How to come out on FaceBook

[Adabelle]

Okay, so as I move towards full-time I'm thinking about how to go through the publicly coming out phase. I've already come out to my immediate family, in the next few months I will include a few of my closest friends and select extended family, and eventually public.

The biggest public coming out for me will be on Facebook. Here I am connected to 500-some-odd people that I know from all aspects of my life, childhood, school, former colleagues, teachers, girlfriends, pastors, and the list goes on.

I am debating two main ways of doing it:

1. Come out publicly (note, link to a coming out letter on my blog, whatever) on my boy profile and let people know I'll be deleting this one. Invite them to be friends with me on the new profile.

2. Come out publicly (however) on my boy profile, and then simply change my name on that profile to my new girl name. Nobody needs to go through the task of befriending me as a "new" person.

Here's the thing. I like the idea of #1 because it means that I'm able to know who in my life is truly supportive of me. And that would be a really nice feeling. I'd be starting sort of fresh, and that might be nice. But I'll probably not retain as many contacts this way due to their laziness of not checking FB often, or discrimination. It does make it easy to discriminate against me this way just by not friending my new profile.

I like the idea of #2 too though because it keeps the maximum number of friends. Also, why should I assume that anyone wouldn't want to continue to be my friend just because I'm trans? If they have a problem with me, maybe it's good that they would need to "unfriend" me on FB to show how they feel. The down side for me is that I'll keep a lot of people in my contact list that might actually not support me, and I'm not sure how I feel about that negative energy. Also, it means I keep all the past tagged photos etc in my profile probably - which means I'm very out and open to new people I meet too (have mixed positive and negative feelings about that).

So what should I do? Overall I think I'm going to need to live my trans status pretty publicly. I know many people from my years as a boy, and I think many of them may want to maintain contact. It's not very realistic (nor necessary I don't think at this point) to think it's more healthy for me to live in complete stealth. So either option is viable to me.

What do you think I should do?

[rejennyrated]

Madelyn

For various reasons its actually a good idea to set yourself up a new account, because Facebook software is still not perfect at taking into account changes of gender. There are some terms and conditions and features which will always treat you as your original gender if you simply change the gender marker on the old account.

Back when I transitioned it was about two decades before Facebook so I didn't have to worry about all this, however I have now seen several people tackle this and the method which seems to work best is this:

1. Set yourself up a new profile in your new name and gender.

2. Friend yourself, so everyone can see you.

3. Tell as many of your friends as you choose to and encourage them to friend your new identity. You can do this either by general announcement or by private messages. The former is quick, but rather public, the second takes more work but gives you some measure of control over how you approach people.

4. For a time run both accounts in parallel

5. Eventually after maybe 6 to 9 month you have to accept that those friends who have not responded to your announcement and have not "friended" your new identity probably don't want to know the new you - so the kindest thing you can do is let them go.

5. Post a final RIP announcement of the imminent "Death" of your old identity to give one last chance for people to respond.

6. DEACTIVATE your old account.

7. Enjoy the new you, and because the account was opened in the correct gender, have no problems with facebook gender related issues and glitches.

I hope that helps.

[Pica Pica]

Just a question, what do you need a 'maximum number of friends' for?

[Lee]

Just a question, what do you need a 'maximum number of friends' for?

Don't you watch south park?  Number of friends is crucial!

[Adabelle]

Just a question, what do you need a 'maximum number of friends' for?

Well, there is a personal element to it. I know a lot of these people and it means something to me to be connected to them. I will be sad when some of them undoubtedly will disconnect from me. Part of me wants to keep as my friends as possible from my previous life.

Incidentally, I've never chosen a gender on Facebook (I refused to when I signed up) and so FB refers to me in the third person already ("X updated their profile picture" instead of using a gendered pronoun etc, it's kinda funny actually, it's been that way for years). This in itself isn't reason for me to create a whole new account.

The real thing is that anyone who doesn't want to be my friend I sort of want them to have to UNfriend me, rather than having me make it convenient for them to stop being connected to a trans person by my deleting my old self. The thing is, I'm not deleted! I am who I am, and I still shared those memories with them, and I am just transitioning. They transitioned with me from childhood to adulthood, from single to married, why would I assume they wouldn't want to transition with me now?

I think we all know the difference, there's a lot of fear in society about being trans etc and that's the reason why someone wouldn't want to stay connected. But I just kinda don't want to give into that - don't want to make it easy for people to have this "frozen" memory of me and have me disappear off their friends list without them taking an active step to delete me. If they want to get rid of me fine, but part of me doesn't want to accommodate making that step easy for them.

I should mention I'm really grateful for the responses so far!

[Dana Lane]

You can change your name and gender flag on Facebook. I did this myself a while back.

Changing your gender
Go to your profile and then click the 'Info' link. The find the "Edit Profile" link.  There is a drop down box that will let you change it. Sorry, only Male or Female choices at this time.

