#i mean like any kind of transitioning. medically. socially. both. basically being the same but she's a girl now. anything.

[pigeon-wizard]

i literally couldn't put all of them on here, also don't hate on other options just root for your choice.

[doberbutts]

one thing to make clear is that from what ive seen people aren't saying transmascs are claiming transmisogyny doesnt exist, but kind of the opposite? as in, transmascs are trying to co-opt specific experiences transfems go through when they dont have that same lived experience, and thus cant offer as meaningful insight. this is basically the crux of the whole tme/tma discourse, though i think it'd be easily resolved if we were just allowed to have our own language to talk about our experiences

Oh there's absolutely people saying we think transmisogyny doesn't exist literally right now in the tag.

But you're also right that there's also people saying that somehow by discussing our problems, we're somehow stealing from trans fem discussions about theirs.

I don't really follow the logic of this to be perfectly honest. I think there is very little that trans fems experience that doesn't either have an equivalent experience for trans mascs or that trans mascs don't experience something also terrible in its stead, just like I think that of the other way around: there's very little that trans mascs experience that trans fems don't have an equivalent or equally terrible experience for. I think that is the nature of us both being affected by the specific intersection of transphobia and misogyny, just gendered in specific ways to hurt us as individuals.

Pretty much any post I've seen on this matter has made a lot of assumptions one way or the other that completely ignore the lived reality of both trans mascs and trans fems, and it's very frustrating to try and engage with this problem because it feels more like people dedicated to screaming at each other than anything really particularly productive.

I also think it is impossible to be exempt from oppression. Not being the target doesn't mean the bullet can't hit you if the shooter can't aim for shit.

And it's genuinely WEIRD to me that trans mascs are talking about suicide and rape statistics, medical gatekeeping, rejection from social groups upon coming out, politicians making laws targeting their ability to transition, erasure and also weaponization of trans pregnancy, resources for the most vulnerable of us requiring detransition at minimum for entry if we're allowed in at all, the rates of violence from domestic partners and family members, struggles with male beauty standards and eating disorders... all stuff stemming from transphobic cishet society and the patriarchy... and somehow we're stealing from trans fems or blaming trans fems for the shit that 99% of the time is lived experience coming from being targeted by fucking cis people in the first place.

Like, how is me talking about getting beaten up while being called a tranny and a heshe and getting pantsed and groped to "prove" my status as a girl due to being incredibly GNC and also intersex prior to figuring out that I'm trans co-opting anything from anyone? I'm talking about something that happened *to me*. It wasn't trans women who sent me home with bruises and scars every day, it was my shitty cishet classmates and their shitty cishet older siblings in an ultra-conservative environment. I don't think trans fems are at fault for what happened to me at all? I just don't like to be told that I'm "victimized myself" by talking about my very real trauma as a kid by someone who isn't even a trans fem claiming to be defending trans fems on my posts about it.

[basicallyaturtle]

Looking at pre-gender reckoning me, I often find myself wanting to distance myself from that person. It's not like that isn't me, just I kinda don't like that it is.

And that is pretty common. People talk about killing pretransistion selves or finally getting to be the you you want to be, and I mean, I still haven't socially transitioned, or medically transitioned. Really the only thing different is my hair length and I guess... like how I hold myself. Maybe it's not that different but I like to think that I have a different air about me than I did in that time. Anyway, all that to say I watched a video of pre realization me and I felt like man it's a shame that guy doesn't exist anymore. Well not like he doesn't, I am a continuation of that person's state of mind, so I am the same person in that anyone can say they are the same person as they used to be. But often times the sense of who a person is is wrapped up in their appearance, which is of course part of where the notion of 'grieving' trans people's former self comes from. Cause it's not like they stopped existing, they just appear to have stopped existing from an outside perspective. People have different ways of conceptualizing their own transitions, some see that they were always their gender and only realized it and corrected it later in life, some see their pretransistion self as a different person, someone they had to kill to get to live themselves, and others see their transition ad one step in the evolution of their life that is constantly happening, constantly changing us from our past self into out future self. I tend to go for a strange combination of 1 and 3 here, 1 because the realization hit like a bolt of lightning when I first saw it, and all these different parts of my past started slotting together into something that made sense, but also 3, because even if deep down I was a girl as a child, I certainly didn't identify that way, even after I learned what being trans was, so this feels more like another change, like going from a quiet nerd kid to a slightly rambunctious energetic college student, a big change sure, but just a change. So I've kind of held both of these in tandem, but I never really felt connection with the first one. I get how people would feel this way, and it's not unreasonable, especially if one spent a significant amount of time trapped in the closet before being able to transition in any way, then your previous gender can feel like a prison, and your old identity is the prison guard. It also makes sense just as a rebuttal to the trans grief as mentioned before when parents or friends or whoever will lament the loss of someone who is still in the room, just going you know what yeah fuck you that person's dead and I killed him.

ANYWAY I never felt connection to 2, but watching videos of that me, I kind of did, but not in the empowered way, just, damn that guy was neat, it is kind of a shame that he isn't around anymore. I literally still boy mode, and barely look different at all, so he does still exist to most people, and I don't particularly act any different, in the way that I'm just me and I'm not gonna shape my personality to try to conform to traditional gender roles, I'm still just me, so he basically is still here, just dresses in women's clothes at home and is a girl online. I don't know what it is that I look at that guy and think it's sad that he's gone. Maybe that people are their experiences, and that guy didn't know he was a girl. Like, it was another few months before he realized it, and hence I am here, but 'I' am not any different from 'him' in that big a way. Like I think back to when I first got to grad school, and I think of that person as basically the same as I am now. A little worse at make up, a little bit less knowledge about the world, but not too different. But when I think of my life before grad school it feels kind of like a dream. Not really because of the gender stuff, I don't think, I had a year after that before grad school that still feels fuzzy, though I was also home, so deep in the closet. Anyway whatever the point is grad school has taken up like 95 percent of my brain processes the last two years, whether because I had to or wanted to, and so it's difficult to think of a time before it. So why don't I look back at myself from when I first moved in and feel the same 'grief' as I di when I look at the person one year younger who still thinks he's a boy? I certainly have a lot more expetiences than her. I don't have videos of from that time, cause post reckoning I got big self conscious about any photo or video with me in it, so there are very little of those after realization. Not that weren't very few before, but I got more vigilant about not letting it happen. A shame really, but oh well. But I don't have any cohesive understanding of what I feel. I guess this also ties into this feeling of wanting to be a good guy. Like you see so many fucked up men in the world and trying my best to be a counterexample of that felt good, so when I relauzed I was not a man, it wa slike damn guess not. I don't think that's the full extent of it though,

So I guess the point of this is I feel a sort of regret that past boy me doesn't exist anymore, even though I've never interfaced with my gender identity in that fashion before, AND even though he basically still does exist, just calls herself something different and has longer hair. And if I'm going to see that me as a different person, I better see me at other points in my life post gender as different people too even though I don't.

[femme-enby]

I’m gonna share my thoughts on something. A few things. All boiling down to one conclusion.

So, I’m sure most of us have seen some sort of discourse on who can and who can’t identify as a lesbian, what it means to be a lesbian, etc.

Well I some folks were fussin about a trans man identifying as a lesbian.

Here are my thoughts.

Firstly- “lesbian” has changed its commonly understood definition a multitude of times. From “woman with any sort of attraction to women in any degree” (meaning you could just be a REALLY big fan of how pretty women are, and cuddling them, but you were also romantically and sexually attracted to men as well, and you’d still have been considered a lesbian) to “non-man attracted to non-men exclusively” to “woman attracted to women only” and back to “non-man attracted to non-men.”

But here’s the thing… gender is fake. It is a social construct. It doesn’t exist as an actual thing. That doesn’t mean you aren’t the gender you identify as, but simply that… it’s even less of a “thing” than the concept of time and how we measure it. You still should respect others and their identity, your identity is still valid… but also the only truth is we are all humans.

Another thing is… for seemingly a large majority of trans men, there are certain experiences from when they identified as a girl/woman, from being perceived as a girl/woman, that has a significant impact on them. Us. It doesn’t matter if I become strong enough to lift someone who is 300lbs without breaking a sweat… I will always be listening attentively when walking around at night. I will always remember the things that happened to me, how I was treated, how those things changed who I would become and how my brain would develop and view the world. I will never be a man in the same exact way a cis man is.

IMO, “trans ____ are ____.” Is in reality just a severe simplification for something cisgender people will NEVER be TRULY capable of understanding. Because how can you get cisgender people, let alone cisgender HETEROSEXUAL people to truly grasp that while they should view and treat trans men/women AS men/women… there will always be that lived experience as the other.

Between the lived experience as both, or all, or however you view your PERSONAL experience with gender, that can impact how you see the world, how you experience attraction, and what label feels most accurate to who you are and how you feel.

ALSO, as much as some might not like to consider it… some transgender people will take their genitalia into account when considering what label best suits their sexuality.

So, again, for the sake of giving a PAINFULLY simplified example, imagine a person who lived up to say, 25 identifying or at least largely presenting as a woman. Going through all the bullshit that comes with that. Then they openly identify as a trans man. Maybe that dude is also still in touch with, enjoys expressing, whatever, femininity. Perhaps he doesn’t have plans to medically transition. Perhaps he doesn’t plan on bottom surgery.

That trans man also is exclusively attracted to women/non-men. He might feel as though “lesbian” best suits him, his experience, his attraction, better than anything else.

And in the end… so what? No one is saying YOU have to date or even ENGAGE with the trans men who identify as lesbians. How they identify has nothing to do with you, if you don’t want anything to do with them.

Aint that what we have BEEN trying to explain to cishet people?? That queer folks existing has nothing to do with them? That all we ask for is basic human decency and kindness?

Plus… gender and sexuality can be fluid. Why do some folks feel so entitled to weigh in on how someone identifies, when for all anyone knows they are trying shit out? They’re still workin on figuring out what labels best fit them?

Basically- someone’s labels have nothing to do with you. Folks testing out labels has nothin to do with you. Neither have any impact on who YOU are or why YOU feel YOUR choice in labels best suits YOU. The same way no one SHOULD have been telling YOU how to identify.

Infighting does nothing but make the community weaker which we have never and still cannot afford.

[servin-up-surveys]

survey #150

What kind of movies are you drawn to? Horror for sure, and I also like those with complex fantasy worlds. Well-written, interesting stories are what I care about most, though. Wholesome stuff is also excellent, like I'll always be a Disney and Pixar fan.

What breakfast are you most likely to have? I tend to go through phases where it's almost always cereal or a meal replacement shake.

What career field could you see yourself in? Something involving artistic expression.

What section do you drift toward at bookstores? Young adult fantasy stuff.

Do you like fried chicken? I actually hate it.

Do you think your parents are proud of you and what you do with your life? Mom tells me she's proud of me for how hard I fight and try to improve, but I feel like a disappointment regardless. I don't know how Dad feels.

Does anyone in your family smoke? My dad and his wife do.

Do you enjoy classic rock? I definitely do.

How do you discover new music? Primarily YouTube recommendations, but also Girt.

List three things that you love about your favorite season. The variety of leaf colors, the temperature, Halloween and its whole aesthetic.

Zombies or unicorns? Unicorns. :')

Candy corn or conversation hearts? omg I absolutely hate both, but candy corn is still worse imo, it's fucking wax

Brownies or cookies? Brownies, generally, but there are times I'd prefer cookies.

What are three of the most disgusting foods, in your opinion? Balut, escargot, clams.

Have you ever had a migraine? UGH yes, it's a fucking miserable experience and I'm VERY grateful they are extremely rare for me.

What’s one medication that you take every day? I take a whoooole lot more, but Wellbutrin is one.

Who was your third grade teacher? Her name was Mrs. Britt.

What’s the weather like today where you live? It's rainy all day on-and-off, and it's quite chilly for this time of year (65*F).

What is one thing you like that a lot of people don’t? Vulture culture, which is basically the use of naturally deceased animals and their parts for artistic creation. I do think it can be done distastefully, but there are breathtaking VC pieces created with much love from the artist.

What is one thing that everyone else seems to like that you don’t? Television. I've started liking it more when I'm watching stuff with Girt, but in general, it really doesn't interest me.

When was the last time you went swimming? Recently, because I did some aqua therapy at PT versus always on land.

Do you have other identities/words you relate to/associate with but don't necessarily identify as? I guess somewhat nonbinary, like gender just means nothing to me personally and I'm definitely a mix of both the traditionally feminine and masculine, but I'm perfectly fine with being a woman to myself and others, I have no interest in transitioning.

How do you want to be perceived as, aesthetically/socially? (i.e dainty, mature, strong, child-like, ethereal, etc.) Uh, strong is definitely one. I'd like to be less skittish and jumpy, and able to stay calm in tough situations. I always want to be seen as a caring person.

Does your partner share your orientation? (Do they identify the same as you?) No, I'm pan and he's straight. We're both cis, though.

When was the last time you experienced a pleasant surprise? Girt showed up with flowers when he came over last as a congrats on finishing physical therapy. <3 I had no idea, but it was really sweet.

When was the last time you were in any amount of pain? This is super super minor for now, but I'm definitely feeling my period incoming because of cramps.

What’s the longest you’ve ever stayed inside? How about outside? Hell, weeks. Maybe even around a month. Outside, I'm really not sure, but probably sometime as a kid.

Who was the last person to hug you? Do you hug this person often? Girt, and yes, every time I see him.

What was the last show you watched? Have you seen it before, or is it something you’re watching for the first time? Girt and I finished watching Dark the other day; we watched all three seasons so it definitely wasn't the first time haha.

Do you enjoy Jim Carrey movies? I do, he's a really funny guy imo with fantastic and very recognizable acting skills, and from what I've heard he's a hell of a good guy too.

Do you remember what the last kind of gum was that you had? Not really, but I thiiiink some mint thing.

Do you enjoy watching shows about survival? Why/why not? They can be interesting; my mom likes watching Naked and Afraid a lot, and while you can learn some cool things, for me personally I've always found these kinds of challenge shows pointless just because of how miserable the contestants always end up. Like the psychological and physical toll you take just to say "yeah I survived in the jungle for a month despite not actually needing to" is SOOOOOO not worth it imo.

Do you have any nicknames for your significant other? Well "Girt" is already a nickname, it's just how I've always known him. He gets the usual partner petnames as well.

