My gender therapist told me this in response to something I said referencing my chest. It was a while ago but it’s stuck with me. I’m wondering what you all think of this comment? The comment felt disqualifying, like I was less male for calling my chest a “breast”, or I would be seen as less male because of it, but I can be pretty sensitive so I might be overthinking and she might be right that men don’t talk like that.
Or maybe more directly, referring to breasts as “breasts” does not in an absolute sense disqualify someone from being a man.
Even if this seems trivially true, it doesn’t stop people from taking generalizations (like men typically say chest rather than breast) and applying them in either a policing fashion or in a disqualifying / gatekeeping fashion.
OP might just need to talk to the therapist about the comment and walk through how they experienced it.
In voice therapy a trans person might intentionally train to mimic common stereotypes in gendered speech patterns, sometimes it’s just pragmatic and useful to be clued into those gendered generalizations to help pass - we don’t know if the therapist was trying to likewise be helpful and accidentally came across as policing or gatekeeping.
Wishing you luck OP!