#because let’s be honest. that’s what agabs are being used to mean.

[fuck-you-showerthoughts]

you're not transfem. fuck off

Ah hello anon! You’re the only one I’ve gotten saying things like this, which means I can answer without flooding things with negativity!

First off, I want to say that this knee-jerk reaction is completely understandable. Labels like the ones I use can seem disrespectful and appropriative, especially with people like terfs using them in bad faith.

That being said however, I need you to understand that this instinct is exactly what prompted the existence of transmedicalism, and aroace-phobia, and the more recent wave of hatred at bi lesbians — all of which have caused much more harm than good and (if I may say so) failed as ideologies. It is reasonable to want to protect what you know especially when it is part of you, but you are assuming shallow mockery where there is none. I am not your enemy. Other people who use seemingly contradictory labels are not your enemy. It is easier to assume others don’t understand the depth of the labels they use than it is to accept that they can be used differently than you are used to, but it is important that we try.

If I call myself a trans woman, it is because I am both trans and a woman, the same as you. Trans unity above all 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍⚧️

[minisugakoobies]

Whipped | KMG

Pairing: Mingyu x GNReader (no agab)

Genre: fluff, idiots to lovers, slightly crack-ish, non-idol!AU

Rating: T

Warnings: Mingyu's a stubborn idiot, but he's also the softest human alive, Minghao's kind of a jerk tbh, use of they/them pronouns for reader, this is honestly just fluffy nonsense meant to give you warm fuzzies

Word Count: 3.9k

Disclaimers: Obviously I don’t own SVT - they just inspire me

Summary: No matter what his friends say, Mingyu is definitely, absolutely, one hundred percent not whipped for you.

A/N: Yep, another Mingyu fic. I can't help it. 🤷‍♀️

Unbeta’d as usual. If you liked this, please let me know! I’d love to hear what you think (but please be kind I’m fragile 🥺) 💕

SVT Masterlist 💜 Main Masterlist

Kim Mingyu is not whipped.

This is what he forcefully reminds himself when you walk into Minghao’s party, looking sweeter than a spring day, a phrase which if he’s being honest is maybe a little more poetic than he’d normally use. That’s okay. He can be a little dramatic if he wants. Why not? Seokmin does it all the time and no one bats an eye.

In any case. Mingyu is not whipped.

That’s why he turns his head, pretending he doesn’t see you dazzle everyone around you with your beautiful smile. While he’s pretending, he also acts like he can’t feel his own lips tug upwards at the soft chime of your laughter, a Pavlovian response to your happiness. No, his smile is unrelated to whatever you’re doing. He’s just in a good mood, one that didn’t suddenly ascend to the heavens when you entered the room.

Mingyu’s not whipped.

He sinks further into the couch where he’s sitting, a little off to the side of where Minghao, Jeonghan, and Seokmin are talking. Theoretically, he’s part of the conversation, adding the occasional hum or laugh, but he’s really not contributing much of anything. He’s too busy thinking about you. Not like that. 

(But not not like that, either.) 

In any case, Mingyu remains firmly unwhipped - solid, unshaken, definitely not falling apart over you. He’ll be absolutely fine, as long as you stay on the other side of the room, where your charms can’t reach him. Except that he can’t stop watching you, and now you’re looking at him, and even though he averts his eyes, it’s too late. He can sense you walking towards him, his heartbeat increasing with every step you take.

Not. Whipped. 

“Hey there, stranger.” 

Instinctively, at the sound of your voice, he glances up at you, like a flower tilting its face towards your light. He nods at your greeting, mumbling a hello of his own. The others sitting around him all greet you as well, but you merely nod in reply, your full attention on Mingyu. 

“Do you wanna tell me why you’ve been avoiding me?”

If Mingyu had a list of things he loved about you, which he does not, being straightforward would be near the top. Of this totally fictional list that does not exist. He admires it, actually, the way you have no patience for dishonesty or deception.

Even though your question is blunt, your smile remains soft as you wait for his response, and Mingyu rethinks his ranking. Item number one on that imaginary list - the way you smile, at him, specifically. It’s so warm, like being hugged by the rays of the sun itself. It makes him happier than he ever thought possible. He wants to curl up like a cat and bask in the feeling. If he’s not careful, he might start purring right now.

He’s totally super normal about you.

“Me?” he asks, stalling for time, praying that a somewhat reasonable explanation falls into his lap in the meantime. He’s only a fair-to-moderate bullshitter, so his hopes are low. He can feel the others staring at the two of you, very obviously listening, because no one in your friend group seems to respect boundaries. It’s not helping. “What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean,” you chirp back, and he does, he knows exactly what you mean, just like you know exactly what he’s doing. “You’ve been ignoring my texts. What’s going on?”

What’s going on is that Mingyu is not whipped, even if it feels like his insides are turning to melty goo beneath your inquisitive gaze. 

“I’m not ignoring you. I’ve just been busy,” he shoots, aiming for breezy and landing just shy of nonchalant. 

“Busy doing what?” 

“You know. Stuff.” Oh god, he really sucks at this. “And things.” Jesus Christ.

You fold your arms, and Mingyu thinks it’s cute the way you’re squinting at him, one eye closed as you assess his response. Unbearably cute, actually, and getting worse the longer it goes on.

“Yeahhhh, that’s not good enough,” you inform him, and with one hand on his arm (Mingyu ignores the electric current that lights up his nervous system when you touch him. It’s just static and definitely not anything else), you pull him to his feet and lead him out of Minghao’s apartment and into the empty hallway. He follows, not because he’d follow you anywhere, but because he’s curious.

Once the door is closed behind you, you turn to him, a serious expression on your face. “Gyu. Be honest with me.” Always, he thinks reflexively. “This is about what those guys said the other night, isn’t it?” 

Of course you know exactly what it is that has his head spinning right now. The two of you have been friends for ages, but Mingyu still can’t get over how easily you always seem to read him. 

A few nights ago, Mingyu and you had been out to dinner with a few others, and it had been like any other time you were hanging out with your friends, lots of laughing and teasing and just being happy dumbasses together. Only on this particular evening, the food had taken a very long time to arrive, but the drinks kept coming in the meanwhile, and you’d gotten a little drunker than usual, and a little clingier, sticking to Mingyu like a magnet.

Not that Mingyu minded having you hanging on his side all night. Nor did he mind keeping a close eye on you, making sure you were drinking your water and eating to help soak up some of the alcohol. None of that bothered him at all - you were his best friend; why wouldn’t he take care of you? Especially when you smiled at him and thanked him for being so sweet, so good to you, over and over.

(He can’t even begin to explain how that made him feel.)

The others noticed. And commented. Mingyu tried to ignore them, but they just wouldn’t shut up. By the time they joked that Mingyu was your trained puppy, suggesting you buy him a pretty collar and a leash to go with it, he’d had enough.

And when he tried to express that, Minghao had shut him down with a scoff, a wave of his hand, and one word. 

“Whipped.” 

Mingyu admits that he’s a lot of things, but he’s not a whipped man. He’s not. He’s not, no matter what the others say. No matter how you’re looking at him right now, concern etched all over your lovely face, lip tucked between your teeth as you wait for his answer. He’s strong. And proud. 

(And maybe a stubborn idiot, but that’s neither here nor there.)

He considers just not responding at all, but he knows how persistent you are, so he settles for a half-shrug. You sigh, leaning back against the wall, arms crossing in front of you. 

“You’re being ridiculous, you know that?” you say softly, shaking your head. “They were joking. They said so! And you know I didn’t take it seriously for a second.” 

“You didn’t hear everything they said!” he protests, crossing his own arms. You’d missed most of the barbs flying his way that night, too busy enjoying yourself. Which weirdly made him happy. He hated the thought of those guys ruining your night. “They said I was your pet!” 

“So? Jeonghan always tells Seokmin he’s got the zoomies when he gets hyper. He knows he’s not actually a dog! It’s just stupid jokes! Our friends are dumb!” you laugh, throwing up your hands. “That’s what we like about them!”

Mingyu can’t help it, he starts to laugh with you, but then he catches himself, shaking his head. “You don’t get it.” 

“Then help me understand.” 

How can he help you understand, when he’s not entirely sure he understands it himself, this storm inside him, clouding his mind? 

“I…” He glances wildly around the hallway, but there’s nothing out here to help him. He can hear the bass from whatever song is playing inside the party, a low, steady thrumming that contrasts the erratic thumping of his heart. “I don’t like being called weak.”

You tilt your head. “Is that what they said?” 

“Yeah. Or I guess… they implied it. When they said I was whipped for you.” He lets out a frustrated sigh, knowing he’s pouting and it doesn’t help his defense, but it’s just his default setting. “But I’m not.” 

Because he’s staring into your eyes as he speaks, he catches it - the quick expression of sorrow that pinches your brow at his explanation - but it’s fleeting, gone in an instant. If he weren’t watching your face so intently, he would’ve missed it. 

“Gyu,” you sigh, the corners of your mouth lifting in what is clearly meant to be a smile, except it doesn’t reach your eyes, and for a moment, the confusing tide of emotions inside him still, and he feels only sadness. That’s not how you smile. “Can you please let it go? Everyone was being an idiot. That’s nothing new! Besides…” You trail off, staring at the floor.

He waits a beat. “Besides what?”

