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radiohead-spiderman · 3 months

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hihi! i found your blog a few days ago and to sum it up I FEEL SEEN. i joined the marauders fandom a little while ago and read the powerpoints, other peoples takes on the characters, seen videos, and posts, and am currently reading atyd but, some of the things i’ve seen kinda just irked me?

and then i found your blog and all of a sudden i kid you not a beam of light enveloped the room, LMFAO I FELT SO HEARD AND SEEN and your posts are so well written and outspoken -something i could have never even try to do. i’ve seen people literally be eaten alive in comments if someone disagrees with a certain popular opinion or ship and that was insane to me like, ISNT THIS FANDOM MAJORITY MADE UP??

anyways thank you for being the beacon of hope <3

(also the one thing that really struck me wrong was the obsession of mlm in the fandom? like they’ll pump out mlm ships and characters i’ve never heard of WAYYY before they remember the women in the fandom. like?? i wanna see more dorlene stuff and a canon complaint lily fic from her perspective! women are so complicated and beautiful i just wanna see some representation and justice for them. for a fandom that preaches representation they really do forget all the women they’ve created. they all make them seem like they’re getting in the way of the mlm ships. for example, marlene being sirius, “crazy” ex, lily getting in the way of jegulas “a bitch”, mary never having a personality other than being pretty -LIKE??? anyways id love to hear your thoughts on this)

A BEACON OF HOPE??? Sobbing and sliding down the wall

ANON this is the sweetest thing I’ve ever been told oh my god, I’m crying that is so sweet, ahrhfbfb, this is genuinely so sweet anon <3

As for the obsession with mlm thing, I feel like every fandom has their fair share of that, usually it’s just fetishization but honestly, while I could be wrong I do feel with the marauders fandom it’s only partly that(there is definitely fetishization though don’t get me wrong)a part of it I think stems from misogyny/internalized misogyny, but I think a lot of it is a part of this fandom’s inability to write certain things, that being non one dimensional women, and sure sometimes you come across a gorgeously written post, but for the most part, the women, even if they’re not written as cartoon villains, never have that much depth, like Lily for example, she could be a main character aside Regulus in something, but she’d never as developed as Regulus, her flaws are easy to fix/easy to understand(and that’s IF she has any). I feel like a part of the fandom thinks that putting Lily in a different relationship and calling it a day with no expansion on her character besides “hot BAMF queen”, is somehow different that making her a cartoon villain, when they’re both basically the same.

I think it heavily stems from misogyny and just not being able to write women with flaws, (of course it’s not just a problem with the lack of flaws in women but I won’t get into that right now lol)

Hopefully this was well worded I’m sleepy :D

#also to add it does definitely stem from fetishization as well #the few gems in this fandom are just MWAH though #also thank you anon I cried reading that #edit tag: I think the inability to write non one dimensional women also falls into the issue of labeling the women as just parts of the men #like Marlene being the girl version of Sirius for example #a part of this fandom has a problem with writing women as an extension of the men

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deafmatteo · 3 years

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hi hi so first i really love your writing, it’s so comforting and lovely, and i look forward to every little bit of it!

and idk if you’ve already answered something like this but i was wondering about your thoughts on skam france season 5?

hello, thank u! 🖤🖤🖤

and i have talked a bit about skam france s5 when i was watching it live but im more than happy to talk about it again & put all of my thoughts into one post JFJSJD.

let me just put a disclaimer here for abuse, both personal & what was shown in the season. also adding a read more because this got LONG, i am so sorry. i talk a lot </3 (ignore the spelling errors, i literally woke up and saw this anon and jumped out of bed to answer dflkgjkdlg)

also! i talk about deafness as a disability in this but that’s my own personal experience & what was written into the season. we know arthur sees it as a disability because he was raised in a hearing society as a hearing person. not all D/deaf people believe this!! this isn’t universal.

first things first, i just wanted to let people know these feelings come from a very personal place. i lost my hearing similarly to arthur — i was beaten as a young child and as the years have gone on and i’ve grown, my hearing has gotten worse. i was hard of hearing with mild to moderate hearing loss in both ears and now i call myself deaf because i have severe hearing loss in my left ear & i am completely deaf in my right ear. (don’t worry about being apologetic or anything! i’m very open about how i lost my hearing because although it’s sad & traumatic, it’s talking about how trauma and disabilities are often more intertwined than people realize. you don’t ever see a disabled person thriving in their natural environment. you see traumatized disabled people learning how to survive.)

i don’t have problems with how arthur lost his hearing. i think it’s a very important story to tell & it’s one that does occur — even if people don’t recognize it. it added to the fear and isolation he felt during his season because he was suddenly extremely disconnected from his peers and the people he called his best friends.

i also absolutely ADORE noee and camille. having a Deaf* woman who was as sassy and blunt and straight-forward as she was is a good thing. people often talk about how D/deaf individuals can come across as rude or unattentive or too blunt and it can be true but when people often talk about it, they do it in a rude/offensive manner! noee did it in a manner that wasn’t stereotypical and felt real. she also had the distain towards hearing people because they continually traumatized & belittled her and they showed that in a way that you knew was justified. she had been hurt by these people and she knew what arthur was experiencing, hence why she was so warm around him. having a Deaf love interest who wasn’t a hearing-people pleaser or someone who needed approval from hearing people was so good because it helped add layers of her own identity that the audience may not even realize exists.

camille as well. having a hard of hearing gay (queer? i can’t remember what he labelled himself as) person on screen without fetishism or trauma porn was refreshing. that doesn’t happen and seeing it was?? amazing. he was able to have fun, be himself, etc. also him acting as a connector between noee and arthur is a reality as well. he exists inbetween both of their worlds and while it’s clear that he is comfortable and okay with it, it’s a reality that often stems into feelings of anger and hurt. (as shown in arthur!) it’s good to see a hard of hearing person who doesn’t feel ostracized from the Deaf community & or the hearing community. he’s just vibing!

the isolation that arthur felt. the lonelines, the pain, the fear—all of it is a reality of the situation he was in. even with his friends attempting to support him in the ways they knew how, he still felt alone. having noee and camille there was such a good!! good thing!!! to have. the way noee criticized his friends, the way ARTHUR eventually yelled at them (especially lucas, like wtf was up his ass), the growth of arthur from clinging onto his fantasy world and accepting himself. i geniunely enjoyed these aspects.

NOW ONTO MY CRITICISMS.

my biggest one is the abuse clip. it was absolutely unnecessary for them to include the audio (and the shadowing) of arthur’s violent abuse. i understand they needed to potray his dad’s behaviours but there were many other ways to go about it that doesn’t re-traumatize people. i rarely rarely get triggered by things due to desensitization & repression and this made me extremely nauseous and it caused me to spiral into memories of my own abuse. yes, i understand the story of arthur’s dad being the villain and contributing to the trauma. no, it did not need to be done in this way.

also the way it was brushed aside & arthur forgave him after the car accident. i know it’s contributing to the cycle of abuse and it will continue after the seasons have passed but i think it should have had more fear, confusion or anger. we could see that arthur hated his father, just by how he constantly attempted to fight back and argue. i understand that it was him acting from a place of survival and trying to mediate to make things calmer but this is his perspective—we could have felt the underlying emotions or seen a brief moment where arthur let his anger take over when he was alone. the abuse was written solely for hearing people. it was trauma porn. it was used as a way to make people feel sorry for arthur and to weaken him. it wasn’t written as integrated into the plot as it should have been and was brought up only to deter the plot away from his cheating. it was one of the things that made it clear the plot was more written for hearing people than for deaf people.

