bloodied yet unbowed

lesbian 🌟 godless, decadent, unrepentant

[artist-monet]

The Bridge at Argenteuil, 1874, Claude Monet

[obeijaflorealesbica-deactivated]

I wish I could invite lesbians to make art with me but because I can't I will just say that I want to give you the desire to make more art. (Yes, even if you think you suck at it.)

[dykestroyer]

And let’s not forget that even if you do “suck at it”, experience will help you improve, so the best option here is indeed to start and then just keep on creating! More art created by lesbians is always a good thing.

[mysteriousartcentury]

Pedro Américo (1843-1905), Hamlet’s Vision, 1893, oil on canvas, 95 x 170 cm. Pinacoteca do Estado de São Paulo

[women-loving-art]

Romaine Brooks Femme avec des fleurs (details) 1912

[returntomytilene]

« Ce souvenir m’est plus cher que tout autre. Te rappelles-tu ce jour où tu étais couchée dans ton grand lit, un peu lasse ? On t’avait fatiguée, m’as-tu dit, et je me suis mise près de toi. Presque chastement j’écoutais ta douce voix ensommeillée, en regardant tes yeux demi-clos et cachés par l’ombre de tes longs cils. Et je pensais que de toucher ta peau doucement ainsi me donnait plus de joie que d’entendre les cris de mes anciennes maîtresses se tordant dans mes bras, terrassées par la violence de leurs sensations ! J’ai horreur de la satiété vois-tu et l’insuffisance me satisfait bien plus. Je n’aime pas la brutalité réelle des sens. Faisons l’amour en sourdine, veux-tu ? »

— Natalie Clifford Barney dans une lettre à Liane de Pougy, avril 1899, dans Correspondance amoureuse, édité par Suzette Robichon et Olivier Wagner

[emotionsincascades]

Hahn: Le ruban dénoué, Douze valses: No. 5, Demi-sommeil embaumé

[pintoras]

Marie Egner (Austrian, 1850 - 1940): A view of the courtyard at No. 8 Dreilaufergasse (today No. 44 Lindengasse), 1070 Vienna (via Dorotheum)

[fordarkmornings]

Details from After The Morning Swim 

William Russell Flint (Scottish, 1880-1969)

Watercolour on paper

[floatingbook]

Do you think its worth creating a blog here? I've thinking about it, because I've seen that there's a lack of certain perspectives here, my perspectives as a non-westerner (russian). But I'm worried about privacy. I'm not gonna write my age and other personal stuff of course, but what about doxxing? I already had a blog here before, but deleted it about 1-2 years ago. I also don't want to post about and tra issues, I'm tired of that.

First off, your privacy concern. You’re the one who’s in control of what you reveal out here. You don’t need to share your name or age or place of residence, nor post pictures of yourself. I acknowledge that you come from a place where those concerns might be heightened, but if you’re careful there’s very, very little risk of doxxing. You can use a vpn if it reassures you. @nansheonearth has a good post on security culture that can help you decide how you want to do this. But the key to whether the threat of doxxing will impact you is: Who will your audience be? Are you going to blog for like-minded women? Or are you going to go into men’s notes and try to rile them up? I’m doing the former, and I’ve only ever gotten a couple of rude anons. If you want to do the latter, consider carefully the implications (I’m not saying you shouldn’t do it, just that you plan adequately).

On the worth of creating a blog on here, well, it depends on your goals. Connection and information are the two things I get from this place. Connection because I live in a remote place where finding lesbians is not easy, and because I want to hear from lesbians all around the world. Information, because I too tought that some of my perspectives deserved to be shared and could help other women deal better with the misogyny and lesbophobia that we face. And sometimes it is good to put your thoughts somewhere, to write them down. And sometimes it’s helpful to have other women interact with your thoughts, challenge you, pick your brain. It makes you grow as a person. This place helped me grow as a person and accept who I am.

