09-01-2011, 03:31 PM | #461 | |
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Hey Chazz.... I totally get what you are saying here... and really appreciate it!
One thing I just want to note ( and a small note at that), Mary Daly really didn't put a lot of emphasis on lesbianism, hers or others. That was rather immaterial to her. She cared about women... plain and simple. The connections she felt were the woman connections steeped in Background and Leaping Connections. "lesbian schmesbian" as she would say.... Quote:
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09-01-2011, 03:48 PM | #462 | |
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My education comment had more to do with how often I see that many don't even do cursory investigations of literature that is readily available to all of us and a means to better understand who we all are. And that said- how are the publishing possibilities going for you? You have to get your work out there!1 |
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09-01-2011, 03:52 PM | #463 |
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This thread keeps going round and round in not very productive ways. I will say again its intent was for lesbians who are females who partner with other females to have a place to discuss stuff related to our lives, experiences, concerns. That includes feminism and all it encompasses. In a mixed community I expected there would be some flack, some obstruction, and derailing. It is not comfortable to discuss womens issues these days. Funky defensive stuff is the natural result of trying to do so. My issue here is, as a female, lesbian who sleeps with other women, we should have a place to go and talk without it being continuous derailed, obstructed, or turned in various discussions of interest to other groups in the queer community. How many times have I said this now? How many more times do I have to? If I went into the trans threads and injected my lesbian way into every conversation, or the femme threads and interjected my butch point of view repeatedly, I would be handed my head. It would be rude, disrespectful, and just a tad annoying. But, it's ok to do it here? It is ok for everyone else to trot in here and shove their concept of what my reality is supposed to be in my face? Do you think you might learn something if you actually LISTENED to my reality before refuting it in favor of your own? This type of interference behavior is a defensive posture. Lesbians like me, wanting space, is very threatening to others. Has to be or we wouldn't keep ending up in the same freakin place everytime. The object of the behavior is to stop whatever is being discussed because it is too threatening. Dont take my word for it, look back your self. It is easier for us to get caught up in terminology and id's than it is to discuss the trials and tribulation of being a woman and a lesbian these days. It is an avoidance tactic. We cant discuss anything of importance as long as we are fighting about the definition of lesbian ad infinitum. This thread is not about trans issues but trans issues seem to become the prevailing focus. Check back. A little head of steam about woman focused stuff gets started and wham! someone changes it to a trans focus. It is a pattern. It repeats over and over. It seems it is safer for some to talk from what appears to be a heteronormative perspective than it is to talk from a woman focused, homosexual, womans space perspective. It's a throw back to the early days of feminism, you know when lesbians were a danger. It is easier, it seems, to change the focus to trans issues than it is to deal with misogyny in our community or the many ways in which women screw over other women. It is much either to deal with trans issues than it is to deal with pro women issues. These are the same tactics I saw used back in the 60's and 70's by women against other women. Women frightened to look at their lives. Women afraid of many things. It is sad to see the same tactics used decades later. Maybe we havent come such a long way baby. Always hated that commercial. And Heart, for the last time, my perception of your flip flopping has nothing to do with your self identity. It has to do with the topic being about the color blue and you injecting one on yellow. Head in the direction of yellow and you change it to orange. Go with orange and you change it to silver. In the beginning I gave you the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps you were trying to sort out things like the rest of us, or were trying to be diplomatic or were more comfortable straddling the fence. But, last night, when you did it, it made me think that you were making John Kerry look decisive. Hence the flip flop comment. For the last time, there is nothing there about who you sleep with or your definition of lesbian - except as it is of your own making. Aj, again, this is not a tread about trans anything. It is about pro woman. But being pro women is automatically equated with being anti trans. Same dynamics from decades ago when feminism was seen as anti men not pro women. It is very hard to talk about pro women without looking at the many ways women are oppressed by men. |
09-01-2011, 04:01 PM | #464 | |
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Kobi:
I was simply using cisgendered as an example of something we do in the community that, in fact, divert us from more useful ends. I was not trying to derail the thread into trans territory again. No purpose is served by that. I would've liked to have seen this thread be a thread about how we, as lesbians, can keep lesbian culture alive. Lesbian culture made me the woman I am today and I think that if we let it die, then we will have a poorer world for it! That is what I was hoping this thread would be about. I think that thread would be useful. I think that topic can be discussed without even ONCE having to divert into all of this other stuff that is not, in fact, about preserving lesbian culture so that if my granddaughter should happen to grow up and be a woman-loving-woman her generation won't have to feel like they are reinventing the wheel. That, to me, is a conversation worth having. I am, for the purposes of that conversation, willing to show up and do my part presuming that 'woman' is large enough to include a woman like me which is how I initially entered into this conversation. Cheers Aj Quote:
