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madtomedgar · 1 year

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books read in December:

The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks about Race, Jesmyn Ward: Great essays, really liked it, learned a lot. At the same time I am starting to feel like the issue isn’t so much needing to learn new information as much as it is consistently listening and understanding and applying what I do already know, and I do wish there was more about that, if that makes sense.

Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City, Matthew Desmond: I had been putting off reading this for years because it felt like a book I should read and I kind of assumed it would be like a long article or a series of housing white papers. It is the opposite of that. It’s rare you find writing this good in nonfiction. Everyone should read this. I did have to keep taking breaks because it was very upsetting, just the realities of this system which I knew about already from the perspective of working with voucher holders and people trying to get vouchers. But probably the best nonfiction I’ve read since the pandemic.

Chemistry, Weike Wang: I liked the stream-of-consciousness style, almost like reading someone’s diary. I found the main character’s struggle with expectations, with herself, and with coming to terms with both what her parents did to her and and did for her really compelling. It helped me better understand my friends who are or have been in graduate programs. A little hetero for me but nothing’s perfect.

False Bingo, Jac Jemc: So the stories are clever and the author builds suspense well, and the one about the board game couple was a delightfully scathing portrait of trying to have friends in your 30s. But. They were mostly kind of boring, kind of caught up in their own cleverness, kind of suffused with a certain middle-class midwestern realism that I find dull and off-putting, and occasionally kind of tone-deaf to the point of offensive. There’s one where these women in this town keep getting attacked and the twist is that one woman lied about being attacked to get herself out of a difficult conversation with her boyfriend, and then all the others wanted to feel special and included so they faked it too, and the people honestly upset about the violence against women are chumps who should have known better. And like... sure, fiction should absolutely be able to just go “if there were two guys on the moon and one killed another with a rock would that be fucked up or what!” but. Jac Jemc isn’t Gillian Flynn, who can and does pull this type of subversion off well. And reading it during the current backlash, in the wake of the Amber Heard debacle and while Meghan Thee Stallion was being pilloried for being attacked and daring to say she was, like I said, tone-deaf to the point of offensive.

Last Night in Nuuk, Niviaq Korneliussen, trans. Anna Halagar: Mama Mia wishes its big night was half as wild as the big night in this story. Again, I found the stream of consciousness style enjoyable, though this was more like being tapped into someone’s internal monologue who is very hung over. It’s gay, it’s queer, it’s trans, it’s complicated. I... really wish authors would stop having their queer women characters declare that being with a butch woman is “just like a man without the penis.” And like. How you know they’re Real Lesbians is that they’re into women not ugly bull-dykes. I also wish the trans man’s trans-ness had felt less like it could just have easily been stone butch-ness. But I think that’s more of a me problem where like... I have had enough people treat the state where I exist comfortably as both gross and a pit-stop on the way to inevitable transition (which I don’t want for me) that stories that even unintentionally play into that aren’t enjoyable to me, even as I recognize that they’re transformative and important for others.

#long post

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biromanticbookbabe · 2 years

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A Grad Student’s Notes on The Well of Loneliness (1 of ?)

I started (technically re-reading) Radclyffe Hall’s The Well of Loneliness, the banned British Lesbian classic from 1928. I read this book once ten years ago but man, I must have been sleeping or something then because wow this slaps very hard (and I’m not even on page 50 yet).

So far, Hall writes more like a Victorian writer than someone like Woolf or Joyce who both more closely embody modernism (the three were contemporaries which is why I compare them).

Her heroine Stephen Gordon is said to be very close to Hall herself. She was also a rich couple’s only child and was attracted to women. The historic term which she used to describe herself was “invert” which was based on German sexology in the late 1800s and early 1900s; male inverts were thought to have female souls and female inverts were thought to have male souls. Hall’s novel featured a main character who was a female invert, like she herself was. Likely Hall would either be a butch lesbian or trans today (we can’t say which because she lived before there was a clear delineation between those two identities; the two communities have been extremely close historically).

Stephen’s relationships to her parents and her first crush on one of the young maids is detailed in this section of the book. She’s closer to her father than her mother. She idolizes both her parents who don’t really seem to know what to do with her. She’s protective of her hyperfeminine mother and tries to copy her father and the stable master whom she comes to trust as a good friend.

Her father is also shown secretly studying a German theory of sexology book late at night (Ulrichs) because he thinks his daughter is an invert. Hall did eventually go study in Germany as a young woman so that’s probably where she learned about these theories herself. Weimar Germany had surprisingly progressive attitudes towards LGBT people and had one of the biggest gay and trans communities in Europe in the 1910s and 1920s. Hall went there in the early 1910s before WWI and that’s where she met one of the major loves of her life, the singer, Mable Batten.

Hall’s faith (she was a Catholic) informs this novel much more than I had expected. Young Stephen becomes obsessed with trying to cure the Maid Collin’s injured knee by praying to Jesus to take the pain instead. She also directly says she’s fine with taking punishment if she’s caught thinking about Collins when she’s supposed to be doing her school work. Hall doesn’t shy away from the intensity of Stephen’s feelings; the rawness of her characters’ emotion reminds me of Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights (an instant favorite for me). If you’re going to love you may as well love with a reckless abandon that borders on madness or religious devotion (take your pick). Both Hall and E. Bronte would agree on this point.

Collins is dismissed for an affair with the footman, who is also sacked. Stephen’s next obsession is her horse that her father buys her for her birthday who- I really wish I was kidding-she also names Collins. There was known coding between women and horses in Victorian pornography so much of her audience would know what she’s doing here but even without that connection; Hall’s basically winking at us here because she made it so obvious that we know the insinuation.

Not even fifty pages into the book and I can already see why 1920′s England lost it’s mind over this. I am a 21st century American Lesbian myself and some of my reactions at different points were also- “Did she really just say that? Oh, girl...” And yes, she did. Hall wrote extremely clearly so it’s impossible to mistake or misinterpret her message as anything else.

This is the story of a masculine little girl who grows up to realize that she absolutely adores women (to the point of her own self-destruction, at times, which is a whole ‘nother level of ouch to read especially if you’re WLW yourself).

Hall did not shy way or back down when challenged in court over the matter at her censorship trial. Say what you want about the girls and horses, but hats off to Hall for making a valiant attempt to defend gay rights and gay love through penning this novel.

#my grad degree mostly focuses on British literature #I opted for that though at my school you can choose American or British or do a mix of both #sorry I like the Brontes Austen Woolf and now add Hall to the pile #I was raised on British media/humor so I'm a weird flavor of American #My Dad was a big Tolkein and Beatles fan and that kind of started it for me #also they're historic dramas and period pieces are class #radclyffe hall #yeah she's a bit cheeky isn't she #you did what no one else could #the well of loneliness #I still like her even though she's giving me major emotional whiplash #because some of this is sad and some it is funny #stephen gordon #this is probably going to be related to future research and fiction for me #grad school #books #bookblr #my chatter #lesbian writers #lgbt literature #classic lgbt lit #brit lit #background and notes #the other original butch feral horsegirl #Anne Bronte's Matilda is still older since she's from 1847 but wow if they aren't almost the same character archetype #want to compare notes? :)#I self-assigned this one #I would fight someone for Radclyffe Hall #very inspiring #I bet she also spoke German too! :O

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freddiekluger · 3 years

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Why Cap Being Internally Closeted Is Not Only Possible, But Valid Representation

i wrote this to a lot of mitski and onsind, so you can’t blame me for any feelings that bleed through

now i don’t know if it actually exists, but i’ve heard of there being a lot of discourse surrounding the captains story arc regarding his sexuality- i believe the general gist is that having a queer character that remains closeted to themselves is either unrealistic or ‘bad’ representation, and as someone who really treasures the captain and relates to his story so far a lot, i thought i might break this down a bit.

i’ve divded up every complaint i’ve heard about this into four main questions which i’ll be covering below the ‘keep reading’, because this is gonna be pretty comprehensive. full disclaimer i reference my experiences as an ex-evangelical non binary butch lesbian a couple times, and i spent a year studying repression and the psychological impacts of high demand sexual ethics for my graduating sociology paper, so this is coming with some background to it i swear

the big questions:

can you EVEN be gay and not know it????

but isn't this just ANOTHER coming out arc, and aren't we supposed to be moving beyond those?

but if cap can't have a relationship with a man because he's a ghost, what's the point?

since cap's dead, isn't this technically bury your gays, and isn't that bad?

1. "but is it really possible to not know? Isn't that bad representation?"

short answer: no and no.

before i get into the validity of the captain's ignorance about his own orientation as 21st century rep, let's break down how the hell the captain can be so clearly attracted to men and still not even consider the possibility that he might be gay, as brought to you by someone who literally experienced this shit.

the captain's particular situation is both a direct result of the lack of information around human sexuality he would have had (aka clear messaging that it's actually possible for him to be attracted to men. i don't mean acceptable or allowed, i mean physically capable of happening- the idea that orientations other than heterosexual exist and are available to him, a man), and a subconscious survival mechanism. the environment in which he lives is outright hostile to gay people, while the military man identity he has constructed for himself doesn't allow for any form of deviation from societal norms, let alone one so base level and major. as a result of this killer combo of information and environment, instincts take over and the mind does it's best to repress the ‘deviant’ feelings until a. one of these two things changes, or b. the act of repression becomes so destructive and/or exhuasting that it becomes impossible to maintain. the key to maintaining a long-term state of repression of desire is diverting that energy elsewhere, and a high-demand group such as the military is the perfect place for the captain to do this (this technqiue is frequented by religions and extremist ideologies worldwide, but that’s not really what we’re here to focus on).

while the brain is actively repressing ‘deviant’ feelings (aka gay shit), this doesn't mean you don't experience the feelings at all. when performed as a subconscious act of survival, the aim of repression is to minimise/transform the feelings into a state where they can no longer cause immediate danger, and something as big as sexual/romantic orientation is going to keep popping up, but as long as the individual in question never understands what they’re feeling, they’ll be able to continue relatively undisturbed. you know how in heist movies, the leader of the group will only tell each team member part of the plan so they can’t screw things up for everyone else if they get caught? it’s kind of like that.

this is how the captain appears to have operated in life AND in death, and it’s a relatively common experience for lgbtq people who’ve grown up in similar circumstances (aka with a lack of information and in an unfriendly-to-hostile environment), and accounts for how some people can even go on to get married and have children before realising that they’re gay and/or trans.

personally, while i can now identify what were strong homo crushes all the way back to childhood, at the time i genuinely had no idea. there was the underlying sense that i probably shouldn't tell people how attached i was to these girls because i would seem weird, and that my feelings were stronger than the ones other people used to describe friendships, but like-like them in the way that other girls like-liked boys? no way! actually scratch that, it wasn't even a no way, because i had no idea that i even could. i even had my own havers, at least in terms of the emotional hold and devotion she got from me, except she treated me way less well than cap’s beau. snatches of the existence of lgbt people made it through the cone of silence, i definitely heard the words gay and lesbian, but my levels of informations mirrored those that the captain would have had: virtually none, beyond the idea that these words exist, some people are them, and that's not something that we support or think is okay, so let's just not speak about it. despite only attending religious schools for the first couple years of primary, until i got my own technology and social media accounts to explore lgbtq content on my own- option a out of the two catalysts for change- the possibility of me being gay was not at all on my radar. don’t even get me started on how long it took me to explore butchness and my overall gender, two things which now feel glaringly obvious.

when shit starts to break down, you can also make the conscious choice to repress which can delay the eventual smashing down of the mental closet door for a time (essentially when the closet door starts to open, you just say ‘no thanks’ and shut it again by pointedly Not Thinking About It). in the abscence of identifying yourself by your attractions, it becomes quite common to identify with a lack- in my case, this meant becoming proud of how sensible and not boy crazy i was, and in the captain’s case, this means becoming proud of how sensible and not sensuous/wild (aka woman crazy) he was, identifying with his LACK of desire for women and partying (which, even in the 40s, involved the expectation of opposite sex romances and hook ups). i’m not saying that’s the only reason he’s a rule follower, but i think the contrast between About Last Night and Perfect Day pretty much support this. (the captain getting on his high horse about general party antics that he inherently felt excluded from because of underlying awareness of his difference & his tendency to project his regimented expectations of himself onto others, vs. joining in the reception party, awareness of how the environment supports difference in the form of clare and sam, and relaxing his own rules by dancing with men- the captain doesn’t mind a party when feels like he has a place there.)

so the captain was operating in a high demand, highly regulated environment (primarily the military, but also early 20th century England itself), with regimented roles, rules, and expectations. working on the assumption that he wouldn't have had out/disclosing lgbt friends, he would have had little to no exposure to lgbt identities, and what information he did receive would have been hushed and negatively geared. while my world started to open up when i started high school was allowed to have my own phone + instagram account, resulting in me realising something wasn't quite 'right' within a few years (making me a relatively early realiser compared to those who don't come out to themselves until adulthood), in life the captain never had that experience. he didn't receive the information he needed, his environment didn't grow less hostile. with the near-exception of havers related heartbreak, his well disciplined and lifelong method of repression never became destructive/exhaustive enough to permanently override the danger signals in his mind and allow him to put his feelings into words. neither of the most common catalysts for change happened for him, so he continued as usual, even after his death.

