As Promised...

CW: CSA mention, Christianity

In my last post, I said I would describe my religious beliefs and how they've evolved since I first became pagan.


Sex:


Then


I'm very sex-positive, while also affirming asexuals and believing that asexuality should be more respected. I've never had sex and don't intend to any time soon - I want to put school first and don't have time for dating. But I hate, hate, hate slut-shaming and SWERF. The choice of whether or not to have sex should be a very personal thing, and that choice - made maturely and responsibly, with proper sex education backing up the decision - should be respected regardless of what it is. I also support sex work, believe that all people should have sexual autonomy, and that sexual autonomy should be respected. I'm very firm and inflexible on consent, and unless someone freely, enthusiastically, and maturely consents to sex, you don't ever even touch them in a sexual way, and the minute that consent is taken away, you back off. It doesn't matter if you were "just playing around" or some such BS. It doesn't matter if someone was drinking or had on a short dress or they're your romantic partner. Unless consent is freely, enthusiastically, and maturely given, you leave them alone - and if you don't, it's not their fault. It's yours, and you should suffer the same consequences as any other rapist.


Now

Okay, so there was my MOGAI phase...but besides that, my beliefs on sex and sexuality haven't actually changed a lot much. I'm a lot more kink-critical now, and as an Aphrodite devotee I see sex as more holy than I used to, but not in the same way as I did when I was Christian.

That is, I see sex as holy - a lot of Aphrodite devotees have sex or masturbate as a devotional act - but I don't think having sex tarnishes it. Why do we need some arbitrary, human-made ceremony in order to partake in a gift from an entity beyond human comprehension? Sex is a beautiful, intimate, spiritual, and pleasurable way to connect to our bodies, our gods (if we have them), the earth, and our partners. And for many marginalized people, it can be a way of radically loving and reclaiming our bodies and ourselves even while sexuality is used against us.

Marriage:

Then

Everyone should have the right to get married and to have it be called marriage, but no one is entitled to get married if not everyone has that option. I also think that no one should be forced to get married and I don't agree with arranged marriage. Unless you're the one actually getting married, you don't get to decide who is getting married to whom. I believe in divorce; what good would forcing people who don't love each other to stay married do? I believe in polygamy, but not only that men should be allowed to have more than one wife. I believe that women should be allowed to have more than one husband, that women should be allowed to have more than one wife, that men should be allowed to have more than one husband, and so on and so forth (there needs to be a better gender-neutral word for 'spouse'). I believe that marriages should be equal partnerships and that there needs to be more centers for domestic abuse, whether or not that abuse takes place within a marriage. Celibacy isn't a bad thing, but no one should be made to feel like they have to be celibate (except for priests and nuns, but that's different - it's part of their job) or shamed for their personal choice of whether or not to be celibate. For myself, I see no real reason to get married but I believe that I should have the right to do so. What's the point, besides things like tax deductions? Being married doesn't make my love for my partner more valid, only legally recognized.

Now

It's pretty similar, but I do have something to say on arranged marriage:

Yes, it's an important part of some marginalized cultures and religions, especially Islam and Hasidic Judaism. And it was, and is, something that I'm ignorant about. Which is why I, as a white person who isn't part of a religion that practices arranged marriage, am going to stay quiet and in my lane about it until I'm better informed. I'm sorry for any harmful stereotypes I perpetuated.

I do actually kind of want to get married, though. Preferably to a woman. I would want to have an outdoor handfasting ceremony and maybe use Ruth 1:16-17 as my vows.

God:

Then
God is the Universe itself and the source of all life and love - God is love. God is completely gender-neutral, having no gender and at the same time all genders. They love everyone equally and infinitely and doesn't (I'm using the singular they here) discriminate based on religion, race, sexual orientation, gender, sex, body size, socioeconomic class, nationality, citizenship status, age, or disability but when someone senselessly harms another or feels threatened by what they don't understand, they distance themselves from God. I believe that God can be found in love and brought closer to humans through love, nature, sex, meditation, prayer, art, or friendship.

Now

Again, sort of similar. God, capital G God, the Holy Spirit, whatever, is a living, sentient, fluid spirit existing in and connecting everything. God is the universe itself.

Then there are the other gods. Aphrodite, Brigid, Osiris, Thor...they're powerful entities, doing their own thing and sometimes interfering in human affairs. You can pray to them, communicate with them, honor them, even worship them...but you don't have to. You don't even have to believe in them, what do they care?
 LGBT:

Take a wild guess.

The Afterlife:

Then

I believe in an afterlife. I believe in ghosts, and in angels. I do not believe in hell - not the fire-and-brimstone variety; that was purely Dantean and I'm not even sure why so many Christians believe in that. I do believe that if there is a hell, it's simply the absence of God. As for Heaven, Heaven is like pure light and pure love, engulfed in the love of the God who loves us so much more than we could ever comprehend but seeks to expand us and not limit us. I also think reincarnation exists and that it's completely possible to remember past lives.

Now

I'm not entirely sure anymore. Like...the concept of the Christian devil is definitely just fearmongering bullshit intended to make decent people think they're doing something wrong (i.e. by rebelling against injustice, having an abortion, having gay sex, not being Christian, etc.) and to give people who are actually sinful a separate entity to blame their actions on, as in "I didn't mean to rape that child, I was just being influenced by the devil and now you can't hate me because I repented for my actions in Jesus' name! :) :)"

But beyond that? I mean...ghosts and spirits, yeah, they're out there somewhere. But like...maybe they're just what happens when a spirit still has shit to do on earth. Then once that's resolved, they just move on. Their energy returns to nature or they get reincarnated. 

Idea

CW: Christianity, abortion, rape, abuse, militarism, police brutality, food, pregnancy, childbirth, white supremacy, eugenics, basically everything tbh


I've mentioned several times that I grew up Christian, and fewer times that I also incorporate some Christian ideology and mythos into my religious beliefs today.

I'm still pagan, of course. I'm polytheist, don't believe in the devil, don't believe in the Fall of Man, and don't believe that Jesus was the Son of God.

But at the same time, I just have a lot of respect for Christianity. Like...if done correctly, it can embody so many of the values that I already aspire to. It revolves around a possibly-gay, working-class Palestinian Jewish man conceived out of wedlock to a teen mom whose best friend was a sex worker. Said Jewish man fed millions of hungry people, provided free healthcare to the poor and disabled, chased capitalists with a whip, blessed a gay couple, and told the rich they had to give away all their money in order to get into heaven.

That's the antithesis of everything conservative Americans stand for.

