#like do i want the world to perceive me as more masc

[thewhizzyhead]

anyways on this episode of izzy's gender fuckery crisis we have this update: oki so like being referred to as a girl and solely a girl and being forced to be feminine because "syempre babae ka kailangan ka maging babae (ofc since u r a girl u have to act like one)" irritates me to death. Other modes of feminine presentation aka skirts and dresses and anything that makes me appear too much of a feminine person also legitimately SCARES ME TO DEATH especially when I'm forced to do so.

however, that being said, upon further introspection on the chick i once really really liked that is now presenting more masc than ever, I have realised that I am not too comfy presenting myself as too masc either. like, I don't want people to look at me and perceive me as a duuuuude , but I don't want to present myself too femininely either as it legitimately makes my skin crawl. like, I find myself comfy in men's clothes and styling but if I imagine/see myself presenting way too much like a man, then I feel very weird and not in a good way - which is weird kasi I thought I would like being more masc presenting given my absolute panic attack-inducing aversion to appearing typically feminine. So anyways the gist is androgyny is my best friend and I would rather be perceived as a blob than as a specific gender

[artigas]

I’m really happy that Black Sails is experiencing a bit of a renaissance, but (predictably) some of the takes I’m seeing online are so busted. It’s wild to me that anyone would complain about the fact that Anne Bonny kisses Jack after she’s developed this life-changing relationship with Max. It’s absolutely wild to see anyone roll their eyes or feel uncomfortable about the fact that Flint has sex with Miranda when he returns to her in season one or that Max is most likely a lesbian but actively has sex with men for pay and knows how to make that pleasurable. It’s crazy to me that some of the very audiences who claim to want queer representation feel so discomforted when they actually see the mess and seeming inconsistencies of queerness that they asked for.

The reality is that there are lesbians who have had (and will have!) meaningful, mutually-gratifying, and deeply sexual relationships with men. There are gay men who’ve enjoyed having sex with women, who are gay as the day is long and nevertheless feel sexually attracted to a woman or two and are nevertheless gay men, full stop. There are gay cis men who are happily married to trans women. There are femme dom tops and butch bottoms and there are mascs afab people who like femme boys. There are non-binary people and trans men who actively identify as lesbians. There are ace and aro people who enjoy thinking about and engaging with sex — sometimes in fiction and sometimes in real life. Queerness, in fiction and in reality, defies neat categorization. That is the beauty, power, and (perceived) unorthodoxy of queerness.

Now, I’ll say this — do I think the straight men behind Black Sails were actively thinking deeply and insightfully about the paradoxes and fuckery of queer identity when they wrote Black Sails? No! By their own admission, Steinberg and Levine have owned up to the fact that some of the writing of the show was really hinged on their own blind spots as people who are not (to my knowledge) members of the queer community. If I want to be generous, I think that the beautiful mess of Black Sails is that, in not feeling like experts enough to designate specific identity labels to any of their characters, the writers stumbled their way into more authentic representation of lived queer experience, which is to say that the notion that James Flint was actively thinking of himself as a gay man was anachronistic. As many lesbian archivists and theories have noted, the notion of a queer identity — as in, queerness is who you are, not what you do — was patently unthinkable for most cultures in the past. In other words, the idea that Anne Bonny operates in the eighteenth century as a lesbian and thus would not willingly engage in relationships with men is not only untrue of the series, but untrue of most recorded lesbian experiences in the real world. The notion that a lesbian would operate her entire life without engaging sexually or romantically with men, for instance, is a very new privilege that some of us are very lucky to enjoy, but it is not true for the vast majority of human history — hell, it’s not even true of our present world.

This is all to say that think that there’s something really funny about how we want queer characters to fit into neatly organized boxes. This isn’t a new problem, either. When the show was still airing, the BS fandom would get itself into tizzies about wether or not Flint is gay or bisexual, wether or not Anne Bonny is a lesbian, wether or not Silver is queer when his only canonical relationship is with Madi, etc etc. We’ve been having these discourses for years and I don’t know. I get that much of it is fueled by how badly some people want to see themselves represented in media, but . . . well. The siloing of queer characters and queer narratives into neat little boxes has never felt very authentic to me and nine times out of ten, it’s also just so damn boring.

[devsgames]

Playersexual

"Playersexual" is a term I only recently learned about and it's fascinating to me. For those who don't know, it usually means a character whose sexual orientation is basically open to whatever the player happens to be playing as. Trans? Yeah they're romancible. Man? Romancible. Woman? Sure, romancible. As long as you're the player they don't really care.

I think this term, combined with playing a lotta Baldur's Gate 3 and Starfield, sorta helped me come to terms with understanding why I often dislike really "open" romance systems where every character is Playersexual.

I'm a queer, bi/pansexual person, and that informs how I perceive interactions in and out of games. I totally understand the affirmation and liberation that comes with being able to romance whoever the heck you want. To some people, that's where the fun is at, and I get it. It's valid.

For me I just I feel weird when Playersexual is the orientation of characters in a game world that is also trying to get me emotionally invested. In my eyes, it tends to strip the perceived agency other characters might have; it makes them feel less like real people with wants, needs, attractions and preferences. They end up being more like a checklist or object to be interacted with until I choose all the right option and unlock the kiss or sex cutscene, or the mechanical bonus a relationship brings or whatever the case may be.

To me, characters that feel 'real' have sexual preference. Honestly I feel that if they lack that they sorta lack a fundamental element that informs them as a person and a character. Like, any queer person can tell you that when you're queer things are different. Interactions are different, how you act on the world is different, how you assess situations and the way you engage in conversations are different. Queer people interact with a predominantly straight world different than straight people do. Similarly, being a straight person in a world full of straight people affords interacting with the world fundamentally different than if you were queer. I think to say "every character is maybe queer" steamrolls this fact and sort of undermines that queer experience to an extent.

