this happened a while back but I thought this would make for an interesting first post

be me, mtf 18, able to pass in public fine

flying back home from college by myself for the first time, kinda nervous

everything is going smoothly until I have to pass through this tubular scanner

when I pass through the gate, the detector goes off, I get confused because I don’t have anything metal on me that should set off an alarm

they ask to pat me down, I look back and there’s a 17 inch monitor behind me with the outline of a human figure with big red text above, something along the likes of “1 ANOMALY DETECTED”

low and behold, a BIG red square is centered on my CROTCH, my heart drops and I feel the blood rushing to my head

the screen is VERY visible to everyone, its facing all the other lines of people and the commotion of several TSA officers gathering to talk amongst themselves is drawing attention

no exaggeration, around 4 strangers start to gather around me and stare between me and the screen

in the midst of it all, a female TSA keeps asking me questions, “be honest with me, are you a boy or a girl?” and “what parts do you have?”

with the little courage I had to muster, I told her indeed I was born male

at this point there’s 8, yes EIGHT, people standing around watching the scene unfold. the TSA officer keeps going back and forth between talking with her coworker in private and asking me questions

she goes up to me and says in a dry tone, “sooo, because you have a penis, you’ll have to be pat down by a male officer”

some big burly guy is standing behind her, he asks if he’d prefer I be pat down in a private room, but at this point, the public humiliation already happened and I didn’t see a point in making the situation last longer, plus I didn’t feel safe being alone in a room with a male officer

he takes me off to the side and turns me around, he starts patting me down while everyone continues to watch

he tries to alleviate the awkwardness of the situation with small talk. luckily, while patting me down, he deliberately avoids patting my crotch and butt and just hovered his hands over me, I can tell he felt pity for me that I had to be put into this position

after he finishes, they release me and I quickly grab my stuff and leave, the damage has already been done and now a bunch of strangers knew

i head to the family restroom to calm down and collect my thoughts, I felt humiliated, but in retrospect, this situation was so absurd that all I could do was laugh it off and I continued about my trip.

Has this happened to anyone else at the airport? This is the first time I’ve ever experienced this. It feels like they’re reinforcing protocol to make it as hard and uncomfortable as possible to be trans in public now.