#fanderpridemeetup

What is the Fander Pride Meetup?

If you haven’t heard of/need a refresher on what the Pride Meetup is, in short, it’s a month-long virtual event in which LGBTQIAP+ Fanders share their LGTQIAP+ experiences through art and other forms of media based on a prompt! You post your work here on Tumblr using the hashtags #fanderpridemeetup and #fanderpridemeetup2021 and tag us in your work. The mods then reblog your work, and we all get to know each other!

This event lasts the entirety of Pride Month and is meant to be a celebration of your identity! An added bonus is that hopefully, you’ll come out of this event having made some new friends with an improved sense of unity with those in the community.

Rules:

Post content relating to each week’s prompts and your identity/experiences on Tumblr through any form of art or media.

The meetup is intended for Fanders in the LGBTQIAP+ community. We respect our cishet allies, but this meetup is for those in the LGBTQIAP+ community to feel seen and connect with each other during Pride Month. Feel free to like and reblog participants work though! Signal boosts help!

Don’t hate on other people and the way they identify. This is a celebration of all identities.

How to Participate:

To participate, make any form of art or media that relates to the prompt, your identity, and/or your experiences.

Tag the blog (@fander-pride-meetup) and use the tags #fanderpridemeetup and/or #fanderpridemeetup2021

Tag your characters (Sympathetic/Unsympathetic) and any other triggers at the beginning of the work and in the tags.

Post it on Tumblr and you are all set! We’ll reblog it to this page for all to see!

What Can You Submit:

All forms of art and media are accepted! From writing to art (traditional and digitl), to edits to cosplay, any and all ways you can think of is welcome at the Meetup! If you can express yourself through it, you can do it! 

Some examples of media we accept:

Writing

Art (Traditional/Digital)

Edits

Cosplay

Selfies

Journals

Headcanon bullet lists

Aesthetics/Moodboards

Photography

(However if you still have any questions, feel free to send an ask!)

This Year’s Prompts Are:

Week 1 (June 1-7): Closet

The closet, the place we all begin in, be it for a few weeks or many years. Some don’t have the opportunity to come out of the closet. Even now, many of our friends may be closeted. But even if you’re closeted, we wish you a happy pride month as well.

This week’s prompt is Closet. Use any form of media you’d like through the TS Characters of your choice to share your experiences in the closet.

Week 2 (June 8-14): Celebration

The Fander Pride Meetup always has been and always will be a celebration of the LGBTQ+ community in the Thomas Sanders fandom. Now, let’s celebrate together in what big or small ways we can! From large parties and outings to jamming out in your room to music, celebrations of your identity come in many different way. There is no right or wrong way to show who you are.

This week’s prompt is Celebration. Show a way that you celebrate your identity through any form of media you’d like through the TS Characters of your choice.

Week 3 (June 15-21): Journey

This journey never really ends. It lasts our entire lives, and we experiences ups and downs. People come and go from out lives, and we continuously learn new things about ourselves. We grow, adapt, and change from these experiences and hardships, and we keep pushing through.

This week’s prompt is Journey. Share a part of your LGBTQ+ journey through any form of media you’d like through the TS Characters of your choice.

Week 4 (June 22 -28): Hope

No matter how difficult the situation, how long the journey, the people you meet, there is always hope for a better future. As the world makes advances in LGBTQ+ rights, this week is about spreading hope for the people who are struggling with their identity, who can’t be open and out all the time, and who have to come to terms with who they are. 

This week’s prompt is Hope, and can be shown through any form of media you’d like through the TS Characters of your choice.

The last two days (June 29-30) are WildCard Days! Post whatever you’d like relating to your identity and the TS Fandom!

FAQ:

Q: Do you set up meetups IRL?

A:  This event is held completely online! We do not schedule a place and time to meet each other irl. If you do want to talk with other LGBTQIAP+ Fanders outside of Tumblr, check out this year’s Discord server! [Copy/Paste link: https://discord.gg/Jj7drExCb5]

Participation

Q: I’m cisgender, allo, and heterosexual. Can I participate in this event?

A: The meetup is intended for Fanders in the LGBTQIAP+ community. We respect our cisallohet allies, but this meetup is for those in the LGBTQIAP+ community to feel seen and connect with each other during Pride Month. Feel free to like and reblog participants work though! Signal boosts help!

