#fuck you rusty leasebound

[angelmelon]

radfems are literally just alt-right people but replace “white ablebodied men better” with “white ablebodied women better”. Radical “feminism” is not made to be kind to disabled people and people of color. Their propaganda and arguments majorly serve to let POC and disabled people know that they are not “normal” to radfems.

[strawberry-ace]

chapter 1

[nniko-i]

day 1: makeup!

for @angelmelon's prompt list for its remake of a transphobic comic :3

[projectinfiltrateleasebound]

Hi my name is Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way and I have long ebony black hair (that's how I got my name) with purple streaks and red tips that reaches my mid-back and icy blue eyes like limpid tears and a lot of people tell me I look like Amy Lee (AN: if u don't know who she is get da hell out of here!). I'm not related to Gerard Way but I wish I was because he's a major fucking hottie. I'm a vampire but my teeth are straight and white. I have pale white skin. I'm also a witch, and I go to a magic school called Hogwarts in England where I'm in the seventh year (I'm seventeen). I'm a goth (in case you couldn't tell) and I wear mostly black. I love Hot Topic and I buy all my clothes from there. For example today I was wearing a black corset with matching lace around it and a black leather miniskirt, pink fishnets and black combat boots. I was wearing black lipstick, white foundation, black eyeliner and red eye shadow. I was walking outside Hogwarts. It was snowing and raining so there was no sun, which I was very happy about. A lot of preps stared at me. I put up my middle finger at them.

[fluffytimearts]

Jeez, you fucking libfems are so braindead, so what if that person is a minor? She was obviously saving the poor girl from the TRA propaganda you all ride dicks for. Rusty is simply saving lesbians from the lesbophobia you push you sick perverts. 

Ya'll-- Ya'll WHEEZE-- we got one.

Alright pedophile apologist having, gay men fetishizing, radfem strapriding, women suppressing, white supremist loving, hypocritical looking, sexual narcissist being, "I'm not like other girls" talking, obviously some illiterate talking ain't no picking up a single book bout facts having, speaking like a wojak having, *gasp* dear lawd, I can't take a breath cuz damn it took it away by the sheer emptiness of your stupidity. Speaking of air, I wonder when you are going to speak, because that dick of "trans brand" mindset is quite muffling. Not even that most of yall, who are mainly entitled femcel white women, do nothing but whine and bitch most of the time to do any sort of affirmative action that protects any lesbians, not that there is anything to protect them from considering. If you picked up a history book, you know that trans people stood with lesbians, so thats number one and two. I see more damage than anything really from radfems putting lesbians down, threatening them of SA and R@pe, and telling them off the wall shit that is more like trapping them in an unhealthy ass relationship with ya'll. 

But alas, call me what you will. Who needs clowns when you are already my favorite entertainment of you guys getting pissy and jumping on my askbox as if you are proving some point "boldly"? 

Keep em coming, sugar tits.

[l0veraven]

why the fuck would you reclaim the violently transphobic webcomic instead of writing your own thing. awful. are you tme? don’t think i’ve ever met a tma leasebound enjoyer. funny.

I'm trans-masc (this is the first time I've seen the term TME so that was pretty cool to see), but there's more to it than just reclaiming the story.

I 100% disavow the author, Rusty, and her beliefs that she shoehorns into her story. Many of her characters are bland and one-note, and (even though the original story is wildly transphobic), it's turning the transphobia on its head and taking a critical look at transphobia while also focusing on the actual lesbian love story.

I'm not sure if I mentioned it in the Author's Notes from the top of my head, but the love story is heavily overshadowed by the story being a soapbox and shouting, "trans women are evil and ugly and [insert more insults here]." In my fic, I'm still bringing topics of gender into it, but in a way that, again, takes a deeper look and is an integral part of how the characters interact with each other.

We also need to talk about how allergic Rusty is to depicting men. That's actually another major issue I have. The flavor of terf/radfem beliefs that Rusty upholds is genuine misandry (prejudice/discrimination against men). I don't use misandry lightly and don't mention it much in conversation.

Chapter 12 actually highlights this point.

