Trans love

Imagine being a black, gay drag queen in the 1800s after being born into enslavement AND having the style and cachè to throw soirées that the girls had to come to! That’s why I don’t want to hear this “we’re not our ancestors stuff.” You’re right!

From The Very Black Project Page- William Dorsey Swann was a gay liberation activist. Born into slavery in 1858, he was the first person in the United States to lead a queer resistance group and the first known person to self-identify as a “queen of drag”. Imagine the queenery of this icon.

He was a slave in Hancock, Maryland and was freed by Union soldiers after the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect. During the 1880s and 1890s, he organized a series of balls in Washington, D.C. He called himself the “queen of drag”. Most of the attendees his gatherings were men who were former slaves, and were gathering to dance in their satin and silk dresses. William was arrested in police raids numerous times,including in the first documented case of arrests for female impersonation in the United States, on April 12, 1888. In 1896, he was falsely convicted and sentenced to 10 months in jail for “keeping a disorderly house” (running a brothel). After his sentencing, he requested a pardon from President Grover Cleveland. This request was denied, but but he was the first American on record who pursued legal and political action to defend the LGBTQ community’s right to gather.

He was known to have been close with Pierce Lafayette and Felix Hall, two men who had also both been slaves and who formed the first known male same-sex relationship between enslaved Americans.

When William stopped organizing and participating in drag events, his brother continued to make costumes for the drag community. Two of his brothers had also been active participants in his drag balls.

Imagine how intelligent and ambitious this man had to be to come up with drag balls in the 1800s! Imagine how many terrible concepts he had to unlearn by himself to be a confident gay black man who does drag in the 1800s! Imagine how courageous he had to be to fight for lgbt people as a former slave in America in the 1800s!

Southern Comfort (2001)

Robert: – and now she’s coming out, full blown… she is something else.

Lola: Oh, please, stop it.

Robert: What? I’m just telling her how wonderful you are, and how beautiful, and how organised, and…

Lola: Actually, you know, I really should put all of this on tape, you know? For when I’m not feeling so great.

Robert: Sweetheart, it is on tape. 

[BOTH LAUGH]

Robert: Just in the last couple of months now, it’s come on real strong, but she just really blushes! I can get her to blush all the way from head to toe. See? And she can’t deal with it! She’s never blushed like that before!

Lola: [SIGHS]

[BOTH LAUGH]

Robert: All my life, I’ve been looking for the perfect woman… and all this time, she’s been right there in front of me, and I didn’t even realise it, ‘cause I never thought I’d have a chance with her.

Lola: Why? You’re like… completely loveable.

Robert: To be loved by you, that’s… that’s…

Lola: I had no notion, to think that we would have this little fling.

Robert: That’s what I feel - we have this nice friendship, we can’t go out, we have fun together, we got no entanglements and stuff and then - bam! Just… all of a sudden, next thing I know, we’re in love with each other and we can’t stop it.

my top surgery is supposed to be in november and my financial situation is pretty bad. im working my ass off with no days off until the date of the surgery but i'll still be $1200-2000 short. if anyone could throw a few dollars at me or reblog this post, i would greatly appreciate it.

if a little trans boy comes out to his parents & is like 4 all youd do for his transition is cut his hair, buy a new wardrobe, & switch pronouns & possibly change names

no one is gonna put a little 4 year old on testosterone OR puberty blockers until theyre actually about to start puberty & then they give them a few years to really decide if they want to start hormones

I’ve created the blog @havenscloset where you can look through a list of free clothes that I’m giving away.

My goal is to provide good, feminine clothes to girls who are early in their transition, cannot buy feminine clothes for fear of being outed, or cannot otherwise afford them. 

I will be adding more items and accessories in the future!

Please give it a look and spread the word!

@havenscloset

@havenscloset

How to make a gaff, a step-by step tutorial for transfeminine people

You will need:

Scissors

A sock OR Length of pantyhose

A pair of underwear

Step One: Cut a 6-inch/15cm segment of the sock or pantyhose. You can throw away the rest, or keep it to use in making another gaff.

Step Two: Cut off the elastic waistband from the underwear. Throw away the rest.

Step Three: Thread the waistband through the sock.

The gaff is now complete! To wear it, put your legs through the waistband on either side of the sock and pull it up like a pair of panties - lots of other posts have covered tucking, but even if you can’t tuck “properly” (i.e., with the testicles in the inguinal canals), it still works if you just kinda smush everything under. Put a pair of panties on over it, and you’re done!

so transmisogyny is the intersection of transphobia and misogyny, which should be obvious but some people don't like to listen. its another layer of oppression past the transphobia that transmascs have. every transfemme I've talked to and befriended has had some experience with feeling predatory for having feelings for someone (generally affects trans wlw more) or infantilized themselves and acted very gentle and passive in order to not feel as though they're predatory. (I'm still working through the first one and used to deal with the latter)

we're taught to be afraid of our own bodies, especially our genitals. it's as if we're monsters for being women born with penises, as if that in itself makes us gross. there's a reason that all the transphobic bathroom arguments come down to a "man dressed as a woman" preying on women. this goes a million times as far for black trans women, who have the added intersection of blackness. that paints them as even more masculine and aggressive despite how far that is from the truth.

I developed my eating disorder because i felt like my body was too big and masculine, that i would look more feminine if i were skinnier. thats obviously something cis women face, but its not the same for us. we're told we have male bodies and that we need to make ourselves smaller to fit in with "real women".

we're excluded from women's spaces for "not having the same experiences" or "invading" or whatever other transphobic reterric they want to use to allow trans men in but not us. we're alienated from trans/LGBT spaces due to the heavy focus on transmasc and tme nonbinary people in discussions of transitioning. for every 20 resources on how to bind and its dangers i get on my dash, I see 1 or 2 on tucking and its dangers. for every 20 binder giveaways i see I've never seen a gaff giveaway. I bet some of you don't even know what a gaff is. (its what we use to tuck)

the amount of times I've seen jokes about men in dresses, the amount of times i've heard words like femboy and tranny thrown around by tme people as if they're not harming us by doing so sickens me. every time you make genderbent fan art, draw a guy looking embarassed in a dress, or make a femboy friday joke, you are contributing to the stigma that follows us wherever we go.

Did you know it’s not uncommon to lose a shoe size or two? Or to shrink a couple inches because your entire pelvis rotates after a while (which hurts like a motherfucker, I might add)? Or that it’s very possible that you’ll suffer some of the symptoms of PMS every month even though you can’t menstruate? Did you know your tastes in food might change because your sense of smell changes? Probably not, because barely anybody researches or published information on this stuff. And who even fucking knows what you can expect after surgery because hearsay reports vary wildly and there’s basically nothing out there.

 Like you might have to do slightly (slightly) more for tighter clothes or different fabrics but like… ya don’t need to tape yourself every day… or ever… and gaffs are good but unless you’re wearing something tight n thin cotton boyshorts or some other strong underwear will do the trick.