#and other queer identities. but mostly lesbians | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

autisticgirliesbracket · 11 months

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here’s all my tags so far. i think there’s a theme

AUTISTIC LESBIANS STAY WINNING!!!

#and other queer identities. but mostly lesbians #autistic girlies bracket #ask #gr3nl3m

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bibiana112 · 3 months

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"The handmaiden is male gazey" did you know lesbians like fucking other women sexy style? Did you know that a large theme in the handmaiden was the male gaze and misogyny and if you can't separate explorations of a harmful idea from endorsements of it you may be hopeless?

guys I knew it I knew that would be a comment inflammatory enough to attract my first hate anon cut the cameras we did it bois :D

#did you know *I'm* a lesbian that is into that shit also? no because reading comprehension website #they're shot like they're doing that for the cameras not for each other so kind of shoots the message on the foot depending on how you look #never said it's endorsement I said it made *me* uncomfortable and bored because I've seen a dozen movies like that and I'm tired #not to mention this is a critical darling of a film #I'm well aware it isn't the movies fault that a bunch of film bros talk about how hot the scenes are but it still irks me #and were the people in charge of the filmaking process women btw? NO much less queer women they were mostly cis men #she had absolutely no qualms about playing a homosexual character #which in Korea actors can be considerably reluctant to do.#<- those two are straight from an interview with the guy the gayness was novelty and shock value #not to mention bestie it was inspired by a book go sing the praises of that while you're at it #that's where the thread of criticism towards the institutions of misogyny were pulled from #In Fingersmith Waters uses her depiction of lesbian love between Maud and Sue to challenge a variety of hetero-patriarchal norms #my god that name's hilarious #you don't need to defend the honor of a queer story that was adapted with a straight audience in mind #and this convinced me to check the book out idk about you but I'd rather see the version actually told by a lesbian 😊#a tag for asks #also ut's queerness is very gender identity related and I think people generally don't appreciate that as much as they do sex stuff

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quierd-kitten · 1 year

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It’s really fascinating to me how intricate “being in/out of the closet” can get when your identity is more complicated than “just gay or trans”.

Like, everybody knows that I’m a trans guy. Some people know that I’m actually transmasculine non-binary, if it comes up. My closer peers, friends, and family know that I’m actually genderfluid and shift between guy, non-binary, and very occationally girl. Only my best friends are aware that I also shift between xenogenders.

Even more complicated : I’m out to my mom as gay and asexual, but not bi or aro-spec. One of my sisters I’m out to as gay, the other I’m out to as bi and ace. Most people catch on pretty quick that I’m bi even if I don’t say it. My friends know that I’m bi and ace. My really close friends know that I’m bi, ace, and aro-spec.

#the closet really isn’t this dichotomy of in/out all of the time #especially depending on how queer someone reads to strangers #like most people who see me on the street would assume I’m a lesbian / bi woman #like. short dyed hair. soft punk/masc outfits. flat chest. anybody with an ounce of knowledge about queer people can clock me as queer #I do have a trans flag and pronoun pin on my backpack when I walk around campus which changes things a little #but the difference between assumed identity vs identity with strangers vs identity with close friends #can be so interesting and nuanced #and I’d say that compared to other people I’m quite open about being queer #if somebody asks me about my identity I tell as much as they’re interested in hearing #the only things I really keep close to my chest are having xenogenders and being aro-spec #mostly bc they take longer to explain tbh

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libraryleopard · 2 years

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The other day one of my friends was like “Where on earth do you hear about all the books you read?” and I’m honestly trying to think about that because I don’t really pay attention to Booktube, Booktok, Book Twitter, or Bookstagram, only occasionally dip back into book blogging, and mostly use Goodreads as a place to track books I want to read or have read rather than searching for recommendations, so I’m trying to make a list of the places I hear about books from besides a few trusted social media mutuals.

Tor.com is one major place I hear about science fiction and fantasy books–they do deal announcements, cover reveals, lists of new releases, and reviews, as well as columns reviewing backlist work. I really like “The Book Queered Me,” for instance, which is people looking back on books that were important to their understand of identity.

The Book Smugglers isn’t really that active anymore, but they reviewed science fiction and fantasy media, as well as publishing essays and short fiction and I read them religiously for a long time.

Book Riot I read occasionally and they publish bookish news and essays. I forgot I was subscribed to their LGBTQ+ book newsletter for a while and went through the emails I’d been sent earlier this week and that particular newsletter is nice because it highlights a couple books and does a round-up of recent news about queer books.

Austraddle’s book section, especially the Rainbow Reading column, does reviews, interviews, and news related to queer books, mostly queer women. It’s helpful for non-SFF stuff because I’m usually very up-to-date on news in the science fiction and fantasy world but they cover poetry, nonfiction, romance, etc.

We Need Diverse Books is a great resources, of course, and I really like the interviews they do with authors of recent releases.

LGBTQ Reads is an invaluable resource for queer literature–new release highlights, author interviews, lists of books by representation or age/genre if you’re looking for something specific.

Electric Literature is where I hear about more adult lit fic/nonfiction stuff, they also have a column called Novel Gazing in which people write about books that have impacted them and I find that really interesting. They also publish poetry and short fiction but I haven’t read much of that.