(Spoilers for people that haven't read the chapter)

Shez's backstory is explored and details how her trauma with her mother being in abusive relationships with men had negatively impacted everyone involved (the mother, siblings, and herself). The character being averse to men and having trauma is completely valid and I would never critique someone having PTSD. I, myself, have PTSD from abusive relationships (familial and otherwise) throughout my entire life, so this isn't something foreign to me, but everyone does experience trauma differently.

I bring up Shez's backstory because even though it's a perfect way to explain why she hates men, it perpetuates the idea that men are inherently violent, predatory, and abusive. This isn't helped by how Meriam, the mother, is genuinely heterophobic and refuses to acknowledge that therapy would be beneficial for her.

(Here are the heterophobic panels in question)

I understand where Meriam is coming from, even though I don't have the same trauma as her. It's understandable that she wouldn't want a man in her house. I see why she's avoidant of meeting Rissa's boyfriend. It's normal to avoid triggers.

What isn't normal is actively avoiding seeking help to work through trauma. This isn't to say she should invite men to her house and "get over it". It's that she needs to learn that not every man is out to hurt every woman they encounter. I had to get therapy myself in the past and had to learn that not every romantic partner will manipulate me, but need to establish boundaries to ideally avoid being in a situation like that again.

To point out the heterophobic lines (which is wild because this is the first time I've seen actual heterophobia in any piece of media)"

Rissa: "[...] SHANEZY doesn't NEED to date women. [... Your ex-husband] was ONE man, mum. ONE. [...] He treats me like a QUEEN. You'd know that if you just gave him a CHANCE!"

Meriam: "One chance is too many. Nice men are the best liars."

This is where Meriam is unable to see the nuances of human interaction. People with enough charisma, period, are the best liars. Could be Ted Bundy, could be your mother-in-law. Anyone and everyone is capable of lying and tearing a person down. Toxic lesbian relationships can and do exist. You don't avoid liars just by attracted to the same gender or only interacting with the same gender.

Rissa: "And WOMEN never lie?!? They're just perfect angels who can do no wrong?!"

Meriam: "Women cannot make you pregnant."

We'll look past the women being able to impregnate (trans women do exist, but that's besides the point). Rissa is making a very valid point. Anyone is capable of lying and you can't avoid toxicity by only avoiding one group of people. Liars exist in a variety of spaces and have a variety of identities. Men are not the only ones capable of bad behaviors.

Rissa: "[...] So my options are: be a fucking lesbian or die alone? Great!"

Meriam: "Rissa... I am not saying this."

But she is. To a degree. I'm assuming that Meriam would be fine if Rissa abstained from relationships entirely (but we can't forget that terfs tend to not acknowledge asexual and aromantic identities), as long as she wasn't with a man. In theory, assuming that Rissa is straight, she would unfortunately be pressured by her mother to remain single.

THE BIGGEST POINT HIGHLIGHTING THE HETEROPHOBIA HOWEVER:

Rissa: "What if we get married, hmm? You just won't come to the wedding? You won't meet his family? Nothing?!"

Meriam: "I cannot support this, but I cannot stop you either."

Rissa: "Well, I guess you'll just never see me after that then!"

Meriam: "You will always have a home here..."

THIS is the problem. Instead of trusting her daughter to ensure her own safety and establish hard boundaries in her relationship with someone she hasn't even met yet, she just doesn't trust men. Period. This dialogue is something that comes straight out of a conflict with a homophobic parent. Remember the lines, "I cannot support this, but I cannot stop you either," and, "You will always have a home here." This reeks of "I don't support your lifestyle, but I still love you and you're always welcome here. Just not your partner."

Why go on about heterophobia?

For one, it demonstrates how hating men is acceptable in the comic, because with how the conversation is treated within the comic, Rissa is the irrational one for not siding with her mother. The other aspect is that it perpetuates "man violent," which isn't really beneficial to anyone. It fails to understand the nuances of people as a whole.

We also can't forget the gay couple with a gender nonconforming son that only appeared for a split second and never returned. Again, Rusty is allergic to men. I actually hate how her friend rags on her "inability to draw men". I think it's untrue, and frankly, I like some aspects of Rusty's art style. However, Rusty herself has mentioned that she refuses to depict men in her comic (unless they're characters like Trinity AKA "Madame President" as shown in Chapter 13).

