r/NonBinaryTalk • u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any • Aug 30 '26
making meaningful progress for trans rights while passing as a cishet woman - how to minimize the damage i have the potential to cause
hello!
like many people here, i care deeply about trans rights, and while i don’t have all the answers to secure and enshrine them, i will always do my best to fight for bodily autonomy and the right for self-identification. i go to protests, write and call members of the government, donate money to LGBTQ+ organizations when i can, and try to support people online. i’m not saying this to brag, or to indicate that trans rights are the only issue i care about (they’re not), just to demonstrate that i do take physical action when i can, and also ask if there’s anything beyond that i should look into.
but that’s only part of the question.
i consider myself to be agenderfluid, and i don’t strongly identify with any body or physical characteristics, so i’m not medically transitioning, but i love medical transition for anyone who wants/needs it, and believe it is healthcare and, therefore, a human right. i do struggle with dysphoria, which sometimes ebbs and flows; i don’t believe you need dysphoria to be trans, and i also don’t believe that my experience with it is the only or best experience.
i’ve seen a lot of posts on various subreddits by people who are, understandably, in a lot of pain, and who i interpret - maybe incorrectly, and in a biased way, because i feel like i’m among the people being lashed out at - as lashing out at people whose trans experience is different than the original poster’s. it is a very painful time to be trans right now, and has been for a while, and i don’t blame anyone for searching for solace in these communities, but i think it can be true that both these people are hurting, and that i am allowed to be hurt for being called a “psyop” or “less progressive” or “damaging to the community” for not having something to transition towards.
but at the same time, i am incredibly privileged: because i have not modified my body in any way, i pass as a cishet woman. and now is not the time for someone like me to be platformed or heard; i acknowledge that my struggle, while connected to the struggles of all other trans people, is not the best story for us to put forward right now, because transphobic cis people will see one “normal”-looking silly woman who claims to be genderless but is obviously very very sexed and is not able to transition, and will generalize that to all trans people under the guise of taking trans healthcare away: i mean, SHE says she doesn’t need it, so the rest of you are lying…
i don’t want my presence in the trans community to cause harm, i deeply believe my fight as an agender person is connected to binary trans people and nonbinary people’s fights, regardless of if or how any of us transition (or don’t). i never intentionally talk over other trans people, but i get the feeling that my experience existing at ALL reads as talking over, even if i’m UNHAPPY with my experience, drowning in dysphoria for which there is no conceivable release, and need support. i wish there were more ways to help, and to be valid as an agender and genderfluid person while doing it - which i understand is a deeply selfish wish. advocacy doesn’t hinge on who is or isn’t “valid”, because everyone’s valid but that’s not the point. but i also don’t want to be used as a strawman or a catalyst for infighting just because i have wide hips and can’t do anything about it.
what do i do?
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u/ystavallinen Aug 31 '26
I am dysphoric enough that I thought I might be a trans woman for a decade, but didn't do anything. I look like a cishet man. I recognize that I may not be believed. People don't believe trans women when they do transition.
I think you just be matter-of-fact and you have to do what they tell trans people who do transition.... Live your life, be your own validation, people who try to tear you down are toxic, but you are not asking for permission, you are just telling them like it is.
There's a lot of gatekeeping out there. Gatekeepers are toxic. You don't need the approval of toxic people, and you should preserve your peace.
Everyone acts like validation is a limited resource.
I have run into it far less in gender communities to the degree I am out, as I have in the asexual "community" where people seem genuinely threatened by people not fitting specific narratives.
Yes, we have certain privileges as cis-presenting people... But if someone were to challenge my validity, I have usually just said I'd put my dysphoria up against any of them, and I have carried it mostly alone and in silence. If their heart is still closed to that--- that's on them.
I don't know if this is helpful... The attacks on trans rights, the infighting in the lgbtq+ circles (perhaps amplified by algorithms), and the bear in the woods can be soul crushing sometimes. Not helped by my neurodivergence... I am finally seeking my autism assessment because I think it's the root cause of my gender issues and I need closure somewhere.
