#experience days for women

[chrissy-kaos]

So I was feeling pretty good on New Year’s Eve. My friends convinced me to go to a little party to hang out and have drink. I took these pics for @the-vanir-queen on snap. I figured ya’ll might like them.

[albaharu]

you get captured by your enemies and you find out they have a song about how tragic you are via the dwarf who is doing unethical experiments on you

[kiranboo]

Wanna get frisky with me?💦

Just some hour's away🛬

#Trans princess 😍😘

[our-queer-experience]

happy birthday to all women ever, i hope you get a lot of cake

[lesser-vissir]

Not gonna actually get into the content of this post, but this is just a symptom of idealism lol

When someone insists that there must be a single correct answer to any given question, especially one that contradicts societal norms the way trans people do, it's just a desire for an idealistic answer to a philosophical question. That if you believe trans women are women as an ideal you must logically extend that ideal.

The line "if you believe in man vs bear the logical conclusion is being a TERF" is exactly that idealist manifestation. I'll give it to her, if you subscribe to purely idealist philosophical solutions, that is the logical conclusion.

The problem is pure idealism has been discredited for like, over 200 years as a useful framework. Dialectical materialism is truly the only useful sociological framework we have because it can sidestep these issues without saying crazy shit like "men are inherently safe for women to be alone with" and just,,, denying the existence of a patriarchal power system that exonerates men for their crimes against women.

[humming-fly]

This 4th of July I’m stealing the patriotism euphoria that’s usually associated with assholes idolizing the worst attributes of this country because fuck ‘em I live here too and remembering the things this country actually got Right is an important exercise when trying to rally anyone to want to defend it in November SO putting my money where my mouth is I’ll start easy and say I really like National Parks!! It’s rad how many of them there are and how they’re actual set up to preserve some of the most beautiful wild areas in our country while still letting people visit to enjoy and experience nature!! (Less important but I love how they put national parks on the quarters I think that’s real fun)

Feel free to add on if something speaks to ya!

[napping-sapphic]

*dreamy sigh* i am once again thinking about butch women

[chrissy-kaos]

Hot cocoa and chill anyone? ☕️🎄

[unreal]

My Name Is Kanaya Maryam

You Fucked My Wife

PREPARE TO DIE

[sparring-spirals]

well. i need to yell about it somewhere. listen. Amanda Lehan Canto on newest season of Um Actually. Ify hosting. BDG hosting with Ify!!!!!!! Fucking. WILD.

[lala-blahblah]

I will never make this because it would be for an audience of one (me) but ever since reading "If we Were Villains" (story about serious drama kids in college who perform shakespeare and deal with a murder) I have been entertaining the thought of a crack fic crossover with High School Musical The Musical The Series where the staff decides they will no longer put on shakespeare after the tragic accident that happened at Thanksgiving, because Shakespeare plays would only increase the tension and drama. So they hire Ms. Jen who decides their spring play will actually be High School Musical (which exists in the 90s in this universe) and it ruins the vibe so much that everyone gives up on being dark and mysterious because they're universally pissed at Ms Jen for making them learn choreoraphed basketball dancing.

[aeolianblues]

was kinda thinking about this when I saw Renee Rapp live recently-- I didn't know her visual vibe, I'd heard a few songs here and there but I hadn't really *seen* her, and her attire at Osheaga was really casual, a jersey (baseball/basketball?) and slacks. And that was so amazing! I couldn't help thinking, the work Billie Eilish has done for how women in pop music are allowed to dress is incredible. Seeing her up there all comfortable you just know that Billie walked in her oversized tops so that Renee in her slacks could run; Billie walked through all the critcisms about how she dressed slobbily and having to assert that she didn't owe anyone a display of skin, so that Renee could be comfortable and unquestioned running up and down the catwalk in front of 10,000 people. How iconic.

And I don't think we even realised at the time how much something as simple as letting Billie dress the way she as a (then-) 17-year-old teenager dressed, could end up meaning for a future generation of women in music.

Obviously there is still way to go, there were weirdos complaining about how 'plain' Dua Lipa's Glastonbury outfit was this year (in 2024!!), l have to ask, are you at Paris Fashion Week?? She is the musical HEADLINER of an entire day of music at one of the biggest music festivals in the world, and you can't grant her the space to exist as an artist, you have to moan about her dress not being excitingly revealing enough. There's work to do, it's still dismal out there. But the space Billie Eilish has created for a most ordinarily-dressed woman popstar is still heartening.

[lucky-clover-gazette]

officially told the guy that this isn’t a relationship or dating thing, and that i just want to be his friend. i don’t really know what’s going on with my sexuality but i know that i don’t want to treat him the way i have treated him, kinda like an experiment or a consolation prize in the place of of someone i actually do feel romantic desire towards. he was disappointed especially since i put it in no uncertain terms, but i can’t do anything about the way he sees me and i trust him to accept my boundaries. i’m just really glad he still wants to be my friend even without the possibility of getting to kiss or date me, because i enjoy his company and with my current lifestyle i can use all the irl friends i can get

[yvesdot]

i noticed your tags on the poll abt how you feel when people ask your pronouns, abt how it clearly skews tme because the answer afraid isn't on there. i want to ask, coming from a place of just wanting to learn, is there an alternative to asking for people's pronouns? i know it can be scary, i've nearly had a panic attack hwvaise i didn't know if i wanted to out myself, and i'm tme, but on the other hand i don't want to assume people's pronouns and i don't want to misgender them. is there some kind of middle ground here?

