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basedkikuenjoyer · 2 years

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So apparently I have hit a milestone while going full bore on my bullshit. There’s fifty of y’all now who decided you were getting enough out of this blog to follow along, and that’s mildly neat. Didn’t really expect that. We’ve had a lot of fun talking One Piece and other anime so I dunno, wanted to do something to mark the occasion and letting y’all know a bit more about my tastes seemed like it could be a lark. Shouldn’t be a shock that One Piece is my favorite anime/manga franchise...so here’s the rest of a top 10! No particular order, whys under the cut. Beyond that, consider me open to lightly personal asks for a bit too, just if you were curious.

TOP LEFT - Ranma 1/2: Okay...confession time. Eiichiro Oda is not actually my favorite mangaka. He’s pretty much only given us One Piece and there are several questionable aspects of his style. As a person and professional, I adore Rumiko Takahashi. Inuyasha was a huge deal for me as a teen. Mermaid Saga has been a fun recent read. Maison Ikkoku is one of my next big purchases planned. But Ranma, Ranma guys...it’s a stone-cold classic. Boy cursed to take the form of a cute girl when doused with water gets involved in a web of romantic pursuits stapled to bizarre martial arts competitions. It’s so silly, it’s honestly pretty smart when it wants to be. Fun shonen with a backdoor to maybe, just maybe giving young men a little empathy about what the girls in their lives are dealing with. This kind of blend is why Takahashi is such a goddamn legend and manga pioneer. Team Shampoo for life.

TOP MIDDLE - YuYu Hakusho: Yeah, it means more to me than Hunter x Hunter. This was one of the most important anime series for me to stumble across. Adult Swim back in the early 00s. It’s what showed me there was a much cooler world of more mature anime out there. Kurama was also a first anime crush and that sparked a lifelong love for plant-based superpowers because that’s probably what I would have if we lived in a cooler world. This is as infinitely rewatchable to me as The Simpsons or King of the Hill, and it even got more meaningful given my boyfriend and I bonded over it early in our relationship.

TOP RIGHT - Paranoia Agent: Another 00s Adult Swim classic, but one it took me a while to properly sit down and watch. I’m...generally a little too squishy for the truly screwed up anime out there but this one I could handle. And I love it. Especially as an adult that has had moments I wish a “Lil Slugger” could give me an out from day-to-day problems. “Happy Family Planning” is such a friggin masterpiece. Same with the most kickass lady in the series talking the monster down. I can’t recommend it easily because it does get into things like suicide casually, but man is it so good at what it wants to do. So short but it leaves such an impact.

MIDDLE LEFT - Kaguya, Love is War: I needed one episode of this to know it’d be a favorite. It’s a silly little high school romcom that has no business being as good as it is but I love every minute of Kaguya and Shirogane’s wild ride. That ending? Facepalmed because it was obviously the only way those two could end up of course. But I also love this series for being willing to be real, calling out gendered double standards and talking frankly about sex in a way that never feels inappropriate. But more than anything it’s a riot! The English Dub just makes me like it more for the headcanon this is all a story Brook is making up to kill time.

CENTER - Stop!! Hibari-Kun: I’ve talked about this one before. Shonen romcom where the everyboy lead is pursued by the perfect girl...who happens to be trans. It’s funny, heartfelt, and so ahead of its time in so many ways. Not to mention the fashion! It’s a cool series made cooler by it’s unique place in manga history.

CENTER RIGHT - Nana: Hey! It’s another one Oda namedropped! I remember being so excited when Shoujo Beat magazine had it’s run here in the US. Had a subscription for issue 1 and let it run for two years. So fun getting that in the mail as a teen even if my Mom groaned about it every time. This was their flagship and it isn’t hard to see why. A very real, even kinda gritty story about early adulthood. The odd couple roommates but the conflict isn’t really as much about them fighting. It’s about women supporting each other and finding their way together. And like Kaguya, it doesn’t shy away from some real problems women that age might have to deal with, even if they’re unsavory to discuss.

BOTTOM LEFT - Revolutionary Girl Utena: Trippy, weird, gay as hell, and has a good point by the end. I just adore everything about Utena. It flew over my head when I was a young teen watching it, but I still enjoyed it. Going back later though, I think this might be one of the smartest anime I’ve ever seen. Only problem is you can’t really describe why it’s awesome without spoiling it. But even little tricks like burying massive twists in clip show episodes...awesome. If I made a manga, this would be the main influence.

BOTTOM MIDDLE - Cardcaptor Sakura: Catch you catch you catch me catch me daaaatte... I’m so glad I got to see this as a kid Sakura’s age. It was always just such a comfy show as a kid. Tomoeda is the type of small town I wish I could have grown up in instead of Biblethumping and letting everything go to shit because all the adults cared about was phony moral outrage. Aside from that though, an almost perfect example of a Magical Girl series. Solid gay rep for the time too which I enjoyed. I say “almost” though because goddamn do I hate the Rika/Mr. Terada side of it. Too far CLAMP, even with the anime reining it in.

BOTTOM RIGHT - Fruits Basket: I was a fanatic about this manga when I was about 14-15. Then it came back with the anime adaptation it always deserved! It’s so hard to pin down what makes Fruits Basket so good, ostensibly it’s just kind of a reverse harem romcom. But its so heartfelt and unfraid to be comfy and sweet. It also gave me Ayame to salivate over. Between him, Kurama, Izo, & Cavendish...I think I have a type.

#50 follower spectacular #ranma 1/2 #yu yu hakusho #paranoia agent #kaguya-sama: love is war #stop!! hibari-kun #nana #revolutionary girl utena #cardcaptor sakura #fruits basket

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jazzsequence · 7 months

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If I tell a trans woman I hope she dies in a car explosion and gets crushed by an elephant it’s just going to be taken as a silly joke right? Not like it’s realistic. I mean if that trans dude can issue death threats when they are funny silly so I right?

This is a fascinating question and definitely not at all trolling.

The difference between threatening a trans person with violence and threatening a privileged, cis-white-hetero male with the same thing is that violence is committed against trans people every day. There is no question that if someone was actually threatening the life of a wealthy tech CEO that any number of systems would jump in to support him and ensure his safety (his own posts on the subject prove this point).

Those same systems fail trans folk every single day, in a multitude of large and small ways, leading to the type of trolling and misgendering you so eloquently illustrate in your fake question.

To be clear, sure, I guess if you told someone that you hoped an elephant fell from the sky and crushed them it would be considered a joke. It wouldn't be particularly funny, but it does not resemble anything close to reality. Threatening someone with a car explosion is a different thing, and I note that you did not use the same language (car covered in hammers, hammers exploding everywhere, etc) which makes it less of a "joke" and more of a threat of intent.

Our freedom of speech in this country gives us permission to say whatever the fuck we want. It doesn't give people a free pass to be an asshole or to deny someone's individual pursuit to exist as they please and be safe from harm or threats of harm.

Is there a double-standard that I have less concern about the wellbeing of a cis-gendered white tech dude than I do about a trans person? Sure it's a double-standard. Because our culture has said that these people over here are okay to live an unbothered life and these people over there are wrong, deviant, sinful and destroying America, and there are very real laws written every day to prevent them from accessing the same quality of life as everyone else.

So, sure, if you want to tell a trans person that you hope they die in a fire, that a piano drops on their head, or whatever stupid shit you want to say, you are within your legal right to do so. And they are well within their rights to block the fuck out of you for being an asshole and a threat to their desire to live a fucking normal, peaceful life without jackasses constantly harassing them.

So glad you were the first question I've been asked on this stupid site in however many years I've had an account open and that you've given me the opportunity to express how truly deplorable of a human being you are for thinking you are being clever.

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deerydear · 10 months

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Doubt tends to surface as transition milestones approach: coming out to family or at school, starting testosterone, scheduling a double mastectomy, changing legal documents. And the advice is almost always: If you’re not sure, take the next step and see how it feels. Fill that prescription and see how it feels to hold that vial of testosterone in your hand or inject it into your thigh. You can always change your mind. Never mind that the more costs you sink, the harder it can be to pull back.

Internalized transphobia, imposter syndrome, and intrusive thoughts let members of online trans communities express and then disown their doubts. So you can say: I can’t let go of the fear that I’m faking it and that this is all a huge mistake. But the conclusion is predetermined: your fears are irrational. Your doubts are misplaced. You must say so yourself, and then the community reinforces your refusal to take your questions and doubts as serious challenges to your self-identity and decision to transition. Not only that: your doubts are a sign you’re really trans.

Resistance, doubts and scruples become part of the heroic story arc that leads to accepting your trans identity and embarking on transition. The ways in which the decision to identify as trans and transition mirrors an authentic journey of self-discovery makes it harder to question, too. You’re overcoming difficulties—including your internal hangups. You’re undergoing often painful procedures. You’re making hard decisions about who to keep in your life and who to cut out. These are the kinds of things people do when they’re overhauling their lives—whether that’s for the better or whether they’ve joined something many of us have come to think of as a cult.

The full article is very illuminating on an emotion that a lot of people try to obfuscate.

I have gotten into these sorts of discussions of "the online trans community and how 'it' acts", a few times.

I've encountered people acting like "this never happens. You're making it up. I've never experienced anything like this. My local trans community experience is much different."

I see a parallel between their disbelief, and the way that I view some feminist women talking about the misogynist behaviour they've faced.

I may have faced nothing like that, so I don't benefit from cutting men out of my life... because not all men are the problem. It's funny to see how "not all men" is a taboo phrase within some feminist circlejerks.

Let me take for instance, this post:

The patriarchy cannot motivate an otherwise innately good man to assault, rape or kill a woman, like people seem to want to believe. The cruelty must already be in him. He fuels the patriarchy with his actions, and the patriarchy serves to endorse his cruelty and provide him with the means to successfully execute it, but doesn't create his depravity in the first instance. The patriarchy cannot psychically compel a “soft, gentle man” to go against his true nature and become a violent rapist, he must already have the capacity to be one. That’s why I criticise the way the “patriarchy” has evolved into a convenient scapegoat that redirects blame away from men and towards a toxic ideology instead. It’s become a catch-all invisible boogeyman that obfuscates the true perpetrators and benefactors of male violence and aggression. A mysterious force that can apparently compel otherwise good men to commit atrocities. That it's the reason why 90% of murders, 99% of sexual assaults, and 95% of domestic abusers are men. That men have no personal culpability, really- it's nurture, not nature. It turns the issue of male violence into a general societal problem that everyone’s complicit in, and everybody suffers equally from. It’s become a passive way of discussing the sex-based oppression women face. People seem to forget that patriarchy is directly tied to men. It was created by men, for the benefit of men, and relies on the participation of men.

It starts off strong and truthfully, but at the end, the author concludes that "this violent system is made 'by men, for men'..... as if there are no good men.

As if it isn't "by abusers, for abusers". Do you think that good men enjoy seeing the women in their lives being mistreated?

When I hear "men", I think of my father. My father is a good man. The first man I've met. He is the blueprint for "what a man is".

I would guess that many of these feminist women's fathers are not upstanding men. They impressed a legacy of hatred upon their daughters.

The issue I have is whenever women like this try to say I should choose them over my own father. Fuck you.

I shouldn't have to suffer just because you did. You fucking pitiful crabs. If you want to act like that, you'll never get out of your bucket. The fisherman will gut you alive.

Personal vendetta, the end. Not very glorious. Kind of dumb.

Can't you look past the nitty-gritty of human beings, and appreciate the scientist within them?

I know I used to, before I started to take everything seriously and personally.

I was able to recognize whenever other people were overzealous and irrational in achieving their supposed goals.

I think part of my problem would be in trying to ascribe a "timeline" to my life.

"Oh, I was more this way back then... I was more this way a few years ago." I can be however I want, mentally... anytime. As long as I summon it up, rightfully.

Sob story?

Attention-seeker?

Lonely child?

Go make use. No-face.

I like the end of Spirited Away.

"I think being in the bath-house makes him crazy."

"No-face, you're really good at this. Where did you learn to spin thread?"

#detransition inc.

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shizuostrans · 2 years

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do you think izaya is transphobic for calling him shizu-chan?