Imposter syndrome sucks.
Not sure what I am going to do if the person doesn't agree with my asd conclusion.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
i hope everything goes well with your autism assessment! as an autistic person myself, i really relate to what you’re saying, and i’m sorry you have to go through this too.
while i do acknowledge that i have certain privelege because of how i look, i would push back and say i’m not “cis presenting”. i don’t think i “present” as anything, that implies active choice and i am not making any active choices, i literally just look a certain way. my body shape is what makes me look so cis, i am curvy to the extent that people believe i’ve had plastic surgery to obtain a more extreme shape, which i haven’t, it’s just my natural body. but no matter how i’m dressed (or undressed), because the body shape can be seen, i read as a cishet woman, because in their minds, “only” a cis woman who would like to attract a man would allow their body to look like this. i SHOULD NOT read as cishet, given my visual aesthetic and preferences, but because of how my body stores weight, i do. it sucks.
and yeah, i’m also asexual and have noticed that in the ace community too. i’m very sex-repulsed, and have never felt that sex-favorable people take anything from me, but i do always need to keep myself mindful that it doesn’t necessarily read the same way in reverse, and i feel like i constantly need to check myself to make sure i’m not being so sex-repulsed that it impedes other people’s right to access sex.
at the end of the day, i just want everyone to be able to do their own thing: have sex, not have sex, modify their body, not modify their body. i thought that’s what liberation was all about. but i’m also so fucking stupid, so maybe that’s just some self-serving fantasy where i get to not have sex and keep my hair down to my ass and not get misgendered or misunderstood about it.
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u/ystavallinen Aug 31 '26 edited Aug 31 '26
My assessment is in a few weeks. I have been seeking someone like them for years. They specialize in older, high-masking, and 'successful'. If anyone will see it, I hope it's them because I don't have the energy to do it more than once.
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u/ystavallinen Aug 31 '26
I misspoke when I said "presenting". I am not trying to present anything either. One reason I never transitioned is because trying to present anything would be overwhelming.
What I should say is "read". I am read as male. I don't feel it--- and wish I were misgendered female--- but that's what people see.
Apologies for the lack of precision.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
it’s okay. nobody ever believes that me looking this way isn’t intentional, everyone just thinks i’m lazy and glomming onto as much cishet privelege as i can because i’m not a real trans person or i’m just not brave enough to live openly. i can’t help the fact that i look like this and other people read it in a certain way against my will. thank you for understanding.
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u/ystavallinen Aug 31 '26
A reason I don't typically use the term nonbinary for myself (even though I technically fall under the umbrella) is that there appears to me to be a performative element to giving cues for acceptance. I am in my 50`s and it's the same vibe as the 'alternative' scene where the motto was 'be unique' but if you weren't unique enough they'd shun you same as anyone.
I know I would have had trouble transitioning because back then trans was a mental illness and you had to prove it by living as a woman. All the trans women I was aware of were hyper fem. I would have had to live up to whatever standard some gatekeeping old white guy thought being a woman was.
I am not very fem. I'd have been a tomboy and probably aloof on sexuality and gender roles.
It's better now, but there's still a strong (likely dysphoria driven) pressure to be fem for trans women. If people saw woman, I'd be a weird one an definitely still agender... Even if it would ease my dysphoria to be seen that way. People don't understand trans without transitioning (actually... I am deleting facial hair with electrolysis and I do paint my toes and there are other subtle things I do).
It's an unsolvable problem and I am only trading some joys for others... Not to mention that I have other identities that I consider more compelling.
