First Of My Kind

There's a huge sense of social isolation that comes with being perceived as male, because now people are subconsciously treating me as a potential predator. All strangers, no matter their gender, keep their guard up around me.

It made me realize that there is no inherent camaraderie in male socialization as there is in female socialization—unless, of course, it's in very specific environments. And the fact I don't amnbiently experience this mutual kinship in basic exchanges anymore is an insanely lonely feeling.

Absolutely, because it's an extremely sticky issue.

Frankly, this is something I would've never understood without living the experience.

It's now blatantly clear to me that most cis men probably experience chronic emotional malnutrition. They're deprived of social connection just enough for it to seriously fuck with their psyches, but not enough for them to realize that it's happening and what's causing it.

It's like they're starving, but don't know this because they've always been served 3 meals...except those meals have never been big enough.

This deprivation comes from all sides of aisle, by the way.

In the case of women: When I'm out in public and interact with women, all of them come off as incredibly aloof, cold, and mirthless. I have never experienced this before even though I know exactly what this composure is—the armor that keeps away creepy-ass men.

As someone who used to wear it myself, I know this armor is 100% impersonal. Nobody likes wearing it, and I can say with absolute certainty that women would dump the armor in favor of unconditional companionship with men if doing this didn't run the risk of actual assault. (Trust me when I say women aren't just being needlessly guarded.)

But I only have a complete understanding of this context because I've experienced female socialization. If I hadn't, I would've thought this coldness was a conspiracy against me devised by roughly half of the human population. Even now, with all that I know about navigating the world as a woman, I'm failing to convince my monkey-brain that this armor isn't social rejection.

And as for male socialization? Again, it seems taboo for a man to be platonically intimate with men for reasons I have yet to fully understand, but I think it boils down to a) the fact society teaches boys that it's not okay to be soft with each other, and b) garden-variety homophobia. Our media only shows men being intimate with one another when they're teamed up against a dire situation, and I'd bet real money it's a huge reason why men gravitate toward activities that simulate being teamed up against an opposing force.

But men are not machines of war. Yes, testosterone absolutely gives you Dumb Bastard Brain, but that just makes you want to skateboard a wagon down a hill or duct-tape your friend to the wall, not kill someone.

The human species looks so much colder standing from this side.

I can see how men might convince themselves that their feelings of emotional desperation is personal weakness as opposed to a symptom they're all experiencing from Western* Imperialism. Because this human connection, this frith, is as essential for our wellbeing as water is.

So sick. How sick. I want to destroy this garbage.

I am a cis bisexual man, and this post fundamentally changed the way I understand and talk about my own sense of masculinity.

These are things that I think most if not all men growing up in the west experience, and it's so easy to not realize that's what you're experiencing. Even coming out as bi and finding acceptance in close (and largely queer) friend groups has been a huge change for me, and really illuminates just how lonely I felt before and crucially how that was not only treated as normal, but even *expected* of me.

It's something I noticed quite a few years ago, and thought it was a problem back then as well. Guys don't feel welcome in these spaces unless they're obviously flamboyant or gender non-conforming in some way.

For example, my roommate, a cis dude, is demisexual, and went through the exact same arc pretty much every person goes through when they realize they're queer: A period of questioning, the clarity of discovering there's a word for it, and the ordeal of coming out to family and friends. Now he's got the demi pride flag hanging in his room. But despite all this, he stays out of queer spaces because he feels like they're not his place at all.

I've also noticed queer people seem less receptive to trans dudes who are very masculine in their presentation and mannerisms—bald, bearded, hairy, the whole nine—as opposed to those who lean more androgynous or who otherwise pepper more gender-nonconformity into their presentation.

Even my own experiences relate, in a somewhat opposite way: My internal gender experience is very squarely "male," but I (intentionally) present more androgynous for "80's rockstar" reasons. However it seems like the queer communities I'm a part of will, more often than not, treat "gender-non-conforming man of trans experience" as interchangeable with "nonbinary transmasculine," when it's not.

Anyway, this is all to say there's a lot of small things that hint at a bias against having too much masculinity in queer spaces—specifically the kind of masculinity that reminds people of typical cis men. It's true there are plenty of reasons why AFAB individuals are cautious around this, but it's also true that it discourages queer cis dudes from joining in, which can turn them off to progressive spaces in general. Which is. Not great.