#y'all love to call people bigots until it comes to actual bigoted people

[thee-radio-host-is-a-kookaburra]

[iputthediscoindiscourse]

Another bi women used lesbianism to shock her parents instead of actually considering what she was attracted to :) and is now going on to suck and fuck and breed with men :)) and now a whole bunch of homophobes plus other lesbians will see this and their doubt about lesbianism will grow deeper :))) larping like a tra because you think lesbianism is a fucking haircut and then pulling right out of it with no apology, go fuck yourself homophobe

As I stated before in the other hate I got, the fact you sent this as an anon proves you are a pathetic coward who needs tons of therapy and help to actually be a functioning human.

Another bi women used lesbianism to shock her parents instead of actually considering what she was attracted to :)

You know when I told my mother I thought I was gay she made it about herself told me she knew i was a lesbian since I was a preteen cause of how I fangirled over Demi Lovato and Taylor Swift. Then admitted to outing me to my father, which explains why he would randomly call me a pervert and a pedophile because to him homosexuality equals pedophilia. Like actually from the time I was 20 to the time I was 23 I literally had no attraction to the male sex at all. Like it was most definitely a trauma response,but like I was a lesbian for like 3 ish years until I did that shroom trip and realized I was in love with a good friend of mine, who happens to be a male. Also fun fact my parents still think I am a lesbian because I haven't talked to them in a few years now sooo.

and is now going on to suck and fuck and breed with men :))

For how much anti-porn radfems say they are this screams like you are a regular porn watcher and adopted the extremely violent language in this media, and use it for people who you do not like. This statement also reduces me to a sex object, which again is antithetical to radical feminism.

and now a whole bunch of homophobes plus other lesbians will see this and their doubt about lesbianism will grow deeper :)))

How does me figuring out my sexuality and gender identity, harm others? You do realize I was in a high control environment until I was about 20 ish and then didn't have really any freedom until I came up to nyc earlier this year right? Like everyone is in the process of growing and finding oneself whether they want to believe it or not. The fact that hate has overcrowded your heart like this, makes me feel sorry for you. The fact you look at the world like this, screams you need some serious help and I hope to God you find it.

larping like a tra because you think lesbianism is a fucking haircut and then pulling right out of it with no apology

how am I like a TRA? Yeah I did have some sex dysphoria was a preteen, teenager and a little bit up til my early 20s, but most of it I worked through on shrooms so, I am just a gender conforming cisgendered bisexual woman. Nothing wrong with that!! Where tf did I say lesbian is a look? I said me being gnc was a cope, I didn't specify why. Which that stems from the fact my parents wanted a son, not a daughter and they bullied me and were rude and cruel to me over my sex, and I thought if I acted more masculine they would love me more. Well that backfired. Pulling out without an apology? what the fuck are you talking about bro?? how is my personal growth have anything to do with others??? Like I wanted to post a cute life update and you people just come for my throat; which proves why I am not the biggest fan of radfems anymore. Most of y'all are hateful bigots with complexes that obscure you from being kind or understanding. Which if you want women's liberation you need to be kind and understanding,which you are neither and I hope to god you find some goddamn peace cause you fucking need it.

go fuck yourself homophobe

How am I homophobic? Like anon you don't know me at all, like now to toot my own horn but there are some bloggers who orbit the same circles as us who know me irl and they will disagree with this statement a lot sooo lol

[shelobussy]

I know you talk abou st*cky in the interracial ships stuff, but can we talk about st*ny? Iron husbands is literally right there, but I also always sees Rhodey as Tonys moral support only. And ik Tony is very shippable with most characters, but the fact his ship is Rhodey is one of the lowest ships in ao3 (ironstrange, winteriron and god forbid stark*r all had more fics in ao3).. It's pretty telling this side also has racism problems...

I'll go ahead and answer this here, but letting y'all know that I do have a marvel sideblog if you want to hit me up there (@themarvelarchives).

Hey, I'm going to ramble for a good minute.

So after I posted my very incoherent, controversial take on St*cky vs SamBucky, there were a ton of ppl who came onto anon saying that St*cky shippers were racist. I think I only answered a few, but y'all were pretty insistent on it. I personally have not observed that St*cky shippers are so I'm not calling anyone out on that side of the fandom for that.

I also did not call out anyone on this side of the fandom bc that's not what my meta was about. I think I mentioned maybe once or twice in the whole post that there was underlying racist in the fandom, but since you asked, we can talk about it here.

Covert Bigotry In Fandom Spaces.

To understand what's going on in the MCU, we have to first look at what I call "woke-queer" fandom.

So "Woke-Queer" Spaces is the phenomenon where certain fandom members like to call ppl out on their bigotry, while covertly harboring their own queerphobia/racism/etc. An example of this that we're all familiar with is TERFS and how they like to claim that they are progressive and woke, while also claiming that trans women are fake and trans men are sexist.

How this translates to fandom, however, is the hypocrisy that is cancellation and callout culture.

For example, Supernatural in particular is a fandom that likes to call out the writers on their homophobia and racism, and yet, somehow, the fandom is chalk full of homophobia and racism. If you want to read more about this, here is a truly excellent article from the perspective of a queer woman of color.

Moving on, I've also talked in a previous meta post, on the internalized acephobia that exploded in 2019 after Good Omens was released. Rather than reiterate everything I said in that post, I'll just leave it at this: the controversy in the Good Omens fandom can be summed up by the fact that queer audiences are claiming that Ineffable Husbands is the wrong kind of queer. The hypocrisy oozes off the screen, doesn't it?

A final way this viably translates to fandom, is in how the Doctor Who fandom evolved over time.

So Steven Moffat takes over as head writer and showrunner in 2010. It's a new series, a new Doctor, a new Tardis, and new branding. He steps up the action, changes the color grating, and raises the stakes. Women are sexier, the Doctor is smarter (and more of an asshole, but that's another meta post), and every companion comes with their own impossible mystery that makes them Special™.

Series 5-10 got tons of woke points for having lesbian characters, an episode where the Doctor is homoerotic with James Corden, and an underlying trans narrative with the Master's reincarnation. What a lot of people forget, however, is that his series was incredibly sexiest, incredibly lesbian/biphobic, and basically turned the Doctor into everyone's fantasy sex-object.

This, unfortunately, brought out the worst of the fandom. There was RTD Era vs Moffat Era wars exploding in certain corners, TenxRose shippers vs ElevenxRiver shippers.

What does this have to do with covert racism in fandom cultures though?

Hnnngng ok, so back in RTD era's we get Martha Jones, the Actual Best Companion On The Entire Show. Except for the fact, of course, that she is written to be in love with the doctor. She's a brilliant character--smart, sassy, flawed, funny, flirtatious--and her entire plotline is reduced down to a school-girl crush on a white man.

She doesn't do well with fans, they scrap her after one season.

We move on to Donna Noble (The Other Actual Best Companion On The Entire Show) and RTD's era ends with them scraping her too and regenerating David Tennant's Doctor.

It will be five more series (not seasons, SERIES) until Doctor Who will have another black companion--who gets extra points for being gay--only to fall victim to "bury your gays" at the end of the season (but not really bc no one stays dead on Doctor Who).

The fandom's reception of Martha Jones was historically bad. The comparisons to her predecessor, Rose Tyler, were rampant and everyone was finding a reason to hate her.

The fandom's reception to Bill Potts was also historically bad, as everyone was screaming that she was being written for more "woke points" and that they wanted Clara back.

Fandom has a historically bad reputation of being problematic and, I would argue, the majority of it has to do with these toxic undertones of bigotry that slip under the radar. "Woke-queer" spaces, as I call them, are these instances above where spaces that claim to be inclusive of gender/orientation/race are covertly bigoted.

Marvel and Cancelling

Now is an excellent time to talk about the MCU.

Anthony Mackie (Sam Wilson) has recently come under a lot of criticism from fandom members for shutting down shipper speculation.

