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waitmyturtles · 11 months

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Turtles Catches Up With Old GMMTV: TharnType and Gray Areas Edition

[What’s going on here? After joining Tumblr and discovering Thai BLs through KinnPorsche in 2022, I began watching GMMTV’s new offerings -- and realized that I had a lot of history to catch up on, to appreciate the more recent works that I was delving into. From tropes to BL frameworks, what we’re watching now hails from somewhere, and I’m learning about Thai BL's history through what I’m calling the Old GMMTV Challenge (OGMMTVC). Starting with recommendations from @absolutebl on their post regarding how GMMTV is correcting for its mistakes with its shows today, I’ve made an expansive list to get me through a condensed history of essential/classic/significant Thai BLs produced by GMMTV and many other BL studios. My watchlist, pasted below, lists what I’ve watched and what’s upcoming, along with the reviews I’ve written so far. Today, I’ll cover the very controversial TharnType, Asian stereotypes towards queerness, and the very difficult gray areas on how this show has been interpreted by various populations over the last few years.]

TW: homophobic and derogatory ideas and language against the queer community. Critical commentary on TharnType and MAME. This review is NOT for you if you are a TharnType or MAME Big Fan.

(I want to give very special thanks to @so-much-yet-to-learn and @lurkingshan for reviewing previous versions of this post and offering the most insightful feedback I could ask for. Thank you both so much.)

Alright. Deep breaths.

TharnType was a necessary addition to the Old GMMTV watchlist. It was. I had to watch it, for:

- the tremendous IMPACT this show has had on BL culture, along with MAME’s continued influence on the genre; - how this show affected shipper culture, and the rippling effects it’s had since then vis à vis MewGulf; - how this show continued to define “high heat” and “chemistry” in BL, and -- at least for me, possibly the most interesting point to needle on -- - what fans, ESPECIALLY the majority cishet fandom, are willing to compromise and/or equivocate on in regards to our values towards the queer community regarding what we consume in media, and how safe or unsafe it is for our queer family that this content exists in the first place.

I gotta say some stuff first before I get into this review. This is the worst show I’ve ever watched, in my own opinion. I offer this flag for MAME and TharnType fans in advance, as I get quite critical down below.

I am angry at this show, at MAME, at the BL industry for allowing this show to exist, and I unfortunately hold anger against Tee Bundit, who I know has since made shows, like Lovely Writer, that deeply criticized the BL industry (and I am enjoying his work now in Step By Step, even while I don’t hesitate to criticize it). ANYONE INVOLVED in the making of TharnType needs to hold personal and professional accountability for this show even existing. And I also think that fans need to hold THEMSELVES accountable if they defend it WITHOUT thinking about the long-term social implications of the existence of this show.

I want to also say that I need to check myself, OFTEN, as I write this, because I don’t want to be some fucking loudmouth, self-righteous ally-savior. I don’t. [My AMAZING drama friends, @lurkingshan and @bengiyo, have held me down during this watch. (Friends. Thank you. Good LORD.)]

I want this review to be as fair as possible to the nostalgia of the moment that this show aired; to note that this show gave high heat, which fans clearly demanded, and IS a worthy component of some dramas if it works with the rest of what the show has to offer by way of writing; and to note that many fans saw a chemistry in MewGulf that they hadn’t seen previously. I especially note that there may be survivors of sexual assault who related to certain pieces of this show, particularly through Type’s lens and his own anger.

With that very long introduction, I will note that I’m not going to talk too much about the show details itself. I don’t need to unwind on plot. For me -- FOR ME -- the show’s plot was problematic.

2019: earlier that year, before TT aired, you had He’s Coming To Me, which was BURIED by GMMTV, and was a TOUR DE FORCE of intricate storytelling and queer revelation. According to this amazing reblog by @so-much-yet-to-learn (another longtime BL observer who UTTERLY held me down during my TT watch, friend, I CANNOT THANK YOU ENOUGH FOR THE HOURS you spent me with talking about TT and other issues), shipper fans angry at Ohm and Singto went so far as to SHOW UP TO THE GMMTV BUILDING IN BANGKOK and PROTEST against the split of the KristSingto ship. This is why, in this TT review, I talk about fans needing to take responsibility and accountability for the media we consume. I believe TT exists in part because fans have allowed it to continue to exist in the universe of BL, and many even celebrate TT’s existence -- all while, in my own opinion -- much more compelling art existed before TT (Make It Right, He’s Coming To Me) and certainly after its airing.

In discussion with @absolutebl (yet another drama expert who held me down during my TT watch, THANK YOU, SENSEI), ABL Sensei brings up that, besides a natural tendency to criticize and blame MAME for our needing to have conversations about safety towards queer family, that TT does deserve to be criticized as a standalone piece of content.

I honestly don’t know, Sensei, if I’m mature enough to make that separation, but I will try. MAME herself doesn’t exist in a vacuum: she has an industry, from producers, to showrunners, to actors, to editors, to networks -- that join her in the making of her work. I’ll do my best to separate everything, but.

I noted in my review of Love By Chance that MAME traffics in common Asian stereotypes against the queer community. At the same time, I know that often, we talk about the yaoi origins of BL in Thailand. I think, over time, the explanation of the yaoi origination has been used as a means of explaining WHY certain tropes exist, such as abuse of a partner, bullying, etc. I want to note that while I acknowledge those origins, I also strongly note (as I did in the comments of my LBC review) that yaoi origins are themselves problematic, as created by a majority cishet female artist base, and thus I question the accurate representation of queer themes both in yaoi and in early and/or questionable Thai BL that lean into common stereotypes held by Asian nations. (That being said, I do DEEPLY ACKNOWLEDGE @so-much-yet-to-learn‘s point to me that many in the queer community still consumed this media, as the West was producing next-to-nothing by way of queer love and/or queer perspectives.)

Much of what I saw in LBC and TT -- gang rape, cheating, revenge, derogatory language, hurtful stereotypes of top/bottom and husband/wife -- are repeat, word-for-word stereotypes that I heard from my Asian family growing up. Examples of what I saw by way of problematic stereotypes in TharnType include:

- Tharn repeatedly and casually calling Type “his bitch,” - The use of the F word, repeatedly, by Type, - Type attacking his out classmates, and indirectly attacking his friend, Tum, - The assumption that because Tharn and Tar are gay, that they are promiscuous (even Techno assumes this while leaving Type alone with Tharn early in the series), - Techno himself not calling out Type for his homophobia throughout the series, - The use of gang rape as a means of revenge by Lhong to Tar,

and many more. I will also note that I was incredibly uncomfortable by Lhong’s redemption at the end, as if the story demanded that Lhong’s own actions that drove him to order grievous sexual violence against another man needed to be forgiven. That was a paradigm that seemed apologetic to his actions and did not sit well with me.

