Things can change, it’s called progress

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-28T19:39:47+00:00

It's also called "progress for the sake of progress," and it's not necessarily a good thing, nor does it mean that it's an objectively correct worldview. This is just like the people that say, "Language evolves, get over it," when we complain about words losing all meaning. Yes, language evolves, but naturally and by agreement of most (if not all) people in a particular society. You can't just force this stuff and tell everyone they have no choice but to go along with it.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-28T19:31:41+00:00

If anything he'll point to the 9% of people that said having a non-white PM would be a bad thing and say, "See? Racist backlash!" It doesn't matter if it was just one single person to them; they will look for anything to blow out of proportion to fit their worldview.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-26T20:36:33+00:00

Yeah, I'm with you on that. Jumping immediately to "he's transphobic and probably homophobic" is dumb. Probably the better response would be, "Talk to your husband and find out why he's upset and what you could maybe work out to keep your girl in sports."

On your question, no, they don't generally let opposite sex coaches in locker rooms, but something to think about: what's the reason for keeping the coaches the same sex as the players? Is it because "we don't want a grown man leering at our pre-pubescent daughters"? Surely we don't expect that every adult male is a pedophile that is using their position to leer at underage girls. And similarly, then that puts lesbians at danger of "we don't want a grown woman who is attracted to females leering at our pre-pubescent daughters."

If the answer to why we don't allow male coaches into the girls' locker room is "it makes the girls uncomfortable changing in front of an adult male" then that's acceptable and makes perfect sense. We should prioritize the safety and comfort of the girls here. But if the girls view this trans woman as a woman and don't feel uncomfortable changing in front of her, what does the existence of a penis have to do with it? In my time in school, I never saw a teacher change in the locker room in front of students. I never saw my football coach's dick.

If this trans woman is walking around waving around a penis in the girl's locker room (or even just changing in front of the girls), that's a completely different story and I would be just as upset by it as finding out that any coach, male or female, was changing in front of their students. I'm just choosing to be charitable - we don't know this person and we don't know their life, so it feels very much like the shit that we had to deal with back in the day to just assume "trans = nefarious intent."

If I'm being totally honest, though, if this were happening to me in real life, I would probably be quite a bit more reactionary. I just have the luxury of not being involved in the situation and trying to look at it from different angles rather than just the kneejerk.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-26T19:54:25+00:00

This is actually a tough one for me. I'm theoretically fine with a trans volleyball coach as long as they aren't pushing gender nonsense on kids. There's an argument that this coach is possibly supervising the young girls in the locker room and that might not be appropriate, but people could (and have) made that argument against gay people before. Would we be worried about a lesbian coach because she'd be in the locker room and she's attracted to females? I'd say no, because we fought against the "all gay people are pedophiles" stigma.

I hate to paint all trans people with the same brush that gays were painted with. I get that we see the worst of it a lot in these spaces, but I kind of think that if a trans woman is just living her life and not trying to "convert" the kids, she should be left alone. I think that Abby's point of, "Hey, maybe have him go talk to her on a human level," is a good idea rather than just a kneejerk pull your daughter out of the sport. At least that way the dad would be able to get an idea of whether this person is just trying to quietly live their life and coach a sport they love or if they're a wackjob that's hoping to ogle preteen girls in a locker room.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-26T12:11:41+00:00

That's the thing that just wooshes right over these people's heads. Kids are kids; they don't know much about the world and so they expect the adults around them to know what they're talking about. It's not that the kid suddenly "understands" gender identity or non-binary people. It's that the kid is taking what you say at face value because you are a trusted adult and they don't have any reason to believe you would just make shit up.

If I had an 8-year-old kid and told them that bacon was made out of cats, they'd probably believe me. That doesn't mean that the kid is stupid and it doesn't mean that bacon is therefore made of cats. It just means that I lied to my kid and they believed me because they trusted me.

The problem is that if every adult around them is going around saying that non-binary is actually a thing, they're just going to grow up either (a) rigidly enforcing gender norms that "non-binary" is supposedly breaking down, or (b) really confused into thinking they're neither a girl nor a boy because they like purple instead of blue or pink.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-24T13:34:16+00:00

You would think that when people start going, "Hey wait a second, none of this makes sense!" that they would then extrapolate that out to, "So it's clearly all bullshit."

But instead they just ask Reddit and get a totally not confusing or contradictory answer like, "Transmasc doesn't mean transman - I'm neither a man nor a woman but I'm a masculine being because I'm transmasc nonbinary."

smh

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-24T13:31:05+00:00

This article highlights one of the main reasons why I don't like the term "queer:" it has no meaning whatsoever.

If you can lump a gay man, a trans "lesbian," a demisexual teen girl, and a married straight woman with three kids who kissed a girl once in college under the same term, it's not a helpful term to use! As a gay man, if I went to a meeting specifically for gay men only (and not trans men), I would expect that we would all have at least one thing in common with each other. If I went to a meeting for "queer people," there's a good possibility that there wouldn't be another gay man there.

Human like to categorize each other because it's sometimes helpful to do that. As a different example, I'm a fan of hiking. If I want to find a group of people to hike with, I'm going to go looking for "hikers" rather than "outdoor enthusiasts" because the second could include people who like to fish, bird watchers, campers, people who like to skinny dip in lakes, etc.

But then, I guess it's nice and easy to just say you're "queer" and get the brownie points, especially since it's a cardinal sin to ask anyone to prove what they're saying these days.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-18T15:01:29+00:00

I hate people who write like this????? When they're not asking questions???????????? And even if they are, multiple question marks like this is really annoying and childish??????????????????????????????

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-18T13:14:58+00:00

I think a lot of this is kids that are being confused by a lot of the rhetoric surrounding being "queer" these days.

When I was in high school, I came out as bi first because (1) I thought it would be more acceptable than being gay and (2) I was confused about my sexuality and not really sure that I was actually gay. After some self-reflection, I realized I was gay and came out as such a few months later.

I try to imagine being a high schooler now and seeing all of this different stuff and being like, "Am I asexual? No, that's not right. Maybe I'm aromantic and demisexual? Am I bi? Or gay? Oh, what's this about aceflux? Maybe that's me."

It seems very confusing and I'm not surprised that a bunch of kids are having trouble figuring it out, especially when it seems like "being straight" just isn't cool.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-18T13:08:36+00:00

The annoying thing is that like, yeah, he's not wrong, and that's what most of us have been saying this whole time! I like to crochet, does that make me a woman? No. It makes me a man who likes to crochet.

Boys can like whatever they want to like. Girls can like whatever they want to like. Everyone can have varied interests that don't necessarily match up with stereotypes about "boys" or "girls." That doesn't mean that the categories "boy" and "girl" are meaningless and don't exist. It doesn't mean that if you're a girl that likes trucks and pink, that you're neither a girl nor a boy.

This really isn't all that confusing and it's so incredibly stupid that these people are trying to make things so damned complicated because they desperately want to justify their own looks and interests. Jeffery here thinks that saying he's non-binary means that people won't gawk at him when he walks down the street, instead of actually just fucking dealing with the fact people are going to gawk at him and being brave enough to weather that in order to dress and act in a way that makes him happy.

Sometimes life is fucking hard and sometimes other people are dicks. You can't "magic words" your way out of that.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-18T12:57:55+00:00

Are you making art for fun or are you trying to make a living off of it? If you're trying to make a living off of it through online commissions or something, you might just be stuck. But that doesn't mean you need to change your art for anyone; just try and not let the weird shit get to you and seek out people in the community that feel the way you do so you know you have friends there.

If you're just making it for fun and posting it online, I'd say either (a) stop posting and just make your art for fun; show it off to people in your life or on private social media accounts for just your friends and family, or (b) try to find some private groups for art enthusiasts and take the temp of the group before you start posting; you'll be able to tell pretty quickly if they've gone all in on the TQ stuff.

As a writer, I unfortunately tend to avoid LGB relationships or characters in my writing because I feel like it's just going to look like virtue signaling. Sometimes I write LGB characters, because that's my experience and I want to be able to reflect my life experience in my writing, but as artists we may just have to ride out this weird wave.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-12T14:11:25+00:00

I think it's a little pearl-clutchy to be freaking out about talking to your teen about sex and masturbation, and it's kind of the wrong thing to be focusing on. Parents being realistic about teens engaging in sexual activity and talking with them about it and making sure they know how to be safe (both from STDs and from personal injury) isn't a bad thing.

