#body hair isn't inherently masculine or feminine
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#bodies aren't inherently masculine or feminine#body hair isn't inherently masculine or feminine#lgbtqtext#lgbtq text#animated text#word art#white#purple#green#body positivity#fem#femme#feminine#femininity#masc#masculine#masculinity#body hair#transmasc#transmasculine#transmasculinity#transfem#transfeminine#transfemininity#lgbtq#lgbtq+#lgbtq pride#lgbtq positivity#lgbtqia#lgbtqia+
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Anyone who thinks that men (cis or trans) are "transmysogyny exempt" has clearly never existed in public as a bearded man with long hair.
Like 98% of people accurately read me as metalhead or reasonably read me as a hippie, but the remaining two percent decide that a masculine face plus long hair means I'm actually a trans woman, and either harass me or celebrate their assumption according to their personal standards. I'm a trans man, but that doesn't matter at all to someone who has decided that long hair is inherently feminine and that only trans women have long hair and an otherwise masculine appearance.
Having AFAB junk in my pants where no one will ever see it means nothing. I am subject to transmisogyny whenever some dingbat randomly decides that how I look fits their fantasy about what a trans woman looks like.
It's even worse for men who actually are feminine in their fashion sense or body language. No one on this entire planet is entirely safe from transmisogyny, as long as one person exists who doesn't like trans women and has their own personal metric for who is and isn't trans enough and womanly enough for them to hate.
This is fucking true and you should say it. Love you, nonny. <3
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I have a complex conversational relationship with my reaction to the way women look in media. As with most human attitudes, it's this mix of what I consider justifiable issues driven by societally narrow ways of depicting women, mixed in with reactionary knee jerk flinch-reactions that I have to seeing character designs that I percieve as 'forcing me to be feminine'. This last isn't at all rational, female characters that are masculine in some respects but feminine in others are not inherently against female masculinity. Someone drawing a character I percieve as a butch lesbian as thinner, daintier, softer and shier than I think of them is not an inherrently bad thing on it's own. But it feels horrible, it triggers a lot of anger and defensive contempt in me that the artist would not deserve directed their way. Most particularly because my perceptions of masculinity cannot always be trusted, smaller facial features are not necessarily feminine, my love of big, square and bold face shapes could draw me into racial stereotypes etc
AND YET... it is still definitely a not-insignificant trend for big and unfeminine female characters to be made smaller and more 'conventionally feminine' by fanartists, interpreters and subsequent media. It is also a trend for masculine-like women in franchises to be 'feminised' using some character trait. Cassandra and Aveline from Dragon Age come immediately to mind, being both the only women in all the games I can think of who could be called masculine, whilst also made straight and painted with this strange romantic naivete, coming off more as 'they failed at femininity' rather than their masculinity being a part of their identity that they express by choice. Honest to god it makes those games so hard to enjoy, media in general! Cus it is also true that, whilst there is nothing wrong with 'badass woman who has short hair and has some muscle definition but still wears makeup and has a boyfriend', it is still the only portrayal of female masculinity any media seems willing to explore these days. Which in turn makes it feel like the only expression of masculinity I am allowed, and that creates this sensation of caging that makes me want to lash out.
It's gotten to the point where I have an instinctual desire to ignore characters that are 'normal bodied' and 'normal gendered' if that makes sense. Not in the way that there is a normal body or gender, but in the way that, in the cultures I am exposed too, there is a very specific body shape and gender expression that is considered the 'strict norm' for women and everytime I see it it leaves me feeling hollow and resentful. And this gender isn't actually even really 'feminine' per se, female characters that are 'too feminine' are roundly hated too, there's like a null gender that female characters have to express in order to be tolerated by the stereotyped 'male viewer'. But this reaction of mine is still made up of both real issues and unjustified flinch reactions and it's hard to parse them in any way other than recognising what's happening and dealing with it internally or with friends who understand.
Like a lot of reactions that have origins in living in a society that is hostile to me, but is being in the moment triggered by just encountering something banal; 'this female character makes me angry just for existing' has gotta remain an inside thought.
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ways of describing your gender that might come from painful dysphoria but are also very sexist/misogynistic (and often cissexist) and worth actively confronting in yourself, since you might very well be reinforcing gender roles in yourself and others:
joking is 100% fine obviously, but sooo many of these i've seen completely unironically within the lgbtq community (terfs dni)
#1 - i'm not a woman or i don't feel like a woman because... i'm too masculine, hairy, loud, snarky, confident, wish i was tall and buff, want to be the one in charge, don't care if i'm pretty, do unwomanly things, don't like fashion, don't like makeup, don't know how to do small talk, don't understand social cues, enjoy stereotypically masculine interests, like to be the one penetrating during sex, like being rough during sex, like dominating, like being tough, all things that obviously contradict womanhood
#2 - i'm not a man or i don't feel like a man because... i'm too feminine, don't like body hair, have a more feminine or high pitched voice, talk or dress in a stereotypically girly way, enjoy dresses and skirts and dolls and makeup, enjoy stereotypically feminine interests, like being the submissive one and being penetrated (which i see as a "womanly thing" especially if it's in a rough way), like being polite and docile and dainty or being promiscuous and wearing revealing outfits, or even being a sex worker, all things that are girl things to me and make me feel like a woman and aren't something a real man would ever be
#3 - OBVIOUSLY i'm not a man/woman... look how androgynous i look!!! how did that cis person even think i was cis lmao???? i'm too gender nonconforming to actually be a cis man/woman, obviously even i will assume a gender conforming person is cis but a VISIBLY ANDROGYNOUS person like ME??? extra hilarious!!!! (there isn't a specific "trans look" bc trans/nonbinary can look like anything and gnc people exist so this is sexist and transphobic af)
#4 - [anything that implies that being trans/nonbinary is a political statement for the person or a choice to say fuck you to cissexist heteropatriarchal society instead of a very personal identity like being gay or bisexual, it's just a political subculture]
#5 - i'm gay/bi/etc and i believe that my lgbtq identity inherently contradicts me being a cis man/woman