You huff and shrug. “It’s nothing, forget it.” 

The uncertainty in your tone unnerves Mingyu even more than your fake smile. Where’s that directness of yours? 

“No, tell me. Besides what?” 

With a deep breath, you look him straight in the eye. “Besides, I’m not delusional. I know you don’t like me like that. I’m not your type.” 

Your voice grows quieter at the end of your sentence, just as the music coming from the other side of the door fades out, and to Mingyu, the silence only amplifies your words, leaving them ringing loudly in his ears like a sonic boom. You’re not his type?

He blinks rapidly, as if that will somehow help. 

“You - you’re not - “ He pauses, searching fruitlessly for the end of his sentence, but it’s nowhere to be found.

“Right. I’m not.” 

The laugh you let out sounds so fake that he winces, and a terrible realization hits him. You’ve taken his stammering to be a complete thought - a confirmation of what you’d said, that you aren’t someone he’d like like that. Curling in on yourself, arms wrapping around your stomach, you shrink away from him, only a few inches but the distance feels so vast. 

“Let’s just forget about it, okay?” 

Mingyu’s speechless. As his silence grows, so does the space between the two of you, until you’re standing by the door, hand on the knob. He feels like he should be doing something right now, snapping into action of some sort, but his brain is still stuck on your declaration.

“Okay,” he finally croaks, because it’s clear that you’re waiting for him to speak, and he doesn’t know what else to do but agree with you, because you’re usually right and he usually agrees with you. 

“Right,” you say again, but you look slightly unsure, and it rattles Mingyu, making him feel even more unsettled than before. “Okay.” And then you open the door and slip back inside Minghao’s apartment.

Alone in the hallway, Mingyu slumps against the wall. Well. That was a spectacular failure. He’d tried to explain how their comments upset him and all he’d done was upset you. The shift in your demeanor was so obvious to him, a flashing neon sign basically screaming “you fucked up!” in blazing red light. 

He gives himself a minute to try to pull himself together, then he returns to the party. As soon as he’s inside, he scans the room, until he finds you standing in the corner, hanging out with another friend, Chan, talking and laughing like everything is fine. Which, as Mingyu feels deep in the pit of his stomach, he knows it is not. 

His previously vacated spot on the couch remains open, so he slips back into it, ignoring the curious looks of his friends. He doesn’t want to answer any stupid questions right now, doesn’t want to deal with any of their crap while he tries to wrap his head around what just happened in the hallway. 

Naturally, his friends immediately start nosing into his business.

“What was that all about?” Minghao asks, turning to face Mingyu. Seokmin and Jeonghan both twist towards him, eager to hear his answer. 

“What was what about?” Mingyu replies, eyes flitting to you again. Chan must be bringing his A game with his jokes tonight, because you’re giggling Mingyu’s favorite giggle, the one that makes your nose twitch like a little bunny’s. It always makes him swell with pride when he coaxes it out of you with one of his dumb jokes, so seeing it right now and knowing he’s not the cause of it, well, it’s not exactly helping improve his mood.

“What was that dramatic exit?” Minghao gestures towards the door. 

“It was nothing. We were just talking.” Again he looks at you. And again, your attention is focused solely on the man beside you. Mingyu doesn’t understand. Can’t you feel him looking at you? 

“Uh-huh. Sure,” Jeonghan drawls, miming the crack of a whip with his hand. Seokmin and Minghao crack up beside Mingyu, but he doesn’t care. He’s too busy trying to catch your eye. He wants to see you smile at him. Just one smile. That’s all he needs to make him feel better. 

His friends lose interest in teasing him when he doesn’t respond, and the conversation moves on. As does the evening. Mingyu bonds with the couch, not leaving except to grab refills of his drink, but otherwise he’s a fixed point in this party, unlike you, who are constantly moving, floating from friend to friend, spreading joy across the room.

Spreading joy to everyone except him, that is. No matter how much he watches you, your light never shines on him again, not like it did earlier. He knows what this is. You’re the one doing the avoiding now. And oh my god does he hate it. He feels cold and lonely, withering away, dying for your attention. For your affection. Because he needs it to thrive.

Oh. 

Oh wow, he’s stupid. The others are right. 

Kim Mingyu is whipped. 

For you, and you only. 

Like it has been every few minutes since he returned from the hallway, his gaze is drawn back to you, and this time, it’s different. Because the mask you’ve been wearing all night finally slips, and Mingyu sees the wrinkle of your brow, and the slight downturn of your mouth, and he understands. You’re just as miserable as he is.

That absolutely will not do. He needs to fix this right now.

Mingyu rises to his feet again, not even waiting for Minghao to finish the story he’s been telling, not that he’s been listening anyway, and starts walking towards you. When he’s a mere arm’s length away, it occurs to him that he doesn’t have any plan, just an urgent need to make you look happy again. And also pay attention to him, because he needs your attention just like he needs you, so he panics, and grabs your hand. 

You look at him in surprise as his fingers slip between yours.

“Come with me. Please,” he adds, a bit hasty in his anxiousness, already tugging you out of the room and into the hallway. A pair of voices follow you both out, as Minghao and Jeonghan both jeer loudly at the sight of Mingyu dragging you away, but thankfully the door drowns them out, letting only the beat of the music through.   Which would be a good thing, except that now it’s just Mingyu and a very quiet you. With your hand still in his. 

“Is everything o-”

“You are my type.” 

You start speaking at the same time he does, but he’s louder, blurting his entire sentence out before you can finish yours. Your mouth freezes in an ‘o,’ and oh, Mingyu can’t believe what a dumbass he’s been for so long. How did everyone else see it but him? 

“I just. Wanted you to know. That you are the type of person. That I like.” Why can’t. He complete. A whole sentence? “Smart, funny, gorgeous….” 

You glance away from him, suddenly shy at that last word, and it just reinforces Mingyu’s point. 

Unfortunately, it does not make it any easier for him to say what he’s trying to say.

“But you’re not just my type? You’re the person I like. Hao’s right. They’re all right. I am whipped for you.” He frowns. “Damn it, I hate it when Hao’s right.” 

That makes you laugh, a quick “ha!” that makes your eyes light up, and Mingyu finds himself feeling stronger, so he doubles down. Might as well own it. 

“But he did, he got this one right. I’m down bad.” He brings your entwined hands up, clutching them in front of him, maybe pressing his luck a little, maybe laying it on thick, but it’s barely an exaggerated version of the truth if it’s not pure simple fact. 

“‘Gyu,” you groan, rolling your eyes, but there’s a twitch in the corner of your mouth that won’t cease, and it makes his heart sing. “Knock it off. I know what you’re doing.”

“I don’t think you do.” He takes a deep breath and steps forward, backing you into the wall behind you. Your hands are caught between you, and he presses the palm of yours against his chest, wondering if you feel the spike in his heartbeat when you inhale sharply. 

“Maybe you should tell me,” you say, eyes wide but voice calm, and again, he marvels at how you strike straight at the heart of the matter, and he decides he can do the same. 

“I’m telling you that I like you.”

The next few seconds are the longest in Mingyu’s life. Nothing has ever lasted this long in the history of time. Entire civilizations are built and fall within the blink of your eyelashes. You keep looking back and forth between his eyes, and he hopes that you see whatever it is you need to believe him, and tries his best to convey clearly what he feels. Even if he’s having trouble speaking his thoughts, at least his gaze can express it. 

“You like me…” 

He nods. “A lot.” Now that he’s said it out loud, it’s hitting him just how much.  

“You like me…” you start again slowly, frowning slightly, “but you don’t like it when others point that out?” 

“I just - “ Mingyu breaks off, a sharp puff of breath exploding out in frustration. How to explain it? “I didn’t like them saying it the way they did. It… it made me feel like they were calling me weak or something.” Your frown deepens and he stumbles on. “But - but that’s stupid, and I know it’s stupid. And I - I don’t care anymore.” 

He clings to your hands, a lifeboat in a sea of turmoil, the warmth of your fingers locked between his giving him hope that this isn’t going completely downhill, this sudden confession of his. It’d be just like him to ruin this with his impatience. He’s always too eager. 

“So what do you care about?” you ask, gaze burning into his. 

And then there’s you. Always so calm and direct. God, he adores you. 

“You. How you feel.” 

As soon as the words leave his lips, you lower your eyes, in the briefest of glances at his mouth, and Mingyu feels that electric shock again, tingling all the way to his fingertips. He barely breathes as he waits for you to speak.

“If you really are whipped for me,” you finally say, “you should go tell them that.” You jerk your chin in the direction of the door.

If that’s what you want, then that’s what he’ll do. Without a second’s hesitation, Mingyu spins, his hand gripping yours to pull you back into the apartment with him. 

Seokmin gawks openly as Mingyu stomps across the room. Minghao and Jeonghan exchange a glance that last night would’ve set Mingyu spiraling, but now rolls off him like water. Mingyu comes to a stop directly in front of his friends, squaring his shoulders, trying frantically to corral his thoughts into something coherent. 

But before he can open his mouth, Minghao leans forward, placing his chin in his hand. “Shhh, guys, I think the puppy’s going to speak!” 

“Hao, shut the fuck up.” 

Minghao bristles when Mingyu snaps at him. Jeonghan and Seokmin both cackle, but then Mingyu glares at the two of them, and they fall silent. He takes a deep breath. 

