#i’m not allowed to enjoy masculine things about myself unless they’re feminine masculine things

[roastedinmarch]

i love being alive and living in the world as a trans masculine person it’s so fun and everyone including the trans community definitely doesn’t either want me dead or think i’m simultaneously receiving male privilege and am basically a girl :)

[ltleflrt]

So I was having a conversation on Discord about omegaverse tonight, and my brain won’t shut up about it, because as usual I come up with my arguments after the discussion is over.  I should have been asleep 3 hours ago, but it’s hot and I can’t unwind, so I’m going to stay up EVEN LATER while the a/c brings things down a few degrees, and I try to get these thoughts out of my head.

I was pro-omegaverse, and trying to explain why *I personally* like the genre, and why I think even with it’s problematic origins and frequently used elements, it’s still a cool genre.  I was essentially having 2 discussions, but they were both using my answers to their questions, even though I was usually addressing them 1 at a time.  That happens when you’re in a Discord chat, and I wasn’t @ing my answers to them, since we were all in the room together.  And I think that cunfuddled the discussion and my thoughts.  So here’s a breakdown.

Issue 1. Biological Essentialism is gross and rapey.

Answer:  Yes, it is.  But so what?  Some people like pure rape-fantasy.  Is it healthy?  That can be argued either way, and it definitely depends on the person writing, or the person reading.  People like gross and rapey stories to get their rocks off.  Whether we like non-con or not, rape fics should be allowed to exist because some people like it.  It doesn’t matter if I think their reasons are valid.  As long as they’re not actively trying to harm someone, let people get down and dirty with their rapey fantasies.

Also, the whole biological imperative to mate isn’t that far off from Soulmate AUs.  Truemates = Soulmates.  Whether we like Soulmate AUs or not, are we also arguing that they shouldn’t exist because they’re problematic?  No, we’re not.  Soulmate AUs are romantic for a lot of people.  Let people have their uncomplicated, fluffy, 1 Destined Love stories.

Something to keep in mind though, is that not all omegaverse fics use the true mate trope.  And quite a lot of fics have characters with a lot more self control during their mating cycles than what you’d find in the short smutty one shots.  It’s common for them to avoid each other during heats, and only share their mating cycle as an act of love, trust, and devotion.  After they’ve been dating for a while.  (I love it when the alpha brings over snacks and water for the omega, and immediately hightails it out of there once they get a whiff of their sexy love interest.  “Take care of yourself, text me when you feel better, loveyoubye! *nyoooom*”)

Issue 2. It’s transphobic.

Answer:  This one is harder to argue, because yeah.  It can be.  But so can non-omegaverse.  Transphobia is, unfortunately, everywhere.  Exploring human gender through non-human gendered beings isn’t a bad thing though.  Cis people should be allowed to explore those things too.  This is step 1 to fighting the Patriarchy.  Questioning it.  Someone may come out of the experience still cis, but they’re going to be more open minded to trans people.  Not to mention, all the trans and enby folks who probably figured themselves out through the gender exploration to be found in omegaverse.

Now, if someone’s into omegaverse and they tell you they won’t read a story about a trans character?  Red flag.

Personally, I like the gender exploration in omegaverse.  Not just in the hormonal stuff, although I do kinda love the idea of seeing cis male characters suffer cramps once a month lol... but I like the stuff about social inequality that women have to go through mapped onto a male character.

I brought this up in the chat, and my use of the term “women’s issues” raised a terfy flag I think, which upset me and made it harder to make my point.  Cuz if there’s one thing I’m not, it’s terfy.  But I do see women’s issues as also trans issues.  Trans Men are treated differently after they start to present as male.  There’s a marked difference between their treatment as a woman pre-transition, and as a man afterwards.  And they still have to be really careful about accidental pregnancy.  I cannot fathom how awful the dysphoria would be for them if they get pregnant.  Trans Women are treated horribly pre-transition if they give any hint of feminine interests.  There’s a reason “girly” is an insult, and it’s because Toxic Masculinity Is The Worst.  And then when they transition?  Hooooboy, gods bless those ladies because Trans Women are treated worse than Cis Women on the social pyramid.  And Enbies?  Oh you sweet things, how the hell do you deal with the rest of us bastards? 

When I say that I am interested in seeing the characters I like deal with women’s issues, I am talking about social inequality, not just periods and cramps (although that a little bit too, because I wish a cis man could just fucking UNDERSTAND why I need a goddamn nap okay? lol), but also sexual health rights, including birth control, including the right to choose whether or not to take hormones, the right to equal pay, the right to equal education.  Feminism, for me, includes trans and enby folks at the table. 

But anyway, the characters I like right now just happen to be men.  I see Dean as a man.  That could mean he’s a trans man too, because trans men are men, yo.  Castiel I see either as a man or non-binary.  So if I want to put them through “women’s issues”, I have to plunk them in a special universe for that.  No one is writing Matriarchy AUs, so Omegaverse it is!

(Side note: If my OTP were f/f, I’d still like omegaverse.  And I could see lots of interesting ways to use all those same tropes for 2 female presenting characters.  So it has nothing to do with genitalia.  Unless it’s smut.  But I swing all the ways, so still not an issue for me lol)

(Side note part deux: I like to read trans stories too.  They have unique things about them that cannot be found in stories about cis characters, even in omegaverse.  And when I see Dean and Cas as men or enby, I’m not putting down people who like them gender flipped.  I just see myself enjoying Trans Woman Claire dating Enby Kaia, more than I’d like to see Dean or Cas written as cis/trans-women.)

Issue 3.  Internalized misogyny!

Answer: This is an argument used against women shipping m/m in general, and has nothing to do with omegaverse.  It just so happens that omegaverse was created for m/m pairings.  But there are TONS of reasons we ship more m/m than any other pairings, ranging from those are the most interesting characters presented to us, to--yes--internalized misogyny.  But I’m tired of that one.  Internalized misogyny is rampant, and telling women that their fantasies are problematic isn’t going to cure them.  There’s better ways to go about it. 

Omegaverse now covers m/f and f/f pairings as well, sooooo... yeah, this one just doesn’t hold water like it used to.  We just need to yoink the media out of the hands of the cis-men who are mostly in charge, and make them give us more compelling women to ship.

Issue 4: That’s not how human bodies work.

Answer: They’re not human lol!  Okay but real talk here.  This issue actually sounds transphobic to me, because it strikes very close to the XX vs XY chromosomes argument.  Omegaverse characters have intersex variations.  Alpha females and Omega males can have both a penis and a vagina in some fics.  It depends on how the author wants to write it, of course.  I usually go with the (horrifying) cloaca for omega males, and the (hyena inspired) psueudo-penis for alpha females instead, but to each writer their own lol

But again... not human.  Let wet buttholes be a thing, lube is expensive and sometimes the bottle gets tangled in the sheets, and you have to stop what you’re doing to find it and... anyway, convenience in fantasy sex is nice lol

In Conclusion: 

Personally, I only like non-traditional omegaverse.  The stuff that subverts the “problematic” tropes.  I was asked what I liked about the genre, and when I explained, it devolved into discussion of the topics above.  But I think what was forgotten in that discussion, was that I kept saying I don’t like the “problematic” things.  I like flipping the tropes.  Which I like in general, when I’m looking for things to read.  I mean, how many Castiel Thinks He’s Straight fics are there?  Not many!  So I wrote one!  Because flipping tropes is my jam! 

I don’t like Soulmate AUs, but with the proper twist I can still enjoy it.  I don’t like Highschool AUs, but I’ve read some that touched me so deeply I still think of them years later.  There’s always someone subverting the tropes I don’t like and turning them into something I do like.

And yet even though I kept saying I liked the subversion of the genre, the discussion kept coming back around to the parts of omegaverse that I *don’t* like.  I will still defend anyone’s right to like the parts of it that aren’t for me though, so I argued away XD

And? Sometimes I like the dark problematic stuff when I’m in the mood to get my rocks off.  Don’t judge, you’re all a little weird in some way or another ;D

Anywho, now that I got this stuff off my chest, hopefully I can sleep.  It has also cooled down by like 4 degrees, and I no longer feel like I’m going to melt in my sleep.  Tomorrow is going to suck, because I have to get up in 5 hours.  Yay!

[scotiaeire]

WHY I’M NOT A MODERN FEMINIST.

NO, IT’S NOT JUST BECAUSE I’M AN AULD FART.

HERE’S THE THING (FOR ME)...I DON’T *WANT* A WORLD OF EMASCULATED, FEMINISED MEN.

BEFORE I GET JUMPED ON, YES, I’M WELL AWARE THAT MEN ABUSE, RAPE, MURDER AND DEGRADE WOMEN ALL OVER THE GLOBE. I MYSELF WAS IN AN ABUSIVE MARRIAGE WHICH INCLUDED ALL OF THE ABOVE EXCEPT, OBVIOUSLY, MURDER...I GOT OUT OF IT, LUCKILY. NOT EVERY WOMAN DOES. I’VE ALSO BEEN SEXUALLY ABUSED BY A WOMAN. IT WAS EVERY BIT AS BAD AS BEING ABUSED BY A MAN.

I BEGAN WORKING (OFFICIALLY) IN THE SEVENTIES. EVEN THOUGH IT WAS AN OFFICE JOB, WOMEN HAD “DRESS CODES” WHICH INCLUDED SKIRTS, HIGH HEELS, MAKEUP, ETC. HATED IT. BUT WHEN I TOOK THE JOB I WAS TOLD BEFOREHAND “YOU CANNOT JOIN OR FORM A UNION WHILST WORKING HERE” SO I TOOK IT.

MY BOSS, AN EX ARMY MAJOR (IT WAS A CHARITY I WORKED FOR, ROYAL PATRONAGED) HAD A HABIT OF CHASING YOUNG SECRETARIES ROUND THE TABLES AND TRYING TO PINCH OUR BACKSIDES. WE HATED IT BUT SAT AT COFFEE BREAK AND LAUGHED AT HIM. WE’D BIGGER WORRIES IN LIFE.

LIKE, MEN DOING THE SAME JOB AS US BEING PAID MORE. AND OF COURSE, WITHOUT THE BACKING OF A UNION (SEE WHAT THEY DID THERE? HUH?) WE COULDN’T DO A THING ABOUT IT, UNLESS WE WANTED TO LOOK FOR ANOTHER JOB.

WHILST I WILL ALWAYS, ALWAYS AGREE NO MAN SHOULD LAY HIS HANDS ON A WOMAN IN ANGER OR WHEN IT’S UNWANTED, BY THE SAME TOKEN, I FEEL IT’S GOING TOO FAR NOW. MEN HAVE NO ROLE MODELS TO *BE* MEN AND NO, WE’RE NOT ALL THE SAME. MEN AND WOMEN *ARE* DIFFERENT. I’M NOT TALKING QUEER POLITICS HERE BTW. MY DAUGHTER IS TRANSGENDER AND I’M MORE AWARE THAN EVER OF HOW PEOPLE VIEW THEMSELVES AND PRESENT THEMSELVES TO THE WORLD.

I’M TALKING STRAIGHT MEN AND WOMEN. THAT PHRASE ALONE WILL NO DOUBT GET ME FLAK. *SHRUG*

I’M NOT ALONE IN NOT WANTING A WORLD IN WHICH MEN ARE LEFT ADRIFT IN A WORLD THAT, LET’S BE HONEST, FOR THE MOST PART, SEEMS TO HATE THEM AND BLAME THEM FOR EVERYTHING.

BUT YOU KNOW WHAT? THERE ARE FEMALE POLITICIANS I HAVE MET WHO, IN THEIR UNCARING GREED AND AGENDAS, PUT MEN TO SHAME.

THERE ARE FEMALE DOCTORS I HAVE MET WHO, IN THEIR ATTITUDE TO OTHER WOMEN, SHOULD BE STRUCK OFF, BUT WON’T BE.

