it's so weird when people think that i'm some sort of MRA or i think misogyny is just diet oppression or something when i talk about the experiences of trans men because it's literally the exact opposite. i understand why girls say things about hating all men and why people talk about how there's fundamentally a cultural difference between "men and women"... i just think it's often an oversimplification because i am a man but i have still had to deal with all the insufferable misogynistic bullshit of nearly every hegemonic cisgender man since i popped out of the womb!!!!!

i could of course go into detail about the brutal, often fatal, misogynistic and transphobic violence we experience. or i could talk about how every single day, i talk to cis men and am reminded just how fundamentally different we are. how they nearly always default to centering themselves, putting their own needs first, never even stopping to consider the perspectives or experiences of others. (this isn't a terfy "male socialization" argument btw, transfemmes absolutely DO NOT do this in my experience, even when they've barely transitioned)

i don't want to have to choose between misgendering myself and misrepresenting my experiences!!!!!

literally any characteristic of a society that victimizes women ALSO applies to trans men- usually moreso than cis girls actually!!!

✨💖✨ here's some fun statistics (with sources) ✨💖✨

we are payed 60 cents to the average worker's dollar, as opposed to cis women who make 82 cents to the average man's dollar (note that the two gender pay gap is reported as women vs men whereas the queer one is trans men vs. all workers, so the gap between us and cis women is actually larger than that)

trans men have the highest rate of violent victimization of any gender demographic (tho the study didn't include nonbinary people as far as i can tell) 107.5 per 1000 people, as opposed to 86.1 for trans women, 23.7 for cis women, and 19.8 for cis men. that means trans men are over four times as likely as cis women to be victims of violent crime.

trans men have the highest rates of suicide attempts in the trans community, and presumably the whole queer community. (45%)

we have the highest rates of negative experiences with our doctors (misgendering, denial of gender affirming care, etc) in the trans community (42%)

transmasculine people have the highest rates of sexual assault in the trans community (58% for nonbinary people and 51% for trans men)

i'm just SICK and TIRED of putting up with cis men's catcalling and insults and lack of respect every day and then being told that i'm a gender traitor by people who should be able to sympathize with my pain! like i appreciate that you think i'm a man, but that means nothing if you don't also unpack your own transandrophobia and acknowledge my experiences of oppression as an intersection of misogyny and transphobia, rather than acting like i've gained male privilege when now i'm just seen as a dyke instead of a nice straight girl.

and just to make one thing incredibly clear: i do not think we have it worse than transfemmes. i do not think they are the enemy or the source of our oppression in the slightest. i'm frustrated at the small few online who've internalized radfem ideas and take it out on us in the most vitriolic ways possible. i'm frustrated with the nearly equal number of trans men who are so eager to be accepted that they throw themselves and the rest of us under the bus. but off tumblr? in the real world? (and on here, with nearly all of you) trans women are my biggest allies, my sisters in arms, some of the kindest most empathetic and caring and badass people i know. cis girls as well for the most part, though a lot of y'all have some transphobia, including transmisogyny, to unpack. and of course, to the trans men reading this, in case no one's told you today: i love you i love you i love you.

Hey sorry to bother, but i don't thing I've really seen any sexism in the fandom? I might have just missed it, but would you be willing to elaborate on it a bit? You don't have to if you don't wanna

CHOKES

I’ll elaborate under a cut because a lot of the sexism I see is rooted in the ns/fw side of the fandom. I’ll be talking explicitly so don’t click if you’re not prepared for a conversation about sex and ectoplasmic genital shit. Also... it’s long.

God, where do I even start? This post covers a lot of the base issues with the fandom, though most of what OP said had to do with queerphobia. The issue with writers and magic genitalia in the fandom boils down to the fact that so often - so often - I click on a fic to read and heteronormativity slaps me in the face. One dominant (male-identifying) partner with male genitalia, one submissive (male-identifying) partner with female genitalia. And okay, I get it, some couples are like that. It’s not bad to write something like that as long as it doesn’t rely on sexism or queerphobia to explain away the choices. But then it’s... every fic. Every. Fic. I click on. 

Actually, I’ll give you some numbers! I’m going to look at the UTMV kinktober fics I’m keeping up with and see what kind of ratios there are. I won’t name them out of politeness, but here we go. Out of 4 Kinktober 2020 series on A03 with, so far, 23 or 24 chapters each, here’s how the gender and sex of the characters play out:

In terms of biological sex, the majority were male/female* with two partners, making up almost half of the fics read (42 out of 94). Out of said fics, 35 had a dominant** male and submissive female dynamic, 4 had a dominant female and submissive male dynamic, and 3 were unclear or there was no such dynamic. Only one out of the 42 fics had the female character identify as a woman. (Furthermore, she was genderbent.) 

The runner-up was the ‘other’ category, which encompassed the following: no genitals present, only one set of genitals present, odd genitalia (such as tentacles), or unspecified. This category made up 26 out of the 94 fics. Of the 26, 20 of them fell into the ‘one set of genitals’ category, with 14 male and 6 female. The male fics were split evenly between dominant and submissive males, and the females were all written as submissive. 

None of the other categories were nearly as popular, with the next one down the line only having 9 fics out of the 94. This category was male/male with two partners. The next one, male/male/female with three partners, had 8. Of the 8 fics, all of them had dominant male and submissive female dynamics.

The female/female with two partners category only had 3. Only one of the three fics portrayed a lesbian relationship where both characters identified as women. 

The other categories were as follows: m/m/m with three partners, m/m/m/f with four partners, m/m/m/m with four partners, m/m/f/f with four partners, m/m/m/m/f with five partners, and m/m/m/f/f with five partners. These categories only had 1 fic each. Each and every fic with a female partner had the female partners playing submissive roles.

It’s important to note that out of the entire roster of fics, there were 3 women. One of them was a genderbent character in a m/f fic, and the other two were in a lesbian f/f fic. Why the lack of women? Why constantly portray those with female genitals as men?

Going back to the post I linked at the very beginning, I do want to cover my bases - I understand that male characters with biologically female genitals and sex characteristics can be a hugely needed source of rep for transgender people, especially those who are transmasculine. As a transmasculine person myself, it’s important to me that male characters with female bodies exist. Having a casual environment where men can have whatever genitals they want is, in theory, rather progressive. However, three things:

Never in all my time in this fandom have I ever seen one of these characters stated explicitly as transgender. None of the fics in the study above did, either. 

In the UTMV, when writing skeletons with magical genitals, having male or female genitalia is seen as a choice. It erases the need for transgender characters. It erases transgender narratives that deal with transition, discomfort, coming out, and dysphoria. If you can pick whatever kind of body you want, why would there be a need for being trans? There’s no easy way to determine a ‘male’ or ‘female’ skeleton, erasing the concept of gender assigned at birth and erasing the struggles that trans people may face.

None of the characters have bodies that might align more closely with transgender folks who medically transition. No top surgery scars, no bottom growth. No breast tissue growth on male bodies, nothing. Of course, why would that exist in the first place? Magic erases the need to portray bodies with quote-on-quote ‘imperfections.’ None of the bodies portrayed even step a toe out of the cisgender box - such as perhaps portraying female genitals with a flat chest or male genitals with breasts. None of that was found in the study, and I don’t recall fics like that outside of the study, either.

So clearly, most if not all authors are not attempting to portray any sort of transgender character when writing them this way - which begs the question, why write men with female bodies? 

While I was taking these statistics, I had a conversation with my partner in which they said something that applies here:

“[Every AU character] being Sans is a problem on its own, but when you have the power to make whatever character a woman, how you approach that says a lot. What people do is that they give a male character female parts and it’s only for sexual purposes. So like, the entire existence of [the female body] in the UTMV serves only for sex and that’s just kind of not good.”

Keeping this quote in mind, the short answer to the question I posed above is this: sexism. In this fandom, the female body, femininity, and being a woman in and of itself is objectified, hyper-sexualized, and exoticized... in that order, respectively. I’m not just using these as buzzwords, I promise you.

The female body is objectified. The same as the quote above, female bodies aren’t seen as something that someone will just have in a non-sexual context. After reading 94 smutfics, their treatment of the female body tends to start looking the same. The female body is for sex. That’s it. Giving or showing a character with breasts, even clothed, is seen as the display of a sexual object, even though breasts are visible on (cis) women in everyday scenarios. In sexual scenarios, the female body is never portrayed realistically, either. Female arousal and preparing the female body for sex - compared to its counterpart, the male body - is wildly unrealistic. Yes, this is porn, and there’s bound to be realism issues, but in comparison, female sexuality is much more unrealistic.

Femininity is sexualized. Characters act feminine for sexual appeal... and only for sexual appeal. Because a character acts feminine, they’re more sexually appealing to their partner. Feminine clothing, such as dresses or skirts, are seen as sexual. 

Being a woman, in and of itself, is exoticized. This isn’t even a staunchly NSFW issue. I’ve been asked if my male characters, explicitly stated to be bisexual, would have sex with a woman. My partner has received asks about ‘what would happen if (insert male character here) met a woman.’ Genderbends of male characters into female characters are seen as cringy, childish, or fanservicey by default. Women aren’t treated as a normal occurrence. When genderbends do happen and people like them, it’s often in a sexual way. “She’s so hot/sexy.” “Step on me, queen.” 

It most likely doesn’t help that all of the popular AU characters in the fandom are men. It creates an environment where women are scarce and hardly represented, leading to unnatural assumptions about them.

I’m not sure how to close this off, so... TLDR; women are normal people. Stop exoticizing them. Stop objectifying the female body. Don’t use trans/queer characters as a scapegoat for your sexism. 

Sincerely, a bigender lesbian who’s sick and tired of all this.

-

*‘Male’ and ‘female’ are used to refer to biological sex. When I talk about gender, I will say men and women.

**When I say dominant, I mean ‘in control’ of the sexual situation. This was determined by considering factors such as written personality, physical position, and how they behaved. Vice versa for submissive. I don’t intend to use these terms as an equivalent to what they mean in BDSM language, though several of the fics attempted to or did portray BDSM relationships. I also do not mean these terms to be equivalent to ‘top’ or ‘bottom’. 

Taking It Up The Ass Isn’t Character Growth - A Rant

So, in response to an ask a while back, I said I had a rant brewing on fandom and sex positions, and well, a lot of you wanted to see it, so here you go. You literally asked for it.

Disclaimer: This is going to talk a lot about top/bottom roles in slash fic and fandom attitude towards them and is heavily filtered through the lens of my own tastes and experiences with fandom. I’d also like to be upfront that I am 100% in favor of people writing whatever fictional content they want, and it’s not what fandom does with characters that bothers me but rather how that translates into attitudes towards real, live people. Also, this is the essay version of a slow burn AU because I regurgitate my entire fandom history before getting to the point. Beware.

I discovered fan-fiction around a decade ago, had no clue what the hell it was, got hooked and dived deeper. I started participating in fandom circa 2013, and I was fairly young and also completely inexperienced both sexually and romantically. The fandom in question was Hannibal and my ship of choice was Hannibal/Will. It was/is a very chill fandom in general, but we had our drama. And chief among the contentious topics was—you guessed it—the top/bottom debate. I can’t actually remember any other topic that was discussed and argued for so ardently in that fandom, at least in those days. Even after I drifted away, I came across a few posts on the matter.

Generally, you had two camps—people who supported strict roles and those who were in favor of switching*. And because we’re a society plagued by illogical assumptions, the strict role camp mostly had people who thought Mr. Big Bad Cannibal in the Fancy Suits wouldn’t take it up the ass because he’s older, more experienced, more mentally stable, and of course, more ‘dominant’ in personality. Yes, that sentence is chock full of problematic shit. I am aware. Lots of people were aware and argued strongly against attributing top/bottom roles to personality. I don’t remember anyone arguing as enthusiastically for Top Will, but those voices were also there. But the general idea was that assigning strict top/bottom roles to a male/male couple was casting them in a heterosexual mold and thus, the progressive option was to make them switch. Strict roles also garnered comparisons to “yaoi” and uke/seme stereotypes, which was of course bad and fetishizing and we, the Western media fans, of course had to do better. Stealth racism is fun to untangle.

Anyway, I lapped up the woke juice. Partly because I was a baby queer from Buttfuck Nowhere, Asia, who had zero exposure to LGBT+ communities and what queer folks did with each other. Partly because it was the stance taken by most of my favorite writers so it seemed like a good position to emulate.

Emulate it I did. Most discussions I had about this happened in private with the handful of close friends I had in fandom. Where it really showed was in my writing. I made sure to write switching—maybe not in every fic, but then I alternated between fics. Thing is though, I did have a preference. I liked Top Will. I created and consumed a ton of Top Hannibal, and sometimes it was okay, sometimes it was not, but I couldn’t pinpoint why it made me uncomfortable. Back then, I thought I was a cis questioning/bi girl and once again, the impression I got was that not being MLM, having a preference was automatic fetishization. So I tried my best to justify my preferences, to my friends at least. I think what I said was that fandom was skewed towards Top Hannibal, and I liked the opposite because I’m a contrary fuck. Which I am, to be fair, but this was just me desperately trying to figure shit out without being offensive.

That’s the line I touted all the way until 2018, which was when I fucked off to grad school in A City, finally freed of Buttfuck Nowhere and able to actually date. At this point, I was settled in my sexuality (girls only) and questioning my gender (non-binary or trans guy). I had also tentatively figured out during undergrad that I’m an exclusive top and a Dom. Actual attempts at dating cemented that, yes, those are my preferences, about as flexible as a steel rod. Cue motherfucking epiphany over my fanfic tastes.

And see, over these years, I was engaging intermittently with fandom. I dutifully wrote switch couples. I also continued to have rigid tastes and continued to explain it away as being a contrary fuck—to be fair, until Steve/Bucky, my preference did seem to be the opposite of the larger fandom preference. But correlation, as we know, isn’t causation. Until Steve/Bucky, I continued to write versatile couples because I honestly didn’t have the guts to just say I liked it just one way. I do now but even then, I feel compelled to add that it’s because I want to see my own taste reflected in fic, so I write/read the character I relate to as a top, it's not that deep etc. Would I be as forthright if I didn’t have that reason? Would I have such strict preferences in fic if I didn’t have strict preferences IRL? The latter’s a mystery, but the former isn’t—I wouldn’t be because fandom is still entrenched in the same ideas that got me to this point to begin with.

