#but i think especially in the context he's writing in as a trans guy from the UK who grew up pretty online

[c-is-for-circinate]

It feels like there's this narrative that fandom keeps wanting to explore, with Steve Harrington, about this very specific type of martyrdom where self-sacrifice is an expression of a lack of self-worth. And, like, yes, write the narrative that's meaningful to you, and yes ok Steve does admittedly get beaten up a lot, but -- legitimately I do not think this narrative is actually Steve's story.

Like, without gendering things too much, there is something in the Steve fanon that I keep seeing that's so reflective of the specific kind of sacrifice and societal pressures exerted on girls, specifically -- this story of 'you make yourself worthy and worthwhile by carving pieces out of yourself', of believing that you must always give and never receive to justify the space you take up in the world. Yes, boys can experience this same pressure (and obviously trans and nb people of all genders run into it as well! sometimes a lot!), but especially in the mid-1980s cultural context where Stranger Things takes place, it's just...really not likely to be a dominant narrative for Steve to be operating under? It doesn't even really match the Steve we see on screen -- who is happy to make sacrifices for the sake of others, yeah, when needed, but who's not particularly kind or giving unless somebody asks first.

And Steve does get hurt a lot on other people's behalf! And this is a problem! It's just a completely different problem than the one fandom keeps writing.

Steve, and I'm going to say this forever, is a story about toxic masculinity, which the show may or may not even know it's writing. The archetypes influencing Steve's character as it shows up on the screen (and the stories and messages that Steve would actually be surrounded by in his actual life) are not deconstructions of suffering heroes who never should have had to fight in the first place and were destroyed by it. That's the Buffy the Vampire Slayer story. Steve's not Buffy. Steve's cultural context is Indiana Jones.

Steve is The Guy! And part of being The Guy is that you're expected to take the hits -- not because Steve is less important than the women-and-children he's supposed to protect, but because, the story says, he will get less hurt. Why should Steve get in between Billy and Lucas? Because Steve is an eighteen-year-old athlete and Lucas is in middle school, and of the two of them, Steve actually stands a chance. (And yes, Steve got badly hurt there, and Max had to save him -- but if Lucas, if Max had taken that beating they would not have been running through those tunnels later.) Was somebody else better-qualified to dive down to the uncertain bottom of a cold lake in the middle of the night? Steve doesn't list his credentials there as a way of justifying some ideal of martyrdom; he is literally the most likely person on the boat not to drown.

And make no mistake: when Steve's pulled into the Upside-Down, he survives the bats long enough for backup to get there. Realistic or not, he's apparently tough enough that he's physically capable of hiking barefoot through hell without much slowing down. Steve is the tank for the same reason as any tank: because he literally has been shown to have the most hit points in the group. You cannot honestly engage with Steve in this context without dealing with the fact that he's right.

AND THIS IS A PROBLEM! This is still a problem! But it's not the same problem that fandom seems to expect. It's not an expression of caretaking or the need for self-sacrifice; it's not an issue with Steve valuing himself less. It's an issue of toxic masculinity so ingrained that Steve doesn't even recognize he's suffering from it, because one of the tenets of toxic masculinity is that Big Strong Guys don't suffer. It's just a concussion, it's fine, he'll walk it off. It's not that Steve thinks he deserves to get hurt, or even that he's less deserving of safety than the others. It's that absolutely nothing in his cultural context allows him to admit that he can be hurt in a significant way.

There's still so much tension that can be gotten out of this situation, I swear. There's so much that can be explored in writing! Hell, the show itself is deconstructing some of this trope, believe it or not, by giving us a Steve who absolutely can take all the hits thrown his direction but still doesn't know what the fuck he's doing with his life. It turns out that doing his job as The Guy is only mildly helpful in horror movie situations (mostly by buying time for smarter, squishier people to do the damage from behind him), and somewhere a little worse than useless in everyday life.

But Steve does not go out of his way to self-sacrifice, he really doesn't. He just does his job. He's The Guy. Of course he's not going to let a kid or a girl or some scared skinny nerd who just learned about monsters yesterday take the hits. Of course Steve's got this.

[utilitycaster]

Unpopular opinion: parts of the cr fandom are really dismissive/ reductive of Travis’s characters. It feels like it’s due to Travis being seen as THE cis het man of the group, and by extension his characters must be heteronormative and bad, despite the fact that you could have queer interpretations of his characters. At the very least, Travis’s characters explore masculinity and the different ways it might look. It’s like the people who are all “ew men are gross and shitty” and act like that’s an absolutely normal reaction to a man just existing.

So this is another one in that I agree with the initial statement, but I'm actually not sure re: the reasoning why. I think it's possible but I could not tell you for sure.

I used to, again, think this was people carrying through Campaign 1 elements well beyond the point where C1 had ended, and so Grog having an intelligence of 6 was being applied to Travis; and this definitely does come through to an extent when people treat Fjord (objectively as smart as Beau without her circlet) as stupid or act shocked that Chetney is the brains of Bells Hells or that he can play a Cerrit, Fjord, or Nathaniel. However, again, I think this is one of those opinions that pops up among people who weren't around for Campaign 1 (or early enough in C2 to be exposed to it regularly) so I don't know if that's the case anymore. It could still be - it could be that Approved Fandom Opinions get passed down even when the logic behind them has long since been lost; that's a really common thing in institutional memory. But I can't say for sure.

I also have in the past credited it to, as you said, people assuming his characters are the cishet guys and then writing them off. That's still possible - I've seen both Fjord and Chetney called "token straight" despite considerable evidence of bisexuality, and they also paradoxically are both commonly headcanoned as trans while still getting called "token straight," which sort of ties into a post I would need to find from someone else from quite some time ago about which cast members are granted agency by the fandom in their choices vs. which are assumed to be the victims of circumstance. And I do think that there are people in fandom who have decided men are icky or whatever, and I used to think this came from a place of bigotry and a slide towards t*rf ideology but I now do genuinely think it's just idiots who don't grant interiority to characters outside their own limited understanding.

But I think it's also useful to consider a few things, most of which I've brought up before:

Travis is extremely offline. He is not here to entertain your headcanons; he has been politely but openly dismissive of some (imo, really fucking dumb) fanon/fan theories. I think the cast frequently talks about how it's their table, and I think that's valid and correct, but Travis is one of the players who lives it the most. He is playing this game with his friends, and he'd like it to be a good story, but if you don't like it, he is not here to make you like it. I think that really fucks with the parasocial connections some people desire with the cast.

Travis's characters tend to examine masculinity as a performance but also the general performance of the self, and the fact that you cannot in the end control how you are perceived entirely, and I think that really unsettles people who have equated presentation with reality and are again, looking for external validation of the self.

Travis can play it big but he's often extremely subtle, especially with his more serious characters, and he's not as easily quotable out of context as some others at the table. I think because he is a lot more naturalistic than dramatic at times (Chetney notwithstanding) and isn't as pithy and quotable in his characters as many of Taliesin's PCs are, and a lot of the strength is in the delivery, he gets overlooked despite being very good with words on the fly.

And finally: this would be a whole post on its own but people are still very foolishly wed to this idea that pressing the big red button in D&D is Wild and Chaotic and haha Big ADHD Man when it's actually how you play D&D if you're not a coward; the button is where the story is stored, and a lot of Travis's strength is that he is extremely good at understanding what the GM wants and supporting it with sufficient grace that it's only visible if you know what you're fucking doing.

[qqueenofhades]

I keep thinking about the ask you answered a little while ago about people wanting a leftist version of Trump is so scarily true it's unsettling. People keep demanding he "do something" about abortion and gun violence but when anyone is like.... he can't, he doesn't have the votes to, they're like "he's the President he said he would do something why hasn't he done something" and it's like ???? what part of this are you not understanding if he doesn't have the votes he doesn't have the votes. Do they want like an EO or something? I'm just not sure what they expect him to do.

And it's also so fucking annoying to see them go after the Dems at every turn while letting the Republicans off the hook completely and not expecting shit from them. You may just want Biden to write them all off and govern like the GOP doesn't exist but he can't.....exactly do that. That's not how our system works. I wonder if they're just sorely misinformed from how rife Twitter is with complete bullshit or if they understand reality but are just saying this stuff for the outrage clicks.

Honestly, as I've said before, I'm not sure? I think it's a combination of willful ignorance and a desire not to learn anything, ever, that might challenge their deeply felt moral superiority. Just the other day, I had someone in my notes who, while otherwise agreeing with most of what I was saying, also insisted that Biden was "anti-trans." And like. The president who, while VP, famously came out for LGBTQ marriage before his boss, who specifically highlighted the violence suffered by trans women of color in his campaign platform, got the Violence Against Women Act reauthorized and passed with strong new protections especially for trans and gnc/queer victims, has issued statements on Transgender Day of Remembrance, made sure to repeatedly insist to trans Americans that they belong and their lives are valid, etc. etc., is definitely anti-trans, dontcha know?

