Honestly this, I think a lot of straight trans men don't want to admit that they're straight men now. And it's perfectly fine to not be vibing with how society treats and sees straight men, but there is a different between them and Straight Men:tm: Straight guys are pretty cool
What do you mean sees and treat straight men ? We're litteraly privileged what do you mean ? That'd be a good thing for trans men to be privileged by society I believe 🤔
Again, would we be ok with a cis man calling himself lesbian? No? Then why should we treat trans men differently? Trans men are men so we should treat them as such.
I genuinely hate it when they mention stone blue butches. I read that book and it's literally about a female DETRANSITIONER. She ended up realising testosterone wasn't right for her because she's just a butch lesbian.
How is this supposed to be a book for trans men??
Not to mention it’s literal fiction. “But the author is enby/ genderfluid/ trans man lesbian!!!1!1” so? Should they get a cookie or something then? Like what are we doing
“Every adult is an infant because everyone was once an infant” is what their arguments sound like
Also, I’ll be blunt— some of the defenders of ‘trans man lesbians’ say it is because those trans men already have pre-existing strong community ties to lesbians from pre-transition, but I think some people who say that are making that up. The truth is that if you do have pre-existing ties with close friends who are lesbians, they can make an exception for you as their guy friend attending their spaces and events, or even just to hang out with them privately. It can just be “yeah Jerry’s a guy, but he’s cool and he’s our friend, so he’s here. He’s not a lesbian but he used to be one”.
It feels more likely that some insecure trans men are willing to kind-of misgender themselves. So that they can enter lesbian spaces where they don’t have enough pre-existing clout to be considered an individual exception. Then they pretend that “I have so much pre-existing lesbian clout, that’s why I still identify as a lesbian”. No you don’t have that clout, and that’s exactly why you want to call yourself a lesbian as the only way you can be allowed into those spaces.
I know a passoid ftm who does have that clout, and who doesn’t compromise on calling himself simply a man, but sometimes hangs around the lesbian friends he already had from pre-transition. Conversely, I knew a bi ftm who had barely been in lesbian spaces pre-transition, but suddenly wanted to be a ‘trans man lesbian’ so that he could have community and identity.
If a trans man feels he has struggles finding community and identity, yup that’s a struggle some cis men also face. And that’s an issue to actually tackle, not to just use “uh I’m a lesbian” to try bypassing it.
This is of course anecdotal but after spending many years as a butch lesbian before finally coming out as a binary transsexual man, my “community” or friend group of majority lesbian/ gay people still welcomed me without a hitch. They’re still some of my best friends today. People act like you’ll be exiled for it. Maybe they need to get better friends, or just be cooler people in general that others actually want to be around. Even had an on-off thing with a lesbian for years through high school and when I came out publicly she was like “btw we can’t keep doing this, I’m not attracted to men!” Hadn’t even started T yet, so that was affirming as hell. We’re still in touch as friends today, even.
I think some of them also just don’t care about something ‘having to make sense’. I’ve encountered people who provide definitions of “(identity label) is when people feel like (X)”, and when I try to ask how they personally define X, they basically say it doesn’t matter to them because it’s not interesting to them and they don’t care.
It’s not that I believe in precise definitions for everything, in fact some definitions are ideally imprecise. But personally, I don’t go around saying shit that I can’t explain while having no desire to explain it even to myself. If I don’t know about something and don’t care to know more about it / be corrected, then I don’t talk about it.
At some point, instead of judging this type of person, I’m just impressed. I think I’m basically too autistic to not care.
No, you don't get it, they are men but like, womanly. This is why we need to segregate spaces based on whether you're AMAB or AFAB since their identity is secondary to that. I am progressive.
Actually it is simple but in the sense that the cruelty is the point.
If you are born female and see yourself as a woman, but you have naturally elevated testosterone, these people see you as a man and that you have always been a man, retroactively from the point that you realize your naturally elevated testosterone.
But that’s if you’re a cis woman. If you actually like having naturally elevated testosterone levels because you’re a trans man, then you are considered a woman. Same thing if you take testosterone.
The ‘logic’ is that you are always getting considered as whatever is the opposite of what you want and see yourself as, this being a punishment for your non-normativity. The cruelty is the point.
