My Blog Got Deleted So Now I Have A New One Cries

[learn-how-to-love]

Does this person hear themselves. Like does this not just sound like a justification for transmisogyny and racism because someone looked “scary” but justified because it’s a stinky trans man who deserves it. Exhausting

[xenineshroom]

Every time exclusionists come up with a new enemy, it seems like the core tenet is, "this group's relative privilege means they should be deprived of, community, resources, compassion, or are otherwise invading and stealing from us, the real oppressed group."

Aro and ace exclusion was like this, they'd say "Asexuals are basically straight, they can just pass as straight, nobody cares if they want to fuck or not, there's aromantic straight man invading Pride, there are quirky asexual straight girls pretending to be queer, asexuals are appropriating Stone and oppressing lesbians."

Bisexual exclusion and it was all, "Bisexuals are basically straight, they can just avoid oppression by being straight, these fucking bisexual women are bringing their homophobic straight boyfriends to pride, bisexual women are appropriating butch and femme, and they can't say dyke, those are lesbian only terms, bisexual women are oppressing lesbians."

And now it's like, "Trans men are basically cis. They can just avoid oppression by saying they are men, these fucking trans men are dangerous rapists who can pretend to be women to avoid consequences, trans men are appropriating T4T, and they can't say tranny, and can't say they were once "eggs", those are trans woman only terms. Trans men are oppressing women."

This isn't even all, transmeds also fit this bill, their enemy is just "the transtrender menace."

Like here we are again, rooting out the fake queers, policing them, traumatizing an entire community, and when we all get embarrassed about how we fell for yet another fucking queer moral panic, the damage will be downplayed, nobody will learn anything and we'll move onto the next secretly privileged queer group who needs to be annihilated in order to defend some poor defenseless women who cannot possibly defend themselves from these ugly mannish straight invaders... huh, wait a second.... why does that sound so familiar?

For those who aren't catching the hint, all of these movements have rhetoric which maps directly onto TERF rhetoric where, "Trans people are privileged invaders, they aren't really oppressed at all, they are dangerous rapists, and mentally ill liars. They are invading lesbian communities, and transing the remaining lesbians, and trans people's very existence is an existential threat to women."

[completely-sane-scientist]

if you bring up omegaverse or mpreg when trans and intersex men try to have discussions about pregnancy you owe every trans and intersex man everything you own

[generalbitchfest]

Listen I'm not saying that diyhrt.info has bad information. I *am* saying that I am endlessly frustrated that this is how they start the section on transmasc diy.

There is no reason to start it off comparing it to estrogen, especially since the estrogen section doesn't open up talking about how "unlike testosterone, estrogen is not a controlled substance and there isn't the same legal risk involved."

And then there's the downplaying of potential legal issues involved with DIY t. There is a difference in giving reassurance and acting like the consequences are no big deal actually, especially after mentioning how much easier to get it is than estrogen.

Why aren't we talking about how you probably shouldn't bring it on flights with you? How there are risks if you're taking it with you in your car on a trip, especially if you're a TPOC? And I know this is more niche, but how if you live with someone on probation, it getting found could have legal consequences for *them*.

Maybe a link to different states' and countries' laws about this so you can be fully informed instead of "trust me it's actually not big deal because they're not going after (cis, primarily white) gymbros."

It just feels like little snipes. Little "stop whining; you have an easier time than people going on e, actually!"

If it's supposed to come off as reassuring, it's not doing a good job imo, and I think it's being too casual about the legal considerations even in the best fair interpretation.

[genderkoolaid]

I've posted this article a few times, about a person who was arrested and sexually assaulted by the police because they stopped hem when hey was traveling with (legally prescribed!) testosterone. but I want to bring it up again.

Here hey described it like this:

“One officer said, ‘It smells like you’ve been having a party in here. Is that right?’” Fransisco, a white nonbinary person in their 30s, told Filter. “He said, ‘Well, if you haven’t been having a party, you won’t mind if we check your car.’” Moving quickly, the officers violently handcuffed Fransisco, took their keys and called animal control to confiscate their dog. Then they searched the car. “One yelled, ‘Show me your track marks, you fucking junkie! We found your needles and drugs,’” Fransisco said. The cop held up their prescription bottle of testosterone. “I said, ‘Those aren’t drugs, that’s my medication. I’m trans.’”

"Legal issues might arise" this person was, again, sexually assaulted in a blatantly transphobic way, and also had their service dog taken away and had to pay to get it back, alongside having to pay $2,500 to get out of jail, something they could only do with help from friends/family. Not everyone can afford that.

And again, this is all when hey had a genuine legal prescription. If hey was traveling with illegal T, what fucking then?

And then there's also the level of how tracked testosterone is. That second article also talks about how testosterone prescriptions, because of its status, gets put in a database than clinicians and law enforcement can access. It includes an account of one trans man who was meeting a psychiatrist he had not come out to as trans, who he was outed to because she was able to see he was prescribed testosterone.

