Trans Politics, Trans Activism, also 'rolling is this transphobic?' thread

right, like, to anyone who reads enough of my posts it's pretty obvious that i'm having a rough time of it right now, and being trans is part of it, but not in the way people think. pre-transition my entire life was kind of centered around me hating myself and thinking of myself as disgusting and worthless, and that kind of thing just doesn't _work_ anymore. i'm being put in this position where i kind of have to learn to like and respect myself and i'm extremely pissy about that.

i do talk a lot about the trans genocide and it is, in fact, very bad and people need to take it seriously and out of all the trans people in the world i'm one of the ones who is probably _least_ at risk from it. the most serious problems i have are a lot more personal and specific than genocide, and none of them are caused by my being trans. well, except for how fucking hard it is for me to get cypionate. i mean i'm sure valerate is fine, but i'm doing _great_ on cypionate and it pisses me off that nobody's fucking making it.

So the Miss Italia beauty pageant has banned trans competitors, stating that entrants must be "female from birth"...and in protest, a bunch of transmen have enrolled to compete.

Trovo geniale che le persone #trans FtM si stiano iscrivendo a #MissItalia avendo come sesso assegnato alla nascita quello femminile. È un vero e proprio atto politico di protesta e visibilità, non scontato o dovuto, che centra il punto rispetto alle affermazioni di #Mirigliani.

— Gianmarco Capogna 🏳️‍🌈 (@gmarcoc) July 22, 2023

Translation: "I find it brilliant that people #trans FtM are enrolling in #MissItalia having female as their sex assigned at birth. It is a real political act of protest and visibility, not taken for granted or due, which hits the mark with respect to the statements of #Mirigliani."

Just popping in to note that the online edition of the Daily Telegraph has Graham Linehan performing stand up outside the Scottish Parliament as the main story in the News Section... and in the Scotland section... and in the Arts section... and in the Culture Wars section (yes, they have a Culture Wars section)... the exact same story with the exact same photograph.

A new-ish acquaintance– I am organizing a reading for her— just had this published. CW: SI, conversion therapy.

https://www.thecut.com/article/what-i-learned-in-conversion-therapy.html

Thanks for sharing table. Indianapolis is... not a great place to be trans. I'm glad your acquaintance made it through.

on consideration, "i'm sorry i told you your queer child is going to hell, my wife has cancer" is the single most hoosier statement i have ever heard in my life. the only way it could be more hoosier is if it was immediately followed up with "so, you going to the pitch-in next week?"

Great, if not surprising, insight into the "conversion therapy" experience. The article felt like it ended too abruptly.

Is there a particular reason that "trans folk" is so often used, as opposed to "trans people"? I can see how "folks" is clearly preferable to, say, "ladies and gentlemen" as a term of plural address, but I've never understood if there was a political or other reason for "trans folk" being so prevalent.

tbc, I have no objection to the term*, I'm just curious if I'm missing something!

*well, I do sometimes think the non-use of "people" feels a little othering, but afaict this wasn't imposed on trans people from the outside (I could very well be wrong about that)

no clue, i didn't know it was used that often. i say it myself but i'm scottish so tend to say folk instead of people :)

I guess "persons" has more focus on the individuality, and "people" more on group / majority, and "folks" has a casual vague all-encompassing "whatever you are" about it that makes it trendy in all contexts right now.

also transes sounds like shit

and people has that annoying extra syllable

it's just the somewhat corny language of online queer communities, not sure there's a whole lot more to it than that

lotta folks and yall out there and as a tennessean it makes me feel at home except when they get deployed passive aggressively like "some of yall really don't get (x)" idk i'm kind of like, it's a term of endearment don't fuck it up

Thanks for the responses! I also advocate for wider adoption of “y’all”

"Y'all" is easy. Try advocating for the broader adoption of "youse."

been using "y'all" for a few years, only got a snarky joke from my boss about going southern.

lotta folks and yall out there and as a tennessean it makes me feel at home except when they get deployed passive aggressively like "some of yall really don't get (x)" idk i'm kind of like, it's a term of endearment don't fuck it up

― Tracer Hand

can "all yall" be used to refer to "some of yall"?

i kept y'all after leaving kentucky in '03, i just think it's a good word, i'm delighted to see it gain more popular currency.

Take it one step further and go with "yinz".

West of Scotland has "youse".

... often rendered as "yiz/yeez".

Yiz as a plural pronoun is found most notably in the Philadelphia area and Delaware Valley (including Southern New Jersey), especially among working-class communities.

“yiz/“yous” also work in Ireland (with some regional variation as to what the vowel is). “Folks” is recommended as an inclusive alternative to “guys” in my (large, American) company.

been using "y'all" for a few years, only got a snarky joke from my boss about going southern.

