#this is why we need queer education in schools

[the-kneesbees]

omg transphobic kid had a civil conversation with trans kid AND asked for their pronouns?? character development

[giantkillerjack]

My first time watching Glass Onion it was obvious that Miles' speeches were bullshit, but I still searched for any hidden meaning there might be.

The second time is a different experience though because every time my brain starts to search for meaning, I feel like Benoit Blanc discovering that no, there is absolutely no hidden meaning.

It's bullshit it's all nothing nothing nothing! It is just how you end up talking when everyone reacts to your self-aggrandizing word vomit like it is actually wisdom.

Also, legit, when Miles gave his stupid bullshit speech about what the word 'disruptor' means to him, I shit you not I was like holy shit am I back in business school right now?!

Miles must have given speeches like that at 100 business school graduations, goddamn.

Like, the motherfuckers really do sound like this. We didn't have any billionaires come, but we had a lot of millionaire guest speakers in my classes, and they fucking talk like that.

They all think they're rugged capitalists, but they're just glass onions!

[befuddledcinnamonroll]

Intercultural Bias in the Fan Experience of QL

I've been thinking about writing this post for a while, and I think it's an appropriate time for it after reading @hallowpen's post today - which if you haven't read yet, please do so.

I'm saying this as someone who's been on a lifelong journey of learning, and is also extremely aware I still have so much that I don't know. I am from the U.S. and that comes with a truckload of bias and privilege. But this is something I have learned that I think is worth sharing.

There is a danger, for those of us who are progressive, yet grew up in countries that have been historically exploitative and oppressive to other cultures.

Because colonizer bias is insidious. And it can be very tempting to say, I'm aware, I've done the anti-racism training, I've read the books, I have my own oppressions I have to fight every day, I'm aware of my privilege, I'm an ally, etc, etc, etc. But this is just like racism - if you are not being actively anti-colonialist in your interactions with other cultures, you are likely perpetuating bias and oppression.

I grew up in a very liberal part of the U.S. and had a very progressive education starting from grade school. I got education on systemic racism in junior high, my high school had one of the first gay/straight alliances in our state. I studied science in college, but since it was a liberal arts degree, I also took classes on sociology of race, the religions of Asia, Chinese history, etc.

But despite all this I still grew up in a country with a fuckton of bias about our role in how we interact with countries around the world. And as we all do with bias that we grow up with, I internalized some of that.

It wasn't until I took some graduate coursework on Intercultural Training & Communication that I really was able to recontextualize my perspective and become aware of my unconscious bias, thank to an amazing instructor.

Other countries do not need us to come in, tell them what is wrong, and tell them how to fix it. Whatever problems there are, there are people in that culture who know, who are actively working on it, and they know better than anyone outside what needs to be done.

Honestly, it doesn't even need to extend to other countries - just look at all the nonprofits and charities in the U.S. that talk about helping the poor, but in the end just perpetuate the cycle of oppression by coming in to neighborhoods and doing zero work to center the perspectives of the people most affected.

You can absolutely support and spread awareness and send money and share expertise when asked, and do the things that the people of that culture ask you to do.

But if you come in, and try to say "this is what you all are doing wrong, and this is what you should be doing" - you are perpetuating a colonialist mindset.

And yes, this extends to media as well.

This is why I struggle with some of the takes I have read, especially those that attempt to rank the "queerness authenticity" of shows, from an entirely Western perspective, with no engagement with the idea that one's queer identity is impacted by one's culture (among other things), and that it can look and be expressed in a million different ways.

There are criticisms of queer directors, blaming them for a myriad of perceived sins, with zero understanding of what queerness might mean to them both individually and as a Thai person, and what they might also be trying to navigate socially, culturally, and politically.

There are people making broad sweeping statements about the direction that they think QL is headed in - some of which enter the realm of catastrophizing - entirely based on their own subjective opinion of what is most important for a different country and culture to care most about in a particular moment in time.

You know why I'm not worried about the direction of QL? Because I know there are millions of Thai people who care about it too. I know the Thai queer community and their allies are speaking up, and pushing for change and progress. I know that they are extremely cognizant of when representation fails, and I know they are the reason representation has already improved so much (sorry interfans, it's not about us).

And yeah, sometimes the pendulum swings the other way - those of us in the U.S. should be very aware of this. But the fight doesn't stop.

There are Thai people who are working to promote mental health and therapy, to encourage people to have strong boundaries with family who have hurt them, to provide more representation for groups who still aren't seen. And someone from a different country complaining about all the ways they think their culture is failing isn't helping a thing.

Like @hallowpen says, this is not about saying you can't critique. Most of the people I follow do a great job at making it consistently clear that their perspective is subjective, and they relate it to their own life and experience. That's great, and a place for people from different cultures to connect!

But those of us who are interfans have a responsibility as members of a global community. There are people from Thailand who read your posts. From Japan, from Korea, from China. Are you speaking up to support them? Or are you talking over them? Are you expressing understanding for what they are navigating from historical context and current political conditions? Or are you just lecturing them on how you think their world should be?

[slayerkitty]

Let's Talk About Trust, Baby

I've seen a lot of posts where people are really confused about Mew and where his head might be at with regard to his relationship with Top. Why he hasn't given Top the boyfriend title back, why they haven't had sex yet, etc. That led me down a rabbit hole of thinking about the relationships between the characters and the one thing all relationships need to function - TRUST. If you don't trust your significant other or your friends/family, etc, what kind of relationship can you even have? I tried to break this down in groups/pairs and some of it might not be as thought out, so there may be more on this as the show goes on but here we go.

The Fab Four

So there's a lot of context we're missing about the relationships between our core four dysfunctional besties (Note: So far, Cheum doesn't seem that dysfunctional, you're doing amazing sweetie!) such as how they met, how long have they been friends (what the hell Ray and Mew got up to that one night... *ahem* I digress). Now, we don't have any real answers to these questions (yet) so I'm taking some educated guesses based on my own college experiences and what I've generally picked up from other university BLs typical story telling.

I feel like the four of them met during orientation (except maybe Ray and Mew, I'm waffling on thoughts that they've known each other since high school). Most university BLs set it up that the mains meet during orientation, bond during whatever torture the seniors are putting the freshman through and kind of build their friend groups based on that.

