#exclusionism cw

[vacuously-true]

Very funny though that the first two TERFs I noticed on the women in math poll were noticed because they were complaining about how math is gross lol.

[the-moogle-of-your-nightmares]

important caveat: is the reason for which they changed their views and started doing better something that started them on the path to doing better, or is it something they only care about insofar as the specific thing that appealed to them is a factor, and once that's removed from the equation are they fine with continuing to do harm?

are they fine with fatshaming and misgendering people they don't like? do they treat being a knowledgeable, inclusive, generally decent ally--not just re: representation, but irl--as a novelty expansion pack for their blorbos, then lose interest when they move on to something else? do they do so for approval and to feel good about themselves, only to throw fits and backpedal when they realize that involves discomfort, work, or self-accountability? do they Learn About an Issue because their partner/close friend/etc falls into that group, only to go straight back to being a bigot after they break up (or whiplash harder into the bigotry out of spite, even)?

or do they take it as a wakeup call to be a better, more compassionate person? do they take the opportunity to make use of what they have, however it ended up in front of them? do they still use this kind of thing as a cue to examine whether there are other avenues of growth that they would do well to open themselves up to, instead of relying solely on that one?

i have an ex-friend who was deeply emotionally abusive, and whose abuse this dynamic featured prominently in. she gaslit me so thoroughly that it was frightening to read what i was saying in response to her--what i was accepting as truth--when i was looking back over things to unpack them after the fact. and as soon as i left her life, she swan dived straight into the queerphobia, racism,* radfem bullshit, and general nastiness she'd been just barely pretending to care about while she was friends with me.

and being friends with her saved me from what could easily have been a spiral into radfeminism, because she was aroace on the tail of ace discourse. it shook me right to my core when i realized one day that i'd hurt someone close to me, at a moment when she needed support, because of a radfem talking point i'd picked up. it turned my shit right around, and surprise surprise i continued to give a shit about being an ally to aspecs after we split ways and i realized how awful she was.

*(i am white, to clarify, but being a racist shithead was very much on her list of ~things you need to be patient with me about so i can become a better ally~ because i kept calling her on it lmao)

taking opportunities to grow regardless of what that gift horse's mouth looks like is so, so important, and it will take you far. just make sure you're actually growing instead of becoming a missing stair.

i do not care if someone learned compassion from a cartoon or a comic or an anime im just glad they're here with us now a better person fighting the good fight. should it have taken something so trivial? maybe not- but it's in the past! and this is the now! and if they're objectively better for it who cares

[thatonegaybrit]

; idk why but after reading some posts I js realized why it took me years and years of questioning, years of discomfort, years of self hate and years of forcing myself into labels to realize I'm transmasc & like guys. Like, like it took me years and it was because

; ( long under the cut + rant like but w a good ending lol /gen )

; because I had been taught men and liking men was bad, was evil, was mysoginistic, was siding w the enemy

pt: ; because I had been taught men and liking men was bad, was evil, was mysoginistic, was siding w the enemy

; and I fully believed this, it was said by my mother and my friends and by social media and influencers and everyone I used to look up too, so why wouldn't it be true ?? So realizing I was transmasc was 100% harder because ppl were clinging on too the whole " if you're born a man or transition into a man you're horrible and evil and disgusting etc etc and there's no getting out of it I hate you " feminism and I wanted so bad to be in a community and to have ppl like me ( and I didn't know of any other safe places ) that I js went with it. I claimed to be a trans ally but I depised trans men & trans mascs, I hated cis men especially ! I hated everyone who was masculine or liked masculine people. I was like legit a terrible person and a huge exclusionist and I didn't even notice. Because I genuinely thought I was in the right, because I'd been raised like that. Because I'd been continuously told that. So I wasn't a " bad person " I was a good person, I was correct and I was spreading good information

; and yk I was devastated when I realized I was transmasc, it was horrifying to think because " oh shit oh no I must be broken, be evil !! and what if I js get worse !?? What if I end up like other men oh no ! " and that is terrifying to think that's how I used to think, like, that was normal for me. That was right.

