empusium

[empusium]

i mean the only reason egg jokes used to make me uncomfortable is that as a very feminine trans guy the idea that a guy being feminine means he must secretly be a girl made me feel not great but then i realized its like. not about me lmao

o7

and for what its worth, there is almost always more to it than just "being feminine", as people seem to assume; things like dissatisfaction and a poor connection to one's body, which might be signs of dysphoria, and seeking out transfeminine people, are what I look for first. It's not running around assuming everyone who's feminine is a woman.

[empusium]

I'm trying to collect and compile a list of transfeminine works and reviews or discussions of said works. I've found there to be very little discussion or consensus around these works, and very little attention on them overall. I want to do what I can to change that. Please if you would on the notes of this post or in my inbox, mention any transfeminist literature you've heard of and what you've heard about it. if you've read it, please give me your thoughts on the work as well, but don't be ashamed if you haven't been able to read something or finish it, I'd rather have some information than none at all. My current goal is to aggregate works which can be shown and recommended to others as core to understanding trans feminism. Any works welcome but I am especially interested in what you found beneficial about them and what audience you would recommend them to. I'm looking for personal thoughts and experiences, not other aggregates that lack context. Thank you I'll start by sharing a few works I've read and found insightful or seen discussed positively myself. Please do provide your own thoughts on the works mentioned as well. If I get enough feedback I will make an update with concise explanations of each work and what they're good for or where they may fail first, though its not about transsexuality, Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex is of core importance for understanding intersectional concepts such as transmisogyny Girls You Can Hit A Brief Materialist Look at Transgender Oppression The Third Sex Hot Allostatic Load Faggotization and The Extant Gender Ternary A Socialist, Feminist, and Transgender Analysis of Sex Work Why are AMAB trans people denied the closet? Transgender Marxism Whipping Girl Marxism and Transgender Liberation A Short History of Trans Misogyny

[empusium]

Hi! I’d like to ask if you maybe could elaborate on Doumeki’s reading as ultimately only cis man? It’s such an interesting approach because it’s such a well established fact that I haven’t even thought about anything prior to that conclusion. I haven’t even thought about it as being a conclusion - just a matter of fact you don’t need to think about lol. But your post made me consider his charakter development before 24/25 ch and after, fandom’s perception of him, and huh. I can see that. Maybe - I can feel that ‘cause I’m not sure if I’m able to pinpoint anything directly or even articulate anything related to it but it’s a food for thoughts nevertheless! And I’m very curious about your thoughts!

(Your post made me genuinely excited and now I’m gonna chew on it ngl)

hiii hello! see, i think viewing doumeki being cis as a conclusion that you have to come to rather than a given allows you to have a better understanding of his relationship to his own gender (not something i see talked about often, despite there being so much meat there!) and progression throughout the story. not to say that you absolutely have to approach it from the "could doumeki be trans?" angle to understand his character, but let's entertain the idea that there could've been a girl underneath all that. even if the only possible conclusion is that she is either "dead" or never existed, it's still interesting to think about

doumeki's gender does feel like something you don't need to question, and i don't think the story asks you to either, but i believe it has more to do with appearances and certain expectations tied to the genre than anything the character actually expresses. you see the design and hear the exaggeratedly deep voice (if you ever listened to a cast talk, you know that hatano wataru doesn't sound like that out of character, there is literal voice training involved in the performance) and it's so simple and obvious: doumeki is a man. none of that is about his own feelings though, right? you just know what you're being sold

the thing is, in the early volumes doumeki is neither that "good at being a man", nor does he seem to particularly care for the role. he doesn't put effort into the gender performance, unlike every other man in the yakuza (except for amou, but more on him later), and similarly to how doumeki doesn't reflect on his own sexuality until yashiro asks, he doesn't reflect on his gender either. doumeki is a man simply because he was told to be one, it's something the reader and other characters project or assume based on his physical appearance, rather than a choice. what experience is it reminiscent of if we take into consideration the possibility of a trans reading and how much doumeki represses and denies himself? if we're actually looking at a lonely, directionless girl who is doing what she was told and doesn't know anything else, would it explain the discomfort and hollowness and certain clumsiness in the role?

