I don't want to write transmasc theory

 With being out publicly as trans there comes an expectation that you will talk about it, that you will answer every burning question. Your place in many conversations becomes that of someone who people poke at for curiosity sake. Trans theory is relatively new in that it is getting more spotlight now than it perhaps ever has. Many people would write about trans people, but often, our writings about ourselves never got the same attention.

I’ve been encouraged and asked to write trans theory, but not simply trans theory generally, not simply my experiences being perceived as a woman or a man and perhaps how they differed. My discussions about what it’s like to live and be seen as a woman or a girl were once inquired upon. I was encouraged to read and engage with feminist literature and broad feminist talking points, when I wrote stories and poetry highlighting how sexism affects people, there was some “value” to it as a sort of “ownvoices” perspective.

But that’s not why I’m writing this, and that’s not what you want from me. To be asked to write transmasc theory in particular, to question if this even counts as transfeminism (theoretically, it should), we must first figure out what transmasc theory even is, and why it needs to be labeled as a subset of trans theory. Should trans theory not encompass all of us? Does splintering trans people apart and telling us what we should and shouldn’t write truly work towards any semblance of trans liberation? Or does it give people not interested in “transmasc theory” plausible deniability to ignore what I have been asked to discuss, under the guise that by talking about masculinity, I must be engaging in some form of patriarchal toxicity?

This is not a question for me to answer, I can’t tell you what transmasc theory is, I can only talk about transness from my lens of understanding. How you as a reader choose to label and dissect it comes after my author’s death.

I am aware that one of the biggest reasons I’ve been asked to talk about this is due to the lack of transmasc theory, so, put more simply, a lack of transmasculine people talking about trans theory. Or perhaps, is it not so much that there is a lack of us, but rather that via erasure and dismissal, it simply looks and feels that way?

I don’t want to write this, and I’m sure my attitude is showing through my words. There is no world in which I can discuss the nuanced and frustrating experiences I’ve had being rejected by friends who I engaged in feminist discourse with trying to talk me away from “being a man”. When we treat gender and sexuality as a socio-political choice, as a moral choice, especially through the lens of radical feminism (I will discuss the attempted reclamation of radical feminism in trans theory at a later date, this is not that) it certainly looks immoral to want to be a man.

Why would you want to be the oppressor? Why would you want to centre the oppressor?

But then, is gender something innate? Something that we don’t choose? Perhaps a more apt and personable question is this: Would you rather I be a suicidal (mostly sapphic) feminist woman, who’s entire point of view on femininity is that it is a prison? Or would you rather I transition, find mental and emotional stability, and then engage with feminism from a critical and analytical point of view, where I can do so without framing femininity as “forced” and where I am not fantasizing about ending my own life? If masculinity, if manhood, is always a form of oppression, then how does it stand that acknowledging that part of me is what saved my life? And what does it say about your perspective on transmasculinity if your takeaway is that you wish I could have been saved “without having to become a man”, that this should be a final resort?

There is a deep discomfort that people have with seeing women and girls become men, they often see it as a loss. The “lost lesbian”, the “wasted potential”, someone who “could have been a wife”, someone who “should be rearing children”. This discomfort is not only seen in conservative worldviews, you can see it in feminist ones too. Being both a trans man and a feminist puts you in a similar position to being a woman in a patriarchal system. You should make yourself small, you should let others speak, you should only speak when given permission. By transitioning, you’ve “lost your right” to “insert yourself in women’s issues”, regardless if those issues of bodily autonomy and sexual violence affect your life in a way they do not affect that of a cis man’s.

The deeply uncomfortable truth is that anyone can perpetuate misogyny, and misogynistic rhetoric doesn’t become something else just because you paint it a different colour and frame it in a different way.

In the article “The Fantasy of ‘Trans’ Manhood: The pursuit of maleness undermines a healthy attitude towards the female body” by Eliza Ramsey (posted on September 1st, 2025), Ramsay argues “…in imagining ourselves better off as men, imagining a state of manhood divorced from male reality, we not only do a disservice to ourselves, but also to other women. Implicitly, the pursuit of an unachievable maleness, or even a genderlessness, abandons the fight for the neutrality of female bodies.”

