#to see if there were any posts on or by trans lesbians of color

[just-a-space-duck]

Transbians of color, y'all are awesome.

#just scrolled through tumblr #to see if there were any posts on or by trans lesbians of color #and it is a shitshow #transgender #trans woman #transbians #lesbian #lgbtqaip #people of color #women of color #enbies of color #nonbinary #my rambles

[butch-reidentified]

as you can see, reblogs and replies are now turned off for this mind-numbingly braindead post, but I couldn't resist sharing some of the batshit content in the notes.

typing in color so it's easier to tell my commentary apart from the screenshots

radfems are insane because... we think "all women matter" doesn't include males. incredible insight. I also love "leave my sisters alone. and leave me and my brothers alone, fuckers," as if that's the direction the harassment is typically occuring in. as if radfems are hunting trans people for sport simply by not believing in or supporting the gender construct. yes. we are clearly the insane party here.

more evidence we're the insane ones, as this person claims men aren't an oppressor class and that somehow believing that they are will lead to... believing butch lesbians are an oppressor 💀 this is your brain on gender - completely unable to even consider sex, only "masc presentation," which is how they come to the batshit conclusion that acknowledging men are an oppressor class will ultimately come to include butch lesbians.

... girl. what.

however........ there's one reblog that really stands above all others. It is so long and so unhinged that it surpasses tumblr's image cap, so I'm going to have to do a part 2 of this post. but here's a sneak peek:

Gender worshippers learn what gender essentialism & bioessentialism actually mean challenge: impossible

Seriously. Y'all loooove redefining shit so much, but these terms were created for specific reasons and you can't just rewrite any word or term you want to suit your beliefs. Gender essentialism refers to the commonly held belief that gendered traits are biologically determined by sex rather than learned. The idea that women are "naturally" or "biologically" homemakers, more nurturing, less confrontational, and more emotional, that little girls "naturally" or "biologically" prefer dolls over toy trucks, that women "naturally" or "biologically" feel driven to have babies and there's no such thing as a happy childfree woman, that sex is inherently more emotional and meaningful for women, that men are more logical, better at STEM subjects, better drivers, that it's "natural" for men to cheat but not for women to, that men are "naturally" or "biologically" more aggressive, that paintball and Call of Duty are naturally "for boys," and a thousand other ridiculous things way too many people believe.

But oh shit, what's that? The people who really started fighting back against gender essentialism and arguing that gender is a social construct were... second wave feminists???!!! the very movement radical feminism is born from and shares most of its tenets with???!!! it's... it's almost like... radfems are the literal opposite of essentialists 😱

Meanwhile, today's trans community will tell gender-nonconforming people they're "eggs" and "totally going to come out as trans any day now" while simultaneously claiming not to define gender by stereotypes 🤡 like, OK...

check notes for Part 2!

#mine #tra reciepts #peak trans #trans activism #gender identity #gender ideology #radblr #radical feminism #misinformation #gender essentialism #bioessentialism

[ysabelmystic]

“I just came from r/196” ask game

Saw another post. I think I should invite y'all to one of our longstanding traditions. Answer the questions then tag 10 (or more) people. I'll go first.

Name? Frankie

Pronouns and gender? he/they/it, transmasc

Sexuality? Lesbian

Country? USA

Top 5 fandoms? Bungou Stray Dogs, Cosmere, All for the Game, Fundiesnark (not a series but I'm too deep in it to not consider it a fandom), .....the tornado fandom? (they're my special interest)

What is your Most forbidden snack? The preserved bones at the Atlanta Bodies Exhibition. They looked so crunchy...

Would you pet a bug? If it's big enough, it is pettable.

Share a weird fact/story about yourself with the class. I like to drive around rural areas and photograph old, sometimes abandoned locations in the dead of night. I have been literally chased out of towns by foot and by car on two separate occasions. The second time this happened, "See You Again" by Miley Cyrus came up on shuffle and that's the soundtrack my friend and I tore out of town to. Also every "guy" I've dated except for my most recent ex (who has big egg energy) is a lesbian now.

What does the color blue taste like? Creme brulee

What is the most beautiful thing you've ever seen? The appalachian mountains of Tennessee in the middle of summer. There's kudzu everywhere. On the backroads, there were several old, dilapidated Baptist churches barely hanging to the side of the mountain. I wonder how many of them were still in use.

What is the stupidest thing you've ever done? Short version: my friend's house almost got broken into by this dude who'd been stalking us for months while we were home alone. Instead of calling the cops, we decided to confront him with a bow and arrow (me), a hatchet, and a baseball bat (him). The plan was that if it went badly, we would simply throw his corpse into one of the many lakes in the neighborhood and let the alligators eat his remains (this was Florida). Why? Because we were afraid of having our home-alone privileges revoked. Luckily for us all, the guy fucked off and we never saw him again.

Stupidest thing you've seen/heard someone else do/say? My ex thought that Jackalopes were real. Also, a nurse I was doing rotations with apparently thought that "Witness Protection" was for Jehovah's Witnesses.

Hyperfixation song? Young Enough + Bleach by Charly Bliss

Is there any meaning behind your profile picture and/or username? Profile pic; I'm transmasc and I'm currently obsessed with TriStamp. Username; It was my fake internet name when I was like 13. I won't change it because I want my mutuals to recognize me, and because I do have a viral post associated with this name.

Dream career as a child? Doctor (funnily enough I'm now in nursing school)

Dream career as an adult? Professional Jester. Not a comedian. I just want to be some weird little guy who dresses silly and you can hire me to roast your boss at work parties.

Thoughts on cilantro? Delicious

Have you ever been banned from a location and if so, why? I honestly can't remember? Probably... but in recent memory I've mainly banned people from places.

What is your cursed food combination? Pineapple on a hotdog with grilled onions. It Slaps.

Trans rights? TRANS RIGHTS

Tagging: @rocket-mankoi @mostlymarco @atleast8courics @jazzlike39 @gemsweater72 @limbobilbo @ameliaaltare @redcrane112 @theoneofwhomisblue @twinkenjoyer @theultimatecarp and anyone else who wants to jump on

#r196 #r/196 #196 #196 campfire #ask games

[mogai-sunflowers]

I hate it when I can't use a term that fits me very well because my brain (which processes everything with images) has an image of that term that doesn't look like me.

Like when I think of "transmasc" and all that pops into my head are skinny, white, American boys with very basic styles (which isn't a bad thing, it's just "too basic" for me personally), and of course, who look like cis boys and hate their bodies or prefer other body.

Meanwhile, I'm a POC, fat, Latine person, with questionable style (/joke), who CERTAINLY doesn't look like a cis boy and who really loves their body.

