“
i am water
soft enough
to offer life
tough enough
to drown it away
”
”
Rupi Kaur (milk and honey)
“
Being gay or straight,” says Elizabeth, “is about who you want to go to
bed with. Being trans—or cis—is about who you want to go to bed as.
”
”
Jodi Picoult (Mad Honey)
“
That's enough cis men for today. I would like to cancel all cis men and go take a nap.
”
”
H.E. Edgmon (The Witch King (Witch King #1))
“
I marvel that I was given credit for my idea. Goes to show how low the bar is for cis dudes in STEM, doesn’t it?
”
”
Ali Hazelwood (Love on the Brain)
“
Binary
There are two kinds of people in the world.
Male and Female.
Gay and Straight.
Black and White.
Normal and Weird.
Cis and Trans.
There are two kinds of people in the world.
Saints and Sinners.
Victims and Villains.
Cruel and Kind.
Guilty and Innocent.
There are two kinds of people in the world.
Just two.
Just two.
Only two.
”
”
Dashka Slater (The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime That Changed Their Lives)
“
I've felt objectified and limited by my position in the world as a so-called sex symbol. I've capitalized on my body within the confines of a cis-hetero, capitalist, patriarchal world, one in which beauty and sex appeal are valued solely through the satisfaction of the male gaze.
”
”
Emily Ratajkowski (My Body)
“
It’s like every identity I have . . . the more different I am from everyone else . . . the less interested people are. The less . . . lovable I feel, I guess. The love interests in books, or in movies or TV shows, are always white, cis, straight, blond hair, blue eyes. Chris Evans, Jennifer Lawrence. It becomes a little hard, I guess, to convince myself I deserve the kind of love you see on movie screens.
”
”
Kacen Callender (Felix Ever After)
“
Ask anyone who’s transgender. They’ll tell you they’re trapped in the wrong body. But me, I’m trapped in the wrong body because I’m trapped in a body. All bodies are the wrong body.
”
”
Tim Cannon
“
Wendy knew how to deal with looking cis and she knew how to deal with looking trans, but she would never, ever figure out how to be both. How the world could treat her so differently—within days or hours.
”
”
Casey Plett (Little Fish)
“
Somewhere, at some point in time, some random cis person who's probably dead now decided all trans people were stuck in the wrong body, and that became law. But I'm not a boy trapped in a girl's body. My body is a boy's body because I'm a boy and it's mine. My body isn't wrong. Okay?
”
”
H.E. Edgmon (The Witch King (Witch King #1))
“
And while it is okay to acknowledge that all kinds of women, whether white, Black, Indigenous, Latina, Asian, cis, gender nonconforming, trans, queer, bi, or straight might have different experiences, it's not cool to act as though transwomen are in some entirely separate category from the more general category of woman. That is something that feminism needs to be clear on - that it isn't feminism if all women's concerns, particularly the most marginalized women's concerns, aren't taken seriously.
”
”
Brittney Cooper (Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower)
“
paint
your nails
black,
rub glitter
on your
face,
take
so many
selfies,
compliment
all your
sisters
(no,
not just
your cis-ters),
& hex
any
man
who
catcalls
you.
- a note from me scrawled on your mirror.
”
”
Amanda Lovelace (The Witch Doesn't Burn in This One (Women Are Some Kind of Magic, #2))
“
She’s suggested, in the way that naive cis people do, with a hint of self-congratulation at their own broad-mindedness, that it seems like trans people are starting to be everywhere, that maybe gender doesn’t matter that much. In his reply, he can’t help but let loose an old defensiveness on this topic. “I think it’s the opposite,” he says too sharply. “The whole reason transsexuals transition is because gender matters so incredibly much.
”
”
Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
“
So one of my responsibilities, as a white, cis-gendered woman, is to learn how to be a traitor to the 'joys' of patriarchal culture that I experience, however unconsciously.
”
”
Erin Wunker (Notes From a Feminist Killjoy: Essays on Everyday Life)
“
Cis men take up so much space,
”
”
Morgan Rogers (Honey Girl: A Novel)
“
The misconception of equating ease of life with “passing” must be dismantled in our culture. The work begins by each of us recognizing that cis people are not more valuable or legitimate and that trans people who blend as cis are not more valuable or legitimate. We must recognize, discuss, and dismantle this hierarchy that polices bodies and values certain ones over others. We must recognize that we all have different experiences of oppression and privilege, and I recognize that my ability to blend as cis is one conditional privilege that does not negate the fact that I experience the world as a trans woman (with my own fears, insecurities, and body-image issues) no matter how attractive people may think I am.
”
”
Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
“
The moms I knew when I was little didn't have to prove that it was okay to want a child. Sure, a lot of women I know wonder if they do want a child, but not why. It's assumed why. The question cis women get asked is: Why don't you want kids? And then they have to justify that. If I had been born cis, I would never even have had to answer these questions. I wouldn't have had to prove that I deserve my models of womanhood. But I'm not cis. I'm trans. And so until the day that I am a mother, I'm constantly going to have to prove that I deserve to be one. That it's not unnatural or twisted that I want a child's love. Why do I want to be a mother? After all those beautiful women I grew up with, the ones who chaperoned my classes on field trips, or made me lunch when I was at their house, or sewed costumes for all the little girls that I ice skated with — and you too, Katrina, for that matter — have to explain their feelings about motherhood, then, I'll explain mine. And do you know what I'll say? Ditto.
”
”
Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
“
You are never too young to learn that the whole world is largely run and designed for straight, white, cis men, or 'the patriarchy'.
”
”
Juno Dawson (This Book Is Gay)
“
Being gay or straight,” says Elizabeth, “is about who you want to go to bed with. Being trans—or cis—is about who you want to go to bed as.
”
”
Jodi Picoult (Mad Honey)
“
Cis heterosexual people rarely have to be in a situation in which they are the only cisgender heterosexual person in the room.
