Native Girls are beautiful.
Native Boys are beautiful.
First Nations Girls are beautiful.
First Nations Boys are beautiful.
Indigenous Girls are beautiful.
Indigenous Boys are beautiful.
Aboriginal Girls are beautiful.
Aboriginal Boys are beautiful.
Inuit Girls are beautiful.
Inuit Boys are beautiful.
Métis Girls are beautiful.
Métis Boys are beautiful.
Aleut Girls are beautiful.
Aleut Boys are beautiful.
Afro-Indigenous Girls are beautiful.
Afro-Indigenous Boys are beautiful.
Mi’kmaq girls are beautiful.
Mi’kmaq boys are beautiful.
Two-Spirit Girls are beautiful.
Two-Spirit Boys are beautiful.
You’re beautiful if you have dark skin.
You’re beautiful if you have light skin.
You’re beautiful if you’re in between.
You’re beautiful if you’re mixed.
You’re beautiful if you fit the Western Gender Binary.
You’re beautiful if you’re don’t fit the Western Gender Binary.
You’re beautiful if you’re multiple genders. You’re beautiful.
(Aboriginal, Inuit, and Métis lines added by @phaedragona. Two-Spirit lines added by many people. Afro-Indigenous and Mixed lines added by @condorofrph. Aleut lines added by anonymous. Mi’kmaq lines added by @kennachaos . Correction on gender lines by @doyoumisterjones . If there’s anyone I’ve left out, feel free to add on to it and/or message me and I’ll change the original post.
with the help of my friends, I made a new lesbian flag that has a meaning since the widespread lesbian flag we use has no meaning and was just posted as the lipstick/femme lesbian flag on a blog back in 2010. I know a lot of lesbians including myself who would rather have a flag with a meaning, so my friends & I are hoping this is gonna catch on eventually!
from top to bottom, the meanings of the colors are: loyalty/trust, freedom to love women, trans/nb lesbians, serenity, and pride/love for oneself.
after a lot of input from people on this post, I’ve realized some things that need fixing about the colors of this flag. with the help of my friends again, we’ve made modifications to the flag. the two top colors have changed to fit better together, and the flag as a whole is more saturated. thank you all for your criticisms on the flag because that helped a lot with fixing it! this is the finalized version:
since a couple of people were asking as well, it is okay to use this flag as icons/headers/etc and is okay to use without credit but I would appreciate it since the flag is fairly new. I also 100% don’t mind people who aren’t lesbians reblogging this, as long as you’re being respectful and are spreading this for your lesbian followers I appreciate it!
special thanks to @cerebrite & @maidofluck for helping me with the original flag, and @lesbistani & a friend who does not wanna be mentioned for helping with the finalized version!
this flag is also a lot more inclusive of butch lesbians because the old flag was based off of the lipstick lesbian flag, which was a flag for femmes, and made butch women feel isolated from its symbology
this flag is brand new! so it doesn’t carry that connotation. i am butch and i love this cool new flag, personally
I don’t know how universally relevant this is (I guess no part of queer history ever is) but I wonder how many trans people know the history of T&T groups.
Like, in the 90′s and 00′s in the Netherlands almost every trans related groups was a T&T ‘Transsexual and Transvestites’ group and that seemed to also be a quite common thing in other north-west European countries for as far as I can see. Maybe beyond Europe too? I’m not sure.
People who called themselves transsexual and transvestites at the time felt that they had many experiences in common that made organising together valuable and many agreed that there was a large grey area of overlapping identities. With very little information available, a lot of trans women identified as transvestites first, before identifying at trans women (in that period often using the term Male-to-Female transsexual and transwoman without the space between the words).
Then, in about 2007-2012, things changed. Transgender became more popular than transsexual and crossdresser largely replaced transvestite. In those early days, the term transgender was often understood to include crossdressers. The transgender umbrella is from that time:
Back then, the word transgender was seen by many as the umbrella term that would unite all the struggles against gender roles. But that grouping together was far from uncontroversial and a lot of heated debates took place over how broad or narrow the transgender umbrella term should be. Some feared too wide an umbrella would take attention away from transsexuals, others feared it would be confusing, some groups that had previously only had transwomen and transvestites did not appreciate the new presence of transmen and transmasculine people in their transgender community, some felt that it was very important to distinguish binary-identified transsexuals from all sorts of weird non-binary identities.