As I noted to @bengiyo: us international fans may be lulled to think that Thailand is majority progressive and accepting of the queer community based off of the BLs that we watch. It IS a much more progressive culture in SE Asia in supporting the queer community, and I would assume that gay culture is able to flourish in city centers, as opposed to rural areas.

But Thailand has NOT legalized same-sex marriage. And I posit that we in the West don’t actually realize that harmful stereotypes against the queer community absolutely still exist and flourish in Thailand, Taiwan, and elsewhere in Asia -- countries that certainly leverage BL as soft power, but nations in which familial or cultural expectations may STILL make ACTUAL coming out and public existence a dangerous or risky proposition. THIS SHIT IS GRAY. BL is fiction -- it is not reality. It is still dangerous -- YES, INCLUDING HERE IN THE STATES -- to be out in very many towns, cities, and communities around the world.

Now. When I went into TT, I understood, AS ASSUMED FACT, that MAME was a sexual assault survivor, who used this style of writing about queerness and queer love to process her own SA experiences. That equivocation gave me the serious jibbles, which I’ll talk about in a second, but I understood it to be the line that most BL observers have made about her work, and/or justification or explanation for her work existing.

I’ve since learned that this is not necessarily fact: that it is not known if MAME is an SA survivor, and that she is notoriously private and has not revealed much, if anything, about her own past.

So, from there, how do I process this? How do I process that it’s FANON -- NOT FACT -- that MAME may or may not write from a survivor’s perspective?

I also note here, thanks to the wonderful @so-much-yet-to-learn, that many fans who are SA survivors have written in the past about how they related to Type’s anger and/or homophobia after his own assault experience. I also understand that SA survivors have, in the past, had difficulty with strong rejections of TharnType, like the one I have composed here, in reaction to the fear that they cannot tell their own stories of internal anger against their perpetrators and the communities from which their attackers come from.

Thus, I want to note a VERY DIFFICULT PROPOSITION TO WORK THROUGH. What we’re facing here is that there may be people, SA survivors in particular, who related to Type’s homophobia. This is Type’s fictional homophobia -- as written by a very real, assumed-to-be female author. At the same time, I myself very much acknowledge that I still see stereotypes against the queer community, in a very Asian voice that I am familiar with, in MAME’s shows.

Let me tell you why this gives me, personally, the jibbles. Let’s assume that MAME is an SA survivor. As someone trained in the social services, I am not sure that I would advise a potential client to create very public content that is potentially harmful towards a minority community, as a means of their own personal processing. MAME is FAMOUS. Her work is POPULAR. Can we justify the dangers that her work poses -- the stereotypes and assumptions she traffics in against our queer family -- for her own psychological processing?

If I am her therapist, I am guiding her to instead journey map, to meditate, to advise her of HUNDREDS of other therapeutic psychological modalities to process her pain -- all modalities that do not set up a minority community to be stereotyped through very publicly consumed content.

I posit here -- MY OPINION, FAM -- that MAME has leveraged her own personal bigotry against the queer community in her shows for clout with Asian and international audiences that would not quibble about the harmfulness of the stereotypes that the show portrayed. And she’s gotten away with it for the utter control she has over her own content. AND SHE KNOWS THERE’S AN AUDIENCE FOR IT, so she keeps making what I call bigoted content.

I thought TT was a DANGEROUS show for perpetuating harmful stereotypes about queer family. And I am distraught at the BL industry for seeing dollar signs against that clout and investing in it.

The equivocating in support of TharnType certainly exists. There are people who view this show with nostalgia, as there still wasn’t the volume of BL content, with heat, in 2019 as we have today. There are people out there who may very well openly relate to Type’s homophobia as a character, and MAME’s homophobia as an author and as a human. Hell, Foei Patara, who we see in everything these days, shared a very anti-LGBTQ+ video on his Instagram just recently.

I DO have to give a nod to nostalgia. I have to try to be fair here. This is the ENTIRE POINT of the OGMMTVC. BL fans in 2019 wanted a thing. High heat, high chemistry. I know that there are fans that are AWARE of these high-level issues of MAME’s work. And yet, there are many that still look back on TharnType with fondness, because it brought something new to the field.

What I’m suffering from here is the equivocation of MAME’s work by way of analysis against a presumed opinion -- NOT fact -- that MAME is an SA survivor. That seems to open some sort of door to allow us to watch her work, despite the dangers of the stereotypes contained within her work.

The ethics of this. I’m not a strong enough person to go near that equivocation. Because I am not a survivor. I’m an Asian. In MAME’s voice, I hear the stereotypes against the queer community that I grew up with. And that’s where I’m writing this review. I’m hurt and appalled by her proliferating what I term to be dangerous viewpoints against my queer sisters and brothers -- assumptions that I heard growing up in my Indian community.

Fuck. Am I ever glad that I DIDN’T watch this show in 2019. I’m protected by a fortress of past and present works that I can rely on that proves that there are other arenas in which BL is being leveraged for good, for progressive art, for the introduction of ideas that support our queer family, AND that might also offer critical commentary on issues that affect other minority or vulnerable corners of society, à la Moonlight Chicken.

I haven’t even gotten to the MewArt scandal and the problematic nature of the MewGulf ship. All of those are also very important issues, but I can’t bring myself to get deep about them, because just talking about the show itself is a lot. But Mew Suppasit’s past alleged behavior is certainly problematic, and is worth considering if folks were to think about watching this show.

In any case: I’m never watching another MAME show again, ever. And as a side note, MewGulf didn’t do it for me. At this point in 2019, I feel like we’d seen ships with much better chemistry and even heat, like PerthSaint (a MAME ship, actually), OhmToey, MaxTul, and even OhmSingto and their utterly brilliant acting. @he-is-lightning-in-a-bottle noted in the comments of one of my TT late-night posts that they didn’t see the MewGulf chemistry, and frankly, I didn’t either -- I didn’t see that these guys, as the acted characters of Tharn and Type, bodily and ferally WANTED AND VISCERALLY LOVED each other in fiction, the way that actor pairs like EarthMix, OhmNanon, FirstKhao, and others have since perfected in their work as their respective characters.

