With my own eyes, I just saw a lesbian on twitter say she was being oppressed by asexual folks because their flag is everywhere, and it’s asexual people’s fault that lesbians are now ‘the last on the conveyor belt in the LGBT community’.
Like. Dude, if you need a scapegoat for your suffering, capitalism is right there. Institutionalized religion is also a great contender. Saying asexuals caused all your suffering because their flag is slightly older and therefore more recognisable than yours is like. my god, have a snickers.
No. No. If they want a scapegoat, turn to the TERFs. There was a perfectly good lesbian flag that was well known in the 90s, that nobody uses anymore because the TERFs took it over. It was known and used before the ace flag was a glimmer. You want to be pissed, get pissed at the part of your own community who is trying to set up walls. Take that shit back if you want it. Use it while holding signs of trans sisterhood. You gave your flag up and are looking for recognition for a new one. That’s why your flag isn’t well recognized yet. Signed a transgender man, former part of the lesbian community for ~14 years.
You want to be pissed, get pissed at the part of your own community who is trying to set up walls.
This is so important.
We need a tag or shorthand phrase for “that thing where the TERF/SWERF/radfem crowd invades lesbian communities, makes it seem like any attack on them is an attack on the lesbian community, drinks all the punch, poops on the floor and leaves the next generation growing up without symbols or a cohesive community”, because it’s fucking happening again.
This is the older lesbian flag, the one that got grabbed by radfems /
TERFs / SWERFs and that very few anti-radfem / anti-TERF lesbians ever
made a concerted effort to reclaim. The Labrys flag:
It was created in 1999, eleven years before the creation and popularization of the ace flag. That gets thoroughly ignored, because it’s not convenient to the radfem rhetoric of ‘lesbians are the most oppressed members of the community EVER’
(uhhh…. trans women of color would like a word? Trans people in
general? I’m not even going to get into m-spec people and every study so
far showing that our parameters re: everything from rates of sexual
violence to poverty are much worse than those of both straight and gay
people, because that’s not the topic of this post).
I want to be very clear on this. When a young lesbian who’s been brainwashed by radfems says that ‘lesbians are the last on the conveyor belt in the LGBT community’, what she means is ludicrous nonsense such as this:
all those ace pride flags? They should be lesbian pride flags instead, because under her beliefs, lesbians deserve absolute prioritization over other members of the community, on the basis of being ‘most oppressed’
the community being seen as a coalition of EQUALS IN MUTUAL SOLIDARITY isn’t
acceptable (at least not at more than shallow, declarative level),
because acknowledging equality of marginalized orientations and refusing
to build the community under a hierarchy is seen as ‘de-centering lesbians’
remember what radfems actually said, in opposition to ‘queer’ as a term? ‘Queer de-centers and erases lesbians / lumps lesbians in with bisexuals anddeluded men (hella transphobic code for trans women) and stops them short of naming their actual homosexuality.’ Changing the discourse to be solely about personal harm was a move of genius
attention being given to issues that affect ace/aro people / activism for ace/aro people
automatically takes away valuable time, valuable resources and valuable
effort, that should have been spent on lesbian issues instead – therefore, any sort of ace/aro-centric work and the presence of ace/aro people is harmful to lesbians.
hell, attention being given to issues that affect bi/pan people / activism
for bi/pan people automatically takes away valuable time, valuable
resources and valuable effort, that should have been spent on lesbian
issues instead – therefore, any sort of bi/pan-centric work and the
presence of bi/pan people (particularly ones that aren’t ‘SGA’) is harmful to lesbians
insert
the exact same thing about nonbinary / genderqueer people, about trans
people (though most of the Usual Suspects haven’t quite gotten to the
point of open and blatant transphobia), about intersex people (it’s my theory that this is at the base of that sudden and widespread campaign of ‘drop the I, intersex people are making their own community’, even
in the face of many intersex people who fought like hell for their
right to remain included and to keep the letter. Some, like @vergess, got rewarded for their effort by being called ‘pedophiles’ and being run off Tumblr)
And I could keep going! The spearhead of radfem infiltration within lesbian communities if two-fold – one, the rhetoric of ‘you are the most oppressed and any sort of attention being paid to these superfluous identities directly harms you’ and
two, the notion that radfems are the ultimate champions of lesbian
rights, the ones who will make certain that lesbians are always centered
and prioritized. That’s how you end up with large recruitment into
radfem ranks of young, inexperienced lesbians, who (naturally) feel
flattered, protected and prioritized. That’s how radfems can shield
themselves of criticism for their fuckery, by saying that any criticism
of radfem rhetoric is an direct attack on lesbians. That’s how you end
up with wankery such as ‘TERF is a slur used to demonize lesbians.’ It’s
my prediction that in several years’ time, the currently-in-use lesbian
flag (the lipstick one) will end up as much of a widespread symbol of
radfems as the older Labrys flag, in the exact same way that the other
flag was taken over.
