CodingSocks' Open Journal

[CodingSocks]

Entry 0: Charter

TLDR?

I plan to write a journal about my thoughts on gender here! I believe it would increase my enjoyment of journal writing beyond previous attempts and also increase the quality of my entries. I also welcome you to give your two cents about anything I say. I would find it very insightful.

So, what is an "Open Journal"?

It's a word I made up, but basically, I have a few things I'd like to explore, in writing, here. I could have done individual threads for each topic, but I think that might cause clutter on the board even if I only ever post three or four entries.

Aren't journals... Private? Isn't that the whole point of them? They are a useful space to explore topics that normally don't see the light of day. A public journal just sounds like a recipe for avoiding talking about the tough things, which may be helpful for you to explore.

It's true. I also plan to keep a parallel journal updated alongside this that I will keep private. Upon writing an entry, I might ask myself whether I would like to abridge the entry before posting or make it totally private. I feel like this could also provide the benefit of helping me ascertain what I truly deem deeply private, and raising further questions as to the justifications I can provide for barriers I have, and whether they are constructive or destructive.

Ever written a journal before?

I've had a few failed attempts at becoming a regular journal writer. I think some of the reasons I wouldn't stick to it is I had a hard time convincing myself to write things that I knew nobody would read, by design. I wouldn't be able to envision a proper dialogue in my head, which is when I most enjoy writing ("ohh so this is why this whole post is written like a QnA" you might be saying to yourself).

Not envisioning a dialogue makes my writing style very route, and I felt more like Bart Simpson writing lines on a chalkboard. I also would never go through an editing process to try and clarify my words, as I regularly attempt to do when effortposting, like I am now. In clarifying my words, I feel like it allows me a 2nd, 3rd, or 4th time to think about something I have said, whereas writing a 1st draft only, I might not be considering the important things thoroughly.

In coding, we call this process "Rubber Ducky Debugging" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_duck_debugging. Coders will literally voice their coding woes and frustrations to a physical rubber ducky. Usually, by articulating the problem to the ducky, something happens in the brain, and the answer becomes evident. I hope maybe to get some of this effect through open journal writing. I know this works because I have been able to learn more about myself this way before by formulating effortposts on Discord communities regarding these topics.

Do you like to write?

I've written a single short story of my own volition in my entire life. It was fun! Evidently, though, inspiration does not strike often.

Pretensious much?

Probably. That, however, is OK.

What do you plan to talk about? Gender, I would presume, given the board.

That would be correct! I'd like to talk about my relationship with gender, but I may also tie other topics such as sex, sexuality, mental health, and culture to aid the discussion as I see fit.

Where do I fit in? Where is the fourth wall? Nearest sledgehammer etc. etc. etc..?

I mainly like the idea of posting some stories and thoughts here. I wanted to do some journal writing privately at first, but then I started to think how it would be very helpful for me if anybody had similar experiences and would be willing to give me their two cents. Maybe I'll then give you back my own two cents etc etc... I believe there is a saying about art communities and how they can be the same group of a few hundred people handing around the same 20 dollars. I feel this is relevant to what I'm trying to say.

That is to say, I am treating this like a journal, but the peanut gallery is open, and the peanuts are free! Chuck your peanuts my way!

[CodingSocks]

Entry 0: Charter

Entry 1: Why now?

cw: discussion of bigotry

So. Why, now? Why, after 21 years on this blue marble have I booked an appointment with a clinic to talk about gender dysphoria? How, after considering that, did the news of a measly 30-day waiting period for an appointment hit me like a sack of nickels to the gut (1)? Why did I spend 21 years gone by passively and sometimes actively avoiding calling this set of feelings what I feel relatively comfortable now calling gender dysphoria?

To be perfectly clear, as I don't think I've said it outright on this board, or frankly, this blue marble yet...



Why do I want to be a girl... Now?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthrise ... thrise.jpg



Why do I want to be a girl now, and how have I found the courage to take steps towards that? Regardless of whether this episode in my life leads to a thriving trans identity, a more robust and understood cis identity, or if I'm lucky, some wonderful third opinion that I don't even have the vocabulary to describe right now. Note: I'm not asking myself why I want to be a girl, but specifically how, on a random ass Tuesday in September, did the summation of my life choices lead to just enough courage to actually start putting things in motion, instead of dismissing my emotions as I have done in the past?

TLDR:

• I do have support networks to help me brace for the negative changes it how people will interact with me.

• Old brain mould might be nice to understand better, but I don't think it's a current-day problem for me. It would be nice to unpack to understand my history better, though.

• I don't have a good plan for nurturing my relationship.

• I think that some of the stress of a 30 day waiting period is having big questions floating unsolved for so long feels kinda stinky.

• I certainly have much more to write about.

Why now is a big question for me right now. I feel like answering this question can help me come to better terms with the various layers of denial I have exhibited in the past and possibly still carry. Identifying the various ways I have denied myself the freedom to explore gender would certainly go a long way toward understanding what exactly I desire, as these layers of denial would certainly put their finger on the scale regarding how I perceive my desires.

So without further ado, what are some easily identifiable layers of denial? I will later work back from these and how they were overcome. I will also try and fight myself on my own denial, as I know for certain that things, while very difficult, are not catastrophic and could certainly be worse. I will also be considering each layer in isolation, as if none of the other layers exist except for the layer in question



The first layer of denial is the effect that my fear of bigotry has on shutting down the idea from the get-go.

