Hi! Are you cis in the UK and you’d like to support trans rights? Great!
How: buy a trans flag pin and wear it in public.
Why: chaff is an overwhelming amount of false positives so that when a missile gets close to the plane, it hits the chaff and not the plane.
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In practice: the goal is to make it DIFFICULT to identify trans people to target with bathroom bans, and to create many FALSE POSITIVES for businesses.
Basically, you might get accused of being trans and kicked out, because of the badge. You say: I wear the badge because trans rights matter.
You follow up with a letter to the business saying you’re fucking furious because some nosy dipshit just tried to play fucking genital police with you in the loos. You know lots of trans people (don’t name any, if you do) and you wear the pin in support and you’re disgusted at them for allowing this.
Blame the business for allowing the behaviour.
Businesses see that their cis customers are getting bothered over a badge and may clarify trans-inclusive policies, so they can kick out the bathroom botherers instead of nice cis allies.
You only need to buy and wear the badge, and you are protecting trans people. You can be genuinely heroic. Even one cis person doing this helps, and everyone you get to join in helps even more.
It’s so nice being on tumblr because you don’t even have to make your own post but people would still follow you anyways if you’re good at rebloging posts they like
So a couple days ago, some folks braved my long-dormant
social media accounts to make sure Iād seen this tweet:
And after getting over my initial (rather emotional) response,
I wanted to reply properly, and explain just why that hit me so hard.
So back around twenty years ago, the internet cosplay and
costuming scene was very different from today. The older generation of sci-fi
convention costumers was made up of experienced, dedicated individuals who had
been honing their craft for years. Ā These
were people who took masquerade competitions seriously, and earning your
journeyman or master costuming badge was an important thing.Ā They
had a lot of knowledge, but ā hereās the important bit ā a lot of them didnāt
share it. Ā Itās not just that they
werenāt internet-savvy enough to share it, or didnāt have the time to write up
tutorials ā no, literally if you asked how they did something or what material
they used, they would refuse to tell you.
Some of them came from professional backgrounds where this knowledge
literally was a trade secret, others just wanted to decrease the chances of
their rivals in competitions, but for whatever reason it was like getting a
door slammed in your face. Ā Now, thatās a
generalization ā there were definitely some lovely and kind and helpful
old-school costumers ā but they tended to advise more one-on-one, and the idea
of just putting detailed knowledge out there for random strangers to use wasnāt
much of a thing. Ā And then what information
did get out there was coming from people with the freedom and budget to do
things like invest in all the tools and materials to create authentic leather hauberks,
or build a vac-form setup to make stormtrooper armor, etc. Ā NOT beginner friendly, is what Iām saying.
Then, around 2000 or so, two particular things happened: anime
and manga began to be widely accessible in resulting in a boom in anime
conventions and cosplay culture, and a new wave of costume-filled franchises
(notably the Star Wars prequels and the Lord of the Rings movies) hit the
theatres. Ā What those brought into the
convention and costuming arena was a new wave of enthusiastic fans who wanted to make costumes, and though a
lot of the anime fans were much younger, some of them, and a lot of the movie
franchise fans, were in their 20s and 30s, young enough to use the internet to
its (then) full potential, old enough to have autonomy and a little money, and
above all, overwhelmingly female. Ā I
think that latter is particularly important because that meant they had a lifetime
of dealing with gatekeepers under our belts, and we werenāt inclined to deal
with yet another one.Ā They looked at the
old dragons carefully hoarding their knowledge, keeping out anyone who might be
unworthy, or (even worse) competition, and they said NO. Ā If secrets were going to be kept, they were going to figure things out for ourselves, and then they were going to
share it with everyone. Ā Those old-school
costumers may have done us a favor in the long run, because not knowing those
old secrets meant that we had to find new methods, and we were trying ā and succeeding
with ā materials that āseriousā costumers would never have considered. Ā I was
one of those costumers, but there were many more ā I was more on the movie side
of things, so JediElfQueen and PadawansGuide immediately spring to mind, but
there were so many others, on YahooGroups and Livejournal and our own
hand-coded webpages, analyzing and testing and experimenting and swapping ideas
and sharing, sharing, sharing. Ā
Iām not saying that to make it sound like we were the noble
knights of cosplay, riding in heroically with tutorials for all. Ā Iām saying that a group of people, individually
and as a collective, made the conscious decision that sharing was a Good Things that would improve the community as a whole. Ā That wasnāt
necessarily an easy decision to make, either.
