I’ve been out as trans and living openly as a woman for only a few months now.
harrasment & violence
In that time I’ve been sexually harassed, physically threatened, screamed at from cars, had people up in my face, up to and including pushing me over, raising fists to me, screaming slurs and derogatory words at me from inches away from my face, and being sexually assaulted in a crowded public place.
I know much of that can be attributed to transphobia but a lot of is just pure misogyny. Nearly every time I leave the house some man will aggressively intrude into my day and make me feel extremely unsafe. This is in response to me literally just walking around saying nothing, looking at the floor.
I always knew that women had a justified fear of men. Now I have it too. Whatever I thought I understood before from listening to women, it’s nothing compared to what it’s like to live it.
“Whatever I thought I understood before from listening to women, it’s nothing compared to what it’s like to live it.”
I’m reminded of something I read a while back, where a man named Marty accidentally was mistakenly sending emails with his female coworker’s email signature and was puzzled for a while on why people were being so difficult. When he realised it, he and his colleague, Nicole, decided to switch emails for a week, as a more deliberate, extended experiment. They both did a write-up of the experience. Marty’s was a Twitter thread that I can’t access anymore, but Nicole wrote a blog post covering her side
In Nicole’s words:
“Nothing changed, except that our clients read me as male and Marty as female. I had one of the easiest weeks of my professional life. He… didn’t.”
What I found so interesting about this story is that it sounds like this Marty guy was a genuine ally. Like, when Nicole called him out for speaking over her at meetings, he listened and started using his voice to bring attention to Nicole (and other women) at meetings. Iirc from his Twitter thread, he thought of himself as an ally who understood how hard women have it. Until this thing with the email signatures, that is.
I think you’re right that even if some of the harassment you’ve experienced is transphobia related, a lot of it will be misogyny. And I think that part of why trans women are so prominently discussed by transphobes is because of the prevalence of transmisogyny specifically.
Thanks for sharing all that. From my perspective it’s as if women all my life have been telling me about this horrible noise they hear all the time, and I’ve been like “wow that sounds really bad I’m sorry you have to go through that” but until I transitioned I never heard the noise myself and now it’s like “damn you girls were not kidding about that noise holy shit”.
Yeah, especially early transition (in my experience) the harassment was fucking constant. It probably didn’t help that I was in my early 20s still at the time. But in addition to a lot of these guys just generally being misogynists they tend to target women who look insecure, young, marginalized, etc. Don’t get me wrong, it continues, but I’ve definitely found for me personally the everyday street harassment type stuff waned over the years. Well that or I stopped noticing all but the most egregious examples of it.
Congrats on the transition, unfortunately yeah the prevalence of aggressive misogyny was somewhere between accurate and understated
Also, I will say that I suspect that part of what reduced my harassment was developing a confident look of “I belong here, don’t fuck with me”. I only say this because you mentioned looking at the floor and because it’s advice some badass women gave me years ago that I think really helped.
There’s many styles to that look and you need to find ones that are authentic to you. But harassers are bullies, and some of them won’t bother when they see a target who looks like she isn’t easy pickings to give them the feelings of power they want. I hate feeling like I should say this because it’s really not your fault, but it helped me a lot and I don’t want to leave people without such knowledge.
I’m happy for you, that you’re able to live openly now.
And sorry, yeah. It’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t been in the shit. There will be good experiences, too.
I once met the coolest men who were drunkenly celebrating a bachelor party and invited me to join (I was smoking a cigar alone on a beach after a break up) and we became friends, so I try not to close myself off to that kind of thing. At the same time all the shoving and shouting and touching makes it really fucking hard to do that.
I have a ton of great men in my life. Kind and gentle and protective in the right way. I’m not afraid of all men. But yeah the scary stuff happens often enough that I’ve learned to be very careful where I walk, to cluch my keys, to location share etc. It’s just all the stuff that other women have told me about their whole lives. It’s just quite an intense experience to have suddenly been dropped into it all in my 30s.
I am so deeply sorry, honey. My heart breaks for you. I hope you know that you don’t ever deserve aaany of that shit! I wish I could bite all their heads off for you and for everyone else these garbage bags harass. :(
I’m sending so much love to you over the Internet. I’m so damn sorry that this has been part of your welcoming to finding and living openly as the woman you are. I don’t even know what to say, it’s just not right!! It’s extra fucked because it’s like, this should be such a joyous time for you, and as usual the assholes ruin it for the decent, innocent people. I hate it so much. I’m all weepy over here for you. I’m sending you big, big Internet hugs, if you want them. 🫂💖
Hey it is actually the most joyous time of my life. For every one negative interaction I have several more positive ones. Warm, open smiles from other women, nods and smiles of queer recognition and solidarity etc. I’m just genuinely so very very happy.
I just wanted to share here because it’s something that I got to see from both sides if you know what I mean. I used to be invisible and now I’m not. And now I understand what that fear feels like, before I used to just hear about from other women.
