#queerplyke

[runawaymarbles]

What does “I broke my laptop by brushing my hair” refer to??

okay so you know how squishy the backs of hairbrushes are? And how they can sort of absorb water, if you, hypothetically, brush your hair while it’s wet? So if one, for example, brushed their hair while it was wet, then put the hairbrush down next to their keyboard so they could keep keysmashing about something on Skype instant messaging because the year is 2011, and then later picked up the hairbrush again and angled it slightly, it might dump water all over your keyboard. This might make keys stick together, and lead to you typing lli8lke5 t5 hii8se for two to three business weeks, because you are a student with no money, until your father has mercy on you and replaces the keyboard. Your friends might mock you for this, and later, when “your fave is problematic” becomes a meme, you might be Problematic because “-favorite harry potter book is the fifth, -once broke her laptop by brushing her hair.” 

one might set that as their tumblr bio and then never change it until it becomes a nostalgia thing.

Hypothetically.

[renthony]

Hey Ren! Have you ever written anything where the character(s) use neopronouns or microlabels?

I have! 

Slow is Smooth features a main character who uses xey/xem/xyr pronouns! At the moment it’s only available to Patreon backers, but there’s something coming very soon that has a character using fae/faer/faers. 

As far as microlabels go, I use a ton of labels in real life, so that kind of bleeds into how I portray my queer characters. I don’t always go into a lot of detail in the stories and use them on page, though. It’s something I intend to start doing a little more often, especially in modern-set stories.

I don’t want to word-of-god confirm what’s not explicitly said on-page and claim representation that isn’t explicitly there. That said, if I were to post a detailed list of my characters’ identities, there would be microlabels aplenty, because I as a person find them super useful and think they’re great!

[vaspider]

It makes me so happy to discover that you found the term bisexual lesbian for yourself. I recently started id’ing as a ply lesbian (as in polysexual/romantic) and it brings me such happiness to know that someone who I’ve followed and respected for all my time in tumblr has also adopted an m-spec lesbian label. Sending you all my love 🥰

Thanks. <3 I’ve been trying to find the right way to explain how attraction works for me for years. Who knew that it was here all along and it has been in use since at least the mid 80s? Jeez. 

[livebloggingmydescentintomadness]

Hey Ashley! I’ve watched 5 episodes of spn by now, and I heard that Castiel only comes in at Season 4, so I wanted to ask—does one *really* need to watch all 15 seasons? What parts can I skip? I want to see max destiel and whatever other parts you think are good (I’ve only heard of destiel as the main attraction). Any advice?

well, it really depends on what sort of tv you like to watch. the first 3 seasons aren’t bad or uninteresting, they’re just a lot more like horror/thriller movies than the intricate drama it became later on. if you like shows/movies about ghosts and monsters, then you’ll probably like the first 3 seasons.

i don’t actually like horror or stuff about ghosts, but i still mostly enjoyed the first 3 seasons because they got me to care about the characters pretty quickly, and the show is surprisingly good at balancing drama with comedy. eventually i got tired of the brothers-only dynamic, but in the beginning the way they care about each other definitely tugs on the heartstrings and wraps you up in the story. 

however, i don’t think there’s anything wrong with starting at season 4, because that’s the point at which the genre starts to change and it becomes a broader story involving heaven and hell and the apocalypse. season 4 creates the basis for season 5, which i think is the most solid season of television they’ve made. no, it’s not extremely heavy on destiel, though there’s some good stuff and we start to really know castiel, but it’s just great television.

after that, it’s largely about what you enjoy, if you like monster of the week episodes or if you’d just like to stick to the bigger story arc episodes and the character-driven episodes, though they can do a good job of blending those altogether. each season has its highs and lows, its good episodes and bad episodes. each season is its own unique experience, and we all have wildly different opinions on which ones are good and which are bad.

i would say that you should start each episode and skip it if it doesn’t appeal to you, watch it if it seems interesting. if the next episode makes it clear you missed something big, go back and slog through it and it might be more interesting than you thought. 

the show is very, very plot-driven and character-driven, so you really can’t just watch “destiel episodes” and have them make sense. i mean you can if that’s literally all you care about, but they won’t make sense. if you don’t care and you just want cas/destiel, try figuring out which episodes misha is in and just watching those. it’ll be confusing, but if you’re happier that way then it’s fine by me.