I know I thought long and hard before I posted that tutorial; the reaction I had gotten when I wore that
armor to a con told me that I had hit on something new, something that gave me
an edge, and if I didnāt share that info I could probably hang on to that edge
for a year, or two, or three. Ā And I
thought about it, and I was briefly tempted, but again,
there were all of these others around me sharing what they knew, and I had seen
for myself what I could do when I borrowed and adapted some of their ideas, and
I felt the power of what could happen when a group of people came together and
gave their creativity to the world.
And it changed the face of costuming. Ā People who had been intimidated by the sci-fi competition circuit suddenly found the confidence to try it themselves, and brought in their own ideas and discoveries. Ā And then the next wave of younger costumers
took those ideas and ran, and built on them, and branched out off of them, and
the wave after that had their own innovations, and suddenly here we are, with
Youtube videos and Tumblr tutorials and Etsy patterns and step-by-step how-to
books, and I am just so, so proud. Ā
So yeah, seeing appreciation for a 17-year-old technique I
figured out on my dining-room table (and bless it, doesnāt that page just
scream āI learned how to code on Geocities!ā), and having it embraced as a
springboard for newer and better things warms this fandom-oldās heart. Ā This is our legacy, and a legacy the current
group of cosplayers is still creating, and itās a good one. Ā
(Oh, and for anyone wondering: yes, Iām over 40 now, and
yes, Iām still making costumes. And that armor is still in great shape after 17
years in a hot attic!) Ā
Hang on a minute. I recognize the name āpenwiperā. Let me checkā Ok, yeah, Iāve heard of this person.
Comment with Just One Thing you've accomplished in the last 24 hours or so. It doesn't have to be a hard thing, or even a thing that you think is particularly awesome. Just a thing that you did.
Feel free to share more than one thing if you're feeling particularly accomplished! Extra credit: find someone in the comments and give them props for what they achieved!
Nothing is too big, too small, too strange or too cryptic. And in case you'd rather do this in private, anonymous comments are screened. I will only unscreen if you ask me to.
The new supermarket ads come out on Wednesday, but I didn't even look at the Safeway ad to see what bargains I'm going to miss this week because I bought stuff last week instead of waiting for this week, which was the original schedule. Maybe I just don't want to know, so I won't kick myself over it. I should really wait and see what I'll be getting next week, though, on the next week I would have missed without the shift. There might be some great stuff.
This is the last horrendously hot night I'll have to endure for a few days. Friday night is supposed to go down to 58, after a high of only 86. I'm so ready for that. I might heat up a frozen lasagna that night, since they have to be done in the real oven, and I don't like them to stay in the freezer too long. This will probably be my best chance this month to use one up.
Oh, that stupid old guy I live with (okay, it's me) has forgotten to charge the phone for three days running, and I lose Idernet when that happens. I've also misplaced several objects each day, and I'm not sure I'm not still missing some of them. But at least I remember to drink my dinner beer, whether I have dinner or not. It's good discipline, and I'm proud of myself. Or a bit drunk perhaps. One of those.
1. I spent Tuesday dealing with dishwashers. Father-in-law needs a new dishwasher and one was ordered, it was duly dispatched and eventually arrived with 2 guys who were meant to remove old one and install new. But the dishwasher was wedged into place so tightly that they couldn't get it out. It looks as if the kitchen units and the floor were installed after the dishwasher was in place, and dishwasher was boxed in. No wiggle-room, no space to lift or maneuver, and installers are not allowed to start breaking apart your kitchen. So they left and took (new) dishwasher with them.