I am currently seen as male, straight (2), and cis. I would, in one moment, upon being out, go to being perceived as female (if I'm lucky), queer, trans, and if I'm unlucky, mentally unstable, disabled, diseased, and a pervert. It's ironic that right-wing rags rail against intersectionality when they do manage to be intersectionally massive pieces of shit. They manage to unify every form of bigotry under the sun into single concepts like they got the infinity gauntlet on the go, on god... I digress.

The idea of going from a privileged position in society to a target of derision, put plainly, is terrifying. On an individual scale, I would also have to deal with specifically the reaction of my father, who I know to hold unsavoury views. I live with him, but I do luckily have the means to live independently if it were necessary to accelerate my life plans.

I can say with great certainty that if we lived in a world where bigotry did not exist, tomorrow would be a very different day.

I would go thrifting, shopping and borrowing to get $100 of gender gear and use it as of that day and go by she/her. I would be doing this right up to my first appointment so that I have more knowledge of myself to tell the therapist. I would either modify this presentation, keep it, or ditch it eventually. Doing all of this wouldn't cause any friction with anyone because, in a sane and free society, we could just do that for a month or two, and nobody would get hurt. The only casualty is my $100 and whatever gender dysphoria I might experience in the run of 1-2 months by presenting in what I would then know is not my gender. I also would have done all of this much earlier in life; how early, I could not possibly say (3).

This I what I mean, however, by how fear of bigotry acts effectively as a form of denialism. With the absence of this one layer, I don't have any nightmare stories to convenience myself against the practicality and desirability of transition. Denial.

Now for the upswing!

I do have a mother who I know I can trust with iron certainty. I have confided in her my sexuality, just in case my father catches wind of my queer identities; she isn't totally caught off guard, and I can expect to have her in my corner. I have specifically been assured by her, "This house belongs to me as much as your father. I will never tolerate a situation where you may feel forced to leave." She truly is a gem who I am lucky to have in this world.

As far as my fear of societal bigotry, my field, while not perfect, is a professional field. There is a low-moderate level of decency I can expect, even if workers' rights can sometimes be treated as a nice idea on a piece of paper. There are worse professional fields, and at least it's professional. There is also a high prevalence of remote work in my field nowadays, so it's more likely I could stealth if I were to play my cards right than otherwise.

I also live in the urban area of a relatively liberal province. Now it would be better if they were all progressive socialists instead of oil hogs, but a girl can dream.

So how was this overcome on Tuesday, when I booked my first appointment?

Simply put, I was willing to just leave this problem for future Socks (my pen name here). She will weigh these considerations (which are valid concerns in my view) AFTER better understanding how much she wants this. Even if these considerations ARE too much (which I currently am inclined to say they are not), the act of seeking gender care could greatly inform whether she might want to consider changing her situation or going boymode. Alternatively, if the appointment does lead to a new understanding of a cisgender identity, that would only be a good thing. So please, anybody reading who does have this form of denialism, consider where I am coming from. This perspective has very much helped me at least pull the trigger.

Of course, this perspective also comes with the downside of keeping important decisions in the air for extended periods of time, which doesn't feel great. It does feel like progress, though.



Next!

Another layer of denial would probably be holdovers of sexist and outdated concepts of femininity that impose unnecessary restrictions on what a woman is and how she "ought" to act. I may unconsciously hold some of this brain mould, which could lead me to unnecessarily exclude myself from the category of girl. unlike the previous layer of denial, this is more tricky to identify, as I will explain below (4).

A few months ago, I was thinking about an early teenage (~13 years old) justification against the possibility of myself being trans.

• I love video games.

• Girls don't play video games.

• If I were born a girl, I wouldn't play video games by the virtue of being a girl. My interests would be something else.

• I don't like that.

• I don't like the idea of being a girl.

• I am not a girl.

On its face upon remembering this, I immediately identified it as a stupid, sexist, and juvenile view of gender. I believe this also may have come from popular myths about trans stories, namely, the idea of trans kids wanting to play with the other gender's toys from toddlerhood. It is certainly the case for many trans stories it may be true, but for me, it served as a very clear affirmation that I was certainly not trans.

What I mean to say by sharing this is that my conceptualization of what it means to be a girl could be clouded by unfair or false expectations of what it means to be a girl. I would like to think that this is all out of my system. I think radically progressive ideas like gender abolitionism and the view of gender as an arbitrary and inconsistent social construct help to reframe gender in an incredibly loose and accepting definition that can be built up to one's liking as opposed to assimilating into what might be the median woman with 2.4 kids, and 1.99997 feet etc.

So how did I overcome this layer of denial?

I think I outgrew too-rigid views of femininity as I became more and more progressive growing up. This was likely more of a bigger deal to me as an early teenager and younger. It is still certainly possible I hold some subtle assumptions about femininity that aren't necessarily true or good, but as of Tuesday, this wasn't a big barrier that was even really thought about seriously. What is more interesting for further exploration later in this journal is attempting to see if these early teenage views had hampered the consideration of a trans identity in other ways. As such, this is more important for my own personal perception of my own trans narrative and may or may not have much bearing for the future, besides possibly digging up more evidence of child/teenhood gender dysphoria.