How could I use a term when my brain tells me that term doesn't fit people like me? I hate that. It's just me?

hey anon. i so wish I could reach through this screen and tell you that who you are is perfect and that you have every right to terminology that feels right, but as a fat trans person myself I know it takes more than kind words to deal with a pain like this, and one that’s even more intersectional than mine with your race and culture in the picture.

but that image you have in your head of what transmasc means, that is not the reality. that is what a small part of the community, of the world, WANTS you to think because they would rather throw other members of their community under the bus to gain faux acceptance for themselves, which is NOT your fault, but it’s also not everyone, there are so many people in this community who look like you or who truly stand with you. Transmasculine history is and never has been white or thin or any of that.

I’m going to link a few things you may want to look into if you’re wanting to start accepting your identity a little more, or just to see that you really ARENT alone. trans men/transmascs of color have been part of our history since the beginning. some of these things im sharing may be somewhat nsfw and have the word 'tranny' in them, just as a warning if that stuff bothers you.

newspaper clipping showing three trans men of color at a festival for a film they were part of, the first ever sexual/porn film by and for trans men of color

some pictures showing some fat trans men and trans men of color at marches are here

Bobby Cheung, the Asian and Pacific Islander trans man who won the Mr. Transgender San Francisco Pageant in 2004

trans men of color discuss intersectionality in a film they directed called "Trappings Of Transhood"

a photo showing the attendees of an FTM conference- you can see many non-white people in attendance

a photo of a group of Latino trans men who attended Tranny Fest in 1999

basic info on victor j mukasa, a Black transmasc lesbian active in East African LGBTQ rights scene

an older fat trans gentleman's photo and experience

a post on pauli murray (please look them up. his experience is much more nuanced than this post gives them credit for, and she was a wonderful intersectional activist)

various trans men (many fat and of color) who have contributed to our history

a conference of Indian trans men

the story of a trans man named Ben

one of my personal favorite transmasc historical figures, Amelio Robles Ávila

Zander Keig, the fat Latino trans man who won social worker of the year in 2020

a wonderful read on the intersectionality of transmasculinity and race

a digital archive of trans and queer Latino history

the Instagram page of a popular Black drag king

an article with interviews with various drag kings, including several of color

Florence Hines, the Black drag king once called the most excellent male impersonator in America

more drag kings many of color!

Drag Kings: An Archaeology of Spectacular Masculinities in Latino America

anon, it is so easy to feel like you are alone when your own history has been unfairly erased from you. but when I say “you are not alone”, I am not offering empty words of comfort- YOU ARE NOT ALONE. Transmasc and similar identity has truly NEVER actually been just for white people or thin people. You are WONDERFUL, and you are ABSOLUTELY a part of trans masculinity and transmasculine history is YOUR history and community as much as it is mine and others. You belong.

#🌌written in the stars ; asks🌌

[headspace-hotel]

hi, so i do have a question regarding trans people- i completely support trans people and people should have the right to do whatever they want to as long as it doesn't hurt anyone, and i would never side with those who try to take away someone's autonomy. that being said, why do people want to be the specific genders(men, women)- what exactly does one feel? is it identifying with gender stereotypes? wanting the other kind of body? i can understand why someone would want to be enby, but can't seem to understand specific reasons why people would want to be transmasc or transfem etc. i've read posts before where people have wanted to be women/men because of gender stereotypes- they wanted to play with dolls/liked feminine/masculine colors/clothes etc. but it's obviously something that shouldn't be stereotyped against and anyone should be allowed to play/like anything they want to, whether it's feminine or masculine. so what exactly is it that makes people want to be either? again, though even if i didn't understand why someone else felt that way, i fully support them.

I'm not even transgender in any flavor so I'm not the best person to ask, but I'm pretty sure the answer is going to be individual for every person.

I think like, the larger society has latched onto the narrative of "I always wanted to play with 'girl' toys and do 'girly' things" because that's what makes sense to a cisgender audience in a culture where behavior and clothing and toys are very obviously gendered.

But that's not, like, what "makes" someone transgender—it's a way of explaining it.

I mean, okay, maybe I can talk about this a little. I'm a cis woman. I've thought about it! I like being female, it feels comfortable to me, and experimentally imagining anything else feels...bad.

This has nothing to do with gender stereotypes—I don't shave, I don't wear makeup, I usually cut my hair super-short, I'll wear my brothers' clothes if I like them, I always actively hated the "girl" toys as a kid (though I was never labeled a 'tomboy'—I feel like autism overpowered any specific gendered label that would otherwise apply to me, for complicated reasons. I was a Weird kid). It's just...I don't know. It's nice when one of my friends in chat in a game i'm playing calls me "she"—like hell yeah! Your mental concept of me is a girl :D

If anything, I started to feel more "woman" when I started dressing and styling more masculine—it was actually seeing pictures of butch lesbians online that made me see an image of myself I liked for the first time. I wanted to be a woman who's like a guy at the auto parts store.

I think some people just have no internal sense at all about their gender, and some of these people probably ID as non-binary, and some of these people probably just identify with whatever they were assigned because that's what's convenient. There are no wrong answers here, right?

And some people have a really strong unwavering internal sense about it, and it's not exactly able to be distilled down to feelings about your body or clothes or interests or whatever, but it exists. I know that I "feel" like a woman even though I couldn't say why. It's somewhere in between "this feels accurate" and "this feels nice."

#random #gender

[cardentist]

As a nonbinary/genderfluid biromantic, demiromantic asexual, literally every part of my gender identity and sexuality has been subject to the same "you could EASILY pass as cishet, so can you REALLY say you experience oppression when you could simply CHOOSE not to" and "you're not REALLY oppressed for being XYZ, you're only oppressed when people mistake you as cis fem/trans fem/gay/lesbian/any other identity we think is ACTUALLY important." My existence in online queer spaces has been hounded constantly by people trying to tell me what my lived experiences are and what they mean, shouting me down about how I can't speak about Insert Issue/Topic Here because sure maybe I'm queer (and to some, I don't even have the right to call myself that) but I'm at the bottom of the Who Is Oppressed More Hierarchy, I am only Oppressed in the way that sometimes I experience what they deem to be a different group's oppression. Not even my oppression is my own! I am too much of an "aberration" to find community and a place to speak amongst the general populace, and I'm too privileged to have a voice in the queer community, even about things that affect me.

