Also shout out to Maia Arson Crimew for also publishing about this
Also probably gonna put a CW for serious transphobia like goddamn this is distressing
Also shout out to Maia Arson Crimew for also publishing about this
Also probably gonna put a CW for serious transphobia like goddamn this is distressing
Truscum do not just compromise with fascists, they are fascists. These people have completely internalized all the junk science of quacks like Ray Blanchard and think that being one of the good ones is not only a viable option, but the right thing to do. Because they already were chuds pre-transition and transmedicalism is how they reconcile their own transness with their ideology.
You can see the same in all of the vocal "detransitioners". It's important here to note that the vast majority of the (very few) people who regret their transition do not do so out of changing their mind about their gender identity, but because they cannot handle the extreme amounts of transphobia they are confronted with. They go into hiding again because they have been hurt and traumatized in the most horrible ways. But you never hear their heartbreaking stories when detransition comes up in the media. That's about 80% of all detransitioners, which already make up a tiny minority of less than 1% of al adult trans people. But whenever detranstion gets brought up in the media, it is not only portrayed wrongly as something else than the fringe phenomenon it actually is, the voices of people who couldn't take the chance to live as their true self get ignored.
You instead hear the stories of people like Keira Bell or Sabeth Blank or Elisa Mae Shupe (the latter is mentioned in the article) and somehow, every single one of them has these pronounced right wing and anti-trans views. And they seriously expect us not to see their "detransition" as a case of their ideology taking over and making them repress again. Shupe secretly went back on DIY hormones while she was still a detrans activist, had medical complications because she dosed the estradiole way too high and has now renounced her anti-trans views and is transitioning and living as a nonbinary transfem again. What was "just a phase" for her was believing she may not actually be trans. These people all suffer from massive internalized transphobia. I am not saying there aren't people who have been wrong about their gender identity, but whenever i see adults making the claim they transitioned out of a mistake, it's folks like this.
Thank you for writing this. The detrans stuff is exactly the same as the ex-gay stuff from the 90s, except with perhaps more malice. The thing is, even back in the day most people kind of knew that ex-gay wasn't a thing, and ex-gay christians seeing male sex workers on the side or something was a cultural trope. People don't have that awareness with detrans, they take it more seriously. It's super frustrating.