[content warning: brief mention of suicidality]
I’ve seen a lot of people say things along the lines of “if you’ve ever thought about being trans, you are trans!” and “cis people don’t question whether they’re trans!” I see people link questioning people to the website amitransgender.com (spoiler alert: it says ‘yes’).
To me, this seems both wrong and harmful. Of course there are people who question whether they’re trans and decide that being trans isn’t right for them. There are gender-non-conforming people who wonder about whether their affinity for ties and discomfort with girls’ nights out means they might be a man. There are sissification and forced feminization fetishists who, noticing the correlation between those sexual interests and being transgender, wonder if they might be transgender as well. There are depressed people who notice how much happier a lot of people are after transition and wonder whether it would cause their depression to lift too. There are people with dissociation and depersonalization issues who wonder if it’s because they’re trans. Heck, there are gender dysphoric people for whom transition is not the right choice– maybe right now, or maybe ever. All of those people exist!
People say, “there’s no pressure to be trans! There’s actually a lot of pressure not to be trans!” As a cultural thing, this is true. However, things that are true of American culture as a whole aren’t necessarily true of every subculture. In queer/trans communities, there’s often a lot of pressure on gender-non-conforming women to transition; some gender-non-conforming male rationalists have told me that their friends assume that they are of course a trans girl, and their objections are just denial.
The advantage of “if you think you might be trans, you’re trans!” is that it gives people permission to think they might be trans. It says: in order to be trans, you don’t have to have known since you were six, or act like stereotypes of the gender you want to be, or hate your body. It’s okay! If you want to be trans you can be! And that’s something that’s desperately needed in trans narratives.
So one of the things I’ve been trying to do lately is switch from framing transness as an identity to framing it as a choice.
Of course, the identity framing is really freaking useful, most notably when advocating for trans rights. The identity framing allows you to say: I am a man, I am always going to be a man, you do not get to question whether I am a man or not, please call me ‘he’ and we will move on with our lives. And in a time period in which allowing people who identify as women to use the women’s bathroom is controversial, allowing people who choose to be women to use the women’s bathroom is far more so.
But the problem with the identity framing is that it allows endless layers of recursive questioning. It is not like there is a blood test to see whether you’re really truly trans or not. There is no way anyone else can verify what you’re feeling and go “yep, that’s definitely dysphoria.” And I feel like a lot of the angst of the gender-questioning person boils down to trying to find a solid, objective answer to a question that’s inherently subjective.
So I think that for a lot of gender-questioning people, it is useful to characterize being trans as a decision. The question is not “do I, in some fundamental sense, have a gender identity that is different from the one I was assigned at birth?”; the question is “would transition improve my life?”
Now, sometimes the answer to the latter question is extremely obvious. To many cis people, the answer is “uh, no, duh.” Many trans people feel like they would rather die than not get to transition, in which case it is pretty obvious that transition would improve their life (for one thing, they would get to have a life). But for people who are more uncertain, I think it can be clarifying to realize that you don’t have to justify your decision to transition with an identity.
Seriously! If your quality of life is better when people call you “they”, you can just do that. If you think it would be really awesome to be fucked in your brand-new user-upgraded vagina, you can get one installed. To a certain degree, I think the debates about whether autogynephilia is a thing or whether trans men have just internalized misogyny are kind of ridiculous: if it improves your life to transition because of your sexual fetish, why is that anyone else’s business? It is your life and your body; you only get one life, and you deserve to be happy.
On the other hand, if transition wouldn’t improve your life, you don’t have to. If you’re wondering about whether your love of skirts and lipstick or your sexual fantasies about becoming a woman might mean you are really a woman deep down, well, it turns out that there’s no law that says that people who are really women deep down need to transition. You can just stay a dude if you want to and if you think that is best for your overall life goals.
You have agency over your own gender. In a very real sense, your gender identity is what you want it to be.
And, of course, if it is a choice, then your decision can change as your life circumstances and self-knowledge change. Detransitioning or deciding to transition doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve come to a different position about what you really fundamentally are deep down; it can just mean that a choice that wasn’t right for you once is right for you now. (Of course, some changes are not reversible, and some reversible changes (such as whether or not you have breasts) are expensive or a pain in the butt to reverse. It’s wise to be cautious about such changes and perhaps wait a while to see if your desire is stable.)
Another important caveat is that transness is an intensely personal decision. No one besides you knows what the best choice for you is. And if someone is like “you’re so trans! you have to transition!”, you have my permission to lightly thwack them with rolled-up newspaper.
Thing of Things 
Now I’m wondering what it means for people to have a “deep down”– it may be just a provisionally useful concept.
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“However, things that are true of American culture as a whole aren’t necessarily true of every subculture.”
Yes this is so important in so many contexts!
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‘Ive seen a lot of people say things along the lines of…’ ive totally seen you do this in the past too dude.maybe ‘along the lines of’ is more narrow than I thought and what youve said/ rebloged/ supported doesnt count to you. But yeah, very helpful post.
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Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.
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This is 1) great and utopian, 2) hurting me with how fucking unattainable it seems and how we’ll always always ALWAYS need lies-to-cis-people. Endless convoluted fucking lies, when the truth can be easy and helps everyone
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I understand and respect the reasons why lies-to-cis-people seem necessary, but I think we as a community are also seriously overdue for a conversation about how propagating those lies as the standard dogma actively harms trans people (in Ozy’s terms, people who would benefit from choosing to transition) because it gives them bad information as the basis for their decision-making and/or self-discovery process.
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Also, holy fuck, an enormous thing required for this that everyone misses (except maybe you wrote on it already, idk): STOP THE STIGMA AND FEAR AROUND DETRANSITION!!! IT PREVENTS PEOPLE FROM TRYING ANY CHANGE!!!
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Some friends of mine were discussing an anime character who is initially introduced as a girl and then “revealed to be a boy”. Some fans say this is obviously a trans girl due to behavior, other fans say this is obviously a cis boy vis a vis self identification. From my point of view, I understand that not a lot of cis people transfer schools wearing a different uniform and let people say different pronouns for them, BUT ALSO not a lot of trans people are literally saying ‘this was a big mistake, this was not the solution to my personal problems, I have always been [birth gender]’ so detransition is a really harmonious explanation for me, much better than “things are different in Japan”. (I’ve been to Japan. This doesn’t happen, at least not at some astronomical rate relative to America.) I have several close friends who are detransitioned, and these lines of self identification reminded me of them; a few even like these characters themselves for precisely the same reasons.
