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I appreciate your tags but like, please don’t do this.

Cis women being transphobic to trans men isn’t Just Transphobia™. Cis women target trans men specifically, because they know they can get away with it in more spaces.

A cis woman being transphobic toward trans women, or trans people in general, is going to be seen as a transphobe. They’ll likely, and rightfully be criticized and/or ostracized from certain spaces because of it- especially in most feminist circles. If they want to be a part of mainstream, non-TERFy feminism, they’re gonna have to meet some bare minimum behavior expectations where that’s concerned.

But when cis women are transphobic to trans men, most people won’t even notice it’s transphobia at all. Plenty of people will even cheer them on:

Trans men get acne and oily skin on T? Men are so nasty! Trans men have bottom dysphoria? Lol, just like a man to be insecure about his penis! Trans men are sexually abused at higher rates than any other gender and we’d like that addressed? Men are so whiny and fragile! Fight the patriarchy!

They’re women! They’re feminists! when they say horrible, violent, stomach-churning, bigoted shit about trans men, they’re just railing against their own oppressors. It’s justice!

There are so many more insidious forms of this, too.

Cis women who infantilize us and try to revoke our autonomy are seen as “allies”, because they’re only trying to protect us!

Cis women who fetishize us as small, soft, effeminite versions of “real men” are still seen as “trans allies”. It sounds so positive; who wouldn’t want to be seen as inherently sweet, safe, and pretty? Who wouldn’t want to be grossly othered and fetishized for qualities we are stereotyped to have? Surely not the men who already have to fight tooth and nail to define our own relationships with masculinity and manhood.

Cis women who quietly refuse to use make reproductive healthcare more inclusive, who go on making that fight about Women’s Bodies, who continue to say things like “men can’t understand misogyny” and include trans men in their “kill all men” jokes… well, they’re just affirming your gender!

Why would trans men want equal access to healthcare? Why would trans men want our suffering acknowledged? Why would trans men, the group with about a 50% rate of attempted suicide, not want to be told that everyone else would prefer we were dead?

Feminism!

This isn’t even touching on the very intentional predation of trans men by cis women. Trans men and transmascs are targeted by cis lesbians in particular for corrective rape, and by abusive cis women as “easy targets” due to the lack of support networks, resources, and community for trans men and transmascs.

These things are said and done by cis women who tout themselves as “trans allies”. These are women who share those “share to make a TERF mad” posts and call themselves “TERF destroyers”. These are women who say “trans women are women”. These are women in your spaces, and in your community; people you follow and admire. They’re even people I follow and admire; women I’ve followed for years have called me a misogynist for pointing out the problems in things like “men can’t know what it’s like to be expected to have children”.

Image #1: The first post edited to say we have really allowed cis to get Far too comfortable being transphobic

Image#2: Picture of a train on its side next to train tracks, i.e. derailed.

8 page short kids book class project on important/current/difficult topics! Covered the topics of change, sibling relationships and the subject of having a transgender family member (in this case an older brother!)

5.6% OF AMERICANS SEE THEMSELVES AS LGBT

A brand new survey published by Gallup in the US shows that there is a big increase in the number of Americans that see themselves as LGBT+. This applies to the number bisexual, gay, trans and lesbian people.

LGBT identification is now 5.6% among US adults in general. The current estimate is up from 4.5% in Gallup’s previous update based on 2017 data. The number for 2012 was 3.5%.

LGBT identification is lower in each older generation, including 2% or less of Americans born before 1965 (aged 56 and older in 2020). 

This is the first time Gallup has asked detailed questions about how LGBT people identify. This means that we have to compare the answers given by people from different generations to see if there has been any shifts as regards their specific sexual orientation and/or gender identity. 

Some take aways from the survey:

The biggest cross-generational increase is found in the percentage who experience themselves as bisexual: Baby Boomers: 0.3% vs. Gen Z: 11.5%. Women are more likely to think of themselves as bisexual than men, which may explain why we find a higher percentage of gay men compared to lesbian women in the LGBT+ community.

There is also an increase in the percentage that see themselves as gay, although not as big: Baby Boomers: 1.2% vs. Gen Z: 2.1%.

The percentage of trans people is also much higher in the younger cohorts (0.2% vs. 1.8%), but this has clearly not led to a decline in the percentage of lesbians (in spite of what some “gender critical feminists”  would like you to believe). There is actually a much higher percentage of the youngest adults who identify as lesbian, when compared to the older generations: Baby Boomers 0.4% vs. Gen Z 1.4%.

What I read out of this survey is that the increasing openness towards – and visibility of – LGBT+ people, makes it easier for people to see themselves as some shade of queer or trans, and to come out as such. That is great news for all LGBTQA+ people as well as  for the community as a whole.

More about the survey here.

See also: 

In Translation

The thing is, I don’t know why I feel like a man.  I was teased and bullied for it a lot when I was little.  I’ve never had stereotypically American male interests.  I never cared about sports or cars or guns.  I was more interested in music and cooking and the arts.  I’ve always been emotionally in tune and sensitive, even when I did my best to suppress my emotions to survive a childhood of abuse from other children.

