#I've been reblogging these transphobia posts but I still feel like a post like this is long overdue

[kjzx]

The author of the les art history blog I reblogged some of the last few drawings from is yikes so just letting you guys know. Can't be bothered to find other post with the drawings but also just letting you know that I don't support that

[velvetvexations]

it’s so bizarre to me that you never, EVER reblog or post anything about transmisogyny or the transfem experience. like, can you even recommend any transfem-centric blogs for me to follow? for someone so into “solidarity” your trans activism seems pretty focused on trans men only

So there are multiple things going on with this ask.

As I've explained several times before - I don't necessarily blame you for not seeing it, but I have - most social issues give me panic attacks to contemplate. The thing I mentioned triggered me so badly yesterday was something in the transmisogyny tag that wasn't tagged with anything I had blacklisted (not that OP's fault, I added more variations of transphobia warnings so it hopefully won't happen again).

Intercommunity issues are less existential. Things like hate crimes and legislative assaults on queer people freak me out and leave me a shaking, crying, doomscrolling mess. I don't even follow like, literally any of the people who followed me for transandrophobia advocacy because they reblog other things that gives me heart palpitations.

That limits my exposure to intercommunity issues facing transfems specifically as well, the vast majority of people I follow don't put any discourse on my dash at all. However, I have in fact reblogged posts purely about transmisogyny (other than the kind transandrophobes throw at me lol) only to immediately delete them when I see the OP is vile towards transmascs in other posts, completely spoling the message. At least one was even specifically about ways transmascs can be transmisogynistic, which I thought was a fair enough criticism before realizing it was at best one good point in a sea of bullshit directed at our trans brothers. Another time I specifically asked someone how they felt about trasnmascs before I reblogged their very good post about transmisogyny and was delighted when they gave a fantastic response.

Furthermore, I do actually just speak on pure transmisogyny myself sometimes! I talked at length about the immense pain it caused me realizing Alison Bechdel was TERFier than I thought in a way that completely contradicts the strip that made me cry out of appreciation for her. Recently, I've also been talking a lot about the ways butch transfems are treated for not looking cis.

Do I mention these things less than transandrophobia and other issues that affect people other than transfems? Sure. But like...so what? I like doing things for other people.

I don't mean to act like I'm some kinna savior or anything, but as I said just yesterday, helping people outside of your own issues is something I'm kinna obsessed with not just in myself but others too. I'm constantly stressing how cis allies should be appreciated e.g. my previous feelings about Bechdel, and despite how she turned out I still firmly believe that cis allies should be treasured. I've donated money to multiple cis allies to say thanks for their statements.

It's not like I'm just so saintly selfless or anything like that, I'm very self-centered, it's just that being an ally to [x], [x] being allies to me, and [x] being allies to [y] who have nothing to do with me is not only a rare area of activism I can function in, it's one that actively brings me joy. This includes having sent multiple messages to transmascs thanking them when they speak up about transmisogyny, because I want to show them the love so many of them have shown me for the same thing.

Finally, you say my trans activism is focused on trans men. Maybe so, by volume. But, and I've mentioned this before, I've been wanting to do more for everyone else as well, literally everyone. I've asked a bit about intersex issues and am trying to learn more about what non-binary people who don't lean to one end or the other deal with as well, and I also want all my cis followers to feel just as comfortable and supported by me as well - and, of course, that all goes for other transfems as well, whose pain cuts me to the bone.

I'm radically pro-everyone, anon, and I want to help uplift them all without exception. I understand focusing on one's own lane, and I neither judge that nor am attempting to portray myself as a uniquely noble white knight. That's just what I personally choose to put my efforts towards.

[foone]

Please don’t feel obligated to reply because this might be a touchy issue, but i see on one of your posts that you hate Hacker News. I just discovered HN a few months ago and have been enjoying it, but as a fellow trans person i’m curious if they’ve been transphobic or the like (based on the context of your comment) and if i should stay away

OKAY SO here's thing thing: as a reader, HN is... fine. They're not great. They have a history of sexism in what posts get boosted and a history of various shades of transphobia in the comments, but that's not particularly unusual as far as internet forums go. Reddit is much the same, for example.

My problems with HN are related to getting posted there. The way the site works when you're reading it and when you're getting posted there are very different. More explanation under the readmore since this got long. (warning: some talk of transphobia and doxxing)

The site is not avoidable. Back when I was still on twitter, getting posted on HN meant your notifications were useless for a week, because they are scraped by endless bots trying to farm for likes and reblogs, and every single one of them ends up tagging you. And even now when I'm off twitter, getting posted there means you still get informed that you've been posted there, by well-meaning people who know you hate it, or are just innocently commentating on how it's neat to see you on HN. Or hey, in the latest iteration, you find out because your askbox is now full of slurs (and not just the ones you'd expect!). Basically, it is impossible to be submitted to HN and not know about it.

And then it gets worse because it's now a known fact that I don't like being on HN. Meaning every time I AM on HN, it turns into a big debate in the comments about why I don't like HN, why I post the way I do, and people arguing with the explanation of my opinion. I'm not even there, and people are mad at the phantom of me for not doing things in the way they like.

Because how I post is part of what they always get mad at me about. I have severe ADHD: This is a well known fact about me, I post about it a lot. It means that I used to post on twitter a lot, because twitter was (at the time) one of the only sites I could post on at all: The way it makes you chop up your line of thinking into small chunks, each of which is small enough that I can focus on it. I've since managed to handle tumblr-posting, and I occasionally post on mastodon now, but for most of the time that I was posted on HN, I was posting this way, only on twitter, in long threads where I don't think much ahead or do editing/revisions BECAUSE I CAN'T.

And here's the thing about people who prefer more "traditional" geek news sites like HN: A lot of them are there because they hate the bite-size nature of sites like twitter and tiktok. And they are Not Happy with people submitting twitter threads to HN: They hate that kind of formatting of content, and announce that fact, loudly.

And then people in the comments point out that I have ADHD and can't post in the style they'd prefer (long well-edited blog posts), and then it turns into an argument there, often with people happily brining up their opinions on whether ADHD is "real" or things like that. Again, I'm getting argued about without being there to defend myself.

And this is where it gets transphobic, through the indirect route of sexism: Someone says something innocent but vaguely dickish like "well he should just hire someone to rewrite all his twitter posts as blog posts!" (like they think I am doing this as a job and can afford to pay an editor, rather than just some weirdo who rants because that's what they do). They assume I'm a man, because most of the people who get posted on HN (and especially the ones who get upvoted) are. They just assume everyone without an Obviously Female Name and a profile picture that's a photo of a smiling woman is male, and honestly they're probably right most of the time, because that's just how the gender balance on HN ends up working.

And then someone points out I use they/them pronouns, and it just goes to shit. You get people yelling that it's not their job to figure out the pronouns of everyone they're talking about, like it's a perfectly normal thing to just assume everyone is male, you get people arguing about how "he" used to be the gender neutral pronoun, you get people arguing that singular-they is ungrammatical, you get people taking offense at the very idea of they/them pronouns because "you can't force everyone to follow your religion" (as apparently either trans or non-binary is a religion now (well, I am a pope)), and then a bunch of "[post flagged]" and you can only speculate about how bad THOSE posts were, if so much other transphobia is still sitting in the comments, untouched by the supposed moderators who are supposed to delete it.

You get people calling you mentally ill, and then getting in arguments about how they mean YOU SPECIFICALLY for the crime of "wanting to not be posted on HN", and not all trans people. Because apparently the HN rules are fine with you saying "this specific trans person is mentally ill and should be locked up" as long as you don't imply that your statements also apply to trans people in general.