”
”
Julie Sondra Decker (The Invisible Orientation: An Introduction to Asexuality)
“
For a marginalized writer writing to a normative audience, the writer has to be wary of normative craft. Much of what we learn about craft (about the expectations we are supposed to consider) implies a straight, white, cis, able (etc.) audience. It is easy to forget who we are writing for if we do not keep it a conscious consideration, and the default is not universal, but privileged.
”
”
Matthew Salesses (Craft in the Real World: Rethinking Fiction Writing and Workshopping)
“
I use the word misandry to mean a negative feeling towards the entirety of the male sex. This negative feeling might be understood as a spectrum that ranges from simple suspicion to outright loathing, and is generally expressed by an impatience towards men and a rejection of their presence in women’s spaces. And when I say ‘the male sex’ I mean all the cis men who have been socialised as such, and who enjoy their male privilege without ever calling it into question, or not enough (yes, misandry is a demanding and elitist concept).
”
”
Pauline Harmange (I Hate Men)
“
Maturity is a social construct upheld by the patriarchy with an incredibly narrow, white, cis, neurotypical scope to enforce conformity and then implemented as an othering and shaming tactic for anyone that steps outside of that paradigm.
”
”
Mazey Eddings (The Plus One (A Brush With Love, #3))
“
Reese spent a lifetime observing cis women conform their genders through male violence. Watch any movie on the Lifetime channel. Go to any schoolyard. Or just watch your local heterosexuals drinking in a bar. Hear women define themselves through pain, or rage against the assumption that they do, which still places pain front and center. Hear the strange sense of satisfaction when they talk about the men who have hurt them—the unspoken subtext of it being because I am a woman. The quiet dignity of saying ow anytime a man gets a little rough—asserting that you are a woman, and thus delicate and capable of sustaining harm.
”
”
Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
“
Cis people always have timelines.
I mean, I know not every cis person has that life, but—what are the cis people in my life doing? What are they doing in your life? Versus what the trans people in your life are doing? On a macro level. Ask yourself that.
”
”
Casey Plett (Little Fish)
“
But like so many neurodivergent women and girls (and people of color and, really, anyone but cis white men), I internalized the criticisms and carried around a lot of shame while I exhausted myself trying to fit into a world that was not built for my brain.
”
”
Emily Farris (I'll Just Be Five More Minutes: And Other Tales from My ADHD Brain)
“
Notre angoisse existentielle sexuelle, notamment dans le cadre du couple cis-hétérosexuel, est le résultat des violences que nous avons vécues, et de structures qui permettent d'en faire un terrain privilégié des dominations, peu importe à quel point nous sommes "libéré·es" ou non.
”
”
Tal Madesta (Désirer à tout prix)
“
The work begins by each of us recognizing that cis people are not more valuable or legitimate and that trans people who blend as cis are not more valuable or legitimate. We must recognize, discuss, and dismantle this hierarchy that polices bodies and values certain ones over others.
”
”
Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
“
Words change depending on who speaks them; there is no cure. The answer isn't just to introduce new words (boi, cis-gendered, andro-fag) and then set out to reify their meanings (though obviously there is power and pragmatism here). One must also become alert to the multitude of possible uses, possible contexts, the wings with which each word can fly. Like when you whisper, You're just a hold, letting me fill you up. Like when I say husband.
”
”
Maggie Nelson
“
Ah yes, the meritocracy. Isn't it amazing how so many of the 'best people for the job' always happen to be white, cis-het, middle-class men? It couldn't be that structural inequality and hierarchal privilege allows for such people to succeed by making their path to power smoother and more accessible than anyone's else's.
”
”
Clementine Ford (Boys Will Be Boys: Power, Patriarchy and the Toxic Bonds of Mateship)
“
-his right to pee safely should trump cis people trying to impress colleges.
”
”
Isaac Fitzsimons (The Passing Playbook)
“
The Latin root of the word decision—cis or cid—literally means “to cut” or “to kill.
”
”
Greg McKeown (Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less)
“
You're a cis-het dude-bro on strike for better conditions.
”
”
Nell Zink (Nicotine)
“
I always thought of sex as the thing straight cis people do to make babies, but Marius leaving kisses on my thighs feels like sex, too.
”
”
Camryn Garrett (Off the Record)
“
Trans folks are often expected to embrace a narrative that makes cis people comfortable--something simple and linear that upholds their binary understanding of gender transition.
”
”
Zena Sharman (The Remedy: Queer and Trans Voices on Health and Health Care)
“
Being trans—or cis—is about who you want to go to bed as.
”
”
Jodi Picoult (Mad Honey)
“
We expect cis women to be harmed, so we focus our energy on warning them to avoid danger.
”
”
Mikki Kendall (Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot)
“
despite the all-encompassing acronym. Though trans youth seek community with cis gay, lesbian, bisexual, or queer teens, they may have to educate their cis peers about what it means to
”
”
Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
“
Quando pararmos de acreditar que a pior coisa a ser feita contra nós é alguém ter direito à própria sexualidade, conseguiremos perceber o que, de fato, é privilégio cis-hétero masculino.
”
”
Geni Nuñez (Descolonizando afetos: Experimentações sobre outras formas de amar)
“
I’m doing this because society wants sex to be straight, cis-gendered, married, monogamous, private, not-for-hire, completely vanilla and all about making babies. And I think that’s bullshit.
”
”
Ava Crawford, Without A Thought
“
I know trans people are supposed to get to be trans no matter how they look or present. This is why the pronouns ritual is supposed to be important, to let you introduce yourself without anyone's assumption interfering with your wish. But I also know that hearing someone's pronouns doesn't make a cis person witness their gender. And this is part of the trauma. As Cyrus told me so long ago, gender is constituted in part by what's reflected back to you, and you don't get to instantiate the exact reflection you want just by saying your pronouns. That's why I'm having my face cut open.
