Trans Masculine/Feminine: The Recreated Binary






The terms tie the authenticity of one’s trans identity to certain presentations, expressions, and stereotypes. If you are CAF, you must be masculine to be considered trans. If not, you’re just a confused woman. For trans women, it creates the opposite. This is of course watering down the subject, as the cissexism, binarism, and femmephobia that go into this are much deeper (especially given the fact femininity, regardless of gender, is used as a falsehood).

Trans masculine/feminine were terms created to be inclusive of non-binary people. However, in the mix, they erased non-binary people. What about the CAF trans people who are feminine in presentation, identity, and everything else? Their transness is not any less valid, and they are definitely not trans masculine. What of the CAM trans people, who remain masculine in appearance, identity, and so forth? Their identity is not any less valid. What about those who are shifters in identity, fluid or queer?

That is not to say that trans masculine is not useful or necessary. There are some non-binary people who identify as trans masculine, as they feel it better fits their gender and its expression. They are more masculine people, but not necessarily men. That is fine. The problem comes to light when trans masculine is used as a catch-all replacement for non-binary CAF people. It implies we are all masculine. We are not.

Trans masculine, an attempt to mean non-binary people, is represented with ‘androgynous’ articles of clothing, such as bowties, that are only androgynous if worn by certain folks. Trans masculine, as an attempt to mean non-binary, does not really create a non-binary inclusion, but a new binary. A more rigid one. You are only truly non-binary if you are masculine or feminine, but only if you were ascribed a certain assumption at birth. Not very welcoming is it?

Trans masculine/feminine are not inclusive terms when used with a broad brush. Places that advertise as trans male/trans masculine are doing little to be inclusive. Instead of actively saying non-binary, it creates an environment of only certain non-binary people. While that may be true for certain spaces, to use it as a catch-all every time you wish to include CAF trans people is an issue. You must be ‘this trans’ to enter. It rings of the Grindr profile headers ‘no femmes’. We are not welcome, even if we identify as trans male. Masculine men only, and maybe masculine people too, but definitely not you.


3 thoughts on “Trans Masculine/Feminine: The Recreated Binary

  1. innocent

    The first comment that comes to mind is “welcome to being a man”.

    You post resonates with my experience growing up as a boy on the feminine end if the spectrum. I have felt the way you describe all my life. An oucast of the binary.

    It’s s uprising how intolerant people who preach tolerance can be. Or maybe they have just transitioned too damn well?


  2. AP

    THIS. This is exactly what I’ve been trying to express to people in current transactivism. Unless they “pass” to perfect masculine stereotype standards in looks and behaviors, FAB folks are just delusional dykes trying to obtain male priv. Why are FAB transitions not taken seriously, but MAB transitions are seen as genuine (and therefore threats)? Is it because…hmmm…people still treat transmen as women and transwomen as men?

    I consider myself trans-masculine in the sense that I am masculinizing my body. Maybe I’d say I’m trans-male. Trans-man starts to bring in all the issues of gender roles, and “gender role” as defined by societal standards has always disgusted me. Now that I’m transitioning, I feel much more comfortable as a man in drag than I did as a woman in women’s clothes, because then I look exactly as I feel myself to be. People like Prince are my idols, and that would be the same even if my body’d been born differently.

    FAB issues are indeed not being properly respected or addressed.


  3. Pixie

    Have been reading your writings for a while, and really appreciate you being willing to write about so many issues so openly. Especially things like this.. The only label I have been able to (sort of) accept (tolerate? not violently object to? not feel erased by?) is non-cis, the rest are all so fixated on being masculine that they leave no room for me.

    Even my therapist, otherwise very open-minded, keeps suggesting things like maybe I should cut my hair if I want people to stop seeing me as female. Even if hypothetically that was the only thing I needed to do for people to make the switch to seeing me as male (unlikely, though I’m sure it would help), I still wouldn’t do it. If I can’t be male on my terms, then this whole nightmare of transition seems utterly pointless on the social level, trading one painfully ill-fitting mask for another.


Leave a Reply


You are commenting using your account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo


Twitter picture


Facebook photo


Connecting to %s
