#i keep forgetting that cishet people exist

[callmeizukunotdeku]

jaytim making out for the first time and jason pulls back and tim is like "tf you think you're doing get back here" and jason just gives him a look and goes "I want to at least go on a date before i fuck you and i'm not in the mood to wank off in your bathroom" and tim looks at him confused for a solid minute before "oh shit! I forgot you were cis" and jason is just "how the hell did you forget I was cis??" pause "wait, are you trans" and tim is just like "you thought I was cis??"

[scamguy]

Due to Kim Dokja being a VERY repressed person in general, I think he would REALLY struggle with his how he'd associate with his sexuality, whether you see him as gay/bi/aro/ace... Actually if you think he'd be fine with dating Yoo Joonghyuk and Han Sooyoung, from the bat, without any issue, then I think you're insane. More under the cut because that all became a big chunk of text.

We're talking about a guy who spent his entire life trying to blend in the background so hard that he became a literal ghost. If he even ever thought about his own sexuality, then he either came to the realization that he is straight (which I just don't think is true considering how often he compliments other men's looks), or that he's not and therefore he should try his best to pass as cishet just in case, so that no one would bother him about it. Don't forget he grew up bullied AND scrutinized by the press. He's used to having to keep things hidden.

I also don't think he'd bother experimenting with his sexuality in adulthood, considering he's only still alive for the sole and unique reason that he wants to read that one ongoing novel, so that stuff is completely out of the picture for him. His closest friend is a coworker he barely ever speaks to, do you think he would try to go out and date people? Pleaaaase...

Kim Dokja wants to disappear in his surroundings, he wants to be ordinary, forgettable, just another coworker, the upstairs neighbor, the unnoticeable everyman in the subway seat angling his phone away from other people's line of sight so they can't see what he's reading. Gender and sexuality is a non-behavior for him; he's presenting as a man because of his assigned sex, and he's not looking for romantic partners because he doesn't need one in order to survive. Genderless, and sexless - truly an undefined shape, who discarded everything there was to discard about his life in favor of focusing completely on a fictional story. Funnily, I think his gender is closer to 'reader' than it is to anything else: he's just Not There.

And as such, standing out, even just a little, is his natural enemy. So while I dont think he's bigoted (all of that stuff could've been handled a lot better in the novel, but: it's made rather clear that he doesn't judge people on their gender identity but on their actions - as shown in the early chapters of the demon king castle scenarios with the catfishing crew - and once he comes to see Jang Hayoung as a real person, rather than his OC, he recognizes her as a woman), I think that because of this fear of standing out, he'd obviously consider the idea of queerness as something undesirable, especialy if it's in relation to himself, because it gets in the way of his comfortably dull (non-)existence.

This internalized homophobia is, imo, made even clearer everytime his possible queerness is brought up by other characters, because he avoids the subject like the plague and he rarely comments on it in the narration, which makes his real thoughts on this very ambiguous and up to interpretation. Even if it's only brought up for laughs, I think it's interesting that Kim Dokja just flat out refuses to speak or even think about being into guys because he's just that embarassed.

So what about post-canon? Unless you're some heartless monster without a modicum of reading comprehension, then you surely dream of an ending where Kim Dokja wakes up and gets to live and grow old with the ones he loves. But even after learning that he can be loved, that he IS loved, can he truly let go of his lifetime(s) of repressed emotions, can he truly accept himself? Is the self-love that brought him back, the same thing as self-acceptance? And even after absorbing the idea that he is of immense worth to the world, is it enough to overcome his guilt? Could he truly bear to live without feeling like he has to hide himself anymore? He understands that he should exist, but does he truly try to live his life to the fullest?

[bookish-bi-mormon]

hey! hope this isn’t offensive, but i was wondering what it’s like to be NB and bi in the Mormon church. Are you out? Does your community respect your identity? I’ve heard about Mormons sometimes being pretty bigoted so I was curious what that’s like for you.

Hey buddy!

Thanks for the question, definitely not offensive but boy howdy is this a complicated question to answer.

So, I've been out as bi since 2016, and out as nonbinary since 2020. I served a mission for my church and was very open about being bi the whole time, and I attended BYU (a religious LDS university) as a nonbinary person.

I wouldn't say either one was easy, but there were a lot of really cool people I met who made it easier.

I have had bishops who were very understanding, one in particular was a trained therapist and was well informed about queer issues, and hopes that gay marriage will be allowed in the temple one day. I had a lovely ministering sister (kinda like assigned friends???), an older lady who took me under her wing and watched queer eye with me and listened to me when I had to cry or vent about homophobia in the religion as a whole.

I gave a talk in sacrament meeting (in front of an apostle!?!!!!) where I talked about being queer and the pain I feel because of unfair church policies and I was hearing from people for months how touching and meaningful my talk was.

There was a lovely family who hosted gatherings once a month for queer latter-day saints to meet and find community and belonging. I'm now part of a small group of trans Mormons who meet up every other week to have our own Sunday school. There are so many queer Mormons on this website who have given me support and community when I've needed it. I'm part of an leftist organization called Mormons With Hope for a Better World, and many of the members are queer in some way.

I guess in conclusion: yeah, as an institution the LDS church is homophobic and transphobic and they keep instituting policies that aim to keep it that way. But there are many many individuals who are fighting for change, some in little ways and others loudly. There are many people who are willing to learn and be inclusive they just don't know where to start. I love my religion and I want to practice it in community. I know it's not everyone's fight, but for me it's worth it to keep pushing back and carving out spaces for queer Mormons. I won't let the cishets forget I exist. I have just as much right to sit in the pews on Sunday as they do.

