Tired and on edge @borderlineursa-stemme - Tumblr Blog

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I’m elliot (he/it/neos) from @ursinefutchass . This is a more venty but also informative where possible type of blog with regards to mental health and zoanthropy.

I have many neurodivergencies, including autism, am on the schizospectrum, borderline personality disorder, adhd, gad, etc. I am also part of a disordered mixed origins system, and with exceptions will refuse syscourse.

Minors DNI, otherwise I don’t care about DNI’s due to how trivial they are otherwise in my experience. However I stand by these stances:

#intro post #vent blog #actually mentally ill

i don’t know how to trust anything or anyone, including myself.

#actually bpd #bpd splitting #bpd vent #bpdtism #actually schizospec #tw paranoia

i want goyim in spiritual spaces that have never thought about jewish people as anything but kabbalists by virtue of being jewish to shut the fuck up about the apparent questionable things in judaism when they can’t even list or say it.

#antisemitism #judaism #jumblr #jewitch #jewish #vent blog #vent post #tw vent #im fucking tired of goyim and/or white people doing this shit #do not derail #if anyone fucking derails i am blocking

ajewishkiwibird

Stolen from insta

#jumblr #jewish #batman #batwoman

samazine

I LOVE YOU TRANS PEOPLE!!!

#trans day of visibility

quantumseeker

Panic attack affirmations!

Hashem loves me, Hashem cares for me, I am not alone.

#anxitey #judaism #jewish #jumblr

The Dybbuk (1937)

#shtetlcore #the dybbuk #jumblr #gothic

supermagick

How does your intellectual disability effect you?

I have mild intellectual disability & level 2 autism, for reference in this text

I mainly have lots of difficulty with problem solving skills, which affect my daily living. I usually go for the easiest way of doing something if I know how to do the thing at all. Sometimes I get lost & go around things in ways that aren't seen as "productive" & more like "weird" (I find that "logic" things aren't as logic & obvious for me). Chores are confusing & draining when I don't get visual examples, & on occasions, hand-on-hand help

I also must say that learning & processing information (<- cognitive functioning) isn't easy for me either. I struggle a lot with numbers, money, maths, remembering symbols, numbers & how they work at all

I have complex communication needs. When I can't communicate what I want my brain feels like it's in a dead end in an alley. I can't keep going. I can't describe my experiences & what I'm feeling without some form of (preferably symbol-based) AAC, & sometimes even with that I just can't!

I also have to say, socially I'm often seen as weird & "dumb". Could be by my stimming, the faces I make, my body expression & all the accommodations I need to go out. I'm not able to follow most conversations, I get confused & out of the circle I go. I also definitely struggle with regulating my emotional responses & end up having lots of crisis on the street. – Friend making is usually hard for me; I do have a few friends though!

I'm still learning some independent living skills, but cooking, managing finances & healthcare are the ones that I've had the most trouble

some examples : I didn't learn to tie my shoes until I was 12-13 years old, I still have difficulty reading & processing text. I can't focus at all unless the subject is my special interests / hyperfixations or related to them. My partner (who also is my caretaker) brushes my hair & prompts me to shower because I can't do those things alone. Partner also manages my meds & always reminds me to take them... & more

here is some more information about intellectual disability / IDD I've found interesting while I was trying to articulate my thoughts :

#freddy's answers 🥪#intellectual disability #idd #intellectual developmental disorder #mild intellectual disability #level 2 autism

narc-rants

Are there any healthy ways a Narcissist can fuel their Narcissistic Supply? /gen

Finally gonna compile a list! If anyone has ideas to add, feel free to comment and I can add em

Healthy ways to get narcissistic supply

1. Making things for others

Art is a great way to get supply! It not only gives you supply from seeing others’ satisfaction from something you did, it also gets you in touch with your own talents, boosting your self esteem in your artistic gifts, something you have control over improving upon

• Gifts like diy projects, handmade notes/cards, drawings, etc. for people you know

• Holiday goodie bags for the office or your peers for more low-effort impersonal gifts

• Selling art commissions, bringing strangers’ or internet mutuals’ ideas to life with your drawings

• Selling projects on Etsy or in-person craft fairs

2. Performance Arts and Sports

Extracurricular activities can be great for our self esteem and mental health. Connecting our body to our mind can help center us in the present and invest us in the future so we’re able to see the physical results of our effort and progress over time, as well as the praise of others from watching us succeed or win. Many of these also come with physical awards that we can display or show off to others

