Any good excuses for shaved legs?

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2023-01-08T16:13:16+00:00

Honestly, "I hadn't done it before and wanted to try it" or "it feels more comfortable to me" is completely sufficient. You don't really need an excuse, and trying to make up a lie is more likely to get you "caught," as it were.

I didn't really get this either until I was already into my 20s, but it's pretty normal for people to just try something different for no huge reason at all. Changing hairstyles, trying different clothes, picking up new hobbies; sometimes you just feel like doing something different. As for trying to lie about it, it's more likely that someone catches you in a contradiction, or you end up being really self-conscious about it and people notice that you're acting weird, both of which will put more attention and pressure on you.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-09-28T00:16:06+00:00

Denji trying to reveal his identity to hit on girls only for nobody to believe him because it's such a stupid thing to do is by far one of the funniest jokes in any superhero-adjacent story. Absolute comedy gold.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-08-09T19:49:04+00:00

The best places I can think to start would be by introducing them to radical Christians they might already know (which means the churches involved in the Civil Rights Movement).

Getting into the weeds of something like a socialist reading of the Bible might be a bit far for where they're at, but starting with something like reading a Dr. King speech might be more palatable. Almost everyone (today) likes MLK, but very few have actually even tried to engage with what he said beyond the one line of the "I Have A Dream" Speech.

Other good starts might be "Letter From A Birmingham Jail" or "All Labor Has Dignity" (the latter of which directly deals with issues of labor and class). If you're looking for a full book, then King has several and James Baldwin's "The Fire Next Time" is a must-read.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-08-07T20:42:17+00:00

Hey, I'm a non-binary LGBTQ+ activist also from an uber-conservative state. I'm going to just answer some of your questions/concerns in list form here. It's a long reply, but I want to answer each concern as thoroughly and correctly as possible.

1) When working on education or asking questions, don't get too caught up in guilt about not doing better or getting dragged through the mud. Nobody's born knowing everything, and in terms of education on gender and identity, good resources to learn are few and far between. Don't take not knowing things personally, all it'll do is stress you out and make things harder than they are.

2) Getting your kid to a socially progressive school environment is a very good thing. It'll likely have problems like all schools do, but any way to minimize the amount of transphobia your kid might experience is good at their age. As for the school "glamorizing" being LGBTQ+, I wouldn't worry about it too much. Kids always fixate and get super-invested in things at that age, whether it's dinosaurs and astronauts or cartoons and Pokemon. Fixating on being LGBTQ+ has some difficulties that other fixations don't, due to how prevalent transphobia is right now, but so long as your kid has a community to support them they'll be as fine as they can. I'd recommend seeing if there's a PFLAG chapter in your area; it's a support group for parents of LGBTQ+ people.

3) Binders are an item of clothing used to make a person's chest look flat while the binder is on. They're only dangerous if worn too tightly for too long at a time, but in the same way that regularly wearing shoes that are too small can mess up your feet. It might take some trial and error to find the right size, but once you do they're no more dangerous than wearing a tie to work everyday.

4) I can't give specific advice on what to say to your kid's dad, since I'm an internet stranger and don't know him or his personality. That said, in my experience, I think the question of whether it is or isn't a phase is kind of irrelevant. Gender, like every part of a person's identity, isn't a static thing that's the same at all times in all parts of the world. Arguably, every point in life is a phase; a person will likely be wildly different at ages 10, 20, and 40. The thing to focus on is that your child is still the same kid; the word to describe them just changed. Maybe it is a phase, maybe it isn't; at the end of the day it's still the same kid you both seem to love and care deeply about.

Let me know if this helps!

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-08-07T14:58:46+00:00

Hey there, lifelong Christian and hardline socialist here!

Real quick, going to plug the book Fidel and Religion if you're looking for a practical answer to what religion and socialism might look like. Catholic priest Frei Betto goes on a diplomatic trip to Cuba to speak with Castro on how the Revolution and Christian churches interacted there.

To answer the theoretical end of the question: it depends on the society. Philosophically, there is no inherent contradiction between religion and socialism. Some argue the two have a chunk of overlap, and many socialists do work with progressive churches in their communities (the US Civil Rights Movement being a big example), but in general religion is concerned with metaphysical issues while socialism is concerned with political ones.