Plus I think its just like, a missed stroytelling opportunity! The straight dude turns my masc ass down because he's not interested in men? Oh hell yeah, if he's polite about it I think that's really cool! He feels like more of an actual person that way, and what might ordinarily be perceived as a 'failure to romance' feels like it could be spun into another step in our journey as friends together. Maybe we'll crack jokes about it later, or he'll have a change of heart once he gets to kmow me better. It might be awkward, but we had an experience together and set some friendly boundaries, and built an understanding. After all, people having boundaries are often what makes people people in the first place.

So when I play a character and a game tells me everyone in a game is queer, then I'm either lead to believe 1) my character is incredibly charismatic (trust me, that's not usually the case) 2) queerness doesnt exist as a concept in this universe (weird in its own way and also usually not true) 3) eh i dunno we didn't think about it too much just choose someone as a partner already (boooo!).

Look if everyone in my party has strong opinions about me pickpocketing someone and stealing 5 bucks from them, I'd expect them to have opinions about who they share a bedroll with >:(

[spacelazarwolf]

Would it be out of pocket to suggest that some trans women still have some remaining ingrained misogyny or perhaps jealousy that causes them to lash out at trans mascs and afab nonbinary people?

i think it would be out of pocket to suggest that trans women are uniquely prone to ingrained misogyny, or that the engrained misogyny trans women may have is somehow inherently worse or more harmful than others’. that being said, i think that everyone who grows up in a misogynistic society has engrained misogyny they need to address and unlearn, and this includes trans women and femmes. i’ve had really productive conversations with several trans femme friends about their process of coming out and unlearning the things they grew up being told about women, how those things affected both the way they interacted with cis women and trans people who were afab and how they saw themselves, how they handled their feelings of jealousy toward folks they perceived as having the body or experience they wanted but thought they couldn’t achieve.

i personally have experienced misogyny from trans women, but it was different than misogyny i’d experienced from cis men or cis women. cis men often leaned into the stereotypes of women being “weak” or “incompetent” or needing to be saved. i had a cis male professor who white knighted so damn hard after i told him i’d been abused by an ex and was recovering from that that i had to literally leave the school because he was making it impossible for me to actually get an education. the experiences i had with cis women were often based around competition or body image. my mom, who is a cis woman, had me on diets from the age of 10 because she didn’t want me to be fat. she spent hours and hours of her life encouraging disordered eating behaviors because she wanted me to look like the perfect image of a nice little girl. the experiences i had with trans women were often based around jealousy, as you mentioned, but it was a very different jealousy than i’d experienced from cis women (mostly because my body type was not something cis women were very jealous of because i was fat and not conventionally attractive.) i had a trans woman tell me that it was transmisogynistic of me to want to physically transition because “trans women would kill to be born in your body.” when comparing those three experiences with misogyny, it was clear that cis men’s misogyny often came from a place of wanting to feel dominant, and was often much more violent. but for cis women and trans women, it was about making me into what society expected me to be in this body. trans women’s misogyny may have been different from cis women’s, but it much more resembled cis women’s than cis men’s, and even though it cut deeper coming from fellow trans people it was not even close to the same level of violence i’d experienced from cis men.

so basically, i think it’s complicated. trans women aren’t uniquely misogynistic, their relationship with misogyny (both experiencing it and perpetuating it) is just different because of their unique experiences as women who are also trans. they have as much a responsibility to unlearn engrained misogyny as the rest of us do and should be held accountable, but shouldn’t be held to higher standards simply because they are trans women. the goal should never be to use engrained or internalized misogyny (or any other kind of harmful biases) as a weapon to prove someone is Bad. the goal should be to help people unlearn harmful biases and support each other to make the world better for everyone.

[genderoutlaws]

Hey sorry if this is too personal but I just wanted to put this on here and ask for advice. I (early 20s) always thought I was a cis girl but lately my gf and a couple of people have started using some he pronouns for me and I really like it?? I don't experience dysphoria, I don't feel bad if people perceive me as a woman, but it feels really good dressing masc and being called that. I have no idea how to figure out if I am genderfluid, nonbinary, or something else. Not to be a stereotype but like, how do I navigate a gender crisis without annoying people around me? I wish I could explain but I really don't get why/where this came from, my gf was asking questions and I had no idea how to answer. So yeah any advice would be appreciated, ty.

mmm my advice is to not worry so much about labelling it and just go with the flow and do what feels good for now — the labels are more about how you choose to communicate yourself to the world, if/when ya feel ready to do that. and pls don’t worry about annoying people, like if they’re worth keeping around they won’t find questioning your identity to be a burden on them bc its got nothing to do with them.

but like yeah hearing he and dressing masc feels good? lean into it, explore, try new things. u might not feel affirmed by every single thing you try but there’s no harm in getting to know yourself better. hope thats helpful bud 🩷

[v-anrouge]

Me who's struggled with my gender and what I wanted for so long, because I like having boobs (sometimes) and having a feminine figure but at the same time I wish I had a d and was 5 inches taller with a deep voice

And I've decided I'm masc-leaning nonbinary, but since the world would only ever perceive me as a girl if I presented the way I wanted, I just settle for dressing more androgynous and keeping quiet so people don't hear my high-pitched voice.

There are a lot of things I wish my body could do that it can't, so I've had to make do and work around it, but. I'm tough so

Like I think I've transcended gender so when will the world get with it? Lolol

~ someone you know who's just a bit embarrassed about sharing but wanted to be included in the convo

nonnie i hope one day u manage to get the necessary to be able to present your true self, maybe a binder for when u don't like ur chest or maybe just bras that'll give the illusion of boobs if you'd rather get surgery and also omg same im so fine w the way my body is now but i also sometimes wish my voice was deeper and i was taller not to be masculine per se but to be one of those feminine men that look like angels from old animes augh gender

[kurokeip]

I keep thinking about how much family means to Kuro, how he's consistently usually the one initiating the entire 'family' thing in Akatsuki and then... danna. There's so much yearning in that stupid nickname and Keito does not even know.