THERE ARE WOMEN I KNOW WHO AREN’T FIT TO RAISE THEIR CHILDREN, WHO THEN GO ON TO BECOME WILD, LOST AND END UP IN JAIL, WHILST THE DADS, DENIED THE CHANCE, WOULD CLEARLY HAVE DONE A GRAND JOB OF BEING FATHERS.

MANY MEN ARE NOW AFRAID TO SO MUCH AS LOOK IN THE DIRECTION OF A WOMAN IN CASE THEY’RE ACCUSED OF ABUSE. THEY DON’T KNOW HOW TO APPROACH A WOMAN IF THEY LIKE HER AND WANT TO GET TO KNOW HER. I’VE SEEN IT FIRST HAND. A CLIQUE OF GIRLS AT A COFFEE TABLE, DROOLING OVER HANDSOME GUYS IN THE CAFE THEN, WHEN ONE APPROACHES TO SAY HI, THEY DELIGHTED IN TELLING HIM WHERE TO GO. WITH AS MUCH RUDENESS AND CRASSNESS AS THE NINETIES “LADETTES” I REMEMBER SO WELL.

THE OBJECT OF FEMINISM IN THE BEGINNING WAS SIMPLE...EQUAL RIGHTS FOR BOTH MEN AND WOMEN. IN VOTING, IN THE WORKPLACE, IN LIFE.

NOW IT’S SLIDING TO EXTREMISM AND THE KIND OF MILITARY FEMINISM THAT DOES WOMEN NO FAVOURS.

AN EXAMPLE? ON A POLITICAL LEVEL, THE SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT. NICOLA STURGEON’S AT FIRST ADMIRABLE GOAL TO MAKE SCOTGOV A GENDER EQUAL TABLE, WHICH IS NOW WOMAN-HEAVY AND INVOLVED THE DITCHING OF MEN WHO HAD SPENT THEIR ENTIRE LIVES WORKING FOR THE SNP, WHO KNEW THEIR JOBS AND DID THEM WELL, DUMPED FOR YOUNG WOMEN WITH ZERO EXPERIENCE AND NO CONNECTION WITH WHAT THE SNP ONCE STOOD FOR. THAT.

IN ORDINARY LIFE? MEN AFRAID TO APPROACH WOMEN SO THAT “DATING” IS REPLACED BY WHATEVER THE LATEST TECH IS THESE DAYS...ZOOM? I DON’T KNOW, SORRY, I DON’T KEEP UP WITH TECHNOLOGY. BUT GODS FORBID A MAN SHOULD ACTUALLY WALK UP TO A WOMAN, ADMIT HE FINDS HER ATTRACTIVE AND WOULD LIKE TO GET TO KNOW HER.

THEY’RE RELUCTANT TO DO SO BECAUSE EXPERIENCE HAS THEM REMEMBERING THE TIME THE WOMAN TURNED AND YELLED AT HIM TO “BACK OFF OUT OF MY SPACE!” OR SIMILAR..

NOBODY WANTS A WORLD IN WHICH WOMEN OR CHILDREN ARE ABUSED IN ANY WAY. OR MEN. BECAUSE YES, IT HAPPENS TO THEM TOO.

THERE’S A HAPPY MEDIUM AND WE’VE YET TO FIND IT. AND WE HAVEN’T.

MEN AREN’T ALLOWED TO FEEL “MASCULINE” YET, THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT THEY ARE. AND NO, “MASCULINE” DOES *NOT* EQUATE TO “CAVEMAN DRAGS WOMAN BY HAIR BACK TO CAVE” OR INDEED, TO ABUSE.

BUT IN AS MUCH AS WOMAN ARE ENCOURAGED TO FEEL COMFORTABLE IN *BEING* WOMEN, AND ENJOY OUR FEMININITY SHOULDN’T WE BE ENCOURAGING MEN LIKEWISE INSTEAD OF MAKING THEM FEEL CONSTANTLY, AS IF THERE’S SOMETHING WRONG WITH THEM?

UNTIL THAT HAPPY MEDIUM IS FOUND, UNTIL THERE’S *TRUE* EQUALITY FOR WOMEN *AND* MEN, THEN AS FAR AS FEMINISM GOES, I’LL STICK WITH HOW I FELT ABOUT IT BACK IN THE SEVENTIES WHEN I WORKED IN AN OFFICE IN A THANKLESS JOB WITH MUCH LESS PAY THAN MY MALE COUNTERPART.

“EQUAL PAY FOR WOMEN”.

FOR THE REST, IT SEEMS TO ME, AS WITH RACIAL AGITATION RIGHT NOW, THERE IS ALSO GENDER AGITATION. AND NO, IT’S NOT A CRIME TO TALK ABOUT STRAIGHT MEN AND WOMEN. IT DOESN’T MAKE ME ANTI LBGQTI (WITH A TRANS GAY DAUGHTER I’VE STOOD BEHIND ALL HER LIFE, I’M UNLIKELY TO BE SO, DON’T YOU THINK?)

SO IN AS MUCH AS I DON’T WANT A WORLD WHERE MEN STILL OWN WOMEN (AND I COULD NAME THE COUNTRIES WHERE THIS IS PREVELANT BUT WON’T, THAT’S A WHOLE OTHER DISCUSSION) AND WHERE DUE TO THE LOCKDOWNS, DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMAN AND CHILDREN INCREASED TO AN HORRENDOUS DEGREE, I ALSO DON’T WANT A WORLD OF COWED, FRIGHTENED, CASTRATED MEN WHO PAY LIP SERVICE TO WOMEN FOR FEAR OF THE BACKLASH IF THEY DON’T.

IT SEEMS TO ME THAT WOMEN ARE IN DANGER OF TURNING THEMSELVES INTO THE VERY CREATURES THEY HATE AND DESPISE.

I’M OLD ENOUGH TO REMEMBER WHAT IT USED TO BE LIKE, AND TO KNOW THAT NO, IT SHOULDN’T BE LIKE THAT EITHER.

BUT I’M HERE AND NOW TOO, AND I SEE WHERE THIS IS GOING. AND WHEN STRAIGHT WOMEN ARE BEMOANING ABOUT HOW THEY CAN’T GET THAT GUY THEY LIKE TO APPROACH THEM, OR THEY’RE LYING ABOUT HOW THEY’RE PERFECTLY HAPPY TO SPEND THEIR ENTIRE LIVES ALONE (I KNOW MANY ARE, BUT MANY MORE ACTUALLY *WANT* A RELATIONSHIP. THAT IS NOTHING TO BE ASHAMED OF) THEN MAYBE WOMEN NEED TO LOOK AT HOW FAR THEY’RE PUSHING MEN AWAY FROM THEM, IN TRUTH, INSTEAD OF WORKING WITH MEN TO FIND THAT COMMON GROUND AND HAPPY MEDIUM.

BECAUSE I PROMISE YOU, NOT EVERY MAN ON THE PLANET IS A WANNABE RAPIST/WIFEBEATER/CHILDABUSER, AND MANY ACTUALLY STILL DO WANT THAT OLD FASHIONED THING...A WOMAN AND FAMILY, HOME AND HEARTH, AND THE PEACE TO BE LEFT TO LIVE AND LET LIVE.

PLEASE FEEL FREE TO UNFOLLOW ME. I’M FINE WITH DISCUSSION BUT WON’T GET INTO NAME CALLING OR ARGUMENTS, THANKS. :)

[rai-jin-andro-jin]

Non-Binary Week 2020

Day 2 + 3 because I missed yesterday:

Day 2 (July 13): Coming to terms

This day is for coming out stories and how you realised you were nonbinary.

Like a lot of people, I grew up with the belief that sex and gender were the same thing; there were two genders, and because I was born with female parts, I was completely and undeniably female. And what it meant to be female was just as rigid: gender roles up to the ears determined what I wore, whether I cut my hair, what I said, what I didn’t say, who I hung out with, who my enemies were, who I could trust, what careers I could have, who I could be attracted to, and what I could think about.

When I entered college, I was away from a lot of these forces that policed my life. For the first time, I was asked on a daily basis to think for myself: and I couldn’t just point to another adult, or the Bible, or to anyone else to explain why I lived the way I did. I had to be able to support myself and my stance and my beliefs. When I was asked to do so, I realized I didn’t even agree with half of the beliefs I held; the other half I discovered were rooted in lies and misinformation about other people, specifically minority groups.

So, over my three-year college career, I grew and changed. I came into contact with different ideologies and was allowed to choose for myself what I wanted to believe and why. I shed traditional femininity both slowly & quickly -- I got an undercut in my hair, stopped shaving my body hair, and wore more comfortable/practical clothes (which ended up leaning toward “masculine” in my case). I still identified as female though -- it was my way of defying traditional gender stereotypes and screaming “I’m breaking the rules and I’m still a female -- respect me or step out of my way!”

During my final year of college, I shaved off all of my hair. Also during this time, I started to discover that I was not straight, but in fact attracted to more than one gender. I first identified as bisexual, but over the next couple years came to embrace the label “pansexual” as well, as I found it less limiting and more inclusive from a linguistic perspective (though I myself consider bisexuality and pansexuality to be basically synonymous in my case). Past college, I started to recognize how the world saw me. Not only did I sometimes tread in the butch lesbian sphere, but I also was misgendered as male quite often, especially after my haircut -- an occurance that didn’t bother me, and instead entertained and intrigued me. I wasn’t trying to pass as male, nor was I interested in transition. I didn’t identify with male pronouns, but they didn’t bother me either. I thought these instances were fun and proved that gender was more fluid than most people realized. It gave me a window with which to play with my own gender.

In the next year or two after college, I found more comfort in dressing androgynously. I didn’t try to present as purely masculine or feminine, nor did I try to lean either way. Instead, I strove to view myself as neither. I identified for a while as androgynous, as it felt detached from both sexes and genders. I enjoyed finding clothing that made my gender appear questionable, and I loved to blur the lines of my presentation. I did it because I could, because it felt the most authentic. I felt like I was showing the world who I truly wanted to be, and how I wanted to be treated. I wanted to be free of the confines of what society deemed was male or female, masculine or feminine. I believed and still believe that no one should ever be gendered at all unless they ask to be. I believe that everyone should be able to define who they are to others, and should be fully respected for it. So often, so many of us are given only a few options, if any at all, and told to make do. We are told that if we stray from these norms, we are unattractive, unwanted, and just doing it for attention. But in reality, we just want to be seen and loved for who we are, for who we choose to be.

Non-binaryness seemed foreign to me for a while. Informed by my upbringing and lack of information, I saw the non-binary identity as something I didn’t fit into. I didn’t meet all the requirements in my head -- non-binary people were other people I knew, other people who’s lives and experiences were different and thus more legitimate than mine. Because of that, I hesitated to identify as non-binary for a long time. But then, as I did more research, read more personal accounts and stories, and connected with friends in real life who were queer and non-binary, I felt like I belonged. I realized I was allowed into that unattainable “non-binary club” that I had built up in my head because it actually wasn’t unattainable at all. It was a community full of people with a wide array of experiences. And mine was not an unfamiliar or unwelcome one. I looked upon the word non-binary, and I realized, with utter joy and happiness:

“That’s me!”

Shortly thereafter, I came out to my friends on social media, and then to some of my family. I went from she/her to they/them, and I wasn’t ashamed or embarrassed, for the first time ever. I felt supported and validated by my friends, more than I ever thought was possible. It was the greatest feeling to finally find a piece of myself.

Even now as I explore the plethora of non-binary identities, I’m still discovering myself. Non-binary describes me just fine! But if we’re getting specific, I don’t have any ties with gender at all, and I’m actively trying to unlearn my gender conditioning to be the best person I can be. That is why I also identify as agender.

It’s a crazy thing to wrap my head around, even as I’m still overjoyed to have a label that explains me and my existence. But the overwhelming feelings that course through my body are ones of happiness. I have a place in this world, whether I know my name/labels or not. I always have had a place, and I always will. And now more than ever, I fight for my place and protection, as well as others’ whose identities are shunned, their protections & rights denied. I want everyone to experience the joy of belonging, not because they fit a mold, but because they’re happy with their own choices and identity. I hope everyone can experience that fully, in all the ways it can possibly occur, for all identities imagineable.