But like...I've heard of this one kind of Satanism that involves Eve being worshipped as a goddess of feminism (I forget what it's called, but I'm pretty sure Mod Roman knows) and of gnostic Christianity, which involves worshipping a mother goddess. Which is a weird combination, but it's also just really interesting and somehow works for me, especially as a Hellenic revivalist because being an Aphrodite devotee sort of combines all the best things of Christianity and Satanism.

This is the weird shit I think about when I leave work an hour early because of flooding and wander around the nearest grocery store until I have to leave for night school (I bought juice and brownies, if you're curious). And I was just thinking about how there are so many powerful women in the Bible, so I started thinking about doing some kind of feminist writing on them.

So now that I'm actually at school and have two hours before my class starts, I'm in the library writing this post on one of the desktop computers there and trying to better organize my thoughts on this project.

First of all, what do I want it to be? Poetry? Vignettes? Short stories?

Second, I need to make a list of all the women in the Bible. So here are all the ones I can think of off the top of my head:

• Eve
• Lilith
• Naomi
• Ruth
• Sarah/Sarai
• Hagar
• Martha
• Mary (Martha's sister)
• Mary (Queen of Heaven)
• Mary Magdelene
• Esther
• Rebecca
• Rachel
• Leah
• Anne
• Elizabeth
• that one woman who almost got stoned to death
• Veronica

And, like, about this Christianity thing, I think I should address it.

So I was raised as a good little Catholic girl, going to Sunday school, getting confirmed, all that. I can still recite a lot of Catholic prayers on command.

And when I was in kindergarten, first grade, anything before that, I just...I didn't really get the concept, but my parents told me we were Christian and that meant we believed in God and Jesus was the Son of God and God loves us and we all go to heaven when we die as long as we're good and love Jesus.

Actually, purity culture and heteronormativity were just really weirdly tied into this, because when I was five and wondering where babies came from, I just assumed that a baby just instantly popped into the mom's stomach when people got married. Not her uterus, her actual stomach. I can actually remember sitting in my bath one night and wondering how she didn't shit the kid out whenever she had to go to the bathroom. Did she just not shit for nine months? Was there something holding the kid in place? (Note that I was born via C-section and the way this was explained to me was "the doctor cut Mommy's stomach open and took all her guts out", so at seven years old, I was shocked when we all had to draw pictures of the day we were born and the kid next to me drew a picture of him coming out from between his mom's legs.)

So after my dad died, we still went to church but it was a lot less often than before, unless we were with my maternal grandparents. At that point, we moved from a small rural town in Minnesota to a relatively diverse suburb near Detroit, which also lead to me discovering that not all my classmates were Christian. And I was told they were wrong and that Christianity was my religion and what I should believe, but also that I shouldn't tell other people that their religion was wrong.

And it was fine and I didn't really care, but there was still this sense that Christianity was the best religion, the superior religion, and that if you weren't Christian you were bad and probably going to hell. That wasn't as strong for me as it was for other people. Like, if you look at how my cousins were raised or how Mod Roman was raised, my own upbringing was pretty tame in comparison. It's definitely not to the point where I can be openly pagan at home, and I was also told that abortion is bad and that sex was for marriage only and that Good Girls Are Modest And Do Not Show The Sinful Thighs, but it really wasn't any worse than what most other Christian kids grow up learning. Like, just moderately sexist and heteronormative and Christian supremacist but not Mike Pence shit.

Sort of libertarian or neoliberal, I guess? Like, "respecting people's beliefs" could mean not outright being an asshole to gay people (as long as they were cis and didn't "shove their sexuality in people's faces") and non-Christians, but it could also mean "respecting the beliefs" of someone who supported conversion therapy and wanted people to be forced through unwanted pregnancies.

It could mean condemning rape, but also voting for a child molester and blaming victims for their own assault. Helping abuse victims, but staying quiet if you knew someone who was abusive.

Volunteering with the homeless, as long as they were "respectable" (meaning they weren't a sex worker or an addict). Condemning slavery and Jim Crow and not using racial slurs, but also condoning police brutality and the deportation of refugees. Being condescendingly sweet to disabled people and encouraging them to "beat the odds" (this lead to a lot of internalized ableism for me), but also supporting eugenics and doing nothing for disability rights.

It could mean uncritically supporting the military and police while quietly ignoring how racist, homophobic, transphobic, and sexist both institutions are and not doing anything to help survivors of military rape, victims of police brutality, people of color who have been harmed by the military industrial complex, LGBT veterans who were forced into the closet or de-transition, and disabled veterans who were injured in service or turned to drugs and alcohol to cope with their trauma - like, my mom would aggressively support casualties of military action in Asia (while probably doing very little to actually help them), but if she knew that my friend Stephen hates the military because they destroyed his dad's hometown in Iraq, she would be just as aggressive about yelling that he was ungrateful, racist (toward white people), un-American, anti-Christian (he's Christian himself, actually, but that's beside the point), and probably a supporter of Isis and/or the Taliban.

I, thankfully, began to see through this bullshit at a young age. When I was about eight, I realized - while sitting in church, of all places - that I had never been given concrete proof that Christianity was true. How did I really know? I couldn't see God. Sure, people had actually lived in Jesus' time, but back then we didn't know as much about science as we do today so they'd probably gotten facts wrong because they couldn't explain it with science. Given this revelation, I decided that I was an atheist. If given proof, sure, I'd be Christian, but until that happened...why should I? Was I supposed to buy into this belief system that I disagreed with just because it was written down in a book and adults wanted me to agree with them?

But I was also smart enough to understand that I should probably keep quiet about this. So I went through the motions. Went to Catechism, had my first Communion, etc.

Then some other shit happened that I'm not going to get into here, and around eleven years old I decided I believed in God again. So I just identified as Catholic by default, given that it was the religion I was raised with. I didn't have a word for it, but I was basically Unitarian Christian. Maybe Unitarian Universalist or agnostic pantheist.

And it worked and I was fine, but that changed after I went on my first mission trip when I was fourteen, the summer before ninth grade. Speaking of - I feel like I should explain these mission trips. Yes, they were run by my church and most of our clients were Christian and they were probably an example of Christian privilege, since Christians had easier access to our help than non-Christians. But they consisted mostly of going to old people's houses and doing their gardening, rather than, say, going to India to build a church while taking poverty porn pictures with the poor unenlightened brown people.

The point is, I was basically "born again" at that point, and I was more than eager to share my spirituality with the world, whether they wanted to hear it or not. I wasn't as conservative as some of my family - I didn't have anything against gay people, I mean. My stance on trans people hadn't really changed for better or worse. And while I disapproved of premarital sex and "immodesty", it was also a relatively low concern. I did believe that Christianity was the only true religion, though.

