On male privilege

   

ambivalent-discontinuity:

transmanconfessions:

I worry If I transition to male as an ftm, I’ll be labeled as a “privileged and oppressive male” by people. Even though transmen do benefit from male privilege after they transition, if they had a female identity before, they didn’t benefit from male privilege and were just as oppressed as females. More so, we don’t have cis privilege. I’m afraid of expressing this idea on tumblr.

I think that this is where intersectionality becomes very useful; we are privileged in some ways and oppressed in other ways. Having certain privileges doesn’t mean that our oppressions do not exist and aren’t very real, it doesn’t necessarily even mean that these oppressions are not visible and have debilitating consequences. They very well can be.

Also, having privilege isn’t inherently a bad thing, and it doesn’t make us bad people. What matters is how we use that privilege. We can choose to be part of the problem or part of the solution. Of course, sometimes we may find ourselves in environments where it’s not safe to speak up and stand up to the oppressive attitudes of the people around us, and the privilege that we’ve gained can only protect us so long as we remain silent (I’m hugely familiar with this). But we can do the best that we’re able to. Not necessarily become “activists”, but even just being a conscious, self-reflective, compassionate human being in our day to day lives. Our world is sorely in need of more men who embody these qualities! :)

I’ve met trans men who were very active in feminist organizing, women-only spaces and communities, before realizing they needed to do something about their gender dysphoria….. but were afraid of transitioning and losing that community despite clearly having clear, debilitating dysphoria that would be mediated by the right treatment. 

For those of you who can relate to that statement, remember…. our own mental, physical, and spiritual healing is intimately connected with the healing of the people and communities that we work with. I was a terrible activist in my pre-transition life and I made a lot of mistakes and hurt a lot of people because the acuteness of my own pain prevented me from being truly present to those I was working with. I wasn’t even able to see how obvious my mistakes were at the time. But now I can, and if I had opportunities to get involved in local community organizing now, I’d be much more effective than I ever was in the past. 

Take care, and good luck with everything <3