End of June this year, there was a Pride march in Helsinki. That was around when I started seriously questioning if I’m really non-binary or maybe actually transfeminine. The organization Transfeminiinit had organized a trans block, open for all trans people, not just transfems. So, I felt safe to go there even though I did not feel securely binary.
I arrived so early that there were only two other in the block people before me. One older trans woman who was carrying the organization’s flag, and then a cis woman. I could not understand what the hell the cis woman was doing there. She did not seem to be the other woman’s close friend. An ally of a kind, maybe? But seemed super suspicious, because when I listened to her speaking, there was nothing hinting why she had arrived to the trans people’s block. And she looked so extremely feminine that I was very sure she cannot be identifying as non-binary either. No enby would be comfortable looking as feminine as she did!
Of course I also considered the possibility that she could be a trans woman, but with that body it was clearly not possible.
Only, some 30 minutes later I listened to her talk about her transitioning and I understood why she was there. Such an extremely passing person that even though she was in a trans event and I was explicitly trying to find some proof that she is trans, I could not recognize her as one.
Now, why am I telling this? Because I just had a conversation with her yesterday, and it turns out she feels horrible because she is sure she does not pass as a woman. She’s saying that “everyone can immediately see that I am trans”.
If you look at her, it is absolutely unambiguous that she is wrong. Just objectively wrong. If she clocks to someone as trans, then at least 30 % of cis women clock as trans to that someone.
What I’m trying to say here is that we all are constantly afraid of not passing. Even the ones who pass with flying colours in reality. Even that woman I now wrote about, who is surely the most passing trans woman I have ever seen anywhere, is somehow still sure that she does not pass almost at all.
I believe I will never stop feeling that I don’t pass. And you will never stop feeling that you don’t pass. Basically no trans woman ever stops feeling that she doesn’t pass. That’s just a part of being trans. No matter how well you pass, that feeling will always be with you. Just tell the feeling it’s irrelevant.
When you know your friend’s answer to “is it now day or night” is always “day” regardless of the time, his answers are irrelevant. Even if in the daytime they are right. That friend’s answers hold no information value at all. And your eternally omnipresent feeling of not passing holds no information value either, because no matter what the reality is, it will always say “thou shall not pass.”
The only way to know whether you pass or not is through other people’s words and reactions. Some time ago a guy opened a door to me and then when I was right next to him, he got shocked and started shouting slurs at me. That was my first time, and it still has not happened again, so I am just happy that it happens so seldom. But I’m also happy that he showed that he would never open a door for a trans woman, only for a cis woman. And he did open the door for me!
And I would never have thought that I already pass, even from a distance. But although my brain says everybody will think I’m a man in women’s clothes from a distance of half a kilometre, in reality I needed to get closer than a metre away from the guy before I was close enough for him to notice I am not a cis woman after all. That’s how you know whether you pass or not. Your own opinion on your passing is not relevant for figuring that out. At what distance people start shouting anti-trans slurs at you tells much more. The unit of passing is the metre :)
So, the question is: How close do you need to walk to an anti-trans person before they start shouting their shit at you? In your case, you could probably give them a kiss and they would not notice.
Okay, let’s go for an anecdote.
End of June this year, there was a Pride march in Helsinki. That was around when I started seriously questioning if I’m really non-binary or maybe actually transfeminine. The organization Transfeminiinit had organized a trans block, open for all trans people, not just transfems. So, I felt safe to go there even though I did not feel securely binary.
I arrived so early that there were only two other in the block people before me. One older trans woman who was carrying the organization’s flag, and then a cis woman. I could not understand what the hell the cis woman was doing there. She did not seem to be the other woman’s close friend. An ally of a kind, maybe? But seemed super suspicious, because when I listened to her speaking, there was nothing hinting why she had arrived to the trans people’s block. And she looked so extremely feminine that I was very sure she cannot be identifying as non-binary either. No enby would be comfortable looking as feminine as she did!
Of course I also considered the possibility that she could be a trans woman, but with that body it was clearly not possible.
Only, some 30 minutes later I listened to her talk about her transitioning and I understood why she was there. Such an extremely passing person that even though she was in a trans event and I was explicitly trying to find some proof that she is trans, I could not recognize her as one.
Now, why am I telling this? Because I just had a conversation with her yesterday, and it turns out she feels horrible because she is sure she does not pass as a woman. She’s saying that “everyone can immediately see that I am trans”.
If you look at her, it is absolutely unambiguous that she is wrong. Just objectively wrong. If she clocks to someone as trans, then at least 30 % of cis women clock as trans to that someone.
What I’m trying to say here is that we all are constantly afraid of not passing. Even the ones who pass with flying colours in reality. Even that woman I now wrote about, who is surely the most passing trans woman I have ever seen anywhere, is somehow still sure that she does not pass almost at all.
I believe I will never stop feeling that I don’t pass. And you will never stop feeling that you don’t pass. Basically no trans woman ever stops feeling that she doesn’t pass. That’s just a part of being trans. No matter how well you pass, that feeling will always be with you. Just tell the feeling it’s irrelevant.
When you know your friend’s answer to “is it now day or night” is always “day” regardless of the time, his answers are irrelevant. Even if in the daytime they are right. That friend’s answers hold no information value at all. And your eternally omnipresent feeling of not passing holds no information value either, because no matter what the reality is, it will always say “thou shall not pass.”
The only way to know whether you pass or not is through other people’s words and reactions. Some time ago a guy opened a door to me and then when I was right next to him, he got shocked and started shouting slurs at me. That was my first time, and it still has not happened again, so I am just happy that it happens so seldom. But I’m also happy that he showed that he would never open a door for a trans woman, only for a cis woman. And he did open the door for me!
And I would never have thought that I already pass, even from a distance. But although my brain says everybody will think I’m a man in women’s clothes from a distance of half a kilometre, in reality I needed to get closer than a metre away from the guy before I was close enough for him to notice I am not a cis woman after all. That’s how you know whether you pass or not. Your own opinion on your passing is not relevant for figuring that out. At what distance people start shouting anti-trans slurs at you tells much more. The unit of passing is the metre :)
So, the question is: How close do you need to walk to an anti-trans person before they start shouting their shit at you? In your case, you could probably give them a kiss and they would not notice.