The ‘obsession’ with trans ‘passing’.
If you’re new to my writing; in short my objective is to converse with those opposed to trans rights, look at their concerns fairly and honestly, then try to dispell and explain the fiction and fact. Mostly I talk to TERFs — whom I prefer to call anti-trans, since validating their “feminism” at all seems wrong to me. Recently we’ve been talking about the obsession with trans people wanting to pass and I think this is a really important subject that needs to be properly deconstructed.
Oh and since the conversation surrounding passing is usually centered on trans women because passing for us is more difficult and we also face the brunt of societal objection this article is going to be mostly talking about this. Sorry trans dudes.
So here goes!
First of all, lets look at what the anti-trans brigade usually say about trans culture surrounding passing. In my experience its framed as a negative because we’re enforcing stereotypes, the focus on passing usually makes them believe that this is the entire point of what being trans even is. The motivations for passing are varied — from using passing to enter female spaces to using passing to live out a fetish called autogynephilia. Which in short is the sexual gratification from imagining oneself with a female form.
Passing, to these people, isn’t anything innocent or pleasant. It’s deceitful, deceptive, dishonest and spells trouble for them and the ideology they believe in. The seeming obsession with passing they argue, is part of the reason for why trans kids are being given the option to transition earlier, and why transition is so heavily focused on as a treatment for dysphoria.
There are elements of the above which are true, though I think that the vast majority of what they believe is not really true or accurate of most of our lil trans community. Especially the fetish and stereotype stuff. It’s almost like they’ve got to the first step of the analysis of this then stopped. They haven’t gone further to ask what the reasons are for these common themes amongst trans people. So lets answer those questions right now!
What is the reason for the importance put into the idea of passing?
In my experience I’ve found this to be less about “looking like a woman” — whatever that means and more about “not looking trans”. This is because if you’re trans you have a much higher likelihood of being unemployed, harassed, bullied, sexually assaulted, evicted and countless other negatives too. This happens significantly more often in those who are out or visible as trans than it does those who live the ‘stealth’ life as it were. We can actually measure this in a sort of semi-scientific way by looking at this study by UCLA and The Williams Institute. Note: its semi scientific because the dataset was never meant for this purpose, this is just extrapolation.
The study in short plots the question “have you ever attempted suicide?” vs “have you ever experienced [social factor]”. So from this we can look at which factors are most likely to have been present in those who have attempted suicide. The average rate for the study was 41%, so anything above this is above average.
Its pretty clear that people knowing you’re trans is significant in raising the suicide attempt rate of this study, by up to 17%. That’s a lot, its like… almost half the average. So in this regard, trans passing is about survival. From my own personal experience and the experience of trans friends I have — we don’t care about “looking like a woman” that much, we just don’t want to look trans because we don’t want to be hassled for it, because being hassled for being trans can be violent or even deadly. Which brings us neatly to the next question which needs answering…
So why do you trans engage with stereotypes?
Femininity is a performance for everyone who does it. Whether you’re trans, male, female, a crossdresser, intersex, or a s̶e̶n̶t̶i̶e̶n̶t̶,̶ ̶̶w̶e̶i̶r̶d̶l̶y̶ ̶a̶t̶t̶r̶a̶c̶t̶i̶v̶e̶ ̶r̶a̶b̶b̶i̶t̶. The reasons for doing it vary depending on the group — drag queens parody femininity for entertainment value for example. This is occupational though and not really comparable to people living femininity as their everyday life.
For example cis women might use femininity because its expected of them, women who don’t engage with femininity are often called bossy, ugly, masculine amongst other things and this can make it more difficult for them to exist in society as they’re swimming against the tide of public opinion. Which is what a lot of radical feminists have done for decades and I respect that. I really do. I think stereotypes are bull heck too and don’t personally engage with stereotypes much at all either.
Trans people do the same. If you’re a trans woman you’re expected to have female mannerisms, expressions, appearance etc. I’ve heard people talk about Caitlyn Jenner saying she doesn’t like sleeping with men, and only wants to sleep with women — and say that this means she isn’t really trans. I think the exact quote from this video is “then what’s the point in transitioning if you just want to sleep with women”? As if lesbian women don’t exist at all. Not that that’s even the worst quote from the clip, I think the bit about shooting his child with a shotgun for coming out as trans is probably a bit more bad.
In my own experience here? My actual diagnosis letter from my clinic says that I was very feminine in mannerisms and appearance when I started at the clinic — as if that at all mattered to whether I was actually a woman or not. Even unconsciously and pre-transition, I had engaged with the stereotypes I thought applied best to me and would help me exist in society better.
The fact is trans people live under the same societal framework all people live under, except those who have seen it and made an effort to somewhat step out from under its shade. The expectation that if you’re a woman you behave, dress and look like X and the expectation that if you’re a man you behave, dress and look like Y are damaging as heck to cis women, men, trans women & men. We should all be working together to be critical of this societal furniture, but instead some of the people who are Woke™ on this issue have decided to just outright attack anyone else who isn’t. Making their perspective very hard to see through all of the horrible stuff they say.
Why do trans people go over the top with femininity?
I’d argue it was partly because they’ve spent so long repressing their feelings and when the pressure in your ‘dysphoria bottle’ where you’ve been stuffing all your bad feels for the last however many years builds up enough? You get a catastrophic explosion of over the top engagement with stereotypes.
The other part is down to the stuff above but with the added caveat that they do not ‘pass’ very well. They very much ‘look trans’. So you have to go harder on the engaging with stereotypes to avoid looking as trans. To give off all the right social cues so that people, even if they can tell you’re trans, would have a hard time calling you the wrong thing. This almost always settles down eventually though, I honestly can’t tell you the last time I wore more than just concealer for make up or clothes that weren’t a tshirt and jeans combo.
Interesting to note is that over the top femininity or even just femininity itself is hardly ever attacked by these people when its an attractive trans woman doing it, such as Paris Lees or Blaire White. Its only ever when its a less conventionally attractive trans person, I won’t post any examples because that would be mean af. But trust me on this, the pictures they send to back this point up are usually above 40 years old and even sometimes not even trans at all. They’re just crossdressers or transvestites these people have lifted from various crossdresser / transvestite hook up sites.
I don’t like stereotypes and I want trans people not to enforce them, how should I approach this with trans people?
Well, for a start shouting “reeeeee, you don’t pass, we can always tell you’re a maaaaaan” isn’t the way forwards here. I get you, I’m very critical of gender roles and stereotypes too. I think most trans people are really, if we weren’t aware of and critical of stereotypes we wouldn’t be able to engage with them in the way that we do to use them to the benefit of ‘not looking trans’ and avoiding the hassle that comes with that.
Would a lot of trans people prefer to not have to put make up on? not have to wear skimpy clothing in the dead of winter? not have to have our hair did gud, not be treated like second class citizens, as if we’re weak and whatever the heck else comes with the stereotypes of women? Heck to the yeah I think they would. We have just as much to gain from smashing this social furniture to pieces as you do — but we’re never going to do it while there’s severe prejudice around trans people in our societies because its too dangerous.
Until the point where being visibly trans doesn’t mean you get abused, harassed, evicted, sexually assaulted, fired, turned down for jobs, seen as a fetish, seen as a pervert, seen as just trying to rape the wahmens. Until basically all of the smears that anti-trans faux feminists have said about trans people for the last few decades disappear from the wider social consciousness — trans people can not ever be your ally in this fight. I’m happy to help you take up arms against toxic parts of society, every single day — but not if it means figuratively cutting off my arm for you to use as a baton.
