That’s a pretty heavy article.

I’ve known a few trans men over the years, more of them the more recent it is than way back. And this has been going on at least since the eighties, to some degree or another. Obviously, it’s changed in the exact details with hormonal transition and surgeries being more available, but every single trans man I’ve known, including the very first back in 88 or 89, have complained about being fetishized and/or still being “complimented” with feminine terminology.

It’s kinda crazy, but it also makes a kind of sense how it happens. People don’t seem to realize how much language is etched into our brains as a map of our experience. Like, look at the journey the word “queer” has made in my lifetime where there were physical fights that happened if you called someone queer, to now where someone using it as a slur is pretty rare because the word has been reclaimed so thoroughly that even out here in the sticks, there’s a clear understanding that the word is different now. It lost a majority of its ability to be weaponized.

Well meaning people can still have trouble shifting their way of thinking, even when they try. I’ve said it before, but I never have any trouble using the pronouns and gender preferences of someone I meet. But the people I’ve known before and after transition, I have had trouble making the switch. It takes a few months before my brain remaps everything around the person and gets it right. I’ve gotten better at not screwing up and verbally using the wrong names/pronouns/gendering through practice, but my brain will still pop up old connections.

And that’s even with people that I helped post-surgery! Even having changed bandages and seen the physical changes up close, those patterns are still there for a while.

Which likely seems tangential, but I’m getting to the point.

It sucks. And it sucks extra because the only way most people learn to shift their thinking is by direct self advocacy by trans people. It places yet another burden on someone that’s already dealing with a metric buttload of hassles. I’ve seen otherwise well meaning people say the exact things the article mentions, and I’ve seen the struggle trans men have dealing with it because they don’t want to correct someone that’s at least trying to be complimentary. Especially when it’s an intimate situation!

The only thing that I’ve also noticed that might help take the sting out of it all is that I’ve had plenty of cis men that have dealt with similar issues by virtue of being shorter, thinner, or exhibiting “feminine” habits. My buddy Craig, back in high school, once said that if another girl called him cute, he was going to freak out. He had a girlfriend say with total seriousness that she was so happy he wasn’t all “muscley” like some boys.

So, even cis men get treated different when they don’t match stereotypes. It isn’t the same thing, but it goes back to what I started with, that we have these patterns, these templates in our heads. They’re partially formed by, and are usually linked with, language patterns. They can be hard to shift but they can shift!

More importantly, it’s perfectly acceptable for someone to insist that they shift when directed towards them. And that’s the point I was working around to. Never hesitate to insist on even the staunchest ally paying attention to their patterns and shifting them.

To those who need to hear it: you’re a handsome lad!

*sigh* transmisandry is alive and well…