#so if gender is just a set of rules we agreed on as a society

[figofswords]

I feel like gender nonconformity is often taken to mean like. presenting as the opposite of whatever your assigned gender is. like as an afab lesbian if I want to be gnc that means I have to dress super masc. but I think for me at least gender nonconformity is more about completely divorcing yourself from any expectations of gender presentation one way or the other. I can dress masc or femme or androgynous, I can wear makeup or not and shave my pits but not my legs, I can be whatever I want to be on any given day without regard for what I’m “supposed” to wear. when I first started really thinking about my relationship with gender there was a period of time where I felt to be valid I had to dress really butch or it didn’t count, and if I wore a skirt that meant I’d been faking it. but I didn’t WANT to dress super butch all the time. I didn’t want to be butch or femme or androgynous or or or or, I wanted to wear what I wanted when I wanted. ultimately I gave up trying to pin down and put a name on my gender identity. I said to hell with it all. my pronouns are what they are and I dress however I dress and I don’t owe it to anyone to define any of that. my gender nonconformity isn’t a nonconformity with femininity specifically; it’s a nonconformity with any sort of gendered rules of presentation. and that was a really freeing thing to figure out. and I think that in online queer communities there’s really this pressure to put a label on everything and to identify as a specific thing and to prove your validity within your identity. non-binary doesn’t have to mean androgynous. gnc doesn’t have to mean butch. and I guess this pride month I’m just really thinking about that, that really all that being queer is about is saying a big fuck it to it all and just…existing, however you want to exist. wear what makes you feel good. be whatever makes you feel good to be. to hell with it all.

#ok to rb #idk where this came from I am just musing #I think also there’s this level of like. I deleted TikTok bc seeing the nonbinary teens on that app made me feel….bad #bevause they were all skinny and conventionally attractive and could pass for androgynous #I’m never going to pass for androgynous. I’m all hips and boobs. I’m curvy as hell and my voice is high pitched and I’m five feet tall #and it made me almost nauseous seeing this idea of what non-binary or gender nonconformity was supposed to look like #but in real life it’s not like that. gnc people look like a million shades of the rainbow #and it’s important to not make gender nonconformity into just another box you have to fit into #after taking gender studies classes I came to this conclusion like #its all made up to begin with. it’s real but it’s made up #so if gender is just a set of rules we agreed on as a society #then there ARE no rules and gender can be whatever you make it #and there’s a real relief to that

[genderkoolaid]

i find this so interesting. on multiple levels. i actually agree that there are trans people who use the language of "gender is fake" while still relying on the idea that gender is not a construct. i mentioned this in another post but we have a problem with conflating our choice in labels with the experiences we use them to express. and then ofc there are people who still follow the medical model of being trans which uses shit like "brainsex."

but i find the comparison w christianity interesting because of the assumption that "full" or "true" belief is an objective measurement. there are plenty of people who identify as christian and perform as christians but don't "truly" believe. and i'm not even talking about hypocrites! there are agnostic + atheist christians who find community in christianity and/or find it valuable philosophically. same as most other religions. because, like gender, things don't have to be Scientifically Real to be worthwhile. its fully possible to acknowledge that gender is fake (so is sex btw <3) and still find value in gender identity. laws being a social construct doesn't mean there can never be value is having an agreed upon set of rules. the only thing recognizing social constructs inherently asks us imo is to interact w those constructs knowing that they are always being recreated.

anyways. transness Exists as a scientific fact. in that there is clearly a common experience had by homo sapiens. partaking in culture is not diametrically opposed to "nature" we are social animals social construction is our nature! this is why social + physical transition works for many. its just smth humans naturally experience. the best argument terfs can make with this information is that identification w sex constructs exclusively is what is the most politically useful thing we can do, but at best this obscures how much influence gender identity has over society & pressures intersex & transsexual people to put themselves in a binary that cannot accurately discuss their experiences even if they are willing to admit that sex is a construct.

#m.

[raainy-daze]

Gotta Get Creative

halloween special !

rottmnt raph x gn!reader

summary: as it turns out, halloween costumes are a whole lot more difficult when you’re trying to match with a mutant turtle.

word count: 1,142

a/n: taking a break from requests to get some halloween oneshots out! i’m counting this as gender neutral, but reader does wear a dress for their halloween costume. happy halloween, everybody!

◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤

Ah, October, the month of spooks and scares. There’s a chill in the air, and celebrations have begun.

The moment you got out of school, you grabbed your things and practically ran the route to the nearest manhole. It was a path you knew well by now, having walked it so many times.

You arrived at the lair in roughly ten minutes (new record!). You went through your routine, greeting everyone - Splinter on his armchair, Mikey and Leo having some sort of competition, Donnie in his lab. Finally, Raph in his room.

“Hello, wonderful boyfriend of mine! It is October 1st, which means I am now about to become a menace to society. Got any costume ideas?”

You dropped yourself onto the bed next to Raph, who, prior to your entrance, had been knitting. He had set his needles down now though, and you pressed a quick kiss to his cheek before grabbing a notebook out of your bag along with a pen.

“Right to the point, huh?”

“This is business, Raph. Halloween costumes are no matter to be taken lightly.”

Several months ago already, you and Raph had agreed to go in matching costumes this year. Now that October had come, the challenge was to decide what costumes.

Of course, there were a few ground rules. Mainly, whatever it was had to something that would cover Raph’s mutation at least to the point where he could go unnoticed topside. Unless the Hidden City celebrated Halloween the way humans do, which you sorely doubted.

This couldn’t be too hard, right?

•°. *࿐

“My brain has failed me. The Internet has failed me. The world has failed me, Raph.”

As it turns out, your imagination wasn’t being very cooperative today, and neither was Google. In front of you sat your phone opened to a list of couples costume ideas (more than a few of which were more than a little unsettling), and all around you were scattered crumpled up pages of your poor notebook.

“Come on, (y/n), it’s only been thirty minutes.” Raph was patting your back in consolation.

“It’s been almost two hours.”

“What?” Raph blinked at you. “That can’t be right.”

You pointed at the corner of your screen, which indicated that roughly two hours had, in fact, passed.

“Oh. Well-” Raph picked up your notebook, reading through the most recent page. “Okay, so not much. That’s fine. It’s only day one.”

“Only day one! We waited until October to decide, and now we’re going to suffer for it! One of the most important parts of a good Halloween is a good costume - or at least an above mediocre one!” You threw your arms up in frustration (and maybe just a bit for the sake of drama), just narrowly missing Raph’s face.

Speaking of which, you couldn’t help noticing something strange in his expression. Like he was holding back a smile, and…

“Are you laughing?”

“No.” His voice cracked as he spoke, and he immediately burst into a fit of laughter.

“You think this is a laughing matter?” You couldn’t help smiling, despite your words.

“I’m sorry! I just- Wait, wait, no!” He grabbed the pillow you were reaching for before you could, and you both dissolved into giggling messes.

Your head was resting on Raph’s shoulder now, and for a moment, you just took a moment to smile.

There were a few minutes of silence, both of you lying back on the bed, before Raph chuckled. “Imagine if we just… ditched the disguise.”

“What do you mean?” You turned to look at him.

“Like, we just go up top wearing a generic couple’s costume, and when anyone asks we just go ‘oh yeah, we’re Jack and Rose from the Titanic, but if Jack was secretly a turtle monster’.”

It was a joke. It was just meant to be a joke. But… “Raph?”

“Yeah?”

“I think you’re a genius.”

•°. *࿐

Over the next month, you spent your time gathering the supplies for your costume. It wasn’t that difficult, really, the Titanic outfits weren’t that hard to recreate.

When the day rolled around, everyone met down in the lair to get into costume. April was in a circus ringmaster’s uniform, with Mayhem meant to be her circus animal. Donnie, to no one’s surprise, had dressed up as Frankenstein for the third year in a row, and had convinced Mikey to go as the monster.

“Leo, where’s your costume?” You raised an eyebrow, and he responded with a grin.

“What do you mean, where’s my costume? It’s right here. I’m a mutant turtle who lives in the sewers.”

“That’s cheating.”

“Says who?”

At this point, you decided to ignore him. You instead turned your attention to your boyfriend, who was sitting next to you on the couch. Raph’s previous joke had, in fact, become reality - here he was, Jack from the Titanic, but as a turtle creature.

“So, if Jack is a turtle now, does that mean he survives after all?” April asked.

“I don’t think snapping turtles live in the ocean,” was Donnie’s response.

“Shh - let it be happy. We need more happy endings in this world.”

“Glad you could find a happy ending in our cover up for a Halloween costume, April.”

“Hey, every costume deserves a little world building. Like magical circus animals…” April gestured towards Mayhem. Or rather, the spot where Mayhem had been moments ago. “Oh, for the love of- MAYHEM!”

You leaned back against the couch, smoothing out your dress. You’d bought a dress initially, but wound up altering it to your liking. You put a lot more effort into it than you’d really care to admit.

“Alright fellas, what’s our route? Got any intel on where the best candy’s at?” Leo took charge of the planning, or at least tried to before Donnie pulled out a rather extensive map of the best trick or treating spots in New York City.

“Well, I’d say these turned out pretty well. The costumes, that is.” Raph smiled at you.

“So would I!” You returned the grin, and put an arm around his shoulders. Well, you tried to. He was a bit too much bigger than you for it to work very well. “April’s right though. A costume like this needs a story behind it. How did Jack become a turtle creature, I wonder?”

“Maybe he’s a ninja, too. One that lives in the sewers.”

“Hey, guys!” You looked back at the others. Donnie was still holding that ridiculously large map - you had to bite your tongue to keep from laughing.

“I’ve got Mayhem, let’s go!” April called from the sewer entrance.

Everyone got up from their spots around the room; Donnie rolled up his map and Mikey rushed the last few finishing touches on his makeup. You grabbed Raph’s hand as you stood up.

“Let’s go get some free candy, people!”

#tmnt x reader #rottmnt x reader #gender neutral reader #reader insert #raph x reader #tmnt raph x reader #rottmnt raph x reader

[lazypanartist]

Can you do a Leo x male reader, where they both have a sleepover alone, but when the reader wakes up, panics in his head, because he's being close to the reader, with their legs tangles up, Leo's arm around the readers waist, and the other around his neck. But then the reader notices Leo sleeping peacefully and quietly calles him cute. But then Leo snuggles up to him closer where their lips are centimeters apart, but then Leo wakes up, and they both get super flustered and extremely nervous?

Slumber Party

Leo x Male! Reader

WHOOH

I actually showed this request to one of my friends at school yesterday.. we both had to take a minute, lmao. I hope I can do it some justice!

IDK if i can do the flustered/nervous part right, so instead I’m having it be more awkward

Notes: Lil bit of awkward tension, there IS a kiss so be warned ig?

Word Count: 1400

-----

It's an unspoken rule throughout our current society; sleepovers are to be conducted only with members of the same gender so that nothing.. scandalous will happen.

It was so deeply ingrained within popular culture that the turtles had seen it in various movies and TV shows (mostly teen flicks that April had introduced to them.)

Even with these precautions taken, you could feel your cheeks heat up when Leo asked you to spend the night at the lair.. his room, specifically.

