#and ist ridiculous because i am an adult

[welveteen]

My dad found my IG account 😬

[lanwangjiismyreligion]

Warning: This post ist about personal experiences with emotional and narcissistic abuse in families. Please be aware that this content can eventually be triggering, thank you.

Yesterday I got an e-mail and it was written in regards to an article I posted on my small German blog last month. This article was my personal attempt to talk about a phrase I heard a few weeks before:

"Aren't we all a little bit narcissistic?"

Here is the link to my article. It is written in German but feel free to share anyway:

I took this phrase and made it the title of my article. I wrote about how such a phrase minimises and trivialises the harm of certain personality traits and in the end shifts the blame to the victims of emotional narcissistic abuse. This kind of societal gaslighting is often used in Germany, unfortunetly.

And this e-mail was such a touching feedback that made me think like rather spontenious: perhaps I should write some kind of memoir where I can collect and share some of my experiences so far? It would be so much nicer to have a book than just posting short articles on my blog ...

2 Seconds later, a shrieking voice screamed in my head: Am I out of my mind??? How could I think I had the skill or the guts to pull this of? How dare I'm that arrogant to think that this is a good idea? Do I want to be the next Stefanie Foo? How insolent, how prespumptous, how overbearing, how absurd and irrational ...

After my inner selfabuse faded a bit, it dawned me: It doesn't matter what I start writing the anxiety of trying and potentially standing out in the open is always there. It scares the hell out of me to be successful doesn't matter how small this success is.

And here ist are some more crazy thoughts:

I don't really think that, well, I know it sounds ridicules, but I don't really know if my experiences are qualified enough to justify writing a memoir.

I'll be blunt: Perhaps on an absurd level of self gaslighting I am not sure if I'm "traumatized" enough. Yeah, even as I write this, I feel that I must be crazy to think that my parents had been that bad.

Because its all so fresh, I mean that I' m able to recognice the possibility that I could be a narcissistic abuse survivor. After I published my fantasy book in September 2023 I started to feel fatigued and anxious instead of being happy. But I couldn't stop writing and I wanted to be a selfpublisher, so I fought. I was live on Instagram, reading chapters, I found an real life writing community were I'm active and do readings, I'm now a member of the team that runs the community, yes, I am successful in a small way.

But marketing was and is so, so scary, the thought of making my book - and in the end myself - public alone was and is terrifying. Yes, I did some things but it was far, far less then some "normal" selfpublisher does in a commercial writing carrier on average. Really far, far less.

I have not an official C-PTSD diagnosis.

I just discovered that in my family was some strange sickening pattern between children and adults that seemed to come from parts of my grandparents and that my parents showed the same behaviour, perhaps a little bit of a variant. My father showed this entitlement, he did the silent treatment, showed impulsive rage, one day something was okay, the other day not, so there were no rules, the jealousy he showed toward my friends and male lovers, he did the triangulation thing with me and my older sibllings, like I was the golden child but later I turned into a scapegoat within days and so on.

It took me until last year to recognize that depression, burnout, immune system problems, heart and blood preassure problems and anxiety where all normal illnesses we younger ones are dealing with until today. Some of these things I associate with PTSD or C-PTSD now, but actually I cannot say for sure because no one diagnosed me or the others. But depressioen and Burnout were diagnosed but it wasn't put into a connection as consequences from emotional abuse.

But this e-mail showed me that it seems there are people out there without a chance of getting a diagnosis who can identefy with my experience and now I'm sitting here thinking in circles:

[sawthefaeriequeen]

*cracks knuckles*

The ban on “adult content” is stupid as fuck, and I can’t even tell you how much it insults my intelligence. And I can’t even tell you how unconvinced I am by Tungle’s so called moral stance, when we have been begging them to remove pron bots and actual offenders for years, and they are now only taking action because of MONEY.  Real moral, hellsite.

Action that…wipes out a great deal of their userbase in the process.

So that’s one can of worms.  I have another issue:

The thing is, with their reportage system,  they’ve effectively given the reins of fandom to the ant/is.

