Lol, perhaps not. But silver linings!

Thank you, you're absolutely right. I don't regret posting last night, it was cathartic and I think not too unreasonably head bitey, (I didn't even capslock!) but today I'm going to spend my free time drawing and playing with my cat. I needed to get it out of my system but now it's time to let it go.

It's bizarre to me, the experience is sitting on me festering and I can't make myself talk about it with my friends or family but I was able to spill it out here in this currently somewhat unfriendly space. Because none of you know me personally and there's some level of shame involved I guess. I'm probably going to regret all this in the morning but maybe I'll at least be able to sleep now.

The one good thing is I don't really care about the stuff here any more. It's put things in perspective. Mark's sexism is annoying and I do hope he eventually manages to learn, because there have been times in the past when I've really loved his videos and gotten a lot of comfort out of them. But in the end there are a lot of dudes on the internet who are bad at talking about gender, and it doesn't affect my life even a millionth of a percent the way an asshole dude in a doctor's coat can.

Content warning: discussion of sexism, transphobia, bad doctors

You say you're not trying to exonerate yourself, but this really does sound like you want us to feel sorry for you. And I might have felt sorry for you, yesterday. But today a doctor at a gender diversity clinic pressured me into a physical examination I wasn't comfortable with, misgendered me when I had what he probably thought was a feminine emotional reaction to that, called me sweetie and kept touching my shoulders throughout the rest of the appointment and I'm going to have to go back to him to get my damn testosterone. This morning I was looking at copies my mother made of the forms my grandmother was forced to sign, surrendering her child to the church, and realizing for the first time that my mother was born with another name that was taken away from her. So now I'm thinking, 40 hours of writing and hundreds of annoying emails is not too high of a price for a cis dude to pay in the process of examining his own sexism.

These posts should not have taken you 40 hours to write. The themes should not have flown over your head the first time you read through. Everyone else I've talked to has gotten it the first time. If all this was incredibly difficult for you, that's because of your sexism.

I've made a lot of excuses for you in my comments. Everyone here has. I don't think we would have if the situation was different. If you weren't a man who's built up a reputation of being socially conscious, being oblivious about sexism. Imagine if someone was reviewing your own book, or another book about homophobia or racism that's meant a lot to you, and acting this way about those themes of homophobia or racism. How would you react to these kinds of excuses?

If this happens to you again: listen. Don’t just try to figure out what you think people want you to say. Listen and think and try to understand and empathize.

Wait until you’ve had a proper discussion before starting your reread. Don’t speed through it because you’re eager to fix your image.

Either pay a moderator to go through comments for you and bring up concerns to you, or devote more time to reading and responding in a timely manner.

Pay attention when your commenters explain things for you. There has been so much feminism 101 in these comments this week. If you still don’t get it, read some theory. I personally am done spending energy on this, but I know there are still other commenters here who are graciously willing to keep explaining things to you.

Maybe this is harsh. I know it's a fuckton less polite than my previous comments. But I think I've done enough polite commenting to be permitted a little harshness.

Yeah, unfortunately I'm not any calmer now. I had a really shitty brush with sexism and transphobia a few hours ago and I'm feeling a really strong urge to go bite Mark's head off, but that would be a bad idea. I'm just. GRAH. I really hope you're right and we've made some small difference and not just beat our heads against a wall.

I still don't understand your thought process there. You had no problem continuing to give us your takes on Tonker and Lofty's relationship and on Jackrum's gender. It was only when it came to recognizing that sexism, misogyny and patriarchy are institutional things that exist and oppress all people who aren't cis men that you had this block. How did you come to this conclusion that the right thing to do was to not mention the overarching theme of the book? Which of our comments made you think that? Everyone has been telling you that we want you to think, and to speak thoughtfully. Not to ignore what you don't understand.

Thanks. I don't know, maybe in a bit when I'm calmer. It was very earnest and had some personal feelings in it, and I'm not feeling that open and earnest right now. But I'll get over it.

This was rough. But I've also had some great conversations here, about a book I rarely get to talk about, so it's probably been a net positive.

I assume that's what inspired Another thing I got out of the comments was that I shouldn’t presume to know what these characters are going through. The biggest thing I missed was the notion of how Borogravia specifically targeted women through its policies and its culture, and thus, each of these generals could have escaped that life as well. And there didn’t need to be a complicated backstory for that, either! If you had the means to escape the world of Borogravia, wouldn’t you take it?

Which is. Not the same as a direct acknowledgement/apology.

This is a great comment, and I wish you didn't feel the need to put so many qualifiers on it. Your personal point of view is insightful and valid.

This is very much making me want to write post-canon fic where Blouse meets Wrigglesworth again and becomes better friends with her. Maybe a story about Borogravia's first underground gay bar, because I really want Blouse doing drag performances now and again and enjoying himself hugely. Polly and Mal can come along to support him and end up enjoying themselves too.