no boys allowed in the room!!!!

On the gyno topic, I went off my implanon the other week after the 3 year mark. Ughhhh first period in 3 years and I already hate it and had a HUGE fight with my patner this morning and i feel like shit.

Seeing as people are doing medical talk itt, I just started my second heavy period in a month and I KNOW it is a thyroid thing but none of my doctors have ever taken me seriously about this stuff. I also have severely debilitating anxiety around doctors and making GP appointments is so hard these days, so I think I'm probably going to deteriorate slowly and painfully until I finally get round to dying. Oh well.

With you on GPs, I'm hard pressed to find any who give a shit anymore. :(

I think you have to persevere and maybe it's not the right thing to do, but google and google until you think you have done enough research to be knowledgeable and make doctors take you seriously. You are ultimately paying their salary.

I know enough smart nurses who hate doctors because of their self serving egos that I don't feel bad anymore about demanding care when I know I need it.

Again and again, it has to be repeated: the term "incel" was literally invented by a woman.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/25/woman-who-invented-incel-movement-interview-toronto-attack

It was a term meant to describe the experiences of women who didn't or couldn't meet gendered expectations, Teh Fats, and the "only gay / lesbian in the village" experience. The fact that this term has been co-opted as a byword for male sexual entitlement tells you everything you need to know about whose problems are considered *real*, or not.

Branwell's gonna be threadkiller here, but I guess that's my job.

I knew I shouldn't have looked in the masculinity thread given the things being said here, but I did, and...

It's so frustrating, seeing dudes saying things like, "oh, if only we had some trans-masc voices in here", given the violent history of ILX's treatment of the few trans-masc ppl that have been out, here. And yet, a cis dude, who is all "Well, I've been hanging out with a lot of 'F to M's and this is what they've said..." is viewed as an authoritative expert voice on transmasculinity.

The irony of this position, when I was literally banned from the trans thread. (It's astonishing, how, when one dude-with-a-history was using the place to carry on; and multiple people asked him to stop - mods were all 'we don't want to be hasty' and 'free speech' and he was never banned from it, and I literally had to leave a space I asked to be created - but the moment I, an NB Trans, steps 3mm from the Acceptable Public Discourse About The Trans, the banhammer came down so fast my head was spinning.)

So ILX only ever gets to see the AFAB trans experience, as filtered through the eyes of cis dudes. And it's very notable that the cis dudes love to share the 'M to F' voices that are all "masculinity is more complicated than we had expected" and "here are some awful ways that being a racialised man is different from being a racialised woman" and "male privilege is... kinda weird and not always cut and dried." Cis dudes *love* sharing those pieces, in a way they do not ever seem to share the multiple transmasc voices saying things like, "holy shit, here are all the ways in which my life got magically easier and less of a hassle, in areas which I didn't even know *existed* when I was still being treated as a woman, the minute I started to really pass." Cis men only ever seem interested in trans issues when trans issues can be used as a tool to contradict male privilege in some way.

But I also know that if I go on that thread, there are a number of men who will start this high-pitched shrieking like...

https://cdn2-www.comingsoon.net/assets/uploads/2017/07/remakes-watching-slide-890Z-videoSixteenByNineJumbo1600.jpg

...at me, in a way that they do not do it at cis dudes who are sharing their cis-filtered view of The Transmasc Narrative. And if I react in any way, it will be because "Branwell is just an angry person". Not because of their misogyny, not because of their transphobia.

Been thinking about this thing discussed above, about "being good at male-coded interests" as a way of almost-accessing male privilege. As someone living in the boundary land, it just doesn't work that way. "Being good at male-coded interests" is still something which leaves you eternally dependent on male approval, and you will only ever be "pretty good... for a girl." The actual test of male privilege, when you're trying to pass as male - is how much male-coded *behaviour* will be tolerated. How much bluntness, how much directness, how much taking-up-space, how much "not having to check in with and be aware of and waltz around the feelings of everyone else in the room". How much of (any kind of) privilege is not the stuff you do have to take into account - but the stuff you *don't*, and the stuff that it's never occurred to you before, that you should even *need* to.

Like, trans men suddenly start to *notice* the day that women start shying away from them on dark streets (in a way that cis men do not - unless they've been educated by a feminist that this is A Thing) because it's taken for granted, that when you're not viewed-as-male, you *have* be aware of people around you.

On that note, I know Kinder has seen this on twitter, but it's pretty relevant to this discussion of the utter bedrock assumptions about violence towards women and masculinity...