These moms, of course, are on a whole other level where they are actively inserting themselves into their teen's sex lives, but it's still more concerning to me that they're talking about sterilizing their children and being actively praised for what great parents they are.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-10-05T20:25:50+00:00

The article called him "they" a lot, too, although it's pretty clear that either the author was doing it mockingly or just had a really hard time trying to write the article using the "correct" pronouns, since Smythe is labeled "he" in some places and there is an instance of "they was" thrown in there lol

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-23T14:21:50+00:00

Ugh, yeah - I do not even understand that art style. It's just so off-putting; why is it popping up everywhere?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-22T19:30:40+00:00

I mean, sure, you could liken the Stormclocks to white nationalists, and I guess some idiots on Stormfront do that. You could also say that the Stormcloaks aren't so much against other races being in Skyrim as much as they are against losing their independence to the Empire. Skyrim is populated with people of all races and it never seemed to me in all of my hundreds of hours in the game that Nords or even the Stormcloaks had any particular problem with the existence of Khajit, Argonians, Bretons, Redguards, etc. They just don't want to be ruled by the Empire.

I know it's meant to be morally grey, but I always considered the Stormcloaks to be the good guys because most Imperials I run across are dicks. The battlecry "Skyrim is for the Nords!" just means "Skyrim is not for the Empire!"

If anything, the fucking Altmer are the racial supremacists, looking down on literally everyone else and attacking people for just daring to pass by them on the road (see also: dick Imperials that do that too).

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-22T19:20:16+00:00

Girl, it's just regular homophobia. You know why you find yourself put off by gay men? Because you're a straight woman that has spent more time romanticizing the idea of gay men than you have actually being around gay men, and because you're realizing that you're a straight woman who wants to date a straight man.

I mean, this really isn't that hard. How can people be so dense?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-21T18:44:43+00:00

Thank you for your service, the question was as ludicrous as I assumed and the response was somehow even worse.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-21T18:43:34+00:00

Hates her boobs, which means that she's actually a gay man, but has no problem whatsoever (assumedly) carrying two children to term and birthing them through her vagina.

As an actual gay man, I would be extremely distressed by becoming pregnant and giving birth to a child, much less two.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-14T13:46:50+00:00

Well, at least he's actually trying, which is more than I can say for a lot of them.

The thing that most trans people don't seem to get is that you're pretty much going to have to stick to "hyper-feminine" or "hyper-masculine" stereotypes if you want to be trans and you want people to believe that you're whatever you say you are.

Women can shave their heads and wear no makeup and still be recognizably women. Men can't do that. See Bishop Briggs vs. Giulia Valentino.

Not necessarily saying that I wouldn't be able to clock this person no matter how hyper-feminine they were, but them's the breaks. You wanna be seen as a woman, you're going to have to try a lot harder than an actual woman.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-14T13:43:11+00:00

Yeah, considering that the races that involve prizes aren't going to be handing out a "non-binary" prize, it definitely seems like either (a) pointless pandering, or (b) a small handful of angsty they/thems complained that they wanted to race but weren't male or female.

The really annoying thing is that these people constantly preach that "sex" and "gender" are two different things, yet when categories like "male" and "female" show up, they go, "I'm neither male nor female!" which is not only a lie but counter to their claims.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-13T17:22:35+00:00

lol Yeah, I was gonna say, I considered it already, and decided that I'm a gay man and don't want to be with a woman.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-09T20:44:20+00:00

You know, I haven't seen all of it, but I always had the impression that Big Mouth was specifically made not for teens or children, but that it was more cringe-comedy for adults where we could look back at our awkward teenage years when we were coming into maturity but not really knowing what to do with it. I actually liked it for the most part (some of the jokes were a little too gross for me), but I honestly never thought that it would be a thing that teens or kids would watch. That was probably pretty naive of me, considering it's an animated show.

I can't imagine someone using Big Mouth as sex education.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-03T12:20:57+00:00

Yeah, that was also the part that bothered me in the article, where it said it had won an award for books "written for adults but with a special appeal to ages 12-18."

Look, I knew I was gay when I was very young, like elementary school age, even if I didn't have the word for it. Most of the boys "had crushes" on the girls and I "had crushes" on the other boys. I'm sure I'm not an edge case with that, but most gay people don't realize it until they're in their teens and hitting puberty. I didn't even actually understand about myself until high school.

I would like to think that the author's heart is in the right place, and that she's trying to help kids that went through whatever she went through (although maybe that's giving her too much credit), but I do also think that material like this, even if it wasn't explicit, only serves to confuse kids, especially gay kids and girls that think they can escape "the horros of womanhood" by simply saying magic words.

I have a niece and nephew that are rapidly approaching high school age, and I worry for them.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-09-02T18:43:15+00:00

On one hand, it's tough for me to really say that books involving masturbation scenes should be verboten in high schools; we read Faulkner's As I Lay Dying in high school, and that includes a masturbation scene. The difference, of course, is that Faulkner's scene was simply written in text and is not highly explicit, versus Kobabe's book, which is a graphic novel and includes actual depictions of some of these acts.

I mean, I'm sure that I'm not in the majority with this, but I was sexually active in high school and I know for a fact that many others were, as well, evidenced by the number of pregnant teens in my school, so it seems a little pearl-clutchy to be like "high school kids shouldn't know about or see anything about sex." That being said, in my mind, even an explicit romance novel would be more appropriate than Kobabe's graphic novel (and I don't think high school kids really need to be reading explicit romance novels).

If this was a case of "off-screen" sex or just a bare mention of masturbation, I'd be more inclined to say that I don't think Kobabe's book should be banned from schools, but it's a graphic novel. It's different. Even if the things that I've seen from it are literally the only two overtly sexual things in the whole book, saying that it's okay for minors is basically like giving a movie a PG-13 rating because it only has ONE explicit blowjob scene, and it's not a REAL blowjob scene because she's blowing a dildo. Like, give me a break.

I'm mostly disturbed by the fact that she's fighting this so hard, like it's a personal attack on her. That tells that she's more concerned about her material being in the hands and minds of tweens and teens more than it is about just having a book published and having her memoirs out there. It's not like people are trying to ban anyone from getting the book. You can still buy it if you're an adult and you are interested. She can still make plenty of money without predating on tweens and teens and confusing them even more than they already probably are during a confusing time in their life.

I think I'm done rambling now.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T20:10:21+00:00

You managed it much more eloquently than I did lol

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T20:06:43+00:00

That's because the gays that speak out against it keep finding themselves banned from public discourse. I don't know what the majority of actual LGB thinks about the TQ+, but there's a part of me that's convinced that this is all coming from straight people that are pretending to be gay for woke points.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T19:57:26+00:00

What's interesting to me is that you say it's possible to be wrong about one thing and right about another thing, because you're absolutely right, but consider that the quote from the OP isn't "the right is wrong about trans rights" but "the right will lose the culture war." To me, that's somewhat telling of the attitude of these people. They don't care about "right" or "wrong," just about "winning."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T19:37:35+00:00

If you look more carefully still, isn’t homophobia just another form of misogyny? Isn’t it about men not manifesting as masculine enough, painted and colorful, making themselves sexy, being pleasured dorsally, breaking sacred vows about masculine social barriers, communication choices. Isn’t it about women diverging from their lane as the kitten, the weaker sex or the homemaker?

Since the "homophobia = transphobia" thing might not stick, he decides to throw in "homophobia = misogyny" too. This is the same as above, where, yes, maybe that's part of it, but it's certainly not that simple. There are plenty of straight, masculine women and straight, feminine men, and likewise, there are plenty of straight men that love masculine women and plenty of straight women that love feminine men. It's almost like everyone on the planet has a different personality and likes different things, and their sexuality really has nothing to do with that.

The only sexuality has to do with it is that, like in my crochet example above, gay people may not feel any particular social pressure to conform to gender expectations. If I was a straight man, I might be ashamed to crochet, because it would be "girly," and there's social pressure on me to not be girly. Being gay, I can kind of bypass concerns about being thought of as girly, because people will probably expect me to be a little girly anyway. This is a problem with social stereotypes and not allowing people (even straight people) to do what makes them happy.

Unfortunately, changing social expectations takes a long time. Lest we forget, it was only fairly recently in the grand scheme of things that it was considered socially acceptable for a man to care about his appearance and take care of his skin. It's not something that can be rushed.

Politically, LGB without the T is divisive, but personally, it’s foolish internalized homophobia in some new camo, and either way, it’s damaging to all queer people.

It is divisive. I don't think it should be; it should be obvious that, politically, the two groups need to stand separately. I take issue with someone saying I have internalized homophobia because I think that, politically, the two groups have different needs and different issues that need to be dealt with separately.

