#obviously this is referring to the inhabitants of the island lesbos

[raindrops-on-concrete]

y'all need to read Herodotus, there's so much talk of lesbians and lesbian ships, it's truly magnificent

[tuulikki]

It’s interesting how there are some conceptual similarities between the German meaning of “quer”, the English word “queer”, and the English word “bent”:

But anyway, I sure love the irony of people making arguments citing etymology, i.e., the record of how words change over time, in order to deny the fact that words change over time. What started as a slur has been claimed by the queer community to such an extent that the non-pejorative sense is dominant in general settings like university departments, resource centres, and—yes—even corporate rainbow-washing posts.

They’re not calling us fags. A big hint for how to tell is remembering that the word “fag” and “queer” are different and do not have a 1:1 of meaning or usage. A helpful hint if you get those confused is to notice how they’re spelled differently, because they’re different words.

Etymology is fun facts to know and tell. Historical origins and usage don’t tell you what a word “actually” means like some big bullshit dramatic reveal in a crap Discovery Channel history documentary about ancient aliens really having built the pyramids. @sapphicconservative please note that “lesbian” should refer only to inhabitants of the island of Lesbos. Additionally, obviously bisexual exclusively means “attraction to only ever two genders”, and frankly we shouldn’t use that or “homosexual” because it’s nonsense to mix Greek and Latin like that. In conclusion, words don’t go through meaning shifts, languages in no way change over time, and wē eall sprecen Ald Ænglisc.

By the way, people with negative or traumatic experiences of these words used as slurs do not ever have to want to be called them, as individuals. That’s not in question, but that’s also not the conversation we’re having. “Queer” is a hard-earned and widely embraced endonym now, and its inclusive power as an umbrella term is probably why exclusionists and TERFs started this whole insidious “q-slur” discourse in the first place.

❤️ 💛 💙 💜 💚

Well, there’s no way around it: This has got to be one of the queerest places on the internet.

How queer, you ask? Apparently, folks on Tumblr are 193% more likely to identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ community than on any other social media platform. That’s you! Well, it’s most of you. It’s a helluva lot of you.

Let’s talk about you—the LGBTQIA+ community on Tumblr. You, who uplift each other, back each other up, uphold each other’s truths. You make Tumblr the supportive space it is.

So hey, whether you’re out and proud or just starting to figure things out, queer Tumblr has got your back—and it touches every fandom and ship and interest you can imagine...we have (finally canonical) declarations of love! Ratty allies! Gay ACNH villagers! Pronoun-positive worms on strings! And frogs! So many frogs. No matter what, you’ll find support and acceptance and, if you need it, a little bit of guidance.

This is who you are. Not just in June, but every day of every year. We wouldn’t have it any other way.

🦄,

Tumblr

[helshades]

lethbian:

i know tumblr is leaking bc i met a girl who’s a ‘bisexual lesbian’ and she was like “am i less of a lesbian for wanting to have sex with men?” and i was like….not to be mean but literally yes

wibbly-wobbly-skawney:

Wtf is a ‘bisexual lesbian’??????

helshades:

Obviously someone who was born on the isle of Lesbos and happens to be bisexual. Which is a rather amusing thing, innit? Evidently, no sexual orientation may change your birthplace.

exclusionaryhomosexual:

fun fact, people born on Lesvos don’t call themselves lesbians. but continue to crack jokes about the lesbian erasure bi women strive to accomplish on a massive scale.

helshades:

By Jove, woman!

Firstly, ‘Lesbian’ happens to be a correct demonym for the inhabitants of Lesbos. I admit to having no idea as to when it got into the English language to refer to a homosexual woman, but I can tell you it happened for French in 1867; a century before that, it was used in this sense as an adjective. Early 20th century famous novelist André Gide was the first, I believe, to use lesbianisme to refer to female homosexuality.

Then. The joke above that had you all huffing and puffing utilises a style of humour which is known as irony, usually meaning something is said as if it were a perfectly straight statement, while other possible layers of sense may be understood, only implicitly. Here, the irony was precisely that everybody not too soft in the head would have known what the O.P. was speaking about, which definitely didn’t involve actual denizens of Λέσβος.

