Transphobia

Trans people are always stereotyped as being soft or gay. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but when are we gonna get rep for big strong people who are trans, not all of us want to be twinks yk ☹️ especially trans men.

Transgender myths and stereotypes I dont like:

• Every strong, deep voiced or muscular woman is trans

• Tans men are always short

• Trans people are always homosexual/romantic and cannot be straight

• Transmasc people are feminine or twinks or whatever

• "People can tell that you aren't a ___"

• "They can't be trans, they look cis!"

• Trans people want to be trans

• Trans people simply existing means they are out to get your children

• God does not love trans people (he does, suck it up)

• Young children should be taught about transgender (js not yet imo, let them learn abt it when they're older)

They make no sense!

TW: Transphobia and Homophobia

So I have these two friends. Let's call them K and T. We are best friends and have the same interests. I have discovered recently that they are to some degree homophobic and transphobic, not all the way, but I've seen the hints, and I feel a bit upset when they bring it up. I think they're really funny and cool, but I can't help but feel that they won't accept me if they hear about how I'm pansexual or bigender, or how I want to change my name to Millie. I need advice on what to do. Anything is helpful! <3

TW; Queerphobia, fear, anxiety

I can hear my mom talking to Grandma and Grandpa in the kitchen about how there's some brain defect that makes people think that they're a different gender or that they are gay when there's "actually only" 2 genders, and about how it's some kind of brain tumor or something like that. She said that Tr*mp changed it back, so there are only 2 genders now.

You have no idea how scared I am hearing them talk about crap like that. It genuinely gives me an anxiety attack because of how scared I am.

I hate how my mom pretends to be an ally when she isn't! She is the biggest queerphobe ever! She just hides it with a fake happiness and a fake acceptance. At least my grandparents don't even try to hide it. That way, I know to never talk out to them about this kind of stuff! My mom is just lulling me into a false sense of security so I trust her.

— Raymond (They/Them)

For context, I live in a very conservative state, and my teacher said that she cannot call someone by a name or pronoun that is not on their birth certificate unless she gets permission by our parents. On the first day of school, she asked me if my birth name was my preferred name, and I said no and that I go by Jayden or Rowan, and she started to call me Jayden every single time without fail. She’s also started to call me all three pronouns (he/they/she) interchangeably (“all three pronouns” because any pronouns that are not these three pronouns are considered neopronouns). Mostly favoring he/him pronouns to address me even though you can very much tell that our body is female, even though I tend to dress unisex/androgynously. My mom did not consent to her calling me this. My mom doesn't know about the pronoun thing. Thank God!

Anyway.

What pronouns and gender does my math teacher even think I am? All I told her was that I go by a different name; I said nothing about my gender or pronouns. I have no pronoun pins or name tags or anything that could suggest my gender or pronouns are anything but the ones I was assigned at birth.

I think she thinks I'm trans (FtM). She calls me by he/him and Jayden is a popular male name, so… I mean, technically, I am.

My math teacher was tossing candy at people who got the answers right, and she tossed candy at the loud girl, and I'm sitting behind the loud girl, but she caught it before it hit me, and she said, "It was going to hit her… or him, or them!". It was nice and thoughtful. No one had ever corrected themselves to use the correct pronouns for me.

Community time at school was interesting! I walked out of math, and the counselor lady handed me a sticky note telling me to go to the teacher's lounge/counselor's office. I thought I was in trouble and was scared. It turns out I was just on the list for this week's activity. It was about resilience and self-care and cheap crappy stuff like that. We were going to make little boxes out of paper, then let them around, and someone would write something positive about us on the tiny little paper box. I refused to do those dumb little boxes because I wanted to be in the study hall reading about angels and demons. I was forced to come and do stupid arts and crafts. I was drawing on my arm when the counselor lady asked if she could do my box. I said I don't care, so she started cutting it out. She asked, "How do you spell your name? Is it with an 'en' or 'on'?" I said "En." I said I'm a writer, not an artist, so I didn't really want to do this little project, and she just went with it. So she just did it for me because she said she wasn't going to force someone to do something they didn't want to do. She made small talk with me, asking if I liked any podcasts. So I told her about The Basement Yard and Crime Junkie. She said she also listens to Crime Junkie, and we talked a bit about that. She passed the box around, and when it got to the loud girl, she said, "Who's box is this? Who are they?" the counselor lady walked up to the loud girl, looked at the box, and said, "Oh, that's Jayden's. He's over there." then she pointed to me. Later, someone asked the same question, asking who Jayden was. The counselor lady pointed at me and said, "Here! *chuckles* He's really quiet."