(if you're wondering why i'm hellbent on using "girl" for schrödinger's transfem doumeki, it's because i feel like you could see her most clearly in the moments where doumeki reminds you of a child. she's in the sensitivity and gentleness and not being loved enough. not because those are inherently feminine traits, it's just... thinking about a childhood doumeki could've had but didn't, the family dynamic being the way it is specifically because he was perceived as a boy, his and aoi's sexual abuse, and what role did it play in him being who he is now. i want to sit with the child hiding underneath all the loneliness and bitterness and repressed feelings. boy, girl, doesn't really matter, this is how i feel about doumeki in general, regardless of the reading. waving my hands. if you feel it you feel it)

doumeki's fear of becoming like his father can be read both as subconscious fear of "becoming a man" (saezuru plays with "father" and "man" being interchangeable a lot, while "son" is someone still in the process of becoming and can be emasculated or degendered) and as internalized transmisogyny because of how it's tied to any expression of his sexuality. like, the violent rejection of his father and anxiety doumeki has around becoming a rapist for simply expressing sexual desire genuinely makes more sense in the context of trans reading than cis one. doumeki's impotence, in his mind, is not a bad thing, because it separates him from his father, and in yashiro's - from other men and her stepfather. they both find comfort in doumeki being degendered in this way, which makes their dynamic early on very interesting, and says a lot about doumeki's feelings towards manhood if you're willing to dig into it

the issue is, regardless of yashiro's feelings and reasoning, she is initially objectifying and sexualizing doumeki in a very particular way that can easily be read as transmisogynistic in this context. her focus is on doumeki's penis, a body part that many people genuinely view as "the rape organ" and would with full conviction tell you is all the proof you need of him being a man, and something that trans women are routinely both sexualized and denied their womanhood for. at the same time, the objectification being tied specifically to doumeki's impotency reinforces the idea that he's desirable only as long as he remains an unfeeling sex toy that has no wants of its own. not to mention that his consent or lack thereof is not considered at all until later on. i get on doumeki's case a lot for not telling yashiro that he's no longer impotent once he realizes, but it's understandable why he doesn't and why he sees himself as a disposable toy. and speaking of disposability, quick strong attachment and willingness to do and bear with anything out of fear of abandonment - very bpd girlie of doumeki (i'm only like, half-joking here)

we can do the usual thing where we equate being in the yakuza, its own little representation of patriarchy, to being a man, not in the sense of personal identity but more so in the sense of belonging to a class and being part of the system. it works with trans reading of yashiro and ryuzaki, but with doumeki... not really. and this is where things start to fall apart, because while everyone around him is saying that he doesn't belong in the yakuza (especially yashiro and aoi, both of whom have their similar reasons for wanting to see doumeki as different from other men, which is in part done by denying him as a sexual being because of how closely sexuality, manhood and violence are tied together for them) and you could argue that there is some truth to it, it is something that doumeki actively chooses for himself over and over again. his reasons for doing so are unique, and he doesn't have any ambitions regarding his placement in the hierarchy, but that doesn't negate the fact that doumeki is making a choice. a self-destructive one, sure, and one that you could read as repression if you wanted to, an attempt to fit the role at the cost of a part of yourself, and therefore still co-exist with the trans reading. but still, it's a choice, and doumeki is able to follow through with it only after his fear of becoming like his father became a self-fulfilling prophecy. is it still about repression then, or simply acceptance of who you are?

so let's talk about what else doesn't work. let's kill the girl

unlike yashiro, who is narratively always positioned close to other women, doumeki is closer to men, and particularly father figures like misumi, his own father and yashiro's stepfather. too many implications in that, none of which are pleasant

doumeki's experience with sexual abuse is different from aoi's and yashiro's, so much so that the latter doesn't connect with him (and him only) through it, she doesn't relate. it goes the other way too, with doumeki not being able to understand either of them. not to say that he isn't traumatized by it, of course he is, but to put it bluntly: doumeki not being on the receiving end of penetrative sex matters here. with the nurse he still gets to be, and forgive me for the clumsiness, in "a man's position", with his sense of identity unscathed. it was an adult abusing a child first and foremost, whereas for yashiro and aoi both gender was extremely relevant to the abuse. there is a line drawn that only really makes sense if we view doumeki as cis

after the time skip, doumeki's power over yashiro is reinforced through sexual violence and control over yashiro's body and sex, with their dynamic being very heteronormative, especially compared to the first volume where doumeki was still degendered because of his impotence and yashiro wrongly assumed that they were similar in what she saw as "being broken" (here's that internalized transmisogyny again). doumeki's desire of control, often seen as protectiveness in a generous light, also ties into the idea of women as property that needs to be protected from other men, often at the cost of their autonomy. not to mention that doumeki's guilt over aoi is also related to failing at the role of a protector as her brother. again, makes more sense when we read him as cis, especially considering how different yashiro's (and ryuzaki's for that matter!) protectiveness looks in comparison

i mentioned amou before, because he's an interesting character who, if we look past the appearances, comes off as very... genderless? compared to everyone else. that, as well as his reasons for being in the yakuza, make him similar to the early chapters doumeki. the difference is, amou-chan with his 私 remains uncommited to the gender game throughout the story. we're not shown a sexual or romantic relationship that would highlight his manliness, and even his position as misumi's unrecognized son reads as rather degendered. doumeki's different, not as static, and not at all degendered after joining the yakuza proper. so in a weird way amou supports reading doumeki as cis by uh, being amou

