It feels like a lot of the time lately when I go to say something about current trans issues I end up sounding like some elderly idiot
I was scrolling Twitter earlier and saw a profile that described themselves as a “hyperfemme AFAB trans person” and their posted images were indeed expressive of hyper femme fashion
and I did the blinky guy meme face
Butch trans women say hi
Yeah I know. I get blinky over that sometimes too, but (maybe wrongly) I feel like butch lesbian aesthetic is different from cishet male masculine presentation? Maybe not, and certainly not always and forever.
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
Sidebar: this particular person on Twitter purports to be a PhD professor of gender studies and offers their services as a social scientist specializing in trans issues “as a member of the trans community,” and, well, honestly I feel like that’s not super helpful. Again, maybe I’m wrong, but I feel like a non-transitioning super-femme AFAB person who makes a point to showcase their commitment to femininity maybe doesn’t have the same experiences as most trans people around the world and I don’t know if I feel comfortable with that person acting as a representative for my community or myself.
Atomika on
+1
GrogMy sword is only steelin a useful shape.Registered Userregular
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
0
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
I can't say I know this person at all, but it feels like an inevitable point along the journey to trans acceptance. There isn't, and can't be a check list of terrible things a trans person has to go through before they get the street cred to speak on their experiences. Whether the person can understand, and relate the message to a wider audience is where I draw my line. If this twitter person never suffers, but can get others to help move the needle in the right direction then I am fully saisfied.
Take as a counter point Caitlyn Jenner. She probably has gone through at least some of what you describe, but lives in a completely separate world at this point. Her world is one where it is a good idea to have republicans in power because of how insulated she is from the daily effects of such policy. The shared suffering has a very different context, and reality because of how complex cultural identity is when we get to the individual level.
+5
GrogMy sword is only steelin a useful shape.Registered Userregular
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
This is gatekeeping. I don't give two shits about whoever this person on twitter is, but them not conforming to your idea of what a trans person is or not having suffered the same indignities as anyone else doesn't mean they're doing any harm.
They're not harming anyone by offering their services as a PhD in gender studies to their fellow trans people and they're certainly not harming "representation".
What is harmful is broadcasting nonsense about how you have to tick various boxes before you're allowed to call yourself trans.
+1
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
I can't say I know this person at all, but it feels like an inevitable point along the journey to trans acceptance. There isn't, and can't be a check list of terrible things a trans person has to go through before they get the street cred to speak on their experiences. Whether the person can understand, and relate the message to a wider audience is where I draw my line. If this twitter person never suffers, but can get others to help move the needle in the right direction then I am fully saisfied.
Take as a counter point Caitlyn Jenner. She probably has gone through at least some of what you describe, but lives in a completely separate world at this point. Her world is one where it is a good idea to have republicans in power because of how insulated she is from the daily effects of such policy. The shared suffering has a very different context, and reality because of how complex cultural identity is when we get to the individual level.
I think we all agree on the importance of representation in leadership, so the problem here is articulating how this person is representative. This isn’t a question of personal qualification; as you say, there shouldn’t be a checklist required to self- identify. However, this is a person who sets themselves as both an authority on and party to being transgender. I know there’s no two journeys alike, but I don’t think it’s wrong to say there is a shared understanding of transhood by most trans people that would be—at most—extremely limited in its overlap with this person.
Using Jenner again as an example, despite likely a huge common sense of struggle shared by her and most trans people, she would be a terrible fit for community ambassador exactly for the reasons you mentioned—but that’s not a meaningful counter. Both these people, I feel, are unqualified figureheads for trans issues. I’m not arguing that sharing a common trans struggle qualifies people for authority, I’m just arguing that not sharing it probably disqualifies.
0
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
This is gatekeeping. I don't give two shits about whoever this person on twitter is, but them not conforming to your idea of what a trans person is or not having suffered the same indignities as anyone else doesn't mean they're doing any harm.
They're not harming anyone by offering their services as a PhD in gender studies to their fellow trans people and they're certainly not harming "representation".
What is harmful is broadcasting nonsense about how you have to tick various boxes before you're allowed to call yourself trans.