And then you get hate in your contact forms for days because people realize you're not active on the HN comments and need to bring the "fight" to you directly.

And frankly, this whole mess is made worse by the site's userbase treating it as a joke or something easily fixable. Like, aside from making my pronouns "obvious" (I'm not sure how, exactly? it's already in all my profiles) which wouldn't help, they want me to just move to a different site, one where I can easily block incoming links by their referrer? They always point to JWZ's blog as an example of this, but he's hosting his posts on his own site. He fundamentally is doing something very different than I am, and I really shouldn't have to CHANGE WHAT SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS I USE just because they're being a butt.

And treating it like a joke? oy vey! I once posted a rant on tumblr about WHY EXACTLY I don't like getting posted on HN, and guess what happened next? SOMEONE POSTED THAT THREAD ON HN.

They also have a history of getting mad at me for not wanting to be posted on HN, like it's prima-dona behavior or "egotistical". Like I should be just happy that my stuff got posted there, something that has only ever brought negative attention. I think maybe they assume I'm doing this as a job, and every time they link to my stuff, I make a bunch of money? That's not the case. I don't make any money from them. I don't have ads. This isn't my job. (Fun fact: I know at least one person who has their blog set up to show ads only when HN links to their content, and not otherwise)

I really don't know why they think it's egotistical of me to not want to get harassed, dismissed, and spammed by their site and their users. It's almost like they think it's me posting my content on HN myself, which I would never do because it doesn't aid me in any way. If I was making content for them, I would make sure it gets posted there. I'm not, so I don't. I post for the sites I post on. I could blog in a way they'd like and then post it to HN if I wanted to. I don't. I choose to tweet (in the past) or post on tumblr or post on mastodon, because I'm posting for those specific communities.

And the thing about it is that all these points are, to some extent, obvious. And people know them. Maybe not the people posting the most unthinking takes on HN, but others will point them out. So this just contributes to any HN thread on my posts turning into a big argument.

And there's always people going "WELL JUST DON'T READ THE POSTS ABOUT YOU" as if that's a reasonable option. first of all, I can't be ignorant about them, as mentioned before they kick down my door and go HEY FOONE YOU'RE ON HACKERNEWS. But more importantly, I'm trans. Do you know what happens if enough people get mad at you online? They start posting your home address, phone number, and pictures of your face and relatives. I have to stay at least SLIGHTLY aware of how the discussion on me is going, or I'll be completely surprised when someone shows up at my house with a gun. (This isn't hyperbole: I have gotten doxxed before because I made a twitter thread that got the wrong people a little too mad at me)

Anyway I've talked to the admins of the site and they have basically refused to do anything about it. They admit that they can block my posts from showing up on the site, but they don't want to because people enjoy my content. My wishes don't matter.

And anyway the epilogue is that this has mostly worked out by now. I stopped posting on twitter, not because HN was pushing me to a site where I could better control my post's reach, but because Elon destroyed it. I'm posting longer-form content now, not because my ADHD got better, but because years of training myself to write this way has made it so that I can handle writing as if I was on twitter-like sites, without the enforced restrictions of them.

And I have countermeasures against HN now. Offensive and defensive ones. I'm a little less likely to be posting Cool Tech Stuff here on tumblr now (because every time this happens it severely dampens my enthusiasm for the subject), but I'm a lot less worried that something I post will end up on HN now, as I have options. (I don't want to go into them because HN being HN, they might take preemptive counter-countermeasures to try to disarm them).

Anyway, tl;dr: it's okay if you like reading the site. my problems with it are with getting submitted there, not with reading it. As long as you don't submit my content there, that's 100% okay with me.

[molsno]

in case anyone was wondering, I turned off reblogs on most of my posts a few days ago because I just can't take it anymore. it gets so exhausting trying to use this website as an outspoken feminist.

I've used this blog for almost 11 years. this is my personal blog. I use this website to engage with topics I'm interested in and meet new people, and that's been true since day 1. but I constantly find that when I attempt to share my thoughts on feminism as a regular person in a normal tone, or I write a joke post complaining about misogyny, people will take me in the worst faith imaginable and argue with me. they'll attack me and harass me, sometimes even with explicitly violent transphobia. they'll paint me as irrational and hostile, or take my lack of nuance in these kinds of posts to condescend to me like I'm an idiot who doesn't know anything.

I've seen it all before, so you know what I started doing? I started writing longer posts that explain my thoughts in detail, with all of the nuance necessary, while addressing all of the potential counterpoints in advance. not only do these get significantly fewer reblogs, they barely curb the problem. people still harass me over them, too. these kinds of posts are also a double-edged sword. when I write long form posts based on feminist theory I've read in a formal tone, people take me seriously, admire me, sometimes even idolize me.

I cannot emphasize enough that I am literally Just Some Girl.

do you know how terrifying it is knowing you have thousands of people will read every single thing you say? especially when some of those people put you on a pedestal?

what happens if you fall?

no matter what, I keep finding myself scared of what people will do to me if I show any moment of weakness. whether I try to treat this like my personal blog and complain about things that annoy me or try to be something of an intellectual who educates people on transfeminism using the knowledge I've acquired, I feel like I'm setting myself up for destruction. if I'm ever messy, if I'm ever flawed, if I ever say something wrong, devastation awaits me. either I receive harassment and threats from people who hate me, or I face social ostracization from people who previously liked me.

do you understand how this has caused me immense amounts of stress? how it's influenced my behavior? how it's caused countless breakdowns? how it paralyzes me? do you understand that this is the reality trans women have to live with when we reach any level of notoriety?

I just... I don't know. I'm tired. I need a break. I like talking about my interests, I like discussing transfeminism, I like educating people. I even like the fact that people listen to what I have to say. the things people say about me can be really flattering sometimes. but I've also seen the horrible things people have said about me, and how they pale in comparison to the things they say about trans women who are more notable than me.

I just want to be treated like a person. I don't know how to make that happen. sometimes I just want to tear it all down and force people to see me for who I really am, even if I have to risk losing everything.

[curioscurio]

Sorry I know it's an old reblog but I came across that post about calling trans surgeries mutilation, and while understand the point you were trying to make, huh....ppl also do call cancer survivors who dad double mastectomy mutilated and cancer patients deal with a lot of people being disgusted by their bodies, feel intense pressure to have implants, doctors sometimes even assume their patients want them, or to wear breatplates (same with hair implants/wigs). "Imagine if someone said that about x other marginalized identity" is imo not the most efficient way to support arguments because often, ppl do already that. Also ableism and transphobia are best friends

I've been sitting here for like 20 minutes trying to think of a response for this so I went and asked my mother ( 13 year breast cancer survivor, double mastectomy + implants + wig + hair stylist for other cancer patients ) what she thought and she said that the tags on my reblog shouldnt be graded as if it were an essay for a social activism class by anonymous tumblr users. Sorry I didn't get an A, I wasn't particularly trying to back my fucking thesis statement.

If you really want to help breast cancer patients going through gender dysphoria as a result of chemo and surgery, try volunteering or attending a cancer walk, cut your hair and donate it to people who makes wigs explicitly for cancer patients, etc etc etc. There are a lot of more "efficient" ways of supporting marginalized identities that doesn't rely on constantly reminding them that there are people in the world who still want them dead.

