#anyway if you read all this im sorry.

[skelejon]

Hi! Genuine question because my sibling is intersex. Also if you don't have the spoons to answer that's okay. Take your time or feel free to ignore me. :)

She said H*rmaphrodite is a specific type of intersex in which one has both sets of genitalia which one or both may have full function.

She never called it a slur around me, just a specific term that should not be replaced with Intersex, as Intersex is an umbrella term, and it's inappropriate to call all intersex people that when it only as a medical term applies to a small subset of intersex people.

Is this correct? I try to stay up to date and informed but when different intersex people give different answers, I don't know who to listen to and trying to research the topic leads to a thousand different answers on what the issue is or isn't.

Thank you for your time!

So this is a weird one. Your sibling is kinda right in that there is an intersex condition medically referred to as 'true hermaphroditism' which involves having ovotestes, which are essentially just made up of both ovarian and testicular tissue in varying amounts.

However, people are moving away from that and using 'ovotesticular syndrome' or 'ovotesticular DSD' as the name instead because of the issues surrounding hermaphrodite as a term. While there aren't enough studies to truly say its very unlikely that someone with ovotestes will produce both viable sperm and viable eggs, you'd need the perfect amounts of tissue and to have external gonads to prevent heat killing off sperm, and then somehow the right levels of hormones to produce either in the first place. Which isn't to say it's absolutely impossible, especially with advancing fertility treatments, just that the chances are astronomically small. A large majority of people with ovotestes are infertile as a result. The term 'hermaphrodite' would imply otherwise and actual true hermaphroditism like is observed in certain animals is considered something that cannot occur in humans, and as a result the term is being phased out of medical literature.

There's also the issue of the implications that people with ovotestes are somehow 'more intersex' than anyone else, which is obviously not true. You can't be more or less intersex than any other intersex person.

To try and sum it up, you shouldn't be calling anyone a hermaphrodite, ovotestes or not, unless they tell you it's alright. Anyone who is intersex can call themselves a hermaphrodite if they wish, as its historically been used to refer to and dehumanize all intersex folks (including calling many 'close-to-female' intersex folks, especially those with clitoromegaly, 'pseudo-hermaphrodites'). It is unfortunately still used in some medical practice and is often used as grounds to perform non consensual surgeries and hormone treatments and so it can be incredibly distressing to have to hear for some folks.

I should add there are also a number of 'dyadic-passing' (for lack of a better word. This is NOT me saying being 'dyadic-passing' is bad or inherently leads to this kind of thinking.) intersex folks that are actually fairly intersexist and will use terms like this to go "oh I'm just normal intersex, not an Actual Hermaphrodite like (insert group of 'less desirable' intersex people)" a little bit like how some gay men will throw more flamboyant gay men under the bus to try and seem like 'one of the good ones' etc.

[collophora]

Do yourself a favor and go read the entire fanfic work of @fanfoolishness

(In order: Under sun and shade, Blind Side, and Breathless (patching up is one of my fav too, I just had no cool sketch idea for it)

[devxoid]

regarding dr ratio's team join voiceline with aventurine

idk where it originated from but i've been seeing this notion that the ENG voiceline is horribly mistranslated and ratio is much more caring and friendly in the original CN. THIS IS LITERALLY NOT TRUE HE IS JUST AS BITCHY IN BOTH LANGUAGES

as a native chinese speaker i actually really love hsr's localisation and i would like to clarify the misconception + explain the cultural nuance/context behind this particular voiceline

i think this tweet might've been the original source for this misconception? op's translation of the CN line is very literal and completely lacking in cultural nuance. while the sentence 管好你自己 does literally translate to "take care of yourself", it lacks the automatic positive connotation that this sentence has in ENG. CN is a high context language -- aka the meaning of a sentence can be totally different based on context clues like tone, body language, etc.

ratio's tone in this line is not the tone of someone who is concerned for a friend. it's standoffish. when said in this kind of tone, the meaning of 管好你自己 is closer to "mind your own business", making the ENG "keep to yourself" a more accurate localisation.

in addition, the word 管 has connotations of controlling/managing something -- directly translating this to "take care of yourself" means it's missing a lot of important nuance.

granted, the second half of the line is a bit unnecessarily aggressive in ENG. the CN is more like "I have no need for your concern", and explicitly saying that he believes aven's concern to be "false" in ENG is definitely a lot ruder than the original line.