This post is about the responsibility that so-called “artists” bear when taking up the mantle of created content about a minority community, as well as the responsibility that we bear, as fans, as the majority cishet female fanbase, to consume this content. MAME and the slices of the BL industry that support her MUST understand that perpetuating stereotypes about a minority community WILL HAVE VISCERAL SOCIAL IMPACTS in REINFORCING THOSE STEREOTYPES, among a majority cishet fanbase and across society, to the danger of the existence of our queer family.

THIS IS WHY WE NEED MORE QUEER CONTENT BY QUEER FILMMAKERS.

That is the way in which this paradigm will be broken over time. And us in the cishet fanbase MUST STAND READY to support art -- in the words of dear friend @wen-kexing-apologist -- by queer family, for queer family, about queer family. We in the cishet majority bear a responsibility to break the paradigm of dangerous stereotypes, perpetrated by who create content through their own bigotry, either consciously or unconsciously -- or both.

[I finished TharnType in record time. I needed to get it out of my system. And now I’m fully invested in OffGun and having a DELIGHTFUL time with Theory of Love: I AM OBSESSED WITH THIS SUBVERSIVE, MINDBENDING SHOW. Ooooooooooooooooooh. Right up my alley! Hopefully I can muster my usual Monday review for ToL -- let’s see. I still feel somewhat broken by TT, but ToL and OffGun have been SUCH a salve.

Here’s the list as it stands currently. We have two changes! First, thanks to a suggestion by @wen-kexing-apologist and @lurkingshan, I’m adding a non-BL (!!!!) to the list in 3 Will Be Free. I have a number of separate Jojo Tichakorn priorities to achieve before Only Friends airs, and this is a big one; as this is a show from 2019, I want to see where GMMTV was willing to go in pushing queer content in non-BLs, and this is the perfect time to watch it. I’ll still include a review in this space!

And, per @absolutebl Sensei’s suggestion, I’ve added YYY (2020) to this, to enjoy Cheewin unhinged in what seems to be a disaster of a show -- but an important one for real queer representation (THANK YOU, SENSEI!). I’m excited for chaos. I’m watching it out of chronology with ITSAY and planning it as a mental break. As always, I’ll take any feedback on the list as it stands!

1) Love Sick and Love Sick 2 (2014 and 2015) (review here) 2) Make It Right (2016) (review here) 3) SOTUS (2016-2017) (review here) 4) Make It Right 2 (2017) (review here) 5) Together With Me (2017) (review here) 6) SOTUS S/Our Skyy x SOTUS (2017-2018) (review here) 7) Love By Chance (2018) (review here) 8) Kiss Me Again: PeteKao cuts (2018) (no review) 9) He’s Coming To Me (2019) (review here) 10) Dark Blue Kiss (2019) and Our Skyy x Kiss Me Again (2018) (review here) 11) TharnType (2019) 12) Senior Secret Love: Puppy Honey (BL cuts) (2016 and 2017) (I’m watching this out of order just to get familiar with OffGun before Theory of Love -- will likely not review) 13) Theory of Love (2019) (watching) 14) 3 Will Be Free (2019) (not a BL or an official part of the OGMMTVC watchlist, but an important harbinger of things to come in 2019 and beyond re: Jojo Tichakorn including queer content in non-BLs) 15) Dew the Movie (2019) (not an official part of the OGMMTVC watchlist, but I want to watch this in chronological order with everything else) 16) Until We Meet Again (2019-2020) 17) 2gether (2020) 18) Still 2gether (2020) 19) I Told Sunset About You (2020) 20) YYY (2020, out of chronology) 21) Manner of Death (2020-2021) (not a true BL, but a MaxTul queer/gay romance set within a genre-based show that likely influenced Not Me and KinnPorsche) 22) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) (review here) 23) A Tale of Thousand Stars (2021) OGMMTVC Fastest Rewatch Known To Humankind For The Sake Of Rewatching Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS 24) Lovely Writer (2021) 25) I Promised You the Moon (2021) 26) Not Me (2021-2022) 27) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) (thesis here) 28) Bad Buddy (2021-2022) and Our Skyy 2 x BBS x ATOTS (2023) OGMMTVC Rewatch 29) Secret Crush On You (2022) [watching for Cheewin’s trajectory of studying queer joy from Make It Right (high school), to SCOY (college), to Bed Friend (working adults)] 30) KinnPorsche (2022) (tag here) 31) The Eclipse (2022) (tag here) 32) GAP the Series (2022-2023) (Thailand’s first GL) 33) My School President (2022-2023) and Our Skyy 2 x My School President (2023) 34) Moonlight Chicken (2023) (tag here) 35) Bed Friend (2023) (tag here) (Cheewin’s latest show, depicting a queer joy journey among working adults)]

#turtles catches up with old gmmtv #turtles catches up with thai BLs #turtles catches up with the essential BLs #the old gmmtv challenge #ogmmtvc #tharntype #tharn x type #type x tharn #mew suppasit #gulf kanawut #mewgulf #bigotry in asian media #discrimination in asian media #discrimination in BLs #allyship

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grimweathers · 22 days

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the last post i reblogged made me think of something i’ve been stewing on lately (just personal irl stuff, not like. big philosophical stuff. basically a livejournal-esque post lol)

this is getting long but i want to get it off my chest so i’m gonna put it under a read more lol. might delete later anyway. also using fake names because i was starting to confuse myself with all the "this friend and her other friend and her other OTHER friend" lmao

disclaimer that stacy is a good friend, she’s a cishet ~ally~ etc etc, but i think (subconsciously?) she thinks gay relationships are worse than straight relationships in regards to Drama™️, and therefore worse in general, and it comes through in the way she talks about it. and it’s been bothering me a lot lately. (the word “drama” makes it sound flippant, but i mean like. all types of relationship issues of varying degrees of severity)

our mutual friend diane recently came out as bi and has been talking about trying to date women. and stacy sometimes tries to discourage diane from trying to date women at all, specifically because stacy's lesbian friends' relationship drama.

which is… weird and confusing to me, because like. cishet relationships are NOT free from drama at all?? obviously?? how many cishet men do we all know that treat their girlfriends/wives terribly? diane specifically has had a lot of horrible ex boyfriends! (as an aside she has like. THEE worst taste in men tbh. like they suck AND they're ugly. i can only hope the women she will someday maybe date are nicer.)

i think all types of people make messy choices in their quests for sex and romance..... no group's immune! or better at it than another group! idk. it feels (unintentionally) homophobic, but i also feel like… there’s an underlying assumption that dating/marrying a terrible manchild is just par for the course for straight cis women. and that’s depressing. (i also think stacy has a bit of a blind spot, because her longtime boyfriend is nice and thoughtful and not terrible).