The last denial layer I will explore in this entry is regarding my relationship with my girlfriend.

My girlfriend of three years is straight. Obviously, if I land on being a girl, this is going to cause a problem. I love my girlfriend, and we do talk often about viewing our relationship as something that could produce family/marriage if everything goes smoothly. I recently broached the subject of exploring myself as non-binary about 2 months ago. She did say she was supportive of me exploring me being non-binary in the context of our relationship. However, I don't know if this evolving into looking more binary is going to add more strain. I don't want to lose her, so the push factor here is pretty strong against exploring my own gender.

The more and more I think about it, binary transwoman is closer to what I end up vibing with.

So how did I overcome this?

Again, this is a problem I've left with future Socks after receiving care. It's definitely the kind of thing I think I would like to bring up early with my therapist early. I know they cannot tell me what to do, but they could certainly offer some tools to figure that out. In all honesty, I find this layer of denial much more of a bitter pill to swallow than I do just fear of bigotry alone. If the relationship couldn't survive, it would impact me severely prospectively at my most vulnerable state, right at the onset of transition.


I think after writing all of this, I've come to a few conclusions:

• I do have support networks to help me brace for the negative changes it how people will interact with me.

• Old brain mould might be nice to understand better, but I don't think it's a current-day problem for me. It would be nice to unpack to understand my history better, though.

• I don't have a good plan for nurturing my relationship.

• I think that some of the stress of a 30 day waiting period is having big questions floating unsolved for so long feels kinda stinky.

• I certainly have much more to write about.

(1) Not to mention, a 30-day waiting period is a luxury in many parts of the world and for many disadvantaged demographics. This experience, at the very least, has given me an appreciation for the hurt that many in physical and mental health cues feel that I hadn't quite understood before, and I am a lucky one.

(2) I am actually bisexual, but only people I trust know this. Yay comphet.

(3) :!: Putting my money where my mouth is, I'm changing my pronouns from He/Him (questioning) to She/Her (questioning) on my user profile here. This is certainly a space where I can feel securely away from bigotry. As explained above, this is mostly an experimental exercise, however, in the spirit of the exercise, I do genuinely desire to be perceived as a girl in this context. This should also be a helpful reminder to those kind people with who I've already had the pleasure of interacting on this board to make that shift from He/Him to She/Her. Thank you very much for understanding <3. :!:

(4) As an aside, I do not pretend to be perfect in my feminism. I think that it is a foolhardy mistake to view feminism as something that can be achieved in daily life, the perfect rational feminist actor. I see feminism more as a tool in my tool belt. As such, when using this tool to refine one's own behaviour, one is liable to miss a few patches or to have thought they were using a good tool, but ultimately it may be dull, or maybe patterns and beliefs need time to be worked on, and will be improved with iterative thinking about the subject. In this way, I am saying I see feminism like a razor, and hair as undesirable traits. Patches do get missed. Sometimes you are using the wrong tool. Sometimes you have thick hair...

I also don't have a formal, theoretical understanding of academic feminism, so if this is bunk, please tell me.

[CodingSocks]

Entry 1: Why now?


(3) Putting my money where my mouth is, I'm changing my pronouns from He/Him (questioning) to She/Her (questioning) on my user profile here. This is certainly a space where I can feel securely away from bigotry. As explained above, this is mostly an experimental exercise, however, in the spirit of the exercise, I do genuinely desire to be perceived as a girl in this context. This should also be a helpful reminder to those kind people with who I've already had the pleasure of interacting on this board to make that shift from He/Him to She/Her. Thank you very much for understanding <3.

Entry 2: Exploring exploring:
Epistemology, as told by a laywoman

cw: discussion of bigotry

TLDR;

• Even if I cannot clearly identify why I want to be a woman, I can still be a woman. Assuming otherwise makes people do stupid things like claiming featherless bipeds are men.

• Being a girl can be becoming a girl

• I need to aggressively be myself to aggressively become myself. Otherwise, my concept of self may never fully reach where it could be.

While writing my previous entry, I stumbled upon a realization that I may have been viewing gender expression as an end state to be derived after consideration, as opposed to a tool which could be used to inform my thoughts. I'd like to relate this to the unification of means and ends, an anarchist political theory. Since, as we may all be aware, the personal is political, and in this case, I believe can offer some insight. To talk about it, I refreshed myself with an article written by Zoe Baker, an academic of the history of anarchism and overall badass (https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library ... s-and-ends).

To quote Malatesta:

it is not enough to desire something; if one really wants it adequate means must be used to secure it. And these means are not arbitrary, but instead cannot but be conditioned by the ends we aspire to and by the circumstances in which the struggle takes place, for if we ignore the choice of means we would achieve other ends, possibly diametrically opposed to those we aspire to, and this would be the obvious and inevitable consequence of our choice of means. Whoever sets out on the highroad and takes a wrong turning does not go where he intends to go but where the road leads him (1).

If you have ever heard the phrase "The ends justify the means", what is meant by "ends" and "means" are identical to what is meant in "the unification of ends and means", but takes the opposite position on the viability of incongruence between the two.

In the context in which Malatesta was speaking, he is referring to the corrupting power that the state apparatus has on well-intentioned greenhorn politicians. That is to say, while power and politics do attract opponents of progress, it also filters out and morphs progress systemically.