this has less to do with the text itself, but doumeki's character progression, uncontrollable anger, sexual violence and behavior after the time skip make a trans reading very... risky i guess is the word? personally, i don't think that we should attempt to do a trans reading only for characters who would be "good representation" (blergh. ough.) if they were canonically trans. but it needs to be done with care. not that i expect anyone to come out of this fully committed to the idea that girl doumeki could've been real of course, i'm just saying this mostly for the sake of transparency and to point out that, if you were to attempt to work through all the contradictions without stumbling into some shitty implictions, it would be reaally fucking hard to do

having said all that (and probably having forgotten to mention a few points, but oh well), i still don't want to definitively declare that doumeki couldn't possibly be trans, to let go of the idea of the girl that i tried to sell you in the beginning. very indecisive on my part, i know. "doumeki can only be read as a cis man" me when i lie. in my defense, it is partially because i do not believe in these things being so easy to determine, at least realistically speaking, as if there is one universal experience, and partially because it's hard to get a good read on doumeki's thoughts after the time skip. does he read as a cis man? yes, absolutely, at least insofar as you can even judge those things from the outside. how much of it is performative, simply playing a role of a man he thinks yashiro wants, and how much of it is genuine? hard to tell. but i guess my main point here is to show that doumeki's gender can be a question, or a conclusion, something to consider different takes on, rather than an indisputable fact you just need to accept the moment you see the character for the first time

[empusium]

Hi! Please do elaborate on butch transfem Ryuzaki!

alright, doomed t4t yuri time

as a disclaimer, there is nothing really substantial to support trans reading of ryuzaki, it's completely accidental and relies entirely on accepting trans reading of yashiro first, which is already asking a lot. i'm working with scraps here, so don't take this as a serious analysis of the text, this is just me reading into it a narrative that i find compelling and purposefully looking at certain things from the perspective that doesn't necessarily align with the authorial intent

i say "butch" specifically because in terms of gender expression, ryuzaki doesn't experience any discomfort with masculinity per se nor does he want to present more feminine. which is why talking about trans reading of the character is a bit trickier than it is with yashiro, isn't it? for many people there's this... expectation, or demand rather, of femininity that comes with the words "trans woman", so a trans butch's womanhood is easily denied on the basis of her "not being enough of a woman" or "basically just being a man". similar logic can be extended to a transgender reading of a character who isn't feminine "enough" or at all, because, well, if they don't want to wear a dress, then what's the point? and i guess part of the appeal of this interpretation for me is that it goes against those notions about gender and transfemininity. obviously you don't have to accept it, but if you don't see why this reading can be compelling, then it's worth asking "why, thought?"

there is just one thing about ryuzaki's gender presentation that stuck with me since the moment he was introduced (and i'll have to thank the movie for that) and it's how particular he is about his accessories, or at least the earring. it's not really the type that i'd normally expect a (cishet) man to wear, and it stays unlike the ring he was wearing in the first two volumes, so there's significance to it. now, i'm not saying that a man wearing accessories means that he must be a woman, and ryuzaki's ring(s), bracelet and necklace in the flashbacks and the cover for ch 26 are what you'd see men in the yakuza wear, but the earring? i think about it a lot, about its implication of homosexuality, and how you can take it a step further, make it about gender, too, and performing masculinity not the same way men do

so, sexuality. in the context of cis reading ryuzaki is very compelling as a gay man, and i've talked about it before, but, as the word "butch" implies, here i want to take it in a different direction and say that he genuinely prefers women. it recontextualizes his feelings for yashiro, because rather than a man falling in love with another man, it's a woman falling in love with a woman like her, because she is like her, trapped and dying just the same. which leads me to ch 14 and the question that sent me down this rabbit hole in the first place

"do you want to become a woman?" do you, ryuzaki? because now this isn't about internalized homophobia and desire for a "yes" just so it would make his feelings for yashiro "normal", as in straight, but then again, even if you were to try to read that intention into it - he's not asking if yashiro is a woman, the question is about wanting to become one. allusion to transitioning aside, there is a connection between becoming a woman or becoming a yakuza, the latter in a less literal sense being about submitting to a violent patriarchal system where the only role you can play if you want to survive is that of a man. ryuzaki is only two years older than yashiro, so he's what, 21? in that flashback, and yet for him everything has already been decided. he's asking as someone who no longer has a choice and has been condemned to rotting in a cage that is manhood, but yashiro still could take a different path, from ryuzaki's perspective at least