It’s not physical either.  I don’t feel like a man because I have a penis or a beard.  If you put my brain in a robot body or any other body, my essence would still feel male (I assume).  I literally can’t imagine what being any other gender would feel like, since I feel so acutely male.

I think that’s why the concept of being transgender always made sense to me.  I’m a man.  I don’t have any bloody clue why I feel like a man, but I don’t feel that it’s tied to my body or my interests or the way that I’ve been treated.  I feel like a man because of something beyond that.  Something ephemeral.  So, why couldn’t others feel the same?  Why couldn’t a person who’s been misidentified as a girl feel like a boy for the exact same nebulous reasons that I do?

And, since gender really doesn’t make any sense to me anyway, why couldn’t there also be people who feel as if they don’t have one?  Or who flow across genders like a ship on a map?

Are there people out there whose sense of their own gender is inseparable from their physical form?  If you put those people into robot bodies or, simply, other physically different bodies, would their gender identity also swap?  If so, why?  Are they actually more lost in their gender identity than I am and they need to hone in on the physical in order to anchor themselves?

And I replied, “well, I could ask you the same thing.” And I moved on, continued, tried to explain why I feel the way that I do, but I don’t think he heard any of those things that I said afterward. 

Because six days later, we talked about it again, and this is what he told me: 

“I couldn’t stop thinking about what you said last week. Because all my life I identified it as ‘these are the parts that I have, and so I am a man’. But you’re living proof that gender is not limited to what is attached to your body, so I asked myself, why am I a man? And all I can say is ‘because I have no idea what it feels like to be anything else’. I cannot imagine what it’s like to be a woman. Or neither, or both, or any other gender. I have always been a man.”

And I replied, “that’s exactly what it feels like for me.”

I’ve partly clarified what the difference is between my strong affinity for masculinity and whatever it is straight men are doing.

Straight men’s attachment to masculinity is reactionary. They lean in to masculine norms out of fear of being perceived as unmanly, as gay, as effeminate or feminine, as inadequate. They fear demotion, loss of status, loss of privilege, a fall from grace. They’re not embracing masculinity so much as they’re backing into it, out of fear of what lies outside it, as one might back into a safe compound while brandishing a gun at an approaching zombie horde.

Whereas my attachment to masculinity stems from 2 sources:

1) “I’ve had femininity crammed down my throat my whole life without my consent and now I’m freeeeee” AKA sort of reactionary, but in an empowering, liberating sense. Throwing off the chains and rebelling against society’s rules.

2) Sincerely relishing and enjoying masculinity, enjoying things like suits, waistcoasts, neckties, leather jackets, sweater vests, pocket watches, cologne, visible sculpted musculature, showing off one’s physical strength, sitting or standing with one’s legs spread, direct blunt communication, confidence, assertiveness, taking the lead during sex, a million little things society has arbitrarily coded “men stuff,” are things I take enthusiastic delight in, like Ariel gushing about her collection of human paraphernalia. I’m like a weeaboo, but for masculinity.

(And yes, there is a heavy element of eroticism for me in a lot of what I listed above.) (Insert autoandrophilia joke here)

In Daniel Lavery’s book, he noted that Gomez Addams has FTM energy because Gomez seems to relish being a man so much, whereas Herman Munster is simply phoning it in, and therefore lacks that vibe. And it’s true! A lot of cis straight men really are just phoning it in. In fact, if they put as much energy and enthusiasm into performing masculinity as I do, they’d probably be perceived as gay! Or at least as a dandy. (Gomez is something of a dandy.) The straight male role seems to demand phoning-it-in. They have to sleep-walk through it.

And the thing is: Women aren’t like this! Some women phone it in, but I can think of plenty of women who sincerely enjoy certain types of femininity, and aren’t doing it because society told them to, or to please men. Femme lesbians are an obvious example, but also straight women who are into goth or lolita fashion, or who volunteer to be surrogates because they enjoy being pregnant and participating in motherhood, or who buy sexy underwear purely because it makes them feel good. Or look at the way women who are hardcore into makeup culture react when some man, unsolicited, says “You know, men think you’re prettier when you don’t wear makeup.” Said man usually gets thrown to the wolves for his impertinence. They’re not doing it for you, bro!

men with traditional views on gender have largely painted themselves into a corner. they only find affirmation of their gender in expressions of male supremacy, and there are fewer and fewer of those all the time, because men aren’t actually inherently better at anything than women are, because it turns out gender doesn’t work like that. men as a class have to actively suppress women as a class to maintain superiority over them, and even then, as we’ve seen, women can still push back effectively, and gender variant people throw wrenches into the works too.

joyous, voluntary expressions of masculinity are gay *because* they’re not reactionary, because they’re not violent, because they don’t respect the established hierarchy of strong men over weak men and all men over women. finding men beautiful, being a beautiful man that loves other men, is not traditionally how it’s supposed to work. taking the outward forms and gestures of domination and repurposing it into something reciprocal is scary to people who have only ever seen the binary of hurting and being hurt. playing with gender has to be taught to people who only know it as a fight.

i’m a trans man. i’m also a committed feminist. i’ve had to come to masculinity after a lot of thought. i’ve had to learn to like men and to forgive them. i’ve had to figure out how to be a man apart from the forms and functions of men trying to be better than women. i’ve had to try to explain this to my dad. adherence to male supremacy isn’t the only way to express your masculinity. it’s just the only way a lot of men are ever taught.

he Joe Biden administration may actually make a huge difference for transgender people, not only in America, but all over the world.

