#i was probably ruder than i needed to be but ya got me riled up

[hehimdykesrock]

Hi. I was wondering if you could elaborate a bit on your reasoning for encouraging the “Bi/Mspec Lesbian” label? I’m not a fan of the label but at least want to try to see where you’re coming from??

Bc as a lesbian who previously identified as bisexual, I honestly find the “Bi Lesbian” label invalidating to both identities. For context, I identified as Bi for quite a while bc I had been told that Lesbians don’t include nonbinary people or trans women. Which is not true!!!

Mspec sapphic people already have the terms Bi and Pan (and Queer, Sapphic, etc.)- Lesbian is the ONLY one that doesn’t include men. Adding it to the Bi label just caters to the fear of not being ‘gay enough’ that society drills into mspec sapphics. Bi women/enbys are still queer. A feminine gender preference can be described just as easily with the term Sapphic. The “Bi Lesbian” term just reinforces the harmful idea that Lesbians ‘jUsT hAvEn’T mEt ThE rIgHt GuY yEt’.

A personal anecdote: in the past few years, I have begun to actively avoid telling men I’m not close to that I’m a Lesbian. Because they frequently want to take it as a challenge. To “convert” me. The “mspec lesbian” idea actively puts Lesbians in danger by just repackaging conservative ideologies under the veil of being *progressive*. (Invalidating the validity of sapphic identities/relationships, and that ‘ALL women are attracted to men/can be converted’. I have also seen mspec lesbians say Lesbians are terfs as a justification for the new label- while the justifications themselves sound transphobic??? The jist of it usually is- ‘Lesbians are transphobic. The identity is defined by not being attracted to men- So why can they like trans women but can’t like binary trans men! Even though I totally believe that trans women are women and trans men are men!!!’)

Sorry this is long and repetitive. I wanted to try to put as much of my reasoning as I could. While I can empathize with why the bi lesbian label was created (bc I identified as Bi for a very long time + thus became heavily aware of biphobia within the LGBTQIA+ community. Even from Lesbians.)- it ultimately implies that Bisexuality isn’t considered “gay enough” and unintentionally perpetuates the idea that Lesbians can be converted into liking men.

My first thought is this sounds like some radfem Gold Star Lesbian bullshit lol. And yeah this is super long and repetitive, so I'm not gonna worry too much about the quality/conciseness of my response. Guess ill try to just take it peice by piece. I usually don't entertain shit like this but I'm bored today so let's try it.

Why do you find someone else having a different experince than you invalidating? Have you considered that this may be a personal insecurity more so than the responsibility of the people who's identities you're uncomfortable with?

The bisexual label has bever been exclusive of trans/nonbinary people, and the misconception that it is is itself transphobia in action. You say you changed your mind about that label after learning that it isn't exclusive of trans people, congratulations. That doesn't mean that everyone else using the bisexual label just hasn't come to that conclusion yet.

Lesbian has historically included bisexuals and etc. It's never been exclusive, but there have always been exclusive people in every queer community.

Do you think there is any true distinction between bisexual history and gay/lesbian history? Why can't we share words? Why are we all obsessed with being unique? Why does it matter so much if we overlap? Isn't that the point of community? To share and to be different and have overlap, to take joy in each other's experiences? Why are you so intent on defining exactly who can be what? Is the point of queerness not to acknowledge our inate and complex humanity, to say "I am unquauntifiable"? It is to me. But maybe that's philosophical, in which case my practical down-to-earth questions are: who gets to make the rules about who gets to be what, who is going to enforce these rules, and what tool of violence are you granting them to do so? Is it you? Is it the government? Is it an organized elected council of queer elders? Are the freaks who don't follow the rules exiled, shunned, imprisoned?

As for these other words we "already have" like sapphic, have you considered that we "already have" lesbian? Lesbian has historically been a word for women(etc) who are attracted to women(etc). Why did we need to make new words to separate each other? Why did we need sapphic when we already had lesbian? I don't feel that making and using new words is wrong and I support anyone who wants to use these labels, I'm just demonstrating that the logic behind that point of yours is identical when flipped. Lesbian has always been here for people like me, it was the only word we had for a long while, so who are you to rewrite its history?

Your personal experience of queerness is not universal. Words mean slightly different things to everyone, that's how languages and humans work. And that's a good thing. That's the point of all this!

The kind of people who harass and assault lesbians don't care about this shit. Are you seriously trying to blame a whole group of queers for ... queers being harassed and assaulted? The straight cis guys who are chasing and trying to "convert" lesbians already don't think of women and lesbians as people. They're not gonna sit there and debate the finer points of someone's identity before they decide if they want to assault them.

The bigots don't care about our labels. They don't even respect whether someone is actually queer or is just someone they perceive as queer. Outside online discourse like this, a faggot is a faggot is a faggot.

I do not have any patience for anyone who believes certain types of queers make the rest of us look bad. Like seriously why are we still doing this? Also you personally right now with this ask have just repackaged dangerous conservative ideologies under the veil of being *progressive*! This is some seriously puritan stuff you've said here! You say it yourself that you have been a victim of being sexually pursued against your will and that you take certain precautions in life to prevent that from happening, and then you turn right around and blame a whole demographic of people *with that exact experience* for bringing that experience onto themselves *and onto you*! What!

Literally nobody is saying all women have the ability to be attracted to men. I have literally never seen or said that apart from this very ask right here. I guess it could happen, someone could be saying that somewhere, but in that situation I'm gonna call them a misogynistic ass and consider them to not be speaking for all lesbians everywhere. And I don't think it's too much to ask that others use the same level of critical thinking skills in that situation.

And as for the people you have seen saying "all lesbians are terfs" those people are lesbophobic. Those are lesbophobes. I don't know what else you want me to say about that, I don't really see how some people being lesbophobic should impact whether or not a whole bunch of other people are morally correct (?) in using the word lesbian.

Ask rating:

4/10 for nonsense and contradiction

#beau answers #i was probably ruder than i needed to be but ya got me riled up #bi lesbian #bi lesboy #bisexaul #queer community #queer label #lesbian #queer discussions #also just realizing i totally glossed over their whole inclusion of the mspec lesbian label but i think its safe to say my feelings about b #bi lesbians carries over to my feelings about mspec lesbians #also also sorry i used the word “women(etc)” i am high and not thinking well #also also also realizing my own response is also a 4/10 for nonsense lmaooooo