What’s the solution? Widespread acknowledgement that no one is owed automatic centering solely on the basis of their identity and that the community wasn’t created to serve the needs of predominantly one or two groups. Thorough education on what ‘equality’ and ‘solidarity’ actually
mean in the context of the struggle against
cis-perisex-heteronormativity and actually implementing them in
practice, rather than keeping them on as empty buzzwords.
Acknowledgement that just because one has suffered under oppression, it
doesn’t mean that others haven’t as well and that acknowledging and fighting against the oppression others deal with doesn’t lessen or ignore one’s own.
That is such a lovely flag, though. Someone please shove a trans icon on top and reclaim it as an inclusionist lesbian symbol.
Like this?
YES, PERFECT, THANK YOU
This post was needed
This is the flag I was talking about before!
That flag is *so* cool!
I loooove the labrys flag, and would personally love to see it recognized & used more widely again. The trans lebsian flag above looks hella cool, but I was also thinking: not every group has a recognizable ‘symbol’ that can be added to the labrys like that (genderfluid, demi, butch or femme, etc etc), so what about combining flags/colors? (I’m using the trans flag for this example, as above, but any flag a lesbian also identifies with would work, imo)
Like this:
or this:
Or if you want to maintain the purple on the labrys flag, this:
Or this:
Thoughts? 😀
The first and last ones are my faves of these four! I’d love to use them to make some positivity graphics
Thank you! And please do use them, or feel free to run with the idea & make other flags with this same concept, as this was just meant to be a jumping-off point 🙂
(For myself personally, I’d love to see the labrys + ace, nonbinary, genderqueer, etc. flags, for example)
Me: Hey, cool, this historical figure seems to have swung both ways
Homophobic Historian: THEY WERE STRAIGHT OMFG STOP READING THINGS INTO IT
Gay Historian: SO WHAT IF THEY WERE MARRIED SIX TIMES THEY WERE GAY GAY GAY
Me: But bisexuality exists and isn’t that the most sensible thing to assume if we have actual evidence of them having had both male and female lovers?
Homophobic historian: THEY WERE CONFUSED AND IT WAS JUST A PHASE
Gay Historian: LA LA LA LA I CAN’T HEAR YOU GAY GAY GAY GAY GAY
Me: But Anaïs just wrote about how she wanted to faceplant in this woman’s boobs, and Byron jumped from this chick’s bed into this boy’s pants and then this Mercury guy even self-identified as bisexual–
Me: Hey, cool, this historical figure seems to have swung both ways
Homophobic Historian: THEY WERE STRAIGHT OMFG STOP READING THINGS INTO IT
Gay Historian: SO WHAT IF THEY WERE MARRIED SIX TIMES THEY WERE GAY GAY GAY
Me: But bisexuality exists and isn’t that the most sensible thing to assume if we have actual evidence of them having had both male and female lovers?
Homophobic historian: THEY WERE CONFUSED AND IT WAS JUST A PHASE
Gay Historian: LA LA LA LA I CAN’T HEAR YOU GAY GAY GAY GAY GAY
Me: But Anaïs just wrote about how she wanted to faceplant in this woman’s boobs, and Byron jumped from this chick’s bed into this boy’s pants and then this Mercury guy even self-identified as bisexual–
I want to make it clear first that I do not want your donation.
I use the term queer because it is more inclusive than lgbt, outside of lgbt excluding anyone who just isn’t included in that tiny acronym I have found it very white-centric, and to be honest to the point of erasure. In one of our more recent articles we discussed the bate, and transgender people in native american communities. And in that research I found many other cultures that had and used terms that were different than transgender, or gay. And this is not the first time that white people have tried to label other communities and it is never a good thing, so I am not comfortable overriding any label they gave themselves, and queer is very purposefully non-specific, whereas LGBT could be one of four things queer is any sexual or gender identity that strays outside what society considers “normal” and does not attempt to label anyone, just say that their label is outside of what society may have expected.
And it is my slur to reclaim for myself and my art and it is no ones job to police how I decide to use it.