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/dec/13/what-would-a-city-that-is-safe-for-women-look-like

It's easier for the woman who wrote this, to imagine RAZING ENTIRE CITIES AND REBUILDING THEM FROM SCRATCH in order to protect women - and then dismissing the idea as infeasible - than it is to imagine a world where male violence isn't considered as totally normal as the weather, or a world where cis men could be educated not to attack or harass people who aren't men.

I mean, this is the absolute failure of vision that I was railing about - when I got banned from the Trans thread.

Someone was saying to me, that fighting "T3r£s" and combating transphobia in Feminism was The Single Most Important Issue in the struggle, because 'some feminists do not allow trans women in women's shelters or rape crisis centres.' Like, the backwards way this is framed, and whose transphobia it ignores and treats as normal... HELLO! why do women even *need* separate shelters or rape crisis centres? The transphobia of women who say 'we really need to screen who uses these spaces...' is named and addressed and problematised - but the transphobia and transmisogyny and common-or-garden misogyny of the men who PUT WOMEN - BOTH CIS AND TRANS AND EVERYONE INBETWEEN - in *need* of these services? That doesn't even require a *mention*. Transphobia has become defined, a priori, as a Women's Problem, in the same way that Rape is classed as a Women's Problem, and that Domestic Violence is classed as a Women's Problem.

(And of course, the best way for cis men to combat transphobia is... to shout at AFABs that they're not being feminist enough. The idea of actually talking to other cis men about male violence, including transphobia...? Scary. Complicated. Can't we get some AFABs in to manage our feelings about that.)

Sorry, I'm probably still too affronted and just genuinely offended by that incident to be posting on ILX. The best person on this is Sara Ahmed, and she talks about those *SNAP* moments. Where people hear and see the snap and act like the snap itself is the problem, but pretend as if the stress and the pressure that leads to the *SNAP* has nothing to do with the snap.

Anyway, apologies for the thread-killing. Blowing off steam, no response required. I'm leaving for Berlin tomorrow, so I won't be around, so I'll just say happy holidays to everyone now. Tschüss!

I mean, being lectured on the best ways to address transphobia, by people who literally started multiple threads, board-lawyering for their RIGHT to deadname me, is... well, it's something, innit.

ty for the welcomes, for anyone not aware already I used to be ILXor Phil D. before I began transitioning. I probably will be doing a lot of lurking rather than posting because I'm still kind of . . . *learning* womanhood? I am a very femme-presenting trans woman, and it's an entirely different way of getting along in the world than the previous 48 years have been. So I'm just kind of going day to day. But I learn from reading this threads and all of your experiences.

welcome eliza!! i don't know enough about the specific situations mentioned in branwell's post above to even fully understand what is going on but i wish everyone the best.

as for learning femininity, i wouldn't try too hard to learn. i sure didn't :) most of the stuff i was supposed to do was way out of character. i remember one time a friend told me that if i wanted boys to like me, i had to be more coy (her word) and even thought i was 16 at the time i was like naaaaaah.

well i don't wish EVERYONE the best, but hopefully you know what i mean.

Hi Bran, rest assured I see your post and I hear you. I'm still taking it in, a bit, and also I don't know about most of that history. But thanks for

Like, the backwards way this is framed, and whose transphobia it ignores and treats as normal... HELLO! why do women even *need* separate shelters or rape crisis centres? The transphobia of women who say 'we really need to screen who uses these spaces...' is named and addressed and problematised - but the transphobia and transmisogyny and common-or-garden misogyny of the men who PUT WOMEN - BOTH CIS AND TRANS AND EVERYONE INBETWEEN - in *need* of these services? That doesn't even require a *mention*. Transphobia has become defined, a priori, as a Women's Problem, in the same way that Rape is classed as a Women's Problem, and that Domestic Violence is classed as a Women's Problem.

xp I wish a lot of people the wurst tbrr but no one on this thread. :D

I definitely get a lot of what Branwell's discussing above -- since I changed my Twitter account and started following different people, I've had a lot of new exposure to LGBTQIA+ and trans politics, and there's a LOT going on there. And their (apologies, Branwell, I can't remember your pronouns) experience in the UK is a lot different than what's going on here, too -- I follow and chat with a lot of UK trans activists (a term I hate) and I don't envy them what's going on these days. And an awful lot of them *do* center fighting TERFs as battle #1 rather than violent, misogynist men. (Although seeing feminists align with evangelicals to scapegoat trans people makes me want to turn into the She-Hulk.)