So people think I'm a transgender man just because my name is Jayden, which is not my birth name, and people know it's not my birth name.

I came home and told mom about how nobody knew my name and kept asking who Jayden was, and then mom blurted out, "That's probably because they know your real name!" that seriously pissed me off, and made me horrible feeling. She’s only started to hate my chosen name once I started to tell other people to call me by my chosen name and it’s not just something that my family uses to address me privately. I genuinely don’t understand why she’s acting like this all of a sudden.

I've realized that the whole pronoun thing at school doesn’t really affect me; I don’t care how people perceive my gender. Labels are important to me, not for others to understand me but for my own self-understanding. I could just explain how I feel in a sentence or two without using strict labels. Still, I like having a label just for myself, something private that helps me make sense of who I am.

I think I’m just going to go by Jayden from now on. But don’t quote me on this. Maybe I’ll only do it IRL, and go by Jayden and Rowan online?

— Jayden (they/them)

Tw: I guess dysphoria or transphobia or being someone you're not

I'm tired of transphobia, but maybe the transphobes are right, maybe if I force myself to be cis I'll live a happier life, I'm so desperate at this point to live happy that I'm gonna force myself to be someone I'm not just to be happy.

Warning: Mild transphobia, mention of transphobic jokes, mention of religion, all-caps and alternating-caps-lowercase, keyboard smash

My ballsona for space

I'm so, so SO tired of my mom and her frickin reasoning and ughhhh

Basically she doesn't like the genderqueer/trans community and VERY OFTEN uses jokes similarly to "I identify as an attack helicopter!!" and other stuff like that.

She uses it when she thinks its going to be "fUnNy", or some stupid reason. The other day she said something like "I identify as [I forgot]" while we were driving and it ticked me off so much

We met this transmasc dude who I'm just gonna refer to as Z while we were at a camping event and my sibling was talking about how they're nonbinary and I mentioned that I was lesbian. (still closeted about my pangenderness lol)

So we were talking about our queerness and I was being excited because I found another genderqueer person in the wild when my mom just shut the conversation down like, "We're all people." in that 'stop-speakig-or-im-going-to-yell' kind of voice and it just UGHHHHH

This happens EVERY SINGLE TIME Im openly talking about being not-cisgender and I'm going to lose it.

She also jokes about pronouns and crap, like "oH sOrrY I dIdnT sPecIfY mY pRonOuns" and what really sets me off is OTHER ADULTS LAUGH while me and my friend are fuming in the frickin corner??

Like lady CALM THE HECK DOWN, ITS NOT FUNNY

There was this one time I was making pronoun pins and she looked excited that I was crafting for once

The way her face fell when she saw what I was making I can not even try to start and she said "I'm not wearing those"

It made me feel so bad for no reason and a few days later I threw the fifty-or-so pins out because I didn't want to see them anymore because I felt bad

And I think her reasons for acting like this about the community are purely because she doesn't like the idea of gender surgery and name-changing

She's very adamant that neither me nor my siblings get our names changed and yells about how its disrespectful to the parents or something

Like, yes, to an extent, it probably is disrespectful in some families but not to the point you need to completely purposely deadname and misgender people??

And I do have a transmasc friend, and she's trying to keep up the right name and pronouns. She slips up sometimes, but that's fine. When he's out of earshot, she deadnames him and uses wrong pronouns more frequently, and then tells me to "put down the attitude" whenever I correct her.

My mom also sometimes judges things like they should have specific teams for trans people and specific teams for non-trans people and she explains her reasoning because of the different muscle-builds o something like that

Something to do with like "yeah trans women shouldn't be on sports teams because they're physically stronger than cis women so maybe they should have their own team" and same with trans men and cis men

So at least mom is trying ig, shes just annoying about it sometimes

My grandma, on the other hand, completely dislikes trans people. She refuses to use his name and pronouns correctly and it annoys me to the ends of the earth, She always refers to him as his deadname and when I correct her she says stuff similar to my mom, though the other day she said "You don't talk to me like that."

I just

Ughhhhh

It sucks so bad, and considering the only people who aren't genderqueer in my friend group are both allocishet (2 ppl) I don't talk to them about school or anything. I'm also afraid to tell my mom about my girlfriend because she thinks I'm not old enough but that's a different story

I think this behavior is somewhat influenced by religion, considering my grandma is heavily Catholic and my mom went to Catholic school for most of her life.

Neither of them will ever use they/them pronouns either, and it ticks me off hearing my mom refer to my friend and my sibling who are both enby as "she" but I cant correct her or I will be told to "stop talking back."

