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unhinged-transmasc-man · 1 year ago

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I really do think that some trans people see the word “man” in trans man and their brain shuts off. Their brains go “Oh, man. Man privileged and bad. Men evil and oppressive. Therefore you, Man, equal evil and oppressive. I do not consider you a person now.” The usual acknowledgement of identities and nuance and lived experience they willingly apply to every other group flies out the fucking window. They are so blinded by gender essentialism they completely dehumanize trans men. They don’t know what to do with us in their simplistic bullshit radfem gender politics. Saying trans women are women doesn’t make you not a radfem, deconstructing bio/gender essentialism, and the belief that all masculinity and men/men-aligned/masculine people are inherently morally evil/oppressive/corruptive, and that all femininity and women/women-aligned-feminine people are inherently morally good/innocent/oppressed, THAT is what you have to do to not be a radfem, at the very least.

I am sick to death of non-trans men acting as if trans men never interrogate what it means to be a man. It is in the DEFINITION of being a trans man. We have thought about what it means to be a man more than anyone else (interestingly, trans women also have to grapple with manhood and masculinity in being raised with patriarchal expectations and realizing they don’t fit them and don’t identify with manhood). We build ourselves up from nothing (in terms of making the world acknowledge us as men instead of forcibly trapping as us “women”), we have to make our bodies match who we are, we have to figure out and be determined to be boys and men before anyone else knows we are. We are trans BECAUSE we are men. We have to figure out what being trans and what being a man means to us. Our sense of manhood and masculinity will always be rebellious (not by our own choice, but in the way any oppressed group is rebellious in existing). Trans men are inherently an anti-patriarchal concept. Obviously trans men can be misogynistic like anyone else, but the claim that transforming into a man is automatically misogynistic is radfem trash. The idea that identifying as a man suddenly erases experiences of misogyny is so inherently alien to the actual lived experience of all trans men that it can only come from people who do not interact with, care about, or view trans men as worthy of listening to, or even acknowledgment at all, or even just outright hate us for existing. Non trans men seem to legitimately think that putting on a binder will make cis people see us as men. That is not how it works, and the fact that I have to SAY THAT just shows the absolute miserable state of how rampant anti-trans man attitudes are (anti-transmasculinity more generally but specifically with trans men).

Trans men think about manhood a LOT. We think about it a lot, because manhood and masculinity are central to our identity in a way that is different from any other group of people. We are taking previous experiences and concepts, and re-framing and re-creating those concepts with what fits us. We have to completely construct both womanhood and manhood. It is also a different kind of thinking of being a man because we actually are the men in that situation, “the man” goes from being Other to Us. The complete disregard for our personal experiences, and the reliance on non-trans men and their endless parade of disgusting and bigoted options rather than US is very telling. Trans men have a unique perspective: manhood and masculinity, and the patriarchy (they are not the same thing) were likely traumatic for us, but our own masculinity and manhood are freeing and liberatory for us because we are trans, and because we are trans men. Obviously we don’t want to be what oppressed us, so our usual conclusion is to do masculinity and manhood in a different way. And yet is it so common for that to be turned against us, to assume that because we are trans men we must be willingly aligning ourselves with patriarchy without a second thought. But some trans people do not want to let us do a different form of masculinity, because they see all masculinity as inherently the same, equally oppressive, and evil.

We have a deeper understanding of misogyny and constructs of manhood than most people. We have a deeply profound awareness of how gender works, we live with it every day. Our perspective is critical for advancing any sort of gendered liberation of trans people, and to act like it isn’t, and to act as if only people who do not identify with manhood or masculinity have an inherently more valid perspective is gender essentialist nonsense. Gender is fluid and can be interpreted in many ways, the harmful ways of the patriarchy are not inherent in masculinity or femininity. Masculinity is not inherently oppressive, the patriarchy is. Of course people not allowed to be men who insist on our right to be men anyway think about our identities all the time. Far more than the people who make these nonsensical claims in the first place. Quite honestly, the only way to make this better (what we can do, because 1. It’s not our responsibility to make non-trans men not hate us and 2. Non trans men need to do their work in fixing their attitudes about us) is for trans men to use our voices and share our point of view. Anti-trans man and masc bigotry relies on silence and deliberate violent erasure, and it’s harder to do that if we never be quiet. Our identities are not morally wrong. We deserve to take up space.

#not sure what to tag this tbh #I am not sure if this is coherent but I had Thoughts #transandrophobia mention #gender essentialism #radfem mention #cw anti masculinity

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moonshinedyke · 1 year ago

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Pinned Post:

-Asteria/Eris (+)

-Mixed Black/Indigenous

-Intersex genderfluid multigender transmascfem

-Alloaro bisexual lilaen lesbian.

-Stud, butch, (bull)dyke, faggot, tranny, freak, bulldagger

This is my blog for venting and just talking about bigotry. I didn't want to clog my main too much with these types of posts since a lot of them involve discoursey topics. This is not a blog that I plan to use to argue with other people under most circumstances. I'm using this blog to vent about my experiences, no matter how big or small they are. Check below the cut for some of my beliefs.

Just because I reblog from someone doesn't mean that I agree with everything they say and do. What it DOES mean is that I think they made a good point in that specific post they made.

-Many white queers have a problem with using their queerness to try and avoid accountability for their white privilege and racism. There is a HUGE racism problem in both online and real life queer spaces.

-Gender criticals are enormous pieces of shit with a very flawed view of sex and gender.

-The hyperpolicing of lesbianism on here is super lesbophobic. Stop obsessing over lesbians not conforming to your neat little cis fem white woman centric boxes. Let lesbians have some gender fuckery without frothing at the mouth.

-Bi lesbians/gays do not hurt mono lesbians/gays by existing. We are not responsible for homophobic cishets harassing you guys and saying that we are is violently biphobic. Stop being a narrowminded cishet bootlicker, assholes.

-Straight passing privilege does not exist. Invisibility and erasure is not a privilege.

-Lesbian separatism as an ideology is transphobic, biphobic, lesbophobic, and racist. If you defend lesbian separatism or pretend that it was even remotely okay then you are a bad person, straight-up.

-Intersexism is rampant in trans spaces. We are not your transition goals, we are not your gotcha to use against TERFs, and we are not nonbinary icons by default. The diversity of the intersex experience is unfathomable because of how many intersex conditions there are and how intersex conditions are viewed across the globe.

-Slur discourse is pointless at best and a straight-up psyop at worst. Let a bisexual call themself a dyke, let a transmasc call themself a tranny, let a lesbian call themself a faggot. I promise that it's not hurting you when other queer people reclaim slurs. Quit your victim complex.

-Butch and femme have always belonged to the whole queer community and have NEVER been lesbian exclusive. Denying that is spitting on ballroom culture- in other words, you're racist and transphobic as hell. Furthermore, Black non-lesbians have more claim to butch and femme than ANY white lesbian does. Read more here. It's a Carrd, yes, but it's a Carrd with actual sources, which is more than you can say for literally every Carrd written by exclusionists that you all choose to use anyways.

-Queer is not a slur and it's up to you to avoid people who use the word if it makes you that uncomfortable.

-Flag discourse is ridiculous. If you hate a flag that badly, just don't use it.

-You don't owe anyone an explanation for why you blocked them.

-I'm very wary of anyone who is against non-traumagenic systems. I don't really understand endo systems or other non-traumagenic systems, but I've seen tons of fakeclaiming and racism coming from the anti-endo community, so I tend to avoid them. I'm not interested in getting into syscourse and I generally keep my system life private.

-Well-researched self diagnosis is good, especially if you can't afford to get a professional diagnosis. Ultimately, you are the one actually experiencing what's in your brain.

-Shipping discourse is ridiculous and literally all of you need to go outside.

-Anti-transmasculinity as a form of oppression exists and to say otherwise is antiblack and transmisogynistic, since it often goes in hand with transmisogynoir.

-Nonbinary people do not owe you androgyny, let alone any change in appearance once they come out as nonbinary.

-Nonmen and nonwoman are not just terms that are super hostile to multigender people, they're also racist due to their hostility towards Two-Spirit people as well as how they've been used to degender Black people.

#pinned post

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kingfaggot · 1 month ago

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sex ed is a transandrophobe

Anon you have no idea how incredibly unhelpful you are. But god fucking dammit I couldn’t put this down and wait. Bigotry sucks and I don’t wanna host that on my blog. So two words of advice:

Give a specific blog name. Give a link.

I will NEVER. listen blindly to callouts like this and these asks get me steamed as hell.

But after asking in a server I’m in, I figured out who you mean. So here’s the thing. I did figure out who, but just looking on my own, here’s the post I was able to find w tumblrs broken search function:

https://www.tumblr.com/certifiedsexed/765437493834399744/hi-sorry-if-im-missing-something-but-re

Looking at this post alone, my impression is that it’s a fucked up semantics argument. That this person is in the ballpark, but has a different way of going about it. It feels silly to me to argue about trans men and adjacent not being targeted for their transmasculinity, but rather trans from a masculine angle, but the spirit is there. I know what’s meant here.

Once I went to the server and actually got further context from here, THEN I understood what the hell you meant:

https://www.tumblr.com/gay-otlc/765281447984676864/a-popular-sex-ed-blog-has-decided-trans-men

I’m tearing you apart with my teeth anon. I’m going to sit further so I can calm down and think before I take any action. Their take on “Yes, you may be targeted using transmisogynistic language but you also still have power you can leverage over TMA people and you still do not have the burden of dealing with transmisogyny constantly knowing you are the target.” is something I don’t agree with, but the posts are largely good. They just look to me to be an imperfect ally.