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09-01-2011, 05:06 PM | #465 | |||||||||
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I respect your wanting to have a place to discuss Lesbian pride and Lesbian culture. And when the topics have stuck to those things, I have stayed out of the thread. However, that has not been the only topic discussed here, and some things have been said that I consider VERY relevant to trans people and how they fit into the queer community. I will give you some specific examples to back up this claim: Chazz said: Quote:
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And, I have seen some nasty comments made and I decided to speak up about it. I was not responding as a transguy when I spoke up, I was speaking as a member of the human race. |
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09-01-2011, 06:00 PM | #466 |
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This is something I'd also like for you to consider, Kobi:
This conversation has not been solely about Lesbian pride or the politics of women. Many weavings have interlaced back to the (same) gender conversation we are having now and have had now for 10+years on these B/F sites. I want to address what you said about "If I took my Lesbian identity to a Trans thread...". That is not what is happening here. Transmen and Male-identified Butches have not infiltrated this conversation to start preaching their identity politics. From my perspective, people have mostly respectfully read along and interjected when something pertains to them...and this conversation has circled Trans issues almost constantly. The reason I bring this up is because (and I'll reiterate this), a "safe" zone for Lesbians on a site that has a large population of many different Queer identities does not mean that anyone who identifies as a Lesbian gets to have a private (but public) thread to tease apart Trans or any other identity while all of the Trans or any other identity are expected to sit back and watch with tape over their mouths. Especially given some of the dialog here that has attempted (whether intentionally or ignorantly) to paint Trans women as "not real". And I would offer that you would probably be pretty uncomfortable if Trans men made a thread entitled "Reclaiming Trans Pride" that went almost 500 posts deep where Trans folks wanted to talk about how Lesbians had victimized them or acted badly once at MWMF or had made them feel unsafe or how their gender construct was invalid for whatever reason. And don't get me wrong, I'm not at all saying that I don't want these conversations to happen. I think we need to talk about what it is that makes people so fearful of one another that we keep clinging to stereotypes or unilateral thinking that results in "Im a victim, You're the oppressor" or "In order for me to be safe/heard/visible/valid, someone else needs to be excluded from the conversation." (and theses aren't meant as absolutes, I'm thinking as I type) Perhaps I'm feeling raw from having visited another forum specifically and explicitly for Lesbians and seeing the entire front page of one of their forums with 50% of the threads devoted to Trans identities and various ways that they are wrong/unsafe/intrusive/etc. etc. etc. Because in my world, pride in our shared history means we aren't "foxhole bonding" over who we perceive to be a common enemy. This isn't to say we shouldn't discuss oppression, because that is certainly part of our history, but our history is not our oppression. Our history is also the things we have accomplished, the ways we have empowered and uplifted one another, and the celebration of each other as women.
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09-01-2011, 06:01 PM | #467 |
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I am a butch female woman kind of lesbian, dyke, female homosexual. I have also had (GASP) good sex with biomen. Sex is sex and pair bonding is pair bonding. Both are fluid things in my almost 60 years on the planet. Granted in the last 30 years my sexual and pair bonding has been exclusively with femmes.
Like Heart I sometimes really do believe it was a choice to have sex and pair bond with women (as adult females) and femmes. Had I chosen to pair bond with men I would be a women's basketball coach at the college or professional level. I chose differently and I am happy with my choice. I have made a huge difference in the world in a different way than as a women's basketball coach. Fuck the gold star toaster oven test.........please take your stuff and put it with Michelle Bachman and the rest of the fundamentalist monotheist patriarchal folks. I am proud to be a big ole fucking dyke.............lesbian as this thread defines it. I have no use for anyone who tells me I can not be a lesbian who has pride just because I liked sex and almost married a bioman once upon a time. Kobi.........this thread keeps going round and round because many of us here don't fit or agree with your definition of what lesbian and lesbian pride means. You can have your reality of lesbian and lesbian pride......guess what I get mine also and they are not the same at all in any way. I defended you once when you first came here. I hoped your learning curve would catch up.........in my mind it has not. I want and need lesbian space, women space. My version is inclusive and yours is exclusive..........yours is a tiny world that has no room for growth and inclusion of the next generation(s). It is no wonder the younger folks and many of us in your generation don't want shit to do with your version of lesbian pride and feminism. I like blue and yellow and find room for both in my identity as a lesbian. And just for the record...........your dismissing Heart is no different than any other masculine being dismissing a feminine being.......it's the patriarchy at work.
