bony-eared assfish

Part of socializing and having friends is being a good listener even when you don't actually give a shit about the subject.

Your are hurting other people's feelings when you bluntly respond with "Anyway..." and then change the topic.

It can not always be about your preferred topic.

Autistic mom of two autistic kiddos here. I do something with my kids called playing the good friend game. I have them ask me a question like “what did you do this weekend” and then I respond with something they don’t like ie: “I ate some sushi for dinner on Saturday! It was delicious!” Their job is to not make a gross face and not to yuck my yum. They have to ask me a follow up question! Minimum one about what I liked about the sushi or who I went with or what I ordered etc. and they have to be kind. I change up what I answer with for the initial question and for all follow ups. It’s incredible!

You can learn how to chit chat about things because you care about the people around you. Small talk is banal and boring but the people in your life are real and lovely and nuanced. Get to know them. You can do it. You’ll build relationships that last. Don’t do it for the sake of small talk. Do it because you’re deeply invested in learning how to see the people around you as whole pictures.

*determine how much or how little counts as Remembering by whatever feels right. you do not need to remember every waking second of the year or have it completely wiped from your mind to say you do or dont remember respectively

"If “man” and “woman” are opposed and mutually exclusive categories, if men can only ever be predators and women can only ever be prey, then trans men can’t exist. We are logically impossible under the terms of the current system. You either “treat us like men” by voiding out half our lives, or you write us back into womanhood by denying our male identities. I knew all that, at least in theory, but when I came out, I actually saw my life story disappearing into other people’s blind spots. I watched myself become unthinkable in real time."

Also these:

"This wasn’t about accountability. This was people tactically forgetting my entire life,including incidents from my life they had personally witnessed or been involved in, so that they could shame me for transitioning. It was bad for me to be a man; if I was a man, I was a bad man, I was all the worst things men are. I was hulking, I was threatening, I was predatory, I was violent."

"I was treated as both genders, but only the most monstrous stereotype of each one."

"The idea that I had always occupied a privileged position within patriarchy was, frankly, untrue; nor did it seem to me that a trans person was any less gender-marginalized than your average cis woman. What privilege I had was conditional, and these books were no guide. Men who wanted to “forge a positive masculinity” (and everyone was very clear that I needed one of those) were encouraged to get in touch with their “feminine sides.” Maybe that was healthy for cis guys, but I had been forced to do feminine things, and present in feminine ways, for the entirety of my young life. Whatever liberation I had achieved came from giving myself permission to stop."

As did the ending:

Unfortunately, this post was made by someone who does use the term transandrophobia (although its not my preferred term)! as does at least one of the additions above, and as do many people in the notes. if you agree with this post and think it is "real transmasc activism," i promise you there is PLENTY of transandrophobia/anti-transmasc theory that you would find really compelling. I actually only started using the term myself after finding a trans woman who was outspoken about supporting the word as a way to discuss anti-transmasculine oppression.

If you want to know more, my pinned is a FAQ on the subject. Even if you disagree with what i say here, I think you would find it interesting. I include many links for further introductory reading, including this post and this post where I go over some common criticisms of transandrophobia and my responses to them. I've also recently been posting some quotes from Emi Koyama's Transfeminist Manifesto, which aren't directly related to the term itself but I think are really important for understanding what transfeminism needs to look like, and the issues with how people today (especially on tumblr) imagine it should look like.

The idea of using misandry in a feminist manner is not a brand new one, either. Sophie Lewis, a great feminist writer, used it in her essay on heterofatalism, Collective Turn Off:

But today, in popular feminism, the unfruitfulness of the ‘androcide’ and ‘exodus’ positions has given way not to a revival of the communist dream of sexual liberation but to a widespread stance of misandry-lite characterised by martyred resignation to the dismal quality of heterosex [...] Note, while a majority of heterofatalist misandrists online today seem to think they are trans-affirming, their position not only requires erasing trans men altogether, but also all trace of trans women’s lived experiences as men, regardless of those women’s own self-understanding. Indeed, misandry, as I see it, can never reliably be prevented from collapsing into transphobia.

She also references this article by Sophia Giovannitti, who also uses misandry in a feminist sense:

The thing is, the popular misandrist left discourse, perpetuated by straight women, has almost nothing to do with sexuality, but everything to do with gender. Like political lesbianism, this Political Heterosexuality is not concerned with actual, felt sexual orientation or relationships—it’s concerned with the reifying of binary categories at the expense of a nuanced analysis of gender that accounts for race, class, and transition.

