having parents that were really angry and petty and abusive when you were young is weird, because it makes part of you grow up to want to be kind, to generate good things, to be a source of peace and wellbeing for others; but it makes another part of you grow up to be quick, and sharp, and spiteful, and that’s always the part that shows itself first in a hard situation, so it’s a struggle between your hateful gut reactions and your wish to not add any more misery to the world. it’s a hard balance, and the people who really, really know me - i know they see that anger flash in my eyes before i quiet it, if i quiet it…i want to overcome years of conditioning, and with gentle, constant force, i know i’ll mellow it. it just takes time.
Had a weird dream where Ganondorf found Link abandoned as a child and kind of took him under his wing. The whole game had a wildly different perspective with different dynamics between the characters. I guess this is semi appropriate for fathers day!
the socialisation that terfs like to talk about - and use to deny the possibility of camab womanhood - does not exist. the idea that men and women receive different messages in childhood - as though children were being separated into different rooms based on assigned gender to watch different educational videos - doesn’t hold up.
women receive and internalise the same message of misogyny as men do. this is not, of course, a post about how men and women are “equally bad”, or anything like that. but women do learn misogyny. the difference is that women are misogynist towards each other while men are misogynist towards women, who have no recourse.
if a woman mistreats another woman, she will probably be mistreated in turn. this is normalised with words like “catty,” “bitch,” - we are told this is simply how women are with each other. meanwhile if a man mistreats a woman, he faces no consequences. this is normalised by heterosexuality. his actions will be justified with phrases like “boys will be boys” or, even worse, by attributing his violence to a secret fondness he does not know how else to express.
the consequence of this is that as women grow up, we either learn to treat each other better or risk having no female friends. (a lot of straight women take that second path!) meanwhile men continue to get away with their violence, and so their misogyny only grows deeper and becomes more entrenched.
i think it is common nowadays to imagine that boys and girls start out the same and grow apart, but i think we have envisioned it wrong. the difference between men and women is not that women do not go on to learn misogyny like men do, but that we unlearn it while men dont. and the reason we unlearn it has nothing to do with biology but with consequences, and the need to find shelter among other women. this need is even greater among lesbians, of course, which is why we’re all the best feminists ~
but the need is also greater for trans women, and even more so if you are both trans and a lesbian. trans women need female community because we are so violently rejected from the male - where even the odd “cool” straight cis girl is allowed to be a part of things.
what is also greater for trans women are the consequences we face for internalised misogyny. where cis women are often willing to let it slip amongst each other (nobody’s perfect!) any instance of misogyny that a trans woman has not yet been able to unlearn (as all of us, cis and trans, are still and will always be trying to unlearn) is capitalised on, punished harshly, and held up as proof - either of our inherently violent biology or of our socialisation (depending on which brand of transmisogynist you ask).
and when trans women face these consequences they are often final. they are promptly exiled from whatever community they were a part of and never welcomed back. and there are so few communities that even want us in the first place.
(and this is not like when a man is ousted from a community. he will always have somewhere else to go, every other community in the world is meant for him - including countless which are only meant for him, and men like him. this “consequence” he faces is no consequence at all.)
and so, a trans woman, having had this happen to her or seen it happen to someone like her, knows that her place in society is as precarious as it can be, and her holding on to it depends on her vast and in-depth knowledge of feminism, politics, social niceties, ethics, and her willingness and ability to perform all of these as well as any role or labor her community might demand of her. and that is her socialisation.
Kinda weird that a lot of the R&M fandom going all “awww I love seeing Beth and Rick have scenes where they’re happy” are completely overlooking that it’s meant to come across as super dark how Beth is basically throwing her kids mental well-being under the bus and ignoring them for the sake of remaining dependent on a father who turns himself into a pickle to lie his way out of therapy
he’s all talk
he’s already spent like three slots bedazzling that biker jacket he hawked off kravitz
“All that talk about the power of friendship,” the antagonist murmured, as they circled the protagonist. “And it never even occurred to you that perhaps your enemies might have friends too, did it? How arrogant a thing, you are…”
seriously, NO ONE DOES THIS and it fruSTRAtes me
Say what you will about Kung fu panda but at least they didn’t put like tiger boobs on tigress
“How do you make something right when you’ve made it so wrong you can never go back”
Sept. 8 & I’m excited.
I’m a bit late for the x-files theme, sry.
Thanx to @theophilegibaud for his wisdom and patience ! This gif couldn’t exist without his advices
bye ;P
Stop arguing about cartoons and go outside
This is your weekly reminder that fandom discourse is cancelled.
Hey there! Here’s another reminder that instead of telling people to kill themselves over cartoon characters, you could go play a fun game of ultimate frisbee outside with your friends!
the long awaited sequel to this
remember a few months ago when I said I had an idea for a funny Longtail comic and then I never drew it haha