However, I happen to know that recently, the Washington Post wrote a bad and misleading article about the Biden administration supposedly joining Republican state AGs to prevent trans girls from playing in women's sports. It was picked up by a big liberal account on Twitter and amplified as "a betrayal of everything the Biden administration has stood for since day 1" (which, you'll notice, implicitly agrees that the Biden administration HAS strongly supported trans rights). Then a few days later, the account holder actually read the policy, agreed that it wasn't what was being proposed and the WaPo had done a hatchet job on reporting it, and admitted that no, the Biden administration actually hadn't done a 180 on supporting trans rights. But if all you have is one Twitter account incorrectly reporting on a bad and misleading WaPo article, which is like... layers on layers of deliberately distorted and extremely out-of-context information, and you use that to decide that BIDEN IS ANTI-TRANS, it just. Doesn't make sense. And even if in the extremely likely event that Biden and/or his administration have missed some of the ideological benchmarks arbitrarily assigned to Demonstrate Absolute Purity On This Issue, like. HAVE YOU GUYS SEEN WHAT THE REPUBLICANS ARE DOING??! HAVE YOU?!?!??!?!?!

I don't know if that is where that particular person got the idea or not, but it demonstrates how the left-wing online misinformation ecosystem works, and which is in some ways is extremely similar to the right-wing online misinformation ecosystem. It doesn't matter if the only piece of "evidence" supporting your belief is a single Tweet written by someone who hasn't read the actual policy based on a bad piece of reporting, that evidence is now to be preferred against every single empirical example to the contrary because it's "the real truth" (translation: it confirms what you already want to believe). That is the example that you will whip out every time someone tries to argue with you to the contrary, and you will never accept anything that contradicts and/or disproves it, because that's what you want to believe and now you will. You technically know that there is information out there which doesn't agree with your position, but it is the "wrong information" and therefore cannot be incorporated into your belief system. You likewise refuse to acknowledge any complexities, any other branches of government (once again, I am begging people to acknowledge both SCOTUS and how catastrophically it was fucked by allowing Trump to fill three seats), or anything other than insisting on the impossible and getting mad when it doesn't get done. Which doesn't sound very productive and/or useful to me, but hey. OUTRAGE. OUTRAAAAAAGE.

[mortalityplays]

It's obviously kind of an oversimplification to say Gomorra is 'about' homosexuality. It's about a lot of things. But it's also completely true and I would even possibly argue that it is the load-bearing point of the show.

On a macro level, the whole thing is about the endlessly bloody and destructive struggle of a life in organised crime. But even in that sense it puts a very specific thematic point on the way love, relationships and blood relations are constant casualties of this way of life, and the effect of that relentless human loss on the players who keep choosing war over peace. Ciro blazing his trail by killing women, children and parents specifically is not a 'kick the cat' villain beat, it's the whole point of the material. Genny being perpetually struck down by his own nuclear family because he is competition to them is part of it. Being in the life means eventually sacrificing those you love on its altar. You murder your wife, you send your son to die in the jungle, you send your father-in-law to prison.

As we absorb that, we're presented with this succession of queer characters living in the periphery of the story. One by one they're introduced to us, they explicate themselves as divergent from heteronormative sex and gender roles, and then we watch them die or disappear. It's heavily implied that the 'lesbian' from the tower blocks may be a trans man, but she doesn't exist in a context where articulating that is an option, and she dies in a white wedding dress inherited from her father. Conte's relationship with a trans woman can only exist behind closed doors. He dates her sister in public, he puts off introducing her to his mother, he appeals to his catholicism to distance himself from his own sexuality. Gege panics and folds because he's afraid for his boyfriend and his daughter. What do I care about the guy fucking you in the ass? Genny sneers, before he beats Gege to death with the watch that signifies his connection to a mob family. Much like the harrowing shit the show delves into around race, the message is 'there is no mercy here'. There is no oxygen for the articulation of queerness. It can only survive unspoken, in negative space.

And there's no argument that the show is about the negative space between Genny and Ciro. Neither of them know how to articulate their relationship. They're best friends, they're worst enemies, they grew up together, Ciro raised Genny, they're brothers, they're father and son. They use the word love. They also use the word hate. They come as close as anyone ever gets to putting bullets in each other's brains. They keep taking turns to ask each other can we do this now? and the answer is always not yet. Even when they're on the same side, they can only discuss the nature of their relationship by proxy, through their mutual relationships with others. Pietro is one. And I could write a fucking essay on the Enzo situation.

The negative space is physical, too. They hover around each other. They talk nose to nose. In the first season they can't stay apart, they grab each other, they pepper each other with kisses. After the life erases all of their visible human connections and sets them at odds, they're shot like orbiting planets. Empty space takes up entire frames between them. Ciro is fucking constantly looking at Genny, to the point that shots are composed around his furtive glances. After they finally reveal themselves to Analisa, Ciro catches Genny by the arm to pull him away from the meeting. That's not a gesture we ever see between other characters, especially in a context like that. They are constantly either 1 inch or 12 feet apart.

But most of all, there's negative space in the title. Gomorra. Yeah it's a play on Camorra. Don't worry about it. Don't think too much about it. Just ignore the primary association with that word that floats into your head when you hear it. It's absent from the show, right? It's absent from the life. This is a mafia show about two straight friends.

[lindenattic]

o/ <- little fella raising his hand . why are we calling anthony leora what makes it her GirlName

so!! for context (you probably know this already) there's that "thy fear will eat you dead / Leora" line in bombsquad. well someone asked anthony about it by text and dunes posted it on their twitter

"Who is Leora?" "I am." HENCE: GIRLNAME. lsdunesarchive has the image itself here w/ link to tweet

but on a more serious level.. i was thinking of writing this out in tags/in a reblog/etc but if this takes off i dont want it to circulate without this context.

as a registered [gender]anthony i would like to clarify: i'm not really on board with any sort of speculation/assumption/projection of trans identities onto anthony. with the amount of love and support he shows the trans community (including his daughter!!!!) i think it's very unlikely that he's like.. an 'egg' in the sense that he hasnt realized 'hey, i could be a girl if i want', and in the event that he isn't cis and is choosing to stay in the closet, that's very much nobody's business but the people he chooses to tell.

in regards to specifically the hoodwink 'i think i was meant to be a woman' thing, anthony just says shit all the time & with the way he talks about the rush/high of performing, i dont feel like that can really be taken at face value. and also he was ummmm really unstable that whole year. and in regards to lyric analysis, especially things about keeping secrets: i have no issue with trans readings of those in a way that's like 'i am trans and i feel this lyric relates to my experiences' but i am kind of uncomfortable about people assuming there are gender-related implications to some of them because uhhh. often times i think the secret that he's keeping from all his loved ones or whatever is like. very often drug/addiction related. and to me there's something... callous? about assuming there's an intentional trans subtext when it's pretty clear in retrospect that it's about like. heroin. (that last bit is particularly about violent waves. and also, this is not in response to any particular analysis)

In General while i may joke around and call anthony a girl or use she/her pronouns or things like that, i don't really think anthony is trans and if he is, it's not our business unless he makes it public. i think he's just a guy who is gnc

[kindlespark]

Too shy .. but I do agree with you on the Cerebrocast not getting QQ 😔.

OMG HI TWITTER PERSON ok context for everyone else i’ve been listening to cerebrocast (who do not like quentin) but i personally have so many thoughts about quentin quire and i DO hate it because he’s the stupidest whitest bitch in existence.

the thing is that i need his story to have been about white trans/queer rage because he literally looks like he has pink hair and pronouns and something something he looks like a walking trans flag with the pink hair and blue psionics and he’s a fucking PHOENIX HOST. YOU KNOW, THE X-MEN’S MANIFESTATION OF FEMALE RAGE??? ANYWAY. its just nonsensical to me that in new x-men morrison chooses their incel school shooter allegory to be…. a punk counterculture radical anarchist mutant who is driven to action when he sees a (implied gay) mutant fashion designer/activist killed in a hate crime. like i just dont think morrison understands politics. it’s a story that demonises leftist radical protesting/riots, and implies the youth doing it are just fucked up/co-opting it for a trend, and are also just super addicted to drugs all the time lmfao. and it is even bizarrer in retrospect because everyone in comics and making comics now pretty much agrees now that magneto IS right. that is just how minority politics irl have developed!! charles’ assimilationist bullshit is long past!!