It just SUCKS, especially considering I'm in an wlw relationship that neither of them know about, nor would approve of. (Not because of the gayness btw, just because of the age and also my grandma is adamant that I am straight despite coming out to her)

Jcfebdjwfehcbdowijpjocbhjxokpjihwsdijcehjnswdiohcebswdjocehx swkqmk ndxjfhbdcxwsjd echbwojx3efr8hy9gyhbdejio2d4ijpnfhj3vrcdesxu09ioejdkwhyismyfamilylikethisughhhh

TW: Family Conflict, Mental Health, Abortion/Motherhood and Gender Roles, Political and Social Opinions, Anti-LGBTQIA+ Sentiments, Queerphobia, Victim Blaming, Self-Harm, Abuse Denial, Religious Oppression, Childhood Trauma, Abuse of Power, Unsafe Environment, Emotional Manipulation, Caps

My grandmother and I are in her room filling out the mental health paperwork for my counseling since I decided that I want to start doing counseling now. I thought it would be a fun thing for us to do since I JUST WANT TO TALK TO ANOTHER LIVE HUMAN BEING FACE-TO-FACE. But I'm stupid apparently, because we just got into a lot of fights, and it was hecking annoying and mentally exhausting. We started talking how abortions and how you have to drive hours to get an abortion even if it would save the victum's life. Then we started talking about being mothers. My grandmother and I were talking about how no one wants children now, and I kept saying that women were groomed to be mothers back in the day, but now women have free will to do whatever they want with their lives. I went on to say that women nowadays want to be equal to men and have the same jobs as then, and she pointed at me and said, "That's a liberal thinking", and she said, "It's just like…" she squinted her eyes, "why would women want to be equal to men?" She said that people are so messed up nowadays and that men and women want to be equal and that some men think they're women. All this crap seriously pissed me off. I want to cry. SHE'S HECKING PSYCHO!!!! WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH HER? I wanted her to fill in the things that I didn't know the answers to because I was a small child and she was with me most of my childhood.

OH MY GOD! I'm shaking in fear now! I don't want to be around her or for her to fill this stuff out anymore! My mood has dropped by 100%. She was looking through all the paperwork to see if she missed anything and saw the 'what is your gender and sexuality' part of it and freaked out! I'm so scared now!!! She just yelled, "WHAT THE HECK IS THIS!" and started listing out all the genders on the page and being a jerk over them.

My grandmother said "Trans woman male to female; genderqueer. [she laughed] I've never even heard of some of these things. It's nuts!"

I just hummed.

My grandmother said, "There's only man and woman, that's what God created. Sexual orientation? What the heck?! You're straight. [she sees that it says 'straight or heterosexual']. Wait, what is heterosexual? What is that? Look it up."

I was so pissed with her and I was so done that I didn't even care to explain it well to her, I just wanted to get it done and over with.

I said, "It's opposite."

She said, "What is it?"

I said, "Man-woman. Man to woman. Woman to man. Opposite sex."

She said, "but it says straight or heterosexual?"

I said that it was the same thing.

I'm never going to be safe with this family. I need to get away from them at any cost.

She said in a firm, strict tone, "You are heterosexual".

She even circled straight.

OH MY GOD!!!! I asked my grandmother if she thought DnD was a bad game because they were talking about taking me to camp with them, and I said I wanted to maybe find someone my age to play DnD with but I didn't know if that would be an okay game to play at camp. Since I like DnD right now and want to learn to play it properly. She said it was a devil game and that the prophet said to not play DnD specifically because it messes with your head and causes children to forget what reality is and they get stuck living in their heads. We spent a little bit online trying to find bad stuff about the game and found nothing. She found a super obscure article saying it causes Satanism, witchcraft, suicide, and violence. I told her the game is nothing like that! She said they must have changed the game since it used to be all about Satanism back in the day.

A little while later, I told my grandmother about my sexual abuse. I told her about how he forced me to kiss me against my will and all of that, and the first thing she said was, "No you weren't", and then I told her that sexual abuse is the overall umbrella term, but technically I was 'sexually assaulted'. She asked me if that's why I stopped going over to his house, and I said yes.

She is still filling out the paperwork, and it's just horrible talking with her because of how she is. She's so conservative and strict and actually psychotic.

My grandmother said my mom is the one making me go crazy, when she's also helping make me worse!!! She doesn't believe in women's rights and believes they should be subservient to their husbands; she's anti-LGBTQIA+ (I'M QUEER!!!! I don't know what I am 100%, but DEFINITELY know that I'm NOT heterosexual/straight and cisgender).

She's writing stuff down while I describe it, and she said I'm going to be put in a mental institution.

I told her that if I get put in a mental institution, it's because of all of them. She got defensive, saying that she did nothing wrong. I said she's anti-everything.

