‘‘JOY”, “AMAZING”, “HAPPINESS”, “wholesome”, “freedom”, “light at the end of the tunnel”, “greatest day of my life”, “euphoria” and “bliss of fairy dust” — what do these words describe?
The answer is “top surgery” in a new Snapchat video called “What is Top Surgery Like For Trans Guys”, created by Pink News. If you don’t know what that is, according to the video it is “a procedure that trans men and trans masculine people can choose to have, where breast tissue is removed and the chest is sculpted to have a more masculine appearance”. Put simply, it is a bilateral mastectomy, given to women as a treatment for gender dysphoria.
The video paints an uncritical picture of top surgery, as you might expect from the first episode of a series entitled Pure Trans Joy. I am sure its positivity will be welcomed by trans men, which is clearly its purpose.
However, it made me uncomfortable. For a feature, I interviewed and photographed women who thought they were transgender, had top surgery, then went on to change their mind and detransition. But although they reverted their names,