The catalyst for me getting out of that was my Spanish teacher in sophomore year, who was probably the most progressive teacher I had in high school. She was the "spiritual, not religious" type and considered herself a feminist, but she was also definitely a libfem. Like, supporting gay rights, but also being transphobic. Being pro-choice and supporting sex education, but calling everyone with a vagina "female". Remember my post "The Privilege of Cuteness", when Alex talked about how middle-class cishet abled white women tend to be drawn to white, liberal feminism? Like, they'll be progressive, they'll be all about "girl power", but they're also really cutesy and noncommittal about it and really dismissive of antifascism and leftist intersectional feminism because they're living in a privileged bubble and don't really have much to fight for? My teacher was like that.

I'm bringing her up because of how, when we were talking about Moorish Spain and how she'd been on the Camino de Santiago, she explained her religious beliefs and they just resonated with me, which made me think about my own. Which lead to me identifying as a "Christian spiritualist" and eventually becoming pagan.

Now, remember that sophomore year was also the year I came to terms with not being straight - and started dealing with a ton of shit from conservative Christians for that. So when I converted to paganism and realized even further how fucked-up so much of Christianity was, I was understandably not feeling all that warm and fuzzy toward it and everything that had to do with it. I had a lot to heal from.

But eventually, through the pagan/witchcraft/occult community (there's a lot of crossover between them), I was exposed to things like gnostic Christianity, christopaganism, Christian witchcraft, and leftist Christianity. It was Christianity the way I felt Jesus would have wanted it.

And while I didn't actually become Christian and don't ever intend to, it did make it easier for me to explore Christianity on my own terms and select things I agreed with to incorporate into my beliefs. Mary and the Saints, for one thing. And Bible verses that I agreed with. I explored my thoughts on Jesus and decided that I revered him as a spiritual teacher and ethicist, but not as the Son of God. I explored my thoughts on God themself, deciding my concept of God was animist (believing that there is a life force in everything) and pantheist (believing that the universe is God and that everything is connected).

And I was still pagan. I followed the Nine Rules of LaVeyan Satanism. I prayed to Aphrodite and other pagan gods, celebrated the changing of the seasons, and worshipped in nature rather than a church. My religious beliefs have evolved and changed, and they're continuing to do so.

In the pagan community, this is called christopaganism. It's not Christianity, and most Christians will probably never warmly welcome a christopagan into their church. Most Christians and many pagans don't believe that it's valid and just see it as a transitional religion, expecting us to just pick a side once and for all. Or they think it's the same as Christian witchcraft, even though they'll yell at the top of their lungs that paganism and witchcraft are two different things.


When I was first converting to paganism, I made a post about my religious beliefs. I'm not making a link to it because it's from our first URL, and most of the posts on there are really cringe-y and were mostly written during my MOGAI phase or when I was first getting involved in feminism but was still really liberal. I'm going to make a post like that again - in fact, it will be the next one on the list.

Book Recommendations - Dove

TW: Suicide, drugs, alcohol, sexual assault

So some random book recommendations because why not?

We Are The Ants by Shaun David Hutchinson-- The main character is a gay boy who has been kidnapped by aliens who are giving him a year to decide whether or not to save the world by pressing a button. He's returned to his home and then taken every night. It's heavily implied this isn't actually happening. His ex boyfriend committed suicide. He's hooking up with a jock guy who bullies him in public. Then a new boy comes and is bi. Trigger warning for a lot of talk about suicide, some sexual assault. There's a lot of philosophical ramblings. The main character has a family member with alzheimers and his brother's girlfriend is pregnant. I'm not sure about racial representation-- reasonably sure it's pretty white. It's pretty good if you like philosophy.

Our Own Private Universe  by Robin Talley -- This book I read recently for the first time and it is really good. The main character is bisexual and that's made clear even though the love interest is a girl and there's no specific instance of male attraction. There's some Hispanic background characters but I think the main characters are white. There's some sex scenes between the main two girls. Actually, quite a few. It explicitly brings up safe sex. There's some homophobia, but no hate crimes.

Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard Book 2: The Hammer of Thor by Rick Riordan -- The first book in this series is good as well. There's a Muslim main character who is also a Valkyrie and is betrothed. She's happy with her betrothal and it's not seen as a weird thing. There is a genderfluid character. There's some implied transphobia and the main character, Magnus Chase, makes a few mistakes, and he's suitably shamed. The character is a badass and it's implied that the character is going to be part of the main cast for the rest of the series. This character is only introduced in book 2, though. The main character is homeless.

All the Rage by Courtney Summers-- Major major trigger warning for sexual assault and rape. All the main characters and white and cishet. It's a novel about a rape survivor. Not a lot to say.

Shade Me by Jennifer Brown-- Trigger warning for descriptions of gore, gun violence, stalking, and prostitution. The main character, Niki Kill, has synethesia. All main characters are white and cishet. Her synesthia helps her solve the murder mystery because another character (spoilers) also has it. It hurts her academically at times. I couldn't say if it's good representation because I don't have synesthesia-- not sure how to spell that, but it's a really good thriller and suspenseful.

If I Were Your Girl by Meredith Russo-- Trigger warning for suicide, hate crimes, rape, and being publicly outed in addition to general transphobia/homophobia. The maincharacter is a transgirl. She's white and straight, passes easily, and is extremely attraction without trying, but it's written by a trans author.

Symptoms of Being Human by Jeff Gavin -- Trigger warning for hate crimes and lots of homophobic/transphobic slurs and suicide. The main character, Riley, is genderfluid. Their friend/love interest sexuality is never explicitly stated, only as 'having standards' and the maincharacter 'being them.' Their other friend is Latino and fat. Riley + the friend/love interest are both white. This is my favorite book in this vein, like, ever. It really helps out and rereading it makes me feel like I'm not alone. And that there are girls out there who will date people like me as well. <3 so good.

Girlmode

TW: dysphoria, bathrooms

So, what's been up in my life lately? Well, I got a haircut yesterday which was awesome. I guess I should take about boymode and girlmode, which is something I've been thinking about.

I feel like I've been shifting back into girl lately. Or actually, in the last few days. I have no idea what causes the shift every now and then, but I'm getting pretty good at it. I'm glad my gender is starting to feel like a girl again so the dysphoria chills the fuck down.

I went on a trip and found myself in a (stereotypical frustrating) situation. Bathrooms. Jeesh. I feel like a cliche when I complain about it, but there's a reason it's been dominating the fucking media-- they're fucking everywhere.

Girl - Boy.

Even saying that just gives me tingles of dysphoria in my chest. I experience dysphoria as a light tightening around my ribcage, just enough that I know there's something wrong and off and strange. It's not as bad as it could be, but I really dislike it. I guess everyone experiences dysphoria differently. The whoopdee fucking doo lottery of crap.

