Jennifer Coates: 我是一个跨性别女性。我没有出柜。我仍在其中。（双语全文） #

English version: I Am A Transwoman. I Am In The Closet. I Am Not Coming Out. | by Jennifer Coates | Medium

中文翻译：翻译 | 我是一个跨性别女性。我没有出柜。我仍在其中。，豆瓣链接 译者：鼠，陶，Sapathyx
删除了译文中备注的原文语句，修改了译文中部分标点符号和粗体／斜体。对明显的几处误译增加了脚注。

NOTE: Wow, I wrote this piece anonymously and privately and did not intend for anyone else to actually read it. It was a way for me to vent frustration without incurring risk. I didn’t tweet this out; I didn’t post or share this. Someone found it and spread it and that’s perfectly okay, but what you’re reading is essentially a diary entry.

前言：哇哦，我私下写了这篇匿名文章，没有打算给任何人看，对我来说这是一种没有风险地发泄困惑和沮丧的方式。我没有发推特，也没发布或分享它。有人看到了这篇文章并把它传播开来——这完全没有问题，但你在读的本质上是一篇日记。

If you are trans and closeted or suspect you might be, DO NOT treat my decisions as advice—they are based on my circumstances. Seek out and speak to other transwomen and absorb their experiences, too. Transitioning helps many, many people and living in hiding can be much more damaging. Let this be just one of many narratives you take in.

如果你是一个还没有出柜的跨性别者或怀疑自己是，不要把我的决定当作建议——我做出的决定只基于我的个人情况。请找到其她的跨性别女性并同时听取她们的经验。性别过渡帮助了许多许多的人，而生活在柜子里可能比前者有害得多。把这篇文章当作你听过的许许多多故事中的一个吧。

Resentments on the theme of “the only real transwoman is an out transwoman.”

以下是对“只有出柜的跨女才是真正的跨女”的一些怨言。

Here are some pieces of the story. It’s not everything but it’s more privacy than I’ve ever wanted to sacrifice.

这些是故事的一部分，尽管不全面，但它们比我曾愿意讲出的部分更加私密。

I am six years old.

我六岁了。

I wake up from a dream that I am a girl, my heart racing, feeling sick to my stomach. I am not sick with disgust; I am sick with shame. It’s not the first time I’ve had this dream, although it is one of my earliest memories. What I feel (although I won’t have access to the metaphor until years later) is like I have, via a rogue HDMI adapter, accidentally projected my most intimate browsing history in front of a classroom. I feel that somehow I’ve been caught—as if everyone in the world watched my dream in their sleep last night. But I want to dream it again. I am six years old and I believe in God, so I pray to dream it again, which — of course — I do.

我从自己是个女孩的梦中醒来，心跳加速，胃部感到恶心。不是因为厌恶，而是因为羞愧。这不是我第一次做这个梦了，尽管它我最早的记忆之一。我感觉像是，通过一个失控的 HDMI 转换器，我不小心把自己最隐私的浏览记录投屏在全班面前（尽管我数年之后才能够通过这个比喻描述我的感受）。不知为何我有种被当场抓包的感觉——仿佛全世界昨晚睡觉时都在看我的梦。但我想再做一次这个梦。我当时六岁，信仰上帝，所以我祈祷能再梦到它一次——当然，我也确实梦到了。

Correlation, meet causation. No funny business, you two.

相关性，来见见因果关系。你们两个别想耍什么花样。

I am seven years old.

我七岁了。

In school we read a chapter book about a boy who changes into a girl. My heart throbs until I feel it in my teeth and I feel like everyone is staring at me. Of course, they aren’t. Back at home I stare at the cover, which shows a boy looking into a mirror to see a girl looking back, and I cry.

我们在学校读了一本关于一个男孩变成女孩的故事书。我的心快跳到嗓子眼了，感觉所有人都在盯着我。当然，他们并没有。回到家，我盯着书的封面，上面是一个男孩在照镜子，镜中一个女孩回望着，然后我哭了。

I hear from a terrible singing cricket that if you wish upon a star it will come true. Almost every night I sneak out of bed and stare out the window, wishing on every star I can see, just to cover my bases. Ever the magical thinker, I tell myself that if I wish out loud one thousand times, I will wake up with long hair in cute pajamas with a different name — and maybe freckles. One thousand, to me, is such a powerfully large number that the cosmic committees — which listen up at night for desperate, whispered wishes — couldn’t possibly miss me. I wish I were a girl, I say to myself over and over (demonstrating a frankly impressive grasp of the past subjunctive). Soon I am singing it to the tune of “The Farmer in the Dell.” I laugh at this, out loud, and it feels like there are two of me sitting awake in my bed — me in cuffed baseball pajamas, and me in the blue nightgown I covet on Wendy Darling.

我从一只唱歌的蟋蟀那听说，如果你对着某颗星星许愿，愿望就会成真。几乎每晚我都溜下床，盯着窗外，对着所有我能看到的星星许愿（以防万一）。因为曾相信“心想就会事成”，我告诉自己如果大声许愿一千次，醒来我将留着长发，穿着可爱的睡衣，有一个不同的名字，也许可能还有雀斑。一千次，对我来说是如此有力又巨大的数量，以至于宇宙委员会——一个每晚负责倾听急切、小声的许愿的协会不可能错过我。我希望自己是个女孩，我一次又一次对自己说，同时表现出我对虚拟语气的深刻理解。很快我把它用“山谷里的农夫”的调子唱了出来。我因此大声笑了起来，感觉有两个我醒着坐在床上——一个穿着袖口收紧的棒球睡衣，另一个穿着我渴望已久的温蒂・达林（译注：童话故事彼得潘里的角色）的蓝色睡裙。

I am aware that the singing cricket movie is not the Wendy Darling movie. Don’t be pedantic; I am seven years old.

我知道有唱歌蟋蟀的电影不是温蒂・达林那部电影。别那么斤斤计较，我才只有七岁。

I am eight years old.

我八岁了。

My favorite people are (and will remain for my whole life) girls — my teachers, my mom’s friends, my classmates. I don’t like to play with boys. Boys are generally dumb and they have boogers in their noses. A somber ring finger performs a gender examination in my nostril. When I play computer games in private, I choose a female character. When it feels safe, I enter a female name. “Kimberly” is one I like, because Kimberly is the pink power ranger.

我最喜欢的人是（并且在我余生中仍会是）女孩们——我的老师，我妈妈的朋友，我的同学们。我不喜欢和男生玩。男孩们通常很蠢并且鼻子里都是鼻屎。一根忧郁的无名指在我的鼻孔中做着性别审查。当我私下里玩电脑游戏时，我会选择女性角色。当我觉得安全时，我会输入女性玩家名。“金伯莉”是我的爱用名之一，因为金伯莉是恐龙战队里的粉红战士。

When I ask to sleep over at my friends’ houses, I am told I am not allowed. Boys are not allowed. My friend Caitie’s mother argues about this on the phone with my mother. I realize my mother is not on my side.

当我询问能否去朋友家过夜时，我被告知我不能这么做。男孩不能这么做。我朋友凯蒂的妈妈和我妈妈在电话中争论了很久。我意识到我妈妈并不站在我这边。

Later, my mother tells me Caitie’s mother is divorced, has a tattoo, and sleeps on a waterbed, the relevance of which doesn’t seem clear. I think Caitie’s mother is cool.

之后，我妈妈告诉我凯蒂的妈妈离了婚，有纹身，还睡在水床上，不过这几件事似乎没什么关联。我觉得凯蒂的妈妈很酷。

I am nine years old.

我九岁了。

I love everything my sister loves, but I will not admit it. I know she and her friends will make fun of me. I know my parents will chastise me and correct me. I am learning the rules, and I am learning that boys liking girl things is a very high stakes issue. I am learning that adults react the same way to my interest in makeup as they do to my interest in matches and lighters.

我喜欢我姐妹喜欢的所有东西，但我不会承认这点。我知道她和她的朋友会嘲笑我。我知道我的父母会惩罚和纠正我。我正在学习规则。我学到的是，男孩喜欢女孩的东西是一件高风险的事情。我学到的是，我对化妆的兴趣和我对火柴及打火机的兴趣会让成年人做出相同的反应。

As if maybe, by being what I am, I might burn down something very important to them. Something that makes their life more comfortable and easy.

就好像是，如果我做我自己，就可能会烧毁一些对于他们来说非常重要的东西，一些能让他们的生活更舒适而轻松的东西。

I am jealous of my sister’s clothing. One day, home alone after school, I sneak into her room and pull on her Tinkerbell Halloween costume. I slip the elastic straps over my shoulders, then the tights along my legs. It fits. My heart feels like the fist of someone trapped under a frozen lake, battering the surface from underneath. How could anything feel so wonderful and so miserable at the same time? I don’t feel like a weight has been lifted — I feel like I’ve put down one weight and picked up another. I run to my room and hide the costume under my mattress. Later, I return it to my sister’s bedroom.