Is that not fucking dangerous? And what happens when your body is clearly androgenizing, but a doctor or cop can see you haven't been prescribed T? What happens when the trans person in question is Black or Latine or Native and there's more risk of these people deciding to treat them as a criminal?

I don't want the message from this to be "DIY T is always bad and you should never break the law!" because I don't agree with that. But my lord, the fucking dismissiveness just kills me. It feels so condescending? Like the author is writing this thinking "well I have to address this so no one can say I didn't, but I really want to emphasize that these risks are basically immaterial and as long as you aren't an idiot you'll be totally fine!"

And you know people would treat this all entirely differently if it wasn't transmascs affected. Folks are out here telling transfems to not go into certain careers because of the risk of transmisogyny, but genuinely think transmascs that they are being whiny birthday boys for literally just pointing out that there are real legal risks that should be acknowledged.

To be fully fucking honest, how the hell are we going to talk about how getting banned from tumblr will literally kill trans women, but testosterone being criminalized doesn't pose any unique or important dangers????????? Like I'm not even saying the bannings don't matter or can't genuinely deprive people of their only source of community or income. But you simply do not get to talk about how bannings are a form of social murder and also pull the "well you can just get it from gymbros and there's like noooo way anything bad will ever happen lol you are just being dramatic!"

I'm just saying. If someone is going to use weed medicinally in a country where it is illegal, even if its not the most criminalized drug, I think we can support that decision while also giving them actual advice on how seriously to treat the illegality and how to keep themself safe, especially when racialized. This (screenshots) is not that, in my opinion.

[vergess]

I don't know how many times I have to fucking say this but TESTOSTERONE HAS NOT BEEN THE GYM BRO STEROID OF CHOICE IN THE WEST FOR OVER 30 YEARS NOW!

If you get "T" at the gym you are getting TRENBOLONE, NOT TESTOSTERONE.

The people saying this shit about T being an easy to get street drug are LYING, and they are getting people KILLED with this lie.

Even if you are somehow, miraculously, able to access this highly controlled medication, you willalmost certainly be getting Aqua Testosterone not T. Propionate or T. Cypionate, which are the ones used for HRT.

Aqua Test, meanwhile, is used to dope before workouts or competitions because it only stays in the body for 4 hours. Even if you tried to transition with it by dosing 4+ times a day, you'd just end up ODing or with excessive estrogens that have other health risks in addition to slowing actual HRT transition.

But, hey! It's just those stinky transmascs getting forcibly detransitioned by these lies, so who cares, right?

Fuckers.

[genderkoolaid]

I do want to say that I'm not sure the claim that gym bro steroids are generally not testosterone is true? At least as of 6 years ago. This 2020 survey of 2,385 men found:

The most frequently utilized androgens were testosterone enanthate (n = 1922, 80.62%), testosterone cypionate (n = 1217, 51.05%), metandione (n = 1213, 50.88%), trenbolone (n = 1199, 50.29%), oxandrolone (n = 1110, 46.56%), and nandrolone decanoate (n = 1107, 46.43%

According to this, non-testosterone androgens are common, but testosterone seems to still be very much the dominant drug. And that's a very good sample size, so I am inclined to trust these numbers. I am not a gym-anything, so maybe this is inaccurate now, or maybe it varies a lot depending on your local gymbro community & in some places trenbolone is the most common. But I'm not certain its as cut-and-dry as some people make it out to seem. I've seen this getting brought up a lot, and I worry this fact is getting spread around more because its really rhetorically effective than because its accurate, especially since i think most people on tumblr don't have the experience necessary to actually know if its true or not.

Regardless, there are still plenty of reasons that "gym bros use it!" does not mean DIY T is super easy or accessible for the average person. Most importantly in my opinion: because its not even fucking safe for gym bros (from here):

[S]ubstantial mean proportions of black-market AAS [anabolic androgenic steroids] are counterfeit and of substandard quality. These products pose a considerable individual and public health threat, and the very wide range in proportions of fake black-market AAS puts the user in a situation of unpredictable uncertainty. There is a great need for future prevention and harm-reduction programs to protect users from these substances. [...]

