Eternal Radness

Look, no one is saying you absolutely have to date a transgender person, but the thing is when you make blanket comments like “Oh, I would never date a trans person” or “I don’t find trans people attractive” about an already marginalized and historically excluded group, you don’t get to play that as a preference. It’s transphobic, bottom line. You’re playing into the idea that trans men and women are somehow “less” or “not as valid” as cisgender people. When you say things like “I just don’t want to date a dick” you’re literally reducing people to their genitals, discrediting their personality, their humor, shared interests, everything down to the cissexist notion that genitals are inherently either “boy or girl parts.” When you say you don’t find trans people attractive, what is the one trait, the single thing that literally all trans people have on common? Yes! It’s that they are transgender. The root of what makes this behavior cissexist is that it is based on the assumption that you will always know if someone is transgender, and them being transgender will magically prevent attraction from happening. So to just go ahead and dismiss an entire group of people merely because you believe us to be inferior, is absolutely transphobic. It’s ok, you don’t have to immediately fly off the handle into a “I’m not fucking transphobic, fuck you!!” tirade. You can confront this internalized transphobia, you can grow from it, unlearn cissexist language and transphobic ways of thinking. No one is personally attacking you, or your sexuality, but when you make those blanket comments against the trans community, you are being transphobic, whether you can admit it to yourself or not.