Thanks for asking!

Disclaimer I am not a trans woman so this is an extremely "correct me if I'm wrong" "based on my many, many, many experiences with the trans women in my life" "proofread by a trans woman close to me" answer.

Disclaimer the second that I do believe in asking people's pronouns in a general sense (I always ask when I get a new coworker, for example, generally with the addition of my pronouns). This does not nullify the concerns below.

The simple answer is that asking "what are your pronouns?" is both a question and a statement. It is not only asking for someone's pronouns, but saying "I feel confident that this information will be useful," which itself says 1) "I am going to be referring to you" 2) "I think my first guess about your gender may be wrong" which itself in many cases is someone's way of saying "I think you are transgender."

This statement does not thrill all trans people.

Many trans women are just trying to pass or be 'stealth' or simply be treated uncomplicatedly as a woman, without an asterisk tacked on, just a woman, outside. Trans women in particular face persistent degendering, and 'they' can be a way to communicate "I do not see this woman as a woman, but because she is a transsexual freak I also do not see her as a man, I see her as something outside of/beyond/beneath gender." See also the obsession with transfeminine characters in media being ~weird unknowable gender goals~ no matter how traditionally femininely they present, generally due solely to sex assignment and/or physical traits they have no control over.

Before I had managed any kind of physical transition, when I looked like a low-resolution cisgender girl, I would go out with a trans woman friend of mine: me in what might as well have been a garbage bag, and her in a full face of makeup and long hair with bangs and a long skirt and earrings and painted nails and, frankly, visible breasts. And she would get referred to as 'they' and I would not. I was always shocked at this-- she couldn't possibly have been clearer about what she was going for, and yet people deliberately refused to address her femininity or womanhood. Why? Because they could tell she was trans. There was not one single way in which I ever looked more feminine than her, and certainly never intentionally. She just 'looked trans', or 'sounded trans', or whatever, so she did not get to be a woman today. This is not a rare experience.

It's important to note that this was intentional, and that the people who do this are not doing it accidentally. This may be happening subconsciously, but the process is thus: "This person is giving me extraordinarily strong signals of intentional femininity" -> "but wait! I spot an Adam's apple/a flat chest/a deep voice/Something Transgender!" -> "Intentional feminine presentation + random consequences of birth = averages out into androgyny!!"

I can't stress this enough: it doesn't matter if this process isn't conscious. Trans women are not stupid. If she has never been 'they'd or 'what are your pronouns'd before putting on her Girlwear Extreme Mode, and suddenly everyone is curious, it is obvious this is not happening because the people in question ask literally everyone. (I have never met anyone who asked everyone their pronouns, and I suspect that anyone claiming they ask everyone-- that they never go 'ah this is a cis man' and drop the case-- is lying.)

As I have heard it told, it feels incredibly invalidating to put every possible effort into femininity and then achieve, at best, a "wow you definitely look like you're transgender!," at middle a "wow you definitely are not passing!," and at worst a "wow you sure look like a circus freak!!" Whereas cisgender women demonstrably are, for the most part, she/her'd by default-- including by those who claim they ask everyone their pronouns. So what is the difference between a cisgender woman in five pounds of makeup and a transgender woman in the same makeup, the same hair, the same jewelry, the same clothes? If you would default to not asking a cis woman her pronouns, why do you not default to the same when the woman in question is trans?

Obviously, many TME people also dress conventionally femininely. Many transfeminine nonbinary people using exclusively 'they' dress conventionally femininely! It must be repeated that I dressed conventionally femininely at the time-- I wore, and still wear, nearly exclusively skirts and dresses and pink and silliness from the women's section-- and I was rarely-to-never 'they'd or asked my pronouns outside of pronoun circles until I physically changed my body. I have a lot of complicated thoughts on this, but again, this is specifically about the circumstance in which, if you deemed this person to be a cisgender woman, you would not ask. We must acknowledge that some women's genders are assumed. Ask yourself: if not for the [insert testosterone-linked quality here], would I be confused about this person's gender?

Rule of thumb: if someone is giving you every possible signal of intentional, active, effortful femininity, and you think she is not a cisgender woman, consider why someone who is not a cisgender woman would be putting in effort to look feminine. Read between the pearls.

(Note: this is not a directive never to ask a pronoun of someone in this circumstance, just to Consider. Consider with your Mind. Accept you may yet be Wrong, and this is OK, even if you do hurt someone. Just Consider.)