fyi, #5 is said not in the respectful way someone will describe their own personal identity, but rather trying to literally state that being gay/bi/etc inherently means not feeling like a man/woman despite MANY lgbtq men & women being totally connected to their binary gender, feeling a special connection to it through their gayness. this includes binary trans people who have a very unique connection to manhood or womanhood. it's not cool to label gayness or transness as inherently nonbinary. radical sure, but binary lgbtq people have fought FOREVER to be seen as no less of a man/woman than anyone cishet, an obviously homophobic af belief that is pushed by bigots everywhere, to the point where some countries have transition legalized but not homosexuality bc they think that being gay makes you not a real man/woman, so you might as well become a "normal" straight person by transitioning. this shit should be called tf out
#6 - i don't agree with misogyny and i want to distance myself from it politically despite being 100% comfortable with being male and living as male and not having any social or physical dysphoria, or even euphoria, so i use the term nonbinary to show support to women. this is a take i've actually seen passed around lmao, both from transmasc and transfem people
#7 - i just want to make cishet people uncomfortable. it's funny as a joke obviously, i've said i'm gay to make men mad wayyy too many times i get it. but some people when prompted will deadass say that's their only reason to identify as nonbinary. and ngl that sounds like treating transness as a political accessory instead of just a personal identity. which means they think being trans is a choice, like political lesbianism back in the day
there's so many hilarious jokes to make about gender that i love seeing around. so many fun ways to describe gender identity. but let's not feed cishet people's sexism and reinforce the bullshit we've learned growing up, excusing it by giving it a fresh rainbow coat of paint. the last thing the community needs is tighter gender roles. we need to EXPAND not only what it means to be nonbinary, but ALSO what it means to be a binary man or woman!!! it's okay if some of these were signs for you, but the way you speak about it matters
#lou text#nonbinary#trans#transmasc#transfem#genderqueer#lesbian#bisexual#lgbtq#lgbtq thoughts#ok to rb#idk just late night rambles
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the problem with tma (transmisogyny affected) and tme (transmisogyny exempt) as labels is that the function they fill isn't to describe an Experience (that's what the term transmisogyny is meant to do), it's to Assign experience based on labels.
it is Assumed that that anyone who experiences transmisogyny (either At All or as the result of an identity/label) Must Be amab and Must Be transitioning into feminity in some way.
there's some nuance to that on an individual level, some people who push the tma/tme label may agree that gnc cis women are also at times affected by transmisogyny for instance. but when someone asks a nonbinary person if they are tma or tme they are asking if that nonbinary person was born with a penis or not. they're putting it in polite terms, but that is the implication.
the point of tma vs tme is Not "do you have personal experience with transmisogyny," which is a valid question when having discussions About transmisogyny. the Point of tma vs tme is "you Cannot have experiences with transmisogyny unless you were born in this particular way with these particular labels." it is Gatekeeping an experience and asking other people out themselves as being gatekept from.
and that's a Problem. both in terms of it affirming this binary, And because it is simply wrong.
it's a problem of seeming common sense, what feels the most naturally intuitive, Not being true. something that tends to be at the heart of a Lot of discourse within the queer community.
it is Not controversial to say that trans women and trans feminine people are, statistically, the group most likely to experience transmisogyny. it's right there in the name, it's a term that was coined to describe the experiences of the intersection of transphobia and misogyny that is pointed at trans women. nobody is arguing against that.
but the leap to "this was coined For trans women so it is Only experienced By trans women" just is not true.
a cis intersex woman is assigned female at birth but has traits that are outwardly read as masculine.
an intersex man is assigned male at birth but has a micropenis or secondary sex characteristics that are read as feminine (breasts, a lack of body hair, etc).
an intersex man is assigned female at birth and experiences both.
an intersex person is nonbinary, born with characteristics that people considered "wrong" and treated as such, and rejects the binary altogether.
an intersex person, regardless of gender or sex or label, embraces being openly gnc.
a gnc person who, whether they identify as cis or not, Does Not consider themselves trans. who intentionally presents outside of the conventions of their gender. who bind or wear breast forms, who practice presenting their voice as higher or lower, who wear make up and fake beards, who wear shape ware to make themselves curvier, flatter. who takes estrogen or testosterone or get bottom or top surgery. who Visibly Presents as someone who blends the masculine with the feminine.
nonbinary people not being beholden to the physical binary. who pick and choose how they want to present, both through presentation And transition. who mix and match based not on the binary but on what they Want. a nonbinary person with a beard and a vagina is not inherently afab, a nonbinary person with a dick and breasts is not inherently amab.
a trans masculine person or a trans man, in turn, is neither inherently immune to presenting femininely Or inherently afab.
an intersex person can be assigned male at birth and transition masculinely.
a multigender person or a genderfluid person can be Both a trans man And a trans woman (or nonbinary, or agender, or-).
an afab person who is a trans man can Also be gnc. can be a person with a deep voice and beard in a dress. can have a penis and breasts. can mix and match any sort of presentation.
a trans man can simply be in the process of transitioning or not be able To transition and be perceived as a masculine person with traits "too" feminine or a feminine person with traits "too" masculine.
how someone is treated is, ultimately, not about the labels that they have but how they are Perceived. labels do obviously influence perception, but they are Not the only factor In perception.
whether or not a person experiences transmisogyny is due to how the people around them perceive them and what that perception inspires that person to do.
the problem with creating a term to limit which labels can experience something is that experience does not care about labels, experiences just happen to you.
and none of this is to say that transmisogyny Isn't a tool created by and for trans women. But it Is to say that it's important to recognize when experiences across many different identities are tied to the same root cause.
all of these groups (and most likely many more that I haven't mentioned), Can experience transmisogyny because they Can be interpreted as trans women or as close enough To trans women to experience oppression or harassment for it.
but what these groups all have in common (what All groups have in common), is Gender Essentialism. that there are two sexes (or two genders), and that there are Inherently traits associated with those categories that cannot be changed.
and the Thing Is. it's not Better when it's trans inclusive. when it states people with this gender or with these traits Must have these experiences, Must be fundamentally different from people with That gender with Those traits.
it is not a Bad Thing to share. people who are different from you will share traits and experiences and this Does Not either take your experiences away or erase the fact that you two are different. trans men experiencing misogyny does not mean that trans women do not. nonbinary people experiencing misogyny is not inherently tied to their sex.