"The idea of two guys being friends and loving each other in 2021 is a problem because of the exploitation of homosexuality. [...] something as pure and beautiful as homosexuality has been exploited by people who are trying to rationalize themselves."

I can't find the rest of the quote, but Mackie goes on further to say that it was important to him to portray "a sensitive, masculine figure" without insinuating that there was romance involved.

Woke culture lost it's shit. Everyone was suddenly claiming that Mackie was calling them exploitative for shipping a gay ship as a queer audience, which could not have been further from the case.

Mackie actually makes some very excellent points in that sensitivity is not gay/queer. Woke culture loves to rag on Toxic Masculinity, but the minute someone plays a character who is loving and sensitive with no queer narrative in mind, they are immediately canceled.

What Am I On About

Okay, let's actually address what your ask was about, Nonnie. You pointed out--rather truthfully--that it is unfair to call-out racism on one side of the fandom, while ignoring it on the other side.

Well, I've gone back through my St*cky vs. SamBucky analysis (which is incoherent at best, I apologize for that) and I see maybe once instance where I called out fandom members for being racist. Here's what I had to say about racism:

"[...] Iron Husbands is a rarepair, probably because it’s an interracial ship."

"[there is] nothing wrong with shipping two white men, but it does become a problem when you ignore/bash POC/interracial ships to the determinant of your own white ship."

And then there was the post you brought up where I addressed interracial ships in the fandom. That one is probably more relevant to this topic, to be honest, as I actually addressed fandom racism there. I assume that your reason for bringing up Stony is because it's a ship that is more relevant to my side of the fandom, HOWEVER, the reason I highlighted Stucky instead was because I was comparing the fact that they've both been around the same amount of time and are relationships that feature the protagonist and their best friend.

You brought up St*ny in the ask, however, so I'm going to talk about St*ny for a minute.

As someone who never has nor will ship St*ny, it never even occurred to me that some of the problem behind the Iron Husbands tag being so small is because everyone ships the white, boring ship. You brought up a very valid point, but because I was never in that part of the fandom, I can't really speak to any possible underlying racism there, besides what I've already said above.

I would be interested in hearing a St*ony shipper or ex-St*ony shippers thought on this, but sadly I don't know any. If you have any more thoughts regarding this, Nonnie, pls drop back into my inbox.

You do make some excellent points in this ask though, and I would like to talk about racism on my side of the fandom.

So back to Mackie and his Twitter cancellation. Notice that Disney made him address the rumors and not his co-star, Sebastian Stan. Anthony Mackie is put on blast and made to answer fan demands and receives backlash, while Sebastian Stan gets to fly under the rader. This is not, by the way, a criticism of Stan, but instead of the blatant racism Disney has been displaying over the past few years.

How this ties in with the rest of my post has to do with my "woke-queer" spaces bit. The outcry across the MCU fandom over Mackie was swift and unforgiving. He was cancelled on charges of homophobia and bigotry--all the while these same fans turn a blind eye to any queer interpretation of other interracial ships and discourse in their own fandom.

The racism that I'm speaking about, of course, is an almost passive racism. Of course if you don't ship a specific ship for reasons other than their race, it's perfectly fine. It's okay not to ship Iron Husbands or SamBucky or any other interracial fandom ships. However, the distinct lack of shippers in the fandom IS telling because there are people who would ship that exact ship if not for the fact that one of men is black.

I don't have much more to say about this except to thank you for bringing it up and for listening to my long rambling post.

(Feel free to bug me about Tony Stark, MCU ships, MCU Meta and anything you want to talk me about on this blog and @themarvelarchives.)

[your-naked-magic-oh-dear-lord]

I didn't want to clutter up Trans Mom's post but I want to say something regarding it.

Not long after I came out as nonbinary, one of my dear friends, a pre-transition trans woman, made an offhand comment about how the world will never take trans people seriously as long as people make up nonsense like ethereal genders, or no genders, or genders in between, etc.

I commented back "you're a fucking truscum?" thought better of it, edited to "transmedicalist" and then remembered that this poor kid had the cock of conservatism so far down their throat, they can't breathe, so I deleted the comment knowing we couldn't have an actual conversation about it.

(my friend is trans, and I want to use female pronouns, but they're still dealing with metric tons of internalized transphobia, and won't let us. But I feel really guilty and uncomfortable calling them male pronouns because they deal with so much disphoria. So please forgive me for using they/them on this context here.)

My friend (at the time) was a 27 year old, 6 ft. tall, half-Mexican, half-Ethnic Jewish, bi/pan/vaguesexual, trans woman.

They had medium tan (obviously Hispanic) skin, stereotypical Jewish traits, including the profile and very thick, heavy, tight curly hair they referred to as the "jew fro".

And this person believed that if you pandered to the ruling class, it would earn you acknowledgement of your humanity.

And I found that so infuriating. That mindset, which I see a lot in exclusionist factions in many oppressed groups (gays who claim to be the "good" gays, bi/pan/ace exclusionists, transmedicalists, certain race groups but I know it's not my place to discuss that, for just a couple examples) that "If I kiss up to the bigots and nazis, and condemn the actions/appearances of the 'fakers' below me, surely they will acknowledge my humanity and welcome me into the ruling class!"

That doesn't work. It will never work.

It's so frustrating. If Nazis patrolled the streets, my friend would be gutted just for looking Jewish before they had time to say "no I'm a GOOD trans".

The point is to destroy the ruling class, not condemn those who need your help in the off chance you might not be destroyed by it.

I love my friend. We're no longer speaking because of something unrelated to this conversation, but I would die for them in a heartbeat, unquestioningly.

But the knowledge that they consider themselves better than me (and many others) because... What, I hate the gender binary and don't feel a part of it? Because I didn't have a label for it til I was 30?

They didn't come to terms with their trans identity until 2014 (don't make me do math) so early-mid 20s? I didn't know that you could be something other than male or female. I didn't know you could just reject the things that trapped you or made you feel bad/weird. If someone had explained nonbinary identities to me at 12, I would have picked it. I spent a year in my tweens adamantly insisting I was a boy.

And see? I'm actually sitting here justifying my identity. That is not why I wrote this.

I just want to address that ridiculous, counterintuitive, directly harmful, (and futile in its intended purpose) attitude.

When all the queers are being herded into the salt mines or the prisons, they're not going to ask at the door, "are you a good trans or a filthy transtrender?" and release you if you answered correctly.

Oppressors don't pick and choose. They don't take any of us seriously. They would wipe us off the face of the earth if it were logistically possible.

So we're comrades. We should be comrades in arms. Picking each other up in the fight for human rights, not using lesser identities as footholds.

I'm sorry I'm rambling. I'm sorry for any antisemitic or transphobic things I said. It was not my intention. I wanted to accurately portray my friend and their beliefs.

I don't care if you're a queer elder or a 10 year old fae sparkle ufo butterfly gender, I believe it's my duty to uplift y'all, protect y'all, unite with y'all. I love y'all. 💜

[themagiciansreccenter]

Author Spotlight: @thursdayeuclid

Every week we interview a writer from The Magicians fandom. If you would like to be interviewed or you want to nominate a writer, get in touch via our ask box.

First things first, tell us a little about yourself.

I'm a thirty-something disabled bipolar queer trans guy who publishes original m/m romance novels when I can tear myself away from fandom long enough to do so. I'm pretty blind without my glasses. I usually have blue hair, a nose ring, and a man bun. As Thursday Euclid, I write lots of happily ever afters, and as prettyclever, I do pretty much the same thing, except with other people's characters that I'm just borrowing from a surfeit of affection.

How long have you been writing for?

My first stories were written when I was a very young child, but I didn't try a novel until I was nine. It didn't quite work out--I couldn't sustain the work to complete a work of that length, and I was writing long-hand---but I tried again at twelve and managed to finish about 50k words. I had a tumultuous adolescence but eventually found myself in Harry Potter fandom in the early aughts, and then I took a long break trying to be a professional. Turns out, I couldn't stay away from tragic magical boys.

What inspired you to start writing for The Magicians?

