[CherylNYC]

Originally Posted by Parker

Yeah, that shit made me twitch too, so I am moving on .....

The internalized stuff is huge because we dont always see it - and even when it is pointed out to us, we still dont always see it .... sometimes, even just having it pointed out to us can make us angry because it goes against what we have been conditioned to believe for how ever long we've been around.

That internalized stuff comes from our conditioning that masculine and maleness is valued more than femininity and femaleness. From birth, girls are ingrained with this idea - we are treated differently than boys, we are given different toys, told what games to and not to play, etc. and we are shown that in most, if not all ways, boys are more valued.

Hell, when I was 16 years old, my parents got me an old 1972 Pontiac LaManns in banana yellow - and I loved the hell out of that car lol. A year and a half later, when my little brother turned 16, they took the car from me and gave it to him, telling me that "boys need cars" and that if I wanted to get a ride somewhere, I should ask a boy or find a boy with a car to date.

This wasnt in the 1950s - this was in the mid-late 1980s - but I do understand that a lot of what they said and felt came from their own upbringing in the 50s.

From an early age until I left home - and even after I left home and was in the Navy (and dont get me started on how the Navy treated/treats women with what jobs we can and cannot do!) - I was taught by my parents who I was supposed to be and that I would never be as good as a boy or man; that being male was the top of the pyramid. Hell, all the way through college and well into being in the Navy, all my mom wanted for me was to find a nice rich man to take care of me - a sugar daddy - because, apparently, I couldnt take care of myself.

I have to wonder if that's part of why I almost transitioned when I was in my early 20s. I never wanted to be a man, but so many people already thought I was a man and so many others were telling me I should transition that I thought that maybe I should just get it over with (I still, to this day, have people telling me I should transition). I started to hate the woman in me because, according to what I had learned so far, she was holding me back, keeping me from certain jobs, clothing, sports, etc.

It took me such a long time to realize it was society that was fucked up, not me.


[I]I wanted to add that I am not in any way trying to say that I dont like men or male id butches or that I think they are bad or somehow wrong - I am not trying to imply that I have had it worse off than anyone else - I dont play the oppression olympics .... we all face violence, we all feel invisible at one time or another, and we all can have feeling of being devalued. [/I]

I am just speaking about my experiences as a butch woman walking through this patriarchal world.

Exactly! I highlighted the part of your post that seems to never be spoken about or aknowledged in our community. It's still percieved to be soooo much cooler to be a man than it is to be a woman. Butches are sometimes pressured into transitioning, and it's all about misogyny. I've seen/heard trans and male IDed people from within and without the bf community exert that pressure, and it makes me sick. I never let it pass. I'm an old school lesbian feminist, and I will NEVER allow anyone to get away with telling a woman that she ought to become a man.

Parker, I'm so sorry that you've had to hear that, and that you continue to hear it. I also highlighted your disclaimer. I understand that you have good reason to feel that a disclaimer must be appended. I wish we could simply say, "We don't want to be men" without having to sooth the possibly outraged males who may perceive our matter-of-fact statements of female ID as an insult to themselves.

The phenomenon bears a strong resemblance to the responses I've read here on this site whenever men are criticized. Five of the first six responses to a linked article written by a trans guy about the incredibly offensive things men say to each other about women when they think they are amongst themselves essentially said, "You shouldn't criticize men because women are terrible." Yes, I know that's somewhat reductive, but that was the strong, clear message I took away from that exchange.

I was treated similarly to you within my family. My parents told my sister and I that we would have to get scholarships to college, but that they would find a way to pay for my brother's education. He would be responsible for supporting a family, after all. (Those conversations happened in the 1970's, and he has not, as yet, supported anyone at all.) We have a long way to go before we can eradicate the internalized misogyny that was and is inflicted on us.