but really, if you try not to take every twist and turn deathly serious, it actually is a pretty fun show, you know? like, there is a reason that it’s been on for 15 years and people still watch it and it’s had this kind of cult following. it has plenty to critique, believe me i’m well aware of that, but it’s funny, it’s cool, it’s interesting, the acting is incredible, they go to a ton of places you’d never guess a show could go. my mom doesn’t like horror and she’s a little homophobic so she doesn’t ship destiel, but she pretty happily watched like, nine or ten seasons just because she enjoyed it as a show.

so honestly, try not to get caught up on it being 15 seasons, try just starting somewhere and seeing if you enjoy it. at some point, give season 1-3 a chance just to see what you think, but you can also start with 4x01 or 5x01 and just see what happens without worrying about how you’re going to watch it all. 

[xeno-aligned]

Do you know of any fairy, magic, nature, or sprituality/religion/holiness related gender descriptors (that's a lot, sorry!). I know of malificae, lunirgender, faegender, moongender, but not many others.

not all at once! but here’s some:

> nature-related genders

> some fae & forest genders

> some fae & angelic/religious/spiritual genders

> some more angelic/spiritual/religious genders

Faeigender: A gender linked to the Fair Folk/Nature Spirits (elves, fairies, nymphs, dryads, pixies, sprites, etc…) or a gender inspired by them that feels mischievous, ethereal, light, magical, pastel, wild, vast, cunning and fluid.

Ulosagender: A xenogender thats animalistic and otherworldly with a strong connection to fairies. An exemgender.

Faekami: Basically, you’re not a boy, you’re not a girl, you’re not even a human. You’re a gender-nonconforming ethereal being trapped in a physical, mortal, vessel, but you lean more towards the femme/feminine side. (Pixkami/pixiekami is the masculine version; elfkami is the neutral version)

Gendermagnificus: A gender that feels magnificent and magical, related to the Fae, nymphs, and mythology.

Faungender: A gender identity that has the same feeling as magic and fae, but with more masculine undertones, and/or presenting in a way that is generally socially interpreted as masculine. A gender with the same energy as sunlight in a forest, as muddy bare feet dancing to the trill of enchanting music, as unkempt hair and an unshaven body/face.

Godgender or Deusgender: A gender identity that pertains to godliness/something holy, meaning it’s an untouched and unaltered version of gender/has no “passing” form/is outside of masculinity and femininity (can meld with feminine/masculine genders, but does not usually carry societies’ norms when this happens); Nonbinary gender for people who identifies as deities or acknowledge a divine aspect within themselves.

[librarycards]

What does transbutch mean to you, and can you talk about the phrase "lesbian specificity, queer multiplicity"?

I can! i’m going to try to keep this brief (A/N: I failed a little), but just last month i finished a looooong, unwieldy undergraduate thesis on the subject, so anyone can feel free to dm me for the link - i’m not posting it here bc my personal info is attached.

for me, transbutch is a few things. it’s 1) the way i think about my own identity in relation to others’. because i’m antiessentialist, i find it useful to establish my id through my relationships w/ others, whether human, object, environment, etc. in that case, my butchness is a descriptor of the relational role i take, whether that be what s bear bergman has called “f*ggy butchness” w/ other butches, or with femmes and others, a role that has some protective, “dominant,” etc. characteristics. my transness describes my ideological orientation ––i subscribe to a politics and practice of destabilization & crossing –– as well as my material relationship to the biomedical and textual technologies of “transition,” both those used by drs and those I create myself, including this ask/my blog.

going from this, i also think about transbutchness as 2) a wider theoretical framework for approaching an increasingly t////rf & trnnsmed -dominated discourse of “border wars.” this poorly-named, racially-ignorant phenomenon, also devoid of any analysis of transmisogyny, was popularized by Halberstam and Prosser in the late 90s to describe then-nascent divides between “trans men” and “butch women”. since then, these divides have grown even more conflictual, with both sides touting essentialist& purity-based logics to shut certain people out of the trappings of solidarity and community. my own political goal is gender-abolition, which i believe must be done along with the disposal of essentialist rhetoric, whether diagnostically, bodily, or “socializationally” based. rather than asking, then, who was “truly trans” or “truly butch/’female’”, i put forward transbutchness as a site of political unity across and through difference.

