says “Stop” or goes limp, taps out, the fight is over.

4. Only two people, to a fight.

5. No Shirts, No shoes.

6. Fights will go on as long as they have to.

7. If this is your first time at Fight Club, you have to fight.

Those were the rules, you don’t follow them you’re out and that doesn’t just mean a simple blacklisting. Fight Club was built from the ground up by people in their 40’s trying to have some excitement brought back into their mundane lives. Though of course as time progressed the younger generations started pouring in to the point the average ages seen in Fight Club were now no longer 40’s but between 20’s-40’s.

If you happen to be an unfortunate soul who wanders into Fight Club, there’s no point in saying be prepared because no newbie is. It doesn’t matter if it's your first and last day there. Rule number Seven always happens. If it’s your first time at Fight Club, you have to fight. It’s not a choice, it's a must.

Profiles 1 | Profiles 2 | Extra

1. All men =🚩

2. Why she kinda 🫦

3. Freak 🫵

4. Homie hopping

5. Hot privileges revoked

6. I got you bbg 💳

7. Neo T student.

More chapters to come…

𝐓𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭: (Comment,message or submit a request to be added to this taglist.)

Oml first smau finally being done 👀 took me forever to decide to actually do it lol, let’s hope this will actually be good 😭 (constructive feedback is always appreciated so if you have any memo’s or notes feel free to tell me!)

Also a little sneak peak into the boys in this one here you go:

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alwaysoutofpaper · 7 months ago

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Meredith's Robe

silly little thing to show the "robe" (more of a shawl really) that Meredith wears to diplomatic meetings. might draw it flattened out later on lol. had fun messing with an anti-aliasing brush for this.

ramblings below :)

the patterns present on the fabric are sort of meaningless ATM, but common on the Hae homeplanet, and the colors were mostly picked to compliment her fur (and eyes... lol). it's a sort of attempt to flatter her features in the presence of other sophont species, who may or may not care about it.

the shawl itself is a sort of traditional thing, and while she does wear it out of politeness and expectation from peers in the correct settings, she personally finds it uncomfortable. hae as a species do not have many qualms about nudity, so generally she does not wear clothing, and especially avoids anything restricting about the neck. outside of winter (her normal off-season, and when her giant winter coat grows in) she keeps her fur clipped short on the chance she might need to wear something. fabric on fur is, of course, uncomfortable for most people, but she bears with it for her job.

pins on the collar are meant to signify title, position, achievements, things of that sort. at least one of them shows her completion of compulsory military service, which is something worth showing to many diplomatic entities and peers in and around the coalition she is a part of. she is not nearly as decorated as some of the Hae she works with, though that is due in part to her youth and some difficulties in climbing the political ladder.

most of the time, the biggest assignments entrusted to Meredith are small interplanetary disputes and trade conflicts. if she isn't busy with negotiations, she is dealing with... so much paperwork. by all means, hers is a desk job - so she jumps on any opportunity that may take her out of the solar system.

at the very least, not dealing with huge negotiations - for example, the kinds that dictate whether or not a war will be started between systems - means Meredith has time for a few hobbies I may or may not cover in a future post :3c

thanks for reading! and here's a shameless plug

#digital art #meredith hae #hae world #original species #original character #worldbuilding #spec bio #spec evo #my art

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intersexbookclub · 4 months ago

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A lot of thoughts about Cripping Intersex

On 2024-09-29 we met to talk about Chapters 0 and 7-9 of the 2022 book Cripping Intersex by Celeste Orr. This was a book that numerous people had requested we read, and we wound up with deeply mixed feelings about it. 😬

Overall reactions:

Michelle: I found the concept of “hauntology” incredibly compelling. I’m here for some shitposting. 🍵

Apollo: I loved the concept of compulsory dyadism. I found the downplaying of “perisex” as a term to be weird, and the lack of divulging intersex/disability status was weird.