Also I know what dog whistle terminology you are using here, and yes, I do include asexual and aromantic people in my articles, and I do not care if you do not like that. Asexual and aromantic people have a history as well and they deserve to be able to learn about it.
And now I want to explain why I do not want your donation.
This is my project, and it is run along with my amazing business partner Grace, but in the end it is mine. I choose in which direction it goes and what I write about, and I am not going to be pressured by money into changing my mind. There is a reason I have made the decisions I have, I am on patreon so I am very firmly my own boss, my patrons are there to support my project, and I love all of them for it, but they do not get to decide where this project goes. I do. And if they don’t like it I understand them withdrawing their support but will not change my art to avoid that. And you clearly feel very entitled to decide where my art is going, and I want to say-as kindly as possible- I don’t want your support. I don’t want support that is an attempt at control, and there is no amount of money you could give me to sell out the asexual/aromantic community.
So go support some other project, because you can’t control what happens here.
Freddie Mercury (debatable, but considering he had had a long-term relationship with Mary Austin and he tended to keep quiet on matters of his private life, we’ll never know for sure)
All or which have either been given the name “gay” or “straight“ by the media despite coming out. There are more than two sexualities and this is a fact that most people (even on Tumblr nowadays) forget. People tend to assume that since someone is with a person of the same gender, they’re gay. (Or vice versa in Angelina or P!nk’s case) This is incorrect to assume because you’re erasing their identities in the process. The people on this list aren’t gay or straight, they’re bisexual.No matter how much the media tries to erase that.
ok this is “earring magic ken” who was introduced in 1992 (and discontinued shortly thereafter)
basically mattel had done a survey and discovered that girls didn’t think ken was “cool” enough
SO someone had the bright idea to research coolness by sending people to raves which, at the time, were mostly hosted & attended by gay men. so they went to these raves and took notes on what the fashions were and finally landed on this outfit, mesh shirt & all
this doll became the best selling ken doll in history, mostly because gay men bought it in droves. (many of them said his necklace was supposed to be a cockring) but mattel and a number of parents weren’t very amused and discontinued the doll
OH MY GOD YOU’RE LEAVING OUT THE BEST PART
SO
MAGIC EARRING KEN. This bitch gay as HELL. supposedly the aforementioned rings on him are for “magic earrings” and clip on charms. These charms are advertised as totally COMPLETELY heterosexual, not gay at ALL, see there’s a Barbie that also has Magic Earring Action with clip on charms! Ken wears them to match, because he’s STRAIGHT
Here’s the issue: THERE IS NO MATCHING BARBIE. Magic Earring Ken is out here straight up wearing cock rings on his jacket with a thinly devised advertising ploy to make it SEEM not-gay. But it’s DEFINITELY GAY. (And if you’re thinking, why cock rings? Well way back in 1992 gay culture was HUGE on wearing cock rings, it was the in-style. Everyone who was gay wore one, even women; you sewed them to your leather jacket, and the placement indicated some of your sexual preference. In case you were wondering, Ken is a Bottom.)
AND IT GETS BETTER. Magic Earring Ken was on the shelves for six weeks before they pulled him. In that short amount of time? Magic Earring Ken became the BEST SELLING Barbie Doll Mattel has EVER SOLD. LET THAT SINK IN. SIX WEEKS. And now every time these wheezy old hetero windbag execs go to look at their sales board, they’re forever haunted by Magic Earring Ken at the top of their charts.
Gay as hell, Cock Ring Bottom Ken, the Best Selling Mattel Doll. Pride.
please take the time out of your day to read about Magic Earring Ken™
So apparently last year the National Park Service in the US dropped an over 1200 page study of LGBTQ American History as part of their Who We Are program which includes studies on African-American history, Latino history, and Indigenous history.
Like. This is awesome. But also it feels very surreal that maybe one of the most comprehensive examinations of LGBTQ history in America (it covers sports! art! race! historical sites! health! cities!) was just casually done by the parks service.
The Park Service is more than just Yellowstone and the Everglades, the National Park Service has custody over hundreds, if not thousands of historic sites, houses, and battlefields. It’s part of their mission to interpret US history and make it available to its citizens. They have completed studies for African American history, Native American history, women’s history, and more.
It’s sad that people let this aspect of the Park Service fall through the cracks.
“Chevalier d’Éon, was a French diplomat, spy, freemason and soldier who fought in the Seven Years’ War. D’Éon had androgynous physical characteristics and natural abilities as a mimic, good features for a spy. D’Éon appeared publicly as a man and pursued masculine occupations for 49 years, although during that time d’Éon successfully infiltrated the court of Empress Elizabeth of Russia by presenting as a woman. For 33 years, from 1777, d’Éon dressed as a woman, claiming to have been female at birth. Doctors who examined d’Éon’s body after d’Éon’s death discovered that d’Éon would have actually been designated male at birth.”
