Hi Kobi,
I understand your point of view and appreciate your post. I am also a fan of common courtesy....which is why you'll rarely hear me telling anyone else what they should do, say, be, or how they should conduct themselves.
Here's the thing for me....and, yes, it ties in to feminism and our history if you'll bear with me.
As a woman, I have been told all of my life how I should behave, what I should value, how I should think, how I should look, etc. Who I was, was not acceptable to the larger society. I should conform, and accept the values of others and....for lack of a better summary....be a good girl.
When I come into BFP, which is supposed to be OUR space, where we can be ourselves, and get policed by other members.....I have an issue.
If I want to be silly or frivilous or serious or intellectual or pissed off is up to me. It is not up to anyone else.
There is another thread (or two) devoted to the subject of the Butch Voices conference. I am not in there leaping and joking. I have stayed out, out of simple respect, for a few reasons.
- I'm not butch
- I've never attended Butch Voices
- I don't know any of the people involved
- I don't know any of the history involved
I may go read, but I probably won't comment. And I certainly won't go be silly in that thread.
However,
this thread started with a light-hearted tone. Yes, some serious conversations evolved, and I'm all for that. But I resent, like hell, being smacked for being light-hearted in a thread that was intended to be.
I also resent, like hell, being told how to behave
by anyone.
If I have violated the TOS, and a moderator points it out to me, then I will acknowledge, apologize and do my damndest not to do it again. I also follow the laws of the larger society. I don't steal. I don't hit people. I don't even lie on my tax return. Heck, I don't even roll through stop signs. I'm a "rulester", as an old-co-worker named me.
I was raised by a mother that we called, among other things "the rabid feminist." I was not allowed to own a Barbie doll because they were tools of the oppressors. I was not allowed to take Home Economics (even though I loved the subject) or Typing in school because they were the means used to subjugate women. Get the feel for it?
Once again, who I was was not acceptable.
I have
never been acceptable...not to the male-dominated conservative society that thought I should get married, have babies and blah blah blah (I'm almost 50....so those messages were alive and well).
I was not acceptable to the andro-lesbians of the 70s because of my inherent femininity.
Here's my personal feminism....and it took me a long damn time to come to....I am just fine. I am acceptable to me. Whether I have sex and relationships with men, or women, or no one at all....that's up to me. If I am intellectual and serious or goofy and frivilous....that's up to me. If I am aggressive, passive, assertive or indifferent....that's up to me.
I do not always (okay, almost never) spout the politically correct vernacular. I'm not a politically correct person. And that's up to me, too.
I am tired of people telling other people how to be....whether we do it in Butch Voices or other conferences, online, in our laws, or by declaring war on other countries.
Maybe I'm getting old and fed up (in fact, I'm sure I am)....but I am sick and tired of it. We do it all the time. We constantly message others.....don't think like that, don't talk like that, don't dress like that, don't use those words, use these words, be this way, call yourself this, don't vote like that, vote like this, believe what I believe, don't think for yourself........BLECH!
When we start behaving with each other the way the larger society has behaved towards us....by judging, censoring and shutting people down....then I'm going to do a big ass, polka-dot clad cannonball in the middle of it.
And that's up to me too. *end rant*