While my mom was putting hydrogen peroxide on my popped blister, she saw my self-harm scars and asked where I got them from. Obviously worried as to where I got some random, but lots, of cuts from. I lied, said I didn't know, and said that I just got them when I woke up one day. I then used an evidence standpoint to further push this lie. (This is the truth →) When she was dating one of her hundreds of ex-boyfriends, I would wake up with bruises on my arms. Turns out, I sleep with my arms crossed, like a vampire, and sleeping on my fingers all night left bruises on my arms. She said that she used to sleep like that and so she would have those bruises too, so she totally bought my lie that the self-harm scars were just because I'm a wild sleeper.

I gave my mom the packets so she could fill in the insurance stuff since neither my grandmother nor I know that stuff, and she's erasing all the stuff about abuse and yelling at me, saying that all my trauma isn't real, and that my VIVID memories of her abusing us are made up, and that she had never laid a hand on us.

She's going to go to the doctors tomorrow and get a new packet so she can go and fill it out herself with the information she wants them to know, AKA none of the truth.

I'M 18 HECKING YEARS OLD!!!! I CAN DO WHATEVER THE HECK I WANT!

She thinks none of my trauma is real, that her abuse wasn't real, and that I'm remembering things that aren't real.

I was going to take my counseling packet and go upstairs so sulky and depressed that my mother refused to believe that she was abusive, but then the boys came out to eat, and she told them to go back into their room. We're now watching Alice in Wonderland! So that's fun!

I want to ask my mom what she thinks about queer people, but I don't want to ruin the fun time we are having. We always fight, so it's nice when I don't, and can be normal people.

So I told my mom that in The Owl House (my favorite show because of the queer characters, and just because I LOVE magic and fantasy stories with witches!) There was a non-binary character, a lesbian character, and a bisexual character. I told my mom how Disney canceled the show because the queer characters didn't 'fit their brand'. I explained all the queer characters to my mom, and she only complained about 1 thing. My mom's only problem with The Owl House was that Amity and Luz are enemies to lovers, which she said means that the relationship will ultimately go back to being enemies (she's been in abusive relationships that could be similarly described as 'enemies to lovers'), like a full circle, they hate each others, they're friends, they love each other? Then they hate each other again. My mom said that Disney was wrong and that Disney was at fault for the show getting canceled, not the LGBTQIA+ characters.

But TV and reality ARE NOT THE SAME. Liking/being an ally to something on TV doesn't always have to translate to liking the same thing IRL.

I asked her if she would accept us—her children—if we were queer, and she said that we are her children, so she would love and accept us anyway. As a counterpoint to her claim, I told her about how she shut Kelly and I down when we were talking about us being queer and then started talking about queer problems at the Spencer Place Apartments we used to live at, but my mom said that she shot us down because she thought we were talking about the LGBTQIA+ community in a rude way. She said that she was thinking that if there was a gay person hearing us talk, then we would hurt their feelings because she interpreted our tone of voice as being rude and not as playful banter like we were really talking. I told my mom that my grandmother got angry and pissed at the queer crap on the filling out form for the psychiatrist, and my mom said she'd love her kids even if they were queer!!!!!! I was actually so happy! Was this my sign from God that it's okay to be queer, or was my grandmother's hatred a sign that being queer is bad?

The entire time, when I would say something related to my grandmother, my mom said to just ignore my grandmother and say that I wanted to be with my real family downstairs or that I wanted my real family to take me places. My mom had been like this towards my grandmother my whole life. My mom said that she does want to spend time with me, but my grandmother won't let her on the ground floor to see me, which isn't true. My mom just has to hecking knock on the door and ask to hang out with me. A locked door doesn't mean it's impossible to get through.

I can't trust either of them. My grandmother is a religious psycho, and my mother is a bipolar manipulator and child abuser. But at least my mom accepts me for being queer (I didn't tell her, but now I know she'll accept me when/if I come out).

— Rowan (vae/vem or they/them)

TW: Societal Pressure, Mentions of Sociopathy, Misunderstandings, Discussion of Furries and Potentially Insensitive Remarks, Discomfort With Parental Attitudes Towards Queer Identities

On the way home from the eye doctor, there was a loud screeching in the car. I asked mom if it was coming from the movie that was playing (we have a family van with a built-in DvD player), and she said that the noise has been coming from the car recently and she thought she was the only one who could hear it. Then she told me about a story about her and my dad.