BUT, and here’s where we come to why this is actually great representation, arrival of mike and Alison represents the opening up of new world. for the first time, the captain is actively made aware of the fact that his environment is no longer hostile, and better than that, it’s affirming. he’s also getting access to positively geared information about lgbtq people and identities, so option a of the two catalysts for change is absolutely present, and resoundingly positive.

the captain’s arc is also relatively unique as it acknowledges the oppressive nature of his environment, but actually focuses on the internal consequences, and the way that systems like those that the captain lived in succeed because they turn us into our own oppressors. for whatever reason, we repress ourseslves, and often can’t help it, and i find that the significance of the journey to overcome that is often overlooked in more mainstream queer media. perhaps it’s just not very cinematic, or it remains too confronting for cishet audiences, but ghosts manages to touch on it with a lovely amount of humour and hope. Jamie Babbit’s But I’m A Cheerleader is another favourite piece of queer media for the same reasons.

not only does it show this, but as the captain continues to get gayer and lean into some of his less conventional traits (like an interest in fashion and the wedding planning), it shows lgbt people who have been or are going through this that there CAN be a positive outcome. it takes a lot to unlearn all the things that have painted you as wrong, especially when a massive institution is desperate to continue doing so, but you can do it, you can be happy, and it's never too late. (i've been meaning to say that last point for ages for ages, but a mutual beat me to it here)

2. not just another coming out arc

i absolutely support the demand for queer stories that don’t center around coming out (it’s like shrodinger’s queer: if you’re not coming out on screen, do you really even exist?), but i don’t align with the criticisms that the captain should already be out. for the reasons mentioned above, the captain’s particular story is fairly different to the ‘young white teenager who mostly knows gay is fine, it’s just everyone else that’s got the problem, but have a unremarkably straight sounding soundtrack, a trauma porn romance, and a cishet saviour’ that we keep seeing. the captain’s ongoing journey with his sexuality emphasises the overaching theme of the show: recovering from trauma and humanity’s endless capacity for growth, and i think that’s worth showing over and over again until it stops being true.

additionally, while the captain’s journey regarding his gayness is a big part of his character and story, ghosts makes it clear that it’s not the ONLY part, and being gay is far from his ONLY characteristic or dramatic/comedic engine. the fact that i’m even having to congratulate ghosts for doing that really shows how much film and television is struggling huh.

while all queer media is, and should be, subject to criticism, i think if it helps even one person then it absolutely deserves to exist, and i can say i’ve found the captain’s journey to be the lgbt story i’ve found that’s closest to my own, which says a lot considering he’s a dead world war 2 soldier who hangs out with other ghosts including a slutty Tory, a georgian noblewoman, and a literal caveman.

3. if captain gay, why he no have boyfriend????

another complaint that’s been circulating is that since the captain doesn’t, and likely won’t, have a boyfriend, that makes him Bad Representation because it follows the sad single gay trope. i kind of get the logic from this one, and a lot of it is up to personal interpretation, but part of me really enjoys the fact that the captain’s journey towards accepting himself is separated from having a relationship.

coming out is often paired with having romantic/sexual relationships (either as the reason or reward for doing so). my own struggle with repression didn't end the second that came out, and i still struggle with letting myself develop & acknowledge romantic feelings as a result of actively shutting them (and most other feelings in general) down for years, and statistics show that lgbtq youth in particular tend not to live out their 'teen years' until their twenties. by not giving cap a relationship straight away, ghosts separates the act of claiming identity and sexual orientation from finding a partner (two things which are, more often than not, separate), and also provides some very nice validation to folks who have yet to have the relationship they want, especially when lots of mainstream queer media is now jumping on the cishet media bandwagon of acting as if every person loses their virginity and has a life defining relationship at sixteen. it’s essentially a continuation of the earlier theme of “it’s never too late”, and who’s to say the captain won’t get a gay bear ghost boyfriend to go haunt nazis with??? people die all the time, it could happen.

(also, i think him and julian will have definitely shagged at least once. it was a low moment for both of them and they refuse to speak of it.)

lots of asexual/ace spectrum fans have come out to say how much they’ve loved being able to headcanon cap as ace, and while that’s not a headcanon i personally have, i think it’s brilliant that ace fans feel seen by his character- we’re all in this soup together babey (and sorry for cursing everyone still reading this with that cap/julian headcanon. i’m just a vessel)

4. “okay, but cap’s a GHOST- doesn’t that make this Bury Your Gays?”

this is a bit of a complex one, but i’m going to say no as a result of the following break down.

Bury Your Gays (BYG), aka the trope where lgbtq characters are consistently killed off (and often with a heavy dose of trauma, while cishet characters survive) is probably one of my least favourite lgbt media tropes. BYG has two main points:

1. the lgbt character is killed, thus removing them from story entirely- hence the use of the phrase ‘killed OFF’ (killed off of the show/film)

2. the character’s death reinforces the perception that lgbtq people’s lives must end in tragedy, instead of being long and fulfilling, or are inherently less valuable. bonus points if the character is killed in a hate crime or confesses same-gender love right before they die (that one implies that queer love genuinely has no future!)

not every death of an lgbtq character is bury your gays, and i personally feel that the captain is an example of an lgbt death that isn’t.

first of all, while the captain is dead, so are the vast majority of characters in ghosts. the premise of the show means that death is not the end of the line for its characters- for most of them, it’s the only reason we get to see them on screen at all. as such, the captain being dead doesn’t remove him from the story, so point one is irrelevant.

at the time of posting, we don’t know how or why the captain died, but we've had nothing to suggest his death was in any way related to his latent sexuality, so his mysterious death doesn’t actively play into the supposedly inherent tragedy of queer lives, nor the supposedly lesser value. that’s as of right now- since we don’t know the circumstances of his death it’s a little tough to analyse properly. while the captain’s life absolutely features missed opportunities and it’s fair share of tragedy, hope and growth (which seems to be the theme of this post) abounds in equal measure. the captain may not be alive, but we DO get to see him growing and having a relatively happy existence, that for the most part seems to be getting even better as he learns to open up and be himself unapologetically- that doesn’t feel like BYG to me.

while writng this, it’s just occured to me that death really is a second chance for most of the ghosts, especially with the introduction of alison. from mary learning to read, to thomas finding modern music, they’ve all been given the chance explore things they never could have while they were alive, and hopefully grow enough to one day be sucked off move on.

in conclusion,

i love the captain very much and i hope his arc lives up to the standards it’s set so far. i don’t know where to put this in this post, but i’d alo like to say i LOVE how in Perfect Day, the captain wasn’t used as an educational experienced for fanny at all. i am very tired of people expecting me to be the walking talking homophobe educator and rehabilitator, so the fact that it’s alison and the other ghosts that call fanny out while the captain just gets to have fun with the wedding organisation made me very happy.

here’s a few other cap posts that i’ve done:

the captain’s arc if adam and the film crew stayed

a possible cap coming out

the captain backstory headcanon

if you’ve read this far,

thank you!

also check out @alex-ghosts-corner , this post inspired me very much to write this

#i subluxed all my fingers and wrists doing this but worth it #bbc ghosts #bbc ghosts headcanon #bbc ghosts analysis #the captain #caphavers #the captain x havers #ben willbond #lgbt representation #lgbt rep #queer media #lgbt media

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prismatic-bell · 5 years

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So I was thinking at work, and you know what Disney should have done if they insisted on remaking Beauty and the Beast? They could have solved two major problems from the first movie in one fell swoop.

First, let’s identify the problems. First, there are only three (named) women in the original BatB movie: Belle, Fifi (Lumiere’s girlfriend, who has a different name in literally every single adaptation), and Mrs. Potts. Or, if you want to be blunt about it: The virgin, the whore, and the mother. Thaaaaaaaat’s not just a whole bunch of unfortunate stereotypes right there, not at all. (There is one more woman, but she’s unnamed: the wardrobe. Apparently in development her name was Madame Armoire, so that’s what I’m calling her.)

Next: Lefou. He was an awful gay-stereotype lackey in the original and he became an awful gay lackey in the remake. Note that I actually like Lefou--I think he’s an incredibly fun character--but that execution, in 2018? Nah, fam.

And how would I fix both of these?

Very simple.

Make Lefou a girl.

With some minor plot changes.

Bear with me a minute here. So we start out with Mademoiselle Lefou following Gaston into frame, right, just like the original. But this Lefou is wearing clothes that are way too big; her hair is chopped short and ragged. It becomes obvious from the way she acts and speaks that her giant not-exactly-a-dress is an old shirt of Gaston’s, and the hair is a self-administered hack job. This Lefou, like Belle, is sort of a town joke--it’s only Gaston’s apparent goodwill that keeps her able to remain in town at all, and the reason for her off-kilter, tomboyish look pretty quickly becomes apparent when Gaston says he intends to marry Belle: Lefou protests, and then quickly goes sad and wistful when Gaston says he deserves the best. Lefou might be kidding the town (and herself) with her overblown Gaston-crush, but she’s not fooling us.

Now, I’m a fan of the stage version, so we’re going to borrow from it just a tad here. There’s a song that isn’t in the movie called “Les Maison des Lunes,” and it’s basically the scene where Gaston gets in cahoots with the owner of the asylum, only awesome. (Listen, it’s a great song.) We’re borrowing that. But instead of Lefou gleefully going along, as the song goes on, Lefou starts to realize just exactly what she’s agreeing to, culminating in a line where, in reply to Gaston saying “she’ll be my bride,” Lefou replies “she’d rather die” and quickly covers it up with a rhyme. Maybe she’s just realized she’s turning against a fellow outcast; maybe it’s occurred to her that she, too, will be tossed aside in some terrible fashion when Gaston no longer has a use for her. It doesn’t matter. Blocking and voice tone show she is, at most, now a very reluctant ally to Gaston’s cause.

Lefou is still reluctant to watch the house for Belle and Maurice to return, no longer because she’s “missing out on the action” but because doing so means facilitating a plan she’s no longer on board with. As The Mob Song approaches, Lefou observes how Belle talks about the Beast, and we see her looking between Belle, Gaston, and her own reflection in a hanging pan with increasing horror; she’s not in love with Gaston, and never was. All she was in love with was an ideal that’s suddenly been shown horrifically wrong. All she has to do to know it is to look at Belle’s face; that’s love, right there.

And so Lefou tries to pull away from Gaston as the march to the castle begins, but she’s dragged along--so she tosses Belle the cellar key, or, if we’re going with the animated “Chip did it” version, perhaps she’s the one who kicks out the blocks from under the wood-chopping machine in the hopes it’ll crash out the window.

(I’m also in favor of girl!Chip, by the way. There are even some schools that already do it that way because of a lack of boys for the cast.)

