*I’m agender and I do kind of feel like part of the community – at least it’s very dear to me. However, I mostly stick to “nonbinary” or “agender” in order to communicate more precisely, so I don’t usually call myself trans.
Disclaimer: I’m sorry if this post is not appropriate for this community. I chose this community because transfem is what I’m most familiar with and what I feel most aligned with because I like to present more feminine. Also, this is a rant so please forgive me if I generalize sometimes. TW: Some light profanity, some very indirect mentioning suicide (“lost”).
Hello, everyone. I hope you’re having a pleasant day. This post will be largely based off of a 2 am car-ride rant that my transfem best friend (let’s call her Anny) was subjected to. She told me I should write it out and post it, so here we are. It’s going to be a mess, I apologize in advance.
It hasn’t been that long since I found out I don’t have a gender. One day I decided to look in the gender-drawer for the first time and it was just empty. Okay seriously, I was always confused as to why people were arguing about gender – I didn’t get why people cared that much if someone was trans… they’re not affected by it, why do they care? It’s just someone’s gender. (Being agender and not knowing it really is an interesting experience.)
I don’t know where to start so I’ll just tell summarize the past 1.5 years for you:
About a year and a half a go, I wasn’t yet as close to Anny as I am now. We had been acquaintances for years but never really hung out until we joined the same D&D group. Eventually, I noticed that everyone in our lot was calling her by a nickname instead of her now deadname. I asked a friend about it and they told me that she preferred that nickname but when it comes to pronouns, she’s not changing anything yet because the German language sucks. It was only after that pronoun-remark that I noticed that this had something to do with gender. The fact that she didn’t use different pronouns due to the language sucking and not her personal preference had me concluding that she did not want to use masculine pronouns anymore but as I wasn’t given any preferred pronouns, I decided to just stop using pronouns for her. This still seems nothing but reasonable and simple to me. Just substitute the nickname for all pronouns, done. Easy. I didn’t know if she was enby, fluid, or something else and I didn’t really care much, either. I just stuck to the nickname and avoided pronouns.
At a birthday party a few months later, Anny and I got to talking and somehow we got to the topic of Reddit. I told her how I had left Reddit a while back and how one of the communities I used to love lurking in was r/traa. I don’t even remember how I found that sub but I just loved the wholesomeness and the people being nice and supportive to each other so I would drop in every now and then to just enjoy that. I didn’t want to post or comment because I didn’t want to intrude as back then, I still thought I was cis.
At that birthday party, Anny and I – along with a few mutual friends – started that D&D group and during one of the early sessions, Anny was browsing r/traa (during the game, how terribly rude of her :3). My oblivious ass asked her “why are you browsing that sub”. She responded with “great question, why do you think I’m browsing that sub?”… it took me like 5 minutes to realize what she meant by that… I’m so incredibly dense sometimes… I, again, didn’t really give it much thought, though. As it didn’t answer my lingering pronoun-question, it didn’t seem too relevant to me.
A couple weeks later, during another session, Anny wasn’t feeling too well, she asked to stay over at another friend’s place that night because she didn’t want to go home (her parents are a bit… let’s call it Christian when it comes to queer stuff). We got to talking about that a bit and eventually that friend asked if Anny would feel better if we used feminine pronouns for her. Her “well, duh” response was all I needed so I just blurted out “finally, I’ve been avoiding using pronouns for you for months now, thank you”. Her look was pure gold. It was a kind of “Jesus, read the room” and “you sneaky little bastard” at the same time.
Over the course of the next couple of months – in no small part thanks to Anny and her insights and experiences – I came to realize that I was agender which was kind of a puzzle piece that made a lot of things make way more sense and it was also something that allowed her and I to connect on a deeper level and share our perspectives on things like wishing to not have a penis (My whole life I thought it was normal to kind of wish one didn’t have one of those. The more you know, I suppose).
Some weeks later, we were all at our prom and around 1:30am, Anny got tired. I decided to drive her home and come back later. Because Anny is pre-transition and wasn’t really out at school, she had been deadnamed the whole day. Nonstop. So when I asked her how she was feeling all she said was “I’ve been deadnamed way too much today.”
