An increasingly popular belief is emerging online where it is deemed “transphobic” or “transphobia” to refuse to date a transgendered person.

The debate, polarizing communities and debate online, asks whether rejecting a sexual partner over their genitals constitutes “transphobia.”

The bulk of social media users who do not belong to a sexual or hard-left political community dismiss the condemnation of “transphobia.”

But the term has become increasingly thrown around to malign people who are strictly heterosexual–and even a large portion of homosexual men, who wouldn’t consider dating a trans person.

Several social media users agree with the notion that refusing to date someone on the basis of their being trans, constitutes “transphobia.”

Transphobia is refusing to date trans people. Why? Trans people come in every shape, size, and color. We are all different! There are trans men, trans women, and non-binary trans folks. Whatever genders, body types, body parts, or feature you are attracted to- it comes in trans. — Pan Pan (@PantophilePanic) August 23, 2019

also refusing to date a trans person bc they're trans is … literally transphobia…. — JUDAS GOAT (@soybeanpardo) August 17, 2016

refusing to date trans ppl is not "a preference", it's blatant transphobia — alejandra (@lesbianaff) September 27, 2015

lmao when did we decide that openly refusing to date trans people isn't transphobia?? — anarkitty (@tendertrender) August 3, 2019

Transphobia is based on discrimination against trans people. Refusing to date a group of people because of their genitals = discrimination. https://t.co/EhlElIxFq0 — EZRA MOVED – CHECK BIO 击 (@coffinpuppy_old) January 2, 2017

Some admit that the issue is akin to straddling a fine line between ‘prejudice’ and ‘phobia’ when answering the question.

https://twitter.com/Susan_Larson_TN/status/1206275565189238784

LGBT magazine, Advocate, asked the question “Is Refusing to Date Trans People Transphobic?” in a recent headline.

In the article, they start by citing a 2018 study which “showed that only 1.8 percent of straight women and 3.3 percent of straight men would date a transgender person. A small minority of cisgender lesbians (29 percent) and gays (11.5 percent) would be willing.”

They continue, “Bisexual/queer/nonbinary participants (these were all combined into one group) were most open to having a trans partner, but even among them, just a slim majority (52 percent) were open to dating a transgender person.”

The article brings up right-wing outlet opinions before informing that, “One is that there are transgender people who are very attractive by any conventional standard. Another is that, according to data provided by PornHub, the U.S. is the world’s largest consumer of pornography, and trans porn is one of the most popular types.”

The author later asks after building a case, “is it transphobic to have a genital preference?” to which they respond, “I would argue that it is not, using the sort of logic that would be used in legal circles.”

But then, they go onto opine, “Namely, this rule can theoretically be applied neutrally across cisgender and transgender people. Thus, the rule of, ‘I am not attracted to people with a vagina’ or, ‘I am not attracted to people with a penis’ can be equally applied to both cisgender women and transgender men.”

The BBC asked in 2018 if it is “discriminatory to refuse to date a trans woman?” following an incident on a reality TV show where trans contestant, India Willoughby, asked other contestants questions on their dating preferences.

The exchange went as follows:

“Would you go out with a transsexual woman?” she queried. “I believe it’s your choice… I would choose not to,” replied the R’n’B singer Ginuwine. “That doesn’t make me scared.” “You would go out with a woman?” Willoughby asked. “Yes.” “But you wouldn’t go out with a transsexual woman?” “No.” The conversation rumbled on. When Willoughby suggested “Let’s have a kiss,” Ginuwine replied “no” and leaned away from her.

A recent meme circulating social media targeted a statistic where 98% of straight men would not sleep with a trans person.

The meme read, “98% of straight men are unwilling to date trans women because of hatred,” ending with: “this has to change.”

More campaigns of this nature have become apparent in recent months.