The Lesbrary does reviews of books about lesbian and bisexual women, as well as round-ups of new releases. Good resource for keeping up with sapphic books.

Rich in Color reads and reviews diverse YA books and is a good place to keep up with books by authors of color.

#will add more of i think of them #there are also websites i still miss like disability in kidlit and yainterrobang #but they're not active anymore #lulu speaks #lulu reads #books

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olderthannetfic · 1 month

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I have really mixed feelings about the small proportion of F/F fiction (original or fanfic), because yeah sure, people have their desires, they should write what they want, I get it. It all works out when I hear it from person to person. But somehow the logic only ever applies in one direction? "There are more male protagonists because men only care about male characters! Women also mostly care about male characters, because that's the majority of characters they get!" And then somehow we also yet kvetch when men write female characters (because it's incorrectly or something, nevermind if women are writing male characters correctly). Why don't we expect gay men to feel compelled only by femslash for the same reasons (but gender swapped) as the lesbian slashers/fujoshi? All of those very rational justifications are applied selectively, "for me for not for thee," and it all only leads to "idk I just don't wanna write femslash", for Reasons. Do we get to call them microaggressions yet?

--

No, you don't get to call other people's fantasy life a microaggression.

That is indeed "for me but not for thee" in the sense that you get to want what you want but other people aren't supposed to follow their id.

Do you also police gay men who spend too much time on drag and obsessing over female divas? That's an actual real world behavior that's somewhat equivalent. It frequently goes unchallenged, at least by progressives, because men are allowed to do whatever they want with chick stuff, while women are "stealing" if they dare to stray into dude stuff.

(God, I've seen so much more policing of drag kings being ~problematic~ for acting out stereotypical gender than policing of drag queens for the same. It's nuts!)

Fujoshi are often queer, but it's absurd to think we're mostly lesbians. We tend to be bi or asexual women with gender stuff going on, though there is a mix of everybody, including lesbians. There are also a lot of AFAB non-women who get lumped in with us. On the rare occasions I find a man willing to admit to being a similar demographic, he usually does like gender play in his hobbies and entertainment. It's just that men face even more pressure than women do to fit into tidy categories. Bi women get told we're whores. Bi men are told they don't exist.

Yes, I know plenty of lesbians who write more m/m than f/f, but in the big picture of all of AO3 or all of fanfic or all of media, they aren't the demographic driving these numbers. They're vastly outnumbered by the bi women, the asexual women, and the straight and gnc women.

The men we should be looking at as an equivalent aren't cis gay men but bicurious soy boys and the like.

Do most of us fujoshi object to equivalent men doing an equivalent thing? I've seen it sometimes, and I agree it's hypocritical. I'd like us to afford men the same ability to play and take on identities in their art. I remember enjoying Ranma fandom back in the day and reading quite a lot of f/f that was probably by men. It had some of that same sense of distance and fantasy that I so enjoy in m/m aimed at fujoshi. (I do consume some by-cis-gay, for-cis-gay content, both m/m and f/f, but it's often too literal and too bound up in specific named identities for my taste.)

On average, the people I see complaining most about men producing f/f material are the same people who think that because I have a clit, I should center my life around women exclusively. In other words, people spouting radfem ideology, perhaps on purpose or perhaps without realizing.

I do agree that some of the ways of expressing a lack of desire to write femslash can get pretty douchey. I want us to move away from some of the less accurate ones like "There are no compelling female characters" because of this.

But the reason for all these jerkass explanations is that women and people perceived as women who like m/m are constantly asked to explain ourselves. These aren't usually microaggressions: they're openly hostile. People get defensive and try to answer with important-sounding reasons about identity and pain because society at large won't accept "I like this" as the true explanation.

Pleasure is never enough of a reason for a woman to do something.

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genderkoolaid · 3 months

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Hello! Non binary here. I'm trying to genuinely understand how saying bi lesbians are a thing are not harmful to the trans, lesbian and bi community. I saw some of the bi lesbians history and this label seems to be something they used to say to identify that they felt mostly attraction to women but could eventually like a man / people that liked men in the past but now go as lesbians. On the first example, Isn't it just bisexuality with a preference to women? and in the second, lesbians with comphet. I understand the need to use those labels in the past, but now it seems harmful to use bi lesbian because lesbians are not attracted men and bisexuals are not lesbians. I have also seen that the use of bi lesbian was a reactionary push to the TERF movement of excluding men from queer spaces as in a way to "purify" women

While someone in either of the groups you described might identify as a bi lesbian, that is certainly not the extent of bi lesbianism.

I think the problem emerges for many people because they are viewing the definitions of queer terms as objective descriptions we discovered. From this perspective, people used to use lesbian in a more expansive sense essentially because they didn't know any better. But I dislike that; our foreparents were not identifying how they did because they didn't know better, their constructions of gender and sexuality are just as valid. And it's important to understand why those definitions formed instead of going “well it's different now so stop it.”