I also feel like they may have gravitated toward each other or remained a group because they're all queer. BLs can go either way on whether or not homophobia exists in their narrative and I think that Only Friends is going the more realistic route (and it's Jojo) so I think that I can definitely see them bonding over being queer. They find an LGBTQ bar and it becomes their thing to do together. Most friendship groups form because people just sort of fall in together due to circumstance and they seem no different.

But do they trust each other? Signs point to yes. (I was shocked too, lol)

Mew and Cheum: We haven't had much focus on her, but he seems to value her opinion and listen to her advice. (We also know that April likes him from the time they've spent together and he likes April, so I would say he and Cheum probably have pretty good trust built up.)

Mew and Boston: He believed without a single doubt when Boston said that Top had never had a lover longer than 3 months and that Top would probably, as Ray put it "nail and bail" once Mew and Top have sex. Cheum also believed Boston. Do I think Boston was lying here? No. But neither do they and that's important. Does Boston trust Mew? I think he does. His issues with Mew are not about trust.

Mew and Ray: These two vibe a little different than the rest of the group. They seem closer; they seem like they've talked about "the deep stuff" (vs maybe superficial topics with their other friends). Their first one on one scene has them talking about Ray's alcoholism seriously (even though Mew doesn't push about it as much as I would have liked) and you can tell there's an intimacy there that the other group members don't share. Whether that stems from whatever it is that happened that night in the video (I am salivating about this, it's delicious, I need more info) or because they've been friends for longer, I don't know.

Let's move on to the pairs:

Cheum and April: Do they trust each other? I assume so? Cheum goes out drinking with the boys at least once a week and April seems okay with that (we haven't heard otherwise), so I'll say yes? (Jojo, I NEED MORE OF THEM. I DON'T HAVE ENOUGH TO EVEN ANALYZE. GIVE US MORE.)

Sand and Ray: I'm gonna call this one as Sand does not trust Ray, but Ray trusts Sand. Sand knows that Ray is a walking red flag and he's trying to resist but Ray is making it really hard. *ahem* Ray bailing mid-make out is not helping Sand's trust issue. If you look at how Sand has cared for Ray since episode one, however, Ray most likely trusts Sand. I mean, Ray talked about his mom to Sand. I think that's a biiiig deal.

Mew and Top: Thanks to Boston, neither of them trusts the other. And this, right here, is why Mew has not moved the relationship forward. HE DOESN'T TRUST TOP. He's still worried that Top will "nail and bail". Remember Mew's checklist from episode two? He only checks off "gets along with my friends" (HAH!) and "respects me" but not "doesn't lie to me". We can infer this means it hasn't been marked off since he doesn't mention it to anyone in this episode. Given that a lot of us clocked Mew potentially spotting Boston's trunks on the floor in the shower, along with him questioning if Top was telling the truth about the fire, it's clear this is the one thing holding him back.

If Mew agrees to be Top's boyfriend, then the expectation of sex becomes a lot higher (it shouldn't but that's a different discussion to be had). It's also implied in the narrative (and from Jojo) that Mew is a very structured person and he doesn't like to lose control (re-watch the counter scene from episode one. You know you want to. I'll wait). The moment that Mew realizes that he is way too into what they're doing, he panics because he doesn't have control over the situation.

Up until episode three, Top did trust Mew. He trusted him enough to get vulnerable and then Boston blew it up by fabricating a narrative backed with evidence of...something between Ray and Mew (I'm seriously dying for this scene, I need it).

Another thing I am having thoughts about is that in this episode, Top referred to himself as Mew's boyfriend and so did Cheum and Mew didn't deny it like he did in episode two. When Top's *ahem* "buddy" approached them at the silent disco, it was very clear that Mew expected Top to introduce Mew as his boyfriend and was visibly (if momentarily) upset that he didn't.

Boston and Nick: Yes and no, but also no and no, respectively. So Boston trusts Nick with some things but not everything which leads to him lying, gaslighting and manipulating (he's a triple threat). In turn, Nick lies right back, because what else can he do? (a lot of things actually, oh Nick, you are starting to spiral hard.) This leads Nick to rigging the CCTV video to show on his phone and to wiretap Boston's car, which just shows you his trust in Boston is non-existent.

In conclusion: Trust is another theme the show seems to be exploring: earning it, keeping it, and what you do after trust is broken. I think it can tie back into the ongoing ephemerality discussion as well: trust isn't permanent. You have to earn it, maintain it, and once broken, it's gone (and seldom can be repaired).

Also, everyone needs therapy.

Tagging the Ephemerality Squad: @waitmyturtles, @chickenstrangers, @lurkingshan, @twig-tea, @ranchthoughts, @clara-maybe-ontheroad

Hope I didn't forget anyone!

[sirfrogsworth]

I cannot figure out why conservatives find sex toys so scandalous. They are especially upset that high school age teenagers are being taught about them, as if they aren't aware of their existence already. And god forbid Walmart sells vibrators. We can't publicly acknowledge that some people have sexual needs. Next they'll have to hide cucumbers and bananas from public view because they are too phallic.

Teenagers who are considering sexual activity should know there are tools they can use if they aren't prepared for actual sex. Tools that are safer than actual sex. But they also should know how to use them safely (lube is your friend) so they don't cause tears and put themselves at more risk.

It's basic sex education.

Sex toys are especially important for queer folks. It is probably not a good idea for first timers to just stick it in the butt and "figure it out." But if you mention butt plugs these people lose their fucking minds like it is some ultimate perversion.

If young people are old enough to have sex, they should be able to ask any question without judgment. We need to stop being so prudish if we truly want to keep things safe for them.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA if I break off an old friendship with someone who stayed by my side despite my mental and general life issues, after everyone else had left?

This friend from high school had been a great friend, kept me company when I was all alone, supported me through two bad breakups, we went to the same college and we were very close.

Until I started talking more openly about politics, being queer, mental health etc. She's the facebook liberal type, slightly left of center. She gave me the freedom to be more open with her by being cool with taboo topics, then turned sour when it extended beyond what she knew. Examples, she'd change subject if I talked about queer media when normally she's telling her friends how she had a sleepover with her "wife" and saw each other naked. She was surprised to learn that you're not supposed to out someone against their will. She believes cops are bad only in USA. We're not Americans.

She started being open with me too, she told me how she hated it when her classmates talked about their favorite music, how she hated any fandom stuff they talked about besides discussing fanfics with another fandom friend, how she makes excuses so she can go wherever she wants alone and not with friends. She told me she spies on my exes on facebook insta etc and tried to tell me what they've been up to and only stopped telling me about after many requests and explanations as to why that made me really uncomfortable.