[lakesbian]

here's every way wildbow accidentally made pre-meiosis "russel" thorburn transgender that i can remember. if you can think of any reasons i forgot please add on

his parents named his younger sister "ivy," as if the obvious grandmother-pandering name "rose" had already been used up. blake theorizes that they used a male version of "rose" for PMT, but this is nonsensical--there is no male form of the name rose, and everything he comes up with as a possible option (in other words, everything wildbow came up with as a possible option) is a major stretch. most don't sound even tangentially like the name "rose." it makes far more sense to assume that PMT was afab and had the deadname rose. (this also makes sense on a thematic level wrt how rose thorburn jr is supposed to be the Real heir that grandmother is forcing blake to die for, but that's getting besides the point)

rose has memories of being harassed over the inheritance by her female cousins, and the idea of these memories just being wholly pulled out of thin air when basically everything else involves memories either being split btwn blake and rose or erased altogether is weird

blake is friends with, like. a lot of gay people. textually runs in poor gay artist circles. the idea of them adopting this weirdly cool cis straight guy is funny but it makes a lot more sense if PMT was trans + gay and only got turned into a straight guy (and a straight girl) yesterday, due to the homophobia demon

PMT literally thinks "Besides, why devote any more attention to your son, when you could just start over?  Have that beautiful baby girl you wanted, right?" which is also like one of the only pieces of internal narration we get from PMT in the entire story. first girl they named rose ran away and did some shit with their gender so now they have a second girl they can't name rose but can still try to raise to go for the inheritance

in the same chapter as when pmt says that, callan is like ohhh you think youre going to worm your way in-, implied sentence ending being "-to the inheritance," which is, like. the family knows it's going To A Girl. so.

PMT was childhood friends with paige, who is The Gay Cousin. it is deeply sensible to imagine them bonding over this, regardless of whether or not PMT (or even paige) knew at the time

it is, like, fully possible for a cishet dude to get sick of living with his shitty toxic abusive family and abscond at the age of 17, but also homelessness is an extremely prevalent issue among transgender kids in abusive families. the narrative of a transmasc kid growing up in an abusive, catholic extended family where girls are pressured to compete for a very gendered inheritance + leaving at the age of 17 & finding a new home among a bunch of gay artists is Significantly more compelling than the cis dude alternative. it just is.

okay i think im running out of, like, logical errors that make sense only if pmt was trans prior to the Obliteration, so as for the thematic stuff. like i said, rose being the half grammy decided was supposed to be "real" and blake being the half that's supposed 2 die for her 2 exist, rose just being unhappy and disconnected by nature of existence while blake is the parts of pmt that escaped from the constraints of the family + found happiness, so on and so forth. "catholic grandmother literally obliterated her transmasc nonbinary grandchild by splitting them into two binary gendered halves & expecting that the man they could've been die to allow the acceptable woman--literally forced to dress in grandmother's clothes--live on and do as grandmother wished" is Everything, doing the same thing but to a cis man grandchild is significantly less compelling

Others who r very old/operating on what are explicitly stated to be oppressive and antiquated gender roles as per the book's themes about inherited/traditional forms of harm keep mistakenly calling blake she/her and rose lmao

??? probably some other thangs im forgetting

[this-is-exorsexism]

Quote from a comment on a certain YouTube video making the rounds right now: “I think people who feel more comfortable using neo pronouns should find people who feel comfortable using them, and just settle for they/them otherwise. We shouldn’t be like, discriminatory to them but we gotta keep it real in regards to wider society.”

First of all I have many problems with the video in question but it’s 2am, I’m tired, and other people have already articulated most of my problems with the video itself better than I can right now, so I’ll spare you that portion of my incoherent rant.

Second of all, using they/them for someone who does not go by they/them pronouns is discriminatory. It’s misgendering, plain and simple — something that the vast majority of the trans community agrees is bad. But if it’s towards those super confusing and icky xenogender people it’s suddenly fine, apparently.

Third of all, a massive chunk of the comment section of the video is like this. A lot of the other comments just disguise this sentiment in a lot more, shall we say, flowery language. Lots of “I don’t have a problem with xenogenders and neopronouns, BUUUUUUUT—” and “xenogenders are harmful because they make more boxes instead of destroying the boxes that already exist which is antithetical to trans liberation” and “there’s not enough of a community for cat gender people for us to worry about them politically”. Just fancy ways of saying “I don’t think they should be allowed to have a day in issues in the broader queer community, we should keep them quiet so they don’t embarrass us in front of the cishets.”

The real problem with xenogenders and neopronouns is how binary trans people can only ever bring them up in order to tell nonbinary people to sit down and shut up.

this is exorsexism.

binary people learn what discrimination is please. also the "the catgender community is too small to worry about them politically", like, are there too few catgender people to matter or are there too many to be dangerous to the good and respectable binary transgender people? not to forget that catgender people are indeed part of the wider nonbinary community. every small subcommunity is part of a bigger queer community, but binary trans people don't understand that because they are part of a huge established community and the people who say these things tend to not have identities that one after the T in LGBTQ+.

we can't afford to leave anyone behind.

[imbecominggayer]

Part 3 Writing Advice: Stop The Self-Hating Narrative Around Disability

I'm BACK! I was working on some other Tumblr posts but i've decided to fulfill my promise to talk about the common associations people seem to have between disability and self-hatred.