The other matter at hand is the "I think you are transgender" beacon. For many transgender women, being told "I think you are transgender" by a stranger in public is tantamount to a threat. This is information that can call a mob, get you fired, get you killed-- and get the murderer off scot free! I'm not saying never do the transgender nod, I'm saying be thoughtful about it.

A coworker recently asked me genuinely why I don't list my pronouns in my work emails. I was pleased someone considered that I had good reason, and said: because it is not relevant. If I am emailing a customer to ask you to please drop off Item X, does it matter whether I am a woman or a man? If a customer is emailing me to ask my rates, do they require more than my name? If they call a coworker and need to refer to me while not knowing my gender... can they not merely use 'they' as a signifier of person of unknown gender-- which is what I ultimately want, anyhow? The amount of times I have fielded calls for other coworkers that open with "I'm looking for Sam-- and is Sam a man or a woman, anyway?" is truly bizarre. Why you could possibly require this information to request that we buy your product is beyond my comprehension. Let me finish my sentence, if you must know, and sooner or later surely a pronoun will be dropped.

In specific, I find that people tend to drop the pronouns question when it is completely irrelevant. If I am checking out at your register, you do not need to know my pronouns. I am not your friend. We are engaged in a transaction, during and after which you need not refer to me, and if you are uncertain, yes, feel free to use 'they', and act as though you would use it for anyone. It is not relevant what my gender is to-- well, to anything, but especially this minute interaction.

If you are checking out at my register, for God's sake, I am at work. I am already doing labor and I take no interest in additionally moderating your discomfort with the fact that you don't know a stranger's gender. You know I'm transgender? Me too! You need not refer to me, ever, because I am at my job and you ought to go home and think no more of me. I am not a man or a woman right now, I am the person selling you poisoned apples. Please leave.

(Sidebar: cisgender men love to do this and then hit me with the hysteria accusations. e.g. "Thanks, man! I mean, uh, miss? [demanding] What is it? [frustratedly] Whatever, I'm just trying to figure out how to refer to you... Sorry!" It's a really excellent cocktail that makes it very clear they are certain I am a transgender woman. They are wrong, but it is revealing of how they treat transgender women.)

Especially because I am a visibly gender non-conforming person-- I hear this daily. I hear it multiple times a day, frequently. I live in a leftist Californian enclave and this is the bread and butter of the lefty cisgender individual.

If we are in a context where it would be polite to assume that we may meet again or become friends-- the club, a house party, what-have-you-- it is once again polite to ask, because communicating "I suspect I'll have to refer to you again" is no longer rude. It's only in a context where the information does not matter except to clarify my gender (to sate your personal curiosity?) that I occasionally get annoyed, because it isn't my responsibility to elucidate my gender for you. If you're a man, it's not even my responsibility to know that you exist.

Rule of thumb: if you are never going to meet this person again, and if you thought they were cisgender you would not ask, and if their gender is wholly irrelevant, refrain from asking.

Also, thanks very much to you for asking this question, for being open to listening, and for trusting me! I like talking and I like talking about gender (see: mention of coworker asking why I didn't list my pronouns which didn't remotely annoy me). I occupy the particular space of being someone who is constantly, loudly, explicitly being gendered, and it can occasionally be a chore. I love being transgender and visibly gender non-conforming and I wouldn't change it for the world; I just wish it was socially acceptable for me to say "my gender is not relevant to our non-relationship and it is rude of you to ask me for this information, especially if you do so in a patronizing manner that expects me to be grateful for the attention." I wish it weren't my job to mediate the response. You can ask me anything! You just have to be prepared to take no for an answer, you know?

Again, I'm one visibly gender non-conforming nonbinary person, and I used to be that TME person who would have given their full set of teeth to get a single "what are your pronouns?" in a month, and I know a variety of trans people, including many transfeminine nonbinary people who use 'they' and may present in an assortment of ways. To be abundantly clear, I am not saying fear or insult is the rule for trans women or transfeminine people; it's just not always desired to have someone ask your gender in public, and I wish we could be more tactful as a community about it. I loved the validation of being asked my pronouns when I first came out, but my validation is not more important than the safety and health of my trans sisters, who are constantly surveilled, degendered, and mocked. Read this quote from Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones.

There is no way to avoid misgendering anyone ever, there is no way to avoid hurting anyone ever, and most importantly, we must make decisions based on the material reality in which we live where trans women get the short end of every stick. When I sent this to my beloved friend who proofread it, she came up with this excellent article which frankly could serve as a replacement to this entire post. It's conflicting access needs: there is no one true answer.

Which is good news for you, because you did the only objectively kind and correct thing one can do: you asked a question, started a discussion, and listened. Thank you🌿

[mikesbasementbeets]

when will people stop being homophobic in the name of bi mike

[yuri-for-businesswomen]

why does everything have to be so complicated. why cant we just say okay this is a space/institution/scholarship/whatever for women only, this one is for transwomen only, and this one is for both of us? why does it have to be such a fight. i think its reasonable to create opportunities and spaces for trans people especially when they are medically transitioned but why does it have to mean female only spaces, opportunities and so on have to always be inclusive of males