As far as learning womanhood goes, the good thing (?maybe) is that I've always exhibited behaviors socially that coded as a little more "feminine." Anything "masculine" was very, very performative, an attempt to butch it up and keep myself in the closet. Heck, I denied myself the fun of Halloween for like two and a half decades for fear of accidentally outing myself! I've certainly already been made to feel uncomfortable by men invading my personal space; I've never liked people walking too closely, etc., but it takes on a whole different character now. And I experienced incredible discomfort when I had to go to a music store recently to buy guitar strings. For the first time ever it felt like a male space that I was invading rather than somewhere I belonged, even though I've been shopping there for 8 years. (Getting deadnamed didn't help, either.)

Heck, I denied myself the fun of Halloween for like two and a half decades for fear of accidentally outing myself!
:( that's a tragedy. 25 years is a very long time to long for something.

i also recognize this Transphobia has become defined, a priori, as a Women's Problem, in the same way that Rape is classed as a Women's Problem, and that Domestic Violence is classed as a Women's Problem. as a major problem. infighting among women has always made me really sad because like eliza said, violent misogyny is everywhere and is killing us. idk i am almost never on the frontlines of anything involving fighting words because of my intense fear of being attacked. i think this makes me shrink when i probably shouldn't but hey i am getting help and learning.

I am so bad with acronyms (I just learned what tl:dr was last year) and I can't find tbrr or maybe that was a typo by inorbit. But in any case I did look up all terms in branwell's post just to make sure I read it clearly. I don't know about that incident that happened. But fuck em. In the last couple of years a lot of passive "good" men have been lamenting that no one told them it was this bad for everyone else who wasn't just like them. And when we do tell men now, over and over, they still choose to focus on, like, problematic corporate event planning at strip clubs when we are obviously talking about something else.

"to be really real" is possibly a noize borad or roxy concoction.

oh man do not get me started on the dividing properties of acronyms and jargon. the "noise era" of ilx exemplified this in that it showed insider/outsider status based on the willingness and ability to post with acronyms, ALL CAPS, discern jokes from not-jokes, and generally conform to the "posting style" exhibited on that sub-board. for a while i thought it would make an amazing corpus for linguistic study but i no longer care about that, at least not for now.

The woman who died in Ireland because she was refused an abortion--the law is changing now but only over her dead body (and those of all the other girls and women who haven't had access to reproductive rights).

South Brooklyn man viciously threatened to shoot & kill a female US Senator after seeing a video online of her criticizing Trump for his stance on reproductive rights. Man has "Keep Christ in Christmas" sign on his front lawn.

Residential center for "troubled" young women closed in Upstate NY after 19 people were arrested for sex-trafficking girls as young as 13 who were there because they were previously assaulted & victimized.

Eliza Dushku was (apparently?!) fired off a show for objecting to rape jokes and harassment.

It's a brutal day for women in the news.

The Eliza Dushku news on top of the fact that when #metoo first popped she said she was harassed as a teen by the stunt coordinator on "True Lies" . . . she has been very poorly done by in Hollywood.

xp Savita’s case made me SO ANGRY and when we won the referendum I read all the notes on the mural and cried. I posted on the thread at the time, but there was a Facebook page called In Her Shoes - Women of the 8th that was heartbreaking.

One of the things that was really surprising and just heartening, though, was the exit poll report that women’s stories were the defining factor in people choosing to vote the way they did. That meant a lot to me, that people listened to ordinary women and changed the law for them.

I am thinking about the campaign all over again and thinking about the bravery of women coming out to tell their stories. It’s such a stigma in Ireland and suddenly there were women speaking up everywhere - I was so proud of them. I know there is a debate elsewhere which is valid about women’s pain being “necessary” for people to think of them as deserving of protection or understanding - but these women were defiant and challenging the order that oppressed us all. They used their pain to force people to confront the reality of the situation, and we are all grateful to them.

I think Saoirse and the shocked gasps at Ronan Mullen's response to her story is a standout moment of this campaign #pkshow pic.twitter.com/ZRuohwIeOl

— Naomi O'Leary (@NaomiOhReally) May 24, 2018

Yeah I remember reading about the "Return to vote YES" campaign and being amazed and heart-ful!!

