i keep noticing that conversations around jkr’s transphobia almost always center trans women, and it’s like we collectively forgot that she aimed her first major public attack at trans men and other afab trans people. the essay she circulated was fixated on the idea that trans men transition to “avoid womanhood,” especially autistic trans men, framing us as confused, impressionable, or socially pressured.

and the thing that really gets to me is how quickly people gloss over that part. that erasure is exactly what makes trans men feel like the canaries in the coal mine here: we were the first group she tested that rhetoric on, and the fact that it barely registers in the larger conversation just proves how easy it is to overlook us.

yes, she’s violently transphobic toward trans women, and that absolutely deserves attention. but it’s strange watching everyone act like it started there. it isn’t a competition, but the sequence matters because it shows a pattern.

this is also part of why i usually avoid fandom spaces. there’s a tendency to flatten everything into one neat discourse point and miss the underlying context. i was double-checking a character’s pronouns and ended up in a thread claiming that the d20 campaign i was watching (that was HEAVILY based on harry potter) doesn’t have any trans women “despite jkr’s transphobia mostly targeting trans women,” and it just made something click for me again. trans men are the canaries. the fact that people still forget that is kind of the whole point.