THE POINT IS:

Why not take a shitty piece of media and re-write it to make it better? It's kinda like being mad at all the anime abridged series out there because the original media is shitty in one way or another. Besides, the story itself has SO MUCH POTENTIAL, but it's completely ruined by the transphobia and focusing on that aspect rather than developing the relationship between Jaden and Riley.

This comic has been going on for 5 years and we got the backstory of a side character before getting a look at Riley's backstory. Focus on the main characters please. We haven't even gotten to the inevitable break-up between Riley and Blaire yet.

Who knows, maybe one day I can publish this fic as its own book like with 50 Shades of Grey 🙈

[micah-write]

bro chilllll i was legit trying to help you with your overlal critique. leasebound isnt a syndicated strip or some published comic she literally isnt being paid to do it. rusty has no obligation to anyone to maintain a consistant style and seems to just fuck around and try whatever new shit she wants just like any other online artist. focusing on her artistic experiments over quality is pedantic and again weakens your overall arguement

No you're not helping because you focused solely on what I said about Jacob, her inconsistentcy rely in how she portrays her characters wich she constantly changes to fit her biased vision of the world, before complaining about only this argument I would ask you to read the rest of my critics . Plus you still don't bring me arguments about where I'm nitpicking when I gave you examples of rusty doing . Plus you hide behind anonymous so 😬😬 not a good look especially since it's so obvious you're a rusty dick rider and unlike rusty I won't block you from disagreeing with me nor will I change your comment

Unfortunately you seem to not understand that the evolution of one's artstyle isn't the same as changing a character design on purpose to fit your lies + whitewashing it . If it was just her artstyle changing I wouldn't critique it . But you haven't read my other critiques and it's painfully obvious

[boreal-sea]

If you don't mind asks about your opinion on particulary bad and infamous radfems/terfs 👀

Any thoughs on Leasebound and Lesbihonest.art Aka Rusty Hearts?

TLDR Context: A mid as frick supposed lesbian slice of life comic (LB) that's actually poorly disguided transphobic, transmisogynistic, misandrists and anti-femeninity propaganda made by a woman who's proudly all of that + antisemitic, tokenist towards black and gay men and a cyberharraser (Rusty)

Here's a post that details all her anthics with sources at the end: https://www.tumblr.com/king-of-general-disarray/716044849274568704/

I know very little about it, thank fuck, other than that it exists, and it is transphobic + everything else. As such, it's a passing drama I've seen one or two posts about and have chosen to stay out of. To that end, I'm going to continue staying out of it lol.

Bigotry is bigotry and tends to come in groups. If someone holds one fucked up view, they probably hold others, too.

That's about all I can say.

[thewebcomicsreview]

Ko-Fi Commission: LeaseBound

Leasebound is a “gender-critical” (TERF) webcomic that attained notoriety after releasing a chapter with hateful depictions of trans people, leading to it getting banned from Smack Jeeves. It’s currently self-hosted on a comic press site without a cast page, archive, or even menu, and doesn’t appear to have a patreon (and likely won’t, given its content). It’s a small enough comic that I wouldn’t normally feel comfortable reviewing it, except that the creator explicitly encouraged me to and appears to be getting off on the bad press. 

The story starts with two characters finding out that they both rented the same apartment because the landlord was incompetent and double booked it.

And this particular landlord doesn’t have any other rooms available. There’s a host of logical objections to this set up, such as

Isn’t this fraud on the part of the landlord?

Wouldn’t a major deception like this void the lease?

Why don’t the women move to some other landlord’s apartment and sue the shit out of the woman who sold them a single apartment and surprised them with a roommate?

How does a huge apartment complex with at least 18 rooms have two people booking rooms that don’t talk to each other?

Is the groundskeeper also doing the paperwork and background checks? You don’t buy an apartment at the apartment store, it’s like a whole process.

Isn’t this just the fanfic “but there was only one bed!” trope taken to an even more illogical extreme?

