I think it’s weird that multiple trans men - including myself - when we first came out were told to watch ‘boys dont cry’.
The only trans men in media people know that is a dramatized telling of the real rape and murder of a transgender man. So when they see a young trans man looking for media to tell him he’s not a freak, not alone, not evil for being trans, that there is people won’t hurt him for being happy they tell him to watch ‘boys dont cry’ - and emphasis on young, I was 13 when my mom sat me down to watch it.
I don’t want to go ‘I got traumatized by a film’ but I was. Being a suicidal 13 year old already being harassed at school because I dressed masculine watching a movie where someone like me gets raped and murdered scared me. It made me think ‘is that what will happen to me?’. And it just didn’t seem to bother my mom, she watched the movie and didn’t seem affected by it, she just went on with her day and that made me think ‘if that happens to me will she react the same way?’
I know this experience is probably less common now because there is so much more trans men in media then when I was 13 but still fucked me and my trans man friends up.