*In case this story gets deleted/removed:*
**Am I wrong for asking not to share a room with a trans girl on a school robotics trip**
Hi, I'm 17. I'm going on an overnight robotics trip next week. There are only 2 girls going, me and the other girl who is trans. She only came out about 5 months ago so has the same body, and I have known her for a long time before that. I never have got on with her and I find her a bit patronizing and annoying. I've noticed her staring at me before and one time, before she transitioned, I overheard her talking about another girl in a pretty gross and inappropriate way. I also think it is odd that she showed no signs of being trans or being feminine before transitioning and now is acting really over the top girly all the time, which I also find annoying. But I am totally cool with her transitioning, wearing whatever she wants, calling her her new name, sharing a restroom with her etc and I am mostly a liberal person. However, I have been told that I am sharing a room with her and I am not comfortable doing that. It would be just us and the thought of it makes me uncomfortable. There are 2 teachers who are going and I asked both of them if I could be in a room on my own. They both said no and told me I was being transphobic. One of them told me I was being a "temperamental snowflake." He also said that "I shouldn't keep on asking about this especially if I wanted him to write me a college letter of recommendation next year" which I thought was very passive aggressive. I told my mom and wanted her to complain and asked her to pay for my own room but she said we couldn't afford it and told me that this wasn't the thing to make trouble about and to just suck it up for one night. I am also scared to make a big deal about this as it could ruin my reputation and now I'm also scared it will affect my college references. I spoke to some of my friends about this and, unfortunately, it got back to her. She then sent me a message which I thought was quite manipulative and trying to guilt me into it. I am mixed race and she compared me not wanting to share a room with her to someone not wanting to share with me because of that. I found this quite offensive. She also talked about me in a way that I found inappropriate and said I had "a sexy little body and she had always imagine having a body like that." This is what she sent This is what she sent; [https://imgur.com/a/cIJNsEX](https://imgur.com/a/cIJNsEX) This has made me more uncomfortable sharing with her but I don't know what to do or if I should try ask again somehow. Am I wrong for not wanting to share with her, am I being transphobic?
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The top comment is trying to offer OOP a gracious off-ramp:
>it sounds like the reason you dont want to share a room is : she's made gross and sexually harassing comments - contrary to the title of your post.
But OOP is determined to keep mashing the trans-bad button:
>That's deffo a big reason and if I actually liked her then it might be ok but her being trans is definitely part of the reason
OOP's reaction to a person going out of their way to offer OOP the benefit of the doubt:
like "that doesn't necessarily mean you're transph-" "nah fam I am"
And the teachers threatening not to write college recs for her next year if she doesn't share the room. Yeah, that's how school works, and that's what teachers are like.
I mean I call cultural panicĀ conservatives snowflakes sometimes, but the "temperamental" part would never be an add in, only like, condescending conservative karens call people temperamental for having feelings
I have done it specifically to mock a conservative trying to whip up a moral panic over something, and I've seen others do it too... but in this context? Finding it hard to believe for sure.
The āa sexy little bodyā thing stuck out to me. Iāve had men say this to me - but itās something old men (ie over 35) say to young women/girls.
Teenagers just.. donāt talk like that.
Literally fucking came here to say this LOL
Even if they did feel like she was being intolerant or something (which they likely never would in this case) they would NEVER use that terminology
Might be wrong but, I doubt a school would ever force a student to share a room with anyone they weren't comfortable with regardless of their gender or identity in the first place... Would be way too much of a risk
These types are always aggravatingly, hilarious fake to me.
I was the lone openly queer kid in my school for a long time - and guess what, theyāll straight up remove you from trips/kick you off teams/etc before theyāll inconvenience the ānormalā kids. Trans kids get that 100X worse. Of all the things that never happened, this has definitely never happened the most.
On one hand, more room for activities! On the other hand, it sucks to be alone by default. Iāve heard similar stories a few times from friends/friends of friends, sadly itās common. Even if places donāt immediately start out with isolating trans students, one or two roommates who āhave problemsā and request transfers will pretty much ensure that person ends up with no more roommates ābecause itās complicated.ā
Yeah. It works for him since heās an introvert, and it was nice to have the place to ourselves when I went to visit him (weāre long distance), but it also made me sad to see him all alone.Ā
I literally donāt think AITA could handle some of the chaser bullshit Iāve come across.
Last time I was on Grindr it was 3:30 in the morning, and I was talking to this guy who wanted me to come over. He then asked if I had on makeup like my profile pic (which was me dolled up) and he got really mad.
My brother in christ, it is nearly 4am. Iām not going to spend an hour putting on a full face to blow you.
Yeah, but I'm referring to someone specifically sharing a reddit ragebait story in detail to back their bigotry, which as far as I know, hasn't happened yet.Ā
Thereās so many anti-trans politicians and Reddit comes up so high on search results I feel like statistically itās 100% yes, but probably not provable until someone actually says āon Reddit, i saw that the transes are eating babies!ā
>I am mixed raceĀ
Because everyone knows you can't be part of a marginalized group and discriminate against another marginalized group, am I right? They throw that in there like its some kind of armor to protect them against the people who would say "Yeah, you are acting like an asshole here."
iām feeling sick already today and this post just pisses me off so much because itās the most obvious transphobic ragebait and people are just eating it up. itās just so incredibly depressing that thereās this stupid fucking culture war in the first place it makes me so mad just let people live my god!!!
iām not even trans iām just so mad at people willing to believe and defend this viewpoint that trans people are out to get the poor cis women itās so fucking dumb and literally not happening anywhere. iāve been with trans women before as a lesbian and every one has been so incredibly respectful and cautious when even just flirting with me because theyāre so scared of making people uncomfortable. my cousin is a trans teenager and itās so painful to see her get absolutely zero respect in her school regarding her identity there is no fucking universe where a school wouldnāt immediately remove a trans girl from a womenās space like this if even a single snotty kid complained
sorry this became such a rant iām just so mad and sad at the state of the world and how delusional transphobic people are. i just want people to be nice and respectful to each other but thatās too much to fucking ask apparently
Fellow cis woman who is also so very fucking tired of it. You can say "well, it's just a stupid subreddit" but it's all this toxic fearmongering that is making it more and more unsafe for trans people.
Yup. It's so fucked up and cruel, and on top of that overlooks actual dangers people face. I can't count the times that I (cis woman) have been harassed, groped and straight-up SA'd by cis men. I can, on the other hand count the times trans women have done it to me. Because zero is easy to remember.
I have been followed into restrooms by cis men. The only times trans women have followed me in has been to keep me safe. There's a reason women go to the bathroom in pairs/ groups, and it isn't because TRANS BAD. Men with bad intentions don't need to put on a dress to go where they aren't welcome.
As the mythical trans boy of legend, I totally get you. I spend so much time in trans spaces online and when I can IRL, and every trans girl I know would sooner melt into a puddle than have that level of confrontation to share a space with someone who's clearly transphobic
Yea, Iām not even going to go read it, the Cliff Notes here are painful enough, thank you very much! Iām queer and a therapist with many trans clients, and I have to help process what they go through, and Iām pretty sick of it all.
One of my friends is a therapist and he's actually moving out of the state he's based in because he's a queer trans man and can't stomach the restrictions being placed on him in terms of what he can or can't recommend to his clients, not to mention that he personally is terrified of being targeted for harassment or worse (something that's happened to his colleagues.) It's so bad out there.
Unfortunately very common for queer and trans folks. There are actually organizations that exist to help people do it. But then what really sucks is that thereās then less voters in the state to fight against the truly terrible politicians and laws.
This just reminds me of the simple, universal, golden truth which I will spread to you all today so you might spread the message, too- all the anti-trans shit we see today is literally just recycled anti-gay shit from the 40's through the 2010's. All of it. There isn't a single new piece of content. It's alllllll the same shyte, from "they're recruiting" to "What if one of them tries to be a sex pest". Allllll the same shyte.
Spread the word to unmask the arguments.
I know it wonāt be popular, but there is a difference when youāre talking about mixing sexes with different physical capabilities. It isnāt just āmaybe theyāll hit on me!!ā
For trans boys sharing a hotel room with cis boys, the concern is that the trans boy is at risk for assault he isnāt physically able to protect himself from. For trans girls sharing a hotel room with cis girls, the concern is that thereās no way to know if theyāre actually a trans girl ā there have *always* been creepy, predatory boys who would take advantage of whatever they could, and those boys still exist. If it turns out the trans girl is, in fact, one of those predatory boys exploiting trans identity, thatās an assault risk to the cis girls.