So. Assuming I’m reading correctly what I’ve now found with assistance, I disagree that you have to be apart of a group to be affected by discrimination targeting them. Like. Say you’re in a chair next to someone else who’s a lot like you. And that person is being shot with arrows. The person shooting wants to hit people like that person sitting next to you. Those arrows can still hit you. Let’s say you’re in a stadium and now you have a lot of people who can get hit. Some are more aware of it than others, but that doesn’t change whether or not they can get hit. People aren’t gonna ask your pronouns or background before committing a hate crime.

And that’s ignoring the fact that transandrophobia exists. Bring that into the equation and we’re gonna need a better way to handle those arrows than trying to protect that one person and so on.

My instinct is to say that their comparison of tme/tma to nonBlack is too narrow to fully communicate the issue, but that’s how language goes. The issue of the belief of those “unaffected” having power over those affected. Like I can use my same example from before. The person being targeted is now Black and those nearby are people who are similar. Doesn’t mean those around said person go unharmed.

Certifiedsexed, as far as I can see, isn’t saying that we aren’t targeted for being trans and identifying with masculinity, but seems to have a different angle on how to address it. which I’m not going to say they’re wholly wrong, but that it just doesn’t strike me as the most effective way to use our time on this planet. Which is my personal opinion.

Like does it matter if misandry exists if trans men and adjacent are attacked for being trans and identifying with masculinity? Not really. Would certifiedsexed stand with us in our struggles to be seen and taken seriously? I’m not sure that’s a solid no. I think certifiedsexed shares really good posts surrounding bodily autonomy, awareness, and self-empowerment. Maybe just cares a tad more about not using words than can also be dogwhistles. Compound words aren’t the same as the two separate words. That’s why they’re compounded. Me talking about transmisandry isn’t the same as using misandry as a dogwhistle. But to them, that doesn’t matter and it’s preferred to use a different term.

I think my conclusion is that I’m going to put their blog name into my filter so I can choose case-by-case which posts I wanna reblog, but that’s kinda just a wise thing to do in the first place, to think about what you post. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to be more mindful, anon. I’m still gonna spend more time thinking here.

P.S. this goes to anyone wishing to call out others. Include the actual name and context. I’m not a fucking sheep.

#asks #anon #callouts #links #certifiedsexed

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lucienne-thee-librarian · 1 year ago

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Plus, imo: I'm sorry, I'll say it...empathy is WILDLY overrated. Especially as a supposed prerequisite for "kindness and treating people well".

Like...why don't we start saying "compassion" or "kindness" instead? Having high or low empathy or whatever is not a choice we can make. Doing the right thing and treating people well is.

Also I'm sorry, but people who pride themselves on being Super Empaths can often use that as an excuse to be at best super annoying about it. And at worst, they can use their I'm an Empath So I Know Better card to be manipulative, or act like their quick judgments about other people and assumptions about what other people must be feeling are by default true because they're more finely attuned to like. The cosmic threads of the universe and the collective unconscious. Plus, someone made the really good point once in an essay about transphobic tropes that - well, human empathy inherently has limitations.

For example, what if someone is trying to tell us about experiences that we simply have never had? It's been known to happen. What do you do then? Do you try to listen to them, and learn new things and be kind even if you can't understand How It Feels To Be this person?

Well, if you're only using Empathy as a yardstick then...you're kinda stuck trying to project your own feelings and experiences onto someone else. And sometimes that's just not gonna work. So you might find yourself instead of actually hearing the person, deciding they must be wrong about their own mind and life, that if YOU were in their shoes you'd have done xy or z so therefore- and now you're inventing explanations about why they're not doing what you would. (See - basically every tine someone responds to someone talking about depression saying shit like You Need To Pray About It because after all when THEY feel sad praying helps them so other people's Sadness must be just like their Sadness and be solved as easily - or literally every trope from transphobic women about how transmasculine people are Lost Confused Girls who must be doing this cause they hate themselves and hated living in a misogynistic world as women and imagi e that they or their tomboy daughters will be PERSUADED and TRICKED into transitioning. Like...these people aren't you. You are not the main character of reality, but sometimes that sort of myopic navel-gazing thinking is where an extreme over-reliance on empathy as a guide for life and for how to live with others can lead.)

Empathy absolutely can be helpful in understanding people yes...sometimes. But it shouldn't be your ONLY tool for that and people with low or no empathy are not automatically doomed to a lifetime of being an asshole because that is a choice and again, high empathy people can be just as shitty or shittier as any stereotype of low-empathy folks is imagined to be.

Also this whole "don't associate us all with Those People" feels very...it reminds me a lot of those queer people who will shit on femme gay men and butch women or polyamorous and therefore "slutty" bisexuals, or... "stereotypical" trans people for existing and blame them for the stereotypes of cishet society in an attempt to distance themselves. Or, as I like to call them "the Not Like Other Gays/Trans People" phenomenon. And it's like...guys I can't believe we still have to keep repeating this but respectability politics is NEVER worth it. Any crumbs of acceptance you think you can purchase through conformity and trying to be One of the Good Ones are hollow and rare and fleeting at BEST. It's not gonna save you, all you're doing is throwing fellow autistic people under the bus cause you think it'll improve your own public image which. Yeah, good luck. Tell me how that goes. But maybe don't expect much sympathy when the leopards eat your faces right along with the faces of the people you're so ready to shit on now.

Autistic spaces are getting so much more hostile towards people with low empathy, and it sucks

There was a subreddit I really liked, people were chill, and then there was a sudden influx of people making posts like ‘Autistic people have empathy! Saying we don’t makes us seem like monsters! Thats not a symptom!’ And people making posts explaining that no, actually, some of us do have low empathy got attacked and told they were wrong or ableist? And it sucks, because its just so hard to find a place to exist where you can be seen as not evil? I don’t know, it just hurts a lot to be told that

#sorry this got long I normally would tag ramble but this felt important

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fite-club · 9 months ago

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Greg again: to that anti transmasculinity blog, I’m sorry to break it to you, but toxic masculine trans guys do exist and I have met a handf of them lol. If you make an effort to meet people outside your own circles I promise you’d know that. Go to queer clubs and try to actively meet people please. Not every trans guy is some harmless dweeb on tumblr. Some trans guys treat women like shit as overcompensating behavior because that’s what they’ve been taught what masculinity is. Some act tough and threatening and have big trucks and think women should listen to them and they get to talk over them. But you’re too busy having your head so far up your ass to see that — and look, I know the prospect of becoming the very thing you hate is scary but no one is saying you specifically are benefitting off the patriarchy. But to act like no trans guy at all benefits from the patriarchy is something you’re sorely mistaken about. Please go and meet more trans guys. Because I promise while many can be wonderful there are some absolute fucking dickheads out there too. You just have to look past your own echo chamber for 5 minutes.

glad to hear coming out went well!! :^)

and yeah, one of the worst toxic-masculinity-perpetuators i’ve ever met was a trans guy i dated for a few months. i was regularly shocked at some of the things that came out of that guy’s mouth. the way he’d refuse to show any emotion besides anger, his eagerness to get into physical fights, the way he’d talk about trans women like they were all horny creeps and overreacting-bitches, the way he’d put down other guys for acting “weak”… and i’d met trans guys before who said some questionable things, but never before had i met a trans guy so openly misogynistic and emotionally stunted. my experiences with this guy are actually a big part of the reason why i care so much about pointing out transmisogyny and male privilege in the transmasc community! because these guys are out here, and we as a community NEED to address it and shame it publicly.

like, i promise y’all, it does not make us look bad to admit that we can benefit from male privilege or perpetuate toxic masculinity or uphold the patriarchy. it makes us look bad when we deny that it exists at all. it makes us look bad when guys like my ex are running around being assholes and other guys are claiming it doesn’t happen. we have to take accountability for that! and by taking accountability i don’t mean “accepting that it’s our fault”, i mean “accepting that it’s a problem in our community that we have the power to do something about”

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tyrannuspitch · 4 years ago

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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

#transphobia #transmasculinity #transandrophobia #this could maybe do with one more proofread but i've spent way too long on this so whatever!

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yharnamsnewslug · 3 years ago

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Hey man I’m sorry to ask (and vent) this, please feel free to ignore. Do you have any tips with how to deal with people not taking trans men’s issues seriously? It’s exhausting as fuck to be shat on by people who should be supportive. I find myself afraid to bring up my issues even among other trans men since so many of them seem to believe the main narrative being passed around about us. I know terfs aren’t actually helpful or friendly to us… but it’s honestly hard not to lurk there sometimes. because they are some of the only people actually acknowledging our issues. I don’t want to look at their stuff, but honestly some of it has been more supportive than most stuff i see from the trans community at large. Like why am I not allowed to talk about how transphobia and misogyny intersecting impacts me as a trans man? I don’t understand why people are so hostile about it. It shouldn’t be a hot take that anyone assigned female at birth is an intended target of misogyny (along with anyone who is perceived as a woman, not trying to be bio essentialist sorry I’m jumbled rn) I’d never side with or believe them (terfs) but it’s hard to have the majority of my community think people like me are oh so privileged for my gender when in reality anything that affects women oppression wise has impacted me as well, either in the past or current (such as medical and legal misogyny). Luckily I’m strong enough to know that terfs don’t actually care for me and would attempt to groom me into detransing. But holy shit how do people not see that this will push some vulnerable trans men in a radfem direction? How can I bring our intersection of misogyny and transphobia up in a way that won’t make people hate me for it? I just want someone to believe me when I say that these things impact me, without making it a pissing content.

Ho boy, I had to pause and read and reread this for a while but... this hits deep - that frustration of people never taking you, your identity, your struggles seriously... I've had that my entire life.

