"making jokes about someone being trans but not knowing it yet can be kinda invalidating and sometimes traumatic"
Sure, but it also isn't for a lot of people. And, a lot of people I talk to say egg jokes helped them realize who they were. Though I do think part of this resistance to an egg joke is actually internalized transphobia at points (the idea of being compared to trans people is being treated as degrading in a lot of these people's arguments) the truth of the matter is different people need and want different things. Me making eggs jokes with my friends is not your friend group.
This is why the recurring complaint of our side is it's never egg jokes can make people uncomfortable, 'make sure your friends are cool with them before just doing them,' it's always complaining about trans women forcing cis men to be women or trans women being "transvestigators" or "similar to Christian missionaries." People who are uncomfortable with egg jokes are always projecting their discomfort onto other people, other friend groups, and portray harmless fun between friends as something abusive.
this is a projection. the egg jokes people are talking about happen among friends and stuff, but this person is doing a whole "never make egg jokes because people did it about me and made me feel bad" (oh whoa is you, people thought you might be transgender, how disgusting to be a tranny). The majority of egg jokes are not about random ass people, it's within friend groups. And, if you don't like your friends saying them, tell them to stop. If they don't? Then stop being their friends. Also from that post
The underwater filter butchered that. I know you can't read it but I wanted to post it cuz fucking look at that. What the hell. Anyways,
This opposition to egg joke people always talk about strangers. As if we're walking up to random people on the street and making egg jokes about them. It's mostly contained to friend groups. This is just an inaccurate portrayal of what's actually being discussed, and I'm sure the op will be like "I'm talking about my experience!" but OP openly admitted that this rant was relevant to a random blogger complaining about an egg tweet a woman made about her own friend group that neither this OP or that blogger are part of. They are actually dictating how strangers are allowed to act and identify with this, not the egg jokesters.
Yeah, once and a while you get shit like "Aaron Bushnell seems transfem" which was a completely innocuous convo that no one would have seen if well known transmisogynists who accuse random trans women of pedophilia like three times a year hadn't found the post. It was a trans woman seeing herself in someone important in history, and even if someone said something inappropriate, the backlash was undeserved. Yall say embarrassing shit all the time and no one's running you off the web site for it.
I'm sorry this person and others seem to have a bad time with egg jokes (though most of the time, what they describe isn't egg jokes but that's a whole other thing), but their few experiences can not be used to determine a blanket response to something so many people actually do enjoy and find useful. I'm especially not gonna take a cis person's opinions on egg jokes seriously (since so many have seemed to gotten involved and think their opinion on this matters).
"are people actually saying you should never tell someone that they might be trans?"
Yes! That's like, the entire underlying premise of this! Like, 100% this is the backbone of every anti-egg joke argument. That's the entire concept of "egg prime directive." And, it's overwhelmingly weaponized against trying to help transfems realize themselves sooner than they would. From the aforementioned Bushnell drama, to the polls where a shit ton of transmascs voted it was ok to tell an eggy friend they might be a trans man but NOT ok to tell an eggy friend they might be a trans woman, to the newest drama where chongoblog whined about a random trans woman on twitter making egg jokes about her friend (which it was later revealed chongoblog misrepresented the tweet), the anti egg joke committee / "You can't tell anyone they're trans!!!" crew are always wielding this ideology against transfems / trans women but practically never against transmascs.
This is why it's constantly said that these posts and arguments are transmisogynistic in nature. "I'm a trans woman and I say eggs jokes are bad, so it can't be transmisogynistic you're just using that as a shield!" That's great but 1) maybe read between the lines, or read the criticisms you're clearly ignoring and maybe you'll see these people don't respect you 2) the whole "using transmisogyny as a shield" is like, classic transmisogyny at this point. We've been hearing that from anti-feminists, cryptoterfs, and trans woman hating google doc writers for a few years now and 3) you being complicit doesn't mean we gotta care about what you say.
"it just feels like people are willfully misunderstanding eachother and its making my brain hurt"
Oh, I'm sure this is absolutely the case. The problem is a bunch of transphobes are really who spurred a lot of this drama up earlier this year and instead of people thinking "oh these people have bad intentions I shouldn't boost this" they instead were like "Yeah! I don't like egg jokes!" and now we have to deal with trans women making egg jokes (normal, harmless, pro-trans and literally want to help trans people) being compared to transvestigators (a literal anti-trans hate group thing). The issue is people aren't treating us as people, and thus it gets returned in kind.
What's the answer to this? Mutual understanding that "some people need to be told they're trans," "some people don't respond well to being told who they are," "egg jokes can help people and be a fun joke for friends," and "some people are uncomfortable with egg jokes" can all coexist. But, honestly, I don't think we'll ever get there.
