Bisexuality

That girl is bisexual? Nah she's just a whore. That guy is bisexual? Nah he's just confused.

Those filthy bisexuals, sleeping with everyone, denying their real sexuality, compromising our concrete view of how things ought to be. How DARE they.

Sound familiar?

Unfortunately, even sometimes among gays and lesbians, there is horrible intolerance and ignorance. And it is shockingly pervasive.

Firstly, I'd like to point out that (cue sass) that crap ain't none of your goddamn business. Who really cares? If someone wants to identify as bisexual, let them. Members of the LGBT community especially, considering many of the struggles we go through, should understand the pain when people deny that your sexuality is even real.

Furthermore, bisexuality definitely IS real, and to understand it we have to pull our minds away from the gender binary. Some people can like men and women (or those fabulous people in between), because they are attracted to people regardless of gender. Bisexuality can often be synonymous with pansexuality, the potential for attraction to certain people of any gender. Bisexuals and pansexuals AREN'T attracted to EVERYONE, just as I'm not attracted to every man I see (think of how exhausting that would be). But to put a limit on the amount of genders you should be attracted to is, to me, the most absurd concept.

Sexuality is a complex and beautiful thing, and we should accept and respect that. It is never black and white, but a diverse spectrum, and everyone's is different (which is actually what the rainbow flag means, FYI). Some people don't even want to put labels on their sexuality so as not to limit themselves to what society expects of that label.

Then there's the "bisexuals", with emphasis on the quotation marks. For a while I told myself that I must be bisexual until I accepted that the way I feel about women is nowhere near as strong as the way I feel about men, thus ultimately identifying myself as gay. But every case is different. When someone tells you they are bi, don't dismiss it. Don't tell them they're confused because it might be a sure thing. And don't, for goodness' sake, pressure them into thinking they have to label themselves as anything. People who aren't straight often really struggle with it, and they need time to sort it out by themselves. Only that person is witness to the true complexities of their own sexual orientation, and only they can choose to define it. For some people, sexual orientation can even be a fluid thing that changes naturally over time. 

As a wise young girl in a racist taco ad once said, "Por que no los dos?" 

Why restrict love to the confines of either one gender or the other?

Why make assumptions based on a simple word one uses to define this key, integral and undeniably natural part of themselves?

They say that love is blind. Why can't it be blind to gender?

Love the bisexuals - love any orientation - and you will restore my faith in humanity.

Thanks for reading. Feel welcome to leave comments, whether it agrees with or challenges me! And have the best day/night/whatever ever!

Feminism

Okay, people, I'm a feminist.

I'm addressing this issue because it's important to me, and I just want to say this, even though nobody will read it.

Some people think it's a bad thing for some reason; that if I believe in equal rights for women I should just call myself an "egalitarian". While I am also an egalitarian, one of the main things I like to advocate is rights for women, the most physically, psychologically and socially abused demographic in human history, despite consisting of 50% of the population.

Therefore this issue is important, people.

Feminism is not the advocacy of women's superiority. Some feminists do go too far and do this, which is why the issue of feminism has become so polarising. But the true definition is, according to the Oxford Dictionary (and supported by other definitions in Wikipedia and just about EVERY dictionary on the face of the earth), "the advocacy of women’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes."

And yes. I did just copy and paste that from the Oxford Dictionary website, and I'm unsure how to change the font. Oh look, it's right up there... nah, I'll just leave it small. It adds a bit of character.

But the POINT is that FEMINISM = (WOMEN=MEN)

Comprende?

If you think men's rights are deteriorating, that our society is becoming too "politically correct" and you think "masculism" should be something we advocate for, you really don't understand how messed up the world really is. And even if feminists are overcorrecting, even if women do end up becoming superior to men, don't you think they're owed some kind of retribution?

Don't laugh, the patriarchy is a thing. Male dominance is engrained in our society, and women have a hard enough time as it is finding themselves both powerful and positive. And while it's harder to see in first world countries today, male dominance is still here. Australia and other progressive countries need to do their utmost to promote equal rights for everyone (something I might talk about in a later post regarding the longterm effects of children's entertainment).

Women put up with enough. They have periods and childbirth and boobs hurting when you punch them, and you can't say that the average man has to put up with worse things (and don't be a baby; there are worse things than getting hit in the testicles).