And so, the melee in the castle, there’s one big change: Lefou quickly realizes this is her chance to make up for the harm she’s caused, and starts wreaking holy hell. Gaston’s crossbow (which he carries but then never uses)? “Accidentally” burned when she just fucking yeets it right at the sentient cookstove. Random approaching villagers trying to take the stairs? Bowled over by a living bust Lefou offers a good rolling start. The doors finally slammed? Yep, she’s there, slumping down amid a group of highly suspicious household objects all out of breath until she asks one very important question: “Where’d Gaston go?”

Now at this point you may be thinking okay, Lefou was the shittiest queer representation ever, but he was representation, and I’ve just swapped out a gay man for a lesbian, which is very much not the same thing. No problem, my friends, because remember the feather duster whose entire role is “be slutty to the point even her name doesn’t matter”?

The feather duster is now a very charming wineglass who, in human form, is a footman. (Or valet, if you prefer the term, although a footman is more likely to make sense as a wineglass and if we’re going deep into the lore, would also be more frequently in contact with Lumiere, the maitre’d.) Given that everyone else has horrifically on-the-nose puns for names, let’s call him Duvin.

(If you’re going to scream about historical inaccuracy because I made the singing candelabra queer, we’re gonna have some words about what your real problem is.) Now if you must have “Human Again” in your Beauty and the Beast--and let me state here that I hate it in the musical and hate even more that they put it back in the animated version when the original reason for removing it was that it makes no fucking sense--this does raise a bit of a problem with Lumiere’s lines, in which he says he had “a mademoiselle on each arm” and Mrs. Potts suggests his return to humanity “should cause several husbands alarm.” But might I suggest, if we’re doing this and doing it right, let’s give the wineglass a greater role than poor Fifi/Babette/Plumette did, make him gay, and go right on ahead and let Lumiere be the giant flaming (not sorry) bisexual flirt he really should have been in the first place, and change the lyrics to “a dashing young thing on each arm” and “should cause several spouses alarm.” Other than the fact that we’re including it at all, that fixes all problems with Human Again.

(If you object to me removing a female character here even though I’ve added two via Lefou and Chip and liberated a third by giving Madame Armoire back her original name and bigger role, I can fix that too. There is absolutely nothing in the lore that prevents the cookstove from being a chick. You could also make Belle’s bed canopy sentient and have her turn back into a maid. Or give that violin-playing hatstand a female role. I’m deeply in favor of the hatstand being Cogsworth’s long-suffering sister. There are many options.)

But let’s get back to the end of the movie, shall we, since I just left the Beast about to be deadified and Lefou collapsed in the hallway and Gaston alive, and none of these are a satisfactory turn of events.

Lefou’s dazed question sends those objects capable of going upstairs fleeing toward the West Wing, just in time to see the Beast fall and Belle’s fateful declaration. Yay! Lights! Flashing! Magic! The Beast is alive and is now a kind of pasty-looking dude who really had no right to call anybody else ugly! Let’s go down to the ballroom, everybody!

. . . . ready for it?

We’ve got Belle--who, without that unfortunate trio of named ladies, just becomes our heroine and, now, our princess. We have Mrs. Potts, the head maid, who very neatly pairs with Cogsworth as our dignified elder heads of the staff, and Chip, who’s The Kid. These are three different kinds of women--understated, professional, Literally A Kid.

And then we add our traditional femme via Madame Armoire . . . who comes in with a very dapper Lefou, proper vest and watch chain and everything. Lefou never stops being a hunter or butch or kind of goofy. It’s just she’s found her people.

(And Lumiere and Duvin both get to be equally courtly and not all stereotyped to death or the butt of any guy-in-a-dress jokes. Although if we must have some kind of clothing joke, I’m deeply in favor of “I had forgotten how very dashing you look in uniform.” “Ah. In uniform?” CUT AWAY AND NEVER MENTION AGAIN.)

THERE. GOOD QUEER REP. MORE WOMEN. NO MORE UNFORTUNATE THINGS WITH THE NAMED WOMEN.

Hire me, Disney.

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krisrix · 4 years

Note

how old were you when you transitioned?

Oof, my friend, I wish I had a simple answer for you.

The short version is: I haven’t medically transitioned, but I fully socially transitioned a bit over a year ago, at 30.

The long version is: every minute of every day of every year is an attempt at “transitioning”.

I’ve known I was trans since I was 5 or so. Not that I had the words for it or understood it or anything. All I knew was that there was something weird going on between my legs and I wanted it gone. TW self-harm: I straight-up tried to claw my junk off around 8 years old. My mom thought I had some kind of infection and took me to the gyno. I decided that repeating that experience was not worth it and left my junk alone after that.

I grew up with my mom and my sister, both of whom are very feminine. Even though my mom dressed us the same, I felt like I was a completely different species. Nothing ever made sense. I was in a constant state of discomfort.

I went to private primary school and was forced to wear a skirt. I get eczema, especially wherever I might be sweaty, so I convinced my mom that having the backs of my thighs against the chairs with so little protection was bad for me. She, in turn, convinced my doctor of this. I got a doctor’s note and was allowed to wear the slacks from the boys’ uniform.

I went to public secondary school, so no more uniforms. I mostly dressed like a boy. My friends and I joked around about it, but I was never firm with them. My mom routinely told me I had “penis envy”, and everyone just assumed (both in private and to my face) that I was a butch lesbian. When someone would say things like “you just wish you were born a boy”, I would say “yeah, that’s true”. But that was it. Everyone tried to ignore it, including me. I didn’t hold my ground.

At 16, when I met my husband, I was completely frank about it with him from the start. It was a non-issue—he’s trans, too. He told his friends and family about his own transness before we met, so it was very easy for me to do the same in his circles.

At 24, I moved to Montreal to be with my husband. Being with his friends instead of my own was the first time I had most people in my life treating me and talking about me the way I wanted.

At 30, I was crumbling under the weight of it. I had spent my whole life so far googling medical transitioning and being terrified. There’s far more info on the internet for gender confirmation surgeries for transwomen than there is for transmen, especially 20 years ago when my search began—but either way, it was really scary. It still is. But by that point, I knew I had to do something, because it was getting to be too much.

The perfect opportunity fell into my lap: a friend who works for CBC pointed Simon and me to a radio segment they were doing on gender and sexuality. The plan was to cover topics in way that gave the average listener a bit of a primer in these various things—a few 15-minute interviews with people from all walks of life that weren’t white, cismale, and heteronormative. We reached out, did a pre-interview, and talked with the producer for 2 hours.

She decided 15 minutes wasn’t long enough to tell our story, so we were brought into the studio for an hour-long live segment, with callers and everything. It was scary and amazing.

Two days before the show, I wrote an absolutely massive (surprise, surprise) Facebook post, informing all of my family members about my transness in no uncertain terms. They were supportive! And many tuned in to the interview! I was flying high!!

I thought, “okay, I’ve done the hard part. The medical stuff is nothing, after that! I can start HRT now!”

But then I remembered that I’m a voice actor, specifically for daily videos on a YouTube channel. And if I start HRT, I will lose my job. I can’t record voice-overs with a wildly fluctuating voice. And even if I could flip a switch and have a male voice the very next day, I know that I’ll likely stop getting work in that field. I have a very effeminate way of speaking. I sound like a contestant on Drag Race. That’s not a bad thing, but there are not a lot of clients who want that type of voice over.

So... for now, I’m a bit stuck. I’m going to keep on with the voice acting gig because I have nothing else I can consistently do. But if that falls through, or if I eventually cave, then I definitely want to try HRT and get top surgery. It’s something that haunts me every day. Hopefully, I will not have to wait another 30 years until I make that next big leap.

#ama #Anonymous #krisrix replies

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a-very-fond-farewell · 4 years

Text

The forbidden crack! Untamed prompts: 14/?

MeetCute modern!AU [mianqing edition]: “Don’t Bother Looking Down”

[title is from the song “We Fell in Love in October” by Girl in Red]

[let me live vicariously through my baby girls ok?? let me have this]

Qingyang wishes she never moved in this damned country in the first place. Coach Nie followed her alright, so she should be fine and, really, she is thankful for this amazing opportunity. But now she kind of regrets giving up her Lanling citizenships in order to move back to her mother’s home country and fence for the Qishan national team. She understands the language to some extent, but the people there immediately notice her accent and they glare at her whenever she speaks.

Coach Nie moved country as well just to make a champion out of her and, although he respects her for the choice she made, Qingyang knows he misses Qinghe and the people he left behind.

Getting into the national team was nothing compared to the impossible task to fit in and live a normal life. Even her new teammates don’t talk to her unless it’s strictly necessary and they always speak in that quick dialect of theirs just to gossip behind her back. Some of the guys in the male team are actually friendly and manager Xiao Xingchen is always offering to help her with this or that. Meng Yao had to leave Lanling to make the team and even his mother is, coincidentally, from Nightless City just like hers. She doesn’t like Xue Yang: barely seventeen, never heard of manners in his life, but he’s a genius in his own way and Qingyang has a lot to learn from his swordsmanship. However, his younger step sister A-Qing is the loveliest girl and the foulest mouth on the planet whenever she begrudgingly cheers for him, so maybe Qingyang could, potentially, relax a bit and have some fun while training.

But no. Their respective teams captains are actually evil and want them to suffer through impossible training sessions just to let them bask in glory without doing much themselves. Wang Lingjiao especially hates Qingyang’s guts and does everything in her power to make her leave.

It’s not Qingyang’s fault if her disgusting boyfriend had tried to give her a lift home too many times already. She wouldn’t even accept a drink from Wen Chao, let alone a lift. But one day Qingyang has enough, honest to the gods she has.

So it’s with a hollow heart that she stumbles into a random library to check if they have something to consult for her anxiety... when she sees her.

The girl that lives above her in her new apartment complex with her Grandma and younger brother. The one who always scowls at her because she never gets the trash out in time. The one who their landlady refers to with the ever lovely title of “our little overachiever” and “med-school dropout” any chance she gets. The one who apparently went to Lanling University along with Qingyang’s cousin ZiXuan and was the top of their class. The one who always runs around with the child she babysits for the rich couple at the end of the street.

And fuck no, Luo Qingyang’s not gonna mess with that.

So when she readies herself for yet another awkward encounter with the angry looking woman, the last thing she expects is to be welcomed with a blinding smile.

“Welcome, how can I help you today?”

And if Qingyang has to rely on some forced pleasantries between retail worker and client just to experience some human connection... so be it. It may be sick to ask for kindness this way, but she’ll make do.

She has to.

[details underneath]

Wen Qing hates her job. Not because she hates books, although she’s not a great reader herself (save from poetry, but nobody needs to know that), but because her boss is the epitome of “welcoming host” and she’s suffering from a chronic case of resting bitch face and forcing smiles is the last thing she wants out of life.

She came back to Qishan to look after her grandma after she broke her femur and her brother Wen Ning is studying to become a teacher and the final exam is nearing. Wen Qing didn’t want him to drop out to look after their grandma, so she left her fancy scholarship behind and came back.

XiChen is her boss at the library and took her in after his brother WangJi asked him to: Wen Qing and A-Yuan are distant cousins, but she and her brother didn’t have a job by the time the child became an orphan and their grandma was too old to look after him; hence, WangJi and his husband Wei Ying adopted A-Yuan and didn’t want him to live separated from his original family, so they moved in Qishan and frequently meet with the Wen’s.

Wen Qing feels bad about dropping out of university, but she refuses to regret it since she’s more than happy to look after her grandma. ZiXuan is a pediatrician now and several years have passed since they were classmates and competing for grades, but he checks on her through video chats every once in a while.

(ZiXuan is -coincidentally- Qingyang’s cousin and they talk a lot more than what they used to do now that he’s married and his wife is waiting for their first child. Turns out, ZiXuan is a secret matchmaking mastermind now that he is happily married and has matured enough to want his dear ones to be happy as well. So he plants the seed of curiosity in Wen Qing’s head by talking about his “hot and exceptionally talented fencer cousin who could possibly bench press a grown man. have I mentioned she’s hot?”)

...

(“Ew, do you think your cousin is hot?” / “Hot as in... lesbian terms, you get me” / “No. I really don’t. I’m straight.” / “Sure Wen Qing. Sure.”)

