Quote:
Originally Posted by Nat
Over the years I've run into many conversations with people off-site who have hit my radar as butch-ish, but who feel like certain "feminine" traits they possess or express somehow exclude them or distance them from butchness.
Among things I've specifically heard: haircuts, relationship to make-up, pronouns, sexual preferences, wearing women's clothes or undergarments, even prefered roles within a family or relationship, even jobs held.
This thread is intended as an opportunity for celebration of the femininity which can co-exist with being a butch. Because I think it's better to celebrate where there has perhaps been some tendency in the direction of shaming in our community and in the greater community.
Do you experience gender pressure from other butches or masculine people to amp up your masculinity or tone down your femininity in order to *qualify* as butch? Have you ever found yourself exerting gender pressure on self-identified butches? If you are not butch, have you ever found yourself pressuring butches to behave, dress, etc in more masculine ways than is natural?
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i've had butch friends to joke with me about not being butch. all in fun. nothing that i took serious. no pressure.
i'm butch, but i've always enjoyed my femme energy. in fact, i love it.
in the early stages of accepting that i am a lesbian, i had a problem with embracing being butch. my brain was so programmed to believe being butch was wrong, ... i had to clean out the clutter and let myself love me.
nat, great thread. i've enjoyed reading all the responses.