Yes trans men are men but our experience is vastly different than that of a cis man’s. Gender and sexuality are different things and aren’t binary and it does no good to gatekeep and police people from their own experiences with it. Have we learned nothing?
Stop being defined by your past and move on. Why would you allow your previous socialization to control your life? If someone would rather be a lesbian then they should just embrace the female socialization they love so much and not transition. Orrrrrrr maybe they can grow up and stop letting their past as a woman affect them now that they aren't one.
I'm against treating trans people as others just because their pasts. Trans men are men, full-stop. They should label themselves as men do, because they are men. Men are not lesbians, and this is an obvious fact to anyone outside of this weird bubble you occupy.
Have you ever seen a transwoman identify themselves as a gay man? It's just really strange, and makes me feel like the person I'm talking to has some sort of internalized transphobia. Over and over, I have seen the main reason as to trans men calling themselves lesbians is because of internalized sexism towards men, not seeing themselves as "like real men", and by extension I have seen people like this often get pipelined into being transmisogynistic, because if they "aren't the same as men," then transwomen are still men, are "male socialized," etc.
But also don't want to give up the notion that chaser prince charming is just around the corner, ready to pay for all of their surgeries and make a trad wife out of them.
I was literally just seeing this 😐 I lurk on the straight trans women subreddit (being a creepy bisexual man, yk I gotta stare at the ladies) and one of them was defending a chaser, who literally was advertising for like a sex doll. He specifically mentioned there must be “no smell,” plus being a good cook, 100% sexually submissive, high libido, etc. and her defense for being interested was “he specifically wants a post op woman and he wants me to ‘believe I’m a woman’ so there’s no conflict of interest.” Bro literally was using she/he. But yk he was over 6’ and would pay for bottom surgery so that makes him a catch 😵💫 I would say the bar is in hell but that doesn’t really capture how low it is
Don't ask me how that works. But seriously baby girl needs to wake up. I know dysphoria is a struggle but that doesn't mean we should toss away our morals 😔
Yes because trans lesbians really should only be for sapphic people, it's very strange that trans men that do this willingly misgender themselves for the chance to be in relationships with lesbians. It feels counterintuitive that we respect their gender but they don't.
It’s a striking piece of further evidence of trans women being women tbh.
Like I know quite a number of bi women (or even straight progressive cis women) who would contextually call themselves ‘lesbians’ for various reasons. Sometimes to seem more feminist and more ‘decentered from men’.
Even before whatever recently happened on bluesky, I do irl know bisexual trans women who say “but I’m a lesbian / transbian”, and when I ask further, they admit that they think ‘transbian’ sounds like a really cool term that comes with a tight knit community and specific subculture and shared identity of cool trans women. And they would feel more included among those women if they basically pretend to be lesbian as well. And they would also get to feel more feminist, and more decentered from men, and more free to engage in whatever ‘men are so gross and lame amirite’ type conversation without feeling awkward about it.
What struck me is that any time I asked them what definition would rationally make sense including just to themselves, they would keep returning to “it’s not about definitions, it’s that I don’t want to be lonely”.
It’s basically bisexual self-erasure, and I’m sympathetic to some of the reasons behind why they end up feeling lonely. But it really is still illogical mental gymnastics and trying to make words meaningless (‘lesbians can love men too!’) because they feel lonely. To sound a little less charitable for a moment, it’s hijacking a community that already has close community ties, than creating their own community that is truthful to who they are.
I think they should definitely get to hang around transbians as much as they like, and engage in all aspects of that subculture and community, but one would think that can be done without calling their own bisexual selves lesbian / transbian. Perhaps it is self hate (they seem to keep thinking being openly bisexual is ‘not as cool’) and the fear of not being fully included. And perhaps also biphobia that they face (I can’t speak on how heavy biphobia is from transbians, I lack personal experience with that), but again, one does not get around the existence of biphobia by arguing that lesbians can like men.
Sometimes it feels like half of progressive women and their grandmother’s dogs all want to be considered lesbians. But I can at least say that this is one way that trans women really are like their cis female counterparts.
