Back lurking here after twitter imploded. Avatar is Leaf Spirit by Simon Gudgeon
247 posts
Latest Posts by rowanbough - Page 4
"the world isn't kind" ok??? Much more importantly are you?????
The local queer centrum asked us all to support the ban on conversion therapy in the EU initiative, so now it's My Job to do it seriously.
We still need so many signatures. Damn. So. Many. Signatures.
Come on people, we can do this!!
worrying is like worshipping the problem
I can't keep having the same conversations about love languages, mbti, iq, bmi, "brain fully formed at 25" and shit over and over again...
The Three Laws of Fandom
If you wish to take part in any fandom, you need to accept and respect these three laws.
If you aren’t able to do that, then you need to realise that your actions are making fandom unsafe for creators. That you are stifling creativity.
Like vaccination, fandom only works if everyone respects these rules. Creators need to be free to make their fanart, fanfics and all other content without fear of being harassed or concern-trolled for their creative choices, no matter whether you happen to like that content or not.
The First Law of Fandom
Don’t Like; Don’t Read (DL;DR)
It is up to you what you see online. It is not anyone else’s place to tell you what you should or should not consume in terms of content; it is not up to anyone else to police the internet so that you do not see things you do not like. At the same time, it is not up to YOU to police fandom to protect yourself or anyone else, real or hypothetical.
There are tools out there to help protect you if you have triggers or squicks. Learn to use them, and to take care of your own mental health. If you are consuming fan-made content and you find that you are disliking it - STOP.
The Second Law of Fandom
Your Kink Is Not My Kink (YKINMK)
Simply put, this means that everyone likes different things. It’s not up to you to determine what creators are allowed to create. It’s not up to you to police fandom.
If you don’t like something, you can post meta about it or create contrarian content yourself, seek to convert other fans to your way of thinking.
But you have no right to say to any creator “I do not like this, therefore you should not create it. Nobody should like this. It should not exist.”
It’s not up to you to decide what other people are allowed to like or not like, to create or not to create. That’s censorship. Don’t do it.
The Third Law of Fandom
Ship And Let Ship (SALS)
Much (though not all) fandom is about shipping. There are as many possible ships as there are fans, maybe more. You may have an OTP (One True Pairing), you may have a NOTP, that pairing that makes you want to barf at the very thought of its existence.
It’s not up to you to police ships or to determine what other people are allowed to ship. Just because you find that one particular ship problematic or disgusting, does not mean that other people are not allowed to explore its possibilities in their fanworks.
You are free to create contrarian content, to write meta about why a particular ship is repulsive, to discuss it endlessly on your private blog with like-minded persons.
It is not appropriate to harass creators about their ships, it is not appropriate to demand they do not create any more fanworks about those ships, or that they create fanwork only in a manner that you deem appropriate.
These three laws add up to the following:
You are not paying for fanworks content, and you have no rights to it other than to choose to consume it, or not consume it. If you do choose to consume it, do not then attack the creator if it wasn’t to your taste. That’s the height of bad manners.
Be courteous in fandom. It makes the whole experience better for all of us.
the vast majority of fanworks are bad, and that's fine, actually. they are bad for the same reason that the average number of legs for a human person to have is less than two: statistics. like with all endeavours and especially creative ones, most people who write fanfiction or draw art of their favourite characters are bad at it. if you line up all the crochet projects in the world, most of them will be, well, bad. some are bad because they're the first thing a person ever made, or the second or third or tenth, and this kind of thing takes practice. others are bad because the person who made them is just not very good at it. maybe they just learned how to make granny squares and they're perfectly happy to never expand or improve on that. most people who dance or bake or garden or braid hair are not amazing at it! and you'd never go to your kid's dance recital or eat your friend's homemade carrot cake and expect the same experience as you'd have at a professional ballet performance or award-winning bakery. And that's if we assume there is an objective measure of Good Art, which there isn't! Some art is just "bad" because you don't like it!
