Dear Cis People

[Terex4]

Before launching into this, I want to put out there that it's always a bigger blow to face ignorance from friends and allies than it is from strangers and our detractors. We expect it from them.

Here's what I'm seeing and how I feel about this:

Trans representation has historically been awful (and that's a gross understatement). Poison is a character that is supposed to help us feel included, which is wonderful, but the success of such an endeavor relies both on the character creator's ability to write and present the character properly, and everyone else responding to her appropriately. This has been a major struggle and, even though there has been an upswing of better-portrayed trans characters, I tend to avoid seeing for myself because our history of being cheap jokes has left me with little desire to try to hope. It's important that we're able to have this.

In my experience, most binary trans people (that is trans men and trans women) are easily triggered by issues involving genitalia. I'm very much included in this and giving a trans woman, who is supposed to represent me, a bulge would piss me off to no end. People's personal preferences aside, having it suggested that it would be okay, much less favorable for a representative character to be presented with such a common, major trigger is insensitive at its absolute best.

After additional thought on the bulge thing, I have to put out there that tucking is totally a thing damn near all of us do so why would a bulge be visible for any reason?

Genitalia in particular is a trigger we have to deal with multiple times a day, every day (I really want to emphasize how big of a trigger this is. Seriously it's terrible having to deal with this). It's always the question I'm asked after "I don't want to offend you but I heard you're one of those transgendered people."

It's a question of when it will induce a frothing rage, not if. Being fetishized is the common reality in which we live. We still have to function despite it and even if we play into it here and there, that doesn't mean we have to like it.

So all of this needs to be taken into account when looking at how we react to these situations. All of us react in different magnitudes to different things. I can look at that conversation and my response is "fucking really?" while it seems to hit Kim a lot more strongly. I sure as hell have my triggers that'll have me spitting nails, they just haven't come up yet.

I want to make sure that last statement isn't confused. Things like this Poison conversation still hit me, very much so, they just don't send me over the edge. There are topics and sentiments that will do that instantly though.

[Overcast]

Never faulted the reaction, just wanted to understand. That last post did a much better job of stating it clearly than what I have had a chance to read so far. I'm able to connect it to some of my own personal triggers for my own general triggers. It helps cement the connection between the trigger itself and Poison as a character. Most of all it helps me know the location of the line for you guys.

With that much put out I am sorry for crossing it. There is a degree of things in me still beyond sympathy to stop, but I can at least respect this.

[Kim]

Thanks for the apology, Overcast. And thanks for the posts from Matt and RPG and Terex. <3 It means a lot to me that while plenty of people were mad at me, Overcast probably had the best justification to be mad at me in this thread and kept their cool, so thank you.

[Overcast]

I'm willing to own up to anything that I did that messes with someone else. That isn't a fun thing and I don't usually intend to do it. When I do I just want to know the background about it, helps me develop my sense of perspective. And I've seen you when you are angry Kim, I figure getting to that background comes with the price of a few prickly words.

[akaSM]

See? We can have nice things after all

[phil_]

It's the power of Koume and her unlimited cuteness.

Also empathy and stuff.

[Overcast]

Hee, I'll admit that I amusingly thought of your signature when I was thinking up what I could say to try to keep this on the track I wanted. We should all be T-rexcellent to each other, tako.

[Glass Pencil]

Kim, I don't really know you despite orbiting the same digital space for, what, I don't know, almost a decade now? More? But shit, you're an asshole.

I mean I get why, to a certain extent. But that doesn't change what you are. Someone ostensibly consumed by rage, looking for convenient outlets to brutalize. You've internalized your negative experiences and now view the world through a lens in which you are the sole arbiter of righteousness, necessarily and immutably infallible in your judgments.

That doesn't strike me as a very healthy way to live, regardless of your personal circumstances or life choices. No real reason for me to say any of this shit other than I can't stand bullies.

Chances are that you were always an asshole. It's not due to some unresolved gender identity issue, its not because of the prejudice you've faced or the hardships you've endured. It happened a long time ago, somewhere near the beginning, and the path of your existence has been mapped by it. You are such an asshole, that I'm a bigger asshole than I was before I read the shit you've posted here. I am a humongous asshole now, and while that's my fault, its in large part a response to your meteoric, planetary scale of assholishness.

I hope you can be less of an asshole in the future. I hope I can be less of an asshole in the future. I don't hold out much hope for either of these eventualities though.

Sorry for being an asshole by the way, I mean I could just erase all this shit and not say anything, that would be the decent thing to do. But honestly this shit has been kicking around my skull since like the first time I vaguely interacted with you. And nearly a decade down the road, if some shit is still there its probably real. So there you go.

I've talked a fair amount of shit about you to my wife, who I think considers you an online friend at least. That's shitty of me and I don't like being passive aggressive like that. I feel like I almost owe it to you to tell you what I think about you.

No fucking idea why I'm even reading this fucking thread any fucking ways. Fuck. You have an amazing gift for making people mad at you, if anything.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by Glass Pencil

Kim, I don't really know you despite orbiting the same digital space for, what, I don't know, almost a decade now? More? But shit, you're an asshole.

If there's one thing the Internet has taught me over this past decade, it's that the lack of interpersonal, face-to-face communication makes all of us dicks.

I mean, we just met recently, right? Wasn't I at least like a decent-if-somewhat mediocre person in person? I certainly remember enjoying your company and thinking you were a stand-up guy.

Now go back and read some of my awful rants on NPF. Hell, even earlier in this very thread, I somehow managed to antagonize everyone angry with Kim and Kim herself at the same time with the same messages! I became so livid over what I perceived to be clear injustices that I felt completely in the right while screaming and shouting like a petulant child.

That's just what the Internet does. We're all faceless abstractions here without any identity. Subsequently, we all judge and are judged solely by the presumed merits of things we type here that we'd never actually say in real life and that don't even really reflect how we perceive the world around us. Often this actually has a positive effect in the aggregate by giving us opportunity to confront the inner demons and erroneous, subconscious assumptions that plague us in real life. But, more often than not, it just enables us all to be real jerks.

I almost wish there was a way we could hook up Skype so, as we posted on NPF, we had to constantly see the faces and expressions of the individuals we were insulting. I think if Synk had to look Kim in the eyes before typing 'tumblr.txt', no matter whether he knew the context or just was being flippant as was claimed, one glance at Kim and he'd stay quiet. But that's not just true of Synk or you or I or Kim, it's basic human nature. Expose yourself to the reality of the hurt you're causing and have the opportunity to react in the moment and you'll quickly become a true diplomat, even when criticizing another's behavior.

I dunno, I'm just ranting because I like you and I like Kim and I like Synk and I like Shiney and I like Terex and POS and Poch and I like all y'all's but more than anything I'm sick and tired of feeling sick and tired whenever I visit NPF over years and years because every fuckin' time we find new ways to destroy our community by diggin' at each other's throats with insensitive insults. I'm as guilty as anyone else, but it's just toxic.

[Overcast]

I felt pretty calm this whole time. There were one or two things I felt worth defending, but I walked into this knowing what I wanted to say and what I hoped to hear. I got about all of it, the big fat key was just trying to say it without adding unnecessary details. Blunt straightforward, bone dry and simple.

I think I outgrew being a dick on the internet years ago, like 05 when Meister gave me my first and only negative rep on this forum. When I realized I have no reason at all to make anyone feel like that. So now I try to be as unifying as possible. At the end of the day we will never end up growing out of this by calling each other assholes.

We do it by being more than that, and letting others vibe off it.