I am a nonbinary trans woman. Within the first year of being out as transgender I was constantly plagued with people asking “When are you going to go on hormones?”, a question which has & still does annoy me to this day.

The dialogue that every trans person must, or should, inherently want to seek medicalized transition, is a deeply flawed & even toxic viewpoint to hold.

Not all trans people want to pass. The presumption that they do, or that they must, reinforces the gender binary in a completely backwards way. Often times you see trans women & men having to perform gender in inauthentic, almost vaudevillian ways, in order to pass. For example, trans men who feel like they have to reject butch tropes in favor of dressing like frat boys to avoid misgendering.

This ideology profits off of the fact that trans people shouldn’t be happy with their bodies, that they need to use money to medically legitimize their ideal existence. This adds an unnecessary classist aspect to trans identity– saying that, if you do not have the money for GRS ‘you aren’t really trans yet’

Within this framework the onus of transphobic violence moves away from the perpetrators & onto trans people. Trans people are only acceptable –their violence is only unwarranted, when they pass flawlessly. Instead of allowing trans people to exist ‘passing culture’ has allowed trans people to assimilate.