Kuro and his fixation on family and wow his use of an ambiguous term that Could refer to and authority figure but also has familial implications because that's what he wants sooo bad.

This scene is super gay but it's also a little more than that.

He's playing house in his head and he's the Mother, because in his little fantasy world with Keito and Souma he can be a Mother and not a 'Man', for as much as Akatsuki touts it's 'masculinity', it's still a group that doesn't care for it much more than for performative purposes.

Do I think Kuro Suffers from Gender Envy? Yes. Do I think he knows? No. Will he ever Know? I don't think so, but he's having a Time about it.

(Also something to note that while people usually think of transness whenever gender envy is brought up, in this case I'm not implying that he is trans, or that transitioning would be best for him. Although you can run w that too- I like transfem kuro- but cis people can also have Relationships with their gender)

Kuro's gender is like. Big Brother-Mother. it's heavily connected to 'familial roles' and therefore his relationships with other people. So when he positions himself as the 'mother' of Akatsuki, it's more than just cheap queerbait, it's a performance of his gender. He uses 'husband' as a nickname for Keito with a clear implication that he's the 'wife'. One of the biggest reasons he began following Keito is because he was so much 'like a mom', Kuro very clearly aspires to be that way even though he's acknowledged that he'd never be able to reach that revered status if he tried.

It's not a clear cut connection to masc/femininity with him, it's about the connection between those genders and their 'roles' in a household, because family is one of the most important things to him.

I don't think anyone in canon really gets it yet, they haven't connected to dots. At most it'll be used as a lighthearted joke. But Kuro Suffers from toxic masculinity and having that be pushed onto him quite a bit. He associates masculinity with aggression, and fighting. Unlike a lot of the more masculine characters, he prefers to offer 'care' instead of 'protection', a clear lean to what society perceives as more feminine.

Akatsuki as a 'family' is more than just a Fanon thing, it's a genuine source of comfort for Kuro. Writing it off as fanon completely, or a solely detrimental thing feels kind of contrarian for the sake of it.

Anyways that was just my little thinkpiece of Kuro's gender. I think transfem Kuro is fun I think all Kuro gender headcanons are fun but canon has so much for me already, and Kuro is unique in that his relationship to gender is linked not to himself, but to his relationships and enforced roles.

[twsted-potionologist]

ok so i like rule 63 fanart in general, right? and i was planning on making designs for rule 63 versions of every Twisted Wonderland student (and for those who dont know rule 63 means genderbent)

i just reblogged a great post by @/sebastianthemadlad talking about why they personally don't like the transfem vil headcanon and it makes really good points. and after reading it i was like "cool! how do i recontextualize this with the rule 63 au?" and had a crisis because... how in the world do i flip the script with vil and epel. (decided last minute to put it under a cut bc way too long and ramble-y)

epel is often mistaken as a girl and gets upset by this and wants to be more masculine because of his traditional upbringing. okay.

so if she's a girl instead, would she get mistaken as a boy instead and want to be more feminine? or maybe she is super feminine and still wants to be masculine but thinks its wrong for her to think that? there's not much of a conflict if she's just okay with being a tomboy or being perceived as a masc woman because her upbringing says women aren't supposed to be masc.

and then vil. oh vil oh vil. i love vil a lot. the platonic ideal of a feminine man. like if harry styles actually did what his fans claimed he did.

sebastian's post mentioned that if vil actually was a trans women, she'd be a tomboy, because the whole point of the character is breaking gender norms. and this really stuck out to me because i was gonna make my rule 63 version of schoenheit a trans woman. so what to do about valerie schoenheit.

making her a tomboy doesn't quite sound right to me, because i think of tomboy as a pretty sport-sy archetype, and she doesn't really scream sporty. like, she's an actress and a model, and she's all about being elegant and beautiful. so tomboy might not be the right word to describe her, but "elegant" and "beautiful" is not just for feminine aesthetics. she could just be a masculine woman. i also kind of half tossed out the idea in the tags i left on that post about nonbinary schoenheit and it's still all kind of mush in my brain right now and i might not take that concept with val totally but i might just steal part of that idea to make her more androgynous too? idk. i made this post because i haven't settled on anything yet

oh hey while you're here i havent settled on a name yet for fem!epel. vote now on your phones!

[rivetgoth]

Honestly being FTM & like. transitioning and passing and living as a man in my daily life but also being visibly GNC is such an isolating experience in the damn community fr. Everyone talks about GNC trans men as monolithically pre-everything. “Support GNC trans men, it’s valid to have boobs! it’s valid to not be on T!” etc etc, while the majority of transitioning trans men are like. Short masc haircuts, masc men’s clothes, talking abt the gym and wanting to be perceived as manly and venting abt their hair growing out too long and often their disdain for femininity tbqh… I’m sorry but there is never ever any space for trans men who are perceived as gender nonconforming/effeminate men. All trans man discourse is either “is it valid to be a trans man who looks like a woman?” or “how do I look more like the most normal cis[het] man ever?” and I never ever ever see space for men who have been on T for years who have undergone surgery and plan to get more who have long hair who wear jewelry who get called faggots by strangers who have full beards who wear women’s clothing. Etc etc etc.

