Tough passing experience

[Ayden]

So, as I have posted before, I pass pretty well in Japan. People don't question me and the only time someone said I was my partner's wife, the Japanese people they told were completely floored and argued back saying "there is no way that guy is a woman." All in all, pretty awesome for me. I can use the men's room with no problem, and have in general just been enjoying it.


Today though, I had a passing experience that was a little heartbreaking for me. I went out for a walk to try and relieve my boredom and to get some air. A young girl, a high schooler, was walking in front of me a ways. I wasn't really paying attention but I noticed that something fell out of her bag and she hadn't noticed. So, I caught up, picked up the fan she dropped and called out to her to wait for a second. When she looked back as I was running up (we were on a side street so it was just the two of us) she tensed up and had this deer in the headlights look. Like, she was actually afraid of me. When I handed her the fan and told her she dropped it, she physically relaxed, thanked me, and hurried on ahead. I just stood there for a minute before I realized why I recognized that look she gave me - its the same look a friend of mine has when she is approached by a strange man (she was assaulted in the past, so she is terrified of most guys). This girl was actually afraid of me for a second. In hindsight, I realized that I probably did scare her. In my area there are not any foreigners, and here I am with blonde hair, tattoos and piercings.


I know that I can't stop people from being weary of me and I knew that it might happen one day, but I didn't expect it to hit me so hard. I mean, I feel silly because I was raised having that pounded into my head. Strange men are dangerous, they want to hurt you and rape you and do terrible things. I understand why she was afraid, but it still hit me hard.

[MrTesto]

That is a dismaying but common experience, at least among the guys I know. Passing as male [often] means getting read as dangerous by women.

When it happened to me the first time, a woman crossed the street so I wouldn't be walking behind her on the same sidewalk. The street she crossed was like an abyss - I as glad to have traversed it, but sad at how it divides us.

[Arch]

I've had a few women whip out their phones, and two of them, after looking nervously over their shoulders, were "talking" on the phone before they could possibly have raised someone on the other end. I'm pretty sure they weren't receiving incoming calls.

And I'm just stumping along, thinking, "Sheesh, it's only me!"

[Frank]

I've had similar things happen. Women awkwardly flicking their eyes between the floor and me and walking on the faaaaaaaar side of the aisle, like I'm going to rape them right in the middle of the store. Or the middle of a street in broad daylight. I just shrug now. Better safe than sorry? I don't know. 

[fooledthecrowd]

I've had similar experiences. The worst was this: I was sitting out on my stoop a few months ago and this girl was walking by wearing a shirt said that "The Cure." I love The Cure. I have some of their lyrics tatted on my arm. Anyway, as she was walking past I told her that I liked her shirt; she gave me the most disgusted look I've ever seen in my entire life. I didn't say it creepily or anything. It was just that she saw this guy telling her he liked her shirt so obviously it had to be meant in a creepy way... meh.

[henrytwob]

That is such a sad statement about our society. The world we ( well,  sick assed others) created where men "prove their powerful" by raping women. Of course, we, this part of the board,  probably didn't have many experiences like that, being the scared one, the one worried about being assaulted. My guess is, predators can smell "weakness". what many "women' are bring up to be. predators of that strip didn't bother most of us, because we just project an entirely different aura. ( there are probably other types who want to kick our asses for what we are).

Or maybe is it just me. I grew up in the city. I also have enough frustration in my life that the aura I project is " you and what army'.

Or course, I am also trying to teach that to my extremely feminine daughter. i don't want predators going after her.

[Adam (birkin)]

My guess is, predators can smell "weakness". what many "women' are bring up to be. predators of that strip didn't bother most of us, because we just project an entirely different aura. ( there are probably other types who want to kick our asses for what we are).

Or maybe is it just me. I grew up in the city. I also have enough frustration in my life that the aura I project is " you and what army'.

Or course, I am also trying to teach that to my extremely feminine daughter. i don't want predators going after her.

