laufire

[laufire]

Just saw there's going to be a Toy Story 5

I think they should keep pushing the nightmare logic of this universe to its most horrifying conclusions. I'm thinking hundreds of years post-apocalypse, all the toys so sun-bleached as to be featureless, cloth and fabric long since rotted away, plastic finally deteriorating. Buzz could carry Woody's head through the endless deserts as the two meditate on what could only really be described as their long damnation and the prospect of it finally coming to an end. Over the course of the adventure Woody succumbs to the decomposition of his organic materials and then under the credits give us a time lapse of Buzz's plastic breaking down over the centuries (millennia?) it would take for every last component to return to the barren earth

[laufire]

we have to start expressing vocal disgust at 'ironic' homophobia again in a big way. if you can't explain to me how calling a guy a twinky little fruitcake valorises the terminology vs. reducing and demeaning him for perceived femininity I don't want to hear it. nobody is off the hook for this.

[laufire]

shitty people only begin to change when they're scared shitless about suffering the consequences of their actions. maybe eventually they can start actually seeing a point to becoming better people and the perks that come with that, such as close, intimate and joyful relationships with others! but as long as their bad behaviour isn't challenged and instead consistently gets rewarded? as long as the benefits of behaving like absolute heels outrank the downsides? they will go on as they've been. and why the fuck wouldn't they? it's working out perfectly for them.

[laufire]

batman #430

giving the way this is framed (rme) vs how it actually manages to come accross to anyone reasonable, I don't think it'll shock anyone to hear this was written by jim "anything more than calmly shaking your finger in the face of sexual violence makes this kid unsympathetic" starlin, but welp. it sure had a huge impact on how I see the waynes, I'm afraid.

(btw after this bruce says he doesn't love thomas anymore and screams that he wishes he was dead. so of course this is just mere hours before thomas takes them to the movies as an apology añlskdfjasf. my point with this is that if bruce was a self aware person capable of facing his parents' flaws, he'd have to wonder whether this incident would become a pattern, just like the many examples he must've seen in his vigilante career. thomas never raised his hand against bruce a second time; martha never again made excuses for him. is it because thomas truly made a one-time mistake that he'd care not to ever repeat? or is it just because they both were dead?)

[laufire]

I have no time for toothless stories about how mindless, effortless love and hope can conquer all, peddling naiveté and a dopey sort of optimism as a moral virtue when it conveniently dodges every challenge along the way through no fight of its own. And I have even less patience for people acting as if this is the only type of story worth making; as if deviating from cheery, empty platitudes (which often only feel like cruelly putting down people who dare being anything but relentlessly perky), is somehow "pointless" instead of a perfectly respectable artistic choice that some of us do know how to appreciate.

[laufire]

I need to get my dumb ass to bed here real soon so I'm not sure how coherent this will be but...

I've been reading "The Other History of the DC Universe" (thank you local library :3 also you should read it too it's good!) and it's convinced me that it's actually a good and crucial thing for the big name DC superheroes to suck and be awful in many terrible normal ways

bc like how do you write stories about how people are being failed by the American Way if the heroes enforcing that American Way aren't allowed to suck and let people down? How could any author acknowledge the ways these comics have sidelined and screwed over characters of color if they are forced to pretend that none of the heroes of this world had any involvement in it?

Why is the Justice League so overwhelmingly white? <- any attempt to diageticly address this which absolves all the white members of any guilt or contribution is simply a farce and a cop out because it denies and runs away from core functions of how and why racial exclusion happens. Talking about systemic racism is good! But you can't be using systemic racism as a shield to protect the honor and feelings of white people and white characters; you can't be using it as an excuse to act like black people are spitefully misguided for holding white people to account for the shit they believe and say and do.

You have to let them suck! You have to let them be a normal amount of racist, sexist, classist and you have to let them be in the wrong about it and you have to let other characters be pissed off about it without getting punished for being pissed off about it!

So much of the world desperately wants to act like racism is a fault-less, perpetrator-less crime, as though it sprung forth from the dust fully formed without any human intervention, and that the tiny few who are abnormally prejudiced are just being possessed by this uncontrollable outside force and are in fact the only people who can be called racist at all. This defensive posture makes it impossible to hold anyone responsible for their prejudiced actions and beliefs. It's unacceptable to me.

