Illusion, remember?

illusionremember @ 2025-09-20T16:52:00

2026-05-09T05:35:55Z

Someone in the KKBB discord group raised a discussion question related to a conversation they were having in class, and in light of other conversations going on on my tumblr dash, I want to share my response.

The question they asked was this:

"is flawed representation better than no representation?"

The suggestion that no representation would be better than flawed representation suggests that only unflawed representation should be allowed. This is itself flawed because there is no objectively correct depiction of any person, because people themselves are complex and flawed.

Also what would happen, if unflawed representation is the only acceptable goal, is that everything would get rejected for one reason or another. This PoC character is flawed because they are loud and that's a stereotype. This queer character is TOO sexual. This character isn't overtly sexual or queer ENOUGH, so they MUST be straight. This disabled character is treated as a victim vs. this disabled character is so untroubled by their disablity they might as well not be disabled. etc etc etc I could come up with "problematique" examples of representation all day. "This character is problematic" is something that gets thrown at every character that's not white/straight/male/fully abled all the time as reasons why people shouldn't like them.

People as a whole will never be able to agree on what "flawless" representation is because for every marginalized person that says "we aren't all like that!" there's another marginalized person that can say "but I AM and I feel SEEN".

So the question then becomes.... who is allowed to decided what the "perfect" representation is? Consider this — the amount of people in the 2SLGBTQIA+ community for whom "queer" is a preferred label because it is inclusive and offers privacy regardless of your particular label, vs. the exclusionary radfem rhetoric that queer is a slur. The thing is, all the queer communities' terms have been used as slurs. So if we're not allowed to use language that might be perceived as a slur, then what terms are we permitted to use? Who decides, in this case, what "good" representation means? What is the criteria that must be met? And who then is excluded by that very criteria?

But when we allow for any depiction, even flawed ones, even damaging ones... now we can talk about it. We can look at these characters and discuss how xyz trait is a stereotype, not necessarily with the intent to erase that from future writing, but to talk about that stereotype as it gets applied to real world people and how it is damaging. Even "bad" representation can become a tool for conversation.

Furthermore it bears pointing out that the "ideal" and "unflawed" depiction is going to look different over time because our cultural perspectives on marginalized people changes so fucking rapidly. Language changes, perspectives change, priorities change. "Good representation" cannot be a static image, and it often means that what was once amazing representation for it's time period, when held to a newer, more modern standard, can seem like bad representation. Which is a problem with the interpretation, not the original work.

So yeah, the concept of "flawed" representation and whether it should be disallowed will only ever lead back around to censorship, which only protects the people in power, and prevents marginalized people from being able to show diversity fullstop.

Flawed representation will always be better than no representation.

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coming out stories

2026-05-09T04:54:44Z

been thinking about the closet and how people write about it and how it sucks because so many networks and publishers only wanna hear about the closet if it's some teenager figuring out they're gay and coming to terms with that and then they gotta come out to all their friends and family and their whole school and their whole community in preferably the most dramatic way possible so everyone can prove how woke the characters all are by having them group hug except for maybe one asshole who's the token homophobe who nonetheless will come around (if it's their parent or friend) or else will be written off as non-noteworthy bigot (if it's some old geezer or mean girl no one likes anyways)

and how that's not how the closet or coming out works at all because we are always coming out of the closet. you don't make a big announcement and then everyone knows. You start with like one or two people that you trust, and then you move outwards until everyone you trust knows. And you gotta keep coming out and coming out and coming out and coming out and sometimes you get sick of having that conversation or you know someone will have a bad response or you don't know a person enough to care if they know so you DON'T come out and you just exist and people figure it out or they don't.

a lot of times we know damn well that we're queer, and we're not agonizing about ourselves but we know it's not safe, so we don't tell people. But we fucking know we're queer and we don't need some elder queer or woke & worldly straight to explain to us that it's normal and okay to be queer and it's no one else's fucking business anyways

and every time someone insists that a character can't be queer because we don't see them kiss another person or state outright that they are queer complete with microlabels and a sad face so we know that they're deeply disappointed in their lot in life, it makes me wanna scream because

the audience is not owed the character coming out to you

and that's all that kind of moment is at the end of the day. It's not even about coming out to their loved ones. It's about coming out to the audience. the clear-cut statement of who they are so that you the onlooker can feel validated and satisfied. If you need to see a character kiss or hear them say "I'm gay" to admit that they aren't straight then what you really want is for the character to come out to you.

