Posts you had second thought about and decided not to post - put them here

so I guess we didn't have second thoughts after all

lol

Fair enough, BB, so you can go and talk in the No Boys thread about how ilx younger people don’t understand you, but you’re the one determined to make our opinions be a one way street. You can talk and we have to listen and take it but anything going the opposite way, nothing. That’s your right but you have to be honest about it.

silby gdi I am literally in therapy about my own transition and in constant discussion about this shit and I have no fucking clue why a very useful and simple term that is used so commonly by transpeople in discussion about this shit is so upsetting to you

Apologies in my last post for misgendering Brad btw sorry Brad

What use is it, ontologically

Gyac, I listen to people who have more experience than me, who are wiser than me, and who have more relevant knowledge than me.

Like this:

gdi I am literally in therapy about my own transition and in constant discussion about this shit and I have no fucking clue why a very useful and simple term that is used so commonly by transpeople in discussion about this shit is so upsetting to you

It can be a hugely helpful way of resolving conflicts in mixed-space settings, to address where you are coming from, how you were raised, what things were forbidden to you, what things were violently and nonconsensually forced upon you - and how the same things which are useful and helpful to you, might feel hurtful and oppressive to someone else, but you both have the right to get your needs met. We've resolved a lot of issues between enby people going in different directionalities by discussing those directionalities. We don't get very far by simply banning words.

It’s useful in discussing with a parent of a child who is coming out as genderqueer, for example, as the experience is different for children who have been assigned and raised male as opposed to assigned and raised female

assigned butchered at birth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtf9QH8KhkA

Like in an enby space, where (deliberately frivolous example) some people are like "I want to express my gender through dresses! and pretty make-up! and glitter nail varnish and all the stuff that was denied to me while I was growing up! This is enby culture!" and some people are like "Ugh, I HATE dresses, get make-up the fuck away from me, I was forced to wear that shit and I never want to see it ever again, enby culture is boots and flannel and buzz cuts!" - it is a way of helping people to understand their differences, and that they can both be right, that where "enby" is located depends so much on where you are coming from.

And using these terms to express where you are coming from, "I was assigned female, I was forced to do some things, I was denied the right to do other things" can be very helpful shortcuts. Maybe generalisations, sure, but shortcuts can be useful, too.

I have no idea what discourse exists that has silby apparently starting at a 10.1 on the rageometer as soon as someone uses [an awkward initialism that probably had greater utility when applied specifically to intersex ppl, idk if it's robbing them of a linguistic tool or w/e though] but it's quite funny that they have their current username during this clusterfoofooraw

all gender is drag, come back Brad, map mb chill out and take a walk?

I’m posting calmly as I always do

Whiney's youtube comes across as more chill than u, silby ...

tho Whiney _is_ Dave Cool

I’d never suggest I’m calmer and cooler than Whiney, famously our coolest poster

https://thepoodleanddogblog.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451580669e2019101acaa1d970c

^^ Whiney in his new career

more like sunset strip glam rock puppies imo

When I first started transitioning, there were men on this forum who started entire threads board lawyering for the right to deadname me

btw other posters may have broader memories or a grasp on timelines that make the following observation less specifically relevant, but just while I'm here:

many ilx0rs have quietly announced that they are transitioning, or changing their pronouns, or personal concept of gender, or login name, and had the other posters adapt to this without fanfare or conflict.

a handful of ilx0rs have also started posting under new names but pretended that they weren't the same person, and been met with distrust and conflict. the conflict and distrust typically escalates the more the new poster insists that they aren't the old poster, and are a completely different person. this occurs regardless of the announced gender of of the new poster.

o xpost

it's a coding joke -- the GIS was for "hipster dog python"

if someone wants to snakesplain that that in fact is not "python" -- i am totally ok with that

many ilx0rs have quietly announced that they are transitioning, or changing their pronouns, or personal concept of gender, or login name, and had the other posters adapt to this without fanfare or conflict.

You know what? I'd have loved to do it this way. I'd have loved to have had the chance to do it this way. I tried to do it really quietly, and discreetly - it was like 2012, I was barely out to myself and my therapist. I didn't want to draw attention to myself, I didn't want to have to explain new and painful stuff and my whole history to people who were often hostile. Other people got to do it quietly - but the usual people on this forum seized on it, started interrogating my motives, accused me of trying to deceieve them, they wouldn't leave it alone, they kept repeatedly deadnaming me and making an issue out of it like I owed each and every one of them a personal explanation.

It was that thing where so many other people got to just be like "name change: be cool" and everyone just went along with it. But I didn't get that benefit of the doubt.