there could've been something there, maybe a conversation that would've made things easier for both of them, but yashiro replies with his usual simplification. yes, it would be nice to be a woman, but the only difference is that it would make having sex with men easier, that's all there is to it. and what does it leave ryuzaki with if he's not even attracted to men to begin with? nothing. there is nothing to being a woman for you, so don't think about. and he doesn't, neither of them do, and yashiro ultimately walks into the same cage as ryuzaki. you've got to wonder how much it hurt to see the only person who is inexplicably like you end up the same way

i'll leave reading into other scenes for another time since i have too much to say on the topic, but hopefully this gives a general idea to go off of if you want to look at the character from this perspective as well. one last thing i do want to mention here is that ryuzaki's first name is atsushi, 篤士. the first kanji can be read as "kind, cordial, faithful, warm", and if you look at the second kanji, you'll see that it has some connotations with manhood, which is why i'm bringing it up. in the context of transgender reading, there is some irony to "man" being implied in your name. we still don't know yashiro's, so it's like there is still some hope, but knowing ryuzaki's means that there might be none left for him. the way he is now, in prison, with his hair forcibly cut short, the earring likely taken away, maybe there isn't, maybe it is too late. and that's fine. there are certain expectations when it comes to trans narratives, that of a moment of realization, transitioning and a happy ending, and those narratives are important, of course, but i personally want to talk more about those of us who were doomed to rot. not because i enjoy the suffering, but because i find some comfort in being able to look at a character who is not intended to be seen that way and say "i still see you, despite it all"

[empusium]

Hi! My ask is related to your latest answer about Yashiro’s interest in leaving yakuza. You mentioned that not showing Yashiro and Miaumi sex was a smart decision and it caught my attention. So I wanted to ask how do you interpret that specific choice? I’m very curious about your take on that cause that’s something I’ve been wondering about but I couldn’t come up with any real answers, I had only some vague feelings about it.

hi hi, thank you for the question! i did spend a lot of time thinking about that choice, but i wouldn't say that i hold any real answers either, especially since we're talking about absence of a scene rather than analyzing something that exists in the text. so ultimately this is just me trying to put my own somewhat vague feelings into words

in my opinion not showing misumi and yashiro having sex renders the sexual violence invisible (in a literal sense, you know it happened, but don't have the mental image to recall every time the man shows his face) and therefore forgettable. it has a lot to do with how misumi is written in general - he is violent and cruel, but the cruelty doesn't come out that often, doesn't seep through his every word like it does with inami for example, where it's difficult to see a person through the anger and disgust that he evokes (it's still important to try to, though). misumi as we know him now is arguably charismatic, usually relatively calm, even funny at times, and his conversations with yashiro come off as friendly and lack the edge. so you're inclined to forget how violent misumi can be. that is, until he says or does something that reminds you of how much control and power he actually has over yashiro (which is also why his cruelty is so... effective? for the lack of a better word). that outburst in vol 7 and the seeming ease with which yashiro deescalated the situation only make me wonder how many times it had happened before and how much it reflects what their dynamic was like when they were sleeping together

i think there's also something in how you learn about misumi being sexually involved with yashiro in ch 1, without it being shown, and later in the same chapter learn about yashiro's stepfather abusing him, once again without being shown anything. you're not forced to look at it. and then in vol 2 you get both the flashback to yashiro being raped and to the physical violence he experienced at the hands of misumi, as well as the lead up to them having sex for the first time (consider the importance of misumi calling yashiro his "son" in this context), but only that - the sex itself isn't shown. you know it happened, you know it will be happening for a while, and you know that it's about control, but you're spared the visuals. here's the thing though, at that point you've already seen yashiro having sex with so many men that adding one more scene shouldn't matter, right?

which leads me to the question of dignity. i don't remember if the word is ever used in the text, but it's always at the back of my mind when i (re)read saezuru. there's a lot to be said about who has the privilege of their sex life being respected and private, who can walk away from a sexual encounter without being branded a whore or a faggot (not yashiro, but seemingly every man who had sex with him. i've got to mention, especially since it's you who sent the ask, that transmisogyny read on that is absurdly easy to make), how different characters' sexual trauma is treated (e.g. aoi's is described by doumeki without her knowledge or consent and simultaneously made into his trauma in a way, and you're shown it, too; doumeki's is only described, not fully, and he talks about it himself), etc. it's a very broad topic, but back to misumi - not showing him having sex is about his dignity. you as a reader are not privy to seeing him exposed the same way as yashiro. you never see misumi having sex with women either, but he boasts about how many lovers he has, because it's a status symbol. so the power and status are established and maintained without his vulnerability being exposed. misumi gets to have dignity, yashiro doesn't, and by not showing them have sex misumi is not put down to yashiro's level, which simultaneously puts him above men like ryuzaki (look at the group sex during the flashback in vol 2 and ch 5 from this perspective, how misumi gets to watch and interrupt both times, whereas his sex with yashiro most likely always happened in private. control, entitlement, possessiveness. privilege of privacy. you know)