In every fandom I’ve been in, I’ve seen some version of this debate go around. Sometimes, it’s one party saying “why would you write Character X as a bottom, he’s so Reason A” and a reblog chain that insults the OP and/or extols the virtues of switching. Sometimes, it’s a general-ish message that says they don’t understand why people have strict preferences when we all know real gay couples switch. Sometimes, it’s blanket statements that accuse anyone with preferences of fetishizing. Sometimes, it’s the same reasoning that gets you “Character Y is a top because of Reason B” transposed on versatile couples except this takes the form of “they switch because they’re equals.”

Ya’ll, I’m fucking tired.

I have long since lost count of the number of stories I’ve seen where an exclusive top learning bottom and liking it is character growth. Where a character who prefers to bottom taking a turn on top is empowering.

Isolated, these are fine. But I’ve seen enough of such stories that it’s distinctly discomfiting and a major squick. Sometimes a trigger, if I'm too immersed in the story. I’m not going to try and burn an author at the stake because they pissed me off. I am just going to close that window and quietly handle my shit. People can write whatever they want. But this one theme hits too close to home, as you can see from this 1.6k rant.

My friend (also my ex-girlfriend) and I had an all-out bitching session about this the other day. Both of us are kinky fuckers who have rigid, complementary roles we prefer and we have both had our grueling days of struggling to reconcile our sexual tastes with our ideologies precisely because of how these things are frowned upon in conservative and progressive circles. Seeing that in fandom, of all places, is both insulting and exhausting. Topping and bottoming aren’t personality traits. Neither is D/s. It’s sexual preference and power play. It really does not have to be that deep. I am not exorcising childhood trauma using the bodies of women. My partners, former and current, have not been brainwashed by the patriarchy. We will not become better, more complete individuals once I magically stop being a stone top and my partners embrace the joys of a strap-on.

I have, with my own two eyes, seen someone say that in a really committed relationship, of course the couple will switch.

Bullshit.

It’s transparent bullshit. This does not get attributed to cisgender M/F couples. Even when the automatic assumptions of woman = bottom and man = top get addressed, switching isn't presented as the default. No one’s saying “oh, if you really love your husband, you’ll peg him”. I do know butch/femme sapphic couples get their own share of shit. Because it’s all heteronormativity, right? Can’t have any other reason for top/bottom roles.

You have two extremes with “so who’s the woman” on one end and “it’s woke only if they switch” on the other, and as far as I’m concerned, they’re equally damaging. There shouldn’t be a pressure, however subtle, to conform your taste in fiction to some arbitrary idea of progressiveness. People are going to like whatever they want anyway; all this does is create an atmosphere where those likes can’t always be freely expressed without a lot of mental gymnastics. We’re seeing so many versions of this in the pushback against so-called problematic content, but smaller, subtler versions exist too.

Fictional characters aren’t real. They can be whatever you want them to be. And yes, other people will often want them to be the exact opposite of your ideas, but that’s just how things work. Meanwhile, the people behind these usernames? They’re real. No one should be throwing real people under the bus to ‘protect’ characters that don’t exist. Hannibal Lecter doesn’t care whether he gets fucked or dismembered in Author B’s fanfiction, but the discourse that surrounds the dick up his ass? That does affect flesh and blood people.

I am not claiming that this is the only attitude in fandom. Middlegrounds do exist. Plenty of people abide by fic and let fic and there are folks who pipe up to say not every RL queer couple switches. But it’s often the extremes that reach most people. That was certainly my experience, and I’m not the only one.

I don’t really know how to end this post. It is 100% a rant and one that’s been building up for a while. Bottom line is that people’s sexual behavior varies wildly and whenever you attack sexual tastes in fanfic by saying it’s unrealistic - or worse because let’s be real, that’s a very tame word choice - please remember that there’s likely someone out there who practices it.

* I’m using switch and versatile synonymously in this post. It’s mostly concerned with top/bottom debates. A lot of what I’m saying is also echoed in portrayals of and discussions surrounding D/s dynamics, but I’m not addressing that as much for now.  

I started to put this in the tags of that other post but realized that wasn’t the place for it, because that post is specifically about the biphobic nonsense of “Are you really bi if you’re in a relationship with someone of the opposite sex?” (the answer is yes, shut the fuck up)

And I didn’t want to distract from that point because it’s an important point, but it stems from what I started to babble about, which is this notion that HETEROSEXUAL = BAD. 

I know that if someone is heterosexual/romantic and cisgendered and in a relationship with another heterosexual/romantic and cisgendered person of the opposite sex, that they are not queer. 

But, especially here on Tumblr, I keep seeing sneaky tendrils of STRAIGHT = BAD which is bullshit that I, as a biromantic asexual, have written about before. I catch only glimmers because I’m actually pretty strict about restricting my content here on the blue hellsite, but I still see some of it.

STRAIGHT = BAD is TERF nonsense, people. It’s white feminism nonsense, too, because PoC need romance in any and all flavors, thank you very much. And, yes, it’s often bi/pan/acephobic. I’m a white cis ace married to a white straight man (though he does really like Matt Damon... perhaps too much? Hmmm...). Y’all would throw me/us out of Pride in a heartbeat for “not being queer,” despite my ace t-shirts and the ace pride necklace I wear EVERY DAY. Hell, I even got my medical information bracelet in ace colors... or as close I could, anyway.

I’ve been called “homophobic” for shipping a canonically gay character with a woman because I headcanoned him (from before the gay reveal) as Bi. Yet the same people will whip around and ship a male character who’s only ever shown interest in women - and who was canonically romantically involved with a female character - with another male character, and claim, “Oh, it works ‘cause he’s Bi.”

That’s biphobia edging into STRAIGHT= BAD territory right there. “It’s okay to make a Straight Character Bi in fanfiction, as an excuse to ship him with another guy, but it’s NOT okay to make a Gay Character Bi in fanfiction while shipping him with a woman.” It’s sort of like how misogyny leads into homophobia: women are bad, therefore a man who “acts like a woman” is bad, too. Same thing. Straight people are bad, therefore a “bi” person who’s in a “straight” relationship is bad, too.  THEY AREN’T IN  “STRAIGHT” RELATIONSHIP. My straight husband is in a queer relationship because he is married to me, a queer woman. FULL STOP. And the policing that goes on in fanfiction... [rolls eyes] Let me tell you some things: A) You can do whatever you want in fanfiction. That’s why it’s fanfiction. You can ignore canon sexuality entirely if you want.

B) Are you really making the Straight Character “Bi” or are you making him “Bi but ‘technically’ Gay” which is... not a thing? Bi is not some stepping stone identity until you figure out whether you’re gay or straight. People don’t stop being Bi once they figure out which sex they’re gonna settle down with. (Also, gender binary much?)

C) FANFICTION IS NOT THE ONLY MEDIA IN THE WORLD. And, hell, as media goes, fanfiction is almost overwhelmingly made by women and/or queer authors. If you’re bagging on fanfic authors because of what they ship/write, just face the fact that you’re only going after the small fish because you can’t take on the big ones - television shows, movies, comics, and professional novels - and you want to throw your weight around.

D) JUST. LET. PEOPLE. BE. HAPPY. This is what I was going to tag-babble about on the biphobia post. If you see a woman who is happy with her male partner? BE HAPPY FOR HER. You don’t need to know if she’s bi or pan or trans or WHATEVER. JUST FUCKING LET HER BE HAPPY. Don’t tell her she’s “not really bi” if she’s in love with a dude. Don’t tell her that male/female relationships are inherently unbalanced and unhealthy. Don’t ask her how many women she’s been with, or go through her fanfic preferences with a fine-tooth comb looking for “proof” that she’s “queer enough.”

Look, I also make jokes about “the straights.” I also roll my eyes about “men.” Hell, I even catch myself “being White.” (I mean, I’m always white, but sometimes I am WHITE, y’know what I mean?) And it’s true that Straight White Men are responsible for so much of what is WRONG in our culture. 

But there is such a thing as throwing the baby out with the bathwater. So I’ma say it again:

HETERONORMATIVITY IS BAD. The idea that you SHOULD be straight, that it’s the default, that anything outside of Male + Female is a perversion? THAT’S THE BAD STUFF.  HETEROSEXUALITY IS NOT BAD. Especially when we’re talking about, oh, just off the top of my head, a black woman being shown as strong and powerful but ALSO being in a loving, consenting mutual relationship with a male partner. That shit is old hat for white women, who definitely need more “I don’t need to be married to a man to prove my worth” storylines, but for black women and other WoC, they don’t often get to see healthy, loving relationships with characters who look like them. 

Getting this through our heads won’t fix ALL the biphobia, of course, but it’ll help. 

The Good, the Drag, and the Ugly

By Ambika Nuggihalli

“Why don’t you start by telling me how you got into drag?” 

“This is a weird story. Lots and twists and turns. Not really. I was born in Chicago proper, specifically in what is essentially the West Hollywood of Chicago. It’s called Boystown,” Ren begins. 

I’m interviewing Ren Ye, a junior at USC. Ren grew up in one of the largest midwestern LGBTQ communities during the legalization of same-sex marriage and the commercialization of LGBTQ identity.

“I lived in an apartment on top of the queerest Target in Chicago,” they tell me.

“There are queer Targets?” I ask.

“Well, it’s ‘cause it’s right next to Boystown! It’s the only Target near there. By default there’s always just a rainbow section.” Ren’s apartment above Chicago’s Queerest Target was a different story. “My parents are pretty homophobic, which is ironic, because they chose to live half a block away from dyke central. I don’t know what they were trying to instill in their kids,” they joke.

Ren didn’t let their parents stop them from growing up alongside 30-year-old drag queens and sneaking out with their best friend Henry. 

“I would do my makeup with Henry in the room and then immediately have to scrub it off. Or if we were going out and meeting our friends half a block away, we’d have to take our makeup in our backpacks, say, ‘We’re going to a cafe to study,’ go to Target, and do our makeup downstairs. It was honestly really fun. Somehow I think of it as a teenage movie where we had to sneak away from the parents. It’s a queer thing to dramatize things into almost a theater play experience.” 

“It’s the inner theater kid in you,” I offer. There’s a long silence before Ren, ever the drama queen, utters back just one word:

“Die.” 

We laugh to ourselves. Suddenly, we remember this is supposed to be an interview. Ren looks sheepish. I say,

“You mentioned the commercialization of gay people and drag. Talk to me about that.” 

“This is my can. I’m opening it up. There are worms in there.” Ren makes a noise to show me just how many worms. It sounds like a lot of them. “I identify as a… I don’t even know what the right word for it is. But the for-now, kind of problematic term for it is ‘AFAB queen’ (assigned female at birth queen) or ‘Bio queen’ (biologically female queen). I like to consider myself just a drag queen, but a lot of gay men and people from the outside looking in like to categorize what drag is,” Ren explains. “There’s been another resurgence of categorizing people within queer spaces in the hopes that there will be some marketable identity out of it. That sounds very theoretical. Do you know what I mean?”

“I understand.” 

“Bitches like, keep trying to monetize us! Like, hop off my dick,” Ren rephrases. “Drag is an art form created by queer people to express something that wasn’t in the binary,” they lament. “Now that it’s in the binary, what do we have?”

“Do you find there are also divisions in drag as a person of color?” I ask.

“Storytime! My stage name is Lil Baby Bokchoy, and that came from my drag mom back in the day being piss drunk coming up to me like, ‘Your name,” and I was like, ‘What?’ and she was like, ‘Little. Baby. Bok. Choy.’ and I was like, ‘What??’ And she was like, ‘That’s your name now!’ and I like it. I think it’s a cute name.” 

Ren exchanges a smile for a grimace. “But once, I had a straight man come up to me and ask me, ‘What’s your name?’ and I was like, ‘Lil Baby Bokchoy,’ and he was like, ‘I would like to eat you up, like… I love Chinese food.’” 

What was cute and familial when spoken by a fellow Asian drag queen became fetishizing, even degrading in that man’s mouth. “I was so mad. I was so mad,” Ren frowns. 

They continue, “Being Asian within drag, it’s hard. If you come from a first-generation or very traditional background, most Asian practices don’t necessarily (a) support queer culture or (b) the arts. And it’s harder for people of color to get their own spots. Luckily, there’s also performance spots that specifically target the API community. There’s Miss Shu Mai--” “Yes! I follow her on Instagram!” I interrupt impolitely. Ren doesn’t seem to mind. “YES! I want her to be my drag mom so bad,” 

“Explain to me the whole drag mom thing.”

“Drag parents aren’t necessarily the age of your mom or your dad or anything like that. My drag mom, she’s 21. I’m 20. When I met her, I was 15 and she was 16. She’s a trans woman, she was kicked out of her house at a younger age. It wasn’t that sad of a story. She got up on her feet, she’s doing amazing things right now.

“She saw the struggle I was in and was like, let me help you. So I stayed with her for a while. She’s amazing. She used to do drag. She doesn’t really do drag anymore. A lot of trans women have problems with drag because of the categorizations within it now. It used to not be like this. It’s only within these last couple years trans people have had visceral responses to the drag community. It used to be a lot to do with race, but now it has a lot to do with gender. I’m not saying it has a lot to do with RuPaul’s Drag Race, buuuuuuuuuut… Yeah.”

I’m about to delve into the image of drag created by media like RuPaul’s Drag Race; an image that overwhelmingly depicts white cisgender gay men at the expense of other identities--especially transgender women of color--when Ren sees someone familiar in the cafe, Claire.

“I call Claire one of my sisters,” Ren says. “I hang out with her outside of drag. She helps me style my wigs because I don’t know how to style my wigs for SHIT,”

“Your wigs?” 