[jax-yacks]

scrolling my dash and a mutual reblogged a post about transphobia. i read it and am interested in it. i go to give my condolences to how the internet treated one of the people on the thread. and low and behold. its jax-yacks.

the whiplash of seeing you in a reblog chain on a post on my dash was insane ngl i was like omg jax-yacks of inceststuck (etcetcetc you had so many blog omg) fame omggggg

anyways im really sorry folks were so shit to you about how you refer to yourself and your gender and sexuality :( no one deserves that....

Jax-yacks of inceststuck!!! Lmao I love it

For real though I'm so flattered you recognized me!! And yes I had so many blogs 😭 Still holding out hope I'll get them back while also starting to figure out which ones to remake and such

I appreciate it. It was definitely the most blatantly I've ever been harassed about shit. Sometimes I feel I'll give he/him pronouns a try again but I think they would end up not being for me anyway

[starry-eyed-fag]

Would unironically love to see a writeup about the anti-rpf movement and how it connects to ableism. Homophobia I can kind of see, people seem to take way more issue with m/m rpf than of f/m from what i've seen, especially in classic rock. But ableism? (Genuine curiosity btw! )

-a curious rpf lover

so i normally don't get into shipcourse, but this is something I actually feel passionate about. RPF writers and readers are attacked for a lot of reasons, some of them fair and a matter of personal opinion, a lot of them very obviously bigoted. (also I will be reblogging this on my discourse blog @political-faggotry, if you want to send me asks in response to this post send them there!)

People take way more issue with m/m and f/f RPF than m/f RPF, as you said. This is because fanfiction and other forms of "shitty literature" have always been associated with queer people. This has been the case since at least the 1960s, when queer authors were forced to write shitty tragic stories that can't really be classified as love stories in order to have their stories told at all. A lot of queer-coded media was like this too, and cishet people caught on.

My informed opinion is that modern-day RPF was created because of an intersection of neurodivergence and queerness. Basically, ND queer people who felt out of place in society came together and formed fandoms around bands, actors, celebs, etc. Due to the increasing popularity of fanfiction in the 2000s, it was only natural that this would eventually bleed into fandoms of bands.

I think that the reason that M/M RPF fic was/is so popular is because of the trans eggs in fandom that 1) liked to project onto male characters and 2) viewed women as competition. Back when I was an egg, this was definitely what drew me to RPF. I did not like reading about Pete Wentz with his actual girlfriend, or with some female OC, I liked reading about him with a man I could project onto and who didn't feel like competition.

Anti-RPF "movements" during the 2000s was very obviously homophobic, misogynistic, and transphobic. Readers & writers would regularly get called homophobic slurs, get misogynist and transandrophobic comments, and otherwise be attacked for being queer and/or perceived female.

In the late 2010s was when the rise of calling things "problematic" because cringe culture died truly happened. Instead of saying "I don't like what you write because you're a faggot", people would say "actually you're problematic for writing that". It was literally the same shit we would get told in the 2000s, replacing words like "faggot" and the r-slur with "problematic".

I'm not saying that all people who call media problematic are like this - far from it. I call some media problematic too! However, media perceived as queer was targeted with accusations of being problematic far more than media without queerness attached, and many people who were already homophobic used this as an excuse to be homophobic while still being seen as "progressive".

I have an entire other rant about how non-MLM "progressives" can be and are homophobic sometimes, but I don't really have the spoons to write all that out right now - I will do it later though!

It would be misleading of me to not also talk about how TEHMs played a big part in the homophobia and transphobia that was directed at the (queer) RPF community. For those unaware, TEHM stands for Trans Exclusionary Homosexual Male. They are basically the TERF lesbians of the MLM gay community. They believe that gay trans men, especially nonbinary trans men and autistic trans men, are straight female fetishizers trying to invade the gay community.

TEHMs often come after transmasculine fans of yaoi anime, queer fanfiction, and yes, RPF. TEHMs will claim that the fact that transmasculine people tend to be in fandoms with a lot of M/M ships somehow "proves" that we are just fetishizing. So. Fucking. Many. Of the most common anti-RPF arguments use TEHM talking points, either intentionally or unintentionally.

TEHMs make use of dogwhistles to spread their messages even to people who are often trans-inclusionary. Claims of fetishizing MLM relationships are more often than not TEHM dogwhistles. A very common claim that I see among people who are VERY anti-RPF (not as in "i do not think RPF is good, but i don't really care all that much", but more as in "if you have ever read RPF in your life you should die") is that RPF is basically sexual assault.

Why would you accuse an entire fandom of young, queer, transmasculine people of sexually assaulting people who are usually 20+ years older than them? This is TEHM rhetoric.

I also want to touch on the ableism a little. Many RPF writers are neurodivergent, as one might expect. The majority of the ones I've interacted with are. The internet loves to get mad at neurodivergent people for having "problematic" interests, and with RPF it is no different.

We are singled out and our interests are seen as inherently disordered, immoral, etc. Those who are very strongly against RPF either do not know this, or they know this and are fine with harassing neurodivergent people over what amounts to a non-issue.

Now, that's the end of my point, but I have a few things to clarify. I am not trying to say that if you personally don't like RPF that you are actually transphobic, homophobic, and/or ableist. You are allowed to dislike anything for any reason and I don't care. My problem is with the people who hate RPF so much that they believe that reading it is a moral failing, or that it is okay to harass those that like it.

It is incredibly important to have boundaries writing RPF, which means not doing it anywhere that it is likely the people you are writing about will see. It is also okay to believe that RPF is inherently breaking a boundary; I disagree, but I see where your (not at anon) opinion is coming from and I respect it. It is not at all bigoted to dislike a thing for those reasons, as they are valid reasons to dislike something.

There is also a larger discussion to be had about the commodification of humans themselves in the music industry, but that is beyond the scope of this post.

I really only have a problem with the people who believe that it is a moral failing, or literal sexual assault, to be in a mostly harmless community that has been historically associated with queerness. That is all.

Please don't bring proship/anti discourse to this post.

[tigerbears]

Hello there!

You can call me TigerBear.

I’m a 20s something trans-girl who's only been on tumblr for almost a year

I mostly just do reblogs, and just random stuff but I'll also post links to my fanfics so keep an eye for that! (Only been one so far, but lots of folks seem to enjoy it xD)

Expect my fics to mostly be UT and DR fics... Same with posts.... Just a lot of UT/DR related reblogs and post, but you'll also see a few posts related to other games I like or things that catch my fancy. (E.G, I've reentered the doctor who fandom after like 4-5 years)

Aiming for the blog to be SFW/Minor friendly but y'know, I'm still an adult and stuff. Might reblog stuff with swearing. May also reblog SFW posts from NSFW blogs/"Minors DNI or do not follow" blogs, but I don't usually follow these blogs and will likely not touch their risky stuff. TL;DR this blog be safe, can't guarantee the same from those I reblogged.

Guess I can talk about some things about myself.

I’m a trans-girl lesbian who goes by she/her pronouns.

I'm also neurodivergent (autistic specifically) so if I act differently/misunderstand things that's why. I'm sorry my brain just be running differently.

I’m likely suffering from chronic Asriel and Noelle brain rot. I want goat boy to get a happy ending and love the trans Noelle head-canon. Shipper of Suselle (Susie/Noelle) and Dessriel (Dess/Asriel). (Oh and of course Alphyne (Alphys/Undyne) but I'm not obsessed with the pair like Suselle and Dessriel. Alphyne's still cute though!) Also opened asks! (but don't really know what I'll do with them, and don't expect quick responses, especially bc I’m the shy type of trans-femme.)

Haven't gotten a lot of asks so I just opened the anonymous ones. (Note: This is on thin ice. I may turn off anonymous asks if I change my mind and realize it's a mistake. I already turned off messaging from people I don't follow because I kept getting incomprehensible bot messages.)

