melchi0r

Howdy, fellow netizens!

It's been almost a week since my last entry. I apologize for my lethargy; between hanging out with my irl friends, watching & reading anime & manga, and appeasing my parents, I have little time to update my Neocities these days.

This past week was pretty eventful for me. Two friends and I went downtown to get some drinks. It was goth night, so my friends looked the part. I, on the other hand, wore a long sleeve button-up shirt with a sweatshirt over it and some eye shadow (Essentially, I was a Tim Burton character!). The drinks were kinda meh, but I had a lot of fun going out.

On the 2nd, I went to get some pizza with another group of friends at a local restaurant. Afterwards, we saw "Nope," a weird movie about ///SPOILERS/// an organic UFO (and a berserk chimp?). It wasn't the best movie ever, but we still had a blast. :)

Finally, I went over to watch anime & movies at a best friend's house two nights ago. We saw Little Witch Academia, Sailor Moon (1992), and a romance movie I can't remember the name of (I was so soooo tired!!). My friend got me hooooked on the original Sailor Moon anime, so that's why this page is bedecked by Usagi pics! :)) I wish someone introduced me to the anime sooner Q-Q but at least I'm enjoying it now! I'm barely on the 6th or 7th episode, but I'm already so, so, so obsessed with it!!!

In other news, I've been thinking a lot about my gender identity lately. I guess that's not much of a surprise considering my last few entries. Recently, I've been toying with the term "transfem" or "transfemme" to describe myself; however, to avoid any confusion, I'd like to add that I do not regard myself as a "woman." Since I'm nonbinary, I don't subscribe to any gender. Rather, I adopt several gender expressions—or none at all—depending on how I feel. It just so happens that, for the time being, I've been leaning more into femininity. I acknowledge that, on the plane of ultimate reality, "femininity" is metaphysically empty. It does not exist in itself, instead relying on a system of relations, symbols, and rituals to sustain itself. But, nevertheless, it is a useful descriptor that at least paints in part how I'd like to present myself to others.

But yeah! I've been feeling here and there, but at least I'm seeing my friends again & doing things I like. Hopefully I can finally express myself the way I want to when I go back to college. I can't wait to start this semester! I'm so excited. ^.^

It's starting to get late, so I'm gonna go ahead and sign off. Until next time!

Dear diary,
I am annoyed.

I'm annoyed by the people that suround me. The gaggle of faceless, anonymous passersby that gawk at me. It's tiring. Sometimes I think it's all in my head—it's not. I'm "different," and that's reason enough for the sneers. I hate to have such a meanspirited & self-centered mentality of the world, but after discovering that, well, I'm the way I am, it is somewhat justified. I'm from a red state (AKA Republican for my non-American followers), meaning that the attitudes towards gay, trans, nonbinary, & queer people are, generally, negative. This didn't use to be a problem for me. Back when I identified as a bi man, I didn't feel like I was in any real danger. I guess you could say that I skirted the line between was "acceptable" and what was "not," and that was fine by me (This was how I viewed the world as a bi man; I am not attesting to the experiences of all cis bisexual people). Now, though, I feel pretty unsafe, especially since homophobic & transphobic sentiment is on the rise in America. Though I dress rather androgynously right now, I'm scared about wearing effeminate clothing in public. I yearn to dress in whatever articles of clothing match my gender expression on a given day; however, I think I'll have to be selective in what I wear. It's so unfair.

Why are MY interests of any concern to other people? It's ridculous how the same crowd that goes on about free speech & freedom of expression seek to STIFLE the free speech & freedom of expression of those they don't like.

People will harp on and on about being individualists & free thinkers, but they make their whole lives about the business others. If a girl enjoys something innocent and pretty, why is it so important to you? If she wants to wear clothes that fit her personality better than “traditional” styles, why is it such a problem? Or if a person who was AMAB wants to wear a dress, is it really that big of a deal? Cis, straight men make it a point to dismantle everything—and anything!—that’s fun & enjoyable for girls and queer people. But of course, it's all justified in the name of kulturkampf: "They are literally groomers, firebrands, culture-distorters, etc. etc. and we need to protect traditional, Western gender norms to safeguard our (white) children!" But is the erosion of these values—values that have dehumanized the Other and cast them out of the social fold—worth preserving? And do they even exist outside the realm of ideas? At the end of the day, we are dealing with a historically-contingent, Western bourgeois morality turned fascistic. I try not to use the term "fascist" lightly, but that is essentially what it is; when the negative "freedom from" in liberalism is turned into a positive, content-filled "freedom for," it is usually a "freedom for" the predominant social identity. Isn't this what Christian nationalism is? It is a freedom not for you or for me, but for a constructed subject that does not exist in reality. So, to this end, the current "dissident right" discourse surrounding gender, sexuality, race, etc. is fascistic.

I'm sorry for the long diatribe. On top of the previous things that I've mentioned, the whole "groomer" discourse has got me on edge lately. Not only is it brain-racking, but it's also disturbing. It's the same rhetoric that was deployed against those "Others" during the Red Scare & Satanic Panic, so I'm just kinda o_o here. Even my own Mother used the term "grooming" when describing LGBTQ+ education in schools (like groomers don't exist in orgs and institutions that teach traditional gender norms lol!). So yeah...

I hope I haven't made y'all bored with all this. I'm just angry, sad, and annoyed.

august