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Dylan Mulvaney is a Modern Trans Superhero
For most people on TikTok an account run by a young trans girl found it’s way onto the front page- even of the most staunch conservatives.
And they like her.
If you’re on the massively popular TikTok app, you’ve likely noticed that the algorithm curates content for each specific user according to their interests. For some transgender users, when Dylan Mulvaney gained widespread attention as a transgender woman doing a series called “Days of Being a Girl” wherein she documents every day of her life since the first day of her transition. She’s perky, quirky, colorful and tremendously likable, quickly garnering over 2 million followers and legion of loyal fans.
For many of those observing the ongoing adventures of Mulvaney, it was initially suspected that she was satirizing transgender woman, bouncing around and squealing, appearing almost as an absurdist version of a trans woman rather than someone experiencing the challenges, both mentally and physically of navigating life as their truest self. Initially, some, including myself, reacted by blocking her with the belief that she was mocking trans identities by presenting a caricature of transness for her followers to laugh at rather than engage with; An ongoing joke at the expense of a community that has suffered at the hands of self described comedians who use trans people…
