Of Metal to Roses, the world burns asunder

A diagram comparing a human hand to the equivalent limb in other mammals from Henry Fairfield Osborn's The age of mammals in Europe, Asia and North America (1910).

Key Takeaways:

Trans women more likely to be unemployed than trans men or enbies but trans women and enbies had much higher full time employment rates than trans men, suggesting much more temporary and part time work among trans men. All were at least 2-5x the unemployment rate of cis queer peers

Disability is one of the greatest factors for quality of life decrease, with a lot of disabled trans people

Over half of trans women had taken medical intervention, a bit under half of trans men, and only a fraction of enbies. Despite this, more trans women than men found they didn’t need medical intervention, with enbies overwhelmingly saying they don’t pursue medical transition

Study skewed young but the youngest respondents had staggeringly poor rates, suggesting that young folks are in much worse positions than adults

Nonbinary people are rapidly becoming one of the largest portions of trans respondents, dispelling the idea that enbies are rare in trans spaces—with this being the largest trans study, the first to include asexual people, and the first ive seen to be made up of mostly nonbinary folks. With all nonbinary subtypes accounted for: 65% of respondents were not binary trans people

Asexuality is much more common than expected among trans respondents and also is not as rare in cis queer people as expected either, suggesting severe undercounting

Trans men tended to come out earlier but were less likely to pursue medical transition than trans women, and not by their own choice

The biggest source of homelessness among youth was relationship to family, which ranged across various trans identities—it had little to do with WHO the trans person was

The biggest compounding factors for trans struggles besides disability have been: 1. Race 2. Migrant status

Across gender lines, trans men had the highest suicide rates, but trans migrants of a variety of genders had significantly higher rates of mental health struggles and suicidality

When it comes to medical discrimination, it was fairly even across binary gender lines, but much higher for intersex trans folks, and even higher in general for trans people of color regardless of gender

In school, gym, and sports, trans girls were much more likely to be discussed, but trans boys were exponentially barred from locker rooms, teams, and facilities. It seems while there is more scrutiny on trans women, they are less likely to be out at this age, so trans boys are the ones being openly penalized, while trans girls are staying closeted in sport. This privileges neither group.

Trans women were the highest subgroup to report violence committed by strangers, with 1 in 5 trans women reporting having been the subject of violence at least twice.

Trans people of color and trans migrants reported significantly higher instances of violence from police, with that number likely being under-reported

In every category, race and migrant status played a much bigger role than gender alone

MY Big Takeaways:

Asexuals and intersex people are still grossly under-considered

Yall are fighting about who has it worse between trans men and women like that's all there is and here is the biggest study on trans people and nonbinary subgroups--even just "nonbinary" alone-- drastically outnumber you. Consider us for once.

This study implies or outright contradicts multiple instances that are assumed to be privileged: a. Trans men are coming out earlier but facing the most extreme brutal circumstances as trans youth with little autonomy, especially from parents who consider trans boys to be girls and therefore property. It's the ROGD movement. Coming out earlier is actually hurting many of them worse than the rest of us, across multiple categories but many are not coming out by choice. b. Trans boys are gender minorities whether they come out or not, and so the "freedom" to pursue gender exploration comes more from a lack of ability to stay closeted than because it's "safer" to be out c. trans girls and women are staying closeted more because of the intense scrutiny of trans women, and this is not a privilege either d. trans women are actually more open to the idea of non-medical transition than trans men, both highlighting the damage of transmedicalist spaces and correlating to how for trans men, recognition of their gender is not just about affirmation, but about what they are barred from accessing when they cannot pass

Disability is a massively massively under-recognized intersection of trans experience, accounting for some of the most staggering results over and over. Disability is of course the most "accepting" axis of oppression, meaning that anyone can come to be disabled from any background, but disability does not go after everyone equally. Being under worse stress, being subject to the most physical violence, being discriminated against in healthcare or education or housing. Essentially: racism and migrant status!

AT EVERY AVENUE RACE PLAYED A BIGGER FACTOR THAN GENDER! DID YOU HEAR ME? AT EVERY AVENUE RACE PLAYS A BIGGER FACTOR THAN GENDER!!!!!

