Butch Femme Planet - Pressure to "prove" yourself?

Butch Femme Planet (http://www.butchfemmeplanet.com/forum/index.php)

- The Lesbian Zone (http://www.butchfemmeplanet.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=95)

- - Pressure to "prove" yourself? (http://www.butchfemmeplanet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2857)

Quote:

Originally Posted by introverted1 (Post 1189342)

I don't feel pressure to "prove" myself as it were, but being femme, I'm definitely not visible. Nobody would guess I'm a lesbian.

Perhaps you need to get some sort of rainbow thingy? Either a pin or some trinket to give a signal to the butches......just saying couldn't hurt

Thanks, Homoe...bought myself some rainbow bling yesterday. We shall see what happens!

As a femme who loves a little makeup and my long hair, I have often been called out for conforming to a patriarchal/Madison Avenue ideal of "beauty". How I present is occasionally not seen as me expressing my sense of self, and I have been dismissed as someone just going through a phase, a "pretendbian" (a great freaking term) or worse, looking for a third to join me and my husband.

I try and make jokes about me knowing the secret handshake or having left my membership card at home in my flannel shirt, but the truth is it does hurt having to prove myself to others. They don't know the battles with my family over my identity or my own struggle to live my truth and love myself. I tried to conform to what I thought a "lesbian" should look like and that didn't feel right for me, either.

So...I just try and be me. I still get men who don't believe I'm a lesbian (although I bet they go home and think about it later...) and others who feel I femme it up too much, but I can't spend my life worrying about what anyone else thinks, can I? t took me a long time to arrive at this point and I will own every bit of it with pride.

There is absolutely no pressure who I am. I'm not a walking billboard. I'm that very feminine woman, you can't tell. And why would I tell? If the need arises, and I feel comfortable, my wants and desires come out.

No need for men to wonder, there is never a moment to give them a chance. Even some of my friends don't know. There is a time and place for everything. It's my life and I'll expose my lifestyle in due time.

No peer pressure. And I bet I have friends who can vouch for me! 😉

I've found that de-centering men in my life has eliminated this worry. Men mostly want lesbians to "prove" they are gay for one of two reasons: 1) to get them to enact or at least evoke the male fantasy of lesbian sex for them to get off to or 2) by failing to "prove" their lesbianism, implicitly open the door to straight male advances.

Not sure this contributes anything to this thread or not lol. But here are the questions I would suggest asking yourself if you're confronted with this issue:
1. Why do I feel the need to prove anything to this person?
2. Do I feel safe right now? Is this person intentionally making me uncomfortable by asking invasive questions?