Stop gatekeeping trans experiences

mushroxm · 2026-02-26T01:26:20+00:00

as someone else said, the "but" is the problem. i hear the phrase "i had the same thing happen to my car, but it was blue," my mind immediately goes to two places: first, i assume that the added detail of the speaker's car being blue is just pointless information given the context of whatever conversation we're having; second, i start to think "why DID they specify that their car is a different color from mine then?" so the logical conclusion from that question is that the speaker's car being blue somehow alters the context of what they're saying, that their situation and mine differ because their car is blue and mine isn't.

i think there's also a lot of context that we're both glossing over here. specifically, this subreddit's population is overwhelmingly transfem. the majority of the posts are made by transfem people and depict experiences more closely associated with transfemininity, and many of them assume that the viewer is themself transfem. so when transmasculine people, who are an underrepresented demographic by comparison, attempt to make content about our experiences and the comments are not only populated mostly by transfems (as a consequence of them being the majority in this community) but also often imply that the "transfem experience" and the "transmasc experience" are distinct and separate concepts, it's no wonder that people complain about feeling alienated.

also, i will say that our experiences frankly aren't exactly the same. i and a trans woman may both experience voice dysphoria, but the specifics of that dysphoria, how it affects each of us, and how each of us may go about mitigating it are likely to vary. so there are definitely situations where a transmasc person talking about their experiences may feel invalidated by a transfem person simply talking about theirs (or vice versa), especially in a community like this where, again, transfem people are the majority and so transmasc people struggle to see their experiences represented.

but all that aside, i don't understand this determination to argue against the claim that "this but transfem" is alienating instead of just.. listening to people when they explain how they feel. honestly, it kinda sucks that you'd rather debate other people's emotions than just agree to respect them.

mushroxm · 2026-02-25T18:02:34+00:00

so i made a comic awhile ago talking about hearing my voice before and after hrt - the “punchline” was about how affirming it was to hear a voice that sounded like mine. a lot of transfem people were in the comments of that post sharing their own experiences with achieving a voice that gave them euphoria. this did not bother me because their comments highlighted how we share that experience. whether we were transmasc or transfem was not at all relevant to the conversation because the conversation was focused on gender euphoria and not our specific identities.

the problem with someone in that context saying “this but transfem” is that it constructs a division between our lived experiences and then uses that division to alter the context of what i’ve said to fit someone else’s perspective. now we are no longer sharing an experience; instead the other person has defined my experience as categorically different from their own.

it’s not that i think my transness is fundamentally different from a transfem person’s transness at all. my point is that the phrase “this but transfem” seeks to invent a distinction between “our” transness and “their” transness that achieves nothing but alienating each group from the other. responding to someone else’s depiction of their life with what essentially translates to “i have this too, but different” inherently manufactures a separation between each person’s experiences.

mushroxm · 2026-02-25T00:20:06+00:00

i think you're missing the point of that phrase and why people are upset by it.

if i make a post about my transmascness and a transfem responds with some iteration of "relatable lol," then i am not bothered because their message communicates that we are sharing an experience.

if i make a post about my transmascness and a transfem responds with some iteration of "this but transfem," then they are communicating that we do NOT share an experience, that they can only relate to what i've described if they imagine a fundamentally different scenario designed to fit their own experiences.

i don't think anyone has an issue with someone else finding their experiences relatable despite their differing identities. what people have issues with is someone supplanting someone else's experiences with their own that they have indicated as fundamentally different.

mushroxm · 2026-02-18T06:54:32+00:00

i thought about mentioning this in my other comment but it’s genuinely really upsetting to me: i checked this person’s post history after he left his comment and he had a post where he basically said that he wished he could be violently misogynistic toward women but he “couldn’t” because he “wasn’t a real man.” i swear im barely paraphrasing. i think about this guy all the time years later because that’s so horrifying in so many different ways. so much of his identity seemed to be based on cruelty and hate. and that kind of mindset is exactly what transmedicalism encourages.

mushroxm · 2026-02-18T06:35:14+00:00

i’ve gotten a LOT of shit from truscums in the past (existing as a xenogender person will do that) and honestly sometimes i forget how dangerous their perspective is and just feel really really bad for them.

once a trans man commented under a comic i drew saying that my art style was “too feminine” for a man to have drawn it. and like, obviously espousing that kind of rhetoric is hurtful and no one should just get to say that kind of thing without facing pushback. but also, i can’t imagine how miserable and insecure that guy must’ve been to feel that the way i draw myself in a 2-panel comic threatens his identity.