Have you ever set up your best friend with someone? Yes and then we flirted behind her back and he eventually broke up with her because he wanted to be with me despite not even ACTUALLY knowing each other christ I would kick 12 y/o Brittany off a fucking mountain lmfao

What’s the worst car accident you or a friend has ever gotten into? I'm not sure. Seeing the picture of my little sister's old car when she got in a wreck with a fucking 18-wheeler makes me want to say that, like the car was entirely totaled, but Nicole - thank fucking god - came out with only seatbelt bruises/scars and I think a headache and general body soreness. You would NOT have expected her to come out even alive; that was a super fucking scary day, I can still hear in my head my mom sobbing on the phone with Ashley finding out where she was and straight bulleting for the hospital. It took her a LONG time to stop crying, long after seeing that Nicole was fine. I don't think I have ever in my life seen my mom that scared and upset.

Has one of your exes ever been the cause of a breakup between you and a boyfriend? No.

What’s something that has made you realize just how much you care and love someone else? When I went into the hospital last March, I was once again freaking out over if I liked Girt in a truly romantic way, but let me tell you, the night he called me while I was there just to talk to me like I was a normal person that he cared to speak to, I fucking knew I loved him, like it was the flip of a switch. Even the staff, who knew me as the gravely depressed patient, could tell how different I was after that. I think the reason it worked that way was I just remembered calling Jason at the hospital right after the breakup when I needed to get stuff from his place, and he was just so "I don't want to be speaking to you whatsoever" and it cut me so deep, deeper than I realized until this phone call from Girt, because it was as if that suddenly healed the wound and shoved in my face, "See? This is how someone is supposed to love you." He called me almost every day while I was there, making time for me even on his work days, and it was always the highlight of that day. This guy just never gives up on me and I owe him so much for that.

What was the name of the last pet of yours that died? My sweet Teddy boy.

What’s the longest you’ve gone without talking to someone when you were mad? A few days.

How long does it take you to normally take a shower? Somewhere around ten minutes. I've never understood how long some people can regularly stay in the shower, like I'm getting clean and getting out.

Have you ever burned incense before? Yes, I like doing that.

Ever been on a picnic? No, but I really want to one day as a date with Girt, once doing so is reasonable with my legs. He was all for it when I brought it up and it made me so happy lol

Do you live with your parents? Only my mom.

What do you call them? Mom/Mama/Ma and Dad/Daddy.

Do you know one of your best friend's major secrets? I actually don't know just how much of a secret it is to his family, but I do know something he certainly doesn't openly share or brag about.

What does your best friend look like? He's tall, slim, pale Caucasian with naturally black wavy/curly-ish short hair but it's graying early like his dad (he hates it, a lot), brown eyes, and he wears pretty normal glasses.

Describe their personality in 3 words: Loyal, reclusive, and funny.

Are you weary of displaying signs of affection for your significant other around adults? Why or why not? Not at all, but also we are adults. I just don't think showing love for someone should be something you should be ashamed of.

Have you ever had red velvet cake or carrot cake? Have you ever made either of those? I enjoy both, but red velvet cake is absolutely on top. I don't bake or even just cook.

If you could see any band/musician in concert, dead or alive, who would you see? Rammstein; not only because they're my favorite, but because their concerts are legendary for how fun and impressive they are.

Are the members of your favorite band still alive? I'm stunned Ozzy is still alive lol, immensely grateful for that, but still. I know he's had at least one bandmate in his solo career to die, former guitarist Randy Rhoads, but I'm not sure about others. Rammstein's lineup is still what it's always been since they started in the 90s.

Who is your favorite rapper? Eminem is the only rapper I know of whose music isn't unordinary for me to like when I hear it.

Favorite country singer/band? Tim McGraw, probably. I do love Carrie Underwood's voice, though.

Favorite female solo vocalist? Honestly not sure, I'd have to think for a while and I don't feel like it.

Favorite male solo vocalist? Again, not so sure on the solo part, so I guess Ozzy by default. His voice is entirely recognizable, like you're not gonna mistake him for someone else, so that makes him stand out, but he's not my favorite voice ever from an audibly pleasing perspective.

Favorite female-headed band? Otep.

Favorite male-headed band? Rammstein.

Who was your favorite musician when you were a kid? Backstreet Boys were first, then Jesse McCartney.

If you had to get a tattoo based off of a movie, what would you get? I actually want a Simba tattoo one day, y'know, the art Rafiki does of him on rock with the addition of his mane and the quote "remember who you are" on it, and I'm even very into the idea of a "hakuna matata" tattoo as someone with such severe anxiety.

What book series do you like? Wings of Fire by Tui T. Sutherland is my reading thing now.

Name one biography you’ve read? I read Ozzy's autobiography as a teen.

Do you have any reading disabilities? No, thankfully.

Who are your favorite artists? I have many, I adore Emil Melmoth's sculpture work, Mothmeister's pictures, Anastasiya Dobrovolskaya is my favorite photographer, and for actual drawings/paintings, I fucking love NukeRooster, Puffygator, Maquenda, Sandara, and Culpeo-Fox, all their social account names bc I don't know personal names.

What is your favorite period of art? I don't really have one.

Do you prefer classic art or modern art better? Both can be fantastic, I don't have a strong preference. I WILL say that I very much enjoy the sheer physicality of classic work, no tablets or fancy Photoshop brushes, etc.

Do you have any art or prints of famous artworks on your walls? No famous work, no.

If you are good, or were good, what kind of things do you/do you think you would paint? Primarily meerkats of course, probably mostly OCs in various RP scenes or just incorporated into cool concepts. I would love to be able to do this, well.

Do you consider architecture an art? OF COURSE, you can't ask an art history student this question and expect them to say no, architecture is some of the earliest and most grand forms of art.

Are you good at photography? I sure hope so seeing as I'm trying to build a career off of it. I do genuinely think I'm better than average at it, but I've still got skills to hone in and also further train my artistic eye from a technical perspective.

Do you know anyone who has ODed or died while high? Well, I didn't know him, but I know of him and care very much about it because this person was Girt's nephew's father. It's an absolutely heart-rending story.

Is weed really the gateway drug? It can be, yes; I know people who started with weed and went worse, so you can't convince me it never is.

Who are your closest friends right now? Besides my boyfriend, Mazzy and Tez.

Have you ever become legit friends with someone you met at work? No.

[tyrannuspitch]

Jumping off @kidrat​ ’s recent post on JKR, British transphobia, and transphobia against transmasculine people, after getting a bit carried away and too long to add as a comment:

A major, relatively undiscussed event in JKR’s descent into full terfery was this tweet:

[image id: a screenshot of a tweet from JK Rowling reading: “’People who menstruate.’ I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?”

Rowling attaches a link to an article titled: “Opinion: Creating a more equal post-COVID-19 world for people who menstruate” /end id]

This can seem like a pretty mundane TERF talking point, just quibbling over language for the sake of it, but I think it’s worth discussing, especially in combination with the idea that cis women like JKR see transmasculine transition as a threat to their womanhood. (Recite it with horror: ”If I were young now, I might’ve transitioned...”)

A lot of people, pro- or anti-transphobe, will make this discussion about whether the term “woman” should include trans women or not, and how cis women are hostile to the inclusion of trans women. And that’s absolutely true. But the actual language cis women target is very frequently being changed for the benefit of trans men, not trans women, and most of them know this.

Cis people are used to having their identities constantly reaffirmed and grounded in their bodies. A lot of cis women, specifically, understand their social and physical identities as women as being defined by pain: misogynistic oppression is equated to the pains of menstruation or childbirth, and both are seen as the domain of cis women. They’re something cis women can bond over and build a “sisterhood” around, and the more socially aware among them can recognise that cis women’s pain being taken less seriously by medicine is not unrelated to their oppression. However, in the absence of any trans perspectives, these conversations can also easily become very territorial and very bioessentialist.

Therefore... for many cis women, seeing “female bodies” described in gender neutral language feels like stripping their pain of its meaning, and they can become very defensive and angry.

And the consequences for transmasculine people can be extremely dangerous.

Not only do transmasculine people have an equal right to cis women to define our bodies as our own... Using inclusive language in healthcare is about more than just emotional validation.

The status quo in healthcare is already non-inclusive. When seeking medical help, trans people can expect to be misgendered and to have to explain how our bodies work to the doctors. We risk harassment, pressure to detransition, pressure to sterilise ourselves, or just being outright turned away. And the conversation around pregnancy and abortion in particular is heaving with cisnormativity - both feminist and anti-feminist cis women constantly talk about pregnancy as a quintessentially female experience which men could never understand.

Using gender-neutral language is the most basic step possible to try and make transmasculine people safer in healthcare, by removing the idea that these are “women’s spaces”, that men needing these services is impossible, and that safety depends on ideas like “we’re all women here”. Not institutionally subjecting us to misgendering and removing the excuse to outright deny us treatment is, again, one of the most basic steps that can be taken. It doesn’t mean we’re allowed comfort, dignity or full autonomy, just that one major threat is being addressed. The backlash against this from cis women is defending their poorly developed senses of self... at the cost of most basic dignity and safety for transmasculine people.

Ironically, though transphobic cis women feel like decoupling “women’s experiences” from womanhood is decoupling them from gendered oppression, transmasculine people experience even more marginalisation than cis women. Our rates of suicide and assault are even higher. Our health is even less researched than cis women’s. Our bodies are even more strictly controlled. Cis women wanting to define our bodies on their terms is a significant part of that. They hold the things we need hostage as “women’s rights”, “women’s health”, “women’s discussions” and “support for violence against women”, and demand we (re-)closet ourselves or lose all of their solidarity.

Fundamentally, the problem is that transphobic cis women are possessive over their experiences and anyone who shares them. Because of their binary understanding of gender, they’re uncomfortable with another group sharing many of their experiences but defining themselves differently. They’re uncomfortable with transmasculine people identifying “with the enemy” instead of “with their sisters”, and they’re even more uncomfortable with the idea that there are men in the world who they oppress, and not the other way around. “Oppression is for women; you can’t call yourself a man and still claim women’s experiences. Pregnancy is for women; if you want to be a man so badly why haven’t already you done something about having a woman’s body? How dare you abandon the sisterhood while inhabiting one of our bodies?”

Which brings me back to the TERF line about how “If I were young now, I might have transitioned.”

I’m not saying Rowling doesn’t actually feel any personal connection to that narrative - but it is a standard line, and it’s standard for a reason. Transphobic cis women really believe that there is nothing trans men go through that cis women don’t. They equate our dysphoria to internalised misogyny, eating disorders, sexual abuse or other things they see as “female trauma”. They equate our desire to transition to a desire to escape. They want to “help us accept ourselves” and “save us” from threats to their sense of identity. The fact is, this is all projection. They refuse to consider that we really have a different internal experience from them.

There’s also a marked tendency among less overtly transphobic cis women, even self-proclaimed trans allies, to make transphobia towards trans men about cis women.

Violence against trans men is chronically misreported and redefined as “violence against women”. In activist spaces, we’re frequently told that any trauma we have with misogyny is “misdirected” and therefore “not really about us”. If we were women, we would’ve been “experiencing misogyny”, but men can’t do that, so we should shut up and stop “talking over women”. (Despite the surface difference of whether they claim to affirm our gender, this is extremely similar to how TERFs tell us that everything we experience is “just misogyny”, but that transmasculine identity is a delusion that strips us of the ability to understand gender or the right to talk about it.)

I have personally witnessed an actual N*zi writing an article about how trans men are “destroying the white race” by transitioning and therefore becoming unfit to carry children, and because the N*zi had misgendered trans men in his article, every response I saw to it was about “men controlling women’s bodies”.

All a transphobe has to do is misgender us, and the conversation about our own oppression is once again about someone else.

Transphobes will misgender us as a form of violence, and cis feminist “allies” will perpetuate our misgendering for rhetorical convenience. Yes, there is room to analyse how trans men are treated by people who see us as women - but applying a simple “men oppressing women” dynamic that erases our maleness while refusing to even name transphobia or cissexism is not that. Trans men’s oppression is not identical to cis women’s, and forcing us to articulate it in ways that would include cis women in it means we cannot discuss the differences.

It may seem like I’ve strayed a long way from the original topic, and I kind of have, but the central reason for all of these things is the same:

Trans men challenge cis women’s self-concept. We force them to actually consider what manhood and womanhood are and to re-analyse their relationship to oppression, beyond a simple binary patriarchy. 

TERFs will tell you themselves that the acknowledgement of trans people, including trans men, is an “existential threat” that is “erasing womanhood” - not just our own, but cis women’s too. They hate the idea that biology doesn’t determine gender, and that gender does not have a strict binary relationship to oppression. They’re resentful of the idea that they could just “become men”, threatened by the assertion that doing so is not an escape, and completely indignant at the idea that their cis womanhood could give them any kind of power. They are, fundamentally, desperate not to have to face the questions we force them to consider, so they erase us, deflect from us, and talk over us at every opportunity.

Trans men are constantly redefined against our wills for the benefit of cis womanhood.

TL;DR:

Cis women find transmasculine identity threatening, because we share experiences that they see as foundational to their womanhood

The fact that transphobes target inclusive language in healthcare specifically is not a mistake - They do not want us to be able to transition safely

Cis women are uncomfortable acknowledging transphobia, so they make discussion of trans men’s oppression about “womanhood” instead

This can manifest as fully denying that trans men experience our own oppression, or as pretending trans men’s experiences are identical to cis women’s in every way

[bansheeoftheforest]

Jaylock, specifically with transmasc Jekyll? T4T legends.

Ah yes, my favorite mix; a trans guy who wants to get trample by a big, strong werewolf, and a trans werewolf who is basically just a puppy. Hell yes <3

Also did I say that these were going to be complimentary to canon? Ahahah well I have no idea how to do that with thi- oh yeah it's an au it doesn't have to be canon complaint ahah nvm also realize i keep steering these to how these ship begins but eh no one has complained so far <3

Also at this point I think I will have to put in keep reading links bc these are getting long sjdhfsjdf

MMmokay. We can all agree that Jasper had a huge crush on Henry from the beginning? Good.

Like, Henry saved him from the cops, was incredibly nice to him from the beginning, and showed him/let him join the Society in the first place. Jasper looks up to him a lot. Henry becomes his only real friend (except for Rachel but... Well... She is more out to get with him rather than be friends with him) so of course he would just... Really... Really... Like Henry after a while.

Virginia catches Jasper watching Henry talking to some of the other Lodgers at some point and she knows exactly what he is thinking. He can try defending himself for exactly 3 seconds before all excuses die in his throat and Virginia begins to pat his back.

"That's normal, mate. Everyone has a crush on Henry at some point." - "Everyone????" - "Yep. You won't hear half of this lot admit it, but everyone has had some kind of crush on him." - "Even you?" - "I said everyone, didn't I?"

Cue a lot of embarrassment from Jasper, cue a lot of understanding and sympathetic gossiping by the other Lodgers, cue a lot of "What do you mean that's the best thing about Henry?", cue a lot of "don't worry, you'll get over the crush soon!".

