"Transandrophobia Discourse" is Literally just Ace Discourse Again
A group of queer people coins a new term to describe their own oppression and starts using it in online discussions. This term is based off of past terms used by other groups of queer people, but that's fine because we're all part of the same community and sharing language is a normal thing to do with people in your community, right?
Wrong, apparently. Some queer people dislike the new term and claim that it isn't a "real" axis of oppression, despite not even being members of the group who coined it.
Said queer people start "jokingly" identifying with the term (proudly calling themselves aphobes/transandrophobes) as a way to mock the group.
In order to make the group easier to dismiss, the "privileged" part of their identity is emphasized, while the "oppressed" part of their identity is downplayed or outright erased (cishet people don't belong in the queer community/men aren't oppressed for being men). This gets people on board with the hate campaign because, out of context, these points sound somewhat reasonable. Basically, they're dogwhistles.
If a member of the group dares to call out any of these dogwhistles, they're mocked for "being too sensitive" or simply told to shut up.
Terms that were previously used in specific contexts (SGA and TME/TMA) are suddenly everywhere, and they're being used as a way to further paint the group as privileged people who're selfishly taking up space in marginalized communities.
If the group dares to adopt any terms from other queer communities because those terms describe their own experiences (heteronormativity/corrective r*pe and T4T/the t-slur, to name a few), they'll be accused of "stealing those groups' culture," usually with a bit of casual N*zi rhetoric thrown in there about how the group "contributes nothing meaningful to culture" and "is incapable of making real art."
People start making entire gimmick accounts dedicated to hating on the group, further fanning the flames with veiled language ("I hate cishets/TMEs in queer spaces") that hides their bigotry to the untrained eye.
Some mainstream gimmick accounts start taking random potshots at the group, even if they weren't previously involved in the discourse. This normalizes bigotry towards the group among Tumblr's userbase even more.
Any instance of bigotry from the group (or a sockpuppet account pretending to be one of them, it doesn't really matter) is shared everywhere and used as an example of why "those people" don't belong in the community.
In fact, ANYTHNG bad that targets the queer community, from Tumblr blogs getting terminated by bigoted staff to harmful legislation, or even serious tragedies like the Pulse Nightclub shooting, somehow ends up getting blamed on the group.
The hate campaign gets to the point where members of the group are constantly being harassed, threated, and suic!de baited by both other queer people and non-queer bigots alike.
Eventually, after the bigots have had their fun and enough members of the group have either been run off the site or k!lled themselves for their liking, the broader queer community suddenly jumps to the defense of the group, with tons of feel-good posts with tens of thousands of notes signaling the long-awaited end of the dreaded "discourse." Well, until the next "queer group who it's okay to hate" gets selected a month later. Transandrophobia has only reached the beginning stages of this, if at all.
If you ever wonder why I, an agender person who isn't a trans man nor transmasc, care so much about transandrophobia on this site, this is a big part of the reason why. I don't want any young person who's coming to terms with their identity to visit "The Queerest Place on the Internet(TM)" and come away thinking that other queer people actually hate them and want them dead, especially considering that the internet is the only place a significant number of them can go to for support.
To make myself perfectly clear, I obviously think that transandrophobia is a real axis of oppression, but you should probably go listen to the plethora of trans men/mascs on this site who've spoken about this topic because, honesty, nobody from any other group deserves to talk over them, including me.
Support your trans brothers and transmasc siblings; that's non-negotiable.
It's both hilarious and depressing how well this post has aged already. There's currently a sockpuppet account called "notallwhitepeople" spamming the transandrophobia tag with racist troll posts and reblogs about "blancandrophobia," and I've already seen several self-described transfeminists either take this obvious bait account at face value or join in on the joke themselves in order to mock trans men/mascs.
This is, quite literally, EXACTLY what exclusionists did to aro/ace people back during ace discourse, and it's incredibly disturbing to watch the same cycle play out again. Y'all are a bunch of bigoted bullies and should be ashamed of yourselves. Do better.