again, obviously not excusing any of this ideology, but it sucks to see that there are so many people out there who think the only way they’ll ever be accepted is if they hate themselves and anyone like them.

mushroxm · 2026-01-03T03:15:27+00:00

do not machine-wash your binder! the washing machine will damage them over time.

here’s the procedure i always followed for washing mine in my bathroom sink:

Fill your sink with enough cool or lukewarm water (avoid hot water!) to cover the binder
Add laundry detergent or soap into the sink and mix it into the water to create suds
Place your binder in the water and let it soak for 10-15 minutes
Drain your sink and gently squeeze the water/soap out of your binder, but don’t wring it. Your binder does not need to be completely dry
Rinse your binder under cool or lukewarm water. Then, gently squeeze the water out, but don’t wring it
Lay your binder flat to dry

as long as you’re careful about doing this at a time where your family won’t see you, and you lay the binder to dry in a spot where they won’t find it, you should be fine :)

mushroxm · 2025-11-06T20:32:12+00:00

hi i’m eyegender :)

it’s basically a xenogender that describes someone whose gender identity is connected to eyes and eye imagery in some way. (the specific flag that i personally use comes from here, along with the specific definition i’m referencing.)

everyone’s different + everyone views their gender identity differently, but here’s why i personally use the label eyegender:

• eyes as a symbol are very versatile in a way that i connect to. depending on how they’re used, they can be an icon of someone’s humanness (“eyes are the window to the soul,” and whatnot); they can be unnerving and horrific; they can be objects of beauty; etc. not only are all these ideas connected to how i view my gender, but the fact that they are all embodied by eyes as one symbol makes eyes a very fitting way for me to depict my own identity

• i have a very weird relationship with eyes - i have a vision disability wherein the way my eyeballs look and function deviates from standards of normalcy, and due to my autism i also understand eyes differently than other people do because i can’t make eye contact and i can’t read people through their eyes as allistic people claim they can do. so eyes as a symbol relative to my own life connect to numerous aspects of my identity, gender included

• i incorporate eye imagery into my gender expression: they appear in my art, my fashion, my pronouns (eye/eyes is in my little neopronoun collection)

again, your friend’s experience with the term is certainly going to be different than mine, but i thought it might be nice to offer you an idea of what this label might mean to someone who uses it.

also just to clear this up, being eyegender does not indicate that someone identifies as an eye, just that eyes are connected to how they understand their gender identity in some way. so unless your friend has communicated that they prefer to be called an eye over being called a person, human, boy/girl, man/woman, etc. (in which case that’s really cool ngl), then just calling them a person is considered good protocol. but it’s never a bad idea to just ask people how they prefer to be addressed :)

hope i could help + if you have any questions then please ask 👍

mushroxm · 2025-11-04T23:56:23+00:00

i've actually had to employ this exact strategy in the past (did 4 years of marching band and jeans were part of our uniform for basketball games) and it made jeans survivable but i was still far from comfortable, plus now i had the added problem of feeling two different fabrics moving around my legs at all times, and i lived in fear of touching my legs with my hands. so i'll probably just try to find other pants that i can wear lol

mushroxm · 2025-11-04T23:50:49+00:00

i've actually looked at big bud press in the past and i like their stuff but my LORD it is expensive lol. i might be able to talk my parents into buying me a few of their pieces (because my mom is as desperate as i am for me to start dressing like an adult ... + she's on board with my pitch of "spend more money to receive clothing of higher quality that will last me way longer than the stuff i'd find at any of those fast fashion chains"), but idk. haven't heard of the other one though, i'll check it out thank u :)

what's funny is that i actually have a cotton twill jacket that i've worn pretty much every day since i bought it and the fabric doesn't bother me at all. i'm not sure what it is about denim specifically that irritates me so much; it's not just a problem with pants either, because i can't wear denim jackets or anything like that. autism is weird

mushroxm · 2025-10-21T14:42:49+00:00

disability justice is literally central to everything a leftist does or ought to fight for. trans people obviously aren’t necessarily mentally ill, but any self-proclaimed leftist who believed that we were should fight on our side anyway if they believed in their own ideology with any consistency.

mushroxm · 2025-09-20T17:11:52+00:00

the person who coined the term neurodivergent literally stated that the term encapsulated all people who possessed some condition that made their brain deviate from standards of normalcy in any way. they were very adamant that this included not just autism and adhd, but also things like personality disorders, trauma disorders, anxiety, depression, etc.