Youth oppression is playing a bigger role than misogyny alone, and a lot of the instances that correlate to why trans men are often eclipsing other groups is due to how society treats those it thinks are not just women but girls--aka misogyny and youth oppression

A theory with a lack of intersection that does not seek to understand how trans men and trans women overlap is a useless metric when over and over there is suggestion that areas where trans men or trans women "benefit" over the other are not actually privileging either of them and are either creating more opportunities for oppression or increasing scrutiny

most big herbivores are, frankly. if you have a pretty steady supply of food and don’t have to worry about missing a hunt and starving to death, you can afford to throw your weight around more and generally be more aggressive!

that’s why the most dangerous big animals in the world are almost all herbivores.

This is Camarasaurus lentus, around 15 ish meters and over 16 tonnes, for reference sake, the largest african elephant bull EVER recorded was 11 tonnes. pretty decent difference right?  Well, except one thing. This is a SMALL sauropod. Want to see a large one?

Yeah, you’re reading that right, 53 tonnes. Almost five times heavier than the largest recorded african elephant ever. And they get even larger.

This bastard was last estimated at 73 tonnes, the largest animal ever to walk the earth. And they didn’t just get big, they got l o n g, too

That right there, is BYU 9024, it (among with a few undescribed remains) shows an animal in the size range of 40+ meters, this one here clocks in at around 40, and the funny thing is? this is the *conservative* estimate, larger specimens are not unreasonable in the slightest. It’s not quite as heavy as the big south american bastard above it, but at 67 tonnes, its close.

Secondly, speed. We’ve all seen it, lumbering behemoths that were dumb as rocks and probably about as fast, with a tailwind, going downhill. Well…. Not really, the latest studies done as of Asier larramedi’s sauropod facts and figures book gives some… Horrifying estimates.

I’ll spare you the complete explanations, there will be a paper out soon that goes into greater depth, but I’d like to draw your attention to the speeds, specifically fo the animal called Giraffatitan. Most people are familiar with it in some way, shape or form, but to clear up what exactly Giraffatitan is. 

They’re not the small ones in the foreground, they’re the big ones in the back. 33 tonnes of pure muscle, moving at 25 kp/h. Again, to provide further reference.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUE304bqwQc  THIS is how fast that is. It’s a house running at you, forget a hippo charging you, this would be a tidal wave of flesh and hatred bearing down on you.

And finally, weapons.

Like someone earlier pointed out,  Apatosaurus should have absolutely trounced the indominus, because quite frankly at such a size anything you do will hurt. Kicks with the front or hind limbs will be utterly devastating to anything except another of their kind, but Apatosaurus had another thing going in its favour.

One thicc-ass neck. Pictured here with speculative keratin spikes on the bottom, whilst the spikes are speculation, the neck itself would have essentially functioned like a fleshy battering ram, capable of pulping ribcages and smashing anything that could have “preyed” upon them. But that’s not even the most terrifying thing, though this is not specific to Apatosaurus itself, but to all diplodocoids (Apatosaurus, Barosaurus, Diplodocus, etc.) Specifically, the tail. 

This is Diplodocus, as you can see, this animal is half tail, as you might also be able to see, the latter half of that tail tapers down to what can, in all essence be described as- a whip. A serrated whip, powered by some of the largest muscles in the largest animals that would have walked on earth. But it gets even MORE horrifying.

You see, there have been studies that have come to a conclusion, and though there are those that have doubted them, I personally have looked at the papers and found merit to the theories.

Well, I’ll not hold you in suspense any longer.

The tips of these tails, could have, and would have broken the sound barrier. Yup, you heard that right, and as soon as that fact begins to seep in, you’ll realize the horrifying implications. A diplodocoid whipping its tail, would blow out the eardrums of any animal close by and unfortunate enough to draw its ire, the sauropod itself would possibly not come out unscathed, but when you can literally give a would-be predator internal hemmorages by, what to them would be essentially like snapping a finger, the benefits begin to outweigh the risks involved. And that’s not even mentioning what would happen if it HIT anything, an impact at such velocity, with such mass driving it would be- quite frankly? Devastating beyond words. Flesh wouldn’t just tear, it wouldn’t just break skin or bones, flesh would MELT, bones would shatter, if not simply cease to be. And this is on a sufficiently sized animal such as Allosaurus or Torvosaurus. On a human? They would be ripped in half. So yeah, Sauropods get shafted in popular media to an extent that isn’t even possible, if you think hippo’s are scary, imagine something fourty times its size, faster than you, and able to kill you without even touching you. Sauropod are kaiju, plain and simple.