I can appreciate that some predators choose to attack those women that they perceive as weak or feminine, but this is very, very far from an accurate generalization. In my undergrad, I heard countless stories of strong, capable, and intelligent women who were sexually assaulted. I can think of one of my classmates in particular, when she broke down and told us that she was almost gang-raped while hunting. She was pretty much the strongest woman I've ever known, and she could kick anyone's butt. I had never seen her that vulnerable, and it was absolutely heart-breaking.


This is something I will have a really hard time with. I know how it feels to be afraid. It would crush me to know I made anyone feel that way, even if I didn't do anything wrong.

[Elsa]

Guys I hope no-one minds a girl posting here...

Guys please do not feel bad about this but it is a normal reaction for a person to protect themselves... and us women tend to be the very expressive with our emotions...

Women generally do this to avoid any chances of being physically attacked by a person, and most women would not have the physical stamina or the strength to defend themselves. And there have been Many case of sexual assault, rape etc that occur in public in almost every country on the planet - so its a better for us to be safe than sorry kinda situation.
The other reason could be that we may be in a relationship so any sign of interest would need to be dealt with swiftly else we would risk hurting ourselves, our partners and the person who is interested...
Sometimes though it could be we are just not in the mood for it - somedays we feel like crawling under a rock and pretending we don't exist...
there could be other reasons as well...

with regards to this... when I joined high school there were these group of girls who I was trying to make friends with (I was presenting as a guy and trying my best to act like a normal guy - even though I did not feel/think like one) - so I asked if they would like to go to a movie - next thing I knew for the next few months I was "the pervert who asks as many women as he could to go out with him" That really took me off guard and made me avoid people for some time.

Guys this would be a sign that people around you are accepting you as who you really are - and that like all cis-guys you would need to earn the trust and friendship of women around you and I know any women would love to be around great guys like you...

It may be sad to mourn the loss of being able to talk to a women without them reacting that way - but this may be the start of something new and amazing...

And I am sure this would go both ways that there would be cis-guys who would treat you as a cis-guy (what they don't know cant hurt them  )
now on bright side you would be able to do things that would have been impossible as a guy - its like they say "when one door closes another opens"

[MrTesto]

...
Women generally do this to avoid any chances of being physically attacked by a person, and most women would not have the physical stamina or the strength to defend themselves. And there have been Many case of sexual assault, rape etc that occur in public in almost every country on the planet - so its a better for us to be safe than sorry kinda situation.
...

Statistically speaking, it's certain that some of the guys reading this board are aware of this, from first hand experience. And for those of us who are perceived to be gay or gender variant somehow, the risks are still present.

For me, now often "visible" as a gay man, that makes this phenomenon particularly poignant.

[Bahzi]

Statistically speaking, it's certain that some of the guys reading this board are aware of this, from first hand experience. And for those of us who are perceived to be gay or gender variant somehow, the risks are still present.

For me, now often "visible" as a gay man, that makes this phenomenon particularly poignant.

This.  I was sexually assaulted when living as a female, and reading as a small, slightly effete looking gay boy now, I'm still on 'alert', if only for a potential beat down.


I've seen numerous statistics; a good number of transguys are sexual assault survivors, and most were raised to be wary of strange men.

[Ayden]

Guys please do not feel bad about this but it is a normal reaction for a person to protect themselves... and us women tend to be the very expressive with our emotions...

Oh, I know. My early socialization with my grandmother beat into my head that men were dangerous. It was rough for me growing up, because I was being told I was a danger basically to myself in my mind. Talk about confusing. 

I've had a few women whip out their phones, and two of them, after looking nervously over their shoulders, were "talking" on them before they could possibly have raised someone on the other end. I'm pretty sure they weren't receiving incoming calls.

And I'm just stumping along, thinking, "Sheesh, it's only me!"

That was me. I just kinda stood there confused and wondering what happened for a minute thinking "Huh?"

This is something I will have a really hard time with. I know how it feels to be afraid. It would crush me to know I made anyone feel that way, even if I didn't do anything wrong.