I'll also say that I don't particularly care if something is damaging to "queer" people, because I have no frame of reference for who those people might be. I certainly don't consider myself "queer." The word itself has degenerated to the point of having basically no definition. I also don't see how disavowing the T can be at all harmful to LGB people, if that's what he's attempting to say. If anything, given the social climate surrounding the T, it is probably more harmful to LGB people to be lumped in with the T and other "queer" people.

There is no LGB without T. Thinking about those families has left me wondering what it’s going to be like for the progressive parents of 2050. What are the queer kids of today going to be confronted with when their offspring come out? What will leave them speechless and unprepared (I’m thinking it involves implants and enhancements; I’m eager to see where my predictions go.)

Yes, teens will always rebel against their parents and teens will always glom on to the newest coolest thing. This goes without saying. My prediction is going to be that in 2050, kids are going to start coming out to their blue-haired "queer" mom and dad by saying, "Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I'm actually straight, not trans, and I'm interested in waiting until I'm married to have sex." I guess we'll see.

As the trans movement is evolving, it is growing past the epithets of “born this way” and “it’s not a choice”. I always resented the political expedient that homosexuality is “not a choice.” It’s my choice, who cares? I never wanted to be restricted by that and I don’t want anyone else to be either.

Absolutely disgusting. If being gay was a choice, then, yes, who cares? But it's not, and this man is a horrible human being for implying that it is. The reason that we are all insistent that it's not a choice is because that helps people understand that a woman that says she's a lesbian doesn't just need a good dicking. By saying, "Yeah, it's my choice to be gay, who cares?" you are telling homophobes that they were right and giving further ammo to people that want to force gay people to be straight.

If anything is harmful to the LGB community, it's that kind of rhetoric. Of course, he doesn't think that way, because he's part of the "queer" community, and is following the party line that one can just choose to be whatever they want to be, regardless of the physical reality of their being.

The trans movement has needed to adopt this same position to receive validity, but a new generation of young nonbinary/gender-fluid people are leading us away from that. In that, transgender is now a phenomenal umbrella community and a huge opportunity for all of us to be part of. I don’t have to choose who I am, I can choose who I want to be. I love that. We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it.

You can choose who you want to be, sure. I believe that "being trans" is a choice. Having gender dysphoria, however, is more similar to being gay in that it is not a choice. Would the author ever decide that he "chooses" to be straight? I imagine that he'd be in for a life of misery if he "chose" that.

You can choose who you want to be in the sense that you can be a good person, a mean person, a funny person, a caring person, etc. You can change your life and your attitudes and can change "who you are" in that sense. You can't just "be a woman" because you said so. There is no path from "being a man" to "being a woman" that can be followed in the same sense that you can follow a path from "being a miserable asshole" to "being a kind and compassionate person." People can, and do, change throughout their lifetimes.

People do not, however, change immutable things about themselves. In fact, they cannot, because those things are immutable. I can never be black no matter how hard I try to wish myself into it. I can never be straight no matter how hard I try to wish myself into it. You see where I'm going.

Just because there are a bunch of idiot teens and twenty-somethings that are trying desperately to continue their childhood narrative of "you are the most special person in the whole world," that doesn't mean that they are right, and I would venture a guess that, once they have more life experience, most will actually understand how wrong and how harmful they actually were.

So for all those non-queer straight-acting gays out there, you’re undermining yourselves, because we’re all one people and we need to stick together.

Oh, okay, so you're speaking directly to me, it seems, since I'm not queer and I mostly "act straight." Glad to know that I'm undermining myself just by living my life. That's certainly news to me. And again, gay people are not a monolith and are allowed to have different opinions on things. Consider the fact that, although I think that what this man has to say is idiotic, counter-productive, and holier-than-thou, I'm okay with him having written this article and, while I don't agree with his opinions, I'm okay with him having those opinions.

This particular article pulled nearly every guilt-trippy trick out of the hat in order to justify why the existence of the LGB Alliance makes him feel bad. The author is manipulative, disingenuous, and highly egotistical, and yet he seems to think that he's a good person. I'll refrain from making that judgment call because I don't know him personally, but I will say that I hope that he doesn't treat his patients with the same attitude that he displays in this article.

What this whole thing boils down to is that this man, like many "queer" people, has some sort of rigidly defined roles in his mind that the vast majority of everyday society doesn't really care about, and he's basing his entire worldview on those. "You can't be a gay man without being feminine," "Being trans is inextricably linked with being gay because they are both entirely about bucking gender norms," etc. etc. It's an incredibly narrow worldview disguising itself as an open worldview, and it's quite insidious how that all works. I believe that he genuinely believes these things he's saying, and that's what the scariest part is.

This sort of rhetoric ultimately undermines everything that gay people fought for over the past few decades, and it's sickening to me to see this attitude reach any sort of prevalence. Thankfully, it seems to be mostly confined to the online space, but I fear that it won't be long until I find myself being chastised in person because I don't walk around with a limp wrist. It's scary how quickly we went from "gender roles suck, do what you want" to "gender roles suck, except actually they are the most important thing and must be adhered to at all costs."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T19:37:10+00:00

Haven’t lesbians been outspoken, outwritten, even outbullhorned, about their enmity for those same childhood female past-times while proudly embracing their inner Peppermint Patty? Because before the world had lesbians, there were tomboys; Tom+boy = girl?

Don't drag lesbians into this. Here's another instance of bias and rigid thinking. Must one be a tomboy to be a lesbian? Must one be a lesbian to be a tomboy? Also, seriously, why the need to chastise lesbians specifically? I'm tired of that bullshit myself; I can only imagine how lesbians must feel reading that shit.

As science hypothesizes the cause of the homosexual condition, theories return to one major thing: gender, androgens and estrogens gone awry in utero. The bond between sex and gender intricately woven together.

Using "science" and "gender" in the same sentence in this way immediately renders this entire paragraph null and void. Also, the specific biological mechanism behind what makes people homosexual has nothing to do with what makes people trans. We may, in time, find some similarities, but there is a marked difference between "who you are sexually attracted to" and "one's perception of one's own body." It's incredibly disingenuous to even include this line.

Cross-gender behavior, dress, mannerisms, past-times and interests are deeply woven into homosexual identity, and is the basis of our romantic and erotic objects of desire. Homosexual identity without transgender identity is just internalized homophobia, no matter how gender normative you are.

This is patently false. I'm not the manliest man in the world by any means, and I do have a few "traditionally" feminine interests (like crochet, baking, etc.) but that doesn't mean that I consider myself feminine in the slightest. I consider myself to be a man that has varied interests, and I consider myself lucky that I'm gay so that I don't experience any sort of shame for having interests that some would consider feminine. My interests and/or behaviors do not make me. My interests and/or behaviors are not inherently masculine or feminine. I'm not interested in crochet because it's a feminine hobby; I'm interested in it because it's a fun and relaxing way to pass the time.

There also exist plenty of gay men that are extremely masculine, and plenty of lesbians that are extremely feminine. What about them? It's ludicrous that he continually assumes that, because he clearly has rigid gender roles in his mind, that that means that those gender roles are both accurate and somehow related to him being gay.

I remember when I first started coming out, I didn’t like going to gay pride parades; too many drag queens. They were too flamboyant, too feminine. I didn’t want them to represent me. I was still figuring myself out, half in, half out of the closet. Being gay was more of an abstract concept still to me, and I hadn’t embraced it in all it’s wonderfulness.

I have never and will never go to a pride parade. They are too flamboyant and overly sexual and I don't want them to represent me. And guess what? That's actually not a problem. Being gay doesn't come with a membership that can be revoked for not following the rules. Gay people are not a monolith. I'm happy that this guy finally decided that "being gay" means "being overly flamboyant and in-your-face and attending pride parades;" I hope he finds fulfillment in that. But again, where does he get off speaking for all gay people and effectively guilting those gay people that don't want to be associated with stereotypes?

I thought I’d outgrown all that. Except, when I recently told a story about a drag performer on 1970s TV who significantly influenced my childhood. Only after I published the story and reread it for the hundredth time did I fully appreciated Beverly LaSalle’s impact. How fortunate I was to have her in my life, in her fabulous flamboyant playfulness, even just virtually and for a few minutes. Seriously, that drag queen may have changed my life for the better. So I guess I would say that I’m still waking up to the truth.