It's All Soup. people have experiences because they do and while we can make general observations about what we see we Cannot make them into hard lines without crushing people in the process.
I want to go on testosterone, I want to have a deep voice and facial hair. I want to have boobies, I want to wear dresses, I want to be Cute.
right now I am pre testerone. I shave my head bald regularly and my chest is small enough that it is often not visible through my clothes. I have a high pitched voice and no facial hair and I wear dad shorts that square my hips and button up shirts.
am I transmisogyny exempt? do people who are interpreted as butch women experience transmisogyny at times? do people who are interpreted as men in women's clothing experience transmisogyny at times? do people who mix traits that are considered masculine with those considered feminine experience transmisogyny at times?
if a gnc trans woman spoke about experiences she's had where she was interpreted as a trans man or as a cis gay man I would not reject those experiences because they aren't the "right" ones. what we have in common does not invalidate our existence as ourselves. our experiences, the ways that other people treat us, do not invalidate our existence as ourselves.
the ways that other people interpret, that other people treat us, do not define our labels our labels do not define those things in turn.
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"a woman simply having short hair & wearing comfy clothing and not wearing makeup nor removing her body hair etc are deemed masculine."
i'm from kenya lol and most women don't do any of this. plenty of women also shave their heads and we aren't considered masculine for it. i have never seen any of my aunties shave their legs nor have i ever shaved mine. these things aren't universal. just admit that masculinity isn't as natural as you want it to be. women existing in their natural state isn't inherently masculine, yes some people in the west may consider it masculine, but you radfems also call it masculine or gnc. when it's not. you guys just fetishize masculinity and think it should be the ideal for women.
lol u know very well that women from most parts of africa tend to barely have leg hair to begin with and u specified shaving legs for a reason bc i guess u were assuming i have no proximity to east africa or sth. be honest. how about other body parts? is it acceptable for women to have armpit hair? u know the reality and ur being misleading on purpose. women also don’t tend to remove leg hair in east asia & a big reason for that is bc the leg hair is hardly present to begin with. u know very well that despite that, women with lesser body hair are expected to perform femininity in other ways.
“women existing in their natural state isn’t masculine” yeah that’s what feminists are also arguing. but it is deemed masculine generally. the entire point is that there is nothing wrong with women existing in their natural states and that women should not be punished for it.
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Hi! I just wanted to say I'm really appreciative of you posting. I've loved lolita fashion for years, and I've started actually buying pieces recently, but I'm frankly intimidated to wear them outside. I'm a big guy with facial hair and I really don't fit the dainty ideal, but I love the frills regardless. How do you work up the courage to go out in a dress with facial hair? Do you have any tips for masculine presenting people who want to safely and confidently wear lolita outside and find community?
Hi! Thank you for reaching out and glad to hear that you're taking the first steps into wearing lolita fashion. As a guy/person with facial hair I understand the complicated feelings that can come along with wearing a more feminine fashion while having body hair.
The biggest tips I would have would be doing what makes you feel the most confident and comfortable, especially in the beginning as youre gaining footing into the style. Over time the more you wear/do something, the more your comfort and confidence grows as well as your knowledge in that area, and you may feel more comfortable in messing around with things like presentation as time goes on.
For some people that's shaving in the beginning and then working their way up to keeping their facial or body hair, for other people that's wearing a fashion mask.
Recognizing that facial/body hair is genetic and not tied to sex/gender also helps a lot! I come from a family of fairly hairy people, we naturally have dark hair so it was not unusual for me growing up to see the women in my life with body hair at one point or another (and unfortunately all the wild hair removal products of the 90s-00s - some scents still trigger my fight or flight response lol).
I think this is also why from my perspective, body hair is not inherently masculine or feminine, just like someone's height or hair color it is an attribute of someone but not defining.
Here are the things I do personally:
face/fashion masks in public always help. Especially if I need to use a restroom for whatever reason, or if im unfamiliar with how these areas interact with gender non conforming people. On that note general safety applies. Be mindful of using alleyways or small offbeat street paths. If I'm going somewhere new and I don't know how the area treats visibly gender non comforming people I tend to be more cautious. Picking a less busy time of day can also be beneficial, my first time wearing lolita fashion in public I went to a cafe at around 6-7 am on a weekend so I came across relatively few people. I also had my partner with me as a support person, which I highly recommend if possible.
Keeping things well groomed. I love my mustache, so for this I tend to trim any flyaways, any pieces that would normally hang over my lip or on the sides that would go below the top lip I trim. In terms of beards the same applies, trimming things to be more uniform or tight fits more with my personal aesthetics, removing any stray/random hairs will do a lot to make a coord feel more polished.
safety in numbers. If I'm going out in lolita especially in the beginning I would have my partner go out with me, or meet up with others in my community, which ties into your last question.
When it comes to community this one can be more tricky and it really is a gamble. I'm really lucky, the communities I'm a part of have people in them that identify and present in a variety of ways, so I feel safe and comfortable around them. Having gnc people there also does a lot to make others feel more comfortable, some people will define femininity very strictly to the point where it can suffocate others, by having others nearby messing with these boundaries it can allow those to experiment with less fear, it also wards off anyone that isn't accepting that people will naturally look and wear the fashion differently.
