Are butches really a dying breed?

[ruby_woo]

There were a ton of butches when I lived in San Francisco, but there seem to be only about 10 of them in Vancouver- and most of them are quite a bit older than me (I'm 29). Probably the whole dying-breed thing depends on geography, and maybe generation.

Luckily for me I like older butches. Ha!

[Mr Nice Guy]

To me there are more Butches then Femmes where I live. That's another reason why I'm still single.

[dancer611]

And where, pray tell, are you at?

[Kobi]

I dont think butches are a dying breed. I also dont believe there is a "small group of radical feminists trying to perpetuate this myth".

In my experience, it seems we have been blessed with a wider variety of options not only in sex, gender, and orientations but in the multitude of ways in which these are expressed.

This freedom, it seems, has changed the landscape into something not so easily identifiable and/or congruent with our own defintions and preferences.

It's neither good nor bad. It's just different from the traditionally held norms.

[Library_girl]

Originally Posted by starryeyes

I live in So Cal, where there are Butches O' Plenty, but what I notice is that the Butch-Femme dynamic is pretty scarce.

Starry.....butches o' plenty? Really? I guess I've been in a coma. All I see are imposters. Down in San Diego I really haven't seen very many butches. Up here in Palm Springs, there might be one or two. And I know one of them, for a fact, is completely psycho. LMAO Seriously, it's Anodrogyny Central. And like an L-Word Reunion or something too.

So would someone please send me the directions to the more butchly populated locations? I have a GPS.

[Mr Nice Guy]

I think that I'm blind to the Femmes in NH. I think they all look straight to me and I do attract straight women which boggles my mind. It's always been a problem since I was young. I'm still trying to figure it out. I even asked one time because I really wanted to know what I did to do that.

[Library_girl]

Originally Posted by Princess

G and Scorp-

We are out there, trust me. There is a whole thread about that issue called Femme invisibility. How would you know how to find us if we "pass" unless we have a stamp across our foreheads or something..

I have seriously considered such a stamp.

Maybe different colored ones for different outfits. Ooh! We could make bracelets or some other pretty accessory! I love accessories.

[Quintease]

Where I live I've heard bf people complain there are way more femmes than butches, forgetting that most of the ''femmes'' they're looking at aren't self-identified femmes at all, they are just lesbians who happen to look feminine.

[aishah]

i wonder if it's partly a generational thing. i feel like younger folks are less likely to know what butch or femme mean and less likely to identify that way...i have a lot of femme friends who are around the age of 30 but less that are around my own age or younger. i do know a lot of bois and studs in this age range but unfortunately none of them live near me, hehe. i agree that it could also have something to do with the fact that there's more of a range of options nowadays in terms of expressing one's gender. i also feel like social conceptions of what lesbians and queer women should look like have changed to the point that maybe people are uncomfortable expressing themselves unless they fit the androgynous and/or lipstick norms? maybe i'm talking out of my ass here, i'm just thinking out loud.

I hate it when zombies dress in butch clothing. Especially when they eat your face.

i died laughing and nearly spit coffee all over my keyboard! i needed that this morning (er...afternoon). best thing i've read all week

[aishah]

Originally Posted by Quintease

Where I live I've heard bf people complain there are way more femmes than butches, forgetting that most of the ''femmes'' they're looking at aren't self-identified femmes at all, they are just lesbians who happen to look feminine.

yes this!!! thank you for posting this.

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Quintease

Where I live I've heard bf people complain there are way more femmes than butches, forgetting that most of the ''femmes'' they're looking at aren't self-identified femmes at all, they are just lesbians who happen to look feminine.

Ok this is an example of where terminology and Kobi's lesbian oriented brain disconnect. Can you explain this to me in a way I might get what you are saying?

[Quintease]

Femme - is a gender ID

Lesbian - is a sexual orientation

Lesbians have traditionally all tried to look like each other in order to be visible or did bf, which was a sexual dynamic.

In places where homosexuality is becoming normalised, so are lesbians. So more lesbians are looking mainstream and more straight women are looking gay, ie: no more lesbian 'look'.

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Quintease

Femme - is a gender ID

Lesbian - is a sexual orientation

Lesbians have traditionally all tried to look like each other in order to be visible or did bf, which was a sexual dynamic.

In places where homosexuality is becoming normalised, so are lesbians. So more lesbians are looking mainstream and more straight women are looking gay, ie: no more lesbian 'look'.

Thank you. That I understood.

[Library_girl]

Originally Posted by Quintease

Femme - is a gender ID

Lesbian - is a sexual orientation

Lesbians have traditionally all tried to look like each other in order to be visible or did bf, which was a sexual dynamic.

In places where homosexuality is becoming normalised, so are lesbians. So more lesbians are looking mainstream and more straight women are looking gay, ie: no more lesbian 'look'.

Welllllll, not always.......sorry Quintease, I have to disagree with one part of what you said. (though I normally agree with so much of what you say and enjoy your posts! So forgive me )

"Lesbians have traditionally all tried to look like each other in order to be visible or did bf, which was a sexual dynamic"

Maybe I am being too picky. I don't know how long ago you mean by "traditionally", but if you go back to say the 1960's, 1950's, and before, (the pre-Stonewall years), all lesbians were butch or femme, that was that. Butch/femme wasn't a subset of LGBTQ, or a sexual dynamic. (LGBTQ didn't exist) Lesbian and b/f were one in the same. (Lee Lynch, my favorite author, has written wonderful books about this) So we weren't all trying to look the same back then. If you were a lesbian, you were either butch or femme, period.

OK, I'll shut up now. I'll stop being such a librarian about it.

