#misandrogyny

[genderkoolaid]

need binary trans people to understand that being nonbinary/genderqueer/gnc and getting euphoria from being androgynous/"genderfuck" doesn't actually mean that experiencing the misandrogyny and dehumanization that comes with being recognizably outside the binary any better. all it means is that there is no hypothetical endpoint, there is no "if i could only xyz then everyone would see my real binary gender and treat me like any other human being and i could escape being treated as an disgusting creature that doesn't fit in anywhere" because the thing that makes you feel real, the thing that relieves your dysphoria and makes you feel like yourself and not want to die, is the very thing that makes you be seen as a disgusting creature. so its either never transition or swap one closet (binary cis person) for another (binary trans person) or just accept that this is the price you pay for being nb/gq/gnc and open about it, and even then people will forcibly stuff you back into the closet, and also you may not even be able to access the gender affirming care you need on account of you not being binary and your goals not being binary.

& like. misandrogyny hurts all trans people because we are all outside the binary to some degree in the eyes of patriarchal society. there are nb/gq/gnc people who may be less personally affected by it day-to-day than some binary/gender conforming trans people! but it does drive me insane seeing people be like "no one in the world could ever understand the immense suffering caused by being read as androgynous more than me, a white binary trans woman, and frankly every nonbinary person who gets euphoria from androgyny is valor-stealing from Me Personally because they must not understand that being androgynous is bad" as if when you get queerbashed for being an obvious tranny, its somehow less painful if you get euphoria from being androgynous in instead of experiencing androgyny as an inherently lesser state of being to be escaped.

[willowbilly]

I wish others would look at me and see even the possibility of a nonbinary person rather than just either a betitted man or a bearded woman, and furthermore that androgyny were not so stigmatized as to be considered an insult in and of itself, one that is used as free license to misgender, degender, shame, and sexualize. Not to mention how this intersects with racialization so as to especially punish people of color. Having an array of mixed masculinized and feminized sex characteristics is normal; not a joke, not ugly, not a fetish. A man with feminized breast tissue is a man. A woman with masculinized facial hair is a woman. Nonbinary people are nonbinary whether “androgynous enough” or not. Et cetera. Human bodies do not need to conform to the rigid binary ideals of assigned sex in order to be bodies that belong to people who are owed basic human respect. It’s okay to be unsure as to how to gender strangers; to privately, politely exchange pronouns with new acquaintances; to correct oneself upon making inevitable mistakes. Visibly trans, nonbinary, intersex, two spirit, genderqueer, and gender-nonconforming people do not shatter reality or degenerate society by simple virtue of their existence, and those who are made invisible deserve acknowledgment.

Like, it does make sense to superficially gender most people upon one’s own perception of their gender presentations and then assigned sex characteristics, with conscientious reflection as to one’s biases, but one may always learn otherwise. Society should make peace with individual variation and uncertainty.

[ieattitansforbreakfeast]

that “not all butch lesbians are trans men”, and that “some butch lesbians are trans men”, are both true statements, should not be so hard to understand. Yet somehow i guess either none of the butch lesbians are men, or all of the butch lesbians are men is the latest violent debate on my dash.

sighs

[transunity]

The Three Tools of Transphobia I- Misandrogyny

This is the first in a series explaining the three tools of transphobia- an explanatory metaphor for how hatred of masculinity, femininity and androgyny inform how transphobia is applied.

Misandrogyny is the androgynous-focused counterpart to misogyny and misandry as concepts. Like the latter two, misandrogyny is often (but not exclusively) deployed as a result of how individuals are read by transphobes. Namely, misandrogyny is the kind of transphobia that occurs when someone isn't clockable as a binary trans man or woman. Instead, transphobes are confronted with someone (that in the moment) they cannot (mis)gender as male or female. In this situation, transphobes will deploy a kind of transphobia often experienced by nonbinary people, if they are not read as either male or female. But this kind of transphobia happens to binary trans people too (especially mid transition).