I don't know about Beverly LaSalle so I won't say anything about that. But this is yet another instance of him taking his own attitudes and ideas and extrapolating them out to the entire gay population and preaching it as though it is gospel. I enjoy RuPaul's Drag Race. I've been to a few drag shows. For a bit, I thought it might be fun to actually do drag, until I learned more about how the drag world is under the surface and decided I didn't want to be a part of that. But I don't identify with drag queens in any real sense. They don't make me appreciate being gay more than I already did. I'm glad this guy found a sense of comfort in this drag queen and could relate to this drag queen somehow, but... let's do this again: stop speaking for everyone and acting like all gay people are exactly the same.

It's as though he thinks, 'If only these gay men could see a drag queen on TV, they'd realize that they are denying their true, hyper-feminine selves.' We're not all the same. Being gay is such a small part of my personality as to be entirely insignificant in the grand scheme of things. Not everyone makes their sexuality their entire life.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T19:36:42+00:00

Let’s establish some obvious parameters. Prejudice against homosexuals is about cross-gender behaviors. The whole terminology of “sissy”, “fag”, “poof” and “dyke” is all about gender. For generations, in prose, poetry, song, performance, tee-shirt slogans, whatever medium they could think of, many gay men have declared their childhood love for dolls, dress-up and decorating while eschewing traditional male play such as competitive team sports.

And this is where we start going off the rails. I think that, yes, some people that are homophobic are homophobic because some gay people exhibit cross-gender behaviors. But I also think that's a bit too simplistic. People are also just scared of something that's "different," and people have trouble imagining something like homosexuality and applying it to their own experiences. Sort of like how I have trouble imagining what a straight man must think when he sees an attractive naked woman (because even though I know intellectually that it's likely the same feeling I get when I say an attractive naked man, it's difficult to translate that feeling when I think about a naked woman).

In other words, just like I have trouble getting excited about the idea of putting my penis in a vagina, most straight people will feel the same way, and think that it's "gross" or "weird." Like, nothing against my lesbian sisters and bi sisters and brothers, but I personally find "being sexually attracted to a vagina" to be kind of weird. Doesn't mean I'm going to go around beating up lesbians or straight men or anything, but it's understandable to me if a straight person finds the idea of gay sex gross or weird.

These "parameters" he's setting are obviously being set to try and inextricably link the LGB to the T. Sorry, but I'm not buying it. Even if all of the homophobia in the world was due to the fact that homophobes just hate feminine men and masculine women, that doesn't mean that there's any relation to that homophobia and trans people.

I remember a time a family came to me for therapy. The young son asked if I followed professional baseball. I explained that being a gay, Jewish New York psychiatrist of a certain age, a convergence of stereotypes rendered me physiologically incapable of watching sports. He seemed a little perplexed but accepted it.

So, this certainly sounds like something that he would say as a joke, but given the context, I think he's absolutely serious. I think he genuinely thinks that he's not able to enjoy watching sports because of his intersectional identity. Right here is where we get to the heart of his attitude, but more on that in a moment.

On the occasions when guys have screamed “FAGGOT!” out of their car windows at me, it wasn’t because I was hand in hand or making out with my boyfriend (or theirs!) It was because I was walking. I was just walking, and there was something about my walk, my clothes, my hair, who knows, which they processed as inappropriately unmasculine.

Sorry, but there are gay people that you can just tell are gay from looking at them. That's not excusing abuse, but there seems to be this idea going around that everyone should be completely free from any sort of strife in their life and that no one should ever bully anyone else. That sounds great, but it's supremely naive. The people that called him a faggot might have called him that because he was acting feminine while he was walking, or they might have called him a faggot because they were just idiots and thought it would be funny to yell at someone walking down the street.

Because the author is gay, he's ascribing motivation based on that. He might be right, he might not be. There are too many unknowns for this story to be relevant to his point.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T19:36:09+00:00

EDIT: I'm really sorry guys - apparently this article really pushed my buttons! I hope you enjoy the massive diatribe.

Oh, geez. Am I about to bitch about literally every paragraph in this article? Yes. Yes, I am.

Not too long ago, a friend’s kid came out as transgender. They grew up in a modern, supportive, progressive family, and their process of acceptance was relatively uncomplicated. That being said, one day some other friends and I were hanging out and the topic of this person’s transition came up. There was a lot of back and forth about it. Were they just going through a phase? Maybe they were actually gay, or just searching for an identity altogether. These were all progressive, middle-aged people talking, many of them gay themselves.

Why is it that "being trans" is like, the one thing that no one is allowed to allude to possibly being a phase? I doubt there are very many people that are, say, in their 30s, that are exactly the same as they were when they were teens. And I'd bet on the fact that most people on the planet went through various "phases" while they were teens, trying on different things to see what fit. When I was a confused teen, I tried on "being bi" for a time because I thought it was more acceptable than "being gay." I'm almost certain there are confused teens right now that see "being trans" as being more acceptable than "being gay," because trans stuff is in vogue right now.

A few months later, another family reached out. Their kid also came out as trans. They felt totally blindsided, and again spoke about it in the old familiar ways. Was it a phase? Our kid doesn’t realize how difficult their life will be. They won’t be happy. They shouldn’t tell anyone yet. Can’t they just be gay? Again, progressive, loving family and ultimately quite supportive.

This family is being painted as being somewhat unreasonable, but they approached a psychiatrist that is supposedly versed in this subject with questions about their child's mental state. What was the expectation? That they would have never reached out in the first place and just unquestioningly accepted whatever their child said when they shouted, "THIS IS ME NOW MOM"?

Do these words sound familiar? They do to me. It’s exactly the same stuff I and many of my gay peers heard throughout our own coming-out process decades ago. So is that it? Have we become our parents? Well, my parents never really embraced my homosexuality, so no. But yes. These concerns don’t occur as transphobic to me, just confusion born of the changing nature of society and humanity, and the challenges this presents for the previous generation as they are confronted by the new stuff. It’s to be expected and is the responsibility of the newer generation to fight for the new stuff as much as it’s the responsibility of the previous generation to listen and learn about something they know nothing about.

He says that he doesn't view the above concerns as transphobic, but it's quite clear by the fact that he's even writing this article in the first place that he feels quite negatively about those concerns, so that's just rhetoric designed to mask his disdain for parents daring to question their child's trans status. He takes issues with parents of old saying the same thing about being gay ("it's just a phase" etc.) and likens them to what's going on with "trans kids." Though the concerns may sound the same, they are coming from a different place.

If a teen thinks they're gay, and goes along with that for a bit, then turns out they were just confused and not actually gay, it's generally no harm, no foul (although the kid may feel some social pressure to continue being "gay" through high school or college or whatever since they entrenched themselves in that identity). If a teen thinks they're trans, and goes along with it to the point of puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, or surgery, then realizes a few years later that they were actually just confused, then there is a lot more harm done in that process. It's reasonable for parents to be concerned and have questions.

Last week, I read a story by James Finn that alerted me up to a schism in UK queer communities between The Gays and The Trans, with small minorities of LGB people rejecting the T through neutrality or frank opposition. This really bugged me, and I’ve been turning it over in my mind ever since.

He's been thinking about this constantly since he first heard about it. It bothered him significantly, but he clearly gave no thought to why it bothered him. He just knew that he was supposed to be bothered by anything seen as "anti-trans," and spent a week limbering up for his mental gymnastics to justify why it's a problem. Again, this is most likely because he's been told it's a problem by thought leaders and he can't imagine thinking critically about the subject.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T18:02:44+00:00

I think you're right in that, a lot of times, the difficulty was artificially inflated in those older games. Those were the days before saving games was even a thing (except in a few limited instances, and most of those instances required you to write down a complex code to save - looking at you, Mega Man), so it was sort of expected that you should be able to complete a game in one sitting of maybe a couple of hours, once you played enough to become an expert at it.

Games like Ninja Gaiden were super hard when you first started out, but the "difficulty" wasn't in the actual gameplay, it was in learning the stages, because the enemies always popped out at the same place, always moved in the same patterns, etc. So you play the level over and over until you basically have it memorized and can breeze through it with no issue.

Now that games are designed to be played for hundreds of hours in some cases, it's a little much, in my opinion, to complain about not having permadeath. It would be pretty devastating, for example, to play through a game like Final Fantasy XIII, somehow manage to get through without the party ever being wiped, and get to the final boss, only to get killed and find out that all progress you made in the last fifty hours of playing was completely gone and you have to start over from the very beginning.

