intersectional feminism should involve everyone

yarn - any/all - 26 transmasc butch with endometriosis - account reviewed by my transfem gf focused on centering transfems while not erasing transmascs in transfeminism ❕this is my transmasc focused account ❕ I do more activism focusing on transfems on my main to prevent harassment disclaimer: I am not uterusless because I am trans but because I am chronically ill

[lookmomnouterus]

hello, you can call me yarn

26 - any/all pronouns - butch lesbian on t (i do identify as transsexual and nonbinary)

I am transmasculine only for the sake of discussion, in actuality I am transneutral. If you are transfem and talking to me I can always ask my girlfriend to respond in my place if you’d like; she is transfeminized and therefore can empathize more. I actually request that you inform both of us on anything you have to say in terms of transfeminism. We’re both always trying to learn and she is aware of everything I say and post on this account. Tumblr is still very new to me

I am chronically ill and deal with physical limitations due to these illnesses. A lot of the conditions are (unfortunately for all of us) in relation to my assigned sex at birth. This is the only context in which my or anyone’s ASAB is ever relevant in discussion - in relation to my own life experience. ❕Transfeminine people still deal with medical transmisogyny and I’m happy to discuss that with anyone. ❕I believe trans women likely deal with: cyclic hormonal periods, PMDD, endometriosis, pelvic floor dysfunction, and a myriad of other “primarily female” conditions/medical experiences. The prominence of these conditions in transfeminine people is not researched enough due to them not being properly recognized as female

disability is a fundamental part of the transfeminism I wish to discuss, hence intersectionality

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my controversial beliefs in relation to transfeminism -

transmisogyny is not a perfect “TME/TMA” dichotomy based on ASAB

and if it is, terms like “isomisogyny” deserve to exist for transmasculine people to articulate their experiences

disclaimer - I do not believe terms like “transandrophobia” work well here. Isomisogyny is much better at articulating the actual phenomenon of pushback against people perceived as women being masculine

trans women DO NOT have privilege over trans men (should be obvious)

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I support trans men and transmasculine people. That’s the focus of this blog in particular though I will sometimes make posts/repost stuff about or for transfems

my posts are intended to be for my personal perspective and desire to involve transmasculine people in transfeminism. In my opinion, it is the best way to get the transmasculine population to undo a lot of their transmisogyny and TERF mindset, which I admit does exist and is systemic. Transmascs should not be the primary focus of transfeminism, not at all, but language like TME/TMA (which implies a biological connotation to one’s experiences) shouldn’t be used to tell a transmasculine person they can’t find language for their experiences in my opinion.

I encourage it to be used to articulate how your experience differs from a transmasculine person’s and perhaps how you’re uniquely transfeminized compared to them (example: “you’re exempt from v-coding and this has been my experience with it that you can not have”) However most of the time I see it being used to simply tell another trans person that their personal experience is not “as bad” as other forms of transphobia with the sole purpose of silencing a trans person discussing their struggles

I may tag things with “transandrophobia” to get more reach. Not agreeing with the word “transandrophobia” does not mean I think the idea behind it doesn’t exist

I am NOT a “believer in transandrophobia.”

Isomisogyny? Yes.

The concept of anti-transmasculinity + anti-butchness? Yes.

One of my core beliefs is that we need a better word for anti-transmasculinity specifically that articulates the misogyny involved than “transandrophobia”

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my lesbianism -

I am very passionate about my ability to both be a lesbian and be on t/identify as transsexual

I AM NOT A MAN - t does not make me a man

I do date trans women and fems and I spend most of my time online dealing with lesbiphobic transphobic TERFs who tell me I can’t be a lesbian

I tend to find particular solidarity with other nonbinary butch trans people but they often happen to be transfeminine

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if you’re transmedicalist I suggest you don’t stick around. If you live and die by the TME/TMA dichotomy but you have no problem noticing how cis gay and feminine men are harmed by misogyny or even transmisogyny… you really won’t want to stick around. my gf does consider us t4t but I acknowledge that it is socially and systemically different from transfem lesbian t4t.