Day 3 (July 14/International Nonbinary People's Day): Nonbinary Joy

Share all things positive about being nonbinary!

I think these can really apply to any gender, sex, orientation, etc., but these are just catered to my personal experience! I think if I had to name this phenomenon, I would call it “Gender Liberation.” So here’s what it feels like to be liberated from gender and gender expectations:

You can wear whatever the hell you want and watch people get real confused.

You get to use they/them pronouns, or whatever pronouns you want; language no longer ties you down!

You get to call yourself whatever you want! You get to choose your name.

All those horrible expectations that make you uncomfortable? Gone.

You get to connect with other non-binary people and hear about their beautiful experiences.

You get to interact with the queer community, which is a beautiful, accepting, and loving collection of people who defy cultural norms and exist exactly as who they are, unapologetically. They are a wonderful group of people to look up to. Anyone who lives and loves to the fullest without shame is one to look up to.

You get to wear your hair however you want and nobody can tell you otherwise.

You get to think about the world without the shades of a binary lens! Turns out the world is so much more colorful!

You get to have awesome flag colors.

You get to have awesome discussions about gender.

You get to be unapologetically complicated, because everyone is way more complicated than their gender, but now, you actually know that and are allowed to exist that way.

I mean, look at the word “non-binary” and tell me that isn’t just the most freeing thing you’ve ever read. Look at the word “agender” and tell me you didn’t just breathe a sigh of relief. No more fucking stupid-ass rules!

Did I mention that you’re allowed to be fully authentic without judgment? Did I also mention that you can finally unlearn all that self-judgment and internalized gender roles?

Gender is fully opt-in.

Now that you’re liberated from all those awful rules and head-spaces, you can think about more important things, like for example: cute people, your favorite books/shows/movies, yummy food, plants, cats, simple joys, arts and crafts, making friends, falling in love, nature, doggos, the whole earth.

Also, now that you’re liberated, you can help to liberate other people by fighting for their rights, because you know that people like you (and people not like you) are being denied basic human rights every day around the world; now you know about it and you know they deserve better, so you can use your voice to help educate and inspire solidarity and community.

Wow, there’s like so many things you can do and be, and no one can tell you not to anymore. Looks like you’re truly confident and happy with yourself! :) That sounds like autonomy at its best!

What *isn’t* awesome about being non-binary?? Absolutely nothing.

[comicteaparty]

May 16th-May 22nd, 2020 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from May 16th, 2020 to May 22nd, 2020.  The chat focused on the following question:

What are you trying to show or tell with your story that you find to be underrepresented?

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

-Mind control/mind reading where both people are okay with it. I like themes of trust -"Superpowers" without secret identities. Because researchers aren't always evil goddamnit! -Portraying people who hurt others not as card-carrying megalomaniac villains but as pitiful and broken people. I haven't gotten to this part of my story yet but I hope I can do it well when I do. -Queer characters but they never say that they are or talk about it in any way. Yes I know I'm probably the only one who wants this

Also, maybe the idea that you don't need to "do anything" with your life for it to be worthwhile? But I'm not sure that I believe this myself

Deo101 [Millennium]

Mostly I'm trying to write about love, and I hardly think that's underrepresented! But, I'm also trying to show a bit of my own personal disabled experience, and I find that the kinds of things I've experienced are hardly represented at all. so, I think I'm trying to show a sort of hope and positivity for things that I think are usually pitied and viewed negatively, which I wish were done more.

chalcara [Nyx+Nyssa]

I just wanted a good ol' classic Eddings-style fantasy romp, but with characters that would usually be cast in the "evil" role, without going the "misunderstood" route.

Plus I wanted to write about shitty family (born, found and married) and that you do NOT have to forgive them in the slightest to move on and better your life.

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

Hmm... One of the main things I want to express with Whispers of the Past is that after past traumas, you may not be the same, but eventually, you can be okay again—even if your "okay" of now, is very different than your "okay" of the past. Normalcy isn't a constant. It shifts with time and becomes something new. A new stasis. A new peace. A new normal. I don't know if I've ever seen another story show this in this way. Another underrepresented theme in WotP is that of the hero choosing mundanity over the amazing. When the quest is over, and all is said and done, and the big baddie has been vanquished, the hero doesn't become ruler, or claim bountiful riches, or sail across the sea to find new lands. No, the hero returns to a world that is familiar and unremarkable. The hero would rather just be an average person.

shadowhood (SunnyxRain)

-Fanfiction. I’m very surprised there hasn’t been a webcomic talking about what it’s like to create fanfiction! But overall the culture involved around it and being a creator. -The relationship and hardships of having a stepparent/being one. Particularly stepdad/stepdaughter relationships -Anger as a reaction to trauma. I see a lot of trauma portrayed as mostly sad, but I want a story where the heroes feel anger, where it’s seen as both a motivator and a detriment -The hardships of dating as someone who’s both touch aversive and on the grey spectrum. Not everyone would be as wonderful or understanding, but it’s important to be around people who are and will stand by you.(edited)

eliushi [a winged tale]

This is why I gravitate towards all these stories made by independent creators I think. So many personal and poignant messages. I’m with you there on the queer characters Eightfish. I want a society where it’s fine to be what you wish and respected to be who you want to be. I think having more positive ways of showing how we can reach that sort of openness can be helpful. In AWT I further explore: - characters in STEM fields and approaches to research design - informed consent and what that means - how to live even when things are falling apart around you, when things are falling apart within you - navigating through crushes, confessions and friendships!

Wow the beginning sounds like the objectives at a science lecture and you won’t be wrong thinking so

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

For my Hybrid Dolls comic, there are several things I want to explore: - Psychological trauma and the effects or damage it can give, without proper treatment. -Writing queer characters without them needing a self discovery episode. But I know some identities are better to be upfront? But in the story, they simply live normal or exciting lives - Narcissism in a relative that one doesn't have to forgive. Being treated as invisible or judged by age, birthright. - Other Concepts of love explored. Attraction that isn't conventional romance. - Friendship bonds between girls, and my own take on an eccentric quirky girl lead. - Being unapologetically feminine, girls who doesn't need to feel like being 'one of the guys' I'm aiming for more character variety in historical fiction, instead of yet another story of a girl 'defying gender norms' by raised as a boy/disguises trope in other similar comics. So the women in my story, use their wits and charm.(edited)

DanitheCarutor

I complain about this all the time, so I'm just going to do a quick overview since I'm sure everyone is sick of it. - Abusers can be smart, popular, generous, charismatic and subtle. I'm kind of sick of them always being portrayed as really obvious, and sometimes really stupid, while there are people like that it's not very practical for them all to be like that. - General mental health stuff. More open representation of it, that it may be something you'll live with for the rest of your life and how that's okay. - Trauma, how it can change you, make you lose sight of the person you were and make you lose interest in things you used to enjoy. (this is coupled with mental health) - Non-romantic relationships with a queer cast. While this is showing up more in fantastical indie works, not very common in slice-of-life type of comics. I can only imagine this is because readers would find it boring or too mundane (can't tell you all how many people tell me my comic is boring. Lol), but being a person totally sick of romance in everything I wanted to do something focusing on family, friendship and the relationships we have with ourselves. - You don't always heal completely. I've already mentioned this, but I want to put a focus on how someone who's been through a lot of shit doesn't alway heal completely, and that's okay. I see in a lot of media where people just overcome their issues, and they live happily ever after with everything all perfect, I want something along the lines of "we still got a long way to go, but we're doing better and we're happier than before". - Not having labels for everything. This sounds like hipster trash, but I don't see the point in putting labels for every character. Like, I put labels for them, mostly during Pride, but it feels pointless in the comic. Apollo is happy to say he's a gay man, but with Julian they're not interested in categorising themselves, all they want is to be comfortable and I don't see nothing wrong with that.(edited)

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

For me, it’s the importance of communication and empathy, and the dangers of its absence. And it’s something I’ve had to think about a lot recently, being more active on social media Everyone’s got their reasons/methods for cutting people off, but I’ve never been a huge fan of a point-blank communication cut unless it’s absolutely warranted. And I’m not a fan of instant demonization when someone messes up or does something I don’t agree with. People are people. We’re all different and we all mess up and we all can change. Keeping lines of communication open is essential for allowing that change, or else we all get locked into little echo chambers where anyone outside is automatically The Worst.™ In a world where everything has gone to hell - and may go further yet - how can things heal when no one is even listening to each other? Where the other side is automatically at fault no matter what? It’s something I grew up struggling to understand (maybe because I grew up outside Washington DC, lol), and really affects me to this day. And if you do end up protecting yourself with silence, how can you still allow other perspectives to be gleaned? I don’t quite have the perfect formula for it. But unless someone is genuinely trying to cause harm, I try to at least attempt to understand where they might coming from - whether I accept it or not. Otherwise it’s so easy to see a lot of people as monsters. It’s a complicated topic for sure, especially nowadays. But yeah. Something like that

Miranda

Hmm that’s an excellent question. Well, a big thing is the varying effects of trauma and ways to handle it. Mainly how burying the past and ignoring traumatic events can affect someone. Also that villains can be people we relate to that just take an extreme way of reaching a goal that most people can understand And how shared experiences can bring people closer (not a unique one) I also want to portray queer characters that are not solely defined by their queerness and don’t have to announce it to everyone.

Tuyetnhi (Only In Your Dreams!)

- Having some talks about the implications of asking what you wish for and the potential consequences that comes with it. - Having more unappologic Vietnamese things happening in the comic. Giving representation to some common things that most Vietnamese Americans (or Asian Americans) can face in terms of relationships, roles, etc. Also since er i'm also directly affected by this, how does the Mixed-Asian Identity plays about it too.(edited)

hmmm I think another thing is that I want to bring up that men who express themselves in a more feminine form is valid and there's no shame that comes with it (positive masculinity hell yaaaa). Also same about expressing characters who are also queer but aren't defined about it either. it's just what they are along with their other interests and goals.(edited)

sierrabravo (Hans Vogel is Dead)

wow, this is a great question! I'm trying to be better about interacting here so I'll give it a shot. My comic is a historical fantasy set somewhat in Interwar Europe/WWII Europe and partially in a fantasy world based on the Brothers Grimm fairy tales. -War stories/histories that aren't about the actual experience of combat: most memoirs and diaries of soldiers I read doing research are about the day-to-day activities, meals, sleeping habits, and random thoughts instead of fight descriptions. It really bothers me when people zero in on in-depth battle maps and obsess over what kind of rifle was used by whom when, when I think it's much more interesting and important to look at the mindset of who was fighting, why they were fighting, and what emotional effect it had on everyone involved (including civilians!) -Asexuality, especially asexuality in history, bc it tends to "disappear" in the historical record as people who may have been ace before that label was widely used tend to not self-identify as it. I'm ace, people in the past were ace, it's a history I'd like to talk about more! -gryphons, they're cool monsters and I think they should be used much more than they are haha

eliushi [a winged tale]

I agree sierrabravo. I find it’s the personal, down to earth, close perspective accounts in historical records that resonate the most with me. Gryphons are also awesome!

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

I feel like there's two separate answers for Super Galaxy Knights Deluxe R (http://sgkdr.webcomic.ws/comics/) The first is what SGKDR represents compared to other webcomics. To me, a major thing I wanted to show with Super Galaxy Knights was a new style of creating webcomics. Animation is underrepresented as a storytelling style, sure, but the main thing I thought was underrepresented in the webcomic space was a "seasonal" method of storytelling. Like, most webcomics I see are either "each page is its own thing" or "it's one big long story, with chapters mostly there to split up different scenes/locations". I very rarely see webcomics build to a major climax in the story, then a resolution, then introduce a brand new conflict. The second is what SGKDR represents compared to other action series (specifically shonen manga/anime, as that's what SGKDR riffs off of the most). I can only think of one shonen story with a female lead, I can't think of any with an explicitly LGBTQ+ protagonist (i only know of one implied one), romance is usually handled very poorly (characters usually get paired with the protagonist due to being female and in the same room, with very little actual relationship building), there aren't many varieties of character motivations besides "pursuit of power/status" of some kind, power scaling usually gets way out of whack, and I... I dunno, I love those kinds of stories, but it just gets tiring after a while. So, I wrote my own that had all the things I wanted in it.