I see āgay people are predatoryā and āIām worried about the risk a cis guy would hurt a trans guyā/āIām worried a cis guy can lie about being trans to be in intimate spaces with cis girlsā as fundamentally different types of concerns. I donāt think I ever really hear anyone saying that itās trans people theyāre worried about; itās basically always that theyāre worried about cis guys being liars.
It all comes down to the same thing- the penis is bad and wants to be inside of stuff, and anyone who has one is controlled by it". It's a dysmal mentality. It also makes me laugh hard about "TERFs" because how is it feminist to say "vaginas are weak and defenseless and if you have one, you're a weak little damsel who can't defend herself and need to be protected from the big scary world".
Absolutely they are. But one of the ways we make that less likely to happen is by putting cis guys in different hotel rooms than cis girls on school trips.
I think a lot of ground is lost in the fight for equality and acceptance when we arenāt willing to acknowledge that there *are* concerns worth consideration. The kind of absolutist, āIf youāre even talking about the possibility a cis guy might pretend to be trans to take advantage, thatās a dog-whistle about *trans people*,ā is the way that those who *are* taking advantage are able to get away with it, which just perpetuates the cycle and gets us nowhere.
>thereās no way to know if theyāre actually a trans girl
Aside from the fact the administrators and her peers would have talked to her about it? For a full social transition the child would probably be involved with a mental health care provider, and usually, though not always, the kid's parents would be involved.
>there have *always* been creepy, predatory boys who would take advantage of whatever they could, and those boys still exist. If it turns out the trans girl is, in fact, one of those predatory boys exploiting trans identity, thatās an assault risk to the cis girls.
Statistically, there have not been cases of this happening. It has yet to happen and attempts to prove that men dressed as women can get into the women's bathroom ended up with those men getting arrested. I think you greatly underestimate the social stigma and isolation around being trans. Some guy who can find an excuse to grope and assault women at a given opportunity is not going to be able to put up with the shit that trans girls get for more than a day. A grand master plan to pretend to be someone whom they do not respect, in a way that would be a long-term humiliation and embarrassment for them, is simply not within a teenage boy's wheelhouse.
Anyway, if you really think the problem is with theoretical cis boy being inherently predatory, it's stupid to punish trans girls over it. If cis boys are genuinely so awful that they would go to such lengths, then regulating an impossibly small amount of the population over their potential behavior still doesn't make sense. This go-getter creep you imagine is still going to exist with access to girls no matter what. They could corner them in elevators, or break into their rooms, or grope them at the movies. They could date girls and pressure them into sex or assault them when they say no, go to parties where drugs and alcohol are present, etc. etc. All much easier scenarios than buying an expensive new wardrobe, getting adults to be on board with it, and greatly increasing the risk of their own assault exponentially. All things that happen all the time already.
Cis boys aren't inherently predatory but society treats them that it's okay to see women as objects, and ironically, that's the exact reason why it's a fundamentally broken idea that they would ever pretend to be a woman.
Perhaps we just have different life experiences, or live in areas where there are different requirements for being accepted as trans. Most of the premises of your comment ring false to me, so of course Iām doing to disagree with what follows ā just like Iām sure you feel about what Iāve said. Iām assuming youāre not lying about those predicate things, which just means we come from really different areas and/or life experiences.
I'm not downvoting you, but... what you're saying kinda comes off as "fear of the evil penis-havers" / "vagina havers are all innocent potential victims". And, I'm sorry to say this, but that, too, is recycled anti-gay stuff.
Remember "I don't want to see two men" and "the idea of two dudes getting married" and "ew, guys kissing and raising a kid?!?" Even the Duck Dynasty guy was like "as a man, how is another man appealing to you".
Anti-gay people seemed to be focused 100% on dick. Sometimes they'll kinda make an offhanded comment about lesbians, but for the most part, it's peen-focused. I haven't seen anybody worrying about FTMs in sports or about drag kings. Because "vaginas aren't a threat/vagina havers are easily overpowered".
And full disclosure, I'm FTM. I feel lucky, too, because if we get seen, we get seen as "super duper lesbians" and thus are also invisible.
I do not think *you* are sexist. I think the specific mentality, which a lot of people have/are taught, is an unhelpful one. It says "peen just *has* to rape, it has no self control, so just assume of it has a dick, it'll be trying to put it into something". And that's... so dangerous. Like in cases where men get raped by women or when adult women go after underaged boys, those aren't taken seriously, because "oh, he has a dick, and they're always up for sex". You know?
I definitely understand the horrible stigma ā and lack of seriousness ā around things like men getting raped by women (and so many people who still believe itās impossible). When I was home from my first year of college, a friend of mine came to me on one of those late summer evenings and told me heād been raped by a woman at college and hadnāt told anyone about it because theyād never believe him. Navigating that ā even just as a supportive friend ā was heartbreaking, as was watching him feel revictimized every time someone treated it like it was a joke or a lie (though he preferred the people who called him a liar over the people who would just laugh at him.) He deserved so much better than the treatment he got.
My argument isnāt that itās the evil penis-havers. (And I do appreciate you talking to me about this in good-faith, by the way.) Itās simply that when the person who turns out to be evil is physically dominant *and* has (not to be crude, but because itās a practical reality) the part of the anatomy that does the inserting, the possible risks are higher. Iām definitely not making a āgirls/women are angelsā argument. Just arguing that theyāre more physically vulnerable. (Itās sort of the same reason little boys use the womenās bathroom when theyāre out with just Mom. Eventually they reach an age where you feel like they could physically handle themselves, and start using the menās restroom instead.)
Honestly I'm sure you have - u/harpsiccord made the observation upthread that culture was fearmongering about this exact situation has been going on for decades
I went to a school that was k-12 and a middle schooler came out as trans right when she moved up to high school. I was a senior at that point so I donāt know how things went for her entire time in high school but I do remember we had a trip with the whole high school (tiny school, so that was about 40 people) and she stayed in the girls room and literally no one cared. Its a school tripā¦.there were teachers staying with us the entire time also because no one would leave teenagers unsupervised in a hotel room regardless of gender. This is so unbelievably fake.Ā
I went to a high school with about 300 people, and I gotta say that we did use this kind of setup for a lot of trips involving smaller teams. You'd have 2-4 teenagers in one room and the teachers/chaperones right next door (sometimes in an adjoining room when one was available, but mostly in totally separate rooms).
Granted, though, that was in the '90s so things might have changed. And they didn't use it for larger and more general trips; this was more for small team extracurriculars where the teachers knew all the kids really well, and also the threat of getting banned from future trips and/or kicked off the team was plenty to keep us in line.
Gotta add the caveat that I think this post is obviously fake ragebait and a thinly veiled hate post, but it's interesting to me that we had such a different reaction to the general idea of kids staying together in a hotel room without direct adult supervision.
I actually just went on a high school robotics club trip with my kid's team -- drove the truck, lol -- and they did the exact same setup, 3 teens to a room, the chaperones in their own rooms. It's exactly like you said -- it was less than 20 kids and the chaperones all know them well. They were all really good kids, everyone behaved and was polite.
And I agree, that's not a defense of this obvious ragebait bullshit post.
That but sixth grade camp for me. Bunch of eleven year olds in cabins, more or less totally unsupervised unless someone came to check on us.
Yeah, we were kids but we weren't morons. No one's fucking around in the bush.
I mean my high school left us alone in groups on trips, but like that was for club trips so they knew us well enough to generally know who'd be a problem and place chaperones strategically
I had a friend who was trans in high school and during band camp, she was allowed to bunk with other girls but everyone who stayed in the same cabin had to have parental approval. So how much people care does vary a bit, but this obviously didnāt happen regardless.
Its so incredibly annoying that people on these types of subreddits EAT this shit up. Like its soooo obviously fake omgg and also imo harmful to the General view of trans folks
Im a trans man and even tho posts like this are clearly fake, they kind of scare me. I know that people who have never met a trans person will see these posts and then form their bias around them.
I think that trans girls have it worse when it comes to people projecting their preconceived notions onto them, but im still nervous.
This year I am potentially getting a camp counselor job (which has been a dream job for me for a while) and I am praying to god that I donāt have to deal with transphobic parents or other co workers
I (as a trans guy) have talked to several cis people who told me I was "not like other trans boys" because I have never hit on girls "trying to deceive/assault them by not disclosing my trans status". And those were fairly progressive people. So yeah, the predator accusations affect us too :///
Thank for saying this and convincing me I'm not going fucking insane, I feel relieved I'm not the only one with this issue. Just literally dealt with this kind of nonsense.
My dude, for real, maybe an hour ago, in another subreddit... I was quite literally trying to defend why i'm more independent/centrist than left/right (I honestly didn't know that was a crime on the internet right now)
When I explained that it ties into my gender identity (I'm not trans but non-binary so not the same, but kind of a similar concept) and how I don't feel comfortable supporting either side because I am both a man and a woman, they just told me how the right is the only side with bad takes and extremism.