“Wigs. I have three wigs in the back of my closest. Fire hazard. Three of them clumped in a corner.”

“That hurts me, as someone who…” my voice drops and I look around the cafe, hoping no one else I know is in here. “I used to do cosplay,” I cough. Any effort I made to keep the rest of Cafe 84 from knowing about my middle school hobby is wasted as Ren practically screams, 

“YOU DID COSPLAY??” They jump out of their seat. “You never told me!!” “Because I don't do it anymore,” I choke, cheeks pink.

“So you’re a weeb.”

“Not anymore! Ex. Rehabilitated.” 

“You’re a weeb!”

“No I am not! I haven’t seen an anime in 5 years!”

“The fact that you know and you’ve counted how long it’s been means that you have a problem. It’s like when cigarette smokers are really into how long they’ve been off for because they keep thinking every day how long it’s been.” It is around now I realize I will be walking out at the end of this interview without any semblance of my dignity. 

“The point is. I know the wig struggle,” I assert weakly. I am grateful that Ren takes pity on me and lets me change the subject.

“I hate that in order to get volume...” they start, but halfway through, we finish the sentence in unison: 

“...you have to tease the wig!” 

“And it kills the wig! It kills it!” I feel my scalp tingle. 

“The glue has killed the wig. Everything has killed the wig. The last thing it has to kill is me,” they say, before slumping back into their chair with a smile. In my mind, I paint one last picture of an electric green wig strangling Ren in their sleep. It wouldn’t be the worst thing they have had to put up with in drag, not by a long shot.

Bisexual Struggles

For the first half of 2019, I mostly dated women. As a bisexual woman, dating men was always just easier. And frankly, my relationships with women in the past had always been better on paper than in reality—until I started dating Dominant women. For the first time, attractions to women actually grew into connections with women. And I really wanted to know more of that. To finally connect with a woman in the way I always knew was possible. 

And I did experience that. I remember the first time a woman stripped out of her suit in front of me—the tie, the vest, the dress shirt... And underneath were curves. Gorgeous curves. All I could think was, “Oh my god, I’m gay. I’m so gay.” And while it didn’t work out with her, I felt like I learned something about who I am. I began to understand why the women I’d dated before didn’t really work out. And I began to identify with a new word: queer. 

Then the Frenchman came back into my life, and the connection was even stronger than it was the first time around. For the first time in a long time, I wanted to give myself to another person. I wanted to submit. I wanted to open up—to give him all my hopes and fears, to stand truly naked in front of him with all my vulnerabilities on display. 

And that meant telling him everything. I told him about my journey over the last year and the deep connection I’d felt with butch women. I told him that I wasn’t ready to give that up. And he listened. He asked questions to understand how I was feeling. And he told me that he wanted my fulfillment, even if it meant being with someone else. And then he listened some more.

He kept listening as I explained how invisible I sometimes feel as a bisexual woman, especially as a mother (almost as if giving birth makes you straight by default). I’ve been rejected by dating profiles that say NO BISEXUALS. I have attended lgbt events through work, only to have people look at me with confusion when I mention my male partner. I have been dismissed as a lost straight girl who thinks kissing girls would be fun, when I’ve identified as bisexual and have dated people across the gender spectrum for 20 years now. 

And this man—this cisgender, straight man—has worked so hard to understand my experience and to understand what connects with me. He does research on butch/femme relationships and on the bisexual experience. He sends me links, full of outrage at how common my story is. He asks questions and listens and does everything he can to support me.

Then he comes across something I’ve posted—something from a butch lesbian’s blog—that says “TERFS AND MEN CAN FUCK OFF.” There are many blogs that prohibit men from interacting with their posts. And as I’ve explained to him, I kind of get it. Because many men act like lesbianism is performed for their benefit. I’ve gotten messages from men who say they love my lesbian posts because “lesbians are fucking hot.” Yeah, those guys can fuck off for sure. 

But then there are men like my Monsieur. True allies. Men who love someone who is queer and want to support them. Men who want to broaden their worldview to include the beautiful variety of human relationships. It’s the same reason I reblog gay men and trans individuals and lgbt people of color and female-led relationships and all sorts of things. Visibility matters. And here is a man who wants to support that visibility and amplify it, and he’s being told to fuck off. It hurts. 

It hurts him, and it hurts me. Because now as a bisexual woman, I am not only invisible but also unwelcome. I get the message that I am part of the lgbt community, but only if I’m not dating a man. That “b” has a lot of conditions on it, apparently. I get that I am privileged to be able to pass—at work, walking down the street, on date night with my partner. I get it because I have walked down the street hand in hand with a woman, and I’ve seen the stares. I’ve ignored them as she stopped to tuck my hair behind my ear and kiss me. I have informed my butch date that there’s a gender-neutral restroom at the restaurant so she knows she doesn’t have to worry. I am a part of this community, and I’d really like to feel welcome in it. 

All of this led me to another realization. A couple of weeks ago, I saw this stunning butch woman running a booth at a festival, and I really really really wanted to talk to her. My kid was having none of it though. Monsieur was teasing me about how sad it was that I missed my opportunity to flirt. But the thing is, I didn’t even really want to flirt. I mean, I did. But more than that, what I really wanted was to smile at her and have her smile back in that way that shows she knows I’m also a wlw. I wanted her to see me.

It’s not about the flirting. It’s about being recognized as part of a community where I am so often invisible. That’s what I’m missing—a sense of belonging with other wlw. Monsieur wants me to join groups and make friends who are part of the queer community. He thinks it would be good for me. But as a bisexual woman with a cisgender straight male partner, am I even welcome? 

For a short while, I was seen and valued as a queer woman. Now I feel I’m on the outside again, torn between my identity and my relationship. I refuse to choose, and I shouldn’t have to. 

1 - I feel like this message will be all over the place, I'm sorry. I just have to get it out. So I'm questioning my sexuality and have been for a while now, but I'm afraid to really think about it. I think I might be bi but it's hard to tell because I'm fairly sure I might be on the ace-spectrum as well which makes it extra hard to realize attraction since I don't think I feel sexual attraction. Or maybe I do but I'm just that dumb and don't get it?

2 - And at one point I thought I might actually be a lesbian bc my (romantic) attraction to men was paired with like a lot of nervousness and not actually wanting to date them if it came to it. But now that I have a crush on a girl (my first same gender crush that I can think of) it’s still the same; I’m super flustered around her and would do ridiculous things to impress her and just wanna hold her hand but if she were to ask me out I know I’d panic and decline.

3 - It doesn’t help that I’ve been depressed for years and I know my mental health is in a very bad place (but I’m getting therapy for it). Does that affect my confusion about my sexuality? I’m also very afraid to pick a label like bi or ace or both just in case I turn out not to be, I don’t wanna be “that straight girl” who tries to belong where she doesn’t you know?

4 - Doesn’t help that I’m terrified of the backlash I could potentially get if I was lgbt+, I don’t know if I could handle it, especially from my parents. I’m sorry if this is a lot, I’m just so confused.

I’m gonna go through this bit by bit again because there’s a lot of different issues and questions here. It’s gonna be a long reply but I don’t know how to condense it even more.

“I think I might be bi but it's hard to tell because I'm fairly sure I might be on the ace-spectrum as well [...] maybe I do but I'm just that dumb and don't get it?”Sexual attraction can be a difficult concept to understand especially if you’re on the ace-spectrum. But you’re not “dumb” for having trouble with this. You simply live in a society that treats sexual attraction a standard experience that ~everyone~ is supposed to have so it’s not really talked about what it really means. Of course it’s an individual thing to an extend but generally speaking, sexual attraction means you can look at someone (even a random stranger) and feel a desire to have sex with them. It doesn’t mean one has to act on that desire but it’s certainly a “oh this person is hot - I wanna bang!!” in the most primitive sense lol I can imagine that being on the ace-spectrum can make it harder to explore what other types of attraction you might experience and to which genders. But it’s not impossible. There’s plenty of asexual/biromantic people and I’d recommend trying to talk to some of those as well and just generally get involved with the ace community.

“my attraction to men was paired with like a lot of nervousness and not actually wanting to date them if it came to it [...] but if she were to ask me out I know I’d panic and decline.”I mean... what you talk about regarding men can be a sign of being a lesbian but I guess it can also just as well be a sign of being asexual since “dating” and “relationships” are often associated with sex and though some ace people do have and enjoy sex there’s also sex-repulsed asexuals. So if you genereally don’t want to have sex or are iffy about it that explains why you backed off whenever you had the chance to date someone - bc you thought this would have to lead to sex which you may or may not want to have. Regarding the girl you currently have a crush on, the whole ~being ace and possibly sex-repulsed~ can also play a part plus internalised queerphobia. Since you struggle to accept your queerness and you currently don’t dare claiming a label for yourself it’s evident that you have a lot of shame that needs to be unpacked. As long as you have this much anxiety about your (a)sexuality and potential biromanticism your gut reaction to a girl’s advances will be panic. It’s not surprising. Crushing on a girl forces you to think about being bi and since you’re scared of facing this reality it’s a logical consequence that you’re freaking out!

“It doesn’t help that I’ve been depressed for years [...] Does that affect my confusion about my sexuality?”Yes, it definitly can affect your sexuality and/or your questioning process. Being queer in an inherently queerphobic society is a form of constant low-key (at best; high-key at worst) trauma. A lot of queer people have some form of PTSD just from ~being surrounded by everyday queerphobia~. But even if your depression has totally different reasons, it can still affect how you deal with sex in general, how you experience romance, how you experience yourself. Questioning one’s sexuality is (unfortunately!) not a safe thing to do for many people which means it can be anxiety inducing. And queer people have higher rates of mental health problems that non-queers. That’s a fact. Anf if you’re already depressed for whatever other reason and then add anxiety over being queer to the mix, well... you do the maths! It’s hard, man. It sucks. But it’s great you’re already getting help already. I’d hope your therapist is queer-friendly so you can talk about these things with them. And additionally you should try to get some queer counselling if there’s something available in your area. If your therapist isn’t queer-friendly then I would strongly advice you to find a different one.

“I’m also very afraid to pick a label like bi or ace or both just in case I turn out not to be, I don’t wanna be “that straight girl” who tries to belong where she doesn’t you know?”’Okay, look. I recently answered two asks that touch on that subject and I don’t think I can say it better than there so I’m gonna quote myself and link you to them so you can read the whole thing if you want.

1) Even when you’re not entirely sure of your bisexuality yet, questioning people belong into the community as well. The “Q” in LGBTQIA+ stands both for “queer” and for “questioning” - some people even use a version of the acronym that has two Qs to highlight that! So you belong whether you already identify as bisexual or not. The LGBTQIA+ community is supposed to be an environment where you can safely explore your sexuality - even if you turn out not to be queer. You still belong for as long as you are questioning because “questioning” is a queer identity. (x)

2) “Straight” women are allowed to experiment and explore their sexuality. I put “straight” in quotes here because a lot of these women might actually be questioning or they are bisexual and struggling with internalised biphobia (which won’t get better if biphobic lesbians keep telling them they are “just one of those straight girls”). And even the women who do end up realising that they really are straight have had every right to experiment. It’s their sexuality and they can do with that as they please as long as they don’t hurt anyone. They don’t owe anyone to come out as queer. “Only to say they are straight” sounds like it’s a huge disappointment when all these women did was live out their sexual curiosity. Any half decent queerfeminist should know better than to police women’s sexuality - even when the women in question are straight. (x)

“Doesn’t help that I’m terrified of the backlash I could potentially get if I was lgbt+, I don’t know if I could handle it, especially from my parents.”I understand it can be terrifying, especially if you know your family won’t support you. But the thing is... no matter how much potential backlash there is, you won’t stop being queer. You cannot stop. You cannot run away from your sexuality. You can certainly try but it won’t make you happy and it will take a toll on your mental health. This is not to say that you ~must~ come out. You can be as much out or closeted as you want and as is safe for you. But you cannot convince yourself of being something you are not. There will probably be some people you can safely come out to, others you’d rather not tell. That’s the on-brand queer experience. Maybe one day you can afford to not give a fuck about what your parents think, even if it comes at the price of losing them. That’s gonna be a problem for future!You though. And if you work on self-acceptance through therapy and through connecting with the queer community, building a support system - then it’ll get easier over time.

It’s unfortuantely very common to be scared of this but being scared won’t make you any less bi or ace or whatever type of queer you wanna be. And yes, I say “wanna be” because at the end of the day what label you use and feel comfortable with is your choice. You cannot technically be “wrong” about your sexuality. Even if you pick a label now and then later realise another one suits you better - then you just change your label. No harm done.

And even if you go through a period of questioning, try on multiple queer labels and then have the grande epiphany that you are actually just a basic ol’ heterosexual heteroromantic cisgender person - you did not harm the queer community in the slightest. I wish more straight cis people would question their sexuality and gender and come to the informed conclusion that they really are straight and cis - instead of taking it for granted because our society treats it as the default. What’s the point in questioning if only people who already know that they are queer were allowed to do it?! What’s the point if everyone who questions their sexuality ~has~ to realise that they are queer?

So.... long story short... sounds like you have the very common Queer Anxiety on top of your existing depression and they are probably affecting each other and make each other worse. You should definitly try to work on your internalised biphobia and acephobia and talk to your therapist about it. I have advice on internalised biphobia here - you can use those methods for asexuality as well.