:readmore:

"Are you sure you don't want me to take the floor? It's your room; I don't want you to be uncomfortable at all.."

You, make me uncomfortable? Please.” He chuckled, grabbing the blanket from your arms and tossing it onto the bed. “If you made me uncomfortable at all, I wouldn’t have invited you!”

“But-”

“Nope! No buts tonight. You already agreed to binging Jupiter Jim with me; I’m not letting you back out that easily!”

You couldn’t help but to laugh alongside him, sitting on the edge of his bed as he set the streaming service up on his phone.

“You pirate it?”

“Nah. Donnie did it for me.”

“Pftt!”

You slapped a hand over your mouth, snickering.

“So, no royalties?”

“Not that we’re paying for, amigo. Besides, it’d take us WAY too long to convince Pops to let us use the projector!”

“Sounds about right.”

—

The two of you stayed up for hours watching movies on Leo’s phone, laughing quietly so as to not disturb the rest of the family throughout the lair.

Come.. morning, probably, you began to rise. A weight to your chest shifted, and you felt something resting on your neck.

Blinking the sleep from your eyes, you suddenly snapped them open.

Leo was barely any distance from you at all. You must have moved closer to one another while sleeping; the weight on your neck was one of his arms, the other holding you by the waist. You could feel weight around your legs and, shifting to confirm, could feel Leo’s tangled with your own.

“O-oh..”

Leo didn’t stir. You waited a few minutes before sighing, relaxing into the turtle’s gentle touch and admiring him. He rested so peacefully; you could feel the slight rising and falling of his chest, and chuckled as a small line of drool tracing down his cheek caught your attention.

“Cute..”

You mumbled the comment, a small smile gracing your face. Lifting one hand, you gently draped it against his waist the same way he was holding you.

It was quiet for a few minutes before he began to stir. Not wake, perhaps- just shift.

Closer to you.

His snout pressed into your nose,arms pulling you closer to him. You gasped with the proximity.

One more move and he could be kissing you..

You chose to banish the thought, instead closing your eyes and forcing yourself to relax. You could still feel the heat in your cheeks.. Not that it would matter if nobody could see your blush.

It couldn’t have been too much longer when Leo finally woke. You could feel it before you heard it; his breathing sped up against your chest, his grip tightened, he shifted his head upwards, snout pressed against your forehead instead of your nose.

You sighed in relief now that you weren’t at risk of kissing him.. Not by accident, at least.

He made a small noise of acknowledgement, pulling his head away.

“..wait..”

You cracked an eyelid, trying to gauge what he was thinking without outing yourself by mistake. He was pulling away from you, quietly muttering “nope.” repeatedly.

Nope..? No to what? To you?”

You reached up, rubbing your eyes as you yawned. Pretending to have just woken. Leo paused his movements, sitting back on his legs. He cracked a smile, somewhat nervously.

“Hey, (Y/n)! How’d you sleep?”

He was blushing heavily, the flush of his cheeks almost cancelling out the markings around his eyes. You finally registered that he wasn’t wearing his mask.. You had been too focused at his closeness to realize earlier.

“I’m fine.. Slept okay, woke up a bit ago but crashed again.”

“Oh, good!” Was he sweating? “I just woke up.. Yeah. Think I might’ve been too hot, y’know?”

If he wanted to avoid.. However you two had woken up? That was fine.. For now, at least. (You told yourself that you could pretend, if nothing else.)

“Isn’t that just how you are?” You flashed him a grin, hoping it was genuine enough. He returned a smile of your own.. And you could feel the heat in your cheeks returning.

“..So..”

“..So..?”

He offered you a weaker, sheepish smile, bringing a hand up to the back of his neck.

“..So, I just had the CRAZIEST dream.”

“Oh?”

You leaned forward, hands on your knees as you sat on his bed.

“Yeah! Have you ever had one of those dreams after watching a romance movie, like, being out on a date or whatever?”

You mimed gagging, causing the other teen to chuckle.

“Yeah yeah, I know. But hear me out!.”

“Finneee.” You rolled your eyes, feigning disgust. “Only because you’re my best friend, ah?”

You could have sworn you watched his smile freeze, his whole face unmoving before his heart caught up with his brain.

“Aww! See, I knew you’d be willing to listen to me!”

You shook your head, smiling.

“Anyways. Just had a dream that I was with my crush, right? Waking up together, cuddling, whatever. I think it must’ve been one of those.. What are the dreams you can move in?”

Your mind blanked momentarily.

Was he talking about what had just occurred between the two of you?

“..I think they’re called lucid dreams.”

“Yeah, one of those! Anyways, in the dream, I wake up cuddling my crush, right? I can do anything I want, so I choose to hold ‘em tighter and kiss their forehead.”

You blanch.

“Leo, if this is your way of confessing, I swear to god-”

“Wheh?”

You shake your head, dropping it into your hands. Finally, after a few moments of silence, you look up, cheeks stained crimson with your blush.

“Leo, I was awake for that whole thing.”

His eyes widened, hands coming up to test the heat of his cheeks.

“..Oh..”

You smiled.

“Well, if it WAS just a dream, I think I liked my mind’s iteration better.”

He looked back towards you, brow furrowing.

“And what would that part be?”

“Well..” You pretend to be deep in thought, fingers drumming along your jawline.

“I think it was the part where my crush shifted in their sleep and almost kissed nme..”

His eyes widened again, though not for long. Instead, his signature mischievous grin graced his face, accompanying his still-growing blush.

“Oh yeah?”

Whatever he was planning was probably.. Part of what single gendered sleepovers were for.

Still, you offered him a matching grin.

“Mayybeee..”

Your flush deepened as he scooted closer, snout almost pressed to your nose.

“Show me.”

Your grin fell, instead replaced by a partially slack-jawed look. Giving yourself a moment to breathe, you shifted forward, pressing your nose against the tip of his snout, mere centimeters left between your lips.

“..This is how it was,, in the dream.

“And where would it have gone if you’d still been ‘asleep’?”

You sighed, steeling your nerves.

Then you turned your head slightly, shifting forward to press your lips against his.

Even with all the blood rushing to his face, his lips were cold. Gentle. He didn’t move his hands from his sides, instead shifting his head to let you kiss him.

You both stayed there for a moment, just touching each other, before you pulled back. The blush on your cheeks hadn’t subsided; instead, the action seemed to have made it worse.

Leo gave you a dopey smile, cheek resting in one of his palms.

“Wow.. better than the dream would’ve been, right?”

You chuckled, hands coming up to press against your burning cheeks.

“Yeah.. I think so.”

-----

I’m still bad at ending things.. But I like how it turned out! Reqs open until further notice.

#rise leo x reader #leo x reader #rottmnt leo #rottmnt leo x reader #rise leo #leonardo x reader #leonardo #rottmnt x reader #rottmnt #x reader #xreader

[spiderfreedom]

not gonna effortpost about this today because I gotta get work done but real short

I notice this argument being used all the time: "you can't make a definition of 'woman' that does not exclude some people that we call women. therefore, the only good definition for 'women' that includes all people we call woman is 'people who identify as woman.'"

and the thing is, philosophically, "you can't make a definition of {thing} that does not exclude some examples we also call {thing}" is something that applies to almost every category! it's literally a whole philosophical problem of "what is the definition of a chair?" didn't we have a whole meme about how nobody can even agree on what a sandwich is?

it's not something unique to women, tables, horses, sandwiches, salads, or anything else. it is a problem of language itself.

you can apply the exact same argument to other categories: "how do you define 'blackness' without excluding some people we call 'black'?" if you're american, maybe you will use the one-drop rule, in which case halsey is black and anyone who had a single black ancestor four generations ago. but is that actually how we use the word black? does that capture something meaningful about being black in america? how about being black in the world?

let's go further: "how do you define 'transgender' without excluding some people we call 'transgender'?" within the transgender community, there is no real agreement on what it means to be transgender! beyond a vague sense of "identifying as the gender society assigned to you", but even that can be challenged. if a cis (female) woman takes testosterone, starts hanging around trans women, calling herself a trans woman, is confused for a trans woman by the people that she talks to, experiences oppression on the basis of being perceived as a trans woman... can she be considered a trans woman, despite being female?

ultimately "how do you define things" is a philosophy of language question more than anything else. perfect definitions that encapsulate sets neatly do not exist, because the terms we use are socially contingent. when people came up with the word 'table', they didn't also create a logically rigorous definition for it. they just said 'well, this thing here is a table.' and then people argue about the edge cases. because also, nobody actually agrees on the members of sets of every single word!! just like how we all have different ideas of what is and isn't a sandwich!

that's the other thing, people already disagree about what words refer to. someone who has the 5ARD intersex condition has testes but may be raised and socialized as girl because their parents think their genitals kinda look like a vulva. is this person a 'girl/woman'? people are not sure... which makes sense... because it is an edge case. is a stool a chair? is a hotdog a sandwich? is an open sandwich a sandwich? the further you get from the 'prototype', the more people are going to be disagree.

so the entire question 'what is a woman' is just an exercise in confusing philosophy of language framed as saying something very meaningful about the social category of woman. it is not! it is a problem of language that we cannot define 'woman' or 'chair' or 'salad' or 'horse' or 'gamer' in a rigorous way. it is nothing inherent to women, chairs, salads, horses, or gamers.

(but what about science?) good question, what about science? science tries to operate differently from the way laypeople talk about things. scientists take common words, like 'energy', and give them different, more rigorous definitions in order to try to figure something out about the world. for laypeople, 'energy' is something vague and diffuse. for physicists, 'energy' is the force that causes things to move, and its behavior is described by certain mathematical models.

similarly, laypeople may take 'woman' to mean 'a person with breasts and vulva/vagina', but a biologist may have a more rigorous definition of 'female': 'producing large gametes.' this is useful because it helps us see commonalities between creatures that may look really different, like flowers, bedbugs, asparaguses, cats, and humans - all very different creatures where sex looks different, but still have a distinction between 'producing large gametes' and 'producing small gametes' - there's no intermediate gamete. biologists have a different word for what people/animals look like, and that is 'phenotype.' when a parent looks at a child with 5ARD condition, they see the child has no visible penis and thus 'looks 'looks female.' a biologist would say that the child's sex is male (because they have the reproductive equipment to produce sperm, and none of the reproductive equipment to produce ova) but that their phenotype is ambiguous. sex is a binary variable, but human development is a long process where are a lot can happen, and so sexual phenotypes are not variable.

so already we're pretty far from the lay definition, because laypeople don't have the same idea of what sex is as scientists do, and don't distinguish between someone's sex and their appearance - for them, the sex is the appearance. who is right? it depends on what you want to do. scientists want to discover meaningful things about nature, and their definitions are far more useful than the layperson's for that purpose. which definitions are useful is also socially determined - we may feel sympathy for the child with 5ARD, told they were a girl their whole life, but who learns that they have testes. should we continue to treat this child as a girl/woman, or should we encourage them to view themselves as a boy/man? that is a social, cultural, legal argument, not a scientific one. the biological truth is the same regardless of the social, cultural, legal arguments, but there may be a compelling case to act differently. that's on us as humans to decide!