I know that permadeath is an option in some games like that (Last of Us comes to mind), and that's cool that it's an option for people, but I personally wouldn't want to play any games that way.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-26T17:49:19+00:00

gender ideology is making normal teenage drama so much more complicated

This is so true. I can't imagine being a teenager right now. My own teen years were confusing enough going from "I'm bi" to "no, I'm definitely gay" to having confusing relationships and also feeling very alone in my feelings. If society threw gender ideology into the mix, I have no idea how I'd have turned out.

I have a nephew that's getting ready to go into high school soon, and I'm pretty worried for him. He's a sensitive guy. I don't think he's gay (although I honestly wouldn't be terribly surprised), but I can definitely see him falling for "you're not a manly man, so you're not a man" stuff. Although there's not much I can do about that other than hopefully be a support for him, and not in the "everything you do is wonderful and I'll never say anything bad about you" way, but in the "let's talk out the situation and really try and get to the heart of things" sort of way.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-25T18:43:00+00:00

It's always funny to me when people pull up the "private companies" thing like it's a shield from criticism. We are allowed to not like something that a privately-owned company or website or whatever does, and we are allowed to comment on those things we don't like. In all of the posts I've read about this, I haven't seen a single person advocating for forcing Nexus to carry the mod. People are just complaining about the takedown and the response to it. Nexus can do whatever the fuck they want, but we don't have to like it.

I'd be interested to see if this whole thing was the other way around, and Nexus took down a mod that put the trans flag everywhere, would the person saying "they're a private site, they can do what they want" still be preaching that, or would they be preaching about how there's a social responsibility to marginalized groups or whatever?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-24T15:55:55+00:00

Viewers hoping that Shiver would be a nonbinary character had some convincing clues to go off from the video showcase linked above.

That's a funny way to say that viewers stretched to the point of pulling every muscle in their bodies to find justifications for a video game character being nonbinary. The idea that the developers even know the colors of the nonbinary flag to put that in there is dumb, never mind that the fact that the whole group seemingly uses those colors would seem to indicate that said colors have nothing to do with the gender identity of the group members. Oh, but also the whole group said a thing! Which means that one member of the group is nonbinary!

It was a huge reach from the very beginning and I can't believe that anyone even thought of it (although, those types of people are obsessed with their flags and with hidden messages everywhere, so I guess I can believe it).

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-24T15:46:09+00:00

I've been following this drama since it was first being talked about on KotakuInAction and I think it's just absolutely ridiculous.

I'm not a PC gamer (except for The Sims) but I'm still fairly certain that any games that have a multiplayer element would disallow the use of mods in the multiplayer environment, since one could obviously mod themselves into having an unfair advantage over other players. Even a mod like this, that just changes the environment, wouldn't be able to be used in a multiplayer situation, I'm willing to bet.

So, someone saw a bunch of pride flags in the new Spiderman game and made a mod to replace the texture with the standard US flag texture that also exists in the game. This effects literally no one other than the person playing the single player game. So why is it a problem, exactly?

I can somewhat follow the line of reasoning that says, "If we allow homophobic things in society, then homophobic people will feel comfortable having those opinions, or may even be emboldened into acting on those opinions, so therefore we must shut down anything that can be validating to homophobia." But let's be real: stopping a homophobe from replacing the pride flag with the US flag isn't going to enlighten them or make them stop thinking negatively about gay people, just like people are still racist against black people even though we can't say the N-word.

You can't stop bigotry without changing the minds of the bigots. And you can't change minds by shutting people down. Those people will continue to be homophobic and forcing gay celebration (not acceptance, let's get that clear; it's celebration) into their single-player game experience is not going to make them change their minds.

Say what you will about the mod creator's intentions. I think it's disingenuous for people to say, "Maybe he just doesn't like the look of the pride flag." I'm almost certain that mod creator's intentions were political, though I wouldn't necessarily go so far as to say his intentions were homophobic. That said, I don't see anything homophobic about replacing the pride flags. The pride flag is a divisive political symbol now, whether we want it to be or not, and the reaction to this mod even existing proves that.

Whatever happened to "live and let live"?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-23T14:52:42+00:00

It took me way too long to even parse that and I'm still not entirely sure what happened.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-18T19:48:47+00:00

That's what struck me as strange - from lesbian woman to gay man? What a weird move.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-17T13:21:18+00:00

Of course the response to that is, "Stop gatekeeping."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-12T20:47:48+00:00

lol I also thought about that, but then again, maybe it's EA subtly implying that giving yourself custom pronouns doesn't change your physical sex.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-12T19:13:44+00:00

The split attraction model is so weird to me. Like, I understand the idea that you can have sex with someone without having romantic feelings for them, but are there people out there that are like, "I'm romantically attracted to women but I am only sexually attracted to men" or whatever? Like, I married my husband because I'm in love with him but his penis repulses me and I only want to have sex with someone with a vagina, but I could never actually feel anything besides horniness for a woman?

I just really can't wrap my brain around the idea of that being a thing.

As a Sims player, I actually don't MIND the idea of being able to make a Sim be exclusively gay, so that their AI doesn't start flirting with someone of the opposite sex, but the split attraction thing is just too confusing.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-11T14:21:33+00:00

That's the problem with the progressive stack and the idea of intersectionality. In my mind, "intersectionality" should basically mean "don't assume you know someone's life story because of any of their specific characteristics."

In the grand scheme of things, Will Smith is better off than a white single father living on food stamps, and intersectionality explains that just fine. Will might experience discrimination because of his skin color, but the white man doesn't have Will's financial security, so don't assume that just because someone is white means that everything goes great for them and just because someone is black means that nothing goes well for them.

It's when people don't have a firm grasp on the concept and still decide to weaponize it that really irks me. Okay, yes, the core message of the tweet is "you still have white privilege even if you're [some other minority as well]" which is technically true if we're looking at things through the lens of intersectionality, but it's obvious that this person is using the concept to mean, "It doesn't matter what else, if you're white, you're bad."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-08-05T14:24:26+00:00

Whatever happened to "trust but verify"? There's a world of difference between assuming that EVERY alleged rape victim is making it up and that EVERY alleged rape victim is telling the absolute truth. Of course you don't want to immediately dismiss someone that says they've been raped, but I don't think it's wrong to ask for some kind of evidence, especially if you're about to ruin someone else's life and reputation over those accusations.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-29T18:14:40+00:00

Huh - looks like the Twitter account you linked has no tweets and the profile picture is a trans flag with an antifa symbol on it.

So I'm going to guess that something happened there in the last few hours; that was pretty fast.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-28T12:07:59+00:00

I just don't understand the "denying our existence" argument. That's like saying, "This event that's only for black women is denying that white men even exist!" Let people have their spaces, Jesus.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-27T22:46:53+00:00

I find myself wondering if that's what the TQ+ is thinking - that there exists oppression against (ugh) queer people somewhere in the world, and they're conflating that with it happening in the US or Western Europe.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-27T22:44:17+00:00

Thank you for the serious and thoughtful response. Every time I see you I think, 'Surely her username is a misnomer.'

While I don't stay up on current events, I did know about the Obergefell thing. I'm torn about it, honestly, because I get the legal reasoning behind it but I also can't see it as being anything other than politically-motivated. But I did also hear about same-sex marriage being potentially codified into law, so I'm not overly concerned. I think that LGB acceptance is really a non-issue in the US, and it shouldn't be too difficult to get Congress on board.

I actually didn't realize it was legal to discriminate in housing based on sexual orientation, although I probably should have since I know that sexual orientation still isn't considered a protected characteristic.

I'm definitely up on the LGB specific stuff, and it definitely feels like oppression being silenced everywhere. Although, that seems to be getting better as I see more gender-critical stuff hitting MSM.

I agree about media depictions, too. That's always been a huge gripe of mine. It doesn't seem like there are many balanced LGB characters in media. Don't get me wrong; I like seeing representation and everything, but for gay men it's the same as you're talking about with lesbians. I feel like shows are either "gay shows" which don't really reflect my life, or if it's just a gay character they're a walking stereotype.

I'm actually wondering what the TQ+ think - like, for your average asexual person, what does oppression look like?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-27T20:53:12+00:00

Also, even though I'm being somewhat facetious, I wouldn't mind some serious replies. :) Like, is there something I should be concerned about pertaining to LGB people in the US? I find that my life is a lot more enjoyable and I'm a lot happier when I don't follow current events, so I'm pretty out of the loop other than the nebulous possibility that the SC may overturn Obergefell.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-27T16:35:17+00:00

My favorite is the "non-binary lesbian" who complains about how people tell her she can't be a non-binary lesbian because that's contradictory and she just doubles down and is like, "ACTUALLY what most people don't realize is that 'lesbian' means 'non-man loving non-man'," as though that's not just a thing that was specifically made up so that people could claim to be non-binary lesbians.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-22T20:49:55+00:00

The annoying thing is that these people aren't wrong, per se - misusing that term devalues it in the same way that calling everything racist devalues the word and makes people not believe it when some actual racism takes place. I'm sure I'll get crap for this, but it's wrong to imply that every LGB person is a sexual predator or a child groomer. But when you're calling someone a groomer when they're actually grooming someone... well, it's more harmful to the children to not be able to point that to anyone.