Except he doesn't. He waits days, weeks, maybe even months, but the crush never disappears. The fact that Henry is so stupidly sweet and caring and loves to spend time with him doesn't help Jasper's situation at all. And the Lodgers notice, and the Lodgers tease him about it.

Henry, as often, remains blissfully unaware.

Or at least that's what Jasper thinks. When Henry comes around to his lab to say hi and check in, and when he brings him some sweets that he claims Rachel sent him to give to him, and when Henry just so happens to eye Jasper up and down, Jasper believes that Henry is just being... Friendly. Very friendly.

And he is just being friendly, at least Henry tells himself that too. Or maybe it's the way he sometimes have a hard time looking away from the werewolf that he realizes that he is... Quite accidentally... Being a bit more than friendly.

And then Jasper-- accidentally or inaccidentally-- comes out to Henry. Perhaps it would be like the same panic in canon but him actually confessing to Henry instead, or Henry would maybe accidentally walk in on Jasper changing. Either way, Jasper halfly panics and Henry just gets the brightest grin on his face, so excited, before he immediately tells Jasper that he can be calm because he understands perfectly!

He doesn't even manage to get out that he, too, is trans, before he immediately starts asking Jasper if he has started to medically transitioned-- like "have you had any surgeries? Or have you taken potions? Oh there are a lot of good potions to change-- personally, Lanyon helped me with surgeries but I made some helpful potions for Virginia-- Oh did you know Virginia is like us, too? But reverse, of course--"

Henry is just. Rambling to poor Jasper. Poor Jasper who is permanently stuck in a :O. He can barely process the words that his very own crush is telling him. For a moment his brain shortcuts and all he can do is to stare at Henry-- the way he is so wildly gesturing as the words roll off of his tongue at 100 words per second. But then Henry notices Jasper's confusion, and he stops, and he repeats himself. He is trans, too.

It ends up with the two of them having a long, long conversation about gender identity as the evening wears on. Henry tells Jasper practically everything he knows about it. He tells him how it wasn't until he started puberty that he realized that it felt wrong, but he couldn't fully transition until later on in life. Lanyon helped him with surgeries but it wasn't until he fully started playing into alchemy that he found and created potions that could help with transitions.

To make a long story short, Henry promises to help Jasper with transitions.

Maybe that's why they suddenly kept getting closer after that. They could relate to each other. Suddenly they wanted to spend more time together. Oh wow huh they are really spending a lot of time together. Wow they are sitting really close... Huh... Wow, wow, wow, Henry is certainly in Jasper's personal space... And Jasper is not pulling away...

Oh wow they smooching. So much smooching. So much smooching yet it's so soft and careful and gentle, Jasper practically melts; melts into the kiss just as much as he melts into Henry's arms.

Aight now some time for the actual relationship hcs.

Hai yes I have said this with every ship so far but consider; cuddles. Jasper is a cuddle bug, Henry craves the warmth and affection.

(Both of them can agree that their favorite cuddles are the full moon cuddles when Jasper is just. A fluffy werewolf. And Henry can bury his entire self into his fur).

Boyfriends helping each other with hormone injections? Boyfriends helping each other with hormone injections.

Sometimes Henry will be very swamped in paperwork, sometimes Jasper wants cuddles, sometimes they compromise and Jasper gets to sit on Henry's lap while he does paperwork. Sometimes Zosi or Christopher will be jealous and it will end up with them in Jasper's lap, too.

Jasper is the only one that supports Henry's obsession with wanting every pet he finds. Jasper is also Henry's alibi when a new stray animal ends up in the Society ("ahah what do you mean "new stray" that's Abby, y'know, one of Jasper's pets").

Jasper's main goal in life is to hear Henry talking in his Scottish accent as much as possible. Jasper is the only one Henry allows to hear it.

Cuddles in bed with Jasper tracing Henry's chest scars (is... Is there an actual word for those scars? Ahaha I don't know) and Henry stroking his hands over Jasper's sides, almost happy that Jasper didn't have to go through surgeries like he did.

Rachel and Robert teasing Henry for having a thing for werewolves? Rachel and Robert teasing Henry for having a thing for werewolves.

So many smooches. Henry can't keep his lips off of Jasper for more than a minute most of the time. So many hugs and so many cuddles after a long day of boring meetings and socializing. Jasper always giggles because he is super ticklish.

Henry reading a book or the newspaper on the couch, reading glasses hanging low on his nose, drinking a glass of wine with his free hand while Jasper is seated on his lap, head rested against his shoulder as he gently snoozes bc poor boy is tired <3

Henry has... Stupidly many nicknames for Jasper. "Fluffball", "Fluffpuff", "Sweetheart", "Wolfie", "My Mister", "Little Sir". He literally will come up with something on the spot and stick with it because Jasper will always giggle and blush.

Surprisingly, Henry is the clingy one. He is also the small spoon most of the time. Man is just skin and bone, he can curl up perfectly so that Jasper, i.e chubby and strong legend McGee, can hold him <3

Virginia third-wheels them a lot. It will start as her trying to have a conversation with her mentor and fellow trans legend and then they will be interrupted by a clingy (and also fellow trans legend) Jasper who came to Jekyll's office in the search for some attention and affection. It ends up with Jasper on Henry's lap while Henry continues his conversation with Virginia like nothing happened.

Jasper was the first one to get to know about Hyde. He was... Surprisingly unbothered and casual about it. That was, at least, until Hyde pinned him against a wall one night and began to flirt with him. Jasper was quite sure his face exploded with blush.

Hyde loves to tease Jasper. Henry constantly tells him off for being... Ah, well, uhm... AH... Too "flirty" with him, so to speak. Jasper has learned to turn the other way and run every time he catches the sight of blond hair or a whiff of spearmint unless he wants to get a heart attack.

Have I told you how much I love the thought of werewolf cuddles?

Also, full werewolf!Jasper basically losing his... Um, sense of awareness? Like he forgets that he is human and he often forgets who the people in his surroundings are, unlike when he was a half-werewolf and fully aware.

What I'm saying is; give me werewolf!Jasper being so incredibly curious by Henry and sniffing him everywhere, somehow opening his shirt just so he can lick his scars because the pack and mate instincts in Jasper is through the roof and his mate is hurt why is he hurt wHO HURT HIM hE SHALL HEAL HIM THROUGH THE POWER OF KISSES.

Henry kissing Jasper's snout. Henry rubbing Jasper's belly. Henry constantly praising and complimenting Jasper.

Henry always making sure Jasper knows how handsome and manly he is. Henry always making sure that Jasper has clothes that aren't torn or dirty and that are comfortable and fits well. Henry doting on Jasper.

Jasper always being there for Henry when things get rough. Jasper stating everything that he loves with Henry and kissing him on the nose when all Henry wants to do is smash his head against the desk and cry. Jasper and Henry taking care of each other <3

[uncloseted]

saying "people who identify as girls are girls" is not simple. at all. i mean ok i am a girl. why? because i identify as one. but why? there's nothing that unites all girls. which doesn't mean that all girls have to be exactly the same but they at least need to have ONE thing in common. i mean if people say yeah i like women, when i'm in the street i look at women not men. how do you know? how do you know who's a man and who's a woman and who's anything else? and even woke people look at someone

1and think "girl" then think, or maybe they're non binary! but they never say or maybe they're a man. never. a person who looks like me has two options: girl or one of the hundreds of non binary identities. but to be a man, I'd have to try harder. it's not enough to IDENTIFY AS. ffs I can't be the only one who sees this. and just to clarify, i sent the joke about Emily being transphobic and i sent the first two of the three asks that you answered together i forgot this. you seriously thinl that if you raise a baby completely gender neutral, like one of those "theybies" and you tell them a girl is someone who identifies as a girl a boy is anyone who identifies as a boy nb is someone who identifies as neither, that they will deep down, without taking into account any stereotypes or biological essentialism, know what gender they are? even if they end up saying I'm a girl/boy, it will be because they will be exposed to girls and boys and "choose" the one they relate most to, or even because they like how the word "girl" or "boy" sounds.

I think you're asking some really good questions here. You're raising a lot of very philosophically interesting questions about the metaphysics of gender (what does it mean to have a gender, what does it mean to be transgender, is gender a social construct or is it innate to humans, etc) and how gender, as a social construct, impacts our lives on a day to day basis. Better philosophers than I have struggled with these questions for decades, but I'll do my best not to get too into the weeds on their different theories in this post. Instead, I'll offer my thoughts on what gender is and then investigate how we interact with it on a practical level. This is likely to be a long post, so apologies in advance, but it's a complicated issue that touches everyone's lives and I want to be mindful of that while writing this. Also apologies that this is going to be a pretty binary post. I don't mean to exclude nonbinary identities from this conversation, but to illustrate the points I'm trying to make, I think it's easier to talk about binary identities first. Just know that I do think nonbinary identities are real, valid and worthy of recognition and respect. Lastly, I'm not attached to any of the views expressed in this post. They reflect my thinking at this moment in time, but that might change as I learn more about these topics. I apologize if any of the views presented here are inadvertently hurtful. That's not my intention at all, but I recognize that regardless of intention, some things can cause harm. My goal in this post is to explore some ideas, and I would love to hear other people's opinions on this topic or criticism of these ideas. The Metaphysics of Gender So, to start out with, what is gender? Why are you a girl? Why do you identify as a girl? Why does anyone, and what links those people who identify as "girls" together? Is identifying as a girl enough to be one? These are complicated questions, both philosophically and culturally, and they've become more visible as we've become more culturally aware of gender variances (recently in the West. Third genders have always existed, and do continue to exist, in many cultures around the world). In biology and philosophy, there's a concept called "homeostatic property clusters" (stay with me here, I promise I'm going somewhere with this). "Homeostatic property clusters" is basically just a fancy phrase for the idea that if a creature has enough of a certain set of characteristics, they can be defined as part of a larger category, even if they don't have all of the traits that creatures in that category might have. In the PhilosophyTube video "Social Constructs", Abigail offers the category "mammals" as an example of a "homeostatic property cluster". Mammals are creatures that have warm blood, produce milk, and birth live offspring. Humans are mammals based on these characteristics, and so are seals and giraffes. But platypuses are also mammals, even though they lay eggs instead of birthing live offspring. These three properties, having warm blood, producing milk, and birthing live offspring, tend to "cluster" together, but they don't have to all be present in order for the creature to be "a mammal"- in this case, two out of three is fine. I think gender is similar. It's a homeostatic property cluster that includes biological, psychological, and social traits. Not all of those traits must be present for a person to "be a girl" or "be a boy", but enough of them have to be present in order for the person to be considered as part of that category ("girl" or "boy"). That cluster of traits is what all "girls" have in common, even if those traits aren't exactly the same for each individual. So, then, in the context of gender, what are those traits? "Biopsychosocial traits" is all very good as an academic term, but what does it actually mean? Let's start with the biological traits, since I think they're what most people default to when talking about gender. Biological Sex and Gender One trait we might consider when talking about whether someone "is a

girl" is sex characteristics. Sex and gender are fundamentally separate concepts, but for many people, they're linked. Many cis people consider themselves cis because they were "born in the right body" or lack the desire to medically transition. They have a "subconscious sex" that matches their physical body. So I think this is a good place to start. We might ask the question, "does this person have primary or secondary sex characteristics associated with being "a girl"?" It feels like the answer should be obvious- do they have tits and fanny, or don't they? But in reality, "biological sex" itself is kind of a homeostatic property cluster. Female sex characteristics include XX chromosomes, ovaries, estrogen and gestagen, a vagina, uterus, and fallopain tubes, breasts, and a menstrual cycle. But there are people without some of these traits that are still "girls". For example, some girls don't have a menstrual cycle (due to menopause, hormonal birth control, low body weight, PCOS, etc), but they're still girls. Some girls don't have a uterus (for example, if they've had a hysterectomy), but they're still girls. Some girls never develop breasts, but they're still girls. Some girls are born with Swyer syndrome, where they have a uterus, fallopian tubes, a cervix and a vagina, but have XY sex chromosomes. They're still girls. Any one of those traits by themselves can't be enough to decide if a person "is a biological girl" or "isn't a biological girl", but if a person has enough traits in that cluster, then they can be considered part of the larger category "biological girl". That by itself is kind of a TERFy take, so I would offer that the biological trait in the cluster "girl" is "has a cluster of female sex characteristics, either naturally or artificially, or gender dysphoria resulting in a desire to acquire those sex characteristics." But that alone can't be enough to determine if someone is or isn't "a girl". If it was, it would exclude pre-medical transition trans boys, even pre-medical transition trans boys who are living their lives as boys. It's also a transmedicalist take- it would also exclude trans people who never medically transition. To me, that doesn't feel right. People shouldn't be considered "a girl" or "a boy" based on biological essentialism, the pain of gender dysphoria, or their access to medical transition. So there have to be other factors at play- other traits in the cluster. Gender as Identity On the other side of the spectrum, some people say that gender is identity. You are "a girl" or "a boy" because that's how you identify- it's how you see yourself. In this viewpoint, gender is something innate to a person, that they instinctively know about themselves. It's perhaps a "female soul" in a "male body". In your ask, you express some scepticism about this view, and I'm inclined to agree. If humans have souls, I'm inclined to think they're not gendered, since what constitutes gender varies so widely across cultures and time periods. But I do also think that "identifying as" is an important element of "being a girl". Identifying as a girl is a basic criteria for being a girl. No person who doesn't identify as a girl can be a girl. It's an innate property of "girlness", the same way that an innate property of triangles is that they have three sides. But I do agree with you that I'm not convinced it's enough to only "identify as". Other traits in the cluster have to be present, because without a physical or social transition (or at least, the desire for a physical or social transition, particularly in cases of people for whom it's not safe or possible for them to transition), a person's identification doesn't have much practical value. Gender as a Social Role If "identifying as" isn't enough, then perhaps an important part of the gender conversation is the social role that gender plays in our lives. A gender is put upon us when we're born, and people continue to expect us to fill our assigned gender role throughout our lives. Maybe what's important isn't our body

