u/TheToledoMan

As the title says, I'm a tomboy, a butch, a crossdresser, a GNC, whatever, I'm not the mainstream idea of "trans girl". Ever liked masculinity, vibed with the boys and the masc girls, I don't wear makeup, don't wear dresses, I'm gamer, otaku, for years everyone read me as a "normal boy", etc. I hadn't realized until 17-years-old (past year).

However, the more I keep thinking about my childhood, the more I start noticing some things.

First of all, my hate towards femininity. When I had 7-9 years, I hated all femme-coded things. Then, it was seen as just a boy being masc, as ever, you know, the stereotype. With the time I learned to accept it and maybe even have a bit of outsider interest. However, retrospectively, I notice something: it was masking, like if I wanted to prove so hard to be a boy, when masc boys just...don't need to do it, they just are. Here's where I think: what if I was just a boyish girl whose context made her believe she was a boy and had to prove it?

Second, pop culture. During that time, among the few exceptions were tomboys in fiction. You know, the girls who rule, who fight, who are boyish, who "aren't like the other girls". Samus Aran, Aqua and Larxene (Kingdom Hearts), Lightning (Final Fantasy XIII), some Pokémon characters (e.g. Hilda), Lara Croft (reboot and a bit Legend's trilogy, not the OG male gaze), you know. At first it looked like, you know, boy liking masc-coded things designed for boys, but for some reason they were rarely magnetic to me. What if that was recognition? Yeah, there is a historical fetishization of the tomboy, I know, same reason why I wonder that if TERFs discover people like me exist would say we are a "very specific kind of AGP".

An example of that connection is Mirror's Edge. I played both games when I was 13-14, and there was something with Faith...

Third, my family. I grew in a mostly matriarchal, feminist family, men are relevant but we women are the main thing. For that same reason, I ever knew women can be however we want. Still don't know how I lasted so much into applying it to trans ones.

All of these things separately aren't that much, but together...they make a picture. If I met my 8-years-old-me I would tell him: "well...how do I tell you what you're going to discover in 10 years?"

https://preview.redd.it/g9onfycjhjah1.png?width=472&format=png&auto=webp&s=2882bfc4dbd86422a42611660b261190fc9ec3e7

Ok, so, after a time being basically a phantom in the platform, I finally complete a game, Delisoba Deluxe, I chose it because it had few achievements. I did most of the work on mobile on Yaba Sanshiro 2 Pro, excepting the Initial D-livery achievement which I did on PC, that thing was a hell to unlock.
Well, I think this is my beginning of the road.

I'm a masculine trans woman, a TGNC, I have no interest in makeup or dresses, no problem with the boys but as a girl, not as one of them, I don't have a problem with being masc. I would pay to relive my childhood and early adolescence but as the tomboy girl I ever was.

I knew the rhetoric since I started to enter in the trans community, "transing the gays away", you know. Here's the thing: after realizing I'm a woman, I started to see more clearly the cracks.

Personally, I see that it doesn't only harm trans men, but actively ignores GNC trans women. Tomboy trans girls are being told they're men or forced to detransition and they act like nothing happened, but trans men exist and they already cry "tomboy genocide." Like, if we apply the logic without bias, the goal should be both protect cis tomboys to forced transition AND trans tomboys to forced detransition, not be asymmetric where only cis people are protected (common from TERF rhetoric btw).

I know there are some actual tensions, we historically faced even more rigid gender stereotypes than cis people—we still do and some internalized them—and sadly there are cis tomboys who were forced to transition, but here's the thing: that doesn't mean we are the problem itself, in most of cases the problem is caused by a third (e.g. hospitals or society). If cis tomboys were mainstream during 1970s-1990s (2000s if we stretch a bit) was because it was the most progressive thing mainstream could show, now we trans people occupy that place, and also those times weren't as gold as some nostalgic GCs remember. Heck, we tomboys overall still have a noticeable presence in pop culture (*cough* Arcane).

Now, whenever somebody talks about "tomboy genocide", I think: "I know what you're trying to do, now if you let me I'm going to play Mirror's Edge while I hear Bikini Kill."

Is for this kind of things that we TGNC people need more visibility.

I'm more of a sci-fi girl, but I'm not unfamiliar with fantasy. Y'all know medieval fantasy is burned as hell and a modern day one feels vague unless very well done, so I decided to ask this.