HOWEVER. i do think there is a way to redeem/fix that and that’s if we think of it as a story that demonises WHITE counterculture. if we take it as a story that’s like yeah, white leftism and white queer/trans rage without intersectionality is just white supremacy. that tbh is what it should’ve been and i’m never giving grant morrison that credit but that’s what i wanted bc my god white gays are annoying and quentin is like such a perfect encapsulation of that entitlement. tbh. i like him so much as a character but if i knew him irl i’d block him on all platforms and throw him off a cliff etc etc

like i think it’s fine to take quentin’s writing in riot at xavier’s at face value bc morrison WAS seemingly aiming for a criticism on how people co-opt politics to be trendy and as an outlet for more personal issues which does happen! i just think the optics are bizarre for that and it falls into wild horseshoe theory shit and i dont think it WORKS you know i think there’s more interesting ways to take that character that aren’t like “the youth’s anger and protesting and counterculture is stupid” especially because we don’t really HAVE any radical characters that arent consistently villainised. and i think people have tried to do that since wolverine and the x-men with a more defanged pathetic quentin who is i think bi now? idk last i remembered christina strain made him lie that benji was his boyfriend in gen x 2017 but does that count? have they said it more explicitly since then? who knows i dont remember either way i think he’s better having been kicked down a few rungs and given growth. i like that his biggest fear is losing his friends/community at school. im glad that ppl have made him more fun as a character now… but they’ve also done that while wiping the political beliefs/allegory out of his character and making him just that superior annoying dude instead of trying to tackle what it does mean for quentin to have a genuine rage and hatred for how the system oppresses and kills people like him. the story implies that rage was never really genuine and he was just acting out but that SUCKS and is BORING because fuck if im not also angry all the damn time about the state of the world! let us be angry about injustice without demonising that anger! like that is why i do think quentin does have a niche following of queer fans bc like for a moment we connected with that rage from a guy who looks like *waves hand in the air* that

also my hottest take that i got redpilled into via one article i read years ago is that i think idie/quentin/evan could’ve been the next insane phoenix jean/scott/logan love triangle. a LOT of work and writing would need to be done to actually make me care about quentin in any relationship but the potential was there and could’ve been great tbh. we’re long past that era now but sometimes i think about how i would reboot that whoooole schtick into something cohesive like it could’ve been a subversive little queer story of colour if watxm volume 2 wasnt just the quentin quire show and idie/evan got more spotlight and if it wasnt completely incomprehensible or had unfortunate art. BUT ANYWAY.

THIS GOT SO LONG AND IS SOOO INDECIPHERABLE SO SORRY ANON I JUST WANTED TO RANT AND TRULY TWITTER HAS A WORD LIMIT ❤️❤️ thank u for ur support ❤️❤️❤️

[selchwife]

ive talked about this before and it may be kind of negative but ill do it again i don’t care. i like talking about my feelings. under a cut bc it’s unconscionably long but stuff about emetwol in fandom and idk. Internalized homophobia I guess?

beyond not caring for some of the m/f emetwol writing i’ve encountered (depending of course on the individual author and WoL) and finding it regressive or sexist, it does feel kind of like. i don’t know, hurtful isn’t the right word, but it’s unpleasant to me that that sort of writing is much more popular than m/m emetwol because it kind of gets at a weird place for me vis a vis like growing up with homophobia that i think is kind of hard to articulate. (this is specifically about stuff that feels super reliant on very highly codified gender roles to me and the way i feel that that sort of work is exceedingly popular, it’s not about every m/f emetwol ship.)

it’s kind of childish language but there’s a part of me that consistently sees these characters as like, “fairytale princesses,” like their performance of womanhood is unassailable and their claim to beauty is unquestioned, and so Naturally they end up with a desirable man, and like. idk. there is an extra TRANS gay dimension in this for me, I guess. i was very invested in fairytales as a kid myself, but i always felt kind of torn about identifying with these female protagonists who inhabited roles I felt like I couldn’t, and very early on i was consistently frustrated by what looking back i recognize as feeling, like, emasculated by the whole idea. my Stereotypical As Fuck Childhood Fantasy at this point was wearing full body armor and saving a princess and having her assume i was male.

anyway, so obviously i have some friction with the whole Ideal Woman Role, given I’m a trans guy. duh. i think it was tough bc like, on an emotional level even as a child i was aware I was a boy, even if i couldn’t figure out how to express this or that it was possible to say so. and i liked other boys, and because i knew vaguely that being gay was “bad,” i felt discomfort and guilt about it, and like i was doing something wrong by liking other boys. compounded by the issue that THEY did not see ME as Other Boys and made me angry by treating me as a girl. so like, it was hard to know on some level that i wasn’t actually female, and like other guys, and then consistently have other guys only like me or interact with me on the level of like, this sort of socially acceptable female face I had to wear growing up. i could only get close to guys i liked on ANY level, whether as potential romantic partners or as friends, through the Girl Pantomime. but because i was stuck in the whole Girl Act there was this wall between me and other guys, and i could never really entertain getting close to even guys I might’ve otherwise been interested in because i knew like, the only reason they had any interest in me was because they were straight. like particularly with my friend from high school who I went to prom with, who i might’ve liked back if like, it were in a context where he was interested in me as another guy - but he only liked me because he saw me as a girl who shared his interests and a girl who was his friend, so he did not like ME.

i guess what i’m trying to say is that seeing these very very gendered like, “ideal subservient woman x guy you like” depictions be met with TONS of positive feedback and engagement and praise feels like a repetition of that rejection? especially because my own writing for emetwol is not met with nearly the same kind of engagement on The AO3. it feels like another sort of “you can only secure the attention of other men whose companionship or love you want by being a woman, rendering the whole thing entirely pointless because the only way that camaraderie and love will fulfill you is if you’re seen as a man — and this is because men and women interacting under the aegis of these extremely exaggerated gender roles is the ideal, it’s what everyone wants and views as positive, and what would be affirming and healing to you is what everyone else finds distasteful and perverse.” and i know it’s not necessarily that deep, but like, it feels that way! it really does feel that way when you’re repeatedly presented with this like stark Men Are This, Women Are This, Men And Women Interact Like This kind of narrative, and you see that narrative praised over and over again, and when you try to tell your own story nobody listens.

and I get that that’s discounting somewhat the fact that my dear friends DO listen, and you guys listen. i appreciate it a lot. it’s just like, idk, it’s a different feeling to have your friends say “cool fic!” when you show them versus publishing your work on ao3 and having other, new people respond and tell you they liked it and so on. and i also understand that popularity means very little, and that there’s no sin in other people writing things that aren’t to my taste and my taste apparently not being so mainstream.

i think it’s just like, I don’t resent other people for being something that I’m not and enjoying things I don’t. but it’s sometimes very isolating and painful to remember that like, idk, I’ve found connection with other lgbt people online and found a good community and structured my little social world around that and it’s great and wonderful, but that doesn’t change that in the wider world I do not fit in. i’m not what people want me to be and not capable of being that, and the things that are important to me are viewed by others with at best a sort of indifference or “how quaint!” and at worst disgust. and straight people’s relationships, and subsequently writing about straight characters’ relationships, are automatically conferred a greater sense of weight and value. and with emetwol sometimes I feel like an m/f story like this is automatically viewed as a sweeping epic and the love as inherently very deep and real, but with m/m it’s sort of relegated to like, oh how cute that men like him too, or whatever. idk how to articulate it precisely, but the feeling like men’s relationships just aren’t seen as like, as romantic or as Real in comparison. silly slash fans playing with dolls. you know. IDEK how much of that is even true, but it’s how it makes me feel, like “you don’t really belong here, no one wants to hear about your silly little Thing, but we suppose you can sit at the kiddy table with the other gays.”

i think one of the things that makes me maddest in this vein is the fic i read where emet having an attraction to men is included as a throwaway line SOLELY in order to establish that he’s become incurably morally corrupt and debauched. like. Cool

and idk, i don’t want to come across like it’s just “i’m crying homophobia bc nobody reads or talks up my stuff on the fanfictions website :’(“ bc i’m aware Not Getting AO3 Hits is kind of a petty complaint and no one is obligated to read my fic in particular. It just feels like the Environment surrounding the ship unless i specifically track down other m/m shippers or nb/m shippers, so it’s hard to pin to one thing. especially bc the perception by the wider ffxiv fandom is TOTALLY that emetwol is like almost exclusively a straight woman’s pursuit

no real good snappy conclusion to this. i just wish i felt better about it i suppose, and also like i didn’t feel i have to apologize so much for feeling unheard compared to other people. it’s not like i want to demand attention as though I’m entitled to it or something, I guess it’s just demoralizing sometimes to put a lot of my heart into writing for pfeil and emet and feel like no one will want to read it or take it as seriously because they’re gay men

[applestorms]

been reading through some of the author commentary from the patreon post archive for HS^2 stuff & writing notes on certain quotes from it and i think i've come up with (slightly) more distinct reasons for why the epilogues/homestuck^2 feel so off and/or frustrating to me. not gonna post the full thing + i'm only about halfway through reading it all, but here's a few points (warning this one gets kinda political):

It’s possible “Ultimate” Dirk’s presence was suppressing other splinters of himself from manifesting.

Wait, so... Ult. Dirk is just suppressing the other splinters? But I thought the entire point was that he subsumed all the other splinters to become one Ultimate Self? Weird, but I guess that plays more into the narrative powers side of things that they put a lot of emphasis on. That, or the creators don't have a very clear idea of what actually makes an Ultimate Self, which would. also work lmfao

Unlike the other victors of the game, Jane threw herself into the world the kids made together. She grew up preparing to take over a major company, and has the confidence to show for it.