ANON I AM SO SORRY FOR ONLY NOW GETTING TO YOUR MESSAGE AFTER 3000 YEARS. Not so chill events have transpired lately and it's made me scattered enough that I kinda forgot. :X *aheeem*

I should probably clarify that my trans Shizuo theory is not in any way tied to Shizaya but like... what’s presented in canon. Where they explicitly hate each other despite Narita bending so far backward to underline it that their reasonings make very little sense. So I'm going off that, with a heavier emphasis on the novels which paints their relationship in a lot less "playful" way than in the anime.

STILL, I don’t think Izaya would be purposely transphobic. Don’t get me wrong, he says some truly despicable and uncalled for things to Shizuo, like the p*do thing, but I honestly believe Izaya doesn’t know.

He vocally hates knowing shit about Shizuo, and the majority of the time he only wants to know enough to do his business without him interjecting. The other times where he is interested in figuring out what's going on with Shizuo are because he's focused on orchestrating plans to take him down or much less often use Shizuo to his advantage (in spinoffs and their early years anyway). I think it’s pretty common for the fandom to think Izaya knows everything about Shizuo, but that’s not quite true. He knows a good chunk about him from all their time together and keeps tabs on him, sure, but gathering intel to get a leg up on Shizuo isn't the same as getting to know him.

What I mean in this context is that it’s easy for Izaya to pick up on the frailty of Shizuo’s masculinity and even easier to pick at it to get a reaction out of him. On the surface it’s a straightforward answer – Shizuo is a personified brutish male power fantasy and suffers from a deep set case of male fragility. There’s nothing too surprising there or worth looking further into. More importantly it's a weakness of his, and it seems fitting for someone as juvenile as Shizuo to be pissed over something equally juvenile. Their relationship revolves around seeing the worst in each other, and any other reasons why Shizuo could get riled up by being called a girly nickname an old classmate referred to him as aren’t really considered.

The last thing imaginable for Izaya to want to do through the main series is humanize Shizuo (or vice versa) when dehumanizing Shizuo is the very foundation for his hatred. He wants to know what makes him tick, not why it does because there’s little point in figuring out the mentality of a monster. Things like his childhood, his life journey, and his gender identity (moreso if Izaya himself is trans) are all surefire ways to do so. Unless Shinra blabbed about it or he heard it secondhand, it’s not something he would actively dig into or have the desire to? Maybe before he met him, but Shizuo has a knack for stockpiling unbelievable rumors, both credible ones and ones that aren’t. He has a whole thing about not being apprehended because everything he is and does is unbelievable to other people, and that includes Izaya. He didn’t believe most of it either until he witnessed it firsthand.

Shizuo also has a rather uhh effective way of dissuading people from outing him or bringing doubt to their claims by instilling the fear of god into the general populace. With the looming threat of bodily carnage if anyone tests his microscopic tolerance threshold. Naturally. It’s practically in the users’ guide to Ikebukuro, and it tracks that using that infamy to identify himself to keep people from picking fights with him or even looking at him funny doubles as a way to cement it into people’s minds. Of being known as the strongest man in Ikebukuro rather than the previous identity he was known for. He weaponizes his own identity, and it adds another layer to his dependence on violence to solve his problems. ANYWAYS.

Do I think Shizu-chan is a type of deadname for him?

Yes. Insisting someone you have a hostile relationship with call you by the name you want to be called when it hasn't been respected for seven years is pretty much that.

Do I think Izaya calls him that to deadname him?

No. Izaya calls him Shizu-chan because he believes Shizuo’s a monster with a stupidly fragile ego, not because he’s a transguy who’s insecure about how people perceive his masculinity and identity. And boy does that man have the fragilest sense of masculinity that I will 1000% get into in the future.

#shizuo heiwajima #izaya orihara #durarara #drrr #shizuoposting #trans shizuo hours #IF they were on amicable terms and shizuo had an understanding #that embracing femininity doesn't actually emasculate you or invalidate your identity it could be different #ALAS that is what aus are for

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after-nine-at-the-oasis · 3 years

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Okay by the way like, as I literally yelled (okay said loudly), yes, out loud:

THAT'S HOW THIS EPISODE ENDS XD???

The 'XD' was for tone lol XDD And besides, after that

Anyway!! Also Mateo was absolutely a d o r a b l e in this episode 🥰🥰🥰🥰 Bird bestie 👍👍👍

But yeah! Time for the :)). . .

REVIEW

Okay, so, I loved this episode! Honestly, I love every episode, just some more than others 🥰🥰🥰. And eh, I'd say this is one of them! Probably not one of my absolute favorites, but I really liked it :)). It did feel a little bit boring, some times more than others, plus the fact that I knew Paul would be okay kind of negated it for me a little bit, but I am nervous about the future :((. I'm assuming what they're talking about is an ICD (implantable cardioverter defibrillator - which I had to look up, because all I could think of was IED but obviously I knew that wasn't it xDD Got the 'I' right, though! Even if I didn't know what it stood for, lol, XD), but I truly have no idea ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I imagine they were purposefully vague, though - it's easiest, especially for future storyline opportunities, even if those opportunities happen to be limited to just having a character explain it without making it seem to redundant ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (alright, that's enough shrugging lol)

But, yeah! First of all: Paul :)). Obviously, lol - I hope, anyway! XD. Well, I suppose I could go with least important/least content first, but, eh,乁| ･〰･ |ㄏ, I'm not lol. Accidental shrug but it has variety and it works so I put it back in lol. Anyway! Paul.

I A B S O L U T E L Y. L O V E MY BOY!!!!!!

Like literally he's just a guy 😭😭😭😭. Trying his best :'((((. But like, seriously, the part where he says his dad was the best person he knew (ignore my weird tense usage, I think it works lol)? Heartbreaking 💔💔💔💔😭😭. Heartwarming as well though, lol - ❤️❤️❤️❤️🥰🥰 xDD. Just, great. All around XD. But anyway, that paired with him talking about "be who you are", referencing being trans (I assume)? UGH!! My heart 😭😭😭🥰❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️. I just- I love him so much okay :'))))))?

And don't even get me STARTED on his friendship with Marjan :'D. Like, y'all are L I T E R A L L Y icons 🥰🥰🥰❤️❤️❤️😭😭. Love y'all so much <3333 :)).

Also just- "Ride or dies don't ghost each other" 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰❤️❤️❤️❤️🥰❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️🥰🥰🥰🥰❤️❤️ YES. I JUST- I LOVE THEM OKAY??? YYEEESSSSSSSSSS ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️🥰🥰🥰🥰❤️🥰❤️❤️❤️🥰. 💔 HEART BROKEN BECAUSE IT HURTS SO MUCH FROM L O V E. And also because they're fighting 😭😭 mainly because Paul's in pain too, so DOUBLE pain for me xdd. But, still, lol. I just- I know it's funny, and it is too, but- themmm :')). Ride or dies :'DD. Ahhh. . . Love them.

But yeah, I am concerned for their friendship in the future :((. I know they'll make up, I just don't know how long it'll be 😬. I imagine, or at least hope, soon though, based on the glimpse of the 3x10 summary I saw.

Back to Paul, though, I am honestly worried that he won't get back to work full force :((. Like, Buck got to in the original 9-1-1, and this is kind of a similar situation, so (story-wise, I mean, lol, not practicality wise xDD) why shouldn't he be able to? Idk, I'd just feel really bad for him if he couldn't, and obviously I'd miss him so, so, much :'(( :'D (bc love him, for the smiley :')) ). We would all miss him, and so would all of them, especially Marjan, and we/I don't deserve THAT (their pain) either, so here we are. With the only possible solution being for it not to happen ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ lol XDD. Seriously though, if it is an ICD, from what I've heard/read, that stuff can mess you up :(( 😬. Fitness and lifestyle wise I mean, mostly. But still :(. It just sucks, and I don't want Paul to be going through this. Limited activities also hits sort of hard with what I'm going through right now and it's just. . . Eulgh. It hurts, and it hits really hard and close to home xdd. Like, not the most thing ever (although, even though I knew it wasn't, probably, for one crazy minute I did consider it being EDS lol - that would be wild XD But, if I can't get rep for that, in glad someone else with something even/way rarer can get it :)) And I'm just glad for them in general lol; happy for you guys, keep going, and doing great :pp :))) ), but still, pretty badly (in a good way xdd). I loved the storyline, of course - honestly that kind of made me love it more :// :)) ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ lol. XDD But, yeah, I love him, so so So S O much, and I just hope he's okay <333.

Anyway!!

TK (and Tommy): :DDDDDD Loved them so much!!! Just- them :)). Love me some Rescue 126 :')). Although I am wondering where Nancy was lol. Same with Asher in The Good Doctor tonight, I guess (to me I mean): she finally had a shift off from work XDD.

Anyway, I really expected TK to turn her down! Maybe accept it at the end, and if we didn't see one of the meetings, the beginning of the next episode, or near it anyway? Somewhere in 3x10. Or earlier, and see it at the end, again, like we did :). But, seriously, he didn't! Refuse, I mean :)). And honestly, good for him :'D. He deserves some healthiness :))) <33.

Also, real quick note!! I'm glad we addressed (with him doing it) the narcotics safe :)). Especially in this episode, this quickly I mean. I don't know if we'll ever see the confession to Carlos, because I'm sure there is one - I mean, maybe it already happened ¯\_(ツ)_/¯! But, still :). It was good, and I enjoyed it. And it proves (though we were already pretty darn sure), to us, and to him, that he's honest :). Because really, he is - he's just a genuinely honest guy. Sometimes he lies or blows up in the moment, but he always comes clean later. And, tries to make it right if he did something wrong (which tends to go with lying, or even lying being the thing done that was wrong lol), or said something in the previous aftermath or whatever (I'm trying to say like, I'm including times like 2x04 in this xDD). Idk, it's just like: nice :)). Good for him :'pp. Again, like I said (I don't know why I need both of those but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ eh, why not - also, for what I'm about to say, not food-wise lol, or anything like that, you know what I mean xDD), he deserves something healthy :')).

And, the Owen storyline! Yeah, surprisingly, I didn't hate it lol. I love Mateo, and he was cute in it (such an adorable little man <3333 my baby :')) ), so that's a bonus as well lol. But, honestly, yeah! It was heartfelt (maybe that's the world I've been looking for sometimes, lol, xD. I mean, heartwarming works, but they're not always the exact same vibes when they don't have extra explanations, yk? Especially when heartfelt can be sad. . . - I mean, seriously, look at least week with episode 8 lol. But, anyway :) ), Owen actually processed some of his trauma, which- honestly, good for him, lol, we got some more of the background of Gwyn, Owen, and to some extent (in this case of background information I mean, even though for some reason I nearly listed him first lol), TK's family life (the apostrophe 's' family life applies to all of them by the way lol). I just always love when we get some of that/those (facts? I guess? Lol, idk), and it included a bird. Soo, I mean, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I kinda have/had to like it :)). XDD. Even if the bird did die, relating to the fact that it existed in the first place and that there was a bird that died in the storyline itself lol. Although. . .

Turns out the bird's not dead XDD. He's fine, he was just chilling lol. Or faking or something xDD. Idk, maybe a medical problem lol. Like, I know there's a 98% chance he is (dead, I mean) but I just- I think it would be funny XDD.

And his conversation with Judd was cute 🥰🥰. Just two guys, being bros, but literally :DD. Because Judd loves the amazing, wonderful Grace, who, despite us not seeing her much this episode, besides a 9-1-1 call or maybe two, I think, is in all of our hearts since she's so awesome. Our queen <33. We stan. Lol, not literally. But yeah, we love her :')) <33. Anyways, back to the two of them, Owen and Judd!! I just love them so much. Their friendship is great :')). Love my little funky boys :ppp!!!

Anyway! Lastly before the final overview lol: where was Carlos. I deserved my boy XDD. C'mon, even just for a second - like, we saw his partner XD. I mean come o n guys, lol. And by partner I mean police partner, by the way - I will almost definitely always call TK his boyfriend lol. I mean, besides partner, except maybe on specific, rare occasions lol. No matter how cute, and fun it is skfhsgdklfs xDD. Also, you know what? Maybe he's just off like Nancy today, lol. Off-work, I mean xD. Good for them lol. Maybe xD. Anyway, lol, still XDD.

