BuzzFeed article on the oppressive roots of lesbianism

[Twogoats]

I wish I was joking!

BuzzFeed have just done an article all about those silly TERF lesbians who don't want to date men...

Thankfully, the comments are ripping the article to shreds! Yay!

Still, BuzzFeed is a very influential website, so this shouldn't be taken lightly!

[Twogoats]

https://www.buzzfeed.com/shannonkeating/can-lesbian-identity-survive-the-gender-revolution?utm_term=.yaW8nnaqo#.eoy1kkBPy

Link

[ChocChocPorridge]

She uses some really harsh words that I don't like reading if I'm honest (and since being on MN I've got a lot more comfortable with swearing - it's name-calling I don't like)

But the word “lesbian” has carried such a deeply uncool connotation for so long — sometimes for terrible reasons (ugly, old-fashioned, essentialist stereotypes) and sometimes for extremely legitimate ones (a history of transmisogyny)

Deeply Uncool? Really? That's the least of it - how about, fetishised, disbelieved, correctively raped? How about rather than call lesbians 'transmisogyinsts' you just let them be, and stop policing them and who they're allowed to love, because that is oppression.

[ChocChocPorridge]

Comments are generally sensible though.

I do like one where someone says:

I just feel like people should be able to use whatever label they're comfortable with even if people define it differently regarding male lesbians and someone responds that that's like calling herself a vegan, even though she eats cheeseburgers, and gets the response:

sexuality is more fluid and personal than a diet

Which is just ridiculous. I change what I eat day to day, but I've been straight my whole life.

[Milliepede]

As long as there is breath in my body I will never ever accept Transwomen as female or as women in the way that I am a woman i.e. adult human female. If that makes me a TERF then that is a badge I will wear proudly. I'm sick of this trans shit.

[AntiSocialInjusticePacifist]

Ummm is there any particular reason lesbians are singled out for this? Nobody seems to challenging my sexual preferences as a straight male. I don't get how you can get all up in arms about a lesbian's preferences, but absolutely no-one elses. It's philisophically inconsistent.

[NotAPuffin]

As long as there is breath in my body I will never ever accept Transwomen as female or as women in the way that I am a woman i.e. adult human female. If that makes me a TERF then that is a badge I will wear proudly. I'm sick of this trans shit.

God, yes, this. I'm just afraid that I'm going to end up being the old woman who hangs onto her offensive beliefs because 'that's how things were in my day', like my FIL talking about 'niggers'. Not that I think it's remotely comparable, you understand, but it feels like things could go that way.

[Milliepede]

I think the more people are exposed to the lunacy of the cotton ceiling and "I am a real woman despite fathering 7 kids", that more people are going to question what transgenderism really is. The thing is most people don't give a shit if Mark puts on a dress and calls himself Maria, I certainly don't BUT I will not be told that I have to put feelings over objective scientific facts. Transwomen should not be allowed into female spaces such as shelters, changing rooms, thay need to learn that if they want to be part of female society then they have to accept their limitations and realise that there are female experiences and spaces where , as biological males, they are not welcome. They have to play by OUR rules and certainly not be telling women what to accept.

[Milliepede]

@ Pacifist
It's because most transgendered people are men and men are used to telling women what to do and what to think or we get beaten. Can you ever imagine them pulling this shit with a bunch of men? Course not, they would get a good kicking that's why. That's why transmen are quiet in comparison, they know that it would be unsafe for them to behave towards men as transwomen behave towards women.

[shins]

I think of the gay men I know and try to imagine their reaction to a Riley-type attempt to make them sleep with women

[Mrsfrumble]

So what's the deal with gay men and FTTs? I've never heard about a male equivalent of the cotton ceiling thing. Is it because trans men tend to be attracted to women? Or if they want to have sex with men, are gay men generally up for it? Or do trans men face the same rejection and just not complain about it?

Sorry if this is addressed in the article. Buzzfeed always makes me feel like my brain cells are dying, so I have yet to summon the will to read it.

[Oswin]

Oh I am so fucking shit of this bullshit. Fucking stupid pricks. .

Fuck lesbians. No one cares what you think as long as you shag a man who feels like a woman.

Idiots. How can they not see what they are saying.

[TheCountessofFitzdotterel]

Sad how homophobia is so accepted among a particular sector of the young these days.
They dress it up in all kinds of wordy justification but ultimately it is still homophobia.
Kudos to those who see it for what it is. The comments are heartening and it's great to see they come from all ages, millennials included.

[QueenLaBeefah]

The author could have used far fewer words and just written that they are a huge fan of conversion therapy.

[VestalVirgin]

"Transmisogyny" is the new word for "misandry", is it? Not going to fool me. Same old shit, different spelling.