Eliza - yeah, I know you used to go by a different name. That's *why* I wanted to make sure you definitely knew you were welcome here? It can be a bit of an imposing thread to jump into sometimes. You got it right, I'm 'they/them'. :)

Sorry I'm so jargon-y and acronym-y! I forget, sometimes. But everyone has different contexts and different milieus and different idea of what common currency. Like, in one of my trans groups, we were throwing all the acronyms around, QUILTBAG this, and TWEF that, and GRA etc. and the conversation was going really thick and fast, until someone leaned forwards and said "what's a meme?" and we all laughed uproariously thinking this was a joke, but then they repeated, "No, for real, pals, - what *IS* a meme?"

So...

It's fine. I like to learn new things. Although, I have gotten MSM: Mainstream Media confused with Man Seeking Man and MCM: Mid Century Modern confused with Man Crush Monday when I was looking up acronyms trying to find the right definition.

I removed myself from the trans discussions (welcome, Eliza, btw!) on other threads partly because of what happened with Branwell, partly because of TERF getting flung around everywhere in a massively self-congratulatory way in light of the above and partly due to another poster who I've slightly side-eyed in the past continuing to be sneering (previously he'd 'splained, incorrectly, something I have fairly in-depth knowledge of and angrily refused to entertain the idea that someone else might know more than him - only a minor thing but enough for me to dismiss anything he's piped up with).

As Branwell knows I'm trying to learn more about gender and feminism. I feel I constantly have to remind myself that 'female' and 'feminine' are two separate things often conflated and one is neither necessary nor sufficient to be the other. (This is in no way aimed at you, Eliza.)

The more I read about gender the less I feel I identify as 'cis' based on others' definitions; but there are SO MANY THINGS that seemingly can't be defined nicely for me and I appreciate that not feeling much about gender (or, actually, identity) could purely arise from the privilege of not feeling any jarring with mine.

The Irish referendum was amazing; I honestly had no idea beforehand how it would go.

excuse nonsensical grammar/sentences; it's been a long day

no offense taken at all, kinder -- I'm always trying to consider the differences for myself! like the mere fact of my dysphoria, my lack of connection to/disgust with my body tells me I'm female. I'm feminine because I prefer presenting that way. I could easily be more to the nb end of things as well.

Seeing as people are doing medical talk itt, I just started my second heavy period in a month and I KNOW it is a thyroid thing but none of my doctors have ever taken me seriously about this stuff.

Oh lord gyno stuff. I ought to be grateful that my doctors took me seriously earlier this year when I talked to them about my heavy periods. But I know that I benefit from 1) being middle-class and white and 2) knowing some of the medical jargon. I underwent endometrial ablation earlier this year. The problem is that my endometrium seems to have grown back like a WEED. Right now I am having a period almost as heavy as before the procedure back in August.

In the meantime, for what it's worth, I'm pleased to see in this thread ILXorz whom I've known in the past.

One of these days I'll let the issue go (or not, who knows), but something I have stuck in my craw is that progressive lefty dudes of ilx would go apeshit if a white person insisted "I'm not racist! I have black friends!" because obviously anyone who grew up with institutional racism has it backed into their bones; denying this is not OK. But apparently it is fine to say "I'm not sexist! I get along great with my women colleagues!" Perhaps some of these dudes are confusing sexism with misogyny; I honestly haven't felt there is much of the latter on ilx (rare trolling excepted), but "I'm not sexist! I'm a feminist." Brother, please.

on that note, i was hanging out with a male friend last night and after hearing about a pretty run-of-the-mill sexist experience i had with a beloved* bartender, admitted to me how blind he (and people he talks to) can be wrt gender issues and misogyny that is so woven into the fabric that he doesn't see it. i was like yeah, we see it. like a magic thread that runs through everything.

*so beloved that there was an entire night dedicated to lauding him, I did not attend

"I don't trust myself to have a drink with a woman friend because I might fall for her" I mean WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK how are you different from Mike Pence on this? So sexist on so many levels.

the say something nice about another ilxor thread is making me smile today. they are falling all over themselves congratulating themselves for being so decent.

I'd say would should organize a women's ilx strike but the results would be far too depressing.

Bah, I don't think they would care or notice and I kind of don't care if they don't like an internet tone that makes them feel jumbly inside. Maybe in 3-5-10 years (or never) they will realize how far behind they were about things.

I mean, I will say it here, but it feels pretty great to be so sure about things sometimes. And this is seriously my huge side-eye about all of this:

One of these days I'll let the issue go (or not, who knows), but something I have stuck in my craw is that progressive lefty dudes of ilx would go apeshit if a white person insisted "I'm not racist! I have black friends!" because obviously anyone who grew up with institutional racism has it backed into their bones; denying this is not OK. But apparently it is fine to say "I'm not sexist! I get along great with my women colleagues!" Perhaps some of these dudes are confusing sexism with misogyny; I honestly haven't felt there is much of the latter on ilx (rare trolling excepted), but "I'm not sexist! I'm a feminist." Brother, please.

they are falling all over themselves congratulating themselves for being so decent.

