#gender is inherent to its cosmology

[braincoins]

2. 9. 14.

Yay!

2. Who is your favourite fictional character and why? Oof. Tough question. I was going to say Lina Inverse, but I think I really have to give it to the Lord of Nightmares, who's from the same anime.

LoN is from "The Slayers" (and its sister show, "Lost Universe", both mid-to-late 90's animes). In this show, there are Gods and there are Monsters and they are pitted against each other... and above both of them is the Lord of Nightmares, which is just one of their names. "Mother of All" is another one, as is "King of Darkness Who Shines Like Gold Upon The Sea of Chaos."

Y'see, part of the cosmology of "The Slayers" is that the world our heroes inhabit rose up out of The Sea of Chaos, which was created from the Lord of Nightmares's body. LoN is bodiless and therefore inherently genderless, though they're usually depicted as a woman with long blonde hair that covers their eyes, wearing a long, elegant black dress.

The Lord of Nightmares is beyond gender, beyond "good" and "evil". They also respect the purity of a wish or prayer made to them, not its intent or alignment (good/evil) or anything like that. How bad do you want it? How pure is your desire for this wish to come true?

According to my personal set of spiritual beliefs - which are heavily based on chaos theory - God is beyond our comprehension, but we anthropomorphize them in order to try to understand. God also doesn't mind what we call him/her/them; they understand that we're doing the best we can within the limits we have. So I sort of jokingly refer to God as the Lord of Nightmares, not because I think LoN is real but because it amuses me to do so, especially with the whole "chaos" angle, and I know God doesn't mind.

This is why my avatar here on Tumblr - and in most social media - is LoN's sigil. Chaos and purity of desire, along with a lack of a physical body and a somewhat capricious nature. Yup, that's God!

9. Are you an organized person, generally? Yes but also no. I love organization, and there is little that is more satisfying to me than successfully organizing something that desperately needed it.

Buuuuuuuut that being said, I tend to let things get a bit messy [coughjustabitcough] before I get around to organizing it. As in all parts of my life, I have to find the balance between order and chaos.

14. What is your opinion on poetry? Well, first off, I'm terrible at writing it. Verse and I do not get on; I am a prose person 100%.

But I like poetry. Depending on the poem, of course. I especially like Dorothy Parker and James Whitcomb Riley.

Tea & Books Questions

#thank you for asking! #sorry that first one is so long and babbly

[rametarin]

TERFs are wrong. But, so are social constructionist Gender Theorists

You know it is not a question of one extreme or the other. As much as both like to think they are morally right and have “the science” on their side, they don’t. Both are god damned annoying, totalitarian, and are interpreting reality and what that means in order to browbeat and push others, both socially and legally, towards doing things based on what those mean.

Both are trying to control the parameters of all things based on the fundamentals by their interpretation of reality, not by the objective facts. Both are wrong.

TERFs are not wrong in that someone that is born with XY chromosomes and a standard male sex conforming body is male, and you need dysphoria in order to be trans. They are not wrong that your gender is not just a wily nily purely social construct.

They are, however, wrong about absolutely everything else regarding what those genders MEAN, where they’re derived from and why they were derived that way.

And the social constructionists aren’t wrong in that we should make exceptions to the biological rule for people with transgenderist disorders of the mind and brain. But, they are wrong in that so many are totalitarian. They do not want these exceptions to be exceptions, they want the very basis and fundamental understanding, how we define gender and sex, to change to be based not on biological empiricism, facts or truth, but by legal and social oughts and things they argue “should be held true else it demoralizes and oppresses a minority.”

There are not, “millions of genders.” There’s your basic standard assed functioning, and then there’s a disorder we otherwise can’t do anything with or about right now where it’d simply more healthy for everybody around if we let them live with the identity that is in their minds and body.

Furthermore, the nonbinarist movement needs to stop being such a cowardly little bitch and argue for itself outside the umbrella of trans rights, because it sits there demanding changes and exceptions and validations be made for it on the basis of bowing to trans rights, when it itself hasn’t stepped out of its parasitic sphere to fight for any on its own. Strategically using trans rights as a platform for both offensive and defensive purposes.

TERFs, up to now, have been virtually unchallengable because, “you must be a horrible right wing fundamentalist religious monster to oppose EQUALITY for WOMEN!” And they’ve just skirted on that since the 60s. Which was absolute hell trying to convince anybody that radical feminism was nonsense and harbored deep, authoritarian bends on takes with social ramifications. Yall were in their corner when they were talking about how, “society” needed to give women, exclusively, help to go to college because of past oppressions. But when someone tried to tell you they had weird obsessions with vaginas and using them as rubber stamps for whom gets special treatment and privileges and exceptions to defaults that make men do dirty work and women get clean pay? Deafening silence.