literally later in the same conversation, stacy was talking about allison, who had rushed into marriage last year with a dude she had already been having relationship troubles with. obviously marriage did not solve this. but somehow she has wayyyyy more empathy for allison because well you don’t understand, allison has been dreaming of getting married her whole life 🥺 okay! that doesn't change the fact that her husband sucks to the point that she randomly started crying at a party he wasn't even at! and rushing into marriage with shitty dudes has happened to more than one of our mutual straight friends btw. she has all the tea on all their relationships and yet she has consistently shown more sympathy for the straight ones than the gay ones, and has consistently been like "ugh gay drama is just so crazy!" (i know the specific details of the gay drama too and i don't think they're really any worse in comparison lol. just run of the mill messy cheating and getting back with exes etc).

idk man. i probably should've said something earlier because it obviously ended up bothering me so much, but this last conversation was like 3 months ago and i feel weird bringing it up now out of the blue. maybe if it comes up again.

anyway The End. lmao @ this livejournal-esque post!!!

#river talks #this is long. but i don't want to talk about it with irl friends since my circle is small and they all know each other lol #and thankfully none of you know who these people are lol

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aroacemisha · 1 year

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Not “Odalia is cishet because she’s a bad person/an abuser”, but instead “Odalia is cishet because she has peak “Oh, I’m not homophobic. I’m an ally!” energy”. Shallow corporate “allyship” kind of thing.

She has the vibes of someone who, if she was a human in the Human Realm and an employee in her company came out, would ask them if they’d like to go on record stating that for the company’s diversity initiative.

#toh #the owl house #owl house #odalia blight #she has cishet energy to me but she doesn't have to be #i'm honestly annoyed by ppl who insist that bad people like odalia and belos have to be cishet #or act like there's something wrong with headcanoning otherwise #like. a villain being queer isn't inherently bad. it's the depiction that can be an issue #if they're the only queer character and/or their queerness is shown as part of what made them bad #you can write a bad person as being queer without that automatically implying that queerness or their specific queer identity is bad #toh odalia #odalia toh

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captain-hen · 2 months

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i also watch the show w my mom who’s def more of a general audience member (she’s in her early fifties, i’m not explaining the concept of fandom to her) but i did once tell her about how people think buck and eddie together as a couple and she was like “interesting. i don’t see it but okay.” this was. several years ago i haven’t really brought it up since so if buddie does “go canon” (we gotta start using a better word go canon is so unserious) most of all i’m curious her reaction because i think it will be funny (she’s not homophobic, to be clear, she is a Proud Ally and super supportive of both me and my queer sibling. she’s just like i said, in her early fifties and a cishet woman so she has a very different gaze than i, a 20 smth queer person)

ooh, PLEASE do report back with what she thinks, in the event that buck and eddie go canon! or if she somehow happens to change her mind on that front. i'm always super curious to hear about the GA's opinions because i don't know a single person irl who watches the show

#i could certainly never watch 911 with my parents :/#neethu answers #anon

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redheadbigshoes · 1 year

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CW: A vent/rant about objectification/fetishization, men seriously DNI

There is something I’ve noticed and it’s really, really beginning to bother me. A lot of cishet men are engaging with any lesbian content that’s being posted, including mine, especially when it’s sexual. And I’ve seen a lot of people act like I’m a mean, scary lesbian for saying that I really, really dislike it. I feel like it isn’t unreasonable to ask for cishet men not to engage in lesbian content, since they are usually engaging in sexual stuff specifically. I feel like they really don’t understand and/or don’t care (probably the latter) that doing that dehumanizes us. Objectifying/fetishizing lesbians does not make anyone an ally. It makes us feel like we’re nothing except something to turn people on. Not to be too personal but I grew up in a very homophobic environment but I didn’t live under a rock—I knew men did this. And it ADDED to my internalized homophobia. Because I don’t think they realize/care that objectifying/fetishizing lesbians increases the idea that we’re taboo and that we’re deviants and gross/dirty. That made me delay my coming out process and actively hate myself more. It’s also part of the reason why wlw content is becoming increasingly sanitized. We want to be seen as whole people and I’m sorry (not really), but cishet men literally have no remote connection to lesbians whatsoever. I guess I can be okay with cishet men appreciating lesbian characters and plots in an innocent and genuinely supportive way, but let’s be real, they almost never are.

I’ve gotten harassed over having this feeling and I’m really tired of it. I understand that there’s nothing I can do to stop it but I will express disliking it and why, and I really don’t want to be harassed over the internet for it.

I just needed to vent/rant. If you have any advice on dealing with this, that would help. Thanks for listening!

Allo cishet men usually don’t care about women, much less lesbians. They know very well they’re fetishizing us and crossing our boundaries by interacting with posts they know they’re not welcome to or know it isn’t made for them.

They don’t see us as people. They don’t see us as human. The worst part is other queers being pissed about us setting our boundaries and not wanting men to interact with our posts, especially more sexual posts.

It’s like everyone around us is telling us we should like men or we should allow them everywhere and that uncomfortable feeling because of men is not valid. This all especially when it comes to lesbians. Queers don’t seem to have a problem with other people who like men doing the same, as long as you still want men it seems to be okay to hate them or feel uncomfortable because of them.

Unfortunately I don’t think there’s any better advice to you besides blocking blogs that you know are men (or the ones you’re not sure). If they’re not respecting your boundaries you should establish them in other ways. It’s frustrating but whenever it’s about DNI lists people who fit those lists don’t care that they shouldn’t be interacting with you, that shows what they think about respect.

#stephanie answers #escapadefemme #long post

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piqued-curiosity · 2 years

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“What I meant is that those heterosexuals start blabbing about how it’s transphobic for gay people not to be attracted to them, and bi people agree because they can be attracted to both sexes.”

I appreciate that this definitely does happen. But I still maintain that bi people’s involvement in it has been overblown. I really don’t take the point that it’s bi people stoking the flames and that we know this because some of the people doing this SAY they are attracted to both dick and vagina. That was why I made those points earlier about trans people lying to suit themselves. Most of the time, when they say “I love girldick!” Or “I see transmen as men 100%”, they don’t MEAN it. Just like everybody else who plays along. It doesn’t mean they are actually bi any more than it means a trans lesbian is a real lesbian.

