thegoatfrogs t1_irx4q2p wrote
Reality and perception of reality are two different things. It's entirely possible for trans people to perceive themselves one way and for another person to not perceive them the same way.
When there's a mismatch there, it is not automatically transphobic. Being trans is a complicated thing and it can be made a lot less complicated with outside acceptance. But a transperson is not owed being perceived in a certain way by others, including other transpeople.
A transperson can demand others acknowledge how they see themselves but they cannot demand others agree with that. That's not transphobic.
Using words like transphobia so universally immediately tries to illegitimize people's perceptions by pretending one person's perception of themselves is an absolute truth and anyone who doesn't conform to that perception is negatively motivated.
hayzulhay OP t1_is7mpo3 wrote
Of course, you can't tell someone to perceive you in a certain way, and I'm not saying that it is bad to address that Leo still sees Kate as a boy, but addressing trans people in the correct way is basic respect, and trans people understand that
thegoatfrogs t1_is8vt8o wrote
That's the thing I tried to point out though. Just because you perceive something to be the correct way does not mean other people agree with you.
And you've replied twice to me now as if trans people are a single uniform group of people who all agree and that's never been correct either.
I've had trans friends who were dead certain that they've always been one gender in another gender's body. Who feel being deadnamed or misgendered is hurtful. Who can't wait to transition fully. Who only want to date heterosexual partners and so on.
I've had trans friends who fully embraced the fact they are intersex with physically demonstrable traits from both genders. They made a choice to be one or the other but they do not at all begrudge other people the fact that they're androgynous enough that people might see it differently.
I've had trans friends who happily proclaim they're chicks with dicks that'll choose which way they lean based on how they're feeling that weekend. They'll laugh at people who misgender them and don't attach any value to it at all.
Don't speak for everyone because you'll always be wrong.
Database-Error t1_is8l3vl wrote
Right. But this is a book about trans people, told from their perspective. Trans people do not see themselves as "x gender pretending to be y gender" you are correct that cis people may see them that way, but writing a trans character that way is completely misunderstanding the experience of trans people. The very thing this book is trying to portray.
thegoatfrogs t1_is8u4zh wrote
I think trans people are still people and there is no one way they view them selves.
Database-Error t1_is9uohm wrote
Right. But seeing yourself as the gender of your gender identity rather than the gender of your biology, is what being trans is. No trans person sees themselves as not that, otherwise they wouldn't be trans
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