Acephobia Is Real

There’s a lot to be said about how toxic online culture has gotten and that one needs to remember that there is a person on the other side of a screen who reads your words- thus we must be more responsible with what we say.

That being said, I wish all Aphobes a very go kill yourself.

I hate aphobes too but telling people to kill themselves isn’t okay. Don’t stoop to their level.

Inspired by @3nby-d3ath-d3ity (hope you don't mind) because honestly this needs to be talked about more

"LGBTQA+ is one of the most accepting communities, you're not being targeted by other queer people!!"

List of things fellow LGBTQ+/Queer people have given me shit for (up to and including threats and suicide baiting):

There's honestly probably more that I'm either forgetting or blocked out, but that's a good list to get the point across, I think. We really need to talk more about how badly some of us treat fellow community members. It only hurts hs, both individually and as a community.

The more I’m on Tumblr, the more I’m tempted to base my master’s thesis on how asexuality and aromanticism are actively harmful by pushing people into further social isolation.

If the only social interaction you get is through romance or sex, you need help. Join a club, man.

Exclusionists really out here getting mad at me for “shutting down conversation” like their “discourse” isn’t just hate speech.

Like I said in my post, English has limited letters and limited sounds. We can all share nb. If someone is using nb in the context of talking about gender? It probably won't get confused with other uses. Someone talking about race using nb? Likely to mean non black. Someone giving a lecture and uses nb? Means they want you to take notes.

I have spoken to a few black nonbinary people on this and they have said to me they don't think it is stealing in any way. And thst contact takes care of most things. It's usually white people arguing on behalf of black people about nb, when a lot of black folks have said that nb stands for a lot of things. Black Americans do not own two letters of the alphabet, any more than nonbinary people or teachers do.

Similarly, this reminds me of aspec discourse, where non autistic people argued that ace and aro people were appropriating the term aspec because apparently autistic people used that term (I'm autistic and we don't). There was a lot of aphobia behind that at the time and allistics speaking over autistics. The same way white folks have been speaking over black folks with nb.

Like other community splitting stuff, this rhetoric is intended to drive a wedge between communities. So, for the good of the people around you, stop anon.

There are a lot of shorthand ways of writing that have a very different meaning depending on context

CBT depending on context is either Cognitive Behavioural Therapy or Cock and Ball Torture

MLM can mean Men Loving Men or MultiLevel Marketing

FTM I have seen used to mean Female To Male and First Time Mum

Shorthand like this is very much dependent on context and this is why need to teach reading comprehension at school

Another good example is if I say "endo". For me, in my current community circle, endo has multiple meanings. I'm planning on seeing an endo about my testosterone prescription soon. I also am inclusive of endos in my little corner of the plural community. That's how words work. We were told to stop using aspec for that orientation because aspec means "autism spectrum", which is not true at all.

However, I only hope that OP is black when making this argument. We need to be listening to marginalized voices first and foremost! /nm

Edit: Also, nonbin is the more widely accepted shorter version of "nonbinary" if enby is not an okay term for someone.

I have literally never seen nonbin before anywhere. Your experiences are not universal.

PSA for anyone who gives half a shit about trans people: You know the posts going around about straight women fetishizing gay relationships? Half the time they’re actually talking about gay trans men. It’s a TERF talking point and it makes me sick how many trans men have been tricked into spreading propaganda against our own existence.

I will elaborate on reblogs but please, use a critical eye when engaging with posts like that. Bigots love hiding their hatred in innocuous phrases and we must be careful not to do their dirty work for them.

If you know anything about terfs and their rhetoric, you’re familar with the concept of autogynephilia. If you’re not, it’s the idea that gay trans women are actually straight men with a fetish for lesbians. It is sometimes contrasted with the homosexual transsexual, a gay man who “became trans” due to internalised homophobia or in an attempt to be more appealing to men. It doesn’t take a genius to notice that this is all transphobic as shit, and reduces the vast spectrum of trans experiences into two neat binary categories that are easily digestible to the cis.

Well, in the rare case that terfs remember the existence of trans men, they have two accompanying categories to sort us into: the self-hating lesbian and the autoandrophile, or “the fujoshi”.

Some background:The term “fujoshi” was coined in the japanese 2chan boards to mock female fans of m/m content, and was later reclaimed by them. The accompanying term “fudanshi” was created for male fans of said content. Then the term was spread to the west, and things went full circle with it being used as a pejorative once again.