This group of people was saying that the character must be a cis boy. I chimed in:
“Like even if it’s supposedly impossible to pass so thoroughly without identifying as trans on some level [nervous laughter reaction image] I’d like to introduce you to some friends of mine called detransitioned people”
Several people immediately gave stern responses: “please don’t push detransition in this chat room, this place is a safe space including some trans people”. The anime having “sketchy writing” was no reason to bring up “detransition” and throw trans people under the bus. Some of these responders cited their own trans quality as a reason they were offended. Combined by the direct instruction to stop talking about this in the space, I stopped responding and have since lost the log of the discussion; “push detransition” is the description I can quote most directly.
Am I behind the times here? I can even understand how my fleeting reference to “passing” could have offended, or other components of the ideas just expressed. But it’s wrong to just say that a character could have experienced detransition???
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The actual number of people who properly detransition seems to be a fairly small minority of trans folks, although as transition becomes easier and more widespread, I would expect to see detransition become correspondingly more common. In any case, the majority of the time I hear people talking about detransition, it is not a good faith discussion of the complexities of a trans life. Instead, it is a weaponized conversation repeated by transphobes acting in bad faith.
This happens a lot. Thus, if you run a forum with a broad trans membership, you might want to nix that topic. Yes, that means you’ll perhaps miss out on some good faith discussions, but so what? You’ll likewise avoid many terrible ones. The end result is, there is plenty to talk about otherwise.
Not every topic needs to be allowed or legitimate on every forum. If a topic is usually disruptive and degrading, just set it aside. If someone needs to discuss it, there are other places (for example, here).
Myself, I see nothing wrong with detransition. Just as it is okay to change gender, it remains okay to do it again, and perhaps again after that. (I know people who have zigged and then zagged and then zigged again. So it goes.) There are costs. The medical reality of gender transition is — well, some of this is permanent. Life doesn’t give do-overs.
But that cuts both ways. I can’t get back all the years I ruined waiting.
In practice, I often find conversations with those who have detransitioned, or those who almost transitioned, but did not, supremely uncomfortable. In theory it shouldn’t matter. As I said, it is okay to transition; it is okay not to transition; it is okay to do it multiple times. But all the same, I find that those who wanted to but didn’t, or who did and moved back, are often weirdly bitter toward those of us who have.
I have some very obvious guesses as to why this happens.
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The anime character is not a real person, so they cannot be “actually trans.” No doubt the creator had something in mind, but who knows how much they understand. If they were some cis guy with a weird sense of comedy (or perhaps just a fetish), then don’t expect the character to reflect much of anything real. Who knows. Some readers might find something there the creator did not intend. Some cis folks will map their own preconceptions onto the character, with no sense of how trans people will feel. Someone who detransitioned might see their own experience reflected. Perhaps the creator had insight into that. Unless they speak up, we can’t know.
In any case, not every forum will want to host every possible variation of this conversation.
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>”This happens a lot. Thus, if you run a forum with a broad trans membership, you might want to nix that topic.”
Suppose a person angsts over what would happen if they are wrong and wants confirmation that they wouldn’t be a creepy weirdo and all alone if they discover transition is not for them?! I know several trans people like that and I think increased legitimation for detransition and talk about it could help them.
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Those considering detransition should be able to talk to someone, but that does not imply that they can talk to everyone. Furthermore, here we are talking about a (presumably) cis person bringing up detransition as media criticism. That is fine, but not every forum needs to entertain every topic. Some forums do. Some don’t. People can choose.
Furthermore, the analysis we make of detransition in an ideal world is different from in the actual world. In other words, this has a context.
I personally know two people who have recently detransitioned. In both cases, they seem genuinely gender dysphoric. (In fact, for one of them, this is their second time on this ride.) Furthermore, they both, near as I can tell, really wanted to succeed. However, in both cases life beat them down. Note that they are both 40-ish, white-working-class. One works as an auto mechanic in a rustbelt town. The other is a kind of washed up old NYC punk who floats between jobs. Neither person has much money nor strong family support.
They need to do what they need to do to make their life work. I wish them the best.
So what role does the “trans community” have here?
Well, there’s a big problem. The reality is, these people were defeated.
That sounds ugly, right? But the world is ugly. The situation is ugly. They didn’t detransition because they aren’t “really trans.” (Except of course I cannot read their minds. But still.) They are doing so cuz work and family and violence and fear and all that stuff. In other words, cuz transphobia.
The thing is, for many of us, who are still on the path, we have to harness our own energy. Just keeping our head up takes most of the focus we have. The first year of transition is really fucking rough. After that, the next four years can be fucking rough. Do you quit half way through the race?
Well yes, you do, if you need to. But those still running? What can they offer?
Seeing other people defeated is terrifying. It hurts us.
Support forums spend a lot of time helping those on the path work through the hard shit. Having someone on the forum with a message like, “I gave up. It was too hard” — well I would encourage such people to seek out another forum.
The point is, it is hard to be friends with someone when my life repudiates theirs, and their life repudiates mine.
This wouldn’t happen in queer utopia. It does happen in real life.
It’s okay to detransition. Do what you gotta do. But let me do what I gotta do.
Don’t let anyone weaponize your detransition against other trans people. Nor should you weaponize it yourself. That happens a lot. It is the reason we can’t have nice things.
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@veronica_d
I’m not sure what the difference is between “don’t let anyone weaponize you and your experience” and “don’t make us look bad by existing, and don’t hurt The Narrative by talking about your experience”, or if it even exists. Like, my existence can be very easily weaponized against trans women. I’m 6’1″, 220 lbs (I swear, I hate it, and even managed to get down to 190 once, but I just can’t restrain myself enough to keep it), have deep voice and beard shadow (I’ve tried electrolysis on my arms, which left me with scars and pigmentation, so I’m not exactly looking forward to repeating this on my face, and I’ve already done numerous laser hair removal sessions, but that wasn’t sufficient, and I don’t quite have enough money to continue), I’m doing my PhD in electrical and computer engineering, sometimes listen to Nightwish, and the main triggering point for my dysphoria was watching enough gedner-bender anime, and occasional futa or crossdressing hentai. If someone wants to make a point that trans women are crazy fat perverted programmer manchildren, who watched too much anime, I’m there for them. And I’m constantly thinking “therefore, I’m not really trans, and if I claim to be trans, I’d be making the real trans women look bad by association with me, so I must suck it up”. I don’t endorse this thought, but it’s definitely there – despite the fact that the most liberal trans communities are supportive of people like me. But they’re not quite supportive of those who detransition, and I can’t imagine how shitty they must feel when being told “shut up about your experience, we’re trying to fight transphobia here!”
