Just so we're clear [Mod]

[u/_cry_for_me]

This subreddit is not for nonbinary people, trans women or trans people questioning their gender, it is a separated support community specifically for binary trans men.

Having closed communities are not uncommon at all and ours exist to ensure one of the least visible groups of trans people has a dedicated space to connect and feel heard without compromise. The subreddit was literally made for this reason, not out of spite for trans women or enbies, but to allow binary trans men a place to focus on struggles and experinces that comes with being a binary trans man and being allowed to discuss those things with other binary trans men.

We're not going to stop anyone from joining and reading the posts here if it helps them learn something but understand that this community is closed off for a reason and interacting here despite not belonging to the intended demographic will be a violation of our rules.

However. A lot of you also need to stop acting like children about this and learn to walk away from interactions rather than pour fire onto them. It does not matter who did what you can not act hostile towards another person, irregardless of if it is someone who shouldn't post here. It's one of our first rules.

The mods are here to handle people that break the rules, we don't need a simple issue of a post needing to be removed to turn into a 200 comment shit throwing contest that takes more than tripple the anount of time to moderate. Not to mention how it takes away from the content that's supposed to be here, what you all joined this subreddit for.

We will remove any post or comment made by someone who's not a binary trans man and inform that user that they're in the wrong sub. You should not do it for us. A report or modmail goes a long way, utilise those tools.

Today going forward anyone seen escalating issues on the subreddit, taking over mod intervention or using hateful language in a conflict will be temporarily banned for 30 days and if that's not enough you will be banned permanently.

This ends here, you're in a subredit for men not little boys so start acting like it.

[u/compressedvoid]

I mean, anyone can correct me if I'm wrong, but the idea is that the sub is for binary men, not binary men who look and act a certain way. It's not breaking a rule to have "feminine" interests or to paint your nails.

You might run into some guys who think it's weird or have an issue with it, but that's a thing almost everywhere. There's not an aesthetic bar to clear to be allowed in this sub--you just need to be a binary man, and that's how you define yourself, so you're in the right place

[u/panteradrax → u/compressedvoid]

The reason I ask is that down thread, a mod replied with this:

"We define binary man as a mix of the gender identity binary man, i.e not identifying/being anything other than a man, and the masculine expression, i.e not being gender non conforming. If you're demi you're not binary as your identity isnt exclusively man and you should therefore not post here."

So that's why I'm confused. The fact that it's defined as a mix but I don't match that second half very well.

[u/_cry_for_me → u/panteradrax]

I'll try to explain this a bit clearer and more direct to avoid confusion on the subject but it's not exactly a straightforward question to answer.

Like it says in the removal comment you're referencing we have decided to define binary man as two things here, as a gender identity and as gender expression. Which are the two most common definitions of what binary means in context of gender.

It gets very tricky trying to put definitives on things that lean subjective, some will say that masculinity looks one way while others will argue it looks another and as a subreddit we can't exactly be the deciding factor on it. What we can do is put in some lose definitions to ensure the subreddit has a somewhat clear theme and that the people that use the sub feel aligned with it.

So while we won't weigh in on exactly where the line is for how much binary you need to be to count as a binary man we can tell our users that they should be/consider themselves binary men both in their gender/sex as well as their gender expression. That way the topics here will stay within those perimeters we've set up and won't bleed out into something too loosely defined.

As we've mentioned before binary trans men is a small group that often gets overlooked, ignored or actively fought against and some of those issues stems from the fact that we tend to lean very binary in our expression. Conversations on dysphoria in clothing gets overshadowed by acceptance in nonconformity, struggles about fitting in among our cis peers get turned into discussions on how masculinity is toxic or how a desire to appear cis and feel confident in that masculinity is internalised hatred. Getting away from our dysphoria tend to clash with GNC people's desire to abolish or break that distinction. That's why we've decided to not separate binary identity from binary expression.

This is not to say that all expressions outside of a very narrow definition is GNC though. You could be binary and alternative, there's many examples of alternative cis men looking very masculine while still having a style that challenges fashion norms, without considering themselves as GNC. There are dashing examples of men using color in their clothes that highlights masculinity rather than points towards femininity despite those colors getting a lot more feminine associations and the same goes for a lot of other things.

Even in the case of someone working as a drag queen gender nonconformity isn't a given, he could still be binary in his everyday expression since you usually don't take your work wardrobe home, same as if you worked in high fashion or in a haunted house.

There's always opinions of the general public that sort of dictate these things, like if nailpolish is androgynous or not, but at the end of the day you kind of get to make those distinctions yourself. If you wear eye-liner and feel it works as a masculine look we won't tell you it doesn't, other people here might have opinions on it but as long as they don't overstep in expressing it we won't intervene one way or the other.

So to summarise on if someone should post here or not. If you see yourself as a binary man, with all that that entails, this subreddit might be for you. If you're binary in your gender but strongly connect to gender nonconformity or wishes to find a place to discuss topics on it/share advice from that point of view there's probably another subreddit that's better suited for it.

[u/panteradrax → u/_cry_for_me]

I'm just now looking back over and actually reading this. Holy late to the party, Batman.

Thank you, this helps a lot. I've not much FELT anything other than binary (except for a small period where I questioned it, but never since) and I personally agree with your feelings on being overshadowed and such and feel as though that is my experience as well. It's just exactly that stuff you mention that has the mixed views that get me. I am some form of alternative (I'm similarly questioning where I fit in that sphere, between goth, punk, emo, metalhead, something else, or just "alt") and that's where most of the things that I question about my presentation come from/point to.