You remember my own slogan "Disabled Adults Are Adults", right?

Well, here is the slogan for the majority of writers who are bad at writing good disability representation "Disabled Adults Are Tragic :`(

This association comes into everything so we'll go from the small chunks of ableist LOOORE~ and then move onto the really big ticket items? Right!

Assistive Aids Are Traps Designed By The Illuminati!

What do these common literary phrases have in common?

Confined to a Wheelchair

Forced to Use a Cane

Cursed To Always Use [Assistive Aid]

The answer: they are exceedingly negatively charged which incorrectly imply that mobility aids such as wheelchairs are horrible fates to be falled upon! This implication that living with disability is such a curse tends to be most forced upon "understandable" villains and sympathetic "tragic" figures who are "unbearably cursed" with a horrid fate

Those phrases are horrible not just because they incorrect imply that devices such as wheelchairs and other mobility aids are curses when, in reality, the individuals who use these assistant aids desperately need them in order to exercise their full potential but also due to the fact that it's an able-bodied centric perspective!

People who actually use these devices don't see them as unbearable weights bringing them down but tools of freedom and autonomy. Obviously, independence is not necessary to lead a fulfilling life but it's a nice cherry on top!

This "able-bodied centric perspective" will come up again!

Curing Disability

At the end of the story i'll cute and sweet protagonist/main character will be forcibly mutilated into an able-bodied person either by machinery in a sci-fi setting or through the gods.

p.s that's just eugenics. eugenics is what the nazis did

Curing disability doesn't just mean a literal cure but also the overall narrative of "overcoming" disability tends to be here.

"Overcoming disability" is when an author implies that through a character's dedication they have "overcame" the limitations of their disability and are functionally no longer disabled.

Basically, if you have a disabled character whose jokes tend to center on "wow, I always forget you are disabled" or "I am the author and I keep forgetting this character has a disability", you have this trope.

The reason why this is shitty is because you, able-bodied author, have disabled readers. Disabled readers of various different types of disabilties who are reading your story.

Can you imagine if every single story of an able-bodied character involved them being forcibly turned disabled as a "reward" for their good behavior?

Can you imagine if every story involving a queer character involved that singular queer character being turned into a cishet individual?

"Disabled people still exist even when your character stops being disabled"

All you have done is tell disabled and non-disabled audience members that disabled people don't deserve to exist. That's bad.

Final: The Self-Hating Narrative

"Disabled Adults are Adults"

When I was inventing that phrase, I knew it needed to be universally applicable. The only reason I specificed "adults" and not "people" was due to the fact I was talking about infantilization in the first part and I didn't want someone to be like "well, obvi special needs kids are going to be treated delicately".

Anyway, the phrase needed to be universal because disabled adults are just people at the end of the day. They struggle with some not universal things like chronical illness or disability. They also struggle with the universal things like: can I support my family, am I ready, will the bank be closed by the time I wake up, can I be a good person?

They also succeed. Sometimes this success is in the form of gaining more mobility then before. Sometimes this success will seem minor to not disabled people or even to disabled people who have never struggled with that particular thing before.

They also succeed at things we succeed at. They create what has never been created before. They prove to themselves that they can be relied on. They laugh when they struggle.

Yes, they sometimes hate themselves. But even then, they continue on. They struggle with their symptoms day-to-day on top of succeeding in the daily struggles we all deal with. They deal with ableist remarks while also having fun.

Disability Is Normality

Many disabled adults and children are fighting for the right to see narratives in which their lives aren't plagued by melodramatic angst about being disabled.

Many disabled adults and children go about their daily lives with an overwhelming confidence about their disability and don't give a shit about what ableist remark you have to say.

And one of the most important things an author needs to be if they ever want to write true, inspiring, and universal works is to listen to voices of those they wish to represent.

If an author wants to represent disabled people living disabled lives in fantasy and reality, they need to listen to the perspectives of those who are actually living those lives. Sure, they may be lacking in terms of how to fly a dragon but humanity is humanity with or without the added uniqueness.

If an author just takes a ableist-covered crap-filled myths of what disability is like, expect backlash! Or maybe expect nothing, disabled adults have way too many concerns to be dealing with your sorry ass.

[topazadine]

LGBTQ friends, I need you to remember this and never ever let it go.

Our community has always outlasted its enemies. It always will.

We are a natural part of humanity's diversity. We belong here just as much as cishet people. We have existed in all societies, in all eras, in all parts of the world. No matter how much bigots claim otherwise.

Fascists simply cannot destroy us. It's impossible, no matter how much they try to claim otherwise. They can legislate against us, shun us, ban us, torture us, murder us, but they can NEVER get rid of all of us.

Times will be hard. We will all suffer. We will be terrified. We may lose family and friends.

But please, do not forget that no matter what they do, the community will live on.

It's our job to keep ourselves alive in any way possible so that we can share our experiences and nurture the next generation of proud LGBTQ people.

Protect yourself. Fight when you can, hide when you can't. There's no shame in self-preservation. You're not "abandoning" us if you have to live quietly. Not everyone is in a place where they can advocate.

But please. Live on. Don't give up. Remember that we will be victorious as we always have been before. Our only objective is to outlast them by any means necessary because they will never succeed.