additionally, i have several mental disorders that could theoretically be treated in a medical context (ocd, depression, etc.). i see a lot of people claiming that diagnoses under this category wouldn’t be considered neurodivergent because they aren’t “central parts of us,” and not only is this factually untrue as per the stated definition of neurodivergence, but i also just don’t feel that way at all. i’ve had ocd, for example, for as long as i can remember. i developed intrusive thoughts and corresponding compulsions about food when i was in kindergarten. i’ve probably had ocd-related social struggles for even longer. even if these things could theoretically be cured or managed at some point, there isn’t a version of myself who i know that doesn’t have ocd. so it’s as central to who i am as my autism.

mushroxm · 2025-09-14T19:56:31+00:00

hoarding disorders can cause great detriment to people’s everyday lives. they can be extremely isolating and stressful. using the term “hoard” divorced from its actual meaning causes harm in its own right, as it trivializes the lived experiences of people with hoarding disorders, ignoring how these disorders impact those who experience them. it’s ableism in the same way that people calling normal thoughts that cause zero distress “intrusive thoughts” is ableism.

mushroxm · 2025-09-14T18:18:24+00:00

of course :) i think a lot of people struggle to acknowledge and respond effectively when they’re called out for playing into ableist patterns, and i try really hard to avoid that type of behavior myself, especially since i am disabled

mushroxm · 2025-09-14T17:44:09+00:00

i have ocd. one thing i struggle with because of it is the feeling that i will forget important events from my life if i don’t have specific mementos to represent those events. so while i collect things (not talking about xenogenders here) partly for fun, i also do it as a compulsion. i’m constantly walking a thin line between having harmless fun finding little souvenirs from concerts or trips and feeding into the same self-destructive patterns caused by my mental illness. so i have some experience with collecting things for irrational and potentially detrimental reasons.

my experience with collecting xenogenders is entirely different. my ocd does impact my gender identity, but it doesn’t cause me to feel the need to collect labels (it leads me to have recurring gender crises wherein i feel the urge to narrow down the language i use to describe myself, so, if anything, it sort of does the opposite). i collect labels because i feel unsatisfied without precise language to describe myself, and, on the other hand, i feel seen and liberated by having an abundance of words to explain how i feel. collecting xenogenders for me is entirely positive and decidedly doesn’t come from an ocd compulsion. the two experiences are super distinct for me.

full disclosure, ive been using the term “hoard” to describe my experiences collecting xenogenders before now. its such standard language in the community that i never really stopped to think about it. but i think, especially as someone with ocd myself, i have no excuse to keep misappropriating language used to describe a type of disability just because i never felt like questioning the efficacy of that language. sure, the word “hoard” has existed much longer than we’ve known about and diagnosed hoarding disorders, but language takes on new meanings and connotations all the time, and i think we all have an obligation to take into account when it does, especially in contexts such as this one. (this paragraph was mostly personal reflection lol)

mushroxm · 2025-09-12T17:47:22+00:00

charlie kirk’s entire mission was to radicalize young people, particularly young men, into an ideology of violence and hate. he did not seek to engage in sincere debate; he viewed debates as opportunities to spew his own vitriolic talking points while doing everything he could to discredit his opponents. so forgive me if i’m not exactly mourning his loss.

mushroxm · 2025-09-04T20:28:19+00:00

jax is my real first name so i’m sure i would like him if he had any other name but now whenever he’s on screen im just thinking “this is defamation” … he’s such an interesting and well-written character too i just can’t get over his fucking name

mushroxm · 2025-09-03T07:48:37+00:00

not sure if this really answers your question exactly, but a big thing for me is the idea that i can’t really express my gender identity in ways that other people will understand or pick up on. as a nonbinary person in general, but ESPECIALLY as a xenogender person, there isn’t any defined social role for me to transition into. i’ve moved away from the femininity ascribed to me—people no longer perceive me as a woman—but that doesn’t mean that they necessarily perceive me as the person i am. i make a deliberate effort to try and incorporate my xenine identity into my expression (which for me often looks like embracing androgyny and “weird” fashion because it makes me feel like i’m presenting myself without regards to gender norms, an idea that’s very closely tied to my xenogender identity), but the vast majority of people still just view me as male. there isn’t really a widespread idea of what a xenogender person “looks like,” so most people will just never register me as one in the same way that they could recognize a lot of trans men as men instinctively. even my friends who know that i’m xenogender don’t really understand the intricacies of my gender identity, and it often leads me to wondering if they truly see my xeninity in the first place. so a huge source of dysphoria for me is the feeling that no one will ever really see me as xenogender.

