#and how osa women think their man is like nigel

[g-a-r-f-i-l-e-d]

Fr when I first started participating in radblr and saw posts regarding osa radfems' bfs or men saying "not my Nigel" I didn't know who that was and just thought Nigel Thornberry??? Like:

[radicalkhaleesi]

how do we, as a community, stop fellow bisexual women from appropriating lesbianism? i don’t necessarily think that all of the bis-who-call-themselves-lesbians even know that they’re doing it; trauma does weird things to our brains and we all react differently. here’s a few points that i’ve been thinking about over the last couple of days, i’m so open to this conversation and discussion!

one, i saw someone ask the other day if you could hate men enough to “turn off” your attraction towards them.

personally, i know that my attraction leans heavily towards women and always has, but i also do genuinely hate men so much that i’m just not attracted to them day-to-day.

is this something other bisexual women experience, and if so (i believe it is) what does that mean for us? how do we work on accepting that we are bi and have been so traumatised by men that we’re repulsed and mentally disconnected from that part of our sexuality?

two, i think more bisexual women need to talk frankly about their attraction to women and choose not to date men. i know people are weird about separatism (i’m heavily in the pro camp personally) but if you know that you likely won’t date men again, talk about it! i’m bisexual and i won’t be dating men again - and that’s normal and fine!

three, stop talking about your bf in lgb spaces. no one cares. stop shoving your nigel down everyone else’s throats, if you’re going to choose to do that good for you but no one cares.

four, we are not oppressed for our opposite sex attraction and we need to stop acting like we are. “but my osa is part of my sexuality too” sure but no one cares. we are not in danger of public homophobic attacks when we’re with our opposite sex partner. we are incredibly likely to be abused BY our male partners and their fetishisation of us and our bisexuality, but that’s not what this post is about.

five, what are we doing wrong as a group to make lesbians angry and uncomfortable, and how do we stop? lesbians don’t hate us because we’re theoretically attracted to men, it’s the behaviour.

just because you’re bi doesn’t mean you have to be with a man. ever. repulsed by men ‘s oppression of us and their actions? don’t include them in your dating pool! why do we, as bi women, feel the need to colonise the lesbian experience in order to justify never being with a man? why isn’t it enough for us to say “yes i’m bi and i have no interest in men”?

this is a bit rambly because i’m tired and sick but the amount of discourse i’ve seen is insane and i want others’ opinions and thoughts!

[femenaces]

i am so tired of het-partnered using radical feminists like gail dines as proof radical feminists can be with men. the point we are making isn’t that gail dines is no longer a radfem now, or that every radfem must be celibate/febfem/lesbian. it’s that if you’re going to be with men and birth their sons then make sure your priority and focus and energy is spent more on women than the men in your life. gail dines makes up for her non-radical relationship by doing super radical work. het-partnereds on tumblr who live a patriarchal life non-radical life irl obsessed w calling themselves radical bc of their radblr blogs need to really think about if their identifying as radical feminist (rather than rad leaning or gc or whatever) helps the movement? stop being selfish? if you’re w a man AND do nothing radical irl AND aren’t even picky w the men you get with then WHY DO U WANT TO BE REFERRED TO AS A RF? like? why are the lesbians/celibates treated as a psyop, as if osa het-partnereds own radical feminism despite rarely doing enough to be considered radical (which is about overthrowing the system not parttaking in it), when in fact it’s more likely het-partnered women will damage the rf movement for maintaining their radical identity just because they disagree w sex industry and gender identity. so no i don’t think having a subsection for seperatism is necessary at all. why should osa het-partnered non-radical women be the default radfem and the rest of us are subsections? the radfem theorists with husbands were radical because of their activist work and energy. jenny with a jakey who does nothing RADICAL besides reblogging on tumblr (which isn’t radical either) needs to stop comparing herself to gail dines. radical feminism isn’t a list of beliefs to tick off but the belief society should be completely overthrown and revolutionised. these women put “voting” on their list of radical actions. it’s a joke.

I do get what you’re saying, and it sounds good in theory, but the sticking points for me are:

We can’t know what users are doing irl. It would be great if we could more openly share the stuff we do, but the safety issue and threat of doxing, stalking, and significant irl consequences keeps almost all of us operating anonymously. So trying judge people based on what we assume they are or are not doing or trying to gauge how much people are actually doing irl is not very feasible

Even if we could accurately determine what people are doing irl, wouldn’t it then become a measuring contest? Like, has so and so done enough volunteer work or irl activism to be considered a radical feminist despite having a Nigel at home? How much is enough to “make up for” (as you say) the fact that someone has a Nigel? This is so subjective that I think it would lead to even more ruthless infighting than we have now.

[kaz-curlymonster]

Rant

“Well I’ve only dated men because it’s hard to find a woman to date.”

Okay but why do you NEED to date someone? Especially a man? You don’t HAVE to be in a relationship. It’s taken me roughly 2.5-3 years to find a woman I was interested in and start dating her. So you don’t need to tell me how hard it is. Between the pans, those who use the Q slur as a label, the polyams, the asexuals, and any male that found his way on what is supposed to be a women only dating app pestering me despite not being interested in males, yeah it was hard as fuck to find a woman I wanted to actually be with. But I didn’t feel the need to settle. I’d rather be single than lower my relationship standards. You don’t HAVE to date a man just because you can’t find a woman. Maybe I don’t get it because they disgust me, maybe I don’t get it because I hate them. Even so, I don’t understand why some people feel like they absolutely NEEEEEED to be in a relationship.

Maybe this is coming across as “well if you don’t think like me you’re wrong”. I hope it’s not, that’s not my intention. I’m not trying to stop you from doing whatever you do, I just don’t understand the logic. Frankly I don’t care for an explanation because I feel like it’s all going to boil down to “I can’t help my orientation” as it always seems to do, despite me never stating anything that would suggest that. Yeah you can’t choose it, but you CAN choose whether or not you’re dating someone. Like, if it was between being single, and getting with someone who is a threat to your emotional, mental, and physical wellbeing, a lot of OSA women would go for the latter and I don’t understand.

Studies literally show that OSA women live longer happier lives when they are single, and shorter lives with men. Have your friend move into a house with you. Buy a toy to meet your desires. There’s nothing a man can do that a toy can’t. And on top of that you don’t have to interact with one of the grossest organs on the face of the planet. Like I said, I don’t care for explanations. I’ve seen as many as I think there are, I just don’t get it and am tired of all my OSA friends complaining to me about their Nigels, and telling me about their sex life like I want to hear it.