I asked my mom if she was happy that I wasn't dating anybody since everybody keeps asking me if I'm dating anybody or when I'm going to start dating since I’m 18 now, and that grandma keeps trying to convince me to have children. Mom said that she's actually glad I'm not dating anybody because she wants me to find the right guy. Which is the nicest thing she’s ever said to me. She doesn't want me to make the same mistakes that she did with dating horrible guys. She said that it has been scientifically proven that men dating women and women dating men will take on the likes and dislikes of the person they're dating to mold their personality so that the person they're dating will like them more, but this whole façade will wear off after 3 months. She said that is why she stops liking the guys she dates after 3 months. So mom told me to make friends with a man for a year or 2, and if I still like him then I can start dating him. But she specified me dating a guy instead of saying ‘person’ or ‘them’ she said ‘guy’ and ‘him’. When I always describe my partner, I use gender neutral language because I like all genders, so I don’t want to misgender them since there isn’t only "he’s" and "she’s". She just kept going on and on about how she wants me to find the right guy, and she wants me to wait a while and see if I like the guy so that I know his true personality after the 3 months and whatever.

She then said that if he cheats on me or he breaks my heart, then I can just move on and know that I can do better than him instead of doing what she did and just being completely heartbroken and letting the breakup ruin my life. I tried to tell her I was aromantic (somewhere on the aro-spec) without saying aromantic. I told her that I don't experience romance like other people, and I don't necessarily ‘care’ that much about a person. She told me that having no empathy is considered sociopathic and that it's a diagnosis. But then I realized that I worded it wrong, so I tried to word it better. I told her that when I do romantically like somebody, it's very weak and if they do 1 thing that I don't like, suddenly all of my attraction goes away for them. And she told me there was something wrong with me if that really happened. I told her if there was like 1 personality trait that I didn't like or that they were a douche bag then suddenly my attraction went away for them, and she said then that wasn't a ‘me’ problem then and that it was a ‘them’ problem then.

I kinda regret telling her that, but only because she didn’t give me enough time to really explain how I feel. She always has to talk over me and interrupt me, which is why I talk so fast now and why everyone complains that I talk too fast. It’s because growing up, if I wanted someone to listen to me, my mother, then I had to talk fast. Maybe that’s why I always feel I need to be in a hurry. I just want someone to listen to me. I want to have a sit down with my family and tell them how I feel; how I feel about my gender, how I feel about my sexuality, both the aroace part and the multisexual part, I want to tell them that when they refer to me with feminine words and terms it makes me uncomfortable. I want them to shut up for once and listen to me. Just let me pour my heart out to them. But that’s only a pipe dream.

I asked mom how I was even supposed to get a boyfriend and jokingly asked if I could find one on Tinder, and she got very, very defensive, saying that I should NEVER EVER find anybody on Tinder because dating apps are only for predators now. So I asked her if I couldn't go online then how I was supposed to find somebody, and she said to just find somebody IRL and have a conversation with them. She gave the example of going up to somebody and saying that I like their shoes. Which I cringed at.

We were pulling into the driveway and mom told me about furries and how some schools say that if a student comes to school dressed as an animal, they are going to call animal control on them. Mom then said, "If they are going to 'identify' as an animal, then they are going to treat them like an animal.".

She used the word 'identify' which made me uncomfortable for some reason, maybe again, it was the tone she was in using. It wasn’t rude or mocking, just in shock that someone would think they are an animal.

I'm kind of scared to come out to her to find out that I'm queer. Recently, she's been kind of using some kind of tone when she says stuff that can be roughly translated as queerphobia, like with this whole conversation we had. So it's kind of been scaring me. Like her specifying a relationship between a man and a woman and a woman and a man, this could be seen as homophobia. And her commenting on how furries will get animal control called on them, could be considered transphobia. But she didn't say any of these things outwardly queerphobic like my grandparents (her parents); it was just the underlying context that made me uncomfortable.

I have to be queer! What I experience with my gender and my sexuality is not normal (cishet-normative)! What I feel and what I experience isn't normal (cishet-normative)! I don't experience the same way that everybody else describes it.

I don’t know what I want to do. I want to date people all of a sudden. I don’t know why I suddenly have this sudden strong desire. I want to date girls first, but my family is queerphobic so I can’t. I still rely on them for important things like housing so I can't tell them I’m going to date girls or that I’m bi or non-binary. Maybe I could just say she’s a friend for the whole time we’re dating. I don’t know what to do!

How are y'all so unbothered by queerphobia? You guys are, like, the chillest people I know when it comes to this stuff. Like, I'm having an identity crisis every time I see a queerphobic comment, where you guys are commenting on how it happened and being upset but seem to get over it so easy (I know it probably a lot more deep than that, but I don't think you guys are questioning your entire life, afterlife, identity, and religion because of a single queerphobic comment, every time, every day, multiple times a day like what's been happening to me).