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Different things are different. You’re allowed to have your experience. However, when I encounter “detransition person,” it is usually them aggressively responding to basic trans outreach with cis folks, entering a conversation with a whole routine of how transition is terrible and dangerous and so on.
But look, people are just beginning to maybe-kinda accept that trans is real and they should respect our gender, but maybe there are some skeptics on the forum and maybe some rightwing chucklefuck quoting Bailey and so on. So this is hard enough without “obsessed with their counter-narrative guy.”
It’s like, transition did not work for them. That sucks. I’m sorry. It worked for me. My gender is not made illegitimate by anyone else’s. And there is enough pearl clutching and enough parents who maybe-maybe-maybe-maybe won’t drive their kid TO FUCKING SUICIDE if they’ll just lighten up enough — but now we get TERROR STORY by some sad-broken soul bitter at me cuz I’m happy and they ain’t.
Cuz in most of these cases the dysphoria does not go away. It just gets sublimated into something rotten.
Which really sucks. But it ain’t my fault.
That is a weaponized narrative. It does not look like, “Yeah, I tried it by {for reasons} it did not work for me. But hey, it worked for these other people. So don’t rush into life altering surgeries or anything” —
— and who is encouraging anyone to “rush into” hormones? Like, fuck off with that shit. Of course no one should rush into hormones. Obviously. Duh. They’re permanent. Think carefully.
But once you make up your mind — run with shit honey. It’s bliss.
Anyway, a personal story is not the weaponized narrative. The weaponized narrative is, “It’s way too easy to transition and the doctors are pushing this on innocent kids and these people shouldn’t be trusted, like I couldn’t be trusted, and resist this. It’s bad. It hurt me. It will hurt more. veronica is lying.”
Fuck that shit forever.
(I just went through this last week on another forum, with some sadsack who tried to “transition as a kid” but then decided they’d be happier as a femme boy. So fine. But they thought that should be good enough for me. They insisted on it. They seemed preoccupied with countering every possible reason to accept trans folks. As context, the guy running the forum is this weird religious cis dude exploring ideas new ideas. He’s smart. I want him on our side. I don’t want assholes working out their bitter failure at our expense.)
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@veronica
It looks to me like you’re demanding your own experience narrative be held as unquestionably legitimate while also attempting to de-legitimate other people’s experience by labeling them “bitter failures” and making incredibly uncharitable assumptions about their motives.
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@veronica
any chance that you could post a link to that forum? I’m interested in having a look at it.
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@Lawrence — I don’t see how you could read what I wrote in good faith and conclude that.
My legitimacy of my experience is not up for debate. If you have a problem with that, you can fuck off. Seriously. I don’t get in the mud with assholes.
What I am saying is the opposite of what you are saying. The thing is, my trans advocacy has absolutely zero problem with people who detransition. If someone says, “I thought I was trans, but I had a bad experience under transition. I think it was wrong for me.” I will respond, “Yeah, that happens sometimes. Life is complicated.”
The point is, I advocate informed consent. Part of that information is, indeed, the fact that not everyone is happy after transition, and they are sometimes unhappy for different reasons. Some, a small number, but not zero, regret transition. Some change their minds.
Informed consent. You need to know this stuff.
But that is not what I am talking about here. Instead, here I am talking about aggressively anti-trans advocates who use their bad experience as a reason to advocate that no one should transition, that no one should be allowed or encouraged to transition, and that transition is fundamentally invalid. They advocate trans-hostile politics, and decry any increased understanding of trans people.
Which, fuck that shit. Fuck them. Fuck you for making excuses for them.
Yes indeed I am ascribing a motive to these people. I cannot read minds, but to me this does not seem like mysterious behavior. One asks, why are they preoccupied with this topic? These people don’t make a passing comment. They dig in their heels and confront at every turn.
Keep in mind, these are not people who talk merely about their personal experience. I have no problem with that — except on certain forums which have banned the topic, but that’s separate issue. These are people who are aggressive, making attacks.
Well, what do I know about them? They wanted to transition. They talk about dysphoria. They seem very hostile to a message of happy, successful transition. They seem likewise hostile to any politics that would encourage more happiness and easier transition.
Hmmm.
Often in life, those who have failed hate the presence of success. This is a tale as old as time. The pattern shows up across all manner of human endeavor. That said, who admits this as their motivation, instead of spinning up some rationalization?
Blah.
In any case, I see this often enough. It seems like a flavor of bitterness and bullshit.
I call it as I see it. These people are a menace. I’m sorry shit went bad for them, but it’s my fault. But still, they want to hurt me, so they are not alone in their misery.
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“my trans advocacy has absolutely zero problem with people who detransition”
If you say so. It sounded before like you thought they were bitter failures who were using a weaponized narrative of detransiition to spread transphobia.
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Saying “I don’t like people of class X who have behavior Y” is different from saying “I don’t like people of class X regardless of their behavior.”
This is one thing: “Those who detransition, and who want to talk about their own personal experience and struggle.”
This is a different thing: “Those who detransition, or those who once wanted to transition, but who do not, either of who then go on to be aggressive advocates for transphobia and trans exclusion and in general to deny the possibility and validity of transition.”
If you cannot distinguish those two things, then I cannot help you.
Try this:
“I have no problem with dogs. They’re cute.”
“I very much dislike dogs who attack random strangers.”
Can you tell those apart?
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I honestly find it hard to believe someone could be confused about what I am saying here.
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@Smoke — Sorry. These are two streams I don’t want to cross.
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@veronica
You explicitly said that “X who Y” is the typical kind of “X” that you encounter.
Furthermore, you characterize Y with a host of ill motives and base character traits, but the outward behavior of Y is “someone had a negative experience of transitioning and they are talking about it”.
I really don’t think I’m *that* confused about what attitude you are conveying towards X.
Now I don’t know the specific people you’re talking about. I don’t know their life story or what their motives are. Maybe they’re just as rotten as you say. Maybe not.
But I don’t see how you can characterize them in the incredibly uncharitable way you are doing and then say you aren’t de-legitimizing their experience.
The behavior you are objecting to is literally “talking about their experience”.