So as someone who usually experiences dysphoria when using the bathroom, it'd be extremely awesome if anxiety didn't make me think I need to go, like, every five seconds. Too bad for my, I guess, because it does.

And even in my 'liberal' area, where they're 'working on change,' they seem insistent on 'boys and girls' as a way of dividing in half. Health class was fun!--they said in the most sarcastic fucking voice ever. I'm impressed with myself I managed to be as outspoken as I was. Of course all the examples were of cis girls with cis boys but when asked, "of course these examples work with gay people too." Not an exact quote I'm fucking paraphrasing here.

And so I oh so tactically skip the last class where we divide into boys and girls to do our own little fucking thing. Because nobody plans for a semi-outspoken trans kid. Well, you should plan for me because I'm going to be here.

Even the thought of choosing one or another had me frozen (Not the movie).

I messed up my hair and did some homework instead. Speaking of messing up my hair-- this was pre-recent haircut, by the way-- it helps with the dysphoria sometimes. I know I don't actually objectively look boyish in the mirror, but the only brain that really matters is my own.

That brings me to Girlmode and Boymode.

I often times pretend I'm a ghost possessing a body. A body that is beautiful and completely disconnected from my nonbinary mindself. It doesn't usually work but at least it's something. We all have our own tricks. It also helps with thoughts of ugliness.

Girlmode and Boymode are when I dress up the body one way or another.

 Girlmode actually has nothing to do with fancy dresses. I have a denim jacket, jeans, tanktops, sometimes necklaces, and a variety of bright shades of lipstick that I put on for Girlmode. It's usually after listening to Dark and Edgy Teenage Angsty Music-- which I really do like, I just also like making fun of it.

My Girlmode smile is wide, but also doesn't show teeth. Sometimes I put on more makeup than just the lips, but not always. I also have some cool pink boots I sometimes where with girlmode. If this outfit had a color theme, it would be pink, purple, and black. Which, ironically, are my favorite colors.

It's about being different. It's about looking like a different girl, because I'm not really a girl. It makes me look at myself in the mirror and say "that person is hot." That girl is-- she's a different person. I just pretend to be her for a while.

Even if I don't really feel like myself. It's fun. I enjoy it. When I'm pretending-- it's when I'm dressing up as a girl. That's the key difference. When I dress up like a boy or a girl, I know it's make believe and I'm making people gender me that way on purpose.

Normal Me wears a hoodie, sweatpants, the occasional political t-shirt, lots of bracelets, and sneakers. I am pretty but not trying to attract anyone. Sometimes I wear flannel shirts, but that usually comes with Girlmode. My smile usually ends up extremely wide and sometimes slightly disturbing. It's the Me I want to end up eventually looking gender neutral as a default.

Unfortunately this ends up looking like also girlmode. I don't want to be in Boymode or Girlmode forever. I want Normal Me to be Neutral Mode. And if my gender shifts to be more Girlmode, then Girlmode I will be.

Boymode is different. I haven't done it as much as Girlmode. I have an oversized Harvard hoodie I wear over whatever shirt-- it doesn't matter because I don't end up taking it off. I mess up my hair and I walk differently. It's hard to explain. I walk with my legs farther apart and lean backwards. I don't smile too extremely like I often do in Normal Mode.

It's a lot about posing. I study boys much more than I do girls. Boymode and its culture confuses me, to say the least. So I end up examining boys and trying to figure out what makes Boyworld tick. I read a really good book about Boyworld-- Guyland: The Perilous World Where Boys Become Men, by Micheal Kimmel. He calls it Guyland, but it's practically the same thing.

I'm intrigued the same way I'm revolted. If only I could pass as a boy! Then I would be able to join them and understand. Why do they act so angry at each other? Is it a sign of friendship or hatred that they insult each other? I often act like Boyworld is some sort of alien species and in a way, it is.

I want to understand.

I've thought about changing my name. I really do like my current name-- it's actually my middle name. My first name gave me dysphoria, and even though my current name doesn't, people hear my name and think Girlmode.

But I'm scared if I change my name again nobody will call me that.

For this to make sense, I have to confess my real name isn't actually Amber. I go by a ton of different pseudonyms on the internet because I'm extremely paranoid. I know first names probably can't do any harm, but, I'm paranoid.

I won't share my current name/original first name, but the name I think I might want, maybe-- I don't think that can do any harm. Besides. It's not like I'm ever going to be brave enough to ask people to call me by it.

I want to be a Lex.

Short for Alexander in Boymode and Alexandria in Girlmode. Or just... Lex. But like I've said, I already go by a middle name and I've had people I care about say that if I change my name again, they won't call me by it. Not for a transphobic reason, I don't think so. Just because they're stubborn.

I also named a character in one of my comics Lex for some reason and she's a girl. That might've been a mistake. I think it was probably just a name on my mind a lot. I've also considered Avalon for a while, but that seemed a bit fancy. I also considered 'borrowing' one of the ex-mods names, but I dunno, that seemed kinda rude. If anyone has any good gender neutral names that you think I might like, please leave a comment. 

Either way, picking a name isn't the problem. The problem is getting people to call me it. It's irritating enough being deadnamed when it wasn't about being trans. (Yeah, that's not just a transphobia thing, although it certainly is a lot of times. People are awful about respecting name changes. "What's your REAL name?" "No, I mean your REAL ONE."

Fuck it, the name I chose for myself-- even if it was based off a middle name-- is my real name. If I'm being totally honest, I legitimately think it would be so much better if everyone got to chose their 'Real' name when they were, like, I dunno, eighteen. At some point. The birth name would just be a stupid fucking placeholder and asking adults for their 'real' name would be considered an extremely rude social mistake.

Hey, I can dream.

Right now I think my gender might be shifting back towards girl but now I've accepted this, I don't think the dysphoria will go away when it finally reaches girl.

Or maybe not. Now I'm writing about shifting back, the dysphoria is coming again. Ugh. I don't know. Maybe I'm just tired. I had trouble sleeping last night for whatever reason.

And I'm also going to write up a list of book recommendations because why the hell not!

Mod Dove/Amber/Lex/Avalon/Whatever the Fuck They Come Up With Next

Introduction + FAQ of Mod Venus

** I have no idea what happened with the formatting. I'm kind of screaming at blogger right now because this is a nightmare **

So. I'm bad at writing introductions, which is kind of ironic since I never shut up about myself.

I'm Roman, or Mod Venus. I use it/its pronouns, if you can't use those the name only please. I'm a stellunarian agenderfluid lesbian who's heavily mentally ill, autistic, traumatized, and fat. I'm also white and lower middle class, for accountability stuff.