”
”
Hannah Baer (trans girl suicide museum)
“
Yes, it is important for women to work together against gender oppression. But which women? Which forms of gender oppression? After all, cis women can and do oppress trans women, white women have the institutional and social power to oppress women of color, able-bodied women can oppress people with disabilities, and so on. Oppression of women isn’t just an external force; it happens between groups of women as well.
”
”
Mikki Kendall (Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot)
“
In one LiveJournal group, an intense Buffy the Vampire Slayer devotee illustrated her feelings thus, by caption-parodying that scene where Spike yells at Angel and Buffy: You’re not cis. You’ll never be cis. You’ll be trans ’til it kills you. You’ll fight, and you’ll shag, and you’ll hate yourself ’til it makes you quiver, but you’ll never be cis. Transgenderism isn’t brains, children, it’s blood! Blood screaming inside you to work its will!
”
”
Casey Plett (A Dream of a Woman)
“
The new political figure known as the cis woman really only has one task: to come in second place. This is a task that all cis women must approach with the utmost seriousness and they must understand that not even feminism is for them.
”
”
Kajsa Ekis Ekman (On the Meaning of Sex: Thoughts about the New Definition of Woman)
“
Feministing writer Jos Truitt puts it, “trans women are disrespected and treated terribly when they don’t pass, but if they do pass they’re called out for upholding the gender binary and cis standards of beauty. It is an impossible bind.”13
”
”
Anne Helen Petersen (Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud: The Rise and Reign of the Unruly Woman)
“
all tax-paying citizens support the library. That includes citizens of different ethnicities and economic backgrounds, LGBTQIA+ citizens, and citizens who hold different religious beliefs. Not just the wealthy, white, straight, Christian, cis-gendered citizens.
”
”
William Ottens (Librarian Tales: Funny, Strange, and Inspiring Dispatches from the Stacks)
“
That’s a good starting point for understanding. I know that many cis people have questions, and also are aware that it may not be their place to ask those questions. I hope that Lily’s journey can be educational—but more important, I hope it inspires compassion.
”
”
Jodi Picoult (Mad Honey)
“
The women who looked at each other in a way Beth didn’t understand, a way sealed forever within the cold and rigid bounds of cisness but which nonetheless told her without room for doubt that they couldn’t leave too soon. That was what scared her. The women who stayed silent.
”
”
Gretchen Felker-Martin (Manhunt)
“
When disclosure occurs for a trans woman, whether by choice or by another person, she is often accused of deception because, as the widely accepted misconception goes, trans women are not 'real' women (meaning cis women); therefore, the behavior (whether rejection, verbal abuse, or sever violence) is warranted. The violence that trans women face at the hands of heterosexual cis men can go unchecked and uncharted because society blames trans women for the brutality they face. Similar to arguments around rape, the argument goes that 'she brought it upon herself.
”
”
Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
“
We must commit to pulling our brothers and sisters out of the river and also commit to going upstream to identify, confront, and hold accountable those who are pushing them in. We help parents bury their babies who were victims of gun violence. And we go upstream to fight the gun manufacturers and politicians who profit from their children’s deaths. We step into the gap to sustain moms who are raising families with imprisoned dads. And we go upstream to dismantle the injustice of mass incarceration. We fund recovery programs for those suffering from opioid addiction. And we go upstream to rail against the system that enables Big Pharma and corrupt doctors to get richer every time another kid gets hooked. We provide shelter and mentoring for LGBTQ homeless kids. And we go upstream to renounce the religious-based bigotry, family rejection, and homophobic policies that make LGBTQ kids more than twice as likely as their straight or cis-gender peers to experience homelessness. We help struggling veterans get the PTSD treatment they need and deserve, and we go upstream to confront the military-industrial complex, which is so zealous to send our soldiers to war and so willing to abandon them when they return.
”
”
Glennon Doyle (Untamed: Stop Pleasing, Start Living)
“
They [heterosexual cis women] are accepted in the straight mainstream way more readily than I [trans woman] will ever be. But they are marginalized in their day-to-day lives because they are feminine. To argue that they are reinforcing the binary, or the patriarchy or the hegemonic gender system, because they are conventional feminine (as opposed to subversively feminine) essentially implies that they are enabling their own oppression. This is just another variation of the claim that rapists make when they insinuate that the woman in question was 'asking for it' because of what she was wearing or how she behaved.
”
”
Julia Serano (Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive)
“
Mr. Harris kept glancing up and down Omar’s body, lingering around his chest and his groin. At first, Omar pretended not to notice. It was a compulsive kind of looking, one that cis people indulged in when they believed they could do it without being seen, though it was so common to catch them looking that their lack of shame was obvious.
”
”
Zeyn Joukhadar (Kink: Stories)
“
Welcoming people [into the trans community] who otherwise might have been able to get by in a cis identity weakens the ideology of cisness, not the ideology of transness.
It’s saying, “we can do things for these people that you cannot because of your narrow ideas of gender.” It’s saying, “these are our people to cherish, not your people to shame.
”
”
bramblepatch
“
When you’ve learned to dissociate defensively around cis people, and you spend all of your time among them, and when they frequently make it clear that you are right not to feel safe around them, you can forget that it is even possible to let your guard down. That you don’t necessarily have to be alone to feel safe. That it is even possible to feel safe.
”
”
Imogen Binnie (Nevada: A Novel)
“
these glaring disparities, about how those with the most access within the movement set the agenda, contribute to the skewed media portrait, and overwhelmingly fail at funneling resources to those most marginalized. My awakening pushed me to be more vocal about these issues, prompting uncomfortable but necessary conversations about the movement privileging middle- and upper-class cis gay and lesbian rights over the daily access issues plaguing low-income queer and trans youth and LGBT people of color, communities that carry interlocking identities that are not mutually exclusive, that make them all the more vulnerable to poverty, homelessness, unemployment, HIV/AIDs, hyper-criminalization, violence, and so much more.
