Izandai

-the idea that women are less capable of abuse than men is an extension of the idea that women are weaker than men.

-the refusal to acknowledge men's mental health and emotions as valid things worthy of support comes from the idea that emotions are inherently feminine in nature and having them is, again, a sign of weakness.

-the treatment of men as generic and expendable and women as special contributes to the idea that women should have less representation because we already "have enough" and "don't need more" and we gotta "even the playing field" or some dumb shit, so any need or want for more attention, regardless of reason, is attributed to "pointless attention-seeking".

-all of this puts trans men in an even more uncomfortable position, because either they're made an exception (because they ~aren't really men~ you see) or they're viewed as self-hating misogynists because why else would you "choose" to be the Trash Gender (tm)?

-the idea that men are inherently terrible only serves to excuse men for being terrible. because, hey, they can't help it, so why bother trying, right? part of holding men accountable for their awful actions is believing they can in fact be better.

-the reason "not all men" is so frustrating to hear is because it's often used in poor faith to derail much needed conversations about toxic masculinity and how it manifests, not because the phrase itself is untrue.

-continuing from the trans men thing, misandry can and does make it harder for trans men to come out, for fear of the aforementioned responses.

It’s what the biphobia discourse was about, it’s what the aphobia discourse was about, it’s what the transandrophobia discourse is about, it’s what the AFAB trans fem/AMAB trans masc discourse is about. Some of y’all heard “nobody should be excluded because of their queerness” and turned it into “Some people should be excluded if they aren’t queer enough” and that’s a big problem. You shouldn’t be trying to get people to prove they’re queer enough. You shouldn’t be forced to out yourself in order to participate in community. “Well what if the cis straight guy gets in-“ well as long as he’s not doing anything wrong, then who gives a shit. You can’t tell who is going to do evil based on their identity. You can’t. It’s only through their actions that you can determine that. That should be the foundation of your belief structure.

Americans:

From Wikipedia: A graham cracker is a sweet flavored cracker made with graham flour.

The next ingredient (which is also extremely traditionally American but slightly more variable) is typically Hershey's chocolate, but you could probably swap this out in the UK with any plain chocolate bar.

Last ingredient is big marshmallows, the kind you do the chubby bunny challenge with, like the size of your thumb and twice as thick.

A proper s'more, the most traditional possible variety, involves to graham cracker squares, two slab segments of Hershey's chocolate, and one to two marshmallows depending on your preference for filling and gooeyness. You put a slab of chocolate on one of the graham cracker squares. Your marshmallows should be toasted, usually over a campfire but if you're doing them at home over a gas stove burner is fine, but the fire part is critical. You can toast them to whatever degree you like, some people like them nice and golden brown but still kind of firm in the middle, me personally? I want that bitch to CATCH ON FIRE, I want it gooey and sticky as hell in the middle, crispy and burnt on the outside. Slap that motherfucker on your graham cracker and chocolate square, top with the other one so your marshmallow and chocolate are sandwiched together by graham cracker on the outside. You do this with your freshly toasted marshmallow because ideally it will be hot enough to start to melt the chocolate so it sticks to the marshmallow and the graham cracker and, combined with the gooey marshmallow, it keeps the whole thing together, and for that reason some people will let them sit for a hot second to let the melting process happen (especially if like me you have chocolate on BOTH graham cracker squares, not just one, because you're a sugar fiend), but if you are a young child you do not have that degree of patience and you eat that shit immediately, unmelted chocolate and all. Consume your summer camp delight like a tiny club sandwich, get gooey sticky marshmallow and chocolate all over your hands, and enjoy.

The first is that you don't pull the marshmallow off the roasting stick and somehow put it on the chocolate. Your staging area will look something like this, with the graham crackers and chocolate already set out (though not usually on the fire like this, for us it was always someone's lap or a picnic table or something)

And when your marshmallow has reached appropriate roasting perfection, you use the graham crackers to slide it off the stick.

and ideally, as a CHILD you are using a literal stick. Like you walked around and spent time looking for The Perfect Stick off the ground while the adults set up the fire. It has to be thin enough the marshmallow will fit, sturdy enough that it won't bow, long enough that you won't burn yourself roasting your marshmallow. And preferably doesn't have a lot of bark that's sloughing off, OR so much bar sloughing off you can peel it all back and get to the clean stick under it. If you're smart, you might stick the tip into the fire first to "wash" it/burn off anything that was still lingering, but. well, most kids don't.