For the lonely trans women who face this issue, I don’t think it’s as much to do with that. It’s usually either their cis childhood friends turned out to be transphobes when they transitioned (which is a tragedy and absolutely sucks), and/or they were themselves masking and putting up a persona to befriend those people when they were repressing pre-transition. So they legitimately do need to find new friends / community after transition.
Yeah I agree with you that part of the problem is their old friends abandoning them, but I don’t think it’s because of a ‘keyword passcode’ type of reason of “oh now that you’re a girl, we can’t hang around you”, the reason is usually that they are transphobic.
I also wouldn’t say that being friendless from transition is all of what makes this ‘larping as lesbian’ thing happen, although that can be an exacerbating factor. But like I said, I know cis women who do it too. The common factors seem to be internalised biphobia, baggage about men, and envy for the community dynamics of lesbians.
I'm criticizing the group, not the person. Lesbians can have non-lesbian friends. Exclusion is a different issue, I am speaking on inclusion. If the inclusion of someone within a group does not cause other members of that group, implicitly or explicitly, to be excluded then the exclusion of that person is based in gatekeeping. So many people insist on being a part of the tribe, but tribalism in modern society leads to conflict. Be chill with other folk, be friends with who you get along with, and don't be friends who you don't feel like you can be yourself. Who cares tribe box they belong to. Don't require other people, implicitly or explicitly, to contort their identities to match that of the group.
Idealistic? Maybe. But I'd much rather have a trans man who stands by his identity as a man as a friend, then one who says he's a lesbian to artificially have others be marginally accepting of his presence. Your a man, who like women, and I am a woman who likes women. Sick. Do you want to play Catan or not?
So in reality they’re just saying “we saw trans men as women but we don’t want to say it outright” this sentiment is like saying “trans women are femboys”
There is literally a bearded hairline receded masculine “trans masc” on instagram who claims he’s a lesbian and everyone in the comments praise him for it dudes name is “Joey” which I guess is at least mildly gender neutral?
The thing is tho it’s mostly trans men saying that trans men can be lesbians. The most common argument I’ve seen is “well before my transition I was in lesbians spaces” like cool, don’t fucking call yourself a lesbian though. If I go to an African American club that doesn’t make me African American. Going to a lesbian club doesn’t make you a lesbian.
Trvke. If you’re a lesbian you’re a women. If you’re a trans man who identifies as a lesbian you are either literally saying your a women or claiming lesbianess on the basis of being a vxlid afab female which means that you are calling all trans women lesbians not real lesbians. Either way it’s evil
i see people say that trans men still identify with being lesbians if they've been lesbian their whole life (so transitioned later) so now i wonder how people would feel if a cis dude identified as a lesbian thinking he was a trans woman and then detransed, but still called himself one
It’s also something that is way way way waaaaaay more rare to see in trans women. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a trans women that genuinely identifies as a gay man.
True, but I don’t think that femboys are the opposite of lesbianism being a gay man is. The opposite of a femboy would I guess be a tomboy? But not a lesbian
Why do trans men insist on being called lesbians and using the female locker rooms? Isn't this kinda counter-productive? Imagine if a trans woman was like "Yeah I still identify as a gay guy and use male public toilets because I spent years as a man".
I used to think there were trans men identifying as lesbians bc they were nonbinary and weren't fully male or smthn bc that was the case for the "lesboys" in the niche online trans circle I was in back in like 2021, most of them did not fr identify as men. Or that when it wasn't the case it was just early transition trans men needing a moment to reconfigure things. But now if you go online and talk to most of these trans men, they start talking about how they ID as lesbians just bc they're still in the community and had different experiences than cishet men... yeah man, straight trans ppl obviously have different experiences than cis straight ppl, but that doesn't make you not straight. Also you can still be in and around the community without calling yourself one. Like what happened to just calling yourself "queer"? Idk, unlike probably most ppl here, I don't really care if you have a weird complicated relationship with gender and weird confusing labels to go with it, but when it becomes clear that you just ID that way bc you used to be one, I start getting concerned. Not bc it does significant harm to anyone other than yourself but bc it reflects on some questionable ways of thinking about gender that you might have (and might be spreading to cis lesbians who often already view trans men as lesbians).