I was irritated with how season four was playing out. I overly identify with Eliot Waugh--he's who I want to be when I grow up; I'm 37 so I'm running way behind schedule--and his relationship with Quentin was *so* important to me. When Quentin got back together with Alice, I was like, "This is it. I've gotta write fic."

That was the beginning. A few thousand words came of it. Ever since the season four finale, though, I've done nothing but write oodles of Queliot fic with my cowriter and best friend clancynacht/charlotteschaos in my every free moment. I was already reading Magicians fic, but there just wasn't enough novel-length Queliot to suit me, so me and Char are remedying that in our own weird way.

Who is/are your favourite character(s) to write? What it is about them that makes them your favourite?

Eliot, because he is me in so many ways, and in all the ways he is not me, he is pure fabulosity and sex appeal. Kady, because she is just the baddest bitch. She delights me to no end. Penny 40, because his sass is killer, as is his tsundere ish, and I just really miss him. Char always writes Quentin and Margo when we collaborate because she's fantastic at channeling them, so I stick to my own faves.

Do you have a preference for a particular season/point in time to write about?

I didn't really start writing fic until s4, but (extrapolated) S5 has been my favorite thing to write. I've also loved the Mosaic fic we're writing based on 3x5 and 4x5. Most of what I read is totally AU, though.

Are you working on anything right now? Care to give us an idea about it?

We've now posted like 225,000 words of Queliot fic, still working on Sound & Color, and we're also working on another novel-length fic for Magicians Hallmark Holiday Exchange as I type this. Since it's all anon, I can't tell you much about our story except that we've already written 65,000 words of it, and the mutual pining is real, y'all. It's very festive, and Quentin is an adorable sad boi and Eliot is very soft and spook and also protective.

How long is your “to do list”?

Char literally made a Basecamp list of everything I should be doing outside of fic, but when it comes to fandom, it's really just MHHE and Sound & Color. We write together really rapidly. For example, when we wrote It's Never Over, we were done with over 100k in a month.

What is your favourite fic that you’ve written for The Magicians? Why?

Definitely It's Never Over. It's crackalicious and full of book canon references, and it's the Magicians Season 5 Queliot fans deserve. I'm so proud of how that one turned out. I've never written a story in fandom that people were so passionate about, either. It was published immediately after that heartbreaking finale, and people really responded to how we resurrected Quentin. Also all the smut, because there's so much smut in that story. Sex magic left and right.

Many writers have a fic that they are passionate about that doesn’t get the reception from the fandom that they hoped for. Do you have a fic you would like more people to read and appreciate?

I hoped Sound & Color would get more attention than it did. It's a long, weird (not quite complete yet) trip through 3x5 A Life in the Day. There's already a lot of Mosaic fic out there, and it's a crowded field, although I think Sound & Color stands apart for being so complete and slice-of-lifey. It's not just focused on the most dramatic moments, but on their entire lives together from beginning to end because I couldn't get enough of imagining it. It's a long, thorough exploration.

What is your writing process like? Do you have any traditions or superstitions that you like to stick to when you’re writing?

I like to listen to Radiohead when I write. It's inspiring and relaxing and keeps the words flowing. Also, Char often creates Spotify playlists for our stories, and I'll listen to those to set the mood as we write. Sometimes I listen to Kpop while writing too, because I only understand one word in fifty and it provides excellent background rhythm.

Because I collaborate with Char on just about everything, we used to write together in Google Docs before migrating our process over to OneDrive through Microsoft Word, which also lets us see each other's work in real time and edit each other's additions to the story. In a lot of ways, it's similar to roleplaying, which is why we can write 100k in a month without getting burned out. We've been working together like this for more than ten years now, so we've got it down.

Do you write while the seasons are airing or do you prefer to wait for hiatus? How does the ongoing development of the canon influence and inspire your writing process?

I prefer writing canon-compliant stories during hiatus and writing AUs while the seasons are airing. Historically, I tend to only read in a fandom until hiatus, and then I start writing. Coming from a book-based fandom (Harry Potter), Magicians feels very different dynamically and has different demands.

What has been the most challenging fic for you to write?

Definitely The Fake Dating One Where El's Parents Come to Visit, because it was different from what I'm used to writing. For one, it was short(ish) and two, Eliot's parents were drawn from my parents, who are also extremely religious, conservative, small town bigots. It cut closer to the bone in a lot of ways, but it was also different because Quentin ended up taking a more dominant, protective role, really exhibiting his innate bravery, and it was a little uncomfortable letting Eliot be rescued by Quentin just because I identify so much with El.

Are there any themes or tropes that you like particularly like to explore in your writing?

Idiots in love, mutual pining, fake dating, dicks & daddy issues, biphobia and bi erasure in queer culture, mental illness, family of choice, friends-to-lovers

Are there any writers that inspire your work? Fanfiction or otherwise?

Lev Grossman, JK Rowling, JRR Tolkien, George RR Martin, Stephen King, NK Jemisin, Owlet (her Infinite Coffee series is incredible if you like Stucky), and Olen Steinhauer.  

What are you currently reading? Fanfiction or otherwise?

I just finished reading Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari, which I admit I read just because Chris Evans recommended it, and wow am I glad I did. Changed the way I look at the world.

Now I'm working my way through the Inheritance Trilogy by NK Jemisin, the Raven Tower by Ann Leckie, the Fever King by Victoria Lee, and All the Old Knives by Olen Steinhauer.

What is the most valuable piece of writing advice you’ve ever been given?

Practice makes perfect. If you don't give it your best every day and work on it even when you don't feel as inspired, you'll never develop the muscles it requires to perfect your craft.

Are there any words or phrases you worry about over using in your work?

My characters murmur way too much. Also honestly, just, like.

What was the first fanfic that you wrote? Do you still have access to it?

It was called "Isildur's Bane" and it was a really insanely nerdy LOTR fic about Isildur and the One Ring. It was gen, and it had none of the characters/pairings people actually wanted to read about, but I was damn proud of it. I have no idea what happened to it. It's been almost twenty years.

Rapidfire Round!

Self-edit or Beta?

For fic, Char and I edit each other as we go. I'd love to have an actual beta, but I do not have one.

Comments or Kudos/Reblogs or Likes?

Comments feed my soul. They used to give me anxiety, but now they are my everything.

Smut, Fluff or Angst?

angst with a happy ending

Quick & Dirty or Slow Burn?

slow burn, to read and to write

Favourite Season?

Season Three

Favourite Episode?

All That Hard, Glossy Armor

Favourite Book?

The Magician’s Land

Three favourite words?

herculean, susurrus, callipygian

Want to be interviewed for our author spotlight? Get in touch here.

[dragon-zena]

even More OC group chat shenanigans

HUGHES: Madena oh my god

ZI: jdndjdjdjjd madena you did NOT

MADENA: I TOTALLY DID IM SVDBDBHD

HUGHES: I hate this Madena wh

HUGHES: “considering that I am a gay,,,” LIKE

ZI: “half of us,,,are immigrants,,,and children and grandchildren of immigrants,,,,end it” like has your best friend ever

HUGHES: YEAH MY BEST FRIEND HAS EVER THEY DID IT TODAY YOU WERE THERE

MADENA: im sorry but like what did she expect complaining about gay people and immigrants to a nb bisexual with two parents from two different continents...like? Ok

ZI: let's debate sexuality when it's obvious that half the class are LGBT and the other half are bigots!!!

ZI: let's talk about “illegal” immigration when almost EVERYONE IN THE ROOM has a close family member that immigrated here!

HUGHES: RIGHT AND TBIS IS AP POLISCI NOT AP “DISCUSS HUMAN RIGHTS” LET'S N O T

MADENA: this is both the greatest and worst day of my life why did I SAY that dbdbdn

ZI: what u said was true and you should say it

MADENA: mnmerrg

ZI: mads ur literally iconic there are literally people talking about u being their hero I'm???

HUGHES: I can't believe the evil was thoroughly defeated in our third hour class today.

MADENA: theevilisdefeated.png

CAMILLA: Narla!

