#can also come from people who they themselves accept some cis men are feminine and some cis women are masculine but suddenly as soon as you

[ozymoron]

dude its always "be yourself" till youre trans and now suddenly oh i get to nitpick every little thing about you oh that gesture was very feminine made you look like a girl oh youre wearing a shirt thats cream coloured? seems a little feminine to me oh you paint your nails? so youre a girl after all like ???? youre giving me mixed messages here am i meant to be myself or am i meant to conform to your idea of what a man is in order to be accepted as one by you

[velvetvexations]

I'm a trans woman. You need to stop being weird about men.

The idea that trans women should be allowed in single sex spaces for cis women is completely contradicted by the man vs. bear discourse. Ignore that I keep going back to the meme - maybe it's still doing numbers, I don't know, but it's good shorthand either way. If you think men are inherently suspicious and dangerous, ask yourself: why does that not apply to trans women?

What, exactly, does a trans woman do to make herself different from cis men? How are you not advocating a belief in people being tainted by the way they were raised* which can only logically apply to trans women as much as it does cis men? It boggles the mind how, if that's a true concept, one could simply self-identify out it. Yet, the way transradfems talk, literally the only thing that distinguishes an AMAB better-than-bear from an AMAB worse-than-bear is that the former says they're totally better than a bear and you should take their word for it, which if men are really Like That should be of little comfort or security.

Some, even, will make impassioned defenses of butch trans women, which as a butch trans woman is great. But then they'll go on about how evil men are, and how innocent and victimized trans women are, and I wonder, what, exactly, differs an especially butch trans woman from a man to them? If, like me, a trans butch woman doesn't always wear clearly feminine clothes, has body hair, maybe even a shade of facial hair, and doesn't at all try to train her voice, are you going to be uncomfortable with her right up until she realizes she forgot to put their pin on and you see the she/her? Apparently that flips the switch from someone you desperately don't want to be alone with to someone you're totally fine undressing in front of?

All that sounds like TERFism, which is exactly the problem. The transradfem version of reality is one where TERF talking points are completely logical, because they're both based in the same radfem reality. That's not my reality, YOU have constructed a system perfect for them to operate in, that their ideology is fantastic for pointing out errors of reasoning in, as if it was deliberately crafted by them to be deconstructed. I would not at all be surprised if that's the origin of a lot of trans radical feminism, a psyop to make the trans community weaker with logic twists that TERFism can swing through like the Gordian Knot.

If you accept man vs. bear, TERFism is the only logical conclusion. If you don't, as I don't, then it isn't.

The only alternative is that you think being a woman is the only thing anyone should be and "choosing" to be a man is morally inferior. Which I shouldn't have to tell you is horrifying. It's also again incongruous with at least your defense of butch trans women - what exactly defines a "man" and a "woman" when a butch trans woman doesn't have to try to pass at all? You are literally saying all of this, gender, transmisogyny, misogyny, hinges entirely on pronouns and a difference of two letters in the name of what they call themselves, someone is dangerous or not depending on if they go by he/him.

TERFs will see this and be like "yeah! exactly!" BUT MY POINT IS USING THAT TO SHOW YOU SHARE THE SAME FOUNDATIONAL LOGIC AS THEM. If you don't want TERFs to have a point then you can stop accepting their worldview any day now! Come join me and frolic freely where we think TERFs are wrong!

*socialization is real and the idea pre-dates TERFs who incorrectly use the idea that to say that because a trans woman may or may not** have been pressured by external forces to play sportsball she must be hardcoded to be a sex offender, which is completely ridiculous

**no one can be said to have the same experiences, it's a generalization

[pepcono]

Accidentally got lost in the sauce while writing a reply and ended up with a shoddy essay. So I've polished it up a bit and packaged it in more proper essay format.

Special thanks to @\Undeaddream for always reminding me that sometimes the people you disagree with most are those you respect most.

Consider the "egg"

Consider the "cis men" who state things like "I really want to be a woman, but I'm not trans"

Consider those who wish they were trans so that they could escape the torture of their body but believe that it's something that happens to other people.

Consider those who are suffering, but are unable to accept the possibility they're trans.

In other words, the egg.

Some would believe that what harm is caused by classifying and naming this person is inexcusable, "it makes people uncomfortable," "it enforces gender norms," they argue.

Their thoughts dwell on those who believe themselves miscategorised, or those insulted by the insinuation that some of their characteristics could be seen as trans.

But do they stop and consider the egg?

Do they consider how people mobilise the position "you shouldn't tell someone they could be trans"?

The anti-egg position, although often coming from well meaning thought process, could very well do more harm than good.

Speaking anecdotally, I saw a yt comment thread where someone said: "Idk wtf is wrong with me. I really relate to this [a song about hating masculine features of ones body and wanting to be a girl] but I'm not a cis woman nor a trans woman, I am 100% sure I am not trans! Idk, am I just a freak or what?" Now maybe you dear reader see that and take them at their word, but I see someone who's in the same position as I was. Wanting desperately to be feminine, to escape my "male" puberty but due to internalised misogyny and transphobia is unable to admit why, unable to accept the solution.

Maybe what they need to hear is "it is ok to be a woman", "its ok to be trans", "you're not a freak for wanting this"

Maybe what they need to hear is "you don't need to suffer"

Some people did point this out in the replies, but each was met with similar statements of "you should insinuate they're a trans woman, that's rude" Maybe you, the reader, agree with that statement, maybe you're even right. But I know how I would've interpreted it. I would have seen it as a statement that I shouldn't consider the possibility, it would further cement the idea that "real trans people just know, because here's all these trans people sneering at that idea I could be trans"

But honestly, I'll be the first to admit "egg" is not the best term for this (But that's a whole other thing). But I instead bring this up to highlight that anti-egg discourse doesn't really stack up to the hype. It kinda reinforces that "just knowing" misconception.

In some people's haste to protect gnc men from the travesty of being compared to trans women (or worse, mistaken for trans women!), they don't stop to consider the egg.

But maybe you dear reader, don't see that, maybe you don't see your own denial and self hatred in "cis men", maybe you don't see someone reflecting internalised transphobia and misogyny that you yourself had to overcome.

And that's ok, not everyone has had the same experiences, some (probably) never even had dysphoria, a lucky few might have even never had to deal with internalised transphobia.

But bloody hell if you can't even acknowledge that not all eggs are even GNC in your post critiquing the term. You might want to reevaluate how complete your understanding is.

(also as an aside, egg can apply to "cis women" but the OP I was replying to didn't acknowledge it and as I repeatedly state, what's key "egg" is relating one's own experiences to them, something I do better with "cis men" eggs than "cis women" eggs)

[5and3nevermind]

Hello! A few days ago I was thinking about yoonmin (as I often do hehehe) and I started thinking about jimin and his gender. Now, I'm not sure if he identifies as anything other than male, but it's safe to say that he has struggled with masculinity and toxic expectations when he was younger. There have been some instances in the last few years were there have been some non-bn references, the first ones that come to mind are the fotoshoot with the bigender symbol and taemin's words on suchwita (“jimin also has that gender-neutral charm and also delicate”).

What I wanted to ask you is how do you think gender has impacted yoonmin?

I don't know if you've ever received an anon about this topic but I was curious about your opinion 😅

Personally, I think Jimin struggled a lot in his early years since he felt the pressure to fullfil this assigned strong masculine roll within the group (when they made him lift his shirt and do things like that). From what he's said in interviews, he later learned to accept himself and I can only think about how reassuring it must have been to have someone as accepting and supportive as yoongi by his side. I feel like yoongi is the kind of person who would encourage him to freely explore his gender (his bestie Halsey uses she/they pronouns by the way) and especially through his art (when face came out some ppl interpreted as Jimin talking about his gender and I found it very interesting).

Anyways, I feel like I'm just rambling haha. To sum up we don't know if he's 100% non-bn, he may still identify as a cis man, but still it's safe to say that he has been exploring his gender in the past.

(We'll probably never get a confirmation if he's actually non-bn, unless things in Korea change A LOT.)

Hi anon! Your question about gender in terms of yoonmin is a good one and something I have wondered about too!

First of all, I agree with you regarding Jimin and his relationship with gender. We’ve gotten many clues (and what I would consider more than clues) about this.

In regards to yoonmin as a pair, one thing I’ve noticed are the types of words Yoongi uses to describe Jimin. Yes, he’s called him handsome. But he’s also used gender-neutral or even traditionally feminine adjectives to describe him: “sexy,” “pretty,” “small and cute.” I think he does this because he knows these are the type of words that Jimin enjoys. Typically, when someone gives a compliment, their words are tailored to fit the person they are complimenting.

Another example: when Yoongi quoted the k-drama line to Jimin backstage in Newark, he quoted the male character’s line thus placing Jimin in the female role in that scenario.

(Likewise, Yoongi seems to be perfectly fine with Jimin referring to him as “cute” and “baby,” which to me shows a level of open mindedness that, unfortunately, many men lack.)

They’re both smart people and they’ve been in the entertainment industry long enough to know how fans analyze things. So, even if the female lead in the Like Crazy choreo isn’t Jimin’s reflection (although I believe she is), he at least would have known that some people would interpret that way…and he was fine with that. Similarly, by now Yoongi knows what many fans think of his Cypher 3 verse. Yet years later, he included that verse, unchanged, in his D-Day set list.

I’m rambling now, but my point is they have both demonstrated an accepting/progressive attitude toward these issues and have not attempted to “set the record straight” when it comes to gender (or sexual orientation, for that matter).

Obviously, Yoongi and Jimin are individuals and each of them has their own unique feelings about gender. We can see differences in terms of how they present themselves. But I do see commonalities in terms of their way of thinking, their acceptance of themselves and their acceptance of others. I hope that makes sense!

Here’s Jimin playing with the idea of gender roles and putting himself in the feminine role: shocked that he’s been caught shirtless, while he places the viewer, who is likely to be female given Army’s demographics, in the role of the voyeur (typically thought of as the masculine role). He seems to love doing this, turning the tables and offering unexpected and non-traditional portrayals of gender roles.

Here’s a video of Jimin talking about how he’s changed and grown over the years.

Here’s a video of Jimin showing (again) that he’s comfortable playing with the idea of traditional gender roles.

Here’s Yoongi saying in an interview that everyone is equal.

Here’s a photo of Yoongi wearing his pride Vans.

Here’s a really cute video of Yoongi with a male fan. (He is treating the male fan the same way he’d treat a female fan, giving the high-five and the cute pout. Like he said in the interview, “everyone is equal,” and he treats fans accordingly. I love this video!)

In Yoongi’s case, I understand that these are not examples related to gender specifically. I see these as clues to his world view and his inclusivity, and of course I’m sure he extends that way of thinking to Jimin.

I hope this made sense! Thanks for this ask, anon!

[tailless-whale]

Disclaimer: this post is mostly just me working out my feelings, trying to figure out how I feel etc. Also it's kinda long.

Ok so my partner is coming out as nonbinary (they/she) and I have a lot of thoughts about it...

I'm super excited for them!!! That feeling of accepting that you're trans is overwhelming but also so thrilling. I remember when my egg started to crack and I was like "fuck, I really am a boy". I got such a thrill when I accepted who I am. I'm so excited for them to be feeling that way and to be going through that journey because it's something I'm experiencing myself and it's been absolutely fantastic. Sure there were some painful moments but the positives far outweigh any negatives I've experienced. I'm happier than I've ever been in my life because I'm finally living my authentic self, and I'm so excited to see my partner go through all that and find herself. I love hearing how they're feeling and seeing how she gets a little happier when they tell me about her plans to transition.