[verdemoun]

timewarp au going to pride:

jake adler has bi wife energy set to his ringtone. king of bead bracelets. he made them himself and hands them out with dangerous enthusiasm. will see somehow hitting on sadie (who is very thank you cutie but i'm married) and be like hello friend i also think my wife is beautiful stunning perfect human being have a bracelet. sadie is also dressed like a cliche tucked in plaid shirt cuffed jeans doc martens finger guns sweeping her husband off his feet and kissing him

bill has the tiniest pride flag but absolutely glared and intimidated his way to the front of the barriers and forgets to blink while watching the march. malfunctions when men actually flirt with him and has to sit down like his self-esteem is so low pls help him. gets called handsome and has to hold a water bottle to his head because world is spinning, does not know how to respond.

kieran and javier are taking turns annoying people with 'whats in your pants' memes intentionally put the weirdest things in their pockets like someone asks their gender and 'oh look three buttons a can of tuna and an opened pack of gum. who wants gum?' labels are too overwhelming they both identify as queer there is nothing cishet about either of them. crying over margaritas together why are we single when every single person in the world is so hot?

arthur and charles keep going on stranger missions to help find lost pins, escorting the youth to the <18 events and handing out water bottles. arthur does struggle with getting mistaken for a right-wing protestor because big scowl-y muscle tall white man with old timey cowboy hat and needs charles to rescue him from getting yelled at because he is too polite to interrupt people.

hosea and bessie were meant to be supervising dutch and bessie had way too much fun explaining this is my husband and my husband's boyfriend. hosea fumbling trying to explain he's not my boyfriend i love my wife. meanwhile dutch escapes and bessie and hosea both just sit down like oh no. this is. bad.

dutch is attracted to the sound of angry shouting like a moth to flame. micah (who does support the gays because his grand-nephew is gay (kai is not gay but is glad the misunderstanding has lead to micah being a better person)), isaac, jack and dutch all put aside their differences for one day and will get arrested for assault and 'infringing on the right to protest' while physically fighting bigots.

annabelle and susan are wearing their 'dutch van der linde made us lesbians' shirts while also holding 'we exist' banners and people think they assume they're referring to vintage lesbians but of course they mean lesbians throughout history including 19th century and long before they have always existed and always will go sapphos

abigail is going out of her way to break hearts she is calling people gorgeous and kissing their cheeks before running off like a manic pixie dream girl to continue the mission to fight whoever it was that gave john their number. john does not understand phone numbers he's being given scraps of paper with numbers on them wondering if it's some kind of encrypted treasure map. also he's genuinely afraid of furries. hiding behind his wife what the fuck are those.

[elisaintime]

The post-episode 3 shift

FRESH POST!

So we were talking about how AMC's Interview with the Vampire Season 1 handles their choice of making Louis a black man in the early 1900s. This is a really cool change the show made in its AU version of IWTV, and it brought in a whole lot of subjects to explore that didn't exist in the books, making the TV show a very different work of art. But all the initial ideas for this show came from a cishet white man, and while he down the line had assistance from poc collaborators, I still think the show had areas where it could have done better with regards to some of the story beats, character arcs, and plot progression. The other thread got unwieldy with multiple reblog trees, but it's here for reference: https://www.tumblr.com/elisaintime/748738811357462528/woah-i-must-have-missed-something-why-are-people You can see everyone else's discussion in the notes.

I love discussions like this! Please talk to me about vampire chronicles! I live for it! I'm posting this now because I am disappointed that a few people seem to not be understanding several things I said. Maybe I said it unclearly, or maybe they're projecting and jumping to conclusions.

Kind of like how this poster does:

I deleted/banned every single comment on my videos that talked negatively about the show making Louis and Claudia black or deriding it for trying to be woke (and there were a bunch!). I delete block and ban all forms of hate speech. My channel is absolutely not a safe space for racists or bigots of any kind.

As you can see in the screencap, there is nothing in these comments that is about the race changes. These comments are talking about other changes the show made from the books and don't touch on race at all. The poster who screencapped them is jumping to the conclusion that these commenters liking the books better than the show automatically makes them racist, and that these are racist comments. And this screencap is specifically what I was referencing at the beginning of the other thread. Several people have said this now, that my YT comments section makes a safe space for racists. But these are not racist comments, and there is no evidence that the commenters are racist. This is projection and assumption. If you DO ever notice a racist comment on any of my videos, that I somehow missed, please bring it to my attention so that I can immediately delete and ban the user from ever commenting on my channel again.

But back to the show itself and my critique of it. I'm always here for talking about vampire-related writing! Let's go!

I still stand by what I said in my videos about the few issues I had with the show's scripts. If you watched my videos or follow all I've said about the show here on tumblr or elsewhere, you'll know how excited about this show I've been from the very beginning, how obsessively into it I am, following every aspect of production and behind the scenes news. You may even be in one of the multiple discord servers with me where we talk about the show constantly. There was much I really enjoyed about season 1, which I was outspoken about in my videos, and people keep seeming to forget. My videos had a greater percentage of positivity in them than negativity. But yes, I did have critiques as well, just like I do with every single piece of vampire media I discuss on my channel--it's the entire point of my channel!--and those mostly had to do with inconsistency in the writing.