I never said it was harmful, I said it might not be helpful. And certainly didn’t say anything about gatekeeping who gets to be trans. This is conversation about public leadership. Dial it back a bit.
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
I can't say I know this person at all, but it feels like an inevitable point along the journey to trans acceptance. There isn't, and can't be a check list of terrible things a trans person has to go through before they get the street cred to speak on their experiences. Whether the person can understand, and relate the message to a wider audience is where I draw my line. If this twitter person never suffers, but can get others to help move the needle in the right direction then I am fully saisfied.
Take as a counter point Caitlyn Jenner. She probably has gone through at least some of what you describe, but lives in a completely separate world at this point. Her world is one where it is a good idea to have republicans in power because of how insulated she is from the daily effects of such policy. The shared suffering has a very different context, and reality because of how complex cultural identity is when we get to the individual level.
I think we all agree on the importance of representation in leadership, so the problem here is articulating how this person is representative. This isn’t a question of personal qualification; as you say, there shouldn’t be a checklist required to self- identify. However, this is a person who sets themselves as both an authority on and party to being transgender. I know there’s no two journeys alike, but I don’t think it’s wrong to say there is a shared understanding of transhood by most trans people that would be—at most—extremely limited in its overlap with this person.
Using Jenner again as an example, despite likely a huge common sense of struggle shared by her and most trans people, she would be a terrible fit for community ambassador exactly for the reasons you mentioned—but that’s not a meaningful counter. Both these people, I feel, are unqualified figureheads for trans issues. I’m not arguing that sharing a common trans struggle qualifies people for authority, I’m just arguing that not sharing it probably disqualifies.
You can't have it both ways though. The shared trans experience is either a necessary qualifier or it isn't. I mention Jenner to highlight just how little those qualification can mean in the face of everything else life throws at you. Life just isn't so easily quantified down into a check list that can give you insight. What two people take from the same experience will be very different.
Further, I would say we can't silence someone because they haven't met some arbitrary set of milestones. This person on twitter can no more help how their life has gone than any of us. Saying that as a result they cannot speak out does not sit well with me at all. They aren't, as far as I know, offering the definitive trans experience. They are offering the knowledge and expertise they have to those who listen. We need to then judge the quality of the message on its own merits. There is no value in dismissing it based on not liking what assumptions we are making based on limited information on the messengers life.
+5
GrogMy sword is only steelin a useful shape.Registered Userregular
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
This is gatekeeping. I don't give two shits about whoever this person on twitter is, but them not conforming to your idea of what a trans person is or not having suffered the same indignities as anyone else doesn't mean they're doing any harm.
They're not harming anyone by offering their services as a PhD in gender studies to their fellow trans people and they're certainly not harming "representation".
What is harmful is broadcasting nonsense about how you have to tick various boxes before you're allowed to call yourself trans.
I never said it was harmful, I said it might not be helpful. And certainly didn’t say anything about gatekeeping who gets to be trans. This is conversation about public leadership. Dial it back a bit.
You're pulling “as a member of the trans community” as if it's a point of contention (never mind the phrasing of "purports to have a PhD"). You said yourself "this probably sounds like gatekeeping".
For what? The crime of being an AFAB trans person that presents femme? For offering services to other trans people? Have they even claimed to be a 'qualified representative' (whatever that means)?
I bring up harm because gatekeeping bullshit is directly harmful. It's telling people in this space right here that there are nonsense standards they have to meet before they can be whatever level of acceptable. Wooly ideas of The Representation have been used to hurt me more than they've ever been helpful.
I understand the point you are trying to make, in that what is exactly the point if you’re a hypothetical trans man or woman that has no desire to do anything to transition besides pronouns or names, but that’s just a rare extreme that isn’t worth getting into the very thorny issue of being trans enough which is just harming everyone to deal with a rarity. It runs parallel to the idea of keeping trans people out of bathrooms because of a hypothetical person lying to assault people.
I’d wager there’s more trans people not undergoing any kind of medical transition out of circumstances than by choice, and we’d be better served by helping the former than scrutinizing the latter.