Overall, I thought this was a really good episode! You know what, scratch that, really GREAT. I just loved it all around, the calls were fun, and no one died :). I mean, there was the aftermath of last week's episode/the week before that's episode lol, but still. I'm really worried for Paul, and for his and Marjan's friendship, not to mention her reaction and how she's doing with all of this, but I think we'll all be okay. That they'll be okay. Hopefully :'pp :)). Now THAT tear is most likely a 'help me' tear lol. Anyway!! Loved Owen, surprisingly, and his storyline - more his storyline to be honest, lol, but I can at least kinda respect his arc, I guess, lol xDD -, loved the bird itself, loved Marjan and her AMAZING fashion sense, especially this episode, and all on ~display~ and everything, with multiple days out of 'the office' lol - out of work xdd it's honestly a good thing I put quotation marks on it lol, kind of on the quotation marks part, since that's not technically what they are XDD -, and I loved TK and seeing his grief, plus him telling that story and the loss and grief group, and his and Tommy's relationship in general this episode 🥰🥰🥰. Besides all that, the calls were amazing - funny, kind of, sweet, intriguing, medically especially, and smart. Just generally a good time :)). And, lastly, though I missed my boy Carlos, Mateo was adorable. Those two things are largely unrelated, but I suppose it's because the good/love factor lol. And of them both being my children - aaaas I believe pretty much everyone on this show is xDD. And for the preview - hm, not my first choice of storylines, but I'm interested! And I'm sure I'll have, and like, the side/other plots too :). I'm just intrigued, right now, mostly!! We'll see what happens, how amazing it is, though I have no doubt that it'll be good :)). If not great, or awesome! Any of those things, lol. Well, like I said, basically xD, we'll have to see!!

So yeah! Loved the episode, it was amazing :)). I'm worried for Paul and all - rhyme! :)) -, but I think we've got this :'p. Wiping off the emotional, not literal, tears, and getting ready for next week :DD <33.

This has been my review of. . .

9-1-1: Lone Star, Season 3, Episode 9: The Bird

I loved the episode. I thought it was great :)). And I'm very excited for the next one :DD!!

See you next week for. . .

9-1-1: Lone Star, Season 3, Episode 10: Parental Guidence

See you all then!!!!

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potatopossums · 2 years

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I feel like our pre-transition selves deserve compassion and kindness.

One of my trans friends is holding a celebration of life for their pre-transition self, and that is the most beautiful concept ever.

I don't think I'm totally in a place where i could do that for myself, if that's ever a place i cross through at all, but i love that idea so much.

Like, i do believe that our past selves deserve credit and gratitude for getting us through what they did, and bringing us to the place we're in now. We are here because of them.

Even so, it's also still hard for me to fully accept my past self.

There were a lot of things that i was and did that just weren't in alignment with who i am now. And i don't like to associate myself with that. I'm ashamed of things i did and believed, especially while i was still Christian and in a conservative community. I don't like the choices i made, even while i felt internally conflicted at times, and was surrounded by a culture and family that molded me to think how i did. Even with that, it's still hard to forgive myself. Because i know those things i said and did were hurtful. And i don't ever want to be that again. I don't ever want to excuse that, not in myself and not in others. And i realize that's a Me Issue, and forgiveness doesn't have to mean that any of those things were okay. But i also have a funny relationship with forgiveness as it is. And that's a topic for a different post.

I think it also sucks bc my past self was externally more a reflection of the people who influenced me the most, rather than my true authentic self. I was a people pleaser, and yeah i did it to protect myself because i really doubt people in my life would have fully accepted me as i was. But that doesn't make it okay. And i hate looking at my past self and seeing other people instead, people who i now see for who they are as well, people i really dislike and distrust ( — people who rejected and attacked me and didn't support me when i was finally vulnerable about who i was and what mattered to me).

So it's complicated.

But — i CAN see the little parts of me that were hidden from everyone, the parts that survived the double life, the parts that are just blooming again because they have a chance to breathe in air that isn't filled with shame. I do love that part of me that was underneath it all, still fighting, finally triumphant and living.

Still have a long way to go even on that front, because unlearning people pleasing is... a lot, lol.

And it's so hard when i run into past bits of myself bubbling up even nowadays. It's hard to have patience with that because it's something i don't want to be. And i even moreso don't want to be like the people who hurt me, the people who molded me to be that way.

But we try to have patience. We try. Because it's what we deserved back then too. Patience and kindness and understanding and choice. Room to grow. Autonomy. Support. I never deserved the pain i endured. I didn't deserve to fear being hated and dismissed and rejected for who i truly was. I didn't deserve the reality of those fears, the roots of them, the rejection and dismissal and hatred flung at me. I didn't deserve to be molded into what i was. Nobody i hurt deserved that pain and mistreatment. And i don't forgive those who don't change. I don't forgive those who remind me of shit people in my life. I don't forgive people who attack my existence. I forgive people who work with me, people who care about the real me, people who want to see me succeed. I don't need to forgive those people who treated me like dirt and abandoned me. I don't need to be close with anyone i don't want to be. I don't need to repair relationships I've outgrown, especially not relationships that i never destroyed to begin with. It's not my responsibility to help other people apologize and change after they've hurt me.

So maybe, just maybe, i can forgive the part of myself that did change. Maybe i can forgive the part of me that persevered and continued to search for freedom and truth, the little bit of me alive today, the blooming part. Maybe i can forgive that part of me that was always there, the part that was terrified and in pain and doing their best to navigate a world that didn't understand them and didn't want them to exist (literally). I won't forgive the abusers. And i won't forgive the abuse. But i can forgive the part that dared to be better than that, the part that dared to live, the part that dared to be vulnerable, soft, strong, and honest. I can forgive the part of me that saw what trash i had become, and said enough was enough, and chose the long and difficult road of changing their ways. I can forgive the part of me that persisted for justice, mine and others'. I can forgive the part of me that is too hard on myself. I can forgive the part of me that just wants to make sure that never happens again. I can forgive the part of me that was so terrified they became an expert chameleon. I can forgive the real me for their mistakes, even though that's difficult.

I can remember when i came out as queer to my mom, she asked me, what about back in high school when you staunchly believed that was a sin?

I replied that i was in high school, i was impressionable, i was surrounded by people who believed those things, went to a church who molded me to believe that, and i didn't have much of a choice to see myself any other way. I chose to believe something that was hurtful, i followed where my leaders and family members led because i thought they knew better than me. Now, i understood that it was wrong of me to adopt those beliefs. Now i understood who i really was in that equation. Now i understood why it happened.

And i wanted to ask why she never stepped in. I wanted to ask why she saw that as a parent and didn't think that was worthy of correcting. So many other things, minor things, were more worth correcting to her than telling me that i was being unfair and wrong. Maybe she didn't have an argument. Maybe she didn't feel confident. But i didn't understand why this came up after i came out as queer almost 3 years later. Was being queer really even an option when i was in high school? When it was a sin to almost my entire community? When i too believed it was, even despite my own misgivings with that? I sooner accepted other people as queer than myself. How could I have possibly allowed myself to even think there was a chance of my own queerness when i was indoctrinated? Not to mention that i was unknowingly aroace for even longer still, which i fully believe made it even harder for me to realize where i was on the spectrum of all these intersecting things.

It's like asking me why I'm queer.

I didn't choose to be queer. I was given knowledge. I was given a space where it was finally actually okay to be queer. I finally had a safe space. It took me so long to realize that safe space belonged to me, too.

I didn't choose to be queer. I finally chose, and had the opportunity and space, to be honest. Both with others, and with myself. I finally had the option. And I chose it. Because it already fit.

#queer #aromantic #alterous #agender #lgbtq #personal #lesbian #gynephile #transgender #tw trauma #tw homophobia #nonbinary

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crazymarvelsuperfamily · 5 years

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A Trans Peter Ficlet

because I have a million and one things that I should be doing, but I wrote this instead. Its about Periods so there’s blood (so kinda TW). There are no spoilers for anything in this. I’m now ignoring endgame :) its just over 1k long

“Peter, come on, wake up now,” Natasha’s voice coaxed him awake. Peter groaned miserably. “You’ve been asleep long enough now, malen’kiy, I need you to get up.” She said, gently shaking his shoulder until his eyes blinked open.

Peter sat up slowly and scanned his surroundings. He had obviously fallen asleep watching a movie in the common room, his limbs sprawled across Tony’s pale grey sofa. “Yeah ‘Tasha, I’m awake now. Wassup?” He yawned, rubbing his eyes roughly.

Natasha smiled sympathetically and crouched down next to him, causing Peter to wonder what had happened. She leaned in close to him, so that Clint and Scott messing around over in the kitchen had no chance of hearing her. “malen’kiy, your period must’ve started.” She whispered.

Peter’s eyes widened in shock, and he looked down. Sure enough, his cotton basketball shorts were stained red, and a small patch of blood had started to pool onto the sofa. His face dropped, struck in terror, and his hands started to shake. He gasped for a few breaths, as a bead of sweat rose from under his curls. “I-I-errr.” He stuttered. He hadn’t told any of the team so far, and he really wasn’t ever planning on. The Avengers were the first people who he met shortly after he came out as Trans – the first people who never knew his dead name, or ever knew that he wasn’t always a guy. And it was amazing. Like, sure he was quite short for someone his age, and hadn’t ever had a real voice break, but no one seemed to suspect anything. And now, all of that was blown completely, just because he forgot about his stupid period. His hands tremored as he tried to stand up, to run away, but Natasha stopped him, cupping his cheeks with her small cool hands.

“Don’t worry Peter; you are not the first person to bleed all over the couch. Ask anyone. Do you need to borrow a few things?” She asked him quietly. Peter nodded shakily. Natasha helped him to stand, and threw down her jacket over the sofa to hide the blood stain. She guided Peter to her apartment, standing behind him with her hands on his shoulders to hide his shorts from the back. Peter wanted to cry in thankfulness at Natasha’s response. She was one of the first people to find out he was Trans and treat him with no difference what so ever.

Natasha led Peter straight into her spacious bathroom and handed him soft, but black towel. “Take a shower, while I wash your clothes out. Pads and tampons and things are in the cupboard below the sink.” She said.

Peter tried to object, “Tasha, you really don’t have to wash my clothes or let me shower or anything, I just need a box of pads – that’s all.”

But Natasha leaned in and kissed him on his forehead, “Kid, I’m an assassin, I bet I’m much more efficient at getting the blood out.” She smirked, “so stop being silly and throw out your shorts in a second.” She turned and left him on his own in the bathroom.

Slightly against his will, he threw his clothes out of the bathroom before he tentatively stepped into Natasha’s shower. And by the time he had stepped out again and dried off, his clothes were clean and dry, and stacked in a neat pile next to the bathroom door. Peter almost double took at Natasha’s skill – how on earth could she do that in 10 minutes? He struggled back into his binder and slipped his shorts and T-shirt back on, and found Natasha in her lounge watching TV.

She gestured for him to come and sit with her, so Peter gingerly did so. She passed a hot water bottle and mug of hot chocolate to him, and with a gulp, he gave a nod of thanks. “How do you do that?” He asked quietly.

“Do what?” Natasha asked.

“All of it.” Peter whispered.

“I don’t know. I’ve always made a mean hot chocolate, and been good at laundry, it’s not that hard. Then again, with Tony as your father figure, it isn’t hard to believe that you’ve never learnt.” Natasha said offhandedly.

“Not what I meant.” Peter looked at her timidly. “Did you know already?”

Natasha sighed heavily, “if it’s any consolation, nobody else knows, not even Tony.”

Peter nodded silently, chewing on his lip. “How have you always known though?” Peter twitched.

“Because I’m trained to see everything, and I act like I know everything all the time.” Natasha shrugged. She shuffled across the sofa so that she was sitting next to him.

Peter briefly rested his head on her shoulder, before sitting up again, to tentatively meet her eye line. “Are you going to tell anyone?” Peter asked hesitantly.

Natasha shook her head. “Not unless you want me to.”