I'm heavily interested in anti fascism and feminism. I also love researching lesbian history, and I hope to be able to write on it in the future. Outside of politics, I'm into the paranormal and fashion! I'm an aspiring fashion designer, and I hope to go to school for fashion design in the next year or so.

Like Mod Ari, I'm also an Hellenic polytheist. I consider myself a revivalist, and I also have a particular focus on Aphrodite. I also work with Artemis, Hekate, Nyx, and Amphitrite. As a witch of 5+ years, I also work a lot on magical theory. Which sounds like a weird focus for a witch, but trust me it's super interesting. At least to me.

I'll sign all my posts with Mod Venus for now.

Anyway, onto my FAQ.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Why do you say so many hateful things about cishets/men/Christians/insert oppressive group here?

Why do you care more about my 'hateful' words rather than the hateful words of those groups? One annoyed lesbian isn't gonna hurt thousands of cishet people. 
Seriously. I can whine and yell all I want but clearly it's not saving the thousands of LGBT people hurt by homophobia and transphobia. Me not liking men isn't harming them so badly that they're dropping dead. Christianity isn't suddenly the most hated religion in the west because I rolled my eyes at someone saying Jesus loves me.
I don't care about the hurt feelings of people oppressing me.

If you don't think oppression is real, I really don't have the time to convince you it is.

The internet convinced you all of this! It's not true!

Surprisingly enough, feminism, anti fascism, LGBT people, etc have all existed long before the internet did. The internet just made the exchange of ideas faster. I can observe injustice happening without the internet telling me. 
Also, while the internet certainly taught me a lot of things, I was picking fights with men long before I called myself a feminist. It's just my libra lifeblood that makes me upset at injustice.

Non Christians/The Gays/insert group here is oppressing Christians!

In America? The west? No, no they aren't. I was raised in a conservative Christian family. We were always taught that it's anti Christian to well... not be Christian. My teachers teaching us about Jewish practices? anti Christian. Muslim women going through the drive through at McDonald's? anti Christian. Enjoying the paranormal and taking interest in science? anti Christian.

I grew up terrified of not believing in god to the extent that I would make up shit in church just to seem more Christian and thus more pure. I never felt the love of god or Jesus, I never felt that warmth.

Christians aren't oppressed by anyone. Take a look at current legislation and politics. Y'all are running everything in a country that's supposed to have a separation of church and state!

You're such a misandrist!

Yeah? And?

Just kidding misandry is fake but if it was real yeah I'd be misandrist #1

You're why no one takes feminists seriously!

... no that's misogyny but sure convince yourself it's because I'm too mean.

Do you seriously believe in Greek mythology??????? You're delusional!

Yeah, and I also believe in the fae, ghosts, astral plane, reincarnation, otherkin, fictionkin... the list goes on and on. I believe in a lot of weird shit. I read tarot constantly and believe strongly in astrology.

Yet I also am a huge science geek. I test my beliefs. I don't take every myth literally, I don't hold my beliefs past when I should. I believe in evolution, I know the Earth revolves around the Sun. Part of my practice is literally to respect science and it's existence. I try to research as much as I can and consider the logic of my own practices because, well, why wouldn't I?

Also yeah. I'm delusional. That's why psychosis means.

How do you even know you're a lesbian?

Well. I like women. I like kissing women. Women I find attractive make me weak in my knees. I want to have sex with women and I want to marry a woman.

The idea of doing any of that with a man makes me wanna vomit.

How do you tell the difference between being non-aligned agender and being woman-aligned agender?

Well, there's not really an easy way to tell the difference as gender is a mess. For me, I just looked at where my experiences in my life lined up. While I don't feel like I /am/ a woman, my experiences are /similar/ to women's. 

For example, listening to lesbians struggles really resonate with me. I can relate and understand those thoughts. When women talk about being impacted by misogyny, I feel the same things they do in those situations. While I may not see myself as a woman, I see myself as similar to them.

Can I call you queer?

No.

Dyke?

Are you a lesbian? Have we talked more than once? Go ahead if yes to both!

Are you femme or butch?

If by this you just mean 'are you feminine or masculine' the answer is no.

If you mean do I identify as either of these sapphic gender experiences, then I consider myself femme. I love ultra feminine clothes, but my relationship to femininity is complicated. I identified as butch for a long time due to feeling uncomfortable being seen as a cis woman.

I have a lot of social dysphoria over being seen like cishet women. My expression of femininity cannot be untied from my lesbianism and my agenderness. Because of this, I tend to avoid calling myself feminine outside of discussing femme and butch.

What mental disorders do you have?

Diagnosed: Generalized Anxiety Disorder, ADHD, minor psychosis

Self-DX: Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Antisocial Personality Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, unknown trauma disorder, arachnophobia

Completely unsure: Dissociative Identity Disorder/unknown dissociative disorder

I have extreme anxiety and minor psychosis related to it. I tend to assume I'm in life threatening danger a lot and that people are trying to kill me.

I have basically no empathy, am extremely self centered, almost no emotions, but when I do have emotions they are extremely intense, violent tendencies, and hyperromanticism/hypersexuality

I have no fucking idea why but I have two people in my head. Bill, who's literally just Bill Cipher, and Juliette, who's been around for a while. They don't talk much, but are there.

- Mod Venus

Disconnect

Disconnect

TW: transphobia, bathroom stress, dysphoria, mental illness, mentions of slurs, homophobia, offensive jokes, mentions of anxiety

I hear a lot about trans people in the circles I'm in online. Generally in a positive way, because I try to block/scream at whoever is rude.

But...

I feel disconnected. 

"We have to fight for trans bathroom rights," feels like something I'd be viewing as an ally. Even though I'm not.

I don't think so, anyway. I see all of this and think 'yeah, that's a thing.' Even though I know it should feel deeply personal, I just get angry on behalf of other people. 

I'm just here. I'm just a person and I'm just watching. A lot of the time I feel like my mind is either a little bit too big or too small for my body. I don't know if my antidepressants or stimulants are either too high or too low. Maybe. Or it could also be dysphoria. 

Dysphoria I'm aware of usually expresses itself with a tingling or pressure in my ribs. It's an explicit feeling of wrongness. It doesn't usually cause me major anxiety attacks. It's just... there. A lot of things are just there.

I'm just here. And maybe just is the wrong word because I'm also strong and smart and creative. But at the same time, I will always be just me.

I'm lucky enough that my school's got a bathroom for whoever. It's not labeled or anything. But there's also only one and I get that there's more traffic in the gendered ones but I'm tired of having to make that trek every time I just need to pee.

And I'm going to this place with a bunch of classmates and apparently there's something cool in the girl's bathroom. And I don't know how to say I just can't go in there. Especially when they were just wondering if they could go into the guy's one to see if there was something there too.