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

@sierrabravo (Hans Vogel is Dead) I totally agree with the difficulty and importance of talking about ace representation in a historical setting! It's extremely difficult to talk about when asexuality was so unknown at the time. I'm eager to see how you handle it!

eliushi [a winged tale]

@snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights) can you speak about

I very rarely see webcomics build to a major climax in the story, then a resolution, then introduce a brand new conflict.

I find slice of life/ some really long mangas with continuous streams of antagonists/web novel like formats use this too but unsure if that’s what you were referring to?

I am also looking forward to more ace representation in the webcomic world

snuffysam (Super Galaxy Knights)

Yeah that format is the sort of thing I was talking about. It's out there, but I don't see it very often.

eliushi [a winged tale]

Ah gotcha! Thanks! I recall some slice of life high school ones I’ve read years ago that have that sort of narrative structure (which feels like the story can continue forever).

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

There's a recurring trope in SF/F where the robot/AI/golem learns that it wants to have free will and make its own decisions. Or there's a biological species that are assumed to be "natural servants", and inevitably you get to the reveal that they're not actually any different from humans in terms of wanting self-determination and independence. If you think of this as a metaphor for relationships between different groups of humans, then yeah, that's the obvious outcome! But one of the great things about SFF is that you can write things that aren't just "direct metaphors for real-world issues, with spaceships and dragons thrown in for flavor." So in But I'm A Cat Person, I wanted to write something about, what if there's a group of beings who really aren't going to develop free will or self-determination? What's the reasonable, ethical way to deal with that? ...also: there's a ton of nonbinary characters in webcomics these days, but at least I can say BICP did it before it was cool.(edited)

Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn)

Leif & Thorn, meanwhile, has a regular old "character forced into servitude, who definitely has independent thoughts and desires that are being controlled" situation. And there's no "Master has given Dobby a sock" loophole they can exploit for a quick fix, so they have to keep up a long-term process of double-talk and rule-bending, to communicate Leif's actual feelings without getting him in trouble. The "realistic language barriers with no convenient universal-translator to get around them" situation -- which, in this comic, is one of the biggest Underrepresented Things I wanted to explore -- makes it that much harder...

Capitania do Azar

I gotta commend you on that, @Erin Ptah (BICP | Leif & Thorn) because you're out there serving my bilingual needs

kayotics

Ingress Adventuring Company is all about the hero after they've finished saving the world, which I think is pretty underrepresented. It's not a quiet contemplative story, since there's still a lot of fun questing stuff going on, but I'm trying to make it clear that this all takes place after the main character has done his big saving the world quest and is still trying to figure out his place after supposedly settling down.

Eightfish (Puppeteer)

I love that Kay

Toivo feels like he has so much history behind him

sssfrs (JOE IS DEAD)

I'm trying to represent orthodox/religious jews because I almost never see my community represented in media. There are orthodox Jewish characters that will be appearing in Joe is dead. In future comics I want to try to plan the story more around including more religious Jewish characters because there still aren't that many in my current project

Also mental illnesses, like trauma and intellectual disability I want to represent my own experiences with it

There isn't as much of a distinct lack of that in media but it's good to have in stories(edited)

Also androgynous lesbians

Nutty (Court of Roses)

With Court of Roses, I'm trying to tell a fantasy story that's for older audiences but proving that Mature Fantasy doesn't have to be ultra gritty. People have each other to depend on, the world isn't bleak, and not every noble is greedy, peasant is starving, etc. I know a lot of fantasy likes to take from realistic Medieval Europe, but the freeing part about making my own world is that it doesn't HAVE to be like that. Their religion is different, more accepting, and again, people are more focused on looking out for each other and having a good time.

Mature themes are still present, such as murder, banditry/pillaging, alcohol, traumatic experiences, etc. but my goal isn't to present them in a darker fashion.(edited)

keii’ii (Heart of Keol)

I wanted to make something influenced by my culture (Korean) without heavily drawing from the mythology. Mythology is just one facet of a culture, yet a lot of people who haven't read it expect HoK to be all about Korean mythology just because it wears a metaphorical hanbok. No. It reflects the traditional aesthetics, but more importantly, the cultural values and the unspoken rules of the society, regardless of whether I agree with them or not. Related to that is body language. I don't want my non-American characters using American body language, such as shrugging, or American ways of using eye contact, etc. I want to show them using (mostly) Korean gestures, sitting, standing and walking like Koreans. I always feel like there's a huge missed opportunity when friggin' aliens use American body language in sci-fi! I understand why people do that -- it makes the work more clear/accessible to English-speaking audience. But in HoK I'm taking the other path. It's a challenge for sure, but I would not have it any other way.

On a more thematic level, I really wanted to explore deeply hurtful experiences that happen in genuinely caring relationships. It's not about good guys vs bad guys, it's not about a nice person being hurt by someone who just doesn't care. Those stories certainly are valid, just not what I wanted to do with HoK. This story is about people who love each other, but don't always know how to communicate their love or needs.

Joichi [Hybrid Dolls]

I am also looking forward to more ace representation in the webcomic world

@eliushi [a winged tale] I agree, the ace rep is a challenge I would like to take on, I'm also curious how it will work in historical times? Even tho I'm ace,I'm still learning new innovative things(edited)

eliushi [a winged tale]

It’ll be important to dig deeper and research into what things were like if you want to capture the authenticity of the period you’re writing in! I’m sure there are personal accounts or documentation of these lived experiences.

Capitania do Azar

I see all these beautiful answers and I almost struggle to find something other than those to say I guess for O Sarilho https://www.sarilho.net/en/ I wanted to write a weird love letter to where I live and how I see my country (tho I'm glad I got other places I love in it too). To my knowledge, we don't get much like that, or at least that's not from a city perspective which is not what I'm trying to go for, at all. There's a lot of tiny cultural things that I want to touch that may be invisible for people who are not from here, but I'm glad that I'm including them for those three readers in the back. Linked to this, in a way, is the fact that I get really tired of those white/gray Sci-fi stories where everything is super clean and super white and technology is absolutely overwhelming and organised. I want Sci-fis in the woods too. And finally, there's something about the way violence is portrayed a lot of times that almost makes you feel like human life just is that cheap. I really don't want to go that road, I'm doing my best to tell a story about war in which death still leaves a toll and violence affects everyone involved

TL;DR I WANTED TO PAINT MY HOUSE

Cronaj (Whispers of the Past)

And finally, there's something about the way violence is portrayed a lot of times that almost makes you feel like human life just is that cheap. I really don't want to go that road, I'm doing my best to tell a story about war in which death still leaves a toll and violence affects everyone involved

@Capitania do Azar This is so beautiful (and tragic). This is something I also hope to express in my work. Super underrepresented message surprisingly.

eliushi [a winged tale]

I enjoy exploring sci-fi beyond the current conventions and absolutely love your setting shizamura!(edited)

Capitania do Azar

Thank u I really love Sci-fi but I don't appreciate that it has become associated with a very specific aesthetic because tbh I find it very limiting

DanitheCarutor

@Capitania do Azar That is actually really refreshing! Horror and action are so packed with glamorized death and violence, you can get really desensitized. The only stories I've ever seen that take those things seriously are war movies based on real life events, like Saving Private Ryan, (which my grandpa, a Korean War vet, said was the most accurate portrayal of what war was like.) and even then you get flicks that totally glamorize the whole thing. I really admire you wanting to put that sense of gravity onto the violence and death in your work, also I love when creators want to tackle war in all it's "too close to home", upsetting realism.

Capitania do Azar

I really love Saving Private Ryan, it is a very nice portrayal with a great message: nobody wants to be here

DanitheCarutor

Yes! I love Saving Private Ryan too, it was nice seeing a movie that didn't make war look like some fantastical bs.

[nacsygen]

i mean, if there's anywhere to suffer about gender, why not tumblr, amirite?

i've known for like at least five years now i'm...not cis.  i've never been able to properly explain it, to myself or to others, but the fact that it sticks around so long tells me that, like and as unlike as my brain has tried to tell me many times before about being bi ("not gay enough") and mentally ill ("not mentally ill enough") like yeah, this is clearly a part of my identity, not just a phase or me, idk, trying to be cool or fit in among all the cool non-cis people i know, i guess???

i think what confuses me is that i don't really have much dysphoria about my physical form, really.  not in my own sense of it.  not without the input of other people.  i'm a very small person and this has informed a lot of my life, yes.  i am well below average height and have never been possessed of strength or grip to speak of (i'm the sheepish one who has to ask the girl working at the pizza place, after five minutes of trying at a booth, to open my bottle of water because my hands are just too small to have a proper adult grip).  but my body is my own, and i've long since learned to live with it, and be comfortable in it.  i got no complaints.

but then, people comment without any sort of prompting on aspects of my physicality, strangers, in public, all the time - whether it's the older lady at the bus stop asking how old i am and what i do to diet because i'm Just So Small! (ma'am, this is just how i am - no, i don't diet - if i stood up you could see my gut - being southern and polite is alas also a large part of my identity -), or the threateningly verbally abusive loud misogynist at the bus stop yelling at my turned back about my "skinny ass white girl legs! get some sun, bitch!", or just today, an older cracker (here in florida that is a descriptor of a culture, not a "slur") who i've ridden the same bus with many times with he and his lady friend, coming up to me while i'm standing waiting (again) for the bus and said "hello ma'am, i was just wondering, are you from The North? where are you from?" and i looked up from my book, bc again southern politeness, and said "nah, i'm from here" and pointed at the ground.  "you're really not From The North?  i'm sorry, i don't mean to be impolite, it's just because of your legs.  they're so skinny and pale, we thought you was From The North." "No sir, I'm from right here in Florida. I just don't tan easy." "well, that was a bet I had going with that girl over there that I just lost." "yeah, sorry, sir, I'm southern born and raised." we ended up on the same bus when it got there, and as i was getting ready to disembark he said "you have a good night there, sweetie! enjoy your book!" "oh, i will." realizing the awkwardness as the bus slowly got to a stop, "sorry, i'm nice, it's all i know how to be." "alright, well, you have a good one!" (i'm pretty sure that last that i didn't even think about said more about how Southern i am than anything else i could have said.)

i know that last was a tangent, but that's the thing - i don't even think about my body as Representing Femininity until other people treat me in a different way because of it.  it happens over and over, all the time, and it's the primary cause of what i've come to recognize as dysphoria.  if i was a boy, if my hair was tucked up in my hat and my chest flattened, would these and many others over the years feel free to comment so freely about my body to me?  i really don't think so.  and that shit sucks.

to me, my body is not a Female Body, despite its resemblance to the Traditional Female Body in its curves and shapes - it is not a Female Body, it is My Body.  my breasts are not female breasts, they are my thiddies and i'm really fond of how they look and like to show them off. like, artistically, they are a gift to the world. my long wavy curls are not Female Hair, they're Rockstar Hair, Fuck You, like i grew up with the old-school and grunge male rockstars i always saw as style icons (and the female rock stars too - huge long hair is a great look for everyone!).  idk if it's because i'm really Just That Pansexual that i can look at my societally-hyper-feminized form - extremely petit,  pale, significant boobs but no ass, skinny arms and legs - and say, you know, that could be a cute guy, right there.  

i've more recently in the past few years experimented now and then more towards as gender-neutral a presentation as i can, even though that just means people see me at a distance and think i'm a pre-teen boy. and yet, people treat pre-teen boys much better than they do almost-30 petit women, is the depressing lesson i've learned from that.  