; but funnily enough after being like okay I'm transmasc now what !?? I went to some transmasc / accepting queer centered blogs & sites & discords and I swear they were so welcoming it flipped everything I knew on it's head. I'd been told they were all gross and mysoginistic and rapists and js terrible people but the nicest person there who helped me sm was a cis gay man. He was kind and supportive and helped me through what I was feeling .. !! He didn't even get offended by my original thought process because his brother had been the same, his friends had been the same, most trans men / mascs in those places had been the same. They'd all thought something was wrong w them, that they were horrid people and they were betraying women etc etc.

; and I'm forever grateful I got out of that way of thinking, I've never been happier being myself. Letting others be themselves. And I don't feel so broken anymore, I don't buy into the " siding w the enemy !! " bullshit because that's what it is, bullshit. Plus I know I don't have to look a certain way to be transmasc so it's helped my dysphoria to an extent yk .. But it still really pisses me off that people hate men for purely being men, that's stupid and literally genuinely not what feminism is, its not what inclusivity is, it's just shitty and stupid. You aren't just born a horrible person and it certainly isn't based off something like gender or sex. And you sure as fuck don't get to call yourself inclusive for it.

; anyways I love you trans men & transmascs and all masculine / man aligned lovelies in all your ways and yeah. You're not evil or disgusting or betraying anyone just because you are a man / masc person <3 ( this also goes for anyone expressing themselves masculinely / who look masculine <333 )

[gautierprotectionsquad]

Bi/mspec lesbian is not a label created by TERFs (that is a common misconception though I'm not sure why) and in fact has a deep history within the lgbt community.

Pink Dandelion, 22, Bisexual Lives by Off Pink Publishing (1988)

“It was at this time that I met a bisexual lesbian, i.e. someone whose culture and identity was lesbian, but who did feel something for some men. I suppose I saw myself as a gay bisexual.”

There are lots of reason's someone might identify as both bisexual and gay/lesbian. People who experience an attraction to multiple genders but largely experiences attraction to women and feel a connection to the lesbian community and label. Usually it has to do with the complexity of gender and gender attraction. It's defining the lesbian label around loving women instead of "non-men attracted to non-men". I think you should read more about it from people who actually use the label and learn from them. I suggest checking out this doc to learn more.

I think taking a moment to learn about "contradictory" labels can really paint how beautiful and diverse the queer community really is.

I've been noticing that on here a lot of pages with the ⚢ symbol in the bio or description is run by radfems and terfs, so much that I even thought about deleting it from mine. But I refuse to give it up, it's a symbol I've always liked that only recently I found the courage to use.

So fuck them, I'm keeping it.

[garfunkopop]

jesus fuck i cant stop thinking about this post that said "a lesbian could be a cis man for all i care" babe THATS NOT HOW IT WORKS

that and people saying u can be multisexual and monosexual at the same time. i get that queer identities can be confusing but this genuinely doesnt make any buttfucking sense

[human-rodent-king]

the post about having love in your heart was not about romance it was about having appreciation for the world around you

Saying "love is the most important thing ever" (paraphrased) is exclusionary language and amatonormativity. Are you aware that aplatonics exist? Have you heard of loveless aros? Honestly, if you're gonna be exclusionist you can at least wait until it isn't Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Month.

[scp3199]

Me when I have no friends who like Midnight Horror School cuz all of them left me and rather be friends with a exclusionist than me (the exclus said bullshit about how apparently, “Trans men can’t be lesbians”) (You also just discovered that your a Trans Man, making it doubly painful):

[my-strange-attraction]

i think you might be stupid as hell because that last bit on your posts about studs is what lesbians have been saying about our label for fucking ever when it comes to your demand for the inclusion of men (you KNOW i am not talking about trans women. i’m talking about cis and trans men.) I can feel your cognitive dissonance and it is amazing.

also butch/femme are lesbian exclusive identities because they only make sense in lesbian context (subversion of gender roles, presentation, OFOS, ect ect). same goes for stud. literally you do not know what you’re talking about. PLEASE do actual research when it comes to these labels before talking about them and not a quick look at a fandom wiki.