parts or our internal identity, but instead, the gender role society lets us adopt. Perhaps society has to let you adopt the gender role you identify as. Either you're perceived as a woman or you aren't, either you "pass" or you don't. Perhaps those expectations that others have of you are what defines your gender. Intuitively, this seems to be tapping into something that feels true, at least to me. "Identifying as" isn't enough because society has to acknowledge that we are who we say we are. As you say, perhaps we have to "try harder" to "be a girl" or "be a boy" than just "identifying as". But this, too, has its problems. What about trans people who can't or don't pass? Does their transness get revoked for not appearing like they're trying hard enough? And what constitutes "hard enough"? Is trying at all "hard enough", or is there a point at which you "become" your gender? How many people need to reach a consensus on your gender before that's who you "are"? Does it get revoked by one person who misgenders you? And what about people who are cis, but occasionally put into an opposite gender role because of the way they present themselves? It seems to me that relying on other people to confer gender onto us is at once too limiting and not limiting enough. Gender as Gender Expression Going off of the idea of gender as a social role, then maybe gender is how you physically express yourself to the world- how you look to others. Maybe if you choose to express yourself as a given gender (through hair, clothes, makeup, voice, etc.), that's the gender that you are (or a reflection of the gender that you are), because that's how society will gender you. But that seems insufficient as well, for a lot of the same reasons that gender as a social role does. There are people who express themselves in stereotypically "masculine" ways but who identify as girls and who are understood to be girls by those around them. Their "girlness" is not culturally taken away from them based on their gender expression (unless there's another trait within the cluster of "being a girl" that they appear to not have). A girl can wear a full face of makeup, a dress and high heels, or have a pixie cut, no makeup, and wear a flannel and Doc Martens, but that alone isn't enough to say that she's not "a girl". This is especially true now, where very few ways of presenting are viewed as inherently gendered. Dresses and skirts are no longer exclusively "a girl thing" and pants have long been gender neutral. And what constitutes "presenting as a girl" and "presenting as a boy" changes across culture, time, and based on other characteristics an individual has (like class, race, size, or level of ability). So gender expression doesn't seem sufficient by itself to determine gender identity. Gender as Behaviors and Actions (aka Gender Performativity) Okay, so gender isn't just gender expression. But what about gender as a set of behaviors, something that you do? Gender performativity is a theory presented by Judith Butler in 1990 (sorry, I know I promised I wouldn't namedrop philosophical theories, but this is important to the conversation). Butler says that gender is constructed through a set of "acts" that are in line with societal ideas of what it means to "be a girl" or "be a boy". This performance of gendered acts is ongoing, even when we're alone, and is out of our control. Butler believes that there's no such thing as a "non-stylized" act- that is to say, everything we do is an act, and there's no such thing as an act that is not perceived as being somewhere on the spectrum of masculinity and femininity (at least, not in the current world we live in). The way we stylize these acts have the possibility to change over time. So Judith Butler believes that we "do" gender rather than "being" gender- that a girl "does girlness" over time. Put another way, a girl does behaviors, actions, and expressions that are stylized as "girly", which is what makes her gender identity "girl". And this gender, "girl", is constantly being

produced as the girl produces more of those "girly" acts. Instead of having an innate gender or expressing our internal gender through the way that we present, Butler thinks our outward gendered acts create our inner gender identity. Those acts and the way we perform them are shaped from the minute that we're born, when we're thrown into a pre-existing gender category and taught that "people like us" do things "in this way". This theory offers an answer to the question we asked in the previous section about gender as presentation; someone who is dressed "masculine" can still be "a girl" because they're performing "girlness"- they're doing acts that are in line with what we think of as "a girl". Because Butler doesn't believe that you're born with an internal gender, her work is controversial in trans spaces and are sometimes thought of as being trans-exclusionary (although Butler herself is a trans advocate). But I think disagree. Presumably, a person could change the stylization of the acts they perform. A person who was performing "boy" can begin to instead perform "girl", although they did not grow up performing "girl". It may be difficult, as they haven't had the performance of "girl" thrust upon them their entire lives, and have not experienced the "oppression experiences of girlhood" that can shape the performance of "girl". But gender performance and gender socialization are a lifelong process, and so the more a person "does girlness", the more they will be perceived as "doing girlness", and the more they will be expected to "perform girlness." I think it becomes something of a feedback loop where performance feeds socialization and socialization feeds performance. What about the "theybies"? What would happen if you raise a baby completely gender neutral? What would happen if a baby wasn't thrown into a pre-existing gender category upon birth? Would they identify as a gender without taking stereotypes or biological essentialism into account? This is essentially a question about social constructs. If we raised a baby with the understanding that some people have male sex characteristics, some have female sex characteristics, and some people have a combination of both, but removed the social constructs we have around gender, would gender still exist to this child? What you've created here is a "Twin Earth" thought experiment- a hypothetical where there are two Earths that are identical in every way except for one. Our Earth has the social construct of Gender, but Twin Earth does not. Would our Theyby still have a gender if they lived on Twin Earth? I think no. They wouldn't have a context to understand the social systems that we've created around sex characteristics, and so they wouldn't be able to place themselves within those systems. They wouldn't understand why we've based our whole society around sex characteristics as opposed to something else. They would be able to identify that they have the sex characteristics associated with "boys" or "girls", but not what it means to "be a girl" or "be a boy". (If you want to dig further into this idea of Social Constructs, that PhilosophyTube video I linked above is a good place to start). They could learn, but it wouldn't be innate to them. We, however, don't live on Twin Earth. We live on Earth. And on Earth, we do have the social construct of gender. So even if you raise a child completely gender neutral, they still have a concept of what it is to "be a girl" or "be a boy". They might learn that "girls" have long hair, or wear dresses, or are nice and caring, or are emotional, or walk and talk a certain way, or wear pink, or whatever other social constructs we ascribe to the gender "girl". They might learn that "boys" have short hair, wear pants, are mischievous, are aggressive, or walk a different way, or wear blue, or whatever other social constructs we ascribe to the gender "boy". Kids who are raised gender neutral look at the physical characteristics of other kids, the gender expression of other kids, the performance of "girlness" or

"boyness" that other kids do, and compare them to the physical characteristics they have, the gender expression they like, the gender expression that's expected of them from others, the performance of gender that they gravitate towards, and the performance of gender expected of them from others, and they tend to pick the one that feels more like their category. Most kids start conceptualizing their gender identity around age 3 or 4, and that's true for kids who are raised gender-neutral as well. When they start spending more time out in the world, they notice that they're different from some kids and similar to others, and they learn the language to describe those differences. But all of this is kind of beside the point, because raising a child as a "theyby" doesn't ultimately have the goal of the child not having a gender or growing up to be agender or genderqueer. It has the goal of allowing children to develop their likes, dislikes, and views of themselves without the contribution of harmful gender stereotypes. And I think that's actually a really great goal- how many of us that were raised female were discouraged from pursuing certain interests (especially science and technology related interests) because those "aren't girl things"? Kids will be exposed to those harmful stereotypes eventually, but if a kid is raised until age 3 without them, they might be more resilient to them when those ideas are presented. And for kids who do end up being transgender, being raised without gender lets them know that they'll be accepted by their family no matter their identity. Okay, but give us some answers... what is gender? So, we've gone over a lot of things that gender isn't, or at least, a lot of things that can't exclusively constitute a gender. But where does that leave us? What does that make gender? I propose it's something like the following: There are lots of ways to have or experience a gender. In order to have a gender, a person must:

1. Identify as that gender and: 2. have a cluster of sex characteristics matching the biological sex associated with that gender, either naturally or artificially, or gender dysphoria resulting in a desire to acquire those sex characteristics AND/OR 3. socially inhabit that gender, through gender expression or gender performance, or have a desire to socially inhabit that gender

I think that covers pretty much every case I can think of. People who identify as a gender and have the sex characteristics matching that gender are cis people, regardless of their social presentation. People who identify as a gender and have gender dysphoria or who have medically transitioned are the gender they identify as. People who identify as a gender and socially inhabit that gender are also the gender they identify as, and so are people who identify as a gender and would like to socially inhabit that gender but can't due to financial constraints or safety concerns. They're just experiencing trans identity in a different way to medically transitioned people. Gender as a Social Construct Okay, so that's the metaphysics of gender, or at least, an approach to the metaphysics of gender. I want to make it clear that I'm not attached to this theory, and I don't necessarily think I'm right. This is just where I've landed in my thinking right now, and I'm open to hearing other people's opinions and criticisms. In any case, it's very abstract, very philosophical, but maybe not super practical for the other questions you're asking here, and definitely not simple. So why, in my original answer, was I making the claim that "people who identify as girls are girls" is simple, then? I was making that claim because the way we interact with other people isn't metaphysical. It's practical. And practically speaking, all you need to do is acknowledge a person the way they ask to be acknowledged. Does someone say they're a boy named Jack who uses he/him pronouns? Great, call him Jack and use he/him pronouns. Does someone say their name is Sarah and use she/her pronouns? Great, call her Sarah and use she/her pronouns. Does someone say their name is Alex and they use they/them pronouns? Great, call them Alex and use they/them pronouns. Does someone say their name is Cloud and they use ze/zir pronouns? Great, call them Cloud and use ze/zir pronouns. You don't have to understand their relationship with their gender or what their gender means at all. You can even think their gender is "cringe". But you do have to respect the way they view themselves, and acknowledge them how they want to be seen. Think about it this way- if you were at an event and someone had a nametag that said, "Hi! My name is Taylor", but when they introduced themselves, they said, "I know my nametag says Taylor, but actually I go by Riley," what would you do? You'd just... call them Riley, right? You don't need to know why they have the wrong nametag to respect that their nametag is wrong. You probably wouldn't insist on calling them Taylor because that's what the nametag says. You probably wouldn't even ask how they ended up with a nametag that was wrong. Trans people are people, and they deserve respect just like anyone else. That's why this is simple- all you have to do is listen and be respectful, even if you don't understand. Wrapping up, here's my question to you. What is it about trans people that makes you uncomfortable? Think about it honestly, and try not to default to, "it's political correctness run amok! People are offended if you breathe too loudly!" Does it feel like a challenge to your own identity, either your gender identity or your sexuality? Is it a discomfort with society changing? Is it a fear of getting something wrong and offending someone? The vast majority of trans people I've met just want to be acknowledged for who they are. They'll politely correct people who misgender them or accidentally say something transphobic. And the ones who are the most aggressive or militant are the ones who have been hurt the most by a system that won't acknowledge them for who they are. It's a plea to be seen in a world that denies them that visibility. Maybe it isn't trans people that need to become less sensitive, but us who need to become more accepting. Some resources that you might be interested in if you liked this post: The Aesthetic | ContraPoints Social Constructs | Philosophy Tube "Transtrenders" |

ContraPoints Gender Critical | ContraPoints Judith Butler's Theory of Gender Performativity, Explained

[fullhalalalchemist]

okay well i’m going to talk about it!! 

so obamitsu are a t4t couple and you wouldn’t really know it bc they’re passing but then they stand up and you see the size difference (she’s 6′0 and he’s 5′1) and their outfits and youre like hmmm something very queer going on here. also i think it is very vital i clarify that while mitsuri is bordering on internet gamer egirl looks she is in fact mostly a prep and iguro is her goth boyfriend. but he also has a lot of insecurities when it comes to his looks bc even tho mitsuri was able to transition at a very young age, iguro went through the same canon childhood trauma by basically being raised in a female cult and then after escaping he transitioned in his late teens.

anyway she’s a social media influencer but mostly one of those cute e-girl makeup youtubers with a side of vlogging and obanai works in a hospital as a medical technologist with his chemistry degree. he’s working on getting his masters rn (he only has 1 year left) but his job and mitsuri’s are solid enough with enough income that they really aren’t worried about the money at all. theyre also both tiktokers but it’s funny because they are on completely different sides of it and she’s verified but he got a little famous over the big alt love that went on last summer. anyway he doesn’t like to be on camera at ALL so like people dont know they are together. misturi’s fans know she has a bf but they dont know much about him. i’ll talk about this part later.

ANYWAY! iguro proposes to mitsuri and they get married and then mitsuri is on her tiktok going ‘my boyfriend, i mean...my HUSBAND :DDDDD!!!!!!!!’ and her fans are like OMGGGGG and iguro, who never really shows his face but people think he wears a mask for aesthetic reasons does eye crinkles when he’s like ‘guess who has a wife now’ and his followers are like NO WAY!!! but no one connects 1+1. anyway at some point a little after that she accidentally gets him preggers and they both panic about it. they end up deciding to keep the baby but dont mention it at all on any social media anyway cuz they dont wanna deal with how mitsuri doesnt “look pregnant” cuz neither are out anyway other than to their friends & family. anyway iguro ends up taking a medical leave and the baby’s born and everythings fine. mitsuri ends up telling her followers she’s going to take a break due to a small family emergency she’ll tell them about later. 

and so now u have this alt trans married couple taking care of a cute baby girl and the baby is sooo cute and tiny and iguro’s heart goes all gooey when he looks at her and mitsuri is like 🥺 im a parent...wowie....i made that...and they end up (play)fighting over what to dress her in bc iguro likes to sew so he sews her all these black lacey dresses and shirts and mitsuri is like pastels!! frills!!! sparkles!!! and in the morning at like 6 am theyre both sleeping in the same queen sized bed with their bby girl between them except she’s still a baby and active at weird hours so they wake up often with her sleeping on iguro’s face or with her feet in mitsuri’s face and all kinds of silly positions 

and also at some point theyre both like ‘look at my baby!!’ on their individual tiktoks and people finally connect the dots cuz theyre like...is this the same baby...omg and they talked about getting married at the same time...OMG WE FOUND OUT WHO THE OTHER PERSON WAS IN THE RELATIONSHIP!!! and it’s just silly and fun and cute 

[sapphos-darlings]

I’d really like some advice or even just shared experiences on what it’s like to be a dysphoric lesbian. I thought that a person needed to be trans to be dysphoric, but after a lot of thinking, I’m pretty certain I’m not trans. But the dysphoria throws me off. I didn’t think this was possible!! Dressing in a masculine way helps a lot, but that then leads to people asking me if I’m actually a woman 😖😖😖

Hey, Sade here, I’m the resident trans/dysphoric mod. I’m bisexual, but hopefully that doesn’t muddy the answer itself too much. Mod Lavender is more than welcome to chime in too, nudge nudge.

Anyways; this may be offensive to a lot of people, but dysphoria doesn’t equal being trans. You can be dysphoric and choose to never transition, and therefore you’re not trans per se. You’re just dysphoric. Transition is a means to cope with dysphoria, a means to easen it, but a lot of people never completely get rid of it. For me, I’m both trans and dysphoric - because I transitioned, socially and medically, but I was dysphoric before I identified as trans, before I knew what being trans was, before I had words for it, and well before I made any decisions to pursue transition of any kind. You know? I think it’s a sentimental difference but for me there is one. Just the way people can say you can be trans without dysphoria, then the alternative must also be true.

There are plenty of people who choose to live as their birth sex and never transition even though they have dysphoria. It’s possible to find other ways to live with that dysphoria, especially because there’s no surefire way to ever be rid of it either way. It’s not a nice thing, nobody’s saying it is, but what works for you personally doesn’t have to be a ready made solution. In fact, there are detransitioners who are very much dysphoric, but found out that transition was not the right way for them to live with it.