I'll say when entering a community, it is always helpful to have an open mind and be open to conversation even if it's awkward. General conversation skills help- asking questions, listening with genuine curiousity/interest to get to know those in your community does a lot to build safety and trust on all sides.
The nice thing about lolita fashion is it has a history that we can look back on - men have always been a part of the fashion, going through old archives and looking through GLBs, it's not uncommon to find people who identify/identified as men or were more ambiguous in identity. Pretending otherwise is just factually incorrect, and watching old footage of meets especially older Lovely Lor videos where she interacts with and showcases members in her old California community we can see lolita fashion enthusiasts across various identities and expressions.
TLDR; take comfort in knowing that regardless of gender identity, there are people who will share similar attributes and characteristics like size or body hair and that doesn't make them (or you!) any less welcome! Having someone to go out with or going to less traveled areas in the beginning can help grow confidence, and as far as communities go just do your best, sometimes we get lucky with our local communities and other times we have to seek people out whether it's using online forums or discord
I hope this was able to help with any questions or worries you may have had, let me know if something is unclear!
#i hope this helps! i tried to be really thoughtful in my response so hopefully my thoughts come through clearly#also thank you for asking/reading!#egl community#lolita community#egl comm#fallen petals#lolita fashion#egl#asks
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Would we classify jacked long haired barbarian warrior as butch? That's the look Rachel has going on post time skip after all.
ok see you're not understanding how the underlying social structures behind how gender non-conformity work. the assumptions inherent to this question suck! not intentionally, but they do suck!
there's a societal ideal of femininity that all women are expected to strive to meet, and failure to strive for it is punished. gender non-conformity isn't an on-off switch, it's a sliding measure of how far someone is deviating from that norm. "gender non-conforming" isn't any one specific set of traits, it's shorthand for saying that someone deviates far enough from that norm to receive notable social punishment for it. there are people out there who would consider their daughters wearing pants from the women's section to church to be 'boyish' and discourage it--this does not mean that said daughters are butch. butch is intentional. incidentally having some traits stereotypically deemed "masculine" is not butch. butch women are intentionally masculine, intentionally deviating from gender norms as an expression of their gender and/or sexual identity. butch does not just mean "couldn't pass as a CW actress."
your question reveals where your own standards for what you consider notably deviating from the norms to be--or rather, what you consider those norms themselves to be. like, okay, ARE we classifying "muscular" as butch? are we deciding that a particular body type is inherently unfeminine because women = feminine = dainty and weak and it's abnormal for a woman to be strong? are we classifying "barbarian warrior" as butch, deciding that being strong & capable of fighting is Inherently Unwomanly? this is, for the record, ridiculous--under current gender norms in america, it is entirely commonplace for women to be athletic and still considered acceptably feminine. but outside of that, it's also ridiculous to equate someone's physical features to their gender presentation--insinuating that being strong is inherently masculine is both misogynist and wildly shitty to the many muscular feminine people out there who would be extraordinarily uncomfortable with having their presentation erased because of their body type! gender is a social construct, and "feminine" and "masculine" are entirely invented categories with inherently misogynist, transphobic, racist, &c. assumptions baked into their blurry definitions--you do not need to be contributing to that by going "yeah it's unfeminine to be able to lift weights."
no, rachel is not butch. at any point. she wears a skirt. wildbow loudly goes on about how she's a Normal Straight Girl. the most notable extent of her gender non-conformity is just...being rude, working out, and wearing dirty clothing. there's no intentional masculinity in her design--there's not even really any masculinity at all unless we're operating by exceedingly conservative definitions of "masculine" and "feminine." unironically calling rachel butch is always going to be just as ridiculous and butchphobic as when taylor does it. she simply was not written that way, and while it's fun to joke, we really should not be wrapping around into somehow mistaking her for representation!
#ask#rachel lindt#parahumans#okay. open season for gender discussion. resident butch weighing in on if rachel is butch or not#are there more butches into worm or is it just me
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Okay, so I've been seeing a lot of shitty takes on gender on tiktok, and one of them really cemented my idea that people who argue why trans people have a mental condition and shouldn't be allowed to get HRT or gender affirmation procedures are absolute dumbasses with absolutely zero knowledge on actual psychology.
They try to employ technical psychological terminology to make it seem like they know what they're talking about but they don't know shit.
And this is not just on tiktok, I've also seen it on twitter screenshots, the takes say something along the lines of "we don't allow people with body dysmorphia to "hurt themselves" over it and we get them therapy so they can accept themselves, so why should we allow people with body dysphoria to do that instead of getting therapy to learn to accept their body" and like, that's where I realised people don't have a single clue that body dysmorphia and body dysphoria are completely different things.
Body dysmorphia is an ALTERED PERCEPTION OF THE BODY AS A WHOLE OR SOME FEATURES, which basically means you perceive your body to be different than it actually is, it is a perception issue that can be caused by comments on one's body or cultural/beauty standards, which is why therapists apply Cognitive Restructuration Therapy (I don't know if that is how it is said in English) so that the person is able to fix the perception of their body.
Body dysphoria on the other hand, is a INHERENT FEEL OF WRONGNESS OR DISCOMFORT ABOUT THE BODY AS A WHOLE OR SOME FEATURES, basically, your body feels wrong for you and that isn't something that can be fixed via therapy, this type of dysphoria can in fact be experienced by absolutely anyone, by which I mean to say, it can be experienced by cis and trans people. People (cis people) with body dysphoria get plastic surgeries quite often, such as nose jobs, brow liftings,.... even hair dye in some cases is linked to dysphoria, damn people can even be dysphoric about their voice, some cis guys go on T to look more masculine and some cis girls go through face feminisation surgery so they can look more feminine (yeah, this is a very stereotypical concept of gender, but like, society standards and constructs) . Gender dysphoria is simply a category of body dysphoria related to gender identity, you feel inherent discomfort about your body because simply it doesn't match your identity, so gender affirming procedures or HRT are simply the same as the aforementioned plastic surgeries that CIS PEOPLE get.