NARLA: Yeah?

CAMILLA: Friendly reminder that we have a game today uwu……….do u have what u need? You dint have ur knee pads last time

NARLA: Fuck, I honestly forgot my stuff. I'm probably gonna drive home and get them.

NARLA: And never say “friendly reminder” or use uwu ever again in my presence.

CAMILLA: You should let Zi bring you uwu

NARLA: Perish, you bitch. You bully. You scoundrel.

CAMILLA: ;^)

NARLA: Hey, Zi. Are you busy after school? I was hoping that I could get a ride home, today. I have to get my vball gear for tonight.

ZI: oh! Yeah! I'll be waiting in the car after school. Can i

ZI: uh

NARLA: ?

ZI: can I come watch you, tonight?

NARLA: I'm blushing so hard she asked to come watch us tonight.

CAMILLA: HELL YEA we need the support

CAMILLA: Not that we gonna lose but your biggest fan being there is gonna make u go into overdrive.........ur gonna beast out........

CAMILLA: ion know if the other team is gonna stand a chance

NARLA: PERISH, ASSHOLE.

NARLA: Of course you can come! :)!

ZI: !!!

CAMILLA: WELCOM TO MY F U CK HO US E

MADENA: we have banini...and avocaidi…

HUGHES: Perish

ZI: perish

NARLA: Perish.

MADENA: Oh worm? Permission granted?

ZI: MADS NO

HUGHES: N O

ZI: mmmmmMMMAAAAAAAAAAA

STEPHANI: God, same.

HUGHES: What's going on in Louisiana? ):

NARLA: They keep raising the prom fee as though we're made of money. Lmao.

JUSTINE: I mean, Narla will be fine, she’s actually made of money,,, but like, not many other people will be.

ZI: LMAO.

MADENA: Zi ):

ZI: im sorry im sorry I just

NARLA: I'll pay for you to go. I'll pay for any of you, if you need it. It's not like we're using it for much, at home.

CAMILLA: ,,, Narla,,, ur mom

NARLA: Irrelevant.

MADENA: godiwishthatwereme.png

CAMILLA: aight……………………..

ZI: id die for Narla but whatever

HUGHES: You're at her game, aren't u

ZI: …no

HUGHES: …

ZI: …yes

ZI: Hughes her thighs...her calves….me gay

MADENA: I heard gay what's goin on

MADENA: oh its just z nvm

ZI: thighs.mp4

ZI: look at her go!

CAMILLA: ive come from the court to tell u that you are Definitely in the wrong chat

MADENA: ho-o-oly shit

CAMILLA: i got her phone lmao y'all secrets safe w me

CAMILLA: just deleted those messages have fun in pineville bye

HUGHES: Isn't that actually a place in Louisiana

HUGHES: Cami?

ZI: she's back on the court but yeah it is

ZI: holy shit I owe Camilla my entire life im going to the T3 Group Chat

HUGHES: real paranoia hours

HUGHES: if u up alone at 3:10 in the morning

HUGHES: hearing things, seeing things, and overthinking ur relationships

HUGHES: slam that mf like

HUGHES: this is so stupid like wow I love. feeling this way. Fave. 10 out of fuckign 10 i lobe iy

HUGHES: I need tk pee but im svared tk adn no ones up i catn

CAMILLA: oh shit

CAMILLA: ok okay im up right now, I'm here right now, I need you to take deep breaths for me

HUGHES: catn’

CAMILLA: can I call u

HUGHES: yehh

ZI: oh no

NARLA: Hughes, are you okay, now? I'm sorry that I wasn't awake when you needed someone. ):

CAMILLA: they asleep rn but I think they r ok for rn

CAMILLA: has this happened before zi

ZI: not to this extent

ZI: sometimes he does focus extensively on everything around him and it makes him anxious

NARLA: Maybe this should wait until Hughes says that we have his permission to talk about this.

CAMILLA: yeah

HUGHES: last night was a shit show

HUGHES: my bad

MADENA: Are u ok now?

ZI: ^

NARLA: ^

CAMILLA: ^

JUSTINE: ^

STEPHANI: ^

HUGHES: Yeah thanks

HUGHES: Camilla made me take sleep medicine and i pretty much passed out soon after lmao

CAMILLA: Sleep > Being Awake lmao

MADENA: mood

ZI: ......everybody wants to be a cat.....

HUGHES: oh my god not again

ZI: aS quare witha horn makes u wish u werent born evertime he plays

MADENA: Oh A Rinky Tinky Tinky!

ZI: with a square in the act! u can set musci back! to the caveman days!

NARLA: Oh, a rinky tinky tinyk!

HUGHES: This is torture you’re all doing ths knowing it was my fave song to play in jazz band end me

MADENA:  👀 👀 👀

Narla: RIP...It was my fault, I wanted to watch The Aristocats.........

HUGHES: Perish, Narla Miaro.

NARLA: Fuck you, Hughes.

STEPHANI: atthepool.png

STEPHANI: shes so fuckgin beautiful shes wearng this bikini and shes like fuckign aphrodite or sme shit

JUSTINE: END THIS

JUSTINE: prety.png

JUSTINE: LOOK AT MY GIRLFRIEND SHE DESERVES THE WORLD SHES GIGGLIN

NARLA: God, can you imagine if I had let the two of you pine any longer than you did?

ZI: this is so gay and cute

MADENA: Justine where do u find ur swimsuits and Steph u look gorgeous end me please

JUSTINE: blush.png

JUSTINE: shes blushing ths is so cute

JUSTINE: Also i just got them at waly worl

MADENA: bless ur photogenic souls for telling me

CAMILLA: U do it for he

NARLA: And you would do it, again.

CAMILLA: You do it for she and now u say

NARLA: You do it for he.

HUGHES: One day is all I ask

HUGHES: Sometimes I forget that the moment Euthymia left the house for college, she changed from a subtle gay to a vindictive gay.

MADENA: God my sister is so fucking iconic mom was like “i dont support that in my house” AS THOUGH I DONT EXIST IN THE BOUNDARIES OF THE HOME BUT ANYWAY Euthymia shruges and is like “im not in your house so lmao watch this” AND KISSES AGATHA RIGHT IN F R O N T OF HER hhfkrk

ZI: im lauhing

HUGHES: Shes not at her mom’s house rn she came to bring something to me for Mads and she’s sporting an undercut and a lot of lgbt pride pins AND a lot of really clever enamel pins too i envy her

HUGHES: She??? Also has??? A scar on her eyebrow???

HUGHES: I ASKED WHY AND SHE SAID “YOU SHOULD SEE THE OTHER GUY”

MADENA: TELL HR TO STAY PUT IM C O M I N G I GOTTA SEE THIS

ZI: send a pic when u get there i wanna see

EUTHYMIA: inspiring my lgacy to be vindictive gays lmao

AGATHA: im lauhfing Zi just texted me and told me that Hughes called you a vindictive gay

EUTHYMIA: im so happy that im able to be ths way

EUTHYMIA: but i want them to wait until they’re super safe until they even think about following the near vicinity of my footsteps

AGATHA: you aren’t even super safe but i get wht ur sayin

AGATHA: I love you, Euthymia Nadine.

EUTHYMIA: I love you, too, Alaris

AGATHA: oooh my last name hot

EUTHYMIA: end it

HUGHES: That freshman is going to get in a fight this afternoon

MADENA: ?

HUGHES: sorry the thought just came to me

MADENA: Hughes,,,

HUGHES: I was right,,,,,,what the fc

ZI: oh thats like when Madena said something about ancient greec andt he teacher was like “nuh uh” but when he searched it up it was true

ZI: but Madena didnt know how they got it right it just randomyl popped up in their mind

CAMILLA: Physics can suck my asshole

HUGHES: Oh?

MADENA: *Hughes voice* oh, you haven’t heard?