Aka people who, in my current main fandom, in the past two years have:

-for “shipping the wrong ship”, harassed a voice actor and his wife and children to the point where he begged them to stop threatening to hurt his family and announced he was withdrawing from fandom talks

-for “shipping the wrong ship”, leaked private pictures of the lesbian nb voice actor and tossed slurs at them every time they were on social media

-sent threats of violence to the showrunners, specifically gendered threats to the female showrunner, because a  ship didn’t happen

-threatened fans, to the point that they had to get different mailboxes to drop zines in so that theywouldn’t get doxxed, had to erase social media  accounts entirely so their jobs wouldn’t be in jeopardy

-am I even gonna start in on the fucking ridiculous, an/ti-typical p/ed/oph/ile  accusations they’ve flung at people for daring to ship a fictional 21 year old and a 25 year old together?

-and much more. So, so, so much more. These are not “sad minors uwu”. They’re misogynistic, ageist, homophobic, racist, ableist, who-knows-what-else-ist right-ing bullies wearing a ‘progressive’ hat.

And Tungle has just given them free rein over fandom content.

^I didn’t list down all that for like, shock value or anything. My point is, I blacklist and block a lot, yes. “Curate your own fandom experience” – should be golden rule on here

But I can’t, in good conscience, use a fandom platform, on any site that lets fucked up people like ant/is take over the helm.

(That’s not even going into how Tungle cannot keep its rules straight; how they will keep on modifying until they render  this site unusable. And they will. We know they will.)

-the only reason I’m not deleting (why I didn’t delete in the first place) is I have a lot friends here, old and new, and I really, really don’t want to lose touch

-but yeah, I sense a real fandom exodus coming. I’m gonna see about paying for pillowfort and I’ll probably finally make a Twitter (it’s NOT my ideal platform, but eh, can’t be choosers right now). Tell me about your accounts wherever, okay? We might as well keep track of each other while roaming the desert

[takaraphoenix]

My Relationship with Teen Wolf

“It’s complicated” doesn’t even begin to cover it.

I discovered the show when it was roughly a three months wait until season 3 would start.

I binge-watched all there was - the first two seasons. And then I, right away, watched it again because it was that good. And then I literally watched it for a third time in a row.

I just completely fell in love with it. Sterek fast became my OTP, I loved the fandom because it was a warm, beautiful place filled with the most amazing headcanons.

I even liked the canon straight couples. Jackson and Lydia were just so beautifully perfect. And Scott and Allison were probably the best example of “soulmates” - because literally nothing else would ever justify the shit they went through for each other.

Even the smaller roles like Danny and the Sheriff and the Coach were just so cool.

I loved it. I loved everything about it. And I was so ready for season 3.

I mean, Derek had Boyd, Erica and Isaac now. Jackson was now finally a wolf and could join the pack. The pack was growning.

Everything went downhill starting with season 3. Now, season 3 in itself wasn’t bad, but it was definitely the start of “bad”.

Writing Jackson, Erica and Boyd out just like that was displeasing at first - it became a bigger issue the more the show went on.

What is the key-element of why season 3 started to be bad however is the True Alpha crap they came up with.

Part of what I enjoyed about the show was the fact that Scott was just this average teen wolf, a little bumbling and awkward but with a good heart. He didn’t have to be the leader. I expect an Alpha to be a leader, a fatherly figure, someone older. Not an awkward newbie wolf who literally learned how to control his wolfiness from a human boy.

That they had to force not just “Scott is main character. Scott needs to be Alpha”, but also “Oh shit, we made it so you gotta kill to become Alpha but Scott is main character, so Scott can’t kill. Hurry up, writers, invent a creative way for him to still become Alpha”.

It’s a load of horse-crap is what it is.

The show would have worked so much better if they had cut that crap. Kept Derek around - as the Alpha - and allowed Scott to slowly learn what it even means to be a werewolf and to then, through character development, become Derek’s second-in-command.

Now. They wrote all those characters out of the show, but they started establishing the twins as potential new pack-mates. And okay. They slowly started to become... interesting characters, the more we learned about them.

And then they were written out of the show too. And that was when it became a real problem with this show.

They want a pack. But they keep writing any character who has the potential of becoming pack out ASAP.

The whole... Isaac/Allison romance, I am still wondering where they pulled that from. Like? She literally tried to kill you an literally all your friends before and she’s basically the big love of your new Alpha? What is wrong with you, Isaac? Do you need therapy? Oh, right, you do. Yeah.