...

Qingyang keeps going to the library after her practice, in full gear and with her hair messy and red cheeks just to see Wen Qing smile at her and being forced to be nice to her. She absolutely knows the other woman is forced to do so and so she annoys her with pleasantries and silly things, but she never outright flirts with her [the lesbian courtship prevents the subjects from using such direct and straight(pfffffft)forward ways of approach, obviously].

...

(“I’m so sorry for forgetting about the trash the other day” / “That’s [*clenches fists*] fine. Don’t worry about it” / “Will you forgive me, Miss Wen? Really? [*Qingyang used ‘Bambi eyes’. It’s very effective!*] / “Don’t worry, that’s fine [*Wen Qing wishes the ground could swallow her whole. The nerve!*])

...

Wei Ying obviously befriends Luo Qingyang: he has to. He’s never seen Wen Qing this flustered in his life and he needs something to entertain him while Lan Zhan is at work. So he meddles bc he’s a little shit, but we all love him for it anyway.

...

(“Did you make a library card yet or...?” / “I don’t want to give that woman my ID, she might call the police on me once she gets a hold on my name” / “You literally live in the same building” / “It’s a big building. And I always misplace the trash, I’m afraid she’ll call the police on me saying I’m actually hiding a corpse in my apartment. No thank you” / “It’s a library subscription, not a birth certificate for gods’ sake” / “I’m not risking it, Wei Ying” / “Then I’ll tell you what to do.......”)

The next day at the library...

(“I want to get a card” / [*internally screeching* “took you long enough, wasting my time”] “Name?” / “MianMian”)

...

Which is apparently the wrong thing to say, because Wen Qing loves poetry and goes ballistic for any reference she can pick in normal conversations. So when she hears ‘MianMian’ she immediately goes “Then my name is YuanDao” and it’s like a fucking switch has been pressed and now WEN QING IS THE ONE PURSUING but Qingyang doesn’t know anything about poetry and doesn’t know what to do. She’s created a butch monster who actually genuinely smiles at her now and that’s too powerful for a small femme like her holy fuck.

O_o

Additional content: Jiang Cheng goes to a million blind dates until he meets XiChen out of fucking nowhere and they move in together two days later + Meng Yao seduces Nie MingJue with hot fencing routines without even sparing a glance at the older man (his drive is focused only on the medal and... for NMJ that’s kind of hot) + Wen Ning is actually a heartthrob but he’s not interested and runs away from people actually swooning at his feet left and right + Xue Yang is not a criminal and only wants his sister to finally get the service dog of her dreams + Song Lan is a referee but he gets distracted by the Qishan team manager bc... boy is he fine

o_O

[I’m suffering. Can someone write this I do not have time to commit to my own writing and I don’t trust myself with the delivery.

I’m but a tiny prompt-machine help me D:]

#mdzs #cql #mo dao zu shi #the untamed #mianqing #the forbidden crack! untamed prompts #mdzs/au: sports #mdzs/au: modern #mdzs/au: fencing #xicheng #wangxian

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parkinsonismblr-blog · 5 years

Text

stonewall

this is by @radfemwonderwoman but it wont let me like/reblog her awesomeness that i desperately need for my records hehe

First of all, the story of Stonewall is very complex. There is a lot of different accounts of what happened and who was there.

Let’s begin with Marsha and Sylvia.

1) Marsha P. Johnson was a gay man/transvestite/self-identified drag queen.

“Johnson’s concept of her gender identity varied throughout her life. In the early 1970s, Johnson simultaneously identified as a “gay transvestite” and briefly considered surgical transition,[18] the latter of which she ultimately rejected, saying in an interview on June 26, 1992 (ten days before her death), “I’m a man.”[3]”

He was for transgender rights, that’s true, but he himself was not transgender or transsexual.

2) Sylvia Rivera is a bit more complicated. Sylva referred to herself as a gay man, a transvestite, and a pre-op transsexual. So she may or may not have been transsexual, but that is not for us to assume.

~ “My first lover taught me how to make love to another man, and in my youth I was always supposed to be the bottom. This is the way I thought a relationship was…an effeminate gay boy was solely to be the bottom. My lover was a butch-looking boy, very butch. Actually, no one even knew he was gay.

~ “People now want to call me a lesbian because I’m with Julia, and I say, “No. I’m just me. I’m not a lesbian.” I’m tired of being labeled. I don’t even like the label transgender. I’m tired of living with labels. I just want to be who I am. I am Sylvia Rivera. Ray Rivera left home at the age of 10 to become Sylvia. And that’s who I am.”

~ “What about the term “drag queen?” People in STAR prefer to use the term “transvestite.” Can you explain the difference?

A drag queen is one that usually goes to a ball, and that’s the only time she gets dressed up. Transvestites live in drag. A transsexual spends most of her life in drag. I never come out of drag to go anywhere. Everywhere I go I get all dressed up. A transvestite is still like a boy, very manly looking, a feminine boy. You wear drag here and there. When you’re a transsexual, you have hormone treatments and you’re on your way to a sex change, and you never come out of female clothes.

You’d be considered a pre-operative transsexual then? You don’t know when you’d be able to go through the sex change?

Oh, most likely this year. I’m planning to go to Sweden. I’m working very hard to go.

It’s cheaper there than it is at Johns Hopkins? It’s $300 for a change, but you’ve got to stay there a year.”

Very few drag queens were allowed into Stonewall and the bar was meant for gay men.

“Eric Marcus, Making Gay History

Actually, it was the first time I had been to the friggin’ Stonewall. The Stonewall wasn’t a bar for drag queens. Everybody keeps saying it was. The drag queen spot was the Washington Square Bar, at Third St. and Broadway. This is where I get into arguments with people. They say, “Oh, no, it was a drag-queen bar, it was a black bar.” No. Washington Square Bar was the drag-queen bar.If you were a drag queen, you could get into the Stonewall if they knew you. And only a certain number of drag queens were allowed into the Stonewall at that time.“

“Martin Duberman, Stonewall

Washington Square was Sylvia’s special favo[u]rite. It opened at three in the morning and catered primarily (rather than incidentally as was the case with Stonewall) to transvestites[.][…]If she was going out at all… she would go to Washington Square. She had never been crazy about Stonewall, she reminded Tammy: Men in makeup were tolerated there, but not exactly cherished.”

From Marsha: “Well, uh, at first it was just a gay men’s bar. And they didn’t allow no, uh, women in. And then they started allowing women in. And then they let the drag queens in. I was one of the first drag queens to go to that place. ‘Cause when we first heard about this… and then they had these drag queens workin’ there. They didn’t never arrested anybody at the Stonewall. All they did was line us up and tell us to get out.”

From Sylvia herself: “What people fail to realize is that the Stonewall was not a drag queen bar. It was a white male bar for middle-class males to pick up young boys of different races. Very few drag queens were allowed in there, because if they had allowed drag queens into the club, it would have brought the club down. That would have brought more problems to the club. It’s the way the Mafia thought, and so did the patrons. So the queens who were allowed in basically had inside connections. I used to go there to pick up drugs to take somewhere else. I had connections.” Sylvia was said to not have even been at the Stonewall riots.

“Paul D. Cain: Where’s Sylvia Rivera? Duberman’s Stonewall placed her at the bar on the first night of the riots, yet your book makes absolutely no mention of her (although you do mention her buddy, Marsha P. Johnson). Do you think that, like so many others, she fabricated her remarks about being there?

David Carter: Yes, I am afraid that I could only conclude that Sylvia’s account of her being there on the first night was a fabrication. Randy Wicker told me that Marsha P. Johnson, his roommate, told him that Sylvia was not at the Stonewall Inn at the outbreak of the riots as she had fallen asleep in Bryant Park after taking heroin. (Marsha had gone up to Bryant Park, found her asleep, and woke her up to tell her about the riots.) Playwright and early gay activist Doric Wilson also independently told me that Marsha Johnson had told him that Sylvia was not at the Stonewall Riots.Sylvia also showed a real inconsistency in her accounts of the Stonewall Riots. In one account she claimed that the night the riots broke out was the first time that she had ever been at the Stonewall Inn; in another account she said that she had been there many times. In one account she said that she was there in drag; in another account she says that she was not in drag. She told Martin Duberman that she went to the Stonewall Inn the night the riots began to celebrate Marsha Johnson’s birthday, but Marsha was born in August, not June. I also did not find one credible witness who saw her there on the first night.”

“My late uncle Bob Kohler was a Stonewall veteran; he could never actually place either Sylvia or Marsha at the bar.”

“The eyewitness accounts in RAT (July 1969) specifically credits “one guy” (not a lesbian or a queen) for precipitating a scuffle by refusing to be put into the paddy wagon…. At least two people credit Sylvia herself with provoking the riot…. But I’ve found no corroboration for either account[,] and Sylvia herself, with a keener regard for the historical record, denies the accuracy of both versions. She does remember “throwing bricks and rocks and things” after the mêlée began, but takes no credit for initiating the confrontation.“

“The Ambrosini photo does not show a single transvestite. Craig Rodwell told researcher Michael Scherker that “one of the myths about Stonewall is it was all drag queens. I mean, drag queens are part of what went on. Certainly one of the most courageous, but there were maybe twelve drag queens. In thousands of people.”

“Randy: Marsha’s the only one, she’s the only one everyone agrees was at the Stonewall riots. There were a lot of other people, but everyone agrees that Marsha was there, so…

Marsha: The way I winded up being at Stonewall that night, I was having a party uptown. And we were all out there and Miss Sylvia Rivera and them were over in the park having a cocktail.”

Please note how it says transvestites - transvestite is defined as:

“a person, especially a male, who assumes the dress and manner usually associated with the opposite sex.”

“Eric: Now you mentioned an organization that Marsha, you were involved with. What was the name?

Marsha: Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries with Miss Sylvia Rivera.

Randy: STAR.

Eric: What was that group about? What was it for?

Marsha: Ah, it was a group for transvestites.

Randy: It was a bunch of…

Marsha: Men and women transvestites…”

Films/interviews:

Pay It No Mind: Marsha P. Johnson

Randy Wicker Interviews Sylvia Rivera on the Pier

Stonewall Veterans Talk About the Night That Changed The World - Stonewall: Profiles of Pride

3) The person who started the riots was a black butch lesbian drag king named Stormé DeLarverie.

“Stormé DeLarverie (December 24, 1920 – May 24, 2014) was a butch lesbian whose scuffle with police, according to Storme herself and many eyewitnesses, was the defining moment that incited the Stonewall riots, spurring the crowd to action. “It was a rebellion, it was an uprising, it was a civil rights disobedience–it wasn’t no damn riot.”[1]”

“Fed up with constant police harassment and social discrimination, angry patrons and neighborhood residents hung around outside of the bar rather than disperse, becoming increasingly agitated as the events unfolded and people were aggressively manhandled. At one point, an officer hit a lesbian over the head as he forced her into the paddy wagon — she shouted to onlookers to act, inciting the crowd to begin throw pennies, bottles, cobble stones, and other objects at the police.”

“Several spectators agreed that it was the action of a cross-dressing lesbian – possibly Stormé DeLarverie – which would change everyone’s attitude forever. DeLarverie denied that she was the catalyst, but her own recollection matched others’ descriptions of the defining moment. “The cop hit me and I hit him back,” DeLarverie explained [in Kaiser’s own interview with her on 1995.12.09].”

Remembering Stormé - The Woman Of Color Who Incited The Stonewall Revolution

However, there are some disagreements on this:

“Charles Kaiser suggested to the author that Stormé DeLarverie (see The Gay Metropolis: 1940–1996 [Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997], p. 198) was this woman, but she could not have been. To cite only a few of the problems with this thesis, DeLarverie’s story is one of escaping the police, not of being taken into custody by them, and she has claimed that on that night she was outside the bar, “quiet, I didn’t say a word to anybody, I was just trying to see what was happening,” when a policeman, without provocation, hit her in the eye (“Stonewall 1969: A Symposium,” June 20, 1997, New York City). DeLarverie is also an African-American woman, and all the witnesses interviewed by the author describe the woman as Caucasian.”