Ok see the other reason I was hesitant to post my response to that ask was because I KNEW this would be the response from those of you who are still lurking from that drama.

The WHOLE POINT of my response was that race matters are different than other queer matters. They just are. It’s not cognitive dissonance, it’s just the truth, but you want so badly for me to contradict myself that you would pretend otherwise until your dying breath.

Also I’ve never been involved in discussions about the stud label, but I have been in discussions about the others. I downplayed it because it hasn’t been my FOCUS because up until recently I was too nervous to explore them because I didn’t identify as lesbian yet, and I didn’t realize what I know now, which is that, though they originated in the lesbian community, they can describe all sapphic people (this includes bisexuals and others who are not solely attracted to women!).

You said they only make sense in lesbian context but you really didn’t explain yourself there so I don’t even know how to refute it. I think it makes sense in any sapphic context, personally, and a lot of my queer (AND LESBIAN) friends agree. I’m tired of bending over backwards to over explain myself to you people so I’m just not going to do it.

I’m going to say it one last time, even if it will still probably fall to deaf ears: other lesbians saying they can be/have been attracted to men does not “demand,” in your words, the lesbian label to include men. It just does for them, because sexuality is weird and people are different, and there can be a variety of different reasons why someone feels most comfortable using a label.

I use the label personally because even though I can sometimes (??? still figuring it out) be attracted to men, I am not interested in dating any. It’s more functional for me than bi or pan. Would you keep me from using it just because, for me, it includes attraction to men? And if you include me, why not include bi lesbians as well?

I almost deleted this one. At what point does defending myself become redundant?

[moved-to-piersgender]

If you ever find yourself saying shit like "let's see how many people I can piss off on here" you are absolutely living your life wrong and need to find a better motivator for living than spite.

[transfagore]

"the ONE and ONLY orientation that has NOTHING to do with men" says the person while in fact there are a bunch of orientations that do not include attraction to men

But yeah I do not expect that exclusionists get their head out of their own asses

Like, the funny thing is how people turn the tables on this site. Apparently defending ourselves against attacks is harassment. Refuting ridiculous and ahistorical arguments like these is harassment. Sometimes I think these people just don't read the things they post or think about their own opinions. They just want to hate gratuitously, because how horrible it is to accept the existence of people different from you, isn't??

[nonegenderleftpain]

Lesbian is still used as a blanket term, and people find a lot of personal meaning in it. Why does your personal feelings about it trump other people's?

Sexuality is fucking complicated. The reasons people use certain terms over others are things that they don't owe you or anyone to be respected. Trying to tell people what words they can or cannot use to describe themselves and their own experiences - which do not affect you - does not make you a good guy defending lesbianism, it makes you a member of the identity police. This talk is what gold star lesbianism and lesbian separatism was born from. And both of those things are deeply unhealthy.

I and other bi lesbians don't owe you a reason for why we don't use sapphic, even if we do have a reason, because we do not owe anyone our experiences to be worthy of and demanding of respect. Someone who identifies as a bi lesbian, or a cis transmasc, or a lesboy in good faith is always going to be safer to be around as a marginalized person than someone trying to dictate whether or not I actually exist and getting angry about the words I use instead of the hatred and harassment I face for being a filthy queer instead of a clean and pure one.

but the term bi lesbian has been around for decades at this point

Yeah, because lesbian was used as a descriptor for women who liked women, whether or not they had other identities.

Lesbian has been used as a blanket term in the past, but for many people today it's a personal identity that carries a lot of meaning in loving specifically and exclusively women and lesbian attracted nonbinary people.

