I would just like to reiterate that while masculinity has always been a characteristic of butches, transmen, generqueer and others, it has not necessarily been the defining characteristic.
Making it the defining quality makes me wanna urp. I LIKE masculinity. I think it is HOT. Do not get me wrong. But if it is the defining quality of butches, for example, that makes everything else that butches are secondary or individual qualities, not as noteworthy somehow.
It encourages a hyper awareness and valorization of masculinity. That's not where I'd go if it were my ID, my umbrella term.
Isn't that already a kind of bone of contention among some members of the groups covered by the term? So to make it part of the umbrella term pretty much decides the issue -- in favor of the folks who foreground masculine gender presentation as part of their ID.
That to me is an issue that might also be generational. African American butches of MY generation often did their nails and wore earrings -- the dangly kind. I am serious. Lots of Black butches in my day had some interesting combinations of masculine and feminine going on in their gender presentation. Still do.
ANd seriously, as an older person, some of the least pleasing things I have witnessed among younger folks has been when they have worked a lot too hard on being masculine rather than being who they are in all their glory.
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