LADS

This post is in no way referring to the wider mainstream population. Based on personal experience, most people are genuinely lovely. This post is specifically a rant (admittedly written partly whilst drunk) aimed toward particular transphobes who believe in dictating another's identity for their own narrow minded and insecure reasons. 

It’s Friday 25th March, Easter 2016 is upon us and I’ve four days off of work. I love a good excuse to go out and party these days, therefore both myself and my girlfriend decide to kick start the weekend ‘celebrations’ by venturing up to the city of Wolverhampton for a night on the town.

The night starts off pretty well. As we exit the taxi, we find ourselves standing outside a swanky cocktail bar. Several drinks later, we are back out on the streets, scouting for a fresh change of scenery to grow more intoxicated amongst. As we pass a fancy looking bar, my girlfriend notices two guitar singers performing. Her attention is captured by their presence and she’s dragging me inside before I know it.

It’s a pleasant environment, looks as though it’s been done up recently. Most of the place is vacant (still pretty early though), however in the far corner sit a group of four boys and three girls. They’re all intoxicated and bantering back and forth with the two singers like over excited kids attending a panto.

“What music do you like love?” Shouts one of the singers. Before I have time to realise who he’s speaking to, my girlfriend responds with a request for Oasis.

We purchase drinks and seat ourselves in the centre of of the room while the band plays to us all.

Several songs later and our glasses are dry. We decide one drink in this place is enough. It’s a nice environment, however the guitar players constantly interacting with the crowd is a little too much to put up with after 30 minutes.

“Where you going?” One of the guitarists asks. My girlfriend explains how we’ve got an engagement to attend, as much as we’d love to say.

As we pass through into the foyer, the words “See ya later Lads” chase after us. An awkward laugh is visibly heard coming from the closing double doors behind us. Humiliation and sadness fill my mind. Me and my girlfriend have just been publicly misgendered, all in the name of a cheap laugh.

It’s amazing just how ok some believe misgendering is. Not only do they presume it’s acceptable to misgender in the name of poking fun at a trans person, they are also genuinely of the opinion that referring to trans women as “he” and vice versa is nothing more than the cold hard truth.

You can put lipstick on a pig, but it doesn’t make it a woman is one way this argument is often presented. The rhetoric here doesn’t really make any sense when you think about it. Yes, putting lipstick on a pig doesn’t do anything to amend or alter its gender identity. For one thing, we don’t even know what a pig’s actual gender might be anyway. It’s an animal that doesn’t communicate in the same way as humans do. It doesn’t have a culture in which to present their gender identities with. Furthermore, lipstick has nothing to do with making something or someone a woman. Basically, what I’m trying to say is, this argument is just a way of distracting people on the opposing end of the debate into over-thinking a nonsensical claim.

Some will make similar claims by using a fictional character (Unicorn/Thor/Jesus) instead of a pig, however the truth remains the same. Of course you can’t transition into Thor, but Thor is a cultural construction, not a gender identity.

Doesn’t matter how much you say you’re a woman, your DNA says otherwise is another argument put forth regarding trans people’s genders. What the transphobes uttering this claim are trying to say, is that the only way you can define gender, is by basing it primarily on the biological basics regarding “male” Chromosomes and “female” Chromosomes, which they were things the transphobes learnt all the way back in Junior school sex education lessons. In their heads, if you have XY chromosomes, you’re a man, and if you have XX chromosomes, you’re a girl. God knows how they define those born with XXY chromosomes or reversed chromosomes (e.g. physical “female” body with XY chromosomes and vice versa). Here, the idea is that the only way we can be identified is via what our genetic code tells us. All hail the sacred cells.

The DNA argument is also often accompanied by a brief statement on a person’s genitals. So, as we all know, more often than not, when a human owns XY chromosomes the fetus usually develops into a male body possessing a penis for genitalia. When a human owns XX chromosomes, that fetus often grows into a female body and owns a vagina for its reproductive organs.

In the same fashion as the previous, the opposing side are here using the key stage two theory of penises for males/vaginas for females in a bid to categories gender based on some biological facts. Again though, no idea how they categories those who are born with ambiguous genitalia. But I guess the problem here is that these people are basing their claims on the idea that there’s simply two fixed biological sexes in existence.

