#internalized enbyphobia

[imposter-syndrome-is]

Imposter syndrome is feeling like you aren't enby enough cause you don't have any of the stereotypical enby traits or hairstyles

imposter syndrome when you're nonbinary is…

[uncannine]

self-hating nonbinary person with internalized transphobia who will stay miserable inside a cage that has the door wide open for them :

"actually ! i don't mind people thinking i'm cis :) like it's okay if they assume, because look at me lmao i don't blame anyone for thinking i'm my AGAB when i look like i do. i don't correct anyone on my pronouns because of the same reason lol it's okay !!! it's not their fault !!! presentation =/= gender !!!!!! that's why i Have To keep performing dangerously close to my assigned gender. i'm just uhmmmm experimenting, yeah :D i'm actually happier when i look the opposite as i do right now, but i am not going to unpack that. i'm not actually trans after all, i'm just nonbinary uwu"

[transenbyconfessions]

TW: self-deprecation

I'm agender. It's so hard.

I'm starting to come out to my friends, and the reply I get most of the time is "ok cool" or "I don't think it changes anything" which is. great. i am grateful that they accept me and don't look down on me, but i want it to matter. I want it to be a big deal. i want them to see me differently, i want them to ask questions. Because no matter how many times I come out, they will just say that it's okay and forget about it, and I won't have the heart to try to remind them.

I don't pass. I don't want to pass. I don't know what it means to pass as agender. I like my voice, and I like my body, but I still have so so much social dysphoria. I wish i accepted myself, and I wish I could bravely go against gender norms, but it's just so hard. I don't want to hate myself. I don't want suffering to be the only proof of my identity.

Understanding myself is hard. Figuring out how I'm comfortable presenting is also hard. And I know and respect that binary trans folks also struggle a lot, and so much more in other aspects of life than I am, but sometimes I wish I would just be trans because. i would have a goal in mind. I would have gender euphoria. I could explain it to people. I think it's easier for others to see someone as a woman/man and refer to them by their pronouns because people are already familiar with it. It's easier to be at peace with your own identity because you understand it. If someone was to ask me about my gender now, there's nothing I could even say. like. no matter which pronouns you use I will still feel uncomfortable. There's no right way about it. I will not be recognised legally. I don't belong in any social group. I can't just be "with the boys" or "with the girls". There is no place for me in society, and I feel so lonely. I want to cry. I want someone to see me for who I am.

Submitted May 31, 2023

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

My Story as a Gender Ideologist

How I went from a devout member of the church of gender ideology to a critical thinker

By: Kiyah

Published: Jun 29, 2022

I used to be a leftist. It's difficult to admit. Looking at it from the outside, it can be hard to understand why anyone would believe such radical and illogical ideas, but it really is like being in a cult. You are taught to censor your actions, your speech, and your thoughts or you will be severely punished. If you step out of line, you deserve violence and for your life to be ruined.

It has been very hard for me to write this and it's something I have thought about for years, but given the current state of the country, I feel like now more than ever I need to begin to share my story.

There are so many aspects of leftism that I want to share my experiences with, but I feel like I need to start with what started it all: Gender Ideology.

I grew up in Texas where I was a tomboy. I liked Star Wars, superheroes, and sports. Being gender-nonconforming was foreign to the religious far-right school that I attended. Parents at my middle school didn't want their kids around me because they thought I was gay or "trying to be a guy". Being exposed to either of those things would send their kids to hell. I was adamant that preferring pants to dresses, playing with legos instead of dolls, and having more male than female friends was not being a guy. Girls had all types of interests and the only thing that separated boys from girls was biology.

Although I knew nothing about my sexual orientation at the time, I never thought being gay was immoral. Gay people were not a threat to anyone and just wanted to live their lives in peace.

I was 16 when I realized that I was attracted to girls. Although I was not at the same far-right religious school anymore, I still lived in Texas. I thought that all Christians, Republicans, and Southerners were just as bigoted and closed-minded as the few people I had interacted with when I was younger. Feeling alone and afraid of what could happen to me if I came out, I looked to the internet for guidance.

