tgirl

The term “tgirl” disgusts me. The more i hear it the more it does and I’m finally able to put into words exactly why. Use of the term “tgirl” bestows upon transsexual women a linguistic markedness (read There Is No Unmarked Woman) beyond the existing marker of girl. It categorizes transsexual women as a different thing from real (cisgender) women, thus creating a third category (boys, girls, tgirls). This is incredibly transphobic. Not necessarily wrong, per se, but it is transphobic assuming the othering of trans people is a form of transphobia. What irks me most about the term though is that, in my experience, it’s predominantly used by queer people and so-called allies. That this othering is from within disgusts me.

This is the sort of thing I’m trying to get at here. That using the term “tgirl” indicates a perceived difference between trans women and real women. It is the language of unrepentant autogynephiles who wish to alienate themselves from cisness due to a delusional cope that being a [] is good for any reason. It is the language of chasers and grifters who seek to curry points by appealing to a desperate minority. It is the language of the pitiable transsexual desperately searching for any positive spin on their accursed affliction, but I reject the idea that separatism can ever heal. Problems can only be solved by confrontation rather than flight, and the term “tgirl” is at best an attempt to flee.