Is the sun transphobic? Does the sun fat shame? Has the world gone mad?

[QuizteamBleakley]

The sun - that big shiny orb in the sky is dangerous to gender non-conforming folk, apparently. Still, you should see me in ma sleeveless & backless sundress, I get called all sorts, some of it quite clever, mostly just crap. Having had a lifetime of name-calling, I just plod on and avoid wearing a bikini to the corner shop.

Oh! And now we have the ‘well why do they dress like that if they don’t want attention’

Honestly, this thread is like the btl bit on the guardian of any and every article about street harassment of women

MissVanjie if you mean what I said I am a man so maybe I am being unfeeling or dismissive, but I don't mean to be. I really don't understand why most people would mock these days. I see all kinds of different clothing.

What I said about random clothes wasn't a joke and I was making a point. It's the stereotypes that are the problem. If we could break away from them completely no one would be mocked for appearance.

Ultimately my point is that everyone can be or indeed has been mocked / catcalled / heckled for their appearance or attire, lets not blame the sun.

I'm sure everyone is deeply chastened by the scolding. Perhaps if you try really hard they'll all go stand in the corner.

Same person [phew] who started a funding campaign to get money for their taxis, because gosh:

Can you imagine what it's like leaving your home in constant fear of assault, harassment and ridicule? This is what trans people experience every day of their lives. Help our trans siblings. Read this thread and share, please

'Yes' said all women 'we can'.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3117210-ATH-appeal-for-travel-bursary-for-trans-women-Not-trans-men

“ It's the stereotypes that are the problem. If we could break away from them completely no one would be mocked for appearance.”

Exactly, i agree with this completely. This person is breaking away from them and doesn’t deserve mockery for that, either in their day to day life, or when they try and speak up about it.

AAK is that directed at me?

I’m posting my point of view on a thread, i haven’t belittled anyone or been disrespectful. Obviously I haven’t followed the hivemind, but i am not sure why that merits you getting all salty ad hominem at me rather than engaging with what i’ve said.

MissVanjie I sort of get what you're saying, and I also don't agree with the mocking of the presentation Travis chooses in clothes. But I don't agree with Travis's demands and complaints.

What I'm going to say below is not linked to those experiencing gender dysphoria. As Travis doesn't seem, in all the media about them, to say they're experiencing this.

A lot of the people on this thread including me, I suspect because of the age of a lot of Mumsnet posters, have lived through times where we also challenged norms.

As a teenager and young adult, I dressed like terryleather , outside the 'norms' of traditional dress. We challenged stereotypes, both gender ones and just traditional cultural ones in the UK full stop.

But, I don't recall, that this was accompanied by a victim-mentality of 'you're killing me, your assumptions about me are invalidating me, you need to adapt your behaviour and bend towards me and my needs'.

Something's happened in the last decade or so which conflates what should be strong statements about challenging 'norms' together with the trans-agenda of 'the most oppressed people on the earth, no one understands us'.

I was a goth too. Anyone who chooses an unusual look needs to develop a thick skin, especially if it's important to you to look that way due to subcultural affiliations or whatever.

Anyone who completely fails to notice the endemic harassment that woman and girls are subjected to and concludes that the stick they're getting for having unusual dress sense is unique and far worse than mere girls being sexually harassed because they have boobs is not exactly winning the World's Most Clued In Person award.

But, I don't recall, that this was accompanied by a victim-mentality of 'you're killing me, your assumptions about me are invalidating me, you need to adapt your behaviour and bend towards me and my needs'.

Honestly? Maybe a bit at one point, but I think that's known as "being a teenager".

It is Kevin and Perry literally brought into the modern day.

Yes, the 'whole world is against me, and I'm going to tantrum until it adores me' thing is as old as the hills.

What has changed is that some powerful people have decided to listen to it instead of rolling their eyes.

I did dress like that partly for the attention as I previously stated, even though I only admit it with age and hindsight.

Some may believe Alok doesn't expect any comment/reaction when wearing the outfit I posted previously but I disagree.

Women know that catcalling and harassment happen no matter what they're wearing - you just need to have a female body that's the only requirement. No woman deserves it or asks for it.

As I said previously, being abused/harassed/catcalled was for me far worse than abuse for my youth subculture sartorial choices, with choice being the important word.
In reality I could choose at any time not to dress like a goth but I couldn't choose not to be in possession of a female body.

*Yes, the 'whole world is against me, and I'm going to tantrum until it adores me' thing is as old as the hills.

What has changed is that some powerful people have decided to listen to it instead of rolling their eyes.*

This is the worrying thing...

If people stare at Alok it's not because he's gender non-conforming, it's because he looks like a colorblind toddler who'd had too much sugar picked out his outfit for him. Nobody dresses like that if they don't want attention.

I agree Angry

And being told it's not nice to point this out is tedious in the extreme - I already know and I don't care!

Bring on strike one!

Well yes, that is rather the bind for these delicate blossoms. They want to widen the bandwidth, etc, and let everyone wear what they want to and are happy in.

But if we all did that, who would look at Travis and Alok? If everyone is a special precious wunderkind who needs to express themselves in funkadelic ways, how will we be able to notice Travis and Alok?

You can see why they're suffering, really. They're actually liberating themselves out of the attention vortex. It must be so hard.

Good points FireFarting

Could you please archive.is the links to Prick News? I hate giving them a click.

Actually AAK, you're probably right, but it was more of a 'you don't understand me' thing.

And as FireFartingDuck says, "some powerful people have started to listen".

Though I'd reframe that a bit, as in "some powerful/manipulative people have started to coopt normal teenager behaviour to validate their own adult needs and validation that fall outside 'norms' of behaviour"

And are starting to be very angry that other people have started to notice what's happening.

And are starting to be very angry that other people have started to notice what's happening.

Diddums, frankly.

Yep AAK

I agree in your sentiment, if only so many otherwise rational people weren't seeming to be sharing in that validation agenda, despite red flags being raised like a flipping bunting production line right now.

I can think of other trans-people suffering more — those who are FtM and wearing binders must be struggling more surely?

The article is good in a "I wear whatever I like because I like it and people shouldn't comment" way, but the headline doesn't really match that.

Totally agree. I was also a goth. Sometimes, I went out just wearing skinny black jeans and a black vest top with docs. Others I went out with my hair in a huge black mohawk, a corset and a Danielle Dax style shredded ribbon and lace skirt. To Sainsbury's. (Ah memories...)

I also used to get things shouted at me.

If you choose to dress 'noticeably' then you are going to have dickheads shouting things at you.

If you 'signpost' yourself as 'different' then dickheads are going to shout things at you.

I personally feel people should be able to dress how they wish without dickheads shouting at them, but clearly the dickheads don't.

But that isn't a trans problem, it's a 'there are dickheads in the world' problem.

The point is that it is much worse when a man experiences it. See also transwomen 'lesbians' who suddenly and indignantly discover a world of homophobia. Tedious

Precisely, if it was framed as "why won't arseholes leave people alone?" then commiserations, mate, some people really ought to come with a built in mute button. When it's framed as I, unique snowflake, and only I and perhaps a few others very much like me am being picked on, which is unacceptable because we're actually special and amazing, then it becomes less of a people in general should stop heckling randoms in the street thing and more of a how dare randoms fail to recognize my innate superiority thing.