CAMILLA: i die

HUGHES: I tutor in physics

MADENA: hes not gonna ask you to pay which is why u should

CAMILLA: I DONT CARE AS LONG AS I PASSED THESE FINALS WHATS YOUR FUCING PAYPAL

HUGHES: meet me in the PMs

MADENA: this is so fucking funny hey @Narla d o u need help with physics

NARLA: No.

MADENA: god i wish that were me

ZI: god i wish that were me

ZI: :0!

MADENA: O: twinsies

[mushroomqueendom]

I did Nazi see that coming. Well, I did, but it's still disappointing.

So I watched the recent Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, and I have…questions.

Like why do we, smart people that we are, keep falling for such a silly trope as “fight hate with love”?

One, what does that even mean? And two, WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN

If you’re not familiar with the term “white liberalism” (aka “white liberal racism”), please read up or watch up or better yet both. A hallmark of white liberalism is the profound graciousness it affords to the least gracious among us. It redefines bigotry in terms of unneeded nuance…and then it dares insist that people of color do the same.

I am particularly disappointed with this particular strain of uninformed white-centric liberalism – a liberalism that purports to want to fight racism, but then approaches it in the meekest voice possible.

“Err, um, excuse me, um, sir…Could you please maybe… not…like…advocate….for…like…. GENOCIDE…or something…..if that’s okay….I’m-not-mad-at-you-we’re-still-friends-right?” Not ok.

In the week’s White Liberal Olympics, Sam Bee executes a perfect white liberal triple backflip and sticks the landing. In the segment in question, Sam Bee interviews a “recovering” white supremacist and asks his opinion on how to fight white supremacy.

HOLD UP.

You’re asking former white supremacists how to fight white supremacy? That might almost seem like logic, if 1) there were any such thing as a former white supremacist and 2) there were any consideration at all given to the protection of people of color and the victims/targets of white supremacy. As expected, the former white supremacist advises that Love, not punches, will conquer all. As expected, the former white supremacist, and Sam Bee by extension, exalt the comfort of self-proclaimed racists over the emotional security of people of color. As. Expected. 

Sigh.

So.

Why are so many white liberals this concerned with staying on racists’ good side?

Well, it’s all about who you empathize with. And much as I’ve enjoyed her show in the past, this segment on Sam Bee’s show is another example that for even the most well-meaning of well-meaning-est liberals, empathy with whiteness continues to trump solidarity with blackness. Put another way, it’s assumed the audience will more easily associate themselves (or maybe a brother or sister, aunt or uncle) with the person who makes the racial gaffe than the person who is a victimof it. And so goes the endorsement of empathy for Mr. Literal White Supremacist. I guess respectability politics are for everyone.

Xxxxxxxxx

Continuing through the segment, Sam Bee invites in Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein, whose reinforcing banter culminates in the directive to “hug a white supremacist.” Now this, of course and presumably, is said with some jest, but let’s take a step back, shall we?

The situations they’re describing, in which one might be pressed to confront a former-friend/now-bigot, are not easy things to do. These are hard conversations and not ones that we should ever seek to approach without empathy…but as with all things, even empathy has limits. And those limits come waaaaay before you get to literal “hug a white supremacist” territory.

A couple rules of thumb, primarily for those for which white supremacy is a new concept: – If your empathy has extended to the point wherein you are literally hugging a nazi, nope, nope, stop. That’s not helpful, no matter what late night talk show hosts seem to be selling these days. If your empathy has extended to the point wherein you’re advocating for others to hug nazis instead of doing something, oh I don’t know, actually useful, then I think you don’t understand what empathy is.

“Hug a white supremacist.” Literal words. Spoken out loud. By “allies.” Terrible allies, some might say. All I can say is smdh.

But let’s take a deeeeep breath, and just tease all this apart for a sec. Questions. Who was the audience for this message? What does “hug a white supremacist/nazi/bigot” mean in actual practice? How does “hugging” work with people who are advocating for continued oppression and genocide? Is it just like hugging a cactus, or…? Also, how is this different from doing nothing? How is this different from the ‘ignore racism and it’ll go away’ crowd? What does one hope to gain (or maintain) from empathizing with white supremacists? Has anyone on this show ever read Letter from a Birmingham Jail? (Contrary to not-so-popular belief, not a letter penned by an anthropomorphic jail cell.)

And lastly, do the writers of this segment understand why the work of anti-racism is meaningful? I mean, if we can at least agree the loose goals of anti-racist work are to protect the marginalized while breaking the vicious cycle system of white supremacy, doesn’t empathizing so deeply with nazis and white supremacists actually serve another master? Doesn’t that recast oppressor as oppressed? Nazis as someone to be pitied and hugged for the struggle of maintaining their minority beliefs? That’s…a dangerous narrative. That’s advocacy of non-racism over anti-racism, and spoiler alert, non-racism is weak, it’s toothless, and it’s intensely supportive of the status quo.

So this hug-a-white-supremacist junk doesn’t serve our stated goal, that is unless our stated goal conflicts with our unstatedgoals (of virtue signaling and the like, cuz it’s not like this whole american apartheid system is worth losing any friends over, amirite?).

In which case, I see you. And gross.

Real talk. You gotta know that confronting white supremacy in a real and impactful way is gonna hurt feelings and end friendships. At a minimum. It was the wrongheaded belief that one could somehow challenge bigotry while still hanging out with bigots that has led us down this crooked cobblestone path, wherein some white liberals regard Naziism as just a “conflicting viewpoint” instead of a “murderous worldview that led to the literal extermination of millions.”

Once again, Why are you spending so much time/effort/energy nuancing Nazis, y'all? I’m asking. Again.

But where Sam Bee and that hug-a-Nazi segment failed the most disappointingly was on two fronts: 1. Failing to tailor a message for her entire audience.  Which until last week, one might assume includes black people and brown people and all shades of non-white people in addition to the white people she seemed to be talking to. Sam. Hug a white supremacist? Who should hug a white supremacist? Me? I should hug a white supremacist? WHY. WOULD. YOU. ASK. ME. THAT. SAM. BEE.? Inevitable comparisons: Would you ask Jewish people to hug Nazis? Women to hug MRAs? Hillary to hug Trumpf? Ok, I know I’m getting snarky, but the question remains. Imploring your audience, which includes people of color, to hug a white suprema-nazi is asking us to exercise super-human levels of empathy. Why would you ask us to take on even more emotional labor, to suppress righteous rage for the sake of Nazi feels? Or even for the sake of a played out joke?

Sidenote: Asking black people, who’ve literally laid down our lives for the cause of civil rights to abandon our methods and adopt those endorsed by their oppressors is just so so tone-deaf it’s *mwah* peak white liberal.

2. Failing to advocate for actual scalable change. And make no mistake, scalable change is legislative change. This is the one thing I always return to that leads this nonsensical fight-hate-with-love-hug-a-nazi biz to an early and inevitable grave. It’s not a serious proposition. It can’t be. Because it’s not remotely scaleable. Hugging a Nazi, engaging a Nazi, having an hours-long reasoned debate with a Nazi accomplishes less than you’d think. Even if you change one Nazi mind, understand that Nazis are not engaging in recruitment only with one-on-one methods. While you spend the better part of your weekend reasoning out why blacks are not a mongrel race with your good friend Chad (who’s kinda cool, except kinda a Nazi), white supremacists are going for SCALE. Gutting the Voting Rights Act. Gerrymandering like madmen. Arming police with military grade weapons. And legalizing vehicular homicide against peaceful protesters. While many white liberals look back at the 50s and 60s and think that the most powerful thing to come out of the Civil Rights Era was integrated lunch counters and better bus etiquette and non-violent protest, black folk know that what integrated those counters and etiquetted those buses were the legislative victories that made public exercise of prejudice less germane. And as for non-violence, the CR era was puh-lenty violent. Violence and non-violence are both tools, necessary and employed…but that’s a whole ‘nother discussion we’ll get into someday. So. Why was there not a single mention of legislative push in any of last week’s episode? No “call your congressman,” no “ballot measure up,“ no “VOTE”? No, just a “send these guys some money,” and also “don’t punch Nazis” cuz every Nazi is somebody’s ma or pa, right?

