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Off Topic / Transgender Megathread
« on: December 22, 2013, 02:59:46 PM »
Everybody is welcome in this thread! This includes trans* people, cis people, gender-nonconforming people, genderforget people, people with interlove conditions, cross dressers, binary and non-binary identified, drag performers, and everyone else no matter your gender identity, expression, or loveual orientation.
Disclaimer: Any posts made within this thread are viewable to the public at large including groups of people who will repost images/comments you make and possibly seek out other real life info linked to your nickname.
There's a lot of jargon in the trans community and sometimes not a lot of agreement between trans people on what some of it means. If anyone in this thread wants to offer additional terms to add to this list, or revisions to what's here, let's talk about it in the thread or over PM.
- Transgender - An umbrella term that includes those identities, conditions, or activities that transgress normative gender or love, either socially, medically, or mentally.
- Transloveual - Someone whose subconscious love is not the same as their assigned love.
- Subconscious love - Another term for gender identity (which is not the same as the term gender in a feminist context). It is the mental or subconscious phenomenon that encompasses your internal experience of your gender and/or love. Everyone has this, not just trans people.
- Gender - In a discussion on trans issues this usually means "subconscious love" or "gender identity". In a feminist sense this is referring to the socialized roles of men/women based on their male/female love identification. Try not to conflate the two meanings (please?).
- Assigned love - This is the term you're looking for if you're typing the words "biological love" or "genetic love" or "real love" or "birth love" or any of a hundred other things. This is the love that is typically assigned to you by a doctor at your birth.
- loveual Orientation - Who you are attracted to. Everyone has a loveual orientation just like everyone has a gender identity.
- Trans - There is some debate over Transgender vs. Transloveual, so to avoid that stupid stuff, a lot of people just use trans.
- Cis - Simply a word meaning not-trans. An easy parallel is homoloveual vs. heteroloveual. You can be totally awesome and avoid othering trans people when talking about non-trans people by using the word cis. So please use cis to mean non-trans! It's a great word :)
- Trans Woman - A trans person whose gender identity is female.
- Trans Man - A trans person whose gender identity is male.
- Genderqueer - Anyone who identifies outside the gender-binary (man vs. woman). If you don't know what pronouns to use, please ask them.
- Blending - An alternative word for passing without the tribal connotations. If someone blends, then they are successfully navigating the world as their gender without standing out as trans. People do this in order to mitigate gender dysphoria, not to reinforce gender stereotypes.
- Conditional Cis Privilege - A description of blending/passing from a trans-feminist perspective. Blending is being granted conditional cis privilege. It's conditional because it can be taken away if someone learns of your trans status.
- Gender Dysphoria - That horrible sensation of being trans that prompts many people to either transition or, sadly, commit self-harm or Self Delete. If I knew how to describe the sensation then I would but I can't and I've never heard of someone successfully conveying to a cis person what it feels like.
Please try to have some common courtesy when asking questions. There are tons of trans people on here that are perfectly willing to answer your questions, but just be mindful that cis-privileged bullstuff and stereotypes will probably offend us. Duh. For example, asking me to seriously consider the views of FOX News contributor Keith Ablow will probably piss me off. So don't do it! Don't ask personal questions or feel like you have the right to know someone's medical history. Surgery is a personal decision and you are not allowed to demand that anyone disclose anything they don't want to. There are lots of people that will freely discuss surgery and highly personal issues, but that is their choice. And try to avoid "debating" with obvious trolls. These threads have a history of attracting horrible trolls (on both sides) and nothing is served by multipage derails about stuff that only you care about.
This section is broken up into general questions, questions about trans men, questions about trans women, and then questions from the questioning. If anyone has any suggestions for things to add to this section, feel free to contribute and I'll add it.
Q: "What does 'transgender' mean? Who is considered trans?"
A: The exact meanings of the terms like “transgender” and “transloveual” are hotly debated with constantly shifting goalposts based off of politics and ideologies. For the purposes of this thread, all gender-nonconforming people can and should be allowed to participate with the obvious caveat that, for example, a cisgendered drag performer not claim to speak for the experiences of all transgender people or vice versa. There are tons of great quotes from current and no-longer-posting TMT posters about what transgender and transloveual means to them. If you're interested you should definitely check out some of the previous TMT OPs.
Q: "Is there a right way to be trans?"
A: NO! If you are questioning and your personal experience does not mesh with many of the posts in this thread, do not despair. Everyone comes to terms with their gender, loveuality, and expression in their own way and on their own terms.
Q: "What about disclosure?" AKA, the "Which bathrooms do they use?!?" question.
A: It's none of your loving business! Disclosure is a tremendously complex subject and trans people feel pressure from all directions to conform to one standard or the other. But it's their loving choice. You do not get to demand or expect disclosure, ever. It's their personal medical history and you do not have a right to it if they don't want to share it. End of story.
Every trans person decides for themselves when and where and how they disclose their trans status and/or aspects of their medical history. It's their personal choice and if you're curious about why they make particular choices then feel free to ask, but don't judge them if they don't want to answer or you don't like their answer.
Q: "Should someone be out or stealth?"
A: It's none of your loving business! Stealth, if you don't already know, is when a trans person decides to live their life mostly never disclosing to people about their trans status. Or maybe they don't disclose to their friends but they do disclose to their partner. Or maybe they don't disclose to most people but are ok disclosing to some friends. Whatever. It's their decision how they want to play it. Out trans people are not being more honest than stealth trans people, and stealth people are not "abandoning" their out brothers and sisters by being stealth.
