#LesbianSafe

[riotkittiesarchive]

beware of attack lesbian!! reblog if you too are, indeed, an attack lesbian

[riotdyke]

2017 -> 2024

Butchness is about becoming, lesbianism is about growth, life is about transitions.

Take up your space.

[radiofreederry]

Throwback Thursday to one of my hottest fits

[tenderanarchist]

Was feeling my fit today

[tactfullyinappropriate]

Ohhh boy, I'm gonna get a lot of flak for this one but... masc lesbian =/= butch. You can be the most masculine presenting person the world has ever known and that does not automatically make you butch.

Butch is an identity and you kinda need to fit that identity, not make the identity fit you. E.g. "lesbians" who are attracted to cishet men. Sorry, hun, you're just not a lesbian. Find your own identity that fits. You are allowed to be your own kind of bisexual or pansexual but what you are not, is a lesbian.

Sure, there is a lot of room for being your own person within an identity. I am not the same kind of lesbian as the next dyke. But if I did not fit (or if I no longer fit) the definition of the lesbian identity, I wouldn't call myself one and insist that lesbians expand the definition to include me.

'Butch' as an identity exists within a certain context. It *is not* a synonym to man, and it's also not a synonym to 'a masculine presenting lesbian'. If you don't vibe with the whole 'chivalry' concept and the specific ways in with butch/femme courtship (as an example) happens, maybe consider if this is the right label for you before insisting that we expand or rather completely rewrite the definition to exclude those things from it.

Some of the discourse around 'we should redefine butch!' reminds me of the discourse around redefining manhood. "It's not fair that men are expected to have masculine hobbies," they say. "It's not fair that men cannot wear glitter and makeup and retain their manhood. It's not fair that men are expected to open doors, and carry heavy things, and to-to---" Yes. You are exactly right. But butches are not men.

'Butch' is an opt-in identity, not something that society at large expects and requires from you. In other words: if you think femmes gushing about being courted by their butches in what to you appears to be a 1960s play-pretend of patriarchy, is silly, objectifying or demeaning toward one of the parties... consider that maybe 'butch' is not the identity for you. That maybe you are a masculine person with their own unique take on masculinity.

But insisting that we redefine butch is like me insisting that we redefine 'yoga' because I vibe with the gymnastics but I don't like the spiritual aspect of it. I can just go to Pilates instead. Or do yoga and accept that other people in the practice experience it differently.

What I am endlessly tired of, as a femme, is being lectured on what I *should* and *should not* find attractive. I am not somehow betraying feminism, objectifying people and degrading myself by daydreaming of a butch who opens the car door for me or - the absolute horror - brings me flowers on a date. I recognize that other people have the right to their own attraction and that masculine lesbians deserve the freedom to explore masculinity on their own terms and be treated with dignity and respect regardless of where that exploration takes them and regardless of who does or does not find them attractive.

That being said, the whole narrative of 'if you find chivalry hot, then you are objectifying butches and you are, in fact, an entitled selfish person' is tiresome. Not all femmes are women but in being chastised for our turn-ons and romantic daydreams (unless we're the Cool Girl who doesn't like flowers and rolls her eyes at romance) I see a lot of the admonishment directed toward cis straight women who dare to swoon when they read romance where the male lead is courteous and generous.

Except, again, butch/femme *is not* man/woman. It's a particular subculture within the lesbian identity and no one is pressuring anyone into conforming to it.

[depressed-lesbian420]

Show me who’s In charge mistress

[farmerlesbian]

EDIT: IF YOU ARE COMING HERE TO REBLOG THIS WITHOUT MY ADDITION FUCK YOU JUST BLOCK ME INSTEAD!! get your lesbophobic ass out of my house. this is my post and you don't get to cut off half of what i'm saying!

lesbians can and frequently do: love, desire, fuck, befriend, date, kiss, seduce, dance with, take as lovers, flirt with, marry, build community with, have and raise children with: genderweird people, transmasculine guys, nonbinary individuals, pansexuals queers, faggy dykes, trans ladies, people who don't use labels, bi girls, gender deviant folks, and so on.

lesbianism does not require or insinuate/suggest/assume cis-ness. it does not mean clear cut binary womanhood of all involved. it isn't limiting or stifling or harmful or outdated. many of us have complicated genders ourselves and love our partners with complicated genders and identities.

anyone who says otherwise or is trying to convince you otherwise doesn't know us very well.

editing to add my addition to the original post:

all of this and STILL lesbians are not into men.

