Labels Update

[sebastienne]

I've been talking to andustar_5 and the term "Lesbian".

Not so clearly defined as all that, actually. I was assuming, in my previous post, that it means "I identify as female and I am attracted to others who identify as female". But does it, necessarily? I'd be really interested to hear the perspectives of people for whom it means "I identify as female and I am attracted to people with breasts and vaginas" or even "I have breasts and a vagina and am attracted to others with breasts and a vagina". Certainly, a few comments in which I was unecessarily combative (for which I apologise) seem to have been drawn from this confusion.

There's some really interesting discussion of it here, with special reference to the way in which lesbian-identified people dating FtMs somewhat invalidates FtM maleness. Now I must admit that lesbian/FtM pairings, and the idea of FtM as a kind of hard butch, is not something that I have come across, although it seems a lot more common in the USA. I'd be really interested in any input from people with experience of this, as well.

But I've concluded - sometimes I'm attracted to people, and their actions and gestures and thoughts and expression. And while I may vaguely prefer the "feminine" to the "masculine" in some areas, this is a pretty gender-neutral area of my attraction.

And sometimes I'm attracted to breasts, and fleshy curves, and full lips and long hair. This tends to correlate with female-identification, but by no means always, and that's OK. I can love these things about you without forcing you to be something you're not!

All else being equal, though, I'll always go for the transgressor, the oppressed, the bottom half of the binary. Female not male. Alternative not mainstream. Exceptional not average. Genderfucking not gender-conforming. Etc. Which is really what my Lesbianism means to me. I am rejected by the Patriarchy/western society/capitalism/you name your lefty scourge, and am attracted to those who are similarly rejected.

Is it immensely wanky to end this with the question "what does your lesbianism mean to you?"? Actually, answer this whatever your orientation! Genitals? Gender? Is there unnecessary confusion because people use the same terms to mean different things?

Comments

[forgiveninasong.livejournal.com]

Before I identified as lesbian, I identified and was bisexual for a good 5 years. I have only really identified as "I am a woman and I am attracted to those who are women". for the last year or so, and am still sort of trying to actively identify as lesbian.

I still don't know what being a lesbian actually means to me. I don't think of my girlfriend as being OMGAGIRLWEAREHOMOSEXUAL! She's just the person that I am in love with, and, having been in heterosexual relationships before, I really don't think that the feelings invovled are any different.

Hmm, I am not particularlly good at explaining myself!

xxx

[the-local-echo.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't call myself a lesbian, but there's something about people who straddle the border, even if it's not a conscious thing at the time, for me or for them...

[potatofiend.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Well, I used to think I called myself a lesbian because, although I'm often very attracted to men on an 'above the waist' level, I couldn't contemplate going to bed with anyone with a penis. Penetrative sex is repulsive to me on a deep personal level. However, then I got confused by the fact that sushi_radical is perhaps the hottest thing I have ever seen: a girl with a penis. So, I don't know!

[deathbyshinies.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I want to join in this discussion, but am not especially comfortable doing it over the internets - I will have to make the SUPREME EFFORT of finding you and talking about it in person. Where are you living at the moment, again?

[janetmweiss.livejournal.com]

I don't call myself nor consider myself a lesbian but hopefully this applies anyway: I call myself bisexual even though I am not solely attracted to girly girls and manly man. I think you sort of outlined the reasons in your last post. I just don't like the words omnisexual (makes me think of steak for some omnivore-related reason) or pansexual (makes me think of orgies). But everyone I am close to knows that I am into girly boys, etc. so I don't think using "bisexual" as a shortcut-word is such a problem.

Then again, things might be different if I were in a serious relationship and presenting a gender-queer partner to complete strangers. As it is, I'm pretty private about my sex life so not too many casual aquaintances know anything at all about my tastes. Anybody close enough to me to hear me call myself "bisexual" has already heard me talking about my love for non-ends-of-gender-spectrum types.

[thieving-gypsy.livejournal.com]

I like girly-girls. (I don't mean horrible vapid Barbie clones, ugh.) Current big crush is all three Puppini Sisters (http://www.thepuppinisisters.com). Maybe that's less about liking girly-girls and more about my 1940s kink, I don't know. XD But nearly all my girlfriends have been the long-hair/high-heels type. THAT SAID, androgyny is incredibly hot, boys AND girls. My dad got verrry nervous at how extreme my Brian Molko crush was when I was a teenager. :D And Kate Moennig is just about the most beautiful thing in the world.