”
”
Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
“
A straight, cis, able-bodied white man is the only person on this planet who can travel almost anywhere (and, as the famous Louis CK bit goes, to almost any time in history), unless they’re literally dropping into a war zone, and feel fairly comfortable and safe (and, often, in charge). To the rest of us, horrors aren’t a thought experiment to be mined—they’re horrors. Bad
”
”
Lindy West (Shrill: Notes from a Loud Woman)
“
This is part of the reason why I feel weird about introducing pronouns when people meet each other in groups; it creates this expectation that each of our genders should be mapped and appropriately invoked at any time, that I'm safer if someone can say exactly what I am, and that I would be harmed if my gender ever confused anyone (or confused me). I'd rather be misgendered than be "accepted" by an establishment that's making some kind of ominous bio/political truth claim about what my transness is. I don't want a trans utopia where there's 200 genders on the census box. I don't want a trans utopia where instagram asks me my pronouns and my sex assigned at birth and then targets marketing at me. I don't want cis people to make money using images of bodies like mine.
”
”
Hannah Baer (trans girl suicide museum)
“
To God, everyone is different but no one is special. You're not special for being straight. Or gay. Or male. Or cis. Or trans. Or asexual. Or married. Or sexually prodigious. Or a virgin. We all have the same God who placed the same image and likeness within us and entrusted us imperfect human beings with such mind blowing things as sexuality and creativity and the ability as individuals to love and be loved as we are.
”
”
Nadia Bolz-Weber (Shameless: A Case for Not Feeling Bad About Feeling Good (About Sex))
“
We live in a culture that teaches us that "men" are the sexual aggressors and pursuers. We also live in a world where most women, trans, and non-binary folks have had negative experiences with men who are hitting on them. These factors tend to lead to some big gender differences for those exploring non-monogamy.
Cisgender men often struggle when they first enter the world of non-monogamy. Within consensual non-monogamy (CNM) communities, most folks who sleep with cis men choose their partners based on referrals and endorsements. As in the world of business, it truly is who you know. Cis men who have been in the communities longer have dated and interacted with more people, and, therefore, have more word of mouth. It is an unfortunate reality that many, especially cisgender women, will not date men they don't already know about through their friends and communities.
So, if you're a cis man exploring CNM, expect that it may take a while before you start seeing the kind of attention that others get. Focus on being kind, respectful, and honest. Respect the needs and boundaries of everyone with whom you interact. Spend lots of time getting to know other people simply as people - especially of your preferred gender to date - and form genuine friendships and connections with them free from any pressure to become sexual.
”
”
Liz Powell (Building Open Relationships: Your hands on guide to swinging, polyamory, and beyond!)
“
trans—whatever that means—hasn’t been some crazy plot of mine to deceive people; it’s just been the fact of living every day. Because I was lucky enough to get on puberty blockers, and do my transition young, people think I’m cis, they think I’m just like they are. Is it really my responsibility to out myself over and over, for the rest of my life? What is it, in the end, that makes me different from cis people at this point in my life—besides history?
”
”
Jodi Picoult (Mad Honey)
“
The Sex and the City Problem wasn't just Reese's problem, it was a problem for all women. But unlike millions of cis women before Reese, no generation of trans women had ever solved it. The problem could be described thusly: When a women begins to notice herself aging, the prospect of making some meaning out of her life grows more and more urgent. A need to save herself, or be saved, as the joys of beauty and youth repeat themselves to lesser and lesser effect.
”
”
Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
“
I WONDER IT HEAVEN GOT A GAY GHETTO
Lorde know(s) cis-hets don`t like me
Baldwin know(s) how white homos exoticize me
I hope heaven got a gay ghetto
Where my QPOC family don`t feel shame
Don`t feel too brown or black
Or femme or phat
Don`t get shame for being free
Don`t get lonely, don`t get sa(i)d
You know, he`s gunna meet white jesus
Shiet, he probably already got a picure
with white jesus
signed and framed on his wall
Mother Mary // Virgin Mother // fucker
”
”
Christopher Soto (Sad Girl Poems)
“
Reese spent a lifetime observing cis women confirm their genders through male violence. Watch any movie on the Lifetime channel. Go to any schoolyard. Or just watch your local heterosexuals drinking in a bar. Hear women define themselves through pain, or rage against the assumption that they do, which still places pain front and. center. Hear the strange sense of satisfaction when they talk about the men who have hurt them - the unspoken subtext of it being 'because I am a woman'.
”
”
Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
“
Doctors are mostly guessing at how drugs affect unborn babies and the women carrying them. This bias isn’t limited to people who have or are planning to get pregnant. Throughout the history of medicine, women have been included in far fewer medical studies, less research and fewer drug trials than men have been. This is true even during studies and drugs for things that solely or mostly affect cis women, like breast and ovarian cancer. It’s absolutely unacceptable. And yet it still continues, to this day.
”
”
Danielle Valentine (Delicate Condition)
“
us run y with endurance the race that is z set before us, 2looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, a who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising b the shame, and c is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Do Not Grow Weary
”
”
Anonymous (Holy Bible: English Standard Version (ESV))
“
The friendship I had with Wendi, though, is not the typical experience for most trans youth. Many are often the only trans person in a school or community, and most likely, when seeking support, they are the only trans person in LGBTQ spaces. To make matters worse, these support spaces often only address sexual orientation rather than a young person’s gender identity, despite the all-encompassing acronym. Though trans youth seek community with cis gay, lesbian, bisexual, or queer teens, they may have to educate their cis peers about what it means to be trans.
”
”
Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
“
But I haven’t forgotten my misplaced anger either, so I also have to remember to shut the fuck up and listen sometimes. Because if I’m this angry as a white, hetero, cis, thin, able-bodied woman (Polly Pocket: Privilege), I can only imagine how angry women at the intersections of other forms of oppression are. Which means I need to connect to a larger community and movement, to let my voice be one of many, to be a voice that sometimes just amplifies other people’s. Turns out this is great, though – because the only thing better than one angry woman is an army of them.