• Performance arts like dance, singing, plays/musicals, ballet, etc

• Group sports like football, baseball, soccer, etc

• Solo-centered sports like gymnastics, ice skating, karate, track/cross country, swimming, weight lifting, etc

3. Non-Physical Competitive Activities

Not everyone is able-bodied or has an interest in physical competition or activities, so there are many others that are just as engaging and rewarding that don’t require the physical labor. Sometimes all you want is to feel like the smartest or most creative rather than the fastest or strongest

• Visual arts like film, photography, sculpture, painting, etc. can be done individually and posted online or can be done in clubs and classes where you can still feel a sense of community and positive competition

• Competitive club activities like chess, debate, robotics/engineering can be done in school or outside of it

• Competitive games like DND and other tabletop games can be played with friends or others

• Video games or other competitive online games with friends or strangers

• Written arts like story writing, essays, and poetry can also be done in and out of school, in group or solo settings, and can be entered into competitions or submitted online

4. Self-Competitive Activities

Not all competition has to be “other” based, sometimes it can be extremely rewarding to win without other players or parties involved. You can improve your scores or times, or simply prove to yourself that you’re capable of overcoming something mentally challenging

• Online solo-player video games, story games, or puzzle apps

• Hand-held puzzles like rubics cubes or other puzzle/trick boxes or fidgets

• Single-player board games, puzzles, or card games

5. Non-Competitive Activities

Not all activities need to be based on competition to be rewarding or give you supply throughout your “progress” or when you get new ideas. Sometimes hobbies can be self-rewarding or even earn compliments from others without prompting

• Fashion and style, including DIY clothing and jewelry for yourself

• Collecting things for your special interest or other interest such as dolls, posters, figures, merch, etc.

• Fanfiction writing, fanart posting, or other forms of visual and written art to be posted on social media sites where you can receive praise and feedback

6. Community Service

As lame as it can sound to some, “community service” doesn’t necessarily have to be a chore. It can be rewarding to do things that benefit others while also getting a boost yourself. And not all community service is volunteer-work, some opportunities may include pay or a career path. Sometimes helping others that you have a complex about being “above” can give you a lot of supply and make you feel empowered

• Animal welfare work like volunteering in shelters or veterinary clinics, work in sanctuaries and farms, pet sitting or dog walking

• Working with children at shelters, schools, after school programs, babysitting

• Social justice work like protesting, organizing events, and working with others in your local community to create change

• Making blankets, serving food, running groups for houseless or domestic violence shelters

7. Work / School

Supply doesn’t have to come from something extracurricular, it can also come from your performance in work or school. Promotions, praise from your boss or coworkers, and succeeding in projects can all be fulfilling. Praise from teachers, high grades, and turning in exemplary work can also be fulfilling. Sometimes it depends on your career / education path, as you may need to tailor your choice to what kind of supply is strongest for you!

• Competition: law, sales, real estate, finances, business, sports

• Creation: classic arts, writing or transcribing, digital art, design, tech, programming, secretarial work, journalism, architecture, building/fixing work

• Community Aid: psychiatry, medical, veterinary, teaching general or special ed, social work

#voids resources #voids asks #npd #actually npd #npd things #npd thoughts #npd culture is #npd traits #npd posting #npd recovery

evilbeepthemeep

Narc Abuse And Why It's Bullshit

Long post ahead and tw for rape apology, homophobia, transphobia and ableism

I decided on a whim to do a deep dive on who coined the term Narc abuse and the ideology used in narcissistic abuse circles.

And oh boy I found some info.

The term Narcissistic abuse was first coined sometime in the 90’s by a guy named Sam Vaknin. Notable things about this dude is he’s a writer, a philosopher, a physicist and has npd. Oh apparently he might not even have NPD and is just spouting bullshit to get away with being an unrepentant asshole.

Fun fact he was arrested and jailed for committing securities fraud in 1996.

Here’s a link to his CV.

notice anything? He holds no qualifications for psychology or psychiatry.

And even has this fun disclaimer on his website

Which means he has no credentials to talk or teach about NPD. Or Abuse. Or Domestic Violence.