Sterica on
+5
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I understand the point you are trying to make, in that what is exactly the point if you’re a hypothetical trans man or woman that has no desire to do anything to transition besides pronouns or names, but that’s just a rare extreme that isn’t worth getting into the very thorny issue of being trans enough which is just harming everyone to deal with a rarity. It runs parallel to the idea of keeping trans people out of bathrooms because of a hypothetical person lying to assault people.
I’d wager there’s more trans people not undergoing any kind of medical transition out of circumstances than by choice, and we’d be better served by helping the former than scrutinizing the latter.
In this case, they’re not even changing pronouns. They’re femme-presenting AFAB with she/her pronouns.
I understand the point you are trying to make, in that what is exactly the point if you’re a hypothetical trans man or woman that has no desire to do anything to transition besides pronouns or names, but that’s just a rare extreme that isn’t worth getting into the very thorny issue of being trans enough which is just harming everyone to deal with a rarity. It runs parallel to the idea of keeping trans people out of bathrooms because of a hypothetical person lying to assault people.
I’d wager there’s more trans people not undergoing any kind of medical transition out of circumstances than by choice, and we’d be better served by helping the former than scrutinizing the latter.
In this case, they’re not even changing pronouns. They’re femme-presenting AFAB with she/her pronouns.
If she preferred She/They would that be enough? Where is the line where she is trans enough to have a voice? I don't ask this question to be an asshole even though it feels extremely aggressive even to me. I ask because that is what we are dancing around here. I don't think there can be a good answer to this question because the question is not good.
I mean if a person identifies as trans then they are. .
This is what we fight for and espouse and I don't see the harm in there being one more voice talking about our struggles even if it's not anything like mine.
I am a AMAB binary ultra femme trans woman and I don't understand a lot of the voices in the choir from my perspective but I will absolutely go to the mat for any of their rights to be in the choir.
Mostly just huntin' monsters.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
+4
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I mean if a person identifies as trans then they are. .
This is what we fight for and espouse and I don't see the harm in there being one more voice talking about our struggles even if it's not anything like mine.
I am a AMAB binary ultra femme trans woman and I don't understand a lot of the voices in the choir from my perspective but I will absolutely go to the mat for any of their rights to be in the choir.
I want to reiterate that I’m not arguing against this person’s transness, I’m questioning their ability to be the leader and representative they are already telling everyone they are because I’m not sure they’re capable of articulating much of a shared trans experience.
I don’t think we would accept a similar scenario from, for example, a white-passing person from a white cultural background arguing for a leadership role in POC spaces, which is what this feels like to me. Like, I think the singer Halsey is a good example here, as she’s gone on record saying she feels it’s important to consider herself an ally of POC communities instead of considering herself part of POC communities because she has white-passing privilege and doesn’t suffer from the same injustices or come from the same home culture as POC without white privilege.
I understand the point you are trying to make, in that what is exactly the point if you’re a hypothetical trans man or woman that has no desire to do anything to transition besides pronouns or names, but that’s just a rare extreme that isn’t worth getting into the very thorny issue of being trans enough which is just harming everyone to deal with a rarity. It runs parallel to the idea of keeping trans people out of bathrooms because of a hypothetical person lying to assault people.
I’d wager there’s more trans people not undergoing any kind of medical transition out of circumstances than by choice, and we’d be better served by helping the former than scrutinizing the latter.
In this case, they’re not even changing pronouns. They’re femme-presenting AFAB with she/her pronouns.
On the surface of it it's like why is she even calling herself trans but then I realize I'm being judgmental and the truth is I don't know her full circumstances. I don't know how she got to where she is or what her story is. I know it took me awhile to figure things out and I'm still not where I want to be. I know there are people that would judge me for that and tell me I don't belong in the club because I haven't done X, Y, and Z. Who am I to decide who is trans enough.
It doesn't seem like I would have much shared experience with her. I don't understand her identity but maybe I don't need to understand it in order to accept it. Besides, isn't that what I'm asking the rest of the world to do for me?
I’m questioning their ability to be the leader and representative they are already telling everyone they are because I’m not sure they’re capable of articulating much of a shared trans experience.