If I ever reblog something that's "WIP "a mess of the original post's tags" it means I f--ked up and forgot to remove the wip tags when the post was in my drafts. Please let me know so I can fix it.

Standard DNI: (note realize it got too long with my explanations so I put the longer ones in a separate footnote post. You can find it at the bottom of the DNI list.)

DNI if you hold

transphobia/TERF beliefs. are homophobia or queerphobia in general. exclusionary towards enbys, transmascs, transfemmes, aro & or ace, intersex, & or other folks/identities. are a transmed/truscum, & or any other gatekeeping/invalidation type. racist. xenophobe. Islamophobe. ableist. or are discriminatory in any other way.

Religious fundamentalist, Militant Atheists, or anyone cant respect other people's religious/areligious beliefs. (Its ok to criticize religious people that are being bigoted/harming others, or parasitic cults abusing and leaching off of their members though. Just don't interact if you say stuff like "All religious people are mentally ill" or "all people of X religion are bigots/terrible".)

(can't believe I have to say this) DNI if you ship "those ships." Y'know, the ones which involve some form of i*nest or p*dophilia. (Fontcest, Chasriel, Frans, Lancer/Susie,) Just generally do not interact if you ship any of those "yikes" ships. I don't want my posts to be associated with these accounts. (Footnote 01)

Kralsei (for now and only for now) just barely gets a pass because we don't fully know what Ralsei is, but future reveals may push Kralsei shippers into the DNI category. I'm not touching the ship due to Ralsei's concerning connections to Asriel. If its revealed Ralsei's the personification of Kris's familial love for their brother or something, and you still ship Kralsei do not interact. You won't be punished for shipping Kralsei before the reveal though; I'd just see you in a similar light to those who shipped Luke and Leia before ROTJ. Even in the best case scenario though the ship is going to feel weird to me though just because of the resemblance to Asriel. (Footnote 02)

Please tag your anti-ship posts as anti-[shipname], or I will likely block you, especially if you just tag the ship name. When I follow the Suselle tag I'm looking for everything but Anti-Suselle posts. (Footnote 03)

If your posts look like that of a p*rn bot I'll likely block you.

DNI FOOTNOTES IN THIS POST! GO HERE FOR ELABORATION!

Here are the tags I use for my own stuff.

#reblog For all the posts I reblog.

#queue For all the posts in my queue (which are just reblogs)

#posts from tigerbear's tumblr (Or) #my posts (Or) #tigerbears posts Stuff that's from me (or reblogs which have comments from me.) Pretty much "tigerbears posts" is going to be anything past the 25th or 26th of April 2024 (because I'm not going back to change all of my past tags.)

#tag that are like posts from tigerbear's tumblr Basically similar to posts from tiger bear except their reblogs and the new content is only in the tags. (I don't use this tag often/probably ever btw)

#Upsetting-Triggering For the very few posts/reblogs that are potentially upsetting, E.G talking about stuff like wars or LGBTQ+ rights being stripped away, general transphobic stuff, ect. (I usually come to tumblr for escapism, so if you feel the same way add it to filtered tags so you at least get the warning pop up before seeing it)

Here's the link to my YT channel even though I've so far not posted anything!

Here's my AO3 too! Even though so far I've only posted one fic!

I also have a pronouns.page

Anyway I hope you enjoy my blog!

[thelocalmuffin]

Welcome! 2024 Edition

Hello everyone!

I'm Ellory/Muffin, and I'm part of the Bakery system. I'm a writer and zine creator who works almost all the time, so my activity is a bit sporadic. This is a multi-fandom blog, but you'll also see memes, personal posts and political stuff here.

This isn’t a DNI post or anything like that, this is just an introduction post. So, hello! There's more about the blog and what I do in the read below.

Writing: I write quite often, so please feel free to check out my AO3. You can also check out the tag #muffin writes for more short stories/direct links to stories.

I am also trying my hand at art. You can find my artwork under #muffin draws for some of my stuff. It's still experimental but some of it is very nice.

Zine Stuff:

I mostly do zines. I like working with the schedules and having a theme to work with. My Zine Portfolio is here.

I do reblog some promotional stuff for my zine projects. I'm proud of what I’ve done and want to let people know what I've accomplished. #muffin's projects is the tags I use for the zine promos.

Other tags you might want to filter:

I know some people are here for escapism and that’s no issue with me. Just keep in mind I do tag serious topics such as ableism, transphobia, and other themes if they are discussed in the post. If you need something tagged, just let me know.

Political: This is my political tag. I like to stay updated with some political news.

Current News: Updates about world changes and news that doesn't quite fall into politics

Boycott: Things that discuss or are recommended to boycott.

Palestine: I am pro palestine and have been for more than a decade. I'll be posting about it.

Muffin speaks: When I'm just talking.

Reblog games: things I think are a reblog games/bait, but I still want to participate in.

Some stuff you might want to know about talking to me:

I do have my ask box open, but I do not respond to anon hate. It will be deleted and you will just have wasted your time. I understand criticism is necessary for growth, but sending derogatory messages won’t really get the point across.

I don’t mind DMs to talk, but please keep in mind I am very socially awkward and shy.

Oh, and my response time is very slow. As I said, I’m a busy bee.

If you want to be mutuals or friends, you are welcome to ask.

I think that's all! I figured it was time to update it since a lot of my priorities have shifted with my projects in the last year!

[emmie-time]

Tw: Suicide/ self harm threats and harrasment below the break (if I did it right sorry if I didnt)

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So today is the third time this month I've been reblogged or commented by people who are implying I should either die as a result of my political and social opinions or kill myself because of my moral opinions on things. I've been on this site for a long time since like 2015 or something, which for me is a long time cause I tend to abandon platforms. In that time I have only ever recieved 5 hate comments or reblogs/asks. All of which only started after Picture Matt made his big ranting posts (these things may not be correlated) it just feels like people are emboldened to be shitty and say shitty hurtful things. Like even though I'm a small blog with like no reach these people still find me.

This place means a lot to me, it's the only place online where I can give my actual opinion and I don't have to use words with the edges smoothed off to do it. I love this place because even if I don't understand some people and the broader spectrum of self expression I'm given the chance to learn and ask questions. I have a chance to grow and be better and really get a handle on my own gender stuff. I get updates on world news way faster than Twitter here and I can find so much cool art and funny posts that lift my spirits. I've been introduced to new hobbies and learned new skills thanks to this site.

I've abandoned every other social media site because of transphobia or fat shaming or suicide baiting, but I don't want to leave here. I want here to be better and safer. I want to be loudly and unapologetically trans and participate in politics. I want my country to be safer and kinder to everyone. I want to feel safe online, and I think I've started to feel less safe here in the past few weeks.

Please be kind with each other and if you're having trouble please talk to someone about it. Seek professional help if you need to and are able. Please live, please.

[aroaceking]

I literally cannot tell if you actually want me to answer any of the things you asked but I'm posting the entire comment and I will answer it. I'm going to be very honest and address that I am autistic so if I've taken the fact there were questions too literally I am actually sorry, I have no intention of requesting engagement from you if you are not actually trying to discuss it with me.

