Heard Some Important Information On Twitter Today, And Thought I’d Post It Here For Anyone Who May

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Watch: This plus-size dance company is blowing away outdated stereotypes about what kind of body you should have to be a savage dancer

Dancer Akira Armstrong has been featured in two Beyoncé music videos, but when she flew to Los Angeles, she couldn’t find an agent to represent her — due to her size. So she decided to form her own dance company, and they are killing it.

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Bitches really be like "Andi Mack deserves a season four, cowards"

Its us. We're bitches

My cat is an evil little shit who bullies all the other cats in my area and scratches me on a daily basis but I would fucking die for him

The many times Victor Nikiforov dreamt of how soft and pliable Katsuki Yuuri’s lips were seemed to be endless. But he knew boundaries, he wouldn’t kiss him unless the circumstances called for it, and god did he hope for them to call for it.

In Hasetsu, Victor found himself falling out of love with the idea of him and in love with the very core of Yuuri. His drive, his unrealized beauty, his passion the moment he glided across the ice and truly became the most beautiful person he’d ever seen on the ice, were what drove him to remain patient and hopelessly loyal. Victor figured if his lips wouldn’t be graced by the soft plushness just yet he would find an excuse to brush at them every chance he had. Whether it was to demonstrate his own Eros by asking him to show his true one soon while gently traversing the softness of his lips with the pads of his thumbs, or applying lip balm on his constantly chapped lips, or even swiping away at a grain of rice that stubbornly strayed at the corners of his mouth no matter what he did, it was enough for Victor especially when he was rewarded with a blush and a shy look down to the ground for the first few weeks.

Victor had gotten close once to knowing the feeling during a beautiful summer day where he had decided that they should have an off day and explore the beach. He adored the way the sound of the seagulls reminded him of Piter, but the beauty of the beaches of Hasetsu were enough to render him speechless. He’d sat at the shore with Yuuri an endless amount of times, but he wanted to truly explore it with him.

He couldn’t remember the last time he smiled so broadly that his cheeks hurt from the flawless effort. Makkachin seemed more like a puppy as she kept up with chasing them around the water, Yuuri had even initiated a water fight as he splashed Victor senseless, eliciting a chorus of giggling and laughter. After a long day chasing Yuuri and Makkachin across the sand, getting enveloped in the salty ocean water and only resting to have a few snacks that Hiroko had graciously packed for them, eventually it was time to call an end to their day by rinsing down in the accessible showers to get the remnants of sand away. As soon as he twisted the spout on, Victor saw Yuuri staring at him through the gentle waterfall. His heart shaped smile only grew broader as he reached over to rustle up Yuuri’s hair and he returned the gesture as they laughed together under the spouts with Makkachin prancing between them and shaking excess water against them.

As they reached to turn off the water, Victor made a grab for the towels and worked to pat away at the droplets that clung on to his silver tendrils and again he caught Yuuri staring.

“Do I have something on me?” Victor asked brightly.

Yuuri furiously shook his head and continued to look on with a look that was a mixture of awe and possible curiosity. After a few moments Yuuri appeared to find resolve and found the nerve to ask something that Victor had learned seemed to be truly intimate in Japan.

“Could I dry your hair?” Yuuri inquired.

Victor threw the towel over at Yuuri and stood directly in front of him, peeking over his shoulder with a wink.

“Of course, I’ll leave it to you, Yuuri!” Victor said absolutely delighted.

He could hear Yuuri laughing nervously but soon his hands were working the towel gently against the length of his hair. It was something Victor thought he could get used to if only to have any excuse to be this close. He hadn’t realized he was in a daze and that Yuuri was done until he opened his eyes and saw Yuuri was directly in front of him.

“Will you do mine now?”

With softened eyes, Victor nodded and ran his fingers through the dampness of Yuuri’s hair. He had previously worked with his hair as they tried to figure out what look would be best suited for him when he was out on the ice, and each time he got lost in the raven strands. Today Yuuri smelled like the ocean and he could still make out the scent of his shampoo. Just as he was sure there were no more stray drops, Victor nudged Yuuri and smiled fondly down at him.

“Shall we head back for dinner and a soak in the onsen?”

Yuuri nodded and walked beside Victor, his body seemed less stiff than it usually was and Victor was delighted to witness that.

“Hey Victor?” Yuuri began.

“Yes, Yuuri?”