Gonna get more into two ideas here in a bit related to this quote, the first being HS^2's Trump Era politics & the second being Jane more specifically. Here's the first connection:

I don’t know if you noticed, but everything is terrible right now. And I don’t mean just in Homestuck’s dumb fake earth. I mean in our dumb real earth. Our planet is burning and folks go to bed hungry just so twelve guys can have more money than Croesus could have ever dreamed of. The concept of “truth” is at its most tenuous – political divisions involve contradictory interpretations of basic facts. I’ve been playing a lot of Death Stranding recently. Basically any media that you’re making in 2019 has to either address what’s going on around us or come off sanitized, sterilized, with its head in the sand. Kojima offers a simple power fantasy: Through Norman Reedus’s sweaty, urine-filled labor, the things that divide us can be banished. America can be unified again.

HS^2 is kind of agonizingly pessimistic when it comes to its (not at all subtle) political messaging, which I suppose you can in part attribute to a Trump-era leftist/liberal culture, but I personally also attribute to a specific flavor of white person existential pessimism. What frustrates me about HS^2's politics in particular though is just how much it talks down to the reader, acting like their (frankly, imo, pretty fuckin basic) reflections on the flaws of capitalism, gender constructs, and contemporary American politics are these revolutionary ideas that nobody other than them truly understands. It's really aggravating to read, honestly, and reminds me a lot of the perspective reflected on in this video by F.D Signifier about Bo Burnham's Inside & white performative liberalism, though in this context the creators are much more insufferable about it than Burnham ever was. (This is NOT to say every creator working on HS^2 was white or even ascribes/d to these kinds of politics, but that's one of the voices that I feel comes through the strongest.)

Edit: Re-watched that whole video and he really does get at the exact idea I'm thinking of. However, I would add that the thing that makes HS^2 feel especially insufferable to me is the fact that it doesn't feel like the authors are engaging in their politics as genuinely or personally as Burnham does. Where Burnham's look into these issues is self-reflective, the existential dread coming from the ways in which he himself plays a part in perpetuation of systems of oppression, I feel like HS^2's creators were unwilling to look at the ways in which they themselves might've benefited from the same kinds of privileges. It's just- it's egotistical, honestly! And it's a vibe that I get from a lot of heavily queer, young, white fandom spaces, which presume that because of their own experiences with queer and trans-based bigotry they understand everything and don't have to examine their own biases or any other nuances to their social position/the privileges they might personally have & continue to benefit from. I don't know- Homestuck was never going to be a good medium for examining the nuances of race and privilege, that was determined by the very first page or whenever Hussie decided non-canon races were a thing, but that doesn't make it any less agonizing to watch such a ham-fisted, pompous attempt at "social commentary." Ugh.

I guess I can understand the desire to get HS^2's politics to be more up to date and with it, again considering what the Trump-era American political landscape looked like (and what HS proper looked like, let's be real), but the way they approach this just makes the authors seem that much more immature to me. I hesitate to even call this political commentary, it's just pointing out that things are bad and then complaining about it. There's no hope here and it shows, and I personally have very little patience when it comes to that kind of perspective. I don't want to be too harsh to the creators or completely undermine the ways they might've faced structural social challenges (yes, trans people have it fucking bad right now! And there was absolutely some bigoted shit directed at the creators that was more reprehensible than anything here, I was there when this shit was coming out, I saw it all too (alongside the genuinely good criticism that they wrote off just as easily, but I digress)), but this shit is just bad, I'm sorry.

Privilege, safety, and inherited wealth do funny things to the brain. People justify to themselves why they have what they have. If you have enough for long enough, you start to convince yourself you deserve it. Jane won the game, lost very little, and as god of a new world decided to dominate its markets as a corporate mogul. Her conception of what was possible with her capability and god-like reason was shaded, limited by the world she grew up in. She is not a goddess of fantasy, a semi-mythical trickster creature like Jasprose, or a meta-aware marionette master like Dirk. She saw a new world and chose, simply, to replicate the power structures of the 21st-century America she was raised in. Boardrooms, power pantsuits, formality and professionalism.

(Longer quote here justifying the horror they did to Jane's character but let's add one more before I elaborate further)

But in the end, isn’t that what every story is? Trying to untie knots that you put in the rope yourself?

This quote is very telling and gets at my issue with the Jane quote from above, really one of my main issues with the all post-canon shit just in general: when the authors were creating a bunch of problems and inserting them into the story, something that is (typically) necessary for any kind of meaningful storytelling, they went about the process of introducing that conflict totally wrong.

In the original story of HS, problems for the characters primarily originated from Sburb, which acts as both the game they're playing and, as is demonstrated throughout Act 1, the world itself. Problems in the story thus often feel at least kind of true to life because they either originate directly from the game & its constructs (which the characters have no control over, parallel to how you can't usually control the world irl) or individuals responding to those circumstances w/ their own set of unique characteristics (Vriska being an active character and creating villains to become a hero but also Rose deciding she has to go through with a suicide mission in response to the game/Doc Scratch and Dave in turn responding to her actions, etc. etc.).

This is not necessarily true for all of the story or every single plot point/character arc, but I think it generally follows, and so for as meta as HS gets, it never really felt to me like you could see the hand of the author when it comes to how major plot elements are introduced, outside of a few very overt examples. Problems are able to crop up fairly naturally through characters responding in what they think to be natural/rational ways to their circumstances, but may or may not be due to the limitations on their understanding. The situation and environment of Sburb and the world of HS itself may be absurd and stupid and crazy and very obviously created by an author, but the characters typically feel consistent and true to themselves as people in how they respond to the absurdity and confusion of their world. It's one of the reasons why I think HS is so appealing as a coming of age story actually, since stepping into adulthood (or even just your teenage years) does often feel like entering a world that is crazy and cruel and unknowable with all of these malicious, far-away forces that know way more than you could ever possibly understand controlling every detail of the world around you and deciding your fate before you even get the chance to know it's coming. These are kids, they really don't have a lot of power even once they ascend to godhood in comparison to the forces they're dealing with, and the story & world reflects that.

The problem w/ HS^2 & the Epilogues is that the authors don't have the same game construct to work with, barely have a world at all to begin with actually, and so they instead twist pretty much every single character into the worst possible versions of themselves in order to try and recreate the same HS absurdity. But it just doesn't work, because there is no real explanation for why every character is suddenly at their lowest point and acting like a fucking idiot all the time other than "ooo adulthood makes everyone worse!" and vague gestures to capitalism and privilege (or what I would call structural ignorance, though I don't think they ever call it that), so the story just comes across as incredibly cruel and uncaring and unabashedly pessimistic in a way that's just miserable to read.

Yes, Jane grew up privileged, it makes sense that she would be sympathetic to capitalism and try to recreate the same social structures that fucked people up on the original Earth- but that is not nearly enough justification for why she has suddenly gone full fascist dictator endorsing troll eugenics and trying to murder people, and it doesn't even work well as social commentary cause it's so extreme right from the start that it couldn't possibly reflect real life issues or the development of actual fascist/bigoted ideas. Yes, Trump's ties to the alt-right are fucking terrifying and conservative politics in general in the U.S. nowadays are incredibly fucked, but there's still logical people and seemingly rational explanations being utilized to justify the bullshit that many people genuinely believe in and HS^2 fails to meaningfully reflect or comment on any of those, at least from what I can tell. Everyone is consistent with how they are terrible, I'll give them that, for Dirk and Jane and everyone else the flaws that are being emphasized are ones that are generally kind of consistent with canon, but I simply cannot get behind why they suddenly decided to be the worst possible versions of themselves other than that the authors realize they needed plot and decided that the best way to make Candy and Meat the Bad Timelines:tm: was to spontaneously make everyone as insufferable as possible.

I think a part of the problem is the time skip, honestly. And the fact that Earth C as a location itself is surprisingly underutilized when it comes to creating problems for the characters. The characters are gods ruling over a world where they can be dictator of the globe at the end of a single election. Without the game and the lack of distinct outside villains, there is nothing stopping them from having full agency over everything other than each other, so in order to create plot, instead of going through the effort to create a world or social structure they just made everyone worse and called it a day. It's like the epitome of white liberalism's inability to understand bad systems vs. bad individuals- there are no real systems here, nothing that actually functions past a name, so everyone is just fucking terrible.

(Honestly, I think the fact that there are no overt outside villains could've been a good way of transitioning to the fact that these characters aren't kids anymore- if Dirk and Jane didn't have to be transformed into fucking caricatures of themselves in order to do it. Really the problem is that so many of the characters that used to add interesting nuance to the social conflict are fucking dead now. RIP trolls.)

Since this is turning out to be the political astronaut ramble I guess I'll just keep going for a bit: one of the most meaningful insights a professor has ever given to me came is the idea that we "haven't earned our pessimism yet," as the younger generations, or haven't faced The Shit directly or long enough to justify having as little hope as we do. Many of us have looked at the problem and given up before even trying to solve it, and are, in fact, not really justified in making such a decision.