Sex is much more of a spectrum than a binary. Despite common belief, XX chromosomes can grow into male bodies, XY chromosomes into female bodies and XXY chromosome fetuses are indeed conceived. Bodies differ, and despite what people may believe, there are a far wider variety of outcomes when it comes to the characteristics owned by each body.

And even if they were just two binary sexes which never overlap, how the hell would it still have anything to do with gender? It’s not like they are the same thing. I mean gender identity is a state of being; how one perceives one’s self within the world in which they exist within. Sex is more to do with the reproductive capabilities of a given body. 

Gender identity has more to do with gender expression; which is the ways in which a given human being communicates its existence to the world around them. Clothes, behaviours and presentations from the life form's surrounding culture are what is used in order to communicate gender expression; a complex variety of signs and symbols delivered in the name of portraying how one perceives themselves to others.

So what the fuck has one’s state of being or portrayal of their gender got anything do with the coding of their chromosomes or the shape of their crotch? Why the hell does a dick get to have the final say on a person’s gender, or a set of microscopic cells for that matter? Why does this “it’s biological” bullshit get seen as a valid rhetoric in the eyes of others? Gender identity (one’s state of being) and gender expression (one’s presentation of one’s self to the world) are in no way the same as sex (a categorization into which most living organisms are placed into based on their reproductive organs).

Yet the argument persists, and there are those out there who still use this as their conclusive argument. Nothing you say will change their mind and no number of explanations on what gender means will be taken on board.

Why do they do this? Well, it’s most likely down to insecurity. You see, gender identity and expression mean a lot to humans. We like to be seen as whatever gender we identify as and hate it whenever others refer to us as anything other. For example, a lot of cisgender boys don’t like being referred to as "girly", and many cisgender girls would hate it if you told them they were in anyway “manly”. So how can such people who want validation of the fact that they are a “man” or a “woman” rid themselves of such doubtful angst?

They tell themselves that their DNA proves that they are of course. I’m a man because I’ve got a penis or I’m a woman because I have a womb. Problem solved. No more questioning of one's fears.

This “science says so” rhetoric is a sad and rather ironic choice of words when you think about it.  For one thing, it’s using science to condemn transgender people in the same way that religion is used often used to condemn gay people. A simple line of text from a body of work is being exploited in order to try shut down the gender debate. Instead of seeing sex and gender as two separate entities, the anti-trans crowd will claim that the great work of science states there are two binary sexes, and that those sexes prove which gender a given life form belongs to; regardless of that life form’s particular identity or expression.

Which is all nonsense. This doesn’t “prove” that trans men are really women and trans women are really men. It’s just a way of simplifying gender in a bid to validate one’s own cis-based insecurities. The truth is, there are more than two genders and the gender of a human isn’t always necessarily the one they were assigned by society at birth. Nonetheless, select members of humanity feel adamant to label people and refer to them in whatever gender they deem suitable. The consideration of referring to a person in the gender which they identify as or express simply does not occur to them as a reasonable form of behaviour. Instead they will speak to someone as if they are defined solely based on their genitalia and/or genetic code.

To put it bluntly dear readers, I was born with a penis. Furthermore, my chromosomes are most likely XY. Although I’m now on HRT, I went through male puberty as a teenager and my body was that of your classic key stage two sex education male body model. Except I don’t identify as a man, but as a woman. My gender contradicts my sex, yet why the hell should that make me a “man”? I don’t present myself to the world as a man, neither do I see myself as one. My genitals aren’t on public display and neither are my genetics. So why should something no one can see have the final say on who I am, especially after all one has done to get here?

Oh grow up Amber you might be thinking. So this belief insults, big whoop. People get insulted all the time. Why should the world stop just because you're in an emotional pickle?

Right, so first thing’s first, yes, I was upset by the guitarist, of course I was. I’ve risked a lot and gone through plenty of physical and financial pain to get to where I am with regards to my gender. Nonetheless, it really doesn’t matter if I was upset or not, because whether I was or wasn't isn’t the point of this post. It may have insulted me, sure, however after a couple of minutes I’d forgotten about the whole affair and was partying drunkenly into the night.

The real problem with misgendering is much bigger than a simple insult, however. It is in fact a far more poisonous act which feeds into the larger structural systems of prejudice toward the transgender community. Believe or not, intentional misgendering is a form of transphobia.