Reblogs are off because I don't really feel comfortable with reblogs when I'm going to address some of my trauma, but you're free to reply to this or send an ask (I think ask word limits are lower now?) if you wish to reply.

tw because I don't know how to explain any of my things without addressing a lot of this: transphobia tw, transmisogyny tw, intersexism tw, homophobia tw, racism tw, csa tw, cocsa tw, childhood sexual trauma tw, medical abuse tw, ableism tw, idk like literally it's just my life idk how to give it enough labels to give fair warning.

under a read more because it's long

@fite-club

okay. there’s a lot to unpack here. i’m gonna first address the “stop sexualizing asexuality” thing— asexuality is about sexual attraction, it is inherently a sexual topic in nature. but you’re alarmingly wrong about something here, and it’s the “recognizing ways I was different from my peers” part as a 14 year old, you WEREN’T different from your peers for not experiencing sexual attraction. MOST 14 year olds don’t. you mention trauma in your past— this is extremely relevant. why do you believe that the majority of 14 year olds were sexual, who told you that? ike, yeah, hypothetically someone who identifies as ace at 14 and experiences sexual attraction at age 18 can change their label from asexual to allosexual. but will they ACTUALLY do that, though? or will they just call themselves a sex-favorable asexual? when you make lacking attraction a part of your identity, what happens to your sense of identity if you DO experience attraction? also i need to point out that there are literal biological functions that are not done developing until you are over 18. your body and brain and hormones are still growing. you definitely cannot say with any certainty that anyone below the age of 16 knows they experience sexual attraction or not finally i need you to understand that by emphasizing “hey, it’s actually completely fine and normal to not be interested in sex at all when you’re in high school” it actually helps prevent teens from being sexually abused. “most teens are allosexual” is NOT the message you want to be spreading.

"asexuality is about sexual attraction, it is inherently a sexual topic in nature."

this is part of what I feel most uncomfortable with. it is innately a conversation about sexuality, but that, too, to me, feels simplified to state as 'sexual' when people are constantly equating sexual with 'having sex' or 'having sexual desires'. developmentally it's a lot more complex than that, especially when you don't use a split attraction model or thoroughly separate/classify all aspects of orientation. I understand why people may break down their identities into the tiniest boxes they can imagine, but I actually don't navigate it that way at all.

I'm deeply uncomfortable with the idea that discussing sexuality is sexual. I know I'm repeating myself, I just am not sure if I'm clear. It's also deeply unsettling to me to see people, of any orientation, act like it's sexual for a child to state if they like boys or girls or whatever else. Or how people act like it's sexual for a child to have a gender identity separate from their assignment.

I will acknowledge the assignment I was given had impact on my feelings on this matter, I was hypersexualized throughout my childhood for being intersex, for publicly going also from 'boy' to 'girl', for my race. I understand that these add to my experiences and are part of why I was reacted to the way I was. That it was a catch-22 because if I had liked boys, I would've been performing gender wrong and if I had liked girls, I would've been performing gender wrong, and that no matter what space I took up, it would be 'incorrect.'

But this experience is mine. I was doomed to be sexualized no matter what I did in the environment I was a part of, and part of that relates to this idea that gender and sexuality in children when 'off the norm' is innately sexual. That if a child expresses a relationship to gender or orientation outside of boxes defined for them that it's somehow sexual.

I tried to define it to an anon earlier also but developmentally I am including things like how children will play-roles as well. A lot of my friends learned gender and orientation through how they wanted to do pretend games or how they felt unfulfilled by them. This isn't sexual, this isn't weird, it's a normal part of development. This includes children picking and pointing out fictional characters or celebrities to admire or joke about wanting to marry/have as a boyfriend/girlfriend/whatever. This includes the way children will also explore themselves through putting claims out like 'so and so is my boyfriend now' or whatever.

"you mention trauma in your past— this is extremely relevant. why do you believe that the majority of 14 year olds were sexual, who told you that?"

I know the trauma in my past is 'relevant.' I'm sure if I had not been further sexualized by adults and children alike for being intersex and the WAY I was intersex that I would not have the same relationship to any of this. As I stated, it's why I feel so strongly about some of it. I don't know who I would be without trauma, I can't just take my trauma aside and yes, I've gone through therapy, multiple attempts, some forced and some me trying to approach it carefully. It's why I tried to study developmental psychology.

I really dislike the statement 'why do you believe that the majority of 14 year olds were sexual'. I believe a majority of 14 year olds weren't and aren't asexual because a majority of the population is not asexual. It's a minority group. So is being gay. So is being trans. So is being intersex. If they feel strongly enough to identify as asexual, it is probably because they have an experience where it has made them feel othered, or at the very least uncomfortable. I don't even see why it matters if they're wrong about it. Nowadays they're constantly seeing people misidentify it as rooted in action, as in if you have sex or not, and some of them are probably very scared of the expectation of sex, and so they may label themselves incorrectly because they want to feel like they have support in language to communicate a perfectly normal boundary to have and when they get older, hopefully they recognize that.

That's part of why I dislike the fixation on if it's about sex or not! Or even the fixation people have on labels staying stagnant! Lots of people identify as straight or cis or whatever before realizing they're not, and it's okay also for them to have gotten it wrong the first or second or fiftieth time around idk. I have friends that still don't exactly know where they sit on both gender and orientation. I think that's normal! We have our whole lives to navigate!

But also 'who told you that'. Almost everyone around me except maybe some of the xtians (I'm not xtian) and mainly the xtians were more focused on telling me that 14 year old girls weren't interested in those kinds of things, which is why they must be 'protected' from 14 year old boys who are entirely too interested in it and my biology would make me unsafe even after I had, against my will, been medically altered due to complications with my hormones and body.

I don't know. I don't know how to explain what I grew up in. I don't know if it's different cultural expectations, I don't know if it's the ways I was seen as a threat by white people, I don't know. It's not 'who' told me that because 'who' was nearly everyone. But even if they weren't telling me that, even if they were telling me I was 'smart' for not dating or that I probably shouldn't date anyway or that no matter who I dated it would be weird, they also thought it was weird I had no actual interest at all. That I didn't admire celebrities or had crushes or expressed any future interest in it. People thought it was weird as hell I thought the entire construct of it was kind of fake, and yes, I was also autistic and so there was a level of them just thinking I was stupid and developmentally challenged because I was autistic, but that's also part of why they tried to 'fix' it, because my presentation was one where I could 'try' to fit.

But also I know lots of people who were raised xtian and expected to be girls who also got really messed up by the confusing explanations and expectations around it. That hurt themselves because they thought there was something gross or wrong with them as they hit perfectly normal developmental milestones. I was also the outlet for a lot of weird guilt and self-loathing from both boys and girls who viewed me as innately sexual for my relationship to gender. That viewed my medical changes as something somehow for them.

I know it's perfectly normal to not date at 14, I don't know how to be more clear about that, I don't know how to say 'yes I am aware plenty of 14 year olds are figuring themselves out, plenty of them don't know or fake crushes or even will explain they don't know if they've had them yet, I know plenty of them are definitely not interested in sex or dating' and also state 'this is why I'm saying it's not about sex! the ways I was othered and hypersexualized and desexualized are about all the tiny other ways I did not fit into the boxes I was supposed to!'

I was trying to express how having 'asexual' as a term helped me cope. Helped me be more compassionate to my peers. Continues to help me now. That's what labels are even for. That's their use. I was upset seeing someone say "#you’re 15!#you don’t want to have sex! that’s fine!#it’s not an identity!" about a niece identifying as asexual on a post discussing how the op's relationship to crushes/attraction has changed from having a lot of them as a teen to mellowing out a lot as an adult (which is normal, which is why I'm so! fucking confused! on the fucking pushback!!!! on me stating that it was othering! to be a child outside of that and attacked by adults and other children over it!!! and now I'm being told 'nothing about ur experience was abnormal' then why!!! was I constantly!!! told!!! it was!!!).