How could I write the inner world of a character like Jefferson Pierce and just... pretend that every time he felt like he was being discriminated against or talked down to by a white hero he was actually wrong and just jumping to conclusions because the other character was white? That would be fucking diabolical. It would also be exactly what is expected, exactly what it is normal to do.

In a parallel vein, how could I write the inner world of a character like Stephanie Brown or Talia and just... pretend that the constant battery of misogyny she was subject to was all in her head and never happened because the men in the room can't have their good reputations besmirched? That would be fucking diabolical. It would also be exactly what is expected, exactly what it is normal to do.

The heroes of the DC universe are by and large barred from being revolutionary, barred from being agents of change, barred from rejecting normality, and anyone who is an agent of change is barred from being good (looking at you, Anarky). The defenders of the status-quo must suck as the status-quo sucks, or else be naught but propaganda.

[laufire]

“On Human Dignity.”  Blackness, Gender & Sexuality

Two things:

As usual, there’s historical and social context that I need explain! This lesson is not what sexuality is, or ‘how to write being gay while Black’. That’s… not that different from you. What this lesson is, is context on how Blackness plays a role in our presentation and understanding of gender and sexuality (as well as your perception of it), and how that’s something you should consider in your characterization, writing, and character design.

I DO NOT KNOW EVERYTHING! The reason this took so long was because I read multiple books and wallowed in my remaining lack of understanding. I cannot join The Tumblr Discourse so do not ask. I tried to be as inclusive as I could, but I learn something new on this app every day, so if I miss something- and I’m bound to- I apologize in advance. Please have grace with me.

TW: Sexual assault mention, homophobia, misogynoir, cannibalism, misgendering

“That’s that White People Shit"

I’m putting the hardest part first; walk with me, you’ll be fine!

I will be honest: this section here, while I do think you should know, I don’t really expect nonblack people to incorporate it in depth. Not because it cannot be done, but because it is a sensitive topic that we ourselves are still struggling with. If you have struggled with anything else while writing Black characters up to this point, this one certainly isn’t for you to touch. Just keep in mind!

There’s an idea I’ve heard before on both sides that Black people are more likely to be homophobic, that queerness itself is white. That is a ridiculous belief, but the root of it ends up right back where you think it would: slavery! I’m sure that you saw me post while I was reading The Delectable Negro by gay Black author Vincent Woodard. I shared those increasingly uncomfortable quotes on purpose! If you have a desire to understand Black culture and Black thought, that means being willing to acknowledge Black pain. How can you avoid stereotypes if you avoid learning their source?  

While I will be using quotes from the entire book, the specific chapter of “Eating Nat Turner” is a succinct explanation of why admitting to the presence of homosexuality, gender fluidity, and queer identity within the Black community is so difficult for my people. While I highly, HIGHLY recommend reading this chapter yourself, it essentially comes down to how admitting to such a potential vulnerability in the armor of Blackness, in gender identity and particularly Black masculinity, would allow white supremacy to destroy us as a people, to do validate doing even more cruel things to us when in a position of power over us. It’s a defensive reaction based in trauma that disregards and discards the queer members of our own community as a threat, a liability when it comes to fighting against the ubiquitous presence of white supremacy.

“Intuitively, Black gay men understood the issue of homosexuality during slavery as a complex phenomenon shaped by a number of factors, including the nation’s unresolved relationship to the legacy of slavery, Black liberatory ideology dating back to slavery, and, most importantly, the maintenance of traditional notions of family and community that originated in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The legacy and memory of slavery had a powerful effect that left many Black gay men feeling isolated from and rendered invisible within Black communities.

Joseph Beam said it first and best: “I cannot go home as who I am. . . . When I speak of home, I mean not only the familial constellation from which I grew, but the entire Black community: the Black press, the Black church, Black academicians, the Black literati, and the Black left… I am most often rendered invisible, perceived as a threat to the family, or am tolerated if I am silent and inconspicuous.” … As Philip Brian Harper has noted, the Black homosexual functioned in the twentieth century as an index for Black masculine anxieties. These ranged from the very personal and painful anxieties of lynching, castration, and the denial of civil rights to a larger set of anxieties rooted in historical erasure and cultural genocide.”

“Sex and gender they also conflated with homosexuality, made out to equal effeminacy. Many Blacks linked homosexuality to castration and the recent history of Black men who had been lynched and Black women who had been raped in the Jim Crow South and in the North. Homosexuality, in its metaphoric power, had an exhaustive function: It is equated with the absence of family, hatred of Black people, estrangement from one’s kin and culture, and all of those horrific aspects of Black experience about which Black people would rather not speak.”