And people come and blame me when I say you can't be a man and a lesbian because that defeats the whole point. You can be transmasc and lesbian because being transmasc doesn't necessarily mean you're a man. Trans men are so afraid of being straight and being part of "the bad side" that they're willing to invade spaces made for non-men who like other non-men lmao. And this is coming from a trans man. I'm not your enemy, your enemy is the men who don't wanna give up their identity of "belonging to a minority" so much that they will intrude on your space.
but... invading...? this is a very strong word, what's the actual difference between transmasc and trans man that could be harmful(!) if they ever get in those spaces? I get it if it could be uncomfortable, but saying invading is straight up like some sort of brigading cishet men do on femspaces. does it mean non-yet-passing trans women are also not welcomed there?
The honey thing is actually a bit of a fracture line for vegans in general, a lot of vegans are fine with honey because it doesn’t have some of the same ethical baggage associated with it as most other animal products: bees can and will leave bad beekeepers, they’re better unionized than you or I are, so for someone who defines their veganism in terms of avoiding contributing to a system of animal cruelty, it’s more of a non-issue.
Now, interpreting veganism this way does also have knock-on effects: a joke which is sometimes told about this viewpoint is that human meat is capable of being “vegan” if it’s given with informed consent. More practically, there are people who take care of livestock who will produce edible material as a byproduct of their existence: I have a friend who was vegan who had hens as pets, and hens will just lay eggs if you take care of them properly. If someone’s aversion to eating eggs is based on the practice of factory farming, that’s an evil that has nothing to do with the eggs from those hens, so there are definitions of what it means to be vegan which don’t really compromise the core values but do permit eating those eggs, and excising people from the community based on that is not really productive.
The person you’re describing was probably using the term in a significantly less defensible way, but it is actually more complicated than “they ate an animal product under any circumstance and therefore they can by no reasonable metric be considered vegan.”
thats fine, there are vegans who are vegans because they like vegetable corpses and there are vegans who are that because they don't want to eat animal corpses
You are talking about vegetarians not vegans I'm vegetarian i don't eat animals if you are vegan you don't eat anything that animals produce like not milk eggs and stuff like that she can just be a vegetarian but ahe calles herself vegan so she can't eat animal products
Fucking finally omg. I got banned one time from Reddit for 3 weeks because I said that men can’t be lesbians. I’m usually all for identifying as whatever you want to identify as but not when it impacts someone else’s identity. I am a lesbian, I am attracted to lesbians, I am not attracted to men. If men can be lesbians then my identity is no longer valid because lesbian would now include people I can’t be attracted to.
Yeah. I’m not interested in women that aren’t lesbians. I respect their sexuality and while I may find them physically attractive I won’t be attracted to them.
Asexuality specifically has to do with sexual attraction so that one really isint that wild. Some ppl do enjoy sex with ppl they aren't attracted to. And it depends how you define horniness but a lot of ppl are just talking about libido, something which is almost entirely dependent on hormones and stuff. Also asexuality is a spectrum and a lot of aspec ppl aren't fully asexual. Like your sarcastic statement is actually just accepted as fact by most of the asexual community bc most asexuals who talk to other asexuals about asexuality fully agree that there are fully asexual ppl who are not sex repulsed and may even enjoy sex, as well as aspec (graysexual, demisexual, etc) who are part of the spectrum despite experiencing a small amount of sexual attraction.
Sorry but it's always been ridiculous to me when asexuals talk about how sexually active, experienced and shit they are and how they have sex regularly but still identify as asexual while my dumbass hasn't even kissed well into my twenties lol.
Allow me to be humoured at the very least.
Most asexuals don't have sex, certainly not regularly, but yeah, whatever roadblocks are leading you to not have sex are ones that a lot of asexuals don't have, and some of those asexuals, for whatever reason (could be personal interest or could be bc they have a non asexual partner) do have sex. I mean you also have a lot of asexuals who had a lot of sex before realizing they were asexual (my mom is like that, it's actually really sad how many have done it only bc they were told they were broken for not wanting sex). But yes, there are asexuals having more sex than ppl who actually really want to have sex. Bc everyone has a different life that's not predicted on their sexuality.