What I've said is that the DRIVING FORCE of the plot wasn’t about Louis's struggles with chafing against society as a black man after episode 3, not that there was no more racism. I said he was obviously still immersed in systemic racism all around him, which the show showed us with visual details in the background, despite no one talking about them. This is fine, we don't need it spelled out for us. TV is a visual medium, and that's what the images are there for. But my discussion is about his character MOTIVATIONS on a writing level. His want vs need. His goal vs obstacle. If you're unversed on the techniques of story writing and plot structure, I recommend Blake Snyder's book Save the Cat as a crash course. In ep 1-3, for Louis, it was about being respected as a man equal to others among his society, the citizens of New Orleans, his colleagues and business rivals. Fighting for social opportunities that were limited to him because he is black. That story ends with episode 3 and a new story begins. I’m not saying this is a bad thing. I just said I NOTICED it.

After it all burns down, Louis stops focusing on society respecting him as a human being (which was ironic to begin with, because he’s not human anymore) and his driving plot becomes about making and keeping a family and such. Obviously race is still an element of that in a mixed marriage, but it’s not about his business or social standing anymore, these parts of his life that were SO IMPORTANT to him in the first three episodes. In the books, vampires stop caring about that kind of stuff the second they are made, but the show changed it to take Louis a few years to get there instead of it happening instantly.

Obviously racism doesn't magically disappear or stop mattering once he accepts his vampire nature (which Lestat kind of promises him it will), but it does shift to being a background element for what we see on screen. He is not focused on it anymore, when it used to be the primary driving force of his plot. We hardly even get to see Louis interact with (racist) society again til the finale (and I made this observation on episode 5, which the end-of-episode credits told us was written by a white person). For example, the police that come to their door are bigoted to him and Lestat because they’re gay, but meanwhile, they act completely colorblind. At this point, Louis’s character motivations are about fear of them being caught for murder, and his emotions regarding how Claudia is struggling with her eternal child body and lashing out--about keeping his family together. Not about his racial struggles as a businessman and citizen in outward society.

Yes, we all know there were non-white people in the writer’s room (thank god! Can you imagine?? If there weren’t any, we’d all have been raging from the very beginning! Did you read RJ’s episode 1 script draft before it got revised with the input of black/queer/female editors? OOF), but the choice to completely shift Louis’s driving character motivations away from his impassioned societal race struggle to something different after 3 episodes was part of the original season outline made by white people before any poc were brought on to the team. 

And again, I didn’t say it was a bad thing, it was just something I NOTICED, and the way the show executed it felt very abrupt and clunky. Did I want the cops to not be colorblind and get in some racial digs and microaggressions while they were at Louis’s house? Ew no. But I did NOTICE that they didn’t do that, and how it was so different from the way Louis was spoken to by white people in the first 3 episodes. Did the white writer of this episode perhaps feel uncomfortable going there?

The season told two different stories for Louis, with an abrupt turn in the arc after episode 3. It didn’t feel like an arc at all, but a sharp angle. Starting with Claudia, Louis’s primary drives and character motivations completely change. He no longer wants to be an important businessman respected in society, he becomes “the housewife,” and never once seems to miss his desperately-fought-for social status at all. This comes back to what I said about the show being weakened by trying to shove in too much book stuff. Ep1-3 were all these cool new original ideas from the show with Louis having entirely new character motivations based on the show's changes to his background. They were naturally driven by what him being black in 1910 now meant. But after that story was done, it abruptly shifts back to more of how he in in the books, and trying to suddenly pull him back to his book personality/motivations/goals after giving us this whole new organically-evolved self in 1-3 was notable. I noticed it.

All in all, I think it probably would have worked much better on a writing level if it was treated as two separate mini seasons instead of presenting itself as an attempt at one coherent whole.  

[sheepleif]

hello tumblr!! i’m back with this years pride icon! i’ll be making a lot more pride themed art than i have in the past 4 years, since i’m finally back at that point where i’m very much proud and happy with being a part of the Queer community, which i think is the perfect time considering what’s going on in the US right now.

Just warning you for a LONG and very personal read:

anyway here’s my experience as a Queer person in the Conservative US, even pre orange clown. i grew up in Conservative Northern Indiana, and if i may be so bold it is quite possibly one of the most evil places on Earth considering the sheer volume of bigotry that happens there. in my home town there was a whole ass Trump house. the entire outside and yard draped in Trump memorabilia. another house, YEAR AROUND has the nativity scene and a GIANT cross IN THE FRONT YARD, and in the area is an active triple K. safe to say it is not a friendly place if you’re not cishet, white, and christian. i never have fit in there. ever. from the moment i was sentient i remember adults from my home town giving me dirty looks, whispering to their children to stay away from me. i developed mental illnesses very early because of this. i always knew i wasn’t just a girl, and i also always knew i didn’t just like boys. but i HAD to hide that, i was taught from a young age that how i felt was sinful. but i had a saving grace, unrestricted internet access during the 2010’s. only instead of randomly happening upon IRL gore, i found a community that understood how i felt and helped me to understand there was nothing wrong with how i felt. at first i was just Bi, then i found out about Genderfluid identities from Undertale. unfortunately a kid i was friends with had me on every social i had at the time and grilled me about being Genderfluid, which then i said “nvm no i’m not, i’m totally cis!! trust me!” and hid the fact i felt things about my gender until 16. though i fully believe that he told people around us that i was Queer and kids really hated me during middle school (for more than that reason, i was the weird kid), but i was told to off myself everyday and this still haunts me into being 21 years old. then another man ruined it for me. actually just the area ruined it. i flip flopped between cis and enby for years, and when i finally accepted it (i had accepted being Pan/Queer for years at that point) the guy i was dating at the time forced me back into the CisHet box. this guy was very abusive and did things to me i will NEVER forget. when he broke up with me i quietly changed my pronouns to she/they on instagram and the NEXT DAY he confronted me in art class. days later he outed me to the neo n4z1 kids. my senior year almost cost me my life because of him. i was called a “tranny whore” and many other things. other trans kids even treated me horribly, denying my identity and leaving me out of being well. trans and queer. i was slammed into walls by people. the past 4 years since 2021 has been building myself back up and rediscovering and trying fully understand myself. this has become “everything changes all the time, nothing is black and white, and the rules of society when it comes to sexuality and gender are bullshit”. my identity has lead to falling out with family, and i’m fine with that. i made this work to be loud, unconventional, a bit too much even. because that’s how people consider my identity. nobody around me even really respects it now, and it’s hard. but what i’ve learned is that i deserve to exist, i can take up space, i have the right to be happy. everyone does. this Pride be proud of who you are, no matter how you identify. you deserve to live and anyone who tells you otherwise is wrong. stay strong y’all and don’t let what’s happening suppress you because that’s what these evil ass people want. stay around, keep living, keep loving, and be rebellious.