#trans#gay#lgbtq#lgbtq discourse#agender#aroace#nonbinary#transmasc#gender dysphoria#body dysmorphia#body dysphoria#gender affirming#dysphoria
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4 things to include in your content notes/summary to make your explicit gender neutral reader insert fic more accessible to trans readers
As a trans person, I've found it difficult to interact with reader-insert fic because the intimacy of 2nd person POV ("you" pronouns) means my gender dysphoria is much more easily triggered than if a third person POV is used. This isn't anyone's fault; my dysphoria is not your responsibility to manage. However, if you want to take steps to make your trans readers more comfortable, I put together a little list of suggestions that can make a major difference.
In the past, I've made frustrated posts about being triggered by reader insert fic. I let my own upset get the better of me and hurt folks, and for that I apologize. I've since deleted those posts since they were unhelpful and unfair. I hope that this post comes across as helpful, rather than judgmental or belittling.
Note: None of these suggestions limit what you can write; write whatever content you want to make! All suggestions are restricted to what kind of warnings/content notes you can include to help trans folks navigate reader fic more comfortably.
If you have a certain biology in mind for your reader, be specific. If you're writing reader as having a vagina/front hole, instead of tagging the fic as "AFAB Reader," say, "reader has a vagina/vulva." Not all AFAB people have vaginas, and many AMAB trans & intersex people do have vaginas. By saying "reader is AFAB," trans women, trans femmes, and other AMAB trans & intersex people are tacitly excluded from a fic, and the implied assumption is that AFAB people all have the same genitals.
Include a content note about what terms are used for the reader's body, and, again, be specific. In particular, avoid things like "feminine terms are used for reader." A lot of trans masculine people use the words cunt, clit, breasts, etc. for themselves; these terms are not inherently feminine. Referring to biological terms as “masculine” or “feminine” can come across as misgendering trans audiences. Instead, take note of which terms you're using, and list them. For example, "The terms hole, folds, lips, clit, and chest are used for reader,” or, “The terms length, cock, and tits are used for reader.”
Include a content note about the type of sex depicted or referenced. Lots of folks already use tags saying what type of sex is included, such as bottom reader or vagina fingering, which is great! It's also helpful to review what passing references are made. If the fic is mostly about oral but reference is made to reader bottoming during vaginal sex, include a note about that in the summary/CNs. If reference is made to a reader topping, same thing. Many trans folks have lots of dysphoria (and potentially euphoria!) around sex & sexual activities, and giving them a heads-up about what to expect is kind & compassionate.
Review your fic for other traditionally gendered language you might be using. You don't have to change such language/imagery; just include a content note for things that are common dysphoria triggers, which include references to hair, body type, clothing, etc. for example, descriptions of reader’s long hair*, curves, skirts/dresses*, or use of traditionally gendered language like "minx" or "bitch" might be deeply uncomfortable for a trans masculine or neutral person. (*Note: Obviously long hair and skirts/dresses are not inherently feminine; these are Western cultural norms, but most English-speaking fandom is Western/abides by Western cultural gender roles. They're also common [though obviously not ubiquitous] dysphoria triggers for transgender folks.) It's useful to include in your content notes what language/appearance markers are used for your reader. For example, "Reader has long hair and wears a dress in one scene."
These content notes don't have to be long, at all. An example that includes all 4 bullet points: "Reader has a vulva, and terms used for them are chest, cunt, and clit. Passing reference is made to reader bottoming vaginally in the past. In one scene, reader is described as curvy."
The TL;DR here is give your audience a heads-up about what they can expect from the fic so that your trans audience can read comfortably. Adding these content notes should only take a couple of minutes, and can make a tremendous difference that makes trans folks feel included and respected.
You don’t have to do anything with your fic you don’t want to. But if you do want to be inclusive to trans readers, I hope you find this post a helpful place to start. And if you have any questions or need clarification, feel free to reach out; I’m happy to talk or point you in the direction of helpful resources.
#reader insert#arcane#canon x reader#canon x oc#self insert#i dunno what to tag this as. I’m in the arcane fandom currently but this is applicable to any gn reader inserters out there#fanfic#silco x reader#silco x oc#whatever I dunno it’s late so I’m just gonna throw this out there and go to bed
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Not saying you're not dysphoric at all, just saying your belief that it doesn't matter if you have gender incongruence or not is inherently harmful to the wider trans community, and maybe you should do more research.
Of course I'm pissed at the control cis people have, but I also want to make sure non-dysphorics don't GET dysphoria from transitioning to a gender they aren't.
I don't want to see them suffer through a mostly irreversable struggle just because they made a bad decision.
Gender dysphoria ≠ gender incongruance.
Gender incongruance is just feeling as though your gender doesn't align with the gender you were assigned at birth. To provide a few examples of what a non-dysphoric trans person may experience:
-Someone who doesn't hate the gender they were assigned at birth/being referred to as such, but feels a whole lot happier with another gender identity, e.g, a non-dysphoric trans woman may feel indifferent about being referred to as a man, but she's a whole lot happier as a woman and being referred to as such.
-Someone who does not experience physical dysphoria and does not wish to pursue physical transition, e.g, a trans man who chooses not to bind, go through the process of hrt, or get any surgeries, and possibly may not present as traditionally masculine, but is still a man and wants to be referred to as such.
-Someone who is unable to define what dysphoria would feel like for them because their identity exists outside of the binary, e.g, an agender person who does not feel dysphoric about their body, nor euphoric about the idea of possessing a "masculine" or "feminine" or even androgynous body.