Elizabeth: the lack of diverging intersex/disability status wasn’t just weird, it was anathema to standpoint theory, and so every time Orr cited standpoint theorists, it made me seriously doubt Orr’s understanding of the theoretical basis that they actively chose to use 🧐. I was disappointed by this book. I agree with its central premise, so I should have been an easy sell. Instead I came out shaking, upset, feeling like Orr was a voyeur to our community, that Orr does not actually view intersex studies as a serious research area, that we’re just a theoretical fascination.

Remy: There were a lot of good points about how disability is socially constructed, but how Orr used “bodymind” detracted from their arguments for me. This book had a lot of uncomfortable conversations, some of them I was happy to read, some I need to come to terms with myself, while others I felt were treated a little too artificially equally such as the section with the phrase "the future is female" and the intersex community being involved in the queer community. 🤔

Bnuuy: it's really jarring how they approach the topic. There are a lot of pieces for a good theory here, but it’s kinda like Orr is just like the completely wrong person to go try to assemble them 🫤

As a collective, we generally were receptive (if not enthused!) about the central message that intersex benefits from disability studies/rights/justice perspectives, and that our community would benefit from more interaction with the disability studies/rights/justice communities! 💜

At the same time, we all agreed that Orr felt like a voyeur to our community. Rather than engaging with the intersex community, they seem to have a one-sided relationship where they read a bunch of things by intersex people but never actually conversed with intersex people. Whether Orr is intersex or not matters a whole lot less to us than whether Orr is actively participating in the community.

We made a lot of (unflattering) comparisons of Orr’s book to Envisioning African Intersex by Swarr, an intersex studies book by a perisex author. The latter is a great example of how a perisex scholar can do right by the intersex community: Swarr is clear about being perisex, clearly lays out her motivation for writing the book (she saw medical photography of intersex people, thought it was fucked up, later became friends with intersex activist Sally Gross, and then wanted to honour Gross’ memory after Gross died tragically.) Swarr was clearly connected to multiple African intersex organizations and made an explicit, deliberate choice to publish her book as open access so that the work could actually be read by the African activists she has been working with. Swarr’s perisex status matters a lot less than the fact that Swarr writes in a way that demonstrates personal investment in advancing intersex rights/justice.

Orr may or may nor be intersex. We don’t know. We don’t really care, because Orr doesn’t demonstrate personal investment in the intersex rights/justice/studies communities. That’s what actually matters to us, and it's what a lot of this post is going to talk about.

Underneath the cut we're going to go into a lot more detail about the book. There were things we liked about the book, and want to be fair in our assessment. Some of the complaints we had about the book hinge on an understanding of sociological theory and academic practices, so we'll give some context on those issues.

What we liked

This book had a bunch of things going for it.

The one thing this book did better than Swarr was its use of hauntology. Swarr invokes hauntology in her book, but not nearly as effectively as Orr does. Orr gets a lot of effective mileage out of how the spectre of intersex haunts people’s bodies. Not just intersex people’s bodies, but also the bodies of pregnant people who are called upon to exorcise the spectre of intersex through selective abortion should a foetus be identified as possibly intersex.

The haunting metaphor rung true for talking about how we intersex people are haunted by past surgeries, forced treatments, medical trauma, and so on. Even when we’re “done” with receiving gender-altering “treatments” we live with their ghosts every day.

We liked the explicit connections that Orr drew between intersex and disability studies. Elizabeth in particular was warmed by the shoutout to how Garland-Thompson explicitly includes intersex in her disability studies work. We felt that Orr perhaps underestimates how receptive many intersex people would be to their central argument - Orr takes on a tone of “hey bear with my crazy radical argument” that we weren’t sure was really necessary.

Orr is not the first to make the argument that intersex organizing and scholarship would benefit from more alignment with the disability world. This gets into criticisms, but Orr isn’t the first to make this argument yet seems unaware of how regularly the argument comes up. Indeed there’s a whole chapter in Critical Intersex (2009) arguing that intersex is better off allying with the disability community than the queer community. It’s not hard to find intersex people on this very website arguing similar things. Intersex-support even has a whole section on it in their FAQ, though it does cite Orr (lol). Orr does at least seem aware of Koyama’s work making this argument.