Yuuri abruptly stopped walking and looped his arm around Victor’s shoulder, bringing his head down so he could lace a quick kiss against his temple and the top of his head.

“I...I feel a lot of gratitude right now and I didn’t know how else to show it so.” Yuuri said clearly flustered.

Victor’s heart threatened to burst from his chest, as he gently placed his finger tips against his temple, though it was quick the feeling of Yuuri’s lips against them were even softer than he could have hoped for.

Yuuri was about to apologize for the intrusion when Victor asked, “May I show you mine?”

Wordlessly Yuuri’s mouth gaped open in curiosity, his eyes searched Victor’s for a clear answer on what he was about to do, but he nodded all the same. Victor smiled gently down at the man before him, as he drew a lithe hand up to rustle at the tendrils of sunkissed hair once again. Victor then made the swift move to kiss against Yuuri’s temple and then his forehead. He heard Yuuri gasp at the forehead kiss and glanced down to see that same lovely blush he loved to see starting at the bridge of his nose and scattering to the edges of his cheeks.

“Thank you for a wonderful day, Yuuri.” Victor said softly.

He noted just how close he was to Yuuri’s face, and was surprised that Yuuri hadn’t repelled back as he usually would have. Instead, Victor had to be reminded once again that Yuuri was a world of surprises especially as he felt Yuuri’s fingers interlocking with his own. There were no more words that had to be spoken between them, and for now Victor was more than okay with working through the feeling of how wonderful it was to feel the warmth of his hand against his own as they walked back to the inn in absolute harmony.

sweater paws reblog if you agree

Since joining Tumblr, I’ve met a lot of young queer people. Look, I’m a bisexual man in a gay relationship, and I’m approaching 30. I was still a kid when Matthew Shepard’s story was being covered on the news. I remember thinking, “I better keep my mouth shut about these feelings I’m having.”

And then I met Dominic when I was 12, and people could see how in love we were. And we got the shit beat out of us. The year I met him, some kids in the grade above me held me down against the bleachers in our gym and stomped on my hand until my fingers broke. Instead of sending me to the nurse, the teacher sent me to the assistant principal to explain the situation. She asked why the kids had beat me up. I said, “They were calling me gay.”

Her response was, “Well, are you?”

My, “I don’t know,” earned a call to my parents, and I was outed. Efforts were made to keep me from seeing Dom. Throughout high school, Dom’s stepmother intensified these efforts. He slept in the basement of the house. Although he was an incredibly talented student, he was prohibited from participating in any extracurriculars. He suffered a lot of physical abuse during those years.

The day he turned 18, he packed up everything he had and walked to my house, and we’ve lived together ever since. Things are better, but they’re not perfect. I’ve had trucks pull up next to me at stoplights and, seeing the pride sticker on my car, through old drinks and garbage into my window. I no longer speak to my dad’s side of the family. I haven’t been to see them for Christmas or Thanksgiving in years. One of my uncles had cornered me at Thanksgiving when I was 17 and said, “I’m not going to judge you, but I’d be happy to break your neck so God can do the judging a little sooner.”

I joined a support group for trans and intersex people. When I joined, 40 people attended regularly. Within the year, the group was half the size it had been. Some couldn’t make it anymore, because they were staying at the shelter, where their stay hinged on them agreeing to instead to attend homophobic sermons. Some were put in correctional therapy. Five of them died. Three of those, I didn’t know, but I knew Alex, the 19 year old who was fag-dragged in Kentucky and died a day later in the hospital, and I knew Stephanie, who went home to Alabama to care for her mom in hospice and was beaten to death with a baseball bat by her mom’s boyfriend.

Tumblr is not reality. The dynamic here does not reflect the dynamic out there. Here’s the part where I finally make a point, and it might be extremely unpopular - but guys, value your allies. Value each other. We are met with enough hate in our daily lives to enter an online safe-space and meet more hate from our own, over petty things. Don’t go after one another over every little thing you find problematic.

Learn to see nuance. Maybe the word “queer” bothers you, and you see a gay man using it as an umbrella term. Maybe someone called a trans man a trans woman because they’re confused about terminology, but the post where they did it was voicing support for the trans community. Maybe someone is just asking a question, wanting to learn more. Stop. Attacking. These. People.

