The Realness Manifesto

I stand on the stage, beat pumping, the constant thumping matching the rhythm of my own heart. My nerves burn brighter than the lights shining on me, illuminating me as I survey the crowd.

Just earlier, my body had betrayed me once again—my abdomen flaring up in pain, as though a vicious battle was being fought, sword against clashing sword, within my flesh. The resulting river of blood was still gushing out of my body and onto white cotton, even hours later, despite the Midol running through my veins.

At the signal of the commentator, I stride forward, letting my nerves and the rhythm of the music carry my feet forward. I stand in front of the judges, face stoic, and watch as they rake their eyes up and down my form. Each one holds up their hands—tens across the board. At their approval, I turn around and walk back, preparing for the battles.

Despite my nerves, I did not carry a single doubt that I would receive any other score. Anxiety, like my physical form—my silky smooth skin, my delicate bone structure, even the soft sacks hanging from my chest—is a mere chain to be broken, fetters holding me back from becoming real.

Onto the battles—the battles! I walk forward once again, shoulder to shoulder with another man. Gone is my anxiety—instead, my bound chest is filled with the fiery taste of being alive. As I step towards the judges, I let my fingers wrap around the fabric of my tie, the golden fabric woven with elegant, swirling patterns, and loosen it slightly. The judges point to me, and I do my best to keep my expression calm as I walk back once more, triumphant against my fellow man.

The process is repeated once more, this time against a broad man with a full-bodied beard, wearing a suit. Running my fingers through my soft, short hair, I stare the judges down as my opponent awkwardly shifts from pose to pose. Once again, they point to me, and I walk back a third time.

For the final battle, I step forward once again, gesturing towards my breasts, imprisoned by the fabric of my binder, then extending my arms outward. If I could speak, if my voice wouldn’t break the illusion, I would say, “This is me—my realest form, my truest self. Whatcha gonna do about it?” The judges stare me down, stare my opponent down, before pointing toward me one final time. I am the victor, emerged triumphant from the battle for realness.

As I walk off the stage, heart still pumping the beat through my bound chest, blood still pouring from my nether regions, I feel the truths of realness wash over me, baptizing me as a new man:

MANIFESTO OF TRANSMAN REALNESS

1. Your physical body is a vessel to be shaped and molded into the form that makes you feel the realest. Chop off your breasts, inject testosterone into your veins, mutilate your body until you are born anew as your truer, realer self.
2. True realness doesn’t come from looking like a man, but having the confidence to know that you are a real man, regardless of how you look. Realness is more than just “passing” as a man, but embodying your realest, manliest self.
3. Realness, like gender, is about the performance. We are not just imitating masculinity, we are satirizing it. The only difference between a trans man and a cis man is that the trans man is acutely aware that all men are merely mimicking the ideals of manhood.
4. Realness is a form of protest. To embody masculinity, despite the circumstances of your birth, is to protest the idea that the way you were born determines the person that you will become.
5. Demolish the gender binary—that state-sanctioned institution which pigeonholes us into rigid conformity. Men are not born, they are delicately crafted by the hands of society. Why should the government stop you from becoming a man, just because you were born a girl?

Realness was conceptualized decades before I was even born. I was not the first, nor will I be the last, to understand these fundamental truths about what realness is. And yet my words are more vital than ever, in this era where fascists and reactionaries aspire to chain us to the shackles of the gender binary.

The gender binary—that ancient social construct that dictates men as masculine and women as feminine! The code that claims that men must be as strong and unyielding as their phalluses; that women must be as soft and compliant as their bosoms! Does it shock you when I reject those norms? That I dare to reject the myths of biology for the truths of my soul?

I reject the dogma that tries to constrain me to womanhood! My transgender brothers, free yourself from the fetters of society, and become the man you were meant to be!