Setting it up that Danny knew all along what was going on just to write him out too.

Killing off Allison. Writing Isaac out of the show.

Basically. We had the “Alpha”, his human best friend, a banshee, a kitsune and a coyote. In a fucking show called Teen Wolf. I mean. Yeah, they kept true to the name and stuck with only ONE Teen Wolf. Because who wants to see an actual pack in a show about werewolves? Oh. Right. Everyone.

Season 4 was just bad. It was lame, it was weird and it had zero pay-off when Peter was suddenly the bad guy again. I had been a hundred percent sure that Gerard was behind this and that this was the reason they kept him alive.

Gerard, other reason for why it became bad. How did no one make sure to kill him? And then, when it’s revealed that he’s alive and basically dying slowly which is cruel, no one finishes him off either. You can not argue the “The good guys don’t kill” thing because keeping him alive while he is slowly dying from the black goo is so much worse than just a mercy-kill. And if you’re setting your good guys up to be cruel assholes who torture their enemies like that... you don’t get to play the “He has True Alpha potential because he’s such a goodie-two-shoes” card. And I am terrified to see what he does in season 6.

Kira was a cool addition, mainly. She... didn’t really get much personality development beyond the point of Scott’s New Love-Interest, but the mere concept of her was cool.

I dislike Malia and will always hate how they shoehorned her in. “Hey, look! Another living Hale! And it’s Peter’s daughter! Wow!”. That she spent basically a decade in the forest as a wild animal but they just pretend that it’s possible to re-introduce her not just into society but high school - whereas she is completely lacking all middle school and half of elementary school education, honestly, can she even read and write? Because she shouldn’t be able to. Even if she learned that ten years ago, she’d have forgotten simply by growing up as a wild animal in the forest. Granted, her behavior is at the very least well-written and animalistic, but that just makes me question the weirdness of Stiles going “Oh, she’s basically a wild animal. Let’s start dating”. Right. Away. If they had taken the time to, you know, re-introduce her to society properly and learn things and her and Stiles falling for each other along the way, okay sure. But this “We just met. Let’s have sex in the basement of the asylum” thing was so weird and so forced.

Season 5 might just be one of the - if not THE - worst thing I’ve ever witnessed on television. If something has that crappy level of quality, I normally turn it off and stop watching.

But the masochistic part of me kept whispering how much I loved season 1 and 2 and that 3 wasn’t so bad and, sure, since season 3 it’s been declining, but they did so well in the first two seasons, maybe they’ll turn it around again.

They did not turn it around.

Season 5 was just... really, really, really awful.

The over-loaded plotlines that kept getting entangled.

The fucking awful new characters. Like. Liam was always and will always be only Scott 2.0, a very, very cheap rip-off of their own main character - and who even does that? But in season 5, he was just awful. That he threw his temper-tantrums and turned his back on Scott and was just generally a pain in the ass.

Allison 2.0 was even worse though. I legit do not bother remembering the name of Liam’s girlfriend, because she is so flat and... unlikeable. Her only reason for being in this was to create the tension between Scott and Liam.

And Liam’s best friend made them feel like “Oh boy, we cut out the jock and his lovable gay best friend. Let’s replace Jackson and Danny with those two!”. Honestly, they really gave up trying to come up with individual, interesting characters.

And casting showed that too. At least Liam’s best friend is black. But literally everyone else they cast after season 3 was two things - white and brunette. This show started out with such an individual, diverse cast - black male Boyd, blonde female Erica, blonde male Isaac, redheaded female Lydia, polynesian male Danny. And now they basically just cast dark-haired whites and the guys even all look the same. This Theo-guy and that... other... wolf... guy... thing... I honestly don’t remember but the guy who had something with Liam’s best friend, they basically looked the same to me.

The decline in character development and design, as well as the decline in story-telling was only topped off by the dreadfulness.

This show used to be bright. And funny.

As in: It took place during the day too. There used to be colors. In season 5, in many episodes, I could barely tell what was going on because it mainly took place during the night and in total darkness.

And I didn’t laugh once in season 5. Absolutely nothing was funny. It didn’t help that comic relief guy Stiles got kicked in the balls by the writers when they decided they also needed tension between Scott and Stiles.

No, fuck you, you don’t.