(again, it’s not the actual story i’m criticizing. it’s how they integrated it.)

the second was noee using her voice to essentially beg arthur to love her. using her voice was a moment of vulnerability and fear that they could have either: a. used in a different manner or b. not included at ALL. i am an oral deaf person—i was raised in a hearing environment & i went to speech thrapy for many, many years. i use my voice a lot. however, whenever i am without my hearing aid and i am tired, i don’t often use my voice because i am insecure about my deaf accent.

noee doesn’t use her voice at all. she has talked about how using only sign language gives her power and stregethnes her identity in a way that the hearing world would never be able to. it was a pivotal moment of her own identity and growth and they threw it out the window to tell arthur she loved him. he rejected her so she used her voice, something that reminds her of her trauma and pain, to beg him to love her back.

another is how alexia said that she wasn’t wired to love disabled people. i love alexia as well, except for this alone was enough to hurt my opinion of her. it’s a reality of abled people—they often act like loving a disabled person is more work and view disabled people as less than to avoid seeing them as potential lovers/friends/etc. my main problem is the fact it wasn’t ever properly addressed and they used it as a plot device after she had been nothing but loving and supportive to arthur during the beginning of his journey. she was so, so loving and caring and they could have used to as a way to talk about how relationships and perspective changes rather having her just be straight up ableist.

when arthur first got his hearing aids, he got smaller ones that were less visible to avoid having other people see. this is a big example of internalized ableism and is a very important point but they never touched on it again. i think it would have been more personal and monumental of his growth to have him go back & change the hearing aids he uses to better aid him in his day-to-day rather than aid his desire to be hearing-passing. i just wanted to see continuation of this.

the love triangle. ABSOLUTELY USELESS. i love both alexia and noee as love interests. they are well-developed women who both had vulnerable moments in the season where they talked about their insecurities and were vulnerable and still had arthur reject/use them both. this is more of a fandom criticism but the love triangle was used solely to demonize noee while they continued to put arthur on a pedestal. the season could have gone either/or with them as love interests or not at all. the season was meant to focus on his journey as a now disabled person and the love triangle took up a large portion of that.

(don’t think i’ve forgotten about people calling others fatphobic/biphobic for preferring noee as a love interest)

this isn’t entirely a criticism but a good point to note. i don’t think skam france had a plan in regards to season five when they casted arthur but he should have been played by a hard of hearing person and there should have been foreshadowing in the earlier seasons for this. i think arthur’s actor did a fantastic job with the content he was given but it would have been a bit more personal if played by a truly deaf/hoh person. noee’s actress talked about this! she said how good of an opportunity it was for season five to occur because it’s extremely rare for deaf people to get opportunities and casting designed for them. having a main actress talk about this and still having the main actor being abled is a bit? bad taste. i just think it’s a product of lack of planning, is all.

ALSO THE CAR CRASH????? this isn’t a big criticism, i’m just like HUH? me & arthur really out hear being deaf and getting hit by cars ig. arthur kinnie

*definitions that add as to why i use deaf & Deaf in this piece.*

#skam france #also wlw noee? she’s a wlw idc #connor answers!#tw // abuse

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kihyunswrath · 5 years

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To everyone wanting to join the kpop industry: kpop is not a genre of music

For real sometimes it feels like people have literally no idea of what kpop means or where it stems from or why it exists, so for the 100th time, here is the reminder again:

Kpop is not a genre. It’s not something you can imitate, or adopt into your own music style. It’s not something you can steal, copy or appropriate. Musically, kpop is just different genres of popular music that have been invented by different groups of people (most often black people, but not always), in different cultures, in different times. Popular music as it is today, cannot be claimed by any singular group because it has been influenced by too many communities and new songs are created literally everywhere on this planet every second of the day, but it has clear historical roots within black communities (and obviously too many entertainment industries fail to acknowledge that fact). Therefore Koreans cannot claim they own the pop part of kpop, nor have they done so. There is also no reason for any of us to claim that kpop is a style of music we can start practicing, or that we deserve to see representation within kpop as non-Koreans.

Again, kpop is not a genre, it is literally simply an industry that promotes Korean people.

That’s about the depth of it. Kpop exists because Korean people wanted to find a tool to have influence over their region, aka they wanted to invest into their soft power. They wanted to find a voice within a global community that didn’t have anything for them in the first place. No one knew anything about Korean people, their history or their culture before the 2000′s. People were dismissive, ignorant and racist toward Koreans (and we still are). Nothing about them was cool, interesting or worth investing in, because people saw them as a third world country. Kpop became one of their tools they used to gain attention from international audiences.

And that’s why it was critical that they used music styles created specifically in America. Not because they were thinking of appropriating black cultures, or because they were necessarily even remotely aware of those racial dynamics and a history of discrimination within America, but because for decades they were told that American audiences and cultural concepts were the only truly modernized, futuristic platforms worth imitating, following and investing in. That is common knowledge among any non-American people. Even today, people living outside of the USA all around the world are told the only way to gain true recognition in the global community is to make a breakthrough in America. People are still told America invented literally everything modern culture-related, that the world revolves around them and all the “classics” in music come from there and that the rest of us could never produce anything as cool or modern using our own cultural heritage and that the American entertainment industry is the only “real” or “relevant” entertainment industry.

So obviously Koreans thought this is the way for them to get views, to find a platform, a voice. They created an industry that catered to Korean people and their needs, and the end goal was to be recognized worldwide by using tools that people were already familiar with. Hence, a combination of mashed music genres that were not created by Koreans but were very popular and easily relatable.

So, what does that mean? It means that without Koreans involved at every stage of the music production, it ceases being kpop. Kpop cannot be produced in any other country, among any other group of people, within any other context, within any other entertainment industry. If the producers and performers are not mostly Korean, if the production system is not mainly based in Korea and the songs they make are not mostly sung in Korean, there is no reason to call it kpop. It just becomes pop. Like I said, the only difference between kpop and pop is that kpop is representing Koreans.

Therefore it does not make sense that hundreds of thousands of non-Korean teenagers, especially non-Asians, rush to use the popularity of Korean pop to their own personal benefit and think that they can become kpop idols if they just create something that “sounds like kpop” or if they join Korean entertainment industries and become trainees. At the moment, a few of them are used as trophy members to make certain groups seem multicultural and multilingual, for those groups to gain more fans in countries those foreigners came from, but the fact of the day is that foreigners cannot claim ownership to kpop. They cannot say they want to create kpop music on their own. They cannot say they want to be the “change” in how kpop is being perceived. They cannot say they are there to shift the goals and “add more diversity” to an industry that was not created for them and is not their platform by definition. They cannot say they “belong” to the industry on the basis that someone from their own community long time ago created a certain music style Koreans are now using. They cannot say kpop represents mainstream music or western music and therefore any and every westerner should be welcomed to that industry with open arms, and that it’s inherently racist if they are not.

Are Koreans racists? Certainly yes. Is their entertainment industry giving credit to black communities for inventing the music styles they now benefit from? Not that I’ve ever seen. Are they appropriating fashion trends from black people even as we speak? Yes. Are they ignorant, dismissive and racist toward many other groups of people, including other Asians and Arabs? Yes.

Yet that does not remove their agency in the matter of kpop. It does not remove the fact that they built their own industry to promote themselves, when they had little to no representation in the global media. Foreigners, while they don’t have to support kpop industry or participate in it and while they have every right to criticize the industry for being racist, sexist and capitalistic shithole, still don’t get to enter the industry however and whenever they wish, thinking they can become closer to their favourite oppas, change the industry in their own terms, demand attention for themselves and think they deserve an opportunity to shine for being “that exotic refreshing foreign presence” (as if they don’t have an entire music industry catering to their own personal needs in their own home country).

If anyone gets to “diversify” the Korean entertainment industry, it’s Koreans themselves. You know, those black Koreans, Korean-Americans, Joseonjok people, Zainichi Koreans, Vietnamese Koreans, white Koreans, Korean diaspora, half-Koreans, North Koreans, disabled Koreans, fat Koreans, LGBT Koreans... you name it. We foreigners are not inherently entitled to anything in that society.

These aforementioned people are perfectly capable of changing, developing, challenging and diversifying their own media and entertainment industry without our “help”. We can call out kpop industry for treating its idols unfairly, for discriminating against their own people, for being abusive, for gaining profit at the expense of their idols’ health and mental well-being. We can call them racist for being racist. We can have an effect on the industry by deciding NOT to support them financially, like really, that’s just literal inactivity and the easiest possible way to have a say in what’s going on there.