For me, there's an additional layer to that idea as well: one of the ideas that Beauvoir talks about in her feminist philosophy is that of agency, wherein social privilege allows for certain groups to decide which meaning-creating projects they want to or to not take on where others are not allowed to make the same choice. If you sit in any kind of position of social privilege, that historical role has continually been the one to not only benefit from the rules, but make them in the first place. This kind of pessimism is thus not just unearned, not just frustrating to listen to, but actively harmful to the creation of meaningful change. Who really benefits from inaction? From a lack of change to the status quo? And who are the privileged to make decisions about whether or not we're allowed to fight for this shit in the first place?

[thephantomcasebook]

Wo his this Elio guy😂

Boy, do I have a story for you, Nonny ...

So, Elio and his wife Linda run Westeros.Org which, I believe, was the first fansite for ASoIaF - dedicated to keeping the lore. It was basically a Wiki for ASoIaF before Wiki was invented.

Eventually, GRRM was having trouble keeping all the lore straight in his head, so he basically hired Elio and Linda to keep track of it for him in the late-90's, I think. He would get somewhere in the book and he would call or e-mail them with a question and they'd look it up for him.

Eventually Westeros.Org became the unoffical site for the entire series. And ... Elio and Linda started acting more and more like not only gate keepers, but police, of the fandom, believing what they say and decree is law in fan spaces, and that anything outside of it is not true fandom. They were the judges of what was "Legitimate". Sort of like those "The Tolkien Society" cock-suckers for the Tolkien fandom.

When I joined the fandom in late 2009, they weren't very popular with fans of the books - pre-tv show. The place to be if you were a GRRM fan was the forums of Ice and Fire which was run by Elio & Linda and they constantly micro-managed and looked over the shoulders of everyone and everything going on there.

An example:

So someone starts a thread with a fan theory. It's outlandish but fun. People start adding to it, giving evidence, restructuring it so that it fit better. Then Elio or Linda - usually Linda - would come in and dump a big ice water bucket on everyone's fun, because, she thinks that the theory is ridiculous and not in the spirit of the series or the lore. People tell her that she's wrong and usually and successfully tell her to pound dirt - cause Linda couldn't debate worth shit.

That's when Elio comes along. Now, for context, go back to that Reddit post and read his response to the post they put up of my ask. Elio would find one inconstancy or mistake of lore in the theory and hyper focus on it. His stance being that because the people crafting the theory got one thing wrong that the entire thing was illegitimate. It didn't matter if everything else fit or that the people arguing with him was 99% right about every thing. He would take that one flaw and build an entire strawman argument around it while constantly claiming "Well, George said this!" Or "George told me this" ... shit that no one could quantify.

So, basically, the people on the theory thread was like "Whatever the fuck, dude, we're just having fun. Go away."

And that's when usually Linda locked or deleted the thread.

So, book readers started getting fucking tired of the teacher's pet, prefect, mentality of them.

However, when "Game of Thrones" started to hit big, they increased their standing as sort of the "Keepers of the Flame" of the fandom. Suddenly they were on podcasts and doing interviews for major publications. They also became gate keepers of knowledge for casual fans and new readers. Everyone fascinated with this Trans-Atlantic couple and their story about how they started off with this little fansite in the mid-late 90's and now were lore keepers for a world wide phenomenon!

Then, they flushed it all down the toilet.

So, around the time that "Game of Thrones" is hitting, fanfiction for the series is fucking everywhere. I think GOT fanfiction at one point over took "Harry Potter" in popularity. So, Linda writes an essay that gets picked by a publication basically saying that Fanfiction isn't just terrible for story telling, but that its basically fucking evil. I believe she refers to it as "Painting over the Mona Lisa" and is just really vitriolic toward all fanfiction writers in general. Of course, as everyone knows, GRRM hates fanfiction, especially fanfiction of his own characters.

There was a huge black lash to Linda's article/essay from not only fans but from other authors. Neil Gaiman then pens a counter/response to Linda's essay stating that not only is fanfiction important to Western Literature, but its is the very bedrock of human storytelling. That creation comes from imitation. And he defends fanfiction writers and their right to create new stories from the genius of other's creativity because that's what humans have always done.

Now, Elio and Linda look like douche bags in front of the entire world.

Then, the final nail in the coffin, comes when they race swapped Xaro Xhoan Daxos with Nonso Anozie - Which is a great character actor that I love in almost everything he's in. She basically condemned it, said that D&D were pissing on GRRM's legacy and she basically got catty with a bunch of blue haired wildebeests. And because she and Elio elevated themselves so highly in the public eye, they got cancelled before getting cancelled was a thing. They basically got labeled racists and got knocked off their pedestal.

Which is a shame, cause, in general, I agree with her about race swaps being inherently racist tokenism. But if they were gonna be cancelled, there is better shit to get them on than the usual leftist trash accusations.

So, GRRM, quietly, retired them from the spotlight - and public association. And by that point the fandom for ASoIaF/GOT was so massive that they couldn't control it, even if they wanted too. And they both kind of faded away.

However, recently, they tried to make a come back with "Rise of the Dragon" which was an art book that told an illustrated history of the "Conquest" and "Dance" that was supposed to tie into "House of the Dragon".

However, they were immediately met with hostility from everyone for either the Daxos incident, or their years of unpleasantness as gate keepers. Also, "Rise of the Dragon" was incredibly inconsistent and conflicting with "Fire & Blood" and the art for it was absolutely abysmal. It and them were panned endlessly. And there was no great rush to buy it and the book came and went with very little fanfare.

Now, my boy, Elio is patroling ASoIaf Reddit groups cause I'm guessing "A Forum of Ice and Fire" is pretty dead. And he's still trying to police the fandom, even now.

The lesson hear, Cats, is to have fun and a sense of humor with the stuff you like ... and don't be a fucking Percy prefect about fan stuff.

[wizardrps]

Wanted: RP Partner(s)

Howdy! So long story short, I am once again getting back into roleplaying, and so I thought I'd make this silly little side blog to try and find some people to roleplay with! Soooo let's get on with it!!!

About me:

My name is Jessie, I'm nonbinary, and my pronouns are they/he! I'm a current college student, so I tend to get very busy out of nowhere. My style is what you'd call advanced literate/novella. I write only in 3rd person. I also have a habit of writing a lot. I have been writing and roleplaying for 10 whole years (I have a lot of stories about my rp history. It's kind of embarrassing lol).

As a little disclaimer regarding my response timing: like I mentioned, I'm currently in my undergrad and my schedule can be hectic. Some days, I'm not busy at all and that means I'm free to respond whenever. However, some days I'm super busy and cannot respond. I try my hardest to be as open and communicative with my roleplay partners as possible. That being said, I do not expect a response immediately after I respond. Take as much time as you need! I know that you have a life outside of roleplaying just as much as I do.

Preferences for Roleplay Partners:

I am over 18, so I am... a little uncomfortable with roleplaying certain themes and topics with people who are underaged. Under no circumstances will I roleplay NSFW with a minor. Please, for the love of all things that are good, do not lie about your age just so you can roleplay NSFW with me. I was 14 at some point too and got upset when adults wouldn't roleplay with me either, but trust me when I say it has nothing to do with your maturity or you as a person. It is for both of our safety and well-being.

As for the topic of NSFW, no porn-without-plots. I don't mind nsfw, but I really don't like it to be the bulk of a roleplay. It gets boring really quick for me.

Please be literate! I'm definitely not an amazing writer and don't expect you to be one either. I'm not a stickler for grammar or stuff like that, but literacy is important to me.

Last but not least, someone who is willing to talk OOC! The most fun I've ever had with roleplays was when I've roleplayed with people who have talked to me OOC. Whether it's about the roleplay or anything about your life, talk to me!!! We don't have to be best friends, but I like to think of roleplaying as a good way to make some really cool friends that I can basically work on a story with :) There's no obligation to always be talking to me, but talking from time to time is nice.

The fun stuff!!! What I'm looking for:

Fandom or OC! I lean towards OC, but if there's a fandom we both enjoy that I can comfortably write a character from, then let's do it! My main genres of interest are: high/dark fantasy, modern fantasy, horror/psychological thriller, pretty much any historical fiction especially if it is medieval or takes place in the last 200 years, some sci-fi, or anything that gives Life is Strange vibes. I'm down for realistic fiction settings, but I usually prefer the other stuff.

Ships. As a queer person, I prefer lgbt relationship dynamics. I'm comfortable with straight ships, but they're just not what I'm used to. Most of my OCs are guys, but I have gals, nonbinary, and trans people also thrown into the mix of my endless batch of OCs. Also, platonic ships are welcomed!

Fandoms:

If you are looking to roleplay a fandom, here's what I'm currently into/what I'm willing to roleplay! A Song of Ice and Fire/Game of Thrones, the Witcher(show, books up to a certain point I left off at lol), the Elder Scrolls, Dragon Age (all 3 games), Hannibal, and Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit (movies and books I guess?)

No/no's:

Things that will get you immediately blocked if you try to pull include: non-con, incest, s/a, children in any sexual context, or any fetishes that have to do with bodily fluids.

Things that are iffy/icks: romanticization of mental illness (i.e. if you haven't done the research to be able to correctly pull of an interpretation of a character with ASPD, don't do it), abusive relationships, and dub-con.