In this systematic review, we were able to include 19 articles within the published literature that provided qualitative and/or quantitative analytical test results of AAS found on the black market from 9 different countries (eight in Europe; one in Latin America), with a cumulative sample size of 5,382 products being analyzed qualitatively and 1,614 being quantitatively tested. We demonstrate that substantial proportions of AAS found on the black market are fake. The overall mean estimate for counterfeit anabolic steroids found on the black market was 36% [...] and an additional 37% [...] were of substandard quality [73% in total counterfeit or substandard]. Although these proportions must be interpreted with caution due to some methodological challenges and high heterogeneity, one must acknowledge the unreliable nature of those substances acquired from the black market. [...] We demonstrate that fake AAS can be substituted, not contain any substance at all, or be adulterated. But in addition, products that contain the labeled substances can still be over-concentrated or under-concentrated. [...] Substandard and counterfeit products found in our systematic review were most likely produced by manufacturers not in line with good manufacturing practices (GMP’s). Rather, those products are produced in clandestine underground laboratories lacking the necessary knowledge or equipment to produce these compounds in adequate quantity and quality, as also described by other authors. The shift from pharmacies to deregulated underground online sites and clandestine underground laboratories occurred after the United States enacted the Anabolic Steroid Control Act in the 1990s. [...] We demonstrate that visual inspection of the package, label, and internal content to identify preliminary signs of counterfeiting of AAS have shown to be mostly ineffective. Different anabolic steroids come with compound or class-specific and unspecific adverse events. Fake products can lead to unexpected adverse events in addition to the already well-established side effects of AAS, which can include cardiovascular toxicity, cardiotoxicity and arrhythmia, cardiovascular events (stroke, coagulation), genitourinary and reproductive impairment, sexual dysfunction and testicular atrophy, gynecomastia, central nervous system abnormalities, impaired mental health and behavior including suicide, skeletal-muscular pathologies, metabolic decompensation, impaired liver functions, and even death. [...] AAS are administered in different ways, including oral, injectables (water or oil-based), transdermal (cream or gel), buccal and sublingual. The most common route of administration is per intramuscular injection and we demonstrate that proportions of counterfeit and substandard substances for injectables compared to oral formulations may be considerably higher. Different forms of formulations and administrations additionally come with specific adverse events. As an example, 17α-alkylation of steroids which is used for oral administration is described to result in increased liver toxicity compared to injectable AAS, because of first-pass metabolism and increased duration time in the liver due to slow metabolization. [...] Besides the problems with chemical quality, our systematic review provides further evidence of microbiological contamination of those substances. Products from clandestine laboratories do not go through microbiological quality control, which can lead to sterility issues and microbiological contamination of injectables. Graham and colleagues demonstrated contamination with bacterial skin commensals during microbiological analysis of their samples. This is especially concerning when those substances are injected into the muscle as it poses a risk of forming abscesses in the muscle and skin necrosis.

In that first study that found testosterone was the most popular AAS used, they also found that "[o]ver 94% of respondents reported side effects from their use." Of the side effects, 43.44% had hypertension, 27.97% had dyslipidemia ("bad cholesterol"), 12.54% had polycythemia (too many red blood cells), and 9.35% had injection site abscesses. All of those things pose an equal risk to a trans man or nonbinary person. & 61.41% of AAS users said they got their supply from the Internet.

Gym bro T is unregulated and this is not a black market born out of any genuine concern for human well-being! "Just get black market T from gym bros" is like telling someone who can't afford their medications to get them off Alibaba. It seems like the entirety of the idea that gym bro T is safe is that, because its such a popular drug, that means there are trusted resources in the community. Which, I'm sure there are to some degree, but that is true of all illegal drugs. I think it would be kind of crazy to tell someone "heroin is such a popular drug, so it's not hard to find trustworthy sources" and then not mention anything about how to actually verify that your trustworthy source is following all appropriate lab protocols and the dosage is accurate and there's only one substance in their and its the drug you actually wanted to take - nope, just "well the community trusts these!" and that's. it?

And I think it is kind of. evil? To just brush aside all these concerns with some abstract idea that trans guys can seek out these communities, get access to those trusted resources, and that those resources will never contain adulterated or over/under-concentrated testosterone or be mislabeled entirely, and that this is all so likely that its not even worth mentioning the risks of black market T in the first place.

I mean, literally, it doesn't seem there is anywhere on the testosterone page on diyhrt.info that goes into fucking any of this (not to mention that the pages are "transfem guide" and "transmasc guide" when like, how fucking hard is it to say estrogen & testosterone? sure, estrogen-based HRT involves more than just estrogen, but more than just transfems do that kind of HRT and apparently that inaccuracy doesn't matter!).

Frankly I think the fact that so many cis men will risk their health and well-being out of a sense that their bodies are inherently unloveable and ugly if they aren't literally 1950s Superman is itself a form of patriarchal violence. Not to mention how this entire black market is the product of the same War on Drugs logic that has gotten so many drug users hurt and killed by making them reliant on black markets with zero oversight. Soooo many cis men have eating disorders and body dysmorphia and a lot of those men are the ones using black market T and other drugs. My brother who I love has been friends with such men, has struggled with those issues himself, and I really hate how glibly so many people treat it.

No man, trans or cis, should be reliant on dubious and potentially harmful black market testosterone! Even if you can get something marked as testosterone cypionate from your local gym bro, that doesn't mean you or him are safe, and it definitely should not be fucking used as a cudgel to shut down trans people talking about the real legal and medical risks they face DIYing. Testosterone being criminalized has harmed so many people and its always fucked up to downplay that, especially as a result of a petty fucking grudge against transmasculine people talking about their oppression. It is not fearmongering to be honest & accurate with people about the risks they are taking with the drugs they are using. Downplaying the risks of taking black market drugs with questionable origins is NOT trans activism.

