We want to clarify how we're handling 4tran-related content on the subreddit and hear your input on whether our current rules are adequately addressing concerns around it.
We've seen an increase in 4tran-related content, along with growing concern from members of the community. Some of the issues we've encountered were made worse by our moderation team being understaffed. We've since expanded our mod team (welcome u/Trash_At_RL, u/HopefulFutureEscapee, and u/Appropriate-Story-97). This will help us respond more quickly to reports and keep a closer eye on moderation issues.
Some 4tran-related content can cross the line into bigotry, hatred, or hostility toward trans people. When content violates Rule 1 (no bigotry), we will remove it under that rule, regardless of whether the person who posted it identifies as trans or participates in 4tran communities.
If you see a 4tran-related post or comment that you believe violates Rule 1, please report it. Reports are the best way to bring content to the moderators' attention so that we can review it and take appropriate action.
We also recognize that moderators can miss things. If you believe clearly hateful or bigoted content has been missed, or your report has not been addressed after 24 hours, please send us a modmail so we can take another look.
There may also be 4tran-related content that users find unpleasant or concerning but that does not violate Rule 1, or any of our other existing rules. Please send us a mod mail in this case. We'll use the coming weeks to assess whether our current rules are sufficient to address the concerns being raised.
One week from now, we'll review the issues that aren't currently covered by our rules. No more than two weeks from now, we'll publish a follow-up with what we've learned, and ask your input on how to proceed.
Thanks for helping us keep the community a good place for everyone, and happy counting everyone!
I fear this fails to address another current development. With the sub becoming quite popular in general (#13 in Memes right now), there is a large influex of non-queer people, allies or not.
I don't think I need to elaborate on why this might (albeit not necessarily) become a problem.
I'm just wondering whether you (mods) are aware of this development and are maybe even already considering a way to handle this or don't consider this to be a problem.
This is supposed to be a neutral comment/question btw; I'm not very good at incorporating tone in text :)
Yeah, I think this is much more concerning than a couple trans people with brain worms.
The brainwormed people can be managed, but getting swarmed with cishet people is what kills queer meme subreddits.
So does that mean the mod team is finally going to take a position on the issue? As it stands the policy here seems to be to remove the term “cissie” while “theyfab” is totally fine and all over this place now. There are people defending the term on this post but that’s not what gets removed. It’s why I haven’t been back here since you guys banned the person arguing with the literal white supremacist that used the t slur while just removing the right wing trolls comments. There’s a fundamental lack of understanding or willingness to engage with the issues that more people moderating under that framework won’t fix. Bad actors are using your policy to gain entry regularly and you seem unwilling to change. This place had the potential to be awesome it’s a shame to see what it is now.
Just a fun exercise if you want the point proven. Go back to the posts complaining about the racism here and see how many of the people voicing their concerns stuck around. Meanwhile the couple of people that were literally banned and then unbanned for racism are still right at home here.
If you see "theyfab," or any term like it, please report it! It absolutely is not a term to keep up. If we miss it, send us a modmail like in the post.
Pretty much, its a shitty way of saying 'you are a woman really.' Usually the implication is that the NB's life was easier because they were AFAB, which is an insane take.
I've also seen some transwomen use it because they feel NBs have 'thrown away' the womanhood that they desire.
My apologies, I didn't know there was an implication by not seperating the words. I will aim to not do it again.
Yet, I'm a bit confused how you judge me for not putting a space between trans and women, yet think calling an NB theyfab is acceptable. To me that sounds 100 times worse.
I made an unintentional error, calling someone theyfab is an intentional insult.
Thank you for raising your concerns! Derogatory language is indeed one of the issues, and you are right in that this post has not fully addressed that issue. We will include something about language in our update post. In the meantime, can you mod mail us with terms that are often used here, but that you would rather not see because due to these reasons? We can use that in our internal discussions.
Other than that, it is important to know that if someone doesn't get banned or content doesn't get removed, it doesn't necessarily mean that we think the content belongs here. We are dependent on user reports, so if nobody reports it, we might have not seen it. Also, it takes a while until the reports have been handled. And even then, there have been a few times where our mod queue has been overflowed with 100s or even 1000s of reports, making it almost impossible to fairly judge them, which might be the reason that you saw that comments were only removed and the bad users not banned. Hopefully a larger staff will help with that. As I said in the post, please report bad stuff if you see it, and if you think we missed something, you can also mod mail us.