I didn’t have any access to social media outside of YouTube and Google (thank god), but I quickly discovered gender ideology. Since this was supposedly the views of the "open-minded” Democratic party, I decided to study it religiously. It seemed at first to be a very easy and simple way to allow people to express themselves and find community. With an infinite number of labels to define gender and sexuality, no one would ever feel excluded and people would easily find community.

When Trump won the presidential election that year, I was devastated. The US had exposed itself as being bigoted and hateful, just like the queer YouTubers had predicted. I was genuinely afraid of genocide against trans and gay people in our country and felt like I needed to fight back against '“right-wing neo-nazi propaganda” encouraging violence and hatred.

I decided to go to school in New England where I studied gender ideology more than I studied for my exams. At my university, the common belief was that we could cure homophobia and transphobia by educating everyone about gender ideology.

For the first time, I felt like I had purpose and community and I was not willing to let go of that for anything.

If I was going to spread the good news about gender, I wanted to understand the nuances and logic behind these terms and ideas. I identified as a woman and as bisexual, so my privilege would have prevented me from ever truly understanding it all. Instead of logically figuring it out on my own, I needed to find trans people, nonbinary people, and especially people of "societally invalidated sexualities” like abrosexual or xenosexual to explain it to me.

However, the more questions I asked, the more questions I had. Why would someone identify as trans when they are completely gender-conforming and have no interest in medical transition? Are gender-nonconforming females really not women? Isn't it homophobic to believe that being gay is an immoral sexuality? If Donald Trump identified as a woman, would he be the first female president? Is there actually no difference between a transwoman and a woman? Wouldn't self-ID laws open the doors for people to easily lie about their identities to gain access to women, transwomen, and other vulnerable groups?  If all of these identities are so subjective that each individual has their own definition, why is this being taught in schools as fact? If we can't define women, how can we defend women's rights? Can children really consent to medical transition? If the point is to be inclusive, why are we trying to ruin the lives of people who don't agree?

I didn't get any clear answers from most people I asked. One response was that people should be able to identify however they want. It's none of my business (especially as someone who wasn’t trans). The other response was that I sounded like a TERF and I should stop asking questions before people think that I am transphobic.

I have a few personal experiences (including a stay in the hospital and an uncomfortable situation at a party that I might share later) that began to show me that self-identity is not the best way to categorize people and that biological sex does matter when it comes to a lot of situations. Although I desperately wanted to believe in gender ideology, I couldn't fight the growing number of questions and concerns forming in my brain.

At my woke university, it was really difficult to discuss what I was feeling. I have a lot of friends who fully embraced these ideas so I felt like I was somehow betraying them by admitting that I didn’t see their beliefs as rational. Being same-sex attracted is not bigoted. Female-only sports are important for allowing women to fairly compete in athletics. Children cannot consent to transition through an affirmation-only model. Being gender non-conforming doesn't make you any less of a woman.

I tried reaching out to people to see if anyone felt the same way I was. Many of the leftists that I spoke to were appalled that I dared to question the gospel of gender ideology. The non-leftists (classical liberals and independents) I reached out to weren't familiar with this way of thinking. They didn’t believe me when I told them about my experiences. They said it was a fringe ideology that only a tiny group of people believed, that it wouldn't leave extremely far-left cities like San Francisco and that I needed to stop listening to "right-wing conspiracy theories".

I continued to doubt myself. Was I just a terrible person? Was I concerned over nothing? Were my experiences a figment of my imagination? Was I letting myself be radicalized by transphobes and bigots? Should I force myself to believe in something I knew was illogical and not a representation of reality?

I didn't want to be an evil conservative. I didn't want to be a bad person. I didn't want to lose my friends, my housing, or risk losing my education. The only way to make it through the rest of my college experience was to put my head down and pretend that it wasn't a big deal.