& frankly I feel like "medically safe testosterone is easy to get from the black market" is also erasing the real, material harm that the criminalization of testosterone has done to so many people. Acting as if these laws haven't made things more dangerous, that the harms are negligible, only serves to distract us all from the fact that everyone, cis and trans, should be fucking pissed about testosterone criminalization. The government should have never been allowed to criminalize people for doing a drug purely because that drug is not allowed in our precious precious sports competitions. Stop getting mad at trans men for talking about our oppression, and start encouraging trans men to form coalitions with gym bros to demand free, safe testosterone for everyone who wants it, for whatever reason they want it.

[shash-o]

Yknow. This has been in my mind for a long, long time.

Within community resources, there is visibly less care about T sources, which shows clearly that the dominant voices on these very popular and recommended resources are either largely people that use e themselves or have focused mostly on that.

Not only are most if not all T sources steroid pharmacies, whereas the recommended E sources are mostly HRT sellers (why could that be, after all T is ~so safe and legal~).

But, a service some aggregators on various sellers and products offer is testing. And here, there is a massive gulf.

This is the list of sellers and their saftey status on trans.diy. They are one of the recommended resources to find sellers of E HRT. However, this aggregator is very openly (at least on the surface) a source for both E and T HRT. So you'd think they would be included in the resource section on T in diyhrt.info. The left shows the screenshot of all E sellers with their status, the right is the one of T sellers:

On the left, the E sellers are mostly E exclusive, with only two also selling T. There are 10 sellers. 5 are fully verified by tests either on the sellers site or on this site by others (Note, could not find the report for Allie's Site, and Aurelia Labs and Hera HRT do not have up to date reports, Symphony does per batch tests and is based on this the best, since that is the minimum tbh). Every single verified seller is a seller specifically for DIY HRT, and the inactive one voix celeste was also HRT specific. They market themselves as such openly.

Meanwhile on the right there are only two sellers and both are apparently unverified by trans.diy, and boy do they have their problems.

The first one is Dragon Ordanance, which trans.diy immediately tells you sells only raws. Well, in search of the lab report, I find out that they also sell other stuff, and are not HRT only. The only injectable HRT they do have is estrogen, but all in all no labs, so that's a no for now.

The second one, Purple panda labs is the same, not HRT specific and also no lab test. So also a no.

And since I right now neither have the time to do a whole TOR dive, diyhrt.market will not be mentioned, although based on the fact that most, if not all sources for T are doping pharmacies, and both trans.diy and diyhrt.market are not mentioned at any point in the Sources section of diyhrt.info, I think we can see that they know that they don't have anything useful.

For the sources on diyhrt.info itself, well just look.

This is the one for E HRT + Antiandrogens, featuring the aformentioned aggregators:

And this one is for T:

If diyhrt.info were honest, they would clearly tell you about about the specific legal situations you could be in with T around the world, and not some imaginary fantasy usa, since even there you aren't safe, even with a legal prescription as mentioned above by gendercoolaid.

They would tell you about international risks. Things like what if you are an hobby athlete in countries where even hobby athletes are charged with doping. If T ownership or use puts you at risk.

The reason I am kinda pissed is because they have this disclaimer on the FAQ section of E:

Plus the entire FAQ looks like this for E:

Meanwhile this is the FAQ for T:

And of course the screenshot of T being legally just fine in the original post.

Diyhrt.info and actually most community DIY info sources are hideously unconcerned with T and nonbinary people. But since they don't say any of that explicitly, it can be simply ignored.

[shash-o]

additionaly trans.diy has the misc tab with more resources:

These are the ones they have listed plus artemis analytical, a volunteer lab that tests hrt.

Do you notice something? Most sources are transfem specific.

But oh, I thought to myself, how lovely! Papers on hrt how wonderful!

Only a single one was on transitioning with t or masculine transition, number 7. While not every single article is posted and most are short, there still is only one explicitly transmasculine paper (and no nonbinary/intersex inclusion).

now, let's look at artemis. A donation based lab, most of it's results are private, except a couple public ones. And well. Can you guess what type of products they have in the public tests? Yeah it's all estrogen.

I understand that most, if not all sources are made and are curated by (binary) transfems and trans woman. However, I do think that it should be questioned more why they can call themselves a general hrt resource and not just an E/feminine Transition source? Why is it that these supposedly neutral spaces are so dominated by one group and why is this not noticed? Why is it that they seemingly don't recognise it as seen by how they write about us?

Sometimes, it feels like that one scene from the good place, yknow with the cactus.

I (falsley) hope, that the community resource that based on appearance is a general one, but I always get dissapointed not only by the fact that the transfem /womans resources greatly outnumber us, but also by the fact that they (those resources and communities) seemingly are not aware of it. There is never anything like a call for action to find more transmasc /men to contribute, never any passing mention of transmasculine /male resources or even just a sentence asking why they can't find anything.