But that would be weird, right.

This feeling is 'just' finding this really cool old poster for a comic and seeing the q slur all of a sudden.

And not in a reclaiming way, which I don't feel completely chill with but at least there's a point. It's just there. It's 'just' a bathroom. 'Just' a joke. And if I live my life in the 'just' heres, then what am I? Because it's never just anything.

Nothing is ever as easy as it looks. It's so easy to look at me and say I'm fine. But I'm not. This isn't fine. Nobody should ever act like any of this is okay. 

Maybe bathroom rights are something to fight for. I'm sure plenty of binary trans kids desperately need to be allowed into the correct bathroom and they DO. Nobody's disputing that. But allowing trans people into the right bathroom isn't the solution. It's temporary. Everything is temporary. The entire idea of a boy and girl restroom is bullshit.

And I don't mean create a third bathroom for "transgenders," because that's just ridiculous and the equivalent of saying binary transpeople aren't really their gender. So if you misinterpret this as that, then fuck you.

The entire idea of two bathrooms is bullshit but that only happened because the idea of two genders that were oh so different. Which isn't true. There's no such thing as being "not like other girls" because by virtue of stating that, you've become exactly like everyone else.

Tear the fucking bathroom signs down.

Tear the fucking binary system down.

Because sometimes small changes don't work. Sometimes being only liberal enough for the 'normal' quote, end quote, people to respect us isn't enough.

The disconnect I feel is because I know how people SHOULD act. I'm not your girl. I'm not anyone's girl. And because I think you like me doesn't mean I have to like you back. Because I'm disconnected from all of this and maybe just absentmindedly tearing everything down is even better.

And I don't even know if there's a point to this-- to any of it. There's a lot of "but" and "and" and "because." 

I don't know who I am but I know one thing.

I'm pissed. I'm tired. No, I'm FUCKING EXHAUSTED. Because it's not funny to laugh at someone in the middle of an anxiety attack and because it's not funny to poke me until I have one. I'm more than just some joke.

What do you want me to say? That I'm okay with gay jokes that border on bullshit yet also have the same "hah it's okay gay people are chill" disclaimers. If I fucking scream the way I want to, I'm overreacting. If I don't say something, I'm telling people it's okay.

So what? So what?! I just act like I'm not there and I disconnect. I run away and hide in the shadow of myself.

I'm not okay with accidentally scrolling down into the comments of a YouTube video while looking for more and seeing "ew, the gay people."

Yes, I know. Don't read the comments. Which is bullshit, victim blaming, and takes responsibility off of YouTube for not just putting in a fucking MODERATION SYSTEM.

It's. Not. That. Hard.

Freedom of speech has limits. You can't grab a microphone and shove a public speaker off the stage, then expect people to listen to you.

If that happens, you're probably an asshole with no respect for listening.

With all this in reality, is it really a surprise I'd rather live in my head? I'd rather pretend to be a character who has the ability to talk circles around assholes in real life. They. Aren't. Real. I can write well enough, but the moment I try to yell, I get too pissed or too sad or both. So I just don't speak.

Head!Me can spend many hours taking down assholes and talking them into supporting their opinions. But I'm not them.

So I'll just keep rambling on about stupid, stupid, garbage.

That was a metaphor.

For assholes. They're the garbage.

Mod Dove 

The Privilege of Cuteness

CW: mentions of alcohol and Christianity






So today my friend Alex and I had a conversation that I want to feature on here. It started out as just them asking my opinion on acting "cute" when that's not how you feel and somehow escalated into an analysis of emotional labor and how women in positions of privilege are seen as inherently cute - that is, fragile, delicate, innocent, loveable, feminine, and nonthreatening - and can use that against marginalized people. Since privilege, and lack thereof, was pretty relevant to the conversation, I'll list ours.


Alex is a white Brazilian agender butch lesbian who doesn't experience transmisogyny. They were raised Christian but are now an atheist exploring secular traditional witchcraft. They're autistic, have PTSD, are in the Cluster-B range for personality disorders, have sensory issues, have lofw empathy, and are a survivor of intimate partner violence from an ex-boyfriend.


I'm a mentally and physically disabled white, non-Latinx American, born and raised, who uses mobility aids (knee braces, and I've considered a cane for when I'm having trouble walking; due to a family history of MS, I'm thinking of asking my doctor to investigate this joint pain before it gets out of control) and is unable to drive independently because of how weak my eyesight is. I'm a woman-aligned genderfluid, gender nonconforming wlw with a strong sga preference, and I don't experience transmisogyny. I was raised Christian but am now pagan - specifically, Hellenic revivalist, but with a healthy dose of animism, pantheism, Unitarian Universalism, and general eclectic neopagan shit thrown in. I'm also incredibly fascinated by druidry and Gaelic polytheism (especially the goddess Brigid) and would love to explore that someday.


So I decided to share it on here. If you're curious, we were speaking English, because the only Portuguese I know are swear words (I heard Alex swear once when someone had been rude to them, and put it into Google Translate later out of curiosity) and their English is completely fluent.










Alex: Can you give me your opinion on a random thing?


Me: Yeah.


Alex: What do you think of people who fake a personality? Like someone who's usually grumpy and tired but fakes a warm, happy-go-lucky personality around others.


Me: Well, I usually am grumpy and tired because chronic pain and sensory issues are just so fucking fun. Which is why I think you're fine, you're not doing anything wrong.

Alex: I see. I used to like, do that a lot on Tumblr to be honest. I was even the type that would put those cute Japanese emoticons on every personal post. And I was thinking I should do that again.

Me: Sounds too much like work, I wouldn't bother. Besides, you'll eventually crack and lose followers online and friends in real life and then people will be pissed because you're not some perfect little neurotypical who's happy and pleasant all the time. So the only time I ever fake a personality is at work and that's only because I'd get fired if I swore at people.

Alex: Yeah but like, you know those people here that are always showing a ~soft~ personality?

Me: You think they're faking it?

Alex: Like even the colors in their blog are soft and they reply to every anon message with "ILY!!!" and shit. And I didn't say I think they're faking it. I was going to say I envy that.

Me: Yeah I used to want that but, like, fuck it.

Alex: People used to follow me on that blog, thinking I was cute.

Me: And also a lot of women in positions of privilege do it too, have you ever noticed that?

...

Alex: I mean that instead of a cute little angel, I'm more like a tiny angry gremlin.



Me: Same.



Alex: And like, sometimes it kinda sucks to be like that because no one finds it cute but yeah.