Edit: Also, it's Twitter. Get off your damn phone for like, ten minutes or something.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-22T20:01:44+00:00

I have my doubts that the non-trans woman is actually a lesbian. I'm sure she's a lesbian in the same vein as transbians are lesbians, in that she feels like because her husband is a "woman" then that makes her a lesbian. But saying "I realized I should call myself a lesbian if my husband calls himself a woman" doesn't win anyone any brownie points. Dollars to donuts this woman is either deeply unhappy and staying in this situation for the supposed benefit of the kids or she is just mentally unwell as her husband and doesn't care what's being said about her as long as people are talking about her.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-22T16:18:20+00:00

Yeah, I think it's pretty strange and coincidental to "suddenly" realize you're gay as soon as your husband "realizes" he's actually a woman. And instead of just saying, "Well, I still love my husband regardless of his outward appearance and it doesn't bother me if he dresses and styles himself like a woman," they think that, and come to the conclusion that because they still love this person who now says he's a woman, that must make them a lesbian.

No doubt that this comes from the sort of mental gymnastics that trans people do like, "Well, I was always a woman, so the whole time you've been with me, I've been a woman."

I know that it's possible and not terribly uncommon for some gay person in denial to enter a heterosexual relationship, get married, and even have kids before waking up and realizing they're gay. But that usually involves leaving the heterosexual relationship. If your husband puts on a dress and grows his hair out and you maintain feelings of sexual attraction to him despite that, you're still straight.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-19T19:49:53+00:00

Yeah, I only say that because I've seen it come up before, where trans women that are just beginning to transition (aka put on a bad wig and an ill-fitting dress) say that they are basically girls because they're learning how to be women, so they liken their transition to a young girl going through puberty or something like that.

And like, I get where that comparison is coming from, but at the same time it also is very creepy. Never mind the fact that if trans women were "always women and just never showed their true selves before" then why should they need to "learn how to be women"?

ALSO never mind the fact that there is no way to "be a woman" - I know plenty of women that don't wear makeup or dresses and always have their hair in a messy bun and I don't think that they're not women.

It really makes no sense to me.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-19T19:18:04+00:00

To be fair (though lord knows I don't want to), I think when he says he's a pre-teen girl, he means that he's "still learning how to be a woman and it's early in his transition," so effectively he's like a pre-teen girl, not that he legitimately thinks he's a pre-teen girl.

Of course, that could just be backpedaling when someone called him out on it.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-14T20:52:08+00:00

You know, I actually agree with you on that. I don't think that I was making a judgment call, but my comment was informed by my personal worldview. Since I am an American, I obviously don't deal with Americans telling me I'm backward for my beliefs (well, I do, but that's more of a "this side vs that side" thing and not something that could necessarily be viewed as an attack on my culture).

I still think that the opera's response was the best one - again, if you're opening yourself up to everyone in the world, I don't think it's productive to just say "go fuck yourself" if you're met with any questioning. It's like going on your public TikTok account and saying something controversial and being shocked that there may exist people that disagree with you. And I think it's important to try and understand each other.

That being said, the people that typically complain about things like this are so militant and make no effort to try and understand the other side, so... yeah, I get where you're coming from. I would like to point out that I, personally, am not interested whatsoever in forcing the opera to stop doing what they're doing, and I'm actually disappointed that the end of the article they talk about making changes for future performances. But I think you're talking more about Americans in general than me in particular, right? If that's the case, you're absolutely right. I don't think anyone has any business trying to force their ideals on anyone else. And given the history of how Americans have treated Europeans... well, let me put it this way: I still don't think it's productive to be hostile to other people, but it's understandable.

I'd also like to thank you for a thoughtful response; it was actually pretty enlightening and helped me see your viewpoint more clearly, so I'm sorry if I seemed dismissive before.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-14T18:33:08+00:00

I get you - I don't really know Italian culture or the makeup of the population of the country. I think you may be reading my remarks as a criticism of the culture, but they really weren't. Just because I said "it's strange" doesn't mean I think anything in particular is wrong, I just think it's strange. I'm sure there are plenty of things about American culture that you find strange but I wouldn't think that means you think American culture is wrong.

What I'm saying is that, if you are going to have a global platform, it's at least worth considering how things might look to everyone that would be viewing your work. To an American, what's happening is objectively blackface. I personally think that blackface needs to have some element of malice to it, which this situation obviously doesn't, but I can see why Americans would look at that and say, "That's blackface."

I notice that you didn't bother to quote the second part of my comment, where I said I completely understand the viewpoint of the festival people and actually agree with their assessment of the situation and their reasoning behind the casting and makeup choices. It's an opera that's historically been done a certain way and they are showing that particular version. It's not a big deal to me. But I appreciate that the festival reps gave a thoughtful response rather than just "spare us your American 'sensitivity' ... GTFO."

Understanding why people think one way is different from supporting that viewpoint, and the festival reps gave a response that would hopefully help people understand their viewpoint rather than just saying "suck it assholes, I don't care what you think." That sort of thing only serves to keep people divided and hating each other.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-14T18:23:57+00:00

The idea that you can put yourself out there on a public platform and receive no criticism for anything whatsoever is so bizarre to me. If I went out to a public park, stood on a soapbox, and started shouting about how I hate straight people, I would expect to have at least some people getting upset with me.

Why should TikTok or Facebook or Instagram be any different? If you have a completely private profile and only share things with people you know in real life (which really should be what social media is for, in my opinion), then the chances that you are going to be harassed on social media would seemingly be pretty low. If you have a completely public profile and are allowing yourself to be seen by just anyone, then you should expect that people with other viewpoints will criticize yours.

Look, I'm not saying that people deserve to be harassed on social media. But a public social media profile is not and will never be a safe space.

I also find myself wondering exactly what these respondents consider "harassment" and what their posts were that received a bunch of "hate." It's sad to me that I feel the need to be hyper-suspicious of this kind of thing, but what are the chances that some of those respondents posted something highly divisive and vitriolic and the "hate" they received was just someone not toeing the party line?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-14T12:54:51+00:00

On one hand, I get it - it's very jarring to see the photos and they could definitely be characterized as blackface. It's also strange that they don't just hire black singers (although, I don't know the racial makeup of Italy and how easy it is for them to find black singers).

On the other hand, I also understand what the festival people are saying when they say that they are not doing a "new production," they are doing a "historical production," and it's meant to be viewed more as a living museum piece. I don't think it's a good idea to erase history, even the bad parts of it, because that's how we all grow and learn.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-11T19:11:05+00:00

You know, if you wanted to make an actual point and not just pat yourself on the back for how "smart" you are, you might phrase things in a way that most people could understand.

Oh, but, "I'm so sick and tired of terfs saying that women have vaginas; they are literally killing all trans people with their rhetoric," isn't really what you're saying, is it? What you're saying is, "Look at me look at me look at me look at me it's all about me me me look at me," right?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-07-05T19:35:42+00:00

Even if that conversation did happen, I'd be willing to bet that the person on the other end was just like, "Oh shit, okay, let him down gently and act like I'm terrible or else I'm never going to hear the end of it."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-30T20:38:33+00:00

This is great and I'm happy to hear it! :) I didn't provide any input in the other post because... I don't know, I don't feel like I'm a "community member" per say as much as "occasional lurker and commenter" but I'm happy to follow wherever you go.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-30T20:32:20+00:00

I can understand being trans, and, honestly, as long as someone's not an asshole about it and are a grown-ass adult, they can do whatever they want. I still believe that body-altering surgery and presenting yourself as the opposite sex is probably not the best way to handle gender dysphoria (much like liposuction is probably not the best way to deal with anorexia, which is also body dysmorphia), but if that's all we know how to do about it for now, fine.

But non-binary I just cannot wrap my head around. I would love to be able to get into the brain of one of these people and find out what exactly they're thinking when they come to the conclusion that they are neither man nor woman, neither male nor female. I just can't believe that there are women out there that are thinking to themselves, 'Well, I don't really FEEL womanly. I guess maybe I feel a LITTLE masculine. I should go ahead and start growing out all my body hair, get a short hair cut, and have my breasts surgically removed.'