A good example could be to consider the Canadian Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Steven Guilbeault, a former Greenpeace activist who was arrested for scaling the CN tower in a protest (nice). However, the path between then and now toward a high-ranking cabinet position dulled his edge and weakened his message (https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/steven ... -1.6230308) (https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/fifth-es ... -1.6410657). Effectively, the aesthetics of his past have been effectively used to make my country's climate policy seem radical and ground-breaking while having the real strength of a moist towelette. He does not seriously threaten the O&G industry or tackle environmental issues. This was ensured through the various compromises and deals he was "forced" to accept on his way up to the cabinet as a means to the end of a genuine urge to tackle climate injustice.

Also, note that this is also saying that means *are* ends. At the end of the day, means are what you are doing, and thus are outcomes in and of themselves. It also implies that the only way we can produce the type of people who are capable of tending to a compassionate society is by living within a compassionate society, as they will not appear suddenly out of the woodwork to implement this society once we "declare" a more compassionate society. Being is becoming.

That is a long-winded explanation of a weird political-wonk theory, but what does that have to do with your gender, nerd?

Fair. Let's get back on topic.

Specifically regarding gender, what are means, and what are ends? How can there be congruence or incongruence between the two? What would the consequences of incongruence be? The benefits of congruence? What are some forces that shape our means to deviate from our desired ends? How do we combat these forces? Importantly, how does experimenting with a genuine feminine identity exhibit a unification between means and ends?

Specifically regarding gender, what are means, and what are ends?

To me, a means to gender looks something like day-to-day gender expression and self-concept. This includes gender traits such as physical appearance, pronouns, and honorifics but also includes attitudes and practices toward queer liberation.

An ends to gender could be seen as the desired, theoretical state of optimum gender euphoria. This is referring more strongly to gender traits and internal/external conditions which can be achieved to become closer to these ideals.

Ends in this context are likely to be very ambiguous but may become clearer over time. This is the case with many ends. Consider the desire to have fun, and socialize with friends as an end. Some possible means may be easily identifiable, board games, snacks, or responsible alcohol consumption; however, what it means to "have fun" and "socialize" is very different from person to person and can even vary within a person from day to day. Sometimes you may think that an activity like playing a couch-coop game is a direct means to achieve an end, but you end up bored or frustrated with the game or your friends.

Similarly, what it means to experience gender euphoria is very ambiguous. However, that does not mean that you don't know what you want, and it certainly doesn't invalidate your identity, much like not knowing how to have fun, or being able to clearly define "fun" doesn't mean you don't know what fun is, or don't understand fun as a concept.
(https://preview.redd.it/tfcxef8c3m281.j ... b3e61f1670 <-- relevant post tackling bigotry)

As I understand it, this acceptance of ambiguity is can also be explained nicely by Ludwig Wittgenstein's "Family Resemblance" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_resemblance); however, I only have a weak understanding of the concept, so I won't go in much further detail than that. You can also check out this video (https://youtu.be/sWSY_Y5fxUA?t=498), which goes into this specific concept in detail to debunk Matt Walsh, who can eat shit.

How can there be congruence or incongruence between [means and ends]?

To quote an anonymous stranger, who I trust said this earnestly:

My cognitive dissonance has grown so much that I’ve defeated dysphoria through sheer madness.
I’ve never been within 10 feet of [an] estrogen molecule yet I see a female in the mirror.

The language implies a level of levity, but what is being described is such a radically strong conviction that the means and ends to gender euphoria have merged into one synthesis: I am a girl.

The means:

• A radically strong conviction that she is a girl.

The ends:

• A radically strong conviction that she is a girl.

That is to say; I believe a congruence between means and ends is achieved with gender when practice, means, is a direct emulation of ends. Being is becoming.

It makes me so hopeful for humanity to know that we are capable

On the contrary, having incongruence between means and ends in this respect, I believe, could lead to undesirable outcomes. I think taking a trepidacious approach as a means of seeking gender euphoria is an approach that compromises and makes concessions to patriarchy and only leads to an understanding of oneself in the confines of a system that is designed to marginalize and oppress the lives and dreams of souls multitudinous. As Malatesta identified:

Whoever sets out on the highroad and takes a wrong turning does not go where he intends to go but where the road leads him (1)

I understand the motivation to give concessions to society for one's own safety, it can be a dangerous world. It, however, is a force I deeply resent and want to show the most amount of irreverence as possible towards. I certainly will have to make compromises with the world, as ~we live in a society~ . However, I strongly believe that every concession to the world would not just damage who I am but who I will become. Being, after all, is becoming.

In what I hope is self-evident, I wish to minimize the damage I cause to myself and to give the bird to whatever forces I encounter that would have me fit into someone else's box. If I'm going to upend my personal and professional life, I almost see no point in going half-send with this. It is not going to make other people have any less compulsion to further chip away at who I am until they take everything right back to square one if they had their way.

What would the consequences of incongruence [between means and ends] be? The benefits of congruence?

I touched on this just above, but I believe that the consequence of allowing incongruence is that it basically opens the doorway for a slow erosion of my own identity back to oblivion and perpetuates notions that the world should be allowed to tell queer people how to act out of a supremacy narrative.