Additionally, it has been used by Black feminists, such as F.D Signifier. He's used in multiple places but here's an example:

As much grief and pain as many men can present within and outside of community, I understand we still also need to resist the urge to be "ironically homophobic or misandrious" as soon as it's time to take issue with a man within or outside of community. This of course does not give boys and men carte blanche to act like assholes, or center themselves in situations where it's not necessary. It just means that we all need to be more proactive and gracious to each other and focus on the whole of the problem. as much as one could muster at least

The term "misandry" is not forever spoiled by use by MRAs; feminists can and do use the term to add further nuance to their feminist theory and activism, especially when it comes to discussing marginalized men whose manhood influences their marginalization in important ways.

None of this requires ignoring misogyny or positioning misandry as simple "the boy version of misogyny" that functions in exactly the same way. The term can be quite useful in describing certain trends in attitudes and behaviors, and can be particularly important in feminist self-critique. bell hooks, while I don't believe she ever used that specific term, wrote about the dangers of anti-male attitudes in feminism to feminism at various points (see Feminism Is For Everybody and The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love). Transandrophobia / anti-transmasculinity theory has always been in conversation with the works of Black feminists and feminist theorists who pushed for greater inter-gender and inter-movement solidarity. It is important that we talk about this issue in feminist, queer, and trans spaces, and there's really no reason we need to let this term belong to misogynistic MRAs.

And the thing is, I know very well that there will never be a perfect term. Because with transandrophobia, no term has ever been "good enough" to avoid anti-transmasculine backlash. The resistance to discussing anti-transmasculinity, and anti-masculinity in general in feminist and queer spaces, will never be solved by finding a Morally Pure Word to discuss it with, because people simply do not want to discuss it.

This is why participating in the backlash to transandrophobia will always be harmful, even if you do want to see more discussions of anti-transmasculinity. The criticisms of the term are by and large not done in good faith, and even those that are are frequently clearly undereducated in what the term actually means. The backlash against transandrophobia has always been apart of that anti-transmasculine "snowballing" you described. This is not to say people have never had valid fears about the term, but it has only gotten to such a point because anti-transmasculinity is something we all internalize and it has been allowed to go largely unchecked in queer and trans spaces for years.

If you want to see more people discussing the kind of things talked about in the posts above, you need to make your peace with the term transandrophobia, because it is the people who use that term who have been the ones most outspoken about the need to talk about these issues before anyone gives us permission or finds the Perfect Word that no one will get mad at us for using. We need to move beyond the linguistic squabbling and take seriously the issues actually being discussed: pay gaps, interpersonal violence, sexual assault, suicide, reproductive rights, misogynistic legal structures, etc.

Contributing to the backlash against transandrophobia fundamentally means contributing to the movement of people who will silence this discussion no matter how perfectly it is worded or how serious its topics are. You don't have to personally like the term transandrophobia, but without it, you would not even be seeing this post that you yourself found impactful, and the term has never, ever been as much of a problem for our community as the reactionary, radical feminist backlash to it has been.

And this backlash has not spared anyone; I have seen multiple trans women talk about being harassed, having people insist they aren't real trans women, that they are lying men, that they should kill themselves, purely for supporting the use of this word. There is so much misinformation out there on transandrophobia and I really do hope you take some time to look into this posts I linked and at least consider them seriously.

It feels dysphoria inducing, not super strongly but definitely and clearly.

I was assigned male at birth. I grew up a truly genderless child.

I only started performing femininity when I subconsciously understood that my masculinity was always seen as equal to being a man which I never wanted.

I became an effeminate teenager, while ridiculously dysphoric because what I truly wanted felt impossible to attain.

I wanted masculinity not manhood. I wanted to be viewed as something other than a man without performing societally normative femininity.

I felt myself tearing apart under the pressure of thinking I had to choose the exhausting and yet dysphoria inducing performative femininity that I never felt truly comfortable with or the dysphoria of being seen as a man and ultimately I began my outward transition journey by trying to conform and perform femininity.

I jumped through all the hoops. I referred to myself as a trans woman. I started taking estrogen and then progesterone and truly all of that has been a beautiful thing for me.

But I only found comfort and peace with myself when I’d reached a level of base and non-performative gendered perception that I started to feel comfortable with slowly but surely embracing my butch identity and masculinity.

I am not a man.

Butch is my gender.

My experience is trans masculine. I found euphoria in embracing my masculinity.