Why is racism different? Sam Bee famously rips apart bigots, misogynists, and liars and lays them all bare with a weekly roundup of political absurdity. Why is racism exempt from the typical and powerful entreaties to support legislature? Why is there all the empathy for bigots, but none for their victims?

Maybe the problem is that liberals think punching a Nazi is the only way we want to engage them. It’s not. Punching a Nazi is a merely one of a myriad of approaches, tools in the toolbox, as one might say. Punching a Nazi is not always the best approach, it’s true, but that doesn’t mean it’s not an approach.

But I digress, because the fact that so many liberals are spending so much time equivocating about the morality of punching Nazis instead of the morality of Naziism gets to the root of the problem: that maybe we don’t think white supremacy/Naziism/racism is all that bad. They’re not big enough evils. Certainly not as bad as punching someone in the jaw — the very act of doing so makes one as bad as a Nazi, I hear. Or maybe it’s because there’s a lax understanding of the violence of words. Words can be violence. And the use of violence to prevent violence does not “make you as bad as them.” If it did, we wouldn’t have laws or enforcement.

My dad used to offer this counsel back in the day, when I was coming of age, just starting to see the world as how it really is. I’ll take some liberty for sake of making a point, but he’d say something like, “Don’t argue with assholes. It empowers them.” True then. True now. Today’s liberal seems content on battling violent rhetoric with only academic bravado. However. Proving you’re “intellectually superior” to a Nazi does nothingto stop said Nazi from causing harm. In fact, the very act of you exerting your awesome brain against his far-less-learned one puts harm into the immediate universe. It actively protects exactly no one. You don’t fight Nazis by proving you’re smarter than them. You don’t fight hate with love. You fight Nazis by FIGHTING NAZIS. You fight hate by PASSING LEGISLATION. You fight hate by CRUSHING THEIR FACIST POLITICAL AGENDA and making bigots and monsters afraid to advocate for death and oppression. You fight. FIGHT is the operative word here. You fight.

So Sam Bee, and white liberal, pleeeease confront the empathy elephant in the room. Please don’t spend or loan any more emotional currency belonging to people of color you purport to protect. Stop being terrible allies. Stop defending Nazi jaws. And also go read Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Go ahead. You need it. We will wait.

MQ

[spotlightsaga]

Kevin Cage of @spotlightsaga reviews... Dear White People (S01E01) Chapter 1 Airdate: April 28, 2017 @netflix @JSim07 Ratings: Privatized @DearWhitePeople Score: 7.5/10 TVTime/FB/Twitter/IG/Tumblr/Path/Pin: @SpotlightSaga **********SPOILERS BELOW********** Dear White People, Brown People, and any People who are reading, listening, watching, or paying attention... Eventually it was coming. Eventually this series had to be addressed. But how? The last thing a Sexually Fluid, White Scotch-Irish, Ginger Male in an 11 year+ gay relationship, living in an Argentinian neighborhood within a city that has massive pockets of square miles with +80% people who speak Spanish as a first language... Or large numbers of neighborhoods with Haitian-Creole voices blasting loudly from friendly faces throwing friendly waves from a group of old men, who for some reason are always sitting at a major bus stop in North Miami Beach (but never going anywhere or taking any busses), wants to be labeled as is a 'Pseudo' or even a 'Hardcore-Leftist' who's desperately out to prove that he isn't racist. You won't be getting that article from me. You won't be getting anything of the sort from this 10-Piece Project that I assure you I will be taking my time on. I am not Left. I am not right. I'm barely in the middle. This isn't political, though it might have political undertones and repercussions. That's on interpretation, not me. By now you know that Spotlight Saga never reviews anything in a traditional manner unless it's an everyday type series that doesn't carry a particular tense or emotional impact. We go at our own pace and I prefer existential challenges, but all are welcome. I had made promises to write articles to accompany 'Dear White People', brought to us by the new & true, multitalented Justin Simien, to multiple readers, but I was waiting for the right time. Sure, I have an army of unreleased articles and reviews ready to shoot out of an iOS cannon when I'm not feeling particularly inspired, but that just hasn't happened lately, so expect last second 'Big 4 Network' reviews to start spewing out sometime in September, because everything from 'Gotham' to 'Lucifer' to 'Colony' awaits you. Oh boy. Now let's get something straight, particularly to the people on Social Media whining and crying about the show's polarizing title, claiming to cancel (or to the ones who actually did cancel, though I doubt it) their Netflix subscriptions because the title evoked some sort of feeling of uncomfortable paranoia, or what they felt was divisive rhetoric, even though it was them who were attempting to divide themselves from Netflix and causing a stir... Ultimately giving the show free promotion in the process. DWP isn't a series that is out to make anyone feel shame, wagging a brown finger across your noses, or smacking you over the top of the head with a rolled up newspaper, preferably Sunday (because there are some people who actually deserve it). The show's main protagonist narrates the thoughts of Justin Simien directly and quite accurately, right off the bat. "Dear White People is a misnomer. My show is meant to articulate the feelings of a misrepresented group outside the majority." @jsouth71 on Twitter, one of many racist, idiot keyboard warriors (I'm personally singling out him because he no longer seems to be active - guess he came, he typed, and he successfully looked like an idiot), responded to the original trailer (legit on March 12, 2017, the show didn't even air until April 28th) with multiple hashtags claiming that Netflix was racist. His most hilarious claim (to me anyway) is the one claiming that the show, what it stands for, and those that support it are all full of #LiberalBS. Well what now, Joey Southworth? I'm not even Liberal, Black, or some sort of seemingly desperate apologist... I have no agenda, except to review a Netflix TV Series in a way like no one has ever done before and while doing so, tell you all MY story, my letter to White People, because there is one thing I won't do... Tell someone else's truth... Unless they ask me to, I am for hire, y'all. Ironically, Lionel (DeRon Horton), says something eerily similar to what I've just said and said before a million times. Some people, *coughAVCLUBcough*, don't understand that telling someone else's 'truth' isn't necessarily the point of journalism, but sometimes it does involve telling another person's story from your OWN perspective, after a little help from gaining a bit of someone else's. So let's kick this thing off, shall we? It's going to be a doozy! Samantha White aka Sam (Logan Browning - ah, yes we see the ironic juxtaposition of those names already, especially since the character is biracial) attends an Ivy League school called Winchester University and hosts a radio show on campus called 'Dear White People'. As the aforementioned quote pulled directly from Sam's mouth would suggest, she really just wants to be a voice not normally heard without some sort of filter or applied lens to trickle out what people feel safe with. Sam isn't prejudice or even remotely a bigot, she doesn't seem to be whatsoever. As a matter of fact, Sam's reactions to environmental stimuli and certain situations remind me of me. She is shown often attempting to pull back when faced with a possibility of reacting off of an emotion, but when that emotion becomes overwhelming, she caves and takes control by spiraling out of control. There is a blackface party on campus and it is quickly revealed by the end of the episode that the campus crew, Pastiche, had their Facebook hacked and invites were sent out after the school's administration had already shut down the idea of the party even going forward. Did Sam send it? Please remember we're talking E1, and I don't go beyond that. She claims to have sent the email in an emotionally provocative, genuinely stirring speech she delivers after her radio show is pushed to the sidelines. She had shown up for her time slot and someone else had taken her place due to the recent controversy. This all forces Sam to make a split, snap decision, overthrowing the DJ booth like a straight up BOSS... A prime example of what I mean when I say she 'takes control by spiraling out'. Sam is also seen videotaping the party and later editing & going over the footage. So far, 2+2=4, but if she did indeed do what she said she did, then she's not the only one playing games to prove a point. She's outed to have a white boyfriend, Gabe (John Patrick Amedori), who she seems to genuinely like and in turn he is definitely enamored with her. Yes, by the way, one can be racist and have a significant other of an alternate race (as we covered in an article in S2 of the E4 & Netflix series 'Chewing Gum' after talking with and interviewing several women of color from the Caribbean)... Thats related to the fetishization or perversion of race, skin color, or anything of the like, but that isn't what it looks like what is going on here. There's definitely some real life chemistry brewing. Of course, some of Sam's peers look at her with disdain after Gabe puts their ongoing, once secret relationship on blast with an Instagram pic and a hashtag... Amazing what hashtags are capable of these days, ammirite? Well, in this case it's less the hashtag and more of the 'tagging' of the pic done by Sam's arch nemesis, Coco (Antoinette Robinson - who my white, CW loving ass recognizes from the God-awful 3rd season of 'Hart of Dixie', yeah I see you, Lavon's Niece!)... All of this confusion and animosity is what Coco wanted but this isn't what she necessarily got, not in the exact form she was aiming for, at least. Here comes the fun part! Through self-reflection and talks with her best friend, Joelle (Ashley Blaine Featherson), Sam realizes she does in fact like Gabe and decides to embrace the couple's outing... Bringing him along to her usually, black only, weekly viewing of 'Defamation', a hilarious satire of Shonda Rhimes' (who might just answer this cheeky mockery, since she just scored herself a Netflix contract) ABC political thriller, or just plain dumbed down (sorry Rhimes' fans) version of 'Scandal' (as if it could go any lower). Ouch! Anyway, according to Sam, 'Defamation Wednesdays' are the cornerstone of black college campus life.' It's just that, well, Gabe is obviously feeling a bit 'fish out of water'... Come on, white people, think about how you feel when you are the only white person in the room, you get it right? Well, that's more than likely how your good friend of color feels when you invite them out and they are the only black person to show up at your Baby Shower, Birthday Party, 'Girls Night Out', whatever the event may be. It takes time. It's admirable that Gabe came, it truly is, but this isn't exactly the same situation that I used for environmental comparisons. Sam has a show called 'Dear White People' for Christ Sake, she has an obligation to stick to her guns, sure... But love is love, and as long as there is no perversion of skin going on, who the fuck cares? Mind your mother fucking own! Oh, but that's a tale as old as time, people just love to give no fucks about this or that, while simultaneously giving all kinds of fucks about who someone lays next to at night. I can attest to both of these things, or some version of it, at least... As I live in a part of the States where I'm the only white guy that's not a Euro-Tourist in an incredibly wide radius, also being in a gay relationship, I get quite a few double takes... And the giant Red Beard doesn't help. Yet, I've come to a point where I've been here so long and become so accustomed to a different environment, being amongst other white people makes me a tad uncomfortable. More on that another episode, another day. Reggie (Marque Richardson) isn't too happy about Gabe's presence at the 'Defamation' viewing party... I'm guessing it's a lot less because he's white and a lot more because Reggie feels like he should be the one holding Sam's hand. Reggie comes off as a bit of a jackass, then again, Gabe is not only encroaching on what appears to be Reggie's love interest, but he's also aggressively inserting himself into the group. It's not that Reggie, or most of Sam's friends and acquaintances are prejudice of intolerant, quite the opposite, really. It actually seems more like a 'too much, too soon' situation. Take race out of the equation for a second, take out that fact that Sam's ideals are being broadcasted over the radio, representing a whole lot of people. EVERYONE eyes the 'new' guy or gal in a group, especially if that new person is also a new significant other, I don't care who you are. It's always best to sit back, shut your mouth, and let people come to you... Not stick out your hand and affirm loudly that, 'Hi, I'm Gabe, and I'll be taking a prominent role here now, whether you like it or not.' I love the fact that just like we all have a long way to go as a society when it comes to understanding where everyone is coming from, why people feel what they feel, so do the characters of 'Dear White People', all of them... Black, White, and everyone in between... Especially the girl in between! Yes, it appears that Sam is telling the truth in her guerrilla takeover, emotionally charged, campus wide, broadcasted admission... And if she wasn't she appears very much ready to to take both the praise & the heat (something not yet shown in E1) that she was the one who hacked the Pastiche Facebook and sent out the invites, encouraging the culturally ignorant to show up in Blackface and other embarrassingly idiotic, culture appropriated, misfortunes of human error to a party that had already been given the axe... But the show is still playful in its righteous delivery. The narrator (Giancarlo Esposito) points out a white girl and guesses that she's in a Nicki Minaj costume... Later on, while in her feelings, Sam quickly switches her music from a soft, feminine country crooning track, Suzanna Spring's 'Some Blue Sky' to 'Black' by 'Innanet James' on her way to the radio station when passing a group of Black acquaintances... It's ok to laugh, it's ok to point out the confusing parts of a sliding identity. It's ok to be who you are as long as you are true to whoever that is... Unless your a fucking hateful asshole, then Fuck You. *Somebody cue a 'Run The Jewels' track, please* *********Written By: Kevin Cage********** http://www.tvtime.com http://www.facebook.com/spotlightsaga http://www.spotlightsaga.com http://www.facebook.com/groups/artsentertainment