But that road leads to becoming CinemaSins, so let’s just acknowledge that the premise is ludicrous and all the characters are morons so we can move on with our lives. Anyway, the characters introduce themselves as Jaden and Riley, and casually accept sharing a bedroom. They exposit a bit about how Jaden dropped out of college and Riley never went, and

Uh

RILEY: Sorry- I wasn’t trying to pry. JADEN: All good. Earlier you said you had a “few things” in mind RILEY: Right, yeah! I thought it was be good to set some ground rules. JADEN: You can add’ “more organised” to the list then too. Haha. RILEY: Wait, really?  JADEN: Stories for another time

What the fuck? What list? What is Jaden talking about? Why is there an apostrophe hanging out after “add”?

You know how in PS1 JRPGs the translation would be really bad and sometimes people would just say weird shit that didn’t seem to have anything to do with what was just said?

That’s how Leasebound dialogue reads, bizarre punctuation and all. The add’ with an apostrophe is baffling, but I also like how “Haha.” is it’s own sentence with a period at the end.

 Anyway, the rest of the chapter is about how Riley owns a cat but has to keep it a secret because she doesn’t know if the landlord allows pets and I guess didn’t think to ask when she was applying for the lease.

So, the status quo is established. Jaden and Riley wanted to buy a single apartment but got foisted with a roommate, but they’re happy because that means the rent is cheaper. Personally if I wanted a cheaper apartment and was willing to have a roommate I’d get an apartment with a roommate in the first fucking place but we really can’t keep complaining about how stupid the premise is we have to move on. So Jaden is in the living room and, hold on, sorry

This living room is massive. The kitchen has a fridge, and oven, and two matching sofas. In chapter 2 Riley’s going to fit in a four-seat table in here. This is supposed to be a studio apartment in Downtown City

Y’know, City. Not any particular specific real or fictional city with a name, but City.

And Jaden and Riley, neither of whom have college degrees, are so hard up for cheaper rent that they’re comfortable with the surprise revelation of having to share a bedroom with a stranger. But they’re also in a huge apartment in the middle of a metro area? This living room is nearly as big as mine, and I have three roommates and live in Cheaper Suburb. Why are you buying all this space at City square foot prices if money is tight? Get a smaller apartment, or if you really need the space get an apartment that’s not in the middle of City? The author of this comic is 23, has she not looked into getting an apartment? Bigger ones are more expensive.

Okay, okay, the premise is dumb. Let’s move on. Riley and Jaden make sm-

Why are you sharing a tiny bedroom if your Living room is party sized and has multiple sofas? Why not partition off some of the living room with room dividers from IKEA to make a faux bedroom with privacy?

Ahem, Riley and Jaden make small talk and order a pizza and it takes a long time and it’s not super interesting but it’s supposed to be cute and I can’t really fault a slice of life comic for taking its time. Riley’s worried that her girlfriend won’t like that she has a roommate (Riley why don’t you move in with your girlfriend?), and Jaden gets a call from work that they’re shortstaffed.

They’re so short-staffed that they’re going to send an employee out to go pick up Jaden. Can Jaden not get to work on her own? That seems like the kind of thing that would make her not want to move in to this specific apartment. Why would you move to an apartment that you couldn’t get to work from? You’re in the middle of City, and your job is a big nightclub in City, and City has public transit. You previously did not live in City, meaning you used to live further away from work than you now do. How did you get to work before? Isn’t picking up a Jaden a tremendous waste of an employee’s time? Even if the club is aware that Jaden can’t get in on her own and is willing to bend over backwards for her here, why not “Jaden, we need you at work pronto. Take a uber over, we’ll reimburse you”, which is dramatically easier for all involved? Why is everyone in this comic so fucking stupid?