So don't make it harder for true feminists by being a deceived moron.

Rant over. You BETTER have a nice day!

...Women are so awesome that I wish I was one, because skirts look like fun to wear. Girls keep telling me they aren't but ... okay I'll stay a man because of the whole childbirth thing.

Year 12 Limbo, National Coming Out Day and Panda GIFs

Long title, short-ish post. Hello all.

Here in Australia, the last year of school is called Year 12 and it's the year we finish high school with the HSC exams, but the Board of Studies of New South Wales has decreed that we can't start the Year 12 course for another week, even though we've finished Year 11 already... so we're kind of in limbo and I'm a bit confused as to what we're actually meant to be doing, but a lot of subjects are just ploughing ahead anyway and telling us not to tell the Board of Studies.

So yeah, I'm in limbo for the next week. But then I start Year 12! And it's exciting and terrifying at the same time. I'm really looking forward to Art and Extension 2 English just because there's loads of creativity and stuff involved in the Year 12 course and it's so open-ended so I'm going to love the freedom. Other stuff... not so much. I'm dreading my other English courses simply because I'll have to do so much reading and study and ugh... Needless to say, my writing ambitions are being put on hold for a while. I might do a bit in the summer holidays but I don't know... I think Art will serve as a sufficient creative outlet.

That's the boring stuff out of the way. Let's talk about National Coming Out Day! Did that rhyme? I don't know. National Coming Day is an event celebrated on October 11, a couple days ago, in several different countries including the US and Australia in memory of the 2nd March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights in 1987 which was a major breakthrough in gay history, so I'm told (my knowledge of gay history is actually pretty atrocious).

But here's the interesting thing about this day: I came out to my parents last year on October 11, without even knowing what day it was! How crazy is that? What a story the grandkids will have to suffer through.

So I'll just now acknowledge how great my life has been since coming out and I encourage people to come out wherever you are. The hardest thing to do for me was coming out to myself, and accepting my own sexuality and after that it was just ripping off a bandaid and telling my parents on October 11, 2012, then my friends about a week later. The closet sucks and there's not enough room to express yourself and yeah, it's one of the hardest things in the world for some people, as it was for me. But once you do come out, you'll feel so free and so much like the person you were intended to be. It's the greatest feeling, and it's such a shame that coming out is even a necessity in the first place. And it's nice to go into Year 12 as secure as I now am. I think I say more in my "Proud to Love" post a few months ago... so look at that too.

Yep, okay, that's pretty much all I needed to say. Everyone enjoy life as much as you can! Love you all! Stay calm and reduce harm. And watch adorable panda gifs. Just google "panda gifs". Unless you have no soul, those fluffy oriental balls of joy are sure to brighten up any day.

Author Update #2: Synopsis of "The Knights of the Fish"

As promised, I have written a brief synopsis of the Knights of the Fish, an extremely basic and somewhat simplistic overview of what this book will look like, although this synopsis is really only for the first half of the story, because everyone hates spoilers, although I definitely know where the story does go and, as I said in my last post, I've planned every chapter - there will be exactly 50 in all (I like round numbers).

At this point, I am currently writing the 17th chapter with 37 000 words (more words and chapters than A Definition of Magic!), and I'm only about a third of the way through. Since the chapters are on average 2500 words in length, I estimate that this novel, when I do complete it, will be approximately 125 000 words and 500 book pages long.

There's enough numbers for you! Moving on to the synopsis:

This story, loosely based on a Spanish folk tale, is told from the point of view of a wise sorcerer called Brujo, who continues to tell the tale even after he, by all appearances, is dead. With the help of his friend, a kindly fairy named Neris, Brujo tries to escape his enemy, the haggish evil fairy Palianthra, who rides on storm clouds and lays the eggs of dragons. But eventually he is caught and transformed into a fish by the sorceress’s curse. After living in a river for seven long years, Brujo finds the poor, downtrodden riverside farmer Guillen, whose crops are failing and whose wife is unable to produce children to help him on the farm. The magical fish decides to help him out while also contriving to defeat Palianthra, and tells Guillen and his wife to eat him, and also to plant other pieces of his body around their farmhouse. Though baffled by the fact that the fish can not only speak but is willing to give up its life, Guillen concedes to the request and, in no time, the magic makes a large sack of gold drop from his chimney while his wife produces a strong set of twin boys – our heroes Hector and Salvador.

