Your trans body is gorgeous. Not in spite of transness. Your trans body is gorgeous. Your transness is beautiful. It doesn’t have to be ignored in order to determine your desirability.

Twenty-One Things You Don’t Say to a Transsexual by Riki Anne Wilchins.

In TransSisters: The Journal of Transsexual Feminism, issue 3, volume 1. 1994.

It’s vital that young trans people understand that they can have a future

not can, do and will. it shouldn’t be a “maybe”, because it’s not. It’s a definite thing - young trans people **have** a future, and we need to guide and lead them into it with open hearts and open minds

For anybody doubting this - please look at this photobook of older trans adults, who have not only survived, but thrived. You do have a future. You just have to believe in yourself.

Actual genetic testing for intersex, gnc, and trans people is going to be great because everybody in the workplace is going to shuffle into the break room (”beats workin’” one of the old white guys will say) and we’ll sit down at the plastic lunch tables and management will pass out a little baggie with a tube to spit in and painstakingly go over how to seal it and affix the label. It’s just like drug testing, you did that when we hired you, except you can’t fail! And you get twenty minutes off your workday, right? Great.

I could get lucky at this point. It doesn’t always show up on tests. I wouldn’t say that my body is a fifty-fifty split. But.

Days or weeks later a couple people from management will pull me off the lanes and take me into the nurse’s office. They’ll open the door for me and say “Sorry, buddy, I know this is a hassle” and they’ll say I have to do it again because my sample looked contaminated. (I did like a 23andMe thing once and they kept telling me they thought my sample must have gotten mixed with some else’s - it’s probably just the way these labs work, the checking process for your sample is probably automated.) But I’ll grunt and say “it’s fine” and sit in a chair and spit into another tube while they stare at me. I might have to repeat the process until they figure out I used to be twins, a boy twin and a girl twin, and my genetics reflect that. (”Oh wow I didn’t know that about you,” will the manager say, trying really hard to make encouraging small talk.)  

Then I’ll find out that there’s some problem with my paycheck or the ID reader thing won’t let me clock in and I’ll go to the HR desk and spend like ten minutes being bored in line while the people in front of me figure out their parking passes or lost passwords and they say there’s some red tape I have to jump through about my gender, it’s not a big deal, you just have to go get a doctor to sign off on - (awkward pause) - on one or another before I go back to work, it’s a federal regulation thing. I’ll irritably play a lot of phone tag trying to make sure I don’t use my UPT (unpaid time off) hours while I can’t work, and then go to the health center the next town over where I used to get my fillings done. The 21-year-old receptionist will give me kind of a pained look when she calls me to the front and I’ll try to act casual for her sake, or maybe I’ll feel defiant and show her I’m uncomfortable and annoyed just to make her feel bad, because she’s the closest approximate thing to a target. (although I won’t, because I’m too old for that and it’s not her fault). The doctor will give me a tight smile and say “Sorry, I know this is invasive.” Then I’ll go home and bitch about it on Tumblr. 

I don’t know exactly what happens next, maybe I’ll lose my job and the state will give me a letter saying that owing to United States regulation they can’t offer Medicaid to (they’ll phrase it in the most neutral possible way, like “those with a gender or sex ambiguity“ - you know, they’re trying to make it sound like they’re still progressive and their hands are tied, all saying that gender and sex are different), and then I’ll bitch about that on Tumblr too, but whatever, I managed bipolar for so long when I was undiagnosed, I don’t need to afford my meds. 

That’s about as far as my imagination goes, but even if they decided to straight-up euthanize me it’s going to be boring, and there’ll be a lot of papers to sign and a lot of shuffling around near plastic tables under fluorescent lights, and it’s not going to feel dramatic and it’s not going to feel like something with a clear way to fight. Jackbooted thugs who I can heroically punch or physically escape from will probably not show up at my house in the middle of the night (and if they do I’d really be fucked, but at least I’d get an adrenaline rush out of it).

I dunno, it might come from being a Slav and knowing people who lived under Communism, but I see the future and not only are we all going to lose our rights and die, it’s going to be slow, boring, and really fucking annoying, and because of that it’ll creep up on us. 

Of course, the upside of this is that the change we want will creep up on them too. You vote, your friends vote, Republicans lose the majority. You vote (vote, goddamn you) in local elections and get better quality candidates if you don’t like the ones we got. Donation posts go around Tumblr and we can gofundme crack teams of immigration lawyers. (Also, check Charity [Navigator] for charities that work with refugees and immigrants.) (While you’re at it, here are [some] LGBT charities too, including one for intersex rights and those supporting LGBT immigrants and asylum seekers.) The ways that you can help are also not dramatic. When they come you have to notice them.

They are also vulnerable to a death by a thousand cuts. Don’t forget that. 

As someone who was forced out of her internship because of her sexual orientation and been forced into and out of situations because of her Judaism? This exactly how it works.

We need you to fill out paperwork.

We need you to sign some things.

We can’t let you do the thing until this is confirmed.

Days go by.

Weeks.

Months.

No one admits that anything is actually happening even though your life is on fire around you, even though you are cut out of what you need to be able to do.

