I never post on those threads, one I'm totally - like way beyond 110% - convinced, (because I work in a totally fake industry that relies heavily on image and photos) that you can't really answer that question based on a photo.
Way too many factors involved in that decision - I seem to remember like 17-18 (right in that ballpark) that we use without thinking about it in gendering people - that a self-photo, at a weird angle, with bad lighting on a cell phone camera taken so poorly that the only thing I can really tell is how bad you need to get the maid back to clean up where you live, or ... more often than not ... has been digitally manipulated to look 'better' is going to provide any 'proof'.
Second, I've been going out, in public to trans events, participating in the 'community', and living in an area with lots, and lots, and lots of out trans persons and I've been doing all of that since the late 70s/early 80s, and that level of over-familiarity may well render me so dazzled that I can't tell anything anymore, or so picky that no one would pass. One of those for sure. But I am aware that I'm coming at it from a different perspective than people who've never been with other trans persons ever.
Third. I get to do fashion/beauty shows a couple times a year and have for like, forever. I'm very aware that some people - perhaps rarely, but still a huge bunch - take photos that are far more stunningly awesome then the real thing, 3-D person. And that most of us look a little bit better in person then we do in photos.
Oh yeah. if a post upsets, let a Mod know... or just do what critically thinking people do. Skip it and read the next one.