A few months ago she and I had a fight, she exclaimed that my politics was too American (I'm just an average leftist like most of 30+ tumblr and my other friends), that my politics was too fandom oriented (she avoids fandom so much she has blocked activists for even hinting at being a fandomgoer, like discussion of racism in fandom is waste of time and silly to her, fan-anything can't be taken seriously), mocked me for having childish interests (just knowing pop culture in general) then we stopped talking.

After some months she texted that she really misses talking to me as I was her only "progressive friend" who understood her when she wanted to discuss feminism, movies, world politics etc. She said she needed me to be her gateway to pop culture knowledge as I knew so many cool new things. She begged me to be friends again, and since I missed hanging out with her a lot I started chatting again. But I told her that it was hard for me to forgive her and I'd leave for real if she hurts me again.

This time she let go of the normal daily stuff we used to talk about and only stuck to Topics of Debate. She asked me to teach her progressive thinking, educate her, but when I asked if she wanted to touch on lgbt+ topics or physical -mental health related topics outside of her comfort zone of basic sexual health, she danced around a lot instead of giving an answer. I snapped and asked yes or no, she said no.

I asked her if she understands that even if she didn't feel like those topics were her priority, I'd probably want to talk about them with her as a queer neurodivergent person and friend, would that be an issue? She kind of ignored it to say that basically her priority was just local political gossip, religion, and a little bit of solarpunk stuff, outdated at that. I was disappointed but let it go and we decided to talk later.

The other day she messaged me with her usual gossip about how her friends are being too excited about some music stuff and what book she thinks I should read (we have completely different taste). And I got a panic attack. Since then I've had multiple panic attacks at the thought of having to talk to her.

She has been one of my oldest friends, she supported me and took my side in every breakup I had and she forced me to go outside when I was severely depressed, she was practically family, but now I feel like I'm walking on eggshells. If I bring up any topic she dislikes she's going to turn away, if I come out to her as trans she'll joke and start to avoid me, she doesn't want to learn anything new even though she takes pride in being a great learner, if I talk about things that make me happy she'll ignore it. I don't know if she'll go and tell others how cringey my interests are. Maybe she'll go to my exes and tell them I used her as support and threw her away when she didn't meet the standard as that's been a line of thinking among my exes.

I'm also struggling with BPD and anxiety, so maybe I'm hating her now and will want her back later, it's my brain being a jerk? I think I'm overreacting and she won't do any of these, but I also feel so drained after we talk these days. I need friends who I can talk to about mundane things, friends who share memes with me and tell me what anime they're passionate about, what new recipe they liked, instead I feel like I'm just there to drag her down with my issues and politics and dumb jokes. But multiple people think I used and discarded them for not agreeing politically, I'd usually disagree but what if I am the problem and I expect too much?

So I'm asking, am I being a jerk if I cut her off?

What are these acronyms?

[jewish-vents]

OK this is painful and I’m sorry if it triggers anyone I just need to share it. I’m queer and I’m Jewish. I’m not super super queer like I’m bi and marginal to the community which always felt like it was run by strict lesbian gatekeeping so my point is I learned to easily pass as straight most of the time because it was easier. And I’m not super super Jewish I was raised as a secular skeptic but my family never denied our Jewishness it’s just that we weren’t part of any religious community but I have proudly claimed my identity as a Jew my whole life. And: I used to always feel safe in the queer community. Like it was a safe space. For me, an outsider, a survivor, of many multiple different kinds of trauma, the queer community was safe and welcoming. There were always people who were kind of obsessed with I/P there, but they were a minority and they didn’t attack me or demand loyalty testing , or if they did make a provocation like at a dinner party it was an aberration from the norm and seen as their obsession and no one joined in. For most of my life, I’m talking 40 years, I felt safe in the queer community. And now it’s just completely transformed. I simply know I can’t be Jewish in any queer spaces without encountering rank antisemitism and callous contempt for Jewish suffering. Maybe you could say I’ve departed these spaces and no one has physically pushed me out, but I refuse to prepare my good Jew™️credentials just to go to a fuckin show or some comedy or dinner party and why should I have to tolerate or adapt to constant antisemitism just to be loved and accepted? In fact I was just beginning to feel safe to be publicly more queer and eke out of the internalized homophobia I carry due to my childhood SA but I can’t do that now. No one will welcome me because I didn’t play their trendy game, and my city’s queer community has made it very clear they don’t give a shit about the harm they cause to Jews. There were firebomb attacks and shootings at Jewish schools, antisemitic slogans screamed at protests at synagogues in my city, and these same people are side-by-side with the (literally) inflammatory speech and lies spread, arms linked and posting social media thrillsville fight the power narcissisms to show how pure they are and how filthy Jews are. That’s what happened to my queer community. These are people I was deeply embedded psychologically with, I was chosen family with. My heartbreak is so deep and it’s been months but I still can’t let go . Where did I go wrong? How many families do I get kicked out of for telling the truth? Could I have educated them more before this happened so that I would’ve been able to stay friends with them? And I ask myself, isn’t this what other Jews felt like, throughout history, other marginal Jews who were at the fringes of their identity groups but getting by, and then just got kicked right out and tossed into the big old pile of JEWS WHO DONT MATTER ANYMORE

I'm so sad to see fellow queer Jews having to go through this. Sadly, it's the reality for many of us. I'm so sorry you're going through that. For what it's worth, I'm proud of you for standing up to yourself and setting boundaries and refusing to compromise who you are to please others

[palant1r]

I feel like you're a good person and smart, so here is a question for you. A fanfic site is bound to be popular with kids. Say a child is being abused, and they go to AO3 and all they see is fics romanticizing their abuse/incestual abuse/ etc. It'll tell them it's erotic and enjoyable and A-OK. If they were to read a fic that portrayed it as a bad thing though, then they can see that their abuse is bad. I know it's unrealistic to ban all fics that portray it as a good thing [1/2]

This ask is full of so many wild ass logical leaps and baffling conclusions that I debated not answering it at all, but you've caught me in a good mood with a lot of time on my hands, so.