4) You know that before Stonewall, there were LGB movements, right?

https://www.out.com/entertainment/popnography/2010/03/homo-history-emma-goldman.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_LGBT_actions_in_the_United_States_prior_to_the_Stonewall_riots

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Council_on_Religion_and_the_Homosexual

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_the_Clock

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Human_Rights

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mattachine_Society

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daughters_of_Bilitis

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Kameny

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Gittings

Just a few examples for you.

5) You should also recognize that Stonewall didn’t affect people outside America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific-Humanitarian_Committee

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veterans_Benevolent_Association

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_Federation_for_Lesbian,_Gay,_Bisexual_and_Transgender_Rights

You can deny history all you’d like, but it doesn’t change it.

Stay mad. 😘 ✌

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emzymakesbelieve · 5 years

Note

not to be fake deep but let's talk about all your old walt babies that you haven't mentioned (because i love the hainline's okay and you and all your kids and i miss you

Send me an old muse and I’ll gush about them.

oKAY SIT DOWN AND BUCKLE UP, KIDDOS.

(I love you, too, sweet pea. *smooch*)

Frank Hainline

So Frank is a prick, to start off, but he’s my prick and you’re not allowed to trash talk him without my say so (which of course you have because he’s A PRICK). He was the kind of kid who wore an anarchy symbol on his jacket but never actually did anything to represent or invoke anarchy. He’s also a gigantic slut and can’t keep his pants zipped for longer than ten minutes. Fidelity is not this man’s middle name (*CoUgH* illegitimate child he never knew about). He definitely wasn’t ready to become a father when Victoria got pregnant (and more or less trapped him into marriage), but by the time baby Penelope came, he devoted every ounce of energy he could to making sure she had a good life, and the two of them actually grew very close. He passed away from cancer when Penelope was about ten.

Norma Hainline

Penelope’s eldest. The two most important things you need to know about Norma are that she’s a dancer and she’s gay as a maypole. Her main focuses are tap and ballet. She loves old Hollywood - she got her start watching Singin’ in the Rain and Fred & Ginger films - but definitely prefers to live in the here and now where she can express herself both as an artist and as a lesbian. The dance world, much as she loves it, is a crusty old institution that needs to break some pointless rules and get over itself. She is also Grade A Mom Friend Extraordinaire™. Her love language is definitely acts of service, particularly making sure you’re eating and sleeping well and taking your medicine on time (though turns out she’s a terrible patient herself). Much to her frustration, her two closet friends - Noah and Nick - are both more or less bent on self destruction and driving her completely bonkers, but she loves them just the same.

Francis Hainline

Francis, the third eldest, has no business being in this family with how shy he is, but nevertheless. Definitely the black sheep of the family, but his siblings defend and support him with everything they have. (Well, Kath usually does it with a lot of sarcasm, but you can tell she loves him.) He’s a total hipster and has a special love for anything that was built before the year 2000. His prize possession is an old camcorder that uses real VHS tapes, so naturally he becomes a film student. I envision him growing up and working as a cinematographer and eventual director of poignant indie films and documentaries - stuff with lots of lingering, fly-on-the-wall shots. Also, special shoutout to Seraphina, the love of his got dang life. Those two gave me so many freaking cavities with their cuteness.

Kathleen Hainline

So Kath is a mess, but that’s just par for the course in this family, I suppose. She’s the baby of the family and has always felt like she’s living in her sister Norma’s shadow. She’s a bit of a wild child, but certainly not to the extent Victoria was. It’s all just a cry for attention, trust me. She wants to feel needed, she wants to feel wanted, she wants to feel special. And anything that takes the attention of the people she loves off of her needs to die, plain and simple. She’s best friends with Daisy and is technically endgame with Jonas (though we really didn’t get to write them that far), so here goes a prayer candle for my lovely Becca.

Dory Novak

As you can probably guess by the name, Dory is based on that delightful blue tang we know and love. In the Walt universe, she developed her short term memory loss after an accident that killed her parents, and was adopted by Marlin. She loves swimming and her family and especially anything combining the two. She’s a freaking sweetheart who is actually pretty hard on herself, and it was so heartbreaking to play her in any kind of stressful situation because five minutes later she would still be freaked out by have no idea as to why (looking at you, Scream event). Also, Scooby liked her a lot and I felt so freaking blessed??? She ends up becoming a social worker and helping kids in the foster system like her.

Charlie Harper & Jenny Harper née Parkington

I never got to properly play Dory’s parents, but here’s the fast and skinny on them. Jenny was a shy bookworm who never thought boys would be interested in her and (for the most part) had made peace with that theory. Charlie was a jock who was head over heels for Jenny but never knew how to communicate it without being a sleaze. Eventually, he manages to ask her out, she says yes, and they pretty much become attached at the hip. She comes to his basketball games and swim meets decked out in the school colors and cheering like a maniac. My guess is Dory came a little earlier than they were expecting, but not so early that it would be considered scandalous - probably when they were almost finished with college or something. Dory became their world and they spoiled that little girl beyond belief. Unfortunately, both of them were killed in a car wreck when Dory was very little.

Marlene Novak

Dory’s first kid, adopted. To sum it up nicely, Marlene’s a hot mess because she was never able to come to terms with the fact that her birth mother didn’t want her. I tried to start this whole plot where she ran into her birth mother just out in the wild and that made her get even messier, but I think I was just throwing crap on the fire to see what blew up at that point. She also has a…flirtatious arrangement, shall we say, with her friend Viv.

Lyle Novak

Dory’s second kid, also adopted. *sigh* Lyle, Lyle, Lyle… He’s a cutie, don’t get me wrong, but I feel like I didn’t give his character enough punch? He just seems kind of blah now that I look back at him. I have a history of being super self conscious about my male characters if they don’t have like a Super Archetype personality for some freaking reason, and Lyle is definitely an example of that. He’s a little shy, but not so shy that it’s endearing, and he’s also a little courageous, but not so courageous that he actually gets crap done. He’s a little complacent, looking back on him, which is kind of the opposite of how I wanted to play him...? I dunno. Maybe I’m being too harsh on myself. HE’S CUTE. LIFE GOES ON.

Cinderella Tremaine

To the surprise of absolutely no one, I’ve actually played a Cinderella counterpart in a few different groups, but let’s just talk about how I portrayed her at Walt. French transfer student in America (I changed her to straight up American after a point) who loves animals arguably more than life itself and tries her best not to cry over things she can’t control. She’s also daydreamy as FRICK. Loves to get lost in her own imagination. If she’s not engaged in conversation or work of some kind, I can guarantee you her conscience isn’t even on this plane. Also, can I just shriek about the superhero AU version of her where she was a counterpart to Zatanna and literally became her own fairy godmother? Because I think about that far more than is probably healthy.

Emmett Tremaine & Johanna Tremaine née Cartier

Same thing as Dory’s parents, just gonna give you a quick lowdown. Johanna came from a fairly well off family in France (distantly related to those guys, but far enough away that it doesn’t really count), but her parents thought she was an absolute embarrassment. She was never afraid to speak her mind when it came to things like etiquette and politics, and she had a fabulously wild imagination. She never stopped believing in fairies, ghosts, gremlins, things like that. Emmett was that quiet nerd dreamer type, very much obsessed with travel and history. And like I need to spell it out for you, but they were LUDICROUSLY in love with each other. Like, nauseatingly so.

Robby Tremaine

Robby is Cindy’s son I whipped up real quick one next gen when I was going crazy and wanted to snatch Nick Robinson’s beautiful face. He’s a hardcore farm boy who doesn’t mind a little mud behind his ears and super environmentally conscious. Not just recycling and veganism and all that, but he will go off on you about sustainable farming and animal raising, and how the hydrogen fuel cell is the way of the future.

Taige Bailey

Based on Terk from Tarzan, Taige is a super jock, total butch lesbian, and altogether DUMBNUT. Like, GOD she’s so stupid sometimes because she just barrels into crap with reckless abandon and doesn’t think things through. Dear God, she will PUNCH you if you so much as look at her funny, just ‘cause she feels bored. And she walks around like she’s God’s gift to creation, but she’s just a little twerp. But she’s my twerp. (Huh. I’m just now realizing how similar Taige and Pen are. In a weird way, Taige is like the tomboy version of Pen.) Here, you can imagine me lighting a prayer candle because I never got to play her against her two best friends and I’m SAD. Y’ALL NEVER GOT TO EXPERIENCE THE TOUR DE FORCE THAT IS T CUBED. Also *cough* she and Vitani may have had a *coUGH* flirtationship.

I would also put Taige’s parents on this list, but they’re so hardly even developed that it’s not really worth mentioning them. I only know their names: Lamarr and April.

Jared Bailey

Taige’s only child, Jared’s still trying to figure out what masculinity means to him, what with being raised by two women and all. He can get a little “dudebro alpha male” sometimes, but he’s also that kid you definitely want to have your back when things get rough. He’ll help you with your homework, teach you how to shoot a three-pointer, and walk you home when it’s dark like the gentleman he is.

#spidcypools #YOU SAID 'ALL' BY GOD #read mores are for wimps #have my children #[ q and a ]#[ muse: frank ]#[ muse: norma ]#[ muse: francis ]#[ muse: kathleen ]#[ muse: dory ]#[ muse: marlene ]#[ muse: lyle ]#[ muse: cinderella ]#[ muse: robby ]#[ muse: taige ]#[ muse: jared ]

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motherstone · 5 years

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Can you tell us more about your OCs? How are the OG cast their ancestors? Are Gabi and Sandra happy together now? Married yet? Your OCs are so rad and I love their story

!! AaaaAA thank you!! 😄😄😭😭💟💗💞💘💓💕💘💝 that’s is so rad of you op!!! And I’ll try my best to tell them a bit of their story:

Lemlin is born with a birth defect (underdeveloped elf ears), which makes him unable to receive vibrations (I hc the tip of elf ears are used to detect so) and hear things properly. He doesn’t really want implants and is actually perfectly fine with his disability, so he wears hearing aids instead and elf ears prosthetics just in battle. He had a full-blooded elf brother, Jaqes, who was the son of a wealthy nobleman before the Nobility class was dissolved a long time ago. They have a close and amiable relationship with one another, but Jaqes didn’t know he’s a member of the covert Auxiliary, much less a sharpshooter (which is ironic, because he’s the head of the Central Intelligence Division in there, a mix of CIA and FBI). Lemlin has a variety of friend including both humans, elves, and halflings. He’s really interested in theater, which is actually pretty suitable with his disability (deaf people are incredibly expressive while signing so yea!), and often goes on shows (Gigas goes with him on ocassion. They sorta have a father-son relationship haha). He’s the elf equivalent of 16 (no one knows. They thought he’s 22, it also doesn’t help he has his helmet on all the time). Lemlin is pan-ace. He lives in Milre, Gulfen.

Ian has a very strained relationship with his father (hc is that nearly all who is part of the Elf army are abusive fathers because they didn’t get the treatment they needed at the time), who is at odds with his homosexuality. He doesn’t care though, although at first he inherited his racism. That is, until his sister (Mako) had teenage sex with a human (who broke up with her when she got pregnant), and thus giving birth to a halfling, much to his anger. He’s even more furious with humans over this, but eventually realize his anger was bullshit, especially when his nephew was born. Now he has human friends, a human BESTfriend (Sandra), and is now seatching for a boyfriend (he’s working on it. If they can’t handle his personality they gotta go). Ian is passive-aggressive and sarcastic at times, especially on the field, so it causes great friction among the group, he is also prideful and assured with his great skills and technicality. However for all of his ego, he is a good leader when Gabi is not around and gets the job done, and is incredibly competent at what he do (he’s based on a few teachers and a classmate of mine haha). He’s the elf equivalent of 26, with kinfe skills, mechanic skills, pilot skills, and tactic skills, only second to Gabi (but the gap is still wide). He’s gay. He lives in Gorbon, Windsor.

