#will I put this under transandrophobia: yes.

[demuredeadbeat]

Why tf are ftm chasers/-oriented posts usually just detrans fakeboy girl shit when mtf chasers are all about girlcock and womandick. Like maybe I'd be more down for fetishization if it was actual fucking fetishization of my actual fucking identity and not just a different way to say you like another type of woman.

[nothorses]

I think one of the ways that tranandrophobia seems to distinguish itself from the other forms of oppression it is connected to is in the way it attempts to convince you it is indistinguishable and that transmascs are always just collateral damage to everyone else's "real" problems.

One example is the very blatent tirf claim that transphobia on its own isn't real, that it is all misdirected transmisogyny, and that transmascs only experience oppression due to our association with transfemmes.

But there is also the insistence that anti abortion laws and similar things are targeted at cis women and therefore are "women's issues" - transmascs shouldn't complain about being excluded because it "isn't about us". Same with homophobia and butchphobia. Even the terf talking point that they are just protecting "little cis girls" from making irreversible mistakes pretends that actual the transmascs being harmed is just an accident and not the goal.

Trying to talk about transandrophobia is a constant stream of "It's just transphobia. It's just misogyny. No, you can't call your experiences misogyny because that isn't about you. You can't call yourself a lesbian or a butch or compare your oppression to lesbophobia. It isn't about you. Yes, terfs hurt you, but you aren't their main target. This isn't about you. Yes, you need abortions and experience medical misogyny, but you can't talk about it because this isn't about you. You were sexually assaulted because of misdirecred misogyny. Don't make it about you. You've never contributed to the history of gay men, or lesbians, or the trans community. It isn't about you. Those cross dressers weren't trans. Stop trying to make women's history about you. You can't reclaim cunt or faggot or dyke because those words aren't about you. I don't care how many times you've been called a tranny. That word isn't about you. Why must you make everything about you?"

Because sure, transmascs exist, and we might be impacted by everyone else's oppression, but it is always thought of as a theoretical consequence of what is really going on, if it is thought of at all. Transmascs are not considered to be oppressed in our own right.

This idea gives the lawmakers plausible deniability, allies an excuse to ignore us, and feeds into transmasc erasure. If we are never the actual target to begin with, then clearly, we can't be uniquely targeted. The law makers don't need to be held accountable for their transandrophobia because it isn't like they are trying to hurt transmascs, right? We need to let the real victims speak, the ones being targeted on purpose.

Nobody ever sees the way it all piles up, and even if they do, they think "well it's just an accident, right? If we fix the main problem, then this fringe issue will go away on its own" without ever considering that transandrophobia isn't as rare, fringe, or accidental as society wants it to appear and that actual effort needs to be put into dismantling it.

It isn't that they actually believe that transandrophobia isn't real. It's that they just don't believe it is about transmascs. Because even if we are the common denominator, we are still just collateral damage and could not possibly have anything of value to say. Because as collateral damage, our issues are never our own and thus never need to be discussed on our own terms.

100%. And I think this is exactly what this sort of cycle of erasure depends on.

We are erased, our problems are erased, and our oppression is erased, which means it's easy for people to ignore us, our problems, and our oppression. There's so little evidence, so few people talking about it, and they never really see or hear anyone name us in this violence, so surely, it isn't about us at all! It must be about the people they know about already, the problems they know about, and the ones who are always readily named in these conversations.

If we're speaking up, there's no reason to believe us; if anything, we come under scrutiny for trying to talk about these issues nobody else can see. We must be crazy, hysterical, whiny and overdramatic, or perhaps malicious. We're stealing attention, stealing space, and stealing help. We might be victims, but we are incidental and unworthy victims.

And ignoring us, our problems, and our oppression means we continue to be erased. Which makes it easier to ignore us, and erase us, and easier to perpetuate violence against us. And so on.

It's understandable, in a way, for people to ignore us; most people don't know about any of this in the first place, and when they do, they're not inclined to take any of it seriously. Even if they do see convincing evidence that our problems are real and worth talking about, it's easy for that to be a one-off that they eventually forget about. Everyone else is talking about everything else, so we sort of fade away.

It's not their fault; they're not trying to ignore us. They just haven't learned to recognize violence against us, and they just don't seek us out, and can they really be blamed for that? Can they really be blamed for the violence that continues because they and others don't see or try to stop it? We're so hard to find in the first place. You know, because we've been so thoroughly erased.

There are a lot of people who've been fighting this for a long time, and even more we don't-- and probably won't-- ever know about, who've been fighting for even longer. I think it's getting better; the organized backlash against us is, imo, a sign that our reach is getting stronger and wider. But it's a hard cycle to break.

[transmascpetewentz]

i meant wrapped not trapped, I do not blame you for misunderstanding me, thats entirely my fault

I think you seem to believe that my issue with transandrophobia as a label is the idea that trans men face oppression (which they do), when instead its the idea that the oppression transmasculine people face is something completely unique to them, instead of being the underlying current of tranphobia

I literally spent the first paragraph explaining my issues with the *concept* of it before segawaying into my issue with it as a conterpart to transmisogyny due to them not sharing an underlying ideological framework

And to touch on some of doberbutts points, trans women are also correctively raped and have suicide rates, and the issue of access to abortion is for every person with a vagina, not just trans men

A frustrating thing that he does there is that instead of giving a counterargument to one of my points (what i personally believe to be a misnomer about the purpose of the label of transmisogyny, were you (nonspecific) view it as a threat to the validity of the trauma we face, and not as a way to describe their own, and what others believe to be just attention seeking) is to bring up severe (often sexual) trauma as a way to put a landmine on that specific point, because any attempt to explain why they are wrong becomes a personal attack on the traumatized parties

this got quite long, so response under the cut. @doberbutts this is the same anon you responded to (by reblogging my post) earlier.

ok

no form of violence experienced under an oppressive system is truly "unique" in that i don't think there are any experiences of violence or oppression that apply to only one specific group, but the motivations behind the violence can differ depending on the demographic it's being done to. i do not think that any specific example of transandrophobia is something that no one who isn't transmasc has experienced, but transandrophobia is the oppression specifically targeting transmascs. i and doberbutts have already pointed out how this works, so i don't feel the need to reiterate that.