我嫉妒我姐妹的衣服。有一天放学后，我独自在家时溜进了她的房间，穿上了她的万圣节小叮当（译注：彼得潘里的小仙子角色）服装。我把翅膀的松紧背带套在我的双肩上，然后把紧身裤袜穿到腿上。很合身。我的心就像困在冰湖下，正从下面猛击着湖面的人的拳头。怎么会有这种让人感觉如此美妙，又如此痛苦的事？我并没有感觉如释重负——我感觉我卸下了一个担子，又扛起了另一个。我跑回自己的房间，把衣服藏在我的床垫下。之后，我把它放回了我姐妹的卧室。

This is not the last time I do this. There isn’t a last time I do this.

这不是我最后一次这么做。也不会有最后一次。

I am ten years old.

我十岁了。

I watch television every day after school. I am drawn to science fiction and supernatural fiction shows. In these shows are villains who can inhabit other bodies or shapeshift. There are machines that swap people’s brains. Even in the more realistic shows there are zany Freaky Friday scenarios where Brother and Sister bonk heads and spend a day learning how hard the other’s life is. I have trouble understanding why Brother doesn’t drop to his knees and thank the god of head bonks.

我每天放学回家都看电视。那些科幻小说和超自然电视剧吸引了我。在这些剧里，反派可以占据别人的身体或者变形。有可以交换人们大脑的机器。甚至在更现实的节目里，也有像《辣妈辣妹》那种，姐弟撞到头后互换身体渡过了一天才了解彼此的生活有多艰难的滑稽情节。我很难理解为什么弟弟没有跪倒在地感谢上帝让他撞了头¹。

Spoiler: their lives, it turns out, are equally hard for different reasons! Which is a comfort and relief for writers who nearly had to consider a non-egalitarian existence mediated by chaos, patriarchy, and contradiction instead of magic, consistency, and narrative resolution.

剧透：最终我们发现她们的生活同样地艰难，只不过原因不同！这对一个差一点就不得不要去思考由混乱、父权制和矛盾造成不平等社会现实，而不是简单用魔法、一致性和叙事手法粉饰太平的作家来说，是一种安慰和解脱。

I am eleven years old.

我十一岁了。

I am in a hotel room watching Maury Povich. A lineup of beautiful women makes its way onto the stage and we are told to guess which ones are “real” and which ones are “transsexual.” I don’t know about these words. I don’t even fully understand what “gay” is, although I pretend to. I suspect “transsexual” is related to “gay” but this doesn’t bother me. Instead, as the hotel coffee machine gurgles out an acrid belch, I feel hope welling up inside of me. How much does it cost to sit in the chair and have them flip the switch? Will it hurt? I don’t care. Any amount of pain will be worth it.

我在酒店房间里看《莫里秀》，一群漂亮的女人走上舞台，观众被要求猜测谁是“真的”，谁是“变性的”。我不知道这些词是什么意思。我甚至不能完全理解什么是“同性恋”，尽管我装作自己明白。我推测“变性者”和“同性恋”有关联，虽然这并未困扰我。相反，在酒店咖啡机发出尖锐的出气声时，我感到希望渐渐涌上心头。坐在椅子上让他们转换我的性别要花多少钱？会痛吗？我不在乎。再多的痛苦都是值得的。

I am twelve years old.

我十二岁了。

I am watching a VHS tape in health class, put on by an unwitting substitute teacher who pulled one from the pile. It’s a human interest documentary from the nineties, recorded from television. It is about people they call transsexuals, and it espouses the easy-to-digest, binarist born-in-the-wrong-body narrative that will remain popular for another decade. The people in the documentary are not the beautiful, smiling, Hawaiian women on Maury Povich. They are tired. Old. Midwestern. The documentary explains about vaginoplasty. The reporter uses phrases like “the surgeon attempts” and “dilator” and “salvage.” Like “hormones” and “osteoporosis.” I fear needles; I fear pills; I fear scalpels; I fear hospitals. The reporter talks about a “long road to recovery.” I realize there is no chair and no switch. I realize also that I don’t fully understand pain. The tired, midwestern wives née husbands have grown their hair and wear dresses. They seem happy.

我在健康课上看录像带，是一个代课老师无意中从一堆录像带里抽出来放的。这是一部从电视上录下来的 90 年代人文纪录片。它讲述的是被称为“变性人”的人，并赞同一种易于理解的、“出生在错误的身体里”的性别二元主义叙事，这种叙事在之后的十年里一直很流行。纪录片中的人不像并不是莫里秀中那些美丽、微笑着的夏威夷女性。她们疲惫。衰老。来自美国中西部。纪录片讲解了阴道成型术。记者使用了“外科医生的尝试”、“扩张器”和“抢救”、“荷尔蒙”和“骨质疏松症”等短语。我害怕针头；我害怕药丸；我害怕手术刀；我害怕医院。记者还说到了“漫长的康复之路”。我意识到现实里没有椅子和转换按钮。我也意识到我还未完全理解痛苦是什么。屏幕中那些疲惫的中西部妻子（前-丈夫）们留着长发，穿着裙子。她们看起来很快乐。

For the rest of my life, two days is the longest I can go without thinking about this. I read stories about powerful, adventurous girls late into the night so I don’t have to think about what my body looks like under the blankets.

在我的余生中，我不去想这件事的最长纪录是两天。我整晚整晚地阅读那些强大又富有冒险精神的女孩们的故事，这样我就不必去想我的身体在毯子下是什么样的。

I am thirteen years old.

我十三岁了。

The internet has arrived and I have learned with some relief that there is, at least for now, a condition called Gender Identity Disorder. I do not know that in the next decade there will be waged culture wars over what is the best thing to call me — nor that they will happen on this very internet, which is just where I go to print out pictures of girls that my parents conveniently assume I have crushes on.

互联网时代已经到来，我因了解到有一种（至少在当时）被称作“性别认知障碍”的情况而稍稍松了口气。我不知道在接下来的十年里会爆发数场关于该如何最好地称呼我的文化战争——也不知道它们就会发生在这个我只是用来打印女孩照片的互联网上。我父母想当然地认定我暗恋她们。

I create a fake(?) screen name on AOL Instant Messenger and tell my school friends that I am my own girlfriend, Jennifer, from a few towns over. I use this screen name more than my own. Jennifer does everything I do and everything I’m not allowed to do.

我在 AOL 即时通（译注：AOL Instant Messenger，一款由美国在线公司开发的即时通讯软件，于 1997 年发布，曾经是全球最流行的即时通讯软件之一。）上创建了一个假的（？）网名，并告诉我学校的朋友们这是我住在几个城镇以外的女朋友詹妮弗。我用这个网名的次数比用自己的名字还多。詹妮弗做了我会做的一切，以及我不被允许做的一切。

I develop an eating disorder.

我患上了进食障碍。

I am fourteen years old.

我十四岁了。

When I help my dad build things, he calls me strong. I feel like I am winning something and losing something at the same time.

当我帮我爸爸做东西时，他说我很强壮。我感觉我在赢得一些东西的同时也失去了一些东西。

I am fifteen years old.

我十五岁了。

I move to the east coast, to a state that both is and isn’t the South, and attend an all-boys boarding school on a scholarship. I hate the idea of having to spend all of my time with other boys. Boys are immature. Boys are hypersexual. Boys are violent.

我搬到了东海岸，搬到了一个既在南方又不算南方的州，拿着奖学金进了一所寄宿男校。我讨厌不得不和其他男孩们一直呆在一起。男孩是不成熟的。男孩是下流的。男孩是暴力的。

I shower in the dead of night, when the communal bathrooms are empty. More than once I am hazed for this. My penis is yanked at. A football player’s finger quests between my clenched buttocks while he asks if I’m gay, and if that’s why I’m afraid to shower with everyone. These are not my people.

我在夜深人静、公共浴室空无一人时洗澡。我不止一次因此被霸凌。我的阴茎被猛地拽住。一个橄榄球运动员一边用手指在我紧缩的臀部中间摸索一边问我是不是同性恋，以及这是不是我害怕和其他人一起洗澡的原因。他们不是我的同类。

I am sixteen years old.

我十六岁了。

Some of these are my people. I meet boys who like to read what I like to read. I meet boys who also have terrible secrets. I meet boys who agree with me that it is terrible to be a boy, although they don’t seem to mean it in the same way that I do. We are not proud to be boys, but we have fun with each other. We throw rocks into ponds and have sixteen-year-old arguments about time travel. We steal condoms from the convenience store. We are beaten up sometimes. We watch Fight Club and beat each other up wearing layers of socks on our hands as boxing gloves. Then we give each other belly rubs—even the football players. We sneak into each other’s rooms late at night to tell stories. We download Backyardigans episodes on LimeWire as a bit, but end up hosting weekly viewings out of sincere appreciation. We lie about our sexual experiences, but we listen raptly to each other’s lies as if they might contain traces of truth, like veins of sexy quartz. Some of the boys are straight and some of them are gay — I kiss a few of each. I realize that I do not love boys in the same way that I love girls, but I do love them still. I wonder what this means — if the fact that I prefer girls is evidence of my boyhood.