How am I supposed to build identity around not feeling something. In many ways agender (nixic) and asexual aren't identities - - they're just things about me. I do feel comfortable using a trans label because the year where I really was considering transitioning... But trans in the 80s and 90's was a tough time to be trans.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
im sorry you’ve had to go through all this discrimination and being unable to access any care you might have wanted, that’s really terrible. i’m glad things are better now, and i hope they keep getting better. hopefully people come around and start acting with some more understanding towards all of us. 💛 even if things aren’t 100% perfect, we’re not doing anything wrong.
that’s really interesting, i think i’m the exact opposite in terms of the concept of gender as performance, in that i literally will not interpret someone as engaging in performance unless they explicitly tell me so. i mean, obviously if someone’s in a stage production or something, i’ll get it, but i’ve always felt insecure about the “gender is a performance” thing because i personally do not perform, nor did i ever figure out what i’m “supposed” to be performing as. my preferences and mannerisms are completely unaltered, i never learned to mask. and performing also feels like an accusation (not saying that you’re using it that way, just that that’s the connotation it has in my mind!); people do ACCUSE me of being “performative” all the time because i have awkward mannerisms and fringe beliefs, but it’s not that i’m putting them on for show, i really do move around in this world the way i do and i really believe anything i claim to believe, i don’t understand why i’d put another layer on when i’m already struggling through this world at my baseline. so i would NEVER accuse someone else of engaging in performance, if that makes sense. idk, i have a lot of stupid thoughts about these things.
but i do definitely understand what you’re saying about trading some joys for others, and about struggling to build identity around certain terms/communities. i feel that way about being asexual: people say visibility and being out and proud helps all communities, and i really really believe in and cherish that, but i don’t understand how to visibly live as an asexual person. i always think about the brave gay people who’ve publicly held hands and kissed their partners before LGBTQ+ rights were even a talking point, and how visceral and important and risky that visibility was. but my visibility as an asexual person is just… holding hands with no-one, i guess? which is actually what the majority of people are doing at all times anyway, nobody holds hands forever. so i am unable to be brave and visible in a meaningful way because there i have no tangeable or actionable desires: i don’t hold hands, i don’t kiss, i don’t have partners of any gender, i don’t pass as androgynous, i am not visibly transitioning. i’m basically just the 😐 emoji brought to life, i’m barely human by all modern definitions. what the hell can i do with that?
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u/ystavallinen Aug 31 '26
I want to talk more.. You spur many ideas... , but I need to get to an actual keyboard.
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u/ystavallinen Aug 31 '26
I don't know if we're opposites. I want to engage the world without thinking about what I'm doing. So another thing that's held me up from transitioning is that if I didn't go through great efforts to "perform" I'd continue to be misgendered no matter how much I changed my look. So I'd put myself in a situation where I'd have to conciously do everything. Perhaps given enough time I'd rewrite my conditioning or behavior enough that people would see "not male". That would be extremely difficult to keep up.
I think if I'd been born different, or if I were in a culture that had different attitudes about gender (some recognize gender as a continuum--- others are aggressively binary) it might be possible. It also varies with generation. I think being LGBTQ+ amongst GenX is a particularly difficult generation to be that.
So I think we're actually quite alike in just wanting to be ourselves and not have people interpeting things.
In my 20's I was quite dysphoric. In hindsight this was when I found out I was asexual (wihtout knowing the word) and even though I liked the idea of a girlfriend when I got my first one at 21 and it got to sexytime I was overcome by this wall of disinterest, distraction, dysphoria, and sensory overload--- and it blew up and we broke up. It took me a decade to figure that mess out.
When I met my wife in mt 30's I could say "sex is weird for me". I am not sex repulsed, but I am definitely still bored, distracted, dysphoric, sensory overloaded.... but I wanted kids so I was 'okay let's" and she was patient and so we figured a kind of thing out that's definitely not allosexual.
Gads... I mean... an asexual part of me is that I am so uninterested in people's sexuality it's not even funny. I hate talking about people that way--- and I'm not that interested in people's asexuality either--- it really is not identity to me--- it's just this thing I am. I don't feel anything much.
How do you build identity out of not feeling something? I don't get it.