Q: I’m questioning. Can I participate in this event?

A: Of course! You’re welcome to participate in the event if you’re questioning!

Q: I want to participate, but I don’t think I can do X prompt for X week!

A: Participation in each week is not required! This is supposed to be a fun event so if you are unable to post something for one of the weeks, don’t stress it!

Submissions

Q: I have a late submission! Can I still submit it?

A: Of course! We reblog late submissions on the first day of the next week. (Example: A late submission for Week One posted on June 8th, the first day of Week Two, will be reblogged.)

However, if you are submitting anything later than that, message one of the mods, Lissa ( @amazinglissawho ​) or Anon ( @books-sketches-and-ink​) and we’ll get your post up!

Q: I don’t have a Tumblr account/would like to stay anonymous while participating.

A: That’s completely fine! Just submit your post to our submission box, and we’ll post it for you!

Post Content

Q: Can I really use any medium I want?

A: Yes! In whatever way you express yourself best, you can do it!

Q: Can we use fem!Sides? Can we use Fander/personal Sides?

A: Yep! If it helps with expressing your identity or if you think it’ll just be fun, you can use them!

Q: Do I have to project my experiences onto a character? Can I project identities rather than experiences onto the characters instead?

A: Of course! You can use your identity and make the character have different experiences!

Q: Can I write about a negative experience that has happened to me?

A: Sure thing! If you feel like you would like to write what feels real to you, then go ahead.

Additional Notes

Part of the meetup is to, well, meetup! Talk to each other and learn about the various identities of people in this fandom!

Since this is a Fander Pride Meetup, try to keep your content related to TS content or yourself. Other fandoms are okay to be mentioned, but please keep it minimal.

Please signal boost! If you have any friends or know any blogs who might be interested let them know! This is for anyone under the LGBTQIA+/SAGA umbrella!

Remember that though “Meetup” is in the name, this event is held online! We do not schedule a place and time to meet each other irl. If you do want to talk with other LGBTQIAP+ Fanders, check out this year’s Discord server!

Week 4 of the Fander Pride Meetup: Acceptance

This is the fourth piece I’ve done for the @fander-pride-meetup. 

I was originally planning to do this piece for the wildcard days next week, however I couldn’t come up with an idea I deemed “worth finishing” for this week, so I moved this ahead of schedule. I don’t know if I’ll be participating in next week’s prompt or not, though. I guess I’ll just have to see.

💜 Realization 💙

A little something for @fander-pride-meetup! 

[ Info Post about the 2020 Meetup | Art Masterpost ]

Art/Edit Taglist under the cut:

(Tell me anytime if you’d like to be taken off or added. If you have any specifications for certain fandoms or content, just lmk :D)

And then it clicked

For @fander-pride-meetup's Week 1: Realization

Chapters: 1/4 Fandom: Sanders Sides (Web Series) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: queer platonic - Relationship, nblw - Relationship Characters: Original Side(s) (Sanders Sides), Anxiety - Character, Logic - Character Additional Tags: Fanders Sides, AU characters, Vira Locked, Loren Locked, Rose Locked, Jessica Locked, Reegan Locked, Padgett Locked, Basically the names are really close to the canon sides, whoever you think it's supposed to be it is, These would be my sides because this is my story, but they dress similarly and act pretty similarly to the canon sides, Sanders Sides - Freeform, Inspired by Sanders Sides, qpp, Queer Platonic Partners Summary:

so, unfortunately, I didn’t have time to participate in the first week, but here at least i did these doodles of ma bois for week two

i might have got the prompt wrong, sorry :V

My story for the Fander Pride Meet Up!

I've never really liked my gender that much. My grandmother always told me when I was very young that girls have to wear pretty dresses and aren't allowed to get dirty and other shit like that. So of course when I moved back in with my mother I completely stopped wearing dresses because she didn't care what I wore, as long as it was matching. However, I was still very limited on what I could do because I was female, and women have to be lady like.

About a year after starting middle school I made a tumblr, that's how I found out about trans and gender fluid people. I was excited to find out there were people like me who were no comfortable with their gender. I decided I wanted to change my name at that time too, I called myself Ashley and I thought it was wonderful because I had always wanted my name to be Ashley. I was constantly going in between being male and female, I thought I wanted to be male but then I would miss being female and would go back, I was gender fluid for the longest time, and I always just kept this stuff online because the Internet is more excepting than real life.

