#i live in the country. its dangerous out here but there are a lgbt people. but theyre mostly kids - i know this bc of alex when he was

[automatismoateo]

Muslims are the biggest hypocrites alive. via /r/atheism

Muslims are the biggest hypocrites alive. For context: this is from a Western-European perspective. First and foremost, I’d say religious people are all hypocrites when it comes to their faith. But muslims, they are the worst and most dangerous, most loud and the most rapidly growing out of all of them. Btw, not picking sides here between Israel/Palestine. The two of them use the exact same rhetorics to try to convince everyone why their side is the victim. Palestine: ‘They bombed hospitals with babies’, Israel: ‘Hamas wants to kill jewish babies’, Palestine: ‘Israel wants to genocide Palestinians’, Israel: ‘Hamas wants another holocaust’, in unison: “WE WERE HERE FIRST ITS OUR LAND!!” They’re just similar to me, except jews are smart and wealthy, whereas muslims are just threatening and aggressive. Anyways, remember when the war started in Ukraine? The complaints about how racist it was that it got so much attention and support: “its all because they are white and not muslims, that’s why these white westerners support them and give more aid to them than to the middle east, disgusting”, then they proceeded to fully support Russia, because Putin kissed the behind of islam and condemned lgbt. Fast forward, the 7 oktober attack happens, now it’s non-stop arguing with everyone that is not as upset as they are about the Palestinians, saying how inhumane it is for people not to unconditionally support them: “you don’t need to be muslim to support Palestine, only human❤️”, yet again proceeding to cry islamophobia etc etc.. now why do they do that? Because Palestinians are part of the ummah, that’s why. I just gave the example of Ukraine, you better believe that’s exactly how they’d respond if Palestinians were non-muslim, non-arabic people.. so then literally all this yelling and protesting they’ve been doing for months is all because of islamic supremacy, the nerve of these people to call others out about an in-group preference…😂 westerns don’t even have 10% the in-group preference they do. They blame USA and Europe for all of their problems, ‘they stole the oil and bombed us, so now us committing crime in the west and immigrating is payback and justified, stop attacking us or stop crying!!1!1!’, they’ll say that, then proceed to worship Saudi Arabia and United Emirates… also, let’s conveniently leave out the role islam has in the failure of their countries, and the way literally all of the leaders in those countries treated their own civilians. Let’s also not talk about how Scandinavia had jack sh*t to do with any or this, yet they’re turning those countries in islamic hellholes as well. It’s just a pathetic excuse, really. They call white men pedophiles, despite being the only group accounting for over a billion people, actively making excuses for one, worshipping one, and having the only countries that still do forced child marriages. They always say the extremists ‘aRen’t ReAl mUslMs’, when in reality, the extremists are living their lives way more like Muhammad did then every single muslim over here that calls them fake muslims ever will. I could go on with examples for days, probably write a book full of them, there’s so much more these people lie about, so much mental gymnastics. They truly know jack shit about their own faith, only propaganda, sad sight to see that that cult is growing. Submitted February 23, 2024 at 01:35PM by Designer_Ad9763 (From Reddit https://ift.tt/mXzIyf1)

[red-woods]

 cw : gore description , abuse    i saw a take saying mental illnesses ( millnesses ) / neurodivergences ( gonna shorfen that fr later to nds ) / disabilities ( dabs ,,,,, im tired dont fucking try to fight me on this one ) : shouldnt get flags because nd people arent as oppressed as gay people    first off you know the least oppressed group ?  possibly in the world ?  countries !  boats !  know what they have ?  flags !     why do they have flags if they’re not homosexual , because as we all know : cloth inherently belongs to the faggots and if you wear clothes , pledge allegiance , or have blankets bed sheets rugs or plushies or pillows : you’re gay .     go back to the mud , like a good heterogender cissexual .  straightvestite .     flags are to easily signal something from a distance .  to easily communicate a message , sometimes a message that inherently needs to be secret .     flags can also symbolize a sense of belonging and identity and similarity to someone else who is also able to recognize said flag from a distance and instantly know you are 1 : likelier to be a safe person , 2 : someone whose existence means they are not alone in a positive way .     finally flags are used to show pride .  You wear them proudly or wave them or display them , so that others can see , and that communicates the message that the thing the flag is in support of : is something you view positively , and regardless of what it is : you are able to feel brave enough to display it .  in terms of country flags that fucking sucks by merit of : countries fucking suck .  however if you had something you were told was sinful , or terribly horribly flawed about you : would you not want confirmation from others that it was okay for you to just exist         ignoring the additional fact that a lot of lgbt+ people are mentally ill because of , oh i dont know , trauma from growing up hiding who we were plus people actively trying to harass if not kill us :    do you have any idea the UTTER BULLSHIT neurodivergent people go through    constant attacks on character and harassment JUST for adhd ,    lots of people treat the tism like a fucking plague , and getting diagnosed CAN GET YOUR HOUSE , CAR , DRIVERS LISCENCE , AND LITERAL CHILDREN TAKEN AWAY FROM YOU    and OH BABY IF YOUVE GOT A STIGMATIZED MENTAL HEALTH CONDITION    gaslighting , manipulation , and other abuses , all conveniently located at the only place you can get any mcfucking help for your symptoms .     now there is no treatment that “ works “ for DID , frankly i would be absolutely terrified of anything that claimed it did , and would have no desire to conform to a society in which little dudes in brain : isnt accepted .  you can have my little dudes over my cold dead body    but DEAR , GOD .  people have lost housing , been institutionalized and had their entire lives taken away , people have lost all sorts of things , the only reason you cant see it is that it happens right under your nose , all the time , and youre used to it .     it’s acceptable to you that people wind up on the streets after a mental breakdown , it’s acceptable to you that people can’t get medication , and are thrown into danger because of it .  the living hell of institutionalization is acceptable to you , you like staying in hospitals ?  imagine that but forever until you die .  it’s acceptable to you that people lose their stability , mobility , agency , self determination , and literal children .       i could sit here all fucking day and go through some bullshit oppression olympics with you that doesn’t fucking matter because all of us were being burned at the stake in the olden days anyways and it doesn’t matter whose experiemce burning was less satisfactory ; and not feel the overwhelming urge to rip out its windpipe because it doesn’t belong to you .      - or !  absolutely batshit concept !     you could look at a flag that helps signal to people they are safe , there are allies nearby , it’s okay for them to EXIST , there is nothing wrong with them , if they need help with a problem relating to whatever the flag signifies : they can talk to this person potentially , and theres a higher chance this person will know how to help and what information to pass along if the person does want to help , and you can go : i like being the bare minimum of adequate for a human being , and walk away .   

[shiningstarr15]

Alright, I’ve been wanting to make this post for awhile now. And I think I gathered enough thoughts and evidence to finally do it.

Before I continue I just want to say that this is my interpretation and not any way trying to denounce any other conclusions that have been made since it was pretty much left to ambiguity. But alright, let’s go.

Giulia is meant to represent the straight ally. Here’s why I think this.

Ok let’s start from the beginning. She lives in the town of Portorosso. A town that is NOTORIOUS for its hatred of sea monsters. Now, to be perfectly honest, this allegory could go for just about anything that is deemed “different” such as racism, homophobia, transphobia, etc. In fact I’m pretty sure the only thing this town DOESN’T have is ableism, as many characters seen throughout are disabled. (Massimo being the prime example)

The point is that, this town has history of hatred, which most likely leads to confusion and stigmatization. Massimo himself is a sea monster hunter, possibly an allegory of homophobia due to propaganda.

(I say this bc as soon as he finds out the truth he is quick to change his mind).

Giulia is a 13 year old, impressionable child that most likely has the same beliefs taught to her from society, and mainly her father. She doesn’t know better but never outright states her hatred. She shows her FEAR of sea monsters bc of propaganda spread across town of them being vicious creatures that eat humans. This is what is engrained into her brain.

But then, she meets Alberto and Luca. Two sea monsters that successfully (maybe?) disguise themselves as humans. She gets to know them, becomes friends with them, and helps train them for the portorosso cup.

And then, Alberto is revealed to be a sea monster.

The look on her face at first is of shear panic. Not hatred, not malice. Panic. She’s scared. This is vastly different from people like Ercole whom the first thing he thinks when he sees a sea monster is to kill it. It doesn’t belong here. It’s unwelcome. It’s wrong.

But Giulia sees different. She’s actually gotten to KNOW them. And yes I say them bc one look at Luca after having outed Alberto (something that closeted gays tend to do at a young age in order to avoid being found out themselves) and she basically figures it out. She may be eccentric but she isn’t stupid.

So as soon as they get to her house. She pretty much knows at this point. And as soon as she reveals Luca..

She doesn’t scream, she doesn’t yell, she doesn’t cry.

She does this.

Now she knows. And here I finally make my first point as to why I think she may be representing an ally.

An ally wants to keep the members of lgbt safe

In a town where sea monster are deemed unacceptable, the first thing she thinks of is NOT “oh my god my friends are sea monsters” she instead thinks “oh my god my friends are in DANGER” she doesn’t WANT them to leave, but she is scared for them. In a world where homophobia is most prevalent and is still illegal, allies will do everything they can to keep them safe. Whether that be giving them a safe space to be themselves or helping spread their message of love and acceptance. The sad truth is, they’re are still many countries where homosexuality is illegal. Portorosso is the perfect example of a place where homosexuality could be forbidden. And she KNOWS this. She even makes it a point to remind Luca that her own FATHER is a sea monster hunter.

Now, I can’t say pushing Luca out and telling him to leave was the right thing. But, at least you can understand why she would. She was scared. This information that sea monsters aren’t as bad as she was taught is new to her. She doesn’t know what to do. So her initial response is to get them out so they don’t get hurt. Again, she doesn’t WANT them to leave. Despite knowing the truth of who they are, she remains loyal.

Now a lot of this could be interpreted as another lgbt trying to help another lgbt, and that’s fine if that’s how you interpret it. But the one thing that was the nail on the coffin for me.. was this line right here.

“You don’t understand”

“No, I don’t.”

2. An ally does not fully understand what an lgbt member goes through.

We can learn about it. We can listen to them. But as far as personal experience goes, we will never fully understand what it is like to be a member of the lgbt. We’re not members, we’re supporters. We are on the outside looking in. Giulia saying she doesn’t understand the situation bc she’s never had to experience it before. Has she been ostracized for being “weird?” Yes. But that isn’t the same thing as being lgbt. And especially with Luca saying he did it bc his parents were gonna send him away. She finally understands the direness of the situation. His parents, they don’t accept him. At least not right now. Albeit it’s bc they are worried about him, what they were gonna do isn’t right. And she knows this.

Finally, one last point I wanna make. Remember when she did this?

Tell me that isn’t a metaphor for taking down homophobia? She risks her own safety to protect the people that she cares about. Even now, as the whole town now knows about Luca and Alberto, she stands her ground to protect them. Going as far as to even confront ercole himself.

It’s a tale as old as time. We defend our friends of lgbt from homophobes and people that want to hurt them. Giulia taking out the “evil empire of justice” is equivalent to an ally helping fight for lgbt rights. It should be a no brainer that they get the same rights as straight people, no? aren’t they just basic human rights? At least that’s what I’ve always thought. But it hits even more closely to you when you KNOW and LOVE someone that is a member. Of course in giulias case, this is the first time she’s discovered the truth, that sea monsters members of the lgbt are not as bad as she was led to believe. She doesn’t believe they’re monsters at all anymore. They’re.. people. Her friends.

And they walk among us. Some of them still “disguised as humans,” others out and showing their colors proudly. But whatever the case may be, she loves them no matter what, and will defend them til the very end.

So yea, this is my interpretation on why I think Giulia represents a straight ally. Again, this is my interpretation as a straight ally as I saw a lot of myself in Giulia. I have friends that are members of lgbt that would go to the ends of the earth for. It’s what being an ally is all about. Defend their rights, accept them for who they are. If you, however, view her as something else (lesbian, asexual, etc) that’s fine! That’s your interpretation. The great part about art is that it’s subjective. You can interpret it however you want! 🥰

[sneezewizard]

This was a highly politicized trial that seemed to blow up due to a collective effort on the right to raise it into a political and a culture war issue. When a bunch of people are suddenly getting very angry about one particular thing online, it always raises a lot of alarm bells for me. And indeed, far-right news outlets spent tens of thousands of dollars pushing ads on this trial. Outrage sells. Which means that if someone or some group of someones is trying to get you to be very angry on the internet, especially at one person in particular, its always important to take a step back and ask why does this person want me to be so angry? I don’t want to get into the specifics of the trial itself. The media circus around it was horrid. I couldn’t follow it very closely. I’m a survivor, and I’ve been cross-examined on the stand trying to get a restraining order, and let me tell you that was one of the least fun fucking things I’ve ever had to do. If someone had decided to turn that into a meme, god I don’t think I would have made it. I’ve also worked in the domestic violence field, and now I work in politics and boy did those two things come together here in a very bad way. This, like recent cultural blowups and panics about various forms of abuse (LGBT hate disguised as anti-grooming discourse, QAnon, etc) are an immense distraction and do an immense disservice to the people actually working to stop abuse. Anti-domestic violence work is inextricable from antipoverty work. Wealthy people are victims of domestic violence, and it's awful when it happens to anyone. But domestic violence is at its most dangerous when people have no other options, and the people needing emergency shelter and resources are not usually like Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. They're often struggling with homelessness, poverty, mental health, addiction, various forms of discrimination, and practically every institutional barrier you could imagine. They often don't have a family or social network that is able to help them. If a survivor has children, that makes leaving even more difficult and expensive. Domestic violence shelters and housing programs are often underfunded, and staff face burnout and secondhand trauma from the work they do all while making basically no money. I knew a girl who worked at an emergency shelter that had a scabies outbreak, and she was so terrified for weeks that she was going to get scabies. She did not make enough money to deal with the ramifications of having to take off work because she got scabies. Domestic shelters in the U.S. (I can’t speak to other countries, but it wouldn’t surprise me if this were also the case) often compete against homeless shelters for funding. So it creates this weird toxic competitiveness that is very detrimental in the long run, all these service agencies pitted against each other for scraps. This is not the first time domestic violence has become a culture war topic to the detriment of progress on the issue. Domestic violence as a point of culture war started with the Father’s Rights groups that formed in the 1970s as a response to feminism, changes in family law, and the burgeoning anti-domestic violence movement itself. And the language around this trial has a lot of the same right-wing, misogynist undertones employed by these groups 50 years ago. Yes, men face domestic violence and this should absolutely be recognized and better addressed, but having the far-right lead out on conversations about gender and domestic violence does nothing but set us back. The policy solutions proposed by Father’s Rights groups never were actually about addressing domestic violence, and generally would have make things harder for survivors of any gender. Turning domestic violence into a culture war topic always sets us back. It ends up obfuscating and misinforming people of the actual issues underpinning domestic violence, which is that we live in a country that makes it hard for people to leave. And the timing here sure does feel ominous. It’s especially alarming to me that this has all blown up on the eve of Roe being overturned, which will be a disaster for people facing domestic violence. Overturning Roe will make this worse. Continuing to gut social services to line the pockets of the wealthy will make this worse. An overly punitive criminal justice system makes it worse. The threat of deportation for undocumented immigrants makes it worse. The threat of defamation suits and the politicization of domestic violence makes it worse. Nothing about the way this trial was covered raised any sort of awareness about this all in a real or productive way. Domestic violence agencies have been fighting for recognition and awareness for decades, and it makes me so disheartened to see tiktok accounts amass millions of views around this trial treating it like some sort of spectacle. We need a conversation around domestic violence that doesn’t involve fancams. If, in following this trial, you have decided that this is an issue you care about, that’s great. But please be aware of the political motivations of certain coverage of the trial. Get involved and support people actually doing anti-domestic violence work. If you are based in the U.S., find your local domestic violence program here and donate, if you can: https://www.womenslaw.org/find-help/advocates-and-shelters Or, donate to NNEDV if you want to support anti-domestic violence policy work on the national level: https://nnedv.org/donate-now/