Maddie

im going to cut my hair this week. 

when i was in first grade, i wanted to cut my hair. but i also kind of didn’t. 

cutting my hair meant that i could donate it. my hair could help someone with cancer! that would be cool. and i didn’t like brushing my hair, and i didn’t like washing my hair, and i did NOT like it when my hair was wet, or dirty, or ponytail-headache inducing. 

but i also kind of liked it. it was long, and it flew in the wind behind me when i ran. i could braid it at sleepovers, and put bows in it, and could put all sorts of pigtails in it for crazy hair day. when i got older i could dye it, all sorts of pretty colors. 

i decided to keep one, long braid. 

funny interlude actually, i wanted one braid in the front. to pull my hair out of my face, and so people could see it. but my mother wanted one in the back. she was trying to talk me out of it, because she didn’t want to deal with it. she also worried that having hair too long braided could give me a bald spot. so we decided that i would have two, and we’ll decide which one to keep. 

i still have two. 

so i was two-braided kid. 

people ask me so often why i did it - on the street, at the dentist, at school. sometimes i say i don’t know. sometimes i say i don’t remember. sometimes i say that it was just a fun thing i thought of when i was little, after all, why do first graders do anything? 

i think i wanted to be like rapunzel in the books that i read, like my uncle with loooong matts that he says he keeps because it keeps the past with him, like the native american draftees that i read about in an article, that were excellent trackers, but it lessoned their ability to track greatly when the army required them to cut their long hair. 

i wanted to be like myself. my hair changed so often, i liked donating it, and i liked change, and i wanted a piece of me to be recognizeable. i always remember the people with interesting hair. 

there was pressure put on me to be good different. i was allowed to be quirky, i was allowed to be odd, as long as i remembered that i had to be funny and cool to make up for it. i needed a redeeming quality for how odd i was. i had to be good different. i forced myself to be as outwardly weird as i could because i was scared of blending in and scared of being singled out for my actual insecurities. i needed to put that difference in between me and the white, cisgender, straight, pretty, able-bodied, skinny person that i thought was “average”. i was too scared of measuring up to what everyone told me was “normal” and “default” and coming up short, that i needed to run the other way. it was my job to entertain, to put on a show for people. i remember laying awake at night in third grade, trying to rewrite the way that i talked so that it was accessorized and quirky but good quirky. “whats a more original way to say hello?”, “i should say ‘steal’ instead of borrow, i think that’s what sarcasm is”, “i think it would be cute and funny to wear mismatched socks”. 

“i wonder what hairstyle people would notice?”

but it was cute. i was young. i liked it at first. 

at girl scout camp when people nicknamed me they named me braids. 

yea, braids. that’s me. i have braids. 

its what people remember about me. my sister when working with people in my grade mention my two long braids, and people remember that more than they remember my name. 

just last week, we were playing psyche, and the question was what i would patch a hole in the roof with, and someone put my braids. 

hair. it’s weird. it’s a part of your body, yes, but also not quite. i can’t feel it. there aren’t any nerves in it. and you get to choose some of it. you start out with what comes from your scalp, be it curly, straight, dark, light, thin, thick. but you get to choose the length, the style, you can dye it, you can make it your own. it is in between body and fashion. 

when we give affirmations, and the rules say that you can’t give physical complements, i still without a doubt get ones that complement my braids. 

are these a part of me? is my choice that i made in first grade that they are complementing? is “braids” a personality? 

don’t get me wrong, i used to like it. a long time ago. i still do. maybe. or maybe it’s just change. 

my father tries to convince me to cut them off. sometimes jokingly, but also not. they’re too much work. but isn’t me who does the work? 

my sister says that i have to cut them eventually. when i say i want to keep them forever, that’s ridiculous. but if i say i will cut them eventually, then yes, that’s the right option. because what if im rejected from a job interview? i certainly can’t go to college with them. i can’t have them as an adult. 

everyone says eventually. but when the fuck is eventually? 

i don’t like them anymore. i really, really, do want to cut them. it’s been long enough. i’ve been keeping them as some sort of obligation to who i once was, which isn’t who i am now. they keep me from being able to have the hairstyles i want. they’re the reason i can’t lay down in the grass as rest me head. the reason i can’t wear necklaces or things with too many rhinestones because they get caught. the reason why i have to stop myself from getting my head wet in pools because it would confine me to hours of brushing. they’re remnants of my need to make sure im feminine enough and accessorized enough to be respected. they aren’t mine anymore. they’ve always belonged to other people. for other people to see, to touch, to play with. 

so i started mentioning that i want to cut them. 

really? cut them? why? yes, i am the same person that cried when a camp bully came at me with scissors while i was sleeping and tried to cut them off. but then is different from now. 

now that i say “now” instead of “eventually”, look how everyone disagrees again. 

even my father, against it from day one, says that he kind of regrets it, because he’s going to miss them. 

my mother resents me cutting them even more, for she’s the one that read in my diary the words “trans”, “nonbinary”, “they/them”. my braids are the last feminine thing about me that she doesn’t want to give up. 

but funnily enough, when she says “But they’re mine too! You can’t cut them!”, that’s when im sure i want to cut them. they are on my head. they grew out of my head. i brush them and braid them every month and every time i go swimming. whatever part of myself that other people think that they own has been stolen from me, and i have every right to take it back. 

isn’t this hard enough? deciding that hey, im grown, i can give up this thing that ive gotten so used to and attatched a part of my identity to? seeing the last bit of my feminine childhood fall to the floor? why do you have to make a fuss and make me hate my hair even more instead of this being a personal right-of-passage for me and a good sendoff?

but everyone wants to get rid of something eventually. because eventually never comes. 

but “eventually” is now. i’m tired of eventually. seeing a doctor eventually or fixing my teeth eventually or getting therapy eventually, moving bedrooms eventually, asking her out eventually, using my preferred name eventually, living eventually. 

i’m not cutting my hair eventually. 

im going to cut my hair this week. 

Hi munchkins, winged monkeys, et. al! Welcome to the madness; intro below.

Accepting your identity typically happens in stages. I speedran them all, sort of accidentally, almost a decade ago. I was introduced to a slammin’ redhead at a bar through a mutual friend, and thought to myself, “Oh… I like women too.” It was a few months before I remembered to mention it to anyone. There wasn’t much of a reaction.

How did I achieve this Nirvana of placid social comfort? I want to say it was because the burgeoning information age paved the way for a new era of progress and acceptance. And it did! I’m definitely happy not to live in fear of being burned at the stake for witchcraft if I’m caught kissing a woman (that does sound kinky, though). But almost every other queer person I’ve ever met (We Are Legion) has had a harder go of it than me. My situation is a bit of an exception.

I binged the queer literature early on. I got the “Haranguing strangers on the bus to acknowledge the toxic heteropatriarchy” stage out of my system. But I never went to queer communities in search of kinship, because I never felt that I lacked it to begin with. So I never realized how divisive identity politics could be even within marginalized groups.

Are you “colonizing queer spaces” if you’re a “straight-passing” bisexual woman in a relationship with a cisgender man? Or is that bisexual erasure?

Are you performing “white feminism” if you foreground trivial issues like “manspreading” in your activism? Or is it appropriation to speak on intersectional discrimination faced by women of color?

Is proudly labeling your sexuality a key part of achieving a sense of belonging and identity that no one should be denied? Or is it contributing to discrimination by propagating the idea that queer youth should be “othered” by default through their coming-out?

Fuck me.

The straight men who heard of “a blog run by two bi chicks” and expected totally different content have already stopped reading, so I’ll admit something: I find these topics annoying and a huge turnoff and I generally avoid them. That, among many other things, is a sign of how fortunate I’ve been in life (I’m trying to avoid typing the word “privilege,” but there it is). Not everyone gets to just opt out of debates on identity, because their identities are politicized against their will.

It wasn’t until recently, when I started talking to a few friends about sexual identity more in depth, that I realized how easy I’ve had it. I slowly stopped muting online threads about identity politics, like a groundhog peeking its head above the surface the see what’s been going on. What I saw was a discourse whose landscape has become so fraught (or maybe it’s always been that way) that it’s almost impossible to enter the conversation without stepping on a landmine. Someone is bound to call you out for something, no matter how good your intentions.

Upon some reflection, my goal here is mainly to inject a bit of levity into the conversation. I believe there is no greater catharsis than humor. To that end, let me start off with total transparency, by enumerating the myriad ways I’ve “failed” as a bisexual advocate:

I love threesomes. Boy, do I love them. If we get along and you ask me to have a threesome with you, I’ll probably already be going down on your girlfriend… Men: DO NOT assume a woman wants a threesome if she tells you she’s bisexual. This is generally understood to be annoying, entitled, and so tacky. I should probably address that disclaimer to all humans, but everyone will know its intended audience is male anyway.

I’m in an open relationship, because I’d be too sad if I had to give up sexual freedom and restrict myself to one gender… But hey, listen. Bisexual people aren’t more likely to cheat, stray, leave you for the opposite gender, or any of that trite crap. You know who’s likely to cheat and/or break up, according to all statistics ever? Everybody. Talk to your partner and find out what they want instead of assuming you can’t be enough for them because they’re bi. Be enough for yourself.

I’m a cisgender woman in a long term, committed relationship with a cis man. I’m told bisexual women are more likely to settle into this dynamic because of the social advantages it affords, but last night I paid for dinner, so what do the haters know anyway? Seriously though, don’t assume a bisexual person has gotten over their experimental phase and moved on to a “straight lifestyle” because they’re with an opposite gender partner. Are straight people asexual while they’re single? No (at least I don’t think so).

I call myself “gay” all the time. Usually when I’m feeling particularly gay. Is this offensive to lesbians? I don’t get invited to the weekly lesbian board meeting, so I have no idea; they don’t even cc me on the emails. I’d like to think not, because the intent is clearly lighthearted. But I may look back in five years and realize what an insensitive monster I’ve been.

I don’t go to Pride… I get crap for this all the time. Why wouldn’t I want to celebrate love and acceptance? We’ve all got to do our part! It’s fun and there’s so much glitter! Usually, I don’t go because I have to work. I like paying my rent on time. But I also think there are more effective ways to commemorate Marsha P. Johnson than marching through rural Canada, wearing a feather boa, to the sound of polite cheers. More on that later.

I’ll probably commit more cardinal sins over the course of this blog’s history, wherever it may lead us. Experience is the best teacher. I hope to hear from as many people who think differently than I do as possible. I also hope to hear from Kristen Stewart, who can DM me any time of day or night. Please.

xoxo Toto

How do you stop being a Terf? (This is a serious question)

Lee says:

That’s a hard one. First, I would also recommend unfollowing all TERF blogs, even if you were mutuals. I’d personally block the blogs, but just unfollowing would work- and get out of terf-y online spaces.

It takes time and effort to deradicalize yourself- our Ally resources has some info on stuff you can do as an ally, but I’d say the first step is using people’s pronouns, respecting their identity, and staying in your own lane about trans things- even if you don’t understand why someone is identifying the way that they do, you should accept that it’s their experience and their label and move on. 

Followers, please add on with more suggestions!

Followers say:

butterscotch-veins said: ive seen a little bit from other blogs that have since been wrongfully shut down during the whole tumblr purge thing, but theyve gotten this same question a lot and basically: it’s a process. it’s listening to trans people-trans women, trans men, and nonbinary people-and believing what they say about their own experiences, and understanding that not all people experience gender identity the same way. and it’s also learning to recognize when people are arbitrarily prescribing roles and ways of being to others, or otherwise shaming someone for ‘fitting stereotypes’, and then it gets you on the way to thinking in less, well, radfem-y ways

gaystarwarscharacter said: uh I would recommend following trans people on social media and reading up on transgender issues! the more educated you are the easier it is to understand where we’re coming from and unlearn toxicity

shadytsun said: Read and learn about trans people experiences , take your time to deconstrusct these issues

heardofbees said: Ask yourself why you previously believed(or acted as though) trans people should be excluded from your kindness and respect.

anon said: Hey terf anon, If you are considering the issues trans people face, and you are saying that you don’t want to be a terf anymore, i’d say your are already well on your way. keep learning! talk to trans folks, and listen! It is really hard to break a bigoted train of thought, and many people don’t even think to try to change, let alone try! You’ll be fine with empathy and compassion. just keep growing.

snakeonbread said: I just wanted to say I’m really proud of the terf anon! I’m glad you are recognizing hate is wrong! If you want to talk to a non-binary person I can help!

hyperandrogenism said: its important that you consider intersex people too! look at how many terf talking points like saying women instead of people with ovaries would harm intersex people,  how terf language like calling trans women “y chromos” (one i saw once) is intersexist, how sex is a spectrum, etc

bullet-farmer said: Okay, anon. I’m going to respond in good faith because I truly believe you are asking in good faith. I am not transgender, but I am nonbinary, and since TERFs often target enbies too, I feel like I have at least some of the equipment to answer you.

The process of unlearning hatred, dislike, or misplaced anger at a group of people is both as easy and as complex as it seems. Here is what I would do.

1. First, start with yourself. Ask yourself what you believe about trans people (I’m using “trans” as an umbrella term here; I am also including anyone who doesn’t fall along the male-female, cisgender binary when I say it). Write these down. Then ask yourself where you think you learned these things. If you don’t have a solid answer–provided you, unlike me, don’t have major problems with memory–the answer may be as obvious as “unlearned hatred from society at large’s treatment of trans people.” Start here.

2. Tell yourself that you must unlearn these ideas and replace them with more humane, more compassionate, and more healthy ideas if you are to give up TERF/radfem ideology. Make a solid commitment to this. I find that writing down commitments like this can be helpful; so, too, can incorporating them into a ritual or religious practice if you are religious or spiritual.

3. Start to unlearn them. When you feel them pop up in your mind or your speech, stop and challenge yourself. Ask what made the ideas pop into your head–if something turned your thoughts toward them or if they just suddenly appeared. If something made you think of them, what was it?

4. As part of unlearning them and replacing them, start to get to know transgender people as people. Read what they’ve written (books or blogs), watch films by and about trans people. Realize that every trans person is different politically, ideologically, and in how they view being trans. Educate yourself on what being transgender actually is, rather than defaulting to a transphobic idea (e.g. trans women are just “men in dresses”).

5. When you feel as though you’ve done sufficient work on yourself and that you won’t or can’t cause people emotional harm–to the best of your ability; we all cause harm without intending to from time to time–seek out transgender people to befriend and care about. Do not put the onus on them to be friends with you, or treat them like your pet morality project. Again, only do this when you feel ready, and only do it if a friendship seems to come naturally–for example, if you go to pride and end up having a great chat with a transgender person while waiting in line for your ticket, or for getting beer if you’re of drinking age, etc. When you do, remember that trans people are not here to educate you, to validate your struggle, or to cheerlead. They are people, just like you are, and want to be interacted with, with respect and care and without you putting your baggage onto them.