Having congruence, on the other hand, is freedom. Easily attainable, perfect congruence is part of my ideal of what queer liberation means to me and the path towards true trans joy. It will be, and is, hard to maintain. I will fail. I will also succeed. However, I ought to embark upon my concept of self firmly with the notion with my eyes set on the horizon, a beautiful horizon. It is, after all, so important also to remember why I am doing this. For joy, freedom, life, and fundamentally what it means to be human.

What are some forces that shape our means to deviate from our desired ends?

I think I've found a way to answer this by answering the previous questions above. To repeat, I think that supremacy narratives from a hierarchical and patriarchal society are responsible for attempting to shape our understanding of the range of possible means that are viable to us.

How do we combat these forces?

How do we combat patriarchy? Friend, do I have an entire literary and oral canon to refer to you. I have a hard time phrasing how to answer this in my own words since the question is so multifaceted. This could be a topic of a future entry into this journal in and of itself. This could be a book, an entire academic career, or field of study, which of course, it is. Feminism writ large.

In one sentence, which I will leave it at for today?

We ought to build a new society within the old, without being naïve about it.

Importantly, how does experimenting with a genuine feminine identity exhibit a unification between means and ends?

I think experimenting with how it feels to allow myself to be a girl has been a positive experience. It has been fraught with emotion for sure, but sitting with these feelings has seen me re-formed slightly anew afterwards each time. What this feeling is, either terror or a genuine lack of identification with womanhood, I have unfortunately a hard time distinguishing. From here on in the journal, I will call this feeling The Grinch.

The best way to describe The Grinch is that it feels like a bomb strapped to my chest, and I am holding the detonator. When it goes off, of my own accord, it will hurt people around me. Ultimately though, I would be at the centre of this explosion.

https://c.tenor.com/7gtRTJVdoDcAAAAC/th ... carrey.gif

I have mentioned The Grinch before in my old thread, but I think I was oversimplifying it by labelling it simply as "stress/tension". It is a different emotion, and it needs a name if I'm going to talk about it. The Grinch, it will be.

I decided to open up further with my girlfriend while writing this entry, which I have been writing over the course of two days. If I know anything about myself, it is that I can't keep a secret from those I love. It was not an easy conversation. I told her about my writing an open journal but refused to let her see it (this). I only told her that it was a small forum I found that had heavy moderation. I told her it fit my needs by being just active enough that I feel that people are out there, but not so active that I should fear being identified or experiencing online harassment. She agreed that it would be good for me to talk about this with people besides her. I also told her that I have been seriously questioning my gender, with the possibilities being:

• Cis, but different

• Feminine nonbinary

• Trans woman

• Genderfluid (including masculine)

• Genderfluid (excluding masculine)

I did not tell her I had been privately accepting the identity of a woman to see how it feels. I did, however, tell her I had been doing mental exercises on people in my class: male, female, nonbinary, wondering what it would be like to be them; at that moment, and then imagine interacting with someone else in the class. These thoughts have been interesting and could be a good topic for a future entry.

She has a hard time understanding how I don't know myself; she herself has a very boolean mind, describing most of her thoughts as either true or false, and has a hard time understanding how truth can come in shades for me or is obscured, cloudy, or unclear. She is supportive of me and tries to make it clear that, in the abstract, she wants me to do what's best for me, even if it breaks her heart in the end.

However, her being human, I think she desperately wants me to stay her boyfriend. She, at one point, asked me if maybe this was the product of not having positive male role models in my life. I pointed out that this is a popular transphobic sentiment, and she agreed, walked it back, and apologised. This isn't even true, by the way, she was specifically gesturing to my father, but I do have many men in my life who are kind and gentle. I honestly can't blame her for grasping at straws here, but it does hurt when she says things such as that.

She did, however, assure me that no matter what, she would be a support for me during the most stressful first months of transitioning and be there for me. I told her that I did not care if she was lying to me; I needed her to tell me this story whether it was true or not. This conversation also led to us agreeing that we may want to try working through this starting now. She decided to go to therapy, and I urged her to reach out to her closest friend to talk about this. AS IT WOULD TURN THE FUCK OUT, her friend's partner, her fiancée, had begun questioning their gender recently, so apparently, it's in the water or some shit. This led to us beginning to plan a housewarming party, board games, and food, where later in the night, me, her fiancée, my partner, and her friend could pair off and cry on each other's shoulders. I am very excited about this event; I do not think I am scared about it, though. It's broaching things that have already been broached. Old news. The Grinch has already exploded here, so I feel just about as comfortable in this context as I do talking here.

It is important to note this experience has also been punctuated by feelings of joy, fun, and confidence. It feels like gliding through the world a little differently. Sometimes there is more pep in my step. Sometimes I modulate my voice very slightly so that I can hear a difference and think of it as fully feminine, while in reality, it is still plausibly masculine. It's fun to do that. I really do want to do more of this. The next thing that's really been kicking around my mind is painting my nails maroon. I, however, have had the unfortunate, very stubborn habit of biting my nails all of my life, so the fleshy bit at the top of my fingers is larger than normal, and I have moderately small fingernails. I'm going to really try for a week to quit biting, and in the meantime, locate some maroon nail polish. One funny thing I noticed regarding confidence today is I did not know how I felt about having breasts, but then I imagined that instead of them being loose and set out to fend for themselves under my shirt, which made me feel vulnerable and bad. I imagined wearing clothing that offers more protection, a cardigan, and what I would imagine the sensation of a bra supporting them would be, and how all this would make me feel. While I can't say definitively that it was exclusively a positive thought because of The Grinch, it certainly assisted me in feeling less panicked from the vulnerability realistically associated with having breasts a-la male gaze.

