#people hear/see 'masc' and think 'man' anywayyyy

[transmandrake]

Scalding hot take I've been ruminating on but I think we need to retire the phrase 'Trans X are trans X' (ie. Trans men are men, trans women are women) and 'trans X are not Y' (ie trans men are not women, trans women are not men)

Not because its wrong per se, but because 90% of the time people say it and actually mean 'trans X are exactly the same as cis X'

And what happens is, even trans people, (id argue especially trans people) consciously or not, internalise that everything that is believed about cis people, is true for trans people.

This leads to absolutely batshit takes like 'its okay to hate trans men because men are our oppressors' (thats just transphobia) and 'trans women are sensitive and delicate and need protecting because they are women' (actually they need protecting because theyre being fucking murdered, not because theyre magical soft sweet little babies (like you think women are. Thats just sexism, even if you mean it positively). This ones often covert because, unfortunately sometimes sexism is gender validating)

Its also a *hand wiggles* phrase because I think a lot of people are so afraid of seeming transphobic that theyve kind of backpedalled into becoming really transphobic by denying the existence of anyone who is both a man and a woman and trans (and any and all combinations you can think of).

I think also this phrase is partially why a lot of people seem to think all trans people want to pass, will pass, and have a completely binary identity. The mere suggestion that a trans man can be a woman or a trans woman can be a man is seen as transphobic, when thats probably how the cookie crumbles for most people with multiple genders that include the binary ones.

(I was really glad to see more awareness and acceptance of multigender stuff in the last while but everyone gets funny about it every time trans stuff comes up... these do not have to be conflicting issues...)

How to help this? I'm not sure. I feel like some kind of indicator whether a trans person identifies as something, versus wants to be something (Im not sure how to explain this distinction. I guess its about whether your gender is more about being TRANSgender or being transGENDER. Yknow?) could be helpful, but well thats just more divisions and distinctions for people to put their burdens on.

Ultimately some women are men and some trans men arent men and some binary people are nonbinary too, because its all made up and simultaneously real. Without acknowledging this, we're just making Sexism 2.0 Trans-Affirming This Time instead of going 'hey, sexism fucking sucks, we shouldn't do that to anyone, cis or trans'.