I've also been thinking about and reevaluating my sexuality in relation to her gender identity. I struggled with my sexuality a while, and only recently (thought I had) figured it out. I used to identify as pansexual, but when I started dating again I found that I'm much more attracted to men than I am to women. For the past year or so I've identified primarily as a gay man, and my partner's transition has made me question that. I love my partner dearly and I plan to stick with them regardless of how they identify, but I do worry. I think I'm primarily attracted to masculinity, and I'm concerned that my attraction will wane if they decide to be more feminine. I don't think it will, but I do worry. I am a little frustrated though - I thought I had finally figured myself out, that I had a label that fit me - and now I don't know what I am all over again.

I've also been thinking about the challenges they'll face as a nonbinary person in a binary world. I identified as nonbinary for a long time before transitioning to a binary trans man, and it was hard feeling like I couldn't quite express my gender without facing opposition from those around me because I wasn't conforming to traditional gender roles. I don't think she'll have many problems with their friends, but I think some of her family will be a different story. I can see some of their family misgendering them out of ignorance or prejudice, and it's difficult and dysphoria inducing to be misgendered by people close to you. I don't like that she'll probably have to deal with that because I know how badly that hurts. I don't want her to feel pain because they're pursuing what makes them happy :(

I'm also wondering if their gender identity will change over time. Mine sure did! I knew from the beginning of our relationship that although they identified externally as a cis man, that they certainly are not a cis man. To be completely honest, I've been waiting for them to accept that they're not a cis man, and to actually do something about it. I've watched them try to perform masculinity in the same way that I tried to perform femininity before my egg cracked. Our second date they told me they didn't like their name and they prefer to go by things other than their birth name, and that they've already tried out a few names. When I asked them what name they would have chosen for themselves, I filed that answer away and nearly a year later, she told me that she was thinking of going by that same name they told me our second date. They've made so many offhanded comments that made me say "oh yeah, they're definitely not cis" that I was surprised this didn't happen sooner. I'm so happy that she's starting to accept, and perhaps eventually embrace their newfound gender. I do wonder if they'll ever go full girl, but I don't want to push them towards something they don't want or something she's not ready to do yet.

They're planning on shaving off their beard on Thursday and I'm super nervous about that (they started growing it when we first started dating; they've had a beard the whole time we've been together) but I'm happy that she's doing what makes her happy. I know I'll love her regardless of how they choose to look 💜

Also, I love using they/she for her!!! It feels so natural; I always felt weird about calling them a he. I keep wanting to call them my girlfriend but I still need to ask how she feels about that... I default to partner for now but I'll admit while writing this post I accidentally typed "girlfriend" a few times and had to correct myself.

Regardless of my worries, I'm super happy and excited for my partner and I'm looking forward to holding their hand every step of the way as they embark on their journey to trans their gender. I'm literally giggling and kicking my feet thinking about how it feels to reach different milestones and feel validated in one's identity, and I'm so psyched to see them experience those feelings. This is the start of a new era for them and it's so exciting to see how excited she is to do this! :D

[building-made-of-paper]

I hate the phrase "men and minors DNI." It's under most lesbian posts I see and it is utterly useless. I get it. You don't want guys with a dykebreaking fetish coming into your inbox telling you they can fix you. Neither do I. But think about who you're actually telling to fuck off. You're telling lesbians who are bigender and are also men that you don't want them around. You're telling he/him butches that they have gone too far and they can't be lesbians anymore. The trans lesbian who doesn't think they pass reading your post sees that and they don't know if they are allowed to interact. On top of that, the people for whom that is directed will ignore that, because they think they're too good for it. DNIs don't do shit, but that's a topic for another post.

Many lesbians have been in straight relationships with men before figuring themselves out or before coming out or for whatever reason (and that is valid, fuck gold star lesbianism). A lot of those lesbians look back on those relationships with regret, which is understandable. Those relationships that happened before you figured things out can have long lasting impacts and often make it much harder to figure out who you are/accept yourself. This can often lead to a general distaste for men that, while it is clear where it stems from, can quickly turn into radfem ideologies (just to be clear, Those Are Bad. Radfems and TERFs can fuck right off, you are not welcome here). Men are not inherently bad, and women are not inherently good. Sure, there are sociological reasons that some men may feel more comfortable barging into spaces they don't belong in, but that doesn't mean that men as a whole are bad. Not to verge on saying #NotAllMen, but there truly are more good people out there than bad ones.

A lot of the background issues here stem back to the fact that society views masculinity and strength as synonymous to power, ability, and many other "good" ideals. Reinforcement of the patriarchy and the idea that the man of the house should be the breadwinner leads to a lot of men holding the belief that the world is in some way built for them. And in much of western culture, it somewhat is. This makes spaces where these specific people aren't wanted hard to maintain because that is exactly the community who doesn't believe that those spaces exist. Again, DNIs don't work for that exact reason. A reminder to an individual person that they aren't wanted does nothing to fix the societal problem that caused that person to think they are welcome. Additionally, trying to tackle those societal problems with a statement reacting against a large swath of the population does nothing to help fix the related societal problem of masculinity being scary and dangerous.

The other side of this western idealization of masculinity is that femininity is seen as a bad thing. To be feminine is to be weak. To be feminine is to turn away from the idea of the patriarchy and show disdain for it. That's a lot of the reason that trans women are so hated, but again, that is another rant for another time. This leads to the other version of this phrase, which I find worse, "cis men DNI." That means that transmascs and trans men are welcomed, even if these are individuals who have no connection to lesbianism, or are perhaps trying to get past previous history with that label. Trans men are put in an awkward situation where they are either feared for being masculine or they are infantalized and thought of as still feminine. It may seem like saying that specifically cis men aren't welcome helps welcome transmasc lesbians and he/she bigender butches, and while it can help in that direction, it is simultaneously actively invalidating other transmascs/trans men.

A lot of the issues with the phrase "cis men DNI" can be traced to how language tackles the gender binary and the modern attempt to overthrow said binary. As is often the case, language and terminology are behind on the times in terms of being able to refer to a specific group of people, but even looking for better terms is just trying to answer the question "who do I want to exclude from my life" which is a road that quickly leads to radical feminism and radical hatred of men.

The big issue with the radical hatred of men is that it leads to the idea that men cannot do good. It leads to the thought that everything men do comes from an evil inherent in their being male. If men are biologically inclined to do evil, that heavily reinforces the idea that they are dangerous, which does nothing to help the idea of women being seen as weak. Even trying to teach reasonable things like self defense becomes a reinforcement of the idea that women have to protect themselves from the inherent danger of men. From here it is easy to see where transphobia comes in. If men are evil and do everything for the purpose of harming women, the only possible reason a man would want to be a woman is to leverage that in some way. There is this idea that being a man makes everything easier (which is in some cases true but certainly not to any level that this ideology promotes), so why make life harder for yourself if not to do the evil that is supposedly programmed into your very being? Even if this idea isn't taken to the point of thinking there is an evil inherent in being male, it continues to reinforce the gender binary by promoting this difference between masculinity and femininity. These become the strong and the weak. The powerful and the hopeless. Even for those who believe in women's ability to be strong and fight back, this still falls into same trap of seeing men as a danger and a threat and nothing else. All of this leads to an inability to see men as human, and that goes south Fast. I've seen radfems who refuse to believe that men experience anything negative because they think that men have everything perfect. That isn't possible. There is no way for someone's life to truly be perfect like that. Hating men makes them become solely a bad thing in people's minds, and that is very dangerous.

To attempt to wrap all of this up, there is no world in which any variation of "men DNI" will include all the people you want it to, and there is no world in which any of those phrases will keep out the people you want to keep out. Radical hatred of men may sound fun, and there may be many men out there who are obnoxious, but the hatred of men does not lead anyone to a good place. It only leads to negativity and perpetuation of the vicious cycle of mutual hatred, something that will never solve any of the fundamental problems that influence the very issues being identified.

[11natrium]

I suppose that I might share some feeling regarding my own masculinity I've been having about myself to the world, perhaps some will find them relatable.

tl;dr - I'm AMAB, and while I struggled with accepting my masculinity, trans men made me feel at peace and safe with it, and I cannot thank them enough.

Now for the longer version:

For quite a while now (a few years, in fact), I have been struggling with my masculinity, as an AMAB person. I grew to feel super uncomfortable with the implications that came from being a "man", at least as it can be stereotypically understood. I know very well that masculinity has positive aspects, like strength or reliability, but being called a "man" made me also feel like someone automatically perceived as aggressive, or dangerous, or a sex pest, or a creep. As far as I'm aware, I am none of that - but I can't help that being "a man" makes me feel like someone who poses some sort of danger, or is a threat to those around them. It no doubt comes from experiencing toxic masculinity - more so from my peers and general society, as I'm thankfully privileged to have a normal family, where everyone is, well, normal and supportive and non-abusive. Still, that toxic masculinity, or hearing about certain men being just, fucking losers, made me want to detach myself from being called a "man".

This is partially why I embraced the identity of a demiboy. Someone mostly masculine, but still someone who does not want to call themselves a man. To be clear - there is more to my identity than just discomfort with stereotypical masculinity. I have interest in outfits and activities perceived as feminine, there are subtleties to how I like to picture myself in art, using a feminine name (Marcy) towards myself, using gender neutral pronouns (they/them) etc. - it goes deeper than just what I outlined above. That's a story for another day, though, what matters for this post is that I felt that unease with my own masculinity.

I guess this is where trans men come in. Briefly - over time, as I interacted with trans men and transmasc folks in general, I started to feel a weird sort of appreciation, maybe even jealousy for them, like I wished I was more like them myself. Eventually, I started to realise that their comfort and the gender euphoria they feel from being masculine made me feel more at peace and secure with my own masculinity. Seeing as one can feel genuine joy from being a man, from the masculinity they themselves worked to achieve, and from the positive aspects of that masculinity, while also rejecting the toxic parts of it... It just, makes me feel SO much better with myself as well.

Perhaps it sounds silly or obvious? But that realisation that I do NOT have to embrace all the baggage that comes with masculinity, and I can instead pick and choose parts of it, shaping my own version of being a man that makes me feel comfortable is something that made me feel massively better with myself. Being a silly guy gives me genuine gender euphoria - so I just embrace that "silly guy" part of masculinity, and give up on the toxic parts of it, like aggressive dominance, or hierarchical view of the world.

Going onwards, I don't think I'll be changing my pronouns from they/them, or drop the demiboy description of my identity. As I said - there is more to my identity that just discomfort for being called a man. But at least, I can be at peace with my own masculinity.

I genuinely have every single trans man and transmasculine person to thank for it. You made my life better, and I could never show properly just how deep my appreciation for you all goes.

While it doesn't really apply to me, I'm certain that trans women and transfeminine people have a similar influence for cis and gnc women. In fact, I have read a similar post from a female perspective before, and I have no doubts that this post influenced my realisation in how much more comfortable I am with my own masculinity thanks to transmasculine folks.

Trans people are a gift to this world. Their presence alone makes the world such a more beautiful place, period. I wish them all plenty of luck and joy going onwards! And once more - thank you all.