I mean I can tell you part of why. I am not fucking stupid. I am aware I was 'abnormal' also for my body and my brain and my race. Normalcy is socially constructed and upheld. Something can be atypical but not treated as abnormal, and something can be common but socially classified as abnormal for structural purposes. Like we say 'minority' for nonwhite people as if white people aren't actually STATISTICALLY globally the minority. (Yes, I know, that depending on your country, they are statistically a majority, but they only became the 'majority' in the country I'm in through horrific violence and even in countries where they are statistically the majority it's violently upheld as they push back against nonwhite people moving in blah blah blah, ie still socially upheld through structures).

Like I feel like somehow I'm having entirely different conversations about this.

"like, yeah, hypothetically someone who identifies as ace at 14 and experiences sexual attraction at age 18 can change their label from asexual to allosexual. but will they ACTUALLY do that, though? or will they just call themselves a sex-favorable asexual? when you make lacking attraction a part of your identity, what happens to your sense of identity if you DO experience attraction?"

Okay but I don't CARE? The stigma around changing your orientation label needs to go but also I don't care if they're wrong. It's irritating, yes, and often derails these spaces and discussions, but also like it's their life, I can't make them change their identity. I can just share information on how other people have expressed attraction and learning to navigate it and offer solutions and pose questions on how their relationship may have changed and give examples of people coming into it deeper in adulthood.

There are people that think they aren't ace because they don't care if they have sex, even though they aren't attracted to anyone, and eventually reach a point in their life, sometimes late in it, where they learn about it and go 'oh' and suddenly have a word for this thing that helps them better define their experiences. And I don't mean 18, 18 is so young.

What happens to people who identify legitimately as a gender or orientation they later realize doesn't fit them? I can't control them. I had a friend who thought she was straight and it took a lot of self-reflection for her to realize she was bisexual. She had to be out of an environment where her attraction to women was dismissed, desexualized, and recognized as equal and not diminished by her attraction to men.

I've had friends who had been neutral on men in their lives, who realized they were lesbians only in their 20s because they had been neutral about men they tried to date due to expectations. I know women who transitioned and tried to like men out of gender obligation, who had to work through those feelings and the root of them to actually understand their relationship to orientation.

If we allow space and discussion for the myriad of ways it presents or develops or can be defined, then this becomes less of a fixation point. The fragility of people's identities rooted in NEEDING to strictly define them is not helpful for many, especially younger people. I'm still younger people. I know people who've changed their identities in their 50s. I know there are people I don't personally know who have changed and played with their identities even later in life.

I use language the way I use language because I'm autistic and descriptionist. I can't stop people from being prescriptionist with theirs.

I understand the harm people experience when they cling to identities that no longer suit them. But I can't constantly stop people from harming themselves, I can't control them! I ALSO can feel uncomfortable or out of place when people try to relate to me and utilize the same terms I do but in completely different ways. I don't know how to interact when someone my age comes to me identifying as ace but then also being alarmed when I do not relate to the ways they categorize attraction or lack thereof. It can be very strange to do so. A lack of something is even harder to define than the existence of something.

"also i need to point out that there are literal biological functions that are not done developing until you are over 18. your body and brain and hormones are still growing. you definitely cannot say with any certainty that anyone below the age of 16 knows they experience sexual attraction or not"

Okay, and again, they can just change how they define it. People biologically change their whole lives. Menopause biologically changes people but it doesn't mean that for the period of their life before they may utilize labels to describe their experience before that point, or that those identities may still be important to them after that point.

I didn't say they always know or correctly define if they experience attraction or not? I don't think people can really say with any certainty until they have reason to feel certain. I think people can be 16 and not know and 25 and not know and 52 and not know.

As stated before, I'm intersex. I was also medically altered in a way that potentially is part of why I do not experience attraction idk. I know people who were medically altered similarly who do experience attraction. Idk. I would say 'I don't care' if it would have been different otherwise, but I do care actually, I care a lot, but my reality is what it is now and it has been incredibly harmful to me to try and 'treat' it. If something changes, I will change my identity, and not feel ashamed that I utilized language the way I needed to while it was relevant to me.

I'm autistic and intersex. I don't. I don't know how to phrase this but like. I have never been developmentally categorized as in the position of 'normal.' Because normal is socially defined and enforced. There are stages and ranges that are categorized as 'normal.' People who do not fit those stages or ranges are treated differently. Sometimes they utilize language for it. I don't. Like that's all it is to me.

"finally i need you to understand that by emphasizing “hey, it’s actually completely fine and normal to not be interested in sex at all when you’re in high school” it actually helps prevent teens from being sexually abused. “most teens are allosexual” is NOT the message you want to be spreading."

It is in fact true that emphasizing to children that it is their right and completely fine and acceptable and a boundary they can uphold to not be interested in sex in high school, this is good and useful and helpful. Giving them language for that is important, regardless of why they need it.

It is also important to help prevent abuse by giving them better language and resources on how they may be developing sexually and that they do not need to be ashamed of interest or engage in unsafe sexual practices as a way to explore that. I had friends literally manipulated by the idea that there was something shameful in their development that was only suitable for adults to 'manage' for them and it was part of their exploitation. This is in fact an aspect of abstinence-only education being a failure.

Children also need to be taught even if they ARE developing sexual interest, they can also develop boundaries around it anyway! Shame, confusion, hiding, whatever about this literally directly leads a lot of teenagers into the arms of predators. It alarms and concerns me this topic can somehow shift into statements that may further confuse these lines, so I want to be very clear.

And I want to also state I don't. Ugh. I don't think children by and large actually are easily defined as 'majority straight' or 'majority allosexual' or anything like that. I think that obviously the majority of people meet that, hence my earlier statement of noticing a kind of othering, but I don't actually think that means it's fair to label hordes of children as either straight or allosexual or even cis because it is in fact typical that they wouldn't even know or have a definitive enough relationship to it.

Feeling drawn to describing an experience you have with language that is about how you've felt othered doesn't even mean no one else involved could later define themselves with those terms. Some of the people who were cruel to me found out later they were boys or found out later they were girls or found out later they were gay or found out later they were intersex in a different way from me even.

I AGREE that children should be taught they are allowed to have boundaries??? I agree that children should be taught it's acceptable and valid and completely within their right to not have crushes or interest in dating or interest in sex or be more focused on their other experiences (like poverty, like disability, like race, like trauma, like education, like gender, like media interests, like whatever else??) over defining themselves and their gender and their orientation?

I think we should in fact encourage that it is okay to not know or not need to know yet. I think we should encourage people to realize they don't have to rush experiences they aren't ready for. I have friends whose first relationship was 25 and they never identified as ace or aro, they just were never in a position to get into that part of themselves for a variety of reasons. I don't. I do not understand the reaction to what I've said.

I was upset because an individual child individually defined themselves and some adult in their life was alarmed by a fairly simple identity that was not in any way some permanent or damning aspect. I'm upset because in 2020 I saw some adult literally tell a middle-grade child who identified as asexual on the internet they were 'attracting pedophiles' by identifying publicly as ace. An adult thought it was appropriate to define it that way and say that kind of thing to a child because of the child's identity. A whole lot of other adults agreed with it and kept going on about the inherently sexual nature of the term meant to describe an orientation.

It's just weird. When I told my mom in high school, she became fixated on the ways she might have broken me or made me that way. She became focused on listing all the possible other explanations and getting me to counseling and then devolved into belittling me for it, when all it was was an explanation for how I felt I was experiencing the world. It helped my friends be kinder to me. It helped me be kinder to my friends. It still helps me navigate the ways I may be unable to relate to others.