2014 was the transgender tipping point, with unprecedented trans visibility and acceptance. Then came the backlash.

The anti-trans backlash

In Europe we have seen extremist governments in Hungary and Poland attack  the LGBTQA community. In Britain some so called “radical feminists” have joined forces with right wing transphobes in a media blitz against trans and nonbinary people. In the US the Trump administration has done its best to undo several years of transgender progress.

Transgender people has  become the focal point for extremists who fear gender diversity, much in the same way as lesbian and gay people were used as scapegoats in the 20th century. 

This is not primarily about trans people. It is about political power and the desire to turn the clock back some 100 years, back to a time with traditional gender roles and a world run by conservative white men. 

As we can see, they are using racism, homophobia and transphobia to achieve their objectives.

The effects of transphobic policies

The various anti-trans policies affect trans people negatively for several reasons: 

Firstly, obviously, they harm trans people because they are denying  them the chance to live a normal life. 

Secondly they hurt transgender people by creating an atmosphere of fear.

This is why the Biden administration may be of help to transgender people all over the world, and not only in the US. 

The Capitol terrorist attack has shown the world what kind of evil we are dealing with here, and having  a sane president supporting transgender people will be seen as a clear signal for change in the right direction all over the world.

What has Biden said and done about trans people so far?

According to the Washington Post  Biden has called the trans struggle the “civil rights issue of our time.”

In 2017, he endorsed Danica Roem, the first openly trans person to be elected to a state legislature in U.S. history.

Biden  asked transgender veteran Shawn Skelly to be part of his presidential transition team at the Department of Defense.

The Post reports that when he left the vice presidency, Biden partnered with other advocates to start the As You Are campaign to advocate for families’ acceptance of their transgender children.

What are Biden and Harris going to do?

Biden has promised to overturn every Trump administration rule that limits transgender rights, including tossing out its near-total ban on transgender troops serving in the military. 

He will also reinstate the Obama-era guidance for protecting transgender students that the Trump administration took away.

Biden has said he will protect the rights of anyone who qualifies to adopt, regardless of religion or family composition.

Legal experts expect that  Biden’s Department of Education will switch sides in two legal battles regarding transgender athletes — one in Connecticut and  one  in Idaho.

Furthermore, the Biden administration will  provide anti-bias training for federal employees and offer incentives for states that adopt programs that help prepare transgender people for the workplace.

Keep in mind that Biden will also try to get the Equality Act passed by Congress. This  law will add sexual orientation and gender identity to existing federal civil rights laws, banning discrimination against LGBTQA people in housing, public accommodations, credit and more. Since the Democratic Party now controls the Senate, there is a  chance that the law will go through.

In support of Black trans people

The Washington post writes:

During a town hall meeting with voters, Biden surprised even longtime LGBTQ advocates when he addressed the killing of transgender women — largely of color. At least 43 transgender or gender-nonconforming people were killed in the United States in 2020, according to the Human Rights Campaign. 

Advocates praised Biden for bringing the issue to the national stage and vowing to direct federal resources to prevent and prosecute such homicides.

“There’s an opportunity here for a national discussion on transgender people of color who are often just left out of the national conversation,” said David J. Johns, executive director of the National Black Justice Coalition, a civil rights organization dedicated to the Black LGBTQ community. 

“Even though the transgender community may have more visibility in TV shows like ‘Pose,’ the vitriol at the policy level that exists within the system leaves no promise of justice.”

Johns said he hopes to see more LGBTQ leaders of color appointed in Biden’s administration.

Under the Obama administration American embassies world wide were decorated in rainbow colors. I expect that to happen again, and that would be a clear message to homophobes and transphobes all over the world that America is again on the side of justice.

Not all of these changes will happen over night, though. LGBTQ Nation reports that Biden’s landmark LGBTQA rights legislation could take more than 100 days to pass. The Corona virus and the Trump impeachment will obviously have an effect. 

here's a tip for those who are healing or plan on getting top surgery: when you change your dressings for your nipples, make sure to use the antibacterial cream they give you every single time until it's safe to keep the dressings off entirely (even then, you should still use it until they're completely healed). it's petroleum-based so it'll keep them moist. if you don't have this, you can use the strongest Neosporin you can find at the store.