[elizabethsharmon]

So. Poland has chosen its "president" yesterday - if we can even talk about real choice here when he won by approximately 422k votes. When he won in 6 out of 16 regions, all of them with significantly lower number of eligible voters. When there are huge discrepancies between the results displayed in each polling district and the ones published on the website of the National Electoral Commission. When there were recurring instances of some voting cards not having the necessary stamps which automatically classified the vote as invalid. When some people went to vote and it turned out they're not registered in their designated district because of system error. When people abroad didn't get their voting cards on time. When his party sent over 150 buses to villages in Eastern Poland to take older, conservative people to voting stations. When this is how the results map looks like - and somehow the blue wins with orange.

In the last five years, Du*a and his party PiS (literally lAw AnD jUsTiCe but believe me, they're none of these things) have completely ruined the country and regressed it to Middle Ages.The democracy practically doesn't exist anymore, not since they have the majority to rule (the opposition won the senate back in the parliamentary elections so it's a small win but it's still not enough). They started with the judicial system, appointing conservative judges who are always ruling in their favour. The courts are not independent anymore. The Constitution is being broken over and over and over again. People have been marching and protesting for years now but to no avail. 

The national television, TVP, is practically owned by the ruling party. The propaganda, fake news, hatred on the opposition and minorities is getting stronger each day. What you need to know is that this is literally the first channel on every TV set in the country. No matter where you live, no matter if you have cable or satellite, you turn on TV and TVP is what you get. Their reach is so much higher than other TV stations from the big four (TVP1&TVP2, TVN, Polsat). Poland has fallen to 62nd out of 180 countries in the World Press Freedom Index compiled annually by Reporters Without Borders. Before PiS took over in 2015 we were 18th. For du*a's presidential campaign now they gave TVP 2 billion PLN in order to strengthen the propaganda. There was a project to give those money to hospital oncology wards but PiS said no. TVP has only been showing him during the campaign. The other candidates have either been showed in a bad light or haven't been showed at all. Voters for whom TVP is the only source of information haven't seen other candidates nor their campaigns.

During the second round of the campaign, when another tv station, TVN, with two major Polish online media, Onet and WP, invited him and his opponent, Rafał Trzaskowski, for a debate. Du*a declined because he said he won't participate in a debate which isn't available for everyone and he asked them to reach an agreement with TVP to host the debate together. In the end there were two debates. Du*a on his own in TVP, answering predetermined questions from journalists reporting to his party and people in the studio that were paid to be there. Trzaskowski on his own in TVN and live on his Facebook channel, answering questions from the journalists from 16 independent offline and online media teams.

At the beginning of his and PiS first term of destroying the country, they started their crusade against women, because as we all know middle aged men are the most eligible people to make choices for women and their bodies. Abortion is Poland is (was? honestly who knows now) only allowed in three cases: if the woman's life was in danger, if the prenatal testing indicates severe damage of the fetus, if the pregnancy was the outcome of rape. With their pro life and anti women initiative, PiS was determined to ban abortion completely and punish it by prison. The bill was so flimsy that in some cases even miscarriage could be turned against woman. Even if the baby would've been born sick or severely disabled, even if the pregnancy could be fatal for the mother, even if it was caused by rape. We went on the streets. All dressed in black, with umbrellas in hand. Hundreds of thousands of women and allies marching and protesting together against the government. And they got scared. The bill proposal was dropped but the fight wasn't over and it still isn't. They tried to bring it back now during the pandemic just because they knew we wouldn't go out protesting. But we did, we blocked the streets with our cars.

The day after pill can only be bought on prescription. But if you end up going to the conservative ob/gyn they can invoke conscientious objection to abortion and they won't prescribe it for you. They want to ban sex ed from schools. In their opinion sex ed “demoralizes children and teaches them masturbation.” They want young people to be uneducated and have sex and get pregnant and give birth. They want to make kids have kids just so they would depend on the government and social wage programme 500+ which gives 500PLN (approximately 125€) each month to families with 2 or more children for each of their children. Right now you can be a woman raising your three or four kids and you will get the equivalent of minimum wage just for that. This program made people vote for them in 2015. First Du*a used it in his presidential campaign, then PiS was blackmailing the voters saying the program will only happen if both president and the government will be on board aka they have to get in so Du*a will sign the bill and people will get the money. People still believe only they can ensure the stability of the program even though almost all the other candidates said it will not go away.

In the last couple of weeks of presidential campaign, it became more clear than ever how Du*a is planning to win the elections - by trying to reach to the mindsets of elderly and conservative voters by attacking the LGBT community. He called us “ideological hurricane”. He said we are worse than communists. His party members have been saying we're not humans. He was saying over and over again how he doesn't care what people do in bed as long as they're not obnoxious on street and in real life about it. How sexuality is a private thing and we shouldn't be proud of it. How there's no place in Poland for “LGBT propaganda that wants to demoralize our children”. How there's no space here for unions for same-sex couples, not even mentioning marriage or adoption. How he'll do everything in his power to protect the “traditional Polish values and family model” (whatever that means). The most conservative parts of the eastern Poland has claimed their towns and villages as “anti-LGBT zone”. It's been going on since last year. After Dua's words now the hate crime is stronger than it ever was. When LGBT activists asked him to apologize for his spiteful words, showed him proofs that suicide rate among LGBT teenagers is higher than it was since his party is ruling, showed him the photographs and shared the stories of the people we lost because of the bashing they encourage and support, he said he won't apologize because he stands by his words and there's a freedom of speech in the country. Not for everyone I guess.

The journalists have been interviewing many people in different parts of Poland after it. What stuck with me were the words of some old man from the countryside who has said that “LGBT should be exterminated in Majdanek”. It's one of the places where the death camp was during World War 2. I don't think I have to tell anyone what words like this mean, how much they hurt, and how much worse it is when they’re said in the country that’s lost so so many lives during WW2. In a country that fought so hard for so many years to reclaim its freedom from the nazis and then from the soviets. In the meantime of this bashing, Du*a has pardoned a pedophile so he could return to his family (and the victim he abused). So that would be it for protecting family values.

The exit polls results yesterday were so close that they gave us so much hope that we would wake up in a new reality today but the hope died quickly. Now we're stuck again with a man who said in the middle of the global pandemic that he's anti-vaccination and he doesn't think vaccine for covid-19 should be obligatory. With a man who thinks climate change and global warming isn't real. With a man whose actions are constantly destabilitizing economy because he only acts like there is today and doesn’t look forward in the future and doesn’t know the way he and his party ruin the country will have terrible consequences in a few years. With a man who is homophobic, racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, and many, many, many other things. With a man who is a "president” of Polish people but only if you're a straight catholic man voting for his party.

Now our fear is that with him being “elected” as the “president” again, his party will try to meddle with the Constitution and try to change it so they could either extend his term for more years or extend the number of terms a president can have. And even if the change can’t happen so easily, what’s sure is that they will try to take away basic human rights from women and LGBT community. They made it perfectly clear in the last five years and during the campaign now.

So if you’re asking yourself now what can you do about it the answer is simple: spread the word. Read about it. Educate yourself. Make a buzz in the social media. We need as much help as we can get. We need foreign media to pick up the topic, we need them to talk about it and to make the noise. We need the foreign governments to know about it. European Union has already declared that if the bashing on LGBT continues, they will take away the development aid from the self-proclaimed “anti-LGBT zones”. Our country has suffered so much and somehow we’re still standing but I don’t know for how much long we will last. So please. Don’t leave us alone.

[alittleyellowdinosaur]

Overly Sarcastic Reminder

 That the Red Cross, following the FDA regulations, does not allow men who have had sex with another man in the past three months (refered to as MSM) to donate blood, even if you are monogamous. Even though they test for HIV/AIDS and other blood borne diseases in every single bag of blood they get. Even though it isnt the 80s and we are well aware that anyone can get HIV. Oh, but don’t worry, they aren’t trans exclusionary - if you are a trans male who has had sex with anyone who identifies as male in the past 3 months, you can’t donate blood either! But trans women and lesbains can because clearly AIDS is a gay men thing.

 And if your nonbinary or intersex? Sucks to be you, you need to pick male or female and they will keep pestering you until you pick one because they are allowed to “verbally confirm” answers. Don’t like this rule? Fine, you can appeal through an incredibly long process. 

But they are totally not homophobic, they swear they are working to fix it*! (*in certain cities, with a single study that will likely need to be repeated multiple times, and not to get rid of it entirely just to find “alternatives” and to see if a “time-based MAM deferral” instead of individual donor questionnaires). 

As an interesting fun fact they exclude literally 62% of the population from donated which, gasp, could be seriously decreased if they maybe let gay men donate blood and maybe then they wouldn’t be having such dangerous blood shortages! what an idea!!

Read More

A NOTE:

Because tumblr likes to twist things i’m going to make things really explicitly clear - THIS IS NOT A CALL TO BOYCOTT THE RED CROSS. This is NOT a call to harass the people drawing blood at your local donation event. This isnt even a call to harrass the Red Cross who are actually working to fix it, albiet very slowly, and have recognized the hurt it causes our LGBT community. The Red Cross is a great organization who are just trying to save lives and they need more donations desperately. Please, please go donate blood this month if you can. Taking 10 minutes out of your day to get a slight prick and a cookie could be the reason an infant lives, or a soldier gets to come home to his family, or a mother can see her kids grow up. I know this pandemic is making everyone have care fatigue but you can help someone without having to care or do anything difficult - for fucks sake just go for the cookies and juice, they are good cookies okay. 

This post is a call to petition, organize, hell harrass if you want, the FDA. They are at fault here, they are part of the reason that we are having such a massive blood shortage, the FDA and their homophobic regulations are the REASON PEOPLE ARE DYING. its more important than ever for these nonsensical rules to change. Because remember - these rules are stupid. these rules do nothing to protect blood donors or those who recieve it. All blood is tested. Anyone can get AIDS/HIV. This rule just hurts the LGBT community and hurts those who can’t get the blood transfusions they desperately need. THE FDA NEEDS TO CHANGE. 

You do not have to reblog this and i will not guilt trip you to do so. But next time you see your work or town holding a blood drive, do your country and fellow human beings a favor and donate if you are eligible. (Post made 1/9/2022)

[tundrainafrica]

i really thought hange was non-binary bc the one who said hanges gender was up for interpretation was kodansha us but isayama asked for gender neutral pronouns right?

here!

I’m gonna answer all of the gender asks in one go because for one, I don’t think I wanna flood my own feed and my own tumblr with the same arguments. 

I think a lot of the questions on Hange’s gender and the topic of  gender and sexuality overall are kinda intertwined and I feel like for anyone who actually reads my stuff, it’s better understood as one big wall of text. 

So I was wondering, is that song the absolute proof about hange's gender?

No. I think the interpretation of the song which people are using to prove that Hange’s nonbinary is very western centric. I actually did research around this song and knowing what I know about Japanese culture, I actually interpret the song as a way for Japanese people to break out from gender norms. 

For people who are not aware, Japan is incredibly strict with gender norms. The LGBTQ community is not as progressive as it is in Western countries (I mean gay marriage isn’t completely legalized yet). And just looking at it from the stand point of gender roles and gender expectations, despite the progressive thinking, there are a lot of things Japanese men and women have to conform to just to be respected in everyday society. Because in Japan, the community has always been more important than the individual and it’s honestly the same for most asian countries as well. 

A lot of the pressure of living in Japan, working with Japanese people is the pressure to conform and I’ve seen my friends do it through small things like getting bangs (because all Japanese women have bangs apparently), wearing make up when going out (because this is generally an accepted for all Japanese people) and always dressing your best because in that manner women are held to an incredibly high standard in Japan. And this goes similarly for men who are constantly pressured to be the breadwinner in the family. If your wife is making more than you, be ready to hear people talk. I know these expectations exist in a Western setting too but Japan is incredibly stiff as a society and this is one reason why, despite having numerous opportunities to moveto Japan myself, I am not at all entertaining that possibility. I have worked in a Japanese company and I hated it and moved to a western company right after six months. I have completely accepted the fact that there is no mobility career wise from a non-Japanese (and a woman at that) in Japanese society. 

In conformity, hierarchies etc, Japan is its own monster. That’s why when songs like Jibunrashiku, Hitchcock (by Yorushika) or Shisoukan (by Yorushika) come out, for one it’s in Japanese so I wouldn’t approach the songs from an English and as a Japanese speaker and someone who is pretty familiar with Japanese culture, I can’t help interpret that song as a social commentary for the shitty parts of Japanese society and how they tend to shoot the concept of an ‘individual’ down. 