In this way, accepting myself privately has led to more and more thoughts, both big and small, vague and concrete. These thoughts do trend towards the direction that I am not lying to myself, and I am unto something with myself, which brings out fear in spades, but maybe not The Grinch...

The only thing I can say is that while doing my thought experiment by pretending to be my male peers, I don't really tend to have a huge desire to be them or a distinct revulsion unless they are very masculine. This trend materializes itself in other ways. Given the option, I would press the magic button that would make me a girl, and everyone else's memories would be magically altered in congruence with this. I also have a much better understanding of trans people who have transitioned to become more feminine while finding transition towards masculinity very... confusing, in a word. I know this doesn't make sense on its face, and in the abstract, I understand it's what I'm going through, but in the other direction. I guess I can understand how someone could tolerate being a man, but a desire to be, or enjoyment of, being a man is somewhat alien to me. I could equally apply this to cis men, but at the same time, I actually don't understand the active enjoyment of manhood of cis men anyways. So I suppose; further, I actually do understand trans masculine types, but I understand them in the same way I don't understand cis men?

Given the option, I would press the magic button that would make me a girl, and everyone else's memories would be magically altered in congruence with this.

This may be crazy, but the only real negative emotion I could feel from pressing that button is... sadness? It feels like giving up on who I am, with what would be my unique trans identity, which is uniquely me. I would certainly like to be a cisgender woman, as it would offer many advantages in terms of privilege in society. But also... It would make me a different person, or specifically, really, a different woman. I don't know who I would be today without the various struggles I have gone through in my life. It kind of reminds me of how people who are autistic describe being offered a similar button to become neurotypical. In that instance, autism has shaped who they are in such a fundamental way, that to instantly become neurotypical would mean the death of the person they knew, with a new person taking their place in the world where they had once lived. I have a family member with autism, so I really identify with the sentiment here. I couldn't possibly call the person who would replace my family member with autism the same person. They would be a stranger.

People talk about "existential dysphoria" (https://genderdysphoria.fyi/en/existential-dysphoria) in terms of reminiscing the loss of what it means to have earlier life milestones tainted with the knowledge that you have been missing out on those experience's, or their allegory, as the gender you identify as. This sadness I refer to when considering pressing the magic button is a kind of the reverse of existential dysphoria, even if I do experience existential dysphoria myself. I do think that I would ultimately press this button, but the radical, "fuck you" part of my brain almost feels like this magic vendor, their button, and their assimilationist bullshit can shove it. I definitely feel very conflicted about the question of being born the other gender entirely at this moment. I like who I am, but I want to become a girl... I want to talk about this more in a future entry. Something is here, X marks the spot etc. I don't know if this makes me a sucker for punishment or what.

Maybe it's because the point of this hypothetical is to perpetrate trans erasure; clearly, what is being proposed by the hypothetical is impossible. Literally magic. It is impossible to magically change people's minds to know you as a girl through all time. It is also impossible to have been AFAB instead of AMAB, and vice versa. It implies that trans people ought to accept scenarios where stealthing is the only way to have a "normal" life effectively and that being cisgender is better than being transgender as a means to those ends. If you find yourself agreeing with the concept that being cisgender is better than being transgender, why? The only valid voice in my head saying anything to the contrary is that it may be nice to have the requisite genitals stock, out of the factory. The other voice is basically telling me that it would save the heartache involved with interfacing with a deeply transphobic society. It's really to this, the idea that the most plausible solution to transphobia is to magic it away, that irks me. Why should I have to do something if a big, primary reason to do so is to conform to the standards set by those who would see us dead, which effectively, this question and others ask of marginalized folk? The button proposes killing the you that exists in this real, corporeal world outside of the realm of magic and replacing you with someone else's life. So yes, I do want to press the button, but the real answer is that I would prefer a button that magically resolved the bigoted thoughts of people in my life, as this comes closer to an ideological statement of what ought to be implemented in this real world.

... Whoo lass! You apparently have a lot to say about the magic button question that I never knew you had in you. While I understand where you are coming from, this post is a fucking behemoth, so let's get to trying to wrap it up.

... OK.

I have noticed that I very much like the way I can socialize with men recently. It's notable because a very old sense of gender dysphoria came from wanting to socialize more with the girls in my grade than the boys in my grade, but feeling like compulsory heterosexuality made a barrier in the trust that girls would grant me to form a platonic relationship. This was doubly dysphoric when I could feel my attraction toward girls in my class getting in the way of the platonic relationship I wanted with the girls in my class. For a very long time, I developed a very negative attitude towards my sexuality and libido and was viewed as purely a force in my life that made me trip over myself. This frustration was felt most deeply around Junior High when I noticed kids my age starting to feel attracted to each other and thus develop these barriers; these are some of the earliest memories I can identify myself explicitly wishing I was a girl. Other earlier memories of gender dysphoria and euphoria exist, like the time my sister "forced" me to put on a dress to try and embarrass me, but really I was going along with that the whole time XD. But yeah, wishing I was a girl is very solidly associated with wishing to socialize as a girl.

