do not forget the patron saint of these weeks that we celebrate ourselves proudly and openly in the streets
her name was Marsha P Johnson, and we have her to thank for so much.
remember, the first Pride was a riot, and she was one of the brave souls who endured it to help carve the path which so many of us walk today. she helped found several activist groups regarding LGBT safety and wellbeing. and she was absolutely radiant, too.
"Kill your local sex offender!" Oh, you mean the guy who went streaking at his local college football game on a dare one time? That's a sex crime.
"No, I mean-"
Oh, maybe the woman who had to pee in a public park that only had pay toilets, so she tried to hide behind the bushes but got caught? Public urination is a sex crime.
"What? No, I mean-"
Oh, maybe you mean the homeless guy who had to strip down to get his clothes in the laundromat to clean them for the first time in weeks? He tried being subtle, but someone called the cops on him, and now he's on the sex offender registry for public nudity.
"Rapists and pedophiles! Kill rapists and pedophiles!"
Oh, like the trans woman who got called a pedophile groomer for helping a trans kid escape her abusive parents?
Or maybe the black man who got labeled a rapist because he came on to another man's wife, and he decided to get back at him by charging him with rape?
How about the 17 year olds who were fooling around, fully consensually, in one of their bedrooms? That's still technically underage sex and thus rape of a minor.
Oh, or maybe you're talking about the doctor who performed genital reconstructive surgery in a state that just voted to get that classified as rape?
People will do everything they can to get you convinced rape and pedophilia are the worst crimes possible, then accuse whoever they like the least of being either a rapist, a pedophile, or both, counting on you turning on them just for being accused of the crime.
"Oh, so you're saying you don't want to kill a serial rapist?"
That's exactly what I'm goddamn saying.
Once we decide a group is okay to kill, the government will do everything they can to convince you that their political enemies are either part of that group, or just as bad as that group, to get you to kill their enemies for them.
The only way out is to accept every life as worth saving.
EDIT: If you're going to go on this post to say that no, you think you really should be allowed to kill people you decide are rapists and/or pedophiles, I'm going to block you. I have already been blocking you, because it's clear that you aren't willing to engage with what I'm saying.
Also, if someone says something like that we'd be better off with rapists being dead BUT that they won't let that opinion shape their stance on public policy, and you reply to that person to accuse them of wanting to murder people, I'm also going to block you, because what the fuck that's a completely different sentence.
EDIT 2: Since so many people seem to fail basic reading comprehension, let's state it again, in different words:
1. Killing people is bad.
2. Killing someone can never be undone by any means we have.
3. If the government can kill people, they will want to kill their political opposition and other undesirables (WHICH CAN INCLUDE YOU PERSONALLY AND ANY IF NOT ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY).
4. If there is a class of people OF ANY TYPE who the government can LEGALLY KILL, they now just need to convince you their enemies count as that class (ever wondered why there's so much emphasis on claiming gay people are pedophiles? Now you know!)
5. If there is a class of people OF ANY TYPE that the public can LEGALLY KILL, murderers just need to convince people that their victims counted as that class (I murdered him because he's a rapist. Anyway now his job is free promote me into that position plz.)
6. As pointed out in the notes (thank you everyone pointing this out!), if the penalty for a crime is death, people are much more willing to silence witnesses to that crime (for example, murdering their rape victims), which is EVEN WORSE than just committing the initial crime.
7. THEREFORE the only way to keep those from happening is to have NO category of people it is considered okay to kill FOR ANY REASON.
1. The Uses Of Snares 2. Heated Rivalry (S1Ep2 Olympians) 3. Bloodhounds (Coakham Pack) 4. Running Free by Richard Askwith 5. Heated Rivalry (S1Ep2 Olympians) 6. Hunting The Clean Boot 7. Hameau Jouas Bloodhound 8. Heated Rivalry (S1Ep1 Rookies) 9. Hudson Williams for Them 10. Heated Rivalry behind the scenes 11. Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie for Teen Vogue 12. Heated Rivalry (S1Ep1 Rookies) 13. Running Free by Richard 14. Hell Dogs: In The House of Bamboo (2022) 15. Drag Hunt by R_Knight 16. Pillion (2025) 17. How To Be A Dog by Andrew Edmund Kane 18. Hordle Hercules Bloodhound 19. Heated Rivalry (S1Ep1 Rookies) 20. Drag Hunt by R_Knight 21. NBC Hannibal 22. Hudson Williams for Out Magazine 23. Pillion (2025) 24. The main components of a snare. 25. Pillion (2025) 26. Drag Hunt by R_Knight 27. Hell Dogs: In The House of Bamboo (2022) 28. Hog Tied 29. Pillion (2025) 30. Heated Rivalry behind the scenes
Yet another new study debunked the basis for the anti-trans sports bans. It was never about sports but for creating legal avenues for exclusion and abjection. This is one of the largest analyses ever conducted, involving 52 studies and 6,485 trans people. Read the study here.