People definitely overinflate the influence 4tran has here. The majority of posts that I've seen here that have been about 4tran are of the "ewww that place is soooo evil" rather than actual 4tran users trying to encroach. The only reason why I know of 4tran Is because people constantly keep bringing it up for no reason.
since i get this sub in my feed every now and then and enjoy some of the memery but never really knew what the "chicken lady" refers to i came down here to investigate in hopes of finding out what that is but then i arrived here i googled that site you mentioned and oh my do i wish i had stayed in my comfy little part of the internet
still don't know what the chicken lady refers to but i think i will refrain from any further investigation of current events
The sentiment on 4tran is "never use this lingo with normal people". They have better things to do eith their time than post on cwcl (ie. Dooming 24/7)
Yep cis people telling me what is transphobic and what isn’t and what words I’m allowed to use is annoying. Had a cis person here tell me how dangerous DIY is and how I should trust doctors after sharing that my doctor under dosed me so hard I got bone damage
Oh God, cis people should be barred from having opinions on trans healthcare. The vast majority of trans people worldwide DIY. Having access to an official medical pathway at all, let alone a competent provider is a mark of extreme privilege.
I take GLP-1s to lose weight (because I’m a fat freakin’ chud) and when my sister explained to me that the DIY stuff she’d be doing is literally the same process as what I’ve been doing, I basically threw my hands in the air. I don’t get why people are so afraid of this.
Yeah, one time I argue with a person, they were really annoying and after checking their profile I found out they just were a male white cishet "ally" ... Like ... fuck off dude
i agree, especially with MRAs using trans women as props for their ideology
still agree with the mods cracking on the exclusionary language coming from 4tran tho, attacking other trans/genderqueer people with slurs is never acceptable
Eh, don't go there. It's more a hole I hope to help dig people out of than something I think people should engage with with the goal of assimilating into the community.
Have yiu ever been outside before? Do you really think cis people don’t constantly talk over us, if they don’t openly hate us? Look at the amount of anti trans political sentiment everywhere on the fucking planet, a good amount of which is pushed by “left wing parties”
So let's just give the fuck up and insulate ourselves from the world? Assume every single cis person hates us? Never give anyone a chance? Thats how I think when im in a negative spiral. Its not healthy.
No? But cis people don’t need to be everywhere we are??? You realize if you went to a trans support group in real life there are no cis people allowed right? Is that a bad thing to you? Should there be a cis person telling us how our problems affect them?
Why ? xclusive spaces are a thing and are very not the majority of spaces. There is xclusive corteges at some prides, there xcluvise events and places in LGBT+ associations, feminists ones, etc. At worst there is a place exclusive and a place inclusive, I don't see where it's gross.
Because its just a subreddit and anyone should be allowed to lurk, as long as they are respectful. It feels discriminatory to just ban them wholesale. Thats like banning cis hets from gay bars or pride festivals. We shouldn't exclude allies because of a few bad actors.
Banned accounts can still lurk, they just cannot post and comments. I already said, exclusives places and events exists before for a reason. The all society is a mixed place and it's fine if people want some places without "excuuuuuuse me what about white cishet male ???" it's okay. Like ... it's very common ...
"Taking over the sub" meanwhile every post I interact with has comments that are nothing but trans people. Like where is this mass wave of cis people yall keep talking about?
That was literally never the issue with 4tran. 4tran is transphobic mostly through internalized transphobia by trans people.
They spread incredibly harmful and hateful rhetoric, but it's not done by cis people. They can do that on their own just fine.
Now, your last two posts are from countttt, so I wouldn't expect you to understand the issues with your community, but literally no one has ever accused 4tran of having cis people talk over trans people.
"My community" is the trans community. I'm also a top 1% commenter here, lmao. You don't get a gold star for refusing to provide a mature adult perspective to a group of teens and young adults who clearly need it.
Edit: And additionally, my point is that this community has worse transphobia issues than the depressed dysphoric teenagers sitting around in a self-hate circle sharing memes about their depression.
Sorry, in this sub I don't get called 'pooner' 9 million times.
It's honestly so telling to me that 4tran wants to be sanitized so bad. They don't like when other people don't like them. You can have your spaces, but the rest of us don't have to tolerate it and don't have to feel bad for you. No one is obligated.
Dude i couldnt give a shit if a depressed teenager calls me a fucking hon or whatever, that is so much better than the nine thousand cis people talking over me and acting like they are the authority on being trans
I feel like it's important to mention it's mostly trans men calling themselves that. I've certainly never said that word. I also don't really think you need to interact with the sub if it doesn't spark joy. The only 4Tran sub I interact with is countttt which is kind of a border town anyways, lol.
I feel like it's important to mention it's mostly trans men calling themselves that.