I hate how much of my questioning of my gender identity is tied into negative experiences with other people and their relationships as strangers to my perceived femaleness.  like, i live in a pretty nice neighborhood now, but i hate going to the local gas station bc the block around it is just...holla bingo time.  last time i walked there by myself i wore knee-length loose shorts and an oversized men's plain t-shirt to go with my walking nikes and baseball cap, and i STILL got hollered at.  "hey, sweetheart! you need help carrying that? hey! hey, young lady!" i did not turn - i hate acknowledging men who holler.  "hey, baby, let me give you a ride to wherever you're goin! no one's gonna bother you!" i wanted to yell back "YOU. YOU'RE BOTHERING ME." but then, he was being significantly more polite than many of the people who've hollered at me over the years, so no point in engaging and hurting anybody's feelings or enduring the "i was just trying to be nice" conversation.

and that's the thing, like. i never feel bad about being percieved as female unless people are doing it in a hurtful way. matter of fact, i have no particular relationship to being female except in hurtful ways from other peoples' perceptions.  my body is genderless, as i am genderless, and it is my body. it does what it's supposed to do and has treated me well for how i've treated it over the years. i'm not mad at my body about it. i'm mad at the people who think my form gives them a right to treat me in unacceptable ways for what should be a polite society.  i get dysphoria from the man yelling from a work truck passing by when i'm just trying to get home from my work, "HEEEEY, LIL MAMA~!" I get dysphoria from being wished "happy mother's day!", or did back in 2014, when on break at work, and a significantly older lesbian gestured at me and said to the man in question, " does she LOOK like a mother to you??"

like listen, i like wearing cute little sundresses, or skin-tight tank tops and short-shorts.  you know why? because i live in florida and it's FUCKING HOT.  they are comfortable.  they are easy.  they are simple choices, that i am allowed to make because i am afab and present femme, and i like the way they look on me and like that i'm allowed this comfort in the heat.

i hate that wearing that for my own comfort gives people a seeming license to comment freely on my body.  i hate that presenting as a woman, a "woman", means people treat me this way.  i hate the bus driver that always says "hello there, little lady" when i board his bus, and i hate that he means well by it. i hate that even when i dress in my loose, masculine, don't-get-hollered-at clothes, i still get hollered at. and i find myself wondering, if i had short hair and no boobs, if i was just a 4'11" young teenage boy, would i get hollered at like this? and no. of course not.

but i don't want my gender identity to be the opposition of a negative in favor of a positive. this has gone into a series about street harrassment when in reality there are many reasons i identify more as male or non-female than because of this. i really don't feel much reason to identify as female other than solidarity with female victims of gendered and sexualized violence. which, alright, that's probably not the most positive way to feel. or reproductive health stuff.  alright, that's just the body i was born with, and i don't feel much connection to it otherwise.  i don't want to medically transition, i don't want to change my body, but like...

i don't really know what dysphoria actually is. is it the feeling of displacement in one's own home of self? is it feeling like everything about how everyone else views you is somehow shifted two wrong lenses over at the optometrist's office? is it just feeling like something...something's really wrong here? if so, i think i’m definitely experiencing dysphoria,.

hey, i'm maria/aril, and i'm trans.  i don't know how, exactly, but i am. and here we are.

[awolspaceman]

how my dysphoria manifests i guess

just gonna warn u right here: this is gonna get in depth talking about dysphoria. if that triggers you, keep scrolling and have a lovely damn day! (also, i anticipate that this is going to get l o n g)

so i’ve seen a ton of shit coming from tucutes about how us “nasty horrible transmeds believe you need to despise yourself to be trans!!!!!!! they’re so harmful to the trans community!!!!!!!” so i just wanna dispel some of those myths. please keep in mind that i’m one person and my experience is totally not universal. i have trans friends who do hate themselves due to dysphoria, and i have friends who aren’t super dysphoric but still experience gender dysphoria. it’s a varied experience. here’s mine. 

i don’t hate my body. if we add up all the things i like/love about my body and then subtract everything i don’t like, we still end up with a positive. i got blessed by the genetics from my parents that i have a relatively masculine face, as well as a pretty pronounced adams apple by female standards. i have really nice eyes in my opinion, and i have some of the thickest eyebrows that i know of. so yeah, i got a masculine face. 

i am very unlucky with the rest of my body. from the neck down, here’s some of the things i like about myself: my collarbones, my shoulders, my hands, my arms, my calves, and my feet. those are all pretty masculine if you ask me. i’m 5′7 and wear US men’s size 9 shoes, and i’m a broad dude (my dad is disappointed in me for one reason and it’s that i don’t competitively swim). unfortunately, i’ve got a big chest. i don’t just have a big chest by trans guy standards, i have a big chest by female standards (if you wanted to put me in a size i’d be a 36 DD, which means i have a bulky ribcage and an even bulkier chest). i’m never perfectly flat while binding, and trust me, i’ve tried on a lot of binders. i live in sweatshirts. i’m also pretty damn curvy, with a smaller waist and thick thighs (mostly muscle, but it still makes me fairly hourglass). apart from my shoulders (which are probably the reason i don’t have that “perfect” hourglass figure thing), i have a super feminine build. that’s just how it be. we’re not even gonna talk about bottom dysphoria because i think you get how my entire body is contradicting itself.

so how does my dysphoria manifest, i hear you asking. my dysphoria is this weird thing that never really goes away. however, it’s not complete and total self hatred. let’s use the shower i took tonight as an example. when i look at myself naked, my body doesn’t register my feminine “bits” as mine. seriously. my brain cannot comprehend that my chest is a part of me. it cannot comprehend my lack of penis, so its circuits overload and i just feel... nothing about it. that feeling of nothingness is then replaced with a similar feeling to touching raw meat. just kind of “huh, that’s weird and kind of gross. i’d like this to be over as quick as possible, please and thank you.” i’m currently sitting in bed, and my chest is pressing into my stomach slightly. i’m not constantly focusing on it (yes, it’s physically uncomfortable, but it’s not making my dysphoria make me want to die), but in the back of my mind, the “ew raw meat” feeling is constantly running. not a fun time. my brain would like to be rid of that feeling as soon as possible. problem is, i’m kinda stuck with it. no matter how much i bind and how much pointless youtube i watch, it’s always there and isn’t going to go away until after i’ve had surgery. 

you know those cursed images that make you go “yeeeeeeeeesh, that’s n a s t y oh god it gets nastier the more i look”? yeah, that “ewwwwwwwww” feeling is the feeling i get. it just feels wrong, and i sure would like it to feel right. do i feel this way all the time? pretty much, unless i’m super distracted, which i try and do all the time. does my dysphoria get to debilitating self-hate sometimes? yeah. lemme explain, with a few choice excerpts from my life. 

this was june, 2018. not that long ago. i needed some sports bras so i could work out, go on long road trips, etc, without binding dangerously or for too long. let’s just say, buying high support sports bras for people with large chests is.... difficult. so, since my mum is a Saint and understands how my dysphoria works, we measured me and bought stuff online. when the stuff came in, there was a return deadline, so i needed to make sure it fit. this is where my dysphoria becomes near debilitating. i ended up sobbing in my room and writing in a small journal i had about how horrible i felt, and this is the gist of what i remember: i want a knife to cut off my chest. i dont care how painful it will be, i just need it GONE. 

i’m on a medication called norethindrone. it stops ovulation and therefore, i don’t get my period (its a fucking blessing. i gained a little weight with it but it’s not too bad, no heavy mood swings, and so if ur a trans dude who wants to stop your periods, check in with your primary doctor about it! they can prescribe it to you, you don’t need to be in gender therapy or anything). however, my natural hormones overloaded it once, about a year ago almost to the day. i got my period for the first time in four months (i had only been on the medication for about that long), and it was hell. i was having more cramps than i had ever had, and my dysphoria was just skyrocketing. i’d had the privilege of not menstruating for a while, and so i’d gotten used to it, and wasn’t prepared for the mental toll of my medication failing. it was horrible.

tomorrow, i’m going into the city with my parents to meet with some people to talk about freezing my eggs. it’s the one thing i need to figure out before i start HRT, so hopefully we figure it all out rather quickly (testosterone is on the horizon babey!!!!! we’re talkin like hopefully under a year until i can start it but idk). however, the thought of even talking about my uterus makes me feel sick. my brain refuses to acknowledge that i have it, so forcing it to acknowledge a part of me i try hard to ignore is 1. exhausting and 2. really distressing. talking about it with my parents made me dysphoric, and when this special flavor of my dysphoria rears its ugly head, i swear i can feel my internal organs shifting with discomfort. so, yeah, my dysphoria gets pretty nasty. 

so let’s just review. personally, my dysphoria manifests as this weird thing my brain cant quite comprehend but definitely does not enjoy, and sometimes it spikes to those self-hating, “everything about me sucks and i want to die” levels, but those are normally induced by me getting deadnamed or misgendered or i’m forced to think about aspects of my body that i work hard to ignore. this is my experience and i’m allowed to share it. not everyone’s is like mine, but i think maybe, just maybe, one person who sides with tucute ideology will read this and maybe, just maybe, they’ll change their mind about the “horrible self-hating transmed ideology” that other tucutes talk about and demonize. 

have a nice night y’all. get some sleep and eat breakfast tomorrow.

[mercurialsmile]

Any tips on writing nonbinary characters? Like, any 'do's and 'don't's? I really wanna get it right, so I thought I'd ask someone who actually identifies as nonbinary :)

Any tips on writing nonbinary/trans characters?

I got two asks for this (maybe from the same person?) and it’s taken me some time to write an answer since this is such a broad... question. 

Thing is, nonbinary is both a gender in and of itself but also kinda an umbrella term? Since you also have people who are agender, bigender, genderfluid, etc. who would also technically fall under the umbrella, but don’t call themselves nonbinary since that’s not the label they want, and since the latter labels are a lot more... specific. 

Non-binary simply means that someone identifies as a gender outside the binary of man and woman and that’s it. 

There’s also the fact that I’m pretty sure I have some opinions other nonbinary people wouldn’t agree with (for example, I dislike neopronouns. Xir/Xe and Zie/Zir are the only ones that’s pronounceable to me. And I straight up dislike nounself pronouns and actively avoid people who only use nounself pronouns since to me, they are. Too hard and complicated to use. I remember reading a really good post on why nounself pronouns are linguistically incorrect in English and how to properly format them to be correct, but I dunno where that post is now) which is also why I have been hesitant about this.

Also it’s a complex... hmm thing. So yeah.

I think the first thing to ALWAYS remember when writing a minority character is that their status as a minority is not their only trait. Don’t use cliches. Don’t make them one-dimensional and make an enby’s entire personality revolving around the fact they’re enby. It’s othering, at least to me, and just plain bad writing. 

Another thing is, even tho I wish there were more books out there about being enby (are there any really out there at all?) for the most part I think cis authors should be careful and kinda tread around writing about an enby’s life and being enby. Unless you have done a shit ton of research, know exactly what you’re doing, and have talked to multiple different enbys (and not just over text either), I would merely have the character. Be there.

1) it’s a lot easier who wants to do all that research?? 

2) still counts as rep (as long as it’s positive)

So how do you write (possibly?) positive rep for a enby character? Let’s go back to pronouns. The most versatile and acceptable pronouns for enby people is they/them tbh. It’s completely gender-neutral. There are enby people who use gendered pronouns as well (She/her, he/him, maybe they use all three!) but writing-wise, it would be easiest to keep to one set of pronouns to make the writing easier to read. I dunno about anyone else, but I for sure would get tripped up and confused if a character’s pronouns change throughout a book. (Maybe it can be written well idk but I don’t think I’d like it personally sorry) so for the most part? I suggest just sticking with they/them. It’s the easiest to write. 

