Last week I read a post on MumsNet that is so good it just has to be shared. Lesbian erasure is real. As a lesbian myself, Iâve noticed friends who of course want to be LGBT friendly and show their solidarity by sharing LGBT links. But without knowing it they are sometimes inadvertently sharing and supporting an ideology that is contributing to the erasure of my own lesbian community. This guest post is a must-read for all lesbians and anyone who cares about us.Â
 Guest post by Iwantmycommunityback
Iâve been thinking a lot over the last few days in particular about transactivism and lesbians and thought I might try to put some of it into writing, partly to try to make sense of it and partly because I still keep seeing people refer to the âLGBTâ or âLGBTQâ community and equating transactivism with lesbian and gay rights.
I think the most obvious impact of transactivism is on young lesbians being encouraged to identify as heterosexual transmen and to subject themselves to damaging medical treatment, the effects of which they will have to deal with for the rest of their lives. I think Janice Turnerâs article in the Times already covers that issue very well (here).
One of the problems for young lesbians (in addition to the rise in lesbophobia particularly among the young) is that, when they reach out to âtheirâ community, eg join an LGBT group for support, what they get isnât their community at all but something very hostile.
Gender critical feminists will be familiar with the idea of trans-identified males co-opting womenâs identities, womenâs rights, womenâs spaces etc for their own ends but there are other forms of appropriation going on, particularly in the (former) LGBT âcommunityâ (including transsexuals themselves having been co-opted by people who donât have body dysphoria and who marginalise them as âtruscumâ) . For lesbians, in addition to the appropriation of womanhood, I think the two main additional identity appropriations that cause problems are:
These are heterosexual biological males who identify as women and, therefore, as âlesbiansâ and have hijacked our community (support groups, social groups, bars, forums, you name it) and believe that lesbians should be open to having sex with someone with a penis if they âidentifyâ as a woman (see âthe cotton ceilingâ). This group has widened further e.g. including âtransfeminine menâ and men who identify as a woman part-time (so get to walk through life as a heterosexual man but just âidentifyâ as a lesbian for a few hours to access a lesbian group or lesbian club night where they are of course the most oppressed person ever and must be centred at all times).
As well as being included in our groups, they are held up as examples to us. For example for International Womenâs Day one group had a talk from an âinspirational womanâ who was a biological male, who hadnât had any surgery, was dressed as a bloke (not that that should make any difference.), had a bit of stubble going on and identified as non-binary (pronouns something like âzieâ) not as a woman. Like, not only could they not find an actual woman who was inspirational enough to fill that spot, they couldnât even find a man who was prepared to say they were a woman. Stuff like this is being funded by charity grants intended for women and for lesbian and gay people.
Donât quite believe it? Hereâs just a random selection of biological males who identity as women found on the lesbian section of some well known on-line dating sitesâŚ..
âQueerâ straight trans allies
This is pretty much a consequence of the above. For those who donât know, queer is now used as an all-encompassing term for anyone who doesnât identify as a heterosexual âcisâ person. However, it is also preferred by certain people over terms like lesbian, gay and bisexual because it does away with what are considered the rigid boundaries of âgenderâ and sexuality e.g. Homosexual, lesbian and gay meaning being attracted to the same sex, bisexual as being attracted to âbothâ sexes. This allows people to reject these categories and the idea that there are two sexes.
Take, for example, Lily Madigan who is a biological male who has now come out as a lesbian and is dating a woman. Letâs presume for a moment that this woman (letâs call her Chloe) is a) a biological female b) and a passionate trans uber-ally. Chloe is a bio female who is dating a bio male with a penis who wears a pink hoodie and identifies as a woman. Say, before that, Chloe was dating a bio male with a penis who wears a blue hoodie and is, therefore, a man. Maybe in her next relationship, she will date a bio male with a penis who has purple hair and identifies as âgenderqueerâ. Therefore, Chloe can now say that she dates men, women and genderqueer people, including both cisgender and trans people. Therefore, she is a queer or pansexual woman.
Along with the transbians, these âqueerâ woman become involved in what was formerly the lesbian and bisexual womenâs community. However, these trans uber-allies have a lot of views that are contrary to the interests particularly of lesbians. They believe that lesbians have âcisâ privilege and also that lesbians (along with gay men) are the most privileged people in the LGBT community. They believe that lesbians are narrow-minded and transphobic for only wanting to date other biological women and oppress transwomen who canât break through the âcotton ceilingâ of their underwear.
Iâm not even sure when this stuff started because, like most of us, due to the blurring of the meaning of words, I just didnât see it happening. A lot of the main online websites, blogs and forums for lesbians started to change, with different women running them and, over time, a shift in the tone â lots about trans inclusion and more references to being âqueerâ and open to relationships with anyone, about how some people (the lesbians) had privilege in our community and should prioritise these other people, less representation of butch women (despite the talk of blurring of gender boundaries/genderfluidity) etc.
