For The Transmasc Voices: (tw Suicidal Thoughts, Transandrophobia)

For the transmasc voices: (tw suicidal thoughts, transandrophobia)

I'm messaging on behalf of my son. I'm NB, wife is transfem, our child is transmasc. He's only 11. He came out a few years ago, is allowed to freely explore and express, and at home he has a great support system.

But he has ALREADY struggled with suicidal thoughts, anxiety, and stress, not just from cishet classmates but from queer peers. He has ALREADY tried to APOLOGIZE for IDing as masc, due to intracommunity reactionary hate. We are ALREADY doing damage control, we have him in therapy, we make sure to celebrate him and lift him up at every opportunity.

He's fucking ELEVEN YEARS OLD and is already being heavily negatively stressed by our own fucking community. His PEERS are also, only 11-13 years old.

This intracommunity bullshit, this deliberate misandry and transandrophobia, is contagious. The children are ALWAYS watching and the vast majority of them do NOT have parents 'in the know' or even supportive, let alone any kind of digital supervision; they SEE YOU. They INTERNALIZE WHAT YOU SAY. They SPREAD IT and they are MIMICKING YOUR FIGHTS.

And when our community screams 'fuck men' 'men are trash' 'yes all men' 'they deserve this' those little caveats of 'oh but not trans men!!' don't actually do shit for anyone except make y'all pat yourselves on the back for being soooo progressive and inclusive. Worse still when they don't even bother with the caveats and just straight up refuse to ever consider nor allow anyone ELSE to consider the unique intersection (yes!! Intersectional fucking theory have y'all heard of it!!!) of both privilege and oppression experienced by transmascs, which is different from the unique *intersection* of oppressions experienced by transfems, which is still different from the unique *intersectional experiences* of still others, and insist no, actually, they're all only the same and actually only transfems can speak at all about any of this and trans men don't have unique experiences and can't have their own language and blah blah blah blah fucking blah.

I can literally see (and foot the bill for!) the harm y'all are doing to yourselves, each other, and to the next generation of queer kids and allies and I am so fucking tired of it. Reactionary hate is communal fucking poison and it ALWAYS involves friendly fire.

oh my god i am mortified but thank you so much for sending this. first of all, i wanted to deeply apologize for what is happening to your son, i have more to say about and to him later, but i want you to know i am very glad you chose to reach out. this affected me in a very real way. i'm not being funny here. a lot of asks don't really get to me, but this struck me like an arrow to the heart and i seriously need people to very carefully read this ask and internalize it. im serious. even if it makes you cry, please re-read it a couple of times. even if you seriously think it's okay to hate men. read this.

men don't just pop into the world men. they're boys first a lot of the time. would you people seriously fucking rather see dead trans boys than living trans men? because that is what you're doing. your incessant gender essentialist bullshit is legitimately getting trans CHILDREN scarred for fucking life and potentially killed. you are potentially actually for real taking a life when you say these things- but are you so happy knowing that there's childrens' blood on your hands?

your son deserves so much better than this holy SHIT. an 11 year old should NOT be having suicidal thoughts, especially over their GENDER. this is not petty internet drama anymore. this is affecting the real world. this is affecting real people. y'all seem to forget that there's a living, breathing person behind every single account you interact with (aside from obvious bots). there are people behind these posts. and you are genuinely affecting them. sure it sounds like a quirky clapback to say "all men should die" or whatever but what about when you say that to someone and it actually kills a man? what about when you're genuinely responsible for ending a life by what you've said and done?

are you prepared to console that man's family? are you prepared to apologize for what you did? are you prepared to understand that this has real life consequences and can literally tear families apart? are you prepared to understand that many parents, including mothers, love their sons? that many people love their relatives who are men? that many people love their husbands and partners? that this would hurt women in a very real way? whether or not you hate all men doesn't matter, but not all women think like this, and this can and will devastate real people in real time. this will hurt women way more than you think.

i wanted to say that i'm glad he has a good support system with you. it must be very comforting to know he has a NB parent to help advocate for him as a trans child. a child. i can't get over that. he should be living his life carefree. he should be playing with other kids, discovering new hobbies, learning about how other people go about their lives, and having fun, but instead he's getting tortured and mocked? for what reason? he's not a tyrant now. he's a boy. boys don't have any power in society. children are not an oppressive class. holy shit

you are doing a great thing by advocating for him. i will do my best to make sure i can, too. i don't need to know your or his name for right now, but i will make sure that i tell his story, because this is beyond fucked up. people need to understand this isn't about views on tiktok and likes on instagram. this is about real people who are hurting. you don't deserve to have to see your child go through all of this intense therapy and pain and suffering. this needs to come to an end.

if you want to share this part of the message with him, i'd like to address him directly. i just wanted to say, that i'm 32 years old, and i realized i was a trans man when i was about 20. i didn't learn the word transgender until i was 19 years old. if i had an awesome NB parent who helped me learn about it at your age, i would've been out as transmasculine, too! i was scared for a while, but some of the happiest years of my life have been while i've been out as a trans guy. i wear what i want now, i talk how i want to, i present how i want to, i love who i want to, and i don't let any of this invalidate me for who i am as a man. i only talk to people who respect me, and there are tons of people out there who love us and see us for who we really are

you're not going to deal with this forever. people are being really, really mean right now, but it's not going to be like this forever. there are a lot of other transmascs out there. if you find other trans boys around your age, do your best to stick with them if they're good to you. it's okay to be a trans boy and its okay to want to be friends with other trans boys. you're not a bad person. you're not mean. you're an awesome kid who's taking the time to explore gender now that it's something you can understand. that's really cool, why wouldn't that be cool?

try not to let them get to you. they are not confident in how they identify and how they feel about themselves. they're taking it out on you. your life matters, it matters so much. other trans boys out there will be so happy to know you exist. you deserve a long, happy life. there's nothing wrong with being a boy or man. we're not bad people. we're capable and deserving of love just like everyone else. your gender isn't anyone else's business. chase your happiness.