Transphobia is predicated on how the trans person targeted with it is perceived at the time. It is the reason why nobody is transmisogyny exempt. If you are perceived as a trans woman by a transphobe you will be targeted with transmisogyny. Regardless of if you are a trans woman, a gnc gay man, a cis butch woman or a trans man mid transition or who presents femininely. Misandrogyny is what happens when a transphobe cannot clock a trans person as a binary gender. Misandrogyny is part of and informs all three types of transphobia: transmisogyny, transandrophobia and ceterophobia. Though nonbinary people are more likely to experience missandrogyny due to existing outside of binary gender.

Misandrogyny isn't limited to just targeting trans people either. Like misogyny and misandry, it is often applied against cisgender people. For example, many androgynous presenting cis celebrities will have their presentation constantly called into question. This is because of how gender roles are enforced and how unbinary presentations are not tolerated in the cishet patriarchy. The categories of masculine, feminine and androgynous can be tools of control. Those who deviate from these categories are thus harder to control from transphobe's point of view and their reaction is to reassign those who deviate back into one of those categories to make it more convenient to control expression.

As are all terms we use, this one is imperfect. But I hope that this post was understandable. Good faith feedback and add ons welcome!

[baeddel-txt]

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but androgynous people aren’t oppressing you by being androgynous.

Non-binary people with an androgynous gender presentation are not the reason that society at large won’t accept you as non-binary.

It’s not because you’re feminine that society doesn’t accept you as non-binary. It’s because you’re non-binary that society doesn’t accept you as non-binary.

It’s not because you’re masculine that society doesn’t accept you as non-binary. It’s because you’re non-binary that society doesn’t accept you as non-binary.

It’s not because you’re gender conforming wrt your AGAB that society doesn’t accept you as non-binary. It’s because you’re non-binary that society doesn’t accept you as non-binary.

We live in a binary society, and being non-binary in any way is a threat to that. Having an androgynous presentation doesn’t suddenly make it non-threatening.

Society doesn’t want you to be androgynous. It wants you to not exist.

[genderkoolaid]

"Because these mechanisms push us into being either a man (and not a woman) or a woman (and not a man), they often differ in how they push us: the ways they push one to be a man differ from the ways they push one to be a woman. This is manifest when mechanisms of assignment are violent. Katherine A. Rimes and colleagues (2019) compared victimization experiences of non-binary and binary trans youth according to sex assigned at birth. They found that AFAB study participants, both binary and non-binary, were more likely than non-binary and binary AMAB (assigned male at birth) participants to experience sexual abuse. Rape and sexual abuse push one into a woman’s patriarchal position by extracting feminine-coded goods. They “make” their targets women by forcing a “failed woman” or a “disobedient woman” into the patriarchal feminine sexual role (Rimes et al. 2019, 237). Meanwhile, when mechanisms of assignment violently push one into a man’s role, they often aim to provoke one into enacting patriarchal masculinity. They try to goad the target into violence, dominating others, or sexual abuse of women. This may explain why Rimes and colleagues found that AMAB study participants, both binary and non-binary, were more likely than non-binary and binary AFAB participants to experience physical assault (ibid., 237)."

— The Logic of Misandrogyny by Jeff M. Engelhardt

[genderkoolaid]

“You can set that boundary and say you don't want anyone who identifies as a woman to interact with you. That's your right. But multigender people aren't gonna trust you & are gonna see you as exorsexist or at least have exorsexist ways of thinking that make you unsafe for us to be around” hey man! Maybe not trusting someone who sets boundaries about their relationship is….. bad? Demanding someone have no boundaries about who interacts with their (especially sexual) content and demanding that people allow people who they are uncomfortable with to be alright with interactions! Yikes!