I was short and shirty with like the 10th person to dispute my name - not even rude, and certainly not on the level of swearing and insults and abusiveness that other posters on this thread have shown to me tonight, just shirty - and boom! A board lawyering thread, about whether they should have the right to know a poster's complete personal history, deadname and everything. It took FGTI to point out how transphobic that idea was.

That *happened* and I'm not having it handwaved away or diminished or justified that it was OK.

Without trying to be combative, or telling you that you handled things wrongly, or that you should have known exactly what to do to handle a gradual transition in a public space, I'm just noting that

It was that thing where so many other people got to just be like "name change: be cool" and everyone just went along with it. But I didn't get that benefit of the doubt

... is not the situation that was .

My recollection - and again, I may have plenty of this wrong: other posters who aren't BB please correct anything fundamentally inaccurate, I'm only typing to try and annotate for bystanders reading the thread -- is that the sequence went

On a board where it was extremely common for people to run short and long-term sock puppets, and still is semi-common for people who've flounced or been banned to come back as socks, a new poster appeared and kept talking about their gender and how classically male they were, and otherwise talked about specific interests of a long-term poster who had stopped posting a handful of hours before this new poster turned up.
Plenty of people assumed this was simply a new login name for the old poster, and - in the manner that ilx0rs still continue in 2020 to call their board colleagues by a real or fake name that they're customarily known as, addressed the new poster by the old poster's name in a spirit of inclusive friendship, demonstrating familiarity and affection by recognising the poster's voice. If they were only encountering New Poster on the threads of mutual interest, they weren't even aware of the repeated declarations of gender on other threads.

New Poster did not say "name change: be cool," they repeatedly argued that they were not Old Poster and that other people were not only wrong but in the wrong, and being dicks (non-gender-specific) by saying NP was OP. A couple of people went "er, if you want me to act like that I will, sure" and other people took the obvious untruth as being disrespectful, and poor sock-puppetry.

--

Later, and separately, Old Poster changed their login again (possibly after a period of reverting to their prior login?), and once again people recognised the voice and genially addressed them under the single-syllable name they already knew said poster by.
IIRC, at different points, the poster gave the reason for the name change as being to associate their general online identity with a name they were already using for visual art, and to avoid IRL drama associating their ILXing with their meatworld name. Assuming they were making early, tentative steps toward transition or different presentation, they were under no obligation to announce this in a public space, but likewise nobody in that space could be expected to not take the stated reasons at face value. When some ppl addressed Old Poster by a common one-syllable IRL name also used IRL and on ILX by multiple other posters, they were taken aback to be accused of nigh-doxxing, as this prima facie did not make sense.

Again, Old Poster Under New Name did not say "name change: be cool," in any way that people could be expected to hear. Old Poster expected every other of the thousand or w/e active posters on ILX to read every single post that Old Poster made in every thread, so when people bumped into Old Poster and called them "one syllable name," Old Poster did not say "hi there, it's BB now btw" and link them to a quiet announcement post saying "name change: be cool." Old Poster frequently blew up at individuals who were showing casual friendship by recognising OP, bemoaning that OP had been asking not to be called that name in multiple other posts, and that it was rude, or dangerous, or insulting, or assaultive, for someone to not have read those posts.

Friction was caused by this mode of reaction, possibly more than understanding was. Many people were also already much less inclined to grant "that benefit of the doubt" due to the sustained gaslighting that Old Poster had engaged in during the earlier name change.

--

Then eventually it became clear that Old Poster wished to be addressed as Branwell, and... everyone began addressing them as Branwell (or a shorter affectionate two-syllable diminutive, just as they had previously).

--

None of this is to say that Old Poster ought to have known the best way to handle it, or should have had a clear picture of their gender journey flash on like a light switch in their mind, or that some old-school arseholes wouldn't have been rude or aggressively refused to be cool about a "name change" be cool. Just describing some things that *happened*.

Sorry for sentence fragment in par 1.

(Also fwiw I remember all this ^^ drama, but I still have almost no idea what Branwell's situation is regarding personal gender conception, or presentation, or transition, or pronouns. So it's easy to believe that even people who were being aggressive or assholey on putative board lawyering threads in 2012 were not being transphobic, or wilfully engaging in deadnaming.)

maybe if a significant portion of a community, including people who have known and dealt with you irl, feel that a community is bad for you and your mental well-being.. it’s bad for you!

and maybe those communities that you feel accepted in are good for you. just off the cuff here, gotta find your own people and accept that some people are not meant to be your people

I had no idea about the reason 'old poster' didnt want to be known by old name until something like 6 months ago or so.