Personally, the Cold War. Imagine the magical world equivalents of the atomic bomb, nuclear anxiety, MAD, Iron Curtain, proxy wars, etc. Also, the indirect battle would be a bit fresher than the classic fantasy war. Still thinking what could be the analog to nukes, maybe the most powerful black magic spell in that world?

Ok, so, here are things that makes me wonder if the 2030s could be a countercultural era:
- Mainstream social media and algorithm burnout and backlash.
- AI backlash, both socially and politically.
- Popularization of VPNs, privacy-friendly, attention-friendly or just not as invasive alternatives. I myself I'm basically living a double life in the web.
- Active backlash against anti-privacy laws.
- Feeling of be living in a "dystopia" actually being a good signal, since it shows people can still think and act to prevent the worst possible future.
- Economical instability.
- Analog revival.
- Lack of trust in power.
- Revival of conservatism, mainly patriarchal (manosphere) and anti-LGBTQ+ ideas or politics.
- People, especially Gen Z, are just tired.

Like, yeah, I know we're part of a scapegoat strategy, but I see we had some flaws also. For me, the biggest mistakes it made was relax with the mid-2010s boom and be over-defensive (well, that damaged socially, institutionally would've been the same with or without); we're not the unique causes of how we are todat, but let's say I see those as modifiers. I think that what we're living now is both a victory of the rhetoric and also a hard but necessary time to learn and make a better future activism, it's too soon to say if we lost or won, maybe we still have decades ahead, now we have to even further build our own networks.

So, I was researching about riot grrrl 'cuz tomboy, and in the process, while having an anemoia attack, I asked myself: could we do something like it in the future? It doesn't have to be an exact "Second Riot Grrrl but trans-inclusive" but to fill a similar role culturally and politically, heck it doesn't even needs to be exactly rock. The closest I can think about is Against Me!

My take: while possible, not guaranteed. Historical parallels and current trends (rise of conservatism, manosphere, erosion of trust in the powerful, people getting tired, slow re-fragmentation of the web, re-popularization of dumb or analog tech, ecological projects) makes me think that the 2030s and maybe 2040s will be very countercultural, but in our specific case trans activism still needs to do a lot of work and changes to learn from the mistakes we made (like relax with the mid-2010s boost, be overly-defensive or act like if that power we got was forever) before we could even think about making something like this. So, while technically possible, we first must do a lot of political evolution before. This is more of a wish, but if it happens, I think that evolution should have we TGNC (Transgender Gender Non-Conforming) people being more visible, we could play a role as a bridge with GNC overall and as an answer to GC's "converting GNC kids" or "reinforcing stereotypes" rhetoric.

I'm interested in sing, so who knows, maybe in 2037 it exists and I'm the Kathleen Hanna of it.

Tip: see parallelisms with gay moral panic (it practically mirrors our current state) and how it (very) slowly ended. Remember the moral panic feels endless while it's happening, but it's not.
Personal one: Be kind, try to be more visible as safe as possible, make clear we're not a menace and let people relate with and see us. Luckily, in my country the moral panic isn't mainstream.

Already posted this but everyone ignored it because for some reason I decided to post at 12 AM.

Like, gender-related things that made you feel anemoia or emotional grief during your egg time, it can be expression, culture, social experiences, whatever.

I'm a butch trans woman. I grew in a feminist family, so I grew with the strong one as my ideal woman.

Since I was a kid, even during the era I strongly tried to perform a masculine boy (yeah my 8-9 years old me was too cringe 'cuz I was a kid), I ever had this weird connection with tomboys. Like, I hated dresses, I hated pink, I hated girly things, I was sure I was a boy, and still, they had something magnetic. That feeling was there in every movie or series I watched, every video game I played, in aesthetics, etc. I had, like, the average tomboy childhood but being read as an autistic boy.

Later, during my questioning time at 15/early 16, I started to research about feminist and tomboy culture, history and theory, and that weird feeling of distressing nostalgia for things I hadn't lived, for things I "for some reason relate too deeply" (spoiler: things that forever should've been mine but weren't), got powered like 100 times bigger. First I saw it as intense curiosity. Then, as familiarity. Then, as anemoia. Then, as a mirror. Then, as grief for things that should've been mine but they were taken from me. Now, like things that *are* mine, of something that I'm part of. Literally, learn feminist history and cultures helped me to realize I'm trans. They weren't the unique reason but a key one.