I’ve been out as trans and living openly as a woman for only a few months now.
harrasment & violence
In that time I’ve been sexually harassed, physically threatened, screamed at from cars, had people up in my face, up to and including pushing me over, raising fists to me, screaming slurs and derogatory words at me from inches away from my face, and being sexually assaulted in a crowded public place.
I know much of that can be attributed to transphobia but a lot of is just pure misogyny. Nearly every time I leave the house some man will aggressively intrude into my day and make me feel extremely unsafe. This is in response to me literally just walking around saying nothing, looking at the floor.
I always knew that women had a justified fear of men. Now I have it too. Whatever I thought I understood before from listening to women, it’s nothing compared to what it’s like to live it.
I’m reminded of something I read a while back, where a man named Marty accidentally was mistakenly sending emails with his female coworker’s email signature and was puzzled for a while on why people were being so difficult. When he realised it, he and his colleague, Nicole, decided to switch emails for a week, as a more deliberate, extended experiment. They both did a write-up of the experience. Marty’s was a Twitter thread that I can’t access anymore, but Nicole wrote a blog post covering her side
In Nicole’s words:
What I found so interesting about this story is that it sounds like this Marty guy was a genuine ally. Like, when Nicole called him out for speaking over her at meetings, he listened and started using his voice to bring attention to Nicole (and other women) at meetings. Iirc from his Twitter thread, he thought of himself as an ally who understood how hard women have it. Until this thing with the email signatures, that is.
I think you’re right that even if some of the harassment you’ve experienced is transphobia related, a lot of it will be misogyny. And I think that part of why trans women are so prominently discussed by transphobes is because of the prevalence of transmisogyny specifically.
Thanks for sharing all that. From my perspective it’s as if women all my life have been telling me about this horrible noise they hear all the time, and I’ve been like “wow that sounds really bad I’m sorry you have to go through that” but until I transitioned I never heard the noise myself and now it’s like “damn you girls were not kidding about that noise holy shit”.
Whoa this is a great analogy.
Yeah, especially early transition (in my experience) the harassment was fucking constant. It probably didn’t help that I was in my early 20s still at the time. But in addition to a lot of these guys just generally being misogynists they tend to target women who look insecure, young, marginalized, etc. Don’t get me wrong, it continues, but I’ve definitely found for me personally the everyday street harassment type stuff waned over the years. Well that or I stopped noticing all but the most egregious examples of it.
Congrats on the transition, unfortunately yeah the prevalence of aggressive misogyny was somewhere between accurate and understated
Thank you lovely, you were one of the first to welcome me here so I’m always happy to see one of your comments.
Also, I will say that I suspect that part of what reduced my harassment was developing a confident look of “I belong here, don’t fuck with me”. I only say this because you mentioned looking at the floor and because it’s advice some badass women gave me years ago that I think really helped.
There’s many styles to that look and you need to find ones that are authentic to you. But harassers are bullies, and some of them won’t bother when they see a target who looks like she isn’t easy pickings to give them the feelings of power they want. I hate feeling like I should say this because it’s really not your fault, but it helped me a lot and I don’t want to leave people without such knowledge.
I’m glad to have made a positive impact!
I’m happy for you, that you’re able to live openly now.
And sorry, yeah. It’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t been in the shit. There will be good experiences, too.
I once met the coolest men who were drunkenly celebrating a bachelor party and invited me to join (I was smoking a cigar alone on a beach after a break up) and we became friends, so I try not to close myself off to that kind of thing. At the same time all the shoving and shouting and touching makes it really fucking hard to do that.
I have a ton of great men in my life. Kind and gentle and protective in the right way. I’m not afraid of all men. But yeah the scary stuff happens often enough that I’ve learned to be very careful where I walk, to cluch my keys, to location share etc. It’s just all the stuff that other women have told me about their whole lives. It’s just quite an intense experience to have suddenly been dropped into it all in my 30s.
I don’t envy you at all. But, it is nice to be validated by someone who’s seen the other side.
Good luck out there.
I am so deeply sorry, honey. My heart breaks for you. I hope you know that you don’t ever deserve aaany of that shit! I wish I could bite all their heads off for you and for everyone else these garbage bags harass. :(
I’m sending so much love to you over the Internet. I’m so damn sorry that this has been part of your welcoming to finding and living openly as the woman you are. I don’t even know what to say, it’s just not right!! It’s extra fucked because it’s like, this should be such a joyous time for you, and as usual the assholes ruin it for the decent, innocent people. I hate it so much. I’m all weepy over here for you. I’m sending you big, big Internet hugs, if you want them. 🫂💖
Hey it is actually the most joyous time of my life. For every one negative interaction I have several more positive ones. Warm, open smiles from other women, nods and smiles of queer recognition and solidarity etc. I’m just genuinely so very very happy.
I just wanted to share here because it’s something that I got to see from both sides if you know what I mean. I used to be invisible and now I’m not. And now I understand what that fear feels like, before I used to just hear about from other women.
Thanks for being so kind. I’m really doing okay.