Disclaimer: these are things that I am not okay writing into detail about. For example, if your character has a past of being abused, I am okay with having the subject touched upon. However, I am not comfortable writing an abusive relationship where my OC is abusive towards yours, or vice versa. Please just be respectful and speak to me OOC prior to bringing up any of these subjects.

Anyhoodles, that's about it! Sorry this post is long and drawn out. If you're interested in roleplaying, please interact with this post via comment or like, or message me! My main means of roleplaying is through discord. My discord tag is WizardLizard#2018. Please bare in mind that I get busy (and last time I made one of these posts I got absolutely swamped with responses and got overwhelmed), so it might take me a little while to get back to you! No matter what I will respond, though!

[high-theyre-frendough]

ABOUT THE BLOG

For a while, I was posting random high thoughts on my main account, but decided, why not make a dedicated page for that kind of content. So, this is my 🍃 account. I will never post or respond here if I am sober or think I am too sober. That way, it is authentic.

MY NAME

If you don’t follow me, call me the avocado bandit. if you do follow me, you must call me the avocado king. becoming a follower makes me your king.

ABOUT ME

I am an adult and I consume weed to help with my C-PTSD & depression. Also for silly time because silly brain is fun. I am a trans guy and I use He/It/Xe pronouns. I would prefer it if minors did not interact here, but I suppose I cannot be too mad if someone comes across a funny out-of-context post. This is under the assumption that I can be funny. I will try to avoid posting here while not high. This includes writing this pinned post.

We have DID and sometimes post about it. However, that is not what this blog is focused around.

DNI

If you are transphobic/TERF/trans-med or otherwise an obnoxious cisgender person (fuck it, especially the CISHETS) then you can go bye-bye.

If think you can be a system without childhood trauma, also bye bye. This account is not the place for this drama, but trust me I have a nuanced opinion on the topic. But I don't wanna deal with it on this account.

If you homophobic, good bye bitch. Also if you exclude asexuals or non-binary people, then fuck off. Go eat a used gym sock.

If you are racist or xenophobic, I hope that your teeth rot out of your mouth, leaving you to only eating bland soup, as you are no longer allowed to enjoy foods from other cultures.

If you are trans-id I would appreciated if you identified as blocked.

If you are pro ana or sh it would be cool if you got help instead of glorifying it online.

If you are a pedo, it would be pretty fucking cool if you got on a boat to the center of the ocean, tied cinder blocks to your feet, and entered the water.

TAG GUIDE

Different types of posts will use the following tags for the following things. If you follow, feel free to block whichever ones you like. Don’t expect everyone to like everything, so here it is for your convenience.

#♻️ gilded profoundness -> These are posts which are meant to be meaningful, even though they probably are not.

#♻️ descriptions -> directly describe the experience of bring high

#♻️ weird -> weird things said while high that are probably stupid on purpose

#♻️ capitalism -> sometimes when i'm high i am thinking about capitalism too hard and confuse myself. should i put "we"??? we are a system but will not talk about it on this account much, so idk if it is relevant? should i add things to confuse? never mind

#♻️ realizations -> things i did not think about before

#♻️ realizations but traumatic -> tmw you have a ptsd flashback while high and then recover and you are still high and also kinda dissociating and you sit there and you think about what you just now realize was trauma cause you thought it was normal but no, it fucking was not, but you're high so you just write it down somewhere so you remember it, then you go back to thinking about silly high things, or consume strange media cause you're high and that's fun to do while high.

#♻️🍆 spicy -> horny posts. probably won't post much of that here as we have a separate blog for horny thoughts, but if it is here it'll be tagged

#♻️ reblog -> posts i reblogged

#♻️ memes -> usually have to do with venting but not always

#♻️ real time -> describing things as they are happening or just happened.

#♻️ free space -> Concepts to write about for entertainment.

#♻️ ask response -> if someone said something that would be nice but do not be mean please

#♻️ agere -> sometimes baby brain takes over. soft fuzzy high brain easily becomes little baby. sfw!!!! (note that this blog is not 100% sfw, though when i do regress, it is in a sfw way)

#♻️ paranoid -> will also be tagged with common tags just in case for filtering. i just realized that if someone follows, and the block some of these tags, this pinned post will be hidden cause i have those tags pinned for convenience

#♻️ neutral -> idk a specific label

#♻️ walmartposting - Its a place for stoners to exercise aimlessly.

#♻️ upset -> vent or something idk

#♻️ dissociative stuff -> stuff about DID. usually syscourse. figured i might as well make a tag for it since we get riled up while high on occasion.

#♻️ yeee 🍺 -> alcohol was involved

[transamorousnetwork]

Why Every Cis-Trans Date Is An Awesome Gift

Often transgender clients offer great examples proving what we say here at The Transamorous Network. That happened again today (at the time of writing this).

The example perfectly shows how our stories create our reality. It also perfectly shows how our stories play out in our own behaviors, and the others’ behavior. Which makes every date we have an experience bearing gifts.

Seeing our stories play out in real time offers us tremendous benefits. Only by seeing them can we do something about them though. So it’s important to learn how to interpret our stories as they play out.

“Reality”, of course, includes our behaviors. So in addition to how we feel and what we think, another great way of discovering stories we have is by looking at how we behave. And how people behave toward us. Especially on dates. 

By doing that, we can deliberately chart paths to all the love (or anything else) we want by telling better stories. This is the basis for why I work with transgender and trans-attracted clients. On the way to getting all they want, clients become empowered. They also become happier. This client is no exception.

Let’s take a look at the wonderful example she offered.

Creating her dating reality as she goes

She recently stopped online dating. I don’t encourage anyone to go that route, so I’m glad she stopped. Here’s why I don’t recommend dating online. But most clients coming to me are on that path. After a while though, they stop dating online. That’s because it’s just more fun meeting your perfect match through serendipity. Online dating sucks.

The client, I’ll call Sarah, now has several men she’s seeing. Most of them are casual. And a few of them involve actually going out on dates. That’s great because Sarah, who is trans, once told herself very strong stories about men not being willing to take her out. But because she’s changed her stories, men now take her out! Go figure!

One guy I’ll call Cleo, wants to take Sarah out. But he’s scared. He still resists his trans-attraction. So, he’ll text Sarah, telling her he wants to see her. Or text her about taking her out. Sarah likes getting these messages. But it irks her that he won’t follow up. She wants him to take her out. He won’t though.

I explained to Sarah that Cleo represents a stepping stone along the path to the relationship she ultimately wants and will have. I also said the more she focuses on positive aspects of what Cleo offers, the more she becomes a match to that relationship she ultimately wants.

Sarah’s working on this. Some days she’s better at it than others. But what happened in today’s session was instructive. First, let’s look at some context.

A relationship to beat all relationships

Sarah loves a man she really wants to be with. She and this guy, who I’ll call Paul, have talked on and off for years. It’s obvious Paul likes Sarah. But he too fears his trans-attraction. Yet he keeps coming back to Sarah. Sarah really wants to be with Paul. I assure her constantly she can be with Paul and will be. Once she becomes fully a match to him and vice versa.

But stories Sarah keeps active about relationships, about Paul and about herself keep her from becoming that match. I am working with Sarah to identify and soothe these stories.

One story she has is if she told Paul about her dating experiences, Paul will get angry at her and cut her off, even though Paul has consistently told Sarah she should date other people. I told Sarah she should share with Paul what she does with these other men. Not to manipulate Paul in any way, but, instead, to authentically express what she’s doing. Besides, it’s exactly what Paul encouraged. And, I assured Sarah, it’s something Paul would appreciate.

So Sarah really wants to be with Paul. Paul likes Sarah a lot and wants that too. But both keep telling stories that keep the two apart. And Sarah won’t communicate authentically with Paul because she’s afraid.

Ok, that’s the context. Now, back to Cleo. Keep in mind what you just read. See if you can put the pieces together about stories and how they created the reality you’re about to read before I explain it in the section after this next one.

Perfect manifestation played in real time

One day Cleo texted Sarah. He complained that a lot of older cis-women were coming on to him. He said he had lots of opportunity to “fuck” these women. But he didn’t know what he wanted to do. Sarah told him he should enjoy these women. He should have sex with them, she said, if he wants to and thinks he will enjoy it.

In other words, she was sharing what we talk about in The Transamorous Network dating approach. The more a person can enjoy life, the more life will yield to them more enjoyable experiences. That’s the general rule. I applauded Sarah for telling Cleo this. It’s spot-on guidance.

A couple days later, Cleo texted Sarah. He shared news that he did actually follow Sarah’s advice. He said he had a great time doing it. Remember, Sarah encouraged Cleo to have sex with these women.

Here’s what happened next, in Sarah’s own words:

“After he told me,” she said. “I got mad. Then I picked a big, giant fight with him. He got really angry with me. Then he stopped talking to me.”

Can you see what happened here? It’s a perfect manifestation of Sarah’s stories about Paul and her playing out in her relationship with Cleo!

The evidence: plain as day

Sarah is playing out her story about being authentic with Paul, with Cleo. Here Cleo is, doing what I suggest Sarah could do with Paul. Cleo is telling Sarah authentically what’s happening in his life with these other women. Notice how Sarah first responds to his authentic sharing. She’s empathetic. She offers really good advice: do what pleases you.