[thedreadvampy]

genuinely though it is challenging to acknowledge that to be productive, feminism must engage with men's experiences and struggles

because feminism exists because we as women are pushed to occupy less space and to make ourselves compliant and perpetually centre our lives around men's needs and wants. it's very, very, very emotionally difficult to square the circle of both recognising that men are people harmed and amputated by patriarchy, and continuing to build ourselves the space to breathe and find independence.

but it does start with a) recognising that men have a valid perspective on patriarchy and are constrained and wounded by patriarchal constructs and b) recognising that, as with any other victims of abuse, we can't fix it For Them, nor is it our responsibility to; we can only recognise their pain and try to offer somewhere to come away from it to.

the challenge that bell hooks and others are offering here though is that it does require shifting away from thinking about feminism as the preserve of women, and towards accepting men (to be clear bc TERFs happen: MEN, not trans women, not trans feminine people) as participants in the movement against patriarchy, not visitors, observers or allies. and that is Fucking Hard and really discomforting to even consider, because all of us as women or as survivors of misogyny have very significant, traumatic experience of having our own needs and experiences constantly pushed aside to make space for men to talk. and feminism is meant to provide a route out of that gendered oppression and silencing.

but if we can recognise that men - even cis men, even straight men, even conventionally masculine men - are harmed by patriarchy, and that men have an interest in dismantling patriarchy for their own wellbeing as well as the wellbeing of women and other not-men, then we have to look for ways to create space for men as equal participants in the conversation.

because to be frank, femininity is in many ways constructed as the default social role. you have to WORK to be masculine or you will be INFECTED with femininity. femininity is broadly constructed as the absence of masculinity, and masculinity as a rigid, constructed and fragile thing. patriarchal masculinity conceives of femininity as an insidious poison (if you don't proactively raise your children to be Manly Men, they will be Feminised). and patriarchal femininity is definitionally adaptive and flexible - it has to be, because it's there to respond to masculine demands - so we're able to construct Women's Spaces wherever we are pushed to, while Men's Spaces are rigid and inviolable.

Feminism and women's liberation has pushed most traditionally male spaces - work, sport, education, leisure, politics, etc - into having to admit women. (and to be clear, that's a Good Thing - I am financially independent and able to seek fulfillment and safety and stability on my own terms because of it. I am able to find joy that I would otherwise be cut off from because of it. I am able to get closer to building meaningful relationships with men because of it.)

But the same assimilation into cross-gender spaces hasn't happened in reverse - and in many ways it can't within patriarchal socialisation, because men aren't given the tools to be adaptive and flexible enough to find and build traditionally feminine spaces. women's spaces are rarely concrete, formal things; they're things that women build in community with each other, and men, particularly men who are subscribed to patriarchal masculinity, aren't afforded that type of community half as readily.

and just as it's vital to have some spaces where those of us who experience misogyny can discuss that among ourselves, men and people socially treated as men need spaces to discuss among themselves that traumatic experience. but they no longer have the sole claim on historic men's spaces, and they're also treated as outsiders in women's spaces. and that doesn't leave a lot of space to develop support networks for the work of growth.

like I'm very much not saying "you're not allowed to exclude men from feminist spaces" because I am actually pretty 100% on the need for spaces where we can discuss patriarchal misogyny among ourselves without having to handhold people who have no personal experience of it through the basics, or look after their feelings about it. Nor am I suggesting women should vacate historic "men's spaces" like work, pubs, sport, university, clergy, whatever, and get back in the kitchen - we've had centuries of that and that's uhhhhh not a winner, I would suggest. But we do need to engage with the value that those being gendered spaces can have for men beyond the preservation of power, and look at healthier and more equitable ways to meet those needs rather than dismissing it out of hand.

like: why do older men go to the pub and the football? because the pub and the stadium are spaces within patriarchal masculinity where men are allowed a measure of community, intimacy and vulnerability with other men! by making those cross gendered spaces, we provide a lot but we also do remove some opportunity to discuss the pain, difficulty and even joys of patriarchal masculinity with other people experiencing it - and as people who recognise the importance of sharing the experience of oppressive misogyny in spaces exclusively populated by people with that shared experience, we could probably recognise why spaces for men to share with men might be valuable in a context where we understand patriarchal masculinity as violently damaging to men in a way different to how it's violently damaging to women.

that's complicated, of course, by the fact that we have women-centred spaces because women are afraid of men - and men are also afraid of men. Patriarchal harm is produced through fear of men, so men harmed by patriarchy may often feel less, rather than more, safe in same-gender spaces. We're all performing for men - women-centred spaces provide relief for women that men-centred spaces can't provide for men.

so like I don't have an answer but the discomfort the question causes is worth examining. "Should men have an equal space in feminism?" is complicated because yes? no? maybe? sometimes? what would that look like? what do we lose? why should I give up space for men again? how can we change if we keep trying to retain separation? how do we remain safe and challenge gendered violence if we don't have spaces where men are sidelined? how do we if we do? I have no answers but I know it's something important.

[thatfeyboy]

"Everyone feels that way" is so telling tbh. I remember constantly being told that any issue I had with femininity or womanhood/femaleness/etc. was just how other women felt all the time, that every women hates themselves and it was the Patriarchy TM that caused it. I have since come to find that all women absolutely do not feel like this. There may be misogyny in the world that many suffer from but this weird bitterness towards womanhood some of these people display is beyond that.

I'm sure it's not all of them, but I wouldn't be surprised if the reason many are so angry is because they too have some gender dysphoria and there world view completely buries any healthy way to deal with it. It likely would also contribute to their total devotion to androphobia, as if you hate being a woman, making men seem like an even worse option likely provides some comfort. It also lets you vilify those you have any envy for who may be living as men (cis or trans).

It's the same as how there are MRA/incel types that end up there because they are bitter towards women, and think being a man is inherently bad, and that feeling is often caused by having gender dysphoria. Other groups just use these feelings as a tool to weaponize us against each other.

Radfems that ARE trans inclusive are still awful to men, they just do it in a trans inclusive way. To them men don't have unique experiences with oppression or the intersection between being a man and other aspects of identity. According to their beliefs being a man is a simple and unchanging structure in the framework of "patriarchy" and can only ever bring someone privilege. Their movement actively encouraged dehumanizing men and moving towards black and white thinking about those deemed unworthy of sympathy. I'm sure I don't need to explain what reasons they give for that, suffice to say the less "female" you appear the more predatory you become.

As an extra cause I don't know where to put this otherwise, I was deeply hurt by this stuff. It took me years of time and therapy to accept myself as a man and not feel I was betraying other women or mistaking dysphoria for "internalized misogyny" (I had severe sex dysphoria) or that I wouldn't be gross and evil and violent and unlovable if I was/accepted I was a man. I cannot begin to imagine how bad it would have been if I'd been properly indoctrinated at that point in my life, for myself and others.

Spot the difference

Terfs saying “Everyone feels that way! It’s just internalized misogyny” about transmasculinity

“Trans inclusive” radfems saying “Transmascs have no unique experiences, it’s just misogyny!”

Oh wait there is no difference

[olderthannetfic]

Now I'm at the point where I think if someone in the queer community is trying to tell women, femmes, afab people/whoever to stop enjoying BL, they also need to be consistent and tell all queer men to stop doing drag because they both engage with gender in the same way.

Everything those folks tell afab people [they're 1) capitalizing on male queerness without any of the struggles that come along with it or 2) depicting x identity without authenticity or 3) it's not #ownvoices/representation or 4) it's using stereotypes of x group that have historically harmed them] also apply to queer men who do drag in terms of them exploiting women for entertainment. Women are a marginalized group in society; that's a fact. A cis queer man will never truly understand what it's like to be a woman. A cis drag queen will likely never have to know what it's like to be constantly told from infancy your body and sexuality just exist for men. Your interests in fashion or makeup or academics are just for men. [By this logic, a cis woman could reasonably find an issue with a cis man then taking this aspect of personal and societal struggle and bastardizing it for entertainment/humor when women every day are killed, harassed, and attacked for not performing femininity for men.] Cis drag queens also use stereotypes of femininity as punchlines or jokes in this escapism when the ones who have to deal with the fallout in society are women. Drag queens are no more "representation" for women than BL characters are for queer men. No one goes to a drag show if that's what they want, and drag queens shouldn't be expected to do that, just like afab BL creators shouldn't be forced to conform to what anyone thinks is "good representation" for queer men. No queer man has been hurt by BL, just like no cis woman has been hurt by drag. Let's be consistent.

Now, is it also true that there are a lot of nonbinary and trans women who do drag as a way to express their gender? Yes. Are they likely the majority of drag queens? No. So, how would we decide who can appropriate aspects of the female experience? We can't. The same goes for afab BL fans and creators. Yeah, lots are trans or nonbinary, but it's ridiculous to expect everyone to out themselves or write a biographical manifesto to justify their tastes in entertainment. Are there drag queens who are misogynistic? Yes, the most famous example is RuPaul. Does this apply to all? No. Just like BL fans and homophobia.

However, everyone knows that talk of getting rid of drag queens is a common talking point of conservatives. This talk around afab BL fans should be considered in the same way.

--

Huzzah!

I've pointed this out many times. Hell, I've seen a blog post from a BL type author who is leery of women writing BL that pointed out the same thing and came to a similar conclusion.

One of the more interesting commentaries on the cis gay male culture aspects of all this was in David Halperin's How to be Gay. Either I'm misremembering, or the kindle price has dropped from academic book horror levels to something more acceptable, at least to my US eye. ($14.16 currently) I highly recommend it.

He uses the word 'appropriation' to talk about what drag queens do, though he doesn't mean it in a "and that is obviously universally bad" way. He explicitly addresses the fact that some women will find drag misogynist, and that's okay. It's okay that they feel this way. It's okay that a subculture makes art for a particular audience that may be offputting or disturbing to other audiences.

The book is about a lot more than just drag. It goes into all of that cis gay male culture like loving The Golden Girls and venerating tragic women of classic Hollywood. I have sometimes, as a woman, felt almost like I was tresspassing on gay men's territory to love Joan Crawford and her ilk. Which, if you think about it, is fucking nuts.

Halperin doesn't talk about BL at all, at least not in that book, but his observations are like a mirror of fandom and inform a lot of how I look at #ownvoices.

The book is based on a class he taught with that same joke title. The point was that he did not find the performance of normative US cis gay male culture ("What a dump!", Golden Girls love, etc.) to be at all natural. He had to learn it. All his friends laughed about how he was the last guy to teach anyone "how to be gay".

Anyway, as he taught the class, he noticed something that shocked him: students were connecting with The Golden Girls and campy, queer-coded old Broadway plays much more than with the direct, literal representation, even when that representation was on Broadway in a similar tone and type of media.

The book is his exploration of why. To boil it down: gay men were seeking things that felt true internally, not externally. They were often identifying with situations and dynamics or with all of the characters. They didn't necessarily want to be told "Here's your self insert! Now relate!" It's full of the same kind of talk of critical distance that oldschool slash meta engages in.

I actually have a whole long meta piece about this: What I Want is To(o) Direct.

I got the idea after reading Halperin and bounced up to Francesca Coppa at a con to blather about it. She was like "Oh, I just wrote a book chapter on that." That chapter is: Slash/Drag: Appropriation and Visibility in the Age of Hamilton. You can find it in A Companion to Media Fandom and Fan Studies.

Drag is great, but I hate the misogynist attitude that men can borrow from women to express their oppression or their interior worlds metaphorically, but women cannot borrow from men for the same purpose.

The inevitable transphobia that comes with strict policing of either is just the cherry on an already towering shit sundae.

[mueritos]

How do you feel abt the topic of transmisandry? I personally don’t like the term (bc it implies that misandry is real), but a lot of discussions of specific transmasc oppression and transman oppression have devolved into people saying transmasc oppression is small potatoes and (in some cases I’ve seen) not real or just a by product of misogyny and there doesn’t seem to be any other term or tag where we can talk abt the oppression specific to transmascs , particularly trans men of color. So I wanted to ask your opinion on it, if you had one.

Hmm. I've had different ideas about transmisandry in the post and have sortve agreed with some aspects of it. I'll be inserting a read more.