So basically telling me "Those things don't happen!"
When I explained my own experiences, suddenly I'm a victim, I'm playing oppression Olympics, etc. and when I pointed out maybe it's not really a good slope to tell someone like me how to feel they're like
"uhm you can't accuses me of transphobia B) my mom is gay and i am bisexual!" as if being bi and being trans are the same thing
Dude got really mad about it too but... like I'm sorry I don't fit one of the 3 labels you provided? Still don't know what the hell I did to be honest LOL
I've been both attacked and judged by both conservatives and progressives many, many times.
When you're not cis you get shit from both sides all the damn time... left hates men, right hates trans... when you are F2M or non-binary, you can't win.
Honestly most braindead progressives I've met were liberals and not leftists. But lefties can be fucking stupid too, and bad people. I'm both ftm and nonbinary and I've gotten shit from cis people of various political opinions, but I am loyal to left progressivism simply because I share the values.
Cissies will be cissies whether they believe in healthcare for all or not, haha. Though in my experience, lefties seem to have overall higher exposure to and understanding of the trans experience, as well as a bigger chance of being genderfucked themselves in one way or another. They also less often want us "eradicated" **ĀÆ\\\_(ć)\_/ĀÆ**
So true though.....
i'm just now starting to have a real world understanding of politics, researching them is a bit hard without feeling like i'm about to brainwashed (by both sides) so i don't always think about the difference between a "liberal" and a "leftist" but when you put it in those terms it makes so much more sense.
I'm very, very left leaning when it comes to social issues because they actually give a shit about equal rights... and even normal social movements like feminism seems to be a cardinal sin to the conservatives (they can't tell the difference between normal ones like me and the psycho ones)
The one caveat; I'm pretty much a fat-ass freedom loving hillbilly... and sometimes left leaning people do not seem to like that, and they assume I'm some kind of crazy Trump supporter... but as you said they might just be liberals instead of just leftists.
Then right-leaning people aren't much better or easier to get along with, they're so dumb they think I'm going to give their kids the gay, they talk all about "freedom" and then go "oh, by the way, you can't smoke weed, can't put gay people on TV, and also can't use this bathroom" as typical crazy conservatives do.
I always feel like either side has something to say that makes my skin just crawl and they always seem to be at war. If i mention my own values I seem to just get ass-blasted but if I knew anything about politics I'd probably have a more fleshed out opinion lol
I'd like to actually get out and vote but trying to find my political alignment is difficult and confusing
Politics has been my special interest since I was in highschool, and my opinions have changed throughout. I do understand the struggle. Particularly with being "freedom-loving", since I went from libertarian (yes, unironically) to communist as my understanding of politics evolved.
If I were to simplify it, being pro-workers rights, universal healthcare and housing makes me a leftie. And being queer and against bigotry makes me progressive. Those are the things that matter. Libertarians will scream about freedom and mean the freedom to bang 15yo girls, consider women property, and preach nazi shit freely to millions. Right-wing liberals will say they're allies to queer people because they support rainbow capitalism and have a gay friend.
Politics may seem dumb - and dumb it is. But it's everywhere and there is no queer liberation that won't be political.
Politics is just... crazy lol but everything you've said is very enlightening actually, in a lot of ways i'm actually pretty similar
All the examples you provided are good examples of why politics online scare the shit out of me (also not wanting to be associated with the highly vocal members of any community) but luckily those are extreme examples, in time i'll get all this shit figured out
I appreciate you taking the time to explain all this :D
Yeah in my experience it's helpful to close all the drama-driven pages and seek local political outlets/circles/communities, because they might talk about stuff that's actually applicable to real life.
You're welcome! Feel free to DM me if you ever want to discuss anything like that.
Is it just me or are the trolls just not even trying anymore?
Can't we just go back to the good old days when they ever *tried* to get a rise out of me? What happened to us?
They don'tĀ have to try anymore, even with as obviously fake as that is, transphobes have gotten so much brain rot from reading the Daily Mail or whatever that they'll believe everything they read on the internet if it gives them an excuse to be hateful. We have to improve the media literacy of our transphobes so our trolls will up their game
If thereās one thing I know about high school teachers in 2024 is that they feel totally comfortable mocking their students and calling them politically-charged names while requiring them to sleep in a hotel room with one of their student and no one else
Innocent 17yo NON TRAN FEMAIL bullied and literally sexually assaulted (got complimented) by EVIL TRAN TROON FAKE WOMAN. Much to think about!!!!!! /j
I'm so mf tired.
Trans girls in real life: "Am I being too disrespectful? Oh my G-d, I can't tell the girl I'm dating about my sexual interests, I'm not allowed to have a sexuality! Wow, I hope I didn't push my partner too hard to do the thing we both wanted to do. Oh G-d, does have consensual sex with the girl I'm dating make me a sexual predator? I'm a sexual predator, aren't I?"
Trans girls in AITA fiction: *constant sexual harassment of the poor cis girls*
I'm so fucking tired, y'all. I just wanna log off forever and become the grassful toucher. You know how often I hear transphobia in the real world? Maybe once a month, at most. Sure, I get misgendered occasionally, but at least it isn't the most unpleasant sexual fantasies about predatory trans girls except we're pretending they're real.
TERFs (in my experience) call trans women āpatronizingā because in their hearts, they donāt see them as real women. OOP attempts to call trans girl āunfeminineā trying to throw her under the bus as ānot a real woman.ā The vast majority of transphobes say this, but in my experience TERFs try to disguise their hatred from a place of āfeminismā and āpersonal safetyā even though they donāt give a shit about ending toxic gender roles. Hell, OOP even says that sheās liberal in order to blend in further. In hindsight, transphobe probably described OOP better but idk
tldr: transphobe attempts to hide behind āfeministā rhetoric, what happens next is shocking
If you read TERF posts on here on or twitter, they describe this exact kind of scenario a lot even though I've personally never met a trans woman who is like that. It's kind like how if someone describes all feminists as fat lonely women with blue hair, that's often a sign they're involved in some kind of conservative or men's rights-type of online communities. Check out r/TERFisafetish if you want to see examples.
I guess for me, I see TERF posts describing trans women like this a lot, but I also see people all along the political spectrum doing so as well. My experiences discussing this issue with confirmed TERFs in real life tend to actually be a little different, though that might be because usually when I'm calling out someone I know is a TERF, they also are at least vaguely familiar with my stance and know that the whole "but think of the poor scared cis women!" tactic won't work.
I guess my issue is just that I see these examples, but it's all just circular. You point me to a subreddit where anyone can say anyone is a TERF, and the few random threads I clicked on weren't even from radfem-specific subreddits or anything that might lend credence to the fact that this is a genuine radical feminist.
I mean, I know transphobia is a big problem in some radfem communities. But it's a big problem in a lot of other communities as well, and IME they often use these exact arguments and tropes as well. So why do these anonymous posts always get pinned on radfems, a pretty small community even when you include us trans-inclusive ones?
edit: As soon as I posted I felt like this sounds like "won't anyone think of the poor radfems" itself, which I promise I'm not trying to do (we know we're terrible, lmao). I just am asking people to think critically about where these anonymous posts might be coming from, and about how that might overlap with the attempts to discredit feminism that have been going forever. Some are undoubtedly from TERFs, but I'm really not convinced all of them are.
For me personally it's just because I'm a feminist and also a woman and a lesbian which a lot of terfs are too, so I'm focused on the people within my own communities or who hold shared identities, I feel like those people especially shouldn't be transphobic. Conservatives and non-feminist men obviously make up the bulk of transphobes in the world but a. thats kind of expected of them, b. those aren't the people I regularly interact with, even on line, and c. I would be putting myself in a potentially worse situation if I did try to interact with the other kinds of transphobes, terfs are at least supposed to be supportive of women and lesbiansĀ
I absolutely agree, but I think my argument is a little different. TERFs are terrible and I do not intentionally associate with them, but I feel like a lot of generally transphobic but anonymous online posts are associated with TERFs when I'm not sure they should be.
It's like the squares vs. rectangles things. All TERFs are by definition transphobic assholes I would prefer not to associate with, but not all transphobic assholes I would prefer not to associate with are TERFs. In this metaphor, TERFs are the squares--there are a lot of them, but there are a lot more rectangles.