I’m not putting the legitimacy of your experience up for debate, I’m saying you’re putting the legitimacy of other people’s experience up for debate.
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Those are the typical cases I encounter. The reason for this is, I suspect, that those who detransition, and then get on with their life, don’t spend a lot of time wading into gender discussions and throwing rocks. They walk their path. I walk mine. There is no reason for me to hear much from them.
Which is not to say they shouldn’t speak up more. If they care to, that is fine. I am saying that, so far as I can tell, they largely do not.
You say this:
That is false. Your quote is nothing like what I said, and why is it in quotation marks? Those are not my literal words. They are nothing like my words. You are a liar.
Instead, in my first post I said this:
(Sorry for the typo in the original. Shit happens.)
Let me point out some key points. Note where I say, “…a personal story is not a weaponized narrative.” Which I follow by saying, “The weaponized narrative is…”
I do this to provide a contrast between what I mean to criticize and what I mean not to criticize. The “not” in the first statement is important. It indicates negation.
A personal story is not a weaponized narrative.
Let me say it again, a personal story is not a weaponized narrative.
Is that clear?
Just before this part, I give a specific example of a non-weaponized narrative:
I don’t expect everyone to have a good experience with transition, any more than I expect every person to have a good experience with long distance bicycling or graduate school. That is fine. They are allowed to talk about it. That is not my point.
I hope I’ve clarified that much.
I go on to specify what the weaponized narrative sounds like. I will repeat,
It it not “too easy” to transition. Doctors largely follow WPATH (and the modern equivalents), which do not “push” gender transition. People can be trusted to operate within a informed consent model, just as we can trust people to make other critical life decisions.
In my second post, I give another example of the sort of thing I am talking about:
I have seen this. It is toxic behavior that is quite beyond saying, “I personally had a bad experience.”
Again let me clarify. I doubt this is the “typical” case of someone who detransitions. However, it is the typical case that I encounter.
I suspect this is because those who detransition understand what happened to them, and do not wish to hinder anyone else. They know that it is already hard enough.
Should they speak up more? I dunno. That’s up to them. Do they have much to add? I dunno. I doubt it, honestly. I think most of us already know that detransition is possible, and we already know how hard things are, and we already know the kinds of risks we are taking. Not only do we know these things, but those who detransitioned know that we know, cuz they walked the same path.
In other words, if they have a good heart, they quietly watch us and say, “I hope she succeeds where I failed.”
Am I sure of this? No, I am not. But honestly, it’s the sort of thing I feel when I see someone surpass me. I’m sure I’m not the only person who feels this way.
Sounds nice, yes. And it is. However, it is not universal. There is another sort of person.
Imagine a person who stands on the side of the dance floor, afraid to step out, and wishes they could break every single dancer’s legs.
But in the case of trans folks, they sorta can. It is already so hard for us to dance. It is already so easy to hurt us.
Bitterness is a real thing. I would expect some of those who detransition to become bitter. Those who do, I would expect them to behave exactly as I see these people behave.
So let me return to my original statement that spawned this subthread:
It is okay to detransition. But do not weaponize your story against us.
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“You are a liar”
Ugh I’m done with this thread now. I’m not a liar but sometimes I do have bad judgement about what discussions to participate in. Sorry Ozy.
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Please don’t personally insult other commenters even if they’re doing something you find objectionable. I’m not going to delete the comment because there is other substantive content there, but I will delete future insulting comments in this subthread.
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If you put in quotes something I absolutely did not say, and something I have tried several times to clarify, then yeah, you’re operating in bad faith. You began this whole subthread with an unfair mischaracterization. Don’t play the victim.
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Argh this subthread was so painful to read because both of you are usually such reasonable people??
Veronica,
– people use quotation marks for purposes other than direct quotes, most relevantly for delimiting a concept or definition; it’s really uncharitable to assume the worst possible motivation?? I guess it’s possible you’ve never encountered any other uses of quotation marks, but trust me this sort of use really is a thing
– you did start this subthread with defending banning non-weaponized mentions of detransition, which can reasonably feel like a harmful attack when people have just expressed that having the option of non-stigmatized detransition would make starting transition easier. I totally agree with you that weaponized uses of this experience are not good, and I believe you when you say that you encounter this quite a lot. But given that having detransition be a non-taboo topic can be useful even for people other than detransitioners, I imagine it’s likely worth the effort to ban obnoxious uses of the topic without banning all mentions of it, and I see how making the whole topic taboo can feel like an attack on some people’s experiences.
Lawrence,
– after Veronica wrongly called you a liar she said a lot of reasonable things? She really did make a distinction between sharing one’s experience and weaponizing one’s experience? This seems obvious to me and I don’t understand how you missed it?
This is so not my business but this was just so unnecessarily painful
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I really HATE being misrepresented. I hate in particular when it takes this form: I type a long post with a subtle position on a difficult topic. Someone responds with “Oh! So what you’re saying is X.” When X is some bullshit that is nothing like what I am saying.
Look, I know communication is hard. I know I’m not the most perfect writer ever to come along. I do my best. But if we hold to the principle of charity, don’t I get to expect some myself?
The fact is, I’m not always going to be the “bigger person.” That is too much to expect from me.
In any case, so far as I’m concerned, the person who says, “Oh! So what you’re saying is X,” is the person being a jerk. This is hard enough. They’re just making it a crap stew.
If they do it three times in a row? If on the third time they are putting quotation marks around their bullshit, which are meant to represent my thoughts?
The principle of charity sailed away on their first post.
Yeah, quotes can be used different ways, but when you’ve been putting words in my mouth already? Fuck that.
How do you talk to a person who is not actually reading your words, but just kinda skimming them or something, and then rounding them off to the nearest bullshit? It’s fucking obnoxious.
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I’m not “conflict averse.” I read Ozy’s “weaponized kindness” thing. It seems sensible. But on the other hand, it strikes me as dishonest, even passive aggressive. I can play that game, but to me it feels like trolling.
Afterwards I feel icky.
I’d rather just lay it out. If I’m pissed, I say so. If I’m hurt, I say so. If I’m offended, you’ll hear about it. If I hold someone in contempt, I express contempt.
I dunno. That can get rough, but it feels honest.
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If a person on a trans support forum wants to talk about detransition, they almost always can. We talk. We support. If they want to talk about suicide, we’re usually open. Depends on the forum.
No forum can be all things. There is no singular “trans community.” There is just a bunch of little spaces each with their own structure. Those structures respond to local conditions. We’re learning as we go.