We appreciated Orr calling out ableism in a lot of intersex organizing. When intersex people and organizations insist that intersex is NOT a disorder or disability, they conflate disorder and disability. This is an ableist conflation: disability activism tends to start from a place of resistance to the medical model of disability, whether it be by the social model or more recent ones like the political/relational model.

Intersex activists insisting that intersex is “NOT a disability” reinforce the idea that disability is a negative, tragic thing. It’s the “I’m not like the other girls” rhetoric: putting down people who experience the same oppression you do in an effort to gain some credibility. It holds our movement back, because ableism is a very potent part of how we intersex people are oppressed. Orr does an effective job of laying this out, and we recommend reading the first chapter for this.

Orr coins a term, temporarily endosex, to talk about how people can learn at any age or time that they have had intersex traits all along. (Another way in which intersex can haunt!). For Elizabeth, the idea of temporarily perisex helped zer understand why perisex people can be *so* insistent in defining intersex as something visible at birth: because if intersex is something you can become at any age, this threatens perisex people with the possibility that they too could find themselves on the minority side of the tracks.

Other terms that Orr uses were big hits with the group. Elizabeth loved “curative violence” and ze expects to get future mileage out of the term. Ze also liked the framing of IGM as medical malpractice. Apollo praised “compulsory dyadism” as a concept. Remy shared that the cyborg stuff in the book gave them a lot to think about.

The book features a takedown of eugenicist rhetoric by a bioethicist by the name of Sparrow. We all agreed that Sparrow’s arguments sucked, were grossly eugenicist, and welcomed that Orr had put in the work to rebut his hateful messaging. Michelle praised how they invoked Sparrow’s lists of undesirables that Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis is supposed to prevent: for xem, it evoked monstrosity identification theory and ideas of the abject.

Elizabeth liked Orr’s argument that genital differences are a threat to the heterosexual (perisex) imagination: there’s so much porn out there that incorrectly presents intersex as “typical fully-developed penis plus typical fully-developed vagina” that really reflects how perisex people have a serious lack of imagination about genitals.

Fact Checking

There are a number of things that Orr says that we felt warrant an explicit fact check.

Orr presents the terms “perisex” and “endosex” as though they are contentious within the intersex community. They are not. The general consensus that one’s choice of perisex/endosex/dyadic is a question of personal preference and familiarity.

Orr clearly prefers the term dyadic, and makes a show of casting aspersions on “perisex” and “endosex”. They make it seem like their origins are disputed, and selectively cite Tumblr posts to make this argument. “Perisex” is actually the most common antonym to intersex on this very website, so it feels surreal that they're publishing the rare anti-“perisex” posts on this platform. Orr does correctly cite the Tumblr which coined “perisex”, the issue is they try to discredit it as a means to make it seem like this is not a term embraced by the intersex community.

Orr makes it seem like the origin of “endosex” is a suspicious mystery. It’s not. the term was first used in German in 2000 by Heike Bödeker. Bödeker is controversial for supporting autogynephilia 😬, but we've never seen anybody doubt Bödeker having mixed gonadal dysgenesis.

Orr clearly prefers the term “dyadic” and makes zero attempt to source the term, and the most minimal attempt at covering its controversy. This term actually does come from outside the intersex community! The term came from gender studies, popularized by 1970s radfem Shulamith Firestone. And it’s controversial for more than just being a laundering of “sex binary”.

Nobody calls it “ipso gender” anymore. It was coined as “ipso gender” but in actual usage has been “ipsogender” from basically as soon as the term was coined.

