[cw: transphobia, dysphoria, self-doubt, self-hatred, cissexist thinking, and, yes, I guess also Contrapoints]

So, here's a thing.

I guess let's start here, with this series of tweets.

Three tweets from Contra.

1) "This has happened to me before in hyperwoke spaces. Like it's me and a bunch of cis women and we all have to go in a circle saying 'she/her' because I'm there."

2) "There's this paradox where I can go to a sports bar in North Carolina and be miss/ma'am'd all night no question, but in self-consciously trans-inclusive spaces I have to explain my pronouns & watch woke people awkwardly correct themselves every time they say 'you guys.'"

3) "I guess it's good for people who use they/them only and want only gender neutral language. But it comes at the minor expense of semi-passable transes like me and that's super fucking hard for us."

Like, there's a lot fucking going on here.

The nakedly hateful fucking cynical sneering at "wokeness."

The use of the sports bar, specifically, as the go-to symbol for "real America."

"Normal people."

The way the two are played against each other,

the same way they would be in literally *any* other fucking reactionary opinion piece.

Like, there's just so fucking much being said here about who actually gets to count

as a real fucking person who matters.

Anyway, almost immediately, her move is to lash out at non-binary people,

for literally no fucking reason.

Like it's our fault a subset of cis people is being weird and cagey and passive-aggressive.

I mean, there aren't even non-binary people *in* this fucking scene.

But we exist.

Not here, but out there. Somewhere.

Theoretically.

And I guess that's enough.

The sheer fact that we *exist* is just fucking ruining everything for everybody.

Which is, shall we say, a running fucking theme for Contra.

All these weird, new, unknowable

non-binary people

showing up, taking over, derailing everything,

a swarming, invading force drowning out the "conventional binary transsexuals."

(I hear she's the last of them, you know).

Never mind the fact that we've always fucking been here.

She's got her fake fucking history.

It's all she fucking wants, and it's all she fucking needs.

And this is all stuff we've gone over at length before, but here's where we start digging deeper.

'Cause it's not just non-binary people she's kicking down at.

Not really.

Like, in terms of the actual, explicit, as-written text,

yeah, it's about those nasty they/thems and their gender-neutral language.

But, really, functionally, in practice,

it's *anyone* whose pronouns wouldn't be immediately guessable at a glance.

(Specifically, a glance through an extremely fucking cis-centric lens).

You know, she hates non-binary people as a matter of course, but she also, maybe even more deeply,

hates other binary trans women.

Trans women who have big feet,

or deep voices,

who get mad, or break down, or yell when they're being fucking traumatized.

Women who are too big, too loud, too hairy, too angry,

too much.

Same thing for binary trans men, ultimately.

Same fucking all-consuming obsession with this bullshit, hollow, fucking futile concept of passing.

cf. that whole thing about serial abuser Buck Angel became her own close personal hero

for the sole, fucking singular reason of passing so well.

Proving, in her mind, in her own words,

that not all trans people were "fucking delusional crazies."

Passing is all there is.

Passing makes you a good person, makes you real, makes you matter.

And if you don't,

or won't,

or can't "pass"

within the *extremely* fucking narrow,

violent fucking confines

of binary, ableist, white-centered beauty standards,

then, hey, fuck you.

But this thread isn't actually, mainly about her.

This is all just kind of setup and framing for the core idea, which is more of a personal thing for me.

A little while back, I updated my pronouns.

they/them -> they/she.

It was a good move.

It made me happy. It *makes* me happy.

Every day, I turn over just a little bit more about what this means to me, and why it matters.

Every day, or at least almost every day, some fucking desiccated piece of me

gets to live just a little bit bigger,

a little bit more.

Thing is, you know, time went by.

Days, and weeks, and whatever.

Time went by.

And no one fucking used the "she."

And I ended up in this place where I thought,

"The first time someone does it,

"I don't want it to be because I fucking asked them to."

Which is what made me start thinking about those old Contra tweets.