to be clear, i don't think that that's how yoneda kou herself looks at things. she wouldn't have been able to put so much love and care towards those undesired otherwise. and as far as i'm concerned, there is more dignity in aoi's shaky voice or yashiro licking his own cum off the floor than in anything misumi has ever done with his life. but that's not how the society both in the context of the story and in real life looks at it. and if we're going with the idea that the author wants to have a conversation with her reader and poke at some biases they might have, then it's worth considering why she chooses to show some things but not others

[empusium]

from the transgender reading perspective, the thing about yashiro's assumption that his stepfather hated the idea of his body becoming "male" which makes the emphasis so important, is that it's all it is - an assumption. not necessarily a wrong one, but one made three years later, specifically after (and because of?) experiencing a form of rejection by kageyama that yashiro ties to his bisexuality and, by extension, gender as well.

it's easy to read projection into it, at least to a degree. the feeling of wrongness in your own body, constant and unrelenting, that yashiro never puts into words. dysphoria, if i had to put it into one. because it's not just about becoming an adult, it's about becoming "a man", about puberty and changes that may have been unwanted. "he must have hated it, and part of me hates it too".

and that's the pattern. everything always, always circles back to "being a man" or rather - "not a (cis) woman". disgust, hatred, abuse, desirability as a sex object, and only as a sex object but never a person, are all easily explained and justified by that alone. yashiro thinks that kageyama stops touching him not just because he's bi, but because he's "a man who likes men". it's a wrong assumption, which is why kuga hurt as much as he did, but it's important that that's where yashiro's mind goes to and that it stays with him for years. how his stepfather actually felt doesn't matter, but if his hatred towards the changes in yashiro's body played any role in him leaving, then it's ultimately a good thing. still, though, that's where the mind goes. the connection between "maleness" and aversion, even when it may be desired, is always there. and it says more about yashiro's feelings than it does about anyone else's.

[empusium]

prefacing this with the usual "everyone is free to enjoy the story however they want", but when it comes to trying to analyze it in any substantial way i personally think that refusing to look at ch 24 and 25 critically is a bit disingenuous. doumeki's inner conflict and fear of becoming like his father are not entirely disconnected from his actions, and neither is his anxiety over what happened with yashiro. the question "was it rape?" is never put into words nor asked directly, but it's there, and it's one you should be engaging with, even if just to say "no, it wasn't". because then you'd need to ask "why, thought?" and maybe even "why is this the only answer i'm willing to accept?" and that's when you can start having an uncomfortable, but meaningful conversation about so, so many things

[empusium]

The fact that neither Geto’s nor Gojo’s body belong to themselves after death is something I’m not normal about.

[empusium]

JJK HOT TAKE #9

Megumi is the most well-developed character in Jujutsu Kaisen. The fact that he's an unlikable little twerp is actually why he's so well written. He's not meant to be appealing or likable or even cool. He's supposed to be a complex victim of trauma and child grooming. The fact that he doesn't just magically get over his trauma makes him a better character, because his human complexity arises from how much he self-sabotages constantly and how much he goes in circles and is unable to overcome all that trauma he's badly coping with.

Megumi's actually an extremely down to earth character and unique in shonen manga? He doesn't have an over the top dramatic backstory. He's not someone with a massive hero complex like Yuji who's also a science experiment from Kenjaku who was always intended to house sukuna. Megumi is just some orphaned kid. Yes, he happened to inherit the Zen’in clans most powerful technique but that made his life actively worse. Megumi is kind of just like a foster kid who was failed by the system and never had any real home or family or even adult caretakers and that's why he stands out in a cast full of very over the top characters.

I think a lot of people hate Megumi because he's very flawed in ways that uncomfortably remind them of themselves. It's cool to see yourself in Yuji or Nobara it's unbelievably cringe to find Megumi relatable.

