Rise Up, Oh Heart, For There is Another Battle to Win

gayisthenewokay:

ellenlovesportia:

listen to the queen

oh god the..the evil lesbian is hypnotising me and telling me that who i am is okay..that evil, evil lesbian

(via adelindschade)

idontcareforgob:

officialgarrusvakarian:

we-are-star-stuff:

zerostatereflex:

An Octopus unscrewing a lid from the inside.

Octopuses are going to kill us all someday

I had a biology teacher that told us this story about an octopus at an aquarium in Australia. The staff were concerned because their population of crustaceans kept disappearing. No bodies or anything. So they checked the video feed to find out what’s up.

Across from the the crustacean tank was a small octopus tank. This little fucker squeezed out of a tiny hole at the top of his tank, walk across the hall, and get into the crustacean tank. He would then hunt and eat. After he was done, he crawled back out and get back in his tank

Here’s the kicker: security guards patrolled the area. The staff realized that the octopus had memorized the security’s routine. It would escape and be back between the guards’ round.

An octopus in Germany was annoyed by a bright light shining into his tank, so he climbed up over the rim and squirted water at it to short it. 

Fuckin’ octopuses, man. 

(via adelindschade)

jojoposeit:

hisanakagami:

hisanakagami:

fandomsandfeminism:

So here is the rough draft for my “Anime and Feminism 101” panel that might be happening at San Japan. 

A few notes:

• This is obviously not a transcript, but just the ppt slides. I’ve timed myself going through them with the commentary I want to add, and it takes about 30 minutes to go through it.
• It is subject to change between now and San Japan.

If you have any suggestions/corrections, PLEASE add them! 

Edit: Reorganized the slides to take up less space on dash.

I disagree with so much of this. I am getting fed up with Western audiences in general but especially with anime (since I am Japanese). This is culturally imperialist, white feminist drivel (but it’s not only white women that do this) and it reeks of hypocrisy - you can’t preach this kind of stuff when the West is also sexist. If you are not Japanese then you don’t have any right to decide which parts of our media are definitely sexist or feminist. I can’t believe you were trying to “educate” people on this topic at a god damn panel.

Hell, the Western market contributes to less than 1% of the anime industry and Westerners are probably one of the worst things for the industry. The majority of them practise piracy and don’t spend a cent yet continue to complain about the quality of anime, demand that studios produce xyz and even whine when their free fansubs aren’t released on express. I once saw some people on a Hourou Musuko post recommending that everyone use KissAnime instead of Crunchyroll because Crunchyroll didn’t have a large selection (since it was legal and was a pay-to-use service created to support anime producers)…just how spoiled are you people?

There is no such genre called “Girl Coming of Age” and the “Magical Girl” genre was a huge contributing factor to the popularisation of moe (fanservice through infantilsation). Funny how you have Madoka and Sora no Woto listed as “feminist series” when they are both moe shows aimed towards adult males. Many people were discussing how Madoka was pretentious lolicon but no one on tumblr thought about the social context until Urobuchi’s interview spread over to tumblr. Misty/Kasumi from Pokemon is still sexualised, she was often used for fanservice scenes (which may not have appeared in the English dubbed versions) and Pokemon’s primary demographic is young males. This kind of “innocent fanservice” is very common among kodomo anime but again, you won’t realise anything without being raised in the culture.

I’m also rolling my eyes pretty hard at how you want anime to subvert gender roles but also believe anime is feminist for presenting girliness as a strength. Japan is a very conservative society and girls being encouraged to be feminine through children’s TV is a way of keeping gender conformity. That’s not a feminist message. There is so much pressure in Japanese society to follow these gender roles. A tomboy is seen as lacking in submissiveness and feminine charm and will often be told in her life that she will be unworthy of marriage and will never be a “real woman”. 

The standard for a “girly girl” is much higher in Japan and girls that don’t reach it are viewed as “manly” since masculinity is the default. This was largely a result of Western imperialists threatening Japanese men (wow what a surprise) after the Meiji era. These Japanese men decided that they would have to become tougher and that they had to stop the “feminization” of their culture by instilling stricter roles onto the Japanese population.

This is reflected in video games such as Persona 4 where Naoto pretended to be a boy because she wasn’t as feminine as society told her she should have been. She wanted to be a detective but to do that she would have to avoid being seen as a weak girl and to gain respect by posing as man. All you tumblr anime feminists went off to interpret her as a trans man and continued to piss on anyone that tried to tell you otherwise. Chihiro from Dangan Ronpa is another example of the problems with these strict gender roles. Don’t project your Western values onto Japanese society.

Often times tomboy may not be considered masculine from a Western perspective, and in fact very feminine instead. Many Japanese feminists are arguing for an abolition of gender roles on children’s TV, they don’t want presenting either masculinity or femininity as a strength. Japan is a traditionalist, homogeneous society with a deep focus on collectivism. If boys and girls were encouraged to focus on their own traits rather than doing just what their gender expected them then that would be pretty damn feminist. 

You are applying Western politics onto Japanese media while practising cultural imperialism and you don’t give a fuck how actual Japanese people feel about it, you just want to boost your ego as you post long-ass essays about anime onto tumblr to prove how much of a “feminist” you are. Why did I never see anyone call out Hayao Miyazaki on his bullshit in “The Wind Rises”? He was glorifying the designer of the Zero’s Engine, Jiro Horikoshi. It was a fighter aircraft that was built with Chinese and Korean slave labour, then used to massacre these peoples. Nah, you were too busy crying over his disdain for otaku and wondering whether Kill La Kill was a metaphor for puberty.

Here’s the post with the powerpoint presentation for those that are seeing the version without it (I don’t know why tumblr user morubito removed it when they reblogged it).

I want to clear up some points:

• Do not send fandomsandfeminism any hate mail but I do want you to all to be more critical of these tumblr “feminists” and the weird essays they write about cultures that aren’t their own
• I never said trans or queer headcanons were bad but a lot of people believe they are actually canon and shut down anyone that disagrees by calling them homophobic or transphobic. Chihiro and Naoto (and now Robin Newman too), are not trans. The gender system in Japan is much more rigid and these “gender-blender” themes (this is actually a genre btw) are critiques of strict gender roles. If you think “gender noncomformity = transgender” then you are probably sexist, and kinda racist too in this context. I personally think Naoto and Chihiro are terrible characters to heacanon as transgender ugh.. Especially Naoto in the original Japanese version of the game.
• I can’t believe anti-social justice and anti-feminists are reblogging this. This post is not for you, I am not your ally. I want you to stand 3984398439482309 feet away from me. I believe social justice is great and I am a feminist. I also happen to be a queer (bisexual) Japanese trans woman (born intersex but assigned male at birth).
• You are free to interpret anime how you wish but performing a “feminist analysis” over it? No, don’t do that. Feminism is very political and it is deeply rooted in Western thought. Also Japanese feminism exists and I recommend you to read up on that.
• Femininity isn’t revolutionary and weaponized femininity is bullshit. Men all over the world want women to be feminine, it keeps them in their place. This is more pronounced in places like Japan. Women should be allowed to make their own choices but must also recognise that the choices they make don’t just happen in a vacuum.
• I would really like to hear other Japanese people to contribute to these discussions more. East Asians such as the Chinese and Koreans due to our shared histories and cultural ties with Japan should also be prioritised, along with nations that were affected by Japanese imperialism (which includes China and Korea again), as well as the voices of people of colour in general. Hearing white people voices all over anime is a nightmare.

this is such an a+++++ post thank you so much

Oh my God I think I love you.  This was flawless.

(via cthulhu-with-a-fez)