The babies were really cute though. This is andrew, and he’s a baby… the size of a horse. If you want to know just how tiny they began, this is probably a good reference.

You have NO idea how long I've been sitting on this infographic made by my buddy @antivan-surana

1) Okay, so. First what I wanna counter- because I know it's coming- is "but there's more white antagonists and there's an equal amount of Black people in the protagonists and the antagonists!" This is a common argument when discussing racism: numbers versus rates. Out of a 24 member main cast (at least the ones I got here) five of those actors are Black (six characters, two played by the same guy). 21%. Okay, not great, not terrible!

2) Now, out of those 6 characters, played by 5 Black actors. 5 of those characters- 2 of them despite their technical protagonist roles- are either antagonists (antagonist ≠ villain), or are treated as such by the fans. 5/6, or 83% of your Black cast is or will be considered acting in opposition to your main hero.

3) one of these Black characters dies early on, and I even got complaints that they whitewash his character to bits. So, yay! One genuinely protagonist Black character... Dead. It's not even like most of these human characters don't die either, but... Ya know. Woulda been cool to pick a protagonist Black character that lived!

4) My thoughts on Calypso and Antinous and the historically bad stereotypes they now represent by casting two Black people in those roles, as well as how their Blackness will affect perception of those roles by a nonblack audience that may have treated them differently if they weren't. This one is a major factor for me, if NOTHING else. Like even if all other things were different, I would still be uncomfortable if the cast list remained the same.

5) @does-it-like-black-women ran a poll on Epic's treatment of Black women (the sole Black woman on the cast), and even though all the takes came from different directions, there was still a very much overwhelming answer of "No". So it's not like people don't notice!

Someone put in my tags once that the casting was a blind audition. Idek if that's true, but I'm not gone hold you, if you cast an entire play blindly and your stats come out looking like this?? I'd be wondering if there's some other biases we might have to look at with you. But that's not a numbers based bullet point, just a thought of mine.

6) "the creator can't be racist, he's Puerto Rican!" Puerto Rican doesn't mean not white. Latino doesn't mean "not white". The same peer who made this infographic explained that there's still a lot of antiblackness in Puerto Rico. You can literally be friends with Black people and still manage to be racist to them, there's no Protective Identity that stops one from committing harm! I also remember being told that he had taken advantage of some of his Black artist peers, though I didn't keep up with that.

In summary, the musical itself is not the problem. It's just another modern take on The Odyssey. You could listen to this whole thing and be fine. The issue is the culture around the musical. That's my problem. That's where the antiblackness lies. If you have a cast where the majority of your Black characters are bad guys, and you've got an audience that is steeped with antiblack bias (and BELIEVE ME... Yes. It does. Every fandom does.) you're gonna end up with that bias festering and revealing itself.

And to me, that's something that someone who was intentional in their casting would have thought about. Someone who took the time to think about what they were creating, who cared about the depiction of Black characters, woulda stood back and at least said "hmm. Maybe we need to make some more of the Gods or maybe even Odysseus, Penelope, or Telemachus Black".

I've seen arguments/defenses that "the characters are just drawn like their voice actors!", whether that's the official artist or fan content. This as a reason why antiblackness isn't so thoroughly seeped into this place.

So tell me why Polites, "the friend of Odysseus" and the one whom serves as his canon guide, is drawn as white. Pale white, a glowing and Illuminating white, even prior to his death.

And here's his voice actor! :D

It took me MONTHS to find out that he wasn't white, like all of the fanart suggests. With the drawing above being referred to as his "Canon" design.

He's Odysseus' beacon! His moral compass, the one whom Odysseus changes his entire mindset for, whom he grieves as a lost brother for the rest of the musical and story.