And there's plenty of other ways, I'm sure, but those are a few examples of friends and people in my life.
Gender dysphoria is feeling distress from gender incongruance - the source of that dysphoria may be from specific body parts, from certain aspects of one's character, from the way one is expected to behave or dress, from situations one may be placed in, and from being misgendered and misperceived as another gender. But not everyone who experiences gender incongruance experiences distress from it and thus, not every trans person is dysphoric.
It's also impossible to make a perfect checklist for gender dysphoria. What happens when a bigender person decides they want to keep their chest and get phallo, but doesn't feel male, and therefore is denied the surgery? What happens when a nonbinary woman wants to keep her facial hair and told she's not a real woman when she chooses to grow a beard? What happens when a genderfluid person wants to get a neo vagina but doesn't want hrt? Hell, what happens when a binary trans guy, who does experience gender dysphoria, decides to wear a dress and gets denied access to hrt?
Using dysphoria as a determining factor as to whether someone can be allowed to transition or not is a very dangerous game. It's been used to forcefully sterilize trans folks -- people who had to prove they were truly trans, truly dysphoric, by giving up their autonomy.
And what about those people who don't fit into binary boxes, who don't meet the expectations determined by cisgender people? What happens when you step out of line, and it's used against you, by people who insist it's for your own good and that you'll regret it?
What other people do with their lives and their bodies isn't up to you. Sure, some people are going to regret it. People regret serious decisions all the time - the decision to get married, to have plastic surgery, to throw themselves into decades of debt to pursue a career they hate, ir even the decision to get a tattoo. There are and will continue to be people who transition and regret it, and there's many more people who were unfairly held back from transitioning because they didn't meet the criteria. You can't do anything for the people who will regret it. It's not your body and it's not your choice. It's not fair to suggest that other trans people should have to suffer to prevent a few more people from making decisions over their bodies and lives that they'll regret.
And the cis people who dictate who gets to transition based on dysphoria don't have your best interest in mind. They want to prevent as many people from transitioning as possible, especially if those people aren't binary, and especially if these cis people perceive them as "weird" or "abnormal."
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(Trigger warning for transphobic content, self misgendering to make a point, transandrophobia. On anon bc some family members follow my main lmao pain)
Hi! I'm Caleb. For reference, I started physically and socially transitioning around 3 years ago.
As a trans man, I was always told not to ruin my perfect, lovely feminine body by becoming like "those filthy men" and taking T and getting top surgery. My mother would always insist "you're not a man, you're just a woman who's been taught to hate herself" and my grandmother would always insist "why would you want to be a man, they're disgusting". Every twist and turn wherever I wanted to seem masculine, someone would insult me for ~abandoning my womanhood~ for the sake of "attention" or "male privilege" (which is unfair, because I've always been treated as lesser than cis men AND women for being a trans man, ergo "a delusional woman") Every time I said I didn't want to be perceived as "pretty" or I said I didn't like how dresses made me feel, people reacted like "oh here comes one of those 'not like other girls'". If I said I liked a certain flower or felt a bit cute one day or did what is considered a feminine hobby, the response was "oh thank God you're not like those *other* men". If someone perceived me as just a butch lesbian, it would always be like "what are you, a male chauvinist?" for appearing masculine. If someone did perceive me as a man, they'd think me disgusting and inherently evil. My transition (which is still under way) is always made out to be some terrible loss of a perfectly good woman, and an attempt to escape femininity because of misogyny by some poor, misled little girl manipulated by the evil transes and men.
Some people have approached me talking about how Elliott Page, too, left femininity for the obviously oh so disgusting masculinity. Some have approached me like "men are more likely to rape and abuse women... why do you want to be a man? do you wanna rape women?"
Jokes have been made about my being a trans man, including "you now have to own only one pair of jeans", "only wash yourself once a week to be a true man", "real men don't wash their hands", "(insert my name) now has to be a piece of shit, it's just the law", "your hair isn't gross enough to belong to a man", "ewww you're a man??", etc etc etc. I'd almost considered detransitioning because every single person I knew except for a select few seemed to hate me for me, even if it was lighthearted or unintentional. People would comment highly inappropriate things about me, and I'd honestly hit one of my lowest points ever emotionally because of, well, everything. I'd fallen behind in my work and studies because I simply felt too shitty to bother.
The way that femininity is considered the epitome of purity, grace, loveliness, kindness, sweetness, etc and masculinity as evil, uncleanly, rude, unfit to be in public, etc has done a lot of harm, not even just for me, but also for my butch lesbian friends. Not to mention the fact that the whole "men are inherently evil" shtick gives actual evil men the excuse they need to be pieces of shit a la "it's in my nature", but that's a different conversation.
I really appreciate you doing the whole transandrophobia thing, makes me feel a little less alone. Some people forget that trans people don't experience the same privileges that cis folks do, as if transitioning magically makes you just like a cis person in every single way. Spoiler alert, it fucking doesn't. I will never experience the same privileges that cis men experience solely based on the fact that I'm trans. It's fucking unfair, but that's how it is.
It's Caleb, again, I felt the last ask was too long. My experiences truly have been a fucking textbook definition of transphobia and transandrophobia, and yet I'm "oh so lucky" that I get to "decide to be a man" and gain privilege over my cis women friends. I'm oh so demanding and oh so sensitive and oh such a typical brutish male for pleading that people stopped insulting me and my expression of self. This fucking oppression Olympics where everyone keeps kicking each other down because they "don't have it as bad" or don't have the same experiences gets the entire queer community fucking nowhere. People act as though radfems only target transfems, but I've had multiple radfems in my dms telling me I'm a poor misled little girl, that I should get off T because it makes me aggressive, etc etc etc. Every time I've complained about it, the response was "you're a man lmao you don't have it as bad, you so desperately want to be oppressed". I love transfems dearly for we are in the same boat, but assuming that trans men don't also have extremely negative experiences based on their gender simply because it's not the same as transfem struggles, and comparing trans men to trans women the whole time in the context of who has a higher percentage of suicide rates or detransitioning or hate crimes... it's fucking exhausting.