“how to recognize AI in fanfic” — hey so this is another not-gentle reminder that AI stole from us. it’s using OUR words and OUR sentences and OUR styles.
writing “long” paragraphs is not a sign of AI — it’s a common narrative choice many writers make both in fanfiction and in traditionally published novels, and AI stole it from us.
using an em dash is not a sign of AI. it’s a stylistic sentence choice that’s been an option in place of commas and semicolons for a very long time, and AI stole it from us.
long sentence structures are not a sign of AI, but are yet another stylistic choice writers often make to create a cadence and tone that mimics the flow of poetry, and AI stole it from us.
“YA narrative breaks”? i don’t even know what the fuck this means, but i can guarantee that AI stole it from us.
italics are once again a stylistic choice that many writers love to use to create emphasis, and it’s a more stylistically acceptable and traditional form of emphasis than bold or underline text. oh, and just to be extra clear: AI STOLE IT FROM US.
stop creating fandom witch hunts over AI when you know fuck all about what it means to sit and write a story, and to spend hours fiddling with sentence structure and dialogue to get the exact right tone. writers will stop writing out of fear that their work “sounds like AI” — IT DOESNT! AI STOLE FROM US! AI SOUNDS LIKE US! — and after a while, all that will be available on AO3 is shitty AI-generated fanfiction.
because yeah, people are going to continue to use AI to write fanfiction whether you “call them out” or not. but making a laughable thread on X that uses asinine criteria is not going to fix that problem. it will just push the real writers out because people will accuse them of using AI when they haven’t, and they will (rightfully) stop writing for spaces that attack them.
the people who enjoy the type of art you create, will like it even if it's imperfect. and the people who hate the type of art you create, will dislike it even if it IS perfect.
don't skip ahead of bullies and bully yourself first. don't badmouth your own work, it doesn't alter other people's opinion on art, but it does make you feel worse about yourself.
Brainrot areas but I'm currently reading Peter Ackroyd's Queer City and aside from being a great (and surprisingly lighthearted) look at queer culture in London it has reminded me that like. I don't actually think this was intentional but reasons to be a contemporary fan of Christopher Marlowe were basically:
there are boys kissing on stage & you can rent them after
no that is the entire reason like they're fine plays but they are more than anything homoerotic plays & people who were big Marlowe fans were effectively known sodomites, it was the late 16thC equivalent of being very into musical theatre
& I just think it's very funny that Hob looked Dream in the eyes and said "I am sexually attracted to men, by the way" and Dream walked off in a huff.
Katie is thrilled to score tickets for the USA men’s hockey finals, but after a strange turn of events, she’s even more excited to find herself up close and personal with the team’s T-Rex star player, Flonto Breem.
The two set off on a first date, and things are going well, until questions about Flonto’s political affiliation start bubbling to the surface. It’s not long before Katie realizes that all the goodwill she’d felt for this dinosaur hockey player was misinformed, and that Flonto is a full on MAGA dork.
Looks like there won’t be any pounding tonight! Unless, of course, the USA women’s team and their star triceratops are somewhere nearby!
This tale is 4,100 words of sexless disappointment that the T-Rex you thought was cool is actually an authoritarian bootlicker.