And now, I'm watching that same rhetoric being used against transmen and transmascs. I remember when people on this site started really exploring queer headcanons for characters, everyone cheering "let's make X character gay! Y character is trans! Z character is a lesbian!" but if you dared to suggest "can Q character be ace?" you'd be met with "... that's boring." I remember how quickly ace exclusion devolved from "aces are boring" to "god, aces are annoying" to "when you think about it, aces aren't even really oppressed, so they aren't queer, so they should just shut up." And then it wasn't just aces, it was bi folks. And then it was enbies too. And now. Here we are.

This is the only site where people will blog about how "Gender is a sandbox! It's fucky! Men can be women, and women can be men! I'm a boygirl kind of girlboy! There are genders and sexualities in all sorts of shrimp colors you can dream of!" but in the same breath, they'll still act weird about he/him lesbians. They'll still claim that ALL masculinity is toxic. They'll still say that men are boring and annoying and-- Oh? You think that's kind of hurtful? You want to use this as an opportunity to talk about your own lived experiences and vent your frustrations courteously and privately on your own blog? Why do you have to make everything about you?! You're lower down the Who Is More Oppressed ladder because, wHeN yOu tHinK aBouT iT, no man can be oppressed for being a man! Even trans men! So you and anybody even vaguely masc aligned should just shut up and stay out of the conversation and let the queers who experience REAL bigotry talk!

... They could at least say something new instead of reusing the same rhetoric they've used for aces and aros and bi/pan folk and enbies and masc/butch lesbians and countless other queer identities.

All that to say, as someone who has been subject to all this for every part of my identity, I stand with you. Trans Unity! Queer Unity!

Context: [Link 1, Link 2]

I know Exactly what you're talking about !

I was around in inclusionist spaces 10 years ago at this point, before I'd fully crystalized what I Had Going On.

I Remember it being pointed out that ace exclusionists were stealing talking points from radfems directly, up to and including ripping off entire posts and just swapping out "trans women" with "asexuals."

I Remember people warning each other that normalizing these kinds of talking points, convincing people that that Mindset is a valid one, would then make it easy to swap out the Target of said mindset.

and it Has happened, over and over and over again. people are Always looking for the marginalized people that nobody wants to stand up for. that people don't understand, that people don't see as Needing support, that people already have negative feelings about even if they don't recognize Why.

it'll only ever stop when people examine the talking points Themselves and throw them out. when people are willing to stand in solidarity with people Regardless of whether they understand them or not.

if someone is trying to convince you that class of people As A Whole are undeserving of support, are lesser than, shouldn't have their voices heard or considered, Question It ! when they hold people up in Comparison to say that their pain is Lesser and therefore doesn't Matter, Question It !!

#discourse #queer unity #trans unity #transandrophobia

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

Andrew Doyle asks: Remember when the pride flag made sense?

Remember when the pride flag made sense?

It was designed by an American Artist called Gilbert Baker in 1978. It was originally an eight-stripe rainbow but was soon refined into the six-striped version that was the norm for many decades.

At a time when gay people couldn't hold hands with their partners on the street, this flag served a useful purpose. It meant that you could easily find gay pubs or other places where no one had to pretend to be something they weren't. The rainbow symbol was a simple and effective concept that conveyed positivity and unity.

And then some activists came along and said hang on a minute, why are there no black or brown stripes in the rainbow flag? See, for some reason they were under the impression that the gay flag was a literal representation of the range of skin colors that are acceptable in the community. And so we got this.

Okay then, I mean, well, there weren't any white stripes in the original one either. But most people understood that it was symbolic with that we were all included already, irrespective of our race.

But then after this, trans activists came along and said, why aren't we in there? So we got this one. And this was the chevron with the pink white and blue, which was based on the trans flag.

But surely this eyesore couldn't get any worse, could it? Well, it could, because activists were then concerned that it was excluding intersex people, so they added this symbol.

Okay, it's getting a bit out of control now. But then last year, some bright spark added a red umbrella to represent sex workers.

Now, if you thought this was getting out of hand, last year then we had Microsoft. They designed a new version to incorporate all the other multiple sexualities and genders that have been invented over the past few years. Let's have a look at that.

I mean, what the hell is it? It looks like a space ship going at warp speed through a Care Bear's bum hole.

Identity politics in its current form is an ever expanding beast. Pride used to be just one day. Then it was a month. And now Pride events have been scheduled all the way from March through to September. As one sign in a shoe shop pointed out Pride never stops. If only it would.

The initialism as well that's expanded too. First we had LGB, and then it became LGBT, then LGBTQ, then LGBTQIA. The Canadian government currently favors 2SLGBTQIA+, although even its prime minister finds that a bit of a mouthful.

Similarly, Pride started out as an important protest against injustice. When the original Pride March took place in London in 1972, homosexuality had only been legal for five years, and the prospect of gay marriage or even an equal age of consent, seemed impossible. Only 2000 people turned up to these protests.

But by contrast, the Pride parade in London in 2022 attracted over a million. And of course, most of those people aren't even gay. It's become a family day out, a huge party.

And what's so wrong with that, you might ask. And that's a fair question. If people are celebrating and having a good time, that's great. Except that's not necessarily what's going. Increasingly, gay people no longer feel welcome at Pride. I spoke to a representative from a lesbian group on this show last year who had been moved along by police when trying to protest at Pride. But isn't Pride meant to be a protest, not a party? What's going on?

The answer is that pride has been hijacked not once but twice.

First by avaricious multi-billion dollar corporations who are able to pose as virtuous by posting the pride flag. Only, they don't do it in the branches in countries where homosexuality is still illegal. After all, you wouldn't want to fly the flag anywhere which might actually make a difference.

I'm old enough to remember that corporations were certainly not celebrating Pride quite so openly before section 28 was repealed in 2003, or before the age of consent was equalized in 2001, or before the decriminalization of homosexuality in Scotland in 1980. So, these corporations' commitment to LGBT rights apparently only manifests itself when it's likely to make them a profit.

And then there's the second hijacking. See, whereas the original Pride was about agitating for equal rights for gay people, it's now been taken over by activists who are obsessed with group identity and who believe that gender is more important than sex.

That's why the British library, to celebrate the advent of pride month this week, posted a thread on Twitter about the sex life of fish, and how some species have been known to change from male to female.

I mean, what's that got to do with Pride? Why have Librarians seemingly forgotten that human beings aren't the same as fish? Now, they've since deleted those tweets, because well, you know they're bonkers. And although we might laugh at that kind of nonsense, the ideology it promotes is actually rather sinister, particularly for gay people.

See, in her book, "Time to Think" by Hannah Barnes, she found that between 80 and 90% of adolescents referred to the Tavistock pediatric gender clinic were same-sex attracted. Studies have long confirmed a correlation between gender non-conformity in youth, and homosexuality in later life. At the Tavistock, staff used to joke that "soon there would be no gay people left." Somehow the medicalization and sterilization of gay people has been reframed as progressive.

