i always think people will care if they know me

like, if you’re a cis person and your loved one is trans and you’re not immediately hostile about it, i’d assume that would mean you’ve taken at least some amount of time to do research, learn a little, support your family/friend/whatever. as human beings i understand that it’s hard to have empathy for everyone. you physically cannot feel emotional about every single famine, war, or case of discrimination individually or your brain will overload and you’ll lose your mind. we all have selective empathy whether we want to believe it or not. but if you care about people in a minority group you’re already incentivized to learn about that group and support them.

but then again, there are plenty of terrible men with mothers, sisters, daughters, so i should’ve realized this unfortunately isn’t how it works in the real world. it’s not the way their empathy functions, or the fact that they don’t personally know any of us. they just genuinely, simply, do not care at all or do not like us whatsoever. in my entire life i’ve gotten one or two responses to my transness that differ from that — everyone else acts this way even after they begin to care about me and we have a real relationship. it makes me question everything because my transness is only one part of me but it’s also a GIANT part, right? and if you don’t even see me as a man or you try but you don’t fully support trans rights, do you even really like me, or are you pretending? i’ve been around very progressive socialists even who behind my back have said they “don’t understand the whole trans thing” but will use my pronouns and name in front of me even though they think it’s all fake. now i feel weird around that friend and i don’t want to talk to her much anymore. the people you would sometimes least expect are so two-faced when you’re trans and you only find out if you have REAL friends who tell you what they’ve said when you’re not around.

anyway. i say all of this because i had a conversation recently with some family members who i was starting to grow closer to. they always talk about being accepting even though they struggle with my name (they use a shortened nickname-compromise between my deadname and chosen name. even though i’ve explained there’s an aspect of degendering to it and i’d really like to hear my real first name once in a while. i let them say it because they’re just not going to change tbh) and pronouns and they don’t actually see me as a man. whatever that’s fine if you’re not actively thinking i should die we can still hang out and have fun. when you don’t get the bare minimum often you learn to appreciate it a lot more or you live drowning in disappointment lmao

the talk was about this trans teacher who started working in a county in our state. she made the news because a ton of parents, well over half the size of a class, tried to pull their kids out and made a big deal about how they didn’t want their kids to see people like me in public. they brought it up, not me, i don’t talk about gender until someone else does and even then i’ll usually try to avoid the topic. but i told them that was super depressing to hear and makes me sad about my chances of ever working my dream job as a public/city librarian. they said well just don’t work in a school around kids and you’re good. i said i don’t even want to work in a school but i want to be able to set up programs in my library for all ages, including children — and don’t you think it’s discriminatory as fuck that children aren’t taught people like me exist until they’re “old enough to understand” even though scientifically gender identity develops between the ages of 2-5, isn’t it messed up that my body has been permanently altered in a way that will forever harm me by a puberty i didn’t want because i had no clue there were other options, because everyone tried to hide the existence of my community from me so much? and they care a lot about children, so i said what about kids like me who just don’t get to find out, who just have to suffer and live abnormal, painful lives because they’re kept in the dark? and even if a child is cis, isn’t it weird to insist in their education that an entire section of the population just doesn’t exist? it’s like not being taught about a certain race. and queer history, specifically trans history (black socialist trans women are responsible for every single right i enjoy as a modern queer american) is such a huge part of AMERICAN history, why would we want to teach children about the important milestones in civil rights movements but not queer liberation ones (not that public education on the former is great whatsoever, or goes without public conflict/dispute, but it’s at least present in the curriculums at all)?

all of this, a whole probably half hour to hour of talking, and they still walked away with the opinion that people like me just don’t have the right to be in some public places. in some states this whole “protect the kids” thing is being used to outlaw my presentation outdoors at all if a child can visibly see me. they don’t understand how deep it goes but this is a plot to keep us in the closet, scared, or in prison, or just segregated forever. they’re all pretty progressive too about every other issue, it sucks that my capacity to live a normal life is the point where people start to think ok this woke shit has gone far enough even if they’re also “woke.” whatever i’m not slightly bitter

it’s just like. you see me in front of you worrying about all of this, communicating it, fearing for my future and for the fates of innocent children. and you’re still, despite our history and friendliness, not supportive of trans rights. it makes me feel like i’m living in a nightmarish crazy bizarro land where everything is written by an absurdist on coke. get me out of here. thrashing at the walls of my earthly cage

saw a post the other day too where somebody on reddit was complaining about a low-effort post that said “i love trans rights.” they were all like fuck this virtue signaling nonsense everyone agrees this is a basic opinion you’re not morally superior or special. it’s wild because the person wasn’t trying to seem superior or anything, they just made a sweet little supportive post. and if you think being supportive of trans rights is a common opinion, even/especially on social media, you’re either misinformed by conservatives who think we’re malevolently taking over the world and establishing a New Trans Order or you live in a happy echo chamber where that actually is a normal opinion. if the latter is the case i’m happy for you. but most of us don’t get the happy go lucky echo chamber where everyone loves us and supporting us is “virtue signaling.” 100% bet you the OP complaining about it was cis too. i’m just so tired of everything man idk