SHOUT IT

SAY HIS NAME: Nex Benedict, another 16 YEAR OLD was murdered in Oklahoma, news channels are deadnaming and misgendering him, just like with Brianna Ghey here in the UK. But I urge you to not let your grief drive you to despair. GET ANGRY. Do not become apathetic, do not let grief numb you. Stand united as a community, lean on each other, have each others back. Reach out to any trans individuals of any age and make sure they have support in some capacity. Speak with your family, your political representatives, your school, anywhere, with anyone, that may be able to make some change, whether big or small. Everything builds, that is the power of a movement, of solidarity. If you make life a bit safer for one trans youth once, then you may have saved their life that day. And that kid might then show some other kid that there is hope, and so they live as well. And it grows.

Fly high Nex.

Rest in Power, Nex Benedict

A 16 year old kid who loved nature and looking after their cat Zeus. Who enjoyed reading, watching the Walking Dead, and playing Ark and Minecraft. They loved to cook and would often make up their own recipes. They did well in school, being a straight-A student. Rest in power a teen who was human and had interests and ambitions and challenges and friendships. A trans youth who was brutally murdered just for being trans, when that was only a fragment of who they were as a person.

Nex Benedict, Jacob Williamson, Brianna Ghey, and other trans youth like them were real people with real lives. They deserved better, longer, happier lives. They deserved to grow up and not fear for their lives. They deserve to be remembered as who they were, not just as another trans kid who was killed, as people with families and normal human lives.

It's so wild to me that as a community we're still so hostile to multigender and genderfluid people existing in gay and lesbian spaces.

You...are aware that people who are both men and women are allowed to be gay, right? And lesbian? Their other genders doesn't cancel their connection to womanhood, or manhood, or whatever else they id with. They are allowed to be gay despite their fem-alignment, and they are allowed to be lesbian despite their masc-alignment.

It comes from these weird online spaces that the standard to be gay or lesbian is to be a "non-woman" or a "non-man," which is inherently transmultiphobic and...extremely ahistorical. And completely misunderstands nonbinary identity. So if you're both then you just don't belong anywhere I suppose.

Arospec Bingo Card requested by anon

I finished the card! Have a go, and feel free to tag any aro friends :)

People who wanted to be tagged:

@feelingthedisaster

Edit: I love that we all just collectively decided it must be filled in green lol

ultimately when it comes to shipping and fandom space treatment of aspec characters i just don't accept "aro/ace people can still date/have sex" as an answer from nonaspecs. like yeah. mhm. okay. now i think we both know that you're not saying that out of real interest in the diversity of aspec experiences. so you can turn in your seventeen-page essay on why and how you plan to examine this character's aspec identity within the context of a romantic or sexual relationship complete with evidence from canon and peer reviews from multiple aspec people within the next week or i'm putting you in the pit from the edgar allen poe story

you never owe ANYONE information on your identity. sexuality, orientation, gender identity, none of it! doesn’t matter who’s asking! they don’t have a right to know! you only have to tell people if you’re comfortable with it.

I think i just need to express that the culture surrounding QPRs right now made me think that i couldn't have strong bonds with my friends. Society told me i cant have strong bonds with friends because that was only for romantic relationships. Then i went into aro spaces and this idea was reinforced using QPRs instead of romantic relationships. it was "You can still have strong bonds with people without romance! It can just be a QPR instead!" "QPRs are MORE than friendship so you can have STRONGER BONDS than you would with friends."

it made me think that the relationships i wanted with my friends HAD to be something other than friendship for it to be as strong as i wanted. If i wanted to be the first person in someones life i had to enter some sort of committed relationship. if I wanted someone to care about me as strongly as i did them then it would have to be a relationship that was "more" than friendship.

I thought I wanted a QPR because i was told the only way to get that care and security that I wanted was to enter into a relationship that was "more" than friendship. because friends didn't care that much. because friends didn't live together their entire lives. because friends were never the priority relationship wise. and it took me years to realize that i didn't want any partnership and i shouldn't have to be in one to want these things from a friend. these things CAN be something friends can do. but i found that out on my own. because the aro community kept saying "you want a QPR" when i just wanted a friend who finally saw me as a priority in their life.

"abinary people can be gay, lesbian, veldian & straight" & "orientations that are explicitly inclusive of abinary people need more visibility and to be taken more seriously" are two statements that can and should coexist.

i see way too much "abinary people can be lesbian etc." and not nearly enough people lifting up orientations that are more explicit in our genders or in people's attraction to us. tbh, this is true for midbinary genders too. there's way more "nonbinary people can use [orientation with binary connotations]" and not enough "look at these orientations that honour us".

trixic, toric, enbian and other mestric labels for specific genders deserve as much love as lesbian, sapphic, gay, achillean, veldian.

not to forget there are many people who are both! for some people, "gay" just doesn't tell the full story and they might identify as a toric gay specifically.

all abinary experiences of orientation deserve visibility.

why do yall want to be oppressed so bad? theres literally nothing special about your made up 'sexuality' and q*eer is a slur, log off for me babes x

my very first anon hate!! i cannot believe i made it this far in this blog without having any sort of hate sent here, this feels like an accomplishment!

i would like to take this opportunity to remind all aros, aces, aroaces, and aspecs of all sorts how valid and loved you are. you’ve all been so lovely and kind thus far and i enjoy reading all of your stories very much. disregard this ask entirely, and please don’t let it discourage you from being yourself proudly.

i would never usually answer anon hate, and this will be the only time on this blog. to anyone else thinking of doing this: your ask will never see the light of day and you will be blocked. don’t bother trying.

“queer spaces should be inclusive of people who don’t enjoy sex and who have “strange”, negative or repulsed relationships with sex” and “sex is an important aspect of lgbt community, history, and activism and queer people should be allowed and able to talk freely about sex without stigma or shame” are ideas that can and should coexist.

it's kinda sad that the label lesboy has been shit on a lot, because it's such a cute and fun label that can mean so many different things. it could mean being a tomboy, being butch, multigender, genderfluid, using he/him pronouns, an expression of transmasculinity, a collective system identity, being cusper, a boydyke, ftm, reclaiming the word boy for yourself, and so, so many other reasons. binary masculine cishet manhood isn't the only manhood to exist, and if people were more accepting, I would be louder and prouder to call myself a lesboy. it's a beautiful identity

what if i said imogen is a better metaphor for generational trauma than she is for chronic pain or queerness

How you may feel towards romance as an arospec person:

Romance-repulsed: People may feel disgusted by thinking of themselves in a romantic situation or by seeing romantic content, such as in a movie.

Romance-averse: A person does not have any desire to enter a romantic relationship.

Romance-indifferent: A person is not against entering a romantic relationship but is not seeking it out. People may want to enter a partnership but have no preference on whether it is romantic or platonic.

Romance-favorable: A person enjoys being in a romantic relationship in specific circumstances.

Aromantic people may identify with one of these terms in the long term or fluctuate between them, or it may depend on the situation. Some Arospecs may not identify with any of these. That is okay, you are valid anyway. :)

(https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/aromantic#what-it-means)

Being a musician is more erotic than I think people give it credit for. Like. Fingering out power chords on a guitar has the same energy as rubbing someone’s g-spot as they finish. A violinist is gently caressing the strings of their instrument and holding it close to their face. A woodwind player is salivating and getting their instrument wet before they put the tip in their mouth. In this essay, I will explain why the Bard class-

hell yeah gay is trending everyone become immediately gayer

So glad im bisexual.