Was that what was going on there? I saw a lot of identifying with the shit-stirring post made by what I always assumed was a sock account, and all that made me think was “yeah, guess I’ll just stick to this thread if I ever want to talk about sexism again lol”.

i was wondering about that too
i don't begrudge the identification but it sends my alarm mode into overdrive -- who wrote it, why, etc.

which one was the shit stirring post/the sock account? I always think of that joke (can't remember if I have the right phrasing)
Q: How can you tell when a man has a cold and doesn't feel well?
A: Oh trust me, he'll let you know.

I finally was able to listen to the Saorsi clip (was always in public areas without headphones). Was Ronan Mullen totally dismissive of her after?

He said that thing about “regardless of anything you have ever done” and got the hostile crowd reaction, but she got a LOT of public support. Even Russell Crowe quote tweeted her in support.

I really debated bringing this up, because it *is* ancient history for most of ILX; but for me it is still very raw.

LL mentioned the off-putting clubbishness of the Noize Borad. Well, the thing is, the guy who started that noize dude thing - he harassed me steadily for a period of YEARS, starting pretty low-key handwave-away-able, but escalating to a point where even other noize dudes started noticing that he had crossed a line. Pretty much *all* of the mods, at the start, took the attitude that this was flirty, banter type thing that was welcomed or enjoyed by me, or that I was even somehow complicit in - rather than this being an overwhelming and awful thing that I wanted to *stop* (but had no idea how to make it stop without him continually escalating). Even once it was generally realised that his attention was not welcome, half the mods took the attitude that I simply deserved it, because I was "annoying". The few that saw it as something I was completely upset by, told me things like... well, he's probably ~on the spectrum~ and maybe he has ADHD, so he clearly has impulse control issues, and you really have to work harder on ignoring him. The idea that *I* might be autistic, diagnosed, with a suspected side order of ADD - the idea that *I* might have serious impulse control issues upon being provoked? That was never even considered. It was my job to manage him, whether I was capable of it or not. Not his job to just... stop harassing. It was always presented that the problem was *me*, that I was doing something wrong to attract it; that I was *causing* the problem by asking for it to be dealt with. My reactions, psychological fallout from that harassment, trauma, meltdowns - became more evidence that *I* was the problem. I became viewed as a Problem Poster. Not the guy harassing me, not the people egging him on, and not the people refusing to do anything about him.

I am not the only female-presenting person who has had serious harassment (or worse) issues with members of ILX. Some of those guys were eventually banned when their behaviour escalated from the women to, say... *mods*. Some of those guys are still here, some of those guys have near-mythical status, they still hold jobs with positions of power. Most of the women, on the other hand...

(To the point where... a few years ago, when someone alluded to the oft-mentioned but never explained "chucking a pint of beer at a funeral" incident - people just *assumed* that I was the perpetrator, when the truth was, ILX had a serial harasser, and after comparing notes with other ILX women on what he'd done to them, and what I'd ignored him doing to me - that I was one of his many *targets*, one of the victims of that incident. Yet, because ILX subscribes to the "to name a problem is to *become* the problem" - of course, I must have been the problem in that situation.)

So when I see long-term ILX dudes posting away on #MeToo threads about how they're ~so different~ and congratulating themselves for their attitudes towards women (or even pulling the whole... why don't more women come forward, why didn't anyone tell us...) you will excuse me if my attitudes are less than laudatory. They saw, they knew, they did... NOTHING. Any guy who likes to congratulate himself on how much "one of the good guys" he is, is generally congratulating himself on his obliviousness and blindness to the stuff going on around him. Spare me.

History lesson over. Have a good week. I'm off to enjoy all the Friedhofer und Altbauten in Berlin.

wow. first, thank you for writing that all out. i appreciate the clarity :)

this clause really stands out for me because "unwanted attention" and other people's inability to recognize and call it out has been on my mind for decades. my whole life?
Even once it was generally realised that his attention was not welcome,

I know that harassment will continue but what if we started to recognize that ---> unwanted attention <--- is not the fault of the person who receives it? imagine a world where unwanted attention stops before it turns into everything else we think of as "women's issues" ;_;

Thx for the clarification as well, although I am trying to keep from finding old posts to fill in a lot of gaps (like, a lot).