so yeah I'm just tired of hearing the same damn arguments over and over again. "what is a woman? is someone with CAIS a woman? is someone with 5ARD? what if we take a young non-intersex male and give them female hormones?" like this will never take us to where we want to go because it's a philosophy of language question disguised as a scientific one. the real question is, what are we talking about and which definitions will help us in that? if you believe that female people are exploited on the basis of their female bodily functions, then obviously you want to bring attention to that by using the word 'female'! if you want to focus on feminine socialization, then it may be useful to bring up cases of people who may not technically be female but were still raised as them, like Erika/Erik Schinegger, a male (possibly with 5ARD) who was raised as a girl and believed he was a girl for most of his youth.

trying to make a single catchy response to a question of what is 'x' is never going to satisfy everyone, because it cannot, because language is imperfect and real life is messy. scientists try to cut nature at the joints, but their cuts may not look like laypeople's! (and don't get me started on scientists disagreeing on what is a joint and what is not, metaphorically.)

and at its worst, when chasing an ironclad definition, you get bizarre answers that seem detached from reality, like saying 'people with CAIS condition are genotypically male and have underdeveloped testes, so we should treat them as males'. they may be reproductive males, but they have a female phenotype, and are raised as girls, and are literally unreceptive to testosterone - to treat them as 'men' on the basis of developmental or reproductive sex certainly seems to be missing something very important from the picture! see below: a person with Complete Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome (CAIS):

does it really make sense to say this person is a man due to her having testes, which technically makes her reproductively male? is that capturing reality? or are you trying to force reality to fit into your definition because you're afraid that if you cannot create a perfect definition of 'woman', that we will never be able to talk about biology and female oppression?

tl;dr: questions like 'what is a woman' are designed to be time-wasters because they are not actually answerable because language sucks. argue for your operative definition, your context, and move on. and don't be afraid to change definitions based on the context... sometimes reproductive sex is relevant, sometimes phenotype is more important, sometimes socialization is more relevant. this is not weakness, it's recognizing that reality is not so rigid and sometimes you must use a different model to get the understanding you want.

#feminism #radical feminism #mypost #stop wasting your time... being dogmatic to any definition always results in weird outcomes #i don't think this weakens the radical feminist case at all #sometimes looking like a woman (have a female phenotype) is more relevant than one's reproductive sex #sometimes one's reproductive sex is quite important #5ARD people go through a normal male puberty for example and if they get a surgery they can also reproduce using their sperm #many 5ARD ppl identify as women bc of their socialization. and in some spaces that makes a lot of sense! #but in sports it is probably not fair for them to compete because they are male in reproductive sex and in phenotype. #recognizing complexity will not hurt us; it will make our case stronger and fuller and richer #justice for all requires dealing with the edge cases and not just defining them away #if you care about intersex women then you need to get used to thinking about this sorta thing #because it is very common for intersex kids to be raised as female despite being reproductively male #it's a space requiring nuance. care. compassion. and thoughtfulness. #philosophy of language

[anderjak]

i was thinking about making a big dumb long twitter thread, but since that site is dying, i'm posting it here:

all it really takes to be radicalized is learning how much is fakey-fake.

we cite gender as a social construct, which it is; it's entirely made up and shifts with the sands in the hourglass. but it's still pretty important for a lot of reasons.

laws are also a social construct; many of us collectively decided that there should be consequences for thing that hurt others, and we all shook hands and agreed that we'd punish people for doing those things. the fact that laws keep changing, being updated, being redacted, etc, is proof that we are quite literally making it up. most of them are just arbitrary ways of protecting us from ourselves.

money is also a social construct; bartering in and of itself is done under the belief of equivalent exchange, that to give also means to receive. we all did kinda collectively agree that, if we're gonna have a bartering system, it's better to use coins and scraps of paper instead of livestock and daughters to purchase goods and services and clout. (though we still kinda do this, it's just more frowned upon.)

we believe in these social constructs enough that defiance against these things is a pretty radical concept; part of the social contract (which in and of itself is a social construct!) is that we all agree to a certain subset of rules and expectations in order to not rub each other the wrong way or hurt each other, and violation of this upsets a so-called natural order.

what i'm saying is, social constructs are still treated as real and tangible, because many of the social constructs we have are important! they help inform us of our role in society.

however, a lot of social constructs are treated as facts of human nature, which isn't the case. one thing that kept fascinating me was the frequency in which i'd see autistic people play with gender, because, hey, if you're someone who misses social cues and often questions social constructs due to the way your brain works, it's a lot easier to perceive gender as a strictly optional selection of traits you can opt into and out of!

it also leads me to understanding why i know so many trans activists, communists, socialists, and anarchists; once you live a life wherein, as part of your modus of survival, you question a major social construct an entire culture builds itself around, markets toward, and enforces by way of marketing and storytelling and so forth. when you realize something's fakey-fake, it's a lot easier to be enraged by the idea that a lot of people simply agree that the social constructs we are expected to adhere to are inalienable and must be maintained at all costs, regardless of how many of these social constructs, like systemic bigotry, actively harm others in numerous overt and covert ways.

when you get to that point, it's a lot easier to finally start asking the question, "why DON'T we just abandon some of these things so we can actually improve our lives, especially if all they do is get in the way of genuine progress"

i think a good starting point of activism really does boil down to sitting with this idea that very few things we deal with and are affected by are in no way set in stone, and can absolutely be changed, and much of the resistance is folks who refuse to treat social constructs as anything but static and permanent.

#bloggerjak #accidentally posted to the wrong blog at first #whoops #forgot how to use tumblr

[diana-prince-s]

I saw a post in which someone said that they didn’t like how Greta treated Carson all season, being hot and cold and leaving Carson hanging when she wouldn’t be available emotionally, and OP compared Greta’s behavior to that of a toxic man in a romcom, and I just spent like half an hour typing a nuanced response to find that OP deleted the post. so I’m just gonna post my response here:

I agree with this take to some extent, and @sentientbubblegum and I had a long debate about this just now, because at multiple points during the series Greta would do something and I'd go "That's so toxic!" But I think to compare Greta to a man in romcoms removes the context of gender and setting from the series and her character almost entirely.

It's important to remember that the 1940s was a dangerous place for any aberration outside of "white, cis, heterosexual, nationalist" American conformity, as we all well know, and different people who exist outside of those boundaries will have different reactions to the type of oppression and fear they experience existing in that type of society. Some -- like Lupe and Jess -- will freely express themselves as best they can while seeking and building community spaces; others -- like Bertie -- will freely express themselves but also try to adhere to society's rules, to "pass," in order to maintain safety. And some people -- like Greta -- will internalize the fear and trauma and do things that are selfish in order to maintain their safety at all costs while being able to partake in their own identity. Was Greta's approach the best out of anyone? Absolutely not. But these characters don't often have access to the therapy or the awareness that there is a "better way" or even the room to discover that there is a better way, and I think Carson and Jo pushed her to later realize that, at least, the better way might be worth trying. I don't think "toxic men" in romcoms have this similar experience where the way their environment treats them causes emotional stress leading them to act in ways that are toxic -- I think they're just toxic.

At the same time, I have critiques about how Greta treated Carson (and how Carson treated Greta, honestly). I think it was incredibly selfish to have done all the stuff with the letter, then when Carson was upset about the letter to be like "Well these are things you needed to say to your husband" and "You need to accept these things in yourself," then to have kissed Carson, thus almost forcing her on a path of queerness, and then to almost immediately withdraw emotionally and physically. It feels like, to me, Greta had a feeling that Carson was queer and then decided that Carson had to go on her queer awakening journey so that Greta could get what she wanted but still remain emotionally detached because she was scared. Queerness is a deeply personal thing and discovering your queerness is a personal journey, and Greta deciding when and how Carson should have that journey was very problematic to me. I also think that this very plot point and storyline is out of character for the Greta that is revealed later in the season. If Greta is so terrified that she'll be outed, why would she kiss a married "heterosexual" woman off of vibes?

I think Greta's lack of emotional availability was not toxic, but I think it was irresponsible of her to be "back and forth" with Carson without communicating her feelings. I began to enjoy their relationship after Greta finally told Carson why exactly she was so hesitant and distant, and I think this was a major turning point in their relationship and the show in general, because it really grounded their relationship in the reality of the time rather than a melodramatic storyline that Greta is wishy-washy. To OP's critique, I'd say that, despite the overwhelming number of queer characters and the innate queerness of the show making ALOTO and the Peaches team feel like a queer utopia, the characters still have to grapple with the reality of the time. The show even forces us to realize that when the bar gets raided, once again taking these relationships out of queer melodrama and placing them back in the time period in which they exist. Greta's intense fear after the raid was valid, but I think the way she blamed Carson for "forcing" her to go to the bar was unnecessary and not okay.

My issue with the conclusion of Greta's story was that she never attempted to reconnect with Carson, to apologize, or communicate any of the "growth" that she experienced in the wake of Jo leaving (which I think wasn't really true growth but a seed of it for next season) -- then she asked Carson to just drop everything and move with her to New York. It felt like Greta, even after all the hurt she caused Carson, expected that Carson would still be in love with her and unquestioningly engage in a relationship on her own terms. ( @sentientbubblegum feels like this invitation was proof of Greta's growth).

In all, I think I liked Greta outside of her relationship with Carson a lot, and while I enjoyed watching Carson and Greta together, I don't think their relationship was a model relationship and I don't think they were good to each other. I hope that, in the off-season, both Greta and Carson have a chance to grow so that their relationship next season is more stable and healthy.

#a league of their own #aloto #greta gill #carson shaw #greta x carson #aloto spoilers

[zhoras-bitch]

Y'all remember Sunkissed?

Probably not, it is sleep-inducingly boring, but I was reading it for the diamonds & it hit me... PB missed such a great opportunity to make the story about mermaids!

I mean, the book feels like PB kinda forgot to give it a plot anyway. There's the family drama, but it is not nearly interesting enough to spend 17 freaking chapters on. So here's how I’d write Sunkissed, but with mermaids.

We can keep the setting: MC (gender customisable, cause there is no point to make this book gender locked) comes back to Turtle Bay, the city their family used to live in before their dad died. With them is their mom, who seems very much opposed to the idea of coming back, and only agrees to stay for the summer to renovate the old family house & sell it. (MC assumes this attitude is the result of their mom not processing her loss in a healthy way, but we’re gonna learn it’s a little more complicated than that later.) For now, MC starts unpacking and in their old room they find a letter from their dad, in which he hints there's more to Turtle Bay than meets the eye.

We spend the rest of the chapter establishing the setting (checking out the town and the beach, meeting the LIs etc.). MC is confused about the letter, because the town seems completely normal... Until the end of chapter 1, when they accidentally discover that one of the LIs they met earlier is a merperson. 

Obviously, this is supposed to be a secret, and MC promises to keep it. Still, they start spending time together, MC learns more about this new world and eventually discovers they have some supernatural powers, similar to those of merpeople.

We have two antagonists: one is some sort of merpeople leader, who dislikes the fact that MC, a human, was allowed in on the secret. The second is a human poacher/evil scientist who suspects that merpeople exist and wants to reveal them to the world. In the finale, antagonist comes this 👌 close to getting the proof, but MC and Eliana (a marine biologist & one of our LIs) manage to destroy/replace the evidence and even persuade the antagonist they were chasing shadows this whole time. Antagonist leaves the town in shame, and merpeople finally fully accept MC for saving their secret.