But the minute TERFs don’t want transwomen in their magical witch girl’s clubs, fucking with the cosmology? Ohho they’re visible now. You can see their bullshit now. They’re weirdos drawing female symbols and self-portraits with menstrual blood and making hacky poems about their uterus, now. They’re bad people now. You can actually see they weren’t, “being hyperbolic” or “just venting about the evil MEN around them” now. Hahahahaa. Hilarious.

TERFs are wrong. Point blank. But so are the social constructionist extremists and postmodernists behind the appropriated bandwagon of what calls itself the trans rights and nonbinarist rights movement in the west. The basis for which they’ve defined their norms is not one of reality, but “oughts” and “should be’s” and “must bes” and “or else”s. To the point where they invented a slur specifically to denounce those that do not share their view. “Bioessentialist.”

That makes as much sense as calling someone a dirty, “bioessentialist” because they say you need to be an elephant, to be an elephant. Yes, you do need the physical, biological characteristics to really BE that which you aspire to be. No, you don’t get to redefine what an elephant is to force the elephant to “identify” as an elephant so something that is not an elephant can also be an elephant.

If misgendering someone is triggering for a minority, it’s just as triggering when you deny someone’s sexuality or gender when they’re hetero and cis. And many are repulsed by the idea that the reason they’re compatible with their sex and gender conformation is because they, “made a choice.” For that matter, if you’re actually transgendered and not some bandwagoneering asshole, being trans isn’t a choice either. It’s a psychological and neurological impossibility to be anything else, not a lifestyle, not a hobby, not a “preferred state of mind.” Arguing anything else is arguing not for trans rights, but for psycho-social dominance in law.

And if you think misgendering someone that’s transgendered is bad, people that make up at MOST, 0.7% of the human species, and some say as few as 0.3% of the human species (people with cleft lips, born missing limbs and more are born more often) then what the FUCK do you think it is, redefining the identities and realities of 99.3% to 99.7% of the human animal, not to mention how every other animal works? (not counting some exceptions like clownfish.)

Gender is not, wholly, a social construct. It’s a derivative and pluto’s shadow from SEX. SEX is not psychological. Sex is not negotiable. Sex is biological and disease can make it express incorrectly or correctly to function as intended by natural selection. Gender is only a social construct in that some cultures have assigned thoughts and characteristics and responsibilities for people on the basis of said sexual role. That’s it.

But people that try to live purely in the psychological sphere or argue that sphere belongs in the dominant position for mankind try to argue it’s the only one that really matters, and while we’re at it, lets let the minority dictate what is normal and rational and good. So their believe gender as feelings supersedes sex as reality.

And why would they argue this? Because they’re, “just such big fans of trans rights?” No. Because they hate disparity and immutable, biological difference. And so want to use the arbitration of human law and culture to marginalize it and pretend it doesn’t exist- to where using technology to circumvent it and the penal system to enforce that view seems like a reasonable, moral thing to strive for. Trans rights for these people have always just been a nice coat of paint to put their real activism under.

And the biggest bitch of it all is, Radical Feminists and Trans Inclusive Radical Feminists and Social Constructionists all receive their marching orders from the same ideology. The same stupid take that says bugger reality, live in a communal fantasy and enforce everybody else to live in it, too. Else they’re a bad person. Else they’re a fascist. They merely differ in the rules and the fundamental parameters.

Know the difference between, “this person is bad and they should be shamed for their beliefs because they are bad,” and, “This person is bad because they’re sitting on a throne that I want to sit on as is rightfully mine.” TIRFs don’t hate TERFs because they’re wrong, they hate them because they’re in the middle of a power grab.

But we have the opportunity to end this “Critical Lens” shitshow forever. Both sides are exposed and showing their true colors as terrible ideologies and people. Both sides are showing their totalitarianism in the form of competitive propaganda and using the legal system to get their way based on past manipulations and exploitations they got from lying to a public that didn’t want to be misogynistic or prejudiced against the transgender.

All it takes is connecting the dots and understanding just how and why it’s not a matter of “bitter evil borderline-conservative Karens Vs. noble oppressed transgenders.”

TERFs are fucking NOT conservatives. They’re typically the same far-left assholes as the TIRFs. They differ ONLY in that they believe critical theory fucking STOPS at the immutable reality of biological sex, because they stand to lose dominance if it’s not immutable- so they demand it be CONSIDERED immutable. Their status as oppressed inherently, hinges on it.

So that’s it then. You’re left with no real heroes in this fight. But if you take anything away from what I’m telling you today, it’s that you can argue legally for trans rights. Just, on the basis as exception to the biological basis, as has been proven. Asterisks. Hyphens. Acknowledging the reality that the existence of the transgendered does not negate the reality of biological sex, nor those whose genders are a direct result of their biological sex as the norm.

