#feel like shit just want intersectional feminism back

[pikachu-surprised-face]

"Female characters can certainly have characteristics found within The Hero's Journey, but it would be difficult to apply characteristics found within The Heroine's Journey to a male character because they generally can't and don't relate."

"The Hero already has power as a man. The Heroine battles not only the conflicts at hand within the story, but is also dealing with the prejudice of being a woman."

ah yes. men just don't know what it's like to aspire to be in a more priviledged position, quite possibly requiring a betrayal of the self, eventually reclaiming initial values, skills or attributes.

men?? dealing with prejudice?? not having power?? has never happened, ever.

just. women can relate to element's of the men's journey, but men could never understand those female woman elements of a story. men and women are just so different, lol. men could never relate. I am a progressive btw.

[figofswords]

the op of the Hannah Gluckstein post is a terf :pensive: shes red on shinigami eyes + has some real sketchy stuff on her blog. obv no judgment, just letting you know in case you wanted to block her. love ur art <3 <3

eurgh thanks for letting me know :/// I’m not gonna delete the reblog bc hannah gluckstein as a jewish butch artist is still something that speaks to me personally and I had never heard of her before but I will be blocking the op. fucking astounding that these people will understand gender-nonconformity of lesbianism and then turn around and fail to expand it beyond the end of their nose. goddamn.

[ftmtftm]

This is a long ask sorry. Recently I saw screenshots of some transmascs (usernames were understandably cropped out) saying that transandrophobia stems from “sex, which is immutable” and these screenshots were being held up as a reason why the idea of transandrophobia was stupid (and if this is the only encounter someone has had with the conversation around transandrophobia I don’t necessarily blame them because that is stupid)

I think in response to that post going around, I’ve also seen a couple people (who were transmasc themselves) accusing people that believe in transandrophobia of like, perpetuating radfem rhetoric and claiming “femaleness when it’s convenient, to victimize themselves”.

I was wondering if you had any thoughts or insight on navigating conversation about transandrophobia or antitrans masculinity when there is the occasional bio essentialist shithead, and that kind of person seems to be the most associated with the theory?

Okay so - I just want to preface this and say this is genuinely just my own personal course of action informed by a lot of my experiences having been on Tumblr for over a decade. I honestly don't know how helpful it is for others, but it's ultimately how I personally do it, so I'll share.

My go to response for the kind of people who seem to be self victimizing or who seem to be bio essentialist shitheads - and my go to response to the people who use that to say they're perpetuating radfem rhetoric by self victimizing - is honestly usually to just scroll past, sometimes block depending personal comfort, and move on.

Sometimes I do engage despite my better judgment and usually? I feel like shit afterwards because it ended up being pointless arguing. Most times I'll draft something that responds to concepts being brought up by those people and make my own post later or I'll reblog a relevant post that I've already made, but I do really try not to directly engage and I would encourage others to do the same.

Instead, I try to contribute in the ways I'm personally good at like via academia/original posts/answering asks. I feel very confident in my own opinions and my ability to back them up in response to accusations of Radfem ideals and self victimization because I know myself and I know my understanding of both Radical Feminism and Intersectional, Black, Decolonialist Feminism. I pretty constantly try to do a lot of self examination, but ultimately I'm confident in my core ethics and morals and I try to reflect that out to others in a human way. That carries a lot of weight for me personally.

That's all really important to me because this is ultimately still Tumblr and there's a lot of people in a lot of pain here. It's the piss on the poor hellscape webed site full of extremely traumatized people that have been at each other's throats over the worst faith readings of every opinion possible for longer than some users have even been alive.

When you've been here and in discourse spaces specifically for awhile - it becomes pretty obvious when a hurt person is lashing out and not actually engaging with an idea in a way that isn't focused on their own pain. I can do what I can, but those conversations specifically tend to devolve into nothing good real fast. So? It's just genuinely not something I try to dedicate a lot of time to engaging directly with. Especially because it gets really exhausting and honestly bad for my own mental health at certain points.

Hopefully that's helpful in some way? I'm genuinely not really sure if it is, but I hope so.

[dear-galileo]

take a walk

read on ao3

written for the 2023 @stonerwitcher event :)

no one likes to come home for thanksgiving, especially when the person who raised you was someone like vesemir.

thankfully, the brothers had each other. and some other ways to deal.

eskel & geralt & lambert, brief geralt/jaskier/yennefer, brief aiden/lambert

cw: past child abuse, brief homophobia, recreational drug use

They arrived together. It wasn’t a spoken decision, but an assumed one. Without words, they knew that Geralt would pick Eskel up first from his school, once his last class of the day let out, and then wait for Lambert to weasel his way out of his office job, probably skip a late afternoon meeting, before they made the journey back home. 

Well. Home was a subjective term. Sure, it was where they had all been taken in, and raised, but Geralt doubted that any of them would actually consider the place to be home. Hell, the shitty dorm that Geralt and Eskel shared their freshman year of college was more home to him. 

But, regardless of their feelings of it, they were making the trip back to the house. Back to Vesemir. It was Thanksgiving, and it was understood that the three of them would go to visit him. 

Lambert was struggling with his clothes in the backseat, trying to fight his way out of his button up shirt, complaining about how the collar had been choking him. Eskel, in the passenger seat, was watching this fight with a piece of clothing through the rearview mirror with mild interest. Geralt was content to have all of his focus on the road. 

“They let you have hair like that, in cubicle-land?” Eskel goaded. The hair in question, was wild as always, poofed up from Lambert yanking his half-unbuttoned shirt over his head, was bright red, and sticking out in every direction. Lambert scowled, grabbing a wrinkled t-shirt from his backpack and yanking it over his head. 

“They think I’m fucking adorable there. Janice in HR keeps dropping hints that I’m going to get a promotion, since I’m such a handsome young man.” 

“No shit?” Eskel asked, twisting in his seat. “Congrats, if you do.” Lambert shrugged, already brushing it off. 

“It’s hell, it’s boring, but it pays the bills. Plus, Aiden likes to see me dressed up like a fucking businessman.” He grinned wickedly as both Eskel and Geralt made retching noises. “Who knows. Maybe it will make the old man proud.” 

For a moment, the only sound in the car was the turn signal clicking. Geralt flexed his hands around the wheel as he got onto the highway. He flicked the turn signal off. 

Lambert sighed heavily and obnoxiously, cutting through the sudden tension. “He’ll probably ask if I’m still gay, huh?”

“Probably,” Eskel replied, leaning forward to fiddle with the radio. “I think you could be the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and he’d only want to know if you’re dating a nice girl.” Both Geralt and Lambert made small noises of laughter and agreement. “How is Aiden doing?” 

“He’s great. The kids adore him, he’s about to win the teacher of the year, and it’s only his first year.” Lambert bragged. He leaned forward, knocking Geralt on the shoulder. “How are your lovers? Jaskier’s been sending me Breaking Bad memes.” 

“He’s good.” Geralt said, his grip on the wheel loosening. “Yen’s good too. Both kicking ass. Yen’s been asked to speak at a college for an intersectional feminism panel.”

“She’ll probably raise the IQ level of the family just by association.” Lambert joked. Geralt huffed, the corner of his mouth kicking up. “Did ya get rid of the old Roach-mobile?” 

Lambert was referring to the shitty old van that Geralt had bought when he was seventeen. It was disgusting, and old as dirt back then, but Geralt loved that van, and had taken care of it until it ran smoothly. 

“No. This is Yen’s car.” Geralt was almost offended at the assumption that he would ever get rid of Roach. He had poured not only years into that van, but also thousands of dollars. Last year, Yennefer had taken him to a used car lot to get something that, in her words “wasn’t an assault on every sense”, but they had left empty handed. 

“I was wondering why it was so clean,” Eskel commented, running a finger along the dash. “I was also wondering how you would ever be caught dead in a Prius.” 

“Love makes you do crazy things,” Lambert crooned. 

“Put your seatbelt on.” Geralt told his younger brother. Lambert rolled his eyes, but complied. 

Eskel finally found a radio channel that they all could agree with, and put it on at a low volume. 

It took a little over an hour to reach their hometown. Geralt couldn’t help but check on Lambert through the mirror. After their small talk had died down, Eskel had pulled out a small paperback book out of his own bag, and was flipping through, his head leaning against the window. Lambert was alternating between fidgeting in his seat, kicking the back of Eskel’s seat, or messing around on his phone. 

None of them were excited to go back to Vesemir’s house. Though they had all grown up to be somewhat decent men, they hadn’t left behind the kindest household. 

All of them had different relationships with not only the house, but with the man who lived within it. Vesemir had taken them in, when they were completely unwanted, so Geralt felt as though he was owed some credit at the very least. But Vesemir was a cruel man, when he wanted to be. 

It wasn’t until after Geralt started to see both Jaskier and Yen that he ever went to therapy. It was a group effort, championed by both of his partners, but he found it useful, against all of his expectations. It gave him the courage to set boundaries with his adoptive father, and to encourage his brothers to do the same. 

That was why they rarely saw Vesemir anymore. Thanksgiving was the one compromise.

Eskel had escaped first. But Geralt was right on his heels, and they lived in the same dorm room for the first year of college. When Geralt dropped out in their second year, they moved into a tiny apartment off campus, with a pull-out couch for Lambert to crash on during the weekends. By the time that Lambert had graduated high school, he had all but moved into the apartment. Geralt set up a folding screen in the living room, and it acted as Lambert’s bedroom for another six months. 

It was freedom, for all of them. Though they were strapped for money most of the time, and Lambert would invite his high school boyfriend Aiden over almost every night, and Geralt would wake Lambert up every time he went to his 6am shift at a nearby repair garage, and Eskel was drowning in homework more often than not, they were free. 