Orr uncritically repeats a quote which romanticizes home births in Black & Indigenous communities as that intersex-at-birth babies were accepted and cared for in a way that wouldn’t happen if the baby were born in hospital. This, sadly, is deserves scrutiny. We’re not saying it never happened: one can find stories supporting it. But the historical and sociological evidence show that infanticide of intersex infants has been widespread globally, and this includes traditional Black and Indigenous birth attendants. Collison (2018) as quoted in Swarr, reports that 88 of 90 traditional South African birth attendants they interviewed admitted to “getting rid” of a child if it was born intersex. That very story we just linked to about a Kenyan midwife saving intersex babies made the news because infanticide was the norm. In North America, some First Nations had similar traditions, e.g. the Navajo would leave intersex babies to die in arroyos, and the Halq’eméylem would leave them to die on a specific mountain. 😢

Michelle was visibly upset when talking about Orr’s repeated comments which insinuate that LGBT marriage equality was an attempt to fit in + liberalism + conformity. In Michelle’s words: “AIDS activists did not watch their lovers die for you to say that marriage equality is conformist bullshit. As a [polyamorous] person who is not legally married to xer spouses, I really felt that one, and I was intensely angry about how Orr was dismissing those activist efforts and the importance of them.”

The Voyeuristic Vibes

The consensus in the group was that Orr’s writing came off as voyeuristic of the intersex community. There were several points in the book where Orr seemed strangely disconnected from the intersex community. Sometimes it was small things, like spelling ipsogender as “ipso gender”, or favouring the term “interphobia” when “intersexism” is actually more popular in the community (it also avoids the potential casual ableism of framing bigots as clinically insane! Which you’d think a crip theorist would be sensitive to…. 👀)

Other times, it felt like a deeper, conceptual thing. For example, Orr’s top priority in future work was to apply their interpretation of intersex issues to critique how LGBT marriage equality was a homonormative, neoliberal, conformist movement. Not only was this viscerally upsetting to Michelle, for Elizabeth it was galling that this is what Orr seems to think intersex perspectives are good for: pushing down other queer groups. 😬 It added to the sense that Orr saw us as a nifty theoretical lens, and wasn’t particularly interested in advancing the intersex cause.

Another disconnection that was noted was in how Orr rebutted Sparrow’s claims that genital differences are disgusting and will not elicit sexual desire in others. Despite detailed rebuttals to other appalling comments from Sparrow, Orr does not bring up the intense fetishization of intersex genital differences which is uncomfortably familiar to all of us. Objectifying medical photography of intersex people with genital differences are shared widely and known to be used for sexual purposes.

Bnuuy was annoyed that Orr seemingly didn't try to talk to or otherwise get input/feedback from any disabled intersex people for their thesis, given that disabled intersex people are not actually that hard to find! (Indeed, four out of five of us are both intersex and disabled.) Given Orr’s emphasis on intersectionality, it’s notable that when they sought intersex texts to analyse, they focused on texts from nondisabled intersex folks.

Orr does not reveal if they are intersex nor if they are disabled. It sticks out. Whether they’re actually intersex or not isn't actually that important to us. We’ve previously read intersex studies works by perisex authors which we loved, and we believe strongly that it is possible for perisex authors to do right by the community if they take the time to engage WITH the community. (See Swarr as an exemplar!)

What we had major problem with is the faux “objective” tone that the book takes on. Orr seems to be trying to hide behind academic language, the “view from nowhere”, and an expensive paywall. This was noticeable to everybody. But Elizabeth, as the only academic in the call, came in with a lot more context as to why it felt gross.

The Misuse of Standpoint Theory

For Elizabeth, Orr's “view from nowhere” became egregious when Orr cites standpoint theorists like Donna Haraway, Nancy Hartstock, and Pat Hill Collins. In a surreal move, Orr explicitly points to Haraway’s famous paper “Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective”. This paper is an evisceration of the “view from nowhere”, “objective” approach to academic knowledge production. Every view is a view from somewhere, and pretending otherwise feeds into the history of how science has been violently used to gaslight and oppress minority groups.

In short, Haraway says:

Elizabeth explains that as result, feminist methodologies accept subjectivity as part of the process: the researcher is expected to articulate their own standpoint, to be transparent about their subjectivity rather than to hide it behind a pretense of “objectivity”. There’s an emphasis on reflexivity, the fancy word for when scholars reflect on how their own social position affects how they do their research.