But does that mean I completely shoot down the idea that Hange is NB? 

NO. Yams said so himself, Hange’s gender is unknown. But at the same time, Yams recognizes the fact that in the anime and in the live action, Hange is a female. If Yams were that adamant to make Hange NB, I think he would have at least made more of an effort to police how she is depicted in the anime and in the live action. 

 His exact words were:　「ハンジは彼（彼女）みたいな、ちょっと浮世離れした、枠にとらわれない自由な感じで描きたかったんです。」If I roughly translated it to English, “I wanted to draw Hange as someone otherworldly, free from the confines of gender.”

Tbh, I wanted to avoid these gender asks altogether but I’ve seen the environment in twitter and the ways many people approach gender, particularly ‘nonbinary’ or genderfluid and it really just doesn’t sit well with me. For one, what’s up with all these rules on how to approach our nonbinary and LGBTQ friends? What’s up with all these accusations that if we don’t follow them to a T, then we’re suddenly transphobic or homophobic? 

The fact that we’re creating all these rules on how to go about her nonbinary gender for one, just defeats the whole purpose of Hange being a free bird in the first place who wouldn’t have cared and who wouldnt’ ever have been confined to gender in the first place. 

I mean the establishment of set rules and social norms on how to navigate gender, sex, sexuality and gender roles is the reason why we had heternormativity in the first place. And what I can see, yes, we did get progressive, we did start recognizing other genders, other ways of thinking but the danger in all this is that, we’re once again creating frameworks and norms about how people that identify as these genders are supposed to act. And this defeats the whole purpose of why we recognized concepts of other sexualities, other genders and breaks from gender roles in the first place. 

We wanted to show these people that their feelings are valid, that the way they’re navigating their relationships and their identities are valid and the heternormative society we’ve lived in that has been condemning for so long, was flawed, was wrong. 

But the thing is, with the establishment of all these social norms on how to navigate our relationships with LGBTQ people and how to navigate our own gender, sexuality, sex and role is just making us regress back to that shitty heteronormative society of a hundred years ago. Because suddenly, everyone is questioning once again ‘How am I supposed to be feeling if I’m nb?” “How am I supposed to be feeling if I’m trans?” “How am I supposed to be feeling if I’m LGBT?”  

And we’re creating these abstract ideas of how exactly, being genderfluid is supposed to feel like. Am I really supposed to be going by ‘they?’ Am I supposed to be uncomfortable with CIS pronouns?

And If I don’t go through this process… If I don’t feel this way then maybe I’m not NB? Maybe I’m not Trans? Maybe I’m not LGBT? And if I don’t conform to this clear cut idea of what NB is which people set up for me, god forbid I might just be transphobic or homophobic. 

And Here’s the thing, everyone’s journey to self discovery is unique and there is no exact way to go about your gender or identity. I find it terrifying actually that creating all these clear cut rules have built misconceptions in so many people already on what they are supposed to feel like when they decide to identify with a certain gender which is no different from long ago when people had to hide the fact that they liked people of the same gender because god forbid they might just be persecuted for being gay. 

Creating these frameworks, these incredibly strict rules on how someone is supposed to navigate relationships with LGBTs and their own personal identities is only making it all the more dangerous for people who are in the process of discovering themselves. 

Back in college, I used to accompany a friend to a clinic when he was starting HRT treatments and before he started them, he had to consult with a doctor and the consultation lasted months. Before all that, they gave him a checklist of ‘feelings,’ which if he does experience them, he checks it and if he does check enough of them and agrees with a huge chunk of them, then he might have gender dysphoria and maybe the HRT treatments and sex reassignment was for him. It was a hundred item checklist,  pages full of waivers, warnings and questions about his own experiences with his gender identity. And the fact that he had to consult for months after on that? There must be a reason. 

Maybe because the academe realizes, maybe because those adept on the field on gender realize that gender is too complex of a subject to have been boxed into these categories in the first place. 

And this whole discourse or I wouldn’t say discourse more of like, this ‘pushing of agendas’ as to say, ‘this is how being gender fluid or non binary is supposed to feel like’ this is how being transgender is supposed to feel like and if you don’t fit it to a T then you’re not transgender or you’re not nb. Or if you don’t fit it all, maybe you’re just transphobic is dangerous for many reasons. Either it gatekeeps people who want to explore their gender further. Or it forces people to have to conform to these and force themselves to ‘feel’ all of these things in the first place. 

And god, this is just the gender issue, I haven’t even explored the sexuality, gender roles or biological issue.  

i mean pronouns are important but they don’t really reflect someone’s gender??? like there’s people who use he/they, she/they or all pronouns(? they just don’t conform to gender binary ahaha

Given the environment on twitter and having witnessed the bullying first hand that came with one writer who is active on twitter using she/her pronouns for Hange, I feel like my own writing and my own POV on how I go about my writing and how I approach the gender of Hange (since I strictly use she/her) might just be a ticking time bomb and I might find myself at the end of whatever hate war or ‘education’ or as I like to just refer to as bullying, one day. 

I believe though I at least have enough knowledge and awareness of the LGBTQ situation and I think I did put a lot of thought already into this before I made my decision to use ‘she’ to refer to Hange.

(And tbh, you can be nonbinary and you can be female at the same time and I’ve written about that multiple times already BECAUSE THEY’RE NOT EVEN IN THE SAME CATEGORY. And creating this mutual exclusivity between being nonbinary and female just kinda invalidates a lot of those people who are still deciding where exactly they fall in this complex web of identity discovery)

As someone who generally mainly hangs out with LGBT people and i have been doing this since high school by the way, and as someone who has tried all the sexualities on the spectrum, I talked to my asexual friends about possibly being asexual, I have experimented with women and sometimes, I just had dry spells and it just so happened that in the end of all these, I fell in love with a guy but I really believe that gender is such a flexible thing and even though I am with aguy right now, I still simp over lesbians, gays, ciswomen, transgenders because simping isn’t about gender. 

And these set of rules on how to navigate genders is just invalidating the experiences of people who are flitting in between the two identities and it just hinders the process of self discovery for a lot of people. 

Anyway, the point is, there is only one statement I found fundamental when approaching my relationships with the LGBT community and my own perspective on my self identity. 

Recognition of someone’s feelings and their journey to a gender identity and the pronouns that come with it are important.

Then someone might go “THEN WHY DON’T YOU RESPECT HANGE’s NON BINARY PRONOUNS. Because just because someone is nonbinary doesn’t mean they automatically go for they. Just because someone is non-binary, doesn’t mean I have to use every single pronoun on the spectrum. The only one who can tell me what pronouns they want used on them is the person in question. 

(I actually read an argument somewhere that going for ‘they’ just because someone is NB is transphobic lmfao. Assuming someone’s pronouns is apparently transphobic too lmfao.)

AND HANGE IS FICTIONAL. And we will never hear about which pronoun she would have wanted in the first place and I think the great ‘nontransphobic’ in-between is just letting people interpret characters how they want to interpret characters in this fictional world (And Hange can be both interpreted as nb and female). It’s the policing which makes the whole process of self discovery, the process of navigating genders all the more difficult for a lot of people. 

And policing how exactly people should navigate gender and sexuality is just gatekeeping. Hange is everyone’s character. The only gender and sexuality identity people have complete jurisdiction on, is their own. And this policing of what exactly certain journeys to discovery are supposed to feel like is inherently harmful for those who are still in the process of deciding for themselves where they stand. 

And going back to what Yams said “I wanted to draw Hange as someone otherworldly, free from the confines of gender/sexuality/gender roles.” I agree with that. 

Because even though I do use ‘she’ with Hange, I do not firmly believe that Hange is a cisgender heterosexual female either. I just believe there are so many more layers to her whole identity and I believe similarly for every single person. Just concluding for one’s self that Hange is nonbinary with a very narrow minded view of what non binary just generally defeats the whole purpose of being ‘free from the confines of gender’ and hinders a lot of discourse and analysis on Hange’s identity over all.

I mean, I don’t know if people agree with this but in the decades I have spent with my close friends figuring out their gender identities, changing pronouns, transitioning, coming out to their parents, here is one thing I noticed. They weren’t asking for a celebration of their gender or sexuality, they weren’t asking for all these policing on how people should approach them. All they wanted was for their feelings to be validated, normalized as an everyday occurrence. I think the point of all these LGBTQ discourse (and by extension race and sex discourse) were all there to just make all these different identities normalized and to completely eradicate the concept of a negative bias or an other which was generally plaguing society for a long time. 

And as their friends, I have never approached them as this champion who would make sure EVERYONE RESPECTED THEM IN THAT WAY IN TWITTER THEY BELIEVE LGBTQ PEOPLE SHOULD BE RESPECTED. All these nonverbal rules I have set up for myself on how to go about being friends with them is because I wanted them to be happy and comfortable in their shoes. And what were the types of things they appreciated? Me hiding it from their parents until they were ready to come out, me helping make their relationship work with their partner, me respecting the pronouns they requested for themselves, me accompanying them to HRT when their parents refused. 

And you know what, that was only a facet of our friendships. My friends’ gender identities and sexualities never dominated discourse. None of them were the ‘token gay friend,’ the ‘token lesbian friend’ or the ‘token asexual friend’ or the ‘token NB friend.’ They were all people I genuinely care about who just happened to have fallen in love with someone of the same gender. They were just people who just happened to be uncomfortable with their original sex. But I would never just describe them as just that. My friend who just so happens to identify as assexual makes a great companion on a night out drinking. My friend who just so happens to be trasngender is really great with logistics and planning and was super helpful and I was eternally grateful when we worked together on that one project. My friend who just happens to be a lesbian has the cutest picture of her girlfreind on her phone screen. 

I will memorize their favorite orders, what makes them tick, what makes them such a great companion, their talents, capabilities more than I will remember their gender. And that’s the characetr song in question is called “Jibunrashiku” or in English “just like me.” Because in the end a strict society which creates all these maxims of what exactly people of a certain gender should act would of course birth songs like “Just like me” A society which puts so much emphasis on gender and sex  as an identity instead of other things like personality, preferences, skills etc. 

And I don’t know if it applies to everyone. But my friends appreciate it because this journey to whatever gender identity they chose wasn’t rooted in some sort of strict framework on how they should be treated according to twitter. It was rooted in their own experiences and how these experiences made them feel. 

Do they feel weird in a woman’s body? Do they just don’t feel any romantic attraction to the opposite gender?

Just treat them as how you would treat anyone else you respect. Just be a decent person. Just be a good friend.

Respect their requests for their own personal pronouns. If they need help, help them to the best of your abilities. 

And here’s the thing, the approach I use with navigating identities, sexuaities genders are rooted in one very simple concept which can be applied to the race discourse, the feminist discourse etc etc. 

Don’t be an ass. Respect people. Don’t reduce people to one facet of their identity. And by extension, when faced with such a dubious situation, think, discern for yourself what’s right or wrong. When there are people educating you, policing you on what is right or wrong, process that information objectively.  

All I have here right now is my own opinions on the gender discourse on Hange and my own opinions on the discourse overall. 

If you don’t agree with it, then have a nice day and I hope you find something else that will convince you to be more openminded but...

UTANG NA LOOB HUWAG LANG KAYO MAMBULLY NG TAO POTA. MAGHANAP NALANG KAYO NG IBANG PWEDENG GAWIN SA BUHAY MO. 

ANG DAMING NASASAKTAN ANG DAMING NATRATRAUMA ANG DAMING NAWAWALANG GANA MAGSULAT KASI DI KAYO NAG-IISIP. PURO TIRA LANG. 

Okay thank you for listening. Do what you want with the information up there but I have said my piece.

[cruisingthedemimonde]

America’s Gay Men in WW2

World War Two was a “National Coming Out” for queer Americans.

I don’t think any other event in history changed the lives of so many of us since Rome became Christian. 

For European queers the war brought tragedy.

The queer movement began in Germany in the 1860s when trans activist Karl Ulrichs spoke before the courts to repeal Anti-Sodomy laws. From his first act of bravery the movement grew and by the 1920s Berlin had more gay bars than Manhattan did in the 1980s. Magnus Hirschfeld’s “Scientific Humanitarian Committee” fought valiantly in politics for LGBT rights and performed the first gender affirmation surgeries. They were a century ahead of the rest of the world.

The Nazis made Hirschfeld - Socialist, Homosexual and Jew - public enemy number one.

The famous image of the Nazis burning books? Those were the books of the Scientific Humanitarian Committee. Case studies of the first openly queer Europeans, histories, diaries - the first treasure trove of our history was destroyed that day.

100,000 of us were charged with felonies. As many as 15,000 were sent to the camps, about 60% were murdered.

But in America the war brought liberation.

In a country where most people never even heard the word “homosexual” , historian John D’emilio wrote the war was “conducive both to the articulation of  a homosexual identity and to the more rapid evolution of a gay subculture. (24)” The war years were “a Watershed (Eaklor 68)”

Now before we begin I need to give a caveat. The focus of this first post is not lesbians, transfolk or others in our community. Those stories have additional complexity the story of cisgender homosexual men does not. Starting with gay men lets me begin in the simplest way I can, in subsequent posts I’ll look at the rest of our community.

Twilight Aristocracy: Being Queer Before the War

I want us to go back in time and imagine the life of the typical queer American before the war. Odds are you lived on a farm and simply accepted the basic fact that you would marry and raise children as surely as you were born or would die. You would have never seen someone Out or Proud. If you did see your sexuality or gender in contrary ways you had no words to express it, odds are even your doctor had never heard the term “Homosexual. In your mind it was just a quirk, without a name or possible expression.

In the city the “Twilight Aristocracy” lived hidden, on the margins and exposed their queerness only in the most coded ways. Gay men “Dropping pins” with a handkerchief in a specific pocket. Butch women with key chains heavy enough to show she didn’t need a man to carry anything for her. A secret language of “Jockers” and “Nances” “Playing Checkers” during a night out. There is a really good article on the queer vernacular here

And these were “Lovers in a Dangerous Time.”

In public one must act as straight as possible. Two people of the same gender dancing could be prosecuted. Cross dressing, even with something as trivial as a woman wearing pants, would run afoul of obscenity laws.

The only spaces we had for ourselves were dive bars, run by organized crime. But even then one must be sure to be circumspect, and act straight. Anyone could be an undercover cop. If a gaze was held to long, or lovers kissed in a corner the bar would be raided. Police saw us as worthy candidates for abuse so beatings were common and the judge would do all he could to humiliate you.