Thank you for sharing your experiences.
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Spin-offing into my own post a bit because this is less about pansexuality and more about sexual orientation and etymology in general.
I personally don't think the definitions of "homosexual" and "heterosexual", as they are in the dictionary, are accurate. Or at least, it's oversimplified in a way that lines up with the idea that sexuality is an inherently rigid thing.
To not make this super confusing, I'm going to be using the word "homosexual" to specifically refer to gay men here. Homosexuality is not just "being attracted to the same sex". If this were true, this would mean that gay men would never be attracted to a trans man, and would be instead attracted to trans women. This would also mean that a gay man could not hypothetically develop a crush-- no matter how fleeting-- on an exceptionally masculine woman.
Homosexuality is about the attraction to male sexual characteristics. Some examples of what most might consider male sex characteristics would be a penis + testicles, a relatively flat chest, small hips, a strong jawline, short hair, the presence of particularly dense body hair, or a top-heavy physique. Obviously, not all men look like this, but this is what most people would picture as being a conventionally attractive adult male. Gay men are attracted to at least some of these features, in different configurations. Maybe they only care about the presence of a penis, without caring of the presentation of their partner otherwise. Maybe they like men with long hair and no body hair, but who also have strong jawlines and relatively thin waists.
And then the question is raised: but can't women also have those traits too? And of course, the answer is yes. And when you say that, it brings in the question of what's preventing a gay man from being attracted to a woman. The answer, and what's uncomfortable for many people to accept, is absolutely nothing, which applies to any orientation. This is why gay men and straight women can sometimes develop crushes on masculine or butch women. This is why straight men and lesbians can sometimes develop crushes on feminine men. This is why any orientation can be attracted to a trans person of any identity or sexual configuration. Our sexualities are not tied to explicitly and rigidly defined genders. We are attracted to sexual characteristics that are more commonly associated with either males or females, and human beings-- being sexually bimodal-- can come in all sorts of configurations of those sex characteristics.
The reason TERFs are so threatened by the idea of lesbians dating trans women is because their entire ideology fundamentally hinges on women and men being completely distinct categories with no overlap. They often target cis women who look "too mannish" or cis men who look "too effeminate" and accuse them of being trans, because they fundamentally cannot accept the idea that sex isn't as clear-cut as they think it is. It's a direct threat to bioessentialism to accept that. And when you ask the question, "if a lesbian can be attracted to someone who is biologically male, but who looks like and identifies as a woman, and may or may not have developed or been naturally born with sex characteristics that are more typical of cis females, then what's stopping a lesbian"-- (an identity TERFs have fully co-opted as being "anti-male")-- "from developing attraction towards a man who also expresses in the same way, and has similar sexual characteristics?"
The answer is absolutely nothing.
Also, as a footnote, some people may take this to mean that everyone is just fundamentally bisexual. Whether I agree with this assessment or not, this is only because my post doesn't take into account the additional psychological and sociological factors of attraction. A fully homosexual man who develops a crush on a masculine woman would likely lose that attraction upon finding out they identify as a woman. If they aren't, then they could be bisexual! That's why it's so complex. I simply forwent mentioning it because I wanted to focus more on how people misunderstand how sexuality works biologically.
#sexology#lgbt#lgbt discourse#anti terf#human sexuality#sexuality#theres SOOOOOOO much more i can elaborate on here it's so fascinating to me#but I'll leave it for now
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been thinking recently about that dichotomy of hairless, skinny, smooth, genderless, "pretty" androgyny that's seen as attractive and acceptable vs. the hairy, fat, rough, genderful androgyny that's labeled ugly, deviant, wrong. never beautiful, at most it can be sexy, and how that ties into infantilization of nb people.
The only established image of a genderless human in western society is a child. small, hairless, with no secondary sexual characteristics. innofensive. There is no archetype of a fully grown adult who is not a man or a woman, no normality to aspire to, only monsters, demons and murderers in media.
So it makes sense for this to become the acceptable face of gnc (trans, intersex and more) people. "see? this isn't a dangerous sexual deviant, it's a sexless baby." it proclaims. similar to the (largely dishonest) idea that homosexuality would be/is more accepted as long as it remains child-friendly, non-sexual, hidden.
But some people are, and want to be, hairy and genderful. Sooner or later those smooth chests grow hair or start to sag or both and what then?
Anything feminine enough is seen as inherently sexual. To a lesser degree anything masculine enough is seen as inherently agressive. To opt out of either is one thing. You are still seen as a threat to society, but less so. But to embrace both? To allow yourself to grow and age and become an adult with all those signs? It's unnacceptable. it's unimaginable even. A beardless man is just young, a flat-chested woman is skinny. But a bearded woman ringing up your groceries? Surely she should be in the circus. A man wearing a dress at the office? He must be performing, or satisfying some sick sexual fetish, he must have an agenda, he can't possibly be just existing.
There's this insidious idea that the first type, shaved and flat chested is a passive kind of rejecting gender norms, one that you might come into naturally, one that you'll grow out of sooner or later, while the second is an active subversion, a political statement, a dangerous challenge to the status quo, when in fact a body with with body hair, that's fatter than the current ideal shape, with longish hair, is just what happens when you exist. when you don't dedicate hours to grooming yourself to an external standard.
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Am i the only one who finds the concept of transitioning from O to A or A to O to be weird asf? Like im trans and it just feels wrong. It's like if cis men started pretending they had periods. I'd feel so uncomfortable with an alpha pretending to have a heat. Idk am i going crazy?