An example of why nonblack people should consider the depth of such a topic- and their place to do so- before incorporating it into their story comes in the form of Styron’s Confessions of Nat Turner, and the backlash he faced from the Black community for such a sensationalized story from a white author.

“The ten Black male contributors [who wrote Ten Black Writers Respond] coupled cannibalism (overtly and covertly) with homoeroticism and effeminacy. For these Black men, homoeroticism became a way of circumventing and projecting their experiences and pain onto certain “effeminate” Black men: the consumed Black man these Black men equated with the homosexual man. Homosexuality served as a means of containing certain unwieldy and historically difficult topics pertaining to Black masculinity, such as the need for intimacy, gender variance, sexual and emotional vulnerability, and violation. It was as if, in this very powerful and discursive moment, threads that had been all along winding through history wove together in a manner that illuminated the past as much as they clouded and blocked full access to its complicated meaning.”

“On the surface, at least, I do not disagree with these Black men and women. I think their analysis regarding historicity and the diminishment of Black communal ties was mostly correct. Styron’s novel was historically inaccurate, depicting Turner as raised by whites rather than the Black parents and grandmother Turner spoke about in his original “Confessions.” Styron depicts aspects of Turner’s sexual life that are not validated in any documentation coming from the time period, and Styron’s exhaustive probing into the racial hatred and self-hatred of Turner clearly reflected something in his own psyche and white identity that he felt compelled to project onto Turner. Black men were put on the defensive by both the novel and by the institutions (literary production, the media) and individuals who supported Styron as an authentic interpreter of Black historical experience. Many Black men, like Bennett, felt that Styron was waging a literary war that paralleled the contemporary political and police state war against Black men…”

The problem with this mindset and approach within the community is that, while it attempts to protect our community, it silences both the prosperity and the pain of an entire section of it, as well as shutting down important conversation that needs to be had even by nonqueer members. And it’s doing it all to fight against a force- white supremacy- that is going to commit violence against us regardless! Respectability politics forces many Black people to stay silent, to not speak up on things that may rock the boat- but the boat needs to be rocked! Blaming fellow victims of racism is not going to save us!

“That was the irony of this moment. Black people invoked the cannibal discourse that could have freed up and complicated Black male perspectives on everything from social consumption to homoeroticism only to defend Black masculinity and Black culture. Black men were not interested in, nor capable of dealing with, the complex legacy of cannibalism and homoeroticism that so powerfully shaped their responses to Styron’s novel.”

But that does NOT mean that it’s a nonblack person’s place to make that argument! While I cannot stop you, I do want you to keep in mind that- as always with sensitive topics- you may have to face Black people who may rightfully be offended by your depiction if not done with care. Styron studied James Baldwin himself- who faced backlash on his end for saying that it was time for the Black community to face such a conversation- and even then, he still projected his white pathology and opinions onto the story of such a prolific hero in our history. Tread lightly!

“Well they don’t seem gay to me.”- A Eurocentric Standard of Passing

How many times have you heard this about a Black character? And if you’re Black and LGBTQ, how often have you heard it about people (or maybe even yourself?) How do we ‘not seem gay’? What is gay supposed to be? There’s this denial, almost, of Black LGBTQ folks, based in a complete disconnect of understanding of our own forms of gender expression and sexuality.

It’s extremely bizarre, because so much of pop gay culture as we know it is from Black LGBTQs (please refer to my infamous AAVE lesson), but… when we imagine an LGBTQ person, they're white.

If you’re Black and queer, you have to be this stereotypical, flamboyant RuPaul-esque figure. Can’t be regular degular. If you’re gay, you gotta be Uber Gay™. If you’re trans, you better pass with Complete Gender and Pizzazz. If you’re nonbinary, you’re not ‘androgynous’ enough. If you’re intersex or asexual, you’re practically not real. If you don’t fill this (white, western) mold, you must not be right. When all you have to be in order to be gay… Is be gay.

I shouldn’t have to put on extra performance to qualify as queer in your eyes! Do you know what looks are considered “androgynous” in my community? What behaviors are deemed “masculine” versus “feminine”? Do you know anything about my queer culture, or are you subconsciously comparing it to your own?

