[Kobi]

Angie,

I appreciate you sharing this. I had asked repeatedly early on what was so threatening about lesbians, like me, having a space like this thread was meant to be. More and more pieces of the puzzle are starting to fit together.

I think I have distanced myself from the anger and the hurt caused by these words to the point where I can now address this in a respectful manner. My hope is that by doing so, a dialogue can develop to address some stuff. It is not to make your life difficult. Nor mine. Trust me, I would much rather be sailing the Atlantic today taking my chances on being lunch meat for the great white sharks than doing this. But. it's important. So here I am.

I apologize for the format here. It wouldnt let me multiquote, so I have to cut and paste.

And, let me add, to respond to some of your points, I have to deal with things like the patriarchy. I want to be clear I am not ranking on the transmen here. These are patriarchal society issues.

You said: I have said 100 times that a Lesbian zone on this website is redundant. To make a "zone within a zone" on a website where the core/essence/foundation is Lesbian is redundant and has bothered me since day one.

Perspective is everything. Your intent is clear. The fact that lesbians kept pushing for their own zone indicates that their experience wasnt matching your intent. The fact that it keeps cropping up is probably as annoying for you to hear as it is for me to have to speak to it.

Sometimes when things keep coming up over and over, we have to ask why. We have to put our own stuff aside, and look at something with a different set of eyes and ears. If I didnt have faith in you to be able and willing to do this, I wouldnt even bother writing this. But I do. And, I know if I can put my shit aside and begin to see racism in a different light, and grapple with trans issues that I am beginning to understand, I know this can be done as well.

You said: "My "begrudging" implementation of the "Lesbian" zone is not because I'm an agent of the Patriarchy and am wanting to deny the voices of Lesbians. It's because I was and am super fearful of creating a space that has the HUGE potential to become militant and separatist and unwelcoming to Transwomen, Transmen, and even BUTCHES based on my own experiences as an out Lesbian of 20 years." Is that Lesbian-phobic? Remember, I'm a Lesbian.

First off, if I was 30 years younger, the thought of being seen as a potentially dangerous, militant, separatist kind of thing would be invigorating and kind of sexy. At my stage of life, the biggest threat I pose is the loss of bladder control when laughing.

Seriously tho, I understand your fear. Once started, some things are difficult to control. But, I dont and I havent heard anyone else say anything like we must overcome, revolt, protest, and other such stuff energy depleting stuff. I am saying and hearing others say, we have issues. We want to be heard in a way that we feel heard, understood, appreciated for the unique people we are amongst other unique people. We want our issues given the same weight as others issues are. If we felt this was happening, I doubt it would keep coming up over and over.

You are not lesbian-phobic. But, we both know queer folk can be homophobic and women can be misogynistic and sexist. Belonging to the group doesnt always stop the dynamic from occuring.

From my perspective, what I see happening is what is called overcompensation. This is defined as a defense mechanism that conceals ones undesirable shortcomings by exaggerating desirable behaviors. It is understandable. In this case, one is representing and working to create a community of diverse peoples who have been and continue to oppressed. It is hard to find a balance and to serve everyone equally. I understand the fear and apprehension. I even understand the overcompensation.

The fact that people have been addressing or trying to address what is seen as an inequity of sorts, means they are experiencing a different reality. It doesnt make their reality any less real or any less pertinent. When we have stuff going on like was/is occuring at BV, when we have lesbians saying their ids are being hijacked, when we have lesbians saying they are feeling marginalized, like guests in their own community, and like there is a push to make them extinct.....that is or should be seen as very powerful stuff. And the fact that these feelings are not the result of what is going on out there but from what is going on within our own umbrella community, should be a HUGE red flag for every single member of this community. And it is not just butches. We have femmes saying they have issues as well.

And, there have been supportive allies here as well saying yeah, I see that. So on the reality check scale, I know what I am seeing and feeling is not a figment of my imagination. It is a reality.

