Also. It is interesting how "lesbian trans man" is seen as a chronically online identity when being against that is honestly a very chronically online stance to take. This viewpoint seems to interpret gender and sexuality labels as simply words in a tumblr bio, rather than descriptors of lived experience in the outside world. Outside of tumblr, I am not a square icon describing itself as a lesbian and a trans man in the same sentence specifically to make Real Lesbians feel unsafe. I'm an entire person and those are both words that describe the way I interact with the outside world.
I mainly continue to use the word lesbian while being a trans man because I am a bigender manwoman, but for the sake of this argument, let's assume I am a monogender trans man, and everything else about my life is exactly the same.
I haven't shared my pronouns with all that many people, those I have shared my pronouns with often forget because I only told them once when we first met. Few people actually use he/him for me, and even fewer know my chosen name. A vast majority of people I meet know me as my deadname, which is extremely feminine. I sometimes pass as male when briefly interacting with complete strangers, but anyone I've known long enough to have a conversation with can easily tell I'm not a cis man.
It's not how I identify, but I interact with the world around me as a woman, because that's how I'm perceived by most people.
I also like women, and I'm fairly vocal about this. If I say a woman is hot, people will interpret that as me being a lesbian. If I say I'm queer, the assumption is that I am lesbian or bisexual; always wlw, never a straight trans man. If I had a girlfriend, we would not look like a straight couple. If I called myself straight, this would be mistaken as me being a woman who likes men, rather than a man who likes women. If I called myself a straight man, I would very likely get laughed at.
Putting "he/him" in my tumblr bio won't change that. Internally identifying as a man won't change that.
Lesbian is the best way for me to effectively communicate my orientation (attracted to women) to others when I am not on the internet. And it's a chronically online take to say I can't use that word because an internet stranger thinks I pass as a cis man.
(disclaimer: some non-passing or closeted trans man will identify as straight men regardless of what other people think! and i genuinely admire them for it! however, i didn't choose to disregard what other people think, and describe myself as a lesbian because that is how i am described by others.)