Those who took part in the debates probably remember the specific standpoints in more detail. For me, I just remember how in 2008-2012 all the T&T groups started changing their names to ‘transgender groups’ and then slowly but surely focussing more on only those transgender people that wanted some kind of transition, physical or social. Eventually, transvestites (or crossdressers, as the common term was by then) disappeared entirely from the transgender groups and a lot of transgender people forgot about the earlier wider meaning of transgender as an umbrella term.
Within that same period, there started to be a LOT of new and fairly positive media attention for transgender issues, specificallytransition related atttention. The media was no participant at all in the ‘what does transgender mean’ question but the questions they did ask were ‘are you on hormones yet?’ and ‘did you have the surgery’? Since that was a lot better than ‘so are you mentally ill because you want to be a woman?’ a lot of people who fitted the hormones + surgery narrative eagerly accepted this ‘positive visibility’ and did not question the narrow focus. This further cemented the view that transgender meant transition.
And the transgender activists? Well, let’s just say many of them, knee deep in a struggle against terrible health care and cruel human rights violations, leaped at the opportunity to seize the momentum and finally make some changes and many didn’t really give much thought to the slow disappearance of transvestites from the newly named ‘transgender’ community.
So where are we now, in 2018?
The transgender community seems to have largely forgotten about their T&T history. The terms transvestite and crossdresser both seem to be in decline, as are the communities that meet around those identities. Younger people who don’t fit the gender binary but also do not desire social or physical transition, are now more likely to identify themselves as some kind of genderqueer and nonbinary or just ‘not into labels’ or just to wear whatever they want and rock it. Some of them find their way back under the transgender umbrella after all. Which I guess is some kind of a happy ending.
But then theres the question of recognizing our legacy. I don’t think a lot of these young people realise that, had they been born 20 years earlier, many of them would probably have found a home in the transvestite community. I don’t think a lot of young transgender people recognize older transvestites as their elders, who paved the way for them. I often get the impression that they view the dwindling groups of 50+, 60+, 70+ transvestites with an element of disdain, as people who held on to a regressive binary identity, instead of as like – their badass grandfather-mothers who build parts of trans history.
I encourage everyone to think of the above next time you see someone shitting on crossdressers. We’re stronger together than we are divided.
Our updated Tumblr URL name reflect the steps we’re taking toward our official name change on July 1, 2018. We will also be releasing a new mission statement, and transitioning to our new website URL. Here’s a snippet of what one of our moderators and community members, Court Alison, has to say:
“…As a person who is both non binary and autistic, I am really excited about this change. It re-affirms our commitment to the work we do and the community we serve. I didn’t have the names to put to my feelings and experiences when I was growing up. It was really challenging not knowing what made me, me.
As a young adult, with relief and pride I realized that I am autistic. Soon after, I learned what it means to be non binary. That happily fit perfectly too. It is my personal hope that the name change will ensure autistic non binary and transgender women of all ages will come to us for support and resources.
Not only does our name change express the ongoing inclusive nature of our work, but also that of the members of the community we serve. The name change is demonstrative of our commitment to inclusivity. This announcement is the first in the steps we are taking towards our legal name change.”
So, recently you’ve found out some big news about somebody you care about. Maybe they came out to you as transgender and/or non-binary, maybe they’ve told you that they’re changing their name and/or that they’d like to be referred to by a different set of pronouns. Maybe—hopefully!—you want to be supportive of them but you’re worried you’re going to mess up (which is an understandable fear)!
Coming out is hard and the fact that they came out to you is a big deal! You should be proud of them for taking this big step and being honest with you about who they are. Changing the way you think about someone is a process, and you will mess up at some point! However, if you really love and respect this person, you will keep trying, and eventually it will become second nature to you.
As someone who has changed my own name and pronouns, here are some things that I feel are important to keep in mind as you’re getting used to this change.
1. Use the new, correct name and pronouns all the time—even when they’re not there to hear you, even when you’re just thinking about them in your head. This is because the end goal of this process shouldn’t be to retrain yourself to call them a certain thing, it should be to think of them in a certain way. By coming out to you and asking you to use their new name and pronouns, your loved one has shared with you something very real about who they really are. You should be trying to retrain your brain to know them by this name, because it’s their real name—much realer than the one they were being forced to use before.
