Tommy Dorfman said a man seated next to her on a recent flight texted a group chat about her, calling her “a f***ing transsexual in the midst of going from a man to a woman” and adding, “Just my luck. I was hoping for a hot babe.” The 33-year-old posted the exchange on Instagram on Friday, May 1.
Dorfman said the messages were “deeply misogynistic and revolting” and that the incident only reaffirmed her decision to feel safe and comfortable in her body and spirit. She said, “This does come at the cost of safety and comfort in the world, especially in America, and that’s not without consequence internally and externally.”
The post lands against the backdrop of a transition Dorfman has been describing publicly for years. She came out as transgender in 2021 and told TIME in July 2021, “I am a trans woman. My pronouns are she/her. My name is Tommy.” In earlier comments, she said passing had never been the point for her, describing transition as a matter of alignment and autonomy rather than the comfort of others.
That makes the flight episode harder to separate from the larger story around her public life. Dorfman said she has at times not felt safe enough to talk openly about her identity, and she later said in October 2025 that she directed the film “I Wish You All the Best,” about a nonbinary teen’s journey. Her point on Friday was blunt: she can still be targeted in public, but she is not changing herself to make that easier for anyone else.
What happens next is less about the post itself than the reality it documents. Dorfman put the exchange in public because she said she could, and because she believed the man’s remarks deserved to be seen for what they were.