#internalized self hatred

[scarlett-ink]

Been dealing with a lot of internalized homophobia recently and trying to deal with homophobia from others is hard enough as it is. I’m gonna try to be positive and work more on my art to get myself out of my rut but idk. This pride month is definitely an uphill battle. Couldn’t decide which version I liked better to express myself so I just included all of them

[kolacheco]

The way Blk ppl bully & terrorize other Blk ppl for being different is appalling . If it’s not alternative BLk ppl it’s fat Blk ppl if Fat Blk ppl aren’t their target then it’s Blk disabled ppl ,if it’s not Blk disabled ppl ,folks are harassing unambiguous Blk women & if not unambiguous Blk women they are picking on 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️BLk ppl . This entire community needs to unpack why someone else living in their truth bothers them so much or shall I say the ppl that don’t fit in the “normal “ box they want us all in so bad . Like how do see another Blk person minding their business and Jump at the opportunity to drag them or talk down on them . Seek therapy my nigga cause that ain’t it .

[fallynnforyou]

I've been dealing with racism my entire life. Being a halfie (half asian/half white) my whole life is a fuckin Identity crisis. With people telling me i'm not white enough and I should go back to my home country even though I was born and raised here and never lived in another country. I don't really Identify with my asian side a lot as I wasn't raised with that culture. (Obviously I still love that culture a lot and I try to indulge more and learn to love who i am) so I consider myself white.

I'm just so tired of explaining myself to other people.

One of the things that saddens me the most is that my Parents don't even try to understand what I'm going through. Talking to my white parent about racism always ends in them saying "of course i understand that you're struggling but it can't be that bad" and talking to my asian parent always ends in "you should be proud of who you are, so whatever". Considering the Generation of my parents has a lot of internalized racism is a whole different Story.

I mean they put me in a Situation like this. I didn't ask to be born. Why can't they at least acknowledge the things i'm going through?

I really wish this was a positive text about how much i love who I am and how it will get better but unfortunately it isn't. I'm still trying to learn. But imagine how difficult life can be when people basically just hate you for existing. All you other halfies out there, I hear you and I'm with you. We got this.

[viobliterator]

Whoops my hand slipped and decided to make another Dazatsu comic centering around internalized homophobia that likely came from the orphanage Atsushi grew up in

and Dazai doing that thing where he evades questions about his actual feelings and not knowing how to comfort people

I love them

[willowashmaple]

my journey out of ‘sisterhood,’ three years on.

Almost two years ago, I wrote a rather lengthy critique of women’s movement and spaces, the female lifestyle empowerment brands, and feminism in general, closing it with this sentence: “No thanks. Count me out of your so-called sisterhood. I’m not interested in your culturally-appropriated ‘goddess’ circles and self-exalting ‘rituals.’ I’m not one of you.”

The gist of it, the tl;dr version is this:

People are divided more by race and class than being united by the biological accident of sex.

Much of what passes for feminism promotes a fantasy of a “global sisterhood” which sugarcoats the insidious problems that keep the affluent white women in the Global North in their positions of privilege while maintaining the oppressive system that dehumanizes and marginalizes the others.

The female lifestyle empowerment subculture, a multi-billion-dollar industry consisting of self-appointed coaches, spiritual teachers, practitioners, influencers, and businesses, capitalizes on cultural appropriation, ableism, classism, and reinforcement of a heteronormative and sexist gender stereotyping, while their fantasy of “the sisterhood” absolves all females of responsibilities and criticism.

Then I concluded, “About a year ago [2018], I made a conscious decision to remove myself from all women-only groups and organizations that I was part of. This was a difficult decision that I did not make lightly, and to a degree, a painful choice because I was part of them for the majority of my adult life. I made quite a few friends through such groups, and at times, they were the only social outlet that I had. But I could no longer keep participating in women-only spaces with a good conscience.”

I wrote this, at the time, in a more or less political language heavy on theories and critique of praxis. I did not, however, discuss what has been going on in my own life personally as it was not my intention or focus at the time.

During much of the previous decade [2010s], I was involved with several women-only organizing spaces -- many of them political, several of them religious. I used to think of myself as a feminist and I uncritically subscribed to the notion of “sisterhood” and all the emotional stuff that came with it. The more I spent time with them the more I found myself increasingly frustrated and ultimately had an awakening: I could not at all relate to women, or their experiences, or their emotions -- what the fuck was I doing.

Partially out of disillusionment, and partly out of disgust and anger, I decided about three years ago that I am nonbinary and therefore free from all that shit.

What I did not understand back then, however, was how neurodivergence informs and shapes who I am far more profoundly than I knew at the time.

Three years ago, I was falsely led to believe in the now largely debunked hypothesis by British neurologist Simon Baron Cohen (a relative of Sacha Baron Cohen, by the way) that autism is a product of an “extreme male brain.”

Maybe that’s why I could not relate to women, I concluded then, and basically gave up on feminism and myself alike.

But that didn’t exactly mean I could understand or relate to men, either. If I were, probably I could’ve felt right at home in the company of “extreme males” (imagine Proud Boys and the likes).

Since then, my understanding of neurodiversity has deepened, thanks to the increased interaction with other autistic people of all genders and sexualities.

I’ve learned that autistic folks generally communicate well with one another and can relate to one another, in the same way how neurotypical folks do among themselves (the phenomenon known as “double empathy”). As I look back, some of the most enjoyable and memorable moments were when I spent time with another autistic individual (even though at the time I was in deep denial about it).

Another thing I have learned since then was there is a huge proportion of the autistic community that exist outside the gender binary (in addition to the disproportionately high percentage of the autistic community that is also LGBTQ+ in comparison with the neurotypical population). Because the lived neurodivergent experiences generally do not align well with the conventional social construct of binary gender and heteronormative ideas of sexuality, there is even a word for it: gendervague, likely coined by activist and lawyer Lydia X. Z. Brown. 

Not knowing these, I had beaten myself up rather severely for a couple of years because I felt like such a freak and failed human being. I was nonbinary not because I was proud of it but rather as a consolation prize of a sort. I was having a combination of self-loathing, identity crisis, enormous dysphoria, shame, and regret. Combined with the massive autistic burnout that I was experiencing for unrelated reasons (and exacerbated by four years of President Trump Stress Disorder!), I became depressed, anxious, and withdrawn in a way I hadn’t been in many years.  

This also made me aware of how -- between all the misinformation and outright hate speech about neurodivergence, and my excessive exposure to peddlers of the self-improvement industry -- internalized ableism is extremely harmful, just as internalized racism and homophobia are.

[tiredfemininity]

Hating being trans isn't internalized transphobia.

Hating being trans isn't internalized transphobia.

Hating being trans isn't internalized transphobia.

Being transgender sucks. You face social oppression, issues with health care, high risks of depression, homelessness, self-harm, and ending up as a sex worker. You have to spend thousands of dollars just to be able to look at yourself in the mirror and see yourself. You have to be extra careful with who you tell your private information because they might end up killing you.

Yeah, being trans sucks.

[shushuttath]

no but did hozier knew what he was doing to my internalized homophobia when he wrote the lines "her eyes look sharp and steady into the empty parts of me, still my heart is heavy with the hate of some other man's beliefs" ?

[todd--chavez]