But not a single one of us has an ownership to kpop, not a single one of us truly understands how Koreans live their lives or how we could “represent” them without being Koreans ourselves. We do not have a free entrance to that industry, even if we think that none of the things they produce are originated from Korea, or if we think they are “shitty racists” in this or that aspect.

People think that just because kpop is now becoming more and more mainstream and because it is targeted to all kinds of audiences that it’s somehow a free field of music anyone can enter. The music itself could be considered a free field - it is indeed just a bunch of different genres of music everyone is creating and recreating. Korean language is somewhat of a free field, too - anyone can learn to speak it. But kpop is not. Surely you can call yourself a kpop artist if you make songs in Korean or say you are a kpop idol because you used to be a trainee inside an entertainment company, but that simply does not make sense. Music sang in Korean language exists outside of kpop, so that does not make kpop kpop. Entertainment industries that train you to become a professional performer exist outside of the kpop industry, so that either does not kpop make. The only way you can be a kpop idol is if you represent Koreans (and their occasional multicultural aspects) in a Korean entertainment company and perform in Korean - and considering how the industry is insanely hard, oppressive, restrictive and limits your artistic talents in every possible way, one could fairly ask what made you want that. What inspires you to represent people of another country, other than fetishization, positive racism and you wanting to jump on the bandwagon because kpop is trendy now and you have the misinformed belief that kpop is a genre of music you could also create? Or perhaps people think they might be treated as special gems because they would then become exotic foreigners in a society that is very homogeneously Korean?

I remember times when jpop, jrock and manga/anime were still HUGELY popular everywhere in the world (in the beginning of 2000s). Times where everyone around me was identifying with Japanese popular culture and their fashion/music/art trends because it was edgy, cool and “alternative”. I still remember those times when people told me they wanted to travel to Japan and become manga artists, and you know what? They were also saying how cartoons/pop music weren’t originally a Japanese invention, so therefore it was well within reason for them to call themselves manga artists or jpop musicians for just “imitating” those styles, or hope they would be welcomed to those industries immediately after travelling to Japan. And I’m not saying Japanese people used these industries only to promote themselves, no, quite the contrary. But I am saying that people did feel entitled to jump onto those bandwagons mostly because they wanted to be seen as “cool and popular” too, Japanese people themselves be damned.

So yeah. Kpop is not the first, and probably not the last popular culture movement that people think they should have an access to simply because it’s fashionable now and because some of the basic elements in it are not originated from one single place. It’s probably also not the first or last industry people think they want to enter because they think that the language spoken or some of the cultural elements added to it made it into a whole “different genre” they could imitate by performing in that language or cosplaying their favourite pop culture acts. You cannot cosplay a Korean person. You cannot adopt kpop if you’re not Korean yourself and/or participating in their entertainment industry while ready to cater to their economy/society as a whole.

Do you guys even know why kpop entertainment industry is the way it is? The reason why the industry developed that way specifically was because Korea, in order to maintain its identity, was extremely protective and nationalistic and had only a very specific platform for playing Korean-made music in 1990s: two TV channels that were owned by the government. Not even radio stations, just two tv channels. They dictated how, when and what kind of music was allowed to be published. That’s why kpop became extremely performance-oriented, because it was created for the television from the very beginning. That’s also why the industry started dictating how the idols were behaving, how they looked and what they were allowed to do/say. That meant an extensive amount of training, manufacturing and controlling and therefore created a need for trainee system. That system ultimately became the only way for Koreans to reach for fame and musical career, because learning all those skills required for acceptable performances in the tv meant you had to have extensive amounts of time and money to practice them. But most Korean teens were and are bound to sit in schools and hagwons all day around, studying immense amounts, so they literally did not have those free hours to practice singing/dancing/performing skills on their own. Joining an entertainment company was the only option they had, and the fact that that route was harsh, time-taking and unforgiving, was simply reflecting the typical mindset of Korean people who think nothing should come easy.

So them going through those industries to become successful artists and idols is because they lack other options, not because that system is somehow superior to all other entertainment industries in the whole world. It is indeed weird, in that context, that people coming from more privileged backgrounds with more freedom and time to spend developing their musical skills should even want to enter an industry that is not built for them, does not answer to their needs and often dehumanizes them because of the kpop industry’s ideology that thinks people are products used for profit and nationalistic promotion.

#kpop #k pop #bts #monsta x #exo #twice #blackpink #seventeen #nct #itzy #red velvet #mine #korean pop #vixx #stray kidz #wanna one

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official-queer · 4 years

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sooo i figured it’d be helpful for me to make a complete post on my thoughts on pansexual as a label. i've answered a few asks about this and then figured i'd covered it enough, but i realize that i covered separate points in each post/ask.

i'll try to make it as organized as possible, but y'all know i'm the king of run-on sentences and unnecessarily long statements and restatements. so yeah, this is gonna be a long one, fellas

"bi = two, pan = all"

in reality, the bi identity has always included attraction to all genders. i'm sure you'll've heard it time and time again, but the 1995 bisexual manifesto states very clearly that bi people are not duogamous in their attraction. insisting that bisexuality is only for attraction to cis men and cis women paints bisexuality as transphobic, as well.

the pan label became so popular with the rise of awareness of nonbinary identities because people started to find it important to state they were also attracted to nonbinary people. the whole pan- prefix was specifically picked because people were aware that "nonbinary" was merely a category for those who fell outside of the imposed male-female dichotomy, and under which several hundred genders could fall.

so... bisexual includes all these hundreds of genders, and pansexual specifies these hundreds of genders. seems redundant, but what's the issue?

"some people find the distinction important"

this is a sentiment i've heard brought up as an argument to just leave pan people alone. but i don't find it quite so valid an argument, irony not intended. *why* is the distinction so important? how come one can concede that bi people like all genders too, but you *must* let people know you are the type of "m-spec" who is definitely able to be attracted to all genders?

the idea one can id as pan but still agree that bi people can also feel the same way a pan person does is contradictory. you are attempting to label an experience as x and argue that it's a necessary label, when there was already a label for x and y. the very idea of a "distinction" is to point out how something is *different*. it's completely redundant.

so if bi and pan are the same, is there some other reason why someone would prefer pan over bi?

"attraction regardless of gender"/"hearts not parts"

i'm lumping these two together because, despite sounding like different points, they argue the same thing in the end. it's just that one is more subtle.

when the label of pansexual was in it's formative years, some sought to argue that pan *is* different from bi, because pansexuals do not consider gender when they are gauging attraction to someone. there are several problems with this.

this switches pan from a "who" label (correct usage of a sexuality label, denoting to whom you are attracted, referring to gender), to a "how" label (incorrect usage of a sexuality label, denoting in what circumstances one feels attraction, not accounting for gender). with the other definition of pan, the "who" was simple - anyone of any gender. with this definition, the "how" is now involved, that being without regarding gender.

within normal parameters of a sexuality label, as in, a "who" label, it is functionally the same as the previous definition. you are still attracted to any gender.

just as well, it can be used just as well for a bi person attracted to all genders. many bi people have stated this is exactly how they feel, and so you jump back to the distinction argument. but also, many gay and straight people have also expressed that gender plays no part in *how* they feel their attraction. their attraction may only include one or so gender(s), but beyond that, it's not something that factors in.

many trans and specifically nonbinary people have stated distaste at this definition as it is dismissive of gender. one gets the impression that their gender struggles, growth, identity, etc. is not important to the pan who uses this definition.

specifically in regards to "hearts not parts", a very popular quote around the early years of the pan label - this gives the very strong idea that pan people are claiming that only their sexuality involves being attracted to the important parts of someone; their mind, their soul, their identity beyond gender, etc.. this is just... yuck.

just as well, this further pushes the pretty prevalent idea among mogai/inclus that gay, bi, and straight people are driven solely by sexual desire. while the "hearts not parts" phrase is uniquely pansexual in nature, the sentiment is shared by inclus asexual and other people using "how" labels, such as demisexual and other "a-spec" people. this sentiment is considered pretty homophobic, because while the idea seems to be against gay, bi, *and* straight people, it is weaponized frequently in opposition to gay and bi folk, especially lesbians.

