Rants

TERFS

Transphobic people really be doing me in. I recently read a story that had a really strong anti-trans sentiment and pointed out to the author as such. Boi did some people not like that I had an opinion, but did not bother to read said opinion before they replied.
My main issues with the book were:
1) They used advanced tech to find biological matches and then partners were chosen from these biological matches to have children. This would automatically exclude trans folk, as our chromosomes would state that we were not suitable biological matches because our chromosomes would be a tell to the gender we were assigned at birth. So plot hole.
2) the book does not do an exploration of gender as a concept. This plot point of a trans women not being able to have kids comes out of nowhere. There is no plot thread that leads up to this. This causes it to sit really out of place in a book which primarily focuses on relationships.
3) It's actually blatantly transphobic. I'm not stretching here, I'm not picking things out of context. The main character literally stops using this women's preferred pronouns as soon as she finds out that the women is trans. She and another character (a medical professional) also laugh at that the fact that the main character is cis and therefore a "real women", as opposed to the trans women who is "fake" by comparison. Despite the fact that the trans women was up until that point considered a suitable partner, just as our main character is.
Now you may be thinking "it's just a story, why does it matter". So let me explain why it matters to me.
The idea that "trans women aren't real women" gets trans women killed every single day. If someone is on a first date with you, or you have just been introduced to them and you think they're kinda hot, they are not obligated to share their personal medical history with you. If you later found out that the girl you went on a date with last week is trans, that does not give you the right to hurt or murder her. Not telling people straight away that you are trans is not lying to them.
If I don't tell you I have type 1 diabetes on a first date, I am not lying, I've just not decided to tell you my personal medical history. You might find out later that I'm diabetic and think "I don't think I'd like the way this might change our relationship dynamic" or you might be ignorant and think that I'm super unhealthy because I have diabetes. But the logical thing to do would be to have a discussion.
But when it comes to people being trans suddenly this all goes out the window.
Trans people are still being discriminated against in today's society. Look at the US and it's controversies over letting trans people into the army. Look at the new bathroom laws that the British government want to put in place. Trans people remain unsafe.
On a personal level, I expect to be disowned by my grandparents when I come out to them. My own parents told me that I will never have a successful career or a committed relationship, which is not true and there are plenty of trans people out there who have both.
These toxic mindsets do effect real world lives. Even if it's "just a story", perpetuating these harmful ideas creates an audience who believes them.
Also, who cares how people identify? If you're not getting in my pants you don't need to worry about what's in my pants. Why does how a minority of people live their lives offend people so much?
And they have the audacity to call us snow flakes.
Rant over.