If you thought you were a true ally, maybe it’s time for some introspection.
CW: transphobic violence
When people get killed for disclosing and people get killed for not disclosing what the fuck are you supposed to do, dating is hard enough as it is imagine your life is literally on the line when you hook up or start seeing someone romantically.
I remember in 2013ish tumblr culture it was like, social justice dogma that genital preferences were transphobic, without much room for nuance. And I bought into it, hard, and never had it challenged for years. Then I got into discord servers with a lot of trans people and started noticing that many trans people themselves have genital preferences. Especially common seemed to trans women who strongly preferred dicks, and further in particular transbians who were only interested in dating other trans women. I don’t want to go off listing examples because there are a ton of different people with a ton of different aspects to the minutiae of their attraction, but yeah meeting trans people with genital preferences, some stricter than others, made me realize that policing genital preference isn’t actually good. Actually my initial reaction when I first started meeting like, transbians who only want to date transwomen who haven’t had bottom surgery was to say “isn’t that bad because it reinforces the transphobic idea that there’s a difference?” But after a while of discussing it and self-examining I realized how problematic that is.
Of course, “I won’t date trans people” doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with genital preference because trans people might have had bottom surgery. So a, say, straight man categorically dismissing trans women because they’re not into dicks doesn’t make sense because not all trans women have dicks.
But I kind of wonder what angle the tweet being linked here is coming at it from. Like the specifically mention the word “preference”, which makes me wonder if this person is in fact drawing on 2013 tumblr social justice dogma that genital preferences are transphobic. I have no idea, and don’t have the energy to read through the replies to see what in particular is going on.
As someone attracted to and has dated both trans women and cis women idk about this one. People can not help who they are attracted to
*trans women and cis women
Post-op, sure. But as for pre-op, some people just don’t like dick. It’s a sad reality :transshork-sad:, but people are allowed to have preferences. The good news is that it seems to have gotten easier over the last decade. As a side note, this tweet is a great example of everything that makes Twitter toxic.
Sad trans shark hurts to see ;(
It’s like the shark didn’t get into Julliard because of their identity and thus missed out on dancing in Katy Perry’s super bowl half time show
I’d like to downvote because I don’t think this post is the most appropriate way to frame this discussion, but I also don’t want to get flagged for the next purge. :thinkin-lenin:
All the fucking downbears jesus fuck. This tweet isn’t about genital preference and it isn’t even exclusively about physical attraction. This is about people who don’t want to date trans women period. Trans women do not necessarily have penises, and you do not necessarily have to have sex with someone to date them. I feel like the tweet is way broader than people are making it out to be. I would assume that it is calling out people who do not want to date trans women unconditionally, or on principle, regardless of physical appearance or genitals. Those people are full stop bad and if you argue against that, then yes, you are a transphobe. I’m way too stupid to have an intelligent conversation about genital preference but this tweet seems way more black and white than people are acting like it is in the comments. Seems like people are taking the content of the tweet and imagining implications that don’t really exist, and then accusing the tweet of being reductive because it does not address the implications that they created in their head.
I would agree a straight dude who feels the bizarre need to LOUDLY DECLARE his lack of attraction to trans women is probably just expressing transphobia.
If it just genuinely the case a straight dude has never felt attraction to a trans woman and doubts they ever would, I mean whatever you can’t control who you’re attracted to. I’d say just yah know, keep that to yourself and if a trans woman ever does express attraction to you just politely say “thanks but no thanks”.
straight dude who feels the bizarre need to LOUDLY DECLARE his lack of attraction to trans women
That’s 99.99999% of transphobic content
It’s really easy to not be absolutely transphobic: just shut up. Why are you obsessing so much?
“So long as we refuse to accept that “woman” is a holistic concept, one that includes all people who experience themselves as women, our concept of womanhood will remain a mere reflection of our own personal experiences and biases rather than something based in the truly diverse world that surrounds us.” Julia Serano
“Coming face-to-face with an individual who has crossed class barriers of gender or attractiveness can help us recognize the extent to which our own biases, assumptions, and stereotypes create those class systems in the first place. But rather than question our own value judgments or notice the ways that we treat people differently based on their size, beauty, or gender, most of us reflexively react to these situations in a way that reinforces class boundaries: We focus on the presumed “artificiality” of the transformation the subject has undergone. Playing up the “artificial” aspects of the transformation process gives one the impression that the class barrier itself is “natural,” one that could not have been crossed if it were not for modern medical technology.”
“People often squabble over what defines a person as a woman or a man—whether it should be based on their chromosomes, assigned sex, genitals, or other factors—but such reductionist views deny our indisputably holistic gendered realities. For all of us, gender is first and foremost an individual experience, an amalgamation of our own unique combinations of gender inclinations, social interactions, body feelings, and lived experiences.”
God tier post lmfaooooooooo
A lot of us cis males grew up in a culture of severe homophobia. I remember not dating women who had overly masculine things like voices or shoulders, whether they were trans or not. I’m still deprogramming and in my 30’s.
abandon hope all ye who enter here
Oh God, it says “destiny on Twitter” as the headline. It’s not what you think it is.
Holy shit, how did this get this many downvotes?
I consider myself pretty open in that I’ll date trans women, but for me to be attracted to that person, they really need feminine traits (kind of like Blaire White – her personality bites, but looks-wise, right up my alley). So if say I’m attracted to roughly 50% of the women I come across, but maybe like 5% of the trans women I encounter, is that a form of transphobia?
What exactly are ‘feminine traits’?
not dating post-op trans women? sure, that’s pretty shitty
but not dating pre-op/non-op trans women isn’t transphobia, you can’t pick your sexuality
i hate this struggle session so much
I don’t think genitals were mentioned though?
that’s literally what everyone is talking about here in the comments rn
calling someone transphobic because they don’t want to date someone with genitals they’re not attracted to is idiotic as fuck and makes us look like lunatics, it’s not “preference”, it’s sexuality and it’s fixed
yes there’s straight men who are still attracted to women if they have a penis but that’s not the case for most
That’s a different argument and I agree with that. Some people like dick and can’t stand pussy others see it the other way around. I believe what OP is referring to is simply taking into account could you date a trans person if they fit every other standard you have, in which case it’s probably transphobic to say no to.
in a case like that yea i would agree with it being transphobic
i just seriously hate the opinion that genitalia is just a “preference”, i feel like it’s basically like a woke version of “being gay is a choice” and it makes me uncomfortable as fuck
