Some froggy affirmations for youđ¸đ
(All available as stickers and such in my Redbubble shopâ¨)
This was very educational and helpful!!!!!!
Thank you <3
Genuine question?? Im a 19 y/o lesbian and ?? I dont find p*nis attractive does that make me a TERF?
Iâm happy you sent this ask, because itâs a perfect place to talk about how someone can get hurt, feel wronged, and become susceptible to extremist recruiting.
First off, treat this as a simple yes or no question, asked with zero surrounding context, the platonic idea of penis preference if you will. âI donât find penises attractiveâ is not a sentiment that makes you a TERF. Youâre okay not liking them. My nonbinary wife doesnât particularly like them, yet they are married to me (who has one) and we love each other more than anything in the world.Â
In fact, in the abstract, I donât like âem much either, and I own one! Ridiculous looking thing, wish I didnât have to deal with it. A general dislike of genitals doesnât make you a TERF⌠not by itself.
Now, here is where the critical thinking comes in, because if you posted something like that on Tumblr or something, it has a different context. You might not even know! It could be a totally innocent mistake, and it happens, and some women either get criticized in ways that makes them feel attacked, or actually attacked because you never know if what you post online is hitting someone on a bad day or a good day.Â
The context first of all is, without any clarifying statements, saying you donât like a genital could imply youâre reducing anyone with that particular set of genitals down to their genitals only. And it could result in either someone telling you it sounds TERFy (if theyâre trying to be gentle) or calling you a TERF (if theyâre out of spoons) because thatâs what TERFs do. Hereâs where it becomes a recruit pitch.
You say âI donât like penises.â This doesnât mean youâre saying you dislike trans women (not all of whom have penises anyway), but if you get the above lecture/yelling, a radfem can come along and empathetically agree how unfair it is that someone made you hurt for saying you donât like a genital, and itâs not fair to tell a lesbian she has to sleep with a male or sheâs a TERF and- OH WAIT A MINUTE!
Hold up, it looks like they were just being nice but wait wait, they just slid cozily from âitâs okay not to like a penisâ to âanyone with a penis is male.â See that? Like a sleight of hand, once youâve agreed with that premises, saying âI donât like penisesâ suddenly becomes attached to âand anyone with a penis is male.â
Alright now in context, going back this kind of equivalency is so common with radfems that at this point saying you donât like a genital is what we call a dogwhistle. Itâs a phrase which is seemingly innocent, and can be innocent, which has been so widely appropriated by a hate group that it carries extra connotations in a certain context. Contexts like posting on Tumblr, which happens to have a particularly large trans population.
Now you canât know every single dogwhistle because thatâs the whole reason they exist - so normal people donât spot someoneâs bigotry and it looks like a disenfranchised group is getting angry over an innocent statement.
And lastly, which you probably already know, but generally not being interested in something doesnât have to equate to disliking anyone with that trait, or even not being attracted to someone with that trait. I bring this up because the difference between a lesbian who just generally doesnât like genital and a TERF is that the TERF things anyone with a penis is automatically bad and a male and probably reading this right now thinks Iâm saying you have to have sex with men or like penises, somehow, despite saying exactly the opposite.
You may have a general preference, but in practice Iâm sure youâve already found a difference between âI am physically attracted to how this person looksâ and âHoly shit I am in love this person is amazing and everything about them is beautiful.â If you havenât had that experience yet, I can promise you some day you will. Not necessarily over genitals, but some day someone will come into your life and youâll love every part of them whether or not itâs something you normally find abstractly attractive.
Keep your heart open to love, keep your mind open to constructive criticism, and youâll never be a radfem or TERF or SWERF or whatever. Thatâs all.
vampires will never hurt you. they are too busy sucking and fucking me
You know those anime meta posts along the lines of âI was born with pink hair. The doctors told my parents I was a Main Character and ever since my life has not known peace from demons/spirits/sports competitions/harems who find meâ
Well I see that, and I raise you this:
An anime boy whose appearance is, by absolutely anyoneâs account, completely and utterly average. Mundane hair. Mundane eyes. Not even glasses to set him the tiniest bit apart. A simple, unmemorable, unrecognizable civilian among a backdrop of millions.
