Trigger warning: some hella transphobic shit follows.
“Just because you don’t like women doesn’t mean you’re not one,” was hurled at me in a Boston living room. Another trans person declared that I was not trans, and their main evidence was “you’re wearing a skirt.” Occasionally, other trans people reject my trans-ness. Often, they reference my decision not to use medical transition or my femme presentation. In trans communities, border patrol is a barrier to connection, and it can be invalidating and hurtful. Who is issuing the badges and cudgels to the trans police? Who decided on the uniform?
Recently, a commenter left the italicized text below as a comment on my earlier post about non-medical transition; and another post about identifying myself as male-bodied. I chose not to publish the comment as-is, because the comment attacked me and another commenter. I am re-posting it here, with my responses in plain text and bold, because I think it illustrates a destructive hierarchy within trans communities and between trans communities and dominant culture.
you tend to write much better on your period? what is this about “loving the bleed”? i hate people questioning others on their gender identities as much as the next trans person does (i am androgynous FTM myself) but this “period-loving” crap is the first i’ve ever heard about dealing with being a man on the inside.
i absolutely hate bleeding monthly, it’s a womanly process coupled with distressing hormones and excruciatingly painful cramps. i respect your desire to be acknowledged as a non-op, no-ho transman and i am not dissing any of you as fellow brothers in any way, but i simply have not met any die-hard FTMs who love having their periods!!! this is just ridiculous.
Actually, calling someone’s body experience process “crap” and “ridiculous” is “ questioning others on their gender identities” and “ dissing any of you as fellow brothers.” I am sorry that you do not have a large, diverse trans community where you are. I am sorry that they have not expressed and taught you a fuller array of gender spectra. I respect your hate for your own bleeding, but I ask that you not impose your feelings and desires on anyone else. It sounds as if you are distinguishing between ”die-hard FTMs” and some other kind of trans masculine person, as if the rest of us are not committed to ourselves, to our gender.
if you love having a female body so much why do you insist on being a man in society? i understand you do not need to transition medically to be male but the majority of males, both cis and trans do NOT wish to have female bodies and if a cis man woke up tomorrow in a cis woman’s body he’d be in absolute terror and dismay, not rejoicing over his period or newfound sexy curves. part and parcel of being transMALE is not wanting those things.
If you paid attention to my self-identification, you would know that I don’t have a female body. I have a male body and I bleed. This paragraph is essentializing, and is not far removed from the transphobic crap I could hear in any mainstream discussion about gender in any of the bro bars in my city. Part of being a transmale for you is not wanting a period or curves. That’s your body experience. Please don’t universalize this. Accept others’ rights to know ourselves and to define our experiences.
for those of you who are not willing to transition medically because you love your natal bodies, i have news for you… you’re not actually transsexuals. yes you’re transgendered and on the spectrum of “transness” but you really are falling into another group altogether when you really LOVE your female bodies. FTMs do not love their female bodies at all and i’m not beefing on you here to be an ass or to state that medical transition is the only way forward as i really do respect the fact that some folks really CAN’T go through medical transition, but just because they can’t doesn’t mean they love their female bodies any more. make no mistake, transmen do NOT love having natal female bodies, but an androgynous person or a gender queer might.
This is absolutely transphobic. I am a trans man, and telling me I am not is textbook transphobia. I love my male body, as I’ve stated before, and I don’t desire medical transition. Also, this implies that a trans man cannot be androgynous or gender queer. I am all three of these things.
perhaps those of you who love your breasts and your periods might like to consider this question – why is it that you want to identify as male only on the inside? for me that psychological aspect is only half of the battle towards becoming myself. there is some social element to gender as you have discovered by changing your name and pronouns, and although i understand your PTSD related behaviours (i too have this condition) i think you truly underestimate how much medical transition or attempting to “pass” actually helps alleviate those fears. no way am i stupid enough to put myself through the agonizing fear of trying to socially transition in my tiny female body. perhaps you think it’s ballsy to do so or manly, but i just find that bloody weird.