”
”
Anne T. Donahue (Nobody Cares)
“
Affinché sia inattaccabile, il patriarcato deve essere rappresentato come necessario. Se gli uomini cominciassero a partorire o le donne a donare sperma, l'attuale stato delle cose apparirebbe per ciò che realmente è: artificiale e del tutto ingiusto. Il tentativo di separare biologia e identità ha rivelato su quali bugie si fonda il discorso patriarcale, e ha scoperto la sua vulnerabilità, per proteggere la quale ha fatto ciò che fa normalmente per contenere la possibilità d'azione delle donne cis: mettere a tacere con la violenza ogni manifestazione di vita fuori dalla norma.
”
”
Jude Ellison S. Doyle (Dead Blondes and Bad Mothers)
“
In 2015, the writer Alex Blank Millard engaged in her own gender-swap experiment to highlight the misogynist nature of online abuse.
Sick of constantly receiving rape threats from ‘faceless eggs’ online, she changed her Twitter profile photo to that of a white man – but kept the content she posted the same.
When Millard tweeted about rape culture, fat shaming, and systemic oppression as Lady Alex, the standard response was a deluge of rape and death threats, and a bunch of guys calling her fat. When she commented on the same things as Straight- and Cis-Looking White Dude Alex, she was retweeted, favourited, and even cited by Buzzfeed (Millard, 2015).
”
”
Emma A. Jane (Misogyny Online: A Short (and Brutish) History (SAGE Swifts))
“
Adults, whether anti-trans hate groups, trans exclusionary feminists, conservative activists, parents, so-called interested observers, or even allies and advocates, tarry within the dangerously limiting circumstances of a system that continues to assay the value of trans children’s being in terms not of their humanity and personhood but via questions absurd in their abstraction for how they ask us instead to wonder if trans children “prove something” about the biological basis of sex and gender or how identity politics have so injured a cis, white, heteronormative imaginary that cannot fathom the obvious fragility of its claims to universalism in the face of a defiant no.
”
”
Jules Gill-Peterson (Histories of the Transgender Child)
“
The final indication of a crony belief is that nothing important is allowed to ride on it. To show this is true of gender-identity ideology, I offer the following thought experiment. Picture a person who insists transwomen are women in every circumstance. If transwomen commit crimes, they belong in women's prisons; if they play sports, they belong on women's teams. If they are attracted to women, lesbians must regard them as potential sexual partners. Such a person will accept no distinction between sex and gender. Transwomen differ from 'cis women' only in having been mistakenly 'assigned male at birth'. Now, what will our true believer do if they need a gestational surrogate?
”
”
Helen Joyce (Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality)
“
Amy remembered how one of them patiently explained that the term "autogynephilia" only works if you don't think trans women are women. If you do, then you immediately see that the majority of women, cis or trans, are all autogynephiles, and that most men would be autoandrophiles – it's not something special about trans women. Of course women are turned on by being women and men turned on by being men! Watch any porn and the sexuality of everyone in it is actually about their own auto-andro/gyne-philia. Listen to them talk. It's about validating their own gender. [...] And alone on their laptops somewhere: the viewers, turned on to identify with people identifying with their gender.
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Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
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Attempts to narrow the referents of the term woman - which refers to half the world's population - to a politically obsolete elite consisting only of privileged, ignorant, upper-class white women are often made by those who belong to this group themselves, so-called 'white cis women'. This can seem odd - are they not pulling the rug out from under their own feet? On the other hand, it may be a smart move, in that a seemingly self-critical attitude allows them to secure their position, symbolically distancing themselves from their identity. Striking first, they anticipate the critique that could be directed towards them, by being the harshest critic of their own circumstances. Thus they are no longer the 'white cis woman' but the 'critic of white cis women'.
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Kajsa Ekis Ekman (On the Meaning of Sex: Thoughts about the New Definition of Woman)
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I love analogies! Let’s have one.
Imagine that you dearly love, absolutely crave, a particular kind of food. There are some places in town that do this particular cuisine just amazingly. Lots of people who are into this kind of food hold these restaurants in high regard. But let’s say, at every single one of these places, every now and then throughout the meal, at random moments, the waiter comes over and punches any women at the table right in the face. And people of color and/or LGBT folks as well! Now, most of the white straight cis guys who eat there, they have no problem–after all, the waiter isn’t punching them in the face, and the non-white, non-cis, non-straight, non-guys who love this cuisine keep coming back so it can’t be that bad, can it? Hell, half the time the white straight cis guys don’t even see it, because it’s always been like that and it just seems like part of the dining experience. Granted, some white straight cis guys have noticed and will talk about how they don’t like it and they wish it would stop.
Every now and then, you go through a meal without the waiter punching you in the face–they just give you a small slap, or come over and sort of make a feint and then tell you they could have messed you up bad. Which, you know, that’s better, right? Kind of?
Now. Somebody gets the idea to open a restaurant where everything is exactly as delicious as the other places–but the waiters won’t punch you in the face. Not even once, not even a little bit. Women and POC and LGBT and various combinations thereof flock to this place, and praise it to the skies.
And then some white, straight, cis dude–one of the ones who’s on record as publicly disapproving of punching diners in the face, who has expressed the wish that it would stop (maybe even been very indignant on this topic in a blog post or two) says, “Sure, but it’s not anything really important or significant. It’s getting all blown out of proportion. The food is exactly the same! In fact, some of it is awfully retro. You’re just all relieved cause you’re not getting punched in the face, but it’s not really a significant development in this city’s culinary scene. Why couldn’t they have actually advanced the state of food preparation? Huh? Now that would have been worth getting excited about.”
Think about that. Seriously, think. Let me tell you, being able to enjoy my delicious supper without being punched in the face is a pretty serious advancement. And only the folks who don’t get routinely assaulted when they try to eat could think otherwise.