you do not understand the concept of transandrophobia, and you regularly demonstrate that your understanding is surface-level and comes from people who have an interest in making it seem less credible. instead of asking people who theorize about anti-transmasculinity (including me and doberbutts!!!) you immediately become hostile and make many incorrect assumptions about our beliefs. i find this highly disrespectful and encourage you to stop getting all of your information about transandrophobia from people who misrepresent it to argue against the concept of anti-transmasculinity.

yes, abortion access is something that everyone who can get pregnant has to deal with, but trans men face unique discrimination wrt abortion access and access to reproductive healthcare that trans women do not. this is because there is a fundamental misogyny component to anti-transmasculinity that you and others who deny it because "it's transmisogynistic!!!" seem to have a failure to grasp. transandrophobia is transphobia, misogyny, homophobia, and the specific modifier of maleness on this oppression all at once. i wish there was a better word for how maleness adds to and modifies oppression in an intersectional way that wasn't associated with mras, but alas there is none that i am aware of. also: anti-transmasculinity never says or implies that trans women don't face some of the issues that trans men do! you are treating this like a pissing contest for who has it worse and that is an attitude i'll need you to drop.

denying transandrophobia is a sentiment that is directly hostile to transmasc survivors of sexual assault, abuse, hate crimes and other things that arise from living under a patriarchy that systemically excludes you from both the male and female classes. the reason why we use this rhetoric is because these types of things arise from the specific intersection that trans men face, and how that can further intersect with sexuality. you are simply making up what we believe on the spot and not actually listening. if you want to come off anon and have a conversation in dms, i'd be willing.

talking to people like you is frustrating because you make these claims about what transandrophobia theory is as if we're a monolith or a homogenous group instead of hundreds of trans men on tumblr dot com all contributing to a larger conversation. no matter how much you claim to be in good faith, you continue to disregard actual transandrophobia theory in favor of some bastardized version you got from someone with "white tme/tma" in their bio. i hope you take this criticism and reflect on how you may be wrong.

[velvetvexations]

That thread hurts, man. I’m nonbinary but I still had my mom try to talk me out of it too. She just kept saying over and over again “you’re just a tomboy going through a phase, you’ll grow out of it” even though I’ve been openly nonbinary for 8 years now.

Like, I get that cis people will suggest to binary trans people that they could just be nonbinary instead, and yes that’s transmisogyny/transandrophobia but it’s also exorsexism. We’re the ones who get thrown under the bus as the least acceptable “alternative” to being trans. It’s not because nonbinary people are more accepted than binary trans people, it’s actually because we’re less accepted, and thus it’s easier to not take us seriously.

They want trans people to be cis more than anything, but they’re willing to settle for all queer people being nice and easy to disregard, and it’s easier to disregard a nonbinary person than a binary trans person because we’re less accepted. The fact that we’re seen as a niche, made up identity and/or a stepping stone to being binary trans makes us easier to write off and treat poorly and be hateful towards with no consequences. That’s why bigots will pretend to be ok with us in order to deny binary trans people their identities.

I'm really happy to platform asks like these because they put it in far better words than I ever could.

[cardentist]

well ! I'm making this post to make a point.

for context, I made this post [Link] earlier, wherein I spoke first about my frustrations with cis people not considering the trans perspective, and Second about my frustrations with me doing so immediately being framed as an attack on trans women specifically Because my frustrations were tied to me being a trans man.

(I do Also consider myself trans fem, but that wasn't particularly relevant to the original post, so I didn't mention it at the time).

this was then followed by an interaction in dms wherein the quiet part was spoken out loud.

1: that trans men Are Not equal to trans women, and that it is taken as an attack on trans women to present them as such (it is not).

2: that the idea that any individual trans man could face harm within the trans community from any other individual is, itself, transmisogynistic because it implies that trans women are capable of oppressing trans men (it does not).

3: that it is Impossible for any individual trans woman to ever speak over any individual trans man, because trans women are women and trans men are men (it is not).

4: that trans women possess some Secret Additional Layer of oppression that no trans man could ever match up to no matter what their individual experiences are, even when that trans man is Also a trans woman (they do not).

5: and by extension, that every single individual trans woman has it worse than every individual trans man in every situation (theoretical or real) no matter what, thus making anything that a trans man experiences Lesser Than by default (do I even need to say anything).

I am going to put the entire conversation (censored) under readmore, but I need it to be understood that This Is Not Hyperbole.

when I say that trans men are singled out and attacked for the simple act of having a voice This Is What I Mean. it is considered by some people to be Inherently Transgressive, Inherently Bigoted, for trans men to consider themselves equals. for trans men to consider their experiences equal.

and so, it is Assumed by Default that a trans man speaking on his own experiences is harmful to trans women Regardless of whether trans women are being spoken on or not.

not everyone thinks this way of course (and the people who Do think this way aren't dictated by gender, this isn't trans mascs vs trans fems this is about bigotry, which anyone is capable of)

but a Significant Enough proportion of people Do, and people don't recognize or realize this fact.

if you feel that I am being hyperbolic, if you've never been exposed to this way of thinking before, if you find yourself Agreeing with any of the points I have listed above, I do suggest reading through this conversation and the posts linked to it.

content warning for a brief non-graphic mention of rape/csa within the linked posts and this conversation.

Me: I know odds are you don't want to hear it, and that's fine you can ignore this message entirely if you'd like. but I Do think you'd better understand what my perspective is if you were to read my response

I do think I Understand where your perspective is coming from, and I get it on an emotional level. but there's a disconnect here where intent is assumed when it doesn't need to be [Screenshot of tags written by anonymous that reads: transandbros (transandrophobia + bros) they think that they can’t be the most privileged in a group because they think trans women have privilege over them. End Transcription]

I am trans masc yes, I am also trans fem, and I don't enjoy assumptions like this being made about me.

Anonymous: i said trans women as in TMA [transmisogyny affected] people. not transmasc or tranfem which can be used by tme [transmisogyny exempt] and tma [transmisogyny affected] trans people

Me: like I said in my response, I want to go on testosterone, physically transition, and then present femininely. I want things like an audibly deep voice, facial hair, a square jaw. I also want to keep my breasts, I want long hair and feminine features, I want to dress femininely and be read as a feminine And masculine person

I also live in mississippi. 

now do you think that if I do that I will walk outside and never ever experience transmisogyny.