However. in my opinion it's not Too far off base. the way he emphasises the second half of that voiceline in CN carries an implication that he actually disdains aven's concern; we can extrapolate from context clues that he feels this way because aven's concern is just an act. tldr; eng line explicitly saying "false display" does make it ruder than CN but it didn't just come from nowhere -- the implication is already there in CN

this is not to say that ratio doesn't care about aven or see him as a friend. imo the reason ratio is so standoffish in this line is because any display of concern from aven here has the clear intention of teasing ratio. they both know ratio can take care of himself perfectly well. this is just how their dynamic works -- aven makes silly playful comments and ratio deflects them by acting cold.

in conclusion: ENG voiceline is not a mistranslation. hsr localisation is definitely not perfect but in this particular case i feel they've done a fairly good job of conveying the original meaning. thank you for coming to my ted talk

[lucabyte]

I don't know how everyone isn't also always constantly thinking about how burial rites seem to be potentially one of the few things Siffrin instinctively remembers about their culture. But rest assured. I am in fact always thinking about it.

Textless version where they're just hanging out. It's fine!

[surreal-duck]

Tuesday is chuu day! (x)

[boygirlctommy]

i love the bit from oct 17 2020 when tommy and quackity trapped wilbur in a cobblestone box to keep him from pressing the button... wilbur punching through the blocks with his bare hand to try to get to the button... tommy frantically replacing the block in front of him yelling for quackity to do something... the moment when tommy stops, blocks the exit, and tells wilbur to do it. press the button. but then theyd die with him. quackitys like "wait, wait-" but tommy holds his ground and wilbur. ohh wilbur. "why'd you have to make it so hard?"

[caitlyn-kirammans]

caitvi fix recs? 👀

Hi, hello! Oh gosh, there's so many great fics out there! Can you believe we have 6000+ caitvi fics and counting??? It used be like 100 lol. I personally have a very long list of backlogs too haha (staring at my 30+ opened fics who are mostly 100k+ words lmfao). I'll list down some that are, at the top of my head, my favorites!

Do note the AO3 warnings too. Some can be NSFW, or some tropes might not interest you, and that's okay! Fandom should be fun for YOU! And if they're not your cup of tea, you can always just read something else that might pique your interest.

With that, here are my two favorite authors: @sunsetsharkblog (AO3 link) and @unamedica (AO3 Link). All of their works are amazing, and you can read pretty much everything they've published. Reasons being:

They update and publish a heck ton of works that are consistently AMAZING

Even if some stories have tropes that I don't usually read (e.g. high school, ABO, royalty, etc etc), I end up loving them and getting into the tropes itself. It takes a great author to do that to me, personally.

My faves are King of Zaun and the Hunter and the Hunted series from Medica, and What a Week and the When we’re together series from Sunset, but ALL their stuff are great and you should definitely check them out.

And here are more other favorite works/authors:

thescriptorium's Where is Love?

hdsoull's It's reassuring (you keep coming around)

@linka-from-captain-planet's devil in disguise, a snake with blue eyes

@becasbelt's either way, we're not alone (I'll find a new place to be from) and you're a word that I can't forget

rosetattoos's lucid dreams about you

lorrxai's Vi's Guide to Not Picking Up Guys

all of @thehaakun's fics, with on your authority as my personal favorite

@connielingus423's late fine

wiseturtlebear's Plus One

KariAteRachel's Bloom for Her

@prettyaveragewhiteshark's you carry my fears (as the heavens set fire)