If you ask a random person on tumbr to define the term, you’d probably get “straight woman who fetishizes gay men”. Which does not match the original definition. Women of any sexuality can be fujoshi, and you do not need to fetishise gay relationships to enjoy depictions of them. What it does match, however, is a terf’s definition of “autoandrophile”.

It’ a dogwhistle. Even if you’re earnestly using it to complain about harmful behavior of cis women, there’s gonna be transphobes in your reblogs who read it as condemnation of those nasty trans men.

That’s what they believe us to be. The only difference between trans gay men and the mythical straight fujoshi furiously masturbating to the existence of gay men is that we took the obsession a step further. To them, we *are* the straight perverts.

And keep that in mind when reading accounts of bad fujoshi behavior. Creating and consuming gay porn? Sounds like something a gay man might do. Calling gay ships “sinful”? Sounds like something a self-hating gay man might do. Wishing they were trans men so they could get in a gay relationship with another man? Sounds like something a gay trans man who hasn’t figured himself out yet might do. Even if it’s on accident, the way we talk about fujoshi works fantastically well to shame and condemn baby trans men.

You might want to ask: What am I supposed to do with all this? Just stop speaking up for unhealthy representations of gay men? Ignore my discomfort at being constantly portrayed as a sex object? Coddle the feelings of homophobes on the off chance that they end up being gay trans homophobes?

Well, no. Silencing ourselves for fear of what our enemies might do with our words is playing into their hands. But we do need to be aware of their rhetoric and the harm it can do. We need to be aware of who they want us to hate and why. And we need to be careful not to unwittingly lend credence to their rhetoric by repeating it. There has to be a way to talk about this stuff that won’t allow the people who want us gone to nod along in agreement.

So I wanted to put this together not because anyone needs to see all of this stuff, or read every word here, but because I think compiling these kinds of posts is useful when we’re talking about transmasc issues in the community.

There is, frankly, way too much for anyone to go through and dissect here. It’s exhausting, and it stressed me out just trying to find the posts to make this. I’m not going to go through everything here and point out why it’s all wrong. I don’t have that kind of time.

What I’m saying is that there is a problem.

Not that the problem is worse than anyone else’s, not that it’s the only problem, not that nobody else has problems on par with or even worse than this.

But there is a problem.

Transmascs are made to feel unwelcome- intentionally or not. There is dwindling space, there is less and less room for our voices. Less support for our perspectives. Less compassion for our experiences.

There is a hostility growing, an assumption that trans men are inherently violent people- are the oppressor. That we must be stopped, that we must be kept out of the community, that our oppression doesn’t matter or worse, doesn’t exist.

I lay this out for you because I want it to be clear why I and others are trying to build space for a healthier community for transmasculine folks; spaces that support and validate them, that are compassionate, trusting, and understanding (without allowing room for misogyny or transmisogyny). I want it to be very clear why I make the posts that I do, why I think it’s so important to change the broader understanding of transmasculine struggles and transphobic oppression. 

I’m exhausted after compiling this. A lot of these posts are recent; this year, or within the last few. Some of them are older. Some of them are from my own inbox, or comments off my posts- and I left many of the posts I found out, too, prioritizing the ones that make sense without the surrounding context and the ones that contain their entire message, stated, and easy to understand. These posts are from other trans men, trans women, nonbinary people- from within our own community.

I just want folks to understand that this is something that exists, that people believe, and that can and does permeate spaces in ways we might not see right away. This is important. This matters. This isn’t okay.

[ID: A compilation transphobic and trans-androphobic posts that read as follows:

1. A post titled “Notes about trans men”. It is a bulleted list that reads:

The last bullet point is highlighted in yellow.

2. A post titled “Trans men are men even when that’s not a positive statement”. The body of the post reads, “(it’s never a positive statement)”.

3. A post that reads, “Finally, a trans political situation where some trans dude’s unresolved aggressive masculinity issues can shine (bonus points to this guy’s name being Logan”

4. Post titled “PSA”. Its OP states, “Support boys. Support bi boys. Support gay boys. Support pansexual boys. Support ace boys. Support aro boys. Support trans boys. Support all boys.”

Another user (username and icon redacted) commented, “No [kissing emoji] boys don’t need support, they need to get over themselves. Support girls. Support bi girls. Support gay girls. Support bi girls. Support trans girls. Support all girls. Fuck boys. What do you need support in? Upholding the patriarchy? Lmao.”

That is not a typo. Support of pan, ace, and aro girls was removed in place of repeating “support bi girls”.