I'm not advocating for takedowns or something like that, before anyone asks.

I just want some fucking honesty.

If you will not include anyone but transfems /women, please just declare that. We can tell when you do not consider us.

[cybergirl2086]

A letter to my fellow trans sisters – transmisogyny is certainly awful to experience and ruining society as we know it, but the solution is not to project our frustration onto trans men and non-binary folks as if they are somehow causing the problem and not the cisgender dominated patriarchy.

Let's be honest with ourselves, us trans women grew up as teenage boys; not that we were boys but that society saw us as boys. Young men are bombarded with misogynistic propaganda every single day, and nobody is immune to that. If you think you're the exception, you're wrong

Internalized misogyny doesn't just disappear when you start taking estrogen. You have to actively, critically examine the beliefs you take for granted and unlearn the bad ideas society has taught you. But so many of you have assumed, just as TERFs do, "well, I'm a woman now, so I can't possibly be sexist," and then start talking about so-called "TMEs" the way incels talk about women (including us!)

Stop making death and rape threats against trans men (especially children, that's fucking gross)

Stop using misogynistic slurs against trans men and enbies ("transandrocunt", "zipper-tits", "theyfab" etc.). Surely you can see that's no better than when we get called "shemales" and "sissies", right?

Stop pretending that growing up as a girl first has zero lasting impact on a trans man's psyche, especially if the man in question grew up in the global south or underprivileged rural areas

Stop pretending that trans men being ignored and invisible is privilege and not erasure (we've already had this discussion years ago with bisexuals having "straight-passing privilege")

Stop all of that. You're making online trans and queer spaces worse for everyone, yourself included. Transfeminism and anti-transandrophobia aren't opposites. They go hand-in-hand! In fact, they're the exact same thing. You're never going to break the gender binary down if you keep acting like being a trans woman is more valid than other genders

Trans women, stand up for your brothers and enby siblings instead of beating them down, especially in this day and age when governments around the world want to fucking murder and detransition all of us. When they speak, say it louder!

If you're already doing that, I love you and you need to keep doing it until we make the world a better place for all trans folks <3

United we stand, divided we fall

[genderkoolaid]

Because I was now a man, I could not speak about what it was like to be a woman. Because I had been a woman, I could never really speak about what it was like to be a man. Do the math: I could not speak. It was a double erasure, a double bind, in which every experience I had was false, and so nothing I said was credible. I could no longer derive authority from my experiences before transition, and shouldn’t even cite them — I had never “really” been a woman, so those things hadn’t happened — but those experiences could always be weaponized against me to prove I wasn’t “really” the man I claimed to be. They call it erasure, when this happens. I wasn’t prepared for how literal the term was. Every day, I could feel myself disappear.

— Eraserhead: On writer's block and being a gender traitor by Jude Doyle

[unhinged-transmasc-man]

There are many good paragraphs but this stuck out the most:

"If “man” and “woman” are opposed and mutually exclusive categories, if men can only ever be predators and women can only ever be prey, then trans men can’t exist. We are logically impossible under the terms of the current system. You either “treat us like men” by voiding out half our lives, or you write us back into womanhood by denying our male identities. I knew all that, at least in theory, but when I came out, I actually saw my life story disappearing into other people’s blind spots. I watched myself become unthinkable in real time."

Also these:

"This wasn’t about accountability. This was people tactically forgetting my entire life,including incidents from my life they had personally witnessed or been involved in, so that they could shame me for transitioning. It was bad for me to be a man; if I was a man, I was a bad man, I was all the worst things men are. I was hulking, I was threatening, I was predatory, I was violent."

"I was treated as both genders, but only the most monstrous stereotype of each one."

Because that is exactly it. Anti-transmasculinity is being both erased and vilified, and then gaslit out of speaking about those experiences by the people who are erasing and vilifying you.

[sparrowhawkandco]

This resonated:

"The idea that I had always occupied a privileged position within patriarchy was, frankly, untrue; nor did it seem to me that a trans person was any less gender-marginalized than your average cis woman. What privilege I had was conditional, and these books were no guide. Men who wanted to “forge a positive masculinity” (and everyone was very clear that I needed one of those) were encouraged to get in touch with their “feminine sides.” Maybe that was healthy for cis guys, but I had been forced to do feminine things, and present in feminine ways, for the entirety of my young life. Whatever liberation I had achieved came from giving myself permission to stop."

As did the ending:

"When I write these days, I try to remind myself that whatever I’m afraid of saying is already true, and denial will not change it. I remind myself that the wrong people benefit from my silence, and will use it to write a version of my life I can’t recognize, or just write me out of the world. There is no established story or role for me; I belong to a category the world is still learning to imagine. I cannot account for the world as other people imagine it. I cannot give you every man’s story, every trans man’s story, every trans person’s story; I don't know them. What I do know is that every new story helps map the territory. All I can do for you, from where I'm standing, is tell you how things are." 