It’s not bigotry to sexually discriminate to some degrees. When dealing with subjectives, it’s a matter of argument. When dealing with biological realities and imperatives, opinion is irrelevant to the self-evident realities, and interpretation matters less than the reality.

But to those that believe any discrimination based on physical differences or state is inherently wrong, just the idea of male and female being two different, named things, (”classes”, if you will) with different, “unequal” functions and capacity, fills them with rage.

Your moralism stops where nature begins. Period.

[readandresist]

Our Mothers, Our Powers, Our Texts: Manifestations of Aje in Africana Literature

Teresa N Washington

This is the revised and expanded edition of Teresa N. Washington's groundbreaking book Our Mothers, Our Powers, Our Texts: Manifestations of Aje in Africana Literature. In Yoruba language and culture, Aje signifies both a phenomenal spiritual power and the human beings who exercise that power. Aje is the birthright of Africana women who are revered as the Gods of Society. While Africana men can have Aje, its owners and controllers are Africana women. Because it is an African female power, and due to its invisibility, ubiquity, and profundity, Aje is often maligned as witchcraft.

However, as Teresa N. Washington reveals in Our Mothers, Our Powers, Our Texts, Aje is central to the Yoruba ethos, worldview, and cosmology. Not only is it essential to human creation and artistic creativity, but as a force of justice and retribution, Aje is vital to social harmony and balance. Washington analyzes forms, figures, and forces of Aje in the Yoruba world, in the Caribbean Islands, in Latin America, and in African America. Washington's research reveals that with the exile and enslavement of millions of Africans, Aje became a global force and an essential ally in organizing insurrections, soothing shattered souls, and reminding the dispossessed of their inherent divinity. From her in-depth exploration of Aje in Pan-African history and orature, Washington guides readers through rich analyses of the symbolic, methodological, and spiritual manifestations of Aje that are central to important works by Africana writers but are rarely elucidated by Western criticism.

Our Mothers, Our Powers, Our Texts includes innovative readings of works by many Africana writers, including Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, Ben Okri, Wole Soyinka, Jamaica Kincaid, and Ntozake Shange. This revised and expanded edition of Our Mothers, Our Powers, Our Texts will appeal to scholars of Africana literature, African religion and philosophy, gender studies, and comparative literature. Devotees of Africana spiritual systems will find this book to be indispensable.

#black womanhood #history #culture

[projectsuminda]

World Building June 2017 - Day 28: Major Figures & Important Players

Solevaille

As I already have most of the first draft of Porcelain Wonderland written, I might as well describe the main characters of the story, as well as a few other important ones.  Well, all but two of them, whose very existence is kind of a spoiler.  But as for the others...

Giuseppe Geppetto: Appropriate last name, eh?  Often called Gigi by his initials, this toymaker runs a shop called Gigi's Dolls and Toys, which I briefly mentioned in the Economy prompt.  But unlike his namesake from Pinocchio, Gigi specializes in porcelain dolls... which, according to many a customer, look like they may come to life at any moment.  (To which he said that there was no way that could happen.)  When not in the shop, he lives at home with his wife Vivi and his twin daughters, who he named Dextrina and Sinistrina because he liked to cradle the former in his right arm and the latter in his left.  (The words dexter and sinister mean "right" and "left", respectively.)

Lucina Geppetto: Born as Dextrina and changed her name when she became Queen of Solevaille.  She rose to fame when she presented her living toys before the mayor on Christmas, and word about them spread that year, culminating into a grand celebration of them at Ludinberg Castle during the following Gallery Festival (see Day 26, Art).  At the festival, she turned the mayor into a Marionette and then persuaded him to let her be Solevaille's first queen.  Indeed, Lucina is quite an ambitious and charismatic young lady, with a seemingly endless amount of energy, cheer, and drama (of the good kind).  However, while she is excellent at coming up with ideas, she is not so good at planning, and even worse at empathizing with people.  Those two flaws would lead her to resort to more and more drastic measures to maintain order over the kingdom.

Sinistrina Geppetto: Lucina's twin sister.  She has quite a shady reputation in town because of her skill with black magic, with a talent for raising the dead and extracting the souls out of living beings (which kills them).  Although she is also responsible for teaching Lucina about magic so that she could bring the dolls to life, she is not in her court, instead being known as "countess" or "town witch".  She is also responsible for the Deathly Glade's existence, and would eventually become its own queen.  But despite all this, she is much more level-headed than Lucina, and tries not to use her magic to cause harm to people... a tall order given its inherently harmful nature.  One notable example of this backfiring horribly is when she “accidentally” places a curse on the Deathly Manor (see, I told you it would be important) that traps all who enter in an intense nightmare.  Not a very good end for people who have been banished to the Deathly Glade.