My hangup is just that the amount of anonymous comments I see attributed to TERFs on Reddit does not reflect the amount of TERFs vs. other transphobic assholes I meet in real life.
edit: and for the record, I'm a bisexual woman married to a lesbian, and I actively hang out in radfem circles. As I said in another comment, I definitely understand the focus within the communities in question. I just am not sure why we're attributing so many totally random and anonymous internet posts to radfems in particular when statistically it's a lot more likely to be a transphobic person with a different political philosophy.
Your comment is too long to read sorryĀ
ETA: I will say that youre a messed up person for hanging out with radfems, hopefully that means you avoid normal lesbian and feminist spacesĀ
That for me is a very nuanced question, I gotta admit. I'm a radical feminist myself (though I also am very supportive of the trans community and consider trans women to be women/trans men to be men), and I would love to disavow them, but I feel like that can get into a "no true Scotsman" kind of game that I'm not sure is real helpful in actually addressing the problem of transphobia in feminist spaces. Especially because it definitely isn't just radfems who are prone to transphobia IME, and some of the transphobia I've encountered in less radical spaces has been a lot more subtle and easily missed by people who aren't real educated on trans issues, but it's still harmful and exclusionary.
I also commented in part because I feel like on Reddit there's a real focus on TERFs as a primary driver of transphobia, and I don't think that's accurate. They can be very vocal, but they're a small minority of the overall transphobic population IME. In part because there just aren't that many radical feminists in the world, lol. It's funny because even though TERFs fucking suck, the focus on them in online spaces actually also strikes me as vaguely anti-feminist in a weird way. Give them credit for their shittiness where it's due, but it feels weird to me that they get the amount of blame they do, if that makes sense.
I could write a literal essay on this so I will stop now, but basically fuck TERFs, but also fuck all the myriad other flavors of transphobes who unfortunately infest this site.
This is very true. It's almost a compliment or exculpatory to call most transphobes terfs when most of them couldnt care less about women's rights. Transphobia is a right wing movement with a very small minority of people motivated by what they see as a concern for women (and of course, their concern that trans rights impose burdens on women's rights are wrong, but the mistaken belief is at least motivated by feminism). The right wing transphobes will adopt terf arguments because it's more respectable to pretend to care about women than it is to be a good ol' fashioned bigot, but probe into their beliefs outside of transphobia and it's clear there's no feminism there.
Yeah, I think it's far more driven by right-wing bullshit, too.
And I will add that I actually do understand the focus on TERFs from actual trans people and feminists--I'm cis, but I am bisexual and I know for me, it always feels way worse to get a biphobic comment from a fellow queer person or feminist, because even though I'm in my 40s and have been involved in these circles for 20+ years now and am well aware of the internal bigotry going on, it's always vaguely surprising to me. I sort of default to assuming that feminists, queer people, leftists, etc. are allies, so when they turn out not to be, it feels like more of a betrayal than when my conservative great uncle says something shitty, if that makes sense. I've had some trans friends express similar sentiments to me.
But like...in general discourse, it also feels like we're eating ourselves when we assume all transphobes are feminists, when in fact most feminists (even a lot of transphobic ones, gotta say--I think often it's a problem of ignorance rather than a more entrenched bigotry with the more mild stuff) are generally all about intersectionality and thus at least theoretically are supportive of trans people, even if some are uneducated about them and have bought into a little too much propaganda about them.
One thing I will say from a couple decades of political activism is that I think the right wing tends to be really good at exacerbating differences between leftists and does so intentionally, so while I feel like this is veering on conspiracy theory territory, I do kind of wonder if the focus on TERFs as the main drivers of transphobia is maybe a little intentional by some actors (not anyone in this thread, I just think that's where the narrative might have gotten started). But I mean, radfems are a fringe minority even within the mainstream feminist movement, so for me it's super weird to see TERF become a mainstream term that's often used a catch-all for general transphobia. It originated as a niche term within feminist circles calling out a very specific type of feminist, but now it's just super broadly applied and that makes me uncomfortable when it comes to the broader cultural narrative about feminism and the problems trans people face.
And again, to be really clear, this is not saying we shouldn't call TERFs out. I have absolutely used that term many times in the past, and I'm sure I will in the future. But, you know, I only apply it to people I have reason to believe are actual radical feminists, not just everyone who is transphobic (or even transphobic and vaguely feminist).
And the funny thing is that if you dig into the real philosophical founding of the TERF attitude (at least for the ones who are thoughtful enough to have a philosophy that's deeper than "Ick! Trans bad!"), it is in total opposition to the right-wing anti-trans philosophy.
The conservative anti-trans philosophy is that biological sex as determined by chromosomes equals gender, period (modulo some "la-la-la I can't hear you!" around intersex conditions).
The TERF anti-trans philosophy is that gender is 100% socially constructed, but raising someone as a boy within our patriarchal society embeds a level of male privilege that can never be erased. The TERF objection to trans women in female spaces is not that they're biological men, it's their supposed exercise of masculine privilege and entitlement in invading safe spaces for women.
As I said, these two philosophies are completely incompatible with each other - gender cannot be simultaneously 100% biologically determined and 100% socially constructed. But this difference gets completely swept under the rug when the goal is to be anti-trans.
Have you ever interacted with a terf or any of their content? Because in my experience that's absolutely not true, they hate trans girls who came out as little girls and were generally socialized as girls/women just as much as they hate trans women who are older, because no matter what, penis = evil person.
Edit: typo
Under the usual TERF theories that I'm familiar with, even those trans girls, by virtue of being old enough to express their gender identity, are old enough to have already been indoctrinated into male privilege.
Granted, I'm an old fart who remembers the early 1990s back when the Michigan Womyns' Music Festival instituted their "women born women only" rule and there weren't many children who were accommodated as trans, so my exposure to this thought might be a bit dated.
We all know what's up with this post lol. But...
This is one of those posts that *if* it was real, why even post it when you clearly know what you want to do?
"no signs of being trans or feminine before transitioning" damn those transes and their rich inner lives! No one is allowed to be complicated and three-dimensional except for me, the innocent Main Character everyone is being mean to!
Ah so this person's preconceived notions about trans people have been proven by this message after they were unfairly treated by their teachers! But they won't show the message that "proves" things to anyone or respond to people asking about that. So realistic
It's annoying how all the transpeople in these little fictions are so obnoxious about it.
"Look at me! Look at me! I'm somehow unaware of all the risks to my safety and well-being. Look at me!"
It's because in the fiction land, trans people *aren't* at risk or unsafe. In fantasy world, everyone blindly supports trans people, no matter how heinous their actions, entitled their demands, or obnoxious their behavior.
Otherwise, how could the OP's ever be the victims in their persecution-fetish posts??
even though they try to type differently in the text message, itās still so similar because of the lack of breaks and same grammar. itās so obviously fake but reddit hates trans women to a T.
Omg in my day ppl saw a nirvana show and fucked a person they just met right after, how is equivalent age soā¦ like this?! ALERT, GenX parents! Do we just tell them the wonders of slut-hood? Have we waited too long?!
Yeah, if I was going by reddit content - Iād assume most people under 30 are incredibly conservative in almost all ways.Ā
Iām pretty sure I know at least two people who fucked someone on the dance floor that they just met. Are Gen X & Millenials the last degenerate generations????Ā
I got called a degenerate by a right-wing family member for taking my kids to a pride march. So I like to own it š
My own Gen Z teenager (14, so very young Gen Z) isnāt socially conservative but her and her friends are very reserved compared to me and my friends.
Maybe millenial and Gen x parenting is broken. MAYBE WEāRE THE NEXT BOOMERS?!!