So, I started thinking about *why* people

who never missed a fucking beat with "they"

were dragging their feet with "she."

Which is where you start thinking Dysphoria Thoughts about your face,

and your voice,

and your body,

and you start thinking,

"No one is ever -- authentically, eagerly, organically -- going to think of me as a she."

And she's not even my main fucking pronoun.

Like, there's a reason I say "they/she" with "they" first.

"They" is where I live -- "she" is a fun vacation.

I don't need "she" all the time.

I wouldn't *want* it all the time if I had it.

I just want it once.

Once, without having to fucking beg.

Anyway, you know how the story ends?

It ends with me getting out of my own fucking head for a second,

thinking, "Hey, that's not fucking healthy or good,"

realizing I was in a fucking shit spiral,

getting in touch with a friend,

and quietly communicating my needs within our established boundaries.

And it was fucking fine.

[intermission -- need to clear my head a little, and then I'll come back and wrap this up]

Anyway.

So, like,

"I don't want to have to fucking beg" is an extremely understandable feeling to be having.

I was extremely fucking bitter, and sad, and mad,

and cloying, and needy,

and despairing fucking existentially,

and all of these things are *extremely* fucking rational, given the life I'd lived so far.

I wanted one (1) good thing.

Wholly good, and sweet, and wholesome,

and healing,

and I wanted it to come without me having to fucking beg for it.

Extremely fucking rational.

Extremely fucking real.

But what it comes down to is the fact that there's a difference between "rational" or "understandable"

and "grounded" or actually "healthy."

Basic communication isn't fucking begging.

It's understandable that it might *seem* that way in the heat of a nasty, complicated moment,

but it's fucking not.

And expecting someone to know what your needs are *without* ever communicating

is self-defeating and pointless.

The moment was not cheapened by the fact that I had to reach out to get there.

Nothing was undermined.

*I* wasn't undermined.

It was still fucking good.

Having to tell people what you want or what you need doesn't fucking undermine you.

People *asking* what you want or what you need doesn't fucking undermine you.

If they're shitty *about* it, then, yeah, that fucking sucks.

That's on them.

It's not a reason to throw a completely different, fucking unrelated group of people under the bus

in front of 700,000 people.

Like, it's such a fucking thing, man.

I've just been over this and over this and over this and over this,

around and around in my own fucking head.

Her tweets, my feelings.

The fact that,

for no fucking reason,

she went on this whole fucking rant

about non-binary people, and they/thems, and "gender-neutral language,"

and literally fucking *none* of that

has *anything*

to do

with fucking *anything*.

"Neutrality" was not a fucking factor.

Like, she seems to be thinking,

"Well, I guess we have to give our pronouns because of the sheer theoretical *possibility*

"that one of us might be a they/them,

"even though we all *clearly* look ~like women~."

But

that's not fucking unique to they/thems.

One of those "cis women" might have been a he/him.

Or a zie/zir.

Or literally fucking anything else.

You don't know *what* their fucking pronouns might be until you fucking ask them.

Because that's how this fucking works.

I'm sorry you fucking hate queerness so much that you apparently can't fucking stand that.

I mean,

you lash out at they/thems most explicitly,

but along the way,

you demonize self-ID,

you demonize clear communication,

you demonize vulnerability,

you demonize damned near *every* single fucking trans person on the face of the fucking planet,

*and* most gnc cis people.

Like,

for fuck's sake,

even the concept of "neutrality" is bigger,

and richer,

and more complicated than she gives it credit for.

'Cause the fact is,

you don't know *what* feelings or concepts are baked into someone's pronouns

until you fucking ask them.

You don't know *what* they're bringing to the table if you're not willing to fucking discuss it.

There's just

There's just so much fucking happening here,

so much fucking vastness,

that her outlook literally does not allow.

And it just makes everyone miserable.

And she's not the only one.

She's just the biggest,

the loudest,

the least subtle,

and the most broadly visible,

which is why she's my example.

why can't we just be better about this