I think in particular being alternative/a rivethead/goth really doesn’t help cuz I do think that goth/industrial male style is pretty unique in that you’re apart of a community FULL of men who are just as nonconforming as you and who often aren’t even “queer”/LGBT, it’s not even necessarily considered GNC in those spaces in the same way it is in mainstream society, like I don’t consider people like Peter Steele or Nivek Ogre or Robert Smith wildly “GNC” really, not to the point that that’s the first way I’d describe them, and none of them are [openly] queer, but I swear to god 99% ov the time when transmasc spaces talk about being “GNC” they include a ton of traits that these guys have… whereas I could not count on both my fingers & toes the amount of guys I see with long hair or jewelry or whatever every single time I go to goth night or a concert or whatever. I passed in goth clubs bathrooms before I passed anywhere else for real like it feels so foreign to see trans guys talk about what constitutes GNC or not when I’m legit often dressed more masculine than my male peers but fall into every single category they consider GNC or fem… I don’t even really consider myself “fem” but I think I’m objectively GNC because of my style and mannerisms, I’m GNC in my behavior even when I’m dressing more masculine in ways that I couldn’t suppress if I tried/I wouldn’t want to anyway, I don’t mind my effeminate mannerisms and I cannot express that not a single one of these effeminate mannerisms stop me from passing, and I’m consistently just read as a gay or effeminate man… except maybe the few times I’ve been mistaken for a trans woman 🤪

IDK. I have the goth community that’s what matters I guess but damn, it’s crazy how something like that can isolate you from the mainstream FTM community so much because there just doesn’t really seem to be a space for transitioning effeminate guys. It’s like, the only option is “gender nonconforming, not passing, and not transitioning” or “gender conforming, passing, and transitioning.” There is never any dialogue for transitioning gender nonconforming men, transitioning men who pass as faggots, trans men who are neither masc or fem, transitioning alternative trans men, etc etc… And I’m sorry but y’all have no real world experience whatsoever if you think “GNC man” can only ever mean “man who is perceived as a woman.”

[doberbutts]

WoC who are radfems or TERFs always tend to particularly disappoint me as a TPoC. Specifically from the perspective of somebody transitioning in a masculine direction, seeing them say the exact same shit about men/mascs of color that white racists is really upsetting. Growing up hearing about how dangerous and predatory white people think the men of color in my life are solely for being men of color (grew up as a SWANA person I the 2000's/post 9-11 so seeing people talk about saving our women who are "fragile" from "brutish and violent" brown men was commonplace) was devistating; seeing WoC radfems who I knew saw similar shit targeted towards the men in their lives parrot violently racist rethoric hurts even more (especially with the comment about trans men of color and masc trans people of color transitioning towards privilege in their eyes, as if being seen as inherently violent and brutish in the eyes of white people is a privilege). Idk but shit like this permiating so obviously through both queer and PoC spaces is so isolating and devistating.

And when I brought that up once people decided I was saying that all black women and women of color are somehow at fault, when it was very clear I was talking about how the "kill all men even marginalized men" movement is forgetting how fraught the world is for a marginalized man, and how marginalized men often do share "women's" experiences, whether because of their gender or because of a different factor within their lives, and thus making statements like "all men are violent rapists" is literally what's used by racist and homophobic and transphobic lawmakers to harm marginalized demographics whether they are actually men or not and thus people who play into that are doing the racists/homophobes/transphobes' work for them.

Another blog on another post said this better than I could but let's be serious. People perceive me as either a black butch or a black twink. Neither of these is what I would call a privileged or safe place to occupy in the world. Sometimes, rarely, being perceived as a man works in my favor (when I diffused a car accident situation I'd witnessed where a woman was being threatened by two significantly larger men after hitting their car)... at other times, it absolutely does not (when I had the police called on me for training my dog in a field, when I was challenged in a single occupancy bathroom). Sometimes, rarely, being perceived as a woman works in my favor (when a violent man reconsiders me as an appropriate target because he "doesn't hit women")... at other times, it absolutely does not (when I have been coerced into sexual situations I did not want by partners who said with their mouths that they saw me as a man but said with their actions that I would only ever be a woman, a thing to own, a bearer of children to them).

Big sigh. As long as we exist as crabs in a bucket, pulling each other down, fighting over scraps, we will never see the change we're trying to enact upon the world. That's the truth of it.

[cowboyjen68]

Hello! I hope you’re having a wonderful day! This is a little out of the blue so let me explain a bit. I’m an AFAB androgynous bisexual. I’m currently in a queer sapphic relationship with the love of my life, who is a lesbian.

I’ve been feeling that something is missing from my identity, and that it is tied into my relationship and the role that I play within it, and I’ve been looking around for terms/labels that would fit how I feel. I connect a lot with the term Butch but I’m cautious of using it as I’m not lesbian and I don’t want to erase the history and identity of the label.

I’ve seen a lot of lesbians caution against using the label of Butch as an aesthetic, as it’s an identity and describes the relationship between sexuality, gender, presentation, relationship dynamics and more.

Im in my 20s, In a sapphic relationship for the first time and exploring a lot of things with my partner. I’m a little confused so I’m gathering information from older lesbians and sapphics where I can, and I was hoping you’d be able to answer my questions. Thank you so much, I really appreciate it!

Hello! I am having a great day, even though late fall cold weather is setting it. I am two coffees in this early morning and I am going to do my best to answer this. Please note, I am not a historian, I don't read much lesbian theory or political writings. I can and only ever come at questions from my personal expiences and from information I have learned in the long held lesbian traditional of intergenerational friendships. Basically, stories around kitchen tables and campfires give me what I draw on to respond.

I am really only seeing the term Sapphic or queer sapphic being used in the last few years so I want to make sure I am understanding you a bit better.  Sapphic was only really ever used to mean lesbian in my circles, since it refers to the first "really out and known" lesbian, Sappho the poet. But I see lately it is being used to describe any women, bi or lesbian, who is attracted to other women. And queer is a very broad term to me. My best guess is as you said you are bi and with a lesbian and sapphic queer is an more expansive definition of how you see your self in relation to your relationship with another women (your current partner). Forgive me if I misinterpret that. Androgynous seems a description of how you are perceived by others. And what aesthetic you feel comfortable presenting yourself as to the greater world. I just want to make sure I am on the same page of understanding.

Butch has always been a lesbian term in my life time.And my friends in their 80′s and 90′s are even more FIRM in the standing that butch is always, strictly lesbian. Many in fact hold very dearly to butch/femme and the connection between the two, how they are deeply interwoven. Butch is  Never used to describe the experiences or energy of bi women or anyone other than a lesbian woman. Historically, to my knowledge, it was used to boil down the experiences and perceptions and realities of masculine lebian women to one easy word that everyone understood. A simplfied descriptor to allow women who shared similar experiences to find each other and form community and be recognized as a defined group within the lesbian and great gay community. And even in the larger world.

