I'm going to talk about being transfem and butch.
I get misgendered in public a lot. Never cruelly. Just a lot. Which makes sense.
I'm 190lbs of muscle with a deep voice. Which I enjoy. Typically I'm wearing leather and jeans. The vast majority of people are going to gender me as male because my gender presentation is inherently masculine, and other parts of me are also masculine.
This is a problem that cis butches face regularly, and that fact helps me cope with constantly being read as male. But it aches the most when I see other lesbians/queer women.
I don't really get to be 'publicly' lesbian. If I see another dyke on the street, I'm just a man. There's no quiet solidarity there. There's no recognition.
Femmes don't preen under my gaze at a bar. Instead, I have to walk up and explain my whole situation and hope that they're cool. Which is rough, because sometimes they're not. Or, worse, they say they are, but they aren't. Which results in a lot of wasted time for everybody.
It takes a supreme amount of self-confidence to walk up to a cute girl and boldly declare yourself also a girl in a voice that immediately gives some kind of lie to what you're saying.
So, baseline, I'm pushing and establishing boundaries. I'm already testing her just by talking to her. Which makes flirting hard, you see? If I feel like I'm already toeing a line, then I'm not going to make a sly comment about her dress. I am, instead, going to be as non-threatening as possible.
This is a great way to make new friends and acquaintances (I have a lot), but a terrible way to get laid.
So, my point is that if you meet a transbutch girl understand that she's already putting up a LOT of work just be here. So, you know, maybe touch my her arm and give me her a compliment if you're interested.