Now Michael Foucault, the big swinging french dick of queer theory, laid out this whole theory about how the real policing in a society happens inside our heads. Ideas about sin, shame, normalcy, mental illness can all be made to control people, and the Twilight Aristocracy was no different.

While cruising a park at night, or settled on the sofa with a lifelong lover, the thoughts of Priests and Doctors haunted them. “Am I living in Sin? Am I someone God could love?” “Is this healthy? Have I gone mad? Is this a true love or a medical condition which requires cure?”

There was no voice in America yet healing our self doubt, or demanding the world accept us as we are. And that voice, the socialist Harry Hay, did not come during the war, but it would come shortly after directly because of it.

Johnny Get Your Gun… And are you now or ever been a Homosexual?

For the first time in their lives millions of young men crossed thousands of miles from their home to the front.

But before they made that brave journey they had another, unexpected and often torturous journey. The one across the doctor’s office at a recruiting station.

In the nineteenth century queerness moved from an act, “Forgive me Father I have sinned, I kissed another man” to something you are, “The homosexual subspecies can be identified by certain physical and psychological signs.” 

These were the glory days of patriarchy and white supremacy, those who transgressed the line between masculine and feminine called the whole culture into question. So doctors obsessed themselves with queerness, its origins, its signs, its so called catastrophic racial consequences and its cure.

“Are you a homosexual?” doctors asked stunned recruits. 

If you were closeted but patriotic, you would of course deny the accusation. But the doctor would continue his examination by checking if you were a “Real Man.”

“Do you have a girlfriend? Did you like playing sports as a kid?”

If you passed that, the doctor would often try and trip you up by asking about your culture.

“Do you ever go basketeering?” he would ask, remembering to check if there was any lisp or effeminacy in your voice.

Finally if the doctor felt like it he could examine your body to see if you were a member of the homosexual subspecies. 

Your gag reflex would be tested with a tongue depressor. Another hole could be carefully examined as well.

Humiliating enough for a straight man. But for a gay recruit the consequences could be life threatening.

Medical authorities knew homosexuals were weak, criminal and mad. To place them among the troops would weaken unit cohesion at the very least, result in treachery at the worst. In civilian life doctors had much the same thing to say. 

The recruit needed a cure. And a doctor was always ready. With talk therapy, hypnosis, drugs, electroshock and forced surgeries of the worst kinds there was always a cure ready at hand.

Thankfully the doctors were not successful in their task, one doctor wrote “for every homosexual who was referred or came to the Medical Department, there  were five or ten who never were detected. (d’Emilio 25)”

Here’s the irony though, by asking such pointed and direct questions to people closeted to themselves it forced them to confront their sexuality for the first time. 

Hegarty writes, “As a result of the screening policies, homosexuality became part of wartime discourse. Questions about homosexual desire and behavior ensured that every man inducted into the armed forces had to confront the possibility of homosexual feelings or experiences. This was a kind of massive public education about homosexuality. Despite—and be-cause of—the attempts to eliminate homosexuals from the military, men with same-sex desires learned that there were many people like themselves (Hegarty 180)”

And then it gave them a golden opportunity to have fun.

The 101st Airborn - Homosocial and Homosexual

“Homosocial” refers to a gender segregated space. And they were often havens for gay men. The YMCA for example really was a place for young gay men to meet.

Now the government was already aware of the kind of scandalous sexual behaviour young men can get up to when left to themselves. Two major government programs before the war, the Federal Transient Program and the Civilian Conservation Corps focused on unattached young men, but over time these spaces became highly suspect and the focus shifted to helping family men so as to avoid giving government aid to ‘sexual perversion’ in these homosocial spaces.

But with the war on there was no choice but to put hundreds of thousands of young men in their own world. All male boot camps, all male bases, all male front lines. 

The emotional intensity broke down the barriers between men and the strict enforcement of gendered norms.

On the front the men had no girlfriend, wife or mother to confide in. The soldier’s body was strong and heroic but also fragile. Straight men held each other in foxholes and shared their emotional vulnerability to each other. Gender lines began to blur as straight men danced together in bars an action that would result in arrest in many American cities.

Bronski writes, “Men were now more able to be emotional, express their feelings, and even cry. The stereotypical “strong, silent type,” quintessentially heterosexual, that had characterized the American Man had been replaced with a new, sensitive man who had many of the qualities of the homosexual male. (Bronski 152)”

Homosexual men discovered in this environment new freedoms to get close to one another without arousing suspicion.

“Though the military  officially maintained an anti-homosexual stance, wartime conditions nonetheless offered a protective covering that facilitated interaction  among gay men (d’Emilio 26)”

Bob Ruffing, a chief petty officer in the Navy described this freedom as follows, ‘When I first got into the navy—in the recreation hall, for instance— there’d be  eye contact, and pretty soon you’d get to know one or two people and kept branching out. All of a sudden you had a vast network of friends, usually through  this eye contact thing, some through outright cruising. They could get away with  it in that atmosphere. (d’Emilio 26) ”

Another wrote about their experience serving in the navy in San Diego, “‘Oh, these are more my kind of people.’ We became very chummy, quite close, very fraternal, very protective of each other. (Hegarty 180)”

Some spaces within the army became queer as well. The USO put on shows for soldiers, and since they could not find women to play parts, the men often dressed in drag. “impersonation. For actors and audiences, these performances were a needed relief from the stress of war. For men who identified as homosexual, these shows were a place where they could, in coded terms, express their sexual desires, be visible, and build a community. (Bronski 148)”

“Here you see three lovely “girls”

 With their plastic shapes and curls.

 Isn’t it campy? Isn’t it campy?

 We’ve got glamour and that’s no lie;

 Can’t you tell when we swish by?

 Isn’t it campy? Isn’t it campy?”

The words camp and swish being used in the gay subculture and connected to effeminate gay men.

I would have to assume, more than a few transwomen gravitated to these spaces as well.

Even the battlefield itself provided opportunities for gay fraternization. A beach in Guam for example became a secret just for the gay troops, they called it Purple Beach Number 2, after a perfume brand.

This homoerotic space was not confined to the military, but spilled out into civilian life as well.

Donald Vining was a pacifist who stated bluntly his homosexuality to the recruitment board as his mother needed his work earnings, and if you wanted be a conscientious objector you had to apply to go to an objector’s camp. He became something of a soldier chaser, working in the local YMCA and volunteering at the soldier’s canteen in New York he hooked up with soldiers still closeted for a night of passion but many more who were open about who they were. 

After the war he was left with a network of gay friends and a strong sense of belonging to a community. It was dangerous tho, he was victim of robberies he could not report because they happened during hook ups, but police were always ready to raid gay bars when they were bored. “It was obvious that [the police] just had to make a few arrests to look busy,” he protested in his diary.  “It was a travesty of justice and the workings of the police department (d’Emilio 30).״

Now it might seem odd he was able to plug into a community like that, but over the war underground gay bars appeared across the country for their new clientele. Even the isolated Worcester Mass got a gay bar.

African American men, barred from combat on the front lines, were not entirely barred from the gay subculture in the cities. For example in Harlem the jazz bar Lucky Rendevous was reported in Ebony as whites and blacks “steeped in the swish jargon of its many lavender costumers. (Bronski 149)”

The Other War: Facing Homophobia

“For homosexual soldiers, induction into the military forced a sudden confrontation with their sexuality that highlighted the stigma attached to it and kept  it  a  matter  of special  concern (d’Emilio 25)”

“They were fighting two wars: one for America, democracy, and freedom; the other for their own survival as homosexuals within the military organization. (Eaklor 68)”

Once they were in, they fell under Article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice: “Any person subject to this chapter who engages in unnatural carnal copulation with another person of the same or opposite sex or with an animal is guilty of sodomy. Penetration, however slight, is sufficient to complete the offense.”

Penalties could include five years hard labour, forced institutionalization or fall under the dreaded Section 8 discharge, a stamp of mental instability that would prevent you from finding meaningful employment in civilian life.

Even if one wanted nothing to do with fulfilling their desires it was still essential to become hyper aware of your presentation and behaviour in order to avoid suspicion.

Coming Home to Gay Ghettos

“The veterans of World War II were the first generation of gay men and women to experience such rapid, dramatic, and widespread changes in their lives as homosexuals. Bronski 154”

After the war many queer servicemen went on to live conventionally heterosexual lives. But many more returned to a much queerer life stateside.

Bob Ruffing would settle down in San Francisco. The city has always been a safe harbour for queer Americans, made more so as ex servicemen gravitated to its liberated atmosphere. The port cities of New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles became the prime destinations to settle. Vining’s partner joined him in New York, where they both immersed themselves in the gay culture.

Other soldiers moved to specific neighborhoods known for having small gay communities. San Francisco’s North Beach, the west side of Boston’s Beacon Hill, or New York’s Greenwich Village. Following the war the gay populations of these cities increased dramatically.

The cities offered parks, coffee houses and bars which became queer spaces. And drag performance, music and comedy became features of this culture.

These veterans also founded organizations just for the queer soldiers. In Los Angeles the Knights of the Clock provided a space for same sex inter racial couples. In New York the Veterans Benevolent Association would often see 400-500 homosexuals appear at its events.

A number of books bluntly explored homosexuality following the war, such as The Invisible Glass which tells the story of an inter racial couple in Italy, 

“With a slight moan Chick rolled onto his left side, toward the Lieutenant. His finger sought those of the officer’s as they entwined their legs. Their faces met. The breaths, smelling sweet from wine, came in heavy drawn sighs. La Cava grasped the soldier by his waist and drew him tightly to his body. His mouth pressed down until he felt Chick’s lips part. For a moment they lay quietly, holding one another with strained arms.”

Others like Gore Vidal’s The City and the Pillar (1948), Fritz Peters’s The World Next Door (1949), and James Barr’s Quatrefoil (1950) explored similar themes.

In 1948 the Kinsey Report would create a public firestorm by arguing that homosexuality is shockingly common. In 1950 The Mattachine Society, a secretive group of homosexual Stalinists launched America’s LGBT movement.

References:

Michael Bronski “A Queer History of the United States”

John D’emilio “Coming Out Under Fire”

Vivki L Eaklor “Queer America: A GLBT History of America”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Lesbians

In 1947 General Eisenhower told a purple heart winning Sargeant Johhnie Phelps, “It's come to my attention that there are lesbians in the WACs, we need to ferret them out”.

Phelps replied, “"If the General pleases, sir, I'll be happy to do that, but the first name on the list will be mine."

Eisenhower’s secretary added “"If the General pleases, sir, my name will be first and hers will be second."

Join me again May 17 to hear the story of America’s Lesbians during the war.

[ohnobjyx]

Would it be that impossible for dd and gg to come out as a couple (provided they respected censorship and didn't talk about it with the media)? I read the other day that homosexuality is not illegal in China, just talking about it and showing in the media, so could not someone as brave and crazy as dd attempt to come out outside of the media? after all they are the first 3 shipped real couples in china, they do have support. Coming out willingly would also save them from being eventually outed..

Hi, anon! (*this blogger cracks her neck and gets ready*) Let’s get into it!

Disclaimer: fake fake fake. Why would you think that we believe in bjyx?

Preface: this post might not be exactly a controversial opinion, since I think many will have the same one. However, it’s alright to disagree: we all have our own perception of the matter, which is coloured by our own experiences (let’s just say that an absolute objective view is difficult). I present here with the most objective post (at least in terms of data and facts) I could write.

Oh, and you all might have noticed, but being concise is not my forte. I tend to digress.

First of all, I assume that the concept of “coming out outside of the media” means that they could have told just close friends and family, without announcing it to the media.

But how would we know that they have done it? (and I don’t mean we should know for sure, ofc). For all we know, they may have already done this, and, from my pov, they probably have. Without entering in “fake” rumours:

TTXS bros know something (repeating myself for the nth time). From the way DZW jumps in whenever it remotely looks like dd is slipping up, how WH poses his questions, how QF teases him. It all seems references to a real, tangible thing, instead of baseless friendly teasing. It’s also very interesting that they have stopped their matchmaking mission and have instead started to defend why dd is “single”.

Their parents are their cover. Even if dd parents didn’t watch TTXS, wouldn’t someone else watch it and ask them about it? Wouldn’t they wonder about the supposed clothes that dd sends home, the medicine, the market stroll? Maybe I’m just projecting, but I wouldn’t use my parents as a shield if they weren’t aware of the situation behind it, because I’d be subjected to their questioning later. That’s why, unless I wanted to tell them or I had already told them, I wouldn’t use my parents as an excuse. So, once is alright, but dd has done it several times, and that, for me, means that his parents know.

That’s what I would consider “coming outside the media”. Of course, this doesn’t involve us fans, and it’s their decision, of which we probably will never hear about (or, at least, not soon, and that’s fine!). 

In my opinion, it’s also the best course of action, especially with all the rumours that are always circulating about them. It wouldn’t be a “brave and crazy” course of action, but rather the most sensible and rational, since it’s the best way to avoid misunderstandings with your friends and family. It’s also considerate for his friends at work, just so they know what to expect when they are on stage and it allows them to understand dd’s reactions.

(Again, we are talking about dd because that’s who anon asked about. I think gg’s circle is less close to him, so it may not be the case with him, but I don’t know enough to say what would happen).

Just let’s suppose his TTXS bros didn’t know anything and just kept trying to act as matchmakers for dd. That’s the kind of situation that’s bound to be uncomfortable for everyone because dd isn’t the kind of person who’d lie (and he doesn’t fast enough to improptu questions). 

The second thing I wanted to talk about is their fans’ support. I want to talk about numbers.

I’m going to explain why I only take the c-fans data as reference. We int fans don’t really count, because we don’t affect their careers directly, as c-fans do. Of course, our support is very useful in showing how many people are rooting for them, like what happened when Roseonly’s livestream with gg was live. And I like to think that they would feel better knowing that there are a lot of people in Chn and overseas that support them and whatever there is between them.

So int-fans do contribute to give more views and likes to their Roseonly livestream (if they can access it, which isn’t always the case), but they won’t buy the roses and impact with real money, so to say.