"it's just a preference"

preferences are for flavors of ice cream. i highly doubt one is basing their whole identity on the phonetic sounds of "pan" vs. "bi", or a "prettier flag", or what have you. typically, if one dives deeper into what exactly these "preferences" are, they almost all lead back to misconceptions about bi as a label.

differing community

it's no secret that pansexual people have, at an alarming rate, culminated for themselves a unique culture and community. it's also no secret that a lot of this reeks of the era it was born from - 2009-2012 internet culture - but my distaste is my own.

some argue that their preference for the pan label is simply due to this differing community. some... do not argue this, but it's apparent. what either party doesn't consider is this: stating preference for one community, in this situation, is stating a preference to not be included in the other community.

this is why i say that some pan people, while not consciously aware, adhere to this argument. i was one of these people. this is where you'll have to forgive my heavy reliance on personal anecdote, but i believe it applies.

when i id'd as pan, i realized later that a big portion of my preference for this label stemmed from this mystified idea of the bi community. in my head, subconsciously, i viewed bi people as mature but not too mature, sexy, club-going, drug-using, edgy. i thought i couldn't be one of those people because they were too *cool* (these ideas aren't cool in this regard - they're very common biphobic stereotypes). pansexuals, on the other hand, where nerdy, friendly, meme-loving, sex-positive but not promiscuous. so many of the "fandom moms" we all used to admired had pan in their tumblr description, twitter bio, blog header, etc.. i could relate to this! (emphasis on could... i'm a normal human being now)

you can see these internal biases become very apparent when you see pan people insisting that their preference is "valid", or when you try to get them to explain how they're different from bi people at all. this isn't a matter of "one community or another", or even "one community over another", but "one community over the boogeyman of our idea of their community". and it all becomes so silly when you see how self-imposed this is - all these traits are bi culture! you're bi! you are contributing all this to bi culture, and you only need to shed your internalized biphobia and realize this!

fetishization of trans identities

i touched on this in my first point, but i'll go more in depth here. essentially, the idea that there must be a separate identity for those willing to date nb people, and god forbid if you're even more ignorant, trans men and women, is inherently othering and, in many cases, fetishizing of trans identities.

in my experience, the pan person who recognizes that pan is the same as bi, but who claims they are pan due simply to preference, is actually in the minority. for every pan of this sort i've seen, i've seen 20 more who blatantly believe that they must id as pan, since they would date trans and nb people. i believe this is almost directly related to how many cis people id as pan, as well as a mix of trans+nb people who've been fed this narrative and now believe it to be true. those quirky fandom moms i mentioned? all cis, all iding as pan performatively. the label of pan is an act of defiance in their eyes, the ultimate symbol of trans+nb allyship. and it's so, soooo cringey. i'd rather they be honest and id as "chaser" and be done with it.

if you're one of those people, or someone who believes this distinction is valid, hear me when i say this: TRANS PEOPLE DO NOT WANT YOUR SPECIAL TREATMENT! binary trans men and women want to be included in your overall binary men and women categories. trans men are men, trans women are women. attraction to men includes trans men by default, attraction to women, the same. nb people adjacent to these binary genders (demi-man, genderfluid, trans masc, agender+masc presenting, etc.) like to be included in these categories of attraction on an individual basis! there are gay men who date masc nb people, and lesbians who identify lesbian attraction as attraction to non-men, and vice versa. how can you rectify iding with an identity solely to point out your attraction to these otherwise unincluded (by your standards) categories, all in the name of being for these peoples' desires, while also ignoring their pleas to just be included and normalized within *all* attractions? can you say that gay, straight, lesbian, and pan people can all be attracted to trans+nb people, but not bi people? that's silly! so, in your attempt to be more inclusive, you've actually insisted on further othering us.

i'll add more points if/when they're brought up, or if i remember anything else later. i just got back from work and am quite tired, so.. :,)

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marshmallowgoop · 7 years

Text

It’s not “Born Sexy Yesterday,” y’all.

I had the great fortune of catching up with the fifth season of Samurai Jack just in time for that episode, and, well, there’s a lot I could say.

But I want to just focus on one thing: what bothers me about so much media criticism---and this is coming from someone who engages in quite a bit of it---is that, in attempting to call out issues of objectification of women and sexism against women, critics often do just what they’re criticizing themselves, stripping away female characters’ agency and personalities in their commentary, painting them as little more than helpless, pitiful things.

And that’s exactly my issue with the “Born Sexy Yesterday” video---and exactly my issue with the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope being applied to Ashi.

(Well, aside from the fact that the whole video in question is a Jonathan McIntosh video, who was a co-writer and producer for the first season of Feminist Frequency’s “Tropes vs Women in Video Games” series, which has this issue on top of a whole host of others, but that’s a discussion for another day.)

The Trope

For a sort of “textbook” definition of the trope in question, McIntosh defines the “Born Sexy Yesterday” character as so:

McIntosh: She has the mind of a naïve, yet highly-skilled child, but in the body of a mature, sexualized woman. She also serves as our hero’s love interest. “Profoundly naïve, yet unimaginably wise” captures the essence of this trope.

“Born Yesterday” is an idiom meaning “extremely naïve, inexperienced, or ignorant.” As a media trope, “Born Sexy Yesterday” has both a figurative and, in many cases, a literal meaning.

From here, McIntosh adds that the “Born Sexy Yesterday” character has “the mind of a child manifest in a mature, female body” and is “brought into the human world already fully formed.” The character is “deliberately framed in a sexualized way” and is “defined by their innocence and inexperience of worldly things---especially when it comes to sex, romance, or basic social interaction.” Notably, they are “deliberately written to be completely unaware of their own sex appeal.”

However, a “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal---despite her newness---is still “often highly skilled in something that men will respect” (often combat), which emphasizes what McIntosh stresses is the most important part of the trope: “Born Sexy Yesterday” is more of a relationship trope than anything---and it’s a male-fantasy relationship trope at that. The guy who ultimately hooks up with the “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal is just as crucial to the trope as the “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal is herself.

And the “guy” part of “Born Sexy Yesterday” is, as McIntosh describes:

McIntosh: Typically, he’s a straight, red-blooded man who has---for a variety of reasons---found himself alone or unsatisfied in love. He finds himself disenfranchised, or otherwise directionless. He either can’t find---or doesn’t want---a woman from his own world---a woman who might be his equal in matters of love and sexuality.

He does have one thing going for him, though. He knows all about living life as a normal human being.

Of course, so does every other guy on Earth, which should make him... unremarkable. Except, to a woman born yesterday. Because she’s presumably never known another man, he would seem like the smartest, most amazing guy in the entire universe.

And here’s where we start to see how the trope is constructed as a male fantasy. It’s precisely her naïvety and her innocence that allows her to see something special in him---something that other, less innocent---or more experienced---women cannot.

In other words, a “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal, as described by McIntosh, is nothing more than a wish-fulfillment sex object for loser guys who can’t get with anyone else.

In other other words, to say that a female character fits the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope is to say that any hopes, dreams, ambitions that she might have outside of a man---and, you know, that whole personality thing---mean nothing. To say a female character fits the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope is to say that she is nothing more than a silly, doesn’t-know-anything sex object, because that is literally what the trope describes.

And that’s why the trope doesn’t sit well with me in the first place. It seems far more interested in bringing down women and reducing them to items of male pleasure than criticizing the writing for depicting them in that way.

Ashi

But bringing this back to Ashi and Samurai Jack, the nasty nature of this trope is also why I dislike it being used to criticize Ashi. Just like every other character that might be described as a “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal, the trope reduces Ashi to nothing more than Jack’s sexy arm candy and completely glosses over and ignores her own growth, her own journey, and her own agency.