[therapatical]

the irony that jude kissed ass so hard to talia bhatt (and she, in response, proceeded to invalidate him and dismiss his experiences, all while he continued trying to kiss ass to her as she's directly disrespectful to his face) still never ceases to amaze me, to this day. like he was so close to getting it but the weird pickme-like self-abandoning behavior won out

[starstruckbaby]

"transmascs love misgendering themselves" hey so are you aware that everytime we try to create inclusive terms we get made fun of? Did you not see how mad TERFs got over the terms "birthing person" or "uterus owner"? We literally can't use terms that wouldn't misgender us because when we do other queer people and people outside the community turn it into a joke.

[dualight]

Preserving @jadwigaspeaks's tags:

#also as far as i can tell most alleged instances of ''transmascs misgendering themselves'' are either#1. a transmasc being gnc / otherwise having fun with gender#2. a transmasc talking about his experiences with misogyny + how being seen *by others* as a woman affected him#or 3. transmascs going into a team/restroom/shelter that's stated to be for women because A. transphobes have specifically banned them from#the men's version or B. the men's version doesn't exist#or C. if the men's version does exist it either cannot or will not meet trans men's needs#none of those can be described in good faith as misgendering one's self#transandrophobia

[genderkoolaid]

tbh my opinion isnt so much that trans men cannot have male privilege. its that the way we understand male privilege is based in cis women, specifically otherwise privileged (esp. otherwise-gendered privilege, i.e gender-conforming/straight/perisex) cis women's understanding of gender as something static and inherent to who you are, rather than something fluid which is, in part, constructed by society and placed onto you separately in every moment.

can a trans man experience (cis) male privilege? yes. can a trans woman? yes. and so can a cis woman! hell, a femme perisex cis woman with a gender neutral name could if she's assumed to be a cis man on a resume. male privilege is not an on/off switch. the idea that it is stems from cissexist understandings of male/female as entirely separate and static categories which everyone can and must be understood through. trans people in feminism are expected to constantly defend and deflect accusations of being Privileged Male Oppressors by promising cis perisex women that our experiences are just like theirs! we don't have any scary opinions that don't align with their worldview! we swear we won't ever make them have to reflect on how being cis+perisex has biased them and potentially made their analysis of gender at all inaccurate! trans experiences are only considered valuable to cisfeminism to the extent that they reaffirm what cisfeminists already hold true. thats why they only ever want to talk about a very simplistic narrative around wages pre/post-transition. its extremely unthreatening to cis people because it presents transness in patriarchy as just going from one cis role to another; it doesn't ask cis feminists to expand their paradigm to include the ways in which trans people are treated as a class and their own complicity in transphobic oppression.

which is why trans men have been getting fucked over by trans-affirmng cisfeminism. because by virtue of having our gender acknowledged, we are expected to forfeit our place in the feminist movement and adopt the role of outsider along cis men*. and its also why trans women and MTX people get fucked over the minute they cannot or refuse to describe their experiences through the one or two approved narratives. cisfeminism cannot tolerate transness-as-transness. it has to be compressed and reduced and diluted into something that fits within a cis-centric framework. we aren't allowed to have nuanced and intersectional conversations about trans men & other trans folks relationship with male privilege, the things we have to sacrifice to there, how fleeting it can be, the fact that for some of us being read as "biologically male" is actively more dangerous than being read as female... if it isn't familiar to cis women, then it means you aren't really oppressed.

*cis men should not be outsiders in feminism either btw but thats another post

[learn-how-to-love]

I found out today that there was a (thankfully very ill-fated) attempt to have the entire Wikipedia article on discrimination against transgender men deleted. At first I thought the perpetrator was yet another bargain bin transphobe/TERF act of disruption but apparently not so, she is a trans woman. The user in question had been disputing the use of transandrophobia in the article as being inappropriate, but as other editors pointed out, the way in which it was used was as to be expected (basically saying “hey this term is being used commonly right now in places to describe this phenomena”). When attempts to get the article edited to remove any mention of the term failed, this user instead decided to just nominate the whole article for deletion instead. She even went as far as to say “you will never be a man” to the editors disputing this, though it was quickly deleted. It’s the actions of only a single person, but I find this indicative of how the chronic devaluing and othering of transmasculine people and voices in faux-transfeminist spaces leads to action basically indistinguishable from cis transphobes. Resorting to attempted vandalism of an online resource and blatant transphobia is a symptom of this trend that deserves absolutely no patience at this point.

[professorfcknmoriarty]

[genderkoolaid]

the transandrophobia Wikipedia page is not being deleted (good work!) but I wanted to share the exchange that went to down.

I saw these screenshots in the notes ~2m after it was decided:

I just took these of the project page:

& looking in the edit history, I see this:

Nice to see this get defeated so quickly.

[fishtank-thinktank]

Also, I feel like it’s important to mention! That if the issue around the page is mainly the word transandrophobia, it should also be stated that the word is used two times in the entire article!