I want you to recognize that whatever image of queerness you have in your mind for your favorite or original characters, if Black people of all shapes and sizes aren’t included, there’s a problem! Because what are you seeing in others, that you’re not seeing in us? Is that, perhaps, a you problem? And why are we not worth the added effort of queer layering that others are?

THAT SAID!

“Oh I know what that’s like, I’m gay-”

This one mostly- if not always- comes from white queer folk. I’ve linked The Last Interview with James Baldwin. It’s so short. PLEASE take the time to read it. I’ve always adored how James Baldwin expresses himself, and while I could never stand so close, I have studied how he conveys his thoughts. But there’s almost nothing I could say that he doesn’t say better.

“A Black gay person who is a sexual conundrum to society is already, long before the question of sexuality comes into it, menaced and marked because he’s Black or she’s Black. The sexual question comes after the question of color; it’s simply one more aspect of the danger in which all Black people live. I think white gay people feel cheated because they were born, in principle, into a society in which they were supposed to be safe. The anomaly of their sexuality puts them in danger, unexpectedly. Their reaction seems to me in direct proportion to the sense of feeling cheated of the advantages which accrue to white people in a white society.”

The idea that “I know what it’s like to experience this oppression as a Black person because I’m gay” is not true. It’s like saying “oh look at my tan, I’m as Black as you now”. Stop it. Think back to that first section on history we discussed- no, you and I are not the same. We can discuss our existing connections, our intersection and have sympathy and empathy with one another on human dignity. We don’t have to act like we’re the same to do that! So don’t go headstrong into your writing (or life) saying “oh I get that completely, it’s because I’m queer”. There are more tactful ways to express your intent of solidarity.

'Queer' vs 'The N Word'

We’re gonna nip this one in the bud, because we’re leaving that argument in 2024. You know the one- “saying queer is like using the N-word- as a reclamation/slur!” What this argument reveals, used by EITHER SIDE, is how y’all don’t actually have community with Black people.

It implies that either “we don’t like it” or “we do”. Yet another binary that does not exist! There are plenty of Black people that despise that word, regardless of context. That think it brings us down. And then there are those that use it as a reclamation of an identity that was used to demean and dehumanize. Either way, one party is not going to walk up to a stranger and force it on them- that would cause an actual fight! It’s not improving your argument. As a whole, I would say stop using Black politics in general to improve your arguments when you are unaware of the overlap, or maybe the lack thereof, between Blackness and queerness in your argument. It shows. I’m not your tool; I’m not your Negro!

I’m not here to tell anyone whether queer is a slur or not. I don’t use it as one, but I recognize when people are uncomfortable, when it is being used as one, and I will use different language when I am speaking directly to someone who says “I do not like that word, describe me as __”. I am just here to say that we’re leaving that argument behind.

Black =/= Gender

Blackness and the concept of Gender have a fraught, confusing history. Not human enough to have rights, but human just enough to fail to meet Eurocentric standards of gender.

One example of this is the term “stud”. Studs are an example of Black women traversing gender presentation, the origin of which is because Black people are perceived as having “lesser sexual dimorphism”- i.e. you can’t tell who’s a woman or not. It’s an in-community joke that doesn’t make sense spoken outside of its historical context (thus, no, your white butch is NOT a stud within this context).

Another example: Megan Thee Stallion is one of the most stunning, feminine women I have ever seen… And her entire career, people have called her a man. Because she’s brown-skinned, Black, confident, loud, and openly sexual, she’s deemed manly. I can’t stand it. Plus her height- and mind you, Taylor Swift, of the same height and probably a higher number of bodies over the years, has never once been called a man or lost any of her “feminine” charm despite it. Why is that? If one of her men had shot in the foot, trying to kill her, there would be an uproar. Why is that?

There is an internal contradiction that being a Black woman is being inherently “gender nonconforming”. The first reason is that I will never be allowed to truly be a “woman” because to be a woman is to be white while doing it. White Tears, Brown Scars by Ruby Hamad is an excellent book on this dynamic in all women of color, and Black activists like Angela Davis and Kimberle Crenshaw have written and discussed the topic as well.

The second reason is I have to play the role of whatever ‘gender’ is expected to get me through this life. I have to be more ‘masculine’; strong, assertive, and proactive, a hard worker willing to sacrifice it all every day, in order to protect my family and myself in a world where a lack of resilience might kill me. I cannot allow weakness to stop me from taking care of my community, because Black women are supposed to show up and save the day. Find a Black woman! they say. She’ll fix it! And odds are, I do know how to fix it because I’ve probably had to address it before.