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Ann Leckie
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The U.S. media’s shallow lens dates back to 1952, when Christine Jorgensen became the media’s first “sex change” darling, breaking barriers and setting the tone for how our stories are told. These stories, though vital to culture change and our own sense of recognition, rarely report on the barriers that make it nearly impossible for trans women, specifically those of color and those from low-income communities, to lead thriving lives. They’re tried-and-true transition stories tailored to the cis gaze. What I want people to realize is that “transitioning” is not the end of the journey. Yes, it’s an integral part of revealing who we are to ourselves and the world, but there’s much life afterward. These stories earn us visibility but fail at reporting on what our lives are like beyond our bodies, hormones, surgeries, birth names, and before-and-after photos.
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Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
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ISAIAH 19 An a oracle concerning b Egypt. Behold, the LORD c is riding on a swift cloud and comes to Egypt; and d the idols of Egypt will tremble at his presence, and the heart of the Egyptians will e melt within them. 2 And I will stir up Egyptians against Egyptians, f and they will fight, each against another and each against his neighbor, city against city, kingdom against kingdom;
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Anonymous (Holy Bible: English Standard Version (ESV))
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On August 7, 2013, on the evening of the fifth anniversary of the war, Georgian President Mikheil Saakasvili, in a prerecorded interview on Georgia’s Rustavi-2 TV, told that he had met Putin in Moscow in February 2008 at an informal summit of the CIS. During the summit he told Putin that he was ready to say no to NATO in exchange for Russian help with the reintegration of the two breakaway territories. Saakashvili claimed “that ‘Putin did not even think for a minute” about his proposal. “[Putin] smiled and said, ‘We do not exchange your territories for your geopolitical orientation... And it meant ‘we will chop off your territories anyway.’”
Saakashvili asked him to talk about the growing tensions along the borders with South Ossetia, saying, “It could not be worse than now.” “That’s when he [Putin] looked at me and said: ‘And here you are very wrong. You will see that very soon it will be much, much, much worse.’” [234]
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Marcel H. Van Herpen (Putin's Wars: The Rise of Russia's New Imperialism)
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History determines your hiring policy. Why are tech companies being lectured by media corporations on “diversity”? Is it because those media corporations that are 20-30 points whiter than tech companies actually deeply care about this? Or is it because after the 2009-era collapse of print media revenue, media corporations struggled for a business model, found that certain words drove traffic, and then doubled down on that - boosting their stock price and bashing their competitors in the process?12 After all, if you know a bit more history, you’ll know that the New York Times Company (which originates so many of these jeremiads) is an organization where the controlling Ochs-Sulzberger family literally profited from slavery, blocked women from being publishers, excluded gays from the newsroom for decades, ran a succession process featuring only three cis straight white male cousins, and ended up with a publisher who just happened to be the son of the previous guy.13
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Balaji S. Srinivasan (The Network State: How To Start a New Country)
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When I was younger, I remember taking pride in people’s well-meaning remarks: “You’re so lucky that no one would ever know!” or “You don’t even look like a guy!” or “Wow! You’re prettier than most ‘natural’ women!” They were all backhanded compliments, acknowledging my beauty while also invalidating my identity as a woman. To this day, I’m told in subtle and obvious ways that I am not “real,” meaning that I am not, nor will I ever be, a cis woman; therefore, I am fake.
These thoughts surrounding identity, gender, bodies, and how we view, judge, and objectify all women brings me to the subject of “passing,” a term based on an assumption that trans people are passing as something that we are not. It’s rooted in the idea that we are not really who we say we are, that we are holding a secret, that we are living false lives. Examples of people “passing” in media, whether through race (Imitation of Life and Nella Larsen’s novel Passing), class (Catch Me if You Can and the reality show Joe Millionaire), or gender (Boys Don’t Cry and The Crying Game), are often portrayed as leading a life of tragic duplicity and as deceivers who will be punished harshly by society when their true identity is uncovered. This is no different for trans people who “pass” as their gender or, more accurately, are assumed to be cis or blend in as cis, as if that is the standard or norm. This pervasive thinking frames trans people as illegitimate and unnatural. If a trans woman who knows herself and operates in the world as a woman is seen, perceived, treated, and viewed as a woman, isn’t she just being herself? She isn’t passing ; she is merely being.
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Janet Mock (Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More)
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US trans activist Sam Dylan Finch lists 300+ "Unearned advantages" that cis people benefit from. These include being spared questions on how one has intercourse, being able to move freely around without being stared at, receiving competent healthcare, not being discriminated in the workplace, not being bombarded with articles about how many people of their gender are murdered, being allowed to wear clothes and uniforms which align with ones' gender, not being sexually objectified and potential partners knowing what their genitals look like and what to call them. Sound familiar? Finch has just described what most women go through on a daily basis. Receiving poorer healthcare due to ones' sex, being groped, subjected to sexual violence and inappropriate, probing questions, reading articles about how women are killed by their partners because they are women - this is unfortunately well known territory for us women. The text thus turns the very harassment and injustices the women's movement fought against into undeserved privileges. We should feel pleased that we are allowed to dress in alignment with our gender, despite us having done nothing to deserve it. We should be thankful that we are permitted to wear high heals and veils, since these 'align' with our gender. If we follow this analysis to its logical conclusion, even a girl who is genitally mutilated at nine and married off at twelve is a cis person and thereby privileged - her sexual partners know what they are to call her genitalia: CUNT! Similarly, a homosexual man in Saudi Arabia or Uganda would, according to this interpretation, be considered the 'normal, natural and healthy' - and privileged.