Q: "I know next to nothing about transgendered folk and had a couple of questions, and I’m a bit nervous about asking a dumb/rude question but was reassured by the OP... until I found that the answer to the 3rd and 4th FAQ question is 'None of your loving business!' Can I suggest you modify the OP slightly?"
A: Yes, you can! :) The thrust of those answers is this: Don't ask individual people about personal medical issues like their surgical status, and don't dictate or ask leading questions about the "right" way to cope with the social issues that come with being trans. If your question isn't doing any of those things, you're probably OK to ask it. All we're asking for is a bit of mutual respect here.
Q: "Is self medication safe?"
A: This is up to an individual to decide for themselves. However, it would definitely be best to get medical supervision even if your are self medding just in case something rare comes up. If you can see a endocrinologist, that's even better.
Q: "What kinds of hormones are involved?"
A: Testosterone, and only testosterone. Testosterone is the main male love hormone. There are several methods of administration for testosterone:
- Intramuscular injection: stabbing yourself (or having someone stab you, you pusillanimous individual) in the leg, butt, or shoulder muscle and filling you full of man juice.
- Subcutaneous injection: stabbing yourself in the butt or belly fat with a much smaller needle and filling you full of man juice. (NOTE: Still fairly experimental)
- Dermal absorption: rubbing on a cream or wearing a patch full of man juice.
A: The effect of testosterone depends partially on the person - if you're Asian or Native American, you probably shouldn't expect much body hair, but Italians can break out the gold chains to nestle into your new fur sweater! But here's an overview of some effects that will definitely happen:
- Clitoral growth - some have reported penetrative ability, though most will achieve no more than an inch or two at maximum. *
- Increased aggression.
- Increased muscle mass and ability to build muscle.
- Facial and body hair growth. *
- Lengthening of vocal cords - your voice will drop. *
- Fat redistribution away from hips, thighs, face, and other areas to belly.
- Increased love drive.
- Cessation of menstruation HELL YEAH :c00lbert:
- Decreased vaginal lubrication.
- Male pattern baldness! If your mom's brothers are balding, you might want to get an early start on the Rogaine. *
- Acne! This is basically a second puberty, including greasiness. If you had it bad the first time around, you'll probably get a repeat, unfortunately.
- Increased blood pressure, cholesterol, and/or chance of heart disease.
- Sterility - this is not well-studied, and T is NOT birth control! Please have safe love!
- Increased incidence of ovarian or uterine cysts or cancer, if you've still got those bits.
- Decreased good cholesterol, increased bad cholesterol.
- Different-smelling body odor. :???:
- Appearance of adam's apple.
- Reduced appearance of aging.
Finally, a few things that will not happen:
- Growth of snake and/or testicles.
- Disappearance of breast tissue.
- Foot or hand size increase.
- Genetic switch from XX to XY.
- Sudden interest in or knowledge of sports, tools, NASCAR, beer, guns, engines, or World War II.
There is also an alternative to testosterone, referred to as "natural transitioning," called DHEA. I don't know a thing about it, other than it exists apparently in the UK.
Q: "How does binding work?"
A: Binding is the practice of flattening and hiding one's breasts to create the appearance of a flat chest. In short, it hurts and is really uncomfortable. While it won't do you any permanent or seriously hurtful damage, it can leave marks that take a while to disappear, and over time your breast tissue will degrade and become saggier. If you're planning to get top surgery, that's obviously not a problem, but if you're unsure, you might not want to bind every day or too tightly. There are several methods of binding, some more effective than others, but the size of your chest is the real limiting factor. Some guys can just wear a sports bra and be passing as a 12-year-old in no time, and some guys can wear two commercial binders and still not convince anyone. Let's go through some possibilities:
- Tape of any kind: No. Do not pass go, do not rip off your nipples.
- Ace bandages: Not great. Tend to fall down a lot if you're bigger than an A, and you can't get it that tightly wound by yourself. Also very difficult to fix effectively if it does slip. That said, this is likely the most widely accessible option due to price and availability. Furthermore, Ace bandages are meant to immobilize joints, so the Ace bandage will get progressively tighter if it doesn't slip. I have heard stories of rib injuries.
- Frog bra: Some kind of super-sports-bra, this is supposedly great for smaller guys.
- Neooprene back braces: These are those squishy blue things you see in the pharmacy. You can velcro it around your chest instead of around your lower back and it works pretty well, but it WILL make you sweat, since neoprene doesn't breathe at all. Powder will minimize risk of heat rash if you go this route.
- Compression vests: There are two main companies that make these things - T-Kingdom and Underworks. They're basically sleeveless vests that you wear under your clothes that crush your manboobs as close to your body as possible. They are quite powerful, but also quite expensive. T-Kingdom has a good guide to buying these, but at Underworks you'll probably want either this or this (or both, if you're really big or brown town retentive).
Finally, there is a program called Big Brothers that allows trans guys, post-top surgery, to pass their old binders along to other guys who can't necessarily afford new ones. There's a small cost, but it's much cheaper than buying new. CK07 has passed along some of his old binders specifically to goons as well, and may find more as time goes on - watch the thread for updates!
