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Drama Ensues When Transphobes Threaten To Call Cops On Trans Man For Babysitting His Sister’s Kids
Man reading a book to sisteru2019s kids on couch while interacting happily during babysitting time.

Drama Ensues When Transphobes Threaten To Call Cops On Trans Man For Babysitting His Sister’s Kids

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We live in a vastly diverse world and, in our opinion, that’s a beautiful thing. Sadly, not everyone thinks that way. For some, our diversity is a nuisance, to say the least. And what’s even more sad is that this kind of thinking leads to discrimination and hate crimes

Like in the case of this story — a trans man gets threatened with being reported to the police after he agrees to babysit his sister’s kids, just because he’s trans. What makes matters worse — this threat came from people who, in theory, shouldn’t be the ones threatening him.

More info: Reddit

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    Sadly, for some people the fact that we live in a diverse world is a big nuisance

    Image credits: freepik / Freepik (not the actual photo)

    A perfect and sad example of this is today’s story about a trans man

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    Image credits: korrawinj / Freepik (not the actual photo)

    In it, the man agrees to babysit his sister’s kids while she’s away, but soon starts getting dragged for that

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    Image credits: freepik / Freepik (not the actual photo)

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    To be more specific, his brother and former friend start spreading lies that the man is planning to inappropriately touch the kids and even show them their genitals

    Image credits: Famous-Toe-4084

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    As these claims are the furthest from the truth you can get, the man went online to seek support

    The OP is a trans individual who transitioned from a female to a male, and had been out of the closet for 12 years at the time of the online post. The sad thing is that his brother never accepted him and never hid that fact. For instance, he’s been deadnaming the original poster ever since they came out. 

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    Deadnaming a person means calling them by a name they no longer use, such as by their dead name, which is considered an unpleasant or even violent act. Most often, deadnaming is directed at trans, gender nonconforming, and nonbinary people. 

    Yet, deadnaming isn’t the only way the OP’s brother shows disrespect. He also goes on for long periods of time, like 5 years or so, where he doesn’t contact the family. Sounds like typical black sheep of the family behavior, doesn’t it? Read on and you’ll see how worse it’ll get. 

    There’s also another person in the post author’s life who doesn’t accept their transition either. What hurts about this one is the fact that he used to be a friend and an ally, but later turned his whole worldview upside down, because he “had questions.” Now, he joined forces with the transphobe brother, and the nightmare team decided to basically ruin the OP’s life. 

    Basically, the original poster was asked to babysit his sister’s kids for 3 weeks while she and her husband went overseas. That’s where said nightmare team found an opening for a straightforward hate crime. 

    They started posting on Facebook that the testosterone, and the fact that the post’s author is trans, will make him want to act inappropriately around the kids he’s babysitting. The umbrella of said inappropriate behavior included things like touching kids in a way he shouldn’t, showing them his genitals, and “confusing them about what a man should look like.” 

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    Image credits: freepik / Freepik (not the actual photo)

    All of the nonsense these people were spilling about the OP on social media fit the “LGBTQ grooming conspiracy theory.” Essentially, this theory states that any person who is somehow associated with the LGBTQ+ community, whether by being a part of or supporter of it, is engaging in child grooming. 

    Even more often than other queer people, the groomer label in the form of a slur is applied to drag queens and trans individuals. 

    The former resulted in the culture war when certain folks were angry about “Drag Queen Story Hour” — an event where drag queens or kings read stories to kids in libraries, schools, and bookstores. The aim of these events is to foster a sense of play and gender fluidity in children, but for some far-right folks, it seems that it’s grooming, which is actually far from the truth. 

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    For trans individuals, the “LGBTQ grooming conspiracy theory” manifests in similar ways to today’s story. Again, most times, these accusations come out of the blue, just for the sake of discrimination, and just like it did in the story we’re discussing.

    The idea for these baseless claims has existed for decades, predating World War II, and sadly, it doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon despite being unsubstantiated. 

    So, this results in hateful individuals trying to ruin someone’s life, even if that person is close to them — like a family member or (former) friend. 

    In the OP’s case, when they complained about it online, netizens rushed to offer support. Some suggested that he should file a police report for something like character defamation. In fact, there were folks who wrote step-by-step what the man could do to fight the situation. You see, while their world can be a hateful place, there are good people out there, too, but sometimes it takes some effort to find them.