You can also talk to me if you want some things from a nonbinary perspective. My messenger is open, I will not expose your identity or our conversations to anyone, and I will help you all I can. I may not be able to answer some (or many) questions or to help you through some things, but I will do my best. I ask only that you approach me with an open mind, an open heart, and goodwill–and that you are over eighteen as I don’t feel comfortable, at thirty-eight, interacting with anyone younger than that.

Not everyone will want to do this for you, and you should only approach people if they unequivocally and freely offer their time and emotional resources. But I am doing as much. I am always happy when I see that people want to leve destructive mindsets behind and want to help them with that goal in any way that I can. If you PM me and don’t want to talk on Tumblr, I will also give you my email.

Let’s talk, anon. :)

Meh, I wasn’t going to do this, but. I can’t really post this on Facebook because it’ll make me look like a drama queen. And I can’t really talk about it with the affected people because the timing’s all wrong. So here’s me venting. (No, this is RL stuff and not Tumblr/fandom related so don’t worry.)

I finally spoke with one of the community pastor at my church. Or, should I say, my old church. Afterwards I decided to stop going to that church, finally.

You see, when I joined that church five years ago, I thought I was straight. And honestly, I was so afraid of questioning my own sexuality and my theology surrounding it that I just set the questions aside every time they came up. 2-3 years in I realized I was demisexual, and started using the label. The senior pastor (kind of a misnomer because he just turned 40 this year. SUPER young for a lead pastor) always seemed to hint that having a sexual identity was wrong, because apparently you’re only allowed to identify as a Christian and nothing else. I guess that would be pretty easy if you were straight and your sexuality was society’s default. I always figured he was ignorant, and if he actually met anyone who was queer he’d change his mind. 

Fast-forward to last year when I found myself crushing on a close lady friend. It wasn’t possible for me to ignore those questions and feelings anymore. So I started asking questions. Not out loud. But I recruited my best friend and we started reading a ton of books by people who disagreed with my pastor’s non-affirming theology. (Around these parts they call it “soft-complementarian.” Basically, they allow women to teach on Sundays and serve as pastors, but they don’t get to make the big decisions in church or in the home.) And I read my pastor’s book on sexuality, and he believes that only men and women can “compliment” each other, or be good matches for each other, because men and women are fundamentally different. I’ve for years now, have known gender norms to be largely social constructs. Even our hormonal make up is less binary than most people think. 

In the book, the pastor, after saying some pretty awful stuff about queer sexuality (like, providing examples in history that weren’t consensual at ALL), he said that he had queer people in his church and that he was fine with that. I thought, well, maybe, that’s a good start. Maybe, if I could be brave enough, I could start a movement of change in that church. 

This spring, the church leadership invited a guest speaker from a church in New York. He’s Australian-American, with a strong accent. I think Americans tend to think him more informed and intelligent because of it. He’s seen as an authority on God’s views on the Gays even though he’s a married, straight, white, cisgendered man. I was at ECCC when he spoke at my church, so luckily I wasn’t there to hear his words in person. When I finally did listen to the podcast, I was deeply upset. He called the gay man who left his (HIS, not THE) church a “casualty.” He said that gay people were in our church and they had “declared war” on us. His analysis of the Stonewall Riots and the Gay Rights Movement were so off base. And he questioned whether queer people are born that way, highly misquoting and twisting the words of psychological researchers. And people in my small group bible study kept talking about how “factual” he was. I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream. I wanted to vomit. 

When I talked to my small group leader, and later the community pastor, they both said that this guest speaker didn’t promote or agree with “Side X” or the “Ex-Gay” movement. He’s more what they like to call “Side B.” Side B believes gay people can participate in church leadership if they vow to be celibate the rest of their lives and “not act on their sexuality.” They see this as reasonable. And I thought maybe, since the lead pastor was okay with queer people being in his church, and on his staff, maybe he’d be willing to listen to what they call “Side A” or what sane people call “Affirming.” They really don’t like the words “affirming and non-affirming’ because it rightly makes non-affirming people look mean. Well. I hate to break it to you, pastor. But you are a bigot. Own it and stop policing my vocabulary.  Turns out, no one is allowed to lead a small group, work for the church, teach on Sunday, or serve in ANY pastoral capacity (even teaching children’s Sunday school) if they’re affirming. The church leadership goes to conference after conference on sexuality, but only if they’re teaching about gay celibacy. They think this is a reasonable take, because at least they’re not preaching conversion therapy. Uh. 

Even though I have no desire to be a church leader, or teach Sunday school--it still bothers me that I don’t have that right in this church. So I decided I’m leaving. But my small group leader is heading out of town for a month for wilderness EMT training. So I can’t really tell anyone in my small group. I have to keep making up excuses as to why I’m not going on Sunday. I mean, I guess I could ghost them all. But I do really like my small group. And most of them are more accepting than the church leadership. I’m also without a church right now, and it sucks. There are so many affirming churches in my area, but they’re all different from what I’m used to. And to be honest, having been hurt by my current church, it’s hard to open up again. 

Here’s a thing, let’s talk about mental illness and being transgender. Don’t worry, I’m not saying The Thing That Sounds Like, this is something totally different that actually exists.

I realise this is kind of like walking barefoot over broken glass and dragging you along with me, which is to say I know I could very easily say or imply something potentially hurtful unintentionally, so if I do I apologise in advance. In that same light I’m going to go through this from my own experiences and perspective rather than making sweeping statements. Because that way lies madness.

As someone with a substantial mental illness (namely Schizophrenia, but this would just as easily apply to a great many others) I am conditioned to always question and consider. That’s not just a philosophical or intellectual concept, but a survival mechanism, it’s why I don’t drink poison despite my compulsive curiosity to find out what it tastes like. More practically I’m aware that I’m different to other people by default, and so I naturally question and consider that idea, what makes me different? What makes other people the same? And the crux of my point that I’m rambling towards; who am I?

That’s either an incredibly easy question, if you’re not actually bothering to answer it, or traumatically complicated. Since we’re talking gender here I’ll just focus on that part to stop myself writing a whole book, but let’s answer it with a stock presupposed idea that I’m just a cisgendered man and work our way forwards.

Starting with the easy(ish) bit, being cisgendered, meaning your gender identity matches the gender assigned to you at birth, assigned by a doctor based on your reproductive organs conforming to one of two binary concepts of gender. That notion gets even more complex for intersex people or other people who for whatever reason don’t have easily stamped and labelled genitalia, but for clarity my personal reproductive organs conform totally adequately (humble brag)

That leads us into the complex part, “man”, what is a “man”? (aside from a miserable little pile of secrets) There are the biological essentialist arguments over chromosomes (or more accurately karyotypes), which by their nature tell us there are way more than 2 distinctions anyway, but we can always go with the doctors orders and say it’s just if you were born with an innie or an outie. Let’s follow that through then, if you can pee standing up you are a man, in which case if you wear dresses, reject masculine culture, and by all other metrics present yourself as anything other than a man, is that still true? If no, then that’s clearly not what defines it, and if yes, even worse, it proves that it doesn’t even mean anything in the first place and the whole concept should be rejected.

Obviously that’s the most shallow perspective, and there is an answer, but it’s a complicated interplay between societal expectations, gender roles, socialisation and not a small amount of historical misinformation that needs to be unravelled among other things. The bare truth, at least as far as I’ve been able to tell in my 30+ years on this dumb planet, is that if you feel like a man, you’re a man, if you feel like a woman, you’re a woman, and if you feel like a helicopter, you’re lonely and afraid and lash out at others instead of addressing your own personal failings and shortcomings.

So do I feel like a man or a woman? Well, no, I don’t feel any connection to either identity, at times I can relate either more or less with one or the other, but for the most part in terms of gender I’m honestly making things up as I go along. You might (and probably do) feel differently yourself, and that’s fine, our identities don’t conflict or even interact particularly. Unless we’re dating and trying to work out if it’s gay. (It totally is)

So what does this have to do with mental illness? Well, that was the whole prompt for the question in the first place, people with a mental illness are generally more inclined to see themselves as different to other people already, and with less assumptions to cut through they’re much more likely to question their identity in a way that non-mentally ill people don’t have to do.

I suspect, pretty strongly, that a lot of neurotypical people who feel out of place or disconnected from the society around them (see the previous helicopter comment) might just find that they come to an unexpected answer if they took the time to interrogate their gender identity. Sadly I also suspect that their own conditioning and relative privilege means that they might not actually know how.

I guess this is one of the few cases where we actually have the advantage.

Advice??? I'm bisexual but my roommate is a lesbian who keeps making passive aggressive comments about how being bi is bullshit and not even on the lgbtq spectrum .

Hi there, Anon~!!! I’m happy to offer any advice I can... I can definitely offer my opinions.  And what your roommate is saying (and consequently putting you through) is wrong, unkind, and very exclusionist.  If bisexuals didn’t “deserve” to be part of the LGBT+ movement, then they wouldn’t still be suffering nasty comments (like hers) today.

Also a lot of the people who started what we call “the gay movement” were bisexual trans women of colour.  They liked men and women, but wanted to be able to express themselves in a variety of ways, with a variety of terms (not necessarily the same words we use today), and form a community that could be a sort of safe space for anyone who was not 100% cisgender and heterosexual, for people who have identities that were not idealized by society at the time (and still aren’t).  

This is an excellent article about how bisexual people have been here from the start of whatever movement we want to call “the gay movement,” and have always been on the front-lines, not just fighting for their own rights, but for the rights of gay and lesbian people too:

https://www.autostraddle.com/weve-always-been-here-honoring-bisexual-history-imagining-bisexual-futures-308423/

For your roommate to say that you don’t have a place in the community is absurd, and simply shows her insecurities.  A lot of gay and lesbian specific folks seem to fear bisexuals for a variety of reasons that aren’t fair to bisexuals themselves.  There’s fear that bisexual people are just straight people pretending to like their own gender “for attention,” or to be trendy, there are fears that bisexual people will always leave their same-gender partners for someone of another gender.  There’s just... so much fear, and so many unsubstantiated assumptions.

Bisexual people are not “half straight” or “half gay.” You have your own, valid sexuality.  It’s not “playing the field,” as bisexual people are no more likely to cheat within monogamous relationships than gay or straight people are.  

Honestly... I think that because we’ve been terrorized into believing that we’re subpar, as homosexual (speaking as a gay guy), we like to have a scapegoat, or another group(s) of people that we can play the superiority role over, the way cisgender and heterosexual people can play it over us, due to ingrained social power (even if they don’t mean to, you know?)

Your roommate is being unkind to you, and she is out of line in spitting in the faces of all the bisexual people who have historically worked toward her rights as well as theirs, and those of everyone else who does fit into the acronym (which, imo, is anyone who has a sexuality and/or gender that is not typically recognized as the default, or which is actively degraded by the dominant combo of sexuality and gender at the time).

She’s being her own worst enemy.  And that’s tragic... I hope she learns and moves forward, but if she doesn’t, the best thing you can do is hold onto the fact that you do belong, you have a right to be here, your sexuality is valid, and this whole, entire community was also built by bisexual people (and sometimes sparked by bisexual people), alongside gay and lesbian people.  The fact that we alienate each other like this (gay and lesbian people against bisexual people, cisgender LBG+ people against anyone transgender, LGBT people against asexual folks...) is divisive and makes us all weaker in the end.  We are far less likely to meet our goals if we keep pitting ourselves against each other; against would-be allies, and people who share a lot of our experiences.

So, that’s my perspective on that sort of attitude (and I’ve seen it again and again).  As for what you can do, well, maybe open a dialogue with her based on resources you can find as to what bisexuals have done for the LGBT+ community historically (it’s a lot), how bisexuals have been there since the beginning, and why you all 100% belong here~!!!! It doesn’t have to be a fight or argument, it can simply be “hey, I know you feel this way, and I want to hear what you have to say; and, I also want to be able to share my own perspectives and experiences with you, so maybe we can come to understand each other better.”

Here are a couple more resources about bisexual people during LGBT+ history (based on a quick Google search), but if you ever want me to help you dig up more, I’ll be happy to do further research~!!!

https://bisexual.org/the-bisexual-warriors-of-the-gay-movement/

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/feb/15/bisexuality-lgbt-history-month

Best of wishes, Anon, and hopefully, if she cannot change her perspective, your roommate can at least learn to respect your perspectives and experiences, as well as your basic humanity.  She does have to agree with facts, she doesn’t have to feel a certain way, but she should at least be willing to stop talking/behaving that way about/around you~!!! That’s just basic decency.

This isn’t nearly as in-depth as I’d like it to be, but here’s my reaction to firearms legislation, mass shootings, who or what’s “to blame,” and what we should be doing about it.

At this point, honestly, I don’t care what your political stance is, whether or not you think gun legislation will or won’t stop “criminals” (whatever the fuck that actually means) from still getting access to firearms illegally. At this point, all that I care about is that we do something instead of debating every single hypothetical pro and con to any degree of restrictive firearms access. Yes, gun violence is a multifaceted issue, and the motives behind each individual instance of a shooting are going to vary. So if we’re not going to talk about making it more difficult for anyone to buy firearms, let’s talk about the sociopolitical motivations behind mass shootings, and what sort of solutions we as a society are willing to commit to.