Twice, one in the intro alongside other words used to describe the oppression that trans men face in this way, the other one being a restatement of that fact: “is sometimes referred to as anti-transmasculinity,[1] transandrophobia,[2] or transmisandry” “The discrimination experienced by transgender men has been described using various words, but none have seen widespread use. Terms used include anti-transmasculinity and transandrophobia.”

The word transandrophobia is used twice in the article, both times referring to the different words that are used to describe trans men’s oppression.

[genderkoolaid]

the funniest thing about this is that transandrophobia deniers want to make anti-transmasculinity theory out to be some terminally online niche internet discourse thing soooo bad. they clearly want to present it as something completely outside the realm of legitimate theory, something no "reasonable adult" or "feminist" would ever buy into because its just so obviously wrong.

but then you have something like this. where it is just so painfully obvious they are on the same side of history as aphobes and biphobes. when you have people who 1) are not personally invested in transandrophobia not being a legitimate term, and 2) are actually looking at the academic and statistical sources given for transmasculine oppression, it becomes pretty obvious that this resistance is motivated by personal discomfort with the term.

notably, in my experience, people are super willing to come out swinging against transandrophobia, all confident in their rejection of the concept, until you respond with numerous cited sources on material transmasculine oppression and back it up with widely accepted feminist theory. then suddenly they ghost. so much anti-transmasculinity thrives as a direct result of people's refusal to acknowledge the reality of transmasc oppression, and when you can't do that because its a Wikipedia page with extensive sources, you have to fall back on petty defensive cruelty, because that was what was at the heart of this uproar all along.

keep talking about transandrophobia and/or anti-transmasculinity. use those terms. don't be embarrassed about it. if trans-rad-feminism gets to be slowly mainstreamed in queer spaces, why can't transunitism?

[crabussy]

every time a trans man who does not want to be called a twink gets called a twink I will personally go out into the world and rend 1 parked car to shreds with my teeth. cut it out

[crabussy]

walk with me for a moment. let's think for a sec. I'm not upset but I do want people to understand. do you think assigning a label associated with feminine features, hairlessness, skinniness/lack of muscle tone, and high pitched voices is something that most trans men would feel comfortable being associated with? why or why not?

[crabussy]

of COURSE there are trans men who don't mind it, or trans men who actively enjoy being called a twink. but I am not hairless by choice. I WANT fat and muscles and body hair and a deep voice. and a lot of trans men that get called twinks DO HAVE THESE THINGS, yet they get called "twink" anyway. why do you think that might be?

it's okay if you've done this in the past. maybe just check in before you call your friend or acquaintance something with so many specific, potentially disheartening associations!

[crabussy]

I wonder if the inverse occurs with trans women getting called "butch" too. because there are many wonderful butch trans women!!! but if you call trans women "butches" for traits like short hair or body hair despite otherwise feminine presentation, maybe think about why that is? is she really a butch? or is that just her body? just ask first!

nonbinary people too. are they really "masc presenting" or is that just their body? are they really "fem presenting" or is that just their body? let's all try to be a bit more cognisant of the language we use to describe the trans people in our lives, yeah? [: it's worth thinking about. don't worry yourself into a hole about it, of course! but it's something to check every now and then.

[strongcat]

no need to wonder, it definitely does happen to trans women. and honestly for some time i felt kind of pressured to identify as butch bc being a lesbian it seemed like the only way to get other lesbians to accept my body as it is. but that literally is just my body

[steviecopeland]

tbh

[userfish]

this pride month we’re all going to be radically pro transgender. or else.

[userfish]

hey so this means radically pro ALL transgender. don’t put limitations on this. all trans people are radically accepted here.

[mikumiotics]

I am making a concious effort to not say 'terf' anymore because trans woman excluding radical feminist(twerf) is wayyyy more accurate about what these people are doing. trans men/transmasc people aren't necessarily excluded from their hateful rhetoric, but the vast vast majority of their hate is directed towards trans women. we are who they constantly obsess over, and in fact there is a significant number of trans men who are sympathetic to twerfs!

[mikumiotics]

you'll notice, if you read the post, if you read the post you 🫵🏻 just reblogged! that it contains the line:

"trans men/transmasc people aren't necessarily excluded from their hateful rhetoric"

You can understand posts you reblog by reading them first ! hope this helps.

[aro-rites]

yeah! you also started your damn post by basically saying "we should call terfs a different thing bc really they only target one (1) type of trans person :D👍"

"aren't necessarily excluded" so I don't know if you know this, but saying something isn't "necessarily" xyz is effectively implying that while it's not this thing, there's exceptions. Framing the struggles of transmasc people as lesser is dumb. if you think differently, you're more than entitled to.