You have to make your own way through it, basically. Trial and error. Our society is really tough on gnc people, and right now it’s easier to assume someone’s trans than it was before because there’s awareness on trans people and so many of us have come out recently so it’s like - people make the connection between a gnc appearance and behaviour and being trans, and they assume that must be the case. There’s so much less representation for other kinds of dysphoric or even just generally gnc people out there, but a lot of talk and focus on trans issues, so it follows naturally.

Don’t let that fool you. You decide who you are and you are the ONLY person who knows what you want and what works for you and what doesn’t. If for you what you want, and how you want to live and what you want from your future, doesn’t involve transitioning socially or medically, you are perfectly fine as you are. Don’t let anyone push you into making decisions that you don’t want for yourself, and don’t let anybody tell you who and what you are. These things are for you only, and there are as many ways to live as there are people on this earth.

Don’t hesitate to make things easier for yourself though - wear the kinds of clothes that you want, be the person that you are without trying to fit inside a given box or please anybody. You are not wrong for being the way you are and feeling the way you feel and doing the best that you can with the knowledge you have of yourself to make it easier on yourself. Being a lesbian is ok. Being gnc is amazing. Society might be confused by you, but that’s just because they don’t know any better. Every time you go out and someone asks you if you’re really a woman, and you answer them, you’re educating a part of that ignorant society. Your presence and choices matter. It can be tiring, but your experience is just as real as someone else’s.

Transitioning is not the only solution to dysphoria. I’m saying this as a person who transitioned and found it to be the right thing for me to do. I’m also detransitioned in every sense of the word except for the words I use for myself, because I wanted to preserve my health and because my dysphoria is now manageable without HRT and passing. There are so many ways to live as your authentic, true self, and nobody’s path is the same as another’s. You have to figure out what’s right for you specifically. One size does NOT fit all.

[werevulvi]

This is a very long, ranty post that's only lightly edited. It's about me deciding to basically leave radfem, so I wanted to be thorough about explaining how and why. And this is mainly because my blog ended up existing in a radblr bubble, deemed as hostile by other ideologies/groups of people, and I need to break out of that bubble, because I feel trapped in it. I'm not sure how, as I may have to start over with a new blog entirely, but I'd hope to avoid that if at all possible (my blog is my baby.) So I'm thinking that making this kinda post is a good start in trying to change how my blog vibes and what kinda blogs I can interact with in a non-debate kinda sense. Basically, damage control.

A while ago, I made some post about how I wanted to move away from the worst rudefem stuff of radfem, for the sake of my mental health. Well, I've now hit a point of wanting to take further steps away from radfem, pretty much altogether. The main reason for this is that there's still too much focus on ragging on trans women, and trans people in general. It's suffocating me, because I'm not all that detrans and I'm not anti-male. I miss connecting with other trans people, and I miss being part of that community. Truth is I've become really fucking hateful towards my own kind and I've been in denial of it. This has been carving a hole in my heart that my radfem views have carved even deeper, and it has led me to become a quite lost soul.

Do I hate trans women? No, but I clearly act as if I do, and I don't feel comfortable with my own actions and thoughts towards/about them anymore. Are some of them cumbrains fetishising my oppression (misogyny) and/or predators? Yes, undoubtedly. But I am not a collectivist and I can't view all trans women like that. Nor does it sit right with me to treat them all as potential predators. I care about trans women in general, ultimately because I am trans too and their struggles reflect my own. I cannot shit on them without shitting on myself. But it's not just about me. I feel empathy for them, and I want to extend kindness and care towards them. I cannot with any goodness in my heart view them as men. Males, yes, but not men. More on that diffentiation later in this post.

I do not want to politisise their gender identities as women, because I don't want my own gender politisised, regardless if that is man, woman, or otherwise. (More on that later too.) I don't want to trap them in the category of "man" because I do not want to be trapped in the category of "woman" as if our transitions and gender incongruence meant nothing at all. Do our transitions change bio sex? No, and I'm not arguing that. I'm saying transition changes SOMETHING and that that something matters. And in a lot of contexts, it even matters more than bio sex.

But isn't that just an emotional argument, like boohoo, my/their feefees? YES, it's an emotional argument. But you know what: I believe that feelings matter, about as equally much as facts and logic matters. An argument being emotional does not make it necessarily useless or invalid. Grave robbery and necrophilia is illegal due to purely emotional arguments. Perhaps think about if that's useless.

I care about trans women's feelings and comfort, not just their rights, and I care about men's feelings and comfort too, because I do not think individual males' oppression being patriarchy's fault even remotely means that "men cause their own problems" because one male suffering at the hands of other men (patriarchy) is NOT his own fault. And him reaching out to women for help when other men fail him AGAIN shouldn't be hard to understand. Of course it's optional to help him or not then, but I feel like it is truly heartless not to, unless he is some kinda raging misogynist. I see that kinda vibe a lot in radfem circles and it honestly churns my stomach. That kinda man-hating is to me absolutely repugnant. You do you, but I will not support it.

Why do I care about males? Because they're human. They're the same species as me, and I care about them as one human to another. Because I don't believe there's any difference between males and females beyond the physical biology stuff. Socialisation varies from person to person. I've always been a person of principles, so I can't sit around and say I only care about fellow females and all females, because no one choses to be born female - and then in the same breath hate males for essentially having been born male, which they also did not choose. If I had been born male, I'd probably hate radfem, and that says something. It's very fucking lopsided, and barely even to my favour.

And I've been asking myself that a lot lately: Is radfem even to my (a bio female's) favour - or is it only the the favour of some kinda statistic average of a general female who doesn't even exist? I dunno, but it's an important question to ask.

This is getting ranty already, but hey I'm trying.

Trans women and males aside, radfem often has a kinda negative view of trans men (and any variety of dysphoric females) that I've always felt iffy about, but first thought I had been mistaken about. It seemed for a long while that radfem is totally supportive of transmascs/dysphoric females, but..... upon closer look, it appears a little bit rotten, sorry to say. Because lately I've come to realise maybe I was kinda right from the start that radfem really is not as supportive of transmascs/dysphoric females as it claims to be. This is probably not intentionally unsupportive, I'm aware, but some of the things that really stand out to me like sore thumbs:

1.) The idea that if gender abolishion happened, no one would be dysphoric or wish to transition medically, is frankly incredibly unfounded. Do you have ANY evidence for that dysphoria is ENTIRELY social, because I've yet to see any reliable study on this. As far as I'm concerned this is just a theory based on essentially the exclusion method that all the biology-based theories are incomplete. So this strong assertion that a genderless society would have no trans people (with sex dysphoria only) gives me this unsettling vibe that radfem is not at all supportive of transition, but would prooobably prefer it if no one was trans - even in a world where gender is abolished and transitioned females are masculine women who just like looking like males, and transitioned males are feminine men who just like looking like females, and I dunno dysphoric nonbinary people would just be men and women who transition in a variety of atypical ways.

Which was always what I envisioned. That no one would be FORCED to be feminine or masculine or anything, because of their sex - NOT that trans people would be forced or expected to accept their physical sex characteristics. Because I don't know about you, but I've personally never based my sex dysphoria on that it's too hard to live as a masculine woman, and I've met tons of other trans people who feel the same way about that. It's a myth about dysphoric trans people, and I think perpetuating it does more harm than good.

Feminism, gender abolishion, etc, probably can't cure anyone's sex dysphoria. And even just striving towards that is a little iffy. How about leave it up to the dysphorics if we wanna be cured? Because I bet most radfems would not wanna enforce a cure for autism if that became a thing, or strive towards curing the world of autism. So why do it with sex/gender dysphoria? Point is I'm just noticing these uncomfortable, kinda hidden anti-trans sentiments behind the gender abolishion idea. I'm FOR gender abolishion, but only if transition would still be available in such a future. But I'm sensing that's not what radfem is actually about, and I've been properly fucking fooled. If so... fuck you for that.

2.) Some of you operate on the false assumption that trans people never pass as the opposite sex. This level of intellectual dishonesty is skewing radfem certain arguments really badly, and makes them appear poorly thought-out at best, and impossible to implement in real life at worst.

3.) The idea that sex segregated spaces can be upheld in a world where some people pass as the opposite sex, is frankly ludicrous to me, if you think of how it would actually pan out in practice. If women's spaces became only ever available for bio women, and males spaces only available for bio men, I'd be banned from both, due to my own transition. (And why the flying fuck would I promote that? I'm not insane.) Because there is no way I can prove that my sex is female, most people do not even believe that my sex is female when I tell them, and I already get tossed out from women's spaces due to that I just look like a man.

People's failure to believe I'm THAT passable irl, is about as frustrating as people's failure to believe I'm actually female, and both those people's arguments on where I "should" go is entirely useless garbage. This doesn't only affect me, but a lot of trans people out there in the world. And then I'm probably more accommodating to this kinda drama, than what most trans people would even be willing to pretend to put up with. I am your faithful lapdog, yet I still get my teeth kicked in for being annoying. To which I have to ask myself: is this kinda martyrdom really worth it? Other trans people often see me as self-hating for being a radfem, and I'm sadly starting to see why.

And to then claim I could just use gender neutral spaces is frankly robbing me of MY female rights. To treat me as a threat to other women is very uncalled for, and yes... misogynistic. And to assume that male-passing females would be welcome in women's spaces in such a world is frankly laughable. Masculine women who have not even touched a vial of testosterone in their lives already have trouble being allowed in women only spaces that have harder rules on "no trans women allowed." This is anti-trans in a way which I cannot support.

If I am to be barred from women's spaces (which I am) because I look like a man, then I WILL use men's spaces. Because I refuse to be dehumanised and stuffed into a "trans toilet/locker room" for other people's convenience. The majority's comfort does NOT get to override my personal comfort. Especially considering men (in general) are not actually uncomfortable with my presense in their spaces, because I look like I belong there. So there is not even any damn argument to be made against me using male only space. This is not because of me wanting some kinda validation for how much of a "man" I "identify" as or whatever. This is about me not wanting to be dehumanised for my medical condition or for how I choose to treat it. Because yes, barring me from both men's and women's spaces does feel a lot like considering me sub-human, because my physical body is frightening, unsettling, gross, or otherwise inconvenient for "normal" men and women to be subjected to. Fuck that noise. I am just as much human and I deserve the same level of basic respect, and that should not be asking for too much. I will not sink below that bar. That's like telling a disabled person that they "have to" use the disabled space because their amputation (or whatever is their ailment) freaks people out, even if they're capable of using the regular men's/women's space despite their condition. So, I'd say barring trans people from both men's and women's spaces is actually rather ableist.

So how do I think that issue should be solved then? Honestly I do not have a solution. So I'd say skip the sex segregation of stuff like bathrooms and locker rooms completely (but keep it for stuff like sports and rape relief shelters) and let trans people themselves figure out which space suits them best, and only intervene in cases when they make a really poor judgement. The only other option would be allowing ALL females in women's spaces (yes, including fully passing trans men) and vice versa all males into men's spaces, but I'm extremely worried about how exactly passing trans people would be expected to go about proving they're going to the right spaces. So I'd say don't do shit until we have found a better (actually better) solution.

Because I can't sit here and say that trans women should never use the women's locker rooms, while I go showering butt naked in the men's locker room. That would be a very hypocritical double standard. Yes, I think passable and/or post-op trans women can and should be allowed to use women only spaces. Based on that I think passable and/or post-op trans men can and should be allowed to use men only spaces, but I do not think that is a perfect or ideal solution.

3.) There's just in general a lot of negativity towards medical transition and how trans people look; our desires, hopes, goals and our dysphoria. This feeds my self-hatred like fuck. Yeah I'd consider myself a rather strong person in general, but I'm not made of concrete, and I think radfem and gender critical thought has broken me down a lot, which took me a while to notice. I don't even know if the real reason I'm calling myself a woman nowadays is because my dream of being a man in ANY sorta sense (be it fantasy or reality) has become completely crushed. Yet I'm unable to truly be okay with being a woman.

Yes, I truly love my pussy, I'm fine with my reproductive ability (producing ova, chance at pregnancy) and in general I like that I started off on a female ground. I love that I have small hands and feet, and a relatively small frame. I really like my height, that I'm not very tall, but do tower most other females. So there's a lot I like about being bio female, and it's mostly things I can't change about my physique anyway. As for my curves, I seem to sometimes like it and sometimes not. I'm also okay with having cellulites and stretch marks. But what I'm NOT fine with about being female is being driven by estrogen, my body's natural gravitation and persistense towards re-feminising itself as soon as I went off of testosterone, having breasts, having less muscle mass than males, having a higher voice, having little to no body/facial hair, etc. I am not fine with being recognised as a woman, or having most female secondary sex characteristics, or lacking male secondary sex characteristics.

This does make me feel like although I'm actually fine with simply being bio female, I'm only fine with it on the condition that I get to look/sound/appear as close to male as medically possible. And does that make me a man in the bio male sorta sense? No, obviously not, but I'm starting to ask myself: Why the FUCK does it matter so goddamn much?! I am sick and tired of being a political pawn no matter where I go. I just wanna live my life.

And radfem discourse (as well as TRA discourse) is so goddamn far from real life it's honestly pathetic and destructive. Most people really don't give a fuck if I'm male or female, or if I have a dick or pussy. It's only really relevant for my doctors and my sex partners. But outside of those very specific contexts, I do like being open about my bio sex, because it just makes it easier to be open about my life, and I feel like that's a good reason to be open about it. However, being open about it solely because some people on the internet think people's bio sex is absolutely crucial info (outside of the context of sex/dating and docs) does not feel good.

I shouldn't feel pressured to be so open about myself, just to not feel guilty for how I choose to treat my dysphoria. I should not have to feel this guilty.

I think my opinions on gender are actually unhealthy for me. I understand more and more that people's opinions on gender are largely just based on their own personal experiences with whatever trans people they've stumbled across. There is no objective facts on what gender is and what it is not. If it's an internal identity or just social roles and clothing. If it's somewhat biological or entirely socially constructed. I feel like I've been arguing bullshit semantics that don't even hold water. I'm not saying that bio sex is changable or a spectrum or completely unimportant, or anything like that. When I say gender I don't mean biological sex.

I'm not saying that I'm not biogically female. I'm saying that just because I'm a female, doesn't mean I cannot also be a man - under, not another, but just slightly looser definition of man which is still connected to physical maleness - in contexts where it simply does not, and should not, matter if I do not fit someone else's definition of what a man or woman is. Because maybe semantics are killing discourse more than it's killing real life issues like human rights. Just saying.

