So, my kid saw a picture of activists from Yes on 3 celebrating the victory and the only thing he said was "They're all obviously trans."
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I like to think I'd be better at talking to him about respecting both passing and non-passing trans people if he was just a cis boy. He's... not. It's complicated. He's a very femme, gender-questioning AMAB who was forced to present masculine before he got to us.
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He reminds me of myself. The obsession with passing, and with trans people's looks, is exactly how I was pre-transition.
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Today, I love the diversity of trans identities and expressions. But if I hadn't finally stumbled on the knowledge that T pretty universally results in a cis-male-passing appearance, I'd probably still be closeted.
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So, how do I talk to a gender nonconforming kid who has this incredibly familiar bad attitude of scrutinizing how well every trans person passes?
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Replying to @e_urq
Ooph, that’s a tough one. I try to keep in mind that: 1) Passing isn’t everyone’s goal and there’s not really a wrong way to be trans. 2) We scrutinize the heck out of each other. The rest of society will never be as capable of clocking us as we are of clocking each other.
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Replying to @AllyBrinken
I would definitely be emphasizing #1 if he was any other kid, but I strongly suspect #2 is what he needs to hear even more- and this is about the point of my thought process where I freeze up and don't say anything in the moment.
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Replying to @e_urq
This might be a good chance to talk generally about how perception works and how people tend to see what they want and expect. Like the first time you hear a new word you suddenly hear it everywhere. Or all those optical illusions that rely on preconceptions.
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Good advice, thanks. I've found it often helps him if we make things very cerebral and abstract, allowing him to process his feelings slowly, on his own time.
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