Even Stonewall, the UK's foremost LGBT charity has redefined the word "homosexual" on its website and promotional materials to mean "same gender attracted." Its CEO, Nancy Kelly, has claimed that women who exclude trans people from their dating pool are akin to sexual racists. There's been an intense resurgence of old homophobic tropes online from gender ideologues that believe that "genital preferences are transphobic" and that lesbians who don't include men in their dating pool must be suffering from trauma.

Gay rights were secured by recognizing that a minority of people are instinctively attracted to members of their own sex. And the new ideology of gender identity rejects this notion entirely, and actively shames gay people for their orientation.

So, when you see this flag, try to understand that many gay people consider it to be a symbol of opposition to gay rights, Women who are concerned about their rights consider it a symbol of misogyny, because it promotes an ideology that denies the reality of sex-based oppression, and yet most people, gay people included, haven't even noticed this transition from the pro-gay rainbow flag to this anti-gay imposter.

And that's because it all happened so quickly, and activists are playing on good intentions of a public who don't want to be seen to be on the wrong side of history. Well, I would suggest that upholding the rights of women and gay people and protecting gender non-conforming children and opposing the hypocrisy of corporations is the truly progressive approach.

Anyone who spends any time on social media would have seen that homophobia is clearly on the rise. It's coming from the reactionary elements of the right, who are now holding gay people responsible for sexualized drag shows for children, and the proliferation of sexually explicit books in school libraries. But of course, they've fallen for the trick. This isn't gay people. That's gender ideologues who've convinced everyone that the LGBTQIA+ movement is one big happy family, when it isn't.

And we know this because homophobia is also on the rise among gender ideologues themselves, who frequently go online to tell gay people to kill themselves. Some of them have said that they celebrate AIDS as a good thing. And this isn't just a few mad activists, there are thousands of examples of this if you've got the stomach to look them up.

So whether it's coming from those who consider themselves right wing or left-wing, anti-gay sentiments are back in fashion. And the best way to combat this is to remind everyone that that Progress Pride flag, and the corporate orgy that accompanies it, is not in the interests of gay people.

And if it's too late to reclaim the original Pride flag, we can at least ditch the new one.

#Andrew Doyle #Pride month #pride flag #rainbow flag #progress pride flag #ideological takeover #impostor #anti gay #homophobia 2.0 #woke homophobia #gender ideology #queer theory #same sex attraction #gay rights #religion is a mental illness

[itsclydebitches]

On the topic of the Curious Cat: As an enby, I don't know how to feel about the fact that the first major characters in RWBY who were canonically enby were a) animals from a whole different world b) killed off in the same volume that introduced them.

Actually, no, I do know how I feel about that.

Little: A mouse who has, by their own admission, no purpose in life and thus swears to help the group on their quest... except they don't. No time is spent developing Little or demonstrating how they're beneficial as an ally. They're squashed to death by the villain during a pseudo-suicide scene and then magically reappear as a totally different person, which is presented as a good thing. They're left behind by the story, presumably never to be seen again.

Curious: A cat who is first presented as an annoyance that the group doesn't want to deal with, then as an outright villain who has been manipulating them this whole time. The story refuses to engage with the ways in which their situation is both relatable and sympathetic, instead having them suddenly gain the power of possession/physical transformation for a lackluster fight scene. They're torn apart by the illusion of another villain that only existed for one episode and, for obvious reasons, will likely never be seen again.

Yeah. I wonder why fans, particularly enby fans, would be unhappy with this representation...

You know, I've brought this up before but I think it's really important to keep in mind that RWBY is an ongoing series. Any representation that's introduced to the canon is, for a significant length of time, the only representation we have and that severely colors our feelings towards the show as a whole. Lately there have been some angry posts about people calling Blake/Yang queerbaiting and they're right, by definition it can't possibly be queerbaiting because they were made canon... but we thought it might be for several years. That's the criticism. The later you're introduced to RWBY and the more you have to binge watch, the less likely you are to understand the issue with these portrayals—especially with a fandom that will talk up what you have to look forward to if you just keep watching to X Volume. Why would I be upset with a stalker, villain lesbian when Saphron and Terra are so cute and just around the corner? Why would I think trans rep is an issue when Mae is arriving in Volume 7? How can anyone possibly claim that the queer rep is bad when the flagship, main character couple kissed on screen and I've already seen the beautiful, romantic GIFs of the moment? Putting aside other issues here (how long queer characters last, the lack of rep for men, etc.) fans ignore the staggeringly long time we were not only waiting for rep, but then waiting for what many would consider positive rep. For years all we had was a lesbian who wanted to kill the parents of the woman who didn't return her affections (notably with the implication that Blake was might be straight...) and a super duper minor character who isn't actually gay because they wanted to kill him off. For years all we had was Coco leering at women behind her sunglasses in the novels, or the hint of gay side-characters in other teams, while Blake and Yang continued a multi-Volume will-they-won't-they dance. For years we've had queer character appear for a few episodes only—the cute couple, the trans activist—before disappearing from the story because they're not important enough to make a core part of the tale. The fact that we have Blake/Yang now doesn't erase those feelings leading up to their canonization.

Now here we are again. "How can you be unhappy with the nonbinary rep?" someone might ask in a few years time, if RWBY continues and we've gotten another cute, minor, short-lived character who uses they/them pronouns. Well, it's because in 2023 everyone was waiting to see if the show would even return and in that uncertainty all we had for rep were two literal animals who were horrifically killed by the story and then left behind, one a full-fledged villain whose death we're meant to celebrate. I'm all for a diversity of representation—I'm by no means saying all your queer characters have to be heroes, or even decent people. I love me a queer villain—but when that's all you've currently got in a show that's struggled both with its rep on screen and its treatment of queer employees... it doesn't feel great.

#rwde #rwby #mymetas

[badger-with-a-boa]

(Long post)

I just had to check the comments under this post.

Trigger warning for a fuckton of transphobia, mentions of murder & rape from my rant.

Apologies for any spelling mistakes and such.

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I am fuming right now. I'm not even surprised of all the transphobia, but the amount of it is sickening. One comment was good, that's it.

I'll never be able to love my fiancée in peace without some transphoic asshole saying I can't be a real lesbian if I'm with her, if I love her, if I'm okay with her being pre-op. Shut the fuck up.

I have to live in fear every fucking day that there's a decently high chance my fiancée could end up harmed, raped or even murdered. It all started because of disguising and close minded bigots like the people here. I have to hope every single damn day and every single time my fiancée goes out in public that someone won't attack her. Imagine living with that.