Background:

[checkoutmybookshelf]

Ok, I'm in the last chunk of Valdemar, the third in the Founding of Valdemar trilogy, and a companion quite literally just went "We want and need our Chosen to be healthy, in mind, heart, and body," and y'all...not only does this ping my ableism bell, but it also seems to be rewriting Valdemaran history a little bit???

Like, let's be absolutely real here. On the page, heralds in other Valdemar books have experienced depression (Vanyel), PTSD (literally most of them, but Vanyel, Thalia, and probably Mags), hypervigilance (Vanyel again), anger management challenges (Tylendel), anxiety (Lan), and a host of varying physical disabilities (Jadus, Thalia, Amily, Pol, and the heralds whose name I forget who ends up severely burned in the Arrows of the Queen trilogy). I haven't always liked how the physical injuries and disabilities are handled, but they've always been present and they've never actually disqualified anyone from being a Herald, even if Amily had to be partly cured before being chosen and Jadus retired after losing his leg.

This new statement about how companions prefer explicitly abled heralds feels like a really icky attempt to rewrite history, and this book has handled disability in general really poorly, even for a Vakdemar novel. And no, this book doesn't even get the excuse of "it's a survival situation" because they've been in Haven for ten years, they're fine. They aren't actively traveling, they've succeeded in building a sustainable and defensible keep, everything else is details and time.

This whole passage is really problematic in the context of the Valdemar universe:

So there are a couple of key issues. First, we really, REALLY need to address why casual sanist language is not ok. The companion isn't talking about quirky behaviors or idiosyncrasies when they say "madness," and we shouldn't be quick to elide what I am choosing to interpret as clinical madness (mad studies scholars, help me out here, I know definitions can be slippery, but I don't have a good one for fantasy contexts) with personality quirks--which is what Restil is doing here. Be CLEAR about your term use and watch where you're using sanist language and maybe stop.

Second, I really dislike the whole idea that madness can spread. Yes, I know, companions are magical and have a weird hive mind thing happening, but I dislike the perpetuation of the myth that madness is contagious or that associating with mad people can make you mad out of nowhere. That's a deeply harmful, isolating idea that is kind of antithetical to heralds as I understood them in other books--particularly Vanyel's trilogy. Community strengthens and supports, it does not ostracize and isolate. This was actually WILD to hear in a heraldic context in a Valdemar novel, because I think every other Herald would rightfully lose their absolute shit over this. Whatever happened to "there will never be another Tylendel?"

Third, the swimmer and drowning man analogy is bad here, for the same reasons that perpetuating the idea that you can "catch" madness is bad. We do not leave people to drown, and the analogy oversimplifies the ever-loving hell out of mental health crises and what can be done to support the person in crisis. We do not just leave them to drown, and again, the Heraldic Circle literally would never.

Fourth...that last sentence is just straight ableist. It is very much expecting what Rosemarie Garland-Thompson defined as a normate: a 20-something cishet white man who is athletic. Literally the normate is so narrow and focused as to barely exist in the real world, and it completely negates the value of anyone who doesn't fit that mold. It's also contradictory to the "we take the weird ones" ethos the companion expressed earlier, so the writing itself is wishy washy on the whole thing.

I am just...floored and kind of disgusted by the blatant rewrite of what companions look for in their chosen here, and I cannot square it with other Valdemar books that handled this better (although not perfectly). Like, as someone who lost communities to chronic illness, I'm very much soured on companions after this book. I will take Yfandes or Kalira or Rolan over any companion in this book, and I'm pretty sure the circle in earlier books wouldn't have stood for this.

[lockandkeyhyena]

Hihi! I’m very confused about terms and I’ve seen you discuss some of these before so i thought you could help me! I’ve tried googling them and I sorta know the definitions, I’m just not sure how to be able tell when it’s being used, etc. I tried searching through tumblr too but all that came up was radfem posts uhhhhhh

Anyways! Terms: Transmisandry, misandry, mysogyny, and transmysogony (I probably spelled these wrong)

misogyny and transmisogyny are bias against/hated of/prejudice against women and trans women specifically. they refer to real tangible issues that are pretty easily understood if youre not a bigot

misandry is hatred of men. its real, as in there are people out there who do hate men, but it’s not a systematic issue because patriarchal men (white, cishet, rich, etc) (who this hatred is usually directed towards) arent like… oppressed lol. it only becomes an issue when it intersects with other prejudices as far as i understand. keep in mind i Do Not Know much about this stuff and its probably best you read some julia serano or bell hooks

transmisandry….. um. best if you forget about this one. just forget it exists. you’ll be happier for it.