But then I’m acting ‘out of a woman’s place’ by being so ‘hard’ and expecting people to listen to my authority. So in order to play a Black woman’s place, I have to balance that with… Somehow not intimidating people by being more ‘feminine’, submissive, vulnerable, sweet and motherly (because if I’m not a good breeder and mother, I am a bad woman). I scare people if I don’t. If I don’t do that, then I’m not a good Black woman. But if I don’t harden myself and be strong and assertive to protect everyone, and tough through everyone’s problems with infinite sacrifice, then I’m not a good Black woman… You see how the cycle gets confusing! (The Delectable Negro and Black on Both Sides also speak on this, and how this is rooted in the creation of the Mammy!)

I spoke about it earlier, but that same inability to be defined as a human, defined as white, haunts many Black men in their goals to be seen as ‘equal’ to white men and receive equal treatment. By seeking to fit a standard of whiteness, they are never going to attain it (and often, that comes back home in not-so-good way)! E.g.: this is the original issue that Louis had in AMCs' IWTV- Louis never actually wanted to be a vampire, Louis wanted to be treated like an equivalent human- and that was unattainable to him not because he wasn’t a human being, but because he wasn’t a white one!

The Racist Counterproductivity of TERFs

Sigh. If you are of this belief, but here to better your writing, I feel like I should say this to you. I want you to listen to me. (TBH, I’m going to delete anything asking me for opinions on this because I don’t want to potentially entertain even a singular troll). Besides, my argument is pretty simple and resolute.

The gender binary is rooted in bioessentialism, and bioessentialism is rooted in white supremacy. You know what else benefits from white supremacy? The white patriarchy.

How are we gonna escape from the patriarchy and white supremacy… if the ideology you believe in… is rooted in white supremacy and patriarchy?

And it’s not just the TERFs- look within yourselves as well! How are we going to make the world safer for trans people, including white ones, if you aren’t willing to confront your own racist biases? If you are unwilling to release the shackles of gender essentialism and the benefits of whiteness, none of us are getting out of here. You are reinforcing the very walls you wish to dismantle!

To offer another side of the conversation, Black On Both Sides by C Riley Snorton has been an interesting read! Essentially, the conversation is on how Blackness and transness intersect, how being Black in and of itself can be and is a transitional, gender fluid experience. It, along with The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould and Medical Apartheid by Harriet A Washington, goes into the history of how the Black body was seen as a different species altogether, and how phrenology, biological essentialism, and examples of sexual dimorphism were treated as an example on how we are an inferior group. Yet, this lack of understanding of our bodies (despite the constant access to it) allowed for us to maneuver within such a system.

An example, of how Blackness has an effect on our perception of gender:

"Cobb suggests that this blackening may have been an anticipatory gesture; when James Norcom (Jacobs’s enslaver) published a description of her in the 1835 issue of the American Beacon, he presumed that she would be “seeking whiteness and dressing as a free woman, not accentuating her Blackness” and finding a “cross-dressing” and ungendered mode for escape. Although the description of sartorial arrangements seems to conform to passing’s logic of movement for protection or privilege, Jacobs’s use of charcoal to darken her complexion tropes—by inverse logic—on more commonly held beliefs (and fears) about racial passing.

As “passing” became a term to describe performing something one is not, it trafficked a way of thinking about identity not only in terms of real versus artificial but also, and perhaps always, as proximal and performative. Like a vertical line with arrows on either end, passing is figuratively represented by moving up or down hierarchized identificatory formations. This articulation of vertical identity also coordinates with forms of binary thinking, typified, for example, by the language of “the opposite” sex. …Brent/Jacobs’s blackened blackness gives expression to her condition as fungible within the logic of U.S. slavery, in which the system of colorism, as Nicole Fleetwood has argued, “produces a performing subject whose function is to enact difference . . . an act that is fundamentally about assigning value.”

As it relates to the scene of Jacobs’s brushing past Sands, her status as “it” also indicates how blackness-as-fungible engenders forms of nonrecognition, as Jacobs’s performance elucidates how blackness and going blacker become an embrace of the conditions that might allow one to pass one’s friends and lovers undetected. In this encounter, fungibility sets the stage for gendered maneuvers on a terrain constituted by modes of viewing blackness, in which Jacobs’s blackness and going blacker color her gender as well as her face."