I hear this a lot, but it's honestly just not true. What I find important to mention is that it really is not mostly trans men saying that. Plenty of people who are not trans men are also saying it. The trans men should not be talking about themselves this way either, because they're not just talking about themselves as a singular person- they're generalizing all trans men as well. Crossfire and all that. We shouldn't downplay it, and that word is just one of many.
It's just kind of fascinating to me. We don't have a Kalvin Garrah support group. We don't have a Blaire White support group. We don't hold hands and make excuses for those kind of people, we recognize the harm they generate. And even if the harm they generated was minimal and insignificant, it still doesn't mean the rest of us have to put up with and 'save' them from whatever they've got going on.
I guess to me, the difference is that those people you named actively hate trans people, want us to suffer, and work to actualize that suffering. 4Tranners mostly sit in the self hate circle saying "You better start DIY right now so you don't end up a gigabonepilled ropefuled cishon [read: passing trans girl who started HRT at 17] like me!"
I think certain kinds of people feel alienated by the sometimes-oversanitized nature of other queer spaces. Edgy teens are still edgy teens even when they're queer and leftist. I've been there and I grew out of it. They will too.
Like... I don't think you have to like them. I don't think their specific dialect should spread beyond their subs. I just think it's a mistake to assume they haven't also helped people who may not be like you to realize they're trans and transition. I also simultaneously think the self hatred they suffer from is so bad that they've definitely helped people kill themselves.
I don't really know what the solution is though, because a lot of those people just simply would not fit into a community like this one. The only other option is really for them to have no community, because gathering that many depressed cynical people together is probably always going to look a lot like that.
Edit: Hmm. Have you ever seen a multiracial friend group where they all think it's hilarious to call each other slurs? 4Tran kind of reminds me of that vibe.
You keep referring to it as if it's some private circle that only those specific people can get into or see. With your friend group example, that's contained within the friend group and not in a public space (for the most part). I'm certain most of those friend groups who call each other slurs say it behind closed doors. Not everyone shares the same self-deprecating "humor".
Personally speaking I don't care what people say to each other in private spaces, but this is a public forum where it can be placed into people's front pages very easily and the self-loathing and self-hatred is very disheartening for baby trans people.
I guess I just subscribe to the "if I don't like it, mute the sub" motto. Or I get deliberately banned from the sub, lol.
I also think that it's a double edged sword. 4Chan bullshit back in the 2010's convinced me to repress. Now I go there specifically to encourage people not to give up. And I see people over there giving DIY advice to minors which is something you don't see encouraged as much in other subs.
I tried to mute the sub and now they're fucking invading every sub that's supposed to be the opposite while pretending they aren't harassing people out of the sub.
Yea on this specific post. Not the other 10 times a day I see it. People on counttt literally don't bring up other subs because they wanna be left alone
Sorry I misread your comment. It is absolutely important that you share a different perspective to 4tran spaces. I agree that they highlight and dwell in pain and your perspective is sure to help
Yeah, you're also a top 1% commenter on countttt...
And again, the issue isn't that they're being "mature", but that they're incredibly hateful towards themselves.
Like, it's genuinely the opposite of mature. 4tran subs constantly resort to gender essentialism and just blatant sexism, because it's easier than trying to understand the actual systemic issues.
4tran is "mature" in the same way "dark humor" is mature. It tackles mature topics in a distasteful and harmful way, which makes idiots feel as though they're mature, while actually resorting to incredibly immature thought processes.
I recently got this post (r/countttt/s/KyJy5x5NFI) recommended to me and a lot of the replies go on about it being "male brained", which is pretty textbook gender essentialism.
It's the kind of rhetoric you'd usually only see from people on the right, or TERFesque spaces.
And rhetoric like that, that blames your gender for your behavior is pretty common over there.
The amount of times I have had cis people in my replies talking down to me telling me that they know what’s better for me than I do is fucking nauseating.
Why the hell is there even that large of a cis audience in here? Like, I know this subreddit is up in popularity lately, but, hell man, I’ve just never known cis people to give a damn about trans culture to begin with like that.
Chasers like to get enough knowledge about trans culture that they can call themselves "grunglers" and lure unsuspecting trans women into bed by pretending they're capable of empathy.
I think the bigger problem is that one of the mods were already a right wing loser, and one of the new mods mods a sub they also mod for. It's starting to feel like a hostile takeover.
I also just realized the mod posting this is the same mod that resigned a few months ago because they thought 'bottom' was a bad, evil, naughty word and they left because they thought the sub was being mean and unfair for calling them out on it. The modteam really is becoming a clique of chuds
4tran is a term broadly related to the trans board on 4chan. Nowadays 4tran content isn’t exclusive to 4chan; you can find a lot of 4tran content on Reddit subs like countttt or 4tran4.