I did feel attracted to boys around early high school, but it would also take me till early university to be honest with myself that I did not just want to be very good friends. In fact, it was in early university that I had my first queer meltdown; I even considered that I might be trans. I identified many of the elements of my adolescence that I have identified here in this journal. What ended up happening is that I tried jerking off to men, and it worked, so I correctly labelled myself bisexual. However, I didn't want to, or couldn't imagine that just because I had figured out one thing, there may be more to it, which, a few years later now, I find myself having that second reckoning I had missed then. I do not blame myself for this either, though. It really was a lot for me to process that I fit somewhere on the rainbow. This episode of my life could again be a good thing to unpack in a future entry.

Since I didn't know how to put the words to my attraction toward boys in my grade, I did not feel that same barrier in attempting to form friendships I created with male peers in high school, and they wouldn't have been likely to pick up on it anyways due to compulsory heterosexuality. Well, maybe except for the time I kissed my friend as a "joke," haha. lmao. lmao. Just joking, guys... I truly am an unstable mass of pure queer that somehow goes through the world oblivious.

So basically, most of my friendships with boys have been coincidences, or I was basically in love with them, whereas I would often actively seek relationships with girls and could frequently find myself with girls being the only people I would be hanging out with at a time.

This is all to say, a more intentional, genuine friendship with men is somewhat new. I'd like to try and explore more deeply what having a group of friends who are men would mean to me if I were to present to them as a woman. After all, women can, and do have groups of friends who are men. This again could be a topic of a future entry.

All in all, really giving myself the space to consider a feminine identity by attempting to embrace it against all forces telling me "no" has opened a lot of doors as to what I desire to do. I recommend 10/10.



In conclusion:

• Even if I cannot clearly identify why I want to be a woman, I can still be a woman. Assuming otherwise makes people do stupid things like claiming featherless bipeds are men.

• Being a girl can be becoming a girl

• I need to aggressively be myself to aggressively become myself. Otherwise, my concept of self may never fully reach where it could be.

P.S: It feels great to shout into the wind here. Thank you for reading. Stay awesome, punks.

P.P.S: I apologize for the absolute size of this post. It's too big for me to edit and took me two days to write, so I apologize if it comes off as somewhat jarbled.

Socks

https://youtu.be/uuLnY0ceR_s

(1) Errico Malatesta, The Method of Freedom: An Errico Malatesta Reader, ed. Davide Turcato (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2014), 281–2.

[Heather]

Hey there, CodingSocks! I love a creative, self-helping use of our platforms. I've not responded because I'm not sure if there's a certain kind of response -- including none at all! -- you want. Let us know?

[CodingSocks]

Hey there, CodingSocks! I love a creative, self-helping use of our platforms. I've not responded because I'm not sure if there's a certain kind of response -- including none at all! -- you want. Let us know?

Entry 0A: Clarification of the charter

Hey there Heather!

I would like to make it clear to you, or anybody else reading, that you are welcome to comment on anything!

Entry 0: Charter

...

That is to say, I am treating this like a journal, but the peanut gallery is open, and the peanuts are free! Chuck your peanuts my way!

This could be, in no particular order:

• Criticisms of harmful views I may be holding, either to myself or others.

• A simple "I agree with that".

• Questions of if I relate to something not mentioned in an entry.

• Questions asking me to elaborate on a subject.

• Stories you find relevant, even without a particular point to them.

• Suggestions of things I should consider trying or resources you think I should look at or avail to.
  • Books.
  • Resource pages.
  • Activities.
  • Video games.
    • I will crush our enemy's bones into a fine powder in World of Warships with you if that's your jam.

• Your best attempt to be funny (I can probably take it in strides, just use your common sense).

• Anything not mentioned here, that passes your vibe check.

Generally, if you want to reply to something, do so. You are probably willing to comment on something I would find interesting/helpful. I have a great impulse to talk these things through with people (evidenced by the 8000 words written above over the course of about 72 hours during a long weekend). I also don't want the size of my posts to deter you from posting small, quick replies. I can't expect anyone to write 4700 words on a whim. However, if you do wish to write extensively, meeting or exceeding my efforts, I also welcome you to do this. Sounds like you got something to get off your chest tbh :p

If you really want to reply something, but you are not sure if it passes your vibe check, you can always ask if it is welcome, either here, or through a private message to me (I think this forum has private messaging? I don't know how to make it work though). If you are hesitant to comment because it would deal with a very sensitive issue, throw a content warning down.



I'd also like to say that I don't require everything to be responded to. I certainly understand that this journal is already quite long, and a response to everything might be quite the task even if I were to stop writing today.

Everything posted in this journal is welcome to be responded to. If I don't want anyone to comment, I will not post that material here. It will remain private writings for myself. Part of the point of writing something publically like this is the hope that it will build correspondence.

Not to mention, as a human, I do love attention. People ought not apologise for basically wanting to ask for a basic psychological need. I'm an attention seeker, and I'm willing to guess you are too. The only thing moderating me here is my respect for your time.

Entry 0: Charter

...