5. A non-bulleted list that reads, “Men are disgusting / This applies to cis men / this applies to trans men / both are men / both benefit from misogyny / both are disgusting.”

6. An ask that reads, “There’s a post going around about how misdirected misogyny cancels out male privilege  and I spoke against it and now a bunch of whiny trans guys are reblogging it with shitty commentary and just. oh my god. how do u deal with this. I don’t know how to tell them they have male privilege”.

7. A typed alignment chart that reads:

The post is tagged #fixed it

8. Post that reads, “If you think that cis men are scum but trans men are okay, are you saying that trans men aren’t real men? That’s pretty shitty, SJW’s.”

9. A post that reads as follows:

Masculinity is the same construct whether displayed by trans men or cis men. Masculinity is a privileged position in white supremacist capitalist heteropatriarchy. Trans men occupy that position whether they acknowledge it or not.

Common expressions of masculinity include ignoring women’s boundaries, enacting physical violence against women, and policing womanhood in other people.

Trans men asserting what they think womanhood is doesn’t fall under that “masculinity” umbrella by coincidence. To listen to their assetions as nonwomen about what womanhood is, is just as dangerous as letting cis men tell you what women are and what women are like.

Trans men deciding they belong in women’s spaces doesn’t fall under that “masculinity” umbrella either.

Trans men being masculine and hurting women is not a coincidence. It is a systematic oppressive framework.

10. A post which reads, “Trans girls: soft and to be cherished / trans boys: a grotto of discomfort”

11. Post that reads, “trans men: just as shitty as cis men but more accepted than you will ever be in women’s spaces!”

12. Post that reads “shrimp dicks and truscum please remove yourself from online and forward into the trash”. The trans-androphobic slur “shrimp dicks” is highlighted in yellow.

13. Post that reads “Valid: Women!!! Trans Women!!! Nonbinary women!!! Any other person who is not on the binary spectrum, was born as a woman, and still acknowledges that they are a woman!!! / Not Valid: Cis Men!!! Trans Men!!! (especially you) Nonbinary Men!!! Any other person not on the binary spectrum, is biologically male, and still identifies as biologically male. / Men are scum xoxo !” It is then followed by a big smiley emoticon.

14. Post that reads “(The half of the trans population that doesn’t have to worry about physical abuse is trans men, in case you were wondering, lol)”

15. A post by autobaeddelphile (baeddel is a fringe anti-trans man/transmasc term) that reads “The idea of a ‘trans community’ is hella fucking toxic in that it allows for trans men to feel entitled to resources and spaces by and for trans women”

16. Post reading, “There is no such thing as cis privilege. I do not - and should not have any reason to - treat trans men and cis men as being separate classes that oppress trans women. While cis men may be cis, everyone not classed as women benefits from patriarchy. Cis women also oppress trans women along a cis/trans axis. But let’s expand this out a little.

“What do we say when we say ‘cis privilege’? It means that we are saying that both cis women and men have privilege over trans women and men. However, this doesn’t make any sense - it’s been well documented in many discussions that trans men exercise significant privilege over cis women. A better understanding of the “transphobia” dynamic is more accurately described under a “transmisogyny” framework.”

17. Post reading “Trans men who fail to acknowledge that TWEF’s harm trans women and protect trans men are complicit in the continued oppression of trans women.”

18. A post where an OP writes, “We’re a minority who’s oppressed as fuck but because we’re men it’s OK to say you hate us all”. A response reads, ‘oppressed as fuck’ literally where, honey. Both usernames and icons have been redacted.

19. a text post that reads as follows:

Trans person: hi I’m trans

The Cis™: OMG Yaaaas Queen Slay [what appears to be a waving hand emoji]

Trans person: I’m actually a tans boy

The Cis™: I am [blushing/shocked emoji] so sorrey!! he trans boi sweet innocent flower prince [leaf emoji] uwu must protec at all cost [two sparkle emojis] u adorable pupper [either a fox emoji or a dog] here is a flower crown ur so smol!!! [sun emoji] u can do no harm [sunflower emoji] I love u sweet precious babby [swirling star emoji]

Trans person: what…the fuck

A redacted user replies “Trans men really out here thinking they’re oppressed because cis people find them non-threatening.”

As a PSA for people unfamiliar, the spelling B-O-I was originally intended to be an inclusive term for male-aligned/masc-aligned trans people who liked the term. It is mostly used now to denote a non-man/to “softly” misgender trans men as men-lite.