The people who should be helping you won’t concede that there is even a problem.

Finally you have a confirmation that hey, actually, you have been fucked?

Well then you better not talk about it or you could make things worse for yourself.

This isn’t the time or the place.

Do something. Vote. Support the ACLU(they were the only organization that did shit for me when things fell apart and even then what they did was mostly pull through non-official channels do to the laws in place).

This accurate. I know because I’ve lived it. But hey, if you want them to do it to you too, go for it.

I did my master’s thesis on emergency contraception and I used gender-neutral language throughout. Most people didn’t notice. My supervisor occasionally asked me to use the word “women” instead of the word “people” but didn’t care enough to follow up when I ignored him. None of the people who reviewed and marked my thesis made any comment on the language I chose to use.

Using gender-neutral language was easy and I suffered no consequences for doing so as an academic, even when writing a detailed thesis on human reproductive biology.

i think the hip new trans thing to do should be choosing as inconvenient a name as possible. like, you have a sibling of the same gender? choose their name. choose ur parent’s name. choose ur pet’s name. choose ur best friend’s name. make ur name a common noun (that isn’t already a name like lane is). call urself “chair.” open the dictionary to a random page and point, now That’s ur name. have a different name for each day of the week

Good morning I’m Swim and I’m here to be fucking nuisance

whats up my name is nineteen i’m nineteen years old and i never learned how to read

Every child I know under the age of 10 is unbelievably chill about gender and tbh I’m jealous  

Me, teaching a pagan kids class: “A lot of people think that the deity Loki might be genderfluid, do any of you know what genderfluid means?”

8 year old, rolling his eyes like that’s the stupidest question he’s ever heard: “Everyone knows what genderfluid means”

Little sister: *walks into the kitchen looking incredibly masc*

Me: “Nice outfit, a lot of afab folks have to work really hard to look that masculine.”

Little sister: *takes headphones halfway off and gives me a blank stare* “Why? Is clothing gendered or something?”

Me: “No, but a lot of people will assume things about your gender based on your clothing”

Little sister: *Puting her headphones back on as she walks away* “Oh, cool I guess.”

9 year old that I babysit sometimes: “What’s that flag on your shirt?” 

Me: “It’s the nonbinary flag. It means that I’m not a boy or a girl.”

9 year old: “I know what it means, have like 5 nonbinary friends, duh.”

I’m fucking begging the terfs in my notes to read literally anything about children’s gender development. 

“It’s because kids aren’t old enough to know that gender is based on sex” Buddy two-year-olds can distinguish people based on secondary sex characteristics, the cis-binary view of gender isn’t hard to grasp. It actually takes children until about age 6-7 for their ideas about gender to be less based on gender stereotypes and more on their individual experience with gender, and for them to recognize and respect gender variant people. So like the fact that y’all’s idea of gender never got past the complexity of a toddlers is not my fault or my problem. 

Also, I know very few parents who actually enforce trans and nonbinary acceptance with their children. The majority of kids are still being told by their parents that “boys have penises and girls have vaginas” it’s just that most kids today have enough gender-variant friends, caretakers, and tv role models, to establish individually that that is false and that gender is more complex than that. This isn’t evil trans people brainwashing your children, this is intelligent children developing critical thinking skills and coming to their own conclusions. 

Someone told my ex-dad (not a sex thing; he just disowned me) that I’m trans and now he’s threatening to come to work and make a scene, and I know I should be upset, but like. What’s he gonna say exactly? And to whom? Because imagining a haggard and likely shitfaced Pennsylvania construction worker barging through the grocery store like, “HEY!!! THAT BROAD-HIPPED 5'3” EFFEMINATE KID WITH THE CONSPICUOUSLY BIZARRE NAME WHO SPEAKS IN A CARTOONISHLY AFFECTED CARICATURE OF MASCULINITY AIN’T GOT NO DICK!!! YOU GONNA BUY SCRATCH OFF TICKETS FROM SOME KINDA DICKLESS ABOMINATION??“ is wild. What’s it going to accomplish? Or is he gonna call my manager? “HELLO, I’D LIKE TO REPORT A FRAUD IN YOUR DELI DEPARTMENT. THERE IS NOT SAUSAGE AS ADVERTISED.” What the fuck.

Odds are he’s more embarrassed of having a trans ex-kid than I am of being outed at work, so what if I go to his job and tell everyone I’m trans first? What then, coward?

That’s such a power move.

‘if you’re a trans guy why are you wearing a bra’ listen my dude, unsure if you know but the day I came out as trans my breasts didn’t immediately retract into my body. they continue to exist. and wearing a binder - no matter how well it fits - for hours on end day in day out becomes unbelievably uncomfortable. wearing a bra as a trans guy doesn’t make you a Bad Trans™. can we stop putting expectations on trans people to perform to the Good Trans Person Standards and being terrible to them when they don’t. other words, can people mind their own fuckin business when it comes to other people’s bodies and what they do with them lmfao

this goes for giving trans women shit for not shaving too. there are a hundred and one reasons why someone may choose not to shave or not be able to. people empower cis women for not shaving (which is perfectly fine and great) and in the same breathe shame a trans woman for not choosing to shave. don’t force a higher standard of presentation onto trans people, especially when those presentations are rooted in stale expectations of gender.

if you misgender a trans person just. say sorry, correct yourself and move on. please dont make a huge production out of it its super uncomfortable for everyone involved

BLESSED POST. REBLOG TO LET EVERY TRANS PERSON KNOW THAT LUKE SKYWALKER KILLS TERFS ON SITE.

