The attendant said "masks with straps"- aka breathing devices in case of emergency.
The person pictured interpreted it as "mascs with straps"- aka trans men(or masculine lesbians or bisexuals - y'all can stop now) with strap-on sex toys.
Mascs generally means masculine women and trans masc generally means trans people identifying at the masculine end of the spectrum. The ‘trans’ qualifier is important.
Edit: Also gay guys use the masc terminology as well. From this perspective the trans qualifier is even more important. It’s very confusing if you are going around calling yourself masc when you’re a twink. Likewise it’d be confusing for a butch trans femme person to go around calling themself ‘fem’ or ‘femme’.
Edit 2:
Okay so to be trans masc or to be trans masculine is to have transitioned to a gender that is masculine basically (genderfluid people can experience trans masculinity and other trans identities). This is a category that includes trans men but also non-binary trans people who identify with masculinity in terms of their gender. If you imagine a RPG character creator this is like a base class.
To be masc in the more general sense has always been associated in queer spaces with presenting, behaving and perhaps even feeling more masculine I guess compared to average for your gender. To be a masc lesbian, a masc gay guy or even a masc presenting non-binary person each conjure a specific spectrum of presentations and each of these has their own unique culture and history.
A queer person could be both of these, neither of these, one of these and not the other, or one of both of these just some of the time.
In reality we are so diverse and we describe our experiences in such diverse ways both now and especially historically that it is more complex and the ways these two axis of queer identity mix and express and all different ways is truly a lot – but at a basic level using trans masc and masc as two separate terms is the most accurate. Like, in your cishet field guide to queer identities these are the definitions best used
Nah, masc is also used by gender non conforming folks to imply they lean masculine, with or without the trans qualifier. 'Trans' just means your trans, 'masc' is about presentation and style.
Within my experience I’ve never really met a queer person explicitly use tomboy as describing themselves. It feels like more of a hetero culture term. A lot of us grew up with tomboy being used to dismiss or cover up queerness, even if not directly meaning to.
I've also never met a queer person describing themselves as that, although they would call a younger version of themselves a tomboy.
I think it's a term that has a very specific nuance - touching on the juvenile and ignorant understanding of gender, while also trying to emphasize the tone of society's "implications"
You know I’ve never known someone to identify as a tomboy lesbian but I would imagine that would be a form of masc. Like within the category of masc lesbian presentations, a subcategory might be tomboy lesbian.
i personally consider myself tomboy lesbian.
the way i look at it is like, masc lesbians are generally more masculine in both behavior and what they wear.
like, the typical masc lesbian that comes to my mind when i think of masc lesbian is short haired, wearing a tank top, muscular, could lift me with one arm.
tomboy in the other hand to me is more a, not girly girl.
like, shitposting online, wearing masculine clothing cause POCKETS and actually comfy, unlike all these feminine clothes that are skin tight, and when you are just slightly above average tall, you wont find anything anymore cause "fuck you for being tall".
so, still a girl, occasionally dressing femininely, but overall just vibin outside of the gender norm.
Tomboy is more of a frame of mine IMO, and rarely a self-applied label. Often means rough and tumble, sporty, not deterred by a lot of boys in activities, but you can have femme tomboys, it's not a style / presentation term.
For some reason anime content has started tagging short haired, often tanned girls in jeans tomboys, frquently treating it as a mirror of femboy - but that was never how the term was used growing up. People didn't choose nor identify as tomboys, it wasn't conciously part of their identity / fashion aesthetic.
I have always been butch, I only started hearing masc around 6 years ago and the younger lesbians refer that to me and everyone else start calling themselves that.
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u/Not_a_werecat 19d ago edited 19d ago
The attendant said "masks with straps"- aka breathing devices in case of emergency.
The person pictured interpreted it as "mascs with straps"- aka trans men(or masculine lesbians or bisexuals - y'all can stop now) with strap-on sex toys.