Also, I suggest to never call your enby characters “it”. Yes, some irl enbys like “it” as a pronoun, but to most it’s dehumanizing, so it’s best to avoid it I think. 

Interestingly enough, even tho they/them is the easiest to write with, it can also be a little tricky at times! Sometimes you’ll have to format sentences differently so readers can understand the difference between the singular and plural forms of they/them. Personally, it’s a fun writing exercise to me! So if anything, writing about an enby character can actually help stretch some different writing muscles so to speak. 

And speaking of pronouns, never ever have the narration misgender the character. Never. Hell, usually, I don’t even have characters or even the VILLAINS of my books misgender characters. And my reasoning behind this is: I dislike using transphobia/enbyphobia as a tool to show a villain is evil--their actions alone in the novel should be enough. And two: if even the evilest of villains aren’t transphobic... that says a lot to me. It speaks VOLUMES and is a lot more powerful of an (unsaid) statement then having your villains be transphobes. (but that’s just my opinion ofc!!) 

Now, to me, if you’re just writing about a enby side character, I would just have them. Be there. Not misgendered, everyone regarding them using the proper pronouns, and avoiding gendered language (which can be hard as it is hardwired into us without us even knowing, for instance!) so make sure you edit accordingly. 

Also, and I think this should be OBVIOUS by now, but PLEASE do not write a “forced coming out” scene. Like, where the cis character walks in on an enby character changing clothes or whatever. Like. That is. So over with and done. Ik that terrible trope fits trans men/women characters better, but I think it’s still important to say here, esp if you’re writing an enby character who tries to pass as the opposite of their birth gender or binds/stuffs/packs/etc at all. It’s uncomfortable, possibly triggering, and honestly? Super cliche. It’s bad writing, my friend. 

And whether or not you want to make the direct statement that they are an enby is kinda up to you? There’s arguments for and against it. If you can fit it into the story safely without making anything clunky, go for it! You can either have the character themselves tell someone how they identify, or maybe they’re being introduced and they ask the person they are introducing themselves to to use “they/them” since they are an enby. I’m sure there are other, more creative ways to do this, but yeah. This specific topic is super situational so I would have a sensitivity reader (or two!) to read over what you write to make sure it’s okay. 

Okay the last thing I’m gonna talk about is character description. Ignoring the fact I personally am terrible at it, there’s a kinda huge divide here. 

For one, a lot of authors and I think enby people in general don’t want others to know their birth gender, which is understandable. And with writing, there isn’t any visual clues besides what you write down. The world is your oyster, you can have your character look like anything, the reader won’t know the birth gender unless you use gendered language. 

The tricky thing is this, tho: the stereotypical enby person/character is someone who is skinny white and vaguely masculine. I, personally, despise this stereotype with my whole being. Imo, enby people can dress and look however they want. Clothes are just fabrics we put onto our flesh bodies. If girls can enjoy pants and boys can like dresses and skirts, then enbys can dress however they want to as well. That’s a freedom I think everyone should have. Clothes don’t dictate gender. Enby people also can’t control what they look like. Some people.. just won’t ever be able to pass as androgynous (unless they Really Work at it, like me!!) and it’s unfair to them I think as well. 

That being said, writing an enby with feminine clothing, for example, will probably have your reader think of them as DFAB, unfortunately, unless you are really careful.

Other things that can make your reader think of an enby’s birth gender: describing them having to wear a bra or having a period, describing if they have to shave their face or not or how much facial hair they grow, describing their genitalia AT ALL, describing them with certain face/body shapes, describing their hair length (possibly), if they wear a binder or stuff a bra or pack, describing if they wear makeup and the list can go on. 

Some people would think you should avoid this completely, which is why vaguely masculine is what people go for. it’s the typical androgynous look (which isn’t bad pe se and I don’t wanna insult anyone who looks like that!) but imo what would be more normalizing and important is to have enby characters look how they want, choose if they wanna wear a binder or not, if they wear makeup, and etc. 

Some people might thing the above is completely fine and that it’s important to show anyone can be enby and you’re still valid as an enby even if you might not “pass” for instance or don’t try your best to conceal certain secondary sex characteristics. Others might think you should make your enby characters as androgynous as possible, even in the stereotypical way. 

Which view is right? Dammed if I know, and I don’t think one is or not. But it is something to think about. I think the stereotypical response to a cis author would be to go with the safest option and allow enby authors write about enby characters breaking gender roles, but honestly, it is your character. Whether you make your enby character vaguely masculine to avoid those pitfalls or go balls to the walls and do whatever you want because enbys can dress and look how they want fuck you all is up to you. Do what you think your character would do and design them to match their personality. I don’t think people should be boxed into what sort of characters they are allowed to make. 

And don’t be afraid to make mistakes. It’s okay if you fuck something up by accident or are accidentally insensitive. And honestly? Groups of people aren’t a hivemind. No matter how good your representation is, there will be someone who disagrees with you and thinks you didn’t “write it correctly”

all I can say is: learn as much as you can, always strive to keep learning and listening, and do the best you can. You can’t succeed if you don’t try and you can’t learn without making a few mistakes along the way. 

(And as for trans characters... I myself am not a trans man/woman so idk how to best say what not to do, but I think it follows the same as above for the most part? I’d ask the opinion of a trans man or woman first rather than an enby like me, as even I have fucked up writing about my trans woman character in the past. I’ve learned a lot since then, but I think I am still learning and would rather not educate someone on a topic such as that. Also this post is already long and I am Tired of writing about this topic lol) 

I rambled a lot as usual and I am so so sorry. It’s late and this was SUCH a broad question I didn’t?? Really know how to answer so YEAH SORRY if this is no help at all!! I tried my best!!

[meeedeee]

Writing Women: Thoughts RSS FEED OF POST WRITTEN BY FOZMEADOWS

A few days ago, I went on a Twitter rant about female characterisation and Mad Max: Fury Road which ended up attracting rather more attention than I’d anticipated. As such, a few people replied to ask for advice about how to write good female characters, and while I answered in brief at the time, it’s something I’d like to address in a bit more detail.

Whenever the topic of how not to write women comes up, usually with reference to such narrative basics as avoiding objectification, lone Exceptional Girls and gender stereotypes, there’s a predictable sort of outrage from people who’ve missed the point. Are you saying we can’t write beautiful women? they ask, only semi-facetiously. Is there a quota for female characters per story we have to hit to avoid being called misogynists? Is romance allowed at all? Can women have any feminine interests, or is that sexist, too? And because we’ve already gone on at length about all these things, we’re usually too exhausted to reply.

The thing is, there’s no one “right” way to write women, just as there’s no one “right” way to write any type of person. In talking about common mistakes, and particularly when we’re talking about them in brief, we’re rarely saying “avoid this one, overly simplified Bad Thing in its entirety,” but are rather expressing frustration at how that particular element is overwhelmingly used in certain quarters, while emphasising how to do it well.

As writers, it behoves us to get into the mindset of our characters: to understand their personalities, backgrounds and motivations, whatever they might be. Bad characterisation is what happens when a writer fails to do this; and while that failure can occur for any number of reasons, one of the most common (and therefore most frustrating) permutations occurs when the writer has a reductive, inaccurate or otherwise stereotypical view of what certain types of people are like in real life, or when they fail to acknowledge that their own experience of the world can’t be universally applied to people from different backgrounds.

So: let’s talk beautiful women and the ostensible ban on writing them, which is one of my personal bugbears.

Culturally, women are expected to be beautiful. In the West, the mainstream concept of “beauty” is held to expire at a certain age while being inherently fetishised, diminished or inaccessible to anyone not white. This means that, in a large number of Western narratives, female characters skew conveniently young, even in contexts where you’d expect such a person to be older; are conveniently long-haired, fashionable and permanently made up, even when disdain for such trappings is ostensibly part of their characterisation; and are frequently written as though beauty is a personality trait instead of a personal judgement. What this means is that we’re all collectively conditioned to make female characters “beautiful” as a reflex, because if we’re going to invent a woman out of thin air, then why on Earth would we want to make her ugly?

But as even the type of misogynist prone to rating women’s looks has tangentially realised, not being beautiful isn’t the same as being ugly. Even given the massive cultural dominance of mainstream Western beauty standards – white, blonde-haired and light-eyed, slim but busty, of medium height, able-bodied, aged between sixteen and thirty, or thirty-five at the absolute most – most of us are generally able to acknowledge the attractiveness of women who differ from those parameters by virtue of more than their hair colour. And when it comes to the question of individual preference – well. The world, as they say, is our oyster. Beauty is not an absolute, but a personal judgement, and that’s before you get into the question of attractiveness as determined by personality rather than looks, which is a great deal more significant than many reductive persons care to admit.

All of which tells us a great deal about how female beauty is perceived, and which is therefore relevant to how female characters are viewed by the audience. But when you’re writing a story, the character has their own internality: you have to know them from the inside, too. When a story tells me in the raw narration, rather than from a character’s POV, that a woman is beautiful, it invariably feels forced, as though the author is imposing a false universal over any judgement I might prefer to make for myself. But in a narrative context where women have every reason to be aware of the value placed on their looks, a story that goes out of its way to tell me about a female character’s beauty from an external perspective only is doing her a disservice.

One of the great paradoxes of mainstream beauty culture is that, while women are expected to look good for men, the effort that goes into maintaining that beauty – physical, emotional, financial – is held to be of zero masculine interest. On TV, it’s common to see a hard-bitten female detective whose hair is worn long and sprayed into perfect coiffure, whose heels are high, whose face is permanently made up, and whose fashion choices visibly outstrip her salary, because we expect all TV characters to be exceptionally pretty. It’s just that, with women, by virtue of the extra accessories and effort “mainstream” beauty requires, making any and all characters strive to clear that bar can’t help but impinge on their characterisation in a way that it doesn’t for men. A flock of teenage boys all showing up to school in various dapper vest, suit and tie combinations would raise eyebrows on TV, but we’re inured to the sight of teenage girls in math class dressed like they’re off to a movie premiere. And what this means, whether intentionally or not, is that we void the prospect of women who, at the level of characterisation, have different approaches to beauty, not just in terms of individual style, but as a social expectation.

So: you tell me your character is beautiful in context, wildly attractive to the men around her. Great! But what does she think about that? Did she go through puberty so early that she was teased about having breasts for years before the same boys started to hit on her? Is she uncomfortable with the attention? Does she enjoy it? Does she deliberately “dress down” to avoid getting catcalled? Does she even like men? Is she confident in her looks? Does she feel insecure? Does she enjoy make up? If so, how much time, money and effort does she put into using it? If not, how sick is she of being cajoled into trying it? How does she dress? Does she actually enjoy shopping at all? What cultural norms have shaped her idea of beauty? Have you noticed how many of these questions are context-dependent on the modern world and our implicit association of beauty with makeup and fashion? If your setting is an invented one, have you given any thought to local beauty standards, or have you just unconsciously imported what’s familiar?

I’m not asking these questions to situate them as absolute must-haves in every narrative instance. I’m asking because I’m sick of “she was beautiful” being treated as a throw-away line that’s nonetheless meant to stand in lieu of further characterisation, as though there’s no internal narrative to beauty and no point in mentioning it unless to make clear that male readers should find the character fuckable.

This goes double for warrior women in SFF novels particularly, not because powerful, kickass ladies can’t be beautiful, but because there’s a base degree of grime and practicality inherent in fighting that’s often at odds with the way their looks are described. A skilled fighter who has no scars or bruises at any given time is as implausible as a swordswoman with baby-soft, uncalloused hands. Long, silky hair might look good, and it’s certainly not beyond the realm of possibility for a warrior to have it, but your girl is still going to need to tie it back when she’s in the field, and if she’s out on the road or in battle with no more bathing opportunities than her male comrades, it’s not going to fall out of her helmet looking like she’s a L’oreal model. If your armies are gender diverse and there’s no stated reason why women can’t hold rank, but the only women we ever see are young and hot, then yes, I’m going to assume you’ve prioritised beauty over competence at the expense of including other, more interesting characters. A woman’s looks are far from being the most salient thing about her, and if a subconscious need to find your female characters conventionally attractive (unless they’re villains) is influencing who you write about, believe me, it’s going to be noticeable.