[boy-gender]

hey dude, this might be a loaded question so no need to reply if you don't want to. but how do you deal with being surrounded by transphobia, like hearing people say transphobic shit and having to see radfem blogs/accounts or posts? a year ago i started to argue and beef with any terf i came across on here because of how fed up i was with being treated like shit and being walked all over, as a trans guy. but obviously that only did damage to my mental state and was a form of self-harm where i would go on terf blogs and hate read and argue with them. i still do it now sometimes and i'm trying to stop but if i do, i feel otherwise helpless in this world seemingly filled with transphobia. i just want to be myself and exist as i am, without weird cunts calling me a fetishist or a tranny or a mentally ill lesbian for being t4t. radfems and their allies make me so angry and i feel like if i don't at least show them that i hate them, they will start to abuse me again.

idk i have a lot more to say on this situation but yeah. do you have any advice or any experience on this?

I have very much been in your position, and sometimes I still fall into old habits of seeking out arguments online. It never makes me feel better, but I get so angry I feel like I'll explode if I don't put it somewhere. I actually found a few things that helped me reframe it though:

First, if I get into an argument here, on this blog, I am platforming the hate. I have to reblog it to argue with it, which means I am passing it on. This blog has hundreds and hundreds of followers, most of whom I assume are trans. Do I want to be a part of exposing them to the vitriol I see? It's bad enough I had to see it, I don't want to inflict it on other people. There are going to be trans people here who aren't as strong as me, who are in a bad place, who are in active crisis, and their safety is more important than an argument. Them seeing that one last bit of crap, that one horrible sentence that really sticks with them, could be the thing they torture themselves with past the breaking point. I don't want to give that to people.

This is why I don't reblog terfs to argue with them, I don't ever post the hatemail I get, and I don't show off hate I find in the wild. If I find something like a law that is hateful that can be fought against and has actionable options, or if someone is confused but I feel they're asking something in good faith and can be corrected, those I will reblog and speak about. I'll even talk about my own personal horrible experiences, because those are my stories and I can control how impactful I write them and how much of the nastiness of them I pass on. But those are very different scenarios.

I've started, when I see hate, to focus on my followers instead, and ask myself: do they need to see this? can anything be accomplished by having more eyes on this? can anything i say change the situation? could the harm done by passing this on outweigh any benefit? And once I've assessed those risks, I often find it isn't worth the argument. The best way to handle terfs is to block them, don't platform them, report them if you see something that violates community guidelines, and mark them as red on shinigami eyes to give others a heads up. You can even make a post like "hey username123 is a terf, you should block them" without passing on the shit they say.

But those are all public facing problems. I have a private tiktok, I have sideblogs with no followers/I remove the followers, and there are anonymous options like reddit and other worse cesspools. No risk of passing that shit on, so what holds me back from going there and having a field day?

One simple tenet. My being trans, being vocally and visibly and obnoxiously trans, annoys them far more than anything I can ever say. Terfs are, at the heart, a reactionary group. They don't exist without something to react to. Like a fire slowly being cut off from oxygen, they will wither and kill each other in infighting if left in isolation. Atleast the regular online scum will. This doesn't apply to ones that have the actual power to lobby for real world harm like joanne and the other big ones- but the odds of you talking to them online are slim. Let the terfs implode on each other and continue to exist. Your existence in a world that wants you dead is a radical act of defiance, and your existence despite what terfs say to you makes them froth at the mouth. No fact you could educate them with, no insult you could give them, will ever make them as upset as you simply living your trans life, thriving.

Piss them off with queer joy, is what I'm saying. It's far more effective. Not only do I not post hate I get, I never vagueblog or acknowledge it either. People sit there refreshing my blog constantly waiting to see the attention I'll give them with a snappy reply, and it never comes, and then they refresh more. I can literally see them doing this with an IP tracker and it's hilarious to me. What I do instead is for every piece of hate about trans people, I make two positivity posts about trans people. I FLOOD the tags with positivity and support. I drown out the hate that no one knows I got- because surely someone else has gotten it too. To me it's reassuring to go to a tag and see the love outweigh the hate- which it does. For every terf you find dozens of trans people in love with who they are. I would rather be a part of that. I'd rather pass that on.

It's also really rewarding. I can see in the tags of my reblogs- some posts have thousands- of people saying they didn't know they had options for their lives, thanking me, thanking other people who contributed to the thread, being so reassured and excited to learn there's hope. I suggest not just reblogging positivity, but also creating your own. Put your defiance into the world and let it give other people strength, and then when they come back and comment on it, take strength from them.

As for the world at large? Maybe I'm a bit more nihilistic, but I look at it two ways. First, trans people can never be totally eradicated via genocide. We are a group that occurs naturally and we will always grow back. If every trans person in the world were killed right now, and all knowledge of us erased, within a decade there would be more people who realized they were trans. They might lack community, they might lack the vocabulary to describe themselves, but they will exist again. Our culture might die- our people will survive. It will be horrific and tragic and a blight on the world that what was here was lost, but trans people and nonbinary people and gnc people and queer people will always grow back again, make a new community, carve out a new place in history. We always have, we always will. An interrupted history is still a history.

Second, the majority of people do not want us dead. The system may want us dead, and a very vocal minority with a lot of money and resources want us dead. But polls show over half of gen z identifies as some type of queer. Polls show most people disapprove of us being political hockey pucks. The violent reaction to us that you see is the death rattle of the conservatives, and they know this, which is why they're using the last of their power to do one last act of catastrophic harm. They only have the power to attack the most disenfranchised among us- queer people, PoC, the mentally ill or disabled, the extremely poor- and they will use it. Historically bigots get loudest right before their entire platform collapses in the mainstream. If we make it through the next decade, through the isolation and poverty and violence, we've made it. That's a big if for some of us. For many of us, we won't make it as individuals. I'm not gonna sugarcoat that. But our people will live on, and new trans people will come after we are gone

Now I'm speaking directly to you, anon. For now, my biggest motivator I can give you is to be here to see victory. Endure. Stay with us. I'm staying whether I like it or not. Stay to see all the queer people who will come next and all the beauty they'll bring and the things we will make. Come sit on my picnic blanket and watch the sunset with me. We might not be okay, but we can be not okay together, and we can start getting better together after that.

[littlequeen7]

I would honestly appreciate any responses to this, I would love to get people's opinions and/or start a discourse. I'm sorry if any of this is controversial, I've just had this on my mind a lot lately.

Okay, so I grew up with Harry Potter. It was one of the first "big kid" books that I read as a child, I was an early reader and an undiagnosed neurodivergent kid so I immersed myself fully in the universe. It became one of my special interests and it has continued to be so for most of my life. It was an escape from an abusive upbringing, and a focus of my maladaptive day dreaming, a safe space. I spent a great deal of time with the books, films and video games. As such, I am very much attached to the series.

That being said, I understand all of the controversy surrounding the series and it's creator. I understand the insensitive racial stereotypes that were written into the books, and I know that the author turned out to be an awful person. I am nonbinary and my brother is trans, so the transphobia that JKR is so open about is very disturbing to me (it would be even if I wasn't a part of the community, but it hits very close to home). I regretfully went to Harry Potter world when I was at Universal Studios a few years ago, and I regret giving any money to JKR or her cronies. Other than the trip to Universal Studios, I have not spent any money on the HP fandom directly since JKR came out with her transphobic views.