Ashi has arguably been as much of the main character of Season Five as Jack has been. The narrative has detailed her horrific childhood, her constant love for nature, her compassion even when she was trained and ordered to have none, her wonder as she sees everything that was hidden from her, her stubbornness in her ways, her turmoil as the truth becomes impossible to deny... and that’s just in the first few episodes!

From there, Ashi gets to wander the world and learn about the world on her own, gets to discover herself and who she wants to be on her own, gets to face her mother and defeat her mother on her own---and that’s just scratching the surface. Ashi has so much growth and development separate from Jack that emphasizes that she is so much more than just some pretty “prize” for him because he can’t get any other girl (which, c’mon, seriously? Jack is hugely adored in-canon, is damn good looking, loses his clothes all the time, and is sexualized up the wazoo just like Ashi is. Ain’t no way this dude would have trouble getting some if he were really looking.).

In any case, the idea of Ashi fitting the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope so insulting because it conveniently forgets everything about her that doesn’t have to do with Jack and her “childishness” that stems from her sheltered upbringing. Despite all of Ashi’s experiences, she’s reduced to a naïve baby who can’t handle herself and doesn’t know anything. While it’s true that Ashi’s childhood leaves her highly inexperienced in the world, her story---which the narrative has so focused on and placed so much significance on---is all about gaining experience. It honestly grosses me out that everything Ashi went through and her journey to understand what was stolen from her is just completely pushed under a rug to pigeonhole her into a demeaning trope.

Think of it this way: would you consider Rapunzel from Disney’s Tangled an example of “Born Sexy Yesterday” due to her sheltered upbringing? I certainly wouldn’t! Rapunzel is so, so, so much more than Eugene’s clueless girlfriend, and her story is all about gaining experience and independence. To say that Rapunzel fits the trope would be to erase basically the entire movie---and I feel just the same about Ashi in Samurai Jack.

And in fact, the video itself actually debunks the idea of Ashi fitting the trope at all!

McIntosh: ...the problem with this trope [“Born Sexy Yesterday”] is not necessarily with the female characters themselves. If these were simply stories involving naïve, extra-terrestrial women who learned about love and humanity, then that wouldn’t be an issue. Likewise, if the male hero was also inexperienced and our two protagonists could discover love and sex together, then that would avoid most of the troubling power dynamic issues.

So, for example, Cameron from the Sarah Connor Chronicles TV show fits the trope, but her relationship with the young John Connor is framed as much more of a mutual exploration.

This season of Samurai Jack has been a story nearly just as much about Ashi---if not as much---as it is about the titular Jack. Season Five hasn’t just been some lame male-fantasy romance, because any and all "romance” has just been left to this one episode---one, out of eight, in which Ashi has always been prominently featured and her story of self-discovery has always been of utmost significance.

Equality

The idea of Ashi fitting the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope is also insulting because of another aspect noted in the quote above: equality. While “Born Sexy Yesterday” is a trope that “fetishes the stark power imbalance between a wiser, more experienced man and a naïve, inexperienced woman” and is “the ultimate teacher/student dynamic,” Jack and Ashi’s relationship is defined by learning from each other. Jack “shows Ashi the world,” if you will, and Ashi does the same for him later, saving Jack from himself by “showing” him all the good he’s done in the world with her words. Jack fights his own personal demons, and Ashi fights hers---and they support each other through it, as equals and friends, not master/object or teacher/student.

Especially in this contested episode, Jack is never depicted as “a wiser, more experienced man” than Ashi---right from the very beginning! Jack tries to seem like he knows what he’s doing when he orders food, but he clearly doesn’t have a clue (as eating the stuff turns his head into a fish). Ashi, meanwhile---the one who is so argued to be naïve and inexperienced---is wise enough to know not to eat the seafood. She may have been sheltered and hidden away from the world, but she’s not a clueless child who doesn’t know anything.

All the sexual metaphors in the episode also point to Jack and Ashi’s equality---or at least, to the fact that Jack is not someone significantly above Ashi in terms of romantic/sexual experience. They are both high school-level awkward around each other. They both don’t know how to figure out the “device,” and they both have to fiddle and fiddle and fiddle with it until they get it right. Neither knows what they’re doing, and they have to figure that out together, just like the Cameron and John example from the Sarah Connor Chronicles.

And, to address the naked elephant in the room, Ashi has, again, wandered around the world without Jack. She knew to cover her nakedness because of social norms---why else would she have made her dress? Ashi’s confusion at Jack’s flustered reaction to her nakedness in episode 8 seems more to me as her being confused that someone like Jack would be flustered about nudity in a literal life-or-death situation. Jack is the one acting like an immature child here, not Ashi.

Finally, from a narrative standpoint, Jack and Ashi are also presented as people put in similar, equal situations. Jack was raised to fight and kill Aku. His childhood was dedicated to the task, and in the series proper, it is still his goal. While Jack wasn’t exactly sheltered per se, he didn’t get to experience the world much as an ordinary person because he was always laser-focused on this weighty, fate-of-the-world task.

In the same way, Ashi was raised to fight and kill Jack. Her entire life was dedicated to the goal. She had no chance to experience the world as an ordinary person---and much like Jack was flung into the future and had to learn how to live in a new world, Ashi has to learn to live in a new world, too. And as shown in episode 8, they’re both still getting the hang of it!

These are people who “get” each other. They were born to fight. They were tossed into a strange new world. They’ve never had the chance to be “normal” citizens. They are both naïve and trying to figure things out together.

Jack is never presented as a grand power over Ashi. She holds her own and stands up for herself. She is not Jack’s mindless, clueless arm candy. She is not “Born Sexy Yesterday.”

Of course, I am not saying that there aren’t legitimate criticisms towards the romance. I’m not saying that people shouldn’t be upset. I’m not saying that anyone has to like the direction the series took. I’m not saying that the backlash is unwarranted or undeserved.

But to criticize Season Five because of “Born Sexy Yesterday” is demeaning, insulting, and just plain wrong.

And, personally, I find it incredibly disappointing that a video essay that should, by definition, inspire critical thinking has only seemed to do the exact opposite.

#samurai jack #born sexy yesterday #ashi #the discourse #meta #ramblings #serious talk #spoilers #sj spoilers #ooh boy i'm sorry for this godawful post but #this is why i dislike so much media criticism despite doing so damn much of it myself #anyway i really do get the discontent over the romance #but to address other points that have been brought up:#i'm a little... eh? about the age thing #i mean has jack -mentally- aged in the last 50 years?#people like to disconnect the body from the mind but i think they're actually rather connected #if the body doesn't age who says the mind does?#i'm also surprised i haven't seen anyone bring up hohenheim and trisha because that's what i see it as #don't really know how i feel about it so *shrug*#but they're two consenting adults in any case #as for the murdering sisters thing #that bugs me too but ashi literally said last ep that her mother killed her sisters so #she doesn't see it that jack killed them in any case #anyway #here's some hot fresh discourse #long post #really long post...#shut up goop #seriously wtf

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pepoluan · 7 years

Text

It’s not “Born Sexy Yesterday,” y’all.

Some time ago, I reblogged what looked like a screencap of someone’s post, a well-written takedown on “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope misapplied against Jashi. I haven’t been successful in finding the original post, so I decided to retype the post -- in its entirery -- here.

(Some transcribing notes at the end of the retype.)

Do remember that: everything I retyped here represented the thoughts of the Original Poster. I agree with most of it, disagree with (a very small) part of it, but all of them are the post of the OP verbatim:

(Long wall of text after the “Keep Reading” link)

I had the great fortune of catching up with the fifth season of Samurai Jack just in time for that episode, and, well, there’s a lot I could say.

But I want to just focus on one thing: what bothers me about so much media criticism -- and this is coming from someone who engages in quite a bit of it -- is that, in attempting to call out issues of objectification of women and sexism against women, critics often do just what they’re criticizing themselves, stripping away female characters’ agency and personalities in their commentary, painting them as little more than helpless, pitiful things.

And that’s exactly my issue with the [“Born Sexy Yesterday” video](link?) -- and exactly my issue with the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope being applied to Ashi.