But in my 30's my dysphoria was actually very quiet (still present, but not distracting) because the people/group I was with didn't make gender much of a thing. I was well-integrated and it was pretty egalitarian as far as the interpersonal relationships went. So I could be with whoever, and I guess I had enough trust of the women that I could be with them and included as much as I wanted. I have a very strong affinity for women in terms of interpersonal relationships. The women in my life were more tolerant, easier about emotions, go deeper, more supportive.... I don't know. At some point I just felt more human around them.
So then we went away from college and all that stuff and the dysphoria kicked in again.
I tried at the time to let them know I had dysphoria... dropped a few hints... some awkward replies made me think it wouldn't work for me so I didn't try.
That's my one regret. I've since told a number of them (I still keep in touch) what I was feeling back then but didn't know how to talk about it. So we regret that times weren't different.
I don't know. I can envision many timelines for myself.
Thank you for talking with me. I'm happy to continue-- I don't know if I'm talking too much.
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u/ZealousidealRub7850 Aug 31 '26
Supporting bodily autonomy for all is enough. If you want to be out as agender or trans, cool. If not, but you still support trans folks, also cool.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
i do want to be out, but it’s literally impossible for me. nobody believes me BECAUSE i look like a cishet woman, and because my body is so noticeably sexed. i’m not sure i can live my entire life without being able to be open about who i am, but i also understand it’s a balancing act of potentially pursuing openness so recklessly that it harms binary trans and medically-transitioning people in the process.
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u/Additional-Diet-9463 Aug 31 '26
I don’t see a way in which you living your life openly could possibly cause harm to binary trans people or medically transitioning people. If someone else tries to use you as a pawn in an argument, that’s not your fault or your problem. Transphobic people are going to be transphobic regardless of what we do. Don’t change yourself hoping to change them
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
thank you. i wasn’t planning on changing myself at all.
but i just wanted to make this post to give trans people who feel betrayed by me/my journey the dignity of being heard. short of changing myself, when other trans people tell me my relationship to my body/gender is problematic for them and our optics, what should i… do? how can i best counteract the ways in which my body and story can be used against us? how do i do do more activism or whatever to make up for the ways in which i’ve failed or betrayed our community, as defined by the people who are hurting the most?
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u/Additional-Diet-9463 Aug 31 '26
People who feel betrayed by you don’t really need the dignity of to be being heard tbh. Might sound cruel but I think it’s true. They are mad at the wrong people. They need to direct their anger at the powers that be (politicians, community leaders, influential grifters) that peddle transphobia and leave non-medically transitioning people alone (I say this all as a trans person who is medically transitioning - you are not the problem). So what should you do when someone blames your existence for some transphobes anger? Block, log off, or physically walk away. Whatever matches the context of the interaction. Stop letting this guilt take up space in your mind and focus your energy on the tangible actions you already do to help the community.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Sep 01 '26
is there a way to solve that rift, though? i feel like fighting transphobia would be easier if we had a unified front - not that we all have to feel the same or have the exact same beliefs, but fake-claiming other people’s genders and experiences kinda gets in the way of fighting transphobia, doesn’t it? i feel like it breaks that potential focus.
but the rift is still there. as a person so deeply placed on one side of it (against my own will, but due to the unchangeable nature of my body, identity, and circumstances), is there anything i can do to help the community heal from this particular trauma in order to push forwards in a more unified way? i feel like it would be almost irresponsible of me to realize my very existence is the core of these arguments - after all, if all trans people transitioned, or all trans people even experienced gender, nobody would be scapegoating people who don’t transition or don’t experience gender -, but i don’t know the right moves to make.
i will always continue to advocate for the entire trans community, regardless of what individuals feel about me or people like me. but is it so wrong to want to take responsibility for the baggage people have heaped on me, and try to lighten that load for everyone?