The issue is that this word is being paired with another identity (bisexuality) and invalidating a very central part of our human experience. We do not date men. We do not center our lives around men. Lesbians are not bisexual, and bisexual people are not lesbians.

If we need an umbrella term, Sapphic has been around literally since the founding of the island of Sapphos. Many, many people identify as sapphic bisexuals. What is the downside to changing to Bi Sapphic? Why does it specifically need to be Bi Lesbian? can we not have one identity that excludes men???

[our-mspec-experience]

I am so angry and I worry about talking about it on my blog where people I know irl will see it and be able to guess who I'm talking about. It's not my place to air out someone else's fears to them, but I gotta tell someone.

Sorry, I'll start at the beginning, cw for biphobia and exclusionism:

A younger bisexual told me she had been worried about coming to a queer event I help organize bc she was scared she'd be interrogated on her queerness and found lacking for "only" being bi. I did my best to reassure her and point out that there's no hierarchy and of course bisexuality is "queer enough" to be queer, but inside I was seething. This is what all that exclusionist bullshit leads to: a young bisexual scared to seek out her own damn community bc exclus have decided there's such a thing as "not queer enough".

Is this your idea of "protecting the community", exclus? Did you successfully sniff out the "fakers"? Are you fucking proud of yourselves for how well you're keeping out those pesky cishets who are totally trying to invade our community at every turn??

I'm aro and pansexual. According to exclus, I am less queer than her. And yet I am the one who gets to be secure in the knowledge that the event is for me, too, while she was scared to come.

Exclus are a fucking blight upon this community.

Well you absolutely did the right thing by reassuring her, and I hope you’re event went well! i agree completely, anyone who excludes people from the queer community are terrible, and no one is “more queer” than anyone else!

[my-strange-attraction]

A Treatise on why Label Policing is Bad

Alternatively named: I do have reading comprehension, you're just a goddamn adult who somehow doesn't know that people can disagree with you for fully thought out and informed reasons and not be a bad person.

I'm kinda tired and don't wanna get riled up because I have work early tomorrow morning but I don't wanna forget to make this post so I'm just gonna jump right into it. I got in a dispute, here's the context for the post in pictures:

(Under the cut because I know this is going to be a long one, but please read if you have the spoons because I think it's important)

The original post:

The self-reblog from OP continuing the rant:

And my response:

You could argue I was asking for OP to get mad at me and write a big post then block me. You would probably be right, but I thought it was important. This IS where radical feminism starts, and I thought it was important to point that out and warn people against it. Also if you've been with me for a while, you know that label anarchy is my whole schtick. I do not stand for label policing, it's just simply one of the worst offenses in my world.

Anyways they answered back. I'm going to go through their answer point by point because they (and some of their followers who anon'ed me) really thought they got me good and disproved all my points. And I still think this is an important subject, so I will gladly take the chance to elaborate my points.

Nope, next question. No, but in all seriousness, there is a huge difference in being frustrated about how people are perceiving a label that you're using versus trying to define that label for everyone else who uses it.

Newsflash: people can use labels in different ways! Label fluidity 101 example is bi vs pan. People use these labels for different reasons and there is so much overlap that there can't really be a solid difference between the two that encompasses all the reasons someone might choose one over the other. Hell, maybe they just like the flag better.

You don't have to be a label anarchist like me to concede that point (although I do highly recommend, being a label anarchist is a blast) and if you understand that, then there's really not that much of a jump to understand why someone might want to microlabel (e.g. bi lesbian) or why someone who might more accurately be described as bi might want to use lesbian as a descriptor instead.

Part of being queer is finding joy in identity. Would you really deny someone else that right?

Gonna be real with you, I don't do background checks when I'm reblogging. I did a cursory glance of your blog just because I was doing a long response and wanted to be sure you weren't actually just a terf. Sue me.