The shooter was [insert minority here] that was motivated by [vague generalization of an aspect of their culture]. Okay. So if the attack was done by a perpetrator who had biased, bigoted beliefs that they inherited from their family/immediate cultural influence at home, then maybe we should implement more effective and comprehensive policies in schools that enforce ideological acceptance. Say, for example, that the shooter held misogynistic, antisemitic, anti-black, and anti-LGBT+ beliefs. Here’s a potential solution: legally mandate that schools — colleges, universities, and K-12 private, public, and charter schools — teach their students that women, Jews, non-white Americans, and LGBT+ people have the same human rights as anyone else, and that verbally/mentally/emotionally/physically abusing them in any social environment/setting (work, school, the gym, the bus stop, etc.) is unequivocally wrong. Start teaching children as young as pre-K that these toxic beliefs are not acceptable, no matter what that child’s parents are teaching them at home. Undermine hatred that the child is inheriting from their family. Teach children earlier about privilege and the centuries’ worth of oppression that marginalized groups have experienced and continue to experience, and teach them how to be allies to marginalized groups, like non-neurotypical individuals, or people that are physically disabled. Teach students comprehensive, scientifically-accurate sex ed, that illustrates the differences between biological sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity, and that these differences do not get to be treated as “abnormal” or “subhuman” just because they’re not as prevalent or as widely-represented as heteronormativity or cisgendered folks. We should also take the time to educate people that just because you meet a person of a certain demographic with a hateful belief, doesn’t mean they represent their entire group. If rampant Islamophobia has taught us anything, it’s that society likes to create “the great other” to have as a relevant foil for our own values, and as a readily-identifiable enemy, while ignoring the hypocrisies and flaws we deny are a part of our own cultures.

But teaching children/students to accept people of other walks of life goes against my personal beliefs! If the government meddles too much in education, they could easily co-opt learning in the future to push certain agendas. Besides, you don’t have the right to indoctrinate my children with your radical liberal ideas! I wasn’t aware that teaching children to not be dickheads to other people was a radical liberal notion, but fine. Have it your way. And yes, I agree, too much government intervention can have its own problems, in a sense of who’s watching the watchman and making sure they don’t overstep certain boundaries. But having no standardized code that teaches students to accept people from other cultural/religious/ethnic/genetic backgrounds isn’t a solution, either. And frankly, there should be no reason why anyone would argue against teaching our kids that diversity is worthy of acceptance and celebration, not shunning and discrimination. If you’re not willing to enact a solution to fix the motivation behind mass shootings, then we need to make it harder for people with radicalized hateful beliefs to acquire firearms. Either present another plausible solution to reduce mass shootings, or pick one of the aforementioned solutions.

The shooter was a [insert person with a mental illness]. Sane people don’t commit terrorist acts! Ah, yes. The old “let’s scapegoat people with mental illnesses as the perpetrators as these attacks, rather than as the overwhelming victims, in order to avoid talking about gun control.” Very well. If we’re going to continue assigning sole culpability to individuals with anxiety, depression, PTSD, bipolar disorder, and other psychopathologies, then that means we need to make medical treatment easier to acquire and less stigmatized. If you have a diagnosed mental illness, then you should be able to access free — or at the very least, cheap and affordable — healthcare to treat your condition long-term, through medication, one-on-one patient-psychologist/psychiatrist therapy, and accommodations in the workplace, school, and so on. People with mental illness should have greater access to resources that protect them from housing and workplace discrimination. We must, as a collective society, learn to not ridicule or make disparaging jokes at their expense, often to the effect of exacerbating their mental illness. We need to learn to not sneer at coping mechanisms, or ridicule someone that has a service animal for emotional and otherwise support. Because if mentally ill people are responsible for these attacks, then that means we should be treating their psychopathologies in order to prevent mass shootings, right?

But I don’t want my tax dollars to go toward the mentally ill! I shouldn’t have to pay to fix their problems. Skirting around the fact that people with mental illnesses didn’t ask to have those “problems” in the first place, what you’re saying is that “here’s a potential solution that could save human lives, but I’m not willing to spend money on it.” If allocating our government tax dollars means that people suffering from mental illnesses get help, and people aren’t as likely to die in mass shootings, then isn’t that worth the expenditure? Either present another plausible solution to reduce mass shootings, or pick one of the aforementioned solutions. 

Look. Lax gun laws are not the sole culprit behind mass shootings. The United States is a petri dish of centuries’ worth of culture clash, and the subsequent internalized hatred that comes with over-representation of privileged demographics, and erasure of marginalized people that’ve been stigmatized by the media. The problem is a combination of factors: compassion fatigue, apathy, complacency, a status quo that solely benefits certain groups at others’ expense, and an unwillingness to examine or relinquish our own biases because we don’t want to change. Radicalized violence and terrorism are multifaceted issues, influenced by factors I haven’t even touched on, because it’s late, I’m tired, and frankly I’m not the best person qualified to educate others on a complex topic I’ve only just begun to unravel myself. But I do know that we need to find a solution. We needed a solution yesterday. We needed a solution months ago. We needed a solution decades ago. Every time we are bombarded by senseless bloodshed and death, we go through the ritual of “sending our thoughts and prayers,” and then patting ourselves on the back and congratulating ourselves for doing what we think counts as the bare minimum.

It’s not enough. It’s never been enough.

Whenever someone tries to foster a discussion on gun violence and the underlying issues, the loudest voices in the room (typically our elected politicians) default to the cliché red herrings of “mental illness” and “[person of a certain minority group] committed the act, therefore [their demographic] as a whole is to blame.” And while there have been instances in the past of shootings being linked to specific groups, these generalizations are correlation, not causation. Clearly, pinning blame to any one group — a tactic we’ve been using for years — hasn’t fixed the issue, so we need to come up with a different answer. Revising our education and healthcare systems have the potential to fix so many issues in our country, but arguments are always made for why “it can’t be done.”

“Can’t” means “won’t.” Meaning that people have the capacity to try, but aren’t willing to.

Which brings us back to firearms. Because until we, as a country, are willing to sit down and find a solution for hate crimes and mental illness (the alleged culprits), then we need to make it harder for people to buy military-grade firearms and go on killing sprees at schools, nightclubs, and concerts. Our “right” to buy and stockpile thirty fucking assault rifles without a comprehensive system to account for the whereabouts of those weapons, and the identity of the wielder does not supersede a person’s right to not be shot and killed.

People are dying nearly every other day in our country at a rate not seen in other nations. At the very least, we should at least be willing to ask other countries for help, and try implementing their tactics just to find out whether or not they’d be a viable option for our country. Not wanting people dead as a result of gun violence isn’t a fucking political opinion. It’s not even a contentious ethical debate. It’s doing the right fucking thing. And if you don’t like any of the proposed solutions, then instead of telling me why mine are inherently wrong, offer up one of your own.

Acephobia, Allosexuality, and what it means to be Queer

I’ve been meaning to provide a comprehensive overview of the so-called “ace discourse” that seems to course through the internet every few years, like a UTI that’s survived 3 half-hearted trials of antibiotics, only ever fading- never dying. As an asexual individual that has been out in this world since the Year of our Lord 2010, there have been wild misconceptions surrounding this issue for as long as I can remember. Let’s start with some basics, just for fun.

Disclaimer: As an alloromantic person, I will not be speaking in regard to aromantics. Most of this stuff can be generalized, sure, but I don’t want to act like I know what it’s like to be aromantic when I truly don’t. Write your own analyses! Speak out! Smash the cishetallopatriarchy!

Asexual? Like a plant?

No, I do not experience a sexual attraction to myself. No, not all asexuals masturbate, nor do all asexuals not masturbate. I have never once woken up with a clone of myself nestled beside me, having reproduced as a microorganism would. These may seem silly things to think in this year, but this was the majority of conversation when I first began to come out. Figured I might as well get them out of the way early on.

Asexuality is defined as a non-normative lack of sexual attraction to anyone regardless of gender. “Normative” is a handy little word that means “outside of the spectrum which is considered “normal” by society”. For example, the construct of cisnormativity implies that being cisgender is the “normative” state for an individual to be. Thus, in the definition, you can hopefully begin to see what’s so queer about asexuality. Here are some more terms the community has!

Sex-positive Ace: An asexual individual who does not mind having sex

Sex-negative Ace: An asexual individual who would prefer to have no sex at all

Sex-repulsed Ace: An asexual individual who abhors all forms of sexual contact- for some, this includes activities like visiting a gynecologist.

Demi-asexual/Demisexual: An asexual that can experience sexual attraction once they have reached a level of closeness with an individual.

Grey-asexual: An asexual that experiences some level of sexual attraction, though not nearly enough to be considered within the “normative” range

Allosexual: A person that experiences a normative level of sexual attraction. Consider this term to be much like the terms “white”, “cisgender”, “abled”, “heterosexual”, and the like. It’s not that it’s necessarily bad to be this way, it’s just that being this way protects you from the discrimination that asexuals experience. Some dislike the term because “it groups me in with heterosexuals!”, but truly any adjective does that. I don’t see people saying “don’t call me white, it groups me in with heterosexuals!”.

It is truly not up to a bystander to determine whether or not someone is asexual. Personally, I knew that I was the moment I saw the term. Many said things along the lines of “Oh, you’re 15, you just haven’t bloomed yet”. However, I wouldn’t say that the analysis that you must be “of age” to identify as anything is necessarily true- Part of the reason I identified so heavily with the term was that I could feel how abnormal I was. 

My friends would talk about topics around sex, and I felt incredibly unengaged. I felt like the only person within my age group that felt the way I did. The sense of being an outsider was what caused me to gravitate to understanding myself as an asexual individual. Regardless of the sex-positive education I sought, despite having a friend group that adamantly put down any slut shaming, I could never find it within me to be sexually attracted to anyone. Many told me I was broken. I certainly felt that way. Finding a proper way to define myself helped me to embrace my difference instead.

Queer Enough To Ride

I would first like to reach out to those of you that believe that asexuality is not “queer” enough to be part of the LGBTQIA+ community- I understand why you want to gatekeep, that is- to staff the entrance to the community, deciding who is and who is not allowed within. Many of you are bisexual, nonbinary, and other queer folks that were once the subject of the “are you queer enough to ride” argument. 

I myself gatekept like you did. I quantified how trans a person needed to be to be considered part of the umbrella. I attempted to divide the bisexual community between “fake” and “real” bisexuals. I did this largely for one reason- I felt like I didn’t belong. I felt that, by providing a baseline, I could place myself squarely into a place of validity. If I could say where “not queer” began, I could say that I was surely queer! In my desperation to prove myself, I denounced the experiences of others. What I’ve now realized is an amazing concept: if we were to define all folks that felt ostracized for their presentations of gender and orientation (and wish to identify with the word itself, which not everyone does) as queer, that automatically does include us! As for using the word “queer”? I’ll turn to a very good friend of mine for this one -  @neurostorm​

Oh goodie, another fight over the operational definition of the word ‘queer.’ If you are taking the reclaimed slur approach, then NBs (which were largely unknown when the slur was at its apex and was strategically reclaimed), transmasculine people (whom the oppressor barely knows exist), and arguably even cis lesbians (who often had different slurs hurled toward them exclusively) don’t have a right to use it either; because the slur was disproportionately applied to gay men and transfeminine people (since the oppressor believed they were one and the same). However, it was agreed that by extension of a general oppression that all gay people and all trans people could “have” it. It was this same idea of general oppression that started the LGBT+ coalition, since on a 10,000 foot level, the oppressor saw them all as just different manifestations of the same thing. The redefinition of the slur to become synonymous with the political coalition was part of its reclamation. The strategy was twofold. First- use its deliberate fuzziness to capture all the edge cases, as gender and sexuality are highly individualized. Second - use this re-branding to neutralize the slur’s power further by completely transforming it to mean something else entirely in the hearts and minds of the cis-hetero world. Regardless of how one defines that term, there is one very basic truth. It has ABSOLUTELY NO BEARING on who gets to be considered a part of the greater LGBT+ coalition, whether or not the term is used to define it! So with that said, how SHOULD we define those who are included? Opinions vary, but strictly for the “sexuality” part of the equation of things, my personal definition I tend to fall back to is that it meets 3 basic categories. 1. Its a significant departure from standard sexuality. 2. It’s a significant departure from expectations placed upon you by society’s sexual defaults. 3. It has a major impact on ones life in how they relate to society’s sexual expectations. This doesn’t imply oppression a priori, and this is deliberate. Oppression is a byproduct of greater society being shitty to certain groups based on their identity, not a part of their identity itself (if it was, then that identity ceases to exist if the oppression against it stops, and I don’t stop being autistic just because I wake up in a paradise where abelism doesn’t exist). Oppression would be that there is a systemic pattern of mistreatment and bias that conforms to and is promoted by the power structures that be, disempowering and marginalizing the other group for their deviance from the imagined normal. So then, about the aces. Where do they fall in in regards to this criteria. 1. Asexuality is a significant departure from standard sexuality, as standard sexuality assumes a moderate-to-high level of libido and desire by default (less so for female perceived people, but less is not none). 2. Asexuality is a significant departure from expectations placed upon one because they are expected to perform sexuality and have a certain level of desire in order to be seen as good partners (and in the case of male-identified people, have their gender validated). 3. This has a major impact on ones life because the expectation and desire of sexuality (or at least the performance thereof for the sake of another) is seen as a default part of romantic relationships to the point where it is implicitly believed by some that it is the sole reason they exist. It has a major impact in that it is always assumed to be childhood trauma, shyness, and “not meeting the right person” (and you know what, even when that is the case it doesn’t invalidate the asexuality they have).

I’ll return to their infodump in just a bit, as they did have more to say. No, they are neither cis nor het, if you’re intent in devaluing their opinion. In fact, they’re not ace! So I will add some of my experience to the meat of their argument. I currently identify as GenderVague (being on the autism spectrum, I don’t necessarily have the best grasp of structures like “gender”), bi/panromantic, and asexual. I did not come out as any form of nonbinary until 2014, as I didn’t have the terms to describe myself, and I did not come out as non-heteroromantic until I forced myself into a state of inebriation (read: became absolutely plastered) and, well, slept with a girl to prove myself. 

I knew that I liked girls, don’t get me wrong! It’s just incredibly hard to prove that, you see, when you’re asexual. I could say that I crushed on girls since the 3rd grade all I liked, but I was forever a “fake bisexual” until I could say that I had sex with a woman. That community mindset (and a desire to not disappoint my allosexual gf) led to me doing what I did, all in the effort to validate myself.