Also. You realize that not all transfems are lesbians. ergo not adjacent to lesbian spaces. right????? and those people are EQUALLY hated by terfs as transbians. (not saying that was ur point, bc i dont think it was, but wow did u make it sound Like That)

look. i'm not in any way saying transfems are not targeted by terfs. but to imply they are their only target is really dumb. Show me these hordes of people that genuinely don't believe terfs hate transfem people. Because if you can't, then the argument of terf vs twerf has no meaning <3

also! believe it or not, repeatedly insinuating i didn't read your post doesn't prove your point more! it makes you sound very silly. hope this helps.

[vampiricvenus]

Atp it was a mistake to allow people with terrible gender and sexuality politics and who just run with the vibes of a new term instead of actually understanding them, to learn about he/him and transmasculine lesbians because none of these imbeciles can think in any shades of gray and took it as "trans man lesbian" instead of "non-binary person who's transitioning towards masculinity and identifies as a lesbian", and also "he/him = binary man, every single time".

[mikumiotics]

I am making a concious effort to not say 'terf' anymore because trans woman excluding radical feminist(twerf) is wayyyy more accurate about what these people are doing. trans men/transmasc people aren't necessarily excluded from their hateful rhetoric, but the vast vast majority of their hate is directed towards trans women. we are who they constantly obsess over, and in fact there is a significant number of trans men who are sympathetic to twerfs!

[genderkoolaid]

i think ive posted about this in the past but PSA: i don't think anyone should talk about the "transandrophobia community" or use the term community to describe this. i see myself as part of a discussion, which many people contribute to, and there may be communities that form within and around this discussion.

but "community" implies a degree of interpersonal connection that i don't think exists. there are also people across this site and other platforms who have very different sorts of discussions about anti-transmasculinity, and i don't think it makes any sense to act as though everyone who talks about transandrophobia/ATM is inherently connected in a "community" and uniquely accountable for each other's actions, purely because we all talk about how transmasculinity is systemically targeted by patriarchy. this does not mean, to be clear, that people do not have a moral obligation to call out transmisogyny, racism, intersexism, exorsexism, etc. in spaces where transandrophobia/ATM is being discussed. the trans community is still a thing, as well as general ethical behavior.

the point of talking about transandrophobia/ATM is to talk about it, to theorize, to organize. people may make friends and find community through this discussion, but that is secondary to the discussion and not the point. & that should be clear from the fact that referring to people as "pro-transandrophobia" or part of the "transandrophobia community" is extremely confusing and contradictory, because the term was always meant for social analysis and organization, not community-building or sectarianism.

and once this goes from a discussion to being a "community," it is becomes something more about interpersonal relationships and, inevitably, drama, than it does about the analysis of systemic oppression. it turns "transandrophobia" and "anti-transmasculinity" from widely applicable terms into the Special Words of One Online Community and, if the community collapses, the words will be seen as tainted. i do not want that. i think one of the most dangerous issues the left faces especially in the US is the inability to distinguish between the personal/individual level and the social/collective level of thinking. ironically, i think the idea of a "transandrophobia community" does more to trap us in the mindset of the personal than it does to encourage us to think socially and avoid the ideological mistakes that helped get us to our current fucked up sociopolitical situation.

i have been very careful while running this blog to avoid using the term "community" but i wanted to make this explicit once again.

[genderkoolaid]

should also add: this is why i fundamentally still agree with the idea of using "transunity" / "transunitist" as terms. they are also theoretical but i think it does a better job at capturing a general trend in queer approaches to patriarchy as well as how trans people (should) relate to one another. i think it covers a lot of ground in terms of describing what kind of things certain people have in common re: how they think about gender and the community, without just collapsing into "everyone who talks about transphobia targeting trans men."

its a different kind of broadness that seems, to me, better suited as "transunity" covers not just anti-transmasculinity but anti-transfemininity and all forms of exorsexism on equal grounds. there are blogs that only cover transmisogyny/transgynephobia/anti-transfemininity that are still clearly part of the broader sphere of "people who treat transandrophobia as a real thing and a major part of transphobia" but it makes much more sense to describe the connection being about the overall approach to how patriarchy & the community are understood, rather than having to funnel all this through "do they think this one word for trans man oppression is good or bad"

also adding @sirmarsian's tags because they make a great point:

#i saw someone use that term (transandrophobia community) and it made me uncomfortable and this encapsulates why#it feels like transandrophobia as an issue is decentralized to put the spotlight on people's personal bonds#it has a weird connotation too. I dont know how to articulate it well but it feels reductive#it's like if instead of the queer community we said 'the homophobia community' 'the transphobia community'#it feels weird to name a community around the oppression rather than the people#queer people arent solely defined by the queerphobia they suffer and the conversations concerning us are broader and more numerous than tha#plus queerphobia can be used against anyone even people who are not queer

[genderkoolaid]

also i think its a good tactical move to change the language from "pro vs anti transandrophobia" (confusing, keeps the terms of the discussion on "is this term allowed and also are we even allowed to talk about this problem that clearly exists", see above) to "pro vs anti-transunity (clear, directs focus back to trans-centered feminist theory, explicitly intersectional, makes visible how trans-radfems are divisive and akin to cis female separatists and exclusionists)