Anonymous: also trans men oppress trans women and benefit from transmisogyny. i say this as someone who benefits from transmisogyny as well. i oppress trans women. i experience misdirected transmisogyny as someone w [with] facial hair and a low voice and long hair and tites. And when people in and out of my community learn about my gender and transition, much of tht [the] MISDIRECTED transmisogyny disapears[disappears]. my experience is better in certain situations than it would be for a similar trans women. if tht [that] is a statement you cannot aggree [agree] with than [then] there is nothing to discuss here

there is no way for a trans women to speak over a trans women [I think they meant trans men?] if they are otherwise on [a] similar playing field (white, abled, class, religion etc) thats not what speaking over means. thats like cis men thinking cis women are dominating the conversation when they make up even 30% of the conversation

Me: the post I was responding to was written by a cis person, I asked people to consider the trans experience and spoke about how it was frustrating that people Don't do that. /I/ was the trans person speaking to a cis person, and then it was decided after the fact that I was somehow stepping on trans women's toes by doing so.

Anonymous: okay great. shouldve kept that context than maybe you wouldnt have also revealed u [you] think trans women can oppress trans men

Me: this is why I suggested you read my response, because I don't believe that and I also explained explicitly why I didn't include the username of the original poster (though part of it, of course, is that I didn't want anyone to harass the op) 

Anonymous: i did read ur [your] response thats how i know you think trans women oppress trans men as equally as trans men oppress trans women

Me: that's not really how oppression works? I believe that trans people are able to Hurt Each Other, because all people as individuals are capable of harming each other as individuals. this is not the same thing as oppression, oppression is a systemic power structure that puts one group above another.

what I've said is that I believe trans people are equals, and you think this is a bad thing? 

I didn't even say that trans people are equals In The World As A Whole (though I do believe that), I said they're equals Specifically Within The Trans Community made by and for trans people.

Anonymous: and i wholeheartedly disagree with that! its incredibly clear as a tme [transmisogyny exempt] trans butch lesbian in community with trans women, its incredibly easy to see how tme [transmisogyny exempt] people are privileged over tma [transmisogyny affected] people

including in lgbt and trans specific spaces!!!

Me: so your point is that from Your perspective you have seen the way that people within queer and trans spaces have made you feel othered and hurt people for being trans fem.

my point is that This Is True, I have seen this as well. but I have Also seen people take that exact same energy and point it at other trans people. I have personally been othered and torn down both for being trans masc And for being nonbinary at different points in time. 

I am telling you that you are right, but that people need to be more open to other people's perspectives to get a clearer picture on the over all situation. 

because when we look at Everyone is saying, the truth seems to be that All trans people are torn down for who they are.

why is that a bad thing? what does it hurt to consider that I have also experienced something similar to you?

I Really hope that your point isn't that I am privileged compared to other trans fems after I spoke in depth about being raped by a man and how that's affected me for the rest of my life

Anonymous: no im litterally [literally] saying that amab trans fems and trans women experience another layer of oppression from afab trans people. i litterally [literally] told you i am also an afab transmasc person. why do you transandrophobia truthers litterally [literally] always jump to trauma dumping ! if you want to put it in those terms, you are privileged in comparison to amab transpeople who actually have higher rates of sexual abuse and rape. you are not more privileged than cis people who experience lower rates rape and sexual abuse.

and fuck u for reading me call myself a butch lesbian and calling me transfem so it suits ur argument

Me: 1: I'm sorry I called you trans fem when that isn't how you identify, I thought you'd explained to me that you were tme trans fem like you consider me to be. we're both upset and this isn't really the best medium to hold a conversation with, so it's easy to word things in a way that can be misinterpreted as well as misinterpret things that would be clearer if you had more time to sit on and absorb the information.

I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, but I am frustrated with you continuously jumping to the most negative reading of my intentions possible.

to rephrase my point:

"so your point is that from Your perspective you have seen the way that people within queer and trans spaces have othered and hurt people for being trans fem."

followed by the rest of it

2: that's not actually true, there are a few studies that have found that trans mascs over all face similar (and at points higher) rates of sexual abuse to trans women.

(this is a link to a tumblr post, but that tumblr post is a link to a study, I've included This link because it has easily accessible pictures of the relevant graphs).

though coincidentally I've recently made a post that relevant to this exact topic

the point I made there (and the point I'm going to make here) is that saying "This minority group experiences This Thing less than That minority group" isn't useful when speaking to individuals because those individuals have still experienced trauma.

individual people Are Not every statistic about their minority group, and they cannot have their Experienced compared based on those statistics

because Experiences are not dictated by statics. and treating people as if their experiences don't matter because their experiences don't match the statistics is cruel.

the other point being, of course, that using studies like this to try to hard measure the Amount Of Oppression between different minority groups is silly.

these are self reported with relatively small sample sizes of specific locations at a specific time. they're Important to prove that there is a problem, but there has never and will never be a measure of the experiences of every trans man vs every trans woman that we can then calculate and compare.

I'm sure there Are some statistics out there that show trans women with a marginal increase of sexual abuse compared to trans men, just like there are some statistics out there that show the opposite.

what this tells us is not that one group Inherently has it worse than the other, it tells us that trans people experience sexual assault, and that's a problem that needs to be addressed.

3: I find it incredibly distasteful to insist over and over again that someone is not oppressed, that they are privileged, that they haven't been hurt in a meaningful way. and Then refer to them speaking about their lived experiences as "trauma dumping"

if you can't handle frank discussions on the trauma and oppression that trans people experience on a day to day basis then you really shouldn't be commenting on that trauma.

[End conversation]

screenshots of the full conversation can be found here: [Link] I would've made a video to fully prove that these aren't doctored, but I don't want to out the person I was speaking to. they don't deserve harassment

[strangestcase]

I think conversations about how transphobia impacts transfems and transmascs differently would go somewhere if "transandrophobia" or whatever you want to call it wasnt treated like. Transmysoginy For Transmascs.

like, yes, all trans people are hit with a combo of transphobia and good old mysoginy but it mixes and overlaps in different ways and it's disingenuous to assume it does so in equivalent ways for men and women. Transfems are treated like Schrodinger's Woman, misgendered as men (transphobia) most of the time but "miraculously" gendered correctly as women only when it hurts them (mysoginy), so they're simultaneously Men Who Are Bad At Being Men or Women Who Are Bad At Being Women. Transmascs are treated like delusional girls, hit with the brunt of mysoginy because their genders aren't aknowledged. While it stems from the same root (treating trans people as a secret bad third gender) (edit: this happens to all trans people btw, we're treated like our birth genders to be cruel until Suddenly gendering us correctly can hurt us- i could write an essay on how this also affects gnc people but uuuh this post is long already), it is put on motion differently.

so like, Yes, it's perfectly easy to point out how transphobia against transmascs can fly under the radar since it can be disguised as a concern troll- without dismissing transmysoginy or pretending we have it worse. idk if i've made myself clear here?