And he has a lot of passions, and a lot of ambitions, which he hones every chance he gets. Heâs dabbled in sports and archery and cooking and just about anything you could wrap a competition around. And heâs competed in many of these. Every chance he gets. With all of his passion and all of his might.
Heâs crushed by the competition every single time.
Until one dayâone day something clicks for him. Something that should have seemed obvious from the start and yet never wasâas though everyone, including himself, was unwittingly blind to it. It clicks, when he realizes every kid whoâs beaten him in competition, every kid whoâs gone on to fame and glory and acclaim, has been some candy-haired gel-spiked ridiculously-dressed fucker.Â
Thereâs some trend there that this Main Character boy canât explain and canât understand but he decides, this one time, fuck it. Heâll play along too. Heâs got a model train competition in four days, and heâs got nothing more to lose. He hits up the department store, buys the pinkest, noxious-est, fruitiest hair dye he can find, the spikiest hair gel available, and the gaudiest clothes on the thrift rack. He enters the model train competition looking like a bubble gum gijinka.
And he wins.
Suddenly, the other candy-haired contestants notice him. They talk to him. They pledge rivalries. Girls notice him. Judges applaud him. Acclaimed model train aficionados offer him internships across the world. Heâs hit on something.Â
The main cast expands to cover just about every candy-hair cliche in the book: from the mostly-normal-looking demure school girl with the blue hair to the Naruto-est, yelling-est boy with the red-and-green spiked hair. The cool megane senpais, the purple haired tsunderes, suddenly everyone is interested in him. Theyâre prodigies and upstarts and underdogs and they truly believe that this main character boy is one of them.
So the main character boy maintains his ruse. He touches up his roots at dawn every morning and carefully attends to his gelled spikes and tells absolutely no one about this great, uncanny, unfathomable secret heâs stumbled upon. He wins his competitions left and right. He racks up the acclaim. Heâs hailed as a prodigy of all trades, just now bursting onto the scene, and boils to the top of all his candy-haired peers.
Heâs rising up, his every dream within his grasp. Until one day he gets a note under his door, taped to an old picture of his Normal Boring self from middle school, that says âYou donât belongâ
Blue or green Shadow or light Me or you All those question Without answers I thought easy But then it hit You hit You hit me hard It swifted me off my feets Now I lay here Staring at the sky Crying without knowing Breathing unnoticed Alive but not Death but not Being me Whatever that means
It took four calls before Lena answered. It crawled across her side table, vibrating angrily like some persnickety insect until she gave it the attention she wanted.
You could just turn it off.
âWhat do you want, Danvers?â
Alexâs voice was thick.
âWe canât find Kara.â
Lena let out a slow, long, theatrical sigh. âSo now youâre accusing me of crimes over the phone. At least your ex had the courtesy to cuff me in person.â
Alexâs patience was clearly short enough, and wearing thinner.
âIâm not calling you to accuse you. Iâm calling you to ask for help.â
âAnd why would I do that?â
âBecause sheâs burned out her powers and we canât find her, Luthor. Supergirl is missing and sheâs powerless.â
Lena licked her lips.
âIs this some kind of weird test to see if Iâll try to kill her? An entrapment scheme or something?â
âFirst of all,â said Alex, âfuck you.â
âMutual,â said Lena. âWhat was the second part?â
âThe second part is that I know you. I know youâre pissed off at her. I also know that you donât react the way youâve acted because your BFF lied to you, Lena. Just like I know that buying a $875 million company isnât what friends are fucking for.â
âIâm sure I have no idea what you mean,â Lena snapped.
âRight. Help us find her.â
âNo,â Lena said, coolly. âGoodnight, Director.â
Lena stabbed the end call key with her finger, resolving to herself that L-Corp was going to release a smart phone that made it more satisfying to hang up on people.
Then she very pointedly did not go out looking for Kara. Instead, she boiled water for tea, and spread open a technical journal on her lap.
After ten minutes, she had not drunk the tea, and her attention was sliding off the abstract like the wrong end of two magnets jammed together. Rubbing at her eyes, she decided sheâd had too long a day for even light reading, and decided to enjoy a news broadcast with her tea.