Euler "Winky" van Winkle: The mayor of Solevaille at the time of the story - well, before he is stripped of his power, that is.  A refined yet jolly old fellow never seen without a monocle, he considers his own position to be less important than its purpose, that being the well-being of the people of Solevaille and the thriving of its artistic culture.

Emille Laroux: The princess of Solevaille, and the first porcelain doll in history to hold a leading position over a country.  Although Lucina oversees most of the work in the kingdom, Emille is notable for carrying out executions (for those who are not banished to the Deathly Glade) and acting as an overall foil for Lucina.  Where Lucina will shower the court dolls with affection, Emille will look down on them.  Where Lucina leaps before she looks, Emille does the opposite.  ...You get the idea.

Krampus: As was mentioned in the History prompt, this evil sorcerer ravaged Ludin, Solevaille's predecessor town, with a zombie apocalypse.  Let's hope Sinistrina does not follow in his footsteps, especially since he has been all but forgotten about.

Peter Pedersen: The owner of the Peter Pan Pub, and a very old friend of the Geppetto family.  Shows up as part of a small resistance force of human "refugees" aiming to escape the dolls' rule over the kingdom (yet somehow stay in Solevaille while doing so).

Cloud Candyfloss: The Ceramic owner of Cloud's Cuckoo Land, Solevaille's local clock shop.  Notable for giving quirky yet meaningful nicknames to the other characters - for example, Lucina is the Queen of Ham (for her hammy demeanor as queen), Sinistrina is Necromantress, Emille is the Hammer Lady (because misbehaving dolls are smashed with a hammer), and Winky is Mr. I Say (after his catchphrase).

Jack "Chrono" Chronopoulos: Cloud's adoptive father.  He invented a time machine about a decade before the story begins, and uses it to travel forward several decades in time, bypassing the entire story.  In said story, he functions as a narrator.

Orenya

I have a collection of short stories planned collectively called the Tales of the Magic Lands, which all take place on Orenya.  Each of these stories focuses on one character (or group of characters) whose existence over the course of history is like an abnormally bright star in the night sky.  Some of those characters are as follows:

Durnem: The first fylin to become involved in one of Orenya's major branches of government - in her case, the Oradamin.  (Not surprising, considering howstereotypically aggressive fylin women are.  Later on a fylin man would become the first of his kind to join the Danramin.)  Like other fylin who would follow in her footsteps, she was motivated to do so by being an outcast from her clan.

Nemaforte: A sunestre herbalist from Theani, living in the Modern Era.  Her name means "poisoned blood", and for good reason: she specializes in peddling poisonous or (especially) psychotropic herbs.  In last year's Flora prompt, I mentioned the extremely-poisonous-but-not-deadly drakima root which causes permanent and destructive psychological damage, and also mentioned an herbalist who ingested it and came out (mostly) sane.  Nemaforte is that herbalist, and she is the only person ever known to have not developed such problems despite experiencing the full effect (involving a long and torturous nightmare).

Drima: A hypnotist whose specialty is luring people into the Void and temporarily enslaving them while draining away their aural energies.  He is notable for seeking to harness the power of Moredriva (who, as was mentioned in last year's Religion/Cosmology prompt, is rumored to make those who gaze upon her too long go mad) to enhance his hypnotic abilities... which is quite a daunting feat considering he's a sunestre, and thus sensitive to sunlight.

Kinenda: A sune of the Ancient Era, who was envious of the sumi for their ability to fly.  Thus, she pioneered the art of psychokinesis, which allowed her to fly just like the sumi could.

Kyomin Sorunor: His name means "dragon master", and he turned out to exceed the name's expectations.  A sumiri from the early Trading Era growing up in Kyonin (not surprisingly), he pioneered telepathic communication with dragons, with whom he was particularly talented at empathizing with.

The Four Bardic Sisters: A quartet of sumiri musicians who witnessed the start of the Day-Night War and strove to utilize their performances to stop it before it got worse.  A difficult task, of course, which drove each sister to a vision quest of sorts to find their purpose in the war.  Even as late as the Modern Era, the story of their quests is widely told, as each sister learns a moral lesson from their quest.  Especially notable from other such fables in that the lessons are less kid-friendly and lean toward the cynical side.  (They're bards - they deserve it.)  Even the origin of their family, the Baoshra family, goes way back, originating with four priestesses who sought to channel the power of the four moons.  According to legend, they enchanted the bloodline so that they would have a single daughter, all with the same man (remember that polygamy is common among sumiri, as was mentioned in the Gender/Sexuality prompt).

Melody Clementine: She is especially unique, as she is an astronaut from Earth.  She and her crew found their way to Orenya, and began conducting scientific research there.  Her presence is especially notable in that A) the natives learned much about things such as the geography of the moons and the stars that are all around, and B) while her crew returned to Earth, she opted to stay on Orenya.

#world building june #wbj2017 #orenya #solevaille