I am very pro intersex so intersexism will not be tolerated (I have many intersex people in my life)

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julia serano on transmasculine people finding “additional language” for their experience of gendered oppression -

What Is Transmisogyny?

My 2007 book Whipping Girl is probably best known for two things: It popularized “cis” terminology (which I did not coin) and introduced…

[eclecticelectriceccentric]

"In a world where masculinity is assumed to represent strength and power, those who are butch and boyish are able to contemplate their identities within the relative safety of those connotations."

so serano fully does not believe that butches face societal oppression. is there any other way to interpret this?

[lookmomnouterus]

I acknowledge that anti-transmasculinity exists. Do I think “transandrophobia” is a good word to refer to that oppression? I’m not sure, I don’t really think so as androphobia isn’t a word that refers to a systemic issue. I feel like there are better words that better articulate what is going on. Saying that shouldn’t warrant a response where I’m outright told to stop talking about this topic that directly impacts me as a transmasculine person. Transandrophobia is the most popular tag on this website to find others who believe anti-transmasculinity is real and systemic.

I may not be a trans man but I am transmasculine. When it comes to TRFs I am seen as a trans man. When it comes to trans men I’m seen as “woman lite” and I’m getting tired of it. We have overlapping experiences. I am on t. If I was bigender you’d have no leg to stand on as I’d partially be a man and I’d be transitioning all the same. I have every right to be here talking about this.

If you disagree you might be exorsexist because this “you’re not even a man why are you talking” logic explicitly excludes nonbinary experiences in the same ways TRFs like to erase and discredit nonbinary experiences. Am I not “trans enough” for you or is it that I’m not “man enough” for you to be able to talk about things I deal with?

[this-is-varsexism-transphobia]

Its genuinely upsetting trying to find good posts in the #transfeminism and #transmisogyny tags to reblog and like posts, but in doing so, getting my dashboard FLOODED with recommendations of posts about how all "TMEs" are evil/selfish/priveleged, and how transmascs and trans men always make things about themselves.

It's a loud minority of people making these posts, half of whom aren't even trans in the first place, to be clear, but I get pissed off that Tumblr sees I'm interested in the transfem and trans woman experience, and interprets this as "you hate trans men and transmascs then?"

The algorithm is trying to facilitate hate, and it's infuriating.

If your hate for transmascs and trans men is stronger than your care for transfems and trans women, you're kind of failing at the whole transfeminism thing. We are not enemies. We are comrades. Don't let this bullshit tear our community apart.

[fern717]

i saw that someone on here coined a term called "AFABsexual", and it's exactly what you'd expect. basically it said that AFABsexual describes anyone who is attracted solely to people who were designated female at birth and that AFABsexual people may identify that way due to trauma surrounding the external biology of AMABs

i don't think i should even need to explain why this is transphobic, but i will anyway: this reduces both people who were designated male at birth and people who were designated female at birth down to their physical bodies, completely ignoring how they may identify

it lumps all people that were designated male at birth together and suggests that they all may be inherently traumatic to some, no matter how they look or what their gender is, just because of their bodies. it narrows people who were designated female at birth down to just their bodies, as well

if someone only wants to date women, they can easily call themself lesbian or straight, depending on their gender. someone calling themself "AFABsexual" shows that they do not see transgender women as women

[legionforweare-many]

it's almost as if a lot of the transphobia trans men and transmascs face was affected and exacerbated by misogyny, and vice versa, to the point where it could be hard or impossible to draw a clean line between them. it's almost like there was some kind of overlap.. an intersection even... i wonder what that could be called? if only there were a word for it. sighs

[creetchurbehavior]

you don’t need to tell trans women that they’re capable of harm. they’re told that every day by society, by the government, by literally everyone.

you DO need to start telling trans men that we’re capable of harm because i fear some of us have forgotten.