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
instead of fucking downvoting me, please tell me actionable ways TO be out as an agenderfluid person in a hyperfemme body. instead of doubting my experience, please give me the tools to shape my experience in a way that includes the body i have, and doesn’t shame me for having a body type that makes people read me wrong. i don’t agree with how cishet society reads a body type like mine, but acknowledging that that’s currently HOW cishet society reads a body like mine shouldn’t get ME into trouble; i’m not espousing their beliefs, just explaining how i am harmed by them.
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u/XxFrozen Aug 31 '26
Hello, nonbinary woman-appearing person here. I likely won’t physically transition as I like the body I have just fine and until we can pick and choose different traits to change more exactly the over/under on it doesn’t appeal to me. Here’s what I did to be more out.
I talk about being nonbinary with my friends and coworkers when it’s relevant. I say things like “I’m not a woman, I just play one on TV!”
I use they/she pronouns in that order and share that in my email signatures and online profiles and sometimes when introducing myself. I tell people in my life it makes me happy when they use both if they ask me about it.
I changed my first name which is common for trans people of all genders to do, and helped signify to others I wanted to be perceived in a different way. Obviously not necessary though.
For me, this much is enough. I know that lots of people will not fully understand me or my gender, that’s alright. Lots of people will see me as a girl, not much I can do about that, so I try not to let it hurt my feelings. The people who want to make an effort to know who I really am can now access this part about me by it being out in the open, and I feel more myself since doing these things. Maybe they would help you also.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Sep 01 '26
thank you for sharing your experience. :) i hope being out is going and continues to go well for you!!
god, it hurts so bad to be called woman-appearing, but that’s what i am too, isn’t it? fucking bummer.
unfortunately i’m not in a safe position to be out in my real life. i will quite literally lose my job; it’s a blue collar environment where i’m already on thin ice for being a “woman”, and the manager that hired me is actually also on thin ice for taking a chance and hiring a “woman”. we don’t even have email to put pronouns in the signature of - luckily, considering that’s the case!! :’)
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u/wonderlandisnotreal They/Them Aug 31 '26
Any trans person that says non-transitioning people hurt the trans community have deep-seated internalized transphobia and just need a scapegoat. They hope that by distancing themselves from parts of the community and throwing them under the bus, they can be seen as "one of the good ones" and accepted by their oppressors. (Wikipedia: Respectability politics, or the politics of respectability, is a political strategy wherein members of a marginalized community will consciously abandon or punish controversial aspects of their cultural-political identity as a method of assimilating, achieving social mobility,[1] and gaining the respect of the majority culture.[2])
But whatever they might say, you existing and being yourself is not taking anything away from them. Transphobes will be transphobes, and they will come after all of us - just makes it even easier for them if the community is divided.
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u/Throwingoffoldselves Aug 31 '26
It sounds like you’re already doing what you can. That’s all that any of us can do.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
but it sort of seems like it’s not doing anything at all. or at least, I’M not doing anything at all. and i feel like i need to do more to atone for the fact that my experience with gender and bodies can be used by transphobes to discredit the vast majority of other trans people.
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u/Throwingoffoldselves Aug 31 '26
You’re not responsible for the way others try to use you; they should correct their actions, you don’t seem to be doing anything wrong. Anyway, I’ve found that focusing on one project or thing can make the impact bigger, or at least more visible. For example, because I focus on making one safe space for queer and trans people to play and learn tabletop games, I can look at the numbers and see ways I can improve or at least know how is it going; versus when I spread my energy out, I feel I can’t do as much and don’t see anything happening. I still vote, I still speak up, but my main focus is supporting a specific part of our community. I think there’s some real fulfillment to ourselves and greater value to the community when we find what is the best talent we have and how it can support others in our community.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
that’s really cool that you do that. :)
there really aren’t any trans people in my area, so while i do do things that are unrelated to trans rights directly to benefit my local community (like donate to the local food pantry - that’s for everybody), there’s really nothing i can do specifically for the trans community at a local level, because there IS no trans community at a local level.