Stop trying to lay down the rules for all trans folks. We got enough shit to deal with.
If someone who detrastioned five years ago wants to talk, of course they can. Certainly if their agenda is maybe re-transitioning, or otherwise dealing with their ongoing dysphoria, then fine. However, if their agenda is to invalidate those actively working through transition, they need to go. If their agenda is to work out their internal frustration at our expense, we’re going to close ranks and show them the door.
That’s the way it is.
On a cis forum, that wants to be trans positive, it’s a third-rail of a topic. I wish it was not. But it is. Individual forums can come up with their own rules. Different moderators might have different tools. But don’t pretend you have an easy answer.
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[I gotta run to a meeting. I didn’t proofread this, even by my normal crappy standards. Be kind.]
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Yea but if trans is a choice and not an identity then you’re fighting for liberty, not social justice when you advocate for trans people.
Oh wait that actually sounds like an improvement!
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In my experience, the more “radical” social-justicey you get, the more people accept ideas like “you should just be able to have whatever relationships you want to/be whatever gender you want/be whatever weight you want/etc. regardless of whether you’re biologically forced into this role or you just want to” which it seems you might classify as libertarian ideas. Moderate social justice people focus on immutable identity & the necessity of certain reforms for some people’s well-being; this works well for impressing the urgency of certain problems on reluctant potential political converts, but it also leaves out lots of people’s experience. Then once you’ve accepted that there’s actually nothing wrong with e.g. sleeping with someone of the same gender, or transitioning, it gets easier to think “well actually why not allow it to be a choice, too?”. (That was my experience with the progression of my thoughts about homosexuality, for instance.)
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Yea, it’s very strange how profoundly different ideas get lumped in with each other under these labels.
For me it’s odd to hear positions that I’m perfectly comfortable with described as a more “radical” version of positions that make my monkey-brain scream “EVIL OUTGROUP MUST DESTROY”.
If Julie Bindel’s extreme blank-slate-ism is feminism; and typical tumbler made-this-way, identity-based social justice is feminism; and the gender-libertarianism expressed in this post is feminism, then just what the hell does “feminism” even mean?
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I’d define feminism pretty broadly as “the belief that women are inherently equal to men but disadvantaged compared to men because of sexism in our society, which means we need to change society to remove the sexism & help women advance”. The differences seem to come from differences in opinion about (a) what counts as sexism and how prevalent it is and (b) what we should change to make it better (which depends on a lot of underlying beliefs about human nature and politics and economics and stuff). Do you often encounter feminism that doesn’t fit into this?
Also out of curiosity, what kinds of “moderate” social-justicey beliefs about LGBT rights strike you as evil and terrible?
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“Also out of curiosity, what kinds of “moderate” social-justicey beliefs about LGBT rights strike you as evil and terrible”
Nothing unusual, just all the typical flamebait.
Brendan Eich, microaggressions, cultural appropriation, trigger warnings, boycotting the entire state of North Carolina, people who claim they are made “unsafe” by other people being allowed to express an opinion.
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…But it’s obvious that people can be made unsafe by someone else expressing an opinion. If someone holds the opinion that, say, it’s morally acceptable to assault Jews, the fact that they hold that opinion makes me less safe than if they didn’t, since they might decide to act on it. If they express that opinion, that could also make me (more) unsafe, either by persuading other people of it (which reduces to the previous case), or by making other holders opinion aware that their opinion is shared, and therefore making them more likely to act on it.
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@Lawrence d’Anna
Hmm, okay, most of those things aren’t necessarily “moderate” and are more about disagreements about what kinds of tactics and tradeoffs are acceptable in activism and social change.
Except I think in some cases you conflate statements of problems with proposed solutions (my understanding is it’s the latter that make you angry and scared?). Cultural appropriation, microaggressions, and feeling unsafe because of people’s opinions are all in that category. Cultural appropriation is an interpretation minefield and I have no interest in taking a position on it, but the other two… well, AJD addressed the “unsafe” part (and also while I’ve been lucky enough not to be in actual danger due to my identity at any time, I’ve definitely observed my friends who have not been so lucky feeling unsafe when they encounter certain opinions that are correlated with danger, which strikes me as a reasonable reaction), and “microaggression” is an incredibly useful concept for me to describe certain things I sometimes experience in my life, and do you actually object to me analyzing my life this way and if so why?
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“more about disagreements about what kinds of tactics and tradeoffs are acceptable”
Yes.
“proposed solutions (my understanding is it’s the latter that make you angry and scared?). ”
Yes.
For me these issues are all about liberalism and pluralism and how conflicts are expected to be resolved. In particular it is about appeals to third parties like social media, courts, employers, and school administrations to resolve conflicts.
For example AJD is correct that in some situations an opinion will make you unsafe. For instance if you are gay in Russia. But in Russia, the ability of gays to censor people for making them feel unsafe is nil. There is no point in complaining to Russian authorities about how homophobia makes you unsafe, because they want it that way. On the other hand, a student at Yale who claims to be rendered “unsafe” by opinions they deem to be homophobic is probably not unsafe at all, and are cynically adopting a victim role in order to silence someone who poses no threat to them.
In general, how much authorities and third parties will respond to defend you from people who make you feel unsafe is extremely negatively correlated with how unsafe you actually are. For humans, the ability to appeal to third parties for protection is practically the definition of safety.
If you can get someone punished for their opinions, you are safe from that person.
Sometimes it’s more complicated than that. Like in the civil rights era black activists would appeal to one third party, the feds, to protect them from another, local cops and vigilantes.
For microaggressions, the story is similar. If “microaggression” is an useful concept for you to describe certain things you experience, I guess that’s fine. If it’s a useful concept for you to use recruit third parties to punish someone, that’s when I’ve got a problem with it.
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I mean, this is the issue, right? Everything else is a distraction from what is really happening, an actual conflict, a struggle for social power.
If I say, “This thing that people do, and in fact person X has done — it’s really hurtful to me.” Well then, others might listen to me. They might take my side. Person X might find that, no matter how they argue and cajole, that they need to change their behavior or lose friends —
— cuz after all, how else does behavior change? It’s sometimes entirely voluntary. Sure. That’s the ideal. I certainly spend a fair amount of energy trying to convince people not to be shits. But often enough it involves various shifts of what is socially acceptable.
Not everyone is going to like it. But of course they are not. They are made slightly less comfortable, in a condition where they have slightly less license to behave howeverthefuck they want, feelings be damned.
