Find your local queers, first of all. Like, that’s literally the very first step. I didn’t do that and I had no support network, just years of free fall. Only knowing them through the internet is fine, but the important thing is finding the queers who are local to you. Do not be like me and assume internet queers are enough, you need the locals so you can hear who the bigots are and how to go shopping in the wrong part of town and not get clocked (trust me, now that you’re queer and aware of it, that’s an actual concern you have to have, even if you think nothing has changed).
Next, do your research. Do not trust medical resources that aren’t on queer-friendly websites. There are literal centuries of misinformation and demonization about queer life (and I’m not just talking about sex) that you need to sift through, and trust me when I say that you can’t do it. You’re too new to this, you have no way of doing it. EDIT: saying this so you know why you have to pick where your research comes from VERY carefully.
After that, your local queers got this. They’ve babysat other newbies, they’ll keep you on track.
If you’re talking about very real life-or-death survival, this is super simple. Just lean into the “tough guy” aesthetic hard. Get a bunch of milsurp, grow one of those dumb survivalist beards, buy a gun or at least talk a lot about buying a gun. This is what I do, you know how many people gaybash me? None. Because no one fucking knows I’m not a chud, when I walk around with my desert sand Hazard4 backpack and MOLLE-laden thigh pouches. I have to warn fellow queers about me when they meet me for the first time, but that’s a small price to pay for being functionally immune to RL bigotry.
Also, you’ll spend less on clothes. The milsurp is cheap and lasts forever. Goes double on the lasts forever part if you buy “tactical” stuff: 5.11 Tactical is overpriced but indestructible, Rothco will have your back for everything except for boots, and UTG/Leapers bags are literally impossible to destroy. I have one that has survived being dragged two miles down a freeway, run over by a truck, multiple drenchings in heavy rain, etc. — and if I got a can of computer duster it would look like new.
If you lay on your sarcastic asshole impression thick when approached by chuds, you also manage to get them to avoid you like the plague without becoming a target of theirs.