Yes, it was a joke. Of course it was a joke. Sweet Beelzebub on a unicycle, we all have a great need to emphasise just how stupid gender activists and the folk following them thoughtlessly can be, how unbelievably ludicrous and pretty nonsensical most, if not all, of the time.

FINALLY. ‘The lesbian erasure bi women strive to accomplish on a massive scale.’ Alright, ducky, let’s have a wee tête-à-tête on this touchy subject. What blooming sort of grand & nefarious anti-gay scheme have we bisexual women taken part in this week, exactly? A massive scale, eh? Lemme guess: our sorry lot of disgustingly fake feminists, en route to secretly snatch the road to happiness from lesbians to hand it to our partners in crime the heteros? Sure.

Meanwhile, in the real world, last time I checked, patriarchy was happening to us and a bunch of morons persuaded that ‘gay’ is the new emo and ‘gay’ the new cool got into thinking that ‘bisexual’ means ‘slut’ or just plain doesn’t exist. Lesbian erasure? Yeah, and did you get the impression that bisexuals are being heralded as the One True Orientation, exactly?

What if—do humour me for a tick—what if you didn’t blame bi girls for faults which we all know are first and foremost gender activists’, transactivists’ and other crazy conservatives’? What if feminism didn’t consist in snapping at your own instead of focusing on the actual roots of common problems? Go dive in a vat of sneezing powder if that’s the best you can do!

exclusionaryhomosexual:

i love having nongreeks explain irony and my language to me. so full of yourself and yet so unfunny and ignorant. people from the island and greeks in general don’t call it Lesbos anymore (there you learned a new thing today), but Lesvos or Mytilene and they don’t call themselves “lesbians”. but sure believe that you know better than greeks what is the “correct” way.

keep denying that manloving privilege and that lesbophobic oppression the bi community calls its “activism”. keep pretending that bis aren’t in the forefront of the genderist brigade alongside heteros and that they don’t try to push their bi supremacy ideas there. and keep joking from that position of privilege instead of setting homophobic bi women straight.

Oh, do get off your high ἵππος or I’ll start speaking French on you. We are writing in the English language. The joke was written in English, where Lesbian is actually the only correct demonym for the inhabitants of Lesbos. Which is still called and spelled Lesbos in English at this hour. Would you call Frenchpeople Français and Françaises in English? No, you wouldn’t, because even if you knew the idiom you would be writing in bleeping English. Or do you know even less English than I know Greek...? I admit that mine is a couple millennia late, at least. Speaking of which, it’s lesbians in the first place because of Sappho, which I know you know, and even though she lived in Mytilene, the island’s name was transcribed as Lesbos in most Indo-European languages which cared to write about it, starting with Latin, from which English descends (mostly through French, yes) in part, and Lesbos it stayed in such languages, for obvious reasons related to a total lack of an accurate transcription of Ancient Greek β. Same thing happened with Phi and Chi, in fact, the former assimilating to the Latin F and the latter to K. So, yes, the Lesbos/Lesvos situation may become a Pekin/Beijing thing and I’m all for Lesvos to win eventually, given the contemporary pronunciation, but in the meantime...

P.S.: what is a ‘bi community’? What activism, where? Is there a membership test I’ve failed and no one thought to tell me about the secret evil conspiracy for erasing proper feminists from existence? Do lesbian activists, who I suppose exist as well, albeit on the side of the angels, have special lamps to detect traces of sperm on putative bisexual women or....?

The fruitcake above has, predictably enough, blocked me, leaving me riddled with so many questions, and understandably bereft.​ This was the first time I’ve ever come across the concept of Bi Supremacy and I was very impressed. I never knew we were out and about to conquer the world! The last time I checked, bisexual slander concerned our supposed superabundant sex life. Promiscuous and diabolic?! Foxy!

In all seriousness, though. Idiotic, bigoted paranoia is probably not how you fight back against a system that actually want you pitted against one another. But what can make about hateful people whose main intellectual activity consists in inventing straw(wo)men to shake a fork at?