For LIs, Eliana’s character would definitely fit in well in this version, I wouldn’t even change much about her. Nathan could be rewritten as our main merman LI, and Samson is a sea witch some wise magician who knows about the supernatural world, but wants nothing to do with it. Or we could scrap them and make new LIs entirely. 

At the family drama side of things, similar to the original, there is some drama between MC and their mom, but we spend waaaay less time with it. And like the original, MC is collecting letters from their dad, except in this version they tell the story of how he and MC’s mom met. At fists it’s just cute fluff, but there are hints something bigger is going on, until the big reveal - MC’s mom is actually a mermaid. She fell in love with a MC’s dad, a human, and broke a bunch of rules to be with him. Dad’s death can be a genuine accident/illness or something more sinister, depending on how dark we want to go. In any case, turns out the reason mom was so opposed to coming back to Turtle Bay is actually because she was trying to protect MC from the merpeople society, which to her brought nothing but misery.

Being half mermaid, MC can now live as both human and merperson. We could have different endings, but in my ideal version MC embraces both sides and stays in Turtle Bay with their new human and merpeople friends. They reconcile with their mom, and mom reconciles with her mer family as well, and they all live happily ever after.

P.S. Yes, this is inspired by the H2O series and Lovestruck’s My Siren Crush.

#playchoices #sunkissed #choices sunkissed #bitch speaks

[silviakundera]

My rambling spoilerific notes on cdrama A Dream of Splendor:

Not on the same level of Story of Minglan (which was the series that truly hooked me into cdramas) but decent writing, acting, complex & interesting characters, and period drama themes I am personally interested in.

Yes, it would have been improved by allowing the some of the female characters to be explicitly sex workers (as opposed to "official entertainers" who don't have sex) . But it still hit the spot for me, even though it had the potential to be more. The women are really interesting characters who are layered and get to be imperfect people. I love me some media that allows female characters to be strong and smart but ALSO a little jealous and short-sighted and hypocritical -- and those negative moments that we ALL have (because we are human) don't mean the character is not still portrayed as sympathetic and worthy of respect. The female leads have very distinct personalities with their own strengths and weaknesses.

And I'd argue that the writers make it clear that virginity is not required to deserve love & romance - Gu Qingfan doesn't care if Pan'er had already had intimacies before him, Du doesn't find Sanniang less attractive for being divorced with a son, the emperor explicitly knows his empresses had been "married" before & only wants to hide her past status and protect her, doesn't disdain her for it. Song Zhang has canonically been intimate with 2 men and the narrative awards her Strength of Character.

I totally get the frustration with the idiotic misunderstanding/separation of the primary couple 3/4th into the drama. But this is the one case where I GET IT and actually agree with the writers' choice.

The whole point is that the drama hammers in again and again the damage all this institutional sexism does to women (family/spouse rights, court rights, guild rights, legal pariah status, et al). And that despite how much of their society sets up women to HAVE to be dependant on a man to be safe and secure.... not planning for yourself and establishing links & finances outside the men in your life is the very worst situation to be in and should be avoided at all costs.

Pan'er counsels others on this several times but is afterall is just human and giving good advice is easier than applying it to your own life. Again, I find it very human and relateable that she struggles to practice what she preaches. And it is sympathetic and understandable that she takes this big risk and trusts her life partner to back her. They truly ARE partners and he has proven to be dependable.

But the narrative wants to demonstrate WHY in this society it is so dangerous to depend on the attentiveness of a man.

The fact that they need to enter into this risky deal in the 1st place is about institutionalized sexism: they are constrained in what businesses they can operate because of their gender. Pan'er also has her options limited due to her social status from being a former forced-entertainer. Because of their social standing, purchasing a real restaurant would always be precarious. They didn't have 5 good options and picked the worst one - they got a shot at an owner who urgently needed cash and so gave them this chance, under limited and unfavorable conditions.

The narrative makes it clear from the start how the female leads are repeatedly MADE to take risks and drastic gambles that would not be necessary if not for class&gender (with their class informed w gender, divorced woman and performer status). They would have a variety of opportunities to purchase a restaurant if the rules of society weren't set against them. I appreciate how clearly this is demonstrated in the story, even as the audience screams at Pan'er not to make this overconfident misstep.

So it is important for the themes the drama is exploring that our main couples' separation is as foolish and happenstance as possible. It underlines even more how these ladies CANNOT be beholden to a dude making time for them. In parallel to actual, intentional betrayal by fake-nice official Shen, the narrative makes the 2 least sexist & most trustworthy men in the drama have a bad day then get all angsty and self-pitying, running off to go stare solefully at running water and stoically Do Politics and spit blood. And now the ladies have to realize how much they had slipped into depending on these guys and didn't have a safety net of their own making. Even the best dudes are people who their society has given all the power to and they have freedom of movement & choice that you don't. They can just abandon you when Shit Happens.

So yeah, normally stupid misunderstandings & contrived separations make me fastforward or drop a series but here I'm like yaaaaaaaaaaaas GIVE IT ME. FEED ME THAT GENDER POLITICS COMMENTARY MMMMMMMMMM DELICIOUS.

and sorry but I'm not really sorry: i loved that the ladies get back on their feet by ending the feud with ridiculous master of 12. It felt narratively appropriate that they put aside their enemy status in that scenario. Like, obviously comic relief foil was an asshat and they had legit grudges against each other. But his mother was an official-entertainer. He wears this "stain" just like them yet retains his pride just like them. Once we learned that, I was CERTAIN it would pay off narratively that eventually they'd ally. It only benefits the people who orchestrate the pariah status on women to have a former official entertainer & current registered performer feuding w the son of an official entertainer instead of being allies. And that scene where Pan'er is like, fck that why do they get to say Wazi is for inferiors?! This is a beautiful memory for both of us, screw those guys! and he's like....YOURE RIGHT !! 😭 Dreaming of a place where performers are treated with dignity and not degraded. "Mr Chi, do you agree with me to make the changes? " Like Sanniang, he's crass and tactless and too brash and inelegant for polite society. But he and his crew so naturally fall into being "one of them", and it feels right to now have him stand by the ladies' side confronting Gu Qingfan's silent 5th Official coach. He's completely a pathetic joke except in those serious moments that are about their dream of earning respect & proving people wrong.

Yes, they team up with a man but it's meaningful that it's THIS MAN and it's not dependant on a man's love & sustained attention but a formal contract. And they build this found family of misfits, with sweet but bumbling scholar Du added-in. (Du calls them a family when he risks himself for Qingfan!!! 😭) It's a big hot mess but YOUR HONOR I LOVE THEM.

Plus, the night revels painting subplot threads in well as it's made explicit that Pan'er instinctively lied to the emperor not only out of concern about Gu Qingfan but in solidarity to women who were forced into sexualized performance work and then forever reviled for it - she risks herself because Pan'er felt she couldn't give up another former pariah to be degraded and executed for the sin of daring to escape her shackles and gain love & prestige. (The men who force young girls to be trained to dance alluringly for them = totally fine and good noblemen. The girls themselves = unworthy and not chaste!! )

The way master of 12 Chi Pan and Pan'er are initially set up to be enemies is paralleled by the Empress and Pan'er being positioned by others to be on opposing sides until she is made to realize she's attacking the wrong person out of fear & to the convenience of others who think women like them are rotten inside. Their precarious position & greviances are, at heart, the same. Like our female leads, the Empress is not behaving rashly and making desperate, hard calls in a vacuum. Again it is institutionalized sexism that has driven her to these calculated, self-protective moves. "I just wish you could put yourself in another woman's position" "She was once reduced to pariah status too. She knew how helpless it felt. She knew it was not your majesty's fault" - the writing intentionally lets this moment be what finally sways the empress and not politics.

p.s. enjoyed how with mistress Gao they flipped the sexist drama cliche of the jealous girl attacking and ruining the rivals of her betrothal: plot twist, she's actually just a regular person and it was all rumors. She and FL become friends 👌 👌

Is the drama quite idealistic and fairytale, where the ladies triumph and they win over the Eastern Capital? Yep. With some heart warming cheese in the finale. But misogyny is still alive and well today and life is hard enough. Sometimes we need a bit of comforting fairytale. I know it was unrealistic but feel-good catharsis is nice ok. I watch dramas for escape. (And they at least couldn't write the emperor immediately eliminating the pariah class in 1 fell swoop, as that would just be TOO much unrealistic fairytale.)

[acknowledged: the ML's job is super immoral and the justice system he participates in is THE WORST. To enjoy this series u have to be comfortable with the narrative wanting to explore social justice about a very specific topic and leaving the critique of period-typical prisioners treatment to other media to explore. Though at least there is a bit of narrative justice when he himself gets tortured for wrongful charges.]

#dream of splendor #cdrama #is it a perfect drama:NO #is it pure and unproblematic:NO #did i enjoy its earnest attempts #to be a pro feminist take on ancient china cdramas #yes #could have been better #but it treats its female characters w a lot of respect #and when people in the town all pitch in money #in the climax #because paner has earned all of their respect #chefs kiss #cheesy but feel good #idealistic and a bit fairytale #ok a lot fairytale #but ms song bringing final evidence #from music #the profession that shames her #i appreciate it #how the writers try to make it all hang together #they had points to make #a clear story they wanted to tell #honestly the writing is do empathetic to all the female characters #i appreciate that #another series would let the empress be a straight up villian #but the narrative is so sympathetic to them all #even when they make bad choices

[fadebolt]

people dont like every slugcat being male except artificer because it kind of implies some weird things

people only headcanon arti as female because they had kids. but like, noone hcs gourmand or survivor as female despite also canonically having children in their endings

it implies some weird things like arti HAS to be a mother because only a mother would be enraged by their kids deaths. it makes no sense why survivor and gourm arent seen as female in the larger community

that or it implies some real weird stuff about why gourmand is headcanoned as male (probably because fat men are widely more accepted than fat women, which is a whoole other issue)

overall its just Weird. its kind of like male is seen as the “default gender” until they do something remotely feminine

Hey, uhh, sorry for taking a while to respond to this. As you could probably tell, I was feeling rather exhausted and stressed during the week, so I thought it might be better to answer after I could catch a little break, and have a much clearer head. Moodiness can make people say and do unreasonable things, and other people refusing to even tolerate me while I'm genuinely trying my hardest to be polite is something that tends to irk me, even when I'm feeling great otherwise. But I'll promise to try and handle this stuff a little better in the future, and just not let it get to me again (or at least not make problematic ramblings in moments when I very clearly shouldn't).

Anyways, as for your points, I'd say I sort of agree. Kids cartoons have absolutely set this problematic trend of "if you see a monster/creature/animal/machine/whatever non human entity, it is male, unless it has specific female traits or features" and this is simply such a common pattern that for a lot of people, it is nigh impossible to start assessing media without it (cus humans do have a hard time ditching their patterns). And wouldn't you know it, excessively caring and overprotective parenting where the children are pretty much the character's whole world, just so happens to be one of those said 'female traits or features'.