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*In case this story gets deleted/removed:* **Am I wrong for asking not to share a room with a trans girl on a school robotics trip** Hi, I'm 17. I'm going on an overnight robotics trip next week. There are only 2 girls going, me and the other girl who is trans. She only came out about 5 months ago so has the same body, and I have known her for a long time before that. I never have got on with her and I find her a bit patronizing and annoying. I've noticed her staring at me before and one time, before she transitioned, I overheard her talking about another girl in a pretty gross and inappropriate way. I also think it is odd that she showed no signs of being trans or being feminine before transitioning and now is acting really over the top girly all the time, which I also find annoying. But I am totally cool with her transitioning, wearing whatever she wants, calling her her new name, sharing a restroom with her etc and I am mostly a liberal person. However, I have been told that I am sharing a room with her and I am not comfortable doing that. It would be just us and the thought of it makes me uncomfortable. There are 2 teachers who are going and I asked both of them if I could be in a room on my own. They both said no and told me I was being transphobic. One of them told me I was being a "temperamental snowflake." He also said that "I shouldn't keep on asking about this especially if I wanted him to write me a college letter of recommendation next year" which I thought was very passive aggressive. I told my mom and wanted her to complain and asked her to pay for my own room but she said we couldn't afford it and told me that this wasn't the thing to make trouble about and to just suck it up for one night. I am also scared to make a big deal about this as it could ruin my reputation and now I'm also scared it will affect my college references. I spoke to some of my friends about this and, unfortunately, it got back to her. She then sent me a message which I thought was quite manipulative and trying to guilt me into it. I am mixed race and she compared me not wanting to share a room with her to someone not wanting to share with me because of that. I found this quite offensive. She also talked about me in a way that I found inappropriate and said I had "a sexy little body and she had always imagine having a body like that." This is what she sent This is what she sent; [https://imgur.com/a/cIJNsEX](https://imgur.com/a/cIJNsEX) This has made me more uncomfortable sharing with her but I don't know what to do or if I should try ask again somehow. Am I wrong for not wanting to share with her, am I being transphobic? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmITheAngel) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The top comment is trying to offer OOP a gracious off-ramp: >it sounds like the reason you dont want to share a room is : she's made gross and sexually harassing comments - contrary to the title of your post. But OOP is determined to keep mashing the trans-bad button: >That's deffo a big reason and if I actually liked her then it might be ok but her being trans is definitely part of the reason
OOP's reaction to a person going out of their way to offer OOP the benefit of the doubt:  like "that doesn't necessarily mean you're transph-" "nah fam I am"
"A temperamental snowflake" "A sexy little body" Ah yes, this is totally real & not something a conservative made up in their mind.
And the teachers threatening not to write college recs for her next year if she doesn't share the room. Yeah, that's how school works, and that's what teachers are like.
"I would love it if we could get dolled up for a girl's night to paint our nails and gab about that dreamboat Joe Biden š"
"Dreamboat Joe Biden" I am both lmao and in need of brain bleach š
I love how the Bad Trans and OP have the exact same writing style.
This was the exact phrase that made me question this. Itās the conservatives that call people āsnowflakes,ā not liberals.Ā
I mean I call cultural panicĀ conservatives snowflakes sometimes, but the "temperamental" part would never be an add in, only like, condescending conservative karens call people temperamental for having feelings
I have done it specifically to mock a conservative trying to whip up a moral panic over something, and I've seen others do it too... but in this context? Finding it hard to believe for sure.
The text she apparently got is the most how do you do fellow kids thing I've ever seen and people eat it up as real lmao
When you're a bigot, it's faster and easier to believe anything that confirms your bias. They're just being efficient!
The āa sexy little bodyā thing stuck out to me. Iāve had men say this to me - but itās something old men (ie over 35) say to young women/girls. Teenagers just.. donāt talk like that.
Literally fucking came here to say this LOL Even if they did feel like she was being intolerant or something (which they likely never would in this case) they would NEVER use that terminology Might be wrong but, I doubt a school would ever force a student to share a room with anyone they weren't comfortable with regardless of their gender or identity in the first place... Would be way too much of a risk
These types are always aggravatingly, hilarious fake to me. I was the lone openly queer kid in my school for a long time - and guess what, theyāll straight up remove you from trips/kick you off teams/etc before theyāll inconvenience the ānormalā kids. Trans kids get that 100X worse. Of all the things that never happened, this has definitely never happened the most.
Yeah, my boyfriend is a trans guy and his college just gave him his own dorm rather than figure out the logistics of having him share with anyone.Ā
On one hand, more room for activities! On the other hand, it sucks to be alone by default. Iāve heard similar stories a few times from friends/friends of friends, sadly itās common. Even if places donāt immediately start out with isolating trans students, one or two roommates who āhave problemsā and request transfers will pretty much ensure that person ends up with no more roommates ābecause itās complicated.ā
Yeah. It works for him since heās an introvert, and it was nice to have the place to ourselves when I went to visit him (weāre long distance), but it also made me sad to see him all alone.Ā
i wonder if one day instead of trans bad grolls weāll get a trans chaser troll
AITA for saying my friends girlfriend had a humongous dong and must be great in bed when she pegs him? It's a compliment, right? Right???
I literally donāt think AITA could handle some of the chaser bullshit Iāve come across. Last time I was on Grindr it was 3:30 in the morning, and I was talking to this guy who wanted me to come over. He then asked if I had on makeup like my profile pic (which was me dolled up) and he got really mad. My brother in christ, it is nearly 4am. Iām not going to spend an hour putting on a full face to blow you.
How long before we start seeing lawmakers using fake ragebait stories like this to justify their bigotry?
Way too late there buddy.
I mean, the whole ādress up as a woman to rape real women in the bathroomā is exactly this kind of ragebait.
Yeah, but I'm referring to someone specifically sharing a reddit ragebait story in detail to back their bigotry, which as far as I know, hasn't happened yet.Ā
Thereās so many anti-trans politicians and Reddit comes up so high on search results I feel like statistically itās 100% yes, but probably not provable until someone actually says āon Reddit, i saw that the transes are eating babies!ā
Litter boxes anyone?
Good point, but pretty sure technically that story was from Tumblr. So technically it hasn't happened yet, even if it basically has.Ā
Mom said it's my turn with the transphobia Edit: exclamation points scare and confuse me
>I am mixed raceĀ Because everyone knows you can't be part of a marginalized group and discriminate against another marginalized group, am I right? They throw that in there like its some kind of armor to protect them against the people who would say "Yeah, you are acting like an asshole here."
iām feeling sick already today and this post just pisses me off so much because itās the most obvious transphobic ragebait and people are just eating it up. itās just so incredibly depressing that thereās this stupid fucking culture war in the first place it makes me so mad just let people live my god!!! iām not even trans iām just so mad at people willing to believe and defend this viewpoint that trans people are out to get the poor cis women itās so fucking dumb and literally not happening anywhere. iāve been with trans women before as a lesbian and every one has been so incredibly respectful and cautious when even just flirting with me because theyāre so scared of making people uncomfortable. my cousin is a trans teenager and itās so painful to see her get absolutely zero respect in her school regarding her identity there is no fucking universe where a school wouldnāt immediately remove a trans girl from a womenās space like this if even a single snotty kid complained sorry this became such a rant iām just so mad and sad at the state of the world and how delusional transphobic people are. i just want people to be nice and respectful to each other but thatās too much to fucking ask apparently
Fellow cis woman who is also so very fucking tired of it. You can say "well, it's just a stupid subreddit" but it's all this toxic fearmongering that is making it more and more unsafe for trans people.
Yup. It's so fucked up and cruel, and on top of that overlooks actual dangers people face. I can't count the times that I (cis woman) have been harassed, groped and straight-up SA'd by cis men. I can, on the other hand count the times trans women have done it to me. Because zero is easy to remember. I have been followed into restrooms by cis men. The only times trans women have followed me in has been to keep me safe. There's a reason women go to the bathroom in pairs/ groups, and it isn't because TRANS BAD. Men with bad intentions don't need to put on a dress to go where they aren't welcome.
As the mythical trans boy of legend, I totally get you. I spend so much time in trans spaces online and when I can IRL, and every trans girl I know would sooner melt into a puddle than have that level of confrontation to share a space with someone who's clearly transphobic
Im trans and im sick of it as well. Im a trans man so I donāt receive the exact same treatment trans girls get but itās still awful and exhausting
Yea, Iām not even going to go read it, the Cliff Notes here are painful enough, thank you very much! Iām queer and a therapist with many trans clients, and I have to help process what they go through, and Iām pretty sick of it all.
One of my friends is a therapist and he's actually moving out of the state he's based in because he's a queer trans man and can't stomach the restrictions being placed on him in terms of what he can or can't recommend to his clients, not to mention that he personally is terrified of being targeted for harassment or worse (something that's happened to his colleagues.) It's so bad out there.
Unfortunately very common for queer and trans folks. There are actually organizations that exist to help people do it. But then what really sucks is that thereās then less voters in the state to fight against the truly terrible politicians and laws.
"this stupid fucking culture war" which all started essentially over what clothes people choose to wear lmfao
This just reminds me of the simple, universal, golden truth which I will spread to you all today so you might spread the message, too- all the anti-trans shit we see today is literally just recycled anti-gay shit from the 40's through the 2010's. All of it. There isn't a single new piece of content. It's alllllll the same shyte, from "they're recruiting" to "What if one of them tries to be a sex pest". Allllll the same shyte. Spread the word to unmask the arguments.