You see, people often look at prejudice from a highly simplistic angle. They think that homophobia is murdering some gay kid; that racism is beating up a black guy; that sexism is yelling at a women to get her tits out; or that transphobia is throwing an egg at a trans person from the window of a moving car.   

Truth is, prejudice is far bigger and far more complicated than this on a grandiose scale. Discrimination is wired deep into the body of our society; manifesting in many forms and disguises. Women in management positions are paid 35% less than the men working within the same profession; Muslims are often perceived as a terrorists by default because they are constantly compared to a group of extremists who they’ve never met; girls are raped and seldom believed by the authorities because those in charge believe the victim’s sexual attraction contributed in some way to the event; police officers are more likely to pull over a black citizen than they are a white one; disabled people are viewed by many as feckless skivers; the working class are perceived as burdens on our society whereas the tax absorbing Royal Family are worshipped for merely existing; men are seen as studs for sleeping around whereas many will look at women and proclaim they are slags for participating in the very same behaviours; refugees fleeing war torn countries are judged as nothing more than animals who threaten local economies and ways of life. These are just a snippet of the vast quantities of ways in which discrimination can disguise itself within our the different corners of our society. It exists on every level, in every office, behind every door, in every school and on every television. No matter where we are or which country we are in, conscious and unconscious prejudice spews from the mouths of many; making people unemployed, forcing them to earn far less than their intellectual equals, putting them in harm's way, making them guilty despite being innocent, branding them with a stained reputation, pushing them back into a the midst of warzones and making life as hellish as possible for them in as many ways possible.

The language we use and the ideas we hold have large impacts upon the culture that surrounds us. The reverse is true also. Culture impacts our ideas, so when we grow up in a world that hates others for being different, well we too become victims of that hatred. Nonetheless, despite consuming it, we also vomit this toxic sludge back into the world in which it came from. The way we talk about people of colour, religious minorities, the disabled, elderly people, gay people, intersex people, asexual people, and so on and so forth shapes the wider world around us. Together the hatred is shared and passed down to younger generations. When someone calls a black man a thug, a muslim a terrorist, a woman a slag, a homosexual a pervert, a trans person a freak; they strengthen these beliefs and notions further. It keeps itself fresh and strong; allowing it to exist well beyond its time.

Referring to a trans person by whatever gender they were assigned at birth contributes to the larger beast of transphobia in many ways.

If you continue to perpetuate the notion that trans women are men and trans men are women, you’re ultimately going to exist in a world where people are often of the opinion that these individuals are one gender pretending to be another. You’re going to live in a society where employers won’t see a woman applying for a job at their firm, but instead a man in ladies’ garments; dressing in clothes and masquerading as someone who they aren’t. Likewise, an employer might see a trans man as a woman dressing in boyish attire, acting out some sort of faux role, caring little about presenting ‘properly’ for the interview. Perceiving someone as an act as opposed to an authentic human being is incredibly harmful in this context. The same goes for individuals who fall under other hetero non conformative ways of expressing their gender. Those who identify and present as androgynous, gender queer or something else are often seen as acting “out of character” in the eyes of the employer.

One way in which the act of intentional misgendering contributes to the larger body of transphobia is in relation to the problems which face trans people when it comes to bathrooms in this day and age. Last week, North Carolina passed a bill which would allow employers to discriminate against LGBTQIA individuals within the workplace. One of the numerous issues that LGBTQIA activists flagged up regarding this law was the fact that it granted employers permission to ban trans from using public facilities that matched their gender identity/expression. Rest rooms and trans people seem to have been bugging the Americans in particular for some time now. There appears to be an awful lot of paranoid talk about how trans people are in disguise so that they can allegedly access previously-restricted bathroom spaces in order to peep at the other users and sexually assault them. It’s a fear that’s never really been apart of reality, as statistics show no trans people have been caught or prosecuted for assaulting cisgender people in public toilets or changing rooms in the past. In fact, the statistics reveal the complete opposite, as numerous occasions have occurred in which paranoid members of the public verbally or physically assault transgender individuals because they believed them to be deceiving perverts using the incorrect bathroom for their own maliciously criminal motives.