I've found that people who don't want to listen and just want to feel self-righteous won't ever listen to reason. And I think that's the toughest thing to get over, at least right now. I believe that this anti-transmasc flare is going to fade one day, but I really would like to explain my train of thought when my frustration overwhelms me.

I believe this transandrophobic wave, much like the biphobic, aphobic, panphobic waves, will one day fade into the background instead of being the Brand New Discourse. This is because the arguments against us are word-by-word the same as Ace DiscourseTM (i hate to call it that but it's a way for me to be understood).

If indeed this is a WaveTM, then the best thing you can do is keep being present, keep fighting, keep being loud and proud of being transmasculine. Let people know that you're here to stay.

Do not seek fucking discourse. It will do you no good. Defend yourself if needed, but block people liberally and curate your dash and internet experience, instead of seeking Baeddels or transandrophobes calling us hysterical women.

The goal here is to exist. To resist. To persist. We need to stay as a cohesive group, a COMMUNITY, one that has different experiences and allows different people to speak up on what transandrophobia has done to us.

If we persist as a community, we've won.

They want us gone. They want to do to us what they've done to the ace community. They want our flags, our queerness, our openness, our lives to be erased from the internet so years down the line, transmasculine people believe we have no community.

Well I fucking refuse. And you should, too.

The best you can do is exist. And happily so. Do your best to post funny little memes and some theory and vent about your life (with proper tags) WHILE blocking any fuckwad who tells you your masculinity is not intrinsic to your transness.

Please, stay. Stay alive and stay awake. Stay free and stay happy among us. Because with that, we can beat these radfems. We can beat the cycle of erasure and hatred.

I believe in us. And I believe in you, anon.

(I also want to thank people like @vaspider and @nothorses for being still active, still here, still wonderfully present when I was ready to give up. They both inspire me so much.)

#ask #anon #transandrophobia

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livebloggingmydescentintomadness · 3 years ago

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Good day to you!

Gender question: I recently heard that binary trans psyches become more stable when they start taking their identified hormone. Like ftm mental health will improve when their testosterone increases. If I think I think I'm enby but my depression goes away when I increase my T, does that make me any less nonbinary? Is it different when you're dealing with binary hormones (estrogen vs testosterone) and a third gender not associated with either? Am I trying too hard to be different but I'm actually appropriating a repressed identity? Asking for a friend~

hello, dear! first of all, i want to make it very clear that i have absolutely no qualifications to answer this question. i have zero medical training, i am not educated on hormones, i have not even really read about this subject. so i'm going to give my opinions and what little i do know, largely just from lived experience, and i want to be clear that that's all you're getting, so please don't take my word as any sort of authority here.

secondly, before we go any further, you cannot "appropriate" being nonbinary or trans as long as you are someone genuinely questioning if you are/believe that you are nonbinary/trans, provided you're not using a culturally specific identity that is not open to you, such as native american two spirit.

if you are not faking on purpose, you're not faking, and if you're not faking on purpose, you are not doing anything wrong. your gender belongs to you, it's a personal identity, not a culture that can be appropriated. you are free to explore it, change your mind, and change your labels at any time, in any way, for any reason, because it belongs to you, and it's about what makes you feel the most comfortable in yourself.

thirdly, it's also important just to be aware that it's possible to be a nonbinary trans man on T. if you feel like you are ftm, if you want to take T, be masculine, etc, that doesn't mean you're not nonbinary. nonbinary is not inherently "third gender unrelated to masculine or feminine", it's an umbrella term that encapsulates a damn near infinite kaleidoscope of gender expressions that don't fit into the boxes of "100% male" or "100% female".

personally, i go by nonbinary because i don't know of a word that actually describes, "i was trained to categorize myself as a girl but i never fit in with the girls, i often felt more comfortable with the boys but i've never actually wanted to BE a boy, i hate being called a woman but i'm fine using she/her pronouns, i'm also fine being regarded in more masculine terms because there's definitely a masculine part of me, but i think that the very core of me, my soul i suppose, is genderless. i don't want to use they/them or wear a binder, though sometimes i daydream about having a mastectomy and hysterectomy just so i'd never have to wear a bra or get a period again, and i kind of like being referred to as mx." i have no idea what to call that except nonbinary, so i just say nonbinary, and it's okay that my nonbinary is very different from other people's nonbinary.

if you want to take T, if you want to transition or do anything else associated with being ftm, that is completely okay. that doesn't mean you faked being nonbinary, and if you explore being transmasculine and it turns out it's not for you, that doesn't mean you faked being transmasculine either. while there are some people who "always knew", there are also lots of people who have to try out different identities and labels until they find the one that's actually right for them.

AND, sometimes your labels change without your prior identity being "wrong". if you end up transitioning to binary transmasculine, that doesn't mean you weren't nonbinary before, it would just mean you aren't anymore. not being something anymore doesn't necessarily mean you never were. sometimes we just change.

fourthly (?), i don't know whether it's a fact that "binary trans psyches become more stable when they start taking their identified hormone". i'm sure that that does happen often, i'm sure that receiving proper hormone therapy absolutely can improve trans mental health, but i don't know that it's a hard and fast rule. hormones are powerful things, and i'm sure that sometimes just having your chemistry altered can cause some psychological upheaval. and on the other hand, sometimes having your hormones adjusted can make you feel better just on a purely physical level, totally irrespective of gender.

in other words, i don't think anyone should start T or E expecting it to significantly improve their mental health, but if it does, that's great. i also don't think that feeling better on T means that you're a trans man, or should i say, it doesn't mean that you have to be. if you feel better on more T, you don't have to throw up your hands and say, "well i guess i'm a man now," like you have no choice in the matter.

do you want to be a man? do you think that being a man (binary or not) would make you happy? would you feel more comfortable in your skin if you presented as masculine?

honestly, i think sometimes those are better questions to ask than sitting around soul-searching for what you "really are". maybe you're like me and you don't have a single word to summarize yourself, or maybe you'll only find that word after exploring new experiences. maybe you'll find something that you've repressed, or maybe you'll just create something new that you never imagined before.

regardless, i don't think you should worry. if you feel more stable and happy taking more T, that's great. do that. if you feel more comfortable and authentic transitioning to male, that's great. do that. if you don't want to do that, then don't do that. explore yourself and your expression without fear that you're appropriating anything, because you aren't.

you're okay, sweetheart. just keep living. you'll figure it out.

#lgbtq #gender #long post for ts #anonymous #ask

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lycandrophile · 3 years ago

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transandromisia isn't a "transmasc issue", you're just excluding a bunch of people from our lived experience and misgendering us as transmasc when we're not. but here we go again, only those with approximation to the binary can be truly oppressed. when all you do is silence other TAA people by pushing us into binaries.

oh boy...

first of all, it IS a transmasc issue. maybe not ONLY a transmasc issue, but it absolutely is one. everything i talk about here directly affects trans masculine people, which i know because i am one, so don’t even go there. believe it or not, something can be an issue for multiple groups at once

second, you have to acknowledge that it is founded upon a hatred of trans men and transmasc people, even if other people are affected. acting like we should never use the word transmasc in relation to these issues is quite frankly ridiculous. if transmasc people weren’t so hated, other people wouldn’t have to face this specific combination of issues either, whether you want to acknowledge that fact or not. proximity (whether real or perceived) to trans manhood / transmasculinity is the key here

third, i’ve acknowledged multiple times on here that my use of the word transmasc as a general term is in large part due to a lack of widely understood terminology (or any terminology) for talking about these issues. if the flawed terminology bothers you so much, join me in actually doing the work to talk about these issues and start working toward better vocabulary instead of just getting mad at me for doing the best with what i have! my priority is talking about the issues, not developing terminology for them, and i have every right to focus on that, but you’re welcome to do that work if it’s important to you

four, it’s honestly incredibly bold of you to assume transmasculinity is always associated with the gender binary. there are MANY nonbinary transmasc people who would take issue with that statement. masculinity CAN mean proximity to manhood, but it absolutely doesn’t always mean that. if you’re going to get mad at me for not using language that’s inclusive enough, don’t start making such sweeping generalizations yourself. i may be a transmasc person who’s also a man, but that doesn’t mean every transmasc person feels a connection to manhood. not to mention, even trans manhood isn't always as binary as a simplistic understanding of gender would assume it is - i'm a trans man but i feel little to no connection to binary conceptions of manhood at all, because gender is complicated and assuming that certain labels are always associated with the binary is reductive

five, some of the issues i talk about on here *are uniquely transmasc issues*. not all of the specific things i discuss on here will be experienced by every person affected by transandrophobia, but they WILL all be experienced by at least some transmasc people because that’s the perspective i’m speaking from. so yeah, the things i talk about are transmasc issues, and some are uniquely so

lastly, you genuinely need to examine why being associated with transmasculinity bothers you so much, because i assure you, you’d find that the reason is the very same transandromisia that you want to say “isn’t a transmasc issue”. i understand that the lack of inclusive language is frustrating, and you’re welcome to be frustrated, and you absolutely don’t have to identify as transmasc or consider yourself under that umbrella in any way, but there’s a level of anger in this message toward the mere idea of being associated with transmasculinity that’s really not a good look for you

if you want to actually have productive conversations about terminology, dial down the accusations and consider offering some alternatives (and if you don’t have any, don’t expect me to!), because coming into my inbox and acting like i’m personally oppressing you for associating the oppression i face as a transmasculine person with my transmasculinity on my personal blog isn’t going to get anyone anywhere

i’m sick and tired of people focusing more on every little flaw in our terminology than on the LITERAL OPPRESSION we’re trying to discuss

i, as a transmasc person, have every right to acknowledge that when i face these issues, it is because i am transmasc. i have every right to talk about them in that context. if you’d like to see these topics discussed within the context of your identity, you are more than welcome to make that content and i would happily share it because i’m not the monster you seem to think i am, i’m just a single human being doing the best i can with the terminology and experiences that i have knowledge of

#ask answered #anon hate

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unhinged-transmasc-man · 11 months ago

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Thank you, OP. No single group of trans people has the authority on what everyone goes through, and it’s harmful to everyone when that becomes the state of affairs. I think a large part of the problem is that trans people (and queer cis people) who’ve aren’t trans men will ask absolutely any other group of trans people (especially trans women) about anti-transmasculinity and transandrophobia before trans men, the group who’s actually affected by the issue. Trans men aren’t considered an automatic authority on transmisogyny, and there would be something deeply wrong with that if we were because the transmisogyny that affects trans women isn’t our primary experience (although it can overlap in some instances).

