After much searching online, it's very hard to see the difference between someone who is a butch DFAB and a transmasculine DFAB. There seems to be a lot of overlap between the two which makes it very confusing. From what I can figure out, it seems the only difference is that someone who is butch still identifies as female (but it gets confusing because I've heard that some dont?) Can anyone try to straight this out for me?

I thought I maybe had an answer. Like playing as guy vs being a guy. But that doesn't quite seem right either. But now that I think about. A girl that would call themselves butch, would consider themselves as a lesbian, and a transmasculine could be any sexual orientation, I think. Idk, that's my best guess. Now I'm confused. 

I think the following:
Being 'butch' would mean (I think) manly, or masculine, but being female?
Being transmasculine would mean being anything, and looking masculine.
I'm not entirely sure but that's the best i can get from the words. Hope it helps!

Does your brain tell you you should be a man? (Transmasculaine) Or do you just want to do some traditionally manly things but have no thoughts of being anything but female? (butch)

I have personally never met a person who identifies as butch and male at the same time. I've heard gay guys describe each other as butch if they're doing something hyper masculine, but it's used more as a descriptor in that sense and not an identity.

Butch as an identity is meant to mean a female who prefers to appear (and sometimes act) stereotypically masculine while still identifying as female. It is most commonly used in the lesbian community, though I have heard it used to describe adult tomboys.

Transmasculine people are individuals DFAB whose gender is incongruent with their sex assigned at birth, who identify as male. It has nothing to do with appearance or sexuality. It's strictly how you identify.

You see, it gets confusing because some people who identify as butch don't necessarily identify themselves as female or male. And if that were the case, you would think they would be transmasculine since transmasculine doesn't necessarily mean the binary ftm. Also, I've heard some people who don't identify as male or female but who call themselves butch also refer to themselves as a lesbian which is very confusing :/

Quote from: jjheipz24 on August 20, 2015, 08:40:09 AM
You see, it gets confusing because some people who identify as butch don't necessarily identify themselves as female or male. And if that were the case, you would think they would be transmasculine since transmasculine doesn't necessarily mean the binary ftm. Also, I've heard some people who don't identify as male or female but who call themselves butch also refer to themselves as a lesbian which is very confusing :/

Omg you have cursed me for the night by letting me read this. I'm gonna end up spending all day trying to figure out the difference. <3

Haha, ultimately this thread is proof of exactly why labels are useless. You could ask ten different people your question and you'll get ten different answers. Labels only matter so long as their definition is universally agreed upon.

Quote from: ftmax on August 20, 2015, 11:07:10 AM
Haha, ultimately this thread is proof of exactly why labels are useless. You could ask ten different people your question and you'll get ten different answers. Labels only matter so long as their definition is universally agreed upon.

This could be a very moot point, honestly. I agree that those two words are 'labels', however I think they would be labels you would apply to yourself, and not something someone else can, because how you think and present yourself is a style unique to you and should be described how you see it, not from a standard set. I'm... not exactly sure what I meant by all this, aside from, I do think there is a standard definition for transmasculine and butch, but your style should be called what you want it to be called, whether it's "that kind of style" or not.

Transmasculine isn't a style though. It's a gender identity.

Yes exactly. I personally identify as non-binary transmasculine. But the differences between someone who says they are butch and someone who says they are transmasculine have become so blurred that it's hard to differentiate. It seems to differ from person to person

Quote from: ftmax on August 20, 2015, 01:59:30 PM
Transmasculine isn't a style though. It's a gender identity.

Wait that might work. Lifestyle vs. Identity anyone? I can't really find a problem with that.

In mtf version this would be something like an effeminate gay guy with long hair v/s a real trans

I would think if a woman preferred to dress and and do manly things but didn't want to change her body or didn't want to transition her name and pronouns she'd be butch. People often called me butch in high school but I couldn't see myself as a girl, I felt like a boy and not even a very masculine boy. I wanted a boys body and my clothes I only wore to feel more comfortable and because it was the only way I could remotely see myself. But I didn't want to look like a woman in mens clothes, I wanted to be a boy. If a woman really liked being a woman who just dressed and acted like a boy then she'd be butch. She may feel like a woman inside but just being gender non conforming would be part of who she is. Whereas trans masculine may just feel like a normal guy and not want to look like someone who is breaking gender norms. I guess as far as not all butch woman identifying as women, I could see a butch woman feeling more like a man or non-binary but it not causing enough discomfort to transition their gender. Or maybe if they thought that given their situation, transition would not be possible or for whatever reason didn't seem worth it to them. Maybe they'd fear discrimination from people in there family or job and decide not to for some reason. When I see older butch women sometimes I wonder if before the internet and recently media attention, they didn't know what trans men were and though being butch was there best option or the fullest expression of themselves they can be and then over time that just became who they are and now maybe they don't want to transition because of age. Well I'm not saying I assume all older butch women feel that way, just wonder if any fit that narrative. It's an interesting annomoly the whole butch thing. For the most part it isn't a big deal if a woman always cross dresses but there is no identity as accepted and common for those DMAB. I think typically a lot of people thought of butch women as women who wished they were men and acted like them. That's what I thought when I was a kid. That if you were AFAB being butch was the closest you could get to being a man and all butch women felt like me and wanted to be men. I think it is a grey area and depends on the person. Would love to talk to more butch women but honestly a lot of the ones I know kinda intimidate me. It's like something you see about a person but don't really bring up.