“I just wanted you to know that I don’t care what you guys say about me anymore, because I like YN.” 

The words spill out of him so easily, not even the tiniest nudge needed. He glances at you to find you wearing a delighted expression and his heart goes buoyant again. He decides to ride the wave. 

“They’re amazing. I’d do anything to make them smile, so if that makes me whipped, then I guess I’m fucking whipped.” 

He’s facing you now, not caring if the others can see the obvious lovestruck look in his eye as he keeps talking, not to them, but to you. Aware that they’re probably all smirking at one another, because they figured it out before he did, but he doesn’t give a single goddamn. 

“I can’t get enough of their smile. And the way they laugh. I like how sweet they are. How honest.” Mingyu can’t stop talking at this point. It’s all gotta come out. “But never mean about it. Even when it’s something you don’t want to hear. Especially when it’s something you need to hear.” 

Your hand twitches in his with every sentence he states. He squeezes back gently as his statements get louder.

“I’m not kidding when I say I’d do anything to make them smile. I’d walk the ocean floor for them. Climb a volcano and surf the lava down barefoot. Capture a star fr-”

“Oh my god, we get it, you like them!” Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “Enough with the bad poetry.” 

“Also? We know.” Minghao snorts. “No need for the dramatic announcement, it’s not news.” 

Mingyu barely hears him, too lost in the way you’re smiling at him now. Forget his earlier rankings. This smile beats all the others. Shoots directly to the top of the list, which, now that he thinks about it, he kinda wants to write down and give to you, maybe framed. Or maybe he’ll stick it on his fridge - with a heavy magnet, of course, because it’s such a long list.

He completely loses all interest in the rest of the room, even though he’s pretty sure most of the party is staring at the two of you. Instead, he finds himself hanging anxiously on the breath you take, hoping for you to say something, to give him an indication of where things stand between you now. Because he knows you’ll be straightforward and get right to the point, whatever’s on your mind. 

You step closer, close enough for him to feel your soft laugh on his lips as you give him a look that sends his pulse rocketing. You’ve never looked at him like this before.

Forget a list. He’s gonna write a whole book. 

“Come on, whipped boy. Take me home.”

If you liked this fic, please consider reblogging! Likes do not help it get seen by other readers. 💕

© 2024 by minisugakoobies. Crossposted to AO3. Please do not copy or repost. I do not allow translations of my work.

[quark-nova]

It's really weird (and by weird I mean exorsexist) how non-binary people are associated with their AGAB if they aren't explicitly transmasc or transfem. I can't speak for AMAB enbies as I'm not one (although I've seen so many posts grouping AMAB enbies with masculine queer and trans people and grouping transfeminine people as a different category than AMAB enbies, which is frustrating and also completly ignores abinary AMAB enbies which is really frustrating) but you also see it a lot with AFAB enbies who aren't transmasc or connected to manhood just being called women or women lite regardless of their actual gender and proximity to femininity.

You see the attitude of grouping enbies as their AGAB in so many ways, whether it being unwillingly included us with masculine/feminine people, or just straight up ignored in any conversations relating to physical transition (ie: see people calling HRT and gender reassignment surgeries "transmasc/transfem HRT/surgery". We're either trans men/trans women lite (because let's be honest here, people don't aknowledged transmasc and transfems that *aren't* men/women) or we're just basically cis people who want to be special and are predatory bad faith actors invading the spaces of real trans people, so our opinions shouldn't be taken into account. We can't be agender, we can't be maverique, we can't be androgyne, we can't be neutrois, we can't be xenogender, we can't have cultural genders disconnected from western concepts of gender, we can't actually be disconnected from masculine or feminine genders in the eyes of most queer spaces.

So alas, even the most progressive of people lump non-binary people into these two categories regardless of our actual gender, and I think that's what we see in that post about masculinity. AMAB non-binary people who are explicitly not transfem get shoved into the label of "man", regardless of their actual identity. It's unfortunate and it's so incredibly frustrating to see happen over and over again.

Thanks a lot for this in-depth take! And yes, I do fully agree that this happens way too often. Nonbinary people are either seen as their AGAB, or as "trans lite", without any regard for the actual complexity of nonbinary identities as we are shoehorned into discourse about a binary understanding of oppression.

[zealsoughtsequesterustanxiedemon]

On last RB

reminds me of the cis male version of that. Brain used to get so weird about trans fans of those characters that would claim that they were trans.

Was very stuck in the mindset of like "Okay they aren't definitionally transgender" (whatever that means). Most people saying it probably mean they're more, like, thematically transgender or just very relatable to trans people. Or they're just unaware of how cis people could relate to it. I've actually seen my fair share of comments from trans women on GB/CD manga going, "I don't know understand what cis people get out of this". They make me laugh.

Regardless I'm not very bothered by it nowadays unless it's accompanied by complaints about people gendering the character as male. Or just shitting on the author for "not understanding that trans people exist." The latter def still annoys me, like this character couldn't be an honest exploration of gender or that the author actually wanted to make a trans character and got told no by publishers. But my brains better now about just muting/blocking and moving on.

Cause I do understand the frustration. There's not a lot of trans characters out there in anime/manga, at least not in the mainstream. These are characters they really relate to and see themselves in. I at least feel being disappointed when a character you thought was trans has the story opt out of making them trans. I've definitely had those with gender bending stories before, even had one that did the opt-out right at the end and left me crying and angry and feeling like shit. I get wanting to see your gender identity reflected there. And for them talking about it they basically get harassed. Even if they can still be an asshole about it sometimes, it's such a minor issue to me now. Again, if it really bothers me, I can always mute/block and move on.

Really we should have plenty of trans and cis gnc characters to pick from. Personally speaking, I definitely need the latter and want more of the former that I don't just see as the latter. Cis people, at least a decent portion of us are always gonna need cis characters that fly in the face of gender norms. It's always weird when people call that kind of behavior "not very cis", when like, to some of us it's kinda intrinsic to being cis. Struggling with gender was actually always a cis experience thing to me; like, not a struggle about which gender you are but like how good at gender you are. Feeling like less or like more of a man. I saw that type of insecurity everywhere growing up, not all equivalent, but definitely there in some amount. Seeing this kind of exaggeratedly "feminine" traits being carried by a man who's often very secure in his masculinity feels so freeing. Even when those characters are insecure, I can see someone who feels a lot like me. It validates my "feminine" interests, lets me feel okay to want to be cuter, wear different clothes, etc.

Its nice seeing that trans people, especially my friends, love these characters too. I love that there's people like me out there, connecting to the same characters, even if we're just a little different (or a lot different). I think part of my original insecurity with these characters being called trans was, like, I figured these were people who'd understand exactly how I'd feel about these characters, but instead, from my understanding at the time, they were denying me. Saying that I shouldn't relate to that character or that if I did I'm probably not what I think I am. The cis side of the conversation is often v surface level ("He's just a guy who likes cute things" or pointing at snapshot-able gender confirmations). So glad I've got plenty of trans friends now who make me feel cool about this stuff and can talk more substantively on characters like this. I love em and wouldn't trade em for any amount of transphobic assholes that'd call these characters men purely because of their AGAB. ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜

[writing-is-a-sin]

as an afab person, i never was allowed to grow armpit hair. so, for the past month (second week of november until today december 6th) i have been trying it out. i haven't shaved my armpits and seeing what it feels like to just not do it.

and, to be honest, it isn't a big change for me. like, it's just hair that grows without being told. it means nothing. it doesn't change anything about me, it doesn't change any actual parts of my personality. however, i am scared of using sleeveless tops these days because family won't enjoy seeing my hairy armpits.

which leads me to think that i should just shave them, just to use more different types of shirts. but at the same time almost all my shirts have sleeves on. i don't even enjoy dresses, they are extremely dysphoric for me and i hate them with everything in me.

this post is honestly just me venting about this new "adventure" of trying out things I couldn't do because of my agab, even on a silent way. it means more a lot to me when i see my hairy armpits for some reason, and i'm willing to keep this test going for a while.

let's see how long will it last.

[jimkirkachu]

I feel like an absolute bastard. (cw gender stuff, names, pronouns, family drama)

As a way to update my parents about Janelle Monae saying in an interview that their pronoun is "free-ass muthafucka" (because gender goals x infinity!!!), I casually led into it by mentioning that my new therapist wanted to know my preferred name/nickname and pronouns—all as a means of getting to my stupid punchline, "they/them seems so much easier now, doesn't it!" ha ha ha I thought we were cool, I've been making pronoun jokes since I came out to them last September because I know it's weird for them to go from having a daughter to having an adult child / offspring / neither daughter nor son. I get it. And I've really tried to be cool about them continuing to Female me while also trying to gradually/gently push them with things like... my Kirk haircut, sharing trivia or articles about NB stuff with them (e.g. the Janelle Monae news), etc. Anyway, I didn’t think any of that would come up again, but I’m clearly an idiot because I’ve spent 32 and a half years with one parent who Never Forgets Anything and Never Lets Any Little Detail Go Unnoticed.