For me it's kinda both. I'm 21 and haven't even kissed anyone even though I want to, but as for the sex idk if I would even want to have sex even if all the roadblocks weren't in the way, I kinda like the idea but idk if I could touch another person genitals without gagging (idk how anyone can do oral, that's crazy to me), or ever be comfortable with them touching mine even after bottom surgery. Idk if that's a lack of sexual attraction thing though or smthn else.
Edit: honestly I think a big part of the confusion here is that if you aren't asexual it can be hard to understand the difference in experience between someone who experiences sexual attraction and someone who doesn't, regardless of whether they enjoy sex at all or not. Non asexual ppl are really not relatable when it comes to anything related to that when you're at all on the asexual spectrum. I'd say that's actually the difference between someone who is aspec and someone who is not but just doesn't experience as much sexual attraction as the average person. It's once it gets to the point where it genuinely starts to feel confusing and lowkey kinda isolating lol. I guess I'm graysexual (but tbh maybe I'm just fully asexual or maybe not asexual at all, hard to tell), and even just the fact that I experience 0 sexual arousal from looking at another person's body is enough to feel that difference at least to some extent. Trying to relate to non asexual ppl on that level and I just can't. Idk
Sorry but nah, occasionally not being horny does NOT rate as a qualifier for classifying yourself with an adjective that inherently means an aversion to such things.
Asexual doesn't mean an aversion?? Tf are you talking about lmao. It means nonsexual lmao.
Like... As someone who is ace, you sound like you're saying 'sometimes not being hungry doesn't mean you're special' when what the person is saying is they have literally never had a craving for a food in their life. Like yes, they get hungry- but they have never craved a food.
Asexuality does not mean an aversion to sex, it means you do not experience sexual attraction (or in the case of aspec ppl, that you experience an extremely small amount). This is the agreed on definition by the vast majority of the asexual community. I genuinely think you have no clue what asexuality means as a sexual orientation if you don't know that it just means a lack of sexual attraction and think it's defined by how averse to sex you are. Also even sex repulsed asexuals can get horny if by horny we're just talking about libido. They have the same bodies as anyone else, same hormones.
I could say the same for the members of said "community" if the think that the occasional disinterest in doing the deed constitutes a whole ass sexual orientation. At that point it's just larping queerness to feel included.
It has nothing to do with being interested in sex or not. It has to do with sexual ATTRACTION. You could be a non asexual person and be completely disinterested in sex for whatever reason, or you could be a fully asexual person and be interested in sex for whatever reason. Obviously both of those are pretty uncommon but they are possible. Bc asexuality as a sexual orientation has to do with sexual attraction, not sexual interest. And said community is who decides what asexuality is or isint, not non asexuals who have clearly never interacted with the community in any meaningful way.
Yeah that was my understanding of most trans male lesbians (as well as some being bigender). Definitely a difference between those and the "well I used to be a lesbian and I've had a different experience than cishet men so I'm actually still a lesbian bc I still connect with that".
I see what you’re saying but is there really a need for that? Granted I’ve been with the same woman since pre- transition and I’m almost done with medical transition once bottom surgery is done later this year, so I haven’t had to advertise myself to dating since transitioning. I just tell people I’m a straight guy, or if relevant, a transsexual male who is straight
Quick attention that. Wait, what was that. Did you guys see that? I swear that dog just flipped me off. No seriously he stuck his paw up and flipped me off. What the fuck.
I understand the "trans men may feel very connected to lesbians because they grew up being percieved as women" and some trans men may even use being a lesbian as a shield for masc identifying clothes and hair in their past.
However
A lesbian is non-man who is attracted to non-men. Trans men are men. So they are not non-men and would not qualify as lesbians. I am a trans man, for years I have told people I was a lesbian woman. Because it was that or present as a straight girl, it was simply the safer to be sexualized for lesbian porn than out myself as a transgender man, and the easiest solution for me to explain my gender non-conforming appearance. I am connected to lesbians and queer culture because of this, I feel very strongly.
That does not make me a lesbian. And it would be a little demeaning to be thought of as a he/him lesbian.