so, 3), transbutchness is both the framework and politics i use and the way i’d like to label myself, because i believe ideological and political labels to be EXPONENTIALLY more useful than “personal identity” ones. this is especially true given growing, much-needed critiques of transmisogyny embedded in lgbtq communities writ large, but especially in the way butchness, and even transbutchness, are conceptualized. in the wake of t///rf efforts to “reclaim”/”make great again” transbutchness, which has been widely and rightfully taken up by TMA transbutches, i find it particularly important to refuse an exclusive and reductionist politic. if we’re thinking about feinberg as transbutch par excellence, we can use hir playful, earnest calls to unity with other “humyn-born-humyns” and apply it to this diverse subsection of gender-crossers interested, broadly, in queer play with/against masculinity grounded in historical awareness.

TLDR: transbutch is an identity/framework based in political solidarity and against diagnosis, body, and social-based essentialism. not only does it include TMA trans butches, but it acknowledges that their use of the term is popular and widespread, taking up similar terminology to refuse transmisogynist/ otherwise-essentialist “reclamation” of it.

[qqueenofhades]

So I just finished chapter 3 of deo volente (Just left a comment, I’m Xenerik on ao3) and I *really* should go to sleep BUT I had to ask: do you have any thoughts on posting an appendix/reference guide for the fic? I’ve seen it done before—one fic I know has a “study guide” as a reference for all the historical details in the fic. History and meta and esp queerness (like some of your recent posts) are my jam and if you were ever to post such a thing (on ao3 or otherwise) I would love to read it!

I have definitely had this thought, just because I had so many people telling me that they were inspired to research more into the history and because it might be easy/helpful to have this all in one place. It would definitely take me some time and effort to put together, of course, since I would have to chase up references. Most of DVLA was written from things that I already knew, heh, so I would have to go back and remember what books/resources are most useful. If there was a general interest in this, I would post the appendix as an extra chapter on the existing DVLA fic on AO3, then drop a link here.

I definitely think there is an excellent opportunity to do some more teaching from it (crusades, medieval history, medieval queer people, etc) and I will definitely look into this if it would be helpful! And try to remember/motivate my ass to actually do it. It would most likely be a brief rundown for each chapter with useful books/articles for each of the mentioned people and topics, though particular references or quotes could also be highlighted (as a lot of the things that the historical characters say as dialogue are things they are actually mentioned as having said.) So yes.

If this would be useful to you/my followers in general, lmk in comments and I’ll see about putting it together. :)

[gendzl]

howdy it's me ya boy back at it again asking for fic recs 😎 just finished reading check please, d'ya have anything for that??

OH BOY, DO I!! I apologize in advance for how clear my love of Kent Parson is here askfjdshfklhj

Hummingbird Heartbeat — a 145k WIP that hasn’t updated in a year but I don’t care because it’s so effing good

Smitten — 11k bittykent fic where bits is kent’s cat sitter.

Out of Gas — 30k kent/dex, TRANS KENT!!!! :D

live through this, and you won’t look back — 13k post-canon jack/kent reconciliation

when it feels right — 30k jack/kent reconciliation

Seven-Year Itch — kent/jack real marriage/fake relationship 👀

always gold — 6k kent/nursey fluff fic

Like Real People Do — 150k kent/omc

Petals and Thorns — 17k series, nursey/dex au featuring satisfying amounts of pablo neruda

The Gay Favour — 43k nursey/dex fake dating au

touchy subject — 50k pb&j :)

you’ve got my number — 10k zimbits wrong number au

Eric Bittle, NBC 10 — 82k media au

Ice Crew, Please! — 61k zimbits, our main buds are an NHL ice crew, jack is...jack

Actually I Do Make the Rules — series, 150k, zimbits, extremely heavy content but also like,, soul-restoring.

[catboy-jesus]

Hey whassup? I was wondering what you mean in your bio, "inclusivity is not radical". Would you mind explaining? Thanks a lot!

Hi! What I mean by that is that there are all these claims that people who accept all queer people (microlabels, xenogenders, non-bi m-specs, a-specs, etc.) into the LGBT+ community are “radical inclusionists”, but it is my belief that inclusionism is not a radical stance and that behavior is just general compassion and the belief people should be able to express themselves however they want to. It should be the standard, not a radical belief.