I have combed through this man’s website, interviews and his medium articles and found some truly terrible shit.

He’s misogynistic

Jacobsen: You agree with First Wave Feminism and Second Wave Feminism, and disagree with Third Wave Feminism and Fourth Wave Feminism. What defines them?

Vaknin: First and second wave feminisms (in plural: there are many schools) were focused on leveling the playing field and fighting abusive and exploitative practices such as prostitution and pornography.

Starting with the suffragettes, they focused on the franchise (the right to vote), equal wages, access (to healthcare, education, the workplace, daycare), revising the dress code (“rational dress”), the right to own and dispose of property, and converting marriage from indentured bondage to an intimate, hopefully lifelong equal partnership.

The third wave was a psychopathic outgrowth. While claiming to be inclusive and permissive, it was a defiant and reckless attempt to “empower” women by eliminating all boundaries, conventions, and mores of any kind in all fields of life.

What women have garnered from the confluence of the three waves is that they should make their careers the pivot of their lives, avoid meaningful, committed relationships with men, and pursue sex as a pastime with any man.

Ironically, the third wave played right into the hands of predatory men (“players”) who took advantage of the newfangled promiscuity while assiduously avoiding any hint of commitment or investment. Third wave feminists internalized the male gaze (“internalized oppression”) and pride themselves on being “sluts”.

The fourth wave of feminism is focused on real problems such as sexual harassment, rape, and body shaming as well as intersectionality (discrimination of women who belong to more than one minority). In many ways, it is an offshoot of second wave feminism.

Quote taken from Prof. Vaknin on Misogyny and Misandry

Transphobic

Philosophically, there is little difference between a narcissist who seeks to avoid his True Self (and positively to become his False Self) – and a transsexual who seeks to discard his true gender. But this similarity, though superficially appealing, is questionable.

People sometimes seek sex reassignment because of advantages and opportunities which, they believe, are enjoyed by the other sex. This rather unrealistic (fantastic) view of the other is faintly narcissistic. It includes elements of idealised over-valuation, of self-preoccupation, and of objectification of one's self. It demonstrates a deficient ability to empathise and some grandiose sense of entitlement ("I deserve to be taken care of") and omnipotence ("I can be whatever I want to be – despite nature/God").

This feeling of entitlement is especially manifest in some gender dysphoric individuals who aggressively pursue hormonal or surgical treatment. They feel that it is their inalienable right to receive it on demand and without any strictures or restrictions. For instance, they oftentimes refuse to undergo psychological evaluation or treatment as a condition for the hormonal or surgical treatment.

It is interesting to note that both narcissism and gender dysphoria are early childhood phenomena. This could be explained by problematic Primary Objects, dysfunctional families, or a common genetic or biochemical problem. It is too early to say which. As yet, there isn't even an agreed typology of gender identity disorders – let alone an in-depth comprehension of their sources.

A radical view, proffered by Ray Blanchard, seems to indicate that pathological narcissism is more likely to be found among non-core, ego-dystonic, autogynephilic transsexulas and among heterosexual transvestites. It is less manifest in core, ego-syntonic, homosexual transsexuals.

Autogynephilic transsexuals are subject to an intense urge to become the opposite sex and, thus, to be rendered the sexual object of their own desire. In other words, they are so sexually attracted to themselves that they wish to become both lovers in the romantic equation - the male and the female. It is the fulfilment of the ultimate narcissistic fantasy with the False Self as a fetish ("narcissistic fetish").

Autogynephilic transsexuals start off as heterosexuals and end up as either bisexual or homosexual. By shifting his/her attentions to men, the male autogynephilic transsexual "proves" to himself that he has finally become a "true" and desirable woman.

Quote taken from Homosexual and Transsexual Narcissists Frequently Asked Questions # 18

Homophobic

There is, however, one element, which might be unique to homosexuals: the fact that their self-definition hinges on their sexual identity. I know of no heterosexual who would use his sexual preferences to define himself almost fully. Homosexuality has been inflated to the level of a sub-culture, a separate psychology, or a myth. This is typical of persecuted minorities. However, it does have an influence on the individual. Preoccupation with body and sex makes most homosexual narcissists SOMATIC narcissists.

Moreover, the homosexual makes love to a person of the SAME sex – in a way, to his REFLECTION. In this respect, homosexual relations are highly narcissistic and autoerotic affairs.