This weeks strip is a sensitive one, because I know it will cause a few people to probably get a little upset. Heidi and I HAVE been invited to a few of these Gender Reveal Parties. We’ve always declined, but never offered up any reasons why, per say. But today’s strip has been a punched up version of a very real conversation we have each time it happens. As a transgender woman, I have a real issue with the idea of Gender Reveal Parties. My own existence kinda negates the real impact of saying “It’s a GIRL/BOY!” when me just being there would be like holding a sign that says “Well, you think that NOW…” And I have to question to morality of taking that “reveal” as the guide by which you will try and essentially indoctrinate a child in a gender that you won’t REALLY know for a few years at least is correct. I KNOW that it fucked ME up. Just my two cents, for what they are worth. I AM sorry to anyone that finds this strip or my comments here uncomfortable. But being asked to gender reveal parties makes ME really uncomfortable, and I guess it’s better if that’s out there.

The first Bionic penis update

DONATE TO THE BIONIC PROJECT AND WIN!

The first 24 hours of the Bionic Project went amazing, cracking the $1000 mark!!!

So a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone that has donated so far!

But we REALLY need to keep the momentum going if we want to see the Bionic become a reality, as the subsequent 24 hours have seen donations peter out to juuuust  a smidge under $200.

As I’m sure many of you, who have already donated are also realising, it’s really tough to get others to part with their hard earned cash, even when it’s a project they believe in and would love to see become a reality. It’s hard! We’re not exactly a cashed up community.

Hence I’ve decided to drop the $1500 fundraising goal to win any existing Transthetics product down to $1000.*

So please, share your unique links in your Facebook groups, Reddit forums, Tumblr posts and Twitter feeds! Let’s keep the momentum going!! And if every one of you that reads this post gave just $10, we’d have this fundraiser licked!!

So please, if you want to see the Bionic become a reality, put down $10, or $5 or $1 and then do your darndest to win yourself any existing Transthetic product by spreading the word!*

DONATE TO THE BIONIC PROJECT AND WIN!

* After you donate, you will be issued a unique link to share in your social circle. Anyone who donates through your unique link will count towards your total fundraising tally.

So I’m sure you guys are wondering

“Mom what is this thing, why’d you reblog it, how does it pertain to me”

Great question.

This is a prosthetic penis. Not a packer. Not a dildo. Not bottom surgery. If it really does come to fruition, this will be a prosthetic that’s a penis, and is much cheaper than bottom surgery, and actually WORKS. You could pee from it, get erections (something bottom surgery doesn’t provide).

And the fact that this post only has 58 notes is a CRIME. This is a trans run business, and while the person in charge words things very very awkwardly (they seem to be a rather awkward person in general), this thing could save so much money and alleviate so much dysphoria. Please @ people with this, any big trans blogs you can think of.

I came close to suggesting in my last post that trans women who are concerned about being permanently sterilized but still want the peace of mind of not having to worry about testosterone poisoning look into gonadotropin releasing hormone agonists as this class of drug is capable of utterly shutting down the testes’ ability to produce testosterone. The problem is that these drugs cost are incredibly expensive so are only available to wealthy people and those with exceptionally good health insurance.

Once again, trans women aren’t really given much of a choice regarding our reproductive health. The best we can do is to make the best decisions we can regarding our own bodies under the circumstances.

I don’t always make comics bout myself, but when I do, there’s like a heap of ‘em all at once in a giant post!

Xoxox

Nonbinary friends: you don’t have to pick a gender, or a gender role.

You don’t have to pick the same gender role in every aspect of your life.

You don’t have to avoid gendered language altogether for fear of being pegged as one binary gender or the other.

It’s ok if you want to be a wife and a dad, or a mom and a datefriend, or a boyfriend and a princess. It’s ok if certain gender roles feel more comfortable than others, it’s ok if some gender roles associate with your assigned gender feel more ok than others, or to only identify with certain genders in specific social contexts, and different genders in others.

A lot of the ways in which we construct gender are around social gender roles, and it doesn’t invalidate you as a nonbinary person to feel comfortable in multiple different roles. You can mix and match. Gender is a mess for everyone and you’re allowed to call yourself whatever feels most genuine and comfortable to you.

If you want to know what it’s like being trans just imagine yourself exactly as you are but everyone else sees you as someone else and if you correct them they may kill you.

this this this. honetly like we need to reframe the entire discussion around trans issues becuse the problem is not trans people, it eeryone else. young trans kids dont get bullied bc theyre trans they get bullied bc other people teach their shitty kids to hate trans people