To ask if anyone is actually against lgbt+ ?

[tictocstar]

If so why? Please people no attacking I am genuinely curious. I know American is more homophobic than UK, and I think (hopefully!) this thread will be empty, but anyone with any experiences or suchlike?

Also please don't accuse me of being homophobic.
(may sound ridic to epect to be accused, but when asking someone this,^ was the reply...)

Yes! I knew I couldn't be wrong, my hatfluid headmates are alive and well

Bringing this back (finally!) to the OP, the most homophobia I've personally encountered is from within such far-left 'social justice' groups - not that I'm saying they're the worst offenders by any stretch, but as someone who spends a lot of time in an academic environment it's the sort I personally come across most often. It's often justified as 'anti-racism', 'anti-sexism', 'transactivism', the idea that white gay men have 'white male privilege' and so on.

The NUS Women's Conference recently passed a motion preventing white gay men from 'acting like black women', somehow managing to stereotype both gay men and black women in the name of being progressive, thanks to this blatantly homophobic TIME article. Which in practice will have an absolutely negligible effect, but it does go to show how prevalent this kind of thinking is in academia.

Again, I'm not saying it's as widespread a problem as the outright 'gay sex is unnatural!' types, but it's still leading to the same sort of prejudice from a different angle - and it's something that non-academics might not be aware of, but which seems to be slowly growing in influence in wider society as well.

Lilka, could you give a specific example of how gender/sex might be relevant to sexual attraction in a bisexual person who has no objection to dating transgender people? I'm not being sarcastic, I genuinely don't get it (also sorry if it's explained in the video, I can't watch it right now).

YY intristic I was shocked at that NUS thing. Could they be anymore offensive.

I recently read an article in which pre-op trans men, some trans men, and cross dressers should be classed as being guilty of appropriating women.

The argument was that if we have such a thing as cultural appropriation, then anyone trying to wear, use or utilise something that is generally regarded as a feminine or woman's thing should be guilty of appropriation.

It's ridiculous.

Saying white gay men have privilege is homophobic! What rubbish. Of course you have.
The NUS motions though were crazy.

I liven n Virginia which is generally quite intolerant - but I am lucky to live in a very lgbt friendly area like a small Greenwich village... It's as common to see gay couples sharing an Icecream or holding hands outside the cinema here a straight couple. I love that my kids get to grow up knowing it is completely normal and ok. My son saw a guy yesterday in the store wearing high heels and pink Capri trousers, holding hands with his male partner... The kid said "look mummy! Look! They're buying my favourite cereal!" There is intolerance here, but I see it more from the older generations and among my conservative, religious friends.

It doesn't half sound like a privilege competition

Everyone has privilege in some shape or form, people need to shut up and accept it instead of screeching about it. What good really does 'accept your privilege' do? I'm a white bi woman, I have some privilege, okay off I pop.

No lucy, saying 'What is extremely unfairly denied you because of your sexuality could float back to you, if no one knew that you preferred the romantic and sexual company of men over women' is homophobic. Because of course, if gay men would just get back in the closet (maybe by not twerking and calling themselves strong black women, seeing as that's what all gay men are into) then they'd suddenly have equal rights and homophobia would stop existing

Otherkin are surely just the crumbs in the bottom of the crisp packet trying to make themselves sound special.

I'm wondering where all the "sapiosexual" girls were when I was a nerdy teenager coming top of the class. Most of them seemed to prefer rugby players and those who played guitars in bands - was I going wrong somewhere?

I am feeling some strange combination of exhausted and then deeply relieved reading this thread.

I consider myself gender fluid and pansexual.

I find the term bisexual problematic because by many definitions it is regarded as attraction to people of male and female gender, but I don't believe that there are only two genders and see it as a spectrum unrelated to someone's physical sex.

I consider myself gender fluid because I have days where I feel more male or female or somewhere in the middle. I feel uncomfortable referring to myself as a woman or a man.

It's generally easier to tell people outside of the queer community that I'm bisexual and a tomboy, as using more accurate terminology usually requires a load of explanation and justification!

Intrinsic Firstly, I think I should say that people define bi and pan differently, and the defintition I use is NOT in any way a universally accepted definition. I just happen to think of pansexuality as attraction irrelevent of any expression of gender identity or sex. But actually, someone who is Bisexual may also have that as their definition of bisexuality. I can't think of ever meeting a bisexual person who was only able to feel attraction to women-born-women and men-born-men, though I suspect that that person does exist, because there is no limit to human sexuality and who we are attracted to. Every combination possible has to exist for someone out there. I think the origin of the two terms is has roots in the old sex/gender debate - 2 sexes only or multiple expressions of gender identity? It's largely about self identification. How you think regarding sex and gender might influence which term you prefer. People often (but by no means always) strongly feel that either bi or pan describes them better. Though some bi and pan people may vehemently disagree and insist there is a very easily definable difference between the two. This will then in turn be vehemently disagreed with by other bi and pan people Better to ask a bi or pan person how interchangeable they see the two terms, and then wait to someone else to come along and disagree. I guess one argument will make more sense to you personally than the other! But using my own pesonal thinking/definition - Perhaps if someone said "as long as someone expresses their gender identity in a 'feminine' way, I am cool with any arrangement of genitals" - I would probably call that either bisexuality or lesbian depending, but not pansexuality. Then that person can tell me what they identify as, so I don't have to guess and then perhaps get it wrong. And now I almost guaruntee someone WILL come along to disagree with me because there isn't a consensus on this, and that's okay

I have days where I feel more male or female or somewhere in the middle.