AmberZ10's All's Fair

JynErsoinNYC's Silver Spoons

cityseeker's the heart's epiphany

HaughtBreaker's Traffic Stop

@heymacareyna's bring me java, bring me joy

CashewNut_Cam's Total Immersion

MyrtenasterRose's The Ace Up Her Sleeve

p0etess's gray is not a real color

hellboy's for crown & country

RedPanda92's Even If Nothing's Certain, I'll Take a Chance With You

MagicBoot's It's about you and me

SarcastCity's Unexpected Chemistry

anyways to every single one of you fic authors ily all so much! thank you for the hard work you guys do for the fandom <3

[its-flame-art]

“wait a minute. wait a minute, Doc. ah... are you telling me that you built a time machine...out of a DeLorean?”

[greencatalystcomet]

im so excited for one year from now when there's an abundance of really long, like 100k+ word deadpool/wolverine fanfiction because. there is currently a drought

[benjaminthecoathanger]

okay, because i saw a poll earlier and i thought the choices weren't clear enough and also the answers i saw to it annoyed me and also i'm curious:

NOTES:

I am including having watched gameplay of a game and not having played it as having watched the source material

In this context if you are writing fic/making art and you are not being commissioned to do so. This is purely for funsies

You getting into something because you saw a post/gifset/video about it and then watched the source material does not count. That's just how you get into new things.

Goncharov does not count because it's not real. I'll break kayfabe here I don't care.

[kndrules]

:D

[daisy-mooon]

"I want Annabeth to be blonde :(" then pick up a PJO book and read it you dumb fuck

[lucabyte]

Standalone post of my doodles for @samhainian's AUs of sorts from this post which you should go read because oouuuuh,,,,,

There's a lot of possibilities with how either of these go, mostly depending on how honest Loop is upfront (or how caught red-handed they are, so to speak). Since... Well, the party is loving. That's the point of the story! They just learned this!

But. How do you even begin to explain this. Especially when you aren't fully over it yourself.

[astrobei]

hi i love your fics and I was wondering if you had any byler fic recs

thanks

hello there! in all honesty, i have not had the time to read a lot of byler fic as of late, but it’s been a while since i posted some recs so i’ll drop a few that i’ve enjoyed recently! as always, i do endorse every fic in my bookmarks to the highest possible degree, so always feel free to look through those for new reading as well <3

say it with your hands by pseudologia (@hellfiremike) — will is a new employee at the movie theater mike works at, and mike starts thirsting over will’s hands to a degree that’s downright detrimental to his employment status

GOD. this fic. i gushed in their dms immediately after finishing it because this might be my favorite modern will characterization of all time, and this is coming from someone who has a million and one takes on modern era will byers. this fic just checked all of my boxes — from the summertime romance to mike’s painfully in-character teenage angsting to will being a frequenter of star wars reddit threads and an enjoyer of sufjan stevens. and the TENSION. oh god the tension. i’ve read all their fics probably three times over each, and i also highly recommend like i am home again, a college au set during a halloween party which made me stare at my phone refreshing ao3 hourly until it updated, and can this be a real thing (can it?) wherein mike and will reunite in a gay bar. enough said

landslide by chamb3rs — the party’s senior year of high school

i don’t often reach for chaptered fics since i usually have such limited reading time, but i’m sooo so so happy i stumbled across this one. there have just been very few fics that have touched me like this one did. i blew through this in one sitting a few weekends ago and subsequently experienced the full range of human emotions (and then some) all in the span of a few hours. everything about this was perfect — the will pov, the weird liminality of transitional periods, the party and byhop family dynamics, down to my favorite portrayal of theeeee jennifer hayes in any fic ever. on top of all of that, this fic perfectly captures the heartbreaking euphoria of being in love with your best friend, and all the ups and downs that come with it. i crawled out of the ao3 tab covered in blood and my chest was hurting and i was shaking and i had damn near chewed my own arm off — and then i sent the link to my friend 10 minutes later and watched her experience the same exact thing like a train wreck in slow-mo HAHAHA

what a time to be alive by passerine_in_jade (@newlesbianprideflag) — will disappears and haunts mike from the upside down