Queer people and characters do not owe you self-identifying language and peeks into their relationships and that doesn't fucking mean they're actually straight unless otherwise said. Way too many people are attacking and belittling REAL PEOPLE because their heteronormative worldview doesn't allow for queer people to see and recognize themselves in others — they think you're part of this group or that group and everyone needs to show ID to interact.

Anyways, people in the closet, I love you. I will hold the door for you as long as you need. I'll station myself outside so that you can feel safer, whatever you need.

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retransitioning

2026-05-09T04:29:52Z

Following a conversation on tumblr about detransition, and how most people don't detransition out of regret, but due to pressure and volatile stigma from their community. It made me think about something that I read a while ago where someone talked about how they frame it not as "detransition" but as "retransition". Because yes, often it's about external pressures and going back in the closet, but also, "detransition" implies an undoing. it implies that their feelings when they transitioned the first time were wrong, were a mistake. It implies that they had a lapse in understanding of themselves and are now correcting an error. And I have a lot of problems with that framework even without the fact that trans folks are heavily pressured to detransition.

People want to act like when you transition it's only and solely a recognition that you were always XYZ, but for many trans people - especially if you are genderqueer, nonbinary, genderfluid - that may not be the case at all. Gender is like a dimmer switch, it can change and fluctuate and while yeah, some people start and stay firmly at one end or another, it's not inaccurate to recognize that for a lot of people gender changes over time. So for someone that transitioned once, then later said you know what, I'm transitioning in the other direction, that doesn't mean that they are "detransitioning". They're not necessarily unbecoming trans, or suddenly realizing they were cis the whole time. They pursued recognition as one gender, and are now pursuing recognition as a different gender. They are transitioning again.

It helped so much with putting words to concepts around gender and transition that I rarely saw anyone talking about, because so much emphasis has been put on "I was always this and never that" as a framework for the trans experience. That's a valid experience for many, but it is not universal.

Anyways, to everyone who has ever transitioned, or retransitioned, I love you, and I support whatever makes you feel happy and safe. You deserve to feel seen and happy.

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illusionremember @ 2026-04-05T19:20:00

2026-05-09T03:47:19Z

I don't care what kind of marginalized you are — saying shit like "xyz kind of person should be allowed to kill/harm anyone (of abc demographic) they want for any reason" or "all xyz should die" or "xyz are evil and valueless" are, in fact extremist, bigoted, and bioessentialist viewpoints that directly contribute to divisiveness and hold back any real ability for ANY OF US to create progress for marginalized people.

Because that attitude isn't about lessening harm or creating safety for the marginalized. It's about who is allowed to cause the harm, and who is an acceptable target to hurt.

Dressing literal violence up as empowerment is still advocating for literal violence.

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illusionremember @ 2026-04-27T19:16:00

2026-05-08T12:05:45Z

do you guys think in 300 years people will be reading our blogs and emails and the things that we write about ourselves and still going "well they didn't have the same concepts around gender and sexuality that we did so clearly it's wrong to say they were anything other than straight or cisgender" or if our genders/sexualities are REALLY out there they might still be like "well MAYBE they were a lesbian/gay man but that wasn't okay so they had to hide themselves as a man/woman"

"this person used he/him pronouns and exclusively expressed a desire to be seen as male but because we have a different term for that now we're going to classify them as a woman instead"

notice how "straight" and "cisgender" also didn't exist as terms back in the day but we don't go around saying that obviously historical figures can't be identified as straight or cisgender and can been reliably seen and recognized as such without pushback?