Quote taken from Homosexual and Transsexual Narcissists Frequently Asked Questions # 18

Islamaphobic

Militant Islam is, therefore, not a cancerous mutation of “true” Islam. On the contrary, it is the purest expression of its nature as an imperialistic religion which demands unmitigated obedience from its followers and regards all infidels as both inferior and avowed enemies. Islam is a young religion. At a similar phase in the development of their respective religions, both Jews and Christians behaved the way Muslims do today: paranoid, hostile, murderous, suicidal, fatalistic, apocalyptic, and nihilistic. Death cults arose in all these three monotheistic faiths.

Quote taken from Islam and Liberalism: Total Ideologies

A Rape Apologist

Nonconsensual sex is a crime and should always be punished harshly.

But falsely promising sex by word or by abundance of unequivocal actions should be equally criminalized as a form of fraudulent misconduct.

Men should be able to recover costs and damages from these "playful" counterparties, including for distress and hurt feelings.

Promises - made verbally or behaviorally - are binding and should be kept: look up promissory estoppel and breach of promise (mainly in marriage). Leading on and misrepresentation should be a crime not only in business and should have adverse actionable and tort or public reputation consequences and not only in politics.

Quote taken from Sex or Gender By Dr. Sam Vaknin

Etc

This fucker has said so much hateful shit i can’t include it all but I do say poke around his website and truly see how bad this dude is.

Narcissistic abuse as a concept should not be followed as a way to deal with abuse. It’s tied deeply into the beliefs of a truly disgusting man and teaches to dehumanise other people.

This man has dehumanised everyone to the point he thinks all women are narcissists for sleeping around instead of settling into a relationship with a man.

Also they should be punished if they lead men on.

The terms you want are emotional, physicial, finacial and sexual abuse.

I’ve read at least one source saying people using narcissistic abuse instead of domestic violence makes it harder for victims to get help since it is a meaningless term.

I am fucking angry at the damage this man has caused victims and survivors of domestic violence and abuse. And at the psych professionals who picked up narcissistic abuse and spread it around. It’s fucking irresponsible and dangerous and they should be ashamed.

My final words are don’t make monsters out of your abusers. They are reprehensible scum and you never had to forgive them but they are humans just like you and me. But dehumanisation leads down a slippery slope of acceptable targets and collateral damage. Which leads to human rights violations and more abuse.

#not culture #info #ask to tag #narc abuse does not exist #homomisia #transmisogyny #transmisia #misogyny #islamomisia #antisemitism

narc-rants

How to respond to common types of NPD ableism

“But Trump/Musk/Kanye/etc is a narcissist!”

You can’t define a disorder by the most severe presentation out there. That’s like saying that Gary Lee Sampson having bipolar means that all people with bipolar are likely to be serial killers and robbers or that Richard Ramirez having been abused as a child means all people who endure childhood abuse are likely to become sex offenders and killers. And we don’t even have proof that the person you mentioned has NPD, that’s impossible to say for certain unless they have a psychologist actually speak directly to them. People can be egoistic and selfish without being disordered. There could also be another issue leading to their behavior such as drugs, brain damage, or a different disorder.

“I know a narcissist and they were the most horrible person I ever met”

First of all, you can’t decide that person was a narcissist unless a psychologist who has directly spoken to them has said they have NPD. If you were abused by this person, that doesn’t mean they have NPD, or any disorder for that matter. Even if you think you see narcissism, you aren’t trained to be able to understand the difference between narcissism and someone being selfish and abusive. Even if that person DOES have NPD, their choice to harm you was a personal choice and not just dependent on their disorder. Not all people with NPD have the same personality, morals, or willingness to improve. Many people with the disorder actively seek help and are caring and compassionate to the people in their life. Just because you don’t see or understand it doesn’t mean that it’s not true.

“Well even if they don’t have NPD, they’re still narcissistic! Why can’t I just say that?”

Narcissism was coined in psychology specifically to refer to a disordered behavior, it was never intended to be used by the average person to describe “selfishness” or “manipulation”. Even psychologists and historians have spoken about how the word has become twisted due to pop psychology, being taken out of context and used to incorrectly label people perceived as “bad”. The word really should only be used in the accurate context and it’s important that we use scientific language properly. The word is not meant for us to throw around, it’s meant for psychological studies and mental health treatment.