    There were people who suggested he do things like report his bullies to the police for character defamation

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    Ugnė Bulotaitė

    Ugnė Bulotaitė

    Writer, BoredPanda staff

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    I am a writer at Bored Panda. I have loved creating and writing down stories about people and things since I was little and I think this passion led me to get degrees in sociology, communication, and journalism. These degrees opened various paths for me, and I got a chance to be a volunteer in the human rights field, and also try myself out in social research and journalism areas. Besides writing, my passions include pop culture: music, movies, TV shows; literature, and board games. In fact, I have been dubbed a board games devotee by some people in my life.

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    Ugnė Bulotaitė

    Ugnė Bulotaitė

    Writer, BoredPanda staff

    I am a writer at Bored Panda. I have loved creating and writing down stories about people and things since I was little and I think this passion led me to get degrees in sociology, communication, and journalism. These degrees opened various paths for me, and I got a chance to be a volunteer in the human rights field, and also try myself out in social research and journalism areas. Besides writing, my passions include pop culture: music, movies, TV shows; literature, and board games. In fact, I have been dubbed a board games devotee by some people in my life.

    Denis Krotovas

    Denis Krotovas

    Author, BoredPanda staff

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    I am a Visual Editor at Bored Panda. While studying at Vilnius Tech University, I learned how to use Photoshop and decided to continue mastering it at Bored Panda. I am interested in learning UI/UX design and creating unique designs for apps, games and websites. On my spare time, I enjoy playing video and board games, watching TV shows and movies and reading funny posts on the internet.

    Read less »

    Denis Krotovas

    Denis Krotovas

    Author, BoredPanda staff

    I am a Visual Editor at Bored Panda. While studying at Vilnius Tech University, I learned how to use Photoshop and decided to continue mastering it at Bored Panda. I am interested in learning UI/UX design and creating unique designs for apps, games and websites. On my spare time, I enjoy playing video and board games, watching TV shows and movies and reading funny posts on the internet.

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    Apatheist Account2
    Community Member
    2 weeks ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    I imagine gay people faced similar bigotry in the early days of it being legalised, when some people assumed that not being straight meant that they followed every perversion under the sun. On a separate note: why is "think" blanked out? Is thinking not allowed now? 1984 here we come...

    Tabitha
    Community Member
    2 weeks ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    Sweetie, back in the eighties when gay people were finally being accepted in society and becoming a protected class for jobs, homes, insurance, etc, way too many were “bashed”, meaning stalked, jumped, and viciously beaten—-some beaten to death—-out on public streets, generally at night, for no other reason than the a******s who beat them were homophobes. That is something I hope we never ever see happen again, to anyone at all.

    Load More Replies...
    Day Andie
    Community Member
    2 weeks ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    There's a lot of good advice about reporting, the wording you should use, and making sure everything is documented--both their threats and having a letter on record that your sister AND brother in law have designated you as the temporary guardian of the kids, with both their names on the letter. Also, file for a restraining order and make sure you include photocopies of their Facebook pages , texts and a list of dates and times of threatening phone calls from your provider. Also make a statement that you are afraid of violence and retaliation because of recent incidents of violence against trans and gays (mention names and dates.) It probably won't be approved, but you can mention it where they will hear it that you have applied for a restraining order and have document and reported their threats. Again, things will be on file. That should cool their jets a bit.

    Load More Comments
    Apatheist Account2
    Community Member
    2 weeks ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    I imagine gay people faced similar bigotry in the early days of it being legalised, when some people assumed that not being straight meant that they followed every perversion under the sun. On a separate note: why is "think" blanked out? Is thinking not allowed now? 1984 here we come...

    Tabitha
    Community Member
    2 weeks ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    Sweetie, back in the eighties when gay people were finally being accepted in society and becoming a protected class for jobs, homes, insurance, etc, way too many were “bashed”, meaning stalked, jumped, and viciously beaten—-some beaten to death—-out on public streets, generally at night, for no other reason than the a******s who beat them were homophobes. That is something I hope we never ever see happen again, to anyone at all.

    Load More Replies...
    Day Andie
    Community Member
    2 weeks ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

    There's a lot of good advice about reporting, the wording you should use, and making sure everything is documented--both their threats and having a letter on record that your sister AND brother in law have designated you as the temporary guardian of the kids, with both their names on the letter. Also, file for a restraining order and make sure you include photocopies of their Facebook pages , texts and a list of dates and times of threatening phone calls from your provider. Also make a statement that you are afraid of violence and retaliation because of recent incidents of violence against trans and gays (mention names and dates.) It probably won't be approved, but you can mention it where they will hear it that you have applied for a restraining order and have document and reported their threats. Again, things will be on file. That should cool their jets a bit.

    Load More Comments
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