I had just assumed it was "don't use my govt name" which had often been said by that poster.
I think most ilxors ,esp those like me who dont use SNA and only really read ILM would never have read any of those threads where it was discussed.

I'm happy to use pronouns that someone prefers, but they do need to tell me.
I realise that someone will get fed up having to do that but how on earth are we meant to know?

Sic, all I can say is, I remember things differently, and you've made a lot of assumptions as towards motives (both mine and other people's), and left a lot of important contextual stuff out. (For a start, you are continuing to attribute the actions of someone else's sock puppet impersonator, to me - even though I made it clear at the time, and afterwards, that it wasn't me? They tried to steal my identity, so I stole their name.)

I started to type out corrections and explanations and additions - there is no point. People are going to believe what they want to believe, and nothing I can say is going to change that. People see their own actions as harmless and other people's actions as weirdly malevolent, and that goes both ways.

There are some people here who like me, engage with me pleasantly, value my voice and encourage me to stay. There are some people who cannot stand even the idea of me, and actively wish me harm, and it is a waste of time trying to please the latter.

attribute the actions of someone else's sock puppet impersonator

Apologies (to Branwell and passersby) if so - I don't have any recollection at all of New Poster's name, but will have a look back and recontextualise if you want to post or ilxmail it.

Sic, I would honestly prefer to drop it at this point.

We remember things differently. Let's leave it at that, no hard feelings towards you.

(Maybe now that ILX *is* a more trans-friendly space than it was in 2012, maybe it needs a dedicated pronouns thread, where people can, if they feel comfortable, log their pronouns for easy searching, if other people are not sure?)

There are some people here who like me, engage with me pleasantly, value my voice and encourage me to stay. There are some people who cannot stand even the idea of me, and actively wish me harm, and it is a waste of time trying to please the latter

You describe another binary situation...but I don't think it's like that....And I don't think all this history is necessary. I think its a lot simpler.

From my own subjective, and partial view of events you basically dropped into the LGBTs thread and in the course of giving advice, started to trying to police it in robust and offensive ways:

This thread is like 99% cis gays, talking about cock all day long, casually equating cock = man, etc. etc. and so on

Overall, (again in my subjective view) some people reacted remarkably well, but unsurprisingly some were offended and upset.

I was asking why some bioessentialism around genitals and gender was OK, and why some wasn't.

This is a repeated thing, within queer spaces, why "woman" is a contested space, and why "vagina" is a contested space, but why "man" is so seldom a contested space, and why "cock" is so seldom a contested space.

If you want to see that as 'policing', that's your interpretation. That's your subjective view.

Other interpretations are available. That maybe that is a genuine question? Something I am really curious about. It's not an easy question, it's not a question with immediate answers. It's a question that definitely makes people uncomfortable. But maybe it is a question that deserves thought and consideration and actual exploration of that topic?

When I think about stuff like "policing", I tend to think about stuff like - why are lesbian identities so heavily policed? Not even just within the queer community, like in the ~general population~, like, this was stuff I was encountering in the wild only a few weeks ago, which led to conversations in my DMs that I was referencing on the Bad Faith / Good Faith thread?

Why *aren't* gay male identities so heavily policed in the way?

Why is me even framing cock discourse in the exact ways that vagina discourse is framed, considered to be *me* policing?

Probably because you saw a lighthearted joke between Alfred and Morbius and immediately took it to offensive places because Brad dared wonder why you were opining on the AMAB experience?

Gyac, correct me if I'm wrong, but I've never seen you identify as queer. You don't seem to be trans, or nonbinary. You are, as far as I know so please correct me if I'm wrong, a cis woman in a heterosexual relationship, and the only engagement I've ever seen you show with trans issues is terf discourse. Why do you feel like you are the best-placed person to play den mother and arbitrate in internicine struggles between conflicting groups of queer people? I really don't know why you think you have that authority let alone the context to do that.

We've had enough discussion about jokes and about humour on ILX, that... jokes, even lighthearted ones, are not somehow exempt from discourse, they are part of it. And dismissing stuff as 'just a joke' is, y'know. Not the power move you think it is.

The prevalence of the 'Gold Star Gay' ~born this way~ trope, and the One True Trans narrative, have been so prevalent and so normative in queer discourse, that we have tropes and names for them - to emphasise the importance of contesting them.

That Brad walked in, saw me naming a trope in order to contest it, and went beserk, deciding that I was propegating the very trope that I was contesting.