An argument that seems to attack manhood, in an article that also has cruel things to say about trans women: “The male fantasy of womanhood appears merely as the pornographic, sexualized version of femaleness.” She goes on to treat trans manhood as more nuanced than trans womanhood, with the caveat that to her, we are traitors. This is a manipulative and cruel attempt to pull us back into “being women” and damn us if we don’t. Trans women, in much of these gender critical arguments that pull from radical feminism, consequently, are fearmongered and monsterized for simply enjoying being women.

The question of “what is appealing to you about manhood?” or “I relate to this as a lesbian, are you sure you’re not just a lesbian too?” are questions meant, even if harmlessly, to question my connection to manhood, because in the eyes of people who ask them, manhood is the “less desirable option”. But I have to wonder, do you think that I chose to be a man? Or perhaps did I simply choose to acknowledge that I am one?

The existence of trans men, and transmasculine people broadly, lodges a rock, and forms a crack, into the idea that manhood is always connected to patriarchal manhood. People that perhaps you knew as feminists, as women, suddenly telling you that they are men, makes you question why they would choose to be such a thing when they have been oppressed by such a thing. So the natural assumption is that “maybe she is trying to escape misogyny”, except that no one wants to experience misogyny, nor is oppression and gendered violence what makes a woman.

In a world without patriarchy, I would still be a man. And in a world without misogyny, women would still exist. Gendered roles need not be connected to oppressor vs. oppressed dynamics, and to truly argue for the broad liberation of women, we need to understand that women don’t need to exist in the context of being oppressed. The involvement of men in feminist discussion often raises discourse about the harm that patriarchal systems do to men, and we can agree that they do harm men. We can also agree that men within that system harm women, and this cannot be minimalized simply because they suffer under a system they perpetuate.

So where does this place trans men? Are “little girls” who don’t conform to girlhood engaging in patriarchal violence against women and girls, or do they too, still face misogyny? We often parallel antitransmasculinity to lesbophobia, and for good reason. Gender non-conforming women face violence meant to condition them into acceptable roles of womanhood, trans men face this as well. The more you do not conform to what is expected of a woman, the stronger this force gets. Trans men have a contested claim to masculinity, we constantly have to work and fight to be seen as men, and “not being masculine enough” results in more force trying to push us back into womanhood. While there are parallels to lesbophobia, this monster does grow its own head aimed at us.

These multiple struggles coiled together create their own beast. By both struggling to be seen as a man, and struggling to still stay in spaces where I can engage with feminism and discuss my own experiences with both misogyny and transphobia, I am treated as though I am both “not man enough” and “not woman enough”. When your identity is seen as a moral marker of your choices, what right do you have to discuss feminism while “choosing to be a man”? And conversely, as someone who “isn’t really a man” what right do you have to discuss and try to redefine manhood outside of patriarchal masculinity? I spend more time arguing for my right to engage with these topics than I do moving forward writing about the nuances of them.

So is this why there is so little “transmasc theory”? And still, what is “transmasc theory” and how does it differ from trans theory broadly? Furthermore, why is my voice important on this? What can I say that a respected feminist can’t say better? Some of these questions I do hope to find an answer to.

I’m only talking about this because I have enough of a voice that people listen to it, because I’ve been asked to by people who feel unable to openly and publicly discuss and write about this. I don’t want to talk about transmasc theory, I want to talk about feminist theory as a trans man. But I know well that to get to where I want to be, I need to do things I don’t want to do. I only care for the people who relate to this and feel seen by this discussion.

You, as the reader, need to make your interpretation of my discussions on gender and feminism and my place in it, I cannot decide that for you. Many of the questions I ask here, and will continue to ask, are just as much for you to answer as they are for me.

Think of this merely as a disclaimer, an introduction, and a list of my grievances, when I write more, I hope to grow these topics into a less splintered viewpoint on transness and gender. If we break ourselves into pieces, we won’t get anywhere.