#identity discussion

[varsex-pride]

How do you define sex identity? Is it a synonym for sex? If so, how would you define them in relation to varsexness?

So far I've came up with this, but I don't know if it is good or not:

Sex Identity: An identity formed based on one’s assigned sex/gender at birth, their current/desired/planned sex characteristics, their body, being gender-diverse/variant, a result of injury/illness, and/or aspects associated with varsexness.  

Just like gender modalities, gender identities/expressions, genders, and attraction-based identities (including m-spec and a-spec), sex identity and sex exists on a spectrum along a continuum. Meaning, someone can have one or more sex identities or lack one and it may be fluid or static for one or more reasons or no reason at all. 

Sex Identity (or sex) should NOT be conflated with gender modality, gender/sex sonance, sexual identity (or other attraction-based identities or the lack thereof), and gender identity/expression, although it can be interconnected and influence with one or more of them. 

I appreciate that you're trying to define it and want us to comment about it. I'm going to comment and try to define it by myself.

sex identity could be multiple things, just like the meanings you listed. however, since it's scope is so ample, when we use sex identity solely and the context talks about the body, it's often to show that the physical body exists regardless of the words we use to denominate or classify it. does that make sense?

sex identity is used less formally than gender identity, and it's more common to see the noun phrase "sexual orientation identity" than the univocal concept "sex identity", at least when used among mainstream activism. because in media and nowaday lectures aimed at people who don't understand much about the community, or from countries where the word gender is unusual, "sex identity" can appear as synonymous to "gender identity". tbh it's confusing to use this term deliberately, and I've seen people using the word "status" instead of identity. however, in the official languages of my country, "status" is more associated with the law, documental things, or computational stuff. that's why I don't use it a lot.

"intersex status", for once, is a term to refer to intersex as an identity, while "intersex variations" to refer to bodily traits (internal/external, and internal here means inside the physical body, and external refers to the apparent traits) or given condition or a set of conditions. status can be recognized by oneself and by others.

about your definition: sex identity in our blog is used totally separated from gender. you can gender your sex traits, and gendering one's sex can be a form of sex identity (eg. I possess a male nipple and a female nipple; I have male genitalia despite producing female gametes). when you gender your sex traits, it's about bodily autonomy and identity self-determination. it's an option to use specific language (eg. my nipples are differently sized; I have a cavernous large phallus despite being oogenic/macrogametic). it should be noted that when using specific language, not everyone will know what those words mean, typically usual to medical studies, and some of them are opt-in like referential language, because it's arbitrary or biased to talk about a indeterminate quantity in a given population. not everyone with a phallus will perceive it as penile or clitoral, or call their pectoral parts as chest or breast, for example.

is sex modality an identity? it can be a descriptor and an impermanent identity that one avoids using situationally, for example. but it definitely can be an identity, or just a relation between how one previously was and how one currently is, between the desired sex traits and current sex traits. it can be about sex sonance too, if one interprets it's tied to.

varsex is sex variance, meaning that it's a dispersion from the expected sex traits. in simple terms, in encompass intersex and altersex statuses. does this stand beyond status? certainly! a group of two people is sex-diverse, regardless of their sex identity. how does that make sense? because even twins are different, so is our genitalia, they all appear dissimilar. except when we talk about groups of people classified by identity or defined with more ample criterion or wider scope. for instance, these two individuals can both carry vulvar tissue. but that depends on how we interpret the word diversity. oh, and there are protsex/protosex people as well, they may or may not be varsex I guess.

sex identity is sex? it depends, it can represent sex. but they are different things. if sex is defined by gametes we produce, are sterile/infertile people exempt from it? it really varies of the context you're using the word sex.

spectrum may not be the best analogy. and: gender & sex can be the same thing for some people. for once, intersex is the gender of many people, and man is the sex of many people too. despite that, they can be distinguished and therefore different things. we can say they can be interconnected or influence each other, but the names/labels/terms are often used documentally and it's inescapable to use them interchangeably sometimes. it's understandable to use only one word for both things, especially when there's only one word in a given language for either sex or gender of theirs.

questions: is "result of injuries" applicable to endogenous traits (since you mentioned illnesses) or specifically about artificial/surgical intervention (therefore mutilation)? would physical changes apply? would it include willingly wanted/planned modifications?