“Well narcissist is the only word that makes sense to me, what would I even use instead?”

Alternatives for narcissistic: selfish, egoistic, solipsistic, conceited, self-centered, vain, self-obsessed, self-absorbed, egocentric, self-interested

Alternatives for narcissist: egoist, egocentric, braggart, selfish person

Alternatives for narcissism: egoism, egocentricity, vanity, conceit, arrogance, boastfulness, haughtiness, overconfidence

“You’re just pretending for attention, you don’t act like you have NPD at all”

A huge part of NPD psychology is the differentiation between overt/grandiose and covert/vulnerable presentation types. The covert/vulnerable presentation is a widely accepted form of NPD in which the person with the disorder does not appear to be narcissistic and is instead more emotionally sensitive and attention seeking. Just because you’ve only ever heard of the overt/grandiose type doesn’t mean that the other type isn’t real. If you think the other type is fake, you’re basically saying you don’t believe that NPD psychology is real and therefore think the disorder doesn’t really exist as psychology has defined it. And if you don’t think that psychology is right about NPD, why do you even care about who does or doesn’t have it?

#voids resources #npd #actually npd #npd things #npd thoughts #npd culture is #npd traits #npd posting #narc abuse does not exist #narc abuse isn't real

narc-rants

Things “narc abuse” believers have actually said about narcissists

• helping your mother to walk rather than walking beside your spouse is narcissistic

• narcissists can be spotted by their thick and dominant eyebrows

• they’re more active at night because the darkness possesses them with a demonic energy

• all male narcissists are secretly gay

• they look like fish when you’ve uncovered their secrets

• all male narcissists have mommy issues and will choose their mother over their spouse

• they all smell bad, especially like fish, metal, or rotting eggs

• narc eyes™️ (eyes go fully black when they’re angry)

• narc abuse survivors are minimalists because narcissists are dirty hoarders

• slouching is a narcissistic way to walk but so is having perfect posture

• walking faster or slower than your company is narcissistic

• being transgender and getting surgery is narcissistic

• not eating when your spouse wants you to is narcissistic

• they’re demons sent to prey on the energy of empaths

• they will literally suck out your soul like a dementor

• narcissists will all sleep with literally anyone who wants them

#npd #actually npd #npd things #npd thoughts #npd culture is #npd traits #npd posting #narc abuse isn't real #narc abuse does not exist

anti-transmisogyny-hub

You could not PAY ME to be upset over people with autogynephilia identifying as trans due to their kink and wanting to be correctly gendered 😭🙏

ohhh noooo someone thinks its sexy to be a woman god forbidddddd!!! /sarc 😰

like im sorry but instead of saying "people with autogynephilia should NEVER be trans women or transfems!! Thats JUST a stereotype, nobody like that ACTUALLY exists!! 😡" how about we like...idk deconstruct the idea that there's something immoral about being a paraphile??? 🤔

And then there's the really STUPID argument of "well then they're non-consensually involving me in their kink by making me call them a woman." Babe, I hate to break it to you thats like saying to person who is fat due to their feederism "they're non-consensually involving me in their kink by making me acknowledge them as fat." Like, they ARE fat - you're just lying if you say they aren't.

Their womanhood is just a descriptor of themself, the same way being fat is just a descriptor of themself. Acknowledging who they are *as a result of their kink* is not involving you *in the kink itself* PLEASE learn the distinction I am TIRED 🫩

#mtf trans #trans woman #transfem #gynequeerphobia #trans women are women #transgynephobia #queerphobia #transgynemisia #transphobia #paramisia

kittyswitching

I do wish I could go on testosterone because I miss the sexual effects a lot, but even the smallest doses makes my intersex ass go "oh we're making testosterone? Time to skyrocket to dangerous degrees that have immediate negative health effects"

like my levels are naturally almost pericis masc range so it's not as bad as it could be for me. I actually like the appearance it gives my body. But if I could push it jusssttt far enough to get my bottom growth back I would love that