Six hours later, my mother asks me what my answers had been when my therapist asked me to pin them down more concretely than "either way, whatever you prefer." ((Aside: apparently therapists want to know the Real You? and having other people decide who the Real Me is... is not what they mean by that??)) I knew I was trapped but I never want to lie to my mom, right? So I told her honestly that my therapist will be referring to me as “they/them” and “Jim” (aka Not my legal name/what my family calls me, as well as a name which traditionally is given to people who are the "opposite" of my agab). (I also reminded her that my previous therapist knew me as Jim, too, hoping that might soften the blow.) Again: I get it. I knew before I said it that it was going to hurt her because I’m choosing to have certain people call me by a name that’s not the one she and dad gave me when I was born. I understand that it’s hard for them. I understand why it’s hard for them.

(And this makes no never mind, but... it’s hard for me, too. 🙁 But I know, that’s beside the point.)

After a long, very uncomfortable silence, she said, “Is it okay if I keep saying she/her?” So I counted to five in my head and said it’s fine, because I honestly never expected her or my dad to be fully understanding of any of this. But now (and not for the first time) I’m very much wishing I’d just never come out to them at all, because at least that way I wouldn’t have gotten my hopes up when they responded by claiming that my being NB was fine and claiming that they would be totally supportive/accepting of it. My expectations were low before they knew because I assumed they would be honest with me about how it made them feel, which I assumed would be along the lines of “betrayed,” “inconvenienced,” “confused,” “disappointed,” “skeptical,” “disrespected,” and/or “we failed our child.“ It seems that when they were so chill about it up front, I forgot to keep expecting those reactions in delayed forms, and I guess I let myself believe that they would actually make the effort to shift some of their thinking about me, maybe even start using they/them for me, etc.

Turns out they were enthusiastic to declare their support (which I greatly appreciate, don't get me wrong) but putting that support into practice has proven to be harder than I think they realized. “Too much has changed too fast” is what I’ve been told now... even though I’m not transitioning to male, I’m not doing HRT or having surgeries, I’m still dressing the same on a daily basis (just changing my “fancy” wardrobe), and the only thing that’s physically different is that I've stopped shaving my legs (which neither of them has even noticed because I only wear long pants).

Anyway she just happened to ask me all this as she was on her way to bed. So there was another awkward silence before she said goodnight, and if 32 years’ experience has enabled me to read any of her moods correctly, then she started crying as soon as I was out of earshot. (I would have confirmed and/or tried to get her to talk to me about it but I’m running, like, a spoon deficit at this point.)

So is my lack of much visible change the problem, then? Is this breaking my mom’s heart because I’m not different enough from my “old” self? Would this be easier in some way if I was transitioning and she could, idk, genuinely mourn the daughter she no longer has? And despite losing a daughter at least she would have a “replacement” kid whose gender still Made Sense to someone entrenched in the gender binary for almost seven decades? Or would it just make things worse?

Should I have simply lied and said I’m going by my legal name with my therapist, because how will my mom ever know that anyway? Has this name thing crushed her so bad because not much else has changed about me otherwise, so she didn’t see it coming? Or am I genuinely the asshole for expecting her to be more supportive/validating too soon, and I just need to be more patient?

((Tangent: she witnessed a really bad impostor-syndrome meltdown of mine a few months ago. I was trying to figure out what to wear to a church function and eventually got so frustrated—and convinced that I’m not really NB, just a pathetic ugly female who hates herself/her body—that I told her to pick out a damn dress for me and take me to a wig shop so I could try and undo everything I’ve done to try and hate my biologically female body a little bit less. And she responded by telling me to wear the pants/button-down/sweater aka “masc-ish” outfit I’d started with. So... is it only if I’m in crisis/panic mode that she can get on board with my being NB? Did my meltdown help her put her own misgivings about this aside? Or was she only okay with my being NB before it included having new people in my life call me by a different name??))

I keep trying to pinpoint what I’ve done wrong, and every time I re-do the math I still can only come up with, “...I was born.” But that wasn’t even my fault. I just feel incredibly selfish for trying to get them to see me the way I see myself. I keep thinking that if I don’t feel female, that’s my problem and I should have kept it to my damn self. If my identity is, in fact, Jim + they/them + non-binary, fine, but I feel like I should have known better than to reveal—to the people who named me and raised me—that I don’t really feel, and never really have felt, like I actually am the person we all assumed I was for 31 years because there didn't seem to be an alternative.

And this is precisely why I started things off with my new therapist by trying to make her decide whether to call me she or they, Jim or my real name. More than anything—more than being sane, healthy, or alive—I want not to be a burden on others.

But that’s all I ever seem to be able to do without fail.

[naoto-lovemail]

Why is it harmful to see Naoto Shirogane as a girl?

[This is not an argumentative post. I am a trans man. This is meant to be educational anyone who denies or even gets aggressive at the idea of Naoto being trans.]

There’s already some posts about this, but I still wanted to make my own and dump it. I apologize for not putting this under a cut, but I feel like people will dismiss it otherwise. 

Naoto introduces himself as a boy. Naoto/ 直斗 is a boys given name that means “Honest Big Dipper”, likely not the name he was given by his parents at birth since he’s afab. He clearly doesn’t use his ‘natural’ voice, and tries to make his voice sound deeper, but it still sounds off. This implies he’s working on voice training still and hasn’t mastered his range. 

From just looking at canon art of Naoto, we can tell he binds. Sometimes he has a very clear bust, and sometimes he’s completely flat. In Line Sticker art, this is confirmed to be done with bandages. 

I bring this up because it’s important to establish: Atlus does not know what they’re doing. Safe binding is not a trans only resource. Cis afab cosplayers bind if they want a flat chest when cosplaying either flat chested women or men, so safety on doing this should be known. 

Bandages are not safe. Naoto is putting himself in danger just to make himself look flat chested. 

Let’s look at his shadow: 

Regardless of in boss-form or not, the shadow has a flat chest. If Naoto’s shadow was a part of himself that he was hiding from, and what he’s hiding is that he’s supposedly a girl, why does his shadow fully present as male? 

That’s not what his shadow is. His shadow is Naoto’s insecurities. “He’s not actually a boy. He’s childish. He just doesn’t like himself. He’s scared that people will see him differently if he was clearly a girl. He’s just doing this to success.”

Taking these thoughts that Naoto’s shadow expresses, it becomes obvious that he has internalized transphobia. He’s justifying why he identifies the way he does and telling himself he’s not really what he is. 

The game portrays these thoughts and insecurities as internalized misogyny that he needs to overcome. 

I don’t know how to tell you that telling an afab person who has said that they’re a boy that they are, in fact, really a girl with internalized misogyny is incredibly transphobic, toxic, and harmful. 

This exact mind set is the reason I personally and many other trans men are not allowed to start our medical transition until we are able to leave our parents.

For Naoto’s justifications, saying that it’s so he won’t be judged in the work place- His mother was a famous detective. There’s no reason he should have this fear, and even then, why go so far as he has? Voice training, unsafe binding, and for his work place to not know his agab or dead name? He would have had to legally change it. No one who is just pretending to be a gender they aren’t would not go through THIS much trouble. 

There’s also the tons of medical themes that Naoto’s shadow talks about, which- again- for a trans person, having medical themes and surgery on the mind, especially a ‘life altering’ surgery, it’s not that uncommon among trans folk who plan to medically transition. Why would a detective’s dungeon be medical themed when he has no medical traits to his character aside from, perhaps, his transition plans? 

Something that bugs me and I’m sure many others a LOT is how, as soon as Naoto’s shadow says he’s ‘actually a girl,’ everyone instantly begins to refer to Naoto as a girl. When this happens from a source that isn’t the character themself, it’s blatantly transphobic. If you hear about someone’s “actual gender” from a person who ISN’T that someone, talk to them about it. Ask them how they actually want to be referred by. 

Another small thing, but Kanji is meant to be gay but then they pulled “Aha, he has a crush on Naoto, so he isn’t ACTUALLY gay!” which, yeah, homophobic and transphobic. If a gay man likes a trans man, that is still just as gay as if he liked a cis man. Making Naoto ‘actually a girl’ was hitting two birds with one stone, and cishets- and even other queer people, sadly- ate that shit up. 

I’ll go over some arena screenshots now, thank you to @covecaller​​ for posting them. 

How much needs to be said about this one? It’s very common for trans people in unwelcoming situations to wish they were born as the gender they actually are, and it especially would make sense for Naoto. As soon as he was outed as afab, no one refereed to him as a boy and they never even asked him about it first. 

This is blatant transphobia. “You lack confidence in yourself” is word for word what my mother said to me when I came out to her. Calling trans people ‘lies’ or a ‘liar’ for their identity? Also blatant transphobia. 

You can look at the other arena screencaps Zach posted here. 

You can say all you want that p4 is old, so of course it’s going to be bad, but so what? Letting it constantly get off the hook and never criticizing the creators will give them a message. Letting things like this go hurts the minorities that that character is a part of, and this is backed up even less by the fact that Atlus STILL hasn’t done anything about it. There is still persona 4 content being made, and Naoto is still being sexualized when he is, by the way, 15-17 throughout the series, and misgendered.

Yes, Naoto is portrayed as a girl who isn’t confident in himself and has internalized misogyny in persona 4, but that’s because the creators see trans men as girls who aren’t confident in themselves and have internalized misogyny. 

Reblogs are highly appreciated, feel free to make your own additions with more proof if you feel like I missed out on something important with explaining why Naoto should not be portrayed as a girl.