[llycaons]

lot of fun opinions on that homophobic shonen protags poll

the debates over yusuke rage. he was openly transphobic on screen, but is also friends with kurama so..hm.

#but I can't believe yusuke has votes when he canonically kissed his bestie#he's a transphobe not a homophobe

obviously there's overlap but! much to consider. he's also someone who grows up a lot during the series and is notably more chill as an older teenager. he definitely said slurs as a 14 yr old tho

ichigo is barely developed but his series is full of stereotypes of gay men as overly concerned with appearance, evilly effeminate, and sexually predatory. 'he has gay friends' says one tag but um citation FUCKING needed! wait shit

#ichigo doesn't understand but he's got the spirit you know? like he thought uryu was gay and tried to be supportive

oh fuck this might have actually happened. okay maybe ichigo isn't the worst but I'm leaving up my earlier thought bc im not a coward

#ive never seen bleach but that guy looks like he'd be an iphone user

ichigo actually predates iphones! but this is not relevant to the discussion

also the tags calling edward a smug atheist bastard vs. his 'love is love' edit lmao

#who the heck slandering Edward Tho!? This boy ain’t give a crap about homo he got better things to worry about. you go little atheist boy.#He the bane of the military existence for a reason that he works for that only keep him around because he good at alchemy. KNOW THE SERIES.

first of all the way this is written is insane. second of all what does being homophobic have to do with being the bane of the military?!

WAIT THERE'S MORE

#who the fuck is calling edward elric homophobic???? yeah he's an annoying atheist but he's so so antifa

PLEASE HE WORKS FOR THE MILITARY

The amount of people saying "edward isnt homophobic" is so funny. The "love is love i see no difference) meme is not the actual edward elric hes a libertarian military brat. Get a grip #''hes so antifa'' you gotta be smoking dick

LIBERTARIAN EDWARD ELRIC

I see why people call yusuke and naruto bi or gay but edward I never really saw it...his friendship with ling seems very hetero to me. fma always came off as a a very cishet series (lest we forget arawaka's 'men are muscular and women are va-voom' doodle + the heteronormative nuclear family ending). and deku and ichigo too I think they're just straight kids

#also izukus homophobia comes from his bully being a fruity bastard

scream?

'most of these protagonists would never be homophobic' I think you've wildly overestimated the average early 2000s 15 year old shonen boy ngl

#kirito vouldnt care less about anything but his friends/harem#he dropped fighting to live out his little nuclear family fantasy#being homophobic isnt on his radar

wow I wonder if having a nuclear family fantasy would predispose you to certain regressive ideas about gender roles and sexual orientation. it's not like most people consciously make an effort to Be Homophobic it just arises from a set of assumptions and stereotypes you're exposed to in a homophobic society....I feel like the person who wrote this may be stupid. this guy is sweeping the poll currently and at least half of the tags that mention him fucking hate him so it sounds like he's a piece of shit. some people are defending him saying he's bi tho. tbh I didn't even think people liked sword art online, famous harem incel incest fantasy about a chronically online gamer boy, in the year of your lord 2024 anymore

back and forths about deku. as a more recent shonen protag he seems less hateful to me but he also seems very het and the author is nasty so. hm

#wtf voted Luffy? he would never. he's literally a pirate

GOOD NEWS EVERYONE PIRATES CAN'T BE HOMOPHOBIC. like I agree but also what an argument, it's kind of nice to see luffy so low since I liked his vibes in the live action but WHO IS VOTING GON??!!!!! you're saying gon is more homophobic that YUSUKE??!!! I don't think gon even knows what homophobia IS and if he did he'd think it was messed up! not a single tag here is disagreeing so maybe they were mistaken votes

goku struck me as foolish yet well-meaning which is what everyone is agreeing.

#also. Goku is aroace spectrum in my hearth. just throwing that out there

god I wish I lived in a world where that meant he wasn't homophobic.

naruto seems to be a mixed bag bc he almost definitely is gay (even tho some ppl in the tags are like umm it's only POSSIBLE) but nobody can agree if he ever stopped being internalized homophobic about it or if he's a more 'confused but he's got the spirit' kind of deal

yuji ranks very low, which also makes sense bc jjk is a newer series and most shonen in the mid-00s had a lot more homophobia in general than they do now. he seems like a decent kid, tho I never finished s1. the pink hair makes him seem chiller than most

kagome is getting mixed reviews but mostly landing on the not homophobic side. having seen nothing of inuyasha I cannot comment. some tags saying she's a fujoshi some saying shes bi some say both

lots of people saying lucy fairy tale so I'm obligated to mention her but idk shit about that show except it looked kinda misogynistic so if she WAS homophobic I'll give her a pass/s

#kirito is the only answer here because everyone else is gay

im sorry but edward and ichigo are like some of the straightest guys in shonen like please

and FINALLY arguments about whether death note should be included, since it was run in shonen jump. it's not a purely action/fantasy series, so that's probably why it was left out, but it WAS targeted towards teenage boys so I guess it would technically count. anyway everyone is saying light would win by a landslide if he was listed

thanks for coming to my breakdown I will probably revisit this in a week when the poll ends

[ramblingtomcat]

This time I wanna post something positive and cute :3

My friendships are unique. I'm not always a good friend but I try for the ones remaining. And that includes:

