womanhood; whiteness; queerness; being online
as a white trans woman who has been very online, of course i care about what other online white trans women think or say and what the general cultural currents are like in that space. those are my people, to some extent
but it’s very important not to mistake that personal sentiment for the idea that this microdemographic of white womanhood is remotely important, relevant, or even coherent on any kind of political scale. or that a culture which is steeped in white protestant ideas of gender, western european orientalism and racism, and feelings of exclusivity and sometimes outright bigotry inherited from forums like somethingawful or 4chan is actually, on the whole, a good or progressive force
it’s okay to recognize your personal attachments to these communities and still criticize them. it’s more than okay, even healthy, to recognize your personal attachments to these communities while deciding you don’t give a fuck what they think or whether their current Discourse has takes which are right or wrong. it’s absolutely crucial that you do form other commitments, to other cultures and communities which ARE politically meaningful and DO matter, if you want to get anything done
cohost re: womanhood; whiteness; queerness; being online
cohost is/has been failing because of the identities of the people who founded it, because of the communities those people are in, and because of the failings of those communities. absolutely. it’s failing because of tech people and tech culture, it’s failing because of online leftists and online leftist culture, it’s failing because of furries and furry culture, and it’s failing because of neurodivergent queers and neurodivergent queer culture. and other reasons besides! if you are invested in any of those communities, it’s necessary that you recognize those failings, realize that they come from inside the house, and work on yourself and the people around you to fix that shit and get better. that’s the only way you will grow, and the only way your community will get to a place where it is effective, or even healthy
but it’s also fine to say nah. it’s also fine to not give a shit. because at the end of the day, these are just friends of friends, not a political organization or movement, and you don’t owe them anything. you can not associate and you can spend your time instead on those who have earned your care