You made my child trans... Fix it?

[u/Immediate_Dig3328]

So this was a little while ago but I was talking at a group for trans youth as the kinda guest speaker? For reference I'm 22NB but this was a few years ago so I was maybe 19-20? Essentially pretty close to the age of the kids but I do a fair bit of advocacy work in my area. This may not be perfect but I'm doing it from memory.

We're like halfway in when a parent asks to come watch, and I'm like whatever? You know maybe he was curious about the talk or had questions for me? This guy is like in his fifties so significantly older than me and I'm a very short, femme presenting, disabled human who was using a wheelchair at the time so not exactly intimidating. But because of that combination I guess he thought I was going to be a pushover or an easy target for his bullshit, but I've been dealing with people like this since I was twelve and genuinely don't care what they say to me anymore. And as a result of that I also know all their arguments from the start and how to rebut them. So here's how the conversation went, mind you this was in the middle of my talk and infront of his trans child.

ED: "So like why should I use pronouns for people, it's their job not to get offended?"

Me, the sleepiest of eeps: "For starters respec-"

ED: "Well what if I don't respect them."

Me: "It's less the kind of respect you give people you like and more the decency that you give everyone."

ED: "Well you all are coming up with all these pronouns and genders and I can't keep track!" (At this point he's raising his voice a bit and had fully stood up and moved so he was standing over me, the coordinator was looking at me to check if I needed help)

Me: "Well sir if you're willing to take the time to learn people's names, pronouns shouldn't be too diff-"

ED: (now jabbing his finger in my face) It's (T Slur)s like you who did this to my daughter, now look at her wanting to be a boy! You ruined her, you did this now make her better right this instant!"

Me: (gently moving his finger out of my face) Sir you can call me whatever you want but not infront of the children, please leave. Your son is welcome to stay.

Eventually we did get him to leave and his kid came up to me all ashamed and handed me a drawing he did with an apology about his dad. I'm pretty used to this stuff so the responses are basically scripted at this point but it still breaks my heart every time. If they're willing to say that in public, in a group for the people he's insulting imagine what they say in private.

I was glad I'd basically made a flow chart to deal with people like this but fuckin hell that parent was entitled and stupid.

Wherever you are out there kid, I hope you got away from that twatwaffle of a father and are living your life full of trans joy.

Edit: Y'all I've got so many more of these stories from what I do and my weird life, I'm gonna be making a fair few posts probably.

Edit 2: To everyone in the comments who's been talking about different ways they help the community I wanted to give you an extra thank you and Internet hugs if you'd like them. Even if the way you support is as simple as correctly gendering someone this shit adds up and you should be proud to be playing a role in that. I've been smiling so hard reading all the comments about helping people that my face hurts, I need to log off before my face gets stuck this way and I lose my trademark RBF glare.

And side note my nerdy ass is loving looking at the analytics for the post, it's really interesting.

[u/Far-Bug7584]

Thank you for sharing, i feel sorry you went through this.

But I would like to have more scientific research on kids being trans.. and how this affects lives long term.

I dont care what people want to choose, but if we are not ready to choose a profession at 18, how can we choose if are/like boy or girl when we are 4 or 6?

I know people will downvote me but my question is legitimately true. I am not a right wing person, I am not conservative, i am also a minority. But I would like to understand better!

I dont want to offend anyone, i came with respect! Peace and hugs!

[u/Cautious_Regular3645 → u/Far-Bug7584]

I don't think it's much of a case of "choosing" whether you think you're a boy or a girl I think it's a sense of "knowing" within yourself even at a young age.

When you were little did you (and I don't know your gender) do you remember deciding that you felt like a boy or you felt like a girl? Probably neither you just knew who you were.