Discourse !!! - Tumblr Posts
What the ffuuu- Argh. It's just getting worse ain't it? I'm sorry +(
Please read.. Please
TW: Harassment, Mentions of Grooming
So I'm just trying to chill with @mary-the-brainrot-enjoyer and a lot of my other friends in a group chat, right? Well, it turns out, one of my friends invited an @/goofy-brainrot-blog supporter into the group chat, and they started harrasing both Mary and I. Telling us to unalive ourselves and stuff like that. And if you want proof, I fucking got it for you, buddy.
I asked my so called friend why the fuck they would do such a thing, and they said: "Well, the drama is really stupid.. And tbh, you kinda deserved to be groomed.." Like are you fucking serious?
I pretty much ended up blocking them and leaving the group chat.
Btw. I know I just posted something positive, but I wanna make a statement due to recent events. Let it be known that I do not and WILL not condone nor justify any inappropriate or creepy behavior towards non-consenting parties in any way, shape or form. I will also not tolerate hatred of any kind towards an innocent person. This blog is meant to be a safe space, not just for me; but for my friends and followers as well. Perhaps even people just passing through.
It doesn't hurt to go at least one day without being a shitty person. Don't stoop to low levels. Stay safe out there fellers.
Been seeing some shit go down on my Dashboard lately. If you know what I'm talking about, then you're well aware of the actions the offender has made. I'm not going to make a callout post because I don't want to be dragged too far into it, but I will say this: For the love of everything good, stay safe out there, y'all. Please remember that harassment won't fix the issue. Even if the person causing the issues is in a bad place, it's no excuse, and they need to seek a better place to be rather than worsening it for themselves. R-pe is not good. Trauma in general is not good. It shouldn't be glorified. If you see someone glorifying it, get the fuck outta there and block them. To minors: PLEASE stay away from NSFW spaces, at least until you're 18. You're endangering yourself, and depending on where you are, that's most likely illegal anyway. It's sad to see this happen. Protect yourselves.
Let me know if I'm being a bigot but I think that the Owls of Ga'Hoole could reduce any Warrior Cat Clan to paste.
I haven't read Warrior cats so I might be talking out my ass, but as much as I love that Scourge cat with the claw collar I don't think that they can compete with like...steel? I can't begin to tell you how batshit insane it is that the birds have extracted raw iron, purified it and perfected the art of metallurgy to forge it into their weapons. Like. Boron wears GOLD. I'm not even sure OoGH and Warrior Cats are in the same league?
An elite cabal of ancient warriors with high grade metal weapons and armor that are capable of silent flight and mass combat logistics...and a bunch of (really angry) cats?
people really just read books like “no thoughts head empty 🤪”
"Nooooo, you can't do this!! It's bad for my trauma!! 😭😭"
Dude...who TF ARE YOU?!?!
Like legit all I did was make a poll! A POLL! Why the hell do y'all feel the need to traumadump and overshare your personal information to a random stranger online simply just to defend a SHIP! That's the most retarded shit I've ever seen in my entire life!!
Btw, since you two wanna whine and complain about my tags so much, here's the deal: I PUT THOSE TAGS THERE TO SHARE MY VIEWS ON HOW I PERSONALLY FEEL ABOUT BILLDIP. IT WAS NOT A PERSONAL ATTACK TO YOUR EGO.
Why did I feel the need to share my opinions? Because I'm allowed to have them, ya entitled bitch! Just like you're allowed to have your takes on Billdip, positive or negative!
Also, I'm not the one here publicly lambasting other people and trying to put them down simply because my pride was hurt here! (unless we're talking you two dumbassess, but you're the exception since y'all decided to spew retarded logic and trauma excuses on me over fictional characters like y'all are 2 years old.)
In other words, please....get a fucking grip!
Alright, let's put this possibly nonexistent debate to rest.
Respectfully, I don't believe you in the slightest!
You're trying to backpedal on your true feelings from earlier by giving me this fake act of "it's all chill bro" now. But it's not! It really ain't at all!
What you did was assist an asshole in framing me as some sort of angry villain online and try to act like you're the ones in the right here. But you're not! Neither of you are, and if it's not already obvious why, well...I truly don't have anything else to tell you then.