[lookmomnouterus]

I think trans men are aware they’re capable of harm. Are they aware they’re capable of misogyny? No, in the same way many cis women feel they’re incapable of misogyny trans men (and some trans women) believe that they can not be misogynistic because either they were assigned female or they are women.

No one is incapable of being misogynistic.

I feel cisgender (especially white) women are the ones most excused and encouraged, unexamined, to perpetuate cisnormative misogyny. On the other hand I believe transmasculine people are more likely to, unexamined, perpetuate transmisogyny as they are in trans spaces more frequently. Bringing them up here is interesting considering the transmascvoicesproject is ran by a person who openly admits it isn’t about platforming transmasc voices it’s about demonizing transfems. This does nothing but make us all look bad to cis people and one another while cis people continue to be misogynistic and transmisogynistic unchecked. I’m getting tired of it.

[solacryptic]

all this arguing about transmisogyny and transandrophobia could be avoided if: 1. we weren't so tribal and particular and saw other trans people as comrades 2. if we didn't put other's identity above their lived experiences... you know if you're a trans woman, go and ask trans men about their experiences (and vice versa)

[transmascfeminism]

“Stupid, confused, broken little girls” don’t get infinite love support kindness and care. That’s what the patriarchy tells you it gives them. What it means is they get locked in the home, raped, beaten, forcibly married, overmedicated into sedation, abused into insanity, institutionalized, and killed. You are listening to the patriarchy’s lies over centuries of voices of victims of misogyny. And by voices I mean the dying screams they didn’t manage to muffle.

[transmascfeminism]

“In what world does being considered a crazy little girl lead to being treated worse than being considered a male predator?” Um. In this one.

[velvetvexations]

Lesbians feel so fucking entitled to the bodies of people they're potentially attracted to because they think it's different than when a man does it.

"wymbyn must keep their lovely feminine bodies I want to have sex with and any that don't are delusional and self-harming because of the patriarchy"

"trans women must strive to look like someone I have sex with and any who don't are delusional and self-harming because of the th***abarchy"

Shut up! You're misogynistic freaks! At least when a cis man doesn't find me attractive he just murders me, which is somewhat more appealing a fate than having to continue breathing the same air as a bunch of obnoxious idiots too stupid to know they're recreating patriarchal gender division with extra steps and calling it praxis.

People will whine and complain so much about how trans women apparently aren't allowed to be "genderfucks." YOU will not let them, you fucking dumbass! YOU will not let them mix gendered presentation! YOU have the one dimensional idea of what constitutes a trans woman!

[phosphorusab]

TERFs don’t own uteri and vaginas. Seeing a uterus or a vagina in art is not necessarily a ‘dogwhistle’ for trans exclusionary/bioessentialist beliefs. It’s not equivalent of Graham Platner’s tattoo, or a swastika or saying the n word. It’s a fucking body part that has been and is being stigmatized and controlled. And now you are participating in that

Have you ever thought to yourselves that not everything is about you? This is just like when after Chappell Roan (the lesbian singer who makes music for lesbians) said before she sang her song The Giver that “only a woman knows how to treat a woman right” and then people got on her ass for being ‘terfy’. So being a lesbian, or having a uterus or a vagina is ‘terfy’? Congratulations, you’ve become a TERF strawman of a ‘TRA’, you’re doing their work for them

Also, do y’all just forget that some trans women have vaginas? Because several trans women I personally know are either getting bottom surgery very soon or are interested in seeking it. It’s important to me that people remember that it’s transmisogynistic to assume that all trans women like having penises or have penises at all

And it’s intersexist to assume that anyone that was perceived as male at birth cannot have a uterus. Stop policing how anyone with a uterus or a vagina expresses themselves artistically about having either of those body parts, even if you think it’s cringe. Especially if you think it’s cringe, I endured the pink pussyhats in 2017 and I kept my mouth shut

Trans people wouldn’t have any of the few rights we have now if it weren’t for the labor of cisgender women and transgender men of the past, who were oppressed because of how their reproductive organs and genitals that they were born with were perceived by their cispatriarchal societies. Emi Koyama says as much in The Transfeminist Manifesto

[lookmomnouterus]

I might be transmasc but I am NOT A MAN.