Changing your name
Click "Account/Account Settings
Then click "Change" next to "Name".

I seriously don't agree that you should create a new account because you are not a new person. I would recommend sending out a status update informing people of your transition and that you will be changing your name and your sex on Facebook (or however you decide). Everyone in our life goes through our transition either directly or indirectly. I think using your same profile is making a strong statement that you are still the same person to them but are a different sex than they were aware of.

I never had two different profiles on facebook though I do have friends who have done that but I don't agree with doing that. They are not two different people they are one person with two profiles.

Sorry if this didn't make sense. I am a bit tired.

[Adabelle]

They are not two different people they are one person with two profiles.

I definitely see the benefit of keeping one profile, and I do consider myself one person. But on the other hand I've got all those old pics of me, and that whole old life you know. Also it might be nice to know which friends of mine really support me and want to remain friends so I can see the benefit of the other way too.

It's such a toss up! I have a few months to decide though luckily.

[Pica Pica]

I'm a neither on facebook, it's always pestering me to choose.

[Michael Joseph]

I'm a neither on facebook, it's always pestering me to choose.

Same here.

[Rebekah with a K-A-H]

I don't know about y'all's policy about who you friend, but if you're the kind of person who likes to collect friends like happy meal toys, I would be a little more discreet or careful with the way you let your friends know. Make sure your privacy settings are such that only the people you're comfortable with knowing do learn.
I had around 200 friends on my old profile, and I'm very picky with who I allow. Even now, I've only friended 70 of those on my new profile.

[Dana Lane]

I definitely see the benefit of keeping one profile, and I do consider myself one person. But on the other hand I've got all those old pics of me, and that whole old life you know. Also it might be nice to know which friends of mine really support me and want to remain friends so I can see the benefit of the other way too.

It's such a toss up! I have a few months to decide though luckily.

I deleted all of my old pictures.

Well, best of luck in however you decide to do this! hugs

[rejennyrated]

You can change your name and gender flag on Facebook. I did this myself a while back.

Dana - yes you can change this. The reason people don't do it is that there have been numerous examples of trans-people who have then had issues with facebook applying incorrect gender related conditions such as those relating to taste and decency in photos and various other things because evidently either someone in facebook does not accept the validity of such an action, or the software is buggy.

It causes problems for example when an old "topless" photo of you as a male is now tagged with an account with a female ID and this now triggers the automatic flesh detection routine which thinks that the photo is indecent because it is of a woman with her nipples exposed. I know this sounds daft, but it has actually happened to several people.

So in setting up a new account the intention is not really to suggest that you are a different person but rather to get around this and other similar issues.

Happily I never had to deal with changing facebook gender but I think I would have done it that way, although I can of course understand the arguments in favour of the other approach.

[lightvi]

I'm really getting tired of facebook, I'm hoping a new social networking site comes out soon. I hate to say it but I actually liked myspace a lot better. I do like how many actual people are on facebook vs. all the bands on myspace but I really enjoyed customizing my profile on myspace.

I changed my gender on facebook and a few people messaged me about it wondering what was going on but other than that no one really seemed to think twice. I guess they all already figured it out or something haha

I wish you good luck and I think setting up a new account is the best way to go, it's far less buggy and it's annoying when you get tagged on old pictures of yourself with your new self.

[japple]

I think you should keep your old profile and update it.  Transition the profile as you transition.  If you have 500 friends a lot of people are not going to go over to your new profile because they're not paying attention, you might try to friend request them.  You won't know if they support you or not.  A lot of people may not support you but they're going to be curious and want to stay in contact.

Make the people who don't support you unfriend you and un-tag any photos you don't want anymore.  You've probably got stuff on there that you want to reference at some point.  You also probably want to see what's up with your casual friends...transferring them all over could be a pain.

[matt]

Thanks for posting this topic because I am actually feeling slightly troubled by the same issue right now. I have just started T (around 10weeks) and soon I have to come out to everyone at school and then.... my most dreaded Facebook...

Like many others mentioned before, I have not chosen a gender on FB at the moment. So I am referred to as "they" "their" etc. So that's not an issue for me. My big problem is that I know a lot of people on FB, but 90% of them are not close to me. Most of them are old school friends, friends I know from various activities and sports, old teachers, family friends etc. I even have a few aunts on there. So it really is going to be a very major decision. Like someone said before, I just wish a new social networking system would come out and make FB obsolete.

At the moment, I am thinking of deleting my FB account forever and not reopening another one. But if I had to retain a FB account I think I would choose to keep my account and just change my name.

I am not sure I am ready to come out to the whole world yet. Some people (aunts, cousins and even good friends of mine) would be incredibly shocked.

I wish there was a better solution.............. but it's not a problem with FB per se, it's the fact that coming out publicly to everyone at once is incredibly hard.