My mental health started to deteriorate at this point. Being gaslit by both sides made me extremely anxious and depressed. But I couldn’t escape it. Gender ideology was in my classes, my dorm, and all of my extracurricular activities. I felt so alone and isolated that I turned to some bad coping mechanisms. If I couldn’t control my thoughts, I would find a way to not think at all.

In a desperate attempt to not completely give up on life, I decided to give gender ideology one last try. I finally allowed some of my friends to convince me that my frustration with gender was because I was actually nonbinary and had "internalized enbyphobia” (another story to tell at some point). Nonbinary identification was common in my dorm and in many of the clubs I belonged to. I started wearing a binder and even considered hormones and surgery.

After a while, I lost a part of myself while trying to fit into a group that would most likely never accept me for who I really was.

The pandemic gave me a break from all of the nonsense and eventually, I found a very small number of people who were feeling the same way that I was. I realized that I wasn't a hateful bigot or a delusional alarmist.

I am a logical thinker and an individual. My thoughts and experiences are not wrong just because they are uncommon. Facts and rational thinking are not bigoted and understanding reality is important.

While I still want gay and trans people to live their lives without fear of violence, I think a lot of valid concerns are being brushed under the rug in the name of being inclusive. Gender ideology is not going to lead to less violence or hatred against trans, gay, bi, or gender nonconforming individuals. In 2022, I see a growing backlash from people who would otherwise probably be allies.

That is why I'm speaking out. I not only want people who are questioning the actions of the modern queer community to see you're not alone, but I also want to encourage people to think critically about some of the negative side effects of the left’s policies and beliefs. As a woman and a member of the LGBT community, I feel that it is important to speak out about these issues and how they are negatively affecting our communities. I don’t want people to make the same mistakes that I did.

Don't accept anything without logically and rationally thinking through it for yourself and feeling confident in what you are supporting.

Going forward, I will work toward fighting for freedom of speech, and, more importantly, I will fight for freedom of thought. The ability to think and rationalize is what makes us human. A growing number of people (especially children!) are being taught that their thoughts are evil and that they need to punish themselves or fear violence for stepping out of line.

I also want to do more work to bring data to political conversations. There is so much data floating around and most people don't fully understand how to process and interpret it. The left often misinterprets data to push their agenda. I have studied data analytics and hope to use it to bring more rational thought to these controversial conversations.

[chesscabrera]

So, I’ve introducing myself as he/she/they since I started college, and like two kids had mentioned something I said during the class discussion and actually referred to be as “he” and “they” and I had to turn my camera off to let some tears out

Like, yes, I’m fine with feminine pronouns but it’s hurtful that basically everyone ignores my other pronouns and 💓💓💓💓

little wins, everyone. little wins.

[enbypanposi]

As a nonbinary person, I sometimes find myself thinking that I’m not a “real” trans person. That my experiences and my voice matter much less than that of a binary trans person. That the dysphoria I personally experience isn’t as important as the dysphoria a binary trans person feels.

But then I remember the white stripe in our flag. I remember the trans activists who are and were nonbinary. I remember the nonbinary people and groups which have existed throughout history all over the world.

I remember that our binary trans siblings are just that--our siblings. That there is not and never has been a competition between us. That their suffering and my suffering is one and the same--that in turn my joy and their joy is the same. That our activism is shared and our goals are the same, that we are the same community--not virtually the same, not almost the same, not alike, but one.

Nonbinaryness is an essential trans experience. The community would be lacking without our voices, our experiences, and our solidarity. We have never been lesser and we have never been an afterthought. To uphold and support the trans community we must uphold and support ourselves, we must validate our own experiences, and we must know and affirm that we are real trans people.

[thechangeling]

Hey you wanna hear something really stupid? I desperately want to change my name and go by something more gender neutral but I'm too afraid to ask everyone to call me something different and I'm afraid of my name choice being judged lol 🙃🙃🙃🤘

[nonbinary-pirate]

I feel so much to internalized enby phobia in me...