First of all: methodological concerns. "They did a poll a while back" who the hell is They? Is this a tumblr poll? Why are we assigning any significance to whether or not half of the users who happened to see a tumblr poll that was likely produced by someone who shared their biases THOUGHT that SOMEONE THEY KNEW had seen pedophilia and incest normalized by fic? That's such an ass backwards thing to base any position on.

You want to save the kids. Sure. Admirable goal. But the premise of your proposal here is based entirely on conjecture and the results of some poll that They did. Also, hey, most underage/incest content on ao3 is WELL TAGGED. Meaning that, when someone clicks on it and reads it, even IF the actual subject matter is "romanticized" there is literally a heading for the reader saying "THIS WORK DEPICTS [THING], WHICH IS BAD"

Say a child is abused, and they read Lolita. They make the same mistake as many, many readers and adaptation makers of Lolita, and they think it's a love story, and that makes their abuse "erotic and enjoyable and A-OK."

...Where do we go from here? Do we now decide that, because Lolita is a complex work with multiple layers and a narrator that deliberately uses purple prose and invokes classical literature to hide his own monstrousness, it needs to be banned?

Why should it be the responsibility of art to impart a beneficial personal and social message not just to its target audience, but to literally anyone who might potentially come across it? Why should the writers of a genre overwhelmingly tagged as Explicit, meaning that people have to affirm that they're over 18 before reading it, on a site you have to be 13+ to use, bear the responsibility of Educating the Nation's Youth on what is Right and Proper?

Your rhetoric is familiar. Very familiar. I got fuckin steeped in it over the last summer when I was reporting on anti-trans legislation, wading through Heritage Foundation summit transcripts and hundreds of pages of bills. Hell, I saw the very phrase "normalizes pedophilia" show up in a bill explicitly targeted at banning queer books from schools. The idea that the very existence of material that is "too erotic" poses an existential threat to children, and that any censorship of art is justified if it Saves the Children, is a deeply conservative one.

A personal story: when I was young, I read The Dragonriders of Pern. This was before I'd had any education on sex ed or consent. There's a rape scene in that series. It's very romanticized. Something about it felt off to me, but it was the only sex scene I'd ever read. I just thought that was what sex was like.

About a year later, I read a Stucky fic with a rape scene. The scene was framed as, if not romantic, at least sexualized in a way that played up the danger and angst of the scene, and it was between the endgame couple. This was, I'd wager, something that you'd want banned. In the beginning chapter note, the author called it what it was: rape.

Two rape scenes, both sexualized, both between an endgame couple we were supposed to root for, only separated by their framing. One taught me a bad lesson. One made me realize that what I had read in that book was, in fact, not consensual sex.

My parents, unbeknownst to me, were going through my search history. They sat me down and said they didn't want me reading erotica, not knowing I already had been in published books. If they had their way — if they'd judged things by YOUR standards — I never would have read those explicit fics. Instead, who knows how much longer I would have gone thinking a man forcing himself on a woman was romantic? Ignorance didn't teach me anything. Experience did.

And, IDK. I think back on news stories I've heard of abused children finding their experiences in books about sex and consent, and seeing themselves in them. Being able to point out what was done to them, because they had a point of reference.

So, no, I don't think that banning every fic that "portrays abuse as good" would be remotely desirable even if it were logistically feasible. And I think you need to move past the idea that art only has the right to exist if it's good for children, saving the children is a goal to which all other ideals should be blindly subservient, and if someone says that something "harms kids" that means you need to uncritically take up arms. I say this without hyperbole: that's the kind of thinking that gets people into QAnon.

[bandaiddd]

Boris’ Queer Identity

I made a post about Theo as a queer person, and I felt no need to give evidence because I feel his queerness doesn’t need to be stated but simply exists - and by not making it overt, Tartt shows sexualities don’t need to be linear or stated.

But for Boris, this one passage says so much about his queer experience and identity. Boris kisses Theo goodbye, they both know what needs to be said but neither of them have the courage to be verbal with their love. The novel is from Theo’s pov, so we know that he wishes he said that he loved him. While with Boris, we can only guess through Theo’s perspective.

Boris rejects the idea that their relationship was anything beyond sexual desire, it was messy and troublesome. But, he kissed Theo goodbye. Personally, I don’t think this is the behaviour of a straight man acting on drunken instinct.

So, why does Boris reject their love? As if he hadn’t, I believe their relationship (sexually, not romantically) would have rekindled.

Boris never heals, he is stuck in that addictive cycle just as Theo is. But unlike Theo, he has no opportunities outside of the crime he involves himself in. His father is abusive and someone he escapes early on, he makes decision immaturely that will affect his whole life and therefore, doesn’t receive that opportunity for maturity and education. His life is doomed to a manipulative, grey world of underground crime. This isn’t a place for a queer person, Boris himself may not even know his feelings are romantic for Theo because of this.

Meanwhile, Theo has so much after his life’s failures. He has the antique shop, schools matching his intelligence, a caring guardian and a future (even though his destructiveness bleeds into his career and future). Theo had so much time to reflect, and seems embarrassed, humiliated and insulted by the insinuation he was the only one who felt so deeply about them. Boris calls him back, he always does, whether it’s out of guilt of the painting or love doesn’t really matter. As he creates this rope, where he can always pull Theo back to him and find him. Boris always wanted to return the painting, it wasn’t his intention to lose it.

I do believe they were the most in love between all the relationships, with Pippa it was more obsession, and with Kotku it was power play - a way for Boris to obtain control over in his life. Maybe he tried to do this with Theo, but lost control in how he felt for him.

It’s clear through their goodbye that Boris feels something for Theo, regardless of whether or not he knows it. His rejection of that is fair, his life is not built for that type of love - the same could be said for Theo. Tartt captures the tragic complexity of queer identities perfectly through their roles in the story, it is essential to share these complex, destructive and forgotten queer love stories that aren’t depressingly tragic, as they do reunite, and do resolve so much together.

Anyways, this is way too long and I hope people actually understand what I’m trying to say as I’m incredibly tired and struggling to articulate words correctly.

[bfpnola]

Hey! This is @reaux07 and I just wanted to re-introduce our org! I am the current executive director of Better Future Program (BFP), a 501(c)(3) youth-run nonprofit headquartered in Bulbancha on Chahta Yakni and Chitimacha land. We envision a future in which youth are not only empowered to challenge oppressive hierarchies each day, but to create new, innovative, and inclusive frameworks of community care and intersectional justice.