[Quintease]

Originally Posted by Library_girl

Welllllll, not always.......sorry Quintease, I have to disagree with one part of what you said. (though I normally agree with so much of what you say and enjoy your posts! So forgive me )

"Lesbians have traditionally all tried to look like each other in order to be visible or did bf, which was a sexual dynamic"

Maybe I am being too picky. I don't know how long ago you mean by "traditionally", but if you go back to say the 1960's, 1950's, and before, (the pre-Stonewall years), all lesbians were butch or femme, that was that. Butch/femme wasn't a subset of LGBTQ, or a sexual dynamic. (LGBTQ didn't exist) Lesbian and b/f were one in the same. (Lee Lynch, my favorite author, has written wonderful books about this) So we weren't all trying to look the same back then. If you were a lesbian, you were either butch or femme, period.

OK, I'll shut up now. I'll stop being such a librarian about it.

Yes but did individual lesbians have a choice? Invariably no. Butches all looked butch and femmes all looked femme. It was a very heteronormative and rigid way of establishing identity, particularly if you wanted to get laid. I imagine many lesbians today would be stumped were they to be asked to pick a side (remembering that dress back then also corresponded to sexual activity far more than it does today).

[Parker]

Originally Posted by Kobi

I dont think butches are a dying breed. I also dont believe there is a "small group of radical feminists trying to perpetuate this myth".

In my experience, it seems we have been blessed with a wider variety of options not only in sex, gender, and orientations but in the multitude of ways in which these are expressed.

This freedom, it seems, has changed the landscape into something not so easily identifiable and/or congruent with our own defintions and preferences.

It's neither good nor bad. It's just different from the traditionally held norms.

Agreed. I also dont think this myth or belief or whatever is about radfems - I think it's about people having more freedom and more options in which to identify; as well as more freedom and options in which to present that identification. I think it's about being able to be gay without always having to "prove" it as someone else said by the way that one presents oneself. I think it's about being able to be a butch in many different ways, shapes, and forms.

Originally Posted by dancer611

So people are mentioning geographical areas a lot...where exactly are these mysterious "butchly populated areas" you speak of? haha

I have noticed a ton o' butches out here in Seattle. The couple next door to me appears (to me) to be a butch-femme couple and the couple who runs the dog rescue I work with is also a butch-femme couple who has a ton of butch and femme friends - and that's just 2 couples off of the top of my head.

[OS Butch]

It sure would make it easier on me if Femmes put a big old "F" on their forehead so I could spot them!

I grew up in the rainbow/Lambda era. I can spot a rainbow at 100 meters! Problem there is many see the rainbow differently from B-F dynamic. We need a logo of some sort....There seems to be one form many id's and genders. We need to start a trend Way back when I wore a ring with the 2 women symbols...

Of course, it isn't hard for Femmes to see that I am a Butch( of the OFOS variety and that is almost extinct!). But, if a Femme were wearing it, I would know she were Femme

[TimilDeeps]

No, we're not dying out.

What I think is happening, like others have already expressed, is that there has been a reordering of sorts. Not in a hierarchical sense but in a fluidity sense. There are far fewer of us butches who claim the ID of butch. The energy is still there, there's no mistaking that. The labels are changing in our community, and there are far more choices in labeling oneself than there were 10 or even 5 years ago.

With change comes restructure. With restructuring comes a new vocabulary, be that good, bad or indifferent.

[Toughy]

Princess..........the color (light pink) you use is very hard to read....just so you know....

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No butch is not a dying breed. If you live in the SF Bay Area you can join ButchFemme Socials yahoo group and our website (my sig line). We have been doing Socials (Yes a Social where you talk to each other without loud music) in SF and Oakland for about 12 years now and it's still going strong. Or if you are coming to town let me or Rope know the dates and we will have a little get together so you can meet folks.....butch, femme, lesbian, pansexual, queer....we are very inclusive.

I have seen a bunch of 'isms' and 'myths' in this thread. It ranges from radical lesbian feminists to impostor butch to old school is dying to traditionally lesbians all dress/look alike to butch/femme is a hetero-normative dynamic to using he when generally referencing a butch to back in the day you had to be butch or femme to......well you get the picture.

Perhaps there is a grain of truth to some of these, but most of them are very broad generalizations.

I know there are plenty of folks who ID as butch in the Bay Area, and there are plenty who run butch energy but don't claim it as an identity. I think folks see what they want to see. If you want to find butch folks (or femme folks), then find some target rich environments.....first thing is get out of the bar. If you live in a larger town or city there are plenty of places you might find butches....film festivals/art gallery opening that feature queer artists, the local queer/womens bookstore (though these are getting harder to find), readings at bookstores, eating in the local gay area, the grocery store in the gay area.....in Oakland some dykes started a wear purple or was it green on tuesday evenings at Whole Foods... GLBT night at the baseball/football games, go women's sports games at the local college or WNBA.....looking for butch (or femme) only in a bar/club is not really going to get you anywhere most of the time.

that's my nickel on the subject.......

[apretty]

Well, you have Dinah this weekend--You should probably see more than a few.

I have to agree with Starry, I think there's plenty of butches in San Diego--When we're out Q frequently spots them trying to give me the eye. (Whereas, I never look about, ever.)

Though, I must say your use of the word, 'imposters' is a curious choice.

Originally Posted by Library_girl

Starry.....butches o' plenty? Really? I guess I've been in a coma. All I see are imposters. Down in San Diego I really haven't seen very many butches. Up here in Palm Springs, there might be one or two. And I know one of them, for a fact, is completely psycho. LMAO Seriously, it's Anodrogyny Central. And like an L-Word Reunion or something too.

So would someone please send me the directions to the more butchly populated locations? I have a GPS.