You can read about it here: https://minds-africa.org/fabric-map-of-africa-the-art-of-storytelling/

Blocking does not have to be some big gesture. I block people for being assholes but I'm also willing to block someone for giving a dumb take about my fav character. I've blocked people because I was tired of seeing their posts in a tag I'm browsing. I've blocked people who had opinions I agreed with but they were an ass about it. I've blocked people simply because I didn't like their personality or the vibe they gave off.

The ENTIRE POINT of Grace’s arc is that he is a Coward, with a capital C. He is a coward not only in his refusal of the Hail Mary mission, but in the way he lives his life before the Petrova Line was ever discovered. Grace has no close friends or coworkers, no pets or hobbies, no partners (short or long term), no family that we know of. His two main drives in life are (1) being a Cool Teacher to his students, and (2) nursing a grudge over getting kicked out of academia for proposing wild theories about life forms not based on water. As Stratt ACCURATELY points out, both of these things have large self-serving components. Grace genuinely loves his students and is good at teaching, but it’s at least partially because his classroom allows him to demand respect and attention without returning emotional vulnerability in the same way a peer relationship would. His academic theories were also largely motivated by a desire to be The Specialest Boy - and while Grace DOES prove himself very smart and capable, his pet theory wasn’t supported by his work with astrophage. Grace doesn’t jump at the chance to work with Stratt when she first approaches him, and he isn’t out there Living LIfe to the Fullest every day. He ADMITS to himself and to Stratt that he IS a coward, both for the way he’s lived up to PHM and for refusing to go on the mission when the timeline made it clear that there wasn’t enough time to bring another candidate up to speed and have the same odds of success. He straight up tells Stratt that he’ll sabotage Project Hail Mary if she tries to force him, DESPITE HIM KNOWING that Earth is headed for a literal apocalyptic Ice Age, and that everyone on the planet - including his beloved students!- has a pretty good chance of DYING if the mission doesn’t succeed! Stratt has to give him a coma cocktail that induces mild amnesia, and bet on him being at least good Enough (TM) not to kill the whole planet because he hated her for doing this to him.

(Also no hate for Eva Stratt, I love her and I will SUPPORT THIS WOMAN’S WRONGS until my dying day, she committed so many crimes and I cheered the whole way)

Despite Ryan Gosling’s very pretty Sad Boi eyes and sweaters, Ryland Grace is NOT a manic pixie dream scientist in love with Earth and its life and cultures. He just ISN’T. And if he WERE, then. Well. He certainly didn’t love Earth enough to fully embrace it while he was here, OR to volunteer to save it when he had the chance. This IS one of those situations where the distinction between “I love life” and “I don’t want to die” is a meaningful one. Does this make Grace a Cancelled Villain of All Time? No - it makes him a coward, but that doesn’t mean he inherently deserved to die. Does it ethically or morally justify forcing him onto a suicide mission while he fought and pleaded not to go? No! It makes Grace ORDINARY. Just some average fucking guy, not evil but not valiant, either. It’s like trying to claim Laika was the top search and rescue dog in the city when she got put into the pod. You don’t NEED to give Ryland Grace all these Tender Tragic Qualities of “loving Earth/Life” to have empathy for this poor dude who got launched into space.

In fact, Grace’s arc DEPENDS on him STARTING from that place of “I don’t really have a reason to be here” to “I have EVERY reason to turn my back on survival and do this act!” Grace wakes up on the Hail Mary, and has no context for why he’s on the ship but assumes that he was a Heroic Volunteer, like Yao and Ilyukhina. He sees their personal effects and Reasons Why They Volunteered, and keeps searching for his own Reason Why until he remembers that he didn’t HAVE a “reason why.” He was never a heroic volunteer. He comes to terms with the fact that he’s going to die, and IS. IN FACT. AS STRATT PREDICTED. A GOOD ENOUGH man to want to save the earth anyway rather than die alone without even trying to figure out the Petrova Problem out of spite. And he can do some pretty neat science along the way, which has always been one of his life motivations! At least he can do that before he dies, in the absence of anything else!

But the thing that Grace ACTUALLY loves enough to die for is ROCKY. The one in a million friend! Who saved his life and opened up his entire view of the universe! Grace’s core trait was NEVER “loving the Earth,” or “loving life.” The WHOLE FUCKING EARTH wasn’t enough to get Grace willingly onboard the Hail Mary! What made him turn the ship around was his GOTDAM SINGING ROCK FRIEND. The whole point is the change! Humanity’s capacity for massive apathetic cowardice and also astonishing bravery and hopefulness in connection. Andy Weir has his head in his ass about politics in his work, but you see?!?! You see, right!?!?!?!