I'm not sure if you are saying you've heard TERFs came up with the term bi lesbian. I wouldn't be surprised, since it's a fairly common rumor. But it's very wrong. To give a very general history, “bi lesbian” came about to describe people who identified with lesbianism– in the sense that they identified with being queer, having some personal relationship with womanhood and loved or desired women– who also were multisexual in some way. “Lesbian” emphasized your love/desire for women as an important part of your identity, and “bisexual” gave nuance to that, creating visibility for bi people within the community. The outrage against bi lesbians came from the same source as the hatred for trans lesbians (of all kinds): radical feminist beliefs in political lesbianism, the insistence that being a lesbian is a political choice to end all personal relationships with men & manhood.

The idea that “lesbians, universally, aren't attracted to men” largely comes out of this shift. You cannot separate the idea that “bi lesbians” don't/shouldn't exist and the legacy of transphobic radical feminism which encourage black-and-white thinking and hostility towards Bad Queers who dared to love or desire men, be men, dress like men, or fuck like men (anything from BDSM to using a strap-on). This divide is artificial and we do not need to just accept it. Bi lesbians are not the source of harm, the ideology that insists on their exclusion is. On top of this, in many physical queer communities bi lesbians & other people with complicated identities are very easily accepted; the idea that it's somehow impossible for these identities to be safely normalized is just queer conservatism.

There are many reasons someone might enjoy the bi lesbian label: personally, I'm multigender and using a single sexuality label doesn't accurately express my sexuality. A lot of times I see people who counter reasons for bi lesbian identity by saying “but that's just being a lesbian/bisexual!” which is another product of this black-and-white thinking. The idea that someone else with a similar experience using a different label than you– or someone with a different experience using the same label– is somehow a threat to your identity is very reminiscent of the way radical feminism relies on patriarchal ideas that everyone in a gender group must self-police that group to ensure homogeneity. Someone with a totally “normal” bisexual experience may still identify as a bi lesbian, or use both bisexual and lesbian in varying contexts, because they feel it accurately expresses their personal sexuality & relationship to queer communities.

There's famously an Alison Bechdel strip about a character being a bi lesbian, but I think my favorite piece of bi lesbian art is this poem by Dajenya. It's a very defiant and wholehearted response to anti-bi-lesbian sentiment and how it harms people within the community far more than bi lesbian identity does. this site is a collection of primary resources on bi lesbianism, including a few interviews from bi lesbians which might be helpful for you.

#m.#ask box

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livefromcastledracula · 6 months

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Book Carmilla vs Adaptations (SPOILERS)

Here are a few 'interesting' adaptations. I like some of them for their own merits, but mostly dislike them as Carmilla adaptations for the below reasons, with some notable exceptions: Vampyr: The Dream of Allan Gray (1932 film): The first Carmilla inspired movie, although it keeps almost NOTHING from the novella except 'female vampire'. In this case, a creepy old lady rather than a charming young lesbian. This is a really moody, slow, acid trip of a film though, a treat for fans of vintage vampire film. (3/10) Hammer Karnstein Trilogy: The Vampire Lovers is the gayest and most book-accurate. Carmilla still kisses/seduces men before killing them, boo. The second one her identically-named reincarnation is blonde and has sex with / falls in love with a man booooooo. She's not in the third one at all. It's all very 70's and nowhere near queer enough, but at least we got the incomparable Ingrid Pitt in the first movie. 5/10. Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust: 'Carmilla' shows up as a surprise third act villain. She's an elegant and imposing vampire queen with a castle called "Cjethe" and the Vampire King offed her previously for being A Bit Too Extra. She's... Bathory. She's Elizabeth Bathory, right down to the name of her historical castle, the elaborate gowns and the blood-bathing. Bathory in Castlevania Nocturne even looks a lot like this one. Cool scary vampire lady, but Carmilla In Name Only. 4/10 Castlevania (Games): She's fine here, but mostly just kind of a big Dracula groupie like most of the other non-Dracula vampires. Often depicting as a flying skull or mask crying bloody tears, with optional succubus-like figure reclining on top of it. Cool. Rondo of Blood has her appear together with a ninja vampire Laura with bunny ears because why the hell not. 6/10 Castlevania (Netflix show): Baddass, angry Karen. She's amazing in the first season when she's scheming against Dracula, but after that she just sort of sits on her butt sipping wine and griping about men for a whole season until Isaac storms her castle. A cool character but not a great Carmilla, because Carmilla for me is defined by how much she loves women, not how much she hates men. Still amazing voice work by Jaime Murray though and her last stand was insanely baddass. 7/10

Carmilla Web Series / Movie: My favorite adaptation. It's obviously playing waaaay fast and loose with the canon and reframing her as a charming antihero in a zany urban fantasy, but there's deep current of love for the source material, especially in the movie. Natasha Negovanlis has charisma off the charts and the Hollstein romance is adorable. This Carmilla might be a black-leather-wearing snarky millenial goth with a Canadian accent, but as the show goes on it peels back layer after layer of the romantic, poetic, wistful, world-weary immortal hinted at by the novella. This show redeems LeFanu's lovelorn villain in all the best ways. 10/10. 2019 movie / Styria movie: I still haven't seen these, have heard good things about the gothic cinematography on the most recent one but not good things about the rest of it. The trailer looked moody and pretty though, I may watch it at some point.

