Real Women Don't...

It seems that there are people out there -- trans or otherwise -- who seem to have made it their life's mission to constantly compare trans women to genetic women and tell us what we're doing wrong. They seem to believe that they alone hold some magical key to the blueprint of what a woman really is or should be, and that it is their duty to share this deep knowledge with us. Whether in blogs, status updates, chat conversations, comment sections of photos, or what-have-you, you can always find at least one person who goes out of their way to inform everyone that "real women don't..." There are even people that you can count on to go out of their way to do this. They put us under their personal microscope and analyze everything we say, do, wear, or believe, and compare it to some arbitrary personal ideal of womanhood as they themselves see it. Even if you give the most basic description of what (you believe) a woman is, there are many that will still not fit into that description for various reasons. What a woman "is" is too layered and complex to be easily defined.

There are plenty of women who wear makeup, skirts and heels every day to the office. These same women are also capable of donning jeans, a sweatshirt and a cap to watch their children play baseball on the weekend. There are plenty of women who can spend an evening at a bar with friends drinking beer and socializing, and then on the very next night could get done up for a fancy wine tasting. There are plenty of women who drive sports cars, trucks, and SUV's, and these same women could also drive a Lexus or Benz to the office. There are plenty of women who use words like dear, sweetie, hun, and darlin', just as there are plenty of women who say dude or buddy. These women do all these things and more, and above all that they don't generally have to worry about being criticized at every turn about "real women don't..." because, in fact, yes they do. REAL women do it all.

Perhaps instead of focusing your personal microscope on everyone else, these people should turn that microscope inward and try to see if they can figure out what is really bothering them so much that they have to criticize and nit-pick everyone around them for every little thing. Maybe these people should stop worrying so much about what everyone else is doing and just live their own damn lives. I don't stick my nose in what everyone else is doing because when it comes down to it, it's really none of my damn business. 

So before you write that next line about "real women don't..." just remember one thing. I'm not trying to be other women. I'm just being me.