I’m not gonna lie tho, it did tire me out too. You have to curate your experience. For me, it involved unfollowing a number of non-lesbians who kept putting men on my dash; restraining the number of depressing news I read (be it about women’s suffering or about the action of tras), not because I don’t care but because most of it trickles down anyway and because I don’t want to get burned out (I’m already well aware of our oppression); and not engaging obvious baits and trolls (some discussions are not worth having, or not worth having where everyone else is having them, e.g. discussing the recent misogynistic comments aimed at Ellen Page, or responding to the lack of understanding of misogynists and homophobes on posts concerning this subjects). You have to pick and choose your battles, and remember that your energy is too valuable to be squandered uselessly. Better to go take a walk or call a friend or fill a notebook then. 

You can always log out or delete your blog if you get tired of it. Its use will come naturally to you after a time, you’ll cut back on what doesn’t serve you. Please drop me a line if you do create one, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Additionally, @dykestroyer had some interesting reflections about blogging on here: 1, 2, 3.

[dykestroyer]

(Merci for that shout out! :) )

I’ll add in that you probably don’t want your work or private email associated to your account, so create something specifically for logins at protonmail or tutanota or something of the sort if you haven’t already, anon.

You know not to share too much information on anything that might identify you; @floatingbook has given you a few links to posts of mine in which I discuss the dynamics of blogging and whatnot, mainly blogging on this platform; one thing I can say is that, if you want to be more careful, you also shouldn’t give in to the rhythm expected of you by the website – the quicker your reaction to a post or to a reply someone sends you, the more likely it is to say more than you intend to.

Make use of the draft function – write something in the heat of the moment if you must, but don’t publish it just yet. Let it sit for a while. Wonder whether you really want to say that and in those terms or whether the subject (or the person you’re talking to) is worth it.

Tumblr can be exhausting if you’re here only to argue and be Super Serious about things, more so if you’ll use it as some sort of political notebook – it wasn’t really made for that and the way our conversations are structured here is proof given how you’ll only ever see all replies to something if you dig around in the notes. Which isn’t to say you “cannot” discuss politics, only to keep an eye out when/if you do, because the media we’re using is treacherous and it has an impact on how we talk and understand things: it’s all very scattered and loose, thus we rarely see the big picture or are able to maintain good, concentrated conversations, especially in posts with a large number of notes.

Is it worth having a blog here? That’s for each of us to say. I’ve made amazing friends and even met the love of my life on here (!). I get to talk to lesbians all over the world, learn new things, crack jokes… What do you want out of Tumblr? It can serve many a purpose, but what do you want from it? Maybe you’ll find it. Maybe you won’t.

I agree with @floatingbook you must curate your experience: choose well who you want to follow and don’t feel pressured to follow people back if their content is not to your liking; you’re not obliged to do anything, really, apart from being civil (and I should hope level-minded, given how things over here can get pretty frenzied for even the silliest topics, mainly out of bad-faith or a lack of comprehension by those involved); you’re not even obliged to keep up a “blogging” schedule or to have your blog be “active” all the time. Use the tool, don’t let it use you.

Lastly… Tumblr is and will probably remain very centered around the United States. You can’t change that. If you decide to join, I’m sure your voice will be heard and appreciated, but it will probably be in the minority; as such, you will find a lot of ignorant opinions everywhere, people who haven’t the slightest idea of what they’re talking about when it comes to other countries and cultures. Don’t bother debating those who have no desire for actual debate – it presupposes that both parties are interested in talking and listening, not in preaching while the other sits in silence and nods without question.

All that being said, it’s up to you! And yes, you can most certainly delete your blog if ever you want to (even if your posts will survive in others’ reblogs, remember that). You can walk away whenever you want if it tires you out, just as much as you can come back at any moment. Good luck! :)

[dykestroyer]

Whenever I get unfollowed, I tend to take a look over those who are left to make sure of one thing -- if it’s not one of my Brazilian or French lesbians, all is well lol.