The friendship between Scott and Stiles has been the backbone of this show since the very first scene of the first episode. And now you decide that Scott should be stupid, shallow and trustful enough to trust Theo instead of Stiles? Really? That... That’s so OoC. Those are your characters, don’t write them OoC.

The fact that Derek and Peter too became characters who just... disappeared for long periods of time was just ridiculous too. It’s like this show is deliberately trying to sabotage itself and to remove good characters.

Lydia, Stiles and Scott are essentially the only characters left from the... bigger ones. Derek, Peter, Isaac, Boyd, Erica, Jackson, Allison, Aiden, Ethan, Kira, Danny.

Instead we get to keep Malia around who, sure, ist still the best of those new additions. Liam. Liam’s girlfriend. Liam’s best friend. Fucking Theo gets to stay?

And Parrish, who... honestly just gives me the creeps because the dude is old enough to have been to war and to now work at a police station as a deputy, which I really hope for the sake of the safety of the people does require some years of training before you get handed a gun and a badge too, but thinks it’s in any way or shape appropriate to date a high school student? Like, sure, it may be legal but that doesn’t mean you have to do that. Especially not if you’re a police deputy. And I don’t care if that sounds like a hypocrite thing to say because I ship Sterek and that might be the same age-difference. I ship Sterek in fanfiction and fanarts. If fans go ahead and ship Lydia and Parrish sure, cool. Everything goes in the fandom. Not everything should go in canon, because there should be some kind of... moral... behind decisions made. Do not romantize adults dating teens.

So. Yeah.

If they hadn’t announced that season 6 is the final season, I would have turned my back after how bad season 5 was. But... cue in the voice in my head that’s still whispering how much I loved season 1 and 2. And this is the grand finale. It’ll be over after this. Just 20 more episodes, I can watch that. And then it’ll be finally over and they can’t ruin it any more.

The grand finale airs in four days. So I’ll be rewatching the first five seasons now and then I will start watching the final season. I’m terrified of it.

And am I the only one who felt like many decisions made were just made to snuff out Sterek? I mean. Stiles who didn’t have any romantic plotline before, all of a sudden having sex with basically a random stranger in a basement and Derek literally fucking the enemy while he’s half-bleeding to death, but let’s just hurry up and make sure they have female love interests...?

[gilrael]

50 Song Shuffle Meme

(This challenge originally belongs to FiretoIce on DeviantArt)

@carajay1317 tagged me for this, so let’s see what happens if I shuffle my saved songs on Spotify.

I’ll tag @le-amewzing and @rolling-blunder (if you guys feel like it of course)

2. I hate… Red and Purple by the Dodos (it’s not my fave song by them, but I don’t hate it or else I wouldn’t have saved it)

3. I hate you because… Smooth Criminal by Alien Ant Farm (omg)

4. I love… Karl-Marx-Stadt by Kraftklub (Never been there, but I do love the song lmao)

5. I love you because… In Between by Linkin Park (Because you apologise?? Okay, I guess?? lol)

6. She said… Emanuela by Fettes Brot (I get it, I will keep my hands off of Emanuela, she’s bad news)

7. He said… The Story of Tonight from Hamilton

8. We said… Zeit ist Geld by Irie Révoltés (”Time is money” It’s a really great song tbh)

9. I caught a disease from… Electric Daisy Violin by Lindsey Stirling (If the disease is a very strong urge to dance, then yes, I did catch a disease)

10. I would sing … as a love song. Frühlingstanz by Schandmaul (it’s instrumental tho lol)

11. I found … in my room. Kashmir by Led Zeppelin (I think the Kashmir region is a little too big to be found in my room lol)

12. I would kill someone if they… Lok auf 2 Beinen by Peter Fox (If someone was running around like Peter Fox in that song, they actually might drive me insane tho)

13. I would marry someone if they… Eighth Wonder by Lemon Demon (No. Just no xD)

14. I would kill for a… The Reel Jig Bag by Fiddler’s Green (I do like playing Irish reels and jigs, they are fun, but I wouldn’t kill for them xD)

15. Air is really made of... Think Who is Your Friend by Distemper (lol)

16. I think about… Bla Bla Bla by Gigi D’Agostino (Honestly tho, this song is stuck in my head quite often although it’s only nonsense lyrics >_>)

