darq , 11 months ago

Just to be clear here.

Firstly, your previous comment was off the mark. While people misgendering you and being nasty to you is a part of being trans, that isn't all I was talking about.

Trans people today are facing systemic threats. The things I worry about aren't if someone is going to misgender me or be mean to me, but if I'm going to be able to maintain access to my healthcare, or if I'm going to be discriminated against in the workplace, or if I'm going to be harassed or maybe even assaulted if I go out dressed as I please. In other places in the world, families are being separated if the parent or child is transgender, and mainstream conservative politicians and influencers are calling for us to be forcibly detransitioned, or in some cases imprisoned or even killed because they consider us obscene, predatory, and a danger to women and children. It's not mean, it's genocidal. And it's not fringe either, in both the US and the UK transphobia is not just popular, it's policy.

If trans people only had to deal with getting misgendered now and then, I would be incredibly happy.

And your comment is an example of what I meant about people not really believing us. The default assumption a lot of cisgender people make is that the main problems transgender people face are about misgendering or pronouns or something, when the real problems are far more material, and far more dangerous. But even as I typed the above paragraph, I know there are people reading it who are going to think that I'm exaggerating. Even people who think that they are trans-supportive.

But then secondly, yeah. A trans person is telling you about what they go through, the transphobia they face, and you are explaining at them about why they are wrong about their own experiences. You haven't experienced what they have, and if you are cisgender, you likely aren't able to experience it. You say you understand the trauma. But you don't. I promise you, you do not.

I don't know what your friend was telling you. Maybe she was exaggerating, or imagining things. I don't know. But if I were a betting person? I would favour the odds that you were dismissing legitimate concerns, and invalidating your friend. Because that's what it is, nine times out of ten, in my experience.