― the dreaded dependent claus (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 29 August 2023 14:20 (three hours ago) link

how much further south can you go though!

la gente

I've lived in Tennessee long enough that I use y'all unselfconsciously in certain settings. Not any time it would seem fake-folksy tho. I also use "folks" a fair amount, I think it's warmer and friendlier than "people."

Just to clarify, I'm not talking about addressing a group as either "people" or "folks" (or y'all, yinz, youse, or, the most inclusive of them all, tout le monde for that matter).

The usages that made me wonder about this were things like: "The organizers changed their recruitment plan and now the conference is much more diverse. This year there were way more people of color, disabled people, trans folk..."; in that kind of context it struck me as possibly deliberate, but I couldn't guess why, and now that I was overthinking it, I started to wonder if it was not-good. But as ufo said, it does seem like a turn of phrase that arose organically and has stuck without necessarily having any larger import.

for a while i think "folx" got used a lot in queer spaces, i think it's just language being language tbh

So I saw a meme excerpting a FOIA act document about Leslie Feinberg, and it kind of confused me. It said "As of April, 1974, FEINBERG had apparently shaved off her beard and was beginning to dress in a more feminine manner and to assume the appearance of a girl." The meme was about the FBI in 1974 respecting a trans person's pronouns, but I'm reading it going like "Wait, Leslie Feinberg was _MTF_?" I had to look it up to confirm. Applying categories like "MTF" or "FTM" Feinberg is, I think, missing an essential point about hir life and experience, but zie was not, in fact, AMAB.

Transphobes: I CAN ALWAYS TELL! FBI in 1974: Apparently have no idea what Leslie Feinberg's AGAB was. Although to be fair, this is the same FBI that spent three years trying to find offensive language in "Louie Louie" and completely failed to notice that the drummer yells "Fuck!" at one point during the song.

Here's a piece about it from Dr. Amanda Weimer at the National Archives:

https://text-message.blogs.archives.gov/2023/06/20/leslie-feinberg-the-fbi-and-gender-pronouns/

youtube just showed me a trailer for "G3nd3r Tr4nsf0rm4tion: The Unt0ld R34lities" ...WTF???

The MSN homepage on my new laptop kept showing me transphobic content aggregated from various sites. Titles like "school board member shuts down trans "woman" who was protesting recent decision" or some similar shit.

whatever the documentary about I guarantee that "untold" is false advertising

xxp I'm just seeing this but it's really telling and I think every trans man online today has frequently had the queasily validating experience of being told by terrible people that they will always be men. it reminds me of people spreading rumours about Wendy Carlos being (in cis logic) "secretly a woman pretending to be a man" which was more right than they knew

if there's an option not to see headlines I'll take it but some apps/sites/devices don't give you that

it's hard to say anything new about the media at this point

The documentary is anti-trans specifically talking about the indoctrination of kids, it's got a really long trailer. I was very surprised to see it (unrelated to themes in an innocent comedy video it followed when in incognito mode)

always best to browse youtube with an adblocker on, that way you never see any trailers or shit

well yeah, I was more surprised to learn about the existence of the thing overall vs. being upset about the ad. Mentioned the context of the encounter cause it implies it's being advertised same as any netflix doc or movie trailer?

yeah I have no idea how youtube decides what ads to show and what not, but the few times I've had to use it without a blocker I've been horrified at some of the shit I've seen. It's clearly not based on any affinity scores I've built up for certain kinds of content. LIke nothing about any profile that's been created by any data mining companies would lead anyone to believe I'd be a prime candidate for right-wing nonsense and yet I will see it if I don't block it.

well yeah, I was more surprised to learn about the existence of the thing overall vs. being upset about the ad. Mentioned the context of the encounter cause it implies it's being advertised same as any netflix doc or movie trailer?

― Evan

i've talked about this in the past, but yes, my experience has led me to conclude that youtube _does_ systemically promote transphobia. transphobic media, such as matt walsh, is what comes up when you search for trans content, and content supporting trans rights doesn't. this has been going on for years and years now. and what can any of us actually do about it? i watch shit on youtube. it's the hegemon. i have all kinds of add-ons installed to that it doesn't recommend me videos at all. this minimizes the personal harm browsing youtube causes me, but it does nothing to address the systemic issue, which is that youtube is one of the major media outlets spreading anti-trans bigotry. they _could_ keep this from happening, but they aren't. instead, they profit from transphobia.

just in case any of y'all are wondering why i'm anti-capitalist.

the few times I've had to use it without a blocker I've been horrified at some of the shit I've seen

I keep youtube history turned off so my browsing doesn't affect what gets listed and there is always shit like "jordan peterson destroys a feminist" or whatever showing there.

Yup - watch any feminist content and you'll be served ebdless clips of dudes DESTROYING feminism, doubt it works the other way around.

