#antijw

i see a lot of tumblrs in the ex-cult/ex-religious community who have an “alternative” gender identity and i just want to say, i get it. we were raised incredibly repressed, very pressured to comply with the norm and the standards, to conform to a homogeneous hetero-normative lifestyle and adhere to the expectations and roles that went along with that. so ANY deviation from those standards was disorienting and called one’s very identity into question.

i think for some it is a trauma response. i hated being born female, but i never had dysphoria or considered that i was trans. my internalized misogyny came directly from my cult brainwashing that women were inferior. i’m also bisexual and didn’t allow that to even become part of “who I was” for years because it was shameful/bad/dirty. so i got the homophobic misogynistic mindset at odds within who i really was and that caused immense agony and internal strife until i walked away from those dogmatic, controlling views.

i get it. i think it’s good to explore and it’s normal after your whole worldview is ripped away to start asking deep questions like, am i even straight? am i comfortable in the body i was born in apart from the toxic gender roles that i was never able to separate from the essence of inhabiting my physical body? am i comfortable with existing as a sexual being? do i feel acquainted with my sexuality? am i a woman? am i a man? what does that look like now that i’ve taken g*d out of the implications of those labels? 

i want to gently say. it is easy to leave one cult and fall into another. those of us who are gender critical sometimes refer to trans ideology as cult-like or the cult of gender. that’s because there ARE some very concerning attributes about the positions we see being taken - villainizing those who disagree denying basic human decency to those you decide are on the “wrong” side, threatening people who hold certain ideologies and philosophies with actual physical violence, and demanding that other people conform to your standards, use your language, and basically worship the ideals/heroes that you say to. it is closed-minded and dangerous, but i see why deconverts are attracted to these communities. they preach love and acceptance, you can explore your identity, you suddenly have access to all these lovely things that were denied to you for YEARS - i get it.

please be careful, please continue to ask hard questions, think critically, and keep learning about what beliefs are out there. i’d say most people who leave a suffocating religion experiment with their identity expression after leaving - it is normal to try several different things before realizing, oh I’m _____ after all! what a freeing, growing process. it could take years. don’t despair. you’re unpacking false narratives about who you are and finding what is truthful enough to replace them with.

being denied bodily autonomy and forced into repressive gender role stereotypes is a recipe to drive traumatized individuals into the arms of some really out-there ideas. when i meet someone who’s left the church and is now ace/demi/aro/femme/poly with ze/zir pronouns and has a name from a video game series, i get it. that in no way makes it to where we cannot hold space with one another, talk about our lives, share our values, explore what we have in common and what we don’t. yes, i’m a radical feminist and that’s partly due to the fact that i escaped an incredibly misogynistic, homophobic, patriarchal cult. 

for some, that will make you automatically say i’m not safe, i’m transphobic, i can’t be trusted, etc. i’m sorry you feel that way. i’m the last person who’s going to tell you WHO to be, HOW to live, WHAT to say because fuck that religious culty bullshit. i only ask that you extend the same courtesy to me. this post is not meant to generalize an entire population of people or to say “you’re trans because of religious trauma not because that’s who you really are” because I don’t believe that. I just am identifying a trend that I see, offering a possible explanation, and opening myself up to dialogue. 

An excerpt from the article: