Harassment

This is what online harassment looks like. Based on the choice of photo to spuriously report for "graphic violence," I suspect I'm being harassed for being trans.

Facebook actively encourages this kind of harassment. Someone can report the same image over, and over, and over, ad infinitum, in the hopes that eventually, just once, the censors will ban it. There is no accountability for bogus reports. You can make a dozen bogus reports and there is no consequence - they don't even give a time-out from reporting, apparently. You are not permitted to comment on the report, such as to point out that the image has already passed muster (something they could easily check automatically), or to report the reporter for obvious harassment, as above.

I have tried, and failed, to find some way of contacting Facebook directly - they appear to make that deliberately impossible.

So there is nothing I can do. At this point I can only assume that I will be harassed until my harasser gets bored, which may be quite a while. And as I said above, Facebook encourages this sort of behavior with their reckless reporting policies.

I think this relates in a non-trivial way to the harassment transgender people and drag performers face over the name policy. Like I said, the fact that my ancient picture of hormone pills, and not the more recent mountain of pills, was reported for graphic violence tells me they have something against teh trans. And they have nothing better to do than to be a pain in my ass for it.

I guess achievement unlocked, guys. bleep-bloop Face Trans Hate 75G

Tits and GTFO

In at least five cases, these very nipples have been deemed safe for work by Facebook's censors. There appears to be no rhyme or reason to the decisions. My nipples at 2 months of HRT, when they were clearly masculine (and, in fact, I was legally male) were removed for nudity. Male nipples. Conversely, my nipples at 8 months of HRT, barely 2 months ago, were allowed to stay. Apparently the A cup boobs of someone legally female are okay, but only in some arbitrary cases. Other times the same nipples have gotten me outright banned.

Is it the lighting? Just a different boob inspector examining with comparison photos? What is it, Facebook?

It's incoherent nonsense meant to enforce a societal double standard. Men's nips? Even moobs? Even pinching it and making a sexy face? A-OK. Completely tasteful display or rendition of feminine beauty? A documentary about experiencing female puberty late in life? Breastfeeding? Naughty, naughty.

So let me ask you: does this picture turn you on so much you just *have* to fap? Will it scar children for life if they see it? Is there a single offensive thing about this picture (other than the fact that I appear in it)? Is there anything not PG in this entire post?

Or is it just a picture of me, honestly showing myself as I am?

Facebook doesn't care what it is. They have their muddled policies. But it makes absolutely zero sense for the same nipples to both be offensive and inoffensive. This double standard has to end.

#FreeTheNipple

Why I'm keeping my gender unchanged on Facebook

In case you don't use Facebook (in which case, drop into comments and tell me how you found this) and have been living under an internet-rock, Facebook now has 58 gender options, not just male and female. These include a lot of terms that could refer to your bloghostess - transwoman, transfemale, MtF, and others. But I'm sticking to plain old "female."

Facebook made this change to accommodate people like me and to better capture the nuances of gender. And to people who choose to utilize these new options, because they feel something other than male or female better identifies them, I say great - I'm glad you have that option. (Admittedly, the only uses I've seen of the new gender and pronoun options "in the wild" are strictly novelty. But I know people who use them in earnest exist.) But I am not one of them, even if I'm in the target demographic. Here's why:

"Transwoman," (to pick an example) is a perfectly accurate description of me. I wouldn't bristle in the slightest if someone referred to me that way. However, the way I see it, I am only a transwoman by circumstance. I am not transitioning because I identify as a transwoman; I am a transwoman because I have to transition to be fully female. That is, I desire to be, and choose to define myself as, female; the trans- modifier simply specifies that I wasn't always that way.

I do not want an intrinsically trans femininity for myself. I'm trans and I'm not ashamed of that. But by defining my gender in terms of being trans, I feel I'd be preemptively alienating myself from my femininity. I'd be defining myself as a non-native female, in terms that anchor my identity to my past and set me apart from other women.

I choose to be a woman, and only an accident of birth makes me specifically a transwoman.