I know someone who works at YouTube, I should ask her what the thinking is internally there, because I imagine there are people who are exasperated with how this algorithm works (or doesn't work).

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/sep/25/eternal-90s-stars-cancel-full-band-reunion-over-reported-trans-rights-clash

Yup - watch any feminist content and you'll be served ebdless clips of dudes DESTROYING feminism, doubt it works the other way around.

― Daniel_Rf, Saturday, September 16, 2023 3:10 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

Sounds a lot like it just feeds you things with the same keywords tbh, aside from other variables it uses to brainlessly lump content together with the same subjects.

Well that's the thing, is the dude watching his Rogan DESTROYS feminism videos getting pro feminist videos served to him by the algorithm? It seems not.

Maybe! Why not? They also probably love to hate-watch that stuff so maybe they're even clicking on it.

In fact, the more they see that stuff in their feed, the more they believe it's "invading" the lives of normal people and kids so I'm sure that feeds their narrative too. "It's everywhere, we can't escape this stuff! We gotta do something!"

Well all I can say is this a phenomenon I've seen a lot amongst ppl who watch yt and are into progressive causes but I've never ever heard of alt right dudes noting the same, which is strange because much of the internet seems dedicated to chronicling everything these ppl say, doubly so if there's schadenfreude to be had. I know this is hardly scientific evidence.

I think there are probably a lot of reasons why, for one: I'd bet pro-feminism videos are much less likely to put the word "FEMINISM" in their thumbnails and descriptions etc, than a video that is all about "ANTI FEMINISM". Also takedown video essays are a pretty popular youtube format, and the people that like that sort of content are looking for people to put things like FEMINISM and twitter discourse in its place. So the demographic for a popular video type is disproportionately on THAT side of the debate. It's just not an equal landscape for both sides.

I think there are probably a lot of reasons why, for one: I'd bet pro-feminism videos are much less likely to put the word "FEMINISM" in their thumbnails and descriptions etc, than a video that is all about "ANTI FEMINISM". Also takedown video essays are a pretty popular youtube format, and the people that like that sort of content are looking for people to put things like FEMINISM and twitter discourse in its place. So the demographic for a popular video type is disproportionately on THAT side of the debate. It's just not an equal landscape for both sides.

― Evan

i mean these are all interesting ideas and if the data to back them up were available i'd definitely consider them

i have an interesting idea! maybe youtube, being a capitalist/corporatist entity, has decided that joe rogan and matt walsh synergize with their business model more readily than feminist, queer, and trans voices do, and therefore they tend to promote rogan and walsh more than they do queer and trans voices.

you know who synergizes really well with youtube's business model, on the left? vaush. that's who.

I was reading one of my favorite blogs today, one I read pretty regularly. I won't say which one it is, only that the person who updates the blog is someone I like and respect a lot, someone I've personally learned a lot about music from. What I'm saying here isn't any sort of a judgement on them or their blog. I only mention because somebody might recognize the source and take it as some sort of judgement. It isn't.

Anyway, I ran across this quote from Will Hermes' 2011 book _Love Goes to Buildings on Fire_:

The Waldorf-Astoria was the epitome of uptown, up-tight, upper-crust New York; whoever agreed to give the ballroom over to the Dolls and their wasted fans was either clueless or wickedly subversive. By midnight, a thousand-some freaks of various stripes were packed into the ballroom entryway, pressing against doors that were supposed to have opened at 11:00. Tempers flared, doors were smashed, and someone lit a stink bomb in the hotel lobby in protest. Security guards admitted a portion of the mob but hundreds were turned away. Arthur Bell described the scene as “Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange and Joel Grey in Cabaret by the dozens, chains and hoods, silver buttocks, scarlet breasts, dildoed noses,” with old-school trannies washing down demerol capsules with swigs of whiskey.

I'm not actually interested in the question of whether or not this is transphobic. Some trans people might say it is, some people might vehemently insist it isn't. I genuinely don't care whether or not making a reference to "old-school trannies" in a book published back in 2011 is transphobic or not. What I care about is this:

Speaking as a future old-school tranny, please don't romanticize me like this when I'm gone. I'm incredibly happy with who I am and what I've accomplished. My life is amazing. I've seen and experienced all sorts of strange and wonderful things. That said, it's really stressful, the way a lot of people treat us. It's hard, and some of the things I've seen people do that might seem glamorous from the outside... a lot of it is just how some of us cope with all of the shit we go through. For me personally, that kind of thing isn't something glamorous, isn't something to aspire to. I personally have coped with trauma in my life in some pretty unhealthy ways. By all means, celebrate me. Please, celebrate me, I'm fairly awesome. However, when I deal with all of the shit I've been through by doing shit that's, well, kind of fucked up? Please don't celebrate that. I don't think it's worth celebrating.

As usual, I'm just speaking for me. Other people are going to have their own takes on this issue. :)