One of my former students was a self-ID'd stud. Her girlfriend was a femme. She had had previous girlfriends -- all straight. She was the first woman each had been with. Anyway, my student's mind was a little blown by the femme girlfriend. Femmes were different from straight girls, she told me (not knowing that she was talking to a femme. lol). Anyway, as she described it, the femme girlfriend was almost too confident. She knew what she wanted in and out of bed, and was, in general, a proud lesbian. They stayed together, however. I think the student just had to adjust to the ways of the new girlfriend.
Anyway, to this student -- before she met her femme girlfriend -- lesbians were studs. From her point of view, the women they fucked were NOT by definition lesbian. They were most often not. They were straight or possibly bisexual. They were girls who couldn't resist the charms of a stud lover.
I had another student, well before the other's time, who ID'd as bisexual She is feminine and at that time was a pimp. She turned her girlfriends out. She took care of them when they got arrested or pregnant, but she was a pimp. Her theory was that feminine women slept with other women because women know how to sexually please other women. In her mind, if you presented as feminine, you were probably not a lesbian. Studs were lesbians. Feminine women might be bisexual, as she was, but were more likely straight and just liked sex with women because men were inept by comparison.
I have no idea how common these attitudes are among young African American women in Richmond or anywhere else. But talk about femme invisibility.
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