I want to get way out ahead of something. trans-age adults (chronologically under 18) do not have any sort of privilege over trans-age children (chronologically 18+). if that statement becomes a battleground in five or ten years, I called it.
All of the power in the adult-child relationship comes from the social construct: legal custody. The police force catches runaway children and returns them to their parents. Parents have police and community support to exert total control over the lives of their children.
A parent can change their child’s clothes, food, schedule, and medicine at will and has the actual power to suppress the child’s speech acts. That power doesn’t come from identifying as an adult and it doesn’t come from being chronologically over 18. It comes from socially imposed roles.
If person A can enact violence over person B and the community supports A, A has privilege over B. That’s all privilege has ever meant. The community responsible can be your friend group, it can be your family, it can be the police force and the courts. Sometimes the community is whoever happens to be present in the grocery store parking lot. But privilege is the ability to take action against another person and enjoy social support because of your victim’s status.
If, someday, everyone treats transage people as their age, from their family, to their friends, to the police and the courts, then transadults will have privilege over transminors. But not before. There is no “essence of adult” that gives each adult their power over children. It is social cooperation that gives adults their power. Absent social cooperation, an adult’s power over a child would be limited to their size and experience gaps. The adult could grapple the child or trick them, but they could not force the child into years of menial and psychological subservience without the full weight of community backing.