I don’t know what it was but I just got mad. Out of nowhere I just started telling her about how I don’t get how her own father – who is aware that she is trans and that she wants to be called by her nickname instead of her deadname – deadnamed her the whole evening. I don’t understand how people can have such little respect for others. I also don’t understand why people always make such a big deal out of names. People get married, nobody cares. If Michael prefers Mike, nobody bats an eye, but as soon as their precious, fragile, narrow-minded, outdated gender norms get involved, they shut down completely and pretend that their brain capacity is insufficient to remember a person’s preferred name. I mean, my dad was raised really conservatively (West Germany in the 70s and early 80s). He’s also the most ADD person I know. He can look you straight in the eye and hear none of what you’re saying. Even he managed to remember her nickname after hearing it once. He uses it >95% of the time. He even manages the pronouns. He slips up every now and then but corrects himself without anyone needing to say anything. People saying that it’s too difficult are usually just jerks who don’t respect other people enough to even try.
When I told her that even my dad managed the pronouns about as well as you could hope from someone in their 50s, she said that she doesn’t even listen to pronouns anymore because I’m the only person who actually manages to consistently do it right. That broke me. I just started crying. The way she said that. So exhausted from this day, so tired of it all… To be fair, our friends slip up only occasionally. Most of the time, it’s fine. However, I could relate a bit because everyone always uses masculine pronouns for me… which technically isn’t wrong (I go by all pronouns) but I don’t like that it’s exclusively masculine pronouns. Though, it was clear to me that I couldn’t really fathom the way she must be feeling.
I then ranted about people pretending that switching pronouns is hard but I won’t bore you with that, this post is already a fricking essay.
At this point, my subconscious is wondering what my point is. I guess my point is that I want you all to know that you’re not a burden. You’re not difficult. You’re not overreacting when people constantly forget your real name and use your deadname instead. You’re going through hardship that most people will never even begin to comprehend the gravity of. I’m really grateful that I get to experience at least a glimpse of what it must feel like because it allows me to be more understanding. When I look through this community and all the other wonderful communities on this instance, like I’ve been doing for years… I just see so many wonderful people that have so much love to give, so many awesome ideas and thoughts to share. People who get their will to live crushed by people being disrespectful jerks. It pains me so much to think about how many great people we have lost to this nonsense. How many people we have lost to people who get offended by someone not conforming to their idiotic understanding of how humans work.
I said this to Anny that night and I’ll say it to all of you: Please, please don’t let them win. Please reach out. There are so many organizations dedicated to helping you all. You’re worth that. You deserve to be supported. Heck, you can even hit me up if you feel that talking to some genderless blob who’s obsessed with Linux and D&D could benefit you. You’re all so lovable, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
If you read all of this… you have my respect.
Lots of love :3
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It sucks so many people have to deal with that kind of thing. I don’t think it is just a matter of forgetting. Its a matter of not caring and they should be allowed that excuse (except for the occasional slip-up).
I’m sorry if this post is not appropriate for this community. I chose this community because transfem is what I’m most familiar with and what I feel most aligned with because I like to present more feminine.
The community was renamed from “mtf” to “transfem” shortly after the migration from reddit specifically to be more explicitly inclusive of people who don’t necessarily view themselves as female or women, but in any way identify with femininity in any way that doesn’t align with their agab. I don’t think there’s any need to worry about whether you belong.
Thank you, hearing that is very reassuring.
I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. However, I’m certain there are lots of people who have so little respect that they purposefully deadname people or at the very least are aware that they’re doing it. I just don’t want to assume that’s what people are doing all the time. Although when someone continuously fucks it up every single time, I find it hard not to interpret it as malicious behavior.
For example, Anny decided on a name over a month ago and that name still isn’t out to anyone but me (actually, today she had a introduction day at university where she introduced herself with that name for the first time… I was more excited about it than she was lol, I digress). Anytime we’d be alone, I’d call her by that name and as soon as someone else was within earshot, I switched back to the established nickname. It’s really not that difficult if you just care a little bit.