Feminist disability studies and crip theory both build on feminist standpoint theory, and Orr claims to be using both. Both frameworks understand disability as socially constructed, and that this social construction is entwined with other social forces such as capitalism, sexism, racism, and so on. Feminist disability studies scholars like Wendell (who Orr cites) clearly position themselves and how their disability (or lack thereof) affects their research.

Crip theory builds further on feminist disability studies, and acts to subvert ideas of ability. It began in the arts - cripping performance art by having wheelchair users perform as dancers, blind people doing photography, Deaf people making music, etc. It spread into other domains, such as crip technoscience. Crip theorists also inherit the tradition of reflexivity, whether it be Eli Claire writing about their personal experiences of disability or Sami Schalk talking about how being nondisabled affects her work as a disability studies scholar.

We provide all this exposition to emphasize how unusual it is that Orr provides absolutely zero information about their positionality nor their personal motivations to this research. 🧐 They provide zero reflexivity as to how their position may have affected their work. Yet their personal biases and subjectivity seemed obvious to us - we were all, in varying ways, set off by Orr trying to pass off subjective opinion as “correct”. As an example, we mentioned how Orr clearly prefers the term “dyadic” and manufactures controversy about the origins of “endosex” and “perisex”, while at the same time conveniently leaving out the unsavoury origins of the term “dyadic”.

Elizabeth pointed out that the ironic thing is Orr didn’t even need to invoke standpoint theory to make the argument that intersex studies would benefit from a disability studies lens. Plenty of intersex and disability studies is done using different frameworks.

Indeed, Elizabeth was surprised that this kind of error made it through a PhD thesis defense. In the department where ze teaches, if a student displays a major misunderstanding about their chosen theoretical framework, the student would be asked to redo the relevant thesis checkpoints (e.g. candidacy paper, thesis proposal/defense) until they get it right.

Some background on academia

Elizabeth brought up a structural problem with the book: it looks like it had zero intersex studies scholars review it prior to publication. 💀

This book originated as a PhD dissertation, which anybody can read for free here. A typical PhD programme is structured as a master-apprentice model of education, where a PhD student apprentices to one (sometimes two) professors. These are known as thesis advisors. The culmination of the PhD is a thesis (aka dissertation), which presents original research done by the student.

To graduate, the thesis needs to pass examination by a committee of professors. The committee acts as a secondary source of support to the student, providing guidance or perspectives to complement the advisors.

Elizabeth explained that when ze assembles a thesis committee for one of zer graduate students, the goal is to ensure any area that the student is venturing into has at least one committee member who is well versed in it. So, let’s say you propose you’re going to do a thesis on “intersex studies meets disability studies” but your thesis advisors are both gender studies people (as Orr’s were). Elizabeth would expect that Orr’s thesis committee would then include at least one disability studies scholar and at least one intersex studies scholar.

Instead, Orr’s thesis committee doesn’t have a single intersex studies scholar on it. Neither the book’s acknowledgements nor the thesis’ acknowledgments acknowledge any intersex studies scholars. Even though Orr is citing intersex studies scholars like Georgiann Davis, Morgan Holmes, and Cary Gabriel Costello, there's nothing to indicate that Orr has ever gotten feedback from any intersex people. This is HIGHLY unusual: normally, intersex studies books have acknowledgments which acknowledge several publicly intersex people, and often one or two intersex organizations.

Research is a highly social activity: researchers are expected to go to conferences, to be in conversation with people working on similar topics. And Orr is clearly social about their research, acknowledging the feminist/gender studies communities they have been a part of. It just seems like intersex studies scholars weren’t a priority for Orr’s academic socializing. 🙃

Orr’s acknowledgments doesn’t even contain the word intersex, which is unprecedented in our collective experience of intersex non-fiction. This is why Elizabeth says that ze was left with the impression that Orr doesn’t think intersex studies is a serious field of research. It appears that Orr views intersex literature as something to be consumed for their benefit, and not a community worthy of participation and a bi-directional relationship.