That was a really, truly bizarre experience.

ban imo

Bran do you ever wonder what the common thread in the bizarre and inexplicable experiences you seem to regularly have where people become hostile to you is

Branwell, the lgbt thread (called self-isolating this spring) was started in April. You had made zero contributions up until five days ago taking offence at Alfred's 'I miss cock'. It wasn't in any way a remark with grand sweeping statements behind it, either. All other thread participants seemed to understand this, only you, who suddenly barged in, did not. Speaking of bad faith and not reading a room...

I don't want to be on an ilx where a gay man can't say - and it's irrelevant if it was a joke or a sincere remark! - that he misses cock.

already mourning the cock war casualties

Branwell, the lgbt thread (called self-isolating this spring) was started in April. You had made zero contributions up until five days ago taking offence at Alfred's 'I miss cock'. It wasn't in any way a remark with grand sweeping statements behind it, either. All other thread participants seemed to understand this, only you, who suddenly barged in, did not. Speaking of bad faith and not reading a room...

― Scampidocio (Le Bateau Ivre), Saturday, 1 August 2020 11:35 bookmarkflaglink

That's not what happened.

I've been lurking on the threads for about 5/6 years now. I saw someone ask a question specificly about an AFAB child who was wrestling with gender and sexual identity. I saw a couple of cis gays struggling to answer the question - I thought that some perspective from an AFAB who has wrestled with gender and sexual identity would be helpful, and he told me it was.

A decision I made in good faith, but have completely come to regret, because it's been rewritten and projected to be in such bad faith hased on Brad's complete misunderstanding and mireading of what I said.

It's now time for this to stop. If you have further opinions on Branwell, maybe go and start a "criticise Branwell" thread because other people are really getting tired of it. This is so tiresome for me, I can't imagine what it's like for everyone else.

Gyac, correct me if I'm wrong, but I've never seen you identify as queer. You don't seem to be trans, or nonbinary. You are, as far as I know so please correct me if I'm wrong, a cis woman in a heterosexual relationship, and the only engagement I've ever seen you show with trans issues is terf discourse. Why do you feel like you are the best-placed person to play den mother and arbitrate in internicine struggles between conflicting groups of queer people? I really don't know why you think you have that authority let alone the context to do that.

We've had enough discussion about jokes and about humour on ILX, that... jokes, even lighthearted ones, are not somehow exempt from discourse, they are part of it. And dismissing stuff as 'just a joke' is, y'know. Not the power move you think it is.

can’t we just have a “step into the ring” thread for this

We tried:

Post here when you want to shit on someone passive aggressively until they see it and start a fight with you ITT

seems like a halfway measure

anyway, to get on “topic”:

Wikipedia, for reference

what is a uniform distribution anyway, ehh who cares, here you go

I am not sure why my bona fides are now under question when you can’t answer why you were making a daft generalisation about the AMAB experience

okay ... uh ... you realize you are kinda proving Branwell's point ... like, why are _you_ on the attack? Why is this "answer" important to you? Why don't you stay in your lane? ... Now you can easily flip that on me, fair game. ...

My stake here is that I have been the subject of ilx pile-ons, I have seen other posters receive this treatment unfairly, and I have had friends experience this type of treatment IRL. It feels like bullying and punching down and is painful to see people I generally like and respect participate in something like this. It is super fucking traumatizing to the person being attacked.

Now, sometimes, the person being piled-on has legitimately wronged someone, or there is past history, like what sic referred to (whether correctly or incorrectly), but this type of interaction is not going to make that person "better" ... assuming the intent is to get the person being attacked to take accountability and make amends and work on bettering themself? If the intent is punishment, then y'all are doing a great job at inflicting that. If y'all want some catharsis, you might be getting that too. But otherwise, this just sucks.

In the context of the incident that provoked this, there are two main people involved, both of whom are already dealing with trauma, ... Branwell has clearly described theirs and Brad's responses to the posts definitely indicate a sensitivity that is totally related to trauma ... and that makes this toxic pile-on even worse to watch, esp. when you have "more privileged" posters joining in the pile-on.

Starting to wish I'd just gone to r/askreddit.

That feeling when you inadvertently step in some dog poop, but actually it's a mine field and the mines are filled with dog poop and shards of glass. Gah. Sorry.

sarahell, did you read the block quoted text where Branwell attacked gyac's character, which had zero relevance to the argument?

wow @ this
I'm not reading what you say
I'm going to judge it anyway
Now you listen to me!

I know such "discussion" board behaviour is common but it's unusual to see it so candidly admitted.

I saw the new Troye Sivan video and was startled at how much he's kinda biting a Patrick Wolf look and almost posted "Patrick Wolf got fucked so that Troye could get fisted, huh" but then I had second thoughts about it

I mean you just did

if only this were the thread for that :)