intense, outward homophobia/transphobia is kind of unavoidably born out of some degree of personal gender/sexuality anxiety, and I think it’s unrealistic to expect people never to point that out. gay and trans people are also victims to that anxiety, and I say that with personal experience. BUT, mocking the anxiety itself and mocking what having such acute anxiety about gender/sex implies instead of the structures that give rise to that anxiety is still reinforcing queerphobia. that needs to be pointed out, criticized, and redirected to more productive ideas
In my mind calling out hair transplants and plastic surgery in the spirit of “this should be okay writ large” is good. Like if you’re against gender affirming care and you get gender affirming care it’s hypocritical and it’s always going to be called out by someone’s pattern seeking brain. The conclusion “therefore nobody should get that kind of care” begs the question for me.
Trans liberation is everybody’s liberation, right? The bravest amogus will be willing to go “actually, you’re right. I’m no longer against trans GAC because I now empathize with their anxiety”
i agree in a vacuum (and have even made similar arguments myself), but as talia bhatt has pointed out, there’s no contradiction in the minds of those who think medical intervention in service of aligning a body with the ideal of their assigned sex is reinforcing what’s already “natural,” they believe those categories exist a priori
i’m ambivalent on the value of pointing out the double standard. i’m sure some people might be convinced by it if they haven’t given it much thought before, and i’m skeptical of any argument’s ability to change the mind of a committed chauvinist, but i guess at the end of the day i’d at least prefer if cis liberals were more focused on raising awareness about attacks on our care and ability to exist in public than dunking on fascists for also taking hormones when that’s never been the foundation of their problems with us anyway
I don’t think you can ever stop people from commenting on the double standard. The reflex to point it out exists a priori in my head so there’s no need to judge its value. But appeal to nature is gonna always be a nasty little mindspace filled with people who love to use gotchas
intense, outward homophobia/transphobia is kind of unavoidably born out of some degree of personal gender/sexuality anxiety, and I think it’s unrealistic to expect people never to point that out. gay and trans people are also victims to that anxiety, and I say that with personal experience. BUT, mocking the anxiety itself and mocking what having such acute anxiety about gender/sex implies instead of the structures that give rise to that anxiety is still reinforcing queerphobia. that needs to be pointed out, criticized, and redirected to more productive ideas
In my mind calling out hair transplants and plastic surgery in the spirit of “this should be okay writ large” is good. Like if you’re against gender affirming care and you get gender affirming care it’s hypocritical and it’s always going to be called out by someone’s pattern seeking brain. The conclusion “therefore nobody should get that kind of care” begs the question for me.
Trans liberation is everybody’s liberation, right? The bravest amogus will be willing to go “actually, you’re right. I’m no longer against trans GAC because I now empathize with their anxiety”
i agree in a vacuum (and have even made similar arguments myself), but as talia bhatt has pointed out, there’s no contradiction in the minds of those who think medical intervention in service of aligning a body with the ideal of their assigned sex is reinforcing what’s already “natural,” they believe those categories exist a priori
i’m ambivalent on the value of pointing out the double standard. i’m sure some people might be convinced by it if they haven’t given it much thought before, and i’m skeptical of any argument’s ability to change the mind of a committed chauvinist, but i guess at the end of the day i’d at least prefer if cis liberals were more focused on raising awareness about attacks on our care and ability to exist in public than dunking on fascists for also taking hormones when that’s never been the foundation of their problems with us anyway
I don’t think you can ever stop people from commenting on the double standard. The reflex to point it out exists a priori in my head so there’s no need to judge its value. But appeal to nature is gonna always be a nasty little mindspace filled with people who love to use gotchas