LGBTAI+ Questions, Information and Discussion thread!

[Lycunadari]

I came about the following (paraphrased) conversation about trans men and misogyny, and I'm not sure what to make of it:

A: As a trans man, you can't know how it is to experience misogyny.
B: But I don't pass/still present female, so people treat me as a woman, so I do experience misogyny.
A: No, that's not misogyny, that's misgendering and therefore transphobia. As a man, you can't experience misogyny, because only women are affected by misogyny.

I'm not sure if I can follow that logic. If I get harassed on a day I present female and happen to be a woman, that's misogyny, but if I present female but happen to be male on that day, it isn't? And if a trans man is harassed on a day he presents female, that's also not misogyny, that's transphobia? I don't get it.

It also kinda ties into the question if male presenting trans women can experience male privilege (I've been told that no, they don't, and while I haven't quite understood the reason why not, I'm not a trans woman myself so I just accepted it. If someone can explain it to me, I'd be grateful.)


I'm also not sure if I'd call every misgendering automatically transphobia (assuming it's out of ignorance and not on purpose). What if someone, say a child, simply doesn't know that trans people exist, and doesn't know that you can't just assume that a person's gender matches their appearance? If this child misgenders a person, is this transphobia?

[Irish Musician]

If you present as a woman and are considered a woman for all intents and purposes....then yeah, it is misogyny. Maybe if the person spouting the abuse was knew that, say, a MtF transwoman was male before her identifying as female then it could be transphobia. Honestly, it could be a little of both! Point being, using the absolute that NO transwoman could EVER know what misogyny is like is transphobia in itself. That is like saying that the woman being presented in front of you isn't woman enough to have the problems of a "real woman"*, and it just ridiculous and stupid.

So I guess my TL;DR is, it can be both depending on the angle of the person's feelings and why exactly the decided to harass said person.





*I don't actually think this and tend to hate it when anyone tries to make things into "normal" things and "abnormal" things.

[Mono Vertigo]

I came about the following (paraphrased) conversation about trans men and misogyny, and I'm not sure what to make of it:

A: As a trans man, you can't know how it is to experience misogyny.
B: But I don't pass/still present female, so people treat me as a woman, so I do experience misogyny.
A: No, that's not misogyny, that's misgendering and therefore transphobia. As a man, you can't experience misogyny, because only women are affected by misogyny.

I'm not sure if I can follow that logic. If I get harassed on a day I present female and happen to be a woman, that's misogyny, but if I present female but happen to be male on that day, it isn't? And if a trans man is harassed on a day he presents female, that's also not misogyny, that's transphobia? I don't get it.

To me, that'd rather be the bingo of being both misogyny AND transphobia.
If the same discussion pops up later, you could maybe compare it with other -isms. If somebody who's ethnically Arabic gets told islamophobic things even though they're actually not Muslim at all, they still experience islamophobia.
(Reality is worse than fiction in this aspect: Sikhs, who are not ethnically Arabic or Muslim, are often mistaken for so, and discriminated against accordingly, because of the headwear. We can't have nice things.)
If they disagree with it, hehh, to me that would be willful ignorance of facts so a rational debate becomes impossible at this point.

It also kinda ties into the question if male presenting trans women can experience male privilege (I've been told that no, they don't, and while I haven't quite understood the reason why not, I'm not a trans woman myself so I just accepted it. If someone can explain it to me, I'd be grateful.)

I'm not very good with questions of privilege, so I'm going to do the next best thing: provide personal anecdotes. (Hey, talking about myself and my feelings and experiences is the best way not to misrepresent anyone else's.)
At least twice, because of my short hair and forms ambiguously concealed by my clothes, I was misgendered. Both times, I definitely felt safer and more serene; drunk guys asking for a cigarette late at night didn't harass me, polite "hello"'s didn't turn into awkward flirting.
I'm very much female but I always enjoy these instances. Because safety.
Women who dress in a less ambiguous manner, or whose body shape can't be concealed so easily, would have gotten less lucky.
So I'd be tempted to say that if a cis woman can experience male privilege, so can transwomen.
Even then, I understand that privilege is actually a very passive phenomenon, that one usually benefits without noticing or asking for it (which is the whole problem of privilege). If it relies mostly on the environment, and not the individual, then why can't misgendered transwomen experience male privilege?
(I could have understood privilege wrong, that being said.)

