PRIMED:
The Back Pocket Guide For trans men
and the Men Who Dig Us

Making it
This is a really exciting time for trans communities and this resource is one of the first of its kind. There is limited information available for trans people around sexual health and many misconceptions in various communities, including trans, LGBTQ and mainstream. This resource is an effort to combat this, to bring together important information and make it available to trans men so that we know what risks we are taking, what choices we have, what questions we should ask and to remind ourselves that our health and bodies matter. This is by no means exhaustive; there are many other issues that we could have included. We want this to be a work in progress, something that will grow and change as more research is done and more people get involved.

The Words
The biggest challenge in writing this resource was, “how can we make a sexual health resource dealing explicitly with fucking, Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs), Hepatitis and HIV while at the same time, using language that is clear and respectful to the wide range of trans men who will read it”? This wasn’t/isn’t easy. Most safer sex resources are not aimed at trans people, let alone trans men or gay/bi/queer trans men. There is no consistent language to use regarding body parts or identities. Even the use of the term “trans men” is not without controversy as there are many terms to describe people who were assigned female at birth but who live as men or male.

We tried to make a resource to talk about our bodies that made us feel comfortable. Still, we have so many different words to describe our genitals, some of us use words like dick or cock, others feel fine with cunt or pussy. We all know clever terms like cockpit and manhole and more abstract words like stuff, pieces and junk. Because there is no consistent term used by everyone, we use the word “front” or “frontal” to describe what is medically referred to as a vagina. In certain cases, we’ve used terms like “vaginal fluids” because we were unsure of how to discuss these aspects of our experiences with words that are comprehensive and respectful.

Since this resource was developed from our community, we have chosen the word non-trans to describe gay men who are not trans identified. There are other terms for this currently in use, including bio guy, biological male or cisgendered. However, we felt that bio- or biological sort of implies that trans men are not biological, which isn’t true. Cisgendered has not yet been fully embraced and can be confusing to people who have never heard it before.  Besides, when else do we get to privilege trans identities and bodies?

We have worked to be respectful and innovative, as well as clear and concise. We know that language is not static. If you are offended or don’t see yourself in this resource, we apologize. This is part of our process as well as a process that is happening in trans and gay communities across North America. We hope you find this useful and engaging. This resource exists for you, so please send us your suggestions so we can make the next one better.