[banghwa]

Nb ask anon here, tysm for answerring the ask about how u came to terms with ur gender, it's always insightful to see what other trans people have to say about their experiences even if I cant relate to everything u said, I guess for me I started to notice that I wanted to present more masc than i used to, I've 'been' a cis girl all my life and a rather girly one to be honest (although I think part of that is because I've been forced to do so).

But when people call me women or girl smth just.. doesnt sound right to me to be honest, like I know I'm not a man but a woman seems also kinda.... "strong", I just want to put wlw as my gender to be honest ajsjkssks I know that doesnt make sense but it's the only thing I know for sure in my life and also they/them pronouns are cool too I guess lol but anything besides that seems so alien to me, like for example my name, it's not that I dislike it but I've always been reluctant to search for a new one, it's like taking a step in a direction, THAT direction u know what I mean

Ugh then there's the whole presentation problem of like I kinda like to look fem but not for certain people but I definitely wanna look more masc or even gnc, like I want people to look at me and not "be able" to assume what I am u know but also sometimes girly things are pretty so fml

Anyways this gender shit is so complicated jules like it takes so much experimenting and shit and I'm just like ugh why cant I just KNOW things right now

(Sorry for the rant but u just seemed very trustworthy and helpful in the 1st ask)

omg pls dont apologize, im more than happy that your trust me enough to talk to me about something to personal <3 but yess i rly love hearing how everyone defines their gender its so interesting how we're all so different but also the same, its very comforting i feel. (answered under the cut bcs it got long lol)

thats actually really similar to how i started exploring my gender! i am a very feminine person but when i started figuring out my sexuality i also started realizing how much i disliked being read as feminine by other people despite liking being feminine. and how much i liked more masculine compliments and indentifiers. i started out id-ing as a cis bi girl and then a bi nb guy and then bi trans guy and then gay nb and now nb lesbian so its BEEN a process lmao and i know how frustrating it is to feel like you dont have it all figured out or to think you have it figured out only for you to realize it doesnt quite fit anymore later on. it feels a lot like you have to restart the whole process, but in reality i think its more of a checkpoint, ya know? sometimes we have to make a lot of stops and try out a lot of things before we find something that fits and thats totally fine. for me it was like. when i realized i was not cis it felt like running as far away as i would from my agab and then slowly coming back to poke it with a stick kjgfhkj.

and its definetly so complicated when you feel like the terms you want to identify with are "contradictory," we don't really have the vocabulary in english to describe how we experience our gender properly most of the time and some things just dont fit and its hard to explain exactly *why* to someone who doesnt Get It. but maybe its partially a blessing in disguise, bcs it lets us really test things out and play around until it feels right. you can definetly id your gender as wlw, i personally describe my gender as "lesbian" bcs i feel thats the only thing that still ties me to "womanhood." i do get what you mean tho, it was really scary for me too to start using "contradictory" identifiers, like im a lesbian but i use he/they pronouns and i like presenting fem but i hate when people assume im a woman or straight because of it. it really is frustrating trying to figure all this out when everyone around you treats gender like something they get to project onto you and feeling like you need to play into that in order to feel "real." i still have a lot of trouble detatching my gender identity from other peoples assumptions and expectations, so it feels a bit hypocritical to try to give advice on that lol, but i think it all comes back to figuring out what *you* want first and foremost, having trusted people who you can talk to and experiment with, and seeing it as a learning opportunity more than a "goal" or "destination."

it definetly is so frustrating but you're not the only one <3 im sorry happy that you're taking the time to explore what feels right to you even though its daunting to admit that to yourself. some steps like trying a different name can ESPECIALLY be really challenging and scary and it takes so much courage to admit that thats even a potential, im so proud of you honey and i wish you all the best <33 im always here and happy to talk if you want to

[genderfluidlucifer]

Response to being asked to give  an opinion on Connie’s calout by residentevil-4

(Tw: CSAM, rape fic, incest fic, predatory behavior, racism, ableism, kink mention, nsfw mentions. Minors should probably dni.)

“Connie and I know each other irl and went to school together for 3 years, although they now live in a different state and have cut contact with me. We went to a private therapy school in Manhattan as we're both disabled and were deemed unable to attend public school. Even though we were pretty close, Connie didn't like having photos taken of them, so I don't have any selfies of the two of us; however, these are from our sophomore and senior yearbooks which at least confirms that we were in the same year at school. People who have seen Connie's selfies should be able to confirm that that is what they look like. First and foremost, Connie is not TMA. They are intersex and the two of us have discussed intersex issues both in person and online, but they are still decidedly CAFAB.” Ok so first off, I want to address this part of the callout. To be honest...was it really necessary to literally doxx Connie ehre? Because this textbook definition of doxxing. Yes Connie’s done some shitty things but I freally don’t think that what they’ve done warrants this level of doxxing. Or...even better, any doxxing. This feels like a really unnecessary breach of privacy, revealing sensitive information on Connie’s childhood that they choose to confide in you with. I really don’t agree with this aspect of the callout as it feels very invasive and bordering on stalkerish.  Btw when I say bordering on stalkerish I’m not directly calling you a stalker Bonnie. Just so we’re clear. I am not defending Connie supposedly faking being TMA. Because faking being TMA is a very serious issue. HOWEVER since I don’t know Connie irl and to be quite frank it’s none of my business what the nature of their agab is. Were not close and I’m certainly not going to like lead Connie onto thinking we’re friends just to confirm this with them because that would be creepy. So to be honest I’m going to take this part of the callout with again of salt for now.

[ID: A cropped screenshot of a numbered list Connie posted to their blog hadrosaurs in response to an ask. 

“3. I’m TMA And that’s completely irrelevant. I’m not accusing them because of their gender I didn’t even know their gender when they said that to me saying that they said that because they fucking said that and the reaction to it was incredibly alarming. Don’t fucking say that stuff to people.]

I mean I”m not a trans woman so take this with a grain of salt if you want but...I don’t see how this is really proof of Connie being deliberately transmisogynistic? Yes Connie gives iffy retellings of mistakes they’ve made in the past. I’ve seen that on their blog before and I won’t pretend it doesn’t happen. BUT here they sound genuine enough and to be honest a growing issue I’ve seen with callouts as of late is. A person confirms they in fact did not do the thing they were called out for. And then the people who make the callout choose to see it as proof of incriminating behavior anyways. To be honest it’s a big problem and it’s also incredibly unfair to the person being called out. If you’re so determined at that point to see the person as bigoted no matter what they say then of course anything they say can be seen as proof. So I’m going to have to pass on this bit of evidence. “Connie responded: “Final note: I have spoken extensively with several trans women about using TMA to describe myself. I will not be getting into discourse about that on this blog again. All that leads to is people demanding my medical records and calling me slurs. If you wanna have a thoughtful conversation about it direct message me cause it’s not happening again here.” Again this really doesn’t seem all that self incriminating. Connie mentions here that they’ve talked to rl trans woman about whether or not they can be considered TMA. Connie really doesn’t have to disclose that personal information to people for any reason. Yes even when people are e including this ask response in a callout. And considering lots of people DO get invasive about Connie’s medical history ans general personal life over matters like this? I feel their reaction is pretty understandable here. “Connie has constantly compared “exclusionists” (or anyone, really) to TERFs, even when the people in question are not transmisogynistic, trans exclusionary radfems, or are even transmisogyny affected themselves.