I have seen it used as an fashion or aesthetic look as in “that is a butch hair cut” or “that suit is very butch” or “arm wrestling, how very butch”. Mostly that is the use of an understood word to convey a stereo type or humorous take on an activity or clothing an no offense should be taken. I guess because I am firm in knowing I am butch because I have shared my experiences and found others like me who relate, a little play on the word is no big deal. No one is looking at Julie Andrews in Victor Victoria in her fitted suit and thinking she is butch. But they might say “That suit is butch”. 

If yiou are bi, butch is not for you. Perhaps masc or masculine Or don’t worry about a descriptor. If the masculinity comes off with clothes or a different hair cut it is just not the same experience as a butch. If you are naturally masculine, but not a lesbian, and believe me, here in the midwest there are plenty of straight and bi  women are far and away more mascline than I am, BUT their energy is just not the same. They are rarely mistaken for men, or “not quite women” as is my experience and that of many butches. 

I would agree with you that butch is a short cut to describe presentation as it relates to our own comfort AND public perception, sometimes relationship dynamics and sexuality. The gender part was definitely something society thrust on me first. “you act like a boy” or “why do you look like a man”. Now my own LGBT community occiasionally tries to thrust gender roles on me and other butches “Butches have muscles” or “butches are supposed to be tops” (NO, LOL) or “butches love sports” (again, NO).  

Please be you and love your woman and be protective and gentle and strong. Wear what you love to wear. Love the hobbies you love and find things that fulfill you. Butch is not for you as a bi person. It is wonderful to have a wide range of friends and find the cross over of experiences. Please seek out bi women and peope  to talk to and share your ideas and stories with them. I know bisexuals can be the hidden among us but they are out there. Perhaps a few will see this thread and reach out. 

I wish you and your love all the hope and happiness you deserve. 

[olderthannetfic]

Hello olderthannetfic-sensei!

I discovered your blog after I learned that my worldview counted as "proship" and that meant a lot of Tumblr (ostensibly) hates me and wants me to do terrible things to myself. I've been doing my best to understand the opposition's point of view, and I keep coming up short, so I thought I'd ask and see if you can point me anywhere helpful.

Do you happen to know what anti demographics look like? Am I mostly dealing with actual children, or are most of them older? The only antis I've dealt with personally have been trans men- at the risk of upsetting the trans community, are trans-masc antis common? Is that where most of the anti-fujoshi blowback is coming from? Also, where did all of this originate? I've heard it came from the Voltron ship wars, but I don't know if that's accurate.

How do they define their own views (when they're not being tantrum-y children)? Is there anything more concrete than "we are decent people calling out the bad ones?"

Thank you for reading this, and whether or not you respond, I hope you have a good day.

--

The stereotypical anti is American, like 22-24, genuinely worried about social justice, but also cripplingly anxious and surrounded by other people with little life experience. they have a completely understandable terror of growing up into this job market/environmental crisis/world, and no clue how to fix anything other than by lashing out at people on the internet. They've unlearned queer=bad without unlearning the underlying queer sex=bad messages their generically conservative upbringing instilled in them.

But, of course, antis come in all ages and a variety of backgrounds.

Yes, trans-masc antis are common, but that's more because of the demographics of fandom than because it's a trans thing. You'll find plenty of salty trans-mascs responding to posts here and telling antis where to stick their nonsense.

Some of the favorite anti talking points easily trap m/m fans who feel they like m/m "a different way" from "those annoying people over there", but this includes queer women. The arguments from other types of queer people echo the trans-masc arguments.

"I found my special place for me where I finally felt safe and seen and now YOU PEOPLE turn out to be here too, and I cannot deal!"

That's what it all boils down to. People want BL to be for them and they perceive something or other as threatening that. There are antis who froth about het or other parts of fandom too. It's not all the fujocourse.

--

No, antis did not spring fully formed from the brow of Voltron fandom. They've been around for years, and the modern upswing was already getting going even aside from Voltron. It's a famously wanky fandom, but it wasn't alone.

The term 'anti' was originally self-applied, but by now, most antis think it's something others force on them. They self define as "normal" (yes, using that word). No, there is nothing more concrete than "decent people calling out the bad ones". Most anti rhetoric isn't that clearly thought out.

I'd go read @fiction-is-not-reality2's back catalogue for posts about the development of the term.

[riverofrainbows]

I get kind of really annoyed with how much some people focus on and how much they ascribe to "female socialization", as well as how universal they apply it, especially in regards to trans men and transmasc people.

I do think that there is some aspects worth discussing of this, but like i said not in the way these people do it.

"Ooh everyone who is afab has these same experiences, we all know how it feels to (be harrassed, be catcalled, have our clothes policed, be told we're not as capable, etc)"

And like yeah probably a lot of people that are perceived as women have some of these experiences. Sexism and misogyny do exist.

But not all of us? And not all experiences? And while we're at it, not all trans men/trans masc people even grew up perceived as women if they came out as a child.

And they always take it to the next step that therefore all afab people share this communal trauma of men, which is where the radical feminism and terf ideology comes in.

This also relies on the assumption that all "female socialization" and "afab experience" is shaped by misogyny perpetuated by men. A lot of misogyny is perpetuated by women (for example the rampant diet culture that is especially put onto children perceived and raised as girls). A lot of strict gender roles for girls and boys are enforced by women, since the majority of child rearing is still done by women. Sure more men are misogynistic, and it's more often men who perpetuate street harrassment, yes. But that is not the only part of daily life.

And the next part is the assertion that "female socialization" that is put onto a transmasc person is then also internalised by that person. If you hear "girls should do this" but you know you're not a girl, you will not internalise it the same way a girl will. There is a bunch of gendered messaging that people will subconsciously absorb in some way, and yes how someone is treated in daily life affects them, but trans people will always have a different experience than peers assigned the same gender at birth, and even cis kids will have, sometimes strongly, varying life experiences. The middle class christian white cis het able-bodied neurotypical female experience that terfs and radfems trout as universal doesn't exist, neither for all women nor afab people, nor at all.