[self-keeping-treasure]

The big difference for me in my identities being a furry vs being otherkin is that I would genuinely rather be an angel. or a robot. or better yet a mixture of both, but I wouldn't want to be a cat, I wouldn't want to have to deal with fur, or whiskers, or having no hands with which to manipulate the world. I like putting cat ears on my OCs and I have a pair of cat ear headphones, but that's just me being a furry because I like the aesthetic, vs me genuinely wanting to shuck my humanity in exchange for for the strength and certainty of steel and a hand of constructed divinity guiding me.

[lgbtransgirl]

Ice cold takes from a Transgender Woman:

Men are not inherently Evil

Everyone has the capacity for evil

Transgender Men are men

Transgender Women are women

Excluding Cisgender Men from your spaces requires Transgender Men to out themselves if they want to engage (Same for Women)

Anyone can be Non-Binary, there is no "look" or requirement

Non-binary masculine presenting people should be welcome in queer spaces, many are just treated as men and predators

Non-binary feminine presenting people should be welcome in queer spaces without being seen as "Woman-Lite"

Edited the wording on the first point because too many terfs keep thinking I'm their friend.

[baba-is-blog]

Baba like dragons?

DRAGON IS FAVORITE

[blackkatdraws2]

[ORV] Happy (late) Father's Day to Han Myungoh. Spread the word for Men's Mental Health Awareness Month



[five-oh-first]

au where anakin doesn't become a jedi and ends up overthrowing the hutts on tatooine with kitster, his mom and adopted family (the lars'). however, tatooine now needs a government, and the best way to get the planet back on its proverbial feet after the hutts' draining rule is to join the galactic republic. naturally, being some kind of Gift From The Desert (anakin is still very force-sensitive), anakin is voted tatooine's senator. and there, he is introduced to the jedi and the lovely senator from naboo...

now has a part two !!

[cosmicredcadet]

I wholeheartedly believe that the last thing that should be said in response to aspecs hating their identity is "don't worry! Aspecs can still do X, Y, and Z" and I'm so fucking serious about this.

The least helpful thing you can do to someone who have not accepted their aspec identity yet is give them ways to compensate for it. If an aspec person is upset over not being able to enter a romantic relationship, the last thing that should be done is to tell them they can still enter one or instead enter a QPR - not because that's not true but because that is quite literally going to stunt their ability to accept their aspec identity. Telling them they can instead enter a QPR when they're upset over the lack of romantic relationships is at MOST a bandaid for the main issue. Instead of them coming to accept their identity and accept who they are you have instead handed them an amatonormative alternative on a silver platter that allows them to pretend they still fit into amatonormativity without every deconstructing it. This is how we get QPRs getting shoved into an amatonormative framework - these people NEVER got over the "I'm sad that I'm aspec" phase because they were handed alternatives instead of given actual support in deconstructing their internalized aphobia, self hatred, and amatonormative biases.

[jesncin]

Happy Pride! Now that Lunar Boy (our middle grade graphic novel) is out, we wanted to share our thought process behind queer vocabulary in media. The constant censorship, imposed western biases on queer culture, and what it means to introduce queer vocabulary to a young audience.

Check out Lunar Boy wherever american graphic novels are sold, or check it out at a library!

[stars-obsession-pit]

What do you mean my “secret identity”? (DP AU)

Danny never cared to try to keep up a secret identity. Well, he did consider it at first, but then he decided it would be pointless. Ghosts would be able to tell anyway, and presumably his parents must have noticed immediately.

True, he never went around announcing that he’s the half-ghost vigilante, but he never saw a need to. Surely it’s more than obvious enough.