It's true that transmen are treated much differently than transwomen, ciswomen, and cismen. But I also don't think coining this oppression as "misandry" is helping anyone. People don't hate transmen because we're men, they hate us because they think we're women. Terfs believe we're sisters lost to the patriarchy and trans agender, transphobes dont even see us as men, and lots of cis queer people infantilize transmen because we're seen as men-lite, again, not even as men. We're fetishized because we are seen as men-lite or as "pussy boys" (again, viewing us as women, and ofc theres nothing wrong with transmen calling themselves pussy boys, its just weird when cis people do it). I do genuinely believe we have, will, and do experience misogyny, only because misogyny affects everyone. Just because a cis man isn't going to be targeted by misogyny, he is still affected by it because of his distance from misogyny (he's not viewed as a second rate human for being a man), he profits off of it, but he is also forced to be a misogynist and internalize misogynist ideas that in the end do not allow him to be emotional, a caretaker, a father, a parent, a husband, and a good person.

Transmen do experience misogyny for the fact that we have lived as women, whether some of us view that period in our lives as us being women or just performing femininity; to be honest, it doesn't matter, because any perception of femininity is seen as inferior. I don't think its wrong to say that transmen experience misogyny, nor is it transphobic to say this. Like I mentioned before, misogyny affects everyone, and we all gain and lose from it in many ways. Female abusers gain from misogyny because they're seen as simply "crazy girlfriends/wives,etc" who do harm that is normalized within that archetype, harm that society as a whole accepts. Transmen gain from misogyny the moment we're seen as "cis-passing", because men will switch up their language around another man in regards to what they say about women. But transmen are affected by reproductive rights, sexual health access (abortion, family planning, birth control, STI/STD testing), and transmen are infantilized largely because we are still see as a lesser sex than cisgender men, something which I would argue IS misogyny. As a transmasc latine, I've had to face heavy gender norms that largely did not shift at all for me even after I transitioned. I was still expected to keep the house clean, cook, take care of children when needed, and while this should be expected of everyone, it was still something that was never expected or even seen in the cismen of my family. In fact, a lot of transmascs of color have to navigate the role of both, and while this is optimal as really everyone should just be doing both roles (and roles as in let's de-gender their functions, like everyone should be cooking, cleaning, doing housework, yardwork, child rearing, etc), it is again not really expected from cis men in communities.

I do think we can come up with a better term, and I've always opted to say "trans oppression" or "transmasc oppression", because while our infantilization and dehumanization IS different according to our status as transmen, I still have a hard time believing it is COMPLETELY different from womens'. I don't think there's anything wrong with being a transmasc who is open to the fact that we still have proximity to womanhood, much like transfemmes can be honest about their proximity to malehood. This isn't to say that transmascs or transfemmes have a "male priviledge" or that transmascs ARE women and that transfemmes are secretly men, or whatever else the terfs say, I think its just a fact that because we have to oscillate between various genders, roles, and identities, that that has made us gain the experiences of those roles we've had to inhabit, voluntary or not. I spend a lot of time in women's spaces, not just because as a feminist one should, but because women's spaces used to be for me! And truthfully, I think women's spaces should be open to trans people; our oppression is rooted in misogyny, just as it is rooted in racism, ableism, sexism, homophobia, and etc.

As for a better term, I think its best to leave that up to the members of our community who have largely shaped it. My proximity to whiteness is far greater than other trans people, so if anyone were to come up with new language or terms, I would prefer to use the ones created by BIPOC trans people. I think it's one of the reasons why I prefer saying "trans oppression" instead of specifying a oppression; when we use hyper specific terms, we move away from the various intersections and similarities between other communities and their oppressions, similarities and communities who I think we need to have better connections and solidarity with. I think we can talk about how transmisogyny primarily affects the lives and well-being's of transwomen and still acknowledge that misogyny also affects transmen without stepping on any toes. I say this, of course, with disclaiming that we can't say this without acknowledging intersectionality (as I always make these claims with intersectionality in mind, but I do have to disclaim because I also realize not everyone walks through life with these intersections constantly in mind). Racism, ableism, colorism, etc need to be acknowledged in order to help those who need social networks, assistance, and aid the most.

I understand the need to label everything we feel; it brings community and a term to rally behind. But I think using the language we already have can do the conversation justice, we just need to have these conversations with nuance, which unfortunately for a lot of people, they just like...do not have. The lack of queer history, solidarity, and queer experience that so many people have...and then these are the people that end up speaking the loudest. The best thing i can say is build solidarity and community, continue learning, continue talking, and get off the internet. Queer spaces are much more meaningful IRL than online.

I hope that helped a bit. It's a bit lengthy and i could keep talking, but I would rlly appreciate any further thoughts, ideas, or critiques :)

[velvetvexations]

I feel like a lot of the trans women saying that masculinity/manhood is always rewarded in everyone because patriarchy often forget that the opposite is true, actually, for people who are seen as women/put in the "woman" category.

Because yes, trans women are usually forced into manhood and "rewarded" for being men, and punished for being women. But that's not because manhood is universally rewarded in everyone, but because partriarchy sees having been born with a penis as "man".

It also sees being born with a vagina as "woman", and every deviation from that is *also* punished.

Yes, people who are seen as women/girls may have more freedom in expression of gender (depending on where they are from. I hate when ppl act like people afab everywhere can just dress like men without punishment. There are so many countries with laws on what "women" (and those treated as women because of their agab) can wear, and if anyone believes for one second that breaking these laws is REWARDED in any way, they're so fucking deep in their own head and need to talk to someone from these countries) but that freedom was fought for by feminists! Feminists have fought to be simply just allowed to wear pants. It's ridiculous to look at how it is now (in the western world) and make conclusions on that without looking at *why* it is that way now and how it was before.

And people are usually expected to grow out of their tomboy-"phase" by the time they reach their late teens, or early twenties at latest, and become a feminine woman, wife, and mother. If you don't do that, your masculinity gets punished.

And the masculinity of people afab is also only (begrudgingly) accepted (in SOME places in the world) as long as they're still visible as women or girls and their masculinity is hot and serves cishet men. As soon as they step "too far" out of these roles (by being non-binary or men, or being "ugly", fat, or anything that would make them "undesirable"), their masculinity gets punished. Horribly.

It's really infuriating when (trans)radfem trans women try to act like their experiences are universal and whenever someone says something that disagrees with them, they must be lying or "delusional" (yay, ableism! so progressive /s) for thinking that they were, in fact, punished for their masculinity or manhood...

Sorry for unloading this on you, didn't know where else to put it. And thank you so much for listening.

I think a major issue here is that no matter how much we try to reason things out and work through why they act the way they do, radical feminism, trans or cis, ultimately comes down, at some point, to a deliberate decision to prioritize egocentrism and their own desires over seeing other people as real, actual people - not even other transfems, who they just sexualize and try to control, or call a TERF if they can't. And it's hard to reason with that.

Like, they have to know on some level that they hyperinflate trans women in particular being "socially murdered"* to use as social capital and terrorize younger** transfems into isolating themselves. Maybe a very long time ago for some of them it came from the distress they felt from the legitimately immense danger transfems face in a variety of contexts, but they've shot far beyond that now and just don't really care. They've built a cage of unreality around themselves that makes me feel like I'm talking to aliens.

Like the other day, I was talking to one who insisted that the tee-em-ees will not show up for me. Like, I said they did, and she said they won't, and I was like, but they DO! They have! Always! I've seen it with my own eyes, directly for me specifically! But it was just "who hurt you," "let yourself be angry," "don't settle for just scraps," "they won't treat you better if you throw yourself at their feet," "social murder," and it's like WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? ARE YOU HAVING A STROKE? WAS THIS A DREAM YOU HAD?

And what about the deliberately cruel fuckery, the constant derision of the most petty things like forcemasc? What the fuck do they get out of wrongly asserting that women are never punished for masculinity and never have a problem with being viewed as masculine, like why are they doing that, what is their goal? Because it seems like it's literally just "mock and invalidate the sexual interests of others and deem it an inferior copy of our thing."

What do they get out of misgendering cis and trans men for forcefem funsies and telling them to suck it up? They don't really believe that their forcefem joke is the only thing that might make an egg crack. That's extremely obviously a lie. They're doing it because they want to, because it's their kink, because they don't care about the feelings of other people, and they can use transmisogyny as a convenient defense when people ask them to moderate literally any of their behavior for the comfort of everyone else to literally any extent while demanding everyone else shut up and defer to them on every single topic in every single situation.

And this stuff with D20 and Ophiuchus and the transmasc character being treated better? A lie. Just fully making it up. Inventing it. Fabricating it. For attention.

I've never had one acknowledge it when I've tried to explain that I first learned about all of this from transmasc friends bringing it to me so they could defer to my opinion.

They're determined to stay like this. It sucks.

*truly a phrase that makes me livid to even think about now, they reduce it to about the same level of seriousness as forcefem jokes, every single time it's so thoughtlessly hollow and self-obsessed but you could guess that from it being a fair description of every thought they externalize

**let me make this clear, I'm referring to young adults, I am not accusing anyone of being predatory towards minors nor am I saying the motivations are necessarily sexual anyway, although clearly transradfems don't care about the effect their hyperbole will have on the mental health of minors exposed to it and trained from a young age to never trust anyone, so underage transfems are very much a concern here, but not in the sense that they're being directly and personally abused in any way

[girl-with-bones]

Also note: there actually aren't clear lines on any of these terms or groups. I know it's easy to think that way when our conversation boils down to who is oppressed more or in specific ways, but like.

You probably don't know your chromosomes. If you've never had them actively tested, you could be some flavour of intersex without knowing it. Does that mean you have the right to speak over known intersex people (especially about their uniquely horrific experiences)? Nope. But it does mean that there's not a lot of use in separating these groups or talking about "stealing" terminology.

We are one movement. The queer community may seem fractured, but we are all lgbt+, by definition. Okay, actually, even that line gets blurry sometimes - but I think that kinda proves my point! In my eyes at least, the goal isn't that all our microcommunities have their unique stuff that nobody else can touch, the goal is to live comfortably with our identities.

If that means certain terms for certain groups to more easily raise awareness about their particular struggles, cool. But we're a community based on identity, and identity is very fluid and does not care for the 'rules'. There are always going to be exceptions. People have been calling themselves girlboys and fagdykes for as long as we've had the words and the concepts.

I think the most insightful thing ive read about this particular situation is "tumblr is where the exceptions tend to gather", and I wish I could properly credit that quote but I cannot remember where I saw it.

Either way, guys, we're on the queer freak website. We're in the place where the people who feel like they don't belong anywhere else come. So yeah, there are gonna be he/him lesbians and afab trans women and non-binary intersex girlboys and to me, that's fine. Good, even! I mean, that's what diversity is. Accepting all flavours of people, however they choose to identify.

But also, we might have a whole generation of queers growing up in this political landscape. Where all they know is a community divided, constant squabbling, and the pressure to be completely inoffensive 100% of the time.

Maybe it's time to go back to basics?

We are a community of atypical people, made a community by being atypical. There are many different ways to identify, and so long as we all work together, we can create a world where each one is accepted and celebrated.

We all suffer in different ways. Misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, etc. But the systems that cause that oppression harm everyone. To some degree, cis, straight men are affected by all three of those - think about how many men in your life seem somehow repressed or insecure for fear of seeming 'gay' or 'feminine', which thanks to those forms of oppression, are deemed bad.

Of course, it's important to note that there is a difference between interpersonal and systemic oppression. Someone shouting slurs at me if they somehow perceive me as non-white is not any less racist just because im not. However, because I am completely white, I am afforded a million and one privileges across society - fairer treatment under the law, statistically better housing in better areas, easier time finding work, etc.