But then, when Cleo acts on Sarah’s advice, Sarah gets pissed. We could replace Cleo with Sarah in this example, and Sarah with Paul. Doing that, we can see how Sarah is creating a reality wherein her stories about Paul and her play out in real time. In perfect view for all to see.

See it?

If I tell Paul what I’m doing with these other men, he’ll get mad and stop talking with me. That’s Sarah’s story about her relationship with Paul. And that story has Sarah feeling fear. Meanwhile, when Cleo does what Sarah’s afraid to do with Paul, at first, Sarah is compassionate. She offers great advice. But when he follows it Sarah gets mad and picks a fight – exactly what she’s afraid Paul will do if she shares authentically what she’s up to, which is what Sarah got mad at Cleo for doing. After all, Sarah is doing what Paul suggested: see other guys. But she’s afraid to share that with him.

First, Sarah is interested and compassionate. This tells her that Paul would be interested and compassionate should she communicate authentically to him. But her fear dominates her behavior as a manifestation. So she gets mad at Cleo after first being interested and compassionate. Then Cleo does what Sarah is afraid Paul will do: stops talking to her.

Power and leverage unveiled

The evidence here is as plain as day. But it’s complicated and hard to see if we don’t know to interpret our reality.

This is the kind of thing we uncover in Transamorous Network sessions. It’s the gold in daily life which reveals to us everything we want to know. Everything that will get us all the love we want. Or all the money we want. Or whatever else we want. Definitely all the happiness we can handle. And then some.

As we can see, physical reality is very sophisticated.  The uninitiated have a hard time figuring all this out. That’s because we have a literal constellation of stories creating our ongoing, unfolding reality. A reality that includes behaviors of others. Others we create as specific versions for ourselves. Those versions reflect our stories back to us so we can do something about them. Our own behaviors do the same thing. But we’re often blind to this.

All of this gives us clues about our inner-understanding. Our inner world constantly projects outward. It creates our realities all day, every day. Which is why Transamorous Network sessions offer so much value. Through the sessions, clients learn how to read the clues.

Just because we can’t see all this doesn’t mean it’s not happening. It is happening. And when a person starts seeing life through this lens, they come into incredible power and leverage. Power and leverage allowing one to deliberately create any reality they want. Including one in which a transgender woman, or a trans-attracted man can enjoy anything they want. That perfect lover included.

Maybe you’re ready to get your hands on that power and leverage. Contact me. Let’s get you started.

[nbwriteschaos]

i've returned with more book rambles!

**mild spoilers for exhale by joel abernathy. content warning for discussions of smut & death ??? weird combo but i promise it's in different contexts**

i find it quite funky that both of the silly little book (over)reviews i've posted here now are about gay werewolves and shifting... i promise i don't have a thing for it. (🤨📸) i actually picked this up on kindle unlimited bc i remembered i had subscription that i abandoned and still paid for, and therefore decided to expand my pallete and start diving into the world of adult queer fiction.

to quickly sum it up for all of my fellow short attention spanned friends: rough southern human dad joins his dead wife's werewolf pack lead by her ex-alpha bf to save their daughter and falls in love with said dead wife's ex-alpha bf. good story, great smut, 3.5 ⭐️

i started this a few days ago and just kinda went for it based off of the description, but i was pleasantly surprised! it was a pretty quick paced, smooth ride which is exactly my cup of tea in novels and always earns a quick star from me. immediately upon the start, the setting and atmosphere became clear and immersive. even though i found that the the writing style wasn't very descriptive and instead pretty straight forward (this is coming as a purple prose loving writer tho), the small town of clarksville came to me as a sepia colored place with rich history between it and the main character, jack. it really drew out the vibes of who he was as a character, and who he would be as the story progressed-- which certainly wasn't disappointing! plus, i reallyyyy think joel abernathy hit the nail on the head with the worldbuilding in this series. each character had a connection somewhere with something and that made it all the more enjoyable.

jack was a great character to begin the story with. i didn't find there to be too much intense growth for him throughout the plot as he was kind of already built with a decent amount of positive traits like being a supportive dad, having that gruff dad attitude, and not-so-subtly hiding a soft spot for his daughter and pretty alpha werewolves, BUT i still found the development of his character to be quite sweet and satisfactory especially when it came time to reveal those secrets about his wife. the very last development that came with him was sort of a surprise and seemed a little out of place despite the foreshadowing, like it was kind of put in there for more shock factor, but it seemed a little too far out of the storyline to even be considered a breaking point. i loved his relationship with his daughter, ellie, and the trans representation she brought was great as it was not subtle or skipped over like many other novels will do on that topic. even though we don't see much of her, i loved her a lot as a character.

AND THEN, we have nicolae, the male alpha of the pack who is conveniently jack's dead wife's ex-mate and his eventual lover (not a spoiler, like, at all). from the start he was enjoyable and super fun to read, i couldn't take him seriously at all. i don't know if that was the point, but as my own interpretation, he was just a silly sarcastic guy who had to be unfortunately serious in regards to his role. plus, he was hot as hell even through the written word. which gets me started on this: the smut scenes in this book were *chefs kiss*. like, tears rolling down my legs, blushing, screaming, flailing around *chefs kiss.* they were so GOOD. so detailed and fun and hothothotttt. their relationship throughout the story was great and well built, but i probably would also be okay just reading 250 pages of smut about them too. seriously tho, their dynamic is great and i always love to see a good little sunshine x brooding character moment. i found they thrived in that department and it gave so much oomf to their chemistry in scenes. their reasoning for being together, their past, their future, etc, was very well executed, albeit maybe, just maybe a little questionable and/or rushed? but tied the story together nicely by the end.

on another note, the plot was good! i did find it fell short in some areas and went sky high in others. there were certain plot points that felt a little out of place, and the pacing between character and relationship developments were kind of all over the board, but considering the length of the novel and the rest of the coming books, it was tolerable and made me eager to learn more about the world. because like i said- the worldbuilding is fucking fantastic.

all in all, i would definitely give this like a 3.5 star out of 5. it lacked in some places and thrived in others, so it's appropriate to give it an in between rating i guess?? (i truly hate rating books because i love everything i read in one way or another but...) i believe it's totally worth checking out and supporting if you're interested in werewolves, angst and.... romance ;)

[thepoisonroom]

Trans Book of the Day #1

Welcome to St. Hell: My Trans Teen Misadventure by Lewis Hancox

Lewis has a few things to say to his younger teen self. He knows she hates her body. He knows she's confused about who to snog. He knows she's really a he and will ultimately realize this... but she's going to go through a whole lot of mess (some of it funny, some of it not funny at all) to get to that point. Lewis is trying to tell her this... but she's refusing to listen.

In WELCOME TO ST. HELL, author-illustrator Lewis Hancox takes readers on the hilarious, heartbreaking, and healing path he took to make it past trauma, confusion, hurt, and dubious fashion choices in order to become the man he was meant to be. It's a remarkable, groundbreaking graphic memoir from an unmistakably bold new voice in comics.

Really dug this one, especially for its frank discussion of trying to find an identity that fits when you have limited language and resources to do so! I thought the strongest and most distinctive parts of the graphic novel were:

The asides where Hancox invites commentary from his friends and family about their actions and reactions during his childhood, teenage years, and early transition. He has huge empathy for the ways that misinformation create obstacles to social and medical transition, even within a well-intentioned support network. The segments where he and his mother talk about lack of information on youth transition and HRT making them both anxious about actively addressing his early childhood dysphoria are particularly strong.

Discussion of eating disorders as a response to dysphoria during puberty. This is something that I've rarely seen addressed in literature even though it's such a common experience for a lot of trans people.

Depiction of coming into new identities and how that both does and does not change your relationships. I can see this being a great read for teens who are anxious about theirs or their friends' evolving identities altering the dynamic between them.

This is a super charming, very frank and funny memoir that I think will resonate with both teenagers and adults. Hancox doesn't shy away from critiquing barriers to transition in the UK, but the main focus of the book is his warm, empathetic depiction of his younger self and his loved ones.

[kyliafanfiction]

Take Your Favorite (Het) Ship and Make Them Lesbians

So, the other day, I read a Rule 63!Zuko/Katara fic that had the tag “take your favorite ship then make them lesbians” (which somehow was a tag no one else had tagged their fic as, which is a real travesty), and that got me thinking. (The fic, for reference and Science Purposes)

(Rule 63, for those not familiar with the term, is a meme that says  "for every given male character, there is a female version of that character and vice versa”. In a fanfic context, Rule 63 is usually another term for ‘cisswap’/Always a girl Aus, i.e. a story where a character who is one character in canon, was born a different one in the AU. These are not the same as trans fic, though sometimes the lines can blur. The various ‘the Girl Who Lived’ fics that exist out there for Fem!Harry, for instance)

That tag is itself really interesting, and it got me thinking. Because there are het ships of mine that I would totally want to see a Rule 63 lesbian version of (i.e. where the guy was always a girl) but there are also ones that I... just wouldn’t.

