I didn't have the language for it back then but I did mention to a transmasc person I knew that the "trans inclusive swim times" needed to be specifically stating that Trans Women and Transfems were overtly welcome because we so often exclude ourselves from trans spaces for fear of being perceived as predators (through the internalizing of systemic rejection of transfeminine people even within queer spaces) and they were very stunned and aghast because it put into context the refusal of 3 transfems they invited to the swim time and how there was only 1 transfem in the like 30 people that showed up and said transfem was the one that hadn't refused their invitation. I said this to them after their friend was asked to leave the "trans inclusive swim time" which obviously contributed to this sort of invisibilized yet evident dynamics description
They talked about it to the events organizers and said event organizers essentially told my acquaintance that "this is a space for people to feel safe, and that they will prioritize those who state feeling uncomfortable in the presence of others over said others" and their heart fucking sank and they made a stink about how this was horrifying twerf and bioessentialist rhetoric. They were banned from the "trans inclusive swim times" and so was their transfem friend. Not because they were transmasculine, but specifically because they were not okay with the fact that some fuckass twerf in an entire group was given so much power as to manage to exclude any and all transfems from the "trans inclusive swim times"
Idk. I'm tired. I'm sad. I'm hungry, and I'm thinking. I am too exhausted to be angry.