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Kajsa Ekis Ekman (On the Meaning of Sex: Thoughts about the New Definition of Woman)
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At first glance, professionalism tries to convince you it’s a neutral word, merely meant to signify a collection of behaviors, clothing, and norms “appropriate” for the workplace. We just ask that everyone be professional, the cis white men will say, smiles on their faces, as if they’re not asking for much. We try to maintain a professional office environment. But never has a word in the English language been so loaded with racism, sexism, heteronormativity, or trans exclusion. Whenever someone is telling you to “be professional,” they’re really saying, “be more like me.” If you’re black, “being professional” can often mean speaking differently, avoiding black cultural references, or not wearing natural hair. If you’re not American, “being professional” can mean abandoning your cultural dress for Western business clothes. If you’re not Christian, “being professional” can mean potentially removing your hijab to fit in, sitting by while your officemates ignore your need for kosher or halal food, sucking up the fact that your office puts up a giant Christmas tree every year. If you’re low-income or working class, “being professional” can mean spending money you don’t have on work clothes—“dressing nicely” for a job that may not pay enough for you to really afford to do so. If you’re a woman, “being professional” can mean navigating a veritable minefield of double standards. Show some skin, but don’t be a slut. Wear heels, but not too high, and not too low, either. Wear form-fitting clothes, but not too form-fitting. We offer maternity leave, but don’t “interrupt your career” by taking it. And if you’re trans like me, “being professional” can mean putting your identity away unless it conforms to dominant gender norms.
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Jacob Tobia (Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story)
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취약계층 김포출장안마( Ymz44.coM )남양주섹파알바 등록문의카톡-> tubeplus <-대상 문화예술교육, 은퇴자와 노인을 위한 실버문화 프로그램을 확충하며, 다문화가족 등의 문화적 권리보장을 강화한다.
또한 아시아문화중심도시와 경주·전주·공주·부여 등 지역적 특성을 살린 문화도시 조성사업을 지속적으로 추진하고, 여가문화, 여성문화 등 인간과 문화 중심의 지원사업을 수행한다.
둘째, 우리 문화의 보존과 활용, 전략적 세계화를 위해 민족문화자원의 발굴과 현대적 계승·활용, 한글·한식·국악 등 한국 전통문화의 산업화·세계화, 기초예술의 활발한 창작 활동과 장르별 특성화된 육성, 전통예술의 창작 지원 및 문화관광자원화 등을 추진한다. 한류 확산의 전진기지인 해외문화원의 신설 및 기능 강화를 통하여 우리 김포출장안마( Ymz44.coM )남양주섹파알바 등록문의카톡-> tubeplus <-문화의 해외진출 지원체계를 구축하고, 해외시장 정보서비스 강화, 우수 문화콘텐츠의 해외마케팅 지원 확대 및 국내 문화콘텐츠의 해외 저작권 보호 강화를 추진한다. 아울러 각 국가와의 수교기념일을 계기로 한국문화를 적극 홍보하고, 미래 잠재시장 개척 차원에서 성장 잠재력이 큰 중동·중남미·CIS 국가와의 문화교류 활성화 및 문화동반자 사업을 지속적으로 지원해 나갈 계획이다.
기존 공연장에 대한 안전관리와 리모델링을 통한 효율화를 추진할 계획이다. 문화예술 지원사업의 효과성 제고를 위해 기금지원사업에 대한 평가제도를 내실화하고, 단순 기금배분에서 탈피하여 수시공모 및 지원컨설팅 김포출장안마( Ymz44.coM )남양주섹파알바 등록문의카톡-> tubeplus <-제도를 도입해 나간다.
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김포출장안마 Ymz44.coM 남양주섹파알바
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Fraternities represent an almost cult-like white-cis-hetero-patriarchy—a closed chute that exists to isolate the sons of the privileged among their wealthy peers and keep them moving straight into the highest echelons of society. Fraternities are where the one percent systematically consolidate their wealth and learn how to keep the rest of society enslaved.
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Alexandra Sokoloff (Hunger Moon (The Huntress/FBI Thrillers, #5))
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I knew as soon as we heard her say her line, as soon as she jammed it into the conversation, “My partner is trans, FTM, I’m cis female.” She was young enough to state it like a challenge to the middle-aged, hoping someone would ask for clarification and allow her to exercise her superiority over us. She had no idea that your ears drank it in, your mouth tasted it, and your heart claimed it as your own.
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Fiona Ashley (Transformation)
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In every part of their lives, young men need access to conversations about what it means to be a man in ways that are not rooted in power, dominance, and violence. We owe it to ourselves to imagine what a post-patriarchal Black masculinity might look like. And, frankly, until we have that conversation, men will continue to kill Black women (cis and trans). And they will continue to kill each other.
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Brittney Cooper (Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower)
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The Latin root of the word decision – cis or cid – literally means “to cut” or “to kill.
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Greg McKeown (Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less)
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Thanks for not making a big deal out if it,” she says after a while. “About my ‘boundaries.'” “Everyone has them. Are other people not okay with that?” “It depends. Sometimes they don’t mind. Straight cis guys are always the hardest to deal with,” Lily admits, thinking about the time she had to leave someone’s bedroom with her pants down her knees. “That’s
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M. Hollis (The Paths We Choose (Lillac Town #2))
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Four articles containing 6 comparisons with reporting data on a total of 213 722 participants were included in the meta‐analysis of total meat consumption and stroke incidence.15, 24, 25, 26 The estimated RRs and 95% CIs of total meat intake and stroke incidence comparing the highest versus the lowest category is shown in Figure 2. The results suggest that consumption of total meat is significantly associated with a 9% to 28% increased risk of stroke.