On top of the fact that straight trans people are perpetuating the majority of this, I’ve noticed that often their straight partners will ID as bi when their partner transitions (because they were with a man and now they’re with a “woman”), and will do the “well as a bisexual… as a member of the LGBT community…” etc and claim that anybody can like either set of genitals while, again, they are already in a relationship with the opposite sex and have no intention of ever being with the same sex.

I also often come across straight teenagers, or people in majority LGBT friend groups and activist groups in colleges (in my experience anyway), who will identify as bi to fit in and push the narrative of “its transphobic not to like penis” etc because that’s what they feel they are supposed to say, and they will be excommunicated from their friend groups if they say otherwise. You can say “how do you know they are straight” but I’ve come across many of these cases in real life with people I’ve known very well for a very long time and I can tell you it’s common. Sure, I don’t know what’s going on inside their heads and I would never correct somebody about their own sexuality but… I know. And I don’t think it’s even malicious a lot of the time! I think these kids are legitimately convincing themselves that they’re not straight because they find some members of the same sex aesthetically pleasing and don’t have enough experience to know what actual attraction is, and it’s anathema to them to be a “boring cishet”. Just look at the teenage girls convincing themselves they have gender dysphoria.

The entire trans movement is built on lies and “lesbians like girldick” is one of them. “I’m a trans lesbian and I like girl dick” is also one of them. I can tell you that almost never is the person saying that ACTUALLY bi. They don’t ACTUALLY like girldick, they just have one and want others to like it. Or they don’t have one but they are brown nosing transwomen as usual, the whole “omg you’re so pretty! You totally pass! I would never know you’re trans” are usually lies too. Those people don’t actually think those things, just like they wouldn’t actually sleep with a member of the same sex. Because they’re straight.

All that to say, I don’t deny that there are bisexuals doing this! I’m sure there are, and I condemn their behaviour! But I really do think the majority of the predatory, homophobic stuff that comes out of the trans movement is coming from straight people, regardless of whether they SAY they are attracted to both genitals. In my experience like 95% of the time they don’t actually mean it and have no intention of acting on it. It’s just a “progressive” thing for them to say.

I’m sure that some people lie about this to look like a good trans ally. But I don’t really believe that it’s the majority.

I’ve noticed that the lesbians* who play along never say they personally like dick, it’s always “some lesbians do, but not me”. “Some lesbians don’t mind it, but I just have a genital preference”. Speaking from experience, it’s all about lying to yourself just enough to not be harassed, but not lying to yourself so much that you snap out of it. That’s why lesbians will pull the “some lesbians, but not me” tactic when it comes to liking dick, because it’s a lie disconnected from ourselves which allows us to convince ourselves we believe it. Because extending that to ourselves is so blatantly untrue to us that it would peak us instantly (I am not talking about cases of extreme internalised homophobia where the gay person is essentially attempting to convert themselves).

It’s like, if I were to say “the sky can be green with orange polka dots, just not where I live”. That’s believable! Because I can look up and confirm that the sky above isn’t green with orange polka dots, but how do I know that it’s not in the next town over? Now, if I were to say “the sky is green with orange polka dots, I’m looking at it right now and it’s so beautiful! I love it so much!”, I can look up and see that’s not true. It’s going to instantly break that belief that the sky can look like that in the first place.

Where I’m going with this is that in my experience, people who are attracted to one sex will do the “some people like this sex, but not me” routine to make the lie more believable to them. It’s the people actually attracted to both sexes who are able to take it the step further and say “I like both sexes, so should everyone else”.

*I’m talking about lesbians in particular because that’s where I have personal experience.

#asks #anon

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nose-bl · 2 years

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hey, question, have any of you ever seen a cishet person using the straight flag and not being queerphobic??? bc i feel like the only times i’ve ever seen cishets using the flag they’re being huge homophobes/transphobes and doing the whole “straight people need a pride month too“

usually actual allies only ever use the ally flag, if any. but idk if there’s like, a good amount of cishets who aren’t bigoted and use the straight flag just because. i’m interested in knowing

#queer stuff #i mean this is more about cishets but im not gonna tag this as 'cishet' am i

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lotrfantasy · 9 months

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i haven’t had to come out since 2017. i come out to someone at least once a year. i am bisexual. i identify as gay. i’m a gender agnostic. i like girls. i still like men. being queer is a large part of my identity. i worry i like any form of non-binaryness best, and maybe that means i’m fetishizing peoples gender identity. being queer doesn’t impact my day to day life. i think about it always. in the womb, before i was born, happening every day— it doesn’t matter when i became queer, it’s one of the greatest gifts of my life. i can’t tell my grandmother. i can’t tell one of my oldest friends. i lie by omission. i talk about it too much. i was never homophobic. i curse god that i was born in 1998, and not 2008, because then maybe i wouldn’t have internalized homophobia like this. i fear that if i’d been born in 1898 i would never have unlocked this side of myself and i would have toiled as someone’s wife all my life. i fear i may still toil. i fear any man is too man for me. i fear i’ll never feel complete until i lie with woman and man and someone else, too. i couldn’t say it out loud to my family so i had to write it down instead and when they read it, i cried. i tell people i always knew i was gay. i tell people i sometimes still don’t know what i am. do straight people cover the “does your family know?” topic on the third date? it’s my duty to come out as gay so that comfortable homophobes are made uncomfortable. so that you confront your biases. so the issue is real to you. to make it easier for the next person, the next generation, so that we move forward. the A stands for ace, not ally, this truly isn’t about you. allys should be allowed in LGBTQIA+ orgs because no one should be forced to out themselves to enter a safe space. you shouldn’t take up room in the narrative if you’re cishetero, pass the microphone along. the best thing an ally can do is make a stand against their homophobic friends, family, community. take me to church, and i’ll worship like a dog. cishets are the same as us because us and them are again socially constructed. but the consequences are still real.