(Well, aside from the fact that the whole video in question is a [Jonathan McIntosh Video, who was a co-writer and producer for the first season of Feminist Frequency’s “Tropes vs Women in Video Games” series](link?), which has this issue on top of a whole host of others, but that’s a discussion for another day.)

The Trope

For a sort of “textbook” definition of the trope in question, McIntosh defines the “Born Sexy Yesterday” character as so:

McIntosh: She has the mind of a naive, yet highly-skilled child, but in the body of a mature, sexualized women. She also serves as our hero’s love interest. “Profoundly naive, yet unimaginably wise” captures the essence of this trope.

“Born Yesterday” is an idiom meaning “extremely naive, inexperienced, or ignorant.” As a media trope, “Born Sexy Yesterday” has both a figurative and, in many cases, a literal meaning.

From here, McIntosh adds that the “Born Sexy Yesterday” character has “the mind of a child manifest in a mature, female body” and is “brought into the human world already fully formed.” The character is “deliberately framed in a sexualized way” and is “defined by their innocence and inexperience of worldly things -- especially when it comes to sex, romance, or basic social interaction.” Notably, they are “deliberately written to be completely unaware of their own sex appeal.”

However, a “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal -- despite her newness -- is still “often highly skilled in something that men will respect” (often combat), which emphasizes what McIntosh stresses is the most important part of the trope: “Born Sexy Yesterday” is more of a relationship trope than anything -- and it’s a male-fantasy relationship trope at that. The guy who ultimately hooks up with the “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal is just as crucial to the trope as the “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal is herself.

And the “guy” part of “Born Sexy Yesterday” is, as McIntosh describes:

McIntosh: Typically, he’s a straight, red-blooded man who has -- for a variety of reasons -- found himself alone or unsatisfied in love. He finds himself disenfranchised, or otherwise directionless. He either can’t find -- or doesn’t want -- a woman from his own world -- a woman who might be his equal in matters of love and sexuality.

He does have one thing going for him, though. He knows all about living life as a normal human being.

And here’s where we start to see how the trope is constructed as a male fantasy. It’s precisely her naivety and her innocence that allows her to see something special in him -- something that other, less innocent -- or more experienced -- women cannot.

In other words, a “Born Sexy Yesterday” gal, as described by McIntosh, is nothing more than a wish-fulfillment sex object for loser guys who can’t get with anyone else.

In other words, to say that a female character fits the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope is to say that any hopes, dreams, ambitions that she might have outside of a man -- and, you know, that whole personality thing -- mean nothing. To say a female character fits the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope is to say that she is nothing more than a silly, doesn’t-know-anything sex object, because that is literally what the trope describes.

Ashi

From there, Ashi gets to wander the world and learn about the world on her own, gets to discover herself and who she wants to be on her own, gets to face her mother and defeat her mother on her own -- and that’s just scratching the surface. Ashi has so much growth and development separate from Jack that emphasizes that she is so much more than just some pretty “prize” for him because he can’t get any other girl (which, c’mon, seriously? Jack is hugely adored in-canon, is damn good looking, loses his clothes all the time, and is sexualized up the wazoo just like Ashi is. Ain’t no way this dude would have trouble getting some if he were really looking.)

In any case, the idea of Ashi fitting the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope so insulting because it conveniently forgets everything about her that doesn’t have to do with Jack and her “childishness” that stems from her sheltered upbringing. Despite all of Ashi’s experiences, she’s reduced to a naive baby who can’t handle herself and doesn’t know anything. While it’s true that Ashi’s childhood leaves her highly inexperienced in the world, her story -- which the narrative has so focused on and placed so much significance on -- is all about gaining experience. It honestly grosses me out that everything Ashi went through and her journey to understand what was stolen from her is just completely pushed under a rug to pigeonhole her into a demeaning trope.

Think of it this way: would you consider Rapunzel from Disney’s Tangled an example of “Born Sexy Yesterday” due to her sheltered upbringing? I certainly wouldn’t! Rapunzel is so, so, so much more than Eugene’s clueless girlfriend, and her story is all about gaining experience and independence. To say that Rapunzel fits the trope would be to erase basically the entire movie -- and I feel just the same about Ashi in Samurai Jack.

And in fact, the video itself actually debunks the idea of Ashi fitting the trope at all!

McIntosh: ... the problem with this trope [”Born Sexy Yesterday”] is not necessarily with the female characters themselves. If these were simply stories involving naive, extra-terrestrial women who learned about love and humanity, then that wouldn’t be an issue. Likewise, if the male hero was also inexperienced and our two protagonists could discover love and sex together, then that would avoid most of the troubling power dynamic issues.

So, for example, Cameron from the Sarah Connor Chronicles TV show fits the trope, but her relationship with the young John Connor is framed as much more of a mutual exploration.

This season of Samurai Jack has been a story nearly just as much about Ashi -- if not as much -- as it is about the titular Jack. Season Five hasn’t just been some lame male-fantasy romance, because any and al “romance” has just been left to this one episode -- one, out of eight, in which Ashi has always been prominently featured and her story of self-discovery has always been of utmost significance.

Equality

The idea of Ashi fitting the “Born Sexy Yesterday” trope is also insulting because of another aspect noted in the quote above: equality. While “Born Sexy Yesterday” is a trope that “fetishes the stark power imbalance between a wiser, more experienced man and a naive, inexperienced woman” and is “the ultimate teacher/student dynamic,” Jack and Ashi’s relationship is defined by learning from each other. Jack “shows Ashi the world,” if you will, and Ashi does the same for him later, saving Jack from himself by “showing” him all the good he’s done in the world with her words. Jack fights his own personal demons, and Ashi fights hers -- and they support each other through it, as equals and friends, not master/object or teacher/student.

Especially in this contested episode, Jack is never depicted as “a wiser, more experienced man” than Ashi -- right from the very beginning! Jack tries to seem like he knows what he’s doing when he orders food, but he clearly doesn’t have a clue (as eating the stuff turns his head into a fish). Ashi, meanwhile -- the one who is so argued to be naive and inexperienced -- is wise enough to know not to eat the seafood. She may have been sheltered and hidden away from the world, but she’s not a clueless child who doesn’t know anything.

All the sexual metaphors in the episode also point to Jack and Ashi’s equality -- or at least, to the fact that Jack is not someone significantly above Ashi in terms of romantic / sexual experience. They are both high school-level awkward around each other. They both don’t know how to figure out the “device,” and they both have to fiddle and fiddle and fiddle with it until they get it right. Neither knows what they’re doing, and they have to figure that out together, just like the Cameron and John example from the Sarah Connor Chronicles.

And, to address the naked elephant in the room, Ashi has, again, wandered around the world without Jack. She knew to cover her nakedness because of social norms -- why else would she have made her dress? Ashi’s confusion at Jack’s flustered reaction to her nakedness in episode 8 seems more to me as her being confused that someone like Jack would be flustered about nudity in a literal life-or-death situation. Jack is the one acting like an immature child here, not Ashi.

Finally, from a narrative standpoint, Jack and Ashi are also presented as people put in similar, equal situation. Jack was raised to fight and kill Aku. His childhood was dedicated to the task, and in the series proper, it is still his goal. While Jack wasn’t exactly sheltered per se, he didn’t get to experience the world much as an ordinary person because he was always laser-focused on this weighty, fate-of-the-world task.

In the same way, Ashi was raised to fight and kill Jack. Her entire life was dedicated to the goal. She had no chance to experience the world as an ordinary person -- and much like Jack was flung into the future and had to learn how to live in a new world, Ashi has to learn to live in a new world, too. And as shown in episode 8, they’re both still getting the hang of it!

These are people who “get” each other. They were born to fight. They were tossed into a strange new world. They’ve never had the chance to be “normal” citizens. They are both naive and trying to figure things out together.

Jack is never presented as a grand power over Ashi. She holds her own and stands up for herself. She is not Jack’s mindless, clueless arm candy. She is not “Born Sexy Yesterday.”