I think there are people who are unfamiliar with trans issues who would look at her and throw their hands up and exclaim "see? they're just making stuff up and it's not real". It's probably not helpful but I think our detractors weren't inclined to change to their minds anyways. You can still point to this as an illustration of understanding not being a requirement for acceptance.
I understand the point you are trying to make, in that what is exactly the point if you’re a hypothetical trans man or woman that has no desire to do anything to transition besides pronouns or names, but that’s just a rare extreme that isn’t worth getting into the very thorny issue of being trans enough which is just harming everyone to deal with a rarity. It runs parallel to the idea of keeping trans people out of bathrooms because of a hypothetical person lying to assault people.
I’d wager there’s more trans people not undergoing any kind of medical transition out of circumstances than by choice, and we’d be better served by helping the former than scrutinizing the latter.
In this case, they’re not even changing pronouns. They’re femme-presenting AFAB with she/her pronouns.
On the surface of it it's like why is she even calling herself trans but then I realize I'm being judgmental and the truth is I don't know her full circumstances. I don't know how she got to where she is or what her story is. I know it took me awhile to figure things out and I'm still not where I want to be. I know there are people that would judge me for that and tell me I don't belong in the club because I haven't done X, Y, and Z. Who am I to decide who is trans enough.
It doesn't seem like I would have much shared experience with her. I don't understand her identity but maybe I don't need to understand it in order to accept it. Besides, isn't that what I'm asking the rest of the world to do for me?
I’m questioning their ability to be the leader and representative they are already telling everyone they are because I’m not sure they’re capable of articulating much of a shared trans experience.
I think there are people who are unfamiliar with trans issues who would look at her and throw their hands up and exclaim "see? they're just making stuff up and it's not real". It's probably not helpful but I think our detractors weren't inclined to change to their minds anyways. You can still point to this as an illustration of understanding not being a requirement for acceptance.
Yeah, I think self-identification is paramount, and I don’t need to understand someone’s internal world to accept them anymore than they should need to know mine. The only thing that would probably make me upset is if this AFAB femme trans person went around saying they were a trans woman and then using that to argue that, say, transmisogyny isn’t real because she doesn’t experience it. But that would be because she’s an asshole, not because she is trans.
2 things, just my opinions from what I've seen in queer + trans online spaces
Thing 1:
I think it's ok to take a minute and say "damn I wish these institutions of power (in this case Insert University Here) would platform the trans people that face the most threat, so that they could determine what would constitute safety + liberation". It would be the ethical thing for these institutions to do, both for reparations and to be in line with their mission statements.
But they won't, because if they were gonna do that, they already would've. These institutions are always late to the party, and they only respond to leverage; by being surrounded by social networks and channels of cooperation that they are left out of by hiring so narrowly.
So we gotta then take that initial feeling of frustration, and use it as fuel to put a broader range of us than just the Cis-Accepted Few in positions of power, whether those are positions we create in our own organizations, or the very local organizations we have any influence over.
Thing 2:
In everything I've seen, doing 1:1 analogies of queer + trans marginalization to Black & indigenous marginalization is super fraught and basically never worth doing, because it's appropriative & because it tends to hurt community members at those intersections.
I think it's ok to take a minute and say "damn I wish these institutions of power (in this case Insert University Here) would platform the trans people that face the most threat, so that they could determine what would constitute safety + liberation". It would be the ethical thing for these institutions to do, both for reparations and to be in line with their mission statements.
But they won't, because if they were gonna do that, they already would've. These institutions are always late to the party, and they only respond to leverage; by being surrounded by social networks and channels of cooperation that they are left out of by hiring so narrowly.
Do you know who's the force of positive change at universities that I've seen in action?
Students
They develop a better understanding of each other and the world, then use that empathy and knowledge to educate their friends and family on QUILTBAG issues and reduce prejudice in their social circles
I believe in them 100% even when I don't believe in the intentions of uni administration (who, I agree, focus on image and profit and do not want to risk either of those, causing them to be late to the party)
+10
Mx. QuillI now prefer "Myr. Quill", actually...{They/Them}Registered Userregular
Well, some good news in the state I unfortunately live in:
ShadowenSnores in the morningLoserdomRegistered Userregular
edited April 2021
Honestly baffled that any empirical research would have had an effect on the progress of that bill, given, y'know, the whole everything, but it's a win where one is badly needed right now.