Like, I guess if you want a cosmetic mastectomy done, that's fine? But it seems to veer so very close to, "Doctor, I really FEEL like a quadraplegic, but all of my limbs exist and are functioning. Can you please remove them?" and the doctor applauding their bravery. How are the social circles these people belong to pretending that this is anything but crazy?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-30T17:19:54+00:00

I hate these disingenuous arguments because it's comparing apples to oranges. In some ways, they are similar (apples and orange are both fruit, and both grow on trees, for example) but in a lot of ways, they are very different (an apple pie and an orange pie are not the same pie). I feel like one of the big differences is pushing all of this on school kids. There wasn't a "gay agenda to indoctrinate kids" because there wasn't a gay agenda to indoctrinate kids. There's no evidence for that. On the other hand, there's plenty of evidence of teachers indoctrinating kids into gender ideology and identity politics. There's just no comparison to be made here.

As an aside, I also hate that all of these arguments typically end with, "If you disagree with gender ideology nonsense and think it has no place in public schools, you don't want trans people to exist!" No one gives two shits about you existing. You exist whether I like it or not, so let's chill with the histrionics. I can't even think of once that I have been in a gender-critical space and heard anything even akin to "let's kill all trans people." It's generally along the lines of, "I don't give a shit if you're trans, but I'm sick of being bullied and seeing other people be bullied and seeing the people in charge kowtow to every whim of TRAs." There's a huge difference between those two things.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-23T20:32:57+00:00

Hear, hear!

I think about this sort of thing a lot. Am I on "the wrong side of history" because I don't like the current transgender trend and think that it's gotten way out of hand? When I say, "I don't care how someone wants to identify as long as they don't turn it into my problem somehow," am I being the same as those who said, "I don't mind gay people, just don't shove it in my face"? Many people that are mired in the activism, as well as lots of people who only know about trans stuff through popular media, think of the trans stuff as being the next big civil rights movement. Are they right? Am I just being an out-of-touch old fogey who is resistant to societal change?

It's quite insidious the ways that we're being trained to question ourselves. Something about "trans liberation" is very different than "gay liberation," but the way things are portrayed, it's very difficult to pinpoint exactly what that something is, and if you can, you're made to feel unreasonable.

I don't think it's unreasonable to be against sweeping societal changes to cater to a very small percentage of people. Asking someone for their pronouns upon first meeting them is completely unnecessary for the vast majority of people in their everyday lives, and yet we're being told we're insensitive for not wasting brainpower and time on completely unneeded things, because there are a small handful of people in the world who are annoyed at having to deal with having "different" pronouns that they themselves chose? It sounds completely batshit, but everyone seems to go along with it.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-21T20:10:04+00:00

This is what happens when you live your life mostly online in echo chambers.

I find it a little disconcerting given that our acceptance is mostly limited to cutesy "trans girls are valid uwu you're so good at music" posts, but in practice we seem to be othered, like we're welcome in the community so long as we make it obvious to people about who we are.

That's probably because you are generally welcome in the community so long as you don't try to deceive people into dating you. Most people don't have a problem with trans people, they have a problem with deceitful people and would-be rapists. You being trans doesn't mean you're exempt from being considered an asshole.

Also, if you're seeing one thing when you're on TikTok or your safe space Subreddits and you're seeing something completely different when you dare to venture out into the real world, maybe that should clue you in to the fact that the internet and safe spaces are not indicative of the sentiment of the general population.

Is the idea of a penis itself disgusting to some given it's associated with men?

I can't speak for lesbians, but as a gay man, I'm grossed out by the idea of doing anything with a vagina. That doesn't mean that I think vaginas themselves are gross or that women are gross, I'm just turned off by them. Lesbians are not turned on by penises! It's really just that fucking simple. "Lesbian" does not mean "hates men" or "thinks men are all gross" or "is disgusted by penises." Stop defining lesbians by their relation to men!

There's burly men with vaginas out there, but you don't see preferences swinging the other way to dick only for lesbians that often.

There are exactly zero men with vaginas out there, and that sentence doesn't even make sense. If a lesbian sleeps with a delusional woman that calls herself a man, there are no dicks involved whatsoever. Also, the "genital preference" for lesbians will never swing to "dick only."

I don't want to be told I'm valid. I want to be treated like I'm valid.

Well, you can wish in one hand and shit in the other, as they say. If you don't want to be told you're valid, crying on the internet about it is going to have the exact opposite effect. If you want to be treated a certain way by other people then you're in for a real bad time. There are people out there that think I'm a jerk, even though I consider myself to be a fairly decent guy. I wish that no one thought I was a jerk, and I would love it if those people that do think I'm a jerk would treat me like I'm a nice guy, but, and here is the biggest point that I really wish I could hammer into the heads of all these people: you can't force other people to do, think, or say what you want them to and you need to get used to that if you want to live around other people.

Lord, I need to get away from this shit. It's bad for my mental health and overall mood. These people are so infuriating and oblivious and narcissistic and everyone else just validates that, which is even more infuriating. I like staying abreast of what's going on in our community, and I don't want to see the pendulum swing back to gay-bashing again because of these people, but it's just crazy to me that these people exist in real life and live their lives this way.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-21T19:41:36+00:00

Nothing against bisexual people, but I am so tired of these confused bisexuals thinking that everyone is bi just because they are bi. (Also not saying that bi people should be expected to date trans people simply by virtue of being bi - just because you like chicks and dicks doesn't mean you're gonna like a chick with a dick.)

It's laughable to think that, as a man who grew up in a world where homosexuality was very hush-hush, my "preference" for dicks has been a factor of my socialization.

It also irks me when they pull all of this "people say 'preference' when what they mean is 'requirement'" shit. Because yes, for most people it is a requirement, and all we're doing is using the terminology that your group decided on when they wanted to deride people. The lack of self-awareness boggles.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-21T18:54:26+00:00

I know! I actually just happened to be on SocialJusticeInAction reading something and I clicked on the next link and BAM. So I checked TiA and same thing.

In a way, it's kind of cool - I've been physically present at the banning of LGBDropTheT, NoNewNormal, SJiA, and TiA. But also that sucks.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-21T18:32:29+00:00

That sucks. :( I'm gonna miss it there, considering that it was one of the few places on Reddit where you could actually discuss things.

But on the other side of that token, I'm not going to be upset about this excuse to just gtfo of Reddit entirely. TiA was basically the only sub that I ever went to. At least it's nice, if quiet, here.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-16T20:07:29+00:00

I hadn't heard of this. I'd be interested in reading more about it, but I also don't really trust Wikipedia's sources that say it was "trans women and drag queens." Almost all of their sources are from 2018 forward, which is fairly suspect in my mind, and leads me to believe that it was "drag queens" and people that are saying "trans women" are making the leap that some drag queens were probably actually trans women but they just didn't have the terminology for that. (Like what's been done to Marsha Johnson.)

I'd love to hear more if anyone here does know more about it, though!

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-16T20:01:42+00:00

Wow - this person posts receipts of them going into someone's DMs to harass them instead of just responding to their comment in the thread, and everyone is supportive of that? Regardless of where you stand on whether "non-binary" people can be "lesbians" (they can't), I can't believe people are supporting that kind of behavior.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-07T19:43:21+00:00

I figured as much - I guess I thought that it was something that was an option when setting up a sub, to allow or disallow "negative" voting. Although I guess just upvoting is still an alright form of self-regulation. :)

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-06-07T15:02:07+00:00

Hey, thanks for adding me in even though I'm not a super regular commenter. I honestly know nothing about Saidit in general, as I followed everyone here from Reddit and don't venture outside of this sub, but is it just not possible to allow downvoting or similar? I really like the idea of getting away from downvotes, but at the same time, that seems like the best way to help the community moderate itself.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-25T20:15:23+00:00

I don't understand how people can say things like, "I [a straight woman] am attracted to men, but like, in a gay way, so that means I'm actually a gay man," or, well, like the above, talking about how his love for lesbians is "sapphic" and more than just "an attraction to women."

Like, I love my husband and I guess that it's "in a gay way" because we're both gay men, but it doesn't "feel gay." It just feels like I love my husband. I feel really bad for all of the people that are getting sucked into this shit and I'm really thankful that I don't have kids right now.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-24T19:54:38+00:00

In headshots, yeah - Chase looks like a twinky guy I guess.