I might take testosterone but that does not make me a man.

I might grow facial hair and wear feminine clothes, this does not make me a feminine man.

I might get a deeper voice and body hair and sometimes wear makeup, this doesn’t make me a feminine trans male.

This also doesn’t make me any less transsexual. I am not cissexual for refusing to identify as a man (because I’m not one)

Why are so many other trans people obsessed with reminding me that they see me as a man or that I *must* live as a cisgender man does otherwise I’m transphobic for implying a transmasc isn’t a man?

I have to call myself “transmasc” while kicking and screaming because too many people can’t tell which direction I’m transitioning in and they feel entitled to know what I was assigned as. Being called a man is genuinely dysphoric

[twinkhonravings]

So why yhe hell r you transitioning? Some of us actually have dysphoria

[lookmomnouterus]

Because I have dysphoria surrounding not having facial hair or a deeper voice. Nothing about my post said that I don’t have dysphoria. That’s why I said “I am not cissexual for refusing to identify as a man.” Can you read?

[lookmomnouterus]

some women treat feminism like a ‘demonizing men club’ and some trans circles like to expand on that instead of critique it as the gender essentialism that it is

once you become “woman enough” for cis women you can join the demonizing men club. and if you’re ‘man’ enough to be seen as a man to them you can’t join the club, you’re in fact part of the problem they demonize so much

this is why nonbinary transfems who don’t fit their idea of a transfem and feminine transmascs who aren’t men but have masculine features (facial hair) don’t get to be part of the club

[no-sharks-on-the-sun]

if i could give one piece of advice to newly transitioning trans men, it's that it's 100% possible to find a community of people (including women!) who don't treat you as a threat, and the people trying to convince you otherwise are not your friends

[ftmtftm]

Also, perhaps, have we considered that it's actually really bad that we treat closeted trans women (and closeted nonbinary people, and frankly cis men too) this way? Like. It's a bad thing that trans women are treated like distrustful monsters for """"being men"""" before coming out by one demographic and then are also treated like distrustful monsters after coming out for being trans by another. That's not a sign of a culture with a healthy relationship with gender in the slightest!!!

Have we considered that treating people as inherently dangerous or distrustful by virtue of their gender alone is in fact, the very gender essentialism that perpetuates radical feminism in our spaces and that is something that we should be working on stamping out?

I am genuinely sorry that people across multiple different identity lines experience this shit because no trans person should be treated like a distrustful monster just by virtue of their gender identity before or after coming out.

*extends my hand* Let's examine the ways we allow gender essentialism to invade our spaces and harm other trans people and put an end to this cycle of gender essentialist abuse together!

[lookmomnouterus]

Treating people this way IS gender essentialism.

And it does harm closeted transfems especially

[lookmomnouterus]

I might be transmasc but I am NOT A MAN.

I might take testosterone but that does not make me a man.

I might grow facial hair and wear feminine clothes, this does not make me a feminine man.

I might get a deeper voice and body hair and sometimes wear makeup, this doesn’t make me a feminine trans male.

This also doesn’t make me any less transsexual. I am not cissexual for refusing to identify as a man (because I’m not one)

Why are so many other trans people obsessed with reminding me that they see me as a man or that I *must* live as a cisgender man does otherwise I’m transphobic for implying a transmasc isn’t a man?