I think that summed up how it made me feel. I've been scared like that, and I think I have probably aimed looks like that at people when I was living female.

I was sexually assaulted when living as a female, and reading as a small, slightly effete looking gay boy now, I'm still on 'alert', if only for a potential beat down.

I came close to being assaulted. It didn't happen but I remember that terrible sense of fear that I had. It didn't help that I was just a kid, about 14 like this girl was.


I'm relieved I'm not the only one. I honestly didn't give any serious thought that a passing experience could make me feel kinda crappy, but at least a lot of folks here have had a similar experience. When I told a few of my friends, the guys told me I would get used to it, but I don't think I will any time soon.

[AdamMLP]

What I can't quite understand, maybe it's being male or something, but women moving away from men that they find threatening in a way that the man could pick up on.  To me that makes no real sense, I get that they'd feel more comfortable away from the "threat" but showing that sort of fear/vulnerability just screams to me as a mistake.  In situations where I've felt scared - I cut down an alleyway in town and a drunk stops me and shows me his collection of beer cans in the hedge - I wanted to get the hell out of there but realised that'd make me look out of place and vulnerable and just drummed it into my head that I can run faster than a drunk and I know that I'd do anything possible to not get hurt in that way again.  Actually I've just remembered the most recent time I went down that alley on the way to college and there was a girl about my age who had asked to follow me because she didn't know the way.  She was on the phone the whole time but as soon as I turned down the alley she asked how old I was and it's only just struck me that she was probably on the phone the whole time, as soon as one call finished she made another, because she was pretty scared and I'm fairly brusque with people I don't know because I find interacting with strangers really awkward.

[Arch]

What I can't quite understand, maybe it's being male or something, but women moving away from men that they find threatening in a way that the man could pick up on.  To me that makes no real sense, I get that they'd feel more comfortable away from the "threat" but showing that sort of fear/vulnerability just screams to me as a mistake. 

Maybe it's just the fear kicking in. But when I was nervous about possibly being followed, I became more deliberate.

People can be amazingly stupid. I'd be at work (blue collar factory job), and a couple of gals would be gossiping to me about someone else. We'd all see that person coming, and if I was the one talking, I would just seamlessly alter the thread of the conversation as if we weren't talking about her at all. I would keep the same tone of voice but say, "Yeah, I think I'm going to The Dark Knight Rises this weekend. Have you guys seen that?" The other dumb clucks were so obtuse that they would start acting nervous and obvious, even saying, "Shh! Here she comes!" or even scuttling away, looking guilty as hell. Now, that's intelligent.

[henrytwob]

yes, it must be really disturbing  to be perceived as a threat. I  can only say that it probably shouldn't be taken personally. As for the friend sexually assaulted during hunting, I am truly sorry. However, that really does just reinforce in my mind that we need to condition women to be able to take care of themselves, physically and mentally. I would love to know more about the hunting incident because very few people are foolish enough to attack someone with a loaded gun on them.  I suspect it was people she trusted, and didn't think to actually shoot them. (Which is of course, such a pity, men like that should be shot on site.) That is part of the problem with our gun laws in Texas. Yes, you can apply for a permit to carry a gun, but if you are not prepared to use it on another human being if threatened, it is more dangerous to actually have it. but that is off topic.

Do you think there is a relationship between ->-bleeped-<- and being assaulted?

[AdamMLP]

Do you think there is a relationship between ->-bleeped-<- and being assaulted?

As in people because trans because they were assaulted or more trans people than cis ones getting assaulted?


I know that I'm not trans because I was sexually assualted, yes I realised about a year afterwards, but the signs had still been there since I was little, I just couldn't make sense of them or know that it was possible until then.

[henrytwob]

I'm not sure what way the relationship may go. Only that if a higher percentage of transgendered individuals also happen to have been sexually assaulted than what the statistics would suggest the numbers should be, then there may be a relationship. That is all. I spend a great deal of time reading research.  I could not begin to guess how the two may be related, only that it might be an interesting study topic.