#carmilla weekly #carmilla #carmilla karnstein #sheridan le fanu #carmilla castlevania #carmilla of styria

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our-transmasculine-experience · 1 month

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People are starting shit about transmasc/trans man lesbians and honestly wish that they’d stop harassing the trans men that say they’re personally uncomfortable with lesbians trying to date them because personally THEY feel invalidated but they also don’t care WHO identifies as what. Because as a mostly gay trans man I don’t feel comfortable with it but I also don’t care what others do, just please don’t yell at me lesbians are awesome

yeah, i don’t really understand all the infighting in the queer community over who’s identity is valid enough. at best it is useless and it’s often hurtful

thanks for saying this! identity is complicated!

#lgbt #trans #trans guy #trans boy #trans man #ftm #transmasc #transgender #queer #lgbtq

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bi-lesbian · 1 year

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heres the thing with how queer labels work: not everyone uses them the same way. and maybe the following might be a bit obtuse of an explanation, but sometimes i work better with analogies so i hope it makes sense to others 😅

lets say youre boxing up some stuff. its mostly clothes, but also some toys and a few miscellaneous items were added in as well. (if its unclear, these "contents" are the substitution of "the specifics of someones identity" for this analogy).

the what: some people would label the box just "clothes." they know whats all in there, its not just clothing, but they just want something simple to note the majority of it. or maybe some of the other items are rather personal, and theyre not comfortable with just anyone seeing the box knowing of its existence.

some others might go more specific so its more clear whats all inside, labeling it "clothes + toys." or may even go into more specifics so its completely clear whats inside, "shirts, ties, stuffed animals, and aunties knickknacks."

some may instead just leave the box unlabeled, because it doesnt particularly matter to them to have its contents noted. or theyre not even entirely sure what one of these weird knickknacks even is, and dont feel like trying to pin it down for a label.

the where: theres also some that would rather label the box by what room it belongs in, so theyd put "bedroom" on it rather than describing whats inside.

the who: then it also comes down to if someone is labeling the box for themselves, or to let someone else know what it contains because theyre giving it away. someone would decide then if they want to go into more specifics, leave it as something simple for easy communication, or go without labeling and only maybe divulge its contents once someone specific has shown interest.

basically, labels can have different purposes.

sometimes someones identity labels are just meant for themselves, as a way to express themselves or trying to understand more of themselves and their feelings.

or maybe their labels are more about the community that they surround themself with, where they find their home.

or the labels could specifically be for communicating to someone else what they are, for if theyre looking for a potential partner.

there could even be a multitude of other ways not specified here that people may use labels for.

and, all of this was a convoluted nap-fueled thought to explain to others why some people use labels like "lesboy." boy and lesbian are just the labels on the box, a shorthand for all the various contents inside. theres quite likely more stuff going on in that gender box of theirs, like multigender stuff, genderfluidity, nonbinaryness, using terms like boy bc theyre gnc/butch, or otherwise, but boy is the prominent part the person whats to label.

i hope this can also put into perspective some reasons why people use some mspec lesbian terms, because some use both bi and lesbian as labels for their communities, or lesbian is their main label they use when telling others what theyre interested in, even if it may not encompass all of their attraction, and many many other reasons. its all about how they try to understand themselves and/or what they want to communicate!

#queer #lesboy #explanation #mspec lesbian #bi lesbian #pan lesbian #ply lesbian #omni lesbian

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dazeddoodles · 3 months

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WHATS YOUR RAINE HEADCANONS??!!!!

I headcanon Raine is Latino, specifically Mexican

They have two moms named Skye and Aria, and they are an only child

Their voice actor once said they see Raine identifying as Transmasc and that their love language is touch and I agree

I think they're either a Lesbian or just identity as Queer with no specific label. But they have a preference towards women, and are only really attracted to feminine presenting men.

They've always loved musicals and they're the reason Eda got into RATTs.

Without heels they're about 5'6 and they started wearing heels at a young age to appear taller.

When they were younger they would always go out of their way to try seem tough because as a Bard they are constantly underestimated.

They hated how their voice sounded when they were younger because of how cute it was, they wanted their voice to sound deeper and more intimidating (Avi referred to the voice they do for Raine as their "Testosterone voice" and "Like a second puberty")

They were a very good student. At their old school they used to stay out of trouble and mostly keep to themselves. The other students found them weird.

When they met Eda it was like a breath of fresh air from the private school kids they're used to. They very much had a "Aren't you tired of being nice? Don't you just want to go apeshit?" moment.

They've calm down a fair bit as they got older, though only to keep a proper respectable image. After the RATS play that gave them stage fright, they care more about drawing attention and became more reserved because of it.

Around Eda they can still be themselves because they know she would never judge them.

When they were younger they used to swear a lot (to try to sound intimidating) but as an adult they try not to swear in public (unless they're drunk and they lose their filter). Though sometimes they accidentally let one slip.

As teenager they were small and scrawny. As an adult they're a bit muscular and also a little bit chubby, mostly on their thighs and stomach. Which is why they ALWAYS wear a belt around their waist.

They're a HUGE romantic and it makes Eda melt.

#asks #raine whispers #raeda #headcanons

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gay-otlc · 2 years

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Transmasc Lesbianism

I'm a lesbian. I'm also a straight trans man. This might confuse you, but you may want to consider looking at perspectives of gender and sexuality that differ from your own and don't fit into neat little boxes.