So I suppose the question is: What het ships do you guys have that you still would find as interesting, and would want to see in a fic (or even consider writing in a fic) if the male character was Rule 63′d? And why?

For me, the top of the list would probably be Dramione (Harry Potter). One, because on a purely shallow level I have to imagine that femaleDraco would be very pretty (:rofl:) but also because there would be some interesting differences in the way Dacia Malfoy (placeholder name) would behave, compared to Draco. Both vis-a-vis Harry, but also Hermione. Plus, Dacia would be less the ‘bad boy’ and more likely the ‘Alpha Bitch’, which is a somewhat different set of tropes, to say the least. Would Dacia have reached out to Harry in the same way, in first year? Maybe, maybe not. Would she still have had Crabbe and Goyle as her goons, or instead say, Pansy and Millicent Bullstrode? A lot of this would also depend on how you see the gender politics among purebloods in the wizarding world (are sons more favored, or no? Are the genders equal? Are there certain expectations about women and their behavior? etc)

My second choice would be Xander/Cordelia, from BtVS. For one, it would be interesting because we could drill down into Xander’s canon behavior and try to separate what is just Xander being Xander, what is a product of his upbringing, and what is a result of him struggling with performing ideas of toxic masculinity because he believes he’s supposed to (related to the second point). If in a fic, Xandra (placeholder name) still has the same apparently shitty parents, how would it look? We can surmise that Mr. Harris presumably berated Xander about how he’d never be a real man a lot, though I can’t recall if the dream version of him does so in “Restless”. But we also know that Xander fears turning into his dad, a lot. Xendra might fear becoming an alcholic like her dad, but she may more likely fear ending up becoming like her mom - letting herself be abused rather than being the abuser, etc. It would also be interesting because, given how things were in 1997/1998, Cordelia realizing she’s gay/bi (or at least being out even to one person) would be a different dynamic. Especially if she and Xendra get caught at the same time. Or maybe Cordelia is more careful, and Xendra is more willing to be the dirty little secret she makes out with in closets? If caught, would Cordelia ever be willing to commit the possibly even greater social suicide of openly dating a girl in a late 90s High School? Or could she pull it off because she’s just that much Queen of the School? How does Willow’s crush on Xander work in an AU where she’s Xendra? If willow’s crush was about it being on a ‘safe’ and ‘unattainable’ boy (a common experience I’ve seen many cis lesbians talking about with regards to when they were younger and still thought or still tried to convince themselves they were straight), then presumably she wouldn’t have crushed on Xendra? Might she have crushed on Jesse? (or does Xendra end up being how Willow realizes she’s gay sooner?) Would Xendra have crushed on Jesse? Is Xendra gay or bi in this AU? Does she still crush on Buffy? If so, does she handle rejection or the prospect thereof better because she assumes Buffy is straight? Does she even try to ask her out?  I mean, there are others I’d read a Rule 63! Lesbian AU for, or even have, when they exist, but I have to admit I don’t find the potential dynamics inherent to be quite as interesting. And yeah, there are some het ships I ship that I just... wouldn’t find quite as interesting if they were lesbians, or just can’t see happening at all in a recognizeable way.

So I ask you tumblr - if you were to take a het ship and make them lesbians, which one(s) would you pick, and why?

[zairas-realm-gateway]

Because of my feral hyperfixation on Bruce Campbell (that apparently has been mounting slowly since childhood), my sister and I often discuss his many characters. Because Bruce is such a charismatic and varied actor, we love discussing the flare he gives to those characters.

More specifically, the sexual and/or gender identities of those characters based on how Bruce plays them. In this post I primarily want to talk about Brisco but I feel like I have to talk about a few others first. Just a couple because my sister and I constantly talk about these characters’ identities.

First up is the lovely Charles Travis (From Congo 1995, for those that don’t know). My personal obsession since childhood, god I want to kiss him. *cough* ignore that...

In the unfortunately, very short time we have with Charlie, he definitely gives off straight vibes. But these are non-toxic straight vibes. Despite being exhausted and stranded in the middle of the Congo, he’s got a bright, friendly disposition and you can hear his chemistry with Karen in the short conversation they have. Honestly, we needed more of him but this post isn’t about that... anyway, Charles is a sweet straight/cis man who may or may not have daddy issues because he let his asshole father send him to the Congo for no good fucking reason!

-

Up next is an easy and familiar choice: Ash Williams, the man who got bitchslapped by destiny and has three kids. 

There’s a lot of content with Ash. You really get to see his chemistry with other characters. I won’t get super deep into it because so many other Tumblr authors

have described it in far more detail but Ash gives off the opposite of straight vibes. The man is definitely giving off bisexual vibes. Ash loved all his girlfriends very much and had excellent chemistry with them. But Ash also has a soft, overly friendly vibe with other guys such as Scotty and Chet. The particular touchy-feely, constantly stealing long glances at each other vibes that Ash shares with Chet is what I’ve talking about. Also, there’s the obvious headcanon that Ash is trans, which I love. The entire series is full of evidence of Ash being trans but I also like to look to the second season of AvED for evidence. The dialog in that season, especially when talking with Brock and Cheryl, is incredibly trans-coded. Go check it out, it’s a great show.

-

Also, honorable mention before I get to Brisco: Autolycus

I haven’t gotten to the part of Xena with him yet but already I can tell you that this man is decidedly not straight. Like literally every other character in this show, this man is some intense flavor of queer.

-

Alrighty, enough of that.

On to Brisco!

Brisco County Jr, the sweetheart cowboy who always looks towards the future.

The past several days I’ve been thinking a lot about Brisco. Why? Because I fell head-over-heels for his disheveled ass, shut up! Now, I would like to say that at the point of writing this, I have only seen the first few episodes but there’s been enough context there for me to really think about this. I know that Brisco gets a girlfriend later in the series/season (he’s a male 90′s MC, it was mandatory he gets one). That being said, I see Brisco as being Gay/Ace with intense top energy (his constant confidence and self-assured aura). 

In like the three episodes I have seen of Brisco, this man has zero (0) romantic vibes with any of the women. His flirting, what little there is of it, is very mild and performative. Most of his relationships with women have a deep platonic vibe to them. Unlike Brisco’s energy with both Lord Bowler and Socrates. When he talks with them, it’s quite flirty and upbeat, playful. He teases them gently and is quite open with speaking to them. Despite him and Lord Bowler being rivals upon meeting, they already friendly protective of each other by the second episode.

The friendship that Brisco has cultivated with Lord Bowler by that point is very soft and affectionate. There’s a deep tenderness that transcends friendship. Lord Bowler drops his rough exterior around Brisco in ways that is not normally done.

People, you do not sing to your rival to comfort them while they’re in pain and dying unless there is something deeper going on with your relationship!

Also, in the episode where he goes to the town full of nothing but women, he doesn’t flirt with a single one. The professor keeps making insinuations about how great their situation is and Brisco’s just like “meh” about the whole thing. In that episode, during the trap set up in the bathhouse, Brisco never even casts an interested look at the naked woman in the bath. He simply thanks her for her help and leaves. Brisco also has decidedly platonic, almost sibling-like chemistry with the town’s sheriff. When he leaves town, there’s only a goodbye. No sidelong glances or shoehorned kiss. Nothing. They’re both the two least horny people in existence.

Speaking of Brisco not being horny, we not come to the part where I see him as being asexual. Though, he is not sex-repulsed. He will have sex if his partner wishes to. He’s not enthused or enticed by sex. Sexual intercourse is not a driving factor in his life. He would much rather be out discovering things or talking to his horse. 

I have a few examples of Brisco in situations where in any other show, the male lead would be overly enthusiastically engaged in the situation:

This is the body language of a man who is viscerally uncomfortable. You can tell by the crease in his cheek where her hand touches that he is actively recoiling from her in-coming kiss.

For this gif, normally in this situation the male lead would be doing one of several things: leaning into the touch, eyes drift down to watch where she is enticingly touching, returning the soft touch, or leaning his head in to continue the conversation. But Brisco does none of these things. He completely ignores what her hand is doing. His eyes stay on her face at all times. He isn’t checking out her very obvious tits. and he is once against actively leaning his head back as he speaks. He doesn’t so much as twitch at her touch. Brisco is completely unphased and uninterested in the sexual implications of their intimate positioning.

This is the least sexiest version of the “omg, I accidentally fell on you in a scandalous way” position I have ever seen in my life. Brisco’s mind is entirely on the situation outside of his intimate positioning. His mind is no way engaged in the fact that he is basically straddling a beautiful woman, he is too busy calculating the amount of danger he’s in. Something that most male leads do not immediately focus on when in such a position.

In conclusion, I’m just here to say that Brisco is an example of performative heteronormativity. He is playing “his part” in normal society but is not enthused by it. He knows how he's expected to act and does so when the time calls for it but does seek out opportunities to act in a hetero or allosexual manner. He would much rather either be on his own and daydream or converse with male friends/acquaintances all while having a deep feminist respect for women and their rights to safety and happiness.