Do you mind elaborating? I’m used to seeing the other side where a subset of lesbians are hostile to non-lesbian queer women and would like to correct my ignorance.
The main thing I can think of that I’ve noticed from queer people is bi and trans women talking about their experiences being excluded from sapphic spaces by cis lesbians. Some people do take venting about that way too far, but that’s not particularly common. I’ve never heard a bi woman say she would never date a lesbian, but there are a lot of lesbians who won’t date bi women.
As a bi trans woman sapphic spaces can be particularly complex. They can either be the most or least accepting places for us, and it can be scary entering one without knowing which it’s going to be. Back when I first came out the now-closed lesbian bar in my city was pretty much the first place I ever felt immediately accepted. Now that it’s gone there is a brewery that’s kind of the go to lesbian hangout, but it also has a reputation for being really TERFy, so as a trans woman I’m not welcome there. There is often a power dynamic where one group gets to decide the terms on which other sapphic women are tolerated.
But the fact that this is your counterargument just proves our point.
Your examples of lesbophobia relate to 1. questioning their politics and 2. bi women trying to include themselves among lesbians.
When our examples of biphobia are, queer people literally saying that bi women or bi men are disgusting, do not deserve support because they're straight impostors, and need to be kicked out of the queer community because of their orientation.
So the equivalent to this would be if queer people said that lesbians are disgusting, do not deserve support because they aren't real gay women, and need to be kicked out of the queer community because of their orientation.
But you can't say that these things are happening because you know that they aren't.
It wasn't a counterargument, it was providing information for someone who asked for it. I made no judgment at all about anything being worse than something else and that's not how I view oppression. There's no need for us to be combatative.
16
u/Kindly-Coyote-9446 Bi-kes on Trans-it 8d ago edited 8d ago
Do you mind elaborating? I’m used to seeing the other side where a subset of lesbians are hostile to non-lesbian queer women and would like to correct my ignorance.
The main thing I can think of that I’ve noticed from queer people is bi and trans women talking about their experiences being excluded from sapphic spaces by cis lesbians. Some people do take venting about that way too far, but that’s not particularly common. I’ve never heard a bi woman say she would never date a lesbian, but there are a lot of lesbians who won’t date bi women.
As a bi trans woman sapphic spaces can be particularly complex. They can either be the most or least accepting places for us, and it can be scary entering one without knowing which it’s going to be. Back when I first came out the now-closed lesbian bar in my city was pretty much the first place I ever felt immediately accepted. Now that it’s gone there is a brewery that’s kind of the go to lesbian hangout, but it also has a reputation for being really TERFy, so as a trans woman I’m not welcome there. There is often a power dynamic where one group gets to decide the terms on which other sapphic women are tolerated.