[empusium]

something that caught my attention while rereading though they drift, they do not sink, but nor do they sing is that yashiro never refers to his stepfather as, well, his stepfather. neither out loud when he tells kageyama about the abuse, nor in his thoughts. he calls him his mother's husband instead (再結婚相手, so second marriage partner if you want to be literal), which is interesting, right? there's this refusal to draw a direct familial connection, he's just a man yashiro's mother married. that's all there is to it.

it's different with doumeki, though. when yashiro tells him about the abuse, he calls the man simply his father (父親) at first, then notices this... slip up, almost? and specifies - stepfather. whether it's because yashiro accepted that it wasn't just some man who had nothing to do with him, but rather a parent, someone who's supposed to be caring and protective, or because the little pretend game of familial connections in the yakuza made the word "father" so inescapable that there's no point in avoiding it anymore, i don't know. probably both.

it's important that yashiro opened up to doumeki specifically, too. every other instance where he thinks or talks about his abuse, both with aoi and misumi, he doesn't reference his stepfather at all. it's just this vague "when i was a kid i was violated by a man. that's all". there's no clear timeframe and no way to even tell if he's referring to a specific man or not (as in, no clear distinction whether "man" is singular or plural). it feels almost impersonal. the only people who get to learn the truth, in yashiro's usual dismissive tone, but with enough details to make it something that they have to look at, are the man yashiro was in love with and someone reminiscent of him. neither kageyama nor doumeki know what to do with it, though.

[empusium]

Oh yes, I’ve been thinking about it whole day. Actually it’s so interesting that even though it’s such an obvious parallel and it’s such an important parallel in Y and D relationship I’m so invested in Yashiro’s impotency as a symptom of his own psychological health and his process of healing and letting pieces of his trauma to his consciousness that the “one and only” trope in that aspect is completely secondary to me. Not even secondary but a play on that trope even. And Y’s reaction to Doumeki’s questions about it makes it even more evident. It’s not a revelation to him, it’s not about “getting together” after revealing the secret. It’s much more about the expectations which Yashiro seems to be so aware. I mean, he in a way seems to be aware of the trope (and that’s so amazingly meta). The whole conversation about his orgasms, his “body reactions” to Doumeki seems to sadden him. And I know it has many layers to it and the sadness also consists emotions and thoughts about Doumeki and their relationship but it seems mich more loaded and much more about being reduced to a body for the nth time. Also there seems to be a need even from Yashiro to be only his body. To trust it and even reduce himself to its reactions cause it would make things so much easier and he’s been doing that for such a long time that it’s a safe mechanism (“safe” meaning a coping mechanism which enable you to survive in a least painful way in your current circumstances). But he’s aware that he can’t do that. It’s not that simple and he’s too far in the process of processing trauma to ignore the internal conflict. To ignore every contradicting aspect in his emotional reactions and his bodily reactions to reduce it only to his relationship with Doumeki. It’s about himself. About his “inability to change” even though it’s such an evident symptom of healing. But he can’t be understood, he can’t satisfy even himself, he can’t be “a good slut”, he can’t be “Doumeki’s woman”, he can’t be neither. He’s stuck. As always stuck in-between space.

i'm aware that yashiro's inability to get an erection during and after the time skip is heavily playing into the whole "doumeki is the only one" narrative, but i don't think it's that simple

[empusium]

❤️❤️❤️

@yukitsukumoo as promised, the extract from chapter 6 of Canary in the coal mine I chose for you.

This is actually inspired by my own experience trying to communicate with one of my colleagues

Tagging @empusium because I love you

Here you go!

Summary

In which Gojo is an award winning young author, who in order to write his last book, what he believes will be his magnum opus, decides to seek out and approach a highly sought after escort on whose experience he hopes to be able to base his novel.

[empusium]

You mention polyamory in the tag of your previous ask but D made it clear that he doesn’t want that and doesn’t that matter? I don’t think Y genuinely wanted an open relationship either considering his reactions about d with other people.

it does matter that doumeki is monogamous and it's perfectly fine to want that type of relationship, i'm sure that in ideal circumstances that's what yashiro would want too. my issue is that it was never even discussed. well, not that there was ever a proper conversation about dating in general, so it's part of a bigger problem. like, yes, doumeki makes it very clear what he wants, right before having sex with yashiro that he never explicitly consents to. it's not really a "let's talk about how i can be with you in a meaningful way that works for us both", right? doumeki wants something and takes it, and that's the end of it. something to be said about how much that conversation revolves specifically around yashiro's body, too. it's always about the body at the end of the day. so, yeah, i'm not saying that polyamory would've fixed anything, it wouldn't actually work, but that's interesting in itself

regarding an open relationship, i meant it in a more one-sided way, where yashiro is still free to have sex with other men. "unfair", yes, not exactly healthy, but neither is what he and doumeki have currently. i guess to me this form of compromise just feels natural, considering everything. sex for yashiro isn't just about his physical needs after all. it's also about getting information or forming useful connections. body as a tool, body as a payment. i don't think it's a stretch to say that sex work is part of yashiro's yakuza work. then there's the whole question of how much of it he actually wants, how often it's not entirely up to him, how his feelings have nothing to do with it and so on. it's complicated, and i think if doumeki understood it even a little bit (which he doesn't) he would consider being with yashiro without demanding to be his only sexual partner, even if it would be hard for him. we're talking about a man who's willing to make (some) sacrifices and die for yashiro after all. but then again, dying for someone doesn't require understanding them, so i guess in a way it's easier