A definition of lesbian that has been gaining popularity in queer spaces is "non men loving non men." This was meant to be inclusive for nonbinary lesbians, as an alternative to "women loving women." However, the phrase is very flawed. I've spoken about this elsewhere, but the main points are

It categorizes all nonbinary people alongside women. In this context, "non-men" comes off as "women or nonbinary people who are basically women." Not all nonbinary people, even if they're non-men will feel comfortable being labeled as a lesbian, since the term has feminine connotations and can cause dysphoria. It's unfair to put them in this box just because they're not a man.

Attraction is complex and cannot be divided into "attracted to men" and "not attracted to men." This disregards people who use the split attraction model (different romantic and sexual orientations), people who experience alterous attraction, people with fluid sexualities, and more.

Gender is complex and cannot be divided into "male" and "all genders that are not male." The identity most blatantly erased by this is multigender identities- people with multiple genders can be both male and a gender that is not male. There are also genderfluid people who are sometimes male, demigender people who are partially male, or nonbinary people who don't identify as male but may refer to themselves with masculine terms such as boy or man anyway.

The focus of lesbianism should not be excluding men. Mindsets like this are echoing TERF rhetoric that seeks to exclude transfeminine lesbians because TERFs wrongly consider them to be men. And it's annoying to make our identity about men or lack thereof, when we don't need to be talking about men at all- our community is about our shared attraction for women, because women are great!

Awesome, we've got that out of the way. If you're still reading this and going "but you can't be a trans man and a lesbian, lesbian means non men loving non men!!!!!", then I don't know what to tell you. Read the list again? Go through the other posts linked? Maybe log off tumblr?

If you read all that and you're willing to accept that not all lesbians will fit into "non men loving non men," and you don't understand but you're open to learn, read on! By the end you might still not understand, but you don't need to understand me to respect me.

For some context, here is a description of my gender and sexuality.

Gender: I'm a bigender trans man. To put it as simply as I can, my gender is primarily male, but I also have some of the female gender. I'm comfortable being seen as solely a man or both a man and a woman, but not solely a woman.

Sexuality: I'm sexually attracted to women almost exclusively. As mentioned at the beginning of the post, I describe myself as a lesbian (or gay, sapphic, etc). I also describe myself as a straight man (or straight transmasc, transhet, etc).

How can I be both?

That's where my multigender identity comes into play. I'm a man and a woman. I'm attracted to women. This makes me both a man attracted to women and a woman attracted to women; a straight man and a lesbian.

Like I said earlier, male is my primary gender and being female is more secondary. So, I'm primarily a man attracted to women, and to a lesser extent a woman attracted to women. Internally, I perceive myself as more of a straight man than a lesbian. I get a lot of gender euphoria from calling myself a straight man, and the feminine connotations of lesbian can sometimes make me uncomfortable.

So, why do I still identify as a lesbian?

Although I consider myself and my attraction to be mostly transhet, that's not really how I interact with the world around me. I'm out as bigender to some people, but I'm also closeted in many contexts, and I don't pass very well even where I am out. This means I navigate my life as someone generally perceived as a woman, who is attracted to women. Even if I don't always consider myself to fit fully with lesbianism, a majority of people will interpret me that way when they find out I'm attracted to women.

Lesbianism is a label I found my home in, for many years, and it still means a lot to me. I spent a long time defining myself as a lesbian and existing in our community, and it's a significant part of my identity.

The way I experienced my attraction growing up was a lesbian experience, not a straight experience. I consider myself a straight man now, but I didn't grow up interacting with the world as a heterosexual child. I was expected to have crushes on boys and was mocked for not fitting into that. I was called a lesbian in a derogatory way when I was ten, and I found power in reclaiming that. When I realized I was attracted to women, I spent years feeling like a freak for it until lesbians communities helped me to be proud. Lesbian is the label that most accurately describes my history and my experience as a young queer.

Also, although the label lesbian sometimes causes dysphoria, I sometimes get euphoria from referring to myself or being referred to as a lesbian. I especially get euphoria from being a butch lesbian. I take so much joy from my butch identity. And while referring to myself as lesbian in a joking manner, with phrases like "I'm so gay for her" or "not to be a lesbian but oh my god," might not count as gender euphoria, saying them makes me happy, and that's enough for me.

So, why do I identify as a man? Because I am one.

Why do I identify as a lesbian? Because it describes my past experience and the way I interact with the world as someone perceived as a woman. Because it's important to me. Because I want to.

Why do I use these labels that contradict each other? Because these are the labels that are right for me, and I have every right to have a confusing identity.

Thank you for your time.

#holy shit this is a long post #i'm so sorry if you actually read all that. i don't know when to shut up </2 #lesbian #men and non men #transmasc lesbian #male lesbian #transhet lesbian #bigender lesbian #multigender lesbian #bigender #multigender #transmultiphobia #<- because it is transmultiphobic to be an ass to me about my identity #gender shit #pride tag #important #so many tags jfk #i will shut up now

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nyxsealia · 5 months

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When I was 17 and trying to figure out what the heck my sexuality was, the main, if not only, piece of advice I found online, even when I directly asked people, was to go out and experiment sexually with various people and see what gender I enjoyed sex with most. And years later, that still seems to be the advice most of us give when someone is trying to figure out their sexuality. And there's nothing wrong with doing that, and if that's what helped you, great. But I do think there's issues with this being the most prevalent advice.

