Men with boobs.

[Heart]

Originally Posted by Nat

Are we holding Cynthia Nixon up to a certain standard because

she's with a butch woman?
she's a star?
she was an actor in Sex in the City?
she's a woman?

I think Heart has a point that describing a masculine woman as a "short man with boobs" is unfeminist and offensive.

If part of straight privilege is never being asked to speak for everyone who is heterosexual, is it fair for us to expect her to speak for every butch and every person who has ever loved a butch? Do you read her as defining every butch when she describes her own partner that way?

How can we encourage her to do better next time? Should we all write her letters? Books, perhaps? An invitation to join the site?

I'm going to say this one last time and then I'm out cause I'm finally pissed (not at you Nat).

I am NOT NOT NOT holding CN up to any standard for any reason. I used her comments (which I do obviously have an opinion about) to make a point about US, about OUR community, about the continual erasure of female/masculine/butch identities. This thread bears that out and I am holding THIS COMMUNITY up to a standard.

I'm pissed because so many responders here lectured me about accepting individual identities, or claimed that there's nothing to address unless we know all about the personal nature of CN and CM's relationship, or called me hysterical, or demanded an apology because I used the word "dude," while its a-okay to call a butch a "short man with boobs."

My intent was continually derailed because basically no one wants to have this conversation. Would it have been SOOOOO hard to stop for a second and consider what I'm saying? That masculine women identified butches are not men, and do not need to be compared to men in order to be defined or understood. That's it. What is so freakin' hard to understand? What is the argument? Why is there such a knee-jerk reaction every damn time the words "woman" and "butch" are brought up in the same sentence? I don't even get where the combativeness comes from.

Contact Cynthia Nixon, but I have no idea what anyone's point to her will be. Certainly not the point I'm making, since that has been hopelessly obscured.