Nice try at attempting to manipulate me and everyone else seeing this "drama" though.
Alright, let's put this possibly nonexistent debate to rest.
Okay so gender is socially constructed and some of us decided that it wasn’t enough so we constructed queerness to defy, nuance and tailor the social construction of gender. We have been very intentionally working and reworking this queerness we constructed since we laid the foundation. I think that intentionality of the process of building the concept of queerness is odd. We regularly, through less than ideal means unfortunately because we have a bad habit of yelling at each other about it, redefine transness amongst ourselves. Ask the first people who identified as transsexual what that identity meant to them and you will get a wildly different answer than you would get from your average modern day trans kid. We are weirdly self aware about this process. I mean. Not totally. Obviously. But in comparison to straight people who are typically mind blown when the 13 year old nonbinary child of someone they graduated with explains to them that gender is a social construct we are hyper conscious of how we’re talking about our genders and attractions. Spend some time scrolling through old asexual forums. Watch the four hour video essay YouTuber X made about respectability politics and transmedicalism. Straight people generally put less thought into being straight over the course of their entire lives than a gay teen spent thinking about gayness in the month following the realization that they’re not straight. This level of intentional consideration going into the development of this social construct is weird, right?
I will be thinking more about why we do this (probably as a way to defend our existence and because queerness in its current form has only really gained traction in this recent age of science and philosophy where we think about everything more but that’s its own thought soup to cook) and what effect this intentionality has on our community and society at large. Are there benefits to this method of social construction? Harms? Are other concepts being socially constructed in a similar way right now? In the past?
Anyone have thoughts on this? Sources? Has someone else already done this thinking for me that you’re familiar with? Strategies for sleeping when your brain won’t shut up about your gay ponderings?
For the people who are out there “fighting the good fight” and “trying to make fandom a better place,” I have two important questions for you:
1. Is the author dead? x
2. Is your baby in the bathwater? x
What do I mean by those things? Let’s start with #1. The Death of the Author is a type of literary criticism, the extreme cliff notes version of which is that art exists outside of the creator’s life, personal background, and even intentions. I’m using it slightly differently than Barthes intended, but that’s okay, because the author is dead and I’m interpreting his work through my own lens.
In fandom, the author is dead. In fact, the author was never alive in the first place, not really. The author has only ever been the idea of a person, because unlike published fiction, the only thing we know about a fanfic author is that which they choose to tell us about themselves.
Why is that important?
Because it might not be true. Hell, that happens in real life with published authors, who have SSN’s on file with their publishers, who pay taxes on the works they create and have researchable pasts. If the author of A Million Little Pieces could fake everything, why can’t I? Why can’t you? Why can’t the writer of your favorite fic in the whole wide world?
Stop me if you’ve heard this before: “you can only write about [sensitive subject] if [sensitive subject] has happened to you personally, otherwise you’re a disgusting monster that deserves to die!!” Or maybe “you can only write [x racial or ethnic group] characters if you’re [x racial or ethnic group] otherwise you’re racist/fetishizing/colonizing!”
You can play this game with any sensitive subject you can come up with. I’ve seen them all before, on a sliding scale of slightly chastising to literal death threats.
Now, I could tell you that I’m a white-passing Latina whose grandmother was an anchor baby. I could tell you that I speak only English because my family never taught me to speak Spanish, something which I’ve been told is common in the Cuban community, though I only know my own lived experience. I could tell you that I’m mostly neurotypical. I could tell you that I’m covered in surgical scars. I could tell you lots of things.
Are any of these true? Maybe! I could tell you that my brother has severe mental development problems, so uncommon that they’ve never been properly diagnosed, and that he will live the rest of his life in a group home with 24-hour care. Is that true? Am I allowed to write about families struggling with America’s piss-poor services for the handicapped now?