The Black Trans/Nonbinary/Genderqueer Experience

Rather than try to summarize opinions on something I had not lived, I wanted to platform some Black trans, intersex, and genderqueer opinions for you all to consider! I asked three questions, and I’ve typed out the responses and placed them as their own post for the sake of space. I don’t care if it’s long- read them! You want to write these characters; you should hear the perspectives of the people you wish to write about!

The Black Intersex Experience

Nothing I could say that someone that is actually Black and intersex couldn’t say better!

Here is a page on Tumblr that compiles resources on the intersex community and its history that I found; while it’s not Black-specific, I have seen the page post topics related to.

The Black Aspec Experience

An interesting thing about identifying as asexual or aromantic while Black is that from all angles, people will simply not believe you because Blackness itself has been sexualized. I talked about this in my lessons on stereotypes, but one of the ways that the sexual assault and violation of Black bodies was dismissed, was to emphasize that not only were we incapable of being r*ped, but that we were naturally inclined to being hypersexual beings and that if we weren’t controlled, we would bring it onto ourselves. Black women were jezebels; Black men were mandigos, vicious savages that would assault pure white women if not chained like beasts.

Here is a page for Black people (!!!) with these identities to gather. Again, BLACK PEOPLE with these identities. Here's another!

The Bit You Actually Showed Up For

So! Given all that historical and social context: really, it’s just about application! You have to ask yourself certain things to catch when you’re about to dip into a bias or stereotype while you’re writing.

Black Queer Joy- A Conclusion

I know I’ve shared a lot of history here, and it’s not been the happiest stuff. THAT BEING SAID!

I must personally say- I am honored to be Black and bisexual. There’s nothing else I’d rather be. I am so happy to be who I am. It’s hard as hell living at the intersection, but the intersection is lit! There’s so much love, history, culture, creation, and so much power here; I’m standing on the shoulders of cultural GIANTS and my chest is full, my chin is high with pride. I love it here!

Being Black and queer itself is not a miserable experience! Your characters should feel joy, because we feel joy! There’s so much that we have to offer the world, it’s practically blossoming from us. I don’t want anyone to walk away from this going “let me go pity the next one I see and tell them how hard their life is”. We don’t need you to feel sorry, we need you to have solidarity! Either show up and do the work, or leave us alone. You can’t join the party at the intersection and then flee when it’s time to fight for it!

Listen to Black queer people in your spaces- dear god, it never fails how conversations of queerness and gender and feminism will leave Blackness completely out, and then be shocked when none of us want to show up. Like I said before- you will never dismantle the walls barring you from your own freedom until you address ours.

Support Black queer creatives, content, perspectives, and people- when you tag on that “support Black trans women” bit at the end of your posts, don’t just speak lightly- understand what that means, and stand on it! Because it’s the thought that counts, but the action that delivers!

[laufire]

[Caption: two gifs from The Pitt. In the first one, Samira Mohan reassures Trinity Santos, telling her "For what it's worth, [Langdon]'s wrong. You're very good at this. In the second one, Jack Abbot whispers to Santos "That was pretty badass. You saved her life. Good job.]

Thank you. That's actually worth a lot. (inspired by @cygnetofthesea's tags)

[laufire]

the het shipper experiences self denial far greater than the fujoshi does i find it fascinating how many like popular m/f relationships defined by their like camaraderie and like viewing each other as equals in a job or profession where they have separate yet entangled lives and like its a drawn out subtextual tension or whatever like in many ways this is straight yaoi like the introduction of women into the professional workforce in jobs previously reserved for men gives this chance to have the fantasy of the woman treated with the same level of respect as the man and like to see this flavor of like the buddy trope now envisioned with its full romantic subtext when one of them is a woman or whatever but the het shipper denies themselves their true desires and works to make sense of this through basic romantic milestones like why do so many people want mulder and scully to get married or cohabitate or have kids like ur fully insane the operative fantasy is the fact scully never has to wash mulders socks you know like its that its entirely divorced from the home and allowed to be an equal partnership and you can literally see this break down in the show itself like the well loved amongst shippers episode where they go undercover in suburbia and its like normal mulder and scully goes out the window for bad jokes about domestic work and wanting scully to take care of certain things like in many ways the romantic fantasy of their relationship entirely disappears if u try and make it conform to these specific milestones but like they literally can be in a relationship but live in separate places they dont have to get married like you could open your mind and realize what you actually like and desire about this fantasy and thing about whats necessary or unnecessary here but people are so trapped in their normative ideas of romantic relationship milestones they cant imagine them both respecting each other and having sex and also choosing to prioritize each other forever without like marriage and children entering the picture which again completely defeats what people find desirable about them in the first place and this is a place of imagination you know anyways the ideology of the heterosexual mind..