Couple points here. One, words are made up, and the definitions of them are constantly evolving. I'm a writer so I'm absolutely more obnoxious about this than other people, but if you want to change the definition of a word, literally all you have to do is use it in that way enough, and people will understand what you're saying. Especially with identity words.

Two, who is "we"? Lesbians in general? We are not a monolith. I am one, and I don't agree that it's a hard boundary. I do agree that in the general sense of the word, used in it's truest form, it excludes men. That doesn't mean it's always used that way, for the aforementioned reasons.

Three, jesus christ I can't believe you're doing the one where you imply that me saying words are made up is what makes men rape women. Biphobia was created on that fallacy.

See above: bi and pan example. Bi lesbian and bi can be functionally the same label, but for some people, the former is just a more comfortable descriptor.

Nah, I advocate for both microlabeling and macrolabeling because literally none of it matters or hurts anyone. People should get to identify however they feel suits them best. That's part of the joy of being queer.

Also, as I mentioned, I'm a writer and I LOVE playing with words. I'm also a philosophy nerd which might explain why I'm so fucking cerebral about it all. Not everyone has to be like me in regards to how they view labels, I understand that I am absolutely the extreme, but everyone should be allowed to because, I repeat, NOBODY IS BEING HURT BY IT.

I ignored that part of the post because I am not a men's rights activist. I thought Barbie 2023 was too nice to the Kens in the end. I'm a misandrist (ok that's mostly a joke). That part wasn't for me.

Heh, just plain wrong. My college, which I have attended for the past three years and where I am currently in my last year, has an over 70% queer population. Not gonna dox myself, but it's well known for being one of the queerest schools in the US. I am constantly talking to Real Actual Queer People face to face. Also I'm mostly on tumblr for the fandoms. This is just my queer sideblog.

I'm an English major, bro. Reading comprehension is kinda my job. And that's a lazy gotcha by the way, that's just the easiest way to discount someone who you disagree with on the internet. Be more creative.

Also DNIs are kind of a hazy concept tbh. The DNI was listed on your pinned post, not the post which I reblogged. In hindsight, you may have put it in the tags of the original post, as all I saw was a reblog, but you have to understand that the internet as a whole is kind of moving away from DNIs because they're so nebulous and weird and hard to follow. Also I thought your post was problematic so I wanted to say it. The morality there is kinda shaky, I'll admit. There, one point for you. I don't regret it.

Something tells me you don't actually wish me the best...

+ bonus the tags

Don't have time? This is a pretty long post. Though to be fair I don't have the time either, it is way too late for me to be up responding to this, so I'll give you benefit of the doubt.

I am a full time student and work two campus jobs, plus have rehearsals and clubs most nights. I do admit to spending a lot of time scrolling on tumblr, but at least I'm not embarrassed by it like you seem to be.

You are four years older than me, not ten. You're not even 30 yet. Chill, ok? And maybe don't go around throwing the kys word when talking to someone you disagree with on the internet, someone might take it the wrong way.

For some reason I don't think you were laughing typing up this reply...

Anyway, that's it. I spent way too much brain energy on this, but it was important, so if you made it this far, thanks for putting up with my rambly ways. If you saw a typo, no you didn't. I'm tired.

[vacuously-true]

TERFs get the fuck off this post I swear to God. I'm going to compress and redistrict your organs. I'm going to pack you like spheres into a spacecraft and launch you at the escape speed of the solar system. You don't get to celebrate women in math unless you're gonna celebrate ALL women in math. Get fucked

[neopronouns]

Bilensman/woman were coined by @/parxgender (cw: exclusionism)

ah, found them. ye, they're similar, though bimancenic/biwomancenic don't inherently mean that one isn't a man/woman outside the lens of their bisexuality, just that their bisexuality and manhood/womanhood are intertwined in some way

[transfagore]

Me identifying as an mspec lesbian because my attraction is fluid simply doesn't hurt anyone and doesn't imply that all lesbians in the world are attracted to men. My existence is not "unfair" or "offensive." You just don't accept people with different experiences than you.