Am I allowed to write about being Cuban? After all, I did just say that I’m Cuban. But is it true? Can I instead write a character that’s Panamanian? Maybe I really am Panamanian, not Cuban. Maybe I’m both. Maybe I’m neither. Maybe I’m really French Canadian. Should we require people to post regular selfies? I can’t count the number of times I’ve had someone come up to me speaking Arabic, and I’ve been told that I look Syrian. What’s stopping me from making a blog that claims that I am Syrian? Can you even really tell someone’s race and ethnicity from a photo?
Am I allowed to write about being a teenager? Am I allowed to write about being a college student? Am I allowed to write about being an “adulty” adult? Can I write a character who’s 40? 50? 60? How old am I?
All of this is to say: you can’t base what someone is or is not “allowed” to write about on a background that may or may not be real. No matter how good your intentions. And I get it - this usually comes from a place of well-meaning. You’re trying to protect marginalized groups by stopping privileged people from trampling all over experiences that they haven’t suffered. I get that. It’s a very noble thought. But you can’t require a background check for every fic that you don’t like.
If you say “you can only write about rape if you’re a rape victim,” then one of three things will happen:
Real survivors will have to supply intimate details of their own violations to prevent harassment
Real survivors will refuse to engage and will then have to deal with death threats and people telling them to kill themselves for daring to write about their own experiences
People who aren’t survivors will say “yeah sure this happened to me” just to get people to shut up
Has that helped anyone? I mean really - anyone??
So now let’s get to point #2: is your baby in the bathwater?
If your intention is to protect marginalized people from being trampled upon, stop and assess if your boot is the one that’s now stamping on their face. Find your baby! Is your baby in the bathwater? Which is to say: find the goal that you’re advocating for. Now assess. Are you making the problem worse for the people you’re trying to protect? Does that rape victim really feel better, now that you’ve harassed and stalked them in the name of making rape victims feel safe?
Let’s say you read a fic that contains explicit sex between a 16 year old and a 17 year old. Is this okay? Would it be okay if the writer was 15? 16? 17? Should teenagers be barred from writing about their own lives, and should teenagers be banned from exploring sexuality in a fictional bubble, instead of hookup culture? Is it okay for a 20 year old to write about their experiences as a teenager? Is it okay for a 20 year old to write about being raped at a party as a teenager? Is it okay for a 30 year old? How about a 40 year old? Is it okay so long as it isn’t titillating? Is it okay if taking control of the narrative allows the writer to re-conceptualize their trauma as something they have control over? Is it okay if their therapist told them that writing is a safe creative outlet?
Is your author dead?
Is your baby in the bathwater?
Now let’s take a hardline approach: no fanfiction with characters who are under 18 years old. None. Is the 16 year old who really loves Harry Potter and wants to read/write about characters their own age better off? Should they be banned from writing? Should they be forced to exclusively read and write (adult) experiences that they haven’t lived? Will they write about teens anyway? Should they have to share it in secret? Should 16 year olds be ashamed of themselves? Should we just throw in with the evangelicals and say that the only answer is abstinence, both real and fictional?
Let’s say that no rape is allowed in fiction, at all. None. What happens to all the hurt/comfort fics where a character is raped and then receives the support and love that they deserve, slowly heal, and by the end have found themselves again? Are you helping rape victims by banning these stories? Are you helping rape victims by stripping their agency away, by telling them that their wants and their consent doesn’t matter?
Is your baby in the bathwater?
Fandom is currently being split in two: on one side, the people who want to make fandom a “safer” place by any means necessary, even if that means throwing out all of the marginalized groups they say they want to protect - and on the other, people who are saying “if you throw out that bathwater, you’re throwing the baby out too.”
The whole point of fandom is to be able to explore all kinds of ideas from the safety and comfort of a computer screen. You can read/write things that fascinate you, disgust you, titillate you, or make your heart feel warm. This is true of all fiction. People who want to read about rape and incest and extreme violence and torture can go pick up a copy of Game of Thrones from the bookstore whenever they want. Sanitizing fandom just means holding a community of people who are primarily not male, not straight, not cis, or some combination of those three, to higher and stricter standards than straight white cis male authors and creators all over the world.