Another seven years pass and the boys discover more miraculous gifts left behind from the fish. Two horses suddenly hatch from the very earth of the garden, their eyes shining blue and their hair pure white. Two shining swords with the initials “H” and “S” and shining shields emblazoned with a blue fish insignia fall from a tree. The message can not be clearer that these boys are destined for greatness. This fact is picked up on by Señor Esteban, a veteran soldier and the local lord, who takes the seven-year-olds on as pageboys so that they might grow to become the Knights of the Fish and fulfil their destiny.

Yet another seven years later, fourteen-year-old Hector is becoming stoic and honour-bound while Salvador is more passionate and virile, with both equal in appearance and fighting skill but differing greatly in personality. While they are being endowed as squires by Señor Esteban on their next step to knighthood, calamity strikes in the kingdom’s capital of Madrid. The King of Spain’s wife is dying of a fatal illness and the younger of his two daughters, Princess Ana, has mysteriously disappeared. It is the engineering of the Marquis of Villafranca, the king’s cousin, who hopes to eliminate the king’s daughters so that he becomes the sole heir to the throne. The marquis continues to plot for the next seven years, trying to gain the favour of the king while also working against his remaining daughter Princess Leonor and avoiding the equally-as-devious royal chamberlain, Mendoza.

Hector and Salvador, at the age of twenty-one, have served Señor Esteban well and are now ready to be made knights and ride off to unwittingly fulfil the destiny that Brujo had in mind for them. Deciding that heroes must ride alone, the brothers split up, with Hector heading to Madrid and Salvador to Toledo.

By the time Hector gets to Madrid, the conniving marquis is now the heir to the throne, having struck a deal with the witch Palianthra to steal away the innocent Princess Leonor with one of her dragons. Hector goes to fight this dragon, the Ruby Dragon, which can fly and breathe fire. At first he fails miserably, but the chamberlain Mendoza, who does not wish for the hateful marquis to succeed to the throne and wants to see the princess rescued, tells Hector of a benevolent dragon, the Amethyst Dragon, which can help Hector defeat the Ruby Dragon and rescue the fair maiden.

Meanwhile, Salvador’s journey is proving to be less epic. On the road to Toledo he scuffles with but eventually befriends an eccentric troupe of Italian comic actors, the Toscanini, who travel around Spain in a caravan. One of these performers is the hot-headed Colombina, who is skilled not only in stage performing but in archery, her constant companion a peculiar blue sparrow. In Toledo, Salvador and the actors meet a gluttonous archbishop who tries to destroy the actors with their controversial plays, and arrests all of them but Colombina, who escapes. Despite their intense rivalry, Salvador and Colombina work together to rescue their friends, but come across a new problem when the Diamond Dragon, one that breathes eyes, tears into the city of Toledo and captures Colombina. Like his brother, Salvador’s quest is now also to defeat a dragon and rescue a maiden, and soon their paths will converge as they head towards their final showdown with Palianthra and end what Brujo started.

Tell me what you think! Bear in mind that there are a few subplots and fun scenes that I have left out of this synopsis, which in my opinion are almost the highlights of the book. If The Knights of the Fish sounds interesting or if you are at all quizzical don't be afraid to leave a comment and also check out my post a couple days ago, which links to a Google Drive document with the first chapter, in which Brujo faces a dragon and then Palianthra herself.

Stay calm and reduce harm! I appreciate all of you who support my writing ambitions and who wish me well in writing this monstrosity of a novel.

Author Update #1: NEW NOVEL IN PROGRESS!

Hope everyone is having a great week! I wasn't going to share this, and many of you wouldn't care anyway, but after a bit of a slump over the past year I've decided that I MUST recommit myself to writing novels! Otherwise, I will shrivel and die.

