Transphobia

[April_TO]

Good Day Ladies and Gents,

I was recently browsing some youtube videos and stumbled upon a video of a transgender woman  being assaulted by a man on the NYC subway. He claims that the our sister touched him hence the assault. It was so painful to watch to see one of our sisters being treated this way. However, a part of me was judging the way she looks and the way she was presenting herself in public. So my whole fear of my transition has resurfaced and being seen as a freak show has come to haunt me again sigh. Bottomline, hating myself for being who I am.

I feel bad for feeling this way. Hence, when I am out I try to steer clear of any signs of potential issues. I just try to act normal, dress up nicely and put as minimal make up as possible to get less attention. However, sometimes I feel why is it so hard to be me.

Do you sometimes feel this way? A phobia against your own kin, yourself.

Love,

April

[Sabrina]

That's one of my biggest fears. I've always been situationally aware of my surroundings at all times. But even more so now that I've excepted who and what I am. Always fearful of an unknown person, devil possessed, taking harm on me. The unknown is hard to prepare for so what I do is be the best person possible. Always willing to be of service to those in need. Make friends everywhere. You will always have allies when you need them as a result. Almost like proverbial armor. The Golden Rule applies here. When I get into girly mode, is when I feel the best and I can be girly around those allies. The armor strengthens and that strengthening can be felt. I have faith that your fear will subside with time but always be aware.

[ImagineKate]

Violence against transgender people scares me. That said I do ride in the subway presenting female and I really don't even get any looks. People are busy playing candy crush or reading, knitting and doing other stuff. A lot of people deliberately stare up at the ads to avoid looking like they are rudely staring. I look extremely ordinary and no one really gives me a second look. If you go out looking a certain way you'll attract attention. I know it sounds like blaming the victim and all but it's reality. But I do at least carry pepper spray with me because you never know if you will encounter a crazy.

[mrs izzy]

Newtons law III

So if your actions are such to push a reaction then it will bring a reaction back.

It applies in the real word.

It will come down to making someone push first.

If you do not make actions for that push nothing will happen

So be yourself and not a beacon of trans*

Also packs are better then the lone wolf. Try in areas needed be in numbers.

Help any?

[Eva Marie]

I think part of your fear is related to being trans, and the rest of it is just related to being a female.

I NEVER EVER understood how vulnerable and exposed women are - until I went out as one. Within two minutes of presenting on the street as Eva I fully got it and fully understood it. It was definitely eye opening, as so much of this journey has been.

Now when I'm out and about I take the same precautions that other women take - I go places in groups, I am always situationally aware, when I am walking somewhere alone I am hyper vigilant, I am usually not out late, I don't hang out at bars, and I call the people that I left once I get home safely.

Presentation is important when trying to avoid being noticed and trying to avoid transphobic people. If you dress like other women you'll blend in. If you wear an outlandish revealing outfit you'll attract attention to yourself and increase the chances that someone will clock you. Not that there is anything wrong about an outlandish revealing outfit, but everything has a proper time and a place, and being on public transportation probably isn't the best time or place for that.

I don't think that you can really do much about transphobia when you encounter it in the wild other than try to walk away from it. The reason you walk away instead of confronting the person is that you have no idea what the person might do to endanger your safety.

[Ms Grace]

Hi April.
I understand where you are coming from. When I first tried to transition in the early 1990s it freaked me out that I could easy spot other trans women out in public (of course there may have been plenty I didn't notice but that never occurred to me). While I realised I was a bit more sensitive to the "tell tale signs" since there were plenty of them I was dealing with myself but that fear of being a "freak" was one of a number of reasons that helped to torpedo that attempt at transition.

When I was contemplating transition again at the start of 2013 I was talking to a gender counsellor about this fear which had resurfaced. I can't remember what he said exactly but he pointed out that the fear was a reflection of my internalised transphobia. My first instinct was to reject that, I considered myself open minded and could never tolerate other people saying transphobic things. But I also knew he was utterly right. That under my so called veneer of personal tolerance I really had quite a dim view of trans gender issues and people. I think it was because I saw myself as a woman not as a trans person, therefore I was not like "them". Sad.

Acknowledging the transphobia, admitting I was trans and that trans covers a broad spectrum of presentation and identification allowed me to quickly let go of my transphobia. Not long after I joined this forum and started to realise that I wasn't alone, most of my fears and problems were not uncommon to many, and that most of the prejudice I had felt about trans people was just the result of cis centric social conditioning and stereotyping.

[Devlyn]

I think I know the  video you're talking about,  but there's also a subway video of a transgender woman absolutely kicking the crap out of a dude, she throws him around like a ragdoll. Life is a two way street.

[Elsa Delyth]

Of course! I especially hate the pretty ones! Lol.

Standing out in any sense is always risky, you get attention from all kinds of people, some of them predictably nasty. We still live in an incredibly prejudiced and scary world. I saw that as early as 2010 someone got away with murder by using the "trans panic defense", or the claim that after fooling around that they dropped that they were trans on them, and this is provocation to kill them. Provocation in court is such that the jury has to agree that any reasonable person would do the same under similar circumstances... I saw a watch mojo top ten like a year ago about top ten movie twists, and one of them was some guy falling in love with a trans woman, only to find out and vomit, to which they say "you know you'd do the same" or something. Society tells people, and re-enforces that we're at minimum disgusting, and sometimes reasonably beaten to death for being "traps".

Not trying to scare you, just trying to say that your fear is reasonable, and by no means unfounded. I agree with the other women that mentioned that you have to live, and plan for safety, not just because you're trans but just for being a woman, let alone that you're trans.

You have to also realize that if you're attractive to men, and men find out, some of them will be extremely angry at themselves about it, and want to take it out on you.

As for feeling that you're kind of blaming the victim, well I don't know that you are. You're empathizing with the victim, seeing yourself as them, and wondering how you could have prevented that. Only natural. The same reason our first question after hearing that someone has died is "how?", because before we care about them, we want to know that what killed them isn't something we ourselves have to worry about.

Be safe.

[EmmaMcAllister]

I'm honestly not too worried about violence, but I completely understand the fear. I'm physically disabled, quite frail looking, in a wheelchair. While I'm certainly at a greater risk of violence, people generally have a natural regard, or pity, for the disabled. I'm not really worried about standing out, because I've always stood out!