But to criticize Season Five because of “Born Sexy Yesterday” is demeaning, insulting, and just plain wrong.

And, personally, I find it incredibly disappointing that a video essay that should, by definition, inspire critical thinking has only seemed to do the exact opposite.

(End of Transcription; notes follows)

[1] I tried hard to replicate the formatting of the original post. However, the font used by the original post was very well-designed to show the difference of italics and non-italics, while the font in which you’re reading this retype might not.

[2] Since I transcribed from a screencap, I have no way of knowing what the OP linked to. These unknown links are marked using this notation: [...](link?). I’d rather leave the links unknown than guessing and link to the wrong things.

[3] Any misspelling would be my fault; the Original Post is practically perfect in its spelling.

[4] If you are the OP and you want this to be taken down and replaced with a link to your actual post, please message me, and I’ll gladly do that.

#Samurai Jack #Jashi #Wrong Trope Takedown #Born Sexy Yesterday #No It's NOT

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lighdesoti-blog · 5 years

Text

Why is gay dating so complicated

When Did Dating Get So Complicated? I might add that my clients are females, so this will put into perspective why some statements tend to lean towards one side. Most people like to rush through the relationship as if there were some sort of medal waiting for them across the finish line. So as we age, not only has our dating pool suffered a major drought, we have to weed through a mess, searching for someone who meets our qualifications. And how do you weed people out? A man knows that he has to work to keep that love alive. Image credit: This is the reason that honesty and are so powerful for creating high-quality interactions — the practice of being upfront about your desires and flaws will naturally screen for those who best suit you and connect with you. This is also why dating and relationships are so painful and difficult for so many of us, particularly if we had strained familial relationships growing up. Just listen to the lyrics of rap music from the likes of Kanye West, Chris Brown, We Dem Boyz, or Wiz Khalif.

Why is it so hard to find a guy I like as well as fancy? If you want to date happily, try to view dating as the time period wherein the guy actually comes out and asks you to be his girlfriend. Practice saying hello to a few strangers until it becomes comfortable. Nevertheless, a complicated woman is definitely one worth sharing your life with. Are there really any such things as rules for gay dating? Setting the stakes too high, too early will just reinforce your anxiety when you fail to meet your lofty expectations. Throughout our lifetimes, we all have personal issues we need to deal with -- issues that often affect the lives of our partners. Then try to start some conversations with people throughout your day — at the gym, at the park, at work, or wherever. In this article about when you are in an interracial relationship, David Schiller gives some good tips, like pretending that you like all the food and refraining from mentioning race at all.

What happened to dating, when did it become so complicated? Free Dating, Singles and Personals They Ain't Like They Used to Be. For me, the more I care about the person, the stronger the attraction is physically. If you want to take care of yourself, you need to know what your needs are and learn how to address them properly. Yet out of those hundreds, we fall in love with a very few. What are you doing for yourself? So what does that mean for single gay folks looking for love? When you date outside your race, people will assume it is some sort of fetish thing. As men believe themselves to be conquerors of sorts, once they have the love of their women, they no longer feel a need to fight for it.

The Truth about Interracial Dating (whether you like it or not) The world to the best of my knowledge has not changed that much, why has something so simple taken such a huge turn for the worst? In fact, I objectified my sex life quite a bit and adopted some narcissistic behaviors in order to push me through some of these insecurities. Eventually, I came to terms with who I am, and moved almost immediately into a relationship with my now-ex. You have to be able to pick one and stick to it are we having too much luck with the ladies or not enough. They don't want a woman to be overly confident saying that they can master anything, but meanwhile a guy can swear up and down that he can beat you at a game like baseball and rub it in your face. The fact the joke below has been shared thousands of times on Facebook suggests there is an issue here.

It's Complicated: Why Dating Is So Hard Maybe one will come along and he won't be Mr. This likely stems from being a marginalized group that is discriminated against, which leads to internalized homophobia and issues with low self-esteem. Many gay men lament the challenges they have with meeting dating prospects and maintaining those relationships once established. In other words I tend to agree with you. Our unconscious is always seeking to return to the unconditional nurturing we received as children, and to re-process and heal the traumas we suffered.

It's Complicated: Why Dating Is So Hard Eventually, you are going to be hearing repeats, which is fine in the beginning. What is so intimate about hanging out at school anyways, geesh? It seems that unfortunately it's just one of those things we are going to have to put up with in life. I have an excellent job where I make loads of money and work from home, only 35 hours a week, and at any time I want, which means that besides money I have time flexibility. As Ernest Baker points out at , it is based on years of white dominance in society. We've been chatting and talking for almost a month and we both really like what we've gotten to know about each other so far. You can objectify people as sex objects, professional work objects, social objects, or none of the above. If you are a white woman dating an Arabic man, be prepared for the security checks at the airport.

Why is dating so complicated?? You and I and everyone else have met hundreds, if not thousands, of people. Look around at the dating pool of 30-somethings. Long after this ruling, interracial couples were still harassed and discriminated against. It is highly annoying and if a guy continues to be this controlling, then quickly drop any communication with him. The world to the best of my knowledge has not changed that much, why has something so simple taken such a huge turn for the worst? I know we're in a recession, but it doesn't matter. It was goofy, awkward, immature, but it came from a genuine place.

Is Gay Dating So 6 Reasons From an Expert Dating is supposed to be fun, but before you get serious, you have always had to find out the answers to serious questions. Fingers and toes included, you get twenty. This is a huge problem and you need to be aware of it before you enter into an interracial dating relationship with a white woman, especially if you are black. You want uncomplicated, look for uncomplicated people. Because complicated is always interesting. I slowly eroded that fear by opening myself up to intimate opportunities little by little over a long period of time. She will almost certainly make your life more interesting.

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realtalkrealpeople-rtrp · 7 years

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Transsexual Allure: The Relationship Between Heterosexual Males And Male To Female Transsexuals.

To date, there has been very little information provided in relation to sexual attraction and sexual relations between males that categorize themselves as heterosexual and male to female transsexuals. The reasons for this could be numerous. Perhaps it is due to a lack of some heterosexual males speaking up about their sexual practices because of society's stigma of homosexuality. The aim of this paper is to take a more in depth look at heterosexual and transsexual sexual relationships and encounters. Along with analyzing the special subset of bisexual men who believe they are heterosexual. This will require other areas of exploration in the sexual psyche of such individuals as well as highlighting cultural and societal influences upon gendered individuals. There will be a variety of resources at our disposal to substantiate the claims and assertions put forth in this paper;including journal articles, books, and an interview. After analyzing all these different sources of information we should be able to answer the question: “What is the allure of Transsexual to a self identified heterosexual man?” and “Can a male that engages in a relationship with a male to female transsexual retain their orientation of a heterosexual male, or does that cease to be?”

Let’s take a look at “How a man can be attracted to a trans woman”and still retain the orientation of being straight. In many different cultures what is defined as sexually “normal” differs greatly, from the sambian people of papua new guinea to brazilians and americans alike. The sambians youth perform oral sex upon the elders but since these people don’t have a concept of homosexuality , it is not considered a deviation of heterosexuality. The example of the sambians is primarly being used to illustrate there are cultures that don’t subscribe to general ideas of western sexuiuality.In the journal article “Exotic Becomes Erotic” the author asserts: [For most individuals, cultural norms define which male and female attributes, if any, are to be idealized and eroticized; when a nonnormatire attribute is erotieized, it is clinically defined as a paraphilia or a fetish and popularly stigmatized as a perversion. ] If we follow this assertion when looking at countries like brazil and america, we may perhaps find that the attraction that a male has for a MTF(male to female) transexual may equate to a fetish. Later in the same article the author points out “noted earlier, both fiction and real life provide numerous examples of erotic attraction between people who may not even like one other; one can dislike a person or class of persons overall but still be attracted to their physical appearance or idealize and eroticize one or more of their attributes. An all too-familiar example is the misogynist heterosexual man who is not only erotically aroused by women's bodies but by narrowly specific attributes of their bodies, such as large breasts. Similarly, even those gay men and heterosexual women who find much to dislike about men in general may be turned on by a muscular male body or a pair of tight "buns" In short, the extrinsic arousal effect remains a viable explanation of erotic/romantic attraction, even to disliked individuals.(Bem 326)” So in relation to males being attracted to MTF transsexuals not only may the attraction be a fetish but its root may stem from external physical attributes a MTF may display.