We don’t really participate in their endorsements, many won’t stay long enough to watch more dramas from them (and I do understand that the lack of eng subs is the main problem), and many don’t/can’t/don’t know how to push them up in the charts. We’ve talked before about how the c-ent industry doesn’t really need the int audience to make a lot of money, and to be highly profitable, and it still applies in a smaller case, like a single idol. 

That’s why I think that in matters of real, tangible fan support, c-fans still make a bigger percentage (around 80-90%) of their support.

So, as of now, there are 3 supertopics in w/ibo that features gg/dd (let’s leave the difference in supertopics for another day, but I don’t support the discussion about people’s sex life, thanks for your understanding):

BJYX. The largest supertopic (top 1) with a wide margin from the others. It has 2.570.000 fans.

ZSWW. It’s the number 5 in the CP supertopics, with 910.000 fans.

LXFY. The number 23 in the CP supertopics with 590.000 fans.

All of them added make 4.070.000 fans. But we have to take into account the overlapping in these three supertopics: many people (like me) are following the three supertopics at the same time. That’s why, in a not scientific way, I’m guessing that those 4.070.000 come to around 4.000.000 once you take out the people that are following the three at the same time.

Even 4 million people is still a huge number of people: that’s more people than the population of the capital of my country, and one tenth of the total census here.

Yet, in China, it means 4 out of every 1400, which translates into 0′003%. It’s also from a very specific demographic (mainly female and young). Of course, it doesn’t mean that they won’t get support from other people if it ever got out, but they can’t know what would happen then for sure.

It means that, in actual 3D world, there are a lot of people who don’t know about their CP. I read the other day some tumblr blogger saying that “we bxg are in our own little bubble, not that many people know about their cp” (was that you, @jcisthebestfightme?) which I agree a lot with. I mean, my w/ibo account and tumblr is filled with bjyx/yizhan, so much that it’s easy to forget that I arranged it to be like this, but that the majority of the people don’t receive so much info about them, nor they analyze their every move like we do.

The only thing they can know for sure is what general population thinks about same sex relationships.

In a recent poll I saw, with thousands of answers about what netizens thought of the legalization of same sex marriage in Taiwan, the supporting votes didn’t get to 50%. In Taiwan, public opinion was like this around the time same sex marriage was legalized:

An opinion poll conducted in November 2016 by the Kuomintang found that 52% of the Taiwanese population supported same-sex marriage, while 43% were opposed. Another poll commissioned that same month found similar numbers: 55% in support, and 45% in opposition. Support was higher among 20–29-year-olds (80%), but decreased significantly with age. (Wikipedia)

(I just want to say, I can’t wait for the younger generations to take over).

More data: the public stance in China could be described as: “no approval, no disapproval, no promotion”, and the public opinion is becoming more and more tolerant, but there’s still a deep-set homophobia, as in only 5% of the lgbt people comes out completely (around 20% comes out to their family), and around 80% of gay men are married to women due to social and family pressure (ofc, these data is from a few years ago, and new polls and surveys are needed, but don’t expect them to carry out a wide-range survey about this nor I think the situation has changed drastically).

In my opinion, society is slowly taking more steps towards tolerance first and acceptance second. One of their best achievement was the lgbt community and many netizens’ refusal to allow w/ibo to instate a ban on content related to homosexuality, which led to w/ibo actually reversing its decision and stop banning that content in less than 3 days.

However, the fact that a lot of people express their support doesn’t take away the truth of a lot of people openly opposing it (let’s remember that there weren’t so many antis to start with in 2/27, but its effects were undeniably large and unjust).

(If any of you read more data about lgbt rights in China, please remember that Hong Kong receives a lot more Western influence, and that public opinion in HK does not represent the actual situation in mainland Chn. Ofc, because they’re more open to lgbt, there are also more data and polls carried out in HK, so a lot of info is HK based).

Leaving this kind of data aside, let’s take another matter of numbers. While they have in total 4 million fans in the supertopics, dd has as of now 35,400,000 fans following him on w/ibo and gg has 26,690,000 fans.

One thing I’m sure they are aware of is the discussion that arises from time to time between the solo fans and the bxg. Another thing they must be aware of, specially dd, is that their fanbase has a lot of females who are their fans, not just because of their talent, but also because they’re single and therefore they can fantasize about being with them.

All in all, even though a lot of people support them, there would be also quite a number of “disappointed” people, with the danger of them becoming antis.

So while I do think they appreciate it, and leave clues specifically for us, and dd goes as far as interacting with bxg, I also feel that gg and dd might not see widespread support, enough so they’d feel comfortable coming out completely with the current public stance on homosexual relationships in Chn.

(And again, from my pov, they aren’t in the closet with their family and friends).

And last, but not least, does “coming out respecting the censorship and not talking about it with the media” mean that it would be known by the general public, or, at least, their fans (in a very hypothetic case, since I don’t know how this could be achieved)? Because then, even if they didn’t talk about it with the media, it would be as good as coming out publicly.

In an idol’s life there’s no “private” and “public”. There’s only “public” and “secret” (and by secret I mean things they “hide” in public/don’t talk about, even though people next to them might know about it). The line between public and private is very very blurred in the c-ent industry.

I always remember the case of an actor who had an affair. Because of his affair (he was married and had a son), he lost endorsements, he was taken out of tv programs and literally erased from filmed episodes. The things he did in private affected very directly his job (I don’t approve of the affair, but the consequences it had surprised me a lot). 

So, while I do think that gg and dd are getting bolder with time, when they were both very startled by the “you’d lose your job if you were in a relationship” phrase, the fear was real and palpable. However, I’m aware that that was their stance a year ago, and that a lot of things have changed (heck, we’ve gone through a pandemic, something I couldn’t have imagined a year ago), so I’m going to observe how they act from now.

That’s why, “coming out willingly would also save them from being eventually outed..” is true, but it’s also true that it would push them into a storm I’m not sure they’d come out completely unscathed. And it may be selfish, but I don’t want them to be the ones who test the public’s tolerance to gay idols.

I think I’m missing my point, so I’ll spell it out: if they want to come out, I’ll support them with everything I have, as I think many fans will do. If they ever prove us wrong dating another person, be it male or female, I’ll support them as a fan too. But I would like any action they take to be decided by them, instead of pressed by fans who just want a confirmation at any cost.

I’ve seen people saying that if they were really together, they should be “honest” with themselves and the audience and come out publicly. In my opinion, it’s easy to judge when you’re not the one who might lose something if you take a step in the wrong direction, and it’s not your income and your job in the line.

I’m sure (reminding you all that I believe that bjyxszd) that they’d come out completely if possible. I’m also sure that they have consulted with managers and public relations experts (and their team would have talked with them about it even if gg and dd didn’t bring it up). Therefore, I strongly believe they are doing what they think is better at the time being. 

To sum up: I’ll support whatever they do, but I don’t want others to push them to do things they don’t want/aren’t prepared to do. They are already between a rock and a hard place, so whatever they do with their relationship is absolutely their call.

So, anon, I hope I have answered you, but I leave here a short summary for you in the case the info was too scattered for you:

Would it be that impossible for dd and gg to come out as a couple (provided they respected censorship and didn't talk about it with the media)? I read the other day that homosexuality is not illegal in China, just talking about it and showing in the media, so could not someone as brave and crazy as dd attempt to come out outside of the media?

They might have come out to friends and family, and, based on dd’s interactions with the people around him and the words he has said, I do believe he has. Because gg is also an honest, sensible person, I think he might have done the same.

after all they are the first 3 shipped real couples in china, they do have support 

Chn is a big country. That means that in terms of public support, sometimes numbers that would be astronomically high in other countries, is not so much in Chn. Translating numbers into percentage, a 1% means 14 million people.

So it’s true that they have a lot of people supporting them, of course. 2 million people is a lot of people, especially considering that many don’t know about them. But when you have to take into account the general public (because it’d be a scandal), since their fans aren’t the only ones interacting with them, it’s still a low number.

Coming out willingly would also save them from being eventually outed.. 

That’s true in the case of family and friends. But if you’re talking about being outed in the media, that’s not possible. Known by the fans = Public.

And remember that in this case, the media wouldn’t talk about them, since talking about homosexuality in the media is prohibited. The problem would come from within the industry and the antis.

[life-rewritten]

TOO MANY ZOMBIES THIS HALLOWEEN!! AKA SCARY/NON SCARY SHOWS I WILL BE WATCHING THIS SPOOKY SEASON

(UPDATE AND UPCOMING ANALYSIS OCTOBER 2020)

Happy Spooky Season! Yay time to think about what shows can help me feel even closer to Halloween celebrations. I'm an introvert instead of dressing up and going partying I watch and analyse shows instead by my self. Here is a list of shows I'm planning to, started to or repeating to watch this month! Join me and let me know what shows you plan to watch for this Halloween! 

Ratings: From 1 to 5 (1 being least excited to watch, 5 being most,) how excited am I to delve into these shows/again?

Currently watching

1.Tale of the nine-tailed

Genre/Themes: Supernatural, Kdrama, Gumiho, Fantasy, Romance, Drama

Country: Korea

Verdict: I guess I'm the only person who isn't that fussed about this drama? But for Halloween, I think I can deal with the supernatural themes even though it feels like a forced grim reaper spin-off (I know it's different, but this just screams like a goblin try hard no offence to all in love with it or vampire diaries but make its foxes. Directing did improve from episode 2 though. Still not a fan of the actress either. I'm just a grouch this Halloween.  Watch as I end up becoming obsessed after six episodes and start analysing this.(smh)

Ratings: 2.5/5

2. Zombie Detective

Country: Korea

Genre: Kdrama,  Mystery, Zombies, Comedy, Crime? Romance?

Verdict: Too many Zombies in Halloween but I'm not complaining not when I get to see his face every episode. Also like this drama is actually so funny, and I can't stop smiling when I put it on. Halloween is going to be a time for laughter and good fun thanks to this.

Ratings: 3/5

3. My dangerous wife

Country: Korea

Genre: Suspense, Mystery, Romance, Crime, Remake of Jdrama

Verdict: I mean conspiracies are grand, so what about a gone girl vibe as well? This drama has it all, a horrible husband and his disturbing mistress who I want to hurt as well,  and a missing wife who was taken for granted, or wait was she? Why is she dangerous then? Did she plan it? Did she know he planned to kill her, will I ever get to trust the idea of love and marriage and men with Korean tv shows this year after World of Married and now this? Probably not and you know what that is a scary thought this Halloween.

Ratings: 2/5

Re-watching

4. He's coming to me

Country: Thailand

Genre: Thai BL, Ghosts, Mystery, Romance, Slice of Life,

Verdict: It's Halloween, so I have an excuse to go back and rewatch this gem of a show. This is one of my favourite underrated Thai BL shows, the actors are incredible, the storyline is heartwarming and brings out a side of me (the tearful side) that I thought was buried deep within I joke, but still, the mystery whilst predictable keeps me on my toes, and the romance touched my heart. The fact that the romance is not censored, or reduced or toxic makes this show a fantastic media piece about representation for LGBT as well. Absolutely excited.

Ratings: 5/5

5. Mo Dao Zu shi anime

Country: China

Genre: Danmei, Supernatural, Action, Fantasy, Romance, Comedy, BL, Horror, Donghua

Verdict: You caught me going back to withdrawal mode of MDZ. Not even going to apologise for this one. MDZ is an addiction that cannot be stopped. For Halloween, I want to see my panicked gays and their love for each other as they battle the living dead, demonic cultivators, and even more. I miss my Wangxian, okay? If you haven't seen this or the untamed and you watch BL, what are you doing with your life??? Honestly though deciding to watch MDZ donghua is the best decision I ever made. What an excellent show for Halloween! A masterpiece.

Ratings: 5/5

Will be Watching

6. Heaven's official blessing 

Country: China

Genre: Danmei, Supernatural, Action, Fantasy, Romance, Comedy, BL, Horror

Verdict: Is it weird how I keep crying and screaming at the PVs of this dongua? How I'm swooning at the half face of Hua cheng (our royal ghost seme) that's been revealed even though I know it's not his real face???, I'm weird I know. The animation looks breathtaking, and I can't believe one of my fave books is getting an anime remake like who else can do this apart from MXTX with her third anime remake this year. This series is just so exciting, and the fact that China doesn't seem like it's even giving any damn in censoring it is making me even more happy and grateful for this. How is this Halloween you may ask; try horror of Gods, monsters, ghosts, zombies and more. The first episode we're going to see and solve the mystery of brides get killed by some ghost cannot wait!

Ratings: 5/5

7. Kingdom 1 and 2

Country: Korea

Genre: Kdrama, Sageuk, Action, Zombies, Horror, Politics? Romance?

Verdict: Not going to lie, I am dreading watching this because I hate horror and like zombies terrify me sometimes in Korean media. However, I also am so excited to watch this because I've been called a fool for refusing to see it, not to mention it has one of my favourite actors in it, an amazing writing and directing team with accolades and proof of excellence, and well for Halloween what's scarier than zombies? Them spreading their disease whilst we deal with political intrigue? Can't think of anything else. 

Ratings: 4/5

8. Miss Gu who is silent

Country: China

Genre: Suspense, Mystery, Romance, Crime

 Verdict: Why is she silent though??? I had to take a break from Zombies and instead decided to jump into conspiracies and revenge dramas. Have absolutely no clue what this drama is about. Still, I've been recommended it by so many people, and well I like a woman who decides to mess everything up so she can ruin those who tried to break her. You go girl! 

Ratings: 3/5

So there you have it, we have ghosts, zombies, missing wives, hidden conspiracies, hot men and girls, and breathtaking animation to the mix! I think this is a good mixture. What about you guys how's your Halloween season and planning going? Hopefully not as grouchy as mine. Enjoy. 

[takoboru]

Hey,

I was wondering if you could help me out a little. I don't have enough knowledge about this so please excuse my mistake if you think I'm being disrespectful by asking you this. I'm asking to improve myself. I apologize if I come across as rude.

So, I come from a pretty narrow minded society and here it's considered a sin to be homosexual or to even even support them. I don't understand why it is so. I see everyone as humans deserving of love and respect regardless of their preferences but, I've seen some people be extremely mean to them. However, recently I found out that some people can't 'support' LGBT for religious reasons yet they 'respect' LGBT. (I heard it's a way to show that they're not dangerous to the LGBT community).

So is it disrespectful if I can't support them because of my community but respect their decisions and preferences?