20. Post reading, “There is no specific struggle of a trans man. If you think there is, typically a trans woman has faced it, and much worse at that, so really only transmisogyny is a thing, since they DO have issues we will never face.”

21. Post reading “Trans men were socialized as men, and as such they benefit from misogyny rather than suffer from it. Men are not oppressed by misogyny. Women are.”

End ID.]

I’m sorry, but I can’t transcribe any more of the images. I tried. Hell, I’ve tried for months, actually. I’ve been working on this post for months on and off, trying to image describe everything, cleaning up the grammar, adding notes for clarity. Fuck, I even managed to finish it up this afternoon. And then the page reloaded. I hadn’t saved. I lost approximately 13 post descriptions.

I can’t physically finish this description. The contents of this compilation, as I’m sure is prominent in the amount that I did manage to describe, is filled with violence, vitriol, misgendering, belittling, erasing of oppression, speaking over, infantilizing, villianizing, mockery, and general hatred. Every time I pick up this post to work on the descriptions, it triggers my anxiety and depression so aggressively that, often times, I dissociate after. I’m sorry. I can’t finish them. If anyone wants to finish what I’ve started, I finished the first three slides. 

I’m sure it doesn’t need pointing out how much gender essentialism is present in these posts. The lack of intersectional politics. If we keep going on like this, talking about each other like this, pushing each other out of our spaces and cannibalizing our communities and tearing each other to shreds, there will only be pieces left for transphobes to easily sweep up and throw out like so much trash.

It is in all of our best interests to listen to each other with sympathy, boost each other’s voices, and uplift each other where we can. We are stronger united.

finishing off this image description. sigh, here we go.

[ID: Compilation of transphobic and transandrophobic posts continues.

22. Post entitled “We need to take back the trans community from trans men”. It reads:

Trans men don’t belong in our safe spaces. I don’t want men in spaces which were created for trans women. It’s not safe.

Trans men haven’t done anything for trans rights, trans women have been at the forefront of trans and queer right movements throughout history, while trans men have done nothing for us.

Trans men almost always pass and don’t need a safe space. They’re men. Men [clap emoji] do [clap emoji] not [clap emoji] need [clap emoji] safe [clap emoji] spaces [clap emoji]

Trans women shouldn’t need to make room for men. End of discussion.

23. Post that reads as follows:

Trans men are men. Which is why they don’t have a space in feminism, unless they are uplifting the voices of women.

Stop bringing up trans men, when you should be acknowledging trans women and our issues.

What do trans men have to deal with? Not transmisogyny, not gay bashing. They’ve got their easy to purchase binders and packers (because of course, they can’t feel like a man without a penis. Of course they want to define manhood with a cock.)

Trans women need your help, we’re the ones dying. We’re the ones facing actual oppression.

24. Post which reads as follows:

The combination of trans men’s male positioning in society, combined with the widespread lie that they understand women, leads to a unique and sinister type of misogyny.

Trans men, as men, are taken more seriously than women. When they purport to be experts on women’s lives, they will often be listened to even more than cis women are. This position of their objectivity occurs regardless of whether they explicitly claim it or not. That is to say, trans men are respected and listened to about women’s experience more than women are, even when they parrot feminist theory about “listening to women.”

25: A post where OP writes “When trans dudes lament that they don’t appear trans enough, a part of me understands - I, too, sometimes wish people didn’t read me as a faggy cis dude. The other part is screaming: dude shut up, you have no fucking idea.”

A reply (possibly by the OP themself, but uncertain as both names are blacked out) reads “I kind of wish other trans men would like…. not talk about their “issues” to literally everyone because 1. people don’t want to hear it, for good reason, and 2. they’re not issues.“

[i can reclaim the f slur so did type it out in the first response]

26. A post in which OP asks, “Actual question, do trans men have to deal with anti-trans cis gay men in the same manner that trans women have to deal with transphobic radfem lesbians and TERF lesbians?” A replier, whose name is blacked out, says “Trans men don’t have to deal with shit, lol.”

27. Post entitled “Trans men are disgusting”. It reads as follows:

They’re literally all just out there performing masculinity. You all can claim that you are “taking back masculinity” and “reshaping” it to a “positive”. But you can’t do that. Only women can take back masculinity.

Only women have been hurt by masculinity enough to reshape. Only women can truly understand the harm that masculinity causes.

There can never be a “positive masculinity” that is performed by a man. All male masculinity is toxic.