I could address those other, early queries at similar length, but what it all boils down to is a marriage of context and internality. No, there’s no quota for female characters per book, but if you’re going to give me a POV perspective on a lone woman associating with an otherwise all-male cast, simply telling me “she’d always gotten along better with men than women” is not sufficient to explain the why of it, especially if her being there is contextually incongruous. By the same token, if you show me the POV of a woman who has every reason to associate primarily with other women but whose thoughts are only ever about men, I’m going to raise a disbelieving eyebrow. If you can’t imagine what women talk about when men aren’t in the room, or if you simply don’t think it’s likely to be interesting, then yes, it’s going to affect your ability to write female characters, because even if you only ever show them with men, those private judgements should still inform their internal characterisation.

One of the most dispiriting experiences I’ve ever had in a writing group was watching a man in late middle-age describe a young woman of his own invention. As an exercise, we’d all taken fifteen minutes or so to write out a detailed rundown of a particular character, either one we’d invented on the spot or who featured in our fiction, and to share that work with the group. This man produced an unattractive girl in her late teens who had no interests besides working in a dollar shop, who lived with her mother but didn’t really have any friends, who liked shopping and eating chips – and that was it. Every time a member of the group prompted him for more details, he just shrugged smugly and said she just liked being in the shop, and that was it. When pressed further, he insisted that he saw plenty of girls like this on the bus and around his area, that she was a realistic character, and that there was no need to develop her beyond this dim outline because she just wasn’t clever or interesting or curious, so why would she have opinions about anything else? It was maddening, depressing and so unbearably sexist I wanted to scream, because by his own admission, what he’d done was look at women in the real world and assume that his reductive judgement of their goals and interests, made on the basis of their appearance, was genuinely the be-all, end-all of who they were as people, such that even when it came to putting a woman like that in fiction, he didn’t feel moved to develop her any further.

Ultimately, if you want to write good female characters, there’s no one way to do it. But if I had to distil all this into a single piece of advice – a practical thing for writers to do, to try and better their skillsets – I’d say: as an exercise, try writing a story with only female characters, or in which men are the clear minority. When women only ever appear singly or in contexts where they never talk to each other, it’s easy to fall into the habit of letting their gender and beauty stand in for characterisation, because you only need to distinguish them from men, not from each other. But try your hand at a story whose five characters are all women, and suddenly the balance shifts. You can’t just have The Feminine One and The Tomboy, or The Ultra Hot One and the Girl Next Door, and nor can you lapse into defining them as such in their own perspectives. You can certainly pick a narrative setting that explains why they’re all or mostly the same age (high school, for instance), but it’s harder to lump them together.

And if it’s never occurred to you to write women as a majority before? Then you might want to ask yourself why that is, and consider how your answer might be impacting your ability to write them as individuals.

      from shattersnipe: malcontent & rainbows http://ift.tt/2w2LECY via IFTTT

[deactivated337]

What’s bothering you right now?

Feeling of boredom. I need a lot to remain mentally stimulated so I feel kind of turned *off* right now.

What would you call your aesthetic?

Hmm…Whether it’s light or darkeness, it better be chic.

Is there a part of yourself that you’re especially insecure about?

Hmm…probably my need to connect with people sometimes. There are wonderful people that I find out there, and with ease, but a lot of times when I’m trying to find them, I get mixed up with negative people and it makes me feel very reclusive until I can get over the weird turbulence.

When was your first kiss?

I was 11, It was 2004, the golden year. Felt pretty good J

Honestly, do you give a shit?

Yes. If I have something to lose, which is a lot, I care. I don’t care about being odd, strange, or unusual though. I’m definitely a cautious, self-protective individual though.

What type of guys do you like?

I don’t exactly have a type, but I’m very attracted to a guy that has a certain sliver of darkness, aggression and masculinity about him.. Spunky, the ability to be mean to people who need a lesson, must be some type of funny, must love and respect females, I really enjoy a guy that makes me feel feminine and womanly. Must be compassionate for people in unfortunate situations, like sweet little homeless women. I like a guy who loves animals, a guy who isn’t afraid to cry with me, I like a guy that will tell me a very personal confession or a secret that that he feels uncomfortable about, totally must bond over secrets and pain. I love a guy that understands an interest in true crime, or what is taboo or unaccepted, I like when he has an eye for life’s mysteries. I like people who give off an aura of power.

Do you have a deep, dark secret?

There are some things that I will take to the grave.

. How would you like to be remembered? Someone who embraced every feeling, heart wrenching or loving, and found a way to grow through it, or love more through it.

Are you afraid of dying? Tbh, yes. It haunts me a lot. No one has come back yet letting us know what really happens, or how our consequences affect us. It’s such a mystery, and I want very much to please my creator. I sometimes worry that I’m not behaving the way they want me to.

 Are you happy with who you are? Yes. I’m not perfect, but I’m extremely comfortable with myself, I believe in myself, my mind power, my abilities. I feel pretty grateful for this living experience.

Have you changed at all in the last year?

Yeah. 23 is a year that no one is going to warn you about, but it’s a year where you’ll shed many skins and will feel like a stranger from who you once were. I’ve learned a lot about myself, I’m a little more serious, but I also feel younger in some ways… I appreciate what money can’t buy, true compassion, and other human beings..especially in their most fragile state. I really appreciate honest dispositions..Someone who can share something with me that may typically be seen as embarrassing or shameful.

Is there someone you can tell everything to without fear of judgment? Unless it was @dandecat or one of my beloved hand chosen friends, no. I’ve never really felt understood or accepted, and I don’t really know what I would do if I was.

What makes you uncomfortable? Bigotry, labels, stereotypes, pessimism, people who feel the need to undermine, or one-up someone else, negativity, impoliteness, callousness, unfriendly people, people who are holier-than-thou, judgement, it all makes me recoil and draw away.

Do you like girls or boys? i.e. what is your sexuality? I like guys. I like dominant people in general.  Physically girls are the crème de la crème but I don’t really romantically connect with them. This town ain’t big enough for the two of us. I’d probably become extremely jealous over another girl ha.

What are your worst traits, and features?

Let’s see…I worry too much. I can become insanely disconnected, cold, and detached from groups, people, activities while they are going on. I sometimes allow people to rub me the wrong way until I become very aggravated, and then overreact. I’m drawn to crazy people. From reading details of so many tragic events, I legit can become too paranoid or suspicious of strangers in public places. I’m hypersensitive to people’s thoughts and their motives so I always feel a little at war with what they want me to know, and what I do know about how they really feel about me deep down. It’s like one crazy mindgame/ mindfuck.  Sometimes I’ll be in a large group of people who are socially interacting, but I have nothing to say, so I’ll just remain quiet…It casts a weird light on me and can sometimes come off as cold, rude, & unfriendly, when in reality I wish that I had the ability to small talk and fit in without everyone else. Tbh I’ve never been able to fit in. I tend to self-isolate.

.What does your outfit consist of today?

A black sweater, pink panties, and kitty socks

What body attracts you the most, men or women? Men, I like sinewy bodies with definition and interesting, arms, wrists, hands

4) Ever kissed a girl? Ha yeah

What do you think you look the sexiest in?

Hmm..Anything femme like skirts, tights, a bikini, beachy wear, sporty wear, I like a tomboy look if it’s complimented with some femininity..boy short panties, high socks, school girl chic, librarian chic, I like to wear anything that gives me a rush.

What’s your most favorite part of your personality? Spontaneity/Innocence

What are some of your favorite physical characteristics for your crush to have?

Nice hands, strong body, piercing eyes. I really don’t discriminate though. I’m very attracted to the mind, so pretty much anyone can look very sexy to me depending on their brains. I really like interesting arms, maybe a little bit of chest hair lol, veins in the arms. Just…masculine?

Do you think that you’re a good kisser? Yes!

What’s something that always turns you on? People who like what is not socially acceptable

Have you ever been someone’s secret admirer? The secret admirer is typically always me

If the whole world were listening to me right now, what would I say? I’d find a way to let everyone know that we are all not so different from one another…Most of our insecurities, someone else can relate to..deeply. There is no reason to feel unworthy, nobody really knows exactly what they’re doing. We’re all strangers to this world. Don’t feel incompetent.

39. What is your purpose in life? To spread empathy

3. What are 3 traits that you like about yourself and what are three that you dislike about yourself? Personality wise.

I like my ability to be open, ability to be friendly, ability to comfort other people

Dislike: I’m so restless. I wish I could be just..100% confident, no fucks given, I also wish that I had the ability to be more tough on rude people who like to test my trigger finger. I’m working on that one.

[sophiesgenderjournal]

05/28/2019

I was feeling kind of down when I came on to write in my journal today. My first ever therapy session is tomorrow *gulp*, I haven’t heard anything back about my immigration status, and I didn’t sleep well. Orange Theory is nuts.

However, as I logged on I saw that someone had sent me a message - and they told me I was doing awesome.

I really needed that today! Thank you so much - I feel much better already! :) It gives me the courage to do something I’ve wanted to do for a while but have been scared of: a stream-of-consciousness dialogue between my feminine and masculine selves.

Sometimes I feel like my out masculine self and suppressed feminine self need to have a conversation. One hates the other, the other has been crushed so long she doesn’t know herself. It’s also something that was suggested in the gender journey book that I’m reading. So, I’m going to attempt to have a stream of consciousness dialogue through text with myself. Sound confused? Good! So am I. For clarity’s sake, I’m going to label them F and M.

M: Why are you here, why won’t you go away and why do you make me feel like crap?

F: I’m part of you, so I can’t go away. As to the why, it’s just you, a piece of your mosaic, an amalgamation of experience and nature, inexplicable and indefinable.

M: That sound like a cop out. Like, I’m a guy. I like action movies. Action games. I hang out with the bros!

F: But...you also don’t feel like a guy. You don’t like being called handsome, sir or son. You don’t care about the clothes you wear - unless they’re feminine clothes. You take pleasure in being gendered female or told you look like a girl.  You dislike male gendered pronouns and you wish you could be a girl sometimes. 

M:AHA! Only sometimes! Other times, I’m perfectly fine being a guy! I enjoy that feeling of being masculine, of strength and power, of lifting and machinery!

F:And it’s not possible to like that in a girly way?

M:No...no that’s not what I’m saying. Girls and women can be strong too, I mean they have to be. And women can enjoy lifting and machinery.

F: Why do you feel guilty that you enjoy feminine things?

M: Because...I shouldn’t. 

F: And why do you hate having your picture taken? Why do you like looking at the angles of your face and enjoy the width of your hips, but you don’t like the hair on your legs?

M: Plenty of guys shave! It’s not weird! Maybe I can be gender-nonconforming? Is that an option?

F:Well I guess...but does it address the root of the problem? Of course guys should be allowed to wear skirts, but do you want to be a guy in a skirt? Or a girl in a skirt?

M: I...I...that’s a trick question!

F: No it’s not. Remember, I’m in here too and always have been. I remember the scenarios you painted in your head when you went to sleep as a child. Of being the only male captive the female army had ever taken and transformed into a girl. Or imagining you could jump between two different lives, your boy life and your girl life, and spending literally all the time in your girl life. Wearing your mum’s clothes without knowing why you felt compelled to do so. It was never to be a guy who could do girly things, it was to be a girl.

M: That’s a very, very scary thought to comprehend. 

F: I agree. I’m terrified too. I will always be here in you, but I’m not sure I’m ready to take the driving seat. There’s so much at stake and so many unknowns. I guess that’s part of the problem - you’ve acknowledged my existence, and now it’s a question of what to do with me.

M:...