Naturally there will be strong resistance to the idea of microaggressions. How do you think it’s gonna work?
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@veronica
I find the details of what third party is being recruited against what kind of offense to be incredibly important.
Appealing to your social circle not to let people microaggress you: probably fine
Appealing to a school administration: probably inapproprite, but maybe, just maybe not, depending on how subjective the microaggresion is.
Appealing to the law: Voldemort
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A big problem with knowing whether transition would improve one’s life is not being able to predict one’s reaction to HRT!
I was not prepared for how much an improvement it would be on a brain level; it felt just so very *right*. On the other hand, some people who absolutely do identify as trans have an adverse physical reaction to HRT and have to limit it. It’s a really troublesome unknown unknown.
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Yeah. :I Fortunately if you detransition early the effects of HRT are fairly minimal.
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(Made a misrake posting as a reply, cant find how to delete)
I think a large part of it is not considering cis by default people. If youre trans, you most likely feel very strongly with your gender. If you assume that cis people feel similarly strongly, its easy to see why you woyld think that if your questioning at all you must not be cis.
I think im probably cis by default, maybe transitioning would make me happier if there was no stigma, maybe not but im fairly confident that given the level of stigma, on net my life would be worse if I transitioned, s8nce I think if my life did get better, it wouldnt be THAT much better, and would be drowned out by the negatives due to stigma.
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Yes. I spent a lot longer than was useful trying to figure out whether I was ‘just’ gnc, or actually genderqueer, even though any pronouns other than he/him/his feel like nails on a blackboard. If I’d rephrased that as “Would it make my life better to switch to such pronouns” it would have been much easier.
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Gah, that was also supposed to be top level, not a reply to rash92)
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Both positions are true at the same time. The fact is, I had no real choice about feeling deep and painful gender dysphoria. It was just there, this soul crushing mess.
So yeah, insofar as that might be a useful political stance — well in my case it is totes true.
Which means, the argument that no one should transition ever, cuz genetics or god or something, once that position is shown to be dehumanizing and gross — well the burden shifts. If I can transition, why not the next person?
Transition is a process, and it turns out in practice that anyone who wants to can engage in that process — at least depending on where they live and so forth. There are practical concerns. But if you can get estrogen, you can get estrogen. You can take it. It will effect your body regardless of what people around you say.
If you are assigned male, you can just become female —
— if you want to. So do you want to? Cuz all you need are the pills and a mouth to take them.
Oh, it helps to get doctor’s notes and stuff. That makes it cheaper. Also, you’ll need that stuff for ID change and surgeries and stuff.
But all the same, it’s not that hard. You might need practical help, some money, someone to drive you, someone to coach you, if your local doctors are all gatekeepery. (Many these days are pretty easygoing on the gatekeeper stuff.) But you can do it.
Do you want to?
If so, just go do it. If you want to be a girl, you can.
Now, I’m not sure why someone would do all of that if they did not experience some kind of dysphoria, but I don’t need to know. There is nothing wrong with changing your gender. I did it. It was awesome.
Good luck.
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Transgender, Transsexual is medical terminology defining a medical condition. We, women, don’t act on peer pressure, self doubt, reading manuals, outside motives. Instead we act on what is within us. So question if our life and health aspects improves after SRS is clearly , yes it does. This is why we have years of HRT and RLE. From medical point of view, we cannot blend together children, adolescents and adults, as these have fundamentally different needs, procedures and remedies. From that perspective, above article is a mess.
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The OP seems to conflate “being trans” with transitioning. There are plenty of people who are transgender by any reasonable definition but do not transition. (Not to mention people who transition with no intention or expectation of “passing.”)
Also, the term “transgender” is pretty broad. It includes gender non-conforming, genderqueer, agender, genderfluid, even intersex and cross-dressers, etc., and such people might — or might not — have any use for transition.
I think what the OP is seeing is the minority of “orthodox transsexuals” who insist that there is One True Way to be trans and anyone who doesn’t follow the OTW is a bad trannie or Not Really Trans or whatever. I’m assuming it’s a minority because so far, in my ~2 years in trans circles, including conferences, I haven’t run into one of them yet, though I’ve talked to people who did. (Of course, if anyone tried it with me, I would just blow them off.)
One thing I notice when I see discussions of trans issues outside of trans circles is an awful lot of misinformation and people speaking/writing with utter certainty and utter ignorance (and no small amount of bad faith), and unless there’s a moderator who is willing to put the brakes on the misinformed, I usually don’t even bother to participate any more.
Folks: if you want to talk about transgender issues and not come across as an ignoramus, you need to spend quite a bit of time interacting with trans people and reading stuff _by_ trans people about trans issues and trans experiences. That’s what I had to do when I started thinking maybe I was trans, and I at least had 50+ years of my own experience of myself to help me.
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You do know Ozy is trans, right
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+1
Ozy seems to conflate “being trans” with transitioning.
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I actually suspect that the pressure to transition for GNC people can exist and may even be stronger in transphobic and sexist cultures. If someone looks like a man, and is guaranteed to get beaten up for wearing a skirt, or at least denied some professional and social opportunities, but could transition and possibly pass as a cis woman, thus gaining the opportunity to do it freely, that seems to be quite an incentive to transition. This, of course, would work only for a limited set of people, but I think might exist nonetheless.
That kinda sucks, doesn’t it? If someone feels like crap, and goes to a doctor, the doctor can make a very educated guess as to whether lithium, Prozac or Aderall could help them, but with testosterone or estrogen everyone is left to their own devices to figure out if it would help. Now, obviously everyone should have the right to take all the Aderall or estrogen is they want to, but for those whose terminal value is not doing a particular thing to their body, but to feel better, it’d be really handy to have access to tools for figuring out if it in fact could help in the long run.
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Pressure for gay and lesbian people to transition into straight binary trans people, that’s well documented in some localities (and no, not just in Iran). to go further, some people interpret cultures with gender roles (besides the female and male labels) as exerting pressure on a larger scale like you describe. http://www.dancingtoeaglespiritsociety.org/twospirit.php Here is one example showing that the alternate gender role sometimes reinforced the strictness of the other gender roles. With the flaming brush example, basket choosing individuals could not attain the role of “man”.
Of course, this is different from transness (or other alternative gender role) being depicted as the ideal. Similarly, when gay and lesbian people are encouraged to be celibate, this is different from celibacy being depicted as the ideal – most would say heterosexual coupling is depicted as the ideal.