There are a lot of reasons someone may not want to do this, various personal or religious reasons, comfort levels, a lack of interest in sex, not experiencing much or any sexual attraction, or simply being too young for this to be applicable.

I found the advice unhelpful for many of the reasons I just mentioned, and it left me feeling lost on how I was supposed to find out what my orientation was. It also left me with thoughts like how can I be a part of queer culture if I don't want to experiment sexually or be sexually active? Even looking at articles with advice on dating as a queer woman I saw bullet points like "It's okay to have sex on the first date!" there was so much emphasis on how it's okay to have very active sex lives that it left me feeling like if I didn't want that, I'd never be able to have relationships because there'd be an expectation of sex right off the bat. Don't get me wrong, sex positivity is important and we shouldn't shame people for their sex lives. But I feel like we don't don't talk about not being into that kind of thing enough.

I also didn't know at the time that I was asexual, and while I'm sex neutral and open to the idea of sex with a trusted partner, I don't have any desire to seek out sexual relationships. Not experiencing sexual attraction made figuring out my attraction a thousand times harder. I still don't know if I'm bi/pan or lesbian. I do refer to myself as gay or lesbian in some instances, but sometimes I say queer or just shrug and say "I like girls" or "I'm not straight" and some days I'm okay with the vagueness of that, but other days I feel the stress and pressure of having to pick an identity in order to have a community to belong to and be accepted. That stress and pressure doesn't get better when all the advice I can find on the subject just tells me to have sex and that'll clear everything up.

We put a lot of focus on finding out exactly "what" you are. And I don't think sex is the best way to do that. Lots of people have varying interest in sexual or physical intimacy, not just queers. My cishet friend told me she got a boyfriend but she wasn't entirely sure if what she was feeling was romantic, and that the idea of kissing made her uncomfortable. She doesn't identify as ace or aro, and she shouldn't have to. People can have a lack of interest in these things without a lack of attraction.

Another issue with this advice is that sexual and romantic attraction doesn't always line up for everyone. You may enjoy sex with all genders, but find you only have a desire to date one. So sexual experimenting wouldn't necessarily answer the question for you. Orientation is really complicated. I did mostly consider myself lesbian, but I occasionally find men aesthetically attractive, and I'm honestly starting to wonder if I'm actually bi but still feel uncomfortable using the term.

All this needlessly long and ramble-y text to say, this advice is simply useless to a lot of people. And while I can't speak personally for this part, I'd bet at least some people who enjoy sexual experimentation still weren't sure of their orientation at the end of it. This advice shouldn't be presented as the one size fits all solution.

If you're uncomfortable or uninterested in figuring out your identity this way, there's nothing wrong with that. There's also nothing wrong with not knowing. You don't have to know right now, or ever if you'd prefer that. It's okay to use vague terms. It's also okay to use whatever label feels closest even if it's not perfect. And remember, you're not locked into anything. You can always change labels.

There is no right way to determine your orientation. Everyone discovers themself in different ways and at different ages. It's not a race or a checklist. The most important thing is to be kind and patient with yourself and whatever you do to figure yourself out, be safe.

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shmaroace · 8 months

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As a fellow aroace, queer films without romance are *fucking hard to find*, but also some of my favourite (for obvious reasons), so here you have the two or three I can think of off the top of my head!

"Te estoy amando locamente": a very recent -as in from last month- Spanish movie about a gay boy discovering the drag scene and getting arrested via the Spanish dictatorship's "social danger" laws. No romance whatsoever, mostly trans characters, centered around his mom's journey into accepting him, and his friends' fight to get the Social Danger laws revoked.

"Pride": a British feel-good comedy about a group of LGBT+ activists who start raising money for a community of Welsh striking miners. There is a very cute established older gay couple, but their relationship is as much the center of the movie as Dai and his wife: it's just there as part of the tapestry of the movie. The main character has a nameless hookup as part of his coming to terms with his sexuality storyline, but there's way more emphasis given to his friendship with his lesbian best friend. A lot of found family, a lot of activism, laughs and tears. Based on a real story (for real, not Hollywood based on a real story).

"United in Anger": a documentary about the history of ACT UP, the famous activist group who fought for the rights of people with AIDS in the 80s. Made by some people who were there, based entirely on interviews to people who were there, it's entirely made available on youtube by the filmmakers. A must-see.

"Aos Nossos Filhos": I guess whether this qualifies as a queer movie is up to you: it's technically a story about motherhood and trauma. A middle aged Brazilian lady who was a political prisoner during the Brazilian dictatorship and now runs a charity for favelas children with AIDS gets told by her lesbian daughter that her and her girlfriend are trying for a baby via assisted reproductive technology; while at the same time a reporter starts interviewing her about his mother, who was the lady's jailmate. Extremely interesting and heartbreaking. The lesbian relationship features relatively heavily though as they try for a baby (also, trigger warning for aces, the very first scene is a very explicit sex scene between the two girls).