他们当中有些人是我的同类。我遇到和我阅读品味相同的男孩，我遇到一些同样有不可告人的秘密的男孩。我遇到一些也同意做男孩很糟糕的男孩，尽管他们似乎说这话的意思和我不同。我们不以身为男孩而自豪，但我们相处地很开心。我们往池塘里扔石头，用十六岁小孩的方式争论时间旅行。我们从便利店偷避孕套。我们有时会被殴打。我们看了《搏击俱乐部》，然后把好几层袜子套在手上，当作拳击手套用来互殴。然后我们互相揉肚子——甚至橄榄球运动员也会加入。我们在深夜偷偷溜进彼此的房间讲故事。我们在 LimeWire（译注：一款早期文件共享软件）下载了《花园小尖兵》当作乐子，但最终出于对它真诚的欣赏，我们开始每周都举行放映活动。我们在自己的性经历上撒谎，但我们全神贯注地倾听彼此的谎言，仿佛其中包含着真相的痕迹，像性感的石英脉络一样。有些男孩是异性恋，有些是同性恋——我每种都亲吻过。我意识到我爱男孩的方式和爱女孩的不同，但我仍然爱他们。我想知道这意味着什么——如果我更喜欢女孩的事实是我男孩身份的证据的话。

One of the boys, from Korea, gets circumcised at sixteen because the girl who asks him to the Sadie-Hawkins dance makes fun of his uncut penis.

其中一个来自韩国的男孩在十六岁时割了包皮，因为邀请他去校园舞会的女孩嘲笑他没割包皮的阴茎。

I am seventeen years old.

我十七岁了。

Girls start to think I am a cute boy. I start to think I am an ugly girl.

女孩们开始认为我是个可爱的男孩。我开始认为自己是个丑陋的女孩。

I am eighteen years old.

我十八岁了。

Laura Jane Grace comes out. In Rolling Stone, she recounts a childhood spent “[praying] to God: ‘Dear God, please, when I wake up, I want a female body.’ Other times [she’d] try the devil: ‘I promise to spend the rest of my life as a serial killer if you turn me into a woman.’”

劳拉・简・格蕾丝（译注：美国朋克摇滚跨儿歌手）出柜了。在《滚石》杂志上，她讲述了自己童年时，“（向上帝）祈祷：‘亲爱的上帝，当我醒来时，我想要一个女性的身体。’其他时候，（她）会尝试魔鬼：‘如果你把我变成一个女人，我保证我将作为连环杀手度过余生。’”

I am in college. I learn that some people ask to be called by different pronouns. I see how this feels in my head. It doesn’t make much of a difference. I still want to sit in that chair and flip that switch. Pronouns are the least of my concerns.

我上了大学。我了解到有些人要求别人用不同的代词来称呼 ta 们。我在脑中想象了一下，感觉这并没有太大的区别。我仍然想坐在那把椅子上，切换那个开关。代词是我最不关心的问题。

I visit a women’s college. I am surrounded by new women and we feel instantly comfortable around each other. I attend a lecture. The speaker yells “who gets to be a woman?” and a crowd of cis women responds “anyone who wants to be!” The sentiment is nice, but I think about the years I spent staring out the window at the stars and I feel suddenly uncomfortable.

我参观了一所女子大学。我被新结识的女性环绕着，但很快我们就觉得与彼此相处十分舒适。我参加了一个讲座。演讲者大喊：“谁能成为女人？”一群顺性别女性回应：“任何想成为女人的人！”这种观点很好，但我想起我曾盯着窗外的星星的那些年，突然感到很不舒服。

Later during this trip I am having a conversation with my new friends about femininity. They are articulate and intelligent women. I’m grateful to be around them. Until I am told by one of them, angrily, that I am not really allowed to talk about femininity because I am a straight cis boy. It is not my place and it is not my territory. I should shut up and listen. Are these my people?

在这次旅行的后期，我与我的新朋友们展开了关于女性气质的谈话。她们都是口齿伶俐、十分聪明的女性。我很感激能有她们在身边和她们在一起。直到其中一个人生气地告诉我，我没什么谈论女性气质的资格，因为我是一个异性恋顺性别男孩。女性气质轮不到我来发言，也不是我的领域。我应该闭嘴听着。她们和我是同类吗？

I don’t correct her. I never correct anyone.

我没有纠正她。我从不纠正任何人。

I am told there is something special — something ineffable — about Female Friendship. I am told that I could not understand or experience this. They said anyone is a woman who wants to be—is it true? What does this say about my friendships with girls?

我被告知，关于女性友谊，有一些特别的东西——一些妙不可言的东西。我被告知我无法理解或体验到这一点。她们说过任何想成为女性的人都是女性——这是真的吗？关于我和女孩们的友谊，它又说明了什么？²

I start to consider what I might be, if my girlness hasn’t counted simply because it wasn’t overtly confessed. I think about my boyness—about my childhood and adolescence—how my experiences with boys deviated from what I was taught to expect. I change my major and spend a year writing about non-gay-identifying male femininity from the Aesthetics of the late 1880’s to vaudeville radio stars. Eventually, as a love/hate letter to coming-of-age films of the 80’s, 90’s and early 00’s, I write my thesis on the friendship and sexuality of American males and its representation in television & film. One piece of feedback is “I am so sick of boys writing about boys.”

我开始考虑我可能是什么样子，如果我的女孩特质仅仅因为没有被公开承认就不算数的话。我想到了我的男孩特质——我的童年和青春期——我与男孩们相处的经历如何与我被教导所预料的情况不同。我换了专业，花了一年时间写关于身份认同非同性恋的男性的女性气质，从 1880 年代后期的美学到杂耍广播明星。最终，作为对 80 年代、90 年代和 00 年代初青春电影的表白／仇恨信，我写了一篇关于美国男性的友谊和性行为及其在电视和电影中的表现的论文。有一条反馈是：“我实在受够了看男的写男的。”

I think about being told I was not allowed to speak about femininity. I wonder what a person like me is allowed to speak about.

我想到被告知我没资格谈论女性气质的事情。我想知道像我这样的人有资格谈论什么。

One of the boys from boarding school, who began to shower with me late at night, who told me through gritted teeth that he was too skinny and too fat, throws himself in front of a train.

其中一个寄宿学校的男孩，那个和我一起在深夜里洗澡，咬牙切齿地抱怨他太瘦又太胖的男孩，最终纵身跃向了火车。

I am nineteen years old.

我十九岁了。

I am in a gender studies class. I am still bewildered that the subject I have been fixated on, reading about, and studying obsessively since my life began is now a thing my friends want to take classes on.

我在上一门性别研究课。我仍然感到困惑，从出生以来我一直关注，阅读并如痴如醉地研究的事情，现在成了我的朋友们想要上课学习的东西。

I am told that masculinity exists in opposition to femininity and that it is unequivocally toxic. I think about the cruel male “mentors” I’ve been assigned throughout my life I think about the football player’s roving knuckle, and hundreds and hundreds of other things.

我被告知男性特质是和女性特质相对立的存在，并且毫无疑问，是“有毒的”。我想到了我一生中那些被分配给我的残酷的男性“指导者”们。我想到了橄榄球员游移的指头，以及其他数不清的事。

I think also about the kind, self-sacrificing male mentors who have found me. And I think about the boys I stayed up late telling stories with. And the boys I kissed. And boys who supported me. And boys I supported. And hundreds and hundreds of other things. And I think about me.

我同时想到了那些找到我的，善良的、自我奉献的男性导师们。然后我想到了那些和我熬着夜分享故事的男孩们。我亲吻过的男孩们。支持我的男孩们。被我所支持的男孩们。以及其他数不清的事。然后我想到了我自己。

In the classroom I timidly, carefully disagree. And I know what it looks like.

我在课堂上胆怯地，小心翼翼地提出了反对。我知道这看起来像什么。

My professor rolls her eyes. The rest of the class are ciswomen. There are disgusted laughs. The good qualities I’m talking about are actually femininity, several explain.

我的女教授翻了个白眼。班上的其他人都是顺性别女性。有人发出厌恶的嘲笑。有些人向我解释说，我所谈论的那些优秀品质其实都是女性特质。

I say that I feel like claiming that self-sacrifice and kindness are feminine values that men are borrowing is like claiming that they are Jewish values that Buddhists are borrowing.

我说，声称自我奉献和善良是被男性挪用的女性价值观，在我看来就像声称它们是被佛教徒挪用的犹太教价值观一样。

One of the students tells me that I can’t be objective about masculinity because I am a straight cis male, and that I should shut up and listen. Are these my people?

