Be an ally to lesbians: stop using LGBTQ+

[Shedbuilder]

I'm a lesbian and I mentally parted company with Stonewall and began opposing it and a lot of other LGB organisations when they added the T and then the Q and then all the other identity letters to the original LGB.

LGB people are united by same-sex attraction. TQ and whatever are linked by their insistence on identity — defining themselves by feelings or whatever. LGB people are united by their experience of homophobia. Transgenderism, and its attack on sex, is inherently homophobic. The two cannot and could never exist comfortably together. As soon as Stonewall added the T to their constituency, it began working against its core community.

Stonewall and other organisations have done this by force. Uncoupling the LGB from the TQ+ is one of the most important things anyone with a GC stance can do.

Please, let us work towards making the letters LGBTQ+ a badge of ignorance and shame, not something that employers should be plastering everywhere as proof of how progressive they are.

Yup

Anyway, I'm done here.

Happy to stand with Shed and any other lesbian who does not want to have her interests subsumed into what's become a men's rights movement by not using the catch-all term, LBGTIQ+

Others may differ. Fine.

Agreed OP that is why the LGB Alliance is such an important group for us all to support (whether straight or gay).

Totally with you. I was mystified when a married straight woman I know set up an lgbtq+ group.

But apparently she identifies as queer. As far as I can see, the TQ+ bit is just a way for people to claim made up victimhood.

Loads of her 'friends' snigger about her behind her back but won't tell her she's insulting every single person who's been persecuted for their sexuality to her face.

They're too keen on scoring the woke cookies to be honest.

SonEtLumiere

Is it generally permissible in the group for lesbians to say they don’t have sex with males?

Is that a serious question?

I can confirm that a lesbian saying she does not having sex with males would not be a controversial thing to say in the lesbian Facebook group.

Mumsnet cracks me up sometimes!

And what if she said she wouldn’t have sex with a trans woman? Would that be controversial?

@SonEtLumiere

I'm in a very active lesbian Facebook group with over 5,000 members, you'd think if this was a 'thing' then someone would have mentioned it but not once has it come up.

I can think of three possible reasons for that:
(a) your perception accurately represents what is happening
(b) you haven’t noticed on the group although it has been said.
(c) lesbians are afraid to say it on pain of being labeled transphobic with all the risks to your physical safety, employment etc.

Would you feel happy to ask the members if in their experience, it is a “thing”, assuming you would not be putting yourself in danger to do so.
Is it generally permissible in the group for lesbians to say they don’t have sex with males?

Or d) The admins of the group police any "wrongspeak" very quickly. I've been in a few groups like that and seen it happen to people for speaking their mind. Dissent is getting shut down right left and centre.

@SapphosRock you cannot possibly guarantee that 99% of lesbians feel that way. You really can't.

Why are you making things up?

I’m a straight woman and totally agree with you.

Kit19 well it would depend on the context. Some lesbians have shared their experiences of struggling with female partners transitioning to male and it's a safe space to discuss that.

Nobody has randomly declared they wouldn't sleep with a trans woman, perhaps because nobody is asking them to.

But coming back to the original point before it got derailed, how can one be in a group for LGB and not be accused of transphobia? And why is this? When we look at the letters and what they stand for, it actually makes sense for them to not be lumped together.
McDonald's isn't McDonald'sTQIA+ and they're not accused of transphobia. They do food.
NSPCC isn't NSPCCTQIA+ and they're not accused of transphobia. They do kids.
The RAC isn't RACTQIA+ and they're not being accused of transphobia. They do cars.
I could go on.
I'm confused because LGB are sexualities and T, Q and I are not. A is obviously debatable about whether asexual is a sexuality or the absence of one (is atheism a religion all over again).
We don't all have to be in one group, especially where logically the things in the group aren't obviously groupable.
Why isn't that okay?

What's going on with LGB Alliance today though - they were tweeting earlier that it's not homophobic to be against gay marriage? I mean, yes there will of course be some gay and lesbian people who don't want to get married, but to be in favour of denying same sex marriage to everyone, to same sex couples who do want to get married is surely homophobic?

I'm not writing this to goad, I'm am very gender critical, but Im not sure I understand what they are saying here? I don't know much about this group other than they constantly get slated as a 'hate group' by TRAs.

Agree, I'm also struggling with the rainbow. So many organisation have it on fb, insta behind their company name. It used to be such a positive sign, now it makes me sad.

From what I've heard, the full version (which is something like LGBTQIAP or LGBTQIIAAPP) includes asexuals, demisexuals, intersexuals, polysexuals, pansexuals, and allies.