But for some reason, non-trans men will almost completely rely on trans women to explain transandrophobia (or if trans men are oppressed at all!) while completely erasing trans men, and without even considering the idea they should listen to the voices of people actually affected by this particular thing! Why does the group that isn’t trans men, get to decide the language that trans men use? Why is another group of trans people treated as the ultimate authority on us??? Why does another group of trans people get to decide how, why, and even IF trans men are oppressed for being trans men??

It’s genuinely so irritating. You’ll see shit from non-trans men like “I know nothing about this topic and I’ve never talked to a trans man who hasn’t been brainwashed into hating himself, but here’s some good resources on the problems with transandrophobia (and every single term we come up with) from trans women!” And then you’ll click on the “resources” and it’s someone with a username like “baeddal-icon-separatist” who absolutely hates trans men and is usually very nasty to any trans woman she doesn’t like as well. Or a more mild example, where they may not be that extreme but will still parrot anti-transmasc talking points that further entrench gender essentialism, and show they obviously do not value or care about trans men in any way. And then those SAME PEOPLE will claim that any trans man who says things like “hey, maybe listen to the people affected by these issues and stop blaming me for my own oppression, maybe treat me like a human being,” is actually a violent transmisogynist who’s also somehow “weaponizing femininity to hide being dangerous predatory men in order to speak over trans women,” which… sound familiar?

Trusting people like that over the ones who actually have personal experience shows a deeply embedded problem, simply that trans men are not valued or cared about. Much like many cis woman feminists, many trans people cannot acknowledge the lived complexity that transmasculinity embodies, because it completely throws off simple gender essentialist binaries and radfem rhetoric. This hurts everyone.

Not only does treating trans women as the ultimate authority on everything trans become a ridiculous amount of pressure that no one should have to deal with, it ends up erasing other voices and adding more of a burden to the hyper visibility that trans women already deal with. No one should be allowed to say “actually, this is why you’re oppressed. I know better than you, and you’re not actually oppressed.” People in different groups have different experiences, and dividing it into a strictly binary thing means that it ignores how transphobia has many different forms that affects all trans people in different and intersecting ways. It also ignores trans people who aren’t just trans women or trans men, because acknowledging other groups of trans people also makes harmful reductive rhetoric impossible to keep intact.

No more "is transandrophobia real" discourse please. It's so fucking exhausting. To quote the eminent scholar James Stephanie Sterling (@jimquisition ) "The gays can do whatever they want". Even if the people denying that transmisandry and transandrophobia are useful concepts are right, I don't really care - they're still being dicks about it.

Whatever marginal value is gained from a strictly accurate use of terms to describe oppression, there's no fucking universe in which it's worth this much ink and invective. Trans men suffer from transphobia. We can all agree on that, right? As an academic discussion, sure, it could be useful to tease out the ways that the transmasc and transfemme experience of transphobia, misogyny, and [insert preferred additional terms here] differs... But it's a curiosity of language, not a fundamental split in the community. Posting "transandrophobia isn't a real thing" isn't Praxis, you're just being a dick. I guarantee you that anyone earnestly discussing their experience with transandrophobia has a better understanding of patriarchy and transphobia than, like, 95% of the general population, on account of, y'know, being trans.

Don't like the term trans guys use to describe their experience of oppression? Okay. I don't care. I think it's much more important that we understand what they're going through than that we split semantic hairs over the number of privilege points that can dance on the head of a clit.

If you are starting shit about transandrophobia, I am 100% certain that you have bigger problems. How can I be so sure? Because we still live in a world where being any kind of trans or gender non-conforming makes you a target for marginalization and violence, and if you're starting shit about this, you are, statistically, a trans woman posting on Tumblr.com, a website that keeps randomly nuking trans people's blogs. We're on the same side here, and if semantics are dividing us or causing members of our community to feel mocked or unwelcome, we've completely lost sight of the larger goal - trans liberation, community, and joy. (And, let it not go merely implied, mind-blowing T4T sex).

Inspired by @yak-leather-whips posting on the subject.

#yeah #transandrophobia #transmisogyny #gender essentialism

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neworleansspecial · 4 years ago

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There’s been a push lately of including more trans characters and trans headcanons in fanwork lately, and that’s a good thing! However, most of the time, the content that gets promoted is by cis creators as opposed to transgender creators speaking from their real world experiences. While it’s important to boost trans voices, that’s not to say you can’t or shouldn’t write trans characters as a cis person.

Please note that this post is not an attack on cis writers! Far from it, in fact. I would say the majority of the time, cis people writing harmful content are doing it unintentionally- they probably just don’t realize that it’s a problem. The main goal here is to educate on what’s harmful, why it’s harmful, and what to do instead. In addition, some trans people, especially young trans people, can fall into these tropes too- after all, all of us were raised in the same cis-centric society.

That said, trans people can write about these tropes if they choose- we’re allowed to discuss our own experiences or those we identify with in a way cis authors can’t or shouldn’t because of our different relationship to gender. If you’re transgender and you write using these tropes, that’s okay! But remember to be self-critical, too; are you writing these tropes because you enjoy them or because they reflect your experiences, or are you writing them because that’s what cis people promote or it’s what you think trans narratives must be?

This particular post will focus on common tropes in writing about transgender characters, and why they’re harmful, as well as ways to counteract them in your writing. As this is a long post, it’s under a read more. Thank you to @jewishbucke for all his help and support.

For the purposes of this post, let’s lay out some basic definitions so that we’re all operating on the same playing field and understanding.

Cisgender (cis): Someone who identifies with the gender they were assigned at birth.

Transgender (trans): Someone whose gender differs from the one they were assigned at birth. Trans people may or may not experience one or more kinds of dysphoria. The level of dysphoria a trans person experiences is not relevant to whether or not they are transgender.

Dysphoria: The discomfort caused by a disconnect between someone’s gender and the one they were assigned at birth. Dysphoria can be physical (related to the body), emotional (related to their feelings/sexuality), or social (related to other’s perceptions of them).

Gender Expression: The way a person outwardly expresses themselves and their gender. This can include but is not limited to pronouns, clothes, hair style, and name.

Transmasculine: A transmasculine person is a trans person whose transition is aimed at becoming more masculine. Trans men are transmasculine people, but not all transmasculine people are trans men. Transmasculine people are transmisogyny exempt (TME), meaning they do not experience the specific combination of transphobia and misogyny that affects transfeminine people.

Transfeminine: A transfeminine person is a trans person whose transition is aimed at becoming more feminine. Trans women are transfeminine people, but not all transfeminine people are trans women. Transfeminine people are transmisogyny affected (TMA), meaning they experience the specific combination of transphobia and misogyny directed towards transfeminine people.

That being said, my point of view making this post is as a transmasculine TME person. I can offer my personal perspectives and experiences, but I cannot speak over or for the specific experiences unique to transfeminine people and trans women. If you are transfeminine or a trans woman, you are absolutely welcome to add on or correct me if in my words, I said something harmful to you and your community. We are all in this together and it is never my aim to overstep boundaries on something I do not understand. So, now that that’s out of the way, let’s get into tropes common in transgender narratives.

The Cis Savior

To start with, one of the most common tropes is the Cis Savior trope. This is commonly associated with the Trans/Cis trope, which I’ll elaborate more on later. The Cis Savior is often not the main character, but a supporter of a transgender main character. They can be a close friend, a family member, a love interest, or a coworker.

In this narrative, the trans person is engaging in behavior harmful to themselves, often related to methods of their transition. The most common one you may have seen or written is the transmasculine person binding unsafely. In that example, a transmasculine person binds (flattens) their chest with something such as ace bandages, which are extremely harmful and can damage their ribs. The Cis Savior finds out about this behavior, scolds the trans person, and purchases or gives them a safe alternative like a binder designed to safely compress breasts. While this example is probably the most common one, it’s not the only one. In general, the Cis Savior trope is when a cis person finds out that a trans person is hurting themselves in some way and rectifies it with superior knowledge of safe practices and/or better resources than the trans person has access to.

The reason this is harmful is because it perpetuates two common misconceptions: first, that all trans people hate their bodies to the point of willingly harming themselves to relieve this self-hatred, and second, that cis people know better about trans issues and bodies than trans people themselves. That’s not to say that neither of these things is impossible. Trans people are not a monolith and there probably are trans people like that, at least for some point of time in their lives. In some situations, especially in reference to trans kids or people who have recently realized they’re trans, it’s possible that they don’t know their behavior could be harmful, or that there are safer alternatives. The problem lies in the repeated framing of this trope as the only kind of trans person and the idea that they can and will be destructive towards themselves until a cis person who knows better comes along.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

A trans character behaves safely and explains how and why.