Sigh

Well, Jaden goes to work, and that leads us off into the infamous chapter 3, “The T is for trouble”

We open the chapter with a bad-faith trigger warning that looks like a real content warning but is actually designed to get trans people really mad as Jaden heads to work and-

Hey hey, Rusty started putting links to her tumblr in the comic pages. Someone was expecting pages from this chapter to go viral, wasn’t she? Was the chapter where Riley and Jaden spend a few pages ordering a pizza not giving you enough engagement? But now that you’re the official #2 Terf Webcomic you get lots of angry people in your tags that you can reblog and be snarky at. Bet that makes you feel powerful. I know the feeling. I built my tumblr following by writing reviews and advice columns for five years, but you went from zero to hero in like a week and all you had to do was say mean things about trans people oh my god I figured it out

You’re Mary. Rusty Hearts is Mary Bradford from Dumbing of Age. You want the validation of the “wrong” kind of people giving you shit. That’s why you made sure all your transphobic comics had links to your tumblr and your getting pizza comics didn’t. That’s why you keep reblogging my ads for my comic that I place in your tags. That’s why you see me post the review and make a response like this

And you know what?

Nah.

I’m not going to include chapter 4. I’m not going to read it. I’m not even going to include chapter 3. There’s nothing that I can add to it that hasn’t been said by a ton of other people. I can post your anti-trans stuff and get the vapors about how bigoted you are, but at the end of the day I’m not the Social Justice Report. I’m The Webcomics Review. And your webcomic sucks. It’s boring, it’s stupid, it doesn’t make any sense. Your premise is ludicrous and quickly abandoned to bait and switch people into reading a political polemic (I did skim chapter four, it’s literally people standing around in a circle talking about how trans people are bad like a terfy Ayn Rand novel). Your characters are all morons in order to get to plot points you want to get to, and your first two chapters are a mountain of pointless exposition and characters being vaguely cryptic about their backstories.Your art is bad not just in that you can’t draw well, but in that you don’t bother to include details to give your world a sense of place, and the details you do include like that luxurious living room actively undermine your alleged story (to the extent that there’s a story at all).

But hey, you got your 15 minutes of fame (and zero patreonbux) from the anti-trans stuff. You got people to read your comic. Good hussle. Well done. Tatsuya Ishida does it better.

Leasebound gets zero genders out of a spectrum.

Like this review? Follow me on patreon, or buy me a Ko-Fi! Or even just read my own webcomic, Saffron and Sage!

[angelmelon]

TERFs and radfems have collaborated with Christo-fascist organizations in the US in order to get transphobic laws passed btw

the same christo-fascist organizations who got Roe V. Wade overturned

please just say your entire belief system is based on hating trans people. It’d be way less embarrassing if you did.

I thought you said you hated men. Why would you rather talk to panels of cisgender fascist men than a single transgender woman??

[angelmelon]

the radfems gonna get PISSED at this one

[angelmelon]

PRIDE MONTH BEGINS!!

and so does GAP!! here’s your little first preview!,

Prologue: 2022

[angelmelon]

ENNUI

I love autistic people 🙏💕

[angelmelon]

Jupe content!! But angsty :[ growing up with a TERF + growing up with a parent who gives literally not a fuck what you do until it effects them personally = hell

[angelmelon]

question for Rusty Leasebound

So are you against shaving everywhere but the arms or…?

An afab person who never shaves anywhere will likely have:

Hairy legs (you seem to have that down, though you don’t exactly draw it very well)

hairy pits (I’ll give it to you you actually do this well)

AND THATS THE ONLY STUFF TO RUSTY APPARENTLY BUT THEY WILL ALSO HAVE

Thick layers of peach fuzz on the face, often times even actual full fledged facial hair, not often a lot but it absolutely can become noticeable

HAIRY ARMS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHY ARE SHANZAY’S ARMS NAKED

a unibrow will often form

SO SO many goddamn neck hairs. Esp if you’re going to draw a ton of people with short hair

happy trail (tummy hair)

but no we must shame afab people with hair in areas that isn’t “womanly” to you by depicting all your trans woman characters with IN YOUR OWN WORDS “ugly traits”, and according to you that includes:

ALL THE GODDAMN ABOVE + ethnic traits because we can’t be normal about middle eastern, Jewish, and indigenous people apparently

I hate you with all my heart Rusty Leasebound please draw women with flat chests and arm hair and without demonizing them

[angelmelon]

sssssso Trinity shaves her armpits and arms but not her face??

Are beards just the only way you know how to show that a woman is trans now?? im still very confused as to why her beard is blue