Gigas! Big and friendly Gigas. He used to live in Ganon’s Gate, and had a halfling bestfriend, that is until said friend was lynched, to his great horror. It leads him to killing someone who went after him, which landed him in jail. Thankfully, Gulfen’s prison system is revised thanks to the King (Trellis. It’s similar to how prisoners are treated in Norway), so his actions are recognized as self-defense. While in prison, someone from the Auxiliary sees potential in him (it helps that he’s huuuuge. Like, 6"10’ huge. I decided that 7 feet is too tall), and thus offers to recruit him once his term is finished. By then, he’s a changed man, learning from experience, books, and stories from the inmates helped him develop a kinder and helpful personality (still cheerful tho. He’s always a joyous and passionate man). He gets into the Auxiliary and was assigned to Lufen, Coco, where he met his wife. It was a celebratio for the end of the great war, and the city was holding a huge banquet (similar to the fiesta of the Philippines where the food is laid out on a huuuuge table), and that’s where he met his future wife, whom he loudly comolimented her cooking (he’s a cook himself). There’s a lot more to his story besides this but I’ll cut it off. He’s the elven equivalent of 36, and is an incredibly strong guy, but lacks any sort of outstanding ability besides that. His personality acts as a great mediator amongst the group, and as a guiding and kind voice to all, and is very friendly towards Theorn. He’s straight. He lives in Coco, Lufen with his son and wife.

Sandra! She’s the physical incarnation of Dumb Bitch Energy (aaaa bit of a self-insert ahah). But by God is she agile and fast. She has 4 siblings (a couple are adopted) and she’s the oldest, her family owning a farm in Lufen. She used to be assigned in Gulfen to detect and neutralize landmines with her dog, until her legs got blown off along with her companion. It devastated her so much, she uses sex to cope (she’s hypersexual, but dw she is working on it). Sandra can a bit slow and dim-witted at times, but has a treasure trove of street smarts with instincts to match and is a friendly person to anyone regardless. She is on ocassion sorta oblivious to the atmosphere, which makes her make a situation worse, but if you direct her on the field, she uses her creativity to do her job efficiently. She’s bffs with Ian, often spending time with one another to the point of a qpr (queer-platonic relationship. THAT close). She’s 23. She’s bi/pan. She lives in a developing town of Lufen.

Theorn, an expert swordsman who is the only person left from the Redbeard warrior clan. He’s still using Leon’s sword, still at good shape, at the age of repulsor and stonekeeper tech (which is impractical but he’s still good fighter so they don’t stop him). He was orphaned at a young age, but developed a strong moral code regardless and became a police officer in Kanalis as a result. He got tangled in with the Auxiliary when he gets out during a lockdown (upon which all citizens goes underground for safety) to help people when the city is attacked by a rogue mountain giant, and sees Gabi slaying the thing and encountering Ian (who is in a different squad from Gabi. This is so long ok), which he is not meant to do or see, as the Auxiliary’s existence must be kept secret. He and Ian fights but they were toe to toe when it comes to close combat, they knock him out and takes him to the Hexagon (Auxiliary HQ) with the intent to wipe his memory of the event, to which he simply pleads to join, feeling he’ll be able to contribute more. Now he’s in a squad of the weirdest, egoistic people he’s met, and although looking serious, is absolutely at a loss of words at the Auxiliary’s odd happnings and morbid humor (heard soldiers develop nihilistic and fatalistic sense of humour once), but deep respect at the fights and sacrifices that they do. His lawful, goody-good personality is often at odds with the group (he’s kind of the prim and proper guy while these dudes… Can be wacky at times), to his great frustration, with Gigas the only person taking him seriously. He is at most odds with Ian (haha sexual tension everyone?) and with Gabi’s chaotic neutral/good personality. He is still good friends with them tho and cares about their sakes. Theorn is still a reliable and the most trustworthy guy of the group, and although his skills are nowhere near outstanding outside parkour, hand-to-hand combat and swordplay, he is strong, fast, and agile in his own way. He’s 24. Theorn is bi/pan.He lives in Kanalis, Windsor.

Gabi. Hot-headed, incredibly petty, batshit strong and skilled Gabi. She follows her own moral code, and is often at odds with the authority at Auxiliary and her own squad until she realizes her toxic attitude aint shit and changed. Now she’s the most serious of the group, but at least reasonable. Has a very fucked up sense of humour and hates Theorn’s personality (cop-convict anyone?), but ultimately came to resoect him for insisitng on doing good in a shitty world. Has a serious crush on a developing artist, who was pretty nice and her cheerful and lax personality helps her feel safe and comfortable, helping her develop social awareness and skills. She is in fact, not in a relationship with Sandra (not her type). Her crush used to have a crush on someone, but eventually stops and slowly has a crush on her (not that she knew. She was p much resigned to unreqruited love). But like her, her cursh has a deep set of mental issues, leading her to fall into depression and neglect, making her unable to work on her recruitment piece for Gulfen’s Institution (which offers free tuiton to its students should they oass and it’s a great school). Gabi then often breaks out of the Auxiliary without permission and during vacation months to take care of her recovery (it started when her mother beat her up in her OWN home, an small dilapilating apartment, making her feel paranoid and unsafe. It ignited old self-loathing and unwavering sadness yet again). She eventually gets better, and gets accepted, to the duo’s happiness. At a celebration party, she takes Gabi as her plus one. As they dance, Gabi finally confesses her feelings, which her crush actually reciprocates. They then starts a happy and healthy relationship. She the elven equivalent of 25. She’s a butch lesbian and lives in an unspecified part of Gulfen. Did I mention Gabilan is her pops

Ravis. He, him/they, them. They think idealistically on ocassion, even ny Theorn’s standards so the squad is kind of exasperated with him. It doesn’t help he is more naive and inexperience in comparison to them (yes, even Lemlin), with a good childhood to boot (in comparison to theirs) so it took quite a long while for them to warm up the guy. Ravis used to have a happy and healthy childhood in Lucien with his mother, and his father working abroad in Gulfen, but visits them very feequently. It all changes when the King suddenly (tw: suicide) committed suicide (?) (they never found the body), plunging the Elf nation into chaos and government shutdown affecting their lives outside Gulfen. They continue on regardless, with their mother ending up as a widow, and they studied to become one of the leading pioneers of Alchemy, under their mother’s tutelage. They then studied combat under three teachers during their teen years, and in nearing the end of their third term, theur mother is afflicted with an unprecedented terminal illness, and dies. Even though they are of age, they quietly move into the North East of Gulfen, in a remote village where they work as a healer. Needing his intelligence, the squad was sent over to recruit and escort them, in order to investigate a chemical used when an attack on the Border Guard occurs, leading to a breach and thus ending the 500 years of the Gate being infallible. They nevertheless have a compassionate and empathetic nature, driven to help others especially those in need. He is quite well-spoken and intelligent, and has good social skills. Oddly enough, he doesn’t really have friends until the squad. They’re the elven equivalent of 20, and is a certified doctor.

#ok that is enough #thank u for asking and apolohies for the ling post #thank u for asking

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hisband · 6 years

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I’ve stayed quiet about this for too long now, and today I finally reached my limit.

If you interact with ifhollicould / heedingcalls / Summer, block me. I don’t want to see her, ever. She was, unfortunately, somebody I spent a year and a half of my time with (from spring 2016 to winter 2017, to be exact). During much of that time I knew something was wrong with our relationship, but kept convincing myself otherwise. I kept convincing myself that maybe I was overreacting to things - that maybe I was being unfair and selfish, for having needs that didn’t coincide with hers, or cater to hers - but that wasn’t the case at all. And if I knew then what I know now, I would’ve taken more screencaps to help document what I’m about to describe. I never would have gotten involved with her in the first place.

Trigger warning for misogyny, homophobia, lesbophobia & transphobia.

Shit Summer pulled during the time that I knew her includes:

Sending a friend of mine - a friend who happens to be a gay man, someone with no interest in women whatsoever - an unsolicited picture of her half-naked body in November of 2017.

Sending me text messages every day for a whole month (December 2017) after I asked her for some space after a family member died, clearly desperate for a response even though I’d already given her a valid reason as to why I wasn’t talking.

Sending me passive-aggressive texts whenever she saw me posting on the dash but not speaking to her, during the time period mentioned above.

Chasing me down after cutting ties with her last year, getting on anon and guilt-tripping me about the fact I left. Here’s the evidence.

Treating female characters like toys or sex objects (seriously, look at her blogs where she writes women - really look at the way she portrays them in her writing, how she goes out of her way to describe how ~dainty and delicate~ they are), or projecting herself onto her own female characters in order to act out the lustful feelings she has towards others’ muses, particularly of the male variety. I can’t tell you how many times she did that to me, which is a big part of the reason why I left a lot of my blogs from 2016 and 2017. Too many bad memories that literally ruined old muses of mine for me (or at least, writing them on this platform).

Ignoring my own female characters, because paying attention to them meant she had to take a break from wanking to the male characters (and our very few m/m ships!) for five minutes.

Having a very superficial interest in female characters and f/f ships. Happily gushing about het ships and fetishizing m/m ships, but losing interest in the subject the minute that lesbian couples entered the equation.

The very few times we did discuss f/f stuff, she described the characters involved as “sapphic babies”, effectively infantilizing them. (She also was uninterested in giving them complex storylines, on that note. Interesting.) M/M ships were “gay babies”, which is just as infantilizing and gross.

According to her logic, women are “the fairer sex” - a term that sure crops up a lot on her blogs! Okay, so…you’re implying that all women have vaginas, Summer? That having a vagina is inherently tied to being a woman? Sex and gender are not interchangeable terms.

The term “fairer sex” is also nasty because it inherently assumes that all women are these weak, feminized creatures, separate from men, less strong and less capable and less rugged and always “fairer” than them. Really interesting statement from somebody who preaches about what a feminist she is.

Which I guess would explain why she took such an issue with my character Ginger, whose behaviour did not line up with Summer’s views on what is traditionally feminine (she even called Ginger “butch” at one point, despite having no idea what that word actually means), but I digress. She’d also frequently reduce Ginger to her sexual orientation. At the time, I wrote Ginger as bisexual, so I guess Summer saw Ginger as “the aggressive girl who fucks other girls”.

As for the more personal shit involving why I cut ties with her!

A lot of it involved her possessive and territorial behaviour towards me, particularly towards the end of our friendship (which is exactly why I left). This started around the time I made Murdoc’s blog, became really active on him, began branching out and befriending other roleplayers, or reconnecting with friends I’d lost touch with. Prior to this incident, Summer and I spoke to each other on a daily basis; it was only towards the end that I began to feel very smothered by her presence. I felt as if I couldn’t go a moment without Summer wanting to know where I was and what I was doing. Summer constantly reminded me that she loved me and valued me as a friend - which I now recognize as a manipulation tactic to keep me by her side, and to make me feel guilty for having other relationships outside of her.

Which is really funny, because I tried on many occasions to get her involved with other peers of mine during the time that I knew her (so she wouldn’t feel left out), only for Summer to constantly decline, claiming those peers of mine were “better” than her and that she “wasn’t good enough to talk to them”. At the time, I thought that maybe it was her social anxiety. Now, looking back, it reads as yet another tactic of manipulation - a way of keeping me around her.

Summer would also frequently take her bad moods out on me, becoming hysterical over text messages and refusing to listen to reason and refusing to find constructive ways to work through her problems. I would frequently try to assure her that everything was going to be okay, only for Summer to brush me off. Those conversations usually went something like this:

Summer: This is making me upset. Me: Have you thought about doing A, B, or C? Summer: I’m going to go mope now.

It didn’t make me feel very good, and often made me feel like I was failing her as a friend. By the end of those conversations, I’d usually feel as drained, and my mood would be as miserable as hers was.

I often felt as if Summer domineered our conversations and the things we wrote about together. In all fairness, I have a very passive personality, and have a tendency to let others lead conversations. I don’t usually give input unless explicitly asked, or if I’m absolutely certain that my input won’t be ignored. I also have a history with allowing people to take their anger and grief out on me. This is something I’ve been actively been trying to work on. I do not want to put all the blame on Summer for all of that, but a large part of me still feels as if the very nature of my personality was preyed upon, and that Summer was manipulating me into doing what she wanted - both in and out of character.

