Talking about being trans as an identity, rather than an action, helps us to understand transness as relating to who you are, not what you do (…) It makes space for people who can’t, or don’t want to transition socially or medically.

The urge to scream this at the top of my lungs. This is something I notice a lot with older generations - how they need “evidence” in order to accept someone as trans. That if you don’t present yourself physically different, that if you haven’t had medical surgery in order to look a certain way, then you’re not trans until you do so. This is such a harmful way of thinking as it completely denies someone’s identity purely by the way they look.

The way someone presents themselves does not take away their identity and you don’t have to look a certain way or change yourself in order to validate how you identify. And like Kit Heyam says, not everyone can or wants to transition either socially or medically. Not everyone lives in a safe space where they can be open about how they see themselves, not everyone has the means or the access to medical transitions. But it’s also completely valid those that don’t want to transition in any way, that feel comfortable in the body they were born in, that don’t feel the need to change in order to look as they see themselves.

When being trans is described as “anyone who doesn’t identify with the gender they were assigned at birth”, the word identify is so crucial here, it’s all about how someone sees themselves, how someone is comfortable identifying, rather than having to take any action to fit a gender stereotype.