17. I am… Twilight of the Gods by Blind Guardian (that sounds awesome)

18. The secret ingredient is… Addict with a Pen by Twenty One Pilots (I relate to this song too much)

19. I will dance with my love to… Your Woman by White Town (My boyfriend does not like this song lmao)

20. I have a crush on… In kaltem Eisen by Subway to Sally (Eric Fish is not what I would consider boyfriend material lmao, especially not if you look at the lyrics of this song)

21. I got hurt because… Fieber by Peter Fox (Well, if I have a feaver I am kinda hurt I guess?) 22. My last words will be… Liebe by Kraftklub (Oh my god)

23. The song at my funeral will be… Tanz mit mir by Faun and Santiano (I wouldn’t mind people listening to cheerful music at my funeral)

24. I died because… Letter Between a Little Boy and Himself as an Adult by Abney Park (I would die if I turned into what I never wanted to become)

25. The story of your life is… Blackout by Linkin Park (Apparently my life is pretty depressing. Which is true in a way?^^’)

26. I like to eat… Peace or Violence by Stromae (this is ridiculous)

27. I live because… Luftbahn by Deichkind (this song is a good reason to live)

28. I’m immortal because… Disowned Inc. by Serj Tankian

29. My superpower is… Master of Tides by Lindsey Stirling (YES!)

30. Tonight I will… Chasing Pavements by Adele (lol)

31. They insulted my mother by… Der Weg by Die Apokalyptischen Reiter (this is the least insulting song ever tho?? lol)

32. I will dream of… Troy by Die Fantastischen Vier (Oh my god, I still remember the weird music video for this song xD)

33. I licked… Wing$ by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis (I don’t wanna lick shoes >_>)

34. My nickname is… Better Day by Dover

35. My best friend is… We don’t believe what’s on TV by Twenty One Pilots (There’s other bands besides Twenty One Piltos I listen to, I swear)

36. I would remove … from the world. Mein Todestag by Letzte Instanz (Does this mean that i will remove death?)

37. I wanted to be … as a kid. The Sound of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel (...)

38. I wish I could juggle… Bring mich nach Haus by Faun (this doesn’t make sense lol)

39. I would bring … with me to a desert island. Die Streuner by Die Streuner (At least I would have some company and good music)

40. In my underwear you will find… The Election of 1800 from Hamilton (LMAO)

41. Your children are like… Brother from a Mother of a Last Name of Another Color by Hank Green (I haven’t thought about this song in AGES)

42. I would trade my soul for… 4-15-13 by Dropkick Murphys (Trading my soul to reverse a tragedy like that seems like it wouldn’t be the worst of ideas)

43. I think the moon is made of… Major Tom by Peter Schilling (NO! Bad Spotify shuffle!)

44. I will bask in… Radio Ga Ga by Queen (Yes pls)

45. I lost THE GAME because… Remmidemmi (Yippie Yippie Yeah) by Deichkind

46. I would lose a fight because… Apology by Fiddler’s Green (That took a very dark turn suddenly >_<)

47. My deep dark secret is… Bienvenue Chez Moi by Stromae

48. My friends would describe me (as)… Hail to the Freaks by Beatsteaks (^^)

49. My favorite song is… Air Catcher by Twenty One Pilots (Not my fave song by them, but definitely somwhere in the top 5)

50. This meme was… Occupied Tears by Serj Tankian (My taste in music does not lend itself to memes like this it seems lol)

[gaiatheorist]

“Morality.”

“Should children as young as 5 be taught about sexual practices between consenting adults?” No, obviously, children are not adults, and have a disturbing habit of copying things they’ve heard or observed. I’m more concerned about A+E attendances to have foreign bodies removed than I am about children ‘learning’ to be anything other than heterosexual, though. 