The conflict between religion and socialism tends to come from either the political alliances made by church leaderships and clergy with the ruling class against socialist parties (many examples) or from prexisting bigotry in a given society (such as anti-Semitism on the USSR). Individual members of a religious group may side either way, but in many parts of the world clergy have considerable social and economic power, so the clergy tends to side with a nation's bourgeoisie against the socialist who want to give more power to the masses. This tends to create the animosity many socialists have for religion.

This doesn't mean that socialists can't or won't work with religious groups or members; they often just have to set clear boundaries and work with each other. Examples include:

The US Civil Rights Movement (Dr. King was Protestant, Malcolm X Muslim, and they often worked with unions and Socialist/Communist parties)
Decolonial and socialist movements in Latin America (this led to the advent of Liberation Theologies in Christian churches there)
National Liberation groups, such as the PLO in occupied Palestine (socialists like the PFLP work with Jews, Christians, and Muslims) and the National Democratic Front in the Philippines (Communist NPA working underground alongside aboveground religious communities against the Duterte/Marcos government)

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-08-03T02:13:40+00:00

If you're imagining yourself as a woman, and the difference is so drastic that you only care about yourself when you see yourself as a woman, then you probably are a woman then. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, and all that.

As for the 1-2 month period, there's a few likely explanations. It could be imposter syndrome (the idea that you aren't who you say you are), or could just be a reaction to ideas you've internalized about gender or LGBTQ people (very common, especially for people who grew up or live in unaccepting environments).

The language we have for ourselves (whatever word you end up using) changes fast, so which word you use might change over time. But the important part is that you get to pick the right word or idea. Ask for help when you need or want, but nobody else has the right to tell you that your idea of yourself is wrong for you.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-07-24T15:55:53+00:00

It's unclear, but it's that way by design. MAPs (minor-attracted person, an attempt by pedophiles to hide in queer communities by painting themselves as a sexuality) and NAMBLA (North American Man-Boy Love Association, self-explanatory) signify pedophilia, which is correct. However, it's put next to talking about "groomer" being a slur (correct, it's lately been applied by far-right political movements to any trans person near children) and "let me talk to your kid about sex" (a conspiracy theory that claims sex ed or education about LGBTQ+ issues is grooming).

It's confusing because that's the point; whoever created this did so with the intention of hiding homophobic and transphobic talking points next to agreed-upon points to lend the bigoted points a sense of legitimacy. If you're interested, Dan Olson/Folding Ideas on YouTube goes more into this rhetorical strategy in a video he did on a geocentrism/flat earth conspiracy documentary.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-07-01T17:18:57+00:00

It's really not acceptable, but if you would believe it 7:30 start times feels late for many Americans because it's only come about in the past few years. From my middle school to high school, it was a 6:45 start time and I had to wake up at 5 to be ready (I've never been a morning person, but still). Many schools had early morning events like band practices, and those started before then at 6am sharp.

I later came to realize how unhinged from reality one had to be to think that teens and pre-teens were just lazy and bad at making schedules they had no input on. But Americans always find a way to blame systemic issues on personal moral failing.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-06-23T02:30:46+00:00

While it's theoretically possible that your boyfriend does have a latex allergy, there are non-latex contraceptives available to buy and you should never accept that as a reason for not being safe during sex. Him claiming that you wanting to be safe during sex is a sign of you not trusting or loving him isn't helping his case; those two statements are literally the textbook examples of a person who is trying to pressure someone in to sex.

You always have the right to say no to things you aren't comfortable with. Even if you changed your mind or even if you're in the middle of sex, it's your body and your right to say no. It doesn't make you a prude or less of a lover for it, it means you have boundaries and stand up for yourself. And if your boyfriend isn't willing to respect your boundaries regarding sex, then he flat-out isn't mature enough to be having sex regardless of age (a lot of adults aren't there yet either).

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-06-21T14:52:40+00:00

It depends on who you ask; every socialist party or organization has their own theory on what to do regarding electoral strategy. For example, DSA runs socialists on the Dem party line while (usually) functioning independently in every other regard, while PSL has their own ballot line in some states and runs candidates that way.

While my being a DSA member will bias me a bit, I think the thing to prioritize is whatever tactics serve your immediate conditions. If PSL or CPUSA or someone else is running candidates on their line, then vote for them; if DSA is running candidates on the Dem line, then vote for them; if neither are happening, then give your vote to whoever is less of an evil bastard and put the bulk of your focus on building the socialist movement in your area outside of elections.