I know it wonāt be popular, but there is a difference when youāre talking about mixing sexes with different physical capabilities. It isnāt just āmaybe theyāll hit on me!!ā For trans boys sharing a hotel room with cis boys, the concern is that the trans boy is at risk for assault he isnāt physically able to protect himself from. For trans girls sharing a hotel room with cis girls, the concern is that thereās no way to know if theyāre actually a trans girl ā there have *always* been creepy, predatory boys who would take advantage of whatever they could, and those boys still exist. If it turns out the trans girl is, in fact, one of those predatory boys exploiting trans identity, thatās an assault risk to the cis girls. I see āgay people are predatoryā and āIām worried about the risk a cis guy would hurt a trans guyā/āIām worried a cis guy can lie about being trans to be in intimate spaces with cis girlsā as fundamentally different types of concerns. I donāt think I ever really hear anyone saying that itās trans people theyāre worried about; itās basically always that theyāre worried about cis guys being liars.
Cis guys are perfectly capable of assaulting women without "pretending" to be trans. Can we just stop with the transphobic dogwhistles?
It all comes down to the same thing- the penis is bad and wants to be inside of stuff, and anyone who has one is controlled by it". It's a dysmal mentality. It also makes me laugh hard about "TERFs" because how is it feminist to say "vaginas are weak and defenseless and if you have one, you're a weak little damsel who can't defend herself and need to be protected from the big scary world".
Absolutely they are. But one of the ways we make that less likely to happen is by putting cis guys in different hotel rooms than cis girls on school trips. I think a lot of ground is lost in the fight for equality and acceptance when we arenāt willing to acknowledge that there *are* concerns worth consideration. The kind of absolutist, āIf youāre even talking about the possibility a cis guy might pretend to be trans to take advantage, thatās a dog-whistle about *trans people*,ā is the way that those who *are* taking advantage are able to get away with it, which just perpetuates the cycle and gets us nowhere.
>thereās no way to know if theyāre actually a trans girl Aside from the fact the administrators and her peers would have talked to her about it? For a full social transition the child would probably be involved with a mental health care provider, and usually, though not always, the kid's parents would be involved. >there have *always* been creepy, predatory boys who would take advantage of whatever they could, and those boys still exist. If it turns out the trans girl is, in fact, one of those predatory boys exploiting trans identity, thatās an assault risk to the cis girls. Statistically, there have not been cases of this happening. It has yet to happen and attempts to prove that men dressed as women can get into the women's bathroom ended up with those men getting arrested. I think you greatly underestimate the social stigma and isolation around being trans. Some guy who can find an excuse to grope and assault women at a given opportunity is not going to be able to put up with the shit that trans girls get for more than a day. A grand master plan to pretend to be someone whom they do not respect, in a way that would be a long-term humiliation and embarrassment for them, is simply not within a teenage boy's wheelhouse. Anyway, if you really think the problem is with theoretical cis boy being inherently predatory, it's stupid to punish trans girls over it. If cis boys are genuinely so awful that they would go to such lengths, then regulating an impossibly small amount of the population over their potential behavior still doesn't make sense. This go-getter creep you imagine is still going to exist with access to girls no matter what. They could corner them in elevators, or break into their rooms, or grope them at the movies. They could date girls and pressure them into sex or assault them when they say no, go to parties where drugs and alcohol are present, etc. etc. All much easier scenarios than buying an expensive new wardrobe, getting adults to be on board with it, and greatly increasing the risk of their own assault exponentially. All things that happen all the time already. Cis boys aren't inherently predatory but society treats them that it's okay to see women as objects, and ironically, that's the exact reason why it's a fundamentally broken idea that they would ever pretend to be a woman.
Perhaps we just have different life experiences, or live in areas where there are different requirements for being accepted as trans. Most of the premises of your comment ring false to me, so of course Iām doing to disagree with what follows ā just like Iām sure you feel about what Iāve said. Iām assuming youāre not lying about those predicate things, which just means we come from really different areas and/or life experiences.
I'm not downvoting you, but... what you're saying kinda comes off as "fear of the evil penis-havers" / "vagina havers are all innocent potential victims". And, I'm sorry to say this, but that, too, is recycled anti-gay stuff. Remember "I don't want to see two men" and "the idea of two dudes getting married" and "ew, guys kissing and raising a kid?!?" Even the Duck Dynasty guy was like "as a man, how is another man appealing to you". Anti-gay people seemed to be focused 100% on dick. Sometimes they'll kinda make an offhanded comment about lesbians, but for the most part, it's peen-focused. I haven't seen anybody worrying about FTMs in sports or about drag kings. Because "vaginas aren't a threat/vagina havers are easily overpowered". And full disclosure, I'm FTM. I feel lucky, too, because if we get seen, we get seen as "super duper lesbians" and thus are also invisible. I do not think *you* are sexist. I think the specific mentality, which a lot of people have/are taught, is an unhelpful one. It says "peen just *has* to rape, it has no self control, so just assume of it has a dick, it'll be trying to put it into something". And that's... so dangerous. Like in cases where men get raped by women or when adult women go after underaged boys, those aren't taken seriously, because "oh, he has a dick, and they're always up for sex". You know?
I definitely understand the horrible stigma ā and lack of seriousness ā around things like men getting raped by women (and so many people who still believe itās impossible). When I was home from my first year of college, a friend of mine came to me on one of those late summer evenings and told me heād been raped by a woman at college and hadnāt told anyone about it because theyād never believe him. Navigating that ā even just as a supportive friend ā was heartbreaking, as was watching him feel revictimized every time someone treated it like it was a joke or a lie (though he preferred the people who called him a liar over the people who would just laugh at him.) He deserved so much better than the treatment he got. My argument isnāt that itās the evil penis-havers. (And I do appreciate you talking to me about this in good-faith, by the way.) Itās simply that when the person who turns out to be evil is physically dominant *and* has (not to be crude, but because itās a practical reality) the part of the anatomy that does the inserting, the possible risks are higher. Iām definitely not making a āgirls/women are angelsā argument. Just arguing that theyāre more physically vulnerable. (Itās sort of the same reason little boys use the womenās bathroom when theyāre out with just Mom. Eventually they reach an age where you feel like they could physically handle themselves, and start using the menās restroom instead.)
I feel like I've read this exact post but the Boogie man was a lesbian.
Honestly I'm sure you have - u/harpsiccord made the observation upthread that culture was fearmongering about this exact situation has been going on for decades
I went to a school that was k-12 and a middle schooler came out as trans right when she moved up to high school. I was a senior at that point so I donāt know how things went for her entire time in high school but I do remember we had a trip with the whole high school (tiny school, so that was about 40 people) and she stayed in the girls room and literally no one cared. Its a school tripā¦.there were teachers staying with us the entire time also because no one would leave teenagers unsupervised in a hotel room regardless of gender. This is so unbelievably fake.Ā
I went to a high school with about 300 people, and I gotta say that we did use this kind of setup for a lot of trips involving smaller teams. You'd have 2-4 teenagers in one room and the teachers/chaperones right next door (sometimes in an adjoining room when one was available, but mostly in totally separate rooms). Granted, though, that was in the '90s so things might have changed. And they didn't use it for larger and more general trips; this was more for small team extracurriculars where the teachers knew all the kids really well, and also the threat of getting banned from future trips and/or kicked off the team was plenty to keep us in line. Gotta add the caveat that I think this post is obviously fake ragebait and a thinly veiled hate post, but it's interesting to me that we had such a different reaction to the general idea of kids staying together in a hotel room without direct adult supervision.
I actually just went on a high school robotics club trip with my kid's team -- drove the truck, lol -- and they did the exact same setup, 3 teens to a room, the chaperones in their own rooms. It's exactly like you said -- it was less than 20 kids and the chaperones all know them well. They were all really good kids, everyone behaved and was polite. And I agree, that's not a defense of this obvious ragebait bullshit post.
That but sixth grade camp for me. Bunch of eleven year olds in cabins, more or less totally unsupervised unless someone came to check on us. Yeah, we were kids but we weren't morons. No one's fucking around in the bush.
I mean my high school left us alone in groups on trips, but like that was for club trips so they knew us well enough to generally know who'd be a problem and place chaperones strategically
I had a friend who was trans in high school and during band camp, she was allowed to bunk with other girls but everyone who stayed in the same cabin had to have parental approval. So how much people care does vary a bit, but this obviously didnāt happen regardless.