Shadowen on
+22
MsAnthropyThe Lady of Pain Breaks the Rhythm, Breaks the Rhythm, Breaks the RhythmThe City of FlowersRegistered Userregular
Honestly baffled that any empirical research would have had an effect on the progress of that bill, given, y'know, the whole everything, but it's a win where one is badly needed right now.
Probably the fact that they could pass it but don’t have enough votes to override the dem governor’s veto.
I would say that, unless you were extremely lucky to transition early in life, you are undoing literal decades of habit so don’t be so hard on yourself.
Sterica on
+24
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I said my deadname when I answered the phone the other day at work, which hasn’t been my legal name for six years. Stuff happens and brains are dumb. No biggie.
+7
AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
Caitlyn Jenner officially supports bans on trans kids playing sports:
One reassuring thing about Caitlyn Jenner offering herself up as the token trans person of the GOP is that almost nobody likes her or will vote for her.
A few talking heads might try to use her existence in their usual "the left are the real bigots" bullshit but most of her political associates are still gonna hate her and refuse to be associated with her because she's trans and that identity is politicized as being radically liberal no matter how regressive, rich, and white she is.
I think there is a useful argument to be made from Caitlyn Jenner’s very existence, which is: clearly, people do not just ‘become trans’ in order to make a (lefty, ‘snowflake-y’, woke) political statement. People transition in response to genuine desires that can manifest in any person regardless of creed, race, class, etc.
Although I guess anti-trans people basically only get convinced when their own loved one is trans (and even then it’s quite dicey) so maybe it’s not useful at all.
Oh hey, in unexpected good news, my cousin Lakin is now my cousin Ellie (and apologies if that is not preferred phrasing, that's how they phrased it themselves) and my frankly racist homophobic dad is.....doing pretty well with it? Not needing as much shoring up as I'd have expected? A little misgendering but a lot more NOT misgendering so, he's actually trying which is far more than I expected. And Ellie seems to be doing well and Ellie's mom is...having a time with it but also getting there. For a tiny town in the south, I'll take it, overall. Really glad to see it go as well as it has. Gives me a little hope for the day this is all just not a big deal, people just doing as they please identity/dress/organ wise and everyone just getting on with it.
I've been casually aware of the ska band We Are the Union, mainly through their trombonist Jer and his channel Skatune Network (who is black, nonbinary they/them). They were formed awhile back due to their dissatisfaction with the state of ska music and they have done a lot to raise awareness and encourage new acts in an antifacist and inclusive movement.
Their lead guitarist and vocalist Reade Wolcott recently came out publicly as trans and their music video reflects and centers this.
Oh hey, in unexpected good news, my cousin Lakin is now my cousin Ellie (and apologies if that is not preferred phrasing, that's how they phrased it themselves) and my frankly racist homophobic dad is.....doing pretty well with it? Not needing as much shoring up as I'd have expected? A little misgendering but a lot more NOT misgendering so, he's actually trying which is far more than I expected. And Ellie seems to be doing well and Ellie's mom is...having a time with it but also getting there. For a tiny town in the south, I'll take it, overall. Really glad to see it go as well as it has. Gives me a little hope for the day this is all just not a big deal, people just doing as they please identity/dress/organ wise and everyone just getting on with it.
I am assuming made up names, but it might be best not to use the old name. If that was including explicitly in their messaging then ignore me, and trust them naturally. Just trying to be helpful since this is an area most people don't have a lot of exposure to.
Super awesome for everything though! I always love hearing stories where this goes well. It gives me hope for this world.
Oh hey, in unexpected good news, my cousin Lakin is now my cousin Ellie (and apologies if that is not preferred phrasing, that's how they phrased it themselves) and my frankly racist homophobic dad is.....doing pretty well with it? Not needing as much shoring up as I'd have expected? A little misgendering but a lot more NOT misgendering so, he's actually trying which is far more than I expected. And Ellie seems to be doing well and Ellie's mom is...having a time with it but also getting there. For a tiny town in the south, I'll take it, overall. Really glad to see it go as well as it has. Gives me a little hope for the day this is all just not a big deal, people just doing as they please identity/dress/organ wise and everyone just getting on with it.