“Why would I want you to though?” Peter tilted his head to the side.

“If you talk to Bruce or Dr Cho, they can give you T, and there are surgical options – you don’t need to ever have a period again – if that’s something you want.” She suggested.

Peter sighed. “I looked into those kinds of things, but they’re really expensive and I didn’t want to put that burden on May, and I’m not sure I’m really to tell Mr Stark, or Dr Banner.” He looked downcast and almost guilty.

Natasha outstretched her arm, and pulled Peter’s head back onto her shoulder, mindlessly carding grow her fingers through his damp curls. “Hey, don’t get upset, that’s super valid and up to be a man understandable. And you know that I don’t think you’re any less of an awesome kid, who’s going to as smart as Tony, strong as Steve, and funny as Clint.” She smiled at him.

Peter cast his eyes up to her face, nervously smiled back, “Thank you.” His eyes started to well up a little, she was the first person who Peter (although unintentionally) came out to who he felt truly accepted him for who he really was.

#spidermom #spider son #trans peter #Precious Peter Parker

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tiergan-vashir · 5 years

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What about a cis woman who has androgynous features and hates it and herself for it? I'd give anything for a more feminine face and not look so flat chested. Is this dysphoria too? Do you have any resources for this sort of problem? It seems silly, but when I see trans women having things like facial feminization surgery or going on hormones and getting breasts that are nice, I wonder if a cis woman who experiences the same pain over her androgynous features is in the same boat..

Aww, anon. I’m so sorry to hear that you’re struggling this way. I wouldn’t say this is gender dysphoria as gender dysphoria is involves a persistent sense of unease and conflict between a person’s physical or assigned gender and the gender with which he/she/they identify. You are a cis woman who identifies as a woman, but wishes she looked more feminine, which is very different.

I would assess how strong your feelings are and if it’s extremely severe, to the point that your distress causes you to be highly preoccupied with it and it is impacting your school, work, home, etc or and you find yourself hiding away, I would consult a therapist. You may have body dysmorphic disorder.If it’s not quite THAT extreme, the I would say that what you’re feeling and struggling with is still totally valid and far, far more common amongst folks than you might think. Whether you realise it or not, as a woman you are bombarded all the time with powerful systemic, societal pressures to look, dress, and behave in a certain manner every day - and all of that can really destroy how people feel about themselves.

Shoving the rest of this under a cut for length.

Let me just tell you right now - my breasts are fuckin’ tiny. I know I literally just asked for advice on binders a few days ago, but I’m an A cup at best. Probably smaller. The slight, itty-bitty ‘cup’ shape on my flimsy bralettes probably give these non-existent knockers more shape than they really have. Even though I’m buying binders and what not, on a lazy day, I could honestly just slap some pasties on these nip-nops and call it good. They’re that small.

This is amazing and awesome now that I’m busily trying to minimize their existence as much as possible. I consider myself genderqueer/genderfluid so some days I’ll be crushed over the fact that I can’t be this tall, jacked, majestic Tiergan-shaped dude, while other days I’ll be fine and dandy with looking like a woman, while MOST days I just want to be the purest manifestation of Gender Confusion Inducement™ in other people. Me wanting binders over my itty-bitty nublet tiddies is just me wanting to go that extra mile to be flat as a fuckin’ wall.

But when I thought I was a cis woman? I felt crushingly ashamed by them.

Back then, I didn’t really like myself or how I looked. I didn’t like looking at myself in the mirror. I HATED looking at myself in pictures. I rarely took selfies, because I thought I was not very attractive. I thought I was bland and ugly looking. Society had told me again and again that attractive women looked a certain way, were shaped a certain way, dressed a certain way, etc, and that clearly my unhappiness was based upon the fact that I did not conform to that mold.I thought to be happy and to feel better about myself, I had to double down on the womanliness and become more conventionally attractive. So I’d buy things like massive push-up bras that never felt good, comfortable, and I hated in a desperate attempt to conform. I’d buy these really specific types of shirts and clothes that I didn’t like at all, but thought was what was ‘pretty’ for women. I’d fumble through learning make-up, not because I was interested in the colors, the expression, the creativity, and accentuating my features the way I wanted, but because that’s just what adult women were supposed to do. I’d buy certain shoes I didn’t really even like, but knew pretty women were supposed to like and wear.

I was trying so damn hard to fit the mold and in the end, it only made me feel worse. I felt like I was wearing this awkward, uncomfortable shell. People would tell me I was pretty, but I didn’t feel happier. I just felt more miserable, because all this extra emotional and physical labour I was putting into myself just to fit this arbitrary bullshit notion of what an ideal pretty lady was supposed to be like was EXHAUSTING and I didn’t even really like how I looked. I didn’t want to do it all every. single. day of my life.

Realising I was nonbinary was absolutely liberating for me, because I thought “Well… if I’m not a cis woman and none of the old ‘rules’ matter anymore, …what does handsomeness or beauty actually mean to me?”

And for the first time in my entire adult life, I defined for myself what beauty and handsomeness truly meant for me. It was wonderful and liberating. The first thing I realised was that I didn’t really give a fuck about how big my boobs are. Society did. And BOY HOWDY it was GREAT not giving a flying fuck about that anymore. I still keep a few bras around for costuming/cosplay purposes, but you could not catch me fucking dead in one otherwise.

I used to hate make-up and find it to be this long, cumbersome chore that I would lose interest in doing every day, but once I got to sit and experiment on how I personally actually wanted it to look on my face - I fucking loved it. I like experimenting with colors and want to play with more. It appeals to the artist in me to play on a canvas even if that canvas is my face.

Fashion as a whole became a wild new experience. I stopped thinking about what I felt pressured to buy because it would make me look a certain way and what I really, really wanted. I made a pinterest board of fashion goals and pinned every single thing I could find that I liked - regardless of whether it was a man, woman, or theater major dressed up in costume wearing it so I could identify what I actually wanted. I dyed my hair pink, but got it cut in a more masculine manner and I fucking love the way I look now.

You might be thinking “Yeah, ok, Tiergan, that’s great and all, but I’m not nonbinary.”

But the funny thing I realised was that even though embracing that I am nonbinary led me to this understanding that I could take back my own power and define for myself what attractiveness truly means for me - this was a thing I could have done at any point in my life if I hadn’t been so buried in all those signals from society on what beauty was supposed to be.

I’m not going to sit here and tell you “just accept ur natural self! Don’t change a thing! Body positivity!!!!!” Because: 1) I know when you’re in a place of feeling super down on yourself, that shit doesn’t help at all and just feels extremely inauthentic. 2) I changed A LOT about myself until I was happy with my appearance. I just didn’t change it in the ways that I previously thought I was ‘supposed’ to.

So instead what I’ll say is that if you’re willing and able, I would set aside an hour or two each week to clear your mind, dig deep, and try to visualize a universe in which nothing anyone else thinks about your appearance matters anymore, because YOU are God. You have a blank slate.

There is no pressure to look a certain way to be considered beautiful, because you’re God. You decide what is beautiful.. No one in this universe gives a fuck if you have big tiddies, little tiddes, medium tiddies or any kind of tiddy, because right now the universe is a blank slate and all tiddies are created equal in a blank slate. No one in this universe cares whether or not you have the perfect heart-shaped feminine face or not, because you’ve not told anyone yet what is considered attractive. You are the decider of beautiful things.

Now imagine that you, as God of this World, descend down to hang with the mortals. You can’t really change your body without going back to your old weirdo universe back on Earth, but what you can change is your clothes, your hair, your make-up, etc. Knowing that this universe is yours and you get to decide what beautiful is for yourself, what would you change?

Remember, you’re God in this universe you’ve made - so you don’t have to impress fucking anybody. Anyone who says shit to you gets smited or yeet into the sun. As a god, you get to wear what makes you feel powerful, majestic, and appropriately godlike - what does that clothing look like? Can you imagine it? If it’s hard, maybe pull up pinterest and surf around for your god-clothes. Would you get stylish sneakers or thigh high boots? Would you get a lady’s power-suit or a lolita dress? Would you get some neat unique godly jewelry? (If yes, I recommend Etsy. That site is gonna destroy my fuckin’ destory my wallet.)

What’s your make-up like? Is it tough to imagine? Pull up another pinterest. Use it to find your god-makeup. And hey - are you putting this make-up on because it makes you feel GOOD and POWERFUL like the goddess you are, or to impress the mortals? Because again - you’re god. You don’t have to impress jack shit. This make up is for YOU and what makes you feel GOOD and POWERFUL and GODLIKE.

Do you still care about having bigger boobs? (Did you know a fuckload of actual supermodels and Hollywood actresses have small tiddies? So even in THIS universe, you don’t need big boobs to be beautiful!) Do you still feel unhappy that your face is kind of androgynous according to the dumbasses back in the vastly inferior universe you originally came from? Or do things in your universe where you’re god feel pretty great? I hope so, because gods don’t really have time to worry about the funky assumptions of mere mortals. You’re too busy being fabulous and doing godlike shit.

Hope this sort of helps!

#non ffxiv #rl ramblings #Anonymous #long post #mobile apparently doesn't do read mores or some shit

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ladyloveandjustice · 6 years

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Fall 2018 Anime Overview: Double Decker! Doug & Kirill

Double Decker! Doug and Kirill follows a special police force devoted to dealing with cases involving “Anthem”, a highly dangerous super-drug that can be both fatal and grant uncontrollable superpowers. The squad is divided into three pairs of partners. The eponymous Kirill is a enthusiastic newbie who partners with a deadpan, “kind of an asshole” veteran named Doug.

It’s hard to say when a show crosses the line from “dumb in a fun way” to “just mind numbingly dumb” but I’d say Double Decker crossed that threshold around about the midpoint of the series. Which is a shame, because I was rooting for it. It seemed like an anime with a lot of potential- it was humorous, irreverent and bombastic, it seemed fun and colorful with a varied cast, it had a nice variety of ladies in the squad, and two of the ladies, Max and Yuri, were heavily coded as a couple right off the bat-

-with Max (on the left) in particular going putting off some Impressive Lesbian Energy with her aesthetic...and early on Doug announced that his life goal was to “eliminate poverty and class”, indicating the series intended to deal with social issues.

It IS possible to be a cheesy, fun show that is also inclusive and deals with social ills, but Double Decker’s clumsy, simplistic attempts to balance this with the larger goofy plot ultimately meant it fell short of being an truly entertaining romp AND was utterly disastrous at being socially aware.

Double Decker acts like it wants to say something about tolerance at points, but is ultimately gutless, toothless and halfhearted, sometimes verging on offensive. It became apparent the show wasn’t going to be truly LGBT inclusive with a character’s uh, “gender reveal” scene midseries that is a just...a mess. Some characters reactions to the “revelation” are just blatantly transphobic (thinking its hilarious, saying the character in question should “tell the truth" about their sex, etc) and this was never called out or challenged. It’s finally explained (baffllngly late in the series) that rather than actually being trans, this character is a cis man who just disguised himself as a woman for flimsy plot reasons, it doesn’t make how the reveal scene was handled and how it was painted as being “funny” any better. It’s not my lane so I won’t really go into it, but this article at Anime Herald covers the whole mess in detail. The whole thing is SO stupid and honestly there was no reason for it to be a plot at all.

If that “reveal” episode had me feeling wary about the show, the episode following sunk any hopes I had for it. Double Decker didn’t even have the guts to have Max and Yuri be explicitly romantically involved, instead just giving vague, baity hints. What’s worse, the episode focusing on Max was boring as sin. It was painfully bland and on the nose “critique” of high school proms SO rote it even had the girl who wanted to be popular transform into a literal “queen bee” (GET IT). The only thing we actually learn about Max in her supposed focus episode is that she hates proms because a bunch of kids rejected her trans friend at one which caused her friend to turn to drugs and disappear forever. Yep, not only can the show not bother to give us actual lesbians, trans people are just tragic props (and the attempt to say a thing about how trans people are treated badly would have felt a LOT more sincere if transness hadn’t been treated as a joke in THE EPISODE JUST BEFORE THIS ONE).