It's weird, I've never thought all that much about it. I never had a particularly angsty time coming to terms with being a great big homo. It's something that was always there for as long as I can remember. It never occurred to me when I was little that girls didn't usually fancy other girls, because it was ALWAYS THERE. So. No big angst. It GOT angsty later when I found out that sex with boys makes me very uncomfortable and kind of skincrawly but I seem to have a knack of choosing the vicious emotional rapists as girlfriends so I'm probably going to be alone for a VERY LONG TIME. XD But no real big drama about BEING gay, once my family knew and got used to it. They were sort of funny before they knew. Not consciously anti-gay or anything, just weird about it because they didn't know anybody who was and thought they had to behave differently around The Homos or something. Over that now. (I'M VERY GLAD.)

Genitals? Gender?

Genitals = lovely! Gender = not so! I need to stop going out with BITCHY BITCHES. There must be nice girls around somewhere. I'm just a psycho-magnet. But seriously, I just seem to be getting on better with girls as I get older. When I was a teenager most of my friends were boys, and my best-best friend of all time was a boy. Now most of them are girls.

I still don't exactly identify as "lesbian", though. I mean, I obviously AM, because I sleep with girls and not boys. I sort of feel like sexuality is this Big Important Thing I SHOULD think about more, but I just don't. It pops up every now and then if some little prat sees me holding hands with a girl in the street and bellows, "LESBIAN!!!" after me, but it's never an, "OMG WOE OPPRESSION!" thing, more like, "...I know! Who are you trying to tell?" and then it's over. I identify as a lot of other things before the list gets to lesbian. B, girl, artist, film geek, photographer, writer, shoe-whore, lesbian. Maybe. I think (I hope) there are more important things to me than the gender of the people I sleep with. Huh. I will think more on this!

</long rambly unhelpful comment>

[andustar.livejournal.com]

I have no underscore in my name :) Although I am considering being a serious LJ whore and paying for a rename token so I can remove the 5, now that 'andustar' is finally free. Heck yes there is confusion, but honestly I can't imagine any easy system that would work much better. Hopefully most people understand that one word sexual identities are only a starting point, rather than the whole truth about a person's taste. This might be wishful thinking though.

I know what attracts me to people, and gender comes into it, genitals do not, but it's also a few random quirks which sound particularly silly spoken aloud :) although androgyny is a good starting point.

[andustar.livejournal.com]

Hm, there was supposed to be a paragraph reak after that second sentence.

[anotherusedpage.livejournal.com]

I... mostly don't identify as a lesbian, despite never having had and never wanting to have full penetrative sex with a man, despite only finding men attractive from the waist up. I mostly use 'queer' and avoid the issue. I might use 'dyke' or 'big fat lesbian' in an ironic sort of a way. Occasionally if I'm trying to get rid of a bloke, (or telling stories about trying to get rid of blokes), I'll use 'but I'm a lesbian'.
So, I suppose I identify as queer first and foremost because I am emotionally and physically attracted to both men and women, and lesbian with reluctance, because I don't like cock. So I guess it's about genitals for me.
Also, I hasten to add, if I ended up in love / in a relationship with someone of either gender who happened to have a cock, I'd do my damndest to get over the squick, because I think that's all it is. *shrug* But the situation is unlikely to come up, as it were.

[potatofiend.livejournal.com]

This is mostly/exactly where I'm at, too.

[ex-leighwoos982.livejournal.com]

What do you define as male, what do you define as female?

I can't think of any worth-while definition for sexuality that does not resort to attraction/repulsion of or by genital type. If you can be in a loving relationship with someone that does not involve sexual intercourse, how can relationships be taken as a reliable indicator of sexuality?

[ex-leighwoos982.livejournal.com]

Additionally, do we only base our assumptions on the binary because there are only 2 types of genitals in our species and only one available to each gender?

If Hermaphrodites were not sugically manipulated and/or maginalised in our society, how might our opinions on sexual identity change?

[otterylexa.livejournal.com]

I don't identify as lesbian, I identify as bisexual, although I'm increasingly also identifying as a dyke. Even though I am attracted to some men, it's much less common than with women, and tends to happen later in the getting to know them process. Also, I seem to have acquired a penis squick which complicates matters somewhat.

I'm most attracted to butchy-women-but-with-long-hair. And men who look like them.