The front of my upper torso is my chest. Using incorrect terms for my body parts denies my experience. I’ve done the transition, and it’s not because it’s “ballsy” but because it is too painful to be called by the wrong name and gender indicators all the time. That’s not “stupid.” I am a small-bodied person, and I know the dangers. I’m making an informed decision, because it’s better for my health to risk the danger than silently to accept constant mis-gendering.
i am non-op, no-ho right now myself but i am hoping to transition medically in the future and i may not even be able to medically yet, i have tests to do first, so please do not think i am hating on anyone here or having transphobia. i just am not convinced that the female-body lovers here are in the same part of the spectrum as me, though i respect that they are somewhat non-binary people…
If you have to say “do not think i am hating on anyone here or having transphobia,” what you have to say is probably going to be transphobic. No one is claiming to be you, so you ought to accept that we will have different experiences and still identify similarly. Why do you think we must convince you of our identities? You don’t have to believe it for it to be true. You have shown so much disrespect for people’s expressed gender identities and bodily experiences here. You have argued against the ways folks have described our bodies and our experiences. You have deliberately mis-assigned my body several times.
My hope for you is that you educate yourself. I hope you find love for yourself and your fellow trans people. I hope you do not repeat this shit and alienate those who might be helpful to you with your process.
All the best to you.
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Tags: body love, cissexism, community, ftm, internalized transphobia, man, self-determination, self-identification, trans, trans man, trans masculinity; masculinity; transgender, transphobia
April 29, 2011 at 3:38 pm |
I’ve been there, hating my body just as much as you have. Just because we rise above our self-hatred doesn’t make us any less trans. Hating the way your body is currently is not a requirement for being trans! We are men who were born in bodies perceived to be female by society, therefore we’re trans! Hate shouldn’t be a requirement for anything of this sort! We’re still men. We’ve just decided that hating the bodies we have isn’t a conducive way to live and we’ve gone the extra mile to accept ourselves as we are, with both a “female” body and a male consciousness. Wallowing in your self-hatred isn’t going to make you any more trans than us, sorry to say. It will just make you miserable.
When I took the steps to accept my body, it only came with the knowledge that I am male and my body cannot change that fact no matter what state it’s in. Secure with my identity as a man is the only way I could accept myself as I am, and that’s the most important thing to me. You, sir, are denying me the truth of myself, and I for one will not allowing you to do that. I am a trans man, and I do not hate my body. I have come to terms with it and am peace. This does not make me any less of a man than you, who are in a constant state of war with your body. Believe me, I’ve been there. I’ve hated my body and I’ve been frustrated with it. Let me tell you something: it doesn’t help anything. In fact, accepting your body as it is helps a lot more.
This is not me telling you to be any less male than you are, because I can’t do that even if I wanted to. You are as male as I am, and I’m not going to pretend your identity isn’t less trans than mine, because that’s just not true. It’s a different approach, but none of us are any less trans than the other. The idea that we are is just ridiculous when the deciding factor is hate vs love! This isn’t an issue of being trans, it’s an issue of self-esteem and loving yourself. Being trans is just the excuse you use not to love yourself when you most desperately need it. Trust me, I’ve been there. I know exactly what it’s like. I just chose love over hate. I will do so again and again and again. Dear commenter, kindly proceed in coming to terms with it.
May 2, 2011 at 12:59 pm |
Daemyn, this is just beautiful: “Being trans is just the excuse you use not to love yourself when you most desperately need it. Trust me, I’ve been there. I know exactly what it’s like. I just chose love over hate. I will do so again and again and again.”
I like that you talk about choosing self-love as a continuous process, and it’s not finished. That helps give me strength.
May 4, 2011 at 1:04 am |
Trigger Warning: transphobic shit.
Oscar,
Thanks for publishing this and continuing with your wonderful blog.