I'm also not sure if I'd call every misgendering automatically transphobia (assuming it's out of ignorance and not on purpose). What if someone, say a child, simply doesn't know that trans people exist, and doesn't know that you can't just assume that a person's gender matches their appearance? If this child misgenders a person, is this transphobia?

Again, accordingly to most discourses I've heard...
Technically, that's transphobia.
IMHO, you need to have a broad enough definition of transphobia to call these instances as such. A white kid who meets a black person for the first time in their life might assume they're actually white people who got dirty, is that racism or an innocent mistake?
(Note that "innocence" is not synonymous with "harmless". Innocent remarks may hurt without any intent to do so, and many innocent kids have shown far more cruelty and selfishness than mature, cynic adults. Still, context matters. The same remark doesn't have the same meaning, and shouldn't be treated identically, whether it comes from a young child, a sheltered old person, a violent bigot, a friend quoting someone, a close relative, a random vendor, somebody who's reportedly researched the subject, somebody IRL, somebody over the Internet... even a remark or question that is universally bad, rarely should be considered to have the same level of badness in every possible instance.)
TL;DR: IMHO if something is bad it's not however necessarily -phobic, even if all -phobic stuff is bad.

[Astrella]

@Above: privilege is not a purely passive phenonemon; it deals with what messages you internalize and how you can and do act on those as well. Just being mistaken for a guy doesn't mean a woman suddenly has male privilege, all it means is that she receives a very very conditional sort of passing privilege.

I came about the following (paraphrased) conversation about trans men and misogyny, and I'm not sure what to make of it:

A: As a trans man, you can't know how it is to experience misogyny.
B: But I don't pass/still present female, so people treat me as a woman, so I do experience misogyny.
A: No, that's not misogyny, that's misgendering and therefore transphobia. As a man, you can't experience misogyny, because only women are affected by misogyny.

I'm not sure if I can follow that logic. If I get harassed on a day I present female and happen to be a woman, that's misogyny, but if I present female but happen to be male on that day, it isn't? And if a trans man is harassed on a day he presents female, that's also not misogyny, that's transphobia? I don't get it.

It also kinda ties into the question if male presenting trans women can experience male privilege (I've been told that no, they don't, and while I haven't quite understood the reason why not, I'm not a trans woman myself so I just accepted it. If someone can explain it to me, I'd be grateful.)


I'm also not sure if I'd call every misgendering automatically transphobia (assuming it's out of ignorance and not on purpose). What if someone, say a child, simply doesn't know that trans people exist, and doesn't know that you can't just assume that a person's gender matches their appearance? If this child misgenders a person, is this transphobia?

How you deal with stuff directed at you matters too. A man getting something misogynistic thrown at him will internalize it differently from a woman. Like, a closeted trans girl hearing misogyny will internalize that as her being a girl being bad, it will have a strong effect on her, despite the fact that she might not present as a woman (a nebulous concept as that is.). A lot of gendered messages and such aren't delivered in isolation, everyone hears it but what we do with it depends on who we are. A message like "women are submissive" is going to make a woman feel like she has to be submissive, while it'll make a man expect submissiveness from women. Different effects from the same message.

----

Say for example you're on an internet forum with no gender markers, a misogynistic comment will still affect a woman, even though she might not be read by other posters as a woman.

[Miriel]

@ Juniper: I don't thinking it's important to classify bad experiences in little boxes. A trans man who doesn't pass and is harassed as a woman is misgendered, yes, but he wouldn't be harassed if he weren't perceived as a woman.

My experience: Once, I was on the way to being harassed on the street, because I'm a woman and stuff. Then, someone clocked, and I was called a "transvestite". Sure, I'm harassed anyway, but what I'm harassed as depends on what I'm perceived as.