Staying with this assumption the questions now become “Are men attracted to the man in the woman or the woman in the man?” Are transexuals appealing to the heterosexuals sexual desire for a woman by looking like a woman, i.e adopting features? According to Don Kulick the author of “Travesti” book about brazilian male to female transsexuals, “These individuals are not transexuals, they instead depict themselves as homosexual males who ardently desire men, and who fashion and perfect themselves as an object of desire for those men.”(Kulick 1998:6) This primarily tells us that MTF at least in brazil consciously dress , act and augment their bodies to attract heterosexual males with feminine features that sexual arouse them. Knowing this information may define the allure Transsexuals exude to heterosexual men and thus shows the attraction initially from an external point of view . The cultural difference between the “Travesti of Brazil” and Transsexuals in the united states lies in their respective gender identification. The travesti as mentioned earlier say they are homosexuals and transsexuals and MTF transsexuals in the united states predominantly identify themselves as female. In a cultural sense, men in brazil that find travesti attractive and have sex with them because of how closely they resemble a woman; making their self accepted sexual orientation range from heterosexual to bisexual. The heterosexual men of brazil do not deem themselves as homosexual even though the MTF Travesti do. The united states social cultural treats MTF Transsexuals as a fetish for its male heterosexual base. The difference here is split between the old norm that a person born a man remains a man throughout life no matter how they choose to transform their body and any man that has relations of a sexual nature with sed person will be considered homosexual; and the new norm that anatomically removing the penis and constructing a vagina for a MTF Transsexual makes that person a woman. Sexual orientation at that point for the heterosexual man involved in a sexual or non sexual relationship can range from heterosexual ,bisexual ,and homosexual. The last two choices being the least accepted by self identified heterosexual males in the united states.

Denial and actually practices provide an alternate view of what “Andro Allure”(Doctor.264) actually is. According to Doctor and Fleming , the “Sexual, affectionate, and social encounters between a transgendered individual and a heterosexual man are known as andro allure”. The very denial of such interactions have been the cause of very little information being gathered about these types of reactions. It would also appear that until society as whole is accepting of different genders aside from male and female binary , real substantive data won’t be available for us to understand the correlations and inceptions of male hetero and MTF transsexual interactions. There was a research article written by Don Operario titled : "Men who have sex with transgender women: Challenges to category-based HIV prevents”, that highlights the correlation between men that have sexual relations with transsexual individuals in Brazil and high rates of H.I.V in the total population.

As stated in the beginning of the paper , there was a interview conducted with an individual we will call lavelle. Lavelle is a man and he was asked a series of questions in regards to the subject matter of this paper. Lavelle was in a relationship with a MTF transsexual. He wished to add this disclaimer before the interview started : I'm currently in a cisgendered hetero relationship with a woman who was born as such. I had a dong'. I love her and she loves me, we have an amazing sex life, and that's all you can really ask for in a relationship.

The following will be few of the questions asked and his answers:

What seems to spark the attraction that Heterosexual individuals have for Transgender individuals?"

For me, it's an ego thing. Here I have someone who wants my dingaling so dang much, they're willing to do whatever it takes to attract me (in this case, features regarded as feminine, such as long hair, breasts, clothing like high heels and stockings, etc). Plus, they're offering up the 'Holy grail' for an endowed guy like me... Anal. There have been quite a few times I took an opportunity just because that ego thing got so overpowering, I'd have felt like an asshole for turning them down.

“Does the attraction to Transgendered individuals make heterosexual individuals cease being heterosexual based on the physical and mental ambiguity,Andro Allure , and inversion(for lack of a better term) encompassed by the societal gender binary?"

I sincerely believe it ceases being hetero at that point, and becomes something 'else'. On one hand... Hey, you're attracted to this person due to the qualities they have externally. On the other hand, sex parts are sex parts, and sometimes it makes it a bit difficult to match them up. The good news is, as long as it's a healthy relationship, who really cares? Mash them parts together however they fit, and enjoy life.don't plan on ever cheating, nor do I have any latent desires such as 'but it'd be so much better if she had one.

“Would you say that there's an aire of denial many heterosexual men have about their feelings towards MTF Transexuals?”

I definitely think so , i feel sad for anyone that has to hide or deny feelings they may have just because society structured in a way that ridicules those who have divergent sexual preferences from the norm. You have these heterosexual men bashing Transsexuals in public, but secretly loving them and what they represent in private

“So then would you say these males are technically bisexual ?”

Yes, i would say so. Whether they admit it or not. They may prefer a feminine form but when that form includes a penis that they wish to fondle then thats when the lines are drawn in this labelist society of outs.

Based off the questions posed and answered , a couple of aspects of these types of relationships can be inferred. Lavelle talks about being sexually attracted to the female features of the trans individual he was in a relationship with. He talked about how his partner appeased his sense of visual stimulation and sexual desire to perform anal sex. He talks about this being very important to him. In the same question he says it was an “ego” thing for him, denoting a sense of power he received from performing the act on his transsexual partner. The second question revealed that lavelle believed that sexual relationships with transsexual individuals takes a male out of the category of being heterosexual. The idea of denial seemed to be the reason that heterosexual males wouldn’t openly say they engage in sexual relationships with MTF Transsexuals. Which leads into the last answer he gave us about the “Labelist society” that likes to categorize people , instead of allowing individuals within that society whether it be the U.S or any other country to define themselves.

All of the information provided in this paper has helped us interpret the key questions this paper seeks to answer. Did we succeed? The initial research questions were “What is the allure of Transsexual to a self identified heterosexual man?” and “Can a male that engages in a relationship with a male to female transsexual retain their orientation of a heterosexual male, or does that cease to be?” The first question was answered by highlighting the practices of the Travesti of brazil and how they attract their culturally heterosexual men. Making a note of these individuals fashioning their bodies to accentuate their societies view of feminine beauty to evoke sexual desire for them from their heterosexual non trans counterparts. This could possibly be the biggest proponent for male and MTF transsexual interaction and arousal. The second answer for the second question primarily depends on who is perceiving the idea of sexual orientation. The hetero male individual depending on his level of acceptance of his sexual preference may decide he fits in the bisexual category instead of the often chosen “straight” category that many males say they are in;to escape societal chastisement . From what can be gathered the idea of orientation is important to society and thus translates to it being important to those within it. Whether it truly matters or not , as long as individuals view it as such there will be those who subscribe to it and those who do not. Thankfully as of today sexual orientation is being less and less stigmatized and more and more accepted . The questions raised and answered may be refuted , but we are one step closer to understanding the transexual allure.

Reference Page

Doctor,Richard F. ,Fleming, James S. “Measure of Transgender Behavior” Archives of Sexual Behavior,Vol.30,No.3,2001 256-271.

Operario, Don, Jennifer Burton, Kristen Underhill, and Jae Sevelius. "Men who have sex with transgender women: Challenges to category-based HIV prevention." AIDS and Behavior 12, no. 1 (2008): 18-26.

Chivers, Meredith L., Gerulf Rieger, Elizabeth Latty, and J. Michael Bailey. "A sex difference in the specificity of sexual arousal." Psychological Science 15, no. 11 (2004): 736-744.

Bem, Daryl J. "Exotic becomes erotic: A developmental theory of sexual orientation." Psychological Review 103, no. 2 (1996): 320.

Weinberg, Martin S., Colin J. Williams, and Douglas W. Pryor. "Dual attraction: Understanding bisexuality." (1995).

Kulick, Don 1998 .Travesti: Sex ,Gender and Culture among Brazilian Transgendered Prostitutes”. Chicago:The Univeristy of Chicago Press

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