-We set out to change the world, but ended up just changing - just changing ourselves.
-What's wrong with that?
-Nothing!
If you don't look at the world.
(Velvet Goldmine)

The first time I told anybody I was genderqueer, there wasn't a word for it yet. I told my closest friend, and he freaked out and told me I had to keep it secret. Never tell another living soul, cause that was just going too far. The bisexuality thing was cute, he said, but that was just - no.

I basically hid in my room for two days, much as I could. Then a vague acquaintance of mine called and bugged me till I agreed to go to a screening of Velvet Goldmine with her. She had no idea what was going on with me, she just needed someone to go with.

And it reminded me there were other sorts of people in the world, there was the possibility to celebrate creative/alternative gender. And not be completely alone. The movie tells the story of (the rise and fall of) about five minutes in which the world was friendly to people whose gender/sexuality was not normative, in which this beautiful sparkly bubble of acceptance held, in London and New York. It made a huge difference for me. Huge.

One of the themes of Velvet Goldmine is social change, dealing with living in a world that was designed for people unlike you. There are a lot of scenes that touch that - getting beat up as a kid and likening the blood to lipstick, getting booed off stage for wearing a dress, the way the media reacted to a kiss between two guys. It's about it's about trying to deal with oppression, resistance, and usually reclaiming or celebrating the difference. And still it's a movie about a safe and understanding world, there for a second.

I was thinking today about the movie actually being about the world. About - no matter if you create a wonderful safe group around you, there's still the world. And some things - most things - can't be changed, you just have to wait for the world to change, to hope it does. And it's one of the hardest things...

And I was thinking, that lately, I'd been meeting more and more people I didn't have to introduce myself to along with a painful discussion of my gender. People who knew what "genderqueer" meant, or who made the effort to read about it cause they cared. Which - has not happened, almost ever, in the past. And in the last few years, year, months - it keeps becoming more of an option. That a random person I'd at uni, in fandom, online, might know something about gender, that there are more than two options - I remember two years ago it'd blow my mind to meet somebody I didn't have to explain this to, in answer to "why are you talking weird?" Less than a year ago, I remember trying to think of anyone, just one person I'd managed to get through to, that I felt actually got my gender, without there being very special circumstances involved, and I couldn't think of one. Less than a year ago, I was talking to this amazing person I met in fandom, and she was mostly straight and cisgender (not transgender) - and she'd asked me what my preferred pronouns were, just - did, on account of being awesome... and I kept asking her how come she was so educated and understanding about it, it just blew my mind!

The world is changing. A little. My world is. And I don't believe it's just cause I hang out at different places. There were no places. I remember these places - really not long ago.

And that's - it's kind of - I'd lost some hope, not completely, and I'm not completely on solid ground about this now either, not by a long shot.
But it still makes me cry.
It's kinda amazing to let go - I'd done everything-eveything I could come up with to make things better, and I was done, for good or bad it was up to the world - and I didn't expect the world to budge, at all -


( some pretty )

I was just seriously told "You should be nicer! My friend didn't call you a bitch cause he's a misogynist! He'd have cursed at you some other way had you been a bio-guy!"

I... um... lol?

Less lol about the rest. *sigh* ( Have a picture of JDM and Craig Ferguson being cute, to make up for the bummer post )

Title: Celebrate You, Baby
Author: CitrusJava
Pairing: Dean/Sam
Rating: light R? How do you rate kink?
Words: 1470
Warnings/kinks: Praise kink, light d/s, rushed, unbetaed
Notes: Set during Tall Tales. This is me day 2, season 2 entry for the 8 Days of Wincest Challenge.
Special thanks to balder12, who introduced me to the fantastic concept of praise kink. There's all sorts of other kinks in there, that I don't have names for. Tell me, if you have them.
(more notes in the end)

Summary: They both threw themselves into this stupid fight instead of talking. But Sam needs Dean to look at him the way he does.
( Sam never talks about )

"It turns out I have a thematic, which is tight relationships between friends who are brothers, with unstated homoerotic subtext" ~Eric Kripke
Guy knows his audience, if nothing else.

It's gotta still be the 13th somewhere... ;)

Season 1 includes some of the most epically SPN images and lines. The soul of the show was there already, primal and strong.

So, For the Supernatural birthday thing (I'm enjoying this so much! Reading people's love for the show, and their "origin stories"...), and my one year anniversary watching SPN, recs for some season 1 fic or retellings with a twist of the beginning of the show, that's now become sort of epic.

I had trouble convincing myself not to include some amazing pre-series fic I love, like fleshflutter's The Time Dean was Sam's Girlfriend and Jess Entered the Winchester Family Business and its great podfic by sadtreepodfic, queenklu's Holly, Ivy, Mistletoe and its podfic by the wonderful applegeuse and perhaps my very favorite fic, And I Have Asked to be Where No Storms Come by candle_beck and its podfic by the author... So, good thing I was strong about that.

Sadly, a lot of the authors aren't around in fandom anymore. I wish I could tell some of these people how meaningful their work has been and still is to me. But at least I can still point to it! :/
And I know a lot of these everybody knows and loves, but hey, it took me a long while to find them myself, perhaps I'm not the only one not to know about them.