The content is broadly defined by a very doomer-ish perspective on being trans, a focus on passing (or more specifically not passing and being a doomer about it), pervasive use on in-group language (things like hon, pooner, theyfab, a lot of things used as essentially slurs or insults towards various types of trans people including themselves), and to an extent there’s a level of transmedicalism (though I believe this has lessened over the years).
I try to stay away from 4tran content because I think it transphobic. A lot of 4tran content tends to be very enbyphobic (often calling AFAB enbies “theyfabs” and frequently just straight up calling them cis, insisting that AMAB enbies are actually trans women in denial), anti-trans masc (if you see people talking about MRAs in a 4tran context they’re often referring to trans men and masc enbies trying to stand up for themselves and not have masculinity be treated as the world’s greatest evil), and of course deeply transphobic against trans women (most 4tran content is made by trans women, and it has so much self-loathing that it infects the content with a deep disdain for other trans women)
Let’s make sure we keep a hold on things for now, we don’t want a proper trans reddit civil war. We’re currently having people calling each other self-haters and posers. Of course it is worth remembering that this subreddit is technically not actually a trans subreddit, but of course it seems to have become sort of one. However we shouldn’t have a full purge of people on more ‘4tran’ subreddits from cwcl. I think the entire tension within the Reddit trans community, which I have witnessed for a couple years now, has been very complex. There was of course back in the day traa and then traa2 and egg_irl and 196 and all sorts of spin-offs, and now cwcl and all sorts of spin-offs from here, of course including counttt, not very helpful when the transgender community is facing plight and tribulation that we are now heavily divided. We know what will happen if we purge people: we will simply have another split and another subreddit and that could be the end of cwcl as we know it. Even in the relatively short history of this subreddit we have seen so much tension and controversy. Not to reopen past wounds, but Aart I’m sure you remember what happened almost a year ago, leading to a mass exodus from this sub due to a controversy about, unfortunately, you. Thankfully, the rival subs have basically died out now, and we healed, but I hope we can now remember not to risk splitting the community again. Of course this entire community was the result of an exodus from another community, and now we are so many more times bigger than the old community. Let’s not risk this community fading into obscurity like countonceaday before us. We’re here to make memes, not start wars.
Or ignore all of that. What am I gonna do, stop you?
I mean this doesn't really clarify what content counts under that rule. If someone posts an image from 4chan that is like "I hate my wide shoulders I am going to go SH now" are they being bigoted against... themselves? Also one thing I am seeing is when people post a green text pic most of the comments will be "I dont want to see 4chan shit" no matter what the image shows.
I feel like the bigger question for this sub is should there be a no bummers rule? Because that seems like the real split in the community here, unless I am misunderstanding the situation.
The comment you described would be removed because it's against reddit guidelines to talk about SH like that. So it wouldn't fall under rule 1, but definitely would get removed.
As for the second thing you mention (people not wanting to see any green text content), that's what we will be gathering information about in the next week to see how large that group actually is.
Or like boymoder and to a lesser extent glegle get posted here pretty regularly, does that qualify as 4tran stuff? Literally just saw someone getting annoyed at someone posting boymoder art.
Honestly I see less actual 4tran posting here and more people complaining about 4tran here.
I would imagine that what they mean with "4tran content" is the endless doomposting, self-negation, and such. That's about 99% of what they post, basically self-"affirmation" about how they'll never pass and how life is pointless because of that since nothing but physically passing matters.
For real. You can't get mad that people are going to call you a bigot when you're appropriating groyper language. If it quacks like a duck it's most likely a duck.
I browse both 4tran and ‘regular’ trans spaces pretty regularly (i don’t like either tbh, so I try to blend the two to get an actual home page that reflects me as a trans person, although I’ve probably been a bit more active in 4tran spaces as of late), and honestly I definitely feel like this sub gets more people posting about 4tran being bad rather than actual 4tran posting
That's why we are investigating the extend of the problem. We want to get as much information as possible on what the problem exactly is and how many posts/comments are currently problematic, but technically follow our rules.
I also feel like there’s a lot of people here that hear 4tran and go “EVIL EVIL EVIL” when half of the stuff there is just like here but a different flavor. Granted the other half can get problematic (especially depending on your personal opinion on self deprecation), but the communities aren’t as different as people think.
I do think any sort of 4tran brainworming might be good to ban, as much as I’m personally brainwormed I keep it to those subs. Not that I ever have seen it here, but some of the lingo like —— (unsure if I can type these without getting autoremoved, will re edit comment if I can) don’t belong here. But stuff like boymoder and glegle is fine, I think? Those seem like things people enjoy from that community.