By the time that Geralt had secured a job with an automobile repair shop with better hours, and better pay, Lambert was getting ready to move in with Aiden (who was getting his teacher’s certificate), and Eskel was almost done with his bachelor’s degree. 

Geralt moved in with Yennefer and Jaskier, in a slightly nicer place a few blocks away. Lambert got an office job downtown and started to climb the ranks, while looking into night classes.

Vesemir never came to visit them. One could claim it was because he was old, and didn’t want to travel from the suburbs into a college town, but the brothers knew that Vesemir couldn’t have cared less. Vesemir had a bone to pick with every one of his kids, and he made sure to drill it into them from a young age that it was the boys who were at fault, not him. 

So as they grew older, the expected winter break and holiday visits lessened, until the only one that remained was Thanksgiving. 

None of the brothers complained about that.

read the rest on ao3

[judeschapstick]

I do this thing when I'm depressed where I will read/watch philosophy that will emotionally rock my shit. The kinda thing that changes my understanding of the world and my position in the world; acting as a jumpstart for feeling things after avoiding my own emotions. After numbing myself to survive a difficult living situation, I read about radical feminism to kick me into gear. During the pandemic, I learned about transhumanism and what it means to be human with the intention of being inclutionary. But I wonder about this relationship I have with philosophy is unhealthy and unproductive and instead is just another form of entertainment. Recently, I studied intersectional feminism because I wanted to bring myself back from a bad place, and I wonder if this is a morally ok thing to be doing? I am taking advantage of the labor of black women fighting for liberation so I can feel alive? Am I ok with that? Part of me says, "Do whatever you have to do to survive," and another says I'm exploiting them, and I will eventually get bored and move on to something else for another kick. It's not like I just forget and ignore all the philosophy when I do start doing other things in my life. Everything still affects me. Also, even asking these kinds of questions centers me in the discussion about intersectional feminism, something that is supposed to have a focus on people of color, and I'm doing the white woman thing of centering it on me. Truthfully, this is what this section of philosophy is supposed to do anyway, right? Question your position and privilege in a system and decide what to do about it? I don't know, it's not like I'm really hurting anyone, but this is a relationship I should unpack and figure out what I'm doing.

[happysadyoyo]

I’m starting to see a lot of “people think it’s the trans femmes who are invalidating trans mascs but it’s actually x, y, or z!”

No, you’re doing it again. You’re choosing to lessen the blow, to bow to the pressures of society around you, to soften your speech in order to make “other people” feel better. 

Trans femme people are absolutely doing this to trans masc people. The language might be obfuscated behind co-opted terminology like TME or whatever, but you step out of the tumblr/twitter bubble to other social media sites that don’t have this cover, and you see it. Explicitly. 

It’s women doing this to men because rad fem ideology is baked into this from the start. It started before the baeddel discourse; it started with cis women choosing to turn understandable anger towards a system that devalues them into targeted harassment towards a class of people that are just as hurt by the system as them! Just because it appeared that men had the power and it’s so much easier to paint them all with the same hateful paint than acknowledge that this system was set up for a very certain kind of people that only exist outside of the reach of your brushes. 

Trans women stepping into feminism and feeling empowered after the long fear and reality of unacceptance and bullying from being othered can get swept into this hateful dogma. After all, for them testosterone is evil, it hurt them, it has caused these irreversible damages to their bodies that the old guard uses to mock and fearmonger them in equal measure. So it’s okay to mock and hate testosterone and masculinity because it hurt them. Radical feminism encourages them to do so openly, so it spills into general trans spaces, especially if those spaces are taken up and vocally support them over other trans voices. 

Which most gen trans spaces do. Because gen spaces are feminist, and women have long suffered under the hands of men. So it’s accepted to hold female or femme voices up and tell the men to wait their turn. But men don’t get their turn in these general spaces.

So they make their own. And there’s a lot of bad. MRA is, mostly, misogyny with a new coat of paint. While they have legitimate issues to talk about, they are toxic, vile places for anyone who isn’t immediately won over by the fact that they can finally talk about male education rates, suicidality, emotional repression, etc. Incels and redpillers have made it a joke at best in feminist circles. 

Why is it a surprise then when feminist men, especially trans men, trans masc, men of color, try to make their own spaces and language, they’re equally mocked by the general left-wing populace. Try to talk about how being an East Asian man in the US is sterilizing in a gen space. You get push back from the other side because East Asian women have it so much worse. Your pain, as a man, is less than becauce you’re a man.

This happens even within spaces made for these discussions. It’s not always “men derailing conversations”. And sometimes when these men do “derail” they make a point. Why are there never discussions that start and center around the peculiar trauma of manhood in patriarchy. We want to be intersectional, but that intersectionality stops the moment the idea of testosterone enters the picture in a positive way. 

So shut up with your “trans femme people aren’t doing this” bullshit. Because they absolutely are just as capable of promoting this shit as the gold star lesbians and white feminists hiding behind their shields of “womxnhood”. Stop infantilizing the people who are continuing these problems, even perhaps unconsciously! 

If we can expect white people to acknowledge their bullshit and men to acknowledge their bullshit, we can expect those same standards to be held when the bullshit comes from our allies. 

Because bullshit is just as lateral so long as it’s held above us. And it ends up raining down on everyone equally.  

[itsclydebitches]

One common defense I see made for Winter, due to her criticizing Ironwood for squeezing Mantle even though she was the one to first suggest martial law was "Oh he was already thinking about it. Winter merely voiced his thoughts to the group." What do you make of that?

That it’s as unpersuasive as this broader, “The group knew things were bad, but it’s okay they went along with it because they were uncomfortable” argument. Even if we were to agree that these were Ironwood’s thoughts and that Winter was merely stating his obvious perspective  — which I don’t, both because Ironwood didn’t enact martial law then and much of Volume 7 is him bending to others’ perspectives  — that doesn’t absolve Winter of suggesting it herself in a manner that conveys her approval. We can’t go, “Ironwood is bad for wanting to enact martial law, but Winter isn’t bad for suggesting they enact martial law.” 

Really, the implied defense in arguments like these is that Winter is being coerced somehow. The only way you can get “It’s okay if Character A does X, but not okay if Character B does X” is if Character A is forced into committing X through some threat, manipulation, or loss of agency. It’s why Penny is not a horrible person for attacking Klein: we understand that in hacking her, Watts and Ironwood took her agency away. It’s why Yang isn’t a horrible person for accusing Ozpin of hurting the Branwens with the bird transformation: we understand that Raven lied to her. (Even though, as I’ve discussed in the past, Yang’s situation is more complicated in that we do hold her accountable for things like, “Why did you trust Raven’s version of events at face value without ever considering that she would lie?”) Part of the assumption that Winter fits this mold is because she does fit it later. Ironwood’s office scene, wherein he very creepily pats her shoulder and discusses torturing Penny’s friends, is meant to convey a, “Holy shit, this guy has gone off the deep end and if I oppose him I might be in trouble” feeling. We understand there why Winter doesn’t just yell her disapproval: it’s not longer safe. It’s the same sort of work we see when the two nameless soldiers appear in Ironwood’s office looking terrified of him and, indeed, we see later that when someone does dare speak up (Marrow) Ironwood immediately attempts to kill them. 

The problem is that none of this work occurred in Volume 7. At no point prior to those scared soldiers, Marrow’s near execution, Winter’s office scene, etc. does the text imply that Ironwood is threatening his people. (And even the above examples are messy af because Ironwood moves from, “Winter betrayed me by releasing the prisoners I needed?? ... Guess I’ll trust her and her alone to have my back when I arrest Penny.” This stuff is not well written.) Rather, we see the exact opposite work, in that Winter goes out of her way to tell people, namely Weiss and Penny, that yes, she’s making her own decisions. She decided to join the military. She decided to become the Winter Maiden. She decided to back Ironwood’s idea to leave with Atlas. And she decided to suggest martial law. 

I’m not going to lie, the fandom’s (and, more recently, the show’s) tendency to erase women agency makes me really uncomfortable. RWBY is a show built around the power of women, particularly young women, and the fandom celebrates that intention... up until the women do something bad, foolish, or even just make a mistake. It’s not that Pyrrha foolishly went off to fight a maiden when Ozpin explicitly told her not to, it’s that Ozpin’s manipulation forced her to take that action (which in turn is built on the belief that it was manipulation to begin with: Pyrrha is incapable of deciding to be the maiden herself). It’s not that Salem planned to enact the eugenics based plan of replacing the world with her magical bloodline and, when Ozma tried to keep that from happening, she killed her children and then burned him alive, Ozma forced her to take that action by daring to leave. It’s not that Raven chose to enter a school with the intention of later killing its inhabitants, gained the trust of the headmaster, received power, entered a war, and then abandoned it to instead spend her days raiding villages that leave them decimated from grimm, Ozpin forced her to go back to that life by revealing horrifying information (don’t think too hard on how, in the next generation, withholding that same information is also bad). It’s not that Winter chose to escape her abusive upbringing by going to the military/huntsmen school next door  — rather than going elsewhere like her little sister did  — and then later chose to support the man she’d come to trust as he navigated situations with no easy solutions, it’s that Ironwood forced her to do everything the viewership doesn’t agree with, despite a lack of evidence for that and Winter’s own claims of, ‘I chose this myself.’ Winter herself becomes a part of that fandom subset when, in Volume 8, she denies having any part in this and instead puts it all on Ironwood’s shoulders. That’s a very sharp contrast to Volume 7 when she acknowledged her own agency. 

