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| Woman being mansplained by Al Eimes on Unsplash . |
First, mansplaining to me is a highly insulting way to communicate with women and one I tried my best not to do before I transitioned into the world of a transgender woman.
In fact I think I went out of the way to not mansplain anything to the women I worked and lived around. I hope now it wasn't noticeable and I was coming off as dismissal. Regardless, I did my best until I was admitted behind the gender curtain and was able to see how the female half lived.
The problem was, I took so many years to get to the point of being allowed to look behind the curtain and play in the girl's sandbox. So I never quite understood what the mansplaining fuss was all about, until it slapped me one night in a regular venue I was accepted in. What happened was somehow I became part of a small group of men discussing a topic I knew a lot about, like sports. I was still new to the system and tried to interject my thoughts into the conversation. Just as I would have as my male self. To my surprise, I was rudely ignored by the men and I quickly left and went on my way. The whole process was another of my life changing moments when I was transitioning.
I didn't know what I was expecting since I had seen mansplaining all my life from other men around me when they interacted with women. Why would I be any different? Well, I wasn't and the better my presentation as a transgender woman became, the more I was talked down to. It was like I had lost most of my intelligence and all my life time experiences in addition to other male privileges.
Quickly I learned to play the game of being a dumb blond, which I was most of the time back in those days. A prime example came one night when my car broke down and I had to call a tow truck. As luck would have it, a well meaning policeman showed up to help and between the driver and the cop figured out the best route to get my car home without even asking me. I was infuriated until the whole evening declined even farther when the tow driver started to explain to me how his wrecker worked. on the ride back Finally, I relaxed and started to ask him questions about what his wife packed him for dinner and why were wheels round. (Just kidding.) But I tried to make the questions of my status as a woman for him which was obviously very low.
Maybe I should have been happy I presented so well that I lost a main part of myself forever. I learned how women are really treated and prepared myself for other gender lessons. The main one I write about often is the loss of personal security I witnessed up close and personal when I transitioned. I learned to park in the most well lit and safest places I could with the shortest walk to wherever I was going, to name one important point. For the first time in my life, I was the prey when I was out in the public's eye and it was quite the change.
Slowly but surely on the rare occasions I needed to communicate with a man, I learned to draw from my personal experiences and understand where he was coming from. I waited for him to come to me and interject my ideas when I could as a transgender woman. By doing so, I was able to build my confidence back up in public.
Today when I am mansplained, I take it with a grain of salt because I know there are plenty of women who reverse the process with their communication with men. I remember several nights when I was fine with talking to the woman in a couple I didn't know and having it all change in a flash when he started to show any interest at all in me. There was no womansplaining going on as I instantly knew where I stood. It also never took me long to understand all the non-verbal cues women use to signal each other.
It is one of the reasons both binary genders have such a difficult time of communicating. Upper level understanding of the genders is one of the rare benefits of being transgender and should be embraced. When you can do it, you truly have the chance to advance as a human.