其中一个学生告诉我，因为我是一个顺性别异性恋男性，我无法做到客观看待男性气质，所以我应该闭嘴听着。这些人是我的同类吗？

I don’t correct them. I never correct anyone.

我没有纠正她们。我从不纠正任何人。

It is interesting to see where people insist proximity to a subject makes one informed, and where they insist it makes them biased. It is interesting that they think it’s their call to make.

有趣的是，当人们坚持认为越是切身接近某个主题就会越了解它时，这种坚持反而使 ta 们产生了偏见。有趣的是，人们认为 ta 们能说了算。

I hand in a term paper on the medicalization and pathologization of trans identities, especially as it affects developing legislation and employee benefits. I like this issue because it’s difficult. It’s a practical problem that requires a delineation between “should be” and “is.” There are two sides and there are important factors on both of them. To be open-minded is to accept liminality.

我提交了一篇关于跨性别身份的医学化和病理化的论文，特别是关于它对制定中的法律和员工福利的影响。我喜欢这个主题，因为它很复杂。这是一个实际的问题，它需要在“应该如何”和“实际如何”两者之间进行明确的界定。它有两个立场，而且两方面都存在关键因素。保持思想开放就代表要接受阈限性。

Liminality is a word I start to use a lot.

我开始频繁使用“阈限性”这个词。

I am twenty years old.

我二十岁了。

I see Hedwig & The Angry Inch for the first time. At the end of the film, Hedwig is nude and wigless and wet — an androgyne with a body neither male nor female. Hedwig’s male sidekick Yitzhak, played by the beautiful, square-jawed Miriam Shor in prosthetic facial hair, is given a wig and a dress. She does her best to look like a man starved of his femininity, finally granted relief. I can not pretend she is a man, but I cry every time I see it.

我第一次看了《摇滚芭比》。电影结尾，海德薇一丝不挂，没戴假发，全身湿透——一个拥有既非男性也非女性身体的双性人。而海德薇的男性搭档伊扎克——由美丽的、方下颌的米莉亚姆・肖尔贴上假胡子扮演——获得了一顶假发和一条裙子。她尽全力让自己看起来像一个缺乏而渴求女性气质，并最终获得了解脱的男人。我没法假装认为她是一个男人，但我每次看到这一幕都会哭泣。

This is also the year I begin to attend drag shows, both on campus and around the city. They’re not…exactly right, but they’re closer to right. I think about how much better I feel in makeup — and how much worse I feel in makeup.

这也是我开始参与校园内和城里的变装表演的第一年。变装并不完全……对劲，但它们更接近那种对的感受。我思考着化了妆时我的感觉和平时相比有多好——以及和平时相比有多糟糕。

I can’t, like so many kinds of women do, pretend to believe that Beyoncés anthems to beauty, flawlessness, and Waking Up Like This, are about me or for me.

我没办法像许多女性那样，假装相信那种碧昂斯式的，对美貌，无暇魅力和“起床就这么美”的颂歌是关于我或为我而创作的。

Which is fine. I don’t need them to be.

这也没什么。我不需要它们是关于我的。

Laura Jane Grace releases “Transgender Dysphoria Blues,” and it makes my chest swell like only a lone voice of solidarity can do. My cisfemale friends side-eye me whenever I play it and remind me that “it’s not just a banger — it’s a song with a message.”

劳拉・简・格雷斯发行了《跨性别焦虑蓝调》，而它使我心潮澎湃，像只有听到一首独唱的团结之歌能造成的那样。每次我播放它时，我的顺女朋友都会斜眼瞟我，并提醒道：“它不仅仅是一首绝世好歌——它是一首有深刻含义的歌。”

I become an ardent fan of Eddie Izzard, who describes himself as a “male lesbian.” Though many accuse him of internalized transmisogyny — afraid to call himself trans — I at least admire his rejection of the constant attempts to squeeze his identity into a universal taxonomy that other people decided on. I admire his focus. I admire his courage when he wears dresses onstage. I respect his position when television forces him into a suit. I admire his willingness to be something confusing. I don’t think we are the same thing, but I think we have both come to the same conclusion.

我成为了艾迪・伊扎德（译注：一位英国单口喜剧演员、演员和活动家。）的狂热粉丝，他形容自己是一个“男拉拉”。尽管很多人指控他内化了厌跨女症——认为他害怕承认自己是跨——但至少我欣赏他对“不断尝试把自己的身份挤进由他人决定的普遍分类”这种行为的拒绝。我欣赏他的专注，欣赏他在舞台上穿裙子的勇气。我尊重当电视强制他穿西装时他的立场。我欣赏他对成为一种令人困惑的存在的意愿。我不认为我们是一样的，但我认为我们拥有一种共识。

Some nights, always alone, I go out in scavenged makeup and women’s clothes with an ID I found in a lost wallet. I never feel more male than on these nights.

有些晚上，我独自一人，用淘来的化妆品化上妆，穿上女性的衣服，带着一张从丢失的钱包里捡来的身份证出门。我从没有比在那些晚上感觉自己更像个男性过。

It’s dark. I wear tights, because of the hair on my legs. I go sit in bars and drink alone. A lot of what happens is what you would expect. When you don’t pass, especially in this city, your head hits brick wall somewhere on the street. When you do, you are a woman alone at a bar, so. I have no rose-colored notions of what public life as a woman—trans or cis—entails.

天很黑。我穿着紧身裤袜，拜我的腿毛所赐。我去酒吧里坐着，一个人喝酒。发生过的很多事都是你能预料到的。如果你不够 pass，尤其还是在这个城市里，你的头总会在某条街被撞到砖墙上。而当你 pass 的时候，你成了个在酒吧孤身一人的女性（嗯）。对身为女性——无论跨性别还是顺性别——的公共生活意味着什么，我没有任何玫瑰色的美好幻想。

The dominance of the born-in-the-wrong-body narrative wanes. Genderfluidity gains popularity. Agender and nonbinary identities are explored and categorized on tumblr. I feel dull in the face of all of these beautiful, jean-jacketed, bowtied mavericks with dyed undercuts, because the boring binarist wrong-body narrative of the 1990’s is the one that fits me best, even after all this time. I have always known. It’s the first thing I remember knowing.

“出生在错误的身体里”的叙事的主导地位正在衰退。性别流动论开始更受欢迎。在汤不热上，人们开始探索和分类无性别和非二元性别的身份认同。在所有这些美丽的，穿着牛仔夹克，打着领结，留着两侧剃掉的彩色头发的反叛者面前，我感到自己平淡又愚钝，只因即使这么多年过去了，那种上世纪90年代的，无聊而又二元的生错身体论仍然是最适合我的。我一直都知道。这是我能记得的第一件事。

At twenty I have finally told someone — a long-time friend and fellow transgirl — about my lifelong struggle with what is now called gender dysphoria. I wonder what it will be called in five years. My friend’s story is different from mine — she didn’t even consider that she might be trans until her teenage years and never felt she was a born-in-the-wrong-body case — but it feels nice to know someone understands, at least partially, about all of this.

二十岁时，我终于向某人坦白了一切——一个老朋友，也是我的跨女同伴。我向她分享了我与现在被称为性别焦虑的感受的毕生斗争。我好奇五年后它会被叫做什么。我的朋友的经历和我不同，直到青少年时期前，她都没有想过自己可能是跨性别，也从不觉得自己属于“生错了身体”的情况。但知道有人能至少在某种程度上理解这些，让我感觉很好。

I am twenty-one years old.

我二十一岁了。

Misandry humor is peaking and it is dripping with cissexism. Down cascade the gleeful tweets from ciswomen about how women are more beautiful than men — how graceful the female body is, how utilitarian the male. How awesome boobs are. How bad boys’ taste in clothing is. How incompetent they are emotionally. How they’re too weak to handle childbirth and periods. Neckbeards are the scourge of the internet. They wax disgusted about “dad bods.” SCUM rhetoric is revived with inconsistent levels of irony. The meme gospel says penises are just shitty clitorises.

厌男的幽默达到了巅峰，且充满了顺性别主义（译注：指默认所有人都是顺性别者，并且只有顺性别才是正常和正确的观念）。顺性别女性们充满愉悦的推文如瀑布般倾泻而下，关于女性如何比男性更加美丽——女性的身体是多么优雅，而男性身体只有功利主义。胸部是多么棒。男性的服装品味有多差。他们在情感上多么无能。他们多么弱小，无法承受分娩和经期。脖子上长胡子简直污染互联网。她们表达对”老爸身材”的厌恶。SCUM 宣言（译注：指 Valarie Solanas 所著的割男／人渣宣言）式的修辞带着时高时低的讽刺水平重见天日。阴茎只是劣等阴蒂，模因福音说道。

I don’t—know where I stand in this. I don’t know my place in this. Are these my people?

我不—知道我在这里的立场。我不知道我的位置在哪。这些人是我的同类吗？

Do I really believe a wig and a pronoun will change how they feel, deep down? About my body? About my chromosomes? About my “socialization”? I don’t. I want to, but I don’t.