Doug also only became aware of poverty existing because of a tragic prop- his backstory amounts to a dead little shoe-shining street girl so one dimensional and cliche I’m surprised she wasn’t found frozen in an alley clutching a book of matches, and that one incident made him realize Poor People Shouldn’t Be a Thing so now he’s, uh....well, he’s not really doing anything about it, but he says he wants to, and that’s good enough right?

Yeah, that’s about the level of nuance we’re dealing with here. It’s nice that Double Decker tried, I guess, but if this was going to be the level of its effort, I wish it had just stuck to being a goofy sci-fi show. As it was, even the “goofy buddy cop” aspect felt really hollow because the show didn’t give us a reason to be invested in these partnerships or these characters.

I wanted to be invested! I was SO ready to appreciate the punk butch and her robot girlfriend, but instead we barely learn anything about them or see them interact. I was READY to be tremendously invested in the straightlaced office girl and her vulgar pink haired partner, but we didn’t learn anything beyond their surface personalities- nothing substantial about what drives them or where they come from or anything. Doug had his eye-rolly dead-little-girl backstory and admittedly sometimes amusing snarky asshole personality, but he spends so much time being insincere there wasn’t much to latch onto with him.

Kirill was pretty much the only one in this show who felt like an Actual Character, and I did find him extremely likable- he was utterly sincere in everything he did, full of heart, dumb and enthusiastic in a fun way, and incredibly sweet and supportive to his friends and loved ones (he was also the only one who was chill and accepting about the not-really-trans character too so that earned him some points) but all the stuff going around him was so empty it didn’t matter.

(ending spoilers here)

The show didn’t put the work into making you connect with these characters, but it DID still expect you to be invested in them. One of the kinda-lesbians appears to have died at one point in the show, but it makes zero impact because you knew basically nothing about that character anyway- it instead just feels annoying, like “wow, you’re just gonna kill that gay without bothering to develop her huh” but the show clearly expects you to be devastated. Then when it’s revealed at the end “PSYCH she’s alive for this ridiculous jokey contrived reason haha really pranked you huh” it’s just even more annoying. Just because I’m relieved you didn’t actually bury the gay doesn’t mean you pretending to bury her wasn’t insulting and pointless. All you did was bring my attention to how little you bothered to develop this character and how willing you are to use her and her kinda-girlfriend’s pain as a plot device, so thanks?

(spoilers end)

The humor of the show basically followed “you thought THIS thing was gonna happen but instead WACKY TWIST haha now the narrator makes a snarky comment about it” and while that was fun at first it just got old without anything going on besides that. And as for the plot, it’s...generous... to call it a plot. At the end it jumps straight to “AND SUDDENLY THERE WERE ALIENS” with almost zero foreshadowing and it just gets stupider from there. Such a ridiculous development would work on a show that was either a) a pure farce or b) something super wacky but with enough heart, drama and character to keep you invested, but DD was neither of those things. It was an anime that wanted you to care, but gave no fucks itself.

(Also this show is supposed to be related to Tiger and Bunny but I honestly have no idea how these two anime are connected in-universe. Is this a prequel? sequel? Are they happening at the same time? WHO KNOWS, THE CREATORS SURE DON’T)

The animation was also nothing to write home about, with a lot of awkward CGI shots and pretty ugly clothing designs- it was colorful enough to distract from it a lot of the time, but definitely not winning any aesthetics awards.

So yeah, Double Decker is very far from the worst anime I’ve ever watched, and I like the concept I think it was GOING for- but what we ended up with was something completely mediocre. The first couple episodes were fun, but by the end it was a chore to watch. I finished it because “well I’ve come this far might as well” rather than any real investment in the show. It wasn’t painful (except for the clumsy attempts at dealing with trans issues), but it was so completely stupid and forgettable, which is sad, because it seemed like it had so much potential at the start.

#double decker #double decker! doug & kirill #double decker doug and kirill #anime #fall 2018 anime #anime overview #my reviews

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maybeshelives · 6 years

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gay things up

We should acklowledge more often the importance of queer represantation in mainstream media. (For the right reasons)

Sure, I can binge watch all six seasons of the L Word - and, trust me, I have - but I still have this undying thirst to gay things up a little. I feel unbalanced occasionally, as if there are still parts of my sexuality I haven’t really addressed, understood and embraced, which consequently urges me to focus more on my gay side rather than my sexuality as a whole: my preferrences in the type of people I sleep with, the type of sexual relationships I form, the things I (dis)like in bed, you know, the list is endless. It makes me think that all these years of repressing my sexuality have made me keep it in a box and just narrow it down to the gender I’d rather have sexual encounters with, which is a rabbit hole itself, all things (gender norms and stereotypes, personal beliefs etc) considered, and just get elated even by the implication that two men or women on TV are queer; neither examining if I like them as people, nor caring about their chemstry or the quality of their relationship, no.

Just keep my standards to the lowest point possible and MAKE IT GAY AS FUUUUUCK.

Being queer in a world of heteronormativity is sometimes a double-edged knife; even your best LGBTQ+ allies are ignorant of your reality.

Yeah well, my straight friends support me on my same sex relationships. But they also don’t really get them most of the time. “What are you talking about?” you will asked surprised, “romantic relationships don’t differ based on the gender of the people involved. It’s the personalitites that matter”.

Well, yes. But also no.

My straight friends can’t really understand the consequenses of being closeted for years, the fear of stigma, the fact that even in 2019 there are still people wishing all of us “degenerates” a slow and painful death (just watch Ellen Page’s amazing show called “Gaycation”; during the Brazil episode, the two hosts interview a serial killer who specifically targets gay people, because he believes that they’re worse than animals and the world should be cleansed by their filthy presense).

There are several bagages following us around, issues that straight people (thankfully) never had to face, like the fear of flirting with the wrong person (especially while being closeted), the fact that our sexual orientation is often times not being taken seriously, the fact that for ages there was a very small amount of LGBTQ+ representation in media, and sometimes it was played out for laughs, or even blatantly killed off (lately, there’s also the issue of “queercoding”or “queerbating”, which is rather complex itself), the fear of violence used against us on the street just for holding hands with someone; being marginalized at any level, a minority, ANY KIND of minority, sucks. Because the majority doesn’t even see you, at times.

But we exist. This should be written in enormous neon letters, and not in 8-sized Arial Narrow ones, as it very often is right now.

No, J. K. Rowlling, I don’t want to have to wear rainbow-coloured strap-ons covered in glitter (wink wink, Sense8) and do my YMCA dance in order to have the revelation that Albus Dumbledore is fucking gay back in 2007. It’s not on print, it’s only a few words said during a sold-out book reading. You had your moment of gay-friendly glory and inclusiveness, but that’s it. During an entire franchise with dosens of presumably heterosexual characters, the single outed person (and one of the most important for plot progression purposes, too) doesn’t even get to have their own moment of gayness. Not even in the prequel, apparently (if you’re new to this, please watch the videos on queercoding I’ve linked above and you’ll be right on track). And you have the audacity to keep on doing it.

No, I don’t want to fucking speculate if Captain Marvel is queer either. No, I don’t want to wonder if Thor: Ragnarok’s Valkyrie is indeed bisexual. (Fun fact: It is being speculated that the two aforementioned characters will hit it off in the new Avengers: Endgame movie). Or the two Teen Wolf guys. Or Dean and Michael from Supernatural. Or several characters from Riverdale. Ugh, it’s exhausting.

And even though it might come off as just another lesbian who’s trying to make it all about her sexuality, shoving it in straight people’s faces, I have to say that heterosexual people are pretty ignorant regarding even their own sexuality from time to time. And that’s problematic for everyone.

Please, let me explain.

Not fully exploring and “owning” one’s sexuality primarily means that they’re missing out experiences they could, in fact, enjoy A LOT. From having sexual partners of all genders to being the proud owner of the best buttplug collection in an entire city, a good sexual experience that never takes place is a missed opportunity. I personally wouldn’t like to miss out on that, like the dirty, dirty hedonist I am.

This missing-outness, self-deception and ignorance can go on for years, decades even. Just simply ask popular YouTubers or my (formerly gold star lesbian) ex-girlfriend (yes, the opposite is also possible).

But, such a personal issue becomes public when queerness and gender & sexuality spectrums are not even seen as something that can be part of anyone’s psyche, especially in the majority of the population. Hence the marginalizing. LGBTQ+ substance, accodring to many people, is something out of this world.

That’s what makes queercoding so annoying. Because it sends off the message that LGBTQ+ characters, romances and storylines are not important enough to be portrayed as openly and clearly as their heteronormative counterparts; they’re pictured as something that will never fully grow and be explored, since it isn’t as significant.

So,why does mainstream representation matter?

In a world soaked in and based onto heteronormativity and whiteness, being LGBTQ+ inclusive has been mislabeled as “pushing an agenda”, where even childhood is being used as a deterrent, a queerness-repellant, which can also breed internalized homophobia.

“Don’t publicly show pictures of faggots kissing, children might see them”. “Dykes shouldn’t be allowed to adopt children, because they [the children] won’t have the right role-models, I mean, who will be the mom and who will be the dad? Plus they will also be bullied by other children”.

I was watching an Ellen Page interview on Stephen Colbert that took place almost two months ago, and I couldn’t help but notice how emotional she still gets every time she talks about LGBTQ+ problems (she has been very vocal about them since she came out as gay in 2014). “This needs to fucking stop” she says.

And, goodness, it does. When the, among others, argument that equality for everyone shouldn’t be debatable still is seen as “cringey activism” by some, it becomes more than apparent why representation of any minority in the mainstream media matters.

Pop culture is like a huge educator. We tend to internalize images shown to us from an early age, we learn to normalize toxic behaviors and worldviews in the exact same way, and even if we can’t really control anyone’s parenting (and homophobia and lack of understanding and acceptance, unless it becomes abusive for the minor, and this abuse is apparent to other adults), there’s still hope that pop culture can bring the bigger picture, all the vieriety of human identity and experience, into our homes.

As I’m thinking about it, I realize that I had never seen a (happy) lesbian couple on television or movies until I was about fourteen or sixteen. Ever. Like, ever. Needless to say, I have my fair share of images depicting straight couples in multiple situations.

So, if you’re not a queer person, a trans person or a person of colour or someone with special needs or mentally ill, and you’re also not convinced by my long-ass rant, consider this: What if you had never ever seen someone like you in a film before until you were fifteen? Or what if you had only seen stereotypical images and expectations of people like you, as a side story to someone else’s bigger and more “important” story? A side story as seen and perceived by the heteronormative gaze?

Or maybe as a joke? A joke that wasn’t made by people like you, people who truly understand what it’s like being you and the actually funny aspects of your own identity and struggles.

Wouldn’t you grow up thinking that you’re a little bit of a monster?

"Like when someone says he wants to watch the world burn. You only get to watch when you have the privilege of not being on fire. It's edgy, but it's not The Darkness. The Darkness is finding a way to laugh about being on fire". - Natalie Wynn

---------------------------------

PS: I know that I’ve used too many embeded referrences, but if you’re interested in this topic, please take your time to examine them. They have broadened my horizons a lot, and gave me comfort and the validation that I’m not insane for feeling and seeing life that way.

#queercoding #representation #lgbtq #ellen page #mainstream media #minority #marginalization #queer

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toycarousel · 6 years

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unfortunately I have been bullied for being just that: straight. it's also a double standard to say heterosexual slang is only a joke; i wouldn't joke about your sexuality so why do that to me? plus people who said it were trying to hurt me. suicide isn't funny either and I worry because blogs like Witchgays encourages this behavior and is proud of it, they even said they actually do bully kids in their school for being straight so i'm lead to think that's what the world is coming to

Hi, Anon~! I have no idea what this is in reference to. :’) I don’t know or follow witchgays, I don’t have a clue as to who you might be, and I haven’t talked about bullying against straight people or LGBT+ people in approximately 4 years, in addition to having never -- not once in my life -- encouraged other people to commit suicide.

So, I’m led to assume that either you sent this to bait me, because you subconsciously thought “here’s a gay dude I can use as a representative of all lgbt+ ppl,” OR (and I’m going to give you the full benefit of the doubt here) you saw a comment of mine somewhere, and thought that I meant something completely different by it than what I truly did, which is fair, and happens a whole lot. ***Then there’s the 3rd option, which is that you meant to send this to someone else who was actually part of the conversation you’re referencing in your ask.