Again, I wish I had more of the aforementioned evidence with me on hand, but I promise you. Go through Summer’s blogs and take a look for yourself. She hasn’t changed. A lot of what I’ve mentioned is still going on, and will continue to go on if someone doesn’t speak up against her.

This post is not an invitation to send hate to Summer, but to inform people of her past and ongoing behaviour so those who may be potentially affected can do what they need to in order to avoid her (blacklisting, unfollowing, blocking, etc). Ignore or disagree with me if you want - I’m merely giving my side of the story and sharing my experiences involving her, and trying to protect those who are at risk of being hurt.

#⇩ ▬ sᴜɴsʜɪɴᴇ ɪɴ ᴀ ʙᴀɢ ( ooc. )#long post /#negative /#drama /#callout /#namedrop /#homophobia /#transphobia /#lesbophobia /#misogyny /#anyways.#if you feel the need to unfollow or block me after this; that's fine #i mean it when i say i never want to see her on my dash ever again

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cowboyjen68 · 6 years

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Given the topic of labels lately, what labels make you personally proud or personally uncomfortable? Do you think age plays a role in what people are comfortable or uneasy identifying as?

First, I do think age can have a lot to do with labels. It can be what was popular or comfortable when you came out, or just the ID that fit you best as you were forming your sense of self. I often see a “rub” between generations as to labels people love, are okay or or absolutely hate. Sometimes the meaning has just changes, the English language is like that, but it only changes to those who do not have experience or memory for the origin of the word, or its common connotations from before they were around. My older lesbians friends (this is a generalization, because there can be factors besides age, much prefer lesbian and not ever queer. They much prefer the spelling of woman to be without the “man” or “men”. SO there are various ways to spell it. They also are very connected to “butch” and “femme” IF they fit within one of those categories and they take it pretty seriously. It is a source of pride and connection for them. My older gay male friends (meaning my contemporaries or older) also prefer Gay over queer most of the time. They do use some of the terminology such as “twink” or “top” and “bottom” but it almost seems like they are not super serious.. more in a gently teasing way when interacting with each other.

Now about me… disclaimer.. this is just me, my opinions and my feelings and connections and experiences with language. I have a degree in English but NOT gender studies (my minor is religion and philosophy). So I do find our language amazing and important. I also know it can be personal and i do not like to police anyone’s language that they use for themselves, whether I like it or not. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth. When I feel like someone is using a label that is important to me, and I think they use it wrong either on themselves or towards me I repeat to myself, people are more important than the words.

One more thing. I do believe labels are important, at least at certain times in life, maybe always for some. It helps us identify our community with in our community. It helps us find mentors within that ID that look like we look, or will look when we get older. It helps people to know they are not alone, that there are others who feel the same way and that they are not wrong about how they feel or want to look, just because society tells them they can’t possibly be what they know they are:

Ok Me

I love Lesbian. I love all the power it holds. It’s very meaning of women who love women. That is me. I always use it. I don’t mind “gay” but if Identifying myself I will always chose lesbian. Sometimes I make the challenge to say it in conversation at least one a day just because I am so proud.

Female and woman. These are also important to me. I align my gender with with physical sex and I love them both. My parents were pretty good about not gendering anything for the most part (I mean it was the 70′s it was fairly common to not over gender clothes and toys etc) I never played with dolls or liked dresses. Growing up I was not afraid of those things I align with my femaleness, such as my hips, vagina and breasts. Those “parts” are my experience being female and while they are not perfect and of course when I was younger I was not fond of them (since they were never the cultural ideal), As i aged I grew to love them and appreciate them. Part of that was I realized how much I loved them on the women I was attracted to and the overwhelming sentiment was that they were shocked someone thought they were lovely. I don’t hold a grasp on these terms so tightly that I mind if they have grown to encompass more that a “woman born with a vagina” . These are not my terms to define, but I am proud of what I connect with to feel like a woman and I encourage others to search and see what connects them to the ID.

There was a bar in Iowa CIty when I was in my early drinking days. It was my “home” as i came out. A very good friend painted a mural on the back wall that said “Are You Queer?” on it. I own the rights to it, he left them to me when he passed away. I have thought or re releasing the art for shirts. I am at a bit of a crossroads. I love the art. And I never was attached to the word “queer”. I usually thing of it as a gay man’s term but now I hear it more often as a way women define themselves. I think it works fine for other. It is not for me. I will always default to lesbian. Queer is too broad of a stroke for my comfort. But I will be releasing the shirts, and in fact did a trial run to raise money for an LGBTQIA Youth Club. I will put a photo of the graphic on my blog some day. I love it because Dan painted it at a time when “queer” was a bold statement and it was HUGE! And because my memory of that bar helping me find myself is sentimental and rich with experiences that make me me.

Butch: Okay.. I just LOVE THIS ONE> IT is ME..It is just ME> As soon as someone called me Butch… i fell in love with it. I was already the very definition of it, I just didn’t know it was a “thing”. Once my older lesbian friends (many fall somewhere on the butch to soft butch spectrum) started to teach me the ropes... the butch nod, that it is okay to shop in the men’s department. Suspenders are always in fashion, my cowboy hat was okay with them and everyone who didn’t like it could “piss off” as one 70 year old once put it. They taught me that butches can be scared of snakes, and change the oil or go to Jiffy Lube. Butches could hate sports and love to camp or vice versa. That we are varied and diverse, but there are in tangible things that we recognize in each other and don’t doubt my instincts. Soft butch actually fits me a little better 75 percent of the time. Just depends on what I am doing or, how butch I look up against the women I am hanging out with.

Terms I am not comfortable with. I get “him’ and “ sir” a lot and it is okay with me. Usually is a snap call based on a sudden glance or look in my direction. I almost always correct it but in a kind way. After the third or 4th correction, I just let it go. Not that big of deal. I would never use them on purpose. I don’t like to be referred to as cis gendered. That is just a personal preference. I know the meaning and I know the reasons and history. I teach about it when I speak. For some reason it strikes me as more information than anyone needs about me in general. If someone uses it about me, I totally let it go. It is fine. I just never use it on myself. And close friends know I prefer they not use it when describing me. I don’t use gnc, even thought technically that could apply. Mostly because I DO consider by dress and hair and butchness to be ALL female. I am just as much a woman in grubby work over alls with short hair as I would be with long hair and makeup (cultural gender stereotype) so I don’t really see myself as non conforming. I am conforming, to what I, as a woman, like to look like. There you go. Took me two days and saving it as a draft several time but I got ‘er done. Thank you for the ask/prompt.

#butch #soft butch

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lennyisdyeing · 6 years

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15-25

hey anon! thanks so much for the ask!

15. are you comfortable with yourself?

not really, heh. i’m actually really uncomfortable in my own skin. it’s kind of confusing, really

16. bottom or top?

bottom. compleettteeee bottom. I honestly tried to be a top, but that so did not work

17. femme or butch?

i’ve kind of never liked these terms? like i get that it’s an important part of lesbianism, it just feels so.... absolute. I’m gonna have to go with a mixture of both i guess

18. do you bind?

i don’t feel the need to, and I don’t, no. I’ve tried before though, when I was figuring out by gender identity, and shit is that stuff difficult and painful if you don’t know what you’re doing

19. do you shave?

these are sexuality questions, so i feel like this question has specific insinuation that i’m not seeing. I...shave my legs??? every few months or so?? yeah

20. if you could date anyone you wanted, who would it be?

my fucking girlfriend bitch. i love the shit out of that woman. (also we’ve agreed to polyamory if cheese became personified)

21. do you have a partner(s)?

hell yea

22. describe your partner(s)

the most beautiful mixture of beautiful person and meme. gets (almost!) all of my references. very kind and generous but also very fierce and determined. will fight for what she wants. apparently fucking Tall™. i love her so very much

23. have you ever dated anyone of the same sex?

right fucking now chicken nuggets

24. anyone of another sex?

i regretted that the second i accepted

25. pastel gay or goth gay?

again, a wonderfully horrendous mixture of both

thanks again so much for the asks, anon! i wish to hear from you again soon ;D

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flockofdoves · 4 years

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was trying to think of a way to divide up ocs on toyhouse so i don’t get too embarrassed about them yesterday but then it turned into just trying to list like every character i’ve ever made the vast majority of them i’d never put on toyhouse lol. but this was fun for myself even though i definitely forgot chracters and even whole stories from when i was younger

kinda old (definitely need updating they’re from when i was 17/18 and haven’t done much in recent years but nonetheless are my most recent ocs and i would probably like to do something with them someday still):

all the alienated characters - raul and michael primarily, also side characters like their relatives (lennie, joaquin, marcell, maybe also shinsuke, natalia, nina, naomi, hana, leela, etc) and friends (still need to name them lol) etc

justicia (less set on doing her story any time soon compared to alienated, but still theres something to it i might want to work with someday)

pretty old (like i was 16-17)

gf debate characters (this is actually older than a lot of the ones i list as even older in this list but i kept working on them til i was like 17 so they hold up better even if i don’t want to finish making their story anymore) - isaac, micah (micah is literally kinda from when i was 12 lol but i brought her to like 3 different stories and she was a boy in the first one too so shes basically not that character anymore), and then side characters like mirabel (originated in same story at 12 as micah), ayçin, anna, micahs mom and her wife, micahs cousin (another one from that old story) etc

those ocs that literally none of them have names or barely personalities i only ever did character sketches and basic concepts but its like a ghost story thing i was gonna do - 12 y/o baby butch protag, the ghost girl, baby butch’s trans girl cousin, cousins trans guy friend

really old (characters from when i was like 14-15 that did not really develop much from there. most of these are characters i have had fun with and maybe drawn since but are goofy and don’t hold up in a lot of aspects and most of them i’ll probably never pick up for stories again)

football lesbians - monica, wanda, and rania

pigeon magical girls (technically maybe i actually finished a very abbreviated version of their origin story for a school art project when i was 15 lol but i planned to do more back then and now i dont want to) - zehra, ronni, the pigeon, probably not amy and zoë that was just a cameo for myself of ocs from when i was like 11 lol

naomi’s story (this one i might actually want to do something with someday, i wrote a short story about it plus a bit more, but i have to make some serious changes i don’t really think i thought of some of the implications of some stuff in it before) - just naomi and the ghost basically. not to be confused with naomi in alienated who is michael’s sister they are not at all the same person

assorted characters that never really had a story - mels and cvijeta, charlotte (thought about putting her in football lesbians. she does basketball but. jock wlw you know)

really really old (characters from late middle school, like 13-14)

uhhh that wizards story. it never had a name idk. i still kinda like them though tbh even if i’ll never do anything with them anymore - tess, ali, nataline, brandy, mo, remora, cnidarian

really really really old (characters from the middle of middle school, like 12-13. at this point my recollection of what came before what might be kinda off tho)

that fae folk in pennsylvania and ohio story - emilia, ilana, micah (first version! lol), mirabel, that boy that i just hate and don’t remember the name of and resent making a character that had a crush on micah, micahs cousin, darling/angel (a faerie that just went by terms of endearment as if they were names), uhhh the second group of characters in a different more rural town i tried to write that i dont remember the names of

haunted victorian house story - benji, aisha, elizabeth

updated onex arget (fantasy world i wrote about a lot when i was in elementary school) story - nai, rieae

idk this story never had a name and barely a plot beyond ivy and victor becoming friends and venting to each other - victor, ivy, miles, maitê

forks and spoons (story i improvised with my little cousin who was like 8 at the time lol) - florimundi(?), i’m forgetting literally all 3 of the other characters names lol (maybe reese and victor for two of them??? but maybe not bc those are also other very old characters that idk if i reused the names of)

theo and ted - theoni and theodore (aka theo and ted!), oh also that guy they meet who wears like. a trench coat iirc

super old (characters from the later half of the 6th grade and early 7th, like 12ish)

really dumb story about a closeted trans person with did getting transformation powers - i actually dont remember the main character and their main other alters names anymore, i remember the other character they had a crush on stephan though