i’m forever a total sucker for a good haunting metaphor, so it’s absolutely not a surprise that this fic is appearing on this list. the premise for this was so so so cool and interesting, and it’s another chaptered fic i’m glad i had a little extra time to read. the way the author had me rooting for mike and will the whole time even though half of the pairing was offscreen for a large majority of the fic is a highly commendable feat. mike’s unyielding loyalty to will and will’s constant faith in him felt so true to their canon selves, and there were so many moments that were so quiet and intimate and tender that i really felt like i was intruding on something. good good stuff

that’s what you get for falling in love by harriet_vane — will gets his first boyfriend in college, and mike, ever the ally, has very normal feelings about it

i want to preface this by saying that this fic is rated m, mostly just for mentions/allusions to sex, and one largely non-explicit portion of a scene in the last chapter. if that’s not your cup of tea, it’s easy to tell when it’s coming up and to skip past it without detracting from the plot, but i think it would be a greater detriment to not rec this fic at all, because it has quickly made the list of my favorite byler fics of all time. something about this take on jealous mike especially resonated with me — his inner monologue is simultaneously hilarious and depressing, and his obliviousness regarding his feelings for will feels so true to life without being overdone or cartoonish. you can tell just how much they really care for each other, and the conflict in this actually made me start crying because it felt so visceral and so fundamentally them. you can tell this author really understands their characters, and the love put into this fic is soooo palpable. it’s the kind of fic where you want to bonk their heads together to knock some sense into them, but you are helpless to do anything but hold on as you’re swung along for the ride.

finally, i try not to just rec fics written by my friends, but my recent reading list would be incomplete without these two wonderful additions:

the way you love me by strangeswift (@strangeswift) — byler exes (absolutely heartwrenching edition)

i’ve been hearing abby talk about her ideas for this fic for the better part of a year as she worked on it, and she actually edited and posted the first two chapters while i was visiting her! and by god is this world a better place with her byler exes concept in it, because if you want angst, you’ll never have to look further than her ao3 page. something about the way she writes will in this fic just makes my heart shrivel up and die in my chest — his quiet resignation, the bitterness (always love a good bitter will byers moment) and the Longing that never quite went away. mike’s characterization is also top notch, and you can really feel the chemistry between them during every interaction. at the time of me posting this list, chapter 4 is not yet up, but trust me when i tell you guys it’s going to soooooo be worth it. :-)

the end is here by bookinit (@bookinit02) — a speculative byler-centric season 5

if you’ve been following my blog for any amount of time, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that haven’s canon rewrite series is hands-down my favorite series across any pairing and fandom. her creativity with her season 5 concepts never fails to astound me — from the scripts she’s been working on as an alternative to the episodes she rewrote for s1-4, to her ideas for possible plot lines, and just incredible writing all around. i’ve had the privilege of reading through her scripts before she posts them to her blog (definitely go check them out) but special privilege bias aside, it takes soooo much skill to create such a visually powerful story in a medium that allows for such little narration, and the corresponding chapters just totally pushes it over the edge. pre-s5 required reading for every byler, and 100000% my new canon if the show doesn’t pan out

this definitely is not an exhaustive list because i have a million and one fics on my to-read, and one day i will get around to reading them all, but i hope there is something on this list that strikes your fancy!!

[dukeofthomas]

I can't find it now but there's a post about suspension of disbelief and how it's broken when the story starts trying to excuse it. "character gets knocked unconscious for hours but there's no further issues from this" okay 👍 "and actually this makes perfect sense because of this and that" um no it doesn't why are you lying to me. like i am willing to ignore the holes and the discrepancies!! all you need to do is let me and not bring unnecessary attention to it!!!

and all that is my issue with the whole robin child soldier argument. like i am willing to ignore it i am willing to engage with the fantasy literally all you need to do is NOT try to convince me that Actually It's Fine Because They Want To Do It or whatever. like literally just shut up about it and i can engage with the fantasy!!

[the-kipsabian]

what is your favorite quote from the infamous hp fanfic, my immortal