First off, huge disclaimer that I am not good explaining my thoughts so if I also come across as rude, I am just very awkward and trying my best 🧍‍♂️

Uh, someone correct me if I’m wrong if theres any religion that actually has that as a “rule” or something, (im not religious sorry :<) but based on what I know, that is just homophobia.

Respecting someones preferences, pronouns, sexuality, etc. is a good thing but imo its not enough. Though I understand some people can’t actively support the queer community given the circumstances of where they live (like if you live in a country super homophobic), Support is needed because the lives of queer people aren’t going to get any better if you turn a blind eye to all the fucked up shit homophobes with power put us through. Honestly, I find what people have told you complete bullshit because even if you respect someone’s pronouns or sexuality or whatever, you can still make matters worse for us by choosing to not support the community. Not supporting us basically means actively putting us at more risk. Letting exclusionists oppress us even more than we already have been (and in some countries it already goes as far as killing queer ppl) so uh, I think you should totally disregard whatever those ppl told you and support the LGBT community :))

if you live in a very homophobic country you can still support us in small ways!!!

if your friend comes out as queer, be their emotional support!!! living in homophobic households can be taxing to our emotional and mental health and people need a place to be themselves sometimes. let them talk about their crush or vent or honestly it doesnt have to be a topic about being part of the community. treat them like any other friend and let them talk about what they like. even if you don’t understand. the fact that you try is enough

if you can, inform people about sexualities and stuff. a lot of people actually dont know about these things so its nice to spread information :))) even if its through social media liek this one big hellsite

bonk all the homophobes/transphobes. honestly, this goes for anyone that oppresses minority groups. letting them in communities is vv harmful to us :’) if you dont have the guts to be out right about it or if it also endangers you and your friend, its best to just 🏃🏻‍♀️

i hope this was somehow helpful to you because ;-; this was really hard to answer.

[mythgirlimagines]

iTuesday is here, and Fusion is ready to hit the stage with a brand new talentswap! Former Ultimate Musician Myth is here and she is ready to rock!

—————————————————-—

BACKSTORY AND TALENT

In Myth’s younger years, she was a bashful wallflower, usually seen in the corner with her headphones up. While most people assume that she is listening to classical music, in reality, young Myth was internally headbanging to rock music. However, a couple of Myth’s middle school classmates found out about her interest in rock music and worked hard to help her become a true rock musician alongside them, giving her a punk-rock makeover and a massive confidence boost in the process. By her high school years, she became the lead vocalist and guitarist for “Starbeat”, the hottest new teen girl rock band! Despite the genre, most of “Starbeat”’s songs are about love, often with LGBT undertones mixed in, which is great for PR and album sales! And luckily, “Starbeat” is still going strong, even as Myth and her friends transition into adults!  ——————-————————————

RELATIONSHIPS

Wyre Anon, Former Ultimate Gymnast

Wyre is one of the few people that knew Myth’s secret. But unfortunately, Wyre lacks musical talent so they weren’t able to help Myth much with her makeover. But Wyre is really flexible and an amazing breakdancer, and they also help Myth build up confidence and helped give Myth her punk-rock makeover. Wyre has never missed a single “Starbeat” concert ever since its inception and was the first ever ”Starbeat” fan!

Anon Scar, Ultimate Animal Breeder

Despite what her innocuous talent would suggest, Anon Scar works really hard to intimidate people with her “Zoophobia Incarnate” act. But it is kind of hard to do that when said “Zoophobia Incarnate” has an adorable ferret perched on each shoulder. And unfortunately, Myth has taken quite the liking to the ferrets, which are named Pain and Panic. But deep down, Scar really cares for people and is glad that Pain and Panic are making Myth happy.

Fusion Anon, Ultimate Chef

When Fusion’s parents started to work overtime and were away from the house for longer periods of time, Fusion taught himself how to cook, in order to feed both himself and his little brother. Fusion was easy for Myth to get along with, because of both Fusion’s kindhearted, almost paternal, nature and Fusion’s willingness to eat Myth’s cursed food combinations. Myth also loves attended Fusion‘s cooking seminars. 

Fusion Anon II, Ultimate Team Manager

Upon meeting Fusion II, Myth didn‘t think that Fusion II was anything like her image of an Ultimate Team Manager. But despite Fusion II’s normally flippant and “too-cool-for-school” attitude, Fusion II is surprisingly supportive and really knows how to motivate and care for her conmates, which very clearly came from her coaching of one of the most skilled Junior Track and Field team in the country. Whenever Myth is having one of her low-points, it’s like Fusion II can sense it and run over to smack some sense into her.

Just Anon, Ultimate Mechanic

Despite his vast knowledge of the internal works and maintenance of machines, Janon never really uses that knowledge to his advantage, and would much rather take a nap or hijack a car in order to escape exams, rather than actually taking the exam. Much to Janon’s dismay, Myth regularly calls him “cute”, probably because of his pink bunny jumpsuit. Janon yearns to run Myth over with his jacked-up monster truck, if she says “so cute” one more time!

Sparkle Anon, Former Ultimate Lucky Student

For someone who got into Hope’s Peak via the lottery and otherwise has terrible luck in anything besides puzzles and performances, Sparkle has such a confident and bombastic personality, and Myth can’t help but applaud Sparkle’s confidence on stage and her loud voice. Myth is planning on teaching Sparkle to play the guitar, and quite possibly let her play in “Starbeat” as an extra guitarist! Sparkle is surprisingly quick at picking up the guitar.

Egg Anon, Former Ultimate Photographer, and Wet Sock Anon, Former Ultimate Traditional Dancer

While Wet Sock is known for their graceful dance moves, as expected for someone from their bloodline, their moves hold a dangerous edge. Quite literally too, for they regularly preform their dance while holding a knife or two. As for their twin, well, they have been cast out of the family and now travels the world looking for the most cursed photo ops. And Egg themselves are about as cursed as their photographs. Most Anons, including Myth, hardly want to talk about this cursed twosome. 

Curious Anon, Reserve Course Student

As the child of one of the wealthiest families in the country, Curious’s parents managed to buy their way into Hope’s Peak Middle School’s Reserve Course, in order to study Business and Economics and inherit the family business. Curious themself has a quiet and polite demeanor for their age, if a bit stoic and unflappable. Myth is trying her best to get Curious to open up and express themselves, but so far, her attempts remain fruitless. 

Anon Nerd, Former Ultimate Swordsman

Nerd was raised by the nobility of the European kingdom Stellarvia, with all but one goal in mind: to protect their daughter, the crowned princess of Stellarvia, from any and all threats. Because of the conditioning from his training, Nerd flies into a rage and assaults anyone he views as harmful towards Iris! (read: anything and anyone) And much to her dismay, Myth is no exception towards this rule, which is not helped by Myth’s fashion sense. 

Eldritch Anon, Ultimate Gamer

Known on MMORPG boards as (BLANK), Eldritch Anon quickly rose through the ranks of every MMORPG and competitive video game that he happened to pick up/download. Unfortunately, due to living his whole life as a shut-in, Eldritch has some massive trust issues and has trouble with socializing and trusting people his age. Myth is currently trying to help Eldritch with that, but her punkish fashion just scares Eldritch off. 

Dream Anon, Ultimate Nurse

Growing up on a volleyball team, Dream always comes prepared with icepacks, salompas, and even knee braces in case of injuries. Even when not around a volleyball team, Dream cares a lot about both her health and her friend’s health. Anytime Myth gets injured during practice, as if by telepathy, Dream will not only patch Myth up, but will also give her a pep talk, just to boost her up. Dream’s pep talks actually give Myth inspiration for her new lyrics!

Iris Anon, Jr. Ultimate Princess

As the crowned princess of the European country, Stellarvia, Iris goes full throttle in changing her kingdom for the better, despite her young age and otherwise clumsy personality. Iris also happens to be a massive fan of “Starbeat”‘s songs. Myth was quite shocked, to say the least, when a princess of a foreign nation claims to be a fan of her music, but Myth is happy that “Starbeat”‘s influence has spread to other cultures!

Purple Anon, Ultimate Yakuza

To say that Myth was shocked when this shy and overly wordy girl was revealed to  be the head of one of the world’s largest yakuza businesses in the country, would be the understatement of the century. Because of Purple’s timid and avoidant nature towards anyone besides Fusion, Myth isn’t really given many opportunities to interact with her, which is a shame really, for Purple is so darn cute! At least Purple‘s large vocabulary gives Myth many new ideas for lyrics.

The premise of this series is simple enough: an adorable punk rocker socializing with her kohais!  —————————————————— APPEARANCE

Myth has shoulder-length brown hair with the bangs and ends being dyed pink, blue, and purple. Myth wears a seira fuku with a loose red tie, a black spiked choker, a white dress shirt and an orange plaid skirt with a yellow star sewn into the side. Over the uniform, Myth wears a black jacket with the bottom and sleeves torn, as well as stars sewn on the elbows. Myth also wears torn pink leggings and brown boots. Sprucing up her design is elaborate eye makeup, and black painted nails with a star design on them!

——————————————————

PERSONALITY

Despite what Musician!Myth‘s appearance would suggest, Musician!Myth is peppy, energetic and has a penchant for cute things, such as puppies and ferrets. And admittingly, she’s still the same shy, awkward, disaster bi rock-music nerd she was back in middle school, just under a bi flag-colored coat of paint and false bravado. She also has a love for writing and romance that helps her write the lyrics for her latest love songs. Her one true dream is serenading her true love with a full-on rock song. She is beloved by her massive fanbase for her energetic, yet shy cinnamon roll personality both on and off the stage.

-——————————————————

Well! I hope you like this talentswap AU, Myth! Stay safe and rockin’ this week!

-Fusion Anon

—

Okay this is pretty great XD I think it’d be cool to be a musician

[southeastasianists]

From the iconic films of drag legend Divine to the campy classics The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, and To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar; the essential documentary Paris Is Burning to the groundbreaking TV series Pose; and, of course, the popular herstory-making franchise of RuPaul’s Drag Race. There’s a plethora of content from drag culture that can comfort the weary during these confusing times.

Drag, in its basic sense, is about transformation. It’s a reaction to society’s standards and expectations. However, albeit entertaining at first glance, drag, like any other art form, has always been political. From half a century ago’s queens of Stonewall riots to today’s digital queens, drag has always fought for the downtrodden – all the while wearing seven-inch rhinestone-studded heels.

In celebration of Pride Month, INQUIRER.net talked to six of the country’s fiercest queens about the importance of drag in this period of turmoil.

The art of drag

I always knew I like creating things, whether it’s dressing up our Christmas tree or dressing up for Halloween. When I first transformed in drag, it was like an epiphany. I knew this is something I would do for a long time. It was love at first drag…

As much as the pandemic has taken away the physical interaction that we used to enjoy during our parties, it also opened up more opportunities for the art of drag to be seen and appreciated. In the past, local drag queens and performers can only be seen inside nightclubs and LGBTQ establishments, and a lot of enthusiasts and artists don’t have access to such places, especially minors and those living in the provinces.

Nowadays, I still get to do drag, but more on hosting and co-producing online shows and parties. In doing so, I’m able to gather people and provide platforms for other drag artists to be seen and perform. So far, the reception has been good, especially since online e-numan is slowly becoming the new normal for our patrons in the clubs…

Drag is dynamic, evolving, and very diverse. Here in the Philippines, most people are familiar with drag through impersonators and our trans sisters donned in impeccable gowns. But there are also drag artists with occult or alternative aesthetics, or unpolished makeup skills, or garbage as part of their brand, and those who tell stories onstage that some may not like.

I, for one, am a storyteller. What I do is I incorporate current events or matters of public interest in the songs I perform. By carefully listening to the lyrics of a song, I weave its meaning to my stand on social issues. People may say it’s a political agenda, or that I’m biased or off-putting, but that’s what art does. It’s meant to provoke and challenge ideologies…

Human rights should never be a collateral damage. It is not the law itself that puts the people at risk. It’s the integrity and morality of those enforcing it that predisposes people to danger and makes them fear for their lives. Why would we trust such absolute power to this government?

-- Eva Le Queen

Mascots of the LGBT community

I started doing drag as an escape from reality. Just like any other art form, it’s a vehicle for the expression of my alter ego. My drag persona is an extension of who I am as a person.

I see it more as a hobby than work. I tell myself that I will stop doing drag once it starts to feel like work. During this pandemic, it’s so heartwarming to see all these queens, young and old, come together during these hard times…

There’s a Chicago drag queen named TRex who said, “As drag queens, we are the mascots of the LGBT community.” That resonated with me because we have a responsibility to amplify the voices of our community. Just because we’re entertainers doesn’t mean we don’t have a say on political issues.

In this country, those who criticize the government get silenced. That’s why as part of a community of outcasts in a society that conforms deeply to tradition, we make it a point to speak out without fear or reservations. Because at the end of the day, we have to be echoes that will remind our countrymen that we are the generation that never forgets…

It’s crazy. “I am the law.” That’s what’s happening in our country right now. It’s no longer about the law of the state. That’s why the Terror Bill is wrong. If the government can abuse the law against journalists who are only doing their job, they can surely do it to anyone.

The problem is, supporters of politicians act like fandoms. It shouldn’t be that way. They hold their positions because the people put them there. But, really, what can we expect from this government? You elect a clown, expect a circus.

-- ØV CÜNT

Disturbing the comfortable

Drag is a matter of creating your own reality, and in creating your identity, you get to choose the traits that you want to embody. I believe that it’s a melting pot of everything I’ve learned in life, especially from theater and the arts.

As drag queens, we get to break the social norms, and we do it with more power and confidence than we ever thought we had.

Drag is art, and art in general is meant to comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable. It’s a fun way of looking at what’s happening in our society and of doing checks and balances. Drag queens have always been integral in the LGBT movement, and removing politics from a drag queen is the same as removing that person’s identity…

Ever since the lockdown, more newbies have joined the scene, and they even get to perform with the more veteran queens. People aren’t that busy so we get to interact with each other. Queens from different clubs and cities finally get the chance to collaborate. Everyone gets a level playing field.

At the same time, it’s also challenging because it’s still a live show, so you still have to put in the effort. There’s no assurance of a talent fee, and the attention span of netizens is so short, especially with so many things competing for their attention online. It’s a different stage, too. We’re constricted to the screens of other people’s devices…

I always try to make my drag fun, but it depends on the mood, the sound, and the message. Same with crafting any other performance, there has to be a story. You should get the audience hooked and there has to be an escalation and climax. Whether you make it subtle or literal, the message always has to come across.