We have a lot of work to do - homosexuality is still criminalised in well over 60 countries. The state of transgender healthcare worldwide is appalling, intersex children are still operated on with zero consent from anybody. But that work can and should come before debating over who's label is less offensive.

Donate to queer charities, if you have the money; spread awareness at your school or work, if it's safe to do so; attend or run lgbt+ events, again if it's safe.

Yes, it is a true statement that trans women experience certain forms of oppression by being specifically transfem. And it is a true statement that trans men experience certain forms of oppression by being specifically transmasc.

But in my view, what's way way more important than who has it worse, is actually supporting each other. Because we all have it bad. We are all atypical, and in some way suffer because of it. And in other ways, can thrive and celebrate that queerness!!

Let's build each other up. Make a strong community. Dismantle these old systems. We have a community in enough numbers to change the world, and we have already done so plenty of times. That's the goal.

As well as being unapologetically queer as fuck 1000% of the time 😋

can perisex ppl also id as afab trans woman (i'm bigender man/woman and i feel my transness affects both but i don't want to snatch terms from intersex ppl)

my sibling in christ do whatever you want forever 🙏

[cuntess-carmilla]

The level of performance you demand from bi people as a whole, but especially of bi women, is motherfucking insane. I really don't get why you all demand bi women virtue signal their sexuality by "rejecting" men in order to not deem them gross lesbophobes by virtue of existing. "Even" if they prefer men that's not necessarily out of some internalized homo/biphobia. They just like men. That’s kind of part of (most bi people’s) bisexuality. Shocker, I know.

A lot of the behaviors you all accuse bi women of (not taking other women seriously as partners, for example) are behaviors a lot of lesbians in denial exhibit too but in us you see victims of our own pain and misogyny who need help and understanding, while in bi women you see vile irredeemable perpetrators who must be ostracized and punished.

You blame them of their own abuse at the hands of cis straight men in ways that if you remove the "bi" from "bi women" you would recognize as disgusting victim-blaming, WHILE rejecting them & pushing them out of LGBT spaces, which, guess what you fucking geniuses; leaves them to have cis straight men as their only viable option. Funny how that works. You're all "women should stay away from dating bi women" or "bi women fetishize lesbianism by wanting to be with women" but shame bi women for being with men IN THE SAME BREATH. What the fuck do you want them to do? Be celibate for your own biphobic comfort?

I legit saw idiots on Twitter say "normalize lesbians only dating other lesbians" as if that's not what's normalized already. Bi women are already seen as gross sluts that kiss women at parties to turn men on and only seriously date men. What the fuck isn’t normalized about lesbians dating lesbians only?

You think that I, a literal fucking dyke, didn't see women at some point as hot for sex and men as the only viable partners for serious relationships? Would you see me as a disgusting dangerous misogynist for having been there, or as struggling with internalized homophobia? If it’s the later, why don't you extend that same compassion to bi women? Only difference there is that I'm a lesbian and they're bisexual.

Sure, they like men so being with men isn't INHERENTLY torture for them like it is for me, but you don't think that thinking/behaving that way is traumatizing for them too? They love women and are depriving themselves of that experience out of internalized biphobia, misogyny and homophobia. You think that doesn’t fuck them up too? They're hurting too, but you think that, unlike a lesbian who does the same, THEY deserve that suffering.

And no one is telling you to date them or to suffer for them through it just because they're suffering too. What you're being told is to see them as the non-straight women they are who're suffering too and understand the complexity of their situation the same way you would someone like me.

You think too that the “solution” to the horrendous rates of IPV they face with cis straight men is swearing off men. Would you tell straight women to do the same if they don’t want to be abused by male partners? You wouldn't. Because you see straight women as not having "an option" but think bi women do and thus they MUST be asking to be abused. Literal “asking for it” shit. It's all victim blaming + Boys Will Be Boys, but add a "bi" to it and it's progressive somehow.

This points to you seeing women's attraction to men as only ok when it's not "chosen", just a passive reception of misogynistic violence (which, way to take away the agency of women’s sexualities, you dumb bitches), but when they IN THEORY have a "choice" because they also like women, their attraction to men is active instead of passive, and thus they're cock-sucking sluts who’re choosing to endanger themselves. You see women whose desire for men is active, as deserving of whatever results from their involvement with men. You can't be a biphobe without being a misogynist.

You see bisexuality as a fractured amalgam of homosexuality + heterosexuality instead of its own standalone identity, and thus they can and MUST choose one or the other, because their “heterosexual” attraction and their gay attraction are in active competition within them like the fucking two wolves shit. You can’t be a biphobe without being a homophobe.

Bi women's attraction to men is NOT normalized and biphobes are living proof of it. It's not normalized; they're bisexual, not straight. Their attraction to men coexists with, interlinks with and isn't independent of their attraction to women. Bi women ARE shamed and punished for liking men because they don't like men alone, they simultaneously like women and those are inseparable for them.

If it was normalized, it wouldn't be widespread to blame them for the abuse they receive when involved with men, like they should pick a side for their abuse to count or matter. They wouldn't be pushed out of LGBT spaces for being with men, it wouldn't be seen by other LGBT people (even many bi women themselves) as a flaw in their sexuality that makes them a gay-straight chimera. They wouldn't feel ashamed of their attraction to men. They wouldn't be seen with suspicion for liking men if it was normalized.

Them simultaneously liking men is seen as not loving men "correctly" AND as not loving women “correctly”. No LGBT women (including cis bi women and straight trans women) are seen as doing love and sex "correctly".

You can only claim bi women's attraction to men is normalized if you see bisexuality as a Lego combo of straight + gay and thus their attraction to men is separable from their attraction to women. It's not. They're not cherry-picked bits and pieces of heterosexuality and homosexuality. They're 100% bisexual, always, no matter in what way their bisexuality expresses itself. Be it bisexual with no preference, bisexual with a preference for women, or bisexual with a preference for men.

It's not 50-50% straight-gay, 25-75% straight-gay, or 80-20% straight-gay respectively. ALL are 100% bisexual-bisexual. If you can't respect that, you're a homophobe and a misogynist.

And yes, it is HOMOphobic to see bi women with suspicion for liking men. You see "homosexual" attraction as inherently in jeopardy if there's a coexisting "heterosexual" attraction because the gay one will be lesser and you see the "straight" one as a threat that'll take precedent. That’s your gay insecurity from internalized homophobia speaking.

Then too, there's a reason biphobes think bi men are secretly gay, and bi women are secretly straight. You see men as the superior and inevitable choice for both. That's misogyny. If you're a biphobe, you ARE undoubtedly a misogynist and a homophobe, even if you're gay and/or a woman yourself.

Every time people make armchair judgements of bisexual women as man-worshipers all I can think of is my sister who cried rivers of tears to me about how painful and stressing it is to over-perform her attraction to men who're not even her type (she likes gnc men!) just to stay closeted, and when I think of that, I wish so badly I could slap each and every person doing that.

And yeah! You read right, GNC MEN. Bisexuality is "gay enough", "even" in their different-gender attraction, that plenty of bi women prefer gnc men, and plenty of bi men prefer gnc women. In fact, plenty of bi people, including the cis ones, are gnc themselves (with a specific tendency towards androgyny but there's many who're distinctly masculine/feminine at it) and thus much more visible as gay than someone like me; a fucking lesbian, but I'm fem-presenting.

"Bi people can stay closeted while in relationships." So can gay men and lesbians who have beards, who hide our partners, whose partners are trans and closeted, if we're trans and closeted ourselves, or if we’re single and not visibly gnc.

My relationship would be seen as straight by outsiders because my fiancé is a closeted trans lesbian. Unless you’re a transphobe you would NOT call that a fucking privilege. It’s not a fucking privilege that she’s forced to hide herself and hide that the nature of her exclusive love for women is gay. That shit fucking kills her inside. It’s not a privilege that to keep the love of my life safe and myself too I have to pretend that our love is straight when it was so fucking hard for me to just detect, let alone ACCEPT and take pride in that I don’t like men.

All of that keeps us safe, but at great emotional cost. Being closeted is safety for all LGBT people, but it’s not a privilege, it’s PAINFUL. You understand this when it comes to gay men and lesbians, and can feel compassion for us. Why not for bi people? Why are you so angry at bi people? Why do you hold so much contempt for bi people?

I'll tell you why: BECAUSE YOU'RE BIGOTS.

[nothorses]

This thread on Twitter (also give @Azure_Husky a follow!!)

Linked Article Transcript below

Content warnings for transphobia against transmasculine people, including violence and harassment It's easy to say that transmasculine people get male privilege and face less oppression than many other trans people, but only if you don't actually listen https://m.dailykos.com/stories/2019/8/9/1877651/-There-is-a-hidden-epidemic-of-violence-against-transmasculine-people

I hear pretty constantly from transmasculine people about the violence they face from cis people and the erasure, condescension, and "suck it up, you're the oppressor now" attitudes they get from other trans people. 

We are failing the transmasculine parts of our communities. We are failing our brothers and masculine siblings. We need to get better at listening to transmasculine people's concerns and working together rather than fostering hierarchies of oppression within transness 

Once transness is involved, shit gets complicated. Simple responses of "misandry doesn't exist because men have the power" assume transmasculine people have access to the same privileges as average cis men when frequently they don't. 

One of the saddest things about being someone who talks about this is that i regularly get transmasculine people giving heartfelt thanks for the smallest mentions of their needs & concerns bc they're so used to transfeminine people ignoring their existence or being antagonistic 

We need to do better. I refuse for some of us trans people to base our fights for equality and justice by stepping on the needs of other trans people. 

I see transfeminine people I care about and respect who will sometimes share "let's make a world without men" type things and like I have had these feelings too, I struggle under misogyny and have a bunch of bad experiences with (cis, especially but not exclusively) men. *and*- 

- i've seen too many of my transmasculine siblings' hurt as they are constantly lumped into "just as bad as cis men" baskets (which I also have feelings about but is a larger topic I think) & have heard from too many transmasculine people who have spent years in denial bc of this 

I've heard from too many transmasculine people who have put off transitioning, tried to avoid accepting their gender, because they internalized the constant stream of this shit. And I love trans people too fucking much to keep letting it go. 

I get that for many of our communities there can be some incredible trauma around masculinity, either because it was enforced on us against our will or due to violence and/or sexual assault. And i don't debate the validity of that trauma. 

And also we can't extrapolate our trauma into "this segment of trans people, by virtue of their gender, is worth less (or worthless)". 

I mean if we want to dig into it, a lot of us transfeminine people get attacked by transphobes under the auspices of trauma regarding specific genitals or gender expressions or body types. And most of us can agree that their trauma doesn't mean they get to denigrate us. 

Honestly I'm tired. And also I acknowledge that my tiredness about this cannot be even a mild fraction of the exhaustion of the trans people targeted and erased by this must be. 

So I'm calling on y'all and asking you to please do better by *all* trans people. I get the joy and relief in venting about men. I do. We live in a misogynistic society and a lot of us suffer under the hands of a specific gender and sometimes we need an outlet. 

But at the very least please be aware of when your venting is in a public space where it *is* going to harm and affect others, and specifically other trans people (since I don't have the spoons to get into a larger discussion about cis men currently) 

Know that every time we make vent-jokes (or not jokes) about how everyone who is masculine is worthless to us, we are directly damaging other trans people, and possibly painfully forcing some to deny themselves or stay closeted because who would want to become The Enemy, right? 

And I feel like I *have* to keep talking about this because if transmasc people stick up for themselves, I see how often they get shot down as just another "not all men" concern troll or like they're trying to talk over feminine people 

Hell I've seen threads where a transmasc person starts the thread to talk about transmasc issues and *still* people have declared it derailing or speaking over others. How do we address their oppression if they aren't allowed to discuss it anywhere? 