[laufire]

inbox prompt fills

Yesterday I posted my 100th fic to ao3, and in doing so I finally cleaned out my inbox 💪. I just wanted to gather them all together.

Jason Todd/Mia Dearden + impulsive kiss for @jaynotwayne

Caroline Forbes/Klaus Mikaelson + impulsive kiss for @missbrunettebarbie

Clarke Griffin/Josephine Lightbourne + surprise kiss for @lucerants

Echo kom Azgeda/Raven Reyes + reunion kiss for @lucerants

Lincoln kom Trikru/Octavia Blake + goodbye kiss for @missbrunettebarbie

Jason Todd/Tim Drake + fake relationship + gentle kiss for @hellispeacefullandempty and anonymous

(Jason Todd/)Mia Dearden/Tim Drake + kissing in bed for anonymous

Emori/John Murphy + true love's kiss for @missbrunettebarbie

[laufire]

CASSANDRA CAIN WEEK

(I) – marred. Scars | Flowers + Cass/Steph. 100 words. Angst, post-breakup. (II) – oracle's long: day 43 of no man's land. Alone | Together + Barbara & Cass. 200 words. First meeting. (III) – the touch of a ghost. Silence | Music + Brenda/Cass. 300 words. One Year Later, angst with a happy ending. (IV) – we are lion's cubs. Quotes | Comic Panels + Cass & Helena. 400 words. One Year Later, teacher!Helena. (V) – accomplices. Death | Rebirth + Cass & Jason. 500 words. Cass's time on the streets, catatonic!Jason. (VI) – dance of the little swans. Past | Future + Cass & Duke. 600 words. Cassbats & Robin!Duke, dance teacher!Cass. (VII) – unmotherly instincts. Happy Birthday | Free Day + Cass & Shiva. 700 words. Cass remained with Cain AU.

[laufire]

three sentence ficathon fills

Here are all the drabbles (exactly 100 words long) I wrote for the event.

BUFFYVERSE

live and learn. Angel/Buffy + "miss you already". Wishverse.

a slayer unborn. Slayer!Darla.

spark. Tara/Willow + "magic tingles".

DCU

luddite. Barbara/Dinah + sexting.

red scape. Jason & Sasha + "paint the town red".

neither by nature nor by law and yet. Dick & Tim + "what 'brother' means".

broken glass. Cass/Rose + "in the empty mirror, I run and run to you / run away from me".

the storm before the storm. Bruce & Steph + "Batman, Batman & Robin(s), a Robin (or a few Robins) under Batman's cape".

a place and a calling. Helena Bertinelli + "home".

PLECVERSE

consumption. Josie & Lizzie + The Merge.

WYNONNA EARP

sweet as poison. Rosita/Waverly + poison kisses.

my own prompts are under the cut (although the ficathon is officially closed to new prompts, people still post fills all year long, and I'd definitely love receiving some :D)

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Diana Prince &/ Artemis of Bana-Mighdall, reflections.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Mia Dearden, second meetings. (filled)

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jade Nguyen/Roy Harper, parenthood. (filled)

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Barbara Gordon/Cassandra Cain, unrequited crush.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Tim Drake, Tim cheating with Jason.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Mia Dearden/Tim Drake, sparring.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Dick Grayson/Helena Bertinelli, undercover. (filled)

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Roy Harper, relapse.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Dinah Lance/Oliver Queen, divorce. (filled)

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Clark Kent/Lois Lane, mourning.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Mia Dearden, role playing.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Tim Drake, truth.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Anissa Pierce/Grace Choi, making up.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd & Talia al Ghul, role reversal.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd & Sasha/Scarlet, the future.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Mia Dearden, action.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Jason Todd/Tim Drake, chase.

DC Comics/pre-reboot/DCAU, Bruce Wayne/Lois Lane, pining for an ex.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Kara Zor-El & Stephanie Brown, Metropolis.