I guess I’m bringing all of this up to say this- whenever I hear people talking about those “cishet aces” always “trying to invade” yadda yadda, I see myself in 2012. To the majority of queer folks, I absolutely appeared straight, being closeted. I’m certain asexual aromantics also are devalued as “straight” for the same reasons. I don’t think any of us are any less queer, forcing ourselves to have sex or not. I also really don’t think anyone whose m.o. is not being interested in sex will get much of anything besides community from being recognized as queer. And for those that identify as heteroromantic in full spirit? I’m going to echo what asexual people of all orientations have been saying- if you say that they’re not welcome, but you say that I’m welcome, you’re specifically stating that my experiences as an asexual person are nothing. Since I personally received far more discrimination for being asexual than for being bi (I emphasize personally, as everyone has different experiences), I feel invalidated when people say I wouldn’t be queer without being bi. You can’t consider my asexuality queer while at the same time stating that asexuality as a whole is not queer.  Let’s go onto the second half of @neurostorm ‘s rant-

As for oppression, there is a systemic pattern of mistreatment and marginalization against asexual people that favors the power structure. The Asexual community can probably answer this in more detail, but off the top of my head, one example of systemic oppression is that society sees a low-libido as a kind of arrested development of maturation (which plays in to abelism in some ways too). Society will pressure asexuals to perform sexuality and force-spark development through things such as corrective rape. Society will flat out erase the existence of asexual people (I know many an evangelical who believe that there is no such thing as an asexual person, and that anybody who says so is just trying to virtue signal and hasn’t admitted their “sins of the heart” to themselves). All of these examples and more are promoted, encouraged, and tacitly accepted by greater society at large. All of these examples are born from and promoted by minor and major biases saturated in the consciousness of the majority of the population, and favoring the power structure that currently exists. That effectively MAKES it oppression using the definition I provided earlier. It is a “…systemic pattern of mistreatment and bias that conforms to and is promoted by the power structures that be, disempowering and marginalizing the other group [in this case, asexuals] for their deviance from the imagined normal.” So to recap. My argument is as follows. 1. The strategy to re-brand “queer” as a coalition name is deliberate and decided upon by the greater LGBT+ community in roughly the 1990s-2000s. If someone personally doesn’t want to be referred to that way, that’s all well and good, but it’s not their place to tell another how they should refer to themselves. This applies to any reclaimed slur, term, or identity phrasing (i.e. the argument of identity-first language vs person-first language in the greater disabled community [other disabled folks can refer to themselves however they want, but they don’t get to tell me I HAVE to use person-first language when I greatly prefer identity-first language to describe myself]). 2. Regardless of how 'queer’ is operationally defined, that has no bearing on whether or not asexuals can be part of the greater political coalition. 3. Going by what I feel is a reasonable set of basic criteria, Asexuals ARE qualified to be a part of the greater political coalition. 4. It can be demonstrably proven that asexuals are systemically oppressed by virtue of their asexuality.

There’s certainly folks that are attempting at this very moment to argue that allowing asexuals into pride will mean that ace voices will take over “more important ones”. I would like to introduce you to a concept that every pride I’ve been involved in fails to implement- prioritizing intersectional voices. Giving the mic to trans lesbians of color instead of white cis gay men. For the love of Marsha P. 

Hell, as a disabled, trans, bi, asexual, autistic immigrant I’m 10 times as intersectional as Tyler Oakley, so can we stop making him our first choice for a speaker? I’ll get off this tangent, but my point is that I am actively dreaming of a world where people that are only one letter of the whole acronym don't speak over all the rest of us. I don’t think it’s fair to be fearful of asexual folks taking up space when our community is so blatantly whitewashed and ciswashed as it stands. Speak out in favor of intersectionality for everyone, stop giving white cis gay men a pass to speak over everyone.

Acephobia

Acephobia, Acemisia, Aceantagonism- There’s a multitude of names to describe the systematic oppression and violence that asexual folks experience. I personally prefer “Acemisia” because it takes up fewer Twitter characters and doesn’t associate itself with mental ailments like agoraphobia, but I’ll call it acephobia since that’s what the kids on here are saying. Acephobia, like other forms of discrimination, is too wide to be wholly understood in a simple lesson, so forgive me if I don’t touch on some issues. In general, oppression exists on multiple levels-

Institutional violence- discrimination written into schools, churches, public offices, and other power structures that make up The State.

Social violence- discrimination carried out as an unwritten social rule through everyday language and encounters

Physical/sexual violence- murder, rape, the fun stuff! /sarcasm

I’m going to try to address each level the best that I can, so bear with me.

Institutions & Asexuality

Many queer folks will use religious texts and fundamentalist Christian views to outline why their oppression in society is legitimate, and this is because The Church is an institution that entwines itself in a lot of issues of morality and law, especially in regards to marriage and love. A common argument that I hear is that asexual folks face no such oppression in that system. However, as an asexual who has discussed this issue for the better part of 7 years at this point, I have discovered this- fundamentalist Christian people do hate asexuality, specifically because it throws a wrench in the idea that one has to consummate a marriage. For those unfamiliar, consummation of a marriage is the act of having sex after a wedding in order to prove the marriage legitimate. 

“But isn’t asexuality the same thing as chastity??” you ask, clearly illustrating that you don’t get the point that we are not experiencing any sexual attraction at all, no matter how hard we try. The problem is that asexual folks don’t “get over” this “phase”. Many of us are unable to consummate marriages, and to not consummate a marriage deems the marriage, in the eyes of the church, illegitimate. This isn’t merely a thought experiment- I do know asexual folks that legitimately were run out of their home for disclosing that they would never marry “the way God intended”. That’s actually a reason for marriage cancellation- “annulment due to a failure to consummate the marriage”. Thus, you can see that the institution of the church, which affects the institution of marriage, which we all know impacts relationships very intimately, has a very marked issue with putting its head around the idea of a sexless marriage. When the same-sex-marriage debate was still young in the early 2000s, many opponents claimed that the reason same-sex marriage was sinful was because the process of consummation would require, in their gross words, “sodomy”. I brought up that many asexual homoromantic couples were likely seeking the ability to marry, and this idea jarred them further- they were outraged that anyone could refuse to consummate a marriage, and stated that a sexless marriage was effectively more of an insult to God than a marriage that brought forth “sodomy” [blech].

There are other institutions where asexuality is actively discriminated against within- I was actually given an intervention in a liberal middle school for writing in health class that I had no plans to have sex, and I quote, “never never ever EVERRR!!!”. I know, mildly excessive, but I was completely sex-repulsed at that age. Multiple teachers were brought in to try to convince me, stating that at my age, “you really need to be thinking about sex rather than trying to avoid it”. Even though this program focused on encouraging students to abstain from sex until they’re ready, they found it problematic that I had no interest in “EVERRR!!!” performing the act. It spoke heavily to the hypocrisy that even abstinence-encouraging programs have when faced with asexual students.

Asexuality in Society

There were countless YouTubers that popped up around the year 2010 that discussed in depth the social ramifications of coming out as an asexual individual. One in particular that I followed was swankivy, who was immersed in discourse in the immensely queerphobic 2009 youtube and OkCupid community. She heard everything from “you’re clearly a lesbian in denial, come out of the closet and join us” to “you’re straight because that’s the default”. In fact, she has almost a decade’s worth of videos titled “Letters to an Asexual” that highlight the sorts of comments we receive on a daily basis. If you couldn’t already guess, many of the comments indicated that she wouldn’t be so controversial if she could pick a “real” sexuality, and stick with it. People often told her things like “it’s ok to be a lesbian” after she had already argued extensively that her asexuality was how she was made and who she was. I know that 2009 youtube videos don’t age the best, so take all of those low-quality films with a grain of salt- a lot of homophobia got launched at her in the early days, and nobody in 2009 was entirely unproblematic.

As the asexual community began to receive recognition from both queer and cis/het communities, their placement was treated like a game of hot potato. We didn’t fit in with the cis/het community, as we still got accused of being broken for not experiencing sexual attraction. The queer community hasn’t wanted us either, for largely the same reasons. We were too deviant to fit in with the mythical norm, and simultaneously too deviant to fit in with the counter-norm. Both communities had very staunch views on sex that we couldn’t fit into. 

Eventually, the A in LGBTQIA+ made space for us. By the year of 2011, I began to see space made in the queer community as a whole for asexual folks. Many empathized with our struggle to find a place of belonging, especially bisexual and trans folks that had been overshadowed by the L and the G for decades. This was a magical moment for me. I didn’t get queer theory at this point. I didn’t totally understand gender & sexuality studies at 16. There was just a piece of me that finally felt welcome. I was allowed to be myself, and everyone was expected to educate themselves on my lived experience to make that possible. I stopped being bombarded with questions and started being able to talk to asexual lesbian and bi girls, asexual trans folks, and everyone else that showed me that it just might be ok for me to be more complicated than society would like me to be. … I’m typically a person that speaks uniquely in logical & academic terms, but looking back at that moment in time is difficult for me to succinctly verbalize. It is incredible to find a place of belonging… I don’t think I would have survived had I not had a community. Being an asexual teen was only bearable the moment people said “You know what? It sucks that people are shitty to you for not being into sex. You can hang out here, we think you’re pretty cool anyways. If you wanna talk about sex we’re down but we totally respect how you were made and know what it’s like to be forced into being someone you aren’t”. I can prove to you with study upon study that unconditional love and acceptance is absolutely integral to a developing teen, but I don’t think even that would attest enough to how blessed I was to find a community who was ok with the way I was.

Asexuality, Sex, and Rape

This section contains sensitive content that details largely my personal experiences with corrective rape and coercion. If you may have a difficult time reading, give yourself a moment to prepare. I feel that this discussion isn’t nearly whole without this piece.

Firstly, we must discuss the term “corrective rape”. I hear often that it is impossible for me to have experienced corrective rape, as I do not identify as a lesbian woman. Let’s break this down as gently as possible- Firstly, if you’re going to claim that asexual corrective rape is “appropriation” of a lesbian term, I hope you also exclude white lesbians from using that term, seeing as a doctor coined it in discussing the corrective rape of black lesbian women in South Africa. Alternatively, we can understand that it’s a term that very succinctly identifies an experience in which someone is targeted for sexual assault in the attempt to “cure” them of an undesirable sexuality. We really ought to give more credit to black innovations of language in general, but I think you see the point that it’s easier to say “I was correctively raped” than “I was targeted for rape by a bisexual guy that believed that asexuality specifically needed to be raped out of someone”. Hopefully, we’re clear on this now.

In 2012, I met Eric Epperson at an anime-con sort of event. He was a bi cisgender allosexual man. He knew I was asexual, and promised that we could “go slow” if I agreed to date him. Seeing as this was my first ever experience with a relationship (and being autistic and easily manipulated), I naively agreed to date him. He, predictably, did not hold true to his promise and forced me to become sexual with him early on in the relationship by saying “well how will I know you really love me if you’re not willing to make love to me?”. He was very effective at discreetly threatening me with abandonment and slander (and more, later) were I to ever say no to his advances. 

Some months into the abusive relationship, I finally persuaded him to watch a documentary on Asexuality in the hopes that he would learn how uncomfortable I was with sex. He made multiple comments on how effectively raping the male star would make him give up asexuality (He was a “feminist”, though, so he never called what he did rape). He referred to asexuals featured as “creepy freaks”. He boasted about how he had cured me and turned me into a “normal person” by threatening me and guilting me into allowing him to do what he wanted to me. He commented on what a sad, empty life the male star must have, not knowing the joy of having Eric’s dick inside of him. He and his mother, a cisgender bisexual woman, were laughing by the end of the documentary about the “freaks who need help”. Eric later admitted that he targeted me specifically because he was interested in “curing” a “weirdo” like me. He had a phrase for it too. “I’ll turn you Epper-sexual”. He intended, from the start, to “cure” me. 

I’m lucky to have been set free from the relationship, even though it was only because he found a 13-year-old lesbian to “turn eppersexual”.

A month after being let go, I met a stunningly beautiful girl. I’ll call her M. She was incredibly effeminate and reserved and had long, brown, curly hair and freckles. I was smitten. Only being a month away from the abuse, I was in a very vulnerable position and asked her to be my girlfriend. Initially, she was okay with “taking it slow”, but eventually she confessed that she really wanted to have sex with me. Afraid that I would be discounted as a “fake bisexual”, I got incredibly drunk (I became severely alcoholic, but that’s another article) and satisfied her as best I could. It was fine at the time, but the aftermath is why seeing her on campus to this day tears my heart.

We broke up because I was way too traumatized by my abuse to hold together a relationship, and drinking and using all day forced me to drop out of college. We initially had planned to stay friends, until a mutual friend of ours broke up with their girlfriend because she was pressuring them to have sex with her, and they were asexual. They felt it better to break it off than to leave them wanting.

“If you’re asexual, you really need to give that up if you really want to satisfy your partner!” she said. “I mean, Ren did it!”

I called her out for that comment, and we haven’t spoken since.

I’m just one asexual out of millions. The fact that countless others can attest to having dated Ms and Erics should speak volumes- after all, the personal is the political. That is to say, I’m not an isolated case. What happened to me was bred from a culture that, at its core, devalues asexuality. I can only hope that M’s learned better since, but I know for a fact that Eric continues to be on the hunt for kids like who I was.

A Positive Note

That last section was totally trauma central so I’m going to end on a positive note.

To keep what happened to me from happening to others, we need a cultural shift. Rather than attempting to quantify how bad acephobia is compared to transphobia and homophobia etc, we need to realize that every human has an intersectional experience. It’s not a matter that an asexual biromantic black woman is oppressed more than a disabled autistic gay trans man- people living in intersections experience overlaps and magnifications of oppression in such complexities that to state something as over-arching as “any black person is more oppressed than any trans person” is not only devaluing but too simplistic to account for personal experiences. Instead, it would be more accurate to say that the woman and man mentioned earlier experience different disadvantages in society, not more or less.

Not one asexual person is demanding that all allosexual folks stay quiet on their experiences being involved in other intersections of oppression. All we’re asking is a place at the table and a room to feel safe in.