Allies are being driven away. Members of our own community are being ostracized. Others are feeling nervous and estranged, and it’s largely because of places like Tumblr, where the social justice movement is quickly becoming violent and radical. I am begging you, stop nitpicking “problematic” things and start directing your efforts to create real change. When it comes to comes to your allies, forget the “social justice warrior” mentality and put down your torch. Educate calmly. Be respectful. Be understanding. Be forgiving. And I’m certainly not saying that your anger doesn’t have a good place - when you are met with bigots on the street, congress members who want to pass hateful laws, violent protesters, abusive parents, prejudiced teachers, that is when you need to be a warrior. That’s when it counts. In the real world. When you have the opportunity to protect people from real harm. Attacking your would-be allies via anonymous asks is just going to lose us ground in the long run. And we don’t have time for that, not when trans women of color are being murdered every day, not when states are still fighting against marriage equality, not when there are politicians in office who believe that trans people are possessed by demons, not when we’ve just lost 50 brothers and sisters to one gunman, not when the media won’t even admit that the attack was homophobic.

Please step back. Look at the big picture. Look at where we are, globally. Don’t just log on to your safe space and attack your allies over small missteps. That’s like washing the dishes in a house that’s on fire, kids. Let’s fight on the battlefield, and when we come home to each other, let’s just focus on bandaging up our wounds so we can go out and win the war.

This is a jar full of major characters 

Actually it is a jar full of chocolate covered raisins on top of a dirty TV tray. But pretend the raisins are interesting and well rounded fictional characters with significant roles in their stories. 

We’re sharing these raisins at a party for Western Storytelling, so we get out two bowls. 

Then we start filling the bowls. And at first we only fill the one on the left. 

This doesn’t last forever though. Eventually we do start putting raisins in the bowl on the right. But for every raisin we put in the bowl on the right, we just keep adding to the bowl on the left. 

And the thing about these bowls is, they don’t ever reset. We don’t get to empty them and start over. While we might lose some raisins to lost records or the stories becoming unpopular, but we never get to just restart. So even when we start putting raisins in the bowl on the right, we’re still way behind from the bowl on the left. 

And time goes on and the bowl on the left gets raisins much faster than the bowl on the right. 

Until these are the bowls. 

Now you get to move and distribute more raisins. You can add raisins or take away raisins entirely, or you can move them from one bowl to the other. 

This is the bowl on the left. I might have changed the number of raisins from one picture to the next. Can you tell me, did I add or remove raisins? How many? Did I leave the number the same?

You can’t tell for certain, can you? Adding or removing a raisin over here doesn’t seem to make much of a change to this bowl. 

This is the bowl on the right. I might have changed the number of raisins from one picture to the next. Can you tell me, did I add or remove raisins? How many? Did I leave the number the same?

When there are so few raisins to start, any change made is really easy to spot, and makes a really significant difference. 

This is why it is bad, even despicable, to take a character who was originally a character of color and make them white. But why it can be positive to take a character who was originally white and make them a character of color.

The white characters bowl is already so full that any change in number is almost meaningless (and is bound to be undone in mere minutes anyway, with the amount of new story creation going on), while the characters of color bowl changes hugely with each addition or subtraction, and any subtraction is a major loss. 

This is also something to take in consideration when creating new characters. When you create a white character you have already, by the context of the larger culture, created a character with at least one feature that is not going to make a difference to the narratives at large. But every time you create a new character of color, you are changing something in our world. 

I mean, imagine your party guests arrive

Oh my god they are adorable!

And they see their bowls

But before you hand them out you look right into the little black girls’s eyes and take two of her seven raisins and put them in the little white girl’s bowl.

I think she’d be totally justified in crying or leaving and yelling at you. Because how could you do that to a little girl? You were already giving the white girl so much more, and her so little, why would you do that? How could you justify yourself?

But on the other hand if you took two raisins from the white girl’s bowl and moved them over to the black girl’s bowl and the white girl looked at her bowl still full to the brim and decided your moving those raisins was unfair and she stomped and cried and yelled, well then she is a spoiled and entitled brat. 

And if you are adding new raisins, it seems more important to add them to the bowl on the right. I mean, even if we added the both bowls at the same speed from now on (and we don’t) it would still take a long time before the numbers got big enough to make the difference we’ve already established insignificant. 

And that’s the difference between whitewashing POC characters and making previously white characters POC. And that’s why every time a character’s race is ambiguous and we make them white, we’ve lost an opportunity.

*goes off to eat her chocolate covered raisins, which are no longer metaphors just snacks*