8
Going forward, should all spaces designated as lesbian, woman-centered spaces be presumptively open to all women?
No.
Some spaces should always be lesbian only. There should be both welcoming to all wlw, and separate lesbian only spaces. Lesbians need to be a protected class with sanctuary spaces given lesbians continually face a horde of patriarchy, male usurpers, manipulators, exploiters, and abusers. We need to be protected also from the women that would give away their own, and our exclusive community that doesn't belong to them that they have no right to speak for. We need to be protected from those that would seek to force males upon us because some women in fact do do this to us. This should be self evident by witnessing the destruction of our community over the last decade.
So long as I'm here this space will remain female homosexual. I will cultivate, protect, and defend female homosexual exclusive space until the day I die.
Thank you.
First thing we could do is bin WDI and its belief in political lesbianism? Our sexual orientation is not a choice. It’s fucking trolling to come into a lesbian group when you believe such homophobic crap.
WDI_USA [OP]April 11, 2024
The Lesbian Bill of Rights explicitly does not take a position on the origin of sexuality and defines lesbians as "females sexually attracted exclusively to other females."
SortaKindaApril 11, 2024
RESOLVED, that as we do not yet, and may never, fully know the origin of sexual orientation, lesbians have the right to be protected as lesbians regardless of how their lesbianism arose – whether inborn, socially influenced, or chosen;
whether inborn, socially influenced, or chosen
So what do you mean by this, then?
WDI_USA [OP]April 11, 2024
Exactly what it says. Different people have different views on the origin of human sexuality, none of which have much scientific evidence behind them. The LBOR acknowledges this variation in beliefs and does not take a position on this question.
If you're trying to encompass the broadest spectrum of beliefs behind female same sex attraction, my issue is your using the label of lesbian for that definition. When lesbian is supposed to be held for women with the narrowest attraction, that is exclusively homosexual. Especially at a time when people are trying to forcibly water lesbian down to such a point to redefine it as, for example "non-men predominately attracted to non-men." And not just by random individuals, it's national institutions like Johns Hopkins, and international orgs like GLAAD who are supposed to be fighting for us, that we're up against!
[Deleted]April 12, 2024
Sexual orientation is not socially influenced or chosen. We are born this way and to say otherwise is completely homophobic. You're only doing lesbians more harm for perpetuating that bs.
OpalsApril 12, 2024
Exactly. It’s weasel words. If we can choose to be lesbians, we can be choose to be straight. Or it’s just another ‘genital preference’, etc.
Lesbianism is NOT A CHOICE!
Political lesbianism is defined as the following: “women who explicitly make a voluntary choice to forgo engaging with men romantically or sexually due to either feminist or personal reasons, but these women are not exclusively homosexual and thus are still attracted to men”.
Political lesbianism is bisexuality. It is not lesbianism. Promoting political lesbianism to “help” lesbian community is a bastardization of what a lesbian is.
[Deleted]April 11, 2024
OpalsApril 11, 2024
I’ve heard Sheila Jeffreys saying that being a lesbian is a choice. Don’t come in here gaslighting us - ESPECIALLY when you can’t even agree that our sexual orientation is not a choice.
I'm editing my comment so that it's more constructive, assuming you are coming here in good faith and genuinely want to know how lesbians feel about this. And you should, because I think by and large lesbians want to support feminist organizations but need to know that you're not going to throw us under the bus.
Everything is fine till we get here: "Instead, it will discuss how some lesbian spaces might be open to all women, not only lesbians, to the benefit of the social and political interests of lesbians specifically, and of all women generally."
In practice, you're right that lesbian spaces are never going to be able to not just be "open to all women" because there's no way to screen for only lesbians entering a space. But if we're going to talk about "lesbian spaces" that are inclusive of all women and bisexual women, don't call them lesbian spaces, because they're emphatically not. It's fine to have a general women's space or WLW space, but calling it a lesbian space is a misnomer and will contribute to the watering down of what it means to be lesbian.
Next paragraph is OK. Some lesbians are more extreme about this than I am, but I think the most reasonable take is that indeed some lesbians do discover they are gay at later points in their lives or after suffering through some pretty lackluster relationships with men that they felt or were compelled to be in. We all come from societies with varying levels of conservatism.
OK, then we get to how lesbians come to realize who they are. This whole section is pretty awful, so let me break down why:
" 1. Some women and girls were always drawn to women, and simply could never bear to submit to sex with any man."
The phrasing is very off here. "Submit" makes it come off like we're all revolutionaries who won't give in to The Man. It's superficially flattering (who doesn't want to be a trailblazer?) but reinforces the idea that we're lesbians because we're fighting the patriarchy. Nope. We're just only attracted to women. Men are romantically and sexually irrelevant to us. They are a neutral category. Like rocks. I personally would not want to be associated with this language either because it feels like an implicit side-eye at women who do "submit". But these women are straight or bisexual and can have loving relationships and consensual sex with men, and no, they're not worse for it. And "submit" makes it sound like we're even slightly attracted to men. We're not. It's not a possibility. There's no submission or even the concept of submission here.
"2. Some have become attracted to a particular woman so strongly that no other sexual possibilities hold any power."
This is just being monogamous. It's not lesbianism. This could be a bisexual woman who's fallen in love with a woman and wants to be with her forever. That's it.
"3. Some have lost their attraction to men, gradually or suddenly, for any number of reasons, including an understanding of patriarchy coupled with an acquired admiration for women; disappointment in their male partners; sexual violence by a man or men; or no apparent reason."
This is homophobic garbage that reinforces the idea that lesbians are just lesbians because they've been assaulted.
"So the landscape of lesbian community is complex."