"Hedwig and the Angry Inch": an early 2000s off-Broadway musical turned movie about an East German gay boy who gets a gender change operation in order to marry a US soldier and move out of East Germany, and ends up touring the US with a shitty band trailing after a rockstar who stole her (?) songs. Impossible to explain, I'm not doing it justice. It's a very interesting exploration of gender as an identity and a performance, and of romantic love and the myth of the "other half" (in a good way).

"Kinky Boots": I know there's a movie, but I only know the musical. Silly feel-good comedy about a struggling shoe factory owner who gets tangled making heels for drag queens. There's a romance story, but it's between the shoe maker and one of the employees. It's been a long time, so I don't put my hand on the fire for the quality of the musical. It has some nice drag queen dances, though (there's a proshoot).

"Luciérnagas": a gay Iranian fleeing his country ends up stuck in a coastal city in Mexico. While he battles homesickness and the urge to go back to Turkey to his boyfriend (even if it's dangerous), he makes friends with his landlady, a young woman who teaches him Spanish, and a Salvadorian ex-gang member trying to cross the border to the US. I saw it a long time ago so I can't promise there will be no romance whatsoever, but it's clearly not the central conflict.

Well, I ended up with more than two, so I'm going to stop now. Hope you and anon like them!!

odd; it says this ask was sent sept 4 but i didn't see it until now. thanks for the recs! i'm assuming it was in response to this post

#aro #aromantic #arospec #ace #asexual #acespec #aroace #aspec #films #em answers

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olderthannetfic · 6 months

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https://olderthannetfic.tumblr.com/post/734842547427508224/ive-seen-some-posts-about-what-shows-first-got

A lot of very influential stuff doesn't stand the test of time and is problematic. But that doesn't mean it wasn't influential. And also, idk, I feel like a lot of younger lesbians and bi women don't really know what it was like to see that show in the 2000s when there were signifcantly fewer shows with all-queer casts, and from what I remember, no other shows with entirely queer women casts.

This is why it's now so jarring to see that a non-small amount of newly found queer people (aka: mostly teens, young adults, people who are discovering their sexuality and identity in the year of our lord 2023) finds Rocky Horror to be something we need to chuck in the trash and forget forever.

Is Rocky Horror perfect? Gee, of course not!

But it's a show/movie from the 70s, and at the time it was absolutely fucking revolutionary, and it still is, even if it uses terms we now consider to be offensive! It was extremely ahead of its time, with its characters and messages and themes, to the point that not even modern shows were able to achieve its level of genuine queer representation.

And I hate, hate, hate that one of their arguments as to why this movie is trash is because "straight cis women" like it, meaning that they're all stupid Karens who are appropriating the gay experience and are fetishizing gay people. Susan Sarandon's character is literally that: she's a cis (debatably) straight woman who has a journey of self-discovery once she meets Frank. Part of her character arc is that she discovers that she can enjoy sex just because sex is enjoyable, and that there's no shame in that. That's a message directed towards women.

Tim Curry didn't dance in fucking high heels, panties, and a corset in the goddamn fucking Seventies for you chronically online shitlings to say that the cult movie that turned him into a star should be forgotten.

--

I die laughing at the idea that that Sweet Transvestite song and its choice of vocabulary is what makes this classic problematique. Some people need to be duct taped to a chair and forced to watch an Almodóvar marathon.

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wanderingcritter · 5 months

Text

★.°✩ ɪɴᴛʀᴏ ✩ °.★

☆🌱° Hellooo, welcome to my alterhuman acc! ^^ Here mostly to shitpost/ramble, idrk how Tumblr works tbh. This is probably gonna be abandoned in like 2 weeks lmao °🌱☆

☆🌱° Basic Info °🌱☆

🦴✦ Name ➤ Sam

🦴✦ Age ➤ 18

🦴✦ Pronouns ➤ They/Them - It/Its - Fang/Fangs - Key/Keys - Star/Stars

🦴✦ Gender ➤ Trans-Nonbinary + Xenogender

🦴✦ Other Identities ➤ Queer, Lesbian, (Questioning) Ambiamorous, Rabid, Autistic, ADHD, Chronosian, Furry, Therian, Otherkin, Alterhuman, Non-Human, Transspecies

🦴✦ Hobbies + Interests ➤ Drawing, Playing Guitar (Spanish Acoustic Castella and Electric Squire), Animation, Parkour, Hiking, Urbex, Skateboarding, Cartoons, Zoology, Human Psychology, Zine Making, Fursuit Making, Social Activism, History, Philosophy, Punk Subculture, Witchcraft, Journaling, Minecraft

🦴✦ Location ➤ WA, USA

☆🌱° Alterhuman Identities °🌱☆

🪐✭ Kintypes ➤ Wolfblood (Psychological), Wingkin (Unknown)

🪐✭ Theriotypes ➤ North American Wolf (Psychological), African Wild Dog (Spiritual), Cape Clawless Otter (Spiritual), Blue Wildebeest (Unknown), Eastern Coyote (Psychological)

🪐✭ Hearttypes ➤ Clado Donestic Dog (Psychological)

☆🌱° What I'll Post °🌱☆

Uhhh idk like I said mostly just shitposting and small things Im too lazy to journal about 💀 This blog will primarily be dedicated to alterhuman thoughts, experiences, artwork, opinions, and activities, however I may occasionally touch on subjects relating to queerness, transness, neurodivergency, furry, and more.