There is nothing you can find on AO3 that you can’t find in a bookstore. Any teenager can go check out Lolita, or ASOIAF, or Flowers in the Attic, or Stephen King’s It, or Speak, or hundreds of other books that have adult themes or gratuitous violence or graphic sex. The difference is that AO3 has warnings and tags and allows people to interact only with the types of work that they want to, and allows people to curate their experiences.
Are these themes eligible to be explored, but only in the setting of something produced/published? Books, movies, television, studio art, music - all of these fields have huge barriers to entry, and they’re largely controlled by wealthy cishet white men. Is it better to say that only those who have the right connections to “make it” in these industries should be allowed to explore violence or sexuality or any other so-called “adult” theme?
Does banning women from writing MLM erotica make fan culture a better place?
Does banning queer people from writing about queer experiences make fan culture a better place?
Is M/M fic okay, but only if the author is male? What if he’s a trans man? What if they’re NB? Who should get to draw those lines? Should TERFs get a vote? What if the author is a woman who feels more comfortable writing from a male character’s perspective because she’s grown up with male stories her whole life, or because she identifies more with male characters? What about all the trans men who discovered themselves, in part, by writing fanfiction, and realized that their desires to write male characters stemmed from something they hadn’t yet realized about themselves?
How can we ever be sure that the author is who they say they are?
Who is allowed to write these stories? How do we enforce it?
Is it better for none of these stories to ever exist at all?
Have you killed your author?
Have you thrown out your baby with the bathwater?
Being 20+ in fandom environments and constantly seeing discourse about shipping etc is basically just this meme
You know Dating Cis men has actually showed me something that makes me really mad. Yall are way to mean to guys, like regular guys. They are litterally so insecure and it makes me mad ok. i dont think we realise how much pressure they actually feel to be like ridicuously muscly in order to be attractive. We all keep saying that the beauty standards they are held to are "power fantasies" but i think just because its not what women actually find attractive about a guy doesnt mean that they dont feel like they have to meet that standard. not to mention there are lots of girls that do hold them to that standard.
i just think its absolutely crazy how mean we are to guys about their looks. and then theyre also made fun of for being insecure like all the time??? i see so many woke women tell men that they are ugly and worthless and then make jokes about men being insecure. like youre contributing to the problem?
i dunno its just heartbreaking when i tell a guy they are actually good looking and they dont beleive me. I think if we started complimenting and hyping up men more they might not always mistake it for flirting
i entered a raffle held by someone deemed 'problematic' and i'm losing my shit at all the antis who are happily ignoring how much they profess to hate people exactly like her so they can enter and get free shit lmfaoooo i see you
whatever the dsmp ended in flames but you'll pry enjoying the good parts of it from my cold dead hands. I have a L'Manberg flag and I still wanna talk about cwilbur and ctommy and what cranboo could have been and what cbeeduo was and you can FIGHT ME.
It's heartbreaking that things ended the way they did but you'll have to put me down to stop me from still wanting to talk about and enjoy the good parts of it. I'm still gonna celebrate just how good it WAS while it was good because goddamn, it was good.
Mooooooooooooooddddd
healthy gay male relationships in which the characters involved kiss, have a sex life, go on dates, declare their love and affection for each other, share a bed, etc will ALWAYS be more revolutionary and necessary to portray than a relationship that’s “undoubtedly a love story but what kind is up to you! uwu why do you want to see them KISS or get some other actual confirmation of their love you disgusting homosexual!”
men being friends or in a relationship ~without labels~ comes second to representing gay men’s love. always.
I spent maybe a week away from the Hetalia tag and I come back to people talking about raids, discourse, aph to hws, threats, etc and I’m wondering “what the heck happened while I was gone?????”
I’m not gonna say anything about the others but I think ppl like Leon/Hop are a bit ambiguous on purpose bc when I played I saw my sort of desi in them and other ppl can see themselves and that’s ok
any poc representation makes me very happy and a 10yo & 18yo me are equally thrilled that there is someone who looks remotely like me in a game
maybe this post isn’t the best place to make this point tho bc I don’t wanna be discouraging to anyone + I know other poc ppl probably experienced similar issues with representation as a child
made a lil sumn sumn
Man, I’m so socially inept
*sees tumblr discourse*
I am the most well-adjusted person to ever socialize