Ever since I started more or less reading as female in social interactions, men assume I& #39;ll find everything they say interesting. I have yet to get used to this, and it is the most jarring change from how the world used to perceive me.

A lot of patriarchal stuff that oppresses women my cis woman friends had prepared me for long ago -- cat calls, the fear of walking home at night, etc.

What I WASN& #39;T prepared for is how men subtly assume they& #39;re the main character of every interaction they have with women.

This extends to, like, walking down the sidewalk. Men generally expect women to get out of the way. This isn& #39;t aggressive, really. It& #39;s just how society has conditioned all of us to behave, and it& #39;s hard, hard programming to break.

Realizing you& #39;re not the protagonist is hard!

Yes, man at the grocery store, tell me more about how painful it was for your mother to give birth to you I& #39;m dying to hear about it and the fact that I am looking at my phone is an indication of nothing no

The flipside of this is true, too: Other women, when I enter into a social interaction with them, give off a sense of _relief_ I can& #39;t exactly explain, an "oh thank God" kinda thing. This was one of THE first things to shift, even when I was still mostly presenting male.

In the event that you enjoy this thread and want to read more of my musing on this topic, here& #39;s a thing I wrote called "The Protagonists" in late 2018 that never quite got the attention I wanted it to, so why not now??? https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/10/10/17925740/tv-protagonists-sexual-misconduct-antiheroes">https://www.vox.com/culture/2...

(It was published under my old name, though I was rapidly moving toward coming out, so notice how I dance around ever referring to myself as gendered!!!)