catwinchester:

pizzaback:

something that really bothers me when people discuss natural selection is when people ask questions along the lines of, “why aren’t all turtles extinct if they’re so slow and dumb” and “if neanderthals are superior to gorillas, then why are neanderthals extinct?”.

Like these are such misled questions that you’d have to answer completely different, unasked questions to actually help the person understand, but it also belies a really unfortunate fact about the history of evolutionary science and how natural selection was once, and for a really long time, studied as if evolution is a battle between superiors and inferiors. and this framework was developed for the purpose of economic and sociopolitical gain, and to justify bigotry toward marginalized peoples, and this framework still permeates how people teach and learn about natural selection. it worries me a lot!

Eugenics, created by Darwin’s cousin if I’m not mistaken.

What most of these idiots fail to realise is that survival of the fittest doesn’t mean the strongest or the most physically fit.

It means survival of the species best adapted for its environment. It’s fit as in fit for purpose. 

But of course, creatures can occupy the same space yet be very different because they have evolved to take advantage of different areas of the ecosystem. 

At its most basic imagine an island where creatures evolve to take advantage of either air, land, and sea. They’re not even in competition with each other most of the time so it’s not about who is the strongest of these animals, they would all be disadvantaged if out into in the other’s habitats, yet each has evolved to be the fittest to occupy their particular niche. 

And no, not all disabled animals die in the wild either. Many pack animals, such as dogs and monkeys, will keep injured and disabled members as part of the group, assigning them roles fitted to their abilities. 

So in short, evolution of not an excuse for bigotry. Ever. 

And if you think that, it just shows your ignorance and since that means you’re dumb, we’re allowed kill you in the name of keeping the species strong, right? 

lines-and-edges:

xenoqueer:

golbatgender:

bai-xue-lives:

diversehighfantasy:

bai-xue-lives:

rootbeergoddess:

diversehighfantasy:

rootbeergoddess:

diversehighfantasy:

Seriously tho, don’t use “but the racists are getting a pass!” while complaining that shipping communities are losing a safe and empowering place to share porn.

The most dominant shipping communities uphold racist aesthetic ideals, methodically erase people of color from their narratives and uphold white men as superior to all – and they continue to congratulate themselves for their own enlightenment while doing it.

Instead of glorifying shipping communities as empowering spaces for women, this is an opportunity to talk about what’s really lurking under that so-called subversive feminism.

After all the ugliness they’ve injected into Tumblr fan spaces, we can do better than letting them go down as martyrs. (Again.)

I mean the reason nipple is happening is partly their fault. A lot of adult, female shippers had zero problem with shipping adult characters with minors. Hell, when Big Hero 6 came out, the tags we full of racist, pedophilic art featuring Hiro and his brother. These women aren’t heroes, they’re part of the problem.

Yes, how tumblr is handling this entire this is low but part of the reason this is happening is because of adult shippers, mainly female ones.

These women aren’t heroes, they’re part of the problem.

Yup.

“Why don’t they take care of the Nazis instead of us”? – Sad fact: The  amount of racist crap I’ve gotten from female shippers on Tumblr absolutely obscures the amount I’ve gotten from actual alt-righties. I’ll get some rightwing dudes mocking me now and then, but the harassment, the campaigns to take me down for blogging about racism in fandom, the false accusations, have all come from women shippers. Not all white, but all women, and 100% from so-called “subversive” shipping communities.

These are the women we create holocaust or Native American AUs without batting an eye. I’ve had female shippers send me death threats and I had one tell me I should get hit by a bus. Yeah, that’s totally feminist.

Also, these women are dangerous too. They have influence over fandom and there are tons of minors they can potentially harm. Why doesn’t anyone care? Isn’t their safety more important than this faux feminism?

Again, the reason for nipplegate is the fault of adult women who have been making fandom unsafe from the get go

I love how you both blame adult women specifically for this debacle (as if there aren’t plenty of men and teens who ship the “bad nasty things”) and not, I dunno, incompetent website moderation combined with corporate greed

And, of course, @rootbeergoddess says this shit right after reblogging this post from @thebibliosphere:

This post is literally about how targeting the “wrong kind of” fiction is, historically, only part one in crackdowns against general LGBT content in fandom spaces.

And yet, somehow, women are to blame for this, and not incompetent, greedy, homophobic corporations.

But nah, think of the children, etc, and ends justify the means, I guess. Because hey, fuck LGBT people if we can punish those gross old (mostly queer) women for drawing cartoon characters, right?

Congrats on derailing a post about racism.

I blame the adult women who fly into attack mode when racism is brought up for their actions. Transformative fandom doesn’t deserve to be lionized with zero acknowledgement of its rampant racism.

Since it is being lionized across the internet in response to the Tumblr Purge, I’m absolutely going to point out its long-standing racism. If you want to make that into something homophobic, that’s on you.

So anyone who objects to your cold dead take on how “adult shippers are to blame for nipplegate” is also to blame for nipplegate, somehow?

Also, the discussion of fandom racism has been around for years, including among shippers. Talking about concerns over censorship doesn’t mean that somehow everyone forgot that racism within fandom spaces is a thing.

