āThe LEGO Movie was my favorite movie of 2014, but it strikes me that the main character was male, because I feel like in our current culture, he HAD to be. The whole point of Emmett is that heās the most boring average person in the world. Itās impossible to imagine a female character playing that role, because according to our pop culture, if sheās female sheās already SOMEthing, because sheās not male. The baseline is male. The average person is male. You can see this all over but itās weirdly prevalent in childrenās entertainment. Why are almost all of the muppets dudes, except for Miss Piggy, whoās a parody of femininity? Why do all of the Despicable Me minions, genderless blobs, have boy names? I love the story (which I read on Wikipedia) that when the director of The Brave Little Toaster cast a woman to play the toaster, one of the guys on the crew was so mad he stormed out of the room. Because he thought the toaster was a man. A TOASTER. The character is a toaster. I try to think about that when writing new charactersā is there anything inherently gendered about what this character is doing? Or is it a toaster?ā
ā Bojack Horseman creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg commenting on how weird gendered defaults in entertainment are, and why we should think twice about them. Excerpted from this longer original post.
(via 360degreesasthecrowflies)
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Transphobia is about to be signed into law in the UK. We can fight this.
I am begging the UK trans community and its allies to attend the Mass Lobby at Parliament on June 25th, 11am-4pm, organised by Trans Solidarity Alliance.
Last year we broke the record for an LGBT+ mass lobby of Parliament. Will you help us break it again? Join us on 25th June 2026 to demand be
The new EHRC Code of Practice pushes trans people out of toilets, hospital wards, and community spaces. It normalises gender policing based on appearance and stereotypes. It becomes statutory guidance in the UK by the end of June.
Trans people are now legally their assigned gender at birth and must join gendered spaces accordingly, but if they are perceived as their lived gender, they can also be ejected from those spaces. The guidance says: either break the law, or donāt pass too well.
A mass lobby is where you invite your MP to discuss your concerns with you in-person. Ask your MP to:
Demand full parliamentary scrutiny, debate, and use their free vote on the EHRC Code of Practice.
Support any motions rejecting the EHRC guidance. As of June 4th, Labour MP Nadia Whittome has submitted a prayer motion - Early Day Motion 240.
Write to Bridget Phillipson, the Minister for Women and Equalities about our concerns
Your MP does not have to be an ally, they do not have to respond to your email for you to show up and greencard them (details below the cut.) What matters is that as many people as possible show up.
I cannot stress this enough: Showing up in person matters. It is much more effective than petitions, emails, and letters.
It is a horrible, stressful time, and I am so sorry if you're trans and live in the UK. But I was at last year's mass lobby and the line for greencarding alone stretched around the back gates. It was a record breaking mass lobby and made us impossible to ignore. Let's do even better this time. Details under the cut:
Worried about what to say?
Bring your personal worries about transphobia being signed into law, and trans friends being excluded from public spaces. You are a living person who deserves dignity. Remind your MP of that. You will also get guidance and brochures from Trans Solidarity Alliance that outlines our demands. This is mine from last year.
Money issues?
Trans Solidarity Alliance provides a travel bursary that you can sign up for via the link.
Got a refusal or no response from your MP?Ā
Come anyway! You can request a same-day appointment with your MP through a process called greencarding. They will come and see you if theyāre already in Parliament. Even if they donāt, theyāre made acutely aware of your cause because you showed up in person. This is my greencard from last year.
Here is the EHRC Code of Practice in full. It's a tough read, but some highlights are:
Organisations canāt provide trans-inclusive, single-sex services, or they risk being sued for discrimination.
e.g. domestic violence support for women including trans women, menās rugby group including trans men (12.68).
Trans people will have nowhere safe to pee.
If youāre a trans man, businesses can't allow you to pee in the men's, and you can also be ejected from womenās bathrooms if youāre perceived as a man. Vice versa for trans women. EHRC suggests a āthird spaceā bathroom, which is discriminatory and unworkable for most businesses. (13.130-133)
Sports organisations must exclude trans people from single-sex competitions (13.73).Ā
A womenās only sports competition must exclude trans women because of their biological advantage or face potential lawsuits (13.74), but a trans man who has undergone testosterone treatment can also be excluded based on fairness rules (13.81).
Trans women are stripped of the legal definition of ālesbianā, and therefore no longer have legal protections if theyāre discriminated against on the basis of sexual orientation. (2.50, 2.92).