Yes but not for the reasons you enumerated. We're complex because we all have different views on different topics, different backgrounds, etc. But we're all like this because we have no choice about being this way. The rest of this paragraph is OK — I do believe in a general WLW space and we can talk about how to make a good one. But again, this is not a lesbian space.
The rest of the doc is mostly OK. I dislike the term "lesbian credentials" because it implies we're all sitting here unfairly judging lesbianism in others, but really we're just trying to protect our identity from becoming meaningless. It's a strategy we do so that we can ID each other and know what the other person means. We don't hate bisexuals or women who aren't gold stars. We just want "lesbian" to mean "lesbian."
I think we should have 3 spaces: 1. exclusively lesbian by the definition of lesbian. No bisexuals or straights. 2. WLW spaces open to lesbians and bisexuals. No straights. 3. Women's spaces open to all women of any orientation. The most politically powerful will be no. 3. The most expedient for romantic purposes is no. 2. The best for lesbian-specific community is no. 1.
Hope this helps.
Well said.
Political lesbianism has no benefit to promoting an actual lesbian community, and bisexuals should respect the lesbian community for wanting a specific group that is open to ONLY lesbian women. A separate WLW group that does accept bisexuals should be a good compromise to them.
Lesbian spaces need to be 1000% protected and given strict boundaries to be adhered to from the jump, otherwise it’ll devolve back into the current mess we are in.
I am raising my eyebrows at the WDI now. I am glad I didn’t join yet or donate, because I am not seeing this article as in good faith.
Thanks for your detailed feedback. I do want to note that this was produced by the Lesbian Caucus of WDI USA.
You're welcome. How many people are in the Lesbian Caucus of WDI USA? How were they chosen/how did they join? I ask because the doc has much language in it that does not seem to represent mainstream lesbian views. The insinuation that lesbianism is due to sexual assault has been roundly denounced over the past decades by many, many lesbians from TRAs to radfem ones. That this language is in the doc makes me uneasy that the Lesbian Caucus does not actually represent lesbians well at all.
For what it’s worth I’ve observed that there’s a lot of variation in “mainstream” lesbian views. The mainstream on here is different from other sites and different from irl normie groups and different from irl radfem lesbian groups. For example, I have found that born this way has a much stronger hold online than in person, as well as in younger as opposed to older-leaning groups.
Anyway, just to say that I would have trouble even picturing what mainstream lesbian views are because the community is pretty fragmented and there seems to be a lot of variation between fragments!
I'll just respond here to your two comments.
I agree there's variation in mainstream lesbian views, but I do think there is a consensus that same-sex attraction is not a choice and that it's not caused by sexual assault. That's what I mean by mainstream. I do understand that older generations did not necessarily think of sexuality this way (though some surely did) and that there are women (probably what I would call bisexual) who choose to only have female partners and therefore ID as lesbian. Most of the women I meet IRL who call themselves lesbian are what I would actually call bisexual, because they clearly do have attraction to men and it's not forced on them (i.e., they willingly engage in heterosexual relationships). They tend to ID as lesbian more out of political leanings or generally being fed up with men.
Personally, I think it's a mistake to include these women in the definition of lesbian or accept them as such. This isn't out of malice, but because the term "lesbian" should (imo) denote only exclusive female-female sexual attraction. It should be a term with biological, not political, meaning. Because there are absolutely women for whom it is just a biological term — we did not choose this in any way. When "lesbian" becomes a political term, it implies that there is a correct way to a lesbian. This is similar to gender roles, where there is a correct way to be a woman if one believes in "woman" as a political entity rather than a biological one. It restricts us in similar ways, will always change to match different political leanings, and prevents us from having a truly supportive community which supports us regardless of how we choose to dress, which things we believe in, etc.
In any discussion of lesbian communities, I believe we need to center the biological reality of what lesbianism is. But I do believe we should have broader WLW communities to include those who I would more accurately term bisexuals or those for whom their sexuality is a choice. We should have communities with women with diverse ideas on sexuality, and we shouldn't police any woman's sexuality in terms of whom she loves or sleeps with. But these women just shouldn't be called lesbians.
I agree 200% that women who willingly engage in relationships with men should not be calling themselves lesbians. I have seen a LOT of that irl, particularly among young people who use it as one of a string of hyper specific nonsense adjectives.
Same, I see it mostly among three groups:
group 1 is most prevalent and obnoxious and would basically ruin any space they enter. group 2 I am ambivalent about but would want them included in a WLW community. group 3 needs support but aren't lesbians and will detract from any lesbian-specific group (and WLW group, I'd argue, unless they're absolutely sure they're attracted to women and aren't just thinking of us as better men).
so I do favor more exclusion regarding lesbian groups in order to protect lesbians and their interests, but we should have larger communities that focus on WLW needs. but I really would want to push back on having attraction to women be viewed as a political rather than biological phenomenon (and that includes bisexuality -- bisexuals don't deserve to have their orientation politicized either).
Went and read the posted article again and was struck by a part of the wording:
I do see your concern about parts of this piece reinforcing particular patriarchal views. At the same time, the phrasing "subjectively described" changes things, I think. It's clear that a lot of lesbians feel they were born this way. Yet I've also met many who make sense of and describe their own journey in very different ways.
I wonder sometimes whether miscommunication plays a role in these discussions. When a woman says she "became" a lesbian, that's read as "turned into" or "got turned into." But I do sometimes wonder if her "becoming" could just as easily be interpreted as acceptance. I think most of us have experiences with resisting our sexuality, and eventually coming to terms with it, and in most cases that coming to terms seems to be triggered by something. I can see that being seen as a becoming, in a grand metaphorical way. I'm rambling now haha. Just some thoughts.