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I think a common answer would be, “I don’t want to be forced to participate in someone else’s fetish.”
Transitioning isn’t just a private affair, it involves everyone you interact with, at least in the beginning. If the customer at your counter asks you to call them “ma’am” because it turns them on, now you’re playing a role in their fantasy you never asked for. If they’re already feeling awkward about the interaction (say, because you still have a five o’clock shadow), your intent can make the difference between feeling like they’re doing their best to accommodate someone with unusual needs and feeling like they’ve been sexually harassed.
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(Oops, “you” and “they” switched places in that last sentence.)
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What if your fetish is being given goods in exchange for money – would cashiers be justified in feeling harassed if you went to a store? Or, slightly more realistically, what if you’re lifestyle submissive, who gets off on the idea of dissolving in your Dom’s life, and only being seen as a part of His life, not your own – so you move into a very conservative area, and enjoy being called “Mrs. [husband’s full name]”? Or what if someone advocates for the right of women to appear with naked breasts in public not because they’re feminist, but because they’re exhibitionist – should we allow the feminists to go topless, but not exhibitionists? FFS, a lot of people may find hugging or kissing their SO arousing – so should we only allow public hugging for those who don’t find it arousing?
I think it’s completely counterproductive to decide whether an action is ethical or not based on whether it provides sexual gratification to someone. Action is either socially acceptable or not. I mean, heck, when we see rapists and child molesters justifying their actions by saying “but I didn’t get any pleasure from that!” we understand immediately that this is a wrong, bizarre, and kinda disgusting approach to ethics – so why would be subscribe to that?
As for not consenting to participating in other’s fetishes – that seems to remind me quite vividly of the homophobic argument that others didn’t consent to witness gays kissing and hugging, they feel gross, and it makes them immediately think of sexual – homosexual, which is disgusting for them – things; therefore, they say, everyone should pretend to be straight in public, and only do gay things in the privacy of their own closets. This argument is bullshit. For one, out society is EXTREMELY exhibitionist about traditional gender-conforming heterosexuality – http://sleepysamurai.tumblr.com/post/114237029387/if-traditional-relationships-were-treated-like – and I could totally imagine that might be quite a few people out there so queer AF that seeing expressions of heterosexuality genuinely irks them out. But if we want to be able to say that while it’s unfortunate that these people feel this way, it’s still not at all a good idea for everyone else to hide their sexuality. And most liberal people would agree that same applies to homosexual affection. Why won’t that apply to kink?
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Agreed, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I guess I haven’t expressed myself clearly.
I think it’s reasonable to expect people to be more willing to tolerate discomfort, inconvenience, etc. in order to accommodate a stranger’s medical condition than to accommodate his fetish. For example, swearing randomly is an imposition on the people around you, but they’ll politely tolerate it instead of calling you a jerk if they know you can’t help it. Likewise, depending on where you are in your transition, people may consider it an imposition to treat you as your preferred gender, and their tolerance may depend on why you’re asking them to do it.
I don’t think ethics really enters into it, unless you’re deceiving them in order to get a more tolerant response.
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Where to draw the line between “behavior that is itself inherently sexual” and “behavior that may be sexualized for some people”?
Should people be allowed to have sex in a public park? If no, where do you draw the line between that and hugging?
Should people be allowed to walk around town wearing fetish costumes? If they do it at a pride parade apparently yes, but if they do it at a playground, probably not. Where do you draw the line?
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I think whether the behavior is sexual is a red herring. What matters is what effect it has on the people who are made into unwilling participants. In a world where most people had the same reaction to witnessing a hug as they currently do to witnessing public masturbation, I’d expect public hugging to be illegal.
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But, to tie this together, if some people were prone to accidental public hugging as a result of a medical condition, or if the only way they could get relief from some symptom of their disease were to hug in public, I’d expect them to get a lot more leniency than people who did it just for fun.
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I feel as if a person has a right to wear any body they want to, whether it’s male, female, nonhuman or whatever for any reason similar to or stronger than “I kinda wanted to”. Usual caveats apply.
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This is interesting, and I want to agree, but I do have one concern.
I’ve never liked the “born this way” argument for gay rights — if it were a choice, it should still be respected (outside of extreme hypotheticals like Scott’s where being gay is so much better for everyone than being straight that if there weren’t major social pressure against it we’d go extinct). And so I’m pleased and intrigued to see a similar line of reasoning extended to being trans.
But there does seem a compelling reason to want to distinguish between people who wish to transition out of severe dysphoria and people who wish to transition out of a fetish or some other reason. As I understand it, the way our health care system works, publicly-funded insurance would cover medical treatments, but elective procedures must be paid for out of pocket. Given that we’re not post-scarcity, this seems reasonable enough, but it does raise concerns about fraud.
Then again, even if we were unable to distinguish medically justified requests from others, how prevalent are the relevant fetishes and the like anyhow? Although I’d rather my tax dollars and insurance premiums not go towards helping people fulfill a fetish, if the ratio of that to helping people with a medical need to transition is favorable enough, I’m certainly willing to accept some wastage — it’s not like my contributions are being perfectly well-spent otherwise. Similarly, I’m sure there’s stuff like this already happening in other areas, with someone with a diapers fetish faking an incontinence diagnosis or something. There also seems to be a fuzzy line between medical need and preference in certain cases.
So I’m not sure. I agree that if you want to mess around with your body for whatever reason, go ahead, but I can still see how it might be in the public interest to know what that reason is.
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I wonder if I am trans. Why ?
Mainly because in ALL my sexual fantasies I do not see my dick or my male body, I do not use a dick, I imagine that I am a woman fucked by a man that has no real face or body. I imagine that I am the woman if see in porn (I am not a porn addict and have never been) and that I FEEL what she feels.
When I see women wearing nylon on legs I am also often very disturbed. Not sexually excited but I want to be them. And as it is impossible I think about suicide because I am not like them.
I have also always felt strange when people call me “sir”. Though I do not expect them to call me “miss” first because I do nt care about what people think and second because I think I am NOT a woman.
BUT I want to have a female body with a real pussy. I do not care about social life as a woman, who could wish this in a sexist society, not even women ! So it is not a proof that I am not trans for me but that I am rational.
So if I was possible I would take a female body in my male life and be women only for sex with men and when I want to feel sexy.
I do not need to be a woman to be in the street to go somewhere, correct ?
If I could choose, I would accept the woman’s life with all the problems to have a female body.