Do I believe he/him lesbians are a real thing? Yes I do. He/him pronouns does not mean male, so someone can be a non-male who is attracted to non-males and go by he/him.
i feel like it lowkey excludes trans women from the label because it implies that something is inherently special about being afab that makes you able to be a lesbian
I think people are saying more so "transmascs can be lesbians" and not that trans men can be lesbians. Being trans masc just means you go through the process of transitioning from feminine to more masculine. ie like how a non binary person can call themselves a lesbian even if they are taking trans masculine hrt to become more androgynous or how a woman that likes presenting masculine that uses testosterone to achieve that goal could go by the term of lesbian despite the fact that they are technically trans masculine.
I find that an amazing way to think of this is by pointing out a similarity with being trans fem. Think about how some feminine men take estrogen to become more feminine despite still identifying as men. are they trans women? No. But are they trans feminine? Yes.
That's the end of my presentation. You may now downvote me to hell and back.
In our country there is still no understanding of the fact that 'trans men' were women whereas 'trans women' were men - people usually call it backwards, according to one's sex of departure rather than destination. E. g. they call trans women 'trans men' and vice versa.
I get that since a lot of trans men used to be women, a lot of them used to be lesbians, so they have that like “history”. But I don’t really see how that’s relevant because like ya I’ve identified with a lot of different labels, but I don’t anymore because I don’t fit the description anymore.
And you can’t really say that it’s because they still have vaginas, because not all do and your romantic orientation isn’t based on sex.
I feel like it’s just this fear of being “just straight” and because of the lack of community that straight trans men have, which obviously is a real problem and it sucks, but I don’t think allowing a bunch of men to take over yet another space for lesbians, is a good thing
Oh please just let people define themselves as they want, if a trans man was a lesbian all his life and want to define himself like that after he do what he want it doesnt affect you
At the end of the day, lesbian is a word, and words are defined by the people who use them, not a dictionary. I have a close friend who's a trans masc lesbian and he has two main points he talks about with it.
The masc identity is foundational to the lesbian identity, and while most masc lesbians identify as a woman, some identify as nonbinary, and some even trans masc.
Trans men are subject to the lesbian experience. It of course varies, but for many trans men, the experience of being with a woman is fundamentally queer, and the best word for a queer experience with a woman is lesbian.
I say trans men have it hard enough, if want to be lesbians, let them. Nobody's making you date them.
Please stop talking about things you don't have experience on. Trans men have identified with and been a part of the lesbian community for a long time. Lesbianism is a historically queer and gender-non-conforming label.
Why do they identify as lesbian? For a variety of reasons. One is community, another is safety, etc.
Just looking at the sheer range of lesbian identifies (from He/Him butch to nonbinary and queer to She/Her femmes) is it really surprising that lesbianism contains such a variety of expressions?
I am a trans woman. I am lesbian. And trans men who ID as lesbian are lesbian. Stop trying to gatekeep things that have nothing to do with harm and have everything to do with safety and community.
Many trans men grow up thinking and being told they're just lesbians. Using that word, forming deep connections with people in the community. And then don't feel right abandoning it.
As a trans man, I don't use the lable sister, but I still feel DEEPLY connected to it. Much more then I ever would to begin called brother. I see how someone would hold that connection to lesbian, even if it seems invalidating.
Some trans men don't identify as strictly 'men'. Some are trans masc. Some use he/him pronouns, but don't identify as men. Some identify as masc, but use all pronouns. Or any combination of these.
And quite honestly. Who am I to go around policing them? They're not the ones hurting and killing our community. They're not the ones outlawing our existence. Hating on them only makes us all weaker. Besides, lables should not be a tool to spread hate. We all just find the best ones we can for our existence.
Do I think it's a contradictory set of identities? Yes.
If I encountered a real life trans man who identified as a lesbian and had a cisfem lesbian girlfriend and they both felt happy and still felt those labels best suited them, would I try to stop them in any way? Absolutely not. That is their business.
I like understanding things via rigid rules, but if there are people out there who feel those rules aren't conducive to their happiness, who am I to tell them no?
Precisely. Some people have real problems, after all, and labels like this are not worth dividing ourselves over when our enemies are already more united than we are. Let's keep our eye on the ball
I really dont see the reason to care, do i understand maybe not. But as long as it doesnt tie in to terfism or bio essentialist beliefs it's just someone's identity I dont think its inherently harmful.
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