L.J. Spencer

There was a trend at the time to do this particular skit/dance thing to this song where a person stands on the stage and looks like they're sad/going through something. Then these other people around them with signs with words like "bullying," "depression," "anxiety," come out and the person hugs them and the word-people start forming a circle around them. Then people come out labeled alcohol, drugs (and sometimes different types of drugs), risk, smoking, etc, and the person hugs them and these people join the circle around them. Eventually, this circle starts to close in on the person and surrounds them like a cage. Then, other people come out labeled parents, family, friends, counselors, etc who try to reach into the cage to pull the person out, but all the people who tried to force their way through weren't able to get through. Then there's usually one person who just sits next to the cage and holds out a hand to the person inside, waiting patiently, and after a minute the person in the cage takes their hand and works their way out of the cage. They hug the person waiting for them, then slowly make their way to hugging the friends and family, too, but instead of forming a circle around them, they stand in support behind them. After that, they hug and say goodbye to all the things that had caged them in, accepting that they exist, but knowing that they don't need them anymore.

And now imagine that all of that was done to *this* song.

As a baby queer/GNC teenager with severe depression and other mental health and family issues, this hit me like a ton of bricks. It was the first time that I could see that my depression and other stuff wasn't for forever. It gave me hope that eventually I'd find the people to stand with me who'd be patient with me and love me as I am.

I ugly cry every. single. time.

....which I forgot about completely before blithely going out in it yesterday to walk to a doctor's appointment and then had to like, sit down with my head between my knees when I got there. I was fully hydrated, had a water bottle with me, wore a hat, walked in the shade, and still by four blocks I was feeling Unwell. It's been ungodly hot out, admittedly, but I have felt more sensitive to it this summer than previous summers and now PERHAPS I KNOW WHY. (My dose was raised over the winter.)

New fic! (with endless thanks to @unamccormack !)

Rating: T

Word Count: 4,206

Summary:

“The question is now,” says one of the members of the committee overseeing his case. “What task you might set yourself.”

This is not a surprise to him. Varba, Garak’s guardian appointed by the Reconciliation Commission, had explained as much in one of their initial meetings. “After you listen,” he’d said. “After you truly understand the harm that was committed—the harm that you committed—you will be asked what is in your power to help make it right.”

"Stuff like this is made to brainwash young girls into thinking that they can 'fix' dangerous men. Such girls usually end up in abusive relationships and their parents are right to worry."

It is rather strange to come across such a gross generalization, operating on an assumption that girls are blank slates whom anyone can manipulate and who can't distinguish between real and make believe on top of it.

In my entire "career"(if you can call it that) of engaging with fiction , the girls and women that I have run into in fandoms happened to be some of the most intelligent, talented, cool, witty and insightful people I have ever met. I've devoured the fics they have written. I have delighted in the arts and edits they've made. Their perspectives and interpretations about the characters and their relationships are genuinely fascinating to read about regardless of whether I agree with it or not. They are the ones who are most often at the receiving end of the antis' ire for no valid reason but they just keep deriving joy and inspiration from their favourite characters and ships and keep sharing it with others through stories, art and thoughts. They are not just smart but incredibly resilient, sensitive and aware not just about the media they consume but about the world around them and its issues.

no. proship literally just means anti censorship and anti harassment. proship does not necessarily mean liking every taboo ship. it does not necessarily mean normalizing any taboo ship.

you can be proship even if you hate every single ship that is taboo. as long as you don’t harass or shame real people over fiction, then by the definition, you are proship.

almost every person who is proship has something they dislike, hate, or even find disgusting. the point is not to normalize any of these taboo things. the point is literally to not shame, harass or censor people who enjoy the things they enjoy as long as it’s fiction and no one in real life is harmed.

and here he made his first fatal error. his moment of hubristic sex pesting. because of course i know where the term blow job comes from, i love learning about sex and the history of sexual terms! i know so much about oral sex that i could write a book on it!

This is just to let everybody know that for Pride Month of 2026, the Ebooks Direct Pride Package has been really ridiculously discounted.

...From the product page:

This package contains all our Middle Kingdoms material—some of the first LGBTQ-representing epic fantasy in the 20th-century fantasy field, now continuing into the 21st. It also contains the matter-of-fact exit from the (contextual) closet of two of the best-loved characters in the Young Wizards universe—Advisory wizards Tom Swale and Carl Romeo, on their first canonically-"out" venture as a couple. The main part of the collection spans more than forty years, from the publication of Diane Duane's two-time Astounding Award finalist The Door Into Fire, first published in 1979, through its main-sequence sequels (both also Gaylaxic Spectrum Awards Hall of Fame winners) The Door Into Shadow and The Door Into Sunset, to 2018's and 2019's interstitial Tales of the Five novels, The Levin-Gad and The Landlady. The collection also includes such otherwise hard to find short works as Lior and the Sea and the two current volumes of the "Sirronde's World" group, The Span and Parting Gifts.* And finally, it also includes the Middle Kingdoms novelette Overdue (Tales of the Middle Kingdoms #2), and the short Young Wizards work Owl Be Home For Christmas.

All that for $19.99? Seriously, I need my head felt! So please go validate my mental state by buying the package.

And happy Pride!

(Meanwhile, the project for the course of the month is to put all the major queer, bi, and/or ace characters in my various series into that shot. Just added: Mevraen, Wyn and Eftgan. Now to get Lissa and Matt and Matt's boyfriend in there...) 😏

(And the usual sorrowful reminder: With regret, we must remind any UK viewers of this product that, due to Brexit, we can no longer sell ebooks directly into the UK. Our apologies.)