[avesnongrata]

If you were to write an author bio for yourself, what would it be?

Thank you for this prompt! I had no idea how much I needed something like this right now. Here's an example of the kind of thing I hope to see printed on a dust jacket sometime in the near future:

“Aves has been a writer his whole life. After mistaking his love of storytelling for a love of teaching for nearly two decades, he finally quit his job as a middle school science teacher to pursue a career as a novelist and writer of comics and video games in 2020. His visionary world-building and vibrant prose have earned him an enthusiastic following of queer readers who long for adventure and deep interpersonal connections of all kinds. (The sizzling smut doesn't go unappreciated, either...)

She lives [anywhere in the world except NYC] with her wife and their [eclectic menagerie of pets]. Their game nights are the toast of the town.”

[runawaymarbles]

Asjdbvdjdksn “you can just @ the captain America fandom next time” Amy that was RUDE and as a cap fan I am here for it

listen I love fanon Steve and I love canon Steve but they are NOT the same Steve and a lot of the complaints that his choices in later movies are OOC come from judging canon Steve’s actions based on fanon Steve’s motivations, in this essay I will

[allofthefeelings]

Hi friendly reminder that And There Are Deserts Still guts me every time I read it and you are a crazy good writer and wowowowow. Thank you so much for the Jewish natasha doc of my dreams.

I am so so SO glad this story resonated with you! There are parts of it I wish I’d done better but overall it’s one of the few fics I’ve written that I’m still really proud of, and messages like this mean a lot. Thank you!

[caitlynlynch]

What was the archive mentioned on this post? Was it a twitter acct or something? /post/617184165801197568/

The Protectorate Archive was, as far as I understood it because it literally existed for about 5 minutes, similar to Ao3 but policed by antis.

It was doomed to fail, because as I’ve said before - probably on my fandom account though - “If everyone is allowed to point at something and say “I don’t like that, it’s not allowed to exist!” the entirety of fandom would disappear in a puff of smoke.”

[cannabisbutch]

From a faggy fem to a faggy butch: ily! I love our reclaiming of words!! If you ever want to talk more about what the fag identity means to you I for one would LOVE to hear it! 🥰

thank you, i love to see other fag-id folks!! reclamation is power that cishets cant steal from us! 

[arco-pluris]

Hi there! Do you think you could explain the gender equation that you have in your "compiled/fragmented genderness" page? You don't have to explain all of yours per se unless you're comfortable, I just wanted to know how gender equations work as they seem super interesting and cool!

My gender is entirely xin/xenine

All my (com)gendered identities contradict making themselves antigenders and agenders/nongenders, and almost all of them are combined as cendgenders, but others were already gemigender. Ekragender, like crystagender but not fluid, describes their destruction (as in zerogender's nullification).

All my autonomous genders/autonomiquinities are genderfuzz, impossible/hard to tell what is going with them at the moment, only what happened in the past with them after awhile.

⟨{[()]}⟩/brackets are making the mishmash/salad/sandwich that is compiling a gender equation. It doesn't have rules, you just put them semiotically and they work intrapersonally how you feel. Some examples:

a mosaigender of demijuxera, demiboy, demiflux, nixvir and genderflor can sum up into mosai[demi(boy • juxera)flux × nixvir × gender]flor

a spectragender of spaciousgender ambigue, mavrine, péra, mazeplexgender, ambinique, genderfluid between tri and gendervast but always ain can be described as ain⟨spectra{bi[péra ∗ mazeplex]gender • am[bi(nique × ambi)gue × spacious]gender}vast⟩fluid

The brackets can be used in different contexts, some just to specify what is within a identity, others just separating word roots.

[gendzl]

The more I think about it, the more I consider myself a fag and feel more happy and safe in the identity. I think a lot of that is due to you and how vocal and open you are about your identity as one. Thanks for paving the way!

!!!!!!! I’m so happy to hear that! <3

Every time I get a message like this I kind of want to happy cry, because it’s a very deliberate choice on my part to Talk About Things Openly in the hopes that it does exactly this. It’s always nice to hear that throwing myself semi-transparently at the internet benefits someone a little bit lmao.

fag rights 2020