I hope that this article was able to provide positive insight regarding the discourse. Let me know if you have any other questions! 

As always, remember- progress > perfection. 

Thoughts on racism, sexism, and fandom: How to Suck Less

I've been in fandom for almost twenty years, and here are some things that are true of pretty much every fandom I've seen: There is a lot more sexism, racism, homophobia, ableism, anti-semitism, etc., in fandom than most of us would like to admit, and the vast majority of it is unconscious. People (mostly white, etc.) THINK they're being perfectly unbiased and fair, and they really, really aren't. Their unconscious prejudices are shining through. And it sucks. We, collectively, suck. But here's something I think most people miss: when we talk about this stuff, the point is not to make people feel bad. It's not about who's a "good," non-racist person, and who is a "bad" racist. It's not about proving who's "pure" and who's not. (Or at least, if that's why you're doing it, you're a really screwed-up self-righteous asshole.) IT'S ABOUT CHANGE. Because the thing is, we are all swimming in a sea of racist, sexist, queerphobic crap all the time. We can't change the larger culture (at least not by ourselves), but we CAN change fandom. I know, because fandom has gotten better about this stuff over the last twenty years. There is still a LOT of room for improvement, but it's better than it was. And it can get better than it is. But not if we ignore the problem or sweep it under the rug or get defensive. The first step in sucking less is to realize that you suck in the first place. The second step is figuring out how to suck less. This post is about that second step. This post is about how to take the knowledge that, yes, we have some problems, and work to make those problems smaller. This post is about how to work through that, grow as a person, learn to suck less, and still have fun in fandom while you're doing it.

There are a lot of posts out there about how to be a good ally. There are also lots of posts out there about avoiding racist/sexist/ableist/whateverist tropes in fic. And there are a lot of good posts out there pointing out that fandom gets WAAAAAY more interested in able-bodied neurotypical cisgender white men than about any other character. We all know what the problems are, or at least, we should. But I think there's a need for "okay, I want to be more inclusive/suck less, how do I do it" on a broad level before we get to the nitty-gritty of "these are tropes I should avoid or be careful about." Namely, how does one get oneself to be fannish about characters that all one's cultural conditioning is screaming at you to ignore? First, some basic principles. 1) This is fandom. It is supposed to be fun. This should not be like that terrible assignment from your least favorite teacher in school, fandom should be fun. 2) We've all been marinating in a stew of racism/homophobia/sexism/ableism/antisemitism/islamophobia all our lives. Even if, on a conscious level, you disagree with any given ism, your gut has been conditioned to prioritize white able-bodied cissexual neurotypical men over everything else. 3) Racism and sexism suck, and sucking is bad, and it makes fandom NOT fun for those on the receiving end of it. We should all be trying to suck less, both as a goal in its own right and because we want fandom to be fun for EVERYONE. 4) It is possible to work at sucking less while still enjoying fandom. 5) The higher we are in the kyriarchy, the more damage your sucking causes, and the more we are protected from that damage. So, like, a white person is part of the power structure that causes and benefits from racism; we're less likely to see it, more likely to cause damage to others because of it. BUT we also have a lot more power to change things for the better. It's not up to black people or Latin@s or Asians or Roma or LGBTQ people or people with disabilities or Jews or any other oppressed group to fix things--they're not the problem. The ultimate responsibility is up to Whites to suck less. (This doesn't mean that, say, a Black person can't suck--just that they are WAY less likely to damage others through their suckitude.) So the question is, how do we as White people have fun in fandom while sucking less? Fear not! It's actually pretty simple, you just have to make that a consistent priority. Let's define Principle 1. How is fandom fun? Well, for me, fandom is fun because there are shows and movies and books that I love, and I love reading and writing fanfic and meta about them, and squeeing about them with my friends. I find all of those activities fun. I hope you all do, too. I want you to keep on finding those things fun. BUT there is a problem. We are conditioned by our society to value men more than women, Whites more than any other race, able-bodied neurotypical people more than disabled and/or neurodiverse people, etc., etc., you can all fill in the hierarchies that our society has tried to instill in us (and has probably succeeded in instilling more than you realize). The preference for white men in fandom isn't any worse than in other places in our society. It's true, and I think it's important to remember. The problem comes in when we leave it at that. "Well, it's not my fault, and anyway even if I AM conditioned to pay more attention to white men more than anything else, this is fandom so I should be able to just ignore that and go on like always." Aaaaand then you continue to have fun, but you keep sucking, and hurting people in the process. We have all been conditioned to favor whitedude above everything else. By which I mean, our society privileges stories about able-bodied neurotypical white men above stories about other people. A white man who has super incredible abilities and can do all the things is Batman, a white woman with all the same qualities is a Mary Sue, and is usually depowered to make room for the male hero, to boot. And characters of different ethnicities, or religions, or with disabilities, don't even have it that good. We think stories about white men are interesting because ... those are the stories we've read, watched, listened to the most. We're used to them. We've been taught all our lives that these are the good stories, the stories that matter. And so most of us have learned to prioritize those stories on an unconscious level. And we show that in our choices, which shows we watch, which actors/actresses we think are hot, which characters we write about. The good news is, that's conditioning. It's not some inborn genetic thing, it's how we've been trained. And we can train ourselves differently! It starts by being mindful. What we consume shapes us, right? So keep that in mind when you choose what you consume, what movies, what books, what TV shows, what fanfic. I'm not saying "don't watch your favorite show if it's got too many white men." But let's be real: some TV we watch/read because OMG ITS TEH BEST EVAR!!1! and some we watch/read because it's fun and some we watch/read because our friends are and some we watch/read because it's better than other things we could be doing. When you're making a choice between two shows/movies/books that will probably be about the same level of entertaining, go for the one that's less ALL WHITE MALE. This is the age of the internet, where our choices are much greater than they've ever been before. When you're browsing Netflix on a Tuesday night looking for a fun movie to watch, give higher preference to diverse shows. Not in an "OMG, I can't ever watch anything with white men again, no matter how awesome it is!" way, but rather in a "I've seen so many movies about White Men(tm) in my life--is this one going to just be more of the same? Are there other options I might enjoy?" way. When you've got a variety of options and they would all be enjoyable, go for the ones least likely to reinforce the WHITE STRAIGHT ABLEBODIED NEUROTYPICAL CIS MALE IS THE DEFAULT AND BEST inside your head. What this can look like in practice: I like Marvel, but I am not a big enough fan to watch all of their shows. I pick and choose and leave myself time for other shows as well. On Netflix there are two Marvel shows I could be watching that are roughly comparable: Daredevil and Luke Cage. Both are about urban superheroes, but Daredevil is white and Luke Cage is black. (Also, Daredevil has some really terrible Yellow Peril stuff.) So I watch Luke Cage. I enjoy it. I'd probably enjoy Daredevil, too, but I don't have time for everything, and so I prioritize. And I don't treat it like I'm taking my medicine and forcing myself to watch something because it's more socially just and not because I like it. I go in expecting to have fun. And you know what? Usually I do. Another example: back in 2011, I needed something new to be fannish about. I had enough time to be fannish about one television show in addition to the stuff I was already fannish about. There were two shows premiering that fall that looked interesting to me, both rather similar: Grimm, and Once Upon A Time. Both were urban fantasy. One starred a white man, one starred a white woman. I chose the one starring the woman and went in to it prepared to love the show. Not grudgingly, but "ooh, this could be fun." And I loved it. If I hadn't, I would have stopped watching it after a couple of episodes and switched to Grimm. That was always an option; I wasn't watching OUaT to be masochistic about "doing the right thing." I was choosing which of two interesting options to give brain and heart space to, and I was going in to it with a brain and heart open to being pleased. If, despite that, it didn't please me? I'd move on to the next thing. Plenty of other fish in the sea. But I started with the less-whitedude option. What this does is it gives brainspace to new possibilities. It erodes the assumption your hindbrain makes that white men matter more than other people do. It erodes the assumption your hindbrain makes that white men are more interesting. The more attention you pay to people outside the cultural norm, the more interesting you find their stories. When you do this, you are actively re-training your cultural conditioning about who matters and who is interesting. And you are having fun while you are doing it. This has two ways that it will erode your suckage in fandom-related ways. First, it increases the number of people likely to be in non-whitedude fandoms, which is a slight counterweight to the overwhelming whitedude nature of fandom in general. One more person reading the fic and (hopefully) commenting. One more person posting about it, whether you do meta/art/fic/gifs/fanmixes/videos/whatever. Second, if you do this consistently over a long period of time, you will find that your instinct to always focus on white male characters will erode. Your background assumption of who is interesting and who isn't will start to shift. Do this with the fannish content you produce, as well. You have a tumblr? Give preference to reblogging women and people of color. If you see something about white guys that is AWESOME AND SQUEEWORTHY, go ahead and reblog it and enjoy it while you do. But, you know, a lot of times we reblog stuff that's interesting but not full-on capslock squee, right? Stuff where it takes a second to decide if you should reblog or not. Where you could go either way. And in those cases, make a conscious decision in favor of diversity. Stuff about white men? If it's in that "should I reblog this?" category, don't reblog it. Stuff about anyone else? Do reblog it. When figuring out new content to post, do the same thing. AWESOME SQUEEFUL STUFF? Post away! Interesting but not incredible? Give more weight to stuff about women and people of color and queer people and disabled people and neurodiverse people and Jews and Muslims and all the rest. It's not about harshing the squee, or putting your fannish tastes through some kind of quota system. It's about balance. Trust me. The world and fandom both have PLENTY of whitedude stuff, they'll get along just fine without more. But there's a shortage of everything else, so that's where the focus should be. And you can do the same with fanfic! Again, I'm not saying "never read your favorites!" I'm saying, be mindful. Are you a big Captain America fan? Check out the Sam Wilson and Natasha Romanov and Maria Hill fic in that fandom, and keep your eye out for more. When you do so, consider filtering out Steve/Bucky stuff occasionally. (http://ift.tt/2oUmoPT) After all, presumably you already read a lot of S/B. Your goal isn't to find fics where Sam is in two scenes to get the Whitedude together or help them work out their shit, but fics where Sam gets to really shine. As himself, not just the sidekick to the whitebro. And don't do it grudgingly; do it with open heart and mind, ready to embrace Sam in his awesomeness. This isn't to say you should never read whitebro fic, if that's your thing, but rather that there should be a health(ier) balance. This isn't about forcing you to choke down your bitter fannish medicine; it's about expanding the things you love. It's about creating more opportunities for joy and squee. And when you read those fics, comment on them! Spread the love! Authors who write about women or people of color tend to get fewer comments on those fics than on stories focused about white male characters, which is discouraging. Share the love; kudos and comment. A comment saying "Good fic" is great, it doesn't have to be long and involved. This holds true for all your fic, by the way, not just the fic where you're consciously diversifying your reading habits. Reading a Steve/Bucky fic and the author wrote Sam well, or Natasha, or Maria, or Rhodey, or Dr. Cho? Tell the author! Point that out specifically. Doesn't have to be elaborate; "I liked Sam" is fine. The point is to reward people for being more inclusive. When you find a particularly good fic based on a certain woman or character of color, check out the author's page. Chances are, they've got more like it. If they do, and you like their work? Subscribe to them so when they write something, you see it. Again, the goal is to still have fun with awesome fic, but shifting what you consume to be more diverse. Because that will shift your internal default away from the Straight White Neurotypical Ablebodied Man that our society tries to push as the default. And that will affect how you see the world both in fandom and out of it. Part of the fun of fandom, for many of us, isn't just about consuming content, it's also about creating it. I love writing fanfic. And here's where a lot of peoples' asses start to show, and where they start whining about how they just write what they write and they only get plotbunnies for whitebro. And that may be true, but again, this is something you can actually change. If your brain doesn't come up with plotbunnies for characters of color, or for women, or for lesbians, or for a mixed-race canon couple, or for disabled or neurodivergent people? You can work on coming up with plotbunnies on your own and train your brain in the process! For example! Say you are a fan of The Flash. For every episode you watch, come up with one plot bunny for a non-white male character. You don't have to write it; that's another step down the road. It doesn't have to be something huge. The first step is getting your brain used to generating plot bunnies for characters you normally wouldn't. If Iris had a big part in that episode, think up a story idea for her. What was she doing while Barry was fighting the villain of the week? How's things going at work for her? If Joe had a big part, think up an idea for him. If there was an Iris/Barry moment, think up a story idea for that pairing. Wally, Cisco, Caitlynn, Lisa Snart, you get the idea. If you're a Supergirl fan, come up with a story idea for Hank or James or Renee Montoya or M'Gann each episode. You don't have to write it, the goal for this part is to get you used to thinking of these characters as people with stories. People you are interested in. I mean, if you get a great idea and want to write it, awesome, but step one is to get your gut and your hindbrain primed to think about these people and care about their stories. You've already been primed to care about and think about white male characters by everything you've seen and read and heard since you were a baby, but there's been precious little priming you for everybody else, so a little extra effort is probably going to be needed. The next step is similar to the choosing-fandoms step, only for choosing plotbunnies. You will probably have some ideas that just yank you over and demand to be written, so write them. But if you are anything like me, there are also times that you want to write and have a lot of different ideas you could write, you just have to decide which. And in that case, you can probably guess by now, give more weight to the non-whitebro options. If you have four plot bunnies you could write, and two of them are about white male characters and one of them is about a white woman and one is about a character of color? Give more weight to the woman and (especially) the character of color. I'm not saying "you can never write white men again!" I'm saying that in your decision-making process, recognize that the rest of the world is weighted WAY THE FUCK IN FAVOR OF WHITE ABLE-BODIED NEUROTYPICAL CIS MEN, so to provide balance, we should be weighting in favor of everyone else, and giving the most weight to the people that society gives the least weight to. The things I've outlined in this post don't magically get rid of all that social conditioning overnight, and they don't magically fix everything. What they do is they give you a place to start, and aim you in a direction so that, if you work on it over time, you will suck less while still having fun in fandom and making it more inclusive. And the more people who do stuff like this, the less fandom will suck over time.

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