But I dunno what I want with my gender or my label. But I think my realisation that I need to scrap my views and values in regards to gender altogether, and rebuild them from scratch... might actually quite likely change my sense of my gendered self (again.) Because you know what? My gender identity seems very highly influenced by my opinions of gender as a whole, and not just by my dysphoria. If I go by just my dysphoria, I think I would consider myself a trans man, which is why I guess I never truly stopped considering that... but my opinions on gender as a whole (women's rights, female liberation, gender abolishion, trans stuff, bio sex, etc) intervene and conflict with that, and makes me wanna be both a woman and a trans man at the same time, which I can't. So I end up being pulled in two opposing directions.

It's just that up until recently my opinions on gender used to matter more to me than tending to my dysphoria. And now I've come to a point where I don't think I wanna have that sorta prioritisation anymore, because it's having real bad effect on my mental health.

And I need to get very real with myself and ask myself if this really is the life I want. Upon knowing that I'm not actually comfortable with my own opinions, and their affects on my mental health is not actually worth advocating for female liberation, which I already know by now. Then my next step is to take a step back and try to consume less media from any and all sides of the discourse, and listen to my intuition again. Hear myself out. This might take a while, and in the meantime I'm just gonna have to say that my stance on feminism, trans stuff, women's rights, etc, is "under construction."

And as for my goddamn gender label... I'm half okay with pretty much anything right now. Transmasc, woman, ftm, trans man, dysphoric female, masculine/gnc/male-passing woman, etc, is all fine. It's not really about how other people label me anyway. How I label myself is the only thing that truly matters to me in that regard. That it's with self-respect, love and care... and not for political reasons.

I think that's just the thing. That I need to stop doing shit I'm not comfortable with just for political reasons.

With that said, I also wanna briefly touch upon other aspects of radfem that I find myself either no longer agreeing with, or just no longer caring about.

The sex work industry: I know it's bad. But I no longer care and I still might wanna become a sex worker one day. At least I wanna try it. Because no I don't want for sex to be personal, private or hidden. I feel like that's just not how I wanna express my sexuality. And sex is the ONLY of my passions I can in any way imagine turning into a job. Because it's the only one of my passions I never get tired of, and also never truly get obsessed with either. Sorry if the sex industry hurt you personally, but I kinda fail to see how that's my problem, or my responsibility, or how it would seal my fate. I don't wanna live my life after other people's problems, and I cannot learn from other people's mistakes (for those who chose it but still got burned.)

Watching porn, engaging in bdsm, etc: After having tried for a couple of years to heal my broken sexuality and to enjoy vanilla sex, I'm frankly giving up. Some say I'd have to go celibate and work really hard on my trauma for it to have effect, which... honestly I'd rather eat a bullet than do that. I saw a sexologist once last summer and oooooh BOY did that go badly! She basically told me I'm just kinky and need to work on accepting myself. That hurt a lot, and made me give up extra hard on psychiatry again (like it was the last drop again) but it made me realise that there just isn't any help for me out there. And that I'm also not willing to do anything drastic to change it on my own.

That what I want is to have a sex life that I enjoy. So... I'll go back to what simply works for me: bdsm sex. That's not entirely without some reluctance and hesitation, and I do plan on going about it in safer ways than I previously did. Like for example only doing it with people I trust and know well, use safety words, etc, as a bare minimum. I'm learning everything I can about safer bdsm practices, well before actually diving into it. But thing is that I like such extreme "kinks" that it's never gonna be entirely safe, and.... I guess I can't be fucked to care anymore, and I'm tired of even just hearing about the preachings of how bad hardcore bdsm is. Like yeah, I know it's bad, now shut up now and leave me the fuck alone to live/ruin my own damn life.

And as for porn: I never quite quit it, just reduced it by a lot. Again, not denying the harms about it, just not caring enough to change my habits.

Conclusions and wrapping it up: Basically, I've always been a Trauma Queen and I just wanna be myself again. I don't think my former views (more egalitarian/equality based rather than female liberation, and neither individualist nor collectivist) were bad or wrong, but rather that how I implemented them into my life and disregarded danger which was bad. Bio sex matters, but I think gender matters too, and the world is what it is. I have to accept that if I'm gonna have the slightest chance of living a happy life. I can't force myself to live according to feminist ideals for the sake of women in general, when those ideals smother my flame.

I cannot claim that either of the things radfem stand against are all inherently bad. I cannot claim that transitioning shouldn't be a thing, even in a perfect world, because I wanna bring my testosterone with me everywhere I go. I cannot claim that there's any "one road fits all" to happiness for all people, or all women. I cannot be a hypocrite who only values female lives when male lives are at core equally valuable. That has nothing to do with pandering to men. All it means is that I want a world where men and women can live in peace together, and if that's not possible, then at least I wanna live my own life in peace with myself, making whichever decisions I see fit for myself, and surround myself with both men and women who are respectful and decent people. I do not want to try to force my life to fit an ultimately flawed ideology. And all ideologies are flawed.

I'm flawed. We all are, and that is okay. Yes, I wanna strive towards happiness and some health and safety, but not ultimate health or 100% secure safety. Health and safety should not come at the expense of fun and happiness, if at all possible. Because I still need some amount of danger to find enjoyment in things, and I think having fun and getting bitter lessons is more important, than being healthy and safe. I've always thought that. It might just even be a core value of mine, and it does conflict with radfem values. What matters to me in life is in conflict with radfem values. I need to learn moderation and to balance fun with health, happiness with safety, and transitioning with reality. But what I do not need is to wingclip myself because of what matters to other people.

Radfem has taught me a lot of good stuff, it has made me aware of a lot of shit I didn't wanna know, but now it's time to move on and leave it behind me.

Please note that I do not mean to demonise radfem as inherently bad, fearmongering, transphobic, etc. It still has a lot of good points that I agree with. And I may still likely reblog and interact with radfem posts that I do feel are good and/or interesting. I just don't wanna lock myself to radfem as an ideology anymore. I do not think radfem is the ultimate truth, and I do not think there even is ANY ultimate truth to such things as gender.

I'm saying that I declare myself no longer a radical feminist because I am no longer dedicated to the cause as a whole. Not that it's suddenly all bad.

I wanna spread my wings and just be my problematic, true self... this sex-crazed, kinky tranny who deep down loves being a transitioned female, but also don't want for any female to suffer oppression simply because of how they were born, but also sees trans women as "women enough", values male lives and their opinions, etc! Whatever else I might think and feel which I haven't figured out yet. Instead of a forcing myself to become a perfect pawn for completely sex-based feminism.

I may adopt some of my old TRA views back, as well as some of my old libfem views. I will not limit myself to only one school of thought, ANY one school of thought. Please remember that if you're thinking I'm gonna go back to be a TRA libfem entirely, because that is NOT the case. What I'm breaking out of is the tribalism and extremism of radfem: the radical part of feminism. Because ultimately, that radical part of feminism, what I've been describing (perhaps poorly) throughout this post, is what's become suffocating for me.

I need to find myself again, beyond EVERY ideology that's telling me how I should think, feel and live my life. I've had enough of that shit. I need to think and feel freely, and live my life for myself.

Thank you all for your patience with me.

[steve0discusses]

Yugioh S4 Ep 15: Yami Joins the Bay Area Tribe By Throwing a Riot About Sports on Caltrain

So as you’ve probably guessed because of my lack of posts--I got kinda busy with life stuff and just got hit with this really nasty flu at the same time. Yes, I am in a Coronavirus-affected area but no, I don’t have it and I am not dying (although I did do the right thing and quarantined myself anyway, much like a whole lot of the Bay who are just...working from home. Traffic’s been great.) It’s just that every January/February I tend to fall apart and get the flu so bad I lose my voice for 5 days. This year was 6 days. I just catch the flu a lot, but at least I get my shots so it’s not as bad as it would have been.

So, I took a hell ton of Nyquil and Dayquil and while I’m...functional...I don’t know if any of this make sense. So forgive my rambling. I usually ramble, today I’ll be like...hella rambling. About TRAINS.

So anyway, Lets talk about Yugioh.

Lets board a Californian train!

Yugioh has decided that out of every vehicle they’ve devoted episodes to--they haven’t done trains yet, so it’s train time. Train time...in America...which is not a great place for trains. Like I never really think about it but...people take the freakin Greyhound over trains. Which is wild, guys, the Greyhound is...it’s a state of mind. We ignore trains so much.

It’s just really funny that they left Japan to go to America to ride a train when it’s like...the show takes place...in Japan. The land of wonderful trains. But wtv, they wanted ye Old Western experience.

Anyway, Rebecca really wanted to go on the train with them, but everyone pretty much decided that children were no longer safe on this trip with Yugi and co. The fact that Yugi and co are also children is something I guess we decided to push under the rug. I mean Duke Devlin has a freakin job and a work Visa at 17 so...that’s adult enough, right?

(*in a very Roaring Camp Railroad Commercial voice, and over the dulcet sounds of a banjo* More TRAINS under the cut!)

And then Arthur decided to just really grill it into Yami for some reason.

I think it was mostly to act as a recap but damn, Arthur Hawkins just really seems to hate Yami for killing Yugi. Anyway, lets get a good look at our train.

Surprisingly for this show, they decided not to put us on the Roaring Camp Railroad through the Santa Cruz Mountains, instead, they put us on an actual legit commuter train, and it blew my mind because...it’s the CALTRAIN.

That’s my train! What’s my Caltrain doing in Yugioh!?!?

They even got the paint job right! This is absolutely the Caltrain!

We never update this train. So yes, it still looks like this over 10 years later. It’s very underfunded.

+++THIS IS TRAIN FACTS FEEL FREE TO SKIP TRAIN FACTS+++++

So the Caltrain was originally privately owned tracks--which is how they are really nicely laid out--a private company bought everything/pushed out the old owners before the place got developed. When trains went under, the tracks were purchased by the State and then given to Amtrack to manage. So, Caltrain is strictly property of the State Government but still run by the Federal Government at the same time. Don’t ask me how it works, I don’t know, I just pay my taxes and it goes vroom.

We’ve wanted to extend the Caltrain down to Southern California for a very long time, but because of corruption and a lot of people in politics refusing to expand the Bay out of the fear of maybe dropping our housing prices to reasonable limits, and the fear of making it way too feasible to get more children to Disneyland, the track has stayed roughly the same length for over 40 years.

Overall, It’s less drive time than this duel that takes up this next arc, I’m pretty sure. I’m gonna guess that the duel will be 3 episodes long because c’mon. This is Yugioh. It’s always 3 episodes long, like a Nintendo boss.

Anyway, all these train facts are things that are probably so weird and foreign to places that have ample trains--but in America, we just don’t have a strong train lobby compared to our auto lobby. So, I’m sure that people in Japan making this series thought “Oh they’re on a train--it can just go forever because why wouldn’t it be long? Aren’t all American trains connected?” but uh...it’s a short train. Like we’re talking like a few hours max, and that’s only if they’re starting from Gilroy.

I will say that BART is longer and has multiple tracks, so you would think they’d just take BART instead. But, it goes under the ocean for part of it, and we’ll get to why that would have been a very big problem in this episode later. Also, BART is very gross and no one wants to animate that outside of a horror movie.

But at least they didn’t go way out of left field and take the SF trolley. The Caltrain does actually go pretty fast. It...kind of makes sense. They did actual research into a real thing that we do have.

++++END RANT ABOUT THIS TRAIN AND HOW NONE OF THIS EPISODE MAKES SENSE BUT IT’S YUGIOH SO I WILL IGNORE THAT++++

And youknow...there’s something just so adorable about seeing desert mesas reflected in the window of the Caltrain. It’s just delightful. Because, in reality the entire stretch of the Caltrain is very densely suburban/urban, and the only place where it isn’t surrounded by city is when it’s flanked by the sea.

But yeah, just put mesas on it!

*freakin curtains*

Joey and Tristan hit the “dining car,” which I don’t think is a thing in any form of commuter train. These trains are for trips the length of about 1 extensive Puzzles and Dragons session on your phone, give or take.

(And man, speaking of, the Yugioh PAD collab was so good, guys. Ah man. Been wrecking like every dungeon in multiplayer ever since Bro and I both got a Yugi to put as our leader. He’s basically one of the best leaders in the game right now and I feel like people at PAD were huge Yugioh fans because they were like “what if we made...basically every Yugioh pull into a freakin beast that broke every dungeon in the game?”)

I can’t believe Joey Wheeler went thousands of miles from his homeland and was like “I better drink an American soda” and chose Orange. I mean he might be drinking an Arizona Tea, but I’m pretty sure he thought “ah, Kenan and Kel, right?” and just nabbed the nastiest soda that exists outside of grape.

I feel like I can still taste the orange soda I drank over 20 years ago. It is terrible. It is SO orange. Gross. But at the same time...good? I really don't know with Orange Soda. It’s probably gross.

Meanwhile, Tea decides it’s an appropriate time for Yami to work on his social skills. Now. When he’s visibly grieving after being berated by his Basically-Step-Grandfather and Rebecca.

And then we find out something I’ve never realized before, and it’s that Tea is really bad at social cues. Like maybe even worse than Yami. Like, I dunno how Pharaoh could look more like an angry cat/hedgehog but Tea was not picking up on it.

And y’all I’m not making that up, these are the topics Tea actually came up with for the guy who just saw his best friend die/was very implicit in said murder. Beaches and Bathing Suits.

She got over Yugi being dead like immediately.

Of course, this episode is kind of weird because, much like this show has done so many times already, these guys are still struggling to truly understand that Yugi is two people in one body. Tea sort of comes to this realization as if she...forgot that she has stepped inside his actual head and seen this for herself.

Or maybe it’s denial, but I’m thinking maybe the show did this for the new people coming to the show, to explain a rather complicated thing that took 3 seasons to cement in our minds. But still, it makes Tea seem very forgetful over a guy she should sort of be dating I guess.

Anyway it’s their first real fight. Kind of. I mean it’s hard to tell if anyone on this show is dating, and it’s equally hard to tell if they are fighting, too.

Well, first real fight if you don’t count Zero when Yugi tried to make out with Miho over a card duel, but I think we’re all doing our best to forget that ever happened. Yugi especially.

Or I guess that time she strangled him nearly to death in the nurse’s office when Shadi took over his body. That counts as a fight, right?

Ah. Now we’re on Caltrain.

Don’t take it the wrong way, Caltrain is actually our higher end safe train, compared to our other transit, BART, which will always sit you next to a weirdo, guaranteed. Caltrain--you can take a good nap on Caltrain. BART...you will never feel comfortable enough to take a nap on BART (also because there’s not enough seating room anymore)

But a lot of people who take the train are just freakin WEIRD. I used to take the Caltrain with my older brother (different bro than the bro of this blog, this is my chaotic neutral bro) because we both worked near the same place in downtown SF, and he would always take with him--I kid you not--a 2 liter bottle of Mountain Lightning for a snack.