[Lycunadari]

Matthew, I think you misunderstood, they didn't say trans women can't experience misogyny, they said trans men can't experience it, even if they "appear" female.

Mono Vertigo, that islamophobia example is a good argument, thanks!

Lena, thanks for the explanation, that makes it clearer. Though I still have a question, what about stuff like the pay gap? In this instance, male privilege is passive, so how does it affect (closeted) trans women?

Caroline, I know it isn't really important to classify these experiences exactly, I just started thinking when I read this conversation. Also, sorry you had to deal with that. :/

For context, I found the exact posts again:

Spoiler: Spoilered for lenght

Show

B: Could you please explain to me how trans men benefit from male privilege as soon as they identify as male? I thought they only get male privilege if society generally accepts them as male.

A: Nah.

Trans men are male. Therefore no matter what they’re perceived as, they’re still inherently male. Yes, this can cause dysphoria and yes it’s generally ****ty; but with being male comes this sort of “barrier” as its best to explain it for visual learners.

Say a trans man gets misgendered through someone being misogynistic at them. This hypothetical barrier takes this misdirected misogyny and redirects it as transphobia, because only partial/whole women can experience misogyny. When a trans man has misogyny directed towards them or is solely mistaken as female, that’s an act of transphobia because gender roles warp our perception of gender and force this idea of what a woman or man looks like.

And it’s transphobic to strip a trans man of his privilege, because you’re implying that he is “less male” than a cis male. It also implies that cis men can’t face misdirected misogyny as well through presentation as well.

and

B: I'm sorry, but are you a trans man? Do you know what they experience? Or are you just another person trying to tell us what we can and cannot experience? I will have male privilege when I am out and when I pass, but everything I hear about myself, and women, I feel as thought they're talking to me. I don't know how to be "male". I only know what it's like growing up as a girl. Misogyny does effect me. Don't just pretend these things said don't hurt. It's not something different. It's misogyny.

A: I’m CAFAB and partially non-female.

Misogyny doesn’t effect you. Transphobia does. You’re not partially/fully female so you literally cannot be effected by oppression of women. By saying you experience misogyny is taking away from the actual problem at hand and that is devaluing you as a person based on what they think you are.

You getting perceived as female is misgendering. Therefore, while yes someone is directing misogyny at you, that misogyny is actually them assuming you’re female based on what you look like. That is transphobia.

Gendering strangers is transphobia.

Wanna know how to be male? Identify as one.

[Coidzor]

I came about the following (paraphrased) conversation about trans men and misogyny, and I'm not sure what to make of it:

A: As a trans man, you can't know how it is to experience misogyny.
B: But I don't pass/still present female, so people treat me as a woman, so I do experience misogyny.
A: No, that's not misogyny, that's misgendering and therefore transphobia. As a man, you can't experience misogyny, because only women are affected by misogyny.

Isn't that basically one of the definitions of transmisogyny? Sounds like they need a basic introduction to some core concepts.

I'm also not sure if I'd call every misgendering automatically transphobia (assuming it's out of ignorance and not on purpose). What if someone, say a child, simply doesn't know that trans people exist, and doesn't know that you can't just assume that a person's gender matches their appearance? If this child misgenders a person, is this transphobia?

Obviously. Children are evil, after all. Just read Lord of the Flies sometime.

That was a misinterpretation, then. The most I did was compare two specific faulty conclusions, and I didn't even come close to comparing attitudes as a whole. Again, I didn't mean to vex anyone, and I apologise.

Who is vexed? I ain't even mad. A little bit confused as to where you were going with your first post on the subject if there was no comparison on any level at all, but definitely not mad.

[Irish Musician]

Matthew, I think you misunderstood, they didn't say trans women can't experience misogyny, they said trans men can't experience it, even if they "appear" female.

Oh, hmmm. Well to speak in such an absolute about something like that just shows ignorance to me. What if said trans man didn't figure out their trans-ness (a word? I think not but oh well) until later in life, say 30? They would have been in "girl mode" for many years and most likely have been victim to some form of misogyny at some point. Who knows?! My point is: You cannot speak to someone else's past experience because you were not the one living them.