28. Post which reads as follows:

Trans women’s stated reasons for going into porn: “so I can eat food and sleep in a bed”

Trans men’s stated reasons for going into porn: “I think it’s hot lol”

29. Post which reads “go figure that trans men would feel “safer” at a women’s college, any man would feel safe in a space where he has violent coercive power over every single person there”

30. An anonymous Tumblr ask, dated September 9th 2020, 12:56.59pm. It reads “when you say trans men don’t oppress cis women, do you mean cishet women? or do you mean trans men don’t inherently oppress cis women? because trans men can certainly oppress cis bi women and cis lesbians”

31. Post in which OP (whose name is blacked out) says “mainstream trans discourse is pretty centred around telling trans women we’re men.” They appear to reply to themself (name is again blacked out), saying “like, all this “sex and gender are two different things”, “gender is an infinite cornucopia of aesthetics”, “self identified woman”, “some men have vaginas” crap is entirely about excluding trans women and putting us in harm’s way, to be murdered or w/ever for the sake of trans men’s attempts to gain access to womens spaces”

32. A reblog in which the poster’s name is blacked out. It reads as follows:

a sampling of the trans men i have met IN PERSON: kail, aiden, aiden, jaden, caiden, skyler, lance, duncan, elliot, ren, rhee, kai, kye, em, elijah, clyde, clove, aleksandr, sebastian

there is nothing immoral about having an uncommon name, but the trans male drive for hyperindividuality seems to reveal a deeper truth of y'all’s lives - that, especially in “queer” and “feminist” spaces, you often have a vested interest in sticking out (something that is not generally advisable or accessible for trans womyn).

that really undermines the concept of a universally experienced “”“transphobia”“"doesn’t it? it’s almost like we don’t have anything meaningful in common, isn’t it?

33. A post in which OP, whose name is blacked out, reads as follows:

“Hwuhhh bwuhhh Tumblr is so mean to the poor trans menz”

It’s probably because we’re collectively sick of ur shit tbh

A replier, whose name is also blacked out, says:

“nobody respects us” buddy you never earned that respect in the first place

34. Post which reads as follows:

blow-back transmisogyny, or, why cafab trans people don’t suffer “transphobia” because transphobia doesn’t exist.

this post is for trans women and camab trans people only

transphobia is only properly understood, if it is a ‘thing’ at all, as spillover damage from cultural transmisogyny and misogyny.

this isn’t even really a idea we aren’t already used to: most people (myself included) don’t deny that patriarchy has negative consequences for some men. it imposes structure and forces it violently on men - but at the same time it gives them a great deal more freedom, and power. but those consequences don’t equate to oppression in-and-of-themselves without any further patriarchal influence on them.

there isn’t really a specific term for that (as far as i am aware). it’s a consequence, a reaction, a repercussion, a by-product. we don’t call it manphobia, and “misandry” is a shibboleth for a ridiculous impossibility believed in by only the most self-obsessed.

and so most of the structural barriers that exist for trans men (medical gatekeeping, state refusal to acknowledge gender, denial of other social services like housing or employment protections) were specifically designed with the thought of barring trans women from accessing them. the fact that they also negatively impact men is by definition an unintended consequence or in some cases an ancillary benefit.

35. Post which reads “little known fun fact trans men have the smallest, most irrelevant, tiniest (almost no) place in the lgbt community”

36. A post titled “THE ISSUES OF TRANSMEN”. It is a bulleted list which reads:

End ID.]

grammar/spelling mistakes in original post screenshots have been corrected for greater clarity.

I need to get some things off my chest before I am officially on hiatus because I saw some shit

1. Calling nonbinary people cis is erasing our identities as trans people and nonbinary people. I am sick of cisgender people making it sound like nonbinary people aren't trans enough to be in the trans community, yes our experiences can be different but that's because being trans is a very diverse experience. We are nonbinary. Full stop.

2. Calling bi/pan/poly/omni people "straight-ish" or "hetero-passing" or "half straight half gay" is extremely insulting and is erasing our identities as multisexual people. It is not a privilege for our identities to be erased.

3. Policing the words people use to define their identities is bullshit. Let people be transmasc lesbians. Let people be aromantic. Let people be genderfae. Let people be polysexual. Stop telling people they're not allowed to be in our community just because their label might be "strange" to you. Newsflash, we're all fucking strange get used to it.

Alright, goodbye until I feel like I can handle tumblr discourse again.