And is this an issue? Well, kinda, yeah. There's a good reason why media has been trying to subvert this for a long while, and I always love to see these characters that possess traits which are usually associated with the opposite gender (for the overly caring parent example - think Marlin from Finding Nemo), or female creatures that straight up possess zero of the feminine traits that tend to be used to identify non humans as female (think something like Rek'Sai or Naafiri from League). I could think of many more examples for both these categories, which I'm honestly very grateful for, because I do feel like it would really suck if we would have hard-set rules for what male and female characters are allowed to be, which would not only be a problem for the future of media and art, but it would also likely end up having an extraordinarily shitty impact on society.

However, the problems start kicking in when people are beginning to demand that you never portray male and female characters with any of their common stereotypes. And to an extent, I get it, but sometimes, those things might actually work, and restricting creators from using them is going to not only create needless conflict, but will also make it more difficult for them to see their artistic visions through. I understand that people would do this to solve a problem, but the issue is that we're swinging too far to the other side. We can uplift the non conformists without belittling the conformists, especially when we're in a fandom, a place where all kinds of people can unite over their love for a piece of media, as a way to relax and have harmless fun in their free time.

And also just because some people portray their characters a certain way, it doesn't mean that they're setting universal truths that everybody must follow. Just because someone thinks "Oh, an animal getting outraged over the deaths of their kids... sounds like a mother to me!", it doesn't mean that they're trying to spread this notion that a father couldn't react in the same way, similarly to how headcanoning Gourmand as male doesn't automatically make someone hate fat women. Are there a few people where these concerns might actually be true? Absolutely, but to claim that they make up the majority, just feels like a wild over exaggeration. And making these sorts of judgemental assumptions over fictional headcanons just doesn't sit right, at least with me.

I know I've written a boatload here (sorry xd), but I really wanted to fully express my thoughts, especially after the whole fiasco. This might sound surprising, but I'm genuinely grateful that you've sent these asks, not only to get me to my senses, but also to actually engage with me on this topic in a meaningful manner. To me, it really doesn't matter if someone else's opinion differs from mine. I'm willing to hear and consider it, and it makes me very happy when the other side is also willing to hear and consider mine. This is how we learn and grow after all, and is a way better strategy than just shutting ourselves into an echo chamber with a bunch of yes-men, and being mad at everybody outside of it... which is something I hope will not be a common phenomenon in this community. This fandom is very important to me, and the last thing I would want is to see it turning into a warzone between a bunch of isolated camps that viciously hate each other (though I am very frightened that the post might be contributing to us heading towards that direction, hence why it felt so awful for me to be silenced... let's just pray that it won't have any nasty consequences, like community members getting harassed or something).

So thank you, for coming here and giving me a chance to speak. It means a lot, and you'll always be welcome here, no matter how badly we might disagree on something. I'll make sure to try and be open to what you, or anybody else might have to say, and I encourage everybody else to do the same (unless that things is a blatant unconstructive insult meant to do nothing but harass, but that's beyond the point xd)

#fade answers

[starlightandpoetry]

Wife Syndrome

At 19 I became a wife

I was groomed for it my whole life

Carry yourself like a lady

And maybe Prince Charming will come and save me

So I stayed in the tower

Waiting for the day my love shower would begin only to find out that no one is grooming the men

No offense

But I’m not even sure I want a Prince

I was taught to be loyal

He was taught to plant multiple seeds in the same soil

Have your own money and cook and clean

But they’re telling him to always look out for his own well-being

Play the field young man

Their are so many fish in the sea

And I agree there may be other well trained women like me

But times are changing and traditions are fading

No one wants the title anymore

People don’t even know what they’re looking for

Whose supposed to pay for dinner when you go on dates

Should it be based on a gender role or how much each person makes

Is he less of a man if he doesn’t get the door

Nothing I was taught as a child applies anymore

There are no rules now a-days only comfort zones

You can create your safe space by adjusting the setting on your phone

So what about the Princesses who were groomed to think for two?

How do I learn how to do what I want to do

We need wife syndrome therapy class in Cleveland

So that woman like me aren’t depressed at the end of cuffing season

I wish I could change my orientation on Tinder to say Mrs not just her slash she

Maybe my profile pic can be my wedding photos and bio can say, the one who always has what you need

I Wish there was a symbolic accessory to let people know your always down to get married

So that only men who want that white picket fence life approach you when you wear it

You keep the King size bed if I have to sleep alone

Being single isn’t glamorous

It’s dark & cold

I only know a life of selflessness where love is my warmth and my light

But in the climate of today’s society monogamy doesn’t seem to be worth the fight

I hope it doesn’t sound like I’m losing faith for a person with my spirituality that would be impossible

But in this new digital era I’m simply a single wife trying to find her place

Trying to build a machine of self-esteem that’s unstoppable

But it’s not 1950 and Prince Charming has always truly only been in fairy tales

So to all my natural born wives I document my journey of unlearning hospitality and just learning how to be myself 💕

#19th century #moma #nature #natural hair #music #mua #motd #moon #modern art #nct dream

[citizenship-project-2023]

Interview Results

We interviewed 2 respondents to see if the online activist movements are influencing the younger generation and the extent to which they are contributing to political change in todays world, and if not, what are the influences that are taking place.

Censorship

Question 1: When asked the question: ‘Do you believe in the ability of an individual or group holding people in positions of power to account through any means possible? (e.g. hacking, exposés, etc.)’, you responded: ‘No’. Do you mind sharing why you believe this?

Respondent 1:

(Paraphrasing) Too much power for someone outside of the judicial system to have.

They should do it through legal means. Information is classified for a reason.

Respondent 2:

(Paraphrasing) Bad individuals at the top of society are not held to account by ordinary means of reporting. “Media has limits”.

Mentioned ISIS, 2015 being exposed by Anonymous hacker group

It holds people to account, and through regular means, it is a good thing.

Whistleblowers should be protected.

Question 2: Have you ever seen the topic of censorship being discussed online? 

Respondent 1:

Yes, Censorship in North Korea and China. Believes from their point of view it’s justified. But doesn’t support it nor oppose it.

Respondent 2:

No

However, respondent mentioned ‘The Great Firewall of China’, Russia, Iran, and “potentially more” countries that censor their media.

Question 3: Have you ever seen the topic of censorship being discussed in any other form of media? (books, film, music, etc.)

Respondent 1:

Yes (films, book), but sees them as only fiction and doesn’t take them with a grain of salt. Eg, Casablanca, made  clear the movie was propaganda, rules that out as a reliable source. Persepolis, set in Afghanistan (checkagain), by a woman who lived there at the time and about taliban. Would give it more credibility because it was autobiographical.

Respondent 2:

No, they didn’t think so. But he mentioned ‘Don't F**k with Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer’ documentary on Netflix & Russian hackers?

LGBTQIA+

Question 1: When asked the question: ‘Do you believe in the ability of an individual or group holding people in positions of power to account through any means possible? (e.g. hacking, exposés, etc.)’, you responded: ‘Yes’. Do you mind sharing why you believe this?

Respondent 1:

Believes people can marry who they want, and doesn’t mind.

Respondent 2:

“Gay people are people” → claimed this statement was “rudimentary” and elaborated: “People shouldn’t have their right to marriage removed. You’re just oppressing an already marginalized group.”

Question 2: Have you ever seen the topic of LGBTQIA+ rights being discussed online?

Respondent 1:

Comment sections in reactions to news or sport events. 

Sport events: Semenya

Hormone levels shouldn’t dictate gender.

Change sports to include people of all genders.

News: Articles about trans people not being real and too many genders. Been exposed to LGBT more than the older generation and is more accustomed to it.

Respondent 2:

Twitter comments accusing gay people of grooming → American conservatives are the loudest

Mentioned the ‘Bud Light’ controversy and had a good knowledge on the topic

Didn't support the beliefs

Mouthpieces who agree: Matt Walsh, Steven Crowder, Ben Shapiro, Andrew Tate, (Daily Wire)

Mouthpieces who spoke against: Hasanabi & Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

Men's Rights

Question 1: When asked the question: ‘What is your opinion on Men’s rights ( The men's rights movement rejects the concept that men are privileged relative to women.)’, you responded: ‘I don't know enough to give a fully informed opinion, but from my understanding so far it seems unnecessarily defensive’. Do you mind sharing why you believe this?

Respondent 1:

Not at a place in society where women have more rights than men. Doesn’t believe women will have more rights than men any time soon.

Respondent 2:

A lot of these people equate women speaking out/wanting rights as a personal attack.” 

He called them Fragile in general”

“It’s not a woman’s world at all.”

The people pushing this movement (het cis white men) are the most privileged and set beliefs upon others

They need a sense of power - don’t want to feel weak

“Putting old world beliefs in a world that’s rapidly changing.”

Mentioned stonewall and the suffragette movement

“A woman gave birth to you.”

Question 2: Have you ever seen the topic of men’s rights activism being discussed online? 

Respondent 1:

Yes: Andrew Tate, other podcasts, tend to skip past it.

Doesn’t support it, sees it as backwards.

Respondent 2:

Yes: Andrew Tate, Steven Crowder

Mouthpieces who spoke against: Hasanabi & Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

#poltics #citizenshipproject2023

[mysticalrambling]

Hi this is mine request, y/n and chris (evans) are married and the have 2 kids, Emma and Jason, and y/n takes Emma to get there nails and hair done they have a girls day , while the boys a a boys day at home, and when y/n and Emma comes home, the boys have cooked dinner for the girls and later that night the have a family movie night, in matching pyjama's

A/N: I loved the plot line and I was happy to write about it. This is what I came up with and I might have added a few more things to the plot line. I love dad Chris Evans and I would love to write more about him. Hope you guys like it and please tell me what you think about it.

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Family Time (C.E)

Chris Evans Fanfiction (Fanfiction Master list)

Warnings: None. Fluff all the way.

Summary: dad! Chris Evans x reader. Chris and the reader spends the whole day with their family. They enjoy the free day with their children and enjoy every moment of it.

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Having two kids was a bittersweet experience for the two of you as they were close in age so they fought a lot. It could be over the simplest of things such as who will eat in which bowl or who will cuddle with daddy at night. Emma and Jason loved each other to death but Jason being the elder was sometimes a little too stubborn. The one thing that always came as a shock to Chris’s family was that your son was a total daddy’s boy and vice versa for your daughter. Your family was always a little different from the others and you loved it.

“Mommy, Jacey pulled on my hair and threw my dollies to the ground.” Fat tears poured down her baby blue eyes as she jumped on your shared bed, effectively waking you both up. Chris just groaned and buried his head in the soft pillows and hands placed on his ears. You didn’t blame him, you both were up pretty late last night because Jason had a severe stomach ache. But he was okay now, considering he was busy annoying his younger sister.

“I will scold him but can you lie down with daddy now so I could freshen up and make you guys breakfast.”

“But I want to stay with you-,” she began to protest and you quickly silenced her by promising a girls only day.

“Besides, you don’t want to cuddle with daddy?” Chris growled playfully and started tickling your three and a half year old daughter. Taking this as your cue to leave, you went to the washroom. Meanwhile, Jason also joined the two of them in bed and lazed around for the whole morning, You prepared pancakes and scrambled eggs that was your family’s favorite breakfast and put out some dog food for Dodger.