[dunmertitty]

just gonna say, i don’t usually rb posts that have the #transandrophobia tag and i have it blocked. and i can make a whole post on what i think about That later, but i think regardless of its tags, that post is important bc why are you getting mad at trans men for doing something slightly bad rather than getting mad at a system that puts marginalized people in this situation anyway. you’re falling for the same divide and conquer categories that humans in power have been using for centuries to make the lower classes mad at each other rather than at the politicians and their systems that only protect themselves.

like i’m sorry but if you think one man receiving resources meant for women is more infuriating than the fact that there’s thousands of people regardless of gender that are unable to have basic necessities under capitalism then maybe you have the wrong priorities!!!

like yes it sucks that a trans man is in a women’s shelter but maybe if the government did something to address housing insecurity, then nobody would have to be in that situation. yes so sad that you had to see a dude with three facial hairs at the gynecologist but if we had better healthcare for reproductive health, women’s health, and trans health, then it wouldn’t be such a big deal.

you think the problem is “there’s not enough resources” so your solution is “let’s gatekeep more people from these resources” but the real problem is that these resources are hoarded by people with money and power so it seems like there’s not enough.

[homophyte]

i think one of the things that really gets under my skin about the spread of the term transandrophobia (and its related discourse) is just how pernicious the myth that accompanies it is: that transfems talking about transmisogyny (both in general but especially within the queer community) are doing stupid useless insular discourse in a time where people wish violence against all trans people, and are thus on the side of those doing that violence because theyre trying to divide us, but that transmascs coining transandrophobia (and its ilk) are doing important community work, are focused on coalition and mutual aid and protection. the biggest projection ive ever seen frankly especially since transandrophobia only exists in response to transfems talking about transmisogyny--it is literally something born out of and to create division in the community, it IS the stupid useless insular discourse. in many ways discussing the transmisogyny that comes from other queers, yes even from transmascs, does far more for community and coalition because it (very undeservedly kindly, might i add) is attempting to bridge that gap between transfems and those w tme privilege, get them to recognize that privilege and work to better themselves to be better allies to transfems ESPECIALLY now when violence against trans people is becoming more acceptable! addressing intracommunity violence is and should be a priority bc we should not be stabbing each other in the back, especially not the most vulnerable among us, ESPECIALLY not now! (note: while im talking about transmisogyny in this instance this is similarly the case for, say, racism in the LGBT community and many other issues--queers of color arent 'dividing the community' by trying to address it, theyre trying to make us stronger BY addressing it, more able to help each other and, again, particularly our most vulnerable.) the insane thing is this discourse recognizes that fact--or at least cant not talk about it from an optics perspective--and will bring it up constantly but their solution is to do like. more transmisogyny and be more hostile to transfems driving them out of community! like. what! nevermind that the idea that transfems are 'sleeping with the enemy' and secretly are trying to hurt others (in this case via driving a political wedge between them (again: LITERALLY what the transandrophobia ppl are doing!)) is a hugely central tenant of transmisogyny in general? like its not even SUBTLE in how it replicates and acts out transmisogyny, theres so little difference between that and the terf fear of transfems putting on a veneer to hide predation. actually kind of boils my blood how hypocritical the whole thing is esp bc its literally enacting that same violence. WHILE also trying to paint themselves as the 'real victims' . i really have no sympathy for it and i absolutely cannot bring myself to hold it against the trans girls who go on to say 'actually fuck you guys i give up on being nice' bc tme people are fucking stupid as shit sometimes. gullible. the amount of otherwise intelligent ppl who fall for this shit and put fucking dobberbutts or genderkoolaid on my dash is just frankly disappointing and im having increasingly less sympathy for the ppl who fail to acknowledge their privilege and as such fall for it

[t-cock]

We have male privilege just as any queer man does. Our male privilege doesn't take away from the marginalization (transphobia) we face in a cishetero patriarchal and white supremacist society. Transphobia is an extension of misogyny, just as homophobia is.

Saying trans men have male privilege should not be intended to dismiss trans men being subject to trans/homophobia, but should be about getting us to recognize the new space we occupy, at the very least in interpersonal situations.

There are all kinds of forms of oppression, and while we are not as a class systemically oppressive, we have the potential of being interpersonally oppressive.

We benefit from a transmisogynistic society because we are trans without being trans women. It’s true that trans men are more "tolerated" or even "favorable" -- but just like any marginalized man, that doesn't clear us of oppression. It doesn't take away from the transphobic violence we face under the same system, it just means we're not always aware of each other's struggles.

I would have agreed with your post before I saw the "transandrophobia" tag. I at first thought it was a post acknowledging our marginalized identity intersects with privilege, but this tag undos that reading. Please understand that androphobia isn't the actual problem going on. You are misdiagnosing a systemic issue.

As a trans man myself, I know there is a need in trans men to have language to discuss our oppression; how our oppression is uniquely at a crossroads between privilege and oppression; but we can do so without unintentionally claiming that misandry is a real issue in society. A cishetero patriarchal, white supremacist (as stated before) society does not hate Men in any real capacity. When men are marginalized by these systems, it is due to seeming adjacency to Women. That is why I say homophobia and transphobia are extentions of misogyny. Transphobia would not exist without misogyny; transphobia exists because of transmisogyny.

We can acknowledge this, acknowledge that in some ways we have potential benefits, and also discuss how the same conditions still/also oppress us. It's true that it is complicated to work through, and yes it can be frustrating when some people don't want to. We don't need to give up the work and go for menimist arguments because... well to be completely honest, I don't really understand why you guys do this, other than it being reactionary. I think being more involved with the history of marginalized queer men would really benefit some of you. I don't just mean from the last few centuries, like when you look into older examples of homophobia it really puts into perspective how deeply misogyny goes and how we got to this point. At least do that before fuming about feminists (which is what you're doing with "androphobia")

I hope my comment gets at least one guy to rethink androphobia trutherism. I know it feels uncomfortable and even insulting to be labeled as having "male privilege" -- but to be completely honest, the first time I ever heard that trans men have male privilege was from an elder trans man. So if you're thinking this is something only baeddels say online to silence us, please remember that some trans men have been saying this for longer than that. The baeddels weren't around when I started transitioning! This isn't a new idea, it's trans feminism!