In other non-men news because they take up way too much of our time that we don't have for them, I am finally starting a new quilting project after 3 years of procrastinating on what I want to do. I might do a colorway inspired by the new season of Mrs Maisel.

TW: descriptions of violence
Femicide in UK: 76% of women killed by men in 2017 knew their killer

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/18/femicide-in-uk-76-of-women-killed-by-men-in-2017-knew-their-killer?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Copy_to_clipboard

Sorry, I really feel like I've sent the thread on a massive downer.

Like, I'm trying to say, "these systems that exist to protect some people, at the expense of other people... they exist everywhere, even ILX" and it comes out like gossip and complaints. It's probably best not to dig up dead dogs, but let them lie. But just... ILX is not immune.

In happier, non-men news, I've moved from "never dating anyone at all because it's too hard" to "advanced level dating: going on dates in a second (or third) language". So far with hilarious and entertaining consequences. (Alas, no sexy consequences, yet.) I think, in many ways, being a foreigner is weirdly great for autistic people, or indeed queer people, trying to meet other people, because... you have an excuse not to understand local customs or social conventions, not because you're a complete weirdo who can't social right, but because you're just... foreign?

Viel Spaß in Berlin, Branwell!

One undiagnosed aspie trait I have (I am probably not aspie, just weird) is that in IRL conversation I have a massive brain-lag where it takes me a while to get my brain-cogs moving to decode something someone says to me, and think about it, then think of an answer, and translate that into actual words, and make sure they're in the right order and I'm not going to trip over the sounds or accidentally say something weird (I always do say something weird btw), and it takes me about a week, and normally by then the conversation has moved on or the other person's left the room or just got really cross about how slow I am.

So I kind of enjoyed early German lessons, because everyone was slow at forming sentences, and I didn't feel so weird? But now we've reached the stage where other people aren't slow, and I'm weird again, oh well. It's still a hobby.

Also I only seem to post on the politics thread these days and I don't know why I post there because either nobody replies or I get sarcastic replies I can't decode and either way I feel like a weird dumb uncool centrist dad mum cat lady who doesn't know what things mean, but I guess that's most people's ILX experience on most threads regardless of gender, so all good. (Today is my last day at work before xmas so "don't care, all good" is my mood for the day)

PS I enjoyed reading allusions to some events in your big post but it is prob best if I don't go into them or their v tangential incidence on my previous ILX life...

(probably just weird = I do wish there was a cheap and judgement-free place to talk through all the things my mental/developmental hypochondria obsesses on so maybe someone half-knowledgeable could say "no, of course not" or "hmm, maybe slightly" or even "hoo boy, you might be the last person alive who doesn't already know", without having to make a big scene at the GP's and then wait two years, or pay £2k for a private diagnosis or probably non-diagnosis of every separate thing that crosses my mind as the latest excuse for being probably just weird. but anyway. probably just weird.)

(also don't make me ask my parents anything about my early life, I really do not need that conversation, they are good well-meaning people but they are awkward and passive-aggressive enough about the whole depression thing, thanks.)

xp I post there constantly and half my stuff gets ignored, you should still post!

health anxiety is a symptom of OCD, have you considered that? Long before I was diagnosed with OCD I went through a few months where I was constantly in the doctors with minor complaints that evaporated as soon as I left. I was surprised I wasn’t diagnosed at that point in retrospect.

re ILX history -- I think ilx was the first message board i joined that wasn't centered on an IRL community, as in most of the people who posted knew/hung with most of the other people at some point, which I feel has a "moderating" effect on behavior. Like, if someone is being troll-y or says something "edgy" you can see them at a bar or show in the next few days and say, "Hey, dude, what did you mean by 'x'? That was a kinda fucked up thing to say!" or, more common, see a close friend of theirs and talk about it, and generally there would be some other context. Like there are more repercussions to being a dick or creep. I think at first I thought ILX was kinda like that, but quickly realized I was wrong (this was 2009).

The other thing I think about/realized was that so many ilx cis-men are significantly younger than me, and definitely during the "golden age" of ilx, a lot of them were in their 20s or barely out of college (or still in college). I've definitely seen some of these dudes mature and change behavior/attitudes that they had had at the time. Not making excuses for any egregiousness, but it's kinda ironic in the context of talking about trans issues, to sort of "deny" the possibility that a formerly creepy asshole could transition into a decent person.

^^^I appreciate this point.