“I want dad to feed me today.” Your five year old son declared when Emma sat on Chris’s lap to be pampered by him.

You sensed a fight heading towards the dining room and you quickly tried to diffuse the situation. “You are going to spend the whole day with your father today so let him feed Emma, please.” He huffed out a fine and you cut his pancakes in to little pieces.

“I am thinking of taking James to do some grocery shopping and then spend the whole day at home.” Chris was free today because his shooting does not start until Monday and he wanted to spend as much time possible with his family before he gets busy. He always hated being apart from you guys and would feel bad if he missed out an important step in his children’s life because of his career. You guys were truly blessed to have him in your life.

“Yeah, that’s fine. I will get them both ready for the day and then we can all get on with our day.” Pecking him on the lips, you took the kids to your room and Chris went to clean the dishes.

“Mommy, I don’t want to sit in the booster seat. I want to sit with you.”

“No, baby, it is not safe.” She was hell bent on her request today and you just ran out of patience. Snapping at her, you were instantly filled with guilt because tears pooled in her eyes.

“Darling, I am sorry. Babe, can you drop Emma and I at the parlor before going to the supermarket?”

“Sure. Just let me get my keys.” Sitting in the middle of two booster seats was highly uncomfortable but you would do it for your children. The whole car ride was filled with both the kids babbling about their school and day care respectively. Your husband silently made eye contact with you from the rearview mirror and you knew he was thanking you. “When should I pick you both up?”

“I’ll text you half an hour earlier.” Getting Emma out of her seat, you walked towards your favorite salon. You already knew that Emma wanted a mixture of blue and pink nail polish because colors are gender neutral. Chris always made sure that your kids never follow the obscene rules set by the society.

“We are going to have so much fun, mommy.” The little girl skipped towards the reception and stood on her tip toes to see you make the reservation.

“Baby, do you want to get a haircut as well?”

“Are you getting one?”

“Yes.”

“Then I want one as well.” The receptionist smiled at your daughter’s excitement and complimented her saying that she looked just like Chris. Emma puffed out her cheeks and mumbled, “I look like my mommy.”

“Sorry. You are a carbon copy of your mother. Now, I have you two stationed right next to each other and you have manicure first.”

On the other side, Chris sat his little boy in the trolley and marveled at how big he was slowly getting. He had decided to properly pamper his family today and an Italian dinner was just a start. One of the things that you always craved in both your pregnancies was his pasta pomodoro and he sometimes had to make it at three in the morning to satisfy your cravings.

“Daddy, can I get some cookies?”

“Yes, but only one because we don’t want you to have stomach ache.” Chris quickly finished the grocery shopping and then went in to Cartier. Pampering his girls was his top most priority today so he had already ordered a bracelet for you with all of the family’s birth stones engraved in it, He also ordered the same exact bracelet for his baby girl just in a smaller size. Emma always wanted the same exact things as her mother and Chris always tried to fulfill her wish.

“Can we get them some pretty flowers, as well?” Quickly, he wiped all the cookie crumbles from Jason’s face and agreed with him. They decided on getting them some pink roses because you both loved them.

The moment they arrived at the house, they quickly got to cooking but Chris made sure that he went no way near the stove. He was given the task to open up the spaghetti packet and picking out the red carrots.

Meanwhile, you both got your nails done with you opting for a bright yellow colour. Chris’s favorite colour. You got your hair cut in square layers while Emma just got a nice trim for her dirty blonde hair. Both the kids had inherited Chris’s hair and eyes but the nose and the smile was all you. During the whole time, you and your daughter talked about anything and everything. She talked about the cute boy in her daycare and how she wanted to be his friend but she got a whole circus running around in her tummy.You just chuckled and thought to not tell Chris because he will freak out and bully that poor boy.

After about two hours, Chris and James came to pick you both up and the whole way back, both the kids kept bickering with each other. The moment you opened the front door to your house, your favorite aroma hit you and a blissful sigh escaped your lips. “Have I told you this new look suits you a lot?” Your husband took you in a backside hug while both your munchkins ran towards the dining room.

“Just like a thousand times from the moment you picked us up. Is this dinner a hint?”

“Well, it’s true and maybe it is.” You kissed him slowly on the lips because the prospect of another kid was exciting to say the least.

“Daddy, I want the pasta!” Emma screamed from across the hallway and you both made your way towards them. The dining was all set and the kids were already sitting at their assigned places with their plastic forks in hand. Chris quickly served the food and you all got to eating. Dodger was sitting by your chair and happily munching on his food. Making silent eye contact with your husband, you guys silently agreed on having another kid. You were thrilled.

They all went to their rooms and came out in their matching Captain America pjs that Chris bought from Los Angeles the last time he was there for shooting. He always loved the idea of twinning with his famiily.

“We have a little surprise for you, don’t we, Jason?” The boy ran towards the living room and you all followed suit. Chris gave you a bouquet with a red long box and Jason did the same but with a smaller size to his baby sister.

The moment you saw the content in the jewelry box, tears welled up in your eyes. This was such a thoughtful gift and there was an empty place in the bracelet for a new gemstone. “You thought of everything, didn’t you?”

“I am giving you a lot of hints, here.”

“You don’t have to convince me, baby. I was thinking about this as well.”

“Then, it’s done. Baby number three of our family.”

“Thank you, daddy,” Emma jumped on Chris from the back and he immediately caught her in his arms.

“No problem, baby. Which movie do you guys want to watch?” He asked but he already knew the answer.

“Lion King!” There were a lot of things that your kids didn’t agree with but this was an exception. They were both die hard fans of Lion King.

“Aw, I thought we will watch Captain America today. But that’s okay, I guess.” He pretended to be hurt by their answer but the kids took it seriously.

“No, daddy. We love Captain America and we can watch it today.” Little hands cupped his light stubbled cheeks and Chris just smiled at his two babies. He was so lucky to have them and he could not wait for a third one.

“It’s okay, bubs. I was just kidding, We can watch it tomorrow. Today is Lion King’s day.” They all got together under the blanket and kept all the snacks on their laps. This was what Chris wanted the whole day; his whole family under his arms, happy.

“I love you.” He whispered to you while you cleaned off Emma’s sticky fingers and the drool on Jason’s chin.

“I love you, too.” You spent the whole night on that couch and somewhere in between the movie, Dodger came up and cuddled to your side. Your life was blissful and it was all because of Chris, the love of your life.

Hope you guys liked it!!

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A/N: This is just some family dribble that I wrote related to Chris Evans. I just love the idea of dad Chris. Send me some ideas related to Chris as a family man and I will be happy to write about it. Tell me if you wanted to be in the taglist.

Tag list: @maximeevansblog, @justile 

Like, comment and reblog.

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#rachelleblodgettwrites #my writing #wattpad writer #creative writing #writing community #tumblr writing #chris evans #dad chris evans #chris evans x female reader #chris evans x reader #chris evans imagine #chris evans fanfiction #chris evans fluff #chris evans fic #chris evans x wife!reader #fan fiction #fluff #family #send me asks #request #answer #steve rogers #the avengers #captain america #movies #tv shows #short stories #my imagination

[wickwrites]

Wonder Egg Priority Episode 4: Boys’ and Girls’ Suicides Do Mean Different Things (But Not in the Way the Mannequins Want You to Think!)

So, let’s talk about this for a second. After I got over my initial knee-jerk reaction, I realized I wasn’t sure how to make sense of exactly what the mannequins were arguing for here. So let me rephrase their statements to make the argumentative structure more explicit: Because men are goal-oriented and women are not, because women are emotion-oriented and men are not, and because women are impulsive and easily influenced by others’ voices and men are not, boys’ and girls’ suicides mean different things – girls are more easily “tempted” by death, and therefore, more likely to require saving when they inevitably regret their suicide. While Wonder Egg Priority, so far, seems to agree with the vague version of the mannequins’ conclusion, namely that boys’ and girl’s suicides mean different things, it refutes the gender-essentialist logic through which that conclusion was derived.

The mannequins choose a decidedly gender essentialist approach in explaining the difference between girls’ and boy’s suicides; they argue that the suicides are different because of some immutable characteristic of their mental hard wiring (in this case, impulsivity, emotionality, and influenceability). Obviously, this is a load of bull, and Wonder Egg Priority knows it. The mannequins are not exactly characters we’re supposed to trust, seeing that they’re running a business that is literally based on letting these kids put themselves in mortal danger. As faceless adult men, they parrot and possibly represent the systems that force these girls to continue to be subjected to physical and emotional trauma (it’s probably more complicated than this, but four episodes in, it’s hard to say more). So, we’re probably supposed to take what they say with great skepticism. Also, the director, Shin Wakabayashi, has recently said that in response to these lines, Neiru was originally going to object, “When it comes to their brains, boys and girls are also the same,” (which unfortunately is not exactly true and is somewhat of an oversimplification, but the sentiment is there). While that line ultimately did not make it in, Neiru does reply with a confused and somewhat indignant, “What?!”, a reaction that gets the message across.  Neiru is not a fan of gender essentialism, and as a (more) sympathetic character, we’re supposed to agree with her.

That is, the differences between boys and girls is not something inherent to their biology or character, but something constructed by culture and experience. This rejection of gender-essentialism is apparent in Wonder Egg Priority’s narrative, which takes a more sociocultural perspective on the difference between boys’ and girls’ suicides. It says, well of course boys’ and and girl’s suicides don’t mean the same thing, that’s the whole reason why we’re delving into the experiences specific to being a girl (cis or trans) or AFAB in this world – to show you how girls’ suicides are influenced by systems of oppression perpetuated by those in power (ie. the adult, in this specific anime).

And all the suicides we’ve seen up until now tie into that somehow. For instance, Koito is bullied by her female classmates who think that Sawaki is giving her special treatment. This is a narrative that comes up over and over again, in real life as well: that if a young girl is being given attention from an older man, then it’s her fault – that she must want it, or at least enjoy it somehow, and that it signifies a virtue (eg. maturity or beauty) on her part. And if Koito is actually being given such treatment by Sawaki, an adult man in a position of power over her, that is incredibly predatory. 

And we all know that child sexual abuse is something that overwhelmingly affects girls, with one out of nine experiencing it before the age of 18, as opposed to one out of 53 boys (Finkelhor et al., 2014). Regardless of whether Sawaki was actually abusing Koito or if the students only thought that he was, Koito’s trauma is ultimately the result of this romanticized “love between a young girl and adult man, but not because the man is predatory, but because the girl has some enviable virtue that makes her desirable” narrative. Similarly, in episode 2, Minami’s suicide is driven by ideas related to discipline and body image in sports, which while not necessarily specific to female and AFAB athletes, is framed in an AFAB-specific way. For instance, take the pressure on Minami to “maintain her figure”. Certainly, male athletes also face a similar pressure, but we know that AFAB and (cis and trans) female bodies are subject to closer scrutiny and criticism. We know that young girls are more likely to suffer from eating disorders. And Wonder Egg Priority situates Minami’s experience as decidedly “about” AFAB experience when her coach accuses her change of figure due to her period as a character failing on her part.