"Or do trans men face the same rejection and just not complain about it?"

Likely that.
While many FtT are lesbians, not all of them are. As evidenced by couples that consist of an MtT and an FtT.
I'd assume that many FtT would be very happy indeed with a feminine gay man who doesn't threaten their masculinity but does have all the physical traits they desire.

It's just that gay men aren't into women, and FtT still have enough female socialisation to respect that. Or simply not enough upper body strength to think it a good idea to tell a gay man that he should go die in a fire.

[Mrsfrumble]

It's just that gay men aren't into women, and FtT still have enough female socialisation to respect that. Or simply not enough upper body strength to think it a good idea to tell a gay man that he should go die in a fire.

I suspect you might be right; maybe trans men don't have the sense of entitlement that comes from being originally socialised as a male.

Okay, I've read the article and some of the comments. I had to stop and scrape my jaw off the floor at the comment that suggested a lesbian wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a "real" and a surgically created vagina (if only they'd open their minds enough to try!) I find that very hard to believe.

[Datun]

I had to stop and scrape my jaw off the floor at the comment that suggested a lesbian wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a "real" and a surgically created vagina (if only they'd open their minds enough to try!)

What they utterly fail to understand is that creating a vagina, for them, is purely so something can be put into it. Let's face it, they're not creating it in order to bear life or menstuate.

They can't understand why a lesbian doesn't have the same attitude. Lesbians are attracted to female genitalia, yes but it's more the whole woman. The way women smell, the things they have in common, as women. The same lived experience. The same female problems. The same socialisation.

And, surely they are even appropriating their own kind, in that the ones who have a vagina, will probably only be interested in men.

They are using those trans-women as justification for forcing lesbians into sleeping with those who don't have surgery.

And in terms of transmen. I think a lot of them are lesbians. But the story of that recently detransitioned transman struck a bell. She said she wanted to escape her gender because of all the sexism coming her way. The reason, I think, why so many teens are doing the same.

But when she transitioned to male and therefore hung around with more men, the gloves came off and the sexism, although not directed towards her, was even worse. Her disillusionment was palpable. The very last thing she wanted to do was try and force herself on them in the way tranwomen do.

[Milliepede]

Let's remind ourselves of a couple of transwomen facts. The majority of transgendered people are Mtf. LESS THAN 30% of these go on to have bottom surgery. Most transwomen are white men who transition later in life and seem to work in STEM industries (l'll see if I can dig out the citation).
It's the poor souls who go ahead and get themselves surgically castrated, have their penis inverted, requiring lifetime dilation of this artificial hole that I feel deeply sorry for. They are clearly mentally ill.

[CaoNiMa]

It's precisely because of things like this that I have "reclaimed" the word lesbian to describe myself. I used to pussyfoot (if you will excuse the pun!) around the word, saying I was "queer" or "identified" as a lesbian. Now I say it like it is. "I'm a lesbian". I'm afraid the term is going to disappear into the PoMo morasse.

[SayNoToCarrots]

I find this whole attack on lesbians bizarre. I don't understand how people are ignoring the fact that people with penises are singling out women! I haven't seen any of these articles / youtube videos demanding that men submit to the cock.

PS Cao, I like your nn.

[VestalVirgin]

I had to stop and scrape my jaw off the floor at the comment that suggested a lesbian wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a "real" and a surgically created vagina (if only they'd open their minds enough to try!)

The only vagina I have any experience with is my own, and I am still 99% sure I could tell the difference.

Perhaps they mean "vulva". I suppose surgery could construe a vulva that, at first sight, looks nothing out of the ordinary - one with no visible inner labia, of course. That might be possible. It is all normal skin, after all, and I suppose they shave off the pubic hair anyway, so the lack of that wouldn't give it away.

But the vagina? Nope, nope, nope. A lesbian would know at first touch, and I am pretty sure any woman who isn't too prudish to wash her private parts would notice something off.

They also claim gynecologists wouldn't notice. Yeah, right. Perhaps male gynecologists who willfully ignore everything that makes a vagina different from a "front hole". But unlikely.

[Boofeckinghoo]

That article is utter, utter bollocks. What the actual fuck is going on with the way some people think? They seem so monumentally unaware of what they are actually saying. They need to give their heads a wobble, or get them out from up the TA arses.
I have two DD and am utterly despairing of what they might have to deal with as they get older. God forbid they should have preferences about who they sleep with, FFS.

[joystir59]

Milliepede Ditto

[almondpudding]

There was also this article, along similar lines:

www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2016/12/20/young_queer_women_don_t_like_lesbian_as_a_name_here_s_why.html