So as a transfeminine person I've got allyship privilege here where I may be condemned as having internalized misogyny or being an assimilationist or something but at least I can't be seen as just another dude talking over women

(i use the binary language there thoughtfully bc a lot of these Us vs Them dichotomies tend to erase nonbinary people or pretend that all nonbinary people are centre or feminine of centre on the gender spectrum) 

Just. Do better. Please. Like. Just listen to transmasculine people with an open heart for a bit and hear the intense transphobia and discrimination they also face and consider the impact of your words on them. 

It sucks to see people who are generally caring and thoughtful about many types of oppression just.. Let it all go when a chance to lump transmasc people in with The Enemy comes up. 

Addendum: I've had a couple people express concern that I'm saying that transfeminine people shouldn't address when they are facing transmisogyny from transmasculine people and I hope that it is clear that isn't what I am saying at all. 

Transmasculine people can be transmisogynistic, absolutely! I've had experiences with that too. What this thread is about is the fact that for *some* people, transmasculine people as a whole are considered less marginalized by dint of their masculinity and it isn't that simple. 

So saying broad statements about transmasculine people isn't "punching up". Its horizontal violence if it's coming from other trans people or can be punching down if it's coming from cis people. That is what this thread is meant to address. 

By all means we should be discussing and addressing transmisogyny. But transmasculine people discussing the specifics of their own concerns isn't in and of itself transmisogyny. We do no one any favours by trying to silence that. 

This thread isn't about transfeminine people never speaking ill of transmasculine people or vice versa. Its about calling-in a specific subset of transfeminine communities for treating transmasculine people as a whole as disposable and The Enemy.

[potteresque-ire]

Can you talk more about the usage of the word "wife" to talk about men in the BL context? I've noticed it in BJYX (particularly with GG), in the (English translations) of MDZS, and then it came up in your recent posts about Danmei-101 (which were super helpful btw) with articles connecting the "little fresh meat" type to fans calling an actor "wife." My initial reaction as a westerner is like "this is very problematic," but I think I'm missing a lot of language/cultural context. Any thoughts?

Hello! First of all, for those who’re interested, here’s a link to the referred posts. Under the cut is arguably the 4th post of the series. As usual, I apologise for the length!

(Topics: seme and uke; more about “leftover women”; roster of feminisation terms; Daji, Bao Si & the origin of BJYX; roster of beautiful, ancient Chinese men; Chairman Mao (not part of the roster) ...)

[TW: feminisation of men]

In the traditional BL characterisation, the M/M (double male) lead pairing is essentially a cis-het relationship in disguise, in which one of the M leads is viewed as the “wife” by the creator and audience. This lead often possesses some of the features of the traditional, stereotypical female, but retaining his male appearance. 

In BL terms, the “wife” is the “uke”. “Seme” and “uke” are the respective roles taken by the two male leads, and designated by the creator of the material. Literally, “seme” (攻め) means the dominant, the attacking / aggressive partner in the relationship and “uke” (受け), the passive / recipient (of actions) partner who tends to follow the seme’s lead. The terms themselves do not have any sexual / gender context.  However, as male and female are viewed as aggressive and passive by their traditional social roles, and the attacker and recipient by their traditional sexual roles respectively, BL fandoms have long assigned uke, the passive, sexual “bottom”, as the “woman”, the “wife”. 

Danmei has kept this “semi” and uke” tradition from BL, taking the kanji of the Japanese terms for designation ~ 攻 (”attack” is therefore the “husband”, and 受 (”receive”), the “wife”. The designations are often specified in the introduction / summary of Danmei works as warning / enticement. For MDZS, for example, MXTX wrote:

高貴冷豔悶騷 攻 × 邪魅狂狷風騷 受

高貴冷豔悶騷 攻 = noble, coolly beautiful and boring seme (referring to LWJ)  邪魅狂狷風騷 受 = devilishly charming, wild, and flirty uke (referring to WWX) 

The traditional, stereotypical female traits given to the “uke”, the “wife” in Danmei and their associated fanworks range from their personality to behaviour to even biological functions. Those who have read the sex scenes in MDZS may be aware of their lack of mention of lube, while WWX was written as getting (very) wet from fluids from his colon (腸道) ~ implying that his colon, much like a vagina, was supplying the necessarily lubrication for sex. This is obviously biologically inaccurate; however, Danmei is exempt from having to be realistic by its original Tanbi definition. The genre’s primary audience is cishet females, and sex scenes such as this one aren’t aiming for realism. Rather, the primary goal of these sex scenes is to generate fantasy, and the purpose of the biologically female functions in one of the leads (WWX) is to ease the readers into imagining themselves as the one engaging in the sex.

Indeed, these practices of assigning as males and female the M/M sexual top and bottom, of emphasising of who is the top and who is the bottom, have been falling out of favour in Western slash fandoms ~ I joined fandom about 15 years ago, and top and bottom designations in slash pairings (and fights about them) were much more common than it is now.  The generally more open, more progressive environments in which Western fandomers are immersed in probably have something to do with it: they transfer their RL knowledge, their views on biology, on different social into their fandom works and discourses. 

I’d venture to say this: in the English-speaking fandoms, fandom values and mainstream values are converging. “Cancel culture” reflects an attempt to enforce RL values in the fictional worlds in fandom. Fandom culture is slowly, but surely, leaving its subculture status and becoming part of mainstream culture. 

I’d hesitate to call c-Danmei fandoms backward compared to Western slash for this reason. There’s little hope for Danmei to converge with China’s mainstream culture in the short term ~ the necessity of replacing Danmei with Dangai in visual media already reflects that. Danmei is and will likely remain subculture in the foreseeable future, and subcultures, at heart, are protests against the mainstream. Unless China and the West define “mainstream” very similarly (and they don’t), it is difficult to compare the “progressiveness”—and its dark side, the “problematic-ness”—of the protests, which are shaped by what they’re protesting against. The “shaper” in this scenario, the mainstream values and culture, are also far more forceful under China’s authoritarian government than they are in the free(-er) world. 

Danmei, therefore, necessarily takes on a different form in China than BL or slash outside China. As a creative pursuit, it serves to fulfil psychological needs that are reflective of its surrounding culture and sociopolitical environment. The genre’s “problematic” / out of place aspects in the eyes of Western fandoms are therefore, like all other aspects of the genre, tailor-made by its millions of fans to be comforting / cathartic for the unique culture and sociopolitical background it and they find themselves in. 

I briefly detoured to talk about the Chinese government’s campaign to pressure young, educated Chinese women into matrimony and motherhood in the post for this reason, as it is an example of how, despite Western fandoms’ progressiveness, they may be inadequate, distant for c-Danmei fans. Again, this article is a short and a ... morbidly-entertaining read on what has been said about China’s “leftover women” (剩女) — women who are unmarried and over 27-years-old). I talked about it, because “Women should enter marriage and parenthood in their late 20s” may no longer a mainstream value in many Western societies, but where it still is, it exerts a strong influence on how women view romance, and by extension, how they interact with romantic fiction, including Danmei.

In China, this influence is made even stronger by the fact that Chinese tradition  places a strong emphasis on education and holds a conservative attitude towards romance and sex. Dating while studying therefore remains discouraged in many Chinese families. University-educated Chinese women therefore have an extremely short time frame — between graduation (~23 years old) and their 27th birthday — to find “the right one” and get married, before they are labelled as “leftovers” and deemed undesirable. (Saving) face being an important aspect in Chinese culture introduces yet another layer of pressure: traditionally, women who don’t get married by the age agreed by social norms have been viewed as failures of upbringing, in that the unmarried women’s parents not having taught/trained their daughters well. Filial, unmarried women therefore try to get married “on time” just to avoid bringing shame to their family.

The outcome is this: despite the strong women characters we may see in Chinese visual media, many young Chinese women nowadays do not expect themselves to be able to marry for love. Below, I offer a “book jacket summary” of a popular internet novel in China, which shows how the associated despair also affects cis-het fictional romance. Book reviews praise this novel for being “boring”: the man and woman leads are both common working class people, the “you-and-I”’s; the mundaneness of them trying build their careers and their love life is lit by one shining light: he loves her and she loves him. 

Written in her POV, this summary reflects, perhaps, the disquiet felt by many contemporary Chinese women university graduates:

曾經以為，自己這輩子都等不到了—— 世界這麼大，我又走得這麼慢，要是遇不到良人要怎麼辦？早過了「全球三十幾億男人，中國七億男人，天涯何處無芳草」的猖狂歲月，越來越清楚，循規蹈矩的生活中，我們能熟悉進而深交的異性實在太有限了，有限到我都做好了「接受他人的牽線，找個適合的男人慢慢煨熟，再平淡無奇地進入婚姻」的準備，卻在生命意外的拐彎處迎來自己的另一半。

I once thought, my wait will never come to fruition for the rest of my life — the world is so big, I’m so slow in treading it, what if I’ll never meet the one? I’ve long passed the wild days of thinking “3 billion men exist on Earth, 0.7 of which are Chinese. There is plenty more fish in the sea.” I’m seeing, with increasing clarity, that in our disciplined lives, the number of opposite-sex we can get to know, and get to know well, is so limited. It’s so limited that I’m prepared to accept someone’s matchmaking, find a suitable man and slowly, slowly, warm up to him, and then, to enter marriage with without excitement, without wonder. But then, an accidental turn in my life welcomes in my other half.

— Oath of Love (餘生，請多指教) (Yes, this is the novel Gg’d upcoming drama is based on.) 

Heteronormativity is, of course, very real in China. However, that hasn’t exempted Chinese women, even its large cis-het population, from having their freedom to pursue their true love taken away from them. Even for cis-het relationships, being able to marry for love has become a fantasy —a fantasy scorned by the state. Remember this quote from Article O3 in the original post? 

耽改故事大多远离现实，有些年轻受众却将其与生活混为一谈，产生不以结婚和繁衍为目的才是真爱之类的偏颇认知。

Most Dangai stories are far removed from reality; some young audience nonetheless mix them up with real life, develop biased understanding such as “only love that doesn’t treat matrimony and reproduction as destinations is true love”. 

I didn’t focus on it in the previous posts, in an effort to keep the discussion on topic. But why did the op-ed piece pick this as an example of fantasy-that-shouldn’t-be-mixed-up-with-real-life, in the middle of a discussion about perceived femininity of men that actually has little to do with matrimony and reproduction? 

Because the whole point behind the state’s “leftover women” campaign is precisely to get women to treat matrimony and reproduction as destinations, not beautiful sceneries that happen along the way. And they’re the state’s destination as more children = higher birth rate that leads to higher future productivity. The article is therefore calling out Danmei for challenging this “mainstream value”.

Therefore, while the statement True love doesn’t treat matrimony and reproduction as destinations may be trite for many of us while it may be a point few, if any, English-speaking fandoms may pay attention to, to the mainstream culture Danmei lives in, to the mainstream values dictated by the state, it is borderline subversive.

As much as Danmei may appear “tame” for its emphasis on beauty and romance, for it to have stood for so long, so firmly against China’s (very) forceful mainstream culture, the genre is also fundamentally rebellious.  Remember: Danmei has little hope of converging with China’s mainstream unless it “sells its soul” and removes its homoerotic elements. 

With rebelliousness, too, comes a bit of tongue-in-cheek.

And so, when c-Danmei fans, most of whom being cishet women who interact with the genre by its traditional BL definition, call one of the leads 老婆 (wife), it can and often take on a different flavour. As said before, it can be less about feminizing the lead than about identifying with the lead. The nickname 老婆 (wife) can be less about being disrespectful and more about humorously expressing an aspiration—the aspiration to have a husband who truly loves them, who they do want to get married and have babies with but out of freedom and not obligation.