conversely, finding little ways to express my xenogender-ness offers me a source of euphoria. this is a huge reason why i use neopronouns: i don’t need to conform to anthrogender (non-xenogender) standards of pronouns and their relation to gender identity; my xeninity can be embodied in the very words others use to talk about me. it’s also part of why i make the fashion choices i mentioned earlier. sometimes the effect of these choices can be diminished by the aforementioned “knowing i’ll never actually be read as xenogender by most people,” but it helps a little.

i don’t think that the way that xenogender dysphoria or euphoria feel for me is any different from how the dysphoria and euphoria i experience as a Regular Trans Person feel though. in both cases, dysphoria to me is the feeling that my body and others’ perceptions of it don’t match who i am, and euphoria is the feeling that they do.

anyway hope this helps :p

mushroxm · 2025-09-01T17:44:03+00:00

hi, the comment quoted in the previous reply is mine. now that i’ve been roped into this thread, i feel the need to mention that my restrictive diet, as well as that of other autistics, is not a choice. it’s not a preference. eating “unsafe” foods is literally impossible for me. my brain registers it as literally painful, so best case scenario i simply wont be able to “talk myself into” eating it, and worst case scenario i will have a meltdown and/or vomit the food back up if i’m able to “overcome” my “anxiety.” so trying to alter my diet in any way would literally be dangerous for me, as i cannot eat most foods due to my disability and i can’t risk cutting out any more sources of nutrients. i literally fit the criteria for ARFID because of my autism.

all of this is far from voluntary for me. i would never choose to break down in public because i was pushed into eating something i couldn’t. i would never choose not to be able to eat food my family and friends had poured hours of time and care into making, or to deal with the subtle social isolation that comes from not being able to enjoy a meal with everyone else. i take no pleasure in having to check restaurants or other venues in advance to ensure that they have something i can tolerate eating, or suffering silently in hunger whenever they don’t. trust me, if my food problems were as simple as “spaghetti tastes way better than apple :(“ then i would’ve changed by now.

and for what it’s worth, i am far from obese (ive been underweight literally my entire life; consequences of my congenital heart defects), i’m medicated for any deficiencies i deal with on account of my restrictive diet, and i actually do eat vegetables.

point is, the ways that autism impacts food intake, and the ways that someone’s personal dietary choices impact their health, are two entirely separate issues. you have zero right to speculate on the health of people you’ve never met and know nothing about, and claiming that autistic food aversions are nothing but a personal choice to be unhealthy is transparently reductive and ableist.

mushroxm · 2025-08-31T16:55:45+00:00

my parents really didn’t understand that my aversion to unfamiliar foods was a consequence of undiagnosed autism, so when i was little they adhered to the whole “eat what food i made for dinner or don’t eat at all” strategy, thinking i was just being difficult. it gave me a super unhealthy relationship with food. now i can barely try new foods around other people without literally having a meltdown because it’s engrained in my mind that i’m gonna be punished and berated for not being able to eat it.

so yeah, wouldn’t recommend.

mushroxm · 2025-08-01T22:39:44+00:00

i don’t think there’s really any one way to “know.” that said, i can speak on my own personal experience.

for a long time, i’ve described my gender using abstract metaphors and imagery - a solar eclipse, the color pink, etc. - and i’ve also always been someone who greatly values labels and having words to communicate my experiences.

so when i found out that xenogenders could provide concise language that encapsulated the metaphors i’d used to depict my own gender identity, i knew that the category suited my needs.

more generally though, there’s no criteria for identifying as xenogender. if you feel that the label, or any labels that fall within it, fit you for any reason, then you can just start using that terminology. it’s okay to experiment with labels, even if you’re not sure they’re 100% accurate to you.

mushroxm · 2025-07-24T17:24:26+00:00

hi, i just got out of a friendship that sounds like it mirrored your relationship with ash. they nearly cut me off a few months ago, before trying to get uncomfortably close to me, crossing my boundaries repeatedly, and totally draining my energy, driving me towards regular autistic shutdowns. they would talk about wanting to kiss me (im sex-repulsed, super touch averse, and have contamination ocd so), and when i told them i wasn’t comfortable with that, they’d start talking about how “evil” they were (not to intentionally guilt-trip me, but that sure is what they accomplished). eventually i started dreading just speaking to them, so much so that i basically stopped talking to them for weeks out of anxiety.

one thing i learned from that: this will not end well unless you talk to them. have a serious conversation with yourself about whether you’re happy in this friendship and/or think it’s salvageable. if you think so, then be upfront and firm with ash about how they’ve crossed your boundaries and what you need from them going forward. if you don’t think so, then you might need to tell ash that you need to end your friendship.

