At this point in my life I am content with the good friends that I’ve made in college. I find that I have the closest friendships with queer men because there’s less of an atmosphere of us both constantly trying to signal and prove our masculinity and more of a “whatever make you happy, I don’t care” attitude. Less repression and insecurity, essentially.

I think that is likely. I notice myself doing the same thing subconsciously where my pitch is higher around women and lower around other men. I wonder if it’s a way to seem less threatening. I’m definitely not the only guy who does that.

If you’re perceived as a woman people tend to be friendlier and more polite towards you. My expierence with transitioning into a man is that people are generally more indifferent and cautious towards me now. I have to be a lot more mindful of coming across as “creepy” or “dangerous” than I used to be specifically with women who are strangers. I’m neither of those things, but the expectation of men being inherently threatening still prevails.

Honestly, just existing is a part of the fight. If people know a queer person personally and see that they’re human too just like them then they’re a lot less likely to dehumanize them and are more likely to help protect and fight for them. It’s easy to dehumanize and be cruel to a group that you’ve never interacted with. But if it’s your neighbor, friend, or colleague then it’s no longer just some abstract concept.

That’s good to know. I’m definitely gonna rush to get all of my docs changed after I get my certificate of name change in the mail. Unfortunately can’t get my birth certificate changed because of the state I was born in.

Southern culture is not what you just mentioned. It is most definitely not a monolith as you’re describing it.

There are a lot of sub regions of the south (such as southern Appalachian, south Atlantic, Cajun, etc). They are all very different from each other and while there are some similarities, there are a lot of differences too. One is in the way we speak. There are even varieties in southern accents. Lotta times you can tell what social class and region someone is from in the south based on their accent. Another is in the widely differing southern culinary practices. It’s not the monolith the media likes to paint it as.

And culturally the south is also very different in a lot of ways. There is a strong culture of respect to elders and using your manners compared to most other places in the US. Despite what you see on the media, people tend to be non confrontational and being direct is not considered polite. If someone has an issue it’s usually talked about when the person is away or in a quiet tone. People are a lot less scheduled and regimented, as well as being friendlier with strangers even in the cities. I had genuine culture shock after I moved to rural new england for the first time. It was such a contrast. I could go on and on about the specifics of southern culture if you’re interested in that.

I encourage you to read up on just how rich and diverse southern culture is. You didn’t say this directly, but by associating it solely with far right (presumably white) cishet MAGA Americans it actively diminishes the queer, people of color, and leftists who also are southerners and are proud of their culture. There’s a lot more of us than the media and Hollywood likes to portray it as. There is also a lot more cultural baggage to being a southerner when outside of the south because of history and media portrayal and people have a myriad of assumptions just because someone is from there. I’ve definitely experienced it.

I would encourage you to visit and see for yourself but yeah, it’s getting unsafe right now. The government is shitty, corrupt, and bigoted. I don’t know if I’ll be able to return home and visit my family and community (that I cherish) after trump takes office because I am trans. That doesn’t make me love my home any less. My point is, southern culture is not defined by being a rural, lower class MAGA person.

Yay, congrats!

Are they likely to reverse changes once they are made? Say I get my passport application/order in before he takes office. Is it still likely to go through?

I’ll give them a read. Looks interesting. Thanks.

Also, I understand what you’re trying to say and that you put it in quotations but saying that culturally the south is 20-30 minutes outside of a population center is entirely inaccurate. Those kinds of blanket statements leave no room for nuance and feeds into stereotypes. A better thing to say is rural areas, red areas, trump territory, etc.

Another misconception about “the South” is that it is a monolith. Even in supposedly deep red states there are big areas that are blue and not all of them are urban. Unfortunately those areas tend to be heavily gerrymandered and do not have as much power as they should.

I see. I was guessing it meant that there would be a lot more active confrontation and resistance with the feds. That’s disheartening.

It’s so strange to be a young person who just became an adult to grow into this. I’m going to fight as best I can for a better tomorrow. We absolutely have to be as united as possible as a community in order to weather and fight this.

I have no fucking idea the path that my life is gonna take. Things were looking up and all I wanted was to finish the college of my dreams and enjoy my life. I have absolutely no idea what to do now. I do have citizenship in another country that I can flee to but that means leaving my friends, family, and education behind. What’s gonna happen :/

Trying to get both my ADHD and T medication for an affordable price has been an absolute pain in the ass for these past few weeks and i dont know if ill resolve it or not.

On the bright side, I am about to start the process of changing my legal name and getting top surgery, so i’m happy about that.

College has been stressful with the workload and I’m still trying to keep my head above the water with that. I think I’m slowly starting to manage but it’s a process. I’ve had some instances of transphobia which were very unexpected because the college I go to is a generally accepting place with a lot of queer people. Most people are okay, just a few bad apples. It doesn’t affect me as much as it did before but still hurts. I’ve made friends that I trust and enjoy being around and who would give me the shirt off their back and that’s what matters most to me. Still struggling with dysphoria sometimes but I think it will lessen as time goes by.

I did see it and i think it’s a really insightful reply. I hope to have some free time soon to digest all of these replies and respond thoughtfully. Been extremely busy with schoolwork. Thank you for your thoughtful response!

Isn’t gender both external and imposed on you at the same time though?

i did voice training long before i started T. My voice usually passed. Had a naturally low voice to begin with. The thing I was most afraid of was my voice i was okay with going to shit but luckily that didnt happen.

I’ve never heard of losing it entirely where you can’t talk, but I have heard about times it has been greatly reduced in quality, tone, and range permanently. Usually this happens if you start on a very high dose of T without building up to it.

Yes…still on low dose. Just got my labs done for the first time in seven months, so with the results of that i can hopefully start the increase.

Maybe you’re right…still expierencing culture shock