A trans character behaving unsafely is supported and educated by another trans person as opposed to a cis person (although this is something you probably shouldn’t be writing as a cis writer- some narratives are better left to us when it comes to the actual experiences of being transgender. Write about trans characters, not being trans!).

A trans character looking into transition on their own finds a supportive community.

The Gender-Non-Conforming Trans Person

The Gender-Non-Conforming (GNC) Trans Person is a trans character who presents excessively similar to the gender assigned at birth as opposed to their actual gender- the trans man who wears dresses and makeup, the trans woman who has a buzzcut and hates skirts, etc. Like is pointed out above in the “Cis Savior” trope, trans people like this can and do exist! Some trans people are GNC for various reasons- personal style, sexuality, being closeted, or just because they feel like it.

Narratives about the GNC Trans Person are very focused on the trans person presenting in a way that does not align with their gender, and is often No-Op (Does not have or want gender confirmation surgery) and No-HRT (Does not have or want hormone replacement therapy). It’s also often combined with the “Misgendered” trope. Trans characters in this trope seem to be extremely against presenting the way “expected” of their gender. For example, think of a transfeminine character not wanting to shave, be it their legs, armpits, face, or any other part of their body that cis women are expected to shave. This can lead to the character being mocked, dismissed, told they are not “really” trans, fetishized, and/or misgendered. These characters are often described as not passing as their gender.

This trope is harmful because it plays into the rhetoric that trans people are faking it or attention seeking. Like stated above, GNC trans people can and do exist. In fact, in my personal experience, a lot of trans people are GNC in some way or another. What is and isn’t considered conforming to gender is very strictly based on cisheterocentric ideas of gender presentation, and fails to take into account the intricacies of being transgender, especially if the person in question is also LGB. Trans people don’t have to conform to the restrictive societal views of what acceptable gender presentation is in order to be “really” trans. The stereotype of highly GNC trans people comes from the idea that they’re choosing to be transgender as a means of attention seeking, which simply isn’t true. Trans people didn’t choose to be trans- it’s just another part of them, like their eye color or the shape of their nose.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

A trans character having fun with gender presentation- why not shop from both sides of the store?

A trans character expressing gender-nonconformity in smaller ways.

Multiple trans characters with different gender presentations.

The Misgendered Trans Person

The Misgendered Trans Person is another common narrative in which a trans character is misgendered, whether it be on accident or on purpose, by a cis character. This can be a family member, an old friend, or a complete stranger. This trope also includes dead-naming, the act of referring to a person by a “dead” name that they no longer use as part of their transition.

When it comes to this trope, it’s usually with a narrative similar to the Cis Savior- the trans character is defended by a nearby cis one. More often than not, the Misgendered Trans Person trope is also combined frequently with the Forced Outing. In this story, a trans person is referred to by pronouns they do not use- in particular, those associated with their assigned gender at birth- as a means of causing angst and discomfort. They may also be called their dead name, also to create drama in the story. For example, consider a trans character hanging out with their family, and their mother uses the wrong pronouns for them, causing the character discomfort. This also includes narratives about a character realizing they’re trans, in which the character is referred to by the wrong pronouns and their dead name until they realize they are transgender. More to that point, as a cis author, you should never write a story about someone realizing they’re trans- as said above, write about transgender characters, not about being transgender.

This is harmful because it minimizes the very real pain and dysphoria that can be caused by misgendering or dead-naming. Changing names and pronouns are often the very first steps trans people take in their transition, and an instrumental part of their identities and journeys. Consider it in terms of your face. You have your own very specific face and it is an integral part of yourself and identity. Imagine someone repeatedly insisting that it’s different. They tell you that your eyes are a different color, or your jaw is shaped differently. It would be uncomfortable, and it’s wrong. Obviously this isn’t an exact or fair comparison, but names and pronouns are not just words when it comes to identity and trans narratives.

In terms of alternatives to this trope, there aren’t any.

There is no acceptable or reasonable way to write a character being misgendered or dead-named as a cis author. This is especially true when you take it upon yourself to make up a dead name for a character. No excuses, no arguments. Just don’t do it.

The Self-Hating Trans Person

The Self-Hating Trans Person trope is where a trans person’s dysphoria, be it physical, emotional, or social, is so extreme that they hate themselves and their bodies in an all-consuming way. This character is incapable of loving themselves and will often rely on a cis character for positivity, support, or self-esteem.

It would be impossible to acknowledge this trope without considering its ubiquity- while the description above is clear and severe, it overlaps often with many other tropes and less intense versions of it have a tendency to appear in most trans narratives. It’s associated with the trans character wanting to be cis (often worded as wanting to be “normal”), behaving in ways dangerous to themselves, and/or refusing to accept comfort. For example, a couple common uses of this trope are unsafe binding in transmasculine people, self harm or mutilation, and conversion therapy. The Self-Hating Trans Person narrative typically involves the character being aggressive toward people who question or try to combat their self hatred as well.

As touched upon in the Cis Savior trope, this is harmful because it perpetuates the stereotype that trans people must hate themselves, and be willing to go to extreme lengths because of it. Plenty of trans people don’t care that they’re trans, or even like that about themselves. The idea that being trans is something that should make a person hate themselves implies that it’s bad or wrong, which it isn’t. There are some trans people who do have these negative feelings- and of course deserve all the support they want and need- but plenty of trans people don’t feel that way. Trans people can and do love themselves and their bodies. Some trans people don’t have severe dysphoria, or may not really have any at all. Trans character’s narratives shouldn’t always be about suffering.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

A trans person who loves themselves and their trans body. (Be conscientious of straying into fetishistic territory, though- trans people are more than their bodies! When in doubt, ask.)

A trans person whose unhappiness is about something else, like losing a pet.

A trans person being loved and supported by their friends.

The Forced Outing

The Forced Outing trope usually goes hand-in-hand with the Misgendered Trans Person. This trope includes a trans person, either closeted (not out, pre-transition) or stealth (not out, post-transition) having their identity as transgender being revealed to one or more people without their permission.

When it comes to Forced Outings, this usually happens around a cis love-interest, and is typically followed by said love-interest assuring the trans character that this doesn’t matter to them. Another common response is the trans character becoming a victim of violence, such as a beating or sexual assault. For example, a trans person gets “caught changing” and is outed to the person who sees them, without their consent. The “caught changing” is another common way this trope is expressed, usually in a bedroom, bathroom or locker room. Sometimes there’s a happy ending. Sometimes there isn’t.

It should be clear why this trope is harmful- outing someone, be it as transgender or gay or any other LGBT+ identity, is not just disrespectful, but it is extremely dangerous. Just because you wouldn’t react poorly doesn’t mean others are the same. Outing a trans person in real life could get them hurt really badly, or even killed, on top of being outright rude and presumptuous. While this is fiction, it’s important to recognize that the media we consume affects the way we view real world situations. In your story, things may turn out fine, but the harsh reality is that in real life, it usually doesn’t. Trans people can and do get killed when they’re outed. Besides that, it follows along with the rhetoric that someone is “lying” if they don’t immediately disclose that they’re transgender. Trans people do not have to tell you that they’re trans, especially if they don’t know you.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternative:

A trans person already being out to and accepted by their loved ones.

The Predatory Trans Person

The Predatory Trans Person is usually same-gender-attracted (SGA) and/or transfeminine. They prey on cis people by coercing them into romantic or sexual relationships. Sometimes the trans person is considered predatory because they didn’t out themselves beforehand, or they use their being transgender as a means of guilting someone into having sex with them. It often overlaps with the PIV trope.

These narratives often revolve around sexual situations, and tend to focus on the cis partner as the main character. It prioritizes the comfort and feelings of the cis person. They’re uncomfortable, but can’t say it for fear of being seen as transphobic, or making their partner angry. For example, the cis character and trans character go on a few dates, and the trans character is presumed cis until they get to the bedroom. The trans character is pre-op and “convinces” the cis person to have sex with them anyway, despite them being uncomfortable. The most common form of this narrative is the transmisogynistic telling of a trans lesbian “coercing” a cis lesbian into sex.

This is harmful for two reasons- first and foremost, it paints trans people as being inherently predatory. It implies that trans people are only trans in order to have sex with those who otherwise wouldn’t be interested in them, reinforcing a long-standing transphobic notion that being transgender is related to sexual deviance and/or fetishes. Trans people are not inherently predatory. Trans people are not just rapists in disguise. Second of all, it makes assumptions about the genitals of trans people. Some are pre-op or no-op, of course, but not all of us are. Some trans people have had bottom surgery. Some trans men have penises, some have vaginas. Some trans women have vaginas, some have penises. And even those who haven’t had bottom (gender confirmation) surgery are still allowed and able to enjoy sex with the genitals they have, and use language regarding their genitals that they feel most comfortable with. There’s nothing wrong with that.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

A trans person having sex with another trans person.*

A trans person and a cis person having consensual sex.*

A trans person participating in nonsexual intimacy with their partner.

The Genderbend

The Genderbend actually refers to two common transphobic tropes; the first is headcanoning a cis character as being trans as the opposite gender. In other words, headcanoning a cis woman as a trans man, or a cis man as a trans woman.

It also refers to the common fandom trope of genderbending (also known as cisswap) to make a character of one gender into the “opposite,” typically associated with changing their physical characteristics to match this new assigned gender.

Narratives about the Genderbend trope rely on two primary assumptions. They assume every character is cis by default, and that certain characteristics are inherent to certain genders. The cis to trans version of this trope often focuses on a “coming out” story in which the character realizes they are trans and comes out to their loved ones before pursuing social and/or medical transitioning.

Cisswap, on the other hand, completely avoids the concept of being transgender, and instead makes the character into the “opposite” gender while they’re still cis. This often comes with physical changes, such as a character made into a girl getting wider hips and a more “feminine” facial structure, as is associated with cis women.