If you could explain what you mean by this, or give an example, Fruu that would be really interesting. When I wake up I might feel grumpy or happy or energetic or lethargic, feel like dressing up or slobbing out, but I can't ever remember assigning a gender to my feelings.

I'd be really interested too Fruu. I've only heard that from the Tumblr generation and it's often seemed rooted in sexism (that when they are feeling strong and competent and able to park a car they're feeling 'male' and when they are feeling like skipping and baking cupcakes and giggling at makeup they are feeling 'female') but Tumblr is full of idiots.

My gender presentation has been very fluid and I'm not all that keen on the definition 'woman' but it's the one I'm kind of stuck with.

Thank you for your answer Lilka, I appreciate the long response! I'm afraid it still doesn't make much sense to me But I think I would define 'gender' differently to you, in that I think there are only two genders and that 'gender' relates to whether you experience body dysmorphia. So the vast majority of female-bodied people are women and male-bodied people are men, regardless of whether they like flower arranging or building computers, but there are also a very small minority of people who feel strongly that they were born in the wrong body, who have the opposite gender to their sex (again regardless of personality). So I suppose to me 'attraction to both genders' is pretty much the same thing as 'attraction to all genders'.

I too would be interested in how you would be define 'feeling more male or female or somewhere in the middle', because I don't understand what it would be like to 'feel like a man'. To a limited extent I can imagine what it might be like to feel (consistently) that my body is wrong and I should have a penis or shouldn't have breasts, but I don't think my personality reflects my gender. The fact that I'm currently reading a book on electronics doesn't mean I'm having a 'male day', for example, just that I'm a woman with traditionally more masculine interests.

Second paragraph was to Fruu, sorry.

It's a hard one to describe. Sometimes when I wake up, I just feel more male (occasionally to the point of dysphoria and feeling down that I'm not physically androgynous so that I could at least have a go at dressing up and passing), sometimes I feel more female, and sometimes I don't really care one way or the other. It's just there, like waking up and having a big craving for a coffee in the morning when you often have tea. Most of the time it doesn't affect how I present to others that much, although it feels to me as though I'm in drag if I dress in girly clothes on a rather male day or boyish clothes on a female day.

I'm generally inclined to think that attributing modes of dress, behaviours and interests to either male or female is mostly founded in sexism and find the fact that people are treated differently depending on their sex in a lot of situations deeply irritating. Maybe when I don't feel aligned with my sex it could just be a symptom of my annoyance about our society still being so sexist and expecting things of me that I'm not. shrugs

When you say you 'feel more male', do you mean you wish you were physically more male-looking? Because that I can relate to more.

sorry, just want to correct you, the q is actually questioning, not queer

I'm happy for people to sleep with who they want and dress how they want. What I do have a problem with is men who cut off (or don't) their penises and say "I'm a woman now, I think girlie thoughts". I do find the gender stereotyping of the transsexual community "I think this not that , I feel this not that therefore I am this gender not that gender" a load of sexist nonsense.
I wouldn't go around being horrible to any transsexuals I met but I do think they are misguided.

Yeah, cos that's how it works

In fact 2Rebecca you show a complete lack of understanding of what it's like to be trans. Probably because you aren't trans.

But yes - it's all about men saying they have their penis cut off and so now they're women. I could explain what it's really like but I suspect you are the kind of person with fixed views who wouldn't listen. Your comment saying it's "men cutting off their penises" says all I need to know about your views.

My understanding is that being transgender is more an issue of feeling like you have the wrong body than feeling stereotypically masculine/feminine. I would describe my interests as more stereotypically masculine, and most of my friends are male, but if I woke up tomorrow as a man it would feel so incomprehensibly wrong to me - I could well imagine having suicidal feelings over it, as indeed many transgender people do. I honestly think I would find it easier to get used to being suddenly disfigured than suddenly having a man's body - not because there's anything wrong with being a man, of course, but because it's not me. Even though I don't think sex makes any difference to personality

And I'm pretty sure no-one thinks 'oh, I'll just invert my penis and be a woman today' Even if someone was willing to go through invasive and risky surgery on a whim, the medical establishment wouldn't allow it.

X-posts. Presumably Orlando knows more about this than me!

I wouldn't define myself as genderfluid so much as genderblind (which I think is why I identify as pansexual). I am physically a woman, but I dont feel female, whatever that feeling is. I don't feel any gender, nor do I see anyone else as any gender. They're just people.