Even if they ignore the words of the ghosts who know, his appearance is still a dead giveaway. His body and voice barely changed aside from his hair and eye color. He wears a full-body suit like the Fentons and uses their tech. Hell, he even goes by nearly the exact same name! “Danny Phantom” may as well be a homophone of “Danny Fenton” even before you consider accents.

…so why do so many people seem to completely ignore the connection?! They could just be pretending so as to not give away the ruse, but that really isn’t necessary for them. Danny doesn’t care, and it’s not like revealing that they know would negatively affect the average person’s life at all (unlike with Danny’s own parents, who might lose business if other ghost hunters stop trusting their work).

[gothyanki]

Thinking about gender roles or lack thereof in Rauatai again (with a side of thinking about gender roles or lack thereof in the Deadfire). Rambling and headcanons behind the readmore:

It only comes up a handful of times in Deadfire, but I’m so fascinated by the idea of Rauatai as a matriarchal-leaning society where “hard” power (military might, sailing ships, guns) is gendered feminine. The Biha quest in the Gullet hints at this - if you’re playing a female character, she thinks Sedūzo will take you more seriously. She also points out that pretty much all the highest-ranking Rauataian military officials are women, which seems to be borne out by the game. (Karū, Sedūzo, and the hazanui from Tekēhu’s story are the only people of that rank we see or hear mentioned, and they’re all women.) Atsura also has an incredible turn of phrase where he refers to something as “like a child picking up her mother’s pistol” [might be paraphrasing a bit].

So if “hard” military power is seen as feminine in Rauatai, does that mean “soft” political power is seen as masculine? Maybe! There’s the divide between Karū and Atsura as the most obvious example; she’s the head of the operation who gets to be very blunt and straightforward about her intentions, while Atsura is the power behind the throne influencing events much more subtly. The ranga nui himself is a man, though I don’t think the gender of a ruler holds much weight without knowing the genders of previous rulers. It’s 100% headcanon, but I’m imagining that high-ranking politicians skew male the same way high-ranking military officers skew female.

It’s worth noting that I don’t think Rauatai has strong gender roles; absolutely nothing about their society or the characters we meet suggests that. There are plenty of men in military careers (including among the higher-ups) and they don’t seem too concerned with gender as a whole. If this divide exists, it’s more like mild background radiation that influences the way people view themselves and each other. I do feel like it adds something to both Maia and Kana’s characters if this is yet another pressure they had to deal with growing up. Some of Maia’s bluntness and in-your-face approach to life is just personality, but another part is her trying to be a Proper Rauataian Lady! Kana has to be skilled at playing politics whether he likes it or not! He talks about his mother pushing his sisters hard to succeed aaaand all three of them ended up in a military/sailing career. There’s a lot going on there!

This led me to thinking about gender in Huana culture(s), because I’m also endlessly fascinated by the similarities and differences between them and Rauatai. Gender doesn’t seem to matter to the Huana at all, not even in a very minor sense; caste is the main determiner of your role in the community. Tekēhu refers to Ukaizo as the “land of [his] mothers”, which is a friendly little reminder that There Is No Patriarchy Here (no legal marriage, no nuclear family, no tracing the bloodlines of children or differentiating between “biological” vs “adopted” kids in a household, children aren’t seen as “belonging” to their parents…) but aside from that, very little is gendered. We do see more women in leadership than men (Ruānu is the only male ranga I can think of, and he’s quite easily displaced by Nairi), but the sample size is small enough that that’s probably a coincidence. I feel like this is what enables Ahimi to shrug off Durance’s misogyny - it does bother me that the Watcher can’t answer back, but in her case, I don’t think she even sees it as worth acknowledging. She’s never had to deal with any kind of shame around or restrictions based on gender/sexuality, so he’s just saying words. (This is a point of friction between her and Pallegina, whose experience of godlike-ness is inextricable from painful gender expectations.)