Of *course* the lead story was Supergirl. She tried putting on the Lakehawks game, but that had been preempted for Supergirl coverage.
She turned to the science channel. Oh, of course theyâd decided that tonight was the night to premier some ridiculous companion documentary for the World of Krypton exhibit running downtown at the convention center, and of course Lena works tune in right as Kara appeared on screen, grinning ear to ear as she charitably gave some literal kid reporter the interview of her lifetime, fielding softball questions about her dead planet.
âWhat do you miss most?â the kid asked.
Lena saw it, saw it the way only someone who knew Supergirl was just Kara Danvers, the nerdy, dorky, kinda basic goof in a pompous costume, could. The flash of real pain in the heroâs eyes, the softness in her voice, like she was apologizing for the honest of her answer.
âRed sunrises,â said Kara.
Lena threw the teacup across the room, and it shattered across the screen, leaving the dregs tricking down the surface. Lena wished the TV had been knocked out, but the screen was shielded by a transparent aluminum sheâd invented herself.
So she changed the channel, just in time to get a face full of The Princess Bride, just as Buttercup was shoving a then-disguised Westley down the hill as he shouted the line the revealed his identity.
âOh fuck you all,â Lena muttered, as she scooped her keys from the kitchen counter.
Lena decided it was a night for subtlety, so she took the BMW, driving with the top down and and her phone in her jacket pocket, so she could feel it if someone called.
Lena drove for the better part of an hour, reflecting on the absurdity of simply looking for Kara in a sprawling city; National City had about two thirds the population of Metropolis, but it covered nearly four times the land area and was surrounded by sprawling suburbs that extended the entire metro area to the size of a small state.
This was hopeless, unless Lena knew where to go.
You know what you have to do. You know what youâve always had to do.
Kara answered on the third ring.
âHi.â
Her voice was tiny and small, and Lena felt like she was clutching some small fragile thing to her cheek.
âHey,â she said, with all the softness she could muster with the top down. She pulled to a stop on the side of Ocean Avenue so she could soften it further. âI heard what happened.â
âI beat the monster.â
âI know,â said Lena. âYou always do. Where are you, Kara?â
There was a beat of silence.
âI donât know who out you up to this, but you donât have to do it, Lena. I know how you feel about me now.â
No, you fucking donât, Lena thought, before she could silence her own frantic mind. If you knew you wouldnât have lied to me.
âTell me where you are.â
âIâm where I belong,â Kara sighed, the hint of slurring in her words hinting that sheâd been drinking.
Then she hung up.
A wave of anger welled in Lenaâs chest, and she clenched her teeth, seizing the shift lever to throw the car in drive and head home; Kara and her sister could handle their own bullshit.
She didnât drive home.
Lena arrived at the convention center in a frantic five minutes, parking crazily in a towing zone. Finding a way in took another few minutes, and soon the flat soles of her tennis shoes were squeaking as they echoed across the polished granite floors of the lobby.
She found Kara in the exhibit, surrounded by quiet, dark displays as she stood in front of a bannered exhibit proclaiming âRAO, THE SUN OF KRYPTONâ.
Kara ignored Lena as she approached, tipping back a sloshing, mostly empty bottle of Jack Daniels to take a hearty gulp.
âKara?â said Lena.
Kara swayed slightly on her feet. Sheâd gotten a raincoat somewhere and put it on over her suit, cape and all, and even from a distance she stank of whiskey. She was staring at the display in front of her, an expansive orrery surrounding a lit model of Rao. Lena had never seen her so haggard, even her lustrous hair limp sallow.
âHi,â Kara said, taking another drink.
âWhat are you doing?â
âChasing a red sunrise.â
Lena approached slowly, until they stood side by side.
She stole a quick glance. Kara had a black eye and she was swaying slightly, and Lena wasnât sure if it was from the booze or the fight. She started to take another drink.
Grasping the bottle by the neck, Lena took it from her. Kara didnât resist as Lena tipped back a long pull on the bottle herself. It offended her palate in every possible way but one, but it was a good way to numb herself.
