CW: Transphobia, Fatphobia
When people talk about a supportive community I’m not really sure what that means.
When the sex-blogging community went through a schism around the issue of transphobia a lot of people were really hurt by the realisation that their supportive sex-positive community wasn’t the inclusive utopia they thought it was. I saw how hard it hit my boyfriend – I watched it break hir heart when ze realised how the people ze worked with, respected, and cared for didn’t respect trans peoples. And I wondered why I didn’t feel that way. Then I realised, I’d been waiting for this to happen. I’m used to being on my guard. Used to being on the outside of my communities looking in, tolerated but rarely included.
And the thing is my transness isn’t the only thing people have to accept, as well as being trans I’m fat, bi, poly, and kinky. People who share and accept one facet of my existence don’t necessarily understand the others. When I shared a picture of me in a bikini to a trans group someone commented that I looked ridiculous. To their credit, the mods handled it well and a lot of people voiced their support for me, as well as asking if I was ok. And I honestly was. Even in spaces which are supposed to be safe for me I still get hate. I went in knowing that this was a very real possibility.
Perhaps I could avoid some of this if I was quieter, if I didn’t take up so much space, if I wasn’t so open about who I am and how I live. But I refuse to compromise who I am for conditional acceptance. And so my community comes slowly. I must build it person by person, testing and vetting each one before letting myself be vulnerable. Because experience teaches me that assuming I’ll be accepted only leads to disappointment.
“I’m used to being on my guard. Used to being on the outside of my communities looking in, tolerated but rarely included.”
Oof! Same tbh. Prior to everything exploding I felt a lot of hollow “support” from many prominent bloggers, several of whom were extremely superficial, patronizing, constantly demanding emotional labour, trying to justify their misgendering and lack of inclusive language, and avoided interacting with trans content of any kind unless they absolutely had to. Whenever I tried to participate in many memes (save for ones from awesome folks like Molly Moore and Kayla Lords) or even just engage in photo threads and shit I always felt soooo unwelcome, like I was being tolerated, like people were being nice to mask their discomfort with the fat, hairy, loud mouthed trans queer who talked about their girl cock, used they/them pronouns, and didn’t even “try to pass”.
Let’s just say I was NOT surprised to see who wasn’t really interested in supporting trans people for real.