France - women only lesbian groups banned from Pride events

It's interesting how accusations are often admissions.

"You lot2 again. Sigh.

Depends who the audience is really.

The UK is a deeply and increasingly transphobic society. But within the LGBT+ community, support for trans inclusion is high and solid. And only increasing every time the mask slips and, for example, people laud the 'LGB Alliance' who have nothing to say about the hoops some lesbians have to jump through to be recognised as their children's legal parents, or to say about the plight of LGBT+ asylum seekers, or about the rise in hate crime directed at Gay and Lesbian people.

Most of us can see what you lot are doing when you claim to be acting in our interests. We can see that it is a lie and that you're trying to use us a trojan horse to attack trans people. We can see it because many of us have lived through the same bigoted playbook directed at us ourselves.

So in terms of gay and lesbian solidarity with our trans siblings, I would say it's going pretty well.

verifiable lesbians

That's a new one on me.

Let's all be 14.

blimey.

It is rather stark when you see it all laid out like that. The abject hatred of women who won't accept male people as lesbians. I used to think that it was just deep prejudice against people who disagreed. After this morning's efforts I do now believe there is some kind of disconnected thinking behind the posts. There seems something about the post that shows extreme fuckwittery.

It bears considering what kind of 'lesbian' treats other lesbians like this, doesn't it?

Well younger lesbians are even more supportive of trans people than older lesbians (who are also overwhelmingly supportive of trans people). And I use them as examples because I keep hearing from straight people what a lesbian really is, and those same straight people insist on either dismissing my experiences or claiming I'm not who I say I am (which is fine, by the way, any of us could be anyone).

So what we can do, rather than relying on anonymous internet posters is look at what prominent, verifiable lesbians, are saying.

If you want my experience though, I've already posted it. I've never slept with a trans woman, that I know of. I don't think I would be sexually compatible with someone with a penis. There are some trans women that I think are attractive women. In principle, I would not rule out a relationship with a trans woman if we were sexually compatible, emotionally compatible and I found her attractive.

But crucially, I don't think any of that has any particular relevance to whether trans women are women. Me finding someone attractive, or being willing to sleep with them, is not the definition of what makes a woman. If it were, then lots of women would find themselves excluded from the definition.

So all that has been spouted here - that if you accept that trans women are women, you then have to be willing to sleep with people with penises - is utter nonsense.

How many sides do people have tea?

Reminds me of quite a few old posters.

A crisp butty comes to mind, their favorite word is cranks.

Not that it matters who tea is, they all have the same playbook.

Although in one sense @TeaKlaxon's position is quite logical. If Pride has been twisted so far from its original conception that lesbians who don't accept penis are supposed to be Ashamed instead then men being more lesbian than actual lesbians is quite reasonable...

I won't elaborate on what I think about Tea.

Well, I know who I'd believe.

Because to me it seems these two posters are hiding behind women with male partners who call themselves "lesbians". How about two males who claim to be lesbians?

What was said, not in so many words? I was wondering if @TeaKlaxon had attempted an answer to my direct question to them and @suggestionsplease1 - is a couple made up of two MTF male people a "lesbian couple" if they say so?

I'm just about to go for a long visit to two women who have been my closest friends (and ex lovers, if it's relevant) for over forty years. We've all been extremely active in both feminist and lesbian politics for all of that time, living in lesbian housing co-ops, working in women only businesses, making our lives and giving our energy and resources as far as is humanly possible with and to women and not men. Every lesbian struggle - and a fair few gay ones, back in the day when we still foolishly believed that there would be reciprocity from men in the gay movement - we were there. Every Pride march, when Pride still meant something, was simultaneously a protest, a wild declaration of visibility and a great excuse for a party. This year my holiday is overshadowed by the fact that the protest, along with the movement, that we helped to create has now been twisted so far from its original spirit and purpose that we have to attend, not to participate, but to protest the very thing that used to validate us.

You can't be a Lesbian if you refuse to admit what one is. You can't be a Lesbian if you refuse to admit what a woman is.

Poor old Posie seems to have a bit of a track record in attracting Nazis by your account.

Grim. It's a joke to them isn't it.

Would you say the same to Jewish people tea? That they attract Nazis?