For me, the message is often about coming together as so-called deviants and telling people who we are and demanding what is ours, or telling people that we are not a sin and that being ourselves is good enough.

-- Mrs. Tan

Drag is unbreakable

I did drag for the first time by joining Drag Cartel back in November 2017. It’s a competition for aspiring drag queens. Category for the night was “Disney On Ice,” so I came as Prince Charming in drag. That night, I won, and from there, my love for drag just bloomed.

I do it because it makes me do things that I’d normally just fantasize about. It’s a realization of the things that give me inspiration. The look, the makeup, the attitude. Even though it takes a lot of time, effort, and money, and even though my face breaks out and I get physically hurt while performing, living that fantasy is still the best feeling…

“Keep drag alive” is what we always say, and that goes for togetherness. For drag queens, drag enthusiasts, and drag lovers to maximize the power of social media and uplift queer artists to keep pushing, and to show that this pandemic is not a reason to stop doing what you love…

Drag is a middle finger to all forms of hatred, homophobia, discrimination, social injustice, and stigma…

What’s going on in our country is so overwhelming that I’m often left speechless. Every day I scroll through my feed and I see one issue after another, and it makes me feel sick. I’m disgusted by the people responsible for all this mess.

I just hope people will take note of those in power who haven’t done anything good for this country. I hope that come election season, the people will remember what’s going on now and who’s responsible. I hope they vote for the right people. That’s all we can do as Filipinos.

—PRINCE

An image of hope

I started doing drag April of 2019 when I met a few drag queens (now my drag sisters and best friends) who helped me build my drag persona. I have always been very flamboyant and effeminate growing up, and drag opened up the possibilities for me to express those traits even further. Before, I was just doing it for self-discovery, but now, it’s for the community as well.

Drag is about finding the courage to create an image of hope and fulfilment for yourself that could later on affect other people’s lives…

The local scene has been very resilient when it comes to this pandemic. This is a living proof that drag is possible even without clubs and big venues. Just like wild grass, it’s bound to find a way to grow on its own no matter what…

Drag has always been political, and expressing my thoughts on socio-political issues through performances, public posts, online protests, and family and peer conversations is a way for me to maximize my drag as a political medium.

With everything that we’re facing right now, I think a lot of people are scared for their own safety more than ever. Aside from the unresolved coronavirus crisis, it’s really frightening to witness the recent displays of abuse of power and the questionable decisions of this government.

As a member of a community that has long been experiencing inequality, discrimination, and unlawful acts, I am deeply saddened with how all of this misconduct diminishes my hopes for a country free from oppression.

—Marina Summers

On the right side of history

Drag is my art, my craft, and my passion. Without it, I’m incomplete. It’s an alternative persona but it’s also part of my identity. It is the Juliet to my Romeo.

My interest in drag started after I saw the film To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar. The glitz and glamour was so fascinating, and I immediately wanted to be part of that world.

People may see us as glamorous toads with a million rhinestones in 7-inch heels but, girl, it’s not as easy as it looks. Drag is not just crossdressing. It’s a transformation.

Drag queens are probably the most resilient and most creative people I know. Drag is thriving even on lockdown. There are a lot of online shows for all to see. We figured out a new way of showcasing our chops. We will survive this…

Drag is political. It was, it is, and it always will be. Periodt. I am a full-grown adult man dressed up to the nines, looking like Joan Crawford after losing the Oscars. It’s a big middle-finger to toxic masculinity and misogyny.

I like to think I have a considerable amount of following, which means I have a platform. I always have a choice, just like everybody else. One can choose to stay quiet, which effectively means choosing the side of the oppressors. Or I, a drag queen, can choose to be part of a positive change and help inspire a new generation of people who are not afraid to express themselves, political or otherwise.

I want to end on the right side of history. As a drag queen, I believe I can do that.

—Dee Dee Holliday

[colorful-yarns-queer-stories]

Wayward Son: You’re Probably Going to Hate Me for This

A quick caveat: This post took me almost 8 months to write because Wayward Son wrecked me that thoroughly. It left me that much of a mess, reeling that hard over how very wrong it went after Carry On. This post reflects those kinds of feelings from a queer reader, so if you love the book and feel extremely positively toward it, this post is not for you. Just keep scrolling and go on to enjoy your day. Your opinion is valid. If Wayward Son left you feeling sick, betrayed, and worse than before you got it, maybe we can commiserate. If you’re teetering back and forth on whether to read it, this post offers you the worst to look at opposite the best. If you don’t want to hear it, don’t read it. It’s that easy. 

On September 24, 2019, I was practically shaking when I opened my eyes and began setting up my cozy reading nook. I requested the day off work, cleared my entire schedule, and settled in my comfiest sweater and blankets with a fully stocked tea cabinet to read what was, for me, one of the most highly anticipated book releases of the year. I pre-ordered a signed physical copy of the book, the audiobook, even got the collectible patch. I could not WAIT to sit down and read the healing story of Simon Snow’s cross-country queer road-trip with his boyfriend Baz and his best friend Penny. I was so excited to see how Simon was helped on his road to recovery from the trauma of the previous book. Rainbow had psyched us up so much to see how things would get better for our favorite Chosen One, despite how hard his journey to mental wellness might be.

Oh, reader. I was so naive.

Now, before I go into my complicated emotions about this book, I need to clarify something. This is not really a book review. This is a brief and personal  examination of how queer characters and audiences are advertised toward vs. what product/representation they receive. Because Wayward Son? As a book, it was solid. Great story, great conflict, great characters. A Very Good Book. But it wasn’t the book we were advertised.

If you are a member of the LGBT+ community, you know what it is to be queerbaited. Shows advertise as though there will be LGBT+ representation, market these stories as queer love stories or stories about queer people learning to love themselves, but in the end, those promises are never delivered upon, leaving LGBT+ audiences open to attacks from cishet fans mocking them for hoping for representation in the first place and reminding LGBT+ audiences that their stories will never be center-stage unless they are fetishes, jokes, or tragedies. (Teen Wolf, BBC Sherlock, and The Cursed Child are just a few immediate examples that spring to mind.)

Rainbow Rowell did not technically queerbait. She wrote two LGBT+ main characters! They got together at the end of the first book! She delivered, right? Mmmm, not quite. Yeah, Simon and Baz got together at the end of the first book, and it was wonderful and heartwarming and hopeful, even if it was still a little bittersweet. After all, that’s realistic right? And they are both still the main characters of the second book. They are still together. She kept her word, right? Wrong.

Rainbow Rowell marketed us a hopeful cross-country road-trip with the Chosen One’s boyfriend and best friend in pursuit of healing and recovery for Simon Snow after he was left traumatized and adrift in the wake of saving the magical world. Well, we got a road trip. He did have a boyfriend and best friend present, sort of. Healing? Hahaha no. None. Not even a little bit. We were promised recovery and hope. What we got instead was a whole lot of Queer Suffering. Literally hundreds of pages of it.

Look, part of writing solid representation is being aware of the cultural and political climate in which you are writing. After the 2016 U.S. election, the LGBT+ and POC communities came under massive fire from the U.S. President, the federal government, and all of the devoted bigots who have loudly and violently sworn themselves to the cause of rooting out and eliminating every minority present here in the States. Since 2016, minority communities have done nothing but suffer under attack after attack over and over and over again. If you look at the majority of books published for LGBT+ audiences since 2016, you will notice that most of them are geared toward messages of healing, of hope, of strength in the face of adversity, because that is what we need given the reality of our existence right now. We need strength, we need hope, we need healing. We exist under a constant barrage of hate and vitriol and violence, and the number of hate crimes being committed against minority communities have risen consistently through the entirety of this Presidential term. So when we are marketed a book about hope and healing, by god we are putting faith in you to deliver on that promise, that commitment you are making to us as a community. We are trusting you, giving you our money, our time, our emotional commitment.

Wayward Son did not deliver on those promises of healing and hope and recovery. Nothing positive happened to any of the characters in the book. Nothing. What hope? What healing? What love? You made Simon and Baz essentially strangers planning their breakup from chapter one, not to mention their individual suffering you attached to their own identities (Simon as ex-Chosen One, Baz as a vampire). You made Penelope Bunce lose her partner of several years. You forced Agatha Wellbelove into a traumatic kidnapping specifically imitating and amplifying her brand of trauma from the end of Carry On. Every single character in your book was a minority (LGBT+, POC, QPOC, women), and every single one was forced to suffer even greater trauma this time with no reprieve or recovery from their previous experiences. YOU MARKETED THE BOOK WITH A FU**ING PRIDE PATCH ONLY TO HAVE YOUR QUEER CHARACTERS PLANNING THEIR BREAK UP FROM CHAPTER ONE. WHAT ABOUT THAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO BE PROUD OF? Did you even take the time to become aware of the big tropes aimed at queer characters by straight authors? Of either burying your gays or making them end up apart? Of why it’s wrong to use your female characters constantly as damsels in distress (I thought you wanted Agatha to be the opposite of that, but here she is being the damsel in distress AGAIN)? Rainbow, YOU were the one who wrote Agatha hating her part in the Chosen One BS. You wrote her hating danger and magic and you wrote her escape only to reel her right back in? Wayward Son felt like Rainbow Rowell hitting the “Undo” button on all of the positive rep she gave us in the last book and replacing it with loads of misery just because cynicism is “In.”

If someone asked me to recommend a YA fantasy for their teen with solid queer rep, a diverse cast, and healthy messages, I absolutely would have had no problem recommending Carry On. I have, in fact, put it into the hands of LGBTQIA+ teens on multiple occasions. I could not, however, recommend Wayward Son. This book was the antithesis to Carry On and destroyed everything I loved about the original. Was Wayward Son, from a literary standpoint, a good book? Absolutely. But I cannot in good conscience recommend it to any LGBT+ readers, especially given the current political and social climate in which we live. Maybe the third installment will be a fix-it. Maybe things will get better. As for me, though, my faith in this author’s representation of minority characters was broken with Wayward Son.

What kills me about it, though… the thing that really just tears me up inside… is that if she had marketed it to us as, “Lol you’re all going to suffer, this book is totally going to hurt,” I would have been okay with it. I love TJ Klune’s books, but they tear your beating heart out of your chest and then feed it back to you by hand. His books hurt. The difference between him and Rainbow Rowell, though, is that he advertises them that way. When he writes something painful, he markets it as painful. When he writes something soft, he markets it as soft. We know we can trust him because he makes realistic promises and then delivers on them. Rainbow did the exact opposite, promising us recovery and giving us nothing but several hundred pages of pain for literally every single character involved. How are we supposed to trust you now? Honestly, for my part, now I know I can’t.

I’m sorry if this is upsetting. I know lots of people (if they ever see this) are gonna be VERY, VERY angry with me for writing it and for feeling this way. But this is my honest take on Wayward Son: the entire book is one giant trigger, and I think that, until there is anything at all positive to offer in its place, that it’s better for LGBT+ and other minority readers to avoid this one. Maybe wait until the next book or stop after Carry On. If you are a member of a minority group and struggle hard with mental health issues, this might be one to avoid for now.

[poemsforpersephone]

The third and final book rec list for fans of The Last Sun!

The Infinite Noise by Lauren Shippen has really cool empathy powers which, although not the two way bond Brand and Rune share, does remind me of the emotion reading aspect in TLS. The m/m relationship in it is also super sweet. 

The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzie Lee. This one I’m recommending because the protagonist is a snarky asshole just like Rune, and the writing style is so well done. It’s m/m and genuinely such a fun and quirky book. Also the cover art is gorgeous!

Silver in the wood by Emily Tesh. This is an LGBT novella where a wild man called Tobias lives in a place called “Greenhollow,” , where, and I quote, “Old secrets better left buried are dug up, and Tobias is forced to reckon with his troubled past—both the green magic of the woods, and the dark things that rest in its heart.” So im recommending this one simply because of the involvement of secrets and troubled pasts haha. 

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir. The front cover of this one gives me The Hanged Man vibes like, all the way to the bone, which is initially what prompted me to rec it on this list. But also: “Gideon has a sword, some dirty magazines, and no more time for undead bullshit.” Idk about the dirty magazines but the rest of it scREAMS Rune. and the main character is a lesbian!!! yay!! 

The Black Veins by Ashia Monet. “In a world where magic thrives in secret city corners, a group of magicians embark on a road trip—and it’s the "no-love-interest", found family adventure you’ve been searching for.” It’s like someone looked into my heart and picked out my deepest desire and then wrote it and gave it life. This book is super diverse and super awesome. 

The Deathless Girls by Kiran Millwood Hargrave is a f/f take on Dracula basically. I’m recommending it because the main character and her sister go through a traumatic event similar to the loss of the sun court, when men come and burn their home to the ground along with their people and they’re captured and taken as slaves. It’s about family, friendship and survival, and it’s beautiful. 

The Never Tilting World by Rin Chupeco. An LGBT book where climate change deniers are the villains? ... you have my atttention. 

Prosper’s Demon by K.J. Parker. This is about a morally questionable exorcist!  It’s a satirical, interesting take on the topic of possession with a kick ass cover. 

The Wishing Heart by J.C Welker. An LGBT fantasy novel where our protag, Rebel, finds a jinni’s vessel and is thus thrust into a whole new world of trying to keep said jinni from everyone else and find a way to free her! The world building is awesome and so are the characters.

Tarnished are the Stars by Rosiee Thor. “A secret beats inside Anna Thatcher's chest: an illegal clockwork heart. Anna works cog by cog -- donning the moniker Technician -- to supply black market medical technology to the sick and injured, against the Commissioner's tyrannical laws.” i have the hardbook version of this and the cover??? is so?? beautiful.

The Weight of the Stars by K. Ancrum. TALKING OF PRETTY COVERS. “Ryann Bird dreams of traveling across the stars. But a career in space isn’t an option for a girl who lives in a trailer park on the wrong side of town. So Ryann becomes her circumstances and settles for acting out and skipping school to hang out with her delinquent friends.”

Predatory by Brooklyn Ray. WERELEOPARDS FRIENDS!!!! god damn wereleopards im?? so happy. m/m 

The Lost Coast by Amy Rose Capetta. FOUND FAMILY QUEER WITCHES. need i say more. 