"your transness doesn't intersect with your manness"

actually my transness IS my manness. they're the exact same facet of my identity. they don't just intersect, they are mutually inclusive parts of each other. one does not exist without the other

[eldorr]

temp pinned

temporary pinned post until i figure out what to put here.

until then here's all of my blogs:

@eldorr = Main Coining Blog (you are here)

@mister-eldritch = Adult (18+) Coining Blog

@monsieur-eldritch = Triggering Content Coining Blog

@tucuteboything = Discourse/Vent blog (If you genuinely want to talk with me about something triggering or discourse related, please do so there)

.

Also with my DNI IDs, I opted into a more "context for context" approach, as I know some screen readers don't read dashes or slashes, so I opted into writing the ID in a way I hope won't come off as me being pro something and anti something similar lol.

Also if you're on my DNI you can still use my terms/flags, just don't interact with me outside of reblogging to hoard blogs.

.

If you're looking for my "Gendered Terms Archival" list for terms similar to Man/Boy/Woman/Girl/Enban/Enby/etc it would be [here]. I update it whenever a post with terms that fit what I'm archiving on it ends up on my dash.

.

Also some important things to note while clarifying about my DNI, under a read more since it's long:

The only "transid" group I'd be fine with interacting is trans species, because as far as I'm aware it's mostly just another word for alterhumans (mostly otherkin/therians), especially for those who want or acquire body mods to reflect that. The term didn't originate from TransID rhetoric so that's why the term transid is in quotations above.

I don't support the grouping of Mspec identities under "Bispec" under the guise of being inclusive. I view it as no different than calling Mspec identities "just Bi". I don't support the spread of BaB rhetoric.

I support KFF and the more casual use of alterhuman and otherkin language. I support those interacting with communities and exploring their identity in non-standard and non-strict ways. I believe anyone should be able to explore and have fun with their identity without being harassed by EITHER side, whether that's people harassing KFF (or other non-kin alterhumans) for the language they choose to use, OR KFF harassing or being ablest/sanist/etc to alterhumans whose identity is non-chosen. I believe folks shouldn't be forced to use highly specific microlabels if they don't want to, even if that language would "fit more."

To do with the above point, and before anyone throws a fit, I'm a reincarnate godshard. I use the term Kin and Kinnie casually to describe my nonhuman-hood as it was the first language I was introduced to and is the only terms that feel like it sticks. I do experience phantom limbs and shifts at times, however any identity (kin) I may take on typically fades at a certain point due to myself being basically a faceless shapeshifting void. I usually do identity as those past 'kins, in a state that may be described as "that was me" or in flux between is/was.

I will also ask if you're a KFF "factkin" to not interact. I'm fine with non-chosen factkin as a lot of the rhetoric against them have also been used against factives.

BIID and BDD are NOT the same as being Transabled or TransID. Don't conflate the two. I also believe folks with BIID/BDD should be able to coin and use terms to describe how they experience their disorder. Such as terms like Aldernic sublabels to describe a body one feels they should have.

Think that men of a minority cannot be oppressed for being (the "wrong" kind of) men. Likewise DNI if you support the phrase "transandrophobia truther" or you support Ba*ddel (e) rhetoric (the anti-nontransfem weirdos).

I'd also ask for folks who support the terms TMA/TME, or use the phrase "theyfabs" even in joking settings to not interact; yes, it's exorsexist and anti-transmasc rhetoric. I'm a Transunitist (Pro-Transunity) if that helps.

Pro-Contact Harmful paras in my DNI covers ANY para that involves any non-consenting partner, anyone or anything that cannot consent, or any involvement of a non-consenting third party.

There's quite a few things missing from my DNI that are mostly run of the mill "basic DNI" stuff, basically any bigot, bigoted belief, right-wingers, etc. I'm pro-choice btw.

[velvetvexations]

two things:

1. objectively the most hilarious/cringe inducing side effecf of telling people about an interest in imperial japan is when you realize The Implications and have to clarify that your interest has made you realize that the entire imperial dynasty should be fired out of a comically large cannon

2. the cgirlforeskin post ("if they saw us as men they would respect us and listen to us"), and similar ones about how nothing about transmisogyny could possibly be about hatred of men, because men aren't hated in a systemic way, ignores

a) that terfs hate men (because that's core radfeminism) and

b) that society will class anyone who Should be a man (has been amab) but does Not do it exactly to patriarchal standards (by being non-white, gay, too soft, whatever dumbshit thing you can think of) as man-but-lesser. which, imo, also (especially in the case of gay men and trans women) relates to misogyny and how patriarchal society just fucking. tier lists women under men (how could gay men want to Have Sex With With The Man Class when that's what the Lesser Women Class Does? how could you want to Become Woman and therefore Downgrade Your Social Standing?) and while misogyny is an important aspect of it with how gay men get feminized by homophobes and trans women get the fucked up standards pushed on cis women but about tenfold as bad, the impulse to punish the Class Of Worse Men is aimed at men. that makes it misandrist or androphobic or whichever word has not had a tantrum thrown over it recently.

it's just not the misandry that the Andrew Tate types and anyone theoryposting about why the term transandrophobia is bad want to acknowledge.

Surprisingly, I've not had anyone call me out over IJ-posting, although I am fairly clear every time that I think it was one of the sickest societies ever cobbled together out of an inferiority complex and desperate need to assert themselves as the greatest nation in the world. Imperial Japan was just...SO evil and SO incompetent, and in the US they don't teach you anything about them outside of Pearl Harbor and maybe if you're lucky Midway and Iwo Jima.

Depressing fact! During the Battle of Okinawa, the single bloodiest battle of the Pacific War, nearly as many Okinawan civilians died as US and Japanese soldiers put together, many through coerced suicide. Teach that shit, dagnabbit.

As to everything else, yes, I absolutely agree. We can either call it misogyny based on who it "targets" (that's another discussion) or we can call it androphobia based on who the feelings that go into it (hatred of men/failed men), but engage with the material reality of it either way.