#personal #🤪#incoherent

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girlyghosty · 2 years

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I’m sorry I appreciate trying to debunk anything used to support trans exclusion but I remember it very clearly because I read Family Outing when it came out and it was so similar to my parents unique form of homophobia it was striking to me — Cher was absolutely reflexively homophobic and especially against lesbians and hostile to gnc women in general at one point. Yes she got better. Yes I accept that as good. No we don’t need to cover up how a parent who is ostensibly pro gay and collects $ as a gay ally icon going ballistic on you for being a lesbian was fucked up. And her essentialist ideas of gender (normal women are feminine! Men are feminine if gay! I have a daughter I want to dish on boys and do makeup with her is that so bad to demand — er want!) is the bog standard but deeply unsettling crap I hope goes away soon because it really does hurt us more than we think it does

Tbh I don't care about Cher or know much shit about her personal life/beliefs/etc. I know her George Floyd tweet was pretty shitty too (while she did apologize for it still very cringe). She definitely caused real harm with her gender-essentialism (though I couldn't find any info quickly on if she has changed in regards to that more recently), her [cishet] white savior complex, and her homophobia even if she's learned since. But if we can't accept people who acknowledge their wrongdoings and work to be better... then what's the point? At least specifically in regards to her treatment of Chaz during childhood and when he came out it's up to Chaz to decide whether she's put in the work and made the steps necessary to be forgiven. As for the impact on society she's clearly making an attempt by supporting charities but it's up to the individual I suppose whether you think she's moved enough in the right direction. The angle of my comment was mostly to fact-check the narrative that she only supports her son being trans because she'd rather have a straight son than a lesbian daughter/she'd only supported her queer child when he'd ""damaged"" (according to the terfs) his body etc etc. That's just untrue. I was able to find that article within a couple minutes of looking on Google, like I said I really don't know/care much about Cher. Just don't like when TERFs or anyone really decide to change someone's personal experience to fit an agenda they want to push. There was a huge sentiment from TERFs in those comments that people liking cher calling out TERFs for being horrible pieces of shit was proof that the pro-trans feminists on Tumblr are just anti-lesbian. It's just not the reality of what happened. Her homophobic history shouldn't be forgotten but neither should her journey of improvement and making amends. Whether you think she's gone far enough is up to you.

#she was definitely a piece of shit to chaz when he first came out but that changed over 10 years before his transition #this was in response to a comment chain on a post w/ a tweet from Cher calling out how awful TERFs are #i don't know enough about cher to endorse her but i say that opinion from her deserves a 'right on!'#anonymous #shut up peter #ask me stuff #tw transphobia

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momowho34 · 3 years

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There was this kid that used to be my neighbor (let’s call him Ivan) and he was a typical cishet white boy gamer kid, and he was kind of an asshole sometimes. But let me tell you, Ivan was also one of the best lgbtq allies ive ever met? Like he was kind of a dick but he was the kind of person to be in a group of people when someone makes a shitty joke and look that person straight in the eyes and say “that’s transphobic, Kevin. Stop being a dick” without missing a beat.

It was just nice to see. Like I told him I was bisexual and he was like “that’s dope. Tell me if I need to beat anyone up for being a dick to you. Anyway, let’s go set things on fire in Minecraft”

He’d be mean to someone and then someone else would call the kid they were bullying a homo and he’d stop what he was doing and be like “there’s nothing wrong with being gay, don’t be homophobic, Billy” and then go back to trashing this poor kid. It was so fucking surreal. I miss him. I’m kinda sad we fell out of touch. Stay strong, Ivan. You… woke middle school bully?

#srsly tho I hope he’s doin okay #he wasn’t all that bad #just a little clueless #miss him #his mom was rlly cool #maybe that’s why he was awesome #she was a weed smoking hippie #man #those were the days #neighbors #story time #lgbtq ally #lgbtq+#lgbtq positivity #allies #straight ally

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nerdfighterwhatevernumbers · 2 years

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did any other aspecs, like, really internalize issues that exclusionists spewed out at them?

like, my first identity was aromantic heterosexual. there were literally whole blogs that specifically said ‘this blog is for lesbians, but bisexuals and asexuals can reblog, heterosexual aromantics can’t’. People would openly talk about how every identity but aromantic heterosexual was valid and the split attraction model was homophobic.

i already was the least queer person i knew, and people who weren’t already my friend who were more queer than me always seemed to agree i was either not queer or on thin ice. I wasn’t allowed to join my college’s lgbt club cuz the (cishet) faculty advisor said no allies were allowed.

things like that made me feel like i needed to be really accommodating and deferent to ‘definite’ queer people, because online and irl i was being rejected and i felt like maybe i WAS being homophobic by caring about my issues or by not agreeing when they said i wasn’t queer enough, because look, i totally wasn’t, Real Gays said so. Look, this popular bisexual blogger of color said I’m not really lgbt and this popular coming out blog said aspecs can’t really ‘come out’ and people listen to them and I don’t want to be an interloper who thinks i’m more oppressed than them, right? I need to know my place so I’m not hurting them by trying to find a community, because everyone says our communities are full of homophobes, and what do we need a community for anyway if we’re not systemically oppressed like these people keep saying we’re not? Why should I have a support system if my support system is homophobic or unnecessary according to these Real Gays?

And then when I changed to ID as more queer I still didn’t think that was enough because I still didn’t want a relationship so very little was materially different and everyone told me already I wasn’t enough, and idk, there’s something about having all that going on as you’re trying to figure out how you fit into an cishet world that also doesn’t want you that makes you hate yourself

#asexual #aromantic #also at college some of the only queer people on campus stopped hanging out with me and i never knew why #so i couldn't help but feel like it was partly because i'd been queerphobic in some way without realizing #and they didn't wanna hafta be my teacher about it. i didn't put that in the main body cuz that's just my anxiety talking #i have no proof this was the actual case #but it really didn't help with internalizing the idea that i was not queer enough to keep around for people suffering from real queerphobia

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colorisbyshe · 4 years

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Have aces always been considered LGBT? No.

I’m massively bored and massively annoyed at people circulating images of radfems to support their arguments. So here’s another ace discourse post.

A fringe argument in ace discourse has been “Asexuals have always been considered LGBT!” even though there has never been any noted reference to cisgender, straight aces in LGBT spaces prior to like... 2010. And the LGBT spaces prior to 2010 that let in cisgender, straight aces were just GSAs (which already let in cishets) in high schools or colleges.

And there is a reason for it.

Part of the reason is the changing definition of asexual. The AVEN triangle is based on the Kinsey “Group X” definition where Group X meant just... not having sex. Kinsey (who should not be cited with adoration for coming up with asexuality, as he was an awful person) did not create the “scale” to address who is or is not LGBT.

Then, radical feminists (ie also not an LGBT group) defined asexuality as viewing sex as nonessential to relationships. This bore an iconic image used to defend aces as LGBT to this day:

The image is from “off our backs” which is a radical feminist publication. This particular group was “Lesbians Activists at Barnard (College).” This was not listing LGBT identities (thus why straight was up there) but was listing identities you could have as a radical feminist. Similarly, the “Asexual Manifesto” was published by radical feminist Lisa Orlando who published it through New York Radical Feminists. And talks about asexuality being a choice, not an identity.