I started to hate everything about myself even more than usual so I decided to just change everything about my tumblr because I just didn't like that part about me anymore, I didn't want to be Phoenix, I didn't want to be Ashley, I didn't want to be anything. Who said I had to be anything anyway? This was about two years ago. I had decided I was going to be a genderless alien, I couldn't stand the thought of genders or the thought of being human. I still kept this to myself, only telling five people, my boyfriend, my sister, and my three closest friends.

About a year later. Last year I believe. I accidentally clicked on a Thomas Sanders video while scrolling YouTube. I realized that this dude was amazing so I stayed until the end and he said his usual outro, and I said, "What the fuck does Non-Binary mean? " I Google it and I finally realized what I was. It's kinda funny. I was claiming to be a genderless being all that time without looking up whether or not there was a thing for it. Still only a few people know about this, including anyone who looks at my tumblr, my mother, the before mentioned people, and a few other friends. I thinks that's all I feel comfortable with right now, especially since I still can't get any of them to call me by my preferred pronouns, but that's fine.

Hey, my name is Sparrow, he/they, and I’m an aromantic ace-spec (autochorissexual) person who is still very confused about their gender identity. I’ve been a Fander literally since Thomas’ Vine days, so for the “Fander Pride Meetup” that is today to celebrate LGBT+ pride in our community, I want to talk about my own identities and how I found out about them. Sometimes it’s a happy story, sometimes it is not, but despite any kind of hardship that comes with accepting yourself, I’d like to show some of my very own Pride. By doing it in the most elaborate, dramatic way possible because I have no chill and also I’m sorry that I’m on mobile and can’t put a cut. Enjoy your never-ending scrolling that I also barely proofread~ 🌈

I’m also gonna put it into neat little categories because I’m like that.

Sexual Orientation,

Ace-spec: Someone who falls on the Asexual spectrum

Autochorissexual: a disconnection between oneself and a sexual target/object of arousal; may involve sexual fantasies or arousal in response to erotica or pornography, but lacking any desire to be a participant in the sexual activities therein

At first, I was going to put this story after my aromantic one, but this one is so much shorter and a lot less dramatic, so it’s gonna go first instead. It was a lot easier to notice that I was ace-spec once I had a word for never feeling sexual attraction towards any actual people. LJ helped me realize this, because he explained what “autochorissexual” was to an anon, and my entire brain just clicked. It was like I immediately realized that I had never had any sexual feeling towards anyone either. People in media (and much more graphic things I’m not going to go into) were the only times I had really felt that kind of “attraction”. Even then, I didn’t really think that they were very hot, just kind of aesthetically pleasing? It’s hard to explain, but since I tried to get most of my information on my sexuality from the internet and how I felt about people in those kinds of...18+ areas, I thought that I liked girls a lot better than the boys. Boys with their shirts off was just...weird, still is weird, but girls were always really pretty looking. So just like with romantic orientation, I took this as a sign that I was gay.

Basically I’m just an idiot that doesn’t research correctly.

But even before that, I had my little hints of suspicion that I may be ace-spec. Most commonly I would start to question if I may be demisexual, but I also confused “romantic orientation” with “sexual” a lot, so I took my “I hardly feel any attraction towards people” as “it takes a bond for me to get sexual feelings”. But even then, it didn’t really click in my head with the label demisexual, so it came and went really fast.

Ace-spec identities really do need to be talked about more, even if some of them may seem “ridiculous” to outsiders. When I first came out as ace-spec (gonna say that instead because I am fully aware “autochorissexual” is a mouthful), it was an actual weight lifted. Because not only from my own trauma and the anxiety of “how do you even do the do in real life?”, it felt so much better to just not be worried about doing something I wasn’t interested in. I’m ace-spec, all my friends know this, and I’ve learned that any kind of relationship can be long-term with no sexual feelings. And honestly, that is a great thought.

Gender Identity,

I remember when I was a kid, me and my sister would play a Fable game at my uncle’s house. One where the younger sibling, whether you played as a boy or a girl, would always be named Sparrow. From the first time I heard that name in that game, I loved it. Me and the few friends I had on my street would all play games of pretend, and we could choose our own names. No matter what, I would always go with Sparrow. I always adored that name a thousand times more than I did my birth name, I’ve always hated my birth name. I told myself for a long time that it was because it had no meaning, and was ridiculously generic. But I realized later that it was also because it was very feminine. It didn’t really feel like me, and although people kept insisting my birth name was a beautiful name...I didn’t like it.