I do actually really like Epic but I won't say it didn't make me extremely fucking uncomfortable upon listening and noticing how many of the major antagonists were black and the others did not seem to be. Especially Calypso really threw me off.

Because... Barbara's voice is beautiful. So truly stunning and I would like to support her completely in the future.

But it's the fact that Calypso is also just in general so often a sexualized character and I'm gonna be honest most of the more modern and common depictions I've seen if her have been black while the others are white which, comes off very jezebel tropey even if not meaning to

And then with the context that she and antonious are both portrayed or implied to be rapist and the best singers were that happened to be black is very odd.

I do feel like the glowing polities is a bit of a non issue though. He's glowing because he's like...a ghost and a guiding light. Which I don't think is strange. But I do think it's strange how he seems to be drawn here. I had not noticed that because I did not engage with any of the videos or streams that were out and the only art I have seen of him has him with curly hair and brown skin but I do see the issue here

It's a bit unfortunate that this turned out this way. And I don't think it intentional but I do think it's a bias that should be looked at if this is how Jorge has chosen to cast and move forward without considering how this may come across and maybe he can do better with his next upcoming orohect

Diversity is important but it's also important to be mindful in your casting

Now I do think, however, it's important taking into consideration the fact that these people auditioned for these roles specifically though. Obviously they're not helpless victims or something. Or at least to my knowledge they all auditioned specifically for these roles. And I don't think Jorge should specifically be attacked for casting them in these roles or anything

Pardon the low quality, these are straight from IMDB.

The Haunted Mansion [2003] is a film where one of the main characters, Sara Evers, is possessed by a ghost that looks strikingly like her. The ghost, as is seen here, still maintains her melanin and is Clearly Black, despite her ethereal nature.

Even if she weren't floating, and without the added context above, you can still see that she's not fully human in some way.

We can't claim that this is a non-issue, as the vast majority of Polites fan designs- with this one being Official as is listed on their wiki- very clearly whitewash him. I used him as an example, because I've seen the fandom claim that their designs are just reflective of their voice actors.

It's important not to end on a "unfortunate that this turned out this way" and move on from there. We have a clear example of antiblackness within the fandom, along with the points that Ice made. Trying to brush over this as a small thing, when it's arguably one of the bigger examples given, helps no one.

Another point to that is vampires, and depictions thereof. As seen in this discussion with Ice, there are ways to show that a character is "other'd" in ways that do not necessitate whitewashing.

@1nsecticidal showed it well here, with a skin tone comparison and ways to suggest an inhuman nature to a character, that again does not include whitewashing. For the last point, about Black actors and their casting into heroic or villainous roles. It's easy to say that- and we'll abstract here, so that it's not Only Jorge being pointed at but society in general- double blind casting is a thing.

Creating entirely new characters to Fit the actor is an option. Looking at your casting choices and realizing that the few Black actors are in the villainous roles. That in particular is disproportionate and should be seen as such.

As an example, if you have 10 actors in a group. 7 are white and 3 are Black. And of those 3 Black actors, all three are fitted into being the antagonist in some fashion. That alone should cause pause. Perhaps more thinking through is required before we move forward. Especially as this is the Final Version of Epic: The Musical. And they rerecorded previous songs to add more emotion or higher stakes or whatever else seemed to need fixing.

Something wrong Arcee? I thought you wanted a fight!

A little break of prints and I had to give my hand a stretch at drawing something different!

❤️💙 Boyfriend activities: epic gaming session

DC Holiday Special: DC's Supergirl Next Door #1 - "Like Home" (2026)

It pains me to inform you all that we have found @transfaguette He unfortunately has passed on. Thank you to everybody who aided us, reposted, and had conversations with us to help find him. I wish I had better news to share.

He’s at rest now.

Please take care of yourselves and each other. You are loved, you are cared for, you are so much more important than you could ever realize.

Suicide Hotline 1-800-273-TALK

“Native people used to live in this National Park” No. They still do.

“Native people used to tell these stories-” No. They still do.

“Native people used to use this plant as a natural remedy-” No. They still do.