Me: Maybe it's a misogyny thing, because men aren't ever under the same assumptions to be cute, unless they're Asian or LGBT or something. Or GBT, I should say, because they can't be L. But women are, and it's like an expectation of emotional labor, that we're always expected to be cute. Especially sapphic women and even more so gender nonconforming sapphics. When I first realized I was sapphic, I was so desperate to be seen as cute because I didn't want to fulfill the "angry man-hating lesbian" stereotype. And even though I wasn't a lesbian, as a bi girl I was vulnerable to a lot of that. So maybe you're going through the same thing.



Alex: Yeah, I know what you mean, like, just by liking girls, you think people are going to think you hate men and want to like, kill your father and brother and stuff just cause they're men. Because people teach us to feel like that. At least I was taught to feel like that, like everyone's going to think that about me if they know I'm into girls.



Me: Right, and remember Jacob? The meninist guy from my church who my friend and I yelled at for slut shaming girls. I told you about him once and you said he reminded you of your brother.



Alex: Yeah. I think part of the reason men are uncomfortable with wlw is because they don't understand us. So, mystery territory or something.



Me: The other girl that was there, Marie, she identifies as a lesbian now but back then she thought she was aroace. So when she talked about feminism, as an aroace, it was cute and progressive and cool. But she didn't really get that I don't have the same luxury because as a disabled nonbinary butch, I was and am constantly seen as threatening and irrational and expected to police my anger more than other women.



Alex: Yeah like, I know you said aroace but I feel like if a woman who men think is available to them talks about feminism, it's not so threatening because they can still sleep with her and sexualize her.



Me: And also that expectation for wlw to always be calm is especially strong for wlw who aren't cis. Because with trans women, they're told they're tr**nies or men, or they're laughed at and shouted down and expected to be quiet for cis women. And for us (Alex and I are both afab nonbinary, specifically an agender lesbian and a genderfluid sapphic), like...so many anti-feminists, including trans men who are anti-feminist, are just like "LOL kek shut up, snowflake tumblrina".



Alex: Back to the "acting cute" thing, I probably can't do it.



Me: Good. Cute people are annoying. Fuck cute.



Alex: I'm usually more...I don't know, I think I'm more the type to defy people? Of course there are moments in which I get intimidated.


Me: I can relate. I almost always feel like I have to walk on eggshells around straight women, especially if they're also cis. And a lot of cis women in the discourse (the discourse has a lot to do with how we became friends, so it generally features into a lot of our conversations), I feel like they act like fragile little flowers about trans issues, like they'll talk about it as if they have the right to say anything at all. And they'll be transphobic, and when a trans person calls them out, they'll get so upset and act like the trans person is a predatory misogynist who just wants to shut poor, innocent little cis women out of LGBT spaces. As if being a woman or being gay exempts them from cis privilege.*


Alex: Yeah I've seen that a lot, but I meant more with my family. For example, if an old relative of mine is at my house and like, they see a m/m or f/f couple on TV kissing, and they go "Oh my god, two women/men, so it's like that nowadays" or something. It's expected of me to give them the Death Stare while saying "Is there a problem?" Or if someone I know says "Family is a man and a woman" or something like this, I'll most likely be the first one to say "Not necessarily" or "You're straight up wrong".

Me: Reminds me of my grandparents. My uncle, my grandpa's brother actually, is gay and I had no idea until my mom had her friend over and I overheard them talking when i was supposed to be asleep because they were drunk and kind of loud. This was only a year and a half ago, and I've known his boyfriend ever since I can remember but until pretty recently I had no idea they were a couple. and they fucking live together, they used to have a dog even. And these same grandparents, they sent my mom and her siblings to a private catholic school because they didn't want them to be around black kids. It's like, with white women or straight women or cis women or whatever, men who share that privileged identity think the women are too delicate and fragile to be exposed to the underbelly of society. Which, according to them, is LGBT people and people of color. And since privileged women tend to align more with their privilege than their womanhood, the women just go with it and repeat those ideals. Which is why, for example, straight women can sexually harass us and get away with it. I think this is even the reason for that one Jim Crow law about "familiarity toward a white woman" and how that was basically the worst crime a black man could commit. And you've probably heard women of color joke about white women's tears. I can definitely see where they're coming from.

Alex: I can see what you mean. Usually white women, especially gentile, non-Latinx white women, are not very interested in fighting misogyny side-by-side with Latinx women and Jewish women and women of color because it's "too tiring". They're not too tired to fight for themselves.

Me: It's because they're seen as cute and innocent no matter what they do, and they can weaponize that against marginalized people of all genders.

Alex: And because of their privilege, the misogyny they experience isn't that big.

Me: And they can claim they're for all women, but they call marginalized women "divisive" when they, or we, talk about issues specific to that intersection of identity. And yeah, I'm so tired of the "All blank experience an equal amount of blank." Like, a rich, white, cisgender, abled gay or bi man is never going to be at the same risk for homophobic violence as we are. A rich white cishet abled dyadic gentile woman doesn't face the same violence from the patriarchy as a less-privileged woman.

Alex: Sure, all women and female-aligned people are affected by misogyny but there are women who are so privileged that if you ask them to give you an example of a moment in which they experienced misogyny, it's very possible that they'll say they don't recall anything. I literally knew girls like that.

Me: There's a reason that women of color and LGBT women and disabled women are more likely to be feminists than abled white cishet women. By the way, is it okay if I use this conversation in a blog post? Like on Blogspot. I'm calling it The Privilege of Cuteness.

Alex: Yeah, sure!

Me: Okay thanks!!

Alex: I mean, feminism attracts us more than it attracts them, for very obvious reasons. If you're talking about intersectional feminism, that is. If you mean liberal, white feminism, it definitely attracts cishet white able-bodied women since it seems like a fun, feel-good aesthetic. Just an excuse to say you're cool for being a girl. It's not really a necessary thing.

...

Me: Okay, I have to get to class now.

Alex: Have fun!

*Specifically, I was thinking of the time a seventeen-year-old cis bi girl was pushing the idea that cis bi people don't have to be sga. As a nonbinary person who has had chasers use this idea to fetishize me, I was understandably annoyed, but I tried to call her out gently. She kept being willfully ignorant and ignoring everything I said, telling me I was being biphobic, and cissplaining, and I finally just snapped at her because she'd pushed me to that.


So she got upset and kept trying to tell me that I had power over her and was taking advantage of this, as a nineteen-year-old. Which is bullshit, because seventeen-year-olds aren't fucking babies, I was only two years older, and the only "adult" things I've ever done, besides college, were drink alcohol, go to a casino, and occasionally act as the "adult supervision" for my younger cousins. She was clearly only bringing this up to distract from the fact that as a cis person, the power she had over me was far greater than any power I have to theoretically buy condoms and lottery tickets and shit. But I was shut down pretty quickly, because this is a trick that cis women use a lot against trans people when called out: making themselves seem vulnerable and innocent so we look like bullies by comparison.