I’ve always just felt disconnected from the label of being a “girl”. People would say something about girls or targeted to girls, and most of the time I would have to tell myself “that means you”. Being a girl felt wrong, doing girly things felt wrong, so I avoided most feminine things to my mom’s annoyance. I felt like I shouldn’t allow myself to be girly to the feminine things I did enjoy, like they were some forbidden art from another world. I’d forget that I was supposed to be a part of that world, and I had to remind myself that no one would think it was weird if a “girl” wanted a girly shirt, or to play with dolls, and that it was actually encouraged. I just kept trying to fit myself into the box of “tomboy” because it fit better than “girly girl”. It still wasn’t very me, but I liked the more “masculine” things over the feminine, so I figured that it was better that way. And I’m a very gray person, I very rarely have black and white views, so it kinda makes sense I didn’t fit perfectly into one box honestly. It’s probably one of the more accurate metaphors to being nonbinary that I’ve seen.

As of right now, I don’t really have a label. All I know is that I’m not cis, I’m not very commonly feminine, and I’m transmasculine at the least. I know that I fluctuate in some form, or at least some kind of fluid (I don’t like genderfluid much though) since I never stay in the same place for very long. I find it pretty hard to not stress out over finding a label since I just want to know now, but taking my time instead of immediately coming out and then stressing again because I found out it’s not me gets rid of a lot of the anxiety. So for now I’m just “questioning”, but not gonna lie, I hope it doesn’t last very long.

I’m very impatient.

Romantic Orientation,

Aromantic: Someone who feels no romantic attraction to anyone of any gender

I’m going to just say this right now; finding out I was aro was not a very happy thing. It counteracted with my dreams and made me feel like I was cheated on by my own mind, maybe even the world despite how dramatic that sounds.

(TW: Unhappy marriages, divorce, parents fighting and a tiny mention of a womanizer)

I dreamed of having a loving husband to make up for all the years of broken marriages that I have seen, one that was funny and kind, one that believed in me, someone to make me feel less lonely than I really was and to fill up a broken piece of my heart from growing up learning love is fake. I saw fights and back talkers, divorce after divorce, and womanizing boyfriends who would scream at my birth mom as she screamed back with the same intensity. Threats of leaving, divorces, and my birth parents staring hateful daggers into each others backs. If they didn’t hate each other they ignored each other. If they stayed together they never said they loved each other. I only ever heard my dad speak good about his wife, but even then, when he wasn’t looking my mom would turn the other way and back talk him. But I never really learned that love was fake. I saw my birth mom scream at her boyfriend, and I dreamed of a world where me and my husband would make up and cuddle after a fight. I heard my mom complain about my dad’s temper for the tenth time that day, and I dreamed of talking to my husband about working on unhealthy flaws we both had. I didn’t learn love was fake, I learned that love wasn’t perfect fairytales instead. I learned how to grow from the mistakes I saw daily.

(Trigger Warnings over)

But before I suddenly started to question my sexuality, I had no evidence that I wasn’t hetero. In first grade I had a kiss with a boy I didn’t actually like, and in second grade I had my first “crush” on a boy in my class. Other kids would date one kid after another, breaking up and moving on so fast that my head started to spin before I even got to middle school. I saw kids get together after only a week of knowing each other and breaking up a couple weeks after. I had started to try and keep track of who had a crush on who because it always got so twisted. I remember in first grade all the girls seemed to have a crush on a kid named Justin, and all I did was just watch them all in confused awe. It was like watching a herd of derpy birds fight over a fancy breadstick on the floor; very important to them, but I didn’t really see the appeal.