Since 2016, our team has been dedicated to educating the masses on various academic subjects, mental health, and most importantly, social injustices that affect today's youth. We even offer over 3,000 free novels, movies, podcasts, and more just to fulfill this goal.

Here's the catch though! Since BFP is youth-run, many of our volunteers are students. During both the holidays and the start of each semester, we always experience a dramatic drop in participation, often meaning our workshops go from being run by 65 people to just 3 or 4. Currently, this is unsustainable for both our organization and our individual mental health. That's where YOU come in.

We need more volunteers! We'd like to not only fill up all of our leadership roles but have more than enough participants to allow each person's responsibilities to be greatly lessened. This would mean we could continue serving marginalized communities, uninterrupted, internationally, while still allowing volunteers to take breaks! We are only human. And even more so, many of us are only teens or children! We need your help.

And guess what? We have a $5,000 grant as gifted by the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana as well as nearly $600 in donations, all to go towards commissioning marginalized artists, mutual aid networks, and so on. Help us develop these plans further so we can service YOUR community today (e.g. we are currently sponsoring a chest binder drive for a local high school).

If you are interested in filling a leadership role, applying as a general volunteer (no specific responsibilities), or are simply interested in learning why we use a committee-based, horizontal organizational structure, tap here. There is something for everyone, promise!

And if you are interested in interacting with our community, our Discord server is linked here and our Linktr.ee below:

Please share to help support a Black-, woman-, queer-, disabled-, and youth-run organization!

[krirebr]

So, I've been going back and forth about sharing this here but it's really been dominating my thoughts for the last two days, and while I've talked about it a lot with friends, I'm hoping that writing everything down will help me process things. And maybe other people, especially aspec people might be able to relate.

I mentioned on Wednesday that I'd had a really terrible evening that had really shaken and upset me. Below the cut, I want to share what happened.

TWs for references to depression, aphobia, exclusionism, and bad therapy (there's probably a better word for it but I'm not sure what it would be.)

So some of you know that I started this year with a pretty intense depressive episode. It was bad enough that I had to take a leave of absence from work and pretty much spent that whole time crying in bed. It's taken a lot of work over the last few months to get myself back to a more stable place. A big part of that work has been regularly going to therapy.

I went to therapy on and off as a kid and in college, but not at all since then. All of my previous therapeutic experience was long before I came out as aroace. There's a long, ongoing history of aspec identities being medicalized and pathologized and that's something I was very aware of while looking for a therapist this time around. But I was also really desperate for help. So I chose as wisely as I could and crossed my fingers.

I chose a queer therapist who specialized in LGBTQ issues. I told them I was aroace in my first session and while they didn't seem very familiar at all, they also didn't make me overly explain myself or want to focus on that rather than the very real and urgent issues I had come to them for, which is what I'd been most worried about.

As I continued to meet with them weekly, they would sometimes ask questions about it, and while it was pretty clear they didn't really get it, they were respectful about it and it wasn't interfering with the help I actually needed.

That brings me to my appointment this Wednesday. I didn't have anything really pressing to discuss so they asked about my plans for the week and I mentioned that I was getting my hair cut and I was excited because I've been feeling lately like my hair is really hetero (I use that word instead of straight because my hair is so, so curly 😂) and I was looking forward to having queer hair again. They stopped. "Wait," they said, "I'm confused. Why did you use that word to describe yourself?" It had never occurred to them that aspec identities would be considered part of the queer community. They, in fact, had an incredibly narrow definition of the word queer - gay, just gay. And they didn't consider asexuality or aromanticism to be orientations at all.

My memories of the following conversation are pretty jumbled, but some highlights included such chestnuts as "What if you meet the right person one day?", asserting that the A in LGBTQIA+ stands for ally, there has to be a sexual component to romantic relationships, and "everyone has to have attraction, humans are sexual beings." They also said that we should dig into my childhood going forward because they were sure there was something there that caused this. I had a pretty traumatic middle school experience (bullying and some psychosomatic stuff that stemmed from that) and they were pretty eager to blame all that for this.

I became increasingly defensive and combative as this conversation went on (which if you know me, isn't like me at all). It ended with us both feeling very bad and uncomfortable.

I think they kind of came around a little bit by the end. They seemed open to educating themselves and even sent me a link to an article they'd found after our session. And that's great, I guess? But the whole thing made me want to crawl out of my skin. I cried a lot when I got home.

I'm not exactly sure what to do from here. My initial plan was to go next week, talk through what happened, offer some context for why I had gotten so defensive, and discuss together whether this was going to be a good long-term fit. But that's feeling less and less likely the more I think about it (I haven't been able to stop thinking about it). This is just such a big part of who I am. And it's a part of myself that I like and am proud of! And I just can't imagine a situation where I would ever feel safe talking about this aspect of my life with them. And I don't really want therapy where I'm constantly having to censor myself. So do I even go to my next appointment? I really don't know.

I know there's a lot of hopelessness in the aspec community around getting mental health care and I really don't want to add to that. I don't want to believe that we can't get help for our actual issues without mental health professionals just wanting to fix things that don't actually need to be fixed. And I hope that's not the moral or ultimate outcome of this story. I've talked to my very lovely network of queer friends and several of them have already said that they'll reach out to their contacts to find some recommendations for me. I deserve to get the help that I need in a space that is actually safe. And my need isn't as urgent as I was. I can take my time now to find someone I'm fully comfortable with.

I'm not sure exactly why I shared this. I don't always get so personal on here. And some of you have already heard it (thank you for being such good friends, seriously). But it's just been festering inside of me for the past two days and I really needed to share it. Thank you for listening.

[incorrectmahabharatquotes]

I know the history of the word Hindu. I was simply using it to give you clarity.

You've made your perspective clear. Deflection and whataboutism are your weapons.

You are so quick to play your dalit card everywhere, but you forget that dalits were among the persecuted Hindus too. I never denied that the caste system is evil and needs to be gone completely. Why bring it up in a conversation where it wasn't even an issue?

You're so far into your leftie liberal mode that you don't even realise that you're here because of the efforts of fellow Hindus' efforts to abolish the caste system and bring in reservations to compensate for the oppression. It's still a work in progress but there's definitely progress.

Moreover, had this nation been running on the same values as Islamic rulers of the past who broke our temples, you'd be killed just for being a queer or being a Hindu who didn't convert.

Just look at the minorities in other Islamic countries.