[grublovequeue]

hi! i dont want to reblog this to my main because its really long.

this post is trying to discuss and explain some possible explanations for why the specific ways that i have watched transmascs participate in the persecution of transfemme people might have arisen. im not trying to claim that every transmasc person is somehow evil or that everyone in all transmasuline community is doing these things. but there is a lot of appropriation of or dismissal of transmisogyny happening and a lot of open hostility towards transfem people also occuring. so this is me trying to discuss the places that i think some of those behaviors might be originating from.

whiteness is not used here as a modifier designed to invalidate anyone or dismiss them out of hand, nor am i claiming that everyone participating in the behaviors i am trying to explain is white. i am adding white as a qualifier to my theory here because this is a tentative explanation of the behavior of people who are in my own demographic of white transmascs and is therefore based on my own white transmasculine experience.

this is me trying to explain why the transfemme people in my life have had patterns of transmasculine people dismissing, invalidating, or appropriating their experiences. a lot of those people did so under the banner of being 'anti-transandrophobia'. so i put it in the tag :) any specific things i am claiming happen in this post are things that have genuinely happened often in front of me in person and online to my transfem loved ones! yes even the one about "viewing transmisogyny as a privilege". that specific sentiment has been expressed to me and to my family several times in person and i've seen it repeated other places online. it is bizarre and an extreme example of the kind of behavior visibility-as-privilege thought can get you into but it is not a strawman.

overall i do not think you got my point in your initial reply. i can go point by point talking about these things if you would like more clarification but i think getting those points out of the way first will probably explain some of what you are seeing here.

my theory about this which is very constrained by my personal aka white experience is that one of the things that happens to u as a white baby girl and then as a young white woman is that bad things are happening to you, and everybody needs to convince you they arent happening (to make sure u are subjugated but still content enough to further the project of white supremacy). and also nothing you think or feel or want can be real or meaningful bc ur just a girl.

and so if ur going to be aware of ur own misery and oppression under patriarchy u have to like develop these repetitive cycles of validation of your own oppression and internal experience as Real and Valid. because everything is very invested in making you forget.

and then this cycle can continue when u transition: the overwhelming majority of bad reactions to transmasc people are based upon that previous reaction to girlness which is to infantilize u and dismiss you and treat u like u arent real. and so as a continued reaction to this many tmasc people become singlemindedly focused upon Realness and Validity. Realness becomes the Only Real Problem, the one Great Wound to be healed.

which to my tfem friends can explain a lot abt the weird way tmasc heavy spaces talk about gender: its a lot of reassuring yourself and others that you're Valid. that youre Real and Valid. youre So Valid. which for most of the tfem people in my life has been kind of bewildering because the truth is if ur tma nobody needs to tell you what youre doing is real because immediately people start doing transmisogyny at you.

[femmefoxbeast]

I’ve been thinking a lot about body positivity and self-image and how to deal with that as a trans man.

This is a long post. The rest is under a read more because of this. It’s a bit rambling too. I’m just working through my thoughts.

CW: surgery mention, abuse mention, unhealthy eating/thoughts about eating mention, lots of discussion of social beauty ideals and how people are treated poorly for not meeting them. Nothing graphic though.

The pressure to transition into an ‘ideal man’

So - in September I had top surgery. It was definitely the right decision and (combined with starting testosterone in July 2019) it’s had a huge positive impact on my mental health. I look at myself in the mirror and finally see myself looking back. I feel like life is full of possibility at the moment. It’s pretty great honestly.

Here’s the thing - I’m chubby - I was in an abusive family situation for a while and ended up with some food issues which resulted in me losing a fair bit of weight and then putting a bunch back on.

Because I’m a bigger guy I’ve got dog-ears (excess skin and fat) at the ends of my top surgery scars. I feel mostly okay about them and am not planning to get a surgical revision. But I feel weirdly guilty about being okay with them.

I feel like there’s this pressure and expectation that if I want to look like a man (and I do because that’s what I am) then I should look like society’s ideal of a man. People seem to think I should want to be thin and muscular and to have a sharp jawline and just the right amount of body hair.

But to be honest I don’t want that. And I feel guilty about not wanting that.

I have a lot of conflicting feelings about this - on one hand, I have this feeling that I’m doing something wrong or wasting my transition somehow? Logically I know those thoughts aren’t mine - I know that this external pressure I’ve experienced has put these thoughts into my head. But the idea has bedded itself surprisingly deep into my brain so I haven’t been able to get rid of the nagging voice going ‘you’re doing it wrong’.

On the other hand, I’m pretty repulsed by this expectation that I should conform even more strictly to societal beauty standards because I’m trans. I shouldn’t have to thin, I shouldn’t have to work out unless I feel like it, I shouldn’t have to try and look cis. I want to look like a man yes. But I want to look like a queer trans man because that’s what I am and if I look like a cis dude then I’ll start seeing a stranger when I look in the mirror again.

It doesn’t help that the pressure to conform isn’t just interpersonal but structural - for example, trans people often have to be below a certain BMI to access surgery on the NHS and even in some private hospitals. Because of this, every time I’ve had to interact with the clinic that prescribes my hormones they’ve made some pretty yikes remarks about my weight.

I still remember, in our first meeting, how the person assessing me commented that if I could lose some weight then I’d be very handsome due to being fairly tall and broad-shouldered for a trans guy. It made me feel like they saw me as an object that could be shaped and moulded into whatever they wanted - into a symbol of their mastery over medicine.

It was dehumanising as hell.

Femininity, fatness and autism

Being overweight and a man who is slowly starting to present in a more authentically femme manner is interesting.

It makes me feel like some kind of horrible pervert a lot of the time.

I think we’ve got this image of a fat, effeminate, creepy dude so embedded in our collective consciousness that it’s poisoning my self-image a little. It doesn’t help that this collective caricature has a lot of autistic traits and well - I’m autistic.

It sucks because I try very hard to be respectful and non-creepy. I don’t think other people perceive me that way, from what I can tell.

But my brain keeps insisting that if I wore a dress or lipstick or high heels then I’ll transform into some Silence of the Lambs-type figure.

So I’ve been restricting myself to just painting my nails and wearing necklaces sometimes.