Can we all talk about this bad ass genderfluid French soldier/spy from the 1700s? Please?
He presented as a woman for a specific reason. That doesn’t make him gender fluid.
They also lived the rest of their life until death as a woman. They retired from their work in the military and lived the last years of their life as a woman, collecting a military pension.
So I don’t know why you think you get to decide that their gender “really” was a cis man?
Chevaliere d’Eon blackmailed the French government into changing the records to say that she was born female. I’m having a hard time seeing that as anything other than an especially punk rock form of legal transition.
God damn. d’Eon did not fuck around.
Fun fact: she continued to compete in fencing tournaments up into her sixties. There’s some great art of her facing off against opponents.
Years ago I once mentioned to a coworker at a theatre where I was interning that my boss was bi (he was out, I wasn’t doing anything I shouldn’t) and she said “Oh! He sometimes shops at the other market!”
I almost fell over laughing at the expression, and I reported the conversation to my mum later. She picked it up and would joke about it for like, YEARS after. It became a running joke in our family, the expression “He shops at the other market.”
This ended up being REALLY funny about five years later when we were trying to find a grocery store on a family road trip and ended up buying what we needed from a grocery store with a big sign out front reading BI-MART. We pulled into the parking lot and I leaned over to my mother and said, “This is the other market he shops at.”
OK someone write me a fic where Steve uses some of these in conversation and nobody figures it out until someone (Natasha?) has a Classic Movies marathon. (you’re fond of your mother? um, me too? I ought to warn you that hitchhiking isn’t as safe as it used to be, by the way. OH, THE POSSIBILITIES FOR CONVERSATIONAL MISUNDERSTANDINGS.)
*pulls out several binders of information regarding Laurens’s non-heterosexuality and drops them with a loud thud in front of you*
I have plenty of evidence as to why Laurens was likely queer (I think he was gay, but if you think he may have been bisexual or something else, I’m cool with that too). Here we go –
On October 13, 1767, Henry Laurens wrote the following to James Grant:
Master Jack is too closely wedded to his studies to think about any of the Miss Nanny’s I would not have such a sound in his Ear, for a Crown; why drive the poor Dog, to what Nature will irresistably prompt him to be plagued with in all probability much too soon.
John was born on October 28, 1754, so he was just a couple of weeks shy of being 13 years old when this was written. Thirteen is a typical age for people to be going through puberty and figuring out who they are (and aren’t) attracted to, so the fact that John has shown zero interest in girls at this point (and for his whole life, really) suggests that he likely wasn’t attracted to them. I understand that sexuality is fluid and that this isn’t 100% definitive, irrefutable proof that Laurens was gay, but I do think it is an important piece of information from John’s early teenage years.
John also didn’t form many close relationships with women. He was close with his sisters and other female family members, but outside of that, he didn’t really seem to interact with women. Even Massey acknowledges this in his biography of Laurens:
In Geneva John worked hard, but he did not let his studies prevent him from forming close ties with fellow students and teachers. It marked the beginning of a pattern: he continually centered his life around homosocial attachments to other men. A handsome young man, properly genteel in his comportment, intellectually stimulating in his conversation, John never had difficulty attracting women and men. Women played important roles in his life, but he reserved his primary emotional commitments for other men.
Of course Massey, being the homophobe that he is, classifies these relationships as “homosocial,” but the point still stands that John enjoyed spending most of his time with men.
Now we get to John’s relationship with Martha Manning. A lot of historians like Massey like to use his marriage to Martha as absolute proof that Laurens was straight. There are a lot of issues with that.
1. We have no idea what went down in the bedroom on the night(s) John and Martha had sex. It is quite possible (and, in my opinion, the most likely explanation) that Martha led their bedroom activities and that John followed in the hopes that he could convince himself that he could love/have sex with a woman. Heterosexuality was the only acceptable sexuality then, so John likely would have felt compelled to hide his queerness and put on an appearance of heterosexuality in order to be accepted.
2. Laurens wrote to his uncle that he married Martha out of pity for her situation:
I should inform you of an important change in my circumstances_ Pity has obliged me to marry_ but a consideration of the duty which I owe to my country made me choose a clandestine celebration, lest the father should insist upon my stay in this country as a condition of the marriage_ the matter has proceeded too far to be longer concealed, and I have this morning disclosed the affair to Mr. Manning in plain terms_ reserving to myself the right of fulfilling the more important engagements to my country. It may be convenient on some accounts that the matter should be kept secret till you hear next from me, & you will oblige me by keeping it so.