#intersex #transmascfem #transneutral

moonlightsapphic

shut the fuck uppppppp you people make lesbians do EVERYTHING for you. bi women in het relationships DO NOT need lesbians to validate them, both because you are grown adults but also because you guys NEVER validate us. case in point, that entire little speech you wrote never once validated the unique experience of lesbians as non male attracted people in a patriarchal society. yes we all like women, but NOT liking men is almost always the greater burden and greater isolating factor in our day to day lives. stop thinking about yourselves and just LISTEN for once, all you EVER do is talk over lesbians and paint us as villains. and next time you are walking down the street hand in hand with your boyfriend take a moment and be grateful that you don't have to have your head on a swivel waiting to be harassed for daring to show affection to your partner in public. that sense of unease you feel brining your boyfriend to pride? that's what we feel the other 364 days a year, except the unease comes from the fear of ACTUAL VIOLENCE not of SOCIAL DISAPPROVAL from a minority group comprising 3% of the population.

Ma’am I am a brown bisexual woman in a Muslim-majority country in the global south and I’ve been dating my (also bisexual) girlfriend since we were 20. It has been five years and even our best friends don’t know we’re dating because we’re afraid of word getting out and being targeted and killed. (People are murdered for less.) There is some minimal social acceptance of transfem folks in our country but even they are treated like garbage. Anybody found to have same sex attraction is cast out by their families. (Families are known for casting you out for even interreligious marriages.) Or worse, they might force conversion therapy on you. They would not distinguish between you being bisexual or gay. The last queer activist in our country was murdered in cold blood 10 years ago and we haven’t had a strong movement since. LGBTQ+ community exists in small, secret bubbles. We’re all afraid.

My relationship takes place only behind closed doors. In a more accepting country, my girlfriend and I would be thinking about marriage and kids by now. She is my soulmate and we initially tried to keep it casual but we couldn’t. Despite all of the above, we chose each other, even though we could hypothetically look for legitimate partner in a man. I didn’t even realize I was bi until adulthood after I broke up with my high school boyfriend, though my girlfriend has known she is queer since she was young. My girlfriend and I spent two years (the worst mental health period of my life, when I made this account to document it) of struggling to unlearn comphet, because I often felt this overwhelming imposter syndrome that I was “faking” my very genuine attraction and romantic love for her. (if you’re a baby gay reading this and struggling with that, it passes I promise!) We also had to deal with the very special bisexual guilt of actively choosing to be in a same-sex relationship every day. We still do.

I wish I could avoid coming out to our families forever to protect the pain and heartbreak that will cause them. They really love me and have given me everything I’ve asked for (I wish I could say I was romanticising, but it’s true), however they have not been raised in a society to understand queerness and I’m afraid they’re too old now. In my darkest moments, I wish that my parents will be able to die without knowing, while still fully loving, supporting, proud, and happy for me. But that’s not sustainable, because already our parents are already asking us when we’re going to get married (to men, of course). Soon, that will become constant nagging, confusion, disappointment and eventually suspicion. If I did come out (which will hopefully happen when I’m much older and wiser and can survive without anyone’s support), I would say I was a lesbian, because 1) they don’t know what bisexual is and I can’t teach them; and 2) if they know I’m bi, they might have more hope they can “correct” me, or even try to sabotage my relationship. And you can be sure as hell I’m not asking some internet lesbian stranger for permission beforehand.

We have gone long-distance across the globe more often than not. We are trying to secure permanent residency in a more queer-friendly country by migrating with stable jobs (which can be a 10+ year process of proving to a country that you are worth giving residency to). We wonder if we’re doing the “right” thing taking it a day at a time, how many people we’re going to hurt for our own selfish happiness. If we’ll ever be able to visit our home country and culture again if word gets out. If we’ll ever have children, and would they be accepted by our families. If we’ll ever be 100% safe. Sometimes, I wish I was a lesbian like you, so I would not have to bear all that AND the guilt of the knowledge I could give it all up for a different loving relationship. If I were a lesbian, at least I would have the conviction of not having a choice. And that is a bisexual struggle you won’t understand, just like you have lesbian struggles that I won’t understand. I am ok with admitting the latter—are you ok with admitting the former?