Nobody’s lionizing anything. People are, quite understandably, angry at corporate censorship and corporate incompetence, which almost always hits marginalised people (such as queer people, many of whom are in shipping communities) harder than those in power (which includes white supremacist blogs). That’s why people are talking about this, and that’s why people are angry.

You’re intentionally trying to twist the situation to focus once again onto fans’ faults, because you can’t bear for a moment for people to direct their anger towards the groups who actually have power and actually cause harm, or see people sympathise with folks you have a grudge against.

Blaming censorship on the victims of censorship is disgusting, and you should be ashamed of yourself.

OP you suck, and you’re exactly the reason why no one can have good discussions on how not to be racist, because y’all start defending actual censorship and homophobic pedophilia libel and blatant misogyny and make outrage for the sake of outrage, misapplying serious issues to generate excuses, because it’s more fun for you than tackling actually issues, which would require you to admit nuance exists and your “enemies” are real people who can change instead of fun punching bag toys.

Not to mention that, in actuality, where else do marginalized writers and artists even get heard of? Meanwhile, in fandom spaces, by design, literally anyone can be seen and heard if they tag well. Particularly on AO3, but before Tumblr fucked up how tags and search worked—which is entirely the fault of Yahoo’s execs and brogrammers—here as well. There are no official gatekeepers, no interviews with those already in power, not even real names and people guessing your demographics from them. Just tags and date posted. So long as you tag well and post regularly, which are skills, not inherent attributes, you got heard. I dare you to act like that’s somehow more racist than mainstream publishing.

Not that I’m a fan of idpol, but since it tends to go over well in these kinds of conversations, let me lay it out.

I’m a sex worker. I did sex work through tumblr. I’m also brown. I’m also disabled, queer, and genderqueer. If you want to place weight on these kinds of identities for the sake of firsthand accounts and primary sources, go for it. If not, you won’t need to, since the things I’m about to say are basic facts.

Fandom is racist, yes. Everything that operates in a racist context such as that of the literal world we live in is racist. But on a racism scale of “hypothetical perfect world of total equality,” and “the fucking KKK,” fandom falls a lot closer to the perfect world than traditional media does, or even can.

See, traditional media operates with limitations. The most relevant of those, for this discussion, is capitalism and profit-seeking. To turn a profit, traditional media needs to appeal to the widest possible audience. In a culture of racism, that means playing into the racism.

Fandom does not operate with a profit seeking motive. That means fanworks have the freedom to be passion projects unbeholden to cultural racism. Now, the creators behind fanworks are, themselves, racist, because we’re all fucking racist, because racism permeates our world like nitrogen. But they have no reason to pander to the worst and most dense pockets of racism.

In fact, fandom has motives to not be racist. Because, here’s the thing: fandom includes people of every race and combination.

And people like me? The people of color you dismally claim to be defending with your censorship seeking? We are motivated to express ourselves through art in a way that is denied to us through traditional media, which gatekeeps us out.

But, you sit here, and you pretend in your little ivory tower, that fandom is worse. You explicitly say, in your post, that fandom is more racist, more violent than nazis.

You say, to me, a brown jew, that I am worse than nazis.

Your claims that you are defending people of color, and any marginalized group, fall pretty fucking short, when you’re pulling shit like that.

But, set that aside. I hate that I have to say, “set aside the shocking, jaw dropping racism you just pulled,” but it’s not actually your thesis.

See, the point of your post isn’t, “fandom is racist.” The point is that fandom should be punished for that racism, even when other people aren’t.

And punishment, in this case, equals denial. It equals the exact same censure and gatekeeping that prevents people like me from publishing in traditional media.

Remember when I pointed out that traditional media is, by necessity, more racist than fandom?

By calling for fandom to imitate traditional media, you are calling for fandom to become more racist, not less.

Setting aside the misogyny, the homophobia, the queerphobia, the transphobia of your post.

This kind of thinking is extremely. Fucking. Racist.

And as someone who purports to be all about increasing the diversity of expression in traditional media, what with the url “diverse high fantasy”?

You need to do better.

Also, like, the actual KKK? The far end of my little racism scale?

They really ARE getting a pass in all this. That’s actually a true statement, and people should be fucking shouting it from the rooftops. This purge seeks to punish women for having bodies, queers for having sex, and sex workers for doing work. And yes, it seeks to punish fandoms for daring to talk about fiction.

But it leaves lynch mod organizers untouched. People who do real harm, to real victims. Victims like me, because just for reference, I’ve lived in KKK country. I’ve watched them set homes on fire and circle the yard with guns to shoot anyone who tries to leave. I’ve gone to bed each night hoping to god the next place they burn down wouldn’t be mine. I’ve watched people die in some of the worst imaginable ways.

And you sit here, and you claim that people should not speak out against that. You claim that saying that is unacceptable is somehow “derailing” a “real conversation” on racism.

As if taking the side of the worst kind of racists is somehow not racist.

So, like, until you can learn to be less disingenuous, I hope that everything you put in your putrid mouth tastes like the rot of which you are thoroughly made.

In other words?

Eat shit.

“By calling for fandom to imitate traditional media, you are calling for fandom to become more racist, not less.”