To remain silent, is to be untrue to oneself. To speak up is to be self respecting, self advocating, and to be put under a microscope at the same time. It is an incredibly uncomfortable reality for me. And, if it wasnt important, I sure as heck wouldnt invite this drama, the stress it provokes, the anger it provokes and the pain it provokes into my life. It IS or should be important to this site, this community, and ALL the people who use it.

One of the things that triggers me about having separate Lesbian space on a Lesbian site is that it pushes so many of my personal buttons about identity fencing. It becomes easy to discount voices as "Patriarchy" even if those same voice share our history.

I think we can celebrate our shared Lesbian herstory and listen to the voices of those who do share, will share, and have shared that path, even if those voices are now deeper.

With all due respect Angie, we disagree on a very pertinent issue here. We have a mixed group of people here. We have males and we have females. To say that patriarchal issues are not present here would be untrue. We have women speaking to sexism, we have women speaking to male privilege, we have a transmen thread about male privilege, we have the BV stuff. It is wasn't here, there would be no reason for these topics or discussions to be had. We wouldn't ask POC to ignore racism nor would we ask transperson to ignore transphobia. So, why would we ask women to ignore the manifestations they see of sexism and misogyny and lesbians to ignore what looks like and feels like homophobia?

We don't want to sanitize the negative aspects of the women's movement and how we discriminated against groups of our own people. We don't want to sanitize the issues of how lesbians, like me, were oppressive to other groups in gay rights. We don't want to sanitize history. I hear you. I agree with you. Then, we shouldn't want to sanitize the patriarchy on the grounds of dna profiles either. That's not transphobia. That's applied logic.

From my perspective, we shouldn't be trying to sanitize the present day stuff either. It sucks the big one and its ugly. But, should that mean we don't step out of our comfort zones and deal with it head on? Does it mean we have to sweep it under the rug and hope it will go away? Does it have to mean people cant discuss things that impact them on very deep levels because it pushes our own buttons? I have more faith in us than to believe that needs to be the case.

You started this site for a reason. And you had a vision for how you wanted it to be. It's a good site. I wouldn't be here if I didn't think so. But, we cant stick our collective heads in the sand ad infinitum. It might work for a while, but somewhere another BV is going to be brewing, and it will come back to smack us in the face again. Life is funny that way.

Not dealing with stuff creates a lot more, slightly below the surface, resentment. That resentment makes it very hard to be open to listening to others when you (generic you) feel others aren't listening to you. Resentment breeds anger. Anger breeds hatred. Hatred makes our lives miserable.

I truly believe in the vision you have. It is a good vision that can benefit a great many people. There is stuff maybe you didn't think would come into play when you started it. But, like it or not, it found its way to your doorstep. And you don't have to do it alone. This is a community. And it is a community that is no stranger to oppression, to opposition, to controversy, to struggle, to muddling its way thru to the other side. And when we get there, we are wiser, stronger, more respectful of the struggles of one another, more peaceful and more harmonious.

We can make that happen, if we want to, if it is important to us, if we understand that it benefits all of us. Cuz if there is one thing our collective histories/herstories should have taught us, is when one of us hurts, we all feel the pain. When one of us gets cut, we all bleed. When one of us gets pushed around or pushed aside, it could happen to us as well.

The process of getting stuff in the open isnt likely to be pretty. But, it can be done respecfully I think. People do have to be able to say what they need to say and how it makes them feel. It might sting sometimes but others have said worse to us and about us in hatred and out of fear.

Being human, it isnt going to be a smooth and flawless undertaking. Mistakes will be made. Errors in judgement, a poor choice of words, and stuff is likely to happen. We dont need a 2x4 or a baseball bat to address it, for the most part. Paying closer attention and a heads up would be nice tho.

To me, even tho we will likely never know the entire story of what happened over at BV, we have seen what happened as a result of people feeling unheard. Is splintering the answer? Can something new and never tried before be created? Does it have to be one way or the other? I dont have the answers or an agenda for where something should go. What I do know is not talking about it isnt the answer.

The question that should be on the table is do we want to deal with it or do we want to lift the rug and get a broom again?