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09-01-2011, 06:22 PM | #468 |
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Aj, As always I have a great deal of respect for you and the risks you have taken here. We have discussed it before and my respect has not changed. Lesbians do have a herstory and it would be nice for that to be perserved, to be respected, to be perpetuated for our children, grandchildren, and all future generations. People are people. We have discussed ideal based approaches versus reality based approaches. In ideal realms we can deny, ignore, and/or dictate a utopia. In reality issues will arise. Changing hearts and minds is best done by example and by talking. A 2x4 upside the head accomplishes nothing but fueling more hatred. You have endured some harsh realities in life. I have endured some harsh realities. But, we are both fighting for the same things. I am proud to stand beside you and call you a sister. There will be issues. I dont think they are insurmountable. June, Again, what you are hearing is being filtered thru something which is not my intent. I can attempt to discuss it with you. It seems very clear to me that you have formed opinions and anything I say will be seen within those opinions. Thus, I dont feel heard. I feel I have to defend and I am tired of defending the right to be heard. Again, if Aj came in here and said I have an issue....you would be knocking heads. If a transman came in and said I have issues....you would be knocking heads. I come in as a woman and a lesbian and your behavior is to knock me. Thats a funky standard that seems to be a manifestation of internalized misogyny. Of course say that leaves me wide open to the usual and customary tirade. Been there, heard that, cutting and pasting will save time. Wont increase communication tho. Atomic, It is hard to answer you without expending a great deal of energy and time. The short version is women and lesbians, lesbians like me, have things to discuss that affect us as women and lesbians like me. We are perfectly capable of handing the process ourselves. It is our experience. Our experience includes issues related to women and lesbians being oppressed groups in a patriarchy. Much of the rationale you have listed in your post for your need to been involved here is almost word for word the same rational I have heard for decades. It is men need to be an integral part of defining the female experience. Not being a part is very threatening. There is just no nice way to say that. The rational that you are not speaking as a transman but as a human being denies that there are differences between the sexes. Heard that many times before too. When the oppression of women is eliminated, seeing everyone as human rather than a sex or gender is possible. In the current reality, it is just a rationalization or excuse to stop women from speaking of their reality. It is my reality. Not your interpretation of my reality. And I am quite capable of speaking to it. And, in closing, yesterday this thread was very female, woman oriented. Today it is once again trans oriented. Funny how that keeps happening. The divesity of sameness. |
09-01-2011, 06:45 PM | #469 | |
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09-01-2011, 06:46 PM | #470 | |
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09-01-2011, 07:10 PM | #471 |
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I'm gonna get some more popcorn for this! *runs out the courtroom*
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09-01-2011, 07:11 PM | #472 | |
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Heart Last edited by Heart; 09-01-2011 at 07:25 PM. |
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09-01-2011, 07:32 PM | #473 |
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Kobi...........damn this is getting old
you just dismissed another lesbian, only it's a lesbian of the butch persuasion....only this time it has a transphobic nature to it...........I rarely ever call transphobia............but it's abundantly clear to me now you are of that persuasion......... get a fucking grip dude.....I am sorry I ever defended you...........you obviously have not learned a damn thing in your time here........ free your mind.....
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09-01-2011, 07:36 PM | #474 |
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and just cuz I am in a piling mood........
funny you ignore me........what is it????.......... you can't fathom or respond to a butch who fucked men and liked it and claims lesbian???????????????
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09-01-2011, 07:43 PM | #475 | |
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I am in red:
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09-01-2011, 07:59 PM | #476 |
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I read my last post. I read the responses. Thank you all for so poignantly illustrating everything I said. I couldnt have asked for a more illuminating display of the truth. I will leave you now so you can continue to prove my observations as correct. Have a good evening |
09-01-2011, 08:14 PM | #477 | |
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09-01-2011, 08:59 PM | #478 | |
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oh goody............take your toys and go home...because no one wanted to play by your rules..... this crap is not even worthy of 'popcorn'.,.............
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09-01-2011, 09:01 PM | #479 |
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I feel like doing a "post-by"... This thread is getting more confusing...
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09-02-2011, 09:52 AM | #480 | |
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I'm not isolated, I have a strong lesbian/Feminist community online and off. I though I was clear about that in my last post???? As to grandiosity, well you're entitled to your opinions, but no, not really. Perhaps you're mistaking a sense of empowerment and incentive with grandiosity, or perhaps, you're administering a slap down. Either way, it's okay..... But to be clear about the empowerment and incentive.... I think it's time for woman IDed lesbians to get back to basics, to refocus our energies on ourselves, one another and the forces that continue to oppress women. No, that's not separatism, it's self-care. The fact that a statement like that sounds like separatism (albeit a misapprehended, extreme version of separatism) to some (you?), is the problem manifest. You have used the term "separatism" in my direction before. The inherent put-down down did not go unnoticed. Of more importance, the implied vilification of self-focusing lesbians did not go unnoticed, either. I'm good with the former, the latter not so much. To be clear Vol. 2..... I live in the world. I work, socialize, friend with, co-parent, professionally counsel, and LOVE some males. One of my best friends on the planet is a straight, biker dude.... I prefer some men's company to some women's company. So no, this is not about "separatism", wanting to sequester myself away from men, trans people, queers, or anyone.... It's about getting back to Lesbian Feminist basics - a certain kind of "politik". It's conversation like this one that have convinced me of the urgency of that.... My basics don't have to be yours (or, do they?). I'm not male-phobic, trans-phobic, mollusk-phobic or any other presumed insult or epithet anyone may subtly or overtly lob at me.... I'm lesbian/woman-centric. That may be heresy to admit these days, but there you have it. Lesbian Separatism, partially or wholly, is: "The separation of various sorts or modes from men [sexually, for instance] and from institutions, relationships, roles and activities that are male-defined, male-dominated, [male-value inculcated] and operating for the benefit of males and the maintenance of male privilege—this separation being initiated or maintained, at will, by women." [Oh no, willfull women ! ! ! !] - Marilyn Frye |
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