These narratives are harmful because of the assumptions they make about all characters/people being cis by default, and that these characters must have the common physical characteristics associated with that body type. The Genderbend in which a cis character is headcanoned as the “opposite” gender perpetuates a harmful rhetoric that trans people are really just their assigned gender at birth with a different presentation. It pushes the idea that transfeminine people are men in dresses and transmasculine people are self-hating women, both of which are misconceptions behind a lot of transphobic violence people face.

Cisswap relies on the idea that presentation or physical characteristics equate to gender, and that in order to be a gender, someone must look a certain way. This is not only harmful to trans people, but to any person who does not fit strict western binary beauty standards. It also fails to acknowledge that gender is not a simple binary of man or woman, but a spectrum that includes a multitude of identities. It should also be noted that the Cisswap trope relies on standards of gender and presentation that are intersexist, racist, and antisemitic as well. In general, the Cisswap trope is harmful to many marginalized groups of people, including but not limited to trans people.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

Headcanoning/writing a character as being trans while keeping their gender the same.

A character being nonbinary.

Creating new OCs who are trans.

The Bottom Trans Man/Top Trans Woman (PIV in Trans/Cis Relationships)

The PIV (Penis in Vagina Sex) Trope is exclusive to Trans/Cis relationships, and typically revolves around same gender relationships. In the PIV trope, a pre-op trans person has penis-in-vagina sex with their cis partner.

In these narratives, the focus is very heavy on the pre-op genitalia of the trans person in the relationship. It’s most commonly seen in m/m fanfiction, in which the trans man has vaginal sex with his cis partner, but also exists in f/f fic in which the trans woman engages in penetrative sex with her partner’s vagina. That’s not to say that trans people can’t or don’t enjoy sex this way, but in this particular trope, it is specifically written in a way that focuses in a fetishistic way on the genitals of trans people and makes broad assumptions about the bodies trans people have and the types of sex they enjoy. These narratives write all trans men as bottoms, and all trans women as tops.

The reason this is harmful is because of the way it generalizes trans people’s bodies, their relationships to them, and the way they engage in sex. Of course there are pre-op (and no-op) trans people who do enjoy PIV sex with their partners, but that does not mean all trans people have those bodies or have that sort of sex. There are trans men who are tops, and trans women who are bottoms. There are trans people who have dysphoria about their genitals, and those who don’t. Some do not or cannot enjoy PIV sex, and that’s okay! The other common issue with this trope is the way that trans people’s bodies are described. Trans people often use words for their bodies that you might consider “anatomically incorrect” because it’s the language that they feel most comfortable with.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

A trans person having sex with another trans person.*

A trans person having non-PIV sex with their partner.*

A trans person participating in nonsexual intimacy with their partner.

The Trans/Cis Relationship

Finally, the Trans/Cis Relationship trope- this trope isn’t inherently bad- there’s nothing wrong on its own with a romantic pairing being between a trans and cis character. The specific dynamic this is about is the trans character requiring reassurance, validation, or other kinds of support from their partner that a cis character would not ask for.

This trope is very commonly associated with Cis Savior and PIV tropes as well. It focuses on the trans person being in a relationship with a cis person who they depend on to “validate” their gender, help with their dysphoria, and protect them from transphobic behavior. It tends to infantilize trans people and make them into someone who cannot function outside their relationship with the cis character. For example, a transfeminine character relying on their boyfriend to make them feel “feminine” enough in their relationship. While Trans/Cis relationships are not inherently bad or wrong, it can be very easy to fall into a trap of writing the cis character as the Cis Savior, and often comes hand in hand with PIV sex when it’s a non-heterosexual couple.

The reason that this trope can be harmful is that it implies trans people are not enough on their own- that they need the support of a cis person who decides they’re “normal” in order to stay mentally well. It comes back often to the Cis Savior trope as well. Trans/Cis relationships written by cis authors may fall into these traps without meaning to. Beyond that, trans people can- and often do- date each other. In fact, some trans people are t4t, meaning that they choose to only date other trans people because it’s what’s most comfortable for them and may be safer depending on the situation they live in. Trans people do not enter relationships based on who will make them feel “valid,” but on who they love- the same as everyone else.

Instead of writing narratives like these, consider the following alternatives:

A trans person’s partner being trans as well. (Although, again, be mindful to write stories about trans characters, not about being trans!)

A trans person being emotionally supportive of their cis partner.

A trans person being single.

Thank you so much for sticking with me during this! I know it’s long, and that it’s not easy to read things that make you question things you’re used to, or to reevaluate things you may have written in the past. Once again, none of this was an attack! The goal of this series of posts is to inform and educate, rather than shame. People who make these mistakes often do it because they don’t know any better, or haven’t been exposed to anything besides these tropes. I encourage you to look at what other trans people have said about portrayals, and when writing trans characters, look for someone who would be willing to beta for you if you’re unsure. When in doubt, ask. And remember- write about trans characters, not about being trans! There are certain nuances to being transgender that, as a cis person, you simply don’t have the background or experiences to write on, and that’s okay! We’re all learning and growing together.

*If you absolutely want to write sex scenes involving trans people, the best thing to do is to get a trans beta- and listen to them- as well as use language that may not be what you consider anatomically correct. Trans people may call their genitals by words that don’t “match” for their own comfort, and using language that focuses on pre-op genitalia can come across and/or be fetishistic. Be mindful and respectful when writing these scenes.

#transgender #writeblr #writingtrans #trans #tusera #emwrite

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lilshotgun · 4 years ago

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So here's why i've been inactive for the past couple months on tumblr:

As many of you know, I've been a fairly avid content creator for the warrior nun fandom creating a ton of content for free. I joined a Warrior Nun discord server named Future Warrior Nuns (which is a ridiculous name considering in the show Ava says there will be no more warrior nuns but that's besides the point) and the treatment I received there was amazing. At the beginning. I spoke up about racism and injustices within the community because you cannot escape it anywhere unfortunately and I believed I'd found a community that would protect me and be there for me if i was ever faced with racism or hate.

For clarity, anyone in blue is a moderator. As you go on to read this their usernames and profile images might change so I’ll clarify who is who. I’ll only be using the names I’ve been presented with and only the ones that are most relevant to the situation.

Fiesta (white American cis woman) aka Doesn't Kelly, Witch Rhyme

Taz (white Australian cis woman)

Milan (a very sheltered American transmasculine poc whos uncomfortable talking about racism because they've never had to deal with it) aka Who The Fuck Is Kelly

Rory (white Australian cis woman) aka Stronger Kelly

But after a while, things slowly started to change. It was subtle and if you hadn't been there from the beginning, you wouldn't have noticed. It started with the moderators spending less time in the server because they had made many of their own servers and spent far more time over there. Which is understandable when you’re a group of friends that all have a common purpose. But the lack of leadership was palpable. I had to sometimes direct fellow server members to proper channels or do a few other things that were supposed to be things that the moderators were supposed to take care of and their lack of care for the server was becoming more relevant. If you were in their little group of friends or kissed their ass then they wouldn't target you unnecessarily.

Exactly three weeks later, (and only one week after my birthday in which everyone was super sweet and nice to me) the love and friendship they claimed to have for me vanished completely. For context, people in positions of power, especially in a server, should be people you can come to if you ever have an issue with anything or anyone. They should also be people that can come to terms with admitting their behavior was incorrect when being told so. So here is what happened:

I have always been open about being a transmasculine person of color on all my platforms, and if you know me on any platform you know that. The behavior shown here between me and the moderators was absolutely appalling to me. They pushed my voice aside and only acknowledged Narcissa, a cis white woman, who was agreeing and saying the same things i had because i had asked her in private to help me out because i felt it was unfair that two server moderators were coming at me so aggressively.

As you can see from the screenshots, they claimed that I attacked Fiesta when i was simply pointing out that her behavior was hypocritical and unfair especially because she is in a position of power and that's something people of power should be aware of.

I was the only one brave enough to say what everyone was thinking. And that's something I have always taken pride in. Speaking up for others when they are too scared to do so themselves. And that was shown through multiple people coming into my dms to tell me they either felt the same way I did or they felt the way I was treated in the conversation above was unfair. This next screenshot is from a private message from a former manager.

Narcissa (white cis woman) received a few apologies from the server managers privately, yet my dms stayed vacant. At this point, they made a “public apology” towards everyone in the server which I forgot to screenshot, and not a single server manager reached out to me in private. But they did share these in the server for everyone to see:

They then opened an anonymous feedback form for us to share if we had any issues privately, which of course, I did, and so I filled it out saying “wheres my fucking apology ~king” so they would know exactly who the response was coming from. I was angry and hurt that they treated me the way they did. I regretted wording it like that almost instantly after sending it. But the deed was done and it was unchangeable. And not too long after, this was posted publicly in the server feedback channel so that everyone in the server could see:

Whether I shared that it was from me or not, she violated the server moderators unanimous statement saying that everything posted in the feedback form would stay anonymous and made my response public using the excuse that me sharing my name made it okay for her to show it to everyone. I was also being informed by other people I’m friends with that the forms that were being submitted were not staying anonymous and that they were being shared from other moderators privately in other peoples' dms.

I stuck around in the server because the people that I had formed friendships with were there and they were special to me and I wanted to be able to talk to them still in spite of everything that had happened to me up until this point. I was much more subdued at this point, I was posting less art and as you noticed I practically disappeared from twitter as well.