[therevengerists]

Kathy Griffin apologized, but she still got what she wanted.

We're all talking about her. This is what people who manipulate media do. For further case study, go re-analyze Trump's entire campaign and presidency, re:his handling of and treatment by the media. Because shit works. Please note: I am not trying to say Kathy Griffin's "performance art" was some real statement about Trump's own sensationalism. For some of the following reasons: 1. No matter which way you slice it, it's not a smart "piece". It's ridiculous rich bubbled liberals with some modicum of attention saying "hur-hur fuck Trump.” 2. It's clueless. Divisiveness is so high, at a time when racial tensions literally have been getting people killed…. like last Friday. It’s on a scale that starts at ‘unhelpful’ up to and including ‘societally damaging’. 3. It's COUNTERproductive. It not only gives ammo to right-wing nutjobs (who, despite any number of posts by liberals ALSO angry at Kathy Griffin, will see this is an entire liberal monoculture out to get them), but it also undercuts those of us advocating a peaceful, civil, equal, democratic America. Way to further the message that ours is the more sane, stable, rational approach to governance. 4. ISIS loves that shit. ANY group manipulating forms of mass media & therefore people towards a perpetually warlike state benefits from this type of fucking farce. It perpetuates a cycle of numerous war-mongering, power-mad, atavistic groups of violence-obsessed bastards the world over. Ahem. 5. Fuck off, Kathy Griffin. Nobody liked you ever because you are the kind of person who would think to do a thing like this. Like your privileged unfunny undeserving ass has ever faced the sort of threats that actual targeted, vulnerable groups in America do under Trump’s hateful, bigoted policies. Seriously fuck off. By that I meant to say, it’s both the wrong message AND wrong messenger. Is there ever a realm where violent sadistic imagery is preferable to salient rational discourse or at worst, insightful satire? No. Never. But if I have to see it, and Jesus knows we WILL be subjected to such shit at some point, do we HAVE to have it paired with Kathy fucking Griffin? Seriously. There is nothing even approaching a point anywhere in the vicinity of her... "artbleaarchh (sorry, I tried to type "art" but vomited so hard that I typed what I vomited at the same time). If I’m incredibly generous and assume she and her photographer friend were at any point going for anything more coherent than “glurpaderpadonkadoo!”, then whatever it was supposed to be definitely did not land. You know what does land? Critics who look at it and wonder aloud ”what is more devastating about this, the decapitated Trump head or Kathy fucking Griffin?". Poignant observations aside, this is exactly the sort of victimhood complex narrative Trump was begging for. No two ways about it. Thank you Kathy Griffin, for literally being the bloodthirsty rabid liberal stereotype that the Right dreamt up & has been selling their base for years. May I suggest for your next act sacrificing a child on top of a pizza? Fuck you very much, Kathy Griffin, who has gotten many of us to type your name repeatedly while you post an apology video with undoubtedly your most hits ever. Because as fucks would have it, apparently Kathy fucking Griffin figured out how stupid humans are in one key, fundamental area: If you yell "hey everyone, look at me!" a bunch of us idiots all look in unison. The more horrible it is, the more that will flock-I mean, look. This is why ISIS is ISIS, and not a two-bit one-camel operation. But their heads were real, and they have a message to sell. That's about the only substantive difference between Kathy Griffin & ISIS. They're real monsters and she just plays pretend for a camera. They both were some nobodies until outrageously vile acts propelled them to social media fame. Both see violence as tool to manipulate. Both know that when it comes to being famous, being hated is as good as being loved. You can't spell ‘infamous’ without famous. People who do this are utilizing the innate emotional drivers in humans for a desired, or corralled, response. Anger, disgust, fear, hate… Some of the strongest flaring emotions can drive entire groups to act in increasingly irrational, fucked up, even evil ways. "Give in to our demands or this person dies." "We need more funding for bombs to stop scary bad guys" "Only I can protect you from great evil" "The Great Satan wants us all dead" "they want to defile our Holy Land" "their entire ideology is a cancer" "our way of life is threatened" "Invaders are coming to destroy us" "they will rape our daughters" "trans women in bathrooms" "different=filthy" "hate the OTHER" "our team their team our team their team” "Protect our purity" “our country needs to come first" "he looked like a demon bulking up" "you know who (((they))) are" "they're coming to take my guns" “they they they them them them” "if you follow another faith you are evil" "if you follow no faith you are evil" "if you follow any faith you are evil" "My side's never wrong" “the other side are all morons with mental disorders” “those people aren’t even human” "What you never knew that was in your pantry… might kill you" "serial killer loose" "new designer drug" “another mass shooting" "kids are calling it the knockout game" “riots fires arson violence rape murder thugs” "tonight at 11" "somebody please think of the children!" "Stock up on canned goods" "Buy a gun" "invest in gold" "don't talk to strangers" "take off your shoes and put them into the plastic bin, please" "if you see something say something" "We are under attack" "Raping our country" “Taking our jobs" "our traditions" "drugs and crime" "Build a wall! Build a wall! Build a wall" "I will be the single greatest jobs president of all time! A law and order president! I will BAN THEM. VOTE FOR ME I WILL MAKE YOU GREAT" "Hey everyone lookit me! I have da prezdent's head but not really hur-de-hur lol now talk about ME, Kathy Griffin, for once! Yaay!!" …and we did. Because that's how it works. It's a really old, really solid con. That's how ISIS became ISIS. How the Military Industrial Complex keeps getting subsidized to make weapons of mass destruction. How Wall Street justified being bailed out. It’s why hate crimes happen. It’s why we’re militarizing the police and handing over our privacy. It's how a profit-motivated media gets ratings, it's how shock jocks get an audience, how lame nobodies stay relevant, and how Trump tricked y'all. They do it, and will continue to do it, because it fucking works, children.

