InsomniaInk

Someday there will be comics!!!!

Inky | Hapless schmuck, former insomniac, comic nerd, inking enthusiast, writer, enjoyer of nachos. 18+ only



Several years ago, before I first really started using twitter or got active on social media at all, I would go to regular weekly game sessions where I would play TTRPGs with friends. This was back when I treated most of my characters as "support" and did my best to not role-play as role-playing made my social anxiety bite into my brain with its sharp venomous fangs.

One summer night after the game was done, when we were all hanging around outside for a bit and enjoying the unusual cool breeze before going our separate ways. An old friend who was visiting home from another state, and who was always eager to bring up topics that would make people interrogate themselves and their beliefs, posed a hypothetical question to our group of guys…

"What would you do if you were in a long term relationship with a woman, the love of your life, whom you were engaged to, the wedding date approaching… and she admitted to you that she was transgender and had been afraid to tell you because she didn't want to lose what the two of you had built?"

It was a good question for a group of (seemingly) young cis hetero guys to be asked back in the early 2010s. Most of my friends didn't really want to say anything and made noncommittal grunts to express that they were thinking about the question… but it was clear they were uncomfortable with the shame that could come with answering the "wrong" way and believed that either answer could be seen as shameful and would affect them socially.

This was back when my social anxiety was near its peak, so I want you to understand that I didn't really want to say anything either. I used to be much more conflict averse than I am now as well, but I had known one of the friends for my ENTIRE life, one that I knew since the moment they were born when I was 2 years old, one that I met when I was 6 years old, and the one I had the least history with who was a friend of a friend I had been around for about a decade but only sparsely within that decade.

My brain hadn't been constantly awash in gallons of adrenaline and cortisol for over a decade and a half, so while I still had the debilitating social anxiety, the extreme hyper-vigilance in social situations I experienced with it had faded over time. I was among friends. I shrugged and replied, still in a slightly noncommittal way with, "What difference does it make?" The guy I had only known sparsely for a decade stated roughly, "Nah, of course I would break up with him. He lied to me, there's no excusing that."

I had grown up on the internet during the early 2000's, mostly in and around the furry art scene, and it had shaped the way I thought about basically every actual meaningful thing I valued as a person and had affected who I WAS as a person in a massive way. That, added to the things I experienced back in school laid the groundwork of me developing into someone who was very passionate when it came to things like fairness, gaslighting, empathy, bigotry, reactionaries, greed… I could go on. So despite being held back by the nasty social anxiety and being quite conflict averse, I was also extremely passionate. It could've gone either way, 50/50 chance. I could've stayed quiet easily but I feel like my brain had a "Harry Dubois rolling a stat check moment" and it was a success.

I replied roughly, "You're saying your hypothetical fiancee, the love of your life, was right to be afraid of how you would react to her telling you she's transgender? And after the time you'd spent together and the love you'd shared you would just throw it all away?"

His response was roughly, "Should have told me up front. It's only right."

So I asked roughly, "So you're saying if she had told you up front you would've had a relationship and become engaged before getting married and everything would've been fine?"

His response was a definitive, "No!"

I replied roughly, "So knowing that one fact about the person who would develop into the love of your life, your fiance, would, if she told you up front, prevent you from ever wanting to get to know the love of your life, and if she waited until a later point in the relationship to tell you it would remove all value of your relationship with her in your eyes and you would dump her when the wedding was imminent?"

No response from him but I stated flatly, "That's fucked up."

He said, "It's my decision."

I replied, "Yup. Fucked up decision."

He said roughly, "That's how I feel, should've told me, and it's my decision."

I replied, "Okay. I'm just saying that's REALLY fucked up."

The conversation ended and he left shortly after that and then the rest of us dispersed and I didn't think about it again for roughly a decade.

Flash forward roughly a decade… A friend who was present within that group that day came out to me as trans. I had no idea. After we finished talking I did what everyone does when someone comes out as a different gender, different sexuality, that they're a furry, or that they're a porn artist, and you didn't have a clue. I looked back at the time we spent together and tried to see if there were any signals I could've picked up on. There weren't. She had spent her entire life up until that point keeping it a secret from everyone. I was no further than the third person she had told and the first person who had been told without it being a necessity. And then I remembered that discussion where I butted heads with the other guy. And I realized that what I said that day was probably important for her to hear at that time. I realized what she would've felt like if EVERYONE had remained silent too. Hearing what I said probably let her know that even here in hicktown she had at least one person she could confide in some day. That may well have been why I was the first person she told without necessity.

So yeah, in summation: "Don't hold your tongue to avoid conflict. Be an open ally to trans folk. You never know who in your posse needs to hear that message."


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in reply to @InsomniaInk's post:

Just trying my best as always. 😌 Interestingly enough, I thought to write this down because of a post Valentine reblogged over on tumblr involving Arthur Morgan's VA, Roger Clark, from RDR2 making a bold statement in support of trans rights. That's why the word "posse" is in the title XD