我真的相信一顶假发和一个人称代词会改变人们内心深处的感受吗？对我的身体，我的染色体，我的“社会化程度”？我不。我想要相信，但我做不到。

They can believe deep down their feelings on who is smart & strong & reasonable and who is dumb & weak & dangerous are within their control, are controlled exaggerations and self-aware and performed, are well-examined. If they saw me nude and wigless and wet, would I not be subject to their funny opinions on penises? On neckbeards? On maleness? On who has a right to talk about femininity? They will read this and tell themselves “No!”

人们可能深信自己能够感知谁是聪明、强大、理性的，以及谁是愚蠢、软弱、危险的，并且这种判断在 ta 们的控制之内；那些流行言论是可控范围内的夸大，是有自我意识的、表演性的，是经过了深入分析的。如果 ta 们看到我一丝不挂、没戴假发、全身湿透的样子，难道我不会成为 ta 们那些有趣观点的评价对象吗？那些关于阴茎的，颈部胡须的，雄性性的，关于谁有权谈论女性气质的观点？ta 们会读到这些并告诉自己：“不！”

In the nineties, cis women were uncomfortable with an animated paperclip because it was “male-looking”.

在九十年代，顺性别女性对一个回形针动画角色感到不适，因为它“看起来像男性”。

On the internet where I used to Ask Jeeves “what is wrong with me,” I now get into a lot of arguments about gender. I have always been revolted by my body hair but could never shave it. Even if I could raze my leg-brows without raising eyebrows, it comes back in with a distinctly male vigor. I mention to a cis feminist friend that I don’t think it’s cool to use “neckbeard” as a pejorative. I say I think it’s hypocritical. I say I know some wonderful, tender, thoughtful neckbearded humans. I also know some people who are very self-conscious about their neck hairs and can’t do much about them. I wonder if there are ways to criticize people based on their character without impugning the hairs that come out of them. She says I am mansplaining. She says I am Not-All-Men-ing. She also says I couldn’t possibly understand the standards of beauty imposed upon women. As if I didn’t spend years bent over a toilet, feeling miserably that even if I were thin enough I wouldn’t be girl enough.

在我曾用 Ask Jeeves 搜索引擎检索“我到底是怎么回事”的互联网上，我现在被卷入了大量关于性别的争论。我一直厌恶自己身上的毛发，但我永远没法摆脱它们。即便我可以在连根拔起我的腿毛时连眉毛都不抬一下，它们还是会带着明显的男性活力卷土重来。我向一个顺性别女权主义者的朋友提到，我认为把“颈部胡须”作为一种贬义词使用并不合适。我说我认为这很虚伪。我表示我认识一些出色，温柔又体贴的脖子上长胡子的人类。我也知道一些人，ta 们对自己脖子上的毛发感到不自在，却对它们无能为力。我想知道是否有办法根据人们的性格，而不靠责难 ta 们身上长出的毛发来评判 ta 们。她说我在犯男言之瘾。她说我表达的就是“不是所有男人都……”她还说我绝不可能理解那些被强加在女性身上的美的标准。就好像我没有在这么多年里，一边对着马桶弯腰，一边悲哀地想，即使我足够瘦，也永远不够像一个女孩。

Of course she couldn’t know my story, but my story is not what made true what I was saying.

她当然不了解我的故事，但我所说的话并不需要靠我的故事来证实。

I posit to her, after useless, stressful paragraphs of diagonal argument, that there are so many dimensions to the body hair conundrum When you are cis and you don’t shave your legs, some people think you are a gross feminist and some people think you are a badass feminist. You have the privilege of experimenting with your body hair because your status and your identity are otherwise secured in ways they are not for transwomen.

在徒劳又充满压力的大段对角论证之后，我向她提出，体毛相关的困境是有很多维度的。当你是顺性别而不刮腿毛时，一些人会认为你是个恶心的女权主义者，而另一些人会认为你是个蒂爆了的女权主义者。你有对体毛做出各种尝试的特权，因为你的世间地位和身份认同在其他方面得到了保障，而这是跨性别女性所不具备的。

Of course she couldn’t know how often I cried after puberty when my leg hair started coming in—felt helpless because I couldn’t even shave it.

她当然不会知道我在青春期后长出腿毛时有多经常哭泣——我感到无助，因为我根本没法剃光它们。

But my story is not what made true what I was saying.

但我所说的话并不需要靠我的故事来证实。

They may call you names but they will not force you into the wrong bathroom. It will not collapse the trembling house of cards you’ve constructed to make people forget what they think you are. You are safe where some people are not.

人们可能会辱骂贬低你，但 ta 们不会强迫你进入错误的洗手间。这不会让你搭建的，只为让人们忘记 ta 们对你的认知的摇摇欲坠的纸牌屋倒塌。在某些人无法感到安全的地方，你是安全的。

When you are trans and you don’t shave your legs, it is taken as evidence to everyone — even to allies in their dark, unadjustable subconscious — that you are not a real woman. Sometimes even by yourself.

当你是跨性别者而不刮腿毛时，这就像是在向所有人——甚至向你友跨的盟友的，黑暗而又不可动摇的潜意识——证明，你不是一个真正的女人。有时甚至连你自己都相信了。

She is furious. She tells me I am a straight cis male and I need to shut up and listen. What she is really furious about is being contradicted by someone who, according to their facebook profile, has a lower ranking on the discourse clearance chart than she.

她怒火中烧。她告诉我，我是一个顺直男，并且我需要闭嘴听着。但真正让她感到愤怒的是，她被一个在讲话许可排行榜上位置比她低的人（至少根据我的脸书用户资料来说是这样）反驳了。

A person’s privilege is very often an explanation of why their beliefs are warped, if indeed their beliefs are warped, which they usually are in some way. But—it’s not proof of shitty beliefs. Those tend to out themselves by…being shitty. If a person is telling this cis girl she is taking for granted a privilege that trans girls don’t have, why is it this cis girl’s instinct to hunt for that person’s identity to see if she can discredit them and not have to think about their point? Don’t answer that. We already know.

一个人的特权往往是对 ta 们歪曲的观念的一种解释，前提是 ta 们的观念确实是歪曲的（通常都是，在某种程度上）。但——它不是那些糟糕观念的证据。那些因为太……垃圾，才脱颖而出的观念。如果有人告诉这位顺性别女孩，她正把自己拥有而跨性别女孩没有的特权视为理所当然，为什么这个顺性别女孩的本能是去靠鉴定这个人的身份来使 ta 的话变得不可信，而不去实际考虑 ta 的观点？不用回答这个问题。我们都知道答案。

Another time I joke about an author who I think is not a great author. I am told that I don’t get to joke about that author, because they are an author with many female fans—their work is coded as a feminine interest. I am told that I just don’t respect them because their work is feminine, and that I probably worship Bukowski and Kerouac. They don’t know I grew up reading this author. I am told that I don’t understand what it’s like to grow up feeling ashamed of my interests because they are feminine.

另一次，我开了一个我认为并不出色的作家的玩笑。我被告知我没有资格开那位作家的玩笑，因为 ta 有很多女性粉丝——而 ta 的作品被归类为女性向的。我被告知我不尊重那位作者只因 ta 的作品很女性化，并且我大约会崇拜布考斯基和凯鲁亚克。ta 们不知道我是读着这位作家的书长大的。我被告知我不会理解在成长过程中因为自己女性化的爱好而感到羞愧是什么感受。

I want to scream.

我想要尖叫。

I want to vomit up the Lisa Frank stickers I peeled off my desk in second grade and ate, in a panic, to hide the evidence.

我想要把我在二年级时从书桌上撕下来、在惊慌中吞下去以掩盖证据的丽莎・弗兰克贴纸吐出来。（译注：一位美国插画家和企业家，以其色彩鲜艳、充满幻想的插图和商品而闻名。）

On Facebook, the girl who tells me about my childhood—about how I have never had to feel ashamed of my identity—has uploaded a photograph of herself as a little girl, dressed as Tinkerbell, standing beside her smiling parents.

在脸书上，那个跟我讲述我的童年，说我从不需要为自己的身份感到羞耻的女孩上传了一张她小时候的照片——她穿着小叮当的裙子，站在她正微笑着的父母身旁。

Because of my eating disorder, my hair is falling out. I think about the horror of going bald—a permanent loss of vitality. I think about how it would destroy the feeble androgyny that is my only comfort in this body. I think about my grandmother, bald from cancer, and what that did to her. And I hear my proudly misandrist-identifying cisfemale friends making fun of bald men as if it were a shortcoming or decision of the men themselves. Bald men make them think of television pedophiles. Bald men remind them of self-indulgent authors and desperate improvisers. I see men on the train losing their hair, their youth, their options, and I feel for them. It’s not funny. It’s a dysmorphic nightmare for anyone. I don’t bother mentioning that I find the jokes unnecessary and insensitive. I know what the girls will say.