I have talked to my brother about the upcoming HP Legacy video game, where I expressed my excitement of having a modern version of the OOTP video game I obsessed over when I was younger, but also expressed trepidation at wanting to spend any money that would directly or indirectly line JKR's pockets. He encouraged me to go through with buying the game anyway (or asking for it as a birthday present), saying I could recognize that I disagreed with her beliefs while still getting to enjoy something I had been looking forward to for years. I still don't know where I stand on this.

Even aside from the moral implications of spending money on the franchise, I have seen a lot of hate on Tumblr for people that still enjoy being a part of the fandom, regardless of if they financially contribute to it or not. I saw a popular post saying they wish the entire fandom would "disappear off the face of the earth" or something like that.

At this point, I use an already paid for HBO subscription to watch the films, and read a LOT of fanfiction, and that is the extent to my interaction with the fandom. What are people's viewpoints on interacting with the fandom without contributing financially towards JKR's bigotry? I honestly find pride in the HP fanfiction community, because they have reclaimed something that meant so much to them, and removed that awful transphobe from the community entirely.

I would love to hear anybody's ideas on this, regardless of where you stand on the issue. I don't know if this will even get views or not, but I would like to learn more and hear more people's opinions. And not in an "I'm too lazy to Google why transphobia's bad" way, in a "I genuinely want to hear from individual people that feel passionately about this" way.

If anyone does reply to or reblog this, I appreciate it!

[omgcatboi]

I really want to go back to posting pics again but I feel like that would be giving tumblr the green light on continuing it's transphobia and sexism.

You can say fat cis guys also get flagged all you want. It doesn't lessen my dysphoria at all.

Now people are talking about me for it. Because I'm steadily losing followers. I don't feel at all welcome in this community anymore.

The moment I slip and let it show how deep in crisis I am, I'm shunned. As usual.

Why would I post and give to a community that only takes? Y'all reblog so many mental health awareness posts but it's all hollow words coming from you. I'm considering deactivating. because once again, my reputation is ruined by a crisis episode. And instead of people asking if I'm ok, y'all leave me.

I understand what I said was triggering, and it's fine to see that. But Jesus Christ am I tired of internet communities shunning me the moment I show just how bad things are for me. You think I just say shit like that normally? You think I just talk like that every day?

I don't.

once again people see you at your lowest and use it to define who you are.

I've been unmedicated for a while now because of shit programs that put me on month waiting lists. Do you realize how fucked in the head you have to be to take 150 Seroquel when you wake up? Do you realize that? With 50 Zoloft and cogentex too? You realize that much Seroquel makes you higher than any amount of smoking weed can, huh? You think they give that out for mild depression?

I'm the epitome of mentally ill and I'm constant crisis. And I'm sick of being left behind by everyone.

If my followers drop back to 2,000 I'm gone. I can't handle watching people leave me because they don't think a person with illness can be a good person. Despite me being pretty positive on here for a while.

I have BPD and I see that for what it is. Abandonment.

I deleted the posts and still losing people. That right there shows me that it isn't because of what I have posted. People are talking. And that's extremely shitty high school mentality and I can't be around that.

I don't want to see it. I'm sick of being the punching bag every time i try to find a safe community. I have special needs, I can't make friends IRL because I talk very slow and constantly make very obvious movements with my entire body that I can't control. People who meet me are surprised when I can talk at all.

This was supposed to be a space where I can make friends despite my differences. But it ended up being like every other community out there.

Wanna know why the mentally ill don't often speak about how bad it is? Why we don't reach out?

Because the moment we have an episode, we're left behind and dropped from entire communities like sacks of potatoes.

I feel like I'll never belong anywhere. I feel like the same hatred I've faced my entire life for being different is going to only repeat until I die. I'll never be accepted by anyone. And that stings.

Yes, what I posted was triggering, you don't necessarily have a very positive mind set when you've got a plan in motion now do you?

But you can say I was wrong without being cruel about it.

Anon stays off. I can already imagine the slew of hate I'll get for posting straight facts here.

You can't handle the mentally ill, so stop virtue signaling and just admit you can't stand when we're negative.

[feralghxuls]

I will be looking out for your post on the Transphobia, (Trans)misogyny, and stereotyping of body shapes in the Ghost fic fandom! Feel free to tag me in it so I can reblog it (if you like) Thank you for your additional points on my post! I felt there was so much to cover I wanted to make it as short and concise as possible. xxx

i'm typing it up now but i'm at work so it'll probably be a bit before i can finish writing it out

i am very glad to see these things being spoken about. i have been seeing these patterns for the entire year i've been apart of this fandom, i just have never had the words to address it until now. and it is the WORST here than any other fandom i've ever been apart of, especially considering how many trans folks are in this fandom.

i am not being short & concise in my post. i'm sure there will still be things i miss, but it's important to me to take the time to address as much as i can

[jerzwriter]

Do you feel like we are seeing a lot more far-right bigotry on tumblr this year than we have during pride month in the past? I saw one post from this meme blogger called "r4cs0" where he was claiming that Chipotle had changed their corporate policies to ban homosexuals from their restaurants after a homosexual man was caught stealing guacamole by smuggling it out in his anus. It was definitely fake news and I think a lot of people were reblogging it because they thought it was a joke, but if you go to r4cs0's blog there is actually a huge amount of homophobia, transphobia, dendrophobia and general bigotry going on over there.

Hey Nonny,

I definitely feel it. This pride feels really off to me, and I don't like it. I am speaking from a U.S. perspective, but I know this applies to other nations as well. The anti-rhetoric is always there, but it feels more blatant like they're more empowered. That's been happening ever since 2016, but this year feels more intense.

My personal feelings? Roe v. Wade was overturned. Now, that in and of itself still has me on FIRE, but like I said on day one, Roe being overturned was not just about Roe, and the far-right has no intention of stopping there. Between that and the far-right media, they're emboldened and not letting down.

I even see it in things that, in general, I don't put too much stock in. Like Target's decision to remove their pride displays from certain stores in the South. Now, I never saw Target as the biggest ally, and I think a lot of corporate pride is BS propaganda, but this isn't good. Why? When I'm in lower Manhattan, it's not the kids there that need to know they're loved and supported... they know. This happened in the communities where they are most ostracized, the most in danger. It doesn't sit well with me.

Also, a lot of companies are putting out their pride logo for a day, then taking it down. Excuse me, but fuck you. America is not a democracy, no matter how much we like to pretend we are, in practice, we are very much a corporatocracy, and right now, we need corporations to be allies more than ever - for lgbtq+ rights, women's rights, racial equity - and so many are backing down instead of standing up - and that's not good. I'm looking hard at where I spend my money these days, and I think we should all try to do that.

Now the shit you are reporting here, I'd like to say anyone who sees that and believes it should have their heads examined, but in our crazy-ass climate, who the hell even knows what's real and what's not anymore (and that's QUITE by design). It's disgusting and disheartening, and it is dangerous.

I'm old enough that I remember when pride was a lot more than a party - and honestly, that has to be remembered, and we need to focus on that. It's great to celebrate, it's important to celebrate, and we should celebrate. But we have to stay vigilant, we have to fight, and for those of us fortunate enough to live in more progressive areas need to really remember those who don't and work for them.

Here's my only hope... the younger generation, in general, is progressive, so I hope the future will be brighter. But don't think the forces at play don't know that the younger generation is more progressive and these bigoted dinosaurs' days are numbered. That's why they're doing all they can - who cares if it's legal or ethical - to consolidate power.

It's hard to see all of this. I've lived through a lot and seen things improve so much. To see things moving backward is just sickening.

Stay strong, Nonny. Sending you love and HAPPY PRIDE... no matter what.