It’s a very simplistic form of “feminism” wherein there’s a Bad Man and a Good Woman and if the woman’s actions in any way seem suspect, it must be the fault of that evil, manipulative, male influence in her life. This is not only a terrible way to interpret women characters  — the best thing you can do is portray us as well-rounded and flawed as we actually are, just like any other human being  — and it’s not just a way to ironically talk over these fictional women  — it doesn’t matter what choices we saw Pyrrha make, or what Winter says about her own life, I know what’s really going on  — it’s also just a bad way of reading the text. The ability to make claims like the one you reference, anon, requires ignoring huge swaths of the story and replacing it with headcanons. Ignore what we saw Winter do, what we say her say, what we saw Ironwood choose in Volume 7, and replace it with these ideas that have no basis in the text, but that I feel very strongly about; an interpretation that I’m more comfortable with. Because people do seem to be uncomfortable with the idea of truly flawed women, not just surface stuff like, “Yeah Yang has a little bit of a temper, but she’s still #perfect.” This includes the RWBY writers. Given that girl power focus of the story, few are willing to acknowledge that maybe Ruby is seriously messing up. Maybe Salem was a victim, but is now very much the enemy. Maybe Winter supported Ironwood through the embargo, supplies, martial law, and murdering a councilman, only turning when he threatened to blow up a city. Winter is culpable in all this and that makes her a better, more well-rounded character. Ignoring that depth for a “women good, men bad” take  — especially in 2021 when we’ve adopted a more nuanced, intersectional form of feminism based on gender diversity  — isn’t something I’m personally able to understand. 

[nothorses]

heyy! first of all i hope you're doing well. thank you for taking the time out to read and respond to this (if you choose to). this has been bothering me for a while and i'd like your opinion on it.

i read these two articles recently - the first one is about a lesbian professor of gender studies + sexuality arguing why women should be allowed to "hate men"; the second is an interview with her about the article in which she addresses some of the negative responses she got to that article.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-cant-we-hate-men/2018/06/08/f1a3a8e0-6451-11e8-a69c-b944de66d9e7_story.html

https://outline.com/ttKscw

i have a lot of questions about this.

firstly, i cannot tell whether this is the sort of reductionist, radfemmy, "fuck all men" feminist you've been talking about. i understand her sentiments but i disagree with her statement, and i want to get better at identifying shallow feminism. i don't think my personal opinion is credible enough (yet) to draw any conclusions right off the bat. are there any 'tells' or signs that indicate what sort of feminism someone is speaking about (in the same way that there are certain idenitifiers of TERF ideology even when it is not explicitly mentioned)? for example, in the interview, she explicitly says "Where is discrimination? Where are men being excluded? Where are men being abused? Oh, come on." as well as her implied praise of kamala harris as 'the feminist we need in office'. are those things indicators of whether her position on feminism is credible/an appropriate portrayal of how Feminism™ should function? in short, do i take this woman entirely seriously about all this?

secondly, how do you feel about gender being a social construct, as she states? does that not contradict the very real physical dysphoria that a lot of us experience? doesn't it invalidate almost all the experiences of struggle against transphobia and cissexism, as well as our identities, by painting gender identity as 'not a big deal' or 'fake' by virtue of being a social construct? also, is gender identity not influenced by biology to some extent?

thirdly, along a similar vein, how do you feel about gender abolitionism? i don't exactly have a v specific question about this one, i just want another trans person's opinion on how that sort of society would affect them. i do not wish to be stripped of my identity, and i am opposed to gender abolitionism because of that. is this sentiment a product of some misunderstanding i have?

if you have any other thoughts at all about the articles, i'd love to hear those. thank you!

Oooh, anon, these are such good questions.

Why Can’t We Hate Men? by Suzanna Walters

Follow-Up Interview with Walters

Walters does a weird sort of dance in both articles: her argument is that “hating men” is okay and even good, but she has to completely misrepresent what “hating men” is, does, and means in order to make her point align with what she actually believes is defensible.

“Hating men” is not actually about hating men, she says; she doesn’t hate men at all, in fact. She knows they’re not the problem, but rather the systems of patriarchy in place. She knows racism and other intersections make “hating men” complicated at best, and harmful at worst. She just wants men to “lean back” and understand the power they hold; to be feminists. She thinks it’s a good thing to welcome men into feminism.

So then what the hell does “hating men” actually mean, to her? Why make that the hill to die on, if nothing in her argument has anything to do with that hill?

I don’t think she really believes any of the arguments she’s making in the first place. Walters pays lipservice to racism and intersectionality in a brief comment, then never brings it up again. Her view of feminist issues is narrow and shallow, dealing mostly with “the safety of women” and the representation of women in positions of power; both of which fail to address the structural issues of the patriarchy and how it functions, and prioritize Making Women Powerful over dismantling the systems of oppression giving people power over each other in the first place. She believes that all men are universally and inherently benefiting from the patriarchy, and that men in fact are the system to be fought.

Some of this pings as TERFy, too. Walters never really argues against radical feminism. Her argument against gender-essentialism is, as you said, that gender shouldn’t exist at all- but she claims the patriarchy discriminates based on genitalia.

You caught that as well; “where are men being oppressed/abused?” she says, after her performative gesture toward intersectionality. Walters also compares the oppression of women to racism at the same time, which... holy shit.

I’d personally peg her as a mainstream liberal feminist. She’s a successful white professor who sincerely believes that her experiences as a woman are universal. Her takes are surface-level and shallow at best, and edging dangerously close to radical feminism and quiet TERFism at worst.

TL;DR: The Author

She’s a mainstream liberal feminist who makes a string of confused, contradicting arguments because she chose to die on a hill she doesn’t really understand. Her arguments stray TERFy and racist on multiple occasions.

RE: Gender questions

What gender is and where it comes from is a complicated question, and I don’t think there’s a simple answer to it. The major arguments are that it’s social, biological, or psychological; either it comes from how you’re socialized, what your genitals look like, or it’s something built into your brain chemistry (think “wrong body” trans theory).

I personally think it’s a bit of a mix, leaning toward the social and psychological, and that where gender “comes from” is a little different for each individual. Biology has a bit to do with it; we’ve had somewhat consistent ideas "man” and “woman” across various cultures.

But what gender means in each society is different, and how people conceptualize it has been different. What gender someone feels they are may be influences by their culture’s gender expectations. Some indigenous cultures even have anywhere from two to five distinct “genders”, and I can say personally that my conceptualization of my own gender relies pretty heavily on how other people perceive and treat me.

Not to mention that trans people have existed for as long as people in general have, even in societies that lack any formal gender concept for trans folks. So psychology must play a role, too.

So if we strip away all social expectations of gender, we’re still left with psychological and biological influences on gender. Which is part of why I don’t think we can abolish gender to begin with; people will always have internal understandings of gender to some extent, and they’ll always express them, and therefore there will always be a social element to gender. We can, however, work toward abolishing restrictive, binaristic, oppressive gender structures that limit and punish expressions of gender.

And as a sidenote, the whole “gender is just a social construct, but genitals are real” and “we should abolish all concept of gender” thing is extremely TERFy. There are thoughtful and trans-inclusive ways of approaching the question, but usually we’re talking about gender as part of a system of power and oppression. Walters is using the TERF framework that their “gender critical” comes from: gender isn’t real, therefore trans people aren’t real. Patriarchy is just based on biological realities and sex, and we should abolish the idea of gender (as code for abolishing trans rights and theory).

TL;DR: Gender

I personally believe that gender is a synthesis of biological, psychological, and social influences that is highly unique to every individual. There’s no real way to “abolish” it, only systems of power and oppression that rely on and enforce it. Walters’ way of discussing it is extremely TERFy, and her arguments should be heavily scrutinized.

[homesweetgoodneighbor]

Stop hating on house-spouses

Speaking of feminism, can we fucking stop with the whole hating on women who want to be housewives? Look, back in the day when the gov't was pushing it's "nuclear family" bullshit and Christians with their "women's place is in the home" fuckery, it was something that was "expected" and forced on ladies.

Feminism is not about completely doing away with a role. It's about giving women the choice about what they want to do, not having it enforced upon them. And, if that choice includes working in an industry, then they should get the same pay as guys. Or, if that choice is "I really just want to take care of the hearth and home" then they should get an equal amount of fistbumps.

It's about fucking respect, yo.

I am going to be a bit gender biased for a second, but bear with me, I'm speaking to a particular mindset:

And, feminism means, STOP GIVING HOUSEHUSBANDS SHIT, TOO.

You know why househusbands get shit? Because being a housewife is seen as lower on the social chain. It's something to feel superior over. "I take care of my wife. I am the king of my castle." *jacking off motions*

Now, to include all genders/non-genders, lemme tie all this together and say:

STOP GIVING PEOPLE WHO WANT TO BE HOUSESPOUSES SHIT. LITERALLY, SOME PEOPLE WANT TO BE AT HOME WITH THE CHORES AND KIDS/PETS (OR NONE OF THOSE AT ALL). THEY ARE NOT LESS DESERVING OF YOUR RESPECT.

If it is a consensual thing, if they made the decision as a couple with no one feeling oppressed or their wishes decided for them, THEN STOP TREATING THEM LIKE THEY'RE LESSER BEINGS!

Holy shit. I have personally known at least 5 housespouses and they are all very happy and their spouses are super respectful and everyone is just content! (One househusband I knew was 6'5" with a lumberjack build. You fucking tell him he's not a Real Man for being a househusband. I fucking dare you.)