When you have people going around saying trans people are the genders they were born as, such viewpoints are essentially fueling this bathroom paranoia further. When someone says “trans women are men”, they are essentially denying the existence of that transgender person. The term “transgender” means the self-identity of an individual who does not conform unambiguously to conventional notions of the “male” or “female” sex. When someone responds by saying “no, you are the gender you were born as” they’re basically saying that the non-conformity isn’t actually a self-identity. Sure, they may call it a “non-conformity”, but merely one in their eyes which only goes as deep as the clothes surrounding that trans person. They don’t care how the trans person sees or presents themselves to the world, in their eyes it’s one big lie.

So instead of just letting trans person use the bathroom which conforms with their identity, people fear that they are hiding behind a cunning mask that allows them to “bypass” into certain areas which they shouldn’t enter. Instead of the trans person being an individual, they become an act in the mind of the ignorant. Not a human relieving their bladder, but a dangerous forgery hiding behind a camouflage for malicious reasons.

Luckily the bathroom issue doesn’t happen often, and a lot of the time, trans people use bathrooms with little to no hassle. I’ve experienced no troubles as of yet, and I’ve been using public toilets as a woman for over a year now. But nonetheless, it does still happen, it does still affect people, and you do still hear of numerous cis men and women expressing concern about sharing bathrooms with someone who wasn’t initially assigned the same gender as they were at birth. When you go around telling people that transgender women are men and transgender men are women, you’re going to add fuel the fire of these idiots who think trans folk are liars plotting to take them down from behind the confines of a once-safe public door. Seriously, it may not be the sole cause of this twisted (and ironically perverted) paranoia, but it’s certainly propping up one the ideas lurking behind its existence.

Another problem with this binary obsessed, biological superiority is the implication it has with trans people in the eyes of straight individuals who may find them attractive. I’ve been on the receiving end of this problems numerous times now, and although most guys in general are ok with finding out they’re attracted to a trans woman, there are unfortunately a handful of highly insecure individuals out there who become hostile whenever they realise a girl they are chatting to was initially assigned a guy. I’ve had drunk lads get frustrated while repeating “you have a cock”, one threaten to break my jaw if I told anyone he chatted me up (prior to knowing), and guys making grossed out sounds whenever I explain to them that I’m transgender.

If you live in a world where you’re constantly told trans women are men, you’re going to increase the likelihood of insecure straight guys becoming angry whenever they are attracted to a girl who everyone’s telling them is really a boy (and vice versa, because it does happen the other way too). These guys don’t just target trans women of course, as gay men have also been known to come under attack whenever they cross paths with such angry and fearful lifeforms. Still, it’s a problem which affects the trans community too, and many have been murdered as a result. If you’re straight and insecure, nine times out of ten, you’re still going to be attracted to a women. Seeing as trans women present as women, chances are, that fearful person may one day find themselves liking a woman of this nature. If these people are to believe the notion that this girl is not a girl when she is, then problems could quite easily arise.

Like I say, most men aren’t like this, but again, the man/woman male/female belief is just pouring more gasoline onto their bonfire.

It’s not only transphobes or scared straight dudes that misgendering impacts, as being referred to by a gender you don’t identify with also strengthens the internal dysphoria experienced by trans people themselves. Gender dysphoria is one of the hardest feelings to explain. For one thing, the emotions can differ significantly from person-to-person.

The best way I can describe gender dysphoria in relation to myself is by comparing it to the feeling you experience when you see something that’s so outlandishly violent or gross that it turns your stomach inside out. It’s like looking at a football player after his bone has shot through his shin, or a man getting his head crushed by a vehicle, or anything basically found on Rotten.com. Anything that turns your bones cold and stomach hot is the feeling I experience whenever I perceive myself or am referred to as a man.

I would get this feeling any time I looked in the mirror during my teenage years. The facial hair, the adam’s apple, the broad shoulders, the muscular arms; all triggered this revolting reaction whenever I remembered such features existed on my body. The shape, the feel, the look; it was all vile. In the end the only way I could cease this sickening feeling was by presenting as a woman, spending thousands of pounds on facial hair removal, another several hundred on risky hormone replacement therapy medication and years of an incredibly difficult social transition. Years of work helped ease the endless discomfort of dysphoria, but to hear a “sir” uttered one’s way, or a “mr” in a doctor’s office, or a “Dan” from my mother, or a “it’s a fucking dude” fired from some thoughtless prick’s mouth in a bar; brings all that dysphoria rushing back to torment me. For days, sometimes even months after, that feeling remains and it takes a lot of time for such a feeling to subside again.