Regardless, because I haven’t spoken, in depth, about this issue in over 4 years, and my stances have changed and developed since then, I’m totally happy to share my current feelings about this. I’m hoping it’ll put you a bit at ease too, along with other people (of all genders and sexualities) who follow me~!!!

I’m going to start by saying that I do, in fact, believe that straight people can be bullied for being straight. I do not think they can be societally oppressed for being straight (they can in other ways, of course, but not specifically for being straight). To be perfectly clear -- it’s not a competition, and I’m not saying that because a group of people aren’t oppressed that it’s okay to treat them badly; the differences between bullying, discrimination, bias, prejudice, and oppression are just that: differences in meaning. And it’s important to know these differences so that we can communicate them to each other.

Being bullied is an extremely severe issue, and the main reason I bring up social oppression here is because folks get the two mixed up a lot, and oftentimes, when they’re told they’re not oppressed for being straight/white/male/cisgender/wealthy/etc., they think that means that you’re saying that their lives have been perfect, and that they couldn’t possibly be hurt, or bullied, or discriminated against due to the things listed above. Which isn’t true. Anyone can be bullied and/or discriminated against for any reason. Like, I could discriminate against all people with green eyes, or all tall people, and while that doesn’t mean that ppl with green eyes or tall people are oppressed, it doesn’t mean that bullying them solely for something outside their control would be okay.

To be oppressed simply means that our current (western/ized) society as a whole is not designed (and was never designed) to benefit the social group a person belongs to. It refers to the very fabric of society -- not to individual bad treatment between people.

Discrimination refers to something similar, but on an individual basis rather than a societal one~! Individuals can discriminate against anyone, for any reason, as I stated above -- and yes, that includes for being straight. One example of discrimination could also include bullying someone for belonging to a specific group of people.

I know to a lot of folks that all seems like pure semantics, and, again, the reason it’s important to have different words for these things is because they are different things. That doesn’t mean that bullying and discrimination aren’t bad, though.

So, with regard to bullying against straight people, while it’s more rare to see people being bullied for being part of the “majority” within a society, it does happen, and I acknowledge that.

As for my personal stances on the things you specifically referred to in your ask, Anon, I do not believe it is okay to bully random straight people for being straight. I don’t think it’s “okay” to bully anyone. And I have personally met LGBT+ people who are very bitter, jaded, and cruel because of the oppression, bullying, discrimination, bias, prejudice, etc., that they have experienced. So I get where they’re coming from (being a gay man myself), but I don’t believe it’s an excuse for taking that pain out on other people for no reason other than the fact that they have not faced that exact same pain. And I do not believe that suicide-baiting or encouraging people to kill themselves is okay under any circumstances.

To summarize, yes, I know that bullying against people belonging to dominant social groups occurs, and I don’t feel that it’s okay. I don’t feel that it helps genuinely improve our individual lives as LGBT+ people, and I think it’s spiteful and unnecessary. I’ve been disappointed in a lot of other LGBT+ people that I used to idolize after seeing them suicide-bait others and actively bully individuals based on nothing more than the fact that they’re not LGBT+ themselves.

As a side note though, I’m a gay man. I don’t know what it’s like to be a lesbian, a trans person of colour, asexual, or the myriad of other people who fall under the LGBT+ acronym. I’m not going to tell them how to feel. I, personally, do not think that bullying is acceptable or effective. I understand why some LGBT+ people avoid/distrust straight people, but not why a few of them actively seek to hurt complete strangers.

So, for full transparency, that’s my current perspective. As a final note, I truly have no idea what you mean by “heterosexual slang” (the phrase which originally led me to think that this was just a baiting ask). What is heterosexual slang??? Slang just means “shortened language,” so is slang even a bad thing, depending on how it’s being used? Literally the only forms of shortened language I’ve ever seen used for straight people are the words “straight,” and “cishet,” and neither of them are derogatory. They’re literally just shorthand terms for longer words and phrases.

The only “slang” word that comes to mind that is derogatory, and is sometimes used for straight people (though I’ve personally more often seen it used against bisexual people within LGBT+ communities) is “breeders.” And that’s a disgusting term to use for sure. Besides that, I’m completely bewildered as to what you’re referring to.

Anyway, I hope that at least clears up my own stance -- if anyone has any questions as to what I mean by certain things I wrote, wants more context/examples, then I welcome an open dialogue. If I receive any asks that are just straight-up abusive in nature, I’ll be ignoring and deleting them.

Best of wishes to everyone, including victims of bullying who are LGBT+ or straight. If you’re just a random person living your life and you’re not purposefully perpetuating harm against others, remember that you don’t deserve to be bullied, and you certainly don’t deserve to be told to kill yourself. Take a step back from the people on the internet (and offline) who make you feel like you don’t have the right to be treated like a person, and especially remove yourself from circles of people who make you feel like you don’t have the right to live.

#hopefully none of this comes across as hostile because I'm actually not feeling so in the least -#sexuality #bullying #lgbt #straight #discrimination #suicide baiting mention -#biphobic slurs -#gender mention -#ask to tag -#anons #scotchasks

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actresque · 7 years

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isn't grell just an okama and not a transwoman? i thought it was confirmed

okay this has been sitting in my inbox for a while and i’ve had trouble coming up with a decent answer that would satisfy both sides of this stupid discourse – not that i’m obligated to satisfy both sides, but i can see where both are coming from and i don’t want to sound like i’m entirely dismissing this idea.

this argument basically boils down to whether you approach the character with a watsonian or doylist interpretation. these are terms i learned through tumblr that have really helped me when thinking about analysis. a doylist interpretation means taking the author at their word, thinking about the reasons the writer wrote the character the way they did, etc— for example, watson’s wound in sherlock holmes changes from shoulder to leg depending on which text you’re reading, and a doylist interpretation of it would simply be that arthur conan doyle forgot. he wasn’t as invested in the characters as his readers so didn’t bother double checking himself. a watsonian approach is when you find an in-universe reason for the things going on within the canon— in bbc sherlock, john’s limp was psychosomatic and his wound was in the shoulder, thus making both wounds ‘canon’ in a sense.

so. is grelle an okama, or is grelle a trans woman?

the simple answer would be both.

the doylist look at grelle concludes that grelle is not a trans woman, that she was created in a japanese society where trans people have little visibility or recognition, so she’s pretty much a cis drag queen. a doylist interpretation states that every joke about grelle wanting a different body or calling herself a woman is for comedic relief and to spark a sense of humorous discomfort in (japanese) readers. fine, whatever.

a watsonian interpretation – and the one that i personally follow – is that grelle is a transgender woman, and has always been a trans woman, because the manga is set in victorian england where the concept of okama doesn’t really exist. grelle would have no reason to continually call herself a woman unless she truly meant it. her motives behind the jack the ripper crimes were the same as anne’s, jealousy and hatred toward the women that didn’t appreciate the capability of bearing children. grelle’s attitudes toward her own gender and her clear desire for a ‘sex change’ are not open to interpretation when you discount the author’s culture playing a part in the creation of the character.

so it really depends on which approach you take. as a roleplayer, i kind of have an obligation to find in-universe, in-character reasons for the things grelle does, not just write it off as something the creator did to be funny. thus, grelle is a trans woman. that shouldn’t really be a point that’s argued.

drag culture and okama culture are inherently transphobic in many ways as it is, so i wouldn’t personally feel comfortable approaching the character from that standpoint. clothes have no gender, attitudes have no gender, the only thing that has a gender is the person under it all, and grelle’s explicitly stated that she’s a woman multiple times. i’m not willing to bend my interpretation to make the character more of a transphobic stereotype than she already is.

#( answered. )#discourse /#i hope this makes sense #i understand she wasn't created with a european mindset but #she lives in 19th century england #Anonymous

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aion-rsa · 4 years

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Cemetery Boys: A Conversation with YA Author Aiden Thomas

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Aiden Thomas’ upcoming YA debut, Cemetery Boys, is not only breaking new ground when it comes to explorations of trans identity and Latinx culture, it’s also a riveting, romantic read filled with paranormal wonder. The #OwnVoices novel follows Yadriel, a trans boy determined to prove his gender to his traditional Latinx family, who all happen to be brujx, with the ability to see spirits. When Yadriel’s cousin is murdered, Yadriel decides to solve the mystery of what happened as a way to convince his family to accept his identity as a brujo. But when, instead of summoning the ghost of his cousin, Yadriel accidentally summons the ghost of (very cute) school “bad boy” Julian, who refuses to leave, Yadriel’s mission becomes much more complicated… especially once he realizes he might not want Julian to go.

We had the chance to talk with Thomas to find out what it was like to build the world of Cemetery Boys and its characters, the novel’s ambitions as “empowering escapism for marginalized readers,” and what it’s like writing during 2020.

Note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Den of Geek: This is a very broad, generic question, but do you remember where the idea for this story first started? Was it a character? Was it a scene? Was it a feeling? Can you think back to that moment of inspiration?

Aiden Thomas: I know the exact moment of inspiration for the book itself. On Tumblr I follow a lot of writing prompt blogs, and one of the blogs posted just a sentence prompt, and the prompt was, “What would you do if you summoned a ghost and you couldn’t get rid of it?” And you see people commenting and stuff and they’re like, “Oh, this super spooky, scary thing.” And I was like, “Okay, but what if he was cute?” And so that’s where the idea came from.

And then I was like, “OK, well, if we’re talking about death and magic, what does that mean to me?” And, as a Latinx person, death and magic is Día de Muertos, right? Day of the Dead. So from there I was like, “Okay, yeah. This could totally work.”

The real inspiration for how the magic system works and the rules and everything that’s laid out is intrinsically related to Día de Muertos. All of the magic stuff that happens in Cemetery Boys revolves around our actual beliefs about how the afterlife works and what Día de Muertos means and bringing our ancestors back. So it was kind of just taking all of this magic around Día de Muertos and just making it literal magic.

So you have this initial idea. (Thank you, Tumblr.) How long ago was that, and what did the process, the evolution of that idea look like? Was it fast? Was it slow?

Oh my gosh. Yeah. Technically Cemetery Boys was actually my option book. The first book that I wrote and sold is Lost in the Never Woods, which is coming out in 2021. So I got all the way through two copy edits for Lost in the Never Woods and then I started bugging my editor. I was like, “Option books, what do you think about that? When do we start talking about that?” And she was like, “Okay, Aiden. There’s no rush. If you want to kick me some ideas, go ahead.” And I was like, “Okay!” And so it was really funny because I believe I sent her five ideas. One of them was like, here’s a full outline, I have 50 pages written, and here’s a synopsis. And then as the ideas went they just kind of got smaller and less detailed. And Cemetery Boys was the last one. And it was, I think, a paragraph, maybe a paragraph and a half. And most of them ended in question marks, the sentences. Because I was like, “Well, maybe it could be this.” And the other thing is that I was really nervous about pitching a book with a trans character and that was entirely Latinx.

The whole book is an entirely Latinx cast. So I always find that kind of funny looking back on it that I was asking permission, to like, “Can I write this? Is this okay? Am I allowed to do this? Seriously, not a big deal. Just maybe.” And then so when she replied, she was like, “Yeah, that’s the one that we want!” And I was like, “Really! Okay.” And then so they needed it fast-drafted. So this is kind of a crazy story. Not last November, but the November before that is when I pitched the idea, and then we got the contract signed. And so it was January where I actually started writing it. It was sold on, what is it called? It was sold with just the synopsis and I think 25 pages or whatever. So I had to actually write the book. I had to write it in six weeks.

Wow.

Yeah. I wrote the rough draft in six weeks. And pretty quickly after my editor got that first draft she was like, “We think that this should be your debut instead.” And I was like, “Ugh, God!” I was like, “Okay.” Even though I went through all this work with the other book. So it was super fast tracked. And, gosh, when did I send it off to copy edits? Everything was done super quickly in like six months or something, which was a crazy turnaround time compared to Lost in the Never Woods, which I wrote during grad school, so it was like three years and then a year of doing edits with my editor. So it was super crazy. It was a very quick turnaround.