At the same time, asexual was referenced by a trans liberation mag, as we can see from ANOTHER image used by inclusionists:

This is an image just saying that all trans people should be liberated no matter if they are straight, gay, or anything else. It should be noted that since this was published in 1970, it was functioning under the same understanding of asexual as used by the radical feminists who defined asexual as seeing “ sex as nonessential to a satisfying relationship.” Not at all our modern definition of asexual.

So, we’re into 1970 and no one is considering ace to be LGBT. And yet it exists as DISTINCT from bisexual, so all of you fuckers can stop with the “actual cishet aces were considered to be bisexual” cause... no they weren’t.

Skip to the first proto ace community as listed by aven itself, Zoe O’Reilly’s “My Life as an Amoeba.” Which speaks of envy towards LGBT people, boasts of asexuality being about not fucking or dating and how that makes them better than teen moms, and defines asexuality how we would aroace. So, different ace definition than today... still not considered LGBT.

AVEN’s creation is messy as fuck and struggles to define asexuality but decides that basically any person who relates to non-sexuality belongs there. Neato.

May 2003 on AVEN: “Let’s change LGBT to LGBTA.” David Jay, founder of AVEN, says, actually, he’s already done so by making his universitys acronym “ LGBTTQQPFAGIBDSM “ (spot the slur, look hard at the inclusion of BDSM). People make “LOL SO MANY LETTERS” jokes that homophobes make about LGBT to this day. Then:

“The ace is for ally bro” and Aven guy says, “Actually, allies are queer.”

So, 2003... aces aren’t LGBT. And David Jay is a fucking freak. Also, someone brought the thread back 8 yaers later to say “Ew aces aren’t LGBT like those sinners.” Oops.

In 2010, aces decided to make their own flag. Some like stripes because it’s “Very LGBT” and well... here are some responses:

So, already an acknowledgment that they might not be LGBT. But calls LGBt people “Alternate sexualities” which... die.

“The gays get a lot of guff, right? Because of their rainbow flag” not OUR rainbow flag, lol. Also, wtf and then someone else points out the a is for ally anyways

In 2010.

In 2015, aces started the #GiveItBack campaign after GLAAD (and then HRC in 2016) said the A is for Ally. You can go on twitter and see aces tweeting about the #GiveItBack campaign if you don’t believe me, lol.

So, if aces want to claim that aces have always been LGBT... I gotta say... history is not on your side and, “No, no, I swear they were actually considered bisexual” doesn’t work because your own images include people listing out bisexual and asexual as separate identities.

Anyways, this post is long as fuck but only took 20 minutes. And will ONLY take me 20 minutes because I’m not arguing with people who want to defend an image of a radfem, an out of context image about trans liberation, or Kinsey lmao. Anyone who wants to argue will be laughed at and/or blocked.

Cause... listen... even aces in the time periods y’all are claiming you were included are saying you weren’t. You’re just wrong. Lol.

#ace discourse #ace history #asexual history #done #long post

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redheadbigshoes · 2 years

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Hey Steph! As always, I'm loving the content on your blog. I know I talk a lot about being a liberal, queer, neurodivergent person in an unaccepting space, my evangelical college.

I'm not kidding when I say I'm forced to go there. My parent told me that if I transferred, I would have to come up with the tuition on my own, and that my learning disability would prevent me from being successful anywhere else. The second part isn't true but my parent is obsessed with me going there for some reason.

Anyway, since I really appreciate all your advice and all your insights on living in this heteronormative world as a femme lesbian, I wanted to ask if there was something you could help me with. I am "straight-passing" (I hate that term but I don't know how else to describe it), so people feel permission to say the most homophobic shit in front of me. It can be anything from shitty jokes made at an LGBTQ person's expense to arguments defending oppressive legislation such as the "Don't Say Gay" Bill.

I get sick of having to hide at my college and pretend to be a conservative Christian straight girl. I do have a few sapphic friends at the school as well as a few allies, but I am terrified of being fully "out" in practice, even if I want to in theory. I want to wear some pride things on my backpack (my girlfriend got me a "Sapphic Society" patch and I got a lesbian pride pin), and the people at my school will probably have no idea what it means, but I'm not sure.

Is it worth it to be out in an unaccepting place even if that means I might be bullied for it? I know being out as a lesbian won't necessarily stop all people from saying homophobic shit, but it would definitely keep some people from feeling comfortable saying those things around me. I just want to be me even if people won't like me for who I am.

Sorry for this long post, lmao. I was just wondering what your thoughts were! Happy pride!

Hey! I’m glad you like it!

I think wearing a pride pin could help you get recognized by other queer people in your college. I’d just make sure to wear a discreet one, something that homophobes wouldn’t know. I guess the lesbian pride flag is a good option because usually people don’t know the meaning of it (especially cishets).

From what you said maybe not coming out to everyone is for the best in your case. I personally don’t think it’s safe trying to come out to people you know are homophobic.

Some people might think it’s worth it. If I was in a similar situation I probably wouldn’t come out, I’d be too scared for my safety. But if you think it would make you feel better than staying in the closet, you should do it.

There’s also other ways of stopping people to say homophobic shit close to you. I don’t know how comfortable you are trying to call them out for their homophobia, but if you choose to not come out to everyone saying something whenever someone is homophobic might show them you don’t agree with their mindset and it could make them say less homophobic things near you.

#stephanie answers #dumbcircusbitch #lgbt #long post

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steamberrystudio · 3 years

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As someone who has read amazing YA books with LGBTQIA+ rep by authors who are allies and LGBTQIA+ members; this whole #ownvoices going on in the indie VN community is upsetting. There should never be fear of writing LGBTQIA+ rep. I understand that it is important to uplift queer creators but if that means condemning someone for writing diverse cast of characters, then no. And yes, I am part of the LGBTQIA+ community. I’m latine, gnc before someone asks. What people need to do is TRUST authors to know what they’re doing and trust them that they know their responsibility when it comes to representation. I discovered my first queer character in a kickass YA Fantasy book by a woman who was an ally of the community. That character and rep meant the world to me. I would hate to see people become afraid of having representation in their work over this debate. We should be celebrating queer rep in every work no matter if they’re allies or LGBTQIA+ members. I do agree that supporting queer creators is absolutely important in a community but not if it means shaming others from writing diverse characters or representation. Otherwise we’d have a problem where we’ll end up demanding that creators include rep in their work if all we’re seeing is white cishet characters and accuse them of being homophobic

I do think it would be nice if we could always just assume positive intent when it comes to creators.