My love for Warrior Nun was decreasing rapidly because the environment had become so toxic and unwelcoming that I felt scared to say much in the server in fear of being banned after seeing one of my trans poc friends banned for saying hi to another member. They had been looking for a reason to ban him for being on my side instead of theirs and apparently found the “perfect” excuse. They deleted his messages and claimed in their private admin channel that he had harassed someone in the server without screenshotting the false evidence first. How do I know this? Because I had a person on the team that valued me as a person instead of as a content creator and what I could give to the server.

I proceeded to curate the server for what fit me best, considering the ridiculous number of channels they created that had nothing to do with the show at this point. And there was an option for members to do that so I used the tools they had provided with and opted out of channels I no longer wanted to see. I consolidated it down to 35 out of 66 channels because some of them had no opt out option. And still, it was way more channels than I'd prefer to be in. I narrowed it down to only ships I actually cared about instead of having a bunch of channels I was never gonna read or say things in. And that's when the manager that cared about us provided me with these telling screenshots.

Why put me in “jail” over removing some roles? It may not have been explicit, but the internalized racism of putting a person of color in “jail” for curating what they wanted from a server is frankly off putting to say the least. "Implicit racism includes unconscious biases, expectations, or tendencies that exist within an individual, regardless of ill-will or any self-aware prejudices."

And what does carl bot do exactly? It logs EVERYTHING. But only if that feature is enabled. And clearly, in Future Warrior Nuns, it is.

They didn’t care about me and didn’t care that I was a consistent content creator. For lack of better words, I was one of the biggest reasons the actual part of the server that was dedicated to the show was constantly active and once I became quiet, along with a few other content creators I talked with, the activity decreased immensely. I said things here and there but that was about it. Until I was looking through their emotes. I noticed that they had trans, gay, demi, bi, aro, and ace heart emotes but the lesbian one wasnt there. Which was honestly surprising considering how much of the fandom identifies as lesbian. So I asked for it to be added and after it was, so many people were super happy because of it.

One day later i asked for more Mary emotes because they hadn’t completely brushed me off after requesting for the lesbian pride one. I noticed that Ava, the white character, had 72 animated and still emotes at the time while Mary, the black character, only had 18. And only 4 out of those were positive emotes. Here's that conversation:

I offered up my services to create Mary emotes for them considering I was an artist and content creator and it would be no issue for me at all to contribute but they declined, saying they were working on some themselves and that they would eventually add them to the server. The ones that they had created all looked terrible. They didn't know how to color correct her skin so that it wouldn't look ashy because of the filters used in the show and instead of asking for help from me, an artist of color, they simply did their own thing. And from 18 emotes, it went up to a dazzling 24.

Needless to say, the racism they claimed not to have was pretty evident at this point. It was shockingly clear that they didn’t care as much about the characters of color than they did for the white and white passing ones. After this entire debacle I didn't even bother trying to ask for more emotes for Lilith considering how warmly I was welcomed with asking for more Mary emotes.

A little less than two months after the initial incident, I still hadn’t been contacted by anyone on the admin team about absolutely anything in private. It wasn’t until people asked Fiesta if she had reached out to me or even bothered with an apology before she sent me this:

The “apology” was worthless. Too much time had passed since I was publicly humiliated and portrayed as the evil transmasculine person of color to them, and only a select few people interacted with me. I felt completely shut out because of how the admin team handled a difference of opinion. Instead of correcting themselves and admitting they were wrong, they doubled down on the intimidation and bullying by changing their rules so that they could find excuses to ban or punish anyone they felt was not on their side.

At this point, my grades were heavily declining. I was already struggling with keeping up with everything on my own due to covid and my mental disabilities. Being a victim of this racist behavior made everything worse. I couldn’t get out of bed, I was barely eating a meal a day because I had no motivation to work so I had little to no money to buy myself food. I was starving most days. And I didn’t ask my mom for help because I felt everything was my fault and that I really was in the wrong and shouldn't have said anything even though looking back at it I wasn't wrong for what I said. I had also been informed that my dad died because of covid and because of all of this stress and depression I had officially failed my classes.

This is really difficult for me to say because I’m a very private person and I hate asking for help or sharing anything about my private life, but for you to understand everything that was happening to me at the time, this is stuff you unfortunately need to know.

There’s many more things that I could say about this server but this thread is already long enough as it is and it was hard enough to write this all down. But behind closed doors, the admin team had some of the nastiest attitudes and behaviors you could’ve seen. Had they realized we had someone on their team that actually valued us and others as people, they probably would have kept their blatant ignorance and dislike towards server members hidden better. But white people like oppressing others when they know they can get away with it and this is just another sad unfortunate example that cost me and my fellow friends of color some heavy emotional and psychological damage. They did wrong and refused to acknowledge it and instead tried to find a way to ban us for not having the hivemind that they so desperately want to control everyone with. If you want to see for yourself, feel free to find a link to a discord server named Future Warrior Nuns. If you look back through their channels, you’ll find most of these conversations either gone or have many messages missing. I hope my story will help understand why I’ve been gone from tumblr for so long and i hope something like this never happens to you.

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transgenderteensurvivalguide · 4 years ago

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Why is it that people seem to always support trans women more than trans men?

Lee says:

If you’re part of an online forum community that is primarily transfeminine, for example, then there’s going to be a lot of resources for transfeminine people.

But if you’re part of an online forum community that is primarily transmasculine, for example, then there’s going to be a lot of resources for transmasculine people.

And just as there are particular online spaces and communities that tend to be predominated by a certain group, there are also IRL ones that are primarily transmasculine or primarily transfeminine even if they are not explicitly defined as such.

If you feel like you aren’t being supported enough in the space you’re currently in, see if you can find a community that does focus around the resources you’re looking for!

As an example- you may have noticed that the transmasculine post-op community on Tumblr is pretty small. There definitely are multiple bloggers out there, and I think I actually follow all of them, but this isn’t really a thriving hub of phalloplasty information or support, or a large community of transmasculine folks who are post-op and post-transition (Thanks, Tumblr NSFW ban!).

So instead, I seek out the spaces where the community I want to be a part of actually is gathering. Now I’m part of many different transmasculine lower surgery groups on Facebook (over 20 of em lol), I’ve attended IRL transmasculine lower surgery support group meetings in person, and now I’m in two different Zoom-based transmasculine bottom surgery support groups.

I also believe that if you want to see more of a particular thing, you should be a part of putting that thing out there! So I still maintain my transition sideblog here on Tumblr, where I will eventually document my phallo when I get stage 1 in May. And that’s how I support the transmasculine community, in my own way. So if you want to see more supportive posts for transmasculine folks, start typing!

We also have to remember that uplifting transfeminine doesn’t automatically occur at the expense of support for transmasculine people. We aren’t trying to tear each other down, so being resentful of the transfeminine community for the people who support them isn’t a good look. Transfeminine people can never have “too much” support!

I do think that there are certain spaces online that tend to focus on positivity and support for transfeminine folks, and there’s nothing wrong with that- again, yes, transfeminine people do deserve support! Transfeminine people often face the brunt of society’s violent transphobia, and it’s important that we recognize the way that trans women specifically are targeted more than other groups are.

Trans women are often hypervisible and a lot of transphobic movements are aimed at them as a result; bathroom bills because transphobes don’t want “men” in women’s bathrooms, banning trans athletes because transphobes don’t want “men” to take over women’s teams, trans people being banned from gendered homeless shelters because transphobes don’t want “men” to sleep in the same room as women, and so on. When you listen to any of these politicians who support these gross things, you’ll hear them constantly talk about the “danger” that trans women pose (while insisting on gendering them as “men” and refusing to recognize that they’re even women). Trans men aren’t even an afterthought.

Being culturally hypervisible in the media means you’re the target of a lot of hate and the recipient of a lot of support, which is all happening at the same time. On the other hand, the transmasculine community at large is less visible in the media which means we often slip under the radar as a community which of course does tie into the erasure of the community. Transmasculine people more often slip under the radar on a personal level too, because many transmasculine people are able to pass by at least 5 years on testosterone and many choose to go stealth as soon as they’re able to.

That doesn’t mean that all transmasculine people can pass or want to pass, or that transmasculine people don’t face transphobia and violence either, or that the vitriol targeting trans women doesn’t invalidate us as well or affect our rights too, or that we shouldn’t get to share our experiences or ask for support.

We can and should talk about transmasculine people’s experiences as well, and transmasculine voices shouldn’t be erased. Studies have shown that suicide attempt rate for trans boys is approximately 20.9% higher than it is for trans girls, for example, and there are many similar statistics showing that trans men struggle in many ways and face a lot of discrimination, which of course deserves acknowledgement.

Experiencing discrimination and subsequent mental health struggles isn’t something that should be glossed over, yet there are many pseduo-progressive folks in the LGBTQ/feminist communities whose posts can sometimes come across as “men are bad and trans men are men so they’re bad!” When you point out that there are plenty of marginalized men out there who need support, people are quick to say “Well, I’ll support you for being trans but I don’t need to support you because you’re a man since men have privilege and therefore perpetuate oppression!” But in the case of trans men, supporting someone for being trans is the same thing as supporting them in being a man, you can’t separate the two.

And you can spend all day talking about in what situations transmasculine people have access to male privilege and in what conditions the privilege applies and so on, but that is a separate conversation from the point here, which is everyone deserves support and that includes trans men (and gay men, and disabled men, and Black men, and Indigenous men, and Asian men, and so on).

Things like body-shaming men for having neckbeards or small penises is seen as okay even though body-shaming women for having body hair or having small breasts is recognized as misogynistic. Sometimes folks respond by saying something like “you can’t oppress your oppressor” which... makes no sense in this context. Making people feel that their bodies are bad goes against the whole body-positive feminist movement, and that’s true no matter which people you think you’re targeting.