But you won't, I know. Because hating fellow Hindus and denying history is more important for you. It's the cool thing to do these days.

One day you'll learn, hopefully soon. I wish you luck. 🙏

How dare you say Babasaheb Ambedkar was a Hindu when he died a Buddhist and swore to not die a Hindu. How dare you insist that the real people who worked towards societal change for women, Dalit and Adivasi people, like Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule, did so at 0 cost of their 'Hindu' society. Savitribai Phule did not have shit flung at her every day by brahmins for you to say 'Hindu' as though they weren't the ones who opposed her attempt to educate girls.

How dare you, lastly, insist that Dalits are ALSO Hindu, as though they haven't been dehumanised and humiliated for centuries on end and prevented from entering temples out of 'Impurity'.

In all our arguments, I find it INCREDIBLY funny that you seem to always focus on Muslim invaders, but never at all focus on the kind of bullshit the British wrecked on us. I'll tell you why: its because the British were the ones to club ALLLLLLL these varied identities together under a wishy washy 'Hindu' label in censuses. Dalit people are also under this label BECAUSE OF CLERICAL LAZINESS.

And this shit worked PERFECTLY for Hindu Nationalists. The more uniform our 'identity' got, the better. But of course, caste was essential to the functioning of 'Hindu' society.

So I give you this chance to inform me: What kind of society acts like this? Why are Dalit children beaten in schools for touching the wrong water pot? And forgive me for assuming, but if you have a household help who comes by, why do you treat her in a way which is 'different' to your family? Why is your circle of friends the same 3 people from the same community? Why do we live in this kind of society? What morality are we functioning on? Tell me, without resorting to justifying henious acts by saying 'Dharma'. I dare you.

-Mod G

--------------------------------------------------

Hello again, Anon-Who-Has-Unfollowed-But-Is-Still-Here-Inexplicably,

Mod G actually replied to you before I did. You didn't say about their reply. That's fascinating. They answered your ask in a far more direct way so I thought adding the same thing would be redundant. Turns out, it wouldn't have been redundant because you didn't even read what they said. Who knew.

You know what? I actually did say what the conquerors did was wrong. I directly talked about it. That's not what-aboutery. Did you not even read that part? I said what they did was wrong and what you're doing is wrong too. (I'm saying it again because you seem to be under the impression that I'm not holding these historical figures responsible for their actions sufficiently enough for your taste.)

I talked about being dalit in terms of reclamation and reparation. It is directly related to the topic you were talking about. Sure, free to tell me that I should be grateful to my "fellow Hindus" and should express that gratefulness by shutting my mouth and not criticizing them when they're doing something wrong. Got it. All that work-in-progress you talk about but I should still know my place and not speak over savarna Hindus. Understood.

Newsflash, the said beloved Hindus will ALSO gladly kill me for being a queer, as you put it. Right now, in fact. We're not exactly a queer-friendly nation, if you haven't noticed.

You also seem to be under the impression that Hindus=Hindutva which is just a wrong assumption on your part. In fact, from all the replies we're getting it seems to me that the other Hindus disagree with your hindutva politics. What do you make of that?

But yes, I'm a filthy leftie liberal blah-blah. I'm hating Hindus because I said something they're doing is wrong. But all you do is keep talking about Muslims and Islamic countries and don't even wonder why.

-Mod S

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

reading updates: september 2023

AHOY EVERYBODY!!! the end of the month has really crept up on me and lo, I have no finished as many books as I thought I would by this point! but so it goes.

also I'm fighting for my life trying to get through all of the library books I have checked out, which is a bummer because there are a bunch of creepy books I want to start reading for Spooky Month! but time is an illusion and I've already made my peace with Spooky Month extending into November, so whatever happens happens, babey! but that's the future, right now we need to talk about what I've been reading for the past month.

A View from the Bottom: Asian American Masculinity and Sexual Representation (Nguyen Tan Hoang, 2014) - Nguyen's dissertation is a really fascinating piece of queer scholarship, which gets deep (pun somewhat intended) into forms of media often overlooked by academia - gay porn, softcore art films, gay indie documentaries - in search of a new understanding of Asian masculinity and bottomhood. I really like Nguyen's thoughtful study of bottoming, effeminacy, and sexual abjection, all of which he's pretty in favor of, balanced with analyses of the factors of race, class, nationality, and citizenship that complicate how gay Asian men are perceived. it's wide-ranging, it's meticulous, it's kind of hot? I love you, queers in academia.

"You Just Need to Lose Weight" and 19 Other Myths About Fat People (Aubrey Gordon, 2023) - god, okay, listen: this book was a little dry TO ME but ONLY BECAUSE I have already spent years listening to Aubrey Gordon discuss all 19 of these myths and a bunch of other shit on her excellent podcast, Maintenance Phase. if you don't listen to Maintenance Phase either start doing that or read this book! which is extremely well-researched and great for debunking pretty much every "justification" a person might off to try and make their fatphobia sound reasonable. frankly if I could load up copies of YJNTLW into, like, a t-shirt gun to just have on standby to fire at people, I would do that.

Sorry, Bro (Taleen Voskuni, 2023) - yeah you all already know about this book, which is the one in which a 27 year old brings the narrative to a screeching halt to assure the readers that it's okay for her to hook up with a 31 year old woman because despite the so-called age gap both of their brains are fully-cooked. that's not actually the worst part of this book; the worst part is that the prose is unpolished in the extreme and the main character is kind of a dumb asshole. cannot say I recommend it, no matter how desperate you may be for bisexual Armenian representation.

Brown and Gay in LA: The Lives of Immigrant Sons (Anthony Christian Ocampo, 2022) - I really like the way Ocampo writes his nonfiction, which is very chatty and extremely accessible (if a little prone to editorializing). I love seeing sociologists writing from the community the community they live in, and these interviews come from second generation queer Latino and Filipino men frequenting the same LA clubs and coffee shops as the gay second gen Filipino author. it kills the presumed spectator that a lot of writing on marginalized communities can fall victim to; here, it's not that brown gay men need to be explained, but rather outsiders who need to make the effort to keep up with their lives. I especially appreciated Ocampo's highlighting the disparity between Latino and Filipino men's experiences in education, where very different sets of racial stereotypes impact their ability to succeed in white-dominated school systems; if you're curious about why Latino and Filipino men are categorized together at all in this study I strongly recommend Ocampo's other book, the Latinos of Asia.