notice how women and female-identified people have consistently been classified as property and as their fathers and husbands' wards and not as full citizens or even full human beings (not to mention how people of color were spoken about and treated) but that doesn't mean that we continue to classify them as subhuman just because that was the legal or culturally accepted understanding at the time? And we also don't try to argue that men and women couldn't be heterosexual because "well the ideas around intimacy were different back then". Like different views on relationships and gender and intimacy did definitely exist but that does not mean that transgender and gay people didn't exist, any more than straight people or cisgender people didn't.

like we can talk about terminology and nuance without denying historical figures their personal identity and the ways that they referred to themselves and asked to be seen. And we can recognize that people that historically had some gender and sexuality that went outside the normative views just might have actually been queer and it's actually really important that we are able to talk about things with the words that we coined recently specifically because we needed better words to talk about these things.

Would that man who banged men have called himself gay? Maybe not at the time, but that is the word we have for men who are sexually attracted to men. Would that person who used he/him pronouns and insisted they were a man and married a woman and lived as a man and had a male name they went by have called himself trans if he lived in modern times where women can be openly lesbian without having to be a man? I mean, yeah, I feel like, even back in the day, if a woman just wanted to bang women there are easier ways to go about doing that than trying to reshape her life as a man. I think maybe he considered himself a man.

Language and terminology change over time because we are continuously developing new vocabulary to describe concepts and things and feelings that already exist. Would that person in ancient times have called themselves queer? No, because Modern English didn't exist back then. People try to use these as gotchas in order to erase and minimize queer people from history, but they glibly apply this logic only where it serves their argument.

Anyways, I hereby give all future historians and queer folks permission to use whatever the newest good faith queer terminology of the era is that accurately describes my queer experience of life to talk about me. If the terms that I typically use in my writings about myself are still in use, please use those. If you are deliberately going to try and erase my queerness, you can go fuck yourself.

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illusionremember @ 2026-05-03T04:12:00

2026-05-08T11:12:50Z

The suppression and limitation of queer voices, writing, and art is more dangerous and damaging to marginalized people than fetishization could ever be.

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Sexuality & Identity

2026-05-08T11:08:10Z

Anyways, friendly reminder from a super fucking queer person that actually

bisexuality is real

gay people can have heterosexual sex and still be gay

straight people can have homosexual sex and still be straight

ace people can have sex and still be asexual

intersex and trans and nonbinary folks — and their partners — can identify their sexuality however the fuck they want

In fact, people in general can identify their sexuality however the fuck they want, regardless of who their partners are and how they are perceived. All of these things can be true and do not contradict each other.

This is because the act of sex is not actually tied to who you are attracted to. People have sex with people they aren't attracted to all the time.

The gender of your partner or previous partners does not define your sexuality. It's okay to have had and enjoyed sex with people that are not the gender you typically are attracted to, and that doesn't necessarily change your sexuality.

Similarly, your partner's sexuality does not get to define your gender. Other people's identity has nothing to do with you or yours. Other people being attracted to you, regardless of their sexuality, has nothing to do with your gender identity. Identity and sexuality are complicated. Other people's perceptions, including attraction, have nothing to do with you, actually.

It comes down to this — your gender and sexuality identity has to do with YOU only. What feels right to you? What resonates with you? What, if anything, are you drawn to?

No two people experience attraction or sexuality or gender in the exact same way. Labels do not slot you into a group with a hive mind. Labels fit around you, not the other way around. If you don't know what label fits, that's cool too. You don't need one, if you don't want one. Labels are simple a means of communication. They are for trying to articulate your identity and describe it in whatever way makes the most sense to you.

Anyways, sexuality is fluid, gender is a construct, all genders and sexualities are valid and deserving of respect. Peace ✌🏻

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