[dykeadentisme]

Não tendo por onde fugir, e querendo apreender a emoção, porque para ele se trata de uma questão vital, o poeta opta pela palavra: caso contrário, a saturação interna poderia comprometê-lo enquanto artista e homem, e conduzi-lo à desintegração (de que as várias modalidades de transviamento moral e orgânico, o alcoolismo, o erotismo e mesmo o suicídio são decorrências naturais), pela impossibilidade de comunicar-se. Daí vem que o poeta seja desgraçado porque poeta, não poeta porque desgraçado. Em qualquer hipótese, tudo não passa duma tentativa, pois o que fica por dizer é muito mais do que o que fica dito: um simples lembrete, espuma evanescente dum imenso mar de sensações inefáveis e desencontradas.

Massaud Moisés, A Criação Literária, IV – Poesia e Prosa

[dykestroyer]

“Having no means for escape and wanting to apprehend the emotion, for to him it is a vital issue, the poet opts for the word: if otherwise, the internal saturation could compromise him as artist and man, and drive him to disintegration (of which the many kinds of moral and organic deviations, alcoholism, eroticism, and even suicide are natural consequences) by the impossibility of communicating himself. Hence why the poet is wretched because a poet, not poet because wretched. Be that as it may, it is all but an attempt, for what is left unsaid is much more than what is said: a simple reminder, fading foam in an immense sea of ineffable and mismatched sensations.“

[artist-pissarro]

Flood in Pontoise, 1882, Camille Pissarro

Medium: oil,canvas

[artist-homer]

Summer Squall, 1904, Winslow Homer

Medium: oil,canvas

[fordarkmornings]

Laura Knight  -  The Flower,  1911  (detail)

British, 1877-1970

Oil on canvas

[lovis-corinth]

The Sea near La Spezia, 1914, Lovis Corinth

[dykestroyer]

I do still occasionally log in to complain, but I’ve noticed a bit of a shift in regards to my “blogging habits” and that is a tendency to only write/share things I genuinely find interesting and would like to show/talk about with other people.

Whether it’s about journal keeping or roleplaying games, some lesbian-related things (that one post about visibility I wrote a while ago ends on a positive note, after all) or whatever, if I’m going to dedicate some time of my life to this stupid website I can’t seem to quit, then it’s gonna be time I legitimately enjoy rather than get caught up in stupid discussions with people I will never meet (nice conversations with people I will never meet, on the other hand, are welcome).

I don’t know. Maybe it’s a consequence of getting older, maybe it’s a consequence of the disillusionment of having been online for quite some time... But it’s a good thing, of that much I’m certain. Not fishing for clicks, not wasting time on debating people who are clearly not talking in good faith, not getting carried away in these life-consuming convos about nothing all that important... It’s pretty good, like taking back a lot of the control that social media has tried to usurp.

[artist-monet]

Banks of the Seine at Jenfosse - Clear Weather, 1884, Claude Monet

[dykestroyer]

“When they look back and read such reflections, they are again reminded that they do indeed have minds; any such reminder is to be welcomed at a time when young people could be excused for concluding that they are only bodies, to be jogged, stretched, exercised, reduced, pampered, decorated, or whatever the latest consuming fad happens to be”

This passage in Geoffrey Summerfield’s contribution to The Journal Book stood out to me: it recalls the whole perverse separation of body and mind all the while critiquing the fixation on The Body as we live it today. A body to be modified in any number of ways to please others, a body whose appearance takes precedence over one’s own inner life... Which isn’t to say that we should not be aware of our corporeal existence, only that one should not be so valued in detriment of the other.

So the act of rendering our thoughts and feelings “tangible” (translating them from nebulous ideas swirling inside our head into words, into ink on paper) could allow us to find the balance between the fallacious division of body and mind, it seems. Thought is given weight, thought that leaves traces of itself behind rather than just disappear into the ether it came from -- subjectivity shines forth even when it is daily pummelled to death by the increasingly shallow and plastic environment around us. Consciousness may break through the tomb that a dumb, homogenous, artificial consumer society has erected for it rather than fall prey to the “necessity” of silencing itself for the benefit of a “like”, a fleeting signal of “acceptance” by some random stranger who matters not at all.

It’s an interesting proposition to ponder...