I was watching a lady doing house stuff on Ye Olde Tubes of You because I am trying to find ways to organize that work with my ADHD, and my brain was all "her husband must be awful if all she can do is stay home". And, my Second Brain was like, WHAT THEY FUCK?! She's obviously happy! She is sitting here posting on youtube about how she does her routine and she wants to help others and has little captions and emojis and nothing feels forced LET THE WOMAN BE HAPPY WITH THE SITUATION SHE CHOSE.

And, that's what I'm saying, tell your overtly righteous self to shut up and read the room.

I am a house spouse. I worked my whole life, and now, I choose to be a house spouse because the option was OFFERED to me. I wasn't TOLD I had to be this. I was offered. I took it.

I am perfectly happy. Super Spouse is awesome to me and treats me with respect and love. I do the same for him. We are very much in love and happy with our situation. We are blessed beyond belief that I am able to stay home since my ADHD and PTSD ruins a lot of "productive societal expectation" for me. Not everyone can do this, and we recognize that we are BLESSED we have this option.

Fucking call me "oppressed" and shit. I dare you.

If you're a true intersectional feminist, you'll know the difference between someone who has made a choice and someone whose choice was made for them.

P.S. The housespouse I was watching on youtube even made a point of saying that while she treats it as a job, she has down days, and no one in her house gives her shit for it. She is not treated as sub-human or a slave. Just wanted y'all to know that.

[curedeity]

Gasher's Dilemma

Summary: Madoka and her struggle to be happy as support. (I described this to a friend as: I decided to write a fic on the intersection between beyblade, sports, and feminism. My friend laughed so hard they may have died, and I can’t blame them.)

    Madoka thinks she used to like battling. Maybe she didn’t love it, but she certainly didn’t hate clashing beys in the arena with someone else. Watching sparks fly had never failed to bring wonder into her childish heart.

    And Madoka thinks she used to hate battling.

    Madoka had never been very good at battling, if she had to rank herself, she’d say she was middling. She’d known how to put a decent strategy together, and she knew the basics of beybattles, but she was always just off.

    She lost a lot.

    She remembers once a kid--- she can’t even remember if she knew him--- kicking her bey out of the ring after a loss. He told her to quit battling because she was obviously never going to be any good at it, she didn’t have the stuff for beybattles.

    Madoka thinks she cried that day.

    Madoka loved her bey, Mad Gasher. She hadn’t made it from scratch, but with the help of her parents. She’d worked on most of its modifications alone, and loved watching her improvements spring to life in the arena.

    She still didn’t win much.

    The training centers had begun to feel oppressive, it always felt like everyone was watching at her, waiting to laugh at her failure. She felt heavy everytime she entered, like chains were weighing her down.

    Madoka decided one day it was best to just focus on her mechanical skills.

    She’d nearly forgotten about her old interest in beybattles after a while. Mechanics was just really fulfilling for her. She loved helping out all the bladers that would come to her store, and loved it even more when a little boy had returned and thanked her.

    It wasn’t until she met Hikaru that she began to think back on those days she’d used to battle.

    Hikaru was a great friend. Madoka hadn’t gotten to know her that well prior to Battle Bladers, but as Hikaru took on a job at the WBBA, Madoka started to see her more and more. They met up for lunch at least once a week, and Hikaru would stop by the shop when she got off early in the evenings and join Madoka, and whoever else was hanging around, for dinner.

    Madoka hadn’t had another female friend for years. Most of the bladers who came into her shop were boys, most of the mechanics she met at the WBBA were boys. Everyone she really got a chance to interact in her domain was a boy.

    She shouldn’t mind it--- really! It’s not like she disliked her friends, Gingka and Kenta were both great and she loved talking with them. Gingka had so much energy, and Kenta was always eager to learn!

    So why had she nearly cried when she got home after her first lunch with Hikaru? Why did Madoka love talking to Hikaru so much, and feel so at ease around her? 

    Madoka felt terrible--- shouldn’t she appreciate Kenta and Gingka this much?

    Madoka felt amazing, and she set up to meet Hikaru again and again.

    It was during one of these lunches that Hikaru began to complain about the environment around competitive beyblading. 

    “It’s a dick club Madoka, honestly,” Hikaru complained, and Madoka almost snorted out the milk she was drinking, Hikaru sighed and laid her chin in her hand, a sparkle of laughter in her eyes. “They were always like you can’t be that good of a blader, you’re just a tiny little girl, girls don’t have any muscle mass. God did it feel amazing to finally get good enough to start kicking their asses.”

    “Beyblade is, statistically, overrun by male competitors.” Madoka didn’t need a stats chart to tell her that, she’d been to tournaments, Hikaru had been the only female competitor she’d seen at many of them.

    “Mhm, it was rare for me to meet another female opponent. It was disheartening, I would always get shit for being a girl, and there was no one there to support me. Makes sense given the harsh atmosphere, I can’t blame them for not wanting to stay,” Hikaru sighed, and Madoka found herself shifting uncomfortably in her seat.

    “It does seem like not the best environment for any girl to feel safe in,” Madoka added in, but her heart was only half in it. What was this pressure she was feeling on herself?

    “I remember this one little girl running up to me one day and saying she wanted to be as good a blader as me. I felt really good then, like I had inspired someone. But now, I just…” Hikaru trailed off.

    “Feel what?” Madoka prodded, and hated herself for it. She didn’t even want this conversation to continue.

    “I feel like I’ve betrayed all those little girls that looked up to me, like I’ve proven all those assholes who talked shit about me right. Look at me, I can’t… I can’t battle anymore.”

    Madoka left the cafe that day feeling worse than normal, rather than better.

    Madoka was enraptured by Mei Mei. The girl was very powerful and kind, and always seemed happy to see Madoka. Madoka wished they weren’t on different teams, that the tension of who would win didn’t exist, she would’ve loved to get to know the other girl better.

    And Madoka was never one to not act on her wishes.

    They didn’t leave China immediately after the first round, they still had another two days left. So Madoka set the boys up with some food, a training plan, and yelled a quick goodbye before she set off for Beylin Temple.

    Mei Mei welcomed her with open arms and a cup of tea. She was invited into what she believed was Mei Mei’s room, and they sat together as Madoka asked about Wang Hu Zhong.

    Apparently they were planning to win the wild card tournament, which was the only path they could take now other than quitting the tournament. Madoka found herself listening entranced as Mei Mei talked about all the new strategies she was coming up with, and the training regimens they would be going through.

    “I can’t believe how dedicated you all are, you’re just the sub Mei Mei and yet your training regimen sounds so much harsher than what even Gingka is doing. It's no wonder Wang Hu Zhong is so good if you all hold yourselves to those standards,” Madoka praised the young woman. 

    “It’s no big deal, we’ve always been this hard-working! It takes constant practice to become the best and live up to everyone’s expectations,” Mei Mei flexed her impressive muscles.

    “It seems like all of you have really put the time and effort in to improve,” Madoka nodded. 

    “We have,” Mei Mei smiled, but Madoka could detect a twinge of sourness in it. A note of discontent. A glint of sadness.

    “I wish my team had that amount of dedication, they all love beyblade but can’t seem to focus on any of the training I give them, and their egos always make them clash,” Madoka sighed.

    “Your team probably didn’t need to dedicate themselves that much,” Mei Mei mumbled, balling her fists, and Madoka found herself immediately going on the defensive.

    “Listen my team may look disorganized but all of them have worked hard to get where they are-” Madoka began, determined not to let anyone minimize the accomplishments of her friends.

    “Sorry, wait, that’s not what I meant, honest!” Mei Mei waved her hands in surrender, and Madoka felt herself immediately backing down. Why had she gotten so defensive, Mei Mei was a friend and had only been nice to her. “Most of my team didn’t have to be as dedicated as me either.”

    Madoka frowned. “What do you mean by that?”

    Mei Mei shifted, but with a look up at Madoka she seemed to calm down, and Madoka found herself giving the other woman a reassuring smile. “It’s, well, you see, it’s pretty obvious I’m the only female trainee in all of Beylin Temple.”

    Madoka thought back, and found she couldn’t think of an example to prove Mei Mei wrong. Mei Mei was the only girl she’d seen in this giant temple.

    The thought made Madoka want to cry.

    “I’ve always had to work really hard to earn my place here. Every time I mess up, it feels like they’ll just kick me out. I have to be perfect to stay, because it feels like I’ve already messed up just for being a girl, so if I mess up again I’ll just be out. No one else has to worry about that, Da Xiang and Chi Yun have never had to feel that way. They don’t even seem to notice I’m the only girl here.” Mei Mei looked close to tears, and Madoka scooted closer so she could rub circles on her back.

    “I thought--- I thought I was finally good enough. That I’d finally earned my place here for good. I worked so hard, I practice most nights, and I’m the best at almost any training exercise. I might not be very smart, but I never give up. I thought maybe I’d finally be good enough, but then Chao Xin had to show up and beat me like it was easy. Like, no matter what I did, I still couldn’t measure up to just some random boy.”

    Madoka found herself giving Mei Mei both her own and Hiakru’s phone numbers before they left the next day.

    Russia sure was a trip for the team. After days on the train, bored out of her mind, Madoka thought that was how the rest of the trip would be. Of course, Masamune had to then go missing, and Madoka had to stay up every night communicating with the WBBA and trying to find him.

    Her eyes burned with tiredness, and she wanted to fall asleep for days.

    But there were only 2 days remaining in Russia, and she still had so much she wanted to discuss and learn from the Russian team. As much as Madoka was involved with beyblade, her side had always been more mechanical and scientific. She knew she could learn a lot from a team that straddled both her side and the side of her team.

    She emailed Aleksei ahead of time, asking if she could come over to talk. He responded nearly immediately with the address of where Lavushka was staying, and Madoka made her way over.