Imagine the families, the friends, the partners that lost someone simply because they were trans. Imagine someone finding out their wife was killed for simply existing in the same room because she was trans. Imagine finding out your brother was attacked and raped by a stranger or date because he was trans. Imagine living with that pain for the rest of your life.

My fiancée is such an amazing woman. She is a talented writer. She loves music with her entire heart. She feeds deer in her backyard. She got so excited seeing bunnies play outside her work. She loves coffee and cheese. She likes to play Animal Jam for nostalgia all the time. She feeds the stray cats in her area. She loves going to thift stores and antique stores. She loves the color purple. She adores horror movies. She tells me facts about the Doctor Who franchise so I better understand references. She's so excited for us to finally see each other next week for the first time. We plan to have a horror movie marathon and eat Halloween candy while wearing matching costumes on Halloween. We plan to be the gayest motherfuckers around.

She's fucking human. She's a sister, daughter, a fiancée, a niece. She wants to be a mom one day. She wants to make music, write comics, have cats and ferrets and bunnies, live in a nice home with a wraparound porch and have rocking chairs so we can watch the sunset together.

Does that sound predatory? Does that sound disgusting? Does it sound like she's harming anyone? Does it seem like she's a man pretending to be a woman to prey upon lesbians?

We are not a straight couple. We are not straight with extra steps. We are both lesbians who love each other and are gay as fuck. She is a talented, beautiful, kind-loving human being that just wants to fucking live without watching behind her back. I'm allowed to love her, I'm allowed to love her body pre-op and post-op, I'm allowed to love her before & after she's on estrogen, I'm allowed to hold her hand and kiss her in public, I'm allowed to marry her, I'm allowed to want a family with her, I'm allowed to love my fiancée. It does not make me less of a lesbian to do so.

She's the love of my life and no one would ever convince me she's just a man pretending to be a woman, she's sick, she's dangerous, she's a risk to children. She is a woman. She always has been. She's my girlfriend, my fiancée, and eventually my wife. We will always be lesbians. No chromosome or genitalia bullshit changes that. She's my girl, she's my beautiful love, she's my whole heart and soul. I'll fight tooth and nail to stand up for her, to fight beside her, to protect her. I'd happily go to prison for attacking someone if they harmed her. Whether that be a complete stranger, a family member, or even police. She can easily stand up for herself, but that will never stop me from being right beside her.

To all transphobes, to all lesbians who think trans women can't be lesbians, to all lesbians that "speak for all lesbians" like this, to anyone that thinks trans women are men, to anyone that thinks trans women can't be lesbians. Sincerely, go fuck yourselves.

#twitter #un women #lgbt #lesbian #lgb with the t #transgender #trans #trans girl #transgirl #trans woman #trans femme #transfemme #transfem #mtf #male to female #trans lesbian #transbian #trans lives matter #transphobes #transphobia #trans rights

[saibher]

(RANT) race vs ethnicity and why transing your gender is ok but transing your race is dumb

Hi, I'm new to Tumblr and lowkey scared to format this post but...

this is coming from a long, civilized arguement I had in my discord and honestly I needed to get other people's opinion on this topic, (and I'm too lazy to make a video essay).

"you can cant change your race, but you can change your ethnicity"

ik PragerU is biased as fuck, but I wanted to explore the logic behind this arguement. As a trans woman of color who grew up in a cultural melting pot, it seems like us mixed folks have a different understanding of ethnicity.

"Transracialism is based on a false understanding of race vs ethnicity."

Just like sex ≠ gender, race ≠ ethnicity.

You are born with a sex. Sex is a biological thing, and there are more than just male and female due to the existence of intersex people.

You are not born with a race. Race is a social construct, but it is rooted in how society sees your biology (but not biological in and of itself). Race is a descriptor given to people based on their lineage and the stuff they receive from their birth parents. You cannot change race because it is a social description of the things you are born with. idk source?

Ethnicity and Gender are also social constructs, but neither are rooted in biology.

Gender identity is how one internally feels about their masculinity and femininity, its a spectrum that some people fall on ends of, or somewhere in-between, and others belong outside that spectrum. Gender identity can be different from expression, which is outward (example: a cis woman can present herself very masculine despite identifying as a woman, as many butch lesbians do) (example2: femboys are still guys despite presenting feminine). I personally am a trans woman, but present myself more androgynously and do not typically favor super-feminine aesthetics.

Ethnicity is based on the culture you were raised in and differs from race because it has to do with nurture vs nature. My race is chinese-hawaiian, but I was raised in Hawaiian culture and do not identify with my chinese heritage.

Conclusion:

You can change your sex through surgery.

You can change your gender because its an internal feeling/desire rather than an external one.

You can change your ethnicity because it is self-described based on a culture that you are in. Changing your ethnicity is a cultural thing and has to do with your ties to a group of people. It's like becoming a citizen of another country. It's a process that relies on the history of other people. example:

You cannot change your race because its a descriptor based on your physical and social qualities based in society. Its defined by your ancestral heritage. You cannot change your race through surgery because race is a descriptor of your history. IN MY OPINION, race is an outdated, elitist, and poor concept in general, and it was created by white colonizers to put down those they find inferior. Any surgeries that attempt to change your race are gonna be based on stereotype and cultural appropriation, and that's racist.

but im just a random trans girl on the internet who dropped out of college so what do I know? Gimme your opinions >.<

#rant #trans #transgender #brainrot #transracial #race #ethnicity #help me understand #feel free to discuss #queer #politics

[neonganymede]

Hey! I hope this is ok to ask about but I was curious about your original piece that you mention on occasion (cocat?). I'd like to know what it's about, or if you could share something you like about it or would want people to know.

I just really like your writing and I'm deeply curious about what an original work would look like from you :)

Hi!! Of course it's okay to ask!!! I'm always eager to talk about cocat!! Thank you for asking!! This book is my baby, and I'm >////< glad that somebody is curious about it!

Putting this under a read more just in case I ramble a little~

If I were to tag cocat (which spelled out is City of Crime and Teeth), it would fall under the twisted and fluffy category. The focal point of the novel is the relationship between Malise, an unwilling and listless crime boss who sees no way out of his current position other than his own inevitable death, and his husband Riot, a man he married the night they met who has plenty of his own dangerous secrets. They both have their shortcomings, with Malise not knowing how to deal with his emotions and Riot believing that he'll never have a place he can truly call home. Neither one have any idea how to navigate this strange relationship they find themselves in, but they both dig their teeth in the moment they meet. It's immediate, simultaneous obsession for the both of them, and they change each other indefinitely. Their relationship would be considered toxic for anybody else, but it works for them.