Aren't journals... Private? Isn't that the whole point of them? They are a useful space to explore topics that normally don't see the light of day. A public journal just sounds like a recipe for avoiding talking about the tough things, which may be helpful for you to explore.

It's true. I also plan to keep a parallel journal updated alongside this that I will keep private. Upon writing an entry, I might ask myself whether I would like to abridge the entry before posting or make it totally private. I feel like this could also provide the benefit of helping me ascertain what I truly deem deeply private, and raising further questions as to the justifications I can provide for barriers I have, and whether they are constructive or destructive.

... I love a creative, self-helping use of our platforms.

Thanks! I was a little worried I was possibly using the board in a way that was unwelcome, so I appreciate you communicating your approval. Also, as politely as I can say this to you Heather, you are old-school cool. Identifying the need for, and creating a forum specifically for sex ed in the late 90's (I can only imagine the resistence you met.) must have been hard. To keep it running for me to use in all the way in 2022 to talk about my life - which hadn't even started when this board went live - is a feat anew. I know one other person who continues to administrate a board from the 90s. They are also cool, like you. So, props!
https://www.scarleteen.com/the_scarlete ... 20Designer




Warmly,

Socks

[CodingSocks]

Entry 3: Transgender and Genderqueer
Gender is an ambiguous image
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambiguous_image

TLDR;

• I use a very flexible understanding of manhood selectively, while not really allowing that same flexibility in my own mind for womanhood.

• I wouldn't be surprised to find someone anonymized with my interests to be a girl, so why don't I hold myself to that standard?

I feel having a slurry of big transgender and genderqueer vibes can make it hard to say definitively whether an impulse really is rooted in a desire to act femininely, or whether it is an impulse to fuck around as a guy. Effectively I've made a concept of manhood that is so stretchy and accepting that I don't know if I fit within, or break outside the confines I perceive.

For example, nail polish is something I want to try. I see it as a generally femininely coded impulse, but I at the same time know that men can, and do, wear nail polish.

I end up questioning everything from the ground up. I liked wearing women's boots as a part of a outfit I did for a Renaissance Fair over the summer. They were black zip-up things with a small heel to give a bit of a piratey vibe that I thrifted. In the context I was using them, they probably came off as plausibly masculine (besides from how pirates are queer coded, but this is besides the point), yet I appreciated some ship-of-Theseus aspect of them still being feminine in my mind and nobody else's. I felt handsome, but feminine? Or maybe it felt pretty, but masculine? Maybe it felt pretty and feminine? Or I'm losing the forest through the trees, and it's just something I "liked" and I don't have to pointlessly gender my life like this?

Can men wear... cute dresses?
They can, and have. Likely, as a provocative fashion statement about masculinity. Still, a man in a dress.

Basically, how can I say anything definitive about this while all of this shit is so arbitrary? However, at the same time, is something so important?



An argument could be to ask what gender I would probably assume to be of someone who would be interested in the amalgam of things I'm interested to be would be. This however would be looking to society for the answers, and carries with it the baggage of societal concepts...

Ooh! An IDEA.

As I identified in an earlier entry:

Entry 1: Why now?

Another layer of denial would probably be holdovers of sexist and outdated concepts of femininity that impose unnecessary restrictions on what a woman is and how she "ought" to act. I may unconsciously hold some of this brain mould, which could lead me to unnecessarily exclude myself from the category of girl. unlike the previous layer of denial, this is more tricky to identify, as I will explain below (4).

A few months ago, I was thinking about an early teenage (~13 years old) justification against the possibility of myself being trans.

• I love video games.

• Girls don't play video games.

• If I were born a girl, I wouldn't play video games by the virtue of being a girl. My interests would be something else.

• I don't like that.

• I don't like the idea of being a girl.

• I am not a girl.

On its face upon remembering this, I immediately identified it as a stupid, sexist, and juvenile view of gender. I believe this also may have come from popular myths about trans stories, namely, the idea of trans kids wanting to play with the other gender's toys from toddlerhood. It is certainly the case for many trans stories it may be true, but for me, it served as a very clear affirmation that I was certainly not trans.

What I mean to say by sharing this is that my conceptualization of what it means to be a girl could be clouded by unfair or false expectations of what it means to be a girl. I would like to think that this is all out of my system. I think radically progressive ideas like gender abolitionism and the view of gender as an arbitrary and inconsistent social construct help to reframe gender in an incredibly loose and accepting definition that can be built up to one's liking as opposed to assimilating into what might be the median woman with 2.4 kids, and 1.99997 feet etc.

I think that I am willing to give an extremely loose definition of manhood for myself, but not extend the same standard to womanhood. I'd probably label this as a coping mechanism that is preventing me from viewing the situation on a more even playing field. Would I be surprised if a cisgender girl had all of the same impulses as me? Nothing even really jumps out as being that abnormal by this view, give or take video games are generally dominated by men.

This is playing out the "Null Hypothecis", that proving oneself to be transgender requires a preponderance of evidence, while proving oneself to be cisgender is assumed, and can be proven with incidental evidence.

In conclusion:

• I use a very flexible understanding of manhood selectively, while not really allowing that same flexibility in my own mind for womanhood.

• I wouldn't be surprised to find someone anonymized with my interests to be a girl, so why don't I hold myself to that standard?

Checkmate, me,

Socks