2. Correct yourself when you get it wrong, even if they don’t say anything. It might be tempting to hope that it just slipped through the cracks and they didn’t notice your mistake. But trust me, they noticed. Being called by the wrong name or pronouns is jarring and painful, but sometimes it’s hard to stand up for yourself and say something.
3. Don’t over-apologize when you mess up! Apologize once, correct yourself, and move on. Apologizing over and over just brings more attention to it than they probably want, and going on and on about how bad you feel for getting it wrong puts pressure on them to comfort you, when this should really be about them and how they feel.
4. Correct other people too! Like I said, it can be very hard to muster the courage to correct people, especially over and over, so having allies in my life who are willing to do that work for me is a godsend. This is a really simple way to take on a little sliver of your loved one’s burden while they’re transitioning. Even a very simple reminder like, “Please don’t forget, Jamey uses they/them pronouns!” can be super helpful and take a lot of pressure off.
5. Be sensitive not to “out” them to people they’re not out to! (This is a caveat to #1 and #4, by the way, because you have to ask them if they’re comfortable with you using their new name and pronouns in front of others.) Coming out is a nerve-racking experience and it’s common not to come out to everyone in your life at once. Outing someone before they’re ready is a terrible, stressful, and sometimes dangerous position to put someone in. Ask who they’re comfortable being out to and be very careful to respect that.
6. Be patient if they change their mind on what they want to be called. It’s really tough to figure out what name and pronouns fit you best and feel the most comfortable without “trying them on” and seeing how it feels when other people use them. Experimentation is an important part of that! If someone changes their name a few times in a row trying to find something that fits, or changes their pronouns but then changes them back, that’s just a natural part of that experimentation.
7. Remember that they’re going through something very personal. Their transition is all about them and what makes them comfortable—not about you and what you think is best. If you don’t think their new name fits them, or if you don’t think the singular they is grammatically correct, or if you think trying to remember their new name and pronouns is too hard… those are all thoughts you should keep to yourself!
Again, coming out is really tough! If your loved one has gathered the strength to come out to you, trust that this is important to them. They know best about what they need to be called to be comfortable and happy. Do your best to put their needs first when it comes to this change and before long, hearing their old name and pronouns will sound almost as wrong to you as it does to them!
Ok but can we talk about how emo, as a genre, defied gender roles in a big way? Like, everything about the culture, from the guys wearing makeup and womens’ skinny jeans, to the way they got unabashedly emotional in spite of the “men aren’t supposed to cry” narrative they’d obviously been socialized with, was just this complete “fuck you” to the idea that there’s a certain way to be a “man”.
And a lot of their detractors called them “girly” or “gay”. And they didn’t give a fuck! Fall Out Boy has a whole song entitled “Gay Is Not A Synonym for Shitty”, which referenced a famous Pete Wentz quote, where he basically said that if you thought his band sucked, to just say it sucked, and not be a “homophobic asshole” about it.
And, then, geez, My Chemical Romance took it a step further, and Gerard Way outright kissed one of his bandmates at concerts purely to infuriate homophobes who were at his shows.
A lot of these bands were openly for LGBT rights, for womens’ rights. I remember one instance where some band MCR was touring with asked women to flash their tits in exchange for backstage passes. And Gerard was so horrified by this, and told his female fans to “spit in the faces” of misogynists in the rock scene.
Like, god, these bands were so progressive. And they still are. Right after the Pulse tragedy, Brendon Urie literally danced around in a pride flag and told his queer fans what they meant to him. Pete Wentz said that “Uma Thurman” was meant to show his female fans that they could be “badass”, too. And Gerard pretty much admitted in an interview to somewhat identifying with the label “nonbinary”.
That’s the most lasting impact that emo is going to have. Showing fans of all genders that there’s nothing wrong with being whoever the fuck you are, that there’s no specific way to be a man or woman. And, god, I just fucking love that.
“So every day during my set, when I’m playing my own shows, I talk about people that are transgender. I talk about it a lot because everyday basically I say: …”
I feel like disco and emo should team up and that should be the next big music thing, sort of a defiant apocalyptic dance party, because disco did this sort of thing too, the rejection of straight white male heteronormativity, and that was basically why it was killed, so, like, emo plus defiant zombie disco would be the perfect thing to play in the Mango Menace era.
knitting in the dark 