This is how every system of "passing" has ever worked in practice. This is why the trans community uses language like that even though its origins are in passing black people moving around outside of segregated zones.
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Passing isn't "you are attractive and conventionally normative looking" it's "you are able, at considerable risk if you get caught, to go outside the limits imposed on your kind"
one thing I feel like people don't understand passing is that, yes it's high risk in its own way, and it's also not always a choice. I found out I had been passing for several months by coming out to the wrong coworker thinking he already knew.
I had already decided I was ok with never passing. I never wanted to feel like I had a secret and there's so much danger to the fact that it's a secret now whether or not I want that. the trans panic defense comes to mind in particular.
there are things that are nice about it. but it didn't magically fix my body image and it only really made me safer from randos passing me on the street, most people in smaller circles like workplaces hear a rumor after awhile and after that work is not very different, sometimes worse, than before
the government still has my records. if they ever decide to pursue action against us they will find me faster than folks who haven't changed their names and IDs. I get sexually harassed a lot more than before and I'm worried every time that they'll try to grope me and turn violent
but other trans folks can be mean about it. I get so many objectifying questions in trans spaces about my body and "what I did" to pass, but if I answer them I get called transmed, and if I try to push back against others idealizing me or talk about the scary parts they say it's insensitive
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