“ Gonna have to disagree with this part of the callout too. Lots of ace inclus blogs, even some run by trans women , have proven that the ace exclus movement was started by swerfs/terfs. But the blog that has the most evidence for this is courteousmingler on tumblr. I suggest you check out that blog’s archiving of the history of ace exclus rhetoric before rushing to call me a transmisogynist for disagreeing with this part of the callout. I looked through all of the evidence for Connie being racist and tbh as a black ndn it all feels incredibly flimsy. It’d be one thing if Connie was using their experiences to derail and invalidate the discussions about how black people are oppressed But they weren’t doing that there at all. This part of the post feels incredibly biased. And like OP is looking for things to be mad about. Going to have to pass on this list of evidence. Also uh I seem to recall that residentevil04 got called out for some questionable behavior as well. “Both me (insepsy, hi) and ezrat have had really weird spikes in activity on our Statcounters, both on the same day. (Saturday, 4/17/21) For both of us, majority of the pages looked at by these visitors have been related to or about Connie, or have been posts that Connie would find "problematic" such as the f slur untagged or something related to "panphobia"/aphobia. I’m sorry but...none of the proof of cyberstalking holds any water. Visiting someone’s blogs and rbing posts to disagree with them is not cyberstalking. Keeping tabs on urls that an abusive person who has harassed are using so you can block them (in this case with kyoshi) and warn your mutuals is not stalking. As a victim of rl stalking it’s...really weird to call this legit stalking at all. Much less claim that you have damning proof of it being stalking when no such evidence exists in the callout. Besides after Connie and nonbinarydave called out one of kyoshi’s buddies for sending a death threat hate anon to nonbinarydave’s toddler st4lker partly admitted to doing it a few times. Then other mutuals in kyoshi’s toxic social circle clearly began joining in. Making side accounts where they tried to spin a false narrative of nonbinarydave’s daughter being one of their alters (ableist as hell.) And also trying to do it in such a way that they thought would trigger nonibnarydave’s psychosis (also ableist as hell.) If you’re going to drag Connie for their mistakes and never let them move on from those mistakes then it’s only fair to do that to people you agree with who also do toxic/bigoted things. ALso the fact that your wording here suggests that you think panphobia and aphobia aren’t real makes me doubt this claim even more. Exclus and their allies are notorious for mislabeling inclus disagreeing with them as stalking. “connie said that they would release that info at a later time and the minor began to argue with them that they had a responsibility regardless of their complicated relationship with age. in this argument connie for a time kept their age ambiguous and at one point told the minor (who confirmed in a later ask that they were severely traumatized by adults) that they obviously weren’t traumatized. connie quickly deleted this ask and any mentions of it and the next post they reblogged was about how wrong it was to try and quantify or discount others’ trauma. on my old blog i @ed them in the replies and asked if they had just done that. connie admitted to it and said it was fucked up but quickly blocked + deleted my comment. i can’t remember whether or not connie apologized to the minor, they may have? but yeah. i thought that was pretty weird.”] I do agree with some of the concern here that adults shouldn’t over expose minors in discourse. I’ve been contemplating this for awhile myself. And trying to figure out how to take better steps to avoid including minors who are triggered by discourse in discourse, especially. HOWEVER I have one little issue with this addition to the callout. If that is the case then exclus and their allies need to practice this as well. You cannot ignore the fact that the reason a lot of minors are getting involved in exclus discourse is due to adult exclus and their allies forcing minors to pick a side in the discourse. Y’all are not at all exempt from this problem. I still remember an ex mutual of mine trying to convince a minor to agree that aces can’t face corrective rape. And based on how aggressive it got with me when I tried to avoid giving an opinion on the matter, I can’t imagine that it would’ve reacted better to the minor refusing to give an opinion or to the minor outright disagreed. Refusing to put these standards on exclus and their allies is both hypocritical and quite frankly very transparent. The claims about them glorifying dark topics on AO3 through their fics also seems unfortunately legit. I mean those asks of shaming people who ask their viewers to not romanticize or glorify abusive relationships in their works is very damning. I’m very disappointed to see that Connie has taken being an inclus to the point of validating antis anti culture wholeheartedly. I can’t think of much more to add to my opinion on that part of the callout. As for the issue of Connie interacting with pro shippers in the past, I do know that this claim is legit. I’ve seen it before and so has Breeze. This was why for a brief time we decided to stop following their blogs. Because it was triggering to have pro shippers put on our dash. And sometimes we just don’t feel it’s worth it to always let people we’re platforming know they’re rbing triggering stuff. So sometimes we just quietly unfollow and choose to not interact until we’re sure they’re filtering what they do and don’t rb in some way. I definitely don’t agree with that behavior. And if they’re still doing that I”ll deplatform again. “The anon asks: “A weird question but do you know any other stimboard blogs with your follow criteria? (No radfems, racists, fandom antis, etc.) I was hoping to find more through your “similar blogs” but a lot have no anti-antis for their DNI or allow truscum/transmeds and exclus. :(“

The user responds: “I know of @turtle-pond-stims, @outofangband, and @kinaesthetics! 🍂🍄" “[ID: A cropped screenshot of an ask sent by Connie from their now-deactivated blog, butch-with-a-tortoise.

Connie says: “hey anon I have safe stim blogs. dm me if you want them. And radfems/bigots aren’t allowed to interact. For my own safety (because the community is honestly terrifying) I can’t publicly say on my blogs that I’m safe for proshippers/kinky people but I try to spread word how I can.”] [ID: Screenshot of a post by evilwriter37, which reads, “I’ve been seeing posts about fandom police leaving ao3, and it’s like: Good. We don’t want you here anyway. Go find your own fanfiction site.”

The post is tagged “#Fandom #AO3 #Antis #Purity Culture” and has 87 notes. It was posted on December 21st, 2020.

There is a reply from main-to-outofangband-andothers saying: “there are Silm antis on that site who are against Russigon (Maedhros and Fingon) not because they’re cousins but because they’re both male (coded)”] [ID: A screenshot of an anonymous (though signed off as being from outofangband) ask sent to evilwriter37, which says, “Melkor and Viggo solidarity is ‘Look there’s nothing wrong with keeping my enemy chained up in my personal chambers at all times so please just focus on the war efforts and I’ll focus on the boy* in my chambers’ -@outofbangand.

*boy used figuratively @ antis”

The user responds: “Pfft!!! Hahaha! You’re absolutely right! (And Viggo does refer to Hiccup in canon as ‘my boy’).”] I can’t really say anything to refute this. Because these are all posts of Connie outright stating that they disagree with antis. And not only sympathize with anti antis but are fully against antis. Looks like very damning evidence. Although ngl I’m not entirely against kinky blogs as a whole? Just so long as they truly stay in their lane with their kink content. And don’t force it on others in any way. Or shame people who are triggered by their kinks. It is true that being entirely against kinky blogs no matter what is dipping your toes into swerf rhetoric. Tbh I’m not going to look at the rest. This is pretty much all I need to make a decision on whether or not I”ll continue platforming Connie. Though I will try to get some more  perspective from people who I interact with as well. Because I feel better about making a more definitive decision after doing that. Also in general please don’t not try to get an opinion from me on how I feel about syscourse. A lot of the claims about Connie’s age weirdness and them using their alters as a shield feel like syscourse to me. Especially if this callout was written by one or several singlets. Singlets should never be trying to judge how legit someone’s system is ever. Even if their system friends encourage them to. You can call out a horrible person with a system without trying to insinuate that they’re lying about their alters in some way. Doing otherwise is ableist ESPECIALLY if you’re a singlet. Also in general the reason I stay out of discussions of judging how someone is handling their systems is because it’s syscourse and syscourse is triggering for my system and I. If this post was an attempt to get me to give an opinion  on the validity of Connie’s system I don’t appreciate it. And I would appreciate not being dragged into such matters again, thank you.

In general there’s like a few parts of this callout that feel legit. Which is unfortunately cluttered with obvious bias and obsessive hatred of Connie. I’m not here to stan or coddle Connie. I know they are not a perfect person. Especially since no human being in the world is perfect. But I feel the way this callout was created was very sloppy since a lot of the evidence was messy at best. And some points were very hypocritical as well as there being some no true scotsman moments from OP. In acting like exclus never do any of the thing that they tried to call out Connie for. Which is behavior that I am not a fan of. This is why people need to be more careful about callouts and like make roughdrafts and have a more unbiased person helping them if they don’t feel they can do it on their own. I’m even trying to make a resolve to do better at that myself. So it’s not like I’m unwilling to put my money where my mouth is. Anyways those are all my thoughts on this messy callout. And tbh I’m not going to get too much more heavily involved in this. Because I need to focus on more immediately serious rl stuff more often, like doing what I can to get out of the hellish landscape of a house I currently am stuck in.

[candyclan]

My HONEST opinion of Kalvin Garrah

Kalvin talks about how the reaction videos he does are purely based off his opinions and they aren’t meant to actually hurt people. While I feel like yes, that may not be his intent, he takes information from what he thinks he knows about them from what they say and draws wrongful conclusions. He applies the logic “well if you were really trans, you’d do XYZ” which is honestly not okay. Just because he feels like “he’s protecting the trans community” doesn’t give him the right to invalidate people he’s never even seen or talked to irl. That being said, I do think he is correct that there are people who do not experience dysphoria and therefore do not have a legitimate reason to transition (physically) who do, and realize it’s a mistake (that’s why there’s detransition videos out there). This is tragic, and honestly, could very well reflect badly on our community because of how conservatives may take it.

Kalvin promotes the idea that seeing a psychologist is SO important before physically transitioning and altering your body in PERMANENT ways. He also promotes that before settling on “Yup I’m trans” you should rule out every other possible explanation for issues with your body: like body dysmorphia or an eating disorder etc. I feel as if he has contempt for people who are identifying as transgender and don’t actively try to alleviate their dysphoria. I agree with a lot of people who are fairly neutral on this topic that there isn’t a really clear cut defined definition of what dysphoria feels like other than “discomfort” toward gendered aspects of what you were assigned at birth. For Kalvin because his dysphoria is so strong, he uses it as an identifier of his trans identity and an UN-identifier for others. Just because he experiences an extreme does not mean every trans person experiences that extreme as well, and it could be a manageable discomfort, almost like a paper cut (while still uncomfortable, and totally legitimate) compared to a bullet wound in his case.