因为进食障碍，我开始掉头发。我想到了变成秃头有多么恐怖——这是一种活力的永久丧失。我想到它会如何摧毁我虚弱的雌雄同体气质，而它是我在这具身体里唯一的慰藉。我想到我因癌症而秃头的祖母，以及那对她造成的影响。然后我听到我那自豪地表明自己仇男者身份的顺女朋友嘲笑秃头男性，就好像这是他们天生的缺陷或是他们自己的选择一样。秃头的男人让她们想到电视上那些恋童癖。秃头的男人让她们联想到自我放纵的作家和失意的即兴创作者。我看到火车上的男人们正在失去他们的头发、青春和人生选择，而我为他们感到难过。这并不好笑。这对于任何人来说都是一场畸形的噩梦³。我不想费力去说我认为这些笑话既没必要又麻木不仁。我知道这些女孩会说什么。

But I know I am not straight, or cis, or a boy. I am nothing so simple as that. I am a girl who has been through a lot of shit and who has grown into symbiosis with her boy suit. But what else I know is that my point is my fucking point. Do I even want to convince someone who will only listen to me when they’re told by the rules that they have to see me as a girl?

但我知道我不是异性恋，或顺性别，或一个男孩。我不是那么简单的存在。我是一个经历了各种烂事，并和自己的“男孩套装”成长为共生关系的女孩。但我还知道，我的观点就只是我的观点。我还会想要说服那些只有在被规定要把我当作女孩看待时才会听我说话的人吗？

Do I have to out myself to be treated like a person worth listening to? To stop my cis classmates laughing at someone who’s reckoned with the boundaries and the dimensions of masculinity and femininity in ways they never had to? With the life I’ve been living for all the years I’ve been living it—do I need their permission to speak?

难道我必须公开我的身份，才能被当作值得倾听的人对待吗？才能阻止我的顺性别同学们嘲笑那些必须用她们从不需要考虑的方式去面对男性气质和女性气质的界限和维度的人？想到我的人生，和我在这人生中经历的这么多年月——我需要她们的允许才能讲话吗？

I genuinely don’t know.

我真的不知道答案。

I am twenty-two years old.

我二十二岁了。

A student in my performance art class hangs an empty mirror frame in the center of the room and has everyone pair off into subjects and reflections. A female classmate duplicates my actions perfectly with almost no delay. I look into the mirror and see her face and her freckles — I wave my hand and see painted nails. I get severely dizzy and have to leave the classroom. I cry big, shaking sobs in the men’s bathroom and come back twenty minutes later. The class is over.

在行为艺术课上，一个学生挂了一个空的镜框在房间中央，并让所有人两人一组配对成主体和镜中的倒影。一个女性同学几乎没有延迟地完美复制出了我的动作。我看向镜子，看到了她的脸和她的雀斑——我挥了挥我的手，然后看到了被涂了色的指甲。我感到一阵严重的眩晕，不得不离开教室。我在男厕所里大声哭泣，颤抖哽咽，二十分钟之后才回到教室。课已经结束了。

I am twenty-three years old.

我二十三岁了。

What I look like is this: a boy. A boy who has inherited a little more body hair than he can fight back, even in the places where he’s allowed to. A boy many ciswomen look at and say “you look like you like Mac DeMarco, ha ha.” (I do.) “I bet you read Jonathan Franzen.” (I don’t.) “I bet you like Breaking Bad.” (It was pretty good.) “I bet you are a self-proclaimed male feminist ally but don’t read women authors.” (Fuck right the fuck off.)

我看起来是这样的：一个男孩。一个继承了多到他无力反抗（即使是在他被允许剃毛的身体区域）的体毛的男孩。一个被很多看到他的顺性别女性评价说“你看起来像会喜欢麦克・德马可的样子，哈哈哈”的男孩。（我确实喜欢。）“我敢打赌你读过乔纳森・弗兰岑。”（我没读过。）“我敢打赌你喜欢《绝命毒师》。”（确实很好看。）“我敢打赌你是个自称盟友的女权男，但从不读女作家的书。”（滚开，滚远点。）

These women have explained to me, with self-righteous anger, with smug superciliousness, what a transwoman is.

这些女性带着自以为是的怒火和自鸣得意的傲慢，向我解释什么是跨性别女性。

Part of me wants them to go through my books—wants them to see where the raised, blurred stipples are, which pages of which books are warped by tears going back over a decade.

一部分的我希望她们能够翻阅我的书，希望她们看看那些被十些年来的泪水浸湿的书页留下的突起的，模糊的，像点彩画一样的痕迹。

Most of me wants them nowhere near my books or anything else of mine.

大部分的我希望她们离我的书和我的其它部分越远越好。

I am twenty-four years old and I don’t know what to do. Without reservation, I embrace the theory of intersectional feminism. I need it — we all do. But do I want to join social circles that won’t have me until I disclose my most private experiences? That will leave me on permanent probation or tell me to shut up until I lay bare every year of dissociation and dysmorphia and dysphoria?

我二十四岁了，然而我不知道我该怎么做。我毫无保留地接受了交叉性的女权理论。 我需要它——我们都需要。但我真的想要加入那些只会在我公开自己最私密的经历后才会接纳我的社交圈吗？加入那些会让我永远处于“考察期”或叫我闭嘴，直到我把自己年复一年的解离状态、躯体变形障碍和性别焦虑赤裸裸地展现出来的人？

Do I need to be inspected and dissected by the people who laughed at me in order to receive my credential?

我需要让那些嘲笑我的人把我完全剖开仔细检验才能获得某种资格和认可吗？

I am now twenty-six years old and—this may freak you out—I’m not coming out. And I’m not transitioning. Here are the easy reasons:

我现在已经二十六岁了，而且——这可能会吓到你——我没有出柜。而且我也没有进行性别过渡。 以下是那些简单的原因：

Because there are social and financial repercussions to transitioning that I cannot afford emotionally or financially. I don’t want to be treated like I have glass bones by well-intentioned cis friends. I don’t want to be told I am “so pretty” when I hate my reflection. It doesn’t make me feel better. It makes me feel worse, and it’s almost impossible to get cis people to turn it off. And I’m uncomfortable enough with the hateful judgment I get when I foray female-presenting into the city alone.

因为进行性别过渡会带来社会和经济影响，而我在情感上或经济上都无法承受它们。 我不想被一些善意的顺性别朋友当成脆弱的玻璃人对待。我不想在我讨厌自己镜子里的倒影的时候被别人告知我“很漂亮”。那不会让我感觉更好。那会让我感觉更糟，而且想让顺性别人不这样做几乎是不可能的。而且当我初次尝试以女性外表独自进入城市的时候，收到的仇视已经足够让我不舒服了。

There are monumental pros and cons to being trans-and-out and in some cases, like mine, the scales are locked even. I choose to experience my dysphoria in private and without relief to absorb the discomfort of delicate cis people so I can glide through the world more smoothly on a frothy trail of secrets and lies. (I’m being bratty and disingenuous here. I’m just afraid this is how you conceptualize it.) Gay and trans people have been doing this for centuries. It happens that I don’t quite think the climate is right for me to be Out ‘n About. But I am excited and happy for the trans children of tomorrow. Jealous of them, even. Maybe there will be a chair and a switch someday.

选择做出柜的跨性别者有很多好处和坏处，在一些特定情况下，以我自己为例，好处和坏处同样多。我选择私下里独自体验我的焦虑，不去承担脆弱顺人的不适，从而能在一条由秘密和谎言搭建的小径中顺畅地行走在世界上。（我在这表现得很讨厌且虚伪。我只是怕你们这样去概念化这个过程）男同性恋和跨性别群体这样做已经几个世纪了。碰巧，我也不觉得现在的环境适合我踏出柜门做任何事。但是我为跨性别儿童的未来感到高兴。甚至有些嫉妒 ta 们。也许未来 ta 们会有那个转换性别的椅子和按钮。

Because it turns out transition isn’t the answer for everyone — to suggest otherwise is narrow-minded and proscriptive. Because for some transwomen, femininity can feel asymptotic — the closer you get, the more you feel you can never make it. I realize it’s not an inspirational message but it’s a hard truth: some people manage dysphoria better than others. When you fight it, it fights back. I am a pharmacophobe and diagnosed obsessive compulsive. I can barely take NyQuil and a cowlick can make my blood pressure rise. I am not strong enough for that battle. I am not well equipped to transition.

因为事实证明，性别过渡并不适合所有人——“它适合所有人”这种想法是狭隘且充满限制的。 因为对于一些跨性别女性来说，女性气质就像是条渐近线——你越接近它，越觉得自己永远没办法成为它。我意识到这不是一个振奋人心的信息，而是一个残酷的事实：一些人可以比其他人更好的地掌控自己的焦虑情绪。你反抗它，它也会反抗你。我是一名药物恐惧症患者和经诊断的强迫症患者。我几乎没法吃 NyQuil（译注：美版白 + 黑感冒药），头上翘起来的头发都可能让我血压升高。我无法胜任这场战斗。我的条件不足以进行性别过渡。

The best I can do, for me, is divest—as best I can—my identity from my appearance and focus, mindfully, on other things. It’s not impossible! Look at those Dust Bowl folks—they were just trying to drive across the country in a jalopy! “Gender?” they would say, “I hardly know ‘er!”