Early in the book, Orr points to Lennard Davis’ work with the Deaf community on reframing Deaf activism away from the “we’re not disabled we’re a linguistic minority” rhetoric. It’s a great example of disability studies scholars having an impact. Thing is: Davis openly talks about how he grew up in a Deaf family that was part of the Deaf Community. While Davis is not little-d deaf, he took on the project as a member of the capital-D Deaf community. His writing (including book acknowledgments) reflect this.

Elizabeth also pointed out that there are scripts and precedent in academia for how to handle positionality and reflexivity when you’re questioning or closeted. If Orr were closeted or questioning, they would have an excellent way to talk discreetly about it through their very own concept of “temporarily endosex”: Orr could write they don’t know they’re not perisex, frame it around how few perisex people actually know they’re perisex, and retain plausible deniability.

Other notes

Bnuuy was frustrated with the implication that disability studies is The Only Right Way to analyse intersex. It’s a useful lens for understanding intersex, but at times it felt like Orr was arguing it was the only appropriate lens rather than one of a collection of suitable lenses. Theories are analytic tools, and social phenomena are complex and fluid - it’s a matter of finding a suitable tool for a given research question, rather than there being One Correct Way to understand things.

Orr’s use of “bodymind” didn’t quite land. The term was created by Margaret Price to subvert the idea that body and mind are dichotomous: many disabilities cannot neatly fit into “mental” vs “physical”. It’s a term that’s had productive use in disability studies. But Orr’s use of it got a negative reaction. Remy pointed out it felt like it instead it actually reinforced the body-mind distinction. Intersex is, after all, a physical thing, and the idea of “brain intersex” is very poorly received by the intersex community - it’s seen as a way that perisex trans people appropriate intersex and/or live in denial about being perisex. It felt like Orr was using the word on autopilot rather than thinking about when and where it is actually subversive.

Bnuuy was concerned that Orr was reading OII Australia’s information on intersex in bad faith. Orr criticizes them for discursively distancing intersex from disability. Bnuuy points out that OII Australia is not writing for an academic (disability studies) scholarship. This is an advocacy organization speaking to a general audience that understands disability through the medical model. Bnuuy read the quotes from OII Australia as them just distancing themselves from a medicalized understanding of disability.

Elizabeth brought up that Orr’s manufactured controversy of “perisex” may have a classist element. While endo- does make sense as an antonym to inter- if one has formal science background, the term peri- is not conventionally an antonym to inter-. Elizabeth has personally noticed a resistance from zer fellow academics to perisex on the grounds that it’s “using scientific terminology incorrectly”, and thinks that’s a classist take.

Michelle brought up that “it also didn't sit great with me that they [Orr] were very condescending about Tumblr like, ‘aww, look at the baby activists trying to do a scholarship," whereas what I'd describe as ‘folk scholarship’ on Tumblr has been very valuable to me. It's not always correct and there can be misinformation, but it has worth.” Remy was unimpressed with how limited/selective Orr’s engagement seemed to be with intersex Tumblr, as well as Orr’s centrist take on “the future is female”.

Closing thoughts

This was a deeply imperfect piece of scholarship. Orr came across as disconnected from the intersex community, and uninterested in working with the community. The work still has some merits: Orr’s first chapter provides an incisive discussion of how ableism is detrimental to intersex advocacy and that trying to distance intersex from disability only adds to societal ableism. Ableism is a serious force in intersex discrimination and we’re stronger off understanding this and explicitly resisting it.

We hope that the stink of Orr’s voyeurism does not sully the important central message of their book. Work needs to be done to teach more intersex people about disability studies. Disability does not mean disorder. Disability does NOT mean medical problem. The disability rights and justice movements are FULL of disabled groups who, just like the intersex community, are actively seeking de-pathologization, bodily autonomy, patient-led care by respectful and well-informed physicians, and fighting neo-eugenics. We are in good company with groups like the Deaf, neurodiversity, and little people communities.

#oh also reminder: we're meeting on Friday to talk about Wicked!#intersex book club #intersex books #intersex #actually intersex #intersex studies #queer theory #crip theory #standpoint theory #disability studies #academia #crip #book reviews #book review #book summaries

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