This is actually a great question leading to an even bigger discussion, and warning! this post is LONGGGG:
what does it mean to be trans in an omegaverse?
(DISCLAIMER BEFORE ANSWER BELOW - I am NOT trans and this is how I handle this topic in my own personal writing, if you are trans, I encourage you to weigh in on how your write your aus and the headcanons you use to provide our community with an "expert" source.)
You can be transgender, but there is no such thing trans-dynamic. Why?
In all of my au's trans people do exist. Do I have specifically trans characters? No, because I'm not trans and I can't speak to the nuances that go into that experience. But they do exist and I have given it some thought. Here are the basics of how my aus approach the subject:
First of all, as we all know, I tend to write a post-modern style where dynamics aren't nearly as relevant as they are in contemporary and traditional styles. Primary genders, such as female, are much more integrated into the framework and language, and therefore the self-perception of the individuals living in this world.
Second, the way at least the English language is structured, the ideas for the concepts of male and female stem from sets of actions/behaviors/skills/etc, that are societally classified as either masculine or feminine. This is an old-school sort of thinking, that of course we can all say there isn't anything we do, say, or act that is inherently male (or vice versa). The way I write omegaverse, there is no "look" associated with being any particular dynamic. You can be tall, short, muscular, slender, have a round face, have an angular jaw, have big feet, have long fingers, have curly hair, have full lips, no matter what dynamic you have. The genes responsible for your dynamic do not have any information on them that says things about your physical features other than if you are a male omega (who then needs to have the organs to get pregnant and have babies).
Similarly, we cannot change our skin color which also leads other people to make assumptions about our behaviors/skills/abilities/etc... The reason I often use skin color as a real world similarity to dynamic is because the majority of the time (not always) someone's skin color isn't the only reason they look "insert nationality/heritage", they also have other physical traits that denote where their ancestors are from such as eye shape, skull shape, nose type, body type, body composition, susceptibility to different aliments, hair type, hair color, etc...
When thinking about dynamics then, they all have gene-expressed behaviors/physical traits. The easiest to understand is omegas have heats, and have the compulsion to nest.
The easiest criticism of this would be, what if an omega doesn't have a heat? To that I would say, what if a woman doesn't have a period? Is she now automatically non-binary or male? Obviously not. If a woman gets a hysterectomy she is still a woman too. Same thing if a male omega gets a hysterectomy, still an omega.
What if an omega doesn't want to nest? In my au this simply isn't possible. It's not so much of a want as a thing that just happens. Some people sneeze when they get bright light in their eyes. Do they want to sneeze? no. Can they stop it? no. Could I train myself to sneeze when I saw bright lights? probably not. What if a beta does want to nest? If a beta wants to make a cozy little spot out of blankets because they like it, that's not nesting. An omega physically and mentally could not stop nesting without medical intervention or other extraordinary circumstances. When an omega nests, things occur in their brain that is not observable when betas or alphas perform the same action.
If a beta wanted to nest they would just be a beta who "nests", they would not be an omega. If an alpha wanted to have heat, this would not be possible even for female alphas with a uterus, it would not be possible. It's not about hormones, it's not about scents, it's not about bodies, it's about genes.
Going back to anon's biggest concern about alphas having a heat, this simply isn't possible. Alphas can menstruate, and alphas cannot have heats. I don't think the analogy of a cis man getting a period is quite right, consider instead, either a FTM trans or non-binary person producing semen or a human laying an egg that hatches into a human baby.
At this moment in time, neither of these things are possible, if they become possible I will need to edit this post with new examples lol.
What do you think anon? What is your answer to this question? And you my friends of the internet, reblog and comment below with how you write your characters and wonderful worlds.
xoxo
ot.
#omegaversetheory#ask answered#nesting#transdynamic#trans community#omegaverse#omegaverse headcanons#omegaverse au#omegaverse dynamics#a/b/o#a/b/o au#a/b/o headcanons#a/b/o dynamics#the basics
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It's funny cos I try not to think about whether how I look/act/present makes me masculine or feminine like I'm just being? I'm only really made aware of myself when I'm around other people or whatever because obviously I'm being perceived .I don't really think I'm masculine but when I hang out with straight people they seem to think I am. I have lots of body hair that I don't shave and I don't wear makeup and I suppose the way I act sometimes makes them uncomfortable? I mostly like the way that other lgbt people react to me cos they seem to generally not project anything onto me I think? The most annoying thing tbh is being a gnc bi woman in a relationship with a man skskkssks a lot of the time straight and also other lgbt people have a lot to say about this..... Like they wonder what my bf thinks of my presentation and act like I somehow tricked him into being with me? Or like he doesn't know I'm not feminine and is being used as a beard. Idk man the perception of gender is mind boggling
hmmm it's interesting isn't it that such a personal and internal thing is so strongly controlled by other ppl projecting their world view onto you. this is why it seems so fluid and baseless to me, why it's so weird that cishet ppl are often so fixed in their gender roles when they can change so frequently from perception to perception. i think theyre just convinced their answer is the right one? anyway it's what i mean when i say i wish i could just show up and be taken as i am - i also find lgbt ppl are more cognizant of this, we're good at actually minding our business in a way sooooo many other groups seem to fucking LACK lmfao. it causes sooo much internal struggle and for what. like am i inherently one thing or the other just because the common heteronormative perception would pin me as so? do they get to dictate what i am, or do it, and if i do - am i just mirroring what i've internalised from them back to them, or am i being authentic? idk! very very weird that ppl would immediately jump to asking your boyfriend what he thinks of your presentation btw and also bizarre that body hair is seen as masculine when it's just a fucking signifier of bodily maturity if anything 😭 it's so so gross im SICK. none of it makes sense. it really does baffle me because ultimately it seems to matter so so much when idk why it has to at all!!!
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