In full-body shots, such as this one with Laverne Cox? https://media.vanityfair.com/photos/5d880728a31a8400089a8251/master/w_2560%2Cc_limit/Laverne-Cox-Lede.jpg

No freakin way.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-24T19:38:23+00:00

Yeah, the only way this "guilt people into dating me" thing makes sense is if that person doesn't care about an actual relationship but only cares about having power over someone else.

I really can't imagine being happy with someone that I tricked or guilted into dating me.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-24T19:19:11+00:00

I really wish that these people would be self-aware enough to type out "She inflicts so much pain on my [by just existing and not doing anything]," then stop, take a look at that, and think, 'Maybe it's not her that's the problem since she's literally not doing anything.' No, instead we go straight to threats and violence.

Also very skeezy in general this language he's using to describe his coworker. He is definitely glossing over the "do bad things to her" when he's most likely talking about rape fantasies.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-20T18:58:07+00:00

"Wild" is an understatement. This lady is so deep in her rationalizations.

"He hit me with his bloody dilator, but it didn't hurt, and he knew it wouldn't hurt, so that's not abuse. But when I said don't hit me, he took it like I was saying he was abusing me and it was very upsetting to him so I wish I hadn't said that."

Look, I get it; you're married and you don't want to go through a messy divorce with a mentally unstable person. But something's gotta give; this is a nightmare situation.

Also, let me just emphasize this: he hit her with his bloody dilator.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-20T18:48:48+00:00

Oh Catherine Tate... Donna was my absolute favorite companion.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-20T18:47:25+00:00

Aw, don't do Rose dirty like that. No one else can be Rose.

That said, I stopped watching Doctor Who after the first Matt Smith season, so I guess I don't really care. I'd be interested to see Jodie Whittaker's Doctor because I really loved her in Broadchurch, but nothing I've seen about Doctor Who since Matt Smith has really made me be like, "Oh, man I can't wait."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-19T19:54:01+00:00

Maybe it's, "Well, I hate men, but if kids grow up without a father (and all fathers are of course, terrible) then they might not hate men because they won't have a terrible father being an awful man around them" ?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-19T18:14:51+00:00

lol Yeah, the question becomes why. Like it's just so inconceivable that a gay man or a lesbian might just... want to have kids. No, gay parents adopting children or having kids through surrogates or IVF are doing it because they're part of a misogynistic conspiracy to... uh... create soulless demon children? I honestly have no idea what point is attempting to be made here.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-19T17:53:47+00:00

Wait a second, when did the bisexual flag start creeping in? I mean, good on you guys for getting some recognition I guess but like, the whole point of the rainbow was that it included everyone.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-19T17:52:07+00:00

What I would do to have these peoples' "problems." Someone on the internet made you sad, really? Jesus Christ, suck it up.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-19T17:50:11+00:00

it's like everyone sees me as a woman, the only difference being that they have to be careful with what they refer to me as

Congratulations, now you understand why people think nonbinary people are insufferable. Because that's exactly the case. You're a woman that everyone has to walk on eggshells around. Sorry you're not happy that your "get out of the binary free" card doesn't actually work that way.

we are not all the same, and we're not all different.

Yeah, almost like you're human beings! Do these people really think that "women" and "men" are monoliths and that everyone that is a woman is exactly the same? How is this happening? How are people so stupid?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-18T20:30:57+00:00

Twitter is so confusing - I barely followed any of that.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-18T20:18:50+00:00

Ugh the split attraction model. Who came up with that complete nonsense?

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-18T19:45:38+00:00

Ugh I'd rather them continue using "queer" than try and fucking reclaim "fag."

Also funny how the shirt says "Fags Hate LGB Alliance" and the background is the fucking trans flag.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-18T19:42:36+00:00

I like how there's a whole part that's basically saying, "Look, we know you are used to having sex with men, but women like different stuff, so make sure to ask her to show you how to have sex with her."

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-18T19:37:32+00:00

I'm all for destigmatizing mental illness as much as possible, so that people that have problems can actually admit to themselves that they have problems and can get help without feeling like they're a social pariah, but I'm very much against glorifying mental illness as though it's a good thing to have and doesn't need treatment.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-11T19:25:38+00:00

From what I've read, it appears that some ancient cultures did do this, but it wasn't necessarily a good thing for the priest/shaman. For one, it was almost universally gay men that ended up in those positions, not trans people, and if said gay men could be considered trans it was because they were typically eunuchs.

The fact that they were castrated for being gay leads to them being in positions of "respect" because they aren't competition for whatever leader currently reigned.

Anyway, what Jules said is right: who fucking cares? Even if we assume that it worked like that, that "trans" was even a thing back in ancient times and that someone being trans made society basically worship them, what difference does that actually make today? Our society doesn't worship trans people (well, I guess that can be argued). Are they trying to say we should be revering them and putting them in positions of power? Get outta here with that nonsense.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-10T18:36:40+00:00

Most people point to John Money for that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Money

Although that was a ways back that he differentiated between sex and "gender identity." I'm not really sure what caused it to become the current zeitgeist. It's only in the last few years that many people seriously consider "sex" and "gender" to be different things. Before that, most rational people considered "gender" to be a euphemism for "sex" because the word "sex" brings to mind "sexual intercourse."

You can see that in action when people start talking about "sexuality" as being "who you have sex with" as opposed to "what sex you are attracted to." Case in point: asexuals who consider a lack of sex drive a sexuality rather than a lack of attraction which would make more sense.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-10T15:15:26+00:00

I might be way off base, but I'm pretty sure that most companies aren't going to switch up their marketing like that without knowing that there's a customer base.

Which is what's actually kind of scary.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-10T14:56:57+00:00

My biggest gripe against the idea of "nonbinary" is that, if you look at it closely enough, you understand that it's effectively a stop-gap measure by lazy people that want gender-nonconformity to be accepted by society at large but want to be shielded from any criticism while they try to change society.

I actually don't have any issue with the idea of gender non-conformity becoming, not celebrated, but tolerated by society at large. I know that it already is to some degree, but I think it'd be cool if no one took a second look at a man wearing a dress because that's just normal, you know?

The problem with "nonbinary" is two-fold: (1) see above; people are lazy and sensitive and don't want to "do the work" of being an outsider in society, so they've made up a special identity that isn't able to be criticized in order to deflect reality, and (2) reinforcing the idea that "nonbinary" is even a thing also necessarily enforces gender norms. So when you see people screeching about breaking down gender norms and then calling themselves nonbinary, all they're doing is shooting themselves in the foot.

Just be a masculine woman or a feminine man and learn to accept that you might have a tougher time in life until society gets over its prejudices. I can guarantee you that a masculine woman or a feminine man has it easier now than they would have 60 years ago. I know it sucks that you might not live to see a world where people don't give you the side-eye because you're a man in a dress, but you can't force social progress. That shit takes generations, and if you really want to make a difference, you have to be doing it for people two or three generations down the line, not for yourself.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-04T17:55:11+00:00

I have... varied views on drag. I like(d) watching RuPaul's Drag Race (I haven't watched it in a few years but I enjoyed it when I did watch it) and I've gone to a couple of drag shows and had a good time. I don't think drag is misogynistic and I don't think that drag is inherently sexual. If these teen boys enjoy dressing up in outrageous outfits and getting on stage to sing or dance or whatever for an audience, I think that's fine. It's the context that matters. The world of professional drag is, to my understanding, rife with sex and drugs and all kind of things that kids and teens don't need to be exposed to.

If these kids want to express themselves in that way, I'm all for it if they're doing it for like, the school talent show or something similar. If they are being surrounded by and "mentored" by adult drag queens, that's a lot more iffy to me. I'm sure there are some drag queens that are reasonably well-adjusted individuals that see mentoring a teen drag queen as no different than an artist having a protege, but... I mean, I personally don't think I'd let my kid hang out with drag queens.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-03T20:42:47+00:00

I think what actually happened is that she had sex with this person once, then invented an entire relationship in her head. No one is blocking their fiancé on social media.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-03T20:34:50+00:00

Right? Like, I'm pretty much the definition of a bear, but from what I'm hearing, all I have to do is say, "Actually I identify as female," and suddenly there's a potential for you to be attracted to my chubby, hairy, bearded, be-penised self?

It's like people think there's a Game Genie for real life or something.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-05-03T20:02:03+00:00

Uhm, your fiancé blocked you?

Dollars to donuts this girl is a stalker.

Horror-Swordfish · 2022-04-29T18:50:27+00:00

Because she had a crush on David Bowie and mistakenly thought he was a gay man because of how he dressed, is my guess.

Horror-Swordfish