It’s also pretty obvious that being a man doesn’t inherently make you a bad person, but a lot of the hate and anger directed at men (whether it’s posted as a joke or said seriously by someone who went through trauma) can make it difficult for trans men to recognize that they’re men because they don’t want to become the thing everyone hates.

So how do we navigate allowing marginalized people to vent about groups who have privilege without causing collateral damage to other oppressed people?

Some people have tried to solve it by saying “I hate only cis men, not trans men!” but then of course you’ve created a new issue which is the arbitrary distinguishment between a cis man and a trans man. A trans man can be just as misogynistic as a cis man, and being trans doesn’t mean anything about who you are as a person, all it says is something about the gender you were assigned when you were born.

When you say that you only hate cis men, you’re implying that you don’t hate trans men because you think they’re different than cis men in some way in their thoughts/behavior/actions which is a transphobic assumption.

Or you’re saying you know that trans men and cis men can be identical in their thoughts/behavior/actions because they’re all men, so the reason you don’t hate trans men is ... ?? because they had certain genitals at birth (which they may not have anymore) ?? And that’s also transphobic because it’s saying you hate people solely because of their bodies which they can’t always control or change and implies having a particular type of body is morally wrong somehow or that your body makes you a bad person.

When someone makes a point of telling a trans man that they hate men, it’s sometimes a deliberate transphobic tactic used to make the person feel like having a male gender identity is inherently bad and makes you bad because it’s who you are, so the only way to become a good person is to not be a man which means not being transgender. And this is some how TERFs try and convince trans teens who were AFAB to re-identify as women instead of embracing being men. It’s hard to embrace being something that people have told you is problematic so people try to repress their feelings and ignore who they are.

Yet folks who don’t say “I hate all men” and instead say “the patriarchy sucks but it’s okay to be a man and not all men are bad” have found that statement controversial too.

Even that phrase, “not all men,” is a red flag because it’s primarily used by the “men’s rights” folks who try and defend their misogyny and push their anti-feminist agenda while denying the ways that they personally benefit from the system. All men benefit from the system of patriarchy if they are recognized as men by the system, but that doesn’t mean every individual man is personally responsible for actively perpetuating oppression or that every man is a bad person.

So when someone points out the ways that men are taught to hate themselves by people who are constantly bashing on men in hurtful ways, or the struggles that men face (even if they aren’t struggles unique to men), there are people who just freak out because they think that acknowledging this is in some way trying to say that men can’t be oppressors, or that pointing it out is somehow delegitimizing women’s experiences or part of a pushback against women’s rights because the MRAs have tried to stake a claim over the entire topic.

So any nuanced conversation about ways that we actually can support men and break down oppression and uplift marginalized folks has been silenced because this toxic group has dominated the conversation and nobody wants to accidentally seem like they support those things, so they don’t support anything that focuses on men at all.

Similarly, when someone posts about something that affects trans men people (usually cis people TBH) often will respond with “trans women have it worse with that issue, and everything else too!” which isn’t a helpful response because while it’s important to recognize the way that trans women face multiple axes of oppression, uplifting trans women in a way that makes it impossible for another marginalized group to have a conversation doesn’t help anyone. It’s okay for some posts to not be about or for trans women without starting to play the Oppression Olympics games because transmasculine people also need support and space and allowing transmasculine people to talk about their experiences doesn’t mean that transfeminine people are being ignored.

All that being said, I would argue that people definitely don’t always support trans women more than trans men, and I wouldn’t even say that people usually do so. It very much depends on the space you’re in. While I do believe that there are a lot of positivity/supportive posts about trans women on Tumblr, this is, in many ways, a direct reaction to counter the large volume of hate that’s also actively being directed at trans women on Tumblr. And while there are plenty of “love trans women!” posts, there is also an issue with the lack of practical resources and material support for trans women because most of the content does not go beyond the surface level heart-emoji type post.

So in what I’ve noticed on Tumblr specifically (as this varies depending on the platform you’re using and the space you’re in), there can be more vocal (aka performative) support for trans women but it mostly tends to focus on their identities saying they’re valid women and so on but doesn’t give them much information or material support or anything else that I would deem a useful resource, whereas there might be less support for trans men in terms of “gender identity positivity for being male” but there’s more practical resources and information that they can use to aid in their transition.

Again, whatever you do, don’t complain that transfeminine people have too much support- that’s not the same thing as saying that you’d like more support for trans men struggling with X issue.

And yes, while we do have many things in common, there are some differences in the struggles the community faces and the experiences we have, and it’s okay to want to talk with other folks who are going through the same thing. That doesn’t mean that you don’t care about transfeminine people or that you think they should have a smaller platform or something, it just means you’d like support for your identity and transition (which is wholly unrelated to how much support there is or isn’t available for them).

So if you are looking for more support for trans men and feel like you aren’t getting what you need in the online or IRL spaces you’re currently moving in, you should try finding the spaces that are meant to be supportive communities for trans men and join them, whether they’re specific blogs, Facebook groups, Discord servers, or in-person/on-Zoom support groups, and also do what you can to create the support you want to see for your community!

#Lee says #not really sure what to tag this as #transphobia #discourse #suicide m #Anonymous #trans #transgender #nonbinary #lgbtq #lgbt #transgender teen survival guide #transgenderteensurvivalguide #TTSG

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euniexenoblade · 5 months ago

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"Listen if you are going to chop up single sentences from my response and ignore the rest then I don’t know how we could possible have a productive conversation."

Because I am quoting you. I am directly replying to you. "If you reply to specific things how can I have a conversation" I have adhd and I need to break things up sometimes, especially when there are multiple things said within one paragraph. It is not a big deal, it doesn't decontextualize what you've said.

"For example, you chose to chop out this sentence 'Terfs want ALL of us dead or detransitioned and in hiding' so you could say that I was rejecting the idea that terfs want trans women dead."

I left that line out because I had already addressed it in what i did quote reply to. Terfs do not want transfems hiding or destransitioned, they want us dead. My point is that the hiding bit is completely unrelatable and furthers my original point in my OP, that the person making that comparison is offensive and misogynistic.

"You also do not understand what I am saying. When I say “failed man” and “failed woman.” I’m saying that we are treated as subhuman because under a strict bioessentialist patriarchy, to “fail” at your gender is to lose your “right” to humanity. We are treated as subhumans who need to be eradicated BECAUSE we “failed” at fitting our assigned gender roles."

You and I have a very different idea of what defines personhood. A "failed man" is still a man. A "failed woman" is still a woman. It doesn't imply subhuman, and the treatment one would receive is still that of a man/woman needed to be beat into shape. I do not interpret being a person as being a man or a woman. This really, really makes me feel that you and I have very different experiences.

"As for your comment about trans men having it better, I don’t know what to tell you ma’am. I’m not trying to suggest that trans women aren’t more likely to face hate crimes. You are and it’s fucking horrific. I will always strive to support trans women in their fight against transmisogynistic violence. All I am asking is that you don’t use a bastardized version of gender-affirmation to deny my lived experience."

I have never once denied your "lived experience," the opposite has happened. You have tried using all these topics to talk over me about a topic I am visibly more educated about. And I have never once affirmed your gender. Yall keep saying that. "Trans men are men" is just true. Not gender affirmation. I am stating basic feminism 101 and transphobia 101. As I said a billion posts up, if that's gender affirmation to you, I'm really sorry you have not been shown any true love as a trans person.

"entire response thread before this point has been INSISTENT that trans men experience male privilege,"

No, I haven't. This is what I mean when I say youre making up someone to be mad at.

"that we aren’t targeted for violence by terfs"

I have never said this. Not once. Screencap where you think I said this and I'll explain what it actually says.

"and that there’s nothing wrong with the blanket statement that because transmasculine people identify as “men” (you know… other than the large number of us who don’t)"

I mean, I'm talking about men, specifically. When I talk about the male privilege stuff, I have specifically said men. I'm not implying all transmascs are "men" cuz that's wrong and the topic of "transmasc" as a whole class having male privilege is murky and not something I actually care to argue about, for or against. You will find I only used the term "transmasc" when talking about terfs, not male privilege. You will find I very consistently said men, until you and the other guy started saying transmasc. You will find that this is the case because literally none of this is relevant to my OP, I did not bring up any of this.

"THAT is my primary issue with your take."

Then you have no issue with my take. Because I didn't say that.

"The fact that I am like 95% sure that even if you haven’t read Judith Butler"

I have, and as someone else explained on the post in detail, you are wrong and are misrepresenting Judith Butler.

Stop making up a woman to be mad at.

Do these weirdos think that when terfs talk about "males" they're talking about trans men? When a terf talks about males, they are exclusively talking about trans women. They are misgendering us as means to deny us our womanhood. "Trans men are men and have male privilege" does not have remotely the same violence. There's no misgendering in it. Trans men are men.

This just annoys me cuz the two examples are absolutely nothing alike, and they both are not bio essentialist. Even if you think trans men are denied access of male privilege, the statement that trans men benefit from patriarchy has no violence to it, no misgendering, it truly has no fangs. It's just a statement about trans men being men and likely having male privilege. It's not bio essentialist cuz it genders trans men how they identify.

The former is incredibly violent, misgendering, and is bio essentialist.

Is this person trying to say "TIMs are males" is about trans men? Cuz it's not. Is this person trying to say trans men actually aren't men? Cuz they are. Is this person trying to claim that trans women on Tumblr dot com saying "trans men are men, therefore they benefit from patriarchy" is the same as a hate group, that has a tangible real world grip on society, and is oppressing the trans community, saying "trans women are male?" God I hope not.

#long post #very long post #transmisogyny #thegenderienvy

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