My other ADHD/autistic friends who I sometimes forget but am very close to when we do talk

The guy who I keep sending cursed things and memes back and forth that make me think "thanks I hate it, please send more"

The girl who is all the drama but also caring in her own way and I appreciate that despite not getting some of her life choices

The girl I know since elementary school who knows exactly how cringe I was and who I will always be cringe with

The guy who is cishet and yet one of the queerest cishet persons I know and actually a guy I would trust with my drink 100%

A ride or die bestie who I managed to match styles with multiple times without actually coordinating it

The platonic soulmate online bestie who ghosts me sometimes but when they're not ghosting me they are the one person that actually gets me and yet I'm not in love with them

Two friends that I befriended when they were breaking up with each other and now we and another before mentioned friend who is dating one of them and we are pretty close despite it getting a little less frequent in the group chat lately

My very neurodivergent undiagnosed writer crowd who I love dearly although sometimes our neurodivergencies don't match

My queer friends and acquaintances that make me forget straight people exist sometimes

My straight friends that remind me that straight people exist and can be chill too

Yeah friends are great. Just needed to get it out

[gayvampyr]

im sorry but this shit pisses me off. i don’t care if it’s a joke. where’s the punchline. even in 2022 gays still do not have equal rep in shows. the fact that only in the last couple years have we gotten actually semi-decent queer rep shows how much queer media is still needed. a lot of people still don’t even know what the word “bisexual” means, much less terms like “asexual” or “aromantic” or “nonbinary”. whether you’d like to admit it or not, it matters that a show actually has a bi character and explicitly says the word bisexual— a popular show at that. ik some of you guys have forgotten that the rest of the world isnt as acquainted with queerness as your online lgbt friend group, but a show on a major streaming platform saying “bisexual people exist” is important. it needs to be said, and it needs to keep being said until people stop forgetting and erasing bi people.

and yeah, the line “masculine guys can be gay” might seem like a stupid obvious thing, but a lot of people don’t consider masc guys to be gay at all, just like they don’t expect lesbians to be fem. i’ve been told several times that i don’t “look gay” and that i must be confused because i should like “boy stuff” and dress masculine if i really liked girls. people need to be reminded that anyone can be gay, as ridiculous as it sounds. we need to be seen as more than a stereotype and im sick of you “edgy” gays shitting on every piece of queer media like it’s twilight.

the show that these tags are in response to isn’t even adult media. honestly it’s hardly even YA. this show is for kids and teens who are discovering who they are. growing up, i never had ANY sort of representation. i didn’t grow up thinking it was okay to like girls, or that i could be interested in people other than boys, or that i even had the option to not like boys at all. queer representation is not only important, but it’s crucial. straight people get to see themselves everywhere, and never as comedic relief or the butt of a joke. queer kids grow up thinking that what they are is humiliating, that they should be ashamed of being those people who get laughed and made fun of on tv (and irl). in 99% of media, gay and trans people have been a laughing stock. the most representation a queer could get a decade ago was a white cis fem (but not TOO fem) gay man who was only a side character, was never shown with a partner, and served primarily as a clown, like queerness is a circus and cishets are the audience.

so i don’t CARE if young queer media is cringe. i don’t CARE if you don’t like it or if you think it’s forced or stupid or pointless or even if it’s just for a corporation to profit off our existence. the point isn’t why it was made or how bad you think the writing is, the point is that it exists and that there are now young queer people who can finally see themselves, not as a joke but as real people, on screen and go, “that. that’s what i am.” and im elated for this younger generation to be able to say that when i couldn’t. so i don’t care if you’d rather just be called a faggot again like in the good ol days when we were dropping like flies and everyone hated us. if cringey tv shows and bad writing is the price for queer kids to understand themselves better and for cishet people to get a better understanding of queer people, then it’s a small price to pay. shut the fuck up and let queer media exist

[cmyknoise]

feel like the part about 'lets not speculate about sexuality and gender identities' people forget is also not assuming straight is the default

if you assume everyone you see on twitter is cishet, you dangerously corner people into boxes where they may feel pressured to come out or go further into the closet.

real people cant queerbait by existing.

a dude calling his best friend his boyfriend as a joke, or pointing to guy character and going 'oh he's hot' isn't queerbaiting just because their sexuality is ambiguous to you.

friends may have different relationships and dynamics than your own, they don't have to be traditional. some friends hold hands and make jokes.

harmless jokes like that isn't problematic in the first place, if anything it pushes the norm that guys can be affectionate with each other or find one another attractive without sexual intent behind it. but even if there is something there, it's not your job to sleuth it out like a detective. no gaydar truthing.

it's also not your job to assume 'oh they won't come out or haven't come out yet that means they're straight!' that's not how that works. you're an asshole. revaluate what the hell you're doing online. speculating someone's sexuality to either praise or condemn is unhealthy and puts us further steps back.

yes this is about content creators online but its also about people you may meet in real life. just because someone is ambiguous with their gender/sexual identity, or if they simply don't say or don't want to, doesn't mean they're straight, and you shouldn't treat them like that. respect their wish to keep that part of their life private, and don't condemn them for making harmless jokes like 'i want to kiss my homies' or 'this character is hot', especially if those jokes are among their friends who DO identify as not cishet and clearly are making those jokes back.

it's harmless, and in fact you do more harm trying to box people in and force them to make some statement on their identity than if you just left them alone and respected people