Admittedly, I had been confused, and bothered by these “can-be”s myself. Just because there are alternate reasons for the feminisation to happen doesn’t mean the feminisation itself is excusable. But why the feminisation of M/M leads doesn’t sound as awful to me in Chinese as in English? How can calling a self-identified man 老婆 (wife) get away with not sounding being predominantly disrespectful to my ears, when I would’ve frowned at the same thing said in my vicinity in English?

I had an old hypothesis: when I was little, it was common to hear people calling acquaintances in Chinese by their unflattering traits:  “Deaf-Eared Chan” (Mr Chan, who’s deaf), “Fat Old Woman Lan” (Ah-Lan, who’s an overweight woman) etc—and the acquaintances were perfectly at ease with such identifications, even introducing themselves to strangers that way. Comparatively speaking then, 老婆 (wife) is harmless, even endearing. 

老婆, which literally means “old old-lady” (implying wife = the woman one gets old with), first became popularised as a colloquial, casual way of calling “wife” in Hong Kong and its Cantonese dialect, despite the term itself being about 1,500 years old. As older generations of Chinese were usually very shy about talking about their love lives, those who couldn’t help themselves and regularly spoke of their 老婆 tended to be those who loved their wives in my memory. 老婆, as a term, probably became endearing to me that way. 

Maybe this is why the feminisation of M/M leads didn’t sound so bad to me?

This hypothesis was inadequate, however. This custom of identifying people by their (unflattering) traits has been diminishing in Hong Kong and China, for similar reasons it has been considered inappropriate in the West.

Also, 老婆 (wife) is not the only term used for / associated with feminisation. I’ve tried to limit the discussion to Danmei, the fictional genre; now, I’ll jump to its associated RPS genre, and specifically, the YiZhan fandoms. The purpose of this jump: with real people involved, feminisation’s effect is potentially more harmful, more acute. Easier to feel. 

YiZhan fans predominantly entered the fandoms through The Untamed, and they’ve also transferred Danmei’s  “seme”/��uke” customs into YiZhan. There are, therefore, three c-YiZhan fandoms:

博君一肖 (BJYX): seme Dd, uke Gg 戰山為王 (ZSWW): seme Gg, uke Dd 連瑣反應 (LSFY): riba Gg and Dd. Riba = “reversible”, and unlike “seme” and “uke”, is a frequently-used term in the Japanese gay community. 

BJYX is by far the largest of the three, likely due to Gg having played WWX, the “uke” in MDZS / TU. I’ll therefore focus on this fandom, ie. Gg is the “uke”, the “wife”.

For Gg alone, I’ve seen him being also referred to by YiZhan fans as (and this is far from a complete list):

* 姐姐 (sister) * 嫂子 (wife of elder brother; Dd being the elder brother implied) * 妃妃 (based on the very first YiZhan CP name, 太妃糖 Toffee Candy, a portmanteau of sorts from Dd being the 太子 “prince” of his management company and Gg being the prince’s wife, 太子妃. 糖 = “candy”. 太妃 sounds like toffee in English and has been used as the latter’s Chinese translation.) * 美人 (beauty, as in 肖美人 “Beauty Xiao”) * Daji 妲己 (as in 肖妲己, “Daji Xiao”). 

The last one needs historical context, which will also become important for explaining the new hypothesis I have.

Daji was a consort who lived three thousand years ago, whose beauty was blamed for the fall of the Shang dynasty. Gg (and men sharing similar traits, who are exceptionally rare) has been compared to Daji 妲己 for his alternatively innocent, alternatively seductive beauty ~ the kind of beauty that, in Chinese historical texts and folk lores, lead to the fall of kingdoms when possessed by the king’s beloved woman. This kind of “I-get-to-ruin-her-virginity”, “she’s a slut in MY bedroom” beauty is, of course, a stereotypical fantasy for many (cis-het) men, which included the authors of these historical texts and folklores. However, it also contained some truth: the purity / innocence, the image of a virgin, was required for an ancient woman to be chosen as a consort; the seduction, meanwhile, helped her to become the top consort, and monopolise the attention of kings and emperors who often had hundreds of wives ~ wives who often put each other in danger to eliminate competition. 

Nowadays, women of tremendous beauty are still referred to by the Chinese idiom 傾國傾城, literally, ”falling countries, falling cities”. The beauty is also implied to be natural, expressed in a can’t-help-itself way, perhaps reflecting the fact that the ancient beauties on which this idiom has been used couldn’t possibly have plastic surgeries, and most of them didn’t meet a good end ~ that they had to pay a price for their beauty, and often, with their lowly status as women, as consorts, they didn’t get to choose whether they wanted to pay this price or not. This adjective is considered to be very flattering. Gg’s famous smile from the Thailand Fanmeet has been described, praised as 傾城一笑: “a smile that topples a city”.

I’m explaining Daji and 傾國傾城 because the Chinese idiom 博君一笑 “doing anything to get a smile from you”, from which the ship’s name BJYX 博君一肖  was derived (笑 and 肖 are both pronounced “xiao”), is connected to yet another of such dynasty-falling beauty, Bao Si 褒姒. Like Daji before her, Bao Si was blamed for the end of the Zhou Dynasty in 771 BC. 

The legend went like this: Bao Si was melancholic, and to get her to smile, her king lit warning beacons and got his nobles to rush in from the nearby vassal states with their armies to come and rescue him, despite not being in actual danger. The nobles, in their haste, looked so frantic and dishevelled that Bao Si found it funny and smiled. Longing to see more of the smile of his favourite woman, the king would fool his nobles again and again, until his nobles no longer heeded the warning beacons when an actual rebellion came. 

What the king did has been described as 博紅顏一笑, with 紅顏 (”red/flushed face”) meaning a beautiful woman, referring to Bao Si. Replace 紅顏 with the respectful “you”, 君, we get 博君一笑. If one searches the origin of the phrase 博 [fill_in_the_blank]一笑 online, Bao Si’s story shows up.

The “anything” in ”doing anything to get a smile from you” in 博君一笑, therefore, is not any favour, but something as momentous as giving away one’s own kingdom. c-turtles have remarked, to their amusement and admittedly mine, that “king”, in Chinese, is written as 王, which is Dd’s surname, and very occasionally, they jokingly compare him to the hopeless kings who’d give away everything for their love. Much like 傾國傾城 has become a flattering idiom despite the negative reputations of Daji and Bao Si for their “men-ruining ways”, 博君一笑 has become a flattering phrase, emphasising on the devotion and love rather than the ... stupidity behind the smile-inducing acts. 

(Bao Si’s story, BTW, was a lie made up by historians who also lived later but also thousands of years ago, to absolve the uselessness of the king. Warning beacons didn’t exist at her time.)  

Gg is arguably feminized even in his CP’s name. Gg’s feminisation is everywhere. 

And here comes my confession time ~ I’ve been amused by most of the feminisation terms above. 肖妲己 (”Daji Xiao”) captures my imagination, and I remain quite partial to the CP name BJYX. Somehow, there’s something ... somewhat forgivable when the feminisation is based on Gg’s beauty, especially in the context of the historical Danmei / Dangai setting of MDZS/TU ~ something that, while doesn’t cancel, dampens the “problematic-ness” of the gender mis-identification.

What, exactly, is this something?

Here’s my new hypothesis, and hopefully I’ll manage to explain it well ~

The hypothesis is this: the unisex beauty standard for historical Chinese men and women, which is also breathtakingly similar to the modern beauty standard for Chinese women, makes feminisation in the context of Danmei (especially historical Danmei) flattering, and easier to accept.

What defined beauty in historical Chinese men? If I am to create a classically beautiful Chinese man for my new historical Danmei, how would I describe him based on what I’ve read, my cultural knowledge?

Here’s a list:

* Skin fair and smooth as white jade * Thin, even frail; narrow/slanted shoulders; tall * Dark irises and bright, starry eyes * Not too dense, neat eyebrows that are shaped like swords ~ pointed slightly upwards from the center towards the sides of the face * Depending on the dynasty, nice makeup.

Imagine these traits. How “macho” are they? How much do they fit the ideal Chinese masculine beauty advertised by Chinese government, which looks like below?

Propaganda poster, 1969. The caption says “Defeat Imperialist US! Defeat Social Imperialism!” The book’s name is “Quotations from Mao Zedong”. (Source)

Where did that list of traits I’ve written com from? Fair like jade, frail ... why are they so far from the ... “macho”ness of the men in the poster? 

What has Chinese history said about its beautiful men? 

Wei Jie (衛玠 286-312 BCE), one of the four most beautiful ancient Chinese men (古代四大美男) recorded in Chinese history famously passed away when fans of his beauty gathered and formed a wall around him, blocking his way. History recorded Wei as being frail with chronic illness, and was only 27 years old when he died. Arguably the first historical account of “crazy fans killing their idol”, this incident left the idiom 看殺衛玠 ~ “Wei Jie being watched to death.” ~ a not very “macho” way to die at all.

潘安 (Pan An; 247-300 BCE), another one of the four most beautiful ancient Chinese men, also had hoards of fangirls, who threw fruits and flowers at him whenever he ventured outside. The Chinese idiom 擲果盈車 “thrown fruit filling a cart” was based on Pan and ... his fandom, and denotes such scenarios of men being so beautiful that women openly displayed their affections for them. 

Meanwhile, when Pan went out with his equally beautiful male friend, 夏侯湛 Xiahou Zhan, folks around them called them 連璧 ~ two connected pieces of perfect jade. Chinese Jade is white, smooth, faintly glowing in light, so delicate that it gives the impression of being somewhat transparent.

Aren’t Wei Jie and Pan An reminiscent of modern day Chinese idols, the “effeminate” “Little Fresh Meat”s (小鲜肉) so panned by Article O3? Their stories, BTW, also elucidated the historical reference in LWJ’s description of being jade-like in MDZS, and in WWX and LWJ being thrown pippas along the Gusu river bank. 

Danmei, therefore, didn’t create a trend of androgynous beauty in men as much as it has borrowed the ancient, traditional definition of masculine Chinese beauty ~ the beauty that was more feminine than masculine by modern standards.  

[Perhaps, CPs should be renamed 連璧 (”two connected pieces of perfect jade”) as a reminder of the aesthetics’ historical roots.]

Someone may exclaim now: But. But!! Yet another one of the four most beautiful ancient Chinese men, 高長恭 (Gao Changgong, 541-573 BCE), far better known by his title, 蘭陵王 (”the Prince of Lanling”), was a famous general. He had to be “macho”, right?

... As it turns out, not at all. Historical texts have described Gao as “貌柔心壮，音容兼美” (”soft in looks and strong at heart, beautiful face and voice”), “白美類婦人” (”fair and beautiful as a woman”), “貌若婦人” (”face like a woman”). Legends have it that The Prince of Lanling’s beauty was so soft, so lacking in authority that he had to wear a savage mask to get his soldiers to listen to his command (and win) on the battlefield (《樂府雜錄》: 以其顏貌無威，每入陣即著面具，後乃百戰百勝).

This should be emphasised: Gao’s explicitly feminine descriptions were recorded in historical texts as arguments *for* his beauty. Authors of these texts, therefore, didn’t view the feminisation as insult. In fact, they used the feminisation to drive the point home, to convince their readers that men like the Prince of Lanling were truly, absolutely good looking.

Being beautiful like a women was therefore high praise for men in, at least, significant periods in Chinese history ~ periods long and important enough for these records to survive until today. Beauty, and so it goes, had once been largely free of distinctions between the masculine and feminine.