I am assuming made up names, but it might be best not to use the old name. If that was including explicitly in their messaging then ignore me, and trust them naturally. Just trying to be helpful since this is an area most people don't have a lot of exposure to.
Super awesome for everything though! I always love hearing stories where this goes well. It gives me hope for this world.
Yeah, they phrased it that way themselves, I know people differ on it. And I'm not at all saying my pop or her mom are doing like, great at all, just getting over a low bar.
I've been having a lot of unprompted moments of thinking "I don't want to chemically change my body... I mean, unless it makes my hair nicer" the last few weeks.
That's it. That's my update. I don't really know what to do with that hah.
Posts
Yeah I know. I get blinky over that sometimes too, but (maybe wrongly) I feel like butch lesbian aesthetic is different from cishet male masculine presentation? Maybe not, and certainly not always and forever.
I guess the analog here is an AMAB person who desires no medical efforts to transition and proudly presents as “hyper masculine” but still identifies as a trans woman? I’m not saying they can’t or shouldn’t, I’m just a little confused as how we got from Point A to Point B
Sidebar: this particular person on Twitter purports to be a PhD professor of gender studies and offers their services as a social scientist specializing in trans issues “as a member of the trans community,” and, well, honestly I feel like that’s not super helpful. Again, maybe I’m wrong, but I feel like a non-transitioning super-femme AFAB person who makes a point to showcase their commitment to femininity maybe doesn’t have the same experiences as most trans people around the world and I don’t know if I feel comfortable with that person acting as a representative for my community or myself.
That's the analog I was referring to. You're right that being a butch trans woman is different from being a cis masc man, but in more ways than just aesthetic. It's a fuckin struggle having to navigate your own desires when they don't map neatly onto binary norms. Having to take other people's understanding of how you got there into account doesn't make that process easier.
You don't have to take medication, you don't have to present in a certain way and you can use whatever label you want.
I agree, though my more salient point is whether or not this is a person who is helpful representation
This probably sounds like gatekeeping, but I’m at least suspicious of this person’s ability to understand common trans struggles and be the face for them. Maybe they’re a good fit! Maybe there’s a rhetorical hook they can use to bring me on board. I’d love to hear it if there is.
But being trans has never cost this person their job, or lost them family, or got them divorced, or barred them from the appropriate restrooms and shops, or kept them from finding clothes that fit, or told them they couldn’t play sports, or had them agonize over the fate of their reproductive ability, or had them recover from multiple painful affirmation surgeries, or made them uproot their entire lives and move somewhere safe.
That’s my struggle. Almost all of those things happened to me, and only because I’m trans. I’m also an ER nurse in the nation’s 2nd-highest LGBT population and see so many hurting and ill trans people everyday who are suffering from the effects of their medications or surgeries. I had a young guy just the other day sick as fuck because his brand-new phalloplasty was infected, and he was petrified he was going to lose his genitals forever—which could have happened!
So to me, the Twitter person isn’t just unqualified representation, they might as well live on the moon for all the connection I feel to their life.
I can't say I know this person at all, but it feels like an inevitable point along the journey to trans acceptance. There isn't, and can't be a check list of terrible things a trans person has to go through before they get the street cred to speak on their experiences. Whether the person can understand, and relate the message to a wider audience is where I draw my line. If this twitter person never suffers, but can get others to help move the needle in the right direction then I am fully saisfied.
Take as a counter point Caitlyn Jenner. She probably has gone through at least some of what you describe, but lives in a completely separate world at this point. Her world is one where it is a good idea to have republicans in power because of how insulated she is from the daily effects of such policy. The shared suffering has a very different context, and reality because of how complex cultural identity is when we get to the individual level.
This is gatekeeping. I don't give two shits about whoever this person on twitter is, but them not conforming to your idea of what a trans person is or not having suffered the same indignities as anyone else doesn't mean they're doing any harm.
