for reasons wretched and divine

And it isn’t. No matter what the reason is, what they say to you, any circumstances at all- it isn’t your fault. It isn’t ever your fault.

If they love you, than they should accept you- Even when it’s confusing or hard for them, they should always support you. That’s on them, not you. 

Passing: Profiling the Lives of Young Trans Men of Color (2015).

[ID: Excerpts from interviews with two trans men. The first, Lucah Rosenberg Lee, has a shaved head and a trimmed beard. The second, Victor Thomas, has curly black hair and a trimmed beard, and is heavier-set.

Lucah, talking about gender dysphoria prior to transitioning, says, “I was in a heterosexual relationship. I was female. I would question this all the time. Am I attracted to these men, or do I just want to be them? That was a big turning point in my own self-discovery.”

Victor, talking about the transphobia he’s endured as a trans man of color, says, “You’re subjected to something because they don’t understand you. And you have to watch the way you react, because you’re a man now. People take you as a threat.”

Lucah, in another scene, discusses feeling erased as a trans man, and racism in trans communities. He says, “Being so invisible within the LGBT community can actually feel so isolating. When people don’t know my history as a trans person, I feel sometimes that I’m viewed as more of an enemy.” END ID.]

Trans men of color deserved to be loved and appreciated, and made safe. Trans men deserve access to our own spaces, no matter how masculine and cis-passing we are. We deserve credit and recognition for the contributions that we have made to trans history, most of which are erased nowadays.

Being a man is not dangerous or wrong. Being masculine is not dangerous or wrong. Being a black man is not dangerous or wrong.

Please support trans men of color.

Please support trans men.

Please support men.

Testosterone is not a “violent” hormone. It doesn’t make you “more aggressive” or a worse person, it doesn’t make you “dangerous” or “toxic”.

Transmascs do not need to be “warned of the dangers of T”. We do not need to spend our transitions terrified that we’re going to become a danger to those around us- that HRT is going to turn us into a monster.

Everyone experiences mood swings during hormonal shifts (pregnancy, menstruation, menopause, estrogen HRT, etc.) and while you might have grumpy moments or feel anger/frustration that you need to learn to handle differently, that doesn’t make you a bad person.

Testosterone can change the way you access/process emotions somewhat, but if you’re already thoughtful about how you handle your feelings and treat others, you’re going to be fine. It’s normal to lash out on occasion, by accident, and then apologize & work to do better. It doesn’t make you a bad person. Everyone on HRT is prone to this, and everyone experiencing hormonal changes is prone to this.

you don’t have to find the perfect just right word for your experience, you don’t have to parse out what named gender you’re closest to on a spectrum, what subset of nonbinary most closely reflects your truth, weigh your masculinity against your femininity against your androgyny to see what the total comes out to, you don’t have to label your gender by its relation or opposition to the gender you were assigned

all those things are great for exploring your gender & if you can find a home in them more power to you