We’ve been here before, with Section 28 prohibiting the ‘promotion’ of homosexuality in schools. Imposed morality, ‘this’ is the right way to be, and nothing else exists. From 1988 to 2000, the only ‘acceptable’ family structure was a Mummy and a Daddy who loved each other very much, and sometimes had a special cuddle. In bed. With the lights off. Bonus points if the Mummy and the Daddy were married. To each other. Anything else was a ‘pretended’ family structure. Apart from the “It’s OK to say no.” booklets in primary school, I don’t remember any ‘sex and relationships’ education at all, the booklets came too late for me, and loaded on the guilt that someone had been doing things they shouldn’t have, and I hadn’t said no. Everything else was biology, insert-tab-A-into-slot-B, to quote the Manic Street Preachers “My idea of where life comes from, a childhood glimpse of pornography.” it really was the age of finding a ‘mucky book’ under a hedge back then. (Or a video tape with no label, and the tabs popped out, before satellite TV.) 

As much as some of our Mums and Dads fucked us up, so did our schooling. The government’s decision that heterosexuality was the norm, and anything else deviant left some of us with ‘nowhere to go’, burying feelings, ostracised by the bullying of the ‘normal’ kids. Homosexuality isn’t illegal, discrimination technically is, and this ‘morality’ debate is a constructed nonsense that will impede the acceptance that love is love, in its many and varied forms. (Sticking with the ‘love’ angle, rather than the ‘sex’ one, the primary school lessons wouldn’t touch on the many ways to couple-or-multiple.) It’s tired but true, that children are malleable and accepting before they are exposed to prejudice. “Why does uncle Bob go everywhere with uncle Jim?” “They’re in love, like Mummy and Daddy.” “Oh, can I have a biscuit?” It really is that simple.

It doesn’t really matter which ‘moral majority’  has the pitchforks out, where there is a majority, there will be a minority, and that imbalance leads to oppression. Letting the kids know, at 5, that there isn’t only ‘one way’ will reduce some of the homophobic bullying at 7, some of the confusion at 13, and some of the self-loathing and suicide at 15. Some of it, not all, because the children don’t only exist in their classrooms and playgrounds. The refusal to acknowledge the ‘other’ choices is a backward step, and it will lead to harm, when some of those children realise that they are ‘other’, deviant, abnormal. 

As much as we’re seeing some celebrities and ‘influencers’ openly-out, not only as homosexual, but a plethora of things we don’t even have tick-boxes for yet, we’ve also seen a return to death-by-stoning in Brunei. Good old family values, there, it applies to adultery as well as homosexual activity. “Oh, but that’s ‘The Muslims’ doing Sharia law, that’s not us!” Death by stoning. Lapidation is a word I never thought I’d need to learn in 2019, Pearl-clutching Christians take note, isn’t the one about not-killing quite near the top of the list of commandments? (I can’t even wrap my head around the ‘observed by’ angle to it, inflicting trauma on a whole group of people, as a means of keeping them in line. It’s barbaric, which is, I suppose, me making a moral judgement.) 

My ‘morality’ is of the ‘harm none’ flavour, my sexual orientation is fluid. That’s not as difficult to reconcile as it might appear, because I don’t wish harm against the Sultan of Brunei, or the parents protesting in Birmingham. I pity them. I think they’re wrong, but still I pity them. By choosing to live by religion-imposed rules, they narrow their world-view, by imposing those views on others, they isolate and ostracise themselves. In the current fragile-fractured society in the UK, it wouldn’t take much for the UKIP contingent to correlate the Sharia stance in Brunei with ‘all Muslims’, if only it didn’t run the risk of them ‘catching gayness’. 

‘Exposed to’ was one of the phrases used. I’m not infectious. My son is ‘pansexual’, whatever that is because he just IS, he had a hetero-normative upbringing, one ‘Mummy’ and one ‘Daddy’ with a marriage certificate signed and sealed long before he was conceived. (He called us ‘Mum’ and ‘My Mum’ for ages, amusing, but it didn’t stop him observing his Dad’s ‘Wahey, look at the tits on that!’ mentality, or his Granddad’s insistence that women were weak-and-feeble little things, that needed to be looked after. Hardly surprising that he never had a girlfriend at school, we must have seemed confusing creatures to him.) His Dad, for all his faults, wasn’t maliciously homophobic, he did have some gay and lesbian acquaintances, but he also engaged in the derogatory banter that’s ‘expected’ in the circles he moved in. Porn-lesbians were titillating, real-lesbians less-so for him, he had defended his gay friends growing up, but still used ‘bummer’ and such as insults. 