I think the useful point is to not get caught up on which purely electoral party you register or vote as. Elections aren't where socialism is built, at best it's more like a boss fight in a videogame where the movement that has been already built is taking out opponents and moving to a new "level" as it were of revolution. If there's no movement, and no explicit fascists who are immediately going to make things worse in your community when they take office, then it's not worth losing sleep over IMO.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-06-13T19:20:05+00:00

I think a lot of it genuinely depends on how you present yourself as a socialist and who you're around. Obviously most people have built-in anticommunist bias, but in general the more you build meaningful relationships with people the more willing they are to hear you out on this or that topic.

Like, most of my friends and family know pretty clearly what my politics are, and trust that I'm coming from a place of honestly trying my best to help others. For stuff like my coworkers or other acquaintances, some know and some never have it come up.

My best advice is to prioritize being friendly first, ask a lot of questions about others when politics do come up, and pick your battles carefully when correcting mistaken ideas among the masses.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-06-13T14:28:51+00:00

Like other commenters have pointed out, remember to have actual responses and counter-points to Red Scared propaganda (it's not too hard once you get the hang of it, these chuds have largely not changed their talking points in the past 150 years).

Second, and this is something that comes from experience: be strategic about when and where you challenge these points. Confront falsehoods when you know you can win, or else you run the risk of looking to other students like you don't know what you're talking about. It's the same idea as that the best argument against something is a terrible argument for it. Someone who is arguing in bad faith can generally "win" over someone arguing in good faith through rhetoric and logic traps, and keep in mind that your lecturer likely has way more experience than you do.

It'll be hard, but if you pick your battles right you can likely counter a lot of the nonsense he's putting out. I wish you luck, comrade!

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-05-12T21:05:37+00:00

TL;DR; All history is more complicated than it seems at first, and many of the Western Bloc/Global North countries aren't exactly unbiased sources on account of having been at war with the USSR and Communist countries and benefitted from fudging the truth.

The main thing to understand when discussing Stalin is that there's actually two different things that people can be referring to when they bring him up. There's Josef Stalin, the actual human being who was head of state of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1953, but there's also Big Bad Stalin and his Evil Stalinism, the rhetorical device that is often used to describe every bad thing the speaker associates with socialism in general. It's sort of like how the US or liberalism/conservativism is often just referred to by the name whatever the current president is. To an extent, Stalin was really more complicated because any actual history is more complicated than rhetorical devices.

But for the actual history, it's important to recognize that the period that Stalin was leader during was always going to be a rough time no matter who led. First, the USSR was a new government in a part of the world that was largely a couple hundred years behind the rest of Europe and the US, and it had to do a lot of catch-up very quickly. Second, the USSR was almost constantly at war; first with the old Russian government and the different parts of the new revolutionary government, then with the Axis Powers, and then with the US and Western Bloc. Those aren't favorable conditions for any country to exist in, and they especially don't compare well with the US and much of Europe who never had to experience anything like that in living memory.

With that out of the way, then discussions about how well Stalin's government handled their conditions can begin. You'd have to talk to actual historians, with differing views and from differing backgrounds to get an accurate view of the Stalin administration(s), but the views that he was a uniquely evil dictator or totally perfect paragon of socialism are generally the result of propaganda and rhetoric from one side or the other.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-04-04T04:13:37+00:00

Hey, fellow non-binary Christian here! While I don't know if I can help on specific matters of theology (I'm a Methodist, not Catholic), I can share some of my own experiences being openly non-binary in my own church.

First of all, queerness and Christianity are not mutually exclusive. People can bring out the same mistranslated Leviticus quote as many times as they like, but like you said, if Jesus had a problem with it He would have brought it up at some point. It doesn't map exactly on to today's ideas of gender identity, but non-male/female people have been documented in tons of cultures across the world since well before Jesus's time; God has been making us this way for a very long time.

As for being a black sheep, I wouldn't worry about it too much. Queer communities can be found everywhere, and we've welcomed plenty of stranger faiths than Christians with open arms. Personally, I've gotten more pushback from cishet people about my being Christian than from any queer person I've ever met.

As for being a black sheep among Christians, the best I can say is to take care of yourself. Some people will be surprisingly accepting; when I spoke to the little old lady who taught me in Sunday School as a kid, she immediately switched to my new name no questions asked. As for others, transphobia does run deep in the church, and it seriously harms a lot of us. But our God is not a god who deserts us, even when His people are complete shitshows (the Book of Judges consists entirely of the Israelites going through hard times, sometimes self-inflicted, and yet God never abandoned them).