I can't get much done at the moment, because my exams are starting, but I'm beginning to immerse myself back into a novel I started writing two years ago. "The Knights of the Fish" (working title) is based on a Spanish fairytale of the same name that I read from a compilation by Ruth Manning-Sanders. It's your classic hero's quest story, with knights going after dragons and rescuing princess, but with my own somewhat original take on it, particularly since I've set it in the 16th/17th century, when knight errants were already a little outdated. I've spiced it up with a bit of humour and wit that I hope manages to mock the medieval fantasy genre while also being taken seriously. I've also added in LOADS of subplots and side-characters like a troupe of actors who get up to mischievous shenanigans and a couple courtiers who constantly connive for power. I've derived lots of tropes from other folk tales and created a balance of witty dialogue, action-filled fighting scenes and court intrigue. It might not be the most original novel ever conceived, but I excuse myself by calling this an "adaption" of a folk tale. I'm mainly writing it because the humour, the action and even the more serious scenes are so fun to write!

I'll try to produce a synopsis, if I can!

I've polished up the plan I wrote two years ago and written a couple more chapters. It'll be 50 chapters all-in-all (a big step from the 15 chapters in my first book "A Definition of Magic"). Right now I'm up to 35,000 words and I've only written 17 chapters out of the 50! Zeus, give me strength!

In the meantime, feel free to read the rough draft of the first chapter I've posted on Google Drive. Here the mastermind wizard fights to escape the clutches of a villainous witch and the first of six dragons that appear in the story!

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxCSozSsVZukYUF6VGNKTjhIbTg/edit?usp=sharing

There are better chapters, but I'm proud of this one too. I'd like to post a more funny and witty one, but most of the subsequent chapters don't make a lot of sense when read out of order. Plus, spoilers. I'll see if I can assemble an excerpt!

Now I've come to the point where I make too many promises...

If you like it or have any questions about it, please leave a comment below!

Everyone stay calm and reduce harm! I love the very few of you who come to this blog!


P.S. I must attribute all of the awesome new planning techniques I've acquired to Katytastic on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/user/Katytastic) who does loads of videos on books and writing, being a novelist herself. Check her out if you're an aspiring writer or just a general book-lover!

How not to insult people

If the only bad thing you have to say about someone is that they wear a skullcap or that they enjoy One Direction, chances are they’re probably a very good person.

Good day, internetians (that should so be a word). Sorry about the lull, although I'm sure none of you care.

Today I’m going to talk about something I’m sick and tired of, because, you know, that’s not what most people talk about in articles all the time. Recently a friend said something that really resonated with me: “If I want to insult someone, I insult them, not their sexuality”. This made me think. This is the way in which all people should be insulted.

Of course I’m a very anti-hate person, and I try to stop it wherever I find it. But there are those people who you just have to “criticise” sometimes, mostly because they’re being a bully, or a moron, or a serial killer, and their reign of terror must come to an end.

In the case where you absolutely must insult somebody, use all the profanity you want. Just don’t pick on parts of them that they can’t control or that aren’t bad, like the demographic they belong to, like a gender, a race, a culture, a fashion, a body type, a sexuality or a fandom (even one as cringeworthy as that of the Twihards). If the only bad thing you have to say about someone is that they wear a skullcap or that they enjoy One Direction, chances are they’re probably a very good person. If they aren’t a good person, point out things about them that are actually bad like, say, that they are a narrow-minded idiot who only judges people by what they believe or what they love.

I’ll try to wrap this post up soon. But please, for the love of whatever god/s you worship or nonexistence thereof, if you dislike somebody, ask yourself why, and if it is for one of the seven-or-more reasons in that last paragraph, I think you need to figure out who deserves an insult in this situation.

Or, even better, you could complement them instead. You’re all beautiful, by the way.

Considering every cowardly insult hurled at me on the anonymous question site Ask.fm had something to do with me being gay, I thought I might as well address this head-on, and I know that millions of people are in this situation. I know that so many people in the world have to constantly suffer being insulted for stupid little things they can’t control or that make them happy. Don’t starve yourself just because someone called you ugly. Don’t stop enjoying country music because a friend called it lame. Do I need any more examples?

Bitch about someone because of how they put others down for this type of thing, or because they do some crazy horrible stuff like cannibalism that is considered horrible by everyone.

All of you, stay calm and reduce harm. And I love you especially, Person Who Has Read All The Way Down To Here.

Idealism vs. Cynicism

Let’s talk more philosophy!

Life is all about balance, and lately this is something that I’ve been struggling with. I’ve drawn an idea of the importance of balance from Shakespeare’s Othello, which we recently studied at school. One of the things it deals with, as many tragedies do, are the extremes of binary opposites: white and black, good an evil, civility and savagery, reason and passion. Another of these binaries I’ve noticed among people is that of idealism and cynicism.