Laurens clearly married Martha to preserve the honor of her and their child. Laurens had quite an obsession with honor, and he could not allow himself to dishonor these people. But Laurens left before his daughter was born, making it clear that he cared more about his country than his new family. Laurens would never see his wife or child again. Martha would die near the end of 1781, and Laurens would die in August 1782. He did make some attempts to bring them over the America, but since their countries were in the middle of a war, this was difficult. He seems to have only written a few letters to her during the war, and we only have one that survived. It also seems that Martha wrote him more often than he wrote to her. And even though John was in France in 1781 (before Martha died) to gain more aid from France, it does not appear that he made any attempt to meet with his wife or daughter during this visit.
Now we get to everyone’s favorite 18th century bisexual – Alexander Hamilton. Laurens’s relationship with Hamilton pretty much screams, “not straight.”
First of all, Laurens never told Hamilton about his wife and child. Not even when Laurens got into a duel with Charles Lee and asked Hamilton to be his second. Laurens literally could have died, and Hamilton probably would have been the one to handle the stuff surrounding that, and at this time, Hamilton was completely unaware that Laurens was married and had a kid. Very not-gay of you, Laurens. Hamilton only happened to learned about Mrs. Laurens and child when he was asked to forward some letters from Martha to John – and this happened one and a half years after Hamilton and Laurens met. It’s not like John would have any reason to keep his wife and kid secret from Hamilton, right? Just guys being dudes. No homo.
When Laurens left Washington’s camp to head south, he wrote the following to Hamilton:
Ternant will relate to you how many violent struggles I have had between duty and inclination_ how much my heart was with you, while i appeared to be most actively employed here_
Hamilton was also begging Washington for leave to head south and get a field command during this time, so it would appear that Hamilton and Laurens could not bear to be separated.
We also have this lovely gem from Hamilton to Laurens, written when Laurens was a POW and Hamilton was soon to be married:
In spite of Schuylers black eyes, I have still a part for the public and
another for you; so your impatience to have me married is misplaced; a
strange cure by the way, as if after matrimony I was to be less devoted
than I am now. Let me tell you, that I intend to restore the empire of
Hymen and that Cupid is to be his prime Minister. I wish you were at
liberty to transgress the bounds of Pensylvania. I would invite you after the fall to Albany to be witness to the final consummation.
My Mistress is a good girl, and already loves you because I have told
her you are a clever fellow and my friend; but mind, she loves you a l’americaine not a la françoise.
Clearly, Laurens had believed that marriage might be able to “cure” Hamilton of something going on between them. And Hamilton just invited Laurens to a threesome on his wedding night. Just another example of bros doing bro things.
One of my favorite examples of Laurens’s queerness is his use of the phrases “dear girl” and “dear boy.” In the one surviving letter we have from Laurens to his wife, he used this phrase:
Reflect for a moment into how much misery we might both be plunged by your captivity, and say dear Girl whether it will not be better to endure the pain of absence patiently, ‘till some eligible opportunity offer.
From Laurens to Hamilton, we have this phrase (there may be more uses of “dear boy” in Laurens’s letters to Hamilton, but this is the only one I can think of at the moment):
Adieu, my dear boy. I shall set out for camp tomorrow.
Bolding in both is mine. To my knowledge, Laurens only ever used “dear girl” to address his wife, and he only ever used “dear boy” to address Hamilton. He saved these terms of endearment for these two people. So for Hamilton, Laurens used the male equivalent of a term of endearment he used to attempt to express his care and affection for his wife.
Finally, we get to Laurens’s last letter to Hamilton. Laurens closed this letter with the following:
Adieu, my dear friend; while circumstances place so great a distance between us, I entreat you not to withdraw the consolation of your letters. You know the unalterable sentiments of your affectionate Laurens.
Most of John’s closings, to Hamilton or anyone else, were often something simple such as, “Adieu” or “Yours ever.” This is by far the most emotionally expressive of Laurens’s closings. Also note his use of “dear friend,” which brings us back to the discussion of “dear boy.”
This covers just about everything in regards to Laurens’s queerness. I have a lengthy post here that discusses the Hamilton-Laurens relationship further. I hope this convinces you that Massey is not to be trusted in his interpretations of Laurens’s sexuality.
Kimchi and Justice 