this part of Lou's life really compels me because like so many parts of his story it touches on a transmasc experience that is so common yet so erased by normative narratives around transmasculinity. most of the time when i see people talking about transmascs & misogyny (like on a very general scale, not just on Tumblr) it's very "before transitioning you are seen as a cis woman and subject to misogyny on the incorrect presumption that you are a cis woman" and then you transition and don't experience misogyny really anymore. so transitioning is going from being a victim of misogyny -> being safe from it if not active in it. and one side to this narrative is ofc the idea that transmasculinity is a maladaptive trauma response to "escape misogyny" and that transitioning from female to male is in line with what the patriarchy wants. experiencing misogyny is about being a cis woman and FTM transition is about moving towards a cis man's relationship with misogyny.
but for so many transmascs who started questioning while in a relationship with a cis man the more you express your transmasculinity the more misogynistic pressure you are faced with. and also, it's hard to meaningfully explore and develop your understanding of yourself when you are taught from childhood to decenter your desires and feelings for the sake of your cis husband. Lou expresses in his diaries at one point feeling scared by an argument with his boyfriend J on machismo– Lou desires the aesthetics of it but not the chauvinistic reality, while J seems to genuinely believe in it. It takes Lou a long time to separate himself from his cis boyfriend's perspective of him, as a gender-fucky girl but always a girl. and other partners express similar ideas, that it's okay for Lou to be kinda queer but as long as his still remains, on some level, a girl they can fuck and enjoy. His own desires, to be a gay man and be truly accepted, to transform his body into what he's always longer for, are irrelevant past the point where they made him sexy to them. Lou also talks about how he felt more comfortable internally while crossdressing as a man, but felt more comfortable externally while dressing as a woman, because while it's more painful on an emotional level to live as a cis woman, it's harder to belong in society as a trans person. Or as he says: "I continue to feel more like a part of the human race, yet less like a person."
& there's this heartbreaking passage after he has been convinced by J to not pursue medical transition and to "accept" his female identity:
Ridiculous when my whole crusade was to be a feminine gay male. And also my inability to merge into a male-male relationship with J, even tho I know now it would have been impossible. I knew I was acting strangely toward him, that I wasn’t relaxed or really me…that with the only person I’ve really felt at ease around. Maybe I would have fallen into the Miss Plastic Surgery syndrome—always blaming one thing or another for the fact that I’m not a “real man.” I hate to face it, but it’s true: I would never be entirely comfortable as a male.
Because in my heart I know I am nothing.
and like. how many of us have experienced that? being unable to even conceptualize yourself as a man because you are so caught up in being a cis guy's girlfriend? convincing yourself that transition would only make things worse, because you can't imagine it as a real possibility and that's more painful than the everyday dysphoria? how many of us minimize our transness for the sake of lovers who think of it as a sexy party trick, but get grossed out and angry when we talk about wanting testosterone, top surgery, god forbid bottom surgery? a LOT of transmascs face a rise in misogyny as they assert their manhood, not a fall. people are sent to conversion therapy or forced into heterosexual marriages after asserting their manhood. our transmasculine identity is not conformity, it is not a symptom of a lack of feminist resistance. being transmasculine IS resistance. it is the RESULT of freeing ourselves from patriarchal roles of daughter-wife-mother. transmasculinity flourishes under feminist liberation, not patriarchal suppression.
I’m not crazy, I’m not living in a dream world. I’m not pretending anymore. I will have a man's chest. I will be a man. Oh, God, I don’t know how to believe it’s true. It’s too good. It’s too good. I know now: I can do anything. I can be anything I want. I can challenge the wind…
theartofmadeline
amandla
titsay
romaincrisis
tangentwithtanner
vaporwave
