To all my trans guys and gals. This one is for you

I was supposed to post this for trans visibility day but it took longer than I thought.

im annoyed and a little pedantic so can i just say as a blanket statement

queerbaiting is when the promotion for a FICTIONAL STORY intentionally hints towards two characters having a romantic relationship, without any intention to follow through in the show, in order to get queer people watching without discouraging the homophobic enjoyers of the show

queerbaiting is NOT:

a celebrity who you think is queer because theyre gnc or they have a 'vibe'. that is a real person and they cannot queerbait

two friends of the same gender pretending to flirt with each other for fun. those are real people and they cannot queerbait

a show with two characters of the same gender who are canonically friends that YOU PERSONALLY think would be better in a relationship. that's not bating, that's shipping, and subject to opinion

there are more but those are the main examples of people misunderstanding what queerbaiting is and being mad at something that isn't actually a problem

Julian Quintero (@julianxquintero) & Zarataco (@Zarataco_)

MALAKAI & ROWAN | Heartbreak High 2024 · Teen · Drama · S2·EP4

To the person who made this joke on here: thank you because I redrew it so I could draw Ruby eating a cigarette

Straight cisgender people will go "Why don't we get pride?? We're unique too!!"

Yeah but have you ever had to look up if it's illegal to go on your vacation trip just because of who you love?

Were you not allowed to marry the person you love years ago?

Have looked at the we have the right to refuse service to anyone sign and get nervous?

Are you being discriminated against even in you own community because you don't want to love (aro/aces deserve double pride or smth idk)

Have you been denied by a doctor because you're trans and it's 'too complicated'?

Are cishet people being harassed and murdered because they're cishet?

We've fought for our place and we're still fighting. When you have to do that then you can have pride.

Source: Sundae Kids

there really is a cultural pressure for transmascs & men to detransition, and it comes from all sides. it comes from the queer community too, not just terfs and cishet transphobes.

it took me a while to realize why transphobic people and transandrophobic queers utterly despise trans guys & mascs who are over the age of like 25- it's because it pisses them right off that we've resisted their attempts to make us detransition. it makes them so angry to see they were unable to groom that person into a life of self-shame and repression. it really seems like MOST people believe that trans men will just detransition eventually in life? people NEVER think about older trans men, only teenage trans boys and trans men in their very early twenties.

when i was involved with my local punk scene i was addressed with condescension, almost everyone around me didn't accept transmasculinity as a legitimate identity and thought that we would've transitioned by now in life. i encountered folks who would talk about transmasculinity with subtle disgust that made me feel like i was doing something wrong, and people who expressed overt disgust, saying in plain english that they were disgusted by breasts and vaginas because they were gay men. all along the way i was literally mocked for not having a penis, and one of my roommates started treating me differently once they found out i didn't have one (because they were attracted to me)

i've been on T for 9 years, and been out as a trans man for a bit longer than that, and i noticed as i've aged i've also attracted a lot of folks who have tried to deter me from identifying as a trans man, either through directly telling me that trans men are inherently dangerous, or by implying that women or another gender are safer, quieter, calmer, "less traumatizing to be around," etc. one of my exes told me they were terrified to date me (despite literally going out of their way to do so for over half a year) because they were scared i would be transphobic to them because i'm a transmasculine lesbian.

i received pressure from online friends to either detransition and become an intersex butch woman, or to something feminine adjacent or nonbinary. for years i dealt with a few friends who kept subtly hinting that i should stop identifying as a trans man or trans masc because of how awful transmascs are- going as far as to sending me screenshots of transmascs speaking, complaining about them and calling them whiny, annoying. talking about how all transmascs are entitled, how all transmascs take things too personally, how we complain too much, and so on.

people make no effort to make space for transmascs and men. i met 0 transmascs in my local punk community that i was able to stay in contact with. none. i met a few in passing but none that actually were introduced to me in a capacity where i could actually try to befriend them. it really felt like other punks in the scene were desperately trying to keep the transmascs apart at times. excuses were made as to why i couldn't hang out with other transmascs i liked, but i was constantly being forced to befriend transphobic cis gay men and transandrophobic transfemmes who outwardly expressed hatred and disgust of us. it really felt like it was on purpose... almost as if other members of this community wanted our attention, but never wanted us to give each other attention or a sense of community. like we were objects, not people to be included in the community for real. satellite friends, if you will.