    It was a nice enough conversation, once Madoka got Aleksei to stop apologizing. They had a really good system, and Madoka found her head spinning with the amount of scientific knowledge they buried her in.

    She got tips on her training plans, and ways to create new moves in regards to the mechanical properties of each bey. They all had unique perspectives on it, and Madoka found herself hanging off every rare word from Nowaguma. His insight on how to create more powerful attacks would be really helpful.

    Lera offered to walk her back to the hotel where she was staying when night began to fall. Madoka couldn’t help but feel grateful, she hadn’t been looking forward to being alone in the dark. Her parents had always told her to never be caught outside after the sun set, and Madoka kept that advice buried deep within her instincts.

    Madoka hadn’t gotten along with Lera that well when they first met, most likely because Lera had been trying to trick them, but Madoka still felt bad about that.

    She also felt bad about disliking how loud the girl was, especially when 3 out of the 4 members of the team she had were even louder boys.

    Lera was incredibly intelligent. She talked about rocket physics in such a colloquial manner that even the boys might’ve even been able to understand her. Madoka knew from experience how hard it was to explain stuff simply for other people without as much expertise in the field to understand, and Lera seemed to do it naturally.

    “So you think that by changing the bey’s weight like that it would almost get rid of friction?” Madoka wondered.

    “Yeah! That’s what I’m going to be testing out first when we reach the labs. I have most of my prior research already completed, and it’s a good topic for my thesis. I might need Aleksei or Nowaguma to agree to test it out for me…” Lera trailed off at the end.

    “Do you need them to test it so you can take the data?’ Madoka asked, but knew that wasn’t the answer. She could take her own data perfectly well while in a battle, even though she hadn’t done so in a while.

    “Nah, it’s just that to test it out I’d want to try it against a variety of opponents, which means going to a local bey club,” Lera screwed up her face in mockery.

    “You don’t like the clubs?” That was fairly obvious, but the question was more serving as a why.

    “They’re completely filled with boys, and none of them will take me seriously when I ask them to battle. And if I win they get mad and call it a fluke. It’s like none of them can just take a loss from someone without a dick,” Lera complained. Despite the jokey tone of her voice, Madoka could still hear the undercurrent of anger beneath it. Anger at how society dared to treat her.

    Madoka thinks she felt that anger too.

    “That does seem to be one of the few similarities in the countries I’ve visited so far. Boys being scared if they even are slightly shown up by a girl that they’ll suddenly lose all their masculinity and never crawl out of the deep pit of despair,” Madoka added in, and found herself remembering the boys who used to mock her when she was a child.

    They were always boys. The clubs were always full of boys, and there was no space for her there, no room for her to mess up, because she was already an outsider.

    But Madoka had messed up, so much.

    “It’s not like I got anything to prove to them though, they can die angry, I mean, look at me! I’m on the Russian team!” Lera did a little twirl and Madoka found herself giggling at the girl’s overdramatics. “I’m never going to be able to do anything to make those boys respect me, or make them happy with me, so why should I try? I know who I am, I’m a scientist, and I’m fucking great at it.”

    When they arrived at Madoka’s apartment, she accepted a quick hug from Lera. Maybe from that hug Lera could pass some of the willpower she had to Madoka, because Madoka could use it.

    She ordered some flowers for Hikaru that night, and added a little note to them. There are people you will never live up to the expectations of, and people who will accept you just the way you are, because living up to the standards is impossible, you can only live by your own.

    Madoka wasn’t very good at writing notes, but from the two hour long call she and Hikaru had the next day, Madoka thinks Hikaru understood.

    Madoka had a lot of time to think on the flights they were constantly taking. Even with all the work she was taking on, it couldn’t take up all the time.

    Had she given up on battling not because she disliked it, but because the environment was so unwelcoming? Had she let a ton of sexists bully her out of it? Was it her fault? No, of course it wasn’t, so why did she still feel like a failure.

    Madoka wanted to love mechanics, wanted to love being support, but how could she when it just seemed to prove what everyone said right? Why did all this have to be so complicated, she just wanted to live her life however she wanted!

    And why did it feel like there’d never be a right choice?

    Because no matter what she did, the words Lera told her and she told Hikaru were correct. There was no way to live up to their expectations.

    Why was that so hard to deal with though? 

    Wild Fang didn’t have any women on its team. Madoka tried not to feel personally about it, but she couldn’t help but remember when she had watched matches as a little girl, and asked her parents why there weren’t any girls playing.

    She wondered if there were little girls at home watching this match and seeing that there was no space for them here. 

    Madoka didn’t want to be thankful for the injuries her team suffered, but at least they took her mind off this. At least they gave her something else to think about than how much of a failure she might look to other girls watching from home.

    Mei Mei texted her at 1 in the morning after her loss saying that she was glad that if she had to lose it was to another woman. At least then one of them could move on.

    The match between Excalibur was stressful, and Madoka felt ready to shatter at any moment. Tsubasa had lost control again, and Gingka had battled looking almost as battered as he did in his last match against Kyoya.

    Yet they all pulled through the challenge, they all rose to meet it, and came out victorious.

    And Madoka had never been able to rise enough to pass the challenge of sexism.

    Madoka hoped that Excalibur won the chance to battle Galaxy again, she hoped that Sophie was able to stand on the winners podium, if only to show young women that they could.

    If only to show Madoka that she could.

    It was afternoon in the hotel they were staying at. Madoka was making a quick lunch for the team. Yu had joined her in the kitchen this time, and Madoka took to teaching him some basics about chopping vegetables and using the stove. She didn’t expect a kid as young as him to be able to do complicated cooking, but she had learned after Kenta that it was worth it to give these children some basics otherwise they’d just live off fast food whenever they were journeying alone.

    Tsubasa, Gingka and Masamune were all watching matches on the TV. It was a junior tournament, with some beginners getting their first taste of a proper tournament scene.

Madoka wasn’t paying that much attention to it, but she found herself suddenly doing so at a comment from Masamune.

“Kinda weird that there are no girls in this tournament, huh?” Masamune mentioned as he munched on some popcorn.

Gingka nodded in agreement. “There aren’t many girls at tournaments I suppose, I’ve never really noticed before.”

“I wonder why that is? Maybe not as many like beyblade, or are as good at it, or as competitive. They just aren’t into it I suppose.” Masamune said that so… so… casually! Like he just couldn’t understand why there wouldn’t be any girls in a tournament. Like it was just fun food for thought for him.

Like he just hadn’t suggested that girls didn’t enter tournaments because they just weren’t as good as the boys, like there was something wrong with them.

Madoka couldn’t hear if anyone agreed with him, or if anyone argued. Maybe that was for the best. She was out the door within a second.

Madoka walked, and walked, and she was going nowhere. Was this always how it was? No matter how much she improved, she’d always be stuck right here in her square of being a failure. And why was she a failure when she just wanted to be herself!

She wished she could make it so Mei Mei would never cry again feeling like there was too much pressure on her to be perfect or she’d be kicked out. She wished she could make it so Lera felt safe doing her research rather than only being able to rely on Aleksei and Nowaguma because she couldn’t ask anyone else for help without it being seen as her being unable to carry her own weight. She wished she could make it so Hikaru didn’t feel guilty about having to retire from battling so she could mentally recover.

She wished she could make it so that she felt ok just living as she was.

Madoka didn’t know where she was, but that had been normal for the past few months. Madoka had been travelling so much, not only externally but internally. She felt disconnected from everything she’d thought she was.

She was drifting.

She just needed a safe harbor to dock at, one that could tell her it was ok, one that would tell her she was enough.

That’s when she spotted Excalibur exiting one of the shops. Excalibur, which had Sophie as one of its members.

She was walking over to them before she’d had time to think, before she’d had time to be rational. Sophie was just so regal every time they met. The woman seemed completely confident in her own abilities and skills. She was almost radiant in the comfortability she exuded. 

“Oh, hello Madoka,” Wales greeted as she neared them, and the entire team turned to lock their eyes on her. She found herself shriveling a bit inside from their intense glares, of course they wouldn’t be that friendly to her, they were still enemies in the tournament.

But…

Madoka wasn’t a fucking coward, and she wasn’t one to back down once she’d started something. “I was wondering if I could talk to you, Sophie?” She hoped her voice came out loud, confident, like the woman she wanted to talk to, but her voice just sounded small and broken.

“Listen, we’re enemies, we don’t have time to-” Konzern began to lecture her, and Madoka found herself ignoring him. She didn’t actually care what he thought.

“How are you able to be so confident, and, and just keep battling despite the fact you're the only girl there? How do you deal with it and look so unbothered, because it’s obvious to me already that Europe is just the same as everywhere else, so how are you able to keep going?” Was Madoka making sense? Madoka thinks her thoughts had stopped being coherent a long time ago. She stopped understanding things, stopped understanding herself.

A warm hand was laid on her shoulder, and she looked up to see Sophie smiling down at her. It was a soft smile, full of understanding. It was like all the other girls Madoka had met on the way here, the mutual experience they all shared with one another. “There’s a park just a few blocks from here, why don’t we go there so we can talk somewhere less busy?” 

The park was quiet, and mostly empty. There were a few joggers running on the paths winding through it, and Madoka could hear the faint laughter of children, but for the most part, she and Sophie were alone.

Sophie led her to a bench and handed Madoka a handkerchief. Madoka couldn’t even argue the gesture, she felt like she might start crying at any moment.

“So then, do you want to tell me about it?” Sophie asked, and Madoka looked into the eyes of this near stranger and found that she trusted her to understand the flurry of emotions that had been building inside of Madoka for weeks, so she let it all out.