I do not hate my male body and even less my male personality. I love myself hence I want to give me a gift : the ability to have a happy sexual life and for me it means being a sexy women with a pussy !!! By sexy I mean average female, not a man in a dress !
Am I trans ?
A shrink tells that I am not, another one tells that I am, so the first one changed his mind and now tells that may be I am.
The second one tells that I have a gender that is woman and that I just express sexual needs as a normal person with a gender that is woman.
For me sex is what rules EVERYBODIE’S life, why do you think that men marry women ? To watch tv ? No, for SEX ! Sex at home and free !
And they want sex with women because it makes them feel more man. I love sex with men because it makes me feel woman.
Will I change sex one day ? May be. May be not. But I think about it.
I think that one doesn’t chose his gender but he can choose to live with a body that doesn’t match.
If the dysphoria is low, it makes sense to stay man. If i it high then transition or changing the body more or less could be logical.
I agree : the wise main question is : “will it improves my life” ?
And that’s when we come to fetish. If it is a fetish, it will likely not improve your life as you can be a a part time woman and get rid of the drive like that.
And probably once the fetish is less strong you will drop the idea of sex change.
If it is not or not only a fetish, then sex will not be enough to feel good. Then transition could be more realistic and logic.
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You’re trans, and obviously so. You don’t have to transition. You will want to figure out how to make your life work. Good luck.
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I think there’s a really important competing access needs issue here though. Because sure, some people may feel a need for permission to consider themselves [whatever], whether that’s in relation to gender or anything else. And some people don’t feel that, but aren’t harmed by it, so whatever.
But some people, including me, have a very strong negative reaction to having people say “you are X” or “Y is what’s right for you” based on clearly inadequate evidence (e.g. “if you think you might be trans, you’re trans!”), and have an instinctive aversion to appearing to “prove them right” in our particular case.
It’s not a coincidence that the first words in the notebook I frequently carry around with me after “I think I might be trans & I’m scared of the possibility, & even more of not knowing” are “I don’t wanna prove someone’s fucking thesis.”
And, you know, I’m pretty clearly atypical in the strength with which I react against this sort of thing (although perhaps less so for rationalist-adjacent folks than the general population?). And I may be even more atypical for actually-trans folks, especially given that it’s still far from clear that I belong to that category at all. In fact, although I’ve updated my estimated probability that I’m fundamentally just a cis GNC dude with depression and a few unusual fetishes and neuroses downward from where it used to be, I’d still put it above 50%. But I hardly think I’m unique in this respect, among trans or cis people.
Of course, the post as a whole is a criticism of the “obviously, you’re trans!” narrative for other reasons (including some relating to competing access needs), and it specifically offers an alternative means of satisfying the needs of the people that that narrative helps that has a lot fewer flaws. So this isn’t meant as criticism of your post, just an addition.
Somewhat unrelatedly, I do think that simply framing things as a choice is a bit facile though. It’s better than the framing you’re suggesting that it should replace, but . . . look, when I say or write things like “I’m think I might be trans,” I clearly don’t mean “I think I may [without realizing it?] be choosing to transition.”
The way I see things perhaps runs into your objection to “trying to find a solid, objective answer to a question that’s inherently subjective.” But I think it’s useful at least conceptually:
The question is sometimes asked “If you could push a magic button and change both your biological sex and the gender everyone saw you as, would you?” While that question may be useful for some people, I think a more fundamental question, and the one that I tend to see as defining whether someone is “really” trans is “If you could push that magic button, should you, if you goal is to maximize your happiness and well-functioning/the extent to which you are eudaimon?”
And for some people, maybe those two questions boil down to the same thing. But they’re not guaranteed to. As you noted in your OP, someone can believe that transition would make them happier, but be wrong, for reasons that have nothing to do with societal mistreatment or the imperfections of current technology, and everything to do with their current sex-and-perceived-gender not being their real problem.
On a personal note, I’ve now reached the point where I feel . . . not comfortable, but at least reasonably confident in calling some of the feelings I have physical dysphoria. Social (gender) dysphoria is harder to say; certainly, I find a lot of things about our society “hard to bear” and some of those pertain to gendered bullshit and some don’t. But I don’t think that the gendered bullshit is really about being gendered male so much as it was what bullshit other people associate with that. (Certainly, I think of myself as a man.) On the physical side, at least, and I think on the social side as well (to whatever extent I have social dysphoria, if anyu), my dysphoria is as far as I can tell entirely negative. And I think, based on my experiences, fantasies, and general sense of how I relate to my body and my gender, that physical magic-button transition would just result in replacing that with a different negative physical dysphoria, and social magic-button transition would likely create negative social dysphoria that was equal to or greater than whatever social dysphoria I have now.
But I don’t know that that’s true. Maybe that’s all a bullshit rationalization generated by a fear of transition or whatever. Or maybe it’s true qualitatively, but quantitatively, I’d be better off than I am now. And maybe not.
And it seems like that’s a situation that isn’t readily addressed under a model of “transness as choice.”
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One man’s modus ponens is another man’s modus tollens. For some, they find the conclusion fits, and are happy. For some, they reject the conclusion. But, they do not reject the implicature, so must reject their thoughts of being trans. But those thoughts are true, they are real, they are there. There is pain in denying the truth.
The truth is thus, that you can think you might be trans, and yet not be trans. The implicature is wrong.
The truth is thus, identity is a cage. It traps you in your definition. To be free is to be nothing. We are only as we must.
This was their hope: to bend reality around you, to give you an identity that did not hurt. This was their mistake: to bend reality with a lie. This was their mistake: the identity hurt.
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Damn your CR
UD, wordpress!This was meant as a reply to osberend.
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“Seriously! If your quality of life is better when people call you “they”, you can just do that…if transition wouldn’t improve your life, you don’t have to… there’s no law that says that people who are really women deep down need to transition. You can just stay a dude if you want to and if you think that is best for your overall life goals.”
My quality of life is significantly improved when people call me “he” instead of “she”. Here’s a problem, though: If I don’t transition, I can’t justify asking people to call me “he”, and people won’t call me “he” when my appearance and voice send a strong signal of “female” to them. Even though I know deep down I’m a man, being called “she” every hour of every day for decades irks me to no end, and the thought of this keep happening for tens of years to come till the day of my death devastates me. Being recognized as who I am in an extremely basic level (as reflected by the pronouns people use to refer to me) is important to my happiness, and for that sole reason I need to transition.
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