对我来说，我能做的最好的事情就是尽我所能将我的身份与我的外表剥离开，并且有意识地专注于其他事情。这并非不可能！看看那些沙尘暴地区的人们——ta 们正在尝试开着破车穿过一整个国家！“性别?”ta 们会说，“不认识，sei 啊？”

I adore Laura Jane Grace, but I never wanted to be a punk rocker. I don’t want to be a conversation-starter or a curiosity, and that’s what I would be in this world, to so many people. All I wanted to be was Wendy Darling. I wanted to be an average girl with an average girlhood. I’ll never be able to go back and have my friends do my hair at sleepovers. I‘ll never go back and wear a gown to prom. I will never have had a girlhood. I’ve had years to try and be at peace with that loss and often I manage. We’re humans. None of it’s fair. So many of us have things taken away from us.

我很敬佩劳拉・简・格雷斯，但我从来没想过成为朋克摇滚歌手。我不想成为一个话题或者某种奇珍异兽，而对于很多人来说，这就是我在这个世界上的样子。我想和大多数人一样生活在这个世界上。我只想成为温蒂・达林。我想成为一个拥有普通少女时代的普通女孩。我永远无法回到童年，让我的朋友在过夜玩耍时给我做头发。我永远不能回到过去，穿着礼服裙参加舞会。我永远不会有少女时代。我花了很多年的时间尝试平静地接受这种失去，并且我经常能做到。我们是人类。没有谁的人生是公平的。我们中的许多人都被夺走过一些东西。

I have read the #eggmode pieces. This one in particular is very good and presents a valuable and kind-hearted perspective. I have seen transwomen use “egg” as a playful pejorative for a time in their lives when they were still developing their presentation and ideologies—sharing awkward pre-transition photos and shaming their past shelves for questionable aesthetic decisions. Even when it’s self-inflicted, it strikes me as deeply uncompassionate, but how these people deal with their own histories is their business. When it’s aimed at other people, though, in an effort to diminish their position or their authority on their own identity, it reflects a prescriptiveness and smugness that I would never have expected coming from the trans community.

我读过那些打着 #eggmode 标签的文章。 尤其是这篇文章非常好，它提出了一个很有价值且善良好心的观点。我见过一些跨性别女性用“egg”作为一种戏谑的贬义词，来形容她们生命中还在发展自己的性别表达和意识形态的那段时期。她们分享性别过渡前那些尴尬的照片，并羞辱过去的自己那些糟糕的审美决策。即便她们只是在拿自己开玩笑，我仍觉得这种行为十分缺乏同情心——但如何评价和处理自己的过去是她们自己的事。然而，当被用来评价其 ta 人时，它试图削弱 ta 们对自己身份认同的权力，反映出了一种我从没想过会来自于跨性别社群内部的规训和傲慢。

Imagine, dear reader, a cis-woman evenly saying:

想象一下，我亲爱的读者们，一位顺性别女性平静地说：

“I wish I looked like that but I don’t and can’t. It sucks and it makes me feel really awful if I brood on it. That’s why I focus on my writing—I’d rather make things. Investing in and building things that aren’t my body helps me cope with the body issues I’ve been saddled with against my will.”

“我希望我能长成那样，但我没能也不能。这很糟糕，而且一直思考这个问题只会让我感觉更糟。这就是我为什么专注于写作——我更愿意去创作东西。投入和建设与我身体无关的事情可以帮助我应对那些被强加在我身上的身体问题。”

She doesn’t sound like she needs advice on how makeup will actually fix her core problem, does she? She seems like she’s doing alright. I’m her and I’m trans. That’s all.

她听起来并不需要关于化妆能如何解决她的核心问题的建议，不是吗？她看起来好像过得还不错。我是她，我是跨性别者。就这样。

I appreciate the encouragement I receive from trans friends, but I reject the implication that transitioning is my destiny. My brain is my brain — my body is my body. They don’t match, and I’ve chosen to devote my energy to coming to terms with that and focusing on other things, rather than trying to change my body. I’m not here advocating this position to other trans people or discouraging anyone from pursuing the path they feel is best for them. I admire and applaud each and every brave, pliable person who can do both.

我很感谢我从跨性别朋友们那得到的支持，但是我拒绝接受性别过渡是我的命运这一暗示。我的大脑是属于我的——我的身体也是。它们并不匹配，而我选择将精力投入到接受这一点并专注于其他事情，而不是试图改变我的身体上。我并不是在这里向其他跨性别者提倡这一立场，也不是阻止任何人追求 ta 们认为最适合自己的道路。我钦佩并赞扬每一个选择性别转换道路的勇敢、坚韧的人。

Now—here are the complicated reasons, most of which I only realized while writing the easy ones:

好了，接下来是那些复杂的原因，其中大部分是我在写简单的原因时才意识到的：

I hate that the only effective response I can give to “boys are shit” is “well I’m not a boy.” I feel like I am selling out the boy in baseball pajamas that sat with me on the bed while I tried to figure out which one I was supposed to be, and the boys who I have met and loved from inside my boy suit—who believed they were talking to a boy. I feel like I am burning the history of the naked body that sits on the floor of my shower. The body that went to prom in a boxy tuxedo and coveted the dresses.

我讨厌我对“男孩都是狗屎”的唯一有效回应是“好吧，但我不是男孩。” 我觉得我正在出卖那个当我试图弄清楚我应该成为哪一种性别时，和我一起坐在床上的穿着棒球睡衣的男孩，以及当我穿着“男孩套装”时遇到并爱过的男孩——他们相信他们正在和一个男孩说话。我感觉我正在烧毁那个坐在我淋浴间地板上的赤裸身体的过去。那个穿着直筒男式礼服参加舞会而渴望着裙子的身体。

Because I am not a boy, but I had a boyhood. I was, and am, made to live as a boy and I cannot suspend the perspective that gave me and join in when it’s time to fluster one of those clueless fuckers into anger by calling him a fuckboi and then tell him his anger proves he’s a fuckboi, or to humiliate one with an OKCupid screenshot because we’ve willfully conflated the clumsy ones with the threatening ones so we can grab those solidarity faves. It’s fucked up. It has metastasized.

因为我不是男孩，但我也有过少年时代。 我以前，和现在都被迫作为一个男孩生活。并且我做不到把我被赋予的视角搁置一旁，去加入在试图激怒一些蠢货时称呼他们为贱屌然后对他们说“你急了所以你确实是贱屌”或是用 OKCupid（译注：一款约会软件）的截图羞辱他人的行列，只因我们故意把笨拙的人和造成威胁的人混为一谈，这样我们就可以获得同温层最爱的话题。这太糟糕了。而这种情况正在加剧。

More than a few out transwomen have told me, privately, they they are uncomfortable with these things, but are afraid that speaking up about it would cause ciswomen to like and trust them less. “I play along,” one of them told me, “because in the queer community the only people who defend cisboys are cisboys. I don’t want to give up finally being read as a girl.”

不少出柜的跨性别女性私下告诉我，她们对这些事情感到不舒服，但害怕说出来会导致顺性别女性更不喜欢和不信任她们。“我会配合她们”，其中一位告诉我，“因为在酷儿群体中，只有顺性别男孩会维护顺性别男孩。我不想放弃终于被当成一个女孩看待的机会。”

Another says “I do the misandry stuff because it’s an easy way to earn queer cred points, but when I think about it it makes me uncomfortable.”

另一个人说：“我做那些厌男的事，因为这是一种赢得酷儿信誉积分的简单方法，但一想到这一点，我就觉得很不舒服。”

Another: “It’s a coping habit I’m not proud of. If I agree ‘girls rule boys drool’ it makes me feel more like a girl.”

还有人说：“这是一种我并不引以为傲的应对习惯。如果我同意‘女孩说了算男孩是蠢蛋’，我会感觉自己更像个女孩。”

Have you noticed, when a product is marketed in an unnecessarily gendered way, that the blame shifts depending on the gender? That a pink pen made “for women” is (and this is, of course, true) the work of idiotic cynical marketing people trying insultingly to pander to what they imagine women want? But when they make yogurt “for men” it is suddenly about how hilarious and fragile masculinity is — how men can’t eat yogurt unless their poor widdle bwains can be sure it doesn’t make them gay? #MasculinitySoFragile is aimed, with smug malice, at men—not marketers.

