To marginalized--especially racialized-- tgirls, any expression of want or desire is constantly interpreted as a manifestation of abuse, because she is made to be subject to the perception and sexual desire of TME's in her life. The knock-on effect of always being interpreted as an abuser-- because everyone assumes you are regardless of reality-- is the direct deterioration of your own understanding of consent. I'll expound on this in a moment but here is my experience:
You have to be able to understand what your TME partner wants before they want it. You have to top them when they want it. Otherwise you're an abuser. You have to be the sex doll who always gives when asked and your own gratification comes as a bonus. Are you even gratified? Can you even feel sex anymore? Or have you been made to be less than to fulfill the needs of someone who loves you despite your being an abuser. Consent doesn't even matter at that point, it doesn't exist for you. Only for your TME partner. You break up with them after lots of fighting and they hold you at fault for the relationship collapsing, like it came out of nowhere. You try to meet other trans women who have also been hurt. Consent becomes messy and you make mistakes and you both get a little hurt. You're both too afraid to be an abuser to ask for what you actually want from this potential partner. But you orgasm for the first time in years. Maybe ever. You wouldn't have been able to if that girl hasn't given you the good faith, hadn't also had to relearn consent and make similar mistakes. Didn't also carry the fear that your ex-fiance was right and you were an abuser.
For girls like me, my friends and my partners, constantly maligned as abusers and monsters and expected to be constantly sexually giving, consent as a concept is broken. It is a one-way ticket to getting you in major trouble with the majority of people.
When you're so on edge and don't get to consent, you have to interpret everything, read every gesture. Stop the fight before it happens. It is my lived experience and I know my sisters feel the same way.
If you don't give that girl the grace she needs when she accidentally crosses a line or misinterprets a facial expression and gets triggered, she's never gonna get the chance to consent.
jbbartram-illu
izzy806
origamiaround
kianamaiart
snowghoul