At least that is what I think, take it or leave it

[Miriel]

Isn't that basically one of the definitions of transmisogyny? Sounds like they need a basic introduction to some core concepts.

Transmisogyny generally refers to trans women, not trans men, however.

[Coidzor]

Oh, hmmm. Well to speak in such an absolute about something like that just shows ignorance to me. What if said trans man didn't figure out their trans-ness (a word? I think not but oh well) until later in life, say 30? They would have been in "girl mode" for many years and most likely have been victim to some form of misogyny at some point. Who knows?! My point is: You cannot speak to someone else's past experience because you were not the one living them.

At least that is what I think, take it or leave it

We don't know sure, but I'd still very much like to know where someone could live for 30 years and not encounter a single misogynistic message. And then figure out just why that would be and see if we could replicate the results elsewhere.

[Astrella]

Lena, thanks for the explanation, that makes it clearer. Though I still have a question, what about stuff like the pay gap? In this instance, male privilege is passive, so how does it affect (closeted) trans women?

It's another one of those situations were you get a little bit of privilege based on certain conditions. I had a study somewhere that basically said trans women's average wages go down as they transition while trans men's tend to stay the same or go up.

-----

Also it's not that trans men and such can't encounter misogyny, considering how pervasive it is, it's just that like, how an individual trans man will handle it / internalize it can vary a lot. It's a complicated matter for trans people cause it also depends to what degree you like thought your assignment was true pre-realizing you were trans etc...

[Zurvan]

Yeah I guess it was a stupid theory anyway...

On a side note, about same sex marriage does any of you guys want to get married?

[Mystic Muse]

Yeah I guess it was a stupid theory anyway...

On a side note, about same sex marriage does any of you guys want to get married?

I'm homosexual (With maybe a bit of an inkling towards bi) and would like to get married, yes.

[Marnath]

Yeah I guess it was a stupid theory anyway...

On a side note, about same sex marriage does any of you guys want to get married?

Kind of an irrelevant question I'd think, since whether or not people want to get married doesn't touch on the fact that it still needs to be made legal a lot of places in the world.

[noparlpf]

97.4% ± 0.3 ace, no particular interest in marriage*, and I have somewhat nonstandard views on marriage. I don't see why one's legal, financial, medical, and child-rearing partners should be restricted by what one does with one's crotch giblets. Say (everything following this is hypothetical) my boyfriend has ****e credit and no prospects. Why can't my sister, her roommate, her roommate's husband, and I form a legal, financial, and child-rearing union? Humans are so silly.

*Okay well I did just send this to my friend because her mum works at UPenn and it might help my chances of getting in as a state resident and saving like $50k over four years, but you can probably tell by the effort I put into it how serious I was being.

[Philemonite]

Yeah I guess it was a stupid theory anyway...

Actually, it describes my surroundings quite well. And that makes me very sad.
We are still stuck in 16th century. Or maybe 14th.

On a side note, about same sex marriage does any of you guys want to get married?

Depends on what you consider a marriage. Is it just a peace of paper, or is it sharing life with one's partner(s)?

[Serpentine]

Yeah I guess it was a stupid theory anyway...

Just because it's not as new and unique as you thought, and just because there's some flaws in parts, doesn't mean it's stupid. Like I said, it's the basis for a lot of very complicated feminist, gender and sociological discussions. Also like I said, what matters, now that the idea has occurred to you, is what you do with it: legitimise it, or challenge it.
If it's a subject you're interested in, I suggest you read up on it. I recommend reading broadly, if you can - feminist critiques of how it's shapped modern society and what can be done about it, studies of gender, power and sex in ancient and historical societies*, etc. And please don't be discouraged from writing a paper on the subject if that's what you want to do; if other people have looked at it before, that just makes it that much easier to find references and evidence.

*I can even share that essay and point you at some sources I used for it if you want.

[golentan]

On a side note, about same sex marriage does any of you guys want to get married?

I want to get married, I don't know whether to a boy or girl (certainly depends on who I meet) and have a kid and a domestic life.