你们是否注意到，当一种产品以一种不必要的性别化的方式被营销时，人们会基于性别进行归责？就好像一只“女款”粉色钢笔是（当然的确是）愚蠢又愤世嫉俗的营销人员试图侮辱性地迎合他们想象中女性想要的东西的产物？而当人们制造“男款”酸奶时，它突然成了关于男子气概有多么搞笑和脆弱的事——除非男人们萎缩的小脑袋瓜能确定酸奶不会让他们变 gay，不然他们就不会吃酸奶？#男子气概真脆弱带着自鸣得意的恶意去攻击的目标是男性，而不是营销人员。

This conclusion—widely shared—is a product of insulated discourse. What I am NOT saying is: “open the floodgates, let in the shitty male trolls!” I know the trolls—they have tried to be my friends, they have tried to sneak into feminist spaces with no desire to learn or listen. I understand not trusting men who loudly and constantly hold forth on women’s issues and refuse to accept when they are mistaken. I’m not encouraging anyone to trust blindly. I am pleading to the discoursers: consider that this insulation has effects and try to mitigate them, if your priority really is finding truth amid a muck of concealed patriarchal lies. Check to see if maybe you are saying things and reproducing things mostly because it sounds good and feels good and nobody is challenging them.

这个被广泛认可的结论是言论单一的结果。我要说的并不是：“打开闸门，让那些该死的男性键盘侠进来！” 我了解那些男人——他们试图成为我的朋友，他们试图潜入女权主义空间，却不想学习或倾听。 我明白不能信任那些就女性问题不断高谈阔论、当自己犯错时拒绝接受的男人。我并不是在鼓励任何人去盲目信任他人。我恳求所有参与讨论的人： 如果你的首要任务确实是在一堆隐藏的父权制谎言下找到真相，请考虑这种单一话语所带来的影响并尝试减轻它们。检查一下，看看你是否在说一些话或再生产一些观点，主要因为它们听上去很棒，让你感觉很好，而且没人会挑战它们。

These are not discursive problems that only apply to an “undercover” transwoman, these are discursive problems that are seemingly only visible to an “undercover” transwoman forced to carry multiple perspectives like bactrian humps.

这些不是只适用于“卧底中的”跨性别女性的一些不着边际的问题——而是这些不着边际的问题似乎只有像背负双峰的骆驼一样被迫背负多种视角的“卧底中的”跨性别女性才能看到。

Because I am interested in complicating your definition of maleness and of boyhood. I was born into that shitty town, maleness, in the remains of outdated ideals and misplaced machismo and repression and there are some good people stuck living there. They are not in charge. They did not build it. And I don’t feel okay just moving out and saying “fuck y’all — bootstrap your way out or die out, I was never one of you.” I want to make it a better, healthier place—not spend all my time talking about how shitty it is and how anyone who would choose to live there deserves it. And to me that means considering them with charity, even when they make it difficult to.

因为我感兴趣的是⁴让你对男性性和男孩气质的定义复杂化。 我出生在那个浸淫在过时的理念和不合时宜的大男子主义中的，叫做“男性性”的狗屎小镇里，而有些好人也被困在那里生活。他们不掌管权力。这个小镇也不是他们建造的。而我不觉得我可以直接搬出去并且对他们说：“操你们的——要么自己想办法出去，要么给我死绝，我从来都不是你们中的一员。”我想让它成为一个更好、更健康的地方——而不是把所有的时间都花在谈论它有多么糟糕，以及选择住在那里的人都是多么罪有应得上。而对我来说，这意味着用宽容的态度对待他们，即便他们有时令我难以保持宽容。

This charity, of course, applies also to the many, many cis women I know who are well-meaning and supportive and still find themselves falling into the habits I’m describing. Most of the kindest and strongest people in my life, my dearest friends, are women—many of them ciswomen. If you’ve gotten this far and are feeling only that I should be spending more time acknowledging the struggles and frustration of cis women to temper my criticisms, know that I spend most of my time doing that. I could write a hundred pieces about the ways men and masculinity have damaged me and the women I love, but you could throw a single stone into the internet and hit three of those. This piece is about what I don’t get to say.

当然，这种宽容也适用于我认识的很多很多顺女，她们充满善意、乐于助人，但仍然发现自己陷入了我所描述的那种习惯中。我生命中最善良、最坚强的人，我最亲爱的朋友们，几乎都是女人——其中许多是顺性别女性。如果你已经读到这里，还是只觉得我应该花更多的笔墨承认顺女的挣扎和挫折，来让我的批判显得温和一些，请知道我大部分时间都在这样做。我可以写一百篇关于男人和男子气概如何伤害我和我所爱的女人们的文章，但你往互联网里随便扔块石头都能砸到三篇类似的。这篇文章是关于我没能有机会说的那些话。

Because it’s not a small deal that the words “not all men” have become entwined inextricably with male fragility and whininess. It makes it awfully easy to insulate the (largely cis-)female perspective on what males are. To begin a statement with those words—“Not All Men”—is to give grounds to anyone who wants to laugh at the rest of it. But here is the truth: not all men are what you think they are. Man does not mean what you think it means. Generalizing harshly and broadly but implying “you know which ones I mean” is an intellectual and rhetorical laziness that is not allowed to pass anywhere else in these communities. Because we don’t get to choose who our words and behavior affect, we are obligated to choose them carefully.

因为“不是所有男人都…”这个措辞已经与男性的脆弱和牢骚密不可分地交织在一起，而这并不是一件小事。它很容易使（主要是顺性别）女性对男性的看法和男性本身隔离开来。 当一个观点以“不是所有男人都…”开场时，它已经给任何想要嘲笑这句话剩余的部分的人提供了理由。但事实是：不是所有男人都是你想象的那样。男性不意味着你认为它所代表的意思。粗暴而笼统地一概而论的同时表示“你知道我指的是哪些人”是一种在社群内任何其它地方都不被允许的智识和修辞上的懒惰。正因为我们无法决定谁会被我们的言语和行为所影响，我们才更有义务去谨慎地选择言语和行为本身。

Because I have been reduced to my appearance — to the way I present for my own well-being — by cisfeminists so often that I feel a fucked up Stockholm syndrome attachment to being misgendered, and to this dual identity. My dysmorphia is as entwined in my identity as anything else. I have lived with it for decades as a girl pretending to be a boy. And the nearer I get to something I’ve wanted my whole life, the more it feels like playing into the aesthetic politics of a group of people who reject me because of the associations they have with my body—a body which I cannot, ultimately, change very much. These people who will only be comfortable when I dilute those associations with femme signifiers.

由于我实在太经常被顺女女权主义者们仅仅基于外在去判断——那种我为了自己的身心健康而表现出的外在，以至于我对被误判性别和这种双重身份产生了一种糟糕的斯德哥尔摩式依恋。 我的躯体变形障碍和其他任何事情一样与我的身份交织在一起。作为一个假扮成男孩的女孩，数十年来，我已经适应了它的存在。我越接近自己这辈子梦寐以求的东西，就越感觉自己是在迎合一群因为 ta 们对我的身体有关的联想而拒绝我的人的审美政治，而我无法对我的身体做什么根本上的改变。只有当我用女性符号淡化这些联想时，这些人才会感到舒心。

As if maybe, by simply being what I am—a girl-feeling brain in a boy-looking body and boy-looking clothes—I might burn down something very important to them. Something that makes their life more comfortable and easy.

就好像是，如果我做我自己——一个活在看起来像男孩的身体里，穿着男孩衣服的女孩的头脑一个女孩的头脑生活在男孩的身体和衣服中——就可能会烧毁一些对于 ta 们来说非常重要的东西，一些能让 ta 们的生活更舒适而轻松的东西。

I can’t transition for me, though I dearly wish I could. Nothing I could do would alleviate more of my old problems than it would cause new. And I certainly won’t transition for them, to sort neatly into their system of what a woman looks like.

我没办法为了自己进行性别过渡，尽管我非常希望我能做到。我所能做的任何事情都无法在缓解一些旧问题的同时不引发更多新问题。并且我绝对不会为了他们进行性别过渡，只为被整齐地归类到他人关于“女人看起来是什么样”的系统里。

Because I didn’t get to decide what I am. I will be thoroughly damned if anyone else does.

因为我没有权利决定自己是谁。如果让其他人拥有决定我是谁的权利，我就彻底完蛋了。

PLEASE, cis allies, realize that girls like this are among you and they are trying to bond with you over how much men suck. They are calling themselves feminists and they are commenting “yas!!!” on the neon vagina-centric art you reposted on Facebook.

拜托，顺性别盟友们，请认识到像这样的女孩就在你们中间，并且她们试图通过抨击男人有多糟糕来和你们建立联结。她们自称女权主义者，并在你脸书上转发的阴道中心主义的霓虹灯艺术作品下评论“媎妹好蒂！！！”

What you want to say right now is “Not All Cis Women,” which is okay! Just also remember that feeling when you hear “Not All Men.”

你现在想说“不是所有顺性别女性都……”，这没关系！只是别忘了想想当你听到“不是所有男人都……”的时候的感受。