But I do understand why people can't always do that. I know there are years of frustration, hurt, and sometimes trauma behind some opinions.

I think what it comes down to for me is this:

1. If there is a game that includes some kind of PoV representation (IE. with the main character(s) through whose point of view we are seeing the story), it would be great to assume it's there because the author felt comfortable writing that point of view (perhaps because it's their own). Even if the experience portrayed differs from your own, you can't assume the author was outside their lane and didn't know what they were doing; nor should you demand they prove themselves to you by sharing their experiences in a public setting to defend themselves. By harshly judging things that don't align to our personal experiences, we can potentially invalidate the lived experiences of the creator or any authenticity/diversity editors that worked with them. I do think we have to be open to diverse representation portrayed in diverse ways.

Even within my family, we often have very different opinions about representation that affects us.

2. Conversely, if there is a game that does NOT include some kind of PoV representation you want, just understand it's very possible that it's outside the developer's experience and they genuinely do not want to mess it up or take the spotlight off other creators who can write that PoV authentically. Many devs are happy to include representation outside of the point of view characters while keeping the point of view character closer to their own experience as a way to balance inclusion and authenticity on both sides of the process.

As I said in my last post on this topic, I think this is a complicated and dynamic topic. There are so many opinions on how representation (of all kinds - not just LGBTQIA+) should be handled and who is equipped to write what. Some of those opinions conflict with each other but are equally valid.

Some creators make different decisions than I make. And I may make different decisions with future projects. I have not locked myself into a single path forever and ever. Every project is different!

I'm definitely not a Representation Authority (tm). I, like a lot of creators, just try to gently feel out the right path for each project. I want my audience to feel represented and reflected in my work and I also want my work to be authentic.

A lot of my time and emotional energy goes toward contemplating that balance and how to approach it.

Thanks so much for stopping by to share your own thoughts on this subject.

#representation #asks

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kingdumbass · 3 years

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so I’ve been thinking about men in woods and all the people claiming it’s homophobic and it’s been making me incredibly irritated and I couldn’t pinpoint why. so I thought about it for a couple days and I know the go-to answer is I’m just a misha fucker so I’m incapable of forming an unbiased thought, but that’s not it. Like. LOOK. I’m nearly 30, I have thoughts and experiences outside of this website. I’m going to tell you why it bothers me now.

If you’re a queer person, especially from my generation, you’ve grown up being fed the idea that being queer is bad for a whole host of reasons. Back in the 90s/early afternoon 00s being called gay was an insult, so much so it was commonplace and everything from too much homework or cancelling plans could be fucking “gay”. I grew up being called a dyke by my family and by my peers just because I was perceived as different and I acted more like a boy. For most of my adolescence and teen years I was called multiple slurs even though at the time I considered myself a cishet woman. I was a strong ally and would pick a fight with anyone being homophobic while simultaneously having internalized years of homophobia.

At 21 I met someone. At the time they identified as a lesbian, a butch one at that. We met at a bar on my friends birthday, they just happened to be there and knew my friend already. We absorbed them into the group that night and they instantly gravitated towards me as I got progressively drunker on sangria. Their body language screamed that they were interested in me. Even my oblivious self picked up on it, but I ignored it even despite making them take their pants off in the women’s restroom to show me their leg tattoos. I was being friendly I thought, there wasn’t any other way to interpret my behavior I thought, even though I was flirting back.

By the end of the night we were outside the bar saying goodnight and as I said goodbye to them they hugged me. When we got in the car my friend got a text halfway home that this person was interested in me and wanted my number much to the chagrin of my friend who had a crush on this person. I laughed when she told me. I’m not gay is what I told her and then everyone in the car told me who cares who wouldn’t want to hook up with them? (They had a reputation of getting with straight girls.) and I thought well me for starters.

The next morning I texted them.

For a couple weeks they practically begged me to hang out with them again. A date is what they were after. I told them I wasn’t really in a dating place, which was a lie, I just wasn’t gay. I told them we could hang out one day at the state park and go swimming. I desperately begged my friend to come with me as a buffer so they would know this wasn’t a date.

My friend inevitably bailed.

It was a date.

I spent the whole morning sweating it out having a whole episode wondering if they thought it would be a date. If they would try to flirt with me again. If I would like it if they did even without the sangria. If it would feel the same flirting with someone who I believed to be a woman. If it would feel the same to kiss them.

During the date, i was surprised how normal it was. How much it felt like any other date. How easy talking to them was and how comfortable I felt around them. I ended up making the first move in the form of holding onto them in the lake. We hugged at the end of it. I didn’t know what to think.

They texted me for a week begging for another date and I told them again I wasn’t in a dating place. But I liked hanging out with them. That was as much as I was allowing myself. And then when I agreed to hang out with them again at their house I knew that was a much more intimate setting than a public park.

We watched x-files on the floor of their room. The episode with the ice. I remember because I was very much focusing on the television instead of the way they were staring at the side of my face. I knew that look, I’d seen it on men before. They wanted to kiss me and I had my very own episode of Gay Panic™️ lying on their bedroom floor.

My palms were sweating and I thought I was going to puke. All those thoughts about how being gay is wrong flooded me and I remembered being called a dyke my whole childhood and how until a few weeks prior I was a cishet woman and now what was I? A lesbian? That wasn’t right either.

They kissed me and I couldn’t kiss them back. I wish I were lying but I pretended to be asleep. They let me sleep in their bed that night.

I wish I could say I got over it, but every step of that relationship threw me. Our first real kiss, our first time having sex, the first time I was finally comfortable enough to realize I was actually the top (lmao)

The first time they said I love you it took me a week just to say it back.

I was always seemingly one step behind because of this internalized crap that had built up in me over the course of 20- some odd years.

They came out as trans to me a year into our relationship. A trans man. A straight man. I didn’t really understand what that meant. I had to do research and in that research I realized what that meant was that I was trans too. This was what was missing. Why i was always clocked as a dyke, why I liked guys but hated when they looked at me. Why I felt so comfortable with my partner.

I came out them months later.

“What if I were a boy too?” I asked one day out of the blue. I didn’t know how to start the conversation any other way.

You know what they said to me?

“You can’t be trans. I’m not gay.”

All of this to say, you can interpret homophobia if you want. It’s an easy interpretation, internalized homophobia is incredibly common especially in every generation beyond the current one. But people are… complex. They’re allowed to be.

#about me #some things i still can't tell you #not me getting earnest on main

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