i agree that yashiro doesn't genuinely want an open relationship (in this case i mean one where they both sleep with other people), but i do think that if it came to that he'd be able to make this work. as much as it hurts him to see doumeki with other people, he doesn't lash out on him for that and usually just distances himself to try work things out. it's very different from how doumeki reacts and acts on his feelings. even when yashiro's cornered and actually expresses his anger and frustration, he still agrees that it's none of his business who doumeki has sex with when asked directly instead of snapping at him for the hypocrisy. so again, i agree that an open relationship is not ideal and not something either of them genuinely want, but i do think that with enough effort and communication yashiro would be able to make it work if it came to that. doumeki wouldn't, thought

[empusium]

OK, now I’m screaming. I’m honoured. I can’t wait for the chapter. Also oh my, NOT my favourite trope which is Freud laughing from the background.

Sharing a WIP (chapter 5 of Canary in the coal mine ) cause I want people to read my shit. @empusium this is for you

It’s just Gojo bonding with his mother

Quick summary

In which Gojo is an award winning young author, who in order to write his last book, what he believes will be his magnum opus, decides to seek out and approach a highly sought after escort on whose experience he hopes to be able to base his novel.

[empusium]

I posted in the tags below my latest post phrase “transgender-“coded” character (socialised as man)” referring to Yashiro. And the moment I wrote it I felt that something is off (and kept overthinking it) but I wasn’t able to grasp it cause we use this phrase, right? There “shouldn’t” be any problem with that, right? But I kept thinking about it and I asked myself a very obvious question - was Yashiro really socialised as a man? Was he really raised and socialised according to gender norms on men and masculinity? And similarly obvious answer to that was - no, he wasn’t. He has always been an observer even to gender.

His whole life was about being treated as unintelligible (according to Riggs and Treharne’s theory of minority stress) and he’s also a perfect example of being an abject in Kristeva’s understanding of this term. He’s a subject (he’s human and should belong to himself) but at the same time an object - object that can be watched, used, treated with repulsion and contempt but because of this in-between existence - subject and object - the he as an abject can be desired, treated with curiosity, but still as an interesting phenomenon, anomaly, a display unit rather than a full-fledged human-being. The examples of groups treated as abjects are women, homosexual people and in general other discriminated groups. When we look at Y he’s at the same time a homosexual man but also he’s “not enough of a man” even without his homosexuality (actually bisexuality which is even “worse”; I’m also aware that those aspects can’t be really separated but for the sake of argument let’s treat them as such) he’s gender is a whole other conversation but while analysing him as a transgender women, we see how this only amplifies everything stated before.

But let’s get back to gender roles. Starting from his childhood, well it’s hard to talk about gender roles while talking about sexual abuse, but comments from his stepfather says a lot about social understanding of violence and its victims. He was raped cause “he was a girl” suggesting that, according to his stepfather’s reasoning, it wouldn’t have happened if he was a boy. We know nothing about other aspects of his childhood but it seems highly unlikely that he was taught and treated “as a boy” (understood as a form of upbringing that strengthens your sense of self-agency, that you have the right to *insert anything* and everything else we taught boys in patriarchal cultures).

During his high school he made himself an observer. He wasn’t part of any group, he didn’t socialise with “other boys” and the only interaction we see between him and the boys is while they mock and insult him. The object of these insults is also very important cause it’s linked to his sexuality, to his body (which is what he sells in their opinion)and he’s reduced to that and defined through that. Also his reaction seems to be important. What he “should” have done according to gender roles was showing aggression, deny “accusations” or act according to any other form of “masculine reaction”. But he’s reaction is a very interesting one and can be analysed through many different lenses but for this post I’m gonna stick with gender roles and abjection. By kissing the boy and grabbing his genitalia he at the same time grabbed him and dragged him to the space others have seen Y in. At the same time he was a subject, active party of interaction - he dragged a person who has (probably) always been treated as a subject from a position of an observer of an abject to the position of being observed in an interaction with the abject, so it presents a question of who is who, who observes who, who is a subject, a full person, and who is not - but at the same time Yashiro stayed in the same position, he amplified others’ contempt towards him, he cemented his position as an abject. Of course he was doomed from the start in this interaction but the action and resilience matters. At the same time a question about the nature of his reaction remains. It was a form of protest, an attempt to be intelligible but it was a form of sexual harassment nevertheless. How does that plays with gender roles? Was he an oppressor, a victim who was just fighting for oneself, both? Was he a “man” in this interaction or a “woman”?