Well, you did it!

You mentioned when you were sending those initial pitches that you were already kind of not even totally allowing yourself permission to lead with this even. For a variety of reasons. And I’m curious, during the process of writing it, did you feel yourself having to push back against that? I don’t know, feeling like you have to reel it back in from the story you truly want to tell because you’re afraid it won’t ever make it to readers? Did that continue as you were writing?

Not so much in the terms of like, “How queer could I make this? How brown can I make this?” I kind of just went full into it as soon as they gave me permission. Then I was like, “Okay, well you already paid me, so here I go!” You know? I think where I got the most anxiety around it was I was really concerned about writing a depiction of whether it’s of someone who’s gay, of someone who’s trans, and/or someone who’s Latinx was that some kind of my internalized “isms” and phobias would come out onto the page and be harmful to young readers. That is what held me up the most and caused me a lot of anxiety. So that was really difficult, and when it came time to start going to copy edits, I emailed my editor and I was like, “I really feel like I need authenticity readers.” I was like, “I know that I’m literally every part of this character’s identity, but I’m really worried about me writing something that’s accidentally problematic. And they were super receptive, and I think I got three sensitivity readers for the main parts that I wanted to hit.

And they did catch a couple of things. Nothing major, but small things that you just don’t realize. And I think sometimes marginalized creators, they’re like, “Well, this is my truth, so I can write it. I don’t need anyone else to double check me,” or whatever. But for me, that was really important, because I was really, really worried about it.

I was going to ask you about authenticity readers. What was the process like for finding people?

The people I found were on Twitter. So, Twitter’s been a huge resource. I didn’t join Twitter until I sold my first book. And then all of a sudden I was like, “Oh, there’s an entire writing community here. Go figure.” So what I did was that I was basically scrolling through Twitter and people that I follow. I found one person, and I was like, “Great, that fills this one section.” But I still had these other two, so I actually put out a call on my Twitter, and I was like, “Hey, I’m looking for some authenticity readers in these sections, and this is the experience that I’m looking at.” Instead of just having random people being like, “Oh, well I’m brown, so I can read it.” And then I found people super quick, and I sent them to my editor, and then my editor reached out to them. So it was actually pretty easy, especially on Twitter. The community is so responsive and those LinkedIn type connections almost really, really helped find those authenticity readers. It was awesome.

Your characters and your community that you’re mostly featuring here are bilingual. But you’re also writing this book in part for people who don’t speak Spanish. I’m curious what it was like balancing that. And again, making sure it maybe is marketable to a certain extent versus staying true to the experience of these characters and for those readers who also live in a bilingual, in their community. Making sure they see some sort of authenticity on that as well.

Yeah, it’s almost about accessibility, is what we’re talking about. Having those experiences and those words even being accessible to people who speak Spanish and people who speak English and people who do both. And for me, I pretty unapologetically use a lot of Spanish in a way that I thought was realistic to when I was growing up and living around families and how the younger generations tend to use more English and then use more Spanish around their families. And so for me, it was more of a challenge in craft. What I did is that I very unapologetically used Spanish, but when I do that I am hopefully careful to give enough context clues so that even if you have no idea what those words mean, you understand the meaning and the thought behind it. So even if you don’t know explicitly what a sentence means, judging by the character’s reactions or internal monologue, that point gets across either way. So you can absolutely go ahead and Google it if you want to, but it’s also there. That was something very conscious I did going through the process being like, “Okay, I need to make sure that I’m writing this in a way that it’s accessible from all kinds of readers.”

I’m curious about the decision to set the book in east L.A. Was it always set there?

Yes, it was always in east L.A. I was born and raised in Oakland, California, so I spent pretty much my whole life in California. I moved up here three and a half years ago. And what I love so much about east L.A. is that it reminds me a lot of Oakland in terms of socioeconomic status and definitely in community. It’s super diverse, and east L.A. is kind of like a central hub that a lot of Latinx communities gravitate towards to. And it’s not necessarily just one Latinx community. And for me, it was really important that the brujx were this conglomeration of multiple different Latinx identities. I didn’t want it to be just one, because I wanted this whole myth and this magic to supersede the creation of countries. It’s very much just Mesoamerican.

So east L.A. is really the perfect place for that, and I wanted to touch base on things like kids who are living on the poverty line and kids who are living on the streets. And for me all of those things, it just screamed east L.A. and I love east L.A. is the other thing, is that it’s a very dear place to me in my heart. So I was like, “Yeah, let me write this little love letter to east L.A. and show others.” That city can be so stereotyped by people and I really wanted to break down some of those barriers and show how really beautiful it is. And the community there is just so incredible.

I’m curious if your experiences as an EMT informed this story at all.

Yeah, that’s really funny. Being an EMT in Oakland, it was a crash course in a lot of things. And a big part of it was what it means to serve your community and what your community looks like. Especially in times of dire stress. So, yeah that definitely informed it. I feel like anytime I tell EMT stories I just traumatize my family. So I’m trying to think, “Well, how can I?” But I had a lot of experiences as an EMT, when you show up on scene, especially when there’s kids involved, that you really see the bad things. Like the panic and stuff like that, but also the coming together of a community. I’m a pretty literal, logical person, but there’s some things that I saw that happened when I was an EMT when there was just like a miracle, but I know that those aren’t a thing. But it’s like, well some kind of magic happened there, because that’s crazy! One time I had a child who was going, basically, and the grandmother pushed through and put her hand on him and started praying and then he came back. And I was like, “What the heck is happening!”

So it’s like that kind of magic, you know what I mean? So stuff like that definitely inspired it. And I’ve always been very community focused. That’s why I liked being an EMT so much. And so again, it kind of comes back to that love of the community, which is what Cemetery Boys is for me.

Yeah, it’s nice to get these stories that, I don’t know, there’s so many “chosen one” stories in our mainstream culture. And that’s not normally how positive change seems to happen in the world.

Cemetery Boys features a Latinx, gay, trans boy protagonist. A first in the YA space. And I think a lot of people have already noted or assumed that this is going to be a story that for a lot of different people, they see parts of their identity reflected back for the first time maybe in a mainstream cultural space. And I’m curious if you can remember the first time you felt that in any way, one of your identities reflected back in a mainstream story for maybe the first time in either a big or small way.

Yeah. It’s funny because I get that question a lot. And when I first started answering, it was kind of like, “When was the first time you saw yourself represented in media?” And for a very long time I was like, “Ugh, I just got to come up with something.” Like, “I’ll just pull this one, I don’t know!” And then I was like, “Well, Aiden, you know what? That’s actually a valid thing to discuss.” So I have never seen myself reflected in media. My whole self, rather. And so when I wrote Cemetery Boys, I was like, “Yeah, let’s have it be all of me.” For me, I was like, “I’m writing this because I haven’t seen myself. So now I’m going to see myself.” And then other people can see themselves who are like me. I didn’t really think of it as, “Oh, this is going to be the first of that.” Until ARCs started going out, and then people were like, “Oh, the first one.” And I was like, “Oh no, I didn’t want that!” I was like, “Wait, no! It’s far too much stress. Too much pressure.” So that was challenging and terrifying.

But as far as parts of my identity goes, Anna-Marie McLemore, their books have absolutely spoken to me. I actually have a stack of them right next to me with all my other books. When the Moon Was Ours in particular, that one was the first time, was definitely the first time I’d ever seen a trans boy in a book, and that was really cool, and it was by a Latinx author, so that was the closest I’ve gotten to and it was life changing, of course. And that’s a pretty recent book. So it’s not like I was a teenager being like, “Oh, finally. Here I am.” I was like, “No, I’m a grown ass adult looking at this teenager in a book.” And I’m like, “Oh my God, finally!” It does feel important to have that answer, create that space for being like, “I haven’t seen myself fully.”

Did you always know this was a love story?

Oh, yeah. I guessed that as soon as I saw that prompt. And I was like, “But then what if you fell in love with the ghost and he was really cute?” So, yeah, it was definitely always a love story. That maybe even came before I figured out what the plot was. And Julian’s character has been a character that I’ve played with in short stories and stuff for 15 years. So that was very easy, coming up with the love interest. I was like, “I already know who he is.” I need to meet Yadriel, though.

Yeah, so that’s always interesting. Especially when it’s your main character. I feel like they’re the hardest to get into their heads and really understand who they are, because you’re not just thinking about what they’re projecting as in a love interest or secondary characters. You’re in their head. So it’s a lot more complicated.

Okay, well I want to talk about the book cover, because it’s amazing. Can you talk about the process of having it happen?

Yeah, totally. When it came time for figuring out the book covers, at that point, sorry I just did something weird. It was like shaking at me. For the cover, I think it was around where we started going to copy edits. They were like, “Oh, we’re going to kick you some artists.” And I was like, “Okay.” I was kind of stressed out about the cover, because I’ve heard so many horror stories from people being like, “Oh my God, it went so wrong. And I hate my cover.” And for Swoon Reads, typically the public gets to vote on the cover, so you really don’t have any say. But for Cemetery Boys, they decided that they weren’t going to do the cover voting, that they just wanted to create a cover and they were really cool about letting me be part of that process. And so the first thing that they did that surprised me was that they emailed me and they were like, “Hey Aiden, we’re moving towards working on the cover. Here’s some cover artists, can you tell us who you’d most like to work with?” And I was like, “Okay, cool.”

So even before I opened it, when I very first started drafting Cemetery Boys, I found Mars Lauderbaugh on Tumblr, and I followed them because I was obsessed with their fan art of Haikyuu and Voltron. And so I had actually commissioned them to do character art back when Cemetery Boys wasn’t even a thing. So I was emailing Mars, I was like, “Hello, I’m a writer, and can you draw my [original characters] for me?” And Mars was like, “Sure, yeah. Here you go.” And then it kind of progressed and I was like, “Hey, it’s getting turned into a book, could you do my character art for me?” And they were like, “Oh, yeah.” And then when I got this list of artists, the first thing that I noticed, which was so cool, was that Macmillan/Swoon had only picked artists who were artists of color and/or trans. And that was amazing and blew my mind. And then I saw that they had included Mars on the list because they had seen the character art, and so I was like, “Yes, yes! Please, Mars, Mars, Mars!” And then so they reached out to Mars, and Mars became my cover artist, and now all of my swag and stuff matches and it just blew my mind. There was three original versions of the cover, so I got to see what those looked like. And they picked my favorite one. Yeah, it was so cool.

And I was nerding out so bad. And being in publishing, I’m very much of the mind of as I’m entering this space, I’m trying to wedge open the door and sneak in as many other people as I can. So being able to take Mars, who is doing commissions for fan art, and being able to get them a book cover deal was really important to me. And that was definitely a highlight. I have the best cover ever. It could not be better.

So had they never done a book cover before?

No, they hadn’t.

Wow.

And they recently got an agent. It’s all very exciting.

Do you think there are other stories you’d like to tell in this world?

Definitely, yeah. When I come up with ideas and stuff, my brain just explodes and splinters out. So there’s definitely other stories that I would like to tell in this world. There’s a couple of side characters that I’m particularly attached to that I would like to explore more. I can’t say any spoilers, but I would definitely like to do a book focused on Julian even. Because, at the end of Cemetery Boys, he goes through some stuff, and it’d be really interesting to see what happens after that. So yeah, there’s always ideas. Definitely. For sure.

I think most of us are aware that a lot of things are hitting differently right now because the world’s different than it was six months ago. Do you think Cemetery Boys is going to hit differently in the world it’s coming into than the one that maybe you imagined it would be released into?

Yeah, that’s a really good question. Yeah, it’s been kind of strange. In terms of hitting different and what the market is being for, or even what readers would like, I think Cemetery Boys is definitely… It’s funny, because it deals with death and murder and stuff like that, but it’s also very lighthearted. And I would hope funny. So I’m hoping that even with all of this going on, I wrote Cemetery Boys to begin with to be a bit of empowering escapism for marginalized readers. Because even before all this, those readers have it so rough and deal with so much hate on a near constant basis. Now multiply, what, times 10, times 100. So what I am hoping is that now Cemetery Boys is even more important in terms of providing some escapism, some release. But also giving those marginalized readers a story where they see themselves as being incredibly powerful, supported, but very importantly, being loved. Even if isn’t necessarily by people who are supposed to be there for them all the time. So even if it’s not their family, found family is important, your friends are still important. So I really hope that Cemetery Boys will be able to provide some comfort, honestly. And I think now more than ever that’s especially important for young readers, for sure.