She doubted what she was saying made any sense to Sophie, but more and more words just came pouring out. The way she was realizing that her bullying as a child had been influenced by sexism. Her love for mechanics but her guilt at not being more proactive. The things Masamune had said. Her want to be a role model for other girls, but how could she be a role model when she was always in the background?

Madoka told Sophie everything, and Sophie sat and listened, and when she was done, after asking for permission, Sophie reached over and hugged her.

The handkerchief was soaked by the end.

“I think we all feel that way sometimes, as if by not being everything and more that we’re letting someone down. That we’re letting other little girls like we used to be. That’s who we’re trying to live up to the expectations for, that imaginary little girl. But in the end, all we can be is ourselves. That’s how I make it through each battle, each loss, each remark thrown at me. I think that just by being me I’ll inspire someone, because if I wasn’t myself I’d just be lying to all those young girls. I think I can be a role model just the way I am, and maybe one day they’ll be even better role models than me, and more and more girls will be able to flourish in beyblade. I don’t know what the future holds, but in the end all I can be is myself, and hope it’s enough for those girls. Because it’s also the only way I can ever be happy.” Sophie answered Madoka’s questions from so long ago, and Madoka finally felt ready to take those words to heart.

“It’s just, hard, not to try to take any responsibility about the institutions running society. Because I am a part of society, so shouldn’t I work to change and revolutionize it? But you’re right that if I were someone I’m not, I’d just be unhappy,” Madoka sighed.

“I think all women are inspiring just the way they are, doing things that make them happy. I just wish society didn’t make us doubt it, and push us away from what we want.” 

All the girls Madoka had met were very inspiring. Hikaru with her determination to continue making others happy. Mei Mei with her pure love for battling and her crazy training. Lera’s incredible scientific genius and confidence in her abilities.

Madoka didn’t want to change a single one of them, they should all get to be happy the way they were.

And Madoka didn’t want to change herself, she wanted to be happy being her.

It was society that had to move over and make way for her.

Sophie ordered a car to help get Madoka back to her hotel. Somehow, Madoka had wandered halfway around the city, and it was starting to get late.

Sophie gave Madoka her number before she went inside, and Madoka found herself smiling as she added another woman to her ever-growing list of friends.

    She hesitated a bit before the door to their shared room. She had left her team suddenly, they must be worried about her. But she couldn’t bring herself to regret her decision, not when she had managed to talk to Sophie.

    She entered the room quietly, but that still didn’t stop everyone from noticing her entrance. Tsubasa was on the phone with--- that sounded like Hikaru? Gingka and Masamune seemed to be arguing over a map, and Yu had been pacing until he spotted Madoka.

    “Madoka! You’re back!” Yu cried as he launched himself into Madoka’s arms. She stumbled backwards as she caught him, bracing herself against the doorway. Madoka may have been small for her age, but carrying around mechanical parts everywhere had made her rather bulky, and she held Yu easily.

    “Madoka!” Gingka and Masamune cried at once, coming to hover around her. Tsubasa followed at a more leisurely pace, but Madoka could still see relief flooding his eyes.

    “I’m sorry I worried you all?” Madoka managed to get out. They were all so close to her, and looking at her with such a range of emotions. How was she supposed to explain what had happened? And what had happened here?

    “We’re just glad you’re back,” Tsubasa said softly, giving her a tiny smile. Madoka returned it gratefully, and put down Yu, who had finally stopped clinging to her.

    “Where did you go?” Yu demanded, crossing his arms.

    Madoka floundered for a second, but Hikaru on the phone came to her aid. “I’m sure Madoka is tired right now, she can explain what happened whenever she wants to.”

    Madoka thanked her and then returned to her room. She needed time to center herself, to figure out how much to tell her team. 

    After ten minutes a knock sounded at her door, and Madoka figured her time was up and she would have to tell everyone. With a sigh, she pushed herself up her bed, and let them enter. To her surprise though, only Masamune was standing outside the door, holding a tray loaded with food.

    “Gingka made the food, the rest of the team is eating around the table right now, but Tsubasa said you might want to be alone. Well--- he also said that I might need to talk to you alone to apologize,” Masamune laughed awkwardly as he rubbed the back of his head, and Madoka led him over to sit on the side of her bed.

    “I don’t really understand what happened, but Tsubasa explained to me a bit why my comments were wrong and might’ve hurt you. I really didn’t mean to do that, honestly! I might not understand but you’re a really cool friend Madoka and I wouldn’t do anything on purpose to hurt you,” Masamune apologized.

    Madoka… knew all that, deep in her heart. She knew her friends were nice people that would understand and listen to her. They didn’t understand because they’d never had to think about it, not because they were purposefully cruel.

    It was nice to be proven that with an apology though.

    “I know you didn’t mean to hurt me Masamune,” Madoka began, giving him a kind smile. But she also needed him to understand where he was wrong, because it had hurt. “I just want to tell you why you were wrong.”

    “And I’ll listen,” he promised.

    So Madoka explained to him how he was blaming women for not being able to handle a hostile environment, and how discouraging and harmful it was to be surrounded by men all the time. She told him about her own experiences, and how his comments had made her feel like she wasn’t doing enough by just being herself.

    Masamune wasn’t as good a listener as Sophie, he interrupted a lot, and didn’t seem to understand everything Madoka was saying. But he stayed there and tried, and apologized again when the conversation was over.

    Madoka would know her words had made an impact on him just a few months later when she saw him cheer on a little girl in Dungeon Gym. He seemed perfectly focused on making sure she received the support to succeed. He was honestly going a bit overboard… and Madoka loved it.

    After the conversation with Masamune, she didn’t really see anyone else for the rest of the night. The next morning, Tsubasa nodded a good morning to her as she started making breakfast, and asked if she was ok. Gingka also apologized to her and asked if she wanted to talk about anything. Yu gave her another quick hug before moving on.

    Hikaru called later that night, and stayed up to chat with Madoka as she worked on maintenance for all the beys. The conversation was very relaxed, the silent understanding still existing between them.

    “I think I want to try battling again, just for fun, not in competitions,” Madoka mused aloud.

    “Well, you got a wide array of friends who’d be eager to be your opponent. And maybe… I’ll battle you someday,” Hikaru responded.

    “I’d be honored if that day ever came,” Madoka smiled at the phone, and hoped Hikaru could hear it.

    Madoka stayed in contact with all the women she had met, and put them in contact with another too. Lera and Hikaru seemed to have bonded about complaining about their bosses, and Mei Mei and Sophie were constantly passing battling tips.

    Madoka loved being a girl. It was like a warm blanket that fit comfortably over her shoulders, like a happy dance in an apartment with low playing music. It just felt right, it felt serene, it felt like who she was.

    And she loved working at her shop. She loved helping bladers find the perfect combination of parts and improve their strategies. She loved watching them test out her modifications in the small stadiums they had, and the way occasionally they’d thank her when they left.

    And she loved it when a young girl entered her shop asking for repairs to her bey, and Madoka fixed it up, offered some advice, and watched the same girl return again and again, with more girls following her each time as they took the world by storm. She was enough, just being herself, and so were those girls.

[lovecolibri]

is it me or is the worst 2x06 apologist bs comes out every time smth malex related happens? like, i vividly remember how, after i thought we were done with this topic, it was brought back right around the 2 week break between alexs kidnapping and michael going after him... like malex fandom was really excited and boom 2x06 is brought back. now with the malex forever drop...

Nonnie, I truly don't know. I have most of that shit blocked or never followed those people to begin with (many are big fans of m*luca as well and also think they were "cute" which is...not suprising) but sometimes blocking the tags is not enough and you gotta unfollow for your own sanity.

The type of people who want to just have a fun discussion about how interesting that dynamic is are personally triggering to me in the same way men wanting to have a casual discussion about feminism and women's rights are triggering to me. There is a superiority complex at work there where they get to act cool and collected while you look upset and irrational but that's only because they are removed from the reality that the subject they are cavalierly discussing like something theoretical, literally affects people's lives.

Yes, RNM is fictional, the character's aren't real people. But how consent intersects with trauma responses and changes based on each person is a real thing. How consent is portrayed on screen CAN and DOES affect how people look at consent in their lives. It is also reflective of how the creators putting together the scene think about consent. The fact that ZERO consideration was put into Alex's blatantly stated (multiple times) sexuality and very specifically stated IN THAT EPISODE feelings about how being with women affected him, shows that the creators didn't particularly care about portraying Alex or his traumatic history related to his sexuality accurately, because they wanted a group sex scene.

The way C*rina (and H*ather too honestly) reacted like everything was okay because the woman was the one making the choices in that situation shows that they didn't take into consideration the aspect that men, even big, strong ones with military training or superpowers, need to consent too. You can't just automatically assume they are on board because men are sex-hungry monsters, or are physically strong enough to leave if they "really want to". It was a total disregard of male consent and male abuse survivors, because again, C*rina wanted a group sex scene.

The fact that The Scene may have looked consentual is because the actors were told to make it look that way, because C*rina wanted a group sex scene. It doesn't mean that it is in character for any of these characters, it means C*rina chose to ignore the trauma history, sexuality, and background of these characters so that she could have a group sex scene. That is it. That is what happened.

Sorry, this post got away from me.