Children do need to be ‘exposed to’ the undisputed fact that not all relationships are heterosexual, and that needs to happen when they’re still at the “Oh, right, can I have a biscuit?” stage. To say otherwise is immoral, because it allows the discrimination and hostility to creep into the lives of those children, with nothing to counter it. It is absolutely fine, and fair for people to have an opinion on homosexuality, bisexuality, fixed-or-fluid gender, what is not fine or fair is for them to impose their opinion on others as a fact. Again, homosexuality is not a criminal offence in the UK, or a mental disorder, some people find it a distasteful notion, and therefore deem it ‘wrong.’ If it’s being practiced consensually, between adults, and ‘not frightening the horses’, it can’t really be ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, it just is. ‘Moralising’ sexual preference (unless it’s for children or animals, or any other non-consensual practice, I’m not going to look them up, my search history is dubious enough as it is.) is harmful. There are gay Christians, lesbian Muslims, asexual people of ‘all faiths and none’, and myriad combinations of everything else. To refuse to acknowledge that is at best ignorant, and at worst incredibly damaging.

I don’t like baked beans. Some people do, some people are indifferent. I’ll eat them if I have to, but I’d prefer not to. What I won’t do is insist that other people don’t eat baked beans, because I think they’re ‘wrong’. (I actually think they’re goblin-shit, disgusting orange lumpy things, with a terrible habit of sticking to the back of the fork, and ending up in the washing-up bowl, but that’s just me.) Whether I eat baked beans or not doesn’t impact on anyone else. Neither does whatever I get up to in the privacy of my own bedroom. I’m not going to go about the place defacing baked beans cans in the supermarket, or hurling abuse at people I see eating baked beans. I’m not going to go to anyone’s house, and dump their beans-on-toast in the bin, I just don’t like beans. I’ve outed myself as bean-ist, bean-ophobic. I could claim that I have a ‘moral objection’ to baked beans, and start a campaign to ban them. How ridiculous would that be?

Nobody taught me to dislike baked beans, in the same way as nobody taught me to have something of an ambiguous attraction to males and females. I’m ‘greedy’, because I can find either/or equally appealing. Or neither, depending on circumstances. I’m not stealing your beans, or forcing you to eat beans, my sexual identity has absolutely no impact on anyone but the person I’m with. I’m no more a ‘predatory lesbian’ than I am a ‘cougar’, chasing down anything with a pulse in order to satiate my ‘dubious’ desires. (Anyone pearl-clutching about the fact that I worked in a school, and might have ‘exposed’ myself to children, it only ever came up once in 14 years. “Miss, I think I might be bi, what are you?” “I’m not really anything, apart from ‘me’, and that’s all you have to be.” ever so slightly duplicitous, but I didn’t want the girl to think it was compulsory to ‘pick a side’ at the age of 13.) 

There will be children in those classrooms in Birmingham, and across the UK who will end up being not-heterosexual. There will be children with two ‘mums’ or two ‘dads’, invisible-erased under the ‘moral’ proclamation of ‘normality’. Yes, it is the majority-norm, but it isn’t the only option, and insisting that it should-be, citing ‘morality’ is regressive, and harmful. It could, potentially, be the start of a slippery slope, if it’s ‘morally justified’ not to even mention homosexuality, what next? Whose morals carry the greater weight, and how should they be imposed on others? 

As others have pointed out, there would be outcry if it was another-other that had been cited as a moral objection. It is illegal to discriminate on grounds of religion, or ethnicity, or gender, disability OR sexual orientation. That a proportion of the population find homosexual practices distasteful does not mean that they are ‘immoral’, any more than a mixed-race marriage, or a couple where one partner was raised Jewish, and the other Catholic. The ‘question’ shouldn’t have needed to be asked. It isn’t a ‘question’ in any sense other than the rhetorical, no amount of hiding behind religious dogma framed as morality makes it a valid question. I respect the rights of others to have views that differ from mine, but the perceived victory of this ‘moral’ argument makes me uneasy. If a parent-protest about homosexuality can cause a school to (temporarily) cease part of the curriculum, what’s next? ‘History is written by the victors’ comes to mind, how many backward-steps before the whole SRE curriculum is deemed immoral, what with some groups objecting to sex before marriage, why should children be ‘taught’ about reproduction, healthy relationships, and bodily autonomy? They’ll find out when they’re married.