[sbry41001]

Hello. I need help and don't know where to get it.

To preface this, I just wanna say, to the one or two people who know me in reality who may or may not see this - I’m just putting this as a fair warning - you can stay calm and know that I will probably be ok and please stay quiet about this because it’s very personal, and I’m just writing this on here as an outlet.

No one will read this most likely, and certainly no one will freaking care, but I figured I'd put that as a disclaimer.

To get right into it,

I have a type of depression that would probably be called ‘persistent depressive’ because sometimes it’s noticeable and other times it isn’t. Usually it involves me staying inside of my bedroom for most of the day and not going out, simply because I am a burden to people and won’t be around them to bother them.

I have been called “abnormal” for having it, or for various other things that can be associated with it, such as letting little things get to me or 'overreacting’ within certain situations. Or simply having feelings such as anger and expressing them.

It has caused me to put myself away and feel like garbage like 90% of the time, and hate myself, and basically I make myself feel like I don’t belong with people or that no one will ever like me, pretty much classic symptoms.

So to get to the next part, which is when it got to be the worst, and the absolute worst and most freaking devastatingly awful period of about a year within my life, and the “story” section, is that back in like June (directly at the beginning of June) of 2016, I met this person (sorry, I won’t be saying who they are or tagging them), and made friends on a certain app just through a public chatroom of some sort, and well apparently this one person enjoyed doing, er… Not so appropriate things during chat/role play and after I started doing it with them to humor them, they actually began to like me and we actually hit it off and became a “couple” (I will never use that term to describe the two of us ever again). I felt great for a long time - someone liked me, even if it was a relationship that was too weird for me and wasn’t actually what I was looking for (for specific reasons that you can dm me for if you REALLY honestly wanna know.)

Well after a while, as I did not expect, we weren’t exactly the same as before, and they began to respond to the other folks in the chat we were in, and I began to feel like they disliked me – thanks to my depression. It felt like they kicked my butt and mentally abused me in ways I don’t really want to repeat because it will probably stir up emotions in me that I don’t want to even remember feeling. There were times that they called people “the most beautiful they’d ever seen” despite the fact that I was their gf. And after I finally snapped and started being rude to them because they never gave me proof that they loved me more than or differently than their previous lovers or friends, and they 'dropped me as a person’, they began cursing at me constantly and started calling me horrible names like “b*tch, saying 'F you’ to me all the time, as I said mentally abusing me, essentially bullying me & saying the most heinous and disgusting things to me - and it broke me. It broke me the hell apart. And while I was far from perfect - I said some bad things to them as well, and I was terrible back because of the horrible emotions and suicide attempts that I had experienced. - Oh, right, I forgot to tell y'all that the BS they said to me made me nearly end up committing suicide until I stopped myself from it because I figured it might not be worth it, despite the fact that I wanted death, craved it, told myself that being hated this much by this person and their friend group meant that I should not be alive.

This went on for a period of about a year until I left their message group and was never invited again.

Another thing that’s made this horrible feeling that I need to be dead even worse is that one of this person’s friends, who I will tag (@mrrald) because I actually want them to know the real story, how much they hurt me, and pretty much how much of an idiot they are. Basically, they said even more horrible things to me, calling me a "racist and sexist bigot” because of the fact that I watch the News and keep up with it on Twitter (and basically because I’m not an SJW like they are), as well as saying that I “cant solve s*it on my own” because I was still effing hurt and depressed that the person who I thought genuinely liked me did not. And, freaking surprisingly enough, I’m not hurt by that anymore, I’m more hurt by how much they hate me so much as to say such nasty things to me and curse me out for just trying to tell them that I Graduated High School.

Yes, I’m being serious, and yes, this got the suicide attempts rolling again.

I hated, and still hate myself, and think that what they said, that I was a “manipulative, need therapy, insane, abhorrent, always have a victim card, and horrible individual” are true, and to this day I still am hated by these folks, get messages from them still saying how horrible I am on my board occasionally from those who I forgot to block, and still want to die because I feel so alone and such intense and heavy and violent self hatred.

My family also dislikes me a lot, and downs me for not having a job yet - even though I’ve been trying hard for just over a year to get one, but simply no one has said yes as of yet and say that I’m also “negative and horrible” all the time. I know already that of their children, I’m the worst, and that I’m the family disappointment. I’m not as pretty, when I do things I don’t do them perfectly exactly as they want, and basically I’m horrible as a person and as a family member. I leave things out, I don’t like it when I’m way behind in a card game, every little thing I do starts an argument - in summation, I’m an immature idiot who screws crap up.

I’m just sick of doing it and think if I were gone, things would be SO much better for them. That’s pretty much what they’ve told me, anyway.

Basically, this is a cry for help, as the title suggests. I want to be alive, not just existing, and I want to stop feeling like I want or need to die.

I need to find something better that will help me with this illness that I have and I need to know how to deal with the people who mentally abused me online in that group. I know there are things in my life that I do enjoy, certain series that have kept me at least partially sane since that horrible yearlong time, and I live for those things and those things only - as an example, I live only to see that new episode of My Hero Academia come out. Or that new SU Episode or Game, etc etc.

Those things are losing their effect on me however, kind of like how bubble gum loses its taste.

I need comfort, I need healing, and I need pleasant social interaction above all else. The light is dimming on my life and I fear that eventually it really will end up getting to the point where I take my own life.

I need to know that I’m not freaking scum/garbage like I’ve been told I am and like I tell myself every day.