[sassyonsunday]

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In retrospect this was sort of mean of you to say:

> It doesn't help either when males who opt-in to this beauty standard

Do you go around telling girls they have to try to look less pleasing to men and more pleasing to your own sensibilities? Aren't you just taking the place of the "male gaze" at that point and replacing it with your own gaze and your own demands to be satisfied? I like looking a certain way. I also like when it gets me attention from men. I have the same motivations as the majority of heterosexual women and I'm trying to live a fulfilling life. You don't need to make it all about you.

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I only felt the need to point it out to drive home the point that there is/was no winning move as a trans person. I feel the need to do this because I've met many people in my life who've tried to tell me things like that it 's obvious that I was "born to be a woman" so I shouldn't worry about transphobia because they think transphobia is only directed at people who look masculine but wear feminine clothes or sex pests who change their pronouns to try to seem less creepy. It's led me to believe that this might be a common position among people who are anti-trans. They think: "these bathroom policies will only hurt the bad ones who don't pass, the passable ones will be fine" as a way of soothing their conscience.

[gertrui]

> Aren't you just taking the place of the "male gaze" at that point and replacing it with your own gaze and your own demands to be satisfied?

No, women should be free to present however they please, that's my point. We shouldn't feel pressure to conform to imposed ideals of femininity, to be praised for it or knocked for not complying.

[sassyonsunday]

> No, women should be free to present however they please, that's my point. We shouldn't feel pressure to conform to imposed ideals of femininity, to be praised for it or knocked for not complying.

I agree with you 100%. When I was in middle school I wanted to look very neat and proper and it caused me problems with boys. I can remember getting picked on for looking too... well groomed? I feel like the opposite pressure exists for people assigned female. I was born with the default option of not needing to look "pretty" in the sense of enhancing my feminine features with clothes and makeup but I enjoy life a lot more when I'm allowed to. I feel for people who have the same problem but from another direction.

[8zah6q7]

Transphobes don't want trans women to be masculine, androgynous, or feminine. When they're honest, they just don't want trans women to be.