[nbbjiang]

i’m packing my shit for the move and i found all the texts i had to read for a gender class back when i studied sociology and wow it really reminded me how much i was involved in feminist protest and how much energy and joy it gave me, i remember feeling like my blood was on fire, like i was unstoppable with my sisters and the sorority i felt? it was a uniquely powerful feeling, there truly is nothing like it. and it’s not that i changed my ideals and my mind about how shit should b or anything but i just kinda fell away from being present in discussions and protests bc it’s so centered around womanhood and being a woman, about reclaiming existence as a woman. and more often than not, the feminist circles and study groups and protests are very trans exclusionary, and by that i mean exclusionary to trans women obviously, but also exclusionary to afab ppl that aren’t women and actually don’t want to reconnect with womanhood, don’t want to use their womanhood to fight for rights and against violence, ppl who want nothing to do with the womanhood they’ve constantly had pushed down their throats. they wanna do it from their experience as a person who has been suffered through the whole experience of existing and being perceived as a woman bc of their agab. for a while i asked myself, can i really be a part of this if i’m not a woman? if i don’t want to use my womanhood to fight? if i just want ppl to acknowledge that my agab is a factor of discrimination and violence, but that my relationship with my agab is not that of a cis woman? i needed someone to tell me that it was okay to be a part of feminism without being a woman, because my agab meant that i was treated like one. i wanted ppl to see that we do have similar experiences and that the fight is not only about being a woman.

if your feminism isn’t trans inclusive then it’s not feminism. if your feminism isn’t intersectional it isn’t feminism. and i want ppl that went through that same process that i did, that took me the better part of a year to understand, to make sense of, to know that they are allowed to be a part of feminism, to take active action without feeling like they don’t belong bc of their gender. feminism is so much more than being a woman and that diversity is also incredibly important bc only then will it truly make a change that doesn’t just oppress another minority. anyway, i’m kinda sad that i had to figure it out on my own bc the people i was around had a very closed view, gender wise, about who feminism is about, about who it really fights for.

[alywats]

February 2021 Reading Wrap-Up

It’s that time again, folks. What I read in February, the month of love: Romance, poetry and... math? And in the last book of the month, all 3!

1. The Female Persuasion -Meg Wolitzer (480 pgs) 3

The first third of this book, I was trying to figure out if it was supposed to be ironic or not, then the second third, I was deeply invested in it *not* being ironic, then in the last third? Let's just say the ending was the worst part.

A commentary on feminism that tried to be self aware, but ultimately ended up as un-intersectional, lacking in plot, and predictable. My favorite character was Cory, I felt like he had the best moments of struggle and growth, and it seems underwhelming that in a book so focused on feminism and female empowerment, it was a man's story that stood out. This book seems like a valiant swing but total miss. Sorry bout it.

2. Shipped -Angie Hockman (336 pgs) 3

I needed some escapism and that is exactly what this Romance On A Galapagos Cruise novel did for me. Winter and the pandemic are both hitting me hard so it was nice to think about the sun and travel and falling in love. The actual plot and writing here did fall into pretty predictable and mediocre tropes, so I can't say that this novel had a lot of depth.

3. Dearly: New Poems -Margaret Atwood (124 pgs) 3.5

Margaret Atwood has a distinct voice that carries throughout all her writing. This was the first poetry I had ever consumed by her, and I was happy to hear that voice in her poetry. With themes of womanhood, climate change, and slug sex, I found myself fully engaged throughout. My criticism is only that some of it seemed overly wordy, making it hard to keep track of Atwood's actual point. I listened to Atwood read it herself, making sure that I wasn't missing the pacing or tone, and every poem fell into the same rhythm, which made it hard for anything to stand out against the rest.

4. Station Eleven -Emily St. John Mandel (333 pgs) 4.5

This was a masterpiece of pandemic fiction: it was very reminiscent of The Stand, but 800 pages lighter, and was still able to capture the humanity and nuance of The End Of The World. After I read Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell, I had a lot to say about Shakespeare and the plague, and Station Eleven reinforces it: Shakespeare wrote in a time where the Black Death couldn't be ignored, and yet plague is not a central theme of his work. Instead he wrote about corruption, the hunger for power, the grief of losing loved ones. The Traveling Symphony in Station Eleven perform Shakespeare to the small camps of people who survived a pandemic:

"They'd performed more modern plays sometimes in the first few years, but what was startling, what no one would have anticipated, was that audiences seemed to prefer Shakespeare to their other theatrical offerings."

Whether during the Black Death, the fictional Georgia Flu, or Covid-19, Shakespeare transcends.

5. X + Y: A Mathematician’s Manifesto on Gender -Eugenia Cheng (272 pgs) 2.5

*see previous post*

6. Leave The World Behind -Rumaan Alam (241 pgs) 4

Is this a thriller? No, but it is certainly anxiety-inducing. Reading this in 2021 is hard, because the plot and the emotions it evokes are very near to reality. I loved the claustrophobia of this book, I loved seeing into the thought processes of the characters, and how relatable each person's priorities and analysis of the situation was. Nothing was known for certain, not everyone cooperated, hard decisions did have to be made. It was well done.

7. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo -Stieg Larsson (465 pgs) 3.5

I am always a little bit skeptical when I go back and read major bestsellers, because I never think they are going to live up to their hype. And for the first 150-200 pages of this book, I was definitely feeling like this was going to be a major disappointment. But then, shit started going down. Yes, there are issues with this being just another thriller about how violently women are treated, yes there are some issues with the way Lisbeth's character is communicated to the reader, but overall I was impressed by the depth this novel was able to capture. I was on the edge of my seat, I kept reading because I wanted to know how it would all end. And I think that is the mark of a good mystery or thriller. I am going to be continuing this series, and I am hopeful that the depth will continue.

I think I also give this series a little bit more lenience, because the author died after only writing the manuscripts for this series, he was not around for the edits or translations, or to take criticism or change anything in later books after public consumption or reaction to this first one.

8. I Love My Love -Reyna Biddy (116 pgs) 1.5

This poetry collection is very much of the "Rupi Kaur" genre of poetry, which is not for me. I hate to be a pretentious poetry person, but "instagram poetry" where you hit them with a one liner that is obviously trying to be sooooo deep, feels so disingenuous to me. I just lose any authenticity that I may have found in the writing. Some of the themes here were great starts, but Biddy didn't develop them enough poetically for my tastes.

9. The Unhoneymooners -Christina Lauren (400 pgs) 3

Earlier this month I read Shipped by Angie Hockman, which claims to be inspired by or reminiscent of this book. And I found some great escapism in Shipped, reading about love and travel and warm weather was what I needed during this Washington winter, so I decided to treat myself to another. The Unhoneymooners was very similar, I read about love and travel and warm weather while I was in a snowstorm during a pandemic. It did it's job, but I wouldn't say it was revolutionary to the genre or to literature as a whole.

10. Beyond Infinity -Eugenia Cheng (304 pgs) 3.5

This is a fun book if you want a broad guide to thinking about infinity. I think the level of depth is great for both people with a lot of mathy background knowledge, and for people who are just starting to get their feet wet. My major setback with Eugenia Cheng's writing is this: she uses non-math metaphors to make math "relatable" to people who may not have had experience with the content she is explaining. But she doesn't use metaphors that work! I found it so frustrating that she was making the math she was explaining MORE vague and MORE confusing, like by comparing the natural numbers to a Great Dane puppy (??). I just found that those choices in communication made it less effective at it's goal of communicating cool maths!

11. The Feather Thief -Kirk Wallace Johnson (336 pgs) 4

I found this work of nonfiction to be so interesting. At every stage I was shocked that I had never heard about any of this. Science, museums, birds, fly fishing, crime, lying, eBay investigations, the moral implications of feigning mental illness, and what it even means to have a mental illness, this book has explorations of it all.

12. 84, Charing Cross Road -Helene Hanff (97 pgs) 4

What a sweet collection of letters. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and the ending was so sad yet so beautiful. Simply warmed my heart and I think you should read this too.

13. Strange Attractors: Poems of Love and Mathematics -Sarah Glaz, Joanne Growney (255 pgs) 5

More on this to come…. But basically this book is everything to me. 

[mildly-offensive-white-dude]

There is an interesting correlation in my life. When it comes to the women I’ve dated, the more feminism is integrated into their identity, the more they tended to become... subservient to me. I don’t just mean in the bedroom - although the correlation still holds there, I think that might be more related to them being more interested in exploring my kinks - but I’m talking about in the greater relationship and in life. The more feminist girls that I’ve dated seemed to... model their lives around me in some way. Ask for less and put up with more of my shit. Get into things that I’m into (including kinks), acquire more of my personality traits, and it usually seemed like their plans for the future would slowly erode until they wouldn’t get in the way of mine.

Now personally, I’m not a fan of this. A lot of guys - particularly the kind who are generally unsuccessful in love and dating - will wax rhetorical about how the perfect woman is essentially an agreeable blowjob dispenser who also cooks and cleans. I don’t want that, I like being with people who are complete people on their own, who have their own opinions and aspirations. (Except in the bedroom, but again - kink isn’t real life and shouldn’t be treated as such). So it’s always been very frustrating to me, watching women mould themselves into something that’s... convenient for me, I guess. Especially once I figured this all out and would tell them, straight up, that I liked their strength and independence.

Maybe this says something about me, or about the kind of women I date. If you delve into the ‘manosphere,’ they sometimes talk about this idea regarding feminism: that women are naturally submissive to men, and today’s feminism serves as a little shoulder angel who’s constantly reminding them not to be that way. Of course, they then go on to conclude that because of this, it’s natural and right for women to be agreeable blowjob dispensers who also cook and clean. Which is a pretty stupid conclusion - first off, even if you accept the idea that women are naturally submissive to men, there’s a big leap from that point to the ‘sex slave, maid and cheerleader’ ideal that pervades those circles. And second, something being natural does not necessarily make it good. Saying that it does puts you in the same camp as antivaxxers and those idiots who won’t let the cashier scan their barcodes because of lasers. This is not a new idea, either - the appeal to nature appears on most lists of logical fallacies that you’ll find, and it’s plainly deficient reasoning. Or, more likely, these people are just trying to find a way to justify the things they want to believe - in this case, that they deserve a girlfriend who’s more sex doll than human.