The Vanishing Half (Brit Bennett, 2020) - it's always kind of astonishing when something that was extremely hyped-up and buzzy turns out to actually be as good as all that, and the Vanishing Half really was that good. the premise of two light-skinned Black twins separating so that one can "pass over" and live her life as a white woman is compelling all on its own, but Bennett is so committed to every possible angle of this premise: what does it mean to live more than one life? what other ways are people more than one person? it shows up everywhere through this novel: in losing your twin, in transing your gender, in drag performances, in actors, in people moving to new towns where no one knows them and becoming someone else. the moment it really hit me that Bennet Got It was a completely innocuous sentence that identified a Korean restaurant owner in California as a man who had attended medical school in Korea - even this background character, who we'll hardly hear from again, has been a different person in a different life! everyone has these layers and layers and different sides of themselves and it's just beautifully executed. mwah. chef's kiss.

[luane-horlis]

This is long and I apologize but I don’t have any other social media and sometimes you’ve just gotta scream into the void.

My first job in a library was a tiny rural community college with an even tinier library. The collection was mostly academic but we did have a couple shelves of kids books for early childhood education majors. No kids were really ever in there, except for one or two bored middle schoolers tagging along with a parent who needed to do homework.

This was around 2008 or so, when I was in undergrad at a Big College in the city and between that and seeing Callie and Arizona on Grey’s Anatomy I was taking my first nervous step into “huh, maybe I am one of them queers…” I had no elder queer role models in my life and there were zero out gay kids in my tiny rural southern high school, so that was quite literally my first experience with sapphic love (and Sara Ramirez is still insanely hot, I’m very very gay for her to this day.) All of this is to set the stage of me as a painfully shy, extremely sheltered, very closeted 20-something with my first real job at a library, the thing I wanted to do When I Grew Up.

We had just gotten a copy of the book And Tango Makes Three, which if you don’t know, is about two male penguins who were pair bonded and raise a chick together. My boss, a middle aged white man, was debating on whether he should catalog it for the kids section or the adult section. I thought he was nuts.

“It’s a children’s story book, why would you want to put it in the adult section?”

“Well, it’s two male penguins…”

“So?”

“It’s inappropriate…”

“How? They’re not doing anything graphic in the book, they just raise a chick together.”

Having gone to grad school and completed my Masters I now know this guy was just a shit-ass librarian who needed to exit the profession, but at the time I was boggled he even had one second thought over cataloging a children’s book as a children’s book. I, again a painfully shy 5’3” 20 year old, almost got into a shouting match with my 6ft 50 something boss over a penguin book, but he ultimately put it in with the children’s books when the Dean of Libraries told him in no uncertain terms to fuck off with his bullshit.

When I got this job working with kids and teens I resolved to be the queer adult I really needed in my own teens so I didn’t have to endure such a horrible comphet upbringing. I have pride pins and pronoun buttons on my lanyard, I wear probably way too many rainbows, I make pride book displays, I’m in the library’s pride discord, and if the YA manager asks I’ll be at every teen pride cafe program to just stand there like “hey, I’m an Adult Queer and we’re here if you need us.”

All of the above is just to say that I’m tired. At my current library we now have an asshole county councilman demanding on behalf of “numerous complaints from concerned citizens” that we move all children’s materials about gender identity and sexuality from the children’s section to the adult section “to protect the kids” and I’m just so tired. It’s 2023.

Protect the kids from what, the same miserable anxiety-ridden tween and teen years I had thinking I was fucking wrong and abnormal for the way I felt? Of being so lonely with no one to talk to and nothing to turn to like, oh, an age appropriate book for information and comfort? I still deal with feeling absolutely worthless and like I’m unloveable now in my mid-fucking 30s from growing up like that so excuse me if I want kids to have access to things which help them grow up safe and knowing they have value without fear.

I’m not giving up, I’m still fighting every damn day to do what I can in my limited scope but fucking hell, I’m tired.

[solarbird]

The long arc of Boomer politics, of resistance, and what Millennials & Zoomers can win starting now

Yesterday, I wrote – mostly to GenX, but also to Millennials and Zoomers – about holding the line one more time. In that post, I talked a little about how some of us have been doing that job this long in order to keep some semblance of a Republic until the cavalry – in the form of a group larger than the Baby Boom – could show up, and still have the tools to take power peacefully, and in a timely fashion.

Today I’m writing for Millennials and for Zoomers. I’m going to expand on yesterday, talk about history, talk about why politics have been as they’ve been in ways you maybe haven’t heard before, and I’m going to talk about the massive opportunity you have now to change this fucking game.

But I have to talk about history first. There’s context, and you need it.

Most of you reading this have never seen actual Generation X politics. Unless you’re from Seattle, or the greater Seattle area, you definitely never have. You’ve only seen Baby Boom politics. What you’re seeing now is still Baby Boom politics, the underlying dynamic unchanging and now crystalised, ritualised, and radicalised over the decades since they took power.

That’s happened in part because the Baby Boom never wanted to talk to anyone else, and didn’t have to. They had a saying – “don’t trust anyone over 30” – that inverted and became “don’t trust anyone under 30″ the moment they hit their 30s. As a group, they’ve despised everyone younger than them my entire life, writing early on that GenX was either “a generation of Darwinesque hyper-predators” (fun stuff if you’re 12) or “useless lazy slackers incapable of achievement” from the very beginning. Most of the time it manifests as simply being locked out and ignored, but I’ve had that raw generational contempt thrown directly at me, more than once – even here in Seattle.

But the thing about Seattle is… we outnumber them here. It’s the only place in the US where we outnumber them. They’ve had to deal with other people, whether they liked it or not. Because of that, they couldn’t really lock into that inward-facing self-reinforcing spiral. They had reality checks and external feedback they had to grapple with, and so… their politics stayed way, way more normal.

So if you want to know what Generation X politics would’ve looked like in a more traditional American pattern, where each generation is larger than the previous – hi. It’s in Seattle, and to a lesser degree Washington State. We’re willing to elect socialists who call themselves socialists and actually have something like a centre-left, and it’s not just downtown.

I mean, there are reasons that Donald Trump didn’t win the white vote here, and this is a big part of it. According to exit polling at the time, he didn’t get the non-college-educated white male majority here in 2016. It was close! But even with the dry side of the state involved – a lot of which is rabidly christofascist – Donald Trump didn’t even win non-college-educated white men, his core, statewide in 2016.