And whenever they try to draw on that supposed "universal trauma of men" to spread their ideology, to shape discussions and claim certain transphobic statements, it really stands out as odd to me because the emotional manipulation through reminding people of trauma or bad experiences they had doesn't work on me, so the base for their following argument doesn't exist.

I have had very little bad gendered experiences in my life. And i know i am somewhat just statistically lucky, because i know it does happen to people I'm not denying that. But i have very little negative impact of that proposed "female socialization", nor much of such a socialisation at all. And not in a tomboy 'my father taught me how to repair cars' way, i did learn how social rules apply to me while i move through the world perceived as a woman/girl and my parents also gave me information on that. But i never had much of what is usually claimed as part of growing up as an afab person. My parents never put gendered expectations on me. Never restricted my food, or forced me on a diet. Never policed my clothing, never policed even the style of clothing. When i started to dress masculinely after i realised i am trans, they never bat an eye even before coming out. They gifted me whatever was on my wishlist, both feminine stuff and remote controlled race cars (and mostly books). I have never been told i am less capable of anything, i actually always heard, from everywhere, that girls can be whatever they want, and that you can be a girl however way you want (and i never heard similar messaging aimed at boys in the scope of gendered messaging i witnessed. I was aware of sexism and that that's why it was especially aimed at girls, but i never heard any of that supposed already plentiful messaging directly told to boys my age). Our period products are and were always out in the open, my father was never weird about it and went with me to my first gynaecologist appointment. I would walk through the apartment half dressed in underwear to ask him to close my dresses. I never had many bad experiences with boys growing up, mostly because i also didn't know any boys; I went to an all girls school, i didn't have any friends so that included boys, i mostly just read books (and my parents never policed or even commented on what books i was reading. My father also recommended me his favourite scifi books, since i always loved fantasy and scifi). Most bad experiences growing up were with girls, through bullying and the girls in school finding me weird due to my autism and because i wasn't really girly or easily connected through girl experiences (i also thought I had internalised misogyny when it was just dysphoria). Most medical bad experiences were with female doctors and medical personnel, including two female gynaecologists. I have had a gross sexual comment made to me twice in my whole life. I never had a bad experience while dating because i have never dated anyone. The closest i have come to dating i did not have any particularly bad gendered experiences, nor really bad ones at all, just awkward experiences.

What i am trying to say with this is that i never experienced "the communal afab trauma" and i know that terfs and radfems are full of shit and purposefully ignore intersectionality and nuance, as well as don't actually care about women.

I did notice and experience some negative effects of sexism and misogyny in societal messaging, like the oversexualisation of female characters, awareness of gender stereotypes and strict gender roles, also i recently noticed i always buy tight or even slightly too tight clothing due to the way womens clothes affected me (that i wore until a few years ago). I am also acutely aware of the gender disparity in healthcare and medical research that is absolutely appalling. I am a feminist and I know that sexism and misogyny exist (and affect others often more than me) and i advocate against it wherever it's possible for me to do so. But i do not share some universal female/afab experience and most definitely not some "female socialization" the way terfs and radfems and those who are sipping the radfems juice claim the world works and try fo force onto trans people (especially transmasc people) in order to perpetuate transphobia of all kinds.

(because in the same vein, some mystical "male socialisation" does not apply to trans women and transfem people in the way terfs and radfems claim, nor does it exist the way they claim it to)

[runin-reads]

trans masc anon again!! firstly ive reread ctts sooo many times like so many times i cant even count like just when im having a bad day or just want to feel comforted i reread ctts!!! its just like its so great to read about trans james and i just love the way you write him and trans james is SOOOOOO important to me!! also also YES!!! the devotion with sirius! like i think he'd be quite a loner if he'd met james later on bc like you said he's pretty picky with people but once he DOES like someone (james) its sooo .... literally like you said worshipful like im rereading POA at the moment and the way sirius and james are described ... AND AS FOR IDEAS ive been thinking about .... wait for it ... SIRIUS WITH A BABY SLING FOR AFTER HARRYS BORN idk why i cant stop thinking about it but sirius walking around with harry in a baby carrier strapped to his chest is like. the CUTEST FUCKING THING??!?! OKAY!!! and hes one of those parents that even though you know the baby IS secure in those slings he STILL puts a hand underneath harry you know JUST IN CASE JAMES (amused james voice) just in case of WHAT sirius? (flustered sirius voice) what if the straps GET LOOSE AND HE FALLS JAMES? (more amused james voice) thats not how it works and you know that but its like intensely attractive that youre so good with babies i think we should make 12 more rn <333 <- sirius being the most amazing dad in the world and james thinking its sooo hot okay hes spread eagle on the bed every night waiting 2 be knocked up again do you see the vision

Trans James potter is so personal to me too <3 I see a lot of myself in him: the false bravado, the compulsion to perform and the desire to be perceived a certain way.

Love your idea as well! Sirius is such a protective father over Harry and his other kids. Of course James thinks it’s sooo hot when Sirius goes into dad mode. I see the vision! They’re only teenagers when Harry is born so they got a lot to learn but ultimately they get the hang of it :)

Just imagine 19 year old Sirius Black, tall and intimidating, walking around with a baby strapped to his chest and his normally haughty face goes all soft when he looks down at Harry. I also imagine him as a dad who hates disciplining his children because of his own upbringing, so he tends be very permissive unless the kids are in danger. Overall he treats them like mini adults and always tries to be involved in their lives.

[pinkest-nekomata]

Finally gathering some words around my AFAB femme enbie experience, and a special thanks to the gender dysphoria bible for getting me over the line here.

Probably one of the more surprising developments of my gender journey has been that the more secure I’ve been in identifying as gender vague, gender queer, and nonbinary the more femme I’ve presented.