Portraits of a Faerie Queen by Tay LaRoi. The fey run amok in this one! f/f with a gorgeous front cover.

Unbroken by Brooklyn Ray. step 1: rent haunted house. step 2: fall in love with witch-turned-demon who inhabits it. step 3: profit???

The High King’s Golden Tongue by Megan Derr. This one is lovely! Nice world building with an emphasis on languages and kingdoms, and a lovely m/m romance that builds from kind-of-enemies-but-not-really to lovers. the audiobook of this is great. 

Salt Magic, Skin Magic by Lee Welch. SORRY YOUR BOOK IS SET WHERE? MY HOMELAND? MY COUNTRY MY COUNTY MY HEART? we never get any attention imma go cry in the corner. its a historical fantasy m/m romance in YORKSHIRE gosh im here for it. And let me tell you... this is one fantastic book. I really, really enjoyed it.

Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner. fantasy, m/m, lotsa swords!

Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst. f/f fantasy with a princess who has fire magic in a kingdom where magic is forbidden! 

Freedom’s Fate by Jennie Taylor. SPAAAAAAACE i love books in space.

Pegasi and Prefects by Eleanor Beresford. “Charley's final year at Fernleigh Manor is complicated by a runaway pegasus, unwanted Games Captainship, a dangerous new rival and, most of all, falling head over heels in love with another girl. What is a reluctant Senior Prefect to do?” catch me while i swoon.

The Necromancers Dance by SJ Himes. m/m vampire/necromancer romance, urban magic and fantasy, very fun and smooth read, a little bit insta love but not totally. 

The Star Host by F.T. Lukens. “Ren grew up listening to his mother tell stories about the Star Hosts – a mythical group of people possessed by the power of the stars.” a m/m fantasy book set to a sci fi fantasy background.

Empty Vessels by Nicholas Williams. “Lucas Mahler babysits clones all day, but he's trapped under the legacy of his body-builder father and his genius girlfriend. When Lucas tries to rise above, he's murdered. Waking up in the body of a clone, Lucas embarks on a mystery full of blood, old friends and lost loves.” idk the whole clone thing in this just always reminds me of lord tower making all the different fake versions of people he knows lmao. 

BOOKS NOT YET OUT

So, the thing is. 2020 is very close friends, and some awesome books are even closer. These below are books I’ve not read yet, since they’re not out and I am a poor ARCless girl, but they’re books you definitely want to keep an eye on.

Witches of Ash and Ruin by E. Latimer. Bisexual OCD protagonist who is a witch D: its everything i could want. 

Wild Sky by Zaya Feli. LGBT fantasy with dragons! It sounds so, so fun.

Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust. “A captivating and utterly original fairy tale about a girl cursed to be poisonous to the touch, and who discovers what power might lie in such a curse...”

The Fascinators by Andrew Eliopulos. “The Raven Boys meets Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, about an openly gay high school senior in small-town Georgia.” m/m fantasy which looks super sweet.

Cemetery Boys by Auden Thomas. “Yadriel has summoned a ghost, and now he can’t get rid of him.” THIS SOUNDS SO COOL oh my god. Yes PLEASE. 

When We Were Magic by Sarah Gailey. “A sly, witchy dark comedy about four teens whose magic goes wildly awry.” Magic, darkness, comedy, what’s not to love for fans of the tarot sequence??

The Extraordinaries by T.J. Klune. I absolutely love T.J.  Klune’s writing so I can’t wait to get my hands on this. m/m superheros!! friends!!! get excited!! I think anyone who likes how witty K.D. is will enjoy this writing style. 

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune. YES ANOTHER ONE this looks so good too we are BLESSED. “A magical island. A dangerous task. A burning secret.”

Fragile Remedy by Maria Ingrande Mora. “Sixteen-year-old Nate is a GEM—Genetically Engineered Medi-tissue created by the scientists of Gathos City as a cure for the elite from the fatal lung rot ravaging the population. As a child, he was smuggled out of the laboratory where he was held captive and into the Withers—a quarantined, lawless region.” The idea of the Withers kind of reminds me of the westlands.

The Fell of Dark by Caleb Roehrig. UHM im always here for lgbt vampires in young adult fantasy fiction. The author says that “this book is gay and filled with monsters” which also fits the last sun so i figured it belongs on the list lmao. 

Ruinsong by Julia Ember. “In a world where magic is sung, a powerful mage named Cadence is forced to use her power to torture her country’s disgraced nobility at her ruthless queen’s bidding.”

[giftofshewbread]

Walk Circumsectly

By Daymond Duck Published on: February 28, 2021

The title of this article comes from Scripture. “See then that ye walk circumspectly not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil” (Eph. 5:15-16).

Here are 7 basic things that people need to know about Bible prophecy:

One, people need to know that God knows the future. Paul said, “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world” (Acts 15:18). God knows what will happen before it happens.

Two, people need to know that God reveals the future before it happens. God said, “I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done” (Isaiah 46:9-10). There is just one God, and He reveals what He plans to do before He does it.

Three, people need to know that the Bible is full of prophecy. God put 18 books of prophecy in the Bible. He put 5 books called the Major Prophets in the Bible. He put 12 books called the Minor Prophets in the Bible. He put the Book of Revelation in the Bible. He put whole chapters of prophecy in the Bible (Matt. 24-25). Depending upon who we talk to, some say 25-40% of the Bible is prophecy. The Bible is full of prophecy.

Four, people need to know that Bible prophecy is reliable. God said, “The prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die” (Deut. 18:20). God’s prophets had to be right 100% of the time. If what they said is not from God, it is from Satan.

Five, people need to know that there is proof of the accuracy of Bible prophecy. The Old Testament records more than 300 prophecies about the first coming of Jesus. Some prophecies are repeated two or three times. After the repetitions are removed, the Old Testament still records at least 108 specifically different prophecies about the first coming of Jesus that were literally fulfilled.

Many years ago, Peter Stoner, former Professor Emeritus of Science at Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California, calculated the probability of one person fulfilling just 48 prophecies to be 1 with 127 zeros (A trillion has just 12 zeros). With the odds being so great for one person to fulfill just 48 prophecies, one must wonder what the odds would be for one person to fulfill all 108 prophecies. Fulfilled prophecy is indisputable proof that Jesus is the Messiah, that God knows the end from the beginning, that God is in control, and that the Bible is the Word of God.

Six, people need to know what Peter said about Bible prophecy. “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost” (II Peter 1:20-21). Notice these four things: Bible prophecy is sure (it is accurate), people would do well (be wise) to pay attention to Bible prophecy, Bible prophecy is like a light (because it helps people understand other things in the Bible), and Bible prophecy was given by the Holy Ghost (the reason why it is 100% accurate).

Seven, people need to know that Bible prophecy is about Jesus. The Bible says, “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy (Rev. 19:10b). Why would people, especially pastors and church members, willfully ignore the testimony of Jesus?

Here are recent current events that relate to Bible Prophecy and our need to walk circumspectly (believe, live and act the way God wants us to believe, live and act).

One: on Feb. 19, 2021, it was reported that Pres. Biden took office promising to improve America’s relationship with Europe, work with our allies in Europe, strengthen NATO, etc.

Pres. Macron of France believes it is time for the EU to establish a more powerful military and tell the U.S. to remove her troops.

The Antichrist will rise to power in Europe and go forth conquering and to conquer.

I am receiving e-mails from readers that want to know if I believe Emmanuel Macron is the Antichrist.

The identity of the Antichrist will not be revealed while the Church is here, but since Israel became a nation in 1948, several people have been identified as the Antichrist that are no longer alive.

There is no question that Macron has many traits of the Antichrist, and he could be the Antichrist, but be careful because skeptics will label you as a false prophet, refuse to listen to you, etc., if something happens to Macron.

Two, concerning world government: on Feb. 19, 2021, it was reported that Biden addressed global leaders with two major speeches (one at the G-7 virtual summit and another at the Munich Security Conference) to declare the end of Trump’s “America First” agenda.

As I understand it, the era of “America First” is dead, and it has been replaced by the era of “Globalism First.”

Trump put the needs of America above the needs of the UN and other nations.

Biden is putting the needs of the UN and other nations (the globalist agenda; the New World Order) above the needs of America.

Know that the World Economic Forum (WEF) plans to ask the G-7 nations to approve “The Great Reset” this fall, and Biden (or whoever is in charge at the White House) is letting people know that he supports the globalist agenda.

Be aware that a former Obama Dept. of Homeland Security Official said more than one million immigrants will try to cross the U.S. border with Mexico this year (many with Covid; some getting vaccinated before American citizens that want vaccinations can get them).

Be aware that Biden has prepared a $1.9 Trillion Covid Relief Package and less than 10% of the money is for health-related issues (more than 90% is for museums, family planning, bailing out states and cities, a bridge that Schumer wants in New York, a tunnel that Pelosi wants in San Francisco and more).

Be aware that the bailout of cities and states is based on unemployment rates, meaning that cities and states that use lockdowns to put people out of work will get more money than cities and states that don’t use lockdowns to put people out of work.

Be aware that Biden is warming up to China; that nation is requiring its people to hate God, wants to head up the coming world government, a government that will hate God, etc. (Rev. 13:4-8).

Know that God gave Daniel a vision of the latter time, the rise and fall of the Antichrist, and his world government during the Tribulation Period (Dan. 8:23-27).

“And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up. And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power: and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper, and practice, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people. And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand. And the vision of the evening and the morning which was told is true: wherefore shut thou up the vision; for it shall be for many days. And I Daniel fainted, and was sick certain days; afterward I rose up, and did the king’s business; and I was astonished at the vision, but none understood it.”

The vision of the coming Antichrist and his world government was so evil and destructive that it caused Daniel to faint and be sick for several days.

In a past article, I stated that God may have allowed Trump to be removed from office so the globalist agenda can go forward (and it is).

God is in control, and He can speed it up or slow it down, but I expect the Democrats to lock America into a world government before the next election.

Three, concerning persecution: on Feb. 16, 2021, Worthy News reported that the Center for Family and Human Rights is warning groups and organizations that the UN (wannabe world government) is planning to create lists of those that oppose the LGBT agenda.

Those that oppose the LGBT agenda will be designated as “LGBT hate groups,” and they will be blacklisted and punished.

Four, concerning natural disasters: the state of Texas is known as a major producer of oil and natural gas, but in 2020, Texas used wind turbines to produce 23% of its electricity.

The extreme cold of the Feb. 2021 winter storm froze about half of the wind turbines, and, at one point, more than one and a half million Texans were without electricity.

It has been reported that without rolling blackouts, the entire system was just minutes away from a catastrophic failure that would have taken weeks, or perhaps months, to totally repair.

Stores closed for lack of electricity, others closed because they ran out of food, people moved into their vehicles to stay warm, more than 40 people died, and this is perhaps the costliest weather event in the history of Texas.

Thank God for fossil fuels because without them, the hunger (famine), cold, death and destruction would be much worse than it was this time.

Incidentally, on his first day in office, Biden stopped construction on the Keystone XL Pipeline in the U.S., put thousands of Americans out of work, and hurt Canada, but now he is promoting a pipeline to carry Turkmenistan gas across Afghanistan and Pakistan to India.

Why are pipelines environmentally unsafe in the U.S. but environmentally safe in Muslim and terrorist countries?

If nuclear power plants are unsafe in the U.S., why is Biden signaling his readiness to resume talks with Iran over the resumption of that terrorist nation’s nuclear program?

Since America’s economy is in danger of collapsing and the U.S. has crude oil that could be sold, why is the U.S. cutting production, jobs, etc. and starting to buy oil again?

If pollution of the atmosphere is causing climate change disasters like the one in Texas, why is Biden ignoring the fact that China is one of the worst polluters on earth, and why is Biden’s Climate Change Envoy, John Kerry, still flying around in his private plane?

It has been my opinion for a long time that God uses natural disasters to warn nations to repent and return to Him (II Chron. 7:13-14), but globalists are using the disasters as a scare tactic to bring in their godless world government.

Godless leaders do not think like Christians, and more and more, it is clear that this world is not the Christian’s home (I Cor. 2:14-16).

To be honest, I do not think America will repent, and if Covid and the Texas disaster are birth pains, there is more to come.

By the way, on Feb. 19, 2021, John Kerry was on CBS This Morning, and he was asked, “How much time do we still have left to avert climate catastrophe?”

He replied, “The scientists told us 3 years ago we have 12 years to avert the worst consequences of climate crises; we are now 3 years gone, so we have 9 years left.

This is 2021, and 9 years from now will be 2030, which is the UN agreed-upon goal for having a world government up and running.

Five: on Feb. 19, 2021, William Koenig, author of “Eye to Eye,” noted that Biden has hit the ground running on issues that are worrisome or detrimental to Israel.

Koenig is famous for pointing out that those that bless Israel are blessed, and those that curse Israel are cursed.

We cannot deny that Biden has come out in favor of the Two-State Solution (division of Israel), he opposed Israel’s construction of settlements in Judea and Samaria, he waffled on Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, he announced that the U.S. might be willing to rejoin the Iranian nuclear deal, he revoked Trump’s designation of the Iranian-backed Houthis as a terrorist organization, and more.

Now, the U.S. (especially Texas) has been hit with a record-breaking storm.

Six: on Feb. 17, 2021, it was reported that there is a leaked July 16, 2020, video of Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, expressing concern to his employees about the Covid-19 vaccine.

Zuckerberg said, “We just don’t know the long-term side effects of basically modifying people’s DNA and RNA … whether that causes other mutations or other risks downstream.”

This seems significant because Facebook has announced an expedited effort to remove posts that say the Covid-19 vaccine changes people’s DNA.

If Zuckerberg can warn his employees about future risks, why are others not allowed to warn people about future risks?

The U.S. Constitution gives citizens freedom of speech, and people like Zuckerberg should not be allowed to take it away.

This is another case of the rich and powerful making rules that apply to others but not themselves.

Finally, if you want to go to heaven, you must be born again (John 3:3). God loves you, and if you have not done so, sincerely admit that you are a sinner; believe that Jesus is the virgin-born, sinless Son of God who died for the sins of the world, was buried, and raised from the dead; ask Him to forgive your sins, cleanse you, come into your heart and be your Saviour; then tell someone that you have done this.