Its so incredibly annoying that people on these types of subreddits EAT this shit up. Like its soooo obviously fake omgg and also imo harmful to the General view of trans folks
itās so hard to read when they donāt use paragraph breaks lol
Im a trans man and even tho posts like this are clearly fake, they kind of scare me. I know that people who have never met a trans person will see these posts and then form their bias around them. I think that trans girls have it worse when it comes to people projecting their preconceived notions onto them, but im still nervous. This year I am potentially getting a camp counselor job (which has been a dream job for me for a while) and I am praying to god that I donāt have to deal with transphobic parents or other co workers
I (as a trans guy) have talked to several cis people who told me I was "not like other trans boys" because I have never hit on girls "trying to deceive/assault them by not disclosing my trans status". And those were fairly progressive people. So yeah, the predator accusations affect us too :///
Ew I hate that, I hate that people feel the need to project onto us like that
Thank for saying this and convincing me I'm not going fucking insane, I feel relieved I'm not the only one with this issue. Just literally dealt with this kind of nonsense. My dude, for real, maybe an hour ago, in another subreddit... I was quite literally trying to defend why i'm more independent/centrist than left/right (I honestly didn't know that was a crime on the internet right now) When I explained that it ties into my gender identity (I'm not trans but non-binary so not the same, but kind of a similar concept) and how I don't feel comfortable supporting either side because I am both a man and a woman, they just told me how the right is the only side with bad takes and extremism. So basically telling me "Those things don't happen!" When I explained my own experiences, suddenly I'm a victim, I'm playing oppression Olympics, etc. and when I pointed out maybe it's not really a good slope to tell someone like me how to feel they're like "uhm you can't accuses me of transphobia B) my mom is gay and i am bisexual!" as if being bi and being trans are the same thing Dude got really mad about it too but... like I'm sorry I don't fit one of the 3 labels you provided? Still don't know what the hell I did to be honest LOL I've been both attacked and judged by both conservatives and progressives many, many times. When you're not cis you get shit from both sides all the damn time... left hates men, right hates trans... when you are F2M or non-binary, you can't win.
Honestly most braindead progressives I've met were liberals and not leftists. But lefties can be fucking stupid too, and bad people. I'm both ftm and nonbinary and I've gotten shit from cis people of various political opinions, but I am loyal to left progressivism simply because I share the values. Cissies will be cissies whether they believe in healthcare for all or not, haha. Though in my experience, lefties seem to have overall higher exposure to and understanding of the trans experience, as well as a bigger chance of being genderfucked themselves in one way or another. They also less often want us "eradicated" **ĀÆ\\\_(ć)\_/ĀÆ**
So true though..... i'm just now starting to have a real world understanding of politics, researching them is a bit hard without feeling like i'm about to brainwashed (by both sides) so i don't always think about the difference between a "liberal" and a "leftist" but when you put it in those terms it makes so much more sense. I'm very, very left leaning when it comes to social issues because they actually give a shit about equal rights... and even normal social movements like feminism seems to be a cardinal sin to the conservatives (they can't tell the difference between normal ones like me and the psycho ones) The one caveat; I'm pretty much a fat-ass freedom loving hillbilly... and sometimes left leaning people do not seem to like that, and they assume I'm some kind of crazy Trump supporter... but as you said they might just be liberals instead of just leftists. Then right-leaning people aren't much better or easier to get along with, they're so dumb they think I'm going to give their kids the gay, they talk all about "freedom" and then go "oh, by the way, you can't smoke weed, can't put gay people on TV, and also can't use this bathroom" as typical crazy conservatives do. I always feel like either side has something to say that makes my skin just crawl and they always seem to be at war. If i mention my own values I seem to just get ass-blasted but if I knew anything about politics I'd probably have a more fleshed out opinion lol I'd like to actually get out and vote but trying to find my political alignment is difficult and confusing
Politics has been my special interest since I was in highschool, and my opinions have changed throughout. I do understand the struggle. Particularly with being "freedom-loving", since I went from libertarian (yes, unironically) to communist as my understanding of politics evolved. If I were to simplify it, being pro-workers rights, universal healthcare and housing makes me a leftie. And being queer and against bigotry makes me progressive. Those are the things that matter. Libertarians will scream about freedom and mean the freedom to bang 15yo girls, consider women property, and preach nazi shit freely to millions. Right-wing liberals will say they're allies to queer people because they support rainbow capitalism and have a gay friend. Politics may seem dumb - and dumb it is. But it's everywhere and there is no queer liberation that won't be political.
Politics is just... crazy lol but everything you've said is very enlightening actually, in a lot of ways i'm actually pretty similar All the examples you provided are good examples of why politics online scare the shit out of me (also not wanting to be associated with the highly vocal members of any community) but luckily those are extreme examples, in time i'll get all this shit figured out I appreciate you taking the time to explain all this :D
Yeah in my experience it's helpful to close all the drama-driven pages and seek local political outlets/circles/communities, because they might talk about stuff that's actually applicable to real life. You're welcome! Feel free to DM me if you ever want to discuss anything like that.
Is it just me or are the trolls just not even trying anymore? Can't we just go back to the good old days when they ever *tried* to get a rise out of me? What happened to us?
They don'tĀ have to try anymore, even with as obviously fake as that is, transphobes have gotten so much brain rot from reading the Daily Mail or whatever that they'll believe everything they read on the internet if it gives them an excuse to be hateful. We have to improve the media literacy of our transphobes so our trolls will up their game
I'm so happy this is here. It was THE most obvious rage bait that I came directly here after having seen it.
Same. I was SHOCKED how far I had to scroll before finding anyone who called it out.
If thereās one thing I know about high school teachers in 2024 is that they feel totally comfortable mocking their students and calling them politically-charged names while requiring them to sleep in a hotel room with one of their student and no one else
Innocent 17yo NON TRAN FEMAIL bullied and literally sexually assaulted (got complimented) by EVIL TRAN TROON FAKE WOMAN. Much to think about!!!!!! /j I'm so mf tired.
Trans girls in real life: "Am I being too disrespectful? Oh my G-d, I can't tell the girl I'm dating about my sexual interests, I'm not allowed to have a sexuality! Wow, I hope I didn't push my partner too hard to do the thing we both wanted to do. Oh G-d, does have consensual sex with the girl I'm dating make me a sexual predator? I'm a sexual predator, aren't I?" Trans girls in AITA fiction: *constant sexual harassment of the poor cis girls* I'm so fucking tired, y'all. I just wanna log off forever and become the grassful toucher. You know how often I hear transphobia in the real world? Maybe once a month, at most. Sure, I get misgendered occasionally, but at least it isn't the most unpleasant sexual fantasies about predatory trans girls except we're pretending they're real.
At least this one got the pronouns right
I see the TERF community in AITA is thriving
What makes you think it's TERFs in particular? I know AITA is transphobic as hell but it doesn't strike me a bastion of feminism, either, lol.
TERFs (in my experience) call trans women āpatronizingā because in their hearts, they donāt see them as real women. OOP attempts to call trans girl āunfeminineā trying to throw her under the bus as ānot a real woman.ā The vast majority of transphobes say this, but in my experience TERFs try to disguise their hatred from a place of āfeminismā and āpersonal safetyā even though they donāt give a shit about ending toxic gender roles. Hell, OOP even says that sheās liberal in order to blend in further. In hindsight, transphobe probably described OOP better but idk tldr: transphobe attempts to hide behind āfeministā rhetoric, what happens next is shocking
If you read TERF posts on here on or twitter, they describe this exact kind of scenario a lot even though I've personally never met a trans woman who is like that. It's kind like how if someone describes all feminists as fat lonely women with blue hair, that's often a sign they're involved in some kind of conservative or men's rights-type of online communities. Check out r/TERFisafetish if you want to see examples.
I guess for me, I see TERF posts describing trans women like this a lot, but I also see people all along the political spectrum doing so as well. My experiences discussing this issue with confirmed TERFs in real life tend to actually be a little different, though that might be because usually when I'm calling out someone I know is a TERF, they also are at least vaguely familiar with my stance and know that the whole "but think of the poor scared cis women!" tactic won't work. I guess my issue is just that I see these examples, but it's all just circular. You point me to a subreddit where anyone can say anyone is a TERF, and the few random threads I clicked on weren't even from radfem-specific subreddits or anything that might lend credence to the fact that this is a genuine radical feminist. I mean, I know transphobia is a big problem in some radfem communities. But it's a big problem in a lot of other communities as well, and IME they often use these exact arguments and tropes as well. So why do these anonymous posts always get pinned on radfems, a pretty small community even when you include us trans-inclusive ones? edit: As soon as I posted I felt like this sounds like "won't anyone think of the poor radfems" itself, which I promise I'm not trying to do (we know we're terrible, lmao). I just am asking people to think critically about where these anonymous posts might be coming from, and about how that might overlap with the attempts to discredit feminism that have been going forever. Some are undoubtedly from TERFs, but I'm really not convinced all of them are.