Looking for advice on how to not be bothered by this stuff.

I was talking to someone online and they said, “Whatever happens, whether you choose to identify as your assigned gender at birth or change it, please never consider surgery. I know from what I’ve seen from people i know and what I’ve witnessed on the internet, gender affirming surgery has a ridiculously small chance of making you satisfied with your body and would likely make your situation worse”

This can't be right, right? The happiness rate after transition has to be somewhat high, like 50–60%, right? It can't be 49–0%, right? I feel like they just looked at the bad studies and decided that was the only right thing, while all the other studies said otherwise. 

But, IDK. What do you think?

At my cousin's birthday party today, our grandpa and my cousin were talking about how seniors only get to pay $80 to get into any national park with a pass from my cousin's job. And my grandpa said, "Maybe you should just say you're 21 and identify as 66 so you can get in for only $80."

I'm scared to go by Rowan or even use pronouns that aren't she/her now, but I don't like she/her, it makes me uncomfortable and makes me hate myself. I like they/he, but that's seen as 'transgender' to my conservative, Christian, CisHet-normative family. They/he makes me feel nice and happy with my body, which says a lot because I hate my AFAB/müllerian body. I like they/he pronouns; it's one of my favorite combos, and the pronouns I use the most out of my hoard, but now I don't even want to use them. I feel scared to sign off my posts with my name and pronouns, even though my family isn't going to see them.

TW: Queerphobia, mention of blood, fear, the word "sex"

At Walmart with my grandmother, I saw a Hawaiian shirt, and I was going to say, "I want to be this type of *uncle*, the one who just wears this shirt and embarrasses my nieces and nephews." But I stopped myself and said, "aunt".

I'm in the book section looking for Loveless by Alice Oseman. They have heartstoppers. But I can't find Loveless.

I had the whole scenario played out in my head: I ask Grandma to buy it for me, and she asked me what it was about. I would then say an aroace person, and she would ask what aroace means, and I would tell her then close off with saying, "Just like me.".

She agreed to take me to Barnes & Noble!

We were in the car to Hobby Lobby, and my lip started bleeding. Grandma said she doesn't have periods anymore, so the only way she bleeds is if she cuts herself and gets her blood drawn. And I said she was lucky because I don't want periods. I don't need them because I don't want kids. I told her I was done raising kids for a lifetime (I've raised my siblings). And she kept saying I needed to get away from my mother, live my own life, and then maybe I'd change my mind.

She kept trying to convince me to have children one day.

We went to eat and then drove to Barnes & Noble. We couldn’t find it so we asked a lady and she gave it to us.

She asked me what the book was about, and I stuttered and told her, but I didn’t use the word “aroace”.

Grandma read the book summary, and it said it was LGBTQIA+.

She said, “L…G…B…T……Q…I…A+, whatever that means.” then laughed in my face.

She then said, "Skip the chapters that will make you gay.". She then said something then said, "That would piss me off," referencing me being queer.

I'm so scared now. I'm shaking. It instantly made me think I wasn't queer.

To roughly sum it up, I told her that aroace is queer because it's not a 'normal' heterosexual attraction, and she said that doesn't make someone 'this', pointing to the word LGBTQIA+.

I told her what aroace meant, and she went, "You're not that, right?" and I just sheepishly said, "No," all quiet, fearing for my life.

I don't even want the book now. I kept saying we don't have to get it if she doesn't want to buy it, but she just kept saying, "It’s fine. I’ll buy it, just skip the chapter that will make you gay."

What if Mom finds the book?

I'm, like, actually scared now.

When I get home, I'm hiding the book on my desk and praying to God that Grandma doesn't tell anyone I own this.

Mom can't kick me out; it's Grandpa and Grandma's house.

I'm having anxiety now, and my right hand feels tingly like it's going numb.

I can't stop thinking about it.

Grandma asked if I was moving out now since my aunt, uncle, and cousin, are coming home today from their vacation, and since Grandma and Grandpa are here, they could help me move out.

She said my aunt and uncle would love to house me because they love me unconditionally. But if they loved me unconditionally, they would love me for being queer, not make me fear for my life and hide a big part of myself.

But like, am I actually queer, or am I just hopping on some 'trend' (for lack of a better word. I’m not in a good mental space right now, just hang in there okay)? Maybe I'm just a masculine girl (tomboy) and support my fellow sisters for being pretty.

I feel sick.

I don't feel like a man or a woman. I'm just me, ya know? And I want to hug, and kiss, and touch, and cuddle, and have sex with both men and women. Does that say cishet to you? Maybe I've just brainwashed myself into thinking I want this.