I think though that specifically with fanfiction, we sometimes forget that when we read a book or watch a movie, dozens of people have looked at it and given feedback and made changes and done quality control before the final product reaches our shelves or screens, and that's not counting the original writer's learning process and past experience. A published book is not anyone's first crochet project, even if it is their debut novel. But with fanfiction, the barrier to entry is so low (on purpose! this is a good thing!) that we do get to see a lot of wonky granny squares, and on sites like AO3 they're sitting on the same shelf as the hand-made silk lace wedding dress and you can't always tell just by looking at it which is which. The consequence of this is that we encounter fic that we think is unpolished, has bad punctuation, is out of character, and we are tempted to think "well, this is awful! how dare this person put this wonky granny square on the same shelf as the lace wedding dress!" But that's not how fandom is supposed to work! That wonky granny square is somebody who is really excited about this TV show they just watched and they are reaching out into the void to share their excitement with you. To scoff at them for not making a lace wedding dress is really, really rude. Even if they did make a lace wedding dress, maybe it's just really not your style, or you think they should have used a different pattern, and it's still their wedding dress. You don't have to wear the dress and you don't have to read the fic.
We all know that there is some fanfic out there that is incredible. I think it's important to talk about that! But the vast majority of people who post their writing online are just sharing their little hobby projects that they make for fun and I also think it's important to remember that.
god I would be UNSTOPPABLE if I was capable of consistently initiating tasks. just you wait. you'll be waiting a while but just you wait
STRETCHING SIAMESE CAT
by Lee Sangsoo
*releases pack of dads into home depot* go……be free
Today I was helping run the booth for the local queer non-profit at the farmer's market and a woman told me that she would like a flag, pointing to our little bucket of flags. So I picked up the bucket and I brought it over and asked her which one she'd like.
"Well, tell me about them!"
"Oh! Okay! This one is the inclusion flag- its for everyone, including allies."
"What's this one?"
"That's the bisexual flag: it represents people who are attracted to two or more genders."
"Hmm... what about this one?"
"That's the nonbinary flag: it represents people whose gender isn't strictly 'male or female.'"
"Hmm... what's this purple one?"
"That's the asexual flag: it represents people who may not feel sexual attraction the way that others do."
She put her hand to her chest and got this really curious look on her face. "Tell me more about that!"
"Oh, happy to! So like if you're out with your bestie and someone real fine walks by and she's like 'omg look at him' and you're like 'girl get a grip?' Or like you just don't get what the 'big deal' is about sex or why everyone is so weird about it? But there's also room for like- you don't fall in love with the way someone looks, you're attracted to the person- their sense of humor and their kindness, or there's something about their personality that just makes it click for you? That's asexuality, too!"
And she got real quiet and seemed to think about it for a minute. So I grabbed our little informational sheet about different queer identities and handed her a copy. "If you want to do some research, this is probably a great place to start."
She thanked me and took an ace flag, stuck it in her hair.
Sometimes when you're online all the time, its easy to think that 'everyone knows about (topic), there's no reason to keep talking about it so much.' But while the people on the internet are real people, the internet ISN'T real life. And there are lots of people who do need to know that they do have community!
One of the jokes is that I'm a lot of people's 'patient zero' for discovering that they're queer. This is why.
i experienced a bad emotion so i won't be functioning for at least 5 business days. hope you understand
When you think about it, gender is a bit like nationality. Most people feel an attachment to the nationality they were born to, but many were born in one country but are now nationals of another. Some people have multiple nationalities, and some only have one for administrative purposes. Some passports get you discriminated against, while some get you easier access to places, and not everyone feels a connection to the nationality they present. And much as no one has ever managed to define Britishness or Americanness, no one is ever going to define gender in a way that makes sense to everyone the definition is supposed to match.
anybody else in the club feeling this one
I turn 30 next month so here’s what I learned in my 20s:
—don’t work for startups, they’re always one ‘innovative idea’ away adding ‘sell your kidneys on the black market’ to your job description.