They're not harming anyone by offering their services as a PhD in gender studies to their fellow trans people and they're certainly not harming "representation".
What is harmful is broadcasting nonsense about how you have to tick various boxes before you're allowed to call yourself trans.
I think we all agree on the importance of representation in leadership, so the problem here is articulating how this person is representative. This isn’t a question of personal qualification; as you say, there shouldn’t be a checklist required to self- identify. However, this is a person who sets themselves as both an authority on and party to being transgender. I know there’s no two journeys alike, but I don’t think it’s wrong to say there is a shared understanding of transhood by most trans people that would be—at most—extremely limited in its overlap with this person.
Using Jenner again as an example, despite likely a huge common sense of struggle shared by her and most trans people, she would be a terrible fit for community ambassador exactly for the reasons you mentioned—but that’s not a meaningful counter. Both these people, I feel, are unqualified figureheads for trans issues. I’m not arguing that sharing a common trans struggle qualifies people for authority, I’m just arguing that not sharing it probably disqualifies.
I never said it was harmful, I said it might not be helpful. And certainly didn’t say anything about gatekeeping who gets to be trans. This is conversation about public leadership. Dial it back a bit.
You can't have it both ways though. The shared trans experience is either a necessary qualifier or it isn't. I mention Jenner to highlight just how little those qualification can mean in the face of everything else life throws at you. Life just isn't so easily quantified down into a check list that can give you insight. What two people take from the same experience will be very different.
Further, I would say we can't silence someone because they haven't met some arbitrary set of milestones. This person on twitter can no more help how their life has gone than any of us. Saying that as a result they cannot speak out does not sit well with me at all. They aren't, as far as I know, offering the definitive trans experience. They are offering the knowledge and expertise they have to those who listen. We need to then judge the quality of the message on its own merits. There is no value in dismissing it based on not liking what assumptions we are making based on limited information on the messengers life.
You're pulling “as a member of the trans community” as if it's a point of contention (never mind the phrasing of "purports to have a PhD"). You said yourself "this probably sounds like gatekeeping".
For what? The crime of being an AFAB trans person that presents femme? For offering services to other trans people? Have they even claimed to be a 'qualified representative' (whatever that means)?
I bring up harm because gatekeeping bullshit is directly harmful. It's telling people in this space right here that there are nonsense standards they have to meet before they can be whatever level of acceptable. Wooly ideas of The Representation have been used to hurt me more than they've ever been helpful.
I’d wager there’s more trans people not undergoing any kind of medical transition out of circumstances than by choice, and we’d be better served by helping the former than scrutinizing the latter.
In this case, they’re not even changing pronouns. They’re femme-presenting AFAB with she/her pronouns.
If she preferred She/They would that be enough? Where is the line where she is trans enough to have a voice? I don't ask this question to be an asshole even though it feels extremely aggressive even to me. I ask because that is what we are dancing around here. I don't think there can be a good answer to this question because the question is not good.
This is what we fight for and espouse and I don't see the harm in there being one more voice talking about our struggles even if it's not anything like mine.
I am a AMAB binary ultra femme trans woman and I don't understand a lot of the voices in the choir from my perspective but I will absolutely go to the mat for any of their rights to be in the choir.
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I want to reiterate that I’m not arguing against this person’s transness, I’m questioning their ability to be the leader and representative they are already telling everyone they are because I’m not sure they’re capable of articulating much of a shared trans experience.
I don’t think we would accept a similar scenario from, for example, a white-passing person from a white cultural background arguing for a leadership role in POC spaces, which is what this feels like to me. Like, I think the singer Halsey is a good example here, as she’s gone on record saying she feels it’s important to consider herself an ally of POC communities instead of considering herself part of POC communities because she has white-passing privilege and doesn’t suffer from the same injustices or come from the same home culture as POC without white privilege.
On the surface of it it's like why is she even calling herself trans but then I realize I'm being judgmental and the truth is I don't know her full circumstances. I don't know how she got to where she is or what her story is. I know it took me awhile to figure things out and I'm still not where I want to be. I know there are people that would judge me for that and tell me I don't belong in the club because I haven't done X, Y, and Z. Who am I to decide who is trans enough.