Idealism looks towards the infinite. Pure idealists are hopeful, spiritual and noble people who persevere through life with adamant optimism. Pure cynics, meanwhile, are centred in sound reality; that which they understand and know to be true. They know that sentimentality has little weighting in the true harshness of our world.

I find myself constantly caught between these two philosophical dispositions. When I speak of love and hopes and dreams, people think I’m too cheesy and gushy. When I question and criticise our traditional understanding of the world, I’m branded a pretentious left-winger. Life is full of contradiction, and if Othello taught me anything, it’s that a balance these perceived binaries is the way to avoid tragedy.

Such problems arise when an idealistic sceptic and a sentimental atheist decides to share his views. People frown and say he has “double standards” or that he is merely “stirring the pot to create controversy, when things are working well enough the way they are, thank you very much”. “The politicians are doing the best they can, so stop whinging”. “Who is going to listen to you, of all the smarter people in the world?”. By far one of the worst accusations is “evangelist”, as if some kind of new cult of radicalism is being started up.

My more drastic ideas, such as my opinion that gender roles should be discarded, do come into a bad press. But as an idealist, I cannot help but weep to see the devolution of Russia’s human rights or Australia’s xenophobic policies towards refugees. As a cynic, I see all the implications of my speaking out, and how it might put some people off.

But even if I am fighting a losing battle, at least I’m fighting the right one, or at least what I believe to be right (in a hundred years I might be considered completely immoral, but that’s called contextual morality, and it’s a story for another day). At least I am refusing, like all the great people I admire from Dr King to Joan of Arc, to accept the backwards world I live in. At least I am trying, in some small way, to do what I can to help and not sit idly by, even if nobody wants to listen.

And that is my rant for today. If you want to continue the discussion, please comment.

By the way, it gives me the greatest pleasure to announce that Ravenclaw has won the poll on “Which Hogwarts House appeals to you the most?” It seems I am read (or at least skimmed over) by kindred spirits.

I hope you all like this month’s question and I’ll be interested to see what you think!

Everyone stay calm and reduce harm. Assume nothing and question everything. But don’t afraid to stand up, be honest and reach for the ideal.

:)

TV Review: "Awkward"

Of course I love typically popular shows like Game of Thrones, How I Met Your Mother, Downton Abbey, Community and The Simpsons. But today I’m going to talk about a slightly more obscure show that maybe hasn’t been the most publicised or successful, but that I’ve really enjoyed watching: Awkward. I’m also planning to review other less-viewed shows such as The New Normal (my review of which will come very soon).

MTV’s Awkward is a high school dramedy (a comedy with elements of drama) starring Ashley Rickards as the infinitely complex and conflicted Jenna Hamilton, who, in a twist of conventional teen-drama tropes, gets with the most popular guy in school in the first episode, which itself instigates her series of dilemmas (no, she does not get pregnant). Also quite unconventional and fresh are the side characters. I thoroughly enjoy Jenna’s best friends Tamara (played by Jillian Rose Reed), a wannabe socialite, and Ming (played by Jessica Lu), a non-stereotypical Chinese tomboy (though I wish they used her more in the main plot). But the character I can’t get enough of is Jenna’s arch-enemy Sadie (played by Molly Tarlov) who, despite being the wealthy, spoiled head cheerleader, is insecurely overweight. Sadie has got to be the most maniacally devious yet addictively hilarious villain I have ever come across anywhere on TV, and her nasty one-liners are among my favourites anywhere. I love a bunch of other characters too, but paragraphs can only go on for so long.

Props to this show for taking a really worn-out genre and putting a bit of a fresh spin on it. I thoroughly enjoyed the the sometimes light and sometimes dark comedy of the excruciatingly awkward moments throughout the show that are so incredibly relatable for melodramatic teenagers like me. I love Jenna as the quirky narrator, constantly questioning herself and the world around her. Also, whoever makes the soundtrack for this show has a really good taste in music. Though it might be a little girl-centred for some guys (which is really no reason not to love it; the humour and themes are very universal), and though it might need to pick up its game a little after what has so far been a slightly sloppy third season (though I think the first season is a must-watch), Awkward is definitely worth checking out if you ever get the time.