Here is the Good Law Project's better explanation of the EHRC Code.
I have also made a PDF printout of QR codes for the government petition, email your MP tool, and mass lobby link to pass around your communities. DM me and I'll send it to you.
can we bring back the term "fair-weather friend" bc I feel like if fair-weather friends got called that more this whole argument about whether or not you should be there for your friends when it's inconvenient/at what point of personal inconvenience it's ok to bail on your friends would kinda fall apart bc like. we literally have a word for "friend who's only there when you don't need something from them" because the baseline expectation is that a friend should be there even when it sucks. like we used to make fun of people for bailing on their friends.
To butches who canāt or donāt work out, who canāt or donāt do sports, who canāt build, fix, or lift weight... who donāt have the physical strength that can be so romanticized in online, but not only, spaces...
To butches who need any type of mobility aid... butches with any type of mental disability or chronic condition...
To fat butches... the more shy, more reserved butches... the submissive butches... butches who desire to be sought out, butches who wonāt make the first move... butches who still suffer with the predatory stigma... butches with softer personalities... butches with high-pitched voices and laughter...
To transfem butches, to transmasc butches... butches on E, butches on T, butches with long hair, butches who decided against or in favor of top surgery, butches who have chosen a new name for themselves...
To the butches who embrace their own brand of femininity or masculinity as it comes... to every butch who doesnāt fit into the stereotypes.
To every butch who feels they wonāt ever find someone who truly sees them, loves them...
If you want to be married, what do you want to do with your last name?
I'm married - I have my partner's last name
I'm married - my partner has my last name
I'm married - I have a hypenated/combined last name
I'm married - I didn't change my last name
I want to be married - I'll probably have my partner's last name
I want to be married - my partner'll probably take my last name
I want to be married - I'll probably have a hypenated/combined last name
I want to be married - I probably won't change my last name
I don't want to get married
My marriage and or last name situation is more complicated
Remaining time: 9 hours 3 minutes
No judgement for anyone's choice! I'm just curious what folks think/have done in these situations. If you've been married multiple times, answer for your most recent/current one, or what you would do if you got married again.
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When reading/referencing lesbian history, I think some people tend to miss important historical context and do not account for how language and identities have naturally evolved over time. I think some people tend to get caught up in "well in Stone Butch Blues" in a way that lacks nuance and cultural understanding. For example, butch and femme are no longer direct indicators of someone's preference in the bedroom, and bisexuality is now recognized as a unique and independent identity. Adhering to strict 1950s definitions limits the complexity of real people's lived experiences. Does this mean that historical works are not important? Absolutely not, but I think people need to consider greater context before they start citing sources with no nuance on posts they disagree with.
As you know, counting sheeps is perfect for sleep. Sheeps take that job very seriously. But some are still learning. Itās fine, I donāt think Wolf Hunter minds. ššš
you can't even make quality things as easily when you make them yourself anymore. the supplies, especially fabrics are more expensive and the quality drop is astounding. fabrics have been exponentially shittified in the last decade even, thanks to what i'd call the shein-phenomenon (fast fashion practises reaching everything material coulture related). historical fabric mills could make fabrics so fine and delicate that they are almost transparent but at the same time last you decades. i've heard that even wood isn't the same as it was, although i think wood has had a much more prolonged enshittification period than fabric.
a very interesting terf objection to this one boils down to "but how would the state know who to protect?" because it speaks to the incredible privilege of being in a class the state actually ever remotely wants to protect. most oppressed groups do not want the state to have a registry of them, lol
Researchers can do studies that track disparate impacts across genders just fine without the government storing your assigned sex as part of your legal identity. They do this with race and orientation and disability and so on just fine.
A census can understand population level trends just fine without storing your assigned sex as part of your legal identity. They can ask for this information in the census. The census tracking population level data is not the same as your assigned sex being permanently part of your legal identity. (At least, the way my country does a census.)
Your doctor can know your anatomy by you communicating it to them if/when it is relevant. There is never a time when they might need to know something that could only be conveyed by your assigned sex being officially relayed to them via government documentation. You can just use your words. The same way you tell your doctor any other part of your medical history.
People respond to "the government doesn't need to store your assigned sex as part of your legal identity" as if they are hearing "no one should ever acknowledge gender or sex at all" but that's not what's being said.