Also can I control who’s attracted to me? No. But I can choose to not act on it, if someone says men dni, men dni, swag. I simply respect relationships. Im not saying boygirls/girl boys/genderfucks are weird, they fuck, some of my best friends are gender fuckers, I’m saying it’s weird to explicitly identify as a woman and then get angry when people who don’t enjoy women interacting with their content…. Get….. angry? At them for setting that boundary.

sigh. okay

Your obsession with our womanhood is misandrogyny. Multigender people aren't infecting any communities, we aren't leeching in womanhood to gay spaces or manhood to lesbian spaces we aren't opening doors to cishet predators, and us interacting with your posts as gay men is not infecting you with our girl cooties. I'm not saying you don't have real trauma but your focus on how some gay men are women is a focus on how our androgyny and how unnerving and dangerous it is to binary identity.

On top of that: the focus on our womanhood when we are discussing our identities gay men means you are assuming that womanhood is a dominant identity, one stronger than our manhood, because its the part of our androgyny which unnerves you the most, which means its our dominant feature. When it comes to being a gay man, everyone sees me as a woman, but when I'm a lesbian suddenly I'm the most man ever, depending on which one offends monogender/binary people the most. If a multigender person is interacting with your post because they relate to it as a gay man, why are you focusing on their womanhood so hard, regardless of if you even know how their womanhood impacts their sexuality and manhood? All you need to know about multigender gay men, in this context, is that they are gay men in gay men's space. Its not weird to explicitly identify as a gay man and then get angry when people invalidate your identity as a gay man because you are also a woman, because they don't want to question why they think those things are incompatible. Why is it so concerning to you that some gay men are women? Why does their gender specifics matter to you at all? Why do you feel like its such an affront in the first place? That's the exorsexism. That's why multigender people wouldn't fucking trust you. Emotions aren't apolitical or except from critical reflection & I'm saying you ought to reflect on why you have this wariness towards multigender people in the first place instead of unquestioningly following it.

Lets pretend to be a transphobic gay man for a minute. "I don't want trans men interacting with my posts. I just don't want to have to see vaginas in gay men's space. Its not transphobic to set boundaries. Why are you getting upset with me? You just want to force me to have sex with vaginas, that's homophobic. I have the right to loudly tell trans men I don't want them to have anything to do with me because I think they all vaginas, all want to fuck me, and I find that disgusting. I respect trans men, I just think that letting them in gay men's spaces is opening the door to trying to force gay men to have sex with women!" Do you seriously not see the similarities?

Look I've had two different anons now talk to me about how much they love & support genderweird people, buuuut they just make life so hard for me because they talk about their identity and want to be respected and partake in their communities :( I promise I support you guys I just would like you to shape your lives around my internalized transphobia. I mean you literally said "I love gender fuckers, my best friends a gender fucker"

I really, truthfully, honestly hope you realize how fucked it is that you've now made me, someone who literally brought up the emotional trauma this kind of exorsexism has had on me and my sexuality, put all of this energy into explaining this and defending us.

[genderkoolaid]

"Misandrogyny is a system of mechanisms that—together with other systems of oppression—enforces the norms that constitute the patriarchal gender binary. According to those norms, everyone is either only a man or only a woman; GNC folk don’t exist. Misandrogyny enforces this nonexistence by (i) assigning GNC folk to a binary gender and punishing non-conformity to that gender, (ii) assimilating GNC folk and cultures into the binary gender system, and (iii) eliminating GNC folk and cultures. Although much has been written on gender policing, binary gender norms, transphobia, and other topics related to misandrogyny, we also need to appreciate that misandrogyny is a system of mechanisms that punishes those who violate binary gender norms. Future work should elaborate further on how misandrogyny intersects with other systems of oppression, including misogyny, transphobia, white supremacy, ableism, classism, and settler colonialism; and it should spell out how mechanisms of annihilation bring about social, legal, institutional, and epistemic nonexistence."

— The Logic of Misandrogyny by Jeff M. Engelhardt