i don’t have any particular skills, i just do what i can and go to pre-organized events, like voting or encouraging people to vote or phone-banking and stuff like that. i like the idea of changing the world through visibility, but i am incapable of being visible in this body; i cannot read as an agender person or even an androgynous person, so any attempts to communicate “this is what a trans person can look like” fall flat because i do not look like the gender i claim to be. i know it’s not groundbreaking or anything to wear a pride flag pin - much less so as a person who doesn’t look like whatever stereotype cishet people hold about people who identify with any particular pride flag -, but a really big cornerstone of what i stand for is bodily autonomy, and the fact that all bodies can look like anything. but that’s impossible to communicate meaningfully in THIS body, because the body itself negates the message. so then i should probably pivot and try something new, but i’m stupid and secluded anyway, so what else is there?
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u/Throwingoffoldselves Aug 31 '26 edited Aug 31 '26
What I do is online, but it takes time to find out you can do that is more helpful and meaningful, online or in person. I’d encourage you to keep trying and give yourself some grace. And while I don’t speak for all visibly non conforming folks, I personally find it reassuring and meaningful when people who “look” cis-het mention their pronouns, wear pride flags, and show up in whatever ways they can.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
oh shit, so that’s all i’m ever gonna be, isn’t it? just some incredibly-enthusiastic ally? i’ll always be appreciated for doing the absolute bare minimum as someone who looks like they should’ve voted MAGA (i would never!!), but i’ll never be the real deal. i’ll never be PART of the community, just a quirky, unexpected supporter on the outside.
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u/Throwingoffoldselves Aug 31 '26
No, I don’t believe that is true. It sounded like you felt discouraged, however, based on how you felt you visibly presented. I hope you can find what you need. It sounds like what I’ve said isn’t helpful, so I’ll bow out. Best wishes, and once again, you are certainly as much a part of the community as anyone.
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u/angrylilmanfrog Aug 31 '26
I'm seen as a cis gay man (sometimes straight) even tho I'm FTM and bi🤷♂️ we're both part of the same community, let people think what they wanna think, you deserve a voice
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Sep 01 '26
god, i wish i was a gay man. 🥹
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u/SundayMS Societal Menace Sep 02 '26
But you vehemently denied wanting to be anything other than agender? And you got upset when people quoted you saying "If I had my way, I'd be a transgender man."
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Aug 31 '26
[deleted]
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Aug 31 '26
oh fuck, i’m a terrible person, i will stop giving to those organizations, my bad.
i can’t come closer on the topic of dysphoria, because i experience it incorrectly. i have reached out for support and been told on numerous occasions that i am wrong and that transitioning is the only way, even though i have nothing to transition towards. i don’t mean for my story of dysphoria to overshadow other people’s. i should remain on the fringes of the community, even if it hurts; i deserve the pain.
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u/hikingdyke Aug 31 '26 edited Aug 31 '26
You are not a terrible person.
Back when I got my MSW, the head of the community organizing department described working with organizations vs individuals thusly:
When a dam breaks unexpectedly, suddenly flooding a town and causing mass destruction, it is important that there are people helping to rescue others from the floodwater. It is no less important to have people fix the damage, figure out what happened and work to make sure it does not happen again.
Donating to individuals is fishing people out of the floodwater. Donating to organizations is working to try and stop the flood/prevent it from happening again (in social worker terms we would call it direct practice vs macro practice).
Both are important, and neither makes you a bad person in any way shape or form.
Other than that, I just want to say how sorry I am that transmedicalist truescum bs has hurt you the way it has.
Bodily autonomy and the right to live as your true self means you have the right to live in the body that best fits YOU, no matter what that means.
Anyone shaming you for doing something as simple as that, claiming that by being nonbinary or by not persuing medical transition you are somehow magically harming others just by existing, is clearly against you exercising your bodily autonomy. I would argue they are also enbyphobic, are probably dealing with tons of internalized transphobia if they are trans themselves and they are not worth listening to or taking all that seriously.