When you bite in, the marshmallow and chocolate SHOULD ooze out all over you. If you don't kinda look like this eating it, you've probably done it wrong:

You find a spot, not above all the logs where everyone sticks their marshmallows by default, but at the heart of the fire. Ideally between a couple logs already glowing gold. Something like here:

Below the leaping flame. Near the logs. There's probably only one or two spots good enough for this on any given fire, but that's okay because everyone else is up above. They will get their marshmallows faster. They will be either firm or burned or both. That's not your goal.

Rotate the marshmallow slowly. Ideally come in at an angle so the part closest to the flame is the side, not the tip. The spot closest to the fire is the spot that turns a crispy golden brown, and you want that everywhere, on the tip and around the circle.

You keep going, slowly turning, for several minutes. Several people will rotate in and out of the higher sections, getting their fast delight. Eventually, your marshmallow will start sagging badly, risking falling. Maybe it does fall and got start over. But eventually it will be golden brown all over, and so liquid it no longer clings to the stick. It is ready, finally.

You say "who hasn't gotten one yet?" And deposit it onto their waiting graham crackers and chocolate. You've made an excellent marshmallow. It isn't for you. Get another while you're over by the bags and go back to the heart of the fire.

That's your evening. One, slow, perfect marshmallow at a time, given to whomever still wants s'more. You're making art for children to stuff into their mouths cheerfully. You're watching the movement of the fire and the heat of the logs, like you would if you were maintaining it — maybe you would be, maybe you were the one who built it — but right now that's not the goal. Let someone else put more logs on, while you take only the one stick and find the best spot for it to live.

You will, eventually, finish a marshmallow and find that nobody moves to accept it. Maybe they're all eating right now, or maybe they've gone through so many they're hesitating. Eat your masterpiece then. Enjoy it, the hardest and most perfect result from a fun and beautiful moment. Go back in for another, until you've run out of marshmallows and the fire is too low or until even you are done with s'mores, until you have made enough.

I have a big problem with the idea that "person insistently telling people that sharks are rough" is supposedly definitively the caricature of "dude who has a compulsive need to be the smartest person in the room" much more so than "person insistently telling people incorrectly that sharks are smooth". There is no difference in the amount of insistence! The only difference is that one of them is right and one of them is wrong! And people assert their intellectual authority on the basis of flagrantly wrong information all the time!

I have to be honest this is such a crock of shit. "legitimate" fears of rape are relentlessly weaponized against trans women and used to restrict our rights and maintain the rapist/rape victim binary. what do you think the entire terf movement is? have you missed when I've talked about how these exact "legitimate" fears of rape are used to DARVO trans women when we are sexually abused?

theres this challenge runner on youtube called ymfah who makes these kinds of videos, and he's so good at them that it makes everyone else unwatchable.

His videos "can you beat dark souls / skyrim / elden ring" without walking are amazing because the requirement for beating the challenges the game throws at you without a mechanic as basic as walking (the videos are even more extreme: he literally disables his L3 thumbstick) turns all these games into incredibly mind-bending puzzles that require incredible amounts of game knowledge to overcome.

Another one of his videos, "can you beat bloodborne with guns only?" Flexes a similar compilation of extreme game knowledge, with the added twist of him turning what is supposed to be primarily a parrying tool into one of the strongest builds in the game. As soon as the build is proved to be able to beat the game, he drops the "is it even possible?" Act and changes the question to "how strong can we make this build?" And the answer is EXTREMELY.

This makes every other kind of video unwatchable because past a certain point every challenge run just becomes a no-hit run with checkpoints. The thing about the souls games in particular is that they can be beat without taking damage, so any run where you can consistently do damage is already possible.

So people who make videos like "can you beat DARK SOULS while at LEVEL ONE while taking TRIPLE DAMAGE with FIST ONLY" are really just asking "am i good enough at the game to fight bosses no-hit for 5 hours straight" and the answer is "depends on the person" but its not entertaining because those runs get reduced to kiting the boss while waiting for the one move with a guaranteed safe opening to attack.

It really shows a core misunderstanding of what makes souls games good, and what makes a youtube video interesting. Souls games are good because different kinds of builds change the dynamic dance that you have with enemies and bosses, and challenge run videos are interesting because they show you how a seemingly impossible challenge can be overcome with enough knowledge.

And here's a video that isn't an example of anything described above but is very definitely about demonstrating an extreme level of mastery over a game's systems:

zombies which look like the default player character. this has no lore implicatjons

skeletons. inexplicably they carry bows.

spiders that are two metres wide and hiss like snakes (imagine how fucking terrifying this would be in real life)

walking bush that wants nothing more than to explode while standin next to you. also theyre afraid of cats

three metre tall guy with social anxiety so bad they try to kill you if you look at them. also they can teleport

really sad ghost

zombies 2: underwater edition

spiders again but now they poison you