For those not in the States, Mountain Lightning is the offbrand Walmart version of Mountain Dew. Yes. I know what I said. It seems dumbfounding as Mountain Dew is already an off brand of Sprite--the true lemon/lemon lime--but indeed, like Inception, you can always go deeper, and if there is a soda so bewildering and random, my older brother will be ON IT.

Anyways, my older bro is a train weirdo, so not only does he prefer Mountain Lightning to Mountain Dew, he would take out a 2 liter from his backpack, tilt back his head, and just chug the whole thing straight from the huge ass bottle in front of God and everyone on that train.

He’d polish it off completely on the ride there and the ride back, because my older brother has this weird medical problem where he can’t really feel pain and he has an insane metabolism and never gained weight until he was like 32, so he can just...chug as much soda as he freakin wants. So, at some point of the trip he would have to use the very tiny bathroom, and it would be very urgent, and he’d just scramble over me to get to the aisle and then kind of skip and hop all the way there on the rush hour train that was completely full of people.

Like, most people don’t even know that Caltrain has a bathroom--well now you know, and for several years there, it was just always taken by my brother violently pissing. That was us (well...him). My apologies.

In case your curious, now my bro has hardcore acid reflux, and all he needs to do is stop drinking so much damn soda, but it’s been very hard for him, so he has cut back to “diet soda”. This is still a lot of soda and it still causes acid reflux. His doctor is working on him.

And yes, Diet Mountain Lightning exists. That’s just so many steps removed from Sprite at this point.

Anyways, enough waxing long about train memories, lets get back to the show, because it’s not this season of Yugioh until there’s a problem with the commute.

Unrelated to Pharaoh punching the walls, everyone has “disappeared.”

My bro looked up the Wiki that says there's “no explanation for the missing train passengers” but we all know what that really means on this show, right?

So, how many people fit on Caltrain?

There’s just NO WAY they’re alive anymore, right? Like Yugioh went and killed 756 Bay Area passengers because...it’s a filler season!

I really feel like there’s just no way Seto or Bakura will ever catch up to Darts’ death count at this rate.

After this, we have ourselves this fun train-jumping trope.

Pretty sure it was the superhuman opposing force of Tea jumping from the back train to the front of the train that forced the back to lose all of it’s 100+ mph momentum and immediately come to a full and complete stop.

Not sure how Darts did this thing with the train separating. But he did. Or maybe it was Rex and Weevil? Either way, he somehow managed to do this well enough to strand Joey and Tristan on the other side of the line that now has no engine.

(course I say this like in 1400 AD the Bay wasn’t full of the Ohlone. this place was basically always developed because...the weather’s hella good when it’s not on fire.)

Now if you go East--southern Utah looks like this, and parts of me wonder if maybe the artists thought they were taking the train all the way to Florida. Did the English dub add “we’re taking the train to the airport” because they knew there was no one in their right mind in America who would take a California-Florida train?

I have no other explanation for why the Bay Area looks like this, than to assume that this is an alternate California where there never was a Loma Prieta Earthquake and also one where Seto and Pegasus bought out and destroyed both Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Which makes Seto and Pegasus sound like just real true heroes, never paving any sort of way for Mark Zuckerberg to happen and unintentionally (or intentionally who knows) screw up our elections.

Or maybe that was entirely Darts? Maybe it was Darts who’s been eating up the Bay, harvesting nerd souls for the leviathan and knowing that no one will miss these Twitter developers if Twitter never happens in the first place. Especially if he’s just ghosting entire Caltrains willy nilly.

But anyway, fun fact about the Caltrain that the creators of this show didn’t know--the train is a push-pull train, so...It has an engine on both sides of the train. Joey and Tristan...still have an engine. It would have never stopped, even with Tea’s incredible backward momentum.

This is normal train stuff and is something you should always assume about a commuter train that cannot afford the time to reattach the locomotive in order to turn around, but we forget about this in TV shows basically all the time.

However, there are fantasy rules that we give to TV that we sort of don’t extend to other places. We suspend our disbelief for things like this train stopping in a track that would, realistically, have another train passing by in 10 minutes anyway. Things like rogue waves that topple over ocean liners. Or CEOs in Silicon Valley who have ass-length blue hair that is tied with one single hair precarious band.

The point at which we no longer can suspend our disbelief when it comes to TV is SO interesting to me. Because I’m fully willing to let go of the fact that Caltrain is A Push-Pull train because it’s still a fun trope although this can never really happen to you on...almost any train at all anymore. But if this were a movie? People would be losing their freakin MINDS. Look what they did after Star Wars. They lost their entire minds over force-field science that doesn’t even exist.

Like, maybe the people who made this episode really do know that San Jose is the 3rd largest city in California, and that this is a push-pull train, and that there are no mesas anywhere near the ocean of San Fransisco. Maybe they did know that--but they decided to suspend our disbelief by pushing this Wild Wild West fantasy aesthetic SO HARD so it makes it believable although this is just...so wrong. Mostly because...it’s fun TV. Not because it makes any sense, but because I would like to have fun instead of thinking.

Which is also how most romance novels work ps. But Yugioh, although *almost* understanding the key ingredient to how romance actually works, I will assume never figures that out.

I hope.

Also, Rex is here.

Bro would like to bring up that Red Eyes is not a rare card in the real world. So Rex is going out of his way to venge a card that costs...$4.50 at Target. That’s less than a meal at McDonalds. This card may have been in a Happy Meal at McDonalds.

*pictured here, the actual canyons of San Jose*

So something that’s interesting between Yami and Joey is that Yami gives in basically immediately and decides to duel Weevil, who would be very easy to just gently push off of this train. Joey on the other hand, looks down at both of his punching fists and is like “why would I bother?”

Not that it mattered, it’s just interesting that even Joey has more restraint than Yami, who has 0 restraint, apparently, when it comes to dueling cards.

Joey has more restraint that Yami, and Joey is the kid who has tried to punch out Seto Kaiba in nearly every conversation he has ever had with Seto Kaiba over the last 4 seasons.

Also, Tea is just standing on top of this train like it’s a completely normal day outside. Girl has no fear.

Wouldn’t these people be covered in bug guts? Like how are they not getting assaulted by so many flies and birds?

But because she has no decent cards the Oricalchos just kicks her out? I dunno. There’s a lot of weird physics in the next scene.

And she just grabs onto a moving train with her bare hands. I feel like Tea is just so woefully overpowered in this group but for the wrong game. I say this a lot. She’s like their One Punch Man but will never, ever know.

So anyway, that was a long time between updates and now I’m out of sync and behind on everything so...hell knows when the next update will be. Depends on the length of episode I guess? Bro really wants to get to what comes next soon though. He’ll pester me until I do it.

Now I can’t mention Mountain Lightning without sharing with you what you do with 2-4 liters of Mountain Lightning after your brother leaves and then just...doesn’t have enough room for all of his Mountain Lightning AND his baby in his car, so he just leaves it in your house.

It’s called Mountain Dew Cake <-(that is a link) and it’s actually pretty damn good.

I made this once and fed it to a British person and they were like “this is so decadent--what’s in this?” and I uh didn’t know how to respond to that other than “it’s really just Mountain Dew, I’m so sorry” and that was a lie, because it was full of Mountain Lightning.

Anyway, if you just got here, this is a link to read these recaps in order.

[genderhawk]

I got mad on FB and posted a rant as a caption on a shared image.  The rant is SUUUUUUPER long and incohea-rant but it felt good to write...

I added the cut at about the same place fb puts the readmore

The image:  

The rant:

I only have to be brave in order to reveal a SLIVER of my true self (if you think I'm not hiding autistic traits by forcing myself to act painfully against my natural relational, communicative, and self-expressive instincts literally any time anyone could potentially see?  you are wrong) because people who AREN'T trans and/or disabled and/or otherwise marginalized in our culture have made it LITERALLY UNSAFE not to. CW: bigoted violence against people of all ages, eugenics, and other bigotry both in the abstract and as it applies to me.  Also, I'll be deleting comments that aren't constructive and respectful because this is MY facebook and, while I don't mind discourse, I don't want to host any content that doesn't serve me.  Argue wherever else you want.  Freedom of speech protects you from the government, not the Alexx. (that right ALSO doesn't cover incitments to violence, like arguments in support of eugenics...............  bc killing someone for immutable traits of their very being?  violent.  Even if it's just in reproductive limitations or the legal need to literally sterilize yourself in order to transition legally...  👀) as well as disordered eating and related weight loss

Anyways...  I've been thinking about living in a world that is hostile to almost every part of me, for one or more reasons.  If I go into spaces for queer and trans people who share my interests?  It's full of white people who can't be rascist bc they "have a black friend" but I'm the black person they've "befriended" and we are NOT friends and they ARE racist. Black spaces?  Most of them transphobic, if not homophobic as well...  Again, usiually not at the surface but even at the best events the bulk are still rife with STRUCTURAL anti-queer microagressions... And so few spaces for queer people, POC, nerds, activsits even.....  MAYBE 1/10 puts accessibility info on the event listing...    I know that not every event can meet every need, but shouldn't they at least be meeting the need of letting me know BEFORE I spend 3 hours getting to a class on interserctional direct action only for me to be unable to attend without SOMEHOW asking the event hosts to help me up the half-flight of steps to get into the building...  But theres no contact info and in order to get help I'd have to GO UP THE STAIRS AND ASK!! Disabled people can make PENNIES to the dollar, not even ten cents to every dollar an abled person can make, and it's LEGAL!  A dollar an hour is LEGAL and sub-minimum wage is standard for disabled employees even in feilds where their disability doesn't impact performance on average. Acording to the CA Public Policy Institute, 32,500 is the minimum yearly income needed for a family of four in California over the average cost of living for the WHOLE state. I divided by 4 and got $677 and change. I make EXACTLY that in SSI, give or take fifty cents.  So lets do some math!  My favorite subject... My PRESCRIPTION meds cost about 30 bucks a month, if I ONLY get the few meds that Medi-Cal and my private insurance through my mom don't cover AND if I can convince all my doctors to give me the max quantity of those so I'm refilling those every 90 days instead of every 30.  My transit?  Now that I have access, is 68.75 for 25 rides which is about how many I need a month.  Compared to the long beach transit 25 ride pass (31.25) so that is already an increase in CoL of $37.50 (not including meds in this updating tally bc most people have some medical copay, and 30 a month on average is comprable to an able bodied person's appt and med copays if they had my private insurance even without medi-cal)...   I do have OTC meds which, a low esitmate for monthly, is about 50 (I'm not counting CBD and THC as med expenses here bc then the numbers would be skewed by racist drug laws too....) for Tylenol, allergy meds, meds for nausea and diarrhea and constipation, dry eyes, dry mouth, other med side effects and symptom management. $87.50 spending increase with REALLY low and highly excluisive estimates... Moving on!  Food.  I can't cook or clean up after myself on a bad pain day (5 to six days a week) so I've lost 20% of my body weight since August due to disability.  A few different grocery budget calculations for my needs if I could cook for 64 of 84 meals a month (20 meals eaten away from home, ordered in, or otherwise convenient) is $145 or so. This also doesn't account for cost increase for allergy safe food items.  Thats also how much calfresh I get, although that number is slightly higher than my food money.  That means that I only spend, according to Jan's bank statment, 100 bucks of my own money on food.  $187 above and beyond average basic expenses per CA policy.   And thats just three needs. LEGALLY housing can't cost more for me bc of a disability, so I'll leave that out of this rant thats getting too long... Just with the four basic needs listed I've only got $274.75 left to buy clothes, further an education or learn a trade so that I'm not on SSI my whole life, pay for anything urgent, pay for anything extra, have fun, pay for THERAPY to deal with the stress of having so little money...................  It doesn';t cover phone, internet, or any medical equipment I might need to fix/replace/or add to my collection of resources...  It sure as hell doesn't cover any kind of community work or social connection. Sometimes it feels like everything is against me and I feel paranoid...  And then I remember that in most states its legal to abuse and torture children like me to make them Normal and Acceptable (ABA, conversion therapy, skin bleaching...)

[lovenotesuggestions]

Im in not such a great place right now. My therapist recently told me I've improved a ton since our first appointment together and she basically implied she doesn't think I need therapy anymore and I feel really bad because for a few months I've been feeling like I'm on the verge of relapse and when school starts the pressure is gonna tip me over the edge. But now I feel guilty for feeling that way because she says I'm better. I know it doesn't make sense but idk what to do about it - Q (1/?)

(part 2) Also my dysphoria which mostly subsided during the school year because I've secretly socially transitioned at school is coming back with a vengeance. One of my best friends got a girlfriend but I'm in love with her and even though it's really unfair of me to feel this way because I've never told her I feel really unwanted because of that. - Q (2/?)

(part 3) I'm really lonely and I have friends but what I want is a deep bond, someone who'll cuddle with me and tell me they love me and will maybe let me take them out to dinner sometimes but it hurts to know that I'll never have that because no one wants a nonpassing, unnattractive trans guy. All I want is to feel wanted and loved by someone and like I'm not destined to be alone. I feel so dirty and unworthy. I don't even feel human. Do you have any advice? (Sorry for multiple asks) -Q

You don’t have to apologise for sending multiple asks dear

Just because you might be doing better than you’ve been doing before, that doesn’t mean you no longer have a right to feel bad or have bad mental health days. I’ve made a lot of progress with my therapist and have way less frequent appointments now, but I’m still in therapy and still have bad days, and that’s okay. Recovery and learning to cope with mental illness isn’t a linear process, and sometimes we slip backwards a little, but as long as the trend in your wellbeing is going upwards overall, then that’s what’s important.  Backslides, relapses, and bad days still happen, and that doesn’t destroy the progress you’ve made. 

Especially if you know you have something coming up soon like going back to school that you know will increase the pressure on you and could cause a backslide, then it’s important to be aware that it’s okay to find that difficult to cope with, and to need additional support. It doesn’t erase your progress, or mean you’re a burden. Difficult circumstances, additional stress, and potential triggers can all have effects on your mental health, and that’s not your fault. 

You don’t have to feel guilty for still needing help, and for still having symptoms and bad days even though you’re doing better, and the feelings you’ve mentioned are something I’d strongly advise you to speak to your therapist about. Whatever is making you feel guilty for still not being at 100% is something that it would probably be helpful for you to work through, and she can also help you with these feelings of being worried about relapse, and some coping mechanisms to deal with dysphoria whilst you’re off school for the summer, and any problems that might arise when you go back, to help prepare yourself and prevent these circumstances from damaging your progress too much. It’s important to be as open and honest as possible in therapy, so again if you haven’t mentioned these fears of relapse or what’s going to happen when you go back to school, it’s important to do that. She can only help you with what she knows about. 