âAlex send you?â
âNo,â said Lena. âShe just had to tell me. She knew Iâd send myself.â
âWhy?â
âBecause sheâs a lot more observant than you are.â
Kara studied her for a moment, then reached for the bottle back.
Lena looked at it. âHow much of this have you had?â
âNot enough,â said Kara, taking another drink.â
âIf you insist on destroying your liver, at least let me give you something that actually tastes good.â
âIt all tastes like paint thinner,â said Kara.
Lena sighed. âGet in the car.â
Kara shrugged and followed Lena out, flopping extravagantly in the passengerâs seat. Lena drove in silence, using the excuse that the wind noise made it too hard to talk.
When they arrived at Lenaâs apartment, she practically shoved Kara inside, and poured the rest of the swill down the drain.
âHey,â Kara muttered.
âThereâs still some of your clothes in the guest bedroom. Take that damned suit off and put on something else.â
Kara complied, trudging into the bedroom. She emerged a moment later, looking small and sad with her hands tucked up inside an oversized hoodie, wobbling giving Lena a glassy look.
As she sat down, Lena handed her a glass of wine and perched on the edge of the couch cushion beside her, gently pressing an ice pack to her eye. Kara leaned into it and let out a soft, unsteady sigh.
âPain hurts,â she observed.
âItâll do that.â
Then she went quiet, sinking into Lenaâs couch with Lenaâs ice pack pressed to her face. Lena stepped into the kitchen and pulled out her phone. Alex answered immediately.
âI have her.â
âThank God. Iâll be over to get her in a few minutes.â
âNo you wonât,â Lena sighed.
Alex didnât answer her for a too-long pause.
âYeah. Call me in the morning.â
âWill do.â
Kara had found the wine bottle when Lena came back, and was taking a drink form it. Lena sat down next to her and took it, drawing on it hard before passing it back.â
âWhat now?â said Kara.
âIs the ice still cold?â
âYeah.â
Kara curled up next to Lena, bringing her legs up, her toes wiggling in empty air. Lena sighed and found her a blanket, spreading it over her too carefully.
As soon as Lena sat down, Kara spread the blanket over her, too, and Lena noticed that her absurd body heat hadnât abated from the loss of her powers.
âYou have tea on your TV,â Kara observed.
âYeah,â said Lena.
It took her a few minutes to find something on television that wasnât Supergirl or The Fox and the Hound.
(Fucking seriously?)
Nature documentaries were Karaâs kryptonite, to turn a phrase, and soon she was sleeping on Lenaâs shoulder, the ice bag fallen into her lap. Lena stared down at the soft features of the surpassingly lovely little goddess snoozing against her and couldnât help it anymore.
She started to weep softly, her shoulders hitching as she struggled to stop it, knowing the attempt was hopeless.
It got worse when Kara began to purr, a deep and soothing rumble in her chest that seemed to seep into Lenaâs bones. After a moment she realized that Kara was crying too; sheâd woken up.
âIâm sorry,â she whimpered. âIâm so fucking sorry, Lena. I canât⌠I canât breathe Iâm so sorry. I lost my red sunrise. I canât lose you too. Iâll do anything. Please let me make it up to you I promise I will, please.â
Lena shifted to a more comfortable position, known this was it for the night, that something had shifted. No, shattered. She was tired of being angry, of being afraid, if thinking of could-have-beens and come-what-mays. Yes, Kara had lied. Lena had lied. Theyâd kept secrets and been stupid and and theyâd hurt each other, but nothing in the world, no principles or closely held rules or petty anger would justify watching her suffer like this.
She was careful as she cupped Karaâs jaw, avoiding the injury, feeling a flash of rage at whoever had done this to her. (That his ass had been throughly kicked by an angry Kryptonian was irrelevant; her vengeance would not be forestalled.)
The kiss was quiet and gentle, at once too soft and quick, more request than declaration, and Kara swiftly answered with one so fierce and honest and hopeful that Lena didnât care that Karaâs mouth tasted like whiskey and wine.
When it was over, Lena found herself whispering, âAs you wish.â
People wake up! New government surveillance dropped
no more "funko pops", i only want figurines made by this guy