Yes, ok, I’ve gone back to being all personal again haven’t I. I said near the start that I was specifically referring to how misgendering contributes to a larger and more violent form of transphobia, yet this point contradicts my pledge right? Well not really, because you see, dysphoria isn’t just a horrid feeling, but it can also be a killer.

Dysphoria differs in intensity from person to person. This is why some trans people have to transition at a very young age, whereas others can go on well into old age before they make the leap. This is because as time goes on, feelings of dysphoria increase in every trans person. Eventually, the feeling gets so intense and unbearable that there are usually two options for a trans person to take; transition, or let the pain consume you.

On the 28th December 2014, Leelah Alcorn took her own life after posting a suicide note on Tumblr. Leelah was raised in a highly conservative Christian home in Ohio. When she was 14, Leelah came out as transgender to her mother and father. Her parents refused to accept her identity and when she turned 16, they denied her request to undergo gender reassignment. Instead of allowing her what she wanted, Mr and Mrs Alcorn sent Leelah to a Christian-oriented conversion therapy program. The aim of these twisted programs is to try and convince gay and transgender teens to reject their identities and sexualities.

Eventually her parents removed Leelah from school, as she had revealed that she fancied other boys in her classes. Shortly after all this, Leelah wrote a post (which would become her suicide note) in which she talked about the loneliness and alienation she experienced as a result of being forced to reject her gender identity in favor of her birth assigned one. Later on that night, Leelah walked into oncoming traffic.

Transgender suicides like Leelahs are still far too common in this day and age. Parents, peers and strangers attempting to force trans people into rejecting their identities - particularly amongst teens - has often been a huge contributing factor in high suicide rates amongst gender variant people. Misgendering doesn’t just offend someone, it tears them apart, one day at a time.

I’ve mentioned a couple of times in the preceding paragraphs the word “biological superiority”, which is basically what this “trans women are men and trans men are women” argument is. People who adamantly believe and claim that biology ultimately defines their overall gender are essentially saying they are the authentic one whereas trans people are the inauthentic by challenging conventional expectations. The ways in which I’ve heard some folk go on about how they don’t think they should be sharing a bathroom with a trans person because it makes them feel uncomfortable leaves me stunned by just how self-righteous such a statement sounds. Because of the shape of their genitals, and the chromosomes they wouldn’t even know where there if it they weren’t told, somehow think they get to act as if they alone can and can’t choose who enters public spaces alongside them.

The misgendering itself is also a form of biological superiority. The person doing the misgendering is assuming the right to appoint another gender identity to those they don’t understand. They confidently call a trans woman a man, despite the fact that her entire existence shows otherwise.

Those who think they have the right to snatch an identity away from another are essentially seeing themselves as a higher form of human; one who can call others whatever and whoever they like.

They talk about trans people and the public spaces they occupy as if they are the sole masters in the trans communities’ fate. As if they have the right to determine who we are and where we may go in public. Again, most people are highly tolerant of trans people using the same public spaces as them these days, but as we’ve seen in North Carolina over the past few days, there still are some out there who spend thousands of dollars on tax payers’ money to hold a meeting where they decide whether it’s ok or not for trans people to access the public restrooms which match their gender. Thinking you’re more of a man or a woman because of your biology pushes trans people into a no-space. After years of hormone replacement therapy, electrolysis, name changes and painful social transitions, do you really think it’s nice for a transphobic cis man or woman to go up to a trans woman and say “you’re a man”? And would this transphobic cis man or woman really believe she was a man, I mean really? With all those changes? Of course not. Most trans women don’t look anymore like a man than Kate Middleton does, so if she’s not a woman but she’s also not physically or psychologically a man, then what are they trying to say she is?

Which of course is what trans people are also sometimes referred to as; it. All these years of being pushed outside of the gender boxes by transphobes, that vile little slur spawned into existence. You sometimes hear the “he,she,it” line uttered and it’s possibly one of the most dehumanizing things you can say to a person. By calling someone an it, you are removing them of any identity altogether. You strip them of their person, they are no longer human in the eyes of the bigot, they are an unusual, exotic, extraterrestrial thing.