Note to my 13-years-old: if Faith Connors makes you feel weird, I have news for you (also I feel old remembering Mirror's Edge Catalyst is now 10 years old and the original nearly 20💀).

It can be about expression, culture, whatever.

I'm a butch trans woman. I grew in a feminist family, so I grew with the strong one as my ideal woman.

Since I was a kid, even during the era I strongly tried to perform a masculine boy (yeah my 8-9 years old me was too cringe 'cuz I was a kid), I ever had this weird connection with tomboys. Like, I hated dresses, I hated pink, I hated girly things, I was sure I was a boy, and still, they had something magnetic. That feeling was there in every movie or series I watched, every video game I played, in aesthetics, etc. I had, like, the average tomboy childhood but being read as an autistic boy.

Later, during my questioning time at 15/early 16, I started to research about feminist and tomboy culture, history and theory, and that weird feeling of distressing nostalgia for things I hadn't lived, for things I "for some reason relate too deeply" (spoiler: things that forever should've been mine but weren't), got powered like 100 times bigger. First I saw it as intense curiosity. Then, as familiarity. Then, as anemoia. Then, as a mirror. Then, as grief for things that should've been mine but they were taken from me. Now, like things that are mine, of something that I'm part of. Literally, learn feminist history and cultures helped me to realize I'm trans.

Note to my 13-years-old: if Faith Connors makes you feel weird, I have news for you (also I feel old remembering Mirror's Edge Catalyst is now 10 years old and the original nearly 20💀).

I'll be fast: this current one for me. I'm 18, and since 2020 me and my family had a titanic glow up from a poor-esque family to have national-wide lawyers, international artists, good houses, and me having a titanic glow up between my 12s and now.

Considering:

- MAD.

- Proxy wars.

- Interdependence.

- Multilateralism.

- Money.

- Capitalist Peace theory.

- Multinational companies.

- Global organizations, treaties, and diplomatic norms structurally reducing the likelihood.

- Even a small direct confrontation between the major powers would have effects so big that none of the parts would want.

- Fear and UN actually helped to prevent direct battles or escalating.

- Current detection and prevention technology.

- Polarization.

- Hacking, cyberattacks and informatics.

- Competence on influence and economy.

- Shadow war theories.

- Russia-Ukraine is already showing the effects of an attempt of expansion.

- Cold War having changed warfare theory forever.

- There are no two main blocks, battles are contained and the support isn't direct.

From my POV, though the fear and attention is necessary to prevent, the fearmongering is just an useless extreme that shock people. Heck, why do we still think that, if it happens, it would be traditional or use nukes in first place when for decades indirect battles showed to work?

"We are closer than ever", uh, do you know Cuban Missile Crisis or Able Archer 83? Like, yeah, we are in a serious situation, but not like that. A "global civil war" is actually more likely.

So, there's this whole Standalone thing, and for now there is only Final Fantasy XI and Terraria (I still find a funny that a game that's on Steam is also here, I guess that expands our reference of what could enter in the future), working with...patches, managers? I hadn't got it at all.

So, this means old PC games, fan games, fan ports, etc, theoretically can be added, likely through patches or a dedicated achievements manager for the games on the category (which I think would be the best way).

Here are the ones I want someday:

PC Abandonware:

- Need For Speed: Underground 2.

- Need for Speed: Most Wanted (2005).

- Prey (2006).

- No One Lives Forever.

- The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay.

- The Simpsons: Hit & Run.

- Marvel: Ultimate Alliance.

- Black & White 1 and 2.

- American McGee's Alice.

- Silent Hill 2 and 3.

- Thief series.

Fan games:

- Sonic Robo Blast 2.

- Super Mario Bros. X

- Sonic Before the Sequel & After the Sequel.

- Mushroom Kingdom Fusion.

Fan ports:

- Practically all of Nintendo 64's decomps and recomps.

- OpenGOAL's Jak and Daxter ports.

- Dusk (Twilight Princess's decompilation).

- The Legend of Dragoon.

- Infinity Blade I and II (yeah, they exist and a one for III is in development, though they are obscurer than the previous ones).