----
please enjoy brand new tingler NOT POUNDED BY THIS T-REX ON THE USA MEN’S HOCKEY TEAM BECAUSE IT TURNS OUT HE’S A MAGA DORK out now. get it here or on tingleverse patreon
So I saw this post and after loving many of the fics on that list, thought about how 20k is still a ton of hits (i know we're grading on a curve with the insanity of this fandom), so I thought I'd pull together my absolute favorite fics with <10k (SOMEHOW)
POV Outsider
And a Sense of Guilt I Can't Deny by @jewelledfoxes, 9k, M
incredible yuna POV fic from this author that you should read everything from immediately
outlier by Anonymous, 4k, M
omegaverse, Omega!Ilya, Beta!Shane, Cliff POV that's just as grimy as it should be when he's talking about his omega teammate
i showed you the way, even though i'd never been by floodlights, 4k, T
Scott POV. I am invested in Scott Hunter now, who knew? It's a realistic depiction of how much Scott would have actually known about Shane and Ilya, as well as filling in some canon blanks in a way I really love. I love the idea that as much as Scott inspired them, they inspired him.
Us Until You by chaentics, 10k, M
Gut-wrenching Svetlana POV. even thinking about this one makes me feel like i'm going to cry
I am the private room by Anonymous, 9k, E
Svetlana/Yuna cheating fic that is so incredibly good and digs into these two characters that I love so well
P (mostly) WP
Full Up by @maple-salad, 2k, E
Ilya is jealous of how big Shane's dildo is. They fuck about it. It's great.
loving you's my only house by @probablily, 4k, E
great take on the fade-to-black sex scene in ep 5. Dacryphilia my beloved.
on earth to know you by probablily, 6k, E
Oh I love this fic. Ilya calls Shane out on his 'no Ilya, we can't' game and they ride out the consequences together
head and body to you by @hemipenia, 4k, M
great Shane character thesis. I love a Shan(m)e spiral and I love bruise kink even more
Butter soft in the moonlight by eatmyass, 2k, E
This one is cheating (12k hits), but it's so good I couldn't resist. Shane buys Ilya driving gloves, then loses his mind and invents home invader cnc
now i wanna be your dog by CatalpaWaltz, 2k, M
more fics should have shane smoking weed. He's a jock cmon guys he's smoking in the offseason for sure
Something in the way you're watching me by Philipa_Moss, 2k, E
Shane and Ilya watch lesbian porn together and it's awesome
Other (character study, AU, ficlet)
sympathy fuck by lustmord, 10k, E
Ilya goes to moscow to deal with the fallout of his father's death, and all his other issues come creeping up. Really great handling of Ilya's hypersexuality and trauma
Cicatrix by mellish, 10k, M
A really great Ilya character study. I love Ilya's denial about how he's affected by shane
anybody like you by plonk, WIP, 36k, NR
This crossed 10k while I was making this, but I'm putting it in here anyway. Incredible figure skater!Ilya au where Shane gets some goddamn queer community, a thing he is desperately in need of.
Wild Ice by @ginkgomoonflower, 800, T
Short and sweet but beautiful. Ilya gets to show off the figure skating his mom taught him.
I really appreciate all these authors and if you come to them from this rec list, please leave them comments and kudos. They deserve it <3<3
Also I couldn't find all of them on tumblr, but if you know their user please lmk and i'll update this!
So a couple days ago, some folks braved my long-dormant social media accounts to make sure I’d seen this tweet:
And after getting over my initial (rather emotional) response, I wanted to reply properly, and explain just why that hit me so hard.
So back around twenty years ago, the internet cosplay and costuming scene was very different from today. The older generation of sci-fi convention costumers was made up of experienced, dedicated individuals who had been honing their craft for years. These were people who took masquerade competitions seriously, and earning your journeyman or master costuming badge was an important thing. They had a lot of knowledge, but – here’s the important bit – a lot of them didn’t share it. It’s not just that they weren’t internet-savvy enough to share it, or didn’t have the time to write up tutorials – no, literally if you asked how they did something or what material they used, they would refuse to tell you. Some of them came from professional backgrounds where this knowledge literally was a trade secret, others just wanted to decrease the chances of their rivals in competitions, but for whatever reason it was like getting a door slammed in your face. Now, that’s a generalization – there were definitely some lovely and kind and helpful old-school costumers – but they tended to advise more one-on-one, and the idea of just putting detailed knowledge out there for random strangers to use wasn’t much of a thing. And then what information did get out there was coming from people with the freedom and budget to do things like invest in all the tools and materials to create authentic leather hauberks, or build a vac-form setup to make stormtrooper armor, etc. NOT beginner friendly, is what I’m saying.