i'll be honest with you. i was at my lowest at this point. i realized i wasn't just a trans man and that i'm a genderqueer person who experiences multiple genders, including womanhood and an "other" gender, which was great. however now i was being forced to completely stuff down being a man for the sake of other people. instead of folks telling me they'd rather not hang out with transmascs, folks rather just attempted to guilt me for identifying as such in the hopes i'd stop identifying that way. i was being told daily that trans men and mascs are inherently violent and terrible to be around. i was in discord servers where transmascs were being kicked constantly for getting even slightly upset about transandrophobia, or being unfairly targeted by staff.

it's violence, but nobody wants to call it that. i pulled myself out of there and am now able to contact other transmascs and trans men who are proud of who they are and have elevated me back into a headspace where it's okay to truly be myself. just keep in mind that if you feel like you're in that situation, you're not alone. people who attempt to groom others are often very subtle it's not always up front. they will start slipping in hateful sentiments very slowly and make you feel like maybe they're the ones who are actually right.

it feels good to be an almost 32 year old trans guy. there's nothing to be ashamed about there. people project their feelings on to my gender and that has nothing to do with me. it has nothing to do with you, either. people will just project on to you for whatever reason- hatred is usually the motivator there. if you encounter folks who keep trying to badger you out of identifying as your gender, no matter who you are, transmasc, transfemme, transneutral, trans anything- they are not good for you. they are not your friends. they do not accept you as you are and you deserve so much better.

breaker doing some internal maintenance on r60 (cowboy mechanist x android)

[ID: a two page greyscale comic showing two characters: r60, a thin android with light skin and short dark hair, sits on crate in front of breaker, a strong pudgy man with light skin and dark curly hair. r60 has a circular backplate open, exposing his spine and inner mechanisms, three of his ribs flipped up out of the way for deeper access. page one shows breaker telling r60 "hold still," and then inserting a screwdriver into r60's inner workings to remove some smalls screws. page two shows r60 blushing and covering his mouth, to which breaker says, "sorry, did that hurt?" r60 hesitates and then says "no," and he grips the knee of his pants as breaker pushes his fingers into an internal window to access some delicate circuits and wires. end ID]

International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia

17 May

*looks down at my lack of breasts*

I bet this is reagan’s fault

Trying to prove a point

REBLOG IF YOU THINK AROACE / aro/ ace PEOPLE ARE A VALID PART OF THE LGBTQ+ COMMUNITY , LIKE IF YOU DON’T

Paulo Victor Melo (@paulo_victorme)

Based on this tweet:

I'd love to hear you expand on your thoughts about gender and deer antlers and also introduce the aspect of caribou antlers to the conversation. Both males and females have antlers but the males drop them in the winter because of the weight while the females keep theirs until the new set pushes the old set out.

I have a lot of thoughts and none of them really go anywhere but I’m happy to expand

it’s funny, I was thinking about caribou while I was making this brown clay deer-person. I didn’t want the antler to read as caribou, it was more just turning thoughts around in my head

I imagine if we had antlers, culturally it would be considered masculine (likely even for those—like caribou—where everyone can grow antlers and shed them at different times).

it made me think about gender being seasonal, with the growing and shedding of antlers.

it made me think about how tender and sensitive antlers are when they first grow in, covered in velvet. is it like menstruation, a gender-specific thing that’s painful or uncomfortable for awhile?

it made me think about losing an antler accidentally, or removing them. or only removing one. or just cutting off a few tines. what would it signify? how would it feel?

do queer deer (lol) notice each other because of how their antlers look, recognize each other as queer?

would a doe feel relieved when it’s time to shed her antlers? would she dread growing new ones? would a buck, any buck, feel dysphoric, feel a loss, when he sheds his?

I don’t know, I’ve just been having the gender recently. so obviously I had to pass that feeling on to my little sculptural creatures