this post was submitted on 23 Mar 2026
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Chapotraphouse
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Page 28 of the document you linked says that although Bushnell identified Lilly and used she/her pronouns on some suspected accounts. On other accounts, Bushnell identified as Aaron and was comfortable using he/him pronouns. It is possible that Bushnell was comfortable with both gender identities.
The document also says that Bushnell identified as Aaron in documents posted during the act of self immolation. The document also points out that there were entirely separate but both active internet accounts. The account 'acebush1' on reddit was active and used the name Aaron until the time of death. Last activity from acebush was February 24, death on February 25.
The document does not present the case that Bushnell was uncomfortable with using he/him pronouns or the name Aaron. I think it would be fair to say Bushnell used multiple gender expression.
It is extremely typical for trans women in the early stages of their coming out process to publicly go under their old name and pronouns, explore their actual gender identity on entirely seperate online accounts and identify as "bigender" or "genderfluid". Transmisogyny is brutal and makes it extremely terrifying for us to come out, there were times in my life were i, too would have had an easier time setting myself on fire than declaring who i actually was. And the same goes for most of my friends and the majority of my community.
You are not making a logical statement. You say that the majority of people who are transgender began as a separate online account. That does not mean that the majority of people who have separate online account with different gender presentation go on to become transgender. The entire reason that transgender people experiment with an online identity is because it is not a commitment. Some people try a thing and decide that they don't want to do it. Some people make fake identities on the internet for no reason at all. Some people make fake identities on the internet for the purpose of deception.
I am not doing erasure. I think it is fine to speculate that Bushnell was experimenting with gender expression. The document says that it is impossible to confirm that Bushnell was committed to being transgender. We do not know. We know that Bushnell used both identities and was seemingly comfortable with both identities.
Bushnell was raised in some kind of weird Christian cult and only came out as an anarchist like a couple years before doing the immolation. I think that Bushnell was probably trying out many new things during the period after leaving the Christian cult.
this sucks
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Null hypothecis strikes again. Your dedication to cis-by-default-unless-proven-otherwise-by-overwhelming-evidence is fucked up. To transphobes, no evidence will ever be enough, why carry water for them?
I did not say that Bushnell is cis man. The acebush1 reddit account identified as a cis man in 4 comments and the document mentions this. I said that we do not know. You are presenting a binary, that Bushnell must either be a cis man or a transgender woman. Bushnell could have been gender fluid, nonbinary, or something else. We don't know.
I respect every person's gender identity. I don't think a person's gender is something that should be investigated by other people. I believe that a person's gender is whatever that that person tells me their gender is. I respect whatever someone tells me that their name is.
In the self immolation video, Bushnell says "My name is Aaron Bushnell" at the start of the video.
I respect whatever people tell me that their name is. I don't try to prove that someone is something else.
I can't speak for others, but I think the push for recognition, from some people, comes from the fact that a lot of us will never be able to fully transition socially and will lead two separate lives, four our entire live. And while Aarons case is not my case and I won't speak for the dead, it is understandable from my point of view that people would wanna bring up the fat that the person may have been trans, it would be nice if I can at least get my real name on the gravestone if I can't get it during my life.
But at the same time, a lot of us understand that we are completely irrelevant in the eyes of majority of the world so I won't split hairs over it. I'm just trying to make sense of why people are stressing the name/gender so much and, at least in my personal opinion, it's because a part of us would think it's kind of neat we at least get named by our choosing. Plenty of trans people will never get called by their name anywhere outside of the internet. I haven't and it's been a decade.
i don’t disagree with you. i do think it is significant that the event was live-streamed on an account called ‘Lilly Anarkitty’. the paper also describes Bushnell using a masculine name and pronouns on LinkedIn and Facebook, and a feminine name and pronouns on Mastodon, YouTube, Discord, and Twitch. to me, one of those groups is more representative of a person’s actual identity. and as the paper says on page 4, “There is a reason it would matter. Trans decedents are often subject to violence even in death; there is a saying that “they call it a deadname … precisely because the people in your life bury you under it”. Given that reality combined with the fact that trans people face a tremendously elevated likelihood of premature death from all causes, death and the treatment of the dead occupy a little-discussed yet central position in the current consciousness and culture of the transgender community. Our perception was that if Bushnell was transfeminine, then we had a communal obligation to take care of her in death.”