Out Of The Closet

TW: Transphobic jokes, coming out, homophobic slurs, anxiety.

So... I'm out.

This is a fairly recent development. I'd come out as, (cringe) 'biromantic h*mosexual' last year. (Which is pretty much zero percent true-- I'm reasonably sure I don't like boys at all and in order to be gay, I'd have to actually be a girl).

But yesterday, there was this whole diversity presentation thing. My school is one of those liberal schools where the idea is that everyone there is super chill and radical, but the students are... slightly less on board with the idea.

Anyway, there was this ice breaker activity. I'm not quite sure what they called it. The idea is you stand up for the identities that you're part of. There was age, which I'm not quite sure why it was included-- I don't really "identify" as my age. There was race and religion. And there was gender.

I wasn't ready.

I really wish I'd been prepared because when they did call out nonbinary, I didn't think about it.

I'm lucky enough to go to a liberal school in a liberal place. I know not everyone has that privilege. I'd just like to reiterate that. This isn't a story about people getting angry and shouting at me. I wasn't ready because I hadn't thought about it.

I mean, I guess I had. I was sorta building up to coming out, but not so publicly.

I stood up and everyone saw.

I didn't think I was going to be the only one standing. I might not have came out if I knew that I was the only one who was. I mean, I'm sure that there are plenty of closeted trans folk... but still. Wow. That did not feel great.

And I really need to process this, okay?

A lot of people came up to me afterwards, calling me brave.

My crush called me brave.

I don't know why this infuriated me. Maybe because I'm not brave and maybe because I didn't even think it through properly. But I hate being called brave.

Nobody asked me if I wanted to go by any other name.

Nobody asked me what my pronouns were.

Maybe if they did, I would've told them the name I've been holding in my head and imagining people calling me for weeks. The they/them pronouns.

And then an activity where we split into boy and girl. I was just there. I just existed and that's basically been my entire life. This. That. And me. If I hadn't said anything, I'd probably just have sat with the girls. It felt freeing... but it also felt off. People 'hadn't planned' for me. Nobody thought I would even exist. It's like I'm a freaking dragon.

An LGBTQ activity. I had to push to share pronouns.

The Q slur was used as one of the Qs without asking if anyone was okay with it.

When I asked not to use it, people pretty much ignored me. "It's okay as long as you're using it positively," but it's not. I used to want to reclaim slurs, but now I don't. I don't want to reclaim any of them. I want to burn them in a fire and scorch them from this earth. I want to show the people who use them casually how it feels.

And it doesn't feel good.

Anyway. That was a side note.

I'm ADHD, which means that sitting still for presentations is already hellish enough. My anxiety was pinging all over and I was about to fucking yell at the next person who called me brave because existing is not brave. 

And boys who joke about having a friend who's 'this' or 'that,' asking for 'advice.'

You're trying to learn about a subject that makes you uncomfortable. I respect the search of knowledge. However, you're not fucking sacrificing my sanity to do it. The next White Cishet Rich Boy TM to do that to me is getting a fuck off and not an awkward dodge.


I'm not your fucking lesson.

I'm not a fucking inspiration.

Being brave shouldn't have to be a thing because you should have already made it fucking clear that it's safe. I shouldn't have to explain and I shouldn't have to be your teacher. Go fucking google it. Go. Fucking. Google.

JUST BECAUSE I'M THERE DOESN'T MEAN I'LL ANSWER YOUR FUCKING INTRUSIVE QUESTIONS.

Alright. I'm going to take a deep breath and count to ten.

THE A DOESN'T STAND FOR ALLY AND SAYING SO IS APPROPRIATION OF STRUGGLES FACED BY THE LGBTQ COMMUNITY--

Excuse me.

I think I'll take another one.

Sigh. I'm so tired of being my school's neighborhood feminist. This is why I didn't want to get into political arguments because I'm not going to be your google. Google is your google.

And I guess I should've known taking a break from politics wasn't going to work because the personal is political. I just... I'm so... so... tired. I'm tired of being kind. I'm tired of compromise and I'm tired of 'not hurting the little transphobic shit's feelings.'

Mod Dove...
For now.

EDIT: oh fuck blogging really IS therapeutic.

Mod Applications

As you may have noticed, two new mod positions have opened up. Freyja hasn't written a post in a year, Amber hadn't in months, and Cosima's only post was her introduction, so I gave all three mods an ultimatum: write something by March 1st or leave. Amber - btw, let me know if you want me to call you something else - did that. Freyja and Cosima didn't.

Well, now (at least in my area), it's 7:13 P.M. on March 1st. There's not even a draft from either of them, and I figure if they were going to write something, they would have by now. But it's not fair to leave the majority of the work to one person.

So...Cosima, Freyja, you're fired. Your names and emails have been removed from the contributors' list and you'll no longer be able to write anything for this blog. I warned you both two weeks in advance, but you didn't do anything, and that's on you.

I'm willing to hire up to ten mods.

The requirements for being a mod are:

• You must be at least one of the following
• Sapphic (a woman/woman-aligned nonbinary person attracted to other women and woman-aligned nonbinary people)
• Achillean (a man/man-aligned nonbinary person attracted to other men and man-aligned nonbinary people)
• Transgender/Nonbinary/Genderqu**r/Agender/anything other than cisgender

• You must be at least thirteen years old.
• You must write your FAQ within one month of joining the team.
• You must write at least one post longer than three paragraphs per month.
• You must submit at least one idea for a new blog name.
• You must not believe that anyone attracted to people of their same or similar gender are capable of oppressing others on the axis of sexuality.
• You must be anti-DDLG/CGL/ADBL (this is a kink in which one person dresses and acts like a small child, while their partner pretends to be their sexually abusive parent. It is known for sexualizing and fetishizing incest, sexual violence, pedophilia, disassociative identity disorder, autism, post-traumatic stress disorder, and other disabilities. It completely repulses me and I'm unwilling to hire anyone who is so much as indifferent to it.)
• You must not be anti-theist (in the sense of being against all religion. I'm religious and it pisses me the fuck off.)
• You must be actively involved in social justice
• You must be anticapitalist and antifascist (also called being a leftist)

Preference will be given to:

• Jewish people (whether you're ethnically or religiously Jewish)
• Muslim people
• People of color
• Women and/or woman-aligned people
• Disabled people (whether physically or mentally)
• Poor/Low-Income people
• Intersex people
• Trans/nonbinary people
• Refugees and Immigrants
• HIV+ people
• People living in Asia, Africa, Mexico, Central America, South America, the Caribbean, Polynesia, Melanesia, or Micronesia
• anyone who fits more than one of the identities on this list.

Mod Applications are here.