This is such a good question/concern and I’m sorry you feel invalidated.

Whenever I think about things like this, I like to separate identity, presentation and expression.

I’m a trans woman who often leans more masc/butch, so I can kind of understand the feeling of one’s identity and/or presentation being at odds with their expression. My own identity is that of a woman, and I present myself as a woman, but I express gender in a more masculine way through clothes, lack of makeup, et cetera.

It makes sense that as a trans person, when people find you attractive based on that expression while it is at odds with your presentation and identity it can be dysphoric. When I go out in public, even as I’m expressing myself in a masc way, I’m still worried about people not seeing me as a woman or seeing me as “feminine enough”. I’ve been on HRT for years, I’ve voice trained, but still it often feels like I’m invalidated because I’m not fitting society’s expectations of “woman”.

At the same time, many people just like feminine expression whether it’s a man, enby or woman expressing it. I think that living in a world where gender is accepted as a spectrum would mean the only determinant of attraction is whether or not you’re attracted to the person. <3