[banthesun]

Spoiler: Some Homophobia

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Hey all, I've recently been up to visit my relatives in the country, this time I noticed was something I'd call an air of latent homophobia. Stuff like people saying "aww, that's gay" and the like. It's got me thinking about some stuff I thought I'd run past you guys.

Back here in inner city sydney, it's always felt pretty different. We have an openly gay parlimentary representative, the yearly Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, and something of a public perception that homophopia is not okay. That's not to say there's any shortage of homophobia, especially the loud, aggressive kind, but it's clear that these people are just ****wits.

I'm not so sure what to think of the types of homophobia I witnessed in the country though. The people I talked to were all nice enough folks, and it just felt like the conversation had never come up (I didn't bring it up myself, in part because I was somewhat caught off guard, in part because it's tricky to bring up). It felt like their homophobia was an issue of the culture, and that they'd never really had a chance to make a choice on what they believed. I wouldn't be surprised if lots of the people out there would remain homophobic even given a full discussion, and I know that this homophobia is still really damaging, but I couldn't really find it as despicable as I would in the city.

Anyway, I was wondering what you guys thought of this, since I'm sure some of you at least have a lot more experience in these matters than I do. ( )

On a lighter note, I've been wondering whether this scene from Blackadder is offensive to trans people, or if I'm just being overly PC here.

[Gwynfrid]

It felt like their homophobia was an issue of the culture, and that they'd never really had a chance to make a choice on what they believed. I wouldn't be surprised if lots of the people out there would remain homophobic even given a full discussion, and I know that this homophobia is still really damaging, but I couldn't really find it as despicable as I would in the city.

Anyway, I was wondering what you guys thought of this, since I'm sure some of you at least have a lot more experience in these matters than I do. ( )

I'm not particularly experienced in the matter, but I think homophobia isn't all that different from the many other types of prejudice. We're hardwired to fear the unknown. Fear breeds distrust, then dislike, and it doesn't take much to turn that into long-standing prejudice. That is the root of most of that stuff. Everything else is made up as justification later. That's why you see the phobia as its highest in places where nobody is out as LGBT, and you see it going down when folks begin to actually meet, then know, all those different/strange/scary "other" people and realize they're just, well, people and not monsters. In my view, that explains most of the difference between city and country outlooks.

[Philemonite]

I'm not particularly experienced in the matter, but I think homophobia isn't all that different from the many other types of prejudice. We're hardwired to fear the unknown. Fear breeds distrust, then dislike, and it doesn't take much to turn that into long-standing prejudice. That is the root of most of that stuff. Everything else is made up as justification later. That's why you see the phobia as its highest in places where nobody is out as LGBT, and you see it going down when folks begin to actually meet, then know, all those different/strange/scary "other" people and realize they're just, well, people and not monsters. In my view, that explains most of the difference between city and country outlooks.

I was going to say lack of exposure, but you said it so much better.

[Kesnit]

Spoiler: Some Homophobia

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I'm not so sure what to think of the types of homophobia I witnessed in the country though. The people I talked to were all nice enough folks, and it just felt like the conversation had never come up (I didn't bring it up myself, in part because I was somewhat caught off guard, in part because it's tricky to bring up). It felt like their homophobia was an issue of the culture, and that they'd never really had a chance to make a choice on what they believed. I wouldn't be surprised if lots of the people out there would remain homophobic even given a full discussion, and I know that this homophobia is still really damaging, but I couldn't really find it as despicable as I would in the city.

Anyway, I was wondering what you guys thought of this, since I'm sure some of you at least have a lot more experience in these matters than I do. ( )

I grew up in a really rural area (like you describe). If there were any gay people in my home town, I never knew about it. (There was a rumor that a 6th grade teacher is gay, but I have no idea if it was true or if it was just people assuming since she wasn't married.) I knew hypothetically that gay people existed, but it was never something I ever confronted personally.

