(no subject)

[cjsmith]

This Twitter post, and the replies, hit me hard this morning.

https://twitter.com/EmmettComix/status/1458534462522859526?s=20

I have never seen this side of cis masculinity. (Affirmation and inclusion are not stereotypically offered by cis dudes to persons who look like me, no matter the topic.)

I am realizing that if a friend is someone who would be supportive and welcoming about something that's that deeply important to me, then I currently have zero cis dude friends among the people I hang out with.

Knowing why doesn’t make it sting less.

Comments

[minoanmiss]

Ow. I am sorry.

[cjsmith]

Thank you.

I need to make sure my friends know how important they are to me. It’s good to be reminded of that! ♥

[lcohen]

i am so sorry that that's your experience. i've been luckier than you and i'm trying to think why that is and i think that part of it is that almost all my cis dude friends who are helpful and affirming and inclusive are approx 15 years or more younger than i am. which gives me hope for the next generation but yeah, cis dudes around my own age expect me to be a totally different type of person and will frequently let me know that :( .

[cjsmith]

Yeah, age is almost certainly one factor. Our generation (I perceive you to be roughly contemporary with me?) isn’t known for fighting its biases.

[lcohen]

i think i'm a little older, but yeah, roughly.

[hitchhiker]

:-/

[cjsmith]

It’s all such a complicated mess. :/

[hitchhiker]

it is :( i would love to find ways to be more supportive though!

[cjsmith]

Thank you. (Edited, with my apologies.)

[hitchhiker]

<3

[ckd]

I'm so sorry you don't have that.

[cjsmith]

Thank you. It’s one of the bigger reasons that I would want to look different from the way I currently look.

On the other hand, I do have friends, and it’s good to be reminded that I need to let them know how important they are to me. ♥

[noelfigart]

Oh man... *wince*

[cjsmith]

I need me some cis queer dudes in my life. Not to say all straight people are Bad or all queer people are Good. Far from it. Just that queer dudes have much more often examined and fought some of our culture's programming around homophobia.

[brooksmoses]

That sucks, dude.

I mean, my relationship with that sort of cis masculinity is also pretty complicated, in that that sort of thing is not really a language I know how to speak, so I don't know that I could be usefully supportive in that way, but I would like to hang out with you more. Perhaps we could take a welding class together or something, when the world is less plagued?

Also I recently saw a talk about "being trans without physical transformation", that unfortunately seems to have stuck in my head rather less than I expected it to, but I remember mention of a trans man somewhere around our age who had a body of a certain shape and was part of a motorcycle group with black leather jacket etc. and they just affirmed him as "one of the guys". And I don't have enough recollection of context (I mostly just remember the photo) to do anything useful with this such as point to things he's written or anything, but the image seems relevant.

[cjsmith]

That is a nifty image!

I am finding I'd like some minor elements of physical transformation, but they're mainly about personal convenience. If I could get my chest obliterated that'd be super. (But I'll never pass, no matter how much work I get done, and that's not a goal anyway.)

Thing is, I'm not a man, really. Sure, I'm far more male than my body looks. But I'm not "a man". What I would love is some confirmation and affirmation from the people around me that they don't see me as a woman. I so strongly resemble one and have been treated as one all my life that I crave the affirmation that I'm not one.

[firecat]

This got me thinking about the demographics of ppl I hang out with currently. One of them is a cis (queer) dude. Everyone else in my inner circle is trans or a cis woman.

[cjsmith]

Excellent!

Not to say that all straight people are Bad or all queer people are Good. But queer people are at least fighting some of the bs that society programs us with, and that helps.

[firecat]

Partly it’s that. And partly there’s a self-fulfilling prophecy — I assume straight cis (white) men aren’t going to be interested in me as a person. Some have been, so I know it’s a prejudice of mine and I’m not proud of that. But not doing a lot to dismantle it either. I have other prejudices that need to be worked on first!

[It’s interesting to try to figure out which category my late partner fell into. He id’d as straight and cis but was a lot more queer oriented and gender nonconforming than most straight, cis men, and he could be affirmative, too.]

[cjsmith]

Yeah, some prejudices are so strongly rooted in statistical likelihood (and are also not made massively harmful by related power imbalances) that they get deprioritized.

I was wondering about him, yeah. I did perceive him to be less gender conforming than most cis het dudes.

[amaebi]

Thanks for showcasing such nice attempts!

The tangle of hierarchical aggression and humanity....

[cjsmith]

One of the cruelest things for humanity is that for a majority of people, sexual desire crosses a very steep hierarchical boundary. My status as desirable object is threatened if I gain the potential status of friend, and that shift represents a loss to the other person.

[wcg]

Huh. I suppose that's true for a majority of male identifying people. My perspective is that friend is a higher probability state, and therefore the better state to seek. If sexually desirable partner happens to become available at some point, that's OK too, but that's just a nice plus.

[cjsmith]

That’s pretty nifty. :)

My mental model of “the majority” is that sex (along with what passes for romance among people who cannot be romantic with an equal) is supremely important, creating a frantic desperation that overwhelms most other considerations.

(My mind is not a nice place. :/ )

[amaebi]

:(

Myself, I don't want romantic or sexual contact, let alone partnership, with anyone who's not a friend, which makes that not sting for me.

BTW, speaking as a sort of genderqueer person, I perceive you as *person*. Or as he tweet says, friend.

[cjsmith]

How I’m perceived and treated has a lot more to do with what they want than what I want, of course. (Another reason I wish I looked different.)

Thank you! I think you are really nifty and I’m really glad to know you.

[ororo]

Erf. I'm sorry that's how things came to be. I hope you can improve your company and certain people become a bit more conscious of their behavior and its impact.

[cjsmith]

Thank you! And I do have friends who see me as a person. I value them and I need to show them that.