Because dysphoria is so subjective, it isn’t fair to label someone as a “transtrender” just entirely and solely on how someone looks on the outside. They may have a higher sense of self-esteem than Kalvin did because of how heavily his dysphoria affects him. This may mean that while they identify genuinely as being trans and probably do actually experience dysphoria (even minor) they choose their preferred gender expression over the idea of “passing”. I understand this because I actually have some really stereotypical “feminine clothes” that actually cause me dysphoria to wear but I wear them anyway cause fuck people. The reason I have such a soft heart towards him is because he and I have a shit ton of things in common and also I watched him cry on his YouTube channel. Legit sob. I see his human in all of this. I see his flawed thinking, and his less than perfect expectations of “gender presentation” as a reflection of his own internal monologue “well I can’t wear this because it makes me look girly”

While I have those thoughts too, a LOT, I never project them on to people the way he does in the videos he makes of the “transtrenders” <—- the reason I put this in quotes is because I hate that word (and he admits he hates it too) there should be a nicer way of politely saying you used to identify as trans or thought you were, but actually aren’t. “Transtrenders” has such a negative base to it because it implies the individuals gender identity is illegitimate and perhaps a phase. While I actually do think there are people who may be confused and do mistakenly identify as being transgender, we should never imply another person is this because that’s FUCKED UP. ESPECIALLY IF YOU DONT PERSONALLY KNOW THAT PERSON TO A HEAVY EXTENT. Claiming, like Kalvin does, to have the “criteria to know if someone else is trans” is fucking bullshit. He makes a good point about it being in our brains and there ARE actually studies that prove that is a legitimate thing, he pushes so hard for it to be seen as a mental health issue so “Real Trans People™️” can be provided healthcare. He has correlated it to a mental health issue, and while I personally think: “Idgaf what it’s called just let me have it covered through insurance.” The fact that you would never in a million years tell someone they aren’t depressed/have anxiety because their symptoms aren’t as bad as yours or they don’t experience it the same way, that’s literally what he’s doing to trans people AND IT is FUCKED.

All of that aside, I didn’t know what being a transmed really was until I saw his videos. I didn’t have any real idea how little sense it made that if you don’t have dysphoria...how can you be trans? I hate how there’s such a stigma on the internet about how dysphoria is rooted in EXTREME MEGA DISCOMFORT when in reality, I can safely say in complete confidence that I didn’t have that huge issue like he did. I have top dysphoria but not so much bottom (unless I’m on shark week and then wellllll....death 0.0) ITS okay to not “hate” what you were given, and be in a better mind space about it than other people because WE ARE ALL DIFFERENT and experience dysphoria in different ways and we are all valid as fuck. I feel as if because so many people can experience body dysphoria and social dysphoria in so many ways literally in as many ways as there are people, in order for it to be considered a mental health issue and be covered by insurance there’s this push to try to come up with what dysphoria ISNT instead of the variety of experiences that is gender dysphoria.

So, in general, my thing is, only the individual can really tell (just like in depression and anxiety) whether or not they’re dysphoric based off their own feelings they have toward their AGAB and how it affects them. It’s almost as if he’s just like every other asshole out there that thinks their opinion matters because they’ve gone through SO MANY STEPS to be trans. His transtrender videos really are demonetized, and he claims to not do it for clickbait or shock factor to get people to watch it and that it’s his raw, unfiltered opinion about an issue he actually genuinely does care about a lot. I personally think the videos need to be taken down because it makes him look so much worse than he really is, and honestly what if the person that he’s talking about in those videos actually was trans and they killed themselves because of the hate his supporters dished. Showing their channel and saying that they don’t have dysphoria (in Kalvin’s eyes) labels them a target to abuse from the people that support Kalvin, whether or not that is his intent. I understand why this could upset someone. This upsets me. I feel a personal connection to someone that is using legitimate facts and points to validate his conclusion that some are worthy (that fit his personal idea of what being trans is) and some aren’t (those that don’t) this being said: That is not all that he is, I promise you. I believe “transtrender” is a thing dear god I’m highly uncomfortable with that word but there isn’t another one to use. I would never LABEL someone a transtrender under any circumstances because to do so would be honestly disrespectful to that persons identity and honestly denying their right to explore who they are. So what if you think you’re trans and then realize later that you weren’t??? As long as you didn’t medically transition, you literally didn’t do anything but explore who you are. It is never okay in my mind to label someone as that, especially if you don’t personally believe in how the person chooses to identify because like I said there’s as many ways to experience dysphoria and a disconnect towards your AGAB as there are people. It comes in different severities and different people prioritize change towards specific parts moreso than others.

That being said if you know you are 1000000% comfortable with your assigned gender at birth (not just learned to tolerate certain things/choose to accept the hand you’re dealt or live with it like me and my vag- how some trans people can), why would identify as being transgender? It’s when this “choice to go with the hand your dealt thing” really gets to Kalvin because he can’t imagine is transition being without the whole kitten kaboodle. Is perception of his gender honestly is a huge reason he can’t see why non-binary AFAB people could ever learn to embrace/tolerate certain aspects of their body. I don’t think he fully understands that binary gender roles that may moreso apply to TRANSGUYS don’t apply to non-binary people.

Non-binary people literally do not identify with one gender binary over another, so Kalvin has a hard time understanding them. It is important to note however, he still respects people even if he doesn’t understand. If he didn’t respect non-binary people as a whole, he would be preaching about how “non-binary isn’t even a thing” because he tends to NEED to think in logical terms with facts and data like the similar brain thing (mtf brains=more like cis female ftm=more like cis males) it becomes hard for him to understand the struggles of non-binary people. Non-binary people don’t fit his “mold” so to speak. Perhaps it’s because he once was a “non-binary SJW” in the past and then pulled a 180 and turned into this literal person that tells other people they aren’t trans even though he’s never met them irl and knows next to nothing about them. It’s funny how he claims that detransitioners turn into TERFS when his transition, which was supposed to help his mental state (perhaps it did idk), had him go from non-binary to low key for all intents and purposes a gatekeeper. He from his perspective claims to know it all because he’s trans. Consider this analogy: being transgender is like trauma. People can be united in that they suffer from it or that it affects them, but everyone’s situation is unique amongst all others so everyone has different “triggers”. I’m sorry if this analogy offended you it’s just I was trying to make sense of it the best I could in my mind

@kalvingarrah

[categoricalglitches]

Aaaugh why is hard (NB problems)

Hahaha our family dynamics include talking about and to each other as [relation] and since I came out as non-binary (oh yeah that happened btw) i have this dumb paranoid feeling my parents are referring to me in the [gendered] third person more ??* and it’s killing me a little bit?

Like. I would describe my relationship to my AGAB as “abfeminine” before transmasculine**, so... This is not a good time. However, the idea of Actually Talking about this is also slightly terrifying even though they would probably not, like, super mind switching to, like, ‘child’?

(I mean, look, I have no expectation for my parents to even understand gender identity as a concept, let alone being non-binary, but they’re not malicious or anything, just kind of clueless.)

But. But. For one, I would have to bring it up, and fuuuck ever doing so in person because I hate talking about this stuff like that? Especially with my family. And doing it in whatsapp seems just a bit cowardly, says person who came out through facebook post. And, more importantly, how even do you do gender neutral pronouns in Dutch? I mean, I guess you could just do straight 3rd person plural (like I use for generics, which to be honest, no one has commented on ever), buuut when just hearing ‘zij’ makes you cringe, knowing it means 3PL instead of 3SG.F DOES NOT ACTUALLY HELP, does it?

And, yeah, without solving problem two, getting problem one out of the way is only half the battle. Like, I’ve been toying with just Dutchfying “they”, or picking “h[vowel]n”, but gg on actually getting that in use.

* Sidenote: like I said this is probably just dumb dysphoria-induced paranoia because half the time they literally have to ask each other [or me] what I just said because, like, reasons rumors are I don’t enunciate clearly enough but obviously that’s not at all true ktnx  

** Alright I would actually never use transmasculine for myself because that indicates a direction I’m not comfortable with--I always knew I wasn’t male/a man waaay before I knew I wasn’t a woman either [but like, back then I assumed knowing I Was Not A Man must have meant that I was a woman, because I didn’t know there were any other options and it took me, uhm, a while to understand that this was probably not an ordinary understanding of your own gender identity] and so for me, I am moving away from my AGAB but not towards the pole of masculinity. So applying that wording to myself makes me pretty uncomfortable.

[freedom-of-fanfic]

hey um just a request, but you seem to use dfab and dmab often in weird contexts when you could just say women and men. e.g.: "any mlm that is shipped by more dfab people than dmab people." as a nonbinary trans person, a sex assigned at birth is not relevant most of the time, so could you maybe use it less when it isn't necessary?

thanks for letting me know your thoughts, anon. I’m pretty sure that particular example comes from the ‘my objections to anti-shipping’ post, which is pretty old now (though I reblogged it from myself today). I remember re-reading that recently and thinking ‘ah, I don’t think this is the best use of these phrases’ but I forgot to edit the original post anyway (classic adhd move, tbh). But still, it’s not the only example of me using descriptors that are kinda ‘eh’. 

I’m sorry that my word choice here was inappropriate and may have made you feel uncomfortable.

my use of descriptors like afab, amab, intersex*, genderqueer, cis, nb, trans, male, female, woman, man, etc is constantly evolving as I try to be precise but also inclusive when I talk about experiences that are affected by gender (which, let’s be real, is a huge number of experiences).

under the cut I’ll go into more detail about why I think picking the right combination of gender descriptors is both really important to me and also difficult to get right without causing anyone harm.

(built in tw: descriptions of transphobia/transmisogyny and mentions of the harm it causes.)

because my blog deals almost entirely in fandom experiences and how they are influenced by negative outside factors, I believe it’s very important to address both personal gender identity and how gender identity is perceived/treated by others (especially bigots/ignorant people) both currently and over the course of their lives. but that gets very complicated, very fast.

For example, every gender experience will be different from one another even if they share aspects of their gender identity:

- even though all cis and trans women are women, cis women and trans women will have very different experiences of womanhood. 

- to dissect this down even further, a trans person who realizes they are trans very early in life and is able to live as their true gender will have a different gender experience from a trans person who doesn’t realize they are trans until later in life, or who realizes they are trans early in life but is forcibly misgendered by people around them, or a person who changes from a non-transgender identity to a transgender identity as an adult, etc etc.