One more example of an image of an ancient Chinese male beauty being similar to its female counterpart, because the history nerd in me finds this fun. 

何晏 (He Yan, ?-249 BCE) lived in the Wei Jin era (between 2nd to 4th century), during which makeup was really en vogue. Known for his beauty, he was also famous for his love of grooming himself. The emperor, convinced that He Yan’s very fair skin was from the powder he was wearing, gave He Yan some very hot foods to eat in the middle of the summer. He Yan began to sweat, had to wipe himself with his sleeves and in the process, revealed to the emperor that his fair beauty was 100% natural ~ his skin glowed even more with the cosmetics removed (《世說新語·容止第十四》: 何平叔美姿儀，面至白。魏明帝疑其傅粉，正夏月，與熱湯餅。既啖，大汗出，以朱衣自拭，色轉皎然). His kick-cosmetics’-ass fairness won him the nickname 傅粉何郎 (”powder-wearing Mr He”).

Not only would He Yan very likely be mistaken as a woman if this scene is transferred to a modern setting, but this scene can very well fit inside a Danmei story of the 21st century and is very, very likely to get axed by the Chinese censorship board for its visualisation. 

[Important observation from this anecdote: the emperor was totally into this trend too.]

The adjectives and phrases used above to describe these beautiful ancient Chinese men ~ 貌柔, 音容兼美, 白美, 美姿儀, 皎然 ~ have all become pretty much reserved for describing beauty in women nowadays. Beauty standards in ancient China were, as mentioned before, had gone through significantly long periods in which they were largely genderless. The character for beauty 美 (also in Danmei, 耽美) used to have little to no gender association. Free of gender associations as well were the names of many flowers. The characters for orchid (蘭) and lotus (蓮), for example, were commonly found in men’s names as late as the Republican era (early 20th century), but are now almost exclusively found in women’s names. Both orchid and lotus have historically been used to indicate 君子 (junzi, roughly, “gentlemen”), which have always been men. MDZS also has an example of a man named after a flower: Jin Ling’s courtesy name, given to him by WWX,  was 如蘭 (”like an orchid”). 

A related question may be this: why does ancient China associate beauty with fairness, with softness, with frailty? Likely, because Confucianist philosophy and customs put a heavy emphasis on scholarship ~ and scholars have mostly consisted of soft-spoken, not muscular, not working-under-the-sun type of men. More importantly, Confucianist scholars also occupied powerful government positions. Being, and looking like a Confucianist scholar was therefore associated with status. Indeed, it’s very difficult to look like jade when one was a farmer or a soldier, for example, who constantly had to toil under the sun, whose skin was constantly being dried and roughened by the elements. Having what are viewed as “macho” beauty traits as in the poster above ~ tanned skin, bulging muscles, bony structures (which also take away the jade’s smoothness) ~ were associated with hard labour, poverty and famine.

Along that line, 手無縛雞之力 (“hands without the strength to restrain a chicken”) has long been a phrase used to describe ancient scholars and students, and without scorn or derision. Love stories of old, which often centred around scholars were, accordingly, largely devoid of the plot lines of husbands physically protecting the wives, performing the equivalent of climbing up castle walls and fighting dragons etc. Instead, the faithful husbands wrote poems, combed their wife’s hair, traced their wife’s eyebrows with cosmetics (畫眉)...all activities that didn’t require much physical strength, and many of which are considered “feminine” nowadays.

Were there periods in Chinese history in which more ... sporty men and women were appreciated? Yes. the Tang dynasty, for example, and the Yuan and Qing dynasties. The Tang dynasty, as a very powerful, very open era in Chinese history, was known for its relations to the West (via the Silk Road). The Yuan and Qing dynasties, meanwhile, were established by Mongolians and Manchus respectively, who, as non-Han people, had not been under the influence of Confucian culture and grew up on horsebacks, rather than in schools.

The idea that beautiful Chinese men should have “macho” attributes was, therefore, largely a consequence of non-Han-Chinese influence, especially after early 20th century. That was when the characters for beauty (美), orchid (蘭), lotus (蓮) etc began their ... feminisation. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which started its reign of the country starting 1949, also has foreign roots, being a derivative of the Soviets, and its portrayal of ideal men has been based on the party’s ideology, painting them as members of the People’s Liberation Army (Chinese army) and its two major proletariat classes, farmers and industrial workers ~ all occupations that are “macho” in their aesthetics, but held at very poor esteem in ancient Chinese societies. All occupations that, to this day, may be hailed as noble by Chinese women, but not really deemed attractive by them.

Beauty, being an instinct, is perhaps much more resistant to propaganda.

If anything, the three terms Article O3 used to describe “effeminate” men ~ 奶油小生 “cream young men” (popularised in 1980s) , 花美男 “flowery beautiful men” (early 2000s), 小鲜肉 “little fresh meat” (coined in 2014 and still popular now) ~ only informs me how incredibly consistent the modern Chinese women’s view of ideal male beauty has been. It’s the same beauty the Chinese Communist Party has called feminine. It’s the same beauty found in Danmei. It’s the same beauty that, when witnessed in men in ancient China, was so revered that historians recorded it for their descendants to remember. It doesn’t mean there aren’t any women who appreciate the "macho” type ~ it’s just that, the appreciation for the non-macho type has never really gone out of fashion, never really changed. The only thing that is really changing is the name of the type, the name’s positive or negative connotations.

(Personally, I’m far more uncomfortable with the name “Little fresh meat” (小鲜肉) than 老婆 (wife). I find it much more insulting.)

Anyway, what I’d like to say is this: feminisation in Danmei ~ a genre that, by definition, is hyper-focused on aesthetics ~ may not be as "problematic” in Chinese as it is in English, because the Chinese tradition didn’t make that much of a differentiation between masculine and feminine beauty. Once again, this isn’t to say such mis-gendering isn’t disrespectful; it’s just that, perhaps, it is less disrespectful because Chinese still retains a cultural memory in which equating a beautiful man to a beautiful woman was the utmost flattery. 

I must put a disclaimer here: I cannot vouch for this being true for the general Chinese population. This is something that is buried deep enough inside me that it took a lot of thought for me to tease out, to articulate. More importantly, while I grow up in a Chinese-speaking environment, I’ve never lived inside China. My history knowledge, while isn’t shabby, hasn’t been filtered through the state education system.

I’d also like to point out as well, along this line of thought, that in *certain* (definitely not all) aspects, Chinese society isn’t as sexist as the West. While historically, China has periods of extreme sexism against women, with the final dynasties of Ming and Qing being examples, I must (reluctantly) acknowledge Chairman Mao for significantly lifting the status of women during his rule. Here’s a famous quote of his from 1955:

婦女能頂半邊天 Women can lift half the skies

The first marriage code, passed in 1950, outlawed forced marriages, polygamy, and ensured equal rights between husband and wife.  For the first time in centuries, women were encouraged to go outside of their homes and work. Men resisted at first, wanting to keep their wives at home; women who did work were judged poorly for their performance and given less than 50% of men’s wage, which further fuelled the men’s resistance. Mao said the above quote after a commune in Guizhou introduced the “same-work-same-wage” system to increase its productivity, and he asked for the same system to to be replicated across the country. (Source)

When Chairman Mao wanted something, it happened. Today, Chinese women’s contribution to the country’s GDP remains among the highest in the world.  They make up more than half of the country’s top-scoring students. They’re the dominant gender in universities, in the ranks of local employees of international corporations in the Shanghai and Beijing central business districts—among the most sought after jobs in the country. While the inequality between men and women in the workplace is no where near wiped out — stories about women having to sleep with higher-ups to climb the career ladder, or even get their PhDs are not unheard of, and the central rulership of the Chinese Communist Party has been famously short of women — the leap in women’s rights has been significant over the past century, perhaps because of how little rights there had been before ~ at the start of the 20th century, most Chinese women from relatively well-to-do families still practised foot-binding, in which their feet were literally crushed during childhood in the name of beauty, of status symbol. They couldn’t even walk properly.

Perhaps, the contemporary Chinese women’s economic contribution makes the sexism they encounter in their lives, from the lack of reproductive rights to the “leftover women” label, even harder to swallow. It makes their fantasies fly to even higher, more defiant heights. The popularity of Dangai right now is pretty much driven by women, as acknowledged by Article O3. Young women, especially, female fans who people have dismissed as “immature”, “crazy”, are responsible for the threat the Chinese government is feeling now by the genre.

This is no small feat. While the Chinese government complains about the “effeminate” men from Danmei / Dangai, its propaganda has been heavily reliant on stars who have risen to popularity to these genres. The film Dd is currently shooting, Chinese Peacekeeping Force (維和部隊), also stars Huang Jingyu (黄景瑜), and Zhang Zhehan (張哲瀚) ~ the three actors having shot to fame from The Untamed (Dangai), Addicted (Danmei), and Word of Honour (Dangai) respectively.  Zhang, in particular, played the “uke” role in Word of Honour and has also been called 老婆 (wife) by his fans. The quote in Article O3, “Ten years as a tough man known by none; one day as a beauty known by all” was also implicitly referring to him.

Perhaps, the government will eventually realise that millennia-old standards of beauty are difficult to bend, and by extension, what is considered appropriate gender expression of Chinese men and women. 

In the metas I’ve posted, therefore, I’ve hesitated in using terms such as homophobia, sexism, and ageism etc, opting instead to make long-winded explanations that essentially amount to these terms (thank you everyone who’s reading for your patience!). Because while the consequence is similar—certain fraction of the populations are subjected to systemic discrimination, abuse, given less rights, treated as inferior etc—these words, in English, also come with their own context, their own assumptions that may not apply to the situation. It reminds me of what Leo Tolstoy wrote in Anna Karenina,

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

Discrimination in each country, each culture is humiliating, unhappy in its own way. Both sexism and homophobia are rampant in China, but as their roots are different from those of the West, the ways they manifest are different, and so must the paths to their dissolution. I’ve also hesitated on calling out individual behaviours or confronting individuals for this reason. i-Danmei fandoms are where i-fans and c-fans meet, where English-speaking doesn’t guarantee a non-Chinese sociopolitical background (there may be students from China, for example; I’m also ... not entirely Western), and I find it difficult to articulate appropriate, convincing arguments without knowing individual backgrounds.

Frankly, I’m not sure if I’ve done the right thing. Because I do hope feminisation will soon fade into extinction, especially in i-Danmei fandoms that, if they continue to prosper on international platforms, may eventually split from c-Danmei fandoms along the cultural (not language) line due to the vast differences in environmental constraints. My hope is especially true when real people are involved, and c-fandoms, I’d like to note, are not unaware of the issues surrounding feminisation ~ it has already been explicitly forbidden in BJYX’s supertopic on Weibo. 

At the same time, I’ve spent so many words above to try to explain why beauty can *sometimes* lurk behind such feminisations. Please allow me to end this post with one example of feminisation that I deeply dislike—and I’ve seen it used by fans on Gg as well—is 綠茶 (”green tea”), from 綠茶婊 (”green tea whore”) that means women who look pure / innocent but are, deep down, promiscuous / lustful. In some ways, its meaning isn’t so different from Daji 妲己, the consort blamed for the fall of the Shang dynasty. However, to me at least, the flattery in the feminisation is gone, perhaps because of the character “whore” (婊), because the term originated in 2013 from a notorious sex party rather than from a legendary beauty so maligned that The Investiture of the Gods (封神演義), the seminal Chinese fiction written ~2,600 years after Daji’s death, re-imagined her as a malevolent fox spirit (狐狸精) that many still remembers her as today.

Ah, to be caught between two cultures. :)