See also
www.unomaha.edu/student-life/inclusion/gender-and-sexuality-resource-center/lgbtqia-resources/queer-trans-spectrum-definitions.php
www.amherst.edu/campuslife/our-community/queer-resource-center/terms-definitions
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/LGBTTQQIAAP

Some people have started just referring to the "alphabet community", although that might be considered derogatory?

@SapphosRock

Women, lesbians in particular are being bullied into either accepting ‘lady’ dick or being accused of being transphobic

You see this gets repeated over and over again on MN and it's just not true. Yes some dodgy TRA may have tweeted it once but I haven't met a single lesbian who has encountered this on or offline. I'm in a very active lesbian Facebook group with over 5,000 members, you'd think if this was a 'thing' then someone would have mentioned it but not once has it come up.

medium.com/@mirandayardley/girl-dick-the-cotton-ceiling-and-the-cultural-war-on-lesbians-and-women-c323b4789368

What's going on with LGB Alliance today though - they were tweeting earlier that it's not homophobic to be against gay marriage?

They clarified:
"That same-sex marriage tweet was very badly formulated! The introduction of same-sex marriage was a great breakthrough for gay people. But support for it wasn’t universal among LGB activists: many saw it as a sellout - joining the establishment. A minority still view it that way."

I suppose it could be viewed as one of those rare areas where people consider stripping rights from a group to be progressive. Married people have hundreds of rights that the rest do not enjoy. Children's rights advocates take a dim view of the ownership and trafficking of children by adults.
In the discussion in the US there were many Lesbians and Feminists who only supported legalizing same sex marriage reluctantly because marriage is regressive.
Now the men are making a family by buying babies.

Happy to.

Historically - think of Radyclyffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness, 'sexual inversion' - there has been a link between sexuality and gender, though. Which makes sense if you categorise sexuality in terms of 'gender' (though really, 'sex') of those someone is attracted to.

The Stonewall Riots and associated gay rights movements have historically included transvestites (as well as drag kings and queens) - both homosexual acts and cross-dressing were and could be persecuted under the law. (There's a meme going around saying "a black trans woman started the Stonewall Riots", which is inaccurate, and a nice bit of lesbian erasure which is one of those things that apparently 'never happens', but so many of those involved were both gay and transvestite and seem to have considered the two things linked.)

Current gender identity ideology says that 'trans' is an umbrella term which includes transvestites, so those historical figures are now being claimed as 'transgender' rather than 'gay'/'lesbian'/'drag king'/'drag queen'. Which is a clever bit of obsfucation because most people will assume that it means those people believed 21st-century gender ideology.

I'm not trying to play devil's advocate here, by the way - I agree with the sentiment you're expressing! But I think some of the other letters in the alphabet soup are much more tacked-on - being asexual comes with its own issues but is not a natural fit with a movement that deals with being discriminated against for what you do, versus what you don't do. Demisexuality is similarly working with a different way of categorising sexuality - levels of attraction rather than the sex of the people you tend to be attracted to - and is also not a thing that systemic discrimination exists around (and also most people don't have a clue what it is, anyway).

I would also suggest that gay men as a group have never really cared too much about lesbians, or women as a whole, while benefitting from their support on issues (the early years of the AIDS crisis, for example). I hate to sound terribly 1970s about it all but lesbian communes are starting to seem like a smart idea...

First:

they shouldn't think they speak for all lesbians

then:

Most of us are fine with it

Ah, so it's ok for you to speak for all lesbians. Oh no, my mistake:

I guarantee 99% of lesbians would not be on board with this

you only claim to speak for 99%.

Really Sapphos, you need to make up better shite.

Yes yes and yes

I work for the NHS and we used to get the rainbow lanyards just if we requested them as an ally whereas now if we request them we have to join the LGBTQ+ group to get them and I don't agree with that.

Don’t worry about the rainbow lanyards, Morph.

The sad truth is that for many of us now, rainbow lanyards look unfriendly. I’d be worried that an HCP in a rainbow lanyard would be unsympathetic if I wanted a smear test etc from someone of my own sex.

It’s a symbol of Stonewall & Pride, and Stonewall & Pride are all about the T. Pride Month last year was hell for me because my office is on the London march route, & seeing the rainbow flag stickers everywhere felt very uncomfortable.

What I personally would really appreciate, and you may well be doing it already, is campaigning for sex over gender. Writing to your MP, signing petitions etc.

Happy to do do that shedbuilder.

In fact, I already only use "LGB" in writing, and fully support the LGB Alliance.