I’m curious how your writing is going right now during this strange and often upsetting time. Has that made you want to write more? Has it led to you writing less? Has it changed the kind of things you’re writing, or how you write?

Yeah, that’s a great question. I think when I’m on Tumblr, not Tumblr, oh now I’m just talking about Tumblr all the time! When I’m on Twitter I get a weird sense of guilt or like I’m not responding the way that everyone else is, because I feel like on Twitter a lot of authors like, “I can’t write anything. How could you possibly write anything right now?” And for me, I drafted a whole other book during quarantine, or finished drafting it anyways. And so I felt weird while I was doing that, because I was like, “Oh, am I not doing this correctly? Am I being an asshole or something?” Because I’m not being super impacted by everything that’s going on. That was kind of stressful, but I finished that draft and to preface, I work in tech. My company shut down, or switched to working from home in mid March, and we’re not opening up for several months as of yesterday. So I’ve been kind of sequestered. This is my entire apartment. I live in a studio. It’s 500 square feet.

Yeah, I’ve just been here. And once I finished drafting that book, I was like “Okay!” And then off it goes to my CPs. And it was like the next day where I realized that writing that book and having that focus had my energies. A lot of other stuff wasn’t getting through, because I was hyper focused. And then as soon as I sent it off and I didn’t have that project to work on, I had three days of just really bad anxiety. And I was like, “Why do I feel so terrible? Why do I feel like I’m stuck in my fight or flight response?” And then I realized, it’s because being so focused on that book was protecting me and distracting me. And then once that was gone, then I was being hit by all these feels that everyone else has been hit by. So that’s been wild. And then so I was like, “Okay, I can recognize that this is what’s happening.” So I started picking up other projects. So I was like, “Okay! Time to distract myself.” Yeah, totally. Right. So it’s definitely had an impact, but as far as impacting my writing, my writing has actually been helping me get through it.

And I’m a really intense outliner. For my project I just finished the rough draft of, the outline was over 100 pages. So having that really strict structure of being like, “This is what’s happening next.” It’s not turning my brain off, but it’s like I don’t have to get lost. I can follow this path, I can stay on track and be focused. So that’s actually helped me during all of this.

And what are you a fan of right now? Or what are you escaping into, if anything? Other than your work.

Animal Crossing has been a big one!

Popular one.

Yeah. Animal Crossing‘s been great. I’ve got a couple of ARCs that I need to read. So those are on the docket. Those are next to my bed right now. And I have been binging a lot of Netflix. I am on the third season of Hannibal and I just started it maybe a month ago and I’m obsessed.

So good.

So good!

Have you watched Killing Eve?

I have! Yeah, I’ve watched, I think maybe the first season. And I need to pick it back up. I just randomly fell off.

I’m also obsessed with Hill House on Netflix. I love it so much. But how my friend talked me into watching Hannibal is they were like, “It’s very similar to Hill House. They’re both really stunning and really creepy.” And I was like, “Oh, okay. Well, when you put it that way, I’ll try it.” And now I’m super obsessed with Hannibal.

Thank you so much for talking with me. This has been a lot of fun.

Yeah, this was super awesome!

I’m excited to finish the book. It’s already brought joy into my life, so thank you for writing it.

Oh, I’m so glad. Thank you!

Cemetery Boys will be out on September 1st, but is now available for pre-order (which are super important). You can find out more about the book here. And find out more about Aiden Thomas’ work here. If you’d like to hear more from Aiden Thomas’ about Cemetery Boys, I recommend this expansive, insightful interview with Adriana on YouTube channel Perpetual Pages.

The post Cemetery Boys: A Conversation with YA Author Aiden Thomas appeared first on Den of Geek.

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Dave Chappelle Doesn’t Need To Punch Down – BuzzFeed News

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In his occasionally funny new Netflix special, Chappelle continues to make anti-trans and victim-blaming jokes. Why can’t he strive to be more thoughtful?

Tomi Obaro

Tomi Obaro BuzzFeed News Reporter

Posted on August 27, 2019, at 6:43 p.m. ET

Netflix / Via screenshot

Dave Chappelle in his new Netflix special, Sticks & Stones.

What’s the most embarrassing public statement you’ve ever made that you’ve had to walk back? As a Sagittarius and a former conservative evangelical Christian — and quite a zealous one — I have plenty.

I won’t regale you with all of them, but certainly one of my top 10 is when I logged on to Facebook dot com in the year of our Lord, 2009. Michael Jackson had just died, and my Facebook feed was disturbingly lacking in sympathetic words of sorrow. One girl whom I went to high school with posted a status about how she didn’t understand why people were so upset about his death — he was “a gross pedophile.”

I was in a vulnerable place. The high school I went to was full of white people who liked to listen to Dave Matthews Band and ask me whether I tanned. I had spent hours in a fugue state watching videos of Jackson when he was a lanky teenager, wiggling his sequined hips in the “Rock With You” music video, his skin still the color of a coconut husk. He still had that wide, broad, and beautiful nose that looked like my nose (and that I too had once hated).

I don’t remember exactly what I wrote under that girl’s status. It was something mean and cutting, and I definitely went on about how he had been acquitted. She responded by saying that swooping in to comment on the post of a random classmate I wasn’t even friends with in real life to defend Jackson was proof of how ridiculous I was being. Touché. I promptly unfriended her and reminded myself to never get into Facebook arguments; they were a black hole.

I thought of that time, and that current of righteous anger, as I watched Dave Chappelle’s latest Netflix stand-up special, Sticks & Stones, which came out this week and has been predictably pilloried for its dismissal of sexual assault victims and anti-trans jokes. Chappelle proudly confesses as much early on in the special: “I’m what’s known on the streets as a victim-blamer.”

He defends Jackson, conceding that even if the two men who came forward in HBO’s documentary special Leaving Neverland earlier this year were telling the truth, it would be an honor to be molested by a musical legend: “I know more than half the people in this room have been molested in their lives. But it wasn’t no goddamn Michael Jackson, was it? This kid got his dick sucked by the King of Pop! All we get is awkward Thanksgivings for the rest of our lives.”

Chappelle still wants it both ways. He is willing to address criticisms of his earlier sets that were more flagrantly, lazily anti-trans, but not actually apologize or admit to changing his mind or express any meaningful empathy.

It’s the kind of purposefully ludicrous statement that’s designed to provoke, of course — it’s not even funny so much as shocking. You hear the audience gasp. (But the loudest boos of the whole night are reserved for when Chappelle jokes about how there’s no such thing as good 36-year-old pussy, which is the punchline to an R. Kelly bit. It’s telling that you can hear an audible exhale when Chappelle concedes that Kelly probably did rape his alleged teenage victims, even though he throws Surviving R. Kelly documentary filmmaker Dream Hampton under the bus to make that point.)

“I’m sorry, ladies, I’ve got a fucking #MeToo headache,” Chappelle complains. “This is the worst time ever to be a celebrity. Everyone’s doomed,” He defends Louis C.K., freely admitting that he’s biased as he’s friends with the guy. “They even got poor Kevin Hart,” Chappelle says. He describes Hart’s 2011 tweet about smashing his hypothetically gay son’s head with a dollhouse as “obviously” a joke. That’s before he launches into a whole spiel about “the unspoken rule of show business,” which “is that you are never, ever allowed to upset the alphabet people” — those people being “the Ls and the Gs and the Bs and the Ts.”

At this point, we’re reentering a familiar cycle: Chappelle releases a special on Netflix, he says something incendiary, it’s quoted back to him in a headline, and Chappelle reacts to the criticism in another Netflix special.

But Sticks & Stones feels distinct in that it encapsulates Chappelle’s paradoxical urges. You could say he’s doubling down, as some critics have written, but that’s not quite right. It’s a low, low bar, but some of the more truly vile anti-trans stuff has been excised from this recorded special. (It was filmed in Atlanta in 2017, two weeks before his run of sold-out Radio City Music Hall shows, so maybe he had time to reconsider the “man-pussy” jokes.)

But Chappelle still wants it both ways. He is willing to address criticisms of his earlier sets that were more flagrantly, lazily anti-trans, but not actually apologize or admit to changing his mind or express any meaningful empathy. In his 2017 special, Equanimity, he talks about receiving a letter from a white trans fan who criticized his transphobia, using the remark to essentially make more tired anti-trans jokes (and it turns out some of the details of the bit were highly embellished). And in a surprise epilogue to Sticks & Stones, he tells another story about Daphne, a trans woman who attended several of his sets in San Francisco and laughed hard at every joke. Afterward, according to Chappelle, they chatted at the bar and Daphne thanked him for “normalizing transgenders.” The audience at Radio City Music Hall, where Chappelle told this story, applauds loudly. It’s cringe-inducing — such a blatantly cynical, familiar move out of the old “I have a marginalized friend, so I can make this joke” playbook. (When Louis C.K. joked about his black friends who have stood by him, I imagine he must have been talking about Chappelle.)

What is especially frustrating about Chappelle’s trans jokes is how he essentially acts as if black trans people don’t exist, and as if black trans women in particular aren’t more likely to be victims of violence. His truth-to-power comedy only works if he acts as though trans people and black people are wholly separate entities. It’s enough to make you want to tie Chappelle to a chair and force him to binge-watch episodes of Pose.

Even if you ignored all the offensive jokes — which is a big ask, so I understand if you can’t — you’re still left with comedy specials that aren’t even particularly funny.

It’s enough to make you want to tie Chappelle to a chair and force him to binge-watch episodes of Pose.

And it grates, of course, because he has been shattering the mythos constructed around him ever since he famously walked away from a reported $50 million deal with Comedy Central in 2005. Dave Chappelle! The funniest man in America! If he had lived in Midwestern bliss for the rest of his life, his legend as one of our most hilarious, biting, silly, essential stand-up comics alive would have stayed intact — even if he did always have a few sets and sketches that were stupid and sexist and racist. But now he’s just like any other rich, middle-aged has-been, bravely taking on “cancel culture,” even as he continues to nab $60 million deals with Netflix.

As Vulture music critic Craig Jenkins recently tweeted, this cycle of jokes, outrage, jokes, repeat doesn’t actually affect Chappelle’s bottom line. He’s still a millionaire — and one who’s still getting booked, at that. So what’s really to be gained from punching down on the most vulnerable? Despite his fearmongering about celebrities falling victim to “cancel culture,” it’s not like Chappelle has actually been shunned. It has merely become less cool to say that you’re a Dave Chappelle fan at certain parties in Brooklyn.

As a beleaguered fan (like “I once spent more money than I had in my checking account to split a cab ride with a girl I didn’t know to watch him perform in a suburb of Chicago and then got stranded in said suburb because there were no cabs going back to the city”–level fan); I want to believe that Chapelle is more thoughtful than he’s been acting lately. And even in Sticks & Stones, which is better than the last two specials, there are kernels of funniness. He still makes me laugh out loud. He can still tell a story with surreal, spellbinding relish — his bit on buying a gun is hilarious. His face is so expressive; his eyes twinkle with impish glee. The way he holds his cigarette and leans forward, looking like a mischievous little boy, shocked that he can get away with it.

But he’s not a little boy. He’s a grown-ass man. And it feels like he keeps making anti-trans and victim-blaming jokes just because he can, which, sure. But why not strive to be more interesting, more original, more thoughtful?

Toward the end of the special, before the epilogue, Chappelle appears to make a conciliatory gesture: “If you’re in a group that I make fun of, just know that I see myself in you. I make fun of poor white people because I was once poor.” I waited for him to say what he saw in trans people, in victims of sexual assault, or in gay men. But he never said anything. ●

CORRECTION

Aug. 28, 2019, at 00:38 AM

Kevin Hart’s tweet about breaking a dollhouse over his son’s head was in 2011. An earlier version of this post misstated the year.

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