Then, around 2000 or so, two particular things happened: anime and manga began to be widely accessible in resulting in a boom in anime conventions and cosplay culture, and a new wave of costume-filled franchises (notably the Star Wars prequels and the Lord of the Rings movies) hit the theatres. What those brought into the convention and costuming arena was a new wave of enthusiastic fans who wanted to make costumes, and though a lot of the anime fans were much younger, some of them, and a lot of the movie franchise fans, were in their 20s and 30s, young enough to use the internet to its (then) full potential, old enough to have autonomy and a little money, and above all, overwhelmingly female. I think that latter is particularly important because that meant they had a lifetime of dealing with gatekeepers under our belts, and we weren’t inclined to deal with yet another one. They looked at the old dragons carefully hoarding their knowledge, keeping out anyone who might be unworthy, or (even worse) competition, and they said NO. If secrets were going to be kept, they were going to figure things out for ourselves, and then they were going to share it with everyone. Those old-school costumers may have done us a favor in the long run, because not knowing those old secrets meant that we had to find new methods, and we were trying – and succeeding with – materials that “serious” costumers would never have considered. I was one of those costumers, but there were many more – I was more on the movie side of things, so JediElfQueen and PadawansGuide immediately spring to mind, but there were so many others, on YahooGroups and Livejournal and our own hand-coded webpages, analyzing and testing and experimenting and swapping ideas and sharing, sharing, sharing.
I’m not saying that to make it sound like we were the noble knights of cosplay, riding in heroically with tutorials for all. I’m saying that a group of people, individually and as a collective, made the conscious decision that sharing was a Good Things that would improve the community as a whole. That wasn’t necessarily an easy decision to make, either. I know I thought long and hard before I posted that tutorial; the reaction I had gotten when I wore that armor to a con told me that I had hit on something new, something that gave me an edge, and if I didn’t share that info I could probably hang on to that edge for a year, or two, or three. And I thought about it, and I was briefly tempted, but again, there were all of these others around me sharing what they knew, and I had seen for myself what I could do when I borrowed and adapted some of their ideas, and I felt the power of what could happen when a group of people came together and gave their creativity to the world.
And it changed the face of costuming. People who had been intimidated by the sci-fi competition circuit suddenly found the confidence to try it themselves, and brought in their own ideas and discoveries. And then the next wave of younger costumers took those ideas and ran, and built on them, and branched out off of them, and the wave after that had their own innovations, and suddenly here we are, with Youtube videos and Tumblr tutorials and Etsy patterns and step-by-step how-to books, and I am just so, so proud.
So yeah, seeing appreciation for a 17-year-old technique I figured out on my dining-room table (and bless it, doesn’t that page just scream “I learned how to code on Geocities!”), and having it embraced as a springboard for newer and better things warms this fandom-old’s heart. This is our legacy, and a legacy the current group of cosplayers is still creating, and it’s a good one.
(Oh, and for anyone wondering: yes, I’m over 40 now, and yes, I’m still making costumes. And that armor is still in great shape after 17 years in a hot attic!)
In 2018 I developed a method to bind fanfiction into hardback books. Like penwiper, I was also literally working in my kitchen by myself and trying things out. This solo work was a meditative experience that allowed me to think deeply about the implications of what I was creating and what my ethics and philosophy should be. I got around to the idea that the knowledge I was building should be spread far and wide, so that together, many of us fans could bind all the wonderful fics that made our lives better in a million tiny ways, and wherever possible, create a copy to give to the authors themselves. In 2019 I wrote How to Make a Book From An AO3 Page, a free manual for how to format and bind fanfic, as a gift to fandom as a whole. It took off during the 2020 lockdown and has been going strong ever since.
Now, through the efforts of so many wonderful people, Renegade Bookbinding Guild has developed out of the Discord server I originally created just to answer questions about paper, fonts, printers and such. I figured there would be no more than 15 people joining. We have surpassed 3000.
I hope in another 20 years time my little tutorial still be kicking along out here, my bad photography and potty mouth sitting forever at the foundational level of an exploding practice of radical generosity and community, preserving the best of fanfiction from the ravages of time and digital threats and censorship, and giving authors the best thank you I know how to give.
