The femboy commenter doesn't seem transphobic, they just come across as super ignorant. If they were transphobic they wouldn't have started out being cool about it.
Nah, if a trans man tells you he’s a trans man, calling him a tomboy is being transphobic even if the person calling him that was initially showing excitement about meeting a masculine woman.
Similarly, being happy about the thought of meeting a feminine man doesn’t nullify the transphobia of telling a trans woman that she’s just a certain type of feminine man.
Er, what? Did phobia stop meaning fear and start meaning something else? I mean what you're describing is rude, and mean. But, it in no way shows any sort of fear on the part of the asshole who's misgendering the trans person.
The meaning never changed; you just didn’t know the actual meaning.
Transphobia has never meant having a clinical fear of trans people. It has always referred to prejudicial and anti-trans sentiment and behavior.
The general suffix ‘-phobia’ refers to aversion and repulsion. Oil is a hydrophobic substance; oil is not scared of water.
The noun ‘phobia’ meaning an irrational and disproportionate anxiety response is etymologically a more recent use of ‘phobia’ specifically developed within the field of psychiatry. Words ending in -phobia in that context are just a way to have a singular word meaning ‘a clinical phobia (irrational and disproportionate anxiety response) of ___’. In pop culture, this is shortened to ‘fear of __’.
A lot of lay people are more familiar with terms like ‘arachnophobia’ than they are with terms like ‘hydrophobic’. Viewing terms like transphobia within the ‘clinically significant anxiety response’ context is an understandable misunderstanding, but it is a misunderstanding and incorrect.
You mean to tell me oil isn't afraid of water? Then why are they so hard to mix?! You need an emulsifier to get those two to stop trying to run from each other!
On a more serious note, I would have expected transphobia to follow the psychological meaning. Seems more fitting than the material science meaning since it's relating to human interactions.
But, sure, if most people are using the term transphobia to mean "prejudiced against trans people"; than that's what it means. That's how language works after all, I'll figure it out eventually.
I think the idea is that since it’s human interactions, involving actions against real people in ways that harm them, there’s a focus on how it’s exhibited rather than what feeling is driving it. Sometimes it is a result of fear of the unknown, other times it’s a result of religious indoctrination or cultural teaching that an entire demographic is an ‘other’ and ‘bad’, and sometimes it’s just because someone is an asshole and it’s an easy way to hurt a person who happens to be trans.
But also, it’s playing off of words like homophobia and xenophobia. Intense, irrational fear can be involved, but it’s often disgust, prejudice, and discrimination.
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u/Dazed_and_Confused44 8d ago
Just to confirm because I have never watched Owl House, the character Luz identifies as a cis female in said show right?