Our Lady of Immaculate Depression

Samus Aran is the most transfem character ever because she's had to become so very strong and well-prepared to operate in environments where everything wants to murder her, but for all her training and equipment, there's still situations in her life where the only way she can move forward is by balling herself up into the tiniest possible shape and rolling along the path before her. But eventually she gets to expand her options with explosives, and that's what every trans girl needs to urgently procure.

The other day I was at the grocery store and when I was leaving the clerk said "Have an ice day! :)" and I asked "Don't you mean, 'have a nice day'?" and she said "No :)" and I walked outside and looked north and saw the horizon hidden behind mile-high walls of blue and white crystal twinkling like diamonds in the sunlight. A herd of mastodons trundled down the interstate, cracking the pavement and shaking the earth with their ponderous tread. A cold, dry wind blew.

not only are most people completely unaware of the devastation of indigenous languages in the americas, most people are completely unaware of the devastation of indigenous languages in europe. never mind occitan, they don't know about basque! it's wild! bleak! existentially horrifying!!!

did you know france has celtic languages? breton is the only celtic language spoken outside of the british isles. did you know france has germanic languages? alsatian, for example, is spoken in the east of france, unsurprisingly in alsace. it's not even the only french germanic language. did you know france has a number of languages and dialects known as langues d'oïl closely related to french? norman and picard, for example, are spoken in the north of france. did you know that france has gallo-romance languages? franco-provençal (which has a number of dialects) is spoken in the east of france, as well as parts of switzerland and italy. did you know that france has a language most closely related to catalan, the langues d'oc? occitan is spoken in the south of france and has a rich literary history. did you know france is home to basque, or rather euskara, a language isolate which predates indo-european languages? romani dialects! corsican! so much more than just french! there are even extinct jewish dialects of occitan! extinct langues d'oïl like angevin! so much linguistic diversity and all anyone talks about is french.

"that character can't be trans fem because we need rep for boys who are feminine" and "these characters can't be gay because we need rep for healthy male friendship" are the same mindset of hyperfocusing on fan response instead of actual text. where are all the trans fem characters with detailed self-acceptance arcs??? where are all the gay couples with focused plot build-up, especially in genres considered "masculine" like action??? in addition to prioritizing cishet sensibilities with a thin progressive veil, it's just a nonsensical thing to say because the representation being defended is more common than the representation being derided as "actually following gender roles tbh."