(It’s also a factor in why the Battle of Seattle could happen, I am just saying. I was there.)

But outside Seattle, and outside Washington State, you’re generally looking at Boomer politics. And I think Generation X has always kinda known that was going to happen, in that we were never going to have a turn at power. Certainly not at the national scale.

Some of us, in fact, have not just known that but have also understood it, which is a different thing. I spent enough time east for school, I could see what was coming and how it was going to play out, and how it was going to be such a long, long war for the Republic – and largely, an effort just to hold. To be a backstop. A centre-left line to keep civil society and elections until someone bigger than them could finally come along.

The fact that we even managed to win on a few fronts – queers, I’m looking at us, but not just us – that was amazing. And also outliers, let’s not kid ourselves. But I’ll take those victories and celebrate them.

So when everything looks so rigid and hopeless and stale, and when you’re seeing “elections don’t fix it, everything just gets worse,” that’s why it looks that way, even when it isn’t actually like that.

Because thanks to their sheer size, their sheer numbers, the Boom just plain outmassed everyone else since like 1980 and everyone’s had to play by their rules all this time.

We could win a round here and there, and even make some real progress in narrow but important areas. But we couldn’t change the game. Hence our fight to keep a civil society not in the politeness sense but in the sense of functional institutions sense, and the fight to keep elections not in the “technically there are elections” sense but in the “elections that can have outcomes Republicans don’t like” sense.

We are at the very tail end of that war now. We have almost won a war most people haven’t even been aware that we’ve been fighting.

2024 is the last best shot they have. They want to keep power, because of course they do. They grabbed it early – skipping ahead of the Silent generation – and haven’t talked to anyone else about power since, just like so many of them never talked to anyone outside their cohort they didn’t have to. But this year is pretty much the end of their dominance unless they can rig everything to keep the appearance of power until they actually die, and they know it.

And by “they know it,” I mean, I actually heard Boomer rightists saying things to that effect in 2016, amongst themselves.

That’s why everything changes after this election, but not during this election. 2024 is the tipping point. Still the old rules, but hopefully the end of them.

If we win – and we will win if we fight – it’ll be because Millennials and Zoomers stepped in and said “that’s enough, grampa.” And everyone who actually works and understands politics will know it.

And since everyone will know it, everything – EVERYTHING – will start to re-orient itself around you. Around Millennials and around Zoomers. It won’t be all at once, but it will absolutely happen.

As long as you keep showing up, as long as you start doing the work, every mechanic of power, every political interest group, every big money, every piece of the machine will start to turn towards you. Because whatever else may be true, the professionals know where the power lies, and it’ll lie with you.

Not us, not GenX. We have a voice in Cascadia, and I love my country-not-a-country bioregion, but that’s the only place we get one. The power brokers will skip us, like they always have. They’ve never figured out how to market to GenX, they thought they were going to “own” Millennials (literal quote there on ‘own’ btw), and they have no idea at all what to do with Zoomers and I thank the gods for it.

It’ll be you, Millennials and Zoomers. You. You will be the ones everyone cares about, as the new power centre of politics. The Baby Boom will try to grab power back, but as long as you keep showing up, they won’t pull it off. In practical terms, it’ll be over.

If we win. Which we will, if we fight and fight together.

But for this election, we’re still under the old rules. The Baby Boom rules, the Baby Boom politics, the Baby Boom control. That’s why I’m praying this can be GenX’s last hurrah as a resistance force, and that’s why I write so much about holding the goddamn line once again, just like so many of us – not all of us, but so many – have done our entire lives.

One more time, no matter how much you hate having to pick between two doddering old monsters…

…we gotta hold the line. We gotta hold the line for your sake, and for our own. Just like we always have.

But after that?

After that, as long as you keep showing up…

…it’ll be all about you.

You’re so close to being able to start taking power and setting the agenda. After all these years, it’s finally the time when you can actually start to do it.

But you gotta help us hold the line in ’24, first. We gotta hold again one, last time, the old way.

And then it’ll be yours.

If you’re willing to take it.

Are you ready?

110 days remain.

-----

[extended commentary and a lot of replies at source]

[lasersheith]

I really need to stop looking into the comments on posts on here. I just saw a big post about the current admin pardoning a bunch of military personnel who had been court martialed and dishonorably discharged effectively for being caught having gay sex and the notes added many more cuts in my faith for the future turning out ok. So many people were like "it's bad actually that gay former soldiers are going to be allowed to vote and have access to VA benefits like healthcare now, because they signed up to be soldiers and are therefore evil and bad and deserve nothing."

Do you understand how manipulative military recruiters are? Do you understand how hard it used to be (and in a lot of places still is) to be queer and poor and stuck living with your unsupportive family? Do you have any idea how expensive college is in the United States? How expensive healthcare is? Retirement? Fucking housing even?

So many people join the military here because they have no other choice. Their family has bad credit or no credit and they can't get loans for college. They can't leave their unsupportive community without a job or a school to go to. And then a big tall man in a shiny uniform with a bunch of fancy ribbons comes to their high school senior year and says "look at all this good stuff you could have, look at all these cool places you can travel. We'll even pay for your bachelor's degree, and if you're really good maybe even something beyond that. All you have to do is sign on the dotted line and we'll tell you where to go." And then you get there and they tell you exactly what to do, what to say, what to wear, how to cut your hair, how to stand, how to walk, give you things to eat that always taste the same at exactly the same time. For a lot of neuro divergent people it's like heaven. Finally there are rules and you can learn all of them and none of them are secret they're all in the book you got on day one.

And then they traumatize the shit out of you. Convince you to do things you otherwise wouldn't because you're inside the propaganda machine and everyone you know and everyone you trust is doing this so you do it too. And then you come and your world falls apart and everyone abandons you.

I'm not saying we should worship the US military or that the military industrial complex isn't one of the largest forces for evil in this world, but that is not the fault of the large percentage of the regular ass people who get suckered into joining up because they have no other options. The fact that the entire strategy hinges on offering these desperate people (most of them barely adults yet) healthcare and education and housing in exchange for their indentured servitude for literal years of their lives is the fucked up part.

It's also a big part of why it's so hard to get education and healthcare reform in this country. What would we offer soldiers if everyone got healthcare and education for reasonable prices? Which is obviously fucked up, but again, not the fault of the desperate people who sign up for the deal.