Quote from: Evolving Beauty on August 20, 2015, 05:01:36 PM
In mtf version this would be something like an effeminate gay guy with long hair v/s a real trans

I know guys like that but they mostly dress in neutral androgenous clothes or feminine mens clothes. I feel like if they wore dresses and womens clothes all the time but used a male name and pronouns it would really confuse people. I've never seen that personally. Or everyone would just assume they are transgender. But a butch woman could wear all mens clothes, mens hair, suits etc and still go by the most feminine name and no one would question it.

Quote from: jjheipz24 on August 20, 2015, 02:19:56 PM
Yes exactly. I personally identify as non-binary transmasculine. But the differences between someone who says they are butch and someone who says they are transmasculine have become so blurred that it's hard to differentiate. It seems to differ from person to person

Agreed; it's not that simple. Anyone who's read Leslie Feinberg's 1993 novel "Stone Butch Blues" knows that the line's been blurry within the community for about as long as the idea of transition has been on the table. Here's how I tend to look at it:

Imagine a person -- DFAB. Probably young. Their sense of style is distinctly masculine, and that, combined with some of their hobbies, likely landed them a label like "gender non-conforming" or even "dyke." As they've grown, they've come to realize that they value strength and power in their body much higher than things like delicacy or beauty and when they look in the mirror, they long for a muscular form. They don't really care for their breasts -- to them, it's sort of visually distracting, and it ruins the sharp silohuette they wish they cut. As for their junk, well, they haven't thought about it much. They were born with a vagina and that's all they know.

So, is the person described above "butch" or "transmasculine"? Well... good question.

If they're attracted to women, they may have found themselves falling into the butch label pretty quickly. Stud, butch, AG, boi... there are a lot of words already in place to label those who are masculine of center. Some butch people use T to bulk up. Some have mastectomies/top surgery.

Evolving Beauty mentioned the comparison between an effeminate gay guy vs a real trans person, and I think that's a good point, but not quite right? It's fuzzier.

In the DFAB world, there's no such thing as a crossdresser. "Men's clothes" are largely nonexistant these days, which is why we don't hear as many tales about a girl sneaking into her father's closet to try on his pants. In contrast to our society's "one drop rule" for femininity, a DFAB person has to go to great lengths to be considered to be blurring gender lines.

They basically have to be wearing a dick. Do they want to pack? Do they want a dick of their own> Feeling dissociated from one's junk or wishing for an outtie rather than an innie has typically been one thing that pushes folks towards the transmasculine label. In my opinion, it might actually be the Big Question for questioning DFAB people. It was for me. 

Of course, there have always been DFAB people who walked between genders. That's why the lesbian community has labels like "stone" or "stone butch" -- someone who kept their pants on during sex and did not receive sexual pleasure, possibly (but not necessarily) due to bottom dysphoria. If dysphoria is involved, how did people not immediately know they were trans? Well, first of all, like I said, there was already an existing label used by similar people with similar feelings. Also, many of us had this vague feeling that transgender was synonymous with transfeminine. We had an image of a trans woman in our heads. We didn't know it could go the other way!

But now, with trans activism and discourse spreading around the word, people who previously only saw one option for themselves are faced with different set of identity words. One has weight and history. One has a feeling of future and promise. What's butch vs transmasculine? Idk. Junk, maybe. Preference, mostly. Age, if the person was coming of age after the dawning public awareness of transgender existence.

I guess I didn't answer this question at all, really. 

Had a random thought, kinda relates. Anyone watch the nickolodeon cartoon in the 90's called Rocketpower? It was one of my favorites growing up. There were 4 friends about 10 years old. One was a nerdy boy who wasn't into sports much. Two were boys who were into extreme sports like skate boarding and surfing. And one was a girl who was kinda a tomboy into extreme sports also. When I look back at it, she was a great character. She wore boys trucks and a sports bra like top swimming, adrogenous clothes and did all these masculine things. She was totally able to keep up with the boys and clearly portrayed as smarter than them. She has purple hair and was really an awesome kid. I think it's cool now that I think about it, that nick had a girl character that was portrayed that way. I was called a tom boy as a kid but I never identified with her when I watched the show. I could see some girls loving that they are girls who are masculine and loving that about themselves. I never looked at her character like, hey she's like me or reggie is cool, I'm like reggie even though I was a lot like her as a kid. I always wanted to be like Otto or Twister and felt like I was like one of the boys on the show. Idk, your convo just made me think of this and I wanted to share. Hope someone remembers Rocketpower.

Quote from: phoenix633 on August 20, 2015, 09:23:31 PMHope someone remembers Rocketpower.

woogity woogity woogity

Quote from: captains on August 20, 2015, 09:25:49 PM
woogity woogity woogity

haha, I wish I could like this.

Quote from: captains on August 20, 2015, 09:07:25 PM
Imagine a person -- DFAB. Probably young. Their sense of style is distinctly masculine, and that, combined with some of their hobbies, likely landed them a label like "gender non-conforming" or even "dyke." As they've grown, they've come to realize that they value strength and power in their body much higher than things like delicacy or beauty and when they look in the mirror, they long for a muscular form. They don't really care for their breasts -- to them, it's sort of visually distracting, and it ruins the sharp silohuette they wish they cut. As for their junk, well, they haven't thought about it much. They were born with a vagina and that's all they know.

Scary how accurate this sounds like my own situation. I don't hate my body or feel it's completely wrong. It's almost exactly like the way you said it. My breasts are distracting to me and don't feel like they belong there. And I've accepted the way my genitals are and don't necessarily want a penis. Calling myself a girl feels weird and so does calling myself a boy, so I guess that why I say I'm non-binary transmasculine. Like a lot of people, I always thought someone who said they were butch (and used it as an identity) still felt like they were a woman, but just enjoyed the more "masculine" style of living.