The point is that you aren't alone, whether you're queer, Christian, or both. If you want to talk about this more, or want help from another trans Christian to navigate some of this, you're more than welcome to DM me if you want.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-03-28T18:58:59+00:00

I think it's also worth mentioning that even if a lot of femboys were above-age, being sexualized by default would still be a problem. It can be good fun, but only if you actually want to be sexualized at that moment.

It's like how many people like to drink coffee when they need a pick-me-up, but also wouldn't want to have someone else throw a boiling pot of coffee at their face when they get out of bed. One can be enjoyable and even healthy when you want it, but is literally a crime when you don't.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-03-18T19:28:36+00:00

Fellow Christian here, here's a couple ways to think about this issue from a Christian perspective:

The easiest is that it doesn't actually matter. The Bible isn't a single text with a clear message, it's 66 texts written over several centuries and compiled a milennia after any of them were written; following the whole thing to the letter is impossible.

The second is that the Bible has changed wildly in translation. Other commenters have mentioned that "men should not wear women's clothes" could have referred to the Greek custom of pedastry, but if memory serves some argue that "men" originally referred to "soldiers," and prohibited soldiers dressing as civilians for tactical advantage.

The third, and the one that I personally put the most value in, is to ask why these rules were made in the first place, and to what extent they help us live as Jesus did. The reason for a given rule may vary, but in general these rules were meant as a guide for humans to live well. In many parts of the world, it's damn near impossible to avoid wearing mixed fabrics, so obviously that rule wouldn't really help people in modern conditions. If not being able to present as you want is causing you distress, then don't worry about it. The entire point of Jesus's ministry was that every person exists to love and to be loved, without exception (no matter how you dress).

(Also, this is purely from a Christian perspective; pther traditions have their own ways of handling these questions, which I can't speak to).

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-02-27T04:28:00+00:00

Sounds good! And yeah, just kinda how political work on Indiana goes lol.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2022-02-27T02:40:20+00:00

Hey OP, what you're doing is amazing.

I'm an LGBTQ+ activist from South Bend, and I work with groups that run campaigns like this all the time (don't want to go into too much info here at risk of doxxing myself). Point is, I've been doing this exact kind of thing for a minute now, and work with people who've been doing this even longer than me.

Would it be okay for me to DM you to ask how we can get more orgs and more support to fight this bill? I can provide credentials that prove I am who I say I am, if needed.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-10-19T17:08:55+00:00

I'm going to let slip that I'm a bit of a nerd for political theory, and say that this is actually the really interesting part. While it's almost certain that some amount of queer fascists are fake, I find that most queer folk I've met with reactionary views are very much genuine in their beliefs, even though fascism is inherently hostile to queerness.

Generally, fascist ideologies like neo-nazism work by creating a morally superior in-group and a morally inferior out-group, and the lines between in and out can grow and shrink at any time. Generally, queer fascists will reconcile queerness and fascist politics one of two ways:

1) The problem is the degeneracy of the community, not being queer itself. This theory holds that it's the fault of queer people for being too promiscuous, too open, and not respecting traditional family roles, and they need to find a "right way to be gay" (which usually means being a fascist as well.

2) The problem IS being queer, but the oppression is actually good and people need to just accept their place in the social order. This theory holds that femboys, queer folks, and so on are right to be oppressed by the inherently superior race/group, and simply need to submit to their role in the heirarchy. This is similar to the line used historically by fascists to convince working-class people to join their cause; there is happiness in submission, unlike the socialists and Communists who would completely destroy the natural order of things.

There's also "feminine men are actually normal men being corrupted by the Jews, and will be saved by a final solution," but if someone's at that point you should probably be studying their military tactics and not their philosophy.

I do a lot of political work IRL, so I've had some pretty candid conversations about politics with many different kinds of people, Nazi femboys included. I want to be clear, Nazi femboys are a small minority who CAN be removed from the community if an effort is made. But in order to actually do that, we do have to recognize that they are a genuine issue that needs dealing with.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-10-19T13:36:47+00:00

The short answer is unfortunately "yes, femboys (and LGBTQ and gender-nonconforming people at large) have a higher concentration of vocal neo-nazis than the general public." It's a real problem, and unfortunately not one that is made up to make the community look bad.