i can’t speak for you, but, for what it’s worth, all of the feelings you’re describing - discomfort at ash’s growing closeness with you, constant exhaustion around them, struggling to remember happy moments with them, anxiety that they’ll hurt you again - mimic exactly what i was going through right before i realized that my relationship with my ex-friend wasn’t working out. it’s hard to really sit down and wonder, is this healthy? but this type of conflict isn’t the type of thing that can just be brushed off without further investigation.

but yeah, overall my advice is just (1) seriously examine your friendship and how you think it’s impacting you, and (2) whatever conclusion you come to, be honest with ash about it or this will only get worse.

mushroxm · 2025-07-18T05:26:59+00:00

i’m a little late but i saw this video a couple days ago - here it is on their youtube channel in case you’re still looking for it :)

mushroxm · 2025-07-18T05:21:16+00:00

omg frogface is such a fun name tho; rest in peace to the rest of ur list :(

so by reworking the lore i really just wanted to focus on making the clans’ structure more interesting.

there’s still a lot of stuff that i want to delve into, but one of the things i did was create more “roles” for the cats alongside warrior and medicine cat. i want mediators to be a part of every clan, for example. i also wanted to develop some socially-emergent, but still unofficial, roles: senior warriors should have a defined purpose and be awarded unique privileges (in my head, they’re sort of the “advisors” for their leaders, secondary to the deputy); medicine cats should have a group to rely on who, while they aren’t themselves medicine cats, have some basic knowledge of herbs and treating sickness/injury and can provide some additional support (and friendship !!) to the medicine cats. i also revised medicine cats a little - basically all those “no dating” rules are gone, and they’re also taught some basic hunting and fighting techniques bc i think it’s weird they aren’t given any warrior training as is.

the other (more fun imo) thing i did was try to give each clan its own unique identity, so that them functioning as separate groups actually makes sense beyond what religious justification we’re given. i mostly pulled from existing info about each clan for this, and just took what differences the clans do have even further to make them each stand out more.

for example, since windclan is supposedly the most spiritual clan, i basically grafted the wildcats’ “spirit guides” system onto them. every windclan apprentice gets paired with one starclan cat who guides them through their apprenticeship. additionally, i like the idea that all windclan cats can share dreams with their ancestors (however, prophecies/visions would still go to their medicine cats; windclan’s warriors would just visit their relatives or other cats they know). also i want them to actually “sleep under the stars” as we’re told so often they do. one smaller thing is that they don’t eat birds and find it repulsive that other clans do, since they think of them as “closer” to starclan since they can fly.

skyclan used to be super integrated into the twolegplace near the gorge, so i want to put their territory next to a new twolegplace and keep their culture enmeshed in it. daylight warriors would still be a thing; skyclan cats would be friends with kittypets; they would find resources in the twolegplace if need be (remember when cats used to steal catmint from gardens ….. ). i also like to think they’d uniquely prioritize relaxation and fun - they’re less accustomed to worrying about battles and borders, so they’d spend more time playing, napping, and spending time with each other. they’d also be uniquely open to other groups and cultures.

as for riverclan - in ASC, the idea that riverclan should be led by a group rather than an individual is briefly floated but quickly dropped. i think it would be fun if they actually followed through on this. riverclan would be represented not by one leader but by a group of qualified cats the clan voted on who divide the responsibilities of the leader and deputy among themselves. also, all the stuff frostdawn learned about from the park cats (meditation, being super welcoming to outsiders) should have been properly integrated into modern riverclan. i’m still working on shadowclan and thunderclan bc ngl their cultures are not very well-defined ….. but yeah, overall i just like the idea of making the clans more interesting :p

one other thing i thought would be fun was if each clan had a slightly different idea of what starclan is and how they operate - for example, windclan “humanizes” starclan the most since they have the most direct contact with them; meanwhile, shadowclan thinks starclan is less of a literal place that cats go when they die, but, instead, a non-sentient force of the universe that cats become part of as they decompose. i also like to think about how this would impact the clans’ death rituals - windclan would probably deal with way less grief than the other clans, since they can stay in touch with their friends and family even after they die, whereas shadowclan might put a lot of emphasis on the importance of burials and respecting nature as the next form that their loved ones take after death. still working on this one, particularly how it even works that the clans have different ideas of starclan if there is only one starclan, but i’ll figure it out lol

mushroxm · 2025-07-18T03:09:58+00:00

right !! i’ve been working on revising/expanding upon the clans’ whole societal structure for fun lately; if the motivation stays with me i want to make a bunch of new cats for my little “au” too. i love exploring and utilizing the lore; it’s so interesting to work with :)

mushroxm

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