I have a low tolerance for cissexist crap in general but especially from other transpeople. I have heard transpeople say things like “The experience of being trans is a living hell for all trans people,” “I have a birth defect,” “Bisexuals are the only people who could possibly be attracted to transpeople.” These are not word for word quotes. Even when they are only talking about themselves it is very hard for me to hear such self-hatred and essentializing.
Thanks for sharing. You too Daemyn.
May 5, 2011 at 10:56 am |
oh geez, this brings me back to a discussion that took place via transgress recently, which i felt was also handled pretty eloquently and firmly. sometimes this reminds me of the way that my friends train their dogs. misbehavior warrants a loud (but not yelling) firm NO.
NO, you do not get to question or essentialize anyone else’s identity. discussion complete. your handling–and Daemyn’s handling, for that matter, of these discussions is heartening to me. thank you.
May 8, 2011 at 9:46 pm |
Hmm… I’m reading “Sexing the Body” right now and you might like it. It probes a lot of questions about medical classifications versus identities. For me, personally, I often feel that being male and being a man are different, and that I can be a man and have a female body, which is NOT to say that my body is not a man’s body, but that it IS a man’s body with certain experiences and needs that many other men do not have. For me, “female bodied” doesn’t make me feel erased, it reflects both a vague biological category (I say vague because even ciswomen are sometimes XY or don’t have all the parts and functions that supposedly make a woman, so what does it mean even as a word medically?) and a social symbol that I have lived with, and yet I do find your take on it really interesting. Keep on writing, your posts are great.
May 8, 2011 at 9:54 pm |
I’m glad you posted this. Cissexist bullshit is like a freaking plague. My favorite one has to be I’ll call you by name but don’t expect me to use female pronouns or I wont use female pronouns until you’ve had surgery. A> How do you know if i’ve had surgery or not, B> This is biological essentialist bull shit. how can someone deny a person’s gender identity when it’s been made apparent the nature of gender being a social construct?
Thanks.
May 9, 2011 at 2:50 pm |
i hate it so much when trans people try to police each other’s genders.
having a period is not a “womanly” process, it’s a biological process that our society has constructed as female and therefore the domain of women. this person calling your body female and your chest breasts is so not okay. it seems that they only respect non-medically-transitioning trans people when that status is out of necessity, not by choice. also, given that they have not be able to access medical transition, it seems like they are bitter about this and lashing out at you because they can’t fathom how someone would choose not to transition medically. as you and others said, i hope they find some peace.
love you oscar.
p.s. what the fuck is a “die-hard” FTM?
May 11, 2011 at 6:14 am |
you are so fierce, oscar.
May 26, 2011 at 9:01 am |
Yes!
Just a world of ‘Yes!’
January 18, 2012 at 3:20 pm |
Hi, I’m a fairly new reader, and I just recently came out as trans, and I’ve been trying to work out my identity and how I feel about my body, etc. I recently came across the following on tumblr and was wondering what you thought of it:
http://www.scarletsorceress.com/2011/12/awkward-argument.html
January 18, 2012 at 7:27 pm |
Hi there, thanks for reading. I think the heart of the argument on the Scarlet Sorceress page, that people should do whatever they want with their bodies, is correct. I support the rights and choices of people who choose to access any medical transition, as well as people who choose not to.
I do take issue with the person saying “most” trans people experience body dysphoria and want medical transition. I think we have all kinds of different experiences, and I’d be loath to say “most” trans people experience any one thing.
I would like a more accepting environment, in which people would see me as a man. I wish other trans people wouldn’t attack me because I’m not seeking medical transition. I would like to dress in drag and have people believe that I am in drag. I would like other gay men to see me without a lot of explaining.
Even though I would like the described world, in which people’s gender identities were honored no matter what their chosen presentation, I disagree that it would do away with others’ needs for medical transition. I don’t think my path should be anyone else’s path.