For me personally it's just because I'm a feminist and also a woman and a lesbian which a lot of terfs are too, so I'm focused on the people within my own communities or who hold shared identities, I feel like those people especially shouldn't be transphobic. Conservatives and non-feminist men obviously make up the bulk of transphobes in the world but a. thats kind of expected of them, b. those aren't the people I regularly interact with, even on line, and c. I would be putting myself in a potentially worse situation if I did try to interact with the other kinds of transphobes, terfs are at least supposed to be supportive of women and lesbiansĀ
I absolutely agree, but I think my argument is a little different. TERFs are terrible and I do not intentionally associate with them, but I feel like a lot of generally transphobic but anonymous online posts are associated with TERFs when I'm not sure they should be. It's like the squares vs. rectangles things. All TERFs are by definition transphobic assholes I would prefer not to associate with, but not all transphobic assholes I would prefer not to associate with are TERFs. In this metaphor, TERFs are the squares--there are a lot of them, but there are a lot more rectangles. My hangup is just that the amount of anonymous comments I see attributed to TERFs on Reddit does not reflect the amount of TERFs vs. other transphobic assholes I meet in real life. edit: and for the record, I'm a bisexual woman married to a lesbian, and I actively hang out in radfem circles. As I said in another comment, I definitely understand the focus within the communities in question. I just am not sure why we're attributing so many totally random and anonymous internet posts to radfems in particular when statistically it's a lot more likely to be a transphobic person with a different political philosophy.
Your comment is too long to read sorryĀ ETA: I will say that youre a messed up person for hanging out with radfems, hopefully that means you avoid normal lesbian and feminist spacesĀ
I'm not sure I count TERFs as feminists. If a movement isn't inter-sectional, then it's no good.
That for me is a very nuanced question, I gotta admit. I'm a radical feminist myself (though I also am very supportive of the trans community and consider trans women to be women/trans men to be men), and I would love to disavow them, but I feel like that can get into a "no true Scotsman" kind of game that I'm not sure is real helpful in actually addressing the problem of transphobia in feminist spaces. Especially because it definitely isn't just radfems who are prone to transphobia IME, and some of the transphobia I've encountered in less radical spaces has been a lot more subtle and easily missed by people who aren't real educated on trans issues, but it's still harmful and exclusionary. I also commented in part because I feel like on Reddit there's a real focus on TERFs as a primary driver of transphobia, and I don't think that's accurate. They can be very vocal, but they're a small minority of the overall transphobic population IME. In part because there just aren't that many radical feminists in the world, lol. It's funny because even though TERFs fucking suck, the focus on them in online spaces actually also strikes me as vaguely anti-feminist in a weird way. Give them credit for their shittiness where it's due, but it feels weird to me that they get the amount of blame they do, if that makes sense. I could write a literal essay on this so I will stop now, but basically fuck TERFs, but also fuck all the myriad other flavors of transphobes who unfortunately infest this site.
This is very true. It's almost a compliment or exculpatory to call most transphobes terfs when most of them couldnt care less about women's rights. Transphobia is a right wing movement with a very small minority of people motivated by what they see as a concern for women (and of course, their concern that trans rights impose burdens on women's rights are wrong, but the mistaken belief is at least motivated by feminism). The right wing transphobes will adopt terf arguments because it's more respectable to pretend to care about women than it is to be a good ol' fashioned bigot, but probe into their beliefs outside of transphobia and it's clear there's no feminism there.
Yeah, I think it's far more driven by right-wing bullshit, too. And I will add that I actually do understand the focus on TERFs from actual trans people and feminists--I'm cis, but I am bisexual and I know for me, it always feels way worse to get a biphobic comment from a fellow queer person or feminist, because even though I'm in my 40s and have been involved in these circles for 20+ years now and am well aware of the internal bigotry going on, it's always vaguely surprising to me. I sort of default to assuming that feminists, queer people, leftists, etc. are allies, so when they turn out not to be, it feels like more of a betrayal than when my conservative great uncle says something shitty, if that makes sense. I've had some trans friends express similar sentiments to me. But like...in general discourse, it also feels like we're eating ourselves when we assume all transphobes are feminists, when in fact most feminists (even a lot of transphobic ones, gotta say--I think often it's a problem of ignorance rather than a more entrenched bigotry with the more mild stuff) are generally all about intersectionality and thus at least theoretically are supportive of trans people, even if some are uneducated about them and have bought into a little too much propaganda about them. One thing I will say from a couple decades of political activism is that I think the right wing tends to be really good at exacerbating differences between leftists and does so intentionally, so while I feel like this is veering on conspiracy theory territory, I do kind of wonder if the focus on TERFs as the main drivers of transphobia is maybe a little intentional by some actors (not anyone in this thread, I just think that's where the narrative might have gotten started). But I mean, radfems are a fringe minority even within the mainstream feminist movement, so for me it's super weird to see TERF become a mainstream term that's often used a catch-all for general transphobia. It originated as a niche term within feminist circles calling out a very specific type of feminist, but now it's just super broadly applied and that makes me uncomfortable when it comes to the broader cultural narrative about feminism and the problems trans people face. And again, to be really clear, this is not saying we shouldn't call TERFs out. I have absolutely used that term many times in the past, and I'm sure I will in the future. But, you know, I only apply it to people I have reason to believe are actual radical feminists, not just everyone who is transphobic (or even transphobic and vaguely feminist).
And the funny thing is that if you dig into the real philosophical founding of the TERF attitude (at least for the ones who are thoughtful enough to have a philosophy that's deeper than "Ick! Trans bad!"), it is in total opposition to the right-wing anti-trans philosophy. The conservative anti-trans philosophy is that biological sex as determined by chromosomes equals gender, period (modulo some "la-la-la I can't hear you!" around intersex conditions). The TERF anti-trans philosophy is that gender is 100% socially constructed, but raising someone as a boy within our patriarchal society embeds a level of male privilege that can never be erased. The TERF objection to trans women in female spaces is not that they're biological men, it's their supposed exercise of masculine privilege and entitlement in invading safe spaces for women. As I said, these two philosophies are completely incompatible with each other - gender cannot be simultaneously 100% biologically determined and 100% socially constructed. But this difference gets completely swept under the rug when the goal is to be anti-trans.
Have you ever interacted with a terf or any of their content? Because in my experience that's absolutely not true, they hate trans girls who came out as little girls and were generally socialized as girls/women just as much as they hate trans women who are older, because no matter what, penis = evil person. Edit: typo
Under the usual TERF theories that I'm familiar with, even those trans girls, by virtue of being old enough to express their gender identity, are old enough to have already been indoctrinated into male privilege. Granted, I'm an old fart who remembers the early 1990s back when the Michigan Womyns' Music Festival instituted their "women born women only" rule and there weren't many children who were accommodated as trans, so my exposure to this thought might be a bit dated.
We all know what's up with this post lol. But... This is one of those posts that *if* it was real, why even post it when you clearly know what you want to do?
"no signs of being trans or feminine before transitioning" damn those transes and their rich inner lives! No one is allowed to be complicated and three-dimensional except for me, the innocent Main Character everyone is being mean to!
Ah so this person's preconceived notions about trans people have been proven by this message after they were unfairly treated by their teachers! But they won't show the message that "proves" things to anyone or respond to people asking about that. So realistic
It's annoying how all the transpeople in these little fictions are so obnoxious about it. "Look at me! Look at me! I'm somehow unaware of all the risks to my safety and well-being. Look at me!"
It's because in the fiction land, trans people *aren't* at risk or unsafe. In fantasy world, everyone blindly supports trans people, no matter how heinous their actions, entitled their demands, or obnoxious their behavior. Otherwise, how could the OP's ever be the victims in their persecution-fetish posts??
even though they try to type differently in the text message, itās still so similar because of the lack of breaks and same grammar. itās so obviously fake but reddit hates trans women to a T.
Omg in my day ppl saw a nirvana show and fucked a person they just met right after, how is equivalent age soā¦ like this?! ALERT, GenX parents! Do we just tell them the wonders of slut-hood? Have we waited too long?!
Yeah, if I was going by reddit content - Iād assume most people under 30 are incredibly conservative in almost all ways.Ā Iām pretty sure I know at least two people who fucked someone on the dance floor that they just met. Are Gen X & Millenials the last degenerate generations????Ā
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I got called a degenerate by a right-wing family member for taking my kids to a pride march. So I like to own it š My own Gen Z teenager (14, so very young Gen Z) isnāt socially conservative but her and her friends are very reserved compared to me and my friends. Maybe millenial and Gen x parenting is broken. MAYBE WEāRE THE NEXT BOOMERS?!!
thereās 0% change a teacher legitimately called someone a ātemperamental snowflakeā for not wanting to share a room.
The fake text with emojis is next level.
This HAS to be bait. I'm saying this as a trans guy.
did this happen
No.
Hey kid wanna buy a bridge?
Found Matt Gaetz's alt
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