But I don’t want to do that any more. I want to be myself as hard and joyfully and authentically as I can all of the time. I feel like I’ve spent so long repressing myself - first because I was in the closet about being queer and trans and then because I was trying my hardest to pass due to not being about to handle social and physical dysphoria at the same time.

I guess it’s something I need to work through... but I’m not going to give up and hide away again. I won’t do that.

Transandrophobia

The other thing I’ve been thinking a lot about is how the sex characteristics primarily associated with men - for example, facial and body hair - are seen in a negative light. Largely in social justice spaces and communities but in the wider world to some extent also.

In social justice spaces, there is a lot of fear and dislike of maleness and masculinity. I can understand why but it doesn’t make it any easier to deal with as a man who is marginalised due to his gender. I don’t feel very safe or comfortable outside of these spaces but it’s often a pretty tough experience to exist in them too.

This dislike of male things extends to physical traits that are seen as male also. Even in supposedly trans-inclusive spaces, I’ve seen this vocal repulsion to things like body hair and facial hair. Disgust towards traits like this is harmful to pretty much everyone who doesn’t fit cis, perisex, white beauty standards.

People who express this disgust in trans inclusive spaces often seem to think that their words will only hurt white, straight, able-bodied, perisex cis men and that it’s therefore fine.

However, I don’t think it’s okay to talk about cis guy’s bodies like that - for one because it’s just a mean thing to do and for two because even if you want to go out of your way to hurt cis men’s feelings then there’s still no way for you to prevent unintended collateral damage if you say horrible things about someone else’s body in a public place.

So if it’s wrong to make comments like that towards relatively privileged people then it’s very, very wrong to say such things about the bodies of trans people, intersex people and people of colour.

Another factor that harms trans men and other transmasculine people specifically is how people tend to react towards our bodies at varying times during medical transitioning. People (especially cis women) tend to react very positively towards us having feminine physical features - being soft and hairless and pretty-looking. Then we receive backlash if we choose to transition - we run into this idea that we’re “ruining” our “precious, sacred, feminine bodies”.

This nasty, entitled rhetoric tends to crop up strongest among TERFs but I’ve come across less explicit, less obviously transphobic variations in trans inclusive communities also.

This demonisation of “male” traits messed with my head when my hormones started to take effect. I was really happy to feel my dysphoria decreasing but at the same time, I had to come to terms with looking well, ugly. At least - ugly according to the spaces and communities I am a part of.

[transfemstalin]

hm I think that's definitely not true on multiple levels. okay . I feel like you're going in the wrong direction so I'm going to break down this post

>"transmascs have male privilege."

yes, this is true, because they are men. all else being equal, a trans man will have power over a trans woman, because of male privilege. do we understand this?

>'so the same patriarchy that calls trans women 'predatory men', is going to give privileges to people who they see as misguided women?'

this is a deliberately bad faith read of what trans women say when we say that trans men still have male privilege. trans men are able to have male privilege because they are men-- even if they are not seen as men currently, that is a factor that can change, right? whereas a trans man will continue to be a man regardless of who sees them as one. they're also capable of oppression, just like anyone else.

transunion (the account), is about 'trans unity'. this is a dog whistle. I cannot stress enough that when you see accounts like this telling trans women to shut up and that they're not actually oppressed by men, that is transmisogyny, and that should not be tolerated. if you want unity in a community, let us talk about our oppression or at least stop being misogynistic to us.

they also fundementally misunderstand the problem of transmisogyny, dumbing it down to society thinking we are predatory men, when that's not actually the case, and again, as you love to keep bringing up, there's more nuance. trans women actually are treated like women, just women that people think it is socially acceptable to abuse. think about how many trans women, even before they come out, have eating disorders, or let men push them around, or when they come out, immediately face misogyny-- because they are women. the transphobia (and yes, it is only transphobia, not transmisandry, misandry as a concept is not real, this is feminism 101)

this also leads into: the misgendering

I am unsure how you were not able to see this? this post directly implies that trans women actually have power over trans men, by virtue of society thinking they're all 'predatory men'. the argument that trans men are oppressed by trans women is a fundamentally transphobic argument, and it's especially clear in this case. let me break it down so as not to be misunderstood:

they bring up the patriarchy, and then reference how "trans women are seen as predatory men". we already know that this is a straw man of what transmisogyny is. but the way this is said also places trans women, "seen as" males, in proximity to power, especially over trans men, who society views as "misguided women."

the basis of this argument relies on trans people being incorrectly gendered to make any sense, and for that reason, it doesn't hold up when you put it under scrutiny. trans people aren't just a monolith of clocky closeted pretransitioners-- a lot of them, I would say a majority of trans people even, actually do pass quite well.

now again, some critical thinking: this post was tagged with transandrophobia and transmisandry. these are not real things. however, trans men do absolutely face transphobia. when you look at the transunion account, it's virtually all posts about how "actually trans men can't oppress trans women because they're actually real women seen as women by society. please look through that account for me and tell me that post I screenshotted was being made in good faith. it's terf shit, those are terf talking points.

I admit I didn't mean for this post to get so much attention, and that things cannot be properly analyzed outside of their context. to understand one thing you must understand many other things. this account is dedicated to getting trans women to shut up when they say that they are being actively oppressed by their trans male counterparts. actual trans unity can only exist when people feel safe talking about their oppression.

what happened to trans men are men.. what happened to trans women are women.. are we just?? misgendering people now????

[magicisrealandsoismyally]

Right so defining socialization theory doesn't change shit for me. It's not about transmascs being "socialized female". It is about how people who are in social positions where they are oppressed but not the most oppressed + they do not interact with people more oppressed than them on the regular. It's not being a white AFAB that does this to people. Being south asian does it too. like i just said. And crazy thing, transfems can do this too. I've heard some ableist shit be said and defended by hella queer people before. No one is immune to feeling like they are the most oppressed group on the list.

To address your second point, the main issue with transandrophobia as a movement is that however you feel about the orginal theory, it's been warped by TERFs and MRAs to the point where the tag is basically 4 different belief systems under a trench coat. I understand that this was not a belief under the original transandrophobia belief, but I call it like I see it, and TERFs have done their damage to the movement.

It's not a lie, it's just a different side of the tag you don't interact with (and good on you honestly, watching transmascs argue for sex essentialism is the most confusing thing in the world because it sounds like they are 30 seconds from being detrans movement leaders)

A term can be coined by a POC and also every POC transmasc I know can hate the movement, these are coexisting statements, plenty of movements do not reflect the person who started them 1 to 1. And like I said, TERFs and MRAs have latched on to the tag.