yeah, some people's partners realize they are men and transition after they've been together. other people only realize they are lesbian after or while in a relationship with a man. other lesbians are sex workers and have men as clients. some lesbians might be questioning and experimenting, or may be pushing themselves through uncomfortable experiences with men. they may not be in touch with their own desires (and lack thereof as well). these things can be tough and complicated and my love goes out to all these people.

but lesbians do not, willingly happily healthily choose to pursue and go after and romance and love and make out with and have sex with and have a relationship with, men. lesbian does mean something, words have not lost all meaning quite yet!

there are wonderful beautiful words for those who do like men, like bi and pan. bisexual and pansexual are wonderful! so are sapphic, wlw, gay, queer, and other terms that folks use. you can be as specific or vague about it as you want.

lesbians are real, we really do exist. we are not your boogeymen, we are not a hypothetical theoretical figure, or a platonic ideal or an academic concept or a figment or fiction to place your fears and anxieties upon. we are real people.

it is harmful to perpetuate either of these things i’ve described here. simply put: lesbians do get with genderweird folks AND still do not get with men. both are true.

[thatdiabolicalfeminist]

some people worry about lesbian identity being too ''limiting'' and i want you to know that if you feel that way you just might not be a lesbian!!

lesbians aren't forcing ourselves to ignore real desires to be with men, we're not cutting ourselves off from things that would be fulfilling or good for us.

i felt stifled and limited when i was trying to force myself to like men, when i was interpreting every feeling of anxiety or combativeness as "attraction", when i was dreading what felt like an obligation to entertain men sexually and perform for them romantically.

lesbianism is me finally giving up on limiting myself!!!

lesbianism is me finally giving myself permission to admit, to myself as well as others, what i actually want and do not want, and not trying to conform to the painfully limiting life mapped out for me by the cultural and economic coercion of compulsory heterosexuality.

lesbianism isn't for everyone. for some people, the lesbian label would be limiting and stifling because it's not what you genuinely want or need!! if you feel genuine desire for men of course trying to be a lesbian would feel bad, you're denying a desire you actually have!! there's no reason for you to force yourself to try to be a lesbian, just like it was bad for me to try to force myself to be bi!

but please understand that for those of us who need the lesbian label, it is freeing and healing, not restrictive.

[draculovemp3]

The femme voice is underrepresented in historical records, though markings of her presence abound. Often, she is the security behind the butch display, the one who makes the public bravado possible. Lady Una Troubridge's words to Radclyffe Hall, while spoken by a white, upperclass, Christian woman, capture some of the enduring aspects of femme power: "I told her to write what was in her heart, that so far as any effect upon myself was concerned, I was sick to death of ambiguities..." Yet to others, the femme woman has been the most ambiguous figure in lesbian history; she is often described as the nonlesbian lesbian, the duped wife of the passing woman, the lesbian who marries. Because I am a femme myself, I know the complexity of our identity; I also know how important it is for all women to hear our voices. If the butch deconstructs gender, the femme constructs gender. She puts together her own special ingredients for what it is to be a "woman/' an identity with which she can live and love.

— Joan Nestle, Flamboyance and Fortitude: An Introduction from The Persistent Desire: A Femme-Butch Reader (edited by Joan Nestle)

[riotkittiesarchive]

[ art by @sweatermuppet ]

[xxconnection]

[radiofreederry]

Did somebody call for a butch?

[tenderanarchist]

🖤self-portrait as A Butch In Love🖤

[lautakwah]

happy lesbian visibility week from ur fav butch prince 💖

[depressed-lesbian420]

I fucking love you baby every inch

[sapphos-darlings]

I know homosexuality is natural because I was born with it.

As a little girl, I in fact thought that everyone was like me; That women were with men just to make children and hang out, that everyone knew the most important person was the female best friend. I didn't know why society was seemingly made out of hetero family units - to me marrying a man and making children seemed like a huge bother and a waste of time. I actually wanted to be a nun when I grow up - up until my mom told me that women don't have to get married.

What a relief! I was only nine but I was happy to dream of my adult life I would surely spent with my very own special girl friend. Not a girlfriend - that I didn't know was possible yet - but another girl who would be my very best friend and also think the same of me.

I was only an elementary school kid back then. I didn't know about the gravity of this simple truth I carried with me. I wouldn't get my first actual crush until middle school.

But I knew that this was me and my feelings, as natural as how I liked nature and animals and fantasy novels and cartoons and bike rides and building snow fortresses and playing in the garden.

That's how loving other girls began for me. Along with everything else, no more odd, no less wonderful.