Trans men are culturally stuck between a rock & a hard place because most cis men give us vibes of “you’re not really one of us” & everyone else gives us vibes of “you chose the path of evil.”

There's a lot of gaslighting involved from all sides, I just thought I'd mention that if you've noticed, you're not imagining it.

I don't particularly expect this to change culturally, but I find that identifying it as a cultural pattern helps me not to internalize it as much & also helps me make self-preserving decisions about just how close I want to get to a wide variety of people.

Like many marginalized minority groups, trans men are held to more rigorous standards of behavior, ethics, speech, and achievement than cis men to be accepted, and bringing this up at all gets identified as aggressive or evidence of privilege / seeking special treatment.

Also like many marginalized minority groups, trans men are punished for our successes with the message that any success proves we were never marginalized in the first place.

Another catch-22: if trans men speak up for ourselves as a group, we are labelled aggressive, privileged, whiny, or seeking special treatment, while if we keep quiet, we are labelled insufficiently masculine.

Anyway, I will end this thread before a horde comes for me – hopefully my 9,000+ account block list will hold the gates. Have a nice day!

P.S. I underestimated the size of my block list

I’ve gotten a bunch of well-meaning replies trying to console me or give me a pep talk, but I’m not looking for emotional support from strangers on twitter. I hope this thread was useful to you in some way. Thanks!

A stranger just tagged me in as a pro-trans attack dog in response to a t*rf with over 11k followers. DO NOT ENDANGER TRANS PEOPLE BY DOING THIS.

I've blocked that stranger, the t*rf & all their followers, so hopefully I won't get brigaded

As long as we're on that topic, Red Block is currently the best chrome extension for mass-blocking in these kinds of situations for safety. (I think the download page is in Korean, but it's in English once you install it, if you don't know Korean.)

If you end up in a debate about this with a reasonable person who isn't just trying to hurt you, focus on sociological data (not theory) about the material conditions of trans men's lives, especially healthcare, salaries, workplace harassment, SA & domestic abuse & self-harm.

The strategies of t*rf rhetoric depend on repeating mottos, slogans, proverbs & theory snippets that sound true because they reinforce widespread prejudice.

You can counter this with *data* about the material conditions of trans people's lives – but it won't work on bigots.

For your own sanity, try to remember that, much like “losing” an argument against the current US president, “losing” an argument against a transphobe doesn’t mean you’re wrong or a hellbeast — your enemy is probably arguing in bad faith

I’m not going to go track down all the sociological data I’ve read about this in 10 years bc that’s an entire research project, but TL;DR:

t*rfs want us all to believe that trans men gain the male privilege that cis men have

but the sociological data on our health, access to healthcare, salaries, workplace discrimination, SA, domestic violence & self-harm

dramatically contradict the t*rf claim

& is very dire

it’s both true that trans men are men,

& that trans men are an underserved, institutionally oppressed, stigmatized population of men

which is a concept you’ve hopefully encountered with other subsets of men, such as racially targeted groups

we’re not in a contest with other marginalized groups to be the most marginalized group

but part of the t*rf strategy is “divide & conquer”

so they redirect trans men’s attempts at discussing the problems facing us

by turning all convos into “someone else has it worse”

it’s a rhetorical trick, because if we don’t prove that we actually have it worst, our concerns get dismissed

but if we do try to prove that we actually have it worst, we throw other marginalized groups under the bus, often trans women

which doubly accomplishes the t*rf goal

I’ve been watching this play out in person & online for *20 years*

& have no idea how to disarm it in realtime, it’s an extremely effective derail

This thread is the longest I’ve talked about any of these issues in public without getting derailed & I’m not sure how I pulled it off — maybe it’s that while doing damage control on this thread, I reached critical mass on my block list???

Just a reminder that there’s no particular reason why anybody should be expected to get into emotionally intimate conversations with strangers on the internet — I’ve gotten some weird guilt trips in this thread for maintaining personal boundaries, but uh...I don’t know you?

Okay muting this thread now! Thanks for reading & tell your cats & dogs I say hi!