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Kyuwoong Kim
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Seong-Ja is an ordinary, happy girl who has high school issues and growing pains just like any other teenage girl, and she should get to be just that: a happy trans girl with a normal life and a loving family that doesn’t treat her or her trans-ness as a burden or an oddity. A happy trans girl whose nature and existence are accepted as ubiquitously normal, instead of treating her like an embarrassing spectacle who constantly has to be explained to her detriment and humiliation. A happy trans girl whose existence, too, isn’t used as a teaching tool for cis folk—and who doesn’t require the performance of trans pain that some people seem to think is necessary to ever empathize with trans people or characters
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Cole McCade (A Single Bright Candle's Flame (Criminal Intentions, #9))
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The research will involve quantifying responses to a series of drawing tasks. All participants in the study will be female, roughly between the ages of twenty and twenty-two. In 1990, at the time of the war, they would have been between four and six years old. I will use Piaget’s model of the preoperational stage of childhood development to limit the study’s grouping parameters. From Utrecht in Chicago, I bought enough art supplies to quantify their qualitative responses. Each participant must complete the same tasks: First, mix a color that represents how she remembers the invasion as a child. Second, draw her first memory of the invasion. Third, draw the objects around her during the invasion. The study will use projective drawing tasks to elicit and examine the nonverbal mental schema of the subjects, all of whom lived in Kuwait throughout the invasion and eventual liberation. The results will be measured for repetition of color, image, and symbol (CIS). I hope to find the answer to these questions from these young adults: Can childhood memories of the 1990 invasion be more accurately recalled using nonverbal, rather than verbal, communication skills? If so, do the recollections contain patterns of color, imagery, and symbols?
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Yvonne Wakefield (Suitcase Filled with Nails)
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If he'd spent his time preparing for anything since the end of the world, shooting a bunch of screaming cis idiots was it.
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Gretchen Felker-Martin (Manhunt)
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There had always been radfems in New England, enclaves of sneering middle-class white women who talked a lot about performing gender roles and appropriating lived experience. They curated incestuous little social media cells where they repeated the same six talking points to the same thirty other women while cis men came sniffing around their hindquarters, venting pent-up hatred on trans women and making sure real women saw them doing it so they could get accredited as feminists and maybe, if they were lucky, catch a whiff of pussy.
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Gretchen Felker-Martin (Manhunt)
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The wanting of children seems to be an accepted universal fact for women everywhere. Not to play the trans exception card, but I'm sorry, it's not the same for transsexuals. It's not considered natural when I say that my biological clock is ticking, because I'm not granted a biological clock in the first place. I ache when I see other moms with kids. I'm so jealous. It's a jealousy of my body, like hunger. I want children near me. I want that same validation that other moms have. That feeling of womanhood placed in a family. That validation is fine for cis women, but it gets treated as perverted for me. Like, the only reason 'a man in a dress' would want to be near kids is not a good one. Let's come out and admit it: Everyone acts like moms are real women and real women become moms. Women who never have kids get treated like silly whores, obsessed with themselves, lacking some basic capacity to love.
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Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
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It was the same tone of uninformed concern that older cis people used with Reese when they discovered she was a transsexual: Oh dear, your life must really not be okay. The response always surprised them: I chose this. I want it. It makes me feel right.
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Torrey Peters (Detransition, Baby)
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[The Book is] is a struggle to break out of the memoir genre that trans women have been relegated to for a really long time, this idea that we are only important or readable as objects to study, as objects to be used as titillation for a cisgender audience. [This narrative of] us explaining our life story of being born in the wrong body and being oppressed and overcoming it and then assimilating into a happy cis-passing straight life. That is not the reality of the vast majority of trans women I know.
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Kai Cheng Thom
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[on Infect Your Friends and Loved Ones] What this contagion effectively ushers in is a near-global reliance on exogenous hormones—an intensification fo what Paul Preciado calls the "pharmacopornographic era" and a quite literal reimagining of Halberstam's early-career assertion that "we are all transsexuals. There are no transsexuals." While we certainly live in a world that is (albeit discontinuously) biomedicalized and in bodies, whether cis or trans, that are deeply imbricated with and reliant on all sorts of exogenous hormones—whether we're on birth control, supplementing ostensibly low T, on hormone replacement therapy to mitigate menopause, or taking hormones to transition—Peters removes the question of agency, establish a new biological baseline that asks everyone to choose and thus to deal with questions of access, scarcity, and gatekeeping the way trans folk have had to for the last several decades.
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Hil Malatino (Side Affects: On Being Trans and Feeling Bad)
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What I am trying to think, however, si how trans subjects might (and do) cultivate forms of self-regard and intracommunal recognition that bolster our ability to see ourselves—and love ourselves, and each other—even as crucial forms of intersubjective gendered recognition are withheld, even as we don't pass as cis, even as we're deprived of the forms of social mooring that gendered legibility and recognition provides: even as we inhabit lag time.
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Hil Malatino (Side Affects: On Being Trans and Feeling Bad)
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It wasn’t the few who’d cheered that frightened her; it was the rest, watching with guarded expressions, not looking at those among their number who cried Go back to Maryland, you fucking Nazis and Fuck TERFs! The women who looked at each other in a way Beth didn’t understand, a way sealed forever within the cold and rigid bounds of cisness but which nonetheless told her without room for doubt that they couldn’t leave too soon. That was what scared her. The women who stayed silent.
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Gretchen Felker-Martin (Manhunt)
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Some people who experience themselves as gender diverse but don't identify or express this in ways obvious to others recognize their cis privilege. They might use words like 'cis-ish' or 'cish' as well as non-binary terms to define themselves.
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Meg-John Barker (Gender: A Graphic Guide)
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I didn’t admit to my mom that I had no idea how to be a part of my community, because there seemed to be a whole second step after coming out, and that was finding your people. I mean, I had cis gay male friends, I did community theater growing up, but they didn’t really feel like my community. And Nova certainly hadn’t invited me into her community, and even if she had, I was pretty sure I didn’t want to be a part of it. But that night at Candace’s felt like I had inched closer to the thing that I wanted. They were just. So. Gay. Effortlessly so. Each with their own iconic style and vibe and fluent in a language that made my head spin. But unlike Nova’s elitist group of self-proclaimed Celesbians, I felt welcome here. Wanted. It was thrilling, and terrifying. It had been four months since that queer hang, and I finally looked forward to having weekend plans. Candace invited me everywhere, like Gay Bowling Tuesdays at the alley in town, and queer book club, and she binged all of Atypical with me in two nights. But even though we were close, there was still something that made me feel distant from everyone else. Like if I got too close, something terrible would happen.
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Haley Jakobson (Old Enough)