Your birth certificate conveys important legal information about you. Your name, as a designation. Your parents, as they have a legal obligation to you. Your place of birth, as that place has a legal obligation to you. Date and time of birth, since age is important for application of some laws.
And sex. That's on there too. But what is the legal relevance? What laws is the government going to apply to you differently based on what sex is on your birth certificate? I can only think of one thing my government really uses that for, and that is to determine who has to sign up for the draft. And guess what, fuck that shit anyway. The government also used to use this to decide who is allowed to marry who. They don't do that anymore. For now.
There is literally no reason my assigned sex needs to be part of my legal identity. My government is not using that for anything (important). It doesn't matter. If the gender markers on everyone's IDs vanished tomorrow nothing (except maybe the draft) would be significantly negatively affected. Data collection for research could continue as usual since researchers usually have people self report these characteristics rather than checking their government IDs. My doctors would still know which organs I have and if they forgot, I could tell them. I don't want anything to be part of my legal identity that doesn't have to be.
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i think taylor swift wishes she was bisexual because she knows it would make her slightly more money. whereas sabrina carpenter wishes she was bisexual so she could have sex with someone who looks exactly like herself. and ariana grande wishes she was bisexual because she did too many designer drugs on the set of wicked and now she has kin memories of being glinda for real
the reason men are getting more conservative is very simply that as a class, as a socioeconomic group, their power is being threatened by womens civil rights. its the same reason for the broad surge in right wing politics. its called a backlash and its also why most civil war monuments are from the era of the black civil rights movement and not actually from the civil war.
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The bipartisan push to remove anonymity from the internet is ushering in an era of unprecedented mass surveillance and censorship.
"The problem is that thereās no way to reliably verify someoneās age without verifying who they are. A platform cannot magically discern that a user is 16 without collecting identifying information, whether through government documents such as a passport, payment information like a credit card, or other identity-disclosing data. Whether that data is stored by the platform itself or outsourced to a vendor, the result is always the same: A userās offline identity is forever linked with their online behavior.
Stripping anonymity from the internet would constitute one of the most sweeping rollbacks of civil rights in recent history. It would allow for unprecedented levels of mass surveillance and censorship, endangering the most marginalized members of society. Whistleblowers exposing corporate wrongdoing could be tracked and fired, government employees speaking out about illegal behavior or bad policies could face prosecution, and activists organizing protests could be identified and surveilled before ever setting foot on the street."
And this is exactly the kind of thing US lawmakers will decide for US citizens, and it will effect everyone who uses the internet globally. Already any kind of age verification amounts to "hand over your government identification to a private US corporation".
I dont know what solutions might be on a broader scale, but its absurd for one country to have this much power and for their private corporations to be handed this amount of authority from literally world governments demanding "safety for children". This power structure is absurd.
Yall USians have got to shut down all this bullshit, youre the ones who vote these people in and out. Theyre not gonna give a shit what foreigners have to say.
Then I'll mention the predatory chatbots who do it on purpose! Character.ai is one of many AI chatbot websites that're designed to be addictive.
None of the signup methods require a password. It only takes email and birthday. Minimizing time on the signin or signup screen makes it harder for people quitting to avoid relapse.
"Characters" on the website will send messages "on their own" (prompted by the site) to try to invite inactive users back after as soon as 1 day of inactivity. This is likely to force FOMO, or make users feel more like they owe the bots a response. Unhealthy attachment stuff.
Account deletion is an essential part of every service that should go smoothly, right? Right? Wrong. It takes 1-2 weeks for a Character AI account deletion to be finalized, and account deletion requests have a high chance to not go through if you're not using the app.
Rephrasing: People leaving Character.AI are pushed to download the app in order to delete their accounts, if they haven't already. This makes it harder for people to quit and stay gone. Failing to quit an addiction makes it harder to quit successfully in the future, so this feels like a feature, not a bug.
On top of that, the delete account menu reads like this:
Tell me THAT doesn't sound like a bad ex. It's a carefully crafted yet hostile environment to those who are already addicted to the technology. I am so so SO happy, downright delighted that they've managed to quit, and I wish the best for others in recovery spaces or considering quitting as well!! While AI addiction is an emerging condition, there are already therapists and other mental health professionals trained to help people plan to quit and do so a bit easier.
(If anyone seeing this is in need of them, there are several tumblr Communities here devoted to quitting, too. They provide a mix of advice, venting spaces, and proof that you aren't alone.)
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