LogFAQs > #950281240

IronBornCorps posted...

Trans is an adjective. The other corresponding adjective would be cis (your gender matches what you were assigned at birth)

That's not the confusing part. The confusion lies in the question of what the birth gender was, which "trans" does nothing to specify.

IronBornCorps posted...

male and female (among others I'm not getting into) are used to describe gender identity.

They could just as easily be used to describe birth gender. I would agree that it makes more sense for them to describe current gender than past, especially where those who pay attention to trans issues know that focusing on birth gender isn't something trans people generally like to do, but for those who don't pay such attention, that's a fairly arbitrary distinction.

Basically, "trans man" could mean "somebody who became trans and is now a man," or it could mean "somebody who was a man and has become trans." The former is more consistent with the established norm of respecting trans people's current gender identity over their assigned one, but plenty of people don't pay enough attention to connect those dots. It's an easy enough mistake to make and a simple enough correction that I think it's reasonable to give people some slack when they make it, unless they're being deliberately disingenuous about it (which they do because some people are turds).

shadowsword87 posted...

No I get it, it's just that it still trips me up and makes me have to think of a diagram.
It's not intuitive to me yet, maybe it will over time, maybe it won't and I'll always have the mental hiccup.

For clarity, this is also my position. I understand it, I think it makes sense, it just also makes sense the other way and I occasionally have to stop and think about it, or will confuse which one it is.

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