I really love writing emotion, and that's a big part of Malise's journey. He always thought that he couldn't feel things because he'd never been taught how, but he actually feels too much, especially in regards to Riot. Meeting Riot is like a burst of color in his otherwise bleak world, and he doesn't know what to do with all of these new things that he's feeling. It confuses the hell out of him, but he'd burn the world for Riot's sake.

And Riot is such a little shit, too. I adore him. He's lived the past ten years on the streets, so when he's suddenly a trophy wife (Malise's words and a definite point of contention between the two) Riot sure as hell takes advantage of that to indulge himself and spend as much of Malise's money as he can. And he's anything but a trophy wife. He's strong and lithe and fiercely devoted to his incredibly stupid and reckless husband. He thinks his situation is temporary; he thinks that Malise will eventually get bored and kill him, and Riot hates how much he ends up loving him.

Cocat is honestly a bit different from what I usually write, if I'm being honest. It's a little dark, a little angsty, but it's also about two incredibly broken people, two victims of circumstance who firmly believe they're only capable of cruelty and pain but have to learn how wrong they are.

Also featured in this mildly violent package: a found family consisting of these two married dumbasses, a pair of knife-wielding twins (one of which is trans, but neither one wants to tell me who it is. And frankly, it's none of my business), possibly the worst but most well-meaning secretary ever, and an ace lesbian who is easily the most unhinged character I've ever written (and easily my favorites. I love her so much).

So yeah! This got away from me a little, but I don't usually get to talk about cocat ^^; so thank you again for asking! And if you were ever interested, I posted a tiny drabble here~

#cocat #city of crime and teeth #sjfkjsald thank you so much for asking about my baby <3 #i'm not sure how interesting it sounds or if it will ever see the light of day #but it's also a book that i'm very proud of and very happy that i wrote #sorry if there are typos. it's almost 3am and i'm very tired but could not RESIST #i honestly. forgot how much i love my book and my characters. i haven't thought about it in so long

[number1villainstan]

Chronostasis???

Kurono Hari! Chances are this is gonna be another long one, just like Chisaki.

How I feel about this character:

Hmm, god, how do I answer this? I definitely feel something about him, but it's hard to pinpoint what. Usually I think about him in relation to Chisaki (because Chisaki is the one I focus on) but he's got a solid amount of independent lore/character building to him, so he's definitely interesting. I also definitely think that he, like pretty much all of the Hassaikai, got cheated in terms of characterization. He, like the rest of the Hassaikai, has so much potential, but apparently the show decided it didn't care about that. Ugh.

All the people I ship "romantically" with this character:

Just like Chisaki, I hc Kurono as aromantic, so the same disclaimers apply: the ships I have for him might be close to romance, but most often they aren't really romance. (Even if I do enjoy explicitly romantic versions of some of those ships.)

Chisaki: My main for him (and for Chisaki). Any OT3s involving Kurono are going to also involve Chisaki (and vice versa). I talked about this a lot in the Chisaki post, but there's some more thoughts I have on this: I think that Kurono is extremely protective of Chisaki, possibly to the point of unhealthy possessiveness; this is very much mutual. I usually set it up so that they've been together so long it's hard for them to even imagine being with anyone else without the other there.

Dabi: This one is a little bit complicated. I talked about it a little bit in the Chisaki post, but I can also see Dabi attempting to seduce Kurono away from the Hassaikai, assuming that he's pining after Chisaki/Chisaki isn't paying attention to him, and Kurono (who is already in a long-term relationship with Chisaki) deciding to have a little fun with it, with Chisaki's blessing. Dabi would have no idea what hit him.

My non-romantic OTP for this character:

Actually, an OC of mine (that I haven't yet talked about with pretty much anyone) named Quill (current 'legal' name: Yamarashi Mikan). My backstory for Kurono involves his house burning down when he's five and him living in an orphanage for much of his early life, and Quill was his best friend during those years. Once he joined the Hassaikai, she ended up running away and establishing a lesbian biker gang somewhere a good distance away from the Hassaikai base. Her name is Quill because that was the first thing that came to mind--she has a mutation quirk that makes her hair like porcupine/hedgehog spikes instead of actual hair, as well as affecting her skin (darker, likely with lighter patterns or vitiligo--I need to look up porcupine skin coloration). She and Kurono bonded over having weird hair.

I also, in some AUs, like the idea of him and Hatsume meeting--I hc Kurono as being very good at mechanics and having built most of the stuff in Chisaki's lab. Two mildly insane mechanical geniuses meeting--the world isn't ready for it.

My unpopular opinion about this character:

He's a trans man AND he's a top. Enough of these stereotypes. (Also, he got bottom surgery, because bottom surgery is a thing and I think fanfic writers forget that.)

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon:

Him getting more than two scenes. And also an actual solid backstory. And characterization beyond 'loyal to Chisaki' and 'can go cold/emotionless during battle.' We got hints that he and Chisaki were childhood friends, we got hints that Chisaki values him enough to not even snap at him when he says something Chisaki doesn't like, but in canon (at least in the show) we know basically zero about him. He should logically be a much more important character during the Hassaikai arc than he is, being the second/confidant of the main villain, but we still get practically nothing.

Send me a character and I'll break their ass down

#kurono hari #hari kurono #chronostasis #bnha chronostasis #mha chronostasis #shie hassaikai #chisaki kai #kai chisaki #bnha overhaul #overhaul #mha overhaul #bnha #mha #bnha meta #mha meta #ask game #ask #anon ask #chronohaul #chrabi #bnha oc #quill is interesting i should talk about her #tagging for exposure #dabi #bnha dabi #mha dabi #todoroki touya #touya todoroki

[neurodivergent-nicky2023]

Sonic Headcanon Sunday: (For the Sake of Working on Making my Own Content XD) Pride Month Edition!

So as you can probably guess from the title, Sonic Headcanon Sunday is thing I want to try out where I post headcanons I have about the Sonic franchise every other Sunday. And since it’s still Pride month, I couldn’t resist starting off with some LGBTQ+ headcanons I have about the characters:

Sonic: Bi, bi, bi!!! (Maybe somewhere under the ace umbrella too???) While he does find some guys attractive, he’s more into girls and non-binaries. I could totally see him eventually opening up more to Amy. And he has DEFINITELY flirted with Shadow a little bit at one point (mainly just to mess with them). I dare y’all to change my mind. /hj /nm

Amy: Demi/Pan because she clearly doesn’t have any attraction or close, emotional bond to anyone but Sonic. But at the same time, if she somehow were to move on from the blue blur, she strikes me as someone who would end up dating a person regardless of their gender (if and when she makes a very close bond with them too, of course).