As I’ve followed what feels good, another key ingredient to gender euphoria to me has been some element of weird.

“I want to get neck tattoos,” I said, “So even when I’m on a zoom call people will know I’m Not Normal.”

I spent the first twenty four years of my life working incredibly hard to not appear weird. I received praise from my parents and adults for being “so mature” (which now I see as a red flag). I developed a constantly self-effacing attitude in social situations, working hard to create an easy conversation for everyone else. I was calm, sharp, self-aware. I would hedge and self-deprecate around my special interests, anticipate and proactively avoid complaints. I hated the arrogance and patronizing tone with which other “smart people” moved through the world.

I leaned into smart casual at work. A-line dresses, a retro bob. I wanted to be seen as fashionable, different, as caring about my clothing—but without spending tons of money or seeming too vain. I now refer to this as “dressing as the type of lesbian I wanted to date” era.

I walked a careful line when it came to femininity. I studied and worked in STEM, meaning the prettier I looked, the less likely I was to be taken seriously.

And as friendly as I was and am, I was also smart, cunning, driven, ambitious—and I wanted to be perceived that way. When I worked as an engineer, I would go out of my way to wear jeans and a polo (which, if I was honest with myself, I hated) to ensure I was taken seriously.

It chafed. I could never quite put my finger on why something felt “off”, even though on paper, dressing more androgynously theoretically should have been affirming to me.

Masculine elements were not foreign to me—I would have dreams where I was a man, and the emotional tenor was always curious neutrality. I had the sense that if I had been born a man, very little about me would be different. My me-ness ran much deeper than that.

When I write, I drift between masculine and feminine perspectives. Writing for me has always been a flow state—an unfolding of parts of myself that are usually suppressed, a safe place to explore emotions and identities and experiences that are unsafe or inaccessible in physical reality. Not everyone who writes the opposite gender inhabits that gender—but I do. I have written whole novels from the perspective of a man—not wondering what it’s like to be a man, but simply existing, expressing, experiencing as a man. (Though, not a particularly heteronormative man, to be fair.)

I never wished to be a man—but I did wish that being perceived as a woman did not bring with it expectations about my preferences and competencies.

It seemed at the time that my experience was well-explained by friction with misogyny, but there were other clues. The wordless not-rightness. An internal flinch whenever I was included in a “thanks ladies” or a “oh a girls meeting”, even at the same time as I felt strangely distant from the more masc-oriented women in my workplace.

I was, on some level, jealous that they were more comfortable in polos and jeans, more awkward in a blouse and skirt.

I felt the most affinity with our office manager, who wore flowing sundresses from Anthropologie and carried herself with feminine strength and warmth.

Meanwhile, I would reach for a dress in the morning and then correct myself—No, you see clients today. Better to be taken seriously.

The shifts happened slowly—and then in lurches. I realized I had ADHD, and then autism. I started to trace all the ways that I’d been compensating, all the signs that I’d never really fit in.

And with great relief, the thought settled over me—“I have never been particularly good at hiding how weird I am.” Now I understand it wasn’t just relief—it was a little jolt of gender euphoria.

I have never thought about gender a cis amount. But my flavor of autism means I think about most things more than most people do, and I had never hated being a girl, and I had never wished to be a man. “Non-binary” had still be framed to me as a matter of androgyny, but terms like “gender vague” and “auti-gender” and “demigirl” started to illuminate my path.

I felt simultaneously a disconnect with my gender and a not-yet-realized sense that my gender was so much broader than I realized—that it included my autism, my weirdness, my enthusiasm, my sarcasm, my interests, my intensity, my me-ness.

The switch to remote work with the pandemic left most of my closet irrelevant. When I was going to bother dressing up, it was for me. I bought goth dresses and thigh highs, mini skirts and crop tops. I reclaimed the adolescence I’d never had. I slowly learned how to do my makeup—something I’d spent hours trying at in high school, then scrubbed off in frustration, more terrified of looking like I’d tried and failed than that I didn’t care to try at all.

And it felt right. And I started getting tattoos—and then I didn’t stop getting tattoos. I donated one batch of work clothes, then another. I figured out I was bisexual and I’d been dressing like someone I wanted to be with, not who I was.

This essay was in part inspired by trying to figure out why I feel such a strong affinity with trans women. “I walked through the valley of gender fuck and emerged in bows and skirts”, I wrote last week, my way of cheering a group of trans women being excited about dresses.

It felt too fraught to say, I get this feeling. I love dresses in this same way. In a trans way. Not in a cis way.

I insisted on wearing a dress to school every day until the second grade, and really the only reason I stopped was undiagnosed sensory issues—when I realized that I could just wear a bike short and a t-shirt and be surrounded in cotton, that became my new obsession.

But I wore dresses in the dirt, dresses chasing bugs, skorts on the soccer field, bows with frogs on them. I knew, from a very young age, that “girl” did not feel quite right—but it did not feel quite wrong, either. And if “girl” didn’t feel right, then that meant I was supposed to be a tom boy and hate dresses and parties and cooking and makeup and dolls—but I didn’t hate any of those things. I just also loved heavy machinery and science and paintball. And, importantly, I wanted to be perceived as someone who loved all of those things at the same time. I wanted the very facts of my presentation to challenge people’s assumptions.

I have thought about, and wrestled with, and chafed at gender in a way that cis women have not. I have felt a rush of gender euphoria in adulthood and have a deep, deep appreciation of how much a skirt, a dress, an eyeshadow palette can mean to someone who is finding themselves in adulthood.

Also, thanks to genetically small breasts and an ED phase, I have also experienced watching my body gain/redistribute weight in a way that is gender-affirming. I can finally buy bras off-the-rack now. (Sort of. 38A is a specialty size, but the right 36B works.)