When I thought I had my very first crush, I noticed that I didn’t really act like it. I remember watching an episode of ICarly where Sam had a crush or was dating a boy (can’t remember which) and Carly showed off the drawing Sam made of her and the boy surrounded by love hearts. It gave me the message that’s what people with crushes did, so although I wasn’t much of a drawer I decided to try and copy Sam’s drawing with me and this boy as swans instead. During and after the drawing was made, I noticed that I still didn’t really feel anything for what I made. I didn’t really care about the supposed “crush” I had on him, but I didn’t think much of it. The next year I would actually go up to this boy and tell him that I “liked” him, and he didn’t exactly give me a straight answer. He said “I’ll tell you when my lawyer [his dog Apples] is around”, and I tried for a little bit to get him to tell me about his feelings towards me before I just accepted that it was a rejection. But later, I would actually realize that I didn’t care about him returning his feelings for me, more so I just wanted to know because I’m nosy. I realized he rejected me and barely even cared, just went back to playing with my friends.

Then, I started to question my sexuality. I didn’t exactly notice my lack of attraction towards any genders, I noticed that I had never cared for men. I thought that girls were prettier than boys, but I became so confused because I had such a lack of feeling any kind of attraction towards people. I considered a couple labels, but even when I knew what asexual and aromantic was, I didn’t even consider it. The people I saw who were aro acted like they had no interest in being in any kind of relationship, and that...wasn’t me. I was sure of that, I dreamed of having a spouse someday, so I immediately dismissed it. And in a feat of confusion and ignorance, I decided that if I knew for a fact I didn’t like boys, then I must only like girls. For many years, I identified as a lesbian. Both my parents still think that I’m gay.

Then, I joined Tumblr. Honestly, Tumblr and all the people I have met in the fanders community have helped me a lot with my identity, and people like LJ and Marin (who I’m scared to tag so I won’t) helped me with accepting myself a lot more than they could ever know. When I first heard LJ describe their queerplatonic relationship with Thuri, how they would marry platonically, I didn’t understand why that thought was so comforting until a little later. I realized that...I was scared. I was scared of being aro, so I hid it from both others and myself. I wouldn’t lie awake at night thinking about the supposed “crush” I had on my best friend, I stared mindlessly at the ceiling feeling empty inside. I would not break the chain. Aromantic people do not marry. I was doomed to live alone forever. I could handle being gay, I could have handled being ace or pan or bi which would have brought out my mom’s severe biphobia, I could handle that. What I couldn’t handle was my biggest dream, the one thing in this world that gave me hope and peace with myself, being ripped away from my hands and being forced to accept that I could never love someone the way that I wanted to. With my already severe problems with feeling any emotion, this was hard to accept. I was willing to ignore my own romance repulsion just to have a “happy” marriage. I was willing to give my comfort away for something I thought would be worth it.

At first, I was willing to accept that I was grayromantic, and that those two boys in my life were the rare times I fell in love. I didn’t want to accept I couldn’t fall in love at all, so I tried to compromise with myself and use that label instead. Then, I read Marin’s queerplatonic Logince verse. A tiny little collage of stories in the same universe that I didn’t even get at first helped me come to terms with my identity. They loved each other. It wasn’t romantic, not sexual...but it was stronger than friendship. I learned that that kind of love was just as important as the ones I tried to dream of having as a kid. I felt like I was able to love again. Maybe not in the romantic way I wanted to, but it meant so much more to me. Queerplatonic saved me from going over the edge, and I think that is a beautiful thing.

I could go into a lot more detail with this. I could tell you about my struggles with understanding my feelings for my best friend CJ, and how I thought that I had a crush on him. I could tell you about the multiple instances I never realized I did because of my lack for romantic attraction, but now look back at and think “how did that not raise flags?”. I could tell you I thought I was just scared of commitment, how I also identified as cupioromantic for a bit, how I literally went through a grieving stage with accepting I was aro, but I’ll simply leave it as this for now. It hasn’t been easy at all accepting that I was aromantic, but that label has given me the most solace and peace, because now I don’t feel like I’m scared of commitment. I don’t feel like I’m faking, like I need to hurt myself to get my dream, like I need to bend to the whims of a romantic and sexual world. I have a new way that feels so much better than bending over backwards for something I can’t have, and I wouldn’t change it for the world.

And a Conclusion.

I will wave this green, white, gray and black flag with pride. I’ll wave my purple triangle one with the same intensity, and when I find out my gender, I’ll learn to wave it with pride as well. Because all of us deserved to have just that; We deserve to have pride and happiness with ourselves. No matter how you may identify, no matter who you love or what you feel like you really are, you can be and deserve to be prideful.

We deserve to wave our flags with pride. And we will have just that: