Lesbian's and the Trans debate

As I recall, no one was accusing S&Mdykes etc of not being lesbians, but of not being the 'right' sort of lesbians. Ditto the straight girls on exploratory missions and oggling the natives at the local lesbian hot-spot, they were only ever claiming to be a (bit) queer, not claiming to be actual lesbians, just a bit possibly bi at weekends (or until they had to settle down) kind of thing.

As regards transwomen hanging out with lesbians back then okay, a few did, in my experience, but very few dykes would have considered them as possible partners, and most of the dykes I knew were totally definite about the existence of a penis being a total no-go area, however 'pretty' the presentation. And it was okay and understood to say that pretty clearly. So, a slight annoyance at best, from the various hangers-on and tourists, no invasion or demands. And the whole lesbian sex-wars thing etc, it was only ever an argument amongst ourselves (which was allowed) I'm sure that if push came to shove we'd have defended fellow dykes, even if we very strongly disapproved of their sexual antics or dress-sense, or whatever. Even tories (although that last one was possibly the most taxing!). Very different from the current invasion and take over bid by the TRAs.............

Such a lot of derailing...

Yeah, @Beyone, you're here to be discussed and protected. Stop offering inconvenient opinions.

Such a lot of derailing after some very powerful and moving early posts.
I have no reason to disbelieve young lesbians testimony about the take over of all women lesbian spaces by transactivists. This is always worth posting again:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3146166-Transactivism-and-the-lesbian-community

Haidees has a point - you haven't answered, just talked around the houses,so to speak. I'd like to know the answer too.*

Why be disingenuous enough to ask, you, as a straight women, with your heteronormative privilege, obviously know what it is to be a lesbians, so why not just tell her.

I'm sure she'll appreciate the help.

Sorry, but my days of being straight womens lesbian encyclopedia are over. I gave that up in my 30s.

Haidees has a point - you haven't answered, just talked around the houses,so to speak. * I'd like to know the answer too.

Words mean something. Lesbian means something. It's not a word that can be used to mean anything the speaker wants.

Since the Lesbains Sex Wars (Google but it's not as exciting as it sounds), there has been a feeling in the LGBT community that, while words have specific means, human sexuality is a strange thing that doesn need very specific definitions.

For example, during the AIDS crisis Men Who Have Sex With Men were a distinct category. They weren't called 'gay' or 'bisexual' because they weren't, they just had sex with men and then went home to their wives and children.

I know a gay man, who finishes work at around 4am and gets a taxi home every night. At the end of the jounrny he offers to pay in cash or in kind. The taxi drivers are, presumably, as heterosexually self defined at the rest of the population but he claims to not hand over cash more than a couple of times a week.

You talk about the erasure of lesbians so Im trying to clarify if you know what a lesbian is, or if you were a Stonewall type lesbian.

That looks a lot like asking someone to justify their sexuality.

A few years ago I was in a meeting with the Chair of an LGBT staff group at one of the Russell Group universities. She was very out and proud about the fact she held that position and was straight. She saw herself very much as an ally. Maybe other people did too.

But every time she spoke about how she understood the LGBT experience and would make decisions based on what she thought was best I would open my mouth to say “what the fuck do you know, you don’t speak for me” and out would come the words “well, that’s certainly an interesting perspective”. I really wish I’d said what was in my head.

If you want to be an ally, be an ally. Don’t talk over us, don’t tell us what we think or how we feel. Don’t behave as if you are entitled to our spaces, don’t behave as if you are entitled to our bodies and don’t behave as if you are entitled to an opinion on our lives. Or that we have a common experience or that you understand empathically what we have been through. You don’t.

Het woman here who didn't rtft.

Lesbian women are the biggest threat to Patriarchy because they reject dick. Dick rejection is the biggest affront to males on a personal and political level because the most meaningful male quest is for dick validation and dick acceptance.

In other words, Patriarchy exists to maintain and expand the realm of dick.

Lesbian rejection of dick turns Patriarchy on its head. How come lesbians don't evaporate or melt or something without penetration by dick?

Because women don't actually NEED dick.

This truth is terrifying for men.

Therefore lesbians are the first in the firing line when Patriarchy fights back to quash any gains of women.

Heterosexual women need to stick up for, defend, back up and thank Goddess for lesbians. They are always on the vanguard.

I feel nothing but gratitude for lesbians, as a heterosexual woman.

@Behold

I too was struck by the irony of trying to shut down a lesbian on a thread about lesbians erasure, while claiming to be saving lesbians being talked-over by trans women.

But hey, same as it ever was.

No one's telling lesbian how to lesbian 🤔 I mean what does straight mean when you use it?

Words mean something. Lesbian means something. It's not a word that can be used to mean anything the speaker wants.

@Haidees

You claim to be a lesbian but are not sure if a lesbian is someone same sex attracted?

How can you claim to be a lesbian if you dont know what one is?

Sorry, just a small digression but I want to revisit this comment because frankly, it’s really miffed me.

I thought my days of justifying my sexuality to straight women were long gone. Apparently not.

Using ‘claim’ in this context is a really pejorative framing. I can’t think of anything less likely to make me want to engage with you or your opinions. You could have used the word ‘identify’ which would dripped with less contempt but that, obviously, wasn’t your intention.

I have no problem with people disagreeing with me. I am all for a decent debate and will always try to listen to other people’s opinions. But if this entire debate is about the erasure of women and their experience I don’t expect the participants to ape behaviour they are asserting is offensive and wrong.

would the man on the Night Tube, seeing you with your partner, past, current or hypothetical future, drop a dollop of kebab on his foot and drunkenly ask if he can join you this evening?"

That's so much funnier than I'm going to be and I'd be happy to live with it but it includes the 'political lesbian' who is shagging women, not because she actually fancies them but to make a point and omits the lesbians stuck in a straight relationships, for social and financial reasons or, back in the day, so she could keep her children.

Even the downstairs lesbian disco at the London Lesbian and Gay Centre on a Saturday night had plenty of straight feminists in attendance.

That's why I preferred to dance with the boys, they were so much better at not telling lesbians how to be lesbians.

@ DJLippy

Here are the links you asked for, firstly The Tavistock:

gids.nhs.uk/about-us#how-long-is-the-wait-for-a-first-appointment

Here's an open letter from the parent:

transtenderlife.blogspot.ie/2017/11/the-day-id-had-enough-of-media-bullshit.html

Just as a curve ball, here's some information on hormonal treatment for boys of small stature and too tall girls:

ns.umich.edu/new/releases/1013-tall-girls-short-boys-using-hormone-therapy-to-shape-childrens-height-to-social-norms

That's just deflection. A lesbian is a female whose sexual orientation is exclusively to females. It's not up to anyone to subjectively redefine the word. There's het, bi and homosexual. That's it.

Has anyone noticed that there are a small number of posters who occasionally visit this board and often mis name @Datun as Datum?
There seems to be a consistency about the type of arguments that they use (and maybe something connected with cake baking?)
Just wondering what that's about as it's such an easy name to remember??

I agree with a lot of what florist says.

As I recall the definition of a lesbian was up for debate prior to this - plenty of women who used to say that butch / femme couples weren't really lesbians (also stone butches, BDSMers, probably others I can't think of right now - it wasn't just about how to be a lesbian but who really counted - anyone else remember "the lesbians will decide who is a lesbian"?) I only caught the very very end of that and it was toxic as fuck even as it tailed away. And the idea that gay men have ever had my back is frankly laughable.

I've come up with my own test for the definition of lesbian, referencing the well known legal "man on the Clapham omnibus" test: "would the man on the Night Tube, seeing you with your partner, past, current or hypothetical future, drop a dollop of kebab on his foot and drunkenly ask if he can join you this evening?"

I keep posting without care

'Men are heterosexual' I mean 'men who are attracted to women are heterosexual'

I meant Behold, excuse me. But men are attracted to women, and men are heterosexual so that is not a definition of lesbian.

I suspect that twitter user has probably been suspended for the website link in her profile as opposed to the word Dyke in her username. A quick search of twitter brings up thousands of users with the word dyke in their name.

I’m not necessarily saying that’s right btw, but I am a great believer in a fact and stating she’s been suspended because she’s got dyke in her username is a radical interpretation of whatever has happened. No one but twitter probably knows. Which is part of the problem, how we consume news and the speed of it. Because someone once said something on twitter, doesn’t make it true.

I can’t talk for every other lesbian, I can only give you my personal perspective which is that for me, a lesbian is someone who is attracted to women. Now, I know that as society gets more accepting of anything outside the ‘norm’ that may mean the definition of a woman broadens but I think narrowing the definition to exclusive attraction to the female sex doesn’t always work. Because as I said before, some of them are hairy men.

That’s my definition. YMMV. That’s ok too.

But the notion that lesbians are being erased as a result of the current situation isn’t strictly true. There have always been issues with lesbian erasure and lesbian spaces. And to be honest, there hasn’t really been such a thing as a solely lesbian space, ever. Even the downstairs lesbian disco at the London Lesbian and Gay Centre on a Saturday night had plenty of straight feminists in attendance.

I’ve lost count of the number of women in the LGBT sector who identify as queer because they’ve got a boyfriend but they once had a dream about Tilda Swinton or kissed a woman at university.

So sorry, but part of me feels that lesbians are being co-opted into a conversation that’s about them but not because of them. As it ever was so.

(I’ve been posting on Mumsnet under this username since 2015. I had two Mumsnet users as witnesses at my lesbian wedding. So in case anyone wants to suggest because I dissent that I am a man, let’s face it they don’t have the attention span for this kind of deep cover.)