It was only years later, when someone who knew the women who had been running one of these websites was talking about who they were and who they were in relationships (bio females in relationships with bio males, basically) that the penny finally dropped with me.These were straight women appropriating our identity and lecturing at us and marginalising us in our own community.
This blurring of the language enables them to do it â but even in cases where you can see it for yourself (e.g. if you are looking at what is clearly a straight couple, who you know will be read by everyone they meet as a straight couple, even if the guy is wearing a bit of eyeliner) you couldnât say anything because now it would be transphobic to say that he wasnât a woman (or genderqueer or whatever).
   Why arenât lesbians speaking out more?
Itâs no always easy to spot whatâs happening
Firstly, I think it takes a while to see what is going on. This for a number of reasons including the deliberate blurring of language, the shutting down of any discussion or even thought on the issue through the repetition of mantras such as transwomen are women and the misrepresentation of this issue in what we consider to be âourâ trusted (LGB) news outlets, organisations, websites etc. We also might be relying on our positive experience of and friendships with traditional transsexuals without understanding how much the trans movement has now changed (traditional transsexuals are often demonised in this new world order too and called truscum). There is also the tendency to conflate trans with gay issues when they are not the same at all. From my own experiences of coming out and being oppressed on the basis of being different, I know its so easy to automatically feel solidarity towards and feel angry about any oppressed group, especially if you are being told that other views are âanti-LGBTâ and coming from âanti-LGBTâ organisations.
 Many lesbians arenât aware things are different now
Some lesbians arenât really that involved any more so arenât aware of what is going on. Many lesbians will have accessed the LGB community, lesbian support groups, lesbian/gay bars when they first came out, when they were looking for a relationship, in times of difficulties etc but are now happily settled in a relationship and donât feel the need to access those resources. They will still have their lesbian âcommunityâ but that will mean texting their friends Sarah & Jo and Claire & Debs and arranging to meet up at their (straight) local pub for the evening. Any involvement with the wider LGBT community will be more minimal like maybe watching the Pride Parade once a year or occasionally reading something on an LGBT website about some awful transphobes who are attacking the LGBT community. They will think back to the transsexual people they knew 10 â 15 years ago who were nice people who just wanted to get on with their lives.
 Young lesbians have no where to go
3) Young lesbians these days are more likely to be identifying as transmen rather than as lesbians. For the few who do, they lack access to a real lesbian community which could introduce them to an alternative to the current discourse. They have little opportunity to discuss shared issues, learn from othersâ experiences and have other lesbian women on their side. Young lesbians who arenât accepted or feel isolated in their school, family, community etc will seek out an LGBT youth group and this community they reach out to will heavily endorse the transactivist agenda as part and parcel (and absolutely central) to their identity. Where else do they go and how do they know that there is anything else?
 Nobody listens to lesbians anyway!
4) The low status of lesbian women within the LGBT community also stops some speaking out. I donât think people outside are really aware of how much misogyny and in particular hatred of lesbians there is from some gay men.
 Thereâs a big personal cost to speaking up
There are big risks to speaking out for women. These risks are increased if you are a lesbian as it is coming from your âownâ community and being a lesbian puts you under suspicion of being trans-exclusionary (ie penis-exclusionary) anyway. If you run a lesbian business or events, you canât risk being anything other than pro the trans agenda or they will destroy your livelihood. And Iâm sure most of us have seen the threats and actual violence meted out to those who dare to disagree. Thereâs also a fear about just broaching the subject with another actual female lesbian because you donât know how many of you are onside so itâs a risk. From tentatively raising the issue with a select few, I do know lesbian friends who have got concerns about this but we are very cautious and tentative about saying anything to other women because of the risk. The bigger stories like the closure of MichFest and the men wielding baseball bats to keep the lesbians in check on Womenâs Marches and Pride Parades are just symbols of the way we are being policed. This is now what happens to what is left of lesbian events, lesbian-run businesses etc, if we donât keep in line.
  Our lesbian voice has been diluted from within
Finally, simply, as Iâve explained above, another reason some of âusâ donât oppose or seem to actively support transactivism is that not all of âusâ are actually âusâ. As lesbians step away from the LGBT âcommunityâ and more âlesbian and queer womenâ emerge from the two groups referred to above, an increasing proportion of âusâ are actually a subset of heterosexual men and women who loathe lesbians and support the transactivist agenda â but, because of the way language is being twisted, youâd never know that.
  Lesbians are an endangered species. I want my community back! Last week I read a post on MumsNet that is so good it just has to be shared.