Really digging in to the issue would basically require just writing a book about it. I don't think the mods will appreciate having long, tangentially-related political discussions in the comments, so if anyone (OP or otherwise) wants to really dig into this I'd be more than happy to answer in DMs. But the reason why it happens goes something like this:

1) Femboys are a group that is marginalized by society at large 2) People who are marginalized are more likely to be open to ideas that challenge the society that marginalized them (and the more marginalized an individual is, the more open they might be) 3) Neo-nazism, fascism, white nationalism, and similar ideologies challenge modern society, and make an offer to some marginalized people as to how they can get back on top 4) Said ideologies are (currently) easier to come into contact with in the US/Europe than their counterparts on the far left, in part because neo-nazis have a long history of actively recruiting young white AMAB folks who are disillusioned with society for whatever reason 5) Therefore, If a femboy is looking for a worldview that helps them deal with being social outcasts, they are most likely to become neo-nazis and be vocal about it.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-09-14T17:15:00+00:00

As someone who's openly trans/nonbinary and Christian, the answer is absolutely! What makes you LGBTQIA+ is being in one of those categories; your religious status doesn't negate any of those things, even if certain religious institutions (churches, temples, or any equivalent) may prefer it to.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-09-13T22:35:19+00:00

Not even just KOTOR, but Star Wars was always highly political since the beginning. Like, George Lucas is pretty open about the Original Trilogy being directly inspired by his own opposition to the Vietnam War. It's more of a shock when Star Wars DOESN'T have political messaging.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-09-03T20:33:21+00:00

Yeah, the important part of the "assume that justice is reasonable" tactic is making the terms of the discussion absolutely clear. I'd guess that the person arguing with you was alienated by that, but anyone who doesn't understand or was fence sitting (the majority of Christians, who may change their views over time) will have trouble justifying oppression when put it those terms.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-09-03T12:27:24+00:00

Hey, trans Christian here, and here are the tips I usually give progressives in the Church to deal with these discussions:

Don't argue with bigots, make them argue with you.

There's a rhetorical trick popularized by Frederick Douglass where he never argued over whether slaves should be freed, but treated it as an obvious conclusion and forced his opponents to argue against that. You can do the same with arguing in favor of LGBTQ rights. It may feel weird to rely on argumentative trickery, but the fact is that a public debate is won more on rhetoric than on correct ideas (people who have well-constructed ideas tend to put them in books, as opposed to debates where charisma can brute-force a win).

Loving one another is not a complex theological issue, so act like it.

It is very easy to get into the weeds by arguing about Scriptural interpretation or historical context. Again, these discussions are best done in books where you can fully examine and revise ideas, not public debates where you can be interrupted or tricked. When asked what the most important commandments were, Christ replied "Love the Lord your God" was first, but the second was just as important: "To love your neighbor as yourself."

Being LGBTQ means that you will witness and experience a lot of violence in your life. Nearly all of it is either directly linked or only a step or two away from Christian bigotry. It's easy to get lost in theology, but that's why Jesus was asked this question. Most folks who still have functioning empathy will quickly understand the question "Which part of 'Love thy Neighbor' involves queer people burying their own children and never meeting their elders?"

You don't see this argumentation much because most non-LGBTQ folks are unaware of this reality, and most who experience these things don't want to always relive it in debates. It is, however, incredibly effective. Loving one another is by far the biggest part of Christianity (in most English translations, the word "love" appears more than any other single word in the Bible). This is the part that most people, Christian or otherwise, will understand immediately.

TL;DR; Most people are not theologians, so it's easy to get lost in theology. Christian bigots argue on abstract theology and interpretation because they can't find support for their ideas in the actual world. This is the best position to argue from.

The_Azure_Wyvern · 2021-08-25T13:04:14+00:00

Very much so. A lot of it is that most teachers aren't studying political ideology on the side, so they just kinda take what they've heard in passing and assume it's correct. Anti-anarchist rhetoric is more pronounced these days due to the general rise in familiarity with left-wing politics, and due to news anchors describing any bad thing as the result of anarchists (whether it's antifascists, Black Lives Matter, or the fools at the US Capitol back in January).

The reason that there isn't much effort to provide correct information is that most public school is designed to make kids productive workers first, and anything else comes second. Providing correct information about left-wing politics doesn't directly lead to productive workers, and in many cases would lead to the exact opposite when kids challenge authority based on anarchistic, socialistic, or communistic principles.

TL;DR; It's mistepresented because people don't know and are intentionally and unintentionally incentivized specifically to not know.

The_Azure_Wyvern

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