It’s also not unfair of you to have feelings for someone, or to feel jealous that they’re in a relationship with someone else, even if you never told them. You can’t help who you have feelings for, and it’s completely normal and natural to feel a little hurt or jealous or unwanted if the person you like chooses someone else. What matters is the way that you act, because that’s what you do have control over, and as long as you’re not behaving in an unfair way because of those feelings, then it’s okay to have feelings. 

This girl you liked not choosing you doesn’t make you unlovable or unwanted - just because she might not have felt that way about you doesn’t mean nobody does or nobody will. You’re still in school so I’m guessing you’re a teenager - that means you have so much time ahead of you to find someone you click with; who loves you for who you are, and who you feel the same way about. It’s not a race, and your peers getting in relationships before you doesn’t reflect on you at all. You’re a whole, lovable person regardless of your relationship status - the fact you’re not in a relationship is just a matter of bad luck in not meeting someone who’s right for you. 

Also, being trans and non-passing absolutely does not doom you to being alone, or make you unlovable! The love of my life is a trans man, and we got together before he started his medical transition, and before he’d even finished socially transitioning. We were together for a year and a half before he even started T, and him not ‘passing’ and him being trans didn’t make me see him as any less of a man, and didn’t affect my attraction to him at all. If anything, I’m more attracted to him because of his trans identity. 

I’m trans too, and passing isn’t even a possibility for me because I’m non-binary and there’s no way to ‘pass’ as something society would never assume you to be. But my partner still loves me for who I am, accepts my gender completely, and finds me attractive regardless of my gender presentation. 

I know so many trans people in relationships with both cis people or other trans people who love their trans partner for exactly who they are, who see them as their gender unconditionally, and whose view of them isn’t affected in the slightest by how well they ‘pass’. You are not unlovable, or doomed to be alone forever, because you’re trans - I promise. There are always assholes out there, or people who don’t understand, but there are also people who see you for who you are, and will love you for being that person. 

If you’re feeling starved for affection, it might be worth in the short-term being a bit more open and affectionate with your friends if you’re comfortable with it. Platonic affection should be way more normalised than it is, and it’s totally okay to cuddle with friends and be physically affectionate with them if everyone’s comfortable with it, and be open about how much you care about them. I tell friends that I love them in a platonic way all the time, and some people find that having that kind of platonic affection can take the edge off that feeling of being deprived of that affection from being single. 

I hope that helps, and I wish you all the best 💖

[countessgreytea]

I stumbled upon a forum and started reading through some MM threads.  One anonymous poster had some interesting things to share in a thread from late September 2018: 

So, I volunteered/worked for the DOS during the end of her toronto years and the transition. I don't like to bash black industry because I feel it's vital for us to make our own opportunities and grow our own wealth, but this tea is absolutely true, and then some. Certain power players would absolutely fawn over her when they met her with her ex husband and when she went to audition would literally laugh in her face. I will defend her against anyone calling her a hooker. That's absolutely untrue. She made a lot of her extra money by befriending fashion people and ultimately getting paid for appearances at dinners/red carpets. She was an opportunist, but honestly if it were a dude, we wouldn't be judging him the way people judge her. I can honestly say that the relationship timeline given to the public regarding Harry is false. If you find that interview with her ex's mom and read between the lines, you'll see it. She has historically not been great with timelines. If people have questions I can answer a few. I'm still in touch with her because I've moved on to work for her friend who is very much in touch with her.

.....

So she and CV (the ex) were as good as engaged even around the end of April - they were both at my birthday dinner. CV is engaged to a singer and they have a baby on the way - that's how ready he was to start a family. He's a really good guy. Even now when I go in to one of his joints and he's around we chat and he offered his family vacation home for me to take my mom for a week. I don't often say this about white men, but I really respect him, he reminds me of my dad. It's a little hard to believe now, but she was more of an earthy Cali girl pre-prince, so they weren't super serious about a formal engagement. CV was totally head over heels and the only reason they were waiting was bc meg really wanted to branch into movies and do something meaningful before settling down with kids and moving into a travel/food show. "Think Bourdain meets Nora Ephron meets hippie chic" is what I wrote in my notes when we were writing up a proposal. I was actually really excited about it, I was going to work on the show. Priyanka Chopra has sorta copied the idea and but changed it so she meets famous people lol. (I have PC tea too, someone point me to a thread and I'll post). Prinze was seeing someone. I hope you'll respect that I won't spill bc that could get me into real trouble. He and nutmeg actually met in the run up to invictus, she "wanted to help" but this is code for wanted to make connections. When they met sparks flew and basically she was like damn issa prince and made her moves accordingly. There was a month between the breakup and the first date and the breakup actually wasn't "final" it was "just a break." She said she was feeling like she was in a rut. From date #1 onwards it was a whirlwind. It was really lovely to watch two people fall in love but very tough bc I knew what had gone down prior. As far as I know she is not pregnant, she is doing IVF though and it has caused a little bloat. That's why her clothes are rarely fitted. She'll be pregnant towards the end of the Aussie tour if all goes as planned. She is very calculating but I really respect her game. For example, that story about the corgis laying at her feet was planted bc white people love anything to do with dogs (I mean, so do the rest of us but white people don't have great attention spans, let's be totally real). She has a natural strategic intelligence from her mother. I cannot say enough wonderful things about her mother. Oprah and Iyanla got nothing on her, imo. This prince thing is the first time ms.meg did someone dirty since I started working for her. She secured the bag, so good for her, I guess.

.....

Made moves - set up the Wimbledon appearance and "happened" to be at the soho house hotel so prinze and her could see each other again. It's a hotel that the public doesn't have the same kind of access too. 

.....

about the engagement interview, and the corgi anecdote:

Oh girl, you don't even know what I did for that interview. Just because Harry told the story doesn't mean it wasn't planted. They planted in the interview so that people would go "aww." Think about the placement of that anecdote - right after they spoke about meeting family and how they'd spent a lot of time together in the past 1.5 years. The story was to push that narrative over the edge by associating it with a sweet story.

.....

Someone replied that MM was in Mexico when PH was in Toronto ahead of IG:

My girl, this doesn't mean we didn't reach out and get in touch with the invictus team. The Internet issa crazy thing!

.....

Whether PH knew about CV:

I actually don't know much about this side of the story - I worked for the DOS, not the prince. I never had access to her personal texts or anything. From what I felt though, I don't think he knew exactly how serious they were

.....

Sure! Auntie Dee has been through a lot in her own life. People haven't looked much into her own childhood, but there was family tension and abuse, but she never let that get her down. She was quick to compliment on good character "thank you for your honesty" "thank you for your grace" "i admire your strength." She really is crazy about yoga though, she says it helps preserve the body. She is not at all judgmental to people who do yoga the first time, including myself, and doesn't like that white women culture vulture yoga from Indians - she is fierce about respecting heritage. She loves gardening. She is lowkey a very strong Christian...idk how that fits with yoga tbh but she's cool with it. She is completely self-made and raised up several black women and other women of color in her professional life (yoga and social work and other artistic endeavours)

..... About the article with CV’s mom : “Mrs Vitiello surmises that Meghan and Cory had been apart for about three months before she first met Harry.”: 

Regarding that Daily Mail article: the specific wording is surmised. The meaning of the word surmise is to suppose something is true without having the evidence to confirm it. I know the person trying to poke holes in my tea won't believe it, but that specific word was fought over and eventually money was paid in order for that specific word to be used.

.....

I could be wrong here - I'm definitely not in her inner circle anymore (professionally there is no real room for upward movement, I started working for her blog so I could eventually work in digital publication and PR). I also know nothing about IVF - I just heard from my boss (her friend) that it causes bloat and it's really unfair that people judge her. I know for sure she is on IVF bc she needed an injection during her trip to Toronto and her PPOs were unhappy and my boss talked about it a lot.

.....

There are a lot of royal "rules" that the family must abide by that aren't normal for you and me, including medication. The physician must be present alongside the assistant to ensure that the shot has not been tampered with, etc. Remember, British royalty goes back to the days of people poisoning each other regularly, there are still archaic rules. I don't know more than that, I'm only peripherally in her life anymore. 

.....

someone asked about PH/MM’s dynamic:

I only saw the beginning, until the move to London. They are both demonstrative, but just from knowing her, I can tell she's a little more cautious in public - she doesn't want to seem too American/gauche. She'll probably relax as she has kids and sinks into her role, you know? It's tough to be totally yourself when you have so many eyes on you.

.....

Do the BRF like MM?

All I've been told is that they love her but they way it's been said seemed like the person who said it was trying to convince themselves as well as me. From emails and coordination purposes, "the firm" aka the staff took to her really well and Prince Chuck liked her a lot too. 

.....

What happened in Toronto with photographers before PH made his statement?

People were trying to break into her house and get onto the Suits set. She jetted to London one evening and eight hours later the statement had been released. It was released like 6 AM ET, I believe. 

.....

Her husband, as far as I know, was not a good dude. She never went into specifics but the person who worked for her prior alway said to forward any emails from him to her lawyer. Their relationship was not good. 

.....

About Suits, and were other family members at her wedding:

She speaks to the women and Rick, not so much Patrick and Gabe but was genuinely on good terms with everyone. I think she misses it, she tries to be normal by going about doing the same things she did in Toronto but I don't think it's the same. It's okay, she's a princess, she'll survive. Other family members were there, yes. 

.....

Oof, where you got all this sourness from? No bankruptcy, no jail (though she did work at correctional facilities). I think the living with her dad thing was just because of proximity to her school. I believe she spent Friday to Sunday evenings with her mom. 

.....

Her offering help with IG:

So she was not volunteering the way you or I would volunteer, but she was reaching out to ask whether she could lend her knowledge of Toronto and relationships with people there to help make things run smoothly. It's not really work, it's basically just talking lol. All these celebs who say they are the UN ambassador for whatever just go on paid vacations to poor folks' homes and film themselves being selfless aka playing with kids and then "lending their support" aka throwing a bit of money or "having high-level conversations." They were both in relationships at the time they first connected and the time they first met. She was looking to see if there was an opening for her, if that makes sense. The "first date" they talk about combines their first meeting and then the actual date after he expressed interest (they broke up with others to date, but remember, DOS told her ex that it was a break because she felt she was in a rut and not feeling connection with him). They definitely were texting a lot before the real first date.

.....

I never heard anything about this - if it's true, my apologies to the poster. I did not know everything about their lives. Doria did not strike me as someone who would file for bankruptcy but I know that many people "aren't the type"

.....

As far as I know Kate is cordial to DOS but you would really expect her to make more of an effort. There seemed to be some jealousy/distrust apparently. 

....

is she close with doria?:

I think they played up the closeness a bit during the "courtship" but from what I saw, they certainly became closer during that time too. I can say that she had been taking care of her mom financially when I was around.

.....

I know when she gets angry she tears up and gets very quiet. 

[realtransfacts]

Sorry to bring it up but what's trans///med??

I’ve had this ask sitting in my inbox for way too long but I wanted to make sure my response to it was at least halfway decent. I don’t know if I succeeded in that though because this still ended up very rambly, but hopefully it can give you some kind of overview of what transmeds are.

The most simplified explanation of transmedicalists (transmeds for short) is that they believe that 1) transness is defined by dysphoria (you have to be dysphoric to be trans) and that 2) transness is a medical condition and hrt/surgery should only be available for those who get approved/diagnosed by professionals.

Informed consent is a terrible idea in their minds because that would mean anyone could make their own choice if they wanted to get on hrt or not. They say this will make people dysphoric as a result, because it would mean that people without a diagnosis (which often means “not dysphoric” to them) would be able to get hrt and the changes from hrt would then make those people dysphoric. This is often combined with some form of nonbinary antagonism.

There is usually more to it though, especially here on tumblr.

Truscums here are usually young white binary trans guys who have not yet started their medical transition or are in the very early stages of it. Not all truscum fit this description, but very many of them do. (And for sake of argument, assume I added that disclaimer sentence to basically every paragraph in this post.)

They’re generally very strict on what counts as real gender dysphoria and what they say is just body dysmorphia. You have to hate your secondary sex characteristics as well as your primary ones - the dysphoria has to be very bad and constant. And if they believe social dysphoria is a thing (which not all of them do) then you have to have that as well.

You also can’t just say that you’re dysphoric - you have to be diagnosed by a (cis) professional to have it confirmed (see their issue with informed consent for hrt). Despite that they usually aren’t diagnosed themselves but hey, their rules only apply to others in this case I guess.

If they believe in nonbinary people, they never believe in all of us. They mock any and all “mogai genders” that they don’t approve of and try to blame the people of those genders (as well as other binary trans people, but we’ll get to that) for why it is so hard to get medical treatment for their dysphoria or so hard for them to have their genders believed/respected by cis people.

They also tend to be very ignorant or outright dismissive of the fact that many cultures around the world and across time haven’t used the western gender binary we’re so used to today.

In the same vein, if they ever do acknowledge the existence of intersex people, which is rare, they don’t view them as anything other than an abnormality or outliners that doesn’t need to be taken into account when they make their arguments or they view them as broken/disordered/”birth-defected” (actual quote) and they don’t believe anyone could or should want a body that isn’t strictly “male” or “female”. They’re very strong pushers of both the sex binary and the gender binary. 

If they “accept” nonbinary and/or intersex people, it’s with a long list of conditions.

Anyone who doesn’t fit their strict and very narrow definition of what a “true” trans person should be like is a faker, a tucute, a transtrender, etc. and deserve to be harrassed and ridiculed and invalidated and so on. (It’s from this “true trans(sexual)” that “truscum” comes as well.)

And even those binary trans people who are dysphoric and are seeking diagnosis and treatments risk having their trans identity called into question or outright denied by transmeds if they don’t agree 100% with transmed ideologies; they also run the risk of being called tucutes, transtrenders, fakes, they run the same risks of harassment, they are also blamed for how difficult it is to get hrt and surgeries, etc.

Transmedicalists work from a medicalized idea of what it means to be trans that most LGBT+ orgs and even most cis professionals these days don’t agree with. Dysphoria is not considered to be a synonym to transness in the DSM-5. And even in countries where the medical diagnosis is still “transsexualism” (like it is here where I live), nonbinary people’s existence isn’t always denied by professionals and it is possible to access treatment even when you’re open about not being a binary trans person (like I did).

What transmedicalists want above all is conformity - they want all trans people to be the same and thus be easily understood by cis people. Anyone who has done any amount of research of transgender people or spent any amount of time in transgender communities should already know that this isn’t going to fucking work, because we are a vastly varied group of people with as many different experiences as there are different trans people.

But hey, they don’t actually care about helping the wider trans community. They care about doing what they think is helping themselves and the people who are exactly like them, and they’re happy to punch down on anyone who isn’t like them. They’re very hard players of the respectability politics game that way.