In retrospect, I can see how I always knew that I was a non-binary person and I was attempting to present in a way that non-binary people are supposed to—androgynous, practical. Dressing femme in a “normal” way felt wrong, too. But femme on my terms—weird femme, autistic femme, queer femme, hyper femme, divine femme—feels right. It feels like it can encompass and express the power, presence, and vitality for which I lacked an outlet for so long.

Alt fashion has given me a way for my gender presentation to say, I am not what society tried to make me. I cannot be told what to be. I don’t play by your rules.

I made a little “wheel of genders” for days I’m feeling indecisive. “Cottage core”, “high witch”, “bubblegum goth” and “athleisure” are a few of the options. And even on sweatpants days, bright pink hair and a rapidly growing collection of tattoos (my own form of bodily transition) are always sure to say, I am not normal.

While I may appear to have gone from subverting stereotypes to embracing (some of) them, my inner journey has been one of attempting to comply with stereotypes and then breaking out of them—as so many other trans people experience.

My goal in sharing this, other than to affirm to myself in so many words, I am nonbinary, is that it might resonate with someone else going through something similar.

I’ve read and read and read through definitions and descriptions of what it’s like to be nonbinary (another distinctly not-cis thing to do), looking for a glimmer of recognition. And slowly I collected those glimmers into a beam of light that’s guiding me now. And I hope my story can be a glimmer for somebody else, too 💕

[v-anrouge]

i almost never draw men despite being a gay homosexual fruity man so genderbends just really tickle my pickle however twst fans are so egregiously bad at doing genderbends??? do. people just think genderbends are longer hair, boobs, and an hourglass figure? fem!vil would not just be vil but with allat YOU WANKERS RAAAGGHHHHH. vil is feminine because hes a MAN and is breaking out of the norms of being a man. his femininity is crucial to his identity as a man. whatever he may be, he'll always be gnc, because the whole point about him is that he DESPISES stereotypical expectations of gendered presentation. he owns his masculinity while also being comfortable in his femininity. so if vil were a woman she'd have short hair, dress in typically masculine clothes, call herself a king-- fuck, vil would probably use he/him pronouns. all that wouldn't negate fem!vil's identity as a woman because her womanhood is based off being her truest self, of embracing the energy that makes her, her, even if it isn't stereotypically feminine, and breaking out of the norms is what gives her power and comfort in her identity. her womanhood IS breaking out of the confines that shackle women to this paragon of submissive perfection. it makes me mad when people waste the potential of genderbends especially since gender can add different and interesting nuance to a character given how the concept itself can shape and affect people's lives on the whole. not to mention, women are often given more shit for doing the exact same thing men do so it'd be interesting to see these characters changed to adapt to that. more people might be anti's of fem!vil than of og!vil. call her a manhater and a feminist that's weakening society and so much more horrible shit because every weak man just NEEDS to drag a strong woman down and humble her and though og!vil is already headstrong, full of confidence, and ready to give anyone shit, fem!vil would have to build her resilience even more against the raging misogyny she'd receive. she knows just how much the world hates women and gnc people like her and that's what motivates her even more to destroy society's narrowminded perception of gender. and you just know how butch women aren't even perceived as women by many members of the queer community-- she's a woman, and she's butch, masculine, etc etc and you'll know it. she won't take shit from both heteronormative people AND prejudiced queer people.

maybe im just speaking yappanese because twst doesn't really have the history of misogyny and sexism as the real world does however there is proof that there is toxic gender norms where we can see the toxic masculinity from the real world being reflected in epel so id take that as an indicator that we may share similarities in some of their societies.

anyhow point is that if you genderbend gnc characters like vil to just be the stereotypical representation of the gender you're bending tjem to, you're the person they hate the MOST. you're putting them in the box they DESPISE because you refuse to see all the effort they've put into their non-conforming identity and seeing them as nothing more than what you expect from them-- perceiving them in the constricting standard they're fighting to break. STOP MAKING ALL FEM!CHARACTERS SHORTER AND THINNER AND MORE CONVENTIONALLY ATTRACTIVE YOU SCAT STAINS!!!!! WHILE A PART OF WOMANHOOD AND UNDESERVING OF HATE, ITS NOT THE PARAGON OF WOMANHOOD BECAUSE THERE IS NO STANDARD TO IT AND TO DEPICT ALL FEM!CHARACTERS AS A MONOLITH OF THE SORT IS AN INJUSTICE TO THEM AS A WHOLE!!! you want a girlboss but can't even do girlbosses right what makes you think you can handle girlfailures or girldisasters OR GIRLINSANITY. women are not there for you to draw them pretty. they can be just as complex as their masc counterparts if not more than in some scenarios.

like fem!jamil would be even more tragic. fem!riddle too. fem!leona too. not to say that they aren't already full of existing nuance because they ARE and it's GREAT but fem characters are just so full of heart wrenching potential AND NO ONE TAKES IT UP RAGGGGGHHHHHHHHH

anyways im not even a girl kisser but i would kiss fem!rook because i fucking love it when girls are unfiltered and creepy and off-putting and disturbing and covered in blood. maybe im bisexual. who knows.

also i just think fem!malleus would be super cool like ahagha girllll you're SO autistic and strange and frightening pleasseeee talk to me about gothic architecture while i explode.

ANON U ATE LIKE HIGHKEY OH MY GOD PLEASE IM PUTTINGTTHIS IN THE MAIN TAG

i never quite understood why i always disliked vil genderbents specifically until like some time ago that i realized the reason i hated it it's because the way people draw it (hyperfemme) doesn't make sense for vil's character, it doesn't make sense that vil, as a man would dress feminine to fight gender roles yet if he was a woman that wouldn't happen and she would still be dressing feminine. genderbents r such an :/ topic because most ppl that make them take the characters make them shorter, skinnier, puts then in tight short clothes, gives them long hair makeup and idk man it always puts me off like being a woman is way more than that and despite the fact a lot of women do present themselves that way, making EVERY character be like that is just idk it FEELS wrong. i feel like most genderbents r just copy and pastes of the same gender roles slapped into a character carelessly just because and honestly it fucking sucks