 Likewise, episode 3 delves into suicides related to “stan” culture, this fervent dedication to celebrities that is overwhelmingly associated to teenage girls. And Miwa’s story, in episode 4, explicitly shows how society responds to sexual assault. When Miwa does have the courage to speak up about her assault, she’s instantly reprimanded by basically everyone around her. Her father is fired because her abuser was an executive of his company. Her mother asks her why she couldn’t just bear with it, telling her that her abuser chose her because she was cute, as if that’s supposed to make her feel better about it. Wonder Egg Priority shows that this sort of abuse is a systemic problem, a set of rules and norms deeply engrained in a society and upheld by all adults, regardless of gender, social status, or closeness (to the victim). Wonder Egg Priority says that, yes, girls’ and boys’ suicides have different meanings, but it’s not due to some inherent difference between the two, but the hostile environment in which these girls grow up. Girls are not more easily “tempted” by death, they just have more societal bullshit to deal with.

But Wonder Egg Priority goes further than just showcasing how girls’ (and AFAB) experiences are shaped by sociocultural factors. The story also disproves the supposedly dichotomous characteristics that the mannequins use to differentiate girls and boys (i.e. influenceability/independence, impulsivity/deliberation, emotion-orientation/goal-orientation). If the mannequins are indeed correct, and that girls are just influenceable, impulsive, and emotional, you’d expect the girls in the story to be to be like such too. Except, they aren’t. Rather, they’re a mix of both/all characteristics. This show says that, certainly, girls can be suggestible, but they’re also capable of thinking for themselves. For instance, when Momoe asserts her own identity as a girl at the end of episode four, she rejects the words of those around her who insisted that she isn’t a girl. If she were as suggestible as the mannequins believe her to be, that would never have happened – she would have just continued believing that she wasn’t girl “enough”. But, she doesn’t because she is equally capable of making her own judgements. Likewise, Wonder Egg Priority shows that girls can be impulsive, but they can also be deliberate and pre-mediating. When Miwa tricks her Wonder Killer into groping her to create an opening for Momoe to defeat it, she’s not doing it out of impulse – it’s a pre-mediated and deliberate choice unto a goal. And Wonder Egg Priority continues, girls can be equally emotion oriented and goal oriented. Sure, the main girls are fighting because they have the goal of bringing their loved ones back to life, but those goals are motivated by a large range of emotions, from guilt to anger, grief, compassion, and love. 

Being emotion-driven doesn’t mean you’re not goal-driven, and vice versa. In fact, in this case, being emotional drives these girls toward their goals. In other words, none of these traits that the mannequins listed are either “girl traits” or “boy traits”. Being one does not mean you can’t be the other, even if they seem dichotomous at first. Wonder Egg Priority’s diverse cast of multi-dimensional female characters allows it to undermine the mannequins’ conceptualization of gendered roles, refuting the idea that these (or any) character traits should be consider gendered at all.

As an underdeveloped side thought, I think Wonder Egg Priority’s blurring of gendered roles is also well-reflected in its style. There’s been a lot of talk about whether Wonder Egg Priority constitutes a magical girl series, and I think that’s an interesting question deserving of its own essay. Certainly, it does follow the basic formula of the magical girl story: a teenage heroine ensemble wielding magical weapons saves the day. But it also throws out a lot of the conventions you’d expect of a magical girl story – both aesthetically and narratively. Aesthetically, it’s probably missing the component that most would consider the thing that makes an anime a magical girl anime: the full body transformation sequence, complete with the sparkles and the costume and all that. Narratively, the girls are also not really magical girl protagonist material – they’ve got a fair share of flaws, have done some pretty awful things (looking at Kawai in particular; I still love you though), and aren’t exactly the endlessly self-sacrificing heroines you’d expect from a typical magical girl story. On the other hand, the anime also borrows a lot from shonen battle anime. We get these dynamic, well choreographed action sequences full of horror and gore, the focus on the importance of camaraderie between allies (or “nakama”, as shonen anime would call it) exemplified through all the bonding between the main girls during their downtime, and in the necessary co-operation to bring down the Wonder Killers. That said, this anime is not a shonen; the characters, types of conflicts, and themes are quite different from those that you’d find in a typical shonen. The bleeding together of the shonen genre and the magical girl genre, at the very least (and I say this because I think it does way more than just that), reflects Wonder Egg Priority’s interest in rebelling against conventional narratives about girlhood and gender.

#wonder egg priority #wonder egg priority analysis #wep #w.writing #my writing #anime analysis #analysis #anime #w.analysis

[thechekhov]

Hi! I saw on a post that you're agender and I'm kinda questioning my gender (again) but what interested me more about that post was that you said you believe that gender is a social construct and I'm not really familiar with that theory. I was wondering if you could explain to me what the whole idea is? (bc I kinda only feel like a have a gender in social situations? In my head, my dreams and how I picture myself in the future, I'm genderless idjskahwksjejensj) Sorry for bothering you if I did.

This is a BIG topic and it opens a LOT of wormholes. 

We’re gonna do this in pie slice statements that will hopefully help explain what I mean. Please keep in mind I’m going to simplify many things for the sake of readability.

1) What is a social construct? 

Social constructs are ideas that are negotiated by social groups. Something being a social construct does not make it ‘not real’. 

For example, money is a social construct. Yes, we have cash - coins, credit cards - but these are physical props that are REPRESENTATIVE of the idea of currency. You have some form of credit to your name - the money is a socially agreed-upon idea of value being represented by bills in your hand, by numbers in your bank account. 

[Description: Two humanoid figures are standing side by side. The right-side figure is holding a rock in its hand. 

Right side figure: Let’s agree that this shiny rock is worth 2 sheep.

Left side figure: Sounds fake but ok.]

Technically, countries are also social constructs. We, as a society, negotiate what a country is, and this can be changed.

[Description: Two figures are standing on either side of a dotted line drawn on the ground. The left figure is pointing down at it while the right figure watches, its arms crossed.

Left figure: Let’s pretend that everything on this side of the imaginary line is mine.

Right figure: ...ok but my house is over there.

Left figure: ... for 3 shiny rocks you can come visit.]

Does that mean canada isn’t real? No. (I mean, obviously canada ISN’T real, but we all agree to pretend it is.) The thing that makes it real is that we are in agreement, and all follow the social rules of pretend to make it seem like the Canadian border, the idea of Canadian citizenship, etc... is an objective fact. (It’s not. These are in fact, negotiable limits and parameters. We have laws in place to define it in legal terms, but those laws can be changed, or may change in the minds of communities. That’s why it’s a construct.)

By that same token, I hold the view that gender, as we largely perceive it in modern society, is a construct. Why? Because it is not inherent; we, as a society, negotiate its meaning. 

2) What is gender? 

People will probably fight me on this and that’s fine, but here’s my (simplified) understanding of gender (from someone who personally has none)

Gender is a social category negotiated by cultures based on your assigned or desired role in your community that influences, among many other things, your physical appearance, your role in family units, your expected position in jobs, etc. 

How I think it happened:

[Description: Two figures are standing on either side of the panel, both holding children-looking figures. The one on the left is wearing purple. The one on the right is wearing green.

Green figure: Hey, I’ve got an idea. What if we separate the babies into two groups based on physical traits they have no control over?

Purple figure: Wh-- okay...?

Green figure: And then limit the jobs they can do and the community ritual involvement available to them based on that!

Purple figure: ... I feel like this is going to backfire on us someday.

Green figure: Nah, it’ll be fine.

The past panel is a dramatic closeup on the purple figure’s face - which is featureless - betraying a deeply doubtful emotion. It says nothing.]

Important points to remember: what gender looks like, what the limits are, what the expectations are... are not inherent to any human biology. We make up gender roles. This is evident in the fact that across the world, gender roles differ by culture. The positions people of a certain gender are allowed to take up are different. What is perceived to be ‘girly’ or ‘boyish’ is different across cultures. 

Simply speaking - currently the (western) model we have, dumbed down, is:

You are assigned male at birth because of physical characteristics

You are raised being told to ‘toughen up’ and ‘boys don’t cry’ and encouraged not to show emotions

You are taught to wear male-coded clothes and discouraged from female-coded fashion choices

You are given more opportunities to participate in sports, encouraged to engage in physical activity, etc

You are not expected to need time off for child-rearing 

Here’s where gender as it works in society breaks down into being not a real thing but instead something we thought up: 

Nothing about having a penis necessitates wearing pants. Nothing about having XY chromosomes means you need to keep your hair short. Nothing about your genome makes the experience of nail-polish different for any human being. 

All of these are arbitrary traits we decided were allowed or not allowed to a specific group of people based on entirely unrelated physiology. 

Even if we delve deeper, there is MORE variation among individuals of the same ‘sex’ than there are, on average, of members of the ‘opposite sex’ when compared to each other. 

Many people use the excuse ‘women are physically not as strong as men’ to say that this has an evolutionary aspect driving these cultural, historical, socially-constructed gender requirements. 

But if there was a physical reasoning behind the culturally-set gender-limited job expectations, then we actually WOULDN’T need a traditional binary gender system to sort ourselves into categories. It would simply be decided as a meritocracy - stronger individuals, regardless of gender, would be given physically-demanding jobs. (Also we know that many jobs thought to be ‘traditionally male’ are just the result of sexist bullshit, so this reasoning doesn’t fly any further than I can throw it which is, coincidentally, not very far. Politics is one such area. Doctors are another. We can go on but I think you get my drift.)

My own example of this is an anecdote when my grandparents came to visit my partner and I in Japan. While we were driving down to Tokyo, my grandmother - who has a PhD in entomology - began to say that driving is a masculine activity and women shouldn’t be driving as it was ‘un-woman-like’. My partner almost immediately fired back that in Japan, studying insects or having any interest in them whatsoever was considered a heavily masculine-coded activity. In Russia, there is no such assignment, and my grandmother was left silently blinking in confusion, unable to come up with any excuse except ‘well, all cultures are different, I suppose...’

Do either of these things inherently have a gendered aspect? Of course not! But we assign gendered ideals to them anyway.

3) If gender is made up and constructed by society, then does that mean trans people aren’t real?

No.

Even if you agree that gender is a social construct, trans people are still real. TERFs don’t get a pass. Why? 

Because gender - as a social construct - still affects our everyday lives, dictates our social position in our community. Transitioning is still a thing that has to happen. The fact that you are NOT easily able to decide your own gender and are ostracized for wanting to transition, abused for dressing the way you want to be perceived, and bullied for wanting people to refer to you with different pronouns - all those are the effects of a social construct that has very REAL impact on our lives.

This is also why I dislike defining trans-ness by dysphoria. Because transgender people are not only their suffering - the suffering is coming from the outside!! Many trans people remember not being concerned about their gender identity in their childhood, because they did not yet perceive the world as being hostile to their desire to fulfil a specific role in society. The issues and self-hatred and dysphoria begins when they express wanting to be themselves - a life which they are forbidden from pursuing based on physical characteristics they were born with.

Does this mean we should try to remove gender from society? If we constructed it, we can deconstruct it, right?

Realistically, I highly doubt this is possible. Gender is so ingrained in our daily lives that it would be difficult. Nor, I would say, would it be necessary to achieve world peace. 

Having social groups - having gender - isn’t inherently a bad thing. The bad thing is when we limit those social groups to specific basic human rights, like voting, or when we forbid them from transitioning from one to another based on things that are out of their control. 