It doesn't seem like I would have much shared experience with her. I don't understand her identity but maybe I don't need to understand it in order to accept it. Besides, isn't that what I'm asking the rest of the world to do for me?
I think there are people who are unfamiliar with trans issues who would look at her and throw their hands up and exclaim "see? they're just making stuff up and it's not real". It's probably not helpful but I think our detractors weren't inclined to change to their minds anyways. You can still point to this as an illustration of understanding not being a requirement for acceptance.
Yeah, I think self-identification is paramount, and I don’t need to understand someone’s internal world to accept them anymore than they should need to know mine. The only thing that would probably make me upset is if this AFAB femme trans person went around saying they were a trans woman and then using that to argue that, say, transmisogyny isn’t real because she doesn’t experience it. But that would be because she’s an asshole, not because she is trans.
"The only real politics I knew was that if a guy liked Hitler, I’d beat the stuffing out of him and that would be it." -- Jack Kirby
Thing 1:
I think it's ok to take a minute and say "damn I wish these institutions of power (in this case Insert University Here) would platform the trans people that face the most threat, so that they could determine what would constitute safety + liberation". It would be the ethical thing for these institutions to do, both for reparations and to be in line with their mission statements.
But they won't, because if they were gonna do that, they already would've. These institutions are always late to the party, and they only respond to leverage; by being surrounded by social networks and channels of cooperation that they are left out of by hiring so narrowly.
So we gotta then take that initial feeling of frustration, and use it as fuel to put a broader range of us than just the Cis-Accepted Few in positions of power, whether those are positions we create in our own organizations, or the very local organizations we have any influence over.
Thing 2:
In everything I've seen, doing 1:1 analogies of queer + trans marginalization to Black & indigenous marginalization is super fraught and basically never worth doing, because it's appropriative & because it tends to hurt community members at those intersections.
Students
They develop a better understanding of each other and the world, then use that empathy and knowledge to educate their friends and family on QUILTBAG issues and reduce prejudice in their social circles
I believe in them 100% even when I don't believe in the intentions of uni administration (who, I agree, focus on image and profit and do not want to risk either of those, causing them to be late to the party)
Can't wait til I move to Vermont in February.
Probably the fact that they could pass it but don’t have enough votes to override the dem governor’s veto.
"The only real politics I knew was that if a guy liked Hitler, I’d beat the stuffing out of him and that would be it." -- Jack Kirby
What a headline
Also I have these hair ties, my hair feels like it's long enough for that but I'm a curly red, so it doesn't work.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/02/politics/caitlyn-jenner-transgender-athletes-california-recall/index.html
God what an awful human being
Fortunately, there is very little chance she becomes governor.
A few talking heads might try to use her existence in their usual "the left are the real bigots" bullshit but most of her political associates are still gonna hate her and refuse to be associated with her because she's trans and that identity is politicized as being radically liberal no matter how regressive, rich, and white she is.
God she's awful though.
Although I guess anti-trans people basically only get convinced when their own loved one is trans (and even then it’s quite dicey) so maybe it’s not useful at all.
Their lead guitarist and vocalist Reade Wolcott recently came out publicly as trans and their music video reflects and centers this.
https://youtu.be/uZyUlhl8yYI
Rad stuff which I felt like sharing here.
I am assuming made up names, but it might be best not to use the old name. If that was including explicitly in their messaging then ignore me, and trust them naturally. Just trying to be helpful since this is an area most people don't have a lot of exposure to.
Super awesome for everything though! I always love hearing stories where this goes well. It gives me hope for this world.
Yeah, they phrased it that way themselves, I know people differ on it. And I'm not at all saying my pop or her mom are doing like, great at all, just getting over a low bar.
That's it. That's my update. I don't really know what to do with that hah.
Democrats Abroad! || Vote From Abroad
It makes the process of going through a puberty. . . Sound so. .. clinical an cold?!
I do not know why I am having this reaction to that wording?
I am not mad. You definitely didn't mean it the way it's hitting me but felt like the acknowledgement of those feelings were on order
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