I have to call myself “transmasc” while kicking and screaming because too many people can’t tell which direction I’m transitioning in and they feel entitled to know what I was assigned as. Being called a man is genuinely dysphoric

[ancientson]

My advice for transmascs and trans men who are new to trans discourse and communities:

Stop trying to be one of the good ones.

You're going to be made to feel like you have to apologize for your gender and your masculinity, like the patriarchy's sins are your burden to carry, like you need to singlehandedly solve misogyny, like you're never really a victim and should suppress that pain to be the stoic protector women are owed, and like you need to make yourself and others like you as small and unobtrusive as possible as an apology for existing.

You're going to be told that trans men are like little girls and should be seen and not heard, that they lie and exaggerate, that they shouldn't want attention, that they're prone to silly fantasies and playing dress-up, that they owe everyone their beauty and sex appeal or they're disgusting and worthless, that they're just holes to be fucked into submission, that their fertility is someone else's property, that they owe everyone around them labor, that they're easily led, that they're just not intelligent enough to be authorities on their own experiences and need someone older, stronger, smarter, and more important to hold their delicate little hands and guide them. Most of the people telling you this will proudly call themselves feminists.

You're going too be told that trans men are men, so they can and should take the hits, that they shouldn't cry or show emotions, that they need to be more stoic, that they need to put their health and bodies on the line for others, that they're hairy and stinky and disgusting in their masculinity, that they're prone to violence and fits of anger, that their anger is scary and should never be permitted or expressed, that it's never justified, that violence is a part of them so violence is just something they should expect and accept without complaint, that their anatomy is a joke or a fetish and nothing more, that their cocks aren't big enough like a real man's, that they need women to act as their moral compass, that they don't have complex feelings like women, that they aren't emotionally intelligent. Many of the people telling you this will proudly claim that they're against gender essentialism.

If you try to be one of the good ones by accepting all of this, by agreeing with it, by enforcing it on other trans men who try to speak up, you will still never be one of the good ones because to them, there is no such thing as a good transmasc or trans man. You are the scapegoat and the sacrificial lamb, all at once. You eat their sins and their guilt and you are placed on the sacrificial altar to absolve them. You are a punching bag. You are a repository for all their unexamined transphobia, internalized or otherwise. You are the effigy they can burn when the cis men who have hurt them are to powerful to touch.

That's what it means to be one of the good ones.

So don't do it. Don't do what they do and turn the anger and resentment you feel for how you've been treated on equally undeserving targets; caring about yourself and others doesn't translate to passing the abuse on to a target you've deemed acceptable as the people who hate you have. But don't let them use you that way, either. You owe yourself and your brothers better than that.

Be a self-respecting, strong, gentle, loving, brave person and let yourself feel, let yourself be vulnerable, let yourself be angry, and refuse to accept abuse. Their baggage is not yours, so don't take it on because you think you need to apologize for being trans or for being masc or male. You haven't done anything wrong by existing or by wanting to be happy and safe.

[dumbdogdiscourse]

If you believe trans men are "only" seen as confused girls then you are, more likely than not, willfully ignoring the transmasculine experience. Trans men and mascs have been talking for years and years about how there is more to it than that.

First, there's the ignorance about what being treated as a "confused girl" means. It means being infantilized, it means being institutionalized, it means having your body autonomy stripped from you, it means being put in your place through rape and abuse, it means being property, it means forced to become a wife and mother. Thats what happens when you're a "confused girl".

Second, the "confused girl" stereotype dwindles the more masculine a trans man/masc becomes. Then he's dangerous. He's a predator; here to steal your daughters away to become hysterical, defective, unfuckable things like himself. He's going to take her fertility, her beauty, her ability to contribute to "proper" society. He's invading women's spaces. He's tricking straight women into being lesbians and gay men into being straight. He is past the point of no return; he can no longer be "fixed"; he must be killed.

To ignore these; to assert that trans men and mascs are "only" seen as confused girls, are never seen as predators, is contributing to systemic transmasculine erasure. Do better.