Spoiler: My first encounter with gays

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When I was 13, I picked up a fantasy book by an author I eventually came to love. About halfway through, the reader learns that two secondary characters - one of whom is a mentor to the main character - are in a lesbian relationship. This was my exact train of thought. (Ylsa and Keren are the characters.) "Ylsa and Keren... But I thought Keren was female." *flips back through book to look for a pronoun for Keren* "Keren is female. Does this bother me? *less than a second pause* No." *picks up book and keeps reading*

Reading that book got me to think about my opinion of homosexuality. Up until that point, I'd never had to think about it, except in the abstract. When someone isn't confronted with something, all the aspects never really come into play. You just don't think about what something means. Saying something is "so gay" is just a phrase with no real meaning behind it, because there has never been reason to put real life people/actions/things into it.

[Icewraith]

It's not just "city vs country". That's a simplification of a lot of religious and political things, many of which happen to run stronger in the country than the city, but aren't necessarily absent from the city.

The "fear of the unknown" is certainly a large part of it, and the lack of people who are out makes other things worse, but it's not a complete solution in and of itself.

[bluewind95]

I have a bit of a question. What easy sexuality label can a mostly agendered (somewhat genderfluid) FAAB asexual person who can only be romantically involved with males use? I mean... I tend to use straight-romantic asexual, but with the agender/genderfluid seems kind of off to me.

[Septimus Faber]

I have a bit of a question. What easy sexuality label can a mostly agendered (somewhat genderfluid) FAAB asexual person who can only be romantically involved with males use? I mean... I tend to use straight-romantic asexual, but with the agender/genderfluid seems kind of off to me.

Androromantic? It's a bit of a mouthful, but etymologically I think it works.

[The_Snark]

I have a bit of a question. What easy sexuality label can a mostly agendered (somewhat genderfluid) FAAB asexual person who can only be romantically involved with males use? I mean... I tend to use straight-romantic asexual, but with the agender/genderfluid seems kind of off to me.

Asexual, androromantic? I don't know if this is a label in common use, so I'm not sure if it will help in terms of explaining things quickly; but the root words are clear enough, and I think I've seen androsexual/gynosexual used when people want to describe their sexuality in terms of 'who I am attracted to' rather than 'how do my preferences relate to my own gender'. (Which seems like a more sensible way to put it anyway, but language is full of mildly nonsensical things. And I guess terms like gay and lesbian manage to include both bits of information in one word, which is convenient.)

Edit - hah, same suggestion. Evidently the meaning is clear enough in some social groups at least.

[noparlpf]

I have a bit of a question. What easy sexuality label can a mostly agendered (somewhat genderfluid) FAAB asexual person who can only be romantically involved with males use? I mean... I tend to use straight-romantic asexual, but with the agender/genderfluid seems kind of off to me.

I'd go with androromantic. Even though I'm cis I describe myself as gynoromantic demisexual because I don't like that "heterosexual" and "homosexual" require the knowledge of the person's gender to actually be useful words.

[bluewind95]

Ah, that IS very simple! Thank you guys.

I find labels like this pretty useful for quick information exchange. I mean... at first glance people don't really need to know all the rest, so having a really simple label like that is very good.

[Zurvan]

Marriage in the sense of ritual. Do you want to do that? Or you don't care.

Also as I said homophobia in my opinion comes from the patriarchal society we live in where feminine is inferior and masculine is superior.

Question(it may be a stupid one) :

Does transvestites(is this the rigth term?) want to look like the other sex in a way no one can tell? Or they prefer to be in the intersection where you look like the other sex but people can tell you are not.

If it is the first one. How do you call the second?

[noparlpf]

Question(it may be a retarded one) :

Please do not use the word "retarded" in that way. It's considered quite offensive.

Does transvestites(is this the rigth term?) want to look like the other sex in a way no one can tell? Or they prefer to be in the intersection where you look like the other sex but people can tell you are not.

If it is the first one. How do you call the second?

A transvestite (a rarely-used word) is a cisgender individual who enjoys dressing in clothing typically assigned to the other gender. A transvestite would be somebody like a drag queen. Some drag queens do go for full passing, some go for flamboyant costumes and makeup. It varies.