And there’s Kageyama and oooh boy. I would love to say that he was different but as many others have already said - he wasn’t. Their relationship was based on pity towards Yashiro as a victim and his body. Actually without his body Kage wouldn’t even cross the line of being just “slightly better than the rest” random boy from Y class. That was Yashiro’s body that changed everything and Kage’s reaction to that was just pure objectification. Y’s body was a true piece on display. They hadn’t even been talking. To some extent yeah Kage acknowledged that the lack of judgment from Y was something he appreciated but isn’t it interesting that through staying silent Y remained in the position of an abject, the interesting object, but at the same time he could keep the scraps of the relationship. But the moment he decided to start talking, decided to tell something about himself as a person, a subject, and about his life, Kage decided to stop touching him and “started acting as some kind of a friend”. And we could look at it as something morally upright, but let’s be honest - Kage knew. He knew Yashiro was a survivor of abuse. Many instances of abuse. But Y was supposed to stay silent to keep the status quo. But he didn’t. What was left was pity but the abjection hasn’t stopped. You to see what I’m trying to say about gender roles here, right?

And then we have yakuza and ooooh. Many people have already written great analyses on Y, yakuza and gender norms, this so I’m not gonna repeat them. I can just comment on the moment he caught Misumi’s attention. It was his foot. You understand me, right? And then the whole cycle of abuse, being forced to join, not having any real choice, lack of ambition as not-fitting-for-the-yakuza-trait and everything else. Doumeki also perceived him through his beauty. Yeah, he saw more, but at the same time he didn’t and Y, even as a boss, wasn’t really in control. And then everything what is going on after the time skip but @nanayashi-agenda has written amazing commentaries on that (and on gender roles, Y position in the yakuza and everything actually) so, once again, I don’t want to repeat others (even though I’m well aware that without his posts I wouldn’t have been able to write this, so thank you).

So yeah, it was supposed to be short. And I don’t even know how to sum this up. Maybe that you could technically see this only as a homophobia but - was it really only that? Cause Y, his gender, his expression, the way he was treated, seems much more complex. Also he doesn’t WANT to be part of male-centred patriarchal organisation (I would even say that in this kind of world). It’s not about the need to be “a man” in a society and surroundings which just don’t let him, that’s not the case. He had always wanted to just be a subject with the real freedom of choices In his life. And once again - you get what I mean, right?

Side note: I’m aware that the Kristeva’s theory is much more complex, but I decided to stay on a basic level of that. Also I’m aware that this kind of understanding of socialisation to specific gender is simplified too cause actually many instances of people’s reaction to Y is because he was perceived as a man so the standards were according to that. What I wanted to say is that the gender assigned at birth doesn’t have to carry over one’s treatment during their earlier life and that it’s much more complex issue.

[empusium]

“We all are drama queens” is actually a quote from Carol Steinberg Gould’s article “Why the Histrionic Personality Disorder Should Not Be in the DSM: A New Taxonomic and Moral Analysis” and that’s the reason I would love to do science. Just to include sassy remarks.

[empusium]

Sometimes I think about the fact that before Freud presented his Oedipus complex theory as an explanation of hysteria he was actually very invested in research on children sexual abuse and how that would be the cause of hysteric reaction during adulthood. He was in fact the one to advocate on “trusting the victim”. He himself stated that it would be impossible for the survivors to lie as they 1) mostly wouldn’t even remember the fact of abuse 2) when suggested by therapist that the incest or other form of sexual abuse might have happened during their childhood, survivors would do EVERYTHING to deny that form of possibility (because the memory of it would be too traumatic to even consider let alone to recall) 3) only after very specific form of therapeutic approach survivors would recall some aspects of the abuse and ALSO 4) it would be impossible for the therapist to induce this kind of memory because, as stated by Freud, suggestion never succeeded in evoking this kind of real reaction unless the abuse had happened.

And it’s so interesting that he dropped this because he thought that the statistics just COULDN’T possibly be true as the numbers suggested that the majority of women were taken advantage of during their childhood. Also he was a coward and was afraid that others doctors (men) wouldn’t approve this (and he was probably right).

And what’s the most fascinating aspect of it is how psychology would look like if he suggested the former explanation, if he presented it instead of the Oedipus complex explanatory which states that hysteria was all about the “natural children’s fantasies” and other bullshit. I mean we still use this theory even though we have a clear evidence of how it was a “substitute theory”. Ofc I’m well aware of other usages of this theory, but how the former theory would affect believing the victims? How much further we would be, even in psychology, if Freud hadn’t had dropped his former understanding of hysteria? Would the stigma around hysteria and being “hysteric” be any different? Would he be even famous if he presented the former theory?