all those characters in bands that i never actually could settle on a story for beyond a variety of interpersonal drama. very inspired by the webcomic jenny hanniver tbh - avery, mark, etti, adrian, xavier, pepper, uhhh theres literally So Many more of them and also so many i dont remember the names of anymore but just for some that come to mind. that periwinkle colored hair in a bowl cut character that always wore a beanie who was in avery’s band whos names on the tip of my tongue (maybe that was etti and the character i’m calling etti was called something else?? maybe victoria? maybe andy? maybe andy was an entirely different 3rd character?? idk. actually yeah i’m positive bowlcut character was etti rereading this), xaviers ex-boyfriend who was obsessed with homestuck (lmao), that guy with red hair i accidentally directly ripped off the design of some jenny hanniver character, that goth guy with braces and glasses (maybe he wasnt in this?), that screamo band with 2 lead singers, that guy with brown hair that said he was straight with an exception (msfdkjghhsfd god), that person with the emo haircut in flame colors, this literally is not even all the characters lol

extremely old (largely from 6th grade, like age 11ish. weird period of time where i suddenly wanted to write about romance but thought it had to be straight but then very quickly was like ‘wait actually nvm i have a laptop now and think i’m bicurious i’m only gonna write about gay people)

gsa story (this might have been the summer before 7th actually but it feels distinctly before the other stuff in the last category so idk maybe just my whole impression of when i made things for middle school is off) - emmy(?), allie(?), noah(???), some other kid, i think noah(?) or the other kid got reused to be the guy i regretted making a part of that faerie story who liked old micah lol, maybe more kids, their teacher

idk that kid with blue hair and black eyes with white irises and his sister

middle school lesbians - leah and cass

lesbian who works in food service and there were weird references to comic books but filtered through me referencing an obscure emo humor youtube channel that made jokes about comics i’d never read - amy, zoë, amy’s straight best friend i dont remember the name of??

tosca (this wasnt straight romance but it was like the last thing pre me always having lgbt main characters) - idk. there were two characters i drew like once. theres nothing to note about this except wanting to make it is what made me learn about webcomics

that story i posted the first chapter of on quibblo about a hippie girl (somehow in 2010?? dont ask me) and an emo boy liking each other before abandoning to never write about cishet romance again. didnt even get to the romance part lol - i forget her name. maybe it was april? maybe it was florimundi and i reused it later for another character, nix, reese (her goth lesbian best friend. thank god for reese)

first attempt at straight romance. also about like. idk. fantastical powers in clouds in providence rhode island - selia, shay, cassandra, selias other friend i forget the name of??

ancient (literally elementary school ocs. obviously theres a lot of grades covered here but its just my memory and ability to reference this is so loose idk if i could even try to accurately divide it further)

shadow magic - mezzaluna, her aunt tabby(?), alexa

a, j, & j (barely counts i didnt do anything with them. those are the only characters also)

arine (some of these characters might not be arine characters and just from other onex arget (fantasy world i wrote a bunch of stories in and made a shitty conlang for and stuff) stories but i just dont really remember) - lia, lias sister, dibujurm, that other fantastical creature who was friends with dibujurm i forget the name of that kinda looked like calcifer from howls moving castle but fuzzy not an actual fire (maybe isigo??), emiaelaesa, that obnoxious prince (i think the story was called arine bc that was his name?), the prince’s servant, there absolutely were more

the musical adventures of shiri and don - shiri, don, some evil villain and his henchmen

rosington (there were like no characters besides her. weird junie b jones rip off with nonsensical humor to everyone but me)

that tree prophecy story (maybe set in onex arget?) - nico, emi (?? maybe not her name), their uncle (i forget his name, maybe lester?), their uncles shipmates, that fortune teller

idk some kid that goes on a scavenger hunt to solve a mystery on vacation in like bermuda or something where he meets some quirky girl character who helps him. thats all

i had some characters that started out as me trying to draw characters from the book hoot by carl hiaasen but for some reason then turned into my own ocs and looked nothing like those characters were described and also basically had nothing to do with them in personality and action beyond name after a while. - beatrice and napoleon. this was in a phase where i got a ‘how to draw anime’ book and napoleon straight up looked like a yugioh character his hair was ridiculous

those fake siblings i made up and lied to a substitute teacher in kindergarten about me having 6 siblings because of for absolutely no reason even though i only have one sibling irl

imaginary friends i shared with my brother and then made stories about - theres so many of these, the most important though was chick-chick-chick. who was a very small chick who wore a top hat. and then he had a family(?) of infinitely smaller chicks (chick-chick-chick-chick, for example) the more “chicks” you added to the name

#my ocs #cpost

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manmodeactivate · 7 years

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My coming out letter (FTM)

This is long af but people wanted to see it so here it is :)

This letter may be a surprise to you but there is no better way for me to explain these things. Over the years I’ve been through some tough patches as you may know but without knowing why. You may have been told of some eating troubles a few years ago and even now (not so much of a problem now though). Even told about self-harm and thoughts of suicide (years ago). You even may have tried to guess the main cause for the struggles as I didn’t have the voice or knowledge to tell you myself. Sexuality is my guess as to what you think it has been… But I had worked that out when I was in year 7 or 8 so that wasn’t the source of my struggles (by the way dad I do like girls mostly at least). Yes I do still like girls but there’s so much more to it that I couldn’t figure out till now. The topic of gender.

I was a tomboy when I was little as you know but I started to realise something was off when puberty hit. I have been thinking about my gender for years now but kept pushing it away because I felt crazy or that I didn’t deserve to live because I was a freak. I felt as though there was a checklist of sorts to be transgender. I was scared as almost everything did stereotypically fit. But that doesn’t mean that I am or not based on a few stereotypes, this was something I had to work out myself without the influence from a third party. No one could tell me if this was who I am or not, only I could and I now know that this is who I am. It was hard for me to come to terms with and took me years. I didn’t want to be seen as a freak like you probably see them but that’s because I didn’t understand. I researched constantly and it helped me understand myself. I’m not trans because of the media or because its ‘trendy’, it’s very serious and I wouldn’t be telling you if I wasn’t absolutely sure. It may seem to you that it is becoming trendy but people are just feeling more comfortable about being themselves in this generation as people are more accepting now than 20 years ago. I am more than willing to go through social harassment, and other negative things to be happy. I really need to do this and know I will need to go through transition. If you really want to be certain we could see a doctor or gender therapist. I wouldn’t wish this life upon anybody as it will be difficult but I need to be happy. The reason I want to pursue this is for my happiness and not just feel like shit for the rest of my life.

I became envious of the boys when they started to grow taller, their voices deepened and when they started to grow facial hair. In turn I began to hate my own body and where the fat distributed itself to. In year 9 I started not to eat so the fat would leave my hips, thighs and chest and it worked a little bit but it was toxic. I had always wanted short hair but mum hated that I wore boy’s clothes already so I didn’t want to make that worse. I’ve stopped shaving because it helps me to feel more masculine and comfortable with myself. I dreaded when I had to get a bra, the material mark of being female. Making my chest more prominent and visible. Disgusting for me. I feel extremely disconnected from that part of my body in particular. My chest is also easily perceivable by other people and hard to ignore from my point of view making it one of the more difficult things to deal with. Now I wear a binder that I have kept hidden, and wash it by hand in secret when I can. Binding is when the chest is flattened by the use of a binder. I have never and will never use bandages to bind as they can cause serious injuries. The binder I use I bought through a friend and have been using for a few months. It’s from a company that makes binders specifically for transgender people called GC2B and I have been trying to wear them only for as long as advised. It just looks like a sports bra with extra fabric on the bottom, like a tank top. Wearing a binder really helps me to feel more comfortable with the top half of my body. When I shower I have to move the mirror and close my eyes 90% of the time as I don’t want to see my body. And now my name. Over time my dislike of it has grown. Not that it isn’t a good name in general but it’s too feminine for me to a point where I can’t say it myself. Hence why I don’t answer the phone because I don’t want to have to say my name. I hate to go out places and buy things in fear I’ll be seen as female so I avoid any social interactions that aren’t necessary. I’ve also avoided a job for this reason I don’t want more people calling me things that hurt me and with a job it would come from two places, the public and co-workers. School alone is enough as by the end of the week I’m overwhelmed and it just slowly builds up over time. It’s also why I shut myself away because I need to recover from this invisible verbal stabbing I get every day.

But what does being transgender mean? By definition it means a person not identifying with their birth-given sex. For me specifically I am a female to male transgender person (ftm/ transman). This means I was “born in the wrong body” as they say. There are 7 billion people on this planet so its impossible for everyone to fall into the two stereotypical binary genders. Gender isn’t as simple and limited as what we are told as kids. It is very complex and it is found that for example a transman has the same brain patterns as a biological male. Interesting right? This is a very real thing. Gender and sex are two different things, sex being biological and gender being what’s in your head. These two are often lumped together when they are two completely different things. One does not necessarily dictate the other just like in my case. I couldn’t imagine my future for the longest time because being a woman or butch lesbian it just made no sense to me. Even to be labelled as a lesbian made me feel strange so I just labelled myself as gay. It was still extremely foreign. But then it just clicked when I imagined myself as a male.

For me to be comfortable with myself in the future I would need to medically transition. Some different parts of medical transition include hormones, top surgery (mastectomy) and bottom surgery. There is no ‘the surgery’ that’s required and medical transition is a choice not a necessity. For me I would need top surgery and hormones to be comfortable with myself which would take a lot of time and cost a lot of money. For hormones at the moment the most common method is an injection around every week or two for the rest of my life. As you know I hate needles but I would love to be stabbed in my arse for the rest of my life if it means that I can become the person I want to be. Top surgery costs A LOT of money ($10 000 give or take a few thousand, increasing over time) but I really need to do it at some point as I can’t bind forever. Other parts of transition are social and physical. Changing appearances like clothing which I have pretty much already done and getting others to use different pronouns and names. For a name I was thinking Nathan would be easiest as you could just start calling me just Nat and gradually warm up to a new name. if you have any other suggestions just let me know and we can talk about other options. I just thought it would be easier and I don’t mind the name. It will take time to use the correct name, whatever it ends up being and the correct pronouns. We can also discuss how we will tell other people too. I know the future will be a big concern but I have tried to think it through extensively. All these changes would greatly improve my mental health and self-esteem allowing me to be the best version of myself.

I can assure you I am not confused and I am still the same person with the same personality. You did nothing ‘wrong’ to cause this and it is not your fault. It is most certainly not a phase and I have not been brainwashed. When I wasn’t even born you wouldn’t have minded if I was born a boy or a girl so it shouldn’t matter now. Just because I’m trans it doesn’t limit me from falling in love or having a family, it’s just more difficult. There are other people that know from teachers to friends and all are accepting, some even had a hunch before I told them. Think of this letter as me finally opening up to you and trusting you fully and the start of a journey you both can accompany me on. Try and be understanding and willing to learn. I know this is very difficult for you and I’m just as scared as you. This is very much unknown territory for you but we can work through this together. It will be a gradual change but I hope you will put the effort in to try and understand, help and support me. Don’t think of this as you losing a daughter but gaining a son. I chose to tell you this in a letter to allow you to process and think about this before you ask questions. This I believe gives me the opportunity to explain myself fully and gives you the time you need to soak in the information given. Don’t immediately contact me after you have read this, (a short text is okay if you need but please don’t call me) discuss it amongst yourselves and then we can set a time where you can ask questions or discuss this further. If you think negatively about me being transgender just let me know in a short text and you can tell me to leave for a few days if you are angry. Please don’t attack me in anyway as this has been hard for me to tell you and this subject makes me feel vulnerable, at least for the moment. I will still live my life the way I want to, with or without you but I’d very much rather have you both at my side. I have also made a playlist of videos about other people’s transitions, common misconceptions of transitioning and hormones and other useful pieces information to further familiarise yourselves with what I’m going through and hope to go through. All you’ve wanted is my happiness. This is what I need. Help me find my happiness.

#pre t #ftm #trans #coming out #coming out letter #letter #ftm transgender #ftm transman #transgender #transman #transboy #transboi #transguy

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