…this headcanon also makes a minor in-game sequence infinitely funnier to me. There’s a moment where Onekaza and the Watcher can get into this little political back-and-forth which Karū clearly has no patience for; she’ll eyeroll at them and be all “If we’re done comparing cocks…” I like to think Rauataians use this phrase when people are diplomatically faffing around, being overly subtle, or arguing verbally without accomplishing anything. Stop using your words and punch her in the nose like a WOMAN!

[spitblaze]

The thing you need to remember about Tumblr discourse is that like 70% of it does not matter off of this specific website and even less of it matters once you get off the internet

[mewos-laptop]

"But what if a cis man starts identifying as a lesbian ??? 🥺🥺"

Then good for him for finding out a label for his complex attraction. Idk what you thought I was gonna say in response to that.

Lesboys are boys who are lesbians. Straight up that's just the definition. That includes cis men.

[aroaessidhe]

2025 reads / storygraph

Something Extraordinary

historical platonic-romcom

an aromantic woman tired of feeling unworthy when the people closest to her leave her behind for romance, and a gay man in unrequited love who is planning on giving up and marrying a woman in misery and drunkenness

she kidnaps him the day before the marriage to stop him ruining his life, suggesting that they get platonically married instead - and on the ridiculous journey to scotland to elope, they have to convince each other if it’s what is best for them, and what they want out of life/love/and friendship

[fromtheseventhhell]

I love how people are only ever interested in defending Arya's right to be weird-looking. It's never defending her intelligence from people who claim she's incapable of thinking for herself, highlighting her importance to the plot and refusing to see her as just a prop, acknowledging how much of her story gets stolen and given to other characters, talking about her trauma or how often it gets erased and overlooked, seeing her as more than just an attack dog/bodyguard, etc. Nope. It's just a "why can't people let Arya be ugly/unconventional looking? :(" post every other week because people are, for whatever reason, obsessed with how Arya is visually perceived. One of the most misinterpreted characters yet the issue is only ever with her being portrayed as "too pretty" or the wrong "type" of pretty. This fandom will entirely rewrite a character's motivations, values, and role in the story to the point that they consider references to canon "hate" but! The true injustice to canon is we acknowledge that she is described as pretty several times. Arya simply existing as her pretty, important, and non-conforming self is too complex and confusing for people to comprehend 😔.

[thecircularsystem]

When I first started therapy, my therapist had to set a very, very clear boundary. When he did, I was a bit frustrated, but I trusted his judgement.

Now, as I scroll the tags, I see the reason he set that boundary.

“I want to stop you there,” he said, interrupting my rant about my parents, “because it seems like you might be straying into trauma flooding. I wanted to ask what you’re feeling right now, and if this feels productive for you.”

I was frustrated. Of course it’s productive, you dipshit, it’s getting the bad feelings OUT. I just wanted them GONE.

But then, since I worked on grounding with him before responding, I realized… they weren’t actually gone. They were just being carried in the air more than in my heart.

Trauma flooding, or trauma dumping, does not actually help. It isn’t a good technique for overcoming your trauma. It is actively going against many of the ideologies of trauma recovery.

To overcome trauma, one needs to accept and come to terms with it. You need to carry it; the point of trauma recovery is learning that you are capable of carrying it, rather than throwing it away.

Please. Feel free to vent, it’s a coping mechanism for a reason! But understand that venting, alone, is never going to help you overcome these problems. It is a stability measure; not something that leads to growth.

[gardensystemtv]

I come on this platform mostly to just have silly fun, but seeing queer, and especially trans infighting on my dash is so frustrating.

Friendly reminder that if you don't support all queer identities you can fuck off. Building a community requires supporting eachother, but don't think I will keep people in my community who care only about kicking down others, that's crab bucket behaviour.

Support transmascs. support transfems. support intersex people. support non-binary identities. support trans men. support trans women. support bi people. support pan people. Support Ace people. Support Aro people. support lesbians. support gay men. Especially fucking support black queer people. Especially fucking support indigenous queer people. Especially fucking support asian queer people. Especially fucking support SWANA queer people. Especially fucking support Jewish queer people. And any intersections of the above, and likely the many I've missed.

No one else's identity is lesser just because it is different,