Relatedly, a person’s life experiences are also deeply affected by what gender other people assign them regardless of their consent:

 - If someone of any gender is raised under the assumption they are a particular gender because of their agab, they will share certain experiences with other people who are assigned the same gender at birth. otoh, how it affects them will depend in part on what their actual gender is, or if their gender identity changes down the line.

- obviously, non-cis people have to contend with a variety of nastiness that cis people don’t have to deal with. I won’t go into detail b/c nobody needs that grossness, but suffice to say: TERFs, right-wing activist groups like FRC, and transphobes in general make non-cis lives particularly difficult, up to and including getting non-cis people killed. in particular transgender people (but this also affects other non-cis identities).

- other forms of misgendering also cause harm, whether deliberate or not. from outright bigotry to people who think there are only two genders out of ignorance to people who use misgendering as a weapon to accidental assumptions of the wrong gender, it’s shit, and everyone will have a different experience with these issues based on a shitton of variables.

- and if all of the above wasn’t enough, gender experiences are heavily influenced by cultural background, the political climate, racism, sexual orientation, and on and on and on.

(and regarding my * on intersex above the cut: i am not intersex, and while I have read/heard a variety of experiences from personal anecdotal accounts by intersex people I generally try to avoid commenting on it from lack of knowledge (particularly because some intersex people have expressed they do not view ‘intersex’ as a gender descriptor but rather as a medical state.))

These are all things I try to bear in mind when making a post on tumblr that references gender. here’s an example of the kind of internal debates that come up:

the Japanese word ‘fujoshi’ is gendered, referring specifically to women who enjoy/create BL & queer-eye fictional m/m relationships. It carries this gendered connotation both when referring to a particular fan experience* and when it’s used as an insult in English-speaking fandom. What gender descriptors do I use to refer to people who are affected by this?

(*in this case I’m referring to using ‘fujoshi’ to describe a specific fan experience in English-speaking fandom/primarily US experience. By virtue of being a different culture than Japan, the experience described by ‘fujoshi’ will necessarily be different.)

as a fan experience, I’d say ‘fujoshi’ can encompass the experiences of women and/or afab people (particularly afab people who were raised under the assumption they were a woman whether or not this was true) who choose to describe themselves as fujoshi.

women: encompassing trans and cis women. (trans women may or may not share the experience of being recognized as a woman/identifying as a woman while being raised, but they are still just as affected all their lives by messages aimed at women.)

and/or afab people, particularly if they were raised under the assumption of being a female whether they were or not: afab people who are raised as women are also affected all their lives by messages aimed at women, though that experience is likely quite different from gender identity to gender identity.

who choose to describe themselves as fujoshi: a person who was raised under the assumption they are a woman may share certain experiences with other afab people, but even if they experienced the same messages/similar experiences as other afab people who chose to identify as ‘fujoshi’, that doesn’t mean they fall under the descriptor of ‘fujoshi’. I’m particularly thinking of trans men and nb people here - unless any one individual says differently about themselves, I think calling a trans man or person off the gender binary a ‘fujoshi’ would be misgendering them - but there may be many examples of people who don’t relate to the gendered aspect of ‘fujoshi’ for many reasons.

as an insult, I’d say ‘fujoshi’ is almost always a mess of gender essentialism and misgendering. It refers to those that are perceived as women by the person slinging the insult. ‘Perceived women’ often include cis women and/or afab people of any gender, frequently including trans men, and occasionally encompasses trans women who the insulter sees as ‘passing’ as a cis woman.

perceived women: people that the insulter and/or ignorant portions of society would categorize as a woman without the person’s consent and regardless of accuracy.

cis women and/or afab people of any gender: a gender essentialist views gender as being synonymous with genitals (intersex people frequently either being categorized by the insulter separately or by whatever HRT/surgery was chosen for them). (in practice radfem ideology has the same effect, but they argue that gender doesn’t exist at all (only biological sex does).)

frequently including trans men: depending on how far the insulter is willing to go with their misgendering & often influenced by whether or not the insulter perceives a trans man as ‘passing’ as a cis man. (this may be affected by whether or not a trans man has undergone HRT/surgery depending on the opinion of the insulter.)

occasionally encompasses trans women who the insulter sees as ‘passing’ as a cis woman: because if they ‘pass’ they may be perceived as a ‘real woman’ (ugh ugh ugh). (this may also be affected by HRT/surgery depending on the opinion of the insulter.)

and now that I’ve settled on these descriptions, how do I condense them to something easy to read without distracting from the points I’m trying to make?

as an experience: “women and/or afab people”, maybe? perhaps “women and/or some afab people”?as an insult: “perceived women”, maybe?

(and I’m happy to take constructive criticism on this. I’d prefer it be sent not on anon so we can privately discuss it rather than doing it in posts on this blog (and if you don’t want to discuss your thoughts, just want to share and go, feel free to let me know - I won’t demand your time.))

in short: I think about a lot of stuff every time I pick gender descriptors on this blog. This doesn’t mean I always make the right choices - far from it - and there may not even be a truly ‘right’ choice. But I’m always seeking to be as inclusive and honest as I can be.

(PS: I don’t talk about my gender status here much other than to say ‘i’m afab’ because while I don’t presently identify as cis, I’m murky on it myself still & I don’t want my gender identity to affect whether or not ppl speak up about their opinions about my use of gender descriptors.)

[colorisbyshe]

Your thoughts on the nb/trans discourse are *chef finger kiss* as an nb person (completely agender) that doesn't identify as trans, I feel pretty much like that. We need to stop being so... theoretical? Materials realities matter so fucking much when discussing this kind of thing.

Thank you! I think when we ignore material realities, we do disservice to more than just nonbinary people and I don’t think it’s very productive.Being able to say “Yes, your identity is real and yes you aren’t just Woman/Man Lite” or whatever doesn’t mean we can ignore things like agab, presentation/passing, and why transphobia exists.Like, agab plays into the oppression trans men and trans women face, so it can’t be ignored in nonbinary people’s life either. Trans women are so violently oppressed not just because they oppress misogyny as women but also because transphobes see them as men trying to “trick” other men and as betraying/weakening manhood; trans women are punished in every way women are for being women and then are punished as “men” too because their agab matters. Likewise, while trans men are men, a lot of systems of misogyny based in biology still affect them too and a lot of their “male privilege” directly relates to how well they pass/are accepted as men. Likewise, agab affects nb people. A completely agender afab person goes through life and relationships differently than an agender amab person, though your mileage may vary based on presentation and acceptance of nb identities. An afab demi girl goes through life differently than an amab demi girl as well because agab, presentation, and passing matters. And just like we can recognize that despite being straight, many straight trans people are still oppressed by homophobia (I can explain this for anyone who is confused) while being relatively privileged compared to gay/bi trans folk, we can recognize that being nb makes relationships to homophobia complicated. Which is why I think some people so adamantly refuse to understand that: nonbinary people can be gay, which means they can be straight, and that if nonbinary people can be gay and straight, that also means cis people attracted to nonbinary people can also be gay or straight.And that even though gay means “attracted to the same gender,” you shouldn’t call “agender people solely attracted to other agender people” gay because not all of those relationships would be affected by homophobia, that that really does depend on agab, presentation, and/or alignment. I have no interest in lying about these things. I have no interest in pretending like blanket statements can be applied to all nonbinary people or that every nonbinary person’s relationship to transphobia and cisness is the same. And I think we have to recognize that in spite of being nonbinary, we live in a world dictated by binaries which means realistic concessions have to be made in terms of how our identities apply. I am no less nonbinary for calling my attraction to women “gay” or “same gender attraction.” Women aren’t any less gay for being attracted to me.Let our identities be complicated and weird and also let us be honest about them. It isn’t demeaning to say that a afab demigirl is still real and nonbinary and under the trans umbrella but also isn’t in need of support the way trans men or trans women are.And if isn’t nbphobic to say that erasure or people not understanding your gender or making fun of your pronouns being cat/cats is like hurtful and bad and you’re still being hurt by transphobia but that... in terms of transphobia that’s like a 0-2 on the pain scale and if that’s the most you’re facing as a nonbinary person, you’re doing pretty okay and should realize that RELATIVE privilege to trans people who identify more actively “against” their agab. It’s weird that a lot of people claim “It’s not the oppression olympics!!! It’s not a competition!!” and then get upset when people say, “Yeah, that’s true; your identity is still valid but you aren’t more oppressed just because your identity is more obscure.” Genuinely if you think it’s not a competition, you should be able to accept that some trans people are “more” oppressed than like... afab nonbinary women who are maybe only one or two steps removed from cisness.Like... I’m fine with admitting that I go through most of my life not terribly unlike a cis person or that GNC cis people might even go through more shit than I do. Just like I’m bisexual and comfortable admitting that relative to bi people primarily interested in/dating the same gender, bisexuals who primarily are interested in or are dating the opposite gender have more privilege. Nb people are still oppressed by transphobia, bi people are still oppressed by homophobia, but to what degree and in what ways is highly dependent on numerous factors.If your politics can not handle the reality of these truths, they aren’t politics actively interested in bettering the lives of all nb people but rather are politics interested in being a martyr for martyrdom’s sake. No thank you.