I have a bisexual friend whose husband abuses her specifically because he suspects she is queer. I have a bisexual friend (in denial) whose fiancé insecurely and derogatorily jokes about her possibly being queer (much like my ex) and because of that she will never come to terms with her own sexuality, and will suppress it for her entire life. I have bisexual friends in very happy and loving M/F relationships. Some of these bisexuals do the work for the community from their position of privilege, others who are annoying mansplainers (much like yourself) to those of us who they perceive as more privileged (because, y’know, we’re not out to them as a WLW couple or even as queer). I’ll tell you now (if it still needs to be said) that most of the bisexuals in the world are actually not privileged at all. If you made a scale of “most privileged” to “most oppressed” (which is nonsensical but this is apparently the intelligence level we’re working with), then bi people in M/F relationships would be pretty much right next to other queer people, and not even close to endo allocishetero people. I have a difficult queer life to build so I have zero interest in playing stupid oppression Olympics and decide whether or not any other letter is “more” oppressed for the sake of internet keyboard warriors who can’t check themselves (or read a book, a paper, a research article anything). What I will do is fight for everyone’s rights (yes, even yours) to talk about their unique personal struggles.

At the end of the day, the bisexuals in privileged M/F marriages are allies to me and my girlfriend. And that means the world to us. When our entire society (and our families) turns their back on us, our queer friends will be all we will have left. Their straight boyfriends will be allies to us and welcome to our community, and symbolic of a world where more endosex allocishetero folks accept us. I want good straight men at Pride. The world listens to them. The point of queerness is deviance, but the point of Pride is liberation, and movement needs numbers. Immersion and understanding leads to acceptance. Are you with the cause or not?

Back when I was with my boyfriend, I avoided addressing my own queerness. And it was in part thanks to gatekeepers like you. Do you guys want more WLW or not? If you do, be kind to bisexual women. Celebrate their love, regardless of their partner. If more bi women were encouraged to find genuine love, if they were told unlearning comphet is not lesbian-only experience, if they had a queer support system when they faced statistically high rates of intimate partner violence due to their bisexuality, if everyone actually validated the unique struggles that lead to statistically poor bisexual mental health and substance abuse, then more of them would seek out healthy relationships with partners that see them for who they are, rather than any available subpar man. If you don’t want to date bi women, that’s fine. But if we include them in our community, they’ll have the opportunity to immerse in the culture, know themselves better, and eventually find each other. We contain multitudes. We do not exist in phases of “straight” and “gay”. Being rude to us when we’re in hetero-presenting relationships only makes us more likely to associate with queerness. Our identity is not inherently privileged, it’s intersectional. We are your peers. And we have every right to point out when anyone is being exclusionary and biphobic towards us, which includes the LGBTQ+ community.

I believe that someone who can afford to be unkind and unempathetic to another queer person, who dares play oppression Olympics like it’s a little game, doesn’t know what it’s like to actually be oppressed. Or maybe they have some insecurities and frustrations they need to work out in therapy. I have so many reasons to be jealous of my foreign queer friends (including lesbians, including trans people) flaunting their privileges, but I’m happy for them instead, I even listen to them when they talk about their (relatively minor) queer struggles in life, and I sure as hell did not have access to therapy to help me with that. I have not met a single queer person who actually engaged in community organising and mutual aid, that is also argumentative like people are on the internet. I don’t know if you’re aware it was proto-TERFs during second-wave feminism that separated the lesbian and bi women in the US, and that some of you have been unknowingly parroting frankly dumb purity culture rhetoric that harms trans people as well as bisexuals.

One of my deep regrets is not having queer elders in my part of the world to represent what my life could look like in the future. I literally contemplated on the phone for two hours with my partner this morning about what the fuck to do with our lives. As you’ve decided to graciously bring so much lesbian wisdom (not at all in the tone of a villain) to my account whilst so bravely hiding as an anon, tell me—what the fuck should we, lowly bisexuals who haven’t even “decentered men”, do? Or do I suddenly strike you as a different person now that you know I’m WLW, or about my other intersectional identities? Do you think I don’t understand your experiences? Do you think I don’t face lesbophobia—because people perceive all WLW as a lesbian? Do you still feel the need for me to acknowledge a bunch of other identities just because I spoke about my bisexuality? I was the same person when I was with my boyfriend. I will be the same if (God forbid) it doesn’t work out with my partner and I find myself with a man at some point again, and I will have to live with the truth of having my heart broken by a woman that I chose (in EVERY sense of the word) to be with. I will forever be queer enough. My hypothetical boyfriend WILL be coming with me to Pride. And if I sense unease because of that, I WILL call you out on it.

moonlightsapphic