I (transsexual man) have a very close friend (cis man) who thinks he's non-binary now. He has a hard time explaining why he has started to believe that, but he has said things about not liking being seen as cis anymore, not being comfortable with the expectations of men, being more comfortable around lgbt people than cishets, and enjoying makeup. Classic. It totally caught me off-guard at first, even though he's always been GNC. Maybe because he's GNC. He seemed to accept himself as a man who likes makeup and all that. I'm not the only binary trans guy he knows, and we've talked about adjacent topics plenty, and he's always framed himself as cis man. A very flamboyant bisexual man, but a cis one.

Maybe some people could be truly non-binary or a third gender or something, but it's probably very rare, and definitely not based on any of the shit he's saying. He's already well-integrated into our local lgbt community, so he doesn't need to convince himself he is NB/trans to fit in with us like I've seen some cis people do... except... a lot of his other friends are NB tucutes. Mostly high-femme bisexual women with she/they pronouns who complain about the straight men they date not "getting it." I've hung out with them and they're a fun crowd when they're not talking about gender. I figured they're pretty harmless since they aren't pushy with their views and they don't try to speak for trans people. Unfortunately now it's looking like my friend is becoming a casualty.

He brings up his "gender exploration" almost every time we hang out now. It's hard to watch my friend try to sort out his feelings, getting more and more confused, yet somehow also becoming more certain that he's NB. So far I've listened to him and not said much back besides occassionally asking questions that might lead him to the conclusion that he is, in fact, simply a GNC cis male. But since his feelings aren't logical it doesn't work.

I'm 99% sure that if I plainly told him what I really think he'd react poorly. I'm too blunt with this stuff sometimes. And we've been close for a long time and I can tell that he's in a sensitive spot about all this. If he feels like I'm completely invalidating his feelings he'll just push me away, of course, and if I say things that also invalidate his other friends' identities it'll blow up and I could even get ostracized from the local community. I generally just avoid talking about this stuff with people IRL since my city is chock-full of tucutes, but this is one of my best friends and I feel like I'm the only one who might be able to bring him back over to sanity on this one. The only mutual who I think is transmed is also a huge asshole who recently got into a fight with said friend so I can't get any help from that guy.

Is there a way to bring him around gently without upsetting him and his tucute friends, or do I let it play out and just hope for the best for my bud?