I wanted to have a go at moving dishwasher myself, but father-in-law was having fits about 'get a proper man' so I spent an hour with my phone to find another handyman. He has been and had to use an electric hacksaw, a large hammer, and a crowbar but success. Old dishwasher is now on the balcony pending collection, and I have arranged for new dishwasher to be re-delivered.
All very boring, but this is what is chewing up my time right now.
Father-in-law is grumpy. He finds this all very stressful and disapproves of the dishwasher on principal.
2. We're having a by-election (council, *not* the big by-election for Makefield), and we had canvassers to visit. First time ever. Opening question was "How's Charlie?" which was a trifle disconcerting. But yes, my cat is a big friendly highly noticeable white cat and he is best friends with all the neighbourhood. Once we had established that "yes Charlie was fine" and "no I wasn't going to vote for them" canvasser didn't linger, but it was interesting.
3. Also cat-related. My cat is snoring. It's the wrong time of day to chat up canvassers, so he's asleep on the bookshelf in my office. When I got myself out of bed, he (laboriously) got down off the bed, climbed from the floor into the armchair, clawed up the back of the armchair and cautiously did the stretch-step from top of chair to bookshelf so he can sit on his blanket by the window. Doesn't want to play or to be fussed, just the cat equivalent of focusmate where he likes to share a space with someone else.
`Just watched Taiwanese film åæę妻妻ē (English title: Heart Set on Her) (just released recently) and enjoyed it. Only 40 minutes long, tackles some family issues (no homophobia from the family) in the eve of their wedding. It doesn't have the run time to get into anything too groundbreaking, but it excelled at giving this relationship life and depth in that time. Super charming, great cinematography and a grounded expectation. Def worth an afternoon watch! They're super cute and I love to see the leads in something longer in the future.
Community Thursday challenge: every Thursday, try to make an effort to engage with a community on Dreamwidth, whether that's posting, commenting, promoting, etc.
Our e-friend Jon who ran a Traveller campaign a while ago invited me and Michael to join a Pendragon game he's running on Saturdays. Actually he mentioned it and I told him I could not commit to every Saturday but I was interested in being there at least part-time and he was OK with it.
Everybody else had already built their characters so I built mine today: she is Dame Patience and she is a Pagan knight at the court of Sir Roderick of Salisbury. We did random builds using the Foundry VTT software so she's not perfectly constructed, but I think Pendragon is like Traveller: you roll your dice and you take your chances. There are three other PCs and Michael and it looks to be a good group, even though there are some players who are young enough to be my kids.
I am apparently also the teaboo and the Arthurian expert in this group, so this should be interesting.
He was on his way out of the building, so I only had time to ask Johnny Knoxville two questions.
First, to whether he's got any plans on releasing a collection of his writings: he's been talking to people he knows about it, so while it's not a definitive answer, the possibility remains open.
Second, to what Muppet adaptation of classic literature he'd like to star in: Wuthering Heights. He didn't say what role he'd take, but there's few that wouldn't be worth full ticket price.
The Museum of the Moving Image screened Jackass: Best and Last, and I signed up for a seat and got in. As is true with every Jackass movie, it's best seen in a packed theater where everyone's laughing hard enough to hurt and having the time of their lives. The Q&A after had Knoxville say gravity was his medium. Jeff Tremaine and Spike Jonze spoke also, about musical cues and levels of trust and pranks played when the cameras weren't rolling. Afterwards, there was wine and cheese and little sandwiches, and just enough time for me to ask Johnny Knoxville two questions before leaving for the night.
I also had a moment to ask Tremaine if he planned on producing more documentaries and found he's working on one right now and that he deeply enjoys doing those. I told him I was sure the world would open itself up to him, then excused myself when some other people came up for selfies. Me, I didn't bother with pictures. I have the ticket stub and my answers as mementos, and they're more than enough to make me happy.
Current Mood:touched
Current Music:Make Your Own Kind Of Music - Cass Elliot
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How did a hamster wheel get into space? The Hamster Wheel Nebula (Longmore 8) was 