Although when someone continuously fucks it up every single time, I find it hard not to interpret it as malicious behavior.
I don’t think the alternative is necessarily malice. My mom I think at least partly misgenders trans people because she just doesn’t get why its a big deal because she doesn’t have a problem being gendered as a guy 🪺 I think sometimes its a bit out of jealousy though, which I think counts as malice.
Oh yeah, absolutely. I didn’t mean to say that it’s malicious whenever someone always misgenders people. I just meant that I personally have a hard time not to interpret it as malicious behavior.
I just fucking scream at people if they use the “pronouns are hard,” or “I don’t want to learn new information,” excuse.
Just use they. It’s literally less pronouns to remember and you already know it. If you can’t do that, you either have to admit you’re a fucking degenerate moron or you’re a biggot.
As for all this fascist nonsense about sanctuary cities, I live in one. Every time I bring it up, people just suck their teeth and say, “IDK about that, there’s a lot of guns in this city.” These clowns have no idea what they’re getting themselves into.
I dont think you know how much it means to me to read this in the state I’m in right now. Thank you for writing
Thank you. Thank you for pushing through and being here with us
You are absolutely welcome to post here. :)
I appreciate the sentiment you’re expressing here. I work over the phone and get misgendered pretty well round the clock every day. I even give my pronouns as part of my opening, like “Thank you for calling, this is LadyAutumn speaking, my pronouns are she/her, how can I help?” My voice does not pass though so like. ~90% of the time I get misgendered anyway. It’s nice when I’m practicing my voice and do get gendered correctly more often, but its a lot of work to maintain that and I have long struggled with vocal training.
Its hard to explain to people the mental toll of being misgendered for 9 hours a day every working day. It makes you dissociate a lot. I usually dont bother correcting people unless they seem intent on misgendering me every single sentence. But, yeah. It wears you down. It messes with your confidence a lot. Like sometimes I look in the mirror after and it feels a little weird remembering oh yeah I actually do like who I am and like the way I look. Like being misgendered so consistently for so long just makes my brain foggy and makes me forget all the things I do like about myself. I manage alright and take care of myself, but somedays are still pretty hard.
People lack empathy of this experience a lot. I dont hate the people who unintentionally misgender me. I don’t blame them at all for the most part. I just assume they weren’t listening when I gave my pronouns or forgot or whatever. But whether its intentional or not doesn’t really make a huge huge difference in how it makes me feel? It’s like someone constantly calling attention to your worst insecurity that makes you feel powerfully misunderstood and uncomfortable. Thats going to hurt, whether the person doing so is doing it intentionally or not. I relate a lot to the way women with fertility issues describe feeling when asked about when theyre having kids. Like its not exactly the same feeling, but its that same thing with a really bad insecurity being called attention to by someone who is well meaning and oblivious. Doesn’t really hurt any less than if they were doing so deliberately.
Oh wow, that sounds really tough. It’s good to hear that you seem to be able to handle it, though. That’s genuinely impressive. I get what you’re saying: Like I mentioned, I go by all pronouns but it’s still disappointing when people use he/him 99.99% of the time. They’re not wrong, it’s just a reminder that I do in fact look like a dude to everyone even though I would love to just have a genderless appearance – as hard as that may be to achieve because what appears masculine/feminine varies from person to person, but I digress.
Whenever someone mentions their pronouns to me, I just use those pronouns (surprise_pikachu.png). I don’t understand how people can just skip over that and do it wrong when they know better. It’s such a small thing. Seriously, it doesn’t take any effort, realistically, yet it can make such a huge difference. You can make someone’s day, maybe even someone’s week by just calling them “Miss”, for example. When I see the smile my transfem friend gets whenever I call her “little lady”… it’s just such a wave of joy. So little effort, such high reward. Almost as good as your friends referring to you as “a genderless demon” whenever they get frustrated that gendered jokes don’t work on you >:3
What I hate is that every stranger I see now assumes she/her pronouns for me (I prefer they/them, but she/her is also fine), yet my own family consistently uses he/him. I understand why, but it still is annoying.