I want to throw up now.

I really do believe that God put me in the wrong body. I feel so disconnected from my female body so much.

I’ve yet to meet one irl but I’ve found my fair share on among us and scratch. If u have any stories about meeting a homophobe/transphobe ~in the wild~ please share!

Edit: Preferably funny ones. If I read too many more sad ones I’ll cry, and I have an eye infection so it would hurt a lot.

Cw: transphobia, fear of non-binary people, and discrimination against such people

This was a mistake, at my little sibling’s school there is a rule where students have to sit boy-girl to stop chatting and “keep order.” Like that ever works. The rule stayed even though some students and parents weren't happy with it. One day, a new student who was transgender joined the class, messing up the boy-girl seating plan. The teacher didn't know where to put them, so things got all mixed up and made everyone uncomfortable. As if that wasn't enough, my sibling is actually non-binary, making things even more complicated but not making them unreal, you know? The teacher, already foolishly struggling with remembering genders based on what genders actually are and not what it might look like, now had to figure out where to seat someone who didn't fit in the boy-girl rule. The classroom turned into a mess of whispers, judgment, and awkward looks. The calm learning vibe became tense, with some students not cool with having transgender and non-binary classmates. As time went on, things only got worse in the classroom. The transgender kid and my sib faced constant judgment and unfair treatment from their peers, who couldn't understand or accept them. The teacher, not ready to handle such a tough situation, got caught up in a mess with no easy way out. In the end, the class that used to be close-knit was torn apart by this stupid boy-girl seating rule. The transgender kid and my sibling felt alone and pushed aside, unable to fully be part of the class. And the other students, driven by fear and ignorance, couldn't see the humanity and value of their classmates who were just being true to themselves. So, my friends, remember the story of the classroom ripped apart by sticking to outdated rules and not embracing diversity. It shows us the harm of discrimination and intolerance, teaching us how crucial it is to make spaces that include and welcome all people, no matter their gender identity. And to think, if they boy-girl pattern rule had never been made in the first place, it would have at least given transgender and non-binary kids a chance. The teacher was probably so worried to keep the class from chatting that she didn’t even care if she was being discrimative to LGBTQIA+ kids. She was just stuck with her stupid rule.

Trigger Warnings: transphobia, homophobia, misgendering, emotional distress, anit-LGBTQIA+, discussions of religious intolerance, references to Nazism, mention of sex reassignment surgery and hormone therapy

My grandma and I have been out shopping all day and we talked about a lot of things, I said I don’t understand how people can become obsessed with things and make it their whole personality. And we talked about religion, mainly mormonism vs. The church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints (our religion), and how I don’t understand how we can all worship the same thing—god, jesus, and the holy spirit—yet all be completely different religions. She said people twist things to follow their rules and don’t actually follow the religion.

I don’t know how, but we started talking about neo-nazis and Kayne West, and how he believes in nazis and whatever. And she then went on to say that people are so screwed up nowadays. And how children are so confused now and that children think their they/them, and how that's actually whatever's between your legs. She kept saying they/them they/them they/them and it was pissing me off. So once she started shitting on the lgbtqia+ community, I stopped listening and just went “mhm” to make this conversation go faster so it would stop faster. I tried to confuse her saying that intersex people are both male and female in their hormones and chromosomes and how cisgender males will grow up a cisgender and once they hit puberty they start to have the female hormones and will get sex reassignment surgery and live as a female. Grandma then said that people are whatever was born between their legs, and if they have messed up hormones they need hormone therapy and not sex reassignment surgery. So I was right, she isn’t a secret ally, she just believes in equal rights for males and females.

This whole conversation really put me off. I was having a great day and then she said that and I shut down.

But I have ***officially*** decided I am ***never*** coming out to my family. I am never telling them I’m queer and once I have the money I’m abandoning them.

It hurt so much. Because I’m ***not*** a girl! I’m not! I was meant to be born male. When I was 6 years old, before I even knew what the lgbtqia+ community was, I knew I was different from the other girls, I hated girl things, I never wanted to be with the girls, I wanted to be with the boys, I liked traditionally male things, I understood male problems and was confused by female problems. I was never meant to be a female, and it makes me feel horrible and gross to be in this body. Does that really sound like I'm following some Gen Z trend?