DC Comics/pre-reboot, Lady Shiva, victory.

[laufire]

snowflake challenge drabbles

I gave myself a prompt challenge back in January, during the Snowflake event over Dreamwidth, and finally completed and posted them \o/

voyeur's instincts. BTVS + Bewitching. Willow, Faith, Buffy.

wildflower. Black Widow + Flourish.

indomitable willpower. Stephanie Brown + Wanderlust.

of narratives. Merricat Blackwood + Harbinger.

to build and to endure. Black Sails + Invincible. Max.

on a high note. Practical Magic + Crescendo. Gillian Owens.

[laufire]

observance

It's an eventful day for the Bats in Gotham. However, Jason has been invited to a birthday party. Jaymia ft. the Arrow and Bat clans. 11k, Rated M.

[laufire]

femgiftboxes' fills

I got some icons and some book recs out of this :D

I myself ended up sharing a few recommendations (for a request about female musicians and authors of colour).

I also wrote my first Locked Tomb fic, a short, angsty Harrow Nova AU one-shot.

And lastly, I made a few Buffyverse icons (150x150, so they might look a bit off on tumblr). Bangel (1), Fuffy (2), Tillow (2), and Faithsley (1), under the cut.

[laufire]

HI!!! jaytim lost days??? :DDD

HI! i don't have a ton for this one so far but the basic idea is that one of tim's hobbies is trying to figure out crimes before the police and he just happens to get really invested in figuring out who killed Egon and all of the other traffickers he was involved with, which leads to him being the first to discover jason is alive again, and he ends up going undercover and working with jason to confirm that it really is him and they become Very Close under the pretense that tim has no idea who jason is and is just some random criminal who works for jason

(for this ask game btw)

Tim knows that hacking into security cameras and police databases the world over to try to figure out crimes before the cops do is a weird hobby, even for him. He knows that it has been ages since he picked up his skateboard, that he needs to maintain a normal hobby to keep himself sane. He knows all this, he really does, but something about it is soothing. It’s almost a reassurance, a reminder that he’s still got it There’s a difficult case - child traffickers, all murdered up in western Germany - that Tim’s been trying to puzzle out. There were no cameras on the property, but the evidence was all still sitting in the office when the operation went bust. What Tim really wants to figure out is who did it, people like the deceased are a dime a dozen anywhere you look, but mysterious figures taking down criminal organizations from the shadows? Maybe Tim should be used to that by now, but he likes to think he has his finger on the pulse of vigilantism, be it in Gotham or across the ocean, and he has no clue who this guy could be. Maybe they were just a concerned citizen, but Tim doesn’t think so. He’s read the police reports, and whoever did it knew what they were doing. The leader of it all was a highly trained assassin with a kill count estimated to be in the triple digits. Definitely not someone an amateur could take down with a lucky shot. Clearly the person behind this knew that too, because the man, Egon, was found beaten and bruised, but the coroner report shows that poison was what finally did him in.

[laufire]

I am never not thinking about the load-bearing bodies in the Batman franchise (Thomas + Martha, Jason, + 90s Gotham in Peril) + how they each echo throughout the canon.

Successive authors keep setting up storylines which either implicitly or explicitly call back to these distinct frameworks of loss (eg. Batman encountering others who have lost or will lose their parents; Batman's kids after Jason all (temporarily) dying in some way; Batman's city forever succumbing to some existentially threatening trouble across the twenty-first century). All these, consciously or not, tap into the potent feelings of grief staked out by the original losses, + yet I find they fail to overwrite the OG memory in part because it was experiencing these unique types of losses for the first time that made these bodies matter. Metatextually, they each became the foundation to a different floor of Bruce's characterisation.

The loss of his parent/s => the man who would create the Batman. The loss of his child => the man who would struggle to maintain meaningful emotional bonds. And finally, the loss of his city, a process inaugurated by the Cult but solidified by No Man's Land => the man who could no longer envision a better world for Gotham and was left defending its remnants.

This is another reason why I believe the Batcat marriage from Rebirth Batman should've gone ahead + ended in divorce. If Bruce + Selina had genuinely done their best but it wasn't enough, Batman would have experienced a new framework of loss - the loss of a partner who chose to walk away. And instead of making him worse, maybe, just maybe, the mourning cycle kicked off by this grief would have led to him appreciating the people he still has.