Title: Credit in the Straight World
Author: vaingirlfic
Podfic: Link
Reader: ann_ciudad I'd have loved to hear more SPN podfic by her
Gorgeous art by: dreamlittleyo
Author's Warnings/Spoilers: pre-series, so no spoilers. Story contains: explicit sexual content, some of which involves the underage. Kink. Sex and violence that may trigger some people. If you know you have issues with triggers, or you just like warnings, detailed warnings are here.
Author's Summary: Sam has always had his brother, when he wanted him and when he didn't. But that was before he was the lucky recipient of a gift from faerie that Dean can't remember and John can't forget. It leaves Sam to find his own way to navigate between the 'real' world and the Winchester world and deal with guilt he can't shake, no matter how hard he tries. And trying? Is going to involve plenty of sex, rebellion (and maybe some of Dean's rock and roll. But not much).

Rec: This is one I always get back to. I love the way it explores Sam's negotiation with being normal. I adore the Sam in this fic. It's definitely Sam, our Sammy, but the fic brings out a side of his I know is there but isn't often written, in human contexts. The way that for all Sam wants to be accepted, wants to be part of society more than Dean does, when it comes to things he's committed to, he's willing to go very far in telling society to go fuck itself, to stand strong in the face of whatever consequences that brings. Another thing I love about this fic is that subs are often written as subby outside of scenes too. Here Sam fights bravely against the notion that he shouldn't sub. I love a sub (or switch, in this case) who claims their subjectivity, their right over their body, to do with as they please. Anyway, fantastic fic, and one that stayed with me.


Title: Memories of Me
Author: Gillian Middleton
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: The memory loss sort of dubcon
Author's Summary: While investigating a routine curse in a small California town Dean loses his memory. With only his brother to lean on feelings begin to develop that aren't exactly brotherly. How's Sam going to cope with that?

Rec: Perhaps because I'm newer to the fandom, and it all seems far away and magical from where I stand, I find a certain thrill in this being season 1 fic that was actually written during season 1. The characterization of Dean, Sam and the world they live in is very season 1, this pure, primal heart of the show, to me. I love fic that deals with the whole incest thing, and this one devotes a lot of time to that. And I often like fic in which a character is altered for a period of time, though they're still themselves (or pretty much), and the way they and the other character deal with it, then the way they both deal with it when it's over. This fic provides all of that, it a way I enjoyed reading a whole lot.

Title: The Fetters of Fenrir
Author: leonidaslion
Podfic: Link
Reader: kitanachan
Rating: NC-17
Author's Warnings: Forced Prostitution, Torture
Author's Summary: How far would you go to reclaim the other half of your soul?

Rec: This is an AU that breaks away from the series at the end of season 1. It's... wow. Its a lot of things I don't normally read, and it still grabbed me in a big way. It's huge, and still I kept wanting more. Just a great story, casefic of sorts... it includes two more elements I have a thing for - someone finding out about the incest and the boys keeping their ground (I want *all* the someone finds out stories!), and a solution that's not about fixing the sick person, but about realizing it's not a bad thing, just not normative.


This. There should be more fic about this.

One year ago today, I got into Supernatural. And I was planning on doing a thing, but it turns out the whole fandom has a Supernatural birthday today too! :D
It's kinda awesome that SPN shares my SPN anniversary (ok, the other way around). The only likely conclusion is that some fans cast a spell last year, to bring new fans into the fandom, and I'm one of them. Thank you for not making me fall in love with a donkey, you guys!

So maybe I'll do a thing in the near future, today wanna tell my "getting into SPN" story :)

I was really into Sherlock, and going crazy over the lack of new episodes. And there was this show I was told was not a shallow misogynistic icky one, though it seemed to be. I'd tried watching a few episodes*, but it just didn't really catch me. But I had nothing to watch, so I gave it yet another shot, deciding to disregard the spoiler problem and start from season 4. After School Special. And then I stayed for anther ep, and another, watched five or so that night.

And I thought - this is great! It'll be like methadone, get me over the Sherlock cravings, and it's safe, it's not anything I'm gonna fall in love with!

( Happy birthday, Supernatural, show and fandom, I love you )

I have lost the ability to can <3

Wow, oh <3
This is probably my favorite episode of the season.

Most of the Sam/Dean, Jared/Jensen stuff was sadly spoiled in advance, but oh, wow, Misha!

The fondness and tenderness in Misha's voice when Dean/Jensen tells him he needs him is a clearer "I love you" than when he actually says it. And the whole "I know you didn't say it, but you wanted to", Holy shit, Misssssssssha!11111111111
New ship, you guys <3

I just want to read Misha domming Jensen into expressing these things in words... which is basically what I just watched, so perhaps the fic is redundant.

And Misha had better get him to talk about him and Jared too, cause omg, OMG, love.

Have reached the killy stage of "Please, please no more articles!"

Meanwhile, look, straight guys are silly.

Seriously, had I read my life in fic I'd have had trouble with suspension of disbelief. Those twists and silly setbacks are so obviously only there as a plot device! Nobody's life's like that!

And on that note - how did Chuck sell a single book?! Oh, right, wait - Winchesters.
Some things are more important than plausibility.