—keeping a collection of basic OTC medicine on you will save your life one day. I recommend Advil, Imodium, and TUMS.
—those little single-use glasses cleaning wipes are 1000% worth the money
—overly self-depreciating jokes just make people uncomfortable, wean yourself off of them
—you can buy dehydrated mini marshmallows in bulk online and they’re a godsend for hot cocoa
—people don’t care if you have fidget toys on your desk they just want to play with them
—try to go to bed BEFORE the existential ennui kicks in
At some point in your life, you were taught that being slightly annoying is an unforgivable sin. Maybe it was by your parents or a teacher or a friend or a bully or an older sibling. But someone taught you that being slightly annoying is a crime punishable by death.
You must unlearn this.
You must accept that all people will be annoying at some point or another in their lives, maybe all of their lives, and that this is okay. It is okay for strangers on the bus, it is okay for children in the grocery store, it is okay for people on social media, and it is okay for you.
If you ever want to truly love your fellow humans, if you ever want to truly love yourself, you must have forgiveness for being annoying.
With my recent Harry Potter posts gaining traction, I just want to make an important note:
You are not a bad person for having enjoyed Harry Potter. You are not a bad person for finding it hard to let go of something so ingrained into your life. You are not a bad person for enjoying the overall story of Harry Potter despite the bigotry JK Rowling managed to smatter into it.
Nobody should be telling you that you are. Your past relationship with Harry Potter is not the issue.
The issue is what you and we all do moving forward with the new information and facts that we know.
And the facts are that JK Rowling is a rampant and proud bigot who is hellbent on using the fortune Harry Potter made her to actively pursue the entire trans community with hostile intent.
And she does not care. She is happy that she is doing it. She is happy that people oppose her because it gives her an excuse to play victim and paint trans people who oppose her as violent, aggressive and evil.
This is not about how you engaged with Harry Potter in the past. Or even how you engage with it privately. This is about whether or not you choose to contribute toward her mission and towards the persecution of trans people right now.
Because when you buy that licensed merch in the store, she gets part of the profit. When you go to Harry Potter World, she gets part of the profit. When you buy the Harry Potter game, she gets part of the profit.
And all of those things result in three consequences:
It shows the marketing departments that Harry Potter is still a cashcow.
It shows JK Rowling that she can say and do whatever the hell she wants and nothing is going to stop that money rolling in.
She is given a steady cashflow which she uses to bankroll anti-trans movements and spokespeople and government petitions.
That is the reality of your choice from here on out. That is why people are asking you to set aside what you once had with Harry Potter and to stand with the people she has made it her life's mission to destroy.
You don't even have to let go of it completely. Just let go of the interactions that directly fund JK Rowling. Just cut off the cashflow she's using to ruin the lives of people she's never even met.
Buy fanmade merchandise or learn how to make your own. If you're cosplaying? Buy unofficial cosplays or buy second-hand off resale websites. Same with other merchandise.
If you want to watch Harry Potter, there are hundreds of non-licensed steaming websites showing it which do not contribute royalty income to JK Rowling.
If you're writing Harry Potter fanfiction, use a site like AO3 which will defend you tooth and claw if she gets desperate and starts coming after fan creators.
Harry Potter might be the comforting memories of your childhood, but JK Rowling is an active threat to the literal livelihood of trans people. People who could lose legal rights and protections simply because of one vicious woman with a bigoted agenda and deep pockets.
All we're asking is that you compare your reasons for enjoying Harry Potter with the facts of why you should make a few simple, easy choices to avoid bankrolling her and determine which is more important.
Or rather, which one should be more important.
And make the right choice.
Shipping fictional characters isn’t representative of your moral values. It’s representative of your particular psychic damage and the themes and motifs that haunt you. Hope this helps.
Figured I would show u guys my new hobby! I’ve been learning embroidery and just finished this mushroom kit I got on Amazon. It’s really fun and relaxing, and it’s nice to create something with my hands <3