F: One thing you can’t do though is push me back down. I’m here now. The genie is out the bottle, Robin Williams or Will Smith, it doesn’t matter. But remember wishes are always nuanced, always tricky things, and always backfire no matter how carefully you phrase them. I don’t know if we can blend to be the same person, if we can share, if you will crush me for the next 30 years or vice versa. But I exist. I am valid.

M: I...I know. And the only reason I’ve hated you is that while I can admire the courage of trans* people, I have always been terrified my the idea that I am one myself. But I don’t want to hate myself anymore. And I need the woman I love to see all of me, not just my carefully constructed facade. You are me. We are one.

F: You had other questions, and we got sidetracked. Why do I make you feel like crap? It’s because you are afraid of me, you hate the very idea of me, and my existence is what makes you feel shitty. Not me myself.

F: And yes, sometimes you don’t feel like a girl. Sometimes you are content to be a man. But it always feels like second place to you. This is hilariously ironic, as we both know that females get second place to men because of all sorts of shitty bias all the time in the real world. But you can’t really apply logic to this, though I know you want to dearly.

F: So just because you can cope some times better than others, it does not legitimize my existence.

M:...does that mean I have to be the one to be crushed now?

F: No. We need to work together to get out of this mess. I mean...you got married. We both love her. She loves you. She is scared of me. I need you to help her love me. And only when she loves me and you will she love me in totality.

Damn, that was tough. It helped though. I’ll see you tomorrow for therapy.

Other updates: I’m relying less on masturbation for self-medication, which is good. The female underwear I bought and have been wearing has helped. I’ve enjoyed keeping up my grooming and exercise routine. Now off to do more cardio (yay).

[anautisticdragon-blog]

I Love The McElroy Bros

I'd like to launch off of my last post by talking about men who occupy both ends of the sociopathic spectrum. Those who embrace the virtues of toxic masculinity and all those iconic ideas of maleness, and those who just eschew them in favour of something better, all the while giving absolutely no damns what others think.

This harks back to one of those hallmark periods of my life which serve to remind me of why I'm so jaded today, why I've such a very low opinion of humanity in general (though that's mostly focused at both extraverts and straight men, if I'm honest). It was a time when I was struggling with my autism, due to my identity, trying to figure everything out and looking for support.

I was part of a community called Rock, Paper, Shotgun. It's a British gaming site devoted to video games journalizm (yes, that kind). I didn't know any better than to not be there at the time, I didn't know why I should avoid places like that in favour of more inviting locales like Polygon. It was very much a British boys gaming club, for boys, with very few gurls allowed. I remember how they even had to bring on a handful of women due to rumblings about how the site was a cavalcade of never-ending sausages.

A sausage fest, you might say.

Of course, they didn't do that until much later. And one of the first women they brought on board was incredibly masculine and all about that toxic masculinity anyway, so... Not a great change for them.

I'll stop ragging on them for their maleness and get to the meat of this.

I'm sorry. I'll also stop with the sausage jokes.

As an autistic person who's experienced a hell of a lot of prejudice, I bond easily with creatures that don't share a human appearance, who will often be the target of human hatred, violence, and atrocity. Orcs, gnolls, werewolves, dragons, et cetera. What I find interesting is that amongst my gal pals, this love of 'friendly creatures that toxic males perceive to be monsters' is absurdly common???

My lady friends love talking deathclaws almost as much as I do. They love Beast, of both Grant Morrison's X-Men and the original Disney animated film, they're fond of dragons and they'll note that it's unilaterally always going to be sausage fest of 'heroes' they're being assaulted by. Heroes who're just there for the loot, really, who'd certainly never -- not under any circumstances -- ever investigate to discover a "vile dragon's" supposed guilt.

Or lack thereof.

And whilst that sounds sarcastic, I mean it unironically. How often do heroes actually do detective work to find out if that dragon they slew was actually responsible for the atrocities blamed upon them. Do they have evidence? Or is this just toxic masculinity's Vigilante Justice 101? And that's not everyday vigilanteism, mind you. No, not at all. Even Batman is a detective!

But then, hilariously, Batman doesn't buy into toxic masculinity so much. Anyone who's ever seen the DCAU version of him knows exactly where I'm coming from with this. He can actually be quite sensitive, understanding, and perceptive. Not exactly the hard-nosed, right wing conservative that the right wing proponents of toxic masculinity seem to need him to be, eh?

Anyway, the point is is that as an autistic person I could easily see unfounded prejudices. Against gender, colour, or even fantastic racism in video game settings. It all got under my skin a little since it all normalised prejudices, and as a mentally disabled person who's often shunned for 'behaving differently than the norm,' I'm all too familiar with how much of a living taboo a person can be.

So, at this boy's clubhouse of toxic masculinity known as Rock, Paper, Shotgun, I'd ask the simple question, plaintively "Why can't we try just attempting to communicate with them first, just to see if we can find out their side of the story?"

And here I was. The sensitive, mentally disabled gay boy ruining the manly men's toxic little clubhouse with a spash of reason. Unthinkable! I'd ask this every now and then, whenever I saw a game whose focus was purely beautiful, extraverted, sociopathic humans slaying creatures I guess we were supposed to assume were "evil monsters" despite a lack of evidence. I just wanted to try talking, is that so completely wrong of me?

They thought so.

I was harshly mocked for over a year (I'm not kidding) about this, until the joke got old. When it finally did, when my amusement value to them had passed, I was banned. It just sort of came out of the blue. What really stung was that Alec Meer, the self-designed autocrat of RPS who banned me, actually saw fit to make fun of my autism publically.

That post is long gone, sadly. I didn't think to make an archive of it at the time because I was so upset. I couldn't understand why they hated me so much for simply wanting to try communicating. I do now, of course. It's all down to toxic masculinity and I was 'taking the fun of their mindless slaughter away with my pansy, sissy-minded, gay empathy.' Which is why RPS Is still mostly a sausage fest.

It was worse for me, too, as someone with bodily dysmorphia. I've been so scarred by humanity that I've been at odds with my outward human appearance for what feels like decades now. Unless a piece of entertainment manages to connect with me emotionally, I'll only enjoy stuff with non-human characters in it. And if there are humans it'll mostly be cartoons just so it's detached enough from what -- to me -- is the monstrous aesthetic that's hurt me so much over the years. The RPS thing is a minor blip in comparison to most of the things I've endured, but I mention it because of what this is all about.

You see, I'm probably what most people would consider the bad kind of "furry" for this reason. Even though I'm not sure if I identify as furry, as much for their sake as my own. I'm just a guy with bodily dysmorphia who'd rather be a shapeshifting robot. Admittedly one who'd often take on the appearance of a werewolf, but still.

So this year of being made fun of -- and I don't know why I stuck around, really, other than hoping they'd actually see that they were being genuinely horrible people -- cut me a little. I became a running joke, a meme. The autistic guy that everyone laughs at for being... hm, how would they always put it? Wrong-faced? Yes. Absolutely lovely turn of phrase to use on someone who's also physically disfigured.

Yeah, my life has sucked. Sorry. I'm a bit of a quasimodo, it's why I don't really go outdoors.

All this because I wanted to communicate. I saw prejudice, I couldn't not. I realised it, I called it, and I questioned it. I asked whether the game might be more fun if we could talk instead.

Apparently most people just want to run around gutting things. It explains the popularity of Fallout 4 over Fallout New Vegas to some crowds, I suppose. One game is one where you can talk yourself out of damn nearly every situation without any violent confrontations, and the other being one where you're given one shopping list of targets to murder after another. Those who've played both will know which is which. Or even those who've played one of them.

I'm just a talker. I'm the kind of person who realises that if we ever met aliens, we wouldn't want to send the extraverted sociopaths who'd try to manipulate them by shaking their hands and putting their backs without realising that they don't have hands to shake, or backs to pat. That this effort might even be seen as hugely offensive.I've always found that when it comes to extraverts -- especially those who're weighed own by toxic masculinity -- their strong suit isn't ever really introspection, is it?

So, the McElroys, then.

I think most people might think that the reason I'm saying this is because of their stance on furries. Oh, sure, that's a part of it. Perhaps it's due to their view that being inclusive and permissive is better (and funnier, due to those who it offends)? And that's part of it, too. Once again, though, it's not why I was inspired to write this thing up.

I listen to The Adventure Zone.

Justin tried talking to the giant crystalline creature. It might've been a joke, but he tried.

More impressively, and the part that really hit home with me, Travis wanted to try talking with the voidfish. Travis has always struck me as a giant baby who'd rather talk, given the opportunity. It's funny that he's playing some kind of beefcake warrior (perhaps somewhat ironically) in The Adventure Zone because of how feminine and sensitive he is. Which I very, very much support. Oh how much I do.

He wanted to try talking with the voidfish. He was excited by the prospect of talking with such an inhuman entity and I'm actually trying not to cry, now. I don't know why this is all making me so emotional but god damn it Travis...

And then Griffin, god fucking damn it, had to actually go and include the rest of it. I actually had to mute while I was listening to this with my partner because I started crying, I'm a huge baby. I know it was as much for the humour as anything, but it still really got to me. The hand on the glass, the jamming session that followed, it was all really powerful stuff for me.

And you know roughly where I am in listening to The Adventure Zone right now, eh?

I need to stop crying.

Anyway... I've always been ousted and shunned because of my disability. Mental disability is a weird thing. It's an invisible prejudice, in a way. I should be in a position where I'm privileged, probably. Except due to how I behave, how I talk, how I hold myself, my body language, and everything else? I'm shunned, I'm often ostracised. People find me strange and undesirable. I'm a living taboo.

I think a lot of very autistic people feel this way. As I said, due to this along with my physical disfigurement? It's why I haven't left my house in decades. The biggest event in my life has been trying to get my partner a fiance visa lately so that we can be together in the UK, we spent five months together and those were the most amazing I'd experienced.

The only memories I have that can match those are the times I've enjoyed spending with dogs. Dogs are a bit too physical for me a lot of the time, their games and ways are very overloading, but I still love them and I enjoy being around them.

I don't know where this is going any more.

Anyway, Travis? Love ya, man. You too, Justin. And Griffin. Even you, Clint. Sorry. That's probably weird.

The thing is? I'm just that sensitive to prejudice. So even obvious fantasy prejudice gets to me and gets me down, I can easily see when it's just a stand-in for the real thing in a fantasy world, it's there to normalise prejudices and give people with a prejudicial mindset a very safe, happy place to be where they can be bile-filled sacks of sheer hatred and never, ever be challenged.

That's what RPS wanted, until I ruined their little boy's clubhouse. With my undesirable empathy. What a shitbag I am. A waster, an intolerable douchefuck of a loser who wants to talk to non-human fantasy creatures. Who wants to do that when we could jam our phalluses in them and make them dead with our magnificent maleness?

It was just... It was so cathartic that Travis unironically wanted to try and communicate with the voidfish. That and the wonderful way they handled Klarg the bugbear, their 'hugbear.'

I just love you guys. It felt oddly vindicating that a group so popular doesn't go for the whole toxic masculinity thing. It's nice.

Thank you.

I'm a neurotic fucker and most of my memories are of hurt, betrayal, pain, and suffering. It's sucked. Like I said, being mentally disabled is one of the worst things you can be because no one seems to recognise the prejudice you have to endure. And I've had to endure some fairly terrible shit. To the point where it's genuinely, desperately difficult to have any faith in humanity in general. I'm not a misanthrope, as I'd never want to see my worst enemy suffer. I'm just...

I'm tired of our species' crap. Frankly. We always think we're so great but we should be judged on how we treat those who aren't like us. Which is probably why we haven't been visited by more advanced life, eh? Anyway, I won't get maudlin on you, the melon collies can back right up a bit...

Thing is? You guys managed to touch me with your shenanigans. So I really do mean it when I say thank you. Sometimes, people like you are a bit of a beacon of light in what, for me, is a very dark, hopeless world.

Now if I could just stop bloody crying.

Why am I like this on Tumblr?

Regardless, thank you.