Shadow: A masculine-leaning non-binary. He uses He/They/It pronouns (Friendly reminder that he canonically was addressed with both He/him and it/it’s pronouns in SA2!) It also owns a neckerchief with the non-binary Pride flag colors. Not only is he asexual but, like Amy, they’re also demi/panromantic.

Charmy: A trans boi! It just makes sense, considering wings and stingers are both female bee parts. Granted the Sonic Team most likely either didn’t know bee anatomy or kept the wings and stinger to make him more recognizable as a bee, but this is more fun to think about!

Mighty: A gay disaster! XD Bonus headcanon that he used to have a crush on both Sonic and Knuckles. The problem? Knuckles is straight, Sonic had no interest in dating at the time, and they both only saw the armadillo as a friend. Yeah poor guy got double friend-zoned.

Espio: Asexual, but not against finding a woman to have a romantic relationship with .

Whisper: Lesbian. She and Tangle have a thing going on. *

Tangle: Lesbian and dating Whisper. *

Barry: Non-binary (They/them)*

Tekno the Canary: Non-binary. They’re fem-leaning and use She/They pronouns.* Also a Sapphic.

And everyone else is straight and cis allies. (Well maybe Rouge might not be straight. She kinda gives off bi vibes too tbh)

[*Implied or confirmed canon(?)]

#Obviously nobody has to agree with me on this. These are just headcanons after all :) #sonic the hedgehog #sonic headcanons #Sonic Headcanon Sunday #pride month #lgbtq+

[rjalker]

For future reference, this post is being made on June 13th, 2022. Why am I including the date? Because the cycle continues, and it will continue.

Apparently we need to go through this again.

The pan flag is pink, yellow, and blue. Magenta, yellow, and cyan to be more specific. That's the pan flag.

If you see someone using a "pan" flag that is instead green, yellow, and orange, that is the flag specifically created by exclusionists who got pissed off that the creator of the actual pan flag isn't a fucking bigot.

They're claiming that not hating mspec lesbians means you're a transphobe, even though that's literally not how any of this fucking works.

Here's the two flag next to each other for you to compare. Feel free to even save this if you need a reference.

[ID: the pan flag, labeled "the pan flag" with three stripes of magenta, yellow, and cyan, with the name of each color written on the stripe.

This is next to the exclusionist pan flag, which is labeled, "the flag created by exclusionists to 'replace' the pan flag because the creator of the pan flag isn't an exclusionist". The flag is striped green, gold, and salmon orange, with the name of each color written on the stripe. The picture has a white background, with a black border. end ID.]

The creator of the pan flag is not an exclusionist bigot, so exclusionists threw a fit and decided they were going to replace the pan flag.

These people are pissed off that people refuse to jump on their bandwagon of attacking and harassing mspec lesbians, by claiming that being an mspec lesbian makes you transphobic.

Mspec lesbians are not transphobic. Most mspec lesbians identify as such specifically because they are trans and/or nonbinary.

If you agree that lesbians can be attracted to both women and nonbinary people, you are literally agreeing that lesbians can be mspec.

Mspec means "multi-spectrum" which is short for "the spectrum of attraction to multiple genders" the same way "aspec" means "the spectrum of ace, aro, apl, and other related identities"

Mspec literally just means someone's attracted to more than one gender.

"Women" and "nonbinary" are two different genders. If you think that lesbians can be attracted to nonbinary people, then do the math! What's women + nonbinary people? Go on, do the math!

That's right! It's more than one! It's multiple! Lesbians can be attracted to multiple genders!

And if you agree that lesbians can be attracted to both women and nonbinary people, but you disagree that lesbians can be attracted to more than one gender, then guess what, fucko? Guess who's the transphobe here? Hint: it's not the mspec lesbian who's older than your parents. It's you, the person saying that all nonbinary people are actually secretly women.

Because that's what your argument is. If you think lesbians can be attracted to nonbinary people as well as women, but you think lesbians can be only attracted to one gender....congrats, asshole, you're a transphobe.

You are also literally falling for people erasing and purposefully lying about history. There are mspec lesbians older than your parents. This term did not get invented on tumblr like exclusionists like to claim (as though being a new term for an old concept would somehow make it inherently invalid). It's literally decades old. Just because you first heard about it on tumblr or twitter doesn't mean it never existed before you learned about it. You sound like straight people saying there's suddenly so many more gay people than there were before just because they've never fucking met a gay person who felt safe enough to be out around them.

Mspec lesbians have existed for decades. The concept is literally older than the internet. People have been calling themselves "bi lesbians" since before you were fucking born.

Get off your imaginary high horse of hatred and just shut the fuck up for once. Just stop fucking attacking people just because you don't understand their experiences.

You do not need to understand someone's experiences and identity to respect them and treat them with dignity.

Mspec lesbians have been part of this community longer than most excursionists have been alive. They've been here since the beginning and they will literally always belong, and there is nothing exclusionists can do about it.

If you actually support trans people the way you claim to, if you actually support lesbians the way you claim to, if you actually respect mspec people the way you say you do, then learn the actual fucking history instead of just going along with whatever hateful diatribe you stumble on first.

There is no sexuality that is inherently transphobic. You will not defeat transphobia by attacking literal trans people who are identifying in the way they feel most comfortable.

If you don't "understand" why someone identifies as an mspec lesbian? Then you have two options:

A) Listen. Be fucking respectful and willing to learn. Stop letting hatred cloud your heart. Actually listen to people who are willing to speak.

B) Accept the fact that you literally do not need to understand in order to be respectful. Cis people do not have to understand what being trans is like in order to stop being transphobic. You have no excuse.

There are too many damn people in the world for you to understand everyone's experiences. You will never understand someone else's experiences the way they do. You don't need to. You just need to be respectful.

Instead of focusing your energy on hatred, on attacking others, make some fucking friends. Build connections. This is a community, not a fucking deathmatch.

Do not support exclusionists. Do not support people who lie about and erase the history of the queer community. Do not support people who throw around catchy fucking buzzwords designed to piss you off.

Mspec lesbians are not your enemy and they never have been. But if you insist on being hateful, you are going to make enemies of the entire community, and you will not be welcome.

If you want to be part of the queer community, then you need to actually commit to building a community, not tearing it apart by attacking anyone whose experiences are different from yours.

Either you support all of us, or you support none of us.

If I see you using the exclusionist pan flag or any exclusionist flag (because yeah, they fucking tried this shit with the aroace flag too), you are being blocked on sight.