Anyway, there might be a grain of truth in that idea, and there might not be. I certainly find that women generally are more deferential to me than men are. But of course there’s socialisation and upbringing and environment and a whole list of other factors to consider, not least the fact that I’m four inches taller and thirty pounds heavier than most women I meet, with a persistent case of resting bitch face to boot. Really, I can’t treat my experiences as unbiased data when it comes to this stuff at all.

I do have a theory, though. Because there’s another correlation I’ve observed, and that is this: out of the women I’ve dated, the more feminism is integrated into their identity, the traumas they’ve experienced are more in number and worse in severity. The staunchest feminist, the one who would ruin friendships and get fired from jobs because of how she aggressively politicised everything? She was the one who had a multiple year relationship with someone who was physically and emotionally abusive, and she was the one who was raped by an authority figure. And she was also the one who would - despite my constant protests - do all my laundry and meal prep for me every day while I was at work. She was the one who was almost physically unable to criticise me, or ask me for something bigger than picking up groceries on the way home. She was the one who never asked me for my portion of the rent even when I was already a month behind. And she was the one who, when I broke up with her, sat there with tears running down her face and offered to help me move.

So what does this say about her, and to varying degrees about other women I’ve dated? My theory is as follows: when someone experiences trauma or abuse, these two things follow, in a degree proportional to what they’ve experienced. First, they reach out for some meaning, some structure, some external source of power to hold their world and their identity together. For these women, who suffered at the hands of men, feminism is what makes sense to fill that gap - and thus a set of (mostly good and right) beliefs become part of the framework of who they are - if you somehow removed this framework their identity would collapse back into the hole left by those traumatic experiences. And second, the abuse they experience becomes their template for relationships - they carry their hurts and fears along with them, still seeking their abuser’s love and approval by proxy. They don’t have any way to function in a relationship except by making themselves as convenient as possible, as close as they can to that agreeable blowjob dispenser who also cooks and cleans. Their identity, which is already scotch-taped to the scaffold that is feminism to prevent total collapse, is less important to them than keeping the peace and avoiding being hurt again.

So what have we learned, at the end of all this? What can we put into action? Obvious conclusions like ‘don’t abuse your girlfriend’ we already know, so they’re not really much use. To some people, your takeaway might be ‘women who have experienced trauma will make better partners,’ to which I would say, a convenient relationship is not a better one, and you’re a sociopath or at the very least an asshole. I don’t really think there’s anything actionable from any of this, if I’m honest. But I suppose that’s the nature of things - even if my conclusions are correct, they might not be useful. But then on the other hand, something doesn’t have to be useful to be worthwhile.

One final thought - I once had a conversation with the staunch feminist I talked about a few paragraphs up, talking about kinks and the meaning of life and things like that. I said to her, “I think the reason I’m dominant in bed is because I feel like I don’t have any control over a lot of things in my life, and it feels good to be in control for once.” And she nodded and said to me, “I think the reason I’m submissive in bed is because I feel like I have to be in total control of everything in my life - otherwise it will all fall to pieces - and it feels good to give up control for once.” Can we make any conclusions from that? Probably not - it’s just two data points after all - but it’s certainly interesting data, placed right on the intersection between sex, trauma and personality. And perhaps we can learn more about ourselves by thinking about things in this way.

[ocasio2018]

why did AOC endorse bernie?

if you don’t get why AOC endorsed bernie, here’s why.

after the last debate, news broke that AOC was going to be bernie’s special guest at his queensbridge rally this saturday, and not only that, she was going to endorse him! i was beyond myself with glee - i was nervous abut which choice she’d make. i had been wondering whether she would continue to be the woman (queen) i knew her to be, or if that dumbass NYT write-up was right; she’s learning to go along to get along in the corrupt House of representatives.

despite the naysayers, within and outside of the party, our girl was still repping US. that meant backing bernie in this fight --  the man who has repped us since before most of us were born. he has vision, integrity, and a bulletproof value system that cannot be swayed by corporate interests and deep-pocketed donors, unlike the majority of the democrats (see: mayor pete’s medicare-for-all stance in april versus now). despite its political inconvenience and a legion of #neverbernie haters, she aligned her values with her actions (that’s integrity, folks).

but then it quickly dawned on me that so many of the folks that i admire on twitter were not going to be happy.

for reasons that are unclear to me, there’s a huge movement to get behind AOC’s message while simultaneously rejecting bernie. a bizarre position, given that she’s been unabashed in her admiration of his message, campaigned for him in 2016, & feeling moved by his movement. he is her ideological forebearer.

still, i knew that the blue dog dems, liberals, and ‘you go girl!’ twitter would be pissed. EW has replaced HRC as the coronated candidate. let me be clear. warren is brilliant, down to earth, and more than fit for this job. she has an authenticity about her and ability to connect that makes you want to root for her. she and bernie are usually aligned on issues and are good friends irl. warren is a progressive. still.

warren has been wishy-washy on medicare for all, is pro-israel-no-matter-what, & unabashedly pro-capitalism. none of that shit is cool, ok? ultimately, it makes me trust my gut that bernie is the candidate who will remain the most dedicated to the world that i envision; an anti-war, progressive society that takes care of its residents despite nationality, race, gender identity, income, and all intersections between. this is a fight for the future of our country and i’m riding with the dude who’s been in the cut for decades.

for those reasons, i’m bernie 2020. given that i’ve seen almost every single AOC interview, i had an inkling that she would be the same. & then she was! but here’s the thing - for some folks, there’s a huge disconnect. they don’t get it. they see bernie and think:

❌ white man (who just had a heart attack)

❌grumpy old man (with a bad attitude)

❌ baggage from 2016 (and a heap of haters)

❌ unrealistic vision that isn’t possible in the confines of the presidency

❌ a missed opportunity to elect the first woman president (of native ancestry lolz).

especially the last one. feminism! girl power! in fact, check out this tweet.

ah yes, “identity politics.” that thing where um, uh...you kind of support the person whose identity is closest to yours..? or like, whoever is more oppressed is who you should align with because they deserve it more?

but here’s the thing. that popular, nebulous, nonsensical definition is wrong. black feminist radicals created that term. identity politics is about organizing around the collective interest of an intersection of identities. black women were politically organizing, animated by specific interests & needs of black women. the combahee river collective who popularized this term knew that sharing an identity does not automate shared interest. all kinfolk ain’t skinfolk. when it comes down to it, your vision matters more than your social identity. in this way, endorsing bernie is aligning with AOC’s identity politics. bernie’s political investments are more concerned with the needs of the most vulnerable. think of it that way.

by comparison...

✅warren consistently centers ‘middle class working families’ in her messaging while bernie focuses on ‘working people’ and the ‘impoverished’.

✅ bernie wants to cancel all student debt, warren only wants to cancel it for some

✅ bernie is anti-war and anti-imperalism, warren wants...a green military?

✅bernie is a committed socialist, warren is a committed capitalist

✅bernie ran against clinton (a hardcore neoliberal), warren endorsed clinton

there’s more, but you get the point. there is one candidate in the 2020 field whose vision is clear, equitable, & staunchly committed to justice for all americans: bernie sanders. asking why AOC would endorse bernie instead of EW fails to recognize that their overall interests are divergent. warren is a woman yes, but bernie would also be the first jewish president. AOC has already acknowledged that she has jewish ancestors in puerto rico - by this logic, should she be as committed to that identity? or should she endorse julian castro, a fellow latinx?

tbqh, some of the blowback smacks of co-opting the intellect & labor of WOC & then discarding them...if you f*cked with AOC last week, today should be no different. she is still fighting for US and even if he isn’t *your* candidate, do not embarrass yourself by dragging her. check the legions of idiots on twitter now, saying she has no clout in the party anyway (HA!) & claiming she would be bad for the warren campaign. nah. you may not agree with this decision but it would behoove you to respect it.

if you still don’t get it, imagine what AOC’s platform will look like when she runs for president-- more like bernie or e. warren?

we can all agree on this, i hope: tr*mp is an abomination and should be impeached. warren or sanders, this country will be much better off.

[cipheramnesia]

The 2 question anon here. So some trans women feel that their struggle needs to be acknowledged, and that is why just using the term women isn't correct? Also I know men who do not accept trans men as men. And they are definitely no version of a feminist. It just seems wrong to put them under the terf umbrella. And maybe it seems to malign the inclusive idea of feminism? Like it seems all the bad words are associated with feminism? And gives the men a free pass to be bigger assholes? You know?

People who don’t accept the genders of trans people are bigots. Someone who thinks trans peoples’ genders aren’t real and that this is a feminist stance is a subcategory of bigot we call TERF for short. Anyone can claim inclusive language as a way to become bigots and assholes. What you’re doing here is seeing a false dichotomy of both genders and bigotry which doesn’t exist.

We can’t unfuck that particular bellend. It’s done damage to the good work of feminism. I don’t have large amounts of shits to give over whether they call themselves TERFs, radical feminists, gender critical, or some other nice face to put on their bigotry. 

The point of intersectional feminism is to recognize the diversity of experiences of people from different walks of life both in terms of the forms of injustice or inequality or bigotry they are faced with, and also in terms of how they claim their place back against that oppression. It’s complex and undergoes a constant shifting as not everyone’s equitable world is fully compatible. It’s hard work, and bigots hate it because they want a simple yes or no answer to everything. And sometimes there isn’t, and part of the work is knowing when to just listen and support someone with a different experience, or when it’s time to speak up for your own needs.