I think some white trans people have a hard time coming to terms with the whole asian fetishization as a form of gender expression thing because I guess sometimes it's a source of idk "comfort" in a very confusing time but like it's not remotely a good excuse let alone a source of much empathy from me. Cause like as a poc who enjoys anime and frankly a lot of east asian media, I get how being presented with the idea that different gender expression than what we're used to in American culture can be very eye opening for a young trans person or even someone well into adulthood who's just coming to terms with their identity as a trans person, but I'm also conscious and try to remain conscious that that gender presentation, the perceived room to play with gender in a different way than what we know is different for people across cultures and even though I grew up in the US I've been made to feel very hyper conscious and conflicted about my own gender, both assigned and not, because of the way my ethnic culture's ideas of gender are perceived by white people.

Like take comfort from the idea that the option to express your gender in ways outside our own cultural pressures and presets exists, sure, but again, be conscious that the PEOPLE (and frankly, characters) you're seeing are rooted in a completely different set of cultural influences, rules, and standards within those societies that effect their gender presentation. Many times it may look gnc to you but to someone else who's actively living this sort of gender presentation or ease of playing with it, it may not be gnc at all and you reducing it to how you feel as someone outside that culture may end up being emasculating or forcing masculinity on someone who sees themselves as completely masculine or as feminine in a context outside of your western standards of either identity. Unless someone or even the material you're viewing within these respective cultures personally or actually notes that what they're doing is gender non conforming or experimentally challenging gender norms within their own cultural norm, then like yeah respecting that and acknowledging that is fine, but like don't be weird about it!!

And like same applies to characters, which I find ludicrous that y'all try to divorce so staunchly from their respective cultural origins. Like anime for example is like 90% of the time based in Japan or worlds very obviously based on Japan, or in Japanese stories/folklore/history, but the excuse is always "I think equating real people with anime characters is ridiculous cause Japanese people dont actually look like that". Like nobody is saying they do but they clearly are writing and creating things thoroughly through their respective Japanese lense and thus so much of it feels so inheritly Japanese. Only time I see white people acknowledge the Japanese root of something is if the damn anime or manga is a fucking period piece in like the Edo period or something, which is ridiculous.

Then to take it further and base your own sexual desirability of this western gaze of thinking all things Asian are inherently gnc is even weirder and yes, more racist. You're basing your sexual desirability on a fetishized and eroticized form of racism, more specifically a lense that always tries to frame Asian bodies as something purely for the sexual and submissive and not wholly human. Asian media isn't trying to like purposefully sell Asian fetishization to you, it's simply operating through it's own lense, even the sexual shit it is producing isn't like selling Asian fetishization, it's just selling the sexual through the lense of its respected culture (like what is popular in the sexual fantasy there for example); the racism on your part comes from viewing it as someone not Asian and thinking that just because its Asian it's either inherently sexual or if it is something sexual in nature, feeling entitled to Asian bodies; both in their purpose to you as sexual objects and as fetishizing them as something desirable for you to look like for the way you shittly perceive these bodies as inheritly feminine or androgynous.

White people as a whole have a massive problem with fetishizing Asian people but it is like alarming as a trans poc to see white trans people as a whole kind of turn that on its head as a form of gender goals or to make themselves feel sexy or whatever and the fact that y'all dont see anything wrong with that is even wilder. There is absolutely a huge difference in acknowledging and even appreciating a different perspective on what masculinity and feminity can look like in a different cultural context and thinking that anything that isn't what YOU'RE used to being inheritly gnc as a result.

I do think it's important to note that framing this problem as a trans femme mainly issue IS shitty and undoubtedly transmisogynist in nature, especially given that I've seen PLENTY of white trans masces doing the exact same shit with very little pushback. Like the amount of trans men I've seen basing their androgyny on idols or anime characters they label as "f*mb*ys" or even calling any remotely twinky asian guy (or hell not even, I've seen yall misgender Asian men of all shapes and sizes) a f*mb*y or labeling him with usually unwarranted or derogatory labels for feminine men (ie fruity, queen, diva) is fucking vile. White trans people as a whole need to be holding each other and themselves accountable for this shit.