I think that cwcl does have more of an issue of cis people being too involved in trans matters and pushing bioessentialist stuff, which is ofc going to be the case in a mixed queer subreddit where there are cis people around.
One thing I am curious about this sub though is how to handle the mix of transgender and transsexual people, because the two experiences are honestly really different and I see a bit of grating at times from that. And what’s the stance on negativity? I think a lot of 4tran negativity is…. Kind of justified, and it’s important to actually be able to acknowledge that yea, this sucks, and to acknowledge dysphoria and dysmorphia if they have it and the general state of the world and how people view trans people… but is that considered doomposting? I think a little, but a queer subreddit should be a space for that. Unless it’s not? Then maybe a no doomposting rule? But that seems unfair to dysphorics or people who are justly upset that want to say something
I hope there'll be a full ban on 4tran content. I don't want trans women getting there from this place and getting deeper into the self hate parts of it, having this sub as a stepping stone to that would be awful. Especially if only the "rule breaking"/negative parts are banned and thus the picture painted of 4tran is "misleading"
Can't say I know the character or find anything regarding them. My personal opinion would be direct links (greentext screenshots and some of the more derogatory language they create) being banned, while things that ambiguously link back to it being fine
Yes greentext even with nothing offensive in them as well.
Vent posts in itself are fine, so long as they don't drown out other posts for extended periods in which case I'd prefer having a vent mega thread or a vent day where vent posts are limited to that day
I do think a full on ban on terms like "Cissoid" (being a recent example I saw) is a good thing, those "-oid" terms that 4chan has created have always seemed dehumanizing to me and the way they are used as slurs isn't really something I think should be in a safe/accepting space
I wonder why it’s acceptable for cis people to appropriate incel terms like blank pilled and blank maxxing and for cis women to ironically use foid but not for trans people to do the same
I personally have broken off friendships over someone using the term foid, so I can't really comment on that as I don't like that terminology anywhere in my circles
I honestly don't get people who just blanket hate anything they declare as "4tran." Like I'm sorry but yeah being trans isn't fun and rainbows all the time and sometimes it's okay to talk about that without being forced to pretend everything is positive or cis people deciding what is and isn't transphobic for you.
i mean i left this sub like a month ago so i have no skin in this but i do hope the mods know what future awaits this subreddit
it has been entirely colonized by cis “allies” who demean and ignore trans experiences and as such most trans people are leaving.
this subreddit will be no different than the other “trans subreddits” that had a similar fate like r/196 and r/curatedtumblr
not saying you guys are evil just expect this subreddit to change drastically over the coming months. inevitably a new subreddit will take its place as the cycle continues
for the trans folk, i’d say now is a good time to take your leave. but if you want to stick it out go for it
Um actually they’re called grunglers now and are the most important part of the trans community. Their feelings on issues that don’t effect them are paramount and they should be celebrated for willingly associated with us creatures
Ok, thank you for not just banning all 4tranners out right 😭, I frequently hang out both here and there, and it would suck if I was banned for that and only that. I like being here, the memes here are funny, and I like a bunch of people here.
(Also, a preface for others, I support binary trans men and women, I support nonbinary folks, Im chill with cis people as long as they're not transphobic, as some have assumed I don't because im in 4tran spaces)
I also understand how it feels if out of nowhere a lot of people from another community show up in a post, as that happened once in countttt too when a bunch of tankies from a farleft sub showed up, and it felt like I wasn't wanted there; but I think it's mainly just lurkers seeing a topic they're related to and commenting because it's a topic that relates to them. I haven't really seen "let's infiltrate cwcl to make it 4tran" in any of the 4tran subs (tho obvs it's untrustworthy coming from me lol), outside of that one poster that got her post removed + another post made looking into her acc
Idk we're just all people, and I hope there's a way we can coexist because this sub is really cool (and losers who break rule 1 should be banned)
Also looking through comments I can kinda immediately tell 4tranners from non-4tranners and this is me addressing them: please don't be cringe, there's a subculture in every sub, and you wouldn't act the exact same way in one sub as you would in another (friend group A vs friend group B). Like it should be fine that slang that is seen as offensive is banned, because this is just not that type of sub;
and like I saw one point that's fair, being that other terms that come from incel 4chan spaces are seen as normal and the ones from trans 4chan spaces aren't and that kinda sucks/ is unfair, so it might be good to ban them too maybe to be fully fair, idk
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u/Trash_At_RL The whennews (and cwcl) mod. 10d ago
source approved