I also tried to come out as aromantic without saying the word ‘aromantic’, because somehow getting married (just in general, not towards me) came up. I said I don’t ever really want to date someone or marry them, I’m fine being single for the rest of my life. And my grandma said that she was sad because she wanted to see my babies, and be the great-grandmother to my babies. And I explained to her that I have never been able to have a crush on someone or to even be in love with them and that I have to force myself to feel that way. And she said it’s because I never get out and let myself feel those things. And I said back when I was in school and out all the time. And we compromised and now I have to at least try to date people. And she kept saying that when I get a boyfriend not to move in straight way when we first meet, not to move in with my boyfriend before wedlock because it goes against our religion, and boyfriend this and boyfriend that. That also made me mad because I like people of all genders.

So I’m just going to abandon my family when I get the money to support myself so I can live my life peacefully the way I want to.

I’m still a trans man who is non-binary, aroace, and pansexual (this is just how I feel right now, I'm not labeling myself, the only reason I use no labels is because my labels change so much). That never changes, the only thing that changes is my love for them, the more they open their mouths the more my love for them disappears.

I hate religion. It’s corrupted so many people. I don’t understand how I’m so accepting yet their not even though were part of the same religion. It doens’t make sense and I hate it.

Cw// transphobia, homophobia

Sw// caps

What do we do with outdated books that would be transphobic and/or homophobic now? Especially, you know, the books where it says “ladies and gentleman, boy and girls” and books that make gender “jokes” where a guy wanted to change gender but lived in a time where you “couldn’t.” And what about old dictionary where sex and gender are interchangeable? Some dictionaries even describe gender as the state of being male *OR* female. Where are all the other gender? And where are all the other pronouns? And they also say that queer is a slur, but not anymore.

TW: Family Dynamics, Mental Health, Coming Out Fears, Transphobia, Religious Conflict, Identity Struggles, Isolation, Internalized Transphobia, Emotional Distress

My aunt was over talking to my grandma, and she left and said "Hi" to me as she was leaving. When she left, my grandma came into my room and said that my aunt was so excited for me to move in with her. My mom (we live with my grandparents) is driving me crazy, so I’m going to move in with my aunt down the street. Her children have already switched bedrooms, and she's painting our room (her daughter and my (future) room). My grandma said that despite my aunt's youngest son throwing a fit about living with all girls, he doesn't mind it. Everyone knows how crazy my mom is, and ever since I was a little kid, my aunt has always been going on about how she wanted to adopt me. There are a couple days over a month until I’m 18 years old.

I'm kind of excited, but also really scared.

I want to come out to them. When I was playing BitLife with my aunt's eldest daughter a few years ago, my BitLife parent came out to me as trans, and I told my aunt's eldest daughter, and she reacted with disgust. Laughing, saying eww or gross (I don’t remember word for word what she said; I know she just acted with disgust, and it made me feel really, really bad (this was back when I thought I was simply an ally). But I like to think my aunt is more chill. My aunt is very soft-spoken. She talks really quietly and gently. I've never heard her say anything about the LGBTQIA+ community, but my family is heavily Christian, so I’m inclined to think she hates us. I mean, she is so bad for God and Jesus that she forces her kids to read the Bible every night. I already have a coming-out letter written and everything.

I'm just scared thinking that I'm going to have to live my whole life pretending to be CisHet and having to keep the real me hidden from everyone I love.

I drop small hits, like saying love is gross (aromantic), that I'm handsome, that I like boy things (transmasculine), etc. But I think they just think I'm not ready to date anyone yet and that I am a tomboy. But for me, being seen as a tomboy is better than being seen as a girly girl.

I'm at the point of tears right now, and I don't know why. I'm just scared and confused, and I'm glad that they're willing to house me, but still, I'm not a girl.........

TW: Misgendering, Homophobia

Just some context: My younger brother and I planned to go on walks everyday, since walking for at least 30 minutes is part of my fitness class homework. And after walking with my younger brother, including a stop at Dairy Queen where we spent $17 on food, we visited Dollar Tree to buy a rocket launcher. We were walking up to a Dollar Tree laughing and joking around like siblings do. Then, out of nowhere, this dude decides to try and shake things up by saying "Boys first," while holding the door open with this smug look. You could tell he was trying to be funny but also kinda rude, you know, trying to misgender me.

But oh man, the universe had a plot twist ready. I just thanked him, real sweet-like, and walked in with a grin. Because jokes on him! I'm trans!!!

Then, as we got to talking more inside, especially about stuff like who we're into, he tried to pin me down as 'gay' again to be rude and whatever. But life’s got a way of surprising you, and his label just gave me a chance to stand tall in my truth, hitting him with a solid "yes." The laugh was on him this time, and anyone else who doubts the power of just being fiercely you.

I love how my siblings and I joke about us all being gay and trans to be rude and whatever, but now I can openly expect it because *I* know I'm these things, but *my family* thinks I'm joking. I'm not, suckers!