Transmisogyny in Queer Spaces, and the Battle Between Genders: My Experience
written on 03/31/23
Ever since my experience in a certain server and leaving neocities due to not wanting to be associated with people like that, this is a topic that has been heavily on my mind. I thought that today being trans day of visibility, now would be as good a time as any to write about it.
I often look at posters, articles, and experiences from the trans community in the 90s, and think to myself of how much it's changed. At the time, it didn't matter what you called yourself, nor how you identified overall. People openly called themselves fagdykes, trannies, transsexuals, and whatever else came to mind, and often expressed open acceptance of each other no matter where they were in their journey. It's a beautiful thing to look back on for me, and something I become sad to realize is now viewed as wrong.
Nowadays, the lgbt community, especially the trans community, is incredibly divisive. There's an extreme amount of importance placed on what labels you use and whether you're usimg them "correctly," and what is an "acceptable" way to experience being trans, leading to constant infighting and constant splitting into groups. As this splitting grows, I continue to notice something incredibly disturbing: a strong divide being placed between transfems and transmascs, and encouraging seeing others as oppressors.
I certainly won't say I haven't experienced heavy transmisogyny in queer spaces, regardless of the gender of who was perpetrating it - and this has caused me to be very careful about what spaces I spend time in. I think a group is safe until J receive a comment about how a trans woman has been "socialized as a man," and therefore a cis woman is justified in insulting her. Until someone tries to engage me in some conspiracy about how transfems are overtaking the trans community and have an agenda against other trans people. Until I receive aggression from people for pointing out what I believe is transfem coding in media, or even just stating a headcanon. Until someone makes fun of a transfem for not appearing traditionally feminine, or for being too feminine, or just because they don't like them and therefore attack their appearance based on how it lives up to their standard of a woman.
Instances like this always hurt more when every day the news reports get worse. It seems like almost every week I have to see an article about another trans woman sued or accused of being a sexual predator, overall painting trans women as aggressive, lying, and preying, and trans people overall as untrustworthy and needing to be eradicated.
However, in recent times I've had to encounter a more unique form of transmisogyny, in the form of people telling me that transfems are oppressors of transmascs.
I was already familiar with this rhetoric from ages back, unfortunately. It always came in the form of trying to create a term for the unique oppression of transmascs and trans men to be the "opposite" of transmisogyny, and justifying why it was necessary. This never made sense to me - the purpose of the term "transmisogyny" was always just to describe the unique intersection of transphobia and misogyny, never to try and paint trans women and transfems as above other trans people. However, with the trans community becoming more and more divisive, this rhetoric has become more widespread. I even see the opposite: transfems on social media trying to combat this by painting every transmasc as a misogynist, and needing to "check" themselves in everything they say about transness or their own experiences.
Both sides make me sick, and both make me fear for the future of the queer community.
As it stands in America, where I currently live, trans rights have come under vicious attack. Sweeping attempts are being made to criminalize transitioning for everyone, and politicians are becoming more and more open about wanting to see the idea of being trans eradicated from the public. And yet, at times like this, people are more concerned about what labels make them the most righteous and how they can rally against others in the community instead of trying to comfort each other and find ways to stand together against the oppression many of us are facing.
I once again think back to the dynamics of the trans community in the 90s. Nothing was perfect back then, and nothing ever will be - but what I miss when reading about those times is the sense of solidarity. The idea that it didn't matter what labels others used or what their transition goals were or what their overall identity - what mattered was that everyone was trans, and therefore everyone stuck together.
To me, that is what needs to come back if we want to survive a modern wave of attack on the trans community. We need to remember to treat each other with love, and to drop label discourse and reinventing a men vs women debate to remember that we need each other now more than anything.
We cannot fight alone, and no trans person should ever be made to.