And yes, transmascs get third gendered you are correct but TERFs think y'all can go back to being a woman it's why they're invading the transandrophobia tag because a lot of transandrophobia truthers argue the same sex based oppression shit as TERFs. TERFs don't try to detransition transfems. Cause we can't be men, not real ones, not in their eyes. They don't see y'all as men, or women, but they'll treat you like victimized women for long enough until they can make you into one "again". To be clear, this is very insidious and bad, but it is different treatment. Closeted transmascs do not get third gendered on an individual level, just a systemic one. Closeted transfems get third gendered on all levels. I mean there's a reason the dysphoria fit is formlessly masc. Because masculinity is viewed as the default. Because when a young "girl" wears masculine clothing like sweatpants and a sweatshirt, no one has a problem with that, they might tell him that "she's wasting her looks" but she's not getting physically assaulted for that. But if a young "boy" wears a skirt, people genuinely get violent over that. I've had people threaten to punch me after i wore pink. It's not because they hate pink, it's because femininity in amabs makes use targets.

Masculinity is seen as a default, as a natural state. It's why transmascs have complained about not being able to dress fun without their masculinity challenged, because everything expressive is dubbed too feminine, because to be masculine effort is not required (by cis men, i'm aware trans men have to put in effort, but it isn't effort that is obvious, male contour makeup isn't supposed to be clearly there for example). It's why stories about crossdressing male are stories like mulan, while stories crossdressing female play it off as a joke something to be ridiculed.

@magicisrealandsoismyally

You do understand that this is socialisation theory right? Just in pretty words?

'this group of trans people spent time occupying this social status and that left you with a sense of entitlement and shapes their behaviour as a whole'...

In case there is someone else who considers this an ok thing to say, let me give you an example of a similar statement which you may understand as bad:

'Transandrophobia deniers are some of the most ex-white men people in the world. Now I'm not saying they were men, but the time they spent occupying a social status where others viewed you as a white man shapes the way you act entitled and claim you're the most oppressed group (white man shit)'

Now. That is a horrifying and transmisogynistic thing to say, yes? We all agree? So we should all also agree that the initial statement was also horrifying and predjudiced against trans men (whether you call that transandrophobic or not).

[seewetter]

Cis men don't know what it's like to be transgender. They don't know what misgendering feels like, even if sometimes everyone gets misgendered. They are "transphobia-exempt" in a certain sense.

Stuff you may not care about under the cut.

Cis men don't directly, personally experience (and that's not an accusation, just an observation) what it's like when the regular, everyday appearance that is normal for their group is perceived as creepy and when the slightest deviation from perfection makes them undesireable or perceived as perverts or threats.

Cis men don't experience being subject to a cis-men-exploiting porn genre that is named after a slur for their group.

Cis men don't have to worry that the fear and hatred of them will lead to them being genocidally legislated against.

Cis men can be perceived as emasculated individuals, but they are not viewed as being in an emasculating cult that is destroying Western civilization by emasculating people.

Cis men don't have to worry when the male bathrooms are broken that they'll be unwelcome in female bathrooms.

Cis men are not the intended target of those mysterious account terminations on this website.

Transphobia is trying to get trans people to stop existing. Transphobia attacks people based on the norms it wants to enforce: the group it wants to force you to be a member of has special value to transphobes and thus whether you are agender, genderfluid or bigender, a transphobe is only trying to enforce those norms to get you to stop being transgender and try to get you to be their best guess at which norm you should be forced to follow, the guy-norm or the girl-norm.

Therefore there are two normative frameworks that transphobes develop a mythology around: a normative framework for deviations from manhood and a normative framework for deviations from womanhood. BUT wait! Lots of us are gender-non-conforming and we experience this normative framework in both direction, right?! Yes, BUT the transphobes committed to trans erasure only want to force you in one direction. So while you might be a man (or non-binary person) experimenting with femininity, transphobes are going to try and figure out whether you are what they think of as a "fake", especially when they craft general narratives like Abigail Shrier's. You can't understand Shrier's work by assuming trans men and women are being targetted by it identically. How would you feel if I showed up and claimed "no one is transandrophobia-exempt" to rain on your parade? That would be totally inappropriate.

The reverse is also true. Emasculation fantasies about, as JBP tearfully puts it "these young men" are not about trans men or transmasculine people in the same way that Shrier's book is not about trans women or transfeminine people.

The intended target audience for these catastrophist narratives is supposed to agree (or be persuaded) that trans people who were born with penises (not transness as such) are a unique threat to masculinity and must be warded off.

But here's the thing

I've seen you post about how trans men are uniquely affected by transandrophobia.

I've seen you deny that trans women have anything they're uniquely affected by.

I've written the post so far assuming it's an oversight but it could also be a feature. Wasn't sure at first what the purpose of that is, but -- stab in the dark -- if transandrophobia is real but transmisogyny is just transphobia, then "the tables turn" and the oppression olympics within the trans community finally dole out their victory prizes to the people who want to discuss how both misogyny and transphobia affect them.

But anon's argument has moved you into territory where to "win" you have to argue that what exempts people from discrimination is that they don't have any brushes with it at all. So now cis people can argue that they also face transphobia (and thus know all relevant things about it from personal experience) and all other privileged groups can also take a shot at it.

And more than that, no one in the trans community is really exempt from a misogynistic framework. We are all marginalized, from the ultra-masculine trans man who suffers from being denied proper medical care for misogynist reasons to the trans woman who finds herself at the mercy cis people who happily and hatefully "revoke" her status as "disturbed man" so they can punish her when convenient.

Why people need to tear down language like "tme" instead of adding their own language like "tae" is beyond me. Unless perhaps you would like to revoke trans women's transgender status so you can punish them when convenient?

"cis men are tme" - I think I have some problems with this idea but I'm not sure they make sense. I don't think cis men as a whole are 100% tme bc. I went to an extremely conservative religious high school. In places like that, being anything close to feminine as a man, even if you were 100% cishet, was absolutely unacceptable. Like you would be bullied by your peers and staff for just. DARING to use a pink pen in class. If that isn't a form of transmisogyny that affects cis men, idk what is.

No one is TME.