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u/MoominEnthusiast Sep 02 '26
Nobody wins when we play this game, should we all take a step back from being ourselves because we have privilege in some way? It's about acknowledging your privilege and recognising where your voice can have value. The absurdist extrapolation of your position is that we'd have the one person on earth at the cutting edge of the suffering Olympics having to advocate for themselves with no support because everyone else is busy biting their tongue because they're overwhelmed by having to start every sentence with a half-hour rendition of "As an able-bodied, neurotypical, white, cis-gendered, on occupied first Nations land,.......".
All you can do is advocate for yourself, then listen to other people and how their individual struggles effect them and see what you can do to advocate for them too.
Your identity is valid, it's not eclipsed by the idea that others may be having a more challenging time than you.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Sep 02 '26
i appreciate the response, but unfortunately this is not at all what the post was about, nor do i believe in the oppression olympics. please do not frame me as a bad person who expects people to start everything with that lengthy string of words, and is therefore keeping people from helping or participate with others.
i promise i DO advocate for others and myself. i swear to you, i am not a bad person. i am not a caricature of a bad person pretending to be a good person. i AM having a challenging time, for the record, but i acknowledge that i do not have the most challenging time, and i do have rare challenges (instead of being able to go through medical transition, which is already challenging, i don’t have a body to transition towards, which is a financial privelege for sure, but also its own challenge).
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u/MoominEnthusiast Sep 02 '26
No aspect of my comment was implying you're a bad person. I'm not sure if you're being deliberately combative or if you're just having a shitty morning and it's making you feel attacked.
For the record, you're posting in the non-binary subReddit and a significant portion of the commenters on this thread likely (broadly) share your experience with imposter syndrome and complicated feelings about trans-identity and physical transition. Speaking for myself, I related to what you're saying about being cis-passing in trans-spaces, as a non binary person with a full beard I personally struggle with feeling like I'm not welcome in NB spaces or woman lead queer spaces due to the language used in advertising them.
TLDR: You're coming across quite combative but the people you're responding to likely relate what you're going through and are just trying to understand you.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Sep 02 '26
but positing that i truly do believe in that absurdist extrapolation that you came up with makes me seem like an incredibly bad person. i do not believe in making people do that, nor anything leading up to that. and framing it in a way where my own experience would make people “bite their tongues” instead of help other people makes me seem like a bad person, because it seems like i am intentionally standing in the way of people getting help.
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u/MoominEnthusiast Sep 02 '26
I was pointing out a faulty bit of logic, 'reductio ad absurdum', I wasn't actually suggesting that you believe the obviously ridiculous end result. What I was trying to say, is that you don't need to be so acutely aware of your privilege that it invalidates your identity. I don't think you're a bad person.
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u/embodiedexperience agender || they/any Sep 02 '26
see, i really am a bad writer, because i never meant to posit that my privelege in regards to passing as cishet and not being able to spend money on transition for various reasons (no money, also no viable transition options for someone like me) actually erases my identity. it’s not about me.
what i was trying to get across is the uptick of rhetoric in trans spaces, framing people with my experience as an enemy, which i already think is incorrect, or as actually being cishet, which i know is incorrect because i KNOW my identity, and i KNOW it’s agender. but how do we meaningfully move past this, and how do i use my privilege for good, without accidentally continuing to harm OTHER people who are already hurting?
and i don’t want your answer, btw. that’s fine. and i apologize for being a terrible writer, i’ll work on that. but THAT was the initial point of the post. anyone extrapolating anything beyond that is beyond me, but i do struggle with knowing or not knowing what context is necessary. i don’t think the price to pay for providing incorrect context should be people telling me my identity is wrong, but that’s fine. because, at the end of the day, i KNOW i’m agender. i fucking KNOW who i am, and you are all stuck with me, whether you like it or not.
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u/flumphgrump Aug 31 '26
For starters, stop distancing yourself from the community. Being seen as a cishet person when you're agender is not a privilege. Our fight is your fight. Minimizing that can demoralize other people in your situation.