These are just some of the worldly transphobic situations which misgendering can enhance, however what about the act of misgendering itself. I mean ok, so you might think so what if it has larger impacts Amber, surely it’s such an insignificant thing to be called a sir from time to time. It’s just a word, and it hasn’t affected you in the ways you describe above.

And yes, ok, fair point, except it isn’t really, because the act of misgendering isn’t just a momentary little insult which goes unnoticed, because much like the T word, the N word or the F word, misgendering has its own historical context for the trans community. Misgendering is often heard during hate crimes. Trans men and women have heard their birth assigned gender uttered at them in acts of violent rage as transphobic people beat them to death; the last words they ever hear. Slurs referring to birth genitalia or pronouns spat at their faces as they experience the final few moments of their existence in unthinkable terror.

The words “it’s a man” are also often heard moments before an object is hurled from a car or a window at a trans pedestrian.

Heck, even the fact that misgendering can lead to suicide is technically considered a form of language which influences the victim into taking their own life. Misgendering is used by killers, yet is also a killer in and of itself.

The context of misgendering is their use in hate crimes throughout history. They are words and ideas which go hand in hand with verbal assault, beatings, suicide and even murder. When I hear a repulsed guy in a bar go “look at that fucking bloke”, or an elderly gentleman utter “fucking tr**ny” under his breath (both actual experiences of mine by the way), I can feel the hate and anger tucked into their words. The ways their lips clench and the words leave their mouths like involuntary ticks. Misgendering may at times be a clumsy mistake (we all slip up from time to time), but when someone intentionally shouts about how biology makes all trans people fakes in the opposite gender’s clothes, well there’s quite clearly a lot more hate going on under the skin.

And I say this because, what’s the problem? Really? I mean why do transphobes want to deny that trans people exist? Why do they feel they need to prove that we somehow aren’t what we say and know we are? Who wins at the end of all this?  What do people really want? Do they want big burly trans men using the women’s toilets while busty trans woman pee at urinals? Do they want us all to have masculine names so they can tell us apart from the “real” girls? Do they want us all to put on as heap of ugly looking clothes so that we don’t inspire any lust in a straight guy or gal’s eyes? Do they want us all to throw away our wardrobes and start buying clothes that match our birth assigned gender? Do you want to drive countless people to suicide by forcing them out of existence? Is that a perfect world? Really? Misery, pain, suicide, murder; is that what you want?

Nah, fuck that, I don’t want that kind of world, and neither does a lot of people. Because seriously, this post sounds at times like I’m aiming this at the cisgender population as a whole. I’m not. Almost all cis people I’ve encountered in my time have been nothing but supportive and understanding to transgender people and the issues we face. Most detest misgendering and will call out transphobia whenever they notice it taking place. Not only are they fantastic in this regard, but the trans community needs their help. We are a growing voice but still need all the help we can get. Those who you consider friends, colleagues, lovers, families; they will help us all gain a bigger voice on the global stage. Last year saw some of the most dramatic changes for trans visibility within the mainstream media take place. The media exploded with content relating to the issues trans men and women face. A more intellectual discussion is now growing amongst the larger population and the majority are now growing up when it comes to trans rights.

However there are still some out there amongst the masses who continue to misgender intently. I don’t mean those who slip up or may have mistaken someone’s gender at one time or another (we’re all human, we all make mistakes). I’m solely referring to those who openly preach the notion that trans people don’t exist, that they are pretending to be something that they are not, that their biology defines their existence and that they infiltrate public spaces where they think they don’t belong.

And now look, before I go, I must add that I’m all for freedom of speech; despite what you may presume after reading this post. I’m a giant support of the right to express views, and I’m in no way saying there’s no place in our world to discuss and challenge the complex differences (and similarities) between sex, gender and what it truly mean to have an identity. Our species learns largely by sharing and challenging one another’s ideas, however there’s a time and a place for such discussions and if one goes around blindly misgendering strangers or people on the street, then they’re exploiting their freedom to express opinions in a manner which sharpens the blade of transphobia. Freedom of speech is a vital part of our society, however if we begin to use this right as a justification to strengthen prejudice, then  it falls outside the realms of free speech and into the lands of hate speech.

The guitarist who referred to me and my girlfriend as “Lads” was more than likely just being a bit of a bellend. He probably didn’t realise what he was saying, and for all we know, he could very well be someone who’s never really thought about nonconforming gender identities.

Still, he did piss me off.