Also, I’m not saying genitals and secondary sexual characteristics aren’t real. Please don’t bother sending me that angry message, I’ll ignore it, I promise. 

But the concept of gender IS something we thought up and maintain and negotiate with each other to this very day. It’s not granted to us by a higher power, nor is it a constant, unchanging thing. It’s a part of the human experience and like everything, it has the potential to evolve - as a concept in our communal memory, as well as on an individual level, for people who feel they want to be perceived differently. 

Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk!

#hiimholalate #gender #agender #queer stuff #gender is a social construct #social construct #genderqueer #long post

[elamarth-calmagol]

What actually is LACE? (an informal essay)

What’s LACE?

Laws and Customs among the Eldar, or LACE, is the most popular section of the History of Middle Earth books.  It's available online as a PDF here: http://faculty.smu.edu/bwheeler/tolkien/online_reader/T-LawsandCustoms.pdf .  There’s a lot of LACE analysis in the fandom, Silmarillion smut fics are usually labeled “LACE compliant” or “not LACE compliant”, and I’ve been seeing the document itself show up in actual fics, meaning that the characters themselves are discussing it.

LACE is an unfinished, non-canonical essay split into several parts.  It covers the sexuality of elves, which is mostly what people talk about.  It also covers elvish naming (which I want to make a whole different post about), the speed at which elves grow up, changes that happen throughout their lives, their death and rebirth, and finally the legal and moral issues of Finwe remarrying after Miriel’s death.  The discussion about rebirth conflicts with Tolkien’s later writings about Glorfindel’s re-embodiment, but to the best of my knowledge, LACE is the best or only source for most of the topics it covers.

However, LACE is not canon since it doesn’t show up in the Silmarillion.  Counting all of the History of Middle Earth as canon is literally impossible, considering Tolkien contradicts himself all over the place.  It is only useful because it has so much information that is never discussed in the actual canon.  Many people consider it canon out of convenience.

Another important thing to remember is that, other than presumably the discussion of the growth of elvish children, the information is only supposed to apply to the Eldar (meaning the Vanyar, Noldor, Teleri, and Sindar) and not the dark-elves such as the Silvan elves and Avari.

The rest is behind the cut to avoid clogging your feeds.

Problems with LACE interpretations

But because it’s hidden in the History of Middle Earth (volume 10, Morgoth’s Ring), barely anyone actually gets the opportunity to read it.  I don’t think most people are aware that you can get it online, so it doesn't get read much.

I feel like this leads to a handful of people saying something about LACE and everyone else going along with it.  I definitely did this.  I was amazed by all the things that were in the actual essay that nobody had ever told me about, or had told me incorrectly.  For example, most people seem to believe that elves become married at the completion of sexual intercourse (whatever that means to the fic author).  In fact, LACE explicitly says that elves must take an oath using the name of Eru in order to be legally married.  Specifically: 

It was the act of bodily union that achieved marriage, and after which the indissoluble bond was complete… [I]t was at all times lawful for any of the Eldar, being both unwed, to marry thus of free consent one to another without ceremony or witness (save blessings exchanged and the naming of the Name); and the union so joined was alike indissoluble.

I’ve seen a marriage oath being included in a few stories recently, but most writers leave out the oath entirely and just have sex be automatically equivalent to marriage.  What would happen if elves had sex without swearing an oath?  I don’t know, but I’d love to see it explored.

Then there’s a footnote that might explicitly deny the existence of transgender elves... or not, but I’ve literally only seen it mentioned once or twice.  Overall, I feel like all of LACE is filtered through the handful of people who read it, and we’re missing out on a lot of metanalysis and interpretations that we could have because most fans never see the actual document.

Who wrote LACE?

I mean within the mythology of Middle Earth, of course.  Since LACE appears in the History of Middle Earth and not the Silmarillion, we can be pretty sure that J.R.R. Tolkien himself wrote it and it wasn’t added to by Christopher Tolkien.  But that’s not the question here.  Remember that Tolkien’s frame narrative for all of his Middle Earth work is that he is a scholar of ancient times and is translating documents from Westron and Sindarin for modern audiences to read and understand.  The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings come from the Red Book of Westmarch, and I believe The Silmarillion is meant to be Tolkien’s own writings based on his research (though it might also be an adaption of Bilbo’s “Translations from the Elvish”, but I haven't looked into that).  So what does LACE come from?

Christopher Tolkien admits in his notes that he doesn’t know.  He says, “It is clear in any case that this is presented as the work, not of one of the Eldar, but of a Man,” and I agree, because of the way it seems to be written as an ethnographic study rather than by someone who lives in the culture.  Honestly, it talks too much about how elves are seen by Men (e.g. speculating that elf-children might look like the children of Men) to be written by an elf.  This changes once it gets to the Doom of Finwe and Miriel, but that could be, and probably is, a story told to the writer by an elf who was there at the time.

Tolkien actually references Aelfwine in the second version of the text.  The original story behind The Lost Tales, which was the abandoned first version of the Silmarillion, was that a man from the Viking period named Aelfwine/Eriol stumbled onto the Straight Road and found himself on Tol Eressea.  He spoke to the elves and brought back their stories to England with him.  So it makes a lot of sense that Aelfwine would also write about the lives and customs of the elves for an audience of his own people.

Does LACE exist in Middle Earth?

I keep finding fics where first age elves discuss “the Laws and Customs” openly, as if it’s a text in their own world.  I usually get the impression that it was brought by the Noldor from Valinor.  But did the document actually exist in that time period?  For me, the answer is definitely not.

First of all, LACE was probably written by a Man, meaning it could not have dated back to Valinor in the years of the Trees, because Men hadn’t awaked yet.  In fact, the closest thing to an established frame narrative for it is that it was written by Aelfwine, who comes from the time period around 1000 CE (though Tolkien doesn’t seem to have pinned him down).  This is at least the fifth age, if not later.

But what if you don’t believe that it was written by a Man?  It still couldn’t have been written in the First Age, because it discusses the way the relationship between elves’ bodies and souls changes as ages go by.  For example:

As ages passed the dominance of their fear ever increased, ‘consuming’ their bodies... The end of this process is their ‘fading’, as Men have called it.

A lot of time has to go by in order for elves to get to the point of fading.  As a bonus, here’s another reference to the perspective of Men. LACE also discusses the dangers that “houseless feas”, which are souls of elves who do not go to Mandos after their bodies died, pose to Men.  How would they have known about that in the First Age?  It further says that “more than one rebirth is seldom recorded” (which isn’t contradicted anywhere I know of), and that’s not something you would know during your life of joy in Valinor, where almost nobody dies.  That’s something you learn after millennia of war.  This has to be a document written well after the Silmarillion ends.

So what about the sex part?  That’s all we care about, right?  Well, it is entirely possible that this was written down by the elves and Aelfwine translated it (though my impression is that he mostly recorded stories told orally to him and that elves were not very much into writing, at least in Valinor where you could get stories directly from someone who experienced them).  However, why would the elves write this down?  They know how quickly their children grow up.  They’ve seen actual marriages.  They don’t need that described to them.  And if they did have a specific document or story explaining the expectations of them when it comes to sex and marriage, why would they call it “Laws and Customs”?  That’s a very strange name for a set of rules for conduct.  I’m sure they had a list of laws written out somewhere in great detail, like our own state or national laws (that seems very in character for the Noldor, at least).  But I seriously doubt that those laws are what we’ve been given to read. LACE is not an elvish or Valinoran document.

Is LACE prescriptive or descriptive?

Here’s the other big question I’m interested in.  Prescriptive means that the document describes the way people should behave.  Descriptive means that it describes how people do behave.  And the more I worldbuild for Middle Earth and the culture of elves, the more I want to say that LACE is prescriptive in its discussion of sex, marriage, and gender roles.

But wait.  I’ve been saying for paragraphs that I think LACE is Aelfwine or another Man’s ethnographic study of elvish culture.  Then it has to be descriptive, right?

Does it?  How long do we think Aelfwine stayed with the elves?  Did he wait fifty years to see a child grow up?  Did he get to witness a wedding ceremony?  Did he meet houseless fea?  I don’t think he could have done all of that.  Maybe a different Man who spent his entire life with the elves could, but then when was this written?  When the elves were still marrying and having children in Middle Earth or when so much time had gone by that they had begun to fade already?

Whoever wrote this was told a lot of information by elves instead of experiencing it firsthand, the same way he heard the stories from the First Age from the elves instead of being there.  Maybe it was one elf who talked to him, maybe several different ones.  But did those elves accurately describe their society the way it was, give him the easiest description, or explain the way it was supposed to be?  If I was describing modern-day America, would I discuss premarital sex or just our dating and marriage customs?  Maybe people would come away from a talk with me thinking that moving in together equated to marriage for Americans in the early 21st century.  And I don’t even have an agenda to show America in a certain way, I'm just bad at explaining.  Did the elves talking to what may have been the first Man they had seen in millennia have an agenda in the way they presented themselves?

Or did the writer himself have an agenda?  Imagine going to see these beautiful, mythical, perfect beings, and you find out that they behave in the same immoral ways Men do.  Do you want to share the truth back home?  Or do you leave out things that don't match your worldview? Did Aelfwine come back wanting to tell people what elves were really like?  Or did he want to say “this is how you can be holy and perfect like an elf”?

Anyone studying the Age of Exploration will tell you that Europeans neber wrote about new cultures objectively, and often things were made up to fit the writer’s idea of what savages looked like. For example, my Native American history teacher in college told a story of how explorers described one tribe who (sensibly) didn't wear clothes as cannibals, because cannibalism and going around naked went together in their minds and not because of any actual incident.  Unbiased scholarship barely existed yet. Even Tolkien was extremely biased and tended to be imperialistic, as we all know.  There’s absolutely no reason to think that Aelfwine wasn’t biased in his own way.  (Of course, now we have to consider what biases a Danish or English man from the centuries around 1000 would have when it comes to things like gender roles. I assume he would have been more into divorce and female warriors than the elves are said to be.)

But is that what Tolkien intended? Probably not. He probably wanted LACE to be descriptive. But he also never got much of a chance to analyse the essay after the fact, which might have led to him discussing its accuracy and even the exact issues I just pointed out about explorers. Anyway, we know he's biased, and honestly, what he intended has never slowed down the fandom before.

Conclusion

In short, I take LACE to be a prescriptive document describing the way elvish culture is supposed to be, not a blueprint I have to stick to in order to correctly portray elves.  I also don’t believe the document that’s available for us to read existed even in the early Fourth Age, where The Lord of the Rings leaves off.  There maybe have been some document outlining the moral behavior of elves, as a set of laws, but thats not the Laws and Customs we have.

Of course, canon is up to you to interpret.  If you want Feanor discussing LACE with someone back in Valinor, go ahead.  If you want to throw out LACE entirely, go ahead.  It’s not even a canonical essay.  All of this analysis is honestly useless when you consider the fact that no part of LACE exists in any canonical book.

But that’s Tolkien analysis for you.

#lotr #silmarillion #tolkien #laws and customs of the eldar #history of middle earth #silm #analysis #meta #headcanon #long post #mine