#mspec lesbian #queer #pan #pansexual #panromantic #pride #June 13th 2022 #long post #solidarity or drown

[solena2]

Just saw someone claim that saying “not all men” and saying “hating men is bad because all gender essentialism is bad” are inherently the same idea and didn’t want to derail the post, but I think there’s a genuine discussion to be had here, so

Hot take, apparently, but the problem with “not all men” rhetoric has nothing to do with the factual accuracy of the statement. Like, we can all agree that not every single man, (or the majority of men) assaults women, right?

The problem with people saying “not all men” isn’t that the statement they’re making is wrong, it’s that they’re engaging in bad faith and obfuscating the actual debate. Because no, not all men, but also “every man has assaulted a woman” was never the point the opposing movement was trying to make. Dudebros just acted like it was because there’s no way to oppose the statement “assaulting women is bad, actually” without sounding like a tone deaf asshole, so they built a strawman to mock instead.

But the post that prompted me to write this wasn’t written by a dudebro. It was written by a terf.

And the problem with terf ideology, also known as the core of terf ideology, is that they really do believe that all men are bad, inherently, by virtue of being men. They view gender as a moral alignment, with men on the “bad” side and women on the “good”, and any deviation from that binary as misguided at best and malicious infiltration at worst.

Which is why they hate trans women, view trans men as confused, and either treat nonbinary people as “women-lite” or, more often, refuse to acknowledge them entirely.

So why is that a bad thing?

Because being real here, that’s a question that needs answered. The seeds of terf ideology grew in fertile soil, and knowing what led to that is important. Knowing the conditions under which radical feminism thrives is what gives us the insight to root it out early.

The same time that “not all men” rhetoric was popular with the right, significant parts of the left were beginning to respond with “yes, all men”. Partially out of frustration at first, I think, at least for those unfamiliar to such statements. (As many of us were, at the time.) People embracing the “man hating lesbian” stereotype and similar things used to discredit them. Going “you know what, maybe I do hate men, maybe I should hate men, maybe everyone should.” because they were hurting and tired of being hurt and when sexism is such a prevalent issue it is genuinely difficult to oppose the statement.

It’s very easy to take a hatred of misogyny and translate it to a hatred of men, because misogyny is synonymous with men, right? Built by men and perpetrated by men and kept alive by men.

So shouldn’t men be sorry for it? Shouldn’t they attempt to atone, whether or not they, personally, have bought into it? It’s certainly true that all men benefit from misogyny, so shouldn’t all men be treated with suspicion?

It’s easy to see why terfs believe what they do, in the end. Their beliefs are based in personal pain and anger and trauma so often.

The problem, as it often is, is that it’s not that simple. “All men benefit from misogyny” is not a true statement, and “all men benefit from misogyny and need to atone for it” is worse.

Any man who’s been called a fag, for example, is not reaping the benefits of misogyny. Any man who doesn’t fit in the cookie cutter mold and is punished for it, whether that’s a drag queen or a gay man or a cis straight man who just likes the fucking color pink, men are just as socially shackled by misogyny as women are, top of the gender bullshit food chain or not.

Misandry is just as bad as misogyny ideologically. The reason it’s rarely as much of a problem has nothing to do with the inherent qualities of womanhood. Systemic misandry isn’t often a problem because we haven’t historically had much of it.

Feminism is not and never has been an attempt to invert the status quo, place women on top, and call it a day assuming the exact same bullshit won’t arise. Feminism is a fight for equality, a fight where we try to liberate everyone, lift everyone up instead of pulling each other down.

We are not crabs in a bucket.

“Trans-exclusionary radical feminism” is what happens when someone decides pulling other people down is easier than lifting them up.

It’s an ideology built on assuming you’re the only victim that matters.

You’re not. Oppression isn’t a competition.

Stop trying to pull us back into the bucket. It does nothing constructive for anyone.

#original post #sol speaks #misogony #transphobia #gender essentialism

[imnothinginparticular]

#finishedbooks Black Male by various. Saw this at my favorite book store in Mitaka of all places and had no idea what it was. Come to find it was a controversial (by default) museum exhibition in 1994, which came somewhat as a shock to me because I was only seeing these after George Floyd as I specifically remember going to the VMFA in Dec 2019 and they had a tiny little black art section in a corner that essentially spanned 200 years of several genres in a mere 14 pieces...with the slapped on 'black' title. I can't even fathom like if the world was somehow reversed a museum just stuffing Turner, a Manet, two Picasso's, Mondrian, and I don't know a Hopper and calling the section white art...it just cheats the viewer out of so much. When I went in 2021 the black art was more somewhat dispersed. With that the exhibit here in the book is an attempt to place in a useful discursive framework issues about representation which are crucial to understanding much post 60s art and the society in which it was made. So because of this approach, "Black Male" provides a quarter century overview of the varying aesthetic strategies employed by a wide range if artists. This premise really sums up its underlying universal concerns, it just funny how "black" gets in there and it becomes whatever to whoever projects themselves upon the exhibit. Also interesting as this was 1994 with the OJ trial coming off of Rodney King in a year that saw 2,280,000 black males imprisoned, while 23,000 earned college degrees a 99 to 1 ratio compared to 6 to 1 for white males. More simply 1 out of 4 black males would go to jail and I remember when I graduated high school 9 years later it was 1 out of 3 as my white high school teachers loved to remind us anytime there was any disobedience. Jay-Z summed it best when he said simply, "one of three of us is doing time/you what that type of shit that can do to a nigga's mind!?" With that I will skip around the essays that features cultural critic main stays like Henry Louis Gates Jr. and even an essay by bell hooks. Was disappointed in one essay that had a small section within that questioned how much Basquait actually knew to what he seemed to understand intuitively which if you just look at his work you just don't pull all those subtle cultural references out of thin air. I felt like it just took up the mainstream narrative that enjoyed him more dead and his since commodification than to see that he was well preoccupied with African American culture and plight in context of our complete condescension within the art world. From there and again with the time it reacts heavily to the late 80s and I loved the essay citing between Bill Cosby and Willie Horton (if you're a Regan baby or before you know) the vast "empty space of representation" in between. I remember as a kid the only black people on TV were athletes/entertainers or crack dealers on the nightly news going back to Willie Horton. And they went a lot into gay and lesbian black issues though still weren't as far as getting into trans as is the case now. So was interesting to see the overall progression from 94 to now....this was around the time as well African American was first being used. An interesting progression on accepted terminology as I recall my dad telling me once (though not sure how much he read into) that on my grandfather's birth certificate it says "colored", his says "negro", mine says "black" and my little sister's says "African American." In all, a beautiful time capsule at the understanding of perceptions compared to where we are now.

#finishedbooks