☆🌱° DNI °🌱☆

I dont rlly have a strict dni, but in general I dislike radqueers + transID ppl and really do not agree with their beliefs/their involvement within alterhuman spaces. As for everyone else, ig just dont be a dick/creep and we're good :3

☆🌱°Thank you for reading this far!! I cant wait to be insanely cringey and say stupid shit, and hopefully make some friends ^^ <3°🌱☆

Dividers credits ➤ 1 - 2

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starlightrosari · 7 months

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Gender struggles from childhood to now (22)

I don’t look like the other girls

I don’t get along with other girls

I get along better with boys

I want to be one of the guys

I wish I looked more like a boy

I don’t feel I belong in women’s spaces

I feel uncomfortable with female gender expectations and experiences

I feel jealous of how my friends who are boys are developing into their bodies

I feel uncomfortable with my genitalia

I feel uncomfortable with my body

I want to look more androgynous

I hate my body

I don’t mind my name, but it feels too feminine. It’s okay on other people, but I’d prefer a nickname for myself

The first nickname was cool, but still felt too feminine. This new nickname sounds really androgynous though, it feels good being called it

I feel like a tomboy

Am I transgender?

Do I have internalized misogyny from having mostly male friends?

I wish I could get along with women so I was treated equally

I just feel small and infantilized, I have to dress more mature and womanly and then I’ll love my body

I’m depressed and dissociated from myself because of people pleasing and trying to fit in with heteronormative people

Who am I?

I’m just a lesbian having a hard time with my sexuality, that’s why I have these body issues and gender issues. And I just don’t know who I am because of depression and trauma

I stopped being called my birth name entirely. I guess family can still call me it even if it feels weird, but it feels good being called “Ari” at my college and by my friends

I stopped people pleasing

I feel better now that I’m dressing masculine

I feel better now that I’m not being called pretty all the time

Maybe I actually am trans?

I kind of like they/them pronouns

Maybe not, I’m okay with my body now and people think nonbinary isn’t real. This is too complicated

I still feel uncomfortable calling myself or being called a woman though

I don’t want to base my identity off the misogyny I deal with anymore, I feel most comfortable calling myself nonbinary for now, and it’s okay if it’s a phase, I just need to explore how I’m feeling

I don’t like using she/her pronouns

I’m terrified to come out to people, maybe I should just tell them I use she/they pronouns so it’s not as big of a deal

I came out to people, but now I feel like I shouldn’t have given them “she” as an option at all

I still wish I were more like a boy, but I don’t think I have gender dysphoria

I’m so envious of my favorite fictional boy characters, I want to cry, I’m nothing like them

I wish when I were out at night I didn’t look like such a girl. I want to look like the beautiful men and androgynous people I see. I want to cry, I hate my body sometimes

Actually I do have gender dysphoria and always have

I wish I were able to be androgynous in the way men can be

I feel uncomfortable being viewed as the feminine bodied person in a relationship. In fantasies I’m always masculine

I feel dysphoric every time I lump myself as sapphic, but maybe it’s just internalized lesbophobia?

No, I prefer calling myself queer. Just because identifying as lesbian stopped me from being cis/heteronormative and was an important part of finding my true self, doesn’t mean I have to keep identifying as it. Still don’t know if I’m attracted to men though

Actually I was attracted to men all along, I just wished I were viewed by strangers as an mlm couple and hated the idea of being viewed as a straight relationship. It was easy to mistake as being lesbian because it at least felt better being seen as a queer woman than a straight girl, so I avoided that possibility altogether by refusing that I was attracted to men because it felt too dysphoric to imagine

I often get really depressed being misgendered, and I feel really detached from myself most days. I don’t want to keep feeling this way

I definitely don’t feel good being called feminine terms or dressing feminine, trying to be more of a girl didn’t make me feel better about myself, I’m absolutely trans and don’t have to doubt myself anymore

I don’t feel dysphoric calling myself nonbinary and neutral language, but I don’t feel euphoric either. How do I identify and what do I do about my dysphoria?

Do I want to transition? It’s so confusing and scary, I wish I were binary trans so I wasn’t so afraid of the irreversible changes

Weighing out changes of the body on T and pros and cons of being off or on T, I’m definitely feeling like some of the changes would make me really euphoric compared to being without it

I actually kind of like calling myself masculine terms. I don’t feel like a man, but maybe I’m a demiboy?

I wanted an androgynous body when I was very young, and I still want one now. I was gaslit by cis people that how I felt about my body was just insecurity, when it was in fact gender dysphoria. I want to transition to a body that feels like me

I like he/him pronouns and feel affirmed being called masculine terms. I’m going to use he/they pronouns and I identify as a nonbinary boy

I’m terrified of having to